"You're Not Alone Anymore, Ray." NorRay Oneshots

[A Fish Out Of Water.]

Shoutout to rainbowkitty1220 for this request, as well as the one after this one!
M

erman! Ray for this one!

Ray breathed out a disgruntled sigh as he watched all of the other kids his age playing tag from afar. His tail swished solemnly in the water as he rolled his eyes.

He hated having to live like this.

He hated being a merman. He hated that inky seashell mark permanently etched onto his left shoulder. But most of all, he hated that none of the other kids even bothered to talk to him.

Ray heard all of their whispers.

"Look at him! Is he some mutant fish or something?"

"Poor kid. I'd hate to live like that!"

"He's a freak! He can't even play tag like the rest of us!"

He was beyond sick of their taunts. He was beyond tired of everyone else constantly singling him out. But there was one person whom he always saw looking at him...

Ray soon found out that his name was Norman.

Norman had hair as white as freshly fallen snow, and his eyes were a breathtaking shade of blue that perfectly mirrored the color of the water that Ray was cursed to eternally swim in unless he found his true love...

Like he was ever gonna find love anytime soon...

"Ray..."

A familiar voice snapped the restless boy from his racing thoughts. He looked up to see those ocean eyes, staring right at him.

Ray knew exactly who that was.

It was Norman.

"H-Hey.." Ray muttered under his breath.

Norman knelt down towards the water. "Even though you're cursed to live here, all you feel like is a fish out of water, right?" He asked softly.

Ray's eyes widened in surprise. "How did you figure that out?"

A smile tugged at the white-haired boy's lips.  "It was your facial expressions. You don't like it here, I can tell. You want to live like a normal human and play tag like us. But you can't." His fingertips brushed against the seashell mark on Ray's shoulder, causing him to shiver as a tingly feeling was left behind. "That mark is the reason that you're stuck here, isn't that right?"

Ray solemnly nodded, his gaze dropping from Norman's.

"Y-Yeah... You're correct."

The black-haired merman felt his heart skip a beat for some strange reason. Usually the stories portrayed the opposite gender as the merperson's true love... But now, it seemed that instead of a girl, Ray's true love was destined to be a boy...

"Hey, Norman!"

Norman turned around when he heard his name, seeing Emma wave at him.