Secrets

A week passed by,then two, and Xander still hadn't spoken to Cleo about the merpeople stuff. He was completely caught up in his work.

He was bouncing between all of his jobs, like finishing commissions and sorting out shipping as per usual but there was so much to do because of his move. Between sorting out his address change with his suppliers and finishing his last batch of packages to be sent off he was completely swamped.

Collapsing onto his hotel bed he let out a sigh of exhaustion. He was so busy the past two days he couldn't really devote time to thinking about coming out to Cleo. Again.

But in a moment of freedom his brain began to race again with possible scenarios. He only had three options as far as he could tell.

One, just come straight out and tell her. Which could lead to a flurry of questions he didn't want to deal with.

Two, calmly have a conversation. Which on paper sounds viable but could get uncomfortable.

Or Three, don't tell her and let the problem get bigger. Something he wasn't about to let happen.

He took out his phone and texted Cleo for a meet-up, a sleepover with stupid animated movies and hot chocolate. They had to talk and the easiest way that was going to happen was if she was comfortable and relaxed.

With that out of the way he could focus on finishing his work. Hopefully the night would go off without anything too serious happening, but with the ring of his phone Xander quickly put it to the back of his mind as he found more issues to iron out.

It wasn't until later that evening that he remembered his plans with Cleo. He was sweaty from running around all day and was not in the frame of mind to deal with having a bath with a tail. He decided to just have one at her place. He grabbed a bag and threw in some snacks and his PJ's as he made a beeline for the door and out of his building.

By the time he got to Cleo's he was even more a sweaty mess. As soon as she opened the door he barrelled through it and asked as politely as possible in his exhausted state to use her bathroom to freshen up.

Cleo waved him through in dazed confusion, the Xander she remembered wouldn't be caught dead looking unprofessional in company, but then again they were ten the last time she saw him. It was strange for him to lose track of time too. Maybe he had just grown out of old habits.

Shrugging it off she went back to the kitchen where she was meticulously making sure that nothing got burned. Again.

A bath, and a fight with a hairdryer later Xander was in PJ's and sitting on Cleo's couch, munching on popcorn before they started their movie.

Cleo popped her head around the wall of the living room.

"So! Hot cocoa with tons of mini marshmallows, the good brownies and-" she narrowed her eyes at Xander's bowl. "More popcorn -_-?"

Xander smiled sheepishly. "Right on the money cuz."

She walked off to get everything and whilst she was knocking around in the kitchen Xander had time to form a plan of attack.

First, watch a really sappy movie to get her in the feels and then when she's all mellowed out he'll tell her calmly.

"So." Cleo said as she placed the tray carefully on the coffee table. "What movie are we watching?"

"I was thinking UP? It's really good."

"Isn't that a but sappy though? What about SharkTail? Way more fun."

That was not in the plan. He needed Cleo sappy right now, not all happy and giddy.

"Or we could watch the Wolf Children? It's a movie I wanted to check out, but I didn't have time because I was working."

Cleo frowned a bit.

"If we're going to watch anime movies what about Ponyo first? Then we can watch Wolf Children."

Xander relented, that was pretty feelsy and he didn't want to continue arguing with Cleo over something so redundant. Plus they were wasting time arguing when they could be eating and enjoying each other's company.

•••

Towards the ending of the movie the both of them were in tears. The film was just too beautiful and they found themselves hugging each other with silent tears running down their faces.

Xander soon had to pull himself together as the nerves got to him about finally telling Cleo about his tail. This was going to be a mess. Xander kneaded his temples. This was to much and he had to stop monologues in his head before he over thought everything.

He turned to Cleo.

"Cuz? I have something to tell you."

"Mmhm?" She turned to him eyes red and puffy from wiping them too hard.

"I don't want to mes-mes-mess around wi-wi-wi. Ungh!" He breathed heavily through his nose for a few seconds to stop the stuttering.

He hated how it crept up on him when his guard was down. It made him feel weak again. He had to restart, this time more slowly, enunciating his words.

"I don't want to mess around with the truth too much so I'm just going to say it. I'm a merman. I have the tail and everything else to boot.

Cleo's sympathetic face, turned to realisation.

"And the only reason I'm even comfortable to tell you this is because I know you're a mermaid too." He hesitantly finished, finally meeting Cleo's gaze.

She sat there with a dazed expression on her face. This was way too much for her to process all at once. She'd known Xander for all of their lives, when he left it tore her ten year old heart apart. This was just…

"How ? Well I know how but I don't know how. When did you change? Was it when you were in America? South America? Aisa? We have to tell everyone now. Lewis will want to check you out when he gets back. We've never met a merman before. This super crazy Xan-"

"Cleo! I know its a bit crazy and I will explain I just have to know if you're mad." He anxiously ducked his head.

"Why would I be mad you big idiot? If there's a secret worth keeping from me then this is it." She smiled shaking his shoulder

Xander let out a sigh of relief.

"I thought you'd be mad because Rikki found out first."

"What! How?" She was definitely mad.

"She sort of… sensed(?) me? The same way I sensed that you guys were mermaids. I guess she's just a bit more… connected(?) to her senses than you are." He stated uncertainty."But I wouldn't worry about it, I wasn't able to sense other merpeople until I was, like, fourteen? Fifteen? "

So that just puzzled Cleo even more. How was that this was just a thing Rikki could do? Did it have anything to do with her connection to Mako? And there were more merpeople out there! How many? A decent amount it looked like.

She started to pull together a plan of action. This was going to take a lot of investigation if it was going to go where Cleo wanted it to.

"Okay. First, you have to tell everyone, not just me and Rikki. We don't keep secrets from each other least of all one this big. Secondly, Lewis and I will definitely be doing some tests to see exactly what differences there are between us. And last but certainly not least, you are going to tell us more about these other merpeople.

We always thought we were the only ones until Bella showed up, and she hasn't seen or heard of other mermaids either."

Xander perked up immediately. This was great! Cleo wasn't mad at him and there wasn't anything to hide from her anymore. He sobered quickly though, Cleo needed to know about the other merpeople.

"Umm… Cleo there's something you need to know about the other merpeople. 1) they are nothing like us and 2) they are very territorial. I'm surprised you haven't met any yet seeing as you live near a mermaid hub." He motioned in the vague direction of Mako.

"What do you mean 'nothing like us'?"

"Well they were born into this. They weren't changed like us. They don't know much else about humans other than what we do to their home, which to be fair isn't that good.

"I've only met one pod that actually integrated into humanity and that was out of necessity more than want."

"So I shouldn't get my hopes up in that regard. Finally knowing that there are more people like us out there but we can't meet them. It's a bit annoying."

Cleo shook off those thoughts though, for another time.

Right now Xander was her main focus.

"Putting that aside, I still don't know now her main focus was Tristan.

"Anyway!" She stated changing the subject. "There is something we could look at in the meantime. What's your power?" He looked confused. "You know, the one that gives you power over water, all of us have one."

"Oooooh. I have two? I guess? It's better if I just showed you."

He stood there confused about how to go about this for a second but he quickly caught on.

"Oookay, you should probably step back." He said that repositioning himself in the room."

She took a step back.

"More."

She was out of the living room.

"A little more?"

She was on the staircase leading upstairs and now thoroughly confused.

"Remind me again where Kim and Uncle S are?" He said shifting the coffee table.

"Kim's at a friend's and Dad is out with Sam- what are you doing?" She was completely lost when he started plugging out the TV.

"Don't worry you'll see. I wish we could've done this outside but you live and you learn I guess." He mused flipping off the lights

She could only make out his faint outline through the darkness of the living room when she heard him mutter something and start rubbing his hands together.

As he pulled them apart arcs of blue electricity started to grow between them. She held her breath as he slowly moved his hands until they were the length of his wingspan, the light from the electricity casting a blue glow across the room as the electricity jumped back and forth between his hands as if it were dancing, or alive.

His hair had loosened and was now on end because of the charge in the air and Cleo could feel her arms begin to prickle in kind. The house was beginning to smell like ozone and Cleo began to worry about something catching alight.

Xander slowly brought his hands back together sufficiently killing the electricity, but the room still hummed with the static in the air.

"Yeah we're definitely telling the others about this. This is crazy, the only other mermaid we met was Bella and she found us by accident. We're going to have to take samples, run drills…" Cleo quickly realised she going through all of this without asking Xander if he was even okay with any of this. "Uh… Are you okay with all this? I think I might be going too fast. It's just a bit strange for me. I'm so used to seeing you one way and now we share something really special. It's… nice."

Xander smiled. He honestly didn't care about testing, it sounded fun. He was just glad that she got it, the need to hide something so personal.

"You wanting to find out more about me is the least of my worries right now. I'm just glad we're still good, y'know?" He shrugged it off. "And anyway, we have brownies to finish and movies to watch, we can figure this out tomorrow."

They soon settled back to watching movies and chatting away, but there was a better sense of closeness that wasn't there before.