This was written for the alphabet prompt meme on LiveJournal. The prompt was "W is for Whiskey," Alex/Lexie. I'm not entirely sure about it, but there's stuff in here that I like and it outweighs what I don't like. Written mostly as a freewrite.
Disclaimer: Grey's Anatomy is the property of Shonda Rhimes and ABC. This writing is for entertainment purposes only and is not for profit.
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In four and a half years, change was inevitable. It was just never in their favor.
Now, people are happily coupled, united, or married with children. Some have taken fellowships halfway around the country, some have moved away, and some are just gone. And then there's the two of them; stuck in neutral, just never having gotten over the separate incidents of heartbreak that happened to both them, within months of one another, years ago. Everyone suddenly had someone else, and through cruel twists of fate Alex and Lexie were left the odd ones out.
They had to move out of Meredith and Derek's house after they were married – it was the considerate thing to do – and besides, Alex couldn't stay in that place after what happened. So, what else was there for them to do but move into an apartment together? They both had slightly crappy salaries and had already been living together for a while anyway. It was the easiest and most logical option, requiring the least amount of thought during those trying times.
So, that's the way it's been for years: Alex and Lexie, the oddest couple, living in a small downtown Seattle apartment once again testing whether or not men and women really can just be roommates. So far they've passed. True, there has been sex, usually when they're drunk. If it can really even be called that. Sex implies a connection, something that they lost right around the time when he forgot they had it in the first place. Now it was merely an act they took part in, something undefined they just did. They couldn't name it, since they didn't have anything to compare it to. Neither Alex nor Lexie have had a real relationship in a long time – another side-effect of the heartbreak. Alex has occasionally brought home a meaningless one-night stand, and Lexie has just tried to ignore romance in general, nearly soured on it.
It's been a hard four years of demons and ghosts and the past that can never be forgotten no matter how hard they try. It's been a hard four years of intoxicated, angry, and empty fucking. It's been a hard four years of not knowing what they mean to one another when they're sober. It's been a hard, impossibly hard, four years in general.
It's been easier (or at least a little less hard) lately, though. With Alex's recent entrance into the Peds fellowship and Lexie's position as Chief Resident, they've been pouring everything into work since it helps them forget about everything else, albeit temporarily. When they're not at the hospital working odd or opposite shifts and they're actually in the apartment together, they're reading or doing paperwork or studying or sleeping and not doing much of anything else.
But, even with their busy schedules, they find time about once every two weeks to take part in a ritual commiseration of sorts. One night, they drop their work and drink themselves silly, repeating the same conversations about all of the shitty things that have happened to them because even after everything misery still loves company. They drink about ill-thought-out marriages and relationships gone bad, about the death of wives and of mothers and of people who still should have been their best friend. They drink about painful, tearful breakups that they never moved past, alcoholic fathers (they share this one), and crazy girlfriends. They only skim the surface, never going into too much detail because it all still hurts like hell and they can't stand it.
But they do talk, and it's usually followed by the sex-like act. Then, the next morning, they wake up with terrible hangovers and can only remember fragments of their conversations, pieces of what they revealed, so it doesn't burn as badly as it would otherwise.
Tonight is one of those nights and the drink of choice is whiskey. There are a few shots of a bottle of Jack Daniels gone between them already and they've hardly started to talk. They're on the floor; Lexie stares at her empty glass, tired after scrubbing in on a long CABG (she won't touch plastics with a very lengthy pole anymore, no way), slowly building up the energy to reach for the bottle and pour another shot.
Alex is lying flat on his back, blinking and squinting, hands resting behind his head. He's drunk enough to ask the room to please stop spinning but not drunk enough to miss the fact that he's a thirtysomething surgical fellow supine on the floor like a stupid frat member. He really hasn't evolved; it hits him, and he laughs bitterly at himself.
The archetypal conversation begins. "Life sucks," he says curtly, voice slightly affected by the alcohol, keeping his eyes glued on the ceiling above. Lexie nods, even though he's not looking at her, and finally decides to pour that next shot. The amber liquid barely settles into the bottom of the glass before she downs it, pretending to shudder and cough because she's Lexie Grey and she Doesn't Do This. But, in reality, she likes it more than she should – maybe as much as her father. She swallows that awful thought with another half-shot before replying.
"Your life sucks," she counters like it's a competition (and it almost is), running her fingers through her hair that's grown shorter over the years. "Sometimes I wonder how you're still breathing. Seriously."
Alex raises himself on his elbows to meet her gaze, waiting a moment for the room to complete another whirling revolution before his expression transforms into the cool and smug smirk that's the same both drunk and sober. He laughs sarcastically, once, a mere exhalation through his nostrils. "Come on, Little Grey," he says, to prove a point, using an old nickname that he knows will sting her but not particularly caring because she probably won't remember and neither will he. "You and I both know that you're packing your own major shitload of emotional baggage."
Her dark eyebrows head upward and she purses her lips, sighing. It's the truth, and the same routine as the times before. He moves slowly to a full sitting position and pours himself another shot. He throws it back easily, puts the glass back on the coffee table, and slides across the carpet closer to her so that the length of their bodies from their shoulders to their calves are just barely touching.
Usually, that would be the extent of it. They would be done talking, take another shot or two, and then move into the realm of wordless sighs, fucking as if it was a mind eraser. There's nothing left to say, nothing they want to anyway; by now they both know everything bad that happened to the other and accept it, not wanting to dig it back up.
But tonight is different. Maybe it's the whiskey, but Lexie has something else to say, something that she's been holding in for a long time but has never been wasted enough to let anywhere past her mind. She knows that it's going to pierce him but it spills out anyway.
"At least she loved you." She averts her eyes, unable to watch his reaction. "At least you know that. At least you weren't a stepping stone that influenced her to go back to someone else, the person she apparently really loved all along. At least she's not still here, well not here but here, so close that you can feel her and it tortures you. At least you know she's probably not happy with someone else. You have that going for you." There are tears, now, not his but hers. She quickly wipes them away because it's embarrassing, it's been years, but the things he once said to her couldn't be erased and he thought he did.
It's painful for Alex, too, to be reminded that Izzie isn't here anymore. But it's cushioned somewhat by his intoxication – instead of a punch to the gut it's a glancing blow to the shoulder. He pushes it back into the corner of himself where he's kept the rest of it tucked for so long. So he makes a joke about Lexie's predicament, partly to be an ass but also partly to make her feel better. "Hope he's enjoying the fucking sunshine," he grumbles sharply.
Lexie smiles bitterly. "Yeah." It's over, then. There's a silent understanding that they both might have gone too far, said too much, and another word might break the balance.
Alex shakes his head. "Life fucking sucks, Lexie."
A short, heavy pause.
"Life fucking sucks," she agrees.
His hand is on her leg; he squeezes her thigh. He's smirking and so is she, because over the years she's learned how to give it right back to him.
They come together in an automatic kiss, then, tasting sharp like alcohol and bitter like something else that neither wants to give a name to at that moment.
Maybe it's the whiskey, but whatever it is that they do is better than usual that night.