Axis

august 16th

LIKE MY DREARY MOOD, the melancholic gray sky outside supplies a steady stream of rain showers. It's the perfect day to hide inside curled up under a heap of warm fuzzy blankets while devouring a good book. So that's precisely what I have been doing, mug of tea sitting on my bedside table, right next to a forest green candle burning that smells rich of earthy evergreen pines.

Down the hall, the sound of Willie running all over the house fills the otherwise quiet air, and it's apparent that the young boy has a surplus of energy with nowhere to put it. I contemplate offering to drive somewhere to get him out of Aunt Colleen's hair, but I can't think of any child-oriented places I could take him and—as selfish as it sounds—I'm too comfortable to bother moving.

The faint pitter-patter of someone coming up the stairs vaguely registers in my periphery, since most of my attention is engrossed within the cream pages of the book resting on my lap. I dismiss it as Aunt Colleen running around the house doing some sort of chores, until the sound of my doorknob twisting open cuts through the air. Jasper's head peeks inside, and I grit my teeth.

"What do you want?" I ask, sounding horrifically rude and impatient. I know I should be kinder, considering he's—you know—my beloved best friend, and since he's fifteen days away from permanently abandoning my life, but I am not in the mood to play around or pretend like I'm having fun today. Human interaction as a whole seems too tiresome.

He can tell that I am in no mood to jest today, so he cuts right to the chase, sitting on the edge of my bed. He studies the floor while he speaks. "You know that I care about you, right?"

"Jasper," I say tiredly. "If you came here to tell me that, you're wasting your time. I already know. Really, I'm fine."

"Good," he says, finally looking up at me. "So then you know me well enough to know that I can't let what happened last night go. You can pretend like everything is fine as much as you want, but I see right through you. And I refuse to pretend."

"That's very nice of you," I say, emotionless, keeping my eyes trained down on the passage in the book I now must reread for the second time, seeing as I absorbed nothing I've read since Jasper popped in. My brain is an empty hole.

He decides to take a different approach. "Willie seems eager to get out of here. Whaddaya say; wanna go take the little dude out for some fresh air?"

"Not really," I mutter, knowing that this is a losing battle.

"That's a shame," Jasper laments with false dejection. "I already told your aunt we would."

Defeated, I bookmark my page and cast my book away in annoyance. "You need to learn how to butt out, Jasper. Not every problem in my life has to fall on your shoulders."

He shrugs as I pick myself up off the bed and trudge over to my closet, slipping on a pair of rain boots and grabbing a black zip-up rain jacket. "I guess I'm not good at not caring about you. My bad." He sounds opposite of remorseful.

"Whatever. Let's just go get Willie and get him out of here so Aunt Colleen can catch a break." I lean over and blow the candle out, causing gray wisps of smoke to curl upward and carry any remnant of hope I had about avoiding Jasper's pity with it.

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If I had to stockpile a list of the top three most important people in my life, it would consist of Jasper (obviously), Aunt Colleen, and Willie. Truly, I love and adore Willie like he's my own brother. He's one of the few constants in my life that I actually enjoy with my whole heart and soul. But good lord, sometimes he can be a handful.