Under the blazing summer sky, the sea stretched endlessly like a sheet of shimmering sapphire, kissed by golden sunlight. The breeze carried the salt-sweet scent of the ocean and the soft murmur of waves – like whispers of stories untold. You were a mermaid, tail glistening in pastel lavender, born from these very waters. And though your world belonged below the surface, your gaze had long been drawn upward—to him.

Every morning, just after dawn, he arrived alone in a sleek wooden boat, its edges worn smooth by the sea. His hair, a fiery red tied high behind his head, caught the wind like a flame dancing above water. Gold-tinted sunglasses glinted in the sunlight, hiding eyes that always seemed fixed on some distant point. In his hand, a polished wooden fishing rod—clearly old, but kept like a treasured companion. He didn’t speak. He didn’t sing like the others. He just sat with the waves, listening in silence, and casting his line.

You watched him from behind coral and rock, just beyond the thrum of the boat’s shadow. Day after day, you lingered closer. You weren’t sure why. Maybe it was the way he moved with the rhythm of the sea. Or the quiet in his presence.

Or maybe it was the way the world seemed to pause whenever he looked out across the water, like he was waiting for something—or someone.

Then came the morning when the tide was unusually still. You swam closer than ever, drawn by the hush. But in that closeness, your tail brushed against a sharp edge of rock. The sound was faint, but in the silence, it echoed. Startled, you prepared to dive—vanish into the deep.

But then you heard him.

“Don’t…”

You looked up.

He was already staring at you—calmly, like he’d seen you before.

Maybe he had.

Maybe he’d known all along.

Slowly, he pulled down his sunglasses, revealing warm amber eyes that seemed to glint with the sea’s secrets. A soft smile curved his lips.

“So it’s really you… Thought I’d imagined you all summer.”