Nine Days and Seven Tears Read online

  Nine Days, and Seven Tears

  By JL Merrow

  Published by JMS Books LLC

  Visit jms-books.com for more information.

  Copyright 2019 JL Merrow

  ISBN 9781634863520

  Cover Design: Written Ink Designs | written-ink.com

  Image(s) used under a Standard Royalty-Free License.

  All rights reserved.

  WARNING: This book is not transferable. It is for your own personal use. If it is sold, shared, or given away, it is an infringement of the copyright of this work and violators will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

  No portion of this book may be transmitted or reproduced in any form, or by any means, without permission in writing from the publisher, with the exception of brief excerpts used for the purposes of review.

  This book is for ADULT AUDIENCES ONLY. It may contain sexually explicit scenes and graphic language which might be considered offensive by some readers. Please store your files where they cannot be accessed by minors.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are solely the product of the author’s imagination and/or are used fictitiously, though reference may be made to actual historical events or existing locations. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Published in the United States of America.

  * * * *

  Nine Days, and Seven Tears

  By JL Merrow

  “You don’t get seals on the Isle of Wight, Briony Brain-dead.”

  The sea had taken on the grey of the skies, and the briny air that buffeted my face was chill with the promise of winter. The seafront was deserted; only a dog walker heading towards the cliffs, an elderly couple in the distance, and me. And now, my annoying little brother, Col.

  “It was probably a rock,” he went on. “A big, fat, rock.” Col punctuated his words with wide-armed gestures, and when he’d finally shut up, he blew out his cheeks.

  I pretended to yawn. Maybe I wasn’t a stick insect with a pair of melons for boobs, like the girls in the porno vids he thought nobody knew he watched on his phone, but so bloody what?

  Maybe I’d skip pudding tonight, though. Well, depending on what it was. Mum did some great puddings.

  “I know what I saw, all right?” I told him. “Anyway, they had a whale in the Thames. Why shouldn’t we get a seal blown off course around here?”

  I didn’t even realize I was standing there with my hands on my hips until he started mimicking me. I shoved my fists in my pockets and stomped along the sea wall away from him. God, I hated this place. Nothing here but sand and sea, and people who remembered every daft thing you did when you were a kid.

  All right. I didn’t hate the place. Maybe I even loved it, with the fresh island breezes and the smell of the sea everywhere you went. But I didn’t love the lack of opportunities and the narrow-mindedness. There’s a reason the word “insular” comes from the word “island.” I was stuck here, fresh out of uni with a degree no one wanted and no bloody job. Not likely to find one round here either, but I’d have to be mad to leave home without some money coming in, wouldn’t I?

  Col didn’t care. He had it all planned out. He was going to finish at the tech college and get a job stacking shelves somewhere, and live at home so he could spend his pay out drinking with his mates every Friday night, with just enough left over to take his girlfriend out somewhere cheap on Saturday.

  I hated her too. Sharp-faced and mean, she was always offering to lend me her clothes and then just remembering there were three sizes between us—and that was on one of my good days.

  If she’d been here she’d have been laughing at me too. But I knew what I’d seen. I’d seen a seal. Beautiful, it was, with eyes you could dive right into. It’d looked straight at me, head cocked like it was studying me, and then it ducked back under the waves. I’d looked for ages, trying to see it again, until Col came up and asked me why I was staring out to sea like a zombie had come up and eaten my brain. Not that it would have been more than a snack, according to my bloody brother.

  I didn’t hate Col. Not really. I just didn’t like him very much, that’s all.

  * * * *

  I went down to the sea front again after dinner. I’d had two helpings of jam roly-poly just to prove I didn’t care what Col said, so I needed the walk. And I wanted to see if she was there again.

  I’d decided the seal must have been a she. Too graceful to be male, she was. Maybe I’d only seen a sleek head and the curve of her back as she dived, but I knew she was grace itself. I wanted to see her again. I wanted to watch the sunset gild her fur while I stood on the beach like a love-starved sailor of old, seeing mermaids in the gloaming.

  I’d forgotten it would be high tide by then.

  The wind was whipping up the waves to crash against the sea wall, sending up clouds of spray that spattered my face and left me tasting salt on my lips. There was no beach left at all, and the gulls were circling high above me, crying at its loss. I shivered, hoping my seal had found somewhere safe to rest for the night.

  I turned to walk back home—and almost bumped right into her. Not my seal, of course. A girl. Well, a woman, really; just about my age, to look at her. She’d pulled down the top half of her wetsuit to show her black swimsuit underneath, swelling with the curve of her full breasts.

  “Hello,” she said, smiling at me. “I’m not quite sure where I am.”

  “Sandown,” I said. “Well, Yaverland, really, this far down, but you won’t have heard of the village.” And I blushed, because there she was, a beautiful woman come out of nowhere, and there I was, getting pernickety about parish boundaries.

  She cocked her head to one side, her dark, wet hair drifting in the wind like seaweed in the swell. “Yaverland? I like the name.”

  Her accent was strange—reminded me of all those Scandinavian crime shows on the telly, though my swimmer would fill out a Faroe sweater much better than what’s-her-face in that Danish show.

  “Where have you come from?” I blurted out.

  “Oh, my boat’s out there,” she said, waving an arm vaguely out to sea. I looked, but I couldn’t see a single light. “Like I said, I think I got lost.”

  “You swam in from a boat?” My heart felt cold as I looked at the waves thundering against the breakwaters, crushing driftwood to pieces. “You can’t go back in this sea!”

  “It’s all right,” she said, her hand soft on my arm. “I’m a very strong swimmer.”

  “Look, why don’t you come back to my mum and dad’s? They’re out—it’s ballroom dancing night. You can have a cup of coffee and—” And I can try and stop you swimming to your death.

  She looked at me for a long, long moment. “You’re sure? That’s very kind of you. I’m Freyja.”

  “Briony,” I said. “And, um, my brother Col’s going to be home, but just ignore him, okay?”

  “Ah! I know—I have lots of brothers.” She slipped her hand into the crook of my arm and we set off back home, my skin tingling every time our hips brushed.

  * * * *

  Col didn’t even look up from his PlayStation when we walked in the door. I didn’t want to talk to Freyja with guns blaring in the background, so I took her into the kitchen, ducking under Dad’s freshly-ironed shirts hanging by the door. We sat at the little wooden table with the wonky chairs, breathing in the scents of fabric softener and the lasagna left over from dinner.

  “How long are you going to be here?” I asked, as I handed her a mug of coffee made with all hot milk to keep out the chill.

  She smiled crookedly. “I can’t stay. I need to get back to Hvammstangi—I really shouldn’t be here at all. I don’t
know what drew me down here.” As she spoke, she laid her hand, warm from the mug and from the heart of her, on my arm. I placed my own hand over it and twined my fingers into hers, my stomach feeling like it was full of little fishes darting joyfully in all directions. “But I’m glad I came,” she whispered.

  “Me too,” I said, and I leaned over the table and dared to kiss her. She tasted of salt and fresh air and freedom, and I pulled her to me, not wanting to let her go.

  Her breasts were warm and soft against mine, her skin like velvet. She clambered onto my lap, still half in her wetsuit like a butterfly coming out of its chrysalis, and we clung together, wordless, until she rested her forehead on mine. “I have to go. I’m sorry, Briony.”

  I tried to stop her. “No, you can’t go.” I pulled at her wetsuit, but she looked so sad I dropped my hand. “I wish you’d stay,” I whispered, defeated.

  “Remember me,” she said softly. “Remember me, and perhaps we’ll meet again.”

  “When?”

  “Nine days’ time, if you still remember me. Nine days’ time. I can stay that long.”

  “Then why not stay with me?” I begged.

  “I can’t,” she said. “But I can come to you once more.”

  I walked her back to the seafront. The wind was quieter now, and the sea was soft and welcoming. Freyja put her hand to the zip of her wetsuit. “Don’t watch me go,” she said, so I turned and walked away, but the splash I listened for never came. For a moment I thought she’d changed her mind, but then I heard her voice on the wind, as if a gull had carried it to me.

  “Nine days,” she called. “Remember that, Briony. Nine days, and seven tears!”

  * * * *

  There’s a lot you can learn in nine days. You can learn all about the different types of seals, and where they live. You can learn that Freyja’s an Icelandic name, and Hvammstangi’s a small town in their North. You can learn that Iceland’s a much more tolerant place than some islands you could think of.

  You can realize that if you have to spend many more months here you’ll go mad, and that while hope can inspire you, it can hurt you too.

  * * * *

  It was a calm, clear night when I went back down to the sea, Mum’s apple crumble and ice cream a cold comfort in my stomach. Nine days, she’d said, and here I was. Maybe I’d already gone mad. After all, who’d seen her, apart from me? Col hadn’t even noticed her passing through.

  It wasn’t hard, keeping her second condition, as I sat on the sea wall with my legs dangling over the edge, hugging myself while I let my tears drop into the water. Harder to keep to seven, they flowed so fast, but I hoped she’d forgive me.

  I thought I saw my seal, but she was gone before I could blink—and then Freyja was beside me, her wetsuit half undone once more.

  “You didn’t forget,” she whispered, and she was crying too.

  I pulled her close to me, the soft warmth of her flesh revitalizing me. “You’re like a hot spring,” I told her. “Warmed by the spirits of the earth.”

  Freyja cocked her head on one side, and smiled. “And you’re a rock for basking on, heated by the sun.”

  “Come and bask with me,” I said, and we stood and walked back to my parents’ house.

  I didn’t disturb them, watching telly with Col. I took Freyja straight up to my room. I peeled off her wetsuit and her swimsuit too and left them on my bedroom floor. My breathing hitched as I kissed her full breasts and the curve of her stomach, her body all softness and warmth. I traced her contours with my tongue, which tingled from the sea-salt on her body, and I kissed her lower still, where the milky white of her skin gave way to darkness and musk. I found where the heat of her was centered, and as she opened for me like a sea anemone she arched her back and hummed with pleasure. The scent and the flavor of her almost overwhelming me, I tongued that hard, crimson bud again and again, until Freyja shuddered and came, crying out softly in an ancient language I longed to understand.

  “You make me so hot,” she whispered, but her white fingers felt cool on my heated skin, like the lap of the sea on a hot summer’s day. They rippled over me, bringing life and yearning to every part they caressed, and then they dove inside me, darting in and out with a touch that both burned and soothed. I gasped as her mouth closed over my nipple, feeling the heat of it deep within me. Her tongue teased me without mercy, but I ached for my loss as it left me—only for my Freyja to murmur soothing sounds as her dark head dipped lower, her silky hair flowing like water over my body. I had to stifle my cries in case Col might hear as she found me again, this time right at my center. She suckled on my clitoris as her fingers moved within me, bringing me higher and higher on a wave of sensation, and I cried out aloud as I crested that wave and broke, tumbling down to float on smooth water, little ripples moving me still.

  Afterward, I held her in my arms and we basked together in a tangle of cool sheets and warm bodies. “I’m going to see you again,” I told her.

  “I can’t stay,” she said sadly, her hair caressing my skin like warm, dry sand as she shook her head.

  “I know,” I said. “But I’m going to see you again.”

  * * * *

  If I were a man, I might have stolen her wetsuit as she slept, and never let her swim away from me.

  But I’m not a man, and despite my name I’m not one to cling onto what’s not mine by right. So I kissed my love in the dawn’s pink glow, and I walked her down to the beach before anyone was up. I turned my back once more as she swam away while the gulls mourned for the both of us.

  But then again, what do gulls know? I booked a flight to Reykjavik with my credit card and started looking for a job there on the internet.

  “Why do you have to go to Iceland? There’s nothing there!” Col grumbled as I packed my bags.

  “Well, it’s like you said. You don’t get seals on the Isle of Wight.” I shut my case with a snap, and Col sneered at me and twirled a finger round by the side of his head, muttering “Briony Basket-case.”

  And I smiled, and started counting the days until I’d see my selkie again.

  THE END

  ABOUT J.L. MERROW

  J.L. Merrow is that rare beast, an English person who refuses to drink tea. She read Natural Sciences at Cambridge, where she learned many things, chief amongst which was that she never wanted to see the inside of a lab ever again. Her one regret is that she never mastered the ability of punting one-handed whilst holding a glass of champagne.

  She writes across genres, with a preference for contemporary gay romance and the paranormal, and is frequently accused of humour. Find her online at jlmerrow.com.

  ABOUT JMS BOOKS LLC

  JMS Books LLC is a small queer press with competitive royalty rates publishing LGBT romance, erotic romance, and young adult fiction. Visit jms-books.com for our latest releases and submission guidelines!

 

 

  JL Merrow, Nine Days, and Seven Tears

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