Chapter Text
Alex wakes up cold. He’s still half-asleep, so he pulls the comforter up higher. It doesn’t really help though. He stretches out his arm to search for Henry’s warm body next to him, but there’s nothing. Alex opens his eyes. Henry is not in bed with him.
What the fuck?
He listens but doesn’t hear any noise from the bathroom, so Henry must be downstairs.
Alex is out of bed and pulling on sweatpants and a hoodie before he’s made the conscious decision to do so. He just needs to see Henry. Except when he gets downstairs, all is quiet. Alex checks the living room and the kitchen, even the guest bathroom. Henry is nowhere to be found. David doesn’t come running to greet him either. Alex is alone.
Henry’s gone. Henry left.
The thought comes out of nowhere, hard and fast, and Alex has to grip the back of the couch for support. This is—ridiculous. He knows, well, he can infer that since both Henry and David are gone, and it’s morning, Henry has taken David for a walk.
But why didn’t he wake Alex? Did he not want to spend time with him? Was the week too much? Was Alex too much, and Henry needed a break from him?
The thoughts feel strange and intrusive, and Alex doesn’t know why they matter except that his hands are shaking and he’s cold and this almost feels like a panic attack except it doesn’t.
Alex isn’t exactly sure how he gets there, but he finds himself back in their bed, wrapped up in the sheets, needing to bury himself in their scent, except they changed the sheets yesterday, and they didn’t even have sex in them yet, so they mostly smell of their laundry detergent. Alex manages to grab Henry’s sleep shirt, buries his nose in it, and has no idea what the fuck is happening to him. He feels terrible; alone and bereft, like someone carved a hole in his chest.
Henry is gone. Henry left. The words play on a loop in his head, over and over, intertwining with the memories of Henry ghosting him after New Year’s, of Henry fleeing the lake house in the middle of the night, of Henry yelling at him in Kensington that he can’t have a relationship with Alex. There are flashes of other memories too, his dad being gone when he came back from camp, his mom absent for work, and June away at college. But they’re just the background soundtrack to the ringing silence Henry’s absence left in the brownstone.
Because Henry is gone. He’s left. Just like he left after New Years, like he left after the lakehouse, like—the memories keep piling on, and Alex feels like he’s suffocating. It’s like there’s no air around him left to breathe, like he’s all alone, like he’s falling from a great height and—falling.
He’s crashing.
Post-heat drop.
The words are swimming in his brain; emotional impact, carrying the mental load for so long, depression if the partner leaves too early, and Alex scrambles for his phone.
There’s a message from Henry, a picture of David sitting next to his favorite tree and looking very satisfied and Alex could cry. Why aren’t they here?
He manages to pull up the call app, but then his fingers freeze. What if he’s too needy? What if Henry doesn’t want to come home yet? What if he’s enjoying his walk? What if he doesn’t need Alex to be with him? What if he doesn’t need Alex to be happy? What if he’s happy without Alex?
His hand slips, across the call button, and before he can realize what’s going on and disconnect the call, Henry’s voice comes from the speaker.
“Good morning, love. Do you want me to pick you up a breakfast bagel?”
Henry’s voice cuts through the madness in Alex’s brain, like someone pulled the brakes on a carousel going at full speed. Everything goes blissfully quiet for a moment. Alex draws in a shaky breath. Henry is there. Henry wants to bring him breakfast.
“Alex? Are you there?”
The breath leaves Alex in a rush and he rolls on his back into the pillows. Henry cares.
“Alex?” Henry’s voice is sharper now.
Alex should probably say something. “H.”
“What’s going on? Talk to me, love.”
“I miss you,” Alex blurts out because it’s the truth. “Can you come home?”
“I’ve been gone for twenty minutes.” Henry sounds very confused, when he just left Alex, alone, in their house, when he should still fucking be here, in bed, with Alex.
Alex would be pissed if his chest wasn’t still feeling like someone wrenched his ribs apart with a car jack and ripped out his heart and the carousel starts spinning again.
“Please, Henry—” Alex’s voice cracks, he can’t believe he’s begging, but he also can’t believe Henry is gone—
“Fuck.”
Henry curses so rarely, it brings Alex up short for a moment.
“Alex, love, I’m on my way, alright. David and I are going to run home. Come on, David, there’s a good lad.” Henry’s breath comes a bit quicker now. “Alex, you’re dropping. Remember, we read about that, post-heat drop it’s a thing, even for alphas.”
“Yeah, I remember.” Because Alex does remember is the thing. But knowing that doesn’t exactly help with the hollow feeling in his chest and the coldness taking over his limbs.
“Tell me what’s happening,” Henry says. Orders really. “Where are you?”
“I’m in bed,” Alex says. “But it doesn’t smell like us, not really, and you left, I got up and you were gone and I—”
“I’m so sorry, love, but I didn’t leave, I just needed to get David out and I—I wanted to let you sleep. You were so tired and I wanted to let you rest. You worked so hard over the week, love, you took such good care of me and I wanted to return that.”
Something in his chest grows at the words, and fills the empty space. Henry wanted to take care of him.
Alex manages to relax infinitesimally. “Can you—” Fuck, he hates being so needy. “Where are you?”
“I’m getting a taxi.”
“What? You don’t need—”
“Alex, I’m not running home for another ten minutes when a cab will get me there in five. Can you wait five more minutes, love?”
Alex doesn’t really know if he can, but he says yes anyway.
“Okay. I’ll be right there. I love you so much.”
And then there’s the sound of traffic and the opening of a car door and the call disconnects.
It doesn’t matter. Henry is coming home. Henry loves him and Henry is coming home.
Alex huddles deeper under the blankets, repeating the words like a mantra in his head.
He’s not sure how much time passes until Henry appears in the doorway of their bedroom, cheeks flushed and hair slightly disheveled. Alex didn’t even hear the door.
Henry curses and starts taking off his clothes—shoes and socks, pants and t-shirt—in the most hurried, unsexy striptease he’s ever done until he’s down to his underwear and crawls into bed with Alex and gathers him up in his arms.
For the first time since Alex woke up this morning, he stops shaking. He takes a deep breath, and there’s Henry’s scent again, fresh linens and cut grass, and underneath the slightest faintest note of woodsy sweetness; summer meadow and cinnamon. It’s so much weaker than during his heat, so faint and hidden, it feels like it’s just for Alex.
“I didn’t think—” Henry starts, pressing kisses to Alex’s forehead, to his cheeks and his nose and his mouth, “you were fine yesterday, I was watching you the entire time and all was good. God, love, I had no idea it could come a day later.”
Alex’s cheeks are wet, and he thinks that Henry is a little overeager with his kisses, but then he tastes salt on his lips. He doesn’t know when he started crying.
“It’s okay,” he manages to say because Henry is beating himself up about this when it’s absolutely not his fault. “You couldn’t have known.”
“Christ, Alex, just let me take care of you.” Henry holds him tighter, one arm around Alex’s waist, the other softly stroking his arm, his shoulder, cradling his neck, and tilting his head up for a gentle kiss.
And Alex—Alex lets himself fall into it. He throws his arms around Henry, pushes a leg between Henry’s, gets as close as physically possible, and lets Henry kiss him.
With every press of Henry’s lips, with every touch of his hand, Alex’s chest is filling up, and his entire body tingles with the warmth returning to his limbs. Henry’s scent seeps into the bed, into Alex’s skin, and wraps like a calming balm all around him.
“Can you take off the jumper, love? Skin-to-skin works better for this.”
Letting go of Henry and half getting out of the blankets to pull off his hoodie is fucking horrible, but Henry’s right, and the skin-to-skin contact he gets afterward is so much better, especially when Henry goes back to pressing kisses to his skin everywhere he can reach, from Alex’s face to his shoulder and the top of his arm.
“I love you so much,” Henry whispers between kisses, “sometimes I still can’t believe how lucky I am to be loved by you. I thought you’d set me on fire, but you just helped burn my golden cage to the ground.”
Alex floats. Tethered only by Henry’s touch, by Henry’s skin against his, by Henry’s scent in his nose, he floats in absolute bliss.
“When I presented as omega I thought it was the worst thing to ever happen to me, but you made it the best thing. It was like you woke me up and made me realize that I was perfect for you and you were perfect for me, and together, we would be perfect.”
Henry’s still kissing him, still talking, telling Alex about all the things he loves about him, about their lives.
At some point, Alex manages to kiss him back more, to hold on tighter.
At some point, when Henry pulls back, Alex’s eyes are actually open and he really sees Henry.
“Fuck, sweetheart.”
Henry’s eyes are incredibly soft. “Are you back with me?”
“Yeah. Fuck, sorry, that was—”
“Don’t.” Henry presses a finger against his lips. Alex resists the juvenile urge to lick it. Barely.
“You don’t have anything to apologize for. We didn’t consider that there could be a delay in dropping. But this is normal. It happens. And being here for you, doing this for you, giving you this moment of comfort after everything you did for me last week—Alex, it means so much that I can do this for you. That we can do this for each other.”
“Yeah.” Alex doesn’t really know what else to say, his heart is too full. He scoots a little lower and rests his head over Henry’s heart. He just wants to lie here and hear it beat. “I love you.”
“I love you too. You were so good for me, love.” Henry slowly cards a hand through Alex’s hair, mindful of the tangled curls. “So perfect. You took such good care of me.”
Alex burrows a little closer into Henry’s chest and presses a half-open kiss to the mole under his collarbone. “Always, baby.”
Henry holds him tighter. They hold each other. Alex drifts off to the sound of Henry’s breathing and the soothing sensation of his hand in Alex’s hair.
Henry doesn’t leave his side for the rest of the day. Well, Alex heroically lets him go when either of them needs to use the bathroom, but otherwise they’re cuddling first in bed, then on the couch, and then in bed again.
They never stop touching.
Neither of them thinks about sex. Alex doesn’t think they’d be capable even if they tried, but they kiss softly, and Henry plays with his curls.
Alex feels good. Mostly anyway. There are moments when he thinks he has to get up and do something—bring Henry food or rub his feet, just something—but he’s also drained and can’t decide on anything. Whenever he tries to think, his thoughts are just racing in all directions at the same time and it’s easier to let his mind drift and lean on Henry.
Henry’s the one looking after drinks and food, he’s the one in charge of the remote and he’s the one with an eye on David. At some point, he calls Shaan, so that David gets at least one proper walk, and the two minutes Henry goes to the door to hand David off to Shaan and has a brief conversation with him are almost as bad as this morning. Alex fights through it, and tries not to let Henry know. It’s futile, of course, because Henry knows him better than anyone, but Henry just gathers him up into his arms and between his legs and surrounds him with his entire body, so Alex is fine.
They go to bed early, both of them absolutely beat and David watches them incredulously from his doggy bed, clearly not believing his dads are going to bed at nine p.m.
They are though, and David gets to come because there’s no way they’re having sex tonight.
“Might be another month, honestly,” Henry says with a slight grimace as he climbs the stairs.
Alex trails behind him, his entire back protesting. “We definitely need to up the exercise routine before next time.”
Henry lets out a very inelegant snort. “You were the one who said I was well prepared.”
Alex thoughtfully eyes Henry’s thighs. “Well, how are your thighs?”
“Well,” Henry slowly says, swaying back and forth, “actually the least painful part right now.”
“So I was right.”
Henry rolls his eyes, very fondly. “Yes, love. You and the entire internet were right about my thighs.”
Alex grins a little. It does make him feel strangely proud that everyone knows how amazing Henry and his thighs are but that Henry is only Alex’s. Alex is always proud of his boyfriend of course, and most of the time pretty smug he managed to reel in a hot prince, but there’s a side of burning possessiveness mixed in that feels very unfamiliar—at least outside of their bedroom in very specific scenarios.
“This heat-drop is wild,” Alex says.
Henry seems to misunderstand because he draws Alex into his arms, but it feels pretty good, so he doesn’t correct him.
They get through their pre-bed routine quickly. Henry still uses the lotion, and Alex gets to rub his back again which gives him a kind of inner peace he usually only gets after finishing a final exam, and then they go to bed.
“How are you feeling, love?” Henry asks and pulls Alex into his arms.
“Good, honestly.”
Henry doesn’t look like he buys it.
“Obviously, I’m still fucking sore, everywhere, but mentally, I think I’m good.” Alex gives him a smile and a kiss. “I’m not cold anymore and I have no inner voice telling me that you’ve left me.”
Henry looks absolutely stricken at that.
“Hey, it’s fine. It just seems that abandonment issues and heat-drop don’t mix well. But it’s all good now.”
Henry looks in no way reassured. Alex needs to reassure him.
“We couldn’t have known this would happen a day later. We’ll be ready for it next time.”
“That’s not...” Henry stops and drags a hand over his face. Then he takes a deep breath. “It just occurred to me that me, er, ghosting you twice probably didn’t help with that and I really should have anticipated this.”
“Oh.” Alex thinks about that. “I mean, maybe? But rationally, I knew you had just taken David for a walk. I knew those thoughts were bullshit, I just couldn’t stop them.”
There’s a tiny part of Alex that knows that he’s fibbing a bit here. Yes, he knew Henry was just out to walk David, but the fear that Alex is too much, that at some point Henry won’t need him anymore… And Henry’s out now. He’s no longer the closeted prince relying on clandestine hookups. He’s free now, and the whole world knows that he’s up for grabs.
Tall, gorgeous, smart, witty gay Prince Charming. What queer guy wouldn’t go for that? And yeah, Alex is hot, but he’s also a mess, and in the fall he’ll start law school. Alex knows how he gets; he will jump headfirst into school work, he’ll live off coffee and burritos, he’ll spend nights in the library or at his desk, he’ll forget dinner dates and won’t reply to messages and—
“Alex. Alex, look at me!”
Alex stares at Henry, not understanding what just happened.
Henry’s eyes are very worried. “Where did you just go off to?”
Alex opens his mouth, wanting to play it off as a joke, that his heat-drop apparently isn’t over, but that’s not true, is it? Because it’s not like he’s wrong. Alex can’t exactly say he knows himself, doesn’t have a good track record of that, but he knows how he gets.
“I just… I know part of it is probably the heat-drop still making me spiral, but it’s not like there’s no truth to it.”
“What do you mean?”
“I start law school soon.”
Henry very patiently says nothing, just strokes his hand along Alex’s shoulder and upper arm.
Alex lets out a heavy breath. “I know how I get. You only know a little. But I become obsessive and I hyper-focus and I forget everything around me, no matter how important someone is.”
“Alex—”
“No, you don’t understand. I’ll work until I pass out, I’ll forget to come home in time for dinner, we won’t spend quality time with each other, and then you’ll realize you have options now, you’re not stuck with me, and—”
“Alex!”
Alex’s mouth snaps shut.
“I do know how you get. Remember all those phone calls and emails and texts in your last semester of uni? Because I do. And yes, law school will be different and difficult, but love, I’m not going to leave if you miss dinner once.” Henry gently fits a hand against Alex’s cheek, forcing him to look into Henry’s face, where a small smile is playing on his lips. “I will be very cross with you and give you a very disappointed look, but that’s about it.”
“But—”
“If you forget something really important I might have David give you a reproachful look.”
“Not David!” Alex can’t help but smile back a little.
Henry pulls him in a little closer, and presses a kiss to the tip of his nose, to his lips. “If I told you I’d be worried that you’d leave me because my dark days get too much for you, what would you say?”
“Impossible.”
“And what makes you think I don’t feel the same about a hypothetical law school study spiral?”
Alex makes a face. “They’re really not hypothetical. Also using logic against me in my fragile state isn’t fair.”
“Alex…” Henry’s mouth pinches at the corner, and his eyes are clouded in pain. “I know that I’ve run away in the past when things got hard. And I understand if that makes it harder for you to trust me. But you have to believe me.”
Henry is pleading with him and Alex takes his face into his hands to tell him that he’ll love him forever and that none of it is Henry’s fault, but Henry beats him to it.
“I love you so much. There’s no one else I could ever want. You’re quite incredibly perfect for me. And now that I know what it’s like to be with you, something that somehow surpassed all of my wildest, most improbable dreams, even though I had so many of them for such a long time, and yet, somehow, magically, reality is still better—I won’t give this up for anything in the world. I won’t give you up, Alex.”
Alex blinks, furiously. “Fuck, you can’t say shit like that when I’m hormonally scrambled.”
Henry opens his mouth, but Alex is still glaring, so instead of saying something even more devastatingly romantic, Henry kisses him.
He really kisses him. It’s not one of the soft, reassuring kisses he’s been getting all day, no. This one has teeth. This one’s deep and absolute, taking Alex’s breath away, but he doesn’t need it anyway, oxygen is overrated, he just needs Henry; his taste on Alex’s tongue, the insistent press of his plush lips, the way Henry’s arms pull him tight so there’s no space between them.
Somehow, operating entirely on instinct, Alex manages to kiss Henry back, to hold him, get a hand into his thick, soft hair, and the other one around his shoulder, holding on to the smooth skin over lean muscles.
They kiss for an amount of time Alex can’t quantify, never wants to end, but at some point, their movements become more frantic, their bodies remembering how this goes, how they can get even closer, and fuck, that actually hurts.
“Bloody hell,” Henry says at the same time as Alex twists his hips away from where they’ve been pressing into Henry’s.
They look at each other, flushed and pupils dilated, but unfortunately unable to do anything about it. For a moment, they just stare at each other, and it’s so fucking ridiculous, they both burst out laughing. They laugh so loud, they startle David awake who shoots them a lethally reproachful look from the end of the bed.
“Fuck,” Alex says with feeling. “My body is so not ready for this yet.”
“Me neither,” Henry says, still trying to catch his breath. He kisses Alex anyway, light and without tongue. “I want to, but I absolutely do not want to.”
“Same.” Alex pulls Henry in closer, and presses a kiss to his cheek. “Fuck.”
“Alex,” Henry says, very seriously. “We’ll be fine. You won’t ever be too much, darling. And we survived months of harrowing secret long distance, we survived getting brutally outed to the entire world and miraculously, we survived my first heat. I don’t think there’s anything we can’t do.”
“Since when are you an optimist?”
“I’m not, love. That’s the whole point. I know that no matter what will happen, we will try. And it will be enough.”
Henry’s reassurance seeps through his skin, settles in every pore of Alex’s being and he feels warm and floaty all over. Because he knows, down to his very core, that Henry is right.
“Yeah, okay.”
That’s when David trots over, noses at their faces and then very pointedly plops down on the blanket, half on top and half between them.
“Is David very passive-aggressively telling us to go to sleep?” Alex asks incredulously even as he starts stroking David’s soft, fuzzy ears.
“Well, he is English through and through I’m afraid.”
“My ancestors would be so fucking ashamed of all the English guys I let sleep in my bed.”
Henry laughs and wraps one arm around David and Alex. “Sleep being the operative word here.”
“Okay.” Alex leans in for one last kiss, then he closes his eyes. “H?”
“Yes, love?”
“We’ll be fine, right?”
Henry pulls him in a little tighter, David squirming between them and weaseling out from Henry’s grasp and traipsing down their legs until he huffs and, judging by the vibration in the mattress, plops down in an indignant huff.
“Darling, there’s nothing we can’t get through. Not law school, not anything the crown has ever done to me or us. I went up against the Queen of England for you. How’s that for your ancestors?”
Alex grins and scoots close enough to Henry to press his nose against the hollow of his throat, inhaling his soft, full scent.
“Well, it’s not tea in the harbor, but it’s pretty good.”
“Plague.”
“Baby.”
Henry presses a very fond kiss to his forehead. “Go to sleep, you miscreant.”
“Love you.”
“Love you too.”
Alex is still grinning when he closes his eyes because his heat drop can go fuck itself. Henry’s right. They love each other. They’re solid. There’s nothing they wouldn’t do for each other. There’s nothing they can’t get through. There won’t ever be a too much.
Alex falls asleep, unworried about the next day. Or any day after that. Whatever happens, they’ll be okay.