A/N: Shyreader18: Thanks for that review! You nailed it. I love basketball. It's probably my greatest passion, though sadly, I'm a lot like Alec in that I am too short to play under the rim and don't have a good enough jump shot to play on the perimeter. I always heard you should write about what you know, and I try not to get too basketball-y with it, but it is a lot of fun to put my boys in the middle of something I love so much. Glad you are enjoying it, too!
PS: Don't you guys wish I could respond individually to each comment without it going through private messaging? I do!
"Alec...Help me..."
Alec heard the plea but couldn't locate the source. He knew the voice, however. He would know that voice anywhere.
"Where are you, Magnus?" he called. He heard no other sounds and saw nothing but darkness. There were tiny pinpricks of light far off in the distance, but nothing to give him a clue as to where he was, or more importantly, where Magnus was.
Then, he heard the soft thud of a basketball against pavement, the clink of the metal rim as the ball went through the hoop. The outdoor basketball court began to materialize in around him. He realized he was standing at the edge of the court in a pair of cut-off sweats and no shirt. Wasn't it December? Why wasn't he cold? As he glanced around, he was able to take in more of his surroundings. The dark brick of the weight room began taking shape, then the asphalt, the rusting metal pole that held the rusting metal rim and backboard that seriously needed to be painted. And then, seemingly out of nowhere, there was Magnus holding the ball between his hands and smiling at him.
"Help me, Alec," he said again, his voice far more distant than his actual proximity, almost ghostly.
"Help you what? Magnus, I don't understand."
He took a step toward Magnus, but the distance between them didn't change. Magnus turned that smile on him again, the shy, crooked smile that Alec rarely saw.
"I need your help. Please." He said this as evenly as if he had asked him to pass the salt shaker.
Alec's heart rate increased. He was starting to feel panicked. He didn't know what Magnus wanted him to do. "Tell me what to do, Magnus. You know I'd do anything for you!"
His grin widened. He shot the ball. It arced high into the air, swishing perfectly through the net. Wait, there wasn't a net on the outdoor court. Was there? No, he was certain there wasn't. He looked back at Magnus and found the ball in his hands again, though he didn't appear to have moved at all.
"I know you would," Magnus said, a thoughtful expression on his beautiful face. "That's why I'm asking you. Help me."
He moved toward Magnus again, but the more steps he took, the further away Magnus seemed to get. Magnus stretched out a hand to him and he reached for it. Their fingertips brushed, but he couldn't grasp him, couldn't hold on. Magnus was slipping away, farther and farther. His voice now sounded like it was coming from a tunnel or a well, a deep, echoing, tinny quality to it.
"Help me…"
"MAGNUS!"
And he was gone.
Alec awoke with a start, covered in cold sweat and panting as if he had run a marathon. He didn't even remember falling asleep. He had no idea what had startled him awake, but the hint of something frightening tickled the edges of his mind. He patted himself down, making sure everything was in place as it should be.
He was still wearing his date-night clothes. He had evidently fallen asleep in his bed. The last thing he remembered was being frustrated that Magnus wouldn't talk to him, and fighting back tears. His face had the dry, crusty feeling that happens after a good cry, and he wondered how much crying he had actually done. He wasn't normally much of a crier, and tending to cry more from anger and frustration than anything else. Perhaps that explained a lot. Those were two emotions he had become very familiar with in the last couple of days.
He went to the bathroom to relieve himself, then stopped in the kitchen for a glass of water. It was then, as he sat the empty glass in the sink, that he realized Magnus's bedroom door was open. He walked around the edge of the counter and had a clear view into Magnus's room. It was empty, the bed ruffled, but not slept in. Magnus was nowhere to be seen. Where could he be at this time of night? Hell, what time was it?
He went back into his room and glanced at his alarm clock. Three a.m. What could Magnus possibly be doing out of the dorm at three a.m.? He crossed the room to his window and pulled back the curtain. He looked out at the dark night sky. There was a partial moon overhead, but it was mostly obscured by clouds. He would see no stars in Brooklyn with all the city lights.
His eyes were drawn to the outdoor basketball court, which he had an obstructed view of from his bedroom window. He saw a ball fly into the air, then a figure run after it as if it were trying to escape. He knew instinctively that the figure was Magnus, though being five stories in the air and three a.m. made it impossible to make out any distinguishing features. He didn't even hesitate, but grabbed his coat and headed out the door.
As he approached the court, the sounds of basketball hit him squarely in the heart. He recalled a glimpse of his dream, but nothing tangible, nothing he understood. He circled around the outer edge of the court and sat on the top of a picnic table, drawing his knees up on the bench seat, and resting his elbows on his knees. He watched Magnus shoot the ball, over and over, hitting just over half of his shots. Clearly there was something bothering him. Magnus rarely missed when he wasn't being defended. He was just too good of a shooter. He wondered if he should say something, but nothing good came to mind, so he sat silently waiting.
Finally, after yet another missed shot, Magnus's shoulders slumped. He went to retrieve the miss, then dribbled the ball as he walked over near where Alec sat. He turned his back, not even acknowledging that Alec was there, brought the ball up like he was going to shoot again, then lowered it.
"It was my stepdad," he said, softly, still not looking at Alec.
"What?" Alec said, not comprehending what Magnus was saying.
Magnus sighed. "You asked who hurt me. It was my stepdad."
Alec's heart sped up with a deep sense of foreboding. Of course it was the stepdad. Wasn't it always the stepdad? He was suddenly unsure he wanted to hear what Magnus had to say, but he owed it to him to listen after how hard he pushed for him to talk.
Magnus sat on the bench beside Alec's feet, holding the ball in his lap. He spoke mostly to that rough, rugged basketball, when he wasn't staring out into nothingness.
"I suppose I should give you a little background information," he began. "My mom and stepdad, Rick, were high school sweethearts. They married a year after graduation, and attended the same college. They shared an off-campus apartment. My stepdad worked so they didn't have to rack up so much student loan debt. He was a short, stocky guy, his skin even paler than yours. My mom was of Indonesian descent, with creamy tan skin.
"One night when he was working and she was walking home from a late study session at the library, she was attacked and raped…by my father. He was a huge guy with very dark skin, a member of the football team. My mom found out a few weeks later that she was pregnant with me. My stepdad wanted her to have an abortion, he hated me from the moment he found out about me, but she said it wasn't my fault how I was conceived."
He paused for a breath. "I think it may have been better if I had been born with lighter skin, maybe they could have passed me off as his son, but my father was too dark-skinned for that. I'm several shades darker than my mom was. I never had a chance at getting him to like me. Then, I grew and grew and grew. I'm about eight inches taller than my stepdad. I had no chance…
"Anyway, I finally figured out I was gay when I was fifteen. No, that's not true. I knew long before that, I just wouldn't admit it, not even to myself. I dated girls, but nothing serious because I just wasn't interested in them. Finally, when I was sixteen, I met a guy. We dated for a few months, and I was so unbelievably curious about having sex with him, we ended up making up an elaborate excuse to be alone together.
"My stepdad was a truck driver and on the road five or six days a week, he wasn't due back until the following day, and my mom had to work that night so I knew we would have my place to ourselves. I had Will cover for me, tell his mom I had a project to finish after school and would be over when I was done. So, we went to my house. I was so nervous. I wasn't a virgin, but I'd never been with a guy and I didn't know what to expect exactly. Neither of us did, really. We had no idea what we were doing, so we did the clichéd thing…he bent me over the side of my bed and went at it.
"It hurt like fucking hell at first, and I wasn't sure I would be able to continue. Then, all of a sudden, it started to feel good, really good. We were so into it, everything else seemed to disappear. We finished together, and I made a spectacular mess all over the floor…just as my stepdad walked into the room. We never even heard him enter the house...
"Before I knew what happened, he practically ripped the guy out of me. Fuck, I still remember how bad that hurt. Rick grabbed a handful of clothes; I don't even know if they were mine or his. Then, he shoved the guy out the front door without even giving him a chance to get dressed. I heard the door slam and it kicked me into gear. I was terrified. I'd never seen that look on Rick's face before: a wild, cruel, almost evil look. I didn't know what he was going to do.
"I sent a quick text to Will that simply said Rick's home. Then, I threw on my underwear and grabbed my t-shirt to try to clean up some of the mess. For some reason I thought that if the mess was gone, maybe he would calm down and it would all blow over."
He paused again, lost in his own head, his own memories. Alec sat there watching him, waiting, anticipation and dread building in the pit of his stomach. He noticed his own hands were shaking, but Magnus seemed calm, distant.
Finally, he continued. "When Rick came back into the room, I saw that same cruel look in his eyes. I'd always known he hated me, saw me as a constant reminder that his wife was raped and that everything had changed after that. But he had never done anything physically to me. He mostly just ignored me. I wasn't allowed to refer to him as my dad, even though he was the only dad I'd ever known. Because of that, even though I feared him at that moment, I never expected what he was going to do, never even thought to defend myself.
"He crossed the room in a flash, screaming things my brain can't remember, and landed a punch against my left temple. He wore a big, ugly ring on his right hand. I still have a scar from it." Magnus pointed to his temple. Alec had never noticed the scar before, but now, in the dim light of the quarter moon and the couple of streetlights, it was throw into sharp enough relief that it was clearly visible. A small, star-shaped scar, bright against his dark-honey skin. Alec wondered if it was not visibly in full light, or if he had just never noticed it because he didn't know it was there.
"Anyway, the blow made me dizzy and a half-fell across the edge of the bed. I remember holding on, trying to get my balance, trying to clear my head. Then, he hit me again, in the chest, I remember feeling fire shoot through my lungs, and I couldn't catch my breath. I fell to the floor. I remember feeling more pain just before I passed out…"
Magnus was quiet for so long Alec began to wonder if this was the end of his story, or at least, if this was all he planned to tell him. He sat patiently, watching Magnus. He still had that cold, detached look in his eyes, and it frightened Alec a little, though he wasn't quite sure why. He wasn't quite sure how he would feel recounting a story like this either. His heart went out to Magnus, though he doubted Magnus knew that.
"I woke up four days later in the ICU. My eyes were so swollen it took several minutes for anyone to notice I was awake. I don't remember much, other than the pain. There was pain in my head, my face hurt, my arm felt really heavy, and there were tubes in my chest and down my throat, helping me breathe. Even so, every fucking breath hurt. Everything hurt. I remember my mom's face coming into focus, and her voice sounding really distant. Then, I passed out again.
"When, I awoke the second time, two days later, the swelling had decreased and I could open my eyes. They had taken the chest tube out, and were waiting to see if I could handle that before they removed the tube from my throat. I had to sit there for hours like that, unable to speak. My throat was so dry and sore.
"The doctor came in to tell me how lucky I was." Magnus made a derisive, bark-like sound. "Yeah. Anyway, apparently I had several facial fractures, but none were displaced so I didn't have to have surgery for that. I had a lot of head trauma and swelling in my brain initially, so they weren't sure if there would be any residual brain damage. I freaked out when they told me my right arm was broken. Like not being able to shoot properly was my biggest worry." He trailed off again, then shook his head. "I had several broken ribs and one had punctured my lung, which is why I had the chest tube in the first place. They managed to fix all the broken bones without surgery, miraculously. Then, he said it would just be a matter of time now. You know, to see if I would make a full recovery…
"My mom told me later that the doctor had told her at first that anything was possible. I could make a complete recovery, or I could be a vegetable for the rest of my life, or I could die, or anything in between. No one really knew what to expect when I woke up. As it turned out, I spent another ten days in the hospital, then started rehab. I had lost a lot of weight and muscle mass in the hospital. I ended up missing the rest of the basketball season, too. But somehow, the only physical reminders I have are the scar on my head, one on my chest from the tube, and a knot where my broken arm healed. Apparently my text to Will is what saved my life. He got worried when I didn't text him back and he and his mom came to my house and found me..."
Magnus became quiet yet again. The silence stretched out between them, until Alec couldn't take it anymore and finally said, "Did they catch him? Your stepdad."
"What?" Magnus said, as if he had been lost in his thoughts, which he probably had. "Oh, yeah." He laughed shakily. "If you're going to run from the cops, a big red rig with pointed teeth painted across the front is probably not the best place to hide. They caught him the next day, and charged him with attempted murder. Said the charge would go to murder if I died."
"What happened?"
"He got 15 years, but is eligible for parole after ten." Magnus was shaking. "He would have gotten less, but they said it was a hate crime, and that increased the penalty. It also let everyone know what I was. I hadn't told anyone but Will at that point. Not my mom, or his. No one. Lucky for me, I was still a minor so the details of the case were not made public. No one knew it was me…at least, not officially. But everyone at my school guessed. Mom ended up divorcing him and selling his rig. She used the money to pay for me to go to a private school where no one knew me."
"My God, Magnus," Alec said. He didn't know what else to say. What could you say to something like that? Nothing meaningful.
Magnus looked up at him. "Don't look at me like that."
Alec flinched at the sternness of Magnus's tone. "Like what?"
"With pity," he said. "I didn't tell you this to get your pity. I don't need it and I don't want it."
"I'm sorry," he said. He watched Magnus thoughtfully as he turned the basketball in his hands. After a few long moments, he said, "Why did you tell me?"
Magnus stared straight ahead, still fumbling with the ball. "So you would understand. I nearly died for being with a guy once. I've never found one worth dying for." He stood, still not looking at Alec. "I'm finding it harder and harder to push you away."
He dribbled the ball a few times, then shot a twenty-foot jump shot. The ball hit the back of the rim and bounced off in the opposite direction. He trotted over to retrieve the ball. Alec was so absorbed in Magnus's story, and mulling over that last line, that Magnus was nearly out of sight before he realized he was heading toward their dormitory. He leapt off the picnic table, scrambling to catch up to Magnus, but by the time he reached him, Magnus was nearly at the front doors.
He knew Magnus wouldn't appreciate having a personal conversation within the elevator or in the hallway leading to their room. So he kept quiet, silently trailing behind Magnus, watching him walk. He carried the basketball pinned between his arm and his chest, casually. His shoulders were slightly hunched over, like he was carrying a weight too heavy for him to bear. And maybe he was. Maybe that was the whole point of his story, to let Alec know that he just couldn't handle all of this. Alec hoped that wasn't the case.
Magnus let them into their room, dropped the ball beside the couch and darted into his room, closing the door behind him. Shutting Alec out…again.
Alec sighed heavily. Magnus had had enough for one night, he knew that without having to be told. He cast one last glance at his roommate's door and went back to his own bedroom. He laid down on the bed, pillowing his hands behind his head, and let his tears fall. They spilled down his cheeks, pooling in the shell of his ears, as he thought about everything that had happened on this hellish roller coaster of a day.
He had known Magnus was hiding something. Asking him who had hurt him had just been a guess. He had no idea how right he had been. It pissed him off like crazy that Magnus's stepdad had done that to him. And it pissed him off more that he could be eligible for parole after ten fucking years! God the judicial system in this country was ridiculous! Magnus had said he was sixteen when it happened. That was at most five years ago. He had only celebrated his twenty-first birthday on Friday. Had it really only been the night before?
So much had happened between them in that thirty-six-ish hour period. They had started speaking again. Then Magnus had broken his heart. He had foolishly gone on a date with someone else, practically told Magnus he loved him, and been rejected again. And now? Now he knew why. What had happened to Magnus still haunted him, that much was clear. Alec had no idea how to move past it, how to get him to see that being with him would be different. His stepdad was in prison, at least for now, and couldn't hurt him anymore. But Alec knew that logic was frequently trumped by fear, and Magnus had a lot of fear.
Help me. The words startled him, mostly because, until that moment, he hadn't remembered any details of the dream that had woken him earlier. Now, he did. Magnus had asked him repeatedly to help him. Was it more than just a dream? Did Magnus really want his help? It certainly sounded like he could use some help, but what could Alec do? He was a Sports Medicine major, not Psychology. He didn't know how to help Magnus.
Then, another, significantly more selfish question entered his mind unbidden. Did he want to help Magnus? Was it worth sticking around for this? He shook his head angrily. If he could punch himself, he would have at that moment. How could he even think such a thing? Yes, he would help Magnus, as much as he could. And if that wasn't enough, he would find some way to give him more.
The problem was he didn't even know what Magnus needed. He'd seemed so lost and distant telling his story. But that could have just been a defense mechanism, right? Putting distance between himself and his memories to keep them from hurting him again. Yeah, that sounded reasonable. Magnus had seemed so normal, if not a bit standoffish when he first met him. Alec was now wondering if his prying had done more harm than good for Magnus. He shook his had again. No, if he had opened old wounds, that was because Magnus hadn't let them heal properly. They would have opened again some day, with or without Alec's help. If Magnus hadn't dealt with this situation, he needed to, and Alec was going to be there every step of the way to help him do it.
That was the promise he made to an unknowing Magnus that night.
