Hamilton and Laurens were a mess, a chaotic spiral of genius and bravery and self-deprecation and uncertainty, all combined into one shape that made up the two of them.
Together, they were complete. Separate, they were simply halves of a whole.
Hamilton had never intended for his life to go that way, never intended to fall in love with a man, let alone one who managed to redefine bravery and then get drunk on two pints of beer, pretty much in the same day.
Laurens was the type of guy who Hamilton knew only came along once in a lifetime. He was kind, funny, sympathetic, every kind of courageous but those things went with recklessness and a tendency to live in the now, but he was identical to John in every fault they shared- only Laurens had the good to balance it out.
Hamilton only had his genius and his determination. It wasn't enough to last forever, but he had always known that he was going to burn out young.
Nothing had changed there. Now he simply had a reason to live (a reason not to let himself be consumed with fire).
Laurens always seemed a shade of yellow in his mind; cheerful sunny yellow that was tempered by the hard glowing yellow of a furnace and countered by neutral, pastel yellow but it was all pulled together by the neon yellow that was Laurens' in a bubble.
Hamilton could never be seen as anything but an angry red. He was the type to flare up at any insult, given or imaginary, fall for every fault until he smashed into the ground with the harshness of blood red and fire all of his guns until all but one of the combatants fell and one day that was going to be him.
It was always going to be sooner than they thought.
Laurens was the first to initiate anything between them. Alex was always the distant one who watched from afar and judged, loudly, but he had never been aware of his surroundings so it was almost too easy to ambush him and force him into a shade of orange that mellowed him out and soothed him and focused him and destabilised him and-
They were the definition of foolishness.
Hamilton only ever thought about it alone in the dark, since neither of them was going to waste precious time on discussing what happened when they weren't with one another. That was a whole different world (their wings weren't fully grown yet).
"Alex?"
"Yes John?"
"How long do you think we have left?"
"Until the fire wood runs out,"
And that's the end of it, isn't it, the last thing they ask and the only thing they can do is wait it out and enjoy the flight until their too small wings send them careening back into the earth. Reality was never a place for them.
Alex asks the other once if there's anything to be done after the war is won. Or lost. But they don't talk about that either (the things they don't say yell in the silence between them and stubbornly remain). The answer, of course, is yes.
It's always yes.
It's not like they need to know anyway, all anyone needs is the here and the now, the today is already a tomorrow so what's the point in looking any further?
They (well, Hamilton and whatever speaking power he holds for Laurens) have never been this way with anyone before, tangled clothes and tangled hair and their lives truly are a mess-
Alex goes out of the house wearing Laurens' shirts more than he'd ever admit but John steals all of his underwear so neither of them bring it up, not even after everything they own seems to have merged into one giant store of stuff, and it genuinely speaks volumes about the two of them that John can borrow Alex's favourite pen and Alex John's hair things and neither of them make a fuss about it.
Things come to a head when Lafayette notices Hamilton's pen in Laurens' pocket though, and spends a fair few minutes ranting and raving about it and the moral issues of stealing until he looks closer at the situation and realises a few fundamental truths at the exact same time.
In this way, Lafayette is the first to know of the relationship and ends up being one of only three people to ever learn about it (Hamilton confesses to Eliza a long way down the line and Washington is always one to silently know everything. Jefferson alludes to it a few times, but they both hope dearly that he's just playing around) and the French man never misses an opportunity to allude to it, tease them about it and walk them to just the wrong side of amusement before backing off with his easy grin.
They both hate him for it and love him anyway.
Their fire burns strongly, igniting every last piece of firewood but Hamilton is sure that they can just throw more on it, that what they have can last forever and isn't an illusion that flickers out with an exhalation of breath.
For once in his life, he's wrong. When it matters the most.
Everything comes crashing down with the single death blow of a letter. It arrives in the post and he ignores it for a little, thinks its unimportant but then there's no letter from Laurens and they send letters to one another daily.
He looks through the post and finds only one letter that it could possibly be.
It's the one addressed to Alex Hamilton. Everyone else knows him as Alexander. It's only John who can call him that.
The paper smells brittle, like the wind mixed into the alcohol that they drink whenever Laurens comes over, but maybe that's just Alexander's fingers trembling to break the thin spidery seal that contains something awful (of that he's sure) and so when he finally gets there it's a miracle and the worst mistake of his life, all at once, the way he's good at doing things.
John Laurens is dead.
Killed in battle.
Honourable death.
How can a death be honourable when will it come for me how can anyone try and spin this any way but it's quiet uptown I never liked the quiet and he's gone why can't I die he's gone I can't seem to die he's gone I could never seem to die.
He's gone. What they had is gone.
Alex Hamilton crumbles into pieces and drifts off with the breeze.