Piano Days and Other Malec One-Shots

Scars

Mild trigger warning for depression/scars/body issues. Just read with caution and get help if you need it, fun friend. Because you are so spectacular at being you. I just know it. *encouragement* ~A

It's a basic lesson in values: beauty is in the eyes of the beholder.

And so is ugliness. 

Scars to Alec were painful mementos of battles and fights. They marked the exact place where he had forgotten to dodge a flying claw or the slice of a blade. A stupid slip-up or mistake that came at a high price.

They became real-- so real and full of emotion that Alec had begun to see them as people. They held the faces of those he had failed to defend. They screamed at him, demanding obsessive attention, which Alec gave. 

Those were the thoughts that kept him up at night.

He was barely 18 and already struggling with them.

What scared him more was the idea that these weren't the first, nor would they be the last. He'd take more hits and blows. He'd lose more friends. He'd probably lose family.

It wasn't something he thought about all the time. It came and went, depending on his mood.

He'd just started seeing Magnus and he was purposely taking it slow. He couldn't handle his own body-- how could he expect to show it to someone else? 

The bedroom was empty when Alec woke up, Magnus' side of the bed unmade but obviously slept in. He'd already slept far too late into the morning and had to get ready. He climbed out of bed, his feet thudding heavily against the floor. He stripped his shirt off on the way to the bathroom. He needed a shower.

Hanging on the wall just before the bathroom was a full length mirror. 

It was the best place to find Magnus in the morning. This time, Alec was the one stopping and staring at his reflection.

He looked like sleep; disheveled hair, sweatpants loose around his hips, and chapped lips.

That was all fixable. His eyes were drawn to what couldn't be fixed.

His back looked the worst in his opinion. It was where he was most vulnerable during any fight, and as Jace and Isabelle frequently reminded him, he always forgot to defend it. Staring at them for too long sent him into a trance of violent reverie. 

The uneven intersection of lines was dizzying. Alec knew that there were five individual ones on that one plane of skin alone, both raised and sunk into his skin.

Why did they have to stand out?

He shook his head.

He had to take a shower.

That was the priority right now.

His right hand reached across his body, grabbing his left bicep, his hand grazing another scar.

They were everywhere.

They were inescapable.

He was trapped within such ugly skin. It made his heart racing and his mind spin.

Alec stumbled against the wall farthest from the mirror. 

A logical person would have stepped away from the mirror. Alec couldn't; his mind was checked out for the moment.

He was on a brink now. Eventually, he would be shirtless in front of Magnus and what would he think? Alec wanted him to hate the scars as much as he did. He wanted Magnus on his side of this unwinnable battle. But there was always the possibility that he found them too ugly. They could ruin everything.