“Well, that will all change when we have kids,” Alex remarks off-handedly as he loads the dishwasher. Henry freezes, heart stuttering as he slowly turns towards his boyfriend. It occurs to him, suddenly, that they’ve not had this conversation before. Voice weak, Henry says, “whoever said I wanted to have children?” --- The winter of discontent. Henry and Alex struggle through what it means to be in it forever.

Alex opens his mouth, though how he plans to respond, he’s not certain. Before any words come to mind, though, his phone slips through his hand, bouncing onto his shoe before landing on the tile between them. Alex kneels down to pick it up, momentarily saved from forming a reply. His brain’s still coming up empty, though, when Henry speaks again. “You might as well suck my cock while you’re down there.” Alex whips his head up to make sure he didn’t just imagine those words coming out of Henry’s mouth. He’s prevented from pinching himself when Henry adds, “It’ll be good practice, looking up at me.”

“Hazza, my thoughts about your husband aside, have you two talked about this at all?” Pez swirls his wine in its glass.  Henry thinks. Runs the lemon slice around the rim of his glass. Stares at the ice cubes that are slowly melting as though they hold the answer to Pez’s question, but they don’t. He doesn’t remember talking to Alex, and can’t pinpoint a time he’d have had the chance to, but he also knows Alex is aware there’s a chasm between them, a distance they can’t seem to bridge. Instead of facing the problem, Alex just throws himself into something else.  Henry sighs and shakes his head. Maybe they aren’t the greatest when it comes to tackling their challenges head on, together. 

Alex swallows down the last bit of his second glass of champagne as the procession music starts to play and everyone stands. June walks down the aisle in a sun-yellow dress holding a tiny bouquet of sunflowers and white daisies.  “June looks so beautiful,” Henry comments as she passes them. “Mmhm” Alex agrees without looking, he can’t focus on anything but the twinge in his bladder, maybe he shouldn’t have had that second glass after all. “Hen, I gotta fuckin’ piss,” he whispers into Henry’s ear.  “I told you to take it easy on the champagne before the ceremony, you know how it runs through you.”

"I know it's not the open road, but…” Henry walks them to the edge of the roof, where they have a view of the city spreading out before them, David flopping down at his feet. “I don't know. I think it's lovely up here. The glow of the city below, it’s humming. If you listen to it close enough, it can tell you all kinds of stories." Henry closes his eyes for a moment, trying to listen: “Stories of lovers professing their devotion to each other through hushed moans, of children blanketed by the safety a good bedtime story provides. There are stories of lonely hearts feeling a kind of solace knowing they’re not alone in this city, that there are many like them.”  When he opens his eyes again, Alex is looking at him, something behind his eyes Henry can't quite figure out.  "Henry..." Alex whispers, but he doesn’t say anything else. Instead, he grabs his hand, leaning against him and pressing his temple to Henry's shoulder, looking out at the city with him.  Henry lets out a soft hum and smiles sadly to himself, resting his own head on top of Alex’s wishing he could kiss his worries away. But at least he can give him this. A vantage point to a city that can be both kind and cruel, busy and empty, or deafeningly quiet among all the noise.

It's hard not to think about that night, especially when June is sitting on the couch with her feet propped up onto Nora’s lap. She’s gently rubbing at the soles of June’s feet with her thumbs, glancing every few minutes from the TV to her face.  Nora can't help but admire June; now changed out of her work clothes and  wearing a white tank top and shorts she stole from Nora. Her wavy hair is pinned back with a butterfly claw clip she only ever wears in the comfort of their home. June bites her lip in concentration as she focuses on her writing. Nora doesn’t realize she’s stopped rubbing June’s feet until she looks up at her with a playful glare. “Don’t stop, my feet are killing me.” June groans. “Flats are terrible for your feet, how many times do I have to tell you that?” Nora clips back, letting a smile spread across her lips when June rolls her eyes in response. “Or do you just need an excuse for me to take care of you?” Nora lets the last part slip, not necessarily regretting it but still remaining cautious of the reaction it pulls out of June. But to her surprise, there is none. June goes back to typing away on her laptop and nudges her foot back into Nora’s hand.

Henry casts his eyes to the ceiling, unable to believe his luck. “Is it really so bad that we both work here? Come on, Henry. It’s been seven years, we can be civil.” Henry just shakes his head. Civil is not the issue. The issue is dredging up feelings Henry has long since buried. But he can’t say that. “I just can’t believe it. Out of all the buildings in all of New York–” “You had to walk into mine?” The smile Alex sends him is devastating. Henry feels it in his fucking toes. He laughs bitterly. “Something like that. How did you even end up here?” “It’s kind of a long story–” “That’s alright,” Henry hears himself say.

Nora assumes that there is actual football being played based on the level of noise around her, but she’s fully focused on June and the rest of the cheerleaders for the first half of the game. The part of her brain that’s always on wonders if there’s an equation that could predict what routine June or the cheer coach will call the squad to do next. She knows there are some routines for defense and some for offense, three options for when the team scores, some more general pep and tumbling ones, and a specific routine they use whenever the marching band plays the fight song, plus a halftime routine. There’s bound to be some way to track the statistics of each and build a predictive model that’s relatively accurate, but Nora would need more data, like a lot more. She’d also need, unfortunately, a much more in-depth knowledge of football, which she absolutely refuses to engage in. So while the math likely checks out, Nora isn’t going to be the one to do it. Alex keeps her from dying of boredom for the rest of the game, happy to snark with her about the other team (she’s not dumb enough to talk shit about her own team while smack dab in the middle of the bleachers), make up fake names for all the fancy football plays, and generally treat the marching band like their own personal karaoke machine, belting out the lyrics of everything from Carry On My Wayward Son and All I Do Is Win to Seven Nation Army and Tequila and every song in between. She even gets into the spirit of the whole thing enough to dance like a maniac when the drumline goes ape-shit at the end of the third quarter. She catches the pleased disbelief on June’s face when they make eye contact over fancy flying drumsticks and tumbling cheerleaders and tries not to blush in response. In fact, Nora’s almost won over to the idea of sporting events in general and football in the specific for the atmosphere alone by the time the game ends.  So it’s even more fucking annoying when Evan goes and ruins it.

“Do you have any idea,” Alex starts, no greeting or acknowledgement that these are the first words they’ve exchanged in three years in sight as he runs a hand through his curls, “how many James Smiths there are in the DMV?”

“A great deal, I should imagine.” James’ eyes absolutely do not follow the way Alex’s fingers run through his hair before disappearing into the pocket of his chinos. He’s well aware that his name is nothing special; he’ll never know if the choice was a deliberate on, picked to ensure that he would be lost in a sea of anonymity.

“About 738, according to my friend Nora. It sure fucking felt like it when I was combing through social media profiles to find out where you worked.” He glances over at Tiff, whose gaze is flickering between the two of them; James can now more easily interpret the expression he couldn’t before. It’s something that’s half holy hell, he’s even more attractive in person and half what does the First Son want with you?

James can’t bring himself to disagree with either assertion.

The eyes are the hardest part, or so Nora says. All the Secret Service agents’ eyes have a kind of strange metallic glint behind them. Often it’s not even noticeable, but if you look too closely, it becomes obvious. Prince Henry’s eyes are flawless, though. Just endless, perfect blue. Really, the only flaw Alex can see in this model is that they made him inhumanly beautiful. No real person has lips like that.

Oscar slips out of the room for a minute and comes back holding a decorated birthday cake. He flicks the lights off and sets the cake just slightly to the left of where Alex is seated, so the cake is in between the two of them. Henry turns to watch Alex, the way his eyes dance in the flicker of the lit birthday candles. Alex is looking back at him, though. He nudges Henry and tilts his chin down to the cake. It’s only then that he really notices that the even, cursive letters spell out ‘Happy Birthday, Henry.’ Or: 5 times someone else planned Henry's birthday celebrations + 1 time Alex did

“Ex-girlfriend, actually, now dating my sister – don’t ask.” “Well, now I absolutely must,” Henry says, looking intrigued, which is when Nora flops down in the seat next to Alex and says, “What’s up, pencil dick?” Alex sighs with his entire body. “I’m going to kill you.” “You can try,” she says brightly, turning to Henry with a grin. “Hey. He has a totally normal penis, I promise.” “Nora.” “How disappointing,” Henry says smoothly. “For a moment there I almost believed you’d solved all my stationery supply problems.” Nora throws her head back and laughs, then orders a paddle of tequila shots that Alex absolutely needs right now, unfortunately.

“You Googled me.” “I did.” Henry shrugs, unapologetic. “Your Wikipedia page is even longer than mine.” “Oh, my god.” Alex scrubs a hand through his hair, the sunlight catching on the silver strands. Henry itches to bury his fingers in them, wants to know what sort of noises Alex would make if Henry tugged on those curls. “Well, at least there are a few pictures on there of me in my prime, I guess.” Henry raises an eyebrow. “I would very much argue that you’re in your prime now.” Alex chokes on a surprised laugh. “Your Royal Highness—” “Henry.”  “Henry.” Alex tips his head back as he closes his eyes, drawing an audible breath in through his nose. When he meets Henry’s gaze again, he’s clearly conflicted. “What is this, exactly?” Henry’s never shagged a sitting politician. Lots of politician’s sons, of course, and most likely plenty of future politicians as well, but never a sitting politician, whether of this country or any other country. He’s suddenly, viscerally aware that he could change that; that Alex might actually be receptive to him changing that. That this isn’t all in his head, or one-sided. He leans in, the three or so inches he has on Alex suddenly seeming like a lot more, and he’s rewarded with a hitched, shaky breath he’s not sure Alex is aware he’s let loose. “On this side of the pond we call it flirting, darling.”