“I just thought you’d think that…”
For a moment there, Alec had almost said it out loud. Hearing Jace said those unthinkable four words, – I love you too – even if he didn’t meant them quite like that, was enough to completely throw him off, his carefully constructed barriers all but crumbled in the face of painful, uncontainable hope.
But Jace hadn’t meant it like that and his foolish hope was as quick to die down as it had been to rise. Still, it left a trail in its wakening and Alec still felt the lingering effects of it as he struggled to maintain a conversation with his parabatai. I just thought you’d think that-
“What?”
That it’s true; That I’m love with you; That I’m gay. They were all truths, and all words Alec bit back and swallowed down almost visibly so, uttering a dismissal in their place and feeling it rest upon his tongue as heavy as lead: Whatever.
His eyes betrayed the feigned carelessness of his words, drawn as they were to Jace’s features, helpless but to fall down to his full lips and wonder. I love you too, Jace had told him, and even while he said it and a foolish part of Alec’s heart allowed itself to hope, the rest of him had thought No, you don’t. Not the way I love you.
Now Jace settled for his dismissal, his lie, accepting to pretend everything was okay even though it clearly wasn’t and Alec never thought it would be again. He had exactly what he thought he wanted. Jace was dropping the subject, letting it go, this brief raw moment between the two of them coming to an end with a simple set of words.
In that very moment, Alec realized he didn’t want it to end, taken by a burst of courage he surged forward, cutting Jace off mid-sentence as he reached for his shirt and pulled him upwards and forward.
“If you want to follow Mom’s ord– ” the words died on his parabatai’s lips, swallowed by Alec’s kiss.
Jace’s mismatched eyes were open wide at first, the shock of what was happening keeping them so for a while longer before he caved. They were standing in the middle of the dais, literally anyone could walk in and they would find the parabatai duo in the most compromising of embraces. Knowing what it must have took for Alec to do so, Jace didn’t have it in him to stop it and, were he to be honest with himself, it wasn’t like he wanted to either.
The kiss was rough, carried by Alec’s unique combination of inexperience and determination, a press of lips as first that evolved into something more with one heavy exhale. Alec kept waiting for Jace to push him away, the moment he finally realized the blonde simply wouldn’t, he melted.
A quiet whimper came up the back of his throat, the emotion of the moment unable to be bore quietly. They were kissing and Alec was smiling into it, smiling wide and pressing the sharp line of his smile into Jace’s slowly moving, welcoming lips.
This, Alec though brightly, loosening his hand on Jace’s only to rest it openly over his parabatai’s heart
– there was no surprise in realizing the beat of it mirrored his own
– This is how I love you.
It was his first kiss, and already Alec knew he’d never want to kiss anyone else.
This just makes me melt. Seriously, that last sentence alone – perfect… *happy sigh*