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“You look pale,” was the first comment Jisung made when they finally arrived at the entrance of his home, a well decorated cave just a few thousand meters above the Mariana Trench. The man practically dragged Minho to move further inside, couldn’t wait to show where he actually belonged. Not the seashore, never the shallow waters. He only truly lived his life when his body was covered in the pressure of the ocean depth. His free hand blindly reached the ceiling until he found the “switch”. One, two, three small bulbs did so little to light the whole cave, but at least Jisung could still watch his special visitor’s expression. “Cool, right? There’s obviously no electricity down here, but I managed to catch some anglers. They make the most beautiful night lights.”
“Kind of a substitute if you miss the stars but get too lazy to go to the surface, too.”
Jisung nodded, happily agreed with Minho. “I need to fetch at least a hundred more to make them look exactly like stars, though. And stars don't need feeding, these ones do. It’s the least I can do to keep their lights on.”
Minho hummed. His eyes raked over Jisung's body, taking a nice look at his aquamarine-silverish tail that couldn’t stop moving completely, always at least doing a small twitch. It was not the first time he saw Jisung in his original form— the mermaid transformed a handful of times when the beach was closed due to bad weather, and Minho was there to witness it. Still, he was mesmerized every time he saw the scales that went up to Jisung's tiny waist and glistened under the moonlight.
“Do they bite?” Minho then asked, he intrusively brought his hand closer to one of the fishes’ faces. Jisung almost shrieked with how reckless his boyfriend was, but he quickly swallowed his words once he saw the fishes didn’t seem to mind. They didn’t even pay attention to Minho, only eyed Jisung occasionally. Not even once snapped their teeth or grumbled, too. A small, healthy jealousy bloomed in Jisung’s heart, because they immediately liked Minho from the first glance when it took him three whole months to finally tame them. The positive side: it was nice to know Minho was never a threat to anyone, even to the deep sea monsters. It’s clear now he’s the one for him, maybe that’s why he couldn’t resist the urge to bring Minho to visit his own home.
“As much as I like your home with the cats and tons of food, I still miss my home, even though there’s literally nothing here,” Jisung said. His and Minho’s home were really the opposite. While Minho’s had bright-colored walls with laughter filled the entire house almost every day, Jisung’s home was cold and quiet considering it was thousand meters under sea levels. “I loved my feet, I loved the way the sand feels against my soles. Hell, I even loved that one afternoon when we were rushing to your house and I accidentally stepped on a huge shell. But I missed my tail. I missed the damp, heavy atmosphere when I breathed. I love being in the land with you, but I feel like I slowly lost who I truly am.”
Minho's expression saddened. “Oh, sweetheart. I’m sorry I made you feel that way.”
Jisung shook his head. “Don’t be. I’d never blame you for that. I still choose you over everything, it’s just… It’s hard to be in love with someone from a completely different world, you know. In our case, with you being a human and I’m a mermaid.”
The silence settled, louder than it ever had. Jisung just wanted to bask in the moment he finally had, coming back home with his lover by his side. He opted to lay on the ground facing the anglers on the ceiling, Minho followed afterwards. He reached Minho’s palm, missing his warmth already. When coldness was what he’s got instead, he frowned and looked up to Minho. Even with the dim lighting, he could see Minho was laying on his side facing Jisung, his smile greeted him. “What’s wrong?” Minho asked. The softness of his tone suddenly didn’t calm him down anymore. Something felt wrong, but Minho didn’t seem to mind. Hell, he didn’t even look like he realized it.
“Your hand’s cold,” Jisung said instead. He changed his position so their bodies finally faced each other, then moved closer and slung his arms around Minho’s waist. Minho wrapped his own arms around Jisung’s body in turn. His body was cold as well. “You’re cold.”
Minho chuckled. “Of course I am. I’ll get more and more colder as the time passes, sweetheart.”
Jisung’s head that was previously buried in Minho’s chest, pulled back until he could see his face clearly. “What do you mean? You always run hot, though.”
“Only if I’m on the land,” He corrected. “Human bodies react pretty differently in the ocean.”
The frown on Jisung’s forehead deepened. “Elaborate, please? Humans seem to have too many rules when it comes to their bodies.”
“Exactly,” Minho laughed. He then ran his fingers through Jisung’s hair, making Jisung had no choice but to close his eyes and settled back to the human's chest with the gentle gesture he provided. “Mermaids can breathe in both conditions, right? Air and water. But humans can only breathe normally in air.”
“And why is that?”
“We have different respiratory systems. You see, this slits on your neck and on the back of your ears—,” He traced the skin carefully. “—is your gills. It’s what makes you breathe in the water. Humans don’t have them. I don’t have them. We only have lungs to breathe air.”
Jisung hummed. He still looked unconvinced. “But I saw humans pass my place a few years ago! They looked like they’re doing just fine, no?”
“What were they wearing?”
“Uh… full-black skin-tight clothes, googles, this straw thingy that formed cute bubbles, and they had these weird, long backpacks. Oh, oh, and they had these reaaally weird looking fins on their feet. It was almost like your kind tries to copy the blue tangs.”
Minho giggled with the silly but detailed descriptions Jisung gave. “They were professional divers, maybe to study the sea creatures. All the equipment they had on their bodies were necessary to keep them alive. The weird backpacks were tanks for air supplies, which were connected to their respirators. Even the blue tang-wannabe fins on their feet had their own purpose, too. Humans really can’t live in the water completely bare. The water pressure will crush us to death.”
Jisung huffed. “Totally wrong. You can. You, in fact, are here with me, and we’re just twenty minutes away from The Trench!”
Minho’s voice grew distant as he spoke. “I really can’t.”
Jisung’s eyebrows furrowed the nth times that day, this time really annoyed. “You absolutely ca—” He tried to pull himself back from Minho’s chest, but the arms around his body tightened, as if he wouldn’t let Jisung move an inch from his now colder body. Maybe he was just imagining it. “Minho? What’s going on?”
“I can’t live in the water, sweetheart. Let alone going to The Trench, the water already filled my lungs when we passed those beautiful coral reefs. My body might have drowned somewhere not far from there by now.”
What?
“What?”
“You heard me.” Minho’s voice was muffled against Jisung’s hair, sounded broken enough for Jisung to burst into tears.
No, no, no. This is not happening. This is a dream, a nightmare he didn’t need. He should’ve woken up by now, dragged into his feet by Minho who was already awake since dawn. Then they had their breakfast together, Minho with his peanut butter toast and him with his seaweed soup—
“I no longer exist, Jisungie. But I’m really, really grateful you are the last person I saw before I took my last breath.”
“Why didn’t you—,” Jisung hiccuped. His tears kept forming rapidly, but disappeared as they mixed with the water. He tried his best to pull himself from Minho, but the human didn’t seem to budge. It was suffocating to question himself whether he went absolutely insane with the strong arms he felt surrounding him. “Why didn’t you tell me to stop?! Why, why did you just do nothing and let me do something we both don’t want to happen?! Our original plan was just swimming, I— even though I did ask you to come, you could say no and I wouldn’t force anything on you! You knew that!”
“But I really wanted to see your home, though,” was what Minho told him. “If I say no, I wouldn’t get to see those anglers with my own eyes for the rest of my life. Your home is really quiet, too. I like it here. It makes my mind finally stop being too loud.”
Jisung was speechless. He couldn’t say a thing anymore, only let his tears added to the weight of the ocean. His grips on Minho’s clothes tightened, as though he would come back to life if he held onto him strong enough. The fingers combed his hair still there, even though it’s getting colder by each stroke. “I love you. I love you so, so much, I’m so sorry I’m the cause of your death and you should’ve never, ever deserve someone like me and I shouldn’t have come to you that night we met—”
“None of that, sweetheart,” He shushed softly. His voice started to sound like a forbidden lullaby. “I love you too, so much. I know I deserve you, and you deserve me too. Anything that happened today won’t make me regret meeting you in the first place. I love loving you so much that if I had to die in the process, I’m glad it’s for you.”
Jisung’s cries intensified. He promptly smacked Minho without using even a little bit of strength. He didn’t have any left. “I hate you so much.”
“No, you don’t.” With that tone, he knew Minho was smiling. Grinning, probably. “Sleep, Jisungie. You’ll be fine once you awake. I need you in my arms for the rest of my life.”
“...even though I did ask you to come, you could say no and I wouldn’t force anything on you! You knew that!”
Oh, trust Minho, he had known his Jisung would never do that. But Jisung had been the only one who didn't know one thing about his kind. The one that could've been seen only by the human. The way Jisung's eyes had changed into something way more feral when he had mentioned his home. Even though he was indeed an otherworldly creature, his kind was the closest to human in every aspect, even when he was in his original form. But the second someone, or even himself, mentioned his home, he looked inhuman. He was nothing Minho had ever experienced before, he's not him, and Minho couldn’t act like he wasn't scared at all with his unusual behaviour. Not like it would change his heart a little bit— he loved him too much. But he tried his best to not go anywhere near the topic; he could count with only one hand.
The morning they spent that day was just like any other day. Minho had needed to cool off in the water, because apparently, summer was not for his originally warm body. He and Jisung had decided to swim a little bit further to the offshore, just because the waves were calm enough. And maybe because Minho loved seeing Jisung played happily in the water deep enough that his tail wouldn’t touch the bar. The scene was so endearing Minho couldn’t help but ask him unconsciously, “Does this feel like going back home?”
Jisung’s head had snapped so fast at his words. His eyes did the thing again. Pupils widened, something had changed but Minho couldn’t register what was changing. He just felt it. If Jisung were human, Minho would have zero doubt bringing him to the nearest exorcist. But Jisung wasn’t. Even in his human form, he would never be a real one.
“Home?” His voice was tight, as if something had wrapped around his neck and pulled hard. His body went rigid, even his own tail had completely stopped moving.
Minho had swallowed. His own throat felt like it was closing. He had known he should’ve changed the topic, but instead— “Yeah. Do you miss your home?”
Danger, his body had told him. When Jisung’s uncanny eyes had started to bore into his own, his tail had started to swish underwater again, this time to get himself closer to Minho. Before Minho could bring himself to stop him, Jisung was right in front of his face. His palms had closed on both of Minho's shoulders, bringing them chest to chest. This close, he could feel Jisung’s heart beating too fast, as if he had just ran a thousand miles. He didn’t know if it was natural for mermaids, or was it only in… particular conditions.
“I do miss my home. Do you want to come into my home?”
The question had Minho stop breathing for a second. Was Jisung being serious, or was it because he was in his hypnotized state right now?
You clearly know the answer, stupid, the other part inside of him had scolded. You’re just considering his offer because you want to know his world as well as he knows yours.
He looked away from the mermaid, but hadn't made any move to get away from Jisung. “I can’t.”
“Why not?” There’s a slight hurt in his voice. Shit. Jisung had never asked anything before, he always dropped out of the trance a few seconds later. Was it because Minho had always quickly diverted him into another topic without responding? But what was that tone? Was he partially conscious and actually wanted to introduce him to his own world? Minho really needed to stop him before he got lured by Jisung’s unconsciously-made scheme. He— “Do you not want to see my home by yourself?”
His mouth had opened without him thinking first. “I do, I really do, I just—”
But Jisung, his ever so precious, instinct-driven Jisung, grinned happily. The palms on his shoulders had felt more and more heavier as he said, “Then let’s go!” and pushed him down into the water.
Minho had panicked. He had tried to push himself away from Jisung, but his grips only got tightened the more he did. He hadn’t got the chance to take a proper breath, and the water pressure was not helping at all. He had started to lose his consciousness with every meter they reached, and Jisung didn’t seem to regain his own within minutes either.
Maybe this is it, he had thought. Died by the hand of my lover. Not bad, nice scenery.
If his lungs hadn't been full of water by now, he would have laughed at his own lame joke. His blurry vision then caught on something colorful. Ah, at least I finally saw the coral reefs with you. Consider this my own way to get me into knowing your world, yeah?