One day, Alexander turned to Philippe and asked, “Are you ever concerned that I’m holding you back? That there’s something more out there, and you’ll never find it?”
“Like what?” said Philippe. “Magic? Inter-dimensional romance?”
“I was thinking world travel, but sure.”
Philippe nodded. “I’ve always wanted to see Machu Picchu.”
“We could go,” said Alexander.
They wouldn’t go. For one thing, Alexander didn’t mean it when he suggested the trip; he was parochial by nature and tended toward traveler’s diarrhea. Also, he had not meant for the conversation to light so quickly upon the tangible absents. There was something else wrong with their life together that couldn’t be solved by a trip to ancient ruins, and when he turned off the bedside light and curled up next to Philippe later that night, he still felt a pulling sensation that they were wasting each other’s time.
Alexander tried again. This time they were in the car, on their way back from the airport, and it was snowing. Philippe had just returned from a conference in San Diego. Deer kept jumping out of the forest and onto the road.
“I’ve never seen so many deer,” said Alexander. “I wonder what’s spooking them.”
“Maybe it’s the storm,” said Philippe. He looked out of the window and said, “It’s so cold here. Maybe we should move to California.”
“Are you happy?” said Alexander.
“Watch out,” said Philippe. Another deer hopped across the road.
Alexander evaded.
A few miles later, Philippe said, “I am moderately happy. Do you need me to say more?”
Yet another deer, this one larger than the others, strutted into the left lane. Alexander pulled into the breakdown lane to avoid it and skidded to a halt. He sighed. “Maybe. I don’t know.”
They watched the big deer walk calmly across the freeway. “It looks so calm,” said Alexander.
“It’s a miracle none of them have been hit.”
“Should we break up?”
“I don’t want to do that,” said Philippe.
“Neither do I,” said Alexander, “But the world feels so small.”
“This is my fault,” said Philippe.
“That’s generous of you to say,” said Alexander.
An entire herd of deer trod through the snow next to them.
*
They saw a therapist. This far north, it was hard to find one that they trusted, but eventually they settled upon a calm, effete young man who felt both soft and sharp at the same time. He looked each of them in the eye at the beginning of their first session and asked them what had brought them here.
“We don’t know what to do,” said Alexander.
“We don’t want to break up,” said Philippe.
“But something is wrong.”
The therapist listened attentively. He didn’t seem bothered or worried or surprised by their story, even the part about the deer. “How many did you see?” he asked.
“Ten or twelve,” said Philippe.
“Except at the end,” said Alexander.
“Right,” said Philippe. “An entire herd at the end.”
“I’m just worried that there are better people out there for us,” said Alexander.
The therapist wondered what was stopping them from figuring out if that was true.
“Well, we’re in a relationship,” said Philippe.
“Right,” said Alexander.
The therapist smiled like he was popping a balloon.
*
Over breakfast the next morning, Philippe suggested the obvious: They could date other people. “To see who’s out there,” he said.
“What happens if there’s somebody better?”
“Better than me?” asked Philippe. “Impossible.”
Alexander swallowed his eggs and shoved more potato than was advisable into his mouth. He took the extra-long chewing process to think about Philippe’s proposal. When eventually he swallowed his food, he said, “So we stay together, unless something better comes along?”
Philippe nodded.
“Like a single-round elimination boyfriend competition.”
“Sure,” said Philippe. “Or an open relationship.”
“What happens if one of us loses?”
Philippe shrugged.
“I like our life together,” said Alexander, and it was true. Looking around the kitchen, he could name a dozen things that he liked about their life together, just in that room. He liked that they never used soap on the cast-iron pans. He liked that mornings always smelled like potatoes and butter. He liked the paintings they had hung. He liked that he got to kiss Philippe on the back of the neck while they cooked together. He liked how their early-morning black tea made him jittery. He liked dancing around the kitchen and telling Philippe about his dreams. He liked Philippe.
“I like our life together, too,” said Philippe. “But maybe we have to earn it.”
*
The early rounds were easy. Alexander and Philippe chose weak competitors for each other, men who were either laughably gross or pitifully banal, men who said things like, “I’ve never felt so connected with anybody,” after only forty-five minutes of conversation. They chose men who sat uncomfortably close and laughed breathily, men who were either too coiffed or too unkempt. Alexander had a habit of dating men named Dave.
They kept score. They remained undefeated.
“Maybe we’re not committing,” said Alexander.
“Or maybe there’s no one better,” said Philippe, kissing Alexander’s eyelids.
Other things happened. Philippe discovered an exciting genetic mutation in the plant that he was studying. Alexander lost his office job and began working at the local nature preserve. They moved across town into an apartment with hardwood floors and a sunnier kitchen. The ground thawed and turned to mud. One day at the nature preserve, Alexander saw three fawns sitting next to his car. When he approached them, they melted away into the woods.
Their therapist seemed happy with the progress—or, at least, he regularly congratulated them on working so hard, and being so kind, and understanding that love was a process and not a destination. He also asked questions, such as: Did they ever intend to go on a second date with someone? If so, how would that make them feel? In their heart of hearts, did each of them feel that they would win the boyfriend competition? And, most unsettling, were they truly dating other people, or were they just using other people to validate each other?
“I haven’t been dating other people,” said Alexander. “Only Daves.”
“ I’ve been dating people,” said Philippe.
“But maybe not the right people,” said their therapist.
“I saw three fawns next to my car the other day,” said Alexander.
The therapist smiled. “And how did that make you feel?”
Alexander locked eyes with Philippe. “Like something’s going to happen. Soon.”
*
At a conference in Toronto, Philippe met a man who had unlocked the secrets of time travel. They went on a date that started with drinks and ended with exploring the International Space Station in the year 2074. They returned to the bar in 2017 and paid their tab. They walked back to the hotel where the conference was being held, hand-in-hand, and Philippe asked, “Have you ever been to Machu Picchu?”
Alexander went on a date with his seventh Dave, and the next day he met the Deer King. It was sunset, and he was closing the gates to the nature preserve when a voice spoke out from behind him.
“Excuse me,” said the Deer King. “I’m sorry to startle you, but I’ve been noticing how kindly you look at my fawns, and how tenderly you touch the leaves on the plants, and how careful you are not to interrupt the birds when they’re nesting. I guess what I’m saying is, would you like to get a drink?”
Alexander was taken aback. But the Deer King had the sweetest disposition and the kindest eyes, so Alexander accepted his invitation and they walked to the local tavern and drank three beers each. Over drinks, the Deer King told Alexander about his life. He had a home in the nature preserve, hidden from human sight, and a hundred families of deer that looked to him for shelter and instruction. “I never really intended to start a family or go into governance, but here I am,” said the Deer King.
“Your name isn’t Dave, is it?” asked Alexander.
“No,” said the Deer King. “Why?”
When Philippe returned from Toronto, he had the fire of the cosmos in his eyes. Alexander told him that something seemed different, and Philippe countered that he could say the same of Alexander. They stood there, on the sidewalk outside of their apartment, trying to understand how they felt about the sudden expansiveness that each one sensed in the other. Alexander broke the silence by saying, “You look happy.”
“So do you,” said Philippe.
“Does this mean that we’ve lost?”
Philippe did not know. If the boyfriend competition was a single-round elimination game, what constituted a single round? One date could not outweigh five years of touching hearts with Alexander. “Well,” said Philippe, at last, “do you like him more than you like me?”
“I don’t know,” said Alexander. “The Deer King is the Deer King, but you are you.”
Philippe nodded. “Maybe we didn’t think this through very well.”
*
The time traveler showed up unannounced. It wasn’t his fault, exactly—traveling through space-time is difficult and imprecise—but Alexander’s heart dropped into his gut when a smartly-dressed, slender man appeared atop their kitchen island one evening as he and Philippe were sitting down for dinner. Philippe had been expecting the time traveler, but not here, not now. He smiled uncomfortably at the unexpected guest and placed his hand on Alexander’s knee.
“Hi,” said the time traveler, stepping off the island.
“You’re a week early,” said Philippe.
“Oh god, I’m so sorry. This thing doesn’t always work correctly. Should I go?”
“Don’t worry about it,” said Alexander. “Do you want a drink or something?”
“You must be Alexander,” said the time traveler. “I’ve heard good things about you. Really good things.”
Alexander suggested that Philippe and the Time Traveler just go on their date early, rather than waiting another week and risking another unplanned intrusion. The Time Traveler thanked Alexander a few too many times, and Philippe touched Alexander’s knee enough that it stopped feeling like comfort, and then they walked out through a small slit in the fabric of reality and disappeared from view. Alexander went upstairs and looked up videos of house fires on YouTube until the sound of a rapping at the window pulled him away from the destruction. He peered outside. A young deer stood in the street next to his house.
Alexander followed the deer into the nature preserve, all the way to the Deer King’s house. When he arrived, a fire was crackling in the hearth and the Deer King was heating up some apple cider. “I could feel that you were sad,” he said, sitting down on a bed of moss. “I hope you don’t mind that I sent someone for you.”
Alexander curled up on the couch with his head on the Deer King’s lap. “Was there a day in December,” he asked, “when the deer were unusually active?”
The Deer King nodded. “A pack of coyotes came in from the south,” he said. “We had to move.”
“Do you think you’ll have to move again?”
The Deer King stroked Alexander’s hair and sipped his cider. “I hope not,” he said.
“But you’re the Deer King.”
“Yes,” said the Deer King.
“So you’ll do whatever you need to do.”
“Yes.”
Alexander wondered if he was losing the boyfriend competition. When he closed his eyes, he saw Philippe and the time traveler, flying over foreign oceans, making love on top of supernovas. He felt the Deer King’s caress and began, for the first time, to feel regret. It was one thing to love two people; it was another to be cleft in two. He would never be able to choose between Philippe and the Deer King, but he would surely lose both of them if he didn’t.
As if in response to Alexander’s sadness, the Deer King propped him up and made him sip the cider. “If you’re ever feeling sad,” said the Deer King, “just follow the deer. My house is open to you.”
*
Philippe did not come back for a very long time.
Alexander tried to pretend that everything was okay. Traveling through space-time was, after all, difficult and imprecise. But text messages couldn’t be sent across the cosmos, and on the fifteenth day of Philippe’s absence, the silence began to eat away at Alexander’s sanity. He had lost. Philippe was gone. He walked home from the preserve and no longer expected Philippe to be waiting for him. The entryway didn’t even smell like Philippe’s shoes anymore.
Alexander checked around the house one final time, packed a bag of essentials, grabbed an apple off the counter, and headed back out to the preserve. A tawny doe met him at the gate. Alexander held out the apple, and the doe nuzzled his neck for a moment before taking the fruit in her mouth. Then she turned and led him deep into the forest.
The Deer King greeted him at the door. “You look sad,” he said.
“I am,” said Alexander.
Alexander and the Deer King lived together deep into the winter. The snow fell like a shroud upon the preserve. The herds of deer slowed down like molasses, the streams froze over, and Philippe did not return. Alexander retrieved his cast-iron pans from the apartment and brought them to the Deer King’s home, and in the mornings they would fry potatoes and make black tea. On most days, the smell of the wood stove seemed to stave off the melancholy. Sometimes, though, when Alexander opened the iron door to cast another log into the flames, he thought he saw a small house inside, burning to the ground.
*
Alexander went to the therapist alone for the first time. He sat in the couch-space where Philippe had once sat, repulsed by the notion of saving space for someone who had not, apparently, saved space for him.
The therapist asked him whether he thought that Philippe was gone intentionally.
Alexander said no. Philippe was just the sort of person who would float away if you let him.
The therapist didn’t say anything to this, and instead smiled with his mouth closed. It reminded Alexander of a cat. The therapist’s silence urged him on, and so he continued: but that is exactly what started this in the first place. “I could feel him floating away. I just thought . . .”
“You just thought . . .?” said the therapist.
“I just thought that if I showed him he was allowed to float away, he wouldn’t.”
The therapist cat-smiled again. How silly. That which is made to float will float; flooding the city will not convince it to sink. “And you?” asked the therapist. “What kind of person are you?”
Rather, said the therapist’s eyes, what has freedom done for you ?
That night Alexander stole away from the Deer King’s bed and ran with a nearby herd. They knew him now, and kept their white tails visible so that he could follow. They led him to a stream, where he watched a fox stalking crickets along the bank, and a rocky precipice, where he could see the moon, and then they led him back to where he came from.
When he entered the house he found that it, too, had frozen. Here was the book that Philippe had been reading the night before he left, folded open to mark his place; here was the satchel that Alexander had tossed on the couch after work. Everything was still, and so foreign.
Alexander let the herd guide him back to the Deer King’s house.
“If there are coyotes,” said Alexander. “Where will you go?”
“Somewhere safe,” said the Deer King. “But there will always be a space for you in my bed.”
*
One day in early spring, when the ground was so wet that it pulled on Alexander’s boots with every step, Philippe walked through the door of the visitor’s center at the preserve.
“Hi,” said Philippe.
“Hello,” said Alexander, suddenly feeling the space that Philippe had left behind.
“I’m so sorry,” said Philippe.
“Do you want a day pass or a yearly pass?” asked Alexander.
“Traveling through time-space—”
“—is difficult and imprecise. A day pass is four dollars and a yearly pass is twenty.”
Philippe looked at the ground. “The yearly pass is a better deal,” he said.
“How is the time traveler?” asked Alexander.
“You didn’t lose,” said Philippe.
“But I didn’t win, either.”
“No.”
They looked at each other for too long. Eventually, they began to remember certain things—the quality of light on a specific Sunday morning, the time Alexander saw a dog get hit by a car, the smell of their lawn at dusk one autumn. Alexander momentarily understood the seduction of time travel, momentarily did not blame Philippe for the space he had created.
Philippe blinked. “I came back,” he said.
Alexander left his station in the visitor’s center and led Philippe through the woods to a small overlook. Philippe was not wearing boots, and his thin shoes very rapidly sank deep into the mud, but he trudged onwards behind Alexander. When they reached the overlook, Alexander stopped. “Look,” he said. In the valley below, vultures circled above the canopy, above the bifurcating streams, above deer lapping at their banks, above the bears in slumber, above the rabbits and mice and insects and detritus and the Deer King’s hidden realm.
“Look,” said Alexander again.
“It’s beautiful.”
“It’s big,” said Alexander.
“Come home with me,” said Philippe.
“I am home,” said Alexander. “But there will always be space for you.”
