Work Text:
“Why don’t we talk about it?” Alex asks one night while they’re sitting in the living room watching reality tv. He turns to look at Henry, and Henry meets his gaze, frowning.
“Because the episode isn’t over yet?”
Alex shakes his head. “No,” he says. “The thing we’re always tip toeing around. The reason you’re here on a Wednesday night watching reality tv with me when you could be at home with your dog reading a book like you actually want to do.”
“I want to spend time with you,” Henry says, soft. “Why do you think I don’t wan—“
“I don’t,” Alex says, exasperation lining the words. He shoves up from the couch, moving to stand in front of the television and crossing his arms over his chest. “You know that’s not what I’m talking about. Why can’t we just talk about it. Address it and why we’re not doing something about it.”
Henry takes his gaze over him; his tense shoulder and tight jaw. The cling of his fingers into his own bicep. Swallowing, he scoots to the edge of the couch, pressing his elbows into his knees. “I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.”
Alex blinks at him, seemingly entirely unimpressed. “So, you’re just going to pretend we’re not in love with each other?”
The air gets sucked out of Henry’s lungs with that blow. “What?” He asks, forcing himself to take in a breath.
“We’re just supposed to go on like this. Neither of us dating anyone because we’re too caught up in how we feel for each other. But neither of us willing to actually take a fucking risk. Even though we both know—we both fucking know!” He throws his hands out at his sides, “How we feel.”
“What—“
“I know you heard me talking to June at Pez’s birthday party. I know you know how I feel.”
Henry blinks slowly, lets the information process. “Well,” he says, soft. “Having overheard that conversation, I also know that you are well aware of my feelings.”
“Jesus, Henry,” Alex says, running a hand over his face. “You dedicated your fucking book to me, of course I’m aware of your feelings.”
“Then,” Henry says, “Why haven’t you said anything?”
Alex’s hand falls to his side. “I was giving you time,” He says, shaking his head, suddenly sounding so tired. “You’re the one who runs at the first sign of commitment. I’ve seen you dump men for the smell of their cologne. For less, even. I think I was scared to act, because I was scared you’d cut me loose and I’d lose you entirely.” He moves to the coffee table, rounding it and sitting on the edge of it in front of Henry. “But I can’t just sit here, staring at the tv, thinking about kissing you, thinking about, fuck, loving, you like some pining fucking idiot. And just, continue not doing anything about it.”
Henry scoots back on the couch, partly to put some space between them, partly because it’s a lot, facing the underlying monster that is their relationship.
It’s true.
He’s dumped men for truly trivial reasons.
But it’s not because he has an issue with commitment.
They just weren’t— christ, they weren’t Alex, and he couldn’t stomach stringing them along.
And he should just say that.
That Alex wouldn’t lose him. That Henry would hold tight and never let go, not ever, not once he’d got him in his arms.
Alex is watching him. “Henry,” he says, seriously. “I want to have this conversation. I want us to make a choice. And if you don’t want to be with me for whatever reason, I need you to let me down so I can move on. I can’t live like this anymore. I wasn’t made to pine. I don’t have what it takes to sit idly by and let this just pass me up. Either we’re wasting precious time that we could be together, or we’re . . .” He trails off, shaking his head and waving a hand in front of him.
And Henry wants to reach out, take that hand, hold it tight and tell him that yes, this is what he wants. He could pine for a lifetime, he could, but he doesn’t have to. What he wants is right in front of him, and he could just reach out into the universe and pluck it from the skies and take it. Take Alex. Have everything he wants, and more. They’d be happy. Without this looming over them—they’d be happy.
He can almost picture it. Waking up beside Alex every morning. Greeting the day with a kiss, with fingers laced through one another. With the welcome warmth of home and happiness, but the thing is—
The thing is.
“Do you honestly think that could last?” Henry asks, quietly. “What we have . . . it’s good, Alex. it’s really, really good.”
They have friendship. Desperate, deep rooted, beautifully alive friendship. They have Tuesday morning coffee at Shiloh’s coffee shop, Thursday movie nights. Their early morning runs, where they meet in the middle between their two homes, leading David around the city as they talk about their respective roles; Henry’s upcoming deadline, Alex’s looming trial. They’ve got brunch with June and Nora every other Sunday, and lunch with Pez on Fridays. Storytime at the shelter on the second Monday of the month.
And the calls in between that links it all together.
“Is it?” Alex asks.
Henry’s gaze falls to his lap.
There’s also all the sneaking glances.
The lonely nights at home, when the day is done and the phones are charging. The dark mornings, when the sun is shining impossibly bright and getting up should be a breeze, but the cold side of Henry’s bed calls to him. The tight feeling in his chest when Alex talks about a date he’s gone on; when Nora or June try and set one or both of them up with someone they know from their respective offices.
He could trade it all for delicate kisses, secret smiles. Trade it all for everything he knows Alex would give him.
But there’s one thing stopping him.
The knowledge that if they ever went there and things fell apart, the icy afternoon is all he’d be left with. The empty bed, the empty apartment, the seeping hollow loss of his father the only looming truth. He’d lose everything that matters to him, every special appointment, every brilliant burst of laughter. Every aching, wonderful moment that is his friendship with Alex—he could lose it all on a gamble that—that—
That something more is the something right for them.
“I can’t lose you,” Henry admits quietly, glancing up at Alex from beneath his lashes. “What you’re asking, the risk—”
“Do you honestly believe we’d be anything less than fucking spectacular?” Alex interrupts, squeezing his eyes shut and shaking his head. “You are my partner in all things that make my life worth living, Henry. If—by some gross misalignment of the universe this doesn’t work, I’d never, ever let you walk away. You’re my best friend. You have my heart.” He leans forward, “I’m not just in love with you. I genuinely, just love you. Even if you tell me here and now that this,” he motions between the two of them, “is never going to happen, I’ll never stop loving you. I’ll never give up on ensuring that your life is as full of happiness and light as you deserve for it to be. I’ll still buy you coffee, and go on walks with David. I’ll drive you home when you drink too many mimosas with Pez at brunch.”
Henry’s eyes sting. “Alex,” he says, voice cracking.
Alex reaches out and grabs Henry’s hands, squeezing them as he pulls them into his own lap. “We deserve to be happy,” he says. “And there’s not a shadow of doubt in my mind that you and I could make each other so fucking happy. We have so much love for one another. We have so much trust and devotion and we’ve built this friendship. How could we fail?” He brings Henry’s hands up to his chest, presses them into the space above his heart. “Don’t we owe it to ourselves to try?”
Henry swallows past a lump, stares at their hands against the dark purple material of Alex’s shirt. “I’d ruin it,” he says after a long, long moment. “Alex, you have to know that I’d ruin it and then I’d lose you and I can’t—”
“You wouldn’t,” Alex urges, scooting to the edge of the coffee table. Their knees bump together, and he squeezes Henry’s hands urgently. “You couldn’t. I know you, Henry. I know your dark days. I know the shadows that eat you up,” He ducks his head to meet Henry’s gaze. “I know what you’ve lost and the hold it has over you. I know you need your space, and I know when to give it to you. But I also know when you’re isolating, and when to break the isolation. There’s nothing you could do to ruin it. I’m here, saying this, forcing this conversation, because I know we’d be good. We’d be so fucking good.”
“You say that now, but—”
Alex shakes his head. “It’s not just words. It’s the truth. It’s reality. It’s us. Look at everything we’ve been through since school. The trials, the tribulations, your family, mine. Everything we’ve fought through to get here, and we’ve done all of it at each others side. Never once failing. Never once abandoning the other. Never one even contemplating moving forward without each other. I love you, Henry. All I’m asking is that you let me love you the way you deserve to be.”
Henry takes in a shuddering breath, and Alex scoots further in, his knees slipping between Henry’s and bumping against the edge of the cushion of the couch. “Or don’t,” he adds, quietly. “I’m not going to force you into something you don’t want. But I am going to make you make a choice. Whatever you choose, you’ll still have my friendship. You’ll never not have my friendship. But I can’t keep wondering what if. I can’t keep hoping, and praying on it.”
Henry sniffs. “Alex.”
Alex stares at him for a long moment, before nodding, almost as if to himself. “Oh,” he breathes. “Okay.” He squeezes Henry’s hands once, before carefully setting them down in Hnery’s lap and scooting backwards on the coffee table until there’s at least an inch between their knees again.
Henry watches him take a big breath, his lashes fluttering as he blinks back the sheen on his eyes. He reaches up and carefully flicks at the corner of his eye, and oh.
Henry’s heart slams against his ribs.
He’s.
He’s crying.
“Alex,” Henry says again, this time scooting forward and closing some of the distance between them.
Alex shakes his head. “It’s okay,” he says, his voice thick, as he looks to the ceiling and takes a big, deep breath. “I have my answer,” he adds, nodding. “You don’t want this. And I’ll respect that.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t need to,” Alex murmurs, sniffing and returning his gaze to Henry’s. “I can see it on your face. You’re not willing to take the risk.”
“There are a million risks I’d take with you at my side,” Henry says urgently. “But I cannot bear the thought of losing you.”
“What about the thought of having more of me?”
Henry’s breath catches at the thought—of pressing his fingers into Alex’s skin. Caressing the soft planes of his chest, his abdomen, further. Of skimming his lips along the slope of his throat, the cut of his jaw. Of taking him in, possessing, being possessed by him.
Alex must see something on his face, because he shifts forward. “Let me say one more thing, and if it’s—if it’s not what you want, then I’ll drop it. I’ll drop it and we’ll never mention it again, and I’ll force myself to move on.” He looks Henry over, pausing, as if waiting for permission to continue.
Hesitant, Henry nods once.
“I have this fantasy,” Alex says after a beat. “You and me. A brownstone in Brooklyn, or a two story in Austin. Fuck, I’d even take a flat in London. It doesn’t matter where, I just—I see us waking up beside each other. Taking the mornings slow. Letting the sun drift in through the window, warming our skin as we bask beneath it’s shine and each others touch. I — I see me making you tea when we finally get out of bed. Sitting in our home office, you working on your next best seller, me on whatever trial’s at my fingertips. Companionable silence. Henry, I see an entire future in our horizon. I’m not looking at the now, thinking how much I want you. I’m not gone on lust. This is—if you want this, it’d be it for me. You would be it.”
He pauses, reaching out to gently tap Henry’s left ring finger, Henry’s gaze falls to the tingling skin there. “I pictured gold for me, silver for you. An engraving of orion on each.” Henry’s gaze snaps back up to Alex’s, his heart hammering in his chest as Alex continues. “A private ceremony, just our closest friends.” There’s a small, sardonic laugh. “Every time I think about it, I think about the look on your grandmothers face when she finds out. I think about how secretly proud you’d be; the way you’d revel in her disappointment. Defiant. Strong. I—”
“You think about marrying me?” Henry asks, unable to stop the tears as they flood his vision and ultimately tip over onto his cheeks.
Alex sniffs. He sounds wistful when he replies, “I think about it all, Hen. What our life could be. I think about it all.”
“You’d want that?” Henry looks down at his hand, at his ring finger, and back up. “You’d want a life with me?”
“I do,” Alex replies earnestly; not a possibility of want, not an imaginary maybe, but a sure answer. A clear and present yes. It’s in his tone, the way he says it, the fervent nature of the words as they slip past his lips; it’s not something he could want. It’s something he does want.
Henry swallows, lets his eyes drift over Alex’s body, slipping up over his chest, along the line of his throat, over the scraggly edges of his jaw, up to his eyes. Quietly, he admits, “i think about it, too.”
Alex lets out a little huff of air. “Yeah?”
Henry nods. “What it’d be like to wake up beside you. How easy it’d be to fall asleep with your warmth radiating over my skin. The heat of your palm on my back. How the days would feel more complete, ending them with you at my side. Less like I'm paying a toll to exist, and more like I’ve been gifted the right of existence. The privilege to share it with you.”
Alex leans forward, tentatively takes Henry’s hand left hand in his own again. “You’d never lose me,” he says; a vow. “No matter what happens. How things turn out. You’d never lose me.”
Henry looks down at their hands, carefully turns his palm over so he can lace his fingers through Alex’s. The movements are slow, but precise. Alex lets him lead, lets his hand be manipulated, until Henry’s fingers slip into the space between Alex’s and squeeze. He stares down at their hands for a moment, before licking his lips and looking back up at Alex.
“Do you swear?”
“I swear,” Alex murmurs, promise and meaning drenched in every syllable. The words drip between them like honey; seeping into the air around them, into their every breath as they look one another over. Into the tears drying on their cheeks.
Alex’s free hand comes up, tentatively cup Henry’s cheek. “You and me,” he whispers, scooting closer. “We’re the real thing. Let me prove it.”
That image is so clear in his head now; contrasting but matching rings on their fingers. Glinting beneath the morning glow in a bedroom filled with little essences of each of them. They’re only just beginning, but it’s so vivid; the future. It’s so clear. It’s a million miles away, it’s two seconds from now. It’s in the glint in Alex’s eyes, in the promise of his lips. In the vow still drifting between them, the cling of their fingers, puzzle pieces perfectly entwined.
And when he nods, it’s in the sure press of lips against his own.