Greeting

"Uhm… How do you start a proper conversation?" Yvie asked, feeling her ignorance engulf her, weighing her down. She had always had conversations with the nearest thing. Be that a teddy bear, some crabs, herself or the Lizard. But most of these partners had been either unable to respond or not brought anything real to the conversation. So this was new. Completely new. Foreign, interesting and scary.

"Oh, I know!" Aqua sang as she had pondered for a bit. Yvie listened intently, a certain joy rising inside of her. Or maybe it was a sort of expectation?

"Let's introduce ourselves properly!" Aqua suggested, taking out her hand, finding Yvie's.

"The Moon told me that humans greet each other like this" She said, giving Yvie's small hand a delicate shake.

"Hello. I'm Aqua. Nice to meet you" Aqua said, shaking Yvie's hand in an awkward fashion, indicating she wasn't really sure what to do or how to do it.

Yvie, who hadn't shaken many hands in her life either, returned the awkward handshake with a little laugh.

"Nice to meet you, Aqua. I'm Yvie" She responded, feeling herself smile and relax. This was a bit surprising, as she thought she had already been relaxing, but as the tense feeling seeped out of her shoulders and jaw, she noticed just how stiff she had been.

'Was I really this uncomfortable?' Yvie wondered, saving the thought for later.

They each let go of the other's hand, laughing a bit at their attempt.

"Hey!" Yvie said, having gotten a bright idea, as a thought had entered her mind.

"Why should we greet each other as humans?" She asked, smiling sincerely at the mermaid in front of her.

"Neither of us are really fully a human, after all…" She explained as she saw the mermaid ponder a bit about this.

"How should we greet each other, then?" Aqua asked, as she nodded along to the sense Yvie was making.

"How do you greet other mermaids?" Yvie asked, as she didn't have any other ideas.

"Oh…" Aqua said. Within a second, Yvie noticed how the water around them suddenly felt like it was dropping in temperature, bringing down the temperature of the air along with it. She noticed how Aqua seemed like she had lost the glistening in her eyes. Just then, something suddenly dawned on her.

"There isn't any other mermaids…" Yvie concluded out loud. Her pride of concluding something got overshadowed by the sadness she felt through Aqua. The familiar feeling stung in her heart as she was at a loss for words. A slight nod from the sad and lonely mermaid in front of her made Yvie cry once again.

Tears, not belonging solely to her, fled down her cheeks as she instinctively found herself reaching out for the existence in front of her.

"I'm sorry" Yvie found herself saying, as she laid her hand upon the head of Aqua, noticing droplets falling to the water.

At once, Yvie forgot all about her quest for questions and answers. The most important thing to her was to comfort the crying being she had wounded with her words.

'Words have power…' She told herself, carving it into her heart, as if to never forget this important lesson. She had never made anyone, or anything cry before. Maybe except for her mother, but that somehow felt different. With this, it was a direct result of what she did. Not who, or what, she was. Yvie had never considered that asking questions might be hurtful.

Still in a state of shock, Yvie managed to pet the head of Aqua, who had become silent.

"I'm sorry" Yvie said again, crying with her even more. At some point the tears just pressed on like a waterfall, as she felt herself opening up. It wasn't only because she had hurt Aqua, but because they reminded so much of each other, that she had opened up for a thought she didn't want to have as well.

"I think I'm lonely too…" She said, leaning down towards Aqua as she felt her head rest on hers, for a moment feeling the warmth of another being.

"I'm sorry as well" Aqua said, trying to find her singing voice, scrambling in her emotions to sort them out.

"I just never heard that question before… I don't think I was prepared to meet the fact head-on like that" She said, sniffling a bit, as she tried to dry her eyes, with her wet hands.

"I knew… But I never heard it out loud before, you know?" Aqua asked. Yvie nodded along, as if she understood. Deep down, she felt like she really did, but somehow, it wasn't something she was entirely sure of. For now, nodding seemed like the right thing to do.

'Is this lying?' Yvie pondered a bit, but decided it was more about giving comfort, than choosing what was right or wrong in that given moment.

"But I do have the Moon!" Aqua squealed, sounding a bit more like herself again. The kindness had returned to her voice, with the temperature in the water around them feeling like it had gone a bit up as well.

"We talk about everything!" She continued, looking up at the shining orb floating in the sky, lighting down as if it were the sole light in the world. The glistening slowly returned to Aqua's eyes, once again competing with her scales.

Yvie wanted to ask how she talked to the moon, but after having just asked something, she couldn't bring herself to it. What if that question hurt her as well? What if it was wrong? What if she started crying again?

'I think… I'm scared…' Yvie admitted to herself, as a swirl of emotions took over her thoughts, and anxiety started rushing through her.

"You talk to the moon?" The Lizard interrupted Yvie's thoughts with a variation of the question she had been debating about. Making it sound like a conclusion with a question mark at the end, more than a proper question. She found herself admiring the fearlessness of her companion for the first time since they had met. But she couldn't help but feel a bit scared.

'Am I scared of the question…?' Yvie asked herself, looking at Aqua who was a bit in thought.

'Or am I scared of an answer?' She continued to ask herself, as she looked towards the Lizard.