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ninzied · 5 months

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kiss me once 'cause you know

in which alex sort of moves in and they don't talk about what it means. or: a cakegate never happened and then they become friends and accidental roommates au. for @rwrbmovie and @rwrbsource's rwrbweek: day 6 | kiss also on ao3. ~2k.

Of all the things they’ve been to one another—sometimes-rivals, reluctant allies, tediously cordial seatmates at international events—Henry never thought that he and Alex would end up being something like friends.

And yet here they are:

Henry, living his little gay life as Pez calls it in Brooklyn, running an LGBTQ youth shelter that’s two blocks away from David’s favorite dog park—

And Alex, earning his law degree at NYU and, apparently, looking up numbers of erstwhile princes (he’d phoned the shelter first, much to Pez’s utter delight) and asking if Henry wanted to grab a coffee sometime.

Henry had been baffled then, and, if he’s honest, even now he’s still not entirely sure he hasn’t missed something.

He brought it up, once. Many months into their—friendship?—after he was reasonably certain that it was a permanent thing, whatever it was.

Alex had shrugged. Tore off some more pita and dipped it into the labneh in front of them. “I wanted to find out if you were any less insufferable now that you’re, you know.” He glanced back up. “No longer royalty.”

“I see,” said Henry, with a customary roll of his eyes. “And what’s the verdict, then?”

Alex replied, around a mouthful of pita and a spectacularly shit-eating grin, “Jury’s still out.” His eyes were alight, either with mischief or the glow of the flickering candle between them, Henry decided he’d rather not think on too closely. “Guess we’ll have to keep seeing each other, just to know for sure.”

“Wonderful,” said Henry dryly, and Alex had laughed, and Henry had tried not to feel a certain type of way about it.

It all could be perfectly normal, you see, if not for the fact that Henry is, as ever, completely and hopelessly in love with the man.

It’s fine—really, it is—on most days.

Most days, they have dinner. Usually someplace obscure, where Henry can’t tell if the staff don’t know who they are or don’t care. Either way, they go where the food is generally excellent and where they know they won’t ever be bothered. Neither of them are public figures anymore, but maintaining some semblance of privacy seems to be an unspoken agreement between them.

Some days, when they’re meeting in Brooklyn, Alex follows him home.

There’s really no other way to describe it, because the first time it happened, Henry had literally turned right thinking Alex would go left back toward the Q; instead, he kept pace with Henry, chatting all the way to the stoop of his brownstone. Then, while Henry struggled to find the most casual way to ask if he’d like to come in, Alex was already striding inside like he lived there.

And, some days, it truly feels like he does.

Henry chalks it up to things like exam times at first.

When they aren’t talking, or watching Star Wars (bickering about Star Wars, more like), Alex is nose-deep in a textbook or furrowing his brow at yet another paper, pausing only to swig on a beer every time David barks at Paul Hollywood onscreen. As the semesters go on, the readings get longer, the papers more time-consuming, and some nights will turn into mornings where Henry finds Alex passed out on his couch and spooning the pillow that has the beagle embroidered in the center.

Henry tries his hardest not to notice nor to feel any particular way about it, but over time his living room is slowly but surely overtaken, resembling more and more the study of some kind of mad genius.

He finds Alex’s notes strewn all about, tucked into odd spaces and utterly illegible to him. Alex’s textbooks occupy every conceivable space but the shelves, some precariously balanced at the very edges of Henry’s furniture. This is how he almost winds up with a broken big toe, when David mad-dashes after a ball twice his size (“Indoors, Alex? For Christ’s sake”), and the largest bloody tome on constitutional law or some such very nearly takes Henry out as he’s walking by.

Henry lifts the book and places it much more securely in the center of the coffee table. It takes some finagling, because there are no fewer than three half-empty mugs of stale brew, one of Henry’s (tea, though, of course), a cluster of Henry’s pens because Alex can’t be bothered not to keep losing his own, and Alex’s glasses, which Alex had been searching for until he and David both got distracted by a new toy.

“You’re a menace,” says Henry.

“You love me,” grins Alex, not even looking up as he play-wrestles David and murmurs, “Good boy,” which is a very fortunate thing because Henry’s just flushed the shade of a tomato, he’s certain.

He mumbles an excuse about checking the oven—an entirely absurd claim to make, because if there are any legitimate issues he’ll simply have to come right back out and face Alex again. Alex has said he can’t be trusted in the kitchen, though from Henry’s point of view, anyone who eschews the metric system is the one who can’t be trusted.

“Remember it’s in Fahrenheit, babe,” calls Alex from the other room, and Henry promptly knocks his elbow into a stray spoon, sending it a-scatter.

That could be an absolutely normal thing to call a friend. Right?

Henry has no concept of how long he stands there, staring at the oven timer tick down. He ought to rationalize it away as best he can, but a very small, very stupid part of him wants to hope instead.

“Hey. Move over.” Alex is suddenly next to him, laughing as he nudges Henry out of the way with his hip. Henry stands frozen as Alex bends down, opening the oven door and giving the pan a testing jiggle.

“Needs a little more time,” he says, then glances at the spoon clutched in Henry’s hand. “Definitely too soon for that. Still gotta chill it overnight. Who eats cheesecake with a spoon, anyway?”

Right.

So, sometimes Alex bakes for them. Sometimes he cooks for them, too. Actually, he’s been cooking quite a lot, come to think of it. They don’t dine out much at all anymore.

It’s become increasingly difficult for Henry to not think about these sorts of things and wonder if they might mean something.

One morning, Henry comes down the stairs to the living room to find that Alex isn’t there.

He can’t actually recall the last time that happened, Alex not ending up spending the night. There’s never not some looming deadline that keeps him up at unreasonable hours, and even then they’re usually up later than that just talking to one another.

Last night Alex had definitely nodded off—refusing the spare room, as always—and he’d seemed deeply asleep when Henry, in a fit of madness or maybe he had a small stroke, who can say, had taken a blanket and tucked him carefully in before turning out the light.

Henry wonders if perhaps that was the thing to have driven Alex off in the middle of the night at last. He tries not to wonder what it could mean, whether it’s irrational for him to feel as devastated as he does, standing there, staring at the neatly folded blanket in front of him now.

Distantly, there’s a clang of something like metal on metal. It sounds as though it’s come from the kitchen.

Henry frowns. He hadn’t heard David come down the stairs after him. Which means—could it—

The clanging noise is followed by a low curse under breath, and Henry, God help him, Henry cannot breathe.

Alex is making breakfast.

He’s already dressed for the day, looking fresh-faced and several cups of coffee in judging from the trail he’s left behind on the counter. Henry ought to have noticed the aroma earlier, but the flat has smelled almost permanently of coffee ever since Alex took up unofficial residence here.

Here. He’s here. Alex is still here.

“Hi,” says Henry, still slightly dumbfounded.

“Morning, sunshine.” Alex shoots him a grin that feels like it’s pierced him straight from Eros’ bow, and Christ when did Henry get so maudlin? “I have a study group soon, but wanted to make sure you got fed before going.”

“I can feed myself, thank you,” says Henry, not terribly convincingly. Surely there must be a box of cereal here, somewhere, that can help him attest to that fact.

“Uh huh.” Alex tilts the pan of eggs onto a plate, adding several garnishes that Henry didn’t even know were in his kitchen’s possession. “Listen, I know you Brits are adverse to flavor, but don’t forget the hot sauce this time, okay?”

“You are determined to give me heartburn,” says Henry, not a little bit wistfully, because Alex truly has no clue.

“You know it.” Alex winks at him while loading the dishwasher. “Tea’s in the cupboard. Got the one you like from that bougie place in West Village, ‘cause that’s just the kind of guy I am.” He straightens, brushing off his hands, already on the move, always on the move. “We still on for the museum social?”

“Oh, yes,” says Henry, cheering considerably at the thought. He has his outfit planned and everything, down to the tie that Alex had gotten for his birthday last year. “Looking forward to it.”

“All right. I’ll see you tonight,” says Alex, and then he’s leaning in as he walks past, one hand cupping Henry’s jaw, his lips touching briefly to Henry’s cheek. Like it’s something he always does—like this is how they’ve said goodbye every morning, how they will say goodbye every morning—and this is it. Henry is simply done for.

It’s over so quickly that Alex is already halfway to the foyer before the thought occurs to Henry that perhaps he’s just imagined the whole thing.

The front door opens and closes. Somewhere he can hear David puttering around, nosing into his food bowl that Alex must have refilled earlier, and yes, it must not have been real. How else could he explain Alex making him breakfast, feeding his dog, kissing him and then walking away like everything hasn’t been utterly and irrevocably changed between them?

Henry is still standing there, trying to recall how to breathe, when the door opens again. And then Alex is there, standing in front of him, and Henry can do this. He wills himself to make it so.

Their eyes meet.

“Hey.” Alex hovers in place for a moment. His expression is fairly neutral, but he’s gone uncharacteristically still. Henry doesn’t think he’s ever seen him stand so still before. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to do that.”

Well. That answers that, then.

Henry struggles to swallow. “It’s all right,” he finally manages to say. It is, in fact, the furthest thing from all right. “No harm done.” Every harm has been done, actually, and Henry doesn’t know which part is worse—that Alex hadn’t meant to kiss him, or that Alex is saying he’s sorry he did. “I know you didn’t mean anything by it. We don’t have to—”

“No—Henry. That’s not what I’m saying.”

“It’s—” Henry swallows again. He can’t seem to recall how to put words side by side anymore. “No?”

Alex shakes his head. He takes one, then another, step closer. His eyes are bright with something that Henry almost doesn’t dare hope to read. Something warm. Something burning.

“I didn’t mean to do it like that,” Alex says. “Because it does mean something.” Henry doesn’t think he’s imagined the way Alex’s voice has cracked at the end. “It means everything, Henry, and I’d really like to do it right this time.”

“Oh,” says Henry, breathlessly. “Yes. Yes, go on then.”

Alex is already striding forward before he’s even finished speaking.

He takes Henry’s face in his hands, and then Alex’s mouth is on his, warm and hungry and wanting. Henry’s lips part, a soft groan escaping Alex’s throat as their tongues meet and slide together, and it’s everything that Henry never thought could be his until now.

His. Alex is his.

Henry buries his hands in Alex’s hair, gripping there in counterpoint to the way he presses his body up against his, trying to get closer. When they part, they’re both gasping a little, Alex’s forehead pressed against his as the air between them starts to settle.

“I’ve been wanting to do that for so long,” says Alex, voice low and heated all over.

Henry smiles. “Darling,” he murmurs, leaning in to kiss him again. “You have no idea.”

#rwrb #red white and royal blue #firstprince #rwrb fic #firstprince fic #rwrbweek #rwrbsource #usernuria #iuserzoe #(tagging you because one of the lines was inspired by your david gifset lol)

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