Written in the Stars by Jayme Ardente-Silliman Page A

me. I waited until the person was close enough for me to tell it was a male before asking again.
    “Are you…” My heart faltered when I saw Geoff Mann rise out of the waves.
    I stood frozen in disbelief as I watched his more-than-perfect, dripping wet body walk out of the water towards me, and with every ounce of my being, I was able to fight back the urge to pinch myself to make sure I wasn’t dreaming.
    “How’s it going?” He walked right past me.
    “Uh…”
    “Are you okay?” he asked.
    Realizing the words in my head weren’t actually coming out of my mouth; I managed to pull myself together enough only to gawk when he wasn’t looking, and forced my motor skills to start working again.
    “You’re fine. I mean, I’m fine.” My face flushed with embarrassment when he flashed me a quirky smile. “What I meant was, are you okay? Is anything broken?”
    “Why, do I look broken?” He searched his body as he dried off.
    “No, but I wasn’t sure after seeing how high the cliff is that you fell off.” I looked up at it again. “It has to be at least thirty feet.”
    “It’s a little over fifty feet, and I didn’t fall. I jumped,” he corrected me.
    “I’m sorry. What?”
    “I jumped,” he repeated.
    “Why would you do something so stupid?” I asked, regretting every word I had just allowed to float out of my mouth.
    “Have you ever done it?” he asked.
    “No. I don’t have a death wish.” 
    “Then how do you know it’s stupid if you’ve never tried it?” He wrapped the towel around his waist.
    “Because you jumped off a fifty-foot cliff that is surrounded by jagged rocks, into shallow water,” I said. “You’re lucky that you didn’t break anything when you smacked into the water, and even luckier that you didn’t land on the rocks instead.”
    “Oh, I see. Because you are too afraid to live on the edge, people like me , who do are crazy and stupid?”
    “That’s not what I said.” I started to get flustered. “And I’m not afraid to live on the edge. I’m not afraid of anything.”
    “Prove it.” He smiled.
    “No.”
    “It’s because you’re afraid, isn’t it?” He said with a fake look of sympathy on his face.
    My frustration grew with every word he said, and if I didn’t leave now, I would end up doing something stupid like jumping off a fifty-foot cliff just to prove him wrong, and considering I’m deathly afraid of heights, I would probably have a heart attack before I could climb to the top. Without saying anything, I turned and started walking away.
    “Wait. Would it make a difference if I told you this wasn’t my first time jumping off that cliff?”
    “Not really, but I would suggest that you get help with whatever life crisis you’re going through before you kill yourself.” I kept walking.
    “I’ll keep that in mind.” He followed me.
    “Why are you following me?” I turned to face him.
    “My car is parked right there.” He pointed to a black Mercedes parked at the end of the street.
    “Oh.” I flushed with embarrassment. “Well, it was almost nice meeting you.”
    “To my knowledge, we haven’t been formally introduced. Therefore, I haven’t met you yet.”
    I wanted to remind him that we met six years before, but since I had just ruined any chance of a proper introduction, one that didn’t involve me acting like a lunatic, there was no way I wanted him to know anything about me, especially my name.
    “Okay, well. I’m really glad you’re not broken and you’re still alive.” I started walking again.
    “Wait a minute. You’re just going to walk away without telling me your name?”
    “No, I’m going run away.” The cliché of what I had just said hit me as soon as the words left my mouth.
    “Wow, that’s really rude.”
    “I’m rude?” I faced him again. “I’m the one who was concerned about you, and you’re the one who turned my being concerned into some kind of joke.”
    “Maybe, but you’re the one who started