Avery Thorn
Tied To The Sea
For all the people being eaten away by the shadows of their mind
Always keep fighting
Chapter One
Jason
I tapped my fingers nervously on the steering wheel as I pulled onto my street. Fuck if I wasn’t jumping out of my skin and hoping I was someone else at that very moment; there’s no telling how my parents would react to the news about Atalanta.
I had called them an hour ago to tell them I was finally coming home and that I had news. They were relieved to get answers as to my whereabouts the last two weeks and said they were on their way back from the university.
Pulling into the driveway, my stomach sunk when I saw their car. It wasn’t that I was afraid to tell them what was going on. If there was anyone I could trust with this, it was my parents. But recounting what happened that night still made guilt flair in my chest, and I honestly was too exhausted to handle the storm of emotions that I was about to deal with.
I took a deep breath in and parked the car. “It’s okay.”
Climbing out of the driver’s seat, I stretched my stiff muscles and walked up the driveway. I didn’t even get halfway up to the door when it burst open and my mom came darting out, her long tresses of auburn hair bouncing wildly as she flung her arms around me.
“Oh, my baby boy! Are you okay? Of course you're not okay, look at you! You’ve clearly lost weight, and Gods, the bags under your eyes could go over the airport weight limit! Are you injured?” She asked as she pulled away and began to pat me down.
I gave her a reassuring smile. “Yeah, Mom. I’m okay. A bit tired, but okay.”
“That’s good,” she smiled, and then proceeded to smack me across the head. “What in the hell were you doing running off like that?! Your father and I were worried sick!”
“Ow!” I winced and covered my head as she continued to try and hit me. “I told you I was fine!”
She looked into my eyes, and I could see hers swimming with tears. “And you think that was good enough? A few vague phone calls? The random text message? Wouldn’t even tell us where you were!”
“The situation was a bit...precarious.”
“Jason Aurelius Thatcher Monroe, what did you get yourself into!?” She scowled as she pointed her finger accusingly in my face.
“Let’s go inside, and I’ll tell you.”
With my hand on her shoulder, I guided my still fuming mother back towards the house. My father stood in the doorway, trying to look like the calm, cool, and collected one, but I knew better. He was probably freaking out internally more than my mother was externally. He just had the tendency to let my mother be the emotional one. He once said that if they were both the irrational ones, it wouldn’t help anybody.
When I got through the door, my father pulled me into a fierce hug.
“I’m glad you're safe,” he whispered as he squeezed me just a bit too tight.
I hugged him back tighter.
I felt a furious scratching at my foot. Looking down, I saw the white eight pounds of fluff that was Rocket, hitting me with his little paws, trying to get my attention.
I picked him up and cuddled him close to me. “I guess you missed me too, buddy?”
His little nose twitched as he took in all the foreign scents that were probably on me before he began to diligently rub his face against my shirt. I couldn’t help but chuckle. He was trying to cover up all the other smells with his own, putting his little rabbit claim back on me.
With Rocket in my arms, I walked into the living room and flopped down, exhausted, on the big couch. My parents, who were studying me expectantly, sat down on the smaller couch next to me, on the edge of the cushions.
“So, out with it,” Mom demanded.
I sighed. “I don’t really know where to start.”
“Start with the worst part,” My father offered as he took my mother's hand into his own.
That was something I had always found interesting. Often, people said, ‘start from the beginning.’ But my father believed that if you started from the section most difficult to tell, then you’ve gotten through the worst of it and it would be easier to tell the rest of the story.
I wondered this time if telling the worst part would make it any easier.
“I was stupid. I let my anger get the best of me, and it ruined a family. Because of me, someone is dead, another person is in the hospital, and…” I paused and took a deep breath. "I turned someone.”
My mother gasped, her hands flying up to cover her mouth, and I could see that her eyes were already filling with tears again.
She was about to fly into questions when my father put his free hand on her arm and said. "Not yet.”
Looking over to me, my father added, "Okay. Now, start from the beginning.”
So, I told them about Atalanta. I had mentioned her in passing to them a couple of times, as this girl I was interested in, but now I told them everything. How from the very moment of meeting her, she had been suspicious of what I was. Of course, that had been my fault. I had been careless when I refilled my bottle with salt, and she’d caught me red-handed.
Despite her suspicions, the two of us had grown closer and started a somewhat awkward romance. At first, I had hoped she would have dropped the whole issue, but she had just turned to asking other people around town.
“Why didn’t you tell us?” Dad asked.
“I thought I was handling it.”
I didn’t mention that I was afraid they would have told me to stay away from her.
“Well, clearly you weren’t,” Mom chided.
“Amy,” My father scolded. “Jason is an adult. If he felt that he needed our help, he’s smart enough to ask for it. That being said, I do think you should have come to us.”
I looked down at Rocket, whom I was holding like a baby. His belly was exposed to me, little nose twitching. I knew my father was right. Yet, thinking back, I didn’t think I would have changed a thing leading up to…to what I had said. That, I would change if I could. Everything that happened afterwards was my fault.
“Mistakes were made, and now I must lay with them,” I muttered, quoting Ajax from all those weeks ago.
My mother, having calmed down from her rage, softly asked for me to continue. So I told them about Atalanta finding me napping at the bottom of the pool, us getting into a fight, and her going out on the boat.
“Do you remember that storm from a couple weeks ago?” I asked. They both nodded. “Well, Atalanta and her family were out in that storm. When I realized that it was coming in, Percy, who I was with at the time, realized she was in danger. So me and several others went out to go find her.”
“Percival was with you? There were others?” my father asked.
I nodded. “Yes, but I’ll get to that later. So we went out…” I recounted going out into the storm and finding the North family hanging on for dear life, Atalanta and her sister falling overboard and their father hitting his head and slipping into a coma.
“When we got there, Atalanta wasn’t breathing.” My breath hitched as I remembered holding her dying body. “We couldn’t get her to breathe on her own, so I did the only thing I could think of.”
My voice croaked when I added, "It was my fault she was out on that boat. I couldn’t just let her die.”
My mother was off the couch, rushing towards me with the intention to sweep me into her arms and provide that motherly comfort, but I held up my hand. She halted. Thankfully, instead of hugging me, she sat down next to me and put her hand on my knee.