Seven Tears at High Tide (15 page)

Seventeen.

Kevin is lazing
about, eating his bowl of cereal slowly, when he realizes it's past the time Morgan usually stopped by. Maybe he should meet him at the beach.

Kevin puts on his wetsuit and grabs his surfboard; he whistles to himself as he takes the short walk to the shore.

A few joggers run past him, but other than that the beach is empty.

Kevin frowns, walking from the pier to the lifeguard tower to the cave, but Morgan is nowhere to be found.

“Morgan?” Kevin calls out, his voice carrying across the beach. “Morgan!”

He doubles back to the lifeguard tower and sees Sally putting on a layer of sunblock. “Hey, have you seen Morgan?”

“Haven't seen your boyfriend around, kiddo.”

Kevin frowns. “I'll come back tomorrow. Let me know if you see him today.”

“Would do, but I won't be here. Alex will be on duty, though. I'm starting classes tomorrow at Cuesta; fall quarter starts early, ugh. You guys at the high school aren't starting ‘till after Labor Day, right?”

“Wait a minute,” Kevin says, blinking. The summer is basically over… and he…

He didn't even realize.

“I have to go,” he mutters, running off.

What did Morgan say yesterday?

It's been a fantastic summer. Thank you for bringing me here. I've never done any of these things before, would have never gotten the chance if I hadn't met you.

Kevin stares at the pier ahead of him. How could he have forgotten? It was what he asked for when he shed those seven tears. He walks slowly, trying to remember the exact words and failing. Kevin was so happily distracted by Morgan, by falling slowly in love with him, that he forgot about the supernatural circumstances in which they met.

Kevin sets the surfboard down on the pier and breaks into a run; the memory comes back now as he races to the end. How could he have been so stupid as to ask only for one summer to be in love?

The tears come easily, fast and hot, tumbling down his face. Kevin hadn't believed it was possible; he made the wish on a whim, a memory of something his mother had once said—

Mom.

Maybe she knows something.

Kevin races back home, heart nearly pounding out of his chest. He flings open the door, bursts into the living room and sends papers flying.

“Kevin,” Rachel scolds, dropping the red pen in her mouth, grabbing for the papers.

“Mom, I need your help.”

She looks up, taking in his sweaty, disheveled appearance and panicked expression. The papers get pushed aside. “Are you okay? Come here, sit down. What's wrong?”

Kevin takes a deep breath, and somehow she knows without him saying anything.

“Ah, I see. You're usually out collecting rocks or surfing with Morgan this time of day. And now… you're not. Everything okay?”

Kevin shakes his head. “He's gone, Mom. I don't know—I think he was only here for the summer—”

“That's terrible. Want me to get us some ice cream? You look like you could use some.”

“No—no ice cream. I want to—um, can you, like, distract me? With a story?”

“A story?” She laughs. “Okay, what kind of story?”

“You told me one once about, um, seven tears at high tide? And granting wishes?”

“Thinking about wishing yourself a new boyfriend? Thought you were pretty dead set on this one.”

“No, no, um, just felt like hearing the story.” Kevin sits down at the counter and props his chin on his hands.

“Well,” Rachel says, taking off her glasses to regard him. She tucks a strand of brown hair behind her ear. “I remem­ber my grandmother telling me this one, when I visited her one summer. She grew up on the Orkney Islands, and I think as a kid I always thought the place was bleak, but as a teenager I appreciated how beautiful and lovely the landscape was, the way the sea—”

“Mom. The story.”

“Are you sure you're all right? I'm not sure this is the best dis­traction for you; these tales usually end quite sadly.”

“Please.”

“All right. How does it go… There was a lonely young woman whose friends had all married, and she was the only one of her age in the village who had not yet found a husband. There was no one she fancied at all, and she walked out to the shore at high tide, speaking of her sorrows, weeping into the sea. The seven tears that dropped into the water carried her yearning request to the heart of the sea, and then a seal came ashore and approached the woman, shed his skin and became a man.”

His mom's eyes have a faraway look, and Kevin knows she can be long-winded. “Yeah, and they get together and they're happy for a while, and then he goes back. What happens after?”

His mom blinks. “I think that's how the story ends. After her husband finds the sealskin she was keeping hidden, he returns to the sea, and she mourns his loss. Why would you ask me to tell you this if you keep interrupting me?”

“Sorry, I just—I forgot this part. She hides the pelt to keep him human, but are there any stories where, like, the human doesn't do that?”

“Not that I know of. Like I said, most of these end sadly. I can tell you another story, where my grandma was sure she had met a brownie—”

“No, that's not what I—” Kevin sighs. He's not sure what he's looking for in these stories.

“I think there might be one story where a man had a selkie wife and every seven years she would come back to shore?”

Seven
years.

Kevin steps away from the kitchen, shaking his head in dismay.

“Okay, maybe not that. Hmm, there's another one that also starts with seven tears at high tide—wait, that ends with them separated as well—wait, is that what you're looking for, a story where the two don't end up together, but it's comforting instead of sad?”

“What's going on?” His dad enters the room, glancing between them.

“Oh, Morgan moved away and Kevin wanted some stories to make him feel better—”

“Oh, you always loved the stories of the Monkey King when you were a kid,” Mike offers. “I think we still have the VHS tapes. I can go set that up and we can watch those together if you like!”

Kevin sighs. “Thanks, Dad, not really in the mood for adventure stories right now, though. I'm—I need to be alone now.”

Is there a rule about making more than one Request? None of the stories had mentioned that—and if they never said he couldn't. Maybe if he asked, Morgan could come back.

Kevin dashes out of the house, running for the ocean.

Kevin hopes fervently
it will work once more. The tears drop into the ocean below, and he counts carefully to seven, then steps back.

“I want Morgan back,” Kevin declares to the sea. “Please, if he wants to—if he wants to come back, I love him.”

Another wave passes by, crashing past the wooden support beams. Kevin stares miserably at the water, watching the next wave roll on by, and then he decides to sit down, his body slumping to the wooden planks in defeat. Kevin gives up and lies back, looking dejectedly at the sky. It's not even cloudy, but a bright cheery blue, another beautiful day that Kevin doesn't get to share with the one person he wants to be with most.

A minute goes by, and then another. Kevin doesn't even know how long he's been crying here, lying down at the end of the pier like an idiot.

“That much is true,” a voice says.

Kevin springs up and wipes his face, then turns to face the water. It's her—Morgan's mother. She's treading water, her pelt draped regally across her shoulders.

“Hello,” Kevin says, bowing his head. He tries to keep his lip from wobbling. “Um… you heard my, er…”

“Darling, you poured so much emotion into that cry it's still resonating across the Sea,” Linneth says.

“I love Morgan.” Kevin holds onto the pier's railing for support. He feels like an idiot; all those times Morgan told him how he felt, and he never said it back. Well, once, but Morgan deserved more, to hear it every day—

“I know you do.” The melodic lilt of her voice rises and falls in the same cadences as Morgan's, and Kevin is struck by a sudden pang of longing. “You asked the Sea for one summer, and you've had your summer to be in love.”

“I didn't know any of this was real then! Magic, shape-shifting seals, none of it!”

Linneth hums, narrowing her eyes at Kevin. “You love my son. If he were human, you would love him still?”

“Of course.”

“He was happier with you than I've ever seen him. Every night he would tell all his brothers and sisters stories of Above and his adventures with you.”

Kevin's grip on the wooden railing tightens.
Where is she going with this?

“Do you remember the beach where you met our family?”

Kevin nods.

“We don't plan to leave for the long swim south until tomorrow. You should come by. Approach quietly on foot. Around noontime today, some of us may shed our skins to walk in the sun on two legs. I have the feeling Morgan will want to spend time in his human form while he can.”

“What are you saying?”

“Take his pelt with you, and Morgan will be bound to you as a human as long as you keep it safe and hidden from him.”

“I can't just—steal him!”

“Others have been stolen before,” Linneth says softly. “By humans less honorable than you. The two of you would be happy, I think.”

And with that she slips away into the waves, and in the blink of an eye is a sleek seal, swimming away.

* * *

Kevin can't believe
he's here, that he borrowed the car to find a hidden beach he's seen only once before. He can't look it up on a map, but relies on memory and some quick calculation of how fast Morgan swam that day and how much time passed on the journey from the rookery to the beach.

Parking the car off the highway, Kevin slips through chaparral, hikes slowly down to the beach, hides in the shrubbery as he gets closer to the sand. He can see the selkies beached in the sun and lazing about in the shallow water. A few are in human form, most of them children: chubby toddlers running around on their little legs, giggling and laughing and falling over in the sand.

Kevin takes in a deep breath when he sees Morgan sitting on a rock, staring off into the distance.

The pelts are all lying on the rocks. Even if the rest weren't too small, Kevin would still be able to pick out Morgan's pelt by the distinct gray-spotted pattern.

He creeps up to the pelts unnoticed and brushes his fingers along the edge of Morgan's pelt. Kevin looks up at Morgan's figure. Even though Morgan has a sad expression, Kevin's heart swells with affection. In an instant, he knows:
I can't do this.

Kevin is ashamed of himself for even considering stealing Morgan's pelt. He made a promise that he would never try to keep Morgan for himself; he is going to keep it. He steps away from the pelts, slinks back into the shrubs and pauses to watch Morgan. If this is the last time he sees him, he wants to savor it, to memorize the angles of his profile, the curve of his jaw, the freckles on his back.

Kevin remembers what Morgan once said about love, about wanting that person to be happy. He knows forcing him to come back wouldn't be right. Whatever happens now, even if the rules of the Sea say they can never meet again and it was only for this one summer, Kevin knows he's still grateful to have known Morgan.

“Goodbye,” Kevin says quietly from his hiding place.

The drive back home is bittersweet.

Eighteen.

It's late in
the afternoon, and Naida and the day's hunting party have returned with the catch. But instead of joining the others in feasting on the fish, Linneth pulls Morgan aside.

“I know, I'm not going to go ashore,” Morgan says flatly. “I will honor the terms of the Request and try not to see him again.”

“I was wrong. If you want to see him, you should go see him to your heart's content and memorize what he looks like, before you forget. Today, of all days, I should not have kept you away from what you desire. If it is what you want—you should go see him. It is not against the rules so long as he doesn't see you.”

Morgan gasps, hardly believing her change in mood. “What?”

“You have a few hours before you will need to return. Go on.”

Morgan nuzzles against her quickly, and she harumphs fondly, pushing him toward the tide.

Morgan swims quickly, heart racing at the possibility of seeing Kevin again. The hour's travel passes quickly, and he soon arrives at the cove. He considers transforming and walking ashore, but that increases the chance of Kevin seeing him. Morgan doesn't want to incur the wrath of the Sea; this little town doesn't deserve a terrible storm because Morgan couldn't stay away.

Morgan thinks about where Kevin might be, and swims toward the pier where he met Kevin.

Sure enough, Kevin is sitting at the edge, watching the horizon with a melancholy look on his face. Morgan sighs happily, watching from the tide, but then realizes he'll be visible if Kevin is looking out to sea.

He isn't alone; a few fishermen stand off to the other side with their lines, waiting for a bite. Morgan dives and swims toward the pier, intending to watch Kevin from behind, and he swims past the fishing lines, taking care to avoid the hooks. But there are neither hooks nor bait at the end of these lines, only small weights to keep them in the water.

Something cold uncoils in Morgan's gut, and he resurfaces just in time to see the two fishermen leave their poles unattended and walk toward Kevin, then grab him roughly by the shoulders.

Morgan wants to transform, to scream in alarm, but that would mean revealing his presence to Kevin—but surely his safety is more important—

One of the men presses a small cloth to Kevin's mouth, and he struggles against their hold for a minute. Then Kevin's eyes close and he slumps forward.