What the Water Gave Me

Chapter Eighteen

Bucky returned later in the day and Steve was still taking inventory of all the things he’d been thrown.

“What is all this?” He asked. “Where’d you get this?”

“Sang at a cruise ship,” Bucky wrote on a new board, an actual whiteboard this time, and held it up.

“What?” Steve cried. “With kids?” Bucky frowned.

“I didn’t hurt them,” he wrote. “I just made them to throw stuff over.” Steve saw Bucky’s jaw tick with frustration. He wiped the board clean and wrote again and held it up. “You don’t trust me very much.”

“Well sometimes, you seem more siren than human,” Steve accused and Bucky glared.

“I AM a siren,” he wrote and underlined the words. “Not human at all!! Siren!! And that’s IT!!” He turned the board around, wiped it, wrote, and held it up again. “I’m not even human a little bit!”

“Why are you saying this?” Steve cried.

“Because it’s true!” Bucky replied. “Why? Is being friends with a siren less appealing?”

“Actually, yes,” Steve shot back. “Most people would say it’s a pretty boneheaded idea.” Bucky glared for a long time before he wrote again.

“I’m not evil,” he wrote. “I’m a siren. There’s a difference.” Steve didn’t answer. “HELLO?” Bucky wrote angrily. “I’m sorry I don’t have legs, because apparently that means you’re inherently better.”

“Take me back,” Steve ordered him. “This instant.” Bucky’s angry scowl fell a little and he lowered the whiteboard. He stared at Steve. “What?” Steve cried. “I want to go back, I want to go home.”

“Sorry,” Bucky wrote. “But, um, I think that’d be a bad idea.”

“Oh, no,” Steve groaned. “Is this payback? Is this what you’re doing, this is revenge?” Bucky’s face hardened again.

“You really think I’m the worst, don’t you,” he scrawled. “You really don’t trust me at all.”

“I don’t think you’re the worst,” Steve replied.

“When I was on land, you were quicker to believe I’d eat your friend before you’d consider that your friend might have been hurting me,” he wrote angrily. “I had to force you to listen to me.”

“You have to admit, it looked bad,” Steve said and Bucky slapped the water. His eyes were starting to shine wetly.

“No!” He wrote in thick letters. “You were supposed to trust me! You were supposed to be my friend! I was losing my SCALES and you almost turned around and left me!!”

“I’m sorry!” Steve yelled. “Okay, I’m sorry!! Now take me back!!”

“I can’t do that!!” Bucky wrote. “You’d be dead in a day!”

“What are you talking about?” Steve cried.

“The poison, you idiot!” Bucky replied. “It’s still in your system, the sponge just makes it a little better! You can’t leave until it’s out of your system! You’re still poisoned!”

“And whose fault is that,” Steve growled and Bucky threw his whiteboard into the water. He was shaking and glaring up at Steve and tears spilled down his cheeks. Then, he turned around and swam away again. “Yeah, go!!” Steve yelled after him. “I don’t need your help, you ass! Go!!” And when Bucky was far enough away that Steve couldn’t see him anymore, he collapsed onto the rock and held himself and tried desperately not to cry.