Chapter Text
Growing up, Alastair carstairs thought he was smart. He had to be, to keep his fathers ‘illness’ a secret, to lie to his sister, to convince his mother he wasn’t drowning under the weight of her expectations and society’s hatred. He taught himself 8 languages, aced all of his classes at the academy despite the other boys bullying, he taught himself all about mundane culture and how their technology worked, he even took to reading the mundane newspapers to further his knowledge of the world. Which is why, when he became involved with Charles Fairchild, Alastair told himself he knew exactly what he was doing.
It started when he was fifteen. Alastair attended a function at the London institute, Cordelia wanted to visit Lucie but his father was too drunk to supervise her visit so Sona sent Alastair to accompany her. He spent most of the ball attempting to hide from the merry thieves, successfully avoiding both Matthew and James, managing to extract himself fairly quickly from a conversation with Christopher regarding some form of science and had a rather pleasant encounter with Thomas lightwood. He had been counting down the hours before he could leave since he’d arrived and finally it had turned into counting down the minutes. And then came Charles Fairchild.
Five years older than Alastair, a good few inches taller and incredibly more confident than him, Alastair was instantly infatuated. Having spent most of his life longing for things he could never have, Alastair saw no problem with privately harbouring a crush on the consuls son. So he spent the next year hoping and longing that the older man would give him the time of day. They met frequently within those twelve months, but never as anything more than acquaintances. Friends really. Such good friends that the consul herself began to greet Alastair warmly whenever she saw him. Eventually that friendship turned into stolen kissed behind locked doors and occasionally more behind even more locks. It meant nothing though, Charles had said as much the first time it had happened, and Alastair had been so in shock and so elated to be given a chance with his idol that he agreed without hesitation. Alastair lied, he thought he’d been falling in love with the consuls son for over a year but he knew he had the first time they’d kissed. Not that he’d ever tell Charles that. So ‘friends’ is all they were. Until Paris.
Alastair was on his travel year. Charles was the interim head of the Paris institute. Technically, Charles was engaged to a Miss Ariadne Bridgestock, whom Alastair had never met, but he was assured that she would not mind, she herself preferred the company of the same sex and there was never any intention to actually marry on either side. So when Charles asked Alastair to come to his room after everyone was asleep, Alastair agreed. And when Charles had whispered into the darkness that he had feelings for the other boy Alastair could barely hide his smile and all he could do was whisper ‘good I feel the same’ before Charles was telling him that they could never be together, that nobody could ever find out and sending him back to his own room. But when Charles asked him over again the following day, Alastair agreed. And the day after that. And the one after that. Until Alastair Carstairs had been sneaking into Charles Fairchild’s Paris bedroom for 3 months and considered them wholly in love with each other.
And that was where the problems started. At the beginning of their arrangement, Charles was kind to Alastair. Kind in a way no one ever had been before. But as time went on and Alastairs feelings progressed, Charles’ kind words seemed to slow to a stop. What used to be loving words and longing glances turned into quick greetings and even quicker dismissals and Alastair did nothing to stop it. How could he? When his whole life love had been conditional? When everyone who’d ever cared about him had gotten bored eventually and begun to resent him?
Even though he was used to it, even Alastair had a breaking point. He told Charles he was feeling unwell and, knowing he wouldn’t bother to check on him, he snuck out of his bedroom window like the reckless teenager he never got to be and decided to explore paris the way he’d wanted to since arriving. He wanted to visit the places he’d loved in his childhood and hope they’d still bring out the same joy in him as they had back then. He’d thought he might buy a new book and read it next to the Seine, so he’d visited his favourite bookshop in the city in search of one worth his time and money. He didn’t leave with a new book but he did leave with Thomas lightwood. Those two days spent with him were the best two Alastair had had since he arrived in the city, which filled him with both childlike hope and a deep sense of guilt. So he told Thomas he was leaving the city and resolved to stay inside the institute until Thomas had gone back to Madrid.
Eventually, Alastair returned to Cirenworth and Charles returned to London and they saw each other infrequently and exchanged short letters only slightly more frequently. That is until Cordelia came barrelling into his room yelling about how excited she was to move to London to become parabati with Lucie. When Alastair asked his mother she admitted it was to try and salvage their families reputation amid Elias’s trial but Alastair couldn’t find it in him to be that upset about the sudden move. London meant Charles.
What Alastair had failed to remember, is that London also meant Ariadne. More specifically, it meant Ariadne being engaged to Charles. It meant hiding his love for Charles and meeting in the darkest corridors of the institute. It meant talking to Ariadne Bridgestock and discovering that Charles had deceived them both. It meant Charles coming to his house, not to apologize or to admit he was wrong, but to try and convince Alastair to live his life the way Charles wanted. It meant Cordelia giving him worried glances whilst knowing entirely too much about the things he’d tried to keep hidden from her. It meant slowly, quietly, loosing the only remaining shreds of his original personality until all he had left was his pride. It was that pride that caused him to break things off. It was that pride that couldn’t stand by and watch as Charles broke off his first engagement and became entangled with Grace Blackthorn. It was that pride that caused him to send charles a letter. And the resulting pride in himself that caused him to dye his hair back to its original black.
Charles Fairchild had made Alastair Carstairs feel a lot of things, but Alastair never expected him to make him feel naive. He hated feeling naive. It was how he’d felt when he’d discovered his fathers problem, how he’d felt every time he had relapsed after saying he’d give the drink up, how he’d felt after arriving at the academy hopeful only to have those hopes dashed. So he sent him a letter calling off their little arrangement.
Alastair Carstairs had a lot of regrets in life. He considered himself a person who’d made many mistakes but Charles Fairchild was the worst of them. Out of all the things he’d done, all the things he regretted, Charles was the only one he couldn’t put down to self preservation or protecting his family. He was the only one that was entirely bad for him, no good had come from that relationship, it was the unhealthiest part of Alastair’s existence. But he managed to cut it out before it was too late. He managed to resolve one of his regrets, so maybe he could fix some more mistakes? Maybe he could get the merry thieves to listen to him, to let him apologize for how he acted at the academy? He wouldn’t tell them the reasons but maybe they would hear him out anyway. Maybe then he could ask for forgiveness from Consul Fairchild and Mr Lightwood. Maybe then he could start to forgive himself.