Girls at the End of the World

They met in a bookshop.

Djike could only describe the black-clothed girl who entered as Widowmaker, a remnant of her childhood affinity for the old action movies that almost plagued her youngest years. It was a fitting title - the girl, Widowmaker, seemed to move through the bookstore with complete silence. If Djike didn’t know any better, she would’ve thought that Widowmaker had silencing runes laced throughout her suit.

“Do you need help?” Djike asked her, the second and fourth and twentieth day that Widowmaker had slipped into the store, not even ringing the magicked bell hanging above the front door.

Widowmaker always shook her head, and slipped away into the floating bookshelves without making another sound. Djike could never tell if she went up to the second or fourth or seventh floor, or even if she had remained on the ground floor at all. Sometimes, she swore she could feel someone’s eyes on her, yet each time she looked, Widowmaker was nowhere to be seen.

Her father had always told her that curiosity would be the end of her. To drift towards the haunting shadow of a woman dressed in all black, who never seemed to speak or laugh or even move in the approximate motions that a human did. It was a curiosity that was natural, but something that she tried to suppress. For the first and second month, it had worked.

The third month was when Djike started to wonder if Widowmaker was a ghost.

The seventh was when she asked.

“Are you dead?” Was a blunted way of asking the question than she was hoping for, but somehow, it made Widowmaker laugh.

Widowmaker shook her head. She might have even smiled under the black mask that she wore all the time. Not dead, she even signed through her black gloves, just a water dweller. It didn’t look like the local sign language Djike had encountered within her decades at the bookstore. Widowmaker’s sign language was more aggressive, faster, somehow sharper - punctuated with harsh flicks of the wrist and quick finishes to the signs - yet it was clearly a complete language, as the potion Djike took every morning, to allow her to understand each customer that came into the store, wanting a single potion or a single book.

“I’m sorry, that was a blunt question. What’s your name?” Djike asked, smiling. Somehow, it didn’t feel like the general strained smile she could leverage in order to calm agitated customers or to get through a particularly waning conversation. It was a cup of coffee during the cold winter nights. It was a smile that she would share with friends, with family.

Widowmaker’s blue eyes flicked up towards the ceiling, where a book floated towards the door, towards the man who had just walked in. Their eyes both followed it, despite Djike knowing this was a sight they had both seen dozens of times throughout the seven months Widowmaker had begun haunting Djike’s bookstore. Just a man picking up a delivery. Nothing special.

When the man lifted his hand up to wave, Djike returned it with a bangled hand and a smile, letting the man slip back outside without another word.

Even when Djike had turned back to Widowmaker, the black-clad woman hesitated before answering.

My name is Vukosava. 

It might have meant something to someone else, but Djike simply smiled and nodded, mulling over the name in her head. She was almost tempted to say it out loud, run over the syllables in her mouth to see if Widowmaker would nod, or appreciate her effort.

Yet she didn’t speak. Instead, she smiled again. The warm smile. “My name is Djike.”

Widowmaker - Vukosava -  stopped haunting her bookstore after that day. 

Instead, every time she comes in, Vukosava goes to sit still on top of one of the hovering tables on the seventh floor. If Djike tilts her head upwards at just the right angle, she can always see Vukosava through the hovering shelves and flying books, her twin braids draped over the railing, waving in the wind like flags to an unknown country.

Vukosava has read almost every single book Djike has in her store - spellbooks, storybooks, fairytales from faraway lands that Djike isn’t even sure how they came into her possession. She reads until the sun begins to come up. Then, she slips downstairs, signs a quick goodbye, and disappears out into the starlight-covered streets and disappears.

Vukosava sinks down into the water then, that much she knows. The human-looking girl isn’t fully human at all.

Today, Vukosava leaps off of the table onto the bookshelf below the second the moon begins to sink down into the sky, carefully spreading her weight to make sure nothing falls, before hopping down to the next. The oddly intricate game of hopscotch continues until Vukosava lands silently, both feet planted on the hardwood floor.

“Don’t you get tired, each time you do that?”

No.

Djike laughs, which makes Vukosava laugh as well. Behind her mask, of course. The one that feeds water into her lungs, that allows her to exist here, if only until the sun starts to come up.

I will be gone for a bit. Not long. Just a week. Ok?

Djike wonders when they’d started asking each other for permission to be gone. She wonders when she started feeling the soft tinges of worry around her ribs each time Vukosava doesn’t show up until late in the day. Has the other girl noticed? Is that why she signs now, telling her that she’ll be gone?

It all feels a little silly, in that moment. That this is her carreening moment, the point in time she’ll be able to locate in the future, if only to say this is the moment I realized I wanted her.

“Okay. For work?”

Yes, Vukosava responds.

“What do you do, when you’re gone for work?”

The girl smiles again, tilting her head to the right just slightly. I dive. There is always treasure to be found.

While Vukosava is gone, Djike wanders around the bookstore. Her fingers brush against the spines of old books, sometimes pulling away with dust, sometimes catching on the cover of a book. Each time, she wonders which of them Vukosava has read. Has she sat down on that handcrafted wooden table that Djike’s father made centuries ago with the exact book that Djike’s holding now?

It feels almost pointless, to want a girl that could never be hers. One that wears the mask just to be able to breathe on land. One who can’t ever speak without drowning in air.

But Djike does it anyways. She repeats it every day. Wandering down the floating ailes, flipping through old tomes of dusty spellbooks and newly-bound books that she hasn’t gotten around to reading. Sometimes, she imagines Vukosava next to her, thumbing through the same book. 

It’s been seven days, with only an hour left until it’s official eight days, and Djike feels silly counting down the seconds. On the eighth day, at least, she’ll have the ability to begin worrying and it will be justifiable worry. A worry that comes with kinship, with the warmth that Djike only used to sense in the bookstore.

Seven seconds before the clock stikes midnight, Vukosava appears in the doorway, still completely clad in black, but with a smile already etched onto your face. Her braids are still dripping onto the hardwood, but with the spell-lined floors, they only drift away like little soldiers, slipping out the door.

“Vukosava.” Djike exhales, stepping out from behind her checkout desk. The only people lingering in the bookstore are other night creatures - vampires, dhampirs, other creatures thar Djike doesn’t recognize. 

Yet they all seem to pale in comparison to Vukosava, the seemingly human girl that lives at the bottom of the sea. The one who hates wandering on land, unless it’s to come visit the bookstore.

I am not late, am I?

Djike huffs a laugh, reaching over her notebook to flip the sign on her desk from Available! to Be right back!

“You had seven more seconds before I would’ve magicked up some missing person posters for you.”

Vukosava grins a sharp grin, the kind where Djike can imagine the girl’s teeth showing. The kind that suited the nickname Widowmaker.

Can I make it up to you?

Djike raises an eyebrow, attempting to make herself look skeptical. “How are you planning on doing that?”

Vukosava somehow grins even wider than before, letting a gloved hand slide into her pant pocket. A handful of crushed algae is crushed inside of her fist. She holds it out the way Djike imagines a cat holding out a dead mouse, waiting to earn praise.

“What’s this for?”

Vukosava reaches for Djike’s hand and pries it open gently, letting the algae fall inside. 

“Vukosava?”

Her voice feels fragile as Vukosava only carefully reaches up to her own face, her gloved hands reaching to the edges of her mask. Djike can’t bring herself to say anything as the other girl carefully peels the mask off of her face. Centimeter by centimeter, inch my inch. 

She can’t help but stare at every centimeter of skin that creeps out, the hooked nose, the red mouth hiding sharp teeth and a thin, almost clear tube that snakes through the corners of her mouth. 

“I- you can’t breath air, Vukosava, what are you-”

The girl interrupts her with a wave and a pointed smile. It’s almost eerie how correct Djike was when she guessed how Vukosava genuinely smiled. Of course, underwater creatures tended to have similar smiles when they had mouths, but this one seemed to genuinely, wholly belong to Vukosava.

Your books are old. Old spells, old tricks. Old magic. You had everything I needed to breathe on land, or, at least, the stores around here did - it was only the algae that was left.

“But- it’s algae, how could it have-”

Algae from the Challenger Deep. Vukosava smiled again, softer this time. It felt like drinking a cup of cocoa topped with marshmallows, a smile Djike wanted to imagine waking up to each night. I found it.

Djike almost wants to cry. Yet she manages to only step forward and take Vukosava’s face in her free hand hand as another book flies over them. Her skin is most likely ice cold, but Djike’s hands haven’t felt blood in decades, so she doesn’t mind. “Why?”

It’s been seventy years since you took over the shop. I wanted to be able to see it with you. In the day. When you close the shutters so you don’t burn. I want to be able to stay with you. But also for you to see my face. Me.

 “Vukosava.” Djike mumbles again, tears in her eyes. 

The algae is a gift. Keep it. Many spells here need algae from the depths.

“Thank you. But- it’s not the algae, I don’t need the algae.”

I know. But I wanted to ask you. Let me order something for you. Food. Drink. Whatever you want. Let’s stay here until sunrise.

Djike truly starts crying then. She’s sure the customers can hear her, even her whispered words to Vukosava, but she doesn’t mind. Vukosava can stay. There won’t be any disappearing into the moonfall, slipping down streets before the sun comes up until she can slip into the nighttime water.

Vukosava wants to stay. In this small bookstore, marked by magic that Djike herself hasn’t completely gotten a handle on. Vukosava has always wanted to stay.

“Of course. Whatever you want to eat.”

Nothing solid. I can’t handle that yet. The tubes don’t help.

“Whatever you want. I’ll ring for some hot cocoa. Have you ever had it?”

I live underwater. Vukosava signs with an impressively blank face. I eat fish and weeds.

“Okay, okay. Hot cocoa. Smoothies. Whatever you want.” Djike laughs with tears still streaming down her face. She’s sure some of them are dripping onto the floor, yet she can’t bring herself to care, knowing that the floor will simply wash them out the front door. “What book should we read together, then?”

Vukosava laughs, a grating sound coming from her throat. 

You pick, she signs. I’ve read almost all of them.