Two Different Worlds (Re-Write) - A Hermitcraft Mermaid AU

Chapter 4 - Not Exactly As Planned

"Dooooc!" I whine, pouting at him, but he only smiles.

"Puppy eyes don't work on me anymore Grian, you'll need to find something else to try and convince me with."

Then he leaves, and I groan loudly into my blanket.

This is stupid! I said I'm fine, Impulse said I'm fine, so why can't he let me out? He's so overprotective of me sometimes because I'm the youngest, it isn't fair! I'll die of boredom if I don't get up eventually, so the one time I can actually leave would be when everyone is asleep.

I didn't want to resort to this, but I guess the only thing I can do is sneak out.

Scar's POV

"Just walk up to the little window, look through, walk back, and you never have to go near the boat again." I mumble to myself, pacing back and frowned while trying to settle my fear... and excitement.

I was all for the 'sneak out' plan, until it came to actually carrying it out. Now I'm standing on the beach, in the middle of the night, trying to gather the courage to just go up to those little round windows on the side of the boat.

When I hear someone walking over, I immediately bail, hiding behind a rock and holding my breath. This was such a bad idea, now a human's gonna find me and their gonna take me away and steal my scales and-

"Please tell me I'm not going crazy..."

A soft voice interrupts my thoughts, and scares the crap outta me at the same time. I hear a sigh, and peek over the rock a little. Coincidentally enough, it's the blonde...Grian. He's sitting at the edge of the water, knees pulled close to his chest.

"Nobody else was there, nobody 'saved you', you just hit your head too hard on a rock."

I try to get a little closer, now intrigued. I should just leave, I know he's ok now. But the fact that he remembers me saving him makes me want to hear more.

But before I can hear more, I sneeze.

Grian turns his head, and his eyes meet mine. Both of us look equally shocked, before he recognises me.

"It... it's you. You're the person who saved me, aren't you?"

I feel my cheeks go red, and I nod. He stands up, walking a little closer to me. Then, unexpectedly, he smiles.

"I knew you were real."

I nod again, standing up too. I can barely gather my own thoughts, but pull together enough words to make a sentence.

"I-I'm Scar."

"Grian." Grian tells me, smiling again and holding out a hand. I'm not really sure what he means by that, so I copy him, holding my hand out too. He looks a little confused, then takes my hand in his, moving his arm up and down a little.

The look of bewilderment on my face makes him laugh.

"I take it you don't have handshakes here...?"

I shake my head. Then Grian frowns.

"You don't live here do you? I really hope we haven't settled on someone else's island."

This would be such a perfect opportunity to say yes. To make him and his ship go away and never come back. That's what Xisuma would want me to do.

But it's not what I want to do.

"No, it's fine. I live... around here." I tell him, still not sure when to let go of his hand. I look down at it, and he does too, going a little red before pulling it away.

"Well that's good... we might be here for a few weeks, maybe even a few months."

Oh no. I might have made the wrong choice.

"But hopefully I'll see you around here! I can't thank you enough for saving me, the least I can do is get to know you."

I find myself smiling and nodding and saying yes, and I really get what Ezra means when he tells me I lead with my heart too much instead of my head. My worry about him and the ship being here kind of disappears as I stare at him, in an almost comforting way.

"...I need to go though, can I see you tomorrow? I'd love to actually have a conversation with you.

"Yeah, of course!"

Grian beams, then he looks like he remembers something.

"But would the same time as now be ok? I'm not exactly supposed to be here..."

"Oh, don't worry, I shouldn't be here either." I blurt, the two of us laughing a little.

"Perfect! I guess I'll see you then! And thank you again for saving me."

"It's ok, but thank you." I respond, as Grian shakes my hand again. I yet again hold on to his hand for too long, and the two of us go red this time before he says a quick 'bye' and leaves.

And for a few minutes, I stand there in absolute shock. I know I don't think rationally when I panic, but what on earth was that? Not only did I speak to a human, but I agreed to meet up with him again.

What have I just done?

And so they meet. The bit where they actually spoke took forever. I rewrote it 3 times, almost decided to put it off until tomorrow (I am not going down that rabbit hole again) tried doing a perspective change, and I'm still not happy with it. It's so weird and rushed and I didn't know how to go about doing it.

Maybe I'll read back on it in a year and decide to re-rewrite it, who knows  /j

- Xan