Page 158 of Under the Waves
Poppy Wells
Before I could register what I was doing, my legs were already running, carrying me towards my other half, myhome. Each voicemail that filtered through my headphones made me sprint just that extra mile harder to reach him.
I didn’t know how I forgot–how I let myself forget that today was the day of his big competition. I promised him I would be there for him and now…now I’d just let him down. Given him another reason to doubt me.To hate me.
As pavement faded to sand beneath my feet, I searched the darkness for him. It only took my eyes a few seconds to find him sat on a lone sand dune by the rising water’s edge, arms wrapped tightly around his tucked up legs. That all too familiar Spiderman hoodie clung to his frame, hiding his face from me.
“Hey,” I exhaled heavily as I reached him, stopping just a fewsteps away from him.
The second he turned and his saddened, droopy eyes met mine, I knew I had hurt him in ways I couldn’t even begin to understand. Under the heat of his stare, my fingers reached for the back of my neck and began to scratch in that all too familiar rhythm.
I had let him down.
The words repeated over and over again inside my head until they were all that I was. I had let myself become so consumed by my own life that I had completely forgotten that he had one too.
How selfish could I be?
“Poppy,” he said.
Oh.
Not Wellsy,justPoppy.
His messy, brown curls, coated in droplets of salt water, stuck to his forehead, just as the light in those once golden eyes died. His entire body was slumped down, defeatedly, but that did not stop Jasper Ridge from trying to smile–to cover any hint of exhaustion and emotions up.
In that small fraction of a second, he looked like Jakson.
“I–” I started to speak before he interrupted me.
“It’s okay, you don’t have to say anything. I shouldn’t have put so much pressure on you to come. It’s okay, you can just…you can just come to the next one.” He tried to smile–tried to reassure me just like he did for everyone else. Even though it wasmewho had disappointed him, who had let him down, it was his words that made me feel as if he thought he was truly to blame for this–like it was his burden to carry for believing in me and our promise.
“Jasper–” I stepped forward towards him just as he stepped a fraction of a step backwards.
Oh.
Silence stretched before us, thick and heavy in an almost suffocating way. I desperately wanted to reach out towards him, to tell him how sorry I genuinely was but I knew–Iknewmy words wouldn’t be enough.
Standing up, Jasper dusted off the sand clinging to his swim shorts and hoodie before turning to me, barely able to look me in the eyes.
“I…I am sorry, Poppy. About today. I didn’t think about how seeing me surf and compete would affect you. I’m not mad at you, don’t worry. I just…I just wish you could’ve been there today, that’s all. But I am glad you are okay and well. Have a good night,” Jasper said, nodding his head slightly to me in acknowledgment before walking away from me and up the beach.
“Stop, Jasper,” I breathed, gripping onto his shoulder as he passed me. “Please, stop.”
“Why?” he said, “so you can tell me whatever story it is that caused you to miss my competition that you promised me you’d come to? I don’t…I don’t want to hear it, Poppy. Not tonight.Please.”
“Why aren’t you mad at me? Why are you making excuses for me and blaming yourself even though it wasmethat fucked up?”
“Because I don’t want to say the wrong thing tonight and ruin us!” He exclaimed, gripping tightly onto my shoulders, just as I had done a few moments ago. His harsh breaths fanned across my skin as I stared up at him open-mouthed, completely lost for words. “I can’t…I can’tlose you, Poppy. I won’t let myself lose you. So for both of our sake, please, just let me go.”
“You know, not everyone is your problem to be fixed!” I yelled, letting the words tear me apart. My throat burned with the knowledge that I was ruining the very friendship that had been my only anchor since I moved back to town, but he had to know that exhausting himself trying to hold together friendships athisown expense was utterly stupid andruininghim. I didn’t…I didn’t want him to ruin himself.
“That is just who I am!” Jasper yelled back, equally as maddened by this as I was. “I fix people, I please people. It’s all I know how to do, Poppy,” He shrugged, throwing a broken, loopy grin my way that looked nothing short of devastatingly heart shattering. “It’s all that I am.”
“No, it isn’t!” I breathed, my heart cleaving in two as I strode up to him and gripped his saddened cheeks in my palms. “You aresomuch more than that, Jasper Ridge. So much more, can’t you see that?”
Jasper wrapped his arms around my waist, head burrowed into the side of my neck as he said, ever so quietly, “I don’t knowanymore, Wellsy.”
“That’s okay, too,” I whispered, gently stroking the back of his neck as my nails grazed softly against his skin. All I wanted in that moment was to hold him, to show him the gentle side to love that was never available to either of us growing up.