His Siren Call

2

The rest of my sleep was, thankfully, uneventful. The image of the hand reaching for me while whatever it was attached to sang a sad song was no longer haunting me. It seemed almost funny now to think of how scared I was at the moment.

I didn't have work today, and Daniel was sleeping in because he hadn't answered my morning text about grabbing a coffee.

I wanted to ask him how the rest of his shift went, and tell him about my dream. We have been friends since we were in elementary school, and always told each other about anything remotely interesting going on in our lives. He would get a kick out of hearing how I scared myself awake and had to watch Netflix at full volume because I was too scared to go back to sleep. Oh, well. He will text when he can and we can just plan to meet up later.

I came home pretty late last night and crashed before I had the chance to take a shower. I wandered into my bathroom and turned the water on. While it was heating up, I took the opportunity to brush my teeth before my mirror became fogged. Once my water was good and hot, I shrugged off my nightgown and got in. Letting the hot water wash over me felt amazing. After the rough night of sleep, I definitely needed this to help wake me up. An iced cinnamon coffee at the coffee shop with my best friend would have been nice too, but after my shower I would have to settle for a cup of Joe here in the kitchen.

Washing my hair and body, scrubbing myself with my favorite sugar scrub, and shaving felt so nice. It was a great way to start the day, and was so relaxing. I stayed in till the water ran cold, and only then did I reluctantly dredge myself back out.

I made my way to the coffee pot and set to brewing my cup. While I waited for that to be done, I whipped up a quick breakfast of scrambled eggs with chives and an apple. When I sat down at my small table to eat, my phone started ringing. Checking the screen, I saw the picture of Daniel wearing a tutu I had set as his contact photo. Oh good, I thought, he's finally awake.

Picking up the phone and putting him on speaker so I could still eat my food unhindered, I answered.

"Well hello, sleeping beauty!"

"Oh shut up, it's not that late. It's only like 11."

"Try 1p.m."

"s**t, really?!"

"Nope. But see how easy it was to mess with you? I do it every day."

"I hate you. Do you know that, Viv?"

"Love you too, Danny. So what's up?"

"Oh, well, I saw you texted about coffee earlier. You still up for that, or?"

"Actually, I made some at home. Drinking it now."

"Oh. Well, how about we meet for dinner later, then?"

"Careful there, Danny. That almost sounds like a date!"

"In your dreams, toots. So, 6:30?"

"Hah, yeah. Sounds fun. Grab me then. I've got a funny story for you I think you'll enjoy!"

"Looking forward to it. See ya, Viv!"

He hangs up, and I go back to halfheartedly eating my eggs. I actually wasn't all that hungry, I only made breakfast out of habit really. Normally I have a pretty healthy appetite, but I guess the bad sleep is messing with me more than I thought.

I glanced at the clock on my wall. I still have quite a bit of time before I have to get ready. I normally go to the cove in the late afternoon and stay till right before sundown, but that time will be spent being out to dinner today. I could just skip today, but I was curious to see if I could get another glimpse of the whale from yesterday. I had hoped to snag a picture of it, and I could even show Daniel at dinner. Just another topic of conversation to enjoy. We didn't get to hang out as much as I'd like to with our work schedules the way they are, so when we did get to meet up we tended to drag it out a bit.

I went to get my swimsuit out of the tub when I realized that it was still very wet and cold. Not to mention I had only just showered, and really didn't want to have to again before I went out later.

After a brief consideration, I decided to skip swimming today and just try to get a better look at the whale.

Loading up in the car, I made the shirt drive and quickly jogged down to my spot at the cove. The cliffs were pretty rocky, and it was easy to find a boulder big enough to comfortably sit on while I waited for any sign of life in the water.

A couple of hours had passed, and boredom had me lying down on the hard surface of the rock, scrolling through social media and considering giving up on this venture for the day. I still needed to be home in time to get ready, and I didn't want to feel rushed. I hate being rushed.

Looking at the time, I decided that if I didn't see anything in the next half hour I would head back.

A mere few minutes had passed when I heard the singing again. Drifting over the waves and echoing off the rocks, bouncing back into the deep blue. Garnishing my phone and opening the camera, I started recording. I zoomed in in the direction of the noise, towards the area I had seen the fin last time.

Sure enough, back against where the sky met the water, a dark shape broke up the horizon. I zoomed in as much as I could, but even so, I couldn't quite make out exactly what it was. It did not look like a fin, though. More like a person who was out swimming way further than was considered safe.

Usually, swimmers stick closer to shore, as occasionally a shark can be seen occasionally in the area. Not often, but frequently enough that, as a rule of thumb, you didn't go past the buoys. Whoever this was was well past them, by at least another 20 meters or so.

Watching through my zoomed in camera, I started waving to try to get their attention.

"Hey! You're too far out, it's not safe! There could be sharks!"

Silence. No acknowledgement. Maybe they couldn't hear me? I took a deep breath and shouted as loudly as I could.

"HEY! CAN YOU HEAR ME?"

Finally, the person lifted an arm out of the water to wave back. They moved slowly, swimming closer. It wasn't until they passed the buoys back into the swimming area that I stopped waving my arm around in the air. When I stopped, I was able to refocus the camera -which was still recording- on them to try to get a closer look.

I could see that this person was a man, looking to be in his mid to late twenties. He had wavy platinum hair that hung to his jawline, and his shoulders were broad and looked strong. I couldn't quite make out his eyes, but his lips were hard to miss. His full lips were pulled into a half smile, and he was looking in my direction.

I still had my camera trained on him and became aware of how rude I was being. I stopped recording and put my phone away. Feeling self-conscious about the whole thing, I decided it would be better if I went ahead and went home. I took a second to gather my things and turned to wave one last time. He lifted an arm out of the water and waved back, still smiling.

I turned to walk away when the sound of splashing drew my attention back to where the man had previously been. All I could see were large ripples, and I assumed he dove under to keep swimming.

The drive back home took longer than expected because of a car crash that had slowed traffic down. I took the opportunity to day dream about the man in the water. His hair was beautiful, and the way it tickled the edge of his jaw and hid his eyes in shadow was.. attractive. The way his lips curled up into that sheepish half smile? He looked like he was aware of his ability to make a girl stop and stare..

When I made it home, I set to work getting ready for dinner with Daniel. I styled my wavy strawberry blonde hair into a cute updo, and threw on some quick and easy make-up. A light brown smokey eyeshadow to make my dark blue eyes pop a bit, and dusty rose lipstick. After I was satisfied with my face, I went to the closet to find something cute. I settled on a brown corduroy skirt that came to just above my knees, and a cream colored spaghetti strap top.

Just before 6:30, I heard a knock at the door. I had just finished putting on my sandals and was watching TV when the welcome sound filled the living room. I open the door and let Daniel in, who makes his way to the couch and plops down.

"Well, just make yourself at home, then!" I laughed.

"Don't I always? Now, have we decided where we want to go?"

"Actually, I was thinking of trying that new Mexican place over on 4th, what do you think?"

"Oh yeah. I could definitely go for a plate of tacos. Let's go!"

He jumped up with all the enthusiasm and grace of a toddler, tripping and catching himself on the arm of the love seat just in time to save him from kissing the floor. He stood back up quickly and cleared his throat.

"You didn't see that."

"Oh yes I did. Graceful." I rolled my eyes and opened the door, gesturing for him to lead the way.

"Ladies first, Danny."

"Oh, what a gentleman you are!" He jokes, and pretends to curtsy.

I kicked him in the butt on his way out and followed him to his car. When we get in, I take note of just how horribly messy his car is. Fast food wrappers, papers, old mail, books, ect. He throws his books and stuff in the back seat, clearing the front seat out for me.

"Damn, what have you been up to recently? This is messy, even for you," I inquired.

"Well, actually, I was going to tell you about it at the restaurant. Don't wanna ruin the surprise!" he winks.

He puts his Ford Taurus into gear and we head towards our destination. For his birthday, I think I'm going to pay for full detail on his car. He's going to need it at this rate, I think to myself.

Ten minutes later, Daniel pulls into the busy parking lot of the La Joya Española. It had only opened a few weeks ago, but I had only heard good things about the food and ambiance.

"Dude, I hope there isn't a wait to be seated. I am STARVING." whined Daniel.

"I don't think so, they have a full indoor and outdoor seating area. I think they can hold something like 200 people. I doubt there are that many here." I comforted him by rubbing his back with my hand while we waited for the hostess to get to us.

"How many?" She asks when we finally make it to the small podium.

"Just two. Could we possibly get an outdoor table?" It was warm out tonight, but not hot. Perfect for this time of year, early summer.

"Absolutely. Follow me, please." She replied sweetly, eyeballing Daniel with a shy smile. When she turned to lead us to the table, I looked at Daniel and made googly eyes at him.

"Looks like you have a fan, Danny." I whispered in a little baby voice.

"Shut up. Jealous?" He laughed and punched me in the arm. We sat down at the table and she handed us our menus.

"Your server will be here shortly to take your orders. Please let me know if you need anything!" She was addressing the table, but making eye contact with Danny. While I wasn't actually jealous, I didn't like that when we were out he would get blatantly flirted with. I mean, first of all, they had no idea that I WASN'T his girlfriend. Secondly, even if they did know that, it still made it extremely awkward to be a third wheel on my own night out.

"We will, don't worry." Daniel says, flashing her a quick smile. Blushing slightly, she leaves us to our menus and he turns his attention back to me.

"Every damn time, I swear. It's like they flock to you. I don't get it!" I muttered.

"Yeah, somehow you've always remained immune to my charms. It's really refreshing. I like a challenge."

"Dude. Shut up before you get hit." I threatened. He waved a hand in the air, dismissing my empty threats.

"Alright, alright. Now, who is going first? I'd love to hear what you've been up to."

I clam up. I had been so excited about showing him the whale, that I completely forgot that I had never seen it. The video I had was just of some guy swimming up to me and waving. Crap.

"Uhmmm, how about you go first?"

"Sure! Okay, so you know how I've been wanting to go back to school for a while now, right?"

I gasped.

"No way. Did you-??"

"Yep! Your boy finally pulled the trigger. I'm getting my bachelors. Hence, all the papers, books, and random stuff all over my car. It's all over my room too. I just started and I'm already struggling to stay organized and keep up. Especially with picking up the extra shifts at work to pay for it. I am EXHAUSTED."

"Daniel, I-..Im so proud of you! You actually did it!"

"Hell yeah I did! Now, what about you? What new, exciting thing is Vivian doing?"

"Well..see, I was out swimming and I thought I heard and saw a whale. I went out again today to try to get a video of it for you to see, but I couldn't find it. I did hear it though! Wanna check it out?"

"Absolutely. Sounds cool."

I pulled up the video on my phone and played it. You could hear the odd whale song being sung in the background of the video, and see the guy in the water. When it got to the part where he was close and waving, the video ended.

"Well," he said, " I definitely heard the singing. Even though it sounded a bit weird. But what's up with the guy?"

"OH, well, at first when he was far away I thought that he was the whale. You know, maybe its tail or something. But then I zoomed in and saw it was just a guy. After that, I guess I just kinda forgot I was recording because I got worried about how far out he was and was waving him in. I hadn't seen him around before, so I thought he was a visitor and didn't know about the sharks that tend to hang out in this part of the waters."

"Hm, actually I haven't seen him either. Hey, did you notice the singing stops once he starts coming towards you?"

"Hm?"

"In the video. The whale singing stops once you start flagging him down. Maybe he is out there playing a recording to try and attract a whale?"

"No, I don't think so. I have heard the whale a couple of times now, and this was the first time I saw this guy out there."

"Well, I hope that you see the whale soon. In fact, if you haven't seen it by then, I would like to check it out with you on my next free day, sound fun?"

"Oh my gosh yes! I miss you going with me. That would be great!"

Just then, the server arrived at our table to take our orders. I ordered fajitas, and he got some kind of platter. Our food arrived quickly, and we ate in earnest. I suppose we were both starving!

Later that night, after Daniel had dropped me off and we said our goodbyes, what he said earlier was on my mind. What if that guy was messing with me? Maybe that is why he was smiling at me after I waved him down.