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They get onto the topic in a way that can’t be described as anything other than silly, when Magnus looks back on it later. He’s having breakfast with Alec, who’s bought a new cereal to try. The box that he’s filling his bowl from says Raisin Bran, which sounds terribly healthy to Magnus, and sports a brightly smiling, anthropomorphic sun on a blue and purple background. Magnus has already dived into his own Coco Pops, so he speaks around a mouthful of them and brandishes his spoon in the direction of the box.
“Since when does Kellogg’s use pride flag backgrounds?”
Alec turns the box around so he can see what Magnus is looking at. “It’s blue and purple,” he says, accepting the milk from Magnus when he hands it to him. “I don’t think it’s intentionally showing support for anything.”
“Still,” Magnus insists. “As a bisexual man, I wholeheartedly approve.”
The milk carton hits the table a little too hard. Alec looks like he’s just seen someone he doesn’t like get struck by lightning – not in any great panic, but still highly alarmed, and above all incredulous. It’s a little more dramatic than a very ordinary Thursday breakfast warrants.
“Alexander?” Magnus asks. “Are you alright?”
Alec’s eyes focus back in on Magnus’s face. “Yes,” Alec says, and as far as Magnus can tell, he is telling the truth. “It just hit me that I’ve never heard you use that word before.”
“What word? Wholeheartedly? It’s a bit of a mouthful, I’ll admit.”
“No, the other one.”
It’s a testament to how little thought Magnus gave his aimless comment that he still needs a few seconds. “Bisexual,” he realizes finally. The lightbulb moment is followed very closely by more confusion. “I’ve said that before.”
Alec shakes his head. “No, you haven’t. Not to me.”
Magnus frowns first at his cereal and then at Alec. He almost gestures with his spoon again, but remembers in time that there’s cereal and milk on it at the moment, so he limits himself to his free hand. “But I must have. I haven’t hidden any part of my sexuality for centuries, and we’ve talked about it before.”
“Never in those terms,” Alec insists. “You said things like that you were attracted to all genders, or that you’d slept with men, women, and the occasional Djinn.”
“Oh,” Magnus says. It’s the only thing to be said, really. “You might be right.”
“I’m sure.”
The air feels a little heavy now. Magnus takes a deep breath and shrugs, palms up gesture included. The spoon is safely back in its bowl. “Well, I guess this means the cat’s out of the bag now: I’m bi.” He grins winningly at Alec, who smiles back, but looks distracted.
“What a shocker,” he says. Magnus is relieved to see him playing along, even if it’s a bit halfhearted.
“I know. I’m usually so subtle about it,” Magnus replies. He’s not getting a lot from Alec, so he decides to keep talking. Clearly this has set Alec thinking about something. “I’ve applied that label to myself for a couple decades now, although I don’t use it as much as I think I do, apparently. I suppose I still fall back on a lengthier description out of habit. Way back when, there often were no words for what I am.”
That seems to draw Alec’s attention, at least a little. He still hasn’t touched his bowl since pouring the milk, and Magnus shudders to think how soggy his whole grain wheat flakes will be when he gets to them eventually. “Do you like that there’s a word now?”
It’s an interesting question. Magnus pushes his by now empty bowl aside and folds his arms on the table. “It certainly makes things easier. ‘I’m bi’ is a nice way to save myself a lot of words. Personally, I’ve had periods where I felt labels couldn’t rightfully represent the entirety of who and what I am, but they’re useful to have at your disposal either way, even just as an approximation. The Shadow World has always had slightly different norms from those that are unaware of us – much more accepting, on the whole – but let me tell you, seeing Mundanes wave pride flags for all kinds of different groups of people really feels like a breath of fresh air after living through the twentieth century in the western world.”
Alec nods. “That sounds very good.”
He doesn’t say anything else, apparently lost in the deep burgundy depths of the curtain behind Magnus. Magnus studies him for a long moment. “Of course, when I say the Shadow World has been more accepting, I’m aware that that’s probably not in line with your experience.”
“No, not really,” Alec admits, breaking loose from his hypnosis by Magnus’s drapery. He looks down at his cereal, pokes the sludge once with his spoon, and then leaves it alone again, in favor of looking at Magnus. “But I know what you mean. It’s the Shadowhunters that are weird about it, not the Downworlders.”
Magnus inclines his head. He tries to soften the blow a little. “I’m not about to defend the people who would have preferred to trap you in a loveless marriage solely to uphold heteronormative ideals, but it makes a certain kind of sad sense for a society like theirs.”
“Like mine,” Alec amends. “They’re not getting rid of me by being dicks.”
Magnus doesn’t even attempt to hide his smile at that. “Fair enough. A society like yours. Its structure is militaristic and you often expect to die young, which means you need as much offspring as possible. Both are easy excuses for homophobia.”
Alec smiles as well, but it’s wry. “Don’t forget how much we love tradition.”
“The law is the law,” Magnus says, not in his crochety old man voice this time, but like he’s remarking on the weather. It makes Alec snort.
“I’ve never said it myself, you know.”
“Your brilliantly insightful Shadowhunter adage about the law?”
“Not that. I think I’ve said that a little too often, probably.”
“What, then?” Magnus asks. He has a pretty good idea, at this point in the conversation, but he doesn’t want to guess. It seems better to give Alec an opening to bring it up himself, or leave the subject alone after all, if that’s what he wants.
“That I’m-” Alec gets as far as that before he stumbles. He sighs, looking frustrated, and starts again. “The word for what I am. For people like me. I’ve never had to use it, because after I kissed you at the wedding everyone knew anyway. If they didn’t, referring to my boyfriend did the trick.”
“That’s me,” Magnus feels the need to point out, because it’s a title he’s proud of.
“That’s you,” Alec agrees.
“Well, do you want to say it? The word for people like you?”
If Alec had looked lost earlier, he looks like he found whatever he was looking for now, but he’s not sure yet if he’s happy about it. He frowns and starts to push all immediately visible raisins to one side of the bowl in front of him, apparently unmindful of the fact that he’s doing it. Magnus thinks it’s very cute, but forces himself not to get distracted.
“I don’t want to not say it.” The words come slowly, like Alec is forming the thoughts as he voices them. “It feels like not saying it would imply that it’s something bad or that I’m still ashamed.”
Magnus stretches his leg a little under the table, until his bare foot bumps into Alec’s socked one. It’s no time to play footsie, but he hopes the contact is comforting, in a small way. “It doesn’t have to mean that. You get to choose what you do or do not want to call yourself. You don’t have to feel guilty for any of it. There’s also no rush to get your labels perfectly right, if you still have doubts.”
Alec looks up from the perfectly separated raisins. He puts down his spoon, not with as much force as the milk carton at the start of this whole discussion, but far more resolutely than Magnus would have expected. “But I don’t have any doubts. I’m really damn sure. I have been for years, even back when I was sometimes lying to myself about it.”
“Is there something else holding you back?”
“Not really.”
“Then why not go for it? Say it right now, if you want to.”
“Okay.” Alec straightens his spine, as if preparing for a physical attack. He sits a little straighter in his chair, which is ironic. “I’m gay,” he says. He blinks. “I’m... gay. I’m a gay man.”
Magnus knows he must be beaming. “How does that feel?”
Alec blinks again, like a confused puppy, and rolls his shoulders a little. He relaxes back into his seat. “Good, actually. It’s just a word, but it’s oddly freeing.”
“Another closet door kicked down,” Magnus muses.
“Another? How many are there?”
Magnus doesn’t think he has an answer to that, even after hundreds of years on this earth. He doesn’t say that directly, because it’s a little depressing, and they’ve touched on too much heavy stuff already to call this a light breakfast. “Some days it feels as if it’s a Russian doll of closets,” he says instead, which he thinks is very clever.
“With every closet you leave, you enter a bigger one? I don’t know if that’s a nightmare for you or a dream. So many clothes.” Alec thinks he’s clever too, apparently.
Magnus waves his hand around, considering. “In my metaphor they were evil closets, but you make a good point.”
“You make good points too,” Alec allows. “Saying it was a lot easier than I thought it would be. I feel stupid for making this such a huge deal.”
Magnus can’t agree. He’s had enough long talks with other people, over the years, to have definite proof Alec is not the only one struggling, and he doesn’t even have to talk to anyone to know Alec won’t be the only Shadowhunter with this problem. “I don’t think it’s stupid at all. I know many Nephilim like to think themselves superior to ordinary humans, but your society has a lot to learn about LGBTQ acceptance from parts of the Mundane world.”
“And the Downworld,” Alec says.
Magnus presses his foot a little closer to Alec’s. “And the Downworld.”
Alec smiles at him, and Magnus feels warm and content. Then Alec’s gaze drops down and his smile falls. “Oh no, my cereal.”
‘Oh no’ are the right words. The flakes have welled up and are mostly dissolved in the milk by now. More than anything else, the mixture resembles an uneven beige-ish paste with a small colony of raisins to one side. Magnus wouldn’t have been terribly surprised if they had started to move. He’s never trusted raisins. “Good luck with that,” he wishes his boyfriend.
Alec scoops up a spoonful. “This looks like something I cooked,” he says, disconcerted.
Magnus manages to hold still until the spoon is half an inch from Alec’s mouth, but then he snaps his fingers. It’s a very productive snap: it cleans the bowl and spoon, disappears them to their native kitchen cupboard and drawer, respectively, and summons a croissant for Alec from a bakery in Boston that Magnus has a soft spot for. It’s this croissant that Alec bites into half a second later.
Alec gets over the momentary shock pretty quickly while chewing. He seems about as relieved as Magnus feels about not having to watch him eat his original breakfast. “Thank you,” he says, between his first and second bite.
“You’re welcome, Alexander.”
Alec tears off a piece of his croissant and offers it to Magnus, who accepts. That warm feeling Magnus had persists, and even spreads.
“I’ve never been more glad to be gay,” Alec says. The word rolls from his lips naturally, like he’s said it a hundred times.
“How so?”
“If I weren’t, I wouldn’t have had you, and I might have had to eat that stuff in the bowl.”
“That’s some solid reasoning,” Magnus has to admit.