drown for you | jjk

10

Fortunately, your little argument doesn't cause any long-lasting hard feelings between you two. The day after, when you bring his food nervously, he appears suspicious but still lets you stutter through some small talk. Eventually, he starts contributing himself, and soon enough, it's as if the argument never even took place. Or almost, at least.

The last few days, you've watched Jeongguk make steady progress. It isn't anything huge, just baby steps, but they're steps in the right direction, and that's all that matters. You're just happy he doesn't starve or strand himself anymore.

He mentions in passing that he doesn't know exactly why he feels the urge to strand himself, just that it comes when he's feeling stressed out and severely confused by his emotions. He simply doesn't know what to do with himself. You'd be lying if you said it's not a huge relief to hear that he didn't try to end his life.

Every day, you visit him, even finding time on your days off. A big part of the treatment plan, except for feeding the siren, is to keep him happy and satisfied, which you never object to.

In fact, you love spending time with him. He's so curious, always asking questions about humans, and even if he's been among your kind for a long time, he still wonders about the world above the shoreline.

You try to answer everything, reminding yourself that he's only ever experienced the absolute worst of humankind. He doesn't talk about his past much, especially before he was first captured. You never push him to.

One thing you never, ever expected in a hundred million years was that you would be teaching a bloody merman how to read! He asked you to teach him, and what are you going to do? Say no? No way in hell.

So you search up a whiteboard and some markers and begin to teach him the alphabet. Since he already knows how to speak and even compose quite complex sentences, it doesn't take long. All you really have to do is show him the letters and which sound corresponds to which letter. Hearing him try to sound out the letters to figure out what word you've written is probably the cutest thing you've ever witnessed.

You're spending as much time with him as you can, but there are twenty-four hours in a day, and unfortunately, you simply can't be with him for most of them. Briefly, he explains that there had been a tv in the same room as his tank at a previous owner's place and how it used to keep him moderately entertained as well as help him learn about humans.

So the next day, you install a tv to the top of the wall surrounding him. Jimin helps you, both with finding one with a waterproof remote and to put it up, making sure it's properly installed behind the glass and won't get wet.

Together with Jeongguk, you pick out all the movies he expresses an interest in, queuing them for him to watch when you're needed elsewhere. You don't like leaving him, but luckily, you're a creative soul, always coming up with things to entertain him in the meantime.

The Rubik's cube takes him a day of tongue out and furrowed eyebrows to solve, but as soon as he's figured the technique out, he requires less and less time until he grins proudly after only a few minutes. To say you're impressed is an understatement; you never actually got the hang of the devilish cube yourself.

And when you mention it to Namjoon, he rushes to scribble down every detail before suggesting more challenging tasks for the siren.

Ideally, they'd all help you with Jeongguk, giving him more social stimulation and entertaining him like you do. But unfortunately, he hasn't warmed up to them at all.

Yeah, he doesn't necessarily hiss or show his fangs at them anymore; he'll even stay at the surface when they, for some reason, have to help you with something—like the tv—seeing as your shoulder needs the rest. But he never talks to them. Not a single word have they heard from him. Of course, Namjoon and Hoseok listen to him on the tapes, but never in real life.