Always

"Alex? Fuck, Alex is that you?"

It was 10 years later. Chicago. Jack had been living there since he dropped out of Baltimore University. He had a job as a marketing associate at an online music store. He spent his days in a gray office, working with gray faced people, trying to sell gray-vaguely-music-related-shit to people over the internet and telephone. Yeah. He was one of those people. His job was dull and monotonous, but it paid the rent, and he could afford decent clothes, and decent food. He did share an apartment though, with his friend from work, Valerie Poxleitner.

Alex had just moved to Chicago, after graduating from Essex University, with a degree in English, and a post graduate degree in teaching, and he had just come from an interview at Chicago University, the departmemt of English Language and Literature, to be a lecturer there. He'd had to sell a lot of stuff to afford his apartment here, which by the way, was a bit of a shit tip. He really needed this job.

After high school finished, and they both went to different colleges and universities, they hadn't kept in touch. Alex hadn't kept in touch with anyone, apart from, surprisingly, Oli and Josh, who both went to university in England too (Oli to somewhere in Yorkshire, and Josh to somewhere in Surrey), and he'd seen Zach a few times, until his sister broke up with him because she didn't like how far they each had to travel to see each other. Jack still spoke to Zach, Rian, Cas and John O, because he needed something to waste the company's free internet on.

Alex turned around to see Jack, dressed so smartly it looked like he'd been at a funeral, jogging over to him, in his overly polished shoes.

"Wow, hey man, how are you?" asked Alex, bringing his old friend into a hug. Back in year ten, when Jack had apologised, it took a few months, but their friendship got back on track. They didn't leave on awkward terms, they were good friends.
"Working in a dead end job, I'm totally sick of this 9-5 routine, because I dropped out of university, and I'm literally, utterly, forever-a-goddamn-lone. So life's great!" he replied sarcastically. "And what about you? What are you doing here?"
"Graduated as an English teacher, and I just had an interview at Chicago university, and I am also, terribly, completely alone! For some reason there's just no appeal for bi-romantic asexuals anymore." Alex grinned, and Jack laughed, oh how Alex had missed that laugh.
"Can I buy you a coffee, Lex?"
"I'd love that, barafag." Alex winked.
"Seriously. How long are you going to keep that up for?" Jack rolled his eyes at the joke, as he lead Alex in the direction of his favourite coffee joint.
"Until it is no longer your name."
"Well, when's that going to happen?"
"It won't, silly!"
"Oh fuck off, Gayskank." Two could play at this game. Jack and Alex were back to their old jokes and games, and when they arrived at The Coffee Bean, they were smiling so much the whole room frickin lit up.

"How's your music taste these days? As good as it was?" inquired Jack, desperately hoping that he wasn't the only one that still listened to classic punk like Greenday and Blink.
"Not changed a single bit."
"Good answer." Jack nodded in approval. "You still write? You know, 'get me out of this place, before I cause more damage, a small price to pay for building houses, out of matchsticks'"
"..You remember that?" Alex asked in shock.
"Yeah, it's kept me sane all this time."
"Wow."
"So you do still write?" Jack pushed the question.
"Yeah, kinda. It's probably all shit though, I lost a lot of inspiration after all my high school emotions calmed down."
"Woah. I'm not sure if I want to hang out with you if you're not as emotionally complex as the Alex I know." Jack smirked, and Alex punched his arm playfully. "Wanna come back to my place? I can make you dinner if you want, I mean, if you only arrived this morning you might not have much in, is all." Jack ran a hand through his hair, it felt like he was asking Alex out for the first time, when technically it was asking him IN. And it wasn't for the first time.
"I'd love to eat your food, but I'd like to go freshen up first, I've not had a shower since being in England so.. But if you give me your address and a time, I can get there by cab?" Alex suggested.
"Sure, give me your hand?" and Alex held out his hand. Jack took a pen from inside his blazer pocket, and scrawled his address onto Alex's hand, followed by a "6pm", underlined at the bottom.
"Great so, I'll see you at six. Thanks for the coffee, it's been amazing seeing you again." Alex smiled genuinely. And turned to leave, then hailed a cab.

Jack rushed around his room. It was a lot tidier than the last room of his Alex had been in, but it wasn't tidy enough. He still only had a mattress for a bed, but he had shelves for all his CDs and DVDs, and no clothes hung on his desk chair, they were all hung inside his wardrobe, like an adult.

"You okay Jack?" Valerie asked him, raising an eyebrow as he frantically cleaned around her, in the main sitting room.
"Yep. High school sweetheart, coming over. At 6. For tea." He explained, tidying magazines into a pile and onto the communal bookshelf, silently questioning why Valerie kept her anime porn in the communal area. Like, come on. Nothing wrong with it, but even with non anime porn, you gotta keep it to yourself.
"Name?"
"Alex. Alex Gaskarth." he replied, loving the way the name rolled off his tongue.
"Is that a guy or a girl?"
"Guy."
"Very nice. Do you want me to exist or to not exist?" she was of course referring to whether or not she should introduce herself to Alex, or just say hidden.
"Exist. Otherwise he will think that some of those rather explicit magazines belong to me. I don't want that."

Alex sprayed himself with lynx, put his shirt on, and buttoned it, and then sprayed again. A guy can never wear too much lynx. Fact. Jeans, to tuck his shirt into, or not to tuck his shirt into. He went with the latter, otherwise it seemed too much like a business meeting. He pulled on his converse, they were all black, blending with his skinny jeans, oh yes, he still wore those.

He got into a taxi, and pretended to be texting to avoid conversation with the driver, as you do.

The doorbell rang.

"Shit that's him. You answer it, make it look like I wasn't waiting. Fuck. Go!" he instructed Valerie, quickly, as he raced into his room.

"Hiya." she opened the door, and greeted him politely.
"Hey, does Jack live here?" he asked.
"Yeah, I'll get him.. JAAACKK. SOMEONE AT THE DOOR FOR YOU." she called back into the apartment. Alex heard a door opening and shutting, followed by footsteps, and then there was Jack, looking stunning as ever, in his equally as tight jeans.

"Wow." Jack checked him out, not even subtly, and Alex blushed. Valerie coughed awkwardly.
"Oh uh. Hi Lex. This is my flatmate, Valerie. She works at the same place I do. Valerie, meet Alex, he's a really good friend of mine from high school." Valerie offered her hand for Alex to shake, who took it, and responded with a 'nice to meet you'.

Later on that evening, after Jack had made them both pasta, he showed Alex his room. Although it was different to the room Alex knew, it still practically screamed Jack. Alex sat down on the mattress, cross legged. Jack did the same, opposite him. Alex couldnt help but look down at Jack's lips.
"Fuck being friends." and Jack leaned forward, and kissed Alex, who immediately had his hands in Jack's hair, kissing back.