The day we met had all the makings of a romantic tragedy. The sea was rough and my small fishing boat was tossed mercilessly in its foam. Through the dark waves I could barely see her arching form. Once nature brought us together, I was at once enchanted by her liquid eyes, her sleek coat, her curiosity about humans. She saved me.
It was just like the story you’ve heard, except that the sea was really the river delta, and my ship was really a kayak, and there were no fish in its small compartments, only beer. And also the weather was pretty nice since it was early September—warm with a little breeze but not enough sun to get a burn. Other than that, everything was exactly the same. The Selkie was just as beautiful as described, and I still remember the exquisite pleasure of the first time I passed my hand in one long stroke down the length of her damp hair to the tail of her seal coat.
But she’s sleeping on the sofa more and more now.
My friends said we moved in together too soon. And I was like, “Dudes, she came from the sea. Like, where am I supposed to tell her to go? Those overpriced flats in midtown?” Plus, she was really sexy back then, like when she pretzeled her bare legs under one of my work shirts and warmed herself by the fire. Everything on land was fascinating to her, and it made me see things I’d taken for granted anew.
But now she’s always going through my stuff. She gets so huffy, stomping around on her two human legs. She says she’s looking for her seal coat so she can return to the sea. I think she’s really checking to see if I got any texts from that new temp in Accounting just because of one little thing I said at the Christmas party last week. And yesterday, just to spite me, she ate all of the lump crabmeat out of the leftovers, leaving a bowl empty except for a spooge of mayo and a few specks of dill. Gross.
She eats in the tub.
Actually, she’s always in the tub. She locks the door and I can’t take a piss or shave or anything. In the beginning, we’d light some candles and drink a little whiskey in the bath together. When we were dizzy from the heat of the water and the whiskey and the anticipation of sex, we’d tumble out, the cold floor tiles exhilarating on our bare skin. Now, she takes my magazines in there. She stays in so long she starts to fall asleep and lets them drop in the tub. The pages of Esquire get all wrinkled and stuck together, and when it dries it’s all bloated and totally unreadable.
She lets some of the cold water out and then tops off the tub with more hot from the tap, over and over. Then, there’s not even enough water pressure for me to do the dishes.
Did I mention that she never does the dishes?
Still, sometimes when she gets out of the tub, when she only has a towel on, she’ll spoon up to me and it feels like before. I can still smell the salt on her skin.
How did we get here? I’ll whisper, but I don’t want to know the answer. How did you get to the river from the sea?
Then her human toes, wrinkled from the tub, will feel creepy and I’ll pull away.
“I told you we need some space,” the Selkie says. Then neither of us says anything for a very long time.
Then we argue about which Wes Anderson movie to watch, or maybe something by Michel Gondry. I try to think about what will be romantic and not too sentimental, not too close to home. Because there are some scenes that I know will make her cry.
Her face gets really scrunched and ugly when she cries.
Listen to "The Selkie Says We Need Some Time Apart" and other tales of the domestic and fantastic on The Story Coterie podcast.