Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Magnus’s foot taps against the gurney in front of him. Sometimes slow, sometimes not so much. Raphael sits on the other side of the ambulance, digging into a burrito dish they’d just picked up across the street. It grossed Magnus out how quickly Raphael could wolf down his food. If he hadn’t known that Raphael grew up with a doting mother that spoiled him half rotten, he would have thought the other man had starved as a child.

He couldn’t complain though. The life of a paramedic was often busy, and they never knew when they were gonna get a call halfway across the city, whizzing through the most ridiculous traffic in the world. Raphael ate fast because they could get a call twenty seconds from now or two hours. And how dare he waste that delicious burrito?

The tapping continues until Raphael pauses, his fork halfway to his mouth. “Must you always be this annoying? I’m trying to eat my dinner in peace.”

“I’m not trying to annoy you.” Magnus purses his lips to keep from smiling. Okay, maybe he had been trying to annoy the other man a little bit. “I’m just bored. I can’t believe tonight has been as slow as it is right now. I’d like a little bit of action.”

“You do realize,” Raphael deadpans. “That when we have a ‘little bit of action,’ that means that someone is hurt, right? You’re wishing for someone to get hurt.”

“So we can save them,” Magnus rolls his eyes. “I don’t want them to die, of course. I want to get a call so we can go save them and be heroes. Maybe we can save like, a senator, or something and we can get our pictures taken outside the firehouse or hospital. That would be cool.”

Raphael shakes his head and takes a bite of his food. “Sometimes,” he says in-between bites. “I think you have low self-esteem and should really get that checked out. Other times, I think you might really believe you’re a magical god that everyone should bow down to.”

“Not a god,” Magnus huffs. “And I don’t want anyone to bow down to me. A little appreciation would be nice, that’s it.”

“You seem to forget what we got last week.” Raphael finishes his burrito and shoves the container back into the bag. “Remember? That lady you gave CPR to a couple weeks ago sent us banana nut muffins and cookies. Those were good.”

“I bet they were.” Magnus says back, full of snark. “We got a huge basket for the two of us to share and you ate them all. In half an hour. I don’t even know how that’s even possible.”

“I’m fat.” Raphael shrugs and picks up his jumbo soda, taking a drink before grabbing his dessert. A giant piece of gooey, chocolate cake. “I told you that you should get yours while you could. You didn’t listen.”

“Because I’d already eaten breakfast!” Magnus scoffs. “I bought three breakfast sandwiches on the way to work and you ate two of them. And you’re not fat. Though one day, if you keep eating like this, I’ll be wheeling you out of your house after your massive heart attack.”

Raphael just shrugs and Magnus stares at him while he eats his dessert. The other man is five years younger than him, with short black hair and soft brown skin. Skinny as a pole, but the skinniness was deceptive. Paramedics had to be strong and Raphael was stronger than most. People were heavy, especially if they were dead weight, and even with a gurney it was hard work. The kid never complained, and they worked well together from the first day.

They actually didn’t look too different from each other. Raphael was born in Mexico and Magnus was of Asian descent. Both had soft brown skin and black hair, though Raphael barely managed to brush his most days while Magnus put glitter and other fun stuff in his. Their biggest difference was their height. Raphael barely hit 5’7” while Magnus is 6’2”. It probably made people laugh when they saw the two standing next to each other.

Hell, it made him laugh.

Oh, hey,” Raphael grins and shoves the rest of his trash into the bag. “It wasn’t just the muffins. Remember that one time after that super bad snowstorm last year? That pizza place made like sixty free pizzas for us.”

Magnus shakes his head. “That one doesn’t count. They made those pizzas for the fire department, the local hospitals, and all the paramedics. Don’t forget either that they wanted a picture taken to put on social media.”

“It was still a nice thing to do.”

“I’m not denying it.” Magnus looks away from him and out the back window. “But it wasn’t just for us. They did a good thing by feeding us but don’t think it was all about generous charity. They insisted on a picture to be put in the newspaper and online. I wonder how much money they made off that alone?”

“Probably a lot, but you can’t expect anything else from a business. They have to make money, after all.” Raphael stands up and moves towards the back door. “I’m gonna go put my trash in the bin up front. Do you want to drive around until we get a call or just sit here?”

“Just drive.” Magnus leans back in his seat and puts his foot up against the gurney to brace himself. “We just stopped to get some food, anyway. Maybe we should just head back and sit by the fire station in case they get a call too. We can be right on their ass.”

“Got ya.” Raphael rolls his eyes. “Put on your seatbelt, you idiot. You don’t have a patient in here with you.”

Magnus stares down at the gurney as Raphael shuts the back door and opens the door of the cab. It takes a couple minutes for Raphael to start the ambulance but soon they are moving slowly down the street towards the fire station. It was getting close to the end of their shift but it didn’t matter. New York City never slept. So it seemed.

The rocking in the seat is gentle, and all Magnus needs to do is keep his foot firmly in place against the gurney to stay upright. It was probably foolish not to put on a belt. They could get in a crash any second and Magnus would probably be fucked if they did. He hated wearing his belt in here though. It stopped him from being able to do his job if he had a patient with him. Not to mention the fact that he had no problem walking in here even with Raphael speeding like hellhounds were after them towards the hospital.

That was another reason why the two of them were such a great team. Magnus grew up in New York and his mother never had a car, far preferring public transportation to driving. He owned a car but he barely ever drove it now. Raphael might literally be in love with his own cars, all three of them. They each have a name and he often whispers at one of them not to be jealous of the others.

On the other hand, Raphael loathed being in the back when it was moving. He was clumsy and always fell when he was back there. They decided together that Magnus was best working in the back while Raphael drove them.

The biggest problem was the patients. Sometimes, well, most of the time, a paramedic has to turn off their own emotions while working. They’d been shouted at, spit on, and, in more than one very uncomfortable situation, even had guns and other weapons pointed at themselves. Once, they’d had to gone in to provide first aid for a cop who had been shot. Magnus and Raphael both thought they’d die that day. The gunshots had been so loud as they and two other cops tried to carry the wounded officer to safety.

He hadn’t made it. Magnus would never forget his widow and children screaming when they’d been told. It had been eerily silent in the hospital as hundreds of officers, doctors and nurses, and other paramedics waited in the halls to pay their last respects before he was wheeled to the surgery room to donate his organs.

And people thought fucking banana nut muffins, cookies, and pizza made up for the shit he, cops, doctors and nurses, and firefighters had to go through on a fucking daily basis. Risking his life was worth a banana nut muffin. So, who, other than Raphael, cared if he didn’t buckle his belt right now?

What was worse, Magnus’s mother didn’t give a shit that he became a paramedic. When he’d told her he was going to be a paramedic, the day he graduated high school, she’d shrugged her shoulders and went back to reading her book. She hadn’t even gone to the graduation, saying she forgot.

Amalia Bane wasn’t a terrible mother when he was young. She’d never hit him, starved him, or done anything abusive towards him in a physical sense. Magnus had always had clothes whenever he needed them, toys, and he could eat pretty much whatever he wished. That was it though.

Ever since he was a child, Magnus knew she didn’t really like him very much. She was never warm with him, never put him to bed once he got big enough to do it himself, never made him meals when he was sick. Magnus was expected to make all of his own meals from the time he was seven. She said that all boys needed to know how to cook, so she taught him the bare minimum. It was the greatest days of his life. If she wanted him to be able to cook, that must mean she loves him… right?

Twenty-eight fucking years, and Magnus has never heard her tell him she loves him.

Magnus always assumed it was the death of his father that hardened her heart towards him. He’d begged her for answers for years, and all she would tell him was that he died. They weren’t married and Magnus has his mother’s last name. There was no way to find out who his father was without his mother telling him. And there was no way she was going to do that.

How long had it been since Magnus spoke to her? Two months? She’d called to ask if he knew a good plumber. He’d wanted to hang up on her, but that would have just made her hate him more.

The ambulance pulls up next to the fire station and Magnus leans back in his seat, waiting for the next call to come in.

Chapter Text

Alec coughs into his elbow as he tries to make his way to his mother’s room. “Mom!” He tries to shout but it comes out weak. “Mom! There’s a fire.”

The only sound that answers him is the crackling of the fire and the billowing of the smoke. Alec can hear sirens but they seem so far away. He tries to shout for his mother again but he falls to his knees, choking on the smoke. He was going to die in here! They were going to die.

“Mom, please.” Alec whimpers and starts crawling down the hallway. “I’m scared, mommy. Help me.”

Finally making it to his mother’s room, Alec grabs the door handle but starts crying when it burns his hand. He grabs it again and tries to twist it. “Mo-mo-mom! Unlock the door! I’m so scared. Mom, help me!”

Sobbing and choking on his breath, Alec lowers himself completely to the floor, feeling the wood grains dig into his belly. They were on the fifth floor of their apartment, so he’d die if he tried to jump from the window. He had to make it to the front door! He could get his mother help if he could just make it to the door.

Halfway across the living room though, Alec finds the strength leaving him. His throat hurt, his eyes felt like they were wet and on fire at the same time, and he was so, so tired. A banging noise fills the room but Alec lays his head on the ground, trying to take the smallest breaths.

Hands flip Alec over and he stares at the smoke in the room, a wavy face hovers above his. His lips open and he feels something against them but he doesn’t know what it is. Garbled words fill the air. “Buddy—okay now—here—mom—where—get you—okay?”

Alec blinks and tries to speak but his tongue feels so large in his mouth. He closes his eyes.

Someone coughs and Alec jerks his head up. He looks around the room to see some of the others cleaning up the trucks. They hadn’t gotten a call in half an hour and when they didn’t have one, they were expected to maintain the trucks. That was the most boring part of being a firefighter.

Alec shakes his head and crosses his arms. His break was almost over, and if they didn’t get a call, he’d be right there alongside them washing windows and checking everything else was working right. On his last shift he’d had to wash the ladders.

When Alec became a firefighter, he’d expected he’d be out there day in and day out, rescuing people from fires. He did get to do that, yes, but there was so much more to being a firefighter. There was cleaning, maintaining, and a bunch of paperwork nonsense that he didn’t particularly care for. If he had his way, all he would do would be running into burning buildings to save lives.

Alec knew his reasoning for becoming a firefighter might not have been the healthiest. He was twelve when his adopted mother, Maya Worthington, turned the oven on and opened the door to try to heat the apartment. She never made enough money to pay for the heat and electricity both. So they would heat the apartment using the oven before bed. He’d gone to bed that night and she must have forgotten.

Forgotten, ha, yeah right. Alec would bet every last dollar in his bank account that Maya hadn’t merely forgotten to turn the oven off for the night. No, it was far more likely that she’d been drunk or high when she’d gone to bed. Maya loved her bourbon, and she loved shooting up even more than that. There hadn’t been much left of her when the fire was finally put out and Alec hadn’t wanted everyone to think she was a bad mom. It wasn’t her fault, not completely.

When Alec was a baby, he’d been adopted by Maya and her husband, Jackson. Jackson was handsome and perfect, as Maya would repeatedly tell Alec when he was old enough to ask about his father. Jackson died in a car accident when Alec was only two years old, and that was when things went to shit for the two of them. Apparently, Jackson had racked up over a hundred thousand dollars in debt after adopting Alec, and Maya had never worked before marrying him.

It had always been a struggle, just getting enough to eat every day. Maya hadn’t started off neglectful. She worked jobs flipping burgers, the only thing she thought she was qualified to do. That had proved to be difficult because she couldn’t afford food, rent, the lights, the heat, and a babysitter all at the same time. Whenever she couldn’t get one of the neighbors to watch him, she had to bring him with her. Her bosses were always furious with her over it, and often lost her job.

Alec had come home one day from first grade to find her drunk, swinging the wine bottle through the air as she gestured at and talked to… no one else in the room. He’d started to cry because she was scaring him. She screamed at him to shut the fuck up and go to his room. He couldn’t remember ever running so fast in his life.

It continued for a couple years like that. Sometimes Alec would come home and she’d be perfectly fine. Other times, she’d be black-out drunk and sad. He’d been eight when he found her at home with a needle in one hand. The sight had made him cry and she told him she wished they’d never adopted him, that Jackson hadn’t died, and that he’d never even been born.

That was always Maya’s favorite insult to sling, especially when she was high. The booze typically just made her cry, but the drugs made her angry. She loved to tell him that if they hadn’t adopted him out of the goodness of their hearts, Jackson would have never gotten so far in debt. And even if he was still going to die that way, he would have left money for her to live on without a burden to take care of.

Alec had only ever gotten brave enough to mouth back once, and it was during one of those moments. He’d told her he hated her guts and wished that she’d died instead of Jackson. Maya punched him so hard in the face it had cracked his tooth and made his nose bleed. He’d been… eleven? It hadn’t been long before the fire.

All of those thoughts Alec had felt about his mom had disappeared when he’d smelled the smoke that night. He wanted desperately to save her life, but the doctor told him she’d probably been dead the first time he called for her. Even after everything… he hoped she hadn’t been scared. Maybe she slept through it. Maybe there was a single good thing about her being an alcoholic drug addict.

Going into the foster care system as a baby had been one thing. Everyone wanted the cute babies. Going into it as a traumatized twelve year whose mother burned herself to death and nearly burned him to death at the same time… yeah, that didn’t work out so well.

No one wanted him. No one wanted his nightmares. No one wanted his problems. No one wanted his silence. No one wanted his fear. No. One. Wanted. Him.

Alec bounced from foster home to foster home from twelve on. Most kicked him out after a week or two dealing with his night terrors that would end in him screaming bloody murder. His last three months before his eighteenth birthday had been spent with one family that allowed him to stay until he graduated high school. That had been nice, not getting kicked out the day he aged out. He stayed with them until June the next year, when they kicked him out the day he graduated.

Throughout all of this, it had been tempting to call his birth parents. Maryse and Robert Lightwood. They’d offered an open adoption and they’d left contact information if he ever wanted to call them… but he never did. From what he’d been told, they got pregnant right out of high school and gave him up rather than raise him or get an abortion. Some days he wished they’d just killed him. No, they weren’t the answer.

They’d never be the answer.

A hand waves in front of Alec’s face and he looks up into the smiling eyes of his chief. Ryan grins at him. “Wakey Wakey, sleeping beauty. What are you daydreaming about?”

“Sorry, sir,” Alec stands and looks around. “What do you need me to do?”

Ryan raises his brow. “You okay, kid? You look a little stressed out.”

Alec nods. “I’m fine. What do you need me to do?”

“If you say so.” Ryan’s look turns into a concerned one. “It’s your turn to take out the trash and then you can wash some windows. It seems like it might be slow for a while.”

“Yes, sir.” Alec nods again. “I’ll get right on it.”

Trying not to think about his mother, father, birth parents, or the fire, Alec gets to work.

Chapter Text

Magnus shoulders open his mother’s front door, kicking it shut behind him. “Mom?” He calls out. “You here? I’ve got food.”

Noise from the tv further in the apartment is the only answer that greets him. Sighing, Magnus moves into the kitchen and places the bag of food he’d brought her on the counter. He slowly pulls all the treats out, wondering briefly if he should just leave after he’s done. It had been two months since they talked on the phone and, what, seven or eight months since they saw each other in person? They lived in the same city for fuck’s sake.

Frowning, Magnus opens the cupboards and peers inside at the rows and rows of cookies, doughnuts, crackers, and cake mixes. The woman had the sweet tooth of a toddler. He puts away the healthy snacks he’d gotten her and then opens the fridge. Takeout containers from all kinds of restaurants look back at him. The door was stuffed full of restaurant condiments and several containers of cinnamon rolls. Finally, he opens the freezer where he sees microwave meals and a few packs of frozen vegetables. A quick look tells him they’re expired.

Magnus rolls his eyes. Those were for injuries, not to eat. Forget Raphael, he’d probably be wheeling his mother out of this place after her heart attack.

After he puts the rest of the food away, Magnus looks around the kitchen. All the counters except the part in front of the coffee machine are dusty. There’s takeout trash on the table. The sink is absolutely full to the brim with dishes. Sighing again, he gets to work. It doesn’t take long to dust the counter or trash the stuff on the table, but it takes over forty-five minutes to rinse or scrap off the dishes, load them in the dishwasher, and start it. He even gives the floor a quick sweep. Next time he could mop.

Not once does his mother join him in the kitchen.

When he gets done, Magnus wonders if he should just leave. She clearly doesn’t want to talk to him or see him. He didn’t have to make it a waste of a day coming here. He could go out to the bar, go hang out at Raphael’s house, or go to a club and find someone half-decent looking enough to take home. Those would all make him the shit son that she already thought he was.

Magnus walks down the hallway to the living room and looks inside. Amalia sits in the recliner they’d had since he was a kid. It was lumpy and he could never understand why she kept it. There was still a purple stain on the side from when he’d spilled some grape juice on it. She’d been so furious, one of the only times she’d ever been emotional in any way towards him, and had ordered him never to sit on it again. He hadn’t dared touch it after that day.

“What are you watching, mom?” Magnus moves further into the room and sees one of his favorite trashy reality shows on. A dating show. “I love this one. Mind if I watch?”

Amalia shrugs and pops a piece of popcorn in her mouth. Instead of sending him for the hills, Magnus stubbornly walks over to the couch and plops down on it. The two of them watch three episodes in complete silence as it grows later and later, the sky getting darker as time passes. He wishes that he’d just left and gone to hang out with a friend. Even sitting at home would have been far better than sitting here for hours with only trash tv to watch and no conversation.

When it hits about ten, Amalia turns off the tv, rises from her seat, and turns off the light, sending the living room into darkness. She walks out of the room without even looking at Magnus. He waits until she starts puttering around in the kitchen before he scoffs. He couldn’t fucking believe her.

Magnus listens as she dumps her popcorn in the trash and tosses the bowl in the sink. The kitchen light turns off, footsteps move towards her bedroom, and the light turns on in there before the door closes. She was going to bed without saying a single word to him. He scoffs again. The best part was that she couldn’t even bother to leave a light on for him. Not even the light in the room he’s currently fucking sitting in.

Had it always been this way? Amalia spoke to him when he was growing up, helping him with homework, and teaching him how to cook. She worked long hours but she always took him out to eat or to the movies both weekend days. Eventually, around sixteen, she stopped doing so much with him. She said he was old enough to drive himself places and even bought him a cheap car. Over the next two years, she spent less and less time together with him until it became almost nonexistent. They were more roommates than mother and son.

And she didn’t even come to his fucking graduation.

“Fuck it,” Magnus says and gets up. “Fuck this bullshit.”

Magnus is not quiet as he stomps through the apartment past Amalia’s bedroom door. He forces down the urge to throw her door open and tell her that it would be so much easier for him if she just told him she hated him. The truth was he didn’t even know what he’d done to make her hate him, but he knew she did. He knew it with every fiber of his being. What he didn’t know was why she didn’t love him. Maybe he’d finally be able to wash his hands of her. It was clearly what she wanted.

When he gets to the door, Magnus turns back to the dark apartment and calls out sarcastically, “Bye, mom! I love you!”

There’s no response. Magnus turns and shuts the door a little too hard before marching to the elevator. Ten minutes later, he’s pulling out of the parking garage into traffic. He taps on the wheel as the cars slowly ease forward. There were so many things he could do at ten at night in New York.

He could go to one of his favorite bars and have a few drinks before heading home. There was a new club that opened a few weeks before that he hasn’t had the time to check out yet. Magnus was always welcome at Raphael’s, but then he’d be shoved full of food by his mother and she’d never let him leave. He frowns. She was a mom, a real mom, and he didn’t know what that felt like.

No, going to their house wasn’t a good idea.

Going home sounded so fucking boring. An observation deck? Nah. There was probably a good late night movie out but the thought of popcorn made him feel sick right now. It’s been a few months since he got laid last, so the bar and club were both sounding more and more tempting the farther he drives. There were plusses for both. His favorite bar was one of the quieter ones and there was usually a woman or man willing to go get a hotel room with him. The club offered loud music, dancing, and even sex in a bathroom, if that’s what he wanted that night.

Sighing, Magnus turns onto the street that would take him home. The last thing he wanted was to fuck someone after having such a miserable time with his mother. He knew why the idea had popped in his head though. After being around someone who so clearly didn’t want him, all he wanted was to be wanted. Even if it was for one night. One hour. One fucking minute.

Was that really so much to ask?

Chapter Text

Alec grunts as he does sit ups in the exercise room at the station. It was a slower shift than normal, and he was trying to keep himself busy. He was sixteen hours into his twenty-four hour shift, and unless an emergency came in, he planned on exercising, taking a shower, washing the windows again, and then eating a breakfast sandwich at McDonalds at the end of his shift. Fast food wasn’t the best choice but he despised cooking, and he always exercised enough to keep the calories off.

The thought of melted cheese, bread, and bacon makes Alec lick his lips. If he did a few hundred more sit ups, maybe he could buy two sandwiches. He already made enough for rent and bills this month. He could splurge a few more bucks and get another sandwich. A bacon sandwich and a sausage sandwich. Yeah, that sounded pretty damn sweet. Maybe even an ice cream treat to go along with it.

He knew eating fast food for breakfast wasn’t the best idea after having it for dinner the night before. Ryan ordered pizza during their last shift too. But Alec had never been taught to cook, as Maya didn’t really know either, and never graduated beyond shoving microwave meals in the oven because they tasted better that way. It didn’t help that Alec straight up just didn’t like to turn on the oven or stove very long at all.

Maya didn’t really try to teach him healthy food habits either. It wasn’t uncommon for her to bring home burgers and fries from whatever restaurant she was working at that week. Sometimes she’d splurge and get onion rings because the onions were healthier for Alec. He hadn’t realized that being dipped in batter and fried had made the onions less healthy. When she cooked at home, it was always tacos, burgers, spaghetti noodles, and mac n cheese bowls with bacon bits on top. For dessert, they’d have butter on bread with cinnamon sugar sprinkled on top. Yum.

Before Maya started on the heroin, when Alec had just turned eight, she somehow landed a job at a local pizza place for three whole months. She’d said he was old enough to stay at home now and he didn’t need to come and ruin her job. She claimed she got sober from the alcohol, pills, and coke, and that she was going to take real good care of him. Every single night she worked; she would bring home a whole pie. Pepperoni. Cheese. Bacon, ham, and sausage was his favorite. All with a side of breadsticks. They’d gorge on as much as they could, and then Alec would take a couple slices to school for lunch the next day.

Obviously it didn’t last long.

Maya showed up to work one day drunk off her ass and her boss fired her on the spot. Alec hadn’t known how she made her way both to work and his school like that, but never before had he been so embarrassed when his entire third grade class heard her stumbling through the hallways, slurring his name. What had she said?

Ah, yeah. “Those bastards fired me. Now you can’t get no more pizza.”

It had been humiliating, seeing everyone giggle and point and stare. His teacher had told them all to study, shut the door, and went to go deal with his mother. One girl had laughed harder than the rest. He couldn’t remember exactly what she said now, but it had something to do with they all knew he was poor because he brought his mom’s free food to school. He’d never once bought a meal in the cafeteria.

Alec snaps to attention when the fire alarms start going off and he jerks to his feet. He rushes from the exercise room and over to the equipment. Other firefighters do as he does, rushing, rushing, rushing to get on their gear as quickly as possible, grab their lights and radios, and head up onto the truck. Five of them sit in a row behind the driver.

One of them, Cody, leans forward in his seat. “Ryan said the homeowner is an old woman who just recently went into hospice. Her two adult sons are there taking care of the house. One of them left the stove on high and the wind from an open window blew a drape onto the burner.”

A couple of the other firefighters murmur, but Alec doesn’t respond. He hated it when a stove catches fire. It wouldn’t bother him if it wasn’t what nearly killed him and killed his mother. They jerk back and forth in their seats as the truck zooms through traffic. The driver curses as someone takes their sweet time getting over. That made Alec glad he wasn’t a driver. As a firefighter he was required to have a license, even though he had no interest in driving in general and didn’t even have a car, but he refused to become an operator when he joined up.

The last thing they needed was him knocking some arrogant asshole’s car out of the way with his truck.

When they get to the one story house, all the firefighters hurry off the truck. Alec can hear the ambulance coming from behind them and he quickly assesses the situation. Smoke billows from two windows on the left side of the house, and the siding was quickly growing blacker and blacker. The front door is open and a man sits on the curb, sobbing.

Cody and another firefighter lift the hose and start towards the house. Cody calls back to Alec, “Try to calm him down! Give him some water!”

Alec rushes towards the sobbing man, black faced from soot, and offers him some water from his bottle. “You’re alright, sir. The ambulance is almost here.”

“Rocky and Toby!” The Man gasps, trying to take deep breaths, and knocks away the water. “You have to save Rocky and Toby too!”

Alec frowns. “There’s two more people in the house?”

“They’re my ma’s dogs.” He sobs and tries to rise. “I couldn’t find them in the smoke. I need to go back in!”

“You wait right here!” Alec pushes the man back down to the ground. He turns around and signals over the driver. “Stay with him. He says there’s two dogs in there.”

The driver nods. “Ryan’ll want you to take someone in with you.”

Right. Ryan always insisted on his crew going in with a partner. It ensured that, if one of them fell, the other could carry them out. Alec calls over Jesse, a younger man who’d just joined three months ago. “Cody and Michael have got the fire. You and I need to go get the dogs. Call for Rocky and Toby when you get in there.”

The two of them rush towards the door just as Cody shouts through the radio. “The fire has spread to the back deck!”

Alec ignores the call as he and Jesse race through the door and down a hallway. The living room is quickly filling with smoke and they lean down. “Rocky!” Alec shouts. “Toby!”

Jesse joins in the shouts and it only takes a few seconds of stumbling through the thickening smoke before they hear a dog bark. Alec shouts again. “Keep barking, Toby or Rocky. Keep barking now!”

The dog continues to bark and the two of them find their way to what looks like a family room or another living room. A German Shepard whimpers in the corner next to a dog bed. Another dog, a yellow lab, lays on the bed, unmoving. Jesse grabs Alec’s shoulder. “He coulda ran out the door. Why didn’t he?”

“Loyalty.” Alec grits his teeth and lifts the lab into his arms. He understood it. His mother was garbage and he hadn’t wanted to leave her to burn. “Come on, doggo. I got your brother. Lets go potty.”

The German Shepard stays at Alec’s side while they make their way back through the house. Alec and Jesse’s radios both go off, filling the air with Cody’s voice saying that the fire had been put out. Alec grunts and finds the hallway again. The German Shepard runs out the door and both Jesse and Alec are quick behind him. The dog starts barking for his owner, who is sitting on a stretcher with a mask around his face.

Alec lays the still lab on the ground, rips off his mask, goggles, and helmet before he kneels on the ground next to the dog. He tilts the dog’s face up, covers the nostrils with his mouth, and breathes twice before he starts compressions. The German Shepard comes back to Alec at some point and whimpers, but Alec ignores it. He breathes twice more into the dog’s nose before he continues the compressions.

It feels like a lifetime, but the lab finally starts to move, his legs kicking and his chest moves up and down on its own. Alec sighs and runs a hand through the poor thing’s fur. “You’re alright, buddy.” His eyes open. Brown. “You’re gonna be okay.”

The German Shepard makes a yip noise and starts dancing around in the grass, lifting his paw and petting Alec’s arm. Alec strokes his head and eyes the collar at his neck. “I see you’re Rocky.” He looks down at the lab. “And you must be Toby.”

A man that looks similar to the man on the stretcher races towards him. “Rocky! Toby!” He lifts up Toby and cradles his body against him. “Thank you so much for saving my ma’s dogs! She’d probably kill us if something happened to them!”

“No thanks needed.” Alec rises to his feet and lifts up his goggles, helmet, and mask. “Rocky was a good boy. He stayed with Toby the entire time.”

“Yeah,” The man smiles and buries his face in the dog’s fur. “Toby’s the baby of the family. He’s just eight months old. Thank you for saving him.”

“You’re welcome.” Alec turns away. “I better go.”

Alec turns to look at the house. It would probably cost a lot to get it fixed, but it was salvageable. He turns back to head towards the truck but one of the paramedics approaches him. “Hey! I’m Raphael. The homeowner wants to thank you for saving the dogs.”

“Um,” Alec jerks his thumb back in the direction of the man still on the lawn, talking to another firefighter now. “He just thanked me.”

“That’s one of them.” Raphael points at the man on the stretcher. “They’re brothers. He was damn near trying to rip himself off the stretcher to get to you while you performed CPR. Can you go have a chat with him before we take him in?”

Alec resists a sigh and plasters on a fake smile before he walks over to the man on the stretcher. The man reaches for Alec’s hand and he takes it reluctantly. “Thank you so much! I’ll never be able to repay you for this!”

Raphael grins. “We accept payment in baked goods!”

“Seriously?” Another paramedic comes off the ambulance and shakes his head at Raphael. “Ignore him, sir. Raphael, load him up.”

The man continues to thank Alec profusely while the two paramedics put him and the stretcher up into the ambulance. Alec shakes his head and turns to walk away when one of the paramedics grabs his arm. Resisting a sigh, he turns around to face the one who had admonished Raphael.

“Hey,” The taller than him, broad-shouldered, tanned, possibly Asian, man smiles at him. “That was impressive.” He looks Alec up and down. “And may I say sexy? I’m Magnus.”

Alec’s cheeks heat up. “Um, have a nice ride going back to the hospital, Magnus.”

Magnus laughs. “If they bring us any baked goods, I’ll make sure to bring you some. Lightwood, huh?”

“Uh,” Alec’s cheeks burn hotter. “How do you know my name?”

“Oh, Blue Eyes,” Magnus grins. “Smoke inhalation get to you? Your last name is on the back of your jacket… just like everyone else’s.”

Oh shit. Alec laughs along. “Yeah, I was just messing with you.”

“Mhm.” Magnus’s grin widens. “I’m sure you were.”

Alec nods and turns away. “Yep. Bye.”

Hurrying away, he hears the other man crack up, which makes him walk faster. Alec shakes his head. Damn.

That was a really good looking guy.

Chapter Text

Magnus taps his boot against the wall of the ambulance. Raphael sure was taking his sweet time getting out here. They were supposed to start their shift ten minutes ago but the man was still inside the station. This was the most boring part of the job. Sitting, waiting, wondering what they’d have to do today. The worst part was Magnus didn’t have anything to go to after the shift.

Camille had left to go on a work trip for a week. Catarina wasn’t answering his calls, which wasn’t much a shock considering how busy the nurse got. Ragnor was too busy communing with nature… whatever that meant. Raphael’s mom would be fine with him coming home with him and eating dinner, but she really was overbearing. How Raphael dealt with it, Magnus didn’t know.

That left only two choices for tonight’s post-work extracurriculars. Magnus could go to his mother’s house and be ignored for hours, watch trashy tv, and have her turn off all the lights and go to bed. He could do that, or he could go out to a club. Maybe a bar instead of a club. Anything sounded good, except going home alone. That sounded horrible.

“Magnus! Magnus!”

“What the hell?” Magnus mutters and stands up before he looks out the ambulance. Raphael races across the parking lot with a huge grin on his face, carrying two… picnic baskets? “I don’t think I want to know.”

Raphael literally leaps onto the back of the truck and Magnus backs away to give the other man space. “What the fuck? Are you on crack or something?”

“I’m on sugar!” Raphael sets the baskets on the stretcher. “You’ll never guess what’s in here.”

“Uh,” Magnus pretends to think. “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe… sugar?”

“Yes!” Raphael clearly doesn’t have a sarcasm detector. “Look in them!”

Magnus opens the first basket and his mouth instantly starts watering when he sees all kinds of muffins, cookies, and brownies. The basket is literally stuffed to the brim. “Yum!” Magnus reaches for a banana-nut and chocolate chip muffin but Raphael slaps his hand away. “Hey! You can’t have them all for yourself, you fat ass!”

“They’re not for me.” Raphael reaches for the other basket. “These are for us.”

When Raphael opens the second basket, Magnus mutters, “You’ve gotta be kidding me.”

Cookies. Chocolate chip cookies. The sad part was there were only about two dozen of them and they didn’t even fill half the basket. “What about the other basket? Who gets to have the delicious goodies?”

“Those are for the firefighters.” Raphael smirks at Magnus. “Well, they’re for one firefighter in particular.”

“One? What do you mean?”

“These goodies are from that family we helped a few days ago.” Magnus gives him a blank look. How many families had they helped by now? “You know, the two brothers with the dogs and that sexy firefighter had to resuscitate the dog?”

Ohh. Yeah. Magnus remembered that firefighter. The dogs too, for sure. “Wait a second. You and I saved one of the brother’s lives, and they gave the man who put his mouth on a dog’s nose all the good goodies?”

“Please.” Raphael grabs a cookie from their basket before he shuts both of the baskets. “We didn’t save that guy’s life. He was fighting us so hard to get off the stretcher that we had to restrain him. There was just soot on his face. Don’t try to tell me you’re bothered by Lightwood putting his mouth on the dog’s face. You were slobbering after him like you were a dog yourself.”

Magnus couldn’t deny it. “So… why do we have both baskets? Couldn’t the brothers have dropped the good basket off at the fire station so we wouldn’t have to see it?”

“They were on their way there.” Raphael wiggles his eyebrows. “I told them we’d be delighted to do it.”

“Ugh, why would you do that to me?”

“Sometimes I think you’re the smartest person I’ve ever met,” Raphael rolls his eyes. “And other times I think you’re stupid. I saw you hitting on that firefighter. We’re going to station 57, which is where he works. You can personally give him the basket of goodies and flirt with him some more.”

Oh. Ohhh. Magnus grins. “What are we waiting for? Go get in the cab and drive!”

Raphael grabs for the baskets but Magnus pulls them away. “Absolutely not. You’ll eat all of ours and then you’ll start in on Lightwood’s.”

“Alexander.” Raphael mutters and hops down from the truck. “His name is Alexander.”

The doors shut and a couple minutes later Magnus is trying to balance the two baskets on his lap as they drive towards station 57. It takes over half an hour to get there, thanks to how terrible the traffic is, but when they pull in, Magnus jumps out of the ambulance and heads towards the station door.

There’s a guy with black haired hair that’s starting to gray standing in the main room when Magnus walks inside. He looks up, “Can I help you?” He looks at Magnus’s outfit. “You guys just waiting for a call to come in?”

“No.” Magnus lifts the heavier basket, just now realizing that he’d carried both in like an idiot. “These were just delivered to my depot. One of them is for us but the other one is for Alexander Lightwood.”

“Oh, he likes to be called Alec.” The man holds out his hands for the basket. “I’m Ryan. I can give it to him for you, if you’d like.”

Magnus looks down at the baskets. “Would it be okay if I give it to him? We talked the last time we saw each other but he took off before we could finish the conversation.”

Ryan raises his brow. “Yeah, that sounds like him. He’s upstairs in our pitiful excuse for a gym.” He points towards a set of stairs. “Just up there and turn right. Can’t miss it.”

Magnus thanks the firefighter and starts towards the stairs. The door opens behind him and he hears Ryan say hello. He looks behind him to see Raphael standing in the doorway and a strange look on Ryan’s face. Oh god, he hoped Ryan wasn’t about to hit on Raphael. He hurries up the stairs to avoid that, hopefully nonexistent, sight.

When he gets to the top of the stairs, Magnus turns to his right and stops. Ryan was right; he couldn’t possibly miss it. There was a room with a glass wall with a few pieces of exercise equipment in it. That wasn’t what drew his eye though. Alec is on a mat doing sit-ups. Without a shirt on. Holy fuck, and he has abs for days!

Magnus grins and opens the doors. “Hey, Alec!”

Alec jerks up and pulls on a shirt with wild eyes. “Uh, uh, uh, uh, hi. How’d you get in here?”

“I walked through the front door.” Magnus resists a snort. He feels like the other man might not appreciate that. “Ryan told me where you were and told me to come up and find you. By the way, is he gay?”

“He?” Alec pulls on the hem of his shirt until he’s completely covered. “Ryan? He had a wife when I met him but she died. He’s mentioned boyfriends and girlfriends since though. So… bisexual, I guess.”

“Yeah, that’s great and all but I think he was hitting on my friend Raphael.” Magnus grimaces. “Who is one hundred percent straight. And like eighteen years younger than Ryan.”

“Ryan’s a good guy. If Raphael tells him to back off, he will.” Alec points at the baskets. “What’s that?”

“Oh, here,” Magnus hands over the heavier basket. “This is from the family whose dog you saved. Baked goods.”

Alec’s eyes brighten as he opens the basket. “Sweet! This’ll keep me covered for a few days at least.”

Magnus raises his brow. “What do you mean?”

Alec’s cheeks turn pink. “I’m not a really good cook. At all. I won’t have to cook at all with this.”

“I guess you have a big sweet tooth.”

“Meh.” Alec shrugs and pulls out the same banana nut and chocolate chip muffin Magnus had grabbed at before. “Not really. I just don’t like to cook and if it’s been cooked for me, I’ll eat it. I like a lot of fast food.”

Raphael would love this man. At least Alec exercised to keep the weight off. Magnus looks at his and Raphael’s basket reluctantly before he hands it over too. “This one’s got your cookies in it. I hope you don’t mind that Raphael may have snuck one of them before we took off.”

“Thanks!” Alec takes the other basket and sets them down together. “You want a muffin?”

Magnus presses his lips together to keep from laughing. He’d just thought about a dirty joke concerning muffins, but he didn’t think Alec would appreciate it considering how shy he is. “No, thanks. I ate on the way over here.”

A ding fills the room and Alec pulls his phone out of his pocket. “Ugh, I have to go wash windows. It’s my turn.”

“Do you want to go out on a date?” Magnus nearly laughs again at Alec’s wide eyed look. “No pressure. But I do think you’re pretty cute.”

“I, uh,” Alec shoves his phone back in his pocket and grabs the baskets. “I’m not really dating. Now or ever or uh, in the future. Thank you though.”

Magnus has never been thanked for asking someone out. “Like I said, no pressure.”

Alec’s phone dings again and he winces. “I should probably go. Ryan can be a real hardass when he doesn’t think we’re doing something right.”

“Okay,” Magnus says reluctantly. “It was nice to see you again.”

Alec’s cheeks turn a darker shade of pink and it stretches down his neck. “Uh, you too. Bye.”

Magnus smiles as he watches the other man practically run out of the room with the baskets. It concerned him that Alec thought of the baked goods as meals instead of sweet desserts. Maybe… just maybe… he could show up with a real, home cooked meal for Alec.

Yes, he’d come back next time he is on shift.

Chapter Text

Alec licks his lips as he pulls back the paper of another muffin. He’d been surprised yesterday when Magnus had come to the station bearing gifts in the form of baked goods. They really were good, and they’d smelled so good when he’d opened one of the baskets only to find banana nut and chocolate chip muffins. He hadn’t been able to help himself and pulled one out to eat it in front of Magnus.

What had been even more of a shock was Magnus asking him out on a date. Alec had never been out on a date. It just never really interested him much. Sure, he sometimes had to scratch an itch, but typically his hand worked well enough for that. When his hand couldn’t do the job anymore, he’d go on one of those stupid hookup apps. It was discrete, they could meet at a hotel for a few hours, and they could both go their separate ways, happy. Well, happy enough.

It wasn’t like Alec thought he was unattractive. He’d had enough people gushing over his bright blue eyes and black hair enough times to know he was decent looking. Some guys on the hookup apps weren’t too thrilled that he was usually taller than them but meh, whatever. It still wound up working out in both of their favors. Women hit on him too but he always just shrugged them off. Some even liked that.

It also wasn’t that Alec didn’t think Magnus was attractive. He’d have to literally be blind to not know that. Part of the problem was they worked generally in the same field. They met while on the job. There was a chance that they’d both have take a call to another place together. Alec never mixed work with pleasure. He’d been hit on by other firefighters, paramedics, and cops, but he never allowed it to go beyond mild flirting.

Part of it was probably embarrassment. Alec really wasn’t much of a catch. Sure, he was attractive enough. That’s where it ended. He didn’t really have much of a life. Going to work, stopping at some fast food joint every day after work, and coming home to eat in front of the television pretty much made up his life. He worked twenty-four hour shifts and then had forty-eight hours off. A lot of the time he slept during that, and when he wasn’t asleep, he was typically watching television, eating, exercising, or going to the grocery store for the paltry things he didn’t have to cook outside of a microwave.

Alec didn’t much care for going on walks or to the gym or to the bars. He was pretty much a homebody. No friends. No family. Either he was at home or he was at work. Magnus seems so much more… livelier, than him. The other man probably loathes staying at home and vegging out in front of the TV.

Taking a bite out of his muffin, Alec looks around his living room. He’s sitting on a black couch with two seats that recline. The TV, admittedly larger than he needs, sits on an entertainment system with two bookcases on either side. One of the bookcases is jam packed full of books. There are even books on top of the bookcase and some at the bottom are spilling out onto the floor. The other bookcase is the same way, just with DVDs instead of books. If those weren’t enough, he had all the streaming services he could get his hands on.

There really was no reason to go out much.

Most people would probably say this place wasn’t a good enough place to live in. He’d gotten a good deal on his apartment but he still paid over a grand in rent for a one bedroom. The other bills were manageable, and he’d been buying little knickknacks over the last couple years to fill this place and make it feel more like home. There are a few paintings on the walls in each of the rooms. There was no dining room, but he didn’t really need one when he had a couch and trays.

The only real worry he had concerning not really talking to people expect his boss was that no one would find his body when he died. Oh well, he’d be dead and wouldn’t have to think about it.

Yeah, Magnus didn’t want any of this.

Alec’s phone rings and he groans before grabbing it from next to him. Hopefully it wasn’t Ryan begging him to come into work. He glances at the screen and groans louder. Emma. His caseworker. Well, his second caseworker. He couldn’t remember the first one from when he was a baby. “Hello?”

“Hiya, Alec!” Alec cringes. “How are you doing?”

“I’m fine. What do you need?”

“I just wanted to chat.” The line goes quiet for a few seconds before she says reluctantly, “Okay, that was a lie. I’m just really nervous to talk about this with you.”

Alec frowns. “You haven’t called me in over a year. Why now all of a sudden?”

“This might be hard for you to take.”

“You don’t need to worry about me.” Alec’s frown deepens. Had one of his ex-foster parents died? That’d be a shame, but he wasn’t really close with any of them. They weren’t terribly fond of him anyways. “Did someone die?”

“No.” Emma hesitates again. “I want you to know that you don’t have to do anything with this information. You know the laws about open adoptions.”

Alec lowers the half-eaten muffin. “No.”

“Please, Alec—”

“I said,” Alec growls. “No. I don’t want anything to do with Maryse and Robert Lightwood. My name is Alexander Worthington, not Alexander Lightwood. My parents are Maya and Jackson, not Maryse and Robert. I have their pictures and their unopened letters. I don’t want anything else to do with them.”

Emma sighs. “I told you that you know the laws. They can’t reach out to you without your explicit permission. They don’t even know what your last name is now, or even if your first name is the one they gave you. I got a call this morning though. Robert called the agency asking to speak with his son’s caseworker.” Alec fists his hand around the muffin, not caring that he’s making a mess. The fucking audacity of that man calling him ‘son.’ “He wants to get to know you. They wanted to make sure you still have their current numbers and address.”

Alec nods tightly. “Yeah, I know where they live.” Funnily enough, they were only a two hour drive from him. “I have phone numbers. I don’t know if they’re current and I don’t want to know. They gave me up. That was their right but they don’t get to come crawling back and begging me to accept them. It is their fault that I was adopted by a woman that turned out to be a drug addict. It is their fault I wound up in foster care until I turned eighteen. Do they know any of that?”

“They know Jackson and Maya are dead,” Emma exhales loudly. “They’ve called a few times over the years and they were informed that you were placed back in the foster care system. Robert asked the agency a few years before you turned eighteen if they could adopt you.”

“What the fuck?!” Alec laughs humorlessly. “You’ve got to be kidding me. They wanted to adopt their own biological child? I don’t remember you telling me about this.”

Emma’s quiet for a few seconds. “I didn’t,” She finally says. “I came by the Roberts’ one day and asked you how you would feel about maybe meeting Robert and Maryse. You didn’t need to know they were interested in adopting you until after you met them. You told me that you hated them and wished they died instead of Jackson. I left it alone after that.”

Alec nods slowly. Yeah, he remembered that conversation. The Roberts were decent people and he liked living with them enough. They had three other foster kids though and they had about as many problems as he had. That house seemed better than parents that gave him up the day he was born.

“Are you there?”

“Yeah.” Alec gets up from the couch and throws away the smushed muffin in the tiny kitchen’s trash can, washing his hands at the sink. He turns off the water. “I’m here. Did he say anything else?”

“Just that he hopes one day you can forgive them. They were young and dumb. They’ve regretted this decision all this time. And… you have three siblings.”

Alec had always wanted siblings. “What are their names? Did you ask?”

“Jonathan but he likes to be called Jace, Isabelle but she likes to be called Izzy, and Max.”

“Okay.” Alec nods. “So, if I meet a Jace, Izzy, or Max, I should just stay away from them.”

“Alec, please—”

“No!” Alec shouts. He tries to lower his voice. “I’m sorry, but I don’t want anything to do with Maryse, Robert, Jace, Izzy, or Max. Robert and Maryse made their choices and now they have to live with them. Either you tell them to fuck off or I will call them to tell them to fuck off. It’ll probably be easier coming from you.”

“I can’t tell them that, Alec.” Emma sighs again and she says quietly, “I’ll tell them you want no further contact. If they have anything to say then they can say it to me. I’m under no obligation to tell you if you don’t want me to.”

“I want no contact.”

“Okay. I’ll call them now. How are you other than this?”

“Fine.”

“Enjoying being a firefighter?”

“Yes.”

“That’s good, buddy. I’ll… I’ll let you go. Talk soon.”

“Yeah, bye.” Alec clicks off of the call before she can respond. “Fuck.”

How fucking dare they? It’s tempting to call up Robert’s number and tell him to fuck off but Emma would be upset. She was one of the few people that still talked to him, outside of work, that is. He didn’t want anything to do with those people. Yeah, they were young. Yes, they couldn’t have had any idea that his adopted father would die and adopted mother would turn to pills and heroin to get over it, before she died too.

Still, Alec couldn’t help but hate them anyway.

Fuck them. Maryse and Robert weren’t his parents. Jace, Isabelle, and Max weren’t his siblings either.

He didn’t want anything to do with them.

Chapter Text

Magnus opens his mother’s door, just like he does every Monday after a trip to the grocery store. “Hey, mom! I’m here.”

Amalia doesn’t answer him, but he can hear her TV playing. He moves to the kitchen and plops the bags down on the table. The groceries she’s got in her cupboards and fridge are more or less the same as last week, and Magnus starts putting away the healthier options he’d been getting her at the store. She ate them, at least, and hasn’t complained about the stuff he’s been getting her.

Well, she hasn’t complained to his face at least. It was possible she complained to friends. Doubtful, considering he didn’t think she even had a single friend but who knows with her. She typically only spoke to him in grunts or yes and no answers. It’s been, what, a year since she gave him a full sentence?

Why the fuck did he let her treat him this way? Magnus shakes his head hard. What the fuck was wrong with him? She didn’t want him around. She didn’t try to hide how much she disliked him. Maybe he was waiting around to see if she might come to the realization that she loved him. Or maybe he was just staying because he wanted to know desperately why she hated him. Neither of those things were probably going to happen, and it stung.

Magnus finishes putting the groceries away and walks to the living room, finding Amalia sitting in her favorite chair. The TV is turned on to another one of her sappy reality shows. Not that Magnus judged her for enjoying sappy soaps. He loved them himself, but she watched them all day long, every day. Maybe if she left the apartment, she could find her own sappy love instead of dreaming about hot guys on TV.

“Hey, mom.” She doesn’t answer him. “Can I watch with you?”

Amalia shrugs and Magnus sits down. “I can’t stay long. Camille and I are going to dinner and a club tonight.”

“Okay.”

“Want to know where we’re going?”

“Sure.”

Magnus almost gives up right then, but he was nothing if not tenacious. “We’re going to this new Mexican food place and then we’re going to this cool club.” Magnus grins. “It’s a BDSM club.”

“Okay.”

Magnus makes a face. She didn’t even react at all about the BDSM thing. That had been a lie but still. She really wasn’t making this easy for him today. “So… I met a guy.”

Silence. “We’ve only talked a couple times but I think he’s just the most adorable thing I’ve ever met in my life. Like seriously perfection.”

Amalia sighs. “What’s his name?”

Hey, a full sentence. The first one he’s gotten all year. Magnus rolls with it. “Alec. He’s a firefighter and happened to be at a fire when my ambulance showed up. I rescued a guy and he rescued the guy’s two dogs. I bet someone could write a movie about it and we’d make a billion dollars on the idea.”

She doesn’t say anything and it’s his turn to sigh. “He’s a sweet guy, mom. Shy. Nervous, but sweet. He’s got black hair and blue eyes. Fit, though I think he eats just like Raphael does.”

That doesn’t get anything out of her either. A commercial starts and she gets up to go to the bathroom. Magnus watches ads for feminine pads, some kind of cookie with coconut crumbles in it, and a new movie he wants to go see with Raphael. Amalia doesn’t come back into the living room, even after she leaves the bathroom.

Magnus gets up from his seat and finds her sitting at the kitchen table, playing a game on her phone. “Bye, mom.”

Amalia waves halfheartedly. Magnus walks to the door, opens it, and shuts it once he’s outside. Instead of leaving though, he presses his ear against the door and listens as her chair faintly scrapes against the floor. Footsteps move past the door until they fade away. She was likely going back to her TV. She’d only gone to the kitchen to get away from him.

Fuck. He needed a long vacation. Or at least some guy’s mouth on his dick at the club.

Magnus glowers down at the menu in front of him and takes a drink of wine. He’d paid for an entire bottle but Camille hadn’t shown up. Now he probably looked like some lonely drunk. Ugh. Where the hell was she?

The waitress comes to the table with a pitying look on her face. “Are you ready to order?”

“No, thanks,” Magnus plasters a fake smile on his face. “I’m sure she’s just running a little bit late.”

It’s clear the waitress doesn’t believe him but she walks away anyway. As soon as she’s gone, Magnus whips out his phone and starts tapping furiously on it. “Come on. I’m gonna murder you if you are standing me up. This is so embarrassing. It’s like I’m fifteen again.”

Magnus pushes the button to send and a ding fills the air. He lifts his head and watches Camille hurry down the aisle towards him. She throws herself in her seat. “Sorry.” She looks at the wine. “I’m gonna need some of that.”

“Sorry?!” Magnus hisses but sees the waitress walking towards them. “This isn’t over.”

“Mhm,” Camille pours a glass of wine and looks up at the waitress when she steps up to the table. “Supreme nachos please, and a margherita.”

The waitress turns to Magnus with a slightly surprised look on her face and he resists the urge to roll his eyes. Yes, he had friends. Well, she probably thought Camille was his girlfriend. Nope. No way in hell. “Taco salad without beans and add chicken to it. Thank you.”

Camille takes a sip of her wine as the waitress walks away from them. “Mm, yum. You have such great taste in wine. If only you had similar taste in men.”

“Again,” Magnus grits out. “I’m not going out with your ex-boyfriend. I know he’s bisexual. I know he’s handsome and has money. My problem is that his penis has been in your vagina.”

Someone gasps and Magnus closes his eyes before he turns in his seat to see an ancient woman, totally in her nineties at least, staring at him with an affronted look. Her friend, only slightly younger, is barely containing her giggles. Magnus flashes a grin at them both before he turns around. “Now see what you did? I offended an old lady.”

“You’re capable of doing that all on your own.” Camille shrugs and takes another drink. “It’s not my fault you said penis and vagina. And come on. Don’t use the clinical terms. You know it’s cock and pussy.”

A soft choking noise comes from behind Magnus and he lowers his voice. “If that old lady dies, it’s your fault. She was offended by my words. Yours are gonna murder her.”

“It’s not murder if there’s no ill intent. What’s the prosecutor going to do; get me up on the stand and ask me if I used my first amendment right to say cock and pussy in public?”

“Goddamn, just lower your voice, please.” Magnus rolls his eyes and picks up his own glass. “What took you so long, anyway?”

“My mom’s boyfriend broke up with her. They’d been together six years and she’d been hinting at marriage, so… she’s a little bit distraught. She wanted me to come over and comfort her. I couldn’t really justify leaving her until she was ready just for our weekly meal.”

“No, no,” Magnus says quickly. “Of course not. That wouldn’t be right. I’m sorry I snapped. I just…”

Camille waits for him to finish his sentence but he doesn’t. “You went to go see your vile cunt of a mom today.”

Magnus waits for a gasp but doesn’t hear one. Good god, she didn’t actually choke to death, did she? He peeks over his shoulder and sees the table behind them is empty. He looks back at Camille. “Don’t call her a cunt. You don’t know what she’s been through.”

“Yeah,” Camille makes a face. “Neither do you. She won’t talk to you.”

“She talked to me!” Magnus doesn’t know why he feels the need to defend Amalia. She’d never really been much of a mom at all. Mother, but not mom. “Today, I told her I met Alec and she sighed before asking me what his name is!”

Camille gives him a deadpan look. “Are you seriously telling me that she asked, ‘What is his name?’, and you took that as a healthy conversation between mother and son? What kind of crack are you smoking, and could I have some?”

“She took an interest!”

“Did she?” Camille stops talking when the waitress appears with their food. She waits until the waitress leaves before she says, “Or did she say what she thought you wanted to hear to get you to shut the fuck up? I’d lay every penny on her not giving a shit and getting you out of the apartment as fast as she possibly could.”

Magnus stabs viciously at his taco salad with his fork. “You don’t understand.”

“I understand better than you do.” Camille doesn’t touch her food and reaches for her margherita. “She has never loved you. She never will love you. Buying her groceries and watching soap operas, reality tv, and dog shows with her isn’t going to get her to love you. How many times will she have to non-verbally tell you to get the fuck out of her life before you listen?”

“She’s my mom,” Magnus says quietly. “I… I can’t just turn my back on her.”

Camille’s face turns sad. “You’re her son. She’s already turned her back on you. You’re the only one that can’t see that.”

Not true. Magnus takes a bite of his food but barely tastes it. Magnus could see the emotional neglect. He knew what his mother was and he knew it might take a miracle to get his mother to see him for something more than an annoyance, or whatever she actually thought of him. If she even thought of him much at all if he weren’t in her space.

Maybe it would be best to just, as Camille so lovingly put it, get the fuck out of Amalia’s life.

Magnus puts down his fork. “I can’t eat this.”

Camille frowns. “I’m guessing we’re not going to the club. Want to go watch movies on your sick TV?”

“No.” Magnus pulls out his wallet and sets his card down on the table. “I want to go to the club. I might actually kill for a blowjob. I want to dance and drink and have some fun.”

“Okay, lets go.”

Chapter Text

Alec breathes heavily as he hauls ass up the seven stories of the apartment building. He would have risked his life climbing into the elevator, but the landlord had, most apologetically, told him the elevator was out. Ryan would have definitely murdered him if the elevator hadn’t, but it might have been worth it compared to hiking up.

Jesse is having a harder time behind him. He groans. “Why do they make buildings with so many damn stairs?!”

“Stop talking,” Alec grunts and clears another landing. “Talking exerts energy.”

“No it doesn’t.”

Alec rolls his eyes and he clears the fifth landing. “Look it up if we survive.”

By the sixth floor, Alec can heavily smell the smoke and he sees it easing out from under and above the door to the seventh floor. He charges up the rest of the way and covers his face with his mask before he grabs the door handle. “It’s not hot. The fire hasn’t made it into the hallway. That’s good.” He pushes the button on his radio. “Ryan, we’re entering the hallway now.”

“Copy,” Ryan responds. “Get to the apartment door and assess the situation. We’re continuing up to the sixth floor and proceeding down to get all civilians out. Have Jesse clear the other three apartments.”

“Got it.” Alec eases the door open and smoke billows into the stairwell. The smoke is coming from the second door on the right. “Jesse, get out the civilians . I’ll get that apartment.”

Jesse immediately rushes to the first one on the left and starts pounding on it. Alec carries the handheld pump towards the apartment and knocks on the door. “FDNY! Open the door!”

Over Jesse’s shouting and the cries of the people who have, somehow, just realized the building is on fucking fire, Alec can hear what sounds like a kid crying. His body stills. “Jesse, get them out of here! Do you got everyone?”

“All apartments are clear except yours!”

Alec grabs his radio. “Ryan, Jesse’s cleared three of the apartments and they’re coming down. There’s a kid in this apartment and I’m about to open the door.”

“Break it down or use a tool. Floors six, five, and four are clear. The fire is contained to that floor and there’s no damage to the ceiling of six. Get that door open.”

“Yes, sir.”

Alec bangs on the door again. “Hey kid, back away from the door! I’m a firefighter and you’re going to be okay.”

Readying himself, Alec swings his axe and slams it into the doorframe. He grunts as he tries to force the door open. The crying inside grows louder and he shouts again. “Get back from the door, kid! You’re gonna be okay! Just get back from the door.”

The smell of smoke grows stronger and Alec drives the axe back into the jamb, satisfied by the noise of wood crackling. He shoulders the door in and it falls off the hinges. “Hey, kid!” Alec shouts as he starts down a blackened hallway. “Where are you?”

Watch the crying have been from a TV.

“I’m in here!” Coughing fills the air and Alec races towards what is probably the living room. “My mommy won’t wake up!”

Alec stumbles and his eyes widen. “Mo-mo-mom! Unlock the door! I’m so scared. Mom, help me!” No. No, no, no. He won’t let it happen again. He looks around the hallway that’s getting darker and darker with smoke. “Keep talking, kid. I’ve got you. Just keep talking.”

“I’m in here! I’m in here! I’m in here!”

“I’m scared, mommy. Help me.”

Rushing forward, Alec moves into the living room where a little girl is sitting next to a couch. Her mom is laying across it, eyes closed. The smoke is thick here and Alec turns to the kitchen, where the smoke is coming from. “Alright kid, what’s your name?”

Buddy—okay now—here—mom—where—get you—okay?”

“Lily.”

“That’s a pretty name.” Alec shakes his head, trying to force his thoughts from steering back to his past, before he eyes the kitchen. “I need you to go out into the hallway. Can you be a brave girl for me and go outside?”

“No! I’m not leaving my mommy.” She coughs loudly. “I’m not leaving!”

Mommy! Open the door!”

God, Alec hopes he won’t regret this. Getting civilians out was the number one goal. “Okay, stay right here and I’ll go put out the fire. Stay on the ground and cover your nose and mouth with your shirt. Can you do that for me?”

He moves carefully to the doorway and peeks inside, seeing a crackling fire coming up from curtains. It wasn’t the stove like… No. Three shattered candles lay on the floor alongside what looks like the remains of a potted plant. The glass of the window has shattered and flames shoot out of it.

Alec grabs his radio. “Ryan, the fire is contained to the kitchen. The curtains are on fire. I’ll put out the fire and then bring the two civilians down. Unconscious woman and approximately five year old girl.”

“Get the fire out before it spreads and bring the kid and mom down. Jesse’s got the civilians down and outside and he’s coming back up to help now. He’s on floor three and rising.”

Great. Alec points his handheld pump at the fire and lets the water spray. The fire crackles and pops rapidly, as if it’s fighting for its survival, but Alec doesn’t let up the water. More smoke billows up from the flames and he pours the water until the flames are completely gone. He sighs and attaches the pump to his coat before he hurries back into the living room.

“Okay, Lily,” Alec grabs the mother under her arms and pulls her down ono the floor. “I need you to crawl on the ground towards the hallway. Can you do that for me?”

Lily lowers herself until her belly is almost flat against the floor, crawling towards the hall. Alec takes off one of his gloves and presses it against Lily’s mother’s neck, feeling a pulse beat strong despite the inhalation. Thank god. Lily wouldn’t be burying her mother like he’d buried his. Alec flips the woman onto her belly, grabs her under her arms, and grunts as he lifts her up into the air. He takes a breath before he pulls her up onto his shoulder, sliding his arm between her legs and taking her wrist into his hand.

The woman’s other hand bumps against his back as he walks towards the hallway. Alec peeks down it to realize Lily’s not in the hallway and moves down it, careful not to bump the woman against the walls. As he clears the door, he realizes Jesse is in the hallway and picking Lily up. “Everyone’s out of the building except us and Ryan downstairs. You put out the fire?”

“Yeah,” Alec readjusts the woman on his shoulders and grunts as his back pops. “Candles on the windowsill. Caught the drapes on fire. You’re faster with her, so go ahead of me and get her out of here. I’ll be right behind you.”

Jesse cradles Lily to his chest and she coughs again. “Just breathe in your shirt, baby. You’ll be fine. I’ll get you out.”

Lily looks up at Alec and waves at him as they start down the hall to the door they’d come in. The trip down the stairs this time is slow, awkward, and painful. He’d been winded reaching the sixth floor going up. He’s even worse coming down, breathing heavily into his mask as he walks down the stairs with a hundred and fifty pounds of deadweight on his back. Why had he chosen this job again? He could have become a receptionist or some shit and the only thing he’d have to lift heavier than some paper was a cup of coffee. His doctor would kill him in twenty years when it was time for surgery on his spine.

When Alec gets down to the third floor, he’s breathing hard and he leans against the banister. He’s not sure he’s going to be able to make it. His hand inches towards his radio but he stops. No. He can’t be weak right now. Why would Ryan trust him to go into a burning building again if he can’t walk the stairs and carry someone? He’s trained for years to go up and down these steps. He’s lifted people way heavier than his woman. If she dies because of him than he’s a complete failure. Maya would have been right about him.

“Hey, Alec,” Jesse’s voice comes from the flight below, footsteps heavy on the stairs. “You okay, man? I can take her if you want.”

“I’m good,” Alec lies. He grunts as he rights himself and walks down the next flight of stairs, nearly bumping into Jesse. “I lost my footing and just had to right myself. Is Lily okay?”

“Yeah,” Jesse laughs despite the situation and starts ahead of Alec again. “She’s on oxygen down there. She’s a tough kid. She wanted to come back upstairs and help you with her mom.”

“Good kid,” Alec eases himself and the woman down another flight of steps, the noise of an ambulance ahead of them giving him the adrenaline boost he needs to make it down the last flight of stairs. “I need an energy drink.”

“That shit’s really bad for you. I’ll buy us a couple when we get back to the station.”

Alec walks through the apartment door and three other firefighters and two paramedics rush towards him. He lets them take the woman from his shoulders and he watches them rush her away towards an ambulance. On another stretcher sitting down with an oxygen mask pressed to her face is Lily. She waves at him again and he waves back before taking his mask off.

“Ugh,” Jesse groans. “We look like shit. And we smell like shit. I call dibs on the showers when we get back.”

“There’s three of them.” Alec’s suddenly exhausted and he just wants to go home to his own bed. He’s still got eight hours left on his shift though. “I’m sure you’ll get one of them.”

“Hey, Alec!” Ryan calls out to him. “Go get on the truck! You did good work today.”

Alec considers arguing but the hard work is over. The fire is out and the people are safe. He nods at Ryan and heads over to the truck.

The hard seat is surprisingly comfy against his sore back and he closes his eyes. He’s almost asleep when the others start climbing into the truck beside him. He doesn’t open his eyes as they drive back to the station. He’d been faced with some… uncomfortable truths today. Maya’s death has been on his mind more often than normal. He normally tried to push thoughts of her away but hearing that little girl calling for help had reminded him of himself calling for help when he’d been saved that night. Screaming for his mom to wake up. Her death had made him want to be a firefighter.

What if that woman dies today because of his hesitation? It had taken him way too long to put out the fire. That kid could have died due to his negligence. He’d gone into that kitchen expecting to see the stove on fire, not candles and a curtain.

When they pull into the station, Alec gets off the truck and hangs up his gear before starting upstairs and towards the shower. He felt gross. He smelled grosser. Maybe a very short but very hot shower would put him in a better mood.

“Hey, Alec!”

Alec snaps back. “What?”

“Uh… Sorry. I didn’t mean to bother you.”

Fuck. Oh, fuck, fuck, fuck. Alec turns around slowly and sees Magnus standing by the door to the gym with an uncertain look on his face, holding a plastic container.

Yeah, Alec’s not getting out of this one.

Chapter Text

”What?”

Magnus looks down at the container in his hands before back up at the back of Alec’s head. “Uh… sorry. I didn’t mean to bother you.”

Alec’s head swivels around slowly and he takes in Magnus with deer in headlights eyes. Magnus isn’t sure if he should apologize or laugh, because Alec really does look like a deer that’s facing his doom in the form of a speeding car. The other man was sweating profusely, had soot on his face, and his chest, his nicely defined chest, Magnus might add, was heaving. Damn, he just got back from a fire that sounded brutal and here Magnus was annoying him.

“Um,” Magnus clears his throat. “I can just go toss this in the fridge. You said you don’t get any good homecooked meals often since you can’t cook very well. I thought maybe…”

Alec’s jaw drops and he stares at the glass container. “So you made me food? And you want me to still have it?”

Magnus frowns. “Why wouldn’t I want you to still have it?”

“Well,” Alec’s cheeks flush. As his skin darkens, it spreads upwards to his forehead and down to his neck. Magnus, like the typical, cliché pervert that he is, wonders how far it spreads. “I was kind of being a jerk to you. I thought you might not want me to have it after that.”

Magnus is torn between apologizing and laughing again. Alec was being silly, thinking he might not want Alec to have the food, but he felt bad that Alec felt that way. Instead, he just shakes his head. “No, of course I want you to have it. I put a lot of time into it. At least an hour.”

Alec snorts. “An hour, huh? You’re my hero.” Swoon. Score one for Magnus. Alec makes a face and looks down at himself. “I was just about to go take a shower. Would you mind waiting a few minutes while I do that or are you about to start your shift?”

“I can wait.” Magnus looks around. “Where should I go sit down?”

“There’s a break room for eating three doors down from the gym. You can go sit there and I’ll be back in a few minutes.” Alec turns away before he pauses. “Um… Thanks. I really appreciate it. Sorry for being a bit of a pill. It was… not a good day.”

“Do you want to tell me about it?”

Alec hesitates before he shrugs. “Maybe. I don’t know. I’ll be right back.”

Magnus frowns as he watches Alec walk away from him. Normally, he might have allowed his perverted brain to start thinking about Alec climbing into a shower and how pretty he probably looked under the water. Now though… It was a bad day. He barely knew Alec and he knew it was unusual for him to snap at people like that. Alec had clearly just gotten back from a fire.

Had someone died? That wasn’t unusual in their line of work but maybe it was a really hard case for Alec. Children were the hardest for Magnus.

Sighing, Magnus turns towards the gym, passes it, and walks into the room Alec told him to go to. He sets the lasagna down on one of the tables before he goes searching for plates and forks in the cupboards.

He sits down and waits. Ten minutes pass and then another ten minutes. Magnus looks down at his lasagna. He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t hoping that this could be a sort of date between them. He hadn’t been on a date in over a month and something told him Alec was more of a homebody. That normally wouldn’t attract Magnus, who strongly preferred being anywhere but alone at home. Especially when that home is remotely near his mother, who hated his guts.

Magnus wonders what Alec’s relationship is like with his own parents. Did they have Sunday evening dinners together? Considering how sweet and shy and proper Alec has been just about every time he’s seen him, that seemed likely. It was pretty obvious that Alec was either gay or bi at the least. Did his parents approve of him being interested in men? It could go either way.

Wow, he really didn’t know anything about Alec, did he? And yet he’s acting like a desperate, horny teenager showing up here with homemade lasagna. Desperate. That wasn’t like him. He knows he’s good looking. More often than not, he’d go home or to a hotel with someone he met wherever he and one of his friends were hanging out. And yet…

All he could think about lately when he was out was Alec. Sweet puppy dog Alec who saved dogs from fires.

The door opens and Magnus looks up as Alec walks into the room. He frowns when he realizes the skin around Alec’s eyes are red. Fuck. Someone must have died. During the first couple of years of working as a paramedic, Magnus would go home and sob after he failed to save the person he was working on. It didn’t get better exactly but he grew better at handling it.

Alec shuts the door and pulls out the chair across from Magnus. He nods at the container. “What’s that?”

“It’s lasagna,” Magnus forces his eyes from Alec’s and pulls the top off the container. “Spinach lasagna to be more precise.”

Alec makes a face. “People put spinach in lasagna? That’s got to be some kind of crime. If it’s not a crime, it should be one of the seven deadly sins things.”

Magnus throws his head back and laughs. “Oh, my god.” He shakes his head. “You have just confirmed to me that you don’t even know what vegetables are. Have you ever eaten a carrot?”

“Carrots are good!” Alec scoffs and holds out his plate for Magnus to serve him some. “They’re especially good when slathered top to bottom in dressing. I get those veggie trays at the store sometimes.”

“That doesn’t count!” Magnus laughs again and carefully eases out a large portion of the lasagna before handing it back to Alec. He plates up some for himself. “You can’t take something healthy, turn it fat, and say you’re doing some healthy eating. I’m ninety-nine percent sure I’m going to be wheeling you out of your place after you have a heart attack. My mom used to fry okra in butter and put breading on squash.”

“I don’t know what okra is.” Of course he doesn’t. Alec pokes at his lasagna warily. “I’ve never had squash either.”

“Well…” Magnus hesitates. “Um, you’re about to.”

Alec jerks his head up before he looks back down at his plate. A look of horror appears on his face. “There is not squash in this!”

Magnus snickers. “The ‘noodles’ are made from squash. It lowers the sodium and calories. Just so you’re not shocked anymore, there’s spinach, squash, homemade tomato sauce, mushrooms, green onions, green peppers, cheese, garlic, and ginger in there. Just a touch of ginger but it really makes it so much better. How does that sound?”

“Healthy,” Alec pokes at it again with his fork. “I’ve never had most of that stuff.”

Of course he hasn’t. “Why not try a bite? Just a bite. If you don’t like it, I’ll—I’ll order you a pizza!”

Oh god, Magnus just realized that he should never have children. He’d be bribing them with cookies and toys to get them to eat. As it is, Alec gives him a wary look before he sighs heavily, cuts off a miniscule piece, and takes a bite. Alec’s eyes widen. “Holy shit!”

“Is it…” Magnus laughs uncomfortably. “Terrible?”

The words are barely out of his mouth before Alec starts cutting into the lasagna and eating large bites of it. Magnus purses his lips to keep from laughing but he lets out a little snicker. Then he thinks ‘fuck it’ and starts laughing again. “I told you it was good!”

Alec shrugs and polishes off his plate of lasagna in a record amount of time. Magnus hasn’t even taken a bite out of his. “Do you want more?”

“No,” Alec’s cheeks flush again. “But can I take the rest home? Except your plate, of course.”

“Yeah. I made it for you.” Magnus takes a bite and chews it slowly before he asks, “Can I ask what you were so upset about earlier?”

Alec looks back down at the table. “I kind of fucked up on the job. I wasn’t very fast coming down the stairs and I had a pretty bad reaction in the apartment.”

“What happened?”

“It was a kid.” Because of course it was a kid. Magnus nods even though Alec can’t see him. “A little girl named Lily. Her mom set the drapes on fire with a candle and fell asleep, I guess. I made a poor judgment call and put out the fire before getting the two of them out. Lily refused to leave her mom.”

“But they’re both okay.”

“Yeah.”

“I mean,” Magnus tries to say delicately. “That’s not so bad. We can’t always play by the rulebooks when we work in these kinds of situations. You put out the fire. That’s a good thing. They both survived.”

“What if one of them wouldn’t have because of me?”

“But that didn’t happen.” Magnus lays down his fork and reaches over to take one of Alec’s hands. “They’re alive and going to be okay. It’s a shame I wasn’t there because I would have made Lily and her mom laugh all the way to the ER.”

Alec smiles but he pulls his hand away from Magnus. Magnus looks down at his plate and takes a bite to keep his face from showing a hurt expression. They sit there quietly for a few minutes while Magnus eats his food. When Magnus is done, he leans back in his chair and fakes a smile. “Did you like it?”

“I think me acting like a human vacuum cleaner may have indicated that I loved it.” Alec smiles again but it quickly fades away. “I’m sorry I pulled away. I’m not really—” His skin starts to turn red again. “I don’t really hold hands or anything like that.”

Magnus nods. “May I ask you a question?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you gay… or bi?”

“Uh,” Alec laughs uncomfortably and looks around the room like he expects someone to jump out of the walls to save him. “I’m gay. I assume that is not a problem.”

Magnus resists the urge to cackle. Oh no, that was absolutely not a problem. “I’m not too put out by that. I was wondering if you might like to go out. Like actually go out. We can even get some fast food if that’s what you want.”

Alec nods, shocking Magnus. “Yeah, okay.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah,” Alec gives him an uncomfortable look. “I’ve never been on a real date though. Is that okay?”

“Wait, are you telling me you’re a—”

A loud, high pitched siren fills the air and Alec jumps to his feet. “I gotta go! Can you put that in the fridge? There are sticky notes. Just put your number on the bottom and I’ll call you!”

Magnus watches as Alec runs from the room without getting an answer. He might have laughed if he didn’t understand the get up and go hustle that an emergency required.

At least he hadn’t actually gotten the word ‘virgin’ out before Alec ran away.

Chapter Text

Alec looks down at his long sleeved black dress shirt. There’s a hole in the sleeve that he hopes no one notices, least of all Magnus. He hadn’t discovered the hole until after carefully picking and denying multiple shirt choices for this… he didn’t want to say date. Did he want to say date? If he was being honest with himself, yeah, he wanted it to be a date.

What had Magnus said exactly? “How about getting something to eat tomorrow? Chinese or Mexican?”

So Magnus hadn’t actually used the word date, but Alec was ninety percent sure it was a date. He hoped it was a date even though he didn’t actually know how to date. What he knew was he had to dress nicely but he didn’t really have nice clothes. Function over form, as Emma liked to tease him after she’d taken a peek in his closet during her last visit.

Speaking of Emma, should Alec tell Magnus he has a caseworker? Well, had a caseworker. Turning eighteen hadn’t driven Emma off though, so Alec still liked to call her that. Being put up for adoption, being adopted, and then aging out in foster care was something someone normally told their potential partners but Alec didn’t feel comfortable… adding in the other stuff. How would Magnus react if he found out Alec’s adoptive father died, his mother was a coke fiend that starved him and then died in an apartment fire that she started, and that no one wanted him because he had nightmares so he aged out in foster care?

Yeah, probably not what you should say on a first date. Is this even a date?

“This is a nightmare.”

“Excuse me?”

Alec jerks his head up to look at the taxi driver in the rearview mirror. “Uh, sorry.”

The man glances at him in the mirror before he looks back at the road. “I think you should just ask him if it’s a date.”

“Wait, what?”

“You were talking to yourself.” The other man grins. “You were wondering if him suggesting Chinese or Mexican counts as a date, which I do believe it does if me and my wife are doing this dating thing correctly. Then you said something about Emma and you were smiling when you did. I thought you wanted Magnus to be your boyfriend but Emma might be your girlfriend?”

Ugh. Alec has never been so horrified or disgusted in his life. He couldn’t believe he was talking to himself without even realizing it! And Emma! She’d projectile vomit if she knew they were having this conversation. “Um, no. She’s actually a sort of mom figure. Sorry about talking to myself.”

“No problem! I usually get people who glower at their phones or stare out the window. I like a nice talk every once in a while, even if I’m not participating in it. So why don’t you just ask Magnus to be your boyfriend if that’s what you want?”

We-Well,” Alec stutters. “Uh, it doesn’t work like that!”

The driver snorts. “That is exactly how it works. You like him and he likes you based on the fact that he asked you out on a date. One of you has to has to be the one to say, ‘Will you be my…’, and why won’t it be you? If seventh graders can do it, so can you. Just don’t ask him to be your husband on the first date. That’ll make things real weird, really quick.”

Alec stares at him. Did people actually do that? He tries to picture how he’d react if Magnus blurted that out, but something told him the much savvier man wouldn’t do something that ridiculous. Or would he? Maybe Alec should just go home.

“We’re here!” The taxi pulls up next to the restaurant, where Magnus is waiting on his phone. Of course. “That’ll be $29.52. You can use the chip on the back of the seat in front of you.” Alec slowly sticks his card in the chip reader. “I’m not gay but I see why you’re freaking out. My wife would call him a stud muffin.”

Alec purses his lips to keep from laughing but it bursts out anyways. “I’ll let him know you said that.” He reaches for the handle. “Thanks for the ride.”

“You’re welcome.”

Magnus looks up when the door slams shut and the cab drives away. His eyes light up and he grins, his eyes looking up and down slowly. Alec flushes and Magnus’s grin widens. “You look great!”

“Thanks,” Alec clears his throat and turns his holey sleeve so Magnus can’t see it. “So do you. The driver said his wife would call you a stud muffin.”

“Stud muffin?” Magnus throws his head back and laughs. It takes a moment for Magnus to pull himself together before he wipes away tears from the corners of his eyes. “Fuck. I love that. I’m gonna tell Camille that someone called me a stud muffin.”

“Camille?”

“My best friend.” Magnus grabs the handle of the restaurant door and opens it, gesturing Alec to go in. He takes Alec’s hand once they’re inside and he leads him to the second set of doors. “You’ll love her. Well, maybe. She’s… prickly.”

Prickly huh? Alec glances at Magnus as he asks the hostess for a booth. He couldn’t imagine Magnus being friends with someone that was prickly, but what did he know. He didn’t have any friends at all. Other firefighters didn’t count. Emma called him her friend but that just felt so weird.

“Interesting place to come on a date.” When they get to the table and give their drink orders, Magnus leads Alec towards the buffet. “I love this place but I can’t control myself here. The sugar biscuits are amazing. I have a feeling you’ll love those.”

Oh, Alec does love them. He’d chosen the buffet because he loves the food, he can get as much of it as he wants for fifteen bucks, and Magnus, the spinach and healthy food fiend, could get veggies while Alec got his chicken and Chinese biscuits. It was a win-win for both of them.

They’re both quiet as they make their way through the buffet. Alec fills his plate with a bunch of sweet and sour chicken, Crab Rangoon, and, in the little bit of space he has left on the plate, chicken and broccoli, heavy on the chicken. Normally he’d pick out the broccoli and just eat the chicken but he figured Magnus might judge him for it.

When they get back to their table, Magnus snickers when he sees Alec’s plate. “I’m proud that you like broccoli, but I don’t think those two pieces cancel out the chicken and crab and cream cheese.”

Alec laughs and sits down. He smacks one end of his straw against his hand and pulls it out. He takes a drink of his soda before picking up his fork and pierces one of the two broccolis. “That is exactly how it works! If I eat a few carrots then I can have a piece of cake. If I eat carrots and celery, then I can have two pieces of cake. Just substitute the cake with chicken and the sauce. The cake would work here now that I think of it. They sometimes have little chocolate cakes here, so… yeah.”

Magnus’s face turns so bright red that it almost looks purple before he bursts out laughing again. Several people turn to look at them and Alec flushes. “It’s not that funny!”

“Yes, it is!” Magnus stops laughing out loud but his belly keeps moving, his lips pursed to keep the laughter in. When he gets control of himself, he says, “Eating one thing that is healthy doesn’t negate the mountain of bad! Don’t make me roll your heart attacked body out of your home.”

“Heart attacked?! That’s not even a thing.” Alec rolls his eyes and eats his piece of broccoli. “See? I’m eating my broccoli. I’m a good boy.”

“I’ll turn you onto healthy food eating. I swear it. I got you to like my lasagna.”

“I don’t think I was supposed to eat it all in one sitting.”

“Uh, no, probably not.”

Still laughing, the two of them dig into their plates and Alec, predictably, finishes his first. He comes back to the table with another pile of chicken, a few Rangoons, broccoli, by itself without chicken, some cantaloupe, and a biscuit, and two little chocolate cakes.

Magnus stares wide-eyed at Alec’s plate. “Oh my gosh.”

Alec looks down at it. What? Fruit, veggies, meat, bread, and sugar. It was a healthy, balanced food pyramid meal. He looks back up at Magnus. “What’s wrong?”

“I can’t believe it,” Magnus shakes his head, mystified. Alec makes a face. He knew what Magnus was about to say. “I can’t believe you actually know what fruit is.”

Alec considers chucking his cantaloupe at Magnus’s head. “You’re such an asshole,” He laughs. “Yes, I know what fruit is. I also know what okra is now and you’re not allowed to put that in lasagna. It looks disgusting!”

Magnus snorts. “Cooked okra looks like snot but I swear uncooked okra is the best thing you’ll ever eat. I like to dip it in ranch dressing. I’m sure that’s right up your alley. Just pretend they’re chips!”

“Thanks but,” Alec makes another face. “I’ll take chips and fried chicken and pizza and my heart attacked at forty, please. You only live once, right?”

“You’re messed up.” Magnus chuckles as his phone rings and he pulls it out of his pocket. “Hello?”

Alec finishes up his food and picks up one of his chocolate cakes. The waiter places the check with two fortune cookies on it and Alec sets his card down before snagging one of the cookies.

“Wait, what?”

Alec looks up and realizes that Magnus’s face is pale, his mouth open in horror. “Is she okay? I’ll be there as soon as I can! What hospital?”

Hospital? Alec frowns. After a few tense seconds, Magnus pulls his phone from his ear and pokes at the screen with a shaking hand. “I-I-I gotta go. My mom’s in the hospital.”

“Shit.” Alec follows Magnus’s lead and grabs his jacket from the back of his chair. “Do you want me to go with you?”

“Please.”

Alec grabs the check and his card and they rush to the front desk.

Chapter Text

Magnus taps his fingers impatiently against the armrest as he silently urges Alec to drive faster. He would have driven if he could, only forfeiting over the keys once Alec realized his hands were shaking too hard to steer the wheel. Maybe he should have driven anyways, considering Alec has got to be the most cautious driver he’s ever met in his entire life. “You know this car does go above forty.”

“I’m driving with the flow of traffic, Magnus,” Alec says gently. “I can’t speed demon racer whip this car onto the sidewalk and race around everyone.”

“That’s something I’d like to see,” Magnus tries to smile. “I suppose it’s not safe to do that right now.”

“The GPS says we’ll be there in three minutes. She’ll be okay, Magnus.”

No, she wouldn’t. Magnus frowns as he looks out the window. It wasn’t a secret that there was something seriously wrong with his mother, and he wasn’t thinking about what just happened today. Aside from the emotional neglect Magnus has gone through his entire life, and he couldn’t kid himself and say he doesn’t realize it’s emotional neglect, she refused to have anything to do with anything outside of her apartment. Her job is remote and she doesn’t even have to deal with meetings. She has had exactly one friend since Magnus was a child and they only talk through text. Her days are spent working, eating candy, and watching soap operas.

Rinse, wash, and repeat.

Magnus might have at one point thought she was just reclusive and shy and just didn’t like to talk to people much. She didn’t make it a secret that she barely tolerated his existence, but as he grew older, he realized that she also barely tolerated the existence of everything outside of her apartment. He bought her groceries so she didn’t even have to do that. Hell, if he stopped paying for her groceries then she’d probably just have them delivered.

Finding out that she fell down the stairs… hurt. Magnus didn’t know why she left the safety of her apartment but she had left it and fell down the stairs as soon as she did. This would probably scare her so badly that she’ll never leave again. He didn’t know how to help her and he didn’t think she even wanted his help even if he knew how to. Everything about this situation was fucked up and he didn’t know how help her.

The car turns into the hospital parking lot and Magnus’s tapping gets faster and faster as he impatiently waits for Alec to pull them into a spot. The car is barely in park when he unbuckles his belt and opens the door. His heart pounds in his ears as he races towards the sliding doors, barely registering Alec’s hurried footsteps behind him.

Magnus runs to the front desk where a nurse is sitting, looking at a computer. “Amalia Bane! She’s my mother and she was brought in here an hour ago.”

“Hold on,” The nurse starts tapping on the keyboard. A hand touches Magnus’s back and he leans into Alec. It’s probably only a minute or two but it feels like a lifetime before the nurse stands up. “Your mother is in room seven. Come with me.”

“Hey,” Alec says quietly. “Do you want me to wait in here?”

Magnus frowns. Amalia probably wouldn’t be happy about it, but he really didn’t want to go in there alone. It might be selfish but he needed Alec’s support right now. “Can you come? You don’t have to.”

“Yeah,” Alec hesitates before he reaches for Magnus’s hand. “Let’s go.”

Exhaling loudly, Magnus follows the nurse through large double doors and down a hallway. The numbers pass by, one, two, three, and Magnus looks away from each of them as they pass. Being in hospitals was normal for him, and so was seeing patients in their most vulnerable moments, but it felt different being a spectator and not a worker. At least he was here with Alec, who probably knew exactly what he was feeling about this.

The nurse stops at room seven and pulls the curtain aside. “I’ll go get you guys another chair. Is there anything you need?”

“No,” Magnus says numbly as he stares at his mother, laying back in her bed with a cast on her right leg. “Thank you.”

The nurse walks away and Magnus lets go of Alec’s hand. He steps into the room. “Hi, mom.”

Amalia frowns at him. “How did you know I was here?”

Magnus clears his throat awkwardly and sits in the chair next to her bed. He squeezes his hands tight to keep from asking to hold her hand. “Hannah called me. She said she found you after you fell and she called me after she left the hospital. How are you feeling?”

“Like my leg is broken,” Amalia looks at Alec, still standing in the doorway. “Is that the firefighter?”

“Uh, hi,” Alec waves. “I could leave if you want to talk to Magnus alone.”

Amalia shrugs and looks around the bed. “There’s no need for that. I’d rather just watch television until they discharge me.”

Magnus’s heart drops and he picks up the remote, but he doesn’t pass it over to her. “Mom, please talk about this with me. How’d you fall?”

“I was walking down the stairs,” Amalia stares up at the TV. “I was going to get my mail. I tripped on one of the stairs, fell, and broke my leg. Do you have any more questions?”

Magnus’s eyes burn and he tries not to cry. The last thing he wanted was to cry and make this about him. Has she always been like this? She helped him with homework and fed him when he was a kid, but isn’t that like… the bare minimum for a parent to do? Has she never given him more than the bare minimum? No, she hasn’t. She got him to adulthood and that was it. She did what was legally required of her.

It made him feel sick.

“Mom, please—”

“Would you fucking stop it?” Amalia snaps back at him. “Mom this, mom that. It’s fucking exhausting. What do I have to do to get you to leave me alone? You’ve always been needy and demanding. Demanding my love and my attention and my money. When are you going to stop doing that? When are you going to leave me alone, Magnus?”

The silence in the room is deafening, and Alec shifts uncomfortably in the doorway. “I’ll just… I’ll just go.”

“No, please, Alec,” Magnus swallows and fights harder against the tears that are sitting on his eyelids. “Mom, why did you keep me if you hated me so much? It’s pretty clear that you hate me, so why? Didn’t I deserve to have a good childhood if you didn’t want to give it to me? I didn’t ask to be born.”

Amalia scoffs. “No, you didn’t ask to be born, but I didn’t ask for you to be born either. Your grandparents forced me to keep you after I got pregnant. They said they’d stop supporting me if I got an abortion or put you up for adoption. And I wasn’t heartless enough to put you in foster care once I got out on my own. I should have just asked them to adopt you.”

Magnus frowns. “So you hate me because they made you step up for me?”

“No,” She shakes her head. “I don’t hate you for that. I hate you because your father raped me.”

Fuck. Fuck. The tears that Magnus has spent this entire time holding back finally spill over. He feels a hand lay on his shoulder, and he presses his lips together to keep from sobbing. Of all the things he thought would be the reason why she loathed him, this wasn’t one. He never understood why she hated him. Fuck, he would have preferred chancing it in the foster care system.

“Could you please leave? And stop coming by my apartment. I can get my own groceries.”

Magnus tosses the remote on the bed and stands up. Without saying anything, he walks past Alec, turns right, and marches down the hall. He can hear Alec hurrying after him but he doesn’t stop as he walks through the same doors he came through when they arrived. There are people sitting in the waiting room and he snorts bitterly. They had families who loved them and were worried about them. Why couldn’t he have that? Why couldn’t someone love him?

The doors slide open and Magnus looks around for the car. Where the fuck is it?

“Hey,” Alec gently takes Magnus’s arm and tugs. “It’s over here. Come on.”

Magnus allows Alec to steer him towards his car. Alec opens the door for him and Magnus climbs in. The door slams and Alec moves around the car and gets in. Neither of them says anything for a minute until Magnus laughs. “Regretting going on a date with someone who’s this fucked up? I’m sure your family is normal.”

Alec’s silent for a beat before he says, “Actually… no. I don’t have a family.”

Magnus frowns. “Your parents are gone? No grandparents?”

“I don’t know,” Alec shrugs and fiddles with the keys. “I was adopted. They…” He shakes his head. “This isn’t about me. We should talk about what happened with your mom.”

“Please,” Magnus reaches for Alec’s hand. “I don’t want to talk about her. What about your adopted parents? Have they passed?”

Alec’s silent for so long Magnus doesn’t think he’s going to answer. Finally, “Yes. My dad died in a car crash. My mom… Well…”

“Well?”

“She… She burned to death.”

Chapter Text

“She… She burned to death.”

Alec can’t help but feel deeply uncomfortable after those words come out of his mouth. He hadn’t wanted to make this situation about himself at all, but Magnus had insisted upon it. It was weird talking about it because aside from Emma and his boss, he’d never talked about what happened to his mom. Even the police and numerous therapists he’d been forced to go to hadn’t been able to get him to talk about it.

And yet… this man he barely knew and went on one date that got interrupted has been able to get him to talk about it.

He looks out the window, afraid to look at Magnus and see pity or horror or whatever look is on the other man’s face right now. “She left the oven on to heat our apartment when I was a kid and it set a fire. A firefighter broke down the door and carried me out.”

“What about her?”

Alec frowns. He didn’t want to tell Magnus that his mother was high on heroin or crack or whatever the fuck she was on when she died. He hated that she chose drugs over him. Magnus didn’t need to know that. “She was asleep in her room when the fire started. They think she inhaled the smoke and that’s why she died.”

Magnus shifts in the seat beside him. “They think?”

“Her body was too badly burned to tell,” Alec shrugs and looks out the side window. “I think they just wanted to make me feel better. Which is better, telling a little kid that his mom burned alive and was in agony the entire time or that she gently died in her sleep from the smoke?”

“How old were you when it happened?”

“Twelve.”

“I’m sorry,” Magnus mutters. “That’s rough. Were you with them from birth or did they adopt you later?”

Alec finally turns to look at Magnus. He doesn’t see pity there, or horror, or whatever else he’d thought there’d be. Just… sadness. “There was a couple that wanted to adopt me the day I was born but that fell through because they changed their minds and wanted a closed adoption while my birth parents wanted an open adoption. I met my mom and dad when I was two weeks old. They were all I knew. Well, my mom was.”

“Your dad died in a crash?”

“Head on collision,” Alec nods. “It was raining at night. The other driver didn’t have his headlights on and they crashed into each other. The other guy survived but was in prison for a while because his lights weren’t on. They say he, um, died instantly.”

“I’m sorry, Alec,” Magnus reaches for his hand and he gratefully takes it. “I’m really sorry. It seems like your life is just as fucked up as mine has been. Probably even more. Have you talked to your birth family about any of this? You said they wanted an open adoption.”

“Uh,” Alec chuckles awkwardly. “No. They wanted an open adoption and it was, but I wasn’t interested in a relationship with them at all. I guess they were interested in taking me in a couple years after my mom died but I stayed in the foster care system instead. I guess my caseworker came to ask me how I’d feel about meeting them and I was pretty vocal about how much I didn’t want to. They decided not to even ask if I wanted to be adopted by them.”

“Wait,” Magnus scoffs. “Your biological parents asked if they could adopt you? What kind of fucked up shit is that?”

Alec shakes his head. “Yeah. They found out about the fire and reached out to try to adopt me. Back then, they weren’t allowed to contact me without my permission. My caseworker, Emma, refuses to even tell them what state I live in. She’s more like my mom than either of my mom’s ever were.”

“I get it,” Magnus nods. “Were you… always Alexander Worthington? You don’t have to answer. I know that’s a really personal question.”

“It’s okay,” Alec smiles. “When the first adoption didn’t go through, my parents named me because apparently, they didn’t want me to go without a name. I was Alexander Lightwood until I went to my parents. They liked Alexander so much that they decided to keep it. My mom started calling me Alec and I liked that more.” He chuckles. “A lot of people thought Worthington was a hilarious name for me when I was a kid.”

Magnus frowns. “Why? It’s a perfectly normal name.”

Alec flushes. He hadn’t really meant to say that. Being broke the majority of his childhood had been something he’d wanted to hide, like his mother’s drug habit that ultimately took her life. It was… embarrassing, humiliating, coming into school with holes in his clothes and a belly that constantly growled. Kids are cruel, and he couldn’t count the times someone offered to buy him a snack in the cafeteria only to take it back once they actually got him in front of the food. At least he wasn’t beaten up for his lunch money like some of the other “reject” kids were.

And that was only because everyone knew Alec almost never had any lunch money.

“Alec?”

Ah, hell. Whatever. There were lots of poor kids in the world, and there were lots of bullies in the world. As long as he didn’t tell Magnus about the drugs, being poor didn’t matter. “We uh, struggled, a lot. Me and my mom, after my dad died. We didn’t have much money and my classmates knew that. They would laugh over me having a ‘rich person’ last name when we were super broke.”

Magnus makes a face. “Sometimes kids are the worst. That explains a few things though.”

Alec tilts his head in confusion. “Explains what things?”

This time, Magnus is the one who flushes. “That probably sounded rude. I meant about your diet. You said you like to eat in a lot of fast food places. I, well,” His face turns a darker red. “I guess I just assumed that came from growing up with not a lot of options.”

Alec laughs. “Oh, yeah. Let’s just say that my mom wasn’t really a big fan of vegetables even when she had the money to afford them. It was like four bucks for a bag of carrots that were gonna expire in a week, or a box of a dozen doughnuts for two bucks. She almost always chose the doughnuts. She worked at pizza places a lot and almost at every one she got an employee meal, so almost every night we ate pizza or shared a bowl of pasta.”

“I get it,” Magnus nods slowly and he frowns. “The system is designed for poor people to fail. I can’t believe you’re not three hundred pounds though.”

“I can,” Alec snickers. “You have no idea how much I exercise. I had the greatest metabolism ever when I was a kid and now, I exercise a lot. It helps that my gear is super heavy and I have to carry it with me when I’m going into burning places. I know I eat bad so I make up for it by exercising a lot.”

Magnus laughs too but he quickly stops. He looks out the window. “I’m… Thank you. Thank you for coming here with me and thank you for not leaving me in there alone with her. This definitely wasn’t how I thought our date was going to end. You learned a lot about me that you didn’t need to know.”

“You learned a lot about yourself that you didn’t even know,” Alec looks down at their hands, still entwined. “It doesn’t matter.” He flushes. “ I mean, it does matter, a lot. It matters a lot. But it’s not something that I’m like, going to judge you for or anything, you know?”

“You’re so awkward,” Magnus chuckles and strokes his thumb down the back of Alec’s hand. “I love it. You’re like the… brightest thing in my life right now. Is it too soon to say that?”

Alec huffs. “I don’t think I’m the person to ask that. I don’t exactly have the best luck with other people.”

“That’s a surprise, considering that you look like you,” Magnus lets go of Alec’s hand and lifts his. Alec almost jumps back when warm skin presses against his cheek. The other man’s thumb brushes against his cheek bone. His eyes glance down at Alec’s lips. “Alec…”

Alec licks his hips and he leans forward a little, his heart racing. Magnus lifts his other hand and cups Alec’s other cheek. He watches the other man move closer and closer, slowly, as if waiting for Alec to tell him to move back, but he doesn’t want him to.

Lips touch his and Alec immediately opens his mouth. Magnus deepens the kiss and cradles Alec’s face in his hands. The other man tastes like water, veggies from the buffet, and mint gum. Under normal circumstances, Alec would think the taste was disgusting. Now though… He couldn’t get enough of it.

Magnus’s hands tilt Alec’s head slightly and their tongues brush against each other. Alec’s not sure what to do with his hands, but he does want to touch Magnus. He tentatively rests one of his hands on Magnus’s chest and Magnus hums deeply in his mouth. Magnus sucks on his tongue and he moans into his mouth. Magnus nips his lip before pulling back.

“As much as I would like that to continue,” Magnus grins. “And I would really like that to continue, we are sitting in the parking lot of a hospital after we’ve both had to deal with… some terrible truths. It might be best to call it a night.”

Alec’s disappointed but he pulls his hand away. “I’m on team continue, but I get it. So,” He clears his throat. “Does that mean you want to have another date?”

Magnus’s eyes light up. “Very much so. Do you?”

“Yeah,” Alec frowns. “I have to work the next two days, but what about Friday?”

Magnus chuckles. “So eager. Yeah, Friday’s good for me too. Do you want to drive back to your place?”

Alec nods and starts the car.

He couldn’t wait for Friday.

Chapter Text

Magnus had never felt more like a virgin than he did a couple nights ago. He couldn’t believe how eager he’d been in that car with Alec. Alec, who Magnus was now about ninety-five percent sure is an actual virgin. The other man had said he didn’t have much luck with other people. That could mean he’d slept with people and it went wrongly, but Magnus was pretty sure it was the other way due to Alec not knowing what to do with his hands.

That was the only thing that had kept Magnus from having sex with Alec in the car in the hospital parking lot. Well, and the fact that he didn’t want to go to jail. The sad thing though was that Alec possibly being a virgin was a bigger deterrent than going to jail was. Maybe he should see a therapist.

He snorts. Yeah, that ship has long sailed, been doused with oil, and lit on fire.

The cold words his mother had spoken to him suddenly douse his horny thoughts for Alec. Maybe a therapist wouldn’t be the worst idea in the world. For, well, for the three of them. Magnus for all his issues with his mother. His mother for what happened to her. And Alec for literally having a mother who burned to death. How does a person get past that and remain semi sane?

And adorable. So freaking sweet. Ugh, Magnus had it bad and he knew it. Tomorrow couldn’t come fast enough. Magnus smiles as he thinks about the date they’d set up when they got back to Alec’s place. He could tell that Alec wanted to ask him up to his apartment but was too shy to ask, and Magnus had latched onto that shyness.

It wasn’t like Magnus didn’t want to have sex with Alec. Hello, it was pretty obvious. But if Alec is a virgin, then Magnus wasn’t really in his element. He’s never had sex with a virgin before. He wanted it to be right. The last thing he wanted was for Alec to have a bad first time.

And he really wanted to do this right. Most of the people he’s been with have been flings. Some have lasted a few months but most of them left.

He knew why. Being a paramedic came with downsides. He couldn’t come home and talk about his day. ‘Oh yeah, honey. I saw a guy crap his pants while having a heart attack on my bus. Yeah, he died. Oh, and I was almost shanked by a drugged up dude who thought I was trying to steal his cocaine. Or how bout that time I was almost shot. Or when that psycho freak nearly choked me to death because he thought I was taking him to jail instead of the hospital.’

Yeah. Those were totally normal conversations to have over dinner or brunch. There were some who were perfectly happy being with a paramedic… until he came home after a shift and, even though he’d been meticulous during his shower at work, he hadn’t been meticulous enough to get a spot of blood. Magnus had always been able to tell what those sickened looks meant.

That is why Magnus had so much hope for what was going on with him and Alec. Alec probably came home smelling vaguely of smoke and fire. He put his life on the line all the time by running into burning buildings and climbing trees to save cats. Both of them understood that any day could be the end.

“This is going to be different,” Magnus mutters. “He’s different.”

“Whose different?” Magnus jumps as Raphael literally vaults into the back of the ambulance. He’s got a huge grin on his face. “What’s going to be different? Who is different?”

Magnus rolls his eyes. “None of your business.”

“Oh, it’s the firefighter,” Raphael hands him a sandwich from the hospital vending machine. Magnus makes a face. “Don’t make that face. You said I wasn’t allowed to order food anymore cause last time we almost got in trouble for that.”

“We didn’t get in trouble for ordering food from Chipotle,” Magnus corrects him as he opens the chicken salad sandwich and gives it a cautious sniff. It smelled fine, save for the fact there were pickles on it. “We got in trouble for you deciding we should stay there and wait for your food even though we got a call. You know we could have gotten fired for that, right?”

Raphael shrugs and opens his bag of chips. “I seem to remember you complaining about that call. It was someone who had a panic attack and misused 911. If I recall correctly, it had been the eighteenth time in two months that they called 911 for an ambulance.”

“Which is why we weren’t fired,” Magnus says sardonically. “It wasn’t a real emergency and they were fed up with that person. I got my ass ripped for it too and I at least had the grace not to throw your ass under the bus and say it was totally, absolutely a hundred percent your idea to stay at Chipotle.”

“It was some damn good Chipotle. Worth the rip.”

Magnus hums. “It was good. I’ll have to see if Alec’s interested in going there sometime. I know he loves Chinese food and he loves pizza. I’m not sure what else he likes to eat though. I can only feed him spinach lasagna so much before he gets sick of healthy food.”

Raphael throws him a wounded look. “You’re force-feeding him spinach lasagna? Poor guy.”

“Poor guy?!” Magnus makes a face. “I’m trying to help his arteries. He’s been eating nothing but fast food and fries since he was a child. His mom didn’t feed him right.”

“So you met his mom? Alright, man!”

Magnus loses whatever humor he’d had before. “No, no I didn’t meet his mom. I’d need a Ouija board to do that.”

“Oh,” Raphael looks down at his empty bag of chips. “Sorry. Now I feel like an ass. Did he tell you about her?”

“Not much,” Magnus shrugs. “They didn’t have much money after his dad died. He was adopted by them. She struggled to feed him good food so they ate out a lot. She um… died in a fire that he was rescued from.”

Raphael’s head jerks up. “What?! Jesus Christ. No wonder he wanted to be a firefighter.”

“That was my thought,” Magnus looks down at his own food, suddenly not hungry. “Kinda makes our own situations not so bad.”

“At least his mom wasn’t trash. Like yours is.”

Magnus feels the urge to defend his mom, but it’s not as strong as it was just a few days ago. He felt sorry for her. What happened to her must have been agonizingly painful and he felt sympathy. But… he didn’t deserve to be treated like garbage his entire life for her pain. Her pain didn’t mean he should suffer too. She didn’t realize that. Maybe she never would. Only she could face her demons and conquer them. It was time he stop trying to kill her demons.

Because he would always be the product of her rape. That wasn’t something he could take away.

“Yeah,” He finally replies. “At least he had a good mom.”

The whine of the radio in the cab calls out to them and their reactions are immediate. Raphael vaults out of the back of the ambulance as easily as he’d jumped into it, turns on his heel, and slams the door shut. Magnus has trashed their dinner and is already belted into his seat before the door of the cab slams closed.

Magnus closes his eyes and his heart races as the lights go on, seen from the back of the bus, and the sirens fill the air. His first shift, years ago, he’d nearly thrown up the first time he rode in the back. What with the speeding around drivers. Now, his body feels like he’s surfing.

He pulls open the window separating him from the front of the cab. “What do we got?”

Raphael makes a clean turn before he answers. “Apartment building. Two story. Fire started on the second floor right side of the apartment. Cause of fire is unknown. The tenant of that apartment is inside his apartment currently and they’ve sent in a couple of firefighters to get him out. The bottom two apartments have been searched and civvies from the bottom apartments were outside when firefighters arrived on scene. No one’s hurt. Searching top left now and no one is in there. Fire is contained to upper right side of the apartment but spreading quickly.”

Okay. Magnus nods tightly. They’d check the others, but the person in the top right apartment was their main concern. “Anything we know about the tenant on the top floor?”

“He’s… old. That’s all the dispatch said. The tenants that made it out said he’s old and not quite there.”

God. Magnus’s stomach lurches as Raphael takes another turn and he can smell the smoke on the air. The ambulance slows and before Raphel can put it in brake, Magnus opens the back of the truck and grabs the stretcher.

Chaos and Raphael greet him. A crowd of people have swarmed the sidewalk and around the apartment which is on fire. It’s eerie, seeing the top right of the building almost fully ingulfed in flames but not quite touching the other sides of the building. Firefighters are on the right side of the building, pointing their giant hoses at the side of the building most in danger. People are screaming and crying.

Magnus and Raphael point the stretcher towards the small group of people that are on the lawn surrounded by firefighters. “Hey!” Magnus calls to… Shit! Ryan, he thinks Alec’s boss’s is. “We need to check out the tenants. Is the one in apartment four still inside?”

Ryan waves his hand towards the people. “They all say they’re fine. Maybe one of you can take the three of them back to the bus to check them out while one of you stay here with the stretcher?” Raphael immediately starts corralling the tenants towards the bus. “Mr. Reynolds is going to need your help once he gets down. I’ve got two of my guys in there with him right—”

The radio clipped to Ryan’s chest beeps and Magnus’s heart starts beating faster when he hears Alec’s voice come out of it. “Ryan, Jesse’s coming down the stairs with the tenant. There’s no one else upstairs. I need to help him get the tenant out. He’s very frail.”

“Copy,” Ryan nods tightly. “Get him out. Source of the fire?”

“Pan on the stove,” Magnus is surprised to hear humor in Alec’s voice. “Bacon, looks like. A little more well done than he probably wanted. I put out that part of the fire though we’ll need more help. I’m following Jesse out now to help the old man.”

“Good, get him out.”

Ryan puts one hand on the stretcher. “Come on. Let’s get him on this thing. It’ll probably take all of us to get him on here. One of the neighbors said he’s very frail already.”

They don’t quite make it to the door before Magnus hears two pairs of footsteps coming down the stairs. Thankfully smoke was coming out from the windows upstairs, and not the stairs. Yet. Alec should be right behind them.

The footsteps get closer and Magnus hurries forward as two shapes appear from the doorway. Magnus lowers the stretcher but it still requires all three of Ryan, Magnus, and the second firefighter, Jesse, to get him up on the stretcher. His face is pale and he looks barely able to get a breath out, so Magnus lowers a mask over his face. “Take breaths through your nose and out your mouth, okay Mr. Reynolds?”

A great, metal thud fills the air from above them and Ryan reaches for his radio. “Alec, you good?”

The silence that comes from both the radio and the stairs is deafening, and Magnus feels his heart fall into his stomach. He stares at the radio as Ryan hits the button again. “Worthington, answer me. You good or do you need aid?” Ryan glances at Magnus. “What are you doing? Get him the fuck out of here.”

What Magnus wants to do is tell Ryan to fuck off and run up the stairs. Instead, he turns and pushes the stretcher towards the ambulance. He feels numb as he hears his own voice, loud and disjointed, tell Mr. Reynolds that he was going to be okay.

Mr. Reynolds would probably be okay.

Would Alec be?

Chapter Text

Alec pounds up the stairs to the second floor, so damned grateful that this apartment building only has two floors and three of the apartments had already vacated the building. The top right apartment was the worrying one. He was sure there was either someone in there, or that they were about to come home to their apartment engulfed in flames. Because this is the source of the fire. He was about to walk into the source of a fire, fun.

“Stairs, stairs, stairs,” Jesse complains from behind him. “Can’t we go somewhere there aren’t so many stairs? Why don’t ground floor places light up?”

“They do. I think someone up there just really hates Ryan. Or you,” Alec reaches the landing and pounds on the door. “FDNY! Open the door!”

Through the door, Alec can hear the sound of moaning. “I can hear someone,” Jesse says unhelpfully. “We’ll have to break it down.”

Alec knocks on the door again. “Step away from the door! We’re going to knock it down and get you out of there.”

Jesse hands Alec his axe and he drives it deep into the wood. He presses his ear against the door and hears the sound of moaning still, distant and far from the door. “Good, he’s far enough back that he won’t get hit.”

It only takes a couple of tries to break the door and Alec shoves his shoulder against the wood. The door slams to the floor and Alec is quickly over the threshold with Jesse behind him. “Sir? Can you hear me?”

The only noise that greets him is another moan, so Alec hurries down the hall towards the smoke that’s making it hard to see the ceiling. A quick look at it makes him realize that the fire is starting to die down, but only if they can manage to put out the source of it. The damage was probably too bad on this side of the building to be salvageable anyways. A loud moan fills the air and Alec hurries into what he believes is a living room.

A man is laying on the floor, half on the sofa and half on the darkening carpet. The guy is old… very old, close to his nineties if Alec had to guess. “We’re going to get you out of here, sir,” Alec pulls his own oxygen mask off his face and presses it against the old man’s face. “Take a deep breath in and let it out. Jesse, can you get his arm up over your shoulder?”

They look at each other over the man’s head. They both knew they couldn’t just throw the man over their shoulders in a typical fireman’s carry. This was going to have to be handled more carefully, more dangerously. Alec helps Jesse put the tenant’s arm over Jesse’s shoulders. He tries to take only the shallowest of breaths and he soon finds himself a little lightheaded.

“Come on, Mr. Reynolds,” Jesse pulls him up easily. Mr. Reynolds looks almost comically small next to Jesse in his gear. “Let’s get you downstairs. Alec, take the mask and I’ll put mine on his face while we descend.”

Alec is grateful when he takes back his mask and watches Jesse place his own over Mr. Reynolds’s face. “Wait,” The man rasps, weakly pulling at the mask. “Wait. Cheyenne. My Cheyenne. I-I ca…” He coughs and spit slides down his chin. “I ca-can’t leave without—”

Jesse and Alec’s eyes meet over Mr. Reynolds’s head. They hadn’t been told there was a girl living here. All the neighbors had said that Mr. Reynolds was old and kind of senile. Alec looks around the room. He can’t see a kid through the smoke, nor hear one. So either she was further in or… No. “Do you know where your granddaughter is?”

The man coughs again. “Cat. My cat. My Cheyenne. Please, please don’t leave her behind. Bedroom. Bed, she’s scared,” He chokes on another cough and Jesse has to use his other arm to hold him up. “She’s all I… I… have…”

Alec knows they have to get Mr. Reynolds out or they were going to be hauling him out in a body bag. “Get him out, Jesse. I’ll get the cat.”

“Hurry, Alec,” Jesse urges him. “The fire’s coming from the kitchen. You have to pass it to get to the bedroom.”

“Just go. I’ve got the cat.”

Alec doesn’t wait to watch Jesse practically drag Mr. Reynolds to the door. He couldn’t believe he might die for a cat. A cat that he hasn’t heard make any noise. A cat that might already be dead. Something told him that would make Mr. Reynolds’s condition worsen, and he couldn’t let that happen. He couldn’t run outside, say he couldn’t find the cat, and know, deep down, that he might have abandoned a poor innocent creature to burn or die of smoke. My Cheyenne.

The only thing that man still has.

The moment Alec steps into the kitchen his nose wrinkles up. Even with his oxygen mask on, he can still smell the burnt, nasty, fucking atrocious bacon coming from the stove. There was nothing, nothing a firefighter hated to smell more than a dead body was bacon. Because bacon, believe it or not, smells like burnt flesh. Alec gags on the smell and looks up at the damage.

Flames shoot up from the greasy bacon, what’s left of it. The walls are black surrounding the stove, the wooden cabinets aflame, and everything on the counter is either on fire or charred black. Alec points his hose towards the stove and lets the water rip. He carefully aims it at the cabinets and, for good measure, the wall too. He knew the outside was on fire, and he couldn’t do anything about that, but maybe he could save the rest of the building by taking out the greasy bacon.

Through the smoke Alec can hear a soft mew. Cheyenne! She’s alive! He hurries through the apartment, past a bathroom and utility room, and into a sparse bedroom. The room is very dark, with blackout curtains over the windows, and Alec doesn’t dare to try to turn on the lights. Fire and electricity do not go so well together, and Alec didn’t want to die in some electrical explosion. He pulls his flashlight out of his pocket and turns it on. “Here, kitty kitty.”

Another meow comes from Alec’s left and he quickly falls to the floor. He shines the light under the bed. “Gotcha, Cheyenne,” Amber colored eyes, wide and frightened, stare at him from under the bed. “I’m so happy you’re alive. Now come out here.”

The cat doesn’t move towards him, so Alec rubs his fingers against each other and makes a pspsps noise. “Damnit,” Alec can feel himself starting to get lightheaded again. Without the windows open, the room is filling up with smoke quickly. Cheyenne might only be safe for staying so low to the floor. He takes a really deep breath. “Okay, no more Mr. Nice guy.”

Alec points the flashlight around the room until he spots a cat carrier in the open closet. He crawls over to it and puts it down. “Come on, shithead.”

The cat senses something but she’s not quicker than Alec. Alec grabs her by the scruff of the neck, yanks her out of her hiding spot, and stuffs her unceremoniously into the carrier. Cheyenne yowls loudly but he just picks up the carrier. He stumbles when he stands up. Shit. He holds his free hand against his mask and takes in a breath. Fuck! He must have been up here longer than he thought. The mask was running low. He had to get out fast.

Alec presses the button on his radio. “Ryan, Jesse’s coming down the stairs with the tenant. There’s no one else upstairs. I need to help him get the tenant out. He’s very frail.”

The answer is instant as Alec walks, so much slower this time, down the hallway. “Copy. Get him out. Source of the fire?”

Alec passes the kitchen and he looks over at the burnt, nasty-ass bacon. “Bacon, looks like. A little more well done than he probably wanted. I put out that part of the fire though we’ll need more help. I’m following Jesse out now to help the old man.”

“Good, get him out.”

Steadying himself against a wall, Alec takes another deep breath from his mask, only to suck in smoke instead. He retches and throws the mask away, grabs his collar, and yanks it up over his nose. That helps, but the hallway that had seemed so short from the living room to the kitchen now seems impossibly long.

Alec holds his hand up against the wall to help him down it. He can hear through the window muted shouts and crackling. The fire. The fire is still going on.

The hallway ends and Alec stumbles into the living room. Cheyenne isn’t yowling anymore, at least he doesn’t think she is. Fuck, he had no oxygen left to give her! Not even from his own lungs! He had to get her out.

Alec takes a step towards the door, so close, so close to fresh air, and he stumbles. He lurches forward and his shoulder hits a metal shelving unit. His back hits the ground and bounces slightly when the shelves land next to him. In front of the door. Whatever air was still in Alec’s lungs is expelled in a small gust and he struggles to breath in, stopped by the smoke that’s clogging the ceiling, turning from black to gray. The fire was almost out.

The radio crackles. “Alec, you good?”

Alec grabs the cat carrier and is relieved to hear Cheyenne yowling through the little metal bars. He uses what’s left of his strength to shove her carrier through the holes in the metal shelves and out onto the landing. He knows he doesn’t have the breath to answer Ryan. He knows he doesn’t have the strength to move the shelves. But he does know that he has the strength to save the cat. One of the others would see her carrier when they came up the stairs after him.

“Worthington, answer me. You good or do you need aid?” Ryan’s voice turns angry. “What are you doing? Get him the fuck out of here.”

Alec’s chest starts to hurt and he clings to it weakly. Was he having a heart attack? His eyes blur.

Is this how his mother felt when she died?

Chapter Text

Magnus’s heart races as he and Raphael help Mr. Reynolds down from the stretcher. Raphael places an oxygen mask on the old man’s face. “Take deep breaths, Mr. Reynolds,” Raphael says before he looks up at Magnus. “Did I hear Ryan yelling over there?”

“Alec’s still upstairs,” Magnus grabs the stretcher. “Do you have him? We might need to pull Alec out of there.”

Mr. Reynolds pulls at the mask. “Wait, my Cheyenne. My baby,” He hacks up a cough. “He’s got my baby.”

A baby? Magnus and Raphael share a look. No one told them Mr. Reynolds had a baby. Did he mean his granddaughter? That thought made Magnus feel sick. He looks at Mr. Reynolds. “Is Cheyenne your granddaughter, Mr. Reynolds?”

“No,” He shakes his head and coughs weakly. Raphael tries to place the mask back over his face but he pushes it away. “She’s my cat. She’s my baby.”

“We’ll get your cat out, Mr. Reynolds,” Raphael moves the mask closer to the man’s face. “Don’t you worry about that. Cheyenne’s going to be just fine.”

Would she? Magnus pulls the stretcher towards himself. “You got him?”

“Got him.”

Magnus turns the stretcher and starts to run back towards the door with it. Alec would risk his life to try to save a cat. Had the old man told Alec it was a cat or had he cried for his baby and Alec went searching for a baby, only to find a cat instead? That metal noise had scared the shit out of Magnus. Would Alec have gotten outside in time if it weren’t for the cat? He didn’t want to sound like an evil, pet hating person, but if he lost Alec after just finding him…

He hadn’t thought he’d meet someone like Alec after everything his mother put him through for the last thirty years. Love, the true, soul binding love that people search for for years and never find was finally in his grasp and he might lose it today. Over a cat. Alec was so kindhearted that he’d die for a cat. That was what Magnus loved about him most.

If Alec survives… Magnus is going to tell him that he loves him.

Magnus pushes the stretcher up to Ryan. “Is Alec okay?”

“I just sent up Jesse,” Ryan looks worried. “He’ll get him down. Do you think we can maneuver the stretcher upstairs?”

“No,” Magnus shakes his head. “It’s too dangerous for us and the patient to do that. I’ll go get the stair chair. We’ll be able to get him down that way then lift him up onto the stretcher.”

Magnus hauls ass back to the ambulance and shouts, “The stair chair, Raphael! We’re not going to be able to get the stretcher upstairs and Alec might need help getting down.”

They have to maneuver the chair around Mr. Reynolds, whose color is starting to come back with the help of the oxygen. Magnus races back to the apartment door. “I’ve got it, Ryan. Is—”

“Hey, Ry!” A voice calls from upstairs. “There’s a cat carrier in the hallway and there’s something metal blocking the door. I need help moving it.”

Ryan steps into the doorway. “Can you see Alec?”

“Yeah!” Jesse’s tone makes Magnus start to worry. “He’s not moving.”

“Shit,” Ryan grabs the chair and pulls it. “Haul your ass up there, PM.”

Magnus hauls ass up the stairs with Ryan. The stair chair swings dangerously between them but neither of them let go as they reach the top of the stairs. Ryan lets go of the chair as Jesse hands him a cat carrier. He peers into the cage and a white paw darts out and bops him in the nose. “Well, she’s okay. Here, Magnus, take her downstairs to your partner. And put a fucking oxygen mask on!”

Growling, Magnus takes the carrier and pounds down the stairs. He ignores the yowling of the creature inside the carrier. A firefighter races around the building and he thrusts the carrier into his hands. “Take this to the ambulance!”

The man isn’t able to respond before Magnus is, once again, hauling ass towards Alec, yanking his shirt up over his nose as he pounds back up the stairs. The smoke is whiteish gray, so the fire is out or almost out, but it still makes his eyes burn. As he clears the top of the stairs, he sees Ryan and Jesse shoving against a metal shelf looking contraption. Between the bars he sees… Alec. Prone. He looks as close as he can in the smoke and he realizes Alec’s chest isn’t moving.

“One, two, three,” Ryan growls. “Push!”

The two of them push against the shelves and it moves a foot or so. It’s not much, but it’s enough for Jesse to squeeze inside. Magnus watches helplessly as Jesse picks up Alec and pulls him further into the apartment so Ryan can push the shelves in further. “Can you fucking help me, Magnus?!”

“Fuck, yeah, sorry,” Magnus grabs the hot metal and hisses. Fuck! “Let’s do it!”

They shove against the metal as hard as they can and it slides forward another couple of feet. Enough to get Alec the hell out of there. Magnus’s hands burn but he shoves the stair chair in the doorway. “Get him in it and we’ll strap him in. I’ll need help getting him down the stairs!”

Ryan and Jesse angle Alec’s body into the chair and Magnus realizes one of the two of them must have put an oxygen mask over Alec’s face. “We’ll have to do chest compressions.”

Magnus pulls the chair out of the doorway and straps Alec’s so, so still body into it before he lines it up to the stairs. Ryan moves past him and down the stairs, turning around about halfway down. “Jesse, help him move it down. Where’s the damn stretcher?!”

Jesse takes hold of one of the handles and they ease the chair down one step. Then another. Magnus coughs into his shirt and the chair almost slides out of his grip. Jesse grabs the other end. “Come on, man. We’re almost out. We’ve got this. We can’t let him die.”

They can’t let him die. Alec could die.

Magnus’s hands still burn as he tightens his grip on the chair and they ease it down towards Ryan. Ryan helps pull it towards the door and sunshine and fresh air and safety. As they leave the building, Ryan bumps into something. “Shit, it’s the stretcher. Come on!”

It takes all three of them to untie and lift Alec out of the stair chair and onto the stretcher. Magnus loses whatever strength he has and he starts coughing roughly. Jesse grabs him and places a mask over his face. Magnus breathes in the oxygen deeply and holds it against his face with his burned hands. Fuck. They didn’t hurt as bad as this when he touched it earlier.

Raphael is giving Alec chest compressions. Ryan is pushing the stretcher towards the ambulance as Raphael works on the man Magnus loves more than anything else in the world. Magnus feels like he’s living through a nightmare as he stumbles through the white-gray haze towards the ambulance. He had to get to Alec. It should be him giving Alec CPR.

“Hey, easy, man,” Jesse grabs Magnus’s arm and helps him walk down the stone path. “He’s going to be okay. I heard him take a breath. He started choking.”

Really? How had Magnus not heard it? He allows Jesse to pull him towards the ambulance. Ryan is standing at the doors and he’s about to close them. Magnus mouths the word, “Wait,” but he can’t say it.

“Hold on, Ryan,” Jesse shouts. “He wants to see him first.”

Ryan holds the doors open and Magnus pulls himself from Jesse’s grip. He stumbles the last few feet to the bus and he looks in.

Alec’s laying on the stretcher with a mask on his face. The normally pale white skin is flushed with black from the soot. But the one thing Magnus sees that tells him Alec is okay is a flash of blue.

Blue eyes.

They’re going to be okay.

Chapter Text

There’s something poking Alec in the nostrils. He grimaces and that only makes the situation worse. The thing not only pokes his nostrils, but it also squeezes his cheeks and even his ears? What the hell could squeeze his cheeks, ears, and poke his nose all at once?

And that infernal beeping noise! It wouldn’t stop, just a constant beep, beep, beep by his head. It didn’t sound like the alarm at the station, or one of the guys’ phones. Maybe one of the guys was just trying to annoy him. Yeah, that sounded about right.

Alec blindly lifts his hand to take whatever the guys put on his face off, but he realizes there’s something heavy on his hand. Something… plastic? And stuck on there with sticky tape.

“Hey, Alec?” A woman whispers from his left. She sounds familiar. “Are you awake? Alec?”

Of course he’s awake. It was pretty obvious he’s awake. He tries to open his eyes but they feel heavy for some reason. Suddenly he remembers smoke, an old man, and Cheyenne. She was all that old man has. “Are you Cheyenne?”

“What? No, it’s Emma,” The woman whispers furiously. “Cheyenne is a cat, Alec. I’m not meowing. You must be brain damaged. Too much smoke.”

Emma? Alec struggles to open his eyes again but almost immediately closes them when the bright lights assault his vision. “Oh, spare me.”

Was that his voice? He didn’t sound remotely like himself! It sounded hoarse and like he’d spent the last fifty years smoking cigarettes. Chain smoking. With stage four lung cancer. Did he always sound like that? No way. His mom killed any desire Alec ever had to smoke, do drugs, or drink. Sugar and caffeine were the only drugs he had, and that couldn’t make him sound like this.

Smoke and fire and a cat. A metal rack. A heart attack? Or maybe his heart just plain stopped. That would explain why he felt like a train ran him over a few times.

Alec forces his eyes open again and squints in the bright light. His old caseworker sits in the chair to the left of his bed. Usually cheerful, the fifty-four year old woman’s brown hair is graying and there are lines around her eyes that hadn’t been there the last time he saw her. She tries to hide her worry when she realizes he’s awake, a remnant of being his caseworker.

“Shh!” Emma holds her finger over her lips and winks at him. “We don’t want to wake him, do we?”

Huh? Alec gives her a confused look and she nods at the wall to Alec’s right. He turns his head and freezes when he sees Magnus asleep. The older man is bunched up on a pea green loveseat that was way too small for him. His neck is at a weird angle and his arm is hanging off the loveseat. It was clear the man hadn’t fallen asleep but passed out from pure exhaustion.

“Poor thing hasn’t left your side in two days,” Emma clucks her tongue and Alec turns back to face her. “I can’t say anything. I haven’t left either. My boss is not too happy with me but whatevs. You’re my favorite kid.”

Emma is the only woman in her fifties that Alec has ever heard say “Whatevs.” He opens his mouth but she just keeps on in true Emma fashion. “I thought he was gonna ride on your bed with you to go get some scan yesterday. He argued with the tech that he wasn’t gonna leave your side. Can you believe it?” She laughs. Why didn’t you tell me you have a boyfriend? You’re holding out on me!”

The woman really is a breath of fresh air. A few breaths. Alec smiles as she keeps going on her roll. She didn’t have to stay in his life after he aged out of the system. Honestly, she’s more his mom than either Maryse Lightwood or Maya Worthington were.

When Emma stops to take a breath, Alec answers the one question he can remember from her tirade. “He’s not my boyfriend,” He clears his throat. “Not yet anyway. We had one date but it kinda ended badly.”

“Apparently not too badly,” Emma smiles at him slyly. “Not too badly because he wouldn’t be here right now if it went too badly. So do you like him?”

Alec looks back at Magnus to make sure he’s still asleep. He hisses at Emma, which makes his voice even more gravelly. “Emma!”

“What?” She whispers loudly. Too loudly. “It’s not state secrets, Alec. He likes you. I’d wager he more than likes you,” Alec blushes. “It’s okay if you don’t feel the same but you gotta be honest. You can’t be happy if you’re not honest.”

Alec rolls his eyes. “We are not talking about this in front of him. Can we talk about something else? Literally anything else.”

A strange look crosses over Emma’s face and Alec frowns. “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”

Emma nods slowly. “I’m fine. Maybe this isn’t a good time to bring this up.”

“What? Just tell me.”

“Okay,” Emma hesitates before she reaches her hand into her oversized purse and pulls out a letter. She sets it down on the movable tray and pushes it over Alec’s lap. He reaches for it but freezes when she says, “It’s from Maryse Lightwood. It arrived this morning.”

“Did you tell her what happened to me?” Alec whispers, not able to take his eyes off the envelope. “You didn’t tell her, did you?”

“No, of course not, honey,” A tan hand touches Alec’s and she squeezes it. “I wouldn’t do that to you. You’re in charge of the situation. The last time we spoke she said she wanted to send some photos of her… her family. I didn’t know if it was a good idea to show you, but apparently I have a really bad poker face.”

Alec laughs humorlessly. She really did. He frowns at the envelope. “Do you think I should look at them? It’s her family, not mine.”

“I don’t know, hon,” Emma leans back in her seat and takes her hand from his. “It might make you upset, seeing a family that you might have, under different circumstances, been a part of. Or… it might answer questions that you have.”

What would you do if it were you?”

Emma laughs. “Oh, I would have torn that letter open the moment it was handed to me. And I might have regretted that decision later. I’m more impulsive than you are though. You might get your heart hurt, and I personally believe your heart will be hurt most when you see Jace.”

Alec’s frown deepens. “Jace is the one they adopted after they gave me up right?”

“Right.”

“They shouldn’t have been allowed to do that,” Alec pushes the table away from him. “That’s not fair. They shouldn’t have gotten to give me up but then take in another kid when they decided they wanted to be parents.”

“From what I’ve been told, Jace was the son of one of their best friends. Robert was godfather and—”

“I don’t care. They didn’t want me but they wanted him! So why should I care about them?”

Alec realizes he’s gotten pretty loud and he glances guiltily at Magnus. He didn’t need to be worried because the man is still breathing lightly, still in the same position he was before. “Sorry, Em. I don’t know why I let them get to me.”

“Because you’re hurt, Alexander,” He glances at her. It wasn’t like her to use his full name. She only did it when she was in serious mom-mode with him. “They thought they were doing the right thing for you and you wound up being in a situation no one could have ever seen coming. Why don’t I go get you a snack from the cafeteria? They had donuts when I was down there last time. Or a Snickers bar. Or maybe two Snickers bars. You’ll have to hide them under your pillow if the doctors come in.”

“You’re gonna get me kicked out of here,” Alec tries to smile. “You’re gonna get arrested and they’ll call you a Snickers Smuggler. I vote for a cheese Danish. I always try to snag one whenever I come here.”

“Two cheese Danishes coming up,” Emma stands up and shoulders her bag. “And maybe I’ll snag some Snickers too, so you’re all stocked up while I go home for a nap. I’m sure Magnus wouldn’t mind going to get you some more candy if you ask.”

Alec snorts. Right. Mr. Spinach Lasagna wouldn’t mind grabbing him some candy. “Go on. I’ll be fine. I’m sure someone will come in any second now.”

“See you in a few.”

He smiles at her for real this time and sighs when she walks out of the room. That was a close call. How many times has he had a close call like that? Dying for a person was one thing but he almost kicked the bucket for a cat. A pretty cute cat, but still. He didn’t regret it though. He hopes Cheyenne is okay.

Maybe he’ll take a little nap. Talking to Emma could be exhausting on a good day and he feels practically catatonic right now.

Magnus sits up a little too fast for someone who has just woken up. There’s a little frown on his face. “Hey, Alec.”

“Hey,” Alec says slowly. “Uh, been awake long?”

Oh god. What if Magnus heard Emma ask him if he’s in love with Magnus?

Chapter Text

A giggling noise wakes Magnus up. He frowns and then grimaces in pain when he realizes his body is in a fetal position in the most uncomfortable hurt locker he’s ever experienced. His mind tells him it’s the loveseat in Alec’s room. He starts to open his eyes when another giggle happens, followed by an exasperated… Alec?!

“He’s not my boyfriend,” Alec clears his throat. “Not yet anyway. We had one date but it kinda ended badly.”

Not because of them. Magnus put the blame squarely on his mother’s shoulders. The date was great until then.

“Apparently not too badly,” Emma says smugly. “Not too badly because he wouldn’t be here right now if it went too badly. So do you like him?”

Magnus was just about to open his eyes, but he keeps them closed. He likes Alec. He more than likes him. Alec’s near death experience had made Magnus face the fact that he’s in love with Alec. Pure masochism prevents Magnus from opening his eyes. Does Alec feel the same?

Alec hisses. “Emma!”

“What?” She whispers very loudly, and Magnus has to stop himself from snorting. “It’s not state secrets, Alec. He likes you. I’d wager he more than likes you. It’s okay if you don’t feel the same but you gotta be honest. You can’t be happy if you’re not honest.”

Emma really caught on fast. Magnus and Alec both needed to be honest with each other.

“We are not talking about this in front of him. Can we talk about something else?” Alec pleads. “Literally anything else.”

Magnus shifts and prepares to open his eyes again, feeling like the worst sort of sneak, when Alec says, “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Emma pauses. “Maybe this isn’t a good time to bring this up.”

“Just tell me.”

There’s another long silence before Emma mutters, “Okay. It’s from Maryse Lightwood. It arrived this morning.”

“Did you tell her what happened to me?” Alec whispers and Magnus feels a sudden urge to hug the other man. “You didn’t tell her, did you?”

Who the hell is Maryse Lightwood, and why is Alec so upset by… whatever it is Emma just gave him?

“No, of course not, honey,” The warmth in Emma’s voice makes Magnus feel jealous. He wishes his mother talked to him like that. “I wouldn’t do that to you. You’re in charge of the situation. The last time we spoke she said she wanted to send some photos of her… her family. I didn’t know if it was a good idea to show you, but apparently I have a really bad poker face.”

Alec laughs. It’s a dull laugh that Magnus hopes he never has to hear again. “Do you think I should look at them? It’s her family, not mine.”

“I don’t know, hon,” Emma lets out a soft sigh. “It might make you upset, seeing a family that you might have, under different circumstances, been a part of. Or… it might answer questions that you have.”

Alec waits a beat. “What would you do if it were you?”

Emma laughs. “Oh, I would have torn that letter open the moment it was handed to me. And I might have regretted that decision later. I’m more impulsive than you are though. You might get your heart hurt, and I personally believe your heart will be hurt most when you see Jace.”

“Jace is the one they adopted after they gave me up right?”

Maryse Lightwood… That must be the name of Alec’s mother. Magnus feels like the worst sort of creep, sitting here silently instead of revealing he’s awake. But a part of him knows Alec needs to be having this conversation right now.

“Right.”

“They shouldn’t have been allowed to do that,” A heavy piece of plastic rocks and Magnus wonders if it’s the dinner tray. “That’s not fair. They shouldn’t have gotten to give me up but then take in another kid when they decided they wanted to be parents.”

“From what I’ve been told, Jace was the son of one of their best friends. Robert was godfather and—”

“I don’t care. They didn’t want me but they wanted him! So why should I care about them?” Alec is silent for a few seconds before he sighs. “Sorry, Em. I don’t know why I let them get to me.”

“Because you’re hurt, Alexander,” Emma’s voice is gentle. “They thought they were doing the right thing for you and you wound up being in a situation no one could have ever seen coming. Why don’t I go get you a snack from the cafeteria? They had donuts when I was down there last time. Or a Snickers bar. Or maybe two Snickers bars. You’ll have to hide them under your pillow if the doctors come in.”

Magnus tunes them out as they talk about their love of junk food. He wishes he’d just gotten up when he first woke up. But waking up to them talking about whether or not Alec loves Magnus was too tempting for him… and then it escalated into finding out more about Alec’s life than Magnus thought he should know yet. What if Alec doesn’t want him to know that his birth parents gave him away and then adopted another kid? Alec’s right. It didn’t seem fair.

Footsteps walk out of the room and Magnus waits a moment before he sits up. Alec doesn’t seem shocked that Magnus is awake. “Hey, Alec.”

“Hey,” Alec gives him a half-smile. “Uh, been awake long?”

Magnus grimaces. “Oh, well, only about since you told Emma that you’re not my boyfriend… yet.”

Alec surprises Magnus by chuckling. “Yeah, I kinda figured. You’re really bad at pretending to be asleep. No one sleeps that still. Oh, and you snore a little bit when you’re actually asleep.”

“I do not snore!” Magnus laughs too. “You should get your hearing checked while you’re in here, Snickers Smuggler.”

“I knew you were awake,” Alec rolls his eyes. “What are the chances of you getting me a Snickers?”

“Pretty low, babe, pretty low,” Magnus stretches uncomfortably, his spine popping from laying down in that position for so long. “Seriously, I’m sorry about overhearing a very obviously private conversation. It just started out as a private conversation and it never stopped being a private conversation, so I wasn’t sure when was the best time to, well, make my presence known during the private conversation.”

“Say ‘private conversation’ five times fast,” Alec smiles at him. “It’s okay. If you’re, uh, actually going to wind up as my boyfriend, no pressure, then you should know this stuff. I guess you heard about my bio mom’s letter.”

“Yeah,” Magnus glances over at the table guiltily. There’s a thick envelope on it. Full of pictures, if Emma had been right about it. “Sounds like there’s a lot of bad blood there.”

Alec nods. “Yeah. I didn’t blame them for giving me up when I was a baby. Even when things went to shit after my dad died and my mom… well, gave into her many addictions, I still didn’t blame the Lightwoods. They were only like eighteen when my bio mom got pregnant with me. They gave me up hoping that I’d have a good life, and they could have good lives too. It should have worked out because the Worthington’s were a great family. They had an open adoption too, so I could be part of the Lightwood’s lives too.”

Magnus frowns. “But things went to shit?”

“Yeah, things went to shit,” Alec looks down at the envelope, but he doesn’t look like he’s actually seeing it. His eyes are glazed over. “My dad died in a car accident. I don’t remember him. He had a really great job, but he went into debt adopting me. Mom couldn’t have kids the natural way and she was really depressed because of it. Well, losing him made her even worse. Not even I could make her happy after he was gone. She turned to drugs and alcohol. She couldn’t keep us fed because she kept showing up to work drunk or high or both, so if we did get to eat it was fast food. Sometimes I even wondered but never wanted to know if the food came from garbage cans.”

Fuck. Imagine wondering if your food came from the trash or not. Magnus has another, terrible, thought. “I know you said she accidentally set the fire. Do you think…”

He can’t say it. He just can’t say it.

“I don’t know,” Alec answers the question anyway. “I don’t know if she set the fire intentionally or not. I’d like to say no because she did love me, but maybe she couldn’t see a way out and wanted me to die with her. There was no note, but she was high on heroin, coke, and a mixture of pills. If the fire didn’t kill her the drugs might have. There was a lethal dosage in her system.”

“And your dad—”

“Same thing,” Alec looks away from him. “There was no note. It was raining and the other driver didn’t have his headlights on. We were in debt, and he could have killed himself using another driver so mom would get his life insurance policy. I’d like to think he wouldn’t do that, especially considering another driver could have died, but I don’t even remember what he looked like or acted like. Mom said he was a great guy, but he hid their money troubles from her.”

“Fuck,” Magnus blows out a breath. “So, both of your parents may or may not have committed suicide, and one of them may or may not have attempted homicide while committing suicide.”

Alec tries to smile. “Yeah. Maybe I’m cursed or something.”

“No, you’re not,” Magnus frowns at him. “You can’t help who your birth parents are or what happened to your parents. Maybe it was two accidents. You don’t know.”

“I’ll never know,” Alec slowly inches his hand forward toward the envelope. He doesn’t touch it though. “Magnus, do you think I should look at this letter? Or pictures, or whatever’s in there? I don’t want to, but I think Emma’s right. I might regret not trying to get to know them. They’re literally the only family I have left.”

Magnus looks at the envelope too. He doesn’t know what Alec should do. His father isn’t someone he ever wants to find out about, and his mother is… whatever his mother is. He doesn’t have a family either, not a real family, and he’s not sure he’s the right person to give advice on families. “I don’t know.”

“What would you do if you were in my place? If your bio father wasn’t… well, wasn’t a monumental piece of shit that deserves to have his dick cut off, I mean.”

What would Magnus do?

He looks at the envelope and chews on his bottom lip. “I… I would open it. If my father wasn’t a rapist, I would want to know what he has to say. Obviously there’s nothing he could say now that I know what he is, but before… Before I knew what he was, I wanted to know everything about him. Now the only curiosity I have is morbid. I just want to know if he’s dead and if he’s suffered. Your situation is different. They gave you up out of love. Or at least that’s what they say. They clearly still care at least a little bit if they’re still sending you letters twenty-three years later.”

Alec picks up the letter. “And if I regret it after I read it?”

“That’s a risk,” Magnus leans back in his seat. “You may regret it if you read it, and you may regret it if you don’t. Opening that letter doesn’t mean the Lightwoods are your family. Opening it doesn’t mean you’re betraying the Worthingtons. Humans have the capacity to create our own families. You can decide who is or isn’t your family.”

“Okay,” Alec mutters and opens the envelope. A small stack of photos and a piece of paper slide out. “Can you sit next to me?”

Magnus gets up from the loveseat and lies down on the bed next to Alec. They’re both too big to be on it together, but Alec doesn’t seem to care as their entire sides are pressed against each other. Alec holds the photos out to Magnus, and he takes them.

The first picture is of a young woman in her early twenties and a boy about ten. The similarity to Alec is… undeniable. “They look just like you.”

“She’s got black eyes though,” Alec rests his head on Magnus’s shoulder. “I wonder where that came from.”

Magnus flips to the next photo. “Look at that fat cat!”

“I don’t think they’d like that,” Alec points at the lettering next to the big gray beast. “His name’s Church. I wonder where that came from.”

“You might find out in the letter,” Magnus says gently and rests his head on top of Alec’s. “Let’s look at the next one… Oh, that is for sure your parents.”

Two tall, black-haired and blue-eyed people look out from the picture. They both look exactly like Alec too. Just like… “What are all their names?”

“Maryse and Robert are my parents,” Alec flips back through the pictures to one of the two siblings. “Isabelle or Izzy is my sister, and the little boy is my brother, Max. And then there’s Jace.”

Magnus pulls out a picture of a haughty, golden-haired man. “That’s Jace.”

“He looks angry,” Alec mumbles. “And cocky. I wonder what he’s angry about.”

“I don’t know,” Magnus glances down at Alec and realizes he’s falling asleep. “You can read the letter later if you want to.”

“Okay,” Alec mumbles again. “Will you stay with me?”

Magnus gently lays the pictures and letter on the tray. “They won’t be able to drag me away from you.”

As Alec falls asleep Magnus glances at the doorway. Emma is standing there with a shit eating grin and two Snickers bars.

Yeah, nothing would ever drag him away from Alec.

Chapter Text

Alec sighs as he grabs the basket of muffins one of the guys from the squad brought over this morning. He’s glad to be out of the hospital, but he’s not used to living such a sedentary life. Normally on his days off he’ll go to the park, go to the gym, or anything else to keep busy, to keep moving. Being told by the doctors to “take it easy” was one of the hardest rules he’s ever had to obey.

But as much as Alec sometimes thought he might actually have a death wish considering how stupid he was to go chasing after cats in burning buildings, he didn’t want to die. And he’d come awfully close to dying. So close that his heart actually stopped, and not in a good way like his heart skipped a beat cause he saw a really cute guy. But in a bad way like they had to perform chest compressions on him or he’d really die.

Ugh, okay. So maybe Alec should give himself a break because he did almost die, but having to stay home and do “light exercises” and “make sure he ate healthy” was getting on every last one of his nerves.

And if Magnus brought over just one more sweet potato lasagna with almond lime sauce, whatever the hell that is, Alec might chuck it out the window.

Alec stubbornly uncurls the muffin cup from around one of the chocolate chip muffins. He’s earned this muffin. He’s eaten every single one of Magnus’s concoctions without complaint, though he will never think that mushrooms don’t taste like rubber tires. One muffin would not stop his heart. Two muffins wouldn’t even do that, and if Alec ate the whole basket, then, well, he’s sure the sweet potato lasagna will counter things out eventually, right?

He glances down into the basket and spots the little note Ryan had sent with the basket. Apparently Alec would be awarded for his brave deed with the Medal of Valor Award. As much as he appreciated it, he… didn’t think he deserved the award. What he did was what most people would do for their pets. Hell, the old man would have done it. But apparently Alec went “above and beyond” for not just the old man, but the cat too, and that showed just what a brave firefighter he is.

Alec sighs and takes a bite of his muffin. What if they ask him why he became a firefighter in the first place?

‘Oh, yeah, my mom was a drunk and a drug addict who committed suicide by burning down our apartment and I survived. I wanted to save people like my mom.’

That would be a real crowd pleaser.

Maybe he could just accept the award, thank the squad, which has become his actual family over the years, and thank the people who decided to give him the award. Yep, it sounded better.

Alec lays his muffin down on the coffee table and glances at another piece of paper there. He sighs for the third time. “What am I gonna do with you?”

He picks up the letter that Maryse Lightwood sent him and his eyes scan over it. He doesn’t need to read it again, as he’s already read it so many times that he’s memorized the whole thing. He knows that Jace is engaged to his on and off girlfriend of four years. They’re getting married in a year, and Maryse said she’d send him pictures in the next letter if she doesn’t hear from him before.

Isabelle has been dating a boy in a band, Simon. Alec can tell that Maryse isn’t quite happy about this, considering how hard she dug her pen into the paper when she wrote the word “band.” Maryse wrote that when she imagines Alec, she imagines that he looks like Isabelle and Max. Well, she got that right. Alec looks almost identical to Isabelle, and damn near identical to Max with the only exception being Max wears glasses.

Max loves books. Alec had snorted when he read that line. That was it, the only thing he was being offered about his supposed brother who really looked so much like he did when he was a child. Max loves books and is quiet. Alec wonders what type of book Max likes. Maybe the reason Maryse didn’t write what kind of books Max likes is because she doesn’t understand them or doesn’t understand why he likes what he likes.

Jace is the person Alec thought he’d want to know the least about, but that was the part of the letter he had read over and over and over again each time he picked it up. His fiance’s name is Clary. Alec hadn’t been able to hold back the face he made when he first read that. Who names their kid Clary? He’s not quite a year younger than Alec. He’s pompous, which actually made Alec laugh out loud. What kind of a parent calls their own kid pompous?

That wasn’t the only insult Maryse had for her second oldest child.

Underachiever, definitely going to be a father at some point because every time he looks at Clary it looks like he’s trying to knock her up with his eyes alone and closed off when people try to talk about his feelings. But all the bad qualities are back up with something good. Beautiful piano player. Has the most beautiful singing voice too. Protective of their family, always.

Alec looks down at the phone number warily. He wants to call. He doesn’t want to call. He wants to hear her voice. He doesn’t want to hear her voice. He wants to ask her why she gave him up. He doesn’t want to ask her why she gave him up because he knows why. He just wants to hear it from her own voice. He wants to tell her he was scared when his real mother, his adoptive mother, did drugs, drank, and then burned down their home, killing herself and almost him. He wants to tell her he vowed to save people like his mom after he couldn’t save her, and he has.

Hell, he literally died to save a cat. Just for a few seconds, but still. It’s only thanks to Magnus and the others that he’s alive to tell the story.

Magnus…

Magnus thinks Alec should call the Lightwoods. He might regret it if he never does it, and the more Alec thinks about it, the more he thinks Magnus might be right. He is curious despite the anger. Who are Robert and Maryse? Isabelle, Jace, and Max? Those are questions that words on paper will never fully be able to answer.

Alec sighs and grabs his phone. His phone beeps with each number he slowly enters onto the keypad. It’s three in the afternoon. Maryse won’t answer. Surely she won’t answer. Didn’t Emma say Maryse Lightwood is some hotshot attorney or something? There’s no way she’s gonna want to answer some rando unknown number when she’s so busy with more important stuff. Definitely not.

The phone rings once, and Alec thinks about hanging it up. It rings again. And again. The anxiety starts to ease somewhat. She’s not going to answer. Maybe he could leave her a short, neutral message, and then he can decide if he answers the phone when she calls back. Maybe he would answer.

Just as the phone rings a seventh time, and the anxiety has almost completely escaped Alec’s body, a woman picks up. “Hello?”

Alec freezes. He hadn’t actually thought she would answer a phone call from an unknown number, and the number of times it rang really made him believe she wouldn’t answer. Hell, he wasn’t even sure he was going to leave a message or not.

“Hello?” Her voice is sharp. It makes Alec’s anxiety skyrocket again. Does he really want to get to know her? “Hello? Is this Jace? Damnit, Jonathan Christopher Herondale, if this is you and you’re prank calling me again, I will not be buying you that three-hundred-dollar hair cream that you wanted me to get you for your birthday. And if you are not Jace, all I have to say is that no, I don’t wish to become a Jehovah’s Witness, my car warranty is not expired, you scammer, and I seriously doubt I won a cruise that I didn’t sign up for.”

Damn, Alec likes her. He actually likes her, and she reminds him suspiciously of Emma, just without the cheery attitude, but the sarcasm is there. “I’m not Jace.”

“Look, who is this? I have a job, and I need to—”

“I’m Alec.”

Maryse pauses. “I don’t know an Alec.”

Alec chews on his bottom lip. Has Emma told Maryse that he only likes to be called Alec? Maybe not. He clears his throat. “I’m Alexander Worthington.”

Maryse is silent for so long Alec thinks she might have hung up on him, but when he pulls his phone away from his ear, he realizes he’s still connected. “Mrs. Lightwood?”

“I’m here,” Maryse breathes softly. Her voice sounds strangled when she says, “Is it really you, Alexander?”

“Yeah,” Alec swallows past a lump in his throat. “It’s me, but if you wouldn’t mind… could you call me Alec? I always think I’m in trouble when Emma calls me Alexander.”

“Of course,” Maryse says very quickly. “I’m happy you called. I wasn’t sure it was ever going to happen. I understand why though. You must be so angry at us.”

Alec presses his lips together. A part of him wants to shout at her. To tell her that he hates her. But surprisingly, that small part has shrunk over the past few days. Now he’s just tired. “Why did you give me up but adopted Jace?”

Maryse is silent for a long time again. “I was disowned when I got pregnant with you. My family was very religious, and I was ordered to get an abortion, or I would be kicked out of the house,” Alec winces. “I refused to get an abortion. I was kicked out that day. Robert’s family were kinder, but they said that it was our choice to have sex, our choice not to use protection, and our responsibility. They offered us their home, and we didn’t have to pay rent, but it was up to us to feed you, clothe you, and to get jobs.

“So we both got full time jobs even though we were in college. I worked as a waitress and Robert worked at McDonalds and on the weekends worked as a delivery driver. Alexander,” She pauses. “Sorry, Alec. It’ll take some getting used to because I’ve always called you Alexander in my head.”

“It’s okay,” Alec’s body is numb. His lips are numb. His brain and heart feel numb. “Go on.”

“It was awful,” Maryse continues. “Everything was so expensive for two eighteen-year-olds who never had to pay for more than a lip gloss or candy bar on their own. Robert’s parents were teaching us a lesson, but we were stubborn and wanted to make it work. You weren’t even born yet. We had to buy a car seat and stroller and a crib. Toys, of course, because you deserved them. Diapers. I think Robert spent an entire paycheck on diapers when I was only four months pregnant because he didn’t know what size you were going to be, and he wanted to make sure we had all we needed.

“We never had enough food to eat. We each had a meal at work, and when we were home, we ate mac and cheese out of a box and whatever we could afford that week. Robert’s mother took pity on us sometimes and fed us when his father wasn’t looking, but she did agree with him that if we wanted to act like grownups, we were going to be treated that way. Then I got fired because I kept missing days. I’d heard morning sickness only happened in the first trimester, but I had morning sickness my entire pregnancy with you, and later with Isabelle and Max.”

Alec leans his head back against the couch and he closes his eyes. “I’m guessing Robert couldn’t afford everything with his own salary.”

“No, he dropped out of college,” Maryse sighs. “He got a second full time job. He was so exhausted all the time, and I was no help either because I spent the majority of my time in the bathroom or bent over the kitchen sink. Still, you were our baby and we didn’t want to give you up. We were determined to give you a good life even if we had to struggle to do it. Then it happened.”

“It?”

Maryse’s voice changes to anger. “Robert was robbed at gunpoint while he was delivering pizza,” Alec’s eyes widen. “They stole his car. It had your car seat in it, his wallet, and a couple bags of clothes that we bought for you. The cops never found the car. Robert’s parents started offering more help, but Robert and I decided that it would be selfish of us to keep you when someone else could give you a far better life. What if you were hurt and we couldn’t drive you to the emergency room? And ambulances here can take so much time… So we gave you up to a family that we met, the Worthingtons, and asked them for an open adoption so we could get to know you. You chose not to, which is your right, and I don’t blame you for.”

“But,” Alec mumbles. “What about Jace? You adopted him after you gave me up.”

“About seven years later, sweetheart,” Alec’s heart squeezes at the endearment. It’s not unwelcome, strangely. “We both went back to school after you were born, and we both got our degrees, got decent jobs. It was a struggle when Isabelle was born, but not as much as before. Then one of Robert’s old friends passed away, leaving behind Jace. I was at first resistant. I, like you, thought it was hypocritical, but we were the only people that Jace knew. Isabelle was the only person that could get him to talk after his father died. I know you must hate us for this, but we decided to try to give him the life that we wanted so desperately for you. We also tried to adopt you after your… your mother died, but you didn’t wish to meet us. So we tried to give Jace a good life. The life we hoped the Worthingtons would give you.”

Alec’s eyes start to feel wet, and he swipes his hand against them. “They tried.”

“We know about the fire,” Maryse says softly. “And we know that you’ve become a firefighter because of it. It might not mean much, but we’re so proud of you.”

“It does mean much,” Alec squeezes the bridge of his nose. “I mean, it means something. I really think I’d like to go now.”

“Okay,” Maryse’s voice gets softer again. He has to struggle to hear her. “Would… Would you like Robert’s phone number? Or Isabelle’s? Max doesn’t have a phone yet, much to his chagrin.”

“Yeah,” Alec shifts in his seat. He really wants to get off the phone right now before he embarrasses himself by crying where she can hear. “Could you text me the numbers? Can I call you back in a couple days or something?”

“Of course,” Maryse clears her throat. “I’m so happy you called. I’ll let Robert and Isabelle know you might get a hold of them. Call me anytime and I’ll pick up, okay?”

“Okay,” Alec mumbles. “Bye.”

“Goodbye, Alexander.”

Alec hits the red button and tosses his phone on the couch. His chin quivers and he covers his face with his hands. He never thought they actually wanted him. He always thought they didn’t want him. And then when he found out about Jace, Isabelle, and Max… that just made it clearer that they didn’t want Alec specifically.

But they did. They did want him. They want him now.

Chapter Text

Magnus leans back in his seat and closes his eyes as he waits for his shift to end. It’s been a slow night. Slower than usual, considering they live in New York. It was maybe his favorite part about living in New York. There was always something going on.

Stove fires, broken legs while doing parkour at the skate park, old grannies that think they’re having a heart attack when it is a palpitation, or just a good ol’ panic attack. Cats trapped in trees are his favorite calls. Those normally go to the fire department, but they do have a police scanner in the truck. On more boring days like this one, Raphael can’t help himself but to speed to the person’s house to rescue the cat before the fire truck can get there.

But it wasn’t all cats and helping little old ladies. Sometimes it was the kind of stuff that made Magnus wonder if he really chose the right career.

Then there were the calls that made Magnus seriously considering drowning himself in a bottle after the shift. Muggings, cabbies getting into fights with riders because the rider tries to ride and dash, car accidents, dumbasses jaywalking when there’s a crosswalk not ten fucking feet away from them, and paying the price for not using that crosswalk, and more. One of Magnus’s least favorites is the people that jump in front of the subway train. There isn’t anyone to save. But that person usually leaves behind a crowd of hyperventilating or screaming people that will never be able to bleach that image from their brains. It’s them Magnus and Raphael have to attend to, and what can you say to make them feel better?

Those are bad days.

Raphael jumps into his seat and hands him a bowl from their favorite Mexican place. The other man starts digging into his bowl with gusto, smacking lips, and crunching chips. Magnus stares down at his bowl that he usually loves, but right now his stomach is churning at the thought of death. The taco beef looks like brains, which Magnus wishes he could say he’s never seen before in real life, but he has, after a nasty suicide.

Magnus lowers the bowl to his lap and looks out the window. Part of him wishes the radio would crackle and let them know someone needed them to help, but it remains silent. Hell, he’d even take a cat in a tree right now. It wouldn’t be quite as heroic as Alec was, but they could be known as the paramedic and firefighter that risked their lives for cats.

Alec… Magnus has never felt so proud of the other man than he is right now. Finding out that Alec got the courage up to call his biological mother was huge. He understood how hard that had to have been, considering his own mother hates his fucking guts.

“You’re not eating that expensive bowl I bought you,” Raphael says between bites. “You’re not feeling suicidal, are you?”

Magnus makes a face at Raphael. “What?”

Raphael drags a chip through a big glop of sour cream, lettuce, taco meat, and cheese. “Paramedics have a high suicide rate. At least compared to normal people,” Magnus’s jaw drops. Normal people?! “You’ve gotten real quiet like you did after that twenty-year-old jumped in front of a train last year. I figured you might be contemplating the big S.”

“I’m not contemplating the big S!” Magnus hisses. “I’m just being quiet. Is that not allowed?”

“I’m just saying, maybe some therapy might help you out. It helps me get through all the shit we see.”

Magnus’s jaw snaps shut, and he stares at Raphael. He didn’t know Raphael had a therapist. That wasn’t the kind of thing the two of them talked about. “I wouldn’t know where to look.”

“I’ll ask my therapist if she can take you on,” Raphael crunches through some more of his chips. “But I’m just warning you; she can be mean. She called me, me, lazy and unmotivated. Can you believe that?”

“Uh,” Magnus feels his face start to turn bright red. “No?”

“You’re a dick. I’ll have you know I am only lazy and unmotivated fifty, sixty percent of the time.”

Magnus’s phone rings in his pocket and he grabs for it, relieved not to have to respond to that. The relief disappears when he sees his mother’s name flash on his screen. “Oh, fuck.”

“What?” Raphael leans across the seat to look at Magnus’s phone. “Fuck balls! What does she want?!”

Fuck balls? Where does Raphael come up with this stuff?

Magnus slides the red bar and lets the call go to voicemail. “I don’t want to hear what she has to say. She pretty much said it all last time when she told me I was a rapist’s baby, and she hates me.”
The phone almost immediately starts to ring again, and Magnus slides the red bar again. “Nope, I’m not dealing with her right now.”

“I mean… you might regret not answering her calls,” Raphael says, and Magnus can hear himself say similar words to Alec. The only difference is Alec wasn’t neglected by Maryse Lightwood for thirty years. “Answer it, hear what she’s got to say, and tell her to fuck off if that’s what you want. What she’s done to you is awful, but what if she’s calling you for help or answers about your father. You might regret not taking that call then.”

Magnus can’t believe he’s about to take Raphael’s advice twice in one day. Maybe he really does need a therapist. He stares at his phone as it lights up again. Three calls in just a few minutes… She’s never called him, once, his entire life. And yet right now she’s doing it three times.

He can still go no contact after this. One phone call, and then no contact. If Alec is brave enough to call the woman who abandoned him, he can be brave enough to call the woman who neglected him.

“Can you give me a minute,” Magnus mutters as he slides the green bar this time and presses the phone against his ear. “What do you want, Amalia?”

Raphael grabs the bowl from Magnus’s lap and his own before leaping out of the ambulance. Magnus knows the other man is going to the back to pig out, and, let’s be honest, try to listen in on Magnus’s conversation. “Amalia?”

“Yes, hello, Magnus,” Amalia sounds fine. She doesn’t sound hurt, or anything, so Magnus can’t think why she’d want to speak to him. “You’ve never called me that before.”

“What am I supposed to call you, Amalia?” Magnus’s jaw tightens, and he fights the urge to cry. He should be past that now. He should be past her ability to hurt him. “You made it perfectly crystal clear at the hospital that I am not your son in any way that counts. If you have a medical emergency, I suggest you call the police and I might be the person that takes care of you, but I probably won’t be. We can go the rest of our lives not speaking to each other, and I’m sure you’ll be pleased with that.”

Look,” Amalia sighs. “I regret my words. I’ve always blamed you for what that man did to me, but that’s not fair. You just look… like him. You look so much like him, and whenever I see you, I get so angry. I know it’s not fair to you. The things I did to you when you were growing up weren’t fair. I need you to understand that.”

“I get it,” Magnus looks at the radio, desperately wishing for it to turn on and tell him he’s needed to save someone, anyone, just so he can get off the phone. “I can’t begin to understand what happened to you, but… I’m sorry, but I wish you had given me up for adoption. I even wish you had just left me on the side of the road at birth rather than raise me. Being on the streets would have given me a better chance than you did. You fucked me up for life. Camille, Catarina, and Ragnor are the only people who have ever loved me. And now Alec loves me. Four people in thirty years, and you aren’t one of them.

“Do you know how fucked up that can make someone?” Magnus realizes he’s shouting, but he can’t stop. “Do you know that I was the only person at my kindergarten graduation who didn’t have a parent there? Or my elementary graduation? Or my middle school graduation? Or high school? I’d long accepted by then that you didn’t give a flying fuck whether I lived or died, but you could have shown up when your son graduated Salutatorian. It’s not just that either.

“You couldn’t show up for me when Camille and I got in that car accident when we were sixteen,” Magnus wipes angrily at his face. The tears burn his skin. “I was crying at the hospital while I waited for you to show up. They even sent in a social worker because you couldn’t stop watching your TV shows long enough to make sure your son was alive or not. I had to come home and tell you I was alive. Do you remember what you said when I told you that? Because I’ll never forget it. You said ‘okay,’ and went back to your show.

“So…” Magnus takes a deep gulping breath. “So leave me alone. You’re not my mom. You’re barely a mother. I’m sorry about what happened to you, but I’m not the one that did it to you. You had choices and you chose to have me and you chose to neglect me and you chose to torture me emotionally if not physically because you couldn’t hurt the man who did this to you. I don’t know why you’ve had this change of heart, and I don’t care. You’re thirty years too late. If you need help medically, I will be there because I swore an oath to protect people, but other than that, you have friends you can call. I refuse to be your emotional punching bag anymore. Delete my number and have a good life, Amalia. That’s what you want, isn’t it? Me gone? Well, you’ve got your wish. Goodbye.”

Magnus quickly lowers his phone, ends the call, blocks Amalia’s number, and deletes it. He realizes he’s hyperventilating, and he can’t remember if he’s supposed to tilt his head forward between his legs or tilt it back and breathe. What kind of fucking paramedic is he?

“Hey, Magnus?”

“I don’t want that fucking bowl, Raphael,” Magnus wipes the tears and snot from his face, but they still come, but his breathing does start to ease. “You can eat it.”

“How heartless do you think I am?” Raphael tentatively gets up into the seat next to Magnus, but Magnus doesn’t look at him. “For the record, I think you did the right thing. And my therapist would tell you that too, I think.”

Magnus snorts. “Sure, she definitely would tell me I did the right thing by telling a rape victim to never speak to me again.”

“I think she would,” Raphael pats Magnus awkwardly on the shoulder. “It’s not your fault, Magnus. What happened to her is awful, but, and I think it’s very important you realize this, you’re a victim of your fathers too. And her. She had options, and she chose the one that would mess you up the most.”

She had. Magnus bites his lip and nods, unable to speak. Raphael pats him on the shoulder again and starts to eat Magnus’s bowl.

He can have it. Magnus would buy Raphael the entire restaurant for this advice.

He’s not his mother’s son, not really. He can’t fix or help her. He can’t change who his father is either.

Magnus has to let her go, and that may be the hardest thing he’s ever done in his life.