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“And another thing.” John was a little bit drunk by this point, but it didn’t matter because Alexander was getting drunk with him. “That man was an ass. I should’ve punched him. You heard what he was saying. I should’ve decked him.”
“You should’ve!” Alexander says, nodding. “Don’t let “good company” ever tell you otherwise.”
“I want to punch someone.”
“I know, my friend, I know. I do too.” Alexander’s eyes go a bit unfocused, and he gestures with his glass at the street. “There’s another one,” he says. A man with a sleek dog walks past on the dusky road, and Alexander shakes his head. “Seems like everyone’s got dogs now.”
John looks over, lifting his own glass to his lips. “You want one?” he asks. “A dog, I mean.”
“Hmm?” Alexander shakes his head distractedly. “No, I mean, there are some ways it’d be nice. I mean, the unconditional companionship probably is- that’s dogs, right? And I doubt they’d mind listening to me talk out loud- you know, most people do. Or they try to put in their own words and I lose my train of thought, although I can’t debate a dog.” His words are just a little bit slurred, but in true Alexander fashion he is talking at full speed.
John watches him, fascinated. As usual. What can he say, Alexander is a fascinating man. Words tumble effortlessly off his spit-slick lips, and the passion behind his answer to what John had thought to be a simple question is almost overwhelming.
“I can debate people. I do!” Alexander continues. But sometimes I just want to think- or write- without being interrupted. And it would be nice to have control over something- somebody. You know, without having to fight every second just to be heard. That’s what people do with dogs, isn’t it? Just point and tell them to sit.“
John is probably a little bit more drunk than he should be. To be fair, though, Alexander is definitely more persuasive than any man has the right to be, and when John hears him issuing a command in what seems to be his dog-voice, he doesn’t even stop to think before he… obeys.
His glass drops on the counter, his body drops from his chair and he lands in a crouch, butt and hands pressed to the ground. He looks up at Alexander for approval, blushing.
Alexander laughs. “John!” He exclaims, and shakes his head in amusement. “I haven’t even opened up the position and already you’re applying to be my animal?”
John isn’t sure exactly what he’s doing, but he nods.
“All right…” Alexander stroke his chin, tilts his head and stares at John curiously. John is motionless, waiting for his next command, even if it’s get up, you’re being stupid.
“Lie down,” Alexander says, and John rests his arms on the floor, his head on his arms, knees curled up under him. Alexander grins again. “Good boy.”
Now it’s John’s turn to grin, nervously, and shiver a little.
Alexander pauses, and John can’t tell why but then he makes an enlightened “oh!” and tells John to roll over.
John does. He crashes into the bar and Alexander laughs again, and John starts laughing too. He doesn’t get up, just lies there and laughs until Alexander is helping him up and then they’re stumbling home, well, to Alexander 's place, because John can’t quite remember where his own is and he’d rather stay with his friend.
When he wakes up the next morning he’s curled on the couch, and his head throbs, and Alexander is across the room, head in one hand and quill in the other. “Alex, go back to sleep,” he mumbles, before doing that himself.
He wakes up again and it’s more like afternoon, and Alexander is waking him, yammering something about breakfast and the newspapers, and John drags himself up and they do get breakfast and newspapers, and by the time they return to Alexander 's place, the events from last night have started to come back. He’s not sure if he should be embarrassed or if he should try to forget the whole thing, but the goofy grin he remembers on Alexander 's face means he…. doesn’t regret it.
And it means that, that evening, when Alexander is once again hunched over his desk and John’s eyes keep drifting over to his visibly tense shoulders, John can’t help but want to see that grin again. He bites his lip, and probably should debate with himself for longer but oh well, he can worry about that later.
He stands up, drops to his knees, and starts crawling towards his engrossed friend. Three feet away, two, and Alexander still doesn’t notice him. One, and then John is resting his chin on Alexander's thigh.
Alexander freezes for a second, frowns, and finishes what John can only assume is the sentence he’d been in the middle of. Then he looks down. “What are you doing?”
“Um,” John says. Maybe this would’ve made more sense if he had bothered to see if Alexander remembered last night at all.
“If you’re trying to steal my ideas, my friend, you’re in the wrong place.”
“I, um…” John’s face is surely flushed. “Never mind.” He pulls away, sitting back on his heels, not quite meeting Alexander 's eyes.
Maybe it’s that position that brings it back. “Oh! Laurens, is this- um- the game we were playing last night?”
John looks up and nods quickly. What he sees in Alexander 's face is confusion that slowly softens into… something else. At least he doesn’t seem upset.
“Huh.”
“Sorry,” John says, and now he feels ridiculous, knees bent, hands on the ground and looking for what, Alexander 's approval? He starts to back away, in a sort of awkward crouch.
“No, John.” Alexander has a hesitant smile on his face, and he slowly extends his open palm to John. “C’mere.”
John stares at that hand.
“It’s fine, John.”
So he approaches. Scrabbling a little closer, and then what? He works on instinct, from what he’s seen dogs doing, and nudges Alexander 's hand with his face.
Alexander lets out a chuckle. “Good boy,” he says, and moves, so he’s scratching John on top of the head, fingers tangling in John’s wild curls. John laughs now, short and sharp and relieved, and more than a little bit disbelieving. “What a good dog,” Alexander says again, and the words sound strange but they also sound good, and John closes his eyes and presses up into Alexander's touch and plays the words over again in his mind. What a good dog.
“All right then,” Alexander says. “John, I’ve got a few more pages to write, and really if the ideas aren’t gone by now they’re going soon, but I wouldn’t mind quiet companionship of this sort while I write, i don’t think. So if you’d like to stay…”
John opens his eyes. Alexander is still staring at him with what seems to be fondness, and his other hand is patting his leg invitingly. John should probably ask, but that seems weird since he’s a dog right now. So he moves his head closer, rests his chin on Alexander's bony thigh.
“Good boy,” Alexander says, and he gives John’s hair an extra-vigorous ruffle before turning back to his work. It only takes him a minute to get into a rhythm of writing, his left hand still casually resting atop John’s head.
It’s soothing. John’s knees start to hurt after a few minutes, but the steady, warm pressure of Alexander 's hand and the scratch of his pen and occasional muttering are comforting in a way that John is only now starting to wonder if he should be indulging in. But that part, that doubt, is more than a little thrilling in and of itself.
He sits that way until his legs fall asleep, and then with a muffled “ow” he removes his head from Alex. He should probably leave, but instead he stretches out his legs and crawls under the desk. He rests his head on his arms and stares at Alexander 's shoes, but because those aren’t very interesting he closes his eyes and dozes.
He wakes up to a clattering on the desk and a triumphant “HA! Take that!” He blinks, it takes him a second to realize he’s underneath Alexander ’s desk, and then Alexander is pushing his chair back so he can peer down at him. “My dear Laurens, you will be pleased to know that I have firmly scorched the bottoms of of those idiot loyalists for this week. Now how about you come out of there, hmm?”
John nods, and crawls out, his knees complaining quietly.
“So it seems,” Alexander says, looking John in the eye, “That while I was out last night I’ve been followed home by a dog. Maybe not the sleekest one I’ve ever met,” he says, his eyes twinkling, “and I’d wager money not the fastest, but he seems to be a good mutt.”
John licks his lips and waits for Alexander to get to the point.
“So I suppose the question is, are we keeping him?”
John’s breath catches, his eyes are so wide he’s not sure they won’t fall out of his face. Alexander can’t be serious. He can’t be seriously proposing that they do this again, again sober, again as in regularly enough to consult about it. Can he?
“I know what the dog thinks,” Alexander says. “I’m asking John Laurens. Should I keep the dog.”
“I think,” John says, and his voice comes out cracked, so he clears his throat and tries again. “I think this dog won’t be too much trouble. Most of the time you won’t even know he’s there.”
“Hmm.” Alexander says. “And the rest of the time?”
“This,” John says, nodding to the desk, “this was nice. A pillow would make it nicer,” he adds a little ruefully. Then, after a moment of consideration “And maybe… maybe what we did last night, sometimes, would be nice too?” He had enjoyed following Alexander 's commands. Maybe sober he’d enjoy it less, but…
“Huh.” Alexander absently scratches the side of his face. “And he’ll do what I ask him to do and not interrupt me when I’m extremely busy?”
“Within reason, of course,” John replies.
“Will he make a mess? Shit in weird places and so on?”
“What- no. No!”
“Good.” Alexander claps his hands together. “John, I believe you know more about animals than I do, so you’ll tell me if it turns out I don’t know anything about dogs, right?”
“I, um. Yes.”
“Excellent.” Alexander looks as though he has just won a particularly satisfying debate. “I’m thinking we should call the dog Jack.”
“Wha- what?”
“Well, it’s a variation of your name, John, a nickname of sorts, but one that I don’t call you so we’re not likely to be confused. And then both you and the dog will know who I’d talking to, that could be a bit awkward, otherwise, wouldn’t you say?”
John honestly hadn’t thought that far ahead. It’s not unreasonable, though, to assume that Alexander 's non-stop brain had been thinking these things through even as he was writing a scathing critique on some ass or another.
“Well?”
“Uh- yeah.” It’s almost unbelievable how quickly and… officially this is all happening. John’s double life as a dog.
“Jack, what do you think?” Alexander asks. Oh. He’s testing him.
It takes John a minute to slip back into the same state of mind he’d been in before. He crouches lower, looks up at Alexander, and nods quickly. Yes. He’s still mostly John just then, but he somehow doesn’t think that Jack will mind.
John waits a few days before trying the experiment again. As much fun as it was last time, what if it goes wrong, or Alexander decides he’s made a mistake, or the game is boring? There are a few moments when John considers curling up next to Alexander, or at his feet, a few moments when he catches Alexander looking at him almost expectantly, but nothing he follows through with.
Fortunately, Alexander does not seem keen on his plan going unproven, and one day while they’re eating dinner over work, in perfectly companionable silence and righteous mutterings, Alexander says “Oh, by the way, is Jack around anywhere?” He winks, just in case the words hadn’t been enough. “I thought I’d adopted a dog, but he seems to be making himself scarce.”
John chokes on his soup. Broth spatters across yet another scathing report of something intolerable the British are doing. John is almost certain that dogs don’t read scathing reports on intolerable British doings, so he shrugs and continues reading.
Later, when the food is cleared away and the scathing reports have been exchanged for patriotic essays, John finds the time to set his reading down. (It’s not a very good essay, anyway.)
He leaves the room. He takes the opportunity to piss and shit like a human. He takes off his jacket and shoes and rolls up his sleeves. And then he crawls back to Alexander on all fours.
Alexander doesn’t notice him at first. There’s no guarantee he noticed when John left in the first place, as he’s engrossed in someone else’s writing, marking it up with vigor and no doubt planning his next ten-page response.
It’s maybe a cue for Jo- Jack to wait, but he doesn’t. He trots over to Alexander and sits expectantly a few feet away. “Hey!”
Alexander jumps, then beams. “Jack! I’ve been looking for you. Come here.”
Jack blinks once, then scrambles across the room to Alexander ’s side. He bumps into the waiting hands and Alexander ruffles his hair. “That’s a good boy, Jack,” he says.
One hand disappears over the table, and comes back with a small piece of bread between two fingers. “Here,” Alexander says, lowering it like an offering to Jack’s nose. “Take it.”
Jack does. It’s just a piece of bread, but the act of being fed, the taste of Alexander's fingers, and the proud “Good dog!” that come after send a thrill of excitement through his body.
Alexander pets him and feeds him bits of leftover dinner for another few minutes, then they go through a few tricks. “Sit.” “Lie down.” “Roll over.” “Stay.”
Stay is hard. Jack doesn’t like it when Alexander leaves the room. What if he’s going to come back with people to mock him, or what if someone walks in by accident while Alexander is gone?
Neither of these happen. Alexander is back in less than a minute, with a new book in his hands, and he praises Jack again. Maybe he can see it on Jack’s face, maybe the whimpering had been less internal than Jack thought, but they take a break from tricks after that.
Alexander sits down on one end of the couch and pats the cushion next to him. It’s a clumsy scramble up the side, but Jack joins him. It’s much more comfortable than the floor. He rests his head on Alexander 's leg, like before, and Alexander runs his hand through Jack’s hair, like before.
Jack is skittish the next few times, but he gets more comfortable rather fast. Alexander's unashamed enthusiasm for being a pet owner is encouraging, and he tracks down spare pillows (and sometimes not-so-spare ones from his own bed) to throw on the floor to make it more comfortable. No one disturbs them, and if there does happen to be a knock on the door, Alexander explains twice, surely Jack will have enough time to leave the room if he wants before Alexander lets whoever-it-is inside.
John trusts him. It turns out John trusts Alexander almost completely, implicitly, and it’s this trust that makes following his commands and receiving his affection feel so good. John is good at following orders: orders from his father that he never wanted to listen to, orders from society telling him he just needed to find a girl, orders from the spirit of rebellion- and maybe someday an actual general- telling him to risk his life for freedom. The last are orders John is more than willing to take, but they don’t result in easy answers and easy praises.
The orders Jack follows do.
Alex, for his part, seems to be enjoying this just as much. At a guess, John would say that Alexander likes not having to holler just to be heard, not having to fight for his place in every conversation, not having to spit words fast enough to make his point before someone tries to talk over him. He has Jack’s complete and utter attention when he speaks, and John thinks he likes the physical contact more than he will admit.
On a few occasions, he’s walked in from a particularly unfriendly day to find John reading, and called “here, Jack! Are you around, doggie?” Those times he heavily favors the physical contact aspect.
Of course, since he is Alexander Hamilton and never does anything by halves, Jack is one of the most eloquent dogs in New York. At the command “Speak,” he will sit up and respond to Alexander 's most recent argument, pointing out where it feels weak, and what, if any, retaliations he can think of. Sometimes he sticks with a short reminder to include freedom for slaves everywhere he possibly can.
(This doesn’t happen quite as often as one might think, partly because Alexander seems to have tireless wells of confidence in his cause, partly because dogs don’t tend to pay attention to politics, and sometimes Jack will whine aloud rather than give an eloquent answer. Alexander has to admit that’s only fair.)
In the meantime, John and Alexander’s friendship changes very little. They get closer, if anything, start spending more and more time together, but they don’t talk about Jack. They laugh and they argue, they write and they get into fights on the street, covering each others’ back. They drink, and their friends, Lafayette and Mulligan seem to have no idea what goes on behind closed doors.
Jack remains housebound for almost a month, but Alexander 's drive for new experiences, for progress, extends even to this. Jack is resting under his desk, waiting for him to finish writing, when there’s a clatter and a muffled curse, and Alexander stands abruptly. Jack crawls out expectantly, but Alexander isn’t done. He’s rushing to get his coat.
Jack whines.
“Oh.” Alexander looks over. “I’m out of ink,” he says, jittering with unwritten words. “I’ll be back.”
Jack whines again. He doesn’t want Alexander to leave.
Alexander bites his lip. His inkstained fingers are still trembling. “Jack,” he says. “Do you want to go for a walk?”
With Alex? Yes. Jack scrambles over to Alexander's side, looking up expectantly. And then at the door. Are they really going outside?
“All right, all right.” Alexander says, and some of the tension escapes the tight knot of his shoulders. “Stand up.”
Jack tilts his head.
“Stand up,” Alexander repeats, gesturing with his hands, and Jack shakily lifts his body, putting all his weight on his back legs.
“There we go,” Alexander says. “That’s a good boy. Now come on.” He heads downstairs and Jack hurries after him, close at his side. His head is a rush of excitement at the prospect of going out, of the thrill, of the risk. “Now just don’t run off,” Alexander is rattling on. “That would be so inconvenient, I don’t know if I can leash you, that would beg questions, but you’re to stay close because I don’t want to lose you.”
Jack rubs his face against Alexander’s shoulder briefly, then scratches lightly at the front door. Alexander chuckles and opens it, and then they’re out. In the world. The world!
He takes off down the road just for the hell of it as soon as he’s out the door. Dodges a few people, laughs at the excitement of it all. He stops at the corner, bounces on the balls of his feet. Then he’s dashing back to Alexander, circling him to lose his momentum and taking a spot at his side.
“What was that all about?” Alexander asks, but Jack just grins. He’s rewarded with a pat on the head and a fond head shake, and he is happy.
He stays close to Alexander’s side for the rest of the trip to the store, and then Alexander seems to decide he wants to shop alone. “Stay here,” he says, looking Jack in the eye. “I’ll be back in a minute.”
The door closes behind him, and Jack stares at it for a minute. It doesn’t even occur to him that he could open it. He can’t. He lets out a small whine and waits.
“Monsieur Laurens!” The voice come from his left. Who- who- Lafayette!
“Hey!” Jack shouts. He doesn’t usually talk unless Alexander tells him to, but he can bark. “Hey!”
“Mon ami!” Lafayette says something in french that Jack doesn’t understand, so he hugs the man instead. His clothes are soft compared to Alexander’s, more embellished, and they smell cleaner.
“Well, this I did not expect,” Lafayette says, but he doesn’t sound unhappy about it.
“Oh, Ja- Well!” Jack releases his friend at the sound of Alexander’s name, and runs back to circle him cheerfully. “Bonjour, Lafayette,” Alexander says.
“There is something you must see,” Lafayette says.
“Now?”
“Très important.”
Alexander looks at Jack, who looks back with nothing less than full enthusiasm. Might as well make this a full adventure.
“Lead the way.”
The something is politics, as most things tend to be. One full-of-himself Samuel Seabury speaking in a wooden voice and gathering a crowd. Mulligan is there, and Burr, wearing incredibly opposed expressions to Alexander’s approach.
“Oh my god, tear this dude apart,” Mulligan mutters. Alexander listens, and Jack can feel the tension build in his small frame, knows the second before the explosion happens and Alexander goes off on the guy.
He’s brilliant. Aggressive. And then-
“My dog speaks more eloquently than thee!”
And Jack’s head shoots up. He yips and whines along in solidarity. Alexander waves a hand at him, and Lafayette catches his eye in mild confusion. “Alexander does not have a dog.”
“Insult,” Mulligan explains.
Jack just lifts his chin proudly. They’re wrong. Even if Alexander insults his mange, he is Alexander’s dog.
Alexander returns to the group wound tight from the confrontation he’d won. Lafayette and Mulligan slap him on the back, and Jack takes the opportunity to hug him, squeeze some of the tension out of his body.
“Good boy,” Alexander murmurs, rubbing Jack’s head gently. “Good dog.” And in that moment, that’s the only thing that matters.