Royce

I stood in the galley, dumbfounded. The legends, rumors, stories… We lived in a world full of magical beings, but there were some things people thought were long extinct. Unicorns for one, and merfolk being another. No one had seen one in ages, and here, I had one in my bunk.

Or maybe not. Maybe it was a coincidence that his hair was the same color red as the one that rescued me. Or maybe it was a man this whole time and I imagined the scales and fins. 

“You’re going to drive yourself into an aneurysm thinking like this.” I muttered to myself as I reheated the broth. I poured more into the cup and went back to my room. 

He was sitting up, which was a good sign. His hair was matted, and I noticed a couple of cuts on his torso, but they looked scabbed over. I handed over the cup and he nodded and raised the cup in gratitude.

“You’re welcome.” I walked three paces back to my desk and put my ass in the chair. I watched as he drank his second a bit slower this time. 

“Do you have a name?” He glanced at me but continued to drink. I wondered if he knew any English at all. “Nombre?” I asked. My Spanish was horrible, but that didn’t seem to spark any kind of recognition either.

“Royce,” I said as I pointed to myself. If that didn’t work, I could make up a name for him.

He nodded and patted his chest. “Troller.”

“Like line fishing?”

He looked at me with a blank expression. Yeah, this wasn’t going to be easy. I picked up my tablet that I used to keep track of the business and walked toward him. I pulled up a language app and realized that wasn’t going to work. I had no idea what his language was to begin with. I pulled up my e-reader instead and loaded several children’s books with read-along functionality. I moved over to him and held out my hand for the cup. I set it aside and set the tablet in his hands.

“Okay, let’s see what you can do with this.” I showed him the motions to turn pages, and sat with him as he went through the first book. He stopped on the letter P and looked at me. 

“Pants.” He pointed to what I wore, then pointed to himself. “Pants,” he repeated.

“Fuck, right. Maybe I can pilfer something from Pete’s locker. You’re about his size.” As I stood up, Troller didn’t stop me. Engrossed with the images from the book, he only glanced at me as I left the room.

When I came back from grabbing some of Pete’s clothes, Troller was animated. He pulled me through the door and excitedly pointed at things.

“Desk!” Troller pointed. “Pencil. Cup. Chair. Bed. Blanket. Book.” I nodded as he displayed how fast he learned new words.

“Shirt,” I said as I pulled the garment draped over my arm and tossed it at him. “Pants,” I said and tossed him those. 

He caught the items, and looked them over. “Shirt. Pants.” He repeated. He looked at me as he stood there naked holding the items. 

It dawned on me that he probably knew what they were but if he was a merfolk, he would have no idea how to wear them. I thanked myself for grabbing sweat pants instead of a pair of Pete’s jeans. 

He didn’t shy away from me as I moved toward him, he offered me the clothes. I took the shirt, bunched it up, then pulled it over his head. I helped guide one arm through a sleeve, then repeated it with the other. He smiled as he looked at what he wore. The t-shirt had a band logo on it. It wasn’t fancy, but hugged his chest like a second skin and highlighted the fact that he didn’t have pants. 

I cleared my throat as I picked up the sweatpants from where they had dropped, crouched down and bunched up the legs. I reached for his calf and he instinctively put his hand on my shoulder. I put one foot through, then repeated the same motion with the other. I grabbed the elastic of the waistband and pulled them up his legs, moved it a bit so that I wouldn’t brush up against his groin too much, then pulled them to his waist. I pulled the strings and he grasped my forearms as I cinched and tied the pants so they wouldn’t fall off of him. 

“Thanks.” Troller said, in a quiet tenor voice that made me smile. 

“You’re welcome.”

He slowly let go of my arms. After holding him most of the night, I hadn’t realized how much I wanted to touch him again. I turned and picked up the device and handed it back to him. He took it and curled up on the bed, legs tucked to the side, and bowed his head in concentration. I listened for a moment as he heard the words and he repeated them back to the device.

I took the cup and went back to the galley to make myself some coffee, then check the boat to see if there was any damage from last night’s storm. I probably had a goofy grin on my face the whole time, but it was tempered with thoughts of wondering where Troller had come from and why he had shown up now, almost a year after he’d rescued me. If it was in fact the same merman that rescued me the night I almost died. I had no way of knowing until we figured out how to communicate in more than one word sentences.