16 Family Drama #2
He was exhausted. He suspected if he had only allowed himself to close his eyes, he’d descend into a deep sleep from which the very war with England wouldn’t be able to rouse him.
He wished Silver had been there and not banging some three to five whores at the same time with his newly acquired treasure.
But he’d known, didn’t he, that this would happen.
That as soon as the gold was theirs, the little arrangement they had fallen into would be over.
And he was a fool, for allowing himself to be soft, for allowing himself to feel something again.
The door to his cabin slammed open and a distinctive drag and drop of an artificial leg brought Hawk out of his reverie of self-loathing.
“Tell me this wasn’t just about the gold to you!” Silver all but shouted.
The bridge of Hawk’s nose hurt. “You should talk,” he growled in response. “How many different flavors of cunt am I going to smell on you if you come closer?”
“Beg pardon?”
“Couldn’t wait to get ashore, could you?” Hawk continued throwing accusations. “The entire way back here, you were crawling out of your skin. What - couldn’t wait to be rid of me? So surly the whole time that we had to share the haul with the god damn crew of the Rose of the Sea?”
“You’re out of your mind!” Silver had the gall to proclaim. “If I seemed preoccupied on our way back to Port Royal, it wasn’t because of the gold! Well, indirectly... it was. But not the way you think!”
“Sure, sure, nothing is the way I think!”
“And what of you? You’ve barely touched me since we left Phallandia!”
“Where?”
“All you ever talk about is securing the gold, and protecting the gold, and sequestering the gold, and what to spend the fucking gold on! I betrayed my family for you!”
Hawk had risen and stood nose to nose with Silver. His hair had grown so long, it suddenly struck him, that Hawk wanted very much to shut the beautiful idiot up with his own mouth and to feel his fingers tangle in those long, wind-swept curls.
“What were you doing in the brothel?” Hawk hissed, fighting down his weaker urges.
“I needed to speak to Mara.”
“What business could you possibly have with her?”
“I...” Silver avoided his eyes. Was she the one he had been fucking? “I can’t explain it to you, but I assure you, there was a very valid and utterly innocent reason.”
“How can I trust you when you won’t tell me the truth?” Hawk ground his teeth together. If he could set Silver on fire with looks alone, the man would be a cinder at his feet.
“How can you not trust me?” Silver’s impossibly azure eyes grew large and he took a step back. “After everything we’ve been through? My gods... Mara had been right! You are incapable of the same kind of love as I am!”
Silverfin couldn’t believe the conversation they were having. How could Samuel, whom he had loved beyond reason before he even knew his given name, how could his Samuel have so little faith in him? In them!
“Fine then!” Hawk ran a hand through his fiery hair as he refused to meet Silverfin’s gaze. “If you believe I’m such a waste of your time, go on! You know where the longboat is! I should have known you’d bail as soon as this treasure hunt was over!”
Sil-ver-fin... Sil-ver-fin
The storm windows had been open and a cool night breeze from the sea flew on gentle wings into the cabin and ruffled Silverfin’s long hair.
“No,” he said out loud. “This cannot be.” He took a step towards Hawk and placed his hand over his lover's heart. “I left my family for you. I gave up my fins for you. I left my home for you. I cut off my hair for you! What more must I give up for you to see that I truly love you, Samuel?”
Come home, Silverfin! Come home!
“What are you talking about, you utterly inexplicable man!”
“I’m not a man!” Silverfin uttered and clasped his hand over his own mouth, horrified at his own words.
“Well, you’re certainly not a woman,” Hawk smirked. “I’ve checked.”
“Listen, Samuel...”
Be quiet, Silverfin! Come home, Silverfin!
“The reason that I don’t have a tan below my waist is because normally, when I’m at home, I have a fishtail and fins there instead of the three legs you bipeds have.”
“What?” A deep crease formed between Hawk’s eyebrows. “Are you actually telling me you’re a bloody mermaid?”
“Not a mermaid. A MerSir! But yes.”
Hawk laughed and Silverfin’s blood boiled.
“I’ve heard of a lot of men give a lot of pathetic excuses to leave their lover, but darling, this one takes them all!” Hawk paused, panting and clutching his own side. “You’re even more mad than everyone thinks you are!”
NOW, SILVERFIN!
Silverfin’s limbs were suddenly heavy and foreign. Hawk’s laughter resounded in his ears like peals of thunder. He was as if caught in a fisherman’s net, struggling to breathe, a fish out of water. Damaged. Broken.
“You don’t trust me,” he whispered. “You don’t believe me. So be it.” He dragged himself over to the storm windows, each step heavier and more painful than the previous, as if the air itself could not wait to be rid of him. “Goodbye, Samuel. Remember that I loved you.”
“Don’t be so melodramatic,” Hawk responded, avoiding meeting his eyes and already reaching for a bottle of rum.
Silverfin narrowed his eyes upon the liquor, a memory flashing across the recesses of his mind.
“It was I, you know,” he spoke, “who pulled you from the oceanic grave that night you tried to drown yourself because you were so heart-sick over Lucas.” Hawk’s hand trembled and he placed the bottle down onto his desk.
“And it was I who pulled you from shark-infested waters when the Orca was shipwrecked in the storm. I suppose next time you’re drowning, there won’t be anyone out there to save you. ”
And with those parting words, he slipped over the windowsill, and down into the waiting waves below.
Silverfin is home! Silverfin is home!
The last thing Silverfin hoped Hawk saw as he swam away was the parting wave of his magnificent tail and the floating, discarded buoy of his peg leg.
Jesus Christ! Hawk thought to himself as he leaned out the storm windows, staring down into the black waves below. It had been a reflection of the moonlight off the waves, hadn't it? Or some large, slender fish that just happened to have been floundering near the surface when Silver dove in.
Except he'd seen the familiar lines of Silver's shoulders in the water, seen the way he moved with that strange fishtail following.
The two parts undoubtedly made a whole, diving down into the depths of the ocean with ease and a grace unfettered by the rough-hewn stump of a fake leg that floated sadly in Silver's wake.
Too many things were coming together now to deny it. Things Silver had said and done. Things Pane, of all people, had said when he'd shown up on the beach naked, the sole survivor of his crew. "The things! In the water!" and "Sharks don't strip you like that."
He's a mermaid, Hawk thought, staggering back to his desk and collapsing into his chair.
He pulled the stopper from the bottle of rum and drank deeply, his head already spinning before the liquor was even past his lips.
The idea was completely impossible, and yet the more he thought about it, the more things seemed to slot into place.
The little peculiarities that he'd written off as Silver's own idiosyncrasies now revealed themselves as blatant tells, enough that he began to feel foolish for not realizing the truth of the matter earlier.
But who the fuck thought that mermaids were actually real? Let alone masquerading as humans? And what the hell gave him reason to be here, anyway? The thought of giving up what must be an idyllic existence under the ocean to deal with the harsh folly of mankind was unthinkable.
What more must I give up for you to see that I truly love you, Samuel?
He did it for you. Hawk tried to drown his terrible realization in the rum.
He did it for you, and you pushed him away.