All Too Well

Autumn leaves fluttered down all around them, flitting like fireflies from the steadily baring branches of trees arching overhead.

Dappled morning light tangled in the canopy and fell to the ground in mottled shades of ochre and pale blue and soft peach, tumbling across Alex's face like sequins glittering off a disco ball.

His hand swung loosely from his side, the fingertips blushed pink from the cold, and Henry watched his face carefully as he reached out to take it. Their fingers wove together like pieces falling into place.

Wading through piles of dead leaves, Alex kicked up plumes of foliage in his path- then knelt to the floor and scooped up handfuls, tossing them in Henry's direction. They blew apart like confetti, hardly reaching Henry at all, and a bright laugh rose readily to the tip of his tongue, spilling out into the breath-misted air in a rush of golden sunshine and early frost and crackling fires.

Their hands were ripped apart, the cold eagerly running in to take the place of their warmth, as Alex broke into a stumbling run through the forest, auburn coat flapping and the sound of his unsteady boots slipping across the ice fracturing the quiet, along with his taunting jibes, shot back over his shoulder for Henry to hear.

By the time he relented and gave chase, Henry's cheeks ached from smiling.

***

One of Henry's hands rested on the cool leather of the car's steering wheel- a vintage one they'd stolen from the royal garage- and the other lay across the centre console, thumb rubbing idle circles into Alex's palm.

Pulling an insane, shit-eating grin, Alex grabbed for his phone and, before he could protest, snapped a shot of Henry, waving it gleefully in his boyfriend's face as Henry groaned at the startled expression caught by the camera.

Alex laughed loudly, filling the car with a shower of fragmented memories- long plane rides, road-trips, midnight lakes, autumn leaves- and Henry struggled to keep his scowl firmly pinned in place, instead leaning across to wind down the window next to Alex.

Waves of icy Winter air rushed in, and Alex shrieked, and half leapt across the car to get away from the open window, climbing on top of Henry as they rolled up to a set of traffic lights, just as they flickered onto red.

"You're an idiot," Henry whispered into the gap between their noses. His breath turned to wisps of smoke.

"You love me," Alex smirked.

"Do I?" Henry mocked surprise. "That's news to me."

"Shut up and kiss me."

Alex leaned closer, until the icy tips of their noses were hovering just centimetres away from each other. His lips twisted up at the corners, eyes softening, and flickering shut for an instant, before-

From somewhere behind them came the angry sound of a driver smashing their horn repeatedly.

Alex scrambled to get off Henry, sliding sheepishly back into his seat as Henry slammed his foot down on the accelerator, and they lurched off again, a private smile playing across his lips.

***

Constellations danced above the two of them, the stars weaving together in a mirror of the hands that lay between them.

Alex peered over the edge of the roof, offering a hand down to Henry to drag him upwards the last few steps. He scrambled gratefully up and stared at the sky, sprawled out above them in a patchwork of light and darkness, while his head spun in a blackhole of terror and adrenaline and excitement.

A sharp tug on his hand brought Henry obediently to the ground, as Alex stretched himself out on the stone, one arm propped behind his head as a pillow, a lit phone screen in his hand and a single earbud stretched out in offering.

Through the darkness, their eyes locked, and Henry's fear melted away into a galaxy of stars.

All Too Well began to filter out of the headphones, Alex reached across to wind locks of Henry's hair around his fingers playfully, and Henry pulled him in for a kiss as endless as the sky above.

***

Wind whipped around them, rustled up by the bustle and buzz of aeroplanes landing and taxiing and taking off in a constant whir of activity- yet the bubble of space around Alex and Henry was silent, and still, and sad.

Alex's plane waited patiently to one side of the runway, and Henry avoided looking at it directly.

Alex's lip twitched, trapped halfway between a sorrowful smile and an inevitable frown.

Henry caught his hand with his own, and began rubbing soft circles into the palm, a thousand nothings stumbling to the edge of his tongue then retreating again.

There was nothing left to say.

The thread between them, wrapped around Henry's heart and leading straight to Alex's own, pulled taut, and Henry's rib cage caved in on a seething, hollow gap.

A piece missing from the puzzle.

A blank space in a picture album.

A forgotten memory.

That's all he was now.

***

Tears stumbled down Henry's cheeks like Autumn leaves from the arching trees above. David tugged excitedly on his lead, scampering ahead, throwing up plumes of dead foliage that rained down on Henry in waves of confetti-

The car pulled up to a red light, crimson reflecting in the mirrors and glinting off the windows, and on the central console, Henry's phone lit up with a name. But it wasn't Alex-

Henry clutched his phone close to his aching, beating heart on the rooftop, All Too Well blasting out-loud from the speakers, and the constellations sobbed above him-

Snow drifted by Henry's bedroom window, dropping softly to the ground like falling stars from the sky. He curled up even tighter in bed, refreshing and refreshing his messages because what if this time it's Alex, and what if he still remembers him, and what if he holds the puzzle piece Henry's been missing all along.

But there are no texts. There are never any texts.

Henry turned his face away from the window, and the laughter filtering in from outside, and the sound of car wheels churning up the fresh covering of frost, and-

"Henry! Prince whatever of who cares?! Sweetheart!"

What if...

What if that's the voice Henry knows better than the voice of his own thoughts?

What if that's the face he's memorised night after night after night?

What if that's his puzzle piece, falling right into place?

Henry leapt to the window, forgetting his tangled bed-hair, bare feet and plaid pyjamas. He peered down- and there, in the snow, was his what if.

In a flash, he was downstairs, shoving past Bea and Pez and Philip and all the guards, and shoving the door open to spill out into the icy Christmas morning.

Alex was there.

His cheeks were flushed pink with the cold, snowflakes tangled in his hair and eyelashes, and Henry tumbled into his arms.

And all the pieces clicked into place.