Connie looked for where he was, and then saw, suddenly, something else: a phosphorescent sparkle on the waves. Something was underneath her, flicking in and out underneath her legs, glittering. Something… she realised was Luke.
Her heart started beating fast. She fought panic, realising that the sweet, mild, eccentric man she’d got to know over the last few months… had gone; had disappeared, was nothing like the same as her and around her instead was this blur of flashing lights, shimmering and moving through the water like quicksilver. She felt her breath get shorter in her throat; looked at the land, which now seemed so far away… What was she doing? This terrible mission, this ridiculous set of events that had led her to this awful catastrophe; that out here on a wild goose chase would be the last night of her life… She thrashed about in the water; found herself swallowing a lungful, which made her choke and splutter as she felt panic overtake her… She tried to push herself up and out of the water, but failed, of course, and fell back, feeling herself caught in terror’s grip, and yet somehow unable to control her reactions; then she slid under the water for the second time, and thrashed about there in fear, gulping down more salt water as she did so, her throat constricting. This is absurd, she told herself, found herself thinking, I could still get back, I could still reach land. But knowing it was absurd didn’t seem to be able to help her as she slipped further and further beneath the waves, the water, below its sun-warmed upper layer, now freezing, and black, and endless, and welcoming her into its huge embrace…
She was grabbed, held on to. She couldn’t feel anything – she was too numb; just conscious of a strong, warming, solid presence, and the flicker of lights invading her peripheral vision.
‘Hair,’ came the noise over the breath of the waves.
She choked and spluttered and, very unattractively, coughed up half the ocean. Luke laughed his familiar laugh, but it sounded deeper. She could feel him, but her eyes were tight shut.
‘Is that you?’ she asked stupidly when she’d stopped retching, still keeping her eyes closed.
She told herself it was because they were full of stinging sea water, and not because she was too terrified to see what Luke had become.
She was in his arms, she could feel that much, and they felt like arms, but they were much bigger and more powerful than in the physical shape she knew – damp, but warmer than her own skin. He held onto her tightly and she felt a powerful chest close by her. And she became aware now that they were moving, clipping through the waves many times faster than she could swim, or even a boat could travel.
‘Are you keeping your eyes shut for a reason?’
Luke sounded so like himself, his normal, amused tones, even in a lower register – that she couldn’t believe it wasn’t him. She quickly opened her eyes, then slammed them shut again.
She was pressed against the chest, the strong, large, translucent chest of…
‘Oh shit,’ she said.
‘I know,’ said Luke. ‘Trust me, I’d have really liked to have been a hairy pathological liar with bones all this time too.’
‘You said you didn’t have a tail,’ said Connie in an accusatory manner, as they zoomed along through the waves as if… Well, as if being carried along by a powerful sea creature. She sighed.
‘I don’t,’ said Luke. ‘Have a look. Nobody asked me about fins.’
‘You have fins.’
‘I have fins.’
There was a pause. All that could be heard was the splashing of the waves.
‘I might open one eye.’
‘Do that,’ said Luke. ‘You’re not the only one looking for the first time.’
‘What do you mean?’ said Connie.
‘Oh. I can see fine under the water, when it’s dark enough. No problem at all. I can see you now.’
Her heart started to beat more quickly again. She knew she should have done that swimwear diet. Too many of Evelyn’s cookies. This was, she was instantly aware, a completely stupid thing to be worrying about at this juncture. What if her shape was horrible to him? What if he hadn’t seen her before and now couldn’t believe what she actually looked like…? Nerves threatened to overtake her again
‘Um, and?’
There was a pause. Everything suddenly seemed very quiet, under the dark of the summer moon, the shimmering stars within touching distance; the water no longer cold from the warm proximity of him.
Suddenly they stopped moving so fast, although he still held her in the crook of his arm.
‘Open your eyes,’ he said. Connie took a deep breath.
‘I mean it. Open your eyes. Please. Look at me, Connie. At who I truly am. Everything I am.’
Connie bit her lip hard, counted to three, took a deep breath – and opened her eyes.
The lights of the shoreline had totally faded from view now; they were only in the North Sea, she knew, but it felt like they were far, far out in the middle of a totally deserted ocean instead of one of the busiest sea routes in the world. At first she couldn’t properly see him: he was simply an outline of stars against a backdrop of greater stars; a movement in the sky.
Then her eyes focused and she could look at him more closely; took in his features – still there, more or less – a little larger, the eyes now less huge in the face; even the hair, although it was now completely colourless, was still thick and curled down his head. He was smiling. His strong body, through which the stars raced and the water could be seen, was the real difference: larger and slender; muscled. He was so obviously his true self, sleek and free; he looked as at home in the water as a dolphin. He held her as she looked.
‘Oh, thank God,’ she murmured.
‘What were you expecting – eel?’
‘Yes,’ said Connie. ‘Yes. Maybe. Bit more eel.’
‘I’m not an eel,’ he said, looking at her through the waves.
‘You…’ She felt strange saying the words, but she didn’t know how not to. ‘You are beautiful.’
Luke smiled, bent his huge head so the stars popped out once again behind it, even though at the same time she could almost see through him. It was very discomfiting.
‘So are you,’ he said.
‘No, I’m…’
Connie looked down, but Luke hushed her.
‘Ssh,’ he said. ‘Oh GOD, it is good to be back in the water. SO GOOD. You know, right now I don’t care if they catch us in five minutes and I don’t care if they shoot us out of the sky and I don’t care if I get harpooned like a…’
‘Like a what?’
‘I don’t know. You do bad things to them. We have a version.’
‘Whales?’
He nodded. ‘Kind of. Except ours make excellent systems analysts.’
Connie stared at him.
‘I need a run, a proper run. I have been cramped inside that body for years. For YEARS. It was like living in a tiny cell. Like a coffin. This entire world is plagued with fishermen, do you know that? I couldn’t risk it, not once, not ever.’
He shivered, water flowing down his neck.
‘And even if you and I have buggered up the entire world, Hair – even if we have answered a call that should have been ignored; could have been prevented – you have set me free. Thank you. Thank you for setting me free.’
He put his large arm around her waist.
‘Want to go for a run?’
It was the most astonishing sensation Connie had ever know. Before, she had thought they were moving quickly through the water, but that was as nothing to now. He ploughed through it like they were galloping downhill. One kick of his strong legs and they shot off above the waves, although sometimes, holding her aloft like precious baggage, he would dive underneath; flicker and gallop in the depths. Once he threw her in front of him in the water then darted to catch her, which at first terrified her, then made her giggle so much he did it again and again, veering up above the water like Neptune, then darting through its churning wake. It was like being tossed around by a cloud. Connie lost trac
k of up or down; couldn’t believe the astonishing sensation of freedom, of speed, of pure liquid joy as she moved along with him in his arms; spiralling or flying as he tossed her like mistletoe across the sea; and she opened her arms and laughed hysterically, yelling as the waves and the wind caught all sound from her mouth before it could be uttered.
They were lucky, and pinged on passing radars as nothing more than a twisting shoal of fish, unremarkable in the dark, except for one lady returning on a booze cruise hen party to Felixstowe, who stared blearily at them from the top deck, where she stood all alone on a warm, windy crossing, wondering if she was going to throw up or not, who watched through doubled eyes the pair dance, and blinked, and thought gloomily that it really was time to get her life sorted out, and decided to do so. Then she went home and chucked her crap boyfriend, Gordon, who never took her swimming in the sea, and became a spirit healer and dolphin trainer, and lived a long, lucrative and happy life doing so.
When the lights of Holland came into view they finally stopped, both of them out of breath, both giggling hysterically. Connie was hot, although she knew the water must be cold. Luke was so strange, so alien; magnificent in the strangest of ways. But he was still himself.
‘4.13418,’ he said, frowning. ‘We must be nearly there.’
‘Or we could just look at the lights and, you know, go to the big lit-up place over there,’ she said.
His face fell as he slowed down.
‘I’ll have to change back.’
She nodded.
‘I know.’
‘I don’t… I don’t want to.’
‘Can’t you swim all the way around?’
‘Around that top wobbly bit?’ he said. ‘One, it would kill you, and two, they’d harpoon me for something. Can’t get away with much round there. No. Always stick to the latitude.’
He sighed, his great chest rippling above the waves. Connie thought all he was missing was the trident.
‘And now,’ he said. ‘Now, when we reach land I must fold myself up again, back into my coffin of skin and colour and’ – his voice shook – ‘bone.’
‘Come here,’ she said to him.
But he was already there. And suddenly, she was in his arms, and closer to him; he was encircling her entirely, and the sound of his heart beating was the only thing in her ears.
She didn’t know what she wanted to do. Did she want to kiss him? Did he kiss? Did they? But she could feel him breathing. And she knew, she just knew – regardless of the fact that he was from a totally different species, from the other end of the galaxy. Connie had been unsure about a lot of things in this life, but she wasn’t in the least bit unsure about this one.
He looked at her, their faces nearly touching; his heart visible, a cluster of pulsating lights.
‘Can I…?’
She tailed off.
‘Are you going to ask me a question about spawn?’ he said.
‘No, I…’
There was a pause.
‘Well, yes. Spawn might have crossed my mind.’
‘Well, are you full of a thousand million eggs?’ said Luke.
‘No,’ said Connie. ‘But I do have one. Which, you know.’
‘Ssh,’ he said. ‘We’re completely incompatible.’
‘Well, that’s strange,’ said Connie. ‘Because, one, in Independence Day all the aliens had USB ports. And two…’
She stared straight into those deep dark eyes.
‘I don’t feel in the… I don’t feel in the least bit incompatible with you.’
It was true. He looked different, but it was still… it was still Luke in there. Still him, even though he did look different. Connie told herself it was as if he’d been in an accident. She wasn’t… it wasn’t like she was doing anything bad. She wasn’t trying to kiss a dolphin. Was she? No. She half laughed to herself.
‘Is this always this embarrassing?’ said Luke, stretching his long arms outwards back in the water, which rippled across his incredibly broad chest.
‘Actually, yes,’ said Connie suddenly. She was amazed how reassuring she found this realisation. ‘Actually, yes, it is always completely embarrassing. Have you got any booze in my bag?’
‘Really?’
‘Always,’ said Connie. ‘But tonight I would say doubly so.’
Luke smiled at her, but it was a confident smile, not a nervous one.
‘You’re like Superman,’ she said. ‘You totally are. All shy with the horn-rimmed spectacles, but get your cloak on and look at you.’
She laughed suddenly, despite herself.
‘Ha. In your element.’
Luke shook his head.
‘I don’t understand.’
‘Of course you don’t.’
She thought about it.
‘Oh,’ she said. ‘I forgot to ask. I don’t know how I could forget to ask, but I forgot to ask.’
Luke – or this beautiful, glistening, sparkling creature that was also Luke – tilted his great head.
Connie swallowed.
‘Are you,’ she said in a small voice. ‘Are you a boy or a girl?’
Luke put back his head and gave a shout of laughter.
‘Humans are obsessed with gender,’ he said. ‘I don’t think you even realise how weirdly obsessed you are. What are you?’
‘Seriously?’ said Connie. ‘You’re asking me this now?’
‘It’s not a very important question to me.’
‘Oh,’ said Connie. ‘Well. I’m a girl.’
Luke nodded.
‘And…?’ said Connie.
‘Well, gender is more fluid where I come from,’ said Luke. ‘You can change it; transition.’ He shrugged. ‘It’s not a massive deal.’
‘How many are there?’
‘Four.’
Connie’s eyebrows shot up.
‘Okay,’ she said, treading water. ‘And which would you say you were at the moment?’
There was a slight pause. She wondered if he would tell the truth. Then she realised that of course it would not matter; her heart was racing so fast she felt like it would burst.
‘Not sure,’ said Luke. ‘It doesn’t really translate. Is it important?’
‘Oh lord,’ Connie said to herself. She moved closer and put her hand on his jaw. She closed her eyes one last time, then opened them again, her heart beating more wildly.
‘Do you kiss?’
He shook his head. ‘The lip thing?’
‘Uh yeah. The lip thing.’
‘That looks weird to me.’
‘Ha HA! Yes, THAT is what’s weird.’
She had been trying to ignore the inevitable, but she couldn’t help it and tried to look under the water.
‘Oi,’ he said, smiling. ‘Are you looking for that bit? It is that bit, isn’t it?’
Connie couldn’t stop giggling.
‘Generally.’
Suddenly she felt his strong arm grab her and pull her close to him, chest to chest. She looked up at him; thrilled, excited – terrified.
‘Shall we try it my way?’ he enquired.
‘Oh,’ she said. ‘OH.’
He pulled her close to his chest, and carried on encircling her until there was not a single part of her exposed to the elements and he was all around, covering every inch of her skin, absorbing her: she was inside him.
And after that Connie understood only two things: colours were unimportant when you could feel the explosions of the stars running through your veins and every drop of liquid in you shone like the sun – and she understood why Luke hadn’t the faintest idea where his erogenous zones were. He was nothing but.
Chapter Nineteen
‘Nothing, boss.’
Nigel swore. He had been so sure. He had held up the entire night’s ferry timetable; cross-checked every walk-up and every ticket purchase; had people poring over miles of dark-tinged CCTV. He had spoken to the Netherlanders, got them to double-check everyone coming in. He had asked for radar sweeps and for boatya
rds to check that no one had got in and stolen a boat, although the idea of two ordinary people managing to get all the way to the Netherlands in a stolen boat across 180 kilometres of incredibly rough sea was unlikely to say the least. But there was nobody marooned, no boats unaccounted for on the scans.
Resistance is Futile Page 19
