How many I'm sorry's will it take? /MALEX

[MAX PETULENGRO]

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Prometheus was going from pocket to pocket, almost channeling Max's nervous energy. Maybe it was good one of them looked it. Otherwise this might be seen as unhealthy... Still, Max was never one to let anyone see him sweat. Even if it was a little weasel. So, he walked calmly through the streets of New York, his face washed and hair combed, his clothing mostly clean. In his hand was a nabbed box of expensive french truffles that he dearly hoped didn't taste like crap. He was a man of the people dammit. He didn't have a taste for expensive stuff... Still, Alex deserved it. Alex deserved a lot.

Eight months. He hadn't spoken to Alex or Aisha in eight months. He hadn't even left a note that morning that he was going out. Though, to be fair, how was he to know he was going to be arrested. He never left a note. He just sort of left and was always expected to come back. And, as a rule, he always followed through with that expectation.

Of course, he'd gone near mad in the 'big house' as they say. Was Alex safe? Had he moved on? Had he moved back to France? As much as Max cared for him, loved him, was connected with him, Max didn't think he could leave New York. And besides, something about France just didn't sit well with him. Something about it seemed... oppressive. Maybe it was the hoighty toighty art and music and cafes. How San Diego tried to be a mini copycat. How it had such a strong chance of taking away a piece of his family. An integral part of his family.

Climbing up the fire escape to Alex's apartment, the restlessness continued to bubble. Would Alex be happy to see him? Would he cry? Would he punch him? Would Max punch back? Probably out of reflex... He wanted this to go well. He didn't want to be alone anymore. To lose his family felt like losing a huge piece of himself. He couldn't do it.

It was lucky New York was such a strange place. A shabbily dressed fellow climbing up a fire escape might be seen as odd any other place in the world. That was one thing that made New York so great. People minded their own damn business. He really did look like his style was based on raping the local goodwill. His jeans were too tight and short, revealing his socks, and his sweater was too tight. The shirts beneath were too large, and his shoes were ratty. The trench coat, at least, fit well. The clothes were as clean as they could be, and he'd put at least a little effort in being presentable.

Reaching the window that was hopefully still Alex's- my, wouldn't that be awkward- he tapped lightly and awaited his fate.


notes:; Sorry, I'm a bit rusty. But it's a start.

[ALEXANDER FORTESCUE]

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Alex got back to his apartment a little later than anticipated and crashed on the couch around 9:30. He hadn't intended to make it back from school that late -- in fact, he'd been staying in more and more lately, between the nights of solitary drunkenness at the clubs when he set to destroying himself as pleasurably as possible. It was like he had been before Max, only it wasn't fun anymore. He went out to kill himself. He didn't go out to have fun.

There had been a time when he had something else to do besides wreck up his body, a time when he could have slid down to the sewer and curled up in Max's arms or played cards with him whenever he felt that tug in his stomach to go out and get shitfaced for no reason other than it felt good at the time. He didn't have that now. He hadn't had that for a long time.

Eight fucking months without a word.

And it had broken Alex Fortescue.

When he was younger, before he had met Max, he had convinced himself that love wasn't worth his time, that connection wasn't worth his time. He'd always had trouble bonding. Some child psychologist he'd seen once had blamed his lack of permanent attachment on never knowing his parents, or on being juggled through the foster care system all his life. Alex didn't know if any of that was true -- all that psycho head case bullshit didn't sit well with him -- but he did know that, prior to the Truands, he hadn't had a family. He had Julius, and he supposed that kind of counted, but Julius, no matter how hard he tried, had never been able to comprise an entire family unit. (And he had made Alex hate him. There was that, too.) Regardless, he'd never believed in love, never found it feasible. It was just lust, he'd figured. Nothing special. Nothing he needed.

But for all that, he was still an abandoned child. He still clung to his few personal relationships and somewhere deep down in his cold little heart he loved more ferociously and more passionately than anyone else.

But then Julius hadn't been paying him much mind either since his eighteenth birthday, and God knew Aisha hadn't dropped by, and fuck, fuck, why did Max have to leave, why did he have to fucking leave, they had a really good thing going, he was happy...

He kicked something over with his foot as he lay sprawled out on the couch. Well, fuck Max. He could get over him. He should never have let himself love him, anyway. Hell, he'd been trying to talk himself out of loving him for the past eight months.

It hadn't worked.

"Fuck," he muttered to himself. His head hurt from the crash after his last high, and what the fuck was that awful banging noise--?

His eyes sprung open and he sat up rather abruptly as it occurred to him the banging wasn't in his head. It wasn't on the TV either, which was blaring some stupid soap opera he wasn't actually watching.

Someone was knocking on his window.

He blinked a few times, brow furrowing as he came back into consciousness, and he all but rolled off the couch, still in his shoes and socks -- he'd been too plastered to take them off. Adjusting his beanie over his messy golden curls, he rubbed the sleep from his eyes and opened the window without really looking.

"Jesus Christ, the fuck you playin' at, man, it's late--"

And then he looked. And then his dimly French voice faded out. And then he stared.

"Ma--"

No. No. No no no no no. No. NO. No this was impossible no.

He staggered a step back. His heart had stopped. The world spun.

"I'm--I'm dreaming."

This was his first thought.

He'd had this dream too many times before.

[MAX PETULENGRO]

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If Max hadn't felt like an asshole before, he certainly did now. Alex thought he was dreaming... He thought Max couldn't be real, that he had left him. Maybe he even thought it had been easy for Max, which it had been anything but. Max climbed into the window, standing before Alex in hopes that his friend- his fellow adventurer, his angel face- might know that he wasn't dreaming. That he might know that Max had not wanted to leave. "Hey Angel." Max sounded older, more resigned, riddled with guilt. "It's really me..."

Prometheus climbed out of Max's pocket, happy for the tension to finally meet it's source in this head on collision of feelings and whatnot. Generally Max would flee, and he envied how easily Prometheus ran to Alex's feet and up his leg, greeting the blond boy on his shoulder with little rodent kisses. Max wanted kisses. He wanted to run up to Alex, and say how he had missed him, how horrible it was to be locked in that concrete building, with only an hour of sunlight a day. How he had wanted to write or call, but his paranoia was too high... So instead he closed the window, and leaned against it.

"I brought you some chocolates..." Just please, don't have stopped. "I thought flowers might have been a bit much..." I don't want to go back to being alone. I need my family. "Glad you didn't move. It might have been awkward, if you had, for whoever lived here." Ignore this comfortable grin, I know I didn't see you yesterday. I don't know why I'm acting like I did. Even Prometheus is staring at me like I've lost my mind. "You look good."

Max didn't, he knew he didn't. His hair was in need of a cut, and his usual scruffle was a bit longer than he liked to keep it. Not much, but enough. His tan was lost somewhere in the New York County jail, and the current paleness that replaced it looked almost sickly. After a few scraps with one idiot or another, Max's sharp features looked a bit smudged, and his nose looked like it had been broken in he last two weeks. But it had been crudely straightened out. He was still handsome, but a hardness seemed to reside in him now. One that made sure that he'd never get locked up again.

Standing with his arms crossed, he waited for Alex to pass judgement. He didn't want to rush him, of course, but he did want to know where they stood. So he watched as Prometheus played with Alex's hair like a fretting Mother, the anticipation building in his gut. God, he hated questions he didn't have the answer to. One uncertainty he wasn't real keen on, honestly.