When Max died, Isabelle cried. Maryse cried. Jace, who usually pushed all his feelings to the side, cried. Robert, who rarely seemed to feel anything other than anger and disappoint, cried. Alec did not cry.
He watched the others grieve. He held Jace as he sobbed into his shoulder. He heard his mother bawling through the night. He watched tears slide down his father's cheeks, once when he heard the news and again at the funeral. He clumsily braided Izzy's hair as she lay beside him, unable to sleep through the night.
And yet, Alec did not cry.
Magnus was the first person Alec had told, outside of family.
"Max is dead." He said, dully and monotone. He couldn't make his voice express emotions anymore he could himself. Magnus thought he was just in shock. Alec thought so too.
Magnus hugged him, willing to keep hugging him until he ran out of tears, but no tears came. And so Alec pulled away, and told him that he was hungry and should get home and make dinner.
That is what he did, but no one in the house ate except him. Jace said he didn't have an appetite, didn't have the stomach to eat right now, and Isabelle screamed at him, calling him a monster for even thinking about food after his little brother had just died.
So Alec took his plate to the room he shared with Jace while in Alicante, and sat staring at the wall while he ate. He couldn't taste the flavours, couldn't tell if the food was hot, or cold, or warm. He was numb.
He just wanted to feel something, to know he was still alive. That night was the first time he did it. Jace was sleeping, but Alec couldn't. He was kept awake, thinking about the words Isabelle had screamed at him earlier. A monster, she had said, and he knew that she was right. He was a monster, with no emotions.
He slid out of bed, crossed the hall to the bathroom. He didn't want to use a seraph blade or anything so holy, to do such monstrous things. Alec opened numerous drawers, looking for something sharp. A razor, perhaps, but he found a small pair of scissors instead, the kind you use to trim your nails with.
Alec breathed out, slow and precise. He didn't feel his chest rising or falling and he would have been scared, under normal circumstances. But these weren't normal circumstances and he wasn't scared and that was the problem.
With that, he pressed the tip of the scissors to his wrist and slid it across, drawing beads of blood. It wasn't deep enough to truly cause him any harm, but the sting of it brought a rush of adrenaline. Now that he could feel something, it was exhilarating and he didn't want the pain to end. He decided that he would heal slow and ugly, like a mundane. Let it scar and remind him that he was human, at least partially.
Still, after that night, he was back to waiting for his mind to catch up, for his brain to process what had happened, but it didn't. Not for a month or so, until he finally returned to the Institute, a small collection of scars now decorating his wrist.
The moment he walked through the doors, he was reminded of Max. His coat was still hung up, and when Alec peered into the library on the way to his room, he could see a book Max had left on the table, open and face down. In the sunroom, there was Max's favourite chair, right by the window, and the one opposite it, the chairs they used to sit in, reading together in comforting silence.
The journey to Alec's room was slow and it hurt, but he was nevertheless glad for the painful memories, because the numbness was beginning to ebb away. He nearly didn't make it to his room, because he completely broke down in front of Max's.
The rest of his family had done their grieving, quick as the Nephilim were expected to, but now it was Alec's turn. He sat in front of Max's room for hours before anyone came across him.
"Alec?" Isabelle seems startled to find him there. He hoped she had not begun to think that he didn't care. He looked up at her, with tear tracks running down his red cheeks and hair plastered to his forehead.
"Oh, Alec." She sat herself down beside him and now it was her responsibility to comfort him. He let his head fall on her shoulder, even though it was uncomfortable for his neck. He just wanted to be held.
He woke up in the middle of the night, in nearly the same position but his head resting on a pillow rather than Izzy's shoulder. He was vaguely aware of a blanket resting on him and that his bag from Alicante was no longer next to him. Izzy must've put it away for him.
He dragged his feet to the nearest bathroom, hoping to find something to mend his broken heart. The only thing he found was a razor blade. He could have laughed at the irony of his situation. Only a few weeks ago, he was doing the same thing because he couldn't feel and now he was feeling too much.
Pressing the razor down hard against his wrist, he swiped it across quickly but it barely drew blood. Frustratingly, Alec ripped the plastic apart and took a blade out of it. He tried again, pressing down even harder than before, and roughly dragged it across his wrist.
This time, there was blood. Almost immediately, it began gushing out from his wound and for the first time, Alec panicked. It hurt, a lot more than any of the others had. He grabbed a hand towel from underneath the sink, using it to staunch the bleeding and apply pressure to his wrist.
He was beginning to feel faint and yet still managed to rush out of the bathroom, not even bothering to turn off the light or clean the blood off of the sink and tiles. He first instinct was to go to Jace's room, which wasn't too far but God, it felt like a mile away. He was out of breath by the time he arrived and the towel was past soaked. Alec thought he was seeing spots, but that could have just been paranoia.
Alec dropped the hand towel, because it hurt too much to grip it with his injured arm and he needed to knock with the other. And so he knocked. And knocked. And finally, after what could be the difference between life and death, he woke up.
"Hello?" He said through a yawn, still asleep for the most part.
"Jace." Alec panted, still resting a hand on his door. He thumped on it, leaving a bloody handprint.
"Alec, what do you want?" Alec could picture his furrowed eyebrows and frown. There was a rustle. "It's nearly 2 a.m.!"
"I'm sorry to inconvenience you at such a time." His voice cracked.
He could hear the bed creak from behind the door, indicating Jace had sat up rather quickly. He assumed he had heard the change in his voice, so different from the robotic sound he had gotten used to hearing over the past while.
In a matter of seconds, the door swung open and there stood Jace. Alec didn't wait to be ushered in, instead inviting himself to. He reached over to flick on the light, but gave a cry of pain. Jace reached over him and did it himself.
Once his eyes adjusted to the lighting, his mouth fell open to a perfect circle, in response to the sight he was greeted with. He pushed the door shut again and rushed over to retrieve his stele.
"Alec, what did you do?" Jace didn't want to take his eyes off his mess of a parabatai, whom was stumbling over to his bed.
"I'm sorry, I just…" Alec sniffed and found a tear rolling down his cheek. He hastily wiped it away with his good hand, leaving smears of scarlet on his cheekbones. "I'm sorry."
Jace shook his head. He now kneeled before Alec, armed with a stele. "Look, I'm pretty sure I can heal you, but it'll still scar." He peered down at Alec's wrist, quickly realising this wouldn't be the first one there.
"This is going to kill, and you're going to black out. But when you wake up," Jace gulped. If. "You are explaining this to me. Okay?"
Alec nodded, eyes closed, and Jace began drawing the precious iratze on Alec skin, pouring his heart and soul into it, and if there was ever a time to call on the angel, it would be now. Alec collapsed with a groan, just as his marred skin, slowly but surely, began stitching the shreds of itself back together.
Jace himself fell back with a sigh, letting out a breath he didn't know he had been holding. He was suddenly aware of his cheeks being damp and leant forward, pressing a kiss to Alec's wrist, staining his lips with his brother's spilt blood.
He pushed himself up, breathed deeply once more, and set himself to scrubbing away the blood of the floors, praying that he would never have to do this again.
This may possibly become a two or three shot, because I want to write about Magnus's reaction to this and then again something similar post-COLS. Hint hint. READ AND REVIEW TO MAKE ME WRITE MORE XOXO