❛ i don’t believe each person has just one true love, but sometimes we don’t have enough time to find another. ❜ from garrett
alec looks down at the mug in his hand. coffee, no alcohol offered by the sheriff in a classic move that had him teasing garrett for quite a few minutes while being offered cream and sugar, a hilarious amount of options that speaks of plenty of babysitters who use his fridge. even then the conversation turned to family. it almost always does with them, three children between two households of such varied ages that the talks have hundreds of different directions to take.
not often do they talk about partners. it feels taboo to speak of with garrett, sensitive and fragile as cracking glass in shaking hands. but it’s him who starts the talk. low voiced and eyes far away, an exhaustion that makes alec’s heart burn and twist into knots he’s unfamiliar with. an ache that he thinks he may have felt once or twice in his life in different colors, different songs than garrett has with this terrible, wretched splitting of his marriage.
christ. a marriage. there’s where the real difference is, huh? garrett had the bravery to tie the knot with someone, and alec’s the type who thinks he’d have left any partner from the past at the altar. his throat feels tight. sipping on the coffee in his hands automatically, uncertain if it will make it down or end up coughed right back up.
he likes to think these are the talks that he’s good at, and yet here he is sitting in a silence that garrett lets him keep. no pushing when you’re caught in your own memories. ignorant, blissfully, of the fluttering in alec’s stomach that no amount of drinking will ever keep drowned out. he’s failing, isn’t he? no comfort for garrett, the one skill alec’s never lost suddenly failing him at the worst of times.
those fingers tighten more and more around his coffee mug. brings it to his mouth, then lowers without drinking. alec swallows down air.
“that’s sweet and melancholy.” he says faintly, trying to smile and wondering how badly he’s failed. “but if i’m honest i just don’t know, it’s something that i’ve... never experienced. weird, right, when i have a kid. surely i’ve been there once, in terrible love with someone and unable to contain it.”
laughing, alec feels his throat dry. clears it, as he looks at garrett on the principle of having to. of being friends. fellow parents. of somehow thinking he deserves to know this, even though they’ve never talked about these things until right, right now. so why?
shit. alec doesn’t know.
“thing is i don’t know how deeply i’ve ever been in love. college -- i wasn’t real there, you’ve heard about it. and then there was philo, and everything in my life has just... been... philo. i’ve never wanted to ruin that or scare her away. upset her. you’ve heard about that with step parents and all i could picture whenever i went on dates was: how could this effect my kid?” alec’s eyes hurt. finally he lets himself turn them down to his drink, the dark liquid rippling with each small motion. “except here she is all grown up, a woman in her own right, and the excuse feels cheap. i’ve probably met the persons that i’m supposed to fall in love with and have... everything with. and then i’ve probably just chased them away.”
SOFTER WORLD STARTERS.








