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Alec almost spits out his coffee as he hears Magnus’s confident answer.
“Kill Jace, Marry Simon, Fuck Alec.”
His best friend says it without blinking or taking a breath and the lunch table falls silent for a minute as everyone processes what Magnus has just said. Alec feels like he’s having a coronary and he hates himself, just a little-- okay a lot-- for the sheer yearning that response creates.
Jace immediately hops on the defensive. “Hey, why would you kill me? Et tu, Brute?” He tips his protein shake in Magnus’s direction. “I’ll have you know that I’m a hot piece of ass and ladies are lining up to get a shot at me.”
Rolling his eyes, Magnus replies, “You wear way too much product in your hair. Just the thought of running my hands through that greasy mess makes me ill. Plus, I don’t think we’ve ever had a civil conversation-- our marriage would be doomed from the start.”
Jace looks like he wants to protest but he just grumbles something nobody understands and chugs his shake. Instead, it’s Simon who straightens, looking intrigued and delighted.
“You’d marry me? Awe, I didn’t know you cared so much.”
Magnus’s reply is absent as his eyes are locked on his phone, fingers flying over the keyboard. “Alexander’s my first choice but since we’re roommates, it’s like we’re already married. You’re a lovely person, Sherman, and at least we have the same taste in music. Coming home to you every night ranks solidly in the middle of how I’d want to spend my time-- not great but better than hell.”
Simon snorts. “You charmer you.”
“Those are bold words, Bane,” Izzy interjects on the other side of the table and Alec didn’t even know she was paying attention. She has a biology test tonight and she’s been furiously reviewing her notes since she plopped down in the seat next to him. “Aren’t you afraid that sleeping with my brother would ruin your friendship?”
Magnus looks discomfited for a moment. It’s striking but Alec can’t read the look in his eyes as he looks uncharacteristically maudlin for a bare moment before he brightens again. Alec could almost believe he’d imagined the look of sour dejection.
“It’s just a game, Isabelle. Alec’s an attractive man and I, more than anybody else, should know how irresistible he is. We’ve been friends since middle school. If I was going to fuck anyone, shouldn’t it be someone I love and trust?”
Alec looks up and his gaze find its unerring way to Magnus’s. He feels a flush crawl up his neck as he meets the challenge in his best friend’s stare. Even though it was a silly game, as Alec looks at Magnus he can’t help but wish it was real instead of his best friend being his usually teasing and outrageous self.
Still. It’s Magnus and there’s really only response Alec can give him. “I love and trust you too, Magnus.”
He hears most of the table groan though Magnus himself doesn’t say anything. No, if Alec didn’t know better, he’d say his friend was struck speechless, though Alec detects the softening of his expression, his eyes growing wide before whatever emotion had flared bright in them is banked.
The moment suspends in time but before either one of them can say anything, Jace is cursing and breaking the moment. “Shit, we’ve got class in ten minutes, Alec.”
Alec groans but heaves himself up-- their class was on the other side of campus from the student center and they’d have to leave now and power walk to get there before Professor Herondale started lecturing. She takes Children’s Psych way too seriously and Alec really doesn’t want his participation grade docked for the day.
Shoving their things into their book bags, Alec and Jace leave with a round of goodbyes. As he passes Magnus, he feels his roommate sweep a hand over his back as he murmurs, “Bye, darling, see you later.”
It’s not until they’re halfway through class and ostensibly working on a group assignment that Jace punches him in the shoulder with a look like Alec’s supposed to know why the hell he just bruised him.
“What the fuck?”
Jace rolls his eyes. “Don’t give me that shit. Did you hear what I heard at lunch? Magnus totally wants in your pants, dude.”
Wincing, Alec’s struck with a pang of resignation for his brother’s delicacy. “You know he didn’t mean it like that.”
“He said, and I quote, ‘fuck Alec.’ In what world does that not mean what it means?”
“Since we’re best friends and he was answering an asinine question,” Alec hisses back, glaring at Jace. “He probably just didn’t want to leave me out.”
Jace just levels him with a look. “You’re dumb as shit, you know that right?”
“Fuck off, Jace,” Alec snaps and Jace’s eyebrows shoot up at the vehemence in his tone.
“Woah, bro. I didn’t mean to make you feel bad. I thought it was good news! You know Magnus wouldn’t joke about boning his best friend just to do it. You mean too much to him and we all know how gone you’ve been over Magnus since, like, eighth grade.”
Alec sighs and it feels like the weight of the world is on his shoulders. “I can’t get my hopes up, Jace. I’ve been in love with him for years but he doesn’t feel the same way.”
Groaning like they’ve gone around the block about this a thousand times-- because they have-- Jace facepalms. “How many times do I have to tell you-- Magnus feels what you feel but you’re both too stupid to get past your own hang-ups to talk about it.”
Alec doesn’t deign to answer and then Herondale is calling for the class’s attention at the front of the room. Both Jace and Alec slink down in their seats, desperately hoping they don’t get called on since they didn’t even make it through the front of the worksheet, let alone the back.
It’s dusk by the time Alec’s pushing his key in the lock of the apartment he shares with Magnus. Running a hand through his damp hair-- Rugby practice had ran over and his hair’s still wet from the shower he'd taken afterwards-- Alec pushes open their front door as he readjusts the bag on his shoulder.
He’s just set to call out a greeting to Magnus-- he’d texted his roommate when he’d gotten out of the shower to let him know when he’d be home-- and he smells pizza from where it must be waiting in the kitchen.
The words die on his lips, however, as he hears what sounds like Magnus arguing with someone.
“No, Cat, I’m a dumbass,” Magnus groans. “I can’t believe I just said it like that but it-- it just came out and I sure as hell wasn’t going to take the words back.”
Alec frowns, confused, though his lips twitch at Magnus’s propensity for being dramatic. Setting his bag down in the little hallway next to the door, he steps out of his Nike sandals and pads to the living room. Magnus is pacing in front of the tv but he comes to a stop with his back to him as he listens to Catarina on the other end.
He watches his friend’s shoulders slump and the urge to go over to Magnus and engulf him in one of his patented bear hugs is almost overwhelming. Hearing Magnus’s next words, though, Alec freezes, hardly daring to breathe.
“Of course I meant them,” Magnus sighs and he lifts a hand to rake it through already disheveled hair. “Alec could have me any way he wanted. The problem is that he doesn’t want. He just doesn’t see me like that, Cat.”
The words set off a chain reaction in Alec and he half thinks that he’s in the middle of an out of body experience. It seems too good to be true but when Magnus starts speaking again just a few seconds later, Alec allows the endless hope that he's been pushing down for years to spring to life.
“He’s my best friend and I’d rather have that than make a move and not even have him in my life anymore. I don’t think I could live without him at this point-- hell we’ve been roommates all four years of college and before that we had sleepovers at each other’s houses at least three times a week. No,” Magnus says resolutely. “This afternoon was just a game and it doesn’t matter if I’m in love Alec and want him to dick me down into next week I--”
At that moment, Magnus turns around whatever he was about to say dies on his lips as he sees Alec standing there in the doorway.
Neither one says anything for a long moment.
Alec hears Cat grow progressively louder through the phone, her tinny voice growing more insistent as Magnus doesn’t say anything.
Finally, Magnus mumbles, “Bye, Cat,” and hangs up. Dropping his arm, Magnus looks up at Alec with fear in his eyes. His devastation is fairly palpable in their tiny living room.
While Alec still feels like he walked on set of a tv show he’s never seen before, it’s the most natural thing in the world to move until he’s standing right in front of his roommate, his best friend.
Swallowing hard, with Magnus’s words ringing in his ears, Alec scrapes enough courage together to say, “You love me?”
And it should be a ridiculous question-- because duh. They’ve been friends for almost ten years-- over half their lives. Magnus was the first person Alec came out to and he was the first and only person Magnus called their freshman year when his at home perm went horribly wrong and they fit together like they’re made for each other.
Alec’s often thought that if he couldn’t have it all then it was enough to be Magnus’s platonic soulmate, his very best friend.
Now, though, he’s struck by the most fervent longing and he can hardly believe his eyes but he thinks he sees it reflected in Magnus’s gaze.
He watches as Magnus takes a deep breath before leaning imperceptibly closer. His voice is scarcely a breath when he corrects, “You must have heard wrong, Alexander. I said that I’m in love with you.”
The words pierce the spell that seems to have fallen over them and without thinking, Alec’s lunging forward, cupping Magnus’s cheeks and hauling him close for a kiss that feels like coming home.
By the time they pull apart, they’re both breathing hard. Alec doesn’t open his eyes immediately, instead content to nose along Magnus’s jaw. He relishes the closeness, the feel of Magnus sweeping absent hands over his back.
Without thinking, he says, “Oh, thank God.”
He’s gratified to hear Magnus snort before he’s pulling back and looking at Alec with the world’s fondness in his eyes. “I think that’s my line.”
And Alec doesn’t know what it is-- the relief and happiness on Magnus’s face, the way he’s stroking a thumb over Alec’s shoulder in a move that doesn’t even seem conscious, or the simple fact that he’s so happy that it feels like he’s exploding-- but everything melts away except making sure Magnus understands his feelings.
“What,” he says softly, hint of a grin curling over his mouth. “Did you really think I wouldn’t be madly in love with you, too?”
He watches the words land on his best friend-- the way Magnus’s eyes widen and flare bright with delight, the shudder that wracks him as he pulls Alec closer.
It’s Magnus who closes that distance a second time and the kiss is far gentler but contains so much more depth that Alec feels like he’s drowning.
They collapse on the couch just a few feet away and spend the rest of the night kissing and laughing and getting caught up on their shows. By the time they remember, their pizza is cold but neither one minds as they bring the box straight to the where they’re sitting in the living room.
When it’s late and they’re both full and exhausted, Alec stands and lets the blanket that had been wrapped around them fall to the floor. Keeping Magnus’s hand in his, he takes a single step back towards his bedroom. “Ready?”
It’s an innocuous enough question. It’s a statement of fact that they spend more time sleeping together than they do apart-- a hold over from all of those sleepovers growing up-- but the single word is loaded with meaning tonight. In the dim light of their apartment, Alce watches a dozen emotions flit over a face he knows as well as his own, though damned if he can read them.
But Magnus doesn’t hesitate as he squeezes his hand and climbs gracefully to his feet. “Lead the way, darling.”
The two fall asleep wrapped around each other in Alec’s shitty twin bed. Alec had thought he’d be too wired to fall asleep after the day he’d had but with Magnus so close and his heart at ease for the first time in ages, he drifts off almost immediately.
The next morning, the two of them wake up and when their gazes crash together-- both of them eager to prove that the night before wasn’t just a dream-- they each breath a sigh of relief. They have a long, incredibly overdue conversation while they make breakfast and by the time they’re sitting down to eat their infamous french toast, they’re on the same page.
A few days later, when they join their friends at lunch, Magnus and Alec keeping holding hands even as the group’s eyes zero in on them.
It’s silent for a beat before Isabelle starts crowing, startling everyone. “Holy shit,” she exclaims and while her smile lights up her face as she shoots a happy look at Alec, it quickly turns mercenary as she turns it to Jace. “You owe me fifty bucks-- I told you that giving Magnus a FMK scenario would settle things.”
When Jace stares at Isabelle before going to Magnus and Alec’s hands, before going back to Izzy, Alec figures no one’s surprised when he jumps out of his seat. Pointing at Alec, he says in a serious tone, “I’m happy for you, bro-- it’s about time,” before pivoting to point at Isabelle and saying just as seriously, “You’ll have to kill me for it,” and running out of the student hub like his ass is on fire.
Everyone waits to see how Izzy will react but she just shrugs carelessly and takes a bite out of her candy bar. “I know where he sleeps and where he keeps his protein powder.”
Everyone laughs and Magnus and Alec share an exasperated, if fond, look as they take their seats.
They don’t let go of each other’s hands the whole meal, which makes eating lunch a little difficult, but neither one minds at all.