Salt.

It fills your nose and rests on your tongue. It settles in a fine dust over the strands of your damp hair and coats your dry lips, leading you to swipe the tip of your tongue over them again. You step higher up on a rock and close your eyes against the salty spray of the ocean.

Not here. The waves are too strong.

Further down the rocky beach, the ocean pushes inland, giving way to a calm inlet. Perhaps here your chances will be better.

You carefully pick your way along the pebbled shoreline, looking for just the right spot. The smooth stones shift under your bare feet when you come to a stop on the other side of the shore. Calm, deep blue water mimics the sky above in a perfect mirror image. Here.

You approach the edge, the chilled water lapping over the tops of your toes. Goosebumps prickle along your skin and you dig your toes into the smaller stones. You inhale deeply, the fresh air and salt sliding down your throat, and take one step.

And then another. Slowly, you wade out deeper into the water until tiny puddles pool in the dips of your collarbones. The finer sediment of the ocean floor is soft against the soles of your feet and you happily sink them in further. This will do.

You take another deep breath, expanding your lungs until they can hold no more. You bend your knees and relax, releasing your grip on the bottom. The water creeps up your neck and over your ears, muffling out the sounds of the waves breaking against the rocks in the distance. The crown of your head finally sinks under and you twist your body so you can look up.

The puffy white clouds above are distorted through the pane of water- they ripple and wave as if someone had dropped a pebble onto their surface. They grow further away as you drift down and your lungs begin to scream.

You cannot hold your breath anymore and it chokes out from your constricted throat. Air bubbles dance to the surface and you remain at the bottom. Water seeps into your mouth and down into your lungs. The salt burns.

Not yet. Not yet.

Darkness crawls from the corners of your eyes, but you fight against it. You have to see. You have to know if he is real. To make sure it all was not only a dream.

The blackness moves closer, but right before it takes over you swear you see a flash of blue.

Consciousness drifts back over you and the first thing you register is the pressure of rocks pushing against your back and the sense that the lower half of your body remains in the water.

You peel your eyes open and the same fluffy clouds in the sky greet you. The lining of your chest feels scratchy and raw, the taste of salt still lingering in your mouth. A quick succession of rocks clicking together as someone pushes away from them and then the sudden splash of water alerts you that you are not alone.

Cautiously you sit up and look around. You sit on the shore, half out of the water, but your body is already accustomed to the temperature. A few feet in front of you the water ripples, disturbed.

Something moves just under the surface. Hiding.

“Please, come out,” you say, dipping your hand under the water.

The peak of a head breaks through the surface as the person hesitantly rises. But, he stops when only his eyes are able to peer at you, keeping the rest of him hidden in the safety of the water. Strands of his deep blue hair hang over dark eyes that stare at you. It seems as if they contain the entire depths of the ocean.

“Do you remember me?” you ask quietly, careful not to spook him.

The boy stills for a moment in thought before giving a short nod of his head. Relief floods through you; it really was not a dream.

“I’ve been searching for you for a long time,” you adjust yourself more comfortably on the rocks and pull your knees to your chest, resting your chin on top.

The boy lifts his head completely from the water, opening and closing his mouth a few times as if to get used to the movement. “You’ve grown up a lot since then,” he replies. “I would have thought you would be a better swimmer by now.” A smile plays at the corner of his lips.

You release a hearty laugh, “I am! But I didn’t think you would show up if I just swam out there. I thought it best to recreate the same scenario from when we first met. Seems I was correct in doing so.”

“Well, next time just come to the shore and call my name. I’ll come to you,” he states, swimming closer to you.

“What is your name?”

“Zelo,” he says, pushing his upper body to rest on the shore next to you, his lower half remaining in the water.

“Zelo…” you turn the name over in your mouth, familiarizing yourself with the way it feels on your lips. “I like it.”

“Thank you,” he responds, turning over to sit upright. That is when you catch sight of a glint of blue beneath the glassy surface.

“I can’t believe it,” you whisper.

“Believe what?” Zelo asks, tossing a smooth black pebble out into the middle of the inlet.

“Your…tail. You. You’re real.”

“Oh,” Zelo smiles, “do you like it?” he lifts the lower half of his body from the water and your eyes widen in amazement. Dark blue scales shimmer under the sunlight, each holding a drop of the ocean within them. Zelo flaps the end of his tail, slapping it against the surface and sending a shower of droplets over you.

“It’s wonderful,” you say in awe.

“Almost my entire body is covered in scales. Look,” he lifts up his arms and turns to face you. Giving him a proper lookover, you now notice the smaller scales that line his body. They gather closer together from his elbows to his hands.

“Your hands, they’re-”

“Webbed!” Zelo sings happily, holding his hands up in front of your face. “Put your hands against mine.”

Excitedly you reach up to press your palms against his, letting out a soft oh when your skin connects. It is nothing like you imagined. His skin is cold and a bit rough, but it spreads a certain warmth through you. The warmth of a close friend. 

“Zelo, do you want to be friends?”

The merman looks up at you, his eyes shining. “Really? I’ve never had a human friend before. We could travel the world and swim in every ocean!”

You laugh at his enthusiasm. “I’m still not that great of a swimmer, but I do want to visit all of the oceans one day.” You pause to think for a moment. “Maybe I can buy a boat and we can travel together that way.”

Zelo grips your hands tightly, inching his face closer to yours. “I would like that. And don’t worry about being a bad swimmer, I’ll teach you. I’ll never let you go.”