TITLE: 13. "Smiling from sadness"
CHARACTER: Hephaestion and Alexander.
RATING: PG
CATEGORY: Historical AU.
SUMMARY: Hephaestion's smile speaks volumes ...
DISCLAIMER: I do not know the people involved, no harm intended; everything is product of my imagination. Alexander and Hephaestion belong to History and to each other but I would not mind sharing my life with the blue-eyed man.
WARNINGS: Angst, tears …
My mother tongue is Spanish and I work without a beta so all the mistakes are mine.
FEEDBACK: comments are love! Any kind of them will help me to improve my writing or leave it forever.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: This idea is just a whim; I just wanted to try and write something different. It is a whole series of 29 short ficlets.
Hephaestion grabbed the full goblet and took it to his lips; the red Macedonian wine went down his parched throat, alleviating the pain that his unleashed tears forming in his eyes had provoked; however he could still clearly feel the lump in his throat.
His king and former lover looked magnificent in his wedding attire and the bride was a true exotic gem; a diplomatic addition to achieve Alexander's Asian dreams.
Many of the companions were still mad at Alexander due to his decision to marry her while others were openly enjoying Hephaestion's downfall.
Dark Cleitus had even dared to punch and split Hephaestion's lip, drawing blood but not a single tear.
In the middle of the celebration, Alexander looked for Hephaestion's cyan eyes and when he found them, the General returned the gesture and also gifted his King a beautiful smile.
Ptolemy, who was nearby, saw the intimate gesture and thought that maybe Hephaestion was taking Alexander's marriage better than he had thought he would.
What nobody realized was that broken people's smiles were always the prettiest because smiling from sadness cost the double.