Chapter Text
"Why do you always have to be so formal?" he asks, one day- as a joke, perhaps, but the delivery falls flat. "We have first names for a reason."
And you want to shoot back, ask him when was the last time he called you Aaron, honey-sweet and gentle, like you have with him- if not out loud then in your head; your heart. But you don't. Because then you would have to see him hesitate, see him come to the same realization that haunts you did, all those years ago, the night before he married Eliza: "never. never." He never will.
Silence is an answer unto itself.
He lets out a breath, not surprised at your reply -or lack thereof- before gathering up his things. "Tomorrow, Burr," he says softly, like an afterthought- like something only said to fulfill his role in this dance of yours.
You wish it wasn't so familiar. Life has never been fair before, though, and it'd be foolish to think it'd start now.
"Tomorrow," you think. It's only when the door shuts that you realize this is the first time Alexander has left before you.
That fact shouldn't taste as bitter as it does.
-
Weeks later, a sort of guilt compels you to take your sorely used bible off the shelf for a bit of light reading. "If I can't make it to church," you reason, "I can at least do this."
You open it and flip towards the latter parts-you hear enough of law and damnation in your line of work, thank you very much-and stop.
Matthew 7:12:
Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you:
do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.
You put it back on the shelf.