Chapter Text
“Hey so. You all know my roommate, right? If not, his name is Hank and clearly you don't watch my videos enough. Anyways, he's gay. And, that's like, cool and whatever. But lately, I dunno, his new boyfriend? Peter? He kinda...rubs me the wrong. And no, I’m not homophobic. My brother is gay, and i’m pretty sure if i was a dick about him being gay Scott would tell me. Anyways….Peter, Hank, and me….” Alex glares at himself in his video. His camerawork is shaky and he clearly has bedhead (who told him to grow out his hair, anyways? It wasn’t the 80’s, and man buns were in. Not what he had. ‘I need to remind Hank to take me where he cuts his hair.’ He thinks.) He’s stopped focusing on the words, he doesn’t need a recap of his day. It was one spent with Hank and, shudder, Peter.
There was honestly nothing wrong with him. Except, that there was. He just couldn’t place it. And what was worse was that everybody loved him except Alex himself. Was it his hair? No, because Alex loved light hair. Ororo had the nicest hair on anybody that he had ever seen, and her’s was white. Was it his fashion sense? No. Alex actually liked that. He and Peter had hung out without Hank many times shopping together. They even bought matching shirts to prove they liked each other to Hank, who still didn’t believe the two boys were remotely friends.
It was a good day. They hung out at the movies, dicked around the mall and even got sushi after (Alex still stands on the basis that sushi sucked ass. But Hank is dumb and so is Peter and boyfriends who outnumber you suck.). Everything was cool until Peter started grabbing Hank’s hand and kissing his cheek. Alex was used to that bit. That wasn’t the part that royally pissed him off. What did, was Peter kissing him even when Hank told him not to.
Like, what the fuck?
He said no, so don’t kiss him. His blood boiled just thinking about it, heating up just at the image from earlier.
To think about it, he wasn’t even sure why Hank told Peter not to kiss him. They kissed before whenever they were around the rest of the group. Raven would snort at the two of them and Ororo would laugh in glee, Scott lecturing them about the usage of condoms and Jubilee’s shrieking of “AID’s are on a rise, don’t be silly, wrap your willy.”
And to be fair, Alex was always uncomfortable when they kissed. ‘Maybe he knows it makes you uncomfortable.’ Is his first thought and- No. It doesn’t make him uncomfortable! He’s okay with Hank being gay, of course he is. It doesn’t change him. He’s still his nerdy, big footed Hank who he met in AP physics. Hank who he would push into Charles's pool every summer at his annual summer bash.
His Hank.
Except, not really because he’s Peter’s now. Peter Maximoff, the brother to Erik. So he has no choice to be nice, even if he didn’t want to because Erik would kick his ass if he was mean.
His only outlet was youtube, and he had a decent amount of subscribers. If 50,000 was a decent amount. His only promise he had from his friends for letting them in his videos was that they wouldn’t watch his videos, and from what he knew, they all kept that promise except Scott. His annoying little brother would always tease him and reference his videos, much to his embarrassment.
That’s not quite the point, though, now is it?
The point is he wants to spend time with just Hank alone, and you would think he’d be able to since they shared a fucking dorm room but nooo, Peter was there just as much as he was himself. He wants to punch him in his stupid pretty little face. He won’t do that. He’s gone to too much therapy to just blow it all away because of a dumb boy who's stealing his best friend.
(Alex sleeps that night and dreams of blurry girls with glasses and dark hair and hands that are just too big but hands that he wanted to look at forever.)
-----
“Annnnnd here is Bozo, who hasn’t been home in 24 hours. Scott, be sure to tell the rest of the group this because he deserves so-”
“Hey! Is being alone with you not punishment enough?” Hank is sitting on the brown beat up stolen couch, flushing red at his friend’s comment, homework spread across their dingy coffee table. His laptop has been thrown aside and he totally in post-orgasm mode, Alex can tell.
Alex is jealous. He blinks in shock, because he-- No, he’s not interested in Hank OR Peter, thank you very much. He probably just hasn’t gotten laid in a long time. “I’m thinking tonight you come to a club with me as apology for leaving me, your very best friend home alone for so long. I could have set the house on fire, you know.” “You’re not that capable. Who knows how you escaped prison.” Hank grumbles, a smile on his face as Alex drapes himself across his lap. His moves his homework aside and his laptop as Alex shuts his camera and he feels victorious. He’s the only person he moves homework and stuff from his internship for, and that’s something even Peter can’t say.
“Magic.” He shifts, head curled in the crook of Hank’s neck. “How was it?”
And the asshole just hums, as if he doesn’t know what Alex means. He pushes him in response.
“Fine.” He’s vague.
“Oh come on, give me more than just ‘fine’.” He’s whining now, and they both know he doesn’t want to know, but they think it for different reasons. Hank, because of it being, well, gay; Alex, because of Peter.
Instead of replying he curls a hand in Alex’s long hair and they stay silent for what feels like hours. Moments like that are what he cherishes the most about their friendship. They put up an act in front of everyone, that they hate each other, that they think the other is a complete tool, that they can’t stand each other. But really, they do care. They care a lot.
Alex doesn’t know why, but when he thinks of Peter fucking Hank he wants to kill him. (He pins it on the fact that he is his best friend he knows better. He thinks he knows the reason why. He just can’t bring himself to admit it.)
(When they go out later, he picks up a pretty girl with green hair and fiery temper. He can’t remember her name and he think’s he might have called out the wrong name in bed. Neither of them say anything about it but he knows he's fucked up.)
-----
Alex wakes up with a number taped to his forehead and not an ounce of memory of the night before. He doesn’t know where exactly Hank fucked off to, but he does know that he, quite frankly, does not care anymore. He feels like they fought. He doesn’t know. Everything was blurry and he remembers fucking someone and that’s it. His mouth tastes like ass and he’d like to pretend that that was because it was the morning and not because he--.
Yeah, anyways.
His bones ached and he felt sluggish, head pounding against his skull. Groaning, he sat up to find medication for his head and water waiting on his nightstand. “Was this the girl?” He doubted it. She left early enough, he could remember that. She didn’t have enough time to go through his house for that, so that took her off his list. Hank was MIA, so not him, Scott, maybe?
And then his door opened, and he was suddenly very nervous.
-----
Erik Lehnsherr was confrontational. He was sharp witted, with a tongue that cut like a blade, and eyes that seemed to stare right through you and into your soul. He was smart; He was feared. And right now, Erik could practically feel the fear radiating off of the poor hungover boy in bed.
And Summers boys took no shit. Ever. Except maybe when it came to scary men who worked for the police force and could probably rip them in half with just one look.
“Charles made you soup.”
“....Okay….”
He squints, because they never spoke. One ever full moon, when Charles would get shitfaced for family gatherings, would they talk, because he would help him carry his wheelchair out to their car. Even then, it was a brief “Thank you.” and, “Yup.” So seeing Erik in his room caused many questions to formulate in his head, all swimming by faster and faster.
“I’ll cut to the chase. You’re hurting both Peter’s and Hank’s feelings. I do not care what you say to Hank, nor do I care what you do, but you will not, under any circumstances, hurt Peter’s feelings. There will be consequences if you do. You will fix this, or I will fucking rip your--”
“Okay, okay, I get it, asshole! Jesus….” He grumbled, having inched back every other word that came out of Erik’s mouth. He totally wasn’t scared! Not at all! He just, kind of maybe wanted to shrivel up and die anytime he saw Erik after what he did to Sean. Sean still couldn’t talk about it, though not the point. They stare at each other, glaring. Finally, in what felt like forever to Alex, Erik turns to go. His shoulders sag in relief, then he tenses when he notes that the man turn around to glance at him again. “Do you think…..Charles likes the color purple?”
“What the fuck? I don’t know, I guess so?”
“Okay.”
With that, the only evidence that he was there at all was the tupperware of soup sitting on Alex’s counter when he got up for more pain medicine.
----
“Alright so that’s a wrap on this week’s edition of ‘Ask Alex’! Leave me more comments in the description for next week’s video, where Hank will once again have to endure pain and answer your stupid questions with me.” Alex waves at the camera, cheeky grin in place, and then waits a few seconds before he gets up to turn off his camera. He turns off his lights and fancy equipment, and he breaks set.
Just as he settles down to edit his video to be posted that same night, Hank finally comes back home. Alex doesn’t look at him, he sits quietly in his chair, and pulls his headphones on. Hank says nothing, he shuffles towards the kitchen in silence.
Alex hates this. He hates when they get weird, because they’re weird for a long time and he can’t cope with it. It makes him nervous, makes him feel like he did when he thought about the time where he was separated from Scott. He feels anxious, always on edge, and he’s missing one person who means so much to him. That’s how he felt.
He sighs, saving his work. He gets up and moves to the kitchen. Fiddling around with the salt shaker, he finds Hank staring down at the oven. Alex leans on the island. He can feel the tension, and he could tell how badly it was. It was never like before, where he could make jokes and pretend that nothing happened. Now, he knows he has to address it.
Confrontation was never his friend. He turns to leave, and Hank mumbles, “I love Peter.”
His heart breaks, and so does his voice when he says, “I know.”
-----
He stays in bed for two days and only Scott knows, because he keeps up his facade on social media. Scott comes by the third day, where instead of finding him in bed, he finds him curled up under his desk, staring at photos of Hank and him from high school. Scott pushes him over with a soft, “Hey, asshole.”
He gets no response.
He knows he has to get up, he has to continue filming to pay rent, has to go to classes, has to-. Alex has to apologize. He knows that, but he won’t. He’ll move out, he’ll bunk with Scott and Kurt until he can get on his feet. As much as he’d probably grow to regret it, he could get Sean to buy an apartment with him. Or even travel abroad. He’d always wanted to go into the military.
“Stop trying to get your way out of this, dude. It’ll never work. Stop being a pussy.” Scott breaks the silence, Alex leaning into his brother. “Tell anybody about this and I will kick your ass, Alex.” He replies, wrapping an arm around his brother. They sat, staring at the photo album.
“You know he still loves you.”
There’s the heartache, followed up by the immediate guilt. He knows that, he does. But it’s not in the way that he wants, and he knows Scott doesn’t really know what's happening. Instead, he nods.
“I know. We’re just fighting. Wanna film a video with me?” “Sure.”
Scott knows better than to push. When Alex wants to tell him, he’ll tell him. They get up and set everything up, Alex makes himself presentable looking, and then, when they’re ready, he hits record.
“Hey guys. I know I promised that I would film with Hank, but he’s super busy this week so here’s my idiot older brother Scott with me to do a……”
(While he films, he can hear Hank in the living room whispering to Peter on the phone. He blinks hard, and shuts the sound out by focusing on Scott’s pestering and his own laughter. Maybe he’ll be okay without Hank.)
(He won’t be.)
-----