Kihyun likes the summer months. He likes the time when students no longer have to attend classes. He learned this from Changkyun after asking him why he visited the beach so often.

“Don’t you have other things to do?” Kihyun couldn’t help but ask.

The human boy looked up from digging a tiny sand mote around what was soon to be his castle. “Not right now. It’s summer vacation. I have a few months free of plans. Most of my friends are away except for one, so I have a lot of time to spend by myself,” he explained.

“You have a lot of time to spend with me,” Kihyun corrected, smiling slyly.

Changkyun nodded promptly. “Of course, but only at night. I don’t want you to be in danger if others saw you in the daytime.”

Kihyun rolled onto his back, head nearly crushing a small structure he made himself.

“Careful,” Changkyun said quickly with a hand jutting out to stop the merman’s head from destroying his own creating. “You don’t want to ruin your castle, right?”

The merman smiled brightly and thanked the boy. He scooted to the side a bit to lay comfortably next to his sand castle. Happily, he swished the water a bit with his tail.

“Why do you do that?” Changkyun asked after noticing the movement of the fins.

Kihyun tilted his chin up to look at the boy. “Do what?” Then he realized and did it again in demonstration. “Oh, this?”

The boy nodded. “Yeah, that.”

The merman shrugged, still playing with the water. “I don’t know. I like it, I guess. Before, I rarely came to shore like this. I was always afraid of getting caught or something, so I’ve always been in the water. The sound here is different. I like the sound and the feeling.”

“You can feel things with your tail?” the human boy questioned. His interested shifted from the sand to the other’s half-submerged tail.

The merman chuckled. “Of course, I can. Can’t you feel things with your feet? Your hands? It’s basically the same. Just that you have two legs and I have one big flipper.” His chuckle evolved into a gleeful laugh.

Changkyun joined the chorus of laughter and finally built up the courage to ask, “Can I touch it?”

Wide, surprised eyes met with his curious ones. “Y-you want to?”

The boy nodded again.

“O-okay,” Kihyun stuttered. “I’ve never had anyone touch my tail before.”

Changkyun smiled. “You haven’t met anyone but me, Kihyun.”

Kihyun realized the truth in his words. He wondered if all humans were curious like Changkyun. He wondered if all humans were as nice as Changkyun. “Go ahead,” he said, maneuvering his tail so that the boy wouldn’t have to get too close to the ocean.

He shivered slightly when he felt a warm hand brush against his scales. He’s always been cold. The ocean’s always been cold. The contrast was so strong for the merman that he flinched a little bit. He looked up to meet the eyes of the human boy. “It’s okay, Changkyun. You can touch it.”

“But you seem uncomfortable,” Changkyun sighed. “I don’t want to scare you.”

Kihyun smiled sweetly and the other returned the expression. “You don’t. It’s just a difference in temperature. I haven’t felt such warmth before.”

“Oh,” the boy said. He reached out and this time Kihyun was prepared for the contact. It was nice. The touch was delicate, hesitant and testing, even. The merman smiled and asked him how it was.

Changkyun shook his head. “I’ve never felt anything like it before. I don’t know how to describe it.”

Kihyun watched as the boy reached forward again, feeling the scales. “I thought they’d be slimy,” he says honestly. “They’re almost like rubber, though. But it’s so smooth.”

“Can I touch your legs?” Kihyun asked back. He watched as Changkyun’s face turned from surprised to sad to calm. He didn’t know someone could feel so many emotions at once. “Is there something wrong? You touched my tail, so I thought—”

“No, it’s okay. You can touch my legs. It’s just—I forget sometimes that I’m also a different creature to you. To me, having legs is so normal that no one really asks to touch them. Then I wondered if I offended you by asking, or if you’ve ever wanted legs for yourself like in The Little Mermaid story,” Changkyun trails off as he explains himself.

Kihyun rolls to his stomach and lifts a hand to place it on the boy’s human leg. “It’s soft,” he said. “It’s not much different from my arms. Just…dry. And not as salty.” He giggles and Changkyun joins him. The human boy squeals, however, when Kihyun’s hand trails down to explore what he was most interested in. “How does this keep you standing?”

“My feet?” Changkyun asked after calming himself from the ticklish feeling of the merman’s fingers on the bottom of his foot. “There are a lot of muscles, I guess? I don’t know, I never really paid attention to human anatomy durin