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Wind Archer found Fire Spirit that night in the kitchen. It seemed that they found each other in Shadow Milk’s kitchen quite often— though, usually, Wind Archer was the escapee and Fire Spirit was the pursuer. This time, it was switched. Fire Spirit had been the one who left the party, and Wind Archer the one to follow him. It was weird.
Everything was weird. Everything had been so weird for months now, and Wind Archer had no idea what to do with it. Fire Spirit had been— it was so hard to even begin to describe it. Distant, yet extremely clingy. Constantly angry, constantly moody, constantly switching up. More often than not, he had been picking some sort of fight with Wind Archer, or just ignoring him altogether. They would argue, they would apologize, and then they wouldn’t talk for a while. It was a cycle, and it was weird, and to be completely frank? Incredibly saddening. For months, Wind Archer had started to worry that their friendship was coming to an end, and that it wouldn’t be able to last much longer. Wasn’t that an insane thought, to think that there could ever come a day when they were no longer friends? It truly was, and yet it felt like that doomed day was impending.
He didn’t even know what he had done wrong in the first place to start the cycle. And he had spent a lot of time thinking on it, valuable time that could have spent working toward his PhD. But he couldn’t think of anything. And yet he still seemed to constantly be doing something wrong— there was always something new that Fire Spirit was starting an argument over, that Fire Spirit was distancing himself over, that Fire Spirit was upset over. It was coming to a point where Wind Archer just couldn’t keep up.
Take today for example, and the past few days. It was Halloween, and they were currently in the middle of Black Sapphire’s costume birthday party (his birthday was only a few days prior, so the theme was fitting). He had flown in from Michigan a couple days ago in order to attend the party, which was nothing out of the ordinary, except for the fact that Fire Spirit had not invited him. Usually, as soon as Fire Spirit knew about an event that they were hosting, he would text Wind Archer and say, ‘here’s what’s happening, you need to come!’, and so Wind Archer would check his schedule, and if he could make it, he would book a plane ticket in advance, knowing he would stay with Fire Spirit while he was in New York. But that didn’t happen this time, no— the first he had heard of the party was in a text from Shadow Milk, who was texting to confirm that he would be there.
Now, he didn’t necessarily have too much against Shadow Milk, even if he wasn’t very fond of him. He was often annoyed by him, as he took all of his comments as extremely disrespectful and offensive, and didn’t really ever enjoy a conversation with him; he was frequently disgustingly jealous of his relationship with Fire Spirit; frankly, he found his voice grating; but he tolerated him, and had for years, for the sake of Fire Spirit and the rest of his best friend’s found family in NYC. But even with such tolerance, it was odd to receive in an invitation not from Fire Spirit, but from Shadow Milk himself. It was odd, and it made him extremely upset.
And so, of course, feeling rather petty after months of such tumultuous waters with Fire Spirit, Wind Archer accepted the invitation, and also accepted Shadow Milk’s offer to stay in his guest room, and decidedly didn’t tell Fire Spirit about any of this. He just wanted to see the look on his face when he walked in and found Wind Archer there after all.
(It was not as rewarding as he hoped, when Fire Spirit had walked into the house to find Wind Archer help set up decorations in the living room, and merely stared at him, before walking past him without a word. Despite his decently pleasant past few days with Sugarfly, Black Sapphire, Candy Apple, and Shadow Milk, he’d wished in that moment that he had never come.)
And so, here he was, walking awkwardly into the kitchen, away from the party. He would usually have wanted an escape soon, anyway— the families’ other friends, Eternal Sugar and Pavlova, as well as Black Sapphire’s best friend Silverbell and his new, obnoxious girlfriend Seltzer, were now in attendance and were severely stressing him out. Fire Spirit, though, who was usually ever the roaring life of the party, had gotten here first. So, Wind Archer followed, to find Fire Spirit messing around aimlessly with things in the kitchen. He knew it was aimless, because he knew him very well, and he could just tell that his movements had no purpose to them.
“Hello,” Wind Archer says, plainly and awkwardly.
Fire Spirit turns around to look at them, giving them a short glance before he turns back around. “Hey.”
Wind Archer tries to not let that sting too much. They flex their fingers, trying to think of what to say, before landing on, “What are you doing?”
“What does it look like I’m doing?” Fire Spirit says shortly. Wind Archer frowns.
“Nothing,” Wind Archer says, because that’s the truth. “It looks like you’re moving glasses around.”
Fire Spirit lifts up his hand and flips them off. Wind Archer chooses to ignore it, bringing their own hands up to their face and rubbing it momentarily before letting them drop back to their sides.
“You’re not usually one to walk away from a party,” Wind Archer says, desperately continuing his attempts to get Fire Spirit to talk to him. “Usually you’re the one keeping it alive.”
“Okay,” Fire Spirit says, again shortly. Wind Archer’s sadness deepens at the continued rejection— still, he carries on, never one to give up. He treads a bit farther into the kitchen.
“So, seeing you all alone in the kitchen is just a bit odd, you know? Usually it’s me. Or sometimes Black Sapphire. Not you. Never you.” Wind Archer’s says, trying to elicit any sort of response from him, but Fire Spirit doesn’t say anything at all. He won’t turn around, and he keeps messing with glasses and plates. Wind Archer lets out a sigh, and then says, “Okay, I’ve had enough.”
This, finally, makes Fire Spirit turn back around. With furrowed brows and a cold stare that was so unfamiliar on the warm, chocolate eyes Wind Archer so deeply loved, he says, “Excuse me?”
“I said I’ve had enough,” Wind Archer repeats. “Of this. Of whatever you’ve been doing for the past few months. I’ve had enough of it, and I’m tired.”
“Are you, now?” Fire Spirit says, scoffing. He shakes his head and turns back around.
Growing more frustrated by the second, Wind Archer demands, “Look at me.”
“Oh, my apologies, your majesty.” Fire Spirit says sarcastically, but he does turn around to face him fully, crossing his arms and leaning against the countertop. “Happy now? Did I follow your little order? Am I a good boy, Wind Archer?”
You’re so beautiful, was all Wind Archer could think, was all he wanted to say, but he held his tongue, something he did often. Even angry, even when he was really upsetting Wind Archer, he was so beautiful. Sometimes it made him want to cry. He never cried, really, couldn’t remember the last time he had— and yet, looking at Fire Spirit made him want to for more ways than one. The flush of color that always sat on the apple of his cheeks, the moles that sprinkled his skin, the shape of his curls; the slope of his nose and his eyelashes and his collarbones. He was so, so breathtaking, it was unfair.
He didn’t say that, though, as he couldn’t ever really say all that without sounding insane, and now definitely wasn’t the time to try and get away with it.
“This is exactly what I’m talking about,” Wind Archer says instead, lifting his hand to gesture at Fire Spirit. “Why are you acting like this?”
“I’m just standing here,” Fire Spirit shrugs.
“Don’t.” Wind Archer says. “Don’t try that with me. Don’t try anything with me.”
“Woof,” Fire Spirit says. “Want me to get on my knees, too?”
“Stop it!” Wind Archer says. “Why do you keep saying things like that?!”
“Why do you keep giving me orders like I’m your fuckin’ bitch?” Fire Spirit says angrily. “You’ve always done that all our lives. Did you know that? I fucking hate when you tell me what to do. I’m not your dog.”
“There,” Wind Archer says. “Is that why you’re mad at me? I’m sorry, I won’t do that anymore.”
“Who said I’m mad at you?” Fire Spirit says, and yet he says it with a growl and a curl of his lip, a sign Wind Archer knows points to aggression. He fights the urge to tear his hair out.
“Your behavior does! You know you’ve been acting like this for months!” Wind Archer says, taking another step toward him.
“The world doesn’t fucking revolve around you, believe it or not.” Fire Spirit bites. “Of course you think everything is about you. You don’t know my life.”
That was such a harsh statement that Wind Archer felt it sliced him open and left a bleeding, open wound across his chest. You don’t know my life. Well, maybe he didn’t, but he had spent his whole life trying to.
“Then educate me,” Wind Archer says. “Tell me what’s wrong. Has something been going on?”
“Just stop!” Fire Spirit says, holding up his palms to exemplify his words. “Stop! Leave me the fuck alone, okay?! What are you not getting?!”
“Keep your voice down,” Wind Archer says, turning and glancing behind him at the kitchen door. “You don’t want to ruin Black Sapphire’s party.”
“I should hit you for that,” Fire Spirit growls. “If you were anyone else, I swear to God I would.”
“What kind of thing is that to say?” Wind Archer turns back to look at him, crossing his arms. “What did you mean to accomplish by saying that to me?”
Fire Spirit launches himself off the counter and takes a step toward him, hands curling into fists. “I’m trying to say, how fucking dare you? Is that clear enough for you? Can you understand that?” He knocks on the side of his own head to prove his point. “You come in here and start yelling at me, then tell me to keep my voice down! You know, I don’t think you’ve ever been punched in the jaw before, and I think it’s about time someone sets you straight?”
Wind Archer’s eyes widen in shock. Fire Spirit had never said something like that to him. Never. It sent him so far reeling that Wind Archer takes a step closer, angrily getting in Fire Spirit’s face. “Fine! Hit me, then, and see how that makes you feel. Will it make you feel more powerful if you hit me? Will it make you feel better?!”
“Maybe I should fucking try!” Fire Spirit says, grabbing Wind Archer by the collar of his costume and pulling him closer, tugging at his neck in a way that was painful and lifting him slightly off his feet.
A bolt of fear runs down Wind Archer’s spine. He never in a million years had thought Fire Spirit would ever hurt him, ever. And yet, he was acting so erratically that Wind Archer believed that he really, seriously in this moment might. He gulps, but he doesn’t back down.
“Okay, then try! Be a brute, then! See how that makes you feel! Because I bet it’ll make you feel awful.” Wind Archer seethes, staring him dead in his wild eyes despite his fear. He tilts his head, playing with fire. “Or maybe it won’t. You enjoyed getting in fights in high school, didn’t you? Like an animal?” He didn’t mean for that last part to come out, not even knowing where it had come from, and he regretted it as soon as it left his lips. It felt like all of the horrid emotion from the past few months was piling up, boiling over, crashing through a dam that no longer could hold it back, and his own disgusting words were the consequence of all his sadness surmounted. He was incredibly good at covering up his emotions, at setting them to the side, at holding the back— but right now, combatted with Fire Spirit’s rage in his face, he felt helpless in the face of the destructive tornado of his own emotion.
“What?!” Fire Spirit shouts, and a bit of his spit lands on Wind Archer’s cheek. He tries not to wince in the face of him, roaring like a lion in his face. His grip on Wind Archer’s collar tightens, and Wind Archer lets out a gasp, hands coming up to claw at Fire’s. “Oh my fucking God, I can’t believe you— I swear to God, I’m—“
“Woah,” Someone behind them says, and they both whip around to see Pavlova standing in the doorway, eyebrows raised in surprise. Fire Spirit lets go of him, and he feels his heels land back on the floor, making a thud sound.
“What are you doing?!” Fire Spirit bites again, now directing his anger towards Pavlova.
“Chill the fuck out,” Pavlova rolls his eyes, making his way to the fridge. He grabs a Cherry Coke out of it before turning back toward the doorway. As he leaves the room, he says under his breath, “Not my fault you two decided to fuck in the kitchen.”
They both stare in silence at the doorway before Wind Archer says, “He has such a foul mouth.” Fire Spirit doesn’t respond, and he turns back toward him to find that he’s started to walk back toward the counter, head in his hands. Wind Archer feels his throat softly, checking for any tenderness, before he says, “Were you really going to hit me?”
“Oh, come on,” Fire Spirit rolls his eyes. “You know I wasn’t going to fucking hit you.”
“Do I?” Wind Archer questions weakly. “Because it seemed like you were going to.”
“Whatever,” Fire Spirit says, putting his hands on the counter and dropping his head.
“I’m going to ask you one more time,” Wind Archer says, crossing his arms once more. “What the hell is your problem?”
“You,” Fire Spirit says. “Coming in here and yelling at me. You. So leave me alone.”
“Can you just answer me?!” Wind Archer says, voice raising once more. “For Christ’s sake, Fire Spirit! I just want to know what I did wrong, okay?! You’ve been acting this way for months, picking fights with me and ignoring me and whatever else! Maybe it doesn’t affect you, but it affects me! It affects me a lot!” His hands drop to his sides again, slamming against his thighs. “I mean—“ His voice drops from heightened frustration to a sadness he can no longer mask. “I mean, you didn’t even invite me here! Shadow Milk did!”
“Are you 5?” Fire Spirit says, turning around to look at him. “You’re upset that I didn’t invite you to a birthday party? One that’s not even mine?”
“I’m not the one acting like a child here! You are!” Wind Archer responds.
“I’m not arguing with you while you’re dressed as Anakin-fuckin-Skywalker, dude.” Fire Spirit laughs scornfully, shaking his head.
“I thought you liked Star Wars,” Wind Archer says pathetically. “And, at least I’m dressed, unlike you!”
“What, you don’t like my costume?!” Fire Spirit says, finally turning around again, offended. He was dressed as an unnamed Greek god, which was really just an excuse to wear little-to-no clothes.
Of course I do, he muses to himself sourly. I was already planning on getting off to it later. Wind Archer physically could not let himself lust over Fire Spirit’s body right now, even if his Adonis-figure was completely on display. He was too angry and too upset.
“Well, we were supposed to match!” Wind Archer says. “We always match! We always do something together!”
“Do you hear yourself?” Fire Spirit says, gesturing at his ears. “You sound like a fuckin’ kid!”
“Maybe I do!” Wind Archer shouts, completely forgetting about the fact he wanted to be quiet so as to not disturb Black Sapphire’s party. “Okay, maybe I do! Maybe it means a lot to me that we always match! Maybe it means a lot to me that you always invite me to these parties! Maybe I am upset like a little kid that you, for a reason you won’t tell me, don’t want to be my friend anymore!” His emotions get to such a high point that he feels himself start to tear up, and out of embarrassment, he tries to blink them back.
“Stop putting words in my mouth!” Fire Spirit shouts back. “My world doesn’t revolve around you! Did you hear that? Did you understand? Do I need to repeat it? My world- doesn’t- revolve- around- you!” His last word comes out a scream, one that takes Wind Archer completely aback and makes him stumble backwards. But Fire Spirit wasn’t done. “I am so fucking sick of you and everyone else acting like everything I do is about you! Oh, poor little Fire Spirit has to follow Wind Archer around like a fucking puppy all the time, oh, how fucking pathetic! What the fuck ever, man!”
“I don’t even understand what you’re saying anymore!” Wind Archer says, pleading. “I don’t even know what you mean!”
“Good! Then leave me alone!” Fire Spirit retorts.
“Fine!” Wind Archer says, and a couple tears fall down his cheeks. “Is that what you’ve wanted, Fire Spirit? For me to leave you alone? Is that what you’ve been doing, is trying to get me out of your life? Then, fine! You can have what you want, and I’ll just leave!”
“You don’t know what I want!” Fire Spirit yells. “Or maybe you do, and this whole time you’ve just been fuckin’ messing with me for the fun of it!”
“How would I know if you won’t tell me?!” Wind Archer says, confusion adding to the mix of emotional waves. “You won’t talk to me anymore! How am I supposed to help you if I don’t know what you need?!”
“Maybe I don’t want your help!” Fire Spirit yells, and it must have been the painful climax of his fury, because he picks up and glass off the counter, turns, and chucks it at the wall, in the opposite direction of Wind Archer. It lands against the plaster with a crack and shatters onto the floor.
They both stare at it, silent, before Wind Archer lifts his gaze and settles it on Fire Spirit, who still numbly stares at what he had done, emotion seeming to have vanished off of his face, body loose instead of tense as if he had let go of whatever was upsetting him in the moment and replaced it with TV static. It reopened that wound in his chest, to know that Fire Spirit was in some sort of pain, and he didn’t know how to help with it. Wind Archer didn’t really know what to do when he couldn’t fix something. Here his best friend was, broken, and he couldn’t do anything about it except perhaps walk away. And walking away seemed like a path that would nothing but the most profound, raw and significant pain he would ever feel in his life, a pain unfathomable, a pain unlike anything he had ever experienced. As he watches Fire Spirit, watches the rise and fall of his bare, heaving chest and the flares of his nostrils, he lets a couple more tears fall without trying to hold them back, like the blooming first petals that signified the coming of the most tragic and dreadful Spring he had ever known.
“What’s going on?” A voice cuts through their silence, and Wind Archer looks up to see Shadow Milk standing in the doorway warily, a fearful Black Sapphire behind him. Black Sapphire’s eyes, like Fire Spirit’s, were trained on the shattered glass on the floor.
“I bumped into him and he dropped the glass,” Wind Archer says quietly, despite the new hole in the plaster of the wall. “My deepest apologies for disturbing your party, Black Sapphire. Truly. I’ll help clean it up.”
“It’s… Fine.” Black Sapphire says in a way Win Archer can’t quite read. He had trouble reading anyone who wasn’t Fire Spirit. What use was the talent of reading him anymore if there would be nothing left to read?
“What happened?” Shadow Milk says, putting a hand on Black Sapphire’s shoulder as he questions. “Before the glass.”
Wind Archer didn’t really know what to say, and so, full of sadness and shame, he just turned his gaze to the floor and didn’t respond. The post-fight clarity was coming to him now, and he realized just how out of control and cruel he had gotten in the pursuit of finding an outlet and an answer to his sadness. It was horrendous.
“I’m gonna go home,” Fire Spirit says, suddenly bursting into tears and turning to look up at Shadow Milk and Black Sapphire. He rushes forward and tackles Black Sapphire in a hug, who flinches very hard before returning it with an odd expression on his face. “I’m sorry, Saph. Happy birthday.” He pulls back and wipes his eyes before walking past them, assumingely toward the door.
“Geez,” Shadow Milk says once he’s gone. “The fuck did you do? Finally break his heart?”
Wind Archer knew that everyone in this house was much closer with Fire Spirit than they were with him, and so it was only natural for them to automatically take Fire Spirit’s side, but he wished that perhaps, even after he had spoken his worries to them, they might consider his side of the story. He sighs.
“I will fix your wall tomorrow.” Wind Archer says. “I’ll go to the store and buy the things I need. I’ll repaint it, too.”
“He threw it?” Black Sapphire says.
Wind Archer shifts on his feet awkwardly. “Yes.”
Shadow Milk looks at him with a quizzical stare. “Did you break his heart?”
“I truly don’t know what you mean by that,” Wind Archer says with exasperation. He wished that people would just say what they meant more often, instead of talking in metaphors and euphemisms and dancing around subjects. He wasn’t good at subtext.
“Oh,” Shadow Milk says. “That’s great, green bean. You’re both just dramatic, then?” Wind Archer gives him a deadpan, unamused stare. “Oookay, I’ll take that as a yes. So, why are you still standing here?”
“Huh?” Wind Archer says, too tired to follow whatever riddle Shadow Milk was spouting at him.
“Go follow him, nimwit.” Shadow Milk rolls his eyes.
“Oh,” Wind Archer says. “Oh, right! Uh, excuse me—“ He pushes past them swiftly and jogs to the front door, swinging it open. Fire Spirit, who was making his way down the sidewalk and to his motorcycle, turns around to look at him. It made Wind Archer’s chest hurt to see his face so red with tears. “Fire Spirit,” He says gently, shutting the door behind him.
“Yeah?” He says, quietly. Some laughing kids pass them on the sidewalk in front of Shadow Milk’s house. Wind Archer stares at him sadly before he sighs and makes his way down the steps, stopping right in front of him.
He doesn’t know what to say at first, and he has to think on it for a moment. He eventually settles on, “I’m sorry that I yelled at you.”
“I’m sorry, too.” Fire Spirit says, reaching up and wiping his own eyes. Wind Archer longs to do it with his own hands, to trace his fingers across Fire Spirit’s beautiful cheeks. “And I’m— so fucking sorry you thought I was gonna hurt you.”
“Please don’t do that again,” Wind Archer whispers. Fire Spirit nods, his lip quivering. They stare at each other in silence once more, and there seems to be some sort of understanding that passes between them, shared between the deep expanses of the language of their eyes. Wind Archer feels the tears return, and he lets them fall freely, lets himself for once just feel the feelings instead of pushing them away. Voice trembling, he says, “You’re my best friend, Fire Spirit.”
“I know,” Fire Spirit nods, voice cracking as he cries. Wind Archer lets himself reach up and wipe the tears. Fire Spirit leans into his touch.
“I can’t lose you,” Wind Archer says honestly. “Especially not over something… dumb.”
“Okay,” Fire Spirit nods, shutting his eyes to try and stop his crying. Wind Archer sighs.
“Come here,” He says, and pulls Fire Spirit into a hug. Fire Spirit falls into it tightly, burying his head into the crook of Wind Archer’s neck. He feels his body shake in his arms, wracking with his cries. “If I am hurting you somehow, I need you to tell me, so I can stop.” He takes in a shaking breath before, “I don’t want to keep doing this. I want to go back to how it used to be.”
Fire Spirit remains silent for a moment, and Wind Archer worries for a split second that he was going to tell him that he, for one reason or another, no longer wanted to be friends. He waits in fearful anticipation.
Finally, speaking hot breath into the place where his neck and shoulder met, Fire Spirit says, “Please don’t ever leave me.” He lets out a cry, squeezing Wind Archer as if trying to prevent him from running away. “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
“I’m never going to leave unless you make me,” Wind Archer says, petting his hand across Fire Spirit’s hair, under his golden headpiece. “If you want me to stay, I always will.”
“I want you to stay,” Fire Spirit says. “Ignore everything I said. I want you forever.”
“Then I’ll be here forever.” Wind Archer pulls back slightly, looking back at Fire Spirit’s face, staring back into his round, sad eyes and searching them.
“I’m sorry for everything,” Fire Spirit says. “There’s just so much, and I don’t know what to do with it. I don’t know how to act, I don’t know what to do.”
“How can I help you?” Wind Archer says desperately, earnestly. “What can I do to fix it?”
Fire Spirit looks at him with a sad smile. “Nothing,” He says, and Wind Archer can tell he’s lying, lying about something. “No one can do anything.”
Wind Archer doubted this was true. Still, he says, “Go home and get some rest. Sleep.”
“Okay,” Fire Spirit nods, taking in a couple breaths and stepping back away and out of Wind Archer’s grasp. “Sorry again. Goodnight, Windy.” He gives him one more weary smile before he turns and starts to head down to his motorcycle.
“Wait,” Wind Archer says, and Fire Spirit immediately turns around. Wind Archer jogs to catch up with him before gently cupping his face and pressing a kiss to his cheek. “Goodnight, my sweet.”
He watches as Fire Spirit’s expression turns back to a frown, and a few tears slide down his face once more. He pats Wind Archer’s shoulder before he turns and continues walking to his motorcycle. Wind Archer watches as he mounts it and rides off, waving one last time before he goes. There’s nothing more he can do except stand there and stare in the direction he drove off in, going over everything that had been said in the past few minutes and trying to grapple with it. He stood there and he stood there, reeling even as kids passed him by, until Sugarfly gently came to walk him back inside.
“You’ll be okay,” She told him, referring to him and Fire Spirit. “You always are.”
He desperately hoped she was right.