Alex is so enjoyable to focalize through - he's so sassy and I just love writing it!

Hope you enjoy the chapter :)

Compensation (kind of?)

"Okay, that's it!" Luke said, slamming his hands down on the table hard enough to make Alex and Reggie jump.

Alex raised an eyebrow, shifting on the studio couch to face his bandmate. "What?"

"You can't keep using the '25 years without a hug'-thing to win arguments!"

"I don't-" Alex began with a scoff, but trailed off as he realised that okay, maybe he had been doing that a bit. Here and there. A lot.

Honestly, he wasn't really upset about it anymore (most of the time), but it was very effective, alright? Take the discussion they'd just been having: rhyming Julie with "drooly" in her own freaking birthday song was just as emotionally stunted as not hugging someone for 25 years. Not even Luke could argue against that.

"Yeah, you do," the boy in question continued, pointing accusingly at him, "and it ends right now!" And with that he lunged forward.

Alex was on his feet in an instant, backing out of reach. "What the heck are you doing?"

"Giving you a compensation hug, obviously," he said, standing up too.

"I don't know if you remember, Luke," Reggie piped up from the couch, "but I tried that before and it didn't work out."

Nodding, Alex took a step back. "Yeah. I don't want a hug."

"Pfft, yeah, you do."

And okay, maybe Luke was right about that, but no way was Alex gonna admit that out loud. Instead, he took another step back. Luke took one forward. Back. Forward. Back. Forward. Faster and faster until they both were running around the studio, dodging attic supports and instruments and speakers and fine, Alex might've been enjoying it a little bit. Moderately. Okay, a lot.

Especially at the sight of Luke's puppy dog frown when he leaped over a speaker in a single bound.

"Why do you have such long legs?!"

"Same reason yours are so short: biology," he snarked back, dancing out of the way again. Honestly, he was kinda impressed that he hadn't managed to fall over something yet. Gym had never been his thing after all-

Of course, of course that meant his foot snagged on an amp cable two seconds later and sent him flying onto the soft carpet. Luke let out a triumphant yell as Alex went down, arms spread wide in preparation to give him the tackle hug to end all tackle hugs.

But Alex had no plans on going down that easy.

With the sound of Luke's feet against the floor filling his ears, Alex tugged on that thing inside him… felt the pins and needles envelop him… heard the now familiar poof… and the loft materialised around him. Or he materialised up in the loft? Whatever, that was a question for later, when Luke wasn't looking up at him with mock betrayal on his face.

"Cheater!"

Alex only leaned against the railing, waving down at him with a teasing smile.

It quickly turned into a yelp as two arms wrapped around him from behind and ice filled his heart. Before he had time to think he jammed an elbow back, poofing back down as the person holding him let go.

"Ow," Reggie groaned, rubbing his side (because of course it'd been him, Alex should've realised, should've known it wasn't someone like Caleb or… or...).

"Shit, sorry Reg. I didn't mean…"

He waved his free hand, voice slightly higher and breathier than usual as he said, "'S… 'S fine. My fault for jumping you like that."

In other circumstances, Alex would've argued against that, but now, with his heart still racing and his lungs still too tight and thoughts too loud… he hummed in response, pulling his focus to the tap-tap-tapping of his fingers against his thighs.

Breathe in. Breathe out.

"You okay?" Luke asked, still standing next to the speaker.

Alex exhaled slowly. "Yeah. Just… no hugs right now. I…" Need some time to ground myself.

"Okay. No hugs."

They stood in silence for a while, the only movement Reggie climbing down from the attic (he seemed to be alright, thank goodness). Alex's lungs seemed to be somewhat back to normal again now. Not that he needed them, exactly, being a ghost and all, but it felt comforting nonetheless.

A smile curved Luke's lips. "You will get that compensation hug though. Just you wait."

Alex rolled his eyes, but mirrored the smile nonetheless as they got back to writing.

:::

The next time it came up in conversation, Julie happened to be there too. They were all lounging on her bed late at night, reminiscing about all kinds of things when Reggie mentioned the (in his words) adorable hug Alex gave Willie, adding "If there's any hug that could compensate for 25 years, it would be that one!"

Of course, they had to explain the whole thing to Julie after that. Safe to say, she was not impressed with Luke and Reggie's comforting skills and told them as much. But, Julie being Julie, it wasn't long before she cut her mini scolding session short to turn to Alex and say, "Can I hug you?"

And Alex nodded, because Julie gave awesome hugs and honestly, how could he possibly say no to her?

Luke obviously didn't get that logic, as he let out an indignant squawk. "Hey, no fair! Why can Julie give you a compensation hug but we can't?"

"Yeah," Reggie agreed, but he was grinning. "Like, I don't wanna accuse you of playing favourites, but… you're definitely playing favourites."

Julie stuck her tongue out at Luke in a rare childish display, making them all giggle.

And maybe it was the late hour, maybe the cozy atmosphere of Julie's room or maybe just the fact that he hadn't felt this calm and relaxed for a long time… whatever it was, it made him relent. Made him say with a half-hearted sigh, "Fine. Come here."

Only pausing briefly for a victorious smile, Luke dove forward and engulfed both him and Julie in his arms. Reggie wasn't late to join either, head coming to rest against Alex's back as he practically tried to squeeze the life (ha) out of him.

And Alex laid there in the middle, thinking about what dorks his bandmates were and (not so) secretly enjoying the affection.