Antihero // Freminet FF

1: Alex

The air around me was getting thicker and thicker. No, wait... it wasn't air. It was pure water. I could feel the darkness of the ocean's depths envelope me in its lethal and inescapable blanket.
Was this the end? The way I was actually going to... die?

As if on instinct, I started kicking my legs, desperate to get out of the damned water and finally breathe again. I regretted my decision of drowning myself and silently cursed myself for being such a depressed and lonely fool. This was the price for my stupidity.

Finally, my arms dropped to my sides, and I stopped kicking my legs like a madwoman. My eyes fluttered shut after I saw the cruel and deadly depths of the ocean for the seemingly last time. I didn't even catch a last glimpse of the sunlight above me — it was too positive to be part of this horrible experience, of my final moments.

Instead of holding my breath, I just exhaled, and I could feel my mouth and nose fill with the cold water around me. The last sane parts of my brain, my survival instincts, told me to cough and get the water out of my damn throat. But I didn't listen to them, instead, I just tilted my head back a little with my eyes still closed, accepting my fate.

I sank deeper and deeper into the water, but at some point, my senses became so blurry and my entire body so unfocused that I didn't know what was happening anymore.

In their dying moments, many people see their entire lifespan run before their inner eyes like a small movie, a reminder of their beautiful memories and past. Maybe the dog they had as a child or the first girl they fell in love with. Some see the things they never were able to achieve and curse themselves for not doing what they could've done to accomplish their goals. And some see the worst moment of their life, the one when they realized that it was too late, that their life was coming to an end.

I saw none of these things.

My inner eye was filled with pictures of my foster parents, all the times they'd abused or spanked me, how they cruelly murdered my sister before my very eyes, and the worst of them all: how I finally ran away from their house and how the only way to escape them was death.

My foster parents never taught me to swim, and my panicked self figured that it was a great idea to use that inability to survive in deep waters to my advantage.
Yes. At that moment, I saw it as an advantage that I couldn't rescue myself from drowning. Because it meant that there was no turning back from this as soon as I was deep enough in the water.

And now, I was actually there — deep in the ocean, so deep that there was no way I was going to survive. And at that point, my dizziness and haziness reached their peak, causing me to faint. Or die. I couldn't remember the difference. Was there even a difference? We all have seen countless people magically wake up from death, and we also have seen countless people die during a "harmless slumber".

As soon as my vision turned black, I couldn't remember what happened anymore.
The next thing I knew was that I gasped loudly, and that there was a constant hitting on my back, as if something was jumping on it.

My eyes slowly fluttered open, and I saw sand, a few Romaritime flowers and the shore of the ocean in front of me, and my chin was placed on a hard, sandy surface. Was I lying on my stomach?

"Thank the Archons you're awake..."

I flinched and slowly turned my head. There was a guy in a black diving suit kneeling next to me, one hand on my back, and his eyes fixed on my face. He had those light blue eyes that dragged my attention, and they looked like there was an entire world of unreleased and twisted emotions inside. His hair was blonde, and his left eye was partially covered by the side of his wet bangs. And... he had freckles.

As soon as he caught me staring at him, he looked away, a hint of a blush appearing on his face. But he quickly cleared his throat and spoke up again: "Can you speak?"

I shook my head and placed my hands on either side of my head and tried pushing myself up, but the guy quickly pushed me back down, his voice concerned.
"Don't. You shouldn't overexert yourself, you're still weak..."

With a shaky sigh, I collapsed back down on the sand. Then, I cleared my throat and spoke up, almost flinching at how hoarse and high-pitched my voice sounded.
"W-who are you?"

The guy awkwardly scratched the back of his neck and avoided my gaze. Was he... embarrassed? And his voice was suddenly a lot shakier, too...
"Oh, uh... my name's Freminet. I'm... a diver. I found you in the depths of the sea... and brought you here."

I nodded in acknowledgment, then recalled what happened and realized he saved my life, so I felt the urge to thank him for it. I quickly raised my voice again and spoke up.
"Thank you... for rescuing me."
He looked away. "Sorry."
"What?" I raised an eyebrow weakly, which probably looked extremely weird.

Freminet's eyes focused on the sand, and he started drawing small circles in it with his index finger. "Sorry for making you feel the urge to show gratitude towards me. I just did what a normal person would've done. There's no need to thank me for it."

I scoffed and finally managed to push myself up to a sitting position, now sitting next to him. "Bullshit. Every normal person shows gratitude for something people did for them."
"But-... uh... okay." He looked away again before sheepishly asking: "What's your name?"

I quickly replied, realizing that it was impolite to not introduce myself to someone who introduced himself before. "I'm Alex."
Freminet raised an eyebrow.
"Isn't that a masculine name?"
"It's short for Alexandra." The name tasted bitterly on my tongue and I quickly pushed the thought of the source of that name away.

He nodded. "Alright, Alexandra, then-..."
"Don't call me that." I looked away and started drawing circles in the sand, just like him.

Freminet tilted his head curiously. "Why not? You said it is your name."
I grimaced in disgust at the thought of people calling me that. "It's the name my foster parents gave me. And... I don't want to use it. That's why I shortened it. Made it Alex instead."

He just kept drawing circles in the sand. "Oh. Okay. Then... Alex. Can you tell me why you were at the bottom of the ocean?"
I visibly flinched. I was not going to tell some stranger that I was trying to drown myself. "NO!"

Freminet flinched as well, and for a moment, we just awkwardly stared at each other with wide eyes before he cleared his throat and looked away.
"Okay. Sorry."

I noticed that he was apologizing for the second time even though there was no reason at all, and I raised an eyebrow at him. "Why are you apologizing again?"

"Because I touched a touchy subject, which I shouldn't have."
Freminet dug a small hole in the sand, his fingers trailing the form of a heart inside it. It was actually quite adorable of him.

I looked at the heart, then met his gaze again. "It's okay... don't apologize, okay?"
Freminet looks away, then slowly nods. "A-are you... feeling better? Can I leave now...?"
I raised an eyebrow. Was I so repulsive to him that he suddenly wanted to leave? That was weird. "Uh... sure. You can leave if you want."

He nodded, then grabbed a diving helmet and put it on before waving at me and quickly diving into the seas.

I was left there, with a small heart and a bunch of circles drawn in the sand. And I knew that for some reason, I wanted to see this guy again.