“Come on, Sunshine. Why the hell not?” Brian pleaded with a look that, on anyone else, would be considered to be a pout. “We’re in Hawaii on our fucking honeymoon for fuck’s sake. How can you justify coming all the way to Hawaii and not go swimming? I know you’re a great swimmer, so why are you so afraid of the ocean?”

“I’m not afraid of the ocean, I just don’t like it. And I’d be happy to go swimming with you, Brian . . . in the nice, clean, well-maintained swimming pool that’s conveniently placed right outside our villa,” Justin maintained, shrugging off the large hand on his shoulder that was trying to propel him towards the moonlit waters of the open lagoon.

“But, Justin . . .” Brian’s exasperation was evident from the fed up edge in his voice. “It’s gorgeous out here tonight. The water looks so inviting. If anyone would want to go for a ridiculously romantic moonlight swim with their handsome newlywed husband, I would think it would be you, Sunshine.” When the boy still stood there with his arms crossed stubbornly, Brian decided to try a different approach. “Isn’t there anything I can do to tempt you?” Brian’s fingertip tickled down the pale ivory chest of his partner, until it trailed over the front of the younger man’s tight swim shorts.

“How about you come back to the room with me and I’LL tempt YOU, Stud,” Justin countered, grabbing the wandering finger and pulling it up so that he could suck on it with his lusciously full lips.

“Tempting . . . very tempting,” Brian conceded, enjoying the way the hot, wet, suction on his digit somehow connected directly to the jolts of arousal stirring his already hard dick. “But I had this fantasy where I would fuck you in the water . . . like two horny, sex-starved dolphins . . .” He pulled his hand free from the boy’s mouth and grabbed onto the smaller shoulders instead, trying to guide him closer to the water.

“Did you know that dolphins are the only mammals other than humans that have sex purely for pleasure? All other mammals do it solely for purposes of procreation or to assert their dominance,” Justin went into full-on PSA mode, apparently hoping to distract Brian, who was still pulling the smaller man step-by-step across the expanse of sparkling sand towards the gently lapping water at the edge of the lagoon.

“Exactly why I want to go play porpoise, Sunshine. So, come on already,” Brian cajoled even as he continued to tug at the intransigent blond.

“No, Brian. I really, REALLY, do not intend to swim in the ocean.” Justin literally dug his heels into the sand to stop Brian’s progress. “If you want to play dolphin, we can do it in the pool. Otherwise, just forget it. I’m not going in there and that’s final!”

Brian could tell from the stubborn set to his Sunshine’s chin that this was not an argument he was going to win . . . at least not that night. He wasn’t going to give up on his gay ‘From Here To Eternity’ beach fantasy, but he wasn’t really in the mood to argue about it either. Tonight, he just really wanted to enjoy the fact that he’d finally convinced his wayward artist to come home from NYC and follow through on their plans to get married. Tonight was all about ‘consummating’ their marriage - again and again and again, if Brian had any say in the matter. So he figured he could give in on the naked lagoon swim idea for the time being. And they DID have the pool all to themselves, so there could still be some skinny dipping. He supposed that as long as he got into his new husband’s hot, tight little ass somewhere that involved water, it would still be enjoyable.

“Fine. You win, Sunshine. Let’s go play dolphin in the pool and you can show me how long you can hold your breath underwater!” Brian teased, happy to see the return of the Sunshine Smile.

“I promise, you won’t be disappointed, Stud,” Justin winked at him, hooked his thumbs into the waistband of the blue & white striped swim shorts and, with a seductive wiggle, shucked them off.

Brian was grinning like a loon as the now-naked ass swished away from him in the direction of the large, custom-built swimming pool that waited for them just beside their vacation villa. Brian scooped up Justin’s abandoned trunks and jogged after the pleasingly plump posterior. Fuck it - did it really matter where he got to take possession of that ass, just so long as he got it somewhere? I mean, really, that Sunshine ass . . .

Brian was only a few meters away from the pool when Justin stepped up to the edge, threw a seductive grin over his shoulder at his drooling husband and then effected a perfect dive headfirst into the deep end. Brian practically tore off his own speedos and jumped in a second later, cannonball-style, too hot and bothered to try for anything more elegant. As soon as his head bobbed back up to the surface, he shook the waterlogged hair out of his eyes and looked around to locate his playfellow . . . only to find nothing.

“Justin?” Brian called out, scanning the entire pool as best he could in the dark and still not seeing any other head above the surface of the water. “Justin! JUSTIN!” Brian screamed, getting really worried when there still wasn’t any answer. “What the fuck? Justin, where the hell are you? Answer me! JUSTIN!”

Finally, just when Brian was about to lose it, there was a ‘whooshing’ noise from the far edge of the pool, off to the side where the builders had created a small, fanciful waterfall that cascaded into the pool over a fern-draped rockwall. Brian spun around, his eyes scanning the area, and eventually detecting a vague shape partially hidden in the lush overhanging foliage. Brian immediately started to swim over, still concerned by the fact that Justin hadn’t answered his calls.

“Stop! Don’t come any closer, Brian,” Justin ordered, his voice icy cold and angry.

“Why the fuck not, Sunshine? Are you okay? You were under a long time. I was just about to fucking freak out. Did you hurt yourself diving in or something?” Brian bombarded the boy with questions as he waded closer and closer.

“Stay back, Brian! Just . . . just stay away, okay!” Justin’s voice sounded panicked, which was definitely not the way to keep Brian from going into protective mode.

“What’s wrong, Justin? Are you hurt? Tell me. Tell Me!”

“I’m not hurt. I’m . . . I’m . . . Oh, shit. I’m so fucked,” the voice coming out from under the dangling ferns sounded like it was only seconds away from bursting into tears. “Just stay away from me. Brian. You have to stay away.”

“I’m not staying away, damn it. What the hell? I’m your fucking husband and I’m not going to stay away from you.” Brian pushed his way through the water until he was close enough to grab hold of his seemingly terrified partner. “Now, tell me what’s wrong right this fucking minute, Justin.”

“This pool . . . you didn’t tell me it was saltwater,” Justin’s voice sounded worried and it certainly wasn’t helping to reassure Brian.

“I thought you would have seen that in the brochure, Sunshine. It’s great, isn’t it? No need for chemicals or anything. It’s much better for your skin,” Brian answered, wondering why his boy was trying to sidetrack the discussion.

“No. I didn’t see that. If I had, I would have asked that we stay somewhere else. And now . . . now it’s too late!” The sentence ended with an outright sob.

Brian could no longer hold himself back. He lunged forward and wrapped the smaller man’s shoulders in his strong arms, pulling Justin’s head in close to his chest. Justin, however, struggled against the embrace, continuing to try to push his lover away, confusing Brian even more.

“Sunshine? What’s wrong? Just tell me already, damn it! You’re fucking freaking me out here!”

“Oh fuck! Oh fuck! Oh fuck! . . .” The young blond was now just chanting between sobs and still trying to push Brian away.

“Fuck this!” Brian couldn’t take any more. He didn’t know what was wrong, but he wasn’t going to figure it out while floating in chest deep water in the dark. Whatever it was, he was confident they could figure it out together, but he had to get Justin somewhere safe where he could see what the problem was first. Taking a firm grip on the boy’s bicep, Brian started towing him away through the water towards the steps at the shallow end of the pool.

As soon as Justin realized Brian’s intent, there was a flurry of splashing and, all of a sudden, Justin’s arm was ripped out of his grasp. There was a strange flash of something blue and sparkly amid the frothing water and then the little blond was just gone. Brian shook his hand, trying to relieve the pain in his wrist from the abrupt wrenching movement. A minute or so later he heard the sound of something emerging from under the water at the far edge of the pool and looked around to find the familiar blond head bobbing above the deepest section over the drain. The sound of more sobbing cut through the otherwise peaceful night and made Brian even more concerned.

“What the fuck, Justin?” Brian yelled, anger and pain edging out the worry from his voice. “Damn it! Get the fuck back here and tell me what the hell is going on right this fucking minute! This isn’t funny anymore. I’m getting fucking pissed off already!”

“I can’t, Brian. I can’t tell you . . . Shit! I’m . . . You’ll hate me. You’ll leave me,” the complaints were almost drowned out amidst the crying and the soft splashing of the water cascading down from the waterfall, but Brian was so focused on his wailing partner that he still heard every word. “I should have told you. I KNOW I should have told you, but I didn’t know how. I didn’t know how. And you would have thought I was fucking crazy anyway. But I should have at least tried to tell you. I’m so fucking fucked!”

Brian was getting more and more worried as he listened to his husband’s almost incomprehensible babbling. He didn’t know what to do, though. He still didn’t know exactly what the problem was, only that Justin - who was usually rational even when he was at his most emotional - was out of his mind upset. And that was making Brian upset too. He had to do something to stop this. Now.

“Justin! Listen to me! Are you listening?” Brian barked out the command as loudly as he could, easily overcoming the crying from the far end of the pool.

“Y-y-yes. I’m . . . I’m listening,” the sobbing reply was barely audible.

“Come here, Sunshine. I’m not going to yell at you across the length of the pool.”

“I don’t want to.”

“I don’t care what you want right now, Justin. Come HERE!” Brian demanded authoritatively.

It seemed to work, since Brian could see the blond head slowly bobbing closer and closer until finally Justin was floating about two feet in front of him.

“Good. Now, you’re going to tell me what the fuck is wrong. You’re scaring the shit out of me, Sunshine, and I can’t figure out what to do until you tell me what the hell you’re getting yourself all worked up about.” Brian could see that Justin was about to argue with him again, so he held up his hand in a ‘stop’ gesture. “I don’t care what the fuck it is. I just want to know. Okay? I’m sure that whatever the problem is - whatever is wrong - we can work it out. Just fucking tell me already!”

It took Justin about a half a minute to quell his tears and sort out his thoughts enough to be able to speak, but when he finally did, it still didn’t make much sense. “I didn’t know the pool was saltwater. I’m not supposed to swim in saltwater. That’s why I wouldn’t go in the ocean. I can’t . . . I can’t be in saltwater . . . It does things to me . . .”

“It does things? What the hell does that mean?’ Brian took a step closer, causing Justin to swim a foot back. “Tell me, Justin!”

“You’re going to be so mad. So fucking mad at me . . .”

“Well, if you keep crying and acting like a total twat I’m going to be even more angry, so you might as well get it the fuck over with and tell me now,” Brian insisted.

“Um . . . Well, see . . . It’s the saltwater. It does stuff to people like me.”

“Stuff? Care to be a little more explicit, Sunshine,” Brian prompted, taking another step closer to his stuttering husband.

“Bad stuff? Like, really, really, bad stuff.” Justin cowered under Brian’s continuing glare, but he really, truly just had no idea how to say what he needed to say. It was just too unbelievable to try to put into words. You couldn’t just SAY something like that. So he figured he needed to show Brian instead. “Stuff like this . . .”

With that, Justin hopped up a little in the water, did a mini-jack knife so that he quickly flipped over and dove under the water, swimming around Brian’s body quickly and then, a minute later, shot up into the air so strongly and so fast that his entire body cleared the water with about six feet to spare.

Which is when Brian finally saw exactly what the problem was.

Although he couldn’t quite believe what his eyes were telling him even then. He didn’t remember doing any drugs since the wedding the day before, so it couldn’t have been an hallucination, could it? Maybe he was dreaming? Maybe he was going crazy? Maybe the years of drinking, drugs and dick had caused him to go completely, over-the-top bonkers? Maybe he’d contracted some horrible disease that had driven him totally mad? Yeah, that had to be it. That was really the only explanation. Because he simply COULDN’T have seen what he thought he’d just seen. That was fucking impossible.

Justin’s leap into the air was topped by a magnificent flip which was followed by a graceful dive back into the water. When he resurfaced in front of Brian, he simply floated there, a little hesitantly, not saying anything but peering intently into his husband’s eyes. His very troubled and disbelieving husband’s eyes.

“Okay . . . so, it seems I’m having a fucking mental breakdown. Sorry to ruin our honeymoon like this and all, Sunshine. I think you better take me to the hospital or something. I’m pretty sure our insurance will cover it, even though we’re on vacation, but just in case, you probably need to call Ted and ask him to check it out,” Brian spoke so matter-of-factly that it would have been humorous if it wasn’t all so serious. “I think I’ll go lie down until you’re ready to head out. Maybe I should take an aspirin or something. Is aspirin good for hallucinations? It can’t hurt, right?”

“Brian . . . You’re not hallucinating,” Justin said, biting his bottom lip in that adorably worried way he had when he thought Brian was going to be pissed off at him.

“No. I am. I have to be. I just thought I saw my husband - the MAN I’ve been fucking for seven years now and who I just married yesterday -  swimming around with a fucking fish tail on the bottom half of his body. A fucking FISH TAIL, damn it! So, yes, I AM hallucinating, because that’s fucking impossible. Now, just take me to the fucking hospital already and have them lock me up in the looney bin before I hurt myself.”

“I’m soooooo sorry about this Brian. Really. I-I-I didn’t mean for this to happen. I-I-If I’d only known the pool was s-s-saltwater . . .” Justin stammered, sounding like he was about to break into tears again.

Brian couldn’t take any more crying on top of the fact that he was having a complete mental breakdown. One or the other he could have handled. Not both, though. So he immediately moved to comfort the crying boy and stop the tears.

Of course, when he pulled the boy’s body closer to him so that he could hold him tight, he noticed that his hallucination was tactile as well as visual - he could actually FEEL the way Justin’s lower body had morphed into one solid length instead of the two separate legs that should have been there. Brian shook his head, trying to dispel the odd sensation, but it didn’t work. With a little bit of trepidation, Brian slowly lowered his hand, running it down the smooth plane of Justin’s back, down and down, to the dip near the bottom of his spine. And then just an inch or two lower - down to where he would expect to feel the lovely swell of his man’s perky ass cheeks - only, that’s where things started to get really strange.

That’s where the downy, smooth texture of Justin’s skin changed. There was a patch of roughness - a transition of sorts - and a sort of ridge where there shouldn’t be one, almost like what the waistband of his swim trunks would feel like, if he’d still been wearing them. From that point on, the smooth skin of the younger man’s back became rough to the touch - it was still smooth when you stroked it downward, but as Brian’s touch moved back upwards, it scraped against Brian’s fingers. That was NOT what his boy was supposed to feel like. Not to mention the fact that, where there should be a welcoming deep crack leading to one of Brian’s most favorite places on his Sunshine, there was only a smooth roundness that gently tapered down the further his hand roamed.

Brian felt his breathing growing ragged and his pulse increasing until he could hear the blood throbbing in his ears. This was NOT possible. This was NOT right. He might have been able to convince himself that he was seeing things - that HAD happened once or twice in the past when he’d really overdone it with the drugs and the drinking - but he’d never FELT something that shouldn’t be there. This was definitely NOT good.

“What . . . what . . . what are you?” Brian finally managed to pant out the words around the lump that had blocked his throat.

“Um . . . well . . . the scientific name would be ‘Homo Aquaticus Sirenia’, although most scientists don’t actually admit that our species exists. But, if they did agree on our existence, that’s what we’d be called. Or so I’ve been told,” Justin explained, his voice sounding almost normal as long as he was talking about something mundane like zoological nomenclature. After that, though, his sure tone faltered again. “Most people would probably call us ‘Sirens’ though. Or . . . well . . . ‘Merpeople’.”

Brian was on the verge of panicking up until the word ‘Merpeople’ came out of his husband’s mouth. That’s when he realized it just HAD to be a really horrible, nasty joke. Probably something Ted and Michael thought up - the guys couldn’t short sheet his bed since they’d flown off to Hawaii, so they must have convinced Justin to play THIS little prank on him. It was totally juvenile, but then again, he had to consider the source. And, once he’d realized it was only a joke - despite it being in rather poor taste - Brian burst out laughing.

“Hahahaha! Good one, Sunshine. You really had me going there for a minute. Who put you up to this shit? It was Theodore, wasn’t it? This is just so like his warped sense of humor. I’ll have to fucking call and fire his ass in the morning. Shit! I can’t believe I almost bought this. Where did you get the costume though? It’s pretty realistic. I’m impressed.”

“It . . . It . . . It’s not a joke, Brian,” Justin replied, his tone nervous and completely devoid of any humor at all. “I wish it was.”

Brian shook his head. He couldn’t have heard that right. It had to be a joke, right? If not, he was going back to his original working theory that he was going insane and needed to go to the hospital immediately. He would prefer if it were a joke though. He didn’t like hospitals much.

Seeing the upsurge of disbelief again in Brian's eyes, Justin grimaced but then let his lower body drift upwards so that he was floating in a more or less horizontal position, allowing Brian a better look at the parts of him that had changed. And, despite the darkness of the night, there was enough moonlight for Brian to get an eyeful. An eyeful of shimmering blue-green fish scales covering a tail that ended in a set of diaphanous fins - all where his Sunshine’s nice strong legs should have been.

“But . . . but . . . but . . . I mean, how . . . No . . . No, oh no . . . Nononononononono . . .”

Justin let his body sink back under the water, afraid that the sight was just too much for his lover. It didn’t help much, though. Brian was still mumbling ‘nononono’ over and over again. Justin wasn’t sure what to do next. Brian seemed like he would be there for a while, murmuring to himself and shaking his head and just generally freaking out. Which was totally understandable, but unfortunately, the lights in one of the other three villas that shared this pool had just come on and he could see heads peeking around the drapes and looking their way. It simply wouldn’t do for him to be seen like THIS. Justin did not want to be the specimen that the scientists used to prove that the age-old legend of mermen was true. He just wanted to get back to his old form and continue enjoying his honeymoon. Which meant that something had to be done. Right away.

“Brian . . . Brian! Snap out of it already, Brian,” Justin hissed, trying to keep his voice down and at the same time get his husband’s attention. “Come on, Brian. I need your help. Can you please freak out on me later? Please?”

Brian’s eyes focused on Justin’s. There was still a very strong undertone of fear in them, but at least he was paying attention finally. Justin tried to smile reassuringly at his husband. He wasn’t sure he pulled it off, but at least he tried.

“I have to get out of here, Brian. I’m basically trapped in this pool, and I think the neighbors over there heard something when you were yelling earlier. I need your help, okay?” Justin explained as succinctly as he could. “You’ll have to carry me to the villa. I promise I’ll explain everything when we get there. Okay? Just help me get out of sight for now. Please.”

Brian seemed almost relieved to have something to DO. He nodded his head and then started to move through the water towards the shallow end where the wide stairs led up from the water to the deck. Justin swum next to Brian all the way. When they reached the stairs, Brian climbed out of the pool, grabbed two large towels off the nearby shelf and then waded back into the water. Using his arms, Justin scooted himself up until he was seated on the step just below the rim of the pool. Brian quickly draped the towels over the man - fish, merman, whatever, fuck! - so that his lower body was concealed, and then scooped him up in his strong arms. Which wasn’t as easy as it sounded, seeing as Justin seemed to have put on quite a bit of weight in the process of turning into a fish. Brian was still too stunned by everything that was happening, though, to be surprised by a little thing like magical weight gain. After getting his balance, Brian climbed all the way out of the pool and quickly covered the ten meters or so to the sliding glass door that led into their vacation rental.

Once inside though, Brian’s determination seemed to abandon him again. Justin pulled off the sopping wet towels and directed his rescuer to deposit him on the bed. Brian followed directions, but then just stood there, staring, and not moving at all. Granted, it WAS quite an unusual sight, so Justin really couldn’t fault him for gawking. In fact, he was a little amazed himself, even though he shouldn’t really be. He’d always known that this was a possibility, but it hadn’t ever actually happened before, so he was pretty much as mesmerized by the experience as his incredulous lover was.

Lying there on the bed, with the lights on, there was no denying the truth their eyes showed them. Justin used to have a regular, trim, human body, with two stout, strong but slim legs, a nicely shaped ass and a rather generous package. Now, all he had was a long, supple, tapering tail, adorned along it’s length by iridescent aquamarine scales that shown with every color of blue you could imagine. At the end of the tail, where there should be two regular feet with toes, there were two fins, the skin of which was so thin that you could almost see through it, although the body of the fins looked strong and rubbery at the same time. And that was all. The rest of his lower body was completely smooth. No bounteous bubble butt. No prodigious package. Nothing but smooth blue-green scales and skin.

Which was enough, in and of itself, to make Brian want to cry.

I mean, it was bad enough to be married to a fucking fish. But a fish that didn’t even have a dick? What the fuck was Brian supposed to do with his husband if he didn’t even have a dick? Or an ass? This was a fucking nightmare of epic proportions!

Before he knew it, Brian felt his legs give out on him and he slumped down into a heap on the villa’s tiled floor. He didn’t know how long it was until he started to become aware of his surroundings once again. It was only Justin’s repeated pleas, calling to Brian over and over again, that brought him back out of his funk.

“Brian. Brian, please! Please don’t do this to me. Brian? Please, Brian. Please.” The words had been repeated over and over again, until they finally penetrated Brian’s overheated brain. When he was at last able to focus and look up at the fish lying on his honeymoon bed, Justin finally relaxed back against the pillows, apparently relieved that his husband was emerging from his state of utter shock. “Finally! Are you . . . well, I was going to ask if you’re okay, but that’s obviously a stupid question,” Justin blurted out, sounding almost as confused as Brian felt. “Can you . . . will you please come over here. I . . . I know this is fucking overwhelming. It’s not like I’m doing that much better though . . . I’m scared too, Brian. I . . . I need to have you here next to me. I need to be able to touch you. Please.”

Brian responded to the need in the voice of the man he loved without even thinking about it. He slowly climbed to his feet - feeling stiff from his sojourn of sitting on the cool tile floor for who knew how long - and approached the bed. Once he got there, though, he didn’t know what to do next. Where to sit? Where to look? What to do with his hands? So he just stood there, next to the bed, biting at his lower lip worriedly and staring at the headboard of the bed over Justin’s left shoulder.

Justin was the one who bridged the uncomfortable moment by reaching up, firmly grasping Brian’s hand and physically tugging him downward until the man was perched on the edge of the bed. Brian still averted his eyes, unwilling or unable to look at his husband directly, but he didn’t flinch away when Justin’s fingers intertwined with his own. It did feel good to be able to touch each other. It was soothing. The only soothing thing that had happened to either of them so far this evening.

Once he had Brian seated on the bed, Justin reached over and grabbed the phone off the nightstand. He punched in some numbers, waited a few brief seconds and then sighed audibly. “Hey, Mom. Um . . . I’ve got a really big problem. You know the resort where we were staying for our honeymoon. So the pool there was saltwater and I didn’t know it before I dove in, and . . . yeah. I’m sure you get the picture. Can you please call me as SOON as you get this message. Bye.” He pushed the button to end the call, and then just tossed the phone aside, chewing at his lips in tandem with his equally distressed husband.

“So, Sunshine . . . care to EXPLAIN,” Brian finally spoke, his voice so full of emotions - anger, fear, confusion, sadness, worry - that it was difficult to tell what he was feeling the most.

“Uhhhhhh. It’s a fucking long story,” Justin groaned, knowing he had to come clean, but not really knowing where to begin. “So, I guess it’s pretty obvious that I’m - for lack of a better term - a merman . . .”

“That’s pretty obvious at this point,” Brian snarked back, still not actually looking at the man whose hand he was holding. “What I want to know is, when, exactly, were you planning on telling me about this little . . . anomaly?”

“Um . . . never?” Justin replied honestly. “You see, my family, we’ve all lived as humans for several generations. So I didn’t think it was really an issue, you know. When I’m human, I’m completely human. And I didn’t plan on reverting back to THIS. If I’d only known about the fucking pool being filled with seawater, I would have stayed out of it, and you wouldn’t really have needed to know . . . Or, at least, that was my plan.”

“Your family?”

“Yeah.”

“So Mother Taylor . . .”

“Yep. She’s a mermaid. And my little sister Molly, too. And my grandma. And her grandma before her. All the way back to Great Grannie Ariel who was the first one to live as a human back around the end of the eighteenth century,” Justin explained, on surer ground now that he was talking history rather than the here and now. “After Ariel became human, she was allowed to live just like anyone else, as long as she agreed never to return to the sea. Which, basically  means that she, and all her descendants, have to stay out of saltwater. As long as we don’t go in the ocean - or saltwater swimming pools - we’re as much human as anyone else.”

“Uh huh . . . And you didn’t think to mention ANY of this to me before we got married? Or at the very least before I proposed that we go to Hawaii - a fucking island in the middle of the fucking ocean - on our honeymoon?” Brian asked, his anger seeming to take precedence over all the other roiling emotions for a time.

“What, exactly, would you have had me say? ‘Oh, hey, Brian. Just so you know before we get hitched, I’m actually part fish. You don’t mind that, right?’ And that would have gone over soooooo well. You would have either had me committed or called off the wedding, or both,” Justin snapped at him, his insecurities boiling up in response to Brian’s anger. “Besides, my mother never told Craig, and she never had any problems. So why would I think I’d have to tell you?”

“Fuck! Because . . . Because I thought that we didn’t have secrets, Sunshine. I thought we . . . well, that we were different. That we . . . that we were better than that,” Brian’s voice tapered off, the hurt outweighing the anger in the end.

“Oh, Brian. We are. We are better than that. And I should have told you. But I just didn’t know what to say. I mean, look at me,” Justin insisted, causing Brian to finally turn his body so that he was no longer facing away from Justin. “How could I tell you about this without you thinking I was fucking crazy? I mean, I’ve known about this since I was a child and even now I still can’t believe my own fucking eyes.”

Brian took a good long look at the man/fish lying on the bed next to him and sighed. It really didn’t seem possible even when the evidence was right in front of him. Brian reached out with his free hand and let one tentative finger trail over the place where Justin’s thigh should have been, feeling the truth of the matter with his own senses, and still not really believing it. How could THIS have happened to his Sunshine? His husband? The man he loved and had known for years? And even if Justin HAD told him about this, would he ever have believed him without seeing it with his own eyes? Probably not . . . Okay, definitely not.

Brian’s shoulders slumped. Justin released his grip on Brian’s hand and snaked his arm around Brian’s waist, pulling on the larger man with a strength he didn’t know he had until he had Brian sitting next to him with their backs resting against the headboard. Brian’s long legs were stretched out next to Justin’s newly acquired tail. It was such an incongruous sight. But it was their reality at the moment, and they both knew they had to deal with it, so hiding - or looking away - wasn’t really an option.

“So, how do we fix this? Shouldn’t you be dried off enough by now that it’ll go away? Or do you need to wash off the salt water better or something?” Brian asked, his practical mind already moving on to what needed to be done next, leaving behind the impossibilities that he would have to mull over later when and if he had the inclination.

“I’m afraid it’s not that easy . . .”

“Why? In all the fucking mermaid movies, they just dry off and then their legs come back. Right?” Brian asked, with a sinking feeling in his gut.

“Don’t believe everything you see in the movies, Brian,” Justin criticized. Brian tensed up in response and Justin knew he should just confess everything. “You see, once we go back to the sea, it’s pretty much a done deal, I’m afraid. We can’t just dry off and get our human form back. Basically, if we want to return to being human, we have to make the same deal my Grandmother did.”

“And what, exactly was that, Sunshine,” Brian asked hesitantly, knowing already that he wasn’t going to like the answer.

“Well, according to all the legends, you have to win a human’s love and seal it with True Love’s First Kiss.” Justin stated, knowing before the words were even out of his mouth exactly how Brian would groan when he heard that pronouncement.

“You have got to be fucking kidding me, Justin!” Brian complained, and added in the expected groan. “I thought that was only Disneyland bullshit! True Love’s First Kiss? How fucking hetero can you get? . . . Not to mention that it’s fucking impossible, since we’ve already kissed like a million times so, you know, first kiss and all, already out the window.”

“Ahh! Does that mean you admit that it’s True Love?” Justin teased his grumpy husband, trying his best to make light of a truly impossible situation.

“Don’t be a fucking twat, Justin!” Brian snapped back, although his tone lacked any real anger, making the word ‘twat’ sound almost like an endearment.

“Hey, I didn’t make this shit up. It’s not my fault that the ‘cure’ is stupid and totally hetero,” Justin seemed almost as annoyed by the ridiculous prospect as Brian. “But anyway, that’s why I called my Mother. Hopefully she’s got some other ideas. Unfortunately, until we hear back from her, I’m afraid I’m stuck like this.” Justin looked down at himself critically, disgusted with the predicament he’d landed them in, while on their honeymoon, no less.

Brian saw the way Justin’s entire demeanor sagged with that statement. It really did suck that this had to happen the very first night of their trip. Brian had envisioned so many enjoyable things for this week. So many enjoyable positions. So many places they were going to fuck . . .

“What the fuck . . .” Brian shrugged and shifted so that he was facing Justin a little bit more. “So, you wanna give it a try anyway?”

“Huh?”

“You know . . . The kissing thing?” Brian offered, almost shyly. “We could . . . I mean, we could at least try it . . . I do, you know, love you, and all, so maybe . . .”

“Oh, Brian!” Justin gushed, falling in love with his sweet, caring, albeit would-never-in-a-million-years-admit-to-it husband all over again.

“Just don’t go and get all moist on me, Sunshine. I don’t do ‘wet work’, no matter how much I love you,” Brian scoffed, trying unsuccessfully to cover up his sentimentality.

“Come here, and fucking kiss me already, Stud,” Justin demanded and, in his enthusiasm to start on the attempted ‘cure’, pulling Brian onto his lap without even realizing how much strength it had taken.

“If you insist, Sunshine,” Brian answered, and applied himself to the lips that he loved, which, thankfully, hadn’t changed at all.

The kiss was long and deep and wet and slightly sloppy but full of passion. It was practically perfect as far as both men were concerned. And it didn’t take them long to completely forget why they were kissing, since the kissing became an end in and of itself. Before either was aware of how far things had progressed, Justin had maneuvered Brian over onto his back, the pair of them lying now crosswise over the bed with the older man pinned below the young, virile blond. And while it might not have been True Love’s First Kiss, it certainly was True Love’s Super Hot and Totally Erotic Kiss. Although, that didn’t seem to be the way to bring Justin back to human form. If anything, the kiss, and the passionate fire that the kiss ignited, seemed to enhance his more overt Merman qualities.

“Fuck, Brian. I love kissing you. You taste so good. I could fucking kiss you all night,” Justin murmured, pausing when it appeared that Brian needed to either take a breath or else run the risk of passing out. “I can’t seem to control myself whenever I’m around you. You have to stop being so fucking sexy all the time.”

Brian himself was feeling almost as out of control. There was just something about his husband that drove him wild. It had always been that way, of course, from the very first night they’d met. It was that quality which had kept Brian coming back to the youth again and again, despite all his rules and his better judgment. Tonight however, whatever it was that Justin had - whatever pull he had over Brian - seemed to be accentuated tenfold. Brian couldn’t get enough of the boy’s lips on his. His taste seemed sweeter. His mouth seemed warmer and his lips softer. He even smelled better than Brian remembered - somehow more masculine. Brian rapidly forgot why they’d started kissing and just reveled in the feelings.

“Mmmmmm. Brian . . .” Justin’s voice finally broke through the haze of lust that Brian had been happily wallowing in. “I don’t think it’s working. I seem to still have a fucking tail, but I don’t really care that much anymore.”

“Yeah . . . um, huh?” Brian didn’t seem to be able to focus on words anymore, and he couldn’t care in the least about that deficiency, all he wanted was to get back to the kissing. “Stop talking, Sunshine, and go back to the lips . . .” Brian ordered, trying to free his right hand in order to reach up and pull those lips down to him again.

Justin refused to let his wrist free, holding both of Brian’s hands over his head in the grip of one of his own strong hands while he used his free hand to run his fingers teasingly down Brian’s side. “You know, marine mammals produce two or even three times the amount of testosterone as most terrestrial males,” Justin announced knowingly, as he wriggled his body around so that he was now lying completely on top of Brian’s no-longer-all-that-longer frame. “Which means that I’m probably a lot stronger than you are right at this minute. And there’s also all those pheromones washing over the both of us. I am a Siren after all,” Justin emphasized each sentence with another kiss, working his way down Brian’s thrumming body. “Do you think there might be some truth to all those seafaring legends, hmmm?” Kissing along the underside of Brian’s arm, across his collarbone, biting at a jutting adam’s apple. “Can I tempt you to new heights of passion?” Trailing his tongue down to one erect nipple that was just begging to be nibbled. “Can I make love to your amazing body, my husband?” Kissing and biting gently at each rib as he worked his way lower. “I DO love your body, Brian. Every.” Kissing along one tender, long flank. “Single.” Kiss applied to the thin skin stretched over one hip bone. “Inch.” Kiss to the crease between thigh and groin, eliciting a groan of pleasure and need from the body now writhing with lust beneath him.

“Sunshine . . .” the name was whispered with a reverence that echoed throughout the night, a clear offer to relinquish anything that would be asked.

“Oh, Brian. I love you so much. And I want you so badly. I’ve never wanted anything this much ever in my whole fucking life,” Justin moaned out his acceptance of the unspoken agreement. “I just  . . .  I just have to taste you.”

He let go of Brian’s hands, so that he could pin the convulsing hips more firmly in place, and then dove down to swallow Brian’s full nine inches in one devouring swallow. Brian arched up off the bed, yelling his husband’s name, grasping handfuls of blond to try to anchor himself into place before he flew off into space. Justin had always been an excellent cocksucker - he was a natural right from the start - but Brian had never experienced ANYTHING like this. It was too amazing for words. The way the boy’s tongue snaked around and around his shaft. The way he kept up a steady sucking pressure. The way the muscles of his mouth and throat caressed Brian’s length. It was exquisite. It was perfect. It was mind-blowing. It was something he had never experienced before and figured he would happily die from this time.

And when the lips he loved finally drew out his orgasm, Brian would have screamed out his pleasure for the world to hear, only he couldn’t breathe and he couldn’t think of a word to scream and he couldn’t move because he was paralyzed as the tremors of his release rocked through his body over and over again until he was left lying there in a gasping, mewling heap without the capacity to form a single coherent thought.

“Thank you, Brian. Thank you. You taste so amazingly good. I could never get enough,” Justin was purring into his husband’s ear. “I want you so much, Brian. I have to have you, now.”

Brian’s heartbeat was almost back to a normal pace for a human when he felt the man lying atop him begin to rub and grind against his thigh. That wasn’t really all that unusual. Justin regularly got so hot and bothered when he was sucking Brian off that he would be dry humping his leg even before Brian had finished. Of course, tonight was different in so many ways. Tonight everything they did seemed to be enhanced. Every inch of skin seemed more sensitive. Every touch seemed to spark electric shocks. Every motion seemed more pronounced. So maybe that was why Brian thought that the pressure from Justin’s cock was more intense and the heat he was feeling against his thigh was hotter than ever before.

Brian wanted that heat. He was amazed at how much he wanted . . . no, needed . . . to feel that long hot length. How had he ever lived without it?

Brian reached between their bodies with one hand, grappling for the heat he was seeking, only to feel something long, hot and damp wrapping itself around his wrist.

“Uh . . . Uh, Sunshine . . . what . . . what is THAT?” Brian froze, but the whatever it was kept on snaking around his arm, moving up from his hand, over his wrist and then higher still.

“Huh?” Justin panted, apparently unable to stop his own writhing long enough to actually understand the words being said to him.

“There’s something . . . on my wrist . . . And, I’m not sure . . .” Brian tried to jerk back his arm, but the whatever it was had a good hold on him now. “Justin! Justin, help me!” he hissed, his passion forgotten almost instantly.

“Brian . . . What?” Justin lifted himself up on his arms so that his body was separated from Brian’s by several inches.

Which gave them both a good view of exactly what new developments were taking place down below.

“OH! Huh? That’s new!” Justin commented as he got a good look at the long, sinuous protrusion that was now snaking up from a slit in the anterior portion of his tail and that had wrapped itself lovingly around Brian’s arm. The appendage seemed to be quite large - maybe more than a foot in length already - with a tapering, thick, ropelike body and a bulbous head at the distal end. It seemed to be quite flexible too. And, as they both watched, the thing throbbed visibly and stretched a little bit further, causing Justin to moan with pleasure as more of his lengths caressed Brian’s skin.

“What the fuck IS that?” Brian didn’t seem nearly as enamored with the new appendage that was groping his wrist as it was with him.

“That, ahem, would be my dork, I think . . . I mean, I’ve never had sex as a merman before, but I AM a cetacean, so it makes sense, right?” Justin started to explain, seemingly fascinated by his newfound anatomy. “See, it’s retractable, because dangly bits just aren’t very hydrodynamic. And, also, you don’t want those parts hanging out and getting all cold if the water isn’t warm, right? Plus all that testosterone I mentioned before, well, it does tend to make certain things get a little bigger. And, well, I guess having sex while you’re swimming requires a little more maneuvering so it makes sense that it has more muscles and can move around more. It’s pretty cool, actually. You thought I was pretty well endowed before? Hah! It’s also really, really, sensitive. You wouldn’t believe how good this feels, Brian. I mean . . . wow!” Justin had dropped his body down a few inches and was already resuming the grinding action with his new favorite body part. “Fuck, am I horny! Seriously! I mean, so . . . whoa . . . so . . . fucking . . . horny!”

Brian was still reeling from the effects of the most amazing orgasm of his life. There were also all those pheromones Justin had been talking about, right? That had to be it. Because there was no other explanation for why he - Brian Kinney, unapologetic and unwavering top - so desperately wanted to have that massive, facile, scary, snake-like, but oh-so-fucking-drool-worthy, whale dong inside him.  

Of course, it really didn’t matter what Brian wanted at this point, since Justin was far too far gone to care. The salacious sea sylph had wriggled himself into place between Brian’s thighs, his strongly muscled lower body knocking the already spread thighs wider and wider. Meanwhile, the dork with a mind of its own was squirming around, tickling it’s way down over a quivering hip, caressing the skin of a taut stomach, brushing tantalizingly along the lengths of Brian’s own cock, and causing the brunet to twist and turn, trying to accommodate the whatever-the-fuck-it-was that was undulating with such single-minded lust over his body looking for the perfect place to make its home.

The wriggling brunet was eventually grappled and held in place by a Sunshine hopped up on testosterone to the point that he easily overpowered his husband. The strong hands pressed Brian’s shoulders deeper into the mattress while the heavy span of Justin’s tail lying weightily over his lower body held the rest of him still. Brian would normally have rebelled at being overpowered like that - it was so unlike him, so out of character for the ultimate control freak - but the heady scent of maleness in the air swarmed his senses and vanquished any resistance he might have marshalled. Before he knew what he was doing, he found himself wrapping his legs tightly around the breadth of his merman’s tail and offering up his most intimate places to the not-so-tender mercies of that throbbing, pulsing manhood . . . fishhood . . . mermanhood . . . Oh, fuck it, who really cared what the hell it was, Brian just wanted it inside him without any further delay!

There was no way that monster was going to fit inside him. It had to be more than fourteen inches long and more than ten inches around. It was just physically impossible. Brian knew that. Still he wanted it. Badly. And he didn’t care in the least that there was no lube, no condom that would fit it, no preparation to speak of. He breathed in another lungful of the heavy male vapors surrounding him and all those concerns melted away. He was so ready and so open for this, it just didn’t matter.

When the bulbous head finally found its way to his already pulsing hole, Brian sighed with contentment. The pressure of it nudging against the tight ring of muscles felt almost friendly. His entire body relaxed so he could let it in. The wetness at the tip, nature’s own lubricant, paved the way and before either man knew it, Justin’s dork was sliding inside, worming it’s way deeper and deeper into the welcoming depths of his human lover, filling Brian with a throbbing neediness that he’d never even known he had within him, but which he was sure could only be inculcated by his most amazing husband.

“Brian. Brian. Brian. Oh, fuck, Brian! You’re so perfect. You’re so fucking beautiful. And you’re mine. All mine. ALL MINE! ALL MINE! FUCKING MINE!” the wanton merman was moaning as his body thrashed and his strong tail flopped around, fins slapping dangerously against the bed, the floor, the furniture nearby.

Brian could no longer understand the words Justin was speaking, he could only drown in the possessive love that was washing over him. He could only revel in the hot fullness that was invading his body and making him feel claimed. He could only just barely breathe as the rough smoothness of fish scales rubbed against his cock where it was trapped between their writhing bodies, creating a friction that was deliciously torturous.

“Look at us, Brian! Look at us together. We are so perfect. Look at how beautiful you are as I fill you up,” Justin demanded, moving back just enough that he could admire the erotic way his dork was sliding in and out of Brian’s well-stretched hole as they moved together. Brian looked down as well, eager to see the culmination of everything he was feeling. Even as convoluted as their bodies were, though, he couldn’t see the sight that was sending Justin into such raptures. What he could see was the way his own abdomen was morphing and distorting, being moved from the inside as the wondrous snake of love wound it’s way within his depths.

Then, before he was really ready for the unbelievable pleasure to end, Brian felt the rising tide of their mutual climax cresting over them both. Justin’s moaning reached an indecipherable crescendo and all of a sudden the one-eyed-wonder-worm inside of Brian got even thicker, the pressure got even greater, and the sense of bliss got even more overwhelming. Then, with a wave of wet warmth - the heat of which he could feel throughout his gut - the merman on top of him gasped, trembled and shuddered. A heartbeat later, Brian’s own irrepressible release washed over him, melting him into a moaning puddle of salty seawater himself as his body quaked and spasmed until he saw only little blue-green floating dots on the sea of his vision.

“Brian. Brian? Brian, time to wake up, my wonderful, amazing lover,” the sweet words finally broke through the haze of happiness Brian had been immersed in as he dreamed.

Brian’s eyelashes fluttered open, balking at the bright light of morning flooding through the curtains they’d forgotten to pull closed the night before. He had never felt so utterly languorous in his entire life. Or so incredibly loved, as the blond man who’d been whispering him awake caressed his chest, kissed his shoulder and petted him awake.

Or, so astonishingly sore . . .

As he rolled over, Brian felt another load of sticky cum squishing out from his already dripping asshole. He couldn’t really remember all of what had happened the night before - he thought he might have lost consciousness after the first time his fishy romeo had made love to him - but there had to be fucking gallons of cum up there. He grimaced at the idea of just how long it would take for all of that spunk to empty out. Of course, it would probably clear out faster if he could get up and move around, but that didn’t seem very likely. Even assuming that his legs worked - an assumption that seemed improbable at the moment since all his appendages appeared to be made of jelly - he didn’t think his abused asshole would let him move out of the bed for at least a week.

“Brian, my love, wake up. You need to eat, Brian. I know you’re still tired, but I’m worried about you. You keep blacking out. I think you need food,” Justin advised, his concern evident in his voice. “Real food - not just more of my cum. I think it might be a little too strong for you or something, cause I’ve never seen anyone pass out from giving head before.”

Oh, yeah. Brian now remembered trying to suck Justin off, and laughingly boasting that he could deep throat even THAT fucking monster . . . No wonder his throat was almost as sore as his asshole.

“And we also need to get you some cream or something, Brian,” Justin continued to worry. “I know you said that you thought my saliva might have healing properties - although, now that I think about it, that was probably just a ploy to get me to rim you for the third time - but, I still think that you’re going to need something to help soothe your ass. I mean, after the fifth round, you seemed really sore. Do you think room service will deliver some Preparation H for us along with breakfast?”

Five rounds? Yeah, judging by the ache in his nether regions, Brian figured that was about right. Fuck, what a night!

“Come on, Stud. You have to move,” Justin demanded, bending his tail upwards in a curl until he was able to tickle Brian’s chin with the flukes of his distal fins. “I promise to just lie here in bed, under the covers, being a good little fish until after the room service guy leaves. But I won’t fuck you again until you promise to eat something. No matter how much you beg me. I’m serious, Brian. So, just go order some food and get some medicine. Okay?”

“M’kay . . .” Brian mumbled, trying unsuccessfully to get together the energy to move out of the warm cocoon of his husband’s strong arms. “N a minnit.”

“Brian. Hey, Brian. No going back to sleep. Come on, Brian. I’m getting worried here.”

Brian might have argued the point and managed to talk his way into getting another hour or so of sleep if the ringing of the doorbell hadn’t finally forced him out of bed. He had no idea who could be at the door of their villa in Hawaii at the crack of ten am, but he was sure that whoever it was, it couldn’t be good. He supposed they HAD been a little loud the night before. The management wouldn’t just kick them out, though, would they? If so, how was he going to smuggle Justin out of here? Where else could they go? Fuck!

The ringing was followed up with an insistent knocking on the door, and Brian knew he couldn’t put this off any longer. Getting up, he found a still-damp towel that he managed to wrap around his middle so that he was more or less presentable. He helped Justin pull the covers over himself, placing a couple of camouflaging pillows in strategic places as well, and then judging that it was good enough. Finally, he limped stiffly over to the door, scrunching up his nose at the wet sensation of still more cum dripping down his legs - it would no doubt take days to get beyond THAT.

“Mother Taylor!” Brian was surprised to see the perfectly coiffed blonde woman standing at his door, ready to knock yet again.

“Brian. Where is my son?” She pushed her way past him into the room as if she regularly manhandled men who towered over her by more than a foot and outweighed her by more than fifty pounds.

“Mom? What are you doing here?” Justin asked from his throne on the bed.

“I got your message, honey, and I hopped on the first flight I could get. By the way, Brian, you owe me the price of one emergency, last-minute, round-trip ticket to Hawaii. I’m warning you - It wasn’t cheap,” the mother lion announced as she moved toward her threatened cub. “How are you doing, Honey? I’m sure you’re scared and a little overwhelmed. It’s pretty frightening the first time it happens, isn’t it? But don’t worry. I’m here and we’ll get you fixed up in no time.”

“The first time? This has happened to you, too? You . . . you know how to fix this?” Justin asked, incredulously. “But, I thought . . . you always told me that it was almost impossible to reverse. That I’d be stuck like this forever if I wasn’t careful. I mean, how the fuck am I supposed to find True Love’s First Kiss? Brian is my only love and we can’t just go back and have our first kiss all over again. And I’m not leaving him to try to find some other bozo to kiss me, so you can just forget that . . .”

“Stop, Justin,” Jennifer demanded, holding up her hand in the spluttering boy’s face. “My goodness, Justin. You really ARE a total Dramatic Queen, aren’t you?”

“That’s Drama Queen,” Brian corrected her. “Of course, Justin’s more of a Drama Princess, but you’re not wrong, Mother Taylor.”

“Whatever! Although, at the moment you’re more of a Drama Fish!” she laughed, tempting Brian to join her even though Justin scowled at both of them. “I’m sorry, honey, but you really DO take yourself far too seriously. You always have. And you were also quite the naughty handful as a child.”

“Still is,” Brian added in.

“Quite,” Jenn replied. “Which is why I knew that if I didn’t scare the fucking pants off you, you would constantly be trying out your fishy side. You were a total terror until you were about fifteen, if you’ll remember. And how the hell would I have explained it to your father? So . . . well, I might have exaggerated a little about the whole True Love thing.” she admitted, with a very WASPish blush.

“Yes! I knew that was a huge load of horse hooey!” Brian pumped his fist in triumph, with a huge grin on his face.

“Well, of course it is, sweetie,” Jennifer smiled at Brian with motherly affection. “But, thankfully, Justin was still young enough, and impressionable enough, when I told him that he believe me. However, now that you’re an adult and have managed to get yourself into this predicament - sorry, about that, Brian, on your honeymoon and all - I better come clean, I guess.”

“Damn right! And this time you better tell me everything, Mother. You can’t believe how stressed out Brian and I have been all night about this,” Justin prevaricated just a bit, not wanting to let his mother off the hook for lying to him all these years.

“Again, with the drama thing!” Jennifer rolled her eyes and shook her head disapprovingly. “It’s simple, really.” She moved over to the side of the bed and motioned for Brian to take a position on Justin’s other side. “All you have to do is provoke the ‘fight or flight’ response. As soon as Justin feels the physical need to run away from whatever the situation is, his body will revert back to his human form, he’ll get his legs back and then he can run away.”

“That sounds easy . . . but, maybe dangerous,” Brian cautioned. “I mean, don’t you have to usually be put in some kind of traumatic situation to get that kind of response? I don’t care if he stays a fucking fish for the rest of his life - I’m not going to let you or anyone else hurt him, Jennifer.”

“Well, you could just spank him. That’s what my mother did to me the first time. Although,” Jennifer eyed the two mostly unclothed men with scepticism, “knowing you two, he’d probably like being spanked, which means that wouldn’t work.” It was Brian’s turn to blush, just a little, as his pseudo-mother-in-law grinned lasciviously at him. “No, I was thinking more along the lines of tickling.”

“Tickling?” Justin bolted upright in the bed, with a very concerned look on his face. “No fucking way! I hate to be tickled. You know that, Brian! Mom . . .”

The two humans hovering over the bed looked at other, grinned, and then purposefully bent over the patient with fingers crooked menacingly.

“Good thing you can’t run away, Sunshine,” Brian cackled gleefully, as he dug his fingers into the tender sides of his very ticklish lover.

“No. NO. NOOOOOO! STOP! STOP! I HATE BEING TICKLED. YOU SADISTIC MONSTERS! STOP!” Justin screamed, wriggled, kicked at them with his tail, flailed at them with his arms and even bit at their hands if they got too close to his face. But with the two of them working in concert, the poor merman didn’t stand a chance. In less than two minutes, they had him chortling with laughter, squirming maniacally and frantically trying to roll off the bed.

There was a flurry of bed sheets, one last bucking of an aquamarine scaled tail, and then, poof, the tail disappeared and there were two legs in it’s place . . . which were promptly put into use as the boy attached to them found his feet and bolted away from the tickle monsters that had been attacking him.

“See? Piece of cake,” Jennifer stated, tucking a strand of hair that had been mussed during the tussle back behind her ear.

“That’s all it takes?” Justin sputtered at his mother from the safety of the far side of the room. “I fucking hate you, you know that, right? All these years you had me so fucking paranoid about the ocean. And I was so scared to tell Brian. And now . . . now . . .”

“Tsk, tsk, tsk.” Jennifer clicked her tongue, walked over to where she’d left her purse, and gathered together the rest of her things. “You’ll get over it dear. Brian, I’m actually glad you know. You can help me take care of him from here on out. It’s a very delicate secret, you understand, but I’m sure you’ll be there for Justin if he ever needs your help again.” The woman walked over and deposited a kiss on Brian’s cheek, then turned towards her son with another. “Now, I won’t stay, because you two ARE on your honeymoon and I don’t want to intrude. You two have fun. I do suggest, though, that you stay out of the saltwater for the rest of the trip.”

Brian grinned over at his lover, who was still hiding from possible tickle torture behind the armchair in the corner.

Jennifer opened the door, ready to leave, but then paused on the threshold. “Oh, just one more thing, Justin. Whatever you do, you need to remember what I told you about how to act when you’re in your Siren State.” Jennifer looked over at her son’s blank face. “You DO remember everything I told you about that, Justin. Right?” Jennifer noted the boy’s confused shrug and sighed. “If you’ll remember, when I explained about the birds and the bees . . . well, I think we used the fish and the sharks for our analogy . . . I told you about the mer reproductive system . . . You don’t remember? Justin! I warned you about this! You know how powerful we are in our Siren State! You have to be very careful when you’re like that. You wouldn’t want Brian getting pregnant with little fish babies or anything, would you? How the hell would we ever explain that back on Liberty Avenue! You REALLY do need to pay attention from now on, Justin.”

Since neither man said anything more, Jennifer slipped on her sunglasses and flounced out the door with one last, “Bye boys! Have a great honeymoon! See you in a week!” before she was gone down the path and out of sight.

“She was just kidding about that too, right?” Brian asked a full five minutes later when he’d finally recovered from the shock enough to remember how to speak. “It’s like the ‘True Love’ thing. Right?”

Justin simply stared at his partner with a worried look on his perfectly human features.

“Right?” Brian asked again. “Justin? Justin! Tell me she was joking! Tell me!”

“Um . . . Mom? Mom!” Justin ran out the still open door and down the path screeching at the top of his lungs for his mother.

With Brian following about three paces behind.