sum: She said she had her own-—NixieCam.
notes: so i ship nixie/cam; also eric is a merman character who's going to be in s2, so i thought that i'd write something short about them; please leave a review xx
He first sees her in the town café, always in a group—she doesn't notice him, not for a while.
She's gotten tired of holding on, of hoping and waiting—even back in the Pod, Nixie was more of a loner than anything. There wasn't much of a family, estranged relatives, who treated her with acidulous expressions and disdaining. "These are humans," she spits out, words falling onto the tiles like acid rain. "Humans—not Gods. Just because they are different, it does not mean they are better."
"Doesn't mean that they're any less than us," Lyla remarks, always quick to defend the human race.
Nixie rolls her eyes, "Yes, because you've met one human who you think is good—and he's not good, let me remind you, he cost us our spot in the Pod, he's the reason we're alone together—it doesn't mean that the entire race isn't flawed."
Lyla laughs, "I wouldn't have it any other way. Humans are flawed beings, and it's so wonderful, isn't it?" She speaks with an almost dazed expression in her typically dull blue eyes, and Nixie momentarily wonders whether Lyla has somehow morphed into the personality of the ever optimistic Sirena; it's a bit annoying, actually, really annoying.
"Flaws aren't something to be proud of."
They do not fall in love, not at all:
For she is a loner, and he was popular. She is condescending, and he is carefree. For she is loyal, and he is envious. And one day, they shared a kiss, but before that, there were conversations and arguments and looks exchanged, for matters of the heart need time.
It has been three months of life aboard the terrainous landscapes—it is not something of choice, perhaps, and Nixie spends her minutes and hours submerged within the Ivory Cave, water flowing in from the crevices and gaps in the wall, majestic in their entity. The roughness, the flawed aspects of nature are what forms its beauty, she decides upon.
Rita was kind enough to take them in—Nixie wouldn't ever be heard accountable for thinking such thoughts, but she's grateful to the woman who took them in, and wonders what it will be like saying goodbye. Harder for Sirena than for me, she ponders upon. "Never thought I'd see one of those," Cam says, walking into the room as though he lives here.
Then again, it's Zac, David, and Cam—the three of them aren't seen without one another. Maybe this is some sort of diversion—Lyla sent Cam down her for me to distract me so she can get the Trident. It's all about the Trident, in the end. She turns around, blue-eyed gaze. "It's called a ring, Cameron," she remarks, staring down at the cerulean-colored jewel embedded within gold casing lying upon her finger—it's everything and anything, and perhaps, it would mean a lot more if she was in the Pod, but it's the ring of completion nonetheless.
"I meant your smile. Never thought that I'd see you smile: you're always brooding."
Nixie raises an eyebrow, arms crossed, "Brooding, am I? Well, I'm sorry if some of us have more important issues on our mind than to think about who should win Kitchen Whiz or something incredibly useless like that."
"You've been watching television? Never thought you'd be doing something like that; well, you learn something new every day."
"Well, if it's somebody as dim-witted as you, of course."
He only offers an easy-going smile, smiling. Nixie stares at him, perturbed expression splayed across face. "That wasn't supposed to be a compliment."
"Well, Pixie Stick—"
Nixie rolls her eyes, and thinks that he sounds more like a two-year old than anything else. Honestly, human boys seemed to be no different than mermen—then again, Zac was the first merman she had come across upon, and hoped that others did not exist; they were too power-hungry, for starters. "Don't call me that, or you're more of a dumb-ass than I originally thought."
"You're a flipping mermaid," he remarks, breaking the silence. Perhaps not entirely clueless.
Nixie's eyes widen, despite the fact that there's nobody even there, because even though probably half the town's population is some sort of supernatural creäture, there are still the other half of the population who are naïve humans, who can't possibly know about the fact that she's a mermaid, because they'd stick her in a museum, and those aren't her plans for the future; not even close. "Not that loud, you complete idiot!" She takes a pause, "Still friends, then?"
Because there have been times where people have reacted in a rather negative manner towards the acknowledgment of her existence as a non-human being, and it's realistic and expected, and perhaps, she treasures Cam's friendship, and that's bad, because attachment to a mortal is never anything to be proud of. "Nothing's changed. You're still a moron." He stares at her blankly; She smiles, brisk tone, "You're welcome."
Over the next few months, the only conservations of significance they exchange are something of tired looks: for they are the ones who must glance at each other, annoyed, when Lyla stares at Zac, and Zac stares at Lyla, and she's really the only one he can complain to Zac about because everybody else is completely in love with him, without even knowing him.
"Hey," he greets, raising an eyebrow at her presence at the café.
It didn't seem to be the typical mermaid hangout spot, but then again, he didn't know that much about her to judge. "Hello," she murmurs back, brief eye contact, eyes blank in expression as they usually were.
"So, uh, I saw you with David there, and I couldn't help but wonder if you know, the two of you, are dating or something?" He blurts out, and immediately regrets the words, except there's this sort of mirthful expression splayed out across her face, and she doesn't smile too often (of course, it makes sense under her situation and all, not that he could ever understand or ever want to understand)—and it's nice to see the smile once in a while, even if it occasionally means making a sorry fool out of himself.
Nixie barks out a laugh, "Dating? Me and David? Are you sure that you're not confusing me with Sirena?"
"Well, the two of you were flirting over there—" Or maybe he's just mixing up signals. Girls were already too complicated, for Merlin's sake, and now there were these mermaid girls to mess everything up.
"We weren't flirting; Sirena was trying to charm Zac into telling us where the trident is, but the spell deflected and ended up working on David but then he saw me first, so he temporarily fell in love with me; I guess what I'm trying to say was that it wasn't real." He stares at her blankly. "And even if it was, I'm sure that you wouldn't have any problem with it: David's one of your good friends, I reckon? But, I'm not dating him."
"Good," he smiles.
"I'm dating Erik."
And she hops off the barstool, blank expression upon her face—and he stares, clouded eyes, into the distance for some time, and wonders when he started caring about Nixie in the first place.
He doesn't see her with Erik very often—
He's something of normalcy, of course, but Cam knows the truth—he's a merman. He has to be. Or maybe he's a demon or an angel or whatever, because it seems as though the entire population of the town is supernatural and Evie and him are the only two humans left on the planet. Which isn't all too bad, because it seems as though humans have a much longer life, what with rivalries and such between the supernatural creatures.
Cam almost misses when his biggest problem was passing Santos's finals—those were the good days. "He broke up with me," she states bluntly, taking a seat on the barstool, as though this place is her new home. Which it sort of is; she comes here more often as of late, sometimes with Sirena and Lyla, sometimes without. "I'll have a strawberry milkshake."
He blinks, "I don't even work here." Perhaps one of her faults—and there were many faults—was her completely oblivious nature to only focus on the problems that surrounded herself, rather than focusing on the actually world. Maybe being a mermaid was complicated, but still.
"Yeah, so? You can make me a strawberry milkshake. I'm sure David won't mind." David is something of awkward societal graces; he should have been something of glory and God, what with his prestigious brother and prestigious last name, and such, but he did not live up to the family fortunes, and that is the end of him, itself.
"Why can't David make one for you?"
"Because he's talking to Sirena, and who knows how long that conversation is going to go? So just make me a strawberry milkshake and let me complain about Erik to you, you moron."
He'd rather not here about a love story gone wrong, because it's not the first time—Evie's always come to him and complained about how Zac had gone wrong, and about how he was focusing more on some new girl named Lyla over here, and how life wasn't fair, and Cam had been forced to lie and say that Lyla was nobody important, and it was all just too complicated, and complications weren't something he exactly enjoyed in his life, though they were there nonetheless. "Don't you have Lyla for this sort of stuff?" He regrets the words as soon as they fall out of his mouth.
Her expression darkens, "Fine, I'll leave."
"No, wait, I didn't mean that; we can talk, if you'd like."
She offers him a slight smile, turning of the lips. "He's a merman."
He gives her a no shit, Sherlock expression, and Nixie resists the urge to smile. "But he's a merman of the Pod—he wasn't kicked out of the Pod like Sirena and Lyla and I were; that means that he could return back to the Pod whenever he likes, and he had to make a choice, between staying here with me, and moving back to live with his family. So he made the latter of the choices, and I can't say that I can blame him, because I would have made the same choice, but it still hurts all the same."
"I'm sorry," Cam mutters. "I'm not good with these type of situations."
"It's fine. I'm not good with these situations either." And perhaps, at the time, there was a chance that they could have been something of friends, but then everything spiraled out of control, and it was his fault, and then it was her fault, and then it was both of their faults, and then nobody's fault at all.
They were something of friends when he screwed everything up.
For it was his fault but not his fault all the same—there was something irresistible about being a merman, the power running through bloodstreams, coursing through harsh veins, all the glory. It seemed as though they were Gods.
And he made a mistake, and that was the end.
She's always in a group, Cam notices after the incident. Always with Lyla and Sirena, like the three of them are some sort of unbeatable triumvirate that can't function without the other two members.
But he knows it's not quite the case—he's seen their fights, the subtle signs of a crumbling empire.
The three of them still go out to lunch together, reputation of perfection a deteriorating aura, but there's the way that Nixie makes a sly comment and Lyla clenches her fist, silver knife sliding through the mahogany table, and they do not look as though they are sisters anymore: they look as though they are mortal enemies only tied together to defeat a common enemy, mainly himself.
Two people, circling around each other, a battle foretold from the very beginnings of time—man vs. man is the simplest and the most common of conflicts, that is for sure.
But Cam knows that it is more than that—for they are sisters as well, and though they look nothing alike, they are sisters, and the shared blood bubbling through their bloodstreams should count for something; it's on a Monday when he approaches her again, at the cerulean colored locker banks which smell oddly of salmon and jasmine-scented flowers. "Nixie," he flags her down, waiting for a moment to catch up.
She casts a dark look back at him, increasing the length of her strides, and the other two girls link their arms into hers and drag her away before Nixie can make another mistake like trusting the human boy again.
"I think she's avoiding me," Cam tells Zac at lunch.
The three of them, Cam, Zac, and Evie who's surprisingly cool about this whole my boyfriend Zac is a merman thing—or is at least pretending to be for the sake of societal graces and boundaries and the fact that Prom's coming up and there's no way she's going alone—are splayed out across the front lawn of the Academy, staring mindlessly into the distance.
Zac barks out a laugh, "You think she's avoiding you? Man, I should be avoiding you. Evie included. I can't believe that you tried to become a merman, take the trident for yourself. Doesn't matter if you're my best mate, but you can't betray my trust like that again."
Cam raises an eyebrow, "Didn't think that you were still hung up on that." Truth be told, it had only been a few weeks since the incident in which Cam had exploited Nixie in order to take the omnipotent Trident and become a merman himself, but there was something of a driving force inside of his mind—some unquenchable thirst for power, the power to be something more than a typical human.
For Zac had complained for hours and hours about how unfortunate the state of being a merman was, but it didn't seem as though swimming speed powers was something to be horrified about. Or that girls suddenly started flocking to him exactly a week after his powers had been confirmed after the new moon's cycle. It didn't seem too bad, not at all. Of course, he was slightly more apologetic for his actions now, but it had been a week, and the two of them had been best mates since the age of five. "I'm not," Zac mutters back.
"Of course," Cam replies, brisk tone. "You know what? I think I'll go talk to Nixie now."
Evie laughs, something high-pitched; her presence had become increasingly annoying over the past few weeks, but at least she was a human, unlike all the other supernatural creatures who had somehow infiltrated their way into the Academy. "You know what, Cam? I might not know much about mermaids and such, but I know things about girls, well, because I am one, and she's sending you all the signals that she doesn't want to talk to you. Or be in the same room as you. Or breathe the same air as you."
"Yeah, well, how long do I have to wait?"
"A bit longer," Evie smiles. "You just have to be patient, Cam, patience is of the utmost importance."
Once upon a time, there was a boy and a girl (and that is how most stories go)—He offered her the world, she said she had her own, and their story ended before it could begin.
The world does not end in fire and smoke pouring down from the heavens, individuals flocking around and watching human history spiral down via Snapchat and Instagram (hashtag apocalypse), but it is an eventual fate—the water pours onto the shores at night, steaming salt and brime releasing a poisonous fume, and amongst the ashes as Cam falls upon the floor, choking in the venom of mankind's own vision, he sees her in the water, eyes closed, for she is at home resting beneath the crashing waves, floating away back to her Pod, and wonders when everything had gone so wrong.