So good and so real
Alexander Hamilton writes. He loves writing. In English everyone always asks him how he writes so quickly and so often. Yet today Alex was distant and distracted. He couldn’t stop doodling cheesy hearts and humming to himself. English was his class right before his three hour off-period, and his date. He had spent the whole class ignoring everyone until the teachers released everyone and he booked it. 1:30. He could drive but it was a five minute walk, and it was nice out. He threw his books in his hand-me-down car and took a deep breath. After two weeks of awkward glances and dreams, he was finally getting a date with John Laurens. He started off toward the direction of the nearest Starbucks, his stomach doing flips with every step he took.
The building came into view and Alex spotted John standing by the door. He skipped over a little faster and grinned. “Hey.” He wanted to say more, normally he would, but right now he couldn’t find the words.
“Hey.” John passed Alex one of the two cups he was holding in his hands, taking Alex’s arm in his own and walking farther down the sidewalk.
Alex took a sip and felt curiosity rising. “How’d you know I get the blonde?”
“I have people.” John shivered a little and pushed himself closer to Alex.
Alex knew that ‘people’ meant Lafayette trying to hard to make this work. Alex didn’t mind, he thought it was sweet that John took effort to find out what he ordered. “So what exactly do you have planned, seeing as we didn’t sit down in the Starbucks and we’re still walking.”
John rolled his eyes with a laugh. “There’s a big field out here. I thought it might be nice to just go and relax. Talk about ourselves and all that other sappy stuff.”
Alex took another sip of his coffee, walking on beside John until a large field came into view. He spotted two people, Jefferson and Madison, sitting at a table. John tensed up beside Alex. “What the fuck are they doing here,” he muttered. John carefully kept walking, avoiding the two to his best ability, but they had already noticed him and were walking over.
“Well, well, well James look who decided to show up on our turf yet again.” Thomas said as he sauntered over with a smirk. “So John, you’ve already moved on? I’m hurt honestly.” He then turned and looked at Alex. “Especially about the fact that you chose a scrawny nerd.”
Alex hid behind John, only glancing up for but a moment as James spoke. “Thomas please, lets get going.”
Thomas huffed. “I’m just having a little fun. Besides I said I was sorry and it wouldn’t happen again, so can’t you just let me have this moment?”
“Sorry won’t change what you did Thomas, now I’m heading back to campus.” With that James started walking away. Thomas looked confused for a second before letting out an angry sigh, running after James.
John quickly shook off the meeting and sat at the nearest table, Alex sitting opposite of him. “What was that about?” Alex asked without realizing how forward it sounded.
John sighed. “Around the middle of my senior year in highschool my dad got moved across the country so I had to switch schools. I met Thomas and I guess I liked him and apparently he liked me. We started dating, if you could call it that, and I found out about three months into it that he was dating James. Apparently everyone just assumed they broke up so they never told me what was happening.”
Alex was taken aback. “Oh...weird. When I was talking to them at Angelica’s party they seemed so...happy. Like nothing bad happened.”
John laughed. “Yeah well that’s how Thomas always is. James just acts like it when he really wants to make things right. But I know the truth. James should just dump his ass. But hey enough about my stupid past. What about you? What was your life like before college.”
Alex let out a breathy laugh. “Oh god where to begin? I basically grew up an orphan, had to give myself an education, and didn’t do much until after this huge hurricane hit and I wrote this poem thingy and apparently everyone loved it so they saved money over the course of two years to send me here. That’s it really.”
John’s eyes were wide. “That’s it? Wow I didn’t know you were so humble.” He smiled warmly and rested his head in one of his hands, his other hand drumming his fingers on the table. Alex remembered that smile from the night they met. A smile that made Alex’s heart melt every time he saw it. It also made him freeze up and forget the world. He had to admit, it was nice. “Alexander, hello?” John’s voice snapped Alex back to reality.
“Hm? Oh yeah sorry just...thinking. Happens a lot.” He coughed awkwardly, feeling his face heat up.
John laughed. “Don’t worry, Aaron does the same thing. I’m used to it. Though I don’t think he likes me very much, so he never responds when I try and get him out of it.”
Alex looked confused. “How could he not like you. I mean what’s not to like? You’ve got a great personality, a really sweet laugh, the best smile I’ve ever seen, really sparkly eyes and-” Alex froze up as he saw the dumbfounded look on John’s face. “I-I mean-”
“No it’s fine.” John laughed a little. “You’re not too bad looking yourself Alexander.” His phone let out a low ringing sound and he pulled it from his pocket and answered it, being greeted with Lafayette’s rushed voice. Lafayette finished his sentence and hung up, leaving John with a sly smirk. “Alex have you had the honor of meeting the ‘king squad’ of the campus yet?” Alex shook his head. “Oh God this is perfect. They’re having this stupid meeting in the middle of the quad and these are the best to watch. Wanna come? We’ve got two hours to kill and I’ve seen these go on all day.”
Alex simply nodded and stood, following John as they walked to campus. They walked around the corner of a building and entered the quad, and Alex immediately felt stressed just seeing the large crowd that was gathered. “Here, let’s sit with the others.” John led Alex to a bench where Lafayette, Hercules, and Aaron were sitting. Alex felt less stressed, and realized where they sat they had a perfect view of what the crowd was gathering around.
On a small blue box stood a decently sized boy holding a rolled up piece of paper. To his left was another boy, wearing what seemed like a king’s crown and a red cape lined with fur. To the right were two guys, both with black hair and scanning the crowd with a blank expression. Alex turned to John and asked, “Who are they?”
John grinned. “The one on the box is Samuel Seabury, the two on his right are Charles Lee and John Adams. The one on his left is ‘King’ George the Third.”
Alex was about to ask more questions when Samuel cleared his throat and unrolled the paper. “Hear Ye! Hear Ye! Your king has new demands!” Alex could hear the British accent so clearly and sat up a bit straighter. This should be fun.