Saira stood in the centre of the clearing with her hands planted firmly on her hips, her chin tilted high, and a radiant, deeply delusional smile spread across her face.
Before her stand her completed “villa.” In reality, it was a structural crime against nature.
Four crooked shipwreck planks leaned against each other at terrifying angles, held together by sheer hope, wet seaweed, and a single rusty nail she had found in the sand.
The roof was a patchwork quilt of palm fronds and shredded sailcloth that sagged dangerously in the middle.
A light breeze blew past, causing the entire frame to groan like an ancient dying beast.
It was a total, absolute hazard.
“Magnificent,” Saira declared softly to the empty air, her eyes glistening with pure, unearned pride.
“A masterpiece of modern architecture.” Perched snugly on her left shoulder, still partially wedged inside his cracked coconut half like an armoured pauldrons, was now a calm Crabby who was no longer terrified.
Somewhere between her dragging timber and weaving palm leaves, she had moved him from his stone pedestal and given him an upgrade.
He was no longer just the head architecture-he was now upper management.
Nom,nom,nom.
Crabby’s tiny mouthparts twitched as he peacefully nibbled on a soggy piece of kelp Saira had tucked into his claws, completely unbothered by his new position near her neck.
Ten yards away, rising out of the calm surf with his elbows resting heavily on the coastal boulder, Eagre stared at the monstrosity.
His jaw hanging open in genuine unfiltered horror.
“That…” Eagre began, his deep voice trembling slightly as he pointed a long, webbed finger at the leaning tower of debris.
“…that is going to collapse the second a gull lands on it.” Saira didn’t even drop her proud posture.
She simply turned her head toward the water, casting Eagre a deeply pitying look.
“You’re just intimidated by my craftsmanship, fish-boy.” Saira said smoothly.”isn’t he, Crabby?” Crabby clicked his claw once and went right back to chewing his kelp.
“See?” Saira nodded, resting a hand lovingly near Crabby’s coconut shell.
“Crabby gives it five stars.
He says the open-concept layout really brings out the natural ocean breeze.” “It has an ‘open-concept layout’ because you are missing three entire walls!” Eagre shouted back, his iridescent fins flaring in sheer carpentry-induced agony.
“A mild gust of wind will render you homeless again!” Saira scoffed, taking a dramatic step backward to admire her new home from another angle.
“Oh please.
It survived my rigorous stress test.” “What stress test?!” “I patted the side of it really gently before you woke up.” She replied, completely serious.
Eagre opened his mouth to deliver a scathing critique of her palm-frond roof, but the distant, distinct sound echoed across the water.
HOOOOOOORN.
The low, distant boom of a foghorn cut through the crisp morning air.
Eagre instantly snapped his head toward the horizon.
Pushing past the thick layer of offshore mist was a massive, three-masted merchant vessel, its white sails caught in the wind as it cut smoothly through the channel.
Realistically, if someone were to jump up and down, light a smoky fire or scream at the top of their lungs, the crew would spot them in minutes.
Eagre’s glowing eyes widened.
A sudden, sharp spike of something cold and unreadable hit his chest.
This was it.
The loud, impossible, money-obssessed human was going to go home.
He waited for the frantic shouting.
He waited for her to start waving her arms, crying tears of relief, and abandoning her terrible pile of sticks to chase after her civilization.
He braced himself for the quiet beach she would leave behind.
Saira slowly turned her head toward the horizon, squinting her eyes at the passing ship.
Crabby paused his kelp-munching on her shoulder, his little stalks tilting toward the ocean.
Saira stared at the vessel for two long seconds.
“Meh,” she muttered.
She turned right back around, crossing her arms and tilting her head to admire the leaning, structurally compromised roof of her palm-frond villa.
Eagre froze.
He blinked once.
Twice.
His webbed ears twitched in total, stunned disbelief.
“Meh?!” Eagre repeated, his voice dropping into a bewildered whisper before rising into an incredulous squeak.
“What do you mean, meh?!
That is a merchant vessel!
A ship!
With food, and beds, and people who do not live in tide pools!” Saira picked a stray piece of sand out from under her fingernail.
“Yeah, and it’s probably full of boring tax collectors and a captain who’s going to charge me a ridiculous passage fee I can’t afford.” She gestured grandly to her four crooked planks of wood.
“Why would I pay for a cramped cot on a smelly boat when I am currently the sole owner of a luxury beach side estate?
Right, Crabby?” Crabby munch-munched on his kelp and clicked his tiny claw in passive agreement.
Eagre stared at her, completely speechless.
His mouth opened and closed like a stranded carp, his ancient, ocean-predator brain utterly failing to process the human standing before him.
She had just turned down rescue for a pile of wet garbage and a crab in a coconut.
A part of him was relieved-a quite, traitorous flutter beneath his ribs that made his stomach drop-and it utterly terrified him.
Why was he relieved?
She was a nuisance.
She was loud, demanding, and had spent the last twenty minutes having a romantic narrative arc with a stuck crustacean.
He should be praying for that ship to pull up to the sand, crate her up, and sail her to the edge of the world.
Instead, his chest loosened, the cold knot of tension easing as the distant vessel began to shrink into the haze.
I am simply waiting to eat her, Eagre lied aggressively to himself, digging his claws into the sea-slick stone until the rock flaked under his knuckles.
Yes.
A predator does not like when another hunter steals his prey.
It is a matter of territorial pride.
“You are completely out of your mind,” Eagre blurted, his voice raspier than usual as he forced his scowl back into place.
“That was your only chance of rescue!
Do you have any idea how few trade routes cross this channel?!” Saira didn’t even blink.
She walked over to her front “doorway”-which was just two palm fronds tied together with kelp-and carefully adjusted a stray leaf.
“Rescue implies I was in danger, fish-boy,” she said airily, giving Crabby another tiny scrap of seaweed.
“Besides, if I left now, who would manage the property values on this beach?
Certainly not you.
You have zero eye for curb appeal.” Eagre sank up to his nose in the cool salt water, glaring at her through the translucent turquoise crests.
No way in the deep abyssal trench was he ever telling her that he had held his breath until that ship disappeared.