SEA, SWALLOW ME, remus lupin

dhà deug, whilst reality sinks in

CHAPTER TWELVE 
whilst reality sinks in

cw: depictions of a panic attack & minor injury detail

                           𖦹 ⋆｡˚⋆ฺ ⋆｡˚⋆ฺ˚⋆˚ 𖦹

   COVE FINDS HERSELF STUCK AT A crossroads.

   The first path curves toward freedom. It sees her painted in a picture of seafoam and salt, the concept of time fading to a trivial thing of the past when she's liberated from all the mortal troubles and stress. In this vision, the Cove that walks this path is content in her life at sea, her days spent swimming in the vast oceans surrounded by the family she holds so dear regardless of whether they're her blood relatives or not. Her worst troubles regard entanglement in fishing nets or territory disputes with the storm kelpies, her worries diluted down to dregs at the back of her mind that evade her on the best days.

   However, the second path swerves away from the first and stretches into the horizon. It takes her towards a full life on two legs with a family to call her own, the bigger picture merely a rough sketch that's awaiting more details. Maybe they'd have a nice house on the coast so that she'd never be far from the sea, perhaps a kneazle or two to make their lives all the sweeter. She would finally have the opportunity to pursue a job that could improve the rights of selkies and other sea folk for good, to fight for what's right in the world she's choosing to live in.

   Would it be fair to leave behind a world of change so that she can eternally indulge in the other world she wants to conserve so badly? To unite with her people without making a difference to how they're perceived back on land?

   The first path, though enriched with freedom, means that Cove would completely lose her life. Her love. Everything on land that she holds dear to her would simply be left to rot. She would have to leave behind all of her friends and disappear into the sea without a trace like all of those other selkies that came before her. She'd lose her lifelines; Fallon, Mary, Remus. All of them left behind without a word from her as she spends the rest of her days in the depths of the sea. Erased, forgotten.

   Cove isn't sure that she has it in her to leave her human life behind. Devoting her days to the wilder side of her identity amongst the seaweed and tidal waves sounds like a dream, and yet she doesn't know if she can muster up the courage to completely abandon everyone she holds dear to her like that. She never thought she'd be forced to pick between her two families and, even though she's a little bit pissed with her at the moment, Madam Pomfrey is completely right — this double life of hers is already beginning to tear her apart.

   Huffing a sigh, Cove skims a stone across the surface of the Black Lake, shivering despite the cardigan wrapped tight around her shoulders. It sinks below the surface after a few hops across the murky waters, pulled down deep below the shore to be discarded and forgotten. Cove could almost laugh at the irony.

No, she can hardly remember how to laugh at a time like this. Instead of laughing at her predicament, her head is hung in shame as she lets the hot, salty tears pour from her downcast eyes. What's she supposed to do? The question echoes around in her head relentlessly, plaguing her every thought and corrupting until she can hardly dream of anything else.

Her breathing is growing more erratic by the second, an unfamiliar sinking feeling building up a horrible weighted pressure her gut. When more and more tears begin to break through her composure and stream down her face, there's nothing that she can do to stop them.