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Every sound you hear, every noise he makes creates a yearning within your non-existent bones. His voice is so melodic, you'd say he was an angel if you didn't hate angels with every fibre of your being. They were the ones to curse you with this life after all.
He answers something, the question itself passing over your head, addressing Tommy. You hear your name and oh, how lovely it sounds coming out of his mouth!
He calls your name, asking if you agree with him and you want to tell him you would agree with anything if it meant he would love you, but you can't.
Instead you settle for a hum of agreement and change the conversation. You ask how he is feeling and try to give him tips for being non-corporeal, passing them off as advice from the other ghosts around you.
Your supernatural knowledge goes unquestioned as your character in the SMP is a form of a medium, hearing and speaking to the unseen dead. Every enderman slain, every sheep fallen off a cliff, every zombie burnt in the light, all of them.
You continue building while conversing with your friends. When you do speak to the chat it is only in response to a donated accusation, A random throwaway account made for the hate comment. The robotic voice reads it out, stilling the others. "You are what's wrong here, you have no right to be acting like friends here when you are the real corruption."
You get a lot of similar comments, due to the combination of your account being relatively fresh and lacking followers(due to all the previous deletions) and joining the SMP extremely late, however this is the first real comment that anyone ever paid money to you for.
As soon as the notification pops up on the screen, a mod block the account but the damage is done. The like-minded commenters start a flood of comments on the same wavelength. Your mods do your best to delete them, but you quickly end up having to end the stream, exit the discord call and log off minecraft without another word. The computer fizzles for a bit, but turns itself off once your hand is no longer touching it.
You look over at your phone, now buzzing with the constant stream of texts.
The first one you reply to is Tommy, assuring him that you are fine and not that bothered by the comment but you needed to get off anyways because of your family (It's been a while since you thought about them, did they end up like you or in the so-called better place? Maybe it's better that you don’t know, you wouldn’t be able to handle the answer either way..) to which he responds with an understanding yet excitable “OK!”.
You move on, apologising and explaining to Tubbo, who was confused as to why you suddenly logged out of the server with no explanation (You always stay on afterwards, why couldn’t have you just pretended to be ok for a bit then end the stream and continue playing? You’re such an idiot. Even on your bad days when you logged out of the calls as well, you continued playing!).
He says he “hopes everything is ok there”, making you laugh dryly. There is no more ok for you, just pain and lesser pain.
Some others, who were watching the stream, text support and questions to you but are ignored in favour of the one who matters most.
Wilbur’s texts are a mess of advice on how to block out hate, support and compliments and questions on if you are ok.
Your heart aches, as for a second you believe he might actually love you back. But then you remember his previous comment, that he could never love you, that he sees you as a younger sibling in a way, that he loves you - “platonically”. You type out a thousand different responses, but end up deleting them all.
You send him a short “Thanks :)” and spend an hour staring at the ceiling while lying on the bed, until your “roommate” comes back.
She’s confused as to why the dishes are clean and why the cups are organised, but ends up attributing it to her previous one night stand, who she left in her bed as she went to work without a note (that you ended up writing on her behalf). As she starts her evening routine, you start packing up your items.
You’re close to him- close to his house. The night comes, and you put them in a package dropped within a postal truck going on a route past his house.
The driver finds the package in the backseat, and drops it off on the doorstep. The driver tries to ring the doorbell, but you were prepared and muted it inside the house, so that he doesn’t hear.
When you are certain the truck is gone and no-one is on the street, you move your items inside the house. You put in a spare room, inside of another empty box.
Then, you see him. You finally see him in real life- not through a computer screen and by god, he is gorgeous. If you thought he was a god beforehand, the image of Aphrodite is the only thing that could describe him.
For a microsecond you stare into his eyes, pretending that he is looking into yours as well.
The moment is disrupted when he continues walking, walking right through you. He stops for a second after, rubbing his neck and looking at you, or more accurately the spot where you are currently standing in, with confusion before shrugging and continuing walking.
Your heart squeezes and you fall to the ground, beginning to sob. No matter how much you try- he will never see you, he can never feel you, he will only know you through the internet. And you, selfish you, are cursed to forever long after someone who, not only does not know and return your affections but can never truly know you. Wilbur may not be yours, but you will always be his. As you watch him hop onto discord and message you, asking to voice call, you realise that maybe- just maybe this will be enough. Maybe you can be content like this, after all; having him in your life is better than not having him at all.