Archive of Our Own

“I guess this is it.”

He didn’t need to say it, both of them already knew. There was no preamble to this day, or maybe every day before this one had been one in itself. Thomas was never really one to get existential on these kinds of topics, if he dwelled on these kinds of things too long he started to stretch into what the meaning of life was and other broader topics that he really should have the answers for but didn’t.

He didn’t care about it, any of it, the sun could explode right now if it wanted to and in eight minutes everything would start to die.

And for those eight minutes he’d still watch Alexander Hamilton smoke a cigarette.

He wished he’d known him longer, most might say 6,000 years was a long time to know someone but it hadn’t been enough. Not when the first centuries had been mindless bickering and the ones following had been the coming together into an awkward friendship, by the later years they’d found their common ground, their mutual comradery but it had all seemed to go by faster than Thomas could comprehend it.

It was as though he’d blinked and then here they were in this field waiting for the end of the world. As disgustingly sappy as it sounded it was true and Thomas wanted to turn back time, if he had been able he’d reach his hands into the sky and rotate the sun, back to the very first day he’d said hello to him.

And he would have told him how pretty his eyes were.

Alexander finishes the cigarette, snuffs it out under his sneaker and pulls another from the package, he claims it's his last pack and he wants to finish it while they still have ground to stand on, Thomas wishes he wouldn’t, when he does he will no longer have a reason to stand here with him.

Thomas has the lighter.

He passes it over, tells himself his hands are shaking because of the cold and not because Alex’s fingers brushed against his own or because he smiled at him using his teeth which Thomas knew meant it was a real smile.

He clutched his jacket tighter around him and shifted from one foot to the other.

They leaned in to each other against the cold. He wanted to say something, but what? He would have no problem opening his mouth and letting the words spill out of him if only he knew what to say. He remembered nothing before this, it was as if Alexander had always been a part of him, as though his own feelings had always been waiting to come forth and meeting him had been their call.

It was an eerie kind of thing, to be so attuned to your body's own desires. Though he’s not sure even now that he quite understands why he has been made to feel this way. Especially as an angel, he shouldn’t be having these sorts of feelings, especially about a demon.

Maybe he’d been tempted and failed.

And now he was lying to himself. He had been alone his entire life, and truly it shouldn't have bothered him. He'd never had company so he shouldn't be missing it. But he did, he’d left heaven, a place supposed to be full of light and good things, leaving behind flocks of angels feeling unseen and unheard. And despite the fact that most of his and Alex’s earlier conversations had been screaming matches he was being listened to.

In the past after their meetings he’d go back to the little apartment he’d been inhabiting on Earth as he kept an eye on things and he couldn’t complain about any of it because he craved the attention from him, though back then he hadn’t known why. And granted there was no one to complain to.

“You want?” Alex offered the cigarette, blowing out a cloud of smoke. It dangled between two fingers. Thomas declined, Thomas always declined but Alex always offered and with a shrug Alex took it back.

Thomas wanted to be happy. He wanted to be content with what he had, and wanted to feel grateful. And yet he could not. He was not.

He was a dreamer, he had always been told that, he ran wild with outlandish ideas that would never come true. He couldn’t help it, he’d felt trapped in his own life and he wanted to be rescued. He didn't know who would do this and he didn't consider the fact that it was very impossible, but he just toyed with the idea of it. Of seeing and touching another thing like him and hearing someone else's voice and not being alone.

Alexander had listened to these ideas. On warm nights when they lie sprawled on a rooftop in whatever city they had fancied at the time. And he advised Thomas to keep his dreams to himself.

“You’re much too wonderful to be a fallen angel.”

“Tell me a story Tom.” Had he really finished the cigarette that fast? He was already reaching for another and without being prompted Thomas handed over the lighter.

“A story?”

Alex nodded as he lit it. “You always have the best ones, come on now, it's my last request before we never see each other again.”

Thomas wishes he wouldn’t speak in such a way.

"Once upon a time." He put the lighter in his pocket. "A boy was trapped on an island.”

He looked out over the grass, there's a breeze that ruffles the flowers. He prays the end never comes.

"And one day from out of nowhere, a train touched down on the sand."

“A train?”

Thomas ignored the question.

"And the boy wasn't afraid."

He ached with the want, with the need to press closer to him, to listen to the tortuous beating of his heart, at least once, he didn’t feel like he was asking for much, but he could never.

"And a man, no an angel, stepped out."

Alex lays his head against Thomas’s arm he is shivering and without trying to think about it too much Thomas puts an arm around his shoulders.

"And the angel took the boy away."

“Where’d they go?”

Thomas smiled, his nose unbearably cold as he rubbed his sleeve over it.

“It doesn’t matter, all that matters is the boy never had to be alone again."

“I don’t happen to know this boy do I?”

“Wherever did you get that idea?”

Alex pushes into him a little more with a laugh. Thomas wants to kiss him, very fiercely, on the mouth.

“Because I know you, you always think of stupid stuff like that.” He takes another drag of the cigarette. “Do you remember the first day we met?”

Thomas lounged peacefully in the cool grass beneath a tree in a field much like this one but in a location he cannot remember.

Part of him was pleased that God had allowed him his solitude on Earth. The other part of him wished that he wasn't here at all because it only reminded him of how truly alone he was. Oftentimes on days like these he would envision himself as just a normal person who was simply sitting under this tree because it fancied him and perhaps later he would go for a walk among the wildflowers or discover someplace new and see things he had only ever heard stories of.

Thomas had a fondness for humans. He envied them and their simplicity, their freedom and their drive. Not having to mindlessly and obediently follow the orders of one who could obliterate them with a snap of his fingers. In his opinion they were the only good thing to come out of God’s multitude of creations.

He’d been enjoying feeling as though he were one of them on the day they met. Sometimes at night when he could not sleep he would mull over that day in his mind wondering if there had been some shift or change that he had missed. But the day had been normal.

That day he had opted to lounge in the branches of said tree since the sun was on a cycle and he wanted to remain cool. It was up there in the branches with the flowers and the wind and his late afternoon drowsiness that he’d first seen him.

Now anyone meeting a demon for the first time often doesn't even know it. The reason being that they don't always give off a demonic appearance the same way that angels don't go flaunting their wings and halos around everywhere when they visit Earth.

At first Thomas thought he was imagining things. Perhaps it was a large bird or a trick of the light. After all this was his own private place, he’d never seen anyone else this far out. Then the shape had moved, actually moved. Walking across the branches as though it were nothing. Thomas scrambled to his feet on a branch.

"W...Who goes there!?" He shouted at the figure who was still partially hidden by shadows. If he squinted he could make out a small humanoid shape.

The mysterious figure gave no verbal response instead it laughed. One short brief laugh that coiled a shred of annoyance in Thomas’s gut.

"I said who goes there!?" He asked a bit louder, straightening his spine trying to appear taller and more intimidating.

"I'd keep it down if i were you." The figure drawled. “No reason to make unnecessary noise.”

The voice was male. It was sultry and low. And with that one sentence Thomas knew everything he needed.

"Demon." Thomas spoke again. “You aren’t meant to be here.”

The demon laughed again, seeming to enjoy the situation. "Isn't that like my entire persona? Doing things I'm not supposed to do?"

"What are you doing here?" Thomas asked keeping a safe distance between them. Never once taking his eyes away from the darkness he hid in.

"I saw a lonely angel who I thought might like some company." Thomas started at this answer. He had been expecting some sarcastic remark or perhaps more appropriately, silence but not this. Something wasn't right.

"Can we talk on the ground?" The demon asked.

Thomas hesitated. Though it was more common for demons to roam the Earth than angels, it was less common for the two sides to seek each other out. And he was even more concerned with how he was going to get him to leave. For the time being he decided to play along. The demon couldn't really do anything if they were talking.

He nodded. "Ok demon, let's talk."

In one fluid movement they were both on the ground, and Thomas finally got a good look at his intruder. The demon was in fact male as he had earlier suspected. A demon looking around his age. He was considerably taller than the demon, an observation that pleased him. The demon had long dark brown hair that although tied up had the appearance of being wild and untamed. He had red eyes. His attire was no less conventional. He wore a black robe with a hood pushed back.

“I’m Alexander.”

Thomas crossed his arms and glared disapprovingly at him. The demon's smile faded.

"This is the part where you introduce yourself to me." He hinted.

“I’m not pleasantly conversing with you, how did you find me?”

Alexander shrugged. “Just kinda stumbled here by accident.”

Now it was his turn to laugh. "Fat chance."

Alex tugged uncomfortably at his collar. "Wow, tough crowd." He then proceeded to scratch the top of his head and shrug. "I really don’t know what to tell you, I like being away from people too.”

“You shouldn’t be near here!”

“Why not princess? You afraid?”

“No!” He’d answered too quickly.

Alexander cocked his head as though studying him. Thomas hadn't attacked him yet like a reasonable angel would've done. Not that he was very old but he did know enough to know that any other angel would've already attempted to forcefully drive him out and none of them would ever dream of talking to a demon.

“I think you should be going now.”

“Going?”

Thomas nodded, tossing his chin in the air. “Leave this place and crawl back to whatever bug infested cesspool you came from."

Alexander was silent for several seconds. He yawned and tiredly rubbed his eyes. "Alright you win. You were her first I guess. I will pack up my things and go back to my bug infested cesspool." He mockingly bowed and smiled. "Ciao angel." And within an instant he vanished.

“Yes I remember.” It wasn’t like he’d ever forgotten a single moment spent with Alexander, not when he’d unknowingly changed his life in such a way.

“Are you okay?” Alexander asked.

Thomas swallowed heavily. “I’m fine.”

Another thing he remembered was the day he was almost certain he’d fallen in love with Alexander.

"Mr. Jefferson?" He had been seated, lost in thought and shaken out of his own head by the voice .He looked up from his desk to the man by the door. He was small and slight with ginger hair and was dressed in crisp white clothes with a nervous smile on his face.

Thomas stood up from his desk chair where he'd been staring out the window and crossed the room stopping to admire himself in his full-length mirror. He was dressed in a clean white shirt buttoned to his neck with a dark purple jacket over it. His pants were a starched white as well and his shoes were a shiny obsidian. He paused to make sure every strand of his dark hair was in its proper place

"You look very nice sir." The man offered kindly and Thomas smiled at his reflection.

"That's kind of you Raoul." He crossed the room and pressed two golden coins into the youth's hand. His green eyes lit up in glee as Thomas disappeared down the hall.

"Thank you, sir, have a wonderful evening," He shouted after him.

Down and down the stairs he strode his step, never faltering, his head and chin always erect. He had learned over the years that if you walked with a purpose people respected you more. And after centuries of feeling insignificant he was happy for the grace it brought him.

He heard the sounds of his guests before he saw them and then he was stepping into the room of nobles and everything went silent.

His brown eyes took in every inch of the room making sure everything was in order before he greeted everyone. There were hydrangeas as a centerpiece, the cooks were waiting with trays in hand for Thomas to give the order. The red rug had already been laid out in front of the door. Everything appeared to be in order.

"My esteemed guests." Thomas drawled and everyone surged to meet him.

The first one to grip his hand was a man in a loud red suit. He wore not dress shoes but running sneakers as though he planned to go for a jog around the block after dessert. His face was wide and he was smiling, his green eyes shining. Dark hair swept back from his face in an intricate bun.

"Aaren Unis." He shook the werewolf’s hand warmly. "I didn't think you were coming."

"I got my second to take care of my errand. I've heard so much about your dinner parties that I knew I couldn't miss this one."

"Well I appreciate your attendance."

The next figure to approach him is Rivera Cadmium who is all bright smiles and jeweled eyes as she embraces his hand with her own.

"Thomas, it has been too long." Her voice lilts and lifts with each syllable.

"Rivera, if I counted the moments of my sorrow away from you, I would be forever saddened." He kissed her cheek warmly and directed them all to a table at the center of the room. "Please everyone take your seats. The food will be served momentarily." Thomas waved his hand in the air ushering the maids forward. Butlers pulled out guest's chairs and steaming food was heaped onto platters.

Thomas was last to seat himself, his eyes eating up the sight before him. Was there nothing better than to be surrounded by good food and excellent company?

He had just been about to begin eating himself when Raoul tiptoed behind him.

"Mr. Jefferson?" He turned.

"Yes, I'm sorry, what is it?"

"There's uh- someone here to see you sir, he says it's very urgent and he cannot be kept waiting."

Thomas frowned. Who could possibly be coming to visit him at such an odd hour? He was about to tell Raoul to inform the man that he was busy and come back tomorrow but before he could say anything, a figure was striding through the dining hall like he had lived in the house all his life. Which was impossible since Thomas knew exactly who it was and he was meant to be in America.

He didn’t look much different than Thomas remembered. His skin was still a pale off white like the surface of a pearl. His hair was still longer and messy and a chestnut brown. He was clad in black leather pants tucked into black boots that laced up. Accented by a black top with long gauzy sleeves. Black sunglasses shielded his eyes.

"Alexander?" He asked, still not quite believing it. He stood up from his chair and watched him cross the room towards the table. His guests leaned forward in their chairs to watch.
He ignored him and the rest of his dinner guests as he rounded the carpet in the center of the room and finally stopped in front of them. Only then did he slip off the glasses to reveal his now cloudy red eyes and smile at him full of teeth and warmth.

He smiled back somewhat more guardedly.

"Thomas." He exclaimed, throwing out his arms to embrace him. Despite how thin he was his grip was bone breaking and he braced himself as he crushed him to him, creasing the front of his shirt. When he released him, he scanned the table taking in each and every face and smirked.

"Alexander." He said for the second time that night.

He wrinkled his nose as he placed the glasses on top of his head. “Why wasn’t I invited to this little party?”

Thomas sighed and put his hand on Alex’s arm. "Alexander, what are you doing here?"

His bright face fell. "Excuse me?"

"You're supposed to be in America." He reminded him.

The demon rolled his eyes. "And you're supposed to be spreading goodness and faith around. I guess you've caught up in some hedonistic tendencies as well.” He smirked. “You don’t have any other demons in your life do you princess?

He could feel his face grow hot as Alexander continued.

"I figured you could use company while you’re being so well mannered and boring but I can see you've got all your nannies already. He glanced over her shoulder at the guests and puckered his lips like he had bit into a lemon.

"Alexander I wasn't trying to- "

He held up a hand. "I don't need an explanation. That wasn't the real reason I came." He rocked back and forth on his heels. "I need your help."

Thomas could feel his relief and guilt fading fast replaced by anger red and hot. "Of course, you do." He grumbled. He shouldn't have expected anything more.

"Come on now Tom, it's not like that, I promise. This is a good help.”

"Thomas, would you mind telling us what's going on?" Rivera on the far left of the table had finally stood and was eyeing Alex with disdain.

Thomas held up his hands. "Now Rivera you remember Alexander, don't you?"

The fairy crossed her tawny arms and scowled.

"Alexander this is- "

"Rivera Cadmium." He was already circling the table and extending his hand for a shake. "You look ravishing. How is your sister Nicola?"

Rivera wrenched her hand away and sat down primly with a haughty toss of her head. "Completely fine, no thanks to you."

Alexander cracked a small grin and leaned over the gentleman's chair seated next to him. "Oh, come on she's not still huffing and puffing about what happened?"

"She most certainly is!" Rivera cried indignantly. And you would be to if some gender confused demon- "

"Enough!" Thomas clapped his hands and gave Alexander a pointed look. "This is a civil dinner party."

"And I've been nothing but civil." He protested.

"You did barge in uninvited." Rivera grumbled.

Alex ignored her turning instead to the maid standing a few feet behind her who was holding a tray of red wine. "Do you mind?" He asked her and before the girl could answer he swiped one in each hand and downed them as though they were water.

Thomas wanted to tell Alex it was lucky he was gorgeous. He might not have put up with so much of his messes if he wasn’t.

"Perhaps we shouldn't have this conversation here?" He suggested. "There are guests. Raoul. tell everyone to go home." He whispered and then to Alexander, "We'll go up to my room."
He led the way up the stairs and he could hear Raoul's fluttery voice apologizing to everyone but an emergency had sprung up. Thomas flung open the door to his room and stepped gingerly inside mindful of every detail. Everything was of course crisp and in perfect order from the covers on his bed to the curtains on his window.

Alex sat down not very gracefully onto his red and gold couch, drinking in the dark oak floors and matching desk and the furniture varying from shades of maroon to cinnamon with golden accents.

"Nice place princess." He complimented.

"Thank you."

"Can I get you something?" Thomas asked. "Muffins or- "

"Tea anyone?" Raoul asked, gracing through the door with a silver tray in his hands and a haughty expression on his face.

"Yes, that would be lovely." Thomas smiled at his assistant as he set the tray down and then left them alone. The room was silent during the process of Thomas pouring tea. The only noise coming from the clink of china as teacups and saucers were passed around.

Alexander's gaze is on his tea, swirling it around in the little blue teacup that is a stark contrast to the white of his skin. He seems to be deep in thought, quiet which is a rarity. He drains his cup quickly like he is doing shots in a pub.

Thomas tries to not scold him like he wants to and instead takes a sip of his own drink while he waits for him to speak. Good looking or not, if he just came here to waste his time he'll send him away. He's worked too hard and too long to be made a fool of.

Even now almost 4,000 years later he still thought about his run in with the demon. It was one of those pesky things that try as he might would not leave his mind. So much time had passed and yet…he had such dashing eyes and a boyish smile.

"You’re pretty. Has anyone ever told you that?" Thomas almost dropped his cup in surprise at the sentence. When his eyes found Alexander he found none of his usual playfulness or mischief, only a rare seriousness

"I’m sorry?" He only hoped he sounded unbothered.

And now he was smirking. “Aren’t you going to say thank you?”

Thomas crossed his knees. “And why would I? You’re a demon, i’m certain you have countless wily methods to burrow your way into people so they let their guards down."

“But you’re not a people are you?” Alexander crossed his arms leaning back on the couch. “You’re an angel.”

“Astute observation.” He muttered and then his face fell even more when Alexander giggled, he hadn’t said anything funny at all.

“Why are you laughing at me?”

“Because you’re funny!” He wiped at his eyes. “I’ve never met another angel half as interesting as you Thomas.”

He glanced away for only a moment, biting the inside of his mouth to fight down the heat rising to his cheeks. “I believe you mentioned you needed my help?”

Alex nodded, reaching into the pocket of his coat and pulling out an apple.

“Eat this for me won’t you?”

“No.” He immediately declined.

“Why not?”

Thomas raised an eyebrow. “Please tell me you’re kidding.”

“Come on now I haven’t poisoned it, how long have you known me?”

“The length of time means nothing when you consider the fact that you are quite literally a spawn of Satan.”

Alex dangles the apple by its stem between two fingers and holds it across the table in front of them.

“Hold it at least?”

Thomas’s hand moves only on instinct before he hesitates.

Alexander sighs loudly rolling his eyes. “For fuck’s sake Thomas it’s an apple it isn’t going to bite you!”

The angel finally gives in, he figures he can humor the demon for the time being, Thomas had known him for centuries and he’d always been an odd one.

"See." Alexander lounged back in his seat as Thomas cradled it in his hand. "Nothing wrong with holding it. Now take a bite."

“I won’t.”

“What if I said please?” He bites down on his bottom lip, glancing up from under his eyelashes.

Thomas’s eyes find the wood of the table.

“You and that apple could be twins princess.”

Thomas’s head jerks up his the red blush in his face growing and Alexander only smirks.

“Come on now angel, take a bite?”

“No.” He murmurs very quietly, his voice shaking.

“Please? For me?”

“I can’t.”

“Can’t?” Alexander stands up from his seat. “Or won’t?”

Thomas doesn’t know if its pleasure or horror that decorates his face as Alexander pulls his shirt over his head, slow and careful. Giving Thomas’s eyes ample time to run up the entire length of his torso, trace scars running in zig zags even below his belt, watch lithe arms fold the shirt neatly and place it on the chair.

“Take a bite Thomas.”

Thomas grinds his teeth together and says nothing.

“Angel.” Alexander purrs approaching him, a slight tilt to his hips. Thomas cannot look away from the way his legs move in the tight pants until he’s standing in front of him.

“Do not try to tempt me.” Thomas says, his mouth feeling very dry all of a sudden. “Your little demonic tricks don’t work on me.”

“Tricks?” Alexander scoffs. “Have I really never told you how I do it?” In the next moment he’s in Thomas’s lap with a leg on either side of Thomas’s waist, their chests almost touching, Alex’s face looming above his own.

He is breathless waiting for the demon to speak.

“Contrary to popular belief Thomas, not all demons have the power to tempt someone in any way they please.”

He swallows heavily. “You don’t say.”

“In fact only lust and gluttony demons can do that.”

“Which are you again?” Thomas gasps feeling Alexander’s hand around his wrist bringing his hand holding the apple up.

“Greed.” He plucks the apple from Thomas’s hand and twists a finger in one of Thomas’s curls. “I can only tempt people with the things the already so badly want. Excessive desire-”
He pushes the fruit insistently against Thomas’s mouth.

“Take a bite angel.”

Thomas does. It sits on his tongue and continuing to make eye contact with him Alexander grips Thomas’s chin, man handling him to chew, and tracing his fingers down his throat when he swallows.

Alexander takes a bite next, right on top of the place where Thomas’s mouth had been. And it makes the angel throb in an embarrassing way.

“You know.” Alex says when he has swallowed. “Generosity is the virtue that directly contradicts greed.” The apple is dropped on the floor. “The attitude of giving rather than taking.”
His warm hands palm over Thomas’s chest. “Maybe thats why we get along so well, i love to take.”

His left hand rests on Thomas’s waist, his right holding Thomas’s chin up, thumb brushing over his bottom lip. Thomas’s eyes flutter at the intense and hungry gaze as Alexander licks his own lips.

“And something tells me you have quite a lot to give.”

Thomas should have been at least mildly suspicious of his motives. Alexander hadn't always shown up before with some mind tricks and slick words but nevertheless Thomas had never acted so enthused before. Yet this time he seemed all too happy to inconvenience himself for his sake. He didn’t know how much of it he wanted to believe.

Alexander glanced over at the angel sleeping soundly beside him.

His affections belonged to clothes and shoes and velvet curtains. Despite being taught everything against it, Thomas was materialistic and as he glanced around his room while the man slept he realized that he didn't recognize anything in the room from his last visit.

Last time he'd stumbled in. Some New Year's Eve about 200 years ago everything had been crisp black with silver accents. Hence why his outfit today had looked the way it did, to maybe bring some of the angel’s warmth away from inanimate objects and onto him.
He’d been surprised when some tight pants and flirty words had been enough to pull him from his seat only to lie him flat on his back on his enormous bed.

“How long have we known each other now?” Alexander had asked between trailing kisses down Thomas’s torso still seated in his lap, he was never able to keep his mouth shut.

Despite the blissed out expression on his face, Thomas seemed to be gauging whether or not Alexander was actually serious, at this point they hadn’t really kept a timeline.

“Five thousand years?” He guessed. “Give or take a century.”

Alexander nodded "Well then despite my earlier attitude I am glad you’ve found friends as high strung as you are, can’t rely on only me for company.”

Thomas smiled, clenching a hand tightly in Alexander’s hair. The man had always been catty. “Uh huh.”

"I’m serious, Imagine if I lived like this? You are extremely good company princess but I don’t think anything’s worth giving up for tea and throw pillows.”

Thomas sighed through his nose. “It isn’t for everyone.” His eyes trailed downwards where if Alexander kissed down far enough and arched his back just so he could see the swell of his ass.

“I knew this was a good outfit.” He could feel the smirk against his rib-cage.

“So you planned this, I told you, you had tricks.”

“Preparation is not a trick sweetheart, I never do anything by halves.”

And he proved it too when Thomas was finally naked and whimpering beneath him.

“You’ll be gentle won’t you? I think it goes without saying that I’ve never done this before.”

Alexander paused from where he’d been nipping against Thomas’s neck and letting his hands explore the softness of Thomas's hips. “Don’t tell anyone but I rather like pretty things.”

He moved a few strands of hair so he could more clearly see Thomas’s dark brown eyes, the pink color in his cheeks, his slightly red kiss bitten lips, the perfect slope of his nose. “And you my dear are a pretty thing, wouldn’t want to break you now would I?”

Though with the way Thomas had passed out immediately after their climaxes Alex is worried he had. He wants to lie here in this bed until the Apocalypse comes, he wants to lie here long after it too, willing away everything else around them until it was just them two, alone in this room with the smell of vanilla and Thomas’s even breathing as he slept. He’d never known a day of peaceful existence, and yet if this is what peace was, he couldn’t deny he wanted more.

Thomas wakes when Alexander begins running fingers lazily through his hair. Eyes opening as Alexander cups his cheek and he leans into the touch.

“I do hope you haven’t ruined me.” He mumbles sleepily.

This made the demon laugh warmly. “You’re an angel, I don’t think you can be ruined, especially not something as good as you are Thomas.”

He allows himself another minute of domesticity before he pulls away, tossing off his covers.

“You’re leaving?” He sounds pitiful.

“I have to, people are expecting me, they’ll be wondering where I am.”

“I don’t suppose that I could be the one to tempt you, to stay that is?” He squeezes his eyes shut as soon as he says it. It can’t be.

Thankfully Alex doesn’t answer and when Thomas opens his eyes to look for him again he’s pulling on an expensive looking red jacket over his earlier outfit.

“That isn’t yours.”

Alexander smiles at him. “Come on now. I just sent you back to Heaven two hours ago.”

Thomas blushes but remains steadfast. “Alexander, take it off.” He hates to admit it but the choice of outfit is beautiful and yet deadly all the same. Like noticing the lovely diamonds on a rattlesnake right before they bite you.

“Alright.” Alexander relents as he removes it.

Thomas wants to keep the argument going, if he does he can get lost in those scarlet eyes.

“Thank you.”

Alexander approaches before leaving. Softly brushing a thumb over his cheek.

“Promise me something?” Thomas asks.

“Anything you want, name it and it's yours angel.” His own sincerity frightens him.

“Promise me that when you remember me, the memory will be of what I was. And not what you turned me into.”

Alexander shook his head with a soft, almost sad smile. “I haven’t changed you Thomas, you changed and forgot to tell me.”

He means to tell him to leave, but he lets his cheek rest against Alex’s hand for just a second longer allowing himself for just a moment to remember what it was like to be close to someone.

He never saw him again after that day, except for here, in this field. Alexander always had an uncanny ability for knowing where he was at all times. And he’d walked up to Thomas and asked if he had a lighter and there was no awkwardness, no questions, no anger. They stood side by side and watched the grass move and talked and reminisced.

And Thomas remembered that Alexander kissed like fire and tasted like mint and though his hands were calloused they were gentle and he absolutely hated baths and he had a nice smile and an even nicer way of making Thomas feel as though he mattered to someone.

And Alex remembered that Thomas’s eyes looked as though they held untold secrets, he wished he’d gotten to unravel them all, and he smelled like vanilla and roses, and that he was soft in heart and kind in mannerism. And he loved clothes and he was the most beautiful thing Alexander had ever seen.

Now, several thousand years down the line there really was nothing knew to say to each other. But if it were the last time they would ever do so.

“You never told me why you needed me to bite that apple.”

He doesn’t have to remind him of when, of course Alexander knows.

Alexander lights his very last cigarette. “To be honest, I just wanted to get you alone....and to see if you’d do it. Do something just because I told you to.”

“That’s stupid, and here all this time I thought it was part of your seduction attempt. Do you do that to all of your victims?”

Alexander catches the bite in the words.

“What do you mean?” He blows out a cloud of smoke craning his head up to look at him.

Thomas fiddles with his hands nervously, eyes on the ground. “Its just that we’ve known each other so long, done things and seen things, experienced things together, been there for each other. I’d always wondered-no I'd always hoped.” He looks down meeting Alexander’s gaze. “Am I silly for that?”

“No Thomas you’re not.”

“I never saw you again after that night. And-And I spent so many years wondering and going over everything in my mind and-” He bit his lip. “And I thought maybe it had all meant something, something a bit more than a one night romp in the sheets. And then you disappeared and I was left feeling like-”

He swipes quick as a flash under his eye to catch a tear. “Well I suppose that's one of the downsides of being an angel isn’t it?”

Alexander swallowed heavily. Never in his entire existence in Hell or on this planet or in the time he’d known Thomas had he ever even considered talking about something as gag inducing as his own feelings.

“I didn’t want to.” He can feel his heart beating rapidly inside of his chest and it frightens him.

“What?”

How can someone sound so lovely and so heartbreaking at the same time?

“I didn’t want to leave. I-”

Thomas knew that Alexander had never been good at talking about things of this sort, things that were personal, that required feeling and truth.

“Thomas I have only ever known one pain since that night. One that has followed me all of the years we spent apart, it was caused by the absence of you.”

“So that night-”

“Farther back.” Alexander closes his eyes as his breath comes out shaky. “I do recall that we met on a sunny day, and you had leaves in your hair.”

“No.”

“Yeah.” He looks at the ground.

“All those years, all those centuries we spent, wasted-”

“I don’t consider any of the time that I spent with you a waste.”

“But-”

“Here.” He offers up the cigarette again. “Come on now, end of the world, last chance.”

Thomas takes it and coughs rather embarrassingly as the smoke escapes his mouth and he hands it back to Alexander.

“When did it get so dark?” He asks, scuffing it underneath his shoe.

“I hadn’t noticed.” Thomas looked up. “Alexander.”

“Hmm?”

“The stars are falling.”

Alex looks up to confirm that yes on the backdrop of the blackness that is the sky the stars are descending upon them.

He’s scared and so he takes Thomas’s hand, holding on to it tightly.

“We should go.” Thomas says.

“They haven’t called for us yet.” Alexander says because it hits him all at once that this is the last time they will ever see each other and suddenly he is the one who wants this moment to last forever.

“Tell me another story?”

“I thought you said the last one was your last request?”

“I’m a demon for heaven's sake Thomas, obviously I lied.”

Thomas deliberates for a minute. “A thousand years from now, there is a star in the universe.”

“One of the one’s falling?’

“No, a different one.”

“Will there be other stars if all of them are falling down now?”

“I don’t know, but it doesn’t matter, it's a story.”

“So there’s a star in space?”

“Yes, and this star didn’t know anything of what was to happen in the years to come.”

“How long do stars live anyway?”

“10 billion years give or take.”

“You’re joking!”

“Afraid not. And this star didn’t need to know of the future anyway because it was a star.”

“Stars don’t think.”

“In Thomas’s stories they do. Neither did this star know of anything that had happened before it.”

“All of its ancestors burned the Earth into a crisp.”

Thomas ignores him. “All the star knew was where it was right at that very moment.”

“Is the star a metaphor?”

“Not everything you don’t understand is a metaphor Alexander.”

“Sure I understand, star in space thinking about the past and future. Who’s the star?”

“No one is the star, it's a star, its itself. And it doesn’t even exist yet because it’s sitting up in space a thousand years from now.”

“How did it get there?”

“Well I put it there of course.”

“I knew it meant something.”

“Oh shove off, I put the star there for us.”

“Us? You don’t say?”

“Us.” Thomas nods. “Because the star has memories.”

“Thought it didn’t know anything about before?”

“It doesn’t, all it knows is what I have expected it to know, it won’t know of creation, of dinosaurs or people or cities or plants and animals, it won’t know of life, or even death.”

“What will it know of? The color magenta? Your favorite kind of cheese?”

“It will know that a thousand years before it, an angel and a demon stood side by side in a field, and that they looked up at the sky, with all of their ancestors descending around them, and that they created it then in their minds before it was ever born.”

Thomas smiled down at him. "And that they loved each other."

Alexander tugs at his hair. "Did they love each other?"

"I would like to think so."

"Then so will I."

And they smiled at each other.

“Does it know anything else?”

“Afraid not. Not much else for anyone to know is there? I’m not even sure what happens next.”

One certainty is that this is their last conversation.

"When you create it...will you tell the star I said hello?"

"First thing I'll do." Thomas promises

Thomas looked into his eyes, there were so many things they hadn’t said, hadn’t done. It wasn’t fair. Alex can’t fix it, Alex can’t make it better, can’t change what he’d done.
But he tries anyway.

“Can it know the demon said he’d stay a little longer this time?”

“If the demon means it.”

“I’ll stay a little longer this time.”

Thomas looks up at the sky.

“And then what does the angel say?”

“The angel says okay.” And Thomas sits down in the grass pulling Alexander with him, the demon’s head resting on his shoulder.

Thomas stares at the stars and Alex stares at Thomas, he wants to map out every inch of his face in this moment, can feel tears prick the corners of his eyes as he watches the bursts of light in Thomas’s pupils as the stars grow closer, mouth half open in wonder yet hand tight in his.

An anchor as the world ends around them.