Alex and Theodore ✓

for breaking others before they break you

act seven:

i
There is something to be said for breaking others before they break you. Alex has never had the strength to do that, and he sure as hell is not going to start now. Not now, with Theo. With Theo who calls him extraordinary. With Theo who looks at him and sees Alexander. Theo's fingers open the gates to Alex's picket fences. His glances send the brick walls tumbling down. His tongue unlocks the mimes' cages with all the cleverness of a lockpick's hands. He makes Alex dance, and how Alex loves it. How Alex has longed for it. How Alex has waited every waking moment for someone to make him dance. He feels different when he dances. He doesn't feel so average. He feels extraordinary. The way that Theo is looking at him is making him feel extraordinary. The ballet barre feels like a distant memory. Eight years of technique are gone, down the drain. Alex dances with his heart, with his soul, with his mind. Alex dances until Theo falls asleep on his couch in his living room. Alex dances until he feels it happen. Alex dances until he is Alexander.

ii
Alex is different. Alex is different when he wakes up and Theo is not only next to him but all tangled up with him. Alex is different when Theo's eyes flutter open and peer into Alex's own. Theo smiles. Those dark, galaxy eyes crinkle at the corners. Alex falls, crashes, burns. Alex smiles. I knew you were extraordinary, Theo says. I knew you were talented beyond imagination. Alex shakes his head. I'm not, he says. I'm nothing. No, Alexander, Theo says, you are everything. Everything. The word follows Alex as he opens his refrigerator and realizes that he has no eggs. He's out of coffee. Theo takes him to breakfast at a little restaurant nearby. They eat pancakes and waffles and Theo talks about last night. He gestures with his hands. He moons over Alex's plies and high leaps. He calls Alex extraordinary over and over and over again. You are extraordinary. You are everything. You are anything but average. Alex asks why Theo is leaving. This is the closest he will get to asking Theo to stay. He never asks them to stay, because they never will. The Theodores of the world will never stay. Alex has to remind himself that this Theodore sees him as Alexander. This Theodore came over three nights. This Theodore made him dance.

iii
Theodore sweeps onto the stage in a flurry of thespians. They're dressed in feathers and boas and long, sweeping skirts. Plunging necklines that reveal nothing. Alex has seen it all anyways. Excitement and apprehension fill his heart. Theodore opens his mouth and begins to sing. His eyes find Alex's, and he winks. Alex feels his stomach flop around in his body like a fish out of water. Butterflies fly through his veins. The world is on fire and Theodore struck the match. The world is on fire and Alex holds the extinguisher in his hands and he throws it away. Let Theodore's fire burn down these picket fences and brick walls. Let Theodore's fire melt the walls of Alex's mimes' cages. Let Theodore destroy him so that he may be remade. Reborn. Reborn again tonight on Theo's lips, in Theo's eyes as he falls apart in Theo's hands. Theodore formally announces his plans to leave after he finishes his song. The crowd cheers. Another Theodore gone, Alex thinks. Later, in his apartment, Alex shows Theo how to dance.