Mermaid

The water was calm, the wind was low and the sun was low in the sky. A perfect day for fishing. I loaded my tackle box into my father's old boat. I loaded in my small red lunch box as well as my fishing rod. Lastly, I put a cooler with ice in it into the boat. I slid into the rowboat. I whistled a tune as I rowed onto the lake. I came to a stop in my usual place, a shady spot near a grouping of rocks. I tied my boat to the rocks and cast my line, closing my eyes and waiting for the fish to come to me.
Hours into fishing, and not a single bite. My phone started buzzing around noon. Out of frustration, I turned it off, not checking the contents of the messages I was receiving. I held my rod between my legs and pulled out my lunch box. Lunch today was a peanut butter sandwich. I finished the sandwich and pulled out my soda. I thought about heading back early, no point spending time out here if the fish aren't biting. I reeled in my line, disheartened. To my surprise, the hook was gone. The line hadn’t been broken, I would have felt that. Did someone cut it? Or something? I tied a new lure to the line and cast it out in the open. I was determined to catch this mystery fish.
    My lure glinted in the sunlight. I stared at it, hoping to catch sight of the mystery cutting fish. The sword fish. I took a sip of soda and set the can next to me. I sat and stared for what felt like an hour. The boat bobbed up and down slowly. I started to reel in my lure, hoping it moving would provoke it. My boat was suddenly rocked by a rogue wave, causing my soda to spill into my lap. I swore as I tried to wipe as much as I could from my jeans. I finished reeling in the line, only to find that the lure was gone. I was getting frustrated now. No sighting of the fish still. I had a few more tricks up my sleeve before I gave up. I cast my line once more, a fresh lure on my line. This would be the one, I told myself. Once my lure was in place, shining a bright orange in the water, I tied a small bell to the line. I held the pole between my legs, and pulled out a newspaper, made it look like I wasn’t watching my line. It was just a superstition passed down from my father, but pretending not to pay attention sometimes gets results.
    A cool breeze blew across lake. I glanced around, nothing yet. My lure was still on the line, thankfully. I whistled some more as I went back to the newspaper; I wasn’t really reading it, the newspaper was about three months old, I just used it to keep my eyes off the lake. I cracked open another somewhat-cold one. The bell rang, I threw the newspaper aside in an attempt to get a glance of the fish. I saw the tail end of the mystery fish disappear into the depths of the lake, blue-green scales, I couldn’t get a size estimate from this distance. I pulled in my line and of course, the lure was gone. I wasn’t sure why this fish wanted the lures so bad, but in vengeance of my other lures, I would catch this thing. I rowed my boat to the docks. I tied it down and got out. I unloaded my gear from the boat and returned to the shack my father had built years ago after buying a pretty nice slice of land on the lake. I went through a locked chest out back, looking for my final chance to catch this fish. A crabbing trap. It had a section where you could push it in to get inside, but you couldn’t push it back out. The metal of it probably couldn’t be cut like my line had. I grabbed a chain from the box as well, so the fish couldn’t just take my box. I took three lures and zip-tied them to the inside of the box. My last three lures. I sighed. If this didn’t work I would have to cut this vacation short. Even if this fish was too big for the box, if it swam in it would get stuck, as trying to pull out of it would only dig the corners of the opening into your skin. I headed to the dock, I would set it up there, it would be easy for me to drag it onto shore. I took my shoes off and headed out to set the trap up. I wrapped the chain around a pole in the shallower part of the lake and took the box to a deep part. I tossed it out and tugged on the chain a bit. This had to work.

    In my shed I made another sandwich. I hadn’t caught any fish so I couldn’t cook that up for dinner. Good thing I had Pringles in case this happened. I took my tube of chips with me out to the docks to check on my trap. The chain was rattling around, something was pulling on the box. With a smug smile on my face, I started yanking in the trap in. Whatever I had caught was a fighter, as I struggled to pull it in. But, I won the fight and pulled the box onto shore. The fish was huge, about six feet long! It had gotten most of its upper half stuck in this box. As I got close to the box I drew my knife, I was going to put it down so it wouldn't have to suffer from suffocating. As I got closer, it looked weirder and weirder. Like it had hair and skin even. I flipped the box over to get a better look. Looking up at me was the face of a woman. The lower half of a fish, and the top part of a beautiful, voluptuous woman; a mermaid. She had gotten her stomach up inside the box, it looked like she had tried to push herself out of the box but gotten stuck on the opening. She was bleeding in a few places as well, most likely from moving up against the box. Her eyes were bloodshot like she had been crying, but now they were furious.
To top it all off, she was topless too.
I stared, unsure of what to do now. Her face got really red as I stood there, like an idiot staring at her. She spoke first, “Are you going to stand there and marvel at my body like a perv or are you going to get your lord out of here?”
    “Oh, uh... yeah,” I stammered. I undid the latches and opened the top of the box. The mermaid started to wiggle herself through the opening. I grabbed her under the arms and quickly pulled her out. I looked her up and down while we sat on the shore, illuminated by the sunset. She had long black hair, beautiful green eyes and her scales were a wonderful blue-green. I couldn’t stop staring at her.
    “Well?” She suddenly demanded, still angry.
    “W-what?” I got defensive.
    “My apology? For tricking the lord of this land into getting stuck in a box?” She was getting impatient with me.
    “An apology?! You stole my lures!”
    “Well, maybe, you should not have put such wonderful jewelry into my waters!”
    “Your waters? My family owns this part of the lake!”
    “Not anymore, human, I am of royal lineage! All waters in this domain are mine. If you want to stay here you will pay tithes to me.”
    “No way in hell, lady. I’ll get the flipping men in black out here to whisk you away to some secret lab for testing!”
    “Oooh, I doubt it, child. As we speak, monster girls are subverting your realms’ governments. I could buy you if I wanted to!” She got smug.
    “W-well... you’re powerless out of the water... so, uh...” I quickly scooped her up in a princess carry and moved her away from the water. Her face got beet red.
    “Y-you- I-” She put an arm around my neck. “Such a strong man.”
    I stopped dead in my tracks. “Excuse me?”
    “You heard me you... big, handsome, strong man. MY strong man.”
    “Lady you don’t own me.” I said stubbornly.
    “Not yet. I will make you mine though. Take me to your abode.” She demanded.
    “Why? You want to pester me there too?”
    “Unless you wish to commence the love making here, I suggest we go somewhere a little more intimate. You also need to dress my wounds.” She crossed her arms and pouted.
    The gears in my brain turned. This mermaid wanted to bang me. “Alright. I’ll take you to my shack. The love shack. Heh.”
    “Good.” She thought for a few moments, “Where do you want our wedding to take place? On the lake shore? In the lake? Maybe on the beach?”
    I started towards my small vacation home. “Talking of marriage already? Lady, a few minutes ago you were threatening to buy me.”
    “Yes, but if we make love the pact is sealed. Ancient laws dictate this. You humans may ignore them. But my people will not.”
    “Oh, ok.” I set her on the bed and began to bind her cuts and scrapes. The way she gasped and breathed as my hands ran over her body was really lewd.
    I finished binding her and sat back for a moment. Was I really going to fuck a fish woman? The answer was yes, yes I was. “If you are done teasing me, I would appreciate if you would come lie with me now.” I nodded and removed my clothing.