The Final Song

Short Story Horror | A Sad Siren Lashes Out

Reader beware: this story contains scenes of violence and death.

Story & Image by Nyanka

On the top of a disfigured rock, Elayne sat twirling her hair in her damp, webbed fingers. She enjoyed sifting the strands and finding soft, slimy bits of seaweed. The smell had stopped bothering her long ago, but the texture reminded her a little of a tongue, and so she found it quite funny to have tongues in her hair lapping at her cheeks and neck. It was silly, but she found delight wherever she could, having been dead now for some 20-odd years.

The thing about being murdered is that there is so much left undone, and so you are constantly left with this nagging feeling in your mind. Did I leave the stove on? Did I forget to unplug the iron? The ghosts of things she should’ve gotten to finish haunted her even when she was out in the ocean atop this jagged rock. Of all the things that haunted her, the most was not taking the life of the fucker that killed her.

The sun was setting, and she knew she had to make her way to dry land. She delved into the seawater and swam at a speed that was not quite human. As the final rays of the sun nestled themselves under the horizon, she could feel the webs between her fingers and toes separating; she could feel the scales melting away.

As she approached the shore, she could hear loud music and see a blazing fire. She swam to a part of a shore that was dark. She took a few awkward steps onto the shore and ran her fingers through her hair to ensure there were no strands of seaweed or other odd bits wrapped in her coarse hair. Her dress was black, and although it had deteriorated over the years, it was dark enough that no man or woman drunk enough would give it a second thought.

She waited a while for the dampness of her body to dry up and followed the light of the bonfire and the cacophony of humans having a great time. When she hit the edge of the group, she stood and watched with calculating interest. She watched as the thick young lady with skin the color of dark amber pressed her ass against the square-jawed young man. She watched as two young men hid behind the line of coconut trees and pressed their lips together tenderly at first and then with a hunger that made her clench her core. Her dull eyes drowned in images of brown bodies alive and dancing. Alive enough to kiss and alive enough to cackle so loud even the music could not stifle it.

The cold calculation shifted slowly into a thing that left a bitter taste in her mouth. She began to wish that she could come to the beach every night to dance, sing, kiss, and fuck. Mostly, she wished she never had to return to the ocean. It bothered her the hopeless loop of life as the creature she was forced to become. She watched them, the humans, and felt a sort of jealous rage at how little they decided to do with the freedom they had, at least, she assumed it. The jealousy and bitterness grew inside of her until it had claws. It used those claws to climb up her throat and escape, vibrating the air upon its exit.

The sound was more of a feeling than words. The sound of her voice sliced through the group with surgical precision. The group froze. There was no kissing, no laughing, no dancing. There was, for a very brief moment, an auditory rapture that froze all in their places; even the fire appeared to stand still for Elayne’s golden tongue.

She could not tell which body moved first. Three members of the groups began to walk toward the water as if puppeteered by Elayne’s music. Their movements were jerky. Their feet dragged in the sand, almost like they were fighting to stay still. They walked until the water met their waist. It was then that tears began to fall, each droplet a prayer to the water to break the spell. They kept walking until the water met their chest. The tears flowed a raging river into the seawater. The water met their necks, and still, their mouths remained shut, but they wept and wept as Elayne sang. The water covered their heads, and only then did their mouths open, too busy gasping for air to cry out in anguish.

The remainder of the group turned on each other. The golden tendrils of Elayne’s song wrapped themselves around them, a python strangling the life out of each and every one. She belted her song that was more feeling than words and arms formerly pressed on the hips of a dancing lover found themselves around a neck. Lips that were just recently pressed on the neck of another found themselves biting at their throat in a rabid trance. The two who had hidden behind the coconut tree in feral lust found themselves climbing up up up until they found themselves falling down down through the air, mouths snapped shut, unable to scream before their bodies hit the cool sand.

By the time Elayne had finished her song, there was no one left alive to hear it. As she watched the effect of the feeling, she had so instinctively turned to sound, she felt a deep anguish. She had destroyed the very things she so desperately wanted. She cried out a sound so raw and broken that the ocean paused its lapping at the sand struck by the sheer pain in her voice.

Elayne ran into the water then, tears the size of the moon landing into the water like the bodies that dropped from the coconut trees. She had only wanted freedom. She only wanted an end to the tireless hunger, rage, fucking frustration and so the water tasting her salty desperate tears listened. She could feel her webbed finger returning and her scales emerging from her brown flesh. The webbed fingers began to turn into fins, and her body continued to transform past anything she had ever experienced. Her delicate lips stretched taut, and her teeth grew so long and sharp that she could not close the very lips she had admired. Her eyes bulged out and spread until they were far apart. Elayne’s long limbs compressed until she was nothing more than a very ugly, angry fish with no memory of the past at all and she was finally free.

In the water, three bodies jerked. Fingers became webbed. Scales decorated flesh like many tiny iridescent tattoos. New lives were beginning or ending, depending on who you asked, but Elayne swam the ocean angry and finally free.

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I really pulled this one out at the very last minute. Although I had the first paragraph written about a week ago, I did not know where this one was heading.

TELL ME:
Did you like or hate Elayne? What were your thoughts on the ending? I almost did not add the last paragraph, but I felt like a cycle like this had to be cruel and vicious. Do you think Elayne was truly free? How did you think this story was going to go? Favorite line/lines?

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PS have a short story on Audre Lorde being published next month. The book is available for preorder here.

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