Arrows Through Archer

by Nash Summers

I hated Danny and loved him so damn much. He was the only good thing in my life. I had no idea what I’d done to luck out with a friend like him,

I’d been sitting in History 101 when Hurricane Danny Patel yanked the chair out next to mine,

Danny was like a brother to me. Only better.

It was almost a relief knowing that someone could go through so much grief and yet still be the same person they were always meant to be.

I might fall a little in love with my own loneliness.

“Didn’t have the heart to tell him you guys started playing Go Fish and ended up playing poker all with the same cards?”

“You carry around hurt like a cop carries a badge.”

An arrow through the heart might’ve been easier to take than Mallory’s expression when he looked at me.

“Ah, Archer. We always hurt the ones we love.” “Why’s that, do you think?” “So that we know they love us too.”

“You’re like a brother to me, Archer. You’re not perfect, but no one is. And if I met a billion people on this planet, I’d still choose you. You and your silent fucking depression—you and your quiet heart and your fear of living.

That was one thing about Mallory I very much admired—he never tried to hide his happiness.

Sometimes Mallory tricked the silliness out of me.

I gasped for air or for existence, but more likely for purpose in life.

Somehow through the darkness of my own mind, I heard Mallory’s voice.

“It’s what parents do. It’s in our blood.” For some reason, that unsettled me. “I don’t know. I guess I don’t think of you like that.”

I spotted Mallory reading a home decorating magazine. For the briefest of seconds, my chest squeezed. And then he looked up. And grinned at me.

Sometimes when you’re alone all the time, you forget what it’s like having someone else near. It’s… nice.”

I’m not ashamed of being gay, but I might’ve felt differently if I’d told my parents and they were ashamed of me. They were—are—my whole world.”

My father had been loud and boisterous, where Mallory was serene and gentle.

“I think there’s something in the Patel bloodline that says you guys are the only ones meant to like me.”

“Maybe there’s something in the Hart bloodline that states we’re the only ones you allow yourself to get close to.”

Sitting in the passenger seat of Mallory’s truck had become somewhat of a haven for me.

I liked to lean against the passenger side window and watch the world pass around us through the front windshield. And I liked to watch Mallory drive.

Whenever he noticed me looking at him, he’d smile at me. It was such a simple, secure gesture, that it made my heart skip. That soft look in his eyes. That assuredness.

Hope was easy to hear, easy to see, but almost impossible to feel. At least for me. Yet, there was something about that day, sitting there, listening to the impossibly sad stories of others with Mallory next to me that made me feel a shred of something I hadn’t felt in a long time.

Sometimes words weren’t enough. Sometimes words weren’t anything at all. So instead of using useless tools in a moment surrounded by darkness pushing at its edges, slowly, I reached out and laced my fingers with his. Without saying a word, he squeezed my hand and didn’t let go.

Sometimes, words meant nothing. Other times, they meant far, far too much.

I watched him into the late hours of the night, my attention on Mallory being the only thing that kept me awake.

The house was dull without Mallory.

There was only here and now and that chair I thought of as my own in this space where Mallory told me he found peace.

“I need you to know something.” “Then tell me something.” “If I could get my hands on those idiots who did this to you…”

“You’re too young to be so cynical. You’ll find love, Archer. There’s no limit for things like that.”

“Tell me how I look, Mallory.”

Maybe if this universe of ours was different. Maybe if everything was different and the sky was the ocean and the clouds were the soil. Maybe if life hadn’t engrained me with apprehension or uncertainty or a longing for some things I obviously could not have. Maybe then, we would’ve had words for each other.

What could I say? Danny, please don’t make your father go see her. It might break my heart?

I should’ve stayed in bed and pretended to sleep. But I couldn’t, not knowing a person like Mallory existed in the world.

I wondered if I’d ever feel this way about anyone else in my life or if this was it for me.

People fall into each other in different ways. Some people fall together in laughter, surrounded by energy and joy. Some fall into each other in passion, unable to keep their skin from touching. But Mallory and I fell into each other slowly, gently, tentatively, like almost everything we did. We were quiet and fluid.

But we did dance together, swaying side to side, back and forth, with my head barely resting on his shoulder and his cheek pressed into my hair.

This wasn’t something either of us could take back. This was strange and unfamiliar and made the world feel right again.

“What are we doing, Archer?” Mallory asked. Falling in love, I thought.

You’re giving me something—a kind of happiness I didn’t expect.” I swallowed hard. “You make me happy too.” Happy.

A simple word for something that felt magnitudes larger. Happiness is something I’d taken for granted up until my parents died. And then after, I’d convinced myself it wasn’t something I’d ever feel again. But here, in a town built between the mountains, standing next to my best friend’s father, I knew that I truly did feel happy.

My entire world, in that moment, consisted of him and only him.

“I didn’t know it would feel like this.”

“Do you know how beautiful you are? And not just this.” He traced his finger along my jawline, the tip of his thumb brushing my bottom lip. “You’ve got this old soul, and it’s serene and hushed and reminds me of the smell when it’s storming outside.”

Because that was all the world was to me from that point on. Mallory.

I burst like a shaken bottle of champagne to the sound of Mallory saying my name, the feel of uneven wood beneath my fingertips and my lover buried inside me.

I closed my eyes and tried to engrain to memory the feeling of his arms around me, his breath against the back of my neck, and the smooth finish of the wooden headboard beneath my fingertips.

Mallory was a reserved person who liked to deal with things in a similar way that I did: alone.