Well, this was a downgrade.
It was the final night of summer, and everyone including myself was gathered at the beach to watch the Moonlight Jellies light up the water. The stars were twinkling like holiday lights in the sky, as if they, too, wanted in on this beautiful display of nature. There was almost no negativity; the closest thing to negative I heard was Sebastian grumbling about how he'd tripped on a rock that morning.
…Well, "almost no negativity" was the most accurate way to put it; there was more than one reason I was sitting down the beach some, pretty far from everyone else. And I wish I was kidding.
I'd gotten to the beach to see Sam sitting in our usual spot… with Penny. Talking to her pretty happily, actually. About what, I wasn't sure, but they both had big smiles on their faces.
How's that a big deal? That's what I wondered myself; my logical side knew they were friends, and friends had every right to talk to each other about whatever they wanted.
My emotional side won out again, though. My emotional side wrote this down as a loss, because Penny clearly made Sam very happy. Because somehow, her sitting in my usual spot mattered. Because for some Yoba-forsaken reason, I felt… cast aside? Nah, that's dramatic. No longer Sam's #1? That was probably more like it.
I stared out at the water, telling myself over and over that I was getting worked up over nothing. Like, these were child-level emotions going on, and I felt mortified for it. I wasn't crying or anything, but… I still hurt. It was that stupid shit like this got to me that made me accept long ago that I was weak.
What was I doing feeling all painful inside over something so trivial when I could be excitedly awaiting the Moonlight Jellies? They only came once a year, and I was letting… this sour the whole thing.
Another curiosity popped into my head. It made me look back over at the piers, where the whole rest of the town stood and chattered excitedly. I scanned the crowd… more specifically, for a patch of purple…
I found it, the purple of Abigail's hair, and as I'd hoped, she was standing right beside Sebastian. Those two couldn't have been inches apart.
Well, there was some good news. It honestly made me feel a little better, knowing that if nothing else, there was that little victory to focus on.
In the end, though, my wrestling with myself only served to explain why I sat where I did. My stupid jealousy would soon become the least of my worries.
It started when I heard some people sit down some ways to my left. Not close to me whatsoever, but maybe halfway between me and the crowd.
I looked down that way to see that it was Alex and a blonde-haired chick. At the time, I didn't think anything of it.
I sat just close enough to the water that it would very occasionally lap against my boots. Seeing this happen again, I decided to take said boots off and let the water envelope my feet instead. The next time it did, I noticed it was just a bit colder than I would have expected. Summer wasn't quite over yet, even if there were only hours left of it. Well, I supposed that was just the thing: there were only hours, if even that, left of summer. I could feel a bit of fall's chill in the air, too.
Speaking of chill, it must have been chilly enough for Alex to ask the girl he was with if she wanted his coat. She gladly took it. I wondered if Alex would ever get that back.
I sat for a few more minutes before I started to wonder if the moonlight jellies had any predators. I imagined they ate plankton and the like, but… who ate them? Did anything eat them? The jellies had an air of superiority to them. Did they really just float on by, not having to worry about anything? Hell, did the other sea creatures salute them as they came by?
I zoned back into reality to see that they'd arrived. There was a distinct blue glow some distance to the left of where everyone stood. The crowd was also going quiet at this point.
Looked like I was going to have to wait a bit to see this year's gang of jelly travelers. That's the way the cookie crumbled.
As I watched them, I then began to wonder what the lifespan of a moonlight jelly was. Were these completely different jellies? Were they all the same? Had only some, anywhere from one to thirty, passed on and been replaced by their kin?
It was strange how I only wondered so much about these guys when they came around. It was a little sad, to be honest.
As they drifted closer, I tried to see if they looked any different from last year's bunch. That soon became futile; not only did they look no different from last year's… but except for a variety of sizes, they looked no different from each other.
I quickly noticed the green jelly. Poor thing didn't seem to be a fan of all the attention it was getting. It had chosen one of the regular jellies to swim close to, like a shy kindergarten child.
Then came a noise from my left.
My blood ran cold when I realized I could only classify the sound as that of a kiss. In fact, I was scared to look. I was scared to move at all, really.
But the noise happened again. No, yeah, that was a kiss.
I went against my better judgement and moved my head just enough so that I could have my fears confirmed and enhanced.
Not only were Alex and the girl making out. Alex was being straddled by the girl, and his hands were just under the bottom of her shirt.
Oh, good Yoba. I was stuck.
Well, at least the whole thing gave me something else to wrestle with myself about: whether to ride out the fuckstorm quietly and get mentally scarred, or GTFO and risk making noise and ruining their moment. As much as I had been non-consensually sucked into it, I was not about ruining moments. For all I knew, they had just discovered the passion they held for each other, and this was their confession, the start of something beautiful.
A moan escaped Alex's throat. I was in the beginning stages of wanting to cry.
I covered my ears with my fingers and forced my sights out on the jellies. How did they reproduce, I wondered? I then internally cussed myself out for wondering that now of all times.
In time, though it was muffled due to my covered ears, I heard Alex say something like "Let's take this back to my place."
"Let's go," the girl replied seductively.
With that, they composed themselves and walked away as if they hadn't been all over each other just now. Had to appear normal in front of the townsfolk, I supposed.
Once they were far enough away, I exhaled the biggest sigh of relief. I then internally thanked Alex, his little girlfriend, Yoba, and fate itself for not making me sit through an unsolicited sex scene. That was, like, two levels up from the unsolicited dick pic, if you ask me.
And once the fear left my system, it was replaced with a weird rush of joy. I guessed I would always be happy to see love blossom between people. I could write a thesis on how beautiful love is and all that. Those two would be there for each other through times of strife and peace, rock and silk, sickness and health, and other words that meant bad and good.
Damn, maybe I should have pursued a job as a marriage officiant or something.
The moan Alex had emitted flashed through my mind again. I actually shivered this time.
The jellies were pretty far away from the townsfolk at this point. Even I was looking at the tail-end of the group.
My eyes found the green jelly again. Sympathizing with its shyness, I gave it a nod. I'm not sure if it saw me, but if it did, I hoped it knew… I felt that.
The people were starting to trickle out of the beach and back to their homes. I overheard Jas talking about how beautiful the jellies were.
Starting to think about having Laslow in my arms and being under the weight of my blankets, I made my way back over to the main part of the beach. At this point, I was just tired. Everything had been taken out of me.
As I turned toward the bridge back toward town, though, that familiar voice called my name.
I turned around to see the blond guitarist himself jogging over to me. Some of my energy… actually, a pretty good portion of it… returned to me.
"Hey!" I said with a smile. "How's your night been?"
"Pretty good!" Sam answered. "Did you see the green jelly this year?"
"…Would it be weird if I said it looked shy?" I answered. "It seemed like it was staying pretty near to one of the regular jellies the whole time they went by."
"You know, you're not wrong," he nodded. "…What did you think of the jellies overall this year?"
"They never fail to amaze me," I said. "I always come up with all these questions about them, but only on the night they come by. It's a bit sad."
"Oh yeah?" he said. "What kinds of questions?"
"Their lifespan, if any of them were from last year's group and how many were descendants…" I said. "…And, uh… how they reproduce."
"Oh," he laughed. "All good questions."
"Yup," I laughed in response.
Well, I supposed tonight hadn't been all bad. It was just that the good was pretty damn good, but the bad was seriously bad. As in I was beginning to wonder if Laslow wouldn't be the only thing standing between me and some serious nightmares tonight.
Author's note: I'm not super proud of this one, especially around the beginning. I ran into this sort of quandary where I knew this was an idea I had to flesh out, but was at a loss for what words to use. I almost gave up on this chapter, but realized I'd already written so much and that the idea in itself was good. So… if you're a fellow writer and you've experienced that, too, you're not alone.