Penned Sea Hearts

Feeling refreshed and ready to keep working now that his stomach was full, Kai swam back to the library, excited to give Rami the plate full of clams he’d brought him. If the poor thing was going to insist on working the whole day, he might as well get a snack doing it.

Kai hoped Rami wasn’t mad at him for indirectly calling him a literature snob. He kind of was one from what Kai had seen so far, but he did it adorably, so who cared? But he’d spent the whole of lunch thinking about how Ramos had looked after Kai had said it. And yeah, Rami had insulted his work again and that was why he’d reacted like that, but he had tried to apologize, so Kai wouldn’t count that as Ramos’ fault.

He entered with a big smile on his face that immediately disappeared when he saw Rami hunched over his desk, his ears down, looking like someone he loved had died. The horrible expression cleared up into Ramos’ usual neutrality when he noticed Kai, before shifting into a confused frown when his eyes turned to the plate in Kai’s hands.

“Oh, that. Yeah, I thought you might be hungry,” he explained, frowning as well as he made his way over to the desk, putting the plate down before plopping himself down on his chair and stretching out his tail. “Are you okay? Did something happen?”

Rami seemed to hesitate for a second before sighing heavily, turning back to a torn-up book in front of him that he seemed to be fixing. “Something that should have happened a long time ago.”

“All right, that’s ominous,” Kai said, trying to swallow his unease. Why did Ramos sound like he’d killed someone while Kai had been gone? He certainly hoped that wasn’t it.

“It’s nothing,” Ramos said a bit too forcefully before he sighed again, running a hand through his hair. “It’s fine. Thank you, erm, for the food. You didn’t have to—”

“Of course I did,” Kai cut him off, shaking his head. Was Rami going to say things like that every time? Kai was pretty sure that Ramos would want to put up a fight every time Kai did anything for him, no matter how insignificant.

If the reason for that was pride, Kai would take it. But Ramos never seemed like he was attempting to reject it because of that, which implied troubling things. Kai certainly hoped it indeed was pride, but he doubted it.

“Just be careful with that plate, I promised to bring it back,” Kai joked half-heartedly as he watched Rami put the book away and hesitantly take one of the clams. The poor thing had probably been hungry this whole time and had just not bothered doing anything about it.

“Of course,” Ramos replied, entirely serious, nodding. “Thank you again. How much do I owe you?”

Kai scoffed. “Oh please, Rami, I’m not telling you. You’d try to pay me back, then. Just eat.”

Ramos scowled down at the clams, putting the empty shell of the one he’d just eaten to the side. “You can’t keep buying me food.”

“Why not? I like you, I’ve got money. Seems to work out.”

Rami opened his mouth to argue, but then he closed it again, saying nothing, looking back at the book he’d been mending. Good, he was giving in. Kai would win this just yet.

“It’s simply…inappropriate for me to be a parasite on your coin pouch.”

Or maybe not. Kai blinked in shock, not sure how to accept that Ramos had just said those words. “Parasite? What?”

“That is what this is, is it not? You are not getting anything in return.”

Kai stared into Ramos’ far too serious eyes, seeing the self-loathing in them. Godsdammit, he really meant what he was saying, didn’t he? This was awful. And Kai immediately had to make him see reason.

“No. Gods below, of course it isn’t. I got you food because I thought you might be hungry. And it’s polite to eat it.”

Ramos ducked his gaze, saying nothing, which made Kai’s heart give a lurch. What kind of bastard had put that idea in Rami’s head? Kai really wondered what that was about. Ramos was like a puzzle, and the more time he spent with him, the more pieces he received. He’d put it all together eventually, though, by the gods, it was difficult to keep himself from pushing him to spill his secrets faster.

Kai watched Rami begrudgingly grab another clam and pull it open wordlessly, but unfortunately, he didn’t look as grumpy as usual when he did something he didn’t like. He mostly just looked vaguely sad.

“I thought you were angry with me,” Ramos said through a mouthful of clam meat, chewing slowly, almost lethargically, as if he wasn’t enjoying the meal at all.

Kai shook his head, immediately ready to deny that claim. He hadn’t realized how it must have seemed to Ramos when he’d left without a word. “No, I’m not mad. Sorry. I was just frustrated with my writing, and I really was hungry.”

“Oh.” Ramos huffed out a little laugh, which would be cute if it weren’t so humorless. “Okay. Good. I apologize for implying your work is bad, though. It is not. I simply am a literary snob.”

“Oh, come on, Rami,” Kai intervened, nudging Ramos’ shoulder with his own. “That’s not true. A literary snob wouldn’t read my work, not even to mock it.” He chuckled. “They always say it’s beneath them to even open a book like mine.”

Ramos nodded, silent again as he picked up another clam, his face far too serious. Kai nudged him again. “So, what did you think of my pornography?”

Ramos finally, finally, rolled his eyes, letting Kai take a deep breath. Back to normal for a bit at least.

“I…didn’t expect the characters to be so well developed.”

Kai immediately thought of turning this into a sex joke, but Rami would probably not appreciate that. He was opening up about what he was really thinking, and Kai couldn’t ruin that.

“Oh?”

Ramos nodded, his ears twitching as he frowned in thought. “I especially liked Lonriel.”

Kai tried not to smirk at that. Yeah, a grumpy, moody merman who prefers to keep his own company does sound like someone Ramos would like, Kai would bet. Though it was equally as likely that Rami would hate that character archetype. People didn’t always like to see traits they shared portrayed, depending on how happy they were with them.

“And of course, your self-insert was very accurate to the real thing.”

Kai choked, not having expected that, especially not when paired with a little smirk on Rami’s face, but as soon as he recovered, he burst out laughing. “Hey now,” he said as he gasped for breath, “just because Teri is happy-go-lucky, incredibly good-looking, and infinitely charming, doesn’t mean he’s me.”

Ramos shook his head, laughing a little, the sound quiet but oh, so beautiful.

Kai had to pause then, frowning to himself. Damn, he really was developing a crush, huh? Actually, that wasn’t surprising at all. Though before he could figure out what was going on in Rami’s pretty head, he’d keep it to himself.

“Yes, of course,” Ramos rolled his eyes again, making Kai grin. “I think at least one tenth of the book is Lonriel gushing.”

Kai chuckled, enjoying this immensely. It was so nice to hear what someone like Rami thought about his books because he didn’t bother sugarcoating anything. In fact, he’d more than likely gone into this looking to nitpick every single problem there was, so the fact that he hadn’t brought up anything substantial meant that Rami hadn’t found much to work with.

That was good because the book he’d picked up was one of Kai’s earlier ones, and he’d definitely grown as a writer since then.

“Hey, don’t blame me for the gushy inner monologues,” Kai joked. “I have no control. I just make some characters and then write down what they do for the most part.”

The way Ramos’ eyes widened then was almost hilarious, he just looked so horrified and baffled, but Kai didn’t laugh only because it had been so unexpected. He was just confused what had caused that reaction.

“What?”

“You….” Ramos blinked, frowning, as if he was struggling to understand the words Kai had said. “What in the infinite, dark waters do you mean you have no control?”

Kai shrugged. “So you’re the other type of writer, huh?”

“The other type of—” Ramos gaped at him before he sighed, his shoulder sinking, his eyes suddenly tired. “Hm. I suppose that is the difference between having the technical skills to write and having raw talent.”

And just like that, Kai scowled at him. Oh, so that was what was going on here, was it? Kai had better deal with that before this nonsense could go further. “I’d start a discussion about there being nothing wrong with planning your stories from start to finish and sticking to the plan, but you’re talking about yourself right now, aren’t you?”

Ramos sighed, pointedly looking away from him, but Kai wouldn’t let him get away with this that easily.

“Don’t be stupid, Rami. You’re plenty talented.”

That did make Ramos turn to look at Kai again, though the almost aggressively doubtful look in his eyes was one Kai could have done without. “It’s nice that you are trying to spare my feelings, but seeing as you haven’t read anything of mine—”

“Actually,” Kai interrupted, blushing a bit as he rubbed the back of his neck. “When I said I found your manuscript, I…kind of read the first chapter, too.”

Ramos’ eyes went wide, shocked into a momentary silence, which Kai immediately needed to make use of.

“I got too curious and excited, okay? I’m sorry. I know it’s invasive. But anyway, that’s how I know you’re plenty talented.” Kai cringed a little at Ramos’ continued silence, but he did his best to push on. “I’d love to read the rest of it if you let me.”

Rami’s expression broke then, his eyes turning glassy and so horribly sad, and yet the rest of his face remained neutral, completely devoid of emotion. The poor merman sort of looked dead inside.

“That won’t be possible,” he said flatly, turning his head away again to stare down at the library logbook. “I…threw it out.”

“You what?!” Kai shouted, receiving a dirty look from an older woman reading at the table opposite them. But Kai barely took notice of her. Not with the insanity that Ramos had just told him. “How could you just throw it out?!”

“I need to move on,” Ramos snapped at him, his voice much quieter than Kai’s, and yet still it was just as effective as if he were screaming at the top of his gills. “And I’m never going to do that while clinging to delusions.”

Kai shook his head, unable to accept that Ramos was saying that. How could he say that? He didn’t need to spell it out to Kai either—he knew perfectly well what he was implying. As if the value of a book was determined by whether a publisher wanted to buy it or not.

They clearly had a lot of work to do.

“You just threw it out, didn’t you? That’s why you looked so damned heartbroken when I came back.”

Ramos stared at him, shocked for a second, likely by the conversation not going how he’d probably thought it would, but Kai didn’t wait around for him to think of some more self-deprecating nonsense to say.

Kai quickly swam out of the library again, having noticed a dumpster behind it. He certainly hoped the manuscript would be there because he hadn’t really noticed any trashcans in the library itself, and even if there were, he couldn’t imagine Rami throwing it out there without coming to retrieve it a minute later. Not with how depressed he’d looked about it.

They needed to have a talk about respecting one’s art later. Clearly, it was high time someone told Ramos that he should be proud of what he’d created.

Kai found the dumpster just as Rami caught up with him, immediately grabbing onto his forearm to stop him, but Kai, being stronger, just swam on, dragging Ramos along for a bit before stopping in front of the large, metal container.

Kai wasn’t sure how these worked here, but back home, they were enchanted to destroy all trash inside of them at a specific time, so it was good he’d found out about this so quickly.

“Just leave it be!” Ramos snapped, letting go of him, his angry voice breaking a little. It made Kai wince to see him so upset, but this needed to be done.

“No! Not as long as you’re throwing your work in the garbage!”

“That is what it is and that is where it belongs,” Ramos replied evenly, glaring, which made Kai glare in turn. How could he say such things? It actually hurt to hear Ramos be so hateful of his own writing.

“I would have thought a librarian would know better than to throw books away,” Kai argued back, to which Ramos said nothing, only looking down a little, grimacing.

Good enough, Kai had won that argument. Now how was he supposed to get the manuscript out when the circular lid of the dumpster was only around fifteen inches in diameter? He wasn’t going to fit in there.

Kai swam up to it, peering inside, trying to only breathe through his gills and not his nose to avoid smelling things. It was very dark inside, but after a while of squinting, Kai’s eyes finally came across what he’d been looking for—a stack of paper off to the side a little. Kai certainly hoped he would be able to reach it.

“Are you seriously going to try to get it out?” asked Ramos, disgust in his voice, which just made Kai feel even more determined.

“There is a book in need of rescuing. Of course I am!” And with that, Kai reached into the dumpster, pushing his arm inside the opening until his shoulder was pushing against the edge, grasping blindly in the direction he’d seen the manuscript. But he couldn’t quite reach, his fingers brushing over the page, which was not enough to grab it.

Gritting his teeth, Kai pushed harder, ignoring the way the metal edge of the dumpster pressed painfully into the skin of his shoulder, even through his shirt, but after a moment longer, he finally reached deep enough to grab a few of the pages, gingerly pulling the whole thing out so he wouldn’t accidentally rip it.

Checking the manuscript over as soon as he had it in his hands, Kai let out a relieved breath, glad that it seemed unharmed, aside from a few stains on the back. It certainly could have been much worse.

He cradled the paper to his chest, to which Ramos reacted with a disgusted scoff. Kai scowled at him.

“How could you throw out your baby?”

The other merman stared at him, baffled, as he sputtered. “Baby?” Ramos pointed an accusing finger at the manuscript. “All that thing has ever brought me is misery.”

“Children can be difficult sometimes.”

Ramos rolled his eyes, reaching out with his hand. “Just give it to me, then. I promise I’ll keep it in a drawer somewhere.”

Kai chuckled, amused that Rami thought he’d give him the book back after what he’d done. “Oh, I don’t think so. You’re just going to throw it away again.”

Ramos sputtered again, his eyes bulging out. The poor guy looked so shocked by Kai daring to do this. And to be fair, Kai did feel a little bad treating Ramos like this. It was clear the merman was going through something, but Kai was sure Ramos would figure it out sooner or later, and if he threw away his manuscript, he’d grow to regret it.

“You can’t just keep it. It’s mine!”

Kai grinned. It was nice to hear Rami be protective of his work after all. He was getting the sense that despite insulting it all the time, calling it garbage just moments prior, Ramos would actually get into a fight with anyone who tried to do the same.

“You threw it out, which means it’s public property now. And I rescued it. So I’ll be keeping it until you learn how to take care of your book properly.”

Ramos glared at him, silent for a moment, as if trying to decide which insult to call Kai, but instead of saying anything to Kai, Ramos shook his head and while muttering something under his breath, he started swimming back to the library.

Kai sighed. Well, at least they’d not gotten into a proper fight. But he probably shouldn’t follow Ramos inside. Only tense silence awaited him in the library right now.

He would just let Rami seethe for a bit and finish his clams. The guy was smart, he would realize how stupid this had been on his own. And meanwhile, Kai would go stash the manuscript at the inn somewhere, before Ramos tried to get it again only to throw it away.