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“Why the hell’d you come here, Alex?”
Michael was tired. Tired of being left, tired of being hurt, tired of being so damn far from Alex.
“Why the hell’d you come here when you’re just gonna leave again?”
“Guerin, I can’t just not follow orders,” Alex said. He sounded just as tired and sad as Michael was. “That’s not how the military works.”
“Yeah, I know, but that’s not what I’m talkin’ about,” Michael raised an eyebrow. He refused to get up from the airstream’s little bed so as to keep a careful distance from Alex, who stood by the door ready to leave. “You never give me a way to get in touch with you, make sure you’re okay, or anything when you leave. So why the hell’d you come here just to go and leave me in dark worryin’ again?”
Michael watched Alex’s stoic façade crack, the way his muscle twitched and the aborted movement of his arm like he was going to reach out and run his hands through Michael’s curls to soothe the worry and doubt away.
“My dad—”
“Screw your dad! He can’t hurt you anymore, Alex.”
“But he can hurt you,” Alex’s face lost its tension, revealing the fear that had been hidden underneath. “I can’t…I won’t give him a reason to hurt you again.”
“Alex—”
“I should go now. I can’t be late.”
“Alex, wai—”
The door was pushed open and Alex was through it, completely ignoring Michael as he scrambled to his feet to follow. A dull ache was already starting to form in his chest: a hollow in his heart the shape of one Alex Manes.
“Alex!” Michael called out. Alex was already halfway to his car, duffel slung over his shoulder and head down, but he slowed to a stop at the sound of Michael’s voice. “Please. Don’t leave like this again.”
When Alex turned around to look at him, his eyes were rimmed red as he held back tears.
“I’m sorry, Michael, but,” Alex wet his lips and stared him down, “I’ll come back. I promise. I…I really hope when I do, that I won’t have to leave again…and that you’ll—that you might still want me around.”
Michael can’t stop it. He can’t. He walked forward, long strides quickly closing the distance between them, and brings his face to Alex’s. He kisses the man in front of him with all the love, longing, and promise he has in him. When they part, neither move away and, with Alex’s warm breath against his lips, he vows:
“I always want you around, Alex Manes. More than anything.”
The following kiss is soft and sad and desperate: a goodbye filled with uncertainty and the last shreds of hope. Michael’s thumb catches a stray tear before Alex is backing out of his hold and throwing his bag in the car. The sound of the car’s door shutting and the engine rumbling to life feel like nails on a chalkboard to his heart as he watches the car back out and drive away.
The dull ache in his chest is now a sharp pain. It’s a hot poker impaled through his chest, pieces of him scooped out and left to either shrivel and die in the desert sun or drive away with Alex. He wonders, if he could remember what the crash had felt like, if it would feel like this.