Chapter Text
Three years and five months ago
What in the bloody hell was Henry doing in a Catholic school?
He knew of course. As their grandmother’s only grandchildren from her only daughter, Henry and his siblings’ Gran had many opinions on how they were raised and what activities they participated in. His parents usually held their ground—Henry did not have to play polo, Bea did not have to learn the violin, Philip did not have to major in economics—but they had learned to pick their battles. His grandmother insisted on a religious education and would not be moved, so they made compromises. St. Anthony’s was one of the best schools in the state and it was close enough to home that they wouldn’t have to live in the dorms.
Henry leans against the cinder block wall outside of the front office, fiddling with the tie that he didn’t have to wear in middle school. The material of his dress shirt is scratchy against his skin and he’s sweating under the uniform blazer that’s far too hot for the late summer temperatures.
“Hey,” Henry hears someone say from his left and he startles slightly, fumbling to keep hold of the books in his hand. He looks over, and his mind goes blank when he sees the person smiling up at him. The boy holds out his hand, and Henry takes it reflexively. “I’m Alex Claremont-Diaz.”
Henry’s father would sometimes read the Bible to him as he fell asleep. He remembers it saying that we are ‘fearfully and wonderfully made.’ Henry had always liked poetry, and he thought that was a lovely sentiment, but he never truly understood what it meant. Until now.
Alex was bright and beautiful and ethereal—a square jawline so sharp it put the work of Michelangelo to shame, freckles scattered across his upturned nose as if painted by da Vinci with all the care that he used to depict Christ, the delicate angles of his face and curve of his waist so perfect, they could only be crafted by the hands of god himself.
“Henry,” he replies once he’s collected his thoughts enough to speak. He drops Alex’s hand after a few seconds too long. “Henry Fox.”
Alex smiles at him, revealing a deep dimple on his right cheek. Henry has to remind himself to breathe.
“I’m supposed to show you around,” he says, pointing behind him with his thumb. He turns and starts walking down the hall, trusting that Henry will follow. He does, taking a few long strides and falling into step beside Alex. “I’m president of the freshman class,” Alex says, looking over at him as he walks. “Which dorm are you in?”
Alex has an accent, similar to those that Henry has often heard since moving to Texas, but not as heavy. His vowels are drawn out and honeyed, and Henry isn’t sure whether he wants him to keep talking forever or shut up. Henry swallows to wet his throat. “Um, none of them. I only live about twenty minutes away so I stay at home.”
“Oh.” Henry almost thinks that he sounds disappointed. “Well, maybe we’ll have some classes together,” he says with a shrug.
Henry nods, but doesn’t reply. He keeps his eyes facing forward, though it's an effort, perpetually drawn to Alex like a moth to a flame. He crosses his arms over his chest, feeling uneasy. Something about Alex makes feelings flutter behind Henry’s ribcage that he has been insistently pushing to the back of his mind for years, not yet ready to face them.
Henry makes a silent vow to himself to stay as far away from Alex Claremont-Diaz as humanly possible.
"Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it."
———
Henry Fox liked to be alone.
He’s the only one in the hallway when he gets to school and starts rummaging through his locker, which isn’t unusual for him. He likes being to school the first thing in the morning. He likes the solitude, the quiet, the peace. The dimness in the halls, the only light coming from the sun peeking over the horizon and the fluorescent light pouring out of classroom windows and reflecting off the clean tile floors, it all reminds him of the church at night, when it’s silent and every small noise echoes around him.
He likes to be alone, always had.
When Henry was a kid, he lived in the big city of London, where everything was too loud, too crowded, too busy, too everything. Henry, on the other hand, was a quiet kid that liked sitting in a quiet room with a book or pen and paper. He was initially angry when his parents moved them to America to be closer to Gran, but he quickly settled in, finding that the rural, idyllic town was much more Henry’s speed.
Nowadays, Henry isn’t so much alone as he is lonely.
There’s a few people milling around the chapel when he gets there, chattering excitedly, happy to see each other after the few weeks of winter break. Henry doesn’t greet anyone before sitting down, putting the books that he grabbed from his locker for his first period class down next to him.
“Haz!” Pez exclaims a few minutes later as he picks up Henry’s books and drops them in his lap, taking their place. He throws an arm around Henry’s shoulders, pulling him close. He rolls his eyes, but doesn’t try to shrug him off.
“Since when are you a morning person?” Henry grumbles with a small, amused smile.
“Since it’s the first time I’ve seen your lovely face since December.” He squeezes Henry's face, his fingers digging into his cheeks, and this time, Henry does bat his hand away with a grimace. “Happy New Year.”
“Happy New Year Percy,” Henry replies congenially.
Everyone silences and settles into their seats as Father Richards steps up to the pulpit, straightening his papers as someone plays a hymn on the piano that a few girls in the front row sing along to. Henry feels his phone vibrate in his pocket, but he doesn’t have the chance to pull it out and check it before Father starts the opening prayer.
Henry doesn’t bow his head or close his eyes. He wasn’t Catholic; very few kids that went here actually were.
“I hope that Christmas was a time of great joy for you and your families,” Father Richards says once he finishes the prayer. He makes some announcements that aren’t relevant to Henry, so he tunes it out, studying the familiar lines of the stained glass window over his head.
The bang of the door at the back of the chapel echoes through the room, and everyone turns their head to see Alex Claremont-Diaz standing on the carpet just inside the door, chest rising and falling rapidly with each breath.
Father only pauses in his speech for a moment before going on, but Henry’s eyes track Alex as he rushes to find a seat. He ends up settling in next to his best friend Nora Holleran after she moves her backpack from the pew to make room for him, only a few rows in front of Henry.
“Seniors, you’re coming to the end of your time at St. Anthony’s. You’ve lived together, studied together, and most importantly prayed together,” Father goes on, but Henry doesn’t listen, paying more attention to the hushed conversation that he can hear between Nora and Alex.
“Nice of you to show up Sleeping Beauty,” Nora leans over to whisper in a teasing tone.
“Aw Nora,” Alex replies sarcastically, leaning his head to the side and flashing a winning smile. “You think I’m pretty?”
Nora narrows her eyes at him and raises her middle finger, which makes Alex laugh quietly, his eyes lighting up with humor and his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down slightly. Henry’s eyes diligently track the movement.
Henry can feel his phone vibrate again. He leans back in his seat, the hard wood of the pew digging into the top of his spine, not reaching into his pocket to check it. Alex turns around and insistently meets his eye, giving him an expectant look. Henry raises a single eyebrow at him, making him huff and whip his head back around.
He zones out for the rest of the assembly, startled to attention at the sound of rustling as people stand and start to rush down the aisles to get to class. Henry stands and slips into the crowd, Pez following close behind.
“What’s your first class?” Percy asks as he walks up next to him.
“Creative writing seminar.”
Pez makes a pained sound. “You always have been a masochist. Didn’t anyone tell you that the final semester of senior year was for shirking your responsibilities and getting pissed?”
“I must have missed that in the school newsletter,” Henry replies flatly.
Pez smirks. “Well I have to get to art class with the rest of the slackers with some sense of self preservation,” he says as he turns down the hallway in the opposite direction of where Henry is headed. “Enjoy your adverbs and suffering my dear!” he calls loudly over his shoulder with no consideration for the other people in the hallway.
Henry rolls his eyes, yet smiles as he turns and resumes walking down the hallway. He only makes it a few steps before long fingers close around his wrist and yank him into the doorway of an empty classroom.
“Finally,” Alex breathes out, sounding exasperated. “You ever heard of answering a text Fox?”
Henry gives Alex a once over with a judgmental brow raised. The golden light of early morning pours in through the large windows that line the halls, reminding Henry of the first time that he saw Alex, sunlight illuminating his curls and his warm skin. “Some people actually pay attention when others speak.”
Alex hums neutrally, needlessly running his hand over the lapel of Henry’s already pristine blazer. “Such a good Catholic.” Henry gives an unimpressed look, which of course makes a pleased smile rise on Alex’s face, revealing the dimple that Henry longs to run the tips of his fingers over. “I was looking for you all morning.”
“Is that why you were late?”
Alex rolls his eyes. “What are you my fucking mom?”
“Language Claremont!” someone—Henry thinks it’s Hunter—calls out as he passes them.
“It’s Claremont-Diaz asshole!” Alex yells after them and then turns back to him. “So how was your break?”
“Can this not wait until after classes?”
Alex shrugs, leaning back against the wall nonchalantly. “I have student council during lunch so I won’t see you until three.”
Henry smiles, mirroring Alex’s posture. “It was alright,” he says. It’s a lie. It was quiet and awkward and often painful. Christmas used to be a joyful time in the Fox house, with Mum always baking something smelling of cinnamon and cardamom and Dad singing off key while Henry played the piano and Bea her acoustic guitar. This was their second Christmas without Dad, and Henry tried to cook even though he was rubbish at it and Mum took a great deal of prodding to get out of bed and sit silently at the table and Bea hadn’t come home. It was far from alright. The look Alex gives him makes it clear that he knows Henry is purposefully omitting the crucial details. “How was yours?” Henry deflects.
Alex leans his head back into the cinderblock, groaning. “That bad?” Henry asks with a small, amused laugh at Alex’s dramatic display.
“Not terrible,” Alex concedes. “June was there.” One corner of Henry’s lips lifts in a half smile. Alex talked about his sister often. It was obvious how much he missed her since she graduated last year and went to college at UCLA.
They both look up as the bell rings, alerting them that they have three minutes to get to class before they’re marked late. “Fuck,” Alex says as he bends down to lift his backpack off the ground and over his shoulder. “I have to get to class or Mr. Lester is going to kill me.” He starts to walk down the hall but turns back to him to say, “Remind me to tell you about the fight my parents had this year. It was like two tiger sharks fighting over a baby seal.”
“Dinner and a show.”
Alex laughs and turns around, walking down the hall in earnest. “See you around Fox!” he calls over his shoulder.
Henry rolls his eyes, but smiles as he leans his shoulder against the hard wall, watching Alex’s retreating form until he turns around the corner and out of sight.
The hinges to Mr. Srivastava’s door have always creaked, and the noise makes the man, as well as everyone else already in the classroom, glance up to look at Henry. He offers a small smile and a congenial, “Good morning Henry.”
Henry wishes him a good morning and offers a smile in return before going to his seat and opening his laptop. Mr. Srivastava was actually Henry's favorite teacher, as he was encouraging without being patronizing, helpful without being overbearing, kind without being overly friendly.
Students trickle into the classroom one by one, the silence gradually filling with the rustling of backpacks and the chattering of students who haven’t seen each other in weeks and the creaking of the door opening and falling closed again. When the bell rings marking the beginning of the school day, the seats are about half filled with thirteen people, which is expected as this was a relatively small school and this class was particularly unpopular. The Senior Writing Seminar is a particularly difficult creative writing class, the coursework so intensive that it fulfills eight college credits. Most seniors in their last semester of high school were—understandably, Henry supposes—uninterested.
The first day is reserved to go over the rather lengthy syllabus, but Henry has practically memorized it. He spends most of the period looking out the window, at the trees in the quad casting shadows on the browning grass. Henry misses living somewhere that it would snow in the winter. It rarely snowed in Texas.
Henry was quick to close his laptop and collect his things after the bell rang, but he halts to a stop when he hears Mr. Srivastava call out his name. “Can I speak with you for a minute?” Henry nods, sitting at the desk directly in front of him. “Have you heard back from any colleges yet?”
“A few.”
“Columbia?”
“Not yet,” Henry answers with a shake of his head.
“Don’t be discouraged by that. You only applied a few weeks ago. You’re a very strong applicant.”
Henry smiles a bit sheepishly at the compliment, shrugging a single shoulder. “I’m,” he starts hesitantly. He applied to so many great schools, so many amazing programs, but he knew where he was going, where he had to go. It’s where his brother went, where his parents taught classes, the only school that his grandmother would find acceptable. “I’m going to ACU.” Mr. Srivastava’s face is blanker than usual. The silence stretches thin between them until Henry huffs. “What?”
“That’s a Christian University.” It isn’t a question. “I’m not sure it’s the right choice for you.”
Henry’s eyebrow shoots up unbidden. “Is that really your place to say?”
He folds his hands atop his desk, challenge in his expression. “I’ve been your teacher for a long time. I think I have some idea of what programs are a good fit for you.” Srivastava leans forward, insistently encouraging Henry to meet his eye. “Abilene is a religious university with a very strict honor code that can be discriminatory to certain students.” He takes a significant pause. “Do you really think that you would thrive there?”
Henry shifts, turning away to look unseeingly out the window. They both know what he means by ‘certain students.’ Henry has been taking Mr. Srivastava’s classes for years, and it only took a few weeks for the teacher to pull Henry aside to tell him that he should feel free to write about what he wants, not what he thinks he should. After a few months, Henry started turning in stories that he actually felt excited to write, most of them unapologetically queer—the kind of stories that he would not be free to read, write, or even talk about at a university like the one that his family has chosen for him.
Henry clenches his jaw, so hard that he can feel the muscle strain. “I’m late to history.”
He sighs, ripping a piece of a paper off his pad to write him a pass. When Henry grabs it, Mr. Srivastava does not release it from his hold. Henry flicks his eyes up questioningly. “Just don’t commit to anything yet,” he instructs. “Give yourself more time to think about it. You have an amazing amount of potential and talent Henry; I’d hate to see you squander it. You could really be something someday.”
The completely genuine compliment makes him uncomfortable, forcing him to look away. He nods, still avoiding eye contact, and he finally releases the note and allows him to leave.
The words repeat on a loop in Henry’s mind through the rest of his classes— you could really be something someday.
Henry had become very good at being the person people expected him to be. It was much easier than trying to be who he really was, as he had no idea what that person would truly be like.
When he tries to imagine the future he wants, all he sees is a blank slate, a black hole, the cursor on an empty word document blinking at him mockingly. There was no point—his future had already been written for him.