Chapter Text
Alex rolled to his right expecting to sink into warmth, strong arms, and pools of blue but he came up cold. The room is flooded with the smell of cinnamon, so he expectantly turns to his nightstand grasping the mug and then melting into the taste. Still warm. He opens his phone to a message from Henry that simply reads, Hello love, went to get tea and to see about the excitement you Texans seem to have about an H E B
Alex smiles softly and then proceeds to scroll through news and Twitter while he drains the rest of his mug.
After a quick shower and starting the dishwasher, Alex moved upstairs, big bay windows flooding the room with warmth and soft daylight. He rips through cardboard boxes labeled “library” in Henry’s loopy, fancy handwriting. Alex brushes his fingers across the letters.
He has this thing, it’s a little obsessive, a little over protective, but he wants to touch everything Henry’s touched, wants to be so in tune to Henry’s feelings so he never gets hurt again because he’s seen him broken and bruised. Alex wants to protect Henry’s borrowed and blue heart because he knows Henry would do the same for him.
He reaches into the box pulling out Henry's classics, his heavily annotated crinkly paged copy of “Sense and Sensibility”, his highlighted to high heaven “Emma”, and his extra copy of “Pride and Prejudice” the original in his possession every time they travel. He gingerly places them in organized piles alphabetically, knowing exactly how Henry will organize them when he gets the time, as he’s talked about this dream library since they signed the deed to the house.
He cuts through the next box and smiles as he places Henry’s memoir on the hardwood, next to Henry’s tear stained copy of “The Song of Achilles”. He reaches to the bottom of the box and pulls out a hefty leather bound notebook, leather straps tied into a perfect bow. It’s worn, fraying pages sticking out. He pulls the bow, opening up the journal.
Every page is titled “Alex” with a corresponding date, he recognizes them all, he follows the words…
Should I tell you that when we're apart, your body comes back to me in dreams? That when I sleep, I see you, the dip of your waist, the freckle above your hip, and when I wake up in the morning, it feels like I've just been with you, the phantom touch of your hand on the back of my neck fresh and not imagined? That I can feel your skin against mine, and it makes every bone in my body ache? That, for a few moments, I can hold my breath and be back there with you, in a dream, in a thousand rooms, nowhere at all?
A chill runs through him, breath catching in tandem. The whole world has seen these but this book, this pen to paper is a special kind of intimacy they never have to share, a part the world will never see. But it’s proof, proof that Henry wrote these words for him, bared his soul to him, and fucking meant it.
He flips through the rest, the memory of reading them for the first time brushing him with a special kind of nostalgia.
He eventually gets through all the ones he recognizes, until he reaches ones he doesn’t. This one isn’t titled “Alex” , instead it’s titled “Eden”.
Eden
My familial ties and bonds brought me to my knees every sabbath I sang and worshiped and praised. I believed with all of my being because that is what I was taught, but then I had you,the way I only believed I could in my darkest fantasies, what I believed were dark fantasies.
Knowing you has made me understand why it was so damn easy for Adam to give into temptation. Loving you has made all the punishment worth it. You Alexander are tempting down to your very core. I've seen it in how you smile, I’ve watched how it plays on your lips before you break out into a full grin. In quite plainly the way you look, dripping in sin. The way you taste, it’s always left on the tip of my tongue and I relish it because maybe just maybe if I sin enough I can escape and run away with you and we can be dirty sinners together. You are my forbidden fruit Alex, my serpent of deceit.
I’ve grown, looked in on, and stared at the metaphor a little while longer and my statement still remains, but my sentiment has changed. I'm no longer sinning but living in the Eden that is the life we’ve built. Away from it all in a safe haven that is you and me, no longer locked in the shackles of naivety and free from the cuffs of sin. My forbidden fruit, my sin, and best of all my freedom. May I prosper in it and you until my time on earth runs out and we can run in the fields of eternity forever after.
Alex flips through the last few pages, four poems remain. He hears the key turn in the lock and closes the book, placing it back where he found it, its bow, wonky in comparison to Henry’s previous one. He feels like he invaded Henry’s privacy regardless of the poem being about him. Henry hadn’t shared it with him and maybe he wanted to keep it that way.
He goes downstairs to meet Henry. “So how was it?”
“I understand the longing you had in New York without your precious H E B.”
“Knew you’d see it my way, baby just wait till I take you to a Central market.”
“I can’t wait.”
As they settled in on the couch for an afternoon binge of Bake Off with Henry’s quiche that is still considered a work in progress after all these years, Alex longed to climb the stairs and read the rest of the poems, they brought him a peace only Henry ever could give him.To think Henry had told him, “It’s okay if I’m not enough I know I could never give you the peace you crave.” Alex had of course reassured him that no one could ever give him more than Henry has.
Those barren soul poems are part of that fact. He craves love, they make him feel more than any peace someone else could promise him.