CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX.
If the guy behind him - or any driver within a city block radius of his car for that matter - blew his horn one more time, there was going to be a crime scene.
On any given day, Alfred could make it from his condo to the court house, and vice-versa, within fifteen minutes. Sometimes twenty or twenty-five, depending on the traffic, how heavy it was, the time of day and where it was to.
Today, however, was not 'any given day'. In fact, it was the day from hell for he and Chris had been sat in traffic, thanks to a three car accident in the dead center of an intersection they needed to pass through, for what was going on forty minutes. The two men were slumped in their seats, slouching in a similar posture and wearing identical masks of blooming frustration. Chris had abandoned his Blackberry on the top of his thigh, spine curling a bit as he was bordering on sliding down to eye-level with the dashboard while Alfred stared at the Mercedes logo in the centre of the steering wheel, his iPhone resting between his legs and completely abandoned; he had been texting his brother but the man took a month and a few days to reply, so he had given up nearly all hope of trying to hold a decent conversation.
Hostility practically exuded from them, quietly simmering and saying nothing as they sat there. It was probably for the better, given the volatility of their tempers - Alfred when behind the wheel of a vehicle, whether it was tuck in traffic or not, given his frequent outbursts of road rage, and Chris with just his temper in general due to his distinct lack of patience no matter the situation.
Maybe they were simply sitting in silence in fear of aggravating the beginning of World War Three.
"So…" Chris started in awkwardly. He sounded strained; on edge.
The two men looked at one another and sighed their frustration.
"Yup," Alfred replied through his teeth. He clenched the wheel harder.
World War Three definitely had potential.
They fell silent again as Alfred edged the Benz a car space further. Jones looked like he was out for blood as he set the car in park, hand clenching the gear shift so tightly that his knuckles were white and if he had a penchant for turning into a gigantic green monster, there wouldn't be a gear shift left. But he wasn't the Hulk, so there wasn't anything to worry about; all he could do was endure his hand savagely cramping up from how tightly he was holding the stick.
Letting go and setting his twitching hand down in his lap, he bit his lip before craning his neck to peer into the rear-view mirror at the sound of approaching sirens. About time someone arrived on the scene other than the solitary ambulance that happened to be in the area. Talk about serendipity.
Sure, he felt a minor sense of sympathy for the people involved in the accident, but if the asshole in the Dodge hadn't barrelled through the clusterfuck of a busy intersection - hell, it was a crazy enough area even when it wasn't the dinner hour - when he was the one with the red light then they wouldn't have to be sat almost two blocks away to freedom. The west bound lane, beyond the accident, was clear, with one car rocketing off down the strip of pavement as the driver had managed to swerve around the accident before someone told him to stop.
Well, we've gone four blocks in the past forty minutes, he thought, idly drumming his fingers on the steering wheel as he and Chris watched three or four emergency response vehicles go flying past them in the lane leading away from the accident. Moments later, two police cars joined them, and just behind them a fire truck.
"Looks like the cavalry's here," Jones commented.
"About time," muttered Chris. "I was giving it another ten minutes before I made a fucking call myself for a goddamn tow-truck. Hell, I'd pay for the fucker and all."
A sentiment the driver echoed; he grunted with a singular nod. Sliding the car out of park, Alfred edged it forward until the bumper of his Mercedes was practically kissing the one of the Elantra in front of him.
Ten more minutes crawled by, and they had managed to get another six or seven car spaces - some serious progress - beyond where they had previously been and were now at the end of another block.
If it weren't for the fact that he was hungry and there was no one home to make dinner - Matthew, had he been off, would have had something waiting for the both of them, but he was working until midnight - he would not have been nearly as bothered. He glanced at his watch; it was almost six o'clock and, unless he said fuck it and grabbed some McDonalds on the way, it would be well after seven, if not eight, before he actually sat down to have anything to eat.
The car ahead of him moved, giving him the space to cross the intersection. Alfred, however, did not move.
"Hey, Al?" Chris asked, glancing between the driver and the spot where they could be parked now. "You gonna go sometime this year, or are we waiting until the next coming of Christ?"
Sitting there for another moment, the lawyer flexed his hands on the steering wheel. Wary, and having been in a car with the lawyer enough times to be so, Chris straightened a little and tightened his seat belt and the very same moment he did that, Alfred took the AMG out of park and shoved it into drive, slamming his foot on the gas and making a turn through the intersection, his tires squealing and narrowly avoiding creating another three-way accident.
Holding onto the 'oh shit' bar every car has four of, Chris' eyes flew wide and he felt his heart and stomach jump up into his throat, fighting for space as the attorney tore down the road. A glance to the speedometer showed that the needle was sitting between sixty and seventy. He should have done himself a favour and just not looked. Despite the fact that he wasn't all that religious, Chris said a little prayer for himself and considered going through the rosary, each and every Hail Mary included, just like his great grandmother had shown him.
Jones banked another sharp turn, his car rocking precariously before slowing down, humming pleasantly to himself as he relaxed in his seat.
"Alfred…"
"Speak up, dude," he laughed, smile wicked, "I don't understand mumbling!"
"I am going to throttle you."
"Says the fully grown man who almost wet his pants and squealed like a little girl."
Chris made a lunge for the driver, causing Alfred to let out a shrill scream as he accidentally drove into the opposite lane before shoving the man off of him and into the passenger door. The two of them stared at the truck in front of them and let out twin screams of horror before the lawyer reacted. He shoved his car back into its proper lane with a yell when the horn of a cube van blared in his general direction, the panicking driver making a 'get out of the way' gesture with his arm.
Pulling the car off the road and up onto part of the curb, causing some pedestrians to jump out of the way, the two men sat there, white-faced and wide-eyed.
"I should kill you," Alfred said in a strained voice.
DePaulo didn't even say anything; he looked a little too stunned.
"You know what? I think I'll kill you." He scratched at his neck as he said this. "You down with that?"
Nodding, Chris rubbed his jaw. "Yeah. Go for it man, I don't see anything wrong with it."
There was a moment where neither of them moved, and Chris was mentally preparing himself for an imminent demise. Something that would be quick but excruciatingly painful. His friend wasn't the most merciful individual. But then Alfred surprised him by shaking his head slowly. "Not yet," he whispered in a menacing voice as he backed the car up. "Not while you're expecting it. I'll wait until the right moment. I'll wait until you've forgotten. Then, when you least expect it, you're a dead man, Christopher."
"You're mental."
Alfred shrugged as he eased the Benz back onto the road. "That's the side-effect of dating someone bordering on batshit," he said with an airy wave of his hand.
There was no arguing with that.
They bypassed the scene of the accident and Alfred looked properly smug. "I don't know why I didn't think of doing that earlier."
"You didn't think of it because you don't know how to think," Chris snapped. Alfred's hand shot out, smacking the other man in the chest. It hit with a hollow thumping noise and a choked 'oof' left him, as well as a litany of garbled curses and backhanded insults.
Good friends? You can tell yourself that. Going as far as believing it, though? That's just craziness.
Once he had dropped Chris off, the cold mid-November breeze sweeping in through the car and chilling him, he settled back and headed in the direction of his own abode. It was fairly cold out, but the lawyer knew it would be colder in his apartment because of the air conditioning problem. Unless Matthew got so fed up with it being cold in there that he found a way to fix it (such as ripping the whole system out with his bare hands because he was a manly man that totally came from a lineage of crazy ass lumberjacks, as did all other Canadians) there was no way the building's maintenance crew was going to go about fixing something as expensive as that.
Although, he could find some sort of loophole in his home insurance clause that called them negligent for something or other and he could file an injunction against them for it, thus winning himself another case and getting free air conditioning and home heating replacement for free.
The short drive between their homes was a short one - Chris lived within a respectable walking distance, which was pretty awesome - and fairly uneventful. No crazy accidents to deal with, no traffic and there was only one kamikaze jogger who decided to bolt across the road just as he was making a turn instead of the usual three or four he ran in to.
Some people these days, he thought as he drove away, cursing as he gave the jogger a murderous look, just really happen to have a death wish.
One of these days he wasn't going to be lucky enough to have quick enough reflexes to slam on the brakes and blare the horn at the same time. There'd either be a big smear of human all over the road and the front end of his Mercedes, or he'd end up having something close to a heart attack because of it.
(Frankly, he'd rather the bloody smear on the road because a premature heart attack would suck.)
Returning home for the day, accompanied by a stress knot at the base of his neck, Alfred was almost looking forward to throwing something crappy in the microwave to heat up and then crash on the sofa for the rest of the night with a videogame controller in hand.
Sliding off his suit jacket as he stepped into his apartment, Alfred yawned and ran a hand through his hair before grabbing a coat hanger. The smell of something absolutely delicious reached him and he smiled, eyes sliding shut. Someone was cooking lobster tails. He brushed off the delicious smell and rubbed the back of his neck as he struggled to get his shoes off, pressing his forehead against the wall and resting his weight against it as he did so.
The fact that someone was cooking in his supposedly empty apartment didn't clue in.
For a moment he stayed there resting with his forehead against the wall supporting his weight, eyes shut and beginning to relax his muscles. As he did this he slowly emptied his thoughts and breathed; breathing was so easy to do, and frankly, he loved the feeling of standing in his porch and just mentally shedding a few pounds. It was what his therapist back in England had shown him.
Meditating was fantastic stress relief, he thought. He knew Vanessa, whom was into all that yoga and tai chi stuff, was also into meditating. Maybe he could get her to show him some more things and he could even pass it on to Matthew or something. There were times when the guy could use some serious relaxation, and meditation was fantastic for that.
Pushing away from the wall and feeling considerably better, he ditched the tie he wore over the back of a chair before toeing off his socks. Grabbing them off the floor and the tie he had discarded, he dumped them in a basket of dirty laundry.
It didn't clue into him that there were people in his apartment until he turned around and stopped upon hearing the sound of keyboards being typed on, pausing and cocking his head when he saw that Matthew and Mathias were sat at the dining room table. The space was big enough for a party of six and they had the entire table taken up with papers and computers. Matthew had both his laptop and the lawyer's set up and was navigating back and forth between them, while Mathias had a Mac and a PC hooked up, both of them connected to the printer that was usually in Jones' office. There were papers, books and phone books everywhere.
It looked as though a library or an archive had thrown its guts up all over the table.
Impressive.
Not even looking up from the computer screen, Matthew greeted him with a pleasant 'hello' and 'there's still some dinner left in the oven if you want it.'
Looking between the two young men, a creeping sense of unease taking over him despite how impressed he was with their set up, Alfred nodded and padded over to the oven, opening the door. For all he knew, the little bastards could have been plotting to take over the world from his kitchen. Worrying about that could wait though. Supper awaited him and it was just as he had suspected: cooked lobster tail. His stomach practically snarled.
Hand on his demanding tummy, he grabbed an oven mitt and hauled the plate it was on out and set it on the counter before uncovering a pot. There were noodles in there, mixed with beans, carrots, mushrooms and these weird, spiral plants all in an alfredo sauce. It looked really good - and smelled even better when he had the cover of the pot off - but the spiral plants were a little too confusing for his liking.
There was no way he was eating it if he didn't know what it was. "What the fuck are these things?" he demanded, plucking one out and holding it for inspection.
Matthew glanced over. "Those are fiddleheads," he said before looking back to his computer. He picked up a pencil, crossed something off on a sheet of paper next to him and slid it over to the Dane for inspection. There was a nod; the paper was returned. What in the hell are they doing- "The grocery store received a shipment of them today, all frozen though. They're imported from Nova Scotia, and they're good for you. So eat up, you're a growing boy."
Alfred snorted before dumping the contents of the pot on the plate. It was all warm enough so that he didn't have to waste time reheating it. "I can't believe you guys had time to cook all of this up and work at the same time-"
Then it hit him. "Why aren't you at work?"
Finally, both Matthew and Mathias looked away from the computers. Williams tilted his head back a bit, a grin on his face. "Should I tell him now or later?"
The Dane smirked wickedly. "Well, he'll find out sooner rather than later, so you might as well tell him now."
"Point taken."
"Tell me what?" Jones demanded warily, setting his fork down. "I don't like where this is going, Mattie."
"I quit my job!"
"Oh. Okay." Alfred nodded slowly before turning back to his food, forking some of the lobster into his mouth. Fuck, whoever cooked it damn well knew what they were doing. And Matthew quit his job, too! Well how exciting. Never too late for a career change-
Then he froze: "You did what?"
Laughter left the two men seated at the table. "Well, it was I either quit, or I punched the manager in the face for being a douche. If one more word had to come out of his mouth, putting me down or ridiculing me, I was going to break his jaw. But that might have ended up being a bad thing, so instead of landing myself an assault charge, I quit."
"So, what are you going to do for rent?" Alfred asked quietly.
The Canadian held up the stack of papers beside him. "I'm going job hunting tomorrow!" he declared. "I got my two old bosses, Lars and Greg as my references. And Mathias is hunting with me; he quit too."
"Yup!" Mathias declared, grinning from ear to ear. "And not only am I doing up resumes, I'm also deciding to take this as a fucking amazing opportunity to start looking into starting my own environmentally-friendly gardening business. Or at least just looking into the logistical and business aspect of it."
The two slapped each other a high-five.
"Fuck yeah, being adults!" Mathias declared. "We're doing it right!"
Slightly dazed, the American nodded and turned back to his food. It was a little bit hard to digest - the news, not the food - as it was the last thing he had expected to hear come from the younger man. "Well, as long as you feel it's the right decision, I mean-"
"And I'm doing up university applications for the winter semester."
Alfred dropped his fork. It hit the ceramic plate with a sharp clatter and he looked over to his partner, eyes widening and a grin breaking out across his face. "What- oh my God you are you serious?"
Laughing at the reaction, Matthew stood and approached the lawyer. "Yep," he said, sliding his arms around the man's mid-section as the other placed his hands on his elbows, tugging him close with a chuckle. "I'm just to the point that I'm sick of a having a dead end job and even though a degree won't promise shit, it's better than nothing, right?"
Kissing him on the corner of the mouth, Al pressed their foreheads together and grinned. "I'm very proud of you," he said quietly, a smile growing at how Matthew's expression softened; how his cheeks darkened a bit and his smile turned just that little bit bashful to make it endearing. "I'm so very, very proud of you, Matthew."
"Thanks," he whispered, ducking his head and pressing closer. Alfred buried his face in curly, sweet-smelling blonde hair and inhaled. "I want to stop sucking at life, y'know? And maybe going back to school would help that a bit."
Tightening his arms around him, the lawyer admonished his words. "You don't suck at life, Pet," he scolded lightly, trailing his fingers down over his back and settling them at the small. "Far from it."
"Does that mean I'm winning?" Matthew asked, smirking.
"All day every day," he laughed, kissing him fondly.
Rubbing the back of his neck when he pulled away, Matt shut his eyes and sighed, tilting his head back for a brief moment as he inhaled deeply. "I'm also reapplying to the art school that accepted me before," he said quietly. "I'm working on another portfolio again, too."
"What are you going to do with an art degree?" Al asked. "Not to be a Debbie Downer or anything, but where's that going to get you in today's society?"
"I don't exactly know," admitted the young man with a sigh, sinking back against the counter but then moving to the side when he realized he was blocking the lawyer from his dinner - just about as dangerous a feat as blocking a starving bear from a picnic basket. "I mean, it's always been a dream of mine to go to art school, and the one I'm applying to offers courses in sociology and politics, but-"
"I know it is," Alfred said, cutting him off. He had picked up his plate and moved it to the center island. "But look at it this way: you even said so yourself, you don't want a dead end job. Then look at the degree you could end up with. It's hard to find work with an arts degree, even if you have a humanities or social sciences minor. You'd have to spend a good chuck of your time looking for employment outside of a coffee shop. There were people that I knew when I went to Harvard that ended up with artsy degrees - like in linguistics and anthropology. Not that I'm hating on those degrees and fields, but they're still looking for work. So even though you'd have gone through school the way you want to, there's a good possibility you'd ending up making coffee for pretentious assholes and their Macs or waiting tables or stocking shelves all over again."
The words stung because they were true, and that was what the Canadian hated the most and what made Alfred feel awful. He knew Matthew knew this, but maybe hearing it from someone else would just reaffirm that knowledge. Or at least he could hope it would.
"Fuck you, Alfred." Matthew groaned and ran a hand down over his face before moving to sit on the floor, resting his back against the center island and his head against Al's calf. Reaching down as he forked some lobster into his mouth, he messed up the other's hair with a light chuckle. "I hate it when you're right. Like, I hate it so much. Why do you have to be right?"
"I tend to look at things a little too in-depth on occasion," he said around a mouthful of crustacean. "But that's my vocational training peaking out."
Williams cursed, hitting his leg. "I also did up applications for a few business colleges, NYU and a handful of other art schools in the area, so who knows. I have until January to figure out everything."
He nodded, staying quiet for a moment as he thought out his next question: "Did you apply to any out of state schools?"
"I sent off applications for Yale, Harvard and Princeton just for the shits and giggles," Matthew said. "But the thing is, I have just enough for two years of tuition, books and fees in my bank account for NYU, which is the most expensive on my list. I wouldn't be able to afford residence. Anyway, I'd have to drag you along, too, so maybe it wouldn't be so bad…"
Laughter. "Would you really?"
Matthew nodded. "Commuting between states to see you would suck," he admitted in a quiet voice. "And you're too fucking needy to depend on a long-distance relationship. I might enjoy subjecting you to the occasional bout of unusual cruelty, but I wouldn't do that to you."
'Only because I wouldn't want to do it to myself,' Matthew thought to himself, withholding a dragged-out sigh in favour of simply shutting his eyes and keeping his cheek pressed against the fine material of the attorney's dress pants.
They sat in silence for a moment, the only sound in the place keeping it from being a chapel-like silence coming from Mathias' audible music and the clacking of him typing on his laptop.
It was nice but, of course, Alfred had to speak.
(This is why we can't have nice things, Matthew wanted to say, but he assumed it would be best to keep that to himself.)
"Well, you have until the acceptance letters start coming in to figure out what you're doing," Alfred hummed. "That gives you at least a good month or so, right? And if you need any help with figuring things out, I'll gladly help you. I've been through university twice, so I know a few things, even if it does differ from school to school."
Standing, Matthew wrapped his arms around the lawyer's shoulders and pressed himself against his back. "Thanks, Princess," he murmured against his jaw, grinning when the man took hold of his hand and gave it a gentle squeeze.
He started, however, when Alfred tensed and pulled away, turning to look at him with a sharp expression, still holding the Canadian's hand in his. His attention was drawn to the beige wrap bandages peaking out from beneath the sleeve of his sweater. "Matthew, what is-"
Laughing weakly he retracted his arm, only to have Alfred tighten his grip on his hand and pull it back. Al was watching him worriedly, blue eyes confused and almost scared. "S'nothing, Al," he reassured with a kiss. Everything when said with a firm kiss on the cheek makes it that much more reassuring, right? "Don't worry about it."
Alfred didn't buy it for a minute; he held fast. "Sorry, but I feel like I should be a little bit worried."
Groaning, Matthew cursed. "Mathias, tell him there's nothing to worry about, for fucksakes."
Plucking his earbuds out, the Dane turned in his chair and studied the couple; the way Matthew was biting his lower lip nervously and looking a bit peeved all at once, and how Alfred was gripping his hand. He chuckled lowly. "Oh, he's telling the truth, man. You can chill," he said with a flippant wave. "S'only a very minor sprain and some heavy bruising."
Matthew sighed when Jones' eyes began to filter a look of relief. The hand began to loosen on his and, looking sheepish, he ran his fingers over his knuckles, giving Matt an apologetic smile.
"We happened to run into Jason on our way here and Matthew might have lunged for his throat."
Alfred's eyes went wide; the hand tightened again. Matthew hung his head.
"Sometimes I really hate you," he said as Alfred turned to look at him, looking properly horrified and enraged all at once.
"Well, I had to stop you from killing him somehow, and grabbing your wrist happened to be the first thing I was able to do," Mathias said, holding his hands up as he placed himself on the defensive. "I mean there'd have definitely been nothing wrong if you killed him. Bastard has it coming. But murder charges would look bad, and then picking up murder charges on the same day you quit your job? Might look even worse, bro, and y'mightn't get a job like that."
"But dude, I was so close to breaking his jaw," Matthew groaned. "Why would you stop me from doing that?"
"I'm a caring friend," Mathias retorted. "And, I mean, as insincere as it might have been, the fucker did sort of apologize."
"Because 'I'm sorry' makes up for four years of emotional and physical abuse."
Grimacing, the Dane sighed. "Okay, so it doesn't," he admitted. "At all. But it takes some serious balls to stand there in front of a kid you abused and kicked out and apologize for all of it without turning around and screaming 'PUNK'D' before bolting, right?"
He had a point there. Not much of one, but with a little work, it could bloom into something that made a shred of sense.
As they talked, Alfred's hand had tightened to the point that the grip was actually painful. Wincing beneath it, he bit his lip. "Alfred, that hurts," he choked out. "Lay off on the death grip, Princess, or I definitely won't be punching anyone with it anytime soon."
Immediately letting go, Alfred murmured a harried sorry before kissing the front of his hand. Matthew blushed and smacked him over the back of the head with an embarrassed snort before the man turned back to finish off his dinner.
"Well, you did give him a good swift kick in the package that brought tears even to my eyes," Mathias commented as he turned back to his computer. "So I think you got your message across."
Quietly snickering, Matthew gave Alfred another comforting peck on the cheek before returning to the table, sitting down in front of his laptop and running his hands up and down his face a few times. It was like he was rubbing away the stress. "I mean, it threw me for a bit of a loop, running into him," he murmured. "I barely recognized him at first, but he recognized me right away. And then he turned around and said sorry? Maybe it wasn't him."
"He could have a doppelganger," Alfred piped up.
"Maybe my mom married the evil twin instead of the good twin. And the twin I ran into today was the good one who somehow secretly knows everything that happened and because he felt bad because of his evil twin's assholeness he assumed his identity and apologized in his place."
"Or," Mathias offered, looking between the two of them, "he's dying or something and apologizing was on his bucket list?"
The three fell silent. Matthew and Alfred shot him a skeptical looks before the student ducked his head.
"Okay, fine. He didn't exactly look like he was dying."
"I wouldn't be that lucky for him to keel over just yet," Matthew snarled bitterly, glowering at the laptop screen as he typed with a renewed viciousness.
Alfred winced at his wording but said nothing; the guy would probably throw one of the computers at him if he did.
No one spoke much after that, except for the occasional mutterings between the two men sat at the table as they compared job search findings. The lawyer, once he had finished the dinner left for him, which had been apparently been cooked for him by the Dane and not Matthew, he had taken to reading through some magazines that were beginning to pile up on the coffee table. There were issues upon issues of the Rolling Stone, a few issues of GQ and a pile of Psychology Today magazines that the State Attorney had told him to look into; those refresher courses he had been taking over the past few weeks were helpful and he was taking more away from them this time around, but with the magazines he had been going through, they seemed that much more interesting.
Hunkering himself down on the sofa, draping his body across the expanse of it, Alfred turned the light on in the corner as Oreo decided to make herself known with a quiet, sleepy mewl.
He crooned softly in the cat's general direction, babbling affectionate nonsense that she clearly didn't understand. Smiling tiredly as the animal trotted along the arm of the sofa, affectionately butting the American's cheek with her head, Alfred scratched the top of his before sliding down a bit further so that his head was on a pillow.
Trailing his fingers down along her delicate spine, watching as her whiskers twitched, the cat padded down over his shoulder and chest before settling in the dead center of his torso, rump facing him. Yeah, glad to see you too, cat, he thought, trying his best to manoeuvre the magazine around the animal's body. She proved to be a perfect blockade. All furry booty that obstructed his line of vision.
So he abandoned the idea altogether, tossed the psychology magazine back onto the coffee table and instead chose to light up a smoke. The fuzzy little blanket he wore purred her content, sending vibrations along his torso. It was almost enough to lull him to sleep, but given the fact that he had a lit cigarette there was potential for disaster. He instead tried to make heads or tails of the intermittent discussions the other two were having.
But the fact that they were barely talking didn't help him in his endeavours of staying awake; that was the problem with having a good meal - the better it was, and the more filling, the sleepier he got. Comfort food was the Devil's plaything. He yawned, briefly masking it with the back of his hand before taking a drag and then glancing through his text messages. There was nothing there that he hadn't replied to, with the exception of a particularly snarky one-liner from Mattie about his ability to-
Oh.
Well that was both rude and inappropriate.
He promptly deleted the message in fear that should someone ever go through his phone for any particular reason they would find that text and he would be shamed into running away forever. Not to join the circus though; that was overrated as sin. He would have to buy his own island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean - because he fucking could and he had looked into it before - to spend the rest of his life living as a technology-abstinent hermit.
(While there, he would develop a fair-trade program with the indigenous population of the island, and he would be their leader and they would make him margaritas and grilled mango/papaya/pineapple/banana skewers while he shared stories of the horrors of New York City traffic jams.)
He gave it a moment of thought, watching the animation as the message was deleted. Honestly, it didn't sound like that bad of a life. He could probably handle it if he really wanted to, right? Of course he could; he was man enough for anything, fuck what Chrissy said about his manhood. Bitch didn't know nothing about his manhood.
Content with the mental chest-thumping he had indulged in, Alfred stretched as he took another drag, slowly letting the smoke out through his nose before refocusing his attention on the two unusually quiet men in his apartment. He had been around Mathias enough to know that the guy was so loud and obnoxious that he could have earned himself the title of being Gilbert Beilschmidt and Jeff Wills' illegitimate love child. Given how quiet Mathias was - and how focused his partner looked; he was quiet enough as it was at times - they were actually dead serious with what they were doing. Which interested him and so he decided to focus on their endeavours once more.
From what Alfred could make out of their sporadic conversations, there were a surprising number of places hiring. Neither of them had been anticipating many places to send out their resumes, but they had compiled a growing list. Most of them were jobs like what the two had just come from - minimum wage jobs that wouldn't get you anywhere in life - and a lot of them were table waiting jobs.
Picturing Matthew as a waiter was a funny picture.
Yawning and pushing away from the laptop, Mathias ran a hand through his wild hair and shut his eyes. "Listen, do you mind if I leave my stuff here?" he asked tiredly. "My eyes are burning and I kind of want to go back to my place and sleep."
"I'm going to say yes," Matthew laughed, settling back as his hands slid down into his lap. "But it's Alfred's table, not mine and-"
"Yeah, y'can leave your shit there," Alfred bellowed from the sofa. His words were loud enough to frighten the cat into bolting - digging her claws into his chest as she used him as a launch pad. He yelped, drawing his knees to his chest as his eyes flew wide because damn that really hurt.
The two laughed and Matthew trailed behind Mathias as he headed to the door, excitedly planning out the next day. Job hunting was what the majority of it entailed, but they were also going to spend some time dropping off university applications.
Following the Canadian's movement with his eyes as he shut the door behind the other blonde and went back to the table, Alfred frowned. He looked so exhausted but yet he continued to do up applications, put together his portfolio - a bunch of his canvases were piled on the floor and there was a camera on the table - and do up resumes. He was nothing short of a trooper.
Turning his attention to the magazine he could now freely look through without having to worry about the bodily obstruction of a cat, he picked it up and began to flick through it. Some of the articles were on stuff he had already covered in university. Although, there was a gigantic article on cocaine addiction. Not what he wanted to be reading about.
Instead he chose to focus on an article about racial biases and how a doctor's unconscious racial bias could actually influence how they treated a patient based on their 'race', or so to speak. And to an extent, it was also prominent in the justice system - just another one of its many and multiplying flaws.
(But hey, he could always hope that he could somehow make it better, or at least in his jurisdiction. Starting small was the way to go, and if he could stretch it out from there, then he would be serving a purpose for once.)
Moving from that article on to one centering on the psychology of the placebo effect - and growing bored with it almost immediately - Alfred tossed the magazine onto the table and grabbed up his newest copy of GQ. That was more like it; fuck the prescribed books. He wanted some mindless reading.
Although he did enjoy informative texts of the sort, whether they involved psychology, law, politics or philosophy (his minor was in philosophy, after all), he didn't exactly want to spend all his time reading them after he had spent the whole godforsaken day alternating between being stuck in traffic and listening in on the court case from hell poor old Chris was in charge of.
Pavel and his court room antics - he had already almost caused two mistrials and Alfred had learnt that his brother's face could turn some very interesting shades of purple - were going to be the death of both him, Arthur and Chris.
Not once, though, had he been brought up, and Alfred felt as though he had finally hit a small streak of luck; the case was nearing an end, but it would be set aside for two weeks in December for Christmas. Then by the middle of January everything would be settled, the verdict given and Jones knew by then he would be clear of conscience and, once that case was over, he'd go in for his year-end review and then he'd take over from Chris.
Alfred let out a low whoosh of withheld air before pinching the bridge of his nose.
Another two weeks of sitting in on the trial and dealing with being as antsy as all hell and wanting to get back down there and own the floor.
Sure, doing paper work was a grand waste of time and an easy slaughter of a few forests, and he loved his volunteer work and visiting schools and helping with all those programs more than anything, what he missed was the actual atmosphere of being in a court room. The tension, so thick to the point of palpability, was almost like a cheap drug to him - something that made him snort at the comparison - and he lived for it. Arguing the defence, the questioning, more arguing, more questioning. Getting the bad guy and putting them in their proper place, or so to speak. He just loved it.
Which he thought to be kind of funny, given he didn't even want to be a lawyer in the first place. It just sort of happened: that he got recommended into the law program at Harvard, and he went with it. He didn't go into law with any long-term ambitions - he had been both high and hungover when he had agreed to do law with Chris.
The fact that things had worked out for him in the end and he had actually been successful had been nothing but a brutal fluke.
Flipping the November issue of GQ shut once he had skimmed through some of the articles, he glanced first to his watch - it was close to nine - and then he glanced over to where his partner was.
Matthew had returned to the computer when Mathias left what was nearing an hour and a half ago, and he seemed to have absolutely no intentions of leaving the spot anytime soon. He was hunched over, head in one hand and his lower lip was in his mouth. Alternating between the two computers he had set up, his hand drifted from keyboard to keyboard as he skimmed down through whatever it was he was doing. Stress practically exuded from him and his face, illuminated by the dull glow of the monitors, was drawn and tired-looking. A proper nervous wreck just waiting to happen.
Watching him for a moment, Jones rested his head against the side of the sofa before he decided that enough was enough; if he was on the other side of the room and could easily tell that his lover was stressed beyond all reasoning - and by his own doing, not that of an external source - then there was no way he was letting him carry on like it. He'd be in tears or throwing his guts up before the night was out.
Standing with a stretch and stepping around some of the books and papers that had slid to the floor, he approached the young man.
"Here, Matt, how about you give all these resumes and cover letters and job and university searching a break," he murmured. The poor guy was growing more and more frazzled by the moment; it really showed when he jumped nearly a foot off the chair with a yelp when his partner approached. Taking his hands, he pried him away from the keyboard, easily maneouvering his slight body up and away.
"A-Al, wait," he babbled, trying to turn them around so he could get back to the table. "I'm almost done-"
"I don't care," said Alfred calmly. "Put it away; I can practically feel the stress coming off of you. We both know what you get like when you start to get stressed about things like this."
Matthew hesitated and, grudgingly, allowed himself to be led away from his mess of organized resumes, university applications and other various things of that nature. The broad hands on his shoulders were reassuring, as was the mouth at the back of his head and Matthew sighed, sinking back into the man's touch. "I suppose," he murmured.
"It's bad enough you had two or three panic attacks last week," the lawyer said softly, kissing along his neck as he began to massage his shoulders. Indigo eyes fluttered shut and Matthew practically whined at the tension-easing pressure. "I don't think it's good for what little sanity you have left-" he received an elbow in the diaphragm, "- to be inducing panic attacks or borderline nervous breakdowns."
"Mm, yeah, whatever," Matthew said, waving his hand flippantly.
Deny it all he wanted, Jones knew he knew what he was talking about; he had spent enough time around him to know some of the signs of his anxiety flaring up. There were times when it happened on a regular basis, but then there were times when he functioned, for lack of a better word, normally, pills or not. Alfred sighed and ruffled the curly blonde locks before moving in the direction of the sofa to crash down on.
Standing there for a moment, hands on his hips and looking out over the darkened city with the lights from other buildings reflecting over his cheeks, Matthew let out a yawn. With a whine Al tugged on his jeans and huffed when he had his attention, pulling him closer.
Matthew hummed acceptingly, dropping his weight on the couch. Stretching languidly the artist curled up with him, sliding down in between his side and the back of the sofa, hand resting on his stomach and looping their legs together.
"Cozy?" Alfred asked, wrapping his arm around him.
Matthew nodded, choosing to simply snuggle into his side, shutting his eyes and letting out a small sigh. He licked at his lips. Closing his eyes as well, Jones tipped his head back and smiled a little as he doodled inane designs against a thin shoulder.
Even though it would massacre his back in so many different ways, he was tempted to say screw it and stay there on the sofa for the rest of the night with him. Matthew was groggy enough to the point that he probably wouldn't want to get up, and well, neither did he. He was comfortable, curled up the way they were, and didn't want to move. But his back was already beginning to knot where he had hurt it a few months ago and common sense told him to get up and drag their sorry asses to the bedroom because otherwise he'd be hopped up on painkillers the next day.
Considering moving, he peered at the man lying beside him; eyes shut, face relaxed and fuck him he looked so utterly at peace. Of course he would when his back was beginning to scream murder. Instead of waking the half-asleep artist, he grabbed the quilt over the back of his sofa and draped it messily over them. He placed a kiss to his forehead before settling down altogether.
They couldn't have been that way for any more than ten minutes, Alfred finding himself in a hazy, semi-comatose state that left his head foggy and his senses numbed, when the doorbell - a rarely used fixture in his apartment - rang, startling them both back into an unwanted awareness.
"Who the fuck-"
Matthew cut off his words with a groan as he sat up, flopping over to the other end of the sofa to turn on a tabletop lamp, effectively blinding themselves. Draped over the arm of the sofa, sleep-flushed cheek pressed into the material and looking properly groggy and disoriented, he grunted. "Want me to get it?"
Running his hand down over his face and throat, letting it settle over his pounding heart, Al nodded. "Might as well," he sighed. "My back is killing me already."
"I still think you should have seen a doctor," he muttered as he stood, tossing the blanket back over the lawyer, "because whatever you did to it that night at the gym, your back hasn't been the same since. You're gonna be fucked if you don't get something done for it."
"Yada yada, old man at the age of twenty-seven," Alfred snapped. "Whatever. Just answer the door already. If it's a salesman, tell him I'm filing a lawsuit against him for being a public nusiance."
Shaking his head as he staggered over to the door, stepping with a little more force as he tried to work some feeling back into his numbed feet and legs, he nearly walked smack into the door as he fumbled with the handle. At the same time he tried to straighten out his clothing in an attempt at appearing presentable. Not that it mattered, really, especially if it was a salesman. Maybe it would be a vacuum salesman, and he could tell him to go and suck himself. He snickered.
Vacuum salesman, telling him to go suck himself. Funny stuff right there.
At that moment Matthew decided that he needed a lot more sleep than he realized.
He did not need to say that to anyone, though, and nor would there be any charges pressed that night for the individual at the door was a woman who stood at least three inches taller than himself. She had bobbed blonde hair, bright blue eyes and the smile she wore was a stunning one: all white, straight teeth, female charm and nothing short of charisma. Matthew realized with some dim annoyance that it might have been love at first sight, but he ignored that in favour of giving the woman a smile. "Can I help you?"
When he spoke, her smile faltered and she looked away, scratching at her cheek before glancing to the slip of paper she held in a dainty hand. "I think I must have the wrong apartment," she murmured. Her voice was accented, but not by anything distinguished; it was more like a smattering of different dialects, like someone who had spent time in various countries or states, long enough to pick up the regional accent but not long enough to lose all of her original one. "Sorry to have bothered you, dear."
As she made to leave, Matthew shook his head. "Well who are you looking for?" he asked. "Maybe I could help."
She turned back to him. "Do you happen to know if Alfred Jones lives around here?"
Grinning, Matthew nodded. "This is his apartment, yeah," he said. "I'm his … friend. Did you want me to get him for you?"
The woman's face lit up and she was positively ecstatic; it looked as though she were about to throw herself at the Canadian to embrace him but at the last moment seemed to think better of it. "That would be wonderful!"
Laughing, Matthew ushered her into the porch, shutting the door behind them, walking around the corner to where Alfred sat.
"There's a lady at the door for you," he said, jerking his head back in the direction he had come from. "Tall, blonde hair and blue eyes. Looks kinda young. She's awfully pretty."
Alfred stood, hand going to his back with a grimace before he straightened. "Oh?" he asked, a crooked smile sitting on his lips. "I don't remember the last time that happened."
Moving past the Canadian as the other went to go back to the dining table - Alfred gave him the dirtiest look he could possibly manage - he approached the woman in the porch only to stop dead in his tracks, eyes growing wide with surprise and delight. Upon seeing him, the woman's expression brightened up and she covered her mouth before running over to him with an excited squawk and hugged him close.
Laughing, Alfred wrapped his arms around the woman and shut his eyes as his lover looked on in confusion as he straightened up the mess on the table. Was she a university friend or something? Someone he had grown up with? Williams shrugged it off and shut the computers before moving to organize the resumes and cover letters.
"Holy shit," the lawyer laughed. "What are you doing here, mom?"
Matthew dropped the papers he was holding, eyes widening.
Mom?
He looked between the two and, well, that explained where Alfred got his looks and his immaculate taste in clothing; although dressed casually she looked flawless in her pencil skirt, t-shirt and flats. She didn't appear to be any older than thirty even though that was clearly not the case, she was still beautiful in a gawky, teenage sort of way that made absolutely no sense but it just worked. And it was crazy that she was taller than both of them, so he assumed that Alfred's father was also shorter than her, because it would make no sense for him to be shorter than either of his parents.
Laughing and following the lawyer as he led her over into the living room, she was grinning and bordering on giddy. "I've moved back to New York to take back up my writing with Vogue and getting involved with New York's Fashion Week," she said, sitting down on the sofa beside her son. "Your father told me that this is where you had gone once you graduated, and that your brother is living here in the city, too. So I called up Arthur and visited him and his family, and then I got your address from him and hi! Hello! Oh, I missed you so much sweetie!" She let out a squeal and latched onto the baffled, laughing Alfred, practically smothering him against her.
Watching them and despite how he chuckled at the scene, Matthew felt his heart plummet and, as ashamed as he was to admit it, he was feeling slightly envious. But he said nothing, just kept a smile plastered on his face as the two talked in rapid tones as he sat at the table, slowly putting papers together. He felt like an excuse of a human for being jealous of his boyfriend seeing his mother after the first time in what had clearly been a long while.
But he couldn't help it. It was wrong of him, and he knew it. Telling himself that didn't stop the burning in his eyes or the lump in his throat or the knot in his chest. None of it went away just because he told himself it was wrong to be feeling those emotions. All of those things just made him even angrier with himself and he almost stapled his finger to the papers he was holding twice but that was his own fault for not paying attention to what he was doing.
'Sue me for missing her,' he thought, gritting his teeth as his vision blurred over. 'Fucking sue me.'
One would think that, over time, things would be easier to deal with. That time would make things better. But no, it doesn't. It rarely does.
Thankful for being sat back-on to them, Matthew wiped at his eyes with a shuddery sigh as a tear slipped down over his cheek unwanted. He'd let them talk; he had no right butting in as they caught up on what was apparently several years worth of missed time. His mother had been to his first graduation from university, for getting his bachelor's degree, but after that they hadn't had any contact because she had gone back to Sweden.
Stapling together papers with a renewed viciousness despite being able to barely see what was in front of him, Matthew sniffled again and swiped at his eyes before sticking the papers into a brown file folder. Maybe he'd just spend the rest of the evening doing this and he'd head back to his place when he was done, and then-
"Dude, Matt, come over, would you?"
Fuck. Matthew shut his eyes and bit his lip, clearing his throat.
Standing and shuffling the papers so that they were in one big pile, he wiped his eyes over once more for good measure and went over to the sofa, dropping down to sit on the arm.
Alfred looked up at him and frowned. "You okay?"
Plastering a smile on his face, Matthew wondered if his laugh sounded as phony as it felt. "Yeah, I'm fine," he said. "I kind of started to fall asleep, that's all."
"See, I told you to leave that shit alone for the night." The look Alfred wore told him he didn't believe a single word of it, but he didn't call him out on it. "Anyway, Matt, this is my mom, Amelia. Ma, this is Matt."
Matthew smiled at his boyfriend's mother and laughed sheepishly. She was smiling brightly, as if to say it's so nice that my little boy finally has some friends! Oh, if only she knew about his other friends. "So, are you Al's roommate?" she asked, leaning towards them as she spoke.
They exchanged a look. Matthew arched an eyebrow. Alfred grinned a little and gave a one-shouldered shrug before turning to Amelia, who was beginning to look a little bit confused by the look the two had exchanged. "I might as well be totally honest," Al said. "Mom, Matt's my boyfriend."
Amelia stared at him, eyes wide and her expression frozen - it looked kind of silly, with her wide, gap-toothed smile the way it was, and Matthew suppressed a snort. After a moment she pulled back a little and blinked. "Boyfriend?" she asked, looking between them. "Really?"
Shifting uncomfortable, Alfred laughed quietly. "Yep. Boyfriend."
For another moment there was no real reaction from the woman as she digested her son, whom she had clearly presumed to be a straight male up until that point, essentially shattering that belief. Or at least half of it. Then she let out a delighted squeal and grabbed hold of the Canadian, who let out a startled yell as he was dragged across his partner and into a very tight embrace.
"Oh Alfie, I'm so pleased to hear this!" she exclaimed, practically smothering the artist as Alfred looked on, choking on his laughter while the younger was slowly turning red in the face because his air supply was being cut off by the affectionate chokehold he was in. "And you are just positively adorable! Oh, I bet you two are just such an adorable couple! This is so awesome! Absolutely precious!" She gave another delighted squeal.
Matthew had given up on trying to breathe and was beginning to hope that receiving oxygen via osmosis through his skin was possible.
Prying his lover out of his mother's arms, Alfred shook his head. "Yeah, that's mom for you," he said with a laugh. "You can dress her up but you can't take her out without the risk of affectionate suffocation or general embarrassment."
Amelia's cheeks turned pink and she giggled a little. "Oh, I'm sorry sweetie," she crooned as she straightened Matthew's glasses and fixed his hair. "I'm just so happy about this! How long have you two been dating for? Are you casual dating or is this for serious?"
Before Alfred had a chance to answer, Matthew nodded. "I think it's been, like, almost six months now? Something around there?" He looked to Alfred for comfirmation and the lawyer seemed to think it over before he nodded.
"Yeah, cause it was mid- to the end of May when we started dating," he said. "And, well, I've been under the impression that it's for serious."
Matthew chuckled with a small bob of the head. "Yeah, for very serious." Alfred, smiling, leant over and kissed his temple, placing a hand over the other's and twining their fingers together.
Amelia squealed again before latching on once more to the artist and cuddling him close, practically shoving his face into her rather ample bosom. This time though, she wasn't entirely choking him, so Matthew stayed there as she crooned and petted his hair, much to her son's humiliation and his partner's not-so-secret enjoyment.
The woman babbled happily about how nice it was that Alfred was finally seeing someone and oh, this was just wonderful, he was finally happy and it was just so nice and wonderful and all those kinds of words. Alfred, red-cheeked and thoroughly embarrassed, just slumped a little in his spot and mumbled mooommmm in the most petulant sounding voice he could muster.
Sitting up and giving him a gentle elbow to the ribs, Matthew gave him a tentative smile even though it felt like it was going to break his face. "Listen here, Mr. Jones," he teased, "that's what moms are supposed to do."
"Oh, which reminds me," Amelia said, sitting up a little bit straighter, "when did you change your last name, Alfred?"
Matthew's eyes went wide and he looked over to the lawyer with a 'what the hell' sort of expression. Alfred sighed. "When I was legally old enough," he said flatly. "First year of university I changed it. I didn't want any ties to the old man after that."
"Does he know you changed it to my maiden name?" she asked quietly. Matthew was beginning to feel uncomfortable, but when he moved to stand and leave them there to talk, Alfred grabbed the back of his shirt and hauled him back down into his lap.
"Yeah, he does, actually," Alfred said, draping an arm over Matt's mid-section, lazily keeping him in place. "There was stuff he had to sign, and he was fine with it. It kind of surprised me."
"I'm just surprised that you chose my last name to change to when there are so many other ones out there that you could have chosen," Amelia hummed pleasantly. "I'm kind of pleased that you did."
"No, it was just the only name I could possibly take as my own because of the rest of America has been overpopulated by other names. Jones just happened to be a fluke," Alfred said dryly. "My original plan was to change it to Schwarzenegger."
Before his mother could say anything, Matthew slid out of his partner's grasp and gave him a hard punch in the upper arm that actually hurt. "You little bastard!" he declared. "Don't you dare speak to your mother like that!"
"Make me!"
"Don't even get me started, boy, because it won't be pretty."
"Well I'm not the one who's being an abusive brat."
"And I'm not the one who's sassing the beautiful woman who put life into me, you ungrateful whelp."
"Boys-"
Alfred feigned offence. "Excuse me? Well at least I'm not the one arguing like a child."
"And at least I'm not the one continuing and provoking said argument!"
"Actually yeah, you are."
"So are you, Al!"
"Am not!"
"Boys-"
"Are too!"
"Am not, so shut up you PMSing little bitch."
Matthew gave him another hard smack accompanied by an insulted squeak. Amelia, trying to suppress her laughter at this point, had outright given them both up as a collective lost cause. "The fuck did you just call me, Princess?"
Alfred was smirking darkly. "I could've said something worse, but I don't want to be offending my Ma."
Turning an interesting shade of red, his lover laughing out right, Matthew faced Amelia and took her hand in his. "Your son is horrible," he stated, shoving away the kissy face that was approaching him through his peripheral vision. "Wonderful, but absolutely horrible."
"Don't be hatin'," Al murmured, edging forward and plastering himself against the younger man's back. He kissed Matt's cheek and grinned at how he squirmed. "You know you love me."
"Yeah, you tell yourself that," Matthew said gruffly. As hard as he tried to bat away his affection, he still sunk back into Al's grasp and stayed there, evidently content to do so.
He remained there as he and Amelia talked, hands covering the ones that were settled on his lower stomach, head tucked in the crook of Alfred's neck. He wasn't listening to what they were saying; he was too busy with his own thoughts of wondering what it would be like to sit down and talk with his mother. Would they still have a good relationship? What would they have been able to talk about?
Frankly, Matthew didn't quite care for words; being able to give the woman a hug and a kiss would have been sufficient enough for him, given he hadn't even been able to do that before she died. He had been at a volleyball tournament in Ohio when he had gotten the call from Jason. Shutting his eyes briefly as he recalled what had been said to him, he felt his stomach turn.
"Listen, Matt," Jason had been gruff, but at the same time, it had been in a quiet, apologetic sort of way that he was unaccustomed to and it frightened him. "I don't really know how to put this, but your mom passed away this morning. Doctor says it was the medicine that made her sicker, her fever wouldn't break and they just lost her-"
That was all Matthew could remember from that phone call. No matter how hard he tried to, nothing came back to him from it. He could vaguely remember getting a flight back to New York the same day he got the call; the condolences he got from his coach, teammates and the parent volunteers that went with him. But after that there were three or four days of just … nothing.
Feeling tears forming behind his closed eyes, Matthew opened them carefully and excused himself from the sofa, ignoring Alfred's questioning stare and muttering something about having to use the bathroom. He wasn't really sure if that was actually what he said because his mumbles sounded incoherent to even him, but he seemed to accept this as a plausible answer and turned back to talking with his mother.
Once in the bathroom, alone and with the door locked, Matthew sank to the floor, biting down on his lower lip until he tasted blood in his mouth as he finally gave in and let tears roll down over his cheeks. He muffled his sobs though; sure he was all the way upstairs, he still didn't want to risk one of them hearing him crying.
When his chest started to hurt and his stomach began to turn and he could feel himself beginning to retch did he stop a moment to try and breathe. As he did that he struggled with hauling out his phone to text Gilbert, essentially begging him if it would be alright for them to hang out. He left out the part that he would more than likely spend half of the time sobbing into him.
Swallowing against the bile rising in his throat, he gave another dry sob as he waited for Gilbert to reply.
His mother hadn't been doing too poorly when he had left, and honestly, that had been the only reason he had gone to the tournament in the first place. It had been the first one of the year, happening during the first week of December. His mother had been sitting up in her bed, slowly getting back to eating solid foods and she was responsive, laughing and acting like she was feeling the best she had been in months. That was December 2nd. He left on the 3rd, and at her insistence. She was gone by the 6th, and he had been due back the 9th.
It just wasn't fair.
The tears returned despite the fact that he felt dehydrated and he grit his teeth in frustration as he opened the message he got from Gilbert, saying he could come over and wondering if everything was okay. Matthew deleted the message instead of replying and stood, wiping at his eyes with his sleeve. Glancing in the mirror he grimaced when he saw just how much of a train wreck he looked and, running the water and grabbing a cloth, he soaked it and drenched his face with it. When he looked back to his reflection, he didn't look nearly as bad. He even managed a watery smile.
But that was a bad idea because it made him look like he was in an immense amount of pain with his spleen or something.
Flushing the toilet and giving his face another once-over with the cloth before discarding it in the sink, he finger combed his hair, pulled back his shoulders and straightened himself out before he left the bathroom. A little part of him had been expecting Alfred to be there, waiting for him to demand what was wrong because he had some sort of sixth sense when it came to this sort of thing, but he wasn't there. It was probably a good thing.
Taking a steadying breath and formulating a quick and easy lie as he headed down over the stairs, Matthew went to the sofa and stood at the back of it. He grinned at them, placing his hands on the back and the two looked up at him. Amelia gave him a blissfully oblivious, content smile but Alfred's began to slip upon seeing the other.
"Listen, I'm gone for the night," he said, working an apologetic note into his voice. "Gil texted me while I was in the bathroom and asked if I could come over for a while. I think he's dealing with some sort of emotional crisis in trying to figure out which movie to watch and requires my assistance."
"Yeah, no problem," Alfred said. "You can take the Jeep if you want."
"Thanks," he said, smiling a little. Turning his attention to Amelia, he gave her a warm smile. "It was nice meeting you, um-"
"You can just call me Amelia, sweetie," she said brightly, standing up and moving around the sofa. "And it was so lovely meeting you, too! We'll all have to go out to dinner soon, maybe within the next weekend or two! Wouldn't that be just grand?" She pulled Matthew into a tight hug, startling him into tensing for a brief moment before hesitantly returning the hug, biting his lower lip as his eyes started to water.
With a chuckle, Matthew nodded, pocketing the car keys that were tossed to him. "Yeah, it'd definitely be awesome," he said. And it would be; he liked Alfred's mom. A little bit eccentric and overbearing, but astonishingly doting and adoring. He just needed to get over the minor detail that was currently dragging him down to oceanic trench level. Or, not so much as get over it as try to cope a little bit better.
Heading over to the door once she gave him another good, firm and loving squeeze, Alfred trailed behind Matthew and followed him out into the hall, shutting the door.
"Listen, Matthew, is everything alright?" Alfred asked.
"No, not entirely," replied the artist, hanging his head. When he said this, Alfred pulled him close and sighed. "But I'm just a jealous asshole, so I just need a few hours and drinks to get over myself."
"Mattie-"
He shook his head, but didn't pull away. "No, Al," he whispered, biting the inside of his cheek. "I'm just being ridiculous and I apparently still don't know how to cope, even after it being almost five years and-" he was cut off when Alfred pressed their mouths together, silencing him. It wasn't that he didn't want to hear what he had to say, but what he didn't want to hear was the younger man putting himself down.
Moving away, their lips still touching but just barely, Matthew sighed against his mouth as his eyes fluttered shut. "I'm sorry," he whispered. "Really. I didn't mean to-"
"Didn't mean to what?" Alfred asked. He pulled him as close as he could get him and held on tightly. "Didn't mean to have a memory? Emotions? The capability of missing someone? I don't want you apologizing for being human, Matthew."
Considering his words, he blinked back the tears that were beginning to return and then nodded, shutting his and moving forward to give Alfred another kiss. Unfortunately, the other had the same idea and their mouths collided painfully and awkwardly, leaving them both with burning, swelling lips and quiet laughter as Alfred murmured 'let's try that again' before pulling him back in for a retake. Matthew practically melted against him this time and only when they were both nearing breathlessness did they pull apart.
"You go on and hang out with Gilbert," he murmured, pressing a kiss to a pale forehead. "And I'll call you tomorrow or something, okay? Or you can call me when you feel up to talking. I don't mind if you need a day or two alone. Just don't be too hard on yourself."
Nodding and earning another warm kiss, Matthew slipped out of his grasp and disappeared into the elevator, a sliver of a smile on his face. Alfred was left standing in the hallway, barefoot and with his hands in his back pockets, shoulders hunched and wondering how long it was going to be before he heard from his lover again.
(Surprisingly enough, it wouldn't even be two days and Matthew would just show up at his place, looking as though he felt a lot better than what he had previously. And when the Canadian sank against him on the sofa, slim legs going to wrap around his waist and calloused hands roaming over his chest and touching him in all the right places, he realized that yes, he was just fine.)