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imagine-silk · 10 months

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AtSV; Peter B!Mermaid with a reader scared of water

》 A lot of people talk about the myth of people who grow a tail in the sea and can breathe underwater, varying from horror stories to barbie. But everyone thinks they're just that, stories.

People think everyone who's lived in an ocean town to love the ocean. None of them have met you. If you had it your way you would never go further than a foot deep. You could swim no problem and you worked on boat but that wasn't ideal.

Then a dude moved in who was simultaneously an open book and a complete mystery. He went to the pub often but never let anyone into his house. He went to the beach and sold things from the ocean floor but you had never seen his gear.

You didn't care about him. Then you found him in a cave face down in the water with blood surrounding him. With no thought you jumped out of your boat and dragged him to the rocks but it was a lot more difficult than you thought it should be. When he got to the rock he stayed under the water and said he was fine and you could leave. You saw two things; a big ass gash on his stomach and a big ass tail behind him. Long story short he scared the absolute shit out of you.

The next day he was completely fine. He caught you staring a few times but you didn't want to talk about it. He didn't feel the same. He caught you alone and interrogated you about it and what you were going to do and was very surprise when you said it wasn't your business or your interest. "You haven't hurt nobody, right? As far as I'm concerned you sing with crabs and eat kelp."

He notices you a lot more after that, how you're always kind of around but never brought to attention. Sure your mom and brother were around but other than that you lived a pretty solitary life, one you didn't care to change. But after living his life walking on eggshells to make sure no one finds out he knows that only lasts so long. So if he sees you he'll walk over. You don't really know how to turn him down or if you even should considering he could kill you while you were working on your boat and no one would find the body.

He thinks your fear of the ocean is super weird for the sole purpose you live and work near and on it. But you don't need to explain money to him, you really don't. It's so inconvenient though. And then the most insane thought came to him. He says you could swim with him in the water so you could see it's not the worst. “Come on, it’ll be fine. You’re safe with me. I can kill anything in the water if it gets too close to you.” He said it so blatantly crude you just agreed so he would stop talking.

The way he transformed was basically immediate and you didn't want to look anyway. He held out his arms and you scooted into them in the cold water. There you were in a cave away from town in the arms of a man you've known for years that felt like only a few hours doing exposure therapy, and that man was also something of fairy tales. All that was going through your head was, "I'm going to die."

He knew you were panicking. "You're good. Try swimming around." You refused. But after you also felt like it helped a bit so you asked if you could try again another day. So every other day you would go off to the cave and meet him there.

It was impossible to not become his friend. He's so dry in his humor and how he handled things, so casually confident. He's a bit assertive and presumptuous but he really does care about you and you can see that clear as day. Then suddenly you weren't drinking alone at the pub and you saw someone enter his house. It was a controlled mess as you thought it would be.

You met someone who came to see him, a kid who walked into his house and then immediately changed whatever subject they were talking about. You asked Peter if he was like him and he said yes but it was complicated. Miles had never been in real water other than a pool so when he did for the first time it freaked him out. The kid accidentally gave you shit for hating the ocean and apologized immediately after.

Little by little it does work but the issue becomes you can't focus because all you can think about is Peter telling you to hold your breath while his hands are holding you up. He's always listened to you and helped you out of the water. It got to the point you forgot to hold your breath and immediately needed to be pulled up.

He does see you increasingly getting starry eyed but automatically doesn't think it could be him so he doesn't think about it. It nags at him in the back of his head but he ignores it.

You are both outed by women in your lives. You were out with your mother and he was with Jess, begrudgingly. Your mom did her vetting process and fully said she was seeing if he was quality material, not necessarily saying you already said something to her. Jess told you what Peter says out of malice, how he likes helping you and doesn't want to stop, how he mentions you all the time. He didn't tell her the information she got but it's true all the same. The two of you wanted to drown in the ocean a pace away.

You two sat awkwardly in his house that night and both put your cards on the table and spilled your guts. "I'm in love with you."

#atsv #peter b. parker #mermaid #merman #gender neutral reader #i dont know if you can tell but i hate the ocean #marvel

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