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“I don’t think it’s my heart you’re worried about,” he says one day. You look at him, surprised. Neither of you haven’t talked about the feelings you aren’t supposed to talk about for almost a week. He is resting against your chest, with your legs on either side of him, against a pine tree by the river.
“What makes you say that?” You reply, your fingers stopping their familiar path through his greying hair.
“You’re scared for yourself. And that’s okay, Indrid, you’re allowed to be scared, but it’s not like I’m gonna try and hurt you either,” he explains.
You have tried so hard to make yourself into the grim old soothsayer you wish you wanted to be. And yet this man, this relatively young man lying between your legs, is the wisest person you’ve ever met. He’s right, just like always.
“You’re scared too,” you say. It’s a desperate grab for any semblance of dignity that you are sure will backfire.
“A little,” he admits, “But not of you. Mostly for you, and a little bit for myself.”
“What are you scared of?” you ask.
“Getting hurt. Dying. Truly being myself for once and it turns out no one likes me,” he says honestly. You knew he would be honest, but you weren’t prepared for the last part.
“Why bother with someone if they don’t really like you?” you ask.
“Because I already love them too much to let go,” he says simply. You realize he was talking about you too.
“Duck—” you aren’t sure how to continue that sentence. How can you communicate the feeling you get when you learn something new about him? How could you begin to describe how good it feels to make him laugh? How could language even capture the love your decrepit heart holds for him?
Instead of words, you try holding him close. He understands what you’re doing and leans in as close as he can. You’re a terrifying creature to most people, and yet he’s curled up against your chest like he would never want to be anywhere else. In his words, “Four arms just means better hugs.” Maybe he should have that same optimism for himself.
“Duck, we’re living in the end times here. There’s so many things to worry about, you have to let go of the self-consciousness,” you say finally. It’s not helpful, and you know that.
Apparently, he doesn’t. “You say the most fucked up shit and it always works,” he mumbles into your shoulder.
“I— a better way to put that would have been that the literal end of my world would not be enough to take me away from you, but it’s too late now. I suppose that’s what I mean, in a sense. You can’t go back, you can’t skip forward. We’re trapped in each moment between infinite nothingness,” you say. It’s more garbage, but like you said, it’s too late now.
“Thanks, Indy, really makes me feel great about my existence,” he laughs.
“If it’s any consolation, the Denny’s opened today, so we can go get dinner,” you say. He laughs harder.
Later, after Denny’s, you’re in his bed, and he’s on top of you, and he suddenly stops.
“What’s wrong?” you ask.
“I get it now,” he says, “Y’know, what you were saying earlier. About not worrying about things.”
“Do you think about the universe while we’re having sex?” you ask.
“Don’t you?” he raises an eyebrow.
You meet him in a kiss because he already knows the answer.
One day, he is panicking again, and he asks you if you know what he is supposed to do as the Chosen One. He’s asked you before, and he will ask again, even though he hasn’t been the Chosen One for weeks. You tell him the same thing you tell him every time. There’s no ultimate plan, no ulterior motives in the fabric of an atom, no singular destiny for the universe. It’s just particles that make up entities that make up decisions based on everything that has happened before. He has no divine duty, no matter what a holographic woman tells him. Sure, it’s scary, but it’s freeing. There’s no narrative arc to anyone’s life. He doesn’t need to map himself onto this Hero’s Journey worksheet he kept from ninth grade. From the moment someone is born to the moment they die, they can do anything they want. The only requirement for a life is that it starts and it ends.
The moment he is truly himself, you notice immediately. It’s like a weight has been lifted from his chest. He laughs louder, talks more, kisses harder. It’s usually only around you, though, and while you want him to be free, it feels good to know that he’s trusting you with a secret. He’s told you so many things he’s never told anyone else. You’ll keep them, keep him, safe in your mind.
“If secrets were seeds,” you tell him, “you’d have to have to hire a gardener for my grave.”
“Bold of you to assume you’ll die first,” he says. And morbid as it is, it’s probably true. Lifespans aside, he’s run into more danger than you can even begin to predict.
“Then I’ll be sure to hire one for yours,” you promise, “You’d make some beautiful flowers.”
“And I got way too many secrets,” he says.
Between the two of you, there’s enough secrets for twenty lifetimes. Those aren’t important, though. What is important is that you are with him. Besides, your mouth has better things to do than lament the things you cannot say.
That’s really it, isn’t it? Why waste time with regret when he is there, looking at you like that. Sure, you’ve made mistakes, and so has he, and you will both fuck up in the future, but right now everything is perfect. And the universe may not have a plan for you, but you have a plan for him. He gives in to your touch, ironically, like it was meant to be.
The best part about this, whatever it is, is that it’s just as intimate for you to sit on the roof and watch the sunset as it is to ignore everything in the comfort of his bed. You’re both leaning on each other. He’s a little breathless from climbing the ladder. You are grateful that he’s breathing at all. So many little details had to match up for you to be in this moment with him, and you would never want to be anywhere else.