under the tide.˚⋆ ೃ* ༄ ⚓︎˚.⋆
frank castle kisses a mermaid for the first time
pairing : frank castle x f!mermaid
summary: two people who can't speak the same language somehow manage to say everything that matters.
a/n: this chapter is one of my favorites, i hope you can feel the yearn and subtle exploration of the two creatures. also thank you to everyone who has read and supported thus far.
if you have any requests please don't be afraid to reach out!
song: nfwmb - hozier⋅ ₊ ˚ ⊹ ⚓︎ ⋅ ˚ ₊ ⊹ 𓈒 𓏸
part five: closer than the water
frank sat like a statue, sitting right where he was, letting her set the pace same as he had every time before. she didn't rush it. she came forward slow through the grass, dry sand catching gold in the last light off his phone screen, and settled down across from him close enough that her knees nearly touched his.
up this close, in this light, she looked different than she had in the harsh morning glare of that first day, though all the same details were still there once he let himself look for them.
the fine scales along her collarbone, faint in daylight, caught the moon instead now, silver where they'd been gold, and her ears still held that same delicate point at the tip, twitching faint the way they always did when something nearby caught her attention before it caught his.
that smell that had appeared and disappeared on him was her! that sweetness was still on her too, thick in the air between them, stronger now that she was close enough to touch, strong enough that frank felt it settle warm behind his ribs the same way it had every time it rolled over him that night. he still didn't know what it meant.
she blinked at him, slow, and he caught it again, that faint second lid sweeping sideways before the first one finished closing, and frank realized, watching it happen, that he'd come to like it. looked forward to her oddities now, almost, the way another man might like the sound of somebody's laugh. it made her even more otherworldly.
he reached into his jacket pocket and laid the night's collection out on the sand between them, one piece at a time. the bottle cap. the sea glass. the stone with the hole worn through it. the twist of seaweed. the oyster. the shard. each one of the gifts she had placed for him.
"kept every one," he said, low, watching her face while he said it. "figured you'd want to know that."
she looked down at the little row of objects, then back up at him, and something moved across her face he hadn't seen yet, some mix of pride and shyness that looked almost embarrassed to be caught wanting his approval that badly. she reached out and touched the oyster last, lightest of all of them, like she knew without being told which one had impacted him the most
frank huffed out a breath, some rough edge of a laugh. "yeah," he said. "that one especially."
he wondered if she had seen him when he found each gift
she looked at him intently but he could tell many things were on her mind. her eyes stared at him intently, but when he began to stare back she flitted her look away.
frank noticed her looking past him at the cooler at some point, curiosity plain on her face, and before he could ask what she wanted ,she was up and rummaging through it herself. pulling out one of the raw shrimp he'd brought for her earlier that night. she held it a second, looking at it, then at him, then shuffled closer and held it out toward his face, insistent, clearly expecting him to take it.
frank blinked at the shrimp being offered approximately two inches from his nose. "you want me to eat that?" he scrunched his face in slight disgust.
she pushed it closer, patient but firm, the exact energy of someone who'd decided the conversation was over and he was simply wrong if he thought otherwise.
"darlin', i appreciate the thought," he said, gently pushing her hand back with two fingers, "but that thing's been sittin' in a cooler for six hours and i didn't bring it for me."
she frowned, clearly unconvinced, and gestured between the shrimp and her own mouth and back at him again, an argument he didn't have the vocabulary to counter even if he'd wanted to.
he sighed, then reached into his jacket pocket instead, pulling out the small bag of swedish fish he'd grabbed on a whim that afternoon. he shook a few into his palm and held them out to her.
she didn't take one right away.
she looked at them a long moment, small red shapes she had no context for at all, nothing like the fish arranged at the tideline that morning, and frank watched her work through the same careful math that she’d probably used on the gummy worms and the lollipop, sniffing at them once, cautious, before glancing up at him like she was waiting on some kind of verification.
"they're candy," he offered, like that explained anything to a woman who'd never had a word for candy in her life. he picked one out of his own palm and popped it in his mouth, showing her rather than telling her.
“see? safe, good. i ain’t gonna hurt you”
that seemed to do it. she reached out slower this time, took just one, and held it a second longer before finally, carefully, putting it in her mouth like she still expected it to fight back.
frank barked out a laugh at the sheer, unguarded delight that crossed her features, eyes going wide, and after a beat of stunned stillness she reached for another, more sure of herself this time now that the first one hadn't betrayed her.
"yeah," frank said, grinning helpless at her, "mmh, figured you might like those."
she abandoned the shrimp entirely after that, setting it back down in the sand with the same seriousness she'd offered it, business concluded, and held her hand out for more candy instead.
she made a sound, happy and content, making sounds out loud the way she had every time before, chasing a word he still had no way of catching. frank leaned in like proximity might help, same old useless habit, and shook his head slow when he couldn’t understand.
"still can't understand, hon," he admitted, quiet, no real frustration in it this time, more like an apology. "workin' on it though. same as you."
she watched his mouth move while he said it, close enough that he could feel her breath, and reached out to touch two fingers against his lips again, same as that first morning, like maybe this time the shape of the words might tell her something they hadn't before. frank held still and let her.
he sat with that a second, then did something he hadn't planned on doing, hadn't let himself think through before his hands were already moving. he reached up under his collar and pulled his own dog tags free, the real ones, the ones that had survived two decades of every kind of hell a man could survive, and held them out to her, resting flat in his open palm.
she went very still. didn't reach for them right away. just looked at them, then at him, like she understood, on some level that didn't need language, that this wasn't the same as a bottle cap or a piece of sea glass. frank held his hand steady and let her take her time deciding.
when she finally picked them up, careful, both hands cupped under his like she was afraid of dropping something that mattered, frank felt something in his chest crack open wider than it had in years. she turned the tags over slow, traced the stamped letters of his name with one finger, and made a small sound low in her throat, not the clicking hum from before, something softer, almost questioning.
"frank," he said again, tapping his own chest, same as he had the first time. "that's me. that's my name." he nodded at the tags in her hand. "and that. that's yours now, darlin', if you want it."
she didn't answer, not in words she had, but she closed her hand around the tags and didn't let go, and something about the way she held them, close against her chest, made frank's throat go tight in a way he wasn't prepared to examine too closely.
he must have been staring, because she noticed, tilted her head at him the way she always did, curious, unbothered, and this time when she reached for his face frank didn't flinch. not even a little. he sat there and let her trace the line of his jaw, the scar through his eyebrow, same path she'd taken that first morning, and felt, for the first time since he'd hauled himself out of that water, something close to steady.
"you scare the hell outta me," he admitted, quiet, mostly to himself, mostly because the dark and the tide made it easier to say things a man wouldn't say in daylight. "not 'cause of what you are. i figured that part out already." he shook his head slow. "scares me how bad i want to stay in this dream forever."
she seemed to understand some of what he'd said, or at least the weight of it, because she tried something new right then, mouth working around a shape it hadn't managed before.
"frrr," she managed, low in her throat, the r caught wrong, more growl than letter. she stopped. tried again. "f...rrr-nk."
frank went very still. "that's, hey. that's close." he leaned in without meaning to, some old instinct that closing distance might help her hear herself better. "frank. try it again, darlin'. frank."
"f'rrr-ank," she said, careful this time, syllables landing a little cleaner, and frank felt something crack open wide in his chest at the sound of it, rough and strange and unmistakably reaching for his name.
"yeah." his voice came out thick. "yeah, that's it. that's me."
she looked pleased with herself in a way that made him melt a little, chin tipping up, something proud and shy tangled together on her face, and she tried it once more, quieter, almost to herself. "frrr-ank."
frank sat with that a second, some new problem occurring to him now that she'd gotten his name right. she could say his. he still didn't have one for her. it was going to take a long time for him to be able to speak in growls and clicks.
"gotta call you somethin' though." he considered her a second, the moonlight catching pale along her collarbone, the wide, patient eyes. "pearl?," he tried, testing it.
she rolled her eyes so hard he actually heard the click of that second lid sweeping with it, unimpressed in a way that needed absolutely no translation whatsoever.
"okay, noted. hard pass." he tried again. "sea star?"
she made a face, actual disgust, nose wrinkling, and swatted his knee like the suggestion had personally wounded her.
"fair enough, that one was weak." he grinned despite himself, enjoying this a lot more than he probably should have. "splasher."
that one got him shoved, flat palm to the chest, hard enough he had to catch himself back on one hand in the sand, and she turned her whole body away from him afterward, arms crossed, chin up, giving him her shoulder and nothing else, the exact posture of every woman who'd ever decided a man wasn't worth the effort of looking at anymore.
"alright, alright." frank huffed out a laugh, low and delighted despite the rejection. she didn't turn back around. tail of her hair caught the wind and that was the only response he got, pointed and silent and somehow still incredibly loud.
frank sat with it a minute, smiling at her back, some old memory surfacing slow, members of his old unit, telling stories about things that lived in lochs and rivers and lured grown men down into the water and never let them back up.
"kelpie," he said, quiet.
she went still. didn't turn around right away, but he caught the perk in her ears, they seemed to twitch in response, but her body was completely still, the sudden stillness of someone listening hard despite themselves.
"there's an old story, scottish. somethin' that lives in the water, looks like whatever it needs to look like to get you close. dangerous as hell, most versions of it." he glanced at the back of her head. "figured it fits. you did drag me under, after all. just turned out i didn't mind so much."
slowly, she turned back around, and the sulk had gone soft at the edges, replaced by something far more smug than she probably realized she was broadcasting, chin still tipped up but for an entirely different reason now.
"my kelpie," frank said again, and watched her preen, actually preen, shoulders squaring, pleased with herself in a way that made it very clear she'd decided this one had passed inspection, no further negotiation required.
"yeah," frank said, laughing under his breath. "it fits you well ."
she reached out and pressed her palm flat against his chest, and this time added a small, decisive nod, like she was formally accepting the position.
"guess it's official, then," frank said. "kelpie it is. brat."
she huffed at that last part, but didn't argue it, mostly because she couldn't, and frank decided that was probably for the best, for both of them.
it was somewhere in the quiet after that she noticed his ears, tilting her head at them the way she tilted her head at most things about him, curious in that same open, unhurried way. she reached up slow and traced the curve of one with a single finger, following the shell of it down to the lobe, frowning slightly, like she was working out what exactly was missing.
frank huffed out a laugh, caught off guard by it. "what, these don't do it for you?"
she traced it again, gentler this time, comparing maybe. he shivered as the tips of her nails dragged along the rim of his ear, and frank realized what she was doing right about the same time she reached up and pulled her own hair back behind one ear to show him, patient, holding still so he could look.
hers came to a soft point at the tip, same as he'd clocked that first morning from a distance, except up close like this he could see the fine webbing of scale that ran along the outer edge too, delicate, near translucent, catching moonlight the same way the rest of her did. he reached out without thinking twice about it this time, some of the earlier caution burned off by the last hour, and ran his thumb slow along the curve of it, feeling the point taper under his hand, the faint twitch of muscle when his touch landed somewhere ticklish.
she made a small, surprised sound, something close to a laugh, and swatted his hand away halfhearted, though she didn't actually pull back from him doing it.
"fair's fair," frank said, easy, some of the gravel gone soft out of his voice. "you get to poke around at mine, i get to poke around at yours."
she huffed at that, something almost sulky in the tilt of her chin, and reached up to touch his ear again anyway, thorough about it this time, like she meant to catalogue the whole shape before deciding once and for all what she thought of it. frank sat there and let her, grinning like an idiot at how much this felt, absurdly, like two kids comparing scraped knees on a playground rather than anything he had a right calling romantic. and yet, he couldn't get enough. he loved being apart of her amusement instead of fear.
"guess we're just built different, darlin'," he said. "no shame in it."
it was reaching for her face that changed something. frank lifted his free hand, slow, meaning to brush the hair back from where it had fallen across her cheek, same easy motion he'd have made without thinking twice for anybody else, and she pulled back.
not far. not fast, not like she was afraid of him exactly, but there was a flicker of something new in her face, uncertain in a way he hadn't seen on her yet, not even that first confused morning. her hand tightened around his dog tags. her eyes dropped, just for a second, to the sand between them, and frank understood, watching it happen, that whatever this was tonight, it carried a different weight than curiosity had. curiosity didn't flinch. this did. he felt the air between them suddenly go tight.
he lowered his hand slow, gave her the room back. "hey," he said, gentle, the same word he'd used on himself more than once tonight. "it's alright. i ain't gonna push."
she looked back up at him after a moment, and reached out herself instead, closing the distance on her own terms this time, fingers finding his jaw careful, deliberate, like she needed to be the one who decided when. frank let her. didn't move. understood, somewhere under the ache of it, that they were both learning the exact same lesson at the exact same time, just from opposite ends of it.
her thumb traced slow along his cheekbone, and she murmured something under her breath while she did it, quiet enough he almost missed it, some soft, breathy string of clicks and vowels he had no hope of translating, but the tone of it he understood just fine. the same tone anybody used, human or not, when they were saying something they meant and didn't expect to be understood anyway, just needed to say out loud regardless.
"i got no idea what you just told me," frank said, low, rough, "but i got a pretty good guess."
she was close enough after that that frank could feel her breath, warm despite the cool of her skin, and he found himself leaning in before he'd fully decided to, some old caution finally losing out to everything he'd been sitting on all week. she went still when he got close, watching him with those wide, patient eyes, and frank paused there, giving her the same choice she'd given him all night.
she closed the distance herself.
it was soft, at first, careful, both of them moving slow like they were each waiting for the other to pull back. she made a small sound against his mouth, something curious more than anything, like she was savoring the moment too, filing it away with everything else she'd learned about him tonight. frank kept it gentle, one hand coming up to rest careful against her jaw, and for a second, just a second, it was the easiest thing in the world.
she stopped close. closer than arm’s length, closer than he was ever braced for with her, water still running in thin lines down her collarbone, catching the early light. her hand came up to his jaw the way it always did, like that was just the shape her curiosity took, and this time frank didn’t hold still under it — he leaned in.
he felt her breath change before anything else, some small hitch, surprise maybe, and then his mouth was on hers, soft, testing, the way a man tests ice before he trusts his weight to it. she tasted like salt and swedish fish. he felt like the whole ocean had gotten into her somehow and stayed there, and frank’s hand found her waist without him telling it to, thumb pressed against skin gone warm despite the cold
she made a sound against his mouth, low, startled, and kissed him back clumsy and eager, like she was chasing the feeling before she’d worked out what it was called.
frank slowed her down without meaning to teach her anything, just wanting to hold onto it a second longer, and that was when he felt it — the graze of something sharp catching his bottom lip, quick, careless, her curiosity outpacing whatever restraint she hadn’t learned yet to put around those teeth.
frank made a rough sound and pulled back half an inch, hand flying up to his mouth on instinct, and she froze immediately, eyes going wide with something that looked a whole lot like panic.
“i’m fine,” he said quickly, around his own fingers, tasting copper faint at the edge of it. “m’fine, darlin’, just wasn’t expectin’ the teeth.”
truth was it hadn’t scared him off so much as it had lit something up low in his gut, quick and unwelcome and impossible to explain to a creature who didn’t have the first idea what she’d done. frank had never once in his life needed things gentle. rough was a language he spoke fluent, had spoken it his whole career, took a kind of comfort in it most people would’ve found unsettling. the sting wasn’t the problem. the problem was how much he needed more of it
she made a small, distressed sound, reaching for his face again, careful this time, thumb brushing right below his lip like she could undo it just by looking hard enough, and frank huffed out a laugh despite the sting, low and warm.
“hey. hey, i’m alright.” he caught her hand, pressed it flat against his jaw instead, steadying her more than himself. “forgot you got a whole set of weapons in there i don’t have to worry about with anybody else. my fault for gettin’ comfortable.”
she still looked wrecked about it, brow drawn, and frank leaned back in before she could spiral any further, slower this time, deliberate, showing her exactly how careful they could be if they both just paid a little more attention.
it went easier the second time.
easier, and then it wasn’t careful at all anymore — it just fell into place, the two of them finding some rhythm neither of them had taught the other, her mouth soft and sure now, teeth held back but present at the edges like a promise instead of an accident, and frank’s hand slid from her jaw into the wet dark of her hair, holding her to him like he’d forgotten there was ever a version of this morning where he hadn’t.
when they finally broke apart, both of them slower to do it than either wanted to admit, her eyes had gone glassy, glossed over dark and unfocused in a way that undid something in his chest all over again. frank wasn’t much better off — the salty and copper taste of her still on his tongue, with sweetness underneath it he couldn’t place and didn’t try to, some rich, strange thing that didn’t belong to anything on land.
the smell of her had gotten into him too, brine and sugar and something warmer underneath both, and it left him lightheaded in a way three days of driving and a near-drowning hadn’t managed.
he pressed his forehead to hers, breathing unsteady, and didn’t trust himself yet to be the one who moved first. every part of him wanted more of exactly that — her mouth, her hands, that dizzying tangle of salt and sweetness
frank hadn’t kissed anyone in ages. he never thought he’d get here so quickly. he never hoped that there would be an after… after his wife.
and yet this gentle creature brought him no fear or apphension. just the sweet desire to feel the salt on his mouth.
they sat close together a long while after, her hand still tangled loose in his, the tide working steady behind them. frank's other arm came up slow, careful, resting along her back, not pulling her in, just present, an offer she could take or leave. she leaned into it. didn't pull away this time either, and somewhere in the quiet that followed she tried his name once more, unprompted, soft, like she just wanted to hear herself get it right.
"there you go," he murmured, and meant every word of it.
"gettin' close to sunrise," he said eventually, voice rough, reluctant. "you gonna have to go back under before people start showin' up?"
she lifted her head at that, looked out toward the water, then back at him, that same flicker of uncertainty crossing her face again before she nodded, small, like the gesture itself was something she'd picked up just from watching him do it. she got to her feet in that same fluid, not quite human way, tags still clutched tight in one hand, and paused at the edge of the grass.
"i'll be back tomorrow," he told her. "same time."
she reached back once more, pressed her palm flat against his chest, same as that first morning, checking, and this time frank covered her hand with his own before she could pull it away, held it there a beat longer than either of them needed.
she smiled at that, small and real, fangs catching faint in the last of the moonlight, and turned toward the water.
frank had seen it happen once before, that first impossible morning, but he'd been half drowned and disbelieving then, too far gone on adrenaline and shock to really watch it the way he wanted to now. this time he made himself pay attention, some part of him understanding without being told that he might not get many more chances to see it this close, this clear.
her hair fell loose and heavy around her as she moved, but she made no effort to use it for cover, bare and unbothered by it the way she'd been from the very first morning.
what caught his eye instead was the net.
a length of it sat knotted low across her hips, fine and dark, woven tight in a pattern too deliberate to be driftwood debris, and worked into it here and there were small shells and bits of sea glass, arranged with a care that had nothing accidental about it. frank hadn't noticed it properly until now, moonlight finally giving him enough to actually see the thing by, and he grinned at his dear mermaid
it wasn't for covering anything. she'd made it clear enough, every time she'd stood in front of him without a flicker of self consciousness, that modesty wasn't a concept she'd ever needed. this was something else. something worn on purpose, chosen, put together piece by piece the same careful way she'd chosen every gift she'd ever left him.
"you're beautiful. you are absolutely breathtaking," he said, low, throat gone tight around it. she basked in his stare, and grinned at him
she looked down at the net herself, almost bashful about it, fingers brushing over one of the shells like she wanted to make sure it was still where she'd put it, and frank filed the sight of her away carefully, certain he'd be thinking about it long after she was gone.
the smell of sweetness came first when she finally turned for the water, stronger than it had been all night, rolling off her thick enough that frank actually felt lightheaded with it, some helpless, low pull settling deep in his chest the second it hit. she walked into the shallows slow, water climbing her calves, her knees, and where it touched her the shimmer that had only ever lived faint under her skin came up bright to meet it, scales blooming outward from nothing like frost spreading fast across glass, spilling down from beneath the net in a pattern too perfect to be random, silver and deep blue-green catching what little moonlight made it into the cove.
her legs didn't so much disappear as remember what they used to be. the shift moved up from her feet, scales knitting tight together, the two long lines of her folding inward slow and deliberate until there was no misreading it anymore, no seam, no visible moment where woman ended and something else began. the net rode the change with her, settling into place like it belonged to both shapes equally. it looked, frank thought, distantly, like watching the tide come all the way in and take the shoreline back for itself.
by the time the water reached her waist the transformation had finished, her tail cutting a clean, powerful line beneath the surface, hair and net both trailing dark in the current behind her, and the smell that had been building the whole time crested and then let go all at once, sweet and heavy and gone, like a held breath finally released.
she looked back at him once before she went under, dark eyes catching the moon, and frank stood there on the sand with his heart going hard, more shaken by that single unguarded look than he had been by anything else all week.
then she was gone, water closing smooth over where she'd been, not even a ripple left behind to prove she'd ever come up onto land at all.
frank stood there a long time after, salt in the air, dog tags gone from around his neck for the first time in twenty years, and found that he didn't mind the weight of their absence nearly as much as he thought he would.
