February 2019

February 2019 is the time marker for Jasper’s established life at the Oceanarium and his plan to leave it with Bella. The period brings together the practical disguises that have kept him there and the imagined partnership that gives his escape its purpose.

Jasper’s Assumed Identity and Work

After the Taser incident with Calla, Jasper traveled north along the coast for several states. He then used a stolen driver’s license and Social Security card belonging to Larry Winkler to obtain a custodial position at the Oceanarium. Jasper did not look much like Larry, but shared his baldness and pale complexion; the false identity seemed plausible enough if Larry had supposedly gotten very fit.

By February 2019, Jasper had held the job for more than a year. The Oceanarium owned five dolphins, and one of them, Bella, had come to seem to him especially receptive to fun. His work there had become the setting for a plan he regarded as only a matter of time: a jailbreak in which he and Bella would leave together.

Bella and the Planned Escape

Jasper imagined a life shared with Bella despite the practical and species differences between them: she would have to remain in water. He believed their courtship could be emotionally rewarding for both of them. He wanted sex to happen, but decided that it did not have to; whether it happened would depend on Bella. He was willing to let her initiate behavior like that of the dolphin he had encountered in the ocean, even if the encounter meant drowning for him.

The imagined partnership also gave Jasper a way to frame his broader sexual fixation. Any dolphin could arouse him, a fact he recognized as bizarre. Fixating on Bella and replaying a future relationship with her brought him a sense of relief: a monogamous life partnership let him pretend the desire was particular to Bella, and therefore an expression of loving her.

Significance of the Time Marker

The February 2019 passage distinguishes Jasper’s concrete circumstances from the future he projects onto them. His false papers and custodial job are real means of remaining at the Oceanarium; the shared life with Bella is still a plan, not an accomplished escape. The same imagined future both narrows his fixation to one dolphin and makes it easier for him to understand that fixation as love. The passage establishes the emotional and practical stakes of his intended jailbreak without confirming that it succeeds.