Work Text:
Simon’s phone is buzzing with text messages before Wille has even made it off the podium. Across the plaza, Jan-Olof is picking his way through the press, gruffly dismissing reporters even as camera shutters continue to flicker. The student body of Hillerska has erupted in applause, whoops and whistles piercing the air. An army of cell phones stay trained on Wille as he makes his way back to his seat.
His head is high, but Simon catches his nails digging into his palms. The Queen’s face is hardened with barely-schooled apoplexy, her eyes never leaving her son. If looks could kill, August would inherit the throne after all.
Over the holiday break, during nights spent awake wondering when he’d stop feeling like the world had dropped out from under his feet, Simon thought a lot about Wille’s interview. In waves of hurt, he’d text Ayub and Rosh paragraphs about how selfish the Crown Prince was. Then, he’d get defensive when they agreed.
Rosh: if he knew he had to deny it, then he had no reason to get your hopes up about it.
Simon: i don’t think he lied. i think he just makes promises he can’t keep.
Rosh: they can’t force him to do anything. he should’ve known that keeping a promise to you was more important than saving face for the royals.
Simon: i know. you’re right.
Now, Simon wonders if it was ever about protecting the Crown. He watches as Wille sits back in the chair beside his mother. Both of them are rigid enough to pass as statues.
Maybe it was never about the Crown at all. Maybe Wille was just scared.
On an impulse that must be the opposite of survival instinct, Simon shuffles through the choir and hops down the stone steps two at a time. Felice calls out his name, and suddenly every camera in the courtyard has forgotten the Crown Prince.
The press, apparently not having found Jan-Olof particularly threatening, stare at Simon like he’s a zebra in a lion’s den.
Hillerska’s applause peters out. Journalists yell over one another, filling the air with rapid-fire questions.
“Simon! What are your intentions with the Crown Prince?”
“Was it you who demanded the Crown Prince lie to the nation?”
“Was the sex tape orchestrated?”
“Have you been paid for your silence?”
Before he can sputter any sort of answer, there’s a hand on his shoulder, firm but gentle. Malin escorts him away without a word as the headmistress takes the microphone and calls for order. Simon glances over his shoulder, hoping to catch Wille’s gaze, but his other bodyguard has him blocked from view.
Simon’s jackhammer heartbeat puts Vincent’s cardio workouts to shame. There’s an indescribable mixture of euphoria and fear battling in his stomach. Malin parks him in the gatehouse, and he swears he can still hear cameras flashing, even though they’re far from the scene of the crime.
Fuck. What happens now?
Malin stands near the door, arms straight at her sides. “Are you okay?” she asks gently, like Simon might break.
Simon’s curled into a wooden chair that he doesn’t remember sitting down in. “Mhm,” is the only answer he can manage. Wille’s bodyguard doesn’t look particularly convinced, but she doesn’t press the issue.
Shit. Wille.
“Can I see him?” Simon asks. Demands. He wonders if they’ll take him away again. Maybe he’s already in the back of some black car, halfway to Drottningholm.
Malin gives him a soft smile. It’s the same one she would always throw in his direction when he passed her in the library, or the hallways between his classes. “I’m sure the Crown Prince will find his way to you soon.”
Simon isn’t convinced. This wasn’t Wille’s first strike with the Royal Court. Just weeks ago they’d tried to drag him kicking and screaming out of Forest Ridge. They’d been ready to replace him with August, of all people. A literal criminal over Queen Kristina’s own son. And that was before he’d called them all liars in a broadcast to the entirety of Sweden.
If Simon weren’t so fucking stubborn, he would’ve learned this lesson already. It’s the reason he can’t take a proven sex offender to the cops. Wille had warned him again and again－the Royal Family doesn’t lose.
The realization hits Simon like a bat to the head. “They’re never going to let me see him," he says, voice catching. All the elation he’d felt watching Wille’s speech turns to rot in his gut. “I told him－I told him I would be his secret. We were going to make it work, we－ There would’ve been time, he was supposed to wait two years, and then his mother would－”
“Simon,” Malin cuts him off, stern but caring. “Her Majesty the Queen holds a lot of power.”
Simon meets her eyes, swiping away at where tears have started to pool.
“Even she couldn’t keep that boy away from you,” she finishes. She huffs a laugh, so quiet it must be to herself. “God knows she tried,” she mutters.
Simon sits with that a moment, Malin mercifully ignoring him as he tries to stop sniffling. He thinks about the video, and the cover-up, and the lies, and the offer of a two year wait. Just two years, Wille had promised, and they could be free.
The second it was out of his mouth, Simon knew it was bullshit. Maybe, in a perfect universe, the Queen of Sweden allows her son to be in a public queer relationship. In absolutely no universe does she allow that relationship to be with a middle-class boy from Bjärstad who Wille publicly denied appearing in a sex tape with.
It was never a matter of waiting. It was easy enough to ignore whenever Wille’s lips were on his, but this－Wille being so brave that it made Simon’s heart burst－this was the only outcome there could be. It was this or heartbreak. Again.
Maybe Wille had realized that, too.
Once Simon is breathing normally, and it’s clear that no reporters will be storming the gatehouse, Malin takes her leave. “If you’d like to wait for him in Forest Ridge,” she offers, “you might find that the Crown Prince has the unfortunate habit of leaving his bedroom window unlocked.”
Simon chuckles at that. “They don’t pay you enough, do they, Malin?”
The bodyguard stays professionally silent, but Simon catches the barest hint of a smile.
Wille’s window is indeed unlocked. Simon climbs in over his desk, careful to avoid the smashed snowglobe sitting off to the side. He tugs the curtains shut.
After ditching his shoes, Simon makes himself at home in Wille’s bed, ignoring the extra one that sits untouched on the room’s other side. He pulls out his phone for the first time since the jubilee. Text messages and missed calls decorate his lockscreen.
Rosh: holy shit simon, are you okay?? did you know he was going to say that?
Rosh: ill kick his ass
Mamá: Call me, Simon. Let me know you’re okay. I love you, mi amor.
Ayub: u okay simme?
Ayub: or should i say prince simme
Ayub: or wait is he still giving up the crown? what’s the deal
Ayub: call me when you can <3
Sara: I’m sorry, Simon. I’ll make it right.
The text from his sister makes his stomach lurch. He leaves it unopened, packs the feelings of betrayal and heartbreak away for later. He shoots a text to his group chat with Rosh and Ayub to let them know he’ll fill them in when he can. First, he needs to call his mom.
She picks up on the first ring.
“Simon?”
“Hi.” Simon clamps down his nerves, smiling as though his mom could hear it through the phone.
She sighs at the sound of his voice. “Oh, sweetheart.”
“I’m fine, Mamá!” The familiar insistence rolls easily off his tongue. “Really, everything’s okay.”
There’s a beat of silence, and Simon wishes this conversation was in person so he could hug her worries away.
“You’re safe?” she reiterates. “I saw that bodyguard take you away.”
He nods before remembering she can’t see him. “I’m fine. She was just taking me away from the press,” he explains. Memories of early December wash over him. Reporters at his front door, paparazzi knocking on his bedroom window. “Have any of them showed up at the house?”
His mom assures him none have. Small miracles.
“Keep the curtains closed just in case,” he tells her. “And don’t open the door for anyone. I’ll spend the night at Hillerska. And I’ll talk to Wille about what we can do to keep them away.”
“Okay,” Linda agrees. There’s a moment of staticky silence between them. Then, the million dollar question. “What happens now, Simon?”
“I don’t know,” he admits. He rubs the corner of Wille’s bedsheets between his fingers. “I need to talk to Wille.”
“Are you two back together?”
An easier question. An easier answer. “Yes.”
He hears his mom take a breath. “Okay,” she says on the exhale. “How are you feeling, mi amor?”
Simon thinks of the way the world lifted off his shoulders when he kissed Wille outside that party. How it felt like he could breathe for the first time since Ayub read out that headline about the Crown Prince’s denial of a scandalous video. He thinks of being in Wille’s bed again, curtains closed, and how it felt like there was nowhere in the world he belonged more. He thinks of how his heart skips every single time he catches Wille staring. How Wille is so easy to make smile, but somehow it feels like he’s won a prize every time. Simon thinks of Wille letting him go because he asked him to, thinks of abdication offers and “I love you”s and sandwiches wrapped in napkins and dropped on his desk with a smile.
“I’m really happy, Mamá,” he answers softly.
The door opens before she can answer. The tension in Wille’s shoulders deflates as his gaze falls on the bed. He’s out of breath, face flushed like he’s just run a mile. His tie is loosened, and his blazer sags off one shoulder.
Simon’s already moving towards him. “Hey, Mamá, Wille’s here. I’ll talk to you more at home, okay?”
"Okay, sweetie. I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
Wille’s in his arms the second he hangs up. His face is warm against Simon’s neck. Over Wille’s shoulder, Simon sees Malin pull the door closed behind him. They stay like that－Wille clutching Simon’s shoulders, Simon rubbing circles on his back－until Wille finally speaks.
“Are you okay?” he whispers, pulling back just enough to meet Simon’s eyes. His hands relax, but don’t quite let go. His nervous expression is achingly familiar.
Simon moves a hand to Wille’s face. He feels a flutter in his chest when it earns him a small smile. “More than okay,” he assures him.
“I didn’t know I was going to say that,” Wille explains in a rush. “But I was thinking about what you said, about being a secret and how much I had hurt you and－”
“Wille－”
“I couldn’t do that to you again, Simon. And I didn’t want to have to love you in secret.”
Simon kisses him, deep and needy, because thank you doesn’t feel like enough.
They wind up on Wille’s mattress. The Crown Prince is on top of him, a hand in his hair and lips on his neck. Simon has to bite the inside of his cheek to stop from smiling so much.
“What?” Wille teases, having worked his way back to Simon’s face. He gives his own shy smile in return.
“I’m just so proud of you,” Simon answers easily. He brushes his fingers through Wille’s hair.
Wille melts into his touch. “You never told me if you like it,” he says, as Simon scratches his scalp.
“Like what?”
“My haircut.”
“Oh my god,” Simon laughs, flicking Wille in the forehead. Wille pouts, barely able to contain his own smile, and Simon strokes his hair again. “Yes, Your Highness, I like your haircut.”
Wille beams, bright enough to light a room. “I missed you,” he whispers. He finds Simon’s hand with his own, interlocking their fingers. “I missed you so much, I thought I would die.”
Simon stretches up to plant a kiss between his eyebrows. “So you’ve mentioned.”
Wille kisses him properly. When they part, Simon adds, “I missed you, too. So much, Wille.”
“I’m scared,” Wille admits, and Simon revels in being able to talk to him like this again. He traces the back of Wille’s hand with his thumb as he continues. “I don’t want to mess this up again.”
Simon answers without hesitation. “You won’t.”
He surprises himself with how sure he feels.
The way Wille’s eyebrows raise suggest he wasn’t expecting that answer, either. “How do you know?” he asks, reverent. His free hand twists one of Simon’s curls.
Simon takes a moment to turn his thoughts into words. He kisses Wille in the meantime, offering a soft reassurance.
“Because you’re trying,” he says, the moment the thought comes to him. “You take my feelings into account. You’re honest with me even when it’s hard.” Simon kisses him again, just because he can. “You stood by me even when the Queen of Sweden told you not to.”
“I should’ve done it sooner.”
Simon traces Wille’s cheekbone, grazing the tiny scar that rests there. “It wasn’t all your fault. It was a shitty situation.”
“Still,” Wille insists. “I’m sorry.”
Sunlight filters through cracks in the curtains, dying Wille’s skin gold. Simon doesn’t know a boy more beautiful.
“I forgive you,” he says softly.
Wille’s eyes get shiny at that, so Simon pulls him in for another kiss. “I love you,” he breathes, so close their lips are still touching. “We’re in this together.” With conviction, he adds, “They can’t take me from you.”
“Simon,” Wille sighs, pressing their mouths together again. He says his name like it’s a prayer.
Later, when they’re both shirtless, sweaty, and tangled in sheets, Malin gives a tentative knock on the door.
“Crown Prince Wilhelm,” she calls, muffled by the heavy door, “Her Majesty the Queen requests a meeting with you before her departure this evening. At the Crown Prince’s earliest convenience.”
Wille presses a kiss to Simon’s forehead. “I should get dressed.”
“Want me to come with you?” Simon offers, climbing off the bed and reaching for the rumpled Hillerska uniforms on the floor.
Wille looks at him like he’s just suggested afternoon tea with August. Simon laughs as he chucks his clothes at him.
“We’re a team, right?” Simon reminds him. “You came out to the entire nation of Sweden, the least I can do is help talk to your mom.”
“I love you,” Wille says, for what must be the tenth time that afternoon. It still makes his chest flutter every time. “But I think I’ve pushed my limits enough for one day.”
The cold tendrils of reality seep into the bedroom. Wille has pissed off the entire Royal Court. That one selfie that someone had grabbed from Simon’s Instagram is probably being printed on the front page of every gossip magazine right now.
“Next time, though,” Wille continues, and the warmth of his voice chases the cold away. He pulls his shoes on, and Simon straightens his tie for him. “I’ll introduce you properly. As my boyfriend.”
Simon’s face flushes. Both boys grin like kids as the word hangs in the air.
He pulls his boyfriend in for one last kiss, and Simon knows they’ll be alright.