Chapter Text
NEW YORK, MAY 2008
Music blares through the giant speakers that are, frankly, too close for Alec to enjoy or peacefully tolerate. The DJ plays an upbeat track, or maybe it’s the club remix of a song Alec doesn’t know. The thrumming base moves through his chest and confuses his heart with every incessant beat.
“Alec! What are you doing here? Go dance!” It’s Izzy, in the red dress she left the house in, but now a light sheen of sweat covers her face and her hair looks slightly less immaculate. She’s the spitting image of carefree fun. “You can’t just sit here and mope all night.” it sounds like a challenge. Alec only raises an eyebrow in response.
“I shouldn't have come to the dance.” he raises his voice as much as he can so that Izzy can hear him.
“Don't say that. You should be here having fun like everyone else.” she takes one of his hands in hers pulling him towards the dance floor, but Alec makes no move to follow and stays planted in his seat. “C’mon! It’s your senior year! Have some fun!” There was not much more she could say through the music. He rolls his eyes, a sign that Izzy recognizes as Alec being stubborn, and lets go of him. She raises her hands in defeat. “Can’t say I didn’t try!” she walks away and disappears into the mob of dancing teenagers.
Alec is sitting on a plastic folding chair in the high school gym, the hardwood floor is strewn with balloons and confetti, watching Magnus, the person he cares about, dance with someone else. Alec’s chest constricts even tighter. Watching them dance makes the aching more consuming, but he doesn’t tear his eyes away.
Magnus laughs at something Dot whispers in his ear and Alec starts to begrudge not being out. A terrifying thought. He hates it. How one fact about himself can possibly change so many things in his life. How he hasn’t had the courage to tell anyone but Magnus that he’s gay. How he didn’t have to tell Magnus just merely confirm what Magnus already suspected. How he’s almost sure Izzy and Jace know but don’t mention it. The fact that he even has to come out at all. It never bothered him this much before- well before meeting Magnus. Magnus, who saw him, talked to him, and took him just like that. Magnus didn’t ask Alec to explain his shifting moods, just supplied the levity to distract him from it all. His heart nearly restarts every time Magnus smiles at him.
Magnus is at the center of a group dancing with Dot, both moving fluidly as if they somehow rehearsed prior to tonight. Magnus is lit in blue and green lights and there is confetti in his hair adorning the blonde spikes. The song changes and the look of pure excitement on Magnus’ face has Alec’s heart doing flips and he has to concentrate on the wood pattern on the floor to remember how to breathe.
Alec recognizes the song as Crank That by Soulja Boy. Magnus played it for him saying “This is killer!” and Alec found himself agreeing.
It’s a thing. It’s definitely become a thing. The direct correlation between Alec liking something and Magnus is a slope that only goes up, he finds. He doesn’t have such varied taste in music like Magnus or Izzy and may have been repulsed by the song when Jace played it loudly in the car, but when Magnus mouthed the words to it, he decided it wasn’t so bad. Alec tries not to think about it.
He finds Izzy at the edge of the dance floor with, who Alec assumes is the Meliorn she’s mentioned over the past few days and lets her know that he’s leaving and to call when she and Jace need a ride home. She gives him her signature ‘really Alec?’ look but nods and lets him go.
At Starlight Diner, Alec furiously stabs his milkshake with a straw. He doesn’t want to go home yet in case his parents are awake and decide to ask him questions he doesn’t exactly have answers to. He takes a sip of the sugary chocolate mocha concoction, when the cherry on top of his drink is plucked by deft fingers.
“I knew I’d find you here.” Magnus says and takes the cherry between his teeth. He slides into the booth, looking out of place in his maroon nearly see through shirt, that Alec is convinced is a punishment for something terrible he must have done in a past life. He keeps his eyes on Magnus’ face. Also breath taking. How rude, he thinks.
“Magnus you should be at the dance.” Alec says. Magnus ignores him as he reaches for the milkshake on the table between them and takes a long pull from the straw.
“You left.” Magnus huffs. “You didn’t even give me a chance to ask you to dance. I’m deeply offended.” He says clutching his chest and looking wounded.
“Ah, I think I spared you actually.” Alec takes the milkshake back. “Dancing is not something I’ve been called ‘good’ at.” Magnus rolls his eyes and murmurs what Alec thinks is the word idiot and well he’s not wrong. “What about Dot?” Alec asks.
“She had an early curfew, so I took her home.” Magnus says. “Granted, I’m pretty sure she’s sneaking out and go to the party at the Blackthorns.” Magnus reaches for the milkshake and uses the straw to scoop the whipped cream into his mouth.
“You could still go. Party sounds fun.” Alec focuses on the milkshake glass.
“Come with me.” Magnus says.
“No.”
“Then no.” Magnus says decidedly.
“I don’t even know why I went to the dance. I didn’t have anyone to go with.” Magnus puts the straw back and pushes the milkshake toward Alec.
“You didn’t have to go with someone to have fun Alexander. Also, to find a date you kind of have to ask someone. That means talking to people.” Magnus has a point.
“Easy for you to say. Dot asked you. Do you know how nerve wracking it is to ask someone out?” he leans back, stretching his long legs beneath the booth. Alec takes a long sip of mocha blended ice and his face pinches in the wake of brain freeze.
“Yes and I would have asked someone, but I said yes to Dot first,” he takes the milkshake from Alec. “What’s the worst that could happen anyway? That they say no?”
“Precisely,” Alec sets his elbows on the table “followed by death.” he deadpans.
“Hey,” Magnus huffs. “I’m the ‘dramatic one’ as you’ve put it. And it’s not like there is only one person out there. You could have more than one guy in mind.”
“Like a backup?” Alec asks and it’s in these moments that he hates how often he thinks out loud when talking with Magnus.
“Yes, like a backup.” Magnus takes another sip. “A friend, you know?”
“Seems a bit cruel to make someone a second choice.” Alec points out.
“Don’t think of it like that. I would have been your back up.” Magnus gestures a hand to his face. “You could have had this, Alexander.” Magnus laughs, a low musical laugh and Alec wants to drown in the sound.
Alec pushes down the nervous feeling rising in his chest. His ears feel hot. “I wish it were that easy. It’s just so… much. Finding someone. I couldn’t find a date to a high school dance, how is the rest of my life going to be? I’m gonna be thirty and single and living with my parents.” Alec drops his head into the crook of his elbow and groans.
“So your dad’s back?” Magnus asks quietly after a moment. Alec turns his head to face Magnus, resting his cheek on his arm.
“Yes.” Alec sighs. “This time it’s all ‘You need to find a girlfriend son.’ and I’m just adding it to the list of things I’m going to disappoint him with.” He sits up, shoulders slumping under an invisible weight. “I just wish I had a sure way to know that life won’t always be so . . . uncertain. So much has to happen for me to be ha- ugh, never mind.” Alec takes a deep breath, it’s shaky like there isn’t enough air to fill his lungs.
Magnus stays quiet and slides the glass towards Alec who takes it nervously.
“You know, not everything happens according to plan Alexander.” Magnus says after a short while of watching Alec stare into the pool of blended mocha in the glass. “Things will happen as they happen, you just gotta go with it.”
Alec groans. “It would be nice to have a backup plan, but for . . . life.”
“I’ll be your backup.” Magnus blurts out almost too quickly.
“What?” Alec’s brows knit together. He’s not sure he heard that correctly. It doesn’t make sense. “You’re serious?”
“Y-yes. Well only if you are my backup too.” Magnus says. “If neither of us are married by thirty, we . . . could get married . . .” his voice trails off. Alec says nothing. “I mean, I don’t know, it’s a long time from now. By then we might both be happy and married and who knows if we are even gonna know each other then or be in the same place, so it might not even-”
“Okay.” Alec says, breaking through Magnus’ rambling.
“Okay?” Magnus takes a breath.
“Yeah. If neither of us are married by the time we are thirty, we give it a shot.” Alec sets his hands on the table. “Like you said, who knows, but it feels nice to have something good to fall back on.” He tries to keep down the hint of a smile on his face, biting the inside of his cheek.
“Okay.” Magnus breathes out, looking relieved. Neither of them say anything for a long moment. For that minute they are just two friends, sitting in a diner, making a ridiculous pact over a milkshake.
Alec wants to remember this image of Magnus sitting in a cracked diner booth with a cherry stem slotted between his fingers like a tiny cigarette. Magnus has a few stray of pieces of tissue confetti in his hair, making him look like a snapshot taken from a lucrative party and badly photoshopped into the yellow light of the diner that doesn’t dare touch him enough to wash him out.
Alec’s phone buzzes in his pocket. It’s a text from Izzy: can you take me to helens party ???
“So” Alec starts, “about that party at Helen’s, you still wanna go?”
“Are you asking me to accompany you?” Magnus says cocking an eyebrow.
Alec pretends to be thinking, pouting his lips and studying the air around Magnus. “Maybe.” he says, but the pleading look that appears on his face betrays him. Parties aren’t appealing to Alec, but if Izzy and Magnus are there then maybe it’s worth going. Magnus slides out of the booth and extends a hand to Alec.
He takes Magnus’ hand and steadies himself.
“Let’s go future husband.” Magnus says and this time, Alec can’t stop his smile.