Disclaimer: I don't own Dark Angel or any characters featured in either of the seasons.
With Ben In Between
Alec sat against the wall of his new apartment as he listened to his messages, of his old phone. Leaning his head against the wall, closing his eyes, he listened to her voice. Some she was composed, the rest she was crying or sobbing. She wanted him to call her. Then there is the message from before that "night". Her laughing or just returning his calls from before, his heart kept clenching. He missed her.
Finally going to his new messages there was messages from friends and co-workers, but nothing about her. Swallowing a lump, he turned his phone off and stared at it. Looking around his apartment he just saw boxes that needed to be unpacked, but he didn't care. Standing up, he looked at the huge window that stared out to the city below; it was a beautiful scene. "Max would love this," he said to him self somberly. Max would like a lot of things here, the front door doesn't stick, the apartment is bigger than his last, he had a new couch that didn't slump in the middle, but he had the same bed. When he accepted the transfer he had requested that he be able to take his bed One thing that wasn't new, one thing that she liked before and would still like now, if only.
buzz, buzz, buzz buzz, buzz, buzz Looking at his phone he saw it vibrating around the floor, 'Biggs' showed on the screen. "Hello," he answered.
"How's Europe?" Biggs voice blasted through the earpiece.
"It's…Europe, not much to say." Alec sighed sitting on the window seal.
"You sound like shit."
"Thank you captain obvious."
"What's up?"
"I miss her. I miss her, I love her, and I hate her at the same time. Is that possible?"
"Apparently so because you're feeling it right now." Silence fell between the two.
"Have you seen her?" Alec's voice reminded his friend of a small boy who was scared. Should he tell him what had transpired earlier today? Biggs didn't know.
"Uh, yeah I saw her this morning. She delivered a package to the base." Alec immediately sat up straight.
"What did she say? Did she ask about me? How'd she look? Is she ok?" He asked if a hurry.
"Whoa, one question at a time. We ran into each other in the hall and talked for a few minutes. She said she had been trying to get a hold of you. Man you didn't tell her you were leaving?" Biggs asked suddenly, Alec immediately slumped, "That's low." He knew it too.
"She didn't tell me about Ben," he fought back, weakly. Biggs just sighed.
"She didn't know you had left, when she found out she left pretty soon afterward."
"How'd she look?"
"Like how you sound. Look I'm not going to relay every second of that few minute meeting. You miss her and love her like you say, call her! She's been calling you for weeks, before and after you left. I just wanted to call and see how you were, I'll catch ya later, ok?"
"Yeah, later," back to staring at his phone, Alec fought the temptation of the voice in the back of his mind and his heart to call her. As he was about to do such, one thing came to front of his mind, Ben. Instead of calling, he threw the phone, hard, across the apartment. "No."
How long Alec sat there, he didn't know. He couldn't think straight or really think at all. His lack of ability to think was very likely contributed to the large amount of scotch flowing through his system like a second bloodline. Ever since that night he had been drinking a lot more than would be considered "occasionally" or "socialably". Numb. That was what he felt, and he loved it. This way he didn't feel the stinging pain of betrayal or the love that still made his heart pound harder with each passing moment of thinking of her. Taking a large, last gulp of scotch Alec through the empty bottle at the opposite wall where boxes still resided. He was aiming for one in particular but because of his numb state, he didn't hit it exactly. But the shards of broken glass did and that satisfied him.
That "special" box that he had aimed for was a simple white cardboard box that was labeled in large magic marker letters, tauntingly, 'Ben.' It was all of his brother's things he had kept from when he had cleaned out his loft in New York, in there was everything he had left as a connection to his seemingly a stranger of a brother.
The night he and Max broken up he had tried to go through the box but he later decided he wasn't drunk enough and didn't have enough alcohol in stock to survive the trip down a lane he wasn't familiar with. Before he had re-closed the box he had tossed in some things, things that should be with his dearly departed brother's possessions. Things that had a connection to Max, after all she loved him, him being Ben. Why not join them in solitude of a cardboard box that will be stuffed away in a closet for eternity. Ok, maybe not eternity, but at least until he decided to get drunk and be self-pitying. And at the rate he was going, the box would probably just stay where it was for a while.
Banging his head against the wall behind him, Alec closed his eyes. All he wanted was Max.