Ex's to Lovers

Chapter 53

In Which Ivan Accidentally Says Something he Doesn't Mean To, But Does Mean, and Alfred Begins to Understand

"So then I said that if I couldn't , then I would run away again, so Arthur said-"

Alfred was rambling spilling everything he wanted to say to Ivan over the past week he's been forced home sick, as he'd been doing since he'd first forced Ivan to come in by ways of some un-subtle threats of sorts, ranging from coming down to get Ivan himself to throwing water ballons at him until he either was soaked or gave up and came in. Gilbert had taken this chance to escape, and wisely so, because anyone who wasn't an oblivious idiot could sense a storm Brewing.

Ivan stared coldly at Alfred with the stale pasted smile of obvious fury he'd had on since Alfred first started talking. Finally, seeing as Alfred was ignoring this, Ivan cut in.

"Alfred."

Alfred cut himself off, suddenly noticing that Ivan looked beyond upset, bordering on volcanic.

"You are okay."

It was a question stated like a statement. Alfred began to sense something was wrong.

"Yes?"

Ivan's cold smile was starting to slip.

"You were not kidnapped, were you?"

Alfred paled. So that's why Gilbert had seemed so off and suddenly escaped. He'd told Ivan what happened and had been trying to warn Alfred before he chickened out! Alfred suddenly remembered the last time his tratourous and weasly friend had gotten him into trouble-and an ex-relationtship with Ivan. Oh, was Gilbert goint to get it later! Right now, however, Alfred avoided eye contacted and admitted the situation in a guilty tone.

"I didn't mean for it to go this far. I just wanted to scare Arthur and hang out with Gil and suddenly everything got out of hand! It wasn't supposed to be like this! "

Alfred defended, but Ivan's Icy smile had completely faded to a pure, straightforward ice wall.

"Alfred," Ivan growled in a voice even scared than any Natalya or Arthur had ever spoken in, "I thought you were in danger."

Alfred stared at Ivan's unexpected declaration, and for the first time ever, his lazy, slacker brain decided to work, and Alfred realized what Ivan was saying with a genuine shock. 

"Were you worried about me?" 

He asked the stunned question at the same time as Ivan hit him with an icy question. 

"Why didn't you tell me your plan? Then I wouldn't -" 

Ivan cut his words angrily, forcing a beam colder than snow, and leveling Alfred with a look Alfred had never seen before. Alfred's eyes caught Ivan's clenched fists, curled in a way Alfred recognized too easily from a time many, many, years ago, when Alfred first decided he could dislike Ivan without hating him, and Alfred felt something much heavier and more unsettling than guilt settle in his throat. 

This was a different time than a lone boy who was new to town, trying not to cry because of the death of a wild animal he hadn't even known, killed and shoved heartlessly in his locker for no sake other than cruelty. Ivan wasn't upset because of a dead bird this time, but because of Alfred.

Alfred began to understand something through his density, and gave Ivan a wide-eyed reassessing stare. He'd thought he knew Ivan,  and with confidence only he had, had never doubted the image he'd drawn of Ivan. But the Ivan in front of Alfred was breaking the imagined image apart.

Alfred's eyes took in the tightly clenched fists, complete lack of a smile, and the almost desperate look Ivan was giving him, and suddenly understood two things.

The first was that he was truly an idiot.

The second was that he didn't know Ivan at all.