There are sparkles everywhere. Well, basically - everywhere except Alec's clothes, which is a major achievement. Seriously, it's amazing how much glitter Magnus can transfer without using magic. It just sort of, follows him around as he works, leaving a little, pink, blue, green, yellow, whatever, colour trail. Makes it very hard to lose Magnus in crowd.

If, you know, you didn't notice him to begin with. Which is hard, what with all the hair gel, glitter, and fluoro colours, which literally make a neon sign saying, massively powerful, extremely gay warlock here.

Which is embarrassing for so many reasons.

(But also kind of…cute.)

.

"If you loved me, you know," Magnus starts. "You'd wear a colour. And before you start, black is not a colour, it's a shade."

"I'm wearing brown," Alec defends. "And brown is a colour." Magnus purses his lips together and looks him up and down.

"That's the washed out sweater, isn't it? Did you really think that you could trick me when it comes to clothes? Oh, how sad. You don't know me at all." Magnus sighs, and Alex just takes another sip of his coffee.

"It's still a colour," he reasons. "A faded shade, true, but still a colour." He hears a dramatic groan and rolls his eyes, still looking into his coffee. "What?"

"You," Magnus answers simply. "Maybe I've been going about this all wrong. Maybe I should start you out on blue, that's a nice colour. Blue isn't offensive, is it?"

"Depends," he reasons. "Navy's fine. But I refuse to be put in aqua."

"You don't let me have any fun," Magnus accuses. Suddenly, he reaches into his pocket and brings out a dark blue headband, covered in sequins, creating a tiny rainbow as it reflects the light. "That's blue. Wear it." Alec lifts it warily with two fingers, looking at it in utter disgust.

"No," he decides shortly. Magnus glares at him.

"You're lucky you're cute," is all he says, coming around to press a kiss on his cheek. "Very lucky." Alec just smiles slightly a blushes, before quickly rubbing a hand over his cheek, trying to get sparkles off.

.

He's sitting with his back against the wall, reading one of Magnus' books about Downworlder's all around the world. Why, he doesn't know, it just happened to be the only thing on the bookshelf that was in English. But it's old and out-of-date, and he wonders why Magnus got it in the first place.

"Why," a voice breaks through his conscience. "are you reading that? That is nearly four decades old, and has a very biased view on vampires. As well as conveniently forgetting to mention that they actually make rather good lovers." He feels himself blanch an even paler shade of white. "Oh, sorry, sweetie. Don't take that the wrong way."

"It's fine," he says, waving a hand in the air. "And it was the only thing I could find that vaguely interested me." He hears a rustle of fabric (most likely very brightly coloured, of course) and steps coming towards him, and then feels a body slide down the wall beside him. He glances from his book slightly, and sees intricate patterns on purple sleeves, reminding him of his own black marks that litter his arms (dressed in black, always, he thinks).

"I can fix that. Would you happen to be interested in some Victorian literature? The originals, I mean. Or maybe something a little bit more current; I do not yet know your taste in books," Magnus replies. "But really, the main question is, why are slumped up against my very bland - which we must do something about - white wall?" He unconsciously shrugs his shoulders.

"You do have a tendency to buy couches that are very…bright," he says. "Particularly the pink one."

"That's a favourite of mine, actually," he replies. "Still, I have accepted the dislike of any fashionable clothes, whatsoever, but furniture. Well, that's new."

"It's a very gay colour," he says before he can stop himself. Magnus seems unfazed by this.

"And so are you," he answers. "You could have some happy bonding together."

"You go bond with the couch then," he says, blushing. "You're gay as well."

"Actually, being an eight hundred and something year old warlock, I happen not to believe in labels," Magnus replies. "So yes, go figure."

"This is far too complicated," Alec says in annoyance. "Could you please let me read now?" With a sudden poof and a gasp coming from his lips, he finds himself seated on a dark leather lounge.

"Yes, now you may," is all Magnus says.

.

It turns out that Magnus does, in fact, have a very impressive amount of books, and while Alec tries to convince him to give him half, he refuses. So instead, he has to borrow one at a time, which makes it a very tedious process due to Magnus' general untidiness. Except when it comes to clothes, of course.

"How," he starts. "did you get Jane Austen's autograph?" he asks one day.

"A gentlemen never gives away his secrets," he replies, giving him a wink. He just smiles into the book slightly.

But it does start to occur to him just how long Magnus has been around for, makes him start to understand why maybe, whenever he sees them together, Isabelle always has her hand clenched tightly around Simon's; as if he'll leave, as if she'll leave him. His thinks that he starts to feel his throat constrict a little ( - but he's never been that sentimental).

He looks over at Magnus, who's wearing a yellow vest on top of a white t-shirt, and his favourite rainbow pants (yes, he has multiple). He smiles sadly for no reason at all.

.

"Holy crap," Simon starts. "You got him to wear blue. I didn't think it was possible." Magnus smiles proudly at him, and he feels himself blush as he looks down at his decidedly black shoes, which Magnus says doesn't go with the outfit. At all. But then again, neither does the shirt - or at least, he thinks it doesn't. Magnus thinks it does ("As if I'd let you go out of the house with me wearing something unfashionable now that you're wearing colour. Please").

"Yes, well done," Isabelle agrees. "Actually, this is the first time I think I've actually seen you in colour, Alec."

"That's it, I'm not doing this again," he says, slouching. He feels a hand on his back, digging into his spine, pushing him back up. He glares at Magnus.

"You look horrible when you slouch," he explains. "And you will wear colour again, sweetie. Believe me, you will."

He pouts.

It's one of Magnus' notorious parties, though considerably more low-key than usual, due to his dislike to lots of people and Simon's fear of faerie drinks - though he's not sure what they'd do to him now; what's he got left to lose?

Jace, Clary, and only a couple more familiar faces arrive afterwards. He sits down on his own dark leather couch, Magnus near him and dressed flamboyantly as usual, and soon the music starts to increase, as do the drinks. He finds himself standing in a corner, watching everybody dance, and smiling to himself softly, though he's still not one for parties.

Magnus comes over to him, and before he knows it, he's pulled him onto the dance floor, which had been there ever since Magnus had clicked his fingers some time ago. The colours are moving under his feet, and he starts to feel just a little bit queasy at the sight (or maybe it's for a completely different reason. Maybe). Magnus leans up to kiss him, and to his own surprise, he finds himself pushing him away.

"Not here," he says, and it sounds wrong on his lips. Magnus frowns, an unusual expression on his normally animated face. It doesn't mix with any of the glitter on his face, looking like diamonds in the sun under the lights. He walks away.

For the rest of the party, he continues to sit in the corner, occasionally talking to Isabelle or Simon. After awhile, everybody says goodbye.

And then it's just the two of them again.

.

"What's wrong?" Magnus says immediately. "Are we having an identity crisis? A sexuality crisis? Are we just embarrassed? What, exactly?"

"I don't know," he answers softly. "I…" he trails off, not knowing what to say. "I don't know," he repeats.

"This is like our first year all over again," Magnus sighs. "Just without a powerful Shadowhunter trying to take over the world. Again."

"You seem to be used to this," Alec observes. "Is that just from me, or just something you picked up?"

"Are you having a go at my immortality? Or my sexuality?" Magnus asks.

"I'm not having a go," Alec replies, sounding a little bit too defensive for his own good. "I'm just…ugh." Magnus glares at him.

"I'm going out for a walk," he says, standing up suddenly.

"Magnus, wai - " with a click of his fingers, he's gone.

There's a little bit of glitter on the floor where he was just standing before.

.

He finds Magnus, who's still sulking, and still wearing one of his ridiculous outfits. He comes by and sits next to him.

"Don't disappear again," he says. "I won't say anything if you don't want me to."

"An apology would be nice," Magnus says. "But I don't think it would fix…whatever's going on. We should go on Dr. Phil or something. Though, I guess the whole Shadowhunter and Warlock thing would probably get too much attention." Alec just nods, before reaching into his pocket pulling out a blue headband

- complete with sequins.

Magnus' eyes widen in surprise, and he can feel the blood rush to his cheeks, and looks down at his shoes. He thinks he sees Magnus smile from the corner of his eye, and hears him say,

"Why did you keep that? Particularly as it is very, very out of style now."

"Um," he starts. "Well, you gave it to me. So…yeah." Magnus shakes his head, but continues to smile at him.

"You need a new one," he explains. "Blue's out, purple's in." He hears a groan come from his throat.

"I'm not wearing it," he says.

"That's what you said about that one," Magnus replies, nodding his head towards the headband still situated on his forehead. "It will happen, I know it." And with that, he leans over and kisses Alec, who kisses back and doesn't care about anything else.

(The future can wait, he thinks.)

Disclaimer: I do not own the Mortal Instruments.

Review please.