“I bet you’re hungry,” Charlotte laughed as she reached out for her phone. “It’s already seven and we all know that if you don’t eat by now, you’re the first to go gremlin.”
Everyone nodded in agreement. If she didn’t eat, everyone knew about it. “You’re probably right.”
“Of course, I am. Selfie!” Charlotte shouted as she held out the phone and everyone squeezed in for a picture. “Man, this light is perfect for pictures.”
Giggling and splashing, they all got out of the water, grabbed their towels and began to dry off. Isabella looked behind her, searching for whatever she saw. She wasn’t sure why it bothered her that no one else saw the movement. It wasn’t like it was an actual ghost, though even as she thought that, she felt like she may be wrong in her thinking.
The unease in her stomach grew and without a reason, she looked sharply to her left and watched a figure shoot from the water, this time as close to the ship as it could get without being on deck. Before the image faded out, she could swear she saw the stunned brown eyes of a boy, not any older than she was, looking directly at her.
Theo
“What the heck was that?” Theo stuttered as he settled below the surface of the ocean. His breathing was heavy, though he took in no water, his mind was in a panic. He never expected to see a vessel of that size. He hadn’t even gone onto the ship and could already tell it was beyond his own imagination.
“Looks like the dolphins made a fool of you,” James chuckled as he wiggled his fingers, attracting the nearby fish to come swim around him.
“Well, that was unexpected. Did you see that girl? The one who looked directly at me?” he asked. In his mind he could see her, the woman who looked like the angel’s sailors used to talk about. The ones he ever believed existed. Her hair was the color of a brightly lit fire with eyes as green as the emeralds he’d seen in Poseidon’s castle, the ones adorning his crown.
“Which one? I saw at least four when I surfaced.”
“The one with fire for hair. She saw me, looked right into my eyes.”
“I think you have finally lost your mind. No one can see us without our permission. And even then, it's only for a second.” James looked over at Theo and gave him a look of disbelief. He’d have given his friend the same look if the roles were reversed.
“I swear she looked right at me,” he whispered into the water as he looked up to see the wake the ship had left.
“Maybe she did. Stranger things have been known to happen in these waters.” His friend was right, they were both living proof of it.
“Let’s go back, snoop around. I’ve never seen such a ship before, and I bet there’s a lot we can get into.” What he really wanted to do was go back and find that girl. Woman. She was defiantly a young woman, one close to his own age.
“Fine but lie low. If someone did see you, it could be the boss playing tricks again. Or the Fates.”
“Poseidon really needs to get a more interesting hobby. Something other than making my life hell,” Theo grumbled as he sent himself flying through the water. The ship wasn’t traveling at a speed that was meant for distance, so it was easy to catch. Without looking back, he knew that James had followed close behind.
Jumping up and into the ship, he found himself in a completely different world. Through his thousands of years of life, he had done an okay job at keeping up with the times, the languages and the cultures. Knowing what he did of the world around him made him miss the days when life seemed to be simpler. He hated every minute of it when he was alive and now, he wouldn’t say no to going back.
“Woah,” he heard James say. Theo agreed. Taking tentative steps, they began to walk the halls, passing through people and walls, exploring what they could see. There seemed to be food at every corner, people of all ages running around, and all the comforts the Gods would require, being enjoyed by those that were not Gods.
His mind was having a hard time processing all the information that was thrown his way. And as impressive as it all was, he found himself not really looking at it. There was something else he was meant to find on this ship and he was hard pressed to stop his body from being drawn to it. If it wasn’t for the constant tug on his body, he’d have jumped ship immediately.
After going up a few decks, below a few decks, then back up, they both found themselves at the aft of the ship, looking out at the sun as it dropped into the ocean. The brilliant flash of green that announced the sun dropping into the horizon, one that most people missed, let him know another day had ended and another would begin. This was his life, day in and day out. He thought he had made peace with it years ago, but something in him stirred in an unsettled manor.
“Now what?” James asked as he walked up to stand beside him.
“No clue,” he answered.
“You’re going to find that woman, aren’t you?”
Theo looked at his friend, whose lips thinned out into a small smile as he winked. It was scary that James knew him more than he did some days.
“Yeah, I guess. I mean, it's nothing really, but you know me. I hate a mystery.”
“Whatever loser. It's not like you have a curfew or a set time frame to be home. Poseidon couldn’t care less.”
Theo snorted a laugh and shook his head. James was right, no one would care if he stayed on the ship or took shelter in a cave two miles below the sea. He was on his own. “Give my best to the old man.”
“Are you dismissing me?”
He looked over at James and raised a brow. “You want to stay?”
“Nope. Don’t drive anyone to jump ship. I’m not cleaning up that mess.” James smiled, stepped up onto the railing and dove off with award winning form. It was too bad no one was around to see it.
“Show off,” he muttered then turned back to the deck, just in time to see the women he was looking for taking a seat on a strange looking bench. Not wanting to risk being seen again, he ducked behind the pool and strained to listen to what was being said between her and her friends.
He wasn’t sure why he wanted to hear what was being said. After a few minutes of listening, he was completely lost. However, in his mind he had hoped that she would talk about seeing him. At least, he hoped she would. He hadn’t considered that she may have already mentioned him or that she didn’t actually see him.
His mind began to imagine what it would be like to hear his name on her lips, to listen as she spoke about things she loved and about this time period. He conjured images of what it would be like to take her hand in his and show her the ocean's beauty, the side of the sea that he rarely enjoyed.
With a jerk, he felt his body push to stand and had to connive himself to stay still. There was nothing he could do about the things his mind had decided to create and it took all his strength to keep his body still and in place.
After a few minutes of arguing with himself and trying to get his body to calm down, he peeked over the edge of the pool to see the woman sitting on the chair with her knees into her chest, alone, and staring directly at him.
“I can see you,” she said, her voice like a song from the ocean, low and music to his ears.
Theo looked behind him, confirming that he was the only person on deck, aside from her, and looked back. There is no way she should be able to see me. Yet, the laws his life had been governed by for thousands of years seemed to no longer matter.
He stood and dusted off his clothes, which startled him since he had been wearing the same things since the day he died. His mind had completely forgotten about his circumstances, attire, and all common since as it focused on only her. He also now had the overwhelming desire to know if he could change his clothes, something he hadn’t ever cared about before.
“Me?” he asked and felt like an idiot after speaking. Of course she was talking to him, he was the only other person on deck.
“Yes, you,” she said with a small smile. He watched as she tucked a wild red curl behind her ear and even from the distance he was at, he could see ge
tting lost in her brilliantly green gaze.
“Uh, hi.” He wanted to snack himself in the forehead.
“Hi.”
Theo stood frozen, unable to move. He knew he should, or at the very least, disappear into the ocean, but something held him in place. Some form of curiosity kept him from doing anything.
“Is there a costume party I missed?”
“Huh?”
“Your outfit, it’s very good. Very authentic.”
Well it should be, I died in it, he thought to himself and was glad he had kept that internal. That would have been a sure-fire way to have her jump ship, which was something he knew he needed to avoid.
She was not supposed to be able to see him.
Isabelle
Well, this is weird, Isabelle thought as she hugged her legs closer to her body. She’d seen him for a brief moment earlier in the day, when she thought he might have been a figment of her imagination. Now she could see him, and had since he ducked behind the pool, and it was evident that her friends hadn’t. They’d have said something, she was one hundred percent sure of it.
But they didn’t. And now this young man was standing in front of her, looking more confused than a freshman on their first day of college. Plus, he was dressed very oddly. And she knew for a fact that there wasn’t a costume party she was missing.
All that aside, Isabelle couldn’t stop staring at him. His clothes were worn thin and tattered with age. He had no shoes on his feet and his tunic looked like it used to be white, but now had faded into a yellowish green. His hair was short and unruly, the brown the exact same color as his eyes.
He looked very young with a very old soul.
“Where are you from?” Her brain answered the question before it was done exiting her mouth. He wasn’t from around here and not even from this time period. Her mind conjured up the ideas, processed that who she was looking at wasn’t someone within the realms of her current imagination and yet, didn’t immediately dismiss the idea.
Her heart, on the other hand, was doing something she hadn’t expected. It was reaching, pleading, for this young man to come near her. It was as if he was a missing part of her, one that she hadn’t had a clue was missing.
“I don’t remember,” the young man answered honestly, then instantly looked like he regretted answering the question. She watched as his hands fiddled with the torn fabric of his shirt while his eyes darted back and forth. He was nervous and despite the fact she felt bad for him, she thought it was endearing.
“Do you have a name?”
“Theo,” he answered automatically.
“Hi Theo, I’m Isabelle.”
“Isabelle,” he breathed out, his voice surrounding her like a prayer of salvation. She had no idea why, and still hadn’t a clue at exactly what she was dealing with, but liked to hear her name from his lips.
A moment of silence spread between them. She waited to feel uncomfortable, yet the feeling never came. She simply waited patiently for him to find something to say. Or do. It didn’t seem to matter to her which came first.
“How can you see me?” Theo finally asked with trepidation in his voice. He was truly afraid of something, or nervous, and that broke her heart. It shouldn’t have, and went against all her previous expectations of meeting people, but it did. She wanted to fix him, if it was possible.
“I don’t know. You look as real as I do. Should you look otherwise?”
“But I shouldn’t. I’m a ghost. I died many, many years ago and you should not be able to see me. No one should be able to see me without my permission and I didn’t give it.” The air charged with static and what little breeze she could feel from the boat moving, was suddenly sucked out from all around her.
She believed in ghosts, paranormal things, things that couldn’t be explained. It just never occurred to her that she would come face to face with a situation where she would have to justify her belief without question.
Opening her mouth, she tried to think of something to say, and couldn’t. Words held no meaning to the situation. At any moment she felt like her body was going to get with the program and bolt from the chair in search of safety. Whatever that meant.
She never moved a muscle and never once feared the man in front of her. “Do you want to come sit by me?” she offered cautiously. There was a strange connection beginning to form between them. This led her to asking if he wanted to come closer and the moment he nodded and began to move, she felt better. Her mind cleared, like whatever it thought it was seeing and hearing was actually real and they weren’t going crazy.
The closer he got, the more handsome he became. The lines of his cheeks were hard and defined, not yet fully matured but close enough to pass as an adult. His eyes were a rich brown color, which matched the color of his hair perfectly.
Muscles defined his arms and chest with a youth that was hard worked in manual labor. She could instantly see the difference between a body that was athletic and a body that had worked for most of its life, and he had done some time in his years. He walked with a fluidity that was sure of each step and didn’t take his gaze off her while he navigated the deck without so much as a hiccup in movement.
Isabelle’s stomach flip-flopped, and butterflies took flight as he neared. She could feel her cheeks flush right up to her ears. Every nerve in her body flared to life as he sat in a chair beside her. She was shocked to not see little bolts of electricity bouncing over her skin.
Her heart instantly swooned, and it took all her mental willpower to not open her mouth and declare her lust, or love, or whatever it was she was feeling for him, aloud. Because no one falls in love instantly, especially not to a damn ghost that may or may not be a real thing.
“So, you’re a ghost, huh?” she said, instead of all the other things her heart was telling her to say.
“I should be. I was cursed and died a long time ago,” Theo answered, never dropping his gaze from her. The look he was giving her was doing amazing things for her ego, she’d at least admit to that.
“A curse? From who?” There was a good chance she didn’t want that answered, but she was talking to a ghost, so who was she to judge the outcome? To hell with common sense at this point.
“Poseidon,” Theo muttered in a flat tone.
“Of course,” she laughed, under her breath, as she dropped her head down and looked at her hand fidgeting on her lap.
“You don’t believe me?” Theo asked, disappointed. Raising her head, she shook it and signed, not knowing what to believe.
“I’d like to, but look at it from my point of view. You’re a ghost, whom I can only see, and you just told me you were cursed by a God that doesn’t exist in my world. Poseidon is a thing of myths and legends, of times long forgotten and stories that sit in shelves, collecting dust.”
“He is not going to like hearing that people don’t believe in him anymore. But I’d love to be the one to tell him.” Theo laughed, the sound like waves breaking against a rocky shore.
Isabella smiled. “Surely if he is a God, this information is not news to him.” A yawn escaped her before she could stop it. Tired was an understatement for what she was and yet, sleep was the last thing on her mind. Ghost or not, she was enjoying his company and wasn’t ready to close her eyes just yet.
“I forgot what it's like to be tired and sleep. You should go and rest,” Theo commented. She watched as he reached out for her hand and hesitated before touching her. Her body didn’t hesitate, however, as she met him halfway, taking his hand and giving him a little squeeze.
There was nothing ghostly about his grip. It was real, callused, and warm. He felt so real, comforting, that she wanted to lean her head against his shoulder and look out across the darken ocean, doing nothing more than dreaming about where he might have come from and why he was here with her right now. She dared not to move, or even blink, afraid that if this was a dream and she’d awake heartbroken.
“You don’t sleep?”
“No, I don’t.” T
heo squeezed her hand and brought her knuckles to his lips, kissing them gently. Chills chased down her spine, followed by a shiver that had nothing to do with a temperature change.
“Rest,” he whispered as he stood. She didn’t want to let go of his hand and continued to grasp his fingers until he faded away, a ghost in his true form. She gasped and put her hand to her mouth, looking around desperately to find a man who seemed to have been nothing more than her imagination. But he wasn’t. He was real, she was sure of it.
Theo
Theo had to disappear before several things happened.
He didn’t want the moment to be ruined by someone or something interrupting him. He wouldn’t put it past Poseidon to barge in and interrupt a good thing, merely because it was a good thing for Theo. The angel on the ship above, with the fiery hair and a spirit to match, Isabelle, was his to explore. No one else’s.
Ironically, that wasn’t the most pressing reason he bolted.
There was a moment, right before he stood, where he could clearly see himself leaning in and laying his lips ever so gently on hers. Thousands of years of feeling absolutely no emotion and in the blink of a second, all of them came crashing in, threatening to drown him out.
He was dead. A ghost. She was real and there should have been no attraction to her. None.
Except, when he closed his eyes, he could see every detail of her burned into his mind, creating a place that he wasn’t likely to be able to ignore. Nor did he want to.
He could see her sitting on the deck of the ship, her hair lazily drifting around her face. Even through the darkness of night, the blush on her cheeks shone brightly and gave him hope that maybe the feeling he had wasn’t only his. He had never had much experience with women and the ones he had kept company with, weren’t of a great moral character. His mother wasn’t much of a good example either. She was a fantasy come to life.
Rising Tides Page 2
