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April still hasn't made up her mind about this place.

That everyone is so open about the use of their magic, about being sirens is still something she's coming to terms with after an entire life of hiding who and what she is. Her meeting with Lara had confused her only because she's never been somewhere like this, where there are rules and expectations of her simply because of what she is and that alone is unsettling to her. She's never been very good at following anyone's rules but her own and now she feels, in some ways, as if someone is always watching, just waiting for her to screw up.

So far she hasn't had any real reason to use her powers. She'd sung to Bach, but only to make him feel better. She's hesitant to do what she might normally, she's reluctant to hum a soft tune just to get a man to do what she wants, and she doesn't like that feeling. On the other hand, living somewhere with people who haven't turned away from her simply due to learning what she is has given her a strange sense of belonging she's not used to. It's not something she's sure she likes very much.

She swims daily, but often tries to be done before sunrise. If she misses it, she'll go after sunset, when it's less likely someone will see her. There's probably not need, but she does it anyway, wanting to be back to herself and dressed again before the sun fully comes up.

Today, though, she's late.

As she drifts back toward shore, she realizes the sun is peaking over the tops of the buildings, that the first rays of light of stretching across the sand and people are out. Some are walking along the beach, others are jogging and there are more still on the boardwalk. She's made the effort to find a private place to swim, but even so, as she stands up in the water, her scales are visible, glistening and black, and she doesn't know whether or not she'll be seen.

[Timed to Tuesday morning. Catch her at any stage of her transformation or after she's returned to her human form and has gotten dressed again. >:D]

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A few weeks ago if Levi had seen a scaled woman walking out of the ocean while he was surfing he would have had a million questions for her. Despite living in Siren Cove most of his life he'd never actually seen a siren in their siren form. Of course, that had all changed in a big way and now it seemed he was running into them all over the place.

Riding a wave into shallow water near where the woman, who he now recognized as April, went ashore. By the time he got there she was dressed again, which was probably for the best. Sitting on his board in water just more than knee deep. he called out to her.

"Cutting it a little close, aren't you?" he asked. "Or are you a bit of an exhibitionist with the scales?"

She's stretching when she hears Levi's voice, her arms over her head and when she turns and drops them, she smiles, giving an exaggerated shrug. As with so many of the people she's met so far in this town, he doesn't seem all that surprised to find out what she is and it makes her wonder about him. Les is a witch, Lara is a siren, the people she's met who seem to take her true form in stride all have something of their own.

Maybe Levi does, too.

"I got a bit of a late start," she answers, walking ankle deep into the water again. Her skin shimmers briefly, black scales rising, but she pushes them back again. "I'm usually done by now."

Levi noted the black scales and wondered if color had anything to do with breed or family of siren. It was something he'd maybe ask Lara about, although he didn't want to put her in a bad position to reveal secrets that she shouldn't. He wondered if April was originally from here. There were sirens all over the world, he knew that, but this seemed a popular place for them.

"That's probably for the best, since I'm not sure how most people would react to the scales. Or the nudity. Actually, I know how most people would react to the nudity."

"Do you?" she asks, an eyebrow raised as she walks through the water, looking at Levi in amusement. She had seen him at the party that night, she knows he's with Lara and while there aren't many people April thinks she needs to cater to, she does know she doesn't want to fuck with that woman. She knows better than to make an attempt to flirt with this man in earnest.

"And how would most people react?" she asks. "Run? Cover their eyes?"

"Oh exactly," Levi said, smirking a bit as she neared. Levi would never cheat on Lara but being a flirt had been a part of his nature for so long he wasn't sure he could turn off. And April was fun to flirt with.

"At least a few people just fainting from the horror of it as well."

"I am pretty terrifying," she agrees, the water moving easily around her calves. Even when she's not in siren form, she feels most at home in the water, right here, the sand under her feet, the cool water against her skin. It's natural for her. She misses it when she's elsewhere. "Legs for days and don't even get me started on my breasts. Horrible sight."

"Exactly, I'm fairly certain that there's a law against you looking like you do," he said. She certainly was aware of what her more noticeable attributes were and Levi found that refreshing. False modesty or falsely placed arrogance wasn't appealing.

"I mean, there's not a single feature of yours that's moderately attractive, is there?" he asked. It was true, too, because every feature was ridiculously attractive.

"Good thing I'm only moderately charming, right?" she asks in return, but she's still smiling, enjoying the lighthearted banter between the two of them. There's a part of her that wants to ask him about Lara, because she feels a strange sort of grudging respect for the woman, though she's not sure why.

But instead she asks, "You dropped pirate lessons in favour of surfing?"

"Exactly, anything more than that and it would definitely be criminal," he said. Levi imagined that being criminal was not something that would have bothered April. There were bits of their earlier conversation where she had thought things that made him sure she knew for sure she didn't mind being criminal.

"I had to. I couldn't keep up the limp, I healed right now, so I had to return to my love of the ocean in the form of surfing. It's a great tragedy."

"Love of the ocean, though, in whatever form is acceptable," she decides with a more genuine smile for him. "A man after my own heart, clearly." April has never loved anything or anyone the way she loves the ocean. People have had a tendency to prove disappointing where the ocean is always exactly where she needs it to be.

"I like the solitude of it. No matter how many people love it there's enough that you can have some all to yourself. It's one of the reasons I got a house up the beach with a lot of land and no neighbors," he said, jerking his head up the beach a ways. He had ended up surfing pretty far from where he lived but that had certainly turned out fortunate for him today.

"And it's turned out to be pretty fortuitous since my girlfriend likes the ocean so much."

"Lara," she says with a nod, her smile still present, though there's something unreadable in it. She's still not sure what she thinks of the other woman simply because she's never had to worry about anything like a matriarch. She's never had to answer to anyone and the idea that she might be kicked out of Siren Cove for not following a certain set of rules doesn't do anything to make her feel especially welcome here.

And on the other hand, she's clearly powerful. She has a firm hand in this town and April respects that.

"Yes, I met her at the music festival," she says.

"Now I'm not surprised that you know who she is but I am surprised you know she and I are dating. Checking up on my availability?" he asked, grinning. More likely than not Lara mentioned him but it would be interesting to know that she talked about him that early on. He highly doubted it actually had anything to do with April giving a damn about whether or not he was single, as flattering as that would have been.

"A town this small, people talk," April answers with a laugh. "Especially when you know how to ask." The truth is, she's seen them together and all she'd had to do was pretend she didn't know who the man was with the matriarch to learn they were dating.

"But if you want to think I was checking up on you, you're welcome to," she adds, her smile growing, because maybe she had been in her own way. She knows better than to get involved with a police officer, but he's certainly handsome and it can never hurt to be sure.

"I'm choosing to believe that you were so smitten to me that you had to ask around until you found out if I was available," he said with a grin. It was a small town and gossip always traveled fast. Hell, for all he knew it was in the papers with covered of the murders. Or the society pages or whatever they were called.

"But if you're ever running late for a swim again, my house is up that way," he said, pointing up along the beach. "It's a small house but the property is big and it's a private beach so you should be alone."

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