Mermaids.

“She was a beauty as alluring as the sea,” the old man reminisced. There was a glint in his eyes when he thought back on his love. “Maybe it was a spell, or maybe she truly was a sight to behold, I don’t really care. She was my world and I would do anything for her…”

“This was your wife?” Richard asked.

“Of course I’m talkin’ bout my wife, who else would I be talkin’ about?” The old man shot back in a cantankerous tone.

“Sorry, it’s just you mentioned two women…” Richard said.

“I did?” The old man’s thoughts began to drift. Richard started to wonder if he was really all there to begin with.”Where was I? Ah yes… my ocean beauty…” his stared out into the water and he was back in time. “She had eyes as green as the sea and hair as red as fire. We met on a night much like this… a bright moon shining over the water, making it look like a bed of twinkling stars. I was a mere deckhand at the time, we were hauling up the last of our nets, commercial fishing, you see... and among that haul, there she was, buried under tuna and mackerel, a beauty like no other…”

“A fish?”

“No, it was a woman, you **** dugong!”

“What was a woman doing in the water?” Richard asked.

“I was as perplexed as you are! We all were! She was a timid creature, wide eyed and full of fright. Naked as a newborn too, now that I recall… I remember loaning her my coat, to protect her modesty from the fellers. Anyways, we brought her below deck and questioned how she came to be in the water. She didn’t speak our language though, so we couldn’t get much out of her. We ended up naming her Luna, after the bright moon that we found her under. The captain radioed out to see if there were any distress signals in the area, sunken ships or a man overboard. There was nothing of the sort. When we brought her ashore, we tried to see if anyone was looking for a missing redhead; Quite a standout around this part o’ the world. Still; nothing. She had nowhere to go and seeing as how I was young and had a place of my own, I offered to share my space with her.”

Richard raised an eyebrow, not quite buying the old seafarer’s altruistic act. The old man snorted. “Aye, ye caught me. I was young and smitten. Still, the other fellers had girls or families to go back to and I was in a position to help this young lass. I never did anything untoward, mind you. My momma taught me better’n that!”

Richard nodded, not sensing any deceit coming from the storyteller.

“She stayed with me and started to pick up some English and Mandarin so that we could communicate. I’d ask her again how she ended up in our fishing net, but she would never give me a straight answer, only that she was exploring and got lost. All by herself, do you believe it? I also asked her name, but she said she liked Luna, so I kept calling her that.”

“And then you two became closer?” Richard asked.

The old man sighed. “Aye… much closer. The only time we were apart was when I had to go work. I could see the longing in her eyes when I told her the sea was calling me. She seemed to hear it too, I think. I’d see her looking out towards the ocean late at night, especially when the moon was full. Just staring at it.” The old man shook his head and took another swig of his drink. “Mind you, ladies on a boat is bad luck. I couldn’t bring her along to enjoy the sea. But, the way she looked to the waters… Any sailor worth their salt could empathize for that longing.”

“So… what did you do?” Richard asked, enamored with the tale.

“Why, I bought my own boat of course! When I’m captain, I get to decide who gets on and who doesn’t. Took me a few years of scrimping and saving, though. Luna chipped in too, she picked up a job as a street vendor, cooking up seafood. She made a mean satay! Anyways, we saved up enough for a modest ship. The Moonchaser. It served us well for many years.”

“Must have been nice,” Richard commented, picturing a life on the seas with the woman he loved.

“Oh it was the best of times…” the old man said, with a tear in his eye. Then he lowered his head. “It was. Until that night…”

Richard perked his ears. “‘That night’?”

“We’d been out late on the water. I was ferrying a group of party goers from the islands back to the mainland. Bachelor party.” the old man shrugged, “It paid the bills. Anyways, it was another dark night, the moon was shining and one of the groomsmen called out saying he thought he saw something in the water. Sometimes you’d catch some surfacing whales around these parts, I told them as much. They were intrigued and wanted to get a closer look, so I rounded the boat around and shut off the engine. Sure enough, we heard the sound of splashing. Luna became alarmed and wanted us to head back, but the men insisted on trying to catch a glimpse of what was in the water first.”

The old sea captain took a minute to collect himself before continuing the story.

“Well, ‘they were paying the bill’, I thought, so we stayed and I tried to guide the spotlight over to where the splashing was. I saw the flicker of a tail disappearing into the water. Then, I heard splashing on the portside and spun the light over there, it was another tail, a huge one! This was like prize tuna size! More splashes. Then, one of the guys called out saying there was a girl in the water. I turned to where he had pointed and sure enough, there was a slender woman with long black hair bobbing in the water with her tits out! Another girl joined her, then a third. The first girl waved to the guys to join them…”

“I don’t like the sounds of that…” Richard murmured.

The old man nodded sagely. “These were young men, riding high from a night of partying; they had no defense against a group of comely lasses skinny dipping in the ocean. They stripped down and jumped in. Luna tried to stop them, but they were already ensorceled by these sirens.”

“... and then what?” Richard asked, not sure he wanted to know.

“Then they showed their real faces…” the captain said, grimly. Their eyes began to glow and their teeth sharpened! I heard the groom shriek out…” he shuddered, “A terrifying scream of pain and despair… one of the girls had sunk her teeth into his shoulder. He screamed all the way into the water as she dragged him down. Others were slashed up by elongated nails! Blood splattered like crashing waves! I tried to help pull one of the boys ashore, but those monsters were strong!”

Richard’s eyes did not blink as he took in the old man’s story.

“I had to get back or I would have been dragged down with him,” he said, shaking his head in shame. “It was then that the monsters pulled themselves onto the boat… that’s when I saw what they truly were! Half women, half fish!”

“Mermaids?”

“Aye, but not your fairy tale version, these were maneaters! And they had eyes on me for their dinner!”

“And Luna?”

“Luna…” the sea captain uttered like a wistful sigh. “She knew what these things were and she charged at them like a warrior! Knocked one of them back into the water. The others dived in after her! There was a flurry of action underwater and the sea foamed up red with blood. I couldn’t tell how long it was but one figure rose out of the water in the end… my beloved Luna… only… it wasn’t her…”

“...’Wasn’t her?’” Richard wondered aloud, “What do you mean?”

“The top half was the woman that I loved… but, behind her was the tail of one of those sea beasts! She was one of them!” The old man gripped his cut until his knuckles went white. “I drove the boat away, never looking back. When I returned to the port, I had to explain where the bachelor party went… and my wife. They called me insane and most people suspect I murdered the whole lot of them and buried them at sea... but there was not enough evidence to convict. I still get suspicious looks to this day. Either way, my business was shot. No one would dare sail with a suspected murderer...so I lost my commission and ended up this salty dog you see before you.”

The old sea captain sunk in his stool, deflated.

“Wow…” Richard said, not able to put any other words together to describe the wild tale. It’s no wonder people thought this old man to be a kook. Richard didn’t really believe in fairy tales and mysterious creatures, but he could tell that the old man was pained. He wondered if there was anything he could do to pick the guy up.