Catch & Release
“When the moon rose... and a mermaid gleamed among the rocks.” ―Hermann Hesse
“You must know, my own love, that in each element there exists a race of beings, whose form scarcely differs from yours, but who very seldom appear to mortal sight… you now see before you, my love, an Undine.” ― Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué, Undine, The Water Sprite (1811)
She loves the sea more, he thought, watching her stroke the bracelet on her left forearm, what she called her ‘heart-arm.’ The wide cuff—its oval of blue-shaded ivory mounted atop the metal—depicted a mermaid resting on surf-pounded rocks, admiring a jewel in her hand. The shape of shells, moonstones aglow, and other faceted stones formed the frame for the lovely sea-maiden. She had told him it was a ‘father-gift’ for her coming of age.
Holding her arm as they descended from the rocks into the flat shallows, he felt the tremor, a cascade prickling of her flesh at the touch of seawater as they waded beyond knee-deep. His arm now around her waist; he felt her breathe and her arms reached for the horizon. Water as far as he could see.
As a sailor, he’d crossed that ocean six times. He knew its allure and wondered at the beauty in depths he’d never know. Each night, he’d seen in her eyes that she knew what he did not as she scanned the moonbeam-lit movement of water during their walks on the beach. The shimmering orbs on her bracelet with their pale lunar-caught light. A luster that grew when she touched them with a saltwater-dampened finger.
She had never asked, but the never-ending longing in her eyes told him he must let her go. It’s time. Her glance with a trembling smile and questioning look forced him to smile back and nod, though it broke his heart.
Chin thrust out toward the sea and arm heavy as he withdrew it from her; he already missed the warm satin texture of her firm, tanned torso and the press of pink-coral-tipped breasts against his chest. She turned to kiss him, a bittersweet lingering of salt-rimmed lips.
As she transformed, the long, lovely legs she had never gotten used to scaled and fused to end in the broad fan that would now push her through the waves. She sank into the water and was gone.
He backed toward the rocks, eyes seaward, searching and hoping. She broached—her back to the incoming surf—a last time as he stood with seafoam washing over his feet. The arc of her muscular back, arms crossed over still human breasts... the thrust of the neck, head pitched back, long, now dark-henna hair cascading behind her. The feathered crest of breakers framed her as she surfaced in a spray of moon-caught drops. It took his breath away.
What was love but to return what she wanted most to her? He swallowed and wiped tears from black-stubbled cheeks.
She pushed off into the trough and was soon out of sight. He waited at the jetty’s edge until the moon set and night became an empty darkness that even dawn would not fill or lighten. While she was with him, they loved with the tide’s certainty and power. His heart had followed hers and it would never beat the same way again.
As the sun rose behind him, he trudged the path to the broader beach, then through the sand to the dune-buried lower wooden steps that climbed toward the boardwalk.
He passed two men, not locals, judging by the newness of rods and the amount of tackle for surf fishing. With a qualm, he prayed she was far from the shore by now. But he knew she must be and now danced among coral reefs and rode the currents that caressed the shoals of this length of land as they swirled and became one with the ocean’s stream.
One man slowed and stopped. “Hey, buddy, it’s catch and release here. Right?”
He nodded and kept moving. Though close to home, it would be a long—hard—walk.
* * *
He had not slept in two days and walked the beach at night. Near the breakwater, he saw something roiling the surface inside the bay’s narrow mouth. Dolphin, he thought. Then heard laughter peal over the water. He climbed over the surf-slick jumble of stone, following the sound to the edge of the shallows. And there she was.
Her eyes trapped the moon and seemed almost as large. Drops of seawater glinted on her breasts as they fell and rose. She raised herself, and he watched as her legs re-formed. His breathing and heartbeat matched hers as he took her in his arms. “I’ve watched for you.” He lifted and carried her over the rocks to a slender stretch of sand.
She brushed hair from his eyes, her fingers following the line of his cheek and jaw to rest a finger on his chin. “I brought you something.” She reached into the pouch at her side.
A cuff bracelet, similar to the new one she wore, but simpler. Its burnished dark red metal gleamed in the moonlight. She slipped it over his left wrist, her hand caressed his arm, leaving tingling behind.
He looked down and saw the engraving etched in the thick metal and filled with mother-of-pearl that pulsed in an iridescent rhythm. The question in his eyes. “It’s the Tide’s Vow,” she explained. She took his hand and placed it over her heart. “A life-partner bond.”
On their arms, the bracelets shimmered with a crimson umber luminescence that steadied and found its pattern following the murmur of surf and their beating hearts.
Her eyes glistened, but not from the runnels of seawater trickling from the foamy thickness of hair down her face as she looked up at him. Those lips that tasted of the ocean’s deep told him that though she loved the sea, she’d come to him every night on the tide.
And he would never be alone.
The original image I wrote from:
EVERY PICTURE TELLS A STORY