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When Alex was younger, the bruises were less frequent. They still popped up, but they'd never been too serious. When they had started to show up on his chest and neck, he'd finally gotten anxious enough to ask his mother what was wrong with him, he wasn't doing anything to get these mysterious marks? She had only responded with a sad smile, telling him, "It looks like your soulmate has quite a few owies." He'd frowned, wondering what game of tag or hide-and-go-seek could have caused his soulmate this much bruising.
Now, older and aware of the real world, he didn't ask about the marks. He didn't talk about them. He tried not to even look at them, really. He felt useless when he did. His soulmate was somewhere getting the shit beat out of them, and what could he do? Nothing.
When he and Jessica had started dating, he had wondered. He had wondered if it was her, maybe, but the thought was quickly dismissed when she had worn a crop top and the bruises littering Alex's stomach were nowhere to be seen on her dark skin. That didn't stop them from dating, though. He pretended not to care about soulmates, and she didn't have to pretend at all. It worked. Well, for a while. Until his fuck up.
After getting the tapes, he didn't have to pretend either. He didn't care about soulmates, he didn't care about anything. What he did to Jessica and Hannah had been so /stupid/ and /careless/, and he couldn't forgive himself. Why would his soulmate?
Clay receiving the tapes had been a turning point for everyone. Clay wanted to take action, to stop this from ever happening again. He didn't care that he himself was on the tapes, just that turning them in was the right thing to do. He didn't even care that Hannah wasn't his soulmate. He loved her like she was. No one liked this. Meetings took place, plans ensued. Clay kept pushing. Alex didn't care what happened. Just as long as he didn't have to carry this enormous /guilt/ on his shoulders anymore.
———
The fight with Montgomery had been stupid. So, so stupid. At home that night, he realized he could walk into school and any one of the people there could have marks identical to his on their face. They will have already realized. There's no way they wouldn't. Everyone knew about the fight by now. He thinks about how they're reacting to this. How would someone react to this? How /should/ they react? Are they shocked? Disgusted? Both?
He doesn't sleep much that night.
———
Justin. They make fleeting eye contact in the hallway, and it's enough. Alex looks away first, slamming his locker and walking out of the building. He'll deal with it later, maybe.
———
As the days go on, Clay gets further and further into the tapes, and everyone gets more and more anxious. Jessica and Justin aren't talking, which probably means Clay is on Justin's second tape. He hopes they can figure things out, mostly for his sake, so that he doesn't feel too guilty for what he's planning to do.
———
When he sees the fresh bruises encircling his neck, he almost breaks.
———
Justin at his doorstep begging for a place to stay wasn't what he had expected, but then again, the entire universe seemed to be against him lately. He tries refusing, he does, but he sees the bruises and the tears threatening to fall and he gives.
He thinks, maybe, he could give and give and give to Justin.
But that wouldn't work. Nothing was working.
———
Justin eats like he hasn't had a decent meal in weeks, and Alex suspects he hasn't. He gives Justin the rest of his dinner.
———
Up in his room, they sit in silence. Justin stares at Alex's profile and Alex at the ceiling. Alex tries not to overthink things, he tries not to imagine a life in which he would be happy with Justin, because he doesn't deserve happiness, and Justin deserves someone like Jessica. A fierce, unyielding force that can hold the both of them up, even when they're down. He can't do that. He can't—
"Will you just— stop!" Justin breaks the uncomfortable silence, his voice harsh and heavy. Alex looks down at Justin, seeing real anger, but also fear. Sadness. He looks away. All he /wants/ is to stop.
Stop thinking. Stop wishing. Stop breathing.
"Stop? Stop what, exactly, Foley?" Alex looks back to the ceiling, hoping his voice sounded more nonchalant than it had in his head.
"You know what, fucking prick." Justin is almost shouting now. Alex tries and fails not to wince. "Why are we ignoring it?" He lowers his voice. "You seen them. I know you did."
"Maybe it was a mistake." Alex doesn't look at Justin as he whispers it, but he can see the flinch from the corner of his eye. He immediately regrets the statement, but it was too late. The damage had been done. Probably for the better. Alex closes his eyes and exhales as steadily as he can, waiting for Justin to leave. He doesn't.
He asks for a ride to Bryce's.
———
Justin is an idiot. Maybe it's good that Alex is ending this now. He couldn't handle him. But who would? Jess isn't going to come around, that much is obvious.
Alex hopes Justin finds someone to rescue him. Or, even better, that Justin rescues himself.
Justin wordlessly slips his hand into Alex's on the way back.
———
Justin snores in his sleep. Alex doesn't know why this stands out to him, but it does. Plenty of people snore in their sleep. Why is this so immensely different? But he knows why, and it's because he'll probably never hear those snores again. And he wants to. He so, /so/ desperately wants to. An unexpected wave of sadness hits him. He turns to look at Justin, whose mouth is hanging slightly open, body less tense than usual.
He feels his eyes well up with tears.
———
Justin scarfs down the pancakes Alex's mother made, and bacon and eggs. This is probably going to be the last decent meal he'll have for a while.
After breakfast, in the safety of Alex's room, Justin kisses him. It isn't hot or rushed like he would have expected from Justin, but soft and slow, like they have all the time in the world. Alex indulges, because Justin does have all the time in the world, and Alex doesn't want to rush him. It tastes like maple syrup and a hint of happiness.
———
Justin leaves after that, with nothing more than a quick thanks, and a polite goodbye to his mother and father. Alex leans against the door and imagines the kiss, over and over again, before going to his room to wait for his parents to leave.
———
To imagine holding a gun to your temple and actually doing so are two very, very different things. It's not like in the movies, either. He's shaking and he can feel tears forming in his eyes, but he keeps the gun there, a cool reminder of what he needs to do. But every time he eases his finger onto the trigger, he pulls it back. Maybe this is like how you can bite off your finger, but your brain won't let you. Maybe his brain isn't ready to self destruct. He glances at himself in the mirror beside his bed. He looks like he's already self destructed.
Suddenly, there's another figure in the mirror. Justin. They make eye contact. The expression on Justin's face is one of terror. He starts easing towards Alex, breathing hard and looking ready to cry or scream or both.
"Don't," Alex whispers. It feels like he's choking, and maybe he is.
Justin is next to him in what seems like seconds, pulling the gun from his grasp, and Alex lets him. He pulls Alex's head to his chest, and when Alex feels his how fast Justin's heart is beating, how hard he's breathing, he just /breaks/. He sobs, everything coming down on him at once. He was going to shoot himself in the head. He was going to blow his brains out, and do exactly what Hannah did to Clay, except there would be no note. Justin would get no solace. Justin would have found him, probably his brains first, and he doesn't deserve that. He cries perhaps even more hysterically, if that's possible, and Justin just holds him tighter.
"If you d-didn't— I was going to—" Alex can't finish, he can't say it out loud, he just—
Justin leans his head onto Alex's, burying his nose in his hair. He can feel Justin whispering against his head, he can hear it, but he can't piece the words together. They stay like that until his sobs fade into sniffling, and Justin pulls Alex's head up so they're facing each other.
"You're worth so much more than some stupid teenage tragedy. There is more to you than what was on those tapes. What you did was wrong, and what I did was wrong, and what everyone did was /wrong/, but we're learning. We have to live with what we did. We have to grow. That's what Hannah wanted. Not this." He takes a deep breath, and brushes his thumbs over Alex's cheekbones. "And this," he gestures between them, "was not a mistake."
Alex kisses him this time, slowly, because he does have all the time in the world, and so does Justin, and for now, that's more than enough.