A Secret Language of Seashells and Glass

by lucidscreamer

Shipwrecked after his uncle tried to kill him, Yami finds himself alone on a deserted island. But he may not be as alone as he thinks, as mysterious messages appear on the beach along with gifts and food. Yami slowly falls in love with his secret admirer through the language they create together, a language of seashells and glass. Mermaid AU (Not a fusion or xover.)

12. Chapter 12

(12)

Yami's not yet the guy who talks to coconuts, but maybe he's losing his mind, anyway.

Things are beaching themselves daily.

"Dolphin" sightings abound, but there's something subtly... off about them.

And now, there's this snowglobe.

When he lifts it, the glitter inside swirls in a blizzard of sparkles. As it settles, he sees that the globe holds a fantastic tropical reef. At the center, two sleek dolphins -one light, one dark- arc around one another, a yin-yang symbol suspended in mid-water.

Suddenly, his crazy musings seem almost plausible.

Maybe his friend's not the dolphin, but the sea-god astride it?

o0o

Life here is dream-like, surreal as time measured in sun's heat and the slow wheel of the Milky Way. Yami's sea-god, a fantasm, feels more real than reality, even as he remains an unseen fancy. Unseen, but not unlooked for; despite his best efforts, Yami's eyes return again and again to the turquoise lagoon, to the deeper blue of the sea beyond, seeking some hint of fin or fluke. "Strange" has become commonplace; given time, he'll breakfast with impossibilities. Now, Yami unwinds a long strand of purple linen cord -woven through pierced shells and metal grommets and looped around interesting bits of glass or stone- from his wrist and knots the ends to form a loop. Even as his face heats with a flush at his foolishness, his heart drums a fantasia of strange hope, ignoring all the rules... and he sets the new-formed necklace atop the cairn of rocks he'd found on the shore, an offering on the altar of his folly.