#form.tales

The sun is hot. A concept he didn’t really think of until his scales had dried out and his skin had reddened and stung at the slightest touch. The world above was louder, too. Gulls squabbled back and forth as they drifted on air currents. The waves were louder, too. Thunderous against his eardrums when they crashed against sand and rock.

But, for reasons he can’t quite explain, he finds peace when he goes to the surface.

He knows he is an oddity, especially here. The gulls go silent for a breath, their white-and-gray bodies tilting so they can get a better view of him. Their yellow eyes are sharp, judging if he’s predator or prey; though both he and they know the distinction is always changing.

Some days, he is prey. Keeping just beneath the surface because the rocky beach is too loud, too crowded by two-legged bodies. Their splashing and laughter are too loud for him to come close. Humans have a familiarity in their faces and mannerisms, but are far too quick to take to excitement and fear for him to like.

This stretch of coast is mostly sheer bluffs, with a few rocky beaches dispersed by erosion or man. He skims them all, caught between boredom and curiosity. He had given up on there being something that would catch his attention.

Until you, of course.

Sae swims the length of the tiny, rocky beach that he’s stalked for the past week. Only the smallest and mundane of fish linger here now. A mer rarely takes territory, but when they do, it is usually because they are in love.

Sae fears the truth is much worse.

The sun dips toward the horizon, casting the sky and sea in an orange glow. He blinks water from his eyes when he breaks the surface, his gills gasping. Today, the gulls shriek to one another, wings flapping as they scatter to safer winds.

Tonight, Sae is a predator, though a gentle one. He tells himself that gentleness counts for something, that hunger wrapped in velvet is kinder than hunger bared.

The first time he saw you, you had come in the dark with a light in your hands. He watched you for nearly an hour, from his post on a rocky outcrop. You combed the beach, though, for what he did not think you knew. It wasn’t until you swung the light over him that he remembered he should have been more cautious. It wasn’t often he startled, and the splash of his exit had scared you so badly you had dropped the light and fled back over the hill to whatever was beyond it.

Yet, you had returned, just as he had, a few nights later.

He was more careful from then on. He had to be, for you glimpsed the thing you had been looking for. Some nights, you were a fevered thing, sweeping your light over the water. Other nights, you were still, standing at the edge where sea met land. Waiting, he imagined.

Tonight, you would have to do neither.

Sae swam to the shore for the first time in his life, stopping just short of beaching himself. You would come to him, he was certain.

There was a story he used to tell his little brother when they were both still small fry tucked into deep crevices for safety. About a mermaid who fell in love with a human and exchanged her tail for legs, only to suffer and then die because her human could not recognize her, let alone love her. Rin had a fascination with overcoming things — with winning, always — so Sae had to adjust the story’s original ending. Instead of the mermaid’s heartbreaking death, she slaughtered her beloved prince and his entire court before she perished.

Sae hadn’t been fond of either ending. Especially in light of his own predicament. The moral of the story, he had thought, was to scare young mers away from the surface and the dangers of humans. But that had been when he was young and feared losing his little brother.

Now, as the moon drapes the world in a gown of silver and he watches you come over the hill, steps hurried and nervous, he recognizes the flaw was not loving a human. No, love was never wrong. But that the mermaid left home.

As fond of the surface as Sae was, even he could recognize the dangers of it. It was too fast, too loud, too much. He could see it on you as you come to him. The shadows under your eyes, the tension you carried in your shoulders — even breathless with excitement and wonder as you step barefoot into the water to reach him, he sees how worn down you are.

He was careful with his begrudging request of the sea witch, to make sure you’d feel no pain. You will be scared at first, he knows, but not in pain. The ocean is so very big and looks so very empty. But you won’t be alone; he will stay with you, always.

Sae exhales softly, pushing water through his gills when you reach him. Saltwater laps at your collarbones, kisses the thin chain around your neck with the pink pearl pendant you had taken from him with shaking, cautious hands the night before. You’re so warm when you step close to him, pressing against his chest as his arms come around you.

He had worked for weeks to make you brave enough to agree to this. Sae had said he would show you the world below, he would give you a taste of what it was like to live as he did. Though… perhaps he had been careful to omit just how permanent the change would be.

He presses a kiss to your forehead — benediction or apology, even he isn’t sure. This will be the part he regrets the most, he thinks. The exposure of his half-truths.

For a heartbeat, he tastes your hesitation in the breath that fans across his face, bright as blood on his tongue. Then your lips find his. Magic answers as the contract is sealed. Your legs kick against him, and he holds you tighter. Water surges, opalescent, up your ribs; bone reshapes to cartilage, skin to scale. Panic bubbles from your throat; a wet, hiccupy sound that Sae swallows down.

Above, a lone gull calls once, then wheels away into the dark.

Jingo doesn't know it either, with how you act toward him. But you don't think he cares too much. He's very self-assured about his own feelings, a trait you've admired since meeting him.

It's been a long day for you. Though, you know it's been longer for him. Waking up early to train, drills with his teammates, eat meals curated by someone else, ice baths, endless hours of reviewing game footage, and media appearances for both his team and himself with sponsorships.

Inviting you over tonight is a surprise, for all the reasons listed above. Normally you don't hear from him beyond a goodnight text—or a good morning text, or the odd meme he finds funny, or cat pictures he thinks you'll find cute, little stolen moments during his breaks that you sometimes respond to. It sounds like more than it is. And you don't put much meaning into it, you swear.

Scruffy, dirty-blonde hair shadowing a sharply handsome face greets you just as you lift your hand to knock on the door. "You're late," Jingo scolds.

"I am not," you retort, instinctively snippy. Jingo grins in response.

He glances down at your shoes as he steps back to let you in, his nose wrinkling. "Did you walk here?"

You ignore his question, slipping your sneakers off. They're scuffed and, yes, a bit wet from the earlier rain. These are your most comfortable pair, as you've told him once before. "I only wear them when I go walking." Your socks are still dry at least.

Then Jingo's hand, calloused and familiar, lands on your lower back, sliding up your spine as he guides you into his apartment. The place is huge, meaning expensive, and styled like a curated storage space. He has all the things he likes, along with countless memorabilia from the various points of his soccer career. He's talked at length about several of the trophies he has lined on his shelves, but you only remember a handful—if only so you can rile him up into going on a rant about them again.

His palm settles on the nape of your neck, a thumb rubbing circles into the tense muscles at the base of your skull. He's talking about his day, bitching about a teammate you didn't catch the name of. You probably should know the names of his teammates by now, but you're not a soccer fan.

You love Jingo and only care about soccer because you love him.

"Earth to dumbass, I said bon appetite or whatever the fuck," his voice ticks toward sharp, edged with concern.

Blinking, you realize Jingo's ushered you into his kitchen. Usually empty and under used, since his meals for the week are already prepped. Except for tonight. Your lips purse, eyeing the spread of greasy food on his island. It smells heavenly. Chicken nuggets, fries, cheap cheeseburgers still in their wrappers, with one plastic cup of soda sitting in the middle of it. This is decidedly not food Jingo indulges in during the middle of the week when he's training.

"What?" you ask dumbly.

His hand slips away from your neck as he leaves you, taking the warmth with him. "What do you mean, what? I went outta my way to get you this junk. Where's my thank you?"

Watching him lean back against his counter and snatch up a few of the fries, that ugly feeling in your chest tightens. It really isn't much. It's just fast food. Shit you probably shouldn't be eating this late, and stuff Jingo really shouldn't be eating.

But you think of your apartment. The empty fridge and cabinets. The pizza box on the counter—extra protein, personal sized pepperoni—the smell of lingering in the cramped kitchen. The hunger of not eating all day twisting in your stomach. The dishes in the sink from the dinner you made the night before that earned you a polite thank you before the door to your boyfriend's gaming room closed and you ate under salted rice and chicken alone on your couch.

Fast food wasn't on the menu, partly because it was an expense you couldn't afford when you could cook at home, but more so because your boyfriend talked at length about how unhealthy it was. All the grease and calories and how much time he'd have to spend at the gym to burn it all off. It didn't matter if you were too tired to cook; it wasn't an option at home. When you didn't cook, it was a fend for yourself night.

"Thank you," you finally say, stepping beside him, trying to ignore the solid heat of him as you pluck up an oddly shaped chicken nugget. The taste of it greasy with too much salt.

You blink hard to fight back the sting in your eyes after you swallow.

"You're welcome," Jingo says, his teeth flashing with a smugness you should scold him for. He grabs the soda, pulls a sip from the straw, grimaces, then tilts it toward you. "As payment, you're waking your ass up to come to the gym with me in the morning."

Your eyes flick up to him as you sip, the carbonation bubbling over your tongue. He's teasing you, warmth effused in his tone. Maybe just a hint of begging as his gaze dips to where your lips wrap around the straw before coming back up to meet your gaze.

"I am not waking up at the ass crack of dawn to get sweaty." You really should tell him no like you've done a hundred other times. You don't go to the gym with your boyfriend (though he's never asked you to come with him, either.)

He wakes up before five in the morning to work out— as you've gathered from the shirtless, sweat-soaked selfies he sends you. Which really is too early, not to mention you live across the city and the commute is a pain, even if you took a cab. You've complained about it before, and that always leads to him offering—

"Then spend the night, I've got a home gym. You don't even have to get dressed, I'm not asking you to work out, anyway," he bargains, bumping your arm with his. His tone turns cheeky as he adds, "I just need a pretty view to keep me motivated."

This is where you tell him no. Jingo knows you're taken; he'd met you when you were starry-eyed in love with your boyfriend. You chew through anther chicken nugget, putting it off.

Maybe you're a bad person for being friends with him when you're in a relationship. He's flirty, and touchy, and all the things you shouldn't allow when you're dating someone else.

"We can go to the bakery down the street after," Jingo continues, pulling you from your spiraling thoughts. "I haven't tried it yet, but it looks like the cutesy shit you like. My sister follows their Instagram page, sends me a billion reels of their ads like a freak hoping I'll take her."

He glances down at you then away, like he can hide the real want in his voice. He's making an effort to draw it back to casual like he usually does, laying down his own soft landing for the blow he's expecting.

You think of the dishes in the sink at home and the empty "extra protein" pizza box for one on the counter. Then look at the spread of cheap, greasy food on the counter.

Jingo is borderline ranting in your silence. verbally living out his imaginary beef with your boyfriend. "And I'll drop you off with your loser and get to see his prissy expression—"

"Okay," you cut him off before he gets too into it.

He pauses, his mouth open. "What?"

"It's late, I should stay the night," you say, your heart beating so quickly in your throat that your voice wavers. His golden eyes widen, and you add, "No promises on the gym thing, though."

You expect some suspicion. Maybe doubt or judgment. For him to ask if you're fucking with him. Or for him to ask, "What about your boyfriend?" All normal things anyone should ask.

The sun’s rays reach through the water, warm and easy as they ride the breeze-driven waves of the lake’s surface. Their strength wanes the further down they stretch, lost to the gloom further out in the water. Here in the shallows, though, the water weeds eagerly drink it up and grow lush along the muddy bottom. And in turn, schools of glittering silver minnows dart in and out of the greenery.

It’s so alive. And quiet.

None of the noise above the water reaches your ears. When you don’t move, you can hear the rushing of your blood. Your lungs ache—have been aching—for fresh air for a few minutes now. But you’ve finally settled at the bottom, a foot of blue-green water above your head, a large rock in your lap to keep you down, and the minnows that startle easily gather around you. You are so much bigger than them–they swim over and under your calves and duck close under your chin, looking for any place to hide from larger fish.

The bluegills, with their sunny bellies lurk further away. Wary of how you loom over the minnows. Their spiny fins look deadly compared to the small, rounded ones that propel the smaller fish. When they swoop close, trying to snatch a minnow, the sunlight catches on their scales, highlighting the vibrant red oranges of their bellies. They certainly look more predatory than the minnows. But you know the spines and bright colors are more defensive than offensive. Bluegills might be dangerous in the shallows, but in deeper water, they’re on the menu.

Finally, your lungs give—your ribs convulsing once in warning. The movement sends the minnows scattering. Pushing the heavy rock away, you’re suddenly at the surface.

Everything is overwhelming the moment you break the surface. Annual cicadas buzz—loud, high-pitched, and fast. The sunshine is blindly bright. Birds call back and forth. And a squad of vehicles crunches over the gravel path to the campground’s main office, the driver of the last one smacking their horn in a quick burst that startles you.

You push your goggles up onto your forehead, blinking hard against the fresh air. The sight of others surprises you. It shouldn’t.

The lake isn’t massive, certainly nowhere near the scale considered “impressive,” but it’s big enough that while you can see from one side to the other, you can’t swim across without some kind of endurance training. There are waterways leading to and from the lake, namely a deeper stream which feeds into a river boaters like to take. You spent your first night here tracing a map of all the connections until your finger found the ocean.

The lake prohibits fishing, and only the campground owner is allowed to use motorized boats on the water. You hauled yourself onto the dock. The sign at the end of it announces the swimming hours—between noon and 4 pm. Only four hours. The strange rules cut down a lot of people’s summer plans at the lake.

Your towel is sun-warm, dry, and fluffy. You aren’t quite ready to leave the lake yet, though swimming hours are almost over. Instead, you drape the towel over your shoulders and let your legs dangle in the cool water. Water bugs skate over the placid water’s surface, elegantly moving in patterns that you don’t understand but admire all the same.

The new arrivals are loud and excited behind you. Their car doors slam and you hear them joking together. Though they’re too far away for you to make out what they’re saying.

You turn your head, catching sight of the tail end of the group. A short redhead and a taller blond seem to bicker, their stances tense in the office doorway. They’re close, though, nearly nose-to-nose. Your weight shifts, leaning a little closer, trying to see their faces better.

Something closes around your ankle, still in the water. Warm, alive, and strong. It tugs and you’re jerked forward on the dock; the wood scraping against the exposed underside of your thighs. You shriek and jerk back.

For a split second, you’re hindered, and you’re certain that whatever has a hold of you isn’t going to let go. But then it releases and you tumble backward. Your skull cracks against the dock with a sharp stab of pain.

You scramble to your feet. When you look at your ankle, you don’t see anything. Not a mark or a scratch. Your heart pounds wild and scared in your chest. Laughter breaks out from behind you. The blond, his long hair covering half his face, has seen you freak out. Embarrassment warms your cheeks.

His laugh breaks your fear. You feel silly. A curious fish had probably just gotten too close to your ankle. You exhale, fingers twisting in the comfort of your towel. It’s time to get out, anyway.

.𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟.

The office is small, the tiled floor a dingy white with tread marks a person could spend days scrubbing and they’d still be there. Pictures of the campgrounds, guests, posters, and lists of information cover the walls.

Half the office is a store. A big display fridge hums in the back, hosting neatly organized rows of beverages and cold things. Someone neatly stacked bags of ice in the bottom. Canned goods and snacks with long shelf lives take up space on a single display rack. There’s a window unit propped up by a ten-gallon bucket next to the fridge and from the sound of it, catches the water dripping from the A/C as well.

But despite the constant noise, it’s quiet in here. The group earlier cleared out. The only person left is the campground’s owner. He stands behind the counter that also serves as his desk. You watch him from the corner of your eye while browsing the snacks offered on display. He writes on a piece of paper in slow, smooth movements while the other hand holds a paper fan.

How he’s hot in this little building is beyond you. Then again, you’re in nothing but your bathing suit and a towel, a coin purse in your hand.

You bought groceries before you came, of course. Easy to make camp fair you can make on one of the many grills outside or on the single hotplate in your cabin. Snacks included. There’s no need for you to be in here.

Except that you’re nosy. You haven’t seen anyone else in the campground since arriving. The strangers that stopped by didn’t exactly look like camper material either. It’s a benign sort of curiosity. Something new to poke at more than a real need to know.

You need a plan of action– way to ask the dark-haired man who his previous guests were. When you checked in, you got the impression he was not a talkative person. Shamefully, you can’t recall his name until you spot the nameplate on the counter by the register.

Itachi Uchiha. Certainly an interesting name.

Your stalling comes to an end when he glances up, his dark eyes meeting yours over the top of the display shelves. You duck your head with a silent curse. Grabbing the first thing you can reach, you head to the counter with it.

“Did you find everything okay?” He’s soft-spoken and reserved, his question a rehearsed line more than genuine care.

“Yeah, was just looking for a quick snack. Worked up an appetite swimming,” you lie, putting the treat down.

He sets his pen aside and his long, pale fingers clack against an old register’s keys. The total reads in dim green numbers on a tiny screen that faces toward you. You’re a little disappointed that he’s more focused on his job than continuing the conversation. But you accept it without complaint, handing the due amount over.

“You stayed out there longer than usual,” he says after a beat longer. The register closes with a scrape of metal against metal. There’s a change in his tone, something more amused. “The sign says swimming is closed at 4 pm.”

Your eyes cut away from the path of the creases in Itachi’s face, floundering to focus on anything except him. You almost miss seeing of the upturned corner of his mouth. The big window behind him, decorated with receipts, old order forms, and sticky notes, has a clear view of the lake. And the dock you spend most of the swimming hours on.

“Did I? Sorry, it’s easy to lose track of time out here!” As you apologize, your eyes find the analog clock on the wall above the entrance door. It’s almost five o’clock—an hour over.

“Try not to make a habit of it,” Itachi says, not unkindly. He leaves your purchase for you to collect and resumes writing.

However, you’re not quite ready to let the conversation end. “Is it a slow week? It’s pretty empty for a weekend, isn’t it?”

“No. We’re out of the way. Locals give us the most business in the fall.”

“Oh. Was that group earlier local, then?”

The sound of pen scratching paper pauses.

You look back and find him watching you, face impassive. It makes your mouth go dry, but you press on. “They seemed pretty lively, huh?”

“They are. You would be wise to stay out of their way while they’re here,” he answers after another beat. The way he says it makes you feel like the kid who isn’t in on the joke.

“Noted.” You take the packaged snack off the counter. The plastic crinkles under your grip. “Have a good day, Itachi.”

He doesn’t return the sentiment.

.𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟.

The cabins don’t have private showers. The campground shares a bathhouse instead. Fours stalls for toilets on one side of the building. Four enclosed stalls for somewhat private showering on the other side. Then a heated bath in the other half of the building. Being the only camper these past two days has felt like a luxury.

Well, luxury is a bit of a stretch.

Like the campground office-store, the bathhouse is an older building. You can only assume that only the most pressing repairs get done around here. Spiderwebs are in every nook and cranny of the place with new ones every day. There are small floodlights on either side of the door and in the dusky haze of evening, the spiders have a veritable feast gathering at their doorsteps.

For you, however, it’s like walking through a bait ball on land and the bait gets its revenge. You’ve made it mostly intact this trip, but when you open the bathhouse door, you duck as a heavy-shelled beetle goes sailing past your head.

The inside of the bathhouse is a little unsettling. The walls are the same thick white-painted cement blocks as the outside and the floor is bare concrete. Both of which make it echo. The showers don’t drain well and underneath the smell of harsh cleaning chemicals is the faint scent of stagnant water. There are four yellow fluorescent lights on the ceiling and one of them flickers at random intervals like some Morse code in its dying days.

But this being your third night visiting, you have outgrown your fear of it. You set your travel bag of non-essentials on the ledge above a sink before taking the shower at the end of the line. It has the best water pressure out of the four. But it lacks the coat hooks the other ones have. You balance your clean pajamas and towel over the stall door and your bathroom caddy sits on the ground.

Calling the bathhouse luxury is a stretch indeed.

You strip out of your bathing suit. A small amount of lake debris has gathered under the elastic band. The water is lukewarm when you first turn it on. You hold a hand under the spray, waiting for it to warm, shifting from one foot to the other on the plastic slip-resistant mat on the floor.

The lake will be colder than this with the cooling nighttime temperatures. It’s unfortunate the swimming hours are so short. The chorus of small frogs, crickets, and katydids is peaceful compared to their daytime counterparts. If the night is clear and the wind is still, the lake’s surface calms enough it reflects the night sky. It would be like swimming through the stars themselves.

However, you would hate to ruin the wildlife’s routines. You snort quietly to yourself once you step into the now steaming water. If you were a raccoon, the last thing you would want is to come to the lake’s banks to wash your breakfast and see some half-naked fleshy thing swimming at your table.

You snort at the mental image.

After a long day of sunscreen, lake water, and sweat showers feel rewarding. Like you’ve earned it. It certainly feels that way as you scrub the grime from your skin.

You want to soak in the bath tonight too. With the group Itachi warned you about coming in, you aren’t sure you want to be caught naked out there. You would stick to showering for the rest of your stay, but tonight you were going to take full advantage of the bathhouse.

Perhaps, though, you aren’t quite used to the hollow feeling of the building yet. Or maybe you’re still unnerved by the fish biting at your ankle.

It starts with a fleeting thought. Just a passing whisper from your mind that maybe you aren’t alone. Your chest tightens and the hand scrubbing soap against your skin jerks.

You huff at yourself, trying to be rational. The only other person on the grounds is Itachi, and you have yet to bump into him at the bathhouse. There isn’t anyone else here. But the baby hairs on the back of your neck raise. It feels like someone is trying to stare a hole into your back.

Your heart pounds in your chest. Like a child too afraid to look under the bed, you’re struck with the idea that when you turn, there will be someone standing right behind you—breathing down your neck. The feelings increase with the staccato of your heartbeats. Until finally you cannot stand it anymore and you twist, eyes wide to meet—nothing.

There’s absolutely nothing and no one behind you. You almost roll your eyes at yourself, exhaling with relief. Though, you peek over the top of the stall door, just to confirm that you’re alone in the bathhouse. Your mind is on edge. After the bath, you’ll go back to your cabin and go to bed at a decent hour rather than stay up reading to lamplight.

You’ve just stepped back into the warmth of the shower spray when the bathhouse door creaks open.

Everything inside you comes to a screeching halt. Your heart slams against your rib cage like a panicked, trapped bird. Terror floods your system like a bucket of ice-cold water. Thoughts fly through your brain, too frantic to focus long enough to hold on to one. You need to pull clothes on, need to find something to defend yourself. You need to—you don’t know what you need to do in this situation.

You stand there helpless, naked as the day you were born, with no idea what to do now that someone has come into the bathhouse with you. You’re so scared that you can’t move.

Instead, you listen. It feels like you’re going to burst an eardrum with how hard you strain to catch a noise. It’s hard to hear over the shower and after a few minutes of gathering courage, you snake a hand out to turn the water off.

You stand there listening for so long, staring at the wall of the shower, that your vision blurs and you get light-headed.

There isn’t a single sound except your frantic heart and the gurgle of water doing down the pipes. After far too long, you try to rationalize it. The door isn’t heavy, made to be easily accessible. In theory, a breeze could blow it open.

If it opened at all. It’s entirely possible you imagined it.

Your sleep schedule still isn’t great. The stress from the city, from being let go—maybe it’s affecting you more than you originally thought. Staying up late reading horror novels isn’t helping either.

You take a shaky inhale, trying to force your nerves to calm. Everything is fine, you’re fine. You turn, reaching your hand out for your towel. You meet the gaze of someone very tall. His eyes are small, beady, and bloodshot, and staring at you.

The sight of a face peeping over the shower stall’s door, gray-blue and cast in the shadow of a flickering fluorescent light, sucks all the air from your lungs. There are markings on the person’s cheeks, sharp and angular, but you can’t quite make them out. Dark blue hair drips with water, wild despite being soaked.

It seems like everything stops, coming to a deathly stand-still before you scream. It rips so violently from your throat, tearing at the soft flesh of your esophagus, that it throws you back. Your eyes shut tightly when your back hits the steam-wet cement brick wall, hands flying to cover yourself.

There’s noise, the sound of things falling on the floor, the startled shuffling backward—then barely covered laughter just as the bathhouse door creaks open and close again.

It’s the laugh that catches you off-guard. You hear it over the scream dying in your mouth. And when your teeth clack together, you begin to put things together. You feel stupid in an instant. The bastards confirm it when you hear their laughter further away, muffled by the bathhouse walls.

The group Itachi warned you about.

They must have come back while you were in the shower. How they figured out you were in here is beyond you, but isn’t hard to guess with how small the campground is.

Where they had gotten it or why they had put a stupid—if realistic—Halloween mask on to scare you is also beyond rational thought. But after seeing your little freak out on the dock, you wouldn’t put it past them to dress up like some swamp creature to scare you.

From the two you had seen, they were at least your age or older. Adults acting like jerk teenagers had you cross. Angrily, you dry yourself and throw on your pajamas.

You don’t bother going through with the bath or the rest of your nightly routine. Instead, you stalk from the bathhouse, across the gravel road and to the big cabin a couple of cars are now parked outside of. The blond man stands at the door, his arms braced on the lip of the door to hold himself upright while he teased someone inside. Water drips from his long yellow hair.

You clear your throat loud and ugly. It catches the blond’s attention quickly. He glances at you over his shoulder, his brows furrowed in apparent confusion. A second later, recognition flashes across his face and he turns to you, his lips parting in a smile—a greeting on the tip of his tongue. But you’re not having it.

“Listen, pal, I do not care what you and your little friends do but do not fuck with me,” you steel your nerves as you bite out your words.

He hunches his shoulders at the threat, his expression dropping into something hostile. “Excuse me?”

“Your pranks aren’t funny. I’ll stay out of your way if you stay out of mine, okay?” You don’t give him the benefit of the doubt.

“What are you even talking about? Back the hell up,” he snaps back. There’s a nasal grunt at the end of his sentences.

It irks you that he’s playing dumb.

You catch sight of red hair coming up behind him. You’ve told him off, but you don’t think you can handle reinforcements. So you give him one more warning look, tug your bathroom caddy close, and stomp the few feet to your own cabin.

Neighbors. Great.

.𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟.

The windows of your little cabin rattling from something loud and heavy scares you awake. You scramble in your sheets, heart pounding before you free yourself of fabric and realize it’s music. It comes through the panes of glass muffled, but you can hear it now that you’re conscious. It’s full of drums and rage against society.

It sounds good—would have sounded good if it weren’t seven in the morning.

You groan into your hands, far too tired to be awake. Considering how late your neighbors got in last night, it’s surprising they’re up so early. But they’re obviously making it your problem as well.

The music continues to blast at top volume for the hour it takes to get your day started. There’s a pause after breakfast where the mirror stops shaking. It gives you a clear view of your bloodshot eyes and puffy eye bags. The respite of silence is short-lived. You bite down on your toothbrush when pop music takes the place of heavy metal.

It goes through several more changes, ranging from country music to techno before it quiets downs again. You’ve put on a cute, comfy outfit for the day, draped a towel over your shoulder, and picked out an easy-to-read book to lounge on the dock with.

You brace yourself, hand on the door handle, for just a moment before stepping into the summer day. It’s hot but lacks the humidity from previous days. The sun shines brightly overhead, with only a few puffy clouds drifting through the blue, blue sky. Cicadas call from the trees. This is your vacation. Your new camping neighbors cannot take this from you.

In the next second, pushing the door open just a little more to step out fully, you’re doused in freezing cold water. It’s such a stark difference in temperatures that it burns. You scream, unable to hold it back. Your muscles lock up from the shock, and you can’t dodge the bucket when it comes down too. It thunks against your skull, still a quarter of the way full. It hurts like a bitch and nearly knocks you off your feet.

You grit your teeth, pushing through the tightness of your shocked muscles and the ringing in your ears. Your neighbors laugh, loud and mean. You’re grateful, in a terrible way, that no one can see the tears among the rest of the water dripping down your face.

“That’s who you’re wasting your time on?” an unfamiliar voice asks, clearly unimpressed.

You glance up, seeing a man with stitching tattoos peeking out from under the sleeveless shirt he wears. Saying he looks intimidating is an understatement. He sits on an ice chest, a speaker crooning something low next to him. The two he’s speaking to—the blond from before and a taller, silver-haired man—clearly don’t hear him.

Your teeth chatter, your mouth twisting into something you hope is unpleasant.

The youthful-looking man with the dull, apathetic eyes is there too, pulling something from the trunk of his car. “Children will act accordingly.”

You blink, droplets of water falling from your lashes, before looking away from them. Despite the warm air, you shiver with cold. The water has soaked your towel too. But your book is dry.

Your book is dry. The vitriolic heat burning your tongue cools when you register that fact.

From the corner of your eye, you catch sight of a silhouette at the edge of the office building. Itachi stands outside, leaning against the white-painted brick. You can’t see his face clearly from where you stand, but you feel his disappointed gaze.

It reeks of “I told you so.” Your gaze drops. The last thing you want is to be kicked out of the campgrounds and have your getaway cut short by your own behavior. When you look back up, he’s gone.

You shoot a glare at the four men gathered in front of the cabin next to yours. The blond shifts his weight to a leg, jutting a hip out. He grins, smug. He’d be handsome if the back of your head didn’t ache and your skin wasn’t just now thawing out.

“Deidara, leave it,” the redhead says sharply. Like calling back a dog.

He snorts and you bite back something mean. Your book is dry and in an hour on the dock, so will you. However, you take their plastic blue bucket. If they want it back, they’ll have to really fight for it.

.𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟.

The sunshine is warm on your back, the gentle lapping of water against the shore soothing you into a comforting feeling. You think about getting in once swimming hours open, but hesitate, thinking about whatever touched your foot yesterday. But it’s your lovely neighbors dragging kayaks out onto the water that makes up your mind for you.

You’ve made it halfway through your book before Deidara seeks you out again.

“You look like you recovered from your shower this morning!” There’s a surprising friendliness in his voice when he calls your name.

Your fingers tighten around the edge of your book, the paper giving slightly. He’s under dressed to be kayaking in deep water—not a life jacket in sight. His shoulders are already turning red. You wonder where he learned your name from. Had Itachi told him?

“I have. Thanks for the concern.” You are far less inviting.

It doesn’t deter him. He dips his paddle in the water, bringing the bright orange kayak closer. The nose of it bumps into a wooden pole and you feel the vibration through the dock.

“Oh, that’s where that thing went,” he says once he’s closer. “Smart.”

Your eyes follow his gaze, landing on the blue bucket. You’ve filled it with ice from the office, drinks buried in it to keep them cold. Irritation pops between your teeth when you say, “It works great. Keeps things real cold.”

“You don’t say…” It’s unfair how pretty he is, with his mouth cocked to the side in that smug way of his. “What are you reading?”

“A book.”

“You’re a straightforward one, aren’t you?”

His grin only grows wider. You think of the knot on the back of your head. Your eyes drop and you turn the page of your book, not reading the words.

“We got off on the wrong foot but look, I’m willing to forgive and forget, alright?” he offers, like you’ve asked for it.

You have to bite back an ugly remark. He shifts in his seat. The squeak of his water shoes against the kayak is loud in the silence. Even the cicadas have gone quiet, as if silencing themselves to spectate this uncomfortable encounter. You turn another page.

Deidara isn’t good at silence. He shows you so in the next moment when his paddle comes up and knocks your book from your hands. It was spared from the prank this morning, but it is the sole victim this afternoon. It lands with a splash on the other side of the blond.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” you snarl at him.

“Hey, I didn’t mean for it to go in the wat—”

You don’t touch him—a fact you repeat adamantly later. When Deidara’s kayak suddenly flips, his single cornflower blue eye widening in alarm, you aren’t even close to him.

Your hand reels back in a fist, ready to slug him, but you don’t touch him. Something grabs the lip of the opening of the kayak—you see pale blue, the arc of water droplets catching sunlight like gems—and flips the little boat.

It’s chaos from there. It happens so fast you can do nothing but watch. You don’t feel afraid while he thrashes under the surface, kicking up water and mud.

When Deidara breaks the surface, he’s screaming. Red slashes mar his chest. They’re horrible. The edges of the skin are ragged. Parts of it flap with his panic, barely remaining connected to him. He scrambles to climb atop the flipped kayak, yelling at you.

You think of the knot on the back of your head. It hurts.

It’s Deidara’s friends that save him, eventually. The silver-haired man, Hidan you learn, paddles up, teasing him for being scared of little lake fish. Until he sees the blood. It’s not worry that he uses when he hauls the blond out of the water, though. He seems annoyed at the blood being spilled everywhere, and that Deidara won’t stop screaming that it was a person down there.

The man turns on you until Deidara says it wasn’t you. It doesn’t look like Hidan believes him, but he also can’t believe someone like you could do that kind of damage.

You suggest a hospital, but they both shut the idea down quickly. The other two arrive and they go into the office building, Itachi holding the door open for them. He watches you with his dark eyes.

You feel like he blames you. A part of you blames yourself as well. You should have reached out to help him at least.

You pick up the plastic handle of the bucket and go back home to the cabin.

.𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟.

The evening is quieter. There’s a bullfrog croaking outside your window, cracked just enough to let an unusually cool breeze in.

You’re watching one of the movies you downloaded on your laptop. It’s an old, black-and-white film. It’s entertaining despite its age, but you think you’re made of stronger stuff than to be scared by it. Especially during this scene, where the lead actress is just swimming. Beautiful, of course, with perfectly practiced flips in the water.

People’s fascination with the underwater world hasn’t changed. You included.

The music changes, sharp and threatening as it pans away from the woman and to the monster lurking in the thick netting of green water weeds.

Knock, knock, knock.

Three gentle but obvious taps against your door startle you. Made of stronger stuff indeed. Your first thought is your neighbors, your mouth set into a thin line. But you haven’t heard a peep from them all evening. You give your unexpected visitor the silence treatment, hoping they’d get the hint and leave.

Knock, knock, knock.

Or not.

You’re aware of yourself. Guilt makes you defensive. You should have reached for Deidara, tried to help him somehow. Acknowledging you’re being cagey doesn’t help, though.

Finally, you sigh and call out, “What do you want?”

Silence is the response. It extends for so long that it makes you uneasy. You pause your movie and sit up on the bed. The bullfrog croaks, deep and bassy outside the window. A voice answers just as you're about to stand and move toward the door.

“I have your book.” The voice is raspy, rough—out of practice.

Your heart pounds in your chest, quick like a frightened bird. You like to think you’re good at picking up on voices, and this one is entirely unfamiliar. Your tongue swipes over your lips. “Thank you…?”

You aren’t sure what you’re supposed to say. It feels wrong, somehow. After everything today, you hadn’t had the chance to worry about the book you had lost. The book Deidara had knocked into the lake.

There isn’t an answer to the drawn-out pause left for them to give their name. In fact, there isn’t any noise on the other side of the door. It makes your mouth go dry and your stomach queasy. You’re filled with so much anxiety it’s hard to breathe. It presses in on you, suffocating. Until you get to your feet and go to the door.

This is stupid. You know it’s stupid. You’d be snarking at the character on-screen that opening the door is an incredibly stupid idea. But not knowing feels so much worse.

You open the cabin door, just a crack to peek. There’s no one there.

Chagrin floods your cheeks. You aren’t familiar with your neighbors. That’s all. One of Deidara’s friends must have returned the book in apology.

The book in question is set in front of the door. Its pages are sun-dried and stiff with water damage. The cheap ink has bled, smearing a lot of the words. But it’s kind of sweet that they returned the book after everything. You flip to the page you had been reading when it was knocked from your hands, then nearly drop it.

The pages here are soaked red, glued together by something thicker than water.

.𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟. The week will end soon.

You try not to let it loom over you, but it’s there—in the quiet gaps between cicada songs and in the stagnant heat of the day. But it is most obvious in the “No Swimming” sign Itachi posted after Deidara’s accident. You can only watch the minnows darting underwater like quicksilver now. It’s an unsatisfactory goodbye.

You stop, sweat dripping from every roll and crinkle in your skin, to uncap your water bottle before downing half of it. The handle of the blue plastic bucket sits in the bend of your elbow, half-full of lakeside debris: fallen leaves, twigs, some acorns, little round pebbles. Things for you to shift through later and make little handmade things for souvenirs. Most campsites are strongly against the practice, but Itachi is indifferent.

You hadn’t planned to take this hike around the lake, but you’ve already made it to the other side. A sigh leaves your lips when you toss the water bottle back into the bucket. You’re being avoidant as well. Your “neighbors” are still around. They’ve pestered you about everything from borrowing your grill lighter to trying to bully you into drinking with them.

Deidara, with white bandages peeking out from under his shirt, has been the most persistent. It’s flattering, in a vain way, to have the blond’s attention. But you aren’t stupid enough to get involved with whatever that group has going on.

If you let him hit? You would never live it down.

You shudder at the phantom catcalling and jeering as you come up to a bend in the trail. There’s running water here, one of the streams that cut away from the main lake. Further down, you can see a bridge that goes over it.

You hear the sound of splashing above the babbling of the stream. It’s not obvious and if you hadn’t stopped you don’t think you would have heard it. You listen to the noise for a while before curiosity gets the better of you.

You’re so nosy.

Stepping off the path, into unmaintained woodland doesn’t feel as foreboding as it should, considering all the stories that come from doing something like this. The sun is too bright, too warm, and the shade too thin to be anything but pleasant to step into. But your gut still tightens. Something brushes against the back of your mind, warning you it could be an animal you don’t want to startle.

But you’re already so close to the source of the splashing. The undergrowth here is denser, the trees coming together in thick green webs of leaves. You peek through them, eyes wide as movement catches your attention immediately. The person on the side, down in the stream rips the breath from your lungs.

The overhead foliage blankets the stream in shadow, dark and damp—a contrast to the warm sunlight caressing your back. While you watch him, a peculiar mix of emotions stirs within. Despite the well-defined muscles, he looks almost sickly, as if he might be unwell. His cheeks are hollow, his face is made up of harsh angles, and his skin is a soft, pale blue-gray that seems more pronounced in the shade.

You watch the water roll up his arms and over his shoulders in wild arcs. Standing with his legs apart and bent at the waist, he appears entirely absorbed in his task, his hands chasing something unseen in the murky water.

Each movement causes the muscles under his skin to ripple. His tall frame moves with a sense of purpose, exuding both grace and strength. There’s something captivating about his presence, an allure that draws you in despite the uncertainty.

A bolt of fear strikes like lightning as you catch sight of his face. You’ve seen him before. You’re the one peeping now, it seems. You should leave—the thought nags at you, screaming in the back of your skull. Whoever, whatever he is, you know he’s dangerous. The shark-like appearance cannot be a coincidence. But a part of you refuses to move. Rooted to the ground, you watch the flex of his biceps, lick your lips at the downward turn of his mouth while he concentrates hard on his task.

You’re fascinated by something so different.

His hands snap out again, closing around something finally by the grin that flashes across his face. Porcelain white teeth, pointed and sharp, catching a sliver of sunshine.

The tiny body of a muddy green frog almost escapes his palms, flinging itself desperately from the giant that holds it. He moves with it, refusing to let it go. You watch, mouth parted, though you aren’t breathing anymore. The man, his eyes gleaming, presses his hands together.

Squeezing and squeezing until—there’s an awful popping sound and pink-stained water drips between the man’s fingers. It’s terrible what he’s done with that handsome grin on his face.

Then he tosses the dead thing toward the bank below you. Two little raccoons, too small to be on their own chitter in excitement. They run forward to where the frog’s guts spill into the mud, squabbling over it before their fighting tears the body in half. They feast like they’re starving.

It’s gross and makes your stomach queasy. But it offers understanding. He’s feeding them. In an archaic, far too gruesome way, but feeding the animals nonetheless.

Your eyes leave the small raccoons, returning to the strange man. He’s looking at you now, too. His grin is gone, faded into a thin frown. You’ve been caught, the blood draining from your face.

Neither of you make the first move.

The baby raccoons, licking their lips after their frog, chatter at him from the water’s edge. They slap the surface, splashing each other by accident when he ignores them. They’re impatient and demanding. The shark-man glances between them and you. Contemplating, he shifts his weight, disturbing the flow of water around his calves. It’s a tiny movement, barely anything at all, but it causes you to flinch back. And the frown on his face deepens.

“What are you lurking like a pervert for?” he calls out, a lilt of sarcasm in his voice.

His strikingly recognizable voice. You’re relieved, somewhat, to know he can speak. Then feel stupid for the assumption he couldn’t. “You’re one to talk.”

“Me? No no, I would never go around peeping at people like that,” he responds quickly. As if he’s eager to be talking with you. “Especially not you. Not with how much you go around shrieking.”

Your stomach twists itself into knots. It strangles the butterflies. This feels surreal to you. You shouldn’t, but you find yourself pushing back the branches of the trees to ease yourself down the slope of the bank, the temperature dropping when the sun can no longer touch you. The little raccoons scamper away with unwelcoming hisses when they spot you.

“Thank you, for bringing my book back,” you say before trepidation can stop you. You can feel it in your gut that getting closer is a bad idea.

The man doesn’t move from his spot in the stream. His expression shifts from his half-smug teasing to more of a question. It’s reflected when he speaks again, “What book?”

“The one that fell into the lake. I recognize your voice.”

“Just from hearing it one time, huh? You sure?”

“I can remember voices pretty okay and yours is very—well everything about you kind of stands out.”

He pauses for a heartbeat, various emotions flickering across his face before he chuckles, “I’ll take that as a compliment from you.”

Oh.

Your stomach swoops in a distinctly different way from fear this time. It shocks you. Somehow you’ve inched closer and mud wells up around the soles of your sandals. Your throat bobs when you swallow your nerves down.

“What’s your name?” you ask him the words a little strained with how tight your throat is.

His sharp, beady eyes observe you intently. Again you find that as unnerving as his gaze is, you don’t dislike it.

“If I tell you, I’ll have to kill you,” he says, his tone light. The way he smiles at you is not comforting.

“Is that code for you don’t have one?” It’s half-playful and wholly unsure. Is it rude to ask another being if they have a name? You offer your own name in the next breath.

He takes it, chewing on it a few times like he’s deciding if he likes it or not.

Suddenly, you’re the frog. Your heartbeat is frantic in your chest once more, desperate for something you’re not sure about. And blindly you think you’re leaping toward the threat when he says your name a final time, his tongue swiping across his blue lips.

“Kisame,” he tells you.

“Kisame,” you murmur, holding the word too gently. “A little on the nose isn’t it?”

“You shouldn’t be so relaxed,” he warns you. “I really could kill you.”

He’s serious. You can feel it in how he looks at you. In the cool shade of the trees crowding too close with the cicada still silent, you know he can. Still, your mouth opens your mouth to protest. Maybe you’re still the desperate frog, jumping the wrong way.

But you hesitate. And he latches onto that hesitation.

You see his plan in the wicked curve of his grin returning before he does it. But you still squeal when he lungs forward, his big arms scooping up water and splashing you in a great wave. The bucket slips from the crook of your arm, cracking against the mud.

His hand, rough but warm, brushes against the exposed small of your back when you turn, fleeing up the side of the bank like a drowned rat. His booming laughter follows on your heels when you return to your cabin.

Your heart is pounding and you stupidly want to see him again.

.𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟.

The first mistake you make is with Deidara.

You’re outside cutting up pieces of your favorite fruit. Fresh and in season, it’s quite a treat. The juice slips down your knife and onto your fingers. You don’t the like the stickiness as much but tolerate it for your snack. The cicadas are at full volume again and sitting beside you is your journal, with glue drying leaves to one of the pages.

It’s a nice day, with a light breeze that occasionally sweeps past you. It makes you drowsy.

You watch the lake. After meeting him, you’re certain it was Kisame that grabbed your foot and injured Deidara. Every disturbance on the water makes you hopeful. Disappointment fills your chest when nothing comes from it. Your ride these up-and-down mood swings for most of the day.

You have to wonder if Itachi knows about Kisame. Is that why he put up the sign? You’re itching to ask, but if he doesn’t you’d sound out of your mind. Or be exposing Kisame’s existence. Which feels worse than being called crazy.

You don’t want to admit there’s selfishness at play too. A part of you resists the idea of sharing the secret you now know. You want to keep Kisame for yourself.

You pop another slice of fruit into your mouth, swiping away the juice that dribbles down your chin with the back of a hand. There’s another disturbance on the water, right next to the dock that’s more agitated—

A figure steps in front of you with a grunt of your name, blocking the view. You sit up in your chair, snorting as you meet Deidara’s gaze. He holds it for a second before darting away. His painted nails tug at his shirt, pulling it up to cover the stark white bandages.

He opens his mouth once, twice, before he finally says, “Hey.”

You chew the flesh of another slice of fruit, holding your gaze on him. When you swallow you drop your eyes to watch the blade of the knife cut another one. “What do you need Deidara?”

“I don’t need anything,” he snaps back too quickly. “Can’t a guy just say hi to his neighbor?”

“Then, hi.”

“You don’t have to say it like that.”

You stop what you’re doing, lips pressing into a flat line. Deidara’s gaze doesn’t waver when you meet it this time. A muscle in his jaw twitches. The mutual annoyance feels heavier than the humidity in the air.

You’re being unfair to him and you know it. The first night they were here you had torn out of the bathhouse, picking a fight with them. But it had been Kisame who had been peeping on you, you’re sure of it despite his denial.

But everything else he had done himself. He didn’t deserve the apology on the tip of your tongue.

“You like art?” he tries again, smoothing the irritation from his expression. You glance at the journal he gestures to.

“Yeah.” You can’t make yourself happy with the conversation change.

“I do art,” Deidara continues as if you’ve asked. “Not any of this kid stuff, of course. I have an appreciation for finer art. The kind of beauty you can only see for a fleeting moment before it’s gone, the aftermath of it vibrating through you.”

He’s animated, his hands moving as he speaks. Whatever he’s talking about, it’s obvious it’s his passion. But you’re stuck on the fact he called your glued-on leaves and scribbles “kid stuff.” Deidara always has a haughty air to him, but it’s most apparent in this aspect.

You have to hide the scowl in the corner of your mouth. But it’s pointless when you say, “So like fireworks?”

Deidara catches you immediately. He scents the mockery in words like blood in the water. His eye flashes, dangerous and scorned.

“I’ll have to show you what I mean sometime,” he offers, challenging.

“Maybe,” you reply. He frowns at the rejection.

.𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟.

The second mistake you make is not locking the door to your cabin.

Well, it’s more so that you’re listening to that damn fluttery feeling in your stomach. You nearly vomit twice from the nerves before you settle onto the bed—it’s neatly made up and smells of air freshener to hide a week worth’s of you.

Your laptop is open, the fans whirring while another black-and-white movie plays on-screen. It’s the sequel to the previous one you watched.

You can’t focus on it, though. Picking at your nails, chewing on the inside of your lip, and glancing like a fugitive at the door takes up more of your attention. For once, you hate the isolation of the campground. You’d be less nervous if your phone had a connection to the outside so you could doom scroll the hours away.

Music from your neighbors rumbles through the walls. It’s nowhere near the volume of their first full day here, but tonight it’s full of spite and bass again. Occasionally you hear one of them belting out the lyrics.

You bite down a tad too hard on the tender flesh inside your mouth. The taste of copper spreads across the tip of your tongue.

A scream rips through the quiet hum of the window unit and the night chirping outside. It’s so sudden it startles you, your heart jumping into your throat before you realize it’s the movie. You reach over and turn the sound down, scoffing at yourself. “Jesus, the volume is all over the place.”

“That’s what you get for pirating bad movies.”

He doesn’t give you the chance to scream, a hand clapping down over your mouth. Panic and terror rips through your system, eyes rolling wild while you try to pry his hand off. The bed dips behind you and then you’re pulled up, back pressed up against a damp chest.

Kisame’s laughter rolls over your ears, rumbles against your back. And your heart beats hard for a reason different from fear. When you stop struggling he eases his hand away and then drops something on the bed in front of you. Shiny blue plastic reflects a warped version of yourself, Kisame wrapped around you. A crack splits the image in half.

It’s filled to the brim with leaf litter.

How he came in through the door without you noticing is a mystery. It’s closed when you glance toward it.

“I’m starting to think you’re leaving excuses to see me again.” Kisame’s thumbs press into the skin of your arms. He hasn’t let fully let you go yet.

Your breathing steadies. “What?”

Lips ghost over the shell of your ear. “You keep leaving trash in my lake.”

“That’s not fair,” you start to say, then think better of it. Looking away from his plastic reflection, turning your head to look at him. He’s startling close. “The bucket technically isn’t even mine and you turned the water into a bloodbath so I couldn’t get my book back.”

“Oh, I suppose that too,” he says with an edged humor.

Your brows furrow. Then you realize what he means. Laughter, surprised and jittery tumbles out of your mouth. “Not a fan of him either, huh?”

“Something like that, yeah.”

“Someone has to like him, with all the confidence he’s got.”

“But not you.” There are teeth in his statement.

“Definitely not me.”

Kisame grunts in response. He’s warm against you, sturdy. And you find that you’ve relaxed into him. He notices it too, his muscles tensing. For a second you think he’s pushing you away—except he’s moving the little blue bucket he’s returned. It finds a new place on the windowsill by the bed.

You find yourself rearranged as well, scooted to the side so Kisame can sit on the bed next to you. It’s a tight fit. He takes up so much space—even more when he leans into you.

“What are you watching?” he asks, drawing your attention to movie still playing.

Warm embarrassment floods your system. You flounder for words, only to mumble, “A bad sequel.” He snorts and you offer, “You wanna finish it with me? Or… do you need go back into the lake?”

Kisame watches you for breath, considering. “You’re awfully comfortable next to someone who could kill you.”

That gives you pause. The words you want to say are sticky in your throat. They’ll choke you if you try to speak them to life.

You like that he’s dangerous. You like his sharp teeth. You like the way his fingers have inched under your shirt to trace the line of your spine—

“That doesn’t answer the question. Do you dry out on land?” you refocus the conversation.

“I’ll be fine for a couple of hours,” he chuckles, low and raspy.

“Good then buckle up for a feature film from the 1950s.” You give him another pause to change his mind. But when he leans back, his hands behind his head, you settle in next to him.

His brows raise when the antagonist appears on-screen. The costume—a feat of practical effects for it’s time but now barely believable—is awkward on land and even more so when it swoops the female lead for the movie up. Another loud shriek crackles out of the speakers.

You’re deathly quiet while it plays out–a back-and-forth between the hero and the monster before it escapes out to sea. The main couple embrace after the ordeal, but there’s still a third of the movie to go so it’s not over.

Kisame sits with you while it plays out. His mouth closed, eyes intent on the screen. He knows quite a bit for not being human. You wonder if he was one once, or if he learned everything somewhere.

“Does Itachi know about you?” You break the comfortable silence when the credits begin to roll. Somehow the two of you have become entangled, hands touching places bordering overly-friendly.

“You ask a lot of questions.” Kisame is quick to answer, a hand sliding a little lower on your hip. His nails scrape at the sensitive flesh, not friendly at all. “You worried he’d see you with a swamp monster?”

“Not at all,” you say just as easily.

He hesitates at the elastic band of your pj bottoms. Teases the flesh of your hip. “He does. We have…an arrangement of sorts.”

The question must be plain on your face because Kisame laughs. It makes your heart squeeze and a heat flare between your thighs.

“I’m not fucking him,” he says just as plainly, his grin half-feral at the expression you must be making. “Don’t let him fool you. Itachi’s more dangerous than I am. But he hates getting his hands dirty. Sharks gotta eat. He keeps the lake mostly free of shitheads.”

You swallow thickly. His tone is light, joking, but his gaze is sharp. Testing.

“Is he how you know so much about everything?” you ask, voice quiet. Trying to keep the mental images from rushing to the forefront of your mind.

You know you’ve made a mistake when his expression clouds, dark and stormy. “No.” He pulls away so quickly it leaves you cold and falling onto the blanket. “Movie’s over. Try to pick a better one next time.”

Kisame slips out of the cabin as quietly as he came in. He takes the heat of the summer night with him.

.𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟.

The third mistake you make is drowning in desperation.

The sun burns hot outside, the humidity is the worst it’s been all week. Cicadas scream, loud and wretched in their search for a mate.

You slept like shit after Kisame left. Your morning is filled with a back-and-forth of what you wanted to do and what you should do. It’s a game of tug-of-war within your mind and it shows in the shadows under your eyes.

There’s an ugly sense of longing in your chest you can’t let go of. Even when the handsome lines of Kisame’s face clashes with the vivid imagination of him knelt over a body, tearing into the gore of it with his sharp teeth. There has to be something wrong with you. Losing your job couldn’t have driven you to this in a week, could it?

You need to see him again. Before you go home.

Your despair must ooze from your pores, acting like blood in the water to those in the campground. Like with the lake, there’s a new sign at the start of the trail that goes around the lake. The one where that leads to the stream you first found Kisame in the stream. You can see it the moment you step outside, the sweltering heat swarming close to your body.

Your “neighbors” are out too. Hidan and that tattooed man haul packs of beer from the back of their truck. More than four men should have. You would have ignored them like you intend to ignore the sign, but Hidan makes an effort to catch your attention with a wave. He grins too widely to be well-meaning.

Your mouth forms a thin line. It just feels off—wrong.

Before you reach the trail, Itachi steps out of the office. His expression is unmoving as he approaches you. Your intentions are obvious. Your feet are still pointed toward the trail. He is not surprised.

“You’re causing trouble,” he says, stopping a foot away from you.

You bite the inside of your lip before you answer, “I haven’t done anything.”

His dark eyes watch you with a sense of apathy. You feel it in how he talks to you. He isn’t telling you this out of annoyance or anger. Not even out of worry. It’s as if he doesn’t care one way or the other but he knows he’ll have to deal with the aftermath no matter what.

Through sheer respect, you don’t try to step around him. You’ve wasted the morning though, you can’t just stand here.

“It’s a bad idea,” he warns again. His voice is softer. It almost makes you want to listen to him.

But your heart doesn’t want to. It bares its teeth with a petulance. “I’m grown. I don’t need to be told what to do.”

“Then let me suggest you go home before you get yourself hurt,” he intones.

Cicadas scream from the tree line behind him even louder. Furious with how long they’ve been alone, their cries unanswered. It constricts around your bones. “Are you kicking me out then?” He stares at you, silent. “I paid for the week. I’m staying until that time is up.”

“Your time is up tomorrow morning.”

Sharply you inhale. It’s a truth you don’t want to hear. It sits like rot at the forefront of your mind. Itachi doesn’t say more when you ignore him—doesn’t stop you when you walk past his “Trail Closed for Maintenance” sign.

.𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟.

The emptiness in the cabin reflects the feeling in your chest. It’s pathetic, mourning like a lovesick teenager again. But you know what’s waiting for you when you go home to your tiny apartment in the city. Bills will be due. Your bank account will be empty. And you’d have to start looking for a new job.

You’ve packed away your things and tucked all but the bare essentials into your car. You want to make another trip around the lake before you leave in the morning. Just one more chance to see him again.

There hadn’t been a sign of him yesterday.

And here you are with a puffy, wet face from hurting your own feelings. Sleep can’t come fast enough. Stupidly—so undeniably idiotically—you’ve left the cabin door unlocked again.

Your “neighbors” are playing their music impossibly loud again. The glass in the windows rattles. Curling in tighter around yourself you cover your ears. It sounds so angry you can’t stand it. It’s too much noise. Too much emptiness.

Too much everything for your sad little self.

Eventually, you have to get up and dig through your bag in the car to find a sleep aid. Deidara sits on the porch outside the other cabin, drinking. It’s too dark to see properly but you can feel the heat of his stare. It burns into you long after you get back into bed.

.𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟.

The laughing is what wakes you.

It feels like you’ve only just closed your eyes when the drunken snorts and giggles of men too old for it pulls them open again.

The handle turns. The door swings open. The sleep medication you took slows your reflexes, your understanding.

For a long, sluggish moment your heart flutters between your ribs.

But then the figure in the doorway splits in two and they step fully into the cabin. Pale yellow and silver catch the dim moonlight. A single, pretty blue eye meets your gaze. A mean sneer mars his expression as he looks down at you.

Deidara crouches to your level, his breath fanning over your face reeks of alcohol. Amusement is tucked into his words when he coos, “Aw look at you, hm? Did our music keep you awake?”

The nasally grunt at the ends of his words makes it hard to focus on anything else. What had he said? You blink hard, trying to remember. Your tongue sticks to the roof of your mouth, dry. A soft hand brushes against your cheek.

Your nose scrunches, a low warble leaving your lips as you pull away. Hidan cackles behind him.

“They’re so fucking over you,” he scoffs. “Let’s just toss them.”

“Shame,” Deidara huffs. “Would have loved to show you my art.”

Your vision swims, sleep trying to pull you back down. You remember the conversation about his art though, and snort. “Fireworks.”

The taller man finds this hilarious, nearly folding in half laughing at his friend’s expense. You aren’t sure why. The blond’s expression is thunderous–ugly and mean. You hate it.

You hate the way he digs his fingers into your face more.

“Let’s see if a dip in the lake will make you a little less bitchy,” Deidara hisses, spittal flying from his lips and hitting your face.

The sleep aid dulls your fear and that’s terribly dangerous. It doesn’t make sense to you at first. Why are they here? Why is Deidara so mean to you? Your head spins and you can’t think straight.

You’re still so sluggish when he pulls you from the bed, locking his arms under your armpits. It’s uncomfortable and you weakly protest. But it doesn’t hit you just how bad the situation is until Hidan takes hold of your legs.

You’re so fucking stupid. Everything goes sideways as you fight against them; slow, uncoordinated kicks of your legs and slurred screams. You didn’t lock the door..

They don’t have any trouble carrying you to the dock between them. Nor do they struggle when they throw you. You hear them laughing, mean, and loud again. The late-night cicadas laugh right along with them when your head goes under.

.𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟.

The lake water is cold. It’s a shock to your muddled brain.

Your muscles lock tight, refusing to move at the sudden drop in temperature. It’s not terrifying at first. Just cold. Your vision blurs in the dark water, and the moon becomes a hazy image as you sink downward.

Down, down, down.

You don’t even need a rock to sink you to the bottom this time.

Then your body releases you from the shock, limbs unlocking with a rough beat of your heart and your lungs swelling to take a breath.

Except you’re underwater and instead of oxygen your lungs fill with the lake itself. It’s painful and so much worse than you ever imagined drawing would be. It feels like someone’s shoved sandpaper down your throat, into your chest and it’s grinding the soft tissue away in there. Your heart hammers as panic bursts awake under your skin.

How stupid this all is. You’ve drugged yourself—Deidara probably hasn’t even realized. You flail weakly in the darkness. You can’t see the moon above the surface anymore. There’s no way to tell which way is up and which way is down under water like this.

Pain sears, angry, and bright in your chest as your body coughs harshly to try to expel the water. There is nothing but water around you, though.

You want to scream.

You’re going to drown.

Going to die.

Something collides with your torso, even in the water it feels like you’ve been rag-dolled. Your head snaps back on your neck and everything from your lungs is forced out with no time to inhale more water. You’re terrified—so incredibly disoriented. Has your soul been ripped from your body? Are you dead?

Your head breaks the surface. Warm night air kisses your face, your cheeks, your mouth. Dazed you see stars above you, twinkling next to the half-moon above you. Silhouettes of clouds drift lazy and unhurried under them.

It’s so pretty.

A wretched sob breaks free from your chest, hacking up lake water with it. Strong hands, clawed and webbed heaves your body up and dumps you on a dock. It’s not the sun-weathered one with smoothed wood. It’s older. It leans to one side, the dark wood splintering and covered in moss.

You cough and gag up water, whoever—whatever—saved you keeping a hand on your back. It’s horrible. It hurts going out as much as it did going in. Your mind is still foggy, slowed by the sleep aid you had taken.

Finally, when you aren’t vomiting up water, you look at your savior. You recognize him instantly, though he’s different—monstrous in the most basic meaning of the word.

Kisame looms over you on the old dock, his pitch-colored eyes glinting. He is, for certain, more shark than human at this point.

He’s horrifying at first glance. His sharp features merge with a more streamlined shark body. Muscles ripple beneath scale-like patterns down his biceps and forearms, bent to accommodate the fins that sprout from them. Gills at his neck pulsate rhythmically, wet and sticky above water. A massive dorsal fin goes down his back and to a tail that stirs in the lake.

But you know it’s Kisame. You know it from the fluttering beats of your heart that’s been yearning to see him again. He’s saved you from drowning.

He jerks backward when you lift a shaky, uncoordinated hand to his face. You gently cup his jaw, not letting him avoid you. Your thumb brushes a serrated tooth. A pearl of blood beads instantly. His pupils shrink.

There’s so much you want to say–so much you need to confess.

Somewhere on the other side of the lake, Deidara is shouting. He sounds like he’s in a panic. An ungodly sound rips from Kisame’s chest. His webbed hand pushes you down, not unkindly.

“Stay,” he says. When you don’t fight him, he slips off the dock and back into the water.

You sit there, shivering in your soaked clothes feeling like you’ve been drug through hell. It’s less than a minute later when you hear the first scream.

smut warning! afab body parts named and described here! scroll down to the next divider for amab!

The screaming continues even after the cicadas fall quiet. The first one you heard ended quickly. Whoever it was died choking on their own blood. You want to pretend you don’t know who it is.

But you know both the victims and the attacker.

You should leave. Itachi’s office should have a radio or satellite phone— some way to reach help. You don’t like Deidara, but you don’t want him and his friends to die. Your stomach somersaults unpleasantly at the thought.

Getting to your feet has you wheezing by the end of it. You wobble on the first step but can make it to the second step without tipping over. You take a deep breath, you can do this.

On the third, however, your foot goes through the wood. You go down with it, the soft skin of your thigh snagging on the edge of the broken board. It happens so fast you don’t have a chance to even think about screaming. And when you realize what’s happened, you have to bite it back to keep quiet.

Katydids and frogs chirp back and forth while you cry, scooting back to pull your leg out of the hole to look at the damage. You’re bleeding but it’s not gushing blood. It’s hard to tell just how bad it is in the half-moon lighting.

You waste too much time.

A hand closes around your ankle, too close to the edge of the rotting dock. Lacking the claws and webbing between his fingers this time, and strong. He tugs you forward on the dock, the wood scraping against the exposed underside of your thighs.

Kisame doesn’t leave you wondering this time. He lifts himself out of the lake, meeting your body with his own.

Despite being in the water, the blood hasn’t washed off. It’s deep red, staining from his mouth and down his chest. It rolls downward to his naked hips. The sight plucks a cord of fear down your spine.

Just as you’re staring at the blood on him, Kisame is staring at the blood on you. His hand drags upward, over your calf. When he brushes his thumb over the scratch on your thigh you wince, but keep quiet. There’s a fear inside you that you’ll trigger something predatory if you make a noise.

But you can’t stop the gasp when his rough lips meet the flesh of your thigh. It’s just a brief kiss, tender and gentle before his tongue slips out to lick up the length of the wound. He hums, the sound and vibration going straight to your core. He leaves behind goosebumps and smears of red.

His touch drifts higher and higher until he pauses. Your stomach is tight in anticipation, breaths shallow. After a long minute, you meet his gaze, flesh burning under his scrutiny. He’s waiting. And you—you’re sick to death of waiting.

God, you are fucked. “Don’t stop now.”

He grins, full of teeth. The sight of them between your legs, stained with blood, with a different kind of hunger sends a terrible sort of thrill through you.

His fingers hook in the waistband of your shorts. You lift your hips to help him ease them down your legs. Kisame groans out loud when you’re exposed to him as if he’s been waiting for this too.

His thumbs part your sticky, slick folds. His warm breath sends a tremor up your spine. The millimeters of space between his mouth and your cunt feels too far and you can’t wait. He meets your core with more force than intended because you buck your hips upward, needy and eager.

He chuckles into your wetness, flashing those sharp teeth so dangerously close to your sensitive flesh. The hand that pushes your hips down is gentle though, fingers kneading the heated skin in soothing circles.

“Easy,” he rasps.

You have to bite back a whine, grounding yourself by scraping your nails against the rotting dock underneath you.

His tongue meets you again, pressed flat through your folds. It drags a shivering moan out of you. Kisame’s answering groan makes you throb. It’s embarrassing how wet you are—how quickly your lower belly coils tight.

He’s gentle at first, his mouth cautious on your puffy slit as he explores you. Like he’s savoring the flavor of you. One of your hands sinks downward, slipping through his wet hair, fingertips pressing against the back of his skull to push him into you.

“Kisame,” you pant, “please.”

He obliges, a thick arm sliding over your hips and tugging you closer to him, lifting your lower body slightly for better access. Your head tilts back, knocking against the rough wood. His tongue cuts through your wetness, sending sparks of electricity through your core as he teased your clit with skillful flicks. Each groan and gasp that leaves your lips makes him work harder.

Your inner muscles ache, clenching tightly around nothing. Kisame takes his time though, following his own sweet rhythm. You almost beg for him to touch you more, but before the words have the chance to form his fingers are inside you. Thick and skilled two of them stretch your hole, curling against your sensitive walls while his mouth suckles your clit.

He drags his tongue back and forth over your sensitive bud while his fingers maintain a steady rhythm, coaxing you ever closer to the edge. His finger finds the spot inside you that sends your hips bucking up in pleasure and an involuntary cry spills from your lips. You can feel Kisame's rumble of approval vibrating against your core as he licks and teases until you finally go limp, still panting heavily from the sheer intensity of your orgasm.

“Not bad,” he all but coos to you, letting your thighs drop.

Words die on your lips as he settles himself fully between your legs and seals his mouth against yours. The taste of yourself is heady and thick. You want to pull him closer, to delve into his mouth like he had done with your sex. But he pulls away before you have the chance.

You make a quiet sound of disappointment when he moves away. It morphs into a startled cry when, without warning, his hips buck forward and the thick head of his cock sinks into you. His fingers dig into the plush meat of your hips, holding you still so he can fuck himself into you. He splits you open, bigger than you expect.

You’re over-filled by the time his hips lay flush against you. Your chest heaving between adjusting to him and fighting the pleasure wracking up your spine.

“Been thinking about how good you’d feel since the first time I saw you,” Kisame says, voice husky and low with a teasing roll of his hips.

You manage a smile, trying to appear unaffected despite the heat coursing through your veins, “Me too.”

His expression is feral in the silvery moonlight, all teeth and pride. Red smears across his face, between your thighs. Kisame, even in his more human form, looks like a monster. It sends your heart fluttering something terrible.

There isn’t time to admire him, though. You buck your hips, a whine on your lips. His length twitches inside you once before he answers, snapping his hips into you. He throws one of your legs over his shoulder and feels like he reaches even deeper inside you. Groans leave both of your mouths.

It’s hard to think straight as he rocks into you, picking up the pace when your hand slips down to rub your clit. He presses into you, nuzzling into the crook of your neck. His sharp, sharp teeth graze the sensitive skin there and earns him a drawn-out moan, your walls fluttering around him.

“Fuck…not gonna last long,” Kisame pants into your ear. It almost sounds pleading.

“Almost there,” you whine, your core tightening. You’re so close.

His hips stutter a strangled moan slipping out of his mouth. His teeth press a bit harder into your throat and you feel him gush inside you. It sends you over the edge again, insides clamping down around him. It’s quiet aside from the heated panting as you both try to recover and the lapping over the lake against the dock.

A soft-breathed moan wrings itself from your throat when Kisame pulls out. Warmth trickles out of you. But you can’t focus on it because he kisses you again—softer without an urgency. You still chase after him when he pulls away.

He tucks a grin into the corner of his mouth, trying to look serious. “You need to go talk to Itachi.”

“Itachi? Why?” you ask, eyebrows raising.

“He’ll walk you through what to say,” Kisame says hands sliding your shorts back up your legs. As if it’s the most simple thing in the world. His teeth flash in the silver moonlight, unable to help himself. “You look fucked up. The police won’t question you too much.”

It’s so stupid you laugh.

smut warning! amab body parts named and described here!

The screaming continues even after the cicadas fall quiet. The first one you heard ended quickly.  Whoever it was died choking on their own blood. You want to pretend you don’t know who it is.

But you know both the victims and the attacker.

You should leave. Itachi’s office should have a radio or satellite phone— some way to reach help. You don’t like Deidara, but you don’t want him and his friends to die. Your stomach somersaults unpleasantly at the thought.

Getting to your feet has you wheezing by the end of it. You wobble on the first step but can make it to the second step without tipping over. You take a deep breath, you can do this.

On the third, however, your foot goes through the wood. You go down with it, the soft skin of your thigh snagging on the edge of the broken board. It happens so fast you don’t have a chance to even think about screaming. And when you realize what’s happened, you have to bite it back to keep quiet.

Katydids and frogs chirp back and forth while you cry, scooting back to pull your leg out of the hole to look at the damage. You’re bleeding but it’s not gushing blood. It’s hard to tell just how bad it is in the half-moon lighting.

You waste too much time.

A hand closes around your ankle, too close to the edge of the rotting dock. Lacking the claws and webbing between his fingers this time, and strong. He tugs you forward on the dock, the wood scraping against the exposed underside of your thighs.

Kisame doesn’t leave you wondering this time. He lifts himself out of the lake, meeting your body with his own.

Despite being in the water, the blood hasn’t washed off. It’s deep red, staining from his mouth and down his chest. It rolls downward to his naked hips. The sight plucks a cord of fear down your spine.

Just as you’re staring at the blood on him, Kisame is staring at the blood on you. His hand drags upward, over your calf. When he brushes his thumb over the scratch on your thigh you wince, but keep quiet. There’s a fear inside you that you’ll trigger something predatory if you make a noise.

But you can’t stop the gasp when his rough lips meet the flesh of your thigh. It’s just a brief kiss, tender and gentle before his tongue slips out to lick up the length of the wound. He hums, the sound and vibration going straight to your core. He leaves behind goosebumps and smears of red.

His touch drifts higher and higher until he pauses. Your stomach is tight in anticipation, breaths shallow. After a long minute, you meet his gaze, flesh burning under his scrutiny. He’s waiting. And you—you’re sick to death of waiting.

God, you are fucked. “Don’t stop now.”

He grins, full of teeth. The sight of them between your legs, stained with blood, with a different kind of hunger sends a terrible sort of thrill through you.

His fingers hook in the waistband of your shorts. You lift your hips to help him ease them down your legs. Kisame groans out loud when you’re exposed to him as if he’s been waiting for this too.

His thumb ghosts up the underside, until he reaches the head smearing the pearl of pre-cum. His warm breath sends a tremor up your spine. The millimeters of space between his mouth and your dick feels too far away and you can’t wait. He barely has time to wrap his lips around his incredibly sharp teeth before you buck your hips upward, needy and eager.

He chuckles around your length, flashing those sharp teeth so dangerously close to your sensitive flesh. The hand that pushes your hips down is gentle though, fingers kneading the heated skin in soothing circles.

“Easy,” he rasps.

You have to bite back a whine, grounding yourself by scraping your nails against the rotting dock underneath you.

His cheeks hollow out, tongue dragging over you before swirling around the head. It drags a shivering moan out of you. Kisame’s answering groan makes you throb. It’s embarrassing how hard you are—how quickly your lower belly coils tight.

He’s gentle at first, his mouth cautious on weeping cock as he explores you. Like he’s savoring the flavor of you. One of your hands sinks downward, slipping through his wet hair, fingertips pressing against the back of his skull to push him further down on you.

“Kisame,” you pant, “please.”

He obliges, a thick arm sliding over your hips and tugging you closer to him, lifting your lower body slightly for better access. Your head tilts back, knocking against the rough wood. His head bobs wetly over your length, sending sparks of electricity through you. Each groan and gasp that leaves your lips makes him work harder.

Your balls tighten, your hole clenching tightly around nothing. Kisame takes his time though, following his own sweet rhythm. You almost beg for him to touch you more, but before the words have the chance to form his fingers are inside you. Thick and skilled two of them stretch your hole, curling against your sensitive walls while his mouth sucks you in further, your tip touching the back of his throat.

He pulls back, inhaling softly and swiping his tongue over the slit of your cock head, while his fingers maintain a steady rhythm, coaxing you ever closer to the edge. His finger finds the spot inside you that sends your hips bucking up in pleasure and an involuntary cry spills from your lips. You can feel Kisame's rumble of approval vibrating around your length as he licks and teases, swallowing your cum until you finally go limp, still panting heavily from the sheer intensity of your orgasm.

“Not bad,” he all but coos to you, letting your thighs drop.

Words die on your lips as he settles himself fully between your legs and seals his mouth against yours. The taste of yourself is heady and thick. You want to pull him closer, to delve into his mouth like he had done with your sex. But he pulls away before you have the chance.

You make a quiet sound of disappointment when he moves away. It morphs into a startled cry when, without warning, his hips buck forward and the thick head of his cock sinks into you. His fingers dig into the plush meat of your hips, holding you still so he can fuck himself into you. He splits you open, bigger than you expect.

You’re over-filled by the time his hips lay flush against you. Your chest heaving between adjusting to him and fighting the pleasure wracking up your spine.

“Been thinking about how good you’d feel since the first time I saw you,” Kisame says, voice husky and low with a teasing roll of his hips.

You manage a smile, trying to appear unaffected despite the heat coursing through your veins, “Me too.”

His expression is feral in the silvery moonlight, all teeth and pride. Red smears across his face, between your thighs. Kisame, even in his more human form, looks like a monster. It sends your heart fluttering something terrible.

There isn’t time to admire him, though. You buck your hips, a whine on your lips. His length twitches inside you once before he answers, snapping his hips into you. He throws one of your legs over his shoulder and feels like he reaches even deeper inside you. Groans leave both of your mouths.

It’s hard to think straight as he rocks into you, picking up the pace when your hand slips down to jerk your dick, already half-hard again. He presses into you, nuzzling into the crook of your neck. His sharp, sharp teeth graze the sensitive skin there and earns him a drawn-out moan, your walls fluttering around him.

“Fuck…not gonna last long,” Kisame pants into your ear. It almost sounds pleading.

“Almost there,” you whine, your walls tightening. You’re so close.

His hips stutter a strangled moan slipping out of his mouth. His teeth press a bit harder into your throat, and you feel him gush inside you. It sends you over the edge again, insides clamping down around him. Your cock throbs again, cum coating your fingers. It’s quiet aside from the heated panting as you both try to recover and the lapping over the lake against the dock.

A soft-breathed moan wrings itself from your throat when Kisame pulls out. Warmth trickles out of you. But you can’t focus on it because he kisses you again—softer without an urgency. You still chase after him when he pulls away.

He tucks a grin into the corner of his mouth, trying to look serious. “You need to go talk to Itachi.”

“Itachi? Why?” you ask, eyebrows raising.

“He’ll walk you through what to say,” Kisame says hands sliding your shorts back up your legs. As if it’s the most simple thing in the world. His teeth flash in the silver moonlight, unable to help himself. “You look fucked up. The police won’t question you too much.”

But it was comforting too. Safe within the castle walls it felt like the storm could touch you. The lightning that struck outside did little to the solid stones, and the rain that pelted against the glass of the window you sat beside never reached you. A fire crackled behind you, lulling against the noise outside.

And gentle breath, the warmth of another person, reminded you that you weren’t alone. Niji sat across from you—entirely undisturbed by the storming outside. His pen scratched across the paper in front of him. Another report you assumed.

Feeling your eyes on him, the blue-haired man’s face lifted. You couldn’t see his gaze behind his goggles, but you saw the way the corner of his mouth quirked upward.

“Scared?” he teased. He had asked the question at least three times since the storm began.

You were quiet for a moment—just a pause to think. Then you say, “Sure.”

Niji’s pause is longer. As if he hadn’t expected your answer to change or what he would do when it did. But, then the smirk that had dimmed turned into a full grin. He dropped his pen and pushed back his plush chair. His hands slapped his thighs, the noise almost drowned out by another roll of thunder.

“Come here then.” He called to you. His voice, however, was softer. Not quite in the sense of being softly romantic or gentle, but just in tone alone. Quieter. Afraid of being overheard.

Your heart brushed against your ribcage from how hard it beats. You went to him easily. Without questioning why. He could be mean—the expectation was insults, really—but things were changing.

Or rather your understanding of Niji and his brothers was changing. They were cruel and monstrous, that was true. And despite whatever their father had done to them…love was something no person could be without. Love of a parent. Love of family. Love of friends.

You didn’t want to call whatever he felt for you as love just yet. But he found comfort with you, at the very least. In the nights he would pull you into his bed. In the way he liked to have you simply sit with him while he worked on boring things. In how he would search for you after coming home for a mission.