“You’re not a bad person.”
“Yes, I am,” he says. “At least, that’s what I’ve been told.”
I look at him and I hold his gaze, hoping he feels comfortable enough with me to share whatever it is that he’s holding back. He sighs after a few seconds and sits up more comfortably.
“The last person I dated was my girlfriend, Nora, and she and I went out for ten years.”
My eyes bulge a bit at his admission. Matt was with someone for ten years? They could have been married. Was Matt married? Does he have kids? I try not to get ahead of myself and just listen as he continues.
“We started dating in high school when we were freshmen and stayed together through college and graduate school. We moved in together when we were twenty. Once we finished our master’s, I didn’t realize it, but she expected us to get engaged. When I took her out to dinner to celebrate, she seemed on edge and when we got home, she barely spoke. I asked her what was wrong, and she said everyone thought I was going to propose. Her family, our friends, everyone.”
“And what did you say?” I ask.
“I didn’t know what to say. I was shocked, but looking back, I guess I shouldn’t have been. I was mainly surprised because we had never even talked about it before. And when I told her that, she said it was because she just assumed that it was coming. Naturally, we would get engaged since we had been together for so long. Since we were best friends.”
Matt goes quiet and I see the sadness that passes over his face. There’s guilt there, too. I wish I could say something to make him feel better, but I think now he just needs to talk. And I can listen.
“She wasn’t wrong,” Matt goes on to say. “Wewerebest friends, and we were twenty-four, so we weren’t too young. An engagement would have been the next step, but I just couldn’t do it. I didn’t want to be with anyone else, I only wanted her, but I wasn’t ready to be a husband. I didn’t feel mature enough and I wasn’t prepared. We had a blowout fight and she said that if I didn’t want to marry her then, I never would. She was ready to end things, but I begged her to stay and give me more time. She did, but that night was the beginning of the end for us. We stayed together for another six months, but everything was different. I could feel it.”
Matt looks down, fiddling with his sunglasses, and I hope he doesn’t put them on. I’m not ready for his mask to go up yet. Thankfully, he isn’t either, and he goes on.
“After we had that big fight, from then on, every day that went by where I didn’t propose, she slowly started to hate me. I didn’t blame her. I couldn’t. I knew it was in my power to make her happy, but I just couldn’t bring myself to do something I wasn’t ready for. I started to hate myself, too. I did for a long time. I still do, if I’m honest.”
The boat lurches up, then down on a wave. I hardly feel it. I’m so absorbed in Matt’s story.
“When the breakup finally happened, it was awful. We had another huge argument, and she unleashed everything she’d been holding in for those last few months. She said I stole ten years from her. That college and grad school is supposed to be when you meet the person you’re going to end up with, and I took that away from her. She said that I ruined her life.”
Matt shakes his head. “Hearing all that did a number on me. We had been together since we were kids. For a long time I thought Nora understood me more than anyone. I was never anyone’s favorite person, but that was okay, because her caring about me proved I wasn’t completely worthless. So to hear her tell me that I’m essentially garbage—it really messed me up.”
“You’re not garbage,” I say. “Not all relationships are meant for forever.”
“Maybe,” he murmurs. “But she was right for the most part. I should have thought about our future more, and we should have talked about it. If we did, we could have at least ended things without her and all our friends hating me.”
“All your friends?” I ask.
“Nora and I had been together for so long that we had the same friend group. And whether or not people admit it, when friends break up, everyone chooses a side and ultimately, they start to leave the other person out. In our case, that person was me. Everyone made the right decision, though. Nora was the better choice.”
Matt’s eyes catch mine, but he’s quick to look away.
“I’ve more or less been off relationships since. They lead to too many problems, so it’s better to keep things casual. Or I just show my true colors right away, and that’s usually enough to scare them off.”
The boat dips and rises with an incoming wave. Matt looks out to the sea, but I keep my eyes trained on him. “It must be lonely. To constantly keep people from getting too close.”
Matt pauses. “I feel close to you,” he says.
I enjoy the sensation that his words bring, but don’t let them seep in too deep. “That’s probably because I’m leaving in six days. I’m close, but I’m far, too.”
Matt doesn’t answer and I start to wonder if I said the wrong thing. I’m all ready to fill the silence with small talk when Captain Sebastian pulls into a cove where he stops the boat. Matt and I watch him as he comes around, pulling out a mini ladder from a storage cabinet and hanging it off the side.
“I’m going to have lunch. You swim.” He then turns around and sits back in his captain’s chair, putting on a pair of headphones, which I can only assume he’s using to listen to “The Business” on repeat.
“Okay,” Matt says, swiftly standing up. “Well, now that I’ve rehashed and relived my painful relationship history, this is as good a time as ever for me to go for a deep dive and never reemerge. What do we think? Goggles or no goggles for my new life under the sea?”
I stand up to face him and I don’t blink. “I think you need to forgive yourself, or at least try to. We all make mistakes and wish we did things different, but if we don’t use those experiences to grow, then going through them was all for nothing.”
“So no goggles then?” I just look at him and Matt groans as he looks out at the water and then back at me. “Fine, I will attempt to begin the process to accept the fact that maybe I’m not the worst person ever birthed into existence.”
“Baby steps are still steps,” I tell him. “It’s a decent start.”
