Chapter Text
(16:18)
Hej, kan vi... snacka?
Wilhelm glances down at the message.
Well, a little more than glances; his gaze lingers on the conversation bubble for so long that the toe of his shoe catches on a warped floorboard and he almost goes crashing down. Righting himself just in time, he quickly turns to see if Malin had caught his little stumble (and of course she had, her lips pursed in what Wilhelm assumed was disguised laughter), a burning flush creeping into his face as he continues towards his room.
He pulls up his phone again though, once more reading over their texts.
(16:18)
Hej, kan vi... snacka?
At the end of their school day, Wilhelm had made himself comfortable at läxis and was trying unsuccessfully to concentrate on his history essay, increasingly distracted by his mind replaying that afternoon’s… conversation with Simon in a never ending loop. He’d just about given up altogether, instead giving in to heated reminiscing about the sounds Simon had made earlier (and fuck, he really shouldn’t be thinking about Simon’s mouth in public...) when he noticed the text and quickly lifted his head, searching.
Simon must have been waiting for his reaction, as he promptly caught and held Wilhelm’s stare from across the room where he was settled at a little table next to Sara, textbooks and worksheets scattered between them. Simon simply twitched an eyebrow at him, as if to say så, kan vi?
Wilhelm picked up his phone, breaking their connection for a second to send his reply before looking towards their table again. He watched Simon’s phone screen light up next to his hand, casting a flash of white neon over his fingers as he tilted his phone towards him to read Wilhelm’s response.
(16:19)
Ja. Just nu?
Simon met his eyes again; nodded once. Immediately, though, he held up his index finger in a sort of wait, hold on gesture and picked up his phone, presumably to draft another text. This text, however, did nothing except confuse Wilhelm when it arrived.
(16:22)
Mmm, actually... you don’t look so well. Are you getting a headache?
But, he felt perfectly fine? A crease appeared between Wilhelm's eyebrows as he shot a message back to that effect.
(16:23)
Vad? Jag mår bra?
Wilhelm watched as the three dots on his screen appeared. Disappeared. Appeared again. He was about to push his chair back, get up and head towards Simon, to simplify this by talking to him (like he asked), when the clarifying text finally came through.
(16:26)
Nej… I think all this noise is getting to you. I think you may need to lay down for a bit… perhaps for the rest of the evening?
Wilhelm surveyed the full, but mostly silent room. What noise? What was he on about? A second message quickly followed, though.
(16:27)
Sara's staying back to help Felice at the stables, so I was thinking I'd take my time heading home, maybe a nice long stroll. Perhaps... follow the stream around to the bus stop?
And… oh.
It finally made sense. That route took Simon directly past his bedroom window.
Wilhelm had no intention of letting Simon get any further than that on his ‘stroll’, and he’d be surprised if Simon had any further destination in his mind either.
A third text (and honestly, if he’d known Simon was a triple texter he’d have excommunicated him by now) vibrated through his phone.
(16:28)
So?
He was now staring blankly at the lit screen resting in his slackened hand.
(16:28)
...honey? 😉
Wilhelm felt blood rush into the apples of his cheeks as he read this last message.
The little shit.
Simon’s face when Wilhelm looked up again was radiating warmth, eyes sparkling out over his phone, held in two delicate hands inches from his face. He’d slouched back in his chair, all pretence of actual study forgotten, abandoned pen rolled halfway across the table.
Wilhelm held eye contact and started stacking his books immediately.
Watched as Simon stifled a giggle and did the same.
So now here Wilhelm is, having made his (hopefully vaguely believable) excuses to his friends about needing an early night, about the start of a migraine, maybe? and about too much light in the study hall. Hoping his flushed appearance had been taken only as further proof of his unwellness. He’s walking - no, tripping - his clumsy way back to his dorm, moving too fast, textbooks clutched tightly to his chest. Eyes glued to the screen in his hand, scanning Simon’s messages again.
Trying to forget the knowing way Malin had studied his face, then shot a look towards Simon (who had his backpack on, leaning down over Sara’s shoulder to help her with a final equation), and returned her focus to Wilhelm before simply gesturing him forward. Trying to ignore how his heart’s racing a tad faster at the mere thought of having Simon alone again.
As Wilhelm reaches out a hand to open his bedroom door, he notices that instead of setting up across from the threshold as she usually does, Malin is still halfway down the hall systematically checking every other room that opens to the corridor.
He stills, turning to her and beginning to ask, “Vad…?”
Malin doesn’t miss a beat of her inspection, doesn’t look at him as she replies. “I have to make a call this afternoon, and phone reception’s a little better at the top of the hall. I can,” she gestures vaguely through the glass-paned door enclosing this wing of bedrooms, “while the rest of the boys are still at läxis.”
“Ah,” Wilhelm says easily, turning the doorknob and entering his room.
He’s about to latch the door closed again when, remembering Malin’s considering glance at Simon earlier and the memory that she’s definitely taken calls outside his room before, it hits him exactly what Malin’s just said. Exactly what she meant by her last statement, that he’s coming to realise was not prompted by a need for phone reception in the slightest.
Okay, so– Cool. Okay. She definitely heard them a couple of days ago then, when Simon stayed the night after the Society party fiasco. And of course there was that afternoon, where Simon all but shouted at her through the classroom door. With a slight groan he thunks his head against the wood of the door, wondering whether he should…
Maybe he should.
He uses his grip on the handle to open the door a smidge further, poking his head back into the dim light of the hall.
“Malin?”
“Kronprinsen?” Malin pauses where she’s made her way back down the corridor, turning her attention to Wilhelm.
“Erm…” Wilhelm brings a hand up, nervously rubbing at the back of his neck, “Um… Tack?” It’s almost a question.
“For…” There’s a glimmer simmering under her ever-stony expression as Malin clarifies, “For taking a call?”
Wilhelm rests his temple against the doorframe, certain he’s read her double meaning correctly seeing the bright glint in her eye. He’s so embarrassed that he darts his stare down to her polished shoes, simply repeating, “Bara– Bara tack, Malin.”
“It’s a short call, mind, not hours,” is what he gets in response. And that’s it, Wilhelm can’t believe they’re having this conversation, as shrouded in subtext as it is. He cannot lift his chin to meet her eyes, so just shakes his head where it’s resting in the doorjamb as Malin wraps up their (hilarious for her, he’s sure) exchange. “But you’re welcome.”
Wilhelm’s slow head shake morphs into a single nod, and he brings his thumb away from the base of his skull to worry it with his teeth. He shuffles back into the room, finally closing the door with a snick, and exhales long and slow.
Okay. So that just happened.
However, he has no time to reflect on it, immediately registering the gentle patter of Simon’s fingernails on his window, trilling a quick four-count once, twice.
Wilhelm walks the two steps across the room, depositing his pile of books uncaringly in the centre of his desk. He reaches a hand out to swipe the half-open curtains fully free of the pane, revealing Simon through the murky glass. And at this, Wilhelm simply… forgets.
The last conversation he had through the crack in the door, the warped board that wanted to see him hit the floor, his ‘migraine’, his history essay; it’s all gone. Because Simon’s standing there, beanie perched on his head flattening his curls and making the hair at the base of his neck appear a little longer, a stray ringlet falling into his eye. He’s got a hand gently resting on the single backpack strap slung over his shoulder, impatiently bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet and smiling up at Wilhelm with a shy wonder.
Wilhelm beams back. Unlatches the window.
Says simply, softly (enormously), “Hej.”
“Tja,” he gets in return. Then lighting-fast Simon slings his backpack around, says, “Catch!” and doesn’t wait for an answer before tossing the heavy canvas bag through the window to Wilhelm.
Wilhelm lets out an “Oof,” as the textbook-laden weight careens into his chest, and his hands come up just in time to grasp it before it falls to the floor. He looks up from his high-flying charge to see tan hands flat on the wide sill. Simon pulls himself up and swings one leg into the room, settling into a straddle position with his back against the window frame.
“Do I get a proper hello?” he teases, eyes flickering down to where Wilhelm’s arms are frozen, full of ochre-encased textbooks. “Or is it my backpack that you really wanted to get your hands on all this time?”
Wilhelm literally shakes himself out of his stupor, gently placing the bag to rest by his desk and gravitating towards Simon. He reaches out to brush that stray curl out of his eyes and back under Simon’s beanie, their gaze locked. He then takes two knuckles to platform Simon’s chin and presses in, Simon’s eyelids fluttering closed as he greets him with a soft kiss. Simon melts into it with a faint hum in the back of his throat.
Their lips part, eyes opening into each other.
Wilhelm greets him again, this time breathing in Simon’s exhale. “Hallå.”
He gets a similar greeting and then a small chuckle from Simon, as he says, “Guess this window-sill thing isn’t too bad.” Simon lifts his left leg up to place his foot on the ledge. “Tell you what, though,” he muses, resting an elbow on bent knee, hand coming up to better secure that piece of hair under the fold of his beanie, “it’s a hell of a lot easier when I’m not dragging a semi-coherent you around, trying to keep you from singing the national anthem at the top of your lungs at some godforsaken hour of the morning.”
Wilhelm doesn’t remember a moment of that. Shit. How much else…?
A gust of icy wind blows in, distracting Wilhelm from his thoughts, and he leans over to refasten the window as a visible shudder passes through Simon at the chill. Simon scooches a tad to allow Wilhelm access, but losing his balance almost topples right into the room. Steadying himself with a hand on Wilhelm’s shoulder, Simon resituates himself with his back solid against the window pane.
He’s navigated himself so that Wilhelm’s thighs are caught between his legs, curling his calves around Wilhelm’s to keep him there. This familiar tableaux brings back the afternoon’s memories in a tingling rush; Simon’s breathless groans and their intertwined togetherness.
Wilhelm recentres his gaze on Simon to find him grinning like a cat that’s got the cream, entirely satisfied with their current arrangement.
But for Wilhelm, their current arrangement also reminds him of Simon’s earlier… silence.
Before he can help it Wilhelm has brought a hand up to his mouth, teeth digging at the corner of his thumbnail. His head drops, stretching the back of his neck, and he’s staring intently at where his other hand is curled into a loose fist, knuckles kneading up and down the centre of Simon’s thigh.
Because… because he’d let it go that afternoon, with Simon looking so panicked at the thought of Wilhelm doing anything other than going along with his teasing (“A ‘big, warm bubble’ though... really?”), and he’d thought it was fine, and he was fine with it, but– he’d placed a kiss over Simon’s heart, and maybe that was cheesy, yes, but for him it was real, and Simon knows that, right? He must know it’s real. So then why did he turn it into some sort of... joke?
(“A ‘big, warm bubble’ though... really?”)
He keeps pressing the same line, up and down the centre of Simon’s thigh.
Unless Wilhelm’s got this completely wrong… but– surely not. Simon had– had said “I like you, too.” Had kissed him (been kissed by him) for hours. Had come apart so– so gorgeously under his hands, his lips, his tongue; had whimpered his name as he fell over the edge, as if it was the only word that existed for him in that exquisite moment. So…
So he must feel it, right? The same burning in his chest, the same needing to be closer, always, ever closer, all the time, evermore? If he didn’t, if this wasn’t that, if– for him… if for him it was–
“Wille...” he hears from somewhere far away. (...for him– what if for him, it wasn’t that–)
It’s not until Simon’s hand covers his fist as he again emphasises, “Wille,” abruptly stalling the brand Wilhelm’s knuckles are pressing into Simon’s leg, that his spiraling thoughts (because what if for him it was something… else– something less–) finally come to a screeching halt.
Simon’s other hand comes up to curl around the fist at Wilhelm’s lips with a now gentle, “Wille, can you...” using Wilhelm’s thumb still caught between his teeth to lift the angle of his head, dragging Wilhelm’s reluctant eyes up to meet his, “look at me, please?”
Simon brings both hands to Wilhelm’s fist now, guiding it away from the clutch of Wilhelm’s teeth and ever so slowly up to his own lips. He places a tender kiss at the thumbnail released from Wille’s grip, stroking sure fingers down and over the back of his palm, to his wrist, up again to his knuckles. Soothing circles are pressed into Wilhelm’s flesh with warm fingertips, Simon’s gaze not straying from Wilhelm’s face, his breathing slow and steady, and… oh.
Wilhelm starts breathing in time with Simon, now that he’s realised his oxygen intake was a little too quick, matching the pattering of his heart a little too fast. Both are surefire reactions to the way his thoughts just dived and delved into crevices they weren’t welcome in.
It seems as if Simon can read this new understanding, this fresh start, in his expression. So Simon takes one more deep breath, shoulders rising to his ears (Wilhelm copies his inhale), before he huffs it out noisily, weight tagged into his elbows as he drops his shoulders. Wilhelm does the same.
“Lite bättre?”
With a slow blink, Wilhelm slightly inclines his head in a subtle nod.
Simon mirrors his movement, easing out his second question. “What are we thinking about?” His hands haven’t stopped their tracing of Wilhelm’s.
And Wilhelm knows he has to ask. He knows. That’s the only thing that will help; that’s the only way he’ll know. But god, honesty is just a painful stranger he doesn’t want to talk to right now. He takes another deep (deep) breath, shoulders up to his ears. Drops the breath, similarly dropping weight into his elbows.
Starts with, “Earlier...” because he knows he’ll never be ready, but if he starts he can perhaps force himself to finish. Simon’s steady presence doesn’t waver. “Earlier, when you…” but now the problem isn’t that he doesn’t want to get the words out, it’s that he can’t find the right ones.
He tries again. “Before, when you– I mean, when I…” He uses the hand Simon’s not currently soothing to gesticulate absently, then runs it through his hair, pushing his fringe out of his eyes. Decides to rip off the bandaid using the same words still faintly rolling through his thoughts. “‘A ‘big, warm bubble’ though… really?’” He repeats Simon’s words, repeating his words from that afternoon, back to Simon now.
Simon’s fingers cease drawing circles into his skin. He probably wasn’t expecting that.
Sensing himself quickly losing bravado, Wilhelm whispers what he really wants (or perhaps doesn’t at all want) to know. “Why? Why couldn’t you...” but he can’t finish the question. Why couldn’t you say you feel it too? Knows he can’t demand that.
Needs Simon to somehow, miraculously, hear the unspoken question and answer it anyway.
“I…” Simon’s fingers thaw, beginning to unfurl Wilhelm’s fist as he again stutters out, “I…” chin tucking to study the lines of Wilhelm’s palm as they’re revealed. “I know, I– I’m sorry,” he finally gets out. Starts again, “I…” his index finger tickling along Wilhelm’s heart line, but gets nowhere still.
With a sharp groan, Simon ducks forward, crown of his head finding Wilhelm’s sternum. Hiding, as Wilhelm had hidden earlier in the day.
Simon seems to prefer this new audience of scratchy wool, frame of his vision containing only scuffed shoes and blue carpet as he begins once more, “It was just… a lot, before. How do you...” He sweetly kisses Wilhelm’s hand where he’d taken it with him to his hiding place.
His next words are so quiet. “Doesn’t it… scare you, too? The…” Simon inhales an ocean breath, and Wilhelm can see his back body expand as he finishes,“The big-ness?” He flattens Wilhelm's captured palm between the two of his, bringing all three up to his third eye in imitation of prayer and letting out a breath through trilled lips. “How do you trust it’s not going to go away?”
“I don’t trust ‘it’.” Simon looks up sharply at this, but Wilhelm’s just glad he’s got Simon’s eyes back on his, scrutinising them as he clarifies. “I trust you.” And with these words, Wilhelm expects a... softening. An opening, in Simon’s expression, in his posture. Expects the tense muscles pulling his eyebrows towards centre to ease.
But nothing of the sort occurs. He sees Simon – he sees Simon – seeing him, hearing him, still stretched taut as a strung bow. Guarded, keeping something of himself to himself. Still.
And Wilhelm realises with a start just how damn much he still doesn’t know about the boy sitting in front of him.
Like, he knows Simon. He does. He knows how the colour of his hair changes with every different angle the sun shines through the dark strands. He’s discovered Simon is most ticklish two-thirds of the way from his rib cage to his hip bone, and knows that blowing a raspberry at this point is the only way to bring out his most ridiculous little giggle. Knows that he invents his own mnemonic devices for algebraic formulae, because ‘the ones in the textbook are so boring, Wille, and they always use only white-person names as well’.
And he– he knows Simon. He knows Simon doesn’t chew gum. He says it’s a little cruel to his taste buds to subject them to the same flavour for so long without interruption, but will hypocritically demolish a bag of mandarins in an intense study session, inhaling them one after the other like a chain-smoker, fight for taste bud rights be damned.
Wilhelm knows Simon loves playing those shoot-bang-pow video games with Ayub, but when it’s his choice to decide on family movie night, more often than not will fawn over a classic romantic comedy with Sara and Linda as opposed to an action-adventure or thriller.
He knows Simon doesn’t have a favourite colour, but that if anyone asks he’ll say olive green because his earliest memory of a dream is one where he sat watching his parents repainting the walls of his childhood bedroom that colour.
But... he still doesn’t know Simon’s favourite food. Still doesn’t know exactly why Simon left Ayub, Rosh and the rest of his settled Marieberg life to start at Hillerska. And, with dawning comprehension, realises that the olive green dream story is the only time he’s ever heard Simon talk about his parents.
The only time Simon’s ever even used that word that packages two human beings so tightly together, wrapping them in brown paper, securing them with thin twine. Parents.
Wilhelm’s memories flash back to Parents’ Lunch, and it’s hard (fuck, it’s hard) to separate the individual moments of before from the windswept haze of after. Because that was the last time he heard his brother’s voice, and he spent so long tattooing that stupid conversation into his very brain synapses that the rest of the day sort of… fell away.
But Wilhelm does recall that it was only Linda he’d met that day. Only Simon’s mamma, and (surprising himself now) remembers how she hadn’t drained her champagne flute; how she’d politely declined the wine-pairings at the starched white table.
And an older memory emerges of Simon that very first week. Smirking, glowing (utterly incandescent), and… without a plastic cup in his hand the entire night.
Wilhelm muses that some family packages, like his, stay tightly bound up ready for the post box; together. Others are unwrapped gently, paper folded, twine knotted; these materials are crumpled and no-longer-new, but easy enough to reuse when the time comes to try again. But many (too many) are set on fucking fire; with many (too fucking many) left to pick themselves up, brush themselves off, find the least charred corners of the chaos and stumble towards a future.
How did he not clock before now that Simon – that his Simon, his brave brave Simon – has lived most of his life still choking on tendrils of smoke?
This uncorks something deep in Wilhelm’s gut; unsteadies him at his core. And he doesn’t want to assume, really, because life is messy and everyone’s got their unique assortment of shit, but he trusts he understands enough to slot this one puzzle piece into place. So of course he’s bloody well scared of the… ‘big-ness’, you absolute doofus, and you fucking prodded at it.
Wilhelm loosens his hand from between Simon’s and brings it (trembling, he distantly notices) to rest a comforting weight at the side of Simon’s neck. Wilhelm’s carefully observing Simon’s face, roaming between his slow-blinking eyes and cataloguing every twitch of his lips. The pads of his fingers press a tad harder into the soft skin at Simon’s jugular.
He promises himself that soon (very soon), he’ll (gently, unobtrusively) let Simon know that… that what? That I’ve realised you never mention your father, are probably shouldering a fuck-ton of familial trauma and I didn’t even notice until it affected me and my feelings?
Wilhelm’s glad his thoughts get to be a practice test for his words.
He’ll find a way to let Simon know he can breathe out a little of the smoke around Wilhelm. Soon. Because he wants so badly to be only, simply, a breath of fresh air for him. Desires so deeply to be, not so much an escape, but a… safe haven. A home.
With Wilhelm’s merry-go-round of bright comprehension finally circling to a gentle halt, he’s not surprised Simon’s next words are uncertain.
Still so uncertain that they don’t even form a complete thought.
“But what if it…” As Simon trails off, Wilhelm brings both hands up to frame his face.
He attempts to answer the half-question. “Whatever ‘it’ is, or isn’t…” Wilhelm traces a single thumb over a cheekbone and proceeds, so carefully, “Or does, or doesn’t, I don’t really–” Frustrated that the words aren’t forming meaning as he wants them to, Wilhelm cuts himself off. Cuts their gaze, looking over Simon’s shoulder through the window at a swaying branch. “I mean–” he takes a cycle of breath, eyes shifting back home to fix Simon with a piercing stare. “I just want you. The rest is… I mean, yeah, maybe it was a lot and maybe it is too soon, but I–”
“I want you.” Simon’s first confident statement abruptly fills the room. Instantly quiets Wilhelm. “Too,” he tacks on the end. “I know that much. I just– just want you too.” Simon lays his right hand over Wilhelm’s left where it curls around his jaw, shifting to nuzzle into Wilhelm’s grasp. He tightens his grip on Wilhelm’s hand, holding it in place as he turns his head just enough to plant a kiss on Wilhelm’s palm, breathing out, “That’s never been the scary part.”
Wilhelm thinks they’ve found something now. Swears he hears it audibly click into place.
“So we just… keep wanting, then?” Wilhelm feels a burn where Simon’s lips are still pressed to his hand.
“Yeah.” Simon’s eyes flutter closed, drawing a breath in through his nose, almost… scenting him.
Wilhelm needs him closer, urgently.
“C’mere,” he says, the run-on words barely discernible, but Wilhelm doesn’t need them anyway.
He uses their combined hands to navigate Simon’s face into the crook of his neck, bending slightly to accommodate Simon’s lack of height due to his seat on the windowsill. Wilhelm then releases this grip, arms travelling around to clutch Simon so tightly against him.
Simon catches on with a reedy whine pulled from the back of his throat, suddenly moving with an intense energy to embrace Wilhelm in turn. He shifts from his perch, feet finding the solid ground of Wilhelm’s room for the first time today as he straightens to standing, connecting their bodies at every possible junction. He draws Wilhelm in closer, five fingers digging into his shoulder blade and a hot palm gripping at his waist.
“I’m sorry–” Simon muffles into Wilhelm’s pulse.
“Thank you–” starts Wilhelm, at the same moment.
A beat, and then again two statements overlap.
“Thank you,” from Simon.
“I’m sorry–” says Wilhelm.
A chuckle from both, and Wilhelm feels Simon’s breath stutter and pool in the dip of his collarbone, his chest intermittently contracting against Wille’s own heart space. He brings a shaky hand up, fingers reaching underneath Simon’s beanie, finally slipping it off and thoughtlessly discarding it on his desk before returning his hand to card through Simon’s now-freed curls once, then twice. Wilhelm runs a thumb around the shell of his ear, traces two fingernails behind his lobe, then wraps his arm around Simon again in a bone-crushing embrace.
All he can hear is their tandem breathing. The rustle of fabric. A slight rattle as the windowpane catches the breeze.
He wonders if Simon knows, when Wilhelm’s holding him like this, how much he so desperately doesn’t ever want to let him go.