DISCLAIMER: Sadly, I do not own Wizards of Waverly Place. If I did, I'd know Selena Gomez, and we'd be married. But that's besides the point... ;)
AUTHOR'S NOTE: So, hopefully you all won't mind that I took a few creative liberties as far as "the rules" of Cupid go as according to the original episode. If I didn't, I wouldn't be able to keep writing this story, so hopefully that's okay!
Rule # 4 -- As its nickname "the green monster" suggests, jealousy has been known to eat people alive. Alex Russo was not an exception.
She likely would have repaired Cupid's arrow much faster had her body and mind not been racked with envious wonderings all afternoon. The thought alone of her brother romancing her girlfriend somewhere was enough for the pieces of wooden arrow in her hands threaten to buckle and splinter even further, and it took her countless deep breaths and moments of concentration to finally get it done.
Max, who was supposed to be doing research, was nowhere to be found, so the young wizardress knew she would have to take matters into her own hands.
She opened the door to the lair where she had left Baby Cupid, repaired arrow in hand, and bent down to level with him.
"Okay, here's your stupid arrow, now I'm going to get my mom upstairs, you'll shoot her in the butt and all of this will be over," Alex barked.
"Not so fast," the snarky voice of Cupid resounded unexpectedly from the adorable baby's body, "Your mom will be seeing stars again, but just because I go away, the love spell on your brother doesn't. And I sense that's the problem you really want to fix."
Alex stopped in her tracks. "Wait a minute -- are you saying that Justin's going to obsess over Harper like this forever?"
"Forever? No. The love from my arrow is only temporary. It should wear off in a month, maybe two," Cupid said.
"Two months?! Wait a second -- if the love is only temporary, then shouldn't that be put out there when people hire you so that they know that it's just going to wear off?" Alex's was near-manic at this point, in disbelief at how screwed up things were.
"Whoa, whoa! First you're yelling at me for the spell lasting too long, now you're yelling at me for the spell not lasting long enough! Listen, the reason the love spell works is because in the one to two months that it lasts, the person who received the arrow will experience heightened romantic feelings so that when the spell wears off, they'll have remembered why they loved the other person so much, or created reasons altogether," Cupid explained.
The teenager felt the color drain from her face as she realized the major glitch in the plan. With her parents, she knew everything would turn out fine, but if the two-month duration of the spell could fabricate feelings of love, there was a good chance that Justin would end up having long-lasting feelings for Harper: and possibly the other way around, too.
"Okay, there needs to be a loophole or an exception or something, right?" Alex pleaded, but before another word could be said, Theresa, Alex's mother, walked into the lair.
"Alex, I need your help in the sub station, we're swamped and your father is nowhere to be found," she said.
"That's my cue!" Cupid chimed in, unexpectedly pulling back the string of his bow and shooting the arrow into Theresa's backside.
Before Alex could protest, Cupid vanished and Theresa pranced around the room like a love struck puppy, a clear testament to the success of Cupid's spell.
"You know what? We'll close early today! It will give me a chance to spend some time alone with your father to thank him for being my husband -- and for helping me bring you beautiful children into the world!" Theresa gushed, all but throwing her arms around Alex as she happily danced out of the room.
As if everyone in her life was instructed to overwhelm her all at once, Justin burst through the door to the lair, dragging an unenthusiastic Harper by the hand behind him.
"Alas, my Juliet, we have arrived!" Justin exhaled as he began another epic-ly stomach-churning love speech. "I am only beseeched to part with you by your request, otherwise I would stay by your side until day meets night and night meets day. But I reluctantly release you to the company of my sister until next we meet."
"All right, Justin. Later," Harper replied half-heartedly.
Justin, having no idea what think ice he was treading on, approached Alex, who was sitting, fists clenched beside her. "My sister, please take good care of my love while I'm gone."
If there was such a thing as blood boiling, Alex was certain hers was at this moment. "Justin, go." Alex spat out through gritted teeth.
Before Justin made his way to the door, he leaned down to Harper's eye level and puckered his lips, to which the quirky girl responded by pressing the back of her hand against his mouth to escape the infinitely more romantic gesture he was planning.
Surprisingly, Justin obliged and finally exited, but before Harper could breathe a sigh of relief, she was distracted by the frustrated outcry of Alex, who had now buried her face in her hands and was lingering somewhere between sobbing and yelling.
Harper knelt down on the floor in front of where of Alex sat, loosely gripping her wrists and stroking them with her thumbs in a comforting fashion.
"Alex, talk to me," Harper requested softly.
"I can't do this, Harper! I can't -- I don't have it in me! I can't even bear 2 hours, I don't know how the hell I'm going to deal with this for 2 months!" Alex cried out, near-hyperventilation.
"2 months? What are you talking about? And what can't you do anymore?" Harper asked confusedly.
"Cupid said that the love spell could take up to 2 months to wear off, and that by then Justin will probably have fallen in love with you for real! If that happened, I would die," Alex lamented.
Harper, semi-relieved, smiled reassuringly. "Whoa, Hun, calm down. You said probably, and besides, that doesn't mean that I'll fall in love with him."
"Yeah, but who says you won't? If I lost you to my brother, I honestly don't think I could deal, like, at all," Alex said, near her wits end.
Harper paused, feeling a bit unsettled by the words exchanged. "Who says I won't? I say I won't, don't you trust me?"
Alex looked up and responded with a truthful, albeit cliché, expression. "I do trust, you, Harper, it's Justin I don't trust. He and I have always had it in for each other, and this would be the worst way he could get one up on me."
But Harper wasn't quite convinced. "So, wait, is this about your feelings for me or your competition with Justin?"
No way. Don't tell me this is going wrong now, too, Alex thought, realizing that nothing that she meant to say was coming across in the right way. "It's not about Justin, Harper, I swear."
"You just said that Justin was the one that you didn't trust, which at the end of the day shouldn't really matter as long as you trust me, because nothing will happen unless I say so, which it won't," Harper insisted.
"Look, I don't know what else to say! If anyone is going to be romantic with you, it should be me, not the guy you've at the very least pretended to have a crush on forever, much less my brother!" Alex digressed before she gave a second thought to how it would sound aloud.
Harper stood from her kneeling position and went for her bag. "Okay, you know what? It's obvious that you don't trust me enough for us to come to an actual solution, so I'm just going to go."
"Harper, please don't go...." Alex begged, following Harper to the door.
"Alex, you really need to let me go right now," Harper assured Alex with misty eyes before exiting the lair.
On the verge of complete breakdown, Alex cried out, throwing the ottoman nearly across the room before surrendering to her tears.
Okay, a spell should be able to fix this, it has to... Alex thought to herself, grabbing the nearest magic book and flipping to the index. The closest thing she found for love reparation was to order Cupid....
...because it worked out so well the first time she did that.
::taps microphone:: Is this thing on? OH HEY! No, this story is NOT dead! Stay tuned for more, and PLEASE REVIEW and let me know what you think so far!