Page 86 of Under the Waves
quiet.
Lia took off down the beach, not wasting a second looking back at us. She wasn’t running away from someone…she was runningtowardssomeone. It wasn’t until Jakson emerged from the waves, each of his arms slung around Kai and Xander’s necks, did I realize why she had left in such a hurry.
“Lia,” Jakson gasped, brows drawn and lips pinched in anguish. “My Blue.”
Ten meters Lia had ran down that beach, brown hair flowing wildly in the breeze.
Ten meters that had felt like a lifetime.
“I’m here,” she sobbed, “I’m here, Jak.”
I watched silently as Jakson stumbled, turning patches of sand into rivers of red tears that leaked from the multitude of open wounds tattering his skin.
“Blue…” He breathed, reaching out towards her like she was his lifeline.
In a world of black and white, she was his stroke of color.
Kai and Xander helped tug him back up to his feet, but it was like his whole body had given up, stumbling like a painful fallen mess across the sand in a last desperate attempt to reach her, almost like his soul begged to feel the touch of her love one lasttime before surrendering to the darkness once and for all.
“You are an idiot,” she shouted, hitting his chest. “A pig-headedidiotand a goddamned fool, Jakson Calloway. Don’t ever do something like that again, do you hear me?”
“You’re here,” Jakson replied in disbelief, his eyes scanning over every inch of her unharmed body as if she were the one in pain. “Blue…”
Any frustration that stemmed from the fear of losing him was washed away the second he called out to her.Lia rose onto her tiptoes, gently cupping his torn and scraped cheeks in her hands.
“I’m here, Jedi. It’s really me, I’m here.”
A sob wrenched its way up his throat as he repeated, blinking, “Blue…My Blue.”
“Yes,” Lia breathed, smiling as her thumb brushed over his redden skin, “your Blue, Calloway.”
Sobs identical those of her Jedi’s erupted from Lia’s lips as Jakson’s hands grasped around her waist, lifting her up in the air and twirling her around. His brows itched together in pain, lips pulled into a wince.
“Jakson Calloway, I swear to Naboo if you don’t put medown—” Lia gasped, lightly smacking his back in an attempt to get him to put her down for his own sake, but Jakson wouldn’t let go of her. He continued to hold her body against his, never once letting go.
Tears fell from the corners of his eyes, merging with the blood dripping down his cheeks from the slash across his forehead. The mixture of blood, sweat, and tears dripped onto her favorite cardigan, but Lia didn’t even bat an eyelash at the mess he was creating.
She loved that folklore cardigan, but she loved Jakson Callowaymore.
Lia was laughing and sobbing and grinning like a madwoman, and Jakson? He was crying along with her. They completed each other. And that,right there, was a love I wanted to have someday. A love that I wished was possible for someone like me.
I doubted I’d find it. I wasn’t made for such childish things.
I was meant to be everyone’s to love but no one’s to keep.
It sucked, of course it did, but I couldn’t change it.
It was just who I was.
None of us were breathing. Xander and Kai stood rooted tothe ground just watching the two of them grip onto each other as if the world was about to tear them apart. It could try, but nothing would ever separate them. Xander’s cold glazed eyes, as dark as iced whiskey, narrowed in on them. I didn’t think either of them had known a love like theirs—something so undeniable, so infinitely unconditional, surpassing the highest heavens and the darkest pits of the earth…but I think they wanted to.
I think everyone wanted to find even a sliver of what Lia and Jakson had together.
Medics attempted to rush down the beach to where Jakson and Lia stood tangled in each other’s embrace, except Kai, Xander, and Lachlan created a barrier between them, preventing the medics from reaching them just yet—almost like they all somehow knew that the reassurance of each other was all the medicine Jakson needed.
“Who are they?” one of the medics asked, looking almost in awe at the mess of pure and raw emotion Lia and Jakson had become tangled up in.
“Jakson and Lia,” Lachlan sighed, eyes fixed on them.