A/N: If you're thinking you've already seen this chapter, you have, but I'm an airhead and left out a pretty important part so I had to fix that. Sorry.
…0…
New York; 2018
four months later…
It's with his heart in his throat that Justin walks off the plane into the throng of people at JFK Airport. He takes a deep breath, willing his nerves to settle. They feel like they're doing the samba underneath his skin and if there's any chance whatsoever of having as close to normal a reunion with his family as possible, he just needs to calm down.
And then he sees them; his parents.
The pulse in Justin's neck twitches, he feels the ticking muscles and his heart is hammering against his ribs.
It's a shock to see how much his parents have aged in the last 6 years. His father's hair is almost entirely gray now, or maybe it just looks that way from a distance since it was so light to begin with, and he's gained more than a few pounds but he still has the friendly, open face and kind eyes Justin's always associated with his dad.
His mother though is the one who looks the most different. Her hair is dark again, with no signs of gray or white to be seen, and it makes the deep lines around her eyes and mouth stand out starkly on her tan skin. She looks much, much older than she is and no longer does she seem like a warm, welcoming presence as she stands stoically with her hand on Max's shoulder. His mother is a detached, reserved person now.
Did he do this?
Justin has no time to really think about that now, for Max breaks away from the group and pulls him into a hug. When he pulls back, Justin sees Annaleigh behind him and she follows suit. He gives her the little Mona Lisa from DC and her whole face lights up before she hugs him again.
"Well, let's get home," Max says loudly, brightly. Forcibly. "I bet Alex is already back at the sub station."
"You guys didn't pick her up?" Justin asks.
Annaleigh shrugs, tucking her long curls behind her ears. "She drove up. And I can't wait to meet her, I feel like I'm never going to get to." Nudging Max in the side, she grins at Justin. "I offered to stay back and wait for her, but Max insisted I come."
"Well, I'm glad you did." He gives her a genuine smile, and tries to keep the relief out of his voice. No doubt Max wanted her there to keep their parents on good behavior.
He can't even imagine how Max talked them into coming down here to meet him.
When they reach Jerry and Theresa, on the outskirts of a large group of people, his steps begin to lag. As much as he's missed his parents, Justin dreads the inevitable awkwardness awaiting him.
Max, who is trying so hard to make this alright for him, throws an arm around his shoulder, and the other around Annaleigh. They must look like a normal, perfectly happy family.
If ever there was a prime example of 'looks can be deceiving,' this would be it.
Justin sees that behind her stoic front, his mother is tearing up when they finally reach her and he says hello quietly, fighting back tears of his own when she wraps her arms around him in a tentative, gentle hug.
"Oh honey," she whispers, "I missed you so much."
He's too choked up to say anything back, so he nods as best he can before pulling away.
His father though, he's the one who stays still and reserved, and shakes his son's hand and pats him on the shoulder, averting his eyes.
Not what he was expecting.
They make small talk on the way out of the airport, mostly about the wedding and they head down to the subway station. The city was more congested than usual for summer and Theresa insisted a cab would take too long. Justin's stomach lurches more than the train as they make their way through the midtown tunnel and downtown.
It's weird.
Justin hasn't set foot in New York since he was 21 years old and being surrounded by as familiar a situation as riding the subway feels as typical as it ever did, but the lapse in time has also made it feel like a new experience.
Just like standing between his younger brother and his parents.
Max asks him if he wants to come check out his garage before they head to the rehearsal dinner. He's expanded into building custom cars and even his eyes seem anxious to get Justin's opinion.
"Sure," he says, pushing open the door to the sub station.
Stopping in his tracks, Justin feels a sense of déjà vu unlike any he's ever felt before letting his eyes rest on his sister sitting at the front counter devouring a huge piece of chocolate cake.
His heart thuds painfully, and drops into his stomach.
Alex looks up, sheepish, and talks around a mouthful of frosting. "Hey guys."
Max and Justin both laugh and they reach her first, hugging her in turn. Justin pretends he doesn't feel the tension in the room skyrocket when he pulls away from her and they look over at their parents.
Theresa hugs Alex tightly, and sniffles against her daughter's hair and again, Justin feels himself getting a little teary himself, and even more so when Jerry hugs her and pulls away wiping at his eyes.
"Alright, enough of this mushy stuff," Max says. He puts an arm around Alex and directs her over to Annaleigh, who is oddly shy at the prospect of finally meeting Alex. "Alex, this is Annaleigh."
Annaleigh smiles at Alex, and only someone totally heartless wouldn't melt at the sight. She looks so hopeful and it makes Alex grin.
"Max," she tells him, "she is way out of your league."
Everyone chuckles at that and when Annaleigh hugs her Alex doesn't look the least bit uncomfortable.
"Who wants cake?" Theresa asks and they all settle around the counter. It feel to him like this is all for Annaleigh's benefit, but Justin isn't going to complain. Not when it finally feels like he has his family back.
The rehearsal dinner is set to begin at 7, uptown at the Regency, and he walks over to Max's garage after they finish their cake while Theresa insists Alex try on her bridesmaid's dress just to make sure it fits.
"This is really something, Max," Justin tells him, grinning, and throws an arm around his little brother's shoulder. "It's great."
As they walk back, Justin looks around and sees that little has changed around their old neighborhood. Some businesses have been renamed or replaced, there's a new park around the corner where a diner used to be.
But time passes and these things do not affect him like they should.
They get back home just in time to have their mother yell at them to go upstairs and get dressed.
Everything goes smoothly. Annaleigh's older brother, Ben, takes a shine to Alex and spends most of the evening attempting to flirt with her. Even when she tries to get away, he finds a way to keep her in his sights.
Theresa seems to find this amusing. Justin sits beside his mother, hoping she won't say anything about the three scotches he's already has as he watches his sister toss 'help me' looks at him over Ben's shoulder. But Jerry's standing near Alex and if something out of the way were to actually happen, he could handle it.
That doesn't stop him from feeling guilty though.
It's coded into Justin's DNA to protect his sister; to fight for her, beside her, even against her if it's for her own good. So just sitting and watching her put up with someone she obviously didn't want to be talking to isn't easy for him to deal with. Yes, there was a time when he would have sat back and enjoyed the spectacle. Alex has always been able to handle herself. But they're adults now, and she knows she has to be civil at least to Ben for Max's sake.
And there's the fact that he never has been able to refuse her help when she asks.
So he takes another sip of his drink and waits silently for the weekend to be over.
…0…
Professor Crumbs is waiting for them in the lair when they get home, Kelbo in tow.
This is the first time Justin has seen his uncle since everything blew apart and he doesn't quite now how to act around him. Max and his parents, they're immediate family; they'll forgive him and Alex for pretty much whatever they do and they know each other the best. He's not quite sure if that extends to extended family.
"Well," Crumbs says in the same oddly deep voice Justin still hears in his dreams, "Justin, Alex, you're both looking well."
He mutters a thank you. Alex is suspiciously quiet.
Kelbo walks to Max, asks him if he's ready, and when Max nods his head he takes his nephew's wand from him and hand it over to the older wizard and nods.
He turns to his niece and other nephew, face drawn of all the good humor Justin used to associate with his dad's rambunctious younger brother. "Have the two of you decided?"
Justin wants to slap himself. He and Alex knew this was coming. Hell, it was the catalyst for their reunion back in Washington, yet of all the old wounds they touched on those few days, this was the only one they never broached.
Foolish, he chides himself.
"Umm…" he begins, embarrassed to admit that they spent close to 48 hours together and never once talked about it only to have Alex take a step forward and cut him off.
"Justin's taking his powers back."
This is news to him. And to everyone else apparently. He feels the heat of their eyes on him, the situation so eerily familiar.
"No, Alex," he puts a hand on her arm and she angles her body to look up at him. "I'm the reason you lost your powers in the first place. You should take them back."
She shakes her head, dark hair flying about her face. "I don't want them," she says, soft, and for a second its like the world has upended itself and he's come out of Alice's rabbit hole. What else could explain Alex, who loved her powers and the freedom and fun they allowed her to stand in front of him now saying she doesn't want to have that back?
"But-"
Again, she interrupts him. "Professor Crumbs took my powers away from me once before, remember? And you sticking up for me was the only reason I kept them as long as I did."
Oh yes, he remembers that.
"If you hadn't," she continues with a glance over at Crumbs, "what happened later may not have ever happened. You lost your powers because of me." She speaks with such passion, such conviction, that even if he didn't know her, he'd know she believes in what she's saying. "I think we all know that I can't be trusted with my powers. I don't think things through, I never have. And if I were to take my powers back, I wouldn't have you there to fix my messes for me."
Justin hears his mother sniffle from her place beside him and he can understand it. He's choked up himself; too much so to speak, even when she squeezes his hand and faces forward again to tell Crumbs, Kelbo, Max, whoever, that she's sure.
Crumbs motions for him to come forward and he watches Max's powers get extracted from his brother's body, feels the tug just as sharply as when his own were stripped away. And when he's instructed to hold his hand out over the older man's wrinkled palm, he does so hesitantly, not sure what to expect.
Blinding heat scorches through Justin's palm, spreading quickly up his arm and throughout his body, zig-zagging around before coming to rest heavily in the pit of his stomach.
He lurches back, dizzy. Everything is too loud, too bright, too much. His vision of the world blurs, and all he can see is colors. Bright colors, red and greens and blues, indistinct and swirled together.
It's like the worst hangover ever and he sits on the living room floor, head between his knees, trying to keep from loosing it all over the rug.
Alex is there, as is Theresa, each one with a hand on his back to try and sooth him and he hears through the roaring in his ears Crumbs giving his old wand back to Jerry to give to him. Without another word, he's gone.
"Justin," Jerry asks, "you okay?"
"I feel like I'm dying."
Kelbo chuckles. The sound is more grating than nails on a chalkboard. "That's to be expected. Your body's been without magic for 6 years. You're not used to it anymore, and you've got your own powers, Max's, and Alex's all at once. It's a lot to take."
He takes a deep in hopes of keeping his stomach on the inside as he speaks. "I'm getting that."
Kelbo assures Justin he'll be fine, he's been through this himself after all, and tells him to let him know if he needs anything before he leaves.
Once the world rights itself again and he's regained the capacity to raise his head up, Justin meets Alex's eyes where she kneels across from him, blank, expressionless, and wonders what's going through her head right now.
…0…
The day of the wedding Justin still feels as if he's nursing a raging hangover, but he tries not to let on to anyone so he won't have to face questions he can't answer to those outside the family.
Max stayed over at the loft the night before. In keeping with tradition, Annaleigh's mother and Theresa both insist that she and Max don't see each other before the wedding. And being that he was the last kid out of the house, his old bedroom is still a bedroom and he had an actual bed to sleep in the night before. His own room became a TV room for his dad, and bull riding paraphernalia and the baseball glove chair fill the space. Alex's room had been Annaleigh's room during her stay there, and then became Theresa's sewing room, still pink and furry, but full of half-finished quilts in Aztec designs and brightly patterned curtains.
Alex had ended up with the living room couch, despite Max's insistence that she take his room. But she was adamant, saying he needed his beauty sleep with a grin and Justin had slept downstairs in the lair, on the couch that had replaced the tiny bench that had been there when the three of them had magic lessons together.
He tossed and turned all night, regretting his decision to sleep down there. He couldn't help but remember the last time he was in that room; when everything blew up, when his family fell apart, and before all that, being with Alex and that look on his face he didn't understand and has never forgotten.
Needless to say, coupled with his physical condition du jour, he's not exactly in the mood for a celebration.
"We're going to be late," Theresa mutters, pacing back and forth at the foot of the stairs. She leans on the railing and yells up, "Max, Alex, hurry up."
"Mom," he says, because he just can't help himself, "you guys go on ahead, I'll stay and make sure Max and Alex get there on time."
"You sure?" she asks and he can see his dad gathering up her purse and wrap as he comes to stand behind her, trying to usher her out the door. He nods.
Max is the first one of them to come down the stairs, naturally. "Justin, does this look right?" He tugs at his tie, hands shaking visibly.
Justin straightens out the leftward slant of his brother's silver tie so it lays perfectly flat down the center of his chest the way it's supposed to. He smoothes it down and then the lapels of Max's tux and steps back. His brother looks pale, nervous, and happier than Justin can ever remember seeing him. "You doing okay, Max?"
He bobs his head. "I'm great." He stops, pondering for a moment. "Is the urge to throw up a good sign?"
Laughing, Justin pats him on the back. They hear the padding of feet coming down the stairs and look up to see Alex coming down in her pale green bridesmaid dress, shoes in her hand.
For a second, Justin has to force himself to breathe and it has nothing to do with magic induced nausea.
She stops and leans a hand on Max's arm to keep herself upright while she fastens the straps of her shoes around her ankles. When she straightens up, she does a small twirl and holds her arms out slightly. "Well?"
Max grins. "You look great, Alex."
"You too," she tells him and re-straightens his tie for him. "You clean up nice." Looking over at Justin she lets her eyes flick up and back down his frame quickly. "Both of you." Then she turns to the mirror by the door and fluffs out her hair, which she's cut since Justin saw her last and is wearing straight. "I think we make a pretty spiffy looking bunch. It must be in the genes."
Justin laughs, because he can't handle the alternative; his desire to punch something, and he isn't sure if he can manage speech around the scream that's clotted in the back of his throat. There's a sob hung there too, and it tastes like shame, regret, and sorrow. But he forces the laugh out, because it's his best option.
Because as he watches Alex hug their brother, laughter and light in her eyes, he wishes he could go back to that night in DC and do everything differently.
…0…
"Hey."
He doesn't turn around when Alex speaks, just returns her greeting and keeps packing.
"You're leaving already?" Alex's voice reaches his ears, small, uncertain.
He does turn around now, gathering up the book and shaving kit he's left lying on the table. "Yeah. I'm doing a lecture series all next week for prospective students and it starts Monday so…"
"Oh." She shifts her weight, fiddling with her bracelet. "When are you-"
"First thing in the morning." He doesn't mean to sound harsh but he just wants this whole weekend to be over. He wants…something.
He's just not sure what that something is.
There's an odd look on Alex's face, sort of a cross between nervous, anticipation, a hint of fear, and maybe even a little bit of worry.
And the fact that she's displaying them here, when its late and just the two of them, makes him want to run as fast as he can back to North Carolina before something happens that throws them back into a tailspin.
Justin recognizes that look. And he knows where it leads.
It's been a rough day. The cab ride on the way to St. Ignatius was tense and just plain weird. Max sat in the middle, sweating a little, while Alex held his hand and Justin reassured him with lame jokes and pointless anecdotes. Then he watched Ben walk with Alex up the aisle, her spine stiff and ramrod straight with tension, before he, as Max's best man, walked with Annaleigh's best friend Catey in her place as Maid of Honor.
The reception wasn't much better; he'd had to smile and be polite to Annaleigh's relatives, make small talk with people he hadn't seen in years. And then Annaleigh had insisted on pictures of the whole family together, including one of him and Alex dancing to some cheesy 70's power ballad he doesn't know the name of but is pretty positive he'll never get out of his head.
He tries to concentrate on packing and not the way it felt to be that close to her again-especially after they had agreed to just let all of that go.
Easier said than done.
"Are you leaving because-" she begins, but he cuts her off.
"I have an 8 am lecture on Monday. I have to go."
"Justin, its summer. Did you volunteer for this or something?" She thinks about that for a second and then she lets out a small puff of laughter. "You volunteered."
"I like to keep busy," he says, brushing past her to grab his sneakers off the chair by the door.
"Why?"
God. He knows where this is leading and he feels bile rise up in his throat at the thought of doing this again. He can't, he just…can't.
"Alex…"
She rushes to place her hands on his arms, to silence him. He clamps his mouth shut. "Justin, what you said today in your toast (he remembers all too well), did you mean that?"
What he'd said…
"To my brother, and to Annaleigh, who were brave enough to go after what they wanted. Not many of us have the guts to do that, and we spend our lives in regret…"
"Well, a lot of times, people do regret the things they don't do, or the things they do," he said, shrugging her hands off so he could put his shoes in his duffel bag. Hopefully, those last few words would do the trick.
But as usual, Alex feels the need to take his plan and tear it to shreds.
She comes up behind him and drops her voice down so low he could barely hear it. He's so attuned to her though; from the sound of her voice to the way she walks, that there's no possible way he wouldn't have heard her.
"Why didn't you ever call me after you left New York?"
That was one question he was not expecting.
"Justin?" she prods. Looking back, maybe that's how all of this began. A statement, a smirk, a poking, a prodding. Him and Alex, what they've always done. "Please."
Justin doesn't think he's ever heard his sister say please in his life. He can't not answer her.
"I was hoping…" he screws his eyes shut and takes a deep breath. "I hoped that if we just left it alone and forgot about it…it would go away."
After a few beats of silence, he looks at her. "How'd that work out for you?" she asks, voice dry, humorless.
"Not well."
He feels her eyes on his back, feels the heat of her emotions burning through him like hot lead. He wants to fidget under her scrutiny, wants to shrink away and hide back in his house in North Carolina, where its safe, where he can bury himself in his work and his research and keep the thoughts at bay.
And then the quiet gets to be too much for him and he turns, angry and annoyed, and rakes a hand through his hair in irritation. "Damn it, Alex…" he exhales heavily. "Why did you come down here? I thought we settled all this in Washington."
"I did too," she says. "And then I saw you again and it just didn't feel over anymore."
Why…why does she do this to him? Why can't she just leave him be?
Because Alex has, her entire life, lived to torment her older brother and she's not going to stop now just because there are actual feelings at stake.
"Tell me you didn't feel it."
She stands in front of him now, big eyes searching his, open want evident in her face. Her small hands twine themselves through his and she steps closer, her skin brushing his. At once his entire body clenches with conflicting emotions. "Justin…I have to know, do you still feel this?"
There's a war brewing inside Justin, battle lines drawn between the need to do what's right and his desire to just give in.
But what would it accomplish? They could give in now, and tomorrow they would be exactly where they started; confused, conflicted, and completely guilt-ridden.
He's been there. And its not a great place to be.
"Alex…" He moves back and extracts his palms from hers. "I'm not going to do this again. I'm not going to put you through this again."
Her eyes change, going hard, and her jaw clenches in defiance. (He should not find it sexy.) "Its not just up to you, Justin. This involves me too and I want-"
"I don't care!" he shouts.
Alex takes a step back, shocked.
Funny, how the few times Justin has ever yelled at anyone in his life, it has always been Alex.
It's always been Alex.
"Alex," he licks his lips and speaks slowly, deliberately, "I mean it this time. We're not doing this."
He goes back to his packing, throwing things in and tugging the zipper closed, movements jerky and breathing erratic. In the back of his mind, Justin clings to the naïve hope that Alex will, for once in her life, take a hint and not press the matter further.
After all, she was the one who had come to him and told him that they had to stop what they were doing in the church. She was the one who had asked him point blank if being her brother was enough for him.
She was the one who kissed him first.
No, Justin doesn't blame her for this mess they've tumbled into. He did, once. Because it was easy and made the guilt a little more bearable, but he's past that now and he knows full well his part in all this.
That doesn't stop him from thinking that if she hadn't kissed him all those years ago right where they're standing now, none of this would have happened.
It all goes back to Alex. For Justin, this has always been the case.
"Fine," Alex finally mutters and its too easy, too convenient for her to pick now of all times to give in to his request.
"On one condition."
He knew it was too good to be true.
With a deep sigh that aches like it comes from his very bones, Justin faces Alex and her determined expression. "What?"
She invades his personal space again; face tipped up to his and so close he can feel the threading of her heartbeat against his chest. Or is that his own? At this point its hard to tell really, where he ends and she begins.
"Tell me you don't love me."
He's sure he has misunderstood. There's no way she just asked him if…
"Tell me," she repeats, "that you don't love me, and I'll leave right now and for the rest of our lives I'll just be your little sister."
Justin laughs; at the absurdity of the situation, at the inclination to slam his head into the wall, at the universe's tendency to torment him with the one girl in the world he can't have.
"Come on, Alex." He tries to brush it off. "You know I love you. I mean, you're my sister."
"No. I want you to look me in the eye," she takes hold of his face and forces him to look directly into her big dark eyes, "because you can't lie when you do and you know it, that you're not still in love with me. You don't act on impulse, Justin. Ever. You always think of the consequences. You had to have felt something…something real."
As far back as Justin can remember, his mother has been a fan of soap operas and he remembers, distantly, an interview she watched once of some actress saying that unrequited loved was the loneliest, saddest feeling in the world and he hoped that he'd never have to go through that.
Now, Justin wishes he could feel it. Now he knows what it feels like to love someone so desperately, and to know, even without the words, that he's loved in return by the only person he can never truly be with. He knows it, how it has made him ache in places he never even knew he had inside him. And he knows that it is, without a doubt, the absolute worst feeling in the entire universe.
He would welcome unrequited love right about now.
"I know you, Justin, and none of this could ever have happened if it wasn't serious for you. You couldn't do something like this otherwise."
Owning up to it would do more harm than good. To both of them.
So Justin does the hardest thing he has ever done in his entire life and he may regret it later. Not because its wrong, or even because it hurts him, but for the pain he sees in Alex's eyes when her hands drop from his face and she stumbles back into the chair in front of the bookcase.
He looks her straight in the eye and tells the biggest lie he's ever told anyone in all his 27 years.
"I've never said I was in love with you, Alex."
That's not exactly what she asked of him, but its close enough to get the job done.
Justin watches Alex walk out the door, and out of his life, and he knows that the next time they see one another, if there is a next time, nothing will be the same. What they have between them is not enough to sustain anything real, and so it will only hurt more in the end. He can feel the agony burning in to his heart with the slam of the door and he embraces it, accepts it. He will mourn, he will grieve. He will yearn for the possibilities he's just turned his back on.
And one day, when he hears the news that Alex has found someone who makes her happy, when she's in love with someone that can hold her hand in public and shout his feelings to the world, he'll rest easier with the knowledge that everything he's done has been for her.
He only hopes that someday, she sees it too.
…0…
A/N: Blech, this chapter sucks, I'm sorry, I've been battling the stomach flu. Next one will hopefully be better.
The interview referenced is one I watched forever ago of Fiona Hutchinson who played Gabriel Medina on One Life to Live.