Let Your Arrow Fly - Kate Deimling

He wasn’t cherubic, like on those Valentine’s Day cards with the clasped hands and dainty white wings. Sweaty curls were pasted onto his forehead. He wore a sagging cloth diaper held up in some mysterious way, and he didn’t have any wings at all. He was standing in front of the fridge, right next to the crack in the linoleum shaped like a Z. A glass with a shrinking ice cube and a smidgen of whisky sat in front of me on the kitchen table, but I certainly wasn’t drunk. He padded over and put a chubby hand on my knee.

“Are you lovesick, doll?” came the raspy voice. Stupidly, I stared at the drink. Perhaps if I ignored him, he would go away. It was February 13th.

“Troubles of the heart? It’s my forte. My raison d’être, some would say.”

I laughed, because he sounded like a bad screenplay. He drew back, startled, his eyes uncomprehending, like a puppy’s. I studied his face more closely. He lowered his gaze as if in modesty, his immensely long eyelashes curling up away from his face. They had to be almost an inch long. The kind of eyelashes women would die for. I thought of my co-worker Marcie and her fake lashes that looked like furry insect legs. His cheeks were ruddy and round, and he had a button nose, with snot crusted under one nostril. One hand was still on my knee, which was at the height of his belly, and the other hung limp at his side, clutching a bow that dragged on the ground. Dust caked his impossibly small feet. I drank the last trickle of whisky.

“No, everything’s just peachy.” I propped my chin up on my hand, feeling my teeth crash together. What did the dentist say about not grinding my teeth? Lips together, teeth apart. Another thing I was failing at.

The little fellow ostentatiously turned his head this way and that. Two lines of ants traveled between the wall and the garbage can. The counter was ringed with coffee and red wine. An overgrown tomato oozed from its split skin.

“I beg to differ.”

“So I’m not the greatest housekeeper.”

“You are heartsick. Let me help. Tell me his name.”

“Why do you assume it’s a guy?”

His lips unpursed, and his blue irises grew bigger. “Tell me the name of your beloved, male or female.” His voice had become higher, birdlike.

“I’m not sure.”

“You’re not sure if you love a woman or a man?”

“I’m not sure I want them back. Maybe it’s better to start over with someone new.”

He crossed his legs and dropped to a seated position on the floor. “You would abandon your love so soon?”

“I’m tired of all the drama.”

“There is no obstacle so great that true love cannot overcome it.”

“Oh, give me a break.” I swirled the ice cube in the glass, watched it dwindle into liquid.

He leaned back and stretched out his legs. His round belly caught the light. The bottoms of his feet were filthy, but the lines on his soles could be clearly traced through the dirt. He shook his head.

“I fear my visit is wasted on you.”

“Yeah, maybe it is.” I took the empty glass over to the sink and dropped it into the dirty water in the dishpan. The yellow scrubber floated like a raft in the murk. Time for this little creep to leave. I had work in the morning.

I turned around and saw him noiselessly walking through the kitchen door. There were wings, tiny ones that sprouted only as far as his shoulder blades. The feathers were downy and gray.

“Wait!”

He stopped but did not turn around. His lower back curved in where it met the rough border of the diaper.

“If I tell you who it is, what will happen?”

He faced me, holding up the bow, and I saw that it held an arrow of gold. The string started to vibrate, and my ears filled with a low hum that I felt in my sternum. I stepped closer and his red lips parted into a laugh like the tinkling of bells, revealing plump gums and tiny, perfect teeth. I caught a faint whiff of sour milk as I squatted down to reach his ear.

Originally published by Little Death Lit

Kate Deimling is a poet, writer, and translator from French. Her writing has appeared in I-70 Review, Tar River Poetry, Valparaiso Poetry Review, Roi Fainéant Literary Press, Ellipsis Zine, Waxwing, and other magazines. Kate is an associate poetry editor for Bracken magazine and lives in Brooklyn, New York. Find her online at www.katedeimling.com.