Work Text:
@PrinceHenry started a live video. Watch it before it ends!
It’s early on a Thursday evening and Alex is in the library, trying to finish an essay for his Constitutional Law class so that he can have the weekend with Henry. Or at least, most of it anyway. Sometimes, when Henry stays up later than Alex, in the morning he’ll turn over and go back to sleep and Alex will fix himself with a bucket of coffee and drag himself off to the study to do some work. Alex isn’t naïve enough to think that his entire weekend will be work free – especially with Henry making solid progress on his book – but he tries to minimise it. Sometimes though, the two of them will sit in the study or at the dining room table and work for a few hours in each other’s company. It usually ends up with Henry rolling his eyes affectionately and relocating with a kiss to the top of Alex’s head, unable to deal with the constant tapping of Alex’s pen or his restless bouncing leg.
So, he should be working on this essay so he can spend more time with Henry this weekend. He really, really should be working on this essay. But.
But.
Henry is going live on Instagram.
Alex has been working pretty solidly for at least an hour without getting distracted by June’s thirty-four texts about their cousin Carlos who just broke up with his girlfriend, Nora wanting feedback on her latest outfit, four new interview requests from the press secretary, and Pez’s messages about whether or not Alex might want to go abseiling with him – he should really introduce Pez to his dad, he thinks. He’s been working and ignoring all of that, so he can take a break, because Henry is going live on Instagram and Alex has no idea why. There’s nothing he loves more than when Henry does something surprising.
He bites down a smile and clicks the notification.
Henry’s face fills the screen, all tousled sandy hair and nervous blue eyes, dressed in a thin blue sweater. He’s sitting at the piano, the edge of the painting on the wall visible behind him and the early evening sunlight poking in through the window next to him, casting him in a dewy gold wash. He’s got some colour to his cheeks and lighter blonde streaks in his hair given to him by the late spring sun. He looks good; relaxed and happy, with smatterings of freckles starting to poke through.
Henry twitches his lips.
‘Hello,’ he says, raising a nervous hand, ‘I’ve ah, I’ve never done one of these by myself before but… well, I wanted to play and I thought that, I don’t know, people seem to be interested enough when June and I sit here and talk about books, so maybe you might be interested in music as well? We’ll see. If it’s terrible then I’ll just never do this again and we can just forget all about it.’
Alex presses his lips together and his heart very impressively does not beat its way out of his chest. Henry’s putting himself out there. Giving himself away. Fuck, Alex loves him.
Henry stretches his fingers, smiles softly at the camera and starts to play. It’s familiar – Mozart – and Alex can’t see Henry’s fingers but he can picture them well enough from memory to see how they span the keys; how the tendons flex and how his fingers move softly with muscle memory. Henry’s eyes have fluttered closed.
A comment: HENRY WE LOVE YOU
A comment: can we see David please???????
A comment: wheres alex
A comment: I love you Henry ❤️🧡💛💚💙💜
A comment: did you and Alex break up
A comment: HI from BRAZIL!!!!
A comment: Will you and Bea do a duet?
A comment: wait omg I just saw Alex join
A comment: ALEX
A comment: omg JUNE IS HERE TOO
A comment: King shit 🌈👑
Henry’s fingers pause, as his eyes catch on the screen. He lets out a laugh. ‘I’m afraid David is upstairs. He’s commandeered a spot on the sofa and is very reluctant to part with it so I don’t think he’ll be making an appearance today. You’re stuck with me.’
Alex watches as a smile flickers over Henry’s face as he continues playing, just as effortlessly as the first time he sat Alex down in the music room at Kensington and talked to him about Brahms and Wagner. His face is soft, slack and unbothered as he plays; he’s lost himself in the sounds of the music, and Alex watches as the comments continue to flood in.
Most of them are overwhelmingly positive. They’re enthusiastic and thrilled to see Henry letting the world see this part of him, in awe of his ease and talent. In amongst it all are the questions about Alex: where is he, did they break up, why is he not there. Then, every so often, a comment that makes something hot and furious rise up in Alex’s chest; someone saying something awful and offensive that makes him have to clench his free fist and actively stop himself from calling up his mom to get the FBI or NSA or whoever the fuck deals with this stuff to track them down so that Alex can personally give them a piece of his mind. It settles though, with the stream of people cursing them in the comments and the outpouring of love and support that follows.
Henry seems unfazed by it all. He’s always better at dealing with this stuff than Alex is; more used to it from everything he sees at the shelter and better at letting it roll off his back. He doesn’t care what people think of him like Alex does, it doesn’t bury itself under his skin in the same way it does with Alex.
He lets his eyes linger on Henry, on the way his lips tug at the corners when his eyes catch on the screen, smiling at a comment.
Alex bites down a smile on his lip. He glances around the library. It’s quiet and the light is fading outside; there’s just the steady tap of fingers on laptop keyboards and the swish of turning pages. He should finish up so he can go home, but Henry has seamlessly moved into something low and heavy, and before Alex can talk himself out of it, he types:
this is so sad alexa play despacito
Alex’s heart thumps in his chest slightly but he hears his own voice in his mind, the echo from a dark kitchen in Kensington telling Henry that this kind of thing isn’t worth overthinking. It’s entirely worth it because at the same time the comment section goes wild, a look that’s so familiar to Alex crosses over Henry’s face: fond exasperation.
‘Aren’t you supposed to be studying?’ Henry says, his voice smooth and unbothered, as though Alex has just popped up behind him in the brownstone, restless and searching out a distraction. He’s still playing, his fingers gliding across the keys by muscle memory.
A comment: ALSX HI
A comment: this is such attention seeking bs 🙄🙄
A comment: you don’t have to watch asshole
A comment: FUCK oh My GOF ALEx I LOCE U
Then, Alex notices the shift in the music into something bright and jaunty, and he has to stop himself from letting out an undignified yelp in the middle of the quiet library as he realises that Henry has honoured his request. Alex glances down at the comment section again, which is going faster, getting filled with more incoherent screams than Alex has ever seen.
‘I don’t know why you’re all so surprised that I know this,’ Henry says easily, with that smug grin that Alex loves on his face, ‘I did go to university, you know. Pez ensured the entire staircase was well acquainted with that song that year.’
@pezlikethesweets: IT WASN’T ALL ME.
@pezlikethesweets: I come here to SUPPORT YOU and I’m confronted with slander against my good name
Henry barely holds in a scoff. ‘It’s not slander when you tweet your own Spotify wrapped every year, Pez. What was it? Top 0.5% of listeners?’
@noraholleran: do WAP next
Henry raises an eyebrow at the camera, and Alex can see the way his cheeks darken. ‘I absolutely will not be doing that.’
@PrincessBeatrice: Duet next time you’re back, please!
A comment: Is this what it’s like to be in the super six gc
A comment: can you play some Taylor Swift
A comment: who is your favourite composer?
@jclaremontdiaz: There are multiple configurations of the group chats. Pez, Nora and Alex have one for when they’re in time out from the main chat.
A comment: HENRY BEA DUET YES PLEASE
@agcd: @jclaremontdiaz there are only so many new yorker articles one man can read!!!
A comment: TIME OUT PLS OH MY GOD
@agcd: @jclaremontdiaz i don’t know why y’all are blaming me, i didn’t do anything i am INNOCENT
@HRHPrincessCatherine: Henry, love, your hair needs a brush. xxx
@jclaremontdiaz: @agcd You started it.
A comment: I can’t believe I get to live in this timeline
A comment: sfshfkgllhjkl THE QUEEN IS HERE
A comment: what the fuck is happening here
A comment: SCREAMING
‘Mum,’ Henry says, a laugh clear in his voice, ‘that’s not a private message, and my hair is fine, thank you very much.’ His eyes are bright, sparkling blue. ‘Honestly, I come on here to play some classical music and you lot just completely sabotage the entire thing,’ he says, but there’s fondness in his voice.
The pile of papers next to Alex has been completely shoved to the side. He leans forward, hunching over his phone and smiling to himself as Henry continues to play, showing no signs of frustration or annoyance, just poorly concealed joy and bemusement. If anything, he seems more comfortable with them all bickering around him. He’s so used to it by now that June, Alex and Nora squabbling is part of the fabric of his daily life.
@PrincessBeatrice: Well, it looks like I’m spending my evening teaching Mum to use Instagram
A comment: wdym queen his hair looks GREAT
@pezlikethesweets: Catherine, you remain my hero and the light of my life
@agcd: queen mom everybody
A comment: this is the most chaotic thing I’ve seen in my life
@noraholleran: BAHAAHHAAHA
A comment: Henry play something from the pride and prejudice soundtrack!!!
A comment: alex do you have auto caps turned off
@agcd: ofc i do
A comment: does henry text with full punctuation I feel like he does
@agcd: yes and i constantly think he’s mad at me
Henry has switched into something soft that sounds like sunrise and softly blowing wind, and June is typing a series of hearts and crying emojis in the chat so he knows that Henry must have fulfilled the request for something from Pride and Prejudice.
He looks up at the camera again. ‘It’s just punctuation. Why would I not use a full stop at the end of a sentence just because it’s in a text message?’
@agcd: because you’re not eighty
Henry gives a long-suffering eye roll, but Alex knows he’d be the first to argue that language is fluid and evolves and adapts to its different applications in different places and times; he’s on the first line of defence, but for now he just continues to play.
He looks happy and unburdened, as though all of this is just another amusing thing in his daily life now rather than something to shy away from. He rolls the sleeves on his thin sweater. His forearms are just in view, moving just slightly as he works his way along the keys; and fuck, ease looks so good on him.
A comment: HELP
A comment: oh my God this is fine I’m FINE
A comment: he looks so fucking good 🥵
A comment: glad you’re fine because I’m not
@agcd: what do you want for dinner
Henry gives another long-suffering eye roll. ‘You can just actually message me privately, you know.’
Alex shrugs. He’s right, he could, but Henry is somehow here and in their living room at the same time, and Alex feels like he may as well be just sitting at home next to Henry while he plays. He feels that close. Every time he looks up at the screen, Alex knows that he’s the only one Henry is talking to.
@agcd: right but you’re doing this so i know you’re not going to reply
@agcd: there’s chilli in the fridge
@agcd: or thai
@acgd: can you put the dryer on when you’re done
@agcd: please
A comment: sdgdhfkgl help this is so fucking funny
A comment: alex oh my god
@agcd: but take your sweaters out or they’ll shrink
@jclaremontdiaz: oh my god Alex let the man PLAY
A comment: I vote thai
A comment: HI FROM ACROSS THE LIBRARY ALEX
A comment: I can see him on his phone and he’s got like, the stupidest grin on his face
Alex pulls himself from the bright light of his phone screen and looks around the library. There’s a girl in the back left corner staring at him. She blushes, brushes her dark hair from her face, then raises a hesitant hand. Alex grins and shakes his head, laughing silently.
‘Alex,’ Henry says, seamlessly switching into Brahms, ‘why don’t you stop terrorising my comments section and come home?’
Alex looks around at his books scattered across the table and sighs. Yeah, he thinks. He’s done enough for today. He could be at home, curled up next to Henry. Maybe he’ll pick his work back up in a couple of hours – once they’ve eaten and watched some TV, and taken David for a walk round the block. He shoves his laptop into his beaten up messenger bag and gestures to Cash. It’s okay if he doesn’t do more tonight. He’s busy, but it’s manageable. Some things are more important; Henry is one of them.
Henry is still on the live, still playing the piano and occasionally answering a comment or a question. The chaos has mostly died down, and Henry is playing easily and happily with a soft smile on his face and hair falling into his eyes.
Alex slides into the waiting car and pulls up his messages with Henry.
HRH Prince Dickhead 💩
on my way home
See you soon, love.