Summary: It's New Year's Eve and Alec seeks you out, hoping to ignite a spark.
Word Count: 770
A/N: Set in the Dark Angel universe. In a post pulse broken world.
Warnings/Tags: None really, just Joshua being a cockblock.
Dividers by @firefly-graphics
Crash was packed. Seems like everyone in the Sector turned out for their New Year's Eve celebration.
Alec made his way through the mass of people, heading towards the bar. Scanning the crowd as he went.
His eyes landed on a pretty blonde that kept glancing in his direction. Smiling to himself he ordered his Whiskey and waited. Sure enough a few moments later he saw the blonde sidling up to him.
“Hi there,” she smiled at him. “Goodness it's hot in here. I'm parched, would you like to buy me a drink?”
Alec dips his head, smiling slightly before flagging down the bartender. “Another Whiskey and whatever the lady's having.”
A few drinks later and she’s hanging off his every word.
If he were to turn on the charm, give her his ‘Baby I want you’ speech he's pretty sure she'd be leaving with him. However his heart is not really in it, he's only half paying attention to the woman flirting with him. Most of his attention is still discreetly scanning the crowd, for you. He thought you'd be here by now.
He's got an idea where you might be though, so downing the rest of his drink he turns to his companion. “Well this has been fun, but I've got to go. Sorry,” he adds at her look of disappointment before disappearing into the crowd without looking back.
“Josh. Here, boy! Anybody home?” Alec calls, making his way into the living room. “Hey Josh.”
“Alec?” He hears your voice from behind him. “What are you doing here? Thought you'd be at Crash with everyone else."
“Just wanted to come and see in the New Year here with my old pal,” he claps Joshua on the back. “Didn't know he'd already got company,” Alec half lied. He was pretty sure he'd find you here when you were a no show at Crash.
You studied him for a moment, eyes squinted, as if you were trying to decide if he was telling you the truth or not.
He let out a subtle sigh of relief when you didn't question him anymore.
“Well, ok then. Beer?” You offer, holding a bottle out to him.
“Thanks,” he says, accepting it from you. “So what are we up to?”
“Tricks and Treats.”
“Uh-huh, sure buddy,” Alec mumbles to Joshua, while glancing over at you.
“Look,” Joshua grabs hold of Alec’s shoulders and moves him to stand in front of the TV. “Tricks and Treats.”
“Oh yeah. Yeah sasquatch." He says, seeing the New Year's festivities on the screen. "They got fireworks this year huh,” he mumbles, glancing over at you again.
“5, 4, 3, 2, 1, Happy New Year!” You all cheer.
“Happy New Year Josh,” Alec hears your saying. Turning just in time to see you placing a quick kiss on Joshua's cheek.
“Do I get one of those?” He asks, wiggling his brows at you.
Watching as you turn to him with an expression he can't quite decipher. Eyes trained on you as you gently place your hand on the side of his face, pulling him down slightly to place a soft kiss to his cheek.
“Happy New Year Alec,” you whisper, as you slowly pull back.
“Happy New Year sweetheart.”
Your eyes stay locked on him. He can feel it again, that magnetic pull that's always there when he's around you. He wonders if you feel it too. He thinks you do. He heard the hitch in your breath, and you're still so close. Sure your hand dropped from his cheek but you haven't moved away from him. His gaze drops down to your lips. It would be so easy to close the gap between you. You're right there. All he has to do is lean in and…
"Stop getting busy, please!"
“Josh we weren't…” Alec sighs in frustration.
Spell broken, you turn away from him and clap your hands together, “Ok Josh you ready?”
Frowning at the interruption, he was so close to finally kissing you. Alec watches you curiously as you grab something out of the bags stashed by the side of the chair, running his hand through his hair and letting out a long sigh.
“Where did you get sparklers from? They're pretty hard to come by these days?” He asks, seeing what you've got.
“I have my ways,” you reply, looking at him over your shoulder with a sexy smirk.
‘I'm sure you do,’ He thinks to himself. Taking a moment to admire the way your jeans hug your curves.
“You coming?”
He can't help but smirk to himself at your question, before following you both outside.
A/N: Happy New Year!!
Poor Alec was so close. Do you think he gets his kiss in the end?
Thank you for reading. Hope you enjoyed it 😊 Would love to hear what you thought 🩷
Could I request Alec (Twilight) with the fluff prompts #5. “You make me want to be a better person.” + #28. “I’m going to marry you one day.” please? Thanks so much!!
Thank you so much for requesting darling. I have qued “Better Man” to post tonight (as you could’ve seen on my schedule, this was qued quite a while ago). Check out my AO3 profile right now for an early read! ☛ click here
with the curtains closed, leaving out any indication of time, it was hard to say where the darkness of the room separated from the nothingness tearing at his insides. as he clutched the covers tight, face half buried in one of the massive pillows, he felt the guilt rolling over him like tidal waves. the guilt of letting izzy and jace down, again and again. of not being there to protect them on their last hunt. or the one before that. the feeling of not being enough. knowing exactly what would have been enough, and yet. feeling the numbness of his body, the dullness in every muscle, as he lay there unable to move, no matter how much his mind was screaming at him to do something. anything. nothing. nothing but the occasional useless. inadequate. failure. selfish. amateur. worthless. the bed dipped behind him, the voices in his head slowly dying as he felt an arm slip around his waist, a warm chest pressed against his back. it wasn’t enough to drive the feelings away for good, but for now, it was a nice distraction.
A very long overdue "adorable grumpy bby" Alec fic as requested by evil-bean. I'm afraid the grumpy aspect turned into angst by the end, but this is Alec Hardy, and angst is practically impossible to avoid with him :(
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There was a knock on his open door and Alec looked up, leaving his elbow propped on the arm of his chair and his glasses hanging languidly from his fingers. He squinted with suspicion and a level of disapproval at the two people standing in his doorway....
Hanging On
Alec stared at his computer screen without really seeing it, a room-temperature cup of tea sitting mostly forgotten by his elbow. Two months. It had almost been two months since Danny Latimer had been killed, and he wished he could have said he was closer to finding the boy’s killer than he had been seven weeks ago. But he couldn’t. Not really. Being able to mostly eliminate a couple of suspects didn’t count, and he could feel what was coming next: the reallocation of personnel and priority…keeping the case open but with a ‘but’…
On the one hand it helped that Broadchurch was the size it was – a population large enough to warrant having its own complete police force and not just what amounted to an “outpost” where he was a regional DI, but small enough so that there weren’t many other cases crossing his desk to make Danny’s murder get shoved to the back burner, unlike what happened all the time to cases that ran cold when he’d still been at Glasgow Police. Which didn’t even exist as such anymore, he corrected himself. It was all the Police Service of Scotland now. He wearily pulled off his glasses with one hand and dangled them between his fingers as he rubbed his eyes. There was almost nothing about his life which didn’t now belong to what felt like discarded history.
There was a knock on his open door and Alec looked up, leaving his elbow propped on the arm of his chair and his glasses hanging languidly from his fingers. He squinted with suspicion and a level of disapproval at the two people standing in his doorway.
Ellie, who was one of the two, for the millionth time since she'd met him, couldn’t decide whether to feel annoyed, pissed, or concerned about her disgruntled, much-too-thin boss. He had said he hadn’t been at the station all night, but his red-rimmed distant eyes and slumped body language told another story. But, even accounting for that, the man really did need to learn to have a filter and when to use it. When to use a filter particularly, as Ellie had seen him show a remarkable level of perceptive tact on a couple of occasions, so she knew he had it in him. Of course, his remarkable ability to be a curmudgeonly arse typically outstripped the flimsy filter he possessed. Still, over the weeks, Ellie had found herself increasingly trusting in the goodwill of his intent, no matter the crusty edge he seemed to almost relish maintaining.
Now, however, as she felt the girl next to her take an unconscious half-step towards her under Alec’s tired glare, was not one of those times she didn't mind how he chose to come across. His gaze traveled up and down them as he tried to figure out what Ellie was doing in his office with a six year old.
“Miller?” he said, warily.
“This is Lexi,” Ellie said, not wasting any lengthy preamble on Alec’s bad mood and placing her arm around the girl’s shoulder, “Her mum owns a local gift shop that was robbed last night.”
Alec waited in silence for a further explanation of why they were in his office.
“I’m getting a statement from her mum and I didn’t want Lexi to have to wait out in the main area in the middle of everything,” Ellie explained with emphatic weight to her voice while Lexi continued to stare at Alec with apprehension and mild curiosity.
Alec stared back, straight-faced, though not un-kindly, and he watched as some of the scared tension in little girl’s body language leave as she realized she wasn’t going to be left to fend for herself in the middle of a police station.
“Right,” Alec said finally, replacing his glasses and nodding before returning his attention to his computer. He gestured without looking towards the chair that was against one wall of his office, “She can sit there.”
Ellie squeezed the girl’s hand reassuringly as she led her to the chair. “It won’t take long,” she told Lexi, “And then you and mum can get on home.”
The girl nodded.
An awkward silence descended on Alec’s office as Ellie swung his door closed behind her and left. For five very long minutes, neither detective nor child said a word.
“What’s that?” Lexi asked finally, pointing to an object in the middle of Alec’s desk, and speaking in an accent that was startlingly and distinctly Northern. Sheffield to be precise, Alec noted.
Alec looked towards where her finger was indicating. “That’s a radio,” he said.
“It doesn’t look like a radio,” Lexi informed him.
“It’s a two-way radio,” Alec amended, “For people to talk each to other when they’re not in the same place.”
“Oh,” Lexi said.
Alec turned his attention back to his computer.
“You sound like my grandmum," Lexi casually observed after a brief silence.
"What?" Alec asked, blinking at the completely unexpected statement as he looked up at the girl.
"You sound like my grandmum," Lexi told him, her tone becoming decidedly more animated and relaxed, "She lives in Scotland by the ocean." She looked inquisitively at Alec, "Are you from Scotland too?"
“Yes,” Alec replied.
"Did you live by the ocean?" Lexi continued interrogating.
"No."
“Oh,” her voice was rather deflated.
Silence fell once again, although Lexi had gained a level of comfort, enough to start being fidgety and swinging her legs. Although Alec could feel her gaze still fixed on him.
“Didn’t you eat breakfast?”
Alec raised his eyes to her around the angle of his monitor. “Why?” he asked.
“Because Mummy says you have to have breakfast to be in a good mood.”
Alec now looked directly at the girl sitting opposite him, “Do I like I’m not in a good mood?”
Lexi solemnly shook her head at him. “You look grumpy,” she said.
“What about you?” Alec asked, “Did you have breakfast?”
Lexi shook her head.
“Why not?” Alec continued.
The girl made a face, “There was only Mummy’s cereal and I hate it. It's gross.”
Alec felt the ghost of a smile try to pull at the corners of his mouth at the look of disgust on the little girl’s face, but he simply returned his attention to his computer and successfully covered up an involuntary snort of laughter.
A lull returned, and Alec typed in a file search for a particular report he wanted to reread, while studiously ignoring Lexi who was leaning forward, sitting on her hands, and swinging her feet energetically, all apprehension and shyness gone despite Alec’s flat and non-conversational attitude.
“How come you don’t shave?” came her next bullet of a question.
Alec bit back an exasperated sigh. There was part of him that was loving having a small child and the innocence they possessed, around. He’d forgotten the buoyant naïve way they viewed the world. But he’d also forgotten how persistent and relentless they could be.
“I thought police had to shave or have awful mustaches,” Lexi continued in a serious, pondering voice, echoing her mother’s blanket observation of police officers from a tv show the two had been watching a few days prior.
Alec felt laughter rise in his chest at the utter solemnness of the little girl’s perception, and struggled to keep his face straight, but succeeded and simply said, “No.”
“Oh.”
There was another pause, and Alec waited for whatever interrogative question Lexi would come up with next.
But it wasn’t a question.
“I’m hungry,” interrupted the most pathetic, sad sounding little voice.
“That’s what happens when you don’t eat breakfast, even if all there is is your mum’s cereal,” Alec replied without looking up. But he could feel the all-too familiar gaze of exaggeratedly sad eyes gazing at him. He hazarded a glance up, and sure enough, big, saucer blue eyes and a heartbreaking little pout met his face. Alec sighed.
Fourty-five minutes after she had left them, Ellie once again knocked on Alec’s office door. “Sorry that took longer……” her voice trailed off when she realized that his office was deserted. Thinking that Alec had probably had to show the girl where the loo was, Ellie headed off around the corner and down the short hall towards the toilets. But she stopped in her tracks as she passed the break-room and caught sight of Lexi sitting on the counter and banging her heels against the cupboard below it, Alec next to her and with his back towards the doorway. He paused what he was doing to glance down at the girl’s swinging feet and slightly shake his head, and Lexi, much to Ellie’s amazement, stilled the motion but didn’t even take a breath to interrupt the stream of six-year-old chatter she was pouring on Alec’s ears.
“It has someone’s name on it,” the girl abruptly interrupted herself, pointing at the jar Alec was holding in front of him.
He simply shrugged. “Well, Brian,” he said, pointing at the written name to indicate what it spelled, his accent broad and lending a warmth to his voice that Ellie hadn’t really heard before, “Is rather a git, so we won’t care if we steal some of his marmalade.”
Lexi tried to contain fits of giggles behind her hand at the rebellious attitude that Alec, as a decided adult authority figure, was including her in.
“Engaging in petty theft are we, sir?” Ellie asked as she came up behind him and with a smile on her face.
“Communal appropriation based on implied consent, Miller,” Alec corrected her with serious but smug dryness and without missing a beat as he handed a piece of toast with butter and (Brian’s) marmalade to Lexi.
“ ‘Communal appropri…’ what?” Ellie asked, as Lexi swung her gaze to exactly mimic Alec’s solemn stare while she bit into what was her second piece of toast. Ellie looked from one to the other, to Alec who was now leaning with one hip against the counter and arms crossed, exuding an air of languid, easy confidence, and to Lexi who was happily almost finished with her piece of toast already and clearly on whatever side, opinion, and attitude that Alec decided to adopt. Ellie felt decidedly ambushed and left scrambling to catch up with what had happened in the brief time she’d been away.
“Communal appropriation based on implied consent,” Alec repeated slowly and with a drawl that was as broad and pronounced as Ellie had ever heard out of him and that had an utterly insufferableness to it, “Try to keep up, Miller.”
Lexi’s giggle at his remonstrance and the smirk that was contained in the lift of his eyebrows, was too much. “I think I liked it better when you weren’t in a good mood, sir,” Ellie snapped at him.
Alec lounged even more languidly against the counter. “Are you grumpy, Miller? Did you not have breakfast this morning?” he asked, his eyes still exhausted but practically twinkling.
Lexi threw back her head and burst into non-stop, deep laughter, the infectiousness of which was enough to elicit a small but actual smile from Alec. Ellie stood glaring at the two, struggling with equal compunctions to hit Alec very hard over the head and to just step back and enjoy seeing what she knew was for him a moment of rare lightheartedness and humour.
“I’m not following,” she said, clueless as to what was obviously an inside joke between Lexi and Alec.
Alec shook his head, his tone going back to normal, “Nothing. I’ll tell you later… You alright there?” he finished abruptly, looking at Lexi, as she hiccupped in the middle of her laughter and choked on a few toast crumbs that were still in her mouth, immediately erupting into a coughing fit. Alec patted her on the back a few times and took the half-eaten piece of toast from her hand, while Ellie poured the girl a mug of water and handed it to her.
“There you go. That’s it,” Alec told her as she took gulps of water between sporadic coughs, “Better?”
Lexi nodded as she gave a couple final coughs, and with the back of one hand, rubbing her eyes that red and somewhat watery from coughing so hard.
Alec gently took the mug from her other hand and refilled it half-way. “You ready to head back to your mum?” he asked over his shoulder as he turned off the faucet.
The little girl wordlessly nodded again as a few more errant coughs escaped.
“Here, finish this up,” Alec said, handing her the mug, “And then you can go with Miller.”
Lexi lifted the mug with both hands and fairly quickly finished off the few swallows Alec had refilled for her.
Alec felt a sudden stab of twisting pain deep in his chest as unbidden memories and forgotten emotions flooded back. No obvious expression crossed his face, but Ellie watched as the light in his eyes went out and the weary, pained way he carried his body returned.
Lexi set the mug on the counter next to her and held out her arms for Alec to help her down. Purposefully angling so Ellie couldn’t see the slight press of his lips together with what was suddenly a monumental struggle to hold back the tidal wave in his chest and throat, Alec gently lifted Lexi under her arms and off the counter. But although Ellie would have certainly caught the look on his face, she could never truly see the full extent of what the feeling of the trust implied in Lexi’s arms reaching to him, did to him – how it simultaneously restored a portion of a sense of humanity that he was so hungry for, it physically hurt… but at the same time, tore him to shreds because it acutely reminded him of a time when he enjoyed the implicit trust of other hands the same size and laughter even more infectious because it called him “Daddy”, and how completely gone it was.
But despite the emotional ambush, somehow his voice was even and steady as Lexi’s feet touched the floor and he straightened. “Do you want to finish your toast?” he asked, offering her the rest of the half-eaten slice.
Lexi shook her head. “You can have it,” she said, “I’m full.”
Alec slowly set the toast down as he watched Lexi and Ellie head out the room and down the hall, the feeling of the girl’s hands on his shoulders still burning through his shirt and bringing him paradoxical and equal measures of relief and worsened pain. He closed his eyes and leaned one hand heavily on the counter.
He just wanted it all to be over.
But it wasn’t.
Danny was still dead; the murderer still walking around Broadchurch.
His mobile was still silent in his pocket; the phone call to his daughter and despair of the prior night, not a dream of his fractured psyche.
His heart was riding the edge of failure on a frighteningly increasing basis, and Lexi’s little six-year old hands on his shoulders stood a good chance to be the last voluntarily trusting human contact he’d experience, never mind the practically dead hope of him feeling his daughter’s hands on his shoulders again.
“You alright, sir?” a voice asked him hesitantly.
Alec instantly pulled himself together and opened his eyes, stamping firmly and viciously on the pain that spread to every inch of his body and filled his ears with a rushing noise. He leveled his usual almost-glare at the person who had come into the room. “Fine,” Alec grunted briefly.
The young DS, who Alec had seen around the station and in briefings but had no idea who he was, nodded as he headed over to the coffeemaker. “Caffeine – lifeblood of the job, right?” he laughed nervously over his shoulder, pouring himself a mug of what Alec knew from the smell had to be disgustingly burnt coffee.
Alec didn’t bother to answer.
“Well you have a good day, sir,” the young man nodded, picking up his mug of coffee and all too glad to make his escape.
Once again the only person in the break room, Alec turned back toward the counter and picked up the half-eaten piece of toast that Lexi had offered him. He stared at for a few seconds before dropping it with finality into the trash. He wasn’t hungry.
She kissed him, slowly, opening her lips to invite him in, and then making a small noise of frustration in her throat and sucking his tongue, forcefully, into her mouth when he didn't respond quickly enough. He lost his breath a little, clutched at her, and then laughed as she threw both of them backward onto the bed and rolled up to straddle his hips, eyes alight and laughing. "Hello," he said, inane but cheerful. She grinned at him, and leaned down to claim his mouth again. "Hi there."
*FLAILS HOPELESSLY*
............
*GRINS IDIOTICALLY WHILE FLAILING HOPELESSLY AND DYING*
"What?" says Becca, starting. "No, I –– I mean –– of course it is. All right and tight. Why –– why do you ask?" Hardy frowns at her. "You're here," he points out. "Wh –– ha! Hahaha!" Her laughter sounds oddly high-pitched, and Hardy can't help glancing sideways at the way she slaps his arm: trying to be playful, probably, but she's overselling the innocence. (He should know.) "No! I don't come around to collect the rent at the door, you know!" Hardy nods affably, waiting for the point.
Hardy frowns at her. "You're here," he points out. LOL :D
