Tetrology Of The Sea - Book 1: From The Sea 🪼✔

Seventeen

For the next couple of days, Ruth took care of Travis as his condition seemed to worsen. He was vomiting all the time now and was getting very weak. The only thing that he was able to keep down was water and broth. Ruth called Josh in after the third day of Travis not eating any solid food as Travis shivered from a chilled sweat he was going through.
Josh took his temperature as Travis laid there exhausted. The temperature was a little high but nothing too serious so Josh grabbed his arm.
"I'm just going to check your blood pressure." Travis gave a small shudder and Josh smiled. "You cold?" He nodded. "I'll get you back under the covers in a moment."
He nodded as Josh got the readings for the blood pressure. It was a little low but nothing too bad. He felt Travis' skin and noticed it was very dry.
"You're skin is extremely dry; you might want to try and keep at least your lips moist so that they don't crack and bleed. I'm going to just feel your stomach here for a moment."
Travis nodded and Josh pulled the covers back to check his stomach when he noticed Travis' pooch looked different. He felt down toward the pooch and noticed that the pooch was definitely harder than normal. At that moment, Josh had a feeling he knew what was going on.
"Travis, will you answer me truthfully if I ask you a personal question?"
Travis turned his face to look at Josh fully.
"While we were gone did you... did you have sex?" he said in a low tone.
Travis' eyes looked away but then looked back at him and he gave small nod. Josh closed his eyes and got up.
"Well, I think I know what it is then. I'll need to speak with your mother for a moment."
"What's wrong with me?"
"I'll just tell Ruth-"
"Josh, why won't you tell me?"
"I promise it's nothing bad."
He left and Travis sighed but was too tired to stay mad at him and drifted into a slight nap.

********************

Ruth heard Josh come down the steps and stood from the couch.
"Well?"
"Remember when we walked in the day we came back and we both thought Travis looked a little different?"
"Yes?"
"That's because while we were gone he decided to give his virginity away."
Ruth furrowed her brows. "Josh, I told Travis that he should never have sex."
"Well, Ruthie, it looks like your little boy had grown up and decided he knew what was better for himself than you did."
"Josh, what are you saying?"
"Ruth, he's pregnant."
Ruth stared at him for a long time, debating on arguing it but she decided against it and sat on the edge of the couch with her face in her hands.
"I knew this would happen one day."
"As did I... Whether he did it on purpose or not, he's definitely pregnant. The pooch that was there when we found him that had the sludge in it is a little bigger and taut to the touch. The other symptoms besides the vomiting are not something I understand but it makes sense..."
"Mom?!"
"Yes, honey?"
"Can you bring me some water?!"
"In a moment!" Ruth turned to Josh. "Have you told him?"
"I told him I needed to talk with you first. Do you want to do this by yourself?"
Ruth thought for a moment. "I think it would be best. He's been so roughed up lately and I don't know how he'll handle this news. If the same little boy is still in there, he wouldn't dare hurt the child... But is there something you could get me for the nausea?"
"Yeah. I'll bring it by later today after I'm done working."
She nodded and Josh left. She walked into the kitchen and found one the big glasses that she had and filled it pretty close to the top with water. She went back up the stairs carefully and knocked on Travis' door. As she entered, Travis was just emptying the first large glass of water.
"Here..." She handed him the glass. "Josh told me."
"Told you what?"
"Travis, you had sex while I was gone didn't you?"
"Yeah."
"Unprotected?"
"Yeah, so?"
"Damn it, boy." She growled smacking him against the head angrily. "What did I tell you about that? If you wanted to get promiscuous, you had to have a condom!"
"Well, it wasn't like I had planned it, Ruth." he snarled.
"Do you realize what you've done?" Ruth hissed.
Travis didn't understand for a moment when it dawned on him and he looked down. His hands went to his stomach and he looked at Ruth with a horrified expression.
"I'm- I'm-"
"Yes, you are. Now do you get it?"
Travis looked at his stomach for a moment and then sighed, running his fingers through his hair.
"I should have remembered that." He mumbled.
"Yes, you should have. Now what are you going to do? We don't even know how this is going to work now."
"Guess we'll have to play it like we see it." He said with a poke to his stomach. "Damn you, Shana."
"Shana?" Travis looked away. "You deflowered our neighbor's daughter?!"
"Well it wasn't my fault! The girl came over here in lingerie that was like a sin or something! I tried to get her to go home but she... seduced me..." he said, his excuse growing thin.
"What if it has not only made you pregnant but her as well?"
"I have a feeling it didn't."
"Do you have a solid explanation for that?"
"Because when we did it and I released, it felt like it pulled back in." Travis said, covering his face from embarrassment.
"What pulled back in?"
"I don't know... But it just felt like after I released that it came back into me. Shana said that... that it felt like I was trying to take something from her. And she meant like I was literally trying to dig around and take it."
"I'll have to look up the reproductive facts of seahorses..."
"I'll look it up. That's just weird to have your mother look up the way your reproduction works. I can go to Wikipedia just as easily as you can. Although, I feel dried out; like I was beached or something."
"You do look like you're pretty dry. Do you think laying in the tub will help?"
"Yeah... I'm sorry, Mom. I know I'm not the greatest kid and I'm a freak like this-"
"You're not a freak, Travis. Different, yes, but never a freak to me. You only turned unknown to me when you changed yourself into what you definitely weren't. You're an extraordinary boy."
Travis nodded and Ruth helped him get to the bathtub. He turned the faucet on and waited for the tub to fill up with water. Once he was satisfied, he took his clothes off and got into the water. The warmth of the water filled his chills and it almost felt like the dryness of his skin was soaking in the water and his skin began to feel less dry. He pushed his feet up a little over the top of the tub and sat there, relaxing a little.
After fifteen minutes or so, he felt his legs beginning to tingle and he uncrossed them, feeling the insides of his legs meld together and go down toward his feel as he pointed them and they melded as well. Within two minutes, a seahorse tail was sticking out of the tub and Travis felt some of the various seahorse things begin to come up on other parts of his body. He felt the small fins beginning to protrude from his arms, his eyes getting just a little bit wider than usual as he lost his eye lids and the eye just took up the socket, and the slits on his neck that were for his gills.
Without knocking, Ruth walked in and screamed. Travis turned to her quickly and ducked under the water to hide. Ruth breathed in and walked over to the tub, looking down into the water as Travis watched her from underneath.
"Come out of there, you just startled me."
He slowly rose up from the water and she smiled.
"I haven't seen you like this a long time."
"I haven't turned in forever." He said with a scratchy voice. "It feels nice."
"True, but you shouldn't let yourself do that in the bathtub. You'll cramp yourself and it's pretty hard for you to get out once you have no feet."
"Can you help me?" he asked sheepishly, knowing she was right.
"I can't pull you out with the strength I once had."
"I know."
She took his hand and he used mostly his strength to pick himself up out of the tub. Ruth took hold of his tail as he eased himself onto the edge of the tub he then slid himself onto the floor where a towel was waiting and Ruth set to drying his legs off with another towel.
"In this form, you can see that you are very plainly pregnant." She said with a small smile.
Travis looked down and could see that it was much bigger in his seahorse form than in his human form.
"Do you think I should tell Shana?"
"Do you think you could live with that? Do you think she could live with that?"
"No..."
"Then if you feel that way, I wouldn't tell her anything. I will not say a word either."
"I just think she should know about it, ya know? I mean, if something happens in the future and all of a sudden she finds out she's got a child somewhere? What if something happens to me and you and they have to put it up for adoption?"
"You're thinking too far into the future. It's up to you whether you want her to know, I'm just telling you that it's risky to do it. It's your decision."
Travis nodded and Ruth dropped the towel on his privates.
"Dry the rest of yourself off."
He nodded and began to rub where he was still seahorse.