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Chapter Text

The kitchen is too bright.

That’s Henry’s first real thought as he steps onto the set of MasterChef for the first day of filming. Not I’m nervous, or I hope I make it past the first challenge, but simply: it’s too bright.

It’s the kind of light that makes every imperfection visible. The kind that hums at the edge of perception, curling down the back of his neck, whispering: you don’t belong here.

He knows it’s deliberate. The producers want nerves. Want shine. Want sweat. This is television, not therapy, and it’s only a kitchen if you squint.

Still, beneath the fluorescence, behind the gleaming metal counters and the precisely arranged appliances and measuring cups, there is the promise of a kitchen. Ingredients waiting. Stations prepped. The quiet thrill of a challenge about to begin.

Henry exhales. One long, measured breath. He smooths a hand down his apron, fingers brushing over the embroidered “Henry” like it doesn’t quite belong to him yet.

Eighteen contestants this year, not twenty. He heard one of the producers say they were aiming for quality over quantity–higher pressure, tighter competition. Every single person here is polished, competent, and probably used to being the best in the room.

Which is fine.

Henry doesn’t need to be the best. He just wants to be good enough to stay.

He surveys the room. A handful of contestants are chatting in clusters–nervous, bubbly, peacocking. One woman is already organizing her spice rack alphabetically. Another guy is fiddling with his knives like he’s about to audition for a sword fight.

Henry doesn’t speak. Doesn’t drift. He finds his station, neatly labeled Station 3, and begins wiping the counter even though it’s already spotless.

A grounding ritual.

🍰🍓

He didn’t plan on doing this. Not really.

He moved to New York a few years ago for grad school–a master’s in comparative literature at NYU that he finished with distinction and a persistent anxiety tic in his jaw. Getting back into baking started as a way to stop overthinking.

A way to make something that didn’t require thesis statements or footnotes.

Just flour, sugar, butter, time.

Turns out he was good at it. Good in the way that didn’t need reinventing. Henry doesn’t chase innovation. He chases balance.

Structure. Precision. Thoughtful sweetness.

He hadn’t even meant to apply to MasterChef.

It was Pez–of course it was Pez–who filled out the first half of the application while Henry was elbows-deep in a pâte sucrée and muttering about his custard setting unevenly.

“You need something to do with this talent, darling,” Pez had said, typing with one hand and eating an almond croissant with the other. “Besides making me emotionally dependent on your tart shells.”

Henry had rolled his eyes and ignored him. But two weeks later, when the producers called to schedule an interview, Pez screamed so loudly he startled the building’s cat.

“I told you,” Pez said, breathless, beaming, pressing Henry’s cheeks between both hands. “You’re going to ruin them. With flavor and cheekbones, my darling.”

And now here Henry is. Somehow.

In a soundstage kitchen, thousands of miles from home, about to be judged by strangers for a dish that might be torn apart on national television.

Because his best friend believed in him when he didn’t yet know how to believe in himself.

Because somewhere, deep down, he still wants to make something that would’ve made his father proud.

🍰🍓

“Cameras rolling in thirty seconds,” a voice calls out–one of the producers, clipboard in hand, earpiece tucked sharply behind one ear.

The contestants straighten up. The mood shifts, a collective inhale. The camera crew fans out, lenses glittering like insects, hovering for the right angle. One producer hovers near Station 6 with a slightly predatory gleam in her eye, already identifying potential drama magnets.

Henry adjusts his collar. Keeps his hands folded. He’s done his mise en place. His station is clean.

His mind is… mostly.

And then someone walks in like they own the whole goddamn kitchen.

He hears the voice before he sees the man attached to it.

“Damn, this is nice. Way fancier than my tiny ass apartment kitchen.”

It’s a smooth voice, bright and full of swagger, Southern-twanged and comfortable in a way that immediately grates on Henry’s nerves.

The guy drops his bag at Station 6, three stations down. He’s tall– unfairly tall–and broad through the shoulders, with dark, unruly curls and the kind of face that knows it’s good-looking. His smile is wide, bright as the lights overhead, and his apron is already crooked, like he couldn’t be bothered to center it.

He’s the opposite of subtle. Everything about him screams: look at me! 

“Alex Claremont-Díaz,” he says, loud enough to make the producer near him perk up like a shark catching blood in the water. “Austin, Texas. Just graduated from law school–but honestly? I’d rather make enchiladas than argue about zoning codes.”

A few of the other contestants laugh. The cameras swing toward him instantly. He knows exactly where they are–Henry can see it in the way he angles his body, performs just enough charm to play as natural.

He’s a showman, Henry thinks. Of bloody course he is.

Law school. Loud. Overconfident. Probably calls people “babe” in arguments and means it.

Alex gives a little wave and tosses a wink to the girl at Station 5. Henry hates that it works.

He returns to organizing his equipment.

🍰🍓

A moment later, Henry becomes acutely aware of someone standing much too close to his left.

“British, huh?”

The voice is familiar– too familiar, already.

Warm. Cocky. Amused. 

Henry doesn’t look up. “Good ear.”

“I’m Alex.”

Like that’s a revelation. 

“I heard.”

He hears the smile in Alex’s voice. “You always this friendly, or am I special, sweetheart?”

“Special,” Henry deadpans. “You’re exceptionally irritating.”

Alex lets out a delighted huff. “Cool. I like you already.”

Henry does look up now. Slowly.

Alex is leaning against the edge of his counter, towel slung casually over one shoulder, elbow propped like this is his personal café and not a highly competitive culinary gauntlet. His eyes are dark brown, deep and sharp, and irritatingly expressive. Devastatingly brilliant. 

He’s still smiling. Unbothered.

“Fox, right?” Alex says. “That your actual name, or are you secretly a spy-slash-pastry chef?”

Henry blinks. “It’s my name.”

“And baking’s your thing?”

“It’s one of them.”

Alex grins. “Sweet. I’m more of a flavor brawler myself. No rules, just vibes.”

Henry has no idea what that means. He refuses to ask.

Instead, he turns back to his cutting board and says, with all the chilly clarity of a glacier, “Your station’s over there.”

Alex doesn’t move.

“I know. Just thought I’d say hi. You’ve got this whole mystery-academic vibe. Thought maybe you needed some chaos to balance it out.”

Henry cuts a glance toward him. “You think you’re chaos?”

“Oh, baby,” Alex says, with a wink, “I’m a walking heatwave.”

Henry’s expression doesn’t change. But internally?

He is already exhausted.

🍰🍓

🍰🍓

When Henry was eight, he believed his dad could do anything.

Arthur Fox was quiet in that rare, golden way–like someone who never raised his voice because he didn’t need to. He worked with his hands. Always had something in the garden or the garage or the oven, depending on the season. Henry used to trail after him on weekends like a shadow in socks, asking questions, touching everything he wasn’t supposed to.

But the kitchen? That was sacred. That was theirs.

Arthur baked with patience. He believed butter softened best on the windowsill. That pies should cool with the window open. That jam was a form of honesty. And that no child should go to bed without licking the spoon.

Henry believed all of it. Not because he understood it–he was eight–but because it felt true. And because no one in the world made a blackberry crumble like his dad. Sticky-sweet. Tart at the edges. Always served warm with cream.

He still remembers the sound of his dad humming in the kitchen.

The smell of nutmeg and vanilla.

The way it felt to be safe.

But then came the summer of hushed voices. Of doctor’s visits. Of quiet dinners and growing silences and the way his mum stopped singing in the car.

Cancer.

Of course it was cancer. It always is, in stories like this.

Arthur tried to keep baking. He did. But his hands started shaking, and the smell of cinnamon began to make Henry feel sick with guilt. By the time he was ten, he couldn’t look at a pie crust without wanting to cry.

Arthur passed just after Henry turned twelve. Quietly. Too fast.

The kitchen went still after that. The house, too.

🍰🍓

Bea–his sister–folded inward. She was fifteen, brittle at the edges and already too sharp for their mother to handle. She turned to pills, then to things Henry didn’t understand until much later. He tried to talk to her, but she stopped listening. Or maybe he stopped knowing how to say what needed saying.

It took years. Years of hospital visits and begging and fury and distance and silence. Henry was the one who finally got through. Who found her in a bathroom, sobbing into her knees, and said, “I need you to come back. Please. Come back.”

She did. Eventually. And she’s still here, now. Healing, like he is. They talk again. Sometimes they laugh.

Sometimes she texts him photos of scones he taught her how to make.

He saves every single one.

🍰🍓

Philip, though–there’s nothing to be done about Philip.

Their older brother turned into the kind of man who used the word lifestyle like it was an insult. Who rolled his eyes every time Henry so much as mentioned another boy. Who said things like “you’ll grow out of it” and “don’t make this your whole personality.”

Henry did grow out of something, in the end.

He grew out of trying to make his family into people they weren’t.

🍰🍓

He left London the day after his Oxford graduation. Suitcase in one hand, his father’s pastry piping tips in the other. He got into NYU on an academic scholarship for his master’s in comparative literature, where he wrote a thesis on how food functions as memory in postwar diasporic narratives–how recipes survive exile, how meals become mourning, how kitchens remember what people forget.

It was the first time he realized that cooking could be a kind of language.

And that he’d been speaking it his whole life.

New York was noise and grit and loneliness. And it was Percy.

Percy–Pez, like the sweets Henry used to hoard as a kid. Raspberry sherbets. Lemon bonbons. Fizzy strawberry drops that burned his tongue a little but made him feel steady when the world didn’t.

Pez had always reminded him of that kind of sweetness: loud, bright, a little chaotic, and impossible not to love.

They’d met in London, back when Henry still wore grief like a second skin and tried to fold himself into polite shapes. Pez never let him. Pez was everything he wasn’t–open where Henry was careful, shameless where Henry was guarded, outrageous in floral shirts that shouldn’t work but somehow did. Pez cracked him open with color and noise and care disguised as irreverence.

When Henry left London, Pez followed. Moved in with him like it was obvious–like there hadn’t been a question–and simply… stayed.

And together, they built something warm in a city that could be so cold.

Not a flat. Not just a kitchen.

A home.

Made of late-night playlists and takeout containers, chipped mugs and croissant experiments. A place where Henry didn’t have to apologize for the dark days, or explain the silence, or pretend the smell of cinnamon didn’t still make his chest ache.

Pez became his home.

His anchor.

His real sibling.

It was Pez who encouraged him to bake again.

Who said, “I know you miss him. But you don’t have to stop loving him just to keep going.”

Who took photos of every single tart Henry ever made, even the lopsided ones. Who saw sweetness in Henry even when all he felt was bitter. Who filled out half the MasterChef application while Henry stood there, flustered, elbow-deep in pastry and self-doubt.

Now, standing in the MasterChef kitchen under a thousand watts of light and more cameras than comfort, Henry Fox wishes he could reach for Pez’s voice like a talisman.

Instead, he takes a breath.

He’s not here for fame. Or spectacle. Or confetti finales.

He’s here to cook. To bake. To put something warm and real on a plate and say, this is mine. 

He’s here to build something soft in a hard place.

🍰🍓

🍰🍓

The challenge is bread.

Sixty minutes. Any cuisine, any interpretation. But the star has to be the bread–baked, proofed, fried, or torn apart on the plate. Something creative. Something technically sound.

Henry feels the familiar hum of adrenaline settle into his bones–not panic, not yet. Just focus. That near-sacred feeling he gets only when he's baking under pressure. The rest of the world peels away. The cameras blur. The lights dull to background noise. It's just him and the flour.

He moves like he’s already mapped out the hour in his head. Measured grace. Quiet hands. He’s doing a savoury bread pudding with caramelized shallots, rosemary, and a soft goat cheese béchamel, served with a sharp apple cider reduction. A dish that walks the line between comfort and clarity.

It’s a risk–bread pudding isn’t flashy. But if he gets the texture right, if he layers the flavor and hits the reduction perfectly, it’ll speak for itself.

Baking, for Henry, has always been a kind of sanctuary. A mind palace. A place to go when the world felt too loud, too sharp-edged. The mixing, the measuring–it centers him. There's math in it, but also magic. There's control, yes, but also a bit of surrender. Watching the rise, the fall, the transformation.

Flour coats his forearms like chalk dust. He wipes his palms down the sides of his apron and starts the shallots, the sweet hiss of them hitting butter like a sigh he didn’t know he was holding.

This is where he feels most like himself.

This is the part of him no one ever managed to touch.

Until now.

Because then there's Alex two stations down, somehow turning bread into a goddamn event.

Henry glances over–just once. Just enough to regret it.

Alex has flour streaked across his jaw. His sleeves are rolled up. He's working on something Henry can’t ever hope to name at first glance, and it’s layered with lime zest and hibiscus glaze and–was that mezcal in the dough? What kind of bloody madman puts mezcal in bread?

And worse–he’s doing it with a goddamn smirk. 

He's talking while he works, too–of course he is–answering questions from one of the producers and tossing flour-dusted quips like he’s the host of his own cooking show. His hands are moving fast, confidently, and yet he’s not rushing. He moves like he trusts himself.

Henry hates how much he wants to watch.

Wants to know what Alex’s dish smells like.

Wants to know what Alex tastes like–Christ, no, stop that.

He drags his attention back to his own prep, but it lingers–just a little too long.

When the timer’s down to ten minutes, Henry’s plating. His hands move with sharp efficiency. His reduction is just thick enough to coat the back of a spoon, and the bread pudding has the perfect wobble. Golden edges, soft in the center. He checks for microgreens, then decides against them. He wants the flavor to speak, not the garnish.

He sets his plate at the front of his station, steps back, and exhales.

And then he hears Alex say, “Well, I hope y’all are ready to cry, because this is the best thing I’ve ever made.”

Henry turns. Slowly.

And sees Alex presenting his plate like it’s a love letter.

And God. It kind of is.

It’s a tear-apart loaf, glazed and steaming, with pockets of hibiscus soaked into the crumb and lime zest curled like ribbons over the top. Alex explains it in that smooth, showman voice–how it’s inspired by his abuela, by Día de los Muertos, by the balance between sweet and smoke and memory.

And for a moment, Henry is just–gone. 

He watches Alex like he’s watching something dangerous. Something exquisite. Something that could unravel him if he isn’t careful.

The kind of man who could taste every soft place you try to hide.

He snaps out of it when a producer nudges him forward. It’s his turn to present.

He walks to the front, dish in hand, spine straight. Eyes forward. Pretending he doesn’t still see flour on Alex’s jaw. Pretending he doesn’t want to wipe it away with his thumb.

🍰🍓

The judges stand before them. Tension coils across the room like a held breath.

“Three standout dishes tonight,” says one of the judges. “Beautiful technique, flavor, and interpretation. And those dishes belonged to…”

A beat. Then:

“Alex. Sabrina. Henry.” 

Henry hears his name and doesn’t react. Not outwardly. But he feels something unlock in his chest.

Next to him, Alex grins. “You’re gonna have to try harder if you wanna knock me off the leaderboard, Fox.”

Henry doesn’t look at him. “I’ll win with flavor. Not theatrics.”

“Men,” Sabrina mutters on his other side, “I swear to God.”

🍰🍓

In the weeks that follow the bread challenge, Henry does what he’s always done: he tries to stay focused.

There are dishes to cook. Judges to impress. Cameras to dodge. He buries himself in prep lists and plating strategies, calculated risk-taking and low-sodium ambition.

And yet.

No matter how hard he tries to keep his eyes on the cutting board, his focus on the food, his heart locked behind flour and fire–Alex Claremont-Díaz keeps getting in the way.

It starts with proximity.

They’re almost never on the same team, but their stations are always nearby… too nearby. Like the producers know what they’re doing. Like they’ve scented the tension and decided to bottle it for ratings.

Henry catches glimpses of Alex all the time now: licking a spoon clean before tossing it into the sink, bouncing on the balls of his feet while waiting for water to boil, mouthing along to the Beyoncé song humming in the back of the studio when the mic boom isn’t close enough to catch it.

He’s… a lot.

Not in the way people say it when they mean too much. Not in a way that makes Henry flinch.

Just–bright. Blinding, sometimes. Like staring into the sun and daring it to blink first.

He’s loud and fast and brazen, yes, but the problem–the real problem–is that Henry is starting to understand the shape of it. Starting to see the rhythm behind the chaos.

Alex doesn’t talk to fill silence. He talks like it keeps him steady. Like it’s a heartbeat he can control.

He laughs like it buys him time.

He moves like the world is always one step from slipping away, and he’s determined to dazzle it into staying.

He cooks like it’s the only place he doesn’t have to prove anything. And that’s the thing that undoes Henry the most.

Not the noise, but the meaning underneath it.

Alex cooks like he’s running out of time. Like cooking is the only thing that’s ever made him feel steady. Like every dish is a plea hanging from his lips to something he’s terrified to lose.

There’s passion in it–not just confidence, but hunger. Heat. Heart. 

And watching it–watching him–makes something old and aching flicker to life in Henry’s chest.

Because that’s how his dad used to cook, too.

Like it mattered. Like it was sacred.

Like the kitchen was the last place in the world where you were allowed to feel everything, all at once.

Henry tells himself to look away. To focus on his own dish. But he doesn’t. Can’t.

Because Alex Claremont-Díaz is a storm in motion, and Henry is standing in the doorway, drenched and breathless and suddenly not so sure he wants to come inside.

🍰🍓

The challenges start to blur.

Not in a forgettable way–each one sharpens them, stretches them, pushes them harder–but in the way life starts to blur when you’re moving too fast to catch your breath. When adrenaline becomes muscle memory. Heat, rush, plating. Judging, breath held. Interviews under too-bright lights. And then, do it all again.

It becomes routine. Then instinct. Then something like intimacy.

Not with the others. Not with the cameras.

Just with the food.

And–God help him–with Alex.

Still, even as the days bleed together, there are some moments Henry can’t forget.

There’s a tart challenge, and Henry is in his element. Lavender crème pâtissière, brûléed fig slices, a sable crust so precise it could hold its shape under a microscope. He’s calm, steady, locked in. He doesn't look up from his station once. Doesn’t need to.

When the judges taste it, one of them mutters “flawless” like they forgot the camera was on.

Henry doesn’t smile. But he feels it–like a wire pulled tighter inside his chest.

He wins that round. Quietly, cleanly.

He’s packing up his tools when Alex walks past and bumps his shoulder, not quite gently.

“Show-off,” Alex mutters, but there’s no bite to it.

Henry turns to reply, some dry retort already halfway to his mouth, but Alex is already grinning–sharp and low and maybe a little impressed.

Henry looks away before he says something ridiculous. Like thank you. Or say it again. Please. 

A few days later, there's a challenge centered around family comfort food. Dishes that say home. 

Alex makes caldo tlalpeño, smoky and spicy and entirely, unmistakably his. He plates it with corn fritters and a braised chicken thigh that looks so tender Henry actually stops what he’s doing to watch. 

It’s the way Alex moves–focused, loose, sleeves rolled to his elbows and hair falling into his eyes. He doesn’t speak for the camera this time. He just talks softly while plating, telling the judges about his dad. About how this was the only thing he could keep down when he was sick as a kid. About smoke and heat and care.

It’s stupid, really, how hard Henry has to work not to listen.

He turns back to his own dish–an herbed potato galette with crème fraîche and roasted garlic jus–but his chest is tight in a way he doesn’t have language for.

Not yet.

🍰🍓

That night, Henry finds himself alone in the lobby of their hotel, staring at the vending machine like it might start offering emotional clarity.

He’s deciding between crisps and starving when Alex appears.

Hair still damp from the shower. Hoodie soft and oversized. Barefoot.

He doesn’t say anything at first. Just walks up beside Henry and nudges his shoulder like they’ve been doing this for years.

“That tart of yours was stupid good,” Alex says.

Henry, not thinking, answers, “Your soup made me cry.”

And he regrets it instantly. 

Too much. Too honest. It lands in the air between them like a dropped plate.

Alex just raises an eyebrow. Slow. Grinning like he’s seeing something he likes.

“Well damn,” he says. “You’re gonna make a man blush, sweetheart.”

Henry clears his throat. “You should blush. You’re terrifyingly competent.”

“That sounded almost like a compliment.”

“It wasn’t.”

(It was.)

🍰🍓

Chapter Text

It starts with the soup.

Or maybe it starts with the tart. The goddamn lavender tart with the bruléed fig and a crust so precise it probably submitted a résumé.

But let’s say it’s the soup. Let’s say it’s the moment Henry turns to him, under the flicker of vending machine fluorescents, and says: “Your soup made me cry.”

Alex had laughed it off, because of course he had. Because that’s what he does. He made a dumb joke–something flirtatious and deflective–and Henry shut him down with that dry, sharp wit that always makes something in Alex’s chest spark.

But now–days later–Alex keeps thinking about it.

About how Henry had looked at him. About how his voice had gone soft around the edges. Like it had cost him something to say it.

“Your soup made me cry.”

Just six words, but it knocked something sideways in Alex. Because it wasn’t about the soup. Not really. It was about the vulnerability. The risk of saying it. The fact that Henry, who so often speaks like he’s reading from the footnotes of his own patience, said it anyway.

And now, every time they pass each other in the kitchen, every time they’re stationed on opposite ends of a team challenge, every time Henry rolls his eyes but doesn’t walk away… Alex feels it again.

That look. That weight. That pull.

And it’s driving him fucking crazy.

Because it’s not just heat anymore. Not just rivalry or banter or a mutual desire to out-cook each other into submission.

It’s something quieter. Sharper.

It’s in the way Henry lingers near his station without needing to. The way he doesn’t laugh at Alex’s jokes but doesn’t tell him to stop either. The way his gaze feels like it lands harder than it should.

Like it sees something he’s not saying.

Which is the thing that unsettles Alex most of all.

Because if Henry’s watching him like that… it might mean he’s already figured something out that Alex hasn’t dared to name yet.

And as more of their competitors get eliminated–one pressure test, one plating disaster at a time–the kitchen shrinks.

Or maybe it’s just the producers.

Alex is almost certain someone behind the scenes is orchestrating this like it’s a goddamn soap opera, because every week, somehow, their stations inch closer.

Until they’re side by side. Only a sink between them. 

Close enough that Alex can feel the heat off Henry’s arm when they both reach for the faucet. Close enough to smell whatever herbs and spices he’s simmering. Close enough that Alex catches himself memorizing the way Henry holds a paring knife like it’s an extension of his hand. Like he trusts it more than he trusts people.

And it’s not a problem, except it is.

Because now Henry is always there. Quiet and steady and infuriatingly composed. And Alex can’t help but lean toward him like gravity has decided something for them.

And maybe it has.

🍰🍓

From the outside, Henry probably seems rude.

And maybe he is, a little. He’s blunt. He delivers compliments like accusations. He has a resting face that could politely murder a man. The kind of guy who probably critiques the shape of a quenelle with the same energy he uses to decline a date.

At first, Alex had assumed it was arrogance.

And why not?

Henry looked every inch the part–like some brooding British prince charming who’d been genetically engineered in a Bond villain’s lab. All perfect cheekbones and thick thighs and unfairly long legs. Gold-spun hair that caught the studio lights like it was trying to get him a shampoo commercial. He was always composed. Always calm. Never cracked under pressure.

He wore his silence like tailored clothing. Said everything in exactly five words or less. Stood too straight. Moved too neatly.

It was honestly real fucking infuriating.

Henry looked like someone who woke up knowing how to poach eggs perfectly. Like he had never, in his entire life, sweated under pressure.

During their very first conversation, when Alex had barely stepped a foot into the MasterChef kitchen, still high off nerves and adrenaline and whatever chaotic confidence lived in his bloodstream–Henry had looked at him, deadpan as hell, and said: “You’re exceptionally irritating.”

Like he was diagnosing a particularly soggy pie crust. 

No expression. No hesitation. Just flat, cool British contempt, delivered with the precision of a pastry cutter.

Offputting as hell.

But also? Kinda hot.

Alex hadn’t known whether to laugh or bark. He did both.

And that’s when he knew he was in trouble. Because instead of being annoyed, Alex found himself… intrigued. 

Because there was something off about it. Something too measured. Too careful. Like Henry wasn’t looking down on him–he was deflecting. Like every eye roll was a shield. Every clipped remark a way to hold people at arm’s length before they got close enough to see whatever Henry didn’t want to show.

So, yeah. Alex knew deep in his gut that it wasn’t arrogance. 

It was armor.

And Alex, for reasons he’s still trying to untangle, wanted to slip past it. Just once. Just to see what was underneath.

There’s just something about the way Henry carries himself–too still, too practiced. Like someone who’s learned to move through the world in pre-measured steps. Like someone who’s spent years keeping the volume down because he knows what it’s like to be told he’s too much, or not enough, or wrong in a language that doesn’t have the decency to be honest about it.

Alex recognizes the shape of it. He’s worn it himself.

Henry, with the sad baby blues and the addicting accent and the impossible pastries, has something to prove. Just like Alex.

And that’s the worst part.

Because Alex sees himself in Henry’s silences.

And feeling seen back? It fucking terrifies him.

Because if Henry can see through him–past the swagger, past the charm, past the chaotic bravado–then maybe Henry could also see the fear. The ache. The part of Alex that still wonders if he’s only lovable in moments, in flashes, before someone decides he’s too loud or too bright or too goddamn much.

So yeah. Maybe Alex flirts to survive.

And maybe Henry doesn’t flirt at all, because he’s still learning how to show his teeth without getting bitten.

But together?

Together, it feels like being read cover to cover by someone who refuses to skim.

And he has no fucking idea what to do with that.

Maybe that’s why it unsettles him so deeply–because being seen by Henry makes him pause. 

Because the thing is, Alex has only ever known how to survive by staying in motion.

It’s why the chaos of the kitchen suits him–the adrenaline, the noise, the split-second decisions. Growing up, cooking was the only place he felt like his brain and his body were moving in the same direction. ADHD made everything else feel like static. But in the kitchen? He could move. He could breathe. 

So when he cooks, he talks. When he talks, he flirts. When he flirts, he feels in control.

Except now, control has blue eyes and a British accent and a face like a regret just waiting to happen.

And Alex can’t stop watching him.

🍰🍓

When Alex was six, his abuela handed him a wooden spoon and told him to listen.

“Not to me, mijo,” she had said, eyes twinkling. “To the food. It’ll tell you when it’s ready. And the ancestors will slap your hand if you stop seasoning too soon.”

He thought she was joking. Until she wasn’t.

His abuela didn’t use recipes. She used instinct and knuckles, the weight of her palm for measuring, the lilt in her voice when the rice smelled just right. Garlic and cumin lived permanently on her stove. There was always something simmering– frijoles, caldito, mole –and if it wasn’t dinner, it was a test batch of something she wanted to try just to see if she could.

Cinnamon dusted everything. It curled into arroz con leche, settled into slow-simmered café de olla, and lingered in the corners of the pantry like a permanent blessing.

Even now, years later, Alex swears he still measures flavor by memory: by the way cinnamon felt against his tongue on a Sunday morning. Sharp at the start, soft at the end.

Like warmth, like coming home.

🍰🍓

On weekends, he used to go to the pulguitas with his abuelo.

They’d rise with the sun and walk the rows of stalls together, Alex’s small hand clutching the hem of his grandfather’s shirt, eyes bright as he stared down at piles of fresh chiles, limones, mangos, tamarindo. His abuelo taught him to check for ripeness with a gentle squeeze, to sniff the skin for sweetness.

They’d pick the juiciest limones and oranges, carry them home in plastic bags that dug into their fingers, and slice them open the second they stepped through the door. His abuelo would juice the fruit by hand while Alex stood on a plastic stool, grinning, waiting for the foam to settle. They’d drink it fresh– limonada y jugo de naranja, cold and bright and messy. And then they’d start cooking.

The carne asadas at the Díaz household were legendary.

Tíos and primos and neighbors all crowded together, the air thick with mesquite smoke and Norteño music, the grill lined with slabs of marinated beef and halved onions and long, blistered nopales. Every dish had a story. Every spice had a purpose. Alex never missed a chance to help, even when he was too short to reach the counter. They let him squeeze limes, rub spices into meat, flip tortillas by hand.

“Cooking is our first language,” his Pá told him once, after a long day. “You don’t have to know how to say it. Just feed them. That’s how we show love.”

And Alex… he believed him.

🍰🍓

He was ten when the fights started–when his parents stopped laughing in the kitchen.

His dad, a lawyer with his own firm, began staying late at the office. Later and later, until dinner was just a reheated plate and a note on the counter.

His mom, always the sharp one, the practical one, buried herself deeper into city council meetings, town halls, and policy drafts. She started taking more weekend trips back to Lometa, where the rest of the Claremonts still resided. 

At some point, Alex realized she didn’t come back rested anymore. She came back tired. Hollow around the edges.

The kitchen got quieter.

The yelling got louder.

And Alex, suddenly feeling too small and too much all at once, started cooking alone.

He’d stand on the same plastic stool and make yellow rice the way his abuela taught him. He’d pull out the pan his dad used for chuletas and try to sear them just right. He made pancakes at night. He tried salsas so spicy they made his eyes water. He tried. So. Fucking. Hard. 

Because maybe– maybe –if he could make something good enough, his parents would sit at the table together again.

Maybe if the food was warm enough, bold enough, home enough, they’d stop unraveling.

They didn’t.

But Alex never stopped cooking.

🍰🍓

🍰🍓

In high school, when he joined the culinary club, he didn’t tell anyone how much it meant to him. How it felt like breathing. Like belonging. Like memory, alive on a plate.

The first time he won a competition–some regional bake-off with way too much pressure and not enough counter space–the only person he wanted to tell was June.

He found her in the school courtyard, plopped the trophy on her lunch table like it was a peace offering, and said, “Okay, I think I might be good at this.”

She blinked at him. Then broke into a grin.

“No shit, Lil Bit. I’ve been waiting for you to figure that out.”

🍰🍓

To this day, Alex doesn’t know how to cook without cumin. Without lime. Without cinnamon and smoke and salt and feeling. His kitchen always smells like his childhood: a little loud, a little sweet, and full of things he can’t quite name until he’s tasted them again.

Cooking was never just survival. It was never just tradition.

It was the thing he reached for when he felt like he might disappear.

It was the only thing that ever made him feel enough.

🍰🍓

The day of the citrus challenge, Alex ends up at the station next to Henry’s, yet again. 

The challenge is deceptively simple: build a dish around one primary citrus ingredient. Showcase its versatility, its flavor, its soul. One fruit. One hour. No mistakes.

Henry, of course, goes for blood orange. Refined. Subtle. A choice that says: I know exactly who I am. 

Alex picks key lime. Bold and bright and unapologetic. Tart enough to make you blink. The kind of flavor that lingers on the back of your tongue and dares you to forget it.

They work in parallel. Not speaking. Not touching. But the energy between them is unmistakable. It hums beneath the clatter of knives and the whir of food processors. A quiet gravity. A slow, inevitable pull.

Alex tells himself to focus. To plate. To win.

But the air is thick with more than steam. And when Henry brushes past him on the way to the pantry–shoulder to shoulder, skin to skin–it’s not much. A second. A whisper of contact.

But Alex feels it.

Not just the touch. The heat of it. 

A spark that lights up his entire ribcage like someone struck a match behind his sternum.

He doesn’t look up. Doesn’t react. 

But he adds too much cayenne to his lime crema and has to start it over, swearing under his breath and trying not to look left.

Henry doesn’t say a word.

Which, somehow, makes it worse.

🍰🍓

🍰🍓

That night, he dreams of Henry.

It’s not graphic. Not even close. There’s no sex, no mouths, no panting against bedroom walls.

Just Henry’s hand on his wrist. Light. Grounding. The kind of touch that says I see you without making a scene.

His voice is there too… low and warm, edged with sleep and something gentler than anything Alex has ever heard from him awake. He’s saying something Alex can’t quite catch. But it sounds like comfort. Like home. Like please stay. 

There’s flour dust in the air. And citrus–lime, maybe. Or orange zest. Sharp and bright. Familiar.

Alex wakes up before he can ask what the dream-Henry was saying. Wakes up dry-mouthed and aching. Like he’s lost something he was never supposed to have.

He lies there for a long time, eyes open in the dark.

And he tries... he really fucking tries, to not think about it.

Because he knows himself too well.

And if he thinks about it too much, if he lets himself name what he’s feeling–

He’ll want it.

More than he dares admit.

More than he knows how to hold.

And he’s not ready for that.

Not yet.

🍰🍓

They kiss a few nights later.

There’s no build-up. No clever banter. No dramatic music cue. Just the kind of quiet that makes everything else louder–heartbeat, breath, the sound of Henry’s water bottle clinking softly against the countertop as he turns, just as Alex steps into the room.

They’re alone.

It’s late. Most of the crew’s cleared out. The staff kitchen’s gone still and half-lit, painted in shadow and the soft hum of refrigeration units. It’s the kind of quiet that feels stolen. The kind that wraps around your throat and says, say it now, or you’ll never say it at all. 

Alex hadn’t meant to stop walking. Hadn’t meant to stand there like a fool with the fluorescent light making his curls frizz and his hoodie hanging off one shoulder like he’s back in Texas again, coming back from summer camp and waiting for someone who’ll never come home.

But then Henry looks at him.

Really looks at him.

Not like he’s trying to figure him out, or beat him, or shut him up… but like he’s seeing him for exactly who he is. For all the noise and the overconfidence and the mess underneath. For the way Alex carries himself like a performance and a plea, hoping no one ever notices which parts are real.

And Alex–

Well. 

Alex kisses him.

Because he couldn’t not.

Because Henry is standing there in soft clothes and softer eyes, mouth parted just slightly like he’s halfway to saying something honest, and Alex can’t survive one more almost.

So he leans in.

And Henry doesn’t pull away. Doesn’t hesitate. Just meets him with this devastating steadiness, with a kiss that’s all heat and precision, like he’s been waiting for this moment but never dared expect it.

Alex thinks: Oh. Oh. Fuck.

Because Henry kisses like someone who knows how fragile this is. Like someone who understands exactly how deep the cut will go when it’s over–and wants it anyway. There’s something reverent in the way he tilts his head, in the way his fingers brush along the curve of Alex’s jaw, in the way he kisses like he doesn’t just want Alex’s mouth, he wants every word it’s ever said in the dark.

And Alex–

Well. 

Alex lets him.

For one long, aching moment, he lets someone hold the truth of him without flinching.

And it’s that– that –that terrifies him more than anything else.

Because now Henry is here.

With his careful hands and ridiculous mouth and ocean eyes that see too fucking much. And he’s kissing Alex like Alex isn’t too much. Like Alex has never been too much.

Like he’s wanted. Not tolerated. Not entertained. Not something bright and breakable to keep at arm’s length.

Just… wanted.

And that? That’s the most dangerous thing of all.

Because if Alex lets himself fall–if he lets himself hope, lets himself believe in this impossibly steady, impossibly good thing–and Henry walks away?

He doesn’t know if he’ll come back from that.

He doesn’t know if he’ll be able to pretend again, to crack another joke, to throw up another wall fast enough before the next person gets too close.

Before the next goodbye.

Because so many people have walked away before.

His dad chose California. Said it was for the firm, for opportunity, but never looked back once the plane took off.

His mom buried herself in politics until there wasn’t enough of her left for home. Always on. Always moving. Always elsewhere.

June chose New York. Journalism. Headlines. A life that didn’t need Alex in it every day–and God, he never blamed her for it, but it still felt like losing something he couldn’t name.

Everyone gets tired of him eventually.

That’s just the way it goes. He’s too much–too loud, too fast, too sharp at the edges. Too everything. 

He’s a firework, not a fireplace.

Fun for the night. A good story, a good time, something you remember fondly but never long enough to stay.

He’s the first two courses of a meal: flashy, exciting, punchy with flavor.

But no one ever sticks around for dessert.

No one’s ever looked at him like they’re still hungry. Like they want more. Like they want all of it.

Except now, Henry has. Henry is. 

Henry… Henry is looking at him like he could be a home-cooked meal and a quiet Sunday and the taste you remember ten years from now.

And Alex… fuck, Alex wants that.

So fucking badly.

Which is exactly why he pulls back.

Hard. Sudden. Like the kiss burned him.

He tears his mouth away, breath catching, heart hammering like it’s trying to escape his ribcage, and he stares at Henry–at his flushed cheeks and swollen lips and the stunned look in his eyes–and he says the only thing he can: 

“We’re not doing this.”

Even though it tastes like a lie on his tongue. Even though his hands are still shaking with the urge to pull Henry back in. Even though every part of him is already mourning the feel of Henry’s mouth on his.

Henry doesn’t speak. Doesn’t move. Just stands there, quiet and wide-eyed, like he’s waiting for Alex to take it back.

But Alex doesn’t.

He can’t.

Because if he walks away first, then at least this time he’s not the one being left behind.

It’s the only kind of safety he’s ever known, ever trusted. 

And maybe it still burns.

But at least this time, he’s the one holding the match.

🍰🍓

After that, things change.

Not obviously. Not all at once.

But Alex avoids eye contact for two straight days. Keeps his voice level. Doesn’t flirt, doesn’t tease. Even when Henry’s fingers brush his on the pass, even when Henry’s laugh cracks out unexpectedly during a particularly bad chicken incident, Alex stays cool.

Pretends he’s fine.

He’s not fine.

He’s fucked.

Alex has kissed people before.

He’s kissed people and never thought twice about it. Kissed boys in bar bathrooms, kissed girls under the bleachers, kissed someone once in a college elevator just because the mood was right and the tequila was strong. He’s kissed with curiosity, with bravado, with affection, with nothing at all.

But he has never kissed someone and felt the bottom drop out of his chest.

Never kissed someone and immediately wanted to run. Stay. Run. Stay. Like his whole body couldn’t decide whether it was terrified or at home.

He doesn’t sleep the night after it happens.

Just lies there in his hotel bed, one arm flung over his eyes, replaying the way Henry had kissed him back–hungry, sure, open. And the way Alex had pulled away anyway. Said, we’re not doing this like it meant nothing, like it didn’t cost him something he doesn’t even have a name for.

The worst part?

He knows exactly what it looked like to Henry: rejection.

What it was … was fear.

Because Henry kissed him like he meant it. Kissed him like Alex was worth something. Like he was wanted, not tolerated.

And Alex–

Alex doesn’t know how to hold that kind of tenderness without choking on it.

And the thing that keeps him up worse than the kiss, worse than the want, is this: he saw it happening.

He saw Henry, these past few weeks, letting down the edges of his guard in tiny, aching increments.

The way his sarcasm had softened, how he lingered a second longer near Alex’s station. The glances, the near-smiles, the way he offered small truths like test balloons, just to see if Alex would pop them or let them float.

Alex noticed.

And he hates himself for pretending not to.

Hates that he looked directly at something real –something raw and careful and offered –and still chose to turn away.

He tells himself it was the smart thing to do. The safe thing.

But all he can think about now is how Henry let him see slivers of something he didn’t show anyone else.

And how Alex, terrified and gutless, flinched.

🍰🍓

They’re down to the top eight now.

The pressure’s different… not louder, not exactly, but deeper. Sharper. It presses in around the edges of everything. The knives feel heavier, the lights feel hotter, and the air in the kitchen is all tension and adrenaline and the quiet, choking fear of being the next one to be sent home.

And Henry…

Henry is sharper, too.

Not in the way he cooks–no, that’s still maddeningly graceful, all careful movement and restrained intensity, like every dish he touches is a thesis he’s quietly determined to defend. It’s not his skill that’s changed. It’s something else. Something in the way he carries himself now. The way his shoulders hunch just slightly inward, like he’s drawing his energy close and keeping it under lock and key. The way he no longer hovers near Alex’s station, doesn’t glance over when Alex swears under his breath or makes some dumb joke under the pretense of easing the tension.

He’s still composed. Still Henry.

But he’s closed now. Again.

Sealed.

And it wrecks Alex more than he’ll ever admit out loud.

Because it’s his fault. And he knows it.

He knows, even if he tries not to think about it too hard, that Henry’s retreat isn’t random. It’s a response. A reaction. A recalibration to the exact moment Alex kissed him like he meant it, and then pulled away like it hadn’t meant anything at all.

At the time, Alex told himself it was the right move. The smart one. That letting it go any further would only end in mess or heartbreak, or both. That keeping his distance was a form of kindness.

But he didn’t realize how much it would hurt, standing just a few feet away from someone who used to look at him like a question he wanted the answer to–and now doesn’t look at him at all.

He didn’t think about what it would feel like to miss something that was never his in the first place. Or how empty the kitchen would feel, even in all its chaos, without that quiet thread of awareness running between them.

He thought he could live with it. Thought he’d be fine.

He was wrong.

And he has no idea how to fix something he was the one to break.

🍰🍓

The day of their last team challenge, the kitchen is buzzing.

The judges announce the challenge: two teams, two captains, one dinner service. The losing team goes straight into a pressure test. Elimination is on the line. 

Alex hears his name first.

Then: “Henry.”

Of course.

They exchange a look across the kitchen–just a flicker–but it holds everything. Tension, heat, resentment. And beneath it all, the memory of a kiss that still aches like a bruise. The firm press of pink lips he hasn’t forgotten. A taste tucked just behind his teeth, like a secret too dangerous to swallow and too tender to spit out.

He lifts his chin. Henry does the same.

Let the best captain win.

🍰🍓

The challenge is brutal from the very first ticket.

They’re cooking a full dinner service at Gordon Ramsay’s flagship Michelin-starred restaurant in Las Vegas–sixty covers, three courses, zero room for error. The kitchen gleams like a battlefield waiting to be bloodied, all polished steel and sharp edges, the heat cranked up past comfort into something closer to survival.

The menu is designed to test everything: technique, timing, nerve.

First course: white asparagus velouté, served with lemon-thyme espuma and a precise quenelle of caviar. It has to hit the pass hot, elegant, and identical every single time.

Second: dry-aged duck breast, pan-seared to mid-rare, plated with a smear of black garlic jus, slivered fennel, and pommes so perfectly layered they’d give an engineer a complex.

Third: pear tart tatin, with miso caramel drizzled to the millimeter and crème fraîche ice cream that melts too fast if you breathe on it wrong.

Alex leads the blue team, and for the first fifteen minutes, he thinks they might actually survive this.

He finds a rhythm. Calls out orders. Checks every station. Keeps one eye on plating and the other on the clock. It’s loud, hot, fast–but that’s his element. He knows how to command a kitchen like he knows how to talk: loud, fast, and with just enough bite to be remembered.

But then things start slipping.

The velouté comes out lukewarm on Table Four. The duck is cut too soon on Table Nine–bloody and limp, the plate smeared with panic. Alex sends it back, tries to course-correct, but the rhythm is broken now.

And Gordon is screaming. 

Not just shouting orders, but red-in-the-face screaming. Full-volume, full-accent fury, hurling curse after curse between directives, and Alex can’t even think through the sound of it.

“Mid-rare? MID-RARE?! That’s still quacking, you fucking donut!”

Every insult hits like heat on raw skin–too sharp, too fast. Every ticket piles on like weight he can’t shake, Atlas with trembling knees and no room left to falter.

He’s yelling to be heard over the chaos, trying to rally his team, trying to fix the mistakes, but his hands are shaking now. He can’t think straight. He can’t fucking breathe. 

Across the kitchen, Henry is silent. Focused. Deadly.

He’s not louder than the noise–he’s calmer than it. He moves with quiet precision, catching a broken caramel just before it hits the plate, refiring his team’s protein–halibut–with steady hands, giving directions like he’s reading a recipe out loud. No panic. No theatrics. Just control.

Alex wants to hate it.

Wants to say it doesn’t bother him.

But it does.

Because the red team holds their line. And the blue team doesn’t.

And when the final plate goes out, when the kitchen finally falls quiet and the judges make their call, it isn’t even a surprise.

Henry’s team wins.

Barely.

But in a kitchen like this, barely is everything.

Barely means safety. Barely means you get to watch from the balcony while someone else fights to stay.

Which means Alex and the blue team are headed straight into the pressure test.

They line up in front of the judges, still in their aprons, hair damp with sweat, hands trembling with adrenaline or fatigue or both. Alex’s heartbeat hasn’t slowed since mid-service. His neck still burns from where Gordon screamed inches from his ear.

There’s a twist. Of fucking course there’s a twist.

Chef Ramsay steps forward, expression too smooth to be casual. A devil’s smile tucked into the corner of his mouth.

“We’ve made our decision. Based on performance during service, one member of your team will automatically face elimination.”

A beat.

Then the name.

“Malika.”

Alex doesn’t react, but his stomach drops. She’s good–really good–but she’d fumbled the jus, forgot to wipe down the plates, cracked under pressure. She knew it, too.

She steps forward without argument, jaw clenched. Brave. Quiet.

And then–

“Alex,” Gordon says, turning to him with that same too-even tone. “As captain, you now have a choice. You can save yourself… or save the remaining two members of your team from elimination.”

A pause, heavy and deliberate.

“If you choose them, you will be the one to face the dreaded pressure test against Malika.”

It’s not a question. It’s a test. One final course, plated on pride and integrity.

Alex doesn’t even blink.

“I’m cooking tonight, Chef.” 

No hesitation. No drama. Just truth.

The room stills.

A few gasps. Someone shifts beside him. But the judges nod, faces unreadable. Professional approval, maybe. Maybe respect. Fuck if he knows. 

But out of the corner of his eye–up on the balcony, where the safe contestants are gathered–Alex sees Henry’s expression shift.

It’s subtle. A twitch at the mouth. A flicker in the eyes. But Alex feels it like a knife nick to the ribs.

He doesn’t know what it means yet.

Only that it matters.

Only that Henry is watching, and whatever Alex just did—whatever this is between them—it’s not over.

Not yet.

🍰🍓

The elimination challenge is unforgiving.

Three soufflés. Three judges. Three chances to fall flat.

A savory gruyère and chive for Gordon–airy, golden, seasoned within an inch of its life. A delicate raspberry and white chocolate for Chef Aarón–sweet but not cloying, risen just past gravity. And a textbook classic for Joe–no frills, no forgiveness. The kind of dish that demands silence and then dares you to breathe wrong.

Alex moves like a man possessed. Focused, laser-tight, his entire body coiled with intent. This isn’t just about survival. This is about pride. About legacy. About not being the captain who cracked.

Malika is good. Steady hands, clean technique. She holds her own and then some. Her sweet soufflé is picture-perfect, her cheese has the right wobble.

But Alex… Alex is hungry. Fucking starving, really. 

And when it counts, when the last timer blares and the judges deliberate, it’s clear in the verdict.

He wins.

Barely.

By a breath, by a whisper of rise and edge and balance. But in this kitchen, barely is everything.

He accepts his victory in silence. Shoulders stiff. Hands aching. The burn of it all still pulsing under his skin.

Fuck. 

🍰🍓

Back in the hallway behind the set, everything feels a little too loud and not loud enough. The hum of producers murmuring into headsets, the clatter of equipment being wheeled past, the distant bark of a stage manager. It all blurs together as Alex leans against the wall, tugging the black apron over his head with trembling fingers.

He breathes in through his nose, out through his mouth, like the therapist he saw in college once told him to.

Slow your pulse. Count to five. Don’t think about the camera. Don’t think about Henry.

He stares up at the ceiling. His heart won't calm down.

And then–

He feels it before he sees it.

A gust of presence. Footsteps coming fast. Charged like thunder.

Henry.

He’s storming down the hallway like he’s been holding something in for too long and finally decided to let it break open. The crew tries not to stare, but they absolutely are. No one moves to stop him.

He doesn’t wait for the cameras to stop rolling. Doesn’t care who sees. Doesn’t care about professionalism or optics or what this moment will look like in the edit.

He just walks–off the balcony, down the steps, past producers with wide eyes and headsets–and heads straight for Alex like he’s on a mission he can’t turn back from.

Alex is still catching his breath, back to the wall, hands slack at his sides, hair a mess, chest rising and falling like he just finished a sprint. He looks up just as Henry closes the distance.

Toe to toe.

Henry grabs the front of Alex’s shirt, knuckles white, and yanks him forward–just enough to shake him.

“You idiot,” he hisses, low and furious.

Alex’s eyes widen. “Jesus, hi to you too.”

Henry’s hands tighten in the fabric between them.

“You chose that,” he snaps. “You chose to risk everything. You nearly got yourself sent home–do you even get that?”

“I–Henry, I–”

“No. Don’t.” Henry’s voice is sharp, splintered at the edges. “Don’t justify it with some noble, self-sacrificing speech. You’re the best damn cook here, and you almost threw it away because you think you have to go down with the ship every time something goes wrong.”

“I was the captain,” Alex bites back, frustrated. “It was my team. I was responsible. I had to take the fall.”

Henry’s voice drops, but the anger doesn’t. “You don’t get to die on every hill, Alex.”

“I’m not dying,” Alex says, exasperated. “I’m still here.”

“You almost weren’t!” Henry explodes, and it echoes off the walls, sharp and real and too loud.

It hangs in the silence that follows.

Alex blinks, stunned. Henry’s hands are still gripping his apron, but his breathing’s gone ragged. His expression fractures.

“You almost weren’t,” Henry says again, quieter now, like it physically hurts to speak. “And I can’t–I can’t stand here and pretend that would’ve been fine.”

Alex stares at him, mouth dry. “Henry…”

“You think I care because we kissed once and you got under my skin?” Henry’s voice trembles, raw around the edges now. “It’s more than that. Christ–it’s always been more than that. I just didn’t realize how much until I watched you nearly lose everything like it didn’t matter. Until I realized how fucking easy it is for you to throw yourself into fires and never look back.”

Alex’s voice is barely there. “Why do you care so much?”

Henry laughs. It’s short. Bitter. Broken.

“Because I’m in love with you,” he says like it’s obvious. Like it’s a given. Like Alex was supposed to know. “And I’m terrified I’m going to lose you before I ever get to find out what it’s like to have you.”

The silence is immediate. Dense.

Alex opens his mouth. Closes it. No sound comes out. His brain stutters, then stops.

Henry lets go.

His hands drop. The space between them opens like a chasm.

“I’m sorry,” Henry whispers, already backing away, already retreating. “I shouldn’t have–”

Alex grabs his wrist.

Yanks him back.

And then he kisses him.

Hard. Desperate. Like he’s out of air and Henry is the only oxygen left.

Their mouths crash together with the force of everything unsaid. The frustration, the fear, the want that’s been simmering under the surface for weeks. Henry makes a noise–surprised, aching–and Alex holds onto him like he’s anchoring himself in a storm.

It’s messy. Breathless. Beautiful.

And when they finally pull apart, panting, foreheads pressed together, Alex doesn’t open his eyes. He just says, voice hoarse:

“You should’ve said that before I almost got myself sent home.”

Henry half-laughs, half-sobs. “You should’ve let someone save you for once.”

Alex closes his eyes. “You’re gonna have your work cut out for you, sweetheart. I don’t think I’ll stop throwing myself into fires anytime soon.”

Henry exhales, shaky.

Then he lifts a hand, slow and reverent, and runs his fingers along Alex’s jaw like he’s memorizing him by touch.

“Then I’ll just have to be there to pull you out.”

🍰🍓