Prompt - Something Lost, Something Found

[infringe]

SONG OF THE SEA ( joshua, alecto ) A selkie far from home, searching for his coat. He meets a kind, lonely, young fisherman who tends the lighthouse near the sea.

Comments

[singinthestorm]

He watches Alecto closely, quiet throughout the tender exchange between him and Avery, every word a needle of pain - Alecto's resolve, his quiet determination, his care and consideration for their son. He doesn't deserve the little thoughtfulness, he thinks, a wry curl of dark humor in the midst of the despair he is desperately trying to hold at bay. There is nothing he can say, he has no right to try to sway Alecto. He had known this was a possibility the moment he grasped the contents of that letter and chose silence over truth, out of fear; but it would do Avery no good for him to add to the complicated confusion of the moment, to be caught between his two parents and their two different worlds.

Joshua stands up from where he's been sitting and walks forward, takes Avery's hand gently in his own as he walks past him where he is staring, teary-eyed and bemused, and leads him to the door where Alecto is standing, looking back. Joshua's eyes are dry, his expression as calm and steady as he can make it, but if anyone in this world knows him well, it is Alecto Archer, his wife of six years, the keeper of their home and his heart, the mother of their son, of another child he might never get a chance to meet. He reaches out with his other hand, his fingers tentative and gentle as they wrap around Alecto's wrist, as he bows his head low and brings it up to his mouth for a kiss, the slightest brush of his lips against the back of Alecto's hand.

"Please take care of yourself," he murmurs. He doesn't know if he can say everything else in his heart - how much he loved Alecto, how much he would be missed, how often he would look out at the sea and wish him well, how sorry he was for his human weakness and sentiment.

And then he lets go.

[infringe]

Words are lost on him. He swallows around a lump in his throat. The press of Joshua's lips to the back of his pale hand makes Alecto want to cry, a sob heaving itself out from deep in his chest. He turns fully, temporarily, away from the door, to grab hold of his husband's handsome, tired, despairing face and kiss him, fully, mouth open, apologies and regret and love pouring forward all in equal measure.

He wants to stay. But he can't help but leave.

"Darling," he says, that treasured term of endearment, now a farewell, trembling with so much feeling. He pulls back to press their foreheads together, briefly. But, try as he might, nothing else comes to him then, a multitude of things he wishes he could say, wishes he could explain, compromise on. But the tide is calling and his magic must run free -

So with that, he flees, his tears stinging cold on his face, but the breath of relief he feels when he finally pulls up the hood of his coat and turns back to what he's supposed to be...it's unparalleled.

Alecto disappears beneath the swell of the rising tide, a flash of pearl white. On the black rocks of the sea cliffs from where he leapt, he leaves behind his wedding band, a thin gold halo glinting in the sun.