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Alex walks into Henry’s office with his usual easy confidence, his smile lights up the small office as he greets Henry with what has become his usual greeting lately. “Hey, sweetheart.” The petname seems to just roll off his tongue like it belongs there, as natural as the light winter-cooled breeze filtering through the slightly open window to cool Henry’s always too warm in the winter office.
Henry shoves the box of chocolates into the open desk drawer before turning to Alex with a smile. His fingers twist the ring on his pinky in the move that always seems to betray his nerves, but he hopes Alex doesn’t notice this time. His mind races and his thoughts are focused entirely on the situation he’s landed himself in. A box of chocolates, clearly a gift, and no note to clarify which of his students, or whoever he supposes, might have left it—or why. It’s a problem he has no desire to explain to anyone, least of all Alex.
“Hello, Alex,” Henry replies, attempting to keep his voice steady. He doesn’t meet Alex’s eyes for long, glancing instead at his desk, then his hands, anywhere but at the man whose mere presence seems to be able to throw his thoughts into disarray. The last thing Henry needs is Alex finding out about the chocolates. The teasing would be relentless, and as it stands, Henry already struggles to maintain composure around Alex and his infuriating charm.
Alex moves closer, casually leaning against the edge of Henry’s desk, and Henry can feel the weight of his gaze. “So,” Alex begins, his tone light and conversational, “anything exciting happen today?”
The question is innocuous enough—Alex asks about his day all the time—but Henry doesn’t stop to think about the intent behind it before he shakes his head no. If he did, perhaps he’d notice the faint gleam of curiosity in Alex’s eyes, the way his lips twitch like he’s holding back a secret. But introspection isn’t Henry’s strong suit, not when his thoughts are consumed by the chocolates hidden just a few inches away. He’s too busy crafting a plan to address the anonymous gift, rehearsing the speech he’ll need to deliver if he can identify the student. It’s a delicate balance to maintain authority and professionalism, and he can’t afford a single misstep.
Alex doesn’t wait for a detailed answer. Instead, with a practiced ease, he grabs Henry by the arm and pulls him toward the door. “Come on, lunch break. You’re overdue.”
Henry protests half-heartedly, but Alex is already leading the way, steering them toward the little café just off campus. It’s the kind of place that feels cozy despite its polished wood floors and slightly overpriced menu. The students rarely venture here during the week, preferring cheaper options in the cafeteria or the food trucks near the library. Henry wonders, briefly, if Alex chose this spot on purpose, if he knew Henry would feel more at ease away from the thrumming energy of student life, especially with them being a bit extra this week with Valentine’s at the end of the week.
The thought doesn’t linger long. Instead, Henry finds himself preoccupied with the lingering memory of the chocolates and Alex’s easy smile across from him. One problem at a time, he reminds himself.
Lunch is, as always, a delight. Alex insists on picking up the tab, claiming it’s his turn, and Henry doesn’t argue, even though he’s fairly certain it’s actually his. The food is good—better than he remembers from the last time they came—but it’s the company that truly makes the meal exceptional. Alex has an effortless charm that puts people at ease, though for Henry, it’s a strange paradox. Alex makes him ridiculously nervous, his presence leaving Henry acutely aware of every small detail about himself, yet at the same time, Alex is one of the few people who can coax him into relaxing.
Their conversation flows as it always does, filled with Alex’s lighthearted teasing and Henry’s occasionally flustered responses. Before he knows it, time has slipped away from them. The bell above the café door chimes as they step back into the crisp afternoon air, and Alex walks him back toward his office, keeping up the lively chatter while Henry’s thoughts begin to spiral again.
By the time the workday winds down, Henry is no closer to identifying his mystery chocolate benefactor. Despite spending a ridiculous amount of mental energy turning over the possibilities, nothing adds up. He’s almost ready to dismiss the whole situation as a harmless but peculiar prank—until he returns to his office and finds another box of chocolates sitting squarely on his desk.
Henry freezes in the doorway, his bag slipping slightly off his shoulder as he stares at the gift. His office door had been locked this time, or so he thought, and the growing mystery sets him on edge. He picks up the box cautiously, as if it might reveal some clue, but it’s as nondescript as the first. Frowning, he opens his drawer and stashes it with the first box, the two now sitting together like an unwanted collection. If this becomes a trend, Henry realizes, he might have to start locking his door more carefully—or possibly setting up a camera.
As his office hours come to an end, Henry gathers his things and heads for the exit, distracted enough by the events of the day that he nearly collides with someone in the hallway. That someone, of course, is Alex.
“Hey, sweetheart,” Alex says with a grin, catching Henry’s arm before he can stumble. “Just the person I was hoping to see. What are your plans for tonight?”
Henry adjusts his bag and clears his throat, trying not to think about how casually Alex’s hand lingers for just a moment before letting go. “I have a meeting with the department chair, then dinner with Pez, and a Zoom call with Bea later tonight. Why?”
Alex sighs dramatically, as if personally offended by Henry’s packed schedule. “Bummer. I was hoping to see if you wanted to go with me to the theater downtown. They’re doing a replay of Rogue One this week.”
Henry’s heart skips a beat, but he plays it off with practiced ease—or at least he hopes he does. “Actually, what are you doing tomorrow night?”
Alex’s smile is instant, warm and bright. “Nothing that can’t be rescheduled. Perfect, it’s a date.”
The casual confidence with which Alex says the word date is enough to send Henry’s brain into a brief, chaotic tailspin. He’s so flustered that he almost trips over his own feet as they continue down the hall. At the end of the corridor, their paths diverge, Alex heading in the opposite direction with a parting smile that lingers in Henry’s mind like the echo of a melody.
Just before Alex rounds the corner, Henry glances back—and he swears Alex is looking back at him too, as if weighing something unspoken. It’s a fleeting moment, gone in an instant, but it leaves Henry standing there a beat longer than he intends, his heart inexplicably lighter.
Henry has 3 more mysterious boxes of chocolates dropped in his office throughout the next day and he’s running out of space to accommodate them. As he stashes the third one into the drawer that somehow just barely has space for it he sees the note that is attached to the bottom. Henry pulls it free and sees it’s just four words Someone who loves you. Henry has the sinking suspicion it’s something he should know maybe a quote or something. He stashes the note in the drawer and locks it as if doing so just might contain the swirling thought his mind has been working overtime on the last few days. It doesn’t gain him any clarity and he’s no closer to knowing who has been leaving him chocolates.
He thinks about it on his drive home, and the thoughts are still whisper-quiet in the back of his mind as he gets read to meet Alex. He had texted Henry earlier with a change of plans, asking him to meet at a diner downtown before the movie. Henry rushes through getting himself ready for an evening with Alex going for a casual look that doesn’t look like he spent too much time on it—at least that’s what he hopes the outfit he decides on says.
He's pulling into the parking lot downtown near the diner at the same time as Alex and the two of them walk from the parking lot to the door together. They fall into step next to each other as they walk toward the entrance. The evening air carries a hint of chill so they’re walking closer to each other. Alex’s shoulder brushes Henry’s once or twice and it sends a shiver through Henry that has nothing to do with the weather.
Inside, the diner is warm and Henry finds the nostalgic mix of chrome fixtures and red leather booths inviting in a way that only diners can accomplish. Henry loves this particular diner, he’s actually been here a few times with Alex, but somehow tonight feels different and it’s giving Henry’s anxious energy a ripe playground. They settle in at a back booth and Henry swears the way Alex’s legs intertwine with his under the table feels different than normal—almost deliberate and intimate.
“So, how was your day?” Alex asks after they order, leaning back against the booth.
Henry starts in about his classes and the sheer amount of havoc the upcoming holiday has created in them. “It’s like, somehow, they have lost their minds, and their hormones have been cranked up more than normal. I really can’t wait for things to go back to normal and them to just be normally hormonal kids again.”
Alex listens intently but Henry notices Alex looks like he’s waiting for something that doesn’t seem to come in his response. Something is different in the way he rests back in the booth sipping his drink.
Their food is delivered right as Henry asks, “What about you? How was your day?”
Alex waits until the waiter is walking away to answer. “Not bad today was one of my early classes and only half the class showed up.”
Alex usually has the best turnout of any of the professors Henry speaks to regularly, in his 8 am classes, so a half full one is odd. Of course, Henry knows that if he had a professor that looked like Alex he would never miss a class either. Alex commiserates with Henry about the weirdness of the students this week, how they all seem to be teetering between joy and something else all week. Henry nods along to all of that until Alex leans forward slightly and his voice drops to a quiet conspiratorial tone that stays between them. “And, I dropped by and delivered three more boxes of chocolates to your office, that apparently got taken again.”
Henry freezes, his fork halfway to his mouth and asks, “I’m sorry, what? You’ve been dropping them off?”
Alex blinks at him and looks confused. “Wait, they’ve not been being taken? I assumed when they kept disappearing and you didn’t’ say anything someone was swiping them,”
“No, they weren’t taken but there was no note until the last one, and even that didn’t say who they were from. So I was maybe a bit paranoid and assumed they were from a student I would have to let down gently. They’re all stashed in the drawer of my desk.”
Alex laughs, his head tipping back against the booth, and Henry joins in. “So you’re telling me that I didn’t need to keep dropping off more I just needed to take the mystery element out sooner.”
Henry chuckles, his cheeks warm. “Apparently.”
“Well,” Alex says, his grin softening into something fond. “Guess I should’ve taken the mystery out sooner.”
Henry swears the way Alex looks at him in that moment, with his smile still lingering, feels like something out of a daydream. It takes all his willpower to stop his mouth from saying so.
Henry shakes his head from his spot in the booth, he can’t help but laugh as he pushes his food around his plate. He can’t get past the sheer absurdity of it all, it’s almost embarrassingly endearing the way the unnecessary mystery and Henry’s paranoia coupled with Alex’s persistence led them here. This time he can’t stop his mouth from commenting on it. “So, you’ve been leaving me chocolates all week, and I’ve been hiding them in my desk like some kind of hoarder, which of course just caused you to leave more.”
Alex leans across the table and smirks. “Yeah, pretty much.”
Henry laughs and runs a hand through this hair. “And this whole time you didn’t think to—I don’t know—tell me?”
“Well, technically I did.” Alex rests his chin on his palm. “Just didn’t realize you were going full-on Sherlock Holmes about it.”
Henry shakes his head in exasperation again, smiling across the table as Alex seems to keep moving closer. “I thought they were from a student, I was preparing a whole speech about student-teacher boundaries and everything.”
Alex nudges Henry’s foot under the table as he seems to move even closer. “Well, I’m glad I saved you from that awkwardness, I should get some kind of reward for that.”
Henry rolls his eyes at the both the absurdity of Alex in this moment and at the fact that his heart is hammering so much over this dinner with one of his best friends and colleagues. He knows it’s not just the boxes of chocolates or the current teasing—but more so that Alex has for some reason been doing all this for him. Alex has inexplicably been thinking about him and planning something that has made Henry feel special. Of course the look, the one he’s seen before but never named, that Alex is giving him right now across the diner table doesn’t help. It’s almost as if Alex has made up his mind about something but not yet told Henry there was even something to consider. He swallows, and pushes through the sudden difficulty speaking. “So … what’s your plan now that I know?”
Alex’s hands find Henry’s across the table, his fingers gently brush against Henry’s wrist before gently wrapping around it. Alex’s thumb traces along Henry’s skin where it rests. Alex leans in and Henry finds himself doing the same. Their lips are mere centimeters apart when they both stop. “Henry, I’m going to kiss you if you don’t stop me”
Henry closes the gap between their lips and it’s everything he ever imagined kissing Alex would be. It’s a slow and deliberate movement of his lips against Alex’s, neither letting it get out of hand in their current location, but enough to set a fire in him. They pull back almost by silent agreement and take their respective spots back against the benches where they’re sitting.
“I wish I had known it wasn’t just me wanting more all this time.” Henry whispers across the table.
Alex whispers back, his voice quiet but certain, “Sweetheart, I’m all in. Have been for quite some time.”
Alex’s surety makes Henry forget every reason he’s ever had to hesitate when he comes to his feelings for Alex. He calls for their check, hoping to take the rest of this discussion somewhere more private.