First Burn • Hamilton

Chapter Five: Burn

a/n: And now here we have Alexander burning himself; not literally just metaphorically don't worry. Hope you like the story so far, it's different than most but different is a good thing because nothing is the same when you think about it.

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Alexander sat at the table of Laurens' apartment. His two eldest children looking on, silently. He felt the heat outside growing, like it was suffocating him. He felt Eliza, her anger burning inside of her. The effects of what he had done were starting to stir, and Laurens sat in front of him, watching him suffer, just as Eliza did. They both enjoyed it to a major extent, Eliza more than John, of course.

Their images became greater once the guilt started to making him fall and he couldn't get back up. Hamilton started to rub his temples, holding his head in his hands as the feelings rushed over him like waves in the hurricane. 

"I'm going, I can't see him like this." Philip said, and before his sister can protest he left the apartment, leaving before a word can escape his sister's mouth to let him stay. They had to stick together in this.

Angelica knew he was going to find their brothers, and she was correct on it, but a plan was stirring in his mind as well. He decided he wasn't going to act on it yet.

That's what he got from his father, that arrogance was definitely genetic.

Alexander moaned, a very groggily one at it. Eliza was filling his mind, filling it and filling it and filling it and never being able to come out of it and all of her rage and what she'd say and everything just toppled over on top of him. The flames she had started in him years before were coming to kill him. It wasn't the fire that killed, it was the smoke that you breathed in. That killed you before the fire could get to you. 

The smoke was getting to him now alright. He could imagine Laurens shutting him out, yet he imagined him sitting right in front of him. Eliza was pregnant with another son, and he knew that. He had to raise his children, he broke so many promises.

The heat was getting to him now, tears were streaming down his face. He wanted someone to cry to, he decided on his mother. It had been so long since he saw his mother. Then he remembered after his mother he could cry to John, and he hadn't been able to cry to anyone else. Eliza on the rare occasion, but he usually let her cry to him. 

He needed to cry too sometimes, but the only people he could cry to were either dead or didn't want him. 

Angelica stood up, going over to her father and hugging him. Something told her to do it instinctively, and he latched on like a baby. It was better to cry now than to cry in front of his yelling wife. Maybe Eliza wanted him to cry, those thoughts swarmed into his head like sharks instead of the wasps that were stinging Eliza. He was crying like his son did when there was a thunderstorm. John would want his father who was never home though, and Alexander would just want someone who loved him back when there was a storm.

Eliza got him through storms, but maybe she wouldn't want to anymore.

Of course she would, he knew who he married, and it'd take forever but she'd come around.

He just needed to count on that, that's what he had. 

"Thank you." He mumbled, Angelica hugged him tighter as a way of saying 'You're Welcome' to her father. The imaginary John Laurens stood in the room, hating seeing Hamilton cry. Angelica knew that she had to feed him eventually, so she let go and went to the cabinets, finding food and looking at her father confused.

"Sometimes people stay here under my permission and they rent. The landlord keeps the food fresh." He said, quieter than his usual volume of tone. She chuckled and took out bread, handing it to her father.

"You need to eat something, and I don't know how to work his kitchen, it's a lot more complex to ours at home." She said, Hamilton smiled at his daughter.

"Oh you are your mother." He said, taking a bite of the bread, as if he didn't just bawl his eyes out. No filter, never had one, never will have one.

"She says I'm more like you, I get it." She said, he raised an eyebrow.

"You're not as inconsiderate as I, or ignorant." He said, she nodded, sitting across from him.

"That's very true. Would you like anything from home before Mother lets you back?" She asked, her father shook his head no.

"I want to wear John's clothing, I'm fine with what is here dear, don't worry about me." He persuaded. She nodded, looking at his cheeks that were hiding a blush of the love he had for John, she knew she had to ask but she felt horrible doing so. But, so very like her father she asked, as it was in her blood.

"How did you love him?" She blurted, Alexander sighed, pulling out his small ponytail and putting it back up. His brown hair was fraying grey near the top.

"The same as your mother, only before I even met her." He confessed, Angelica looked at him helplessly, but not the helpless her mother gave him.

"But, isn't that a sin?" She asked, Alexander chuckled.

"I've never been much of a man of god darling, and Im sure I've already committed many many sins in my lifetime worse than loving John in the same way I love your dear mother." Alexander said wisely, Angelica noted what had happened that morning and nodded, he was right. He had done worse things, and if love was the best thing than what was so bad of him loving John?

She knew at that point she wouldn't express that with anyone but her father.

"I think I get it now." She said, Alexander leaned across and took his daughter's hand.

"You don't have to, it's not yours to get." He said, she nodded, letting him sit back and look around, tears in his eyes.

"Did he love you back?" She asked, he smiled.

"Yes, yes he did. If I never met your mother and he never met his wife when he did we'd have lived together until we found them. That did happen for a small time, but not too long." He said, smiling at the fond memories of them when they were young and in love. The two in the room decided to ignore the elephant that had called that morning. 

"If you weren't so blind when you were young would you have been his partner?" Angelica questioned.

"If the situation was that perfect and it had worked out like that, I'm sure I would have. But I'm never satisfied am I?" he asked, Angelica chuckled.

"No, and you never will be. Even if you are content in one minute, you probably won't be the next." Angelica observed. The fire was still burning within Alexander, but he had run far enough to catch his breath in the manor he had been trapped in with the flames when it started. He wouldn't escape, but he could get away for now.

"Your aunt is also a lot like you as well." He noted.

"I think you two are more similar than you think." Angelica commented.

"We are, and to think I lost picked her instead of your mother, thank god she introduced me." He said.

"She regrets it, you know. She's in love with you and she'll always be." Angelica said, looking out the window of the apartment. She heard her father chuckled and lean back in his chair once more, he smiled at her, looking to the flourished red and gold walls around them.

"I know, and sometimes I love her too. But never as much as your mother. Laurens was an acceptation, but no one like your mother." He said, Angelica sighed at the thought of going home to her angry mother who would have been stress-baking.

"How could you do that to her? You must apologize, you understand that right?" She said, he nodded ,the fire finding him again.

"I forget," he lied, which Angelica knew he just didn't want to admit something he knew. "She'l come around and we'll talk. Just let her heat cool a bit. I'll be around. You know where to find me." 

Angelica watched as her father took out a scotch glass but poured red wine into it. She watched as he drank it, and she was too young of course to drink but she knew what he'd do to himself that night. She left him with a kiss on his scratchy cheek to find her brothers at the park, where the clouds darkened once more, but no child cared as they walked back to their family home in the same way, together.