Work Text:
“Hey, Hey!”
Alicent tunes it out and turns another page.
“Hey, Hey are you ready?” Double clap. “Are you ready?” Double clap.
Alicent again questions her life choices and every wrong decision that led her to the bleachers after school.
“To play!” Clap. “Say go, team!” Clap. “Go, team!” Clap. “Dragons all the way!”
Alicent glances up from her book to see a sheet of silver blonde hair go flying into the air. As always her heart stops painfully as Rhaenyra poses atop the human pyramid. Rhaenyra shoots her a cocky glance before falling backward into the waiting arms of her fellow cheerleaders.
Alicent’s eyes rove over her best friend. Alicent has never confronted that side of herself, the part that enjoys looking at Rhaenyra’s legs in that skirt more than a girl should. It’s the part of her she has known to hide since she was six years old when her father drove past two women on the street holding hands and called them a slur.
It was the first time she learned about two women wanting each other the same way the Disney princesses wanted their prince.
“You didn’t have to stay for the whole practice.” Rhaenyra bounds up to her, high off adrenaline with a flush in her cheeks. The red cheer skirt and crop top do very little to hide Rhaenyra’s physique. Alicent looks back down at her abused thumbnail and pulls a loose hanging flap of skin. Blood pools from the small cut and she wraps her finger in her t-shirt.
“It wasn’t too bad,” Alicent lies. She shoves her English book back into her backpack and barely swings one strap around her arm before Rhaenyra is dragging her off the field.
On the same field, the football team lines up doing their drills, and at the center of the testosterone huddle is Criston Cole. It’s like something out of a bad rom-com as Criston with his flowing dark locks and Dornish good looks, lobs a perfect pass to an in-stride Harwin Strong. As soon as the football hits Harwin’s hands Criston is looking over at Rhaenyra with a smug smile.
“Ugh.”
Alicent gives herself whiplash looking down at Rhaenyra, incredulity on her face.
“Did you have a fight?” Alicent asks, trying to keep the thread of hope out of her voice. Rhaenyra only pulls on Alicent’s arm that much more strongly as they head toward the parking lot.
Alicent’s father can afford a better car for his daughter. Otto Hightower has money, every family who sends their child to King’s Landing has money, but that was money best spent on his company. Alicent’s car was not bad by any means, it was a dark blue Nissan that ran smoothly, but it was nothing compared to Jason Lanister’s mustang the next parking spot over.
Alicent embarrassedly opens the door for Rhaenyra and gets in the front seat. The car starts with a low whine.
Alicent’s hands sit at ten and two on the steering wheel and she can see the second Rhaenyra sees her torn nail bed.
Rhaenyra opens the glove box and pulls out a bandaid. “Let me see your hand.”
“It’s already stopped bleeding,” Alicent whines. She wants to leave the school before five-thirty, thanks. “Let's just go.”
“No. This is why you catch so many colds,” Rhaenyra scolds, carefully unfolding the ridiculous pokemon bandaid over Alicent’s picked raw skin. “You need to take care of open cuts or you’ll get germs.”
“Like you did that time Sara dropped you?” There was a reason Sara was no longer on the cheer team. Dropping the cheer captain will do that.
“It never happened.”
“It did too. You had a fat lip for a week.” Alicent laughs now at the memory but at the time she had almost had a heart attack. One second Rhaenyra was on top of the pyramid and the next she was face down on the mat with a busted lip and a bloody nose.
“I can’t believe you would bring that up. We agreed to never speak of it again.”
Alicent takes back her hand and flexes her finger where the bandaid restricts her movement. She pulls out of the parking spot and drives away.
Rhaenyra puts her feet on the dashboard even though Alicent has told her again and again not to do that.
Rhaenyra sees her glare and drops her feet to the floor. Instead, she begins sifting through her glovebox again.
“Is your dad home?” She asks.
“No, he’s working late.” The good goes unsaid by Rhaenyra. She continues to rummage through the glovebox before pulling out a packet of cookies and starts munching on one. Alicent steers them out of the school parking lot. “I washed your clothes from the last time you stayed over. You can take a shower when we get to my house.”
“Alicent, I love you more than anyone. No one gets me like you do.”
Alicent turns away and pretends to check her blind spot so Rhaenyra can’t see her red face. “I’m just the only one who will put up with you.”
“I am a delight.”
“You’re a menace,” Alicent hopes her voice isn’t as lovestruck as it sounds in her head.
+
The tragedy of having feelings for your straight best friend is that her boy troubles never last long. Whatever lover’s spat she had with Criston is over the next day as they giggle in the shadow of the lockers.
Alicent slams her locker closed with more force than necessary and thinks her green t-shirt perfectly matches the feelings on the inside.
+
The Hightowers, all two of them now Gwayne is off to college, live in a large ranch-style house in a suburb near Kings Landing.
Alicent’s house isn’t as opulent as Rhaenyra’s, whose backyard is massive with a pool and a dragon-shaped waterslide. When they first met at age 6 it was the height of cool in her eyes.
More often than not Alicent is home alone while her dad works. Every corner of the yard is protected with security cameras. Alicent’s bedroom is in the back of the house guarded by a gigantic fence and gate. Somehow Rhaenyra still finds a way over the fence.
It scares her to death when at 11:30 on a school night Rhaenyra bangs on her window.
Alicent is close to clubbing Rhaenyra with her old aluminum softball bat.
“What are you doing here?” She hisses, opening the window wide enough for Rhaenyra to come sliding through it and onto the floor in a heap.
The sharp smell of some fruity alcohol stinks up the room and Alicent knows it will seep into the carpet.
Rhaenyra stumbles back to her feet. “I wanted to see my best friend,” Rhaenyra says with uncharacteristically watery eyes. Alicent’s stomach drops and she starts clawing at her hands.
Alicent’s eyes nervously dart around her room before landing on her desk. “Did you want to borrow my study guide? We have a calculus test tomorrow.”
Rhaenyra bursts out into hysterical giggles, slumping against her, her head resting heavily in the crook of her shoulder. Each hot exhale sends suppressed shivers down Alicent’s spine.
Alicent gives in to the need to push back that silver-gold hair, as soft as silk underneath her fingertips.
Rhaenyra moves her face away from her neck and stares at her.
Rhaenyra’s eyes are blown wide, a faint ring of bluish-purple faintly visible around the pupil. Alcohol, Alicent knows: it still doesn’t stop the swooping in her stomach.
“Let’s go lie down.”
She matches Rhaenyra backward until her knees hit the green comforter and she lands on the mattress with a soft fwoosh.
Rhaenyra has been in Alicent’s room a thousand times. She knows the soft green paint, the pale carpet underneath their feet, her desk and the bookshelf beside it crammed with her favorite childhood books, and her mother’s cross hanging from a hook next to her vanity. And Alicent is used to her here, where she flips through her dogeared books and steals her jackets during wintertime. But seeing Rhaenyra bathed in the soft lamplight is different, she feels, than it ever is during the daytime. It’s more and something inside her chest pulls like a fish on a hook.
Staring at Rhaenyra in this light is dangerous. She turns away and opens her drawers. “You can borrow some of my pajamas.”
+
There is a gap in her curtains. A place where she didn’t close them properly when Rhaenyra crawled into her room. The sliver of light reflects on her mother’s cross, casting emeralds in the moonlight. They stare at her like green eyes in the darkness.
Alicent closes her eyes so she cannot see their judgment anymore.
“I don’t don’t think I’m a good person,” Alicent confesses in the dark. They are shoulder to shoulder on Alicent’s full-sized bed and Rhaenyra’s breaths have slowed and deepened. She’s on the verge of sleep when she feels the whispered words leave her mouth.
Rhaenyra rolls over to face her. “You’re the best person I know,” she says.
Again, Alicent feels the burn inside her chest, an unquenching fire that isn’t satisfied with only being Rhaenyra’s best friend.
“I want too much.” I want you, Alicent thinks wildly. It’s an unsafe thought, brought about by close proximity in the dark. She turns away.
“You’re allowed to want,” Rhaenyra mumbles into her back.
Alicent hasn’t wanted anyone else since she was old enough to want. And Rhaenyra will never want her back.
+
It’s Saturday and Rhaenyra is wearing worn-out jeans. She swings their joined hands back and forth and Alicent thinks about how she wishes she could freeze this moment.
“I heard Larys is going to ask you to homecoming.”
Alicent isn’t a mean person, really she isn’t, but the thought of Larys makes her want to gag.
“He stares at my feet during math. I don’t wear sandals anymore because of him.”
Rhaenyra’s smirk widens. “I didn’t know I was getting a free show whenever we’d paint our nails together.”
“I hate you.”
Rhaenyra laughs and Alicent sighs heavily. They stop at a park bench in front of a lake. Ducks harass a picnicker at the lunch benches and it’s peaceful. Alicent is her own worst enemy and breaks it.
“You’re going with Criston, then?”
“Yes.”
Maybe it’s her wild hopes, but Alicent thinks she doesn’t sound enthusiastic. Not fluttery and giggly like she was at the beginning of their relationship. Each day passed like torture back then.
“Are you going to tell me what’s wrong?”
“Who said anything is wrong?” Rhaenyra challenges. She is always disagreeable when she is worried , Alicent thinks sighing.
She lets Rhaenyra stew and watches an exceptionally fat duck push over another duck to steal part of a sandwich.
“He asked if I was his whore.”
It’s so out of left field that Alicent chokes on her own saliva.
“I say stuff and he just gets so-” Rhaenyra waves her hands around wildly. “Like, who says that, you want me to be your whore? ” She says it in a mock deep voice and Alicent is so taken aback that her laughter bursts out hysterically.
“He’s just-” Boring, uptight, annoying. Alicent can fill in the words for her and ignores how the same adjectives are regularly applied to her by others.
Rhaenyra’s face splits into the first genuine smile that she’s seen in a while.
“He’s not like you,” she settles on and all of Alicent’s hysterical laughter falls away. The breath catches in her lungs and burns .
“If he doesn’t make you happy-” Alicent begins carefully. She can’t tell Rhaenyra to leave Criston—she is too headstrong to take her advice—and she’s terrified some of her own feelings will seep out from the cracks of her walls if she tries. She can’t figure out how to end the sentence and lets the last word trail in the air.
“You can have anyone you want.”
+
Rhaenyra kicks her feet restlessly and Alicent fights the urge to smooth down the crinkle developing between her eyebrows.
“Why won’t you show me your dress?”
One weekend when Rhaenyra is off doing whatever, Alicent chooses her homecoming dress even though she plans to attend alone. It’s a lonely affair, by herself without her best friend, but who else does she have other than Rhaenyra? The thought sits hollow in her chest.
There’s a delusional dream that sits in the back of her mind: that Rhaenyra will be so overwhelmed by Alicent in her dress that she declares her undying love. It’s a daydream she traces over and over again until the paths are well-worn. A fantasy.
“It’s a surprise,” Alicent says without looking up from her homework.
“I’m your best friend.”
Alicent scribbles down an answer. “Are you?”
Rhaenyra smacks her knee. “I thought we didn’t have secrets between us.”
Alicent looks down at Rhaenyra then, whose head lies in her lap underneath the shade of a large oak tree. Her eyes trace the shadows on her face, down the line of her cheekbones until they rest on her lips. Alicent looks away.
“Everyone has secrets.”
+
“I broke up with Criston.”
Alicent’s books fall to the table with a loud thwacking sound that reverberates around the library. Face glowing, Alicent looks at Rhaenyra, blinking rapidly as if the girl in front of her will somehow morph.
“You broke up–”
“I didn’t know you were hard of hearing,” Rhaenyra says. There’s no fight in her voice. And she isn’t upset. Alicent feels her brain tripping and rebooting over and over again, every thought blanking out like a white screen of death.
“Why?” she finally stutters out.
“I’d rather take you to homecoming.” Alicent hears ringing in her ears and is this what a stroke feels like? She knows her face is incredulous and Rhaenyra laughs at her. “He was boring.”
The old librarian circles closer to their table like a shark smelling blood in the water and Alicent leans closer.
“He’s always been boring,” Alicent whispers, forgetting her long-held policy of never bashing one of Rhaenyra’s boyfriends. It never ended well once she got back together with them.
“Can we go to homecoming together?” Rhaenyra asks. As friends is implicit, Alicent knows, but it doesn’t stop her from flushing to the roots of her hair. “I’ll be a perfect gentleman, I promise,” she adds.
“Of-of course.” She wills her face to stop burning and her heart to stop fluttering.
Rhaenyra smirks. “Now will you show me your dress?”
“No.”
+
The night of the homecoming football game is cold. Alicent sits bundled in Rhaenyra’s scarlet school sweatshirt while on the field Rhaenyra and the cheerleaders freeze to death in their uniforms.
She wouldn’t be here, sitting on an ice-cold bench with her ass completely numb from cold, unless Rhaenyra is here. Especially as Criston Cole has the best game of his life. Each throw is on target and Alicent gnashes her teeth so often that she has a migraine by halftime.
To make matters worse, Larys Strong takes the empty bleacher space next to her.
“Hello, Alicent.”
“Hi, Larys,” she says through clenched teeth. She wraps her arms more tightly around her body.
“They’re going to make a striking homecoming king and queen.”
Alicent’s eyes dart over. “Who?”
“Your best friend and our dearest quarterback.”
Of course. Rhaenyra is the unspoken delight of King’s Landing and Alicent knows she will get the crown. And Criston is the quarterback so it only makes sense. It doesn’t stop her from feeling aggravation rising inside her chest. She tears at loose threads on her gloved hands.
“They’re destined to be together. They’re on the field and we are on the sidelines. But we don’t have to be on the sidelines alone.” Larys shoots her a longing look and Alicent knows exactly what he wants. Larys’ eyes trace down her body and down her legs in a way that makes Alicent feel like spiders are crawling on her skin. She tucks her legs closer to her body.
Alicent shuts down any attempts at conversation with Larys for the rest of the game. Alicent feels the burn of Larys’ eyes when the Dragons win. Something similar to rage sits in her stomach as Criston follows Rhaenyra off the field.
+
The afterparty is held at Laena’s house. The Valeryons come from the same old money as the Targaryens and it shows in the sprawling house with its own movie studio, heated pool, and miniature golf course in the backyard.
Corlys Valeryon does a lot of business overseas alongside his wife. It just so happens that one of these trips perfectly coincides with the homecoming game.
Alicent pushes through the throng of people and feels overheated in her attire from the crush of bodies. A steady bass pounds in her temples from the surround sound system and Alicent is awed to see so many of her classmates already half-drunk and falling over themselves. The party only just started. She hasn’t seen Rhaenyra, though she’s found every other white-blond-haired relative. She’s seen Laenor, wrapped tightly around Joffrey on the huge couch, and Laena with her group of friends.
She already regrets agreeing to come. You need to keep me company. Who else am I going to gossip with?
“Alicent!” Rhaenyra appears at her elbow. Her red solo cup sloshes dangerously but does not spill. She wraps her free arm around Alicent’s body, which burns white hot in response. Rhaenyra’s mouth is at her ear and Alicent can smell processed sugar. “This way, Laena bought cake!”
They weave through the steadily intoxicated teenagers to the bar. Atop it sits a cake and a variety of store-bought baked goods along with what looks like every bottle of alcohol the Valeryans own.
They sway in time with the music at the bar. Rhaenyra wastes no time in securing her a slide of cake and refilling her own glass. She also steals a forkful of cake.
“Rhaenyra!”
There’s a smudge of frosting on her lips and Alicent feels that familiar sweeping sensation in her stomach, the kind that she once prayed was just queasiness.
“Here have a drink,” Rhaenyra waves the cup teasingly underneath her chin, the familiar challenging smirk on her mouth. “Have fun, Ali. Live a little.” What choice does she have?
Alicent drinks the concoction with a small wince. “It’s disgusting!”
Rhaenyra only laughs at her, swaying in beat with the music. Underneath the letterman jacket, Rhaenyra is only wearing her cheerleading outfit and the bare expanse of her midriff taunts Alicent. She steals the cup back from Rhaenyra and drinks deeper still.
She feels eyes on them and sees the way Criston stares at Rhaenyra. Alicent wraps her arm around Rhaenyra and angles her body in front of her.
“We’re going to have a lot of fun tonight,” Rhaenyra half yells into her ear. Alicent shivers and convinces herself it’s with concern. What are we doing tonight?
Laena weaves her way through the crowd and grabs Rhaenyra’s arm. “We’re starting!”
Rhaenyra in turn pulls Alicent along. “We’re coming!”
She allows herself to be drawn in Rhaenyra’s wake. “What are we doing?”
“Spin the bottle!”
+
As a child, Alicent attends Sunday School. Her father is from a very Catholic family and insists Alicent learns the religion. She is baptized as an infant and goes through the steps to become a full Catholic. She remembers as it was not so very long ago, preparing for First Penance. Before she could receive the Sacrament, before she could receive the first communion, Alicent had to repent of her sins.
Alicent commits another sin that day. The Father asks her what she wants to repent and Alicent’s mind goes straight to Rhaenyra. To the way, her hair glows in the light of her bedroom during their sleepovers. The way Alicent’s stomach aches when they are apart. The longing is like a living animal in her chest.
None of which she can confess. Not to God and not to an old man of a similar disposition to her father. She lies, and she knows in her heart that she is the worst sinner. If there’s anything that would turn God away it is that.
God must hate her. There is no other reason the bottle would spin so slowly before slowing to a stop in front of Rhaenyra. She remembers the way the room jeered and the boys mocked Criston. The way Laena had to practically drag Alicent off the floor and into her walk-in closet.
The door slams behind them and a lock clicks into place. The irony of being trapped in a closet is not lost on Alicent.
Rhaenyra’s face is flushed with laughter and teasing joy that makes Alicent quake down to her toes.
“Well, come on then.”
Alicent is overcome with the mad desire to throw herself at the door and plead for mercy. Instead, she backs up so her back is to the door. Outside she hears the drunken teenagers. “Hightower stole your girl!” someone shouts and the room beyond roars with further laughter.
“We’re not letting you out until you kiss!”
God hates her.
Rhaenyra takes it as a challenge, trapping Alicent against the door with both arms next to her head. Despite being the shorter one, Rhaenyra fills the room. Alicent presses her hands to the door and feels the walls closing in.
“You heard them,” she says in dangerously low tones. Alicent wonders if this is how an exorcism feels. There’s something inside her twisting and writhing to come out, but she feels frozen. Rhaenyra’s expression softens. “It’s not a big deal,” she says.
Alicent disagrees. This is a very big deal. It has always been a big deal for Alicent, who unlike Rhaenyra never felt anything for boys. Repressed Alicent, who was forced to attend Sunday school and confess her multitude of sins in a darkened room, but could never confess to this one. This was her private sin, hers, even if her father would always raise his eyebrow at her attachment to her ‘childhood companion.’
“You have a boyfriend,” Alicent says with as much moral certainty as she can muster.
Rhaenyra smiles her wide crooked smile. “Ex-boyfriend.”
Hands smack the wooden door behind her, more hoots, and Alicent knows that if she wanted to leave, she would let her. That she expects it, even. There’s a challenge in her eyes, but also surety. Rhaenyra knows that Alicent will back down. Meek Alicent.
She grasps Rhaenyra around the neck and smashes their lips together.
It’s artless and Alicent knows if anyone were watching that she looks like a fish. Rhaenyra freezes against her and her sloppy kiss. She withdraws. Tears of humiliation begin to burn in her eyes. This is so stupid.
She closes her eyes and hopes, prays really, that she will sink into the walls. “Done!” she yells. As soon as the door is open she runs for her life. She doesn’t stop running until she is somehow home again, draws the curtains, and curls up under the sheets.
+
The night of the dance, she sequesters in her home without Rhaenyra, who is getting ready across town with her cousin Laena.
This should be something they should do together. But Alicent has done her best to avoid Rhaenyra since the closet. She hasn’t looked once at her phone and even thought about not showing up to homecoming. Her green dress hangs from the back of her dresser, waiting. But still, Alicent sits in her pajamas on the bed, and tears at what little remains of her fingernails.
Her phone vibrates against the sheets again. It hasn’t stopped buzzing since the closet incident, and Alicent hasn’t had the bravery to look. She isn’t sure what gives her the bravery now. She flips over the phone, the wallpaper of her and Rhaenyra staring up at her, and sees the missed notifications. At the top is her most recent text.
Please come.
+
Alicent enters the room and the music does not stop and no one turns around to look at her. She is not the hero of this story. Her entrance is unremarkable. Just another latecomer. Standing proudly in her green dress, auburn hair pulled back, and makeup carefully applied, Alicent feels like a woman going to war.
She isn’t sure what she hopes to accomplish tonight. She kissed Rhaenyra and then she ran away. Rhaenyra did not kiss her back. The memory sends white-hot shame down her spine.
Someone gently touches her elbow, and Alicent knows that touch like muscle memory.
The music is horrible, and the gym lighting is harsh, but Alicent has never seen anyone more beautiful. Rhaenyra is breathtaking. Her dress is red and flowy and her hair looks spun silver.
“You came.”
Alicent’s breath rattles around inside her lungs and shakes her body. Her nerves are tightly wound, but Rhaenyra is too lovely to think of anything else right now, not even her fear.
“You asked.” She will always come when Rhaenyra calls.
Rhaenyra then does something unexpected. She takes Alicent’s hand, careful of her clawed fingernails, and kisses the back with a delicate brush of her lips.
“See? I’m a gentleman.” Alicent breathes out a laugh. The air around them suddenly feels thick and heavy. Alicent doesn’t dare name it.
“I’m sorry I pushed. You know, in the closet.” And they’re talking about it. It’s the giant pink elephant in the room but Alicent was happy to ignore it. She had hoped Rhaenyra would forget about it somehow, through some specific kind of amnesia.
“I’m sorry,” Alicent murmurs.
Rhaenyra’s voice turns petulant. “You ran away.”
“Can you blame me?”
They stare at one another. Alicent isn’t sure what to say or do.
“No. But you left before I could do this.”
Their second kiss is tentative, barely a brush of lips. It sends a shockwave down her spine nonetheless. Alicent knows she is clumsy and doesn’t know what she is doing, but she presses forward hungrily. Rhaenyra’s face splits into a warm smile, turning hungry. Their third kiss is possessive. The fourth bruising. Lungs burning, Alicent breathes out against Rhaenyra’s lips and presses her body closer to the girl’s warmth.
This is what drowning feels like, she thinks. Her lungs cannot fill with enough air and she’s sinking. She’s terrified she’s going to say something wrong, something horrifyingly stupid like–
“I love you.” Something like that. Alicent Hightower was condemned the second she left her mother’s womb. She’s an abomination, a blight, a–
Rhaenyra’s face cracks into a smile, so bright it’s like sunlight pouring out of her face. “I love you too.”