10. Archer
Chapter 10
Archer
Archer carried two folded beach chairs to the circle he set up in the middle of the lawn, flinging them open and placing them down.
Then he counted again, making sure he had enough chairs for the owners.
The Richards. The Cortezes.
The Brambles. The Jansens.
The Vanderbergs. His parents.
Then him, and Tea. He used his feet to measure out the space between each pair, then turned to where he would be sitting.
Tea’s chair seemed too close for comfort, but apparently they were past social distancing from one another now.
Even though every bone in his body told him to run.
“Hey, sorry,” Tea said from behind him.
He didn’t look at her.
“You’re late.”
It was obviously why she was apologizing, but setting up the circle took double the amount of time it should have without her.
And he was pissed at her in general, but for reasons he didn’t dare voice to her.
It was easier to blame the chairs.
“Nan insisted I wait until she finished the muffins.”
He whipped around to face her.
She held a basket of blueberry muffins, steam rolling off the tops.
“No.”
She frowned.
“Archer, you can’t get coronavirus from food, you know that.”
He huffed.
“Plus, Nan said she does it every year, and I think having a few things that feel normal will help people feel more comfortable about the things that are not.”
He rubbed a hand down his face.
“Fuck, fine.”
She didn’t respond as she handed him the stack of printed agendas.
He placed a sheet down on each chair, Tea following from behind and securing each one with a warm muffin.
Butter grease seeped from the paper wrappers onto the pages.
He sucked in a sharp breath.
“Comfort,” she reminded him.
“It’s like this every year.”
“Oh yeah, and how would you know that?”
She stood up straight, giving him that stubborn Tea expression he knew all too well.
“Because Nan and Pop used to come home with a grease-and-coffee stained agenda every year.”
He grunted and rolled his eyes.
Her brow pinched. “What’s up with you? Can you handle this today?”
“I’m fine .”
“Are you sure?”
He gave her a curt nod.
“I…didn’t get a good sleep last night. That’s all.”
It was actually the past few nights, but he didn’t want to admit that to her.
I had a few flings. Her words made his blood boil after she said them, leaving his anger at a constant simmer.
The idea of some other prick putting their hands on her made it impossible to fall asleep.
The first night he got out of bed and did seventy-five pushups before collapsing on the floor.
Last night was eighty-three.
He lay there after, in the dark with only the moonlight streaming through his window, still wide-eyed as the same thought haunted his ability to sleep: It should have been me.
She had made her choice, and he already promised himself he wouldn’t go through that again.
Even if the way she looked in her summer dress made him do a double take.
He busied his hands with straightening the chairs when he caught himself counting the freckles dotted across her shoulders.
“Need to make a coffee?” she asked.
“I could probably hold down the fort for a bit if you need it.”
“No, it’s fine.” He flashed her a smile that he knew she wouldn’t buy, so he ended the conversation by snatching a muffin out of her basket, peeling off the paper wrapper, and shoving the whole thing in his mouth.
She smirked, then took a seat in her chair, unwrapping a muffin herself.
She picked at the top as she read through the agenda on her lap.
The Wild Pines crew was punctual, as usual.
By ten o’clock, everyone was sitting in their respective spots.
Jorge and Lily laughed at Rhonda as she finished off a joke then leaned back in her chair and flung an arm around Steph’s shoulders, who was rolling her eyes.
Sandy read through the agenda with glasses perched on her nose, tutting at whatever discussion point she was clearly disappointed by.
Kelly was shouting the measurements and ingredients for her muffins to Victoria Jansen across the circle.
Wayne sat beside her with a comical frown, like a kid who had a lollipop stolen from him.
He looked out toward his docked boat and sighed audibly.
Archer coughed, then coughed louder to get people to shut up.
They eventually did.
“Morning, everyone. Thank you for coming. I know this year looks a lot different than others—”
“Astor, are you seeing this?” Sandy interrupted.
“We’re talking about—”
Dad silenced her with a swipe of his hand.
“I’m sure Archer has it all under control, Sandy.”
His chest tightened.
He sounded supportive, but his use of I’m sure didn’t exactly instill confidence.
Tea cleared her throat.
“We only have an hour, so let’s get to it. Our first point of business is figuring out who isn’t cleaning the fishing cabin.”
Joel straightened his shoulders and glared at Archer.
“I can’t believe you haven’t figured it out yet. Your father would have caught the culprit by now.”
Archer tightened his grip on the handle of his chair.
“Okay, we’re not doing this.” Rhonda wagged her finger between Sandy and Joel.
“New rule. No one compares Archer to Astor. If you haven’t noticed—and you should have, because it’s obvious—Archer has been doing an excellent job taking care of this place without any of our usual help.”
Soft fingers brushed against his clenched white knuckles.
He turned to Tea, who looked back at him with a reassuring smile.
She nodded.
He loosened his grip.
Joel squared his shoulders toward Rhonda.
“You’re probably defending him because we all know it’s your sons who are the problem.”
Rhonda coughed out a laugh.
“My sons? Have you met them? Do you ever seem them fish? Danny is way too busy posting TikTok videos of him dancing to some ‘Savage’ song, and Chris is too busy making out with Ashley.”
Jorge jumped up from his seat.
“They’re making out ?!”
A chaotic rush of yelling befell the group.
Tea attempted to calm everyone down, but after a few please calm downs and we have a lot to discuss , she groaned in defeat and leaned back in her chair.
Archer smirked. “Still think we don’t need to account for derailed conversation?”
She rolled her eyes.
The derailed conversation cost them thirty-seven minutes of meeting time.
Archer was also highly amused at how flustered Tea was when she realized she underestimated how long the Fourth of July party planning would take (twenty-six minutes).
After concluding that they would proceed with the party outside as normal, the meeting had coasted past an hour and a half.
They hadn’t even touched on jet skis yet, and to Archer’s dismay, they didn’t find a solution for whoever was wreaking havoc in the finishing cabin.
They finally called for a vote by noon.
Archer raised his hand in favor of jet skis, holding his promise to stand in solidarity with the twins.
Tea, to his surprise, raised hers to be in solidarity with him.
It made him look like less of a loser when everyone else voted against them for the umpteenth year in a row.
He was already dreading the horrifying fire pit he would wake up to in the morning.
Archer tucked his hands behind his head and reclined in his chair as the owners dispersed.
Wayne was the first to bolt out of his seat and head straight for his boat.
Kelly made her way to Victoria and Lily to talk more about who was cooking what for the party, the three of them standing a little too close for his comfort.
But he lost all of his ability to fight them on anything, especially after they voted on continuing to pause the cleaning services that summer.
It meant he was still on his own for all of it, and he desperately wanted a reprieve.
Tea sat silently next to him, legs tucked under her dress as she finished scribbling the meeting minutes in a spiral-bound notebook.
Rhonda crossed the circle, stepping up to Archer and blocking his view of the sun.
“Beer?”
He cocked a brow.
“A little too early for one, don’t you think?”
“We’re living through a global pandemic and you survived your first owners’ meeting. I think we’re past following societal norms.”
He hesitated for a moment, then decided fuck it.
He swiped his hands down his legs and grinned.
“Yeah, okay. I’m in. Your porch?”
“No, we’re going out.”
He froze.
Rhonda pointed to Tea.
“You coming?”
“For a drink?” she asked.
“No, for the rodeo. Yes , for a drink.”
“The rodeo sounds unsanitary.” Tea eyed him, understanding painted clearly on her face.
“And so does a bar.”
“I promise, this one is outside and safe.” She made her way backward toward Steph.
“Meet us at my car in twenty.”
He exhaled a low hum.
“Hey.”
He turned to Tea, her face full of concern.
He hated it.
“If you’re not comfortable, you don’t have to. We can say no.”
Archer clenched his fists, then cracked his knuckles.
“Are you comfortable?”
She shrugged.
“Only if you are.”
He wasn’t comfortable with any of it.
The owners standing close.
A public bar. A global pandemic.
The girl he’d thought he was in love with sitting next to him after all of these years.
But he wanted to get her to stop looking at him like that, like he was broken and needed fixing.
He didn’t need fixing.
He was fine.
Archer hopped up and reached out his hands.
“Give me your things. I’ll drop them in the office.”
She hesitated, some sort of thought flashing before her eyes.
But then she smoothed out her features and handed him her notebook, laptop, extra agendas, and pens.
Twenty minutes later they sat in the back seat of Rhonda and Steph’s Hatchback, the four of them masked up with windows down as they pulled away from the gravel driveway of Wild Pines.
Steph dragged the sunshade down in her front seat, then examined herself as she pulled her cropped hair into a small bun at the top of her head.
“So, Tea, how does it feel to be back?”
“Odd.”
“You’re going to have to shout, I can’t hear you with the windows open,” Rhonda yelled.
“ Odd ,” she repeated louder.
“Most days I feel like it’s all a dream.”
“A good dream, or a bad one?” Steph asked.
“Both.”
Archer turned his head a fraction so he could see her in his periphery.
Her legs were tucked close again, her dress draped over her thighs.
She pinched the skin at her ankle with her thumb and pointer finger.
It was the first time she admitted to how she was really feeling.
Up until then, Archer had to pretend that everything was fine with her.
He knew it wasn’t. How could it be after everything?
Steph turned around in her seat to face Tea.
“You know you can talk to us, right? We’re always here for you.”
She nodded.
“Yeah, I know.”
Rhonda lifted a finger, her other hand on the steering wheel.
“But we understand if you would like us to keep our mouths shut until then.”
Archer watched with bated breath as color flooded Tea’s cheeks.
“I appreciate that. Thank you.”
They didn’t say anything for the next fifteen minutes, not until they pulled into the dirt lot of a shit-colored shack in the middle of the woods.
Music blared from speakers hanging at haphazard angles along the awning, and the place was packed.
His chest tightened as he read a message painted in blue on the side wall.
Save yourself from the heat and get a drink!
“This feels like a bad idea,” he grumbled low.
Rhonda parked and pointed to a picnic table on the lawn, far from the crowd.
“We can snag that spot over there.”
He unbuckled slowly.
“And we get drinks…how? Do we have to go in there?”
A crowd of people spilled from inside the bar and out onto the patio underneath the awning, fans blasting cool air on their faces.
The lawn was dotted with picnic tables, giving people enough space in case they wanted it.
“There’s a walk-up bar on the other side for people who don’t want to go in.” Steph unbuckled and opened her door.
“I’ll grab the first round.”
“Are you sure? I can—”
“Archer, we watched you get fed to the wolves for two hours. Seriously. Drinks on me.”
“I’ll help you,” Rhonda declared.
“You guys grab the table.”
Archer followed Tea across the lawn, distracted by the number of people around him.
How does anyone find this safe?
he thought. When he was in Minneapolis during the first few months of the pandemic, he measured every action he took, weighing the pros and cons and if it was worth putting other people at risk.
He heard someone call his name in the distance.
He scanned the lawn, leaving Tea to herself as she sat down at the table.
“Archer!”
He turned, then felt his heart fall to his feet.
Janelle stood before him in a black tank top and cropped shorts, her dewy brown skin exposed and her braids hung loose by her shoulders.
His eyes widened. He felt like he couldn’t breathe.
Clench. Unclench.
She smirked and crossed her arms. She didn’t wear a mask, and he was thankful he still had his on.
“What a coincidence, huh?”
He cleared his throat and looked down at his sneakers.
“Not really. You know my family has a cabin up here, and yours isn’t far either.”
When he looked back up at her, Janelle’s head was tilted to the side, that smirk still on her face.
Of course she knew. This run-in didn’t seem like a coincidence in the slightest. She looked…
pleased. Like she meant for this to happen.
She reached up and squeezed his arm, then stroked her thumb back and forth against his bicep.
“You look good, Archie.”
Clench.
Unclench.
He rubbed the back of his neck to stop himself.
He could have told her everything—about Dad handing resort management to him, about everything that happened at Hermes Lounge before lockdown—but he didn’t feel the need to.
Even if Janelle’s demeanor was warm and inviting, their relationship felt safe.
Comfortable. Easy . Drama free.
Plus, if she didn’t want to play any part in his life back in January, why would he expect her to care now?
He stepped out of her grasp.
She slipped her hands in her back pockets.
“Are you taking care of yourself, Archie?”
Archer dropped his hands to his sides.
Clench. Unclench. Hearing her say his nickname made this entire interaction even more unsettling.
When he opened his hands again to clench his fists, his left hand came around slender fingers.
Archer whirled his head around, finding Tea beside him.
She stood there with that stubborn look in her eyes, mask still on as she held his hand.
“Your beer is getting warm.”
He looked above Tea’s head and found Rhonda and Steph, four bottles of beer on the table.
Rhonda did a little shimmy.
Steph gave him a thumbs-up.
“And…you are?”
Archer turned back to Janelle.
“This is Tea,” he answered for her.
Janelle’s eyes widened.
“Tea? As in your childhood friend Tea?”
Heat crawled up his neck.
Janelle didn’t know everything about Tea, but she knew enough.
Like how she was one of his closest friends growing up.
How he developed a crush on her, then she disappeared.
He’d conveniently left out the rest. “Yep.”
Her eyes dipped to their joined hands.
“Very…interesting.”
Tea stepped back, pulling on Archer’s hand.
“Nice meeting you,” she said to Janelle.
Archer followed Tea, hands still joined as they made their way to the picnic table.
When they sat down, Tea made sure to sit right beside him, thigh to thigh, and placed a hand on his knee.
He looked across the lawn.
Janelle watched them from afar, head tilted.
Then she stepped back and vanished into the thick crowd.