Chapter Text
Education: NYU Philosophy major.
Well, not exactly true. Henry bites into the inside of his cheek, moves his foot stretched across the sofa’s armrest to the rhythm of Ashley Tisdale’s take on Last Christmas he often finds himself gravitating towards while slightly tipsy, and reconsiders.
Education: Ex-NYU Philosophy major. Pre-Law on a gap year.
Not exactly true, either. But better. Casual, with just a hint of poshness. He hits the preview on his profile and his brow furrows. Definitely too long. Makes him look like he’s trying too hard, which he definitely is not.
Education: NYU.
Perfect. No need to overdo it. He scrolls down through blank windows. “Job title”? Maybe one day. “Company”? Nope. “Living in”? He just allowed Tinder to use his location, didn’t he? “Don’t show my age”? Who in the devil would ever need that one?
Henry shifts his body in a concerning angle to reach for the bottle of red wine from the floor and raises his upper parts just enough not to choke on his huge gulp. This app is already starting to feel itchy, and he hasn’t even made a single swipe yet. He puts the bottle back down and his head falls back on the sofa, when the front door opens.
“Mate.” Pez sends him a disapproving stare the moment he notices him. “This literally looks as if you hadn’t twitched since I left.”
Pez is fully dressed, sharp silver suit and a turquoise shirt, curly hair nicely trimmed and wide dark eyes covered with glittery eyeshadow, back from a conference on one of his endless passion projects. Henry loves him, more than he’d ever think he could love anyone who’s known him back in Eton, but right now, watching him stand there all pretty and judgemental, such contrast to Henry’s greasy hair, old sweatpants and fluffy Christmas socks, he kind of wants to throw the wine bottle at him.
“Excuse you, I have moved,” Henry says, not even lifting his head. He puts his phone down and stares at the ceiling. “I have walked all the way to the door and back once my falafels came.”
“You spent another day on the couch, not even bothering to scrap a plate of pasta this time,” Pez muffles, crossing to the armchair facing Henry. “And I’m not even surprised. And this, my dear, is a sign that your habits are becoming concerning.”
Henry sits up to look at his flatmate with as much dignity as he can gather.
“I’m allowed to have feelings, Percy, and deal with them as I find appropriate.”
“You absolutely do” Pez rests his elbows on the coffee table between them and leans forward to face Henry. “But it’s been a month since you’re single, and some seven rereads of Northanger Abbey since you’re a sad, purposeless human shell. Jobless, may I add.”
Henry mirrors Pez movements, which puts their faces a tad too close, and goes for the same serious tone.
“I’m working on it.”
“You’re not-” Pez stops, and his nose wrinkles. He gives Henry a half-smirk. “Is that bloody red I’m smelling?” he asks, and then he laughs jovially and springs up to walk to the kitchen.
“What?” Henry calls after him “It’s Friday!”
“It’s Friday 5 PM!” Pez laughs, yanking the cupboard door open. “This is great, actually. Pajama days, red wine, food delivered under your nose. Some lovely life you’re living.”
“If you must know,” Henry says. “I spent some solid hours on a job hunt. And, having found nothing appealing, sadly, I decided to take care of other aspect of my misery.”
“You applied for your Masters?” Pez drops, unimpressed.
There’s a gulp in Henry’s throat, but red wine pushes the next sentence through it: “I joined Tinder.”
Pez drops the pack of Earl Grey he’s been holding and freezes by the counter, staring at Henry, his smile growing so wide it takes up half of his face in a second.
“No fucking way.”
“Well,” Henry offers, instantly regretting every single decision he’s made for the last twelve hours. “I. Might have been drunkish when I did that-”
“No! No, no, no, you poodle,” Percy resumes making tea, now half a bit faster. “Don’t you dare gobble around it. This is good. This is terrific,” He vigorously pours milk in two cups resembling Christmas stockings. “This? Might be the singular best decision you made since I’ve met you.”
Henry blinks, not certain how to proceed. “Thank you, I suppose. I did decide to move here with you, though, so you might want to show some more appreciation for that one.”
“Oh, one truly brilliant idea,” Pez chuckles, getting the cups from the counter and starting back to the sofa. “Drop everything you know and move to the country you hate for the degree you don’t even care about just to see your family twice a year less. Nope” He moves Henry’s legs to the floor, causing him to almost fall from the couch, and takes a seat by him. “That was you being pathetic. This ” he points at the phone between them. “This is you actually taking charge of your life. In your own, semi-active way.”
“Why do I feel like you’re overreacting?” Henry takes a careful sip from the cup he was offered.
“Cause you’re drunk,” Pez flashes him a bright smile. “Come on. I know it’s not very you, but it’s about time. You definitely need your dick sucked.”
Henry makes a show of choking on his earl grey to buy himself some time to think of an answer to that, and, maybe, to hide some embarrassment, but then a female voice cuts in with “Do you guys need a minute? I can come back later,” and his theatrical coughs become authentic.
“Hi, babe,” Pez promptly ignores his desperate gasps for air. “‘been standing there long?”
“Not too long, luckily for all of us,” the girl drops her baby blue coat on the armchairs and throws her arms around Pez’s neck, resting her chin on the tip of his head so that her eyes are almost on the same height as Henry’s. “Is Henry getting laid?”
“Hi, June,” Henry offers, breathing heavily and clutching to his cup for dear life. He only gets a honey-sweet smile and raised brows as a response, making it known he should answer. “I joined Tinder today.”
“Oh my God, baby, that’s awesome news!” June exclaims. “Are you sure you’re ready?”
“Honestly-”
“ I’m sure I’m ready for you to be ready,” Pez cuts in before he can finish. “You need to get back to live. You know, maybe you should tag along tonight.”
“You totally should!” June picks up the idea, and Henry takes the stare off her bright face to the bottle of red on the floor.”
“What’s the cake situation?” he asks, trying not to sound hopelessly disinterested.
“It’s a birthday party,” June goes on, her voice soaked with amusement as if she just had an epiphany. “The birthday boy is twenty one, a real teddy bear - sweet, kind, pretty, head stuffed with plush, negative IQ score. A perfect one night stand. The space is booked seat per person, but my brother’s ditching so you can jump into his spot.”
June’s brother. Henry’s stomach tangles embarrassingly.
“Alex’s not coming?” he asks, doing his best to sound casual.
“Nope,” June says. “He likes to occasionally remind people that he’s a huge ass nerd who studies at Christmas. So you can totally cut in, he won’t mind.”
Henry isn’t so certain - from what little he had listened to Alex talk, he learned that there must be very few things Alex doesn’t mind. He’s always going about things that need either an improvement (NYC public transportation, American healthcare, Star Wars’ soundtracks) or an extinction (racism, university tuition fees, monarchy), though most of the time, nobody asks, and he generally seems to be annoyed a lot. Especially when he needs to acknowledge Henry’s presence - this, somehow, seems to never fail to unnerve him. Henry can’t imagine a valid reason for it, but he’s seen enough of this aversion in their interactions to phantom that Alex will not be over the moon with having his spot taken by Henry, even if he didn’t plan to make use of it anyway.
Which, if he were to be honest, is exactly why some two hours and two glasses of wine later he changes into a button up shirt and dress pants, combs his hair, throws his phone into his coat’s pocket and joins June and Pez.
❅❅❅
In the uber to the club Henry has to admit to himself that he is a tiny bit disappointed that he’s not seeing Alex tonight. Not that he thought he might be seeing him tonight - he definitely did not plan leaving the apartment under any circumstances, and once he did, it was solely on the premise of Alex not being where he’s going. It’s just that, June mentioned him - and Henry’s mind immediately offered an image of brown curls, and sparkling brown eyes, and white sleeves pulled up strong forearms, and a chin dimple, and, well. Henry hasn’t seen those since October, and he’s just thinking. It wouldn’t be absolutely terrible to see Alex.
It wouldn’t feel good to see him, either. It never quite is - Alex would most probably monopolise every discussion he’s in, make some very controversial comments as if they were absolutely obvious, befriend eleven people who aren’t Henry, and then ditch each of them half sentence to go bump his arse to some early 2000s travesty. He’s always so fucking loud and intimidating, Henry has no idea how to act around him. Which doesn’t change the fact that he feels somewhat drawn to him, that there’s a part of him that wants to stay around Alex, and just stand in close proximity in all of his awkward masochism. Henry really despites that part.
Henry’s not an idiot, though - he knows that he’s been attracted to Alex since the second he first saw him. Maybe longer, actually. He has this vague memory of getting drunk with Pez in the middle of the week, right after he met June for the first time when she was writing an article about him for the New York Times, and asking if she by any chance has a brother, and if so, is he by any chance gay. It wasn’t about Alex back then - it was about June being very pretty, sweet and a perfect match for Pez, and about Henry being lonely, and freshly out of another crappy relationship, and jealous. Still, then it turned out that June actually has a brother, and this brother happens to look just like her and share none of her other qualities, except for calamitous heterosexuality. A truly Shakespearean, however brutal, irony that didn’t stop Henry’s breath from catching every time Alex is mentioned.
“Hen?” Pez throws him back into reality. “Do pause your sad music video and share a thought with the class.”
Henry blinks twice and looks away from the rain drops on the car window. “I really wish we had white Christmas this year.”
“It’s 46 degrees,” the Uber driver offers.
“I have no idea what the fuck that means.”
Anyway, Henry hasn’t seen Alex since June’s birthday party in October and, he realises with dread, he kind of misses the agony of being in one room with him. Not that this means anything, truly. Alex probably doesn’t even remember his name - he has way too many things to do and people to meet to bother remembering his sister’s boyfriend’s awkward flatmates, Henry can easily tell from his Instagram profile. Which he doesn’t follow. He just takes a quick look at it every now and again. For absolutely no reason at all. But still, Alex’s company would be appreciated. He would probably go on some tirade about American history or presidency of George fucking Bush, junior or senior, or other war criminal Henry has very limited idea about, and Henry could just stand there and listen. Because there is something about Alex that makes every single topic he chooses captivating. He’s just that easily charismatic. Or cute.
Cute , good Lord. Henry’s drunk.
If he’s drunk enough to refer to Alexander Claremont-Diaz as cute , even if only to himself, he definitely is drunk enough to stumble on his way out of the Uber. Also, drunk enough to have to cling to Pez’s forearm to steady himself on the way from the car to the club’s entrance. Drunk enough to ignore June’s jokes about his pre-drinks habits, and even drunk enough to laugh at some. Drunk enough to come up to the club security person and whisper something about crashing the teddy bear’s party.
And, surprisingly, not quite sober enough to get in.
“‘Scuse me?”
“One, he literally just told me he’s trying to crash.” Security guy says to June, promptly enjoying Henry, who’s very confused and, apparently, also holding his elbow. “He’s not on the list, and he’s not even trying to hide it. And two, even if he was, he’s fucking hammered.”
“‘M not mmered,” Henry shakes his head, clutching security guy’s elbow tighter. “‘M just like this. You know, mate. English.”
“I’m not letting him in.”
Which is why, after some very blurry attempt to negotiate, (“What if I paid you 50 bucks?” “Drop it, dude.” “Okay, how about I’ll grab a coffee with you tomorrow?” “Please leave before I have to nine one one you.”), Henry’s sitting back in an Uber June got for him, with the exact same driver, who’s enjoying this way too much.
He gets another bottle of red in his local convenience store and collapses back on the couch as soon as he enters. He stares numbly in the void for a second, thinking about his options for the evening, when his phone buzzes.
A Tinder notification. Well. Henry almost forgot. A message from a Kyle. God, he really had to get drunker than he thought if he swiped right somebody named Kyle. He promptly ignores the “waddup” he got, but doesn’t seem to close the app..
It’s been long, and Henry’s drunk enough to admit he’s horny, so, though still hesitant and unconvinced, he gives this Tinder thing a chance. A twenty four years old wanna be rapper. An army boy. Somebody who claims he’s twenty one but definitely is not. The guy Henry made out with at an inauguration party last year. A solid gulp of wine. One cute guy with in round glasses and a blue sweater. Henry smiles slightly and reads the bio. Biology student, comic book fan. He can work with that. He closes the to look through the pictures and- well. The guy is dressed in an opossum costume in the third pic. Well. A gulp of wine. A swipe left - furries make him feel very uneasy. A bare chest with no bio. A gulp of wine. An Instagram influencer with a classic gym mirror shot. A gulp of wine. Somebody named Steven who uses pics of this young French Oscar nominee. A gulp of wine. A poorly masked marijuana dealer. A gulp of wine. A- holy fuck .
Henry sits up so rapidly the movement makes a bit of wine splash out of the bottle, and stares at the phone as if it had just bitten him. This can’t be it. Henry has never been a spiritual one but if he’s seeing it right, this must be some kind of shady higher power pulling his leg. He locks the phone. Puts it down. Takes another sip of wine. Drums his nails on the table. Laughs to himself. Shakes his head. Takes a breath. Puts up his phone again. Stares at the dark screen. Unlocks it.
Yep, still there. A smiling selfie in the sun. Brown skin and white polo, smile wide, eyes squinted. A chin dimple. Alex, 21. NYU.
Henry’s heart is beating out of his chest when he looks through the photos. There he is: Alex at a debating competition, Alex in a hurried mirror shot in an elevator, Alex with June by some water body, Alex in a blurry party selfie. His bio reads just: “on my way from texas sweetheart to america’s favorite. what’s your fav star wars movie”.
There are. So many questions in Henry’s head. He takes a deep, shaking breath and swipes right before his anxious, wine drunk brain can provide any answers, and then his heartbeat stops for an instant because the screen goes baby pink and fancy Tiner font announces: It’s a match!