Status: closed @mayahirsch
Location: Alex’s parents house
With his mom and dad’s attempt at a new family tradition, or maybe it’s the rekindling of some Coleman family custom that predates him, Alex has taken on the unofficial role of dishwasher. Not that it bothers him. It’s mindless, mostly quiet, and it allows him a moment to give attention to his sometimes roaming thoughts - imagining it’s the same quiet serenity of a cigarette break, stepping away while dulled voices carry on merrily in the background.
He finds himself alone in the kitchen now, sleeves pushed up his arms with knuckles and long fingers covered in suds. He hears his mother laugh in her loud, Long Island way, and usually the sound of it brings upon the helpless tug of his lips into an easy smile. Right now, however, he’s too preoccupied by the thought of Sage Carson to entertain distractions from the other room.
Alex needs to ask her for a favor, though he’s not sure he has the right to ask anything of her anymore. Sure, it starts with said favor, when and how he plans to ask even though he’s not positive he’ll actually go through with it, but then his thoughts spiral towards how they got to this point of awkward tolerance of each other’s existence. Strangers to one another with too much heartache between them to ever foolishly think they can actually call what they have now a “friendship”. And then it turns to this, thinking about what they once had and telling himself it’s nothing more than innocent reflection. He almost believes it too, but then he hears someone coming into the kitchen, glancing over his shoulder to see Maya. “Hey,” Alex says with a sort of smile, turning his focus back to the sink. “You got sent on a wine run, or did you think I needed company?”