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straighttohellbuddy · 11 months
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what you love you devour {c!Wilbur Soot}
Summary: As someone who is chronically honest and the self-appointed court jester of this world, your place in any conflict or situation had always been whichever place to be amused you the most; being on the side of the grown-ass man who put time and effort into waging war against smartass kids over discs? Of course. Immediately switching sides to join the child as he and someone you've never met before start a drug empire? Of course. Except said newcomer seems to know exactly how to keep you entertained; your place becomes by his side, and you quickly come to realise that no-one else will ever compare.
{ masterpost }
Need to Know: She/They Reader. Villain!Reader. Past, toxic c!Quackity/Reader, established platonic c!Dream & Reader. Set during the DSMP timeline. 
A/N: 25,323 words. this has been about 2 years in the making, which is why i haven't tagged the few people on the taglist but anyways, i finally came back and reread what i had and was like.... this actually holds up pretty well as is. so yeah, i've added and subtracted a few things here and there in the last few hours to make it all make sense overall, but holy shit im so happy to have it out there. is it possibly the wankiest/dramatic thing ive posted in a while? yes. but its also 25k so eat up. and if you wanna talk to me about it! PLEASE DO!!
Warnings: VILLAIN!READER, discussions/implied suicidal ideation, violence & blood, implied and joked about smut, heavy psychological/emotional manipulation, romantic obsession, betrayal, murder, implied torture. it gets pretty dark at times, just take care.
Citrus Scale: 💚 LIME 💚
{ full playlist }
"You've created capitalism, good job," sarcasm dripped from your words as you leaned against the side of the Camarvan while Sapnap attempted to arrest Tommy and the most recent newcomer, a brunette with a way with words that you found yourself admiring.
"I didn't create capitalism," Wilbur automatically defends himself, turning on you like he had the words on the tip of his tongue, simply waiting for someone to bring it up. Though he was playing at being innocent, you could see he was holding back a smile.
"What do you mean?" Tommy, behind him, frowned, before spluttering, "you know what, who cares- Wilbur, buddy don't listen to her, she'll say anything to get a rise out of people," he grumbled, but you just talked over him, addressing the newcomer.
"I'm not implying that you, new boy -"
"Wilbur," he corrected you automatically.
"- you, Wilbur, were the theological creator of capitalism," you rolled your eyes, but couldn't help your own smile at the situation, "I'm saying that you're trying to have a monopoly on potions and the ability to brew them, so you can inflate the price to whatever you want with no competition that people would be able to buy from, all that artificial supply and demand bullshit."
"Don't know what you're on about," but Wilbur's back was to the others as he said it, lips twisting into a grin, "this is but a humble hotdog van."
"A humble hotdog van!" Tommy added resolutely for emphasis, which you yourself repeated, much quieter, turning the words over in your mind as you narrowed your eyes and looked over all of them, "oh get lost, go run back to Dream," Tommy huffed, before turning on Wilbur, "why are you even giving her the time of day? She's in his guard, she's probably here helping Sapnap."
And that's when your gaze finally flicked to the man himself in full diamond armour, who was glowering at you, bow half raised. He stays quiet.
"He doesn't seem too keen on her," Wilbur points out, looking over his shoulder, giving the faintest smile to the kitted-out guard.
"It could be a ruse!" Tommy insisted.
"I'm simply a court jester -" you tried, hands raised defensively, but Tommy cuts you off.
"You shot me!"
"What's a humble court jester doing at our humble hotdog van?" Wilbur asks, turning back to you. At this prompt, however, your whole face lit up and you stood up straight, frantically digging around your pockets, searching, until you offer a small stack of blaze rods, like it's an offering.
"Playing along," you tell him, eyes alight with mirth and mischief.
"Why?" But he takes the blaze rods and you give a shrug, shoving your hands into your pockets.
"It's the funniest option."
---
"It's not capitalism, it's a drug empire," Tommy grumbled under his breath the moment they bring you into the Camarvan and shut the door behind you, before he added, "and I still don't like that you're here."
"It's not my fault that the concept of a grown-ass man going to war with literal children over two discs is deeply funny," you raised your hands in mock surrender as you sat on the counter in the hotdog van.
"Then why were you on his side?" He demanded, and you schooled your grin into something seriously.
"Thomas, Thomas listen to me -"
"Do not call me Thomas," Tommy told you flatly, and for a moment you couldn't help your sharp smile.
"Listen, Tommy, my boy, I was on the side of the grown-ass man who was waging war over discs; you're a kid, dude, being on your side would make too much sense and would be far less funny."
"One, you're a terrible person," Tommy says flatly, and you can't help but laugh not exactly inclined to disagree with him, "two, I'm not your boy, and three, if it suddenly becomes fucking funny for you to turn on us, I will kill you a lot, okay?"
"Okay," you nod, conceding, and though he's still frowning at you, mistrustful, you can't help but follow it with, "but I think you underestimate how much I appreciate our new friend, whose first thought, after finding his way to us, was 'I'm going to build a drug empire and recruit Tommy-goddamn-Innit as my first ally'; very few things can top that, honestly."
Wilbur, who was kneeling by a chest a few feet away and had been quiet this whole time, snorts a laugh. Good.
"Does Dream trust you?" However, when he spoke, your bright mood evaporated. Then he stands, turns, and leans his hip against the chest he was just rifling through, cocking his head to one side as he regards you, "it's not bait, I'm not asking you if you're a double agent, I trust you -" though there was something behind his eyes that contradicted his words, "- just, does Dream trust you?"
"Dream and I have... an understanding," you said carefully, "I understand that he is incredibly powerful -" Tommy made a derisive noise in the back of his throat at that, "- and he understands that I am simply a court jester."
"I don't remember many jesters with enchanted netherite axes," Tommy mutters under his breath. For the barest moment, when he looks at you he sees you looking right back, something dangerous, something like a warning in your eyes that vanishes so fast he’s half concerned he imagined it. No-one else seemed to have seen it, judging by how Wilbur’s continuing on. You’ve already looked away.
"So he may expect you to turn on him?"
"Eventually," you agree, "but he also knows I'd turn back to his side with the right incentive," you knew no good could come of trying to hide your nature, especially since it could lead to others actively attempting to win your loyalty, which you couldn't deny was pretty nice. Tommy was actively glaring at you after this particular admission, however Wilbur hums thoughtfully, regarding you with an expression you can't quite read, one that makes you feel like he's evaluating you; you sit a little straighter.
"Would you steal his potion supplies for us if he had any?" And suddenly, Wilbur's tone was light, as if he were asking for you to run an errand rather than commit treason. While Tommy was flabbergasted at his bluntness, you nodded emphatically.
"Oh, absolutely."
----
"Could you be more subtle while robbing me?" Dream frowned the moment he saw you up to your elbows in a chest in what he considered to be his base of operations.
"Not my fault you're bad at hiding your stuff and good at finding me," you huffed in return, not even bothering to look up, even as Dream peered over your shoulder to see what he'd left behind that you were currently looting. Tortoise shells and empty bottles, not much, but it's something.
"I don't appreciate you stealing my shit for Tommy," Dream pointed out, and you snorted a laugh, beginning to pocket your findings. He sat beside the chest, watching you, "I'm going to stop him."
"You're going to try."
"I thought you were on my side," but even as he said it, he wore a grin that was all teeth; you both knew he was joking, "you'd tell me where the discs were if you knew, wouldn't you?"
"In a heartbeat," you agree without hesitation, sitting back on your heels and finally looking at your sort-of ally, "but we both know Tommy doesn't trust me as far as he can throw me."
"He's a smart kid," Dream's smile gets tight at the edges for just a moment, and when you look to him, he’s looking back at you with a shallow gaze - you ever take something from me like that again and I’ll fucking kill you; you hear your own voice in your head, and wonder if Dream’s thinking of that same moment, of your violent, possessiveness rearing it’s head, your axe pressed to his chest in the dead of night. Back in the present, his gaze clears and he looks at the chest you’re currently elbow deep in, pointedly, "you are robbing me." The memory passes from your mind.
"You weren't here and I'm not using actual force; this is looting at best," at your indignance, he rolls his eyes, looking away, and you open the chest again, taking the remaining items, despite their meagre value. "I'm not doing this for Tommy; Wilbur's the one who suggested it."
"The new guy?"
"The new guy," you confirmed with a nod, "the first thing he does after getting here is commit crimes; I think I'm in love," you tell Dream flatly, mostly joking.
"Sounds like a man after your own heart," Dream points out, not even trying to hide the teasing edge to his words; how deeply bizarre this interaction would be if anyone else were to walk in.
With all of the chest's contents safely in your pockets and satchel, you sit back, eyes narrowing as you give Dream and his mischievous smile a look as you finally try and figure out what this whole interaction means. However the teasing does well to hide the faint notes of apprehension in his voice.
"'s the reason I sided with you in the first place;" you said slowly, "you know how chaos gets me going," your tone was flat, clearly conveying that you hadn't deciphered the nature of this interaction, but your actual words were enough to have Dream himself laughing despite this, the air clearing. "You here to stop me?"
"Does anyone else know where my base is, and are you going to steal anything else from me?"
"No and yes," you answer bluntly; if you were anyone else that answer would be two death sentences, one right after the other, "blaze rods," you quickly elaborate, wilfully digging yourself deeper as Dream opens his mouth.
"You can't have my blaze rods," he says, though he's smiling faintly at your well-worn antics.
"Agree to disagree," you stood swiftly, trying to step over his legs to get to the next chest. Dream grabs your shin with one hand, stopping you in your track as he's sighing deeply.
"Go away, Y/N," he says firmly, letting go of you to get to his feet, beginning to push you to the entrance of the bunker, even as you whined; the fact that he let you take as much as you already had was not lost on you however, and you let yourself be nudged to the door, only putting on a show of protesting.
The timer that had started ticking the moment he'd found you in his bunker had finally run out.
"Get better security," you told him, and he gave you a wide, toothy smile.
"Love you too," he responded, "and keep me updated if you ever find those discs." At that, you give him a quick salute and head back in the general direction of the Camarvan.
----
"L'Manberg?" You said, not even trying to hide your scepticism.
"L'Manberg," both Tommy and Wilbur reiterated, sounding completely sincere in their dedication to the ridiculous name.
"L'-Man-Berg?" You said, slower, squinting at them, waiting for their sincerity to crack.
"But don't worry, Tommy himself said that 'even women can work here'," Wilbur said, corners of his mouth twitching at Tommy's various irritated exclamations, "like... in the hotdog van... with us; we're not implying that women have to work to be here, this isn't- this isn't communism -"
"You've made that abundantly clear," your scepticism broke in the face of his floundering, "I remember you brought capitalism to the Greater Dream SMP, Mr Soot," you were desperately trying not to laugh, though Tommy was fairing much worse than you at that.
"I mean- I mean- I mean-" Tommy spluttered through his laughter as it died down, trying to get himself back to being something resembling serious, "you also- you can't be on Dream's side if you're with us."
"I'm not," you answer honestly and easily.
"So you're on our side?" He clarified, though you had to hum at that.
"No..." you said carefully, before finally looking him in his eyes, "I'm on my side, I just happen to like," without breaking eye contact with Tommy or your serious facade, you pointed directly at Wilbur, to his left, "him." Tommy's outrage at your answer was predictably hilarious, hence the main reason as to why you gave it, and Wilbur's delighted 'that's good enough for me' and accompanying smile was enough to solidify your loyalty with them, at least for the time being.
----
"I knew it would be you," they've taken no chances with you when they started taking people prisoner; Tommy was the first to go, and you happened to show up right as Fundy was being lead away. Wilbur and Tommy had both sent you messages, letting you know people were being arrested, and while they probably meant for you to stay away, you had other ideas.
So now, here you were, with Sapnap's crossbow bolt between your shoulder blades as you were being unceremoniously shoved to the courthouse.
"Stop talking," he muttered, poking you probably harder than necessary, but it did little to dim your smile.
"I've barely said anything," you shrugged, the nonchalant movement only serving to remind you, as if you could forget, about the weapon at your back, "but I'm flattered, really; I knew it would be you."
"Stop. Talking."
"They've got several people escorting Tommy, and even Fundy has Eret and Tubbo," you kept chattering away, despite your guard's grumbling, "but we've fought together, you know what I'm like, and so does he," you gave a faint laugh, "they knew I'd listen to you; you're the only one besides Dream himself who could get me to go peacefully."
"Why then? If you're going to keep talking, can you explain why? Why are you going peacefully, why with me? Are you actually saying you would have put up a fight if I were anyone else?"
"Would you trust anyone else to bring me to jail on their own?" You asked simply.
"I think you overestimate how challenging you are -"
"So that's a yes, you'd trust... Tubbo to lead me to the courthouse alone?" Your tone was sly and heavy with implications, "or Ponk? Or what about Eret? I don't know him but he seems nice. I'd like to get to know him, if you're saying you'd like to swap -"
"I don't trust you," he cuts you off, words forced out through gritted teeth.
"But you trust you," you hum thoughtfully, "because you know you're the only one up for it. They're sweet kids, but they're still kids, aren't they? If the right person talked for long enough they'd believe anything. This is why I knew it'd be you taking me to court; you're better than that," you're better than them hangs in the air, unspoken but still so loud, and you're glad he can't see the way you're grinning.
Then, you give a self deprecating chuckle, shrugging again.
"Honestly I'm probably giving myself too much credit here, I'm unarmed and unarmoured, you're easily overkill as my escort, but again, I'm flattered," the pressure between your shoulder blades lessens until the sharp bolt is gone, and you hear Sapnap's footsteps fall silent. Intrigued, you turn, and you see him scowling.
"Don't do that, don't be cute, don't be coy;" he frowned at you, at how your expression had been schooled into something tamer than the delight you were feeling, "you won't trick me; I remember Dream in that warroom, you remember, we were all planning and he assured us that you were your most dangerous unarmed and unarmoured -"
"I can't believe you remember that," you huff a disbelieving laugh, hoping the delight in your eyes didn't give you away.
"Yeah, well I do; don't coy, don't be shitty, okay? I was sent here for you for a reason, me, alright Y/N? I'm the one with the crossbow," already your words were working their way into his psyche, the bestowing of compliments, building him up, only to undermine it all. Whether he realised it or not, the praise you hid amongst your teasing and self-aggrandizing felt good to hear; you're just glad he believed it.
And so you walked with a crossbow bolt nestled between your shoulders, in silence for the rest of the way, being shoved into a cell beside Tommy, who'd been sitting on the bed provided, chattering away loudly to the other guards.
"What took you so long?"
----
The jacket you're given doesn't fit quite right; it's close, but maybe the arms are a little too long, and it sits strangely when you button the front with more than one button, but you wear it with pride, grip tight on the lapels as you spin on your heel, waiting for an approval from the others.
"Looks good on you," Wilbur's voice is carefully neutral, though he nods, his slight smile betraying him.
"Now will you finally admit you're on our side?" Tommy asked, brow pinched as he looked you over.
"What do you mean? She's with us, of course she is," Tubbo voices his confusion, and you finally, finally relinquish.
"Yes, Tommy, I'm fighting for L'manburg," you inclined your head towards him, smiling faintly.
"Say it, say you're on my side," Tommy demanded, "because I wanna remember this moment when you inevitably double cross us."
"Tommy," you said carefully, trying not to show how amused you actually were.
"Don't patronise me," he warned.
"Tommy," you shifted your tone to something a touch more respectful, but the boy's mouth remained set in a firm line, "I'm on your side as long as you're on Wilbur's side."
"Of course," Tubbo pipes up brightly, "we're all on the same side, for L'manburg," and he so cheerfully misses the subtle nuance in your words that it seems to convince Tommy. Wilbur's smiling to himself, genuine, whole face scrunched up and pleased.
"Seems like an overreaction," Eret, who you were yet to get a proper read on, looked over the four of you with interest; he hadn't been here long either, "they robbed Dream for us, they got arrested too -"
"Y/N is a trickster spirit at the best of times," Tommy tells him, "you can never be too careful, trust me."
"I'm just a jester," you raised your hands in a placating gesture, gaze dipping if only to hide the spark of mischief that found its way to your eye every time you found yourself underplaying your abilities.
"A revolutionary jester," Wilbur corrects, and your gaze snaps to him, your smile growing a touch wider, a shade sharper.
"A revolutionary jester," you agreed.
----
"You should have a home here," you hear Wilbur musing as he's chopping wood with a distracted energy, "do you have a home?" He quickly follows it with, and you snort loudly.
"Christ dude, of course I have a house," though you take a moment to reconsider, "well I have a bed in the savannah," you paused, "near... near Dream's Mountain." You admitted. There's a hum, and when you look to Wilbur he's regarding you curiously.
"Still?"
"Dream doesn't operate out of there anymore," you told him candidly, "but I like it; lots of sand," you added, and Wilbur actually paused.
"Can I ask you something very frank?" He asked, leaning against the handle of his axe where it was pressing into the dirt. You nodded, "what incentive would it take for you to turn on us, and on L'manburg? If Dream offered any number of weapons or diamonds or armour, would you take it?"
"I have everything I need," you told him honestly, "and I don't think Dream could offer me enough incentive to turn against L'manburg the way it stands right now," you shrugged, but he tipped his head to the side, frowning.
"So what would it take you to turn on us individually?"
Your mouth fell open, unused to being properly listened to, properly understood.
"You listen too much," you muttered, unused to being caught out in the way you would twist words. Wilbur, seemingly surprised at your reaction, grins from ear to ear.
"You know, while you were all being arrested, I heard something; I heard someone say that you're at your most dangerous when you're unarmed and unassuming, and I think I'm starting to get it-"
"If I find Tommy's discs, I have an obligation to give them to Dream," you let the words fall from your lips in an effort to derail that train of thought, gaze on your hands as you pluck blades of grass from the ground, twisting them in your fingers. Wilbur carefully lowers himself to the ground, to your level.
"From what I understand, that seems perfectly reasonable, in your mind at least," he says with a half smile, looking to you, expression somewhat unreadable, his pause harbouring something quietly hungry; "and what about me?"
Mouth opening and closing at a sudden loss for words, you find yourself unable to look him in the eyes.
"I have no pre-existing reason to turn against you," your voice is quiet, is flat, but your forgetting fingers betray how antsy this particular shred of honesty made you.
"So, Tommy's the only one you'd throw under the bus?"
"Its up to you," you shrugged, "and I'd only steal Tommy's disc and hand them over, I wouldn't hurt him."
"Are you lying?"
"I don't lie;" your tone was harsh, looking to him with a fire in your eyes, "I will not betray them, or Tommy in any other way, so long as they are all... aligning... with... you." There's no pretty way to twist your words around it, and you can't help your faint, flustered embarrasent, "my word is my bond." Then, softer, heart in your throat, "stop looking at me, Wilbur."
"That's a lot of power you've given me there," he said with a faint laugh, "so if it's no longer in my best interest to align with them-"
"It depends on if you mean that they're no longer allies, or if they're actively hostile," you point out, "because the ways in which I would betray them if they are not my allies are... varied. If they're my active enemy, then that's more of a straightforward fight, you know?"
"And if I decided it's no longer beneficial to be allies with you?"
"You'd be smart," you tell him, knee-jerk reaction, which startles a laugh from him; you give a faint, self-conscious apology, "honestly I'd respect it, it'd be an incredibly funny move after the things I've said, you know?"
"But, no, if I betrayed you, what would you do?"
"Are you planning on betraying me?"
"Not currently," he shrugged easily, and you blinked slowly at him.
"I don't know what I'd do, not yet, but I can get planning," you said with an almost teasing air, while he splutters in protest, "yeah I know you just said you weren't planning on it, but I'm pretty sure you've lied to every single question I've asked since getting here," you paused, smile growing wider, and strangely fond, "actually I think you've lied more than you've told the truth in general since you arrived."
A second passes, then another, then finally he breaks out into laughter.
"And you accuse me of listening too much!" His expression was frankly delighted.
----
You follow them into the dark, down the stairs, listening to the way they were joking about Eret managing to come up with a nuke. The night is unassuming. Spirits are high. 
But they bring you all to a small room full of  chests. Something is wrong. You stay with Eret by the door, and he's got a hand on your shoulder - you can't run. 
"The chests are empty-" you hear Wilbur's confusion, right before Tommy asks what the button in the middle of the room does, and before he can even press it, his fingertips barely contacting the wood, you step forward -
"Easy now," Eret's voice is a gentle murmur, only for you, grip tight on your pauldron. When you look at her, a moment of silence amongst the others' confusion, his expression is… unreadable. Ice cold now, there's a sword through your chest, you can feel it where you shouldn't, followed by the searing heat of blood filling your lungs and windpipe -
"Y/N?!" Wilbur's eyes land on you as Tommy presses the button, you fall to your knees, choking on a mouthful of blood, and when your gaze locks with his, the reality of the betrayal sets in. There's horror in his eyes, and you see Tommy and Tubbo turning before you're suddenly gasping awake in your bed in L'manburg, shaking, eyes wide and goosebumps rising along your skin as you hear your comrades screaming and shouting for help, horrified at Eret's betrayal, all coming in tinny through the communicator still on your hip. You don't properly know what happened after the button was pushed, and you think that was a conscious decision.
Your first life is taken quietly, not with a bang but with a whimper.
There's something inevitable about it for you, at least in your mind, but the others didn't deserve this, didn't deserve that betrayal. You can still feel the sticky heat of the blood in your lungs, your throat, ice cold sword where it had pierced through your back, slipped between your ribs, and come out the other side. 
"It was never meant to be," Eret sounds like they’re smiling as they say it, as the others are yelling, and you realise that they're probably reviving in their own homes. You want to ask, want to demand answers, but your hands shake, and when you find your voice, all that comes out is a furious growl, low and full of venomous malice the likes of which the others had never heard from you, judging by how your voice cut through the chaotic mess of shouting.
"What the fuck did you do?" 
Eret leaves the communication channel. The silence rings in your ears.
"He betrayed us," Wilbur said, tone flat, thinly veiling his own fury at the situation, "she had us killed by Dream and his men," and then, "he killed you." Like it means something, like he's worried your apathy, or even your connection to Dream, could sway you from your anger. Like he knows betrayal of your nation means little; like he knows you well. Something about this catches in your mind; you knew it was only a matter of time before you were betrayed, but the rest of them cared - Wilbur cared enough about you to know you, and Eret had him killed too. 
Your communicator vibrates for a moment, and you look down to see a message from Wilbur himself; Where are you?
Your life was of little consequence, the same could not be said for your comrades.
"They killed me," you said softly, before you swallowed hard; home. Dig the ground by the corner of the walls near the river, you send back. "You died too; you all died. Who was there?"
"Who do you think?" Tommy cut in, loud and brimming with rage.
"It was all so fast, but I saw George, and Sap, and Dream," Tubbo cut in, voice a little shaky, bring Tommy's fury down somewhat.
"Punz was there too," Wilbur said carefully, "they have our things." And you stay quiet as they rage, as you sit in your bed, unable to get up, mind moving a thousand miles a minute as you try and figure out how to process all of this, what it all means. It doesn't take too long before there's sunlight streaming into your little, cosy hovel, followed by Wilbur climbing down the ladder provided, packing dirt into the hole he'd made to keep your location secret. 
When he gets to the bottom of the ladder, he takes a deep breath - Tommy and Tubbo are chattering away, audible over both your communicators. Making eye contact, finally, he doesn't quiet seem to know what to do, or where to go. You turn off your communicator. Everything tastes like iron. You don't move. He leans against the wall by the ladder, closing his eyes tightly for few moments, and slowly sliding down, sinking to the ground. 
"Wilb- mate are you alright? Where are you?" Tommy's voice rings out from the communicator still on Wilbur's hip, and he sighs deeply.
"I'm fine, I'm fine, just need a few moments, I'll be with you soon," and he turns off the communicator before getting a response. 
Silence. Deafening silence.
"I'm sorry," your voice is a whisper, but it's clearly audible in this little room. 
"What?" Tone immediately defensive and sharp, Wilbur's eyes snap open and he looks to you with a glare.
"No, I- I've had betrayal coming for a long time, but you- you all didn't deserve that," you clarified, hand on your chest, feeling the raised, tender scar tissue where the sword had come out - it had slid through your sternum like fucking butter, it had been so cold, even as the points where it had touched your clothes caught fire, even as it melted through the metal of your armour - your hand starts to shake. Everything tastes like iron. 
"What happened?"
"What did Eret say to you?" His question surprised you, and when you look to him, his gaze is hard and cold.
"Easy now," you remember, "held me back when I went to step forwards, and ran their sword through me before the button had even properly been pressed -"
"I saw," Wilbur's voice was softer.
"I'm sorry, I should have warned you -" your lip was trembling, shake in your words as you drew your knees up to your chest. 
"You didn't know, you couldn't have-"
"I could have done more, I could have done something -" the tears start to fall.
"Dream's guard were laying in wait, and the button was their cue to ambush us," Wilbur explained carefully, "but you…" he swallowed hard, "I watched you die." He sounded furious and disgusted, looking at his own hands, twisted into claw-like shapes, ruminating on his own helplessness at the situation.
"You're the only one who noticed," you said, barely audible, "I don't think you were meant to notice."
"What the fuck does that even mean?"
"I wasn't meant to see what happened, and it was meant to be assumed that I died in the skirmish," you said, tone flat and bitter, before your tone grows malicious, "because Dream is a coward."
"I wasn't meant to notice?" He asks, voice weak.
"No-one was; dying in the skirmish is less targeted, but if I had glimpsed any of their team killing -" You swallowed hard, dropping your gaze, "any," you push the word to hide that it's not exactly the truth, "of you… Dream knows I am more than capable of exacting revenge." There was a dark truth to your words that Wilbur couldn’t even begin to fathom, a history he was unaware of.
"I do notice you," Wilbur says, and you're brought from your bitterness momentarily, surprised by the earnestness of his words. He stands, "and I've never heard you speak like this before." 
"There are rules," you tell him, watching him cross the room to your bed, to sit by your side, "and I don't expect the same level of honesty that I give, but I expect- I expect- I-" but you can't find the words for what you're trying to say, sitting forward scowling at your hands.
"You would have let him betray us all still if you'd know, wouldn't you? You would have even let her kill you," Wilbur's tone is alight with realisation, and your mouth drops open with surprise; yes, yes of course you would, how did he put it into words like that? He doesn't even sound particularly hurt by that realisation, more fascinated.
"I absolutely would have," you answer.
"But you had no idea," its not accusatory in the slightest, his tone matching yours, alright with bright interest, "which is why- why- why you're so- why you're reacting like this," its like he's trying to piece together how he sees you out loud, "you need to know where all the chess pieces are, what moves are being made, you're not playing as much as you are a spectator delighting in the chaos of it all, with a front row seat." But he's grinning from ear to ear. Your whole body is alight with the instinct to reach out and touch him, to prove he's real and not something you're imagining, because no one else has even cared to figure you out like this, and no one would even come close to reacting so brightly about it. 
"I'm sorry I'm like this," you say with a momentary huff of disbelieving laughter, but he reaches out and puts a hand on your knee. The contact burns. You look down at his hand like you can't quite believe it, head swimming, trying to process this all. 
"Don't be; knowledge is power and you never lie," he pointed out, "you're a good ally to have." Your heart feels like it's beating out of your chest. Wilbur Soot I'd die for you; the words press against your teeth until it's almost painful, and his hand is still on your knee. You grab it - he's real, he's here, the things he's said are real too!
"I won't betray you," is what you say instead, and Wilbur's expression turns to surprise in the face of your earnestness, your seriousness. You never lie; the thing he's said is playing on both of your minds at this moment, of this you're sure.
"You shouldn't say things like that," he says very carefully.
"Then you understand the full extent of what I'm saying, don't you?" You take his hand now in a handshake, palm to palm, "Wilbur Soot, I will never betray you."
"You have never lied to me," he said, voice low and serious, demanding an answer. You meet his gaze.
"I have never lied to you," you affirm, before adding, "you know me." And you're fairly certain he doesn't quite understand the importance of that, that his understanding of you is the reason for your loyalty. "You don't have to extend the same sentiment, don't worry, like I said I don't expect the same lev of honesty -"
"I will not willingly betray you, Y/N," Wilbur says, matching your earnest seriousness, "and I will attempt to only be honest with you." 
----
“What is it about you?” There was a strange quality to Dream’s voice as he voices a question that had seemingly been weighing on him for a long while. Wilbur, where he was trying to fit all of his friends’ equipment on his person to carry back to them, snaps his attention to Dream, brow furrowed. 
"What?" 
"Loyalty is the one thing Y/N covets above all else, and yet for some reason they’ve given it freely to you -” Dream’s voice was smooth and thoughtful, like he’s not quite aware he’s speaking out loud. 
“Maybe it’s because I respect them -”
“I respected them, but still...” he trailed off; again the idea of a darker shared history between you and Dream makes itself known. Wilbur's scowl deepened, "I don’t think they genuinely respected me... or anyone, before you. They get possessive, like dangerously possessive, but you’re different." 
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"You know the thing they do, the way they can talk around people and topics without even lying, and make it look, you know, like it’s easy?” And the minute the words leave Dream's mouth, Wilbur's gaze drops; of course he'd noticed.
"They’ve got a way with words," Wilbur's agrees, slowly, eyes narrowed. At the defensive notes in Wilbur’s voice, the smile dropped from Dream’s face. He’s seen this loyalty before, but never before in someone you yourself were loyal to in turn. This is uncharted territory. This suddenly feels like a dangerous conversation to be having. 
“Everything they’ve done is to amuse themselves, so you make no sense to me; what about you is so compelling that they find entertainment in playing revolution?”
“Maybe,” Wilbur says, tone light but clearly well thought out, “someone who is used to listening to everyone else finds a certain novel charm in being heard.” His gaze is icy, but he’s not looking at Dream; he’s standing at the end of the room, gaze hard as he looks at the door, as if focusing intently on something in his mind as he spoke; “I think you assume everyone believes in the ideals that their side stands for, and I also think,” he narrows his eyes, still staring into space. Despite not being the target of his glare, Dream, for the first time in the conversation, feels a strangely familiar powerlessness, “that you underestimate an individual’s loyalty to another individual, rather than to a cause,” he paused, “or a nation.” 
“I’ll fight for you, of course, but I can’t kill any of those kids -” in Dream’s mind, he’s taken back to the moment he’d recruited you to his side after he’d stolen Tommy’s discs. You’re looking up at him from where you’re leaning over a grindstone, sharpening your axe. When he’d asked why, you blinked slowly at him, “I’ve barely spoken to them; I can’t discern if they deserve it.” There’s something cold in your eyes as you look at him, and he hears it clear as day without you needing to say it out loud; I don’t kill people I don’t know.
Something about Wilbur in this moment reminds Dream of you. He feels the faded scar on his collar bone ache faintly; the part of him that had wanted to somehow warn Wilbur of your true nature was quickly growing quiet in the back of his mind.
Then, Wilbur looks at his own hands for a moment, before digging through his bag, through the various belongings he was now carrying. He pulls out your axe, and looks back up at the space by the door. Then, to the button, before finally looking at Dream, your axe still in hand, but it rested by his side, nonthreatening. Dream can’t look away from the weapon.
“You were laying in wait for us in the name of your nation,” Wilbur says, tone strangely neutral; he looks back at the door; “you complain about a lack of respect but won’t warn them when they’re about to die.” This is where he’d watched you die; that, atop the various other insights Wilbur has shared here have Dream’s blood running cold. Dream wants to argue that you would have tipped them off, but his words die on his tongue; he at least knew you better than to interfere in a good plan, an entertaining plan, where you would be able to watch the effects of a major plot twist play out in real time, even if it meant you too had to be sacrified... And Wilbur knew this about you too.
“I see,” Dream muses, trying to hide how shaken he was by the moment that had just passed, “you’re starting to make more sense now.”
“And you know what,” Wilbur said, unsettling tension breaking as he grinned, “I think you’re making more sense too; Y/N’s willingness to still bring up their loyalty to you does at least.”
“Their loyalty to me?”
“They still look out for Tommy’s discs on your behalf,” he said candidly, “we all know, but they’re yet to find them so Tommy’s yet to have a proper go at them.”
“It’s always sunny in L’Manberg then,” Dream says, dryly. 
“It’s... amusing, to try and see the world the way you see it,” Wilbur’s chipper, but there’s something almost malicious in his bright tone, and Dream’s hair stands on end. His own words haunt him, your loyalty called into question; did you simply help him because you found him trivial and amusing? While it doesn’t exactly surprise him, it stings in a way he didn’t expect. Looking back at Wilbur, it’s clear that at least some of Dream’s feelings about this particular revelation showed on his face, despite his best efforts. Wilbur’s grin was cheshire-esque. Even his smugness somehow had an echo of yours. 
He leaves. Dream feels sick, alone in the final control room.
----
"Can I ask you something?" Wilbur asks tentatively, and you look away from the furnace you'd patiently been waiting to smelt your iron ore.
"Of course."
Another long pause; you approached him where he was sitting at the table, watching you with reservation. 
"What happened between you and Dream?"
Surprisingly, your expression dropped to something blank in an instant, gaze going glassy. 
“He’s my friend,” you say flatly, turning back to the furnace, but not before Wilbur caught a glimpse of your grimace.
“I think he was trying to warn me against you,” Wilbur huffs a faint laugh, but it’s more to test your reaction; when you turn back, your expression is wide and innocent, almost pleading.
“What did he say?”
“That I’m the first person you’ve shown actual respect to,” Wilbur says, tone light but words blunt; it surprises you, which he can read on your face, and you hesitate for a moment, not wanting to confirm or deny as much. His smile grows wider, grows endeared, “and he did say you tend to get possessive.” Your gentle, flustered nature turns into something colder at that, and you look to your hands.
“He says a lot of things,” you mutter, with an air of bitterness. It’s interesting interacting with you; half the time you still seem to try and put on an act around him, though the other half you seem to let yourself be as honest as you’re able, “he says a lot of things to the people I like, then they like me less.” Then, suddenly, you look to him, defiance in your eyes, “I don’t care what he said, I’m not using you, Wilb-”
“Hold on, he never said anything like that,” he holds up his hands, defensive, placating. Your eyes go wide and your mouth snaps shut; you can’t look at him, sitting down, hunching in on yourself. 
“Sorry,” you mutter, sighing deeply enough that your shoulders sag, “Dream is my friend, I know it doesn’t seem like it right now, but I thought... he’s taken things from me like this before, things I, well...” you can’t quite put it into words, but Wilbur sits back, watching you, when something in his mind clicks.
“Covet.” His voice was soft with understanding, gentle as he asks “who was it?”
You blink slowly; there was something visceral and feral burning through your veins. You’d spent so long intricately designing the way the world would see you, this single moment feels like you’re on the knife’s edge trying to figure out if having him understanding you is endearing and heartwarming, or cloying and dangerous. He promised he wouldn’t betray you, but he’s not as honest as you’ve trained yourself to be. 
But you promised not to betray him, and you’ve become someone defined by your word. All you can do is leave, if that’s what you want. You can’t lash out, you must let him live with the way he knows you, with no promise to keep it to himself. Self preservation is the way your fingers flex, aching for your axe.
“I’ve given you too much power over me,” you swallow hard, hands in fists. 
“You won’t hurt me, though.”
“We both know I couldn’t even if I wanted to.”
“And you do want to,” he says it like it’s a fact, all light and neutral. You keep your mouth shut; you can’t lie if you don’t speak, no matter how sweet you know it would taste to lie. “I have never felt fear or anger like I felt when I watched you die,” he breaks the silence. 
“I’m sorry,” you mutter through clenched teeth, staring intently at the floor.
“You’re not to blame,” he says easily, “none of us deserved that; you didn’t deserve that.” 
“You didn’t deserve to see that,” you corrected automatically. 
“I thought you wanted to hurt me.”
“Well I can’t.”
“You won’t,” he says, tone still light. You glance a look at him, only to see him resting his chin in his hand, regarding you with a gentle smile. The distinction stings in your mind, the way he clearly understands your internal conflict, it sets your teeth on edge, “you knew what you were getting into when you offered your loyalty; Dream was confused, you know, about why you’d given it so freely when you covet it -” that word again, your expression twists into something frustrated as you drop your gaze back to your hands, “- but he doesn’t really get you, does he?”
“He likes to think he’s like me,” you mutter, “but then he acts like he’s better, like he’s building a family from this war, but he’s going to be left with people filled with resentments. I was aquiring resources, but he didn’t like my methods...”
“Who?” Softer this time, Wilbur asks.
After a very, very long time, you look to him, gaze shallow.
“I thought Quackity was like you, I thought he’d understand.”
“Understand you?”
“Understand the world, the truth,” you wet your lips for a moment, “but he clung to pretty words without question; I could see he had potential, so I kept him around, and it was easy - it was so fuckin’ easy -” You recount how you’d set your sights on loud-mouthed, brash, desperate for recognition Quackity, and how you’d made him your whole world, bombing him with affection and attention, making him feel understood, like the place he belonged was by your side. Quackity had always looked for somewhere to belong, that hadn’t changed, though you muse that you may have made it harder for him to trust it when he finally found a place where he felt like he belonged. 
“Everything I fed him was a lie I’d laced with something that sounded close enough to love and sincerity that he’d believed it,” you looked down at where you were tracing shapes on the back of Wilbur’s hand as he listened intently, “I gave him nothing, but made him believe he had everything, until... until I wanted to see how far I could go. I wanted to see if he’d die for me... and he would have, until Dream decided to grow some morals.” You stood, sudden fury burning through your veins at the memory, “he had to sew the fuckin’ seeds of doubt in Q’s mind, had to pick holes in my lies -”
“You lied that much?” This seemed to genuinely shock Wilbur, and you stopped your pacing to look to him.
“It’s why I don’t lie; it’s harder to pick holes in the truth, harder to undermine me,” your lip curled, “Q lost faith in me, stopped trusting me, and there was fucking nothing I could do about it; it was my fault, honestly, so I don’t lie anymore. I’m upfront about who I am. I only keep people around if they’re useful, or they’re entertaining, because that’s the other fucking thing I learned; nothing fucking matters more than keeping me happy, because everyone gets too serious for their own good in the end. Dream was fun before he- he- he-”
“So am I useful or entertaining?” Wilbur asks, and you freeze. Then, slowly, you take a deep breath.
“It was novel to feel understood.”
“And now it’s bloody terrifying you,” he says gently, “because as much as you want to, you can’t trust anyone as much as you trust yourself.”
“I understand people, Wilbur, and no-one I’ve ever met has understood the inherent benefit to honesty the way I have.”
“But you still promised me your loyalty.” He says. You swallowed hard, nodding once. You meet his gaze, refusing to break it, refusing to back down, waiting for him to elaborate. “And I promised you mine, as best I could,” he pauses gives you an evaluative look over, “I can’t trust people, obviously, but I know I can trust you.”
“People don’t like me when they realise I can pick them apart, that I can rewire and reprogram them like I’m an engineer,” and Wilbur regards you curiously as you say this, like he’s going to try and counter it, but you square your shoulders, “even you, Wilbur; do you think, when we met, you’d still trust me if I was upfront about this?” And he closes his mouth, thoughtful, “I wanted so desperately to keep around the first person to halfway understand me, you’re impressed rather than fucking terrified like you should be. Because you know it’s true.”
“Are you trying to push me away?”
“We both know you won’t go,” you say with the faintest, self-deprecating smile, “a stalemate of respect, of our own design.” Then, your expression turned serious, “I have never felt fear or anger like I did when I realised you watched me die.”
Then, very slowly, his gaze meets yours, hard-edged and dark.
“Do you trust me as much as I trust you?” It’s a loaded question; he’s never been given any reason to doubt you, mostly thanks to your honesty and loyalty, but you’d never been afforded that same assurance. But in this instance, it didn’t matter, you knew your answer without a shred of doubt.
“Yes, absolutely.”
----
Its said a shark can smell blood in the water from a mile away, and you, you know there's a traitor living a peaceful life up in the castle. It irritates you, sets your teeth on edge; it's not that they killed you that bothers you, it's that they were careless about it, they let the one person you never wanted to hurt watch you die. The event had shaken Wilbur; the taking of your life was not the matter you cared about. 
"You okay?" Others had noticed how distracted you were; in your mind, all you could see was the shocked horror in Wilbur's eyes, and the feeling of the blade in your back. Blinking quickly, back to the present, you smiled brightly at Tubbo, or as brightly as you could manage.
"Of course." 
You watch the others sparring and training together and your hands ball into fists, as if aching for a fight. But you've got an image to keep up; you're not the brawn here, you're a jester, you're meant to keep those who you care about smiling. 
"You ever wanna hold a sword to my neck like that..." you tone is suggestive as you trail off, grinning at Wilbur, who's got his sword poised beneath a training dummy's chin, glaring at it with ferocity. The moment you call out, however, his focus break, and you see him fighting back a smile as a flush works its way up his cheeks.
"Come test your luck then," he calls back, and you blinked quickly.
"I don't want to fight you, Wilbur," you tell him, quieter, hoping it comes off as soft, as something endeared.
"You should know how to fight," he points out, lowering his sword, digging the tip into the dirt as he leans on the pommel a little.
"I know how to fight," you counter, and a long moment of silence follows as he considers that.
"How have I never seen you with a weapon then?"
"You have, you just haven’t seen me use it as a weapon." You tell him rather pointedly, voice low, and though you’re still smiling, there’s something sharp at the edge of your voice that’s unfamiliar to him. It takes him aback, and for a long moment he’s silent as he regards you with a newfound seriousness, “I’m just a jester; what’s a jester want with a sword anyways?” You half laugh, a little louder now, gaze flicking to the others milling around nearby. Nobody outwardly acknowledges you, nobody apart from Wilbur, who just frowns. His gaze is trained on a spot just past your head, where you know the hilt of your axe sits. 
You know you need to act soon, the idea of Eret living in the lap of luxury after everything that happened has your blood boiling. It's getting out of hand. It's getting distracting. 
"You're very observant," you note, tone fond as you come back to the moment. Wilbur surfaces from his memories too, his own smile turning all kinds of fond.
"Out of necessity," he points out, making his way over to you. There's something about his tone that is fond, is knowing, and it melts your heart a little, those hints of understanding that no-one else had bothered to afford you. The person who'd betrayed the only person to understand you had been crowned king; soon, your retribution would come soon. 
"What's bothering you?" Quiet enough that no-one else could hear, Wilbur reaches out, fingertips gentle on your cheek as he tips your face, has you look him in the eyes. You wonder what he sees when he looks in them, because for a brief second, for a flash, again you see the memory of silent horror as he'd watched you lose your first life. You swallow hard, and close your eyes, leaning into his touch for the briefest moment. 
"I keep thinking about what Eret did," your voice is barely more than a whisper, giving only the truth, no attempt made to obfuscate it, like you usually would. Wilbur was quiet. You didn't want to open your eyes, didn't want to witness his reaction, but he's quiet. 
You don’t tell him what you’re going to do, what you’re planning; there’s no need for him to worry unnecessarily. If you survive, you survive, and if you don’t, well you have another life to fall back on. If you wake up in bed with a new scar and one less life, that was your decision to make. No-one should worry on your behalf, but Eret needed to know that their actions would have consequences. 
So you choose a night where the moon is overshadowed by clouds, and take your axe with you. 
You’ve always been one to make an entrance, and even now you don’t disappoint, laying in wait for as long as it takes, hours spent dead silent and idle, simply waiting.
"You should be very careful if things don't go exactly to plan," finally your voice rings out through the throne room, and Eret, all dark hair and pale eyes, stops dead where they'd been passing through. Slowly, so slow its almost painful, they turn to look at you. You, draped in the throne like you own the place, axe leaning carefully against the arm of the seat. Your name escapes her mouth like a curse.
"It did go to plan," she hisses, tone guarded. 
"If it had gone to plan, I wouldn't be here," you say, shifting a little, sitting a little lower, "if your timing had been better," you paused with a shark-like smile, "I may have been the only person in L'manburg to have no issue with your betrayal," and finally you look at him, watching his face as he tries to piece together what you mean, why you're here, "on paper I admire you." You tell them callously. Their lip curls in derision.
"Dream said you'd see my side," they say carefully.
"Dream says a lot of things to a lot of people," for a moment, your expression darkens, "I'm sure he told you to kill me first."
"To avoid…" she trails off, frown deepening. Your smile returns, wide and dangerous.
"You broke something of mine, Eret," you tell him seriously, a mad glint in your eyes, "and part of your plan worked like a charm; I won't go after anyone else because I've got plausible deniability, I didn't see who killed who in that skirmish." 
"Then why the fuck are you here?"
"Because you killed me, and Wilbur watched; it's all he could do. It was a cruel thing that you did, making someone feel helpless like that."
"You're not here because I killed you?"
"Why would I be? I'm a court jester," you huffed a little laugh, smile turning cruel, "but you used me to make Wilbur sad, and someone's got to take the blame for upsetting the thing I like."
"If that's true, why spend all this time talking? Why not just kill me?"
"Because I like to make sure you get my message; Dream's heard my message, he tried to tell you," this is where you stand, finally, rising, gaze shallow, picking up your axe as you go. Slowly, you descend the steps of the throne, and Eret draws his sword. There's uncertainty in his eyes; he's close to where you want him.
"You're stalling."
"The more I talk, the more you try and remember what people have said about me, don't you? But they don't talk about how I fight, it's never been the most impressive thing about me," you give a low, guttural laugh, axe low in your tight grip, "I'm most dangerous when I'm unarmed and unarmoured, right? That's what they say, right? What do you think that means, really think about it?" 
Eret swallows hard.
"It means that you're all talk," he's trying to put up a confident front, but you watch him tighten his grip on his sword. You raise your axe.
"Not quite." 
There's nothing elegant about the way you attack, movement uncharacteristically blunt with speed that surprised the King before you. Teeth bared, you slash and duck and weave, playing dirty, tripping them up. You take hits and lash out, snarling and spitting with anger until there's no mirth, only malice, and you bring your boot down on their hand, knee pressed to their throat. There's fear behind their glasses. There's a cut above your brow, blood trickling down your face, slashes along your arms, certainly a few on your chest, but Eret's on her back on the cold floor of the throne room.
"You have no fucking idea of what I'm fully capable of," you snarl, leaning in close to their face, applying pressure until they drop their sword, hissing in pain, "this is your only warning; if you hurt- if you fucking touch my things again, I'll make it stick-" and leaning back, you use your axe to separate their head from their shoulders, taking their first life. 
And you're alone, breath coming out shakily, gasping as the adrenaline courses through you. Somewhere in the castle, Eret is waking up with your words echoing in their head. You should leave. Standing slowly, you cast a derisive look to the blood stain on the floor, the only proof of the altercation. Someone else's problem. 
You leave through the front doors, still carrying your bloodstained axe. Really, he should have better security. 
At the doors to the castle, you pause, casting a derisive look over your shoulder; this all could have been avoided. You pull out your communicator, flicking through your contacts.
[keep your things on a shorter leash] you send to Dream. He should have chosen more carefully, or been more insistent. But that was his problem; if he kept up like this, you may have to start questioning your friendship with him. 
But there's something cathartic that comes as the adrenaline is depleting. It's said that revenge doesn't provide the cathartic relief that one hopes for, but you weren't looking for revenge as much as you were looking to send a message. And you're fairly certain that message was thoroughly received. Eret had been afraid, deeply and truly afraid; you'd seen it in her eyes. It made up for the fear you had seen in Wilbur's. 
You breathe a deep sigh, letting your shoulders relax for a moment; you head home.
There's static in your ears as you travel back to L'manburg, and you don't quite register that you're back on your nation's soil until you hear shouts. Tommy, Tubbo; the children, they spot you covered in blood that's both yours and not, and they're full of concern. You smile. The wound on your head starts to ache a little, the adrenaline wearing off fully.
"Don't worry about me -" you try, unable to keep the fondness from your voice.
"Wilbur!" Tommy hollers, because he knows. Everyone knows. You've staked your claim enough that even your allies know where to turn when you're acting out of character. It has you laughing, quietly at first - Dream had tried to warn Eret, how stupid must they be to ignore that, to not follow his instructions to the letter? - but your laughter only gets louder as Tubbo takes off, also calling for Wilbur ad Tommy, genuinely concerned, asks what the fuck happened to you.
"I'm a jester," you laugh, eyes a little wild as you look to the child, "I'm just a fucking jester! A messenger! Can't kill the messenger," there's something wild, something feral about you, covered in blood with a grin that's all teeth, bloody and bruised and covering a bloodstained axe. Tommy takes a step back, wary and quiet. His eyes are wide as he looks to your axe. 
"I thought you used a bow," he says quietly. Your smile grows wider.
"I'm a bad shot with a bow," you tell him seriously. He blinks slowly, processes your words.
"You shot me," there's apprehension in his voice. He's getting it. Perhaps you should take more caution here; you don't want to break the illusion of you he sees.
"I didn't know you then," is what you say, and see the confusion and vague horror as he tries to figure out what you mean by that. But he's interrupted.
"What did you do?" Wilbur doesn't see the humour in your appearance, he seems like he's barely containing rage. When all you do is grin, giving a slight shrug, he turns to Tommy, tells him he'll take care of you, that the boy should join Tubbo. Tommy looks between the two of you; he tells Wilbur to be careful. You laugh again, bright and loud, and Tommy and Wilbur both frown at you, but at least Tommy follows Wilbur's directions.
With the kid gone, Wilbur turns on his heel, making a beeline for where he knows you've hidden your living area, and you follow him without question.
In your house, his voice turns softly malevolent;
"Who did this to you?" Oh. Your heart catches in your throat, and the surprise must read on your face; despite his furious expression he's gentle when he takes hold of your wrist, leading you to your basin.
"You don't need to worry about me," you tell him softly, though you obligingly sit on the edge of the basin. You lean your axe up behind you.
"You're covered in blood," he points out, gaze flicking for a moment to meet yours as the water runs, filling the basin up. 
"Only some of its mine," you try, endeared by the care he was showing, "I just had to deliver a message, that's all."
"You look like you had to go through hell for it," he muses.
"You don't need to worry about me, Wilbur," and you reach out to take his hand where he's dousing a washcloth in the water. He goes still. 
"What message?" He asks, finally conceding, tone finally soft. He flips your hand, carefully wiping the blood from it. 
"People need to be more careful who they use me against," you say idly, and Wilbur is quiet as he works diligently away, cleaning the blood from your hands, from your arms when you offer them. 
"I kept seeing the moment you saw me die," you tell him softly, voice barely more than a whisper as he's rinsing the blood from the cloth. He gives pause; you continue, "I expect betrayal, but I can't imagine how it must feel to have to watch that and be unable to do anything; I suppose that's why Dream told them to kill me first. If their timing wasn't perfect, I'd see one of you slaughtered - I could have seen you slaughtered," you muse, looking down at your hands, at the blood beneath your nails. Carefully, Wilbur finally lifts your chin so he can gently dab at the wound on your forehead, looking as though he was holding back a fond smile. "But I think what happened was worse; I never want to be the source of your unhappiness, on purpose or not," then finally, you look to his eyes, to how he's focusing, and your heart beats hard against your ribs, "I don't want you to worry about me." It's barely more than a whisper, far more honest than the candid way you'd said as much earlier. 
"What did you do?" It's fond now, much lighter than the situation at hand called for, and for a moment he meets your gaze, smiling ever so slightly, your face still in his hands.
His eyes are so dark, you never want him to stop looking at you like this; these feelings are already becoming dangerous, on the verge of swallowing you whole. You need him closer. It had been a blood sacrifice to atone for that look in his eyes.
You will never have the words to tell him all you’re willing to do for him. 
"The king is dead," you tell him, "long live the king." 
----
"Surprised you weren't optioned as their VP," Quackity's smile was all teeth as he slid into the booth, across from you. 
"Surprised you were," you fired back, glad for his company; the two of you don't talk like you once did, but you'd always held a fondness for him.
"POG2020 here to drown their sorrows at losing?" He asked, tone edging on something almost mean, but stopping just short.
"Those of them that can drink," you'd grinned, gaze turning to the bar where Wilbur was glaring into a half drunk pint, "he promised me a drink half an hour ago," but you're tone was fond. Quackity makes a noise of sudden understanding.
"That's why you weren't his VP," he says, sitting a little lower in his seat, expression smug, but eyes alight like a tiger with his interest piqued. You make a noise like you have no idea what he's talking about, "poor form, really, looks bad if he's sleeping with his VP."
"You dirty fuckin pervert," but your grin gets wider as your tone gets flustered, "we're not fucking!"
"But you want to," his grin gets wider, "late nights at the office, just the two of you, all alone, its stressful, it's a tough job you know-" his tone is low, teasing in a way that means you can't meet his eyes, but his tone shifts as he seems to hear what he's saying, "hey do you wanna come work with me?" It's mostly a joke, smile turning to something genuine with the way it crinkles by his eyes, and the tension from mere moments ago disappears, and you lean forward, resting your chin on your hand with a sly smile.
"Depends on the benefits," you match his earlier tone, teasing and low, and he mirrors your positioning, face now close to yours, close to the middle of the table.
"I'm sure I could talk Schlatt into something reasonable for the other benefits," he's still smiling, still mostly joking, as were you, though you couldn't deny the thought of being Quackity's assistant and part of the Jschlatt Administration was deeply amusing given your recent history.
"You really in the market for an assistant?" Your tone was brighter, far less joking, and for an instant, Quackity flushed an amusing shade of pink.
"I could be- this was meant to be a bit-" 
"You here to rub my nose in it, Quackity?" Wilbur's voice, when it joined the pair of you, was accusatory, and though you don't move from your surprisingly intimate moment, Quackity's eyes slide to the side, to watch Wilbur side effortlessly into the seat beside you. 
"Former President Soot," Quackity grinned, but instead of watching Wilbur's reaction, he looked back at you, raising a single, almost challenging eyebrow. Wilbur, at the very least, ignores the comment.
"You conspiring against me?" He asks, mostly directed at you, and while Quackity tries to snort and play it off, you can feel Wilbur's hand slide down the length of your back coming to rest at your hip, arm now around you, and you lean out of your moment with Quackity and into his touch.
Something in Quackity’s gaze turns cold, like he’s awash with memories long past, like he’s quietly mad at himself for losing himself in the moment with you, for forgetting any part of what you’d put him through. 
"Not in a technical sense, but I also hadn't agreed to anything," you tell him, finally looking at him. As you settle into the space beside him, his arm moves to wrap around your shoulders, fingers resting gently on your upper arm; it's a clearly possessive gesture. Something in your heart bursts with warmth.
Looking to him, you see he's looking back at you, expression burning, question in his eyes; was I interrupting? Your grin turns sharper. If he had been interrupting, you're more than capable of telling him to fuck off, but just having him around reminds you that this is better than any alternative. 
"Oh," Quackity's voice was alight with realisation, breaking the moment, and you turn to him as Wilbur leans into you a little more, "you would have made the worst VP," he practically crows, tone more mocking than it was light, "you wouldn't have made it a week."
"Don't be a prick," Wilbur scowled, "if they'd wanted the job they of course would have been more than welcome to it -"
"Good old fashioned nepotism," Quackity, sounding especially smug, did little to brighten Wilbur's mood, who was set to mumble something else snide before Quackity's eyes fixed on you, "wait, you didn't want to be VP? I was actually right, wasn't I? You knew exactly what would happen, yet somehow he doesn't?! Have you even seen yourselves? How does he not - Ow!" You kick him in the shins under the table. Hard. 
"What the fuck are you on about?" Wilbur asks, as Quackity brings his leg up to rub at his sore shin. He's still fucking grinning. Asshole.
"Keep your dirty little mouth closed, Q," you warned. 
"Don't worry, I know its not my dirty little mouth you're interested in- fucking ow, Y/N!"
"Good," Wilbur's voice in your ear is warm and pleased and he's leaning on you now, solid and tipsy with his forehead against the side of your head, "he's being a dick, you have terrible friends you know."
"You'd be the worst," you murmur back, voice syrupy and full of affection as Wilbur actually giggles, not even bothering to try and contradict you. Quackity, across from you and still rubbing his shins, mimes gagging. 
"Go be Vice President, Quackity," Wilbur sneers.
"Don't be a salty bitch, Mister Former President," Quackity's lip curls. 
"Kick him in the shins again, my love," the nickname alone, Wilbur in your ear, it has your heart in a vice-like grip, and Quackity must see it in your eyes how eager you are to follow through because he draws his knees up to his chest with gusto, flipping you both off. You laugh.
"Love you, Q," you tell him with sincerity, out of habit. When he tells you to shut up, there’s nothing joking in his tone in that moment, gaze avoiding yours as he’s shimmying from the booth.
"You're so generous with your words," Wilbur's voice is a gentle sigh, something wanting, something almost forlorn. For a moment your breath catches in your throat, but before you can respond, before you can even think of a response, he's already talking again, "what was he on about anyways? Talking shit about you like he has any right to, you would have made a great VP, I asked, you know I asked -" he sits up, as if worried that you think he thinks less of you, but his arm is still around you.
"Will your the only one who wanted me to be VP," which isn't a lie, but in your trademark fashion, it also wasn't the whole truth. 
"They don't trust you with a nation," he sounded so bitter, and for a moment your heart stutters in your chest. 
"They shouldn't," you tell him softly. 
"Do you like Quackity more than me?"
"I think I probably like him more than you like him, yes."
"That wasn't what I was asking and you knew that," then his voice drops, something in his eyes as serious as you've ever seen, "do you like Dream more than me?"
"Wilbur…"
"I know- I know you're close, I know, I just… I need to know, you know?"
"Will…" and as you say his name, voice a hesitant murmur, he cups your face.
"You don't have to- to be worried if you do, I just need to know, for me, it's selfish but I need to know for me; I'd understand, of course of course I'd understand, you two have history-" and his gaze is boring into you, eyes wide and dark and you can't find the words for how much you want him to hold you close, hold you tight and never let go. 
You hesitate. You drop his gaze.
"You do," he sounds heartbroken, his grip on you grows slack.
"I have never lied to you, Wilbur," your tone is nervous and hesitant, "but I'm afraid of answering, I'm afraid of what it means."
"You'd… you'd betray me for him?" Drunk and emotional, he sits back, but your hands are shaking. 
"Wilbur, I'm afraid of answering because… you're wrong. It's you. Over Big Q, over Dream, over everyone… Wilbur I-" your voice caught in your throat, words too honest by half, so you swallow them, choose safer ones, "will choose you," you let out a shaky sigh, "you have my loyalty." 
His eyes were wide as saucers, shiny and overwhelmed and emotional and then he's holding you so tight it's like a vice, face pressed into the crook of your neck.
"You've always had my vote," you tell him faintly, and he holds you tighter still. 
"You," he whispers incredulously, not even your name, just, "its you." And your mind hears them said like a mirror, like he himself can't quite believe your honestly. 
----
“They’re exiling you,” you hear Quackity before you see him; they’ve got you locked away, and probably for good reason, but also probably at his insistence.
“It’s better than the death penalty,” you say, huffing a laugh.
“It doesn’t have to be like this,” his tone is gentle but reserved, and when you finally look up from your hands, elbows braced on your knees, you see him leaning on the bars of your cage. It’s too dark to read his expression, but you can tell from his voice, “just play nice with Schlatt and you can stay a citizen.”
“Play nice?” You asked with the faintest of smirks, “what does that entail exactly?”
This is where he grows quiet, crouching down and looking at the floor, mouth in a thin line.
“You’re good at playing nice, it shouldn’t be hard,” you can’t mistake the bitterness in his voice, and you give pause, “just say it was an act, your loyalty to that dictator, Wilbur.”
“Lie, so I can swap out one perceived dictator for another?” You asked softly.
“Helping run a campaign for the former president only to admit that you don’t actually give a shit, and stay loyal to the man who won by forming a coalition with the two losing parties, that sounds exactly like something you’d do,” he pointed out, and there’s something in his voice you can’t identify, something akin to faint desperation, though you can’t quite understand why. But still, something catches in your throat. 
“Isn’t it funnier to stay loyal to the former president who lost after the two losing parties formed a secret coalition? To the point of exile?”
“Can’t you just play nice? Can’t you just lie?”
“You wanna keep me around that bad?” You asked, faintly teasing edge to your words, but as soon as he stands, as soon as he speaks, you can hear him growing defensive.
“I’m the Vice President trying to offer an olive branch to a potentially skilled ally,” he sniped, “don’t get it twisted.”
“I’m not going to lie to try and play nice with the dictator who stole the nation from the person I’m loyal to,” you tell him, blunt. Quackity is quiet for a very long moment. 
“Dream ‘ll be heartbroken,” his voice is suddenly strangely rough, “someone’s knocked him out as top fuckin’ dog in your little, black heart -”
“Q,” it’s finally clicked, and you don’t know what else to say. 
----
“I want you to know what I’m capable of,” you say softly, looking up at the stars. Then, slowly, you look at Wilbur, who’s regarding you with interest, “everyone ends up afraid of me,” you tell him, “and it might be self sabotage, but I want you to fear me too. I’m not used to love, I’m not used to understanding.” 
“More honest than usual tonight,” he muses with a gentle smile.
“If I’m not feared I feel like I’m being underestimated.”
“It sounds like self sabotage.”
“I feel violent today,” then, looking up at the stars you take a deep breath, “I love you. I don’t think I’ve said that before; I love you, Wilbur.”
“You love me and you want me to fear you,” he says slowly. His gaze follows the tense set of your shoulders, “not used to loving someone?” You shake your head. 
“I want to cut off your head, just so you know I could,” you tell him, hands behind your back, gaze skyward, “I think I want to fuck you, but I’m not sure, I’m really not used to loving someone, not genuinely. I don’t think I know how to love you in a way that makes sense.” 
Finally, you turn to him, expression neutral, while inside you were alight with nerves. He’s watching you, dark eyes thoughtful. You swallow hard.
“I’m trying to push you away,” you tell him without hesitation, “because I’ve given you too much power over me, and I-” you voice catches, your façade cracking, and finally you drop your gaze, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I’m like this.”
Even your honesty was it’s own kind of dishonest mask, and there was nothing more fear inducing than genuinely letting it slip. Your image is a house of cards and you keep handing Wilbur fucking fans. 
“You know at some point I am just going to leave; I don’t want to, but if you keep pushing -” he pauses, as if expecting a rebuttal, but your mouth remains firmly closed, which causes him to frown, “- I’m going to end up leaving. Do you want me to go? I’m just going to ask, because you keep pushing, you keep doing this, I’d rather you were just honest with me.”
“I’m always honest with you.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“I don’t want you to stay around me out of some sort of moral obligation,” you tell him.
“That’s not an answer.” 
“And I can’t answer because you can’t guarantee you won’t end up fucking fearing me like everyone else! I can’t answer because I am not going to be responsible for someone else’s feelings; if you stop caring about me I don’t want you to feel like you should still be around me, and just go on to resent me!”
Squeezing your eyes closed, face scrunched up, you force the words through your lips, “I would give you the fucking world, Wilbur, but I don’t expect- I don’t want to expect anything in return,” your jaw clenches for a moment, but you relax your face, eyes still closed, “obsession,” you sigh gently, “is safer if I am sure it is not reciprocated. Especially obsession like this...”
“Like this?”
“The things I obsess over... they’re just that; things. And I want to keep them safe, but I don’t... I don’t actually love them like I love you,” your lip curls, and you look at the ground, slowly sinking into a squat as you contemplate, “it’s fucking obscene,” you spit, as if disgusted at yourself. “Love makes me feel fucking filthy; it’s always funnier when I’m the object of desire.”
“You’re still trying to push me away!”
“And yet you’re still here, so who’s the real idiot!?” You snapped, lip curled in a sneer as you shot him a venomous look; the shock of it all was plain as day on his face, but you don’t let the faint guilt you feel show on your face as you look at your hands.
“I love you,” he says faintly, still sounding surprised, like he can’t quite realise what he’s saying, “and I’m just tired to trying to fight you on that, I don’t know how to prove that what I say to you is the truth; you don’t have a patent on honesty, and I just don’t know what to do to get you to believe me.” And then, coming back to himself, anger returning, “it’s not filthy to be in love!”
“It is when it’s obsession,” your answer comes out more like a growl.
“Y/N, my drug empire turned into a nation, I think more people should be obsessed with me,” he says with surprising levity. Something protective, something jealous flares up at that suggestion, but you keep your reaction to yourself, looking up at him as something close to hope flares bright in your chest. “You act like you’re the only one here, like you’re the only one allowed to worry about me, like you’re the only one willing to- to die. You killed the King for me, you have Dream’s respect, if I was going to be afraid of you it would have settled in by now,” then, “the only reason I haven’t killed Eret for what he did to you is because you got there first yourself. Do you believe me when I tell you that I love you?”
The question hangs in the air between you both; you think you can almost see it there, catching starlight. You look at your hands instead.
“I believe there’s something wrong with the type of people who fall in love with me,” you admit, barely louder than a whisper, “and part of me believes you’re better than that.” 
“Listen to yourself,” he gives an exasperated chuckle, “there’s something wrong with you.”
“I know that,” you say almost immediately. Silence lapses out between you, and finally Wilbur sighs, stepping in close and wrapping his arms around you.
“I think it might be why I love you.” 
There’s never been a more dangerous feeling in your chest than in this moment, in his arms. You want to tell him you’d kill for him, you’d die for him, but it’s more than that, more than you could explain or do justice with words alone, so you hug him back, and never want this moment to end.
“There’s something wrong with you, too.”
----
He is silent; cold and unmoving and your hands start to shake. 
"You did what you had to," your tone is flat, no distress, nothing, just flat. Phil is quiet. Neither of you move. You can hear your heart beat in your ears. "We should move his body."
"Yeah…" and then, softer, "actually, no, it won't be around for long… but we can set up a gravestone."
"What do you mean?"
"Bodies here don't stay, they move on-" and as Phil speaks, as you step towards the body on the ground, hand outstretched, it begins to fade to ash, to dust. Only his things were left behind. Your fingers curl into a fist and you lower your hand, "are you okay?" His voice has the barest shake, like he still can't believe what just happened.
"It was never meant to be," you tell him instead of answering truthfully, forcing yourself to smile as you finally look up to the father of your best friend, your- "are you okay, Phil? I'm sorry you had to do that, I'm sorry-"
"You're okay." He sounded deeply concerned by what he'd perceived to be your response. Looking out from the room to the crater, you see Withers flying overhead, and hear shouting and confusion.
"I should go," you say softly, "I'm the only one left who could take the fall for that," you muse, jaw tightening for a moment, though noone can see your expression. When you move past Phil, you pause, and tell him quietly, reassuringly, that he did what had to be done, and that you were sorry. 
"Was he just a means to an end for you, just another joke? You'd gotten better, you'd gotten kinder-" his voice finally betrayed his distress; his son was dead by his own hand and you'd just watched, "what happened?"
It takes you a long time to formulate your response, terrified of letting yourself be vulnerable; you'd been the villain too many times to not expect an opportunist to use your vulnerability against you. Phil may not be that opportunist, but you know better than anyone what dangers may lurk behind a kind face and sincere veneer.
"Whatever I may have felt is no longer relevant, to you, me, or anyone; he's gone, as is L'manburg."
"Did you even care about him?" Phil asks gently, "don't talk your way around me, please, Y/N." Your breath catches for a moment; he's giving you an imploring look, holding your wrist carefully; outside, someone, possibly Tommy, is hollering both yours and Wilbur's names with fury. 
"Care is a very weak word for how I may have felt," you tell him softly, holding his gaze. Your tone is flat, but you see it in his eyes when he catches your meaning, how you can't bring yourself to admit out loud that you loved Wilbur, "not that it matters now… not that anyone would believe you if you told them." You said, tone dismissive. Phil lets you go.
----
"Oh hello, Quackity!" You hear Ghostbur cheerfully greeting someone as he peers out the window, leaning far enough out on the sill, pushed up on his toes, that you're half worried he'll fall. You hear violently loud shushing outside your house and your blood runs cold. Why was he trying to sneak up on your house?
You’re intrigued by it all, and don’t try and put up a fight.
"I suppose the kangaroo court is now in session," you mused, peering up at the precarious contraption above you, "can you at least tell me why you're dropping an anvil on my head?"
"Because you're a threat to society," Quackity grumbles, though he can't bring himself to look at you.
"Because you drove my father to madness, helped him blow up half the land, then you killed him once he'd outlived his purpose," Fundy was unflinching as he levelled a glare at you.
“They didn’t kill me,” it’s Ghostbur’s voice that joins the foray, amid the shouting, while you’re hopping from one foot to the other, looking up at the anvil, the gentle reverb that accompanies his soft speech cuts through the din.
And suddenly the madness stops; all eyes on the Ghost.
“Don’t kill her over me, if that’s your reasoning;” he paused, nervous, “or just don’t kill them…” he trailed off.
“Don’t you get that they’ve already made up their mind?” Quackity’s rolling his eyes, standing by the lever that decides your fate, “if they wanted someone to release them, they could have convinced one of us by now-” and he looks to you, eyes dark and cold, and the moment you’d shared back at Wilbur’s grave surfaces in your mind ‘you’re getting better at hearing the truth’.
"Quackity-" you breathed, alight with intrigue at this development, unable to help yourself. There's an old, familiar flicker of misguided desire, for lack of a better word.
"Keep my fucking name out of your mouth," he muttered, only loud enough for you to hear, "and quit it with that tone." He can't look at you; you delicately wrap press your hands to the glass of your cage.
"Q, what tone, I don't-" but even you could hear the giddy notes that bleed through in your words.
"You're about to die; I'm about to kill you, but you're hear acting- talking like you did when you pretended to care about me-"
"I have cared about you from the moment I met you," you fired back defensively, "I have always cared about you, Quackity."
“God I really fuckin’ preferred it when you lied, then I didn’t have to try and figure out what the fuck you mean when you talk like that,” he snapped, before making his way from the podium, “I’m sick of them, someone else pull the lever.” He called out; he’s taking a stand, trying to block you out, keep your words out of his head. This was the Quackity you’d been so captivated by when you’d met him, the man who intrigued you, who you thought could challenge you, whose very nature excited you. Heart beating in your ears, you press your hands to the glass of the cage, looking out past him, to the others.
“I was not responsible for what happened to Wilbur,” you called, looking to Fundy, who you’re pleased to see looked conflicted, “what happened to L’Manberg wasn’t my fault- I fought with you. I fought with you all,” there’s the faintest notes of desperation in your voice. You had already made peace with your fate, now you were simply intrigued as to whose hands your blood would be on.
“Fine, Fundy if you’re conflicted because they didn’t kill your dad, you can stay out of it,” Quackity’s got his hands shoved in his pockets, but you can see the hard, tense line of his shoulders.
“It feels like our actual execution reasons... aren’t there anymore,” Tubbo points out, “and as a leader, I feel bad killing someone for being a nuisance, and not even a nuisance to me or anyone else.”
“This feels kinda personal,” Ranboo adds, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, “which is fine, but they don’t seem like a threat to the country.”
“Did you fucking forget she became Wilbur Soot’s right hand?!” Quackity demanded from them, stepping forward again, “ she may not have been responsible for pressing the button, but she had ample opportunity to stop him; hell, she had ample opportunity to not be a dick. How can we even believe what she says?!”
“People do some fucked up things for love,” Ranboo gives a simple shrug.
“And Y/N doesn’t lie,” Tubbo pointed out, looking to you. In this moment, time freezes; his words buzz in the back of your mind as you look to Quackity, trying to decipher how he’s reacting when you can’t see his face. Because he can’t give it away, can’t bring himself to admit the power you once had over him, the sliver of power you still have, can’t make himself look weak, and it’s killing him.
They’ve only known you to be honest, and for that you’re glad... but Quackity knew you before.
Perhaps your begging, your desperation, had worked too well.
----
“You gonna give the people a show?” Your heart is beating in your throat as you find yourself waiting in your cell, hands restrained behind your back as Dream himself paces in irate silence outside your cell.
“I gave you the option to come back, to join me to not go down this road,” he’s seething, hands balling into white-knuckled fists and unballing again and again, “I don’t understand you, I don’t fucking understand you, Y/N,” and he stops, pulls off his mask to run his hand through his hair in irritation. Then he looks to you, and you’re looking back, expression thoughtful, or at least, you hopes it comes across as thoughtful, rather than betraying the way you’re heart is hammering against your ribs.
“It’s not your fault it’s more amusing to be on the side of revolution,” you told him, lips quirking into the faintest smile, “they called it L’manberg,” your smile widens, unable to help your own laugh, and his distress becomes more evident. Then, smile slowly fading, you meet Dream’s gaze, giving a slight frown.
“You didn’t have to do this,” you tell him seriously, “you could have picked anyone else to do this, you didn’t have to volunteer.”
“If I had picked anyone else,” he swallows hard, looking at the ground and taking a deep breath, “you would have talked your way out, and it would have made them look weak, but there would be a target still on your head and you’d be hunted.”
“And you?”
“You’ve never done that thing you do with me, talk circles, trying to get me on your side -”
“You’re already on my side,” you say gently, but his expression turns pained.
“They know - everyone knows I’m the only person on the side of Pogtopia you haven’t attempted to talk your way around, but I’m also the only person who could convince you to go into exile, to not fucking let yourself be killed, and have the others not hunt you furiously when they find out.”
“Dream the Great and Powerful,” you smile, tone fond and frankly adoring, he winces again.
“You’re a pain,” he mutters, mostly to himself, before he lowers himself into a squat, as if to centre himself, gaze lifting to you finally, “you can go; join Tommy in exile, you don’t have to… to… you don’t have to die, dude.”
“If I die, in their eyes I’ve atoned for my crimes,” you try to sit back, settling in a little against the wall, “you and Tommy will never see eye to eye, but like you said, that thing I do, the way I talk my way around people, that has affected more than just you,” you took a deep breath, “the only person I really respected apart from you died, Dream, the only person who truly vouched for me apart from you is dead, Dream.” Your smile grows tight, and suddenly you can’t look him in the eyes; respect, it was so much more than that. Your heart grows warm at his memory, the mere thought of his smile, before growing cold and sad as he demanded that Phil kill him. It must show on your face.
“Wilbur protected you,” Dream said, tone knowing, but you couldn’t help but bark a laugh at that.
“Wilbur was my limiter,” you corrected, and Dream’s eyebrows rose, momentarily broken from his distress, “I respected him, I… anyways, so if he asked me not to fuck with one of our allies, I wouldn’t - except to give you Tommy’s discs,” you clarified, and for the barest moment, Dream’s lips twitched into something almost resembling a smile.
“You’re kind of awful,” he says gently, “you’d fuck with your allies? Just change sides, don’t mess with the people who trust you and expect them to keep trusting you as such.”
“My ally was Wilbur, the rest of them were on his side,” you explained, “I’m on my own side before anyone else's,” you reminded, and he nodded seriously, looking to the floor, bouncing on his toes.
----
"I- I mean I'm not sorry," Quackity muses. You don't look up, but you hear him sit on the other side of Wilbur's Tombstone. 
"I don't know why you would be; you're not responsible for what happened to me."
“Oh,” Quackity frowns, giving pause, “no, I meant about him,” and he slaps the side of the tombstone with one hand.
“Not your fault either,” you shrugged.
"He did it to himself," which is right, but not in the way Quackity means it. He thinks Wilbur blew up. He doesn't know what was asked of Phil. You're quiet, and finally Quackity speaks; "did you actually love him or was it another one of your stunts?"
"Love is a strong word," you respond, tone devoid of inflection. He can't hear how badly you want to confirm, you want to holler how fucking wide the sky has gotten in Wilbur's absence. 
"Can you just teach me how to not fucking care? Because how is it so easy for you? How do you wake up and decide you're going to ruin lives and stand by while the world goes up in flames?" 
“I don’t do it on purpose.”
“It’s just a side effect of who you are as a person,” he says derisively. 
"You find what you love and let it kill you," you tell him, voice quiet. 
"You find who you love and let them kill you," he says, knowingly, "you followed Eret into the control room because of Wilbur," he said knowingly, "and we all saw who gave you that mark on your neck," he laughs humourlessly. "But you can't even entertain the idea that I could hurt you, can you?" He asks.
"Find who you love and let them kill you."
"What then?" 
"Hope your love for them dies too; severing attachments takes great personal sacrifice." 
"You sound like Dream."
"I've known him the longest, you know?"
"He's your best friend, I remember," he tells you derisively, "so did your love die?"
"My attachment to him is situational at best." 
“But does it die?” He asked quietly, “you severed the attachment, but does the love die?” His tone is hollow, and you swallowed hard. 
“You’re getting better at hearing the truth.” You give a humourless laugh, and he responds with a non-committal hum
“I liked you better when you lied," he says quietly.
"I almost got you killed," you tell him flatly, and he huffs a faint laugh.
"Correction, I almost died for you."
"What's the difference?"
"Intention," you can hear his faint smile, "find what you love and let it kill you, after all." Then, quieter, "you should finish the job."
"Don't."
"Don't what?"
"Give me that kind of power over you," you tell him flatly. 
"You should finish what you started," he scoffs, the mood shifting more and more with each word, "you're the one who wanted me to die for you; if you're learning to be all honourable and noble and shit, you should learn to take accountability -" he huffed in frustration, "can I be perfectly fucking honest with you for a moment?"
"I'd appreciate it," you tell him. There's a few moments of silence that follow, and finally you shift, peering at him over your shoulder to where he's leaning against the headstone, legs kicked out in front of him. He looks at you, eyes dark and tired.
"I'm so tired of giving a shit about you."
You know there's something selfish in how you miss seeing his smile in this moment. But then again, did you miss his smile, or did you miss what it represented; his love and loyalty. 
----
"You're getting rained on," Ghostbur said quietly, looking at you with his wide, cloudy eyes as you held an umbrella open and aloft above him.
"I'll live," you said pointedly, and at Ghostbur's smile became faintly strained, but he accept the umbrella. You, however, didn't move, sitting beside him on the log that you'd found him on.
"What are you doing out here?" He asked, shuffling a little closer, if only to try and shield you too with the little umbrella. Instead of looking to him, you look at the grey, drizzling clouds looming overhead.
"I saw it was clouding over," you told him, "and no-one I spoke to had seen you for a while..." you trailed off, shrugging, as if that was enough.
"You've always been a lovely friend, I remember that, I remember..." but his own voice trails off, dies in his throat; you look at him with interest, and after a beat he looks back at you, "I remember the good times, the happy times, and you, in the beginning you were a wonderful friend, but I don't... they say I blew up a nation, you know, and I don't remember that, but I don't remember a lot leading up to that either. It -" he hesitates before backtracking, choosing his words carefully, "did something bad happen between us?"
Your understanding of the word, of the time you spent with Wilbur, it was all shattering in your mind at once. His eyes were wide and full of concern when you look back at him, and he reaches out gently, wiping away a tear you hadn't realised had fallen; you hear the hiss of the water against his thumb and move out of his touch.
"Sorry," he says softly, genuine apology in his voice, "was it because of what I did to L'Manberg?" He asks gently. Around you, the rain was getting heavier.
"I thought we were happy," it came out barely louder than a whisper, and you quickly wiped your eyes, despite the rain now coming down hard enough to hide your tears, "I should have... I know I should have said something, but I thought we both just knew, you know? I should have..." and you turn, bottom lip trembling, "I'm sorry, Ghostbur, I know you're not him, you keep saying that, but I never got to tell Alive-You that I... you know," you swallowed hard, "that I love him. You? Him? I never actually got to tell him properly, in a way that makes sense. But I did. I do. And I thought... Fuck," the word comes out in a harsh breath, and you find yourself scowling and looking away, "probably for the best that I didn't say anything if he - you, I guess - weren't - wasn't? - happy."
"I know he cared about you, as much as I can remember, he never stopped caring," Ghostbur's voice is quiet, and finally, you look at him. His face is scrunched up with concentration, but there's small trails of steam -
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to make you cry," you're genuinely apologetic, and he looks shocked when you look up, as if he hadn't even noticed.
"Just because I don't remember doesn't mean... well a lot of things were not good memories towards the end, but that's because of everything going on up here," he was wiping at his eyes quickly to dispel the tears before he taps his temple with two fingers, "and if what you're saying is true, he wasn't unhappy because of you, he was just unhappy, and it... there are months missing for me, and that's no-one's fault."
Oh... well you supposed you could understand that, still, it was difficult to process this whole conversation and all it's implications.
"How is this the most amusing option, if you don't mind me asking?" He suddenly speaks up, and you look up with confusion.
"What do you mean?"
"You're upset, I don't think I've ever seen you upset -"
"Well it probably wouldn't be a good memory if you had," you reminded, to which he conceded.
"But I remember clear as day when we met, and you told me and Tommy that you simply did whatever amused you the most, this... this doesn't seem particularly amusing."
"I don't operate like that anymore," you told him frankly, staring at your hands.
"Oh," he muttered softly, before asking, voice tentatively, "why did you think to come find me?"
You take a moment to deliberate, to consider your own reasoning and motivations, still looking at your hands, fingers twisting and curling and locking into inconsistent shapes.
"You used to do this near the end," you said softly, "used to run off and sit near the button and think and think and think but never do anything," you paused, "and I never cared about the land like I cared about you, so I was all for blowing it all up, but it... I could see it was doing something to you. The election, everything that was happening, it did something to you; you were spiralling, and I knew if I didn't know where you were, you were by the button. Awful and fucking beautiful, and dude, I'm- I'm so sorry I didn't tell you but, Christ, I was so in love with you, Wilb-" looking sharply at him, your voice died in your throat, and you corrected yourself, "him. Not... you're different. Right. Ghostbur." He blinked at you, a little taken aback by the sudden passion of your outburst, of your explanation. You cleared your throat. "No-one else had the balls to acknowledge that the land no longer functioned by the ideals it was built for, and I loved your passion; I could listen to you talk down there for hours. Sometimes I did. It was like a prison and a safe space all at once, and I don't know if it made things better or worse, but when he couldn't stand to see what the world had become, we'd sit in that room with the button and talk."
Finally, you looked at him, seeing him and not the man he used to be.
"And today I couldn't find you, and I knew it was going to rain, and... I know rain hurts you. There's no button, but you don't spend time in town anymore, so I looked for Friend." You looked at the little, blue sheep who'd been happily munching on some grass during your conversation. Then a faint, cold pressure in your hands, and you look down to see Ghostbur pressing a vial of a thick, blue liquid into your hands.
"Have some blue," he said softly, "it'll make you feel better." And then, much softer, he thanks you for finding him, he takes your free hand and laces your fingers with his, "thank you for talking to me."
"Thank you for talking to me." You mumble, giving his hand a squeeze, feeling a touch guilty for unloading all of this on him. No-one else would listen, or if they would, they didn't care; people had gone from not trusting you because you refused to be completely loyal to any thing but yourself, now they hated you for staying loyal to what they deemed to be the wrong thing. Allies were few and far between, and Ghostbur may see himself as separate to Wilbur, but you weren't going to stop yourself from caring about him too.
----
"You're in here," Tommy's voice is quiet where he's thumbing through a notebook you half recognise. Making a noise of interest, you look a little closer at the notebook - What I Remember. Ghostbur's notes, you feel yourself growing tongue tied.
"I don't- you shouldn't be reading that."
"You suddenly decided to grow a conscience?"
"Shut up," your lip curled, "and I'm not in it."
"Who else would be the Favourite Jester?" He asked, turning the book around, but you covered your eyes. 
"Don't be a sook," he sneered.
"Does Ghostbur know you have it?" You asked, and he grew a little antsy at that, to which you simply growled at him to give it back. But still, you catch a glimpse of it;
“Its you.” - in the notebook, in Ghostbur's neat scrawl - you chose me when no-one else did.
----
"I think Tommy trusts me," you told Dream, frowning at your brewing stand. Dream, for his part, finds the humour in your statement where he's sitting at your table, leaning back, his feet on the table.
"Tommy, I've changed!" Your tone shifts to a mocking imitation of your earlier conversation with the boy, "death has changed me!" And you dropped the act with a snort, "getting a scar doesn't make me a different person," you rolled your eyes. Dream clears his throat.
"Sorry about that, again," he muttered.
"No hard feelings, dude, obviously," you grinned over your shoulder.
"So you- you're okay with my plan; the two of you fought side by side for your nation -"
"I'll be by your side until -"
"Until something better comes along," Dream nods in resignation.
----
“I’m sorr- Ghostbur I’m so sorry,” you sniffled, angrily rubbing at your eyes, frustrated that he had even seen you get so emotional, “I’m not- you shouldn’t have seen that, I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay, crying’s normal,” he said, voice a gentle echo of the one you loved, “do you want to talk about it?”
“Not with you, Ghostbur,” though you’re shooting for light, it doesn’t land, and instead, he looks to the floor, apologising. You wipe the tears that refuse to stop spilling from your eyes.
“You still miss him so much it moves you to tears?”
“You caught me in a moment of weakness.”
“I didn’t think you were capable of those,” he says with a faint laugh, and you look at him, see his quietly fond smile, and for a moment you see the memory of Wilbur himself, and your expression crumples. Immediately as you bury your face in your hands, you feel him by your side, apologising, trying to lay a comforting hand on your arm. The touch is cold but familiar, and you reach out instinctively and grab his hand.
“Ghostbur, my life is a fucking joke and I’m not laughing anym-” he kisses you quick when he gets the chance, his mouth on yours so close to being familiar, but not quite. It knocks the wind from you, and for a moment you let yourself fall into it, grabbing his sweater and pulling him closer. 
“Does that help?” He asks a little breathless when you part, and you can’t look him in the eyes, only at your shaking hands balled up in his perfect, yellow sweater. 
“You’re not him,” your voice is a shaky whisper.
“I...” his words get caught in his throat, “I think right now I’m close enough. Does this,” and he holds your face with one hand like it’s porcelain, like he’s afraid you’re about to shatter, “does this help?”
“Why?” You can feel how weak you are in this moment, unable to let him go, knowing the truth of the whole situation. 
“I don’t like seeing you sad.”
“It’s not your job to make me happy, give me time and I’ll be alright,” but you don’t let him go, then, “tell me you don’t love me, please.”
“It seems dangerous to even entertain the idea; I’m not Wilbur,” he says gently, and finally you look at him, meeting his gaze, leaning into his touch. 
“Do you even want any of this?” Your voice is barely a whisper, “me, or anything like this moment?” Ghostbur visibly hesitated.
“I don’t want you to be sad,” he said with a surprising firmness, “I want to do whatever makes you happy,” then, his voice goes quiet, “even now, I forget sad things, people tell me sad things and the conversation ends, and I just... lose whatever they said,” he gives a faint smile, “but even in time that aren’t... aren’t the happiest, I haven’t forgotten you; something about being around you makes me happy, happy enough to remember you. All I want is for you to be happy too.”
“Did you lie to me?” Your voice is barely more than a whisper, and you can’t look him in the eyes, so you watch his lips twist into something thin and unhappy, before stumbling over his words, trying to deny, “did you lie about not remembering me? About not remembering... not remembering how close we were?”
“I thought...” his expression reads apology, his hands coming to cover yours where you can’t bring yourself to let him go, still holding him close by his sweater, “it would be easier for you to let go, to move on, if you didn’t know.” 
“But you don’t care about me like he did.”
“I care about you,” his eyes go wide and concerned, “but I’m not him. You understood him better than anyone and- and- and- he needed you- uh, your company,” he correct, faint blush rising on his cheeks at his own implicit wording, “more than anything else. You’re the one who stayed.” 
You swallowed hard, huffing a humourless laugh.
“And he’s the one who got away.”
“Y/N...”
“This feels...” you look to your hands still holding him close, then to his mouth, then his eyes, taking a shakey breath, “self destructive, for us both,” and his expression reads shock, reads apology, but in that instance you cave to your need for contact, leaning into him, to find what comfort you could in him. A shiver runs down your spine as you make a snap decision, “I know you’re not him, but I still love you,” you lie; he’s not the one you promised to always be honest with, but for now he’s as close as you’ve got, and you can’t let him go, “please don’t go.” 
----
It’s been a long time, relatively since you’d seen Q when you run into him. You’re not looking for him, you’re merely roaming on an overcast day, but he looks like he’s on a mission. He seems surprised to see you, right before his expression turns dark.
“Figures I’d run into you out here sooner or later,” his words genuinely confuse you, which he seems to pick up on, because at least for a moment, he seems confused himself, before clarifying, “Dream’s in prison.”
“Oh?”
“Don’t ‘oh’ me.” His audible irritation makes your own smile grow just a touch wider, “you know you should be there too.”
“Cruel, Q, they’ve already killed me for my crimes once,” you practically sing, amused smile stretched from ear to ear, “haven’t I suffered enough?” His smile was thin and mean.
“Not even close.”
“You make me miss being a bad person,” you say with a hint of self deprecation.
“Don’t sell yourself short,” Quackity snorted, “you’re still terrible.”
“I like you standing up for yourself; self confidence is a good look on you.”
“You like anyone who actually challenges you,” he rolled his eyes, “which makes me feel fucking stupid for ever caring about you like I did. You don’t give a shit about simps, I get it now.”
“You’re better than that,” you tell him, which is a metaphorical slippery-slope, a half truth, since you only half-believe it, but your tone is low, is sincere, and he blinks quickly, surprised. 
“I- yeah, I know,” he scowls, but turns away. 
“Good, it’s good you know your worth,” you tell him seriously, “you have...” and you huff a faint laugh, tone awed and gentle, “so much potential, Q.” And for the barest moment, his expression softens. Carefully, he steps up to you.
“This is how it started last time,” his tone is low as you feel the feather-light way his fingertips ghost up your arm. He’s in your space, gaze locked with yours, searching for something in you that you can’t begin to guess at, right before he grabs your chin hard enough that it hurts, “you try and  build me up so you can tear me down - I’m not doing this again.” 
God damn it, you can feel your heart beat against your ribs at the sight of the fury in his eyes. 
“Q-” you try, soft and a little helpless. For a moment, both his grip and his gaze softens, and you know that look, that faint gentleness, from a time long passed, “I never spoke poorly of you, you just lost faith in me.” 
The look in his eyes before he storms off gives him away; he hates that in a twisted way, it’s still the truth.
----
“I’ve always appreciated your honesty,” Ghostbur muses; night is falling over the snowy biome you’d decided to call home, the house Dream had built for himself that sat abandoned since he was taken prisoner. Ghostbur is sitting on a bench, looking around, ankles crossed wearing a sunny smile.
“It’s the only thing I’m consistent about,” gave a wry smile, not looking up from where you were crouched in front of you brewing stand; everything started because of these brewing stands, just look how far you’ve come. You try not to dwell on that.
“Consistently inconsistent,” his tone was bright and fond, but then he hums, “you’re consistent in a lot of ways; you’re loyal -” he points out, but you’re so quick to respond it doesn’t even register at first. 
“Only because I love you,” then, silence, and you scrunch up your whole face with regret, “him, Wilbur,” you sigh deeply, “don’t get me wrong, Ghostbur, I care about you, probably too much by my standards, but...” and you trail off, a touch apologetic.
“Everyone keeps telling me that I did, or well, he did, all these terrible things; I just... I just want to know why.”
“Why what? Why he did what he did?”
“Why you still loved him when he did all those things,” Ghostbur clarified. You freeze.
“You want me to be honest?” Your voice is soft, and when you look over, you see he’s drawn his legs up to sit cross-legged on the counter, tearing apart a loaf of bread for something to do with his hands. 
“You’re always honest,” his tone is earnest, but he can’t look at you, before you can speak, however, he goes on, tone softer, “I remember bits and pieces, more and more as time goes on. More of you is always coming back; more of us, and I thought not remembering would be the most painful part about being around you, making you sad because I can’t remember what happened to make you feel so close to me before... before I died, but I think remembering’s worse,” he looked up, “because I’m not him. Like I’m borrowing someone else’s memories even though they’re mine, because I don’t think like he did; I don’t think I understood you the way he does. I don’t...”
“Everyone’s so quick to tell me what terrible things I’ve done - my son, Fundy, I spoke to him, he’s- he’s- he’s not happy with me, you know? Nor is Tommy, I mean most people just need me to know how awful I was, but you... you speak his name with love and honey on your lips and I don’t know how or why, you make all the terrible things sound like miracles and I don’t know why.” 
Slowly, you get to your feet, stretching a little, as your words begin to fall from you and you make your way over to Ghostbur, his pale form golden in the candlelight.
“I don’t know how to put it, but I don’t... I never feel quite real, not - for lack of a better word, given the nature of everyone here - human enough, and I look around and I see Tommy and Tubbo and George and Puffy and -” you rest your hands on his knees, gently, as you watch his hands tearing apart the loaf of bread, “and they’re all effortlessly people, they’re good, they’ve got dirt beneath their nails and a sparkle in their eyes, and I tried being good and noble and honest, and the only part I liked was being honest but being too honest somehow made me the villain; no-one understood. Dream came the closest, he felt like another amalgamation of interactions pretending to be human, but he knew his power and his place and his role, and he didn’t understand that I had no interest in playing the same part over and over again; consistently inconsistent, apart from my honesty and my loyalty. He liked my honesty and loyalty, so he did his best to accept the rest of me that came with it.”
Looking him in the eyes, finally, you could see it dawning on Ghostbur. Your fingers tapped a gentle, inconsistent rhythm on his knees. 
“But Wilbur... you - he - he... he...”
“He loved you,” Ghostbur’s voice was gentle, but after all this time, the confirmation from his returning memories, it was enough for your voice to catch in your throat. Then, he nodded again like it was a confirmation, “he loved you.”
“He loved me,” you said, voice barely more than a whisper, “not despite who I was, but because of it, loved all of me, at least, that’s what it felt like... I’d never felt that before, and I... I never wanted to let it go,” he’s putting the bread to the side, slowly sliding off of the counter and into your space, “he was staying true to himself, and they hated him for it, but I never could, and I never will.” You murmur, as he wraps his arms around you, holding you tightly in the dimly lit room. 
“It’s you,” you whispered against the fabric of his sweater, echoing your words from what feels like a lifetime ago, “above everyone else, I choose you. You have my loyalty.”
A moment of silence; he swallows hard, presses his face into the crook of your neck.
“It’s you,” he whispers back, just as Wilbur had those months ago; at the time you though they were an incredulous echo of your own thoughts, but now you know it’s an admission, a return of affection, a declaration; you have my loyalty, he’d been trying to tell you. 
You can’t tell Ghostbur you love him, you can’t tell him you love him, you cannot tell him you love him, no matter how much you want to. He’s not Wilbur. He’s not the Wilbur you fell in love with. 
You tell him anyways. Whisper it like it’s a secret. 
“I love you. I’m sorry.”
His answer comes whispered with a kiss at your temple, a small token of comfort.
“I know.”
----
The world had fallen still in a way you had only felt before natural disasters. There was quiet. There was peace. Something was wrong. Your conversation with Dream played on repeat in your mind, over and over and over.
"You will owe me a life." You can't forget the gravitas with which he'd said it, eyes dark and eerie as he sat cross-legged on the floor of his prison; you will owe me a life.
The phrasing had caught you off guard, because what in the hell did that even mean? It could mean anything, hell he could claim your first child if he wanted to, but you'd been desperate enough to not question, to just accept.
"You really do love him, don't you?" He'd said softly as you'd sat opposite him, when he'd jokingly asked if you'd take his place in the prison in exchange for Wilbur back.
"Of course," had been your serious answer to both questions. Dream had laughed, equal parts fond and weary, his gaze drifting up to the impossibly high ceiling.
"Its a nice thought, though I doubt Sam would simply let you switch with me," he mused, adding, "you know Ghostbur won't be around anymore."
"But Wilbur will be alive," you insisted, and finally he looks at you.
"You trust me," its not a question.
"I've always trusted you," its not a lie. Dream blinks at you, surprised by your honesty. He should be, somehow everyone overlooks your defining trait being brutal honestly. Moments like this remind you why you need Wilbur back so desperately; he understood you in a way no-one else did, not even Dream.
"I killed you," he says, almost to himself, like he's just remembered that fact.
"I know," you nodded, "and I trusted you then, and I trust you now. Everything happens-"
"Don't say for a reason," Dream gritted his teeth with irritation at the phrase, but you gave a faint smile.
"No, I was just going to say that everything happens. We live, we die," you shrugged.
"Then why are you asking me to bring him back?"
"I didn't realise your book of necromancy was purely for decoration," there's a slight edge to your words, lip curling in knee-jerk defensiveness. Dream looked back at you suddenly, eyebrows rising at your tone.
"Is that why you trust me?" There's something betrayed in his voice, and he sits back, away from you, something dangerous in his eyes.
"That's..." you tried to find a way to talk your way out of the situation, but your inability to lie was more of a hindrance now than anything else, "so reductive," you settle on. But you're fidgeting.
"Then complicate it for me," he's practically ordering, and if he weren't the only way to bring back Wilbur, you wouldn't be complying so easily. Then, like a bolt of lighting it hits you; you look up, gaze unwaivering as you meet his.
"Kill me."
"What?"
"Kill me. Don't bring me back," you yourself are almost ordering, tone leaving little room for argument.
"What the fuck; why?" He hissed in confusion, and you knew, in that instance, that your point would be clear.
"Why not?" Something amused and sinister curled at the edge of your lips as you regained the upper hand in the conversation, "if you'd prefer, I could kill myself; walk straight into the lava until my lives run out," and with that, you carefully get to your feet as he frowns at you. Sauntering over to the flowing, molten walls, you stick your hands in your pockets, looking pensively at the liquid rock.
"Wouldn't it kill two birds with one stone? If I'm dead, maybe I'll find my way back to Will, and you won't have to revive him. That's what the kids call a win-win, right? I won't ask you for anything, but, you know, I won't owe you anything either."
When you look to him, you get to watch in real time as it dawns on him. The way his face contorts with bitter anger makes your own, imposing, gloating stance soften, even as he looks away, refusing to look at you.
"I don't..." you sighed deeply, "I don't trust you because I know you can revive me, I trust you because you're a pragmatist, Dream, and as long as I'm useful to you, well..." you trail off, coming back to him.
"I don't understand you," he said, finally, voice terse, "you've fucking commodified your existence and sold your allegiance to the highest bidder; how do you stand it? I get it, you think I'm controlling, fucking news flash, so was Wilbur, so was fucking Techno, so is everyone. We're a bunch of cruel, self-canalising, power-hungry assholes masquerading as heroes and villains trying to make ourselves feel better for the atrocities we commit."
"And what currency am I selling myself for?" You snort, despite his serious tone; when he looks at you, as if he can't believe you're laughing at his rant, you tip your head and regard him thoughtfully, "while I appreciate that that seemed to have been weighing on you for a while, I'd advise you to not project your shit onto me; have I ever cared about having power for myself?"
That's actually a good point, he seems to realise, and finally, his expression softens, and he gets to his feet.
"Do you care about anyone other than yourself?" Surprisingly, it's not judgemental, it's intrigued, like he has a sudden understand of you that makes everything else make sense. Your smile is so soft and unguarded as you gently cup his cheek with one hand, fondly rubbing your thumb across his cheek.
"You know, you might be my best friend," you told him instead of answering, "and I trust you." He takes a deep breath, expression going serious as you can almost see the cogs turning in his mind.
"Despite... fucking everything, and who you are as a person," he said with the faintest smile, "I actually trust you too," but he hesitates, the slightest crease forming above his brow, "but I don't think I can still say that if Wilbur comes back -"
"Dude -" you're surprised by Dream's honesty in turn, but you do respect it as he clarifies himself.
"He's the one you care about, the only one besides yourself, I know, I've seen it," he gives a faint smirk, "we're still friends, of course, there's no doubt about that, but if I asked you to kill someone that Wilbur would rather have alive, or if I asked you to, say, join me on an adventure with a low survival rate, if Wilbur asked, you'd choose him, wouldn't you? You'd do whatever it takes to make him happy."
"Dream... I -"
"Your loyalty is absolute, but selective; you put yourself first, then Wilbur, and maybe I'm overestimating my place in your life, but I think I may be below him, but above most others..."
"What are you saying? What do you want?" You asked carefully.
"I'll bring back Wilbur, maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but I'll bring him back, but you'll owe me a life," and you can't even begin to properly process what he's saying, "not his," Dream clarifies, "I wouldn't do that to you, but in one way or another, you will owe me a life, and when I ask for it, however that may be, you need to uphold your end of the bargain, or I'll send him right back to where he is now."
I'll bring Wilbur back. I'll bring Wilbur back. I'll bring Wilbur back. That's the four words he'd said that you're fixating on, that're playing through your mind on repeat, and you practically crush Dream in a hug as you agree, breathlessly thanking him. He hugs you back, and you can feel his smile against your shoulder, laughing somewhat fondly at the notes of relief in your voice as you mutter that he's your favourite.
"For now," he snorts when you step back, and you give a sheepish smile, ducking your gaze.
"For now," you agree.
----
"Who let you- does Sam know you're in here?" Quackity's voice is dangerously quiet, a strange smile on his face, like having you here is a boon rather than a terrible mistake.
"Q, what the fuck?" You rubbed at your eyes, forcing the sleep from them. Dream is already scrambling as far as he can from the newcomer, anger and fear in his eyes. He tells Quackity to fuck off.
"What are you doing here? You planning an escape for my favourite little war criminal?" He paused, "have you moved on now that your favourite little war criminal is dead?" Everything about him seems sharp, seems cruel and threatening; something about it is thrilling, like a challenge, and you find yourself standing to your full height, refusing to drop his gaze.
“Big Q,” you take some small pride in the fact that your voice doesn’t shake, “you’re looking markedly more malicious today.”
“Yeah, well, I’ve been coming here for a while, looking for one simple thing, and your buddy there really hasn’t exactly been helpful,” there’s a faintly manic gleam in his eye, but your blood is hissing and spitting in your veins, conflicted and delighted in equal measure -
“He was your friend you fucking asshole!” The words burst from you, disgusted as you wear a manic grin. 
“I was your friend, you fucking piece of shit!” He hollers back, “I was more than your fr-” but his mouth snaps shut, expression one of seething rage, “don’t fucking talk like you still trust him, like you care about him;” the curl of Quackity’s lip is cruel, the look in his eyes cold as he shifts his grip on his sword; a humourless laugh escapes him, “except, of course it’s you who still cares; first Dream, then Wilbur, the only people you actually care about are just like you,” and there’s so much derision in his voice that it almost stings, almost, if he wasn’t right. How can he not see the way his cruel tone delight you? How can he not see the irony in his words in this very moment; “now fuck off, you’re in my way.” He sneers.
“I’m not letting you hurt him,” you refused to move, and his eyes widened, disbelieving laugh escaping him.
“Look at that! Did the wizard finally give you a fucking heart?” 
“Look at that!” You mirror his tone, though your own is acidic, pushing, you’re pushing him now, the way you know best, “did you finally get over your pathetic feelings? You finally getting smart enough to see me as a real threat?” And you’re in his space, in his face, refusing to back down, waiting for the moment he snaps.
“I never cared about you, I cared about the fact that you paid me attention; note the difference,” he snarled; it’s a lie, you know it’s a lie, can remember the way he’d looked at you, how he’d almost died for you, and it’s fucking intoxicating.
“You’re so good at hearing the truth, but you’re fucking shit at obfuscating it,” you tell him with a cool confidence, “I hung the stars in your sky, Quackity,” his jaw clenched tightly at your change in tone, the look in your eye, “but tell me again about how it was all an act for you, say it in a way I’ll believe this time.” It’s designed to cut him, and you can see it in his eyes when it does. Fight back, damn it! 
“Maybe I’ll give Dream the day off, kill you instead,” he tries, but you can tell his heart’s not in it. 
“This isn’t fun for him like it is for you,” Dream pipes up, and Quackity shoots him a surprisingly confused look, while your look over your shoulder, faint disappointment in your eyes. Dream, however, exhausted and paranoid with Quackity in his cell, still has enough wherewithal to understand you better than almost anyone else.  
“I wish you would,” you don’t look away from Quackity. Your voice is cold in the wake of Dream’s revelation, and when he looks back at you, Quackity looks... uncertain. A dangerous state to be in considering his opposition.
“You’re down to your last life, don’t fucking test me,” Quackity warned, but his heart’s not in it like before. As you approach him, he raises his weapon, but your confidence strides never falter, “Sam wouldn’t give a shit if I killed you, no-one would.” 
“You would,” you tell him snidely, finding yourself growing sick of the sound of his half-baked cruelty. 
“Are you just here to let what you love kill you?” He gives a mean, humourless smile. 
“Bold to assume I love you, Q.”
“Well, seeing as the only bastard you ever knew how to love was so eager to off himself, I figured I might be all you have left to get back to him,” there’s faint triumph in his eyes when he can see his malicious words touched a nerve, but he wasn’t playing your game right, and you were tired of not having fun.
“It’s not my fucking fault you look for a home in everyone who’s halfway nice to you,” something in you snaps, and your tone is cold and unwaivering, “don’t blame me for your fragile sense of self; you were so ready to believe anything I told you, but when I did what people fucking do - when I let you down - you had to go and let it shatter you,” you sneered.
“You being a shitty person is my fault?” He scoffed, and you stepped up to him, emboldened. You barely even feel his sword at your throat.
“Before breaking your cheap, little heart, I hadn’t been honest a day in my life; everyone had told you as much, you chose to ignore them; did you think you could fix me?” You gave a harsh laugh, stepping forward, crowding him into taking a step back, expression irate, trying to keep up his strong front, “Actually, I guess, wow, you did; since you, I haven’t told a lie,” and you gave him a derisive look, “because fucking you up wasn’t a challenge, making you fall in love with me wasn’t a challenge, getting you to the point where you’d die for me? Not a fucking challenge, Quackity. You offered me your life and it fucking bored me.
Talking to me makes you want to be a worse person? Good luck with that; you will always be better than you fear, better than you fucking hope or wish you were, because you couldn’t fucking stomach killing me once, you couldn’t fucking stomach being a truly terrible person.
You want my blood on your hands? Your hands were mine, and I couldn’t have given less of a shit, so no, if I have any say, you’re not gonna hurt Dream, because you’re hurting him to get the thing that’s going to bring back the person I actually fucking fell in love with. I can’t believe I ever wasted my time on you when he was out there.
I’m tired of trying to be amicable with you when you’re still - fucking still - picking up the pieces and trying to figure out who the fuck you are; God, I fucking hope you kill me, I hope it brings you peace, I hope it brings you clarity, but you better make sure it counts, you better make sure it fucking sticks!” 
----
"You do things that hurt you because you don't know what else to do, even if you don't enjoy them," Ranboo's voice is flat, and your expression twists to something derisive, though you attempt to regain your composure.
"Incredibly presumptuous of you," you respond, still alive, if burned.
----
"How many more?" Ghostbur's touch was light on your forearm, tracing the shiny, healed scar of where you'd thrown your hands up to protect your face as Quackity had shoved you into the lava waterfall that surrounded Dream's cell. It hadn’t killed you; he hadn’t been able to go through with it, and the lava curtain parted as the bridge approached the cell at Sam’s command. But it had still left it’s mark.
"What?" You surfaced from your thoughts as his cool hand stilled against the memory of the burn.
"How many more until you see him again?" He asks, and he doesn't look sad often, but he can't look you in the eyes. Then, gently, his hand comes to rest on your shoulder, thumb brushing against the scar that stands out on your neck, a perfect circle, a perfect reminder of what you’d lost the second time you’d died.  
And you meet his gaze, can see the nerves hidden just behind his eyes - is this why you do this? Am I… not enough? What a dangerous thought, dangerous territories; how cruel you were to let him fall for you, even a little, even when both of you knew it was a terrible idea. 
Dream's voice was in your head - Ghostbur won't be around anymore - and you'd answered without flinching - but Wilbur will be alive. 
"One," your voice came out hoarse, "one life and I'll see him again." You can't look him in the eyes, even as he holds your face; he has no idea what to say to that. It's the truth, but not the one he realises. 
"You don't love me, right?" You asked, clearing your throat, moving carefully out of his reach.
"You shouldn't kill yourself for him," Ghostbur tells you with uncompromising sincerity instead of answering, "you're worth more than that."
"I need you to tell me that you don't have feelings for me, Ghostbur -"
"Seems like a very worrying thing to be asking given the circumstances," again he tries to deflect, but there's something close to guilt eating you up inside, and you stand, moving out of his space, Dream's voice in your head.
"Do you love me or not, Ghost of Wilbur Soot?" You demanded, and his expression turned hard, so unlike his usual self.
"I'm not him," he said carefully, but his gaze dropped; he couldn't look you in the eyes, "and I don't think it should matter either way, because you've made it abundantly clear that he's the one you want; I'm not going to say I don't and let you kill yourself."
"I promise I'm not going to fucking kill myself!"
Ghostbur went very quiet. 
“Any answer is dangerous, really, so it doesn’t matter either way,” he’s pulling his sleeves down to cover his hands, to fiddle with, trying to distract himself, “I love Friend,” his tone was aiming for something light-hearted, an attempt to change the topic, and it did it’s job well enough; your lips twisted into a grin.
“First a Salmon, then a Sheep, your tastes are -” but he looks at you, giving a strangely amused little smile.
“Questionable?” He finishes your sentence, and you find yourself less amused with the situation; he brings up a good point, including you all the same, though you’d been meaning to say bestial, but fuck, what does that make you? For a moment, you find yourself in crisis, wondering if you were technically in a polyamorous relationship with a ghost and an actual sheep. But you push it to the side -
“It’s selfish,” you hear his voice in your head, see him looking at you with wide, shiny eyes in the dim light of a pub, but you can’t help but repeat the words that had been said to you, “but I need to know for me -”
Ghostbur could say anything, and you see the realisation dawning on his face; he knows what you’re asking. He could be silent, he could brush you off, he could say anything else -
“It’s you,” just the way you’d said it to Wilbur, confirming what you feared; Ghostbur drops his gaze when he says those words to you, when he means to say I love you, how can you not see that?
Those two words hang in the air between you, like they always have. You should leave. You should go before you develop a conscience. But you can’t... there’s something familiar, something intoxicating about this moment, his loyalty; you’ve seen this before, you’ve craved this before. 
You step up to him, and as if on instinct, he rests his hands on your hips, leaning into your touch when you hold his cheek gently. 
“I love you,” your murmur, and his eyes fall closed, breathing deeply, “I love you.” It’s easy, it’s too easy, to fall back into this, to let him rest his forehead against yours, your arms around his neck, knowing in your heart that his loyalty, his love, was a means to an end; “I love you.”
He trusts your words, even now. 
“Please don’t go,” he whispers, pulling you close now, moving to press his lips to the crook of your neck. So you stay. Your time with him is limited, though only you know that, so you will enjoy it while you can.
----
"This was your plan," Tommy muttered, horrified, as the realisation dawned on him, "you're the one who pointed out that killing Dream in the prison didn't break any of the prison's rules," he whispered, before turning on you, eyes wide, Friend's leash still looped around his wrist, "you're the one who suggested using Ghostbur as a decoy, because no-one would suspect him."
"You set him up," Ranboo was horrified. One by one they were turning on you.
"You knew Ghostbur didn't- he didn't want to be revived!" Tubbo exclaimed, hurt and betrayed, "I thought - Y/N I thought you loved him, how could you -?!"
"Wilbur and Ghostbur are not the same person! How do you all keep forgetting that?!" You snarled in response, expression contorting to one of rage; that was enough to shock them into silence, taking a step back as they regarded you with a new kind of fear.
"We were happier with Wilbur gone, we liked Ghostbur and he liked us!" Tommy exclaimed, before his voice dropped to something soft and betrayed, hurt in his eyes, "Ghostbur didn't fucking deserve that; you're a terrible person," and your expression dropped to a smirk that didn't reach your eyes.
"I'm sorry about Ghostbur, I am, but the ends justifies the means; do you remember what I told you when L'Manburg was first forming? I told you I'm not on Dream's side, but I'm also not on yours," and you paused for a moment, before looking to the heavy remains of the button room, through which you knew Wilbur himself would finally be returning any moments now, "I'm on Wilbur's."
----
Then you see him, and oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck this is real and you owe Dream a life and Wilbur is alive. You're frozen in place. He's talking to Tommy, who sounds frankly horrified that Wilbur is back, but you're frozen. Heart beating in your throat, the sunrise that’s coming brings with it a warmth, though to you it feels closer to vindication. 
And there’s yelling and horror from the others who’ve accompanied you, but you can’t hear them, approaching slowly, with measured, even steps.
Then, his eyes meet yours and something in his expression softens. When he smiles at you, every terrible thing you did was worth it for this moment. Having the others there is too much. You don't want an audience, you don't want anyone there to judge you and your choices, the things you've done to get to this moment.
"This," Tommy turns on you, "this is what you bloody well wanted; now you're acting all shy? " His lip curled, and your expression turned flat and unamused.
“Don’t mistake respect for shyness,” you tell him bluntly, with a cool confidence that was unrecognisable to the blonde, who hadn’t known you well enough before he’d begun starting conflict to know the depths to which you could sink. But he was beginning to learn. 
“She’s part of the reason I’m here at all,” Wilbur reprehends him, while Tommy physically recoils at his tone, "Dream himself said as much." And then he's offering you his hand; nothing else matters.
"I can't be here," there's disgust in Tommy's voice, but its enough that the others leave, giving you and Wilbur peace. Finally.
"You're a sight for sore eyes," you tell him, taking his hand with a sharp smile, which he mirrors.
"Thirteen years I was stuck in that train station, and you're just as stunning as when I last saw you," he muses, and you reaches out to run your fingers gently through the unfamiliar white strands of his hair. His eyes study your face, your expression, drinking you in; you'd missed how dark his eyes could be, and when you look back at him, meet his gaze, you see a hunger there.
"Don't leave me," escapes you, but it comes out as a demand, insistent, “don’t ever fucking leave me again,” and you see him swallow hard, then slowly, he smiles.
"Never again," and he's kissing you desperately, mouth on yours with an intensity you relish. I missed you, I missed you, I missed you - you can taste it on his tongue, sticky sweet and somehow sharp and you dig your nails into him, maybe trying to keep him here, keep you both in this moment. When the kiss breaks and you're breathing hard, you don't let him go, though he doesn't either.
"You lied for me," he muttered, something akin to delight on his face, which shocked you enough that you stepped back, or at least tried to, though he held you tight, "no, not-" he tried to clarify, "I won't leave, I don't plan on it, but- I love you." Your heart is beating in your throat, still not quite sure what he means, "I've loved you for a long time," he added, and reaching out, he cupped your face in his hand, "I remember this," he murmured, "Ghostbur - you're scared I didn't love you because he couldn't remember, but I loved you so much, for so long, I just knew... knew what I was going to do. I knew I was going to leave you, I loved you but I was so doomed, so he couldn't remember."
When had your vision gone cloudy, when had tears started to sting your eyes.
"Don't cry, my love," Wilbur murmured, leaning in to rest his forehead against yours as your breath stuttered from your chest as he soothed the biggest fear that had been plaguing you for months.
"Were you worried that I didn't love you because of him?" He asked, like he enjoyed hearing you bare your soul. Of course he did. You remember kissing Ghostbur, his cold lips and soft apologies when you'd pulled away, and you wonder if Wilbur had those memories too.
"He's not you, no point trying to fret about your feelings based on his actions," you huff a watery laugh, finally letting go of him with one hand to wipe at your tears, “he didn’t understand me like you did, but he...” you swallowed hard, “I’m glad to have had him around in the interim.” Wilbur’s lips twist into an amused smile, and his gaze clouds over for the barest moment; you wonder if he can see your resolve cracking in Ghostbur’s memories, taking comfort in his when he’s the closest thing to Wilbur himself that you can find, the lies you’d told to keep him by your side in your moments of selfish desperation.
“I think he loved you, in his own way,” Wilbur said gently. However, as you made a vaguely guilty noise in the back of your throat, he continues thoughtfully, "though, you know, when Dream came to pick me up on that train, when Ghostbur took my place, Dream made sure we both knew, you know; she's the reason you're here, Ghostbur, he'd said, and said that makes you part of the reason that I'm coming back at all," he muses, strange quality to his voice that you couldn't quite place, though when your eyes were dry, you looked at him definitely, challengingly.
"He's not you," you reiterated, firmer this time, "I cared for him for what he was, but he's not the one I want; I love you." You said without hesitation, before you realise what you've said, and you go still, before taking his face in your hands, making sure he's looking you in the eyes, "I think I’ve loved you from the moment I met you, Wilbur; I love you, I fucking love you -" and he's endeared by your declaration as you wrap your arms around him and bury your face against the crook of his neck, whispering the words like you're hoping they'll find a place on his skin forever.
"I didn't tell you before and I'm never making that mistake again,” you admitted faintly; “it’s you.”
“Above all others, I choose you,” his smile is warm, and something bright lights up in your chest. Grinning, elated in this moment that you’d worked so hard to finally get to.
“You have my loyalty, my love.”
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straighttohellbuddy · 9 months
Text
so stay here, darling {Quackity}
Summary: Growing up, like many children your age, you had an imaginary friend. You met him in your dreams, you play together, and he grows up with you. Unlike many children your age, your imaginary friend never goes away. In which the boy you dream up somehow thinks he dreamed you up.
Need to Know: No pronouns used for reader. Dreamwalker AU. Reader & Q are the same age.
A/N: 3040 words. LOOK OUT HIGH CONCEPT BULLSHIT. saw a movie from 2001 about existentialism and dreams where the main guy reminded me of q, and so the writing demon decided i should write this. id love to know what you guys think of it because i wrote it in a fugue state and remember uh NONE OF IT byeeeee seriously is it good its 3am
Citrus Scale: 🧡 ORANGE 🧡
You don't remember when you started dreaming about the boy with the dark hair and dark eyes.
"Well does he have a name?" Whenever you tell anyone about him, this is always their first question, and every time you have to scrunch up your face and shake your head.
In the last dream you'd had, the two of you were on the beach that might have been from a memory, and he was more distinct than the hazy shape of whoever had brought you there. The two of you had been building a sandcastle taller than both of you, taller than any adult you knew; he was talking so much, and you liked hearing him talk. It didn't matter what his name was, you and the boy who kept showing up in your dreams had more fun things to do than worry about names.
Sometimes you catch yourself realising that you're dreaming while they're in progress; usually it's because you can't read the books you find, but sometimes it just clicks. You're dreaming. This isn't real.
"Hey, if this is dream, can I fly?" You ask him, and he looks back at you with surprise. Now that you've noticed, it's hard to ignore; the world is almost familiar, but more of a blur of colour than it ever is in life, like looking out of the window on a road trip. Squinting over his shoulder, you make the haze of colour take shape into a park with a jungle gym.
"This is a dream?" He's blurry at the edges, but still more in focus than anything else in the world. Slowly, he begins to drift, his feet lifting off the ground, and his expression turns panicked. Snatching his hand before he starts to flail, you concentrate as hard as you can to ground him; you hadn't meant to do that to him, even if he is just an imaginary friend.
It doesn't work; he holds your hand so tight you can feel it when you wake up. It had been so real...
You want to apologise, but you don't properly remember the incident the next time you see him. You also don't realise that it's a dream, you're just excited to see your friend and hear him talk about that time he almost flew away. What a story! He insists he can teach you, and in this dream, you're not aware that it's a dream, but it feels perfectly normal to hold his hand as you both wobble your way through the early stages of flight.
---
"You look sad."
"I think I'm meant to grow out of seeing you."
Silence.
"Now?"
"Maybe. Probably one day."
"I think I'm meant to too."
"I don't want you to."
"Me neither."
He takes your hand.
---
It's not a recurring dream as much as he's simply an occasionally recurring character in your dreams. However the occasional dreams don't stop, even though it's been years. Having an imaginary friend is less cute the older you get, so you stop telling people about him so much.
But more and more you find yourself looking forward to those dream, to seeing your friend -
"You should have a name," he tells you a few weeks out from your eleventh birthday. The two of you are traversing through crystal-filled caverns, pitch black if not for the faint glow that emanates from the two of you, naturally, since you'd drunk a potion of fireflies, and this was a dream.
"What do you mean I should have a name?" You laughed, "I have a name, you should know it," still not fully aware that this was a dream, part of you believes he knows it. He's part of you, you will understand when you wake up, of course he should know it, "if anyone should have a name it's you-"
When you finally dream of him again, he's eager to pick up where the two of you left off, needling you for your name, and though you're confused, you realise that your name turns cottony and mushy and forgettable in your mind and on your tongue. He tells you that that's foolish.
You wished the boys in your class smiled like him, or laughed like he did. His stories were more interesting, more engaging, and you're fascinated with how your mind has chosen to weave information you'd somehow caught, overheard, delivered back through him.
Of course you could only dream up the perfect boy.
---
Sometimes he's the one to let you know it's a dream.
You swear he's changed, gotten a bit taller, it's like he's grown up, you swear he used to look like a kid. Then again, so did you; you didn't realise dreams could grow up with you.
"Dreaming again," on top of an anime-looking school building, sitting on the edge with your legs dangling off the edge, he's looking at his watch.
"Dreaming again?" You ask, right as you realise the horizon is just an impressionist landscape painting of pastels. Showing you his watch, you see the way the digits move like liquid, unable to be read.
"Can't read digital clocks in a dream," he tells you matter-of-factly, "or fine print."
The print part of that you knew, but not the clocks... Surely you must have heard it somewhere, internalised it, and your dream was deciding to throw it at you. Surely.
---
When you're fourteen you dream of the airport lounge, and of him. This is one of those dreams that you fully believe, that you're unaware that it's a dream. Your plane is delayed and the two of you are sitting in beanbag chairs with clean, cool light streaming in through the large, glass windows several yards away. Somehow you both fit in the one beanbag chair, he's got his arm around you and is telling your about some videogame he's been playing with his brother.
This you already were aware of; somehow you were very good at keeping this figment's lore in order in your mind, even if the dream contexts always change.
"Toon Town?" You hear yourself ask, angling your face to look at him properly; his hand stills where he'd been tracing patterns on your arm. There's a look in his eyes that you'd seen in movies and TV shows and on some of your friend's faces now that they were starting to date. Oh, right, in this dream he's your gamer boyfriend, obviously.
"Like of course you remembered," he sounded a little flustered, a little giddy, "but I still love that you remember that kind of thing." It feels natural to lean in to kiss him, it all feels so real, so warm, his arm still around -
Your alarm goes off.
---
The Boy you dream of is fascinating and detailed and more alive than any character you've ever tried to come up with on purpose. Growing up with you, the lore your subconsciousness has given him has grown too, expanded to a family, friends you never see but know by name, and strangest of all, a fledgling attempt at being a YouTuber, not to mention a hundred amazing stories he insists he's taken part in.
He's not random like the rest of the dream; a million different universes and concepts get explored in your dreams, but who he is as a person never changes. He is who he is in space, under water, at the beach, in class, while flying, while fighting dragons and dinosaurs, while on a date at the Mad Hatter's Tea Party.
On the nights you dream of him, you resent your interrupting alarm.
You're assured that strange dreams are part of being a teenager, but you know you can never admit that your hormone-addled teenage brain has gotten further with your imaginary friend than anyone in real life. Teen magazines and health class say that's perfectly normal, but you're pretty sure they're talking about one-off dreams, not about recurring scenarios involving your imaginary friend from childhood whose now very much a teenager too in your mind.
No, that you'd be taking to your grave.
---
"Stop being watercolours for a second," you mumble with a soft smile, taking his face in your hands. He was still shifting and blurring at the edges in this dream, still looking like a painting. The watercolours shift to become rich, textured oil paints; you can't help but laugh. His smile lights up his face, and the paint shifts so he looks the closest to what you'd imagine him to look like as a real person.
"What are you doing?" He chuckled, pulling you into his lap. The world around you is a dark, rich blue. You're on The Simpson's couch at night, the TV playing behind you.
"Trying to memorise you," you tell him, running your thumbs along his cheeks, mapping his face with your fingers, gentle down the bridge of his nose, across his brow, along his cupid's bow, "I feel like I can never draw you like I see you here."
"You draw me?" There's something indescribably fond in his voice.
"In the margins of my notes," you admit, "in class... I wish..." you were real, but you trail off. His expression is warm and soft; you're holding his face again.
"Can't use watercolours in your class notes?" He teases, "I totally bet you could." It takes your mind off of your yearning, however, and you regard him with amusement.
"What am I?"
"What?"
"Right now, I'm not trying to be anything; am I watercolours?"
"A really hot Etch-A-Sketch," to which you both break down in laughter.
---
"What's it like being a character in someone's dream?"
"Why are you asking me that?
----
How strange it is to hear him talk about wanting to be a lawyer. You can't remember having a strong urge to become a lawyer; you wonder what part of your subconscious this was pulled from. Still, you encourage him, tell him you're excited for him.
There's something in the shaky breath he lets out when you hug him that surprises you. Why would he be worried about your reaction? The dreams you share are ones where you're in love more often than not now, he knows you love him, you support him, right?
"I love you, you'll be great!" You tell him earnestly, but as he pulls back his expression is drawn.
"I'm too old for this; it's not real."
The tears that burn your eyes feel all too real too.
"Isn't that part of it, that it's okay, that it's escapism, because it's not real?" You tried reasoning with this part of your mind that's grown cool to you without warning. Is this what you truly fear deep down, is this what you're too afraid to acknowledge consciously in any other way?
"There's something wrong with me! Being in love with a part of me that isn't even real," he says through clenched teeth, voicing every fear you dare not speak, even to yourself, "I feel... wrong thinking that my real experiences don't live up to my fucking dreams!" It looks like it hurts him to say, but god it hurts to hear. You crumple, crying softly as this quickly became a nightmare, "this isn't real! This isn't fucking real!" Like he was trying to convince himself. The alarm couldn't come soon enough.
---
It starts in the middle of domestic bliss, his head in your lap without any set up. For a long moment he gazes up at you as you stroke his hair, before your last interaction came crashing down on you both.
He closed his eyes, you looked away, to the endless blue sea stretching out around you. But he doesn't get up, and you don't stop running your fingers through his hair.
"You'll find someone who isn't me," you tell him softly, assuringly, "someone as good as, someone better."
"Someone real."
I know, you silently resign to yourself, I need to find someone real.
---
"Fuck I wish this was real."
"I thought we agreed that it's better that it's not."
"But you look so good."
"I was stressing about this outfit... so thanks."
"Can you wear it more often?"
"That sounds like a slippery slope for us both."
"It is."
But you're both grinning as he pulls you in for a kiss. For tonight, you decide it doesn't matter.
---
One of your friends seems really eager to invite you to VidCon, and you suppose you liked YouTubers well enough to go. Some little voice in the back of your mind reminds you that you invented your favourite YouTuber back when you were a kid. Something like wishful thinking, you've always told yourself -
You'd dreamt about a plane the other night, he'd said the seats in the dream were far more comfortable than the actual plane seats. Said he was on his way to VidCon himself, maybe that's why you're so quick to say yes to your friend's offer. It had been a sign; part of you wanted you to be there, the part that spoke through him.
When you dream of him next it's the night before the convention, and you're aware that it's a dream. He says he's stressed as the two of you float over the convention centre; his outfit keeps changing and shifting, and you know you're stressing over what to wear tomorrow in your own way. When you tell him that it's going to be okay, that you'll be there, he gives a strange little smile, as if to say obviously.
You both think you know what the other means.
You are both wrong.
---
It's loud and overwhelming and you realise you may have made a mistake when you're half an hour into a line for a guy you've never heard of. The YouTuber you dream about isn't fucking real, you shouldn't be here -
"I thought you'd be more excited to meet Q," your friend seems confused at your quickly souring mood as the line progresses at a snail's pace, "I only got us in this cue for you to meet him."
"Who?"
"Q?" Your friend frowns, "Quackity; the guy you've been obsessed with for as long as I've known you," she half laughed, "you've been drawing him all over your shit since high school."
There's a nausea building slowly in your gut as you hear her speak.
"I don't... I don't know who you're talking about."
"Are you being serious right now?" She frowned, "like you draw his beanies and caps and hoodies and everything, I only found out about him like a year ago but I recognised him from your math notes... You really don't know him?"
Perhaps this is why your imaginary friend pushed you to come here. This was the reason, even if you weren't consciously aware of it.
Except your friend in the line beside you opens up Instagram and shows you a photo that makes your blood turn to ice. The resemblance went beyond uncanny. You think you might be sick.
How? Why? Had you met him as a child and just kept dreaming of him? What the hell was happening? The line was moving and you let it carry you forward.
Your imaginary friend. You imaginary boyfriend. The boy you've dreamt of your entire life. Your first... everything, and absolutely nothing at the same time. YouTuber. Aspiring Lawyer. The person you felt hopeless for falling in love with.
You feel faint. Your friend looks worried, she keeps asking if you're okay. Telling her you are, you try and tell yourself it's just the scariest coincidence in the world. Still, you have to meet him.
When you get to the front of the line, you watch him chatter and laugh with the excited teenagers at his table, and oh god, you know his voice, his smile, his laugh -
"Seriously, are you okay?" Your friend in your ear.
"I'm good," you tell her, swallowing hard as you raised your voice enough to make sure he'd hear, while still acting as though you were talking to her, "I said I'd be here."
Turning to him, you see he's half standing, eyes wide, dark as you've always known them to be. He looks incredulous. He looks like he's going through the same kind of overwhelming realisation you'd gone through five minutes ago.
"You're Quackity," you say with a fond smile.
He takes a startled breath, coming back to the moment, beginning to beam.
"This is going to sound batshit insane," he began hesitantly, though your smile is already widening in anticipation, "but has anyone ever told you that you'd make, like, a really hot Etch-A-Sketch?"
Ignoring your friends utter bewilderment, you burst out laughing, relief flooding through you as you nodded emphatically twice.
"Twice, actually," you snorted.
"Was it twice?" He tipped his head to the side, and you gave a wide smile.
"Second time was in that really bright toy shop, the one with the -"
"Giant Buzz Lightyears?" He filled in sagely, suddenly remembering, and you both quickly shuddered, recalling the nightmare.
"What the fuck is happening right now?" Your friend asked, deeply confused by the whole interaction, "I thought you didn't know him."
"It's... unbelievably complicated," you told her with an air of apology, which only left her seeming miffed. As you turned your attention away for the moment, however, Quackity was ushering over one of the convention volunteers who had been hovering around, witnessing the bizarre event.
For a moment, out of the corner of your eye, you catch him checking his watch; your smile widens at the action, the way he's making sure it's real like you'd seen him do countless times in dreams. This time is different. This time is better.
"I'm sorry," you finally hear him say, addressing you with a breathless kind of laugh, "I never caught your name."
You'd always assumed he'd known it. You'd assumed he wasn't real. You assumed you'd made up his smile, his laughter, his warmth, his joy.
You could stop wishing for someone real to love the way you loved him.
"Y/N," you tell him, and are met with the smile you'd dreamt about for as long as you can remember, "my name's Y/N."
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to show you the stars (and win your heart) {Wilbur Soot}
Request: This is really simple and no where near as interesting as your writing. But, what if the reader has a rooftop spot they go to a lot to think or draw or whatever. And one day they get the news that they've lost their job so they go there but a really lanky guy with curly brown hair is already there. Idk, not my best but it's somethin
Summary: Five moments after you move to Brighton, and the one where it finally feels like home. // (Five moments online after Wilbur Soot meets his new neighbour on the roof, and the one where he finally introduces them to his audience.)
Need to Know: They/Them. Some discussions of unemployment, a bit of possible second hand embarrassment. Reader has no idea about Wilbur's online activities. Fluff.
A/N: 5075 words. I LOVE THIS REQUEST!!! My life has been kind of falling apart lately but Ive been working on this on and off for a week or so. So I kind of tweaked the prompt, I hope you don't mind, so instead of the reader having just lost their job, it's the aftermath of having lost their job and having to relocate to a new city (because that's literally what happened to me), and adapting to the new city and meeting Wilbur while settling into the city, you know?? I hope you like it, it brought me great comfort. Written on my phone and unedited.
The air smells different here. On top of the building? Brighton? On the other side of your life going absolutely tits up? Where is here, really; it's such a relative concept. But the air smells different. Different to your old home. Different to your old town. Different to your old life. Not good necessarily, just different -
The door to the roof creaks something dreadful as it opens. You're focus is caught, naturally, and your pensive expression turns upon a surprised stranger.
"Sorry," tall, brunette, pale but not freckled enough for them to be visible to you at this short distance. He hovers in the doorway but ultimately joins you on the roof. When he lets go of the door, there's that noise again, that awful, attention grabbing noise.
"No, it's fine," you're not sure why he apologised, or why you're accepting it. Maybe the noise of the door. It's like the two of you are locked in a stalemate; he clearly wasn't expecting anyone to be up here.
"Am I in your spot?" You ask, already getting up.
"No! No, uh, no," he shakes his head, and he apologises again, this time gesturing to the city beyond the edge of the roof. Maybe he feels guilty for drawing your attention in the first place, is urging you that it's safe to go back to whatever you were doing.
Giving an awkward nod, you turn back to the city, to breathing this new air and new life. Behind you the sound of his sneakers against the pavement gets marginally fainter as he finds a spot for himself a good distance away from you.
"It's a good roof," you're not sure what possess you to say it, voice rising above the faint wind to make sure you're heard by this stranger sharing your silence.
"What?"
"It's a good roof," you repeat yourself without a hint of hesitation. You feel like an utter fool, at least until his reply comes.
"'spose it is."
You head back inside. The door's creak, as always, begs for attention, and gets it; glancing over your shoulder you meet the stranger's gaze. He nods at you with the faintest smile, but then his attention his back on the horizon. He doesn't watch you leave.
New air. New city. New neighbours.
----
(There is nothing about Wilbur Soot's next stream that would differentiate it from any other in any significant way.
It doesn't matter, you don't know who Wilbur Soot is.)
----
Music flows from the flat above yours, and you find out in the best possibly way. It's not that it's loud at all hours, soaking through the floor to wake you up, there's nothing to complain about, instead, with the window open for the sweet, Spring breeze, the faintest guitar notes carry on the wind, as if from an adjacent open window. It's not enough to pick out a proper melody, it's not even enough that you can still hear it if you move away from your window.
It doesn't even sound particularly rehearsed, it almost sounds like it's being rehearsed. Alone; an in-progress melody.
Encore, you want to cheer when the music grows quiet and the window slides shut, but the musician wouldn't hear you. Every part of this building begs for the attention it's occupants don't seem to want. Closing doors, closing windows, louder always than a hello in the hall.
Still, you keep your window open.
And sometimes the music comes back.
At least this new building sounds better than your old one.
----
(It's been a few months since Wilbur's played Soft Boy for anyone online, whether that be his own stream or for his friends. It's March now, well into Spring, and Tommy's stream is as good a place as any. Wilbur himself isn't live, he's just on a headset at home, desk by his open window where the street below is for once mercifully quiet. Still, it's not ready for proper release, he has other priorities, maybe he wants to workshop it a little more before getting it properly produced. But the fans and his friends enjoy it.
You, of course, are ignorant to all this context; still you don't know who Wilbur Soot is.)
----
The stranger visits the roof at night as often as you do. Rugged up at night despite the days growing ever warmer, you grant yourself a reprieve from job hunting if only to take peace in the stars. At night the horizon sometimes becomes difficult to discern, stars dancing dangerously close to the night light of the city.
It's different again at night, a new kind of night that you're still getting used to. But the creak of the door is familiar. The stranger's apology is familiar. The way he sits a bit closer to you each time, or you to him if he's there first, that's all becoming familiar too.
"I'm Will," he offers the second time the two of you meet. He's still a fair distance away; it will be weeks before the two of you are side by side. You introduce yourself and he nods, "you moved in not long ago, right?" Something about the lights of the city make him glow.
You nod. He smiles.
"It's a good view," he looks back out to the city, and you take a long moment before you look away from him. You like the way he smiles; you like these moments on the roof, the ones that have passed and the ones yet to come. You're not quite sure why you prefer the moments with him in them rather than the moments alone on the roof without.
"'spose it is," and though you're looking out to the city, you don't really see it.
----
(Recently, Wilbur has been streaming earlier in the day, at least for him. Not every stream, of course, maybe once a week. He seems disappointed when it gets too late after he loses track of time.
"Alright, Cinderella," Quackity scoffs after Wilbur comments that he has to go, that it's later than he realised, "abandoned me," he plays up being hurt, "what is it? What's more important than me, Wilbur?"
"Don't be like that, Q," Wilbur responds dotingly, "I'll make it up to you, I promise."
"How?"
"I'll DM you how," Wilbur's voice goes low and exaggeratedly flirty, giving an over the top wink to his camera, "you can't see it but I'm winking suggestively at the camera," he adds for Quackity's sake, who at seems placated by the exchange. Then, Wilbur finally explains; "I've got a friend who keeps a strange schedule, I'm- I'm just trying to work around them right now." And Quackity finally gives his blessing, which makes Wilbur laugh.
You don't see the quiet sigh of relief he breathes when he gets to the roof and sees you there. Even if you did, you wouldn't even begin to know why. Well known internet celebrity Wilbur Soot has started scheduling his work is in the hopes that he'll see you more often... Not that you know who Wilbur Soot is.)
----
The stranger Will has an office and you don't even have a job. Still. All this you learn while going for a job in the same building as his office, apparently. Except that it's late in the afternoon and you're just leaving your interview and he's just arriving and he seems just as confused as you.
"Do you work here?"
"Hopefully," you answer, and something about his look of genuine interest has something stirring in your chest, "I just had an interview," you elaborated, not wanting to admit to yourself that this single moment, in which Will tells you he's also hoping for the best for you, has you more flustered than the interview itself.
When you ask if he works here too, he candidly admits he does, but is cagey about the details. He's not part of company you'd just interviewed with, his office is his own.
"Will I see you on the roof tonight?" He asks, catching you completely off guard.
"What time?" Thankfully at least your mouth works faster than your brain, "I'm headed home now." Then, as he's checking the time on his phone you blurt out - "have you- will you have eaten before then?" And he looks at you with confusion, "I could make some food, if you're working. I could make dinner for when we hang out on the roof."
Will absolutely beams.
Something about his smile has your heartbeat stuttering in your chest. It hits you in this moment that Will genuinely enjoys your company on the roof just as much as you do his.
He asks you how late is too late, and when you let him know, he nods and suggests and hour before then. How does his smile seem to get wider? There's a look in his eyes that's all warm and fond; did that always happen when he smiled? How had you not noticed it before?
"That's very kind of you, I can see about getting some kind of dessert for us on my way back," he offers, and you try to waive off the suggestion but he laughs softly, "I never said it'd be gourmet, I was thinking more along the lines of something from a petrol station, I'm not sure what else would be open; any preferences?"
"For petrol station sweets?" And even though you're grinning, you're clearly endeared.
"For petrol station sweets," Will confirms with a nod. It takes you a moment to think it over before giving a few suggestions as options, and he takes a long moment to focus on remembering them, repeating them back to you to confirm.
Then he tells you he's looking forward to it, and he sounds so sincere, and the feeling in your chest is frighteningly hopeful. This is a new feeling in your not so new town that you weren't anticipating.
You grin back.
"Me too."
----
(Close to the end of April, there is a day in which several members of the DreamSMP go live together for a lighthearted, mostly lore-free stream. These creators included, among a few others, Wilbur Soot who happened to be in notably high spirits.
"Am I not allowed to be in a good mood, Tommy?" Wilbur jokingly demanded when Tommy pointed it out.
"No, it's freaking me out," Tommy didn't even hesitate to play along with the bit, "do I have to bully you? Do we have to bully you?"
"I think... we should," Ranboo agrees after a moment of deliberation, holding back his laughter.
"Tommy, I love you man but you need to come up with new go-to solutions," Wilbur responds blithely, "and I'm pretty sure you couldn't actually bully me in any way that mattered," he turns his nose up, wearing a wide grin, "I've got dinner on the roof to look forward to, nothing can ruin today."
"Can I try?" Tommy deadpans without missing a beat, and Wilbur breaks into surprised laughter almost immediately.
"Tommy," Philza just sounds faintly exasperated, and Wilbur can't stop laughing.
His friends and his content are his entire life, and he's acutely aware of how lucky he is to be a content creator, the opportunities he's been afforded, so he keeps it to himself that the best part of that night wasn't the filming, it was coming back to seeing you smiling on the roof of the flat.
Because it didn't take him long to figure out that you had no idea who Wilbur Soot was; every time he remembers this, he lets himself enjoy it quietly, letting himself get close to someone who, for the first time in a long time, has no preconceived notions of him. You like him for him, and one day he hopes he can tell you how much that means to him.)
----
You're surprised at how long it's taken you to ask what floor he lives on, and even more surprised to learn that he's on the floor above you.
It's been a very long day, instinctively looking forward to heading to the roof at sunset after finishing a trial shift that you're not completely confident went well.
"Are you the one with the tiny, little pot plants on your windowsill?" He asks, which surprises you.
"Uh, yeah I am, they were gifts from when I moved into my last place," part of you wants to ask how he knew, but somehow it makes sense. Of course he's seen the pot plants, of course he knew they'd be yours.
There's a pleasant lull in the conversation before you think to ask -
"Are the walls thin?"
You don't even for a second consider that there may be some suggestive implications until Will squints at you in confusion. There's a parcel of fish and chips open between you both, and he had been picking through the chips trying to find the most crisp.
"Not as far as I've noticed," he pauses, before adding pointedly, "floor seems pretty soundproof too." He's too invested in figuring out what you're implying to go back to food, at least not immediately.
"No, no!" Realising your mistake your smacked your hand to your mouth out of embarrassment. Wide eyed, you find yourself waving with one hand trying to chew and swallow your own food faster to clarify, "no, sorry, nothing weird, I swear," you laugh awkwardly, finally finding your voice, "I just wondered if you knew who lived in the flat directly above mine, they play guitar, I thought that you might have heard- that it might help identify -" but Will's expression has turned unreadable, and again find yourself realising your misstep only after the fact yet again. Immediately you begin apologising.
"Sorry, I- I must seem so creepy I'm so sorry, I should just go up and knock on their door instead of eavesdropping and asking you, I'm sorry Will -"
"Is it good?"
Your mouth snaps closed, and when you look to Will you're surprised to see him looking genuinely curious. He picks up a chip and gestures like he's prompting you to answer.
"What?"
"Do you think they play good music?" He asks again, tone free of any kind of judgement. It takes you a moment to process the shift in the mood.
"I don't recognise any of it," you murmur, trying to properly order your thoughts, "I don't hear it a lot, only very occasionally, when I'm sitting next to my window if it's open, which is why I think it's the person above me..."
Will blinks at you, eyebrows raised, still waiting for a proper answer.
"I like it," you nod, ducking your face to hide your embarrassed smile, "I keep wanting to call out 'encore'," you chuckle a little self consciously at the admission, "but that feels like crossing a line."
"You are very sweet," you hear Will mumble, his tone endeared, "and you have no idea who it is?"
"Every time I think about going up and knocking on their door I feel like a creep," you sighed, "which, I mean, given the situation I definitely am, and it gets worse literally every day. It's not like telling them at this point would do any good."
"It might," he offers.
"I admire your optimism but I'll keep my dignity while I still can."
"I think it'll go better than you'd think," he muses, doing a bad job of fighting back a smile.
"Oh yeah," you roll your eyes, "just knock and admit," perhaps your patience is wearing thin after a long day as you put on a mockingly saccharine voice, "you play such lovely music! How do I know this? Well I've been listening in for months like a stalker, just downstairs, sometimes I'll even make a cup of tea and pretend like it's my own private concert!" You let go of the act as you pitch yourself back to lay on the roof, scowling at the sky, "I'd rather die," you huffed.
"Months," he murmurs, almost awed and barely audible, before asking, "your own private concert? That's kind of adorable, honestly," he tells you, sounding frankly delighted.
"Oh shut it, Will," you sulked, crossing your arms over your chest.
"You're very sweet," he reiterates in that same soft tone as before.
"You're biased," you roll your eyes.
"Of course, that goes without saying," Will answers blithely, and you can hear his shit eating grin in his voice, "considering I'm the musician who lives above you."
You know he's watching you, he's waiting for your reaction.
"Will you know if this is true that I'm never going to recover from the embarrassment, right?" You manage, as level as you're able, your body stiff as an absolute board with tension.
"Nothing to be embarrassed about," he assured you, though in this moment it wasn't exactly effective.
"You're pulling my leg, aren't you?"
"Would you like me to prove it to you?" He offers easily. When you finally sit back up, clearly apprehensive, there's nothing but that familiar, warm kind of fondness you find in his smile. He gives you time to process, he doesn't push you, doesn't grow impatient or irate as you scrutinise him. Finally, you sit back, as if done with your analysis of him and were still unsure of what to make of all this information.
"Come on," he says gently, getting to his feet and offering you his hand, "let me play you something I've been working on, I need a second opinion." Warily, quietly, you take his hand.
The shock wears off. He makes you tea. You peer out his window to see your little row of pot plants just below. Then, just as he promised, he plays you something that you're already familiar with despite it never having been released.
Front row seats to your own private concert.
He turns faintly pink when you do in fact ask for an encore, but he can't stop smiling.
----
(Lovejoy, the band which Wilbur Soot fronts, releases their first EP 'Are You Alright?' on May 8, and it almost immediately begins to trend across various charts, including internationally. It's unequivocally a success, and is being plugged online by fans and friends alike.
Wilbur, however, is blindsided by the text he receives from you in the week that follows the release. If you were ever going to find out what he did for a living, it would have been this week, instead:
[interview went well, I've got my fingers crossed, thank u for the luck xx and omg literally in such a good mood I mistook a song on the radio as one of yours THAT WOULD BE SO COOL TOO HEAR THO!!]
[hey actually if you're up for it do you wanna call? I'm all high on adrenaline and there's some stuff I wanna talk about when I feel like I'm on top of the world 😅💖]
And Wilbur, who was due to start streaming in only a few minutes, pushed back from his desk and pressed Call. On the other end of the line you're bright, brimming with excitement and enthusiasm and confidence and -
"I've been wanting to ask you for ages, actually even before I found out you were the talented musician living above me, that was just a bonus, and might be the reason I'm calling, because that song I heard was so familiar -" you're rambling, something Wilbur rarely heard you do. When he asks if you're okay, you grow quiet, "I'm nervous."
"About what?"
"Misreading things. Fucking with our friendship."
Oh.
"I have it on pretty good authority that you have nothing to be nervous about," Wilbur assures, a warmth flourishing in his chest as he hears your breathy, relieved chuckle.
"I'd like to get a drink with you some time," you tell him with a newfound confidence, "or see a movie, or a band, or anything. A date. Away from our building." There's so much excitement in your voice it's infectious, Wilbur finds himself grinning.
"I'd like that very much," then, after a long moment, he clears his throat, "do you remember what the band was called?"
"What do you mean?"
"On the radio, you said you thought you heard my song; what band was it?"
"Oh," you pause, considering, "not quite sure. Love-something?"
"Ah."
"Ah, what? Wilbur I don't like that tone, ah what?"
"Ah, I might have to tell you something."
"Christ, what now?"
"I'm at work; if you want I can pick up take out after and we can have dinner together."
"Are you going to tell me what you do for a living yet?"
"Do you trust me?" He asks softly, and there's a long pause, in which you sigh.
"Of course I do, Will," you answer honestly, "always, you know that."
"I know," he agrees fondly, "and that means a lot to me. I promise I'll explain it all tonight, I promise." Softer now, he smiles, "I hope you know how glad I am to have you in my life," he hesitates for the barest moment before quickly adding, "and I'm very proud of you for getting the job."
"Thanks, Will," he can hear you smiling, "I can't wait to see you tonight."
Five minutes later, Wilbur Soot begins his geoguesser stream. There's something different, the vibe has changed, but no-one can put their finger on why.
There's no outward difference, but there's electricity in the air. When you finally find out the truth about Wilbur Soot, when you see the VOD for the stream, see how big he smiles right as he signs off, you will call him a sap.
----
Your tiny, little pot plants sit nicely on Wilbur's windowsill. It takes a while, but slowly your things begin to migrate from your apartment upstairs to his. Before coming to Brighton, you'd paired down your things, and so it's nice to find space for yourself in his apartment, in his life. It doesn't feel empty here, it doesn't feel sparse and new.
And Wilbur? It seemed like things with him just kept getting better. You took every chance you got to hype him up, endlessly proud of him and all he was doing with his online and musical careers.
When you meet his band, they all greet you with a warm familiarity, and Wilbur spends the first half hour bright red as they jump at the chance to tell you that they feel like they already know you. However this makes you turn all sappy and endeared, and it takes all of your energy to stay even semi professional and not act as enamoured with your boyfriend as you felt.
While you end up meeting and getting along with his family, the thing that gets you properly nervous is when he asks if you want to get lunch with his friends Phil and Kristen. You know the family-dynamic bit by now, so of course you say yes; you need them to like you so much.
Both Phil and Kristen hug you when they first meet you. It's like they can tell you're nervous, their words, their tone, everything about them is gentle. At one point, Wilbur and Phil get caught up talking about some upcoming streams they're planning, and while you're excited to watch, their discussion goes over your head for the time being. Almost as if by instinct, you look to Kristen, as if to gauge how you should be reacting, but she's looking back at you, expression endeared.
"This is still new to me," you admit, shuffling your chair a bit closer to her as to not interrupt the other two. She laughs softly, but the sound is kind and understanding.
"It gets more coherent in time," she assured, to which you ducked your head to hide your faintly embarrassed expression.
"I understand all of the words individually, but this streaming stuff is so far out of my usual realm," carefully, you look up to watch how animated Wilbur is getting as he talks over his plans for the DSMP stream for the following night, running it past Phil, "tell me I'm not weird for watching old VODs in my spare time to try and figure out how it all works, and what's happening in that Minecraft thing. I know he's doing cool shit, I'm just trying to figure out how to properly appreciate it."
"You're not weird, that's adorable," Kristen is grinning from ear to ear, which served to brighten your own smile, "you'll get it in no time."
Wilbur looks over for a moment, practically glowing with enthusiasm, hands raised mid-expressive gesture, and catches your eye. His expression softens as he seems to briefly forget what he was saying; Kristen looks between the two of you and fondly shakes her head.
It's easier to hug them goodbye than it was to say hello, no nerves as you tell them honestly it was good to meet them, that you look forward to seeing them again soon. Something eases in your chest when they both return the sentiment in kind, genuine in their affection.
"Home?" Wilbur asks as he unlocks the car, and you pause as you turn the word over in your mind. He's said it before a million times, but somehow this time is different, this time feels real. Home.
"Yeah," you say softly, sounding a little dazed as you climb into the passenger seat.
"You okay there?" Tone light, he's smiling as he asks, and you turn, unable to stop the grin as it makes its way across your face.
"I love you," you tell him like you can't quite believe it yourself, though maybe it's more the fact that- "I can't believe I've never said that before."
"What do you mean you can't believe you've never said it before?" He's grinning now, endeared.
"I love you, Will, I've loved you for ages, we practically live together," you laugh, "but I've never actually said it, I hate that! I hate that I've never said it! I love you, Will!"
"I love you too," he tells you sincerely, leaning across the centre console to kiss you, which you enthusiastically meet him in the middle for. You've kissed him more times than you can rightly remember, but it never feels to give you butterflies.
At home, he's quiet, smiling to himself while lost in thought throughout the afternoon. When you ask about it, he hesitates.
"You never had to say it," he admits with a shrug, "I knew." When your brow furrows with confusion, his expression turns vaguely guilty and self deprecating, "you have to admit, I was acting pretty sketchy about a lot of my life -"
"- with good reason," you countered, but all he could do was smile fondly, shaking his head.
"In hindsight," he points out, "now you know why I was being evasive about a lot of things it makes sense, but at the time I didn't really know, or, well that's not true," he flushed, "I didn't exactly believe why you would still trust me after all that," he looks to you once more, "but you did."
"Of course," you answer automatically, before it hits you what he's saying, "because I had a crush on you; because I love you." Then, as he's nodding in agreement, your eyes go wide with realisation, crowing with glee; "because you had a thing for me too!"
He doesn't disagree. He wraps you up in his arms and kisses you, and this moment feels like home.
----
(Wilbur's stream entitled 'SPECIAL SPOOKY GUEST CHATTING AND LOWKEY Q&A BE ON YOUR BEST BEHAVIOUR!!' happens on Halloween. Its the first video to ever even explicitly name Y/N, let alone feature them.
"I'm so nervous I'm going to be sick," is the first thing the internet hears of you, while Wilbur's sitting in frame, watching you off frame.
"You don't have to do this," he assured. He's wearing something shimmery on his skin, and plastic vampire teeth that are giving him a faint lisp. He's wearing eyeliner.
"No, I know we're live, I want to do this, I do, I do!" You insisted, before making a noise of anxiety, "but I might pass out. I need to study more." At that, Wilbur gives you a fond look, before looking to his camera.
"They call watching my VODs 'studying'," he explains. You make another anxious noise, before taking a deep breath and quickly sitting yourself into the chair beside him, looking at him and not the camera.
"I'm going to get a good grade in streaming, which is both normal to want, and possible to achieve," you mumbled; you too sparkle with some sort of shimmer, but are holding your plastic fangs in your hand, fidgeting with it.
Even without explaining who you are, everything about the way Wilbur looks at you says that he's in love with you. After a moment, your anxious expression softens as you find yourself fascinated by how he's sparkling, and you reach out to faintly touch his cheek. While you may have forgotten the audience, Wilbur has not, yet he still allows the moment to go on as you grow more comfortable in front of the camera, beside him.
"Love?"
"Yeah, I know," you mumbled, finally coming back to reality. Looking away from him and to the screen in front of you both, "Q and A," you murmur, reading the stream title. Thankfully you don't seem as daunted as moments before, "the first question seems to be 'who am I'." You take a deep breath and look to Wilbur, who grins back.
"Welcome to your first stream, you wanna say hi?"
"What if I just didn't? We go the whole stream without explaining who I am," you couldn't help yourself, snorting a laugh, which makes Wilbur cackle at the idea.
"You do whatever you want, I'll support you, that's hilarious."
"But cruel," you conceeded, despite how amused you were by the idea. Looking back to chat, you could see half having a meltdown at the idea. But you are not cruel; you'd both talked about it for far too long to chicken out now.
It's time for the world will know who you are.
"I'm Y/N, nice to meet you all!"
"And," Wilbur adds with a proud smile, "if you hadn't guessed, they're my partner.")
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pretty best friends {Dream}
Anon asked: hello!! i saw that requests are open (i think? if not ignore this!!) and i was wondering if u could write a cc!dream x reader where the reader is maybe a faceless streamer as well, or dream just hasn’t seen her face yet for another reason and the first time he does he like… gets all quiet or something and reader thinks it’s bc he thinks theyre ugly and then dream is like “no it’s not that! never that.” djsjsjfroeod i love ur writing tysm!! 😽😽
Summary: Sometimes it's hard to explain what popular, faceless streamers go through to anyone else, so when you find someone whose good, if chaotic, vibes match up with yours, you'll hold onto that friendship tight so long as they feel like the right person to be around. So you're delighted to find that you and Dream operate on the same wavelength. What started as an MCC team up turns into an unshakable bond that you're both hell bent on making everyone else's problem.
Need to Know: They/Them. Popular Faceless Streamer!Reader. Suggestive discussions about CGI characters.
A/N: 3472 words. is this any good? Someone let me know. Can be read as platonic ! 💖 Seriously it's 5am and I'm catching a train in 10 minutes I've been up all night writing is this good???
"Am I nervous about being on Dream's team?" In the few hours before Minecraft Championship began, your nerves had gotten the better of you, so instead of psyching yourself out, you'd gone live early on the training map, "now; no. A few days ago? God, absolutely," you admitted with a warm laugh, "but considering I was acting weird the first time I got to talk to him, and now he's still messaging me to chat, and not just about MCC things, I figure it's on him."
Despite your lack of a camera, your chat could clearly hear how wide you were smiling, already sounding fond despite the relative youth of the friendship you were discussing.
"I was running on not a lot of sleep, and like, I wanna say professional fear," you huffed with faint amusement, "because, like I wasn't starstruck because oh my god its Dream, but more like, I haven't had enough sleep and I'm talking to a man with more followers than there are people living in Australia, you know?"
[Dream: bold of you to assume I am ever well rested either 😂] flashed up in your chat for a moment for everyone to see, and though they couldn't see the surprise on your face, the silence is deafening.
"Shut up, he's here, everyone be cool," you began babbling, "Dream I swear I'm not usually this shit at To Get To The Other Side, I promise," you laughed awkwardly, right before you eat shit on the training map. Then, after a moment, you switch tactics; "also, hey Dream, call me and tell everyone that I'm not lying and we are becoming friends."
It takes a few long moments as you loiter on the training map, looking through comments, many of which were doubtful, before everyone hears the Discord call noise.
"Mods ban everyone who doubted me," you announce triumphantly before you even say hello, and everyone hears Dream's laughter echo across your stream.
"Hello to you too," he chuckles.
"Hi bestie," you play up your closeness, but still he plays along.
"Hey new bestie."
A long moment of silence follows, which you eventually break with a sigh.
"I'm sorry, you didn't need to actually call, I was just being a menace," you admitted sheepishly, starting a new game.
"What are friends for?" Dream responded with easily, and you immediately hit menu and left the server.
"Dude!" You crowed.
"Dude, what?"
"Dude, I was being a menace, you're so nice!" You sound a little muffled, as if covering your face with your hands. Again, Dream laughs, again, it's a kinder sound than you feel like you deserve considering the context.
"We were doing Smash or Pass with the CGI creatures in Spy Kids 2, which I suggested," Dream points out, putting you both on blast in an instant, "and not only were you cool with that, but we both want to smash the Spider-Monkey, so now we're friends. I don't make the rules."
"It's the objectively correct answer," you don't even hesitate before answering, mouth moving faster than your brain, and face still presumably in your hands, "look at that creature and tell me he doesn't; one, sling phenomenal dick, and two, both know and practice aftercare." As you're speaking, if only to provide context for your audience, you tab away from Minecraft to Google image search the Spy Kids 2 Spider-Monkey.
"Yeah, I read your messages, I agree on all fronts; the Spider-Monkey is a service top and would treat us right," Dream added sagely, "but what I'm saying is the fact that we had in depth discussions about our reasoning behind whether we would smash or pass these CGI creatures has forged a friendship that I refuse to back out of."
"That's why you agreed to be my friend?" Your tone was strangely fond at that revelation.
"No, I agreed to be your friend because I posted a Thumb-Thumb from the first movie in our team's chat and you answered 'smash' in all capitals three seconds after I posted it, followed by 'what that thumb do', again, all capitals -"
"I hadn't had a lot of sleep!" You cut in to defend yourself, still sounding vaguely embarrassed.
"I was impressed by your fucking conviction!" He shouts, but the bright affection in his voice keeps him from sounding too aggressive. A few seconds of silence followed, and you tabbed back to Minecraft.
"To those in chat wondering," Dream sounds more than a little amused as he broke the silence, "I hadn't asked Smash or Pass, I literally just posted a picture of the Thumb-Thumb in the group chat; they responded before I had a chance to follow up."
"I don't know what I was thinking," you mumbled, sounding all kinds of bashful.
"I want to study you," you could hear him smirking. It was easy to play up your embarrassment when your chat couldn't see you grinning, "for the record you were really quiet when we first all met in the VC, so it surprised me - in a good way, of course."
"A good way?" You asked dubiously.
"Hey, if it wasn't, I wouldn't have DMed you to follow up, I wouldn't have bothered to watch your stream to try and get to know you better, and I wouldn't have called when you asked," he points out with a strangely kind bluntness to his words. You're once again quietly, ruminating on his words as a warmth blooms in your chest.
"Okay now I am kind of starstruck," you mumble, flustered and fond, "you need me to fight someone for you I definitely will," which gets him to laugh, and begins your long, public history of being a Dream Stan on main.
After your group places 4th in MCC, you anticipate your fast-formed friendship with Dream to fade considerably. You tell yourself you don't mind, that that's what happens; you're friends now, sure, but you shouldn't expect to be especially close.
But he's still just as quick to answer you. He starts conversations. He calls you just because he's had a strange thought he wants to talk through with someone, and you're one of his first choices, so of course you start calling him in similar situations. It doesn't take long for a script to form, even if it's just between the two of you, neither live, even sometimes bleeding into your DMs; Bestie, I've had a thought. / Terrifying, continue.
While you don't interact live often anymore, you speak in private almost daily, and neither of you forgets the joke even when the other isn't around to hear it. Jokes about stanning turn to jokes about simping, made all the more amusing by neither of you knowing what the other even looks like.
While you begin to develop a solid friendship with George and Sapnap along the way, so too does Dream get to know your own housemate, an ASMR YouTuber who is kind but bemused by your burgeoning friendship with one of the biggest names on the platform. Still, she gets along well just as you do with the rest of the Dream Team.
And when your housemate moves out and you're by yourself in the little two-bedroom apartment, they make sure you never feel lonely.
While live interactions were limited, you never hesitated to defend one another, no matter the platform. Mods in your streams quickly learned that if vitriolic Dream-Antis weren't banned before they properly got your attention, you would put them on blast without a shred of mercy.
[the bit is dead. you and dream don't give a shit about each other we know this is for clout. let it go] pops up as a donation that slipped through the cracks, and you, who had been ranking notable Cyberpunk NPCs on a tier list, and had mentioned in an offhand way that you and Dream got into an argument about some of the A-Tier choices, go dead silent.
The mood drops.
"Can you please explain how?" Voice absolutely poisonous and calm, you let your mouse rest idle in the middle of the screen, "mods let them speak; can you bring up this proof that everyone knows about that insinuates that my friendship with Dream is a spiteful bit on my behalf?" And you wait.
[everyone knows. obviously. you guys aren't friends you don't ever talk]
"Obviously," you give a thin-lipped smile that no-one sees as you read a message from Dream himself, asking if you want him to call. You hit call and continue to address the troll, "not that I have anything to prove to you, or anyone," you drawled, feeling rather smug seeing that Dream had picked up, "hey bestie, sorry to interrupt your hot boy shit, but get a load of this clown," you snorted.
"You want me to ban them?" Dream asks with the kind of lazy, smug confidence that was rarely warranted in your shared discussions, but made a pleasant little shiver run down your spine every time you heard it. Chat was screaming.
"That's right, you have mod privileges on my streams, don't you?" Your tone is frankly catty, so full of smug confidence that even without a visual your audience is practically able to picture your smile.
"Yeah, you gave them to me months before we even talked about you joining the SMP -" Dream's own tone shifts as he stops matching your energy to menace you on your own stream. As anticipated, it broke you into disbelieving laughter as you shrieked for a moment.
"You're such a dick!" You laughed brightly, "I've been building up that will-they-wont-they-invite-me bit since MCC!"
"Okay, bye bestie, love you!" Dream announced cheerfully over the top of your dismay before immediately hanging up the call. While you're half-groaning, half-laughing at his sheer audacity, one of your other mods was quick to post that this is how people knew you were actually good friends, and for once your chat was in absolute agreement. At least when they weren't begging you for details on your SMP character and when you might finally join.
"I never said I accepted the invite," you tried to play coy, but it was futile, "he's so lucky he's cute."
Thankfully the overall reception to Dream's brief cameo was positive, and at least for a few days the people claiming you were a clout chaser quietened down. It's a brief reprieve but you're still glad for it.
In some ways you found it easier being faceless online; it's easier to disconnect yourself from a lot of the baseless hate. That being said, you found yourself, like many of your faceless fellow creators, to be a lightning rod for speculation and cruel potential comparisons. And more than anything, people went to horrifying lengths to try and discover your true identity behind the screen.
"Would you ever do a proper face reveal?" You hear yourself asking Dream at an hour that's arguably both too late and too early.
"I mean I want to," he admits, "I want to meet my friends and fans and make IRL content, you know?" Serious conversations were happening more and more often between you two. Maybe it's a sign of closeness, "but still the idea kind of freaks me out, like I'm losing a safety net. I love Sap and George but now that they're out there it's like they've kind of forgotten what it's like, and now my numbers are fucking astronomical, it's..." The way he signs betrays just how exhausted he was by certain aspects of his success.
"I know..." While your numbers may not be even close to Dream's, you've still got a few million subscribers of your own, and know all too well how the pressure aches. Still, you try to lighten the mood, "I'll make you my lock screen."
"What, now?" He laughs with confusion
"After your face reveal I'll make you my lock screen," you tell him with complete sincerity. You're not completely sure what reaction you're hoping for, but silence isn't it.
"Dream?"
"I've had an idea," he muses, sounding suddenly energetic, and you don't even have time to make an intrigued noise before he's continuing, "we should meet up."
"In person?"
"Yeah, you come to me or I'll come to you," enthusiasm is spilling from him, and you hear him begin to frantically type. You, however, are far more hesitant.
"Why? What would be the point?" And at your question, the tapping of the keys goes silent.
"I wanna hang out with you?" He says a little awkwardly, almost like it's a question, "I want to see you in person? You're one of my best friends? I think it'd be funny for two of the biggest faceless streamers to do a meet-up before either of us face reveal? Take your pick," he sounds a little defensive.
"I-" you find yourself touched by the sentiment, overwhelmed at his words, "I know we are friends, and I know it's kind of something we joke about, but I always figured, you know, you had George and Sap and..." you feel your chest swell with pride, "do you really think of me as one of your best friends?"
A long silence follows.
"Do you not?" He asks, sounding a little disappointed, which has you backpedaling almost immediately.
"Of course I do, but I don't -" you hesitate before admitting, "I don't really have any other best friends. I like my housemate but ours is a convenience thing more than anything else."
"You're a different kind of best friend to Sap or George, or you know, even different to Karl or Q," he tells you after a few moments of deliberation, but at least he seems to be in better spirits, "but yeah, I still consider you one of my best friends." The typing on his end of the call has tentatively resumed.
"What kind of different?" You ask gently, and are again met with hesitation.
"There's parts of how I..." He trails off and hums thoughtfully, trying to organise his thoughts, "the way we exist online- no... I mean yes but it's not quite..." Then, carefully, "you know me," and he lets it hang in the silence between you both, and you give him the time to elaborate, heart in your throat, "you know me in a way that's very hard to describe and so much harder to find, because I feel like you know me in the nichest way, you know? Since that random-ass call the day of MCC, I was like, sure about you in a way that I'd never been about another person. Like safe - I mean," and he splutters half sentences again for a few moments, like he hadn't quite meant to admit that last part, but you're glad he did. You knew exactly what feeling he was talking about, the one that burned deep in your chest, that you knew you could never dream to find the words for.
You tell him your address.
He goes quiet.
The typing continues.
"So this is it, I'm coming to visit," suddenly he sounds nervous, and despite feeling that too, you can't help but grin.
"How soon?"
"Two days?"
"Two days!" The way you cheer in confirmation is cathartic for you both; you hear him definitely hit enter to purchase the plane ticket, and he laughs like he can't believe it's really happening. Then, as the laughter dies down, your voice turns quiet and fond, "you make me feel safe too, Dream."
"Stop," he sounds plaintive but still somehow bright, "I already kind of feel like I'm about to cry, I can't believe I get to see you so soon."
"So soon," you echo the affirmation with a smile.
To celebrate you watch and movie together, ending up falling asleep on the call. All you feel when you wake is how giddy you are knowing how soon it would be until you saw your best friend in person, finally!
He insists on taking an Uber from the airport, wants your first time seeing each other to be somewhere your voices have no chance of getting recognised, so by the time you buzz him into your building your practically sick with anticipation. Pacing with your earbuds in, something about hearing the echo of his real voice at your front door just ahead of hearing him in the call, it makes it all feel so real.
"I'm gonna hang up and knock now," his tone is so gentle, like he can tell you're freaking out more than he is right now.
"Okay, love you," you blurt out on tense instinct. He hangs up but you can hear his fond laughter the moment before he starts to knock. He doesn't even get a third knock in before you've wrenched the door open, heartbeat in your ears, absolutely clueless on what to expect -
He's real. He's a real person and he's standing in front of you and your best friend Dream has kind eyes. Around the time you register that this isn't a trick, that he's got wavy hair and he's tall and pale as all fuck, you realise that you're definitely checking him out, which somehow feels weirder when it hits you that he's actually very handsome. He had a place in your heart pretty much since you met him, but this is a welcome surprise.
"Do you wanna come in?" You asked with a little laugh, stepping to the side and gesturing him in. His expression was unreadable as he stepped past you, "it's good to see you," you tried, but once you closed the door and turned around, you couldn't help but feel self conscious.
"Come on man, this is really me, I'd rather you not do a bit, I've been cleaning but I tried to -" you dip your gaze to avoid looking at him, scouring your outfit for any stains you made have noticed, hoping his reaction was to something you could fix -
"This isn't a bit, sorry, I promise," he says in a rush, stepping forward. When you finally look back up, he's smiling at you, hand hovering like he went to touch your cheek but he's not sure he's allowed, "I cannot believe you've been this pretty behind the screen this entire time, this is so unfair, I could have bought a plane ticket months ago."
Slowly, as his words sink in, you feel yourself beginning to grin and grow flustered.
"Okay, this bit I approve of -"
"Who says it's a bit?" He crowed, stepping closer to you, cupping your face with his hand, "look at your face, this isn't a bit, you're hot! Who let you be hot?" And you know that tone, have heard that smile in his words before; the fact that this smile was behind it every time?
"No, shut up, you're not allowed to simp over me, I'm meant to be simping over you; you just finished a plane and uber ride, how are you not a hot mess? Who let you be hot?" And immediately he's turning red, basking in your compliments with a wide grin.
"We're gonna be insufferable on stream, aren't we?"
"Without a doubt," you beam, and finally you pull each other into a tight hug.
After dinner you drag a second chair into what is now your office, making sure the space was set up for you both to be comfortable. Once your computer is booting up, he pulls out his phone and instructs you to make half a heart with your hand in front of the computer. He completes the heart with his own and snaps a photo, your aesthetic set up in the background.
[am I really in @Y/N's apartment IRL for the most convoluted meet up ever or am i very good at photoshop? idk you decide] is how he captions the photo, which you immediately retweet onto your main account with a link to your Twitch.
"I ain't ever seen two pretty best friends!" You quote loudly at your chat to start your stream, immediately causing Dream to laugh, leaning over to press his forehead against your shoulder while you continued on strong, "and neither will you! Welcome to the most confusing and least provable meet up! Special guest Dream, do you wanna say hello?"
"I do," he wheezed, "I'm special guest Dream, coming to you live from Y/N's office, believe it or not!"
"I'm seeing a lot of non believers here," you mumbled with faux disappointment.
"They don't have to believe," Dream points out, far less performative than he'd been a moment ago. When he smiles at you, something eases in your chest. There's no weird tension, or uncomfortable silences, or doubt. Your best friend is by your side; the only thing that matters in this moment is him.
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die mad about it {Dream/Reader/Sapnap} // Part 2
2. 2021
Summary: A retrospective on the interconnected timeline of Dream, Sapnap, and TV and film star Y/N, via social media.
2021. The year starts with Y/N's recent film racking up nominations during awards season, while Y/N themselves tries to work their way into getting into the DreamSMP. Dream isn't exactly thrilled with this, and he and Y/N appear to start beefing on Twitter. Sapnap moves in with Dream and his still-unknown housemate, but appears to be having a great time there, and Dream, in an interview, reveals that he's not technically single. Ft. mentions of the PSMP
Need to Know: Explicitly Non-Binary!Reader, early-20s!reader, reader is an incredibly well known film & tv star and has been living with Dream for several months/just over a year. Polyamory.
{ masterpost : 2 / 3 }
A/N: 6997 words. OH MY GOD ITS LITERALLY DOUBLE THE LAST ONE WHAT. also pretend its several months ago and i had this done on time please and thank you xx PLEASE LET ME KNOW WHAT YOU THINK I LVOE THIS FIC AND THIS STYLE OF WRITING EVEN IF IT TAKES ME AGES!!
Taglist: @esylwen @ihatesunfl0wers @theghostpeach @rainyaheysoe @magicastle @tidelqnds @icarusthefoolish @randokku @todaynotseen @moyo5653 @kittyfragsmini123666 @lacunaanonymoused @parkerpeanuts @sadredflower0000 @jay-being-weird @ronsbadidea @lacunaanonymoused @dreamtogether2000 @summerknights @mishthemess @lovejoywill @randosposts @stormy-skies-falling @gaysludge @hatchetislostpog @cryinghotmess @boiled-onionrings @busyfangirling12
Taglist is always open! Feel free to message or comment if you’d like to be added! xx
· JANUARY ·
At the beginning of January 2021, Y/N's tweet 'so glad they pushed back the SAG awards to march this year at my request, my boyfriend just moved in so im unavailable for the rest of the month' quickly followed by 'dont worry its not because i carried furniture and hurt my back or anything, my boyfriend helped him with all the heavy lifting, i just want to know i have several weeks to be domestic without being interrupted' caused chaos and confusion on Twitter, and they trended for the following 8 hours. After relative radio silence for twelve hours, the only tweet you chose to interact with was one that asked 'which is the side piece tho', to which you responded 'both i sleep in the middle 💙❤️🖤'.
Y/N also retweets a video originally posted on TikTok by user @.woolfenhawke; the woman in the video has dark skin and is wearing pale yellow pyjamas. The label at the top of the video reads 'millennial celebrity Y/N every single time they open Twitter Dot Com'. She starts facing away from the camera, and turns around suddenly, and the camera zooms in very quickly on her face as she lip-syncs to the audio of Tyler Oakley saying 'Hello LGBT community'.
----
The most popular fandoms in the character tag of Y/N Y/L/N are Actor RPF, HELIX (2020) RPF, Star Wars RPF, X-Men RPF, and American Horror Story (TV) RPF. The most common pairing is tied between Y/N Y/L/N/Amandla Stenberg and Y/N Y/LN/Evan Peters, followed closely by Y/N/Reader. However, since the beginning of January, there has been a steady increase in fan works rated Mature or Explicit featuring polyamorous pairings.
Reposted from Tumblr and quickly growing in popularity is the fanfiction '(in the absence of everything) i promise to keep you warm'. The first chapter was posted on November 24, 2020, one week after HELIX's public premiere, and has updated consistently in the following months. It is ongoing, at 13 chapters and approximately 45,000 words. It has the following tags; Explicit, Actor RPF, Y/N Y/L/N/Chris Evans/Pedro Pascal, Y/N Y/L/N & Amandla Stenberg, Y/N Y/L/N & Oscar Isaac, AU, Assistant!Y/N, Polyamory, Polyamory Negotiations, Movie Sets, Secret Relationships, Power Dynamics, Protective Chris Evans, Protective Pedro Pascal, Daddy Kink, Fluff and Smut, D/S Undertones, Service Top, Domestic Fluff, Social Anxiety, press publicity and paparazzi, Red Carpets.
---
Sapnap posts a photo of himself and Patches in order to announce that he's moved in with Dream and Dream's housemate. Not long after the official post goes up, two posts are added to his Instagram story.
The first is an piece of fanart of Y/N's character Woolfe standing back to back with who appears to be Technoblade from the DreamSMP as he's often depicted in fanart. Technoblade is wearing what appears to be the top half of a boar's skull as a mask covering his eyes, while Woolfe is wearing the angular, aesthetically cyberpunk mask that covers their mouth and looks like a wolf's nose and snarling mouth. The background is black while both characters are lit in sharp relief from either side, with Woolfe being lit in neon green, and Technoblade being lit in neon pink. Stretching across the whole middle of the piece in bold, white lettering is the quote 'If you want to be a hero then die like one.' The art piece is in landscape, A3, and framed and hung against a dark wall. The artist of the piece has been tagged, and across the top Sapnap has added 'proof of housemate's 'not a shrine' to technoblade' in pink letters.
The second is of a polaroid stuck to a dark wall, and an unlit but partially used candle at the very bottom of the image. The polaroid is partially obscured as Sapnap appears to have purposefully edited the photo to scribble in black over one of the figures in the photo to hide their identity. What can be seen in the photo is Sapnap, a little blurry, clearly laughing, half turned from the camera and positioned like he's leaning into someone with his arm around them. There is am arm around his shoulder that is unobscured, but their hand is cut out of the image and they are wearing long sleeves, so there is no identifiable features visible. Over the black scribble, in white text; 'a little bit of a shrine ❤️'.
----
"They travel a lot, the housemate travels a lot for work usually," one of the earliest streams Sapnap does after he moves is a somewhat indulgent Q&A while playing Valorant, "in like, chunks of time, a few weeks I guess? But when they're home they're still working, but usually in a way that's, I guess more similar to me and Dream? Like it'd feel weird and, I don't know, like arrogant, I guess? To compare our work? Usually at least. But because of how everything is, you know, a lot of their work is online, and like we have a schedule for who needs the house quiet at what times. That's- that's all I can really say. I know it's vague," he laughs apologetically, "but it has to be." Then, after a few moments of reading through chat he frowns, "can you tell us where housemate is now? I don't know if I'm allowed, hang on," he pulls out his phone and types away, "I'll ask." It doesn't take more than a minute for him to receive a response; "they're on the West Coast, that's all I'm allowed to tell you."
He does not address any of the numerous questions asking him to clarify the Housemate's relationship with Dream or himself.
· FEBRUARY ·
@.dreams-housemate-updates changes their twitter handle to @.dreamnaps-housemate-updates. Their header also changes to the meme image of Bugs Bunny, pointing with both hands to the right, overlaid with the communist flag, with the words "Our Housemate" in the centre.
----
@.YourTwitter: me and the boys at 2am looking for BEANS [Image ID: Y/N, Amandla, and the director of HELIX all posing on the red carpet for the Golden Globes.] | @.YourTwitter: BEANS acquired [Image ID: Two stills from the live broadcast of the Golden Globes, the first one being of Y/N and Amandla in the audience, leaning against one another and clutching each other, beaming and on the verge of tears as they are looking up, presumably at the stage. Y/N has their free hand up and partially covering their mouth. The second is of HELIX's director Robert Eggers on stage having just received the Golden Globe for Best Director of a Motion Picture. He has a hand to his heart and is using the Golden Globe itself in his other hand to point out into the crowd, presumably to Y/N and Amandla.]
HELIX was nominated for 5 Golden Globes in total, and won two; Best Director - Motion Picture, and Best Original Score - Motion Picture.
----
On Valentine's Day, you post one picture to your Instagram story. It's of a nondescript hotel bed covered in red rose petals. The duvet is black and neat, and the only caption you've added is white text highlighted with red in the top right corner; no shitposts today im actually in love.
----
It had been somewhat disheartening to be on set on Valentine's Day knowing you were so far from the two people you loved the most. It's been weeks since you were home, which only made it all the harder. The shoot went well, and you were glad to be messaging Dream and Sapnap through the day, even if you couldn't be near them.
Around lunch they tell you that they're sending flowers to your hotel, that it was meant to be a surprise but they'll need your room number, and that the hotel might call to confirm with you. As much as you love the gesture, it makes you miss them both even more, and you start browsing flights back to Florida on your phone in between takes, fantasizing about having the time to take off and see them.
The hotel calls in the afternoon, and you confirm that anything from your boyfriends has full permission to be placed in your room while you were gone. Sun will be setting in a few hours, there's no time left for your fantasy to come true, not if you wanted to remain professional.
There'd always be next year, you tell yourself.
You message to say that you miss them, and they respond in kind, both quick to assure you that there's always going to be more time, that one day wouldn't matter. Perhaps not in the long run, but today it felt like it did.
So when you get back to your hotel and see the rose petals on your bed, it feels too good to be true.
And when you catch sight of both Dream and Sapnap waiting patiently in the larger living space of the room, you feel yourself begin to tear up. They're both with you immediately, wrapping you up in their arms, endeared as they try and soothe you, murmur for you not to cry.
It's been a long day of heartache, thinking that you'd be without them, so it's all you can do to hold them tightly, a mess of laughter and cathartic tears as you tell them how much you love them both. You hadn't realised just how much you'd missed them until this moment, until you're peppering them with kisses and babbling about how this has gone from the worst day to maybe one of the best of your life.
"So far," Sapnap grins teasingly, kissing your temple. Dream echoes his words, echoes his tone, and you feel yourself growing flustered as your initial wave of shock and awe had died down.
Best day of your life, so far.
· MARCH ·
In early March 2021, the nominations for the 93rd Academy Awards are announced, and HELIX receives 6 nominations; Best Picture, Best Director, Best Original Score, Best Visual Effects, and Chris Evans is nominated for Best Supporting Actor. Controversy arises, however, as Y/N is also announced as a nominee for Best Actor.
A statement is released by the Academy the day after the nominees were announced, stating the decision as to which category they were nominated in was due to the technical broadness of the category, and that Y/N's team had been contacted prior to the nomination being confirmed.
A day after The Academy releases their statement, Y/N posts two updates to their Instagram story;
1. A blurry selfie taken in bed, sheet pulled up to their neck, giving the camera peace sign. Across their forehead reads 'its an honour to be nominated, im looking forward to the day that there's a category specifically for nonbinary actors and actresses so people like me don't have to be torn to shreds online when people try to acknowledge and appreciate us'.
2. A photo of a mostly empty plate sitting on their bedside table, covered in crumbs, with a knife and fork sitting in the middle. Their hand can be seen giving a thumbs up closer to the camera, and is captioned '"why didn't you respond before now its been two days????" sorry buddy i was getting my shit rocked and eating pancakes in bed. i knew it'd be a hot button issue online so i decided to celebrate the nom first. im allowed to celebrate my achievements ✌️'.
----
@gnflmnop: you remember that one time @.YourTwitter tweeted about the dsmp right before their movie premiered and then Never Again? Did I hallucinate that? | @YourTwitter: my boyfriends bully me whenever I go to tweet about it :( | @YourTwitter: they're mad about who my favourite is (it goes back and forth but they're never happy with who I say 😔) | @.YourTwitter: if y'all knew my boys this would be so much funnier, I promise this is all v lighthearted. | @.gnflmnop: Who's your current fav?? | @.YourTwitter: @.Quackity 🥰 | @.Quackity: HOLY SHIT
· APRIL ·
HELIX ends up winning four of the six Oscars it's nominated for; Best Director, Best Visual Effects, Best Original Score, and Y/N wins Best Actor.
Transcript of Y/N's winning speech from the 93rd Academy Awards for their performance in HELIX:
Before I start, I need to say something to the people like me - non-binary and trans people like me - beyond this room, watching this live or in the future; hi! Look! We can see it now, you can see me; the world is changing and our future is bright! [Brief pause.] Now, on January 4th this year, my ex-manager told me I was an unhireable PR nightmare, and tonight he decides to text me; congrats on the nom, for your own sake don't start a twitter tirade when you lose, Anthony Hopkins is eighty seven, he can't fight back. [They are becoming audibly choked up.] To that I say; don't you wish you put your energy into something useful? [Pause as they compose themselves.] Which is why I'm up here, thanking my amazing manager who actually believes in me, our whole incredible team behind HELIX, especially Rob and Amandla - you should both be up here with me, because I wouldn't be here without either of you. [They take a moment to clutch the Oscar to their chest, looking overwhelmingly grateful.] And the only thing better than this is knowing I get to see my wonderful, supportive, damn amazing partners after. My favourite place in the world is at home with you both, I love you. [Sniffling, they give a watery laugh.] This is a moment, isn't it? This is our moment. Thank you.
Given the immense exposure of The Oscars, Y/N's speech quickly goes viral. The backlash from the conservative side of the internet is immense, however the outpouring of support still manages to dwarf it. It's seen as a cultural reset, with 'the world is changing and our future is bright' being painted across every LGBT+ corner of the internet. Also, both the polyamorous and nonbinary communities specifically appear to adopt the phrase 'this is our moment'.
----
The following interaction occurred during a Just Chatting stream on Wilbur Soot's Twitch channel on the 30th of April, and can be found in the stream's VOD beginning at 53:46.
"Can I share something surreal with you all?" Wilbur asks, tone vaguely bemused as he was streaming with Tommy, Ranboo, and Philza, "lads, chat, can I share the most, I think unexpected reaction I've received after yesterday?"
"Unexpected how?" Ranboo snorts a laugh.
"Like, I think it was the emotion I was going for, but I never expected this person to contact me?"
"Oh interesting, who was it?" Tommy asked excitedly.
"Well, I mean, there's weird ways the SMP kind of breaches containment that makes me think 'ah, people lying for attention on the internet again'," Wilbur begins, and is met with stifled giggles from the others, who seem to know exactly what he means by that sentiment, "which I don't necessarily know why I think that, since most times it's kind of innocuous or makes a roundabout kind of sense, like a politicians kid getting them to tweet at us, but there was something a few months back that I heard about and I was like 'that's absolute bullshit'."
"You do especially seem to get a few weird ones," Phil agrees.
"And I don't usually get star struck; I'm not trying to brag here, but I've had - well, we've all had - some pretty high profile encounters here and there," Wilbur's voice was rising in intensity, as the others voiced their agreement, "but there was an interaction a few months ago, and I kind of shot my shot since I don't use Twitter and had my Discord passed on to this person, and nothing really came of it."
"Who was it, man?!" Tommy groaned, frustrated by Wilbur building up the encounter, much to everyone else's amusement. Wilbur pauses for a moment.
"Yesterday I received my first message from Y/N since we'd connected on Discord, after months mind you, and it's a selfie of them giving me the thumbs up, whilst clearly crying -"
"What?!" Several of the others in the chat exclaimed, Wilbur clearly matching their confused, startled energy.
"Right?! And you wanna know what the caption was? Here, I'll read it to you guys, it says; Wilbur, why am I crying about minecraft ghost."
Silence.
Then;
"Three days ago they won an actual fucking Oscar; what reality am I in right now?" He crows, still clearly baffled.
"That can't be real," Ranboo announced, sounding a little dazed.
"Why is Y/N Y/L/N crying about minecraft ghost, Wilbur?" Tommy practically yelled, "we saw HELIX together with Tubbo the last time I was in Brighton, I refuse to believe fucking Woolfe shed real tears over Ghostbur!" Then, after a beat, "oh God, and it was my fault too! I need to start writing an apology," he's clearly half joking, and the others play along.
"The character Woolfe?"
"No, to Y/N themselves," Tommy says, adding, "maybe if I ask Dream nice enough he'll take it back."
Not long after this conversation occurred live, the following was posted to Twitter;
@.YourTwitter: ooh lads, me and my parasocial relationship might not survive this one omg @.WilburSoot @.philza @.tommyinnit @.ranboo | @.ranboo: [GIF from Y/N's award speech at The Oscars; Y/N is holding their award to their chest, standing behind a podium. The caption at the bottom reads 'This is a moment, isn't it?'.]
And;
@.Dream: despite wishful thinking, no celebrity tears based twitter campaign will make me take back certain SMP based events. in fact if you tried i think id just double down and say certain minecraft ghosts got what was coming to them | @.YourTwitter: @.YourTwitter | @.YourTwitter: see its that easy to @ me. &lt;3 | @.Dream: didn't you win an oscar? please get a hobby | @.YourTwitter: dont vague me just because ur mad ur not my favourite | @.Dream: @.YourTwitter You make me want to smack you sometimes. | @.YourTwitter: hot. dm me. | @.Dream: Why are you like this? | @.YourTwitter: for the bit. <3
· MAY ·
@.enbyhawke: @.DreamWasTaken @.YourTwitter the people have spoken. Link to the Change.org petition 'Let Y/N Join The DreamSMP'] | @.YourTwitter: @.Dream the people have spoken 😌 | @.Dream: @.YourTwitter the people need to be quiet, I already told you no in our DMs. | @.YourTwitter: [GIF from Mean Girls of Regina George, phone to her ear, caption at the bottom reading 'Boo, you whore.']
----
Rating: Explicit Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply Category: Other Fandom: HELX (2020), Dream SMP Relationships: Woolfe (HELIX)/Clay | Dream (Video Blogging RPF) Characters: Woolfe (HELIX), Clay | Dream (Video Blogging RPF) Additional Tags: PWP, what is this lol, crack, based on a twitter post, Eric Andre Voice LET ME IN but its woolfe and the dsmp, Power Imbalance, hate fucking, choking, spit, reluctant bottoming, degradation, so close to just writing RPF but im pretending to have dignity, ch 1 is afab!Y/N, ch 2 is amab!Y/N, otherwise the chapters are identical, just like every other smut oneshot with Y/N or their nb characters lol, the Y/N fandom etiquette is beautiful tbh we all know what we're doing here, WAIT c!Dream IS LITERALLY JUST A YOUNG VERSION OF CHRIS EVAN'S CHARACTER OH MY GOD, DOWN TO THE EXPERIMENTING ON PEOPLE AND KILLING THEM AND BRINGING THEM BACK Language: English Series: Part 1 of isn't bite also touch (HELIXsmp) · Next Work -> Stats: Published: 05-15-2021 Words: 4863 Chapters: 2/2
i'll tell you my sins (and you can sharpen your knife) FullContakt
Summary: There's a price to pay for clear intentions. Woolfe understands the roles and rules of this place and is happy to call themselves a villain, however the one who originally chose that title isn't exactly willing to give it up, so Dream decides to find out exactly how far Woolfe is willing to go for it.
Notes: Y/N and Dream's one online interaction makes me laugh so fucking hard, they're both so chaotic, I don't know who is the one with the audacity here. I think they both have far too much. But anyways, since im lowkey obsessed with the few HELIX/DSMP crossovers we already have here (literally never cried as hard as i did finishing starslikerhinestones's Woolfe/Wilbur MASTERPIECE 'a hero's job is to die'. seriously if nothing else please read it for Hawke being THE BEST OLDER SIBLING to tommy, as long as you don't mind tragedy and heartbreak) ANYWAYS seeing that interaction between Y/N and dream just made me think that Woolfe and c!Dream would HATE each other so here, they beat the shit out of each other... and yeh fuck a bit. Enemies-to-enemies-who-hatefuck.
----
Sapnap makes an offhand comment during a stream about how he's missing their housemate since they went to the UK. Dream seems to share this sentiment, joking 'and we didn't even get to swap them for George while they're gone, it's so unfair'. Both seem genuinely disheartened by the housemate's absence, but make a note of how proud they both are of everything the housemate has been doing.
----
From May 20th to May 23rd, the 'PenisSMP' or 'PSMP' trends on Tumblr as a shitpost directed at the Minecraft YouTube community, that flourished on the oft overlooked blogging platform, was quickly co-opted and expounded upon by said community.
In amongst its colourful cast and rapidly developing lore, several real figures were included and adopted into the kayfabe, including current members of the DreamSMP such as Tommyinnit (given the alias 'Wife_Haver' in the PSMP), and ConnorEatsPants, with no significant alterations to his already established character whatsoever, just that he existed in this SMP too. Alongside them, Y/N was quickly adopted into the lore and cast of characters with the in-game alias of '4rs0n_R1sk', as first mentioned in user @.localtubboenthusiast's post;
localtubboenthusiast literally why is anyone surprised that fvckass blew up half the server?? why is ANYONE surprised they keep setting fires??? they were literally hand raised by 4rs0n_R1sk!!! #who is literally being played by one of the most chaotic actors of our generation #this is why dream didn't let Y/N join the dream SMP #hes a coward #psmp #penissmp #penismp #y/n y/l/n #4rs0n_r1sk #fvckass the sheep #fuckass the sheep
And the follow-up question they received;
Anonymous asked: WAIT HOLD UP THATS WHERE I KNOW 4RS0N'S VOICE??? ITS Y/N????
localtubboenthusiast answered: yeah apparently they're friends with penis irl and asked if they could join out of spite after the whole dream refusing to let them into the dsmp thing 😂 can't believe they literally don't even stream they're just there lol
#also in case it wasn't clear i AM a PenisUnavailable And ShittyFartBaby69 Are Actually Y/N's Boyfriends truther #4rs0n_R1sk #Y/N Y/L/N #PSMP #penismp #penissmp
Fanart of '4rs0n_R1sk' usually depicts Y/N as either their character Woolfe from HELIX, or Contakt from The New Mutants with a warm colour pallet and fire powers. They are usually drawn with 'Fvckass the Sheep', 'PenisUnavailable', or 'TurboThruster'.
----
@.YourTwitter: went to dublin and all I got was spit on. they give you exactly what you ask for here, amazing customer service 🥰 | @.Ic3_Squared: Hey bestie some thoughts should stay in your head ❤️
· JUNE ·
I Spent A Day With DREAM was posted to YouTube by Anthony Padilla on the 9th of June, and the following exchange begins around minute 5;
Dream: God it's so weird, actually, because there's been these huge changes in my personal life that have happened, like, parallel to the whole YouTube thing, but are still significantly effected by it, if that makes sense? Anthony: What kind of changes to do you mean? Dream: Like, uh, I'm not fully sure if I'm able to talk about this, though I guess if this bit makes it into the video I've confirmed that I am allowed to actually talk about it, [Dream laughs] but I feel very lucky to currently be in the best relationship of my life, but like, I feel like that would have happened, like me- me and my- you know, [Dream stumbles over his words a little, as if to purposefully dance around the precise wording of the relationship] that would still be happened even if I never blew up.
----
📌 Pinned Tweet @.dreamnaps-housemate-updates: If Dream is dating his housemate that would be news to us too. We don't have any more information than anyone else on this matter. Please stop asking us, thank you.
----
On June 26th Twitter user @.goldenghostgirl asks you if you'd be watching Minecraft Championship (Pride), and who you'd be watching. You respond less than half an hour later with three consecutive tweets; 'me and my parasocial relationship will be watching pink parrots 😌🦜💓', then 'only because @.smajor didnt invite me to play which isn't his fault since he doesn't know I'm secretly very good at minecraft.... but just so you know... for next pride... 👀 👉👈' and finally 'im actually being legit here, minecraft as a game is far bigger in our house than I really let on, I'd love to prove my boyfriends' mentoring has paid off 💖'.
For MCC Pride, the team Pink Parrots is made up of SolidarityGaming, Grian, Wilbur Soot, and Technoblade. Highlights from their team during the event include;
Wilbur makes a point to say hello to Y/N at the beginning of the event as he figures they're probably watching. When providing clarification for the situation to the rest of his team in the VC he refers to it as 'mutually parasocial'. Wilbur also jokes about becoming an honourary member of Y/N's polycule. Y/N does not publically comment on any of this; it is not made clear if they saw it.
Technoblade mentions that Dream has been DMing him during the event, and that both he, and his housemate who isn't Sapnap, but is just happy to be here, are cheering them on.
Wilbur's fire alarm chirping aggressively, much to his growing frustration, until he has to disconnect as there is apparently an actual fire emergency in his building. He had to talk to the firefighters who arrived on scene in order to confirm that he was safe to re-enter the building. He is able to rejoin MCC.
In Wilbur's absence, there are several suggestions for a temporary replacement; Technoblade suggests Dream, Grian mentions that Y/N has put their hand up on Twitter, while Wilbur himself suggests Philza Minecraft. Philza ultimately becomes Wilbur's temporary replacement.
Philza breaking down with laughter when he reads your follow up tweet; "Don't look at me, I retract my statement. Coach, I was wrong I'm not ready for the big leagues, you shouldn't put me on. If you have the choice of Philza Minecraft of course you choose Philza Minecraft." He then adds, as his laughter dies down, that he understands now why Wilbur had called his interactions with you 'surreal'.
After the event concluded, you post one final tweet; "if any interviewer ever brings up today I WILL lie."
· JULY ·
On July 14, the final episode of Loki is released on Disney+. During one of the final scenes, after the timelines have all split and Loki is making his way to try and warn Mobius about what had happened, we see Y/N being dragged through the facility, clearly reprising their role as the mutant Contakt (Itta Marie) from 2020's New Mutants.
An hour after the premiere of the episode, Y/N tweeted twice;
1. 'oh yeah lol should update my IMDB about that'.
2. 'nd yeah dad acquired, for those keeping score at home' [Image ID: Y/N and Tom Hiddleston in costume as their respective characters Contakt and Loki on the set of the Loki series. They appear to be in an animated discussion between takes.
----
@.YourTwitter: there's no irl sdcc so no-one can stop me from cosplaying and doing some sort of Q&a.. need suggestions. And questions.
@.YourTwitter: imagine if I became a twitch streamer lol. anyways q&a here [Link to user PR Nightmare on Twitch.]
"Tommyinnit in my chat? Is this real?" You found yourself beaming with delight, "do you wanna join? DM me your Discord on Twitter, you're awesome, dude!"
"Are you cosplaying Ghostbur?" Is the first thing Tommy asks the minute you voice call him.
"I am!" You tell him with delight.
"Why?"
"I miss him," you admit freely. Tommy snorts a laugh, but the conversation trails off until, "it's so cool to talk to you finally, both my boyfriends speak so very highly of you."
"You're... a fan of mine?"
"I like your videos, yeah," you agree without hesitation, "and your arc is super compelling to watch on the SMP."
Tommy goes very quiet for several long moments before you hear faintly 'ow... ow... ow...'.
"Are you okay?" You ask, concerned, and Tommy hums for a moment.
"Sorry, just had to pinch myself a few times," then even as your laughing fondly, he continues, "still not convinced this is a real conversation I'm having."
----
@.dreamnaps-housemate-updates posted a clip from Sapnap's then-latest Minecraft stream on July 28th with the caption 'i love the way they love';
"What's been your favourite part of living with me so far?" Dream's voice is saccharine and teasing as he asks Sapnap live on stream.
"God, you're so needy," Sapnap laughs, though his tone is fond. While his focus remains primarily on his screen where he's playing Minecraft, occasionally his gaze will flick to something to his left, off camera.
"Thank you," Dream sounds quite smug, "but is that really your favourite?" In the silence that follows, Dream's tone takes on that saccharine tone as he prompts again.
"I mean if you twist it the right way, like with the right words," Sapnap sounds uncharacteristically soft, almost embarrassed, and seems to be intently focusing on his game with a faint flush to his cheeks.
"Twist what? Me being needy?" Dream half laughs, but Sapnap continues, sincere.
"I mean, I obviously wouldn't actually word it like that, but you're obviously the best part of living with you," he admits, a warm silence follows, and finally Sapnap looks directly at whatever is to his left, though he still appears to be addressing Dream when he speaks; "I'm not mentioning our housemate because they already look like they're a half second away from saying something emotional despite the fact that I'm live," he warns pointedly with a grin, as if to stave off the housemate in question. Then, after a moment, he softens his tone and expression considerably, practically radiating affection, "but you're the other best part about living here."
----
@.StardewwSoot: how long have @.YouTwitter and @.Callahan been mutuals? 👀👀
· AUGUST ·
@.YourTwitter: in Switzerland, finally able to add another Hot Hollywood Dad to my collection of father figures @.VancityReynolds
@.YourTwitter: ALSO PREMIERE OF FREE GUY AT THE LOCARNO FILM FESTIVAL!! DEFINITELY SHOULD HAVE LEAD WITH THAT!!
----
During an interview as part of Free Guy's press junket, an interviewer asks Joe Keery and Ryan Reynolds if either of them had met Y/N's partners.
"No, but I'm sure they're having a great time in Canada with my high school girlfriend," Ryan says without missing a beat as his younger costars break out in laughter. All three of them are grinning, a clearly easy comradery between them all, even as Y/N gives him a shove and insists their boyfriends are real. "Oh yeah, then what are their names?"
"I wish I could tell you, but I literally can't," you admit, a little sheepish, even as Ryan loudly proclaims that you're not making a strong case for yourself, "I wish- dude, I promise I wish I could tell you, but you wouldn't even begin to believe why I can't!" You insist once more.
----
@.yourtwitter: my toxic trait is every time I miss my boyfriends I read fanfiction about them and send them links to my favourites | @.yourtwitter: the reviews are in folks
[screenshot of a group chat titled '🎉 No Noise Complaints Since 8/23 🎉'. cat daddy: [screenshot of above tweet] cat daddy: your toxic trait is being funny when we're not able to publicly respond H0TB0I: your toxic trait is never specifying when you're missing us or being a menace Ryan Reynolds Lover: ????? cat daddy: @H0TB0I cranky because you skipped the tags and read mpreg aren't you Ryan Reynolds Lover: oh lol yeah no I was just being a menace when I sent that sorry 😅❤]
| @.asheeberree: WAIT PEOPLE WRITE FANFICTION ABOUT YOUR BOYFRIENDS??? WHO ARE YOU DATING??
Less than an hour later, Sapnap tweets out "our housemate just said 'pass me your phone I want to cause problems on purpose' so that's the only context I can give for whatever the next tweet is ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯" less than three minutes later, the following tweet is posted to Sapnap's alt account:
@.sapnapalt: dreamnap housemate here hello sap's twitter, I have a question. why are y'all sleeping on omega!dream and alpha!sap as concepts? I'm absconding with his phone so you have time to answer and I can see your responses before he deletes this 😘
· SEPTEMBER ·
A selection of articles and quizzes from Buzzfeed.com tagged Y/N Y/L/N in the month of September, 2021;
If Ever We Have To Elect A Representative For All Millennials, Here's My Pitch For It To Be Y/N
(Quiz) Plan Your Mission And I'll Tell You Who In The Mandolorian's Crew Would Be Your Bestie
10 Most Plausible Potential Secret Beaus For Y/N (And The Hottest Fanfiction For Each To Prove It)
(Quiz) Plan Your Ideal Date To Find Out Which Of Y/N's Hot Hollywood Father Figures Is Your Daddy
This Talented Artist Does Everything Right In Their Artwork Showcasing Their Fancast for The Breakfast Club In 2021
· OCTOBER ·
On October 3rd, you tweeted in rapid succession 'Callahan's my best friend now', 'hacker voice: im in', '@.Quackity heyyyy what are u doing rn? u free buddy?' and then a link to your Twitch account, where you were live on the Dream SMP.
The following is one of many short clips that you liked on Twitter after your Stream ended;
"Hey look at you go," Quackity laughs "you know your way around here better than I do; you weren't lying about watching us it seems."
"Yeah, well I play quite a bit with my boyfriends, since it's something they're really into, and they really got me into the SMP in the first place; they've been invested in this since day one," you said, smiling warmly before you leaned close to your camera and mic, "and now chat, you're gonna go ahead and clip that for me, and post it to twitter, so they can see it."
----
Dream and Sapnap both post photos to Instagram of several Halloween costumes they wear together. Most of the photos are just of the two of them, always with Dream entirely covered to continue obscuring his identity, but the final photo of both photosets is one of the housemate, for the first time in record.
They appear to be wearing a black hoodie, black gloves, black jeans, and appear to have borrowed the mask Dream has worn previously.
In Dream's Instagram post, the housemate is looking directly down into the digital camera they have around their neck, clearly having been taking the photos for Dream and Sapnap. The mask is lifted off of their face and sits on top of their head, however with the angle they are looking, the mask completely obscures their face and smiles directly at the camera.
In Sapnap's post, the setting is different to any of the other photos, as it appears to have been taken in a living room. Dream is still wearing the black hoodie and Squid Game mask, while the housemate appears to have fallen asleep with their head in his lap. Dream's mask is on the arm of the sofa, as is what appears to be a bright green hoodie. The housemate's hood is up while they're laying with their back to the camera so their face isn't visible. Dream is resting a hand on their hip and has his phone in the other, seemingly still using it despite his mask.
On Halloween itself, Y/N posts an image of themselves against a black wall dressed the same way as Dream appears in a few of the earlier photos he'd posted of himself, with a green hoodie, completed with a large, white, smiling mask. Both on Instagram and Twitter the photos is captioned 'this is my official apology to @.DreamWasTaken for breaking into his server'. Dream responds on Twitter telling you 'you're on thin ice....... lucky you're almost as cute as i am in that fit'.
· NOVEMBER ·
On November 11th, the trailer for the 15th season of sitcom 'It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia' is uploaded across the series' various social media platforms. The clip, that lasts just over one minute, appears to take place in Dublin, and includes indications that Y/N will play a reoccurring character throughout the season.
The two most notable clips are;
'Sweet Dee' seems gleeful as she informs Y/N that they are a great assistant, before immediately spitting upon them.
And;
"So we need you to clarify which of us is gay -" Dennis posed the question to Y/N standing close beside his sister.
"Mac, right? He's the gay, isn't he?"
"Yes," Dennis frowns, "but he likes men, and you are -" he gestures to their body, "not. However, if we," he gestures between himself and Dee, "both are trying to sleep with you, then one of us is gay," he paused, visibly deliberating, "or, well, not gay, but also not straight, since that would make this much easier for me, but for me to be straight you'd have to be a woman and you are -" again, he gestures to their body, "not..." Dennis clasped his hands together, tone growing almost furiously frustrated, as if at Y/N themselves, "so now, you beguiling little minx, have made us both potentially neither gay nor straight, you have turned us into Schrodinger's Fruits!" Waiting, breathing hard at the end of his outburst, it cuts to Y/N, visibly confused by the situation, brow furrowed.
Not long after the clips are posted, you retweet it with the caption 'show with the most BDE (big dad energy)' and a photo of yourself on set in Dublin in the middle of a cheesy group hug between the five lead actors of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. Not long after, the show's official twitter responds with;
@.AlwaysSunny: Welcome to the family! [ID: Four stills from the upcoming season of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia; 1. Dennis clearly having taken Y/N by surprise, grabbing them by the shoulders and kissing them. Neither appears to be enjoying themselves; Dennis's entire expression is scrunched up like he's smelled something awful, while Y/N is so tense their arms are throw out to the side. 2. Dee and Y/N nose to nose, both staring intensely into each others eyes, the tips of their tongues awkwardly touching where they're poking out of their otherwise closed mouthes. 3. Charlie and Y/N both covered in mud, fully clothes in a bog up to their waists, passionately making out. 4. Mac leaning against a bar counter from behind it, beaming brightly at Y/N who is slouched at the back. Mac is gesturing proudly to four different coloured liquor bottles lined up in the order yellow, white, purple, black, thus making a side-on nonbinary flag. Y/N is giving the display a tired smile.]
----
@.YourTwitter: I honestly can't believe that on Halloween I celebrated a year with my dream boi, and like a week later I got to celebrate again with hot boi, just before the anniversary of HELIX. | @.YourTwitter: everything has happened so much this year, Im so proud of all the wonderful people in my life and all the projects we've worked so hard on!! | @.YourTwitter: omg this might have been the best year of my life..... | @.Dream: so far. | @.Sapnap: So far. | @.YourTwitter: @.Sapnap @.Dream ur both so right,, best year of my life So Far 😌
· DECEMBER ·
December 2021 is surprisingly quiet.
At the beginning of the month you announce that since you've actually got some time off, you're going to be stepping back from social media to focus on spending time on your partners and yourself. Many voice their support for you, including both Dream and Sapnap.
Sapnap streams far more frequently than Dream, and it's notable that he seems incredibly bright in all December streams, even moreso than usual.
Dream does two Twitter Spaces during the month, and in both he sounds practically giddy, explaining that both he and Sapnap are glad to have their housemate home for the holidays.
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The Archive Of Our Own tag 'Clay | Dream/Sapnap/HousemateWasTaken' has 98 works by the end of 2021. The fanfiction with the highest kudos in this tag is 'Tommy's Guide to Imports and Exports', which is part 3 of user alliumc4t's series 'The Kids Aren't Alright'. This series revolves around the romantic relationship between Dream, Sapnap, and their housemate, whilst also becoming legal guardians of Tommyinnit, Tubbo_, and Ranboo. The series is still labelled as ongoing, and contains the following fics;
'Ohana' Isn't A Real Word
Blessed Be The Boys Time Can't Capture
Tommy's Guide to Import and Exports
Time's Arrow (The Achilles Heel)
The Only Normal Person In This Whole Damn Building
Flags and Other Decorations
----
And finally, to book end the year, Y/N posted the following Tweet just after midnight on New Year's Eve:
For all you asking, the boys were each other's New Year's kiss, I gave our cat a smooch on her little fuzzy noggin. Good start to the year all around. 💖
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you know me {cc!Wilbur/Reader}
Summary: As much as you love your university dormmates, you wished they wouldn't try and wingman you every time you all went out together. The only thing that gets them and their good intentions off your back is telling them you're already seeing someone. What happens after that is at least partially their fault for misinterpreting your friendship with Wilbur... But it's also his for agreeing to go along with it when you ask, and it's definitely yours for not being more worried when he gleefully threatened to be the most embarrassing fake boyfriend the world has ever known.
Love, it will not betray you, dismay or enslave you, it will set you free.
Need to Know: They/Them. University Student!Reader, high school friends-to-lovers, fake dating.
{ p l a y l i s t }
Citrus Scale: 💚 Lime 💚
[ ALL FUTURE UPDATES CANCELLED ]
sigh no more
one foot on sea, one on shore
my heart was never pure
but man is a giddy thing
Extra Content
memes from your dorm gc
Taglist: @extremeloserr @ahsteriawrites @mishthemess @spencer-not-reid1 @esylwen @lovejoyenjoyer @harbingerofheartbreak @lavcha @axeofwars @hiredars0nist @boiled-onionrings @river-exe @artsycanongoer @ghostyv @mitbin24 @generalnav @raes-gay @btwimskyvv @midnightsky1213 @lastwandastan @alive-woman-sitting @musiclovebot
Taglist is always open! Feel free to message or comment if you’d like to be added! xx
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you know me {Wilbur Soot} // 1
sigh no more
Summary: As much as you love your university dormmates, you wished they wouldn't try and wingman you every time you all went out together. The only thing that gets them and their good intentions off your back is telling them you're already seeing someone. What happens after that is at least partially their fault for misinterpreting your friendship with Wilbur... But it's also his for agreeing to go along with it when you ask, and it's definitely yours for not being more worried when he gleefully threatened to be the most embarrassing fake boyfriend the world has ever known. Need to Know: They/Them. Set late 2020ish?? University Student!Reader. childhood best friends with Wilbur.
{ masterlist }
A/N: 2452 words. so ive been struggling to exist lately which is why i haven't posted this earlier despite how much i love it. im not sure when the next parts will be though i have made a solid start for now, but i really do hope you enjoy this! solid feedback is also a fantastic motivator, so if you have any thoughts, feelings, or suggestions at all about what you might like to see in this story going futher, please let me know!! i hope you enjoy it <3 also im just gonna go ahead and say here that one of my favourite forms of intimacy is giving ur friends silly nicknames on messenger.
Warnings: References to drinking.
Taglist: @extremeloserr @ahsteriawrites @mishthemess @spencer-not-reid1 @esylwen @lovejoyenjoyer @harbingerofheartbreak @lavcha @axeofwars @hiredars0nist @boiled-onionrings @river-exe @artsycanongoer @ghostyv @mitbin24 @generalnav @raes-gay @btwimskyvv @midnightsky1213 @lastwandastan @alive-woman-sitting @musiclovebot
Taglist is always open! Feel free to message or comment if you’d like to be added! xx
Your class is running far later than you'd expected on a Friday afternoon when your phone starts blowing up with messages. You had only been at university for a few weeks but finally had managed to schedule time to hang out with Wilbur, and had wanted to show him around your new dorm, so messages from him were to be expected. As you check your phone, however, you realise you forgot to tell the rest of the people who lived in your dorm that he would be meeting you there.
[Y/N literally is this your man? Come collect him from the sofa if u know him or let me know if I should call campus security] Your Residential Advisor sends to your dorm's group chat along with one of the awkwardest photos of Wilbur you've ever seen in your life. In class you choke on a laugh before seeing a series of messages from Wilbur as he'd been navigating around the campus until finally -
[hamilton kinnie(affectionate): I THINK THE PEOPLE YOU LIVE WITH THINK IM A SERIAL KILLER]
[hamilton kinnie(affectionate): like ted bundy]
Your whole face scrunches up with fond but well worn exasperation as your lecture across campus finally comes to an end. You respond first to the dorm group chat, assuring them that he was indeed your friend, and that you'd left your room unlocked if someone could show him there so he wouldn't have to awkwardly wait in the living area, before finally turning your attention back to Wilbur's messages.
[🦀in my crab arc 🦀: nobody thinks you're Ted Bundy can you please just be normal while interacting with my dormmates]
[🦀in my crab arc 🦀: my RA let you in she's gonna show you to my room you can wait there]
[hamilton kinnie(affectionate): I'm so normal right now I asked about the Weather! Small Talk! ]
[hamilton kinnie(affectionate): seriously tho this is so awkward she definitely thinks I'm a creep]
[hamilton kinnie(affectionate): which I AM but that's usually part of the long con, not a vibe I like to give off at the start]
[hamilton kinnie(affectionate): thats a joke]
[hamilton kinnie(affectionate): obviously]
[hamilton kinnie(affectionate): but actually please get here soon she definitely wants to call security on me I'm pretty sure]
[hamilton kinnie(affectionate): please tell her I'm not a murderer]
[🦀in my crab arc 🦀: alfkalflakfls]
[🦀in my crab arc 🦀: no someone just told her you're an internet celebrity lol you're fine]
[hamilton kinnie(affectionate):😐]
[🦀in my crab arc 🦀: not me lol]
[🦀in my crab arc 🦀: I didn't even remember to tell them you were coming to the dorm today why would I mention something like that]
[🦀in my crab arc 🦀: you passed the vibe check tho]
And you send a screenshot of the group chat where someone had mentioned that he was the awkwardest man they'd ever seen, but a few others had chimed in that he had a 'cute, shiny face' that made sense for an internet celebrity. Someone had screenshotted and close cropped his name from Twitter already and just commented 'FROM CHARLOTTE'S WEB?????' which had the latest response of '😳🕸️SOME PIG🕸️😳' which had the most positive reactions of any message in the chat.
You assure Wilbur you've told them not to be weird, which does little to alleviate his concern, but thankfully you're climbing the stairs to your dorm and are only moments away. Your RA gives you a look which you shrug helplessly at, but thank her nonetheless as you abscond to your room to put Wilbur out of his misery.
"It's different to how I imagined it," is the first thing Wilbur says to you. The door isn't even properly closed, and you're setting your bag down by your desk before you give him a wry smile.
"Better or worse?" The door closes with a click and you cock your head to the side, watching him while he gazes around at the way you've decorated the little dorm room from where he's perched on the edge of your bed.
"That's entrapment," his face lights up with an amused grin, still looking around, "I'm used to your old room," and when you sit beside him and flop back to look at the ceiling, he follows suit, "it's nice here, well decorated." And there's something about his strangely reserved tone that has you sighing.
"They're not gonna be weird about it," you assure him softly; unfortunately you were able to intuit what was worrying him fairly well. This isn't the first time you've had a conversation like this.
"You know I don't think it's your fault," he tells you matter-of-factly, turning to look at you, "but people -"
"- are weird," you finished with the faintest disappointment, knowing all too well that he was right. Still, you're glad he's here, and you tell him as much. He smiles at that, but it doesn't quite reach his eyes.
"We could go," you suggested, "I could plan better for next time and give you the full tour in the middle of the day when everyone's in class," the earnest offer makes his smile widen to something fond, "come on, we can get dinner and eat at your place, get on the piss at a pub across town; barely anyone goes past walking distance here." His whole face scrunches up with something all kinds of bashful and fond as he hides the expression against your shoulder, smacking you with his forehead hard as you speak, "I'm only here for a year, dude, you've seen it, that's all I require, I'm content, you never have to come back, which does mean there's a good chance I'll be living at your place on weekends but -"
"- and you'll spend your weekdays wasting away here in your well decorated Fortress of Solitude -" he snorts, shifting back to lay beside you properly, but at least now he's grinning.
"- I have friends outside of you," you remark flatly, smirking.
"I never agreed to that," Wilbur plays at being offended, and you sit up if only to shove him in the side.
"If you're really so jealous I can move in with you -"
"Into what? My linen cupboard?" He sits up too, giving you a right shove back, which has you skittering to your feet, crossing the small space to lean against your desk once more, looking at him with a sharp grin.
"You already having a housemate is not my problem," you stick your nose in the air and try not to laugh at the whole charade. As the bit slowly dies but the good mood remains, you ask if he wants to leave now, or later.
"I quite like it here," he says instead of answering properly, looking around again with a newfound fondness, "I might live here; gonna give up my place and move in. You're okay to sleep on the floor and be the only one paying rent, right?" After a moment, you school your expression into something neutral as he plays up his innocence.
"Wil, did you ever hear that Flight of the Conchords song Petrov, Yelyena, and Me?" You ask with a blithe smile. You can see the moment he remembers the song and it's premise, the way amusement lights up in his eyes as he keeps his expression otherwise controlled.
"The one where they eat their unwitting roommate in his sleep?"
"Yeah, that one."
"Never heard of it," he refuses to break eye contact, "haven't the foggiest," he sits back a little, "on an unrelated note, how about snacks, and something on Netflix, and I don't move into your dorm?" Giving a toothy grin, you finally break and laugh, agreeing easily.
You pass him your laptop from your bag and tell him where the charger is while you head out to the shared kitchen to get snacks for you both.
"You guys joining us tonight?" There's more than just your RA in the common room now; a few of your dormmates are sitting around the kitchen island preparing for predrinks. They'd already invited you earlier in the week, but you'd declined in favour of hanging out with Wilbur.
"What?" Now in the presence of other people who definitely knew who your best friend actually was, you could feel yourself growing tenser.
"You and Wilbur, you know you're always welcome to pregame with us, he is too," your RA smiled so kindly, as if trying to reassure you.
"We won't be weird about it," one of your dormmates assured earnestly, "it's cool that he's your friend." The girl next to her elbows her pointedly and averts her gaze, trying to hide her smile.
"He is," you blurt out, "my friend that is. He's my best friend, and he has been for ages, so just... don't be weird -"
"Come on, we're not being weird!" The first girl tries again, before giving a long sigh, "we'll try not to be weird," she concedes.
"You can't blame us for being a little curious about him," your RA says carefully, "he's a pseudo-celebrity on the internet, he -"
"Yeah but he's not a spectacle," you countered sharply, brow furrowing. You open the fridge into silence, "he's my best mate, he was before any of the internet stuff, and he's a person before any any of it; can you guys just treat him like that?" And you grab a bottle of soft drink from the fridge, closing it again, leaning your forehead against the cool metal with your eyes closed, "sorry, I shouldn't have snapped."
"No, we get it," one of the girls says sincerely.
"Do you and your friend Will wanna do pres with us?" The other offered kindly, and you take a deep breath, grateful for their understanding.
"I'll ask," you tell them, and all three give a little cheer at that, "no promises," you warned with a half-smile, and they all nodded quickly, thankfully all wearing grins.
The minute you step back into your room, however, you're startled by Wilbur standing only a foot from the door. His arms are crossed awkwardly over his chest, hands tucked into his armpits, cheeks puffed out and eyes wide as he rocks back on his heels with the movement of the door. He looks... kind of guilty. Also like he's trying desperately not to look guilty.
"I wanted to ask about the bathroom," all came out in a rush, and you, door still open, sighed, "you took longer than expected," he added; you hung your head. He'd heard your outburst at the very least, that much was clear. Stepping aside you tell him the bathroom is across the hall, hoping to use the brief moment to come up with some sort of an apology.
Instead, as he leaves, he heads to the common room first, and you can see from your door as he raps his knuckles on the empty doorframe, garnering the attention from the three girls in the room.
"Hello, hi, I'm Wilbur, Y/N's friend Will," its an akward if amicable start, jerking his thumb over his shoulder to your bedroom door where you stood still watching.
"Y/N's friend Will!" All three in the kitchen practically chorus, like they were somehow aware that he knew about the conversation that had just occurred and it was all an inside joke. Well, it does get Will to chuckle.
"I was told there was an invite to drinks, is that still on the table?"
"Uh, yeah of course," you can hear your RA answer, though she manages to regain her composure, "it'll be us and the guys from over there," you don't see her gesture but knew she'd be pointing to the block across your joined balcony, "we start drinking pretty much any time after sundown, but will be heading to the club around ten."
"It's a theme night - neon," one of the girls added, "not that you have to dress up or anything, but I'm about to make a run to the costume shop for any face paint if either of your guys want some, that's pretty much all I plan to do for pres," she laughs brightly as the others groan about how it's going to end up a mess, and Wilbur looks over his shoulder; he knew you'd be there, but gives a grin nonetheless.
He raises his eyebrows in silent question, and you, so endeared having watch him mend bridges that weren't even his problem, smile and shrug; sure, why not.
"We'll be there," he tells them, which elicits another round of cheering from the three prepping in the kitchen, "lovely to meet you ladies," a sentiment which is echoed back at him, and from there he finally actually heads to the bathroom.
The interaction you'd witnessed has you feeling all sentimental, and as you close your door and head back to your bed where Netflix is waiting, you can't wipe the goofy grin from your face.
"I guess you can move in here if you want," you tell him with this silly, saccharine tone, and Wilbur laughs before he even closes the door, "I'll sleep on the floor, you win."
"Nah," he shrugs, kicking off his shoes finally.
"Lost interest?" You raised your eyebrows at him and he gives a dubious glance over your bed. Then, almost as if he feels guilty about admitting as much, he sits beside you, back against the wall that served as your headboard.
"I literally don't fit, Y/N," he pointed out, kicking at your wall to draw attention to how dangerously close his feet are to the end of the bed already. You allow your tone to get teasingly sappy as you tell him he fits in your heart, and all he can do is rolls his eyes with a half smile, the sacchrine silence lasting right up until you pull your laptop onto your lap an a notification from your dorm's group chat flashes up in the bottom corner of the screen.
[🕸️SOME PIG🕸️ confirmed for pres!!]
It was one of the girls who had been in the kitchen, but Wilbur's expression seemed to flash through all five stages of grief upon seeing it, despite the growing number of heart emojis for the message.
"Oh god, is that really what they're calling me?"
Pulling out your phone you text the group to remind him that his name is Wilbur. Immediately, however, you get the response that 'that's too obvious'. Beside you, Wilbur snorts a laugh.
"What? Like I'm a secret agent?" Which you then send word for word in the group chat, attributing it to Wilbur himself as he buries his face in his hands and you quietly cackle. They were trying, in their own way, to accommodate your request to 'not be weird about it', which you were grateful for, so at least this you were happy to laugh about.
So they end up deciding to call him Charlie; it's short for Charlotte's Web.
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straighttohellbuddy · 2 years
Text
the red means i love you {c!Technoblade}
Summary: Yandere!Technoblade. Fake gods are worshiped with wine and flowers; real gods require blood.
Need to Know: They/Them. Yandere!Technoblade / Enabler!Reader. established relationship. DARKFIC & LIGHT SMUT PLEASE READ WARNINGS VERY CAREFULLY !!
A/N: 2755 words. hey holy shit read the warnings i mean it. this really isn't for everyone. but anyways i started this months ago lol and it makes me feel some type of way. probably OOC as all fuck. if you do end up reading this, 1. is it coherent? 2. is it any good? :/
Warnings: Romanticisation/Rationalisation of Yandere Behaviour; NON-GRAPHIC SMUT (no genitals specified), GRAPHIC KNIFE-PLAY BLOOD-PLAY AND PAIN-PLAY, SEMI-VIOLENT BODY WORSHIP?? OBJECTIFICATION. Violence. Scarification. Bondage. Mutual Obsession. Dead Dove: Do Not Eat
Citrus Scale: ❤️ GRAPEFRUIT ❤️
{ yandere!dsmp masterpost }
He gets antsy in isolation; the voices are hungry, and fresh bruises will never compare to cherry-red blood on the snow, on his hands, like wine the way you'd seen him savour it before the regret flashes across his face. Blood for the Blood God cheered like the fleeting high was worth the exhaustion the whole ordeal brought with it. You'd seen it time and again; violence simply for violence sake was tiring. It's been a long time since he'd felt like killing for anything or anyone that wasn't you, and since you're by his side in the tundra, there was little reason for him to jump to violence, or at least, violence you didn't relish in.
Because you basked in reminders of his power, finesse, how easily he could wreak devastation, and there was something thrilling about when he turned those skills upon you, knowing he loved you too much to break you beyond repair. But there was also something intoxicating when he almost would, when he'd spend days lavishing praise upon you as he cared for you, tended to the wounds he'd inflicted, nursed you back to health.
In the split second after he'd land a hit while sparring, and he's breathing heavy, eyes wild, and the pain hasn't hit you yet, you see the way his eyes light up. This time it had been a deep gash in your cheek, which had genuinely startled you, and he turns immediately, apologising, saying he lost himself in the moment.
"Don't worry about me," you tell him as he takes your face in his hands, the contact stinging as blood begins to seep from the wounds, "you wouldn't kill me," you assured him, and it's as if he needed to hear the words out loud to believe them, his gaze softening, your hands resting on his hips, "and if you did, we both know you would have your reasons."
"You're so..." but he can't even finish the compliment, syrupy affection in his eyes as he looks at you, still holds your face. He can't find the words in this moment, cant say what you know he's thinking, 'you bleed for me' but you can still hear it. His gaze is endearing as he looks at his own hand on your cheek, before holding it up in the sunlight, your blood shiny and slick on his fingers.
You take his hand in yours, love unspoken but well heard as you softly kiss his knuckles. Carefully, you bring his hand back to your cheek, the stinging wound and the warm, red proof that you were alive. When you pull him in for a kiss, he's holding your face tighter this time, the pressure searing beneath his touch as you kiss him; the tense set of his shoulders had eased, however, and to you, that's all that mattered.
The moment, he tells you later, soothed the voices, at least for the time being. You, stretched out next to him in bed, carefully applying bandaids and ice packs to your more recent training wounds, make a noise of interest.
"I don't like hurting you like that," he admits, voice low, sounding almost remorseful. Instinctively you turn your attention from your bandage application, to him, curling an arm over his chest, resting your chin on his shoulder.
"Like what?" Because he's not one for admitting remorse, especially not about something like this; you've got well cared for scars to the contrary.
"Like in a way we haven't discussed," it takes him a long moment to find the words, but you know its still not entirely the truth; as if your awareness of the altercation was crucial to his enjoyment of it. He got caught up like this a lot, when injuries were accidents. The problem was that it wasn't his intention, it wasn't premeditated; you never minded the lack of warning, he'd had your complete trust for as long as he'd had your heart. You knew what he was capable of, but that he loved you, that's why you trusted him. He, however, knew what he was capable of, and loved you, which is why accidents scared him half to death.
"But it felt good, didn't it? Better than usual," as you say that, he looks to you, sharp and calculating, gaze focused on the patching job he'd done on your cheek earlier, "do you want that? The blood?"
"I don't need it," he says softly, kissing your nose, "I like what we have, I like training with you, you don't-"
"But do you want it?" You ask, reaching up to touch his cheek, your fingertips feather light as you trace where the scar would be on him, and his eyes close for a moment. He leans into your touch.
"The things I crave," he begins, before amending with the faintest smile, "the things other than you, don't matter out here; I'm keeping us safe. The violence for the sake of blood, it's exhausting to keep searching for," he groaned faintly, before adding, "and dangerous," his gaze slides to you, and you know he's not concerned about himself. You, however, held his face for a long moment.
"And what of blood without violence?" You ask softly; he goes very still, breath caught alongside the thought, "Blood for the Blood God," When you lower your hand to his chest, his eyes open. Dark and thoughtful, there's hesitation there, confusion almost.
"You don't know what you're offering," his tone is like ice water, a shock to your system with how cold it is. There's no warning when he sits up, out of your embrace, leaving you cold and confused, "I'm trying to keep you safe." Accusatory, as if you're in the wrong, as if you should know better.
He leaves before you've even formulated a response, tense and seemingly furious and you have no idea how or why the situation changed so dramatically. It's always hard to try and sleep alone nowadays, but you don't have much of a choice.
Techno comes home still wreathed in the heat and horrible sufler smell of the Nether, sweet words on his lips as he curls into bed beside you. None of them are an actual apology, but he's got a talented hand between your thighs as he tells you he loves you, and it's enough to ease your fretting, half asleep mind for the time being.
It seems safer to leave that topic well enough alone for the time being, but it doesn't leave your mind. The thoughts that begin to haunt you encroach on every part of your life. Intrusive, idle chatter starts up when you're training and the sun glances off his blade and catches your gaze, and won't shut up as you're preparing dinner together, and the chatter roars with approval whenever you so much as get a paper cut. Perhaps this is what it's like to experience the voices that clamour for blood and violence in your love's head, though more and more you're sure it's your mind's way of encouraging you, because there are moments where Techno looks at you, eyes dark with a barely concealed desperation, and all thoughts in your mind go silent.
"Don't look at me like that if you're not going to do anything about it," you teased, catching him in one of those dark, thoughtful moments he was becoming increasingly prone to. Techno, however, is pointedly quiet, averting his gaze, light from the fire making him seem somehow even more dramatic, "you've been trapped in there a lot lately," settling yourself on the sofa beside him, you curl up by him, cheek against his shoulder.
Still, he remains quiet.
The crackle of the fire fills the otherwise silent room, though Techno shifts to wrap his arm around you, pulling you a little closer. You feel when he presses a kiss to the top of your head.
"Wish I could be trapped in here," he mumbles against you, drawing circles on your shoulder with his finger, "figure out how you live like you don't feel fear."
"I have you," you respond with absolute, blunt sincerity.
"What?" It sounds as if he genuinely didn't expect your response.
"I have you," it comes out a murmur, angling your face to his, nose to nose as your gaze locks with his, "why would I ever feel afraid." His pupils are blown so wide with want that you're half afraid you'll get lost in them. He must feel the erratic beating of your heart, must know the thrill you feel in this moment -
"You should fear what I want to do to you when you say things like that," his voice is low and you feel like you could melt at the implications, which was probably not his intention, but you didn't care.
"And yet you don't even do anything," you sighed languidly, eyelashes fluttering as you find your gaze dropping to his lips, "what a tease -" but then there's two fingers in your mouth, effectively shutting you up.
"And if I tore you apart, would that make you happy?" He practically snarls, but you angle your head to make sure he can see the dreamy look in your eyes. After a few moments of intensity, he moves his hand from your jaw, your mouth, to grip your thigh, to pull you closer.
"Is it what you want?" You feel elated, all kinds of heady and fire-warm. This is the precipice, the moment where he yet again understands you truly mean you'd do anything for him, and his hesitation will evaporate -
"More than anything," he admits, as if his honesty had left him breathless, and he kisses you hard before you have time to think. Pulling you into his lap, he takes the opportunity to fist his hand in your hair. When he pulls hard, it's the first of many wonderfully aching, stinging, bruising moments of the night.
And you learn that there is no blood without violence, not for the Blood God...
There's a sharp pain the moment the blade first breaches your skin, metal along your sternum cool before the pain brings with it heat. You try to bite back your yelp, but can't quite manage it. You've been cut before but never so deliberately, not by someone who looks at you like Techno does now. Techno, sitting carefully on your thighs, doesn't seem to acknowledge it; he drags the blade down the centre of your chest with an almost agonising unwaivability, tears springing to your eyes, trying not to squirm, to make the pain worse.
"Techno," you whimper, his name escaping you almost involuntarily, nervously tugging at your wrist bindings above your head. There's something dark and strangely detached in Techno's gaze as he meets yours.
"I'm okay," you murmur unconvincingly, "I- it hurts more than I thought it would is all, I'm sorry I'm-" though for all your babbling you don't even consider asking him to stop. He presses the flat side of the blade to your ribs and reaches out with his free hand to carefully wipe away your tears.
"You're so good," there's something hungry in his eyes, "so good to me... beautiful like this." And something clicks in your brain; you'd do anything to keep him talking to you like that, looking at you like that.
"More- please, again," you choke out, a desperate gasp as pain and pleasure weave together in your mind. Something about the way you've already begun to beg has his breath catching in his throat, an animalistic noise escaping him. Already his self restraint is all but shredded; before you knew he'd hesitate, or check in with you, but now -
"More what?" A demand for an answer. The blade is ice cold and feather light against your skin.
"Blood, please," stutters from your lips as you try to lean up to kiss him. Instead, he keeps one hand firm on your shoulder against the table, wearing a pleased smile as he instead dips to keys you, "my love, make me bleed."
He seems to derive pleasure from the way you whimper against his lips, your faint noises of pain as he carefully carves into the skin of your sternum while kissing you. It's starting small, he tells you, at least for now, having left a simple geometric pattern on your sternum that he admires as he fucks you. He lavishes you with praise, works hard to get you off but leaves you a bloody mess until well after the afterglow has faded.
When he tells you it will leave a beautiful scar, something inside you lights up with joy, with love.
"I can take more, I -" already you're babbling, offering. He hasn't untied you; the ache of your bound wrists is comfortingly familiar as you allow yourself to be taken care of.
"Don't," Technoblade warns you firmly, looking up from where he's cleaning and dressing the wounds. Even so, he seems calmer and steadier than he's been in a long while, as if granted a brief moment of mental peace after what had just occurred.
"You keep offering something very dangerous, but maybe your naivete is part of why I find you so precious," he pauses for a long moment before leaning in to press a kiss to the edge of the bloody pattern he was responsible for. A thin line of your blood shines by the corner of his mouth as he pulls back and smirks up at you. You're desperate to kiss him, but you knew it would interrupt his care, and you'd probably remain restrained past the point of it being enjoyable.
"Did it help?"
He is quiet for a long moment after your question. Finally, he spoke.
"How much did it hurt?"
"What?"
"Tell me how much it hurt," there was an unexpected dark edge to his voice now, something pleased and almost smug. He's holding bandages but his hands have stilled, "when you begged me to carve into you like that," it's that hunger again, the same you'd seen the moment you'd winced and gasped and squirmed once he'd finally put the blade down in favour of admiring his work, now free hand between your thighs.
Now he's just... admiring you, bound, marked, still comfortable at his mercy. Looking at the angry red lines in your skin, he can see the blood slowly seeping from them, his personal form of art. Carefully, you wet your lips, shifting the barest amount against the still bloodstained linens.
"It was awful," you murmur honestly, "it still is kind of unbearable, more than I expected." He blinks slowly, hands still hovering inches away from your torso. He hears it, you know he hears it, the way you speak so carefully about the pain without a hint of negativity. He's a sudden rush of movement, kissing you with newfound intensity, one hand coming to cup your face while the other he presses flat against the still fresh wound.
"I could kill you, you silly, porcelain thing," he groans, as if turned on by the very idea he's warning you about.
"Could you?" A breathless, wanton gasp escapes you, and it turns to a pained whimper as he presses against the wounds more insistently, which he echoes with a pleased noise of his own, "please, I need you to -"
For the first time in a long time the voices seem sated. They've had their fill of violence, of blood, of you, they're practically sick with how they've gorged themselves on all you've offered for them. But Techno himself? He loves to know just how much it hurts, and loves to make you beg for it nonetheless. He loves knowing how far you'll let him go, how much you'll endure and still ask for more. He loves the proof of your devotion. He will never get enough.
And you?
You want to wear the scars like the proof of your love for him, with pride. You now understand and appreciate the pain he's inflicted on others in your honour. You relish in knowing you can satisfy all he craves in a way that no-one else ever would.
But mostly, you crave those moments, the bloody handprints he leaves on your thighs, the gentle way he caresses the ice cold blade against your skin, and the look in his eyes as you whimper, like you're the only thing in the world that has ever mattered.
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straighttohellbuddy · 2 years
Text
die mad about it {Dream/Reader/Sapnap} // Part 1
1. 2020
Summary: A retrospective on the interconnected timeline of Dream, Sapnap, and TV and film star Y/N, via social media.
2020. Dream first mentions having a housemate and refuses to say anything else, and when it turns out Sapnap knows more than he's letting on to his audience, he plays along too. Meanwhile, Y/N brings their housemate to events and yet somehow no-one seems to even know his name.
Need to Know: They/Them. Explicitly Non-Binary!Reader, early-20s!reader, reader is an incredibly well known film & tv star and has been living with Dream for several months/just over a year. Polyamory.
{ masterpost : 1/3 }
A/N: 3794 words. OKAY HELLO FRIENDS GUESS WHO'S BACK AT IT AGAIN??? its me. but also considering this is already almost 4k i decided that splitting it up into the 3 years was a good call. it's an interesting style but i like it :)
Taglist: @esylwen @ihatesunfl0wers @theghostpeach @rainyaheysoe @magicastle
Taglist is always open! Feel free to message or comment if you'd like to be added! xx
· JUNE ·
In June of 2020, Dream mentions that he has to keep his voice down during a stream, so he doesn't wake his housemate. It is the first time he's mentioned any sort of housemate. He does not mention them again.
Twitter, abuzz, seems to all share the same sentiment:
can you imagine being Dream's roommate? Do you think they know?
· JULY ·
The first trailer for Paramount's upcoming modern, dark fantasy, thriller HELIX, directed by Robert Eggers, and starring Y/N Y/L/N and Amandla Stenberg is released on July 12, 2020. After sweeping the 2019-2020 festival circuit, finally the film will see wider release in mid-November 2020. Described as a stylistic feast, the film appears to accent it's overall Film Noir aesthetics with moments of Psycho-Pop colour and movement, and proffers itself as a deconstruction of the the modern franchise villain. It's an exploration through metaphor of the idea that both the narrative and metanarrative that a villain finds themselves in pushes them to violent extremes in spite of, or even sometimes because of, the valid critiques they make of society, which often bely an anticapitalist agenda. Alongisde this, it offers critique of the modern superhero franchise's thinly-veiled role as military propaganda in Western media. The trailer is set to an orchestral cover of Mother Mother's Body with vocals by Halsey.
· AUGUST ·
In August of 2020, Y/N attends the premiere of their new movie, The New Mutants, seen here on the red carpet with Co-Star Charlie Heaton, accompanied by a friend, who declined to share his name for privacy reasons.
Twitter user @.Y/NS_EYELASH posted the following, among retweeting other, similar supportive sentiments from fellow users:
I love Y/N knowing their needs, cos I saw an interview they did a few years ago talking about how they need someone to help them stay grounded and not anxious on red carpets /1 | but also the fact that they brought their housemate, who is for all intents and purposes Just Some Guy, who won't even give his name? Yes King, Give Us Nothing /lh /2
Several tabloid articles are written speculating about the nature of Y/N and their housemate's relationship. Y/N does not respond, but does like several tweets that discuss how the media bastardises friendships and can ruin them.
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On an alternate channel stream on August 31st, 2020, Sapnap confirms that both himself and George know, have spoken to, and consider themselves friends with Dream's housemate, but claims 'it's a bit weird sometimes, you know...' and though he trails off, he does not elaborate.
The exact reason about what Sapnap find weird about it all and why is hotly debated for a solid week. The reigning theory is jealousy that the housemate is able to see Dream in person.
· OCTOBER ·
In October 2020, at the beginning of a Zoom interview with MTV, the interviewer gives an offhand compliment about their setup and background. Y/N laughs and admits that they asked their housemate's friends for advice, and that the microphone itself is their housemate's; he also lets them borrow it for voice over work.
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Halloween 2020; #DreamWasHaunted trends on twitter after Dream mentions that his housemate dressed as a sexy ghost for Halloween. Sapnap mentions that the mysterious housemate sent him a photo of themselves in costume, again confirming that they are good friends, but also calling it surreal. The twitter @dreams-housemate-updates is created.
Also Halloween 2020, Y/N posts photos of their costume, which consists of a sheet ghost, fishnets, and high heels, captioned 'do you think they'd still let me be in the sequel 😈💖'.
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When the stream ends, and Dream has said his goodbyes, the only sound in the apartment is his PC cooling in the darkness. In moments like these he barely feels real, like he's given everything to his friends and his fans and he's only existing through wishful thinking.
Outside, he's sure countless people his age are losing themselves to the night, cool air turning sticky-hot in the modern day masquerade that was Halloween. His PC is silent, the LEDs of his set up have long since dimmed. He finally relaxes his shoulders, and in that moment the weight of the world slips from them.
Finally, he feels like he can stand.
The rest of the apartment is marginally cooler than his office, but it's still just as dark; pitch black and growing ever closer to midnight, so he turns on his phone light.
It's quiet enough that he half wonders if you've left to join the revelry for yourself, but thinks better of it. You would have at least texted him.
In his room is the only other light in the void darkness of the apartment; you're in his bed, on your side, reading something on your phone. Before he'd started the stream, you'd been going through the photos he took of you in your ghost costume, the two of you laughing hard enough to wheeze, but those few hours feel like a lifetime away. You cast enough light, he turns off his own.
Patches is curled up, purring, and refusing to move where she's decided to curl up practically on your forehead. Her eyes are alert, eyes shining in the glow of your phone screen; the minute she sees Dream she stands, stretches herself into a strange, tall shape, and nimbly running towards him, run just past him, and stand between his legs in the doorway, her tail wrapping around his shin.
Dream looks at Patches, and you look at him.
Yesterday the first episode of The Mandalorian had aired, and of your expansive audience of friends, fans, and followers, he was the only one who saw the way you were almost sick with nervous worry.
Now, your thumb on the screen keeps it from timing out, keeps your face aglow and tired eyes visible. His duvet is pulled up to your nose. He hadn't really expected this, but he's glad for it. No words, no sounds, the ringing in his ears in the darkness.
He pulls off his shirt, leaving him only in sweatpants, and he eases the phone out of your grip. In the moment before he locks your phone, he sees you've been going through your Twitter DMs. There's no light now, his curtains drawn, and the apartment quiet. You shuffle over to make room for him in the dark.
His touch is gentle in the dark, at first to make sure he doesn't collide with you, but then he doesn't let go. You shuffle back. The space lessens between you, and with his hand on your hip, you carefully lean to rest your forehead against his.
"I'm so tired," your voice is a weak, forlorn whisper, and he wraps his arm more securely around you.
Both swallowed by the darkness, by the silence, you know the world can't get to you here. This is a sanctuary.
There's no grand gestures, no declarations, but nothing is quite the same once you both wake up. Not different, just better.
· NOVEMBER ·
FIlming for the upcoming CW show 'Walker' starring Jared Padeleki commenced in Austin, Texas commenced in mid-October of 2020, however in early November, Y/N has been announced as an upcoming guest star in it's first season, and is travelling to film on location. Among various updates on Twitter and Instagram, they post 'turns out i can't 'Netflix and Chill',,, my friends and colleagues going on well produced adventures in the background kinda ruins the mood lmfao'.
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@.dreams-housemate-updates: SAPNAP HAS MET UP WITH THE HOUSEMATE [quote tweet from @.sapnapalt: can confirm @dream's secret housemate is real and also they're mine now sorry no takebacks]
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On his stream on November 3rd, 2020, Sapnap announces that Dream's housemate has been in town for work. While his chat is clamouring for answers as to who they are, he says they're sitting next to him, but communicate by text, not wanting to be identified by their voice.
"Did you take the job just to visit me?" In a clip from the stream, Sapnap's voice is overwhelmingly fond. After a moment, he adds, "I knew it, you're such a simp, you could have just asked- I won't take it back," he laughs loud and bright, "you literally took a whole job as an excuse to come visit me; you're a simp." And we can hear what is the the first and only, to this point, distinct clip of Dream's Housemate as they laugh.
Three days later, November 6, 2020, Sapnap tweets from his alt account about an impromptu watch party with Dream's Housemate for The Mandalorian Season 2, Episode 2, just after it releases:
@.sapnapalt: excited to be able to watch the new #TheMandalorian episode with dream's housemate since they know more about this series than anyone else i will probably ever meet | @.sapnapalt: #HousemateMandalorianWatchParty yeah sure but also i don't think you all fully realise WHY this is the best and worst thing ive been a part of | @.sapnapalt: immediately after watching the recap "i feel like I should remember more of that happening. or any of it." off to a GREAT start #HousemateMandalorianWatchParty | @.sapnapalt: "not to give anakin skywalker any props but he was right about sand" #HousemateMandalorianWatchParty | @.sapnapalt: "prop department my beloveds" #HousemateMandalorianWatchParty | @.sapnapalt: "costume department my beloveds" #HousemateMandalorianWatchParty | @.sapnapalt: "Pedro Pascal and his tiny muppet child my beloveds" #HousemateMandalorianWatchParty | @.sapnapalt: "tell your followers i just have a lot of love in my heart" #HousemateMandalorianWatchParty | @.sapnapalt: "tweet @.Disney that i (HousemateWasTaken) should kiss pedro pascal in season 3" #HousemateMandalorianWatchParty | @.sapnapalt: "dont tell dream tho. not because i think he'd be jealous, but id feel bad if i got to kiss pedro pascal and he didn't." #HousemateMandalorianWatchParty | @.sapnapalt: "i don't know if he wants to kiss pedro but it'd still feel unfair to me" #HousemateMandalorianWatchParty | @.dreamwastaken: i give it five minutes before they've forgotten about the episode and just actively start simping for the cast and crew ❤️
Y/N also tweeted on 6 November, 2020. As a guest star on The Mandalorian Season 1, who had been promoted to series regular for Season 2, each week they retweet several posts around the time the new episode airs. This week, they also tweeted 'it doesn't matter if ive known you five minutes or five years, if you ask to watch an episode of #TheMandalorian with me that i tell you im in, you should know that one of the things i tell you when we watch it will be 100% false and i will not tell you which' followed by 'brb tryna convince this cute guy that some of baby yoda is repurposed Kermit the Frog'.
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As of the middle of November, 2020, there is wild speculation about who Y/N was rumoured to be seeing whilst in Texas, though no evidence beyond two tweets from the beginning of the month point to them being close to anyone. Several Instagram story posts have highlighted their love of the people around them in the state, and also deriding the several paparazzi they've had following them.
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"You wanna come with me to New York?" Sunday brought with it the cruel anticipation of Monday just around the corner, but with your face pressed to Sapnap's chest it's easy to shut out the rest of the world, "all expenses paid." Your can't even be bothered to hold back your yawn.
"You want me at your premiere?" There's a smile in his voice that you've come to love the sound of, and his fingertips are tracing patterns across your shoulders. You give a hum of confirmation; his hand stills, palm warm against your back even through your shirt.
"Just got you all to myself, I don't wanna leave yet," it comes out as a contented mumble, holding him a little tighter, "I missed you, dude."
"What, yesterday while you were at set?" He huffs a faint laugh.
"Before that, before we were all, you know," you finally raise your face to look at him, "I... yeah I missed you." There's a flush on his cheeks that you hadn't been expecting, and his eyes are so warm and kind.
"I can't go to New York with you," he says so very gently, which you'd been expecting, but was still faintly disappointing to hear, "it'd be too much of a giveaway, for you and for Dream." And you knew he was right, but you'd still wanted to offer. Still, after a moment, you see the regret in his eyes, "I can't believe I'm turning down meeting Chris Evans," he groaned. At this, you propped yourself up on your hands so you could lean in and give him a soft kiss.
"There's always next time," you assured, and that seems to be enough for him, as he's grinning when he pulls you back in.
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'HousemateWasTaken | Dream's Housemate (Video Blogging RPF)' is now a recognised character tag on ArchiveOfOurOwn, with thirty-four fics; twenty-nine were posted between November 6 and 30. There are thirteen fics in the tag 'Clay | Dream/Sapnap/HousemateWasTaken', and two in the tag 'Clay | Dream/Pedro Pascal/HousemateWasTaken'.
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HELIX premiered in New York on November 17th, 2020, and Y/N attends wearing a black, impecably tailored suit with blood-red embroidery and neon pink accessories, as a stylistic homage to the film itself, and matching their co-star Amandla Stenberg, dressed almost identically with sienna embroidery and neon orange detailing. Highlights from the red carpet interviews and photos include:
The moment Y/N and Amandla first see each other and practically run to hug one another in greeting, beaming.
Y/N posing with Chris Evan and Katie McGrath, like the child in an awkward family photo.
Any and all interviews with both Y/N and Amandla being so bright and joyful that it's almost incoherent, the most notable of which is, after being asked what it was like filming with Chris Evans, both leads turn to each other and just start asking 'Dad Evans?' in a loop, as if its the continuation of some long-running inside joke. It culminates with Chris Evans himself joining them, and both of the young leads cheering 'Dad Evans!' when he does. He regards them both very fondly, seemingly used to this behaviour, and both Y/N and Amandla both then answer the interviewer's initial question with glowing praise for Evans. He gives them both a kiss on the top of the head before they all move on to the next interview.
Y/N arm in arm with the director and the writer, standing tall and looking unshakably confident.
From rogerebert.com:
HELIX (four and a half stars)
In an age where no month is spared from the new release of a slick, shiny blockbuster made for the masses, we are constantly fed black and white morality, and worlds where even shades of grey never seem to stay that way for long. Director Robert Egger's genre-defying 'HELIX' is the refreshing and eloquent open hate-letter to this cult of personality that is the modern, franchise, superhero film, that we as a society didn't realise we so desperately needed. It's a film that will leave you feeling sick and cynical as you walk out of the theatre, but before you're even halfway home you'll be craving a second viewing, whether it be for the style, the story, or the meaning behind it all. From the desaturated design populated with violent, sparing colour, to the masterful way we slip and merge between an ironically upbeat, alternative soundtrack and deeply unsettling orchestral, it all serves to augment the oftentimes chillingly grounded performances which carry this heavy story.
Y/N in the role of protagonist, the supervillain Woolfe, is a masterclass of subtle discomfort unto themselves from the very moment the film begins. Their nuanced idiosyncrasies are relatable and believable as we spend time with them going about their day. The moments linger perhaps a second too long, which, while easy to consciously miss, subtly adds to the distinct impression that Woolfe is out of sync with the rest of the world. As we continue on, and Y/N continues to captivate us as we watch Woolfe's moral, mental, and ethical decline into violent hedonism and depravity, its terrifyingly easy to understand and believe their character progression and decisions, even if we don't agree with it, even if it's completely reprehensible. There's a queasiness that comes the moment you start seeing Woolfe as both a monster and a mirror.
[read more]
It should also be noted that in the afternoon of November 17th, 2020, just hours before the premiere began, Y/N tweeted the following:
my stylist is worried that im nervous for the premiere (which you should all see; wide release across North America with midnight screenings tonight) but idk how to tell her im actually fucked up over yesterday's events in a minecraft youtube rp | me 🤝 @.WilburSoot playing characters whose rapidly declining mental state and increasing disenfranchisement have lead to extreme, violent, detrimental outcomes, and being villainised by our narratives. | askdashkldf my housemate just messaged me 'why are you like this'.. its funnier with context, but its also funny without because honestly im kinda asking myserlf the same lol | MY CUTE FRIEND FROM TEXAS JUST ASKED ME IF I KIN DREAM I HATE IT HERE | edit: dream is FINE okay?? having kins is ALSO FINE,, none of that is the issue but i can't elaborate on what is the issue asakdfjlsdkjf i have a premiere to get to .. | i cant believe people think i have a PR team lmfao anyways | but also hello to dsmp enjoyers who might be finding me now, if u watched yesterday's events and were rooting for either wilbur or especially techno, boy do i have the movie for you! .... also everyone else! HELIX slaps and im excited to share it wit you all!
This marks the first time Y/N has acknowledged any part of the MCYT community publicly. It's the breakdown of a barrier; several content creators had been following you already due to your status as a public figure, but you now follow several content creators back, including both Sapnap and Dream.
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A fanfiction titled 'did you mean it (when you said i was better off dead)' was posted to Archive of Our Own on November 30, 2020 with the following tags: Dream SMP - Fandom, HELIX (2020), Woolfe (HELIX)/Wilbur Soot, Wilbur Soot & Phil Watson (Video Blogging RPF), Hurt/Comfort, Fix-It Fic, Implied Suicidal Ideation, self aware!woolfe, ghostbur - freeform, FUCK dr michael chris evans all my homies HATE dr michael chris evans, inspired by a tweet, Crack Treated Seriously, on GOD we're gonna get woolfe some love and affection.
· DECEMBER ·
With December of 2020 comes a vague update to Y/N's public relationship status in the form of a photo of a sleeping tabby cat, curled up at the bottom of an unmade bed, posted to Y/N's Instagram story with a poll; Is it morally wrong to date a guy just because you're sad his cat chooses to sleep at the end of his bed and not yours? [Responses: YES (38%) | NO (62%)]
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Throughout December, various interviews and clips from the press junket for HELIX are released on various websites and platforms while the film is still in theatres.
"Are you bringing your roommate to the premiere?" Amandla asks in what appears to be a little bit of down-time between questions while the camera is still rolling.
"That lovely, tall fellow?" Katie McGrath leaned past Chris Evans to look at you, and you smiled brightly but shook your head with bemusement.
"I do like it when he can join me but he does this, like, freelance media production stuff and he's kind of part of this huge project right now, so I have no idea how he'll be for November," you explained with a shrug and a smile.
"Do we know his name and I've just forgotten or is he still cultivating that air of mystery?" Amandla snorts, leaning against you further on the sofa. You shift to make yourself more comfortable, tipping your head to hers.
"Still a man of mystery," you laughed fondly, and the interviewer quickly cleared his throat, next question prepared.
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On a chill stream near the middle of December, 2020, Dream mentions that his housemate technically has Technoblade fanart printed and stuck up around their room.
"I think they're making a shrine," he says mildly, trying to stay neutral even as Sapnap is wheezing with laughter.
"Oh man, they're so gonna hate that you called it that!" He crowed, just as there comes a loud, insistent banging on Dream's door. Sapnap's passed the point of audible laughter.
"Can I help you?" Dream sounds all kinds of smug and teasing, despite how quiet he seems to have gotten since moving away from his microphone. Whoever is at the door, presumably his housemate, is not audible, "it's a little bit of a shrine," he appears to counter some sort of silent argument, "it's his quotes, like three seperate- more than one is a shrine -" there's the faintest sounds of movement, and something that sounds like a hand coming to slap a door or wall, "if you're gonna have a shrine of anyone it should be me or Sap," as if that's somehow a logical argument, "no, like an official one with candles, and the pictures closer togeth-" and his words are cut off very suddenly. Then, after a considerable amount of silence, and to much the shock of everyone both in and watching the stream, the housemate can be heard.
"You're lucky you're cute." It's so quiet half the words can't even be properly heard, and it's not enough to reveal the true identity of the housemate, but it's not hard to figure out what had been said.
The door closes; Dream clears his throat when he's back by his computer.
"They have photos of me up?" Sapnap's tone is all fond and warm, completely ignoring the fact that the stream had heard the housemate's voice very faintly... and were also quickly jumping to conclusions about how they'd shut Dream up so quickly.
"Yeah, the cute ones from when they visited last month."
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The Archive of Our Own tag 'Clay | Dream/Sapnap/HousemateWasTaken' has 22 fics by the end of 2020, and while there are around 27 fics in 'Clay | Dream/HousemateWasTaken', approximately 15 are also tagged with some variation of 'Clay | Dream/Reader', 'Housemate!Reader', or both.
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And shortly after midnight on New Year's Eve, bringing 2020 to a close, Y/N posted the following on Twitter:
EVERYONE SHUT UP ITS 2021 IM MAKING A HIT TWEET ahem. 🥰 this year's midnight kiss was a dream 🥰
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straighttohellbuddy · 2 years
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die mad about it {cc!Dream/Reader/cc!Sapnap}
Summary: A retrospective on the interconnected timeline of Dream, Sapnap, and TV and film star Y/N, via social media.
Need to Know: They/Them. Explicitly Non-Binary!Reader, early-20s!reader, reader is an incredibly well known film & tv star and has been living with Dream for several months/just over a year. Polyamory.
{ p l a y l i s t }
Citrus Scale: 🧡 ORANGE 🧡
[ IN-PROGRESS ]
2020
2021
2022
Taglist is always open! Feel free to message or comment if you'd like to be added! xx
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Okay so I'm working on a different thing that had me thinking about my fics and music, and a fully formed music video idea sprung into my head when I thought about Rabbit Heart (Raise it Up) and my ghostbur series 'midas'. so now, here. you don't have to have read midas to enjoy this but it probably helps. basic context is that reader lost all three lives and is a ghost now;
The looking glass, so shiny and new How quickly the glamour fades I start spinning, slipping out of time Was that the wrong pill to take? (Raise it up)
The entire first stanza is Reader before they lose their final life, the initial joy with the others after winning L'Manberg's independence, the Reader seeming lost and uncomfortable and lashing out at Q during the election arc, which causes them to lose their final life.
You made a deal, and now it seems you have to offer up But will it ever be enough? (Raise it up, raise it up) It's not enough (Raise it up, raise it up)
The Reader waking up outside of L'Manberg and realising that 1. they're dead, 2. that their pride got them killed, and 3. with the last line there they see that Schlatt & Q won the election.
Here I am, a rabbit hearted girl Frozen in the headlights It seems I've made the final sacrifice
As the Reader walks through the streets they're horrified to see how things are changing, how their friends are being treated, but are too afraid to reveal themselves to anyone. As these scenes all take place at night they're all heavily saturated in blue, but the reader's touch as they run their hands across walls, fences, everythying, it stains a bright, vivid gold.
We raise it up, this offering We raise it up
The visuals turns fluid and colour rich as we see the Reader painting gold across the town, but we never see exactly what they're writing/drawing.
This is a gift, it comes with a price Who is the lamb and who is the knife? Midas is king and he holds me so tight And turns me to gold in the sunlight
The Reader turns sharply to look over their shoulder, as if caught, but we transition to another scene entirely where they're looking at L'Manberg. We see their expression turn horrified and they start running desperately, camera following them with a wide shot so we see the detonation of L'Manberg at 'who is the lamb and who is the knife?'. We cut to the Reader in the tunnel, expression distraught, sunlight filtering in from the crater at the end of the tunnel. We cut to a wide shot of the Reader on the far left of the screen, and Philza sitting with his back against the wall on the far right, sunlight filtering in bright from Phil's side. Seperating them and taking up most of the screen is the words 'I was always fighting for it's soldiers' in large, shining, gold letters.
I look around, but I can't find you (raise it up) If only I could see your face (raise it up) Instead of rushing towards the skyline (raise it up)
The Reader reconnects with their old friends, but searches for Wilbur, seeing echoes of moments they shared in places that are now stained gold. It's clear they're happy to reconnect but distracted all the while, hoping, searching.
I wish that I could just be brave
A hand takes the Reader's, staining them blue the way their touch stains gold.
I must become a lion hearted girl Ready for a fight
We see shock on the Reader's face; they're positioned directly in the sunlight, and so the reverse shot that reveals Ghostbur has him illuminated in gold by the sunset, smiling so warmly at them.
Before I make the final sacrifice
The Reader reaches out and touches Ghostbur's cheek and he leans into the touch; when their hand moves, because of how rich the light of the sunset is, it simply appears as a glittery kind of highlight.
We raise it up, this offering We raise it up
We cut to a wide shot of this moment, as if to give the couple their privacy, slowly rotating around them, showing them to be standing over the rubble of L'Manberg, both bathed in the gold of the sunlight while the rubble beneath them glints occasionally with old, gold stains. Both are full of joy, both taking this moment to be close and to finally reconnect.
This is a gift, it comes with a price Who is the lamb and who is the knife? Midas is king and he holds me so tight And turns me to gold in the sunlight
Absolute joy. Montage of building their house in the woods. Friend (the lamb) has a special place just for him in their house, and weapons (the knife) are used only for decoration. We get domestic closeness and romantic moments for the last two stanzas.
Raise it up, raise it up Raise it up, raise it up
The next four shots are all taken in the kitchen, the camera is in the same place for all as it cuts through each shot. The first is a conversation with Phil that is clearly very warm and chill. The second is phil and techno, again mostly chill. The third is with Tommy and the Reader is clearly kind of distressed about whatever is being discussed. The fourth is Tommy, Tubbo, and Ranboo in conversation with Ghostbur looking very serious, while the reader is behind them all in the doorframe, clearly anxious but not wanting to say anything.
And in the spring I shed my skin And it blows away with the changing wind
Ghostbur is clearly leaving for something, he takes the reader's face in his hands and says something reassuring to them, and they nod but can't meet his eyes. He kisses them on the forehead.
The waters turn from blue to red As towards the sky I offer it
Ghostbur steps out of frame, and the Reader watches him leave but doesn't move to stop him, just looks upset by it all. As we pull back, Ghostbur closes the door of their little house that is painted in blue and gold, bathing the reader in shadows.
This is a gift, it comes with a price Who is the lamb -
The reader is outside, though it is later in the night, and they stop, having found something. Their expression is distressed.
and who is the knife?
We cut to a very wide shot of Tommy, Tubbo, and Ranboo, tiny at the bottom of the screen as the Prison looms large and imposing, filling up the entire rest of the screen behind them.
Midas is king and he holds me so tight And turns me to gold in the sunlight
The Reader's expression absolutely shatters as the situation is fully explained to them; Ranboo and Tubbo immediately come to comfort them. The Reader crumples.
This is a gift, it comes with a price
There's a fluid, stylised transition to the reveal of what happened, of Ghostbur going into the prison and Tommy's panic and distress when Ghostbur becomes trapped with Dream.
Who is the lamb and who is the knife?
The walls are rising so Tommy can't see exactly what happens, only that Dream is approaching Ghostbur with malevolence and Ghostbur is panicking too. As the wall rises, the screen too goes black.
Midas is king and he holds me so tight And turns me to gold in the sunlight
We cut back to an over the shoulder shot from behind Tommy where he can see Tubbo and Ranboo comforting the Reader. The sun appears to be rising behind him. He turns, seems both horrified and full of apprehension. The other two who were comforting the reader also look up.
This is a gift, it comes with a price Who is the lamb and who is the knife?
As the song goes into its final chorus we linger on a long shot of the reader as Tubbo and Ranboo leave them to walk in the direction of the rising sun. The Reader is obviously crying, but soon they look up, distraught and confused.
Midas is king and he holds me so tight
They stand, confusion turning to hope as they walk further into the light, and they briefly try and shield their eyes to get a better look.
And turns me to gold in the sunlight
We cut to a shot of Wilbur painted gold in the sunlight, smiling broadly, until he shifts enough to put the sun directly behind him, and with his face now in shadow its clear; there is no gold on him, he is Revivebur, not Ghostbur, and there's something mean about the way he's smiling.
This is a gift
We cut back to the Reader, now standing in his shadow, and in the final show we watch their tentative hope turn to despair as they realise what this means, that the Ghost they love is gone.
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straighttohellbuddy · 2 years
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but you're talking in your sleep {Wilbur Soot}
one. does she still think of me
Summary: Two years ago, you'd met Wil Gold in a pub shortly after moving to London, but ended up falling out of contact when it turned out your ex-boyfriend moved to try and make things work... Completely unrelated, but lately Tommy's started complaining to Wilbur about his sister bringing her insufferable boyfriend home for Christmas, and Wilbur's wondering where he's heard your name before.
Need to Know: She/Her, implied early 20s, Sister-Innit!Reader. it is never stated or even implied whether Tommy & the reader are related by blood or otherwise, so that's up to you, and while there are mentions of reader celebrating christmas, it's more because Tommy's family celebrates it. reader is said to be studying literature at university. please heed the warnings.
A/N: 8533 words. fuck it, i'm posting now unedited. part 2 tomorrow. part 3 day after that. 3 days three parts lets go. ive put my grubby little hands all over lovejoy's songs and decided many are about the reader because its my wish fulfilment fantasy and i can do what i want. if you take one look at the pacing i'll bite you, but if you comment or send me an ask about the fic i'll kiss you on the mouth. ALSO MARK IS AN OC, not a cc.
Warnings: drinking (both recreationally and Situational Alcohol Abuse*), implied emotional & verbal manipulation/abuse, emotional cheating ??
[ * while this fic deals with heavy drinking as a coping mechanism, it is situational alcohol abuse, not alcoholism, which is why, in the later parts, it appears easier to resolve (in a sense) than alcoholism. source? i'm a recovering alcoholic, trust me, i know serious alcoholism doesn't usually have an on-off switch. ]
{ masterpost : 1 / 3 }
{ p l a y l i s t }
Taglist: @marvelsmurphy @automaticcomputerpaper @kattenprinsen @parkerpeanuts @bumblebea-xo @lovehatewhateveritis @rainyaheysoe @tcphat @smol-flower-kiddo @pogface @luluwinchester @captainpuffyrp @dreamerwasfound @pepe-lepe @njhrecord @auralol @moonlightaura03 @the-friendly-ghostwrite @blaisey-bee @kingudon @friendwasfound @ahsteriawrites @eeyore-onthefloor @30-minutes-into-the-future @rexgoesrawrrrrrr @arielting @laneunderwave @axeofwars @hoezeeor @lightninginab0ttle @irwinkitten @gyneve @stoop18 @franaby @ozdramaqueen @moriiartist @ticcisimon
Taglist is always open!!
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"Y/N is bringing Mark home for Christmas," Tommy mutters with distracted disdain one evening over a Discord VC; Wilbur's the only other one in the chat with him, the two of them waiting for Charlie and Tubbo to join to film a video. Tommy's tone comes as a surprise; for all that his online persona is boisterous and rather egocentric, the kid himself was quite kind and well mannered, so genuine dislike, bordering on actual contempt, was enough to pique Wilbur's interest.
"Not a fan of Mark, are we?"
"He's really ruining the name Mark," Tommy answers without hesitation, the thoughts clearly having plagued him for a while, "but Y/N got mad at me the last time I called him The Inferior Mark over text -"
"Sorry," Wilbur cuts him off, "Y/N?" That's what breaks Tommy from his distracted ranting, giving pause and sighing deeply. The clatter of his keyboard stops.
"My older sister;" he says, tone far warmer, "she's in London doing cool Uni things, but for some stupid reason is still dating Milquetoast Mark, who is decidedly less cool, but he was nice to her in high school so now I have to look at his face every time she comes home to visit."
"Milquetoast Mark?"
"The man is the very essence of beige, Wilbur," Tommy groaned, pitching himself back in his chair, vaguely muffled, as if holding his face in his hands, "he looks like a clown themed whack-a-mole, but I still couldn't pick him out of a line-up of one!"
There's so many things Wilbur wants to ask as he's trying not to laugh, but before he can decide which to go with first, Discord alerts them to the fact that Tubbo joined the call, and he doesn't even get to say hello before Tommy's groaning loudly.
"She's bringing Milquetoast Mark, and I'm going to eat dirt," Tommy whined, and Tubbo made a noise of understanding.
"Yeah, she warned me that she'd just told you," he says with an air of commiseration.
"Tell Wilbur! I don't think he believes me that Mark is the personification of bloody nothing!"
"Mark is..." Tubbo muses for a moment, but as soon as he can get a word in edgewise, Wilbur pipes up.
"Okay, hold on, I do believe you, but how long have we known each other? How is this the first time I'm hearing about you having a sister?" He's half laughing, though there's confusion in his voice.
"Mark's not a fan of being known or having fun, so I don't mention them a lot," Tommy mutters, "she's wanted to do YouTube for ages but -" he huffs irately through his nose, but doesn't finish his thought.
"She only made friends with me to spite Tommy," Tubbo added, "she called me The Superior Brother," his voice was gleeful, Wilbur didn't have to see him to know he was practically preening.
"I assume this was not long after Tommy called her boyfriend The Inferior Mark," Wilbur snickers, and Tommy's loud sigh, and Tubbo's delighted laughter is confirmation enough.
Charlie joins not long after, and the video goes on ahead without a hitch, though in the back of his mind, something about the name of Tommy's sister was familiar to him. He's not quite sure, but doesn't think much more about it.
Tommy messages him with various plots against this mysterious Milquetoast Mark, including serving him actual milk-drenched-toast as a snide reminder of how Tommy feels about him. It's usually accompanied by screenshots of his messages to his sister, who's already shot down whatever ludicrous idea he's had.
Wilbur's not quite sure why Tommy keeps messaging about his sister, but it's rather endearing; considering only himself and Tubbo know of Y/N's existence online, he takes it as a sign of trust. It's not often enough for him to really notice at first, once every few days, asking for advice on potential Christmas presents, or telling Wilbur about how he's excited to hang out around town with his sister and Tubbo, but as Wilbur learns more, he gets more and more of that sense of strange familiarity, like he's met this woman before. Maybe your name's familiar, or your choice of study, Literature of all things, or maybe it's a weirdly familiar sentiment he thinks he hears in Tommy's words, knowing he's heard it before -
"She wants to be a uni professor, what a nerd," despite his words, the way Tommy says them is drenched in pride and affection.
He gets a photo with two incredibly blurry, nearly unidentifiable figures in the foreground, and he only discerns the one on the left is Tommy by the height, colour pallet, the indistinct delight on his face, and the fact that he was the one literally crash tackling the second figure into a blur of motion with his hug. In the background, a man Wilbur didn't recognise with dark hair in a blue polo shirt was watching the movement with mild disdain. Three minutes after the first photo is sent, a second comes through that is just zoomed in on the man in the background's face so it filled the whole screen in a truly unflattering way, with the word 'BITCH' typed in big, red letters across the bottom of the screen. The second photo is simply captioned 'mark 😠'.
[Y/N home?] Wilbur sends, giving a faint smile at Tommy's exuberance.
[mark is in my fucking house wilbur 😠] Tommy responds, adding [and i can't call him a bitch to his face because Y/N will get upset with me so im telling you] and then sends through a second, new photo just of Mark's face with the word 'BITCH' over it. Wilbur gets new photos nearly identical to the second and third sporadically throughout the days that follow, but never any photos of Y/N herself.
But his suspicions are confirmed less than a week after your arrival at Nottingham.
[wilbur you're the only one that knows i have a sister outside of tubbo so you're also the only one who i can tell that tubbo is going to be banned from my house. i hate them both] Tommy sends to Wilbur one fine afternoon, and it's not long after Wilbur sends back a confused but amused message that he gets a video chat request over Discord.
When he answers, the entire screen is filled with Tommy's frowning face.
"You see what I have to put up with?" Tommy grumbles, flipping the camera around to where Y/N and Tubbo were sitting on the sofa, hugging each other almost comically close, with Tubbo's head on your shoulder, and your cheek resting on his head as he was quietly talking about plans he had for upcoming videos.
"What is happening?" Wilbur laughs, finally grabbing both your and Tubbo's attention.
"She called him the superior brother," Tommy huffed, "they've been like this for half an hour." Neither you nor Tubbo move, but Tubbo does wave.
"I said 'superior brother - comma - parasocial'," you clarified, "and I Tubbs is only here for a few days; you're acting like you and I didn't spend a full hour the day I got back both trying to fit on your gaming chair while you showed me memes and art people have done of you," and Tommy, at the very least, conceded on that, right before you ask who he's talking to.
Looking back to his phone screen finally, Tommy gives a slight frown; when had Wilbur turned his camera off?
"Will, you still there?"
"'s Wilbur," Tubbo clarified for you, right around the time your phone went off, and you let go of Tubbo to pick it up, eyes going wide as you quickly pressed the phone to your chest so Tubbo couldn't glimpse at the screen while you crowed with laughter.
"That Wilbur!" You exclaimed, "I was eighty percent sure it was you but not enough to -"
"What are you talking about?" Tommy asked, right as Wilbur turned his camera back on; he was sitting at his desk looking deeply shocked. You, however, were detangling yourself from Tubbo, phone still pressed tightly to your chest as you stood. Both boys were audibly confused, while Wilbur was hiding half his face behind his steepled fingers, as if waiting. He didn't have to wait long, however, as once you stand and slide your phone into your pocket, you step into the space beside Tommy as he switches the camera back around so yourself and your brother could both be seen.
"Hello Wil Gold," you say cheerfully, and before Wilbur can even splutter through his various confused and suddenly alarmed thoughts, you turned to Tommy, "Wil and I used to hang out at the same bars early in my first year."
"You know him? Why didn't you say anything!?" Tommy exclaimed, "we've had extensive discussions about my videos that he's in!" Then, after a beat, he practically yells, “is Wilbur Soot your friend ‘Tall Will’?”
"Our friend Tall Will," you correct him with sage amusement, before conceding, "and, I mean, evidently- but like I said, I wasn't a hundred percent sure -!" You fired back, a little flustered at being called out, though finally Wilbur found his voice.
"As opposed to all your short friends named Will?" He asked, incredulous.
“Tell me I’m wrong!” You crowed, responding without even missing a beat, rolling your eyes.
“It’s your name in her phone,” Tommy pipes up, nose in the air, still making an attempt at betrayal. You, however, look directly at the camera, smile all Cheshire-wide and knowing.
"I’ll let him continue to believe that," and when your words come out all kinds of smug, Wilbur’s phone seems to conveniently fall flat, now pointing at his roof.
"Then what is his name in your phone?" Tubbo asked, still intrigued and on the peripheries of this unexpected event. Wilbur himself was mercifully quiet.
"It's too mean, I can't tell you," you lied, looking at the boy over your shoulder, though were honest when you added, "and I'm going to change it anyways since I now know it's your friend Wilbur," and you pinched Tommy on the cheek for effect, even as he tried to slap your hand away, even as he automatically corrected you.
"Our," he mutters without even really thinking about it, before he's imploring you, "come on, tell us please," while he's leaning against you hard enough that the pair of you almost toppled over. Despite your laughter, you adamantly refuse, making your way back to the sofa, however as you flop back down beside Tubbo, Tommy is quick to follow suit, and throws himself like a starfish over both of you.
The sound of your bright laughter as you squabble with your brother hit Wilbur square in the chest, and he ends the call.
He's kind of grateful that it was a short call, but can't help but think about the fact that it's been well over a year and a half since the last time the two of you had spoken. He keeps reading the texts. He can't believe he hasn't deleted them, that he still has the same bloody phone.
[Wilbur: you coming out tonight? feels like forever since we've hung out]
[your future hot lit professor 🍑📚💖:it's been like 2 days 😅]
[Wilbur: still tho]
[Wilbur: don't make me say i've missed you]
[your future hot lit professor 🍑📚💖: im sorry,, mark's taking me to a movie tonight. i'll have to catch you another time]
[Wilbur: ah don't worry about it, have a good night]
And then it was nothing. Absolutely nothing for almost two years. Until today.
[Wilbur: weird question, are you currently hugging a kid called Tubbo?]
You hadn't even opened the message, which means his name is still saved in your phone, and you knew it was him the moment the message had popped up on your lock screen.
Later, he'll text you as his curiosity gets the better of him, asking privately this time what his name is in your phone.
[i can't believe you forgot! neither the name itself nor the emojis i added was something i could admit in front of my little brother and his best friend so i'm definitely immediately changing it, but......😅] and your accompanying screenshot has him blushing scarlet and putting his phone down as he took a moment to recover.
It was unfortunately, however, confirmation that you were the exact same Y/N that he'd had a six week fling with at the start of his third year of uni after meeting you at a bar, offering to show you the sights of London since you had said you were new to the area. The sights had definitely included his bedroom -
And suddenly he's reminded of the grateful surprise in your eyes when he'd brought you tea when you'd woken up, how you'd held the mug to your chest with one hand like you were afraid someone was going to steal it, phone in the other, how you half smirked as he'd settled back against his headboard carefully -
"I don't mean to be forward, but does this mean I can get your number?"
And there'd been no hesitation, no considerations for 'wait isn't this a one-time thing?' or the fact that you'd known each other for about 12 hours in total. You didn't have to stay; he's had girls leave with little fanfare, girls who tried not to wake him, and girls who whose promise to call him some time was obviously a lie. For his part, Wilbur was well aware he didn't have to get you tea, didn't have to bring it in to you while you had remained tucked under his duvet. He wasn't above subjecting girls to the awkwardly polite small talk his housemates would inflict upon them while they all sat around the table of questionable stability eating breakfast, and he's pretty sure none of those girls left with his number in their phone.
But you, new to the city and didn't owe him shit, especially not when he used that information to hit on you in one of his less graceful pick up attempts, and you turned out to be warm and funny and honest - "If you want me to go, I'll go, no hard feelings, we barely know each other, I get it dude -" and you laugh so hard you almost spill your tea when you read what he'd saved his name as in your phone.
You'd named yourselves in each other's phones almost two years ago, and now had to live with the consequences of never changing them. Was that really what he'd wanted you to remember him for at time? He's not wrong persay, but still... The guitar and eggplant emojis you've added are mocking him, he's sure of it.
And now he had to look Tommy in the eyes and act like he didn't sleep with his sister. Several times.
Fuck, the fates must be finding this funny.
[thank you for being so good to tommy] you sent, which surprised him, as does your follow up message [always knew you were a good sort]. For a few moments he blinks at the messages, still glancing at the name your future hot lit professor in bold letters at the top of his screen.
[he's a good kid] Wilbur sends back without really thinking.
[he's the best 😊] it seems that for all Tommy was excited to see you and talk about you, the sentiment was mutual; it would have been heart-warming if the new context didn't make it vaguely disconcerting.
He wants to ask - well, he wants to ask a lot of things. Do you know how Tommy feels about your boyfriend? Was the Mark you were with now the same Mark you'd gotten back with back when you knew each other? But instead, he chooses to go with -
[you really didn't recognise me before now? me and your brother have been making content for months now] he points out, and he works more on the world for his next one-hundred-player streams. It takes him a moment, but before you've sent through the response you’re working on, he can't help but add [I've MET him. i've met your dad].
[i mean i did recognise you but it would be weird trying to explain to tommy,, not even because of what happened but i really didn't want to explain HOW i recognised you. i don't even want to admit it now 😅] but of course your answer piques his interest, and he eggs you on. Which almost immediately comes back to bite him, since the first thing you send through is that you've seen a lot of the DreamSMP. Every single potential moment you would have possibly seen flashes through his mind, and he's kind of dreading which of them was the one that made you go 'oh I know him!'. Even you seem hesitant, as it's taking you an awfully long time to finish your next message, and he hasn't touched his keyboard.
[um.] It took you four minutes to send this. Four minutes. [you're gonna laugh.......]
[actually maybe i don't want to know] he responds, and the typing bubble from you suddenly stops. For a moment, he breathes a sigh of relief, content with never knowing, however you start typing again and his head hits the desk, dreading your answer. His phone buzzes several time before he feels as though he can handle whatever you've sent, and he reads the messages waiting for him from you;
[so like i said i was 80% sure i knew you]
[and also i watch most of the big smp stuff from tommy's pov obviously]
[but then i got this confirmation and it kind of made me really happy because i was sad we fell out of touch but im glad you and tom are friends you know?]
[so 80% sure ...... then 100% ,,,,, uh. not EXACTLY what I remember but close enough that i was sure it was you, yanno?]
You're stalling.
[i'm dreading this please just tell me before the suspense kills me] he sends. He's even more embarrassed than he'd predicted, staring at the link you'd sent with a blank kind of horror.
All Reactions Of Wilbur Blowing Up L'manburg During the War On Dream SMP
He knows exactly how and why you recognised him, the face he'd been making, the show he'd been putting on, and he's pretty sure he can never look Tommy in the eye ever again.
[actually the knowing is worse lol] Wilbur sends, [this is how Pandora felt].
[probably hahaha,,,] then less than a minute later, [but maybe you should look back in the box, I hear there's something good to come out of this]
[Hope?] He hopes you can read the wryness of his response, but is pretty sure it won't translate.
[something like that I guess] you send, [maybe it's just me but I'm gonna be honest I'm glad I get to talk to you again]
[hi Y/N] he can't help but grin at your earnestness as he presses send.
[hi wilbur 😊💖]
He's so fucked.
And maybe he finds your Instagram, because you and Tommy are following each other, and he knows he's can't follow you, can't even like one of your posts, because his fans watch his likes and following list with - ha - fanatical attention. But you're smiling so brightly, holding hands with the man he knows is Mark as recently as last week, and there's a strange, unwelcome sensation in his chest. He closes the app before he can scroll too far; he's not trying to be masochistic today.
It's not that he thinks about you a lot, because well, he hadn't. For a long time, he'd been very good at not thinking about you entirely, almost forgotten even, but then you'd appeared when he'd least expected it. And it's like you'd never left his mind.
[you still studying lit?] he asks the next morning. He doesn't have to. He could have left it. Could have let you message first, and have been content to never message again if it came to it. But he hits send anyways.
[yeah a bit hahaha surprised you still remember] it takes you almost an hour to respond. He looks at your name in his phone, and again doesn't bother changing it.
[tommy mentioned it] which isn't technically a lie.
[of course he did 😂😂] you send back much quicker. Then, a few moments later, a candid photo of Tommy sitting at a kitchen island, taking a too-big bite of a piece of toast, looking at the camera like he'd been caught red-handed, [snitch]. But still, he learns that you're picking up some curriculum method subjects for High School English next semester, which has a strangely sinking sense of deja vu going off in the back of his mind, but he chooses instead to ignore it.
Your replies are sporadic at best, and often vague when he asks about uni, hesitating about anything even bordering on personal that isn't your little brother. Sometimes it'll take days for a one-sentence response. When he asks if everything's okay, he's not sure what tone to read in your answer.
[its just a bit weird messaging my little brother's friend, you know? 😅]
It kind of winds him in a way that he hadn't anticipated, but he supposes he understands.
[i can stop] he offers.
[no] comes almost immediately from you, [um please no? i do like talking to you. tom's got good friends 😅] and what the fuck is that supposed to mean? As he's spent a good deal of time staring, bewildered at the message, he gets a notification from discord. It's Tommy.
[Y/N wanted me to tell you that MARK 😠is weird about her being friends with you] and okay, that makes sense... and makes Wilbur strangely uneasy. Tommy, who must have been feeling something similar, and also because he probably couldn't help himself then sends [because he's a BITCH. dont tell Y/N i said that but im right].
[tommy's a good kid] he sends back to you directly instead, and hopes you read the understanding in the message. You send back a single red heart, an agreement of the written sentiment, but also an I know, and thank you.
You have become some strange echo of the woman he remembers; two years can change people considerably, but the more he recalls about who you were, the more he wonders how you became who you are.
But there's shades he recognises; your smile in the photos Tommy sends, the kindness in your words when you talk about your brother and Tubbo and their content, and how you wax poetic when he asks you about what you've been reading lately. If you see he's been watching your Instagram stories, you don't comment on it.
With the understanding that you were trying to act as if you'd never spoken to him before now, it's much easier to talk to you. Vague seems less vague when he understands that he's back to being closer to a stranger than a former friend. But with each day comes old shades of familiarity, whether you like it or not.
Until it's Friday, a week before Christmas, and it's almost midnight and you're calling him. Your photo lights up his screen; it's a selfie you took sitting against his damn headboard back in London. He really should change that, at least to look less creepy and pathetic.
"Will! Will!" You're gasping with delight when he answers, "Will, you're real, right?" You're stage whispering without giving him a chance to get a word in edge-wise, voice still managing to echo amongst the din of background noise.
"Are you at a pub?" He yawns, though he's sitting at his computer.
"You're real! I knew it!" You cheered quietly; he can hear someone calling for you through a door, asking if you're in there, "I thought I dreamed you up!" You tell him earnestly, ignoring the other voice for the time being, but he laughs softly.
"Are you drunk?" He asks with faint fondness, but you don't seem to quite hear him either.
"Now I know you're real because I called your number and you actually answered and are real, I have to tell you that you treat Tombles - Tommy -" you corrected yourself without missing a beat, "treat Tommy good, and if you don't keep doing that I'll be- Will, I'll be so mad I'll stop imagining you! You'll stop existing, so be nice to Tom, and if you can still be nice to me that would be nice, but if I imagined you like this I think you'll keep being nice to me so I don't have to remind you -" you giggle to yourself.
"I'm still real," he reminds you gently.
"You're real," you breathe, strangely calm. You name is called from outside again. A closer voice asks if it's your name they're calling, but you say it isn't. "Hey Will, I-" you start suddenly, only to hesitate, and then, softly, he hears you sigh and say, "did you know Tom says you make music?"
"I do make music, I didn't know he was recommending it," he says after a moment of hesitation, "are you okay? Do you need me to call you a taxi or something?"
"Mark's looking for me," you mused, "is it good music?"
"I, uh, I suppose? Depends on the song, but I made it, I think you need to ask someone else for a verdict on it's quality," he huffs a faint laugh, before adding, "shouldn't... shouldn't you go to him?"
"He'll find me, he always finds me," and it's said with a gentle serenity, though Wilbur is strangely reminded of someone who's succumbing to frostbite, "of course you're real; everyone real knows the right thing to do is go to him, don't make him worry -"
"Baby, please," in the background, the noise grows louder as Wilbur assumes a door is opened, and someone calls inside, "if you're in here, please come out, it's almost your turn on karaoke."
"Be out in a minute!" You called in response.
"Mark?" Wilbur asks as the noise grows quieter again.
"Mark," you confirm, tone unreadable, as you make faint grunts, "ooh my bones," you add, presumably getting to your feet, "picked my song right before I called you, thought it would take longer."
"Why'd you call?" Wilbur hears himself ask.
"Wasn't sure if you were real," you answered honestly and easily, "why'd you pick up?" And he answers without hesitation.
"Had to prove I was real, didn't I?"
The way you laugh has him grinning from ear to ear, so loud and bright and surprised, as if it's the funniest thing in the world.
"I've missed you so much, Will, so much!" You exclaim as your laughter dies down, so fond it almost hurts.
"I've missed you too -" but as he says it, the door at your end opens again, and Mark's back, insistent, almost whining, and you cheerfully tell him that you're on your way.
And you hang up without saying good bye.
Twenty minutes later on your Instagram story, not that he's following you, it's just that you happen to be at the top of his most recent searches on the app, he sees the shaky footage of yourself attempting Do I Wanna Know by Arctic Monkeys. You're grinning so damn bright it's visible even on the poor recording, singing your heart out. He gets ten seconds into the video before he feels like he's spying on something he wasn't meant to see.
Because he knows that fucking song.
Because while you were definitely drunk, he was dead sober, and is haunted by your 'picked my song right before I called you'. Maybe he won't change your contact picture just yet.
The next day, he doesn't hear anything from you, and doesn't want to risk anything, so he messages Tommy to ask if you got home okay.
[they got in at like 3am and woke me up] Tommy messages quickly, following it up with [MARK 😠left about 10 minutes ago to go look at this open house or something but Y/N is pretty hungover so she's been in the shower for the past hour wasting all the hot water]
[kind of you to recommend my music to her 😊] Wilbur adds, mostly as an afterthought, but Tommy is quick to respond to that too.
[nah she knew you made music she was just wondering if i had any favourites] then, [she said she likes Jubilee Line, i said she should move then lol].
And Wilbur wants to respond, wants to say something, but in his mind you're looking at your hands and he's looking at you.
"I didn't pick London for the school, I picked it because it was..." you trailed off, and he watches you scrunch up your whole face as you choose to not finish that particular thought. But you steel yourself, taking a deep breath and smiling bright, bright enough that it's obviously forced, and you finally look up; when you meet Wilbur's gaze, you seem almost startled, you hadn't realised he'd actually been watching you.
"It's a good school, though, I'm glad I got in, and Mark, he's- he's really sweet. It's brave of him to move, even though I'm on campus and he's not; none of his family's lived outside of Nottingham for generations," the face you're making is close to a smile, to anyone else they might mistake it as such, but there's a wrinkle in the bridge of your nose, a tightness at the edge of your smile, "he's training to go into the same line of work as his dad, he's just glad he can do it here," you laugh, but there's no humour in it. The sky was slate grey, a chill in the air that wasn't there the day before, and you'd found out a few days ago that your - former ex - boyfriend Mark had found a place in town. You say that he's good to you, but then you use the word persistent, but it hadn't quite sounded like a compliment.
And Wilbur had been fine to be just friends with you; he did like you as a person, really enjoyed your company outside of the sex. He had no idea it would be the last time the two of you would see each other for two years. You looked tired, but still tried to smile as you started digging around in your bag.
"Hey, anyways, I was thinking -" you started, and Wilbur couldn't help himself.
"Always a dangerous pass time," he muses, but was glad to see it made you smile, even if it did have it rolling your eyes.
"Har har, you're a master of comedy," you tell him with well-worn exasperation, reaching over to take his hand, "if you get a chance between your various jester activities, I finally found that poem I was talking about in the car the other day," you're carefully writing the name of the poem on the back of his hand, grinning to yourself, "it's silly, but the last stanza especially reminds me..." and you look up, capping the pen with an air of finality, "of us, I suppose. Reminds me of hanging out with you."
You Are Jeff - Siken, you've written. You look a little less tired as he fondly calls you 'a sweet, little pretentious nerd'. But he never gets around to reading it; your words wash off in the shower. He can't remember the name of the poem after that, and you aren't around to remind him.
In the present, he's feeling masochistic, and he clicks your Instagram profile again, and your latest post where you're kissing Mark's cheek by a river, announcing that you were grateful to be back in your home town. His thumb hovers over where you've tagged Mark, and he swallows his pride and follows the link, and opens the man's story.
"'cause there's this tune I found that makes me think of you somehow and I play it on repeat," you sing as the clip begins, your eyes closed. Mark had captioned the video 'my little songbird 😍' and Wilbur feels an irrational twinge of anger in his chest.
[how's your head?]
[never had any complaints before] you send, and then almost immediately unsend [ignore that lol].
[consider it ignored]
[thank you hahaha] you message, and he's pretty sure he reads some sort of relief.
[did your very long shower help?]
In response, after a few minutes, he gets a video; it's filmed in landscape, like you had been laying on your side and hadn't been bothered to sit up, pointing the camera at the door.
"Tom-bh!" You shout, with a strangely emphasised 'b' at the end, groggy, playing at being annoyed. As if on cue, Tommy trots into the room, leaning against the doorframe.
"Yes, my dear, sweet sister?" He asks, far too innocent for it to be genuine.
"You're a dirty little snitch," you tell him, voice still groggy and hoarse, and his grin gets brighter. He waves.
"Hello Wilbur," he looks at the camera, "I assume that's why you're pointing your camera at me?"
"It's a video, and I'm gonna hang out with Tubbo today," you sulked, "since he's not a snitch-" and there's a cheer from down the hall, distinctly Tubbo.
"Can't," Tommy rocked back on his heels with a smug little smile, "not unless you wanna stream with us -" The video stops abruptly.
[so are you going to stream with them?]
[wilbur i am dying] and you send it with a reasonably unflattering and exhausted selfie of you with your blanket pulled up to your ears [nobody else is allowed to see me like this especially not the internet].
[im honoured that i get to 😂] he sends back, and pretends like the idea that you'd trusted him enough to send that photo doesn't genuinely warm his heart.
The next day, Sunday, the two of you chat all day, as if with newfound enthusiasm and familiarity, and the past few weeks' hesitation seems almost entirely forgotten. He casually tells you he's streaming later if you've got time to check it out, and you tell him you know, that Tommy asked you to pick up snacks.
[mark's with his parents and our parents are out for the evening time to do delinquent things] you send a photo with that caption, of you holding the camera out far enough to catch Tommy's bed in the shot behind you and your awkward smile, where Tommy himself is sitting with his legs crossed, hunched over and looking at his phone with a bowl of chips in his lap, and a laptop on the bed near him with the waiting screen for Wilbur's twitch stream already on.
[that's cute but it'd be cuter if you subscribed] Wilbur sends back as a joke moments before he sits down at his desk. His phone buzzes as his mouse hovers over the button for his camera to go live.
[bold of you to assume i'm not] you text back. He grins widely, sending a single word, before turning his phone over to start the stream with the biggest grin.
[simp]
He doesn't see you in the chat, and he's not sure if he's glad about that or not, but as soon as he wraps up for the night and turns his phone back over, he sees a barrage of texts from you. Once you realised he wasn't looking at his texts during the stream, and therefore you wouldn't be distracting him, you'd decided to send through your running commentary, which, even with only half-remembered context on Wilbur's part, was still endearing and amusing.
Even in the few days leading up to Christmas the rate at which you're messaging each other doesn't seem to slow. Photos of hot beverages and warm meals and blurry candids of Tommy and Tubbo are sent, with a few photos of what you were doing, selfies taken with your face right in the corner so your activity could be seen behind. Wilbur, of course, responds in kind, and is sure to keep you updated with his drink tally on Christmas Eve before the stream.
"Was such a good stream!" He doesn't even bother to say hello to you when he calls after the stream, flopping back on the sofa in his basement, legs hanging over the end as it won't even fit a person of far more average height.
"That's good to hear, dude," you sound like your whispering, which he points out almost immediately.
"You're always whispering when we talk like this, like it's a secret -" but he's cut off by someone in the background of your call, asking if everything is alright. He knows that voice; Mark.
"Just a friend who's a bit tipsy, I just wanna stay on the line with them so I know they get home safe," you assured, though you're a little muffled. As you presumably uncover the receiver, before you can even speak, you both hear Mark call out that you're just talking to one of your drunk friends.
"As if you have a myriad," Wilbur rolls his eyes with barely concealed disdain.
"You heard that?" You asked weakly.
"And I heard you lie about me; I am home," he saw fit to point out. You were quiet for a very long moment, and finally, he conceded, "I shouldn't have called. It's Christmas Eve. You're probably with your family -"
"Mark's family," you corrected faintly, and a hush falls over you both, "why'd you call, Will? Can I help you with something?"
"Well, I was just drunk, and streaming, and I remembered that you called me last week when you were drunk, and also I was hanging out with Tubbo and I was like 'you know who Tubbo adores? You', so I called."
"Not to confirm if I was real?" You asked, voice betraying your fond smile.
"Oh I know you're real; if I had made you up, you wouldn't -" but Wilbur thankfully stops himself, pivots before putting his foot in his damn mouth, probably using his last shred of good sense in the process, "have fallen out of touch for so long." It sounds lame, even to his own ears, but you've only been speaking again for three weeks, which in itself is almost half the length you knew each other originally. His mouth seems hell bent on writing checks time and common sense won't allow him to cash.
"Won't happen again," you tell him with a gentle sincerity, and the conversation falls away for a moment. Then another, warm silence echoing down the line until Wilbur starts humming a half remembered tune; he likes to think you're smiling to yourself, wonders if you'd recognise it. You'd sung this very song just a week ago.
"Sweetheart, you must be freezing, please come inside," Mark's voice on the other end of the line, in your background, is all love, is all care. Wilbur stops humming.
"Be in in a minute, dear," you tell your boyfriend, tone all kinds of warm and fond. Perhaps, Wilbur's drunken mind thinks, he should afford you the same curtsey you'd shown him while drunk, and just hang up. But he doesn't.
"I figure you heard that."
"Back in to Milquetoast Mark?" He grumbles.
"I told Tommy to stop calling him that," you huffed a deep, irate sigh.
"Tommy also calls him a bitch, so I think Milquetoast is the least of Mark's worries -"
"Wilbur!"
"Sorry," Wilbur backtracks, wishing he'd bitten his tongue, "that was out of line."
"Yes, it was."
"Tommy just loves you is all."
"Tommy loves me enough to keep that shit to himself," you sniped back, and Wilbur's jaw tightened, not quite able to decipher your implications.
"Merry Christmas," he says quietly, finally.
"Merry Christmas, Wilbur," you sigh, and even after you hang up, there's almost a full minute where he lays with the phone pressed to his ear, wishing he could have said more.
And considering the frequency of messages before today, your radio silence on Christmas itself is deafening. Perhaps it's simply that you're spending time with your family, but to see you updating your Instagram story every hour or so kind of feels like you're deliberately ignoring him.
In all the photos he sees, you're wearing the sweater he knows Tommy bought for you; the kid had excitedly sent a photo, relieved that he'd actually managed to find it. You're always smiling in the photos, or laughing, or content, but you're always happy, and that, at the very least, makes Wilbur smile. He feels like a creep and a fool for getting so pressed.
In the evening, you post a single photo to your actual page, of yourself, Mark, and Tommy, lit by firelight; Mark is sitting on the floor, back against the sofa with his legs stretched out, and your head is pillowed in his lap, while Tommy, in turn, is stretched out with his head pillowed on your stomach, blonde hair bright against the sweater he bought you, his phone pressed to his chest. Your eyes are closed and your smile's content, while Mark is looking at you like you're the most beautiful thing he's ever seen, the two of you holding hands, fingers laced together.
YourInstagram: as lil nas x said, ayy its a holiday (styled by tombles who im not allowed to tag but i love this sweater and this photo and he said i could post it. if u recognise him..... no u don't)
He should delete the app; at least then he'd stop compulsively checking it every five minutes.
[tom's my little brother of course he's going to have some Opinions. don't bully my boyfriend on his behalf is all im asking] he gets the text at nine at night, and though he's had a good Christmas in it's own right, with countless calls and chats with family and friends, that message from you is a nice way to end the night.
[understood] he messages back. You send a heart emoji and a few minutes later unsend it, but he sees it. He's not sure why you'd unsent it, but he's glad he had seen it at all.
And messaging continues like before, like nothing had ever happened.
So he keeps his opinions to himself because keeping in contact means more to him than asking why the brother you love so much hates the man you've been dating for years, it means more than asking why you keep calling when you're drunk and saying that you just want to hear him talking. It means more than asking about why you only see your family at Christmas and why you only call Tommy on his birthday and don't seem to text him that often while still calling him one of your best friends; it means more, but not by much, and every day wears on his resolve.
It would be out of line to ask any of those, he's so painfully aware, but you've gone back to London and Tommy's started asking him how you're going. Tubbo hasn't heard from you, your messages to Tommy are growing more and more infrequent, but somehow you're managing to message Wilbur almost every day. Something about it feels off, feels wrong -
[hey tommy's been asking if you're okay] you'd read his message three hours ago but are yet to respond. Every time his phone buzzes, his pulse jumps, despite not really knowing what answer to anticipate. But it's not you. It's never you. There's only radio silence, and he's meant to be streaming but -
[thanks for letting me know. ive messaged him. i'll try to do that more it must have slipped my mind a little now that i'm getting back to study. sorry you had to be the go between. 😅]
He's overwhelmed by a strange, unfamiliar sense of relief. Perhaps it’s because Tommy needn’t worry anymore, or maybe he’s glad for the both of you. As long as you and your brother were still in contact, Wilbur could feel some of his own concern lift. It takes him a full day, looking back, to realise exactly why he’d felt so immediately pleased by your response, but finally it hits him. You trusted him enough to believe his message conveying your own brother’s concern; it felt like respect, that you hadn’t even thought to question him on it –
“How’d you even get up there?” Wilbur’s squinting up at you, half-shielding his eyes from the afternoon sun behind you as you grin widely at him from the top of a concrete barrier by the Thames.
“’s a good view from up here,” you declare instead of answering, “not sure if I need you after all, got all the sights of London here,” and you cast your gaze behind you, out to the city on the other side of the waterway.
“You’re probably right,” Wilbur half-smiles, still vaguely concerned about your precarious vantage point, but picking up your teasing tone well enough and playing along, “I mean, I was going to skip the sights in the Thames, but you’re one swan-dive away from the best view under the river,” and without thinking, he reaches up to offer his hand as some sort of support, still not quite sure how you’d made it up onto the barrier in the first place.
“Alright, Mister W-H-S,” you laugh faintly, finally scrambling down to the footpath, taking his hand for stability as you made the final hop to solid ground. There’s something about you, something electric, the same thing that had drawn him to you in the first place last Friday night. Part of him had been nervous on his way here, that that spark would disappear in the daylight, that he’d imagined your inherent intensity and delight –
“Oh I know that one,” you interrupt his thoughts, practically bouncing along beside him, arm outstretched and pointing to a building that looked exactly like a half dozen other buildings in the vicinity, “that’s The Eye; The London Eye.” You’re so blatantly wrong that it actually takes him a moment to gather his thoughts.
“No?” His own hesitation gives you cause to grin, a dead giveaway that you’re doing a bit, and he can’t help but smile as he shakes his head. Your joy is infectious.
“You sure?”
“Like eighty percent,” he plays along, and you cast your gaze around, before pointing to another random building.
“That’s it, isn’t it?”
“You’re getting warmer,” he appears to concede, and there’s mirth amid your disbelieving laugh.
“Really?”
“No,” he snorts.
“’cos it’s Big Ben, right?” Your grin is all teeth.
“You need my help so badly,” he actually laughs, fondly jovial, though he hears you laugh too, and is surprised by the warmth that blooms in his chest at the sound. When he offers his arm, you concede that maybe you do need him around after all, looping your arm with his, happy to follow his lead.
Moments like that, like the one he found himself in now, the moments that showed the depth of your trust and respect, even if he didn’t fully feel like he’d earned it… it had been years since he’d felt this warmth in his chest. He hadn’t even realised how much he’d missed it before he’d felt it again.
His phone buzzes.
[your future hot lit professor 🍑📚💖: heu]
[your future hot lit professor 🍑📚💖: hey]
[your future hot lit professor 🍑📚💖: can i call]
It’s a Thursday evening, almost five; the warmth is disappearing, the concern is rapidly returning. He calls you first. When you pick up, your apologies are all blurring together already; it’s different this time, there’s no delight in your answering tone when you hear him asking what’s going on.
“It’s selfish- I’m selfish – you shouldn’t- I’m sorry,” you’re rambling, “it’s weird that I miss you, I think- I know - I don’t know you so I shouldn’t call you like this…” and you punctuated your messy string of thoughts with a loud groan.
“It’s okay, you’re okay, you know me,” he speaks without even thinking.
“No, I should go, I should go,” you mumbled, defeated. But there’s no dial tone. A full minute passes. You say his name so quietly, as if you’re not even sure if he’d answer, but he does, “you didn’t hang up,” is all you can think to say.
“’course I didn’t,” he says with an indescribable fondness. You won’t remember it, which is probably why he didn’t hold himself back.
“London air is grimy, ‘s all full of grit and garbage and –“ you make a rough but descriptive noise in the back of your throat, but it melts to something unhappy. Finally, you huff a sigh, “and I’m all selfish and full of grit and garbage –“
“Hey, no,” he says sharply, “come on; you know if anyone else talked about you like that Tommy would give them a solid smack, you don’t get a pass because it’s you.”
“Are you threatening to sick my own brother on me?” You asked, and though your huff of laughter sounded a little pitiful, it was still a laugh.
“If you keep talking shit about yourself,” he said with conviction, and your giggling sounds more fond than forlorn. It’s working. Finally, he asks if you’re okay. You babble with incoherent dismissal of the question for a moment before you suddenly start to make sense –
“-nd of course it’s not weird that I miss you, I know, we are friends – were friend? We’re friends now, right?“ but you didn’t give him a chance to answer, “but like, I keep thinking about wanting to see you in person and that feels weird and kind of selfish and you probably shouldn’t have picked up – I’m being weird – but I’m the one who messaged, and you’re just a good guy so of course you called when I texted–“ you cut yourself off, clicking your tongue against the roof of your mouth, “I’m everywhere. My mind’s everywhere. The walls shout back, I didn’t realise they could do that, or start the argum- I’m not making sense. I’m sorry.”
“I’d like to see you in person,” is all Wilbur can think to say in the wake of your half-coherent rant. He has friends in London he could stay with, it’s not like he’s got a serious work schedule to adhere to, he –
“Could I come to Brighton?” Your voice is small, but there’s a note of hope, and he suddenly has an image in his head of the way you’d beam at him when he’d pick you up from the train station. He’s agreeing without even thinking, and there’s something relieved about your faint laugh. Maybe now isn’t the best time to organise this sort of thing, but neither of you seem to be able to help yourselves, suddenly excited as you ask how soon is too soon.
Smiling, Wilbur checks his calendar.
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straighttohellbuddy · 2 years
Text
but you're talking in your sleep {Wilbur Soot} // 2
two. and she told me that she fucking hates you
Summary: Two years ago, you'd met Will Gold in a pub shortly after moving to London, and had a six-week fling with him, but ended up falling out of contact when it turned out your ex-boyfriend moved to try and make things work... But now you're back in contact, back to being friends, and have made arrangements to finally hang out face to face. And any latent, traitorous feelings Wilbur may or may not have aren't anything he wants to bother you with.
Need to Know: She/Her, implied early 20s, Sister-Innit!Reader. it is never stated or even implied whether Tommy & the reader are related by blood or otherwise, so that's up to you, and while there are mentions of reader celebrating christmas, it's more because Tommy's family celebrates it. reader is said to be studying literature at university. please heed the warnings.
A/N: 11,707 words. unedited as all fuck, i have so much love in my heart for this part, but please heed the warnings. PLEASE Tell me how you're liking it so far!! :)
Warnings: recreational drinking, implied emotional & verbal manipulation/abuse, emotional & physical cheating, heavily implied intimacy but never explicit.
{ masterpost : 2 / 3 }
{ p l a y l i s t }
Taglist: @marvelsmurphy @automaticcomputerpaper @kattenprinsen @parkerpeanuts @bumblebea-xo @lovehatewhateveritis @rainyaheysoe @tcphat @smol-flower-kiddo @pogface @luluwinchester @captainpuffyrp @dreamerwasfound @pepe-lepe @njhrecord @auralol @moonlightaura03 @the-friendly-ghostwrite @blaisey-bee @kingudon @friendwasfound @ahsteriawrites @eeyore-onthefloor @30-minutes-into-the-future @rexgoesrawrrrrrr @arielting @laneunderwave @axeofwars @hoezeeor @lightninginab0ttle @irwinkitten @gyneve @stoop18 @franaby @ozdramaqueen @moriiartist @ticcisimon @randokku
Taglist is always open!!
----
In less than a week, after only a few texts to confirm times and [just stay with me I have a couch] sent without hesitation after you’d asked for hotel recommendations, and now he’s been sitting in his car for twenty minutes at the train station, kicking himself for being so early. Berating himself is easier than dealing with his nerves, so he turns up his music and texts you while waiting for your train to pull into the station.
Your texts are vibrant and excited since you’d gotten on the train, in a way they hadn’t been in the few days lead up to your trip, but he doesn’t think much of it, too busy trying to convince himself that he’s got his nerves under control. Really he’s doing quite a good job, right up until you message that the next stop’s Brighton, in all capitals. He tells you he’s going to wait inside the terminal, and when you send [SEE YOU SOON!!!!!] he’s left alone with his music and his thoughts and his goddamn erratic heartbeat.
There’s a moment of terror, amidst the lively crush of people inside the terminal near peak hour, that someone might recognise him. It’s kind of the nightmare scenario; neither you nor he needed that right now, and he hadn’t even brought some sort of hat or glasses. Thankfully, it doesn’t appear to be a problem, however, as he makes it to the exit for your train’s platform with little stress.
And your smile is even brighter than he’d imagined it would be.
Like something ripped straight out of a movie, you stop at the top of the platform’s steps you’d just ascended, the other passengers parting in streams left and right behind you, continuing on their way, but giving you this moment. You seem to pick him out of the crowd instantly, meeting his gaze with a hundred-watt smile. Though you’re too far away to hear, but he can read it on your lips when you say his name, like a confirmation.
The moment only last a seconds and then you’re both moving, stepping forward to meet in the middle, and you don’t even hesitate to wrap him up in a hug. There’s relief and warmth as you fist your hands in his sweater, as your shoulders relax with your breathless laugh.
“It’s so good to see you!” You tell him, stepping back holding him at arm’s length for a moment as you look him over.
“It’s been –“ a long time coming, something we both seem to need, something I didn’t realise I’d been waiting two years for, “too long; good to have you here,” he tells you, simply letting himself enjoy this moment. For a beat, you seem like you’re about to say something else, but when you see the way he’s grinning, matching your energy, he thinks he can see your breath catch. Wishful thinking? Maybe, but you look up to the roof, then around, step back, bouncing on the balls of your feet as your next words are something of an excited, only half coherent babble.
It's endearing, but Wilbur has just realised how absolutely stupid and terrible this idea was.
You’re Tommy’s sister.
You’re in a relationship.
You and he had a fling for six weeks, two years ago.
So it’s easy to tell himself when you’re in another city, that he doesn’t have feelings for you. Again… But he can only delude himself for so long when you’re by his side.
Offering your arm, you ask him if there’s any restaurants he’d recommend.
“What?” Surfacing from his thoughts, he tries and fails to process what you’d asked. He loops his arm through yours, and thankfully, you don’t seem to think much of his momentary lapse, apart from it being amusing.
“I’m bloody starving,” you reiterate, and he takes the hint, leading you both to the exit closest to his car, “and I’d be happy to get junk I’m familiar with, but if you had any recommendations for not-junk restaurants,” you laugh a little at your own phrasing, “I’d love to hear them.”
He takes you to a hole-in-the-wall, family-run restaurant a block from his apartment, and you buy him dinner as thanks. In some strange way, it’s as if you’ve picked up right from where you’d left, just as easy to talk to as he remembered, just as earnest. You hum along to the songs on his playlist and compliment his taste in music and seem genuinely excited and interested when you ask if he’s been working on anything recently.
For a moment, he’s quiet, expression twisting as his mind flashes to the lyrics he’s been trying to grasp for the melody he keeps humming to distract himself whenever his mind remembers you’re wilfully dating a guy your brother hates. It’s petty, and one of the things the two of you don’t talk about, so he keeps that to himself. Instead, he talks about another song on the EP he’s been working on. The light in your eyes as you listen to him talk about his music – he’d forgotten how you could make him feel elated simply by listening to him. It makes him want to work on the EP, just so he can have something to show you.
At his door, however, you grow quiet, one hand reaching up to grasp at your backpack strap as you watch him unlock his door. As he turns, tries to ask if everything’s alright, you’re already thanking him for giving you a place to stay. His voice dies in his throat, and all he can do is give a smile.
“Of course,” he offers, “any time.” He’s not sure if he was meant to see the relief in your eyes as he turns back to open the door.
In his flat, you sit tentatively on the sofa, graciously accepting his offer of a drink as he heads to his kitchen. Still, you’re quieter than you were earlier. When he comes back with your drink of choice, you’re surprised for a moment. He puts his own drink on the coffee table and picks up the TV remote, anticipating your question.
“We spent a lot of time in pubs together,” he points out, not looking at you as he tries to pick a streaming service, “least I could do is remember your favourite drink.” Out of the corner of his eye, he sees you duck your head quickly.
“And you call me a simp,” you mutter, but your tone betrays just how touched you are that he’d remembered. He feels justified in the smug smile he wears as he asks if there’s anything you want to watch.
The night grows late as the mood grows warm and comfortable, both you and Wilbur tipsy watching trashy movies and making up drinking games with vaguely incomprehensible rules, and you ask if you can send a photo of him to Tommy. Of course he agrees with delight. For a moment, you deliberate, squinting at your screen with your camera pointed at him, before you gesture for him to move closer to you.
“I gotta be in the photo,” you tell him, as seriously as you can manage. Wilbur, seeing no flaw in that logic, shifts to sit beside you, throwing his arm around your shoulders. Both of you are positively beaming, your head on his shoulder, his cheek against your head, a little blurry from your unsteady hands. You caption it [our friend tall will ☭] and send it without a second thought.
Until, a moment later, Wilbur’s phone starts vibrating.
“It’s a discord call from Tommy,” he says with a half-giggle, and you smack your hand to your mouth, before you scramble to mute the TV, and the movie you’d stopped caring about before it had even started.
“Tommy, hello, you’re calling at a strange hour,” Wilbur tries and fails to sound sober, missing the mark atrociously.
“I’m streaming,” comes Tommy’s response. You double over, dropping the remote and pressing your other hand to your mouth in an attempt to keep quiet. Wilbur’s free hand gently rests on your back as he can’t help his own mischievous grin.
“Am I on speaker? Hello, Tommy’s stream!”
“Are you drunk?” Tommy asks, faintly disbelieving.
“I’m not sober,” is how Wilbur chooses to phrase it.
“’s very late,” you stage whisper, straightening up again, looking from the phone to Wilbur, unable to fight off your smile, “why’s he still streaming –?“
“Wilbur!” Tommy, insistent this time, interrupts you.
“Tombles go to sleep, it’s a school night,” you say, louder this time, and Wilbur breaks, laughing loud and bright.
“Hey, Mother Innit’s fully aware I’m still up and streaming, take it up with her,” Tommy counters, before seemingly remembering the situation at hand, “and Sister -” he says pointedly, only to be interrupted by Wilbur.
“Ooh~ listen to that tone, you’re in trouble!” He teases, and your delighted, mischievous laughter rings out loud in the little apartment. After a moment, however, your own phone buzzes with a text from Tommy [glad you arrived safe]; on the phone, however, he clears his throat.
“Yeah, she’s in trouble! She’s stealing my friends! I don’t think I like you and Wilbur being friends anymore –“
“You don’t have the authority to revoke my Wilbur privileges,” you take the phone from Wilbur, nose in the air, while he’s wheezing with laughter beside you, “I’m revoking your Wilbur privileges!”
“You can’t do that!” Tommy spluttered.
“I just did!” You crowed, triumphant, “be nice or I’ll revoke your Tubbo privileges too.”
“You wouldn’t dare –“
“It’s part of my master plan, Tombles,” you tell him, spouting absolute bullshit with ease, “next stop; America. You got to hang out with Dream’s sister, so me, your sister, will hang out with Dream,” you squinted for a moment, considering, before you amended, “that’s a threat.”
“Can you believe this, chat?” Tommy gasped gently, playing the victim.
“Where is all this coming from?” Wilbur says, confused and delighted by your sudden conviction and apparent foresight.
“’s the Cain Instinct,” you said with an air of fondness, before settling back against the sofa, leaning your head against Wilbur’s shoulder, “you can retain Wilbur privileges because I love you,” you tell your brother, “and he’s a good sort –“
“’Okay bet’ says Dream!” Squawks Tommy in mock horror, setting off both yourself and Wilbur all over again, “Christ, man- Dream’s trying to call me-“ as soon as Tommy announced that, both you and Wilbur excited requested that Dream be added to the call, much to Tommy’s exasperation. However, once he’d conceded, you realised –
“I feel like I shouldn’t meet Dream for the first time while I’m drunk,” you stage whispered to Wilbur.
“That’s how we met,” Wilbur points out, which only serves to confuse you.
“You and Dream?”
“You and me,” and as he says it, you finally understand what he’s saying, your initial worry already forgotten. For a moment, you’re giggling as you look at him, and he’s ninety percent sure you’re remembering how the two of you had met –
“This is great –“ you hadn’t even heard Dream join the call, but the moment he does, your laughter stops, eyes going wide, “- I’m so okay with us becoming friends to spite Tommy, that’s funny as fuck.”
“Dream you can’t bully me on my own stream,” you knew from Tommy’s tone alone that he was rolling his eyes, but smiling gently. Despite Dream lazily offering to start streaming, delighted that it again would be out of spite, Wilbur watched you with concern as you levelled an intense gaze at his phone.
“You okay?” He asks quietly, and you lean closer to his phone.
“Dream Minecraft-YouTube, I’m so drunk, I’m so sorry,” you whisper with great concern, and the tension breaks as everyone else on the call bursts out laughing. But then you gasp sharply, “oh fuck, Tommy’s live! I’m live! Oh no, I promise I’m less drunk usually, Tommy’s chat! This is a joke, mostly, I love Tombles very much, but also if I haven’t embarrassed myself too much I would actually like to be friends with Tommy’s cool streaming friends; Dream –“ you say suddenly, taking a deep breath, squeezing your eyes closed as you tried to focus, “Dream I mean you, you seem very cool.”
“Hey, what about me?” Wilbur asked, still grinning, before Dream even had a chance to respond.
“Unfortunately we are already best friends,” you told him without missing a beat, taking the phone from him and leaning forward to rest your elbows on your knees.
And you continue to chat with your brother and Dream, but something about what you’d said had overwhelmed Wilbur’s heart, and as you lean forward to chatter away, he half drapes himself on you, wrapping his arms around you and pressing his face against your shoulder blade. The moment, illuminated only by the light of the muted TV and the street lights out the window, fills him with an indescribable contentment. Did you used to fit so easily into the space by his side?
When the call is long forgotten, and the hour has gotten unreasonably late, and he realises you’ve fallen asleep on his shoulder, he thinks about how easy you are to love. Tomorrow-Wilbur can regret that sentiment, but for now he’ll stand by it, especially since the moment he goes to move, you wrap an arm around him. Carefully, well as carefully as he can manage, he frees himself, gently insisting that you stretch out properly on the sofa. He’s gone for all of two minutes, getting you a blanket and a glass of water, but you’re clutching one of the sofa pillows beneath your head, curled up, by the time he’s back.
“Thanks Will,” you mumble with a contented little smile as he drapes the blanket over him, which, okay, a little spooky considering he thought you were properly asleep. What’s more terrifying, however, are the two words you manage next; “love you,” which you follow with a gentle sigh, as if you hadn’t just uttered two of the most confusing words in the English language.
The rest of his night is spent staring at his ceiling, the silence of the flat as deafening externally as the racket of his conflict was internally. It’s nothing, he’s sure it’s absolutely nothing; he tells his friends that he loves them all the time, it’s not like he’s pinning for any of them. You’d been travelling and drunk and tired and it had been a nice night, a perfectly platonic declaration mumble of love wasn’t out of the realm of possibility.
But, his traitorous mind sees fit to remind him, this isn’t actually the first time something like this had happened. Last time, he’d kept it to himself, and you’d ended up with Mark, so he thought he’d made the right call. Maybe it was a coincidence, but –
“Okay, what are the most important things I should know about London?” You’re half giggling in the dim, golden light of the pub. The cover band that’s been playing is between sets, but you’re still leaning across the table the way you’d been just so he could hear you earlier, “apart from the location of the most underappreciated flat in a ten kilometre radius.”
“I never said underappreciated,” Wilbur can feel himself flush, but is doing a very good job of keeping his somewhat aloof demeanour intact, “I said I think a girl like you would appreciate the contents of the flat as much as you’d appreciate any other tourist trap –“
“So your flat’s a tourist trap?” Your smile is sharp and teasing, but there’s nothing malicious in it. He takes the bait happily, playing along.
“It has its moments,” he says loftily, “we’ve been known to host a party or two, but no-one’s thought to leave a review on Trip Advisor, so it’s still trendy. No lines.” For a moment, his expression wrinkles as he thinks about what he’s saying, but you seem thoroughly pleased by the bit.
“Nothing on Yelp?”
“I haven’t checked recently, but if you’d like to, be my guest,” he answers without even really thinking, though when he does, he’s fighting back a smile, “still got my fingers crossed for a good Google Review soon.”
“Is it like an Uber driver asking you to rate them five stars at the end of a trip?” You asked, light dancing in your eyes, “’broke my phone but that’s on me; would get smashed here again, five stars’?”
“Absolutely; we’re wonderful hosts, of course we’d get five stars,” he says with absolute confidence. For a moment, his words hang amid the warm, golden air. Looking to you, he’s surprised by the way you’re regarding him, watching him with quiet delight, or perhaps even amusement, completely comfortable in this moment.
“Well then now I have to go there,” you say softly, sounding almost nervous and trying to hide it behind your amusement, “see for myself if the hype is worth it.”
Wilbur, who’d been caught up in enjoying the convoluted joke, and had momentarily forgotten that he had been rather boldly hitting on you, had not expected that to work. The band was making their way back to the stage, he’d almost finished his pint, and your whole demeanour has turned electric despite you not moving a muscle.
There’s the click, hum of the amp being turned back on, and the patter of drumsticks as the band gets themselves back into gear, and the sigh you give is so carefully casual as you tilt your head to watch them. Remarking that they’re good, you follow it with an offhand mention that you’d be happy to head out at any point. No rush, but all anticipation.
And in the cool night air, he finds himself going back to your earlier question, half-jokingly asking what the most important thing would be to know about you.
“It’s not the most important in general,” you start with a sly little smile, “it’s not really important in any other situation.” He makes a noise of confused intrigue, not quite sure where this could be going, but you wet your lips as you look at him properly, meeting his gaze with an expression that could only be described as coy, “I talk in my sleep.”
The morning light is infiltrating his room through the cracks of his blinds as he desperately wished he could remember your first meeting with less clarity. But alas, it’s all he can think of until he finally manages to shut his mind up enough to sleep.
Of course when he wakes around eleven, not only does he regret getting to sleep so late, but is worried for a moment that you’d been stuck waiting for him for hours.
Which, while technically you had, you hadn’t seemed to mind. You’d spent the morning catching up with his flatmates, well the one who’d accompanied him to Brighton who’d been overjoyed to see you again, and the others who were more than happy to meet you and help you nurse your hang over. They’d given you a towel so you could shower, and you’d helped cooked breakfast, and he’s spilling from his room, all pyjamas and apologies, but you’re sitting on the sofa with a cup of tea, looking up from your phone.
There’s that smile again, the one you’d worn yesterday at the train station when you’d first spotted him, just as bright to see him for the first time, mid-morning in his apartment. It’s like just being around him brightens you up; he’s not sure he’ll ever get used to that. He’s not sure he wants to. His panic eases. He takes a moment. You ask if he wants tea, and then, with a smile, to remind you how he likes his tea.
He's still half waking up so you're more than happy to lead the conversation, the fallout from the call with Tommy and Dream, looking back on your own antics with faint embarrassment, thankfully, rather than regret.
"It could have been so much worse," you laugh lightly, "my saving grace is that Mark doesn't watch Tommy's streams," you don't leave time for him to even properly process that thought before you're fondly rolling your eyes at your brother's antics. Tommy's still trying to talk you into getting Twitter, but he's been trying for months now.
A moment comes as the two of you are weaving around the kitchen, chattering away about plans for the afternoon, your asides asking about where the tea and sugar are kept not even breaking the flow, it feels familiar in a way he knows it shouldn’t. But then he goes to reach for a cupboard just above your head as you’re adding sugar, part of him knowing that he should ask you to watch out but it’s muscle memory, faster than he can process, and you’re in the middle of speaking -
You’ve ducked, anticipating him, without even missing a beat, or a falter in your words.
He’s still moving on autopilot, searching for the marmalade, and you weave around him, heading to the fridge to get milk. Physically, he’s making himself toast, mentally, he’s beating the part of himself that’s a hopeless romantic with a broomstick as it’s desperately trying to ascribe meaning when there probably isn’t any. Except once you’ve finished with the milk he takes the carton without even thinking, putting it back while he’s enthusing about the unique nature of the DreamSMP as a storytelling device, and you take the marmalade he’d just capped and was about to put back, putting it in the cupboard above you, and somewhere in the back of his mind, the words Drift Compatible light up in neon.
It's almost midday and you’re in his kitchen, dissecting the story he’s now largely responsible for, with the same enthusiasm and detail as you do any of the other literary classics you’d dedicated your life to. There’s a light in your eyes that’s captivating as you scrutinise the story with delight, lavishing praise on he and his friends, and the world they’d helped build. It’s a dialogue, he’s swept up in it, matching your enthusiasm as he adds nuance and clarification, right up until –
“- in the end, I think my main thought is,” you took a long sip of your tea, unable to meet his gaze; when you put your cup down there’s a smile twitching at the edge of your lips, “this Breaking Bad roleplay got really out of hand.”
“But for a Hamilton role play…?” He prompts, grinning from ear to ear.
“Oh, very on brand;” you assured him with mock seriousness, “exactly what American founding father Alexander Hamilton would want for his legacy in the modern day,” you nodded adamantly, and Wilbur sat tall, throwing out his arms in triumph.
“See, you get me, thank you,” he announced, barking a heaty laugh as if relieved to finally have someone seeing his perspective. It dissolves into laughter for you both, before lapsing into comfortable silence.
The few days that you’re here seem to fly by, a blur of joy and easy companionship. You’re less impulsive than he remembers, but there’s still a glint in your eye when you spot a tree with sturdy branches, or look longingly at a high-rise, like you’d still quietly like to lie on the roof and gaze at the sky. On the second night of your stay, he’d woken at three in the morning to get himself a glass of water, and you’d sat bolt upright on the sofa, scaring him half to death, telling him seriously that his flat was ‘sturdy and safe’ as if it was of vital importance. So yes, you still talked in your sleep it seemed. It alleviated some of his worry about the previous night.
Friday, your third day in Brighton, he had intended to stream, but was fully prepared to take a rain check, but you get all wide-eyed, and tell him not to put things off on your behalf. Which is how you both end up in his office, with him on camera, and you sitting on the floor a few feet away, your back against the wall, assuring him that you don’t want to be seen.
“I feel like Tommy told me you wanted to do YouTube too,” he says, browsing through his Twitter for some last minute suggestions for games to play. He hadn’t exactly anticipated doing this stream at all, so it was going to be rather off-the-cuff. You respond with a faint, nondescript huff. Looking over his shoulder, you’re frowning slightly as you look down at your phone.
“Yeah, I-“ you say, distractedly, before you look up and fully process what he’d said, “yeah, I mean, doesn’t everyone our age,” you say, faintly dismissive, expression drawn as you hold your phone close to your chest. Pressing your back flatter against the wall, you crane your neck up to look at his set up.
“I mean, I guess,” he shrugs a little awkwardly, “but I feel like he wouldn’t have mentioned it if there wasn’t, like intent, like he mentioned you wanting to still be a professor.” Your nose wrinkles just a little at that.
“He’s probably remembering me talking about that when I was younger,” though your tone is a little uneasy for reasons Wilbur can’t quite place, you give a small smile, “I think I’m just trying to focus on something realistic and stable for myself now. Even a uni professor needs a Masters; high school teacher only needs a Bachelor,” but you still can’t meet his gaze, “’d you think I’d be good at it?”
“At what?” There’s several different options there, and he’s not quite sure which would matter to you most.
“The high school teacher thing,” finally, you looked back at him, smile widening, mood lifting. He considers for a long moment, leaning back in his desk chair, looking back until he’s gazing at the roof as he makes thoughtful noises.
“I thought you were set on being a uni professor,” he says carefully, dropping his cheek to his shoulder to look at you, expression carefully neutral. You tried to shrug casually, but your shoulders were tense.
“Just answer the question,” you rolled your eyes, trying to hide your sudden discomfort behind your fond tone, “me, attempting to teach high schoolers literary analysis; you think I’m up to it?”
“If it’s the kind of thing you want to do, yeah,” he says with a half-smile, “I’ve heard you talk about the books I hated in high school; if you’d been my teacher I probably wouldn’t have hated them half as much.” His smile stretches wide and as innocent as he can manage as your eyes narrow, trying to decipher exactly what he means by that. But the answer was satisfactory enough for you that you let it drop, changing the subject as you ask what he’ll be playing.
He refers to you as ‘the cryptid crashing on my couch’ smiling bright as the sun as he does so, identifying you early as to not confuse his audience if he talks to you during the stream. He asks again, a final time, if you’d like to join him, that you were more than welcome to. All his audience sees is your hand, holding out your phone to him where you’ve written out ‘only if you distort my voice and blur my face like im in witness protection’. At that, he barks a laugh, and reads your statement to his audience. That’s how you’re known for the rest of the stream, as the hand that pops up whenever you have an aside you think is pertinent to add.
Every other question chat asks is demanding to know who you are. Whenever Wilbur mentions it but keeps his mouth shut on the truth, his gaze flicks to you, because he knows you’ll be smiling. One of his off-hand jokes, however, has you making a noise in the back of your throat which draws his attention. When he looks back at you, there’s something amusing in your eyes, mouth pressed into a thin, frustrated line. Your nose wrinkles, further showing off your frustration at your own self-imposed silence, when you meet his gaze. Of course he knows why; he’d made a blatantly wrong statement with far more confidence than the statement warranted. It was exactly the kind of bullshit you couldn’t help but play along with.
“If you’ve got something to say,” insufferably smug, he watches you puff out your cheeks. Averting your gaze, you flip him off, hand in frame for the camera to see, “sook,” he teases, “just say what’s on your mind.” For a moment, your mouth drops open as if you’re about to say something, to call his bluff, but your gaze flicks to his webcam.
What’s on my mind, you mouth pointedly when you look back to him; something about your expression has turned bashful for reasons he can’t quite fathom. You glance quickly at the camera again before shaking your head, you wish, you mouth, but can’t quite look him in the eye. There’s a serious moment where he considers ending the stream, because this feels like it could be a moment, a chance. He’s a hypocrite, he can’t begin to say what’s on his mind, won’t give himself the chance, getting back to his stream after another brief moment and a deep breath.
By the time the stream ends, chat is eighty percent sure it’s a fellow YouTuber trying to keep a low profile, but Wilbur simply shrugs, stretching back in his chair with a Cheshire-esque smile.
“There’s only seven billion people in the world, eventually one of you’ll guess right,” his smile is toothy, and you’re grinning at him, watching him finish up his stream with your knees drawn up to your chest. After it ends, there’s sincerity in your voice as the two of you head to the pub to meet up with his housemates for drinks.
Just as you had with Wilbur, your friendship with the housemate you remember had picked up as if there wasn’t a two year break in the middle, and the others were bantering with you as if they’d known you just as long. You match them all drink for drink, playing along with stupid jokes and shenanigans. As the night continues and you slide gracefully from tipsy to drunk, you begin to hum to yourself between thoughts and words without even being aware of it. It’s familiar, but you’re not humming consistently enough for Wilbur to pick it.
There’s more flashes of who you used to be, impulsive ideas and an inherent need to climb anything and everything as the pack of you head back to the flat in the early hours of the morning. Wilbur’s perception of the world is blurry in it’s own right, and he barely has enough forethought to keep you from attempting to climb a street-sign like Mulan with your jacket that you’d just shed. He grabs your hand while you’re eyeing up the pole, tugging you along to keep up with the others, and you seem to be deciding whether or not to be put out by it, but when you look down to see him still holding your hand, you grin. Giving a little skip, you behave for the final block to the flat, humming louder now, chattering away whenever you felt your input was required.
You all make it about an hour through the first Lord of the Rings movie, and the terrible, convoluted drinking game you’d made up, before one of his housemates is throwing up, and you all decide to retire for the night instead of trying to keep going; you’d have tomorrow night as well. Like long forgotten habit, when Wilbur stands and stretches out, he offers you his hand, and you take it.
“Don’t have to call this time,” you giggle, sitting on the edge of his bed as he comes back from getting two glasses of water.
“Call?” He puts the glasses on his bedside table, and when he looks at you, déjà vu hits like a truck.
“Like that song,” and you hum the same melody you’ve been humming all night; he recognises it now, “I think they were playing it in the pub,” Wilbur’s pretty sure he would have remembered if they’d played Do I Wanna Know? at the pub; he would be humming it too.
“Ever thought of calling when you’ve had a few, ‘cos I always do~” your memory of the melody is a bit all over the place, but you’re grinning widely, “to see if you’re real,” you explain, then look around, “I can’t believe I keep asking that,” you laughed, “you’re so patient, dude, I can’t believe you keep indulging me, or, well, that’s not the right word but you know what I mean,” you give a gentle, endeared sigh, focus back on him, on where he’s watching you, still wearing his jacket and shoes.
“’s kind of funny, kind of a self fulfilling prophecy,” you say after a moment.
“What is?” He’s afraid of moving, of breaking this moment, the moment he thought he’d never get to experience again.
“The song,” smile widening, you lean back languidly, looking at his roof, “there’s this tune I’ve found that makes me think of you somehow~”
“And you play it on repeat?” Wilbur can’t help but smile in response.
“And I play it on repeat,” you echo quietly, grinning, hands behind your head, “of course you’re real,” you muse with an adoring sigh, “I could never imagine you.”
“Being around you again has kind of made me feel more real than I have in a while,” he finds himself saying, pulling off his shoes. He’s desperately, internally trying to convince himself to not do what he knows he’s going to do. But you agree with the sentiment, and he has to pretend like the rest of the song isn’t playing in his head, chipping away at his reservations bit by bit. You say it’s all felt very familiar as you’re pushing yourself back up to a sitting position, head tilted just a little as you watch him. There’s something in your eyes that’s dangerous and enticing; he’s doomed. Pulling off his jacket, he finds himself unable to look at you despite the way he's steeling his nerves, “would you forgive me for being selfish for a moment?”
“Depends,” your voice is a murmur, something unidentifiable in your tone. When you stand, he catches the movement out of the corner of his eyes, “depending on what you mean,” you give the faintest huff of laughter, “I might even encourage it.”
“Encourage it,” he echoes softly, and your smile turns to something coy. Anything he’d wanted to say is lost in that moment, and he crosses the space to you, taking your face in his hands. For a moment, he pauses, gaze searching yours. It’s time enough for you to break away, to back out.
“Familiar?” He murmurs with the faintest smile, trying to memorise the way you’re looking at him, almost starry-eyed, voice catching in your throat.
“Wil, please -” suddenly breathless, you’re almost pleading and it’s all the encouragement he needs, crashing his lips to yours. It’s sweet triumph, just a kiss for all of three seconds before he finds his arms winding around your neck, pulling you closer, pulling a pleased noise from you as you deepen the kiss to something messy and insistent.
All his hesitations and reservations and doubts are quickly disappearing, just as the back of your legs hit his bedframe and the moment break as you both find yourself falling; Wilbur catches himself before he lands directly on top of you. In the few seconds that follow, shock reads on both of your faces like a neon sign, as he’s braced over you, blinking rapidly. You recover first, beaming as laughter erupts from you. Of course he’d almost accidentally body slam you when he finally gets to kiss you again. Groaning with faux embarrassment, he flops onto the bed beside you, unable to keep his own laughter in as he hears yours.
“Pretty familiar,” you giggled, looking up at the ceiling as your laughter died down.
“Would another reminder help?” Looking to you, he reaches out to trace his fingertips along your jaw, and you lean into his touch for a moment before giving your coy but enthusiastic response.
Making out with you in his bed after a night at the pub turns out to still be one of his favourite experiences, all he needed really was a reminder. Both of you agree it wouldn’t be right to go any further in your current, drunken states, but considering he hadn’t expected any of this, he’s thrilled as you kiss down the column of his throat. Your nails are a welcome sting, and the noises that escape your with each gentle bite he gives is like music to his ears.
The guilt, however, starts to settle in when you both agree to try and get some sleep. Which is… difficult. If he falls asleep, the night ends, and you’re a day closer to leaving, to going back home to your boyfriend. Neither of you is innocent in this, but something about the idea of knowingly, deliberately, being a side-piece curdles and sours in his chest. You’re laying on your side, while he’s looking up at the ceiling, gaze glassy as he’s stuck in his own mind.
This should feel worse than it does, morally speaking, he thinks. But it feels almost sickening peaceful, this moment soothing an ache in his soul that he’d successfully repressed right up until you video called right back into his life a few months ago.
He’s awoken from his surprisingly restful sleep at around five in the morning as you jostle him. Only half-aware, he can feel the way you’re tapping his torso, then his shoulder, moving down his arm, chanting the word ‘hand’ in a way that’s more than a little ominous. But he’s seen this before.
“Y’ okay?” He asks blearily, and you go dead silent. For one, unsettling moment, you’re frozen, before he feels your fingertips press gently against his wrist by his side, before sliding against his palm, fingers lacing with his. Then, carefully, you rest your head back on the pillow by his. “Better?” He mumbles, yawning, and giving your hand a squeeze.
“Need hand,” you say with absolute sincerity. He knows, even in his half asleep state, that he’s more conscious than you.
“Need hand?”
“Don’t let go it’s illegal,” you tell him, as if stressing the severity of the situation, but he’s already almost back to sleep. This too feels familiar, he finds himself reminiscing before he passes out again.
“I’m gonna get you a roof,” is the first thing you’d ever said to Wilbur in your sleep. It was the week after you’d first met, and your second time spending the night in his flat. You’d woken him up to tell him this, all while being completely unaware that you were still asleep.
“I have a roof?” He rubs at his eyes, confused and concerned given the intensity with which you were speaking.
“You deserve so many rooves,” you tell him, one hand on his shoulder, eyes wide and glassy, but sincere in your absurdity, “I’ll get you so many rooves.”
“What?”
“A whole city of rooves, Wilbur,” you’d insisted, “for you, and for me, and for the stars.”
“What do you mean? Are you okay?” He’d asked, yawning a little, propping himself up. Your hand was still on his shoulder. It seemed, however, that your urgent thought was over, as you simply stared at him blankly, expression vacant, evidentially not hearing anything he said. He does try again, says your name gently; you blink at him.
“Go back to sleep,” he says, thankful when you comply and flop back down, seemingly content. At least now he could be sure you weren’t joking about sleep talking, especially when he brings it up the next day and you scrunch up your whole face with embarrassment, having no memory of anything you’d said.
So it became habit for him, to make note of the things you said to him on the nights he awoke to you talking in your sleep. You always seemed to be suitably mortified whenever he brought them up, but you never asked him to stop, as if simply embarrassed by how sweet and sincere you were despite not making any sense most of the time. It’s not every night, of course because you’re not at his flat every night; you’ve really only known each other for a few weeks, that would be strange. Except then it becomes a month, and it’s every night you are at his flat, and he finds himself looking forward to hearing whatever it is your unconscious mind deems important for him to know. The page in his notes app is barely more comprehensible than you are.
“bad interior decorator but its okay because you’re a good guitar”
Very worried about my circulation in the winter
Good flat
Offered to punch a police officer for me since she kept telling me I’d been arrested
Said she’d float away if I didn’t hold her hand. Also said she’s very bad at being a balloon animal because she keeps opening her mouth to breath and letting the air out.
Im the best half of a spider :)
Took my hand, told me to wait here, and immediately fell back to sleep
“love a long boy” asked if that was me and she just said “gangly bitch” :)
Rats told her they have orgies in the walls because they’re full of love too. she thought it was important that i know
Really tried hard to get up and climb out of my window insisting that we needed to climb a tree. Back in bed she claimed that I was good for her and told me that she loved me.
When he wakes up the next morning, wakes up properly, for the first time in years, he adds to the list he’d curated, both from last night, and the two nights before. You’re still asleep beside him, curled up on your side away from him. He feels a little strange, a little nostalgic and guilty in equal measure, both for the warm sense of contentment that settle in his chest, and acknowledging that he never deleted those notes from his phone, that they sat idle at the bottom of the list of notes he’s taken in the past few years.
So he gets up, removes himself from the moment and gets breakfast, because it’s almost ten in the morning and he really should be starting his day, and not being a creep. He takes the time as he waits for the kettle to boil to remind himself that last night was absolutely the wrong way to go about shooting his shot, and that you still had a boyfriend. Did he regret kissing you last night? Absolutely not. Would he let it happen again? Well, probably not; if he had any good sense he wouldn’t.
And tomorrow you were heading back to London.
And…
And…
And where’s his good sense gone? Probably where he left it last night, in a pile on his floor beside your jacket, because after getting food delivered, the two of you last all of one episode of a nature documentary he’s only half following, before you somehow end up in his lap.
“Christ, didn’t miss this,” one of his housemates remarks when he gets home, punctuating it by throwing a balled up, empty chip packet at the pair of you.
“Not our fault you’re home early,” Wilbur grins as you hide your embarrassment against his collar.
“Were you raised in a barn?” His housemate counters from the kitchen, “we just bought this lounge, don’t be feral –“
“We weren’t being feral!” Wilbur crows, just as you raise your head and call out.
“But I’m always a bit feral,” and Wilbur feels like he should have anticipated that, scrunching up his face with defeated amusement. He concedes, mentioning that you can watch the show in his room, his hands resting on your hips.
“Yeah,” your lips twitch into a smirk, “that was the important part in all of this.” You quirk a challenging eyebrow at him, and Wilbur’s pretty sure he made some kind of resolve this morning, but can’t even begin to remember it.
“I was deeply invested in it,” he tries to be earnest, tries not to smile to wide.
“Was truly fascinating,” you nodded, matching his energy, still in his lap, arms around his neck, “riveting plot.”
“It was a documentary,” his resolve is crumbling, and your smile grows wider.
“I must have been distracted,” you murmur, leaning in to kiss him again, though this time Wilbur’s housemate throws his keys at you two, hitting Wilbur in the back of the head. It’s incentive enough to finally move. There’s a bounciness to the way you move, picking up your leftovers from lunch, putting the scraps in the bin, swanning through the flat to Wilbur’s room as he follows, endeared by your whimsical nature.
You’re spinning idly in his desk chair, waiting for him, one leg tucked up beneath the other. Closing the door behind himself carefully, he watches for a moment, leaning on his wall, arms crossed. Each time you spin, you make eye contact with him, expression bright.
“So, documentary?” Finally, you grin mischievously and keep spinning. That smile could inspire him to move mountains, or something else sickeningly saccharine; his stupid heart is bordering on embarrassing itself at this point. So before he can say something embarrassing and far too honest for this light mood, he closes the distance between the two of you, taking your face in his hands and crushing his lips to yours.
Later, the guilt will settle in his bones.
Later, he’ll ask the question that’s been plaguing him, ask if you even like your boyfriend.
Later, you’ll be wrapped up in his sheets, stretched out on his bed as your whole face scrunches like you’ve bitten a lemon, and he’ll have no idea what you mean when you tell him that that hasn’t mattered in a very long time. It feels like an answer bigger than whatever’s happening between the two of you, but it doesn’t make him feel better.
Later, he’ll be wearing pyjama pants and you’ll be wearing his sheet like a toga, and you’ll try to absolve his guilt. You’ll take his hands once he puts down his glass of water, and tell him that he doesn’t owe Mark shit, and you’d made your choice happily; Wilbur isn’t the guilty party here.
Later, he’ll ask why.
And you’ll let go of his hands. In the moment before you turn away, your expression falls, but he’s not sure he was meant to see that, as when you sit on his bed, wearing a coy smile, there’s something faintly guarded beneath your teasing tone as you tell him that he’s funny and pretty; what’s not to like?
“You play along, people are so afraid to play along, you know? And you start your own bits, good bits,” you’d told him over lunch, having only known him for a month at that point, “you’re a weird bitch, Gold, I like that in a person,” you grinned, before taking a bite of your food to emphasise your point.
“Glowing review,” Wilbur smirked, only half-sarcastic, as he watches you over the lip of his cup before taking a sip, “you should add it to your Google review of the flat.” It had become something of a running joke, and Wilbur has come to love the endearingly mischievous glint in your eyes every time it’s referenced.
“Weird bitch, five stars?”
“Feel like it would draw in the hipster crowd,” Wilbur’s smile grows wider as he clarifies.
“You and your flatmates are the hipster crowd, you don’t need my help with that,” you point out, instead immediately offering the alternative of, “you should slap it in the corner of your first album.” The assuredness of your words, even amidst this joke, catch him by surprise. First album, as if you knew there’s be more than one. But you’re still talking; “you know I do mean weird bitch as a compliment, right?”
“Y/N, you’re a weird bitch,” Wilbur says it fondly, say it like he means obviously. You beam.
“See that’s what I like, you know? People are afraid to be weird bitches but weird bitches make the world go round.”
And he gets these flashes, these memories that he’s never read too much into before; there’s always something there, always something you can’t say just beneath the surface –
“What about you?” Your words break through his thoughts, curious if guarded, and he takes a deep breath, pondering for a moment, “is it just nostalgia?” You huff a laugh but there’s no humour in it; you can’t quite look him in the eyes. But you’ve given him an easy out, if he wanted to take it.
“Nostalgia’s a pretty way of putting it,” he chooses his words after only a faint hesitation, because he’s not going to fuck this up and take the nonsense you say in your sleep to heart, he’s not going to emotionally overstep. So he smiles, and the tense set of your shoulders relaxes.
“I needed… this,” you admit carefully, something grateful in your voice despite your obvious hesitation. He still takes it as a win.
“And you know I’m always happy to help a friend in a time of need,” Wilbur’s tone is faintly amused as he steps forward and leans down, into your space, though you’re giggling at the not-quite-truth of his words, picking and choosing which parts you believe. Still, you tilt your face so your lips meet his, and Wilbur won’t allow himself to dwell and ruin this moment. Or the several that follow.
That night, the two of you make dinner together in his little kitchen and take it up to the roof of his flat. He’ll give a half-hearted apology about it not being as tall as his London flat, or even your dorm building, but you’re uncharacteristically quiet as you look at the stars. When you look at him, there’s so much in your eyes that he can’t even begin to understand; mouth open but wordless, you look like you’re on the verge of a half-dozen different things, but unsure where to start.
“We should eat before the pasta gets cold,” you drop your gaze, finally speaking, but you don’t seem able to stop smiling. A little quieter you add, “hell, it’s been so long since I’ve been on a roof.”
“That doesn’t sound right,” Wilbur can’t help his confused little half-smile, “do you mean, like, you’ve stopped trespassing on rooves or-“
“No, just altogether,” you carefully mix the sauce in with your pasta, not taking your eyes off of it, “even ones I’m allowed to be on; didn’t realise I missed it this much,” finally, you meet his gaze. He’s surprised by the forlorn look in your eyes; despite this, you’re smiling, thanking him.
The moment passes when you look away, without even giving him a chance to let you know that you didn’t need to thank him for anything, but your tone has brightened as you announce that you’ve been reading the fanfic named Heat Waves purely because you think telling Tommy that you had would causes him psychic damage, but it turned out to be well written. Wilbur suggests telling him while he’s streaming with Dream; the idea has you incapacitated with laughter.
His chest feels lighter somehow, but there’s an impending sense of dread in the back of his mind knowing that he may very well start spiralling the moment you head back to London. If he doesn’t dive into a new project, he’s not going to be able to stop himself thinking about all the things you’ve said and not said, and what it all means.
He’s not awoken by any tremendous movement that night, instead he gets up to go to the bathroom, and when he gets back into bed beside you, you don’t even open your eyes as you drape an arm over him.
“Love you, Will,” you sigh, cheek half pressed against his shoulder. He tries not to take your sleep talking to heart, but it still makes him smile.
During the drive to the train station the next day, Wilbur mentions that you’re always welcome to stay a few more days. While you thank him for the offer, you joke that you don’t want Mark getting suspicious, and it leaves a sour aftertaste in the back of his mouth. But as he agrees to walk you to the train, it disappears.
“Have you ever heard of the poem You Are Jeff?” You ask as you hoist your bag from the boot, and Wilbur makes a noise in the back of his throat indicating that it hasn’t. But he should have. You’re quiet; he asks if you recommend it. After a noncommittal noise of your own, you shrug, “I was thinking about it in the car, it’s kind of long, but the last stanza…” trailing off, you shut the boot and take a deep breath. Grinning with faint nervous energy, you change the topic to your own imminent departure. Wilbur tries to make a note of the poem, but it doesn’t really stick.
It feels sappy, but like the done thing, to watch the train leave, and it doesn’t have long to go as he finds himself leaning on a pole, watching you through the window packing your bag into the luggage compartment above your seat. You catch him watching through the window and you grin impishly for a moment before darting through the cart to the door as the voice on the speaker announces the train’s stops; it’ll be leaving very soon. But you weave through the thinning crowd for a moment until you find him, and he’s already hugged you goodbye so he’s not sure what else there is to say. You glance surreptitiously around for a moment before beckoning him close. He obliges, confused for all of three seconds before you kiss him quickly.
“Okay, I should…” you seem a bit flustered, like you can’t quite believe your own courage, gesturing to the train. But Wilbur sees your hesitation, and if he gets a kiss goodbye, he’s going to get the big, movie kiss, so he pulls you back in with a grin.
If it’s the last thing you remember of the trip, he wants to leave you breathless, and he succeeds, murmuring for you to come back soon, arms still around each other in the few moments that follow. You nod, a little speechless, a little giddy, stealing a final, quick kiss before boarding the train for good.
The doors close. You wave through the window. The train departs.
[okay I’ll bite] he messages Tommy from his car, still in the parking lot of the train station half an hour after you’d left, having been working on the song he’d been trying to ignore in the back of his mind the whole time you’d been in town; [what is mark’s deal? Y/N doesn’t even like him and neither do you. what’s up with that?]
[he’s a bitch and im going to roundhouse him into an active volcano] Tommy sends back with very little hesitation.
[i’m serious]
[so am i] Tommy responds, and Wilbur scrunches up his whole face in exasperation. But then his phone is ringing.
“Is she still there?” Is the first thing Tommy asks, frowning over the video call, and Wilbur, expression still mostly pained, shakes his head, “she get on the train okay?”
“Half an hour ago,” Wilbur sighs deeply, finally relaxing his face, looking at the uncharacteristically serious kid on call, “I’ve just spent five days with her, and I don’t mean to pry, but I have to, man I have to.”
“She really, actually told you she doesn’t like Mark?” Tommy’s tone is hard, and Wilbur hesitates for a moment.
“Implied as much,” he deliberates before adding, “said it didn’t matter if she liked him or not,” and he tries not to think too much about the situation in which you’d said it, at least not while on call with your little brother.
“And you believe her?” The question is unexpected, and feels rather like a test.
“I mean, yeah, I- uh, yeah,” seeing as you’d happily cheated on him with Wilbur, he was inclined to believe you. Looking at his little phone screen, however, he sees some of the tension ease in Tommy.
“Okay, good,” he says, mostly to himself, “it’s good she’s saying it to more people, people who believe her,” he specifies, which doesn’t sit quite right with Wilbur. He files that away for the time being, “it used to be just when she was drunk she’d call and rant and wouldn’t get mad at me for calling him a bitch, but,” Tommy makes a face, like he knows he shouldn’t be saying this much, but he doesn’t stop himself, “it’s been happening more.”
“The bitching about him?”
Tommy’s quiet for a very long time.
“Yeah,” one word says so much; yeah the bitching is happening more, but so’s the drinking. But Wilbur won’t pull on that thread, that’s not his business. Well, none of this is his business really, but he feels like he’s been left out of the loop a little too much regarding that boyfriend of yours.
“So what’s the deal with Mark? Is he… is he magic or something?” Wilbur fumes, “because she- she- Tommy she doesn’t seem happy with him, so I don’t –“
“She’s not,” Tommy groans, “and I don’t get it either, I just know-“ and finally his mouth snaps shut, scowling. Wilbur wants to apologise, wants to acknowledge that he shouldn’t be asking about this, that he knows he’s prying, but Tommy exhales loudly through his nose, “Mark was like a knight in shining armour back when they were in high school, bit of a dork, but nice enough and didn’t seem as much of a Tory as his dad, so I thought he was pretty alright.”
“What?”
“Mark’s dad’s been chief of police in our town for as long as I can remember,” Tommy says with a sigh. Wilbur watches quietly, patiently, as Tommy puts down his phone at his desk and runs his hands through his hair, “and Y/N’s kind of always been seen as a wild card by our parents; I don’t know if she was like that when you met her, but that would have been the only time she hasn’t been with Mark since she was seventeen, I don’t know if she –“
“Climbing things, enjoys being on rooves,” Wilbur nods, and for the briefest moment, Tommy smiles, though it’s tight, “impulsive things like that?”
“Yeah,” Tommy’s got both his hands resting on his head, leaning back in his desk chair, gazing off into the distance, “it got her in a lot of trouble when she was about my age, but I think Mark ended up offering to talk to his dad –“
“The policeman?” Wilbur interrupts, and Tommy pauses, gaze flicking to his phone, expression drawn. For a moment, he sees the family resemblance between you and your little brother around his eyes in this moment of seriousness, of unspoken truth. His silence speaks volumes. “I just never knew is all,” Wilbur says quietly. Tommy looks away again.
“Yeah, well, it’s not like she was ever charged with anything, Mark made sure of that,” things quickly start clicking into place bit by terrible bit. Finally, Tommy sighed, almost deflating in his seat as he doubles over, forehead coming to rest at the edge of his desk, “I don’t know- man, I don’t know why she stays with him,” he admits, “I’ve- I’ve got theories, but she never- I don’t know for sure, you know?” When he looks up, there’s pain in his eyes; his heart was obviously aching for his sister.
“Man, she called me bloody well crying the day she found out he’d moved to London after her,” he murmurs, dejected at the very memory. However, before Wilbur can even ask why Tommy’s telling him all of this, the boy in question sits back up, tone far lighter, “she used to tell me about you, you know, back before we knew each other.”
“What’d she say?” Both confusion and affection course through Wilbur at this piece of information, and Tommy shakes his head, laughing softly.
“You and your flatmates were the best thing to happen to her in a long time, she couldn’t wait to tell me about you lot,” his tone is so affectionately teasing it’s almost sickening. But it practically confirms something Wilbur had been concerned about for a long while; you hadn’t revealed how close you and Wilbur actually were, either when you’d first met, or now. Thank god, that was future-Wilbur’s problem.
“I think that’s still true,” Tommy says after a moment, “but maybe I’m biased. Would be a bit hard if my sister and one of my best mates didn’t get along,” Wilbur feels his heart grow warm at the sentiment, listening to Tommy ramble on, “and it’s good for her to have someone else- I mean, someone who she can admit that stuff about not liking Mark to. He’s so Milquetoast and that’s the problem, everyone thinks he’s incapable of sin, and ‘calmed Y/N down’ or whatever the fuck… I hate him.” Tommy groaned, rolling his eyes, before pivoting without a second thought, “are we still streaming Lore tonight?”
Wilbur sighs and it feels like the tension in his whole body eases.
“Yeah.”
But it doesn’t last.
It’s a weird stream, a weird night overall, only half focused on the content. Thankfully he wasn’t the focus of the lore, so he could get away with being a little vacant as Ghostbur. The moment he signs off, he’s humming the now-established melody that’s been frankly plaguing him, and piecing together lyrics on the drive home.
The days pass by, turn to weeks, and you’re still messaging each other like nothing ever happened. Sometimes friends shag friends and its not a big deal; usually those friends aren’t actively in other meant-to-be monogamous relationships with people they don’t actually like, but that’s more your problem than his, so he tries not to let it get to him.
But it does.
Every text feels strangely sanitised, like words and meaning can’t quite align, with the freedom of honesty only being granted in the sporadic calls the two of you still keep up. He likes habit, likes tradition, likes the sound of your voice. So maybe he’s weak, he’s not the one playing along while seeing someone else.
"Hey," he can hear your smile in your voice, and can't help his own, feeling tipsy and warm as he struggles with the buttons of his shirt.
"Hey," he giggles, and you don't even ask if he's drunk; its usually the only time you call each other.
"Good night?" You ask, and he gives a long, contented sigh, pausing where he's losing against his shirt.
"Such a good night," he hums contentedly, and decides to leave his shirt for the moment, focusing instead on his shoes, which seem like the next most worthy opponent, "you gotta come to Brighton again, we only saw, like, the third most best pub, this one- this tonight one has the best beer battered chips, I can't believe I didn't think to bring you here -"
"Is that Pandora?" Across the line, Mark speaks around a yawn, "is she okay, it's late -"
"Who?" Wilbur asks, and it takes him a few moments and falling on his ass to put the pieces together as you seem to be telling Mark that everything's okay, "is my name in your phone Pandora?" He's met with muffled sounds of movement, and then the closing of a door, and you huff a faint laugh.
"Sorry about that -"
"Is my name in your phone Pandora?" Wilbur asks, feeling far more sober than he'd felt several minutes ago. But you're silent; it's answer enough, "does Mark still not know we're friends?"
"Are you home safe?" You sound suddenly very tired.
"Do you want me to stop calling?" Wilbur asks seriously; it's not accusatory, it's genuine. Something about knowing how thoroughly you've been lying about him to your boyfriend, it makes him feel ill. In his current state he can't say what he wants to, well he can, but he knew he's put his foot in it, sound like he was blaming you, and that's the last thing he wants, "I can stop- if it- it's more trouble than I'm worth -"
"Wil," you laugh softly, warmly, endeared, "it's okay, it's- Mark's friends- it's okay. It's like putting a goldfish in a new tank, gotta acclimatise him to the idea of us being friends before he knows you're a dude."
"Is that why you don't text or call Tommy? Because Mark gets weird seeing a man's name on your phone?" Falls from Wilbur's lips as he gives in and lays back on his floor. It takes him a moment to realise what he's said, right around the time you start spluttering - "fuck, sorry." He groans, scrunching his whole face up with regret, "don't hold that against me, I'm sorry -"
"That's... not exactly the reason," your voice at the other end of the line is so small, "or, well, no it's not exactly applicable, since I don't really message anyone..." you stall for a moment, before admitting, as if through clenched teeth, determined to finish the thought despite realising it might be a mistake, "apart from you."
"What if he hears its me when you pick up?"
Immediately, and much to his surprise, your tone shifts very suddenly.
"I'll risk it if it means I get to hear you like this," there's something about the way you say that, the way you're grinning and amused at that, that has his heart in his throat.
"Why?"
The silence is fucking deafening. He's half worried you've hung up, and he has to check, but no, you're just quiet on the other end.
"You're not gonna remember this, are you?" And he's not even sure of his own answer, but you don't give him time for one, "enrichment?" Though it sounds like a question, like your trying to make it sound light but it’s not quite working, like you're not even sure yourself. The word, however, has the air Wilbur breathes turning sour.
"You're not a zoo animal," he responds flatly.
"I shouldn't have said that," you laugh awkwardly, trying to keep your tone bright, but its clear your heart's not in it.
"Did you lie to him when you came to Brighton?"
Silence. Again. Always silence when you both know the truth and know it will hurt.
"You're drunk, Wil."
“You know talking to the people who love you shouldn’t feel like enrichment, right?” He asks, all sharp and mean and bitter in the moment as he found himself fixated on how thoroughly he loathed your boyfriend, how you could barely speak to your brother, or seemingly have friends because of him. It’s misplaced, the anger spilling out at you, but he’s not in any sort of shape to think critically about it. Over the phone, you’re spluttering, confused and defensive, but he’s so caught in his own head that he barely hears it. Angry and half-dressed and cross-legged on his bedroom floor, Wilbur scowls with sudden clarity.
“Is that all I am to you?”
“This is entrapment,” he can hear you’re crying at the other end of the line.
“It’s not entrapment, it’s a yes-no question,” he snaps, “am I just enrichment in your little life? Something a little bit brighter than your reality? A holiday; am I just a holiday to you –?!”
“This is so much bigger than you, Wilbur!” Explodes from you tearfully, “and I’m sorry, okay? You don’t deserve this, I know that –“
“Go back to bed,” Wilbur flopped back onto his floor, looking up at his ceiling.
“Wilbur –“
“Go,” he says, “I’m sorry I called.”
The conversation weighs on him even after a full night of rest, and all he knows is that he has to get into the studio before this song eludes him.
The content, the idea isn't new to him or his music, but this… this one’s the most telling; he’d had plausible deniability with the others, fabricated things to make it not immediately obvious to… well to anyone who isn’t you. He’s pretty sure you’ll get half a verse in and know, because sometimes it feels like you know him well enough that it's almost an accident. Because yes, he’s written for songs for girls he’s loved before you, and girls he’s loved in the two years of radio silence, but considering the situation he found himself in, he desperately needed some plausible deniability with that one.
This one, however, had no structure until he saw you again, until he left and your absence felt raw. It’s half finished when he brings it to the band. He’s immensely grateful when Joe takes an interest and offers to help him finish writing it.
But in the end, he knows he’s already swallowed his doubts and agreed to put Sex Sells on the EP. This one they’re tentatively calling Perfume, and already he’s conflicted. Maybe it’ll go on their album.
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straighttohellbuddy · 3 years
Text
bodyache {Corpse Husband}
@bingusmode my beloved requested: hey u … u asked for soft prompt? i wanna… i wanna give u a dialogue prompt ive been working on that i made for myself…. “do you think stars have feelings?” “i’d like to think they do. i think stars fall so in love they like to run into each other and create supernovas.” and then later in the story, with no added context, to see if MC remembers- “hey… i think i might be pulling a star” :’) it’s from a dream i had w corpse and maybe… maybe u can take it and do something good with it too :’)
Summary: You are the best part of a bad past - and then you come back.
A/N: 5202 words.
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Warnings: light crime?? like trespassing, also mentions of Corpse getting in a fight. also also mentions/implications of disordered eating.
Citrus Scale: 🧡 ORANGE 🧡
Corpse claims he doesn't have friends outside of the internet. When you hear this, you call him dramatic and roll your eyes.
"I don't have friends, I have you, and we're not friends, you just keep showing up at my house," his tone is deadpan as he elaborates, looking up from where you'd placed your phone in front of him. On the screen is his interview in the latest Anthony Padilla video, where he'd explained that it's not like he has to hide his identity since he doesn't have anyone to hide it from.
He's sitting at the kitchen island of his shoebox kitchen, while you level an unimpressed look at him.
"You're the one who keeps letting me in," you tell him pointedly, hands on your hips as you look around the kitchen, before ducking down and opening one of his cupboards.
"I'm being polite," he fires back, snarkily, and you glance up at him, eyebrow raised, a little disbelieving.
"Where'd you put your big soup pot, Mister Nobody-Loves-Me?" You ask instead, and he huffs, dropping his head to the counter in exasperation.
"I don't want fucking soup."
"Well I brought ingredients for soup," your tone is lofty as you make your way through the cupboards.
"I didn't ask you to," he reminds, but you, pot in hand and triumphant, stand up straight again, now grinning from ear to ear.
"If you can look me in the eye and tell me you've eaten in the past forty-eight hours, I'll leave."
A long, incredibly telling silence follows; for you it's a victory, as is Corpse's defeated sigh.
"What kind of soup?"
So no, Corpse doesn't have friends outside the internet, but he does have you, and has for the longest time.
You're somehow the best of a bad situation, the silver lining of the shitty, dark cloud of his past choices and poor judgement. Meeting you when he did, back when he was nobody and giving time to people who would sooner offer a knife than a helping hand, it feels like divine intervention.
He took hits and spat blood with the best of them, learned to flip knives and hide weaknesses, like how his body was actively self destructing at every given moment, but you were on the sidelines, watching him like he was a fucking zoo animal at first, fascinated. These people weren't fascinated by anything that didn't come rolled in thin paper or a dime bag, too caught up in themselves and the anger and the violence they indulged in that you, quiet, observant you, were unnerving.
"Take a fucking picture," he'd hissed when he'd spotted you at one of the usual haunts, perched on a milkcrate like some punk gargoyle all decked out in black. You were watching him - fucking again - after someone had tried to start shit, and he'd ended up with a black eye and split lip. Not an unusual occurrence for a Saturday, but the way you're looking at him, your hands shoved deep in the pockets of your jackets, eyes alight with something unreadable while your expression was strangely neutral, it make the hair stand on the back of his neck.
"Do you want some aspirin?" You call. In the rose-gold chill of the night, it feels like some strange scene from a movie; Corpse scowls.
"The fuck?"
"Do you want," you say slower this time, pulling your hand out of your pocket, holding something thin and shiny between your middle and pointer fingers, "some aspirin?" Oh; you're holding a packet of fucking aspirin like it's a Yu-Gi-Oh card and you're Seto goddamn Kaiba.
"I'm fine," he tells you stubbornly, forcing the words between his teeth. He's been through worse, he doesn't need your charity. Putting the medication back in your pocket, he watches through narrowed eyes as you take a deep breath, giving him an evaluative look over. People around here paying close attention does not usually mean good things.
Still, you wear that strangely neutral mask, intrigued fascination in your eyes, before you look away, sharply to your left, and Corpse is given the clear and distinct impression that you're done with the interaction, and with him for the time being.
The general consensus among his so-called friends is that you and your deeply strange aura were always on the peripheries of all the goings-on around here. Everywhere he went, he seemed to catch a glimpse of you; you didn't seem to pay much attention to him after that first and only interaction, but you were always around.
No-one knows where you come from, no-one knows where you go where the sun comes up, but people don't tend to mess with you, though it seems to be more tradition than for any reason anyone can remember.
You wear denim jackets that are too big for you, sleeves swallowing your hands and hiding the brass knuckles it took him a long time to actually notice.
On a night where he happens to be milling in your general vicinity, he's surprised when you offer a bottle of water. He doesn't take it, obviously, he has no way of knowing what's in it.
"It's just water," you tell him flatly, taking a sip yourself.
"I don't care, I don't want it," he tells you seriously, deeply confused by the whole situation.
"Okay," you say with a shrug, taking a larger gulp of water this time, one hand still in your pocket as you slouch against the brick wall beside him. After a few moments of silence, however, you speak up, "you lips wouldn't split so bad and would probably heal faster if you were better hydrated."
"Why are you looking at my lips?" He fires off, as it's the only part of that sentence he can properly comprehend.
"Because you keep getting punched in the face," you glance at him with the faintest hint of amusement curling at the edge of your lips. His whole expression scrunches up, but you're not exactly wrong. You offer the water bottle again; he takes it, sculling the entire thing defiantly.
"You're weird; you know you're weird, right?" He hands back the empty water bottle, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand and managing not to wince where he does, in fact, have a recent split.
"Of course I know," you answer easily, smile growing a little wider as you look out to the rest of the dingy parking lot, and your fellow undesirable youths gathered there, "I'm like this on purpose."
"Why?"
"Why not?" You shrugged, before taking a deep breath, slumping further against the wall, tipping your head back to look up at the sky, "it passes the time."
Corpse has the people he hangs out with, the friends he knows in the back of his mind would turn on him at a moment's notice, and you don't really have anyone since you seem to prefer to watch everyone, but more and more it seems the two of you end up spend your nights roaming the city together when there's nothing better to do.
"If you're not careful," one of the first things you'd ever told him when the two of you go on your first solo expedition of the city in the early hours of the morning, is that, "those people will eat you alive." And at the time, he knew what you meant, wasn't blind to the kind of people he was hanging out with, but he was still wary of you and the games you seemed to play.
"Just worry about yourself," he'd rolled his eyes. Your smile grew wider as you turned, walking backwards a few steps ahead of him, uncharacteristically smug.
"I'm unpalatable." You grin. Something about his understanding of you clicks, in that moment, perhaps in a way you didn't even intend; the eccentricities that practically drip from your every word, your every move, are a defence mechanism.
However, as time goes on, he realises that understanding may not be completely accurate. What about you changes in the time you spend together? Nothing than he can put his finger on, but your mannerisms and strange behaviour becomes more and more like part of his background noise, turning from vaguely unsettling to endearing. The way you watch makes him feel seen for the first time in a long time.
"Do you think stars have feelings?" There's something soft in your voice that he hears more and more when it's just the two of you together. It is a little jarring to hear it now, considering you were both loitering beneath a bridge; you're smiling up at the sky, and he's decimating an empty shoebox he'd found with a pocket knife.
By now he's used to you saying whatever happens to be on your mind, even if it made no sense, though sometimes you still managed to catch him by surprise.
There's a long moment where he thinks over what you've actually said, and a few moments longer as he gazes at you with confusion. It's as if you can feel his eyes on you, as you look over your shoulder with an amused little smile; he's never seen your smile reach your eyes like this when you're around other people.
"It's okay, there's no-one else around to tear your apart for having opinions on hypothetical star feelings."
Sometimes, occasionally, for a few sparing moments once in a blue moon, he remembers you're more than just the front you put up, the jumble of eccentricities you use to distract from how observant and thoughtful you are about the people around you. Him especially. It still feels like a trap.
"I'd like to think they do," when you realise you're probably not going to get an answer from him, you rock back on your heels for the moment, balancing there as you look up at the sky once more, "I think stars fall so in love they run into each other and create supernovas." It's... endearing. Corpse presses his lips together, but can't bring himself to speak; he watches you, silhouetted by stars.
You're disarmingly honest, neon amongst the grime of his life where honesty feels like a trap, like something to be used against him. It might be killing him; this life, these people, killing him faster than the shit that's been killing him since the beginning. He has to get out.
"I'm not coming back here," he's trying to hype himself up, the two of you sitting on the roof of a building you definitely shouldn't be on. The air is still, is icy in winter, and the two of you are sitting side by side, pressed together to conserve heat, legs dangling off the side of the building.
"Here here?" You asked, your cheek on his shoulder as you look out to the lights of the city twinkling below.
"To any of this bullshit; to the people, the fucking assholes, the shady ass shit I know - I know - I should know better than be a part of," he's seething, scowling, fidgeting.
"Like trespassing on rooves?" You ask quietly, tone mild, if faintly amused, kicking the side of the building with your heels, though he steamrolls ahead.
"I'm gonna get serious about my music," voice soft but determined, your head rises and falls with the deep breath he takes. You tuck your arm in his, tuck yourself further against him in the cold.
"It's good music," you agree sincerely without hesitation. The night sky is changing, though it's barely noticeable, the faintest tinge of lavender on the horizon.
"I'm not coming back here," he says again, softer this time; he rests his cheek against your head.
"You shouldn't," you tell him, "you're better than this." It's not self deprecating, nor is it said with any sort of rose-coloured tinge to your tone; you present it as fact. He's better than this.
He wants to ask where you'll go when he's gone, but it feels selfish, implying that you don't have a life outside of him. He still doesn't know where you're from. He still doesn't know where you go when the sun comes up. He's afraid of the answer you'll give, but he's more afraid of saying the words out loud. If he asks where you'll be without him, he knows you'll hear the truth; where will I be without you?
And honesty like this still feels like a trap.
"Do you still think supernovas are just stars overwhelmed with, like, their love for each other?" He asks instead, looking up at the sky where the stars themselves were slowly disappearing in preparation for the sunrise. For a long moment, you're quiet, surprised he remembered that at all, confused why he would bring it up now.
"I think supernovas are stars exploding," your voice is so quiet, if he wasn't so close he doubts he would have been able to hear you, "I'm whimsical, not stupid, but..." you hummed thoughtfully, "I think sometimes I feel like a supernova." But you don't seem to be able to bring yourself to explain... but you don't have to. He can't quite articulate it, but he understands all too well how it feels to be something of a supernova.
So he leaves without saying any real goodbyes, just stops showing up, and blocks numbers of people he'd been in fights with despite deluding himself into believing they're friends, and he looks at your name in his contacts when he sees the sky turning lilac on nights where he knows he's been up too late.
He leaves behind years, but knows he's better for it.
He makes music - it's good music - and doesn't look back - he shouldn't, he's better than that - and works on the shit he's really passionate about instead of wasting his life on the people who cared more about the hypothetical spoils of his sustained ambition than what he actually would create. And you.
He left behind your blunt sincerity and charming aloofness, the first and only person who's made him feel anything other than insignificant.
Days turn into weeks turn into months, and your absence makes itself known every single day. There's a faint, resentful voice in the back of his head of the person he used to be, the person who'd turned down your first offer of aspirin because he'd rather soldier through the pain than trust anyone to actually have good intentions. It spoke more to the poor company he used to keep, but the voice in his head said he'd gone soft for missing you.
He hadn't blocked you, but he also hadn't heard from you, and something about that makes his chest ache, like you didn't even miss him enough to reach out. The thought turns jagged, however, because he knows all too well that he hasn't reached out to you, despite how quiet his background noise has gotten since he'd left.
There's too many stars now; it seems like the night sky's gotten wider in your absence. It's overwhelming. He closes the blinds.
Until it's Tuesday afternoon at the end of spring, and his world has just started to change online, but in person the biggest difference is that he's moved apartments. So now he's squinting at the ingredients on the back of a packet of chips since this convenience store has weird flavours that he's hesitant to try. A hand shoots out beside him, reaching past to grab a packet for themselves, and when he mutters a distracted apology, shifting out of their way, he realises after a few moments that whoever it was beside him hasn't moved.
"Can I help-" he frowns, unsure of what this person's problem is, except he realises almost immediately what their problem is; they're you.
Wearing oversized pyjamas in the middle of the convenience store, looking like you'd just woken up from a deep sleep and had shuffled down here in a haze. Which... okay relatable; Corpse's own attire was most definitely the first things he'd picked up off his floor after trying and failing to get to sleep after several hours of attempts.
Reaching out, as if in a trance, you gently prod him with a look of bewilderment on your face.
"Not a dream," he tells you reflexively; catching your train of thought was like old habit, even if just for a moment. Blinking quickly, like waking, like coming back to reality, finally your gaze meets his.
And then you yawn.
Which is the exact moment Corpse realises that he's never actually seen you during the day time, despite having known you for literal years. He's seen you at sunrise and sunset, but for all intents and purposes, you, like him, were practically nocturnal in the rough few years you'd been hanging out together.
His sleep was marginally better now. Marginally.
This single moment is suspended in time, light pouring in the windows of the store behind you like some cinematographer is getting his rocks off to this reunion with the way you're almost silhouetted in gold. But he can still see your face, still see your smile, still see the way everything about you turns fond as you process this moment. It's like no time has passed, just being close to you, everything about you is so familiar.
"Have you refused to stay hydrated out of spite in my absence?" Is the first thing you say, and reflexively, Corpse's face scrunches up, and his tongue darts out to wet his lips.
"That's how you say hello? You poke me and stare at my lips?" He asks, though the exasperation he feels towards you is familiar and strangely comfortable; your grin widens.
"I simply made an educated guess -" another yawn cuts your words off, and you give a little stretch, before trying to shake out a bit of your obvious exhaustion. Maybe you were actually nocturnal all this time.
The two of you end up on the roof of his building, if only for old-time's sake, though he finds it strangely funny that this is the first time either of you has had permission to be on the roof you found yourself on. In the shade of the stairwell where the two of you sit, backs to the wall and sharing your haul of junk food, it feels like something out of a memory. Except in the day, in your pyjamas, something about you seems far gentler than he ever remembers you being.
Months disappear in minutes and your friendship picks up right where it left off.
It gets cooler as the sun sets, but he doesn't want this day, this night, this moment to end, so he gets blankets, and you order dinner for the two of you. Corpse... isn't quite sure when the last time was that he had a proper meal, and despite the lighthearted way you joke about it, you seem to share the same problem. So together you eat, and laugh, and when you look at the stars with the light in your eyes and a smile on your lips, a sight he'd thought he'd never see again, it almost overwhelms him, like he could find the right words for this moment they'd practically explode out of him. But he can't find the right words, could never find the right words, listening, instead to you babble about what you've been up to.
It's as if he's trying to memorise this moment, watching you with fond familiarity, leaning his head back against the brick wall behind him as he watches you through half-closed eyes. The universe is correcting itself for your absence from his life with this night, and then going back the other way when he wakes, still on the roof, not sure when he'd passed out the night before. His whole body feels like it's revolting against him for sleeping on the fucking roof, without even a damn pillow. Unfortunately, it's not the worst sleep he's gotten lately.
The sky is lilac and golden where he's grimacing at it, sun barely having risen, but when he shifts, tries to get himself into a more comfortable position, he sees you, a few feet away, curled up on your side with your hands pillowed beneath your head, asleep. He shouldn't be surprised, and yet he still is, touched by the fact that you'd stayed. Proof that you cared after all this time.
Time passes, time together. Now he has you back, he's not letting you go. You were always the best part of the shit he used to put himself through, the only thing he'd really consider going back for, the only thing he knew was worth bringing with him.
Practically neighbours now, he's surprised when you invite him over to your place for dinner.
He learns where you're from.
He learns where you go when the sun comes up.
Sometimes, he joins you there.
Your apartment is about the same size as his, hobbies and crafts and posters and bric-a-brac cluttering the space, filling it with the things you love; grinning at him as he flops on the sofa, you tell him he fits right in.
He doesn't realise things are getting better, getting brighter, until he looks back at where he'd come from. He'd climbed from the tar pit, but he'd been working himself into exhaustion with his newfound freedom. At least now, when you bang on his door with a grocery bag and a USB with the latest blockbuster pirated and ready to watch, it means he's eating, and focusing on something other than whatever's been slowly driving him mad. And you always seem to know exactly when he needs a break. You still watch; you still see him when he can barely see himself at times.
But he learns quickly that somehow your sleep schedule is worse than his.
And you're only eating well because you're making sure he does too.
And you live close by, sure, but each day it feels like it grows a little further apart. You've come to keep each other in check, to do your best to take care of each other when you can, but sometimes Corpse thinks he might sleep easier knowing you've managed to get some sleep too. His own exhaustion gets to be almost unbearable sometimes, he hates to think what you've putting yourself through.
But strangely enough, the two of you appear to be on the same wavelength.
"Is it weird that I sleep better on your sofa?" You asked, snuggling beneath the blankets he'd haphazardly thrown over you; he can tell you're beaming, even if he can only see your eyes. It's almost six in the morning, the sun was rising, the two of you had been marathoning horror movies and you had given up on the idea of going home before attempting some rest.
"The fact that you sleep at all is one of science's greatest mysteries," he smirked, but as he passed on the way to his own bedroom, he pets your cheek fondly. To see you sleeping serenely when he stumbles out of his room around midday for a glass of water, it fills him with an indescribable warmth.
It happens over time.
Your toothbrush on the sink, more of your shoes pile by the door, then you're bringing different cutlery and utensils from your own kitchen as you keep making the two of you food, or Corpse will be cooking and realise too late that he never had a lemon zester to begin with. What kind of parallel universe is this where he seriously requires a lemon zester? That's the thought that baffles him in the five minutes it takes you to run and grab your own.
"I'm not letting you take the sofa! I'm the guest -" you argued brightly, right as he frowned at you, then down at the basket of laundry in his hands.
"You stopped being a guest when you started throwing your laundry in with mine," he tells you without room for argument, "the sofa is bad for your back, let me -"
"My back is fine!"
"Yeah, now," he rolled his eyes, "take the bed; if it means that much to you, we can, I don't fucking know, switch every week or so," he offers, tone implying that he thinks you're being ridiculous. Which, you consider as you lay flat on your back in his double bed, staring up at the ceiling, you might have been.
"It's a double bed," you call out into the darkness of four-fifty-eight in the morning.
"I'm aware," Corpse's tired, half muffled response comes a beat later.
"Do you..." you pause for a moment, finally conceding defeat on the earlier matter, and also just now realising how absolutely stubborn you were being by refusing all his earlier offers for a far more comfortable sleeping arrangement, "we could just share."
It becomes domestic, if erratic, and every day there's fewer and fewer reasons that you can find to be still paying rent on your own place that you're never at. The pair of you live a simple and cheap life, which, considering some days Corpse feels more like his namesake than others, and he's still got his medical bills to keep in mind, it's probably for the best.
The things that had filled your home slowly come to populate his apartment, just as you'd fit yourself seamlessly into his new life.
"I can't believe I ever thought you were intimidating," Corpse is grinning with your head in his lap, poking fun at your various collectables scattered about. The afternoon is warm, plates from lunch sit, practically licked clean, on the coffee table.
"Hey, my personal life and my weird, street-rat life were separate for a reason," you'd stuck your nose in the air as best you could, fighting back a smile of your own, "I was intimidating."
"You were unsettling -"
"You thought I was unsettling because you didn't know why I was actually intimidating!" You wriggled around for a moment, half bracing yourself against the arm of the sofa to properly look him in the eyes.
"Oh I fully believe you thought you were intimidating," there's something about his voice, about this moment, you'd felt it before, more and more recently, like it was building.
"I kept pulling out knives when people tried to fight me," you tell him as seriously as you could muster, feeling yourself grow warm as he held your gaze.
"A lot of those assholes had knives," his voice is soft, though you couldn't help the sharp grin that found it's way onto your face.
"Yeah, but they're all talk... mostly."
"And you? Ready to cut a bitch at a moment's notice?" He huffed faint, a disbelieving laugh, to which your eyebrows rose.
"You knew me back then, I was unsettling; could you say with absolutely certainty that I wouldn't cut a bitch at a moment's notice?" And though you make a very good point, he leans in, closing the gap between you, pressing his lips to yours.
Something about the way you taste - like something sweet and familiar, like the food you'd made together - the way you feel - he's held you gentle, held you close, woken up with an arm around you to see you smiling all sleepy and content with the contact, but never like this, though he's wanted to hold you like this for longer than he can put into words - or maybe it's gentle, pleased noise you make as he deepens the kiss; every sensation in this moment is going to be burned into his brain. He pulls you into his lap properly; all roads were leading here, he realises thinking back. Nothing else would have made sense. You wrap your arms around his neck, the reality of it all feels like its about to overwhelm him.
When you pull back, eyes wide, drinking in his expression and trying to process the moment, he watches your whole face light up. He holds you tighter, it's all he can do in this moment, pressing his face, his grin, against your collar.
"How do you do that?" He's a little breathless, "how do you do that with your face, I don't -"
"Do what?" You sound confused, and he pulls back, if only to gaze at you; he doesn't realise how utterly lovestruck he looks in this moment. You can't help but hold his jaw gently, thumb brushing his cheek.
There's no hesitation when he speaks now; honesty hasn't felt like a trap for a long time, but it's still a struggle to find the right words -
"Your face just says everything; you can say everything without even saying anything, and I just feel like- I feel like that supernova. I never know what to say when I wanna say something, I just feel like I'm going to explode."
"A supernova?" Voice barely more than a whisper, you're awed and fond, even as his face scrunches up with embarrassment as he realises what he's said.
"You make me feel like a supernova," he murmurs despite himself, doubling down as he leans in to trail kisses up the column of your throat.
There is consistency and care in the love you share. It's cooking together, and playfully bickering about the right amount of time to cook pasta, but getting distracted, getting wrapped up in each other until the water boils over loudly. It's consistently inconsistent sleep schedules and dragging the other to bed if they've been awake for objectively too long. It's pride and support and hyping each other up, and you may not know a lot about the online world that has begun to deify Corpse, but others opinions wouldn't sway your own, you just feel lucky that his music is consistently fire.
It's the way Corpse likes having the blinds open at night because he likes the way the sight of the stars makes you smile.
It's the way you hear him, loud and adamant where he's in the middle of a drunk-stream with some of his friends -
"I wasn't lying- hey, I wasn't lying, okay when I said I didn't have people IRL, I have you guys, okay, but you're online, you're all online, you already know who I am so it doesn't matter if you know who I am," he's rambling, and you pause the show you're watching, half tempted to poke fun at him as you had when you'd heard him echo this sentiment before, but as you crack the door to his office open, leaning against the doorframe, he turns to you, undeterred, beaming but still obviously addressing the rest of his stream.
"I don't have friends offline, but I have them, and they're not..." his tone is going soft, going somewhat sappy and sentimental, and your heart feels like it's about to burst with love at the look of tipsy adoration he's regarding you with, "they're not my friend. They've never been my friend, they're better; they're... constant." After all this time, you're still here, and you know there's no place you'd rather be. "They're my constant."
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straighttohellbuddy · 3 years
Text
don't threaten me with a good time {Dream}
Request: if you’re still taking requests- cc!dream and reader who is part of the dream team being the typical will they/won’t they couple
Summary: Y/N sends Dream their address mostly as a joke, and it's all uphill from there.
A/N: 5653 words. WHY IS THIS 5.6k?! WHY AM I LIKE THIS. seriously though im kind of really in love with this fic. im sorry there's not thaaaat much of the dream team but this is set after sap and dream move in together. also i was listening to the FOB song of the same title for a lot of this, but i think Cake By The Ocean fits the fic better??
Warnings: many many suggestive jokes but it's sfw, almost painfully fluffy at the end
{ Idiots-To-Lovers 'verse } | { 1 / 4 }
"Fuck you," Dream muttered, which wasn't uncommon despite the fact that you considered him one of your closest friends. Years long friendships, knowing how to push one-another's buttons, it tended to illicit that kind of response. Your particular brand of friendship with Dream, however, meant it was not uncommon for your response to be along the lines of -
"You wish," you were grinning from ear to ear, gaze flitting around the screen looking to see if there were any more mobs advancing on you, or if you were finally in the clear.
"And so what if I did?" He retorts, voice sliding from irate to challenging, something familiar and teasing about his tone, his energy, that you knew you could match with ease.
"Alright bet," since your character seemed to be safe for the moment, you slouched back in your seat, lazy smirk on your face as you picked up your phone.
"Wait, what?" He half-laughed, a little confused at your response, before you heard his phone go off with a text notification, and you waited for a beat before he started to laugh his ass off.
"I said, alright bet; come romance me, green boy," you snorted, leaning back in to your computer, glancing at chat for a moment, before Dream's shouted through the VC;
"Did you just send me your fucking address over a bit?!"
"Well I didn't think you were fantasizing about sticking your dick in my PO box," you said blithely, which, after a moment to process what you'd just said, the comment seemed to break Dream. It sounded like he'd left his desk, laugh faint and echoing.
"Fuck you, Y/N," he came back with, and though the sound of his smile in his voice warmed your heart, you couldn't help yourself.
"You have my address," tone coy, you heard him mutter something indistinctly, but didn't push the bit any further, instead attempting to gather together what you'd need to make several beds and start strip-mining the Nether for Netherite.
You don't expect much to come of it; the address was sent on a whim but you did actually trust Dream. Well, you trusted him not to give out your address, or use it for evil, though it still comes as a shock the next day when the buzzer by your door goes off, and when you ask who it is, an unfamiliar voice identifies themselves as being from a flower delivery company.
[you motherfucker] You text him, alongside a photo of the elaborate bouquet of roses you bring up to your apartment.
[consider yourself romanced 💖🖕] Is his response, but all you can read into is your move.
When you tweet a photo of the flowers, you caption it 'a simp found my address. should i move or wait for more things to show up?' to which Dream, with all the subtlety of a blimp, responds 'you're gonna die waiting'. Ass. It does makes you laugh, though.
But it comes up again, several days later you're doing an alt stream, taking uquizes people are recommending on your Discord, when someone asks about the flowers in your background, right as someone else is asking if Dream ever actually showed up at your apartment.
"The flowers are actually from Dream, I tweeted about them a few days ago but I don't think I actually made that clear," your tone fond as you gaze over your shoulder at the flowers, you take a moment to let that fondness flourish in your chest; he didn't need to do anything, and yeah, maybe it was for a bit, but he still didn't have to send them at all. Clearing your throat, you turn back to your camera, "because he's too chickenshit to show up himself." You grin sharply, unable to stop yourself from teasing him, even when he wasn't here to defend himself. Or so you thought.
Your phone goes off.
"Are you watching my stream?" Is how you answer the phone, met with an indignant Dream -
"I'm too chickenshit to show up? You're the one who said you wanted to be romanced; I didn't think showing up to your house was romantic I thought it was fuckin' creepy, excuse me for being a gentleman!" Then, after a moment with no response from you, he adds, "stop laughing, Y/N, I'm protecting my own honour here," but he was clearly smiling, holding back laughter of his own.
"Dude, you wanna fuck me so bad it makes you look stupid," you wheeze, to which he hung up.
Then, a minute later, a donation of a hundred dollars from the man himself 'And what if I did just show up? What then? Hypocrite❤️'-
"Thanks for the donation, Dream, why don't you show up then, in the pouring fuckin' rain, put your money where your mouth is," you smirk, ignoring his follow-up dono of 'you wanna fuck me so bad it makes you look stupid and underline the second you!'. You roll your eyes instead, favouring other messages.
So imagine your shock when after forty minutes of radio silence, you get another dono from him reading 'FBI open up' as the buzzer on your door goes off.
Your chat is on another fucking level of crazy as they immediately put two and two together, and suddenly you can hear your heartbeat in your ears as you look at your door.
"Shut the fuck up," you breathe, mostly to yourself; you'd tried to call his bluff, but he seemed to have turned the table on you, calling yours. You leave your mic on, mostly because this has great content potential, and you leave the frame to press the little microphone button that leads to the door of your building.
"If you're minecraft speedrunner DreamWasTaken, I'm going to throw rocks at you," is what you decide on, and there's a moment of silence before his incredibly familiar voice buzzes back up.
"So in answer to the question 'what would you do if I did show up' the answer is, you'd throw rocks at me? Not gonna lie, less hot than what you'd been implying," and then, after a beat, he laughs, "I can hear myself through your stream, that intercom is so loud."
You buzz him in.
You go back to your computer, only to see your viewers have increased significantly, and everyone is begging to know what's happening. You just sit, as if deflated, in your chair, awaiting your comeuppance to knock at your door.
The first and most obvious thing about Dream when you open your door to him, is that he's fucking soaking wet.
"Why are you moist?!" You demand, ushering him inside.
"I ran here!" He's grinning from ear to ear, "consider yourself romanced!" And the elation in his voice is enough to quell your nerves, and you look him over for a moment, see his phone in his hand still with your stream open, with an earphone in one ear, and you sigh gently, smiling.
"You live within running distance?" You asked, an eyebrow raised as you head to your bathroom. The stream catches you opening the door to the bathroom behind you, but Dream stays where he is, out of shot, for good reason.
"Actually yeah," his tone drops to something far more conversational, and when you come back, towels in hand, you see him looking around your apartment. You hand him the stack of towels and head back to your set-up, muting your microphone and putting up your 'We'll Be Right Back' screen for the time being.
As soon as you were no longer being watched by over a hundred, thousand viewers, you dropped your irate act, beaming at Dream.
"I cannot begin to believe you, dude!" You found yourself laughing, "oh man, you win this round, okay, you definitely win this round."
"I fucking knew it! Calling me chickenshit, you little hypocrite!"
"I didn't think you'd actually come over!" You exclaimed, eyes wide and amused, watching as he dried himself off as best he could, "dude, you're soaked, you could have caught a cab."
"As if, this is so much more dramatic."
"You'll catch your death like that," you gave a longsuffering sigh, already heading to your drawers.
"I can't believe you thought I wouldn't follow through," he clicked his tongue.
"Sorry for underestimating you," your conceded, rummaging around your pyjamas, looking for - a-ha! "A friend of mine left these after couch surfing here, they should fit you," you offer, and Dream, who'd been focusing on trying to wring out his jeans with little success, seems surprised by the kind offer, looking to the clothes in your hands.
"Are they pyjamas?"
"They're all I really have that would be comfy for you," you said, a little helplessly, he carefully reaches out and takes them.
"They've got ducks on them," he says quietly, almost to himself, marvelling at them, and you hesitate before adding -
"And I've got... my Sapnap hoodie came out of the dryer this morning, actually, I bought it a few sizes too big, it's pretty cozy," you offered, and at that his expression turned fondly amused.
"That's adorable -"
"Shut up," you mumbled, "you want the hoodie or not?"
"I didn't think I'd be staying," he admitted, "I just kinda showed up to make you eat your words, I can go -"
"You ran all this way, let me wrap up my stream, and stay for dinner, I was thinking of making myself stir-fry but I've got enough for two."
"You sure?" He asks, tentatively, and you finally look to him; it hits you in this moment that you've never even seen a proper photo of him, and yet you'd known immediately who he was. This feels... inevitable.
"Yeah, absolutely," you grinned, ducking your gaze, "I'll throw your clothes in the dryer too, if you wanted to get changed that is, you don't have to -"
"I feel like I'm wearing a fucking mop; I'm gonna get changed," he says with a grin, heading through to your bathroom when you gesture to it. Stopping at the door, however, he gives you a genuine, fond smile, "thank you."
"I'm gonna do a bit where I call Sapnap and ask him to pick you up," you tell him bluntly in return. He snorts a laugh, and closes the bathroom door behind himself. "Give a knock when you're done and I'll cut the camera for you."
"I appreciate that," he calls back.
You go back to your idle stream, only to see your viewers had doubled, and when you pick up your phone, the first thing you see if several messages from friends telling you you're trending on Twitter. You turn on your camera and mic again, and open your phone.
"Ah hello, was wondering when I'd be getting a call from you," when Sapnap picks up, he sounds all kinds of smug.
"Can you come collect your man from my home?" You asked flatly, to which he was already cackling with laughter.
"He actually ran, didn't he? He fucking ran there, is he still there?" He asked, sounding absolutely delighted by the whole ordeal, "it's your fault for giving him your address in the first place."
"I didn't think he'd actually show up!"
"As if you wouldn't show up to our house out of spite if he gave you our address," Sapnap pointed out, which shut you up fast, "you both wanna fuck each other so bad it makes you both look stupid," he cackles before hanging up.
You sit, pretending to sulking in the silence, just quietly reading your chat, while dwelling on the fact that fucking Dream is now in your apartment. The man you'd both been aggressively, albeit mostly jokingly, pursuing, and been pursued by online, publicly, for over a year. The shock of his arrival was finally wearing off, but your nerves were alight for all new reasons; you try and push those thoughts out of your mind as Dream knocks gently on the bathroom door.
The blurry photo you take of your floor, with Dream's knee in the corner, wearing your friend's duck pyjamas gets several hundred thousand likes, and the stream itself is your most popular by a longshot.
It went on longer than you intended, as Dream sat on your bed, half watching your stream on his phone when he couldn't read your monitor properly from where he was, and you gently bullied him into taking a few quizzes himself, with you clicking the options for him. Despite the unexpectedness of the situation, it's one of the best nights you've had in a long time, and you're rather sad to see him go, waving goodbye as he climbs in the taxi after dinner, wearing his now-dry clothes.
#Y/NWasTakenMeetup trends. Most of the fandom appears to be under the impression that you've made good on your constant threat-slash-flirting, and those who think you're dating were seemingly in a heated war with those who think he's dating George. You tweet 'don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone' which appears to confuse everyone in the replies, apart from a few who get your reference to the song. Dream replies with 'love watching you get ratioed vaguing about how i went home in a taxi. you could have just asked me to stay'.
[you're a fucking menace. at least you got the song reference] you texted him.
[i googled it you hipster] Is his only response.
And things, on the surface at least, return to normal after that, your chatter seeming just as teasing and flirty as it's ever been. But there's something new to the interactions, a new... familiarity. You've seen his face. He's been in your house. You've actually had dinner together. You've heard his laugh in person.
It's not that you were particularly subtle before, but one late afternoon while hanging out on the server with George, after you make a particularly forward joke, Dream very pointedly reminds you -
"Last time I was in your bed, you didn't even do anything about it, so, how'd you put it, put your money where your mouth is?" God you can tell he's smirking, but you're not one to back down.
"You're the one with my address; you wanna run all the way over here again?" You retort, smile sharp, only for you to hear Dream, in an echo-y way, like he's no longer at his computer, holler for Sapnap, and your whole body freezes. George is the only one who's actually live right now, cackling with laughter.
"I cannot believe he ran to your house in the rain," George is grinning as he's mining peacefully.
"The only reason he hasn't run to you is because he's physically unable to run across the ocean," you point out, and George gives a fond chuckle, conceding that you were right about that; if he ever figured out how, both you and George were sure there was nothing that could stop him then.
Some noises come from Dream's end of the call, some scuffling, of typing, then your phone goes off, right as he says, obviously close to his mic -
"Money. Where. Your. Mouth. Is." He demanded.
You look over the address, before plugging it into your maps app.
"That's an hour walk and you ran here in the rain!? It would've taken you ten minutes to drive!" You hollered back.
"You're the one who said, and I quote, romance me, green boy, and so I ran through the rain because it's fucking romantic!"
"I'm not running to your house!"
"I never asked to be romanced! You're the one with the high standards!"
"You assholes are as bad as each other," George snorts, but you're already shoving your phone in your pocket, leaving your mic on as you rummage and grumble around your little flat, looking for a jacket and your keys.
"Fuck you, Dream," is the final thing you say. You do, however, he's his teasing response before you're logging off and leaving. He's parroting your words back at you, smug ass.
"You have my address."
Sometimes you wish you weren't so motivated by spite, but you do end up walking to Dream's house out of spite, only stopping at a florist when you're almost there, picking up a cheap, but pretty bouquet.
When you hit the intercom, you hear Sapnap asking tentatively who it is. You tell him your name, and he sounds ten times more exasperated when he tells you he hates you; he's of course joking, and lets you into the building. He also happens to be the one who opens the door when you knock, and at the sight of you holding a bunch of flowers, he tells you he really hates both you and Dream, and closes the door on you.
You knock again.
"Clay get the door," you hear Sapnap call, and Dream's beaming from ear to ear the moment he opens it, and sees your exasperated face and bouquet of flowers.
"Please let me get a photo of this," he basically begs, holding back his laughter, and you obligingly wait in his doorway for him to take the photo before he lets you inside. He shows it to you - you look a little abashed, flowers half covering your face - and you give a faint smile, spiteful determination already wearing off, fading to something warm, glad to see him.
"Wait, no that's not -" you hear George all tinny through Dream's headphones as you follow him to his office space after Dream takes the flowers from you and puts them in a jar with some water.
"I got flowers, George," Dream sounds so genuinely delighted, voice all pleased and soft, that you turn away for a moment to hide your smile, if only from him. Making him happy like this effected you so much more than you wanted to let on, only for him to go on to say, "I'm being romanced." And though there's a half-teasing edge to his words, you can feel your heartbeat quickening in your chest. Why had you come here again? Just for a joke? A joke about sleeping together?
But nothing ends up happening. Again. All the build-up with no follow through because you don't actually talk like that without the safety of the computers between you. He's still so easy to be around, to joke and talk with, you don't feel as if you've got all the flirting, all the coy suggestions you'd both made about what would happen when you met up, hanging over your heads; it was all a joke anyways, you told yourself, it was all a bit for entertainment purposes. You guys shoot the shit, and he makes you dinner, repays the favour you so kindly had done for him, and you have dinner with him and Sapnap, who, after the shock of seeing you at the door with flowers, shakes his head and points out that you'd only had their address for less than an hour before you'd showed up. But he lets it slide, and has dinner with you both.
You watch a movie with a name you're already forgetting, and Dream's only half paying attention, mostly on his phone, while yours ends up vibrating with a notification. He's trying desperately to look innocent, like he hasn't just tagged you in something.
Its the photo of you in the doorway captioned 'i'm not running to your house they said. i'm not gonna romance you they said.' so of course you had to respond with a blurry image of the TV in front of you, of the movie you're only vaguely invested in, replying with it, along with the caption 'tryna netflix and chill but honestly more invested in whatever this is u gotta step up your game buddy' and a few moments after you post it, you see him grin out of the corner of your eye, and he huffs a quiet laugh. Sapnap asks if anything's going on, and you show him your screen instead of answering, smiling, altogether too amused with yourself.
"Your poor fans," he snorts, "you're as bad as each other," and then he proceeds to pull out his own phone.
'i'm literally on the sofa next to you both while you giggle like children at twitter instead of watching the movie please stfu'
And he wears a pleased little grin of his own at the way both you and Dream crow with laughter once you see his response.
And when the movie's over, when you know you should be going, when you've nervous that you're overstaying your welcome, you can't help but hesitate. You don't want to stay... but also you kind of really want to anyways. Maybe you're just cursing that you walked here, and now it's too late to walk back, and you're gonna have to call a taxi or an Uber, or maybe it's just that you can't help but enjoy their company and you don't want to go back to your empty little apartment, but your thumb stalls over your phone for a moment before you book an Uber. It's the right call, you know, and you just hope Dream hadn't seen your hesitation, hadn't read anything into it.
"You ever wanna hang out again, grab dinner or just chill, well, you know, the seal's broken, you know where I live," he's sitting with you on the steps of the building while you wait for your ride. It's cold, but you're shoulder to shoulder, both with your knees drawn up close to yourselves, attempting to preserve heat, and he's so fucking warm.
"Same goes for you," you tell him sincerely, and he gives an appreciative hum, leaning against you as a moment of affection.
Maybe you should leave Twitter, you think, when you get home to see that once again #Y/NWasTaken is trending. Maybe you should stop feeding the fans lies when nothing's even happened beyond any sort of casual contact.
But then he's asking if you're free for lunch, because he's bored and wants company on a Tuesday afternoon. And you say yes.
But then it's a Saturday night and you have no plans and he's five minutes into a stream and you ask if you can come and lay on his floor for company because the highlights video you've been trying to edit is giving you a headache. And he says yes.
But then it keeps happening, every other week you guys seem to physically be in each other's streams or videos, and you hang out when you're not working, and your phone connects to his wifi automatically, and you fall asleep on his shoulder while he's working on some coding, trying to explain it when he's not getting lost in it. And you wake up tucked into his damn bed, only to stumble out apologetically seeing him still awake, looking at his phone with bleary eyes.
"Did you get any sleep?" You asked, voice rough but full of concern.
"No, I've been- I'm alright, I'm fine, you sleep alright?" He asks, attempting to rub the tiredness from his eyes; it doesn't work. You nod, something warm and fond overruling your concern for him as you give a genuine thanks. His laugh is rough as he tells you not to worry about it.
"Go to sleep, dude," you urge, pulling out your phone to order yourself a ride home.
"No, I'll- I'll-" he yawns loudly, "I'll see you off, don't want you to get stabbed or anything."
"I'm not going to get stabbed," you try and assure him as he's getting to his feet.
"Don't argue with me," he shoots for stern and misses, thanks to another yawn, but you keep your mouth closed anyways, obliging him.
You sit on the steps of his building together, as you always did, like tradition, but this time is more quiet than most. You're watching your ride get closer on the app, and he's leaning against you, head on your shoulder, scrolling through Twitter, though his hand goes still, and his phone screen dims, and he really needs to go to bed if he's falling asleep on you too.
"My ride's here," you say gently as it pulls up, and he makes a noise of acknowledgement as you get up, helping him to his feet. When he hugs you goodbye, it's different to usual, and you can't place exactly why until you hear his gentle, sleepy sigh; warm and full of unguarded affection, he holds you close, and you let yourself melt into this moment.
"Text me when you get home safe," his words blur together a little, and he presses a kiss to your temple, before he's pushing you softly to the Uber. He doesn't even seem aware of how he's broken the script of your goodbyes with one single moment. He waves you off with a blithe smile and you wave back, trying to figure out how to process this all, gently touching at your own temple for a moment.
Oh.
Everything changes and nothing changes after that. You were so uncertain if it was a fluke, a sleepy mistake or just platonic affection on his part, but it had lead you to a realise you couldn't come back from. Now you're nervous that all the tweets about how you and Dream are actually in love are seeing through the jokes and banter and bits to what you may have been projecting. Fuck.
But you're not gonna let it change your relationship with Dream, not until you know more, not until you know if he is just outright joking, because either way he's still your best friend.
So of course, when he Tweets a photo of Patches in his lap to promote his merch, you reply with 'never have i wanted to be a cat so badly in my life 😻😻'. It takes almost five minutes for a response.
'I saw your pokemon streams i know u own cat ears. 💵👄' and you hear his voice in your head - if you're gonna thirst tweet, you better be ready to put your money where your mouth is.
[bet. thats fucking funny as dude] you text him moments later, hunting through your drawers for the cheap ears you'd bought mostly as a joke.
You're in an Uber on the way to his apartment when your phone goes off again. Dream's tweeted again, but he wasn't the one who @'ed you.
'@Corpse_Husband ever think about doing a more gender neutral version of Cat Girls Are Ruining My Life?....... asking for no reason in particular' to which Corpse had simply responded with '@Y/N this your man??'
Everyone knows. Everyone knows. Fucking everyone can tell.
Oh this may have been a mistake.
But you play along, like always, putting on the ears and taking a selfie in the back seat of the Uber, telling Corpse that he could use that as the cover for the song. Within seconds your replies are flooded with confusion and thirst and people losing their minds.
Sapnap opens the door for you, and tells you Dream's in his room, but as you go to pass him, he grabs your wrist gently, stopping you in your tracks.
There's a pause, a hesitation. He's looking at you, analysing you for a moment, as if formulating how he's going to phrase whatever he's going to phrase -
"I wouldn't say anything," he starts, voice soft enough to ensure he wasn't overheard by Dream, which already has your nerves spiking, "but George kindly pointed out to me that you may be as dense as Clay is about this -" oh fuck, oh no, what - "you know he's in love with you too, right?"
"Too?!" Your eyes, go wide, and you immediately drop your volume, trying to limit your reaction, though it's certainly difficult. Poor Sapnap looks like he's quickly forming a headache, "you know I -? Fuck, of course you know- wait-" you mutter, freeing yourself from his grip to nervously fidget, before getting back to the part of that sentence you should have properly been focusing on.
"He what?!" You hissed. Sapnap screws his whole face up like he's bitten a lemon.
"I'm not playing match maker, you're adults," he nudges you towards Dream's bedroom, "and I say this with love of my own for both of you: you're both so fucking stupid sometimes." And so with those words of encouragement out of the way, he's absconding to his own room to avoid further questions.
The few steps to Dream's bedroom feel like a haze, feel like a lifetime.
"You really wore the ears, you're adorable, you know that?" Genuine, warm, you can hear the way he's smiling rather than see it, sunlight silhouetting him where he's sitting on his bed in this golden afternoon, this golden moment. You want to freeze this moment, this single, perfect moment before you're about to make a fool of yourself.
You step inside and close the door, leaning against it.
"You okay?" He cares. Oh God, Sapnap's right and you can hear it in his voice.
"Can we... can we talk about the stuff we don't talk about face to face?" You hear yourself say, and he shifts out of the light; you can see the concern on his face.
"We don't talk about a lot of stuff, you have to be more specific; is this like, general, like something terrible's gone on in the world, or is this, like... like us?" Brow furrowed, he's still looking at you, still watching you. Your heart is in your throat.
"Half the time we're online together we're joking about- about- about- about hooking up," you're trying to keep your nerve to get through this, looking out the window rather than at him, "and I'm so unbelievably cool if they're just jokes, dude, you're probably my best friend and I don't want to jeopardise that, so I'm kind of glad nothing has come of it yet, and we don't really talk about it... but also," you swallow hard, and he gives you your moment, "if they're not just jokes, that's also unbelievably cool."
"Oh!"
"And- and Sapnap was saying some stuff just now, mostly because he thinks we're kind of dense - and depending on how this goes he might be right about this -" you add, finally, finally looking at Dream and his hesitant, but pleasantly surprised expression, "and I think if I don't tell you now that I'm kind of in love with you I might never get the nerve to do it again."
It takes a moment for him to process all of that. Then a second, then a third, then a slow smile stretches out over his face.
"You love me?" He asks, gently. There's no reservation, there's only delight.
"I love you," you tell him, firmer this time. Pushing yourself up from the door, adding, "more than kind of; kind of a lot, if that's okay. I love you kind of a lot."
"Kind of a lot is great," he tells you. His smile keeps getting wider with each word you say, "kind of a lot is so fucking great!" And he stands, elated, crossing the room to you, to wrap you up in his arms; it's like a great weight has been lifted from your heart as you meet him for a kiss. It's enthusiastic and feels inevitable in a way that has you lighting up from the inside out with warmth -
"I love you too, kind of a lot," he grins, pulling back for a moment to clarify, "if that wasn't obvious. I thought I was being obvious, so I'm sorry that I wasn't, I don't know, more obvious? I didn't want to make you uncomfortable and push it if you'd already read what I was trying to-" he isn't mad when you interrupt him since it means your mouth on his.
Later on, the two of you attempt to cram onto the sofa to recreate his earlier photo with Patches, and the minute you post it, alongside the original image for context the likes begin to skyrocket into the hundreds of thousands.
'i apologise for ever doubting the power of manifesting what you want' you caption the images, tagging Dream in it. You're both still on the sofa, though you've moved to a far more comfortable position, and he's pulled the crocheted green blanket to cover you too. A few moments later, the replies from your friends are coming in. Corpse says this should be the song cover. Sapnap, however, tags George, and simply says that he's sorry for saying anything. No-one else gets it, not yet, though you're sure it won't be long until this whole messy situation finally gets explained, becomes public news. You like the Tweet, and Dream snorts a laugh beside you.
"We are kind of dense," you said softly, "I'm glad he said something."
"If it means I get this, I'll forgive him for being a snitch," Dream gives you a squeeze, and you give a content little sigh, pressing against him further for just a moment.
"I think I've properly had feelings for you... ever since you ran to my house in the rain," you admitted.
"Because it's romantic- wait, that's like-"
"A long time," you sighed sheepishly, "yeah; I didn't really fully realise though -"
"No, no, that's a long time, yeah, but," and he's struggling not to laugh, and doing very poorly, "I realised I might actually love you the day you showed up at my door with flowers after only having had my address for an hour."
"God we joked about it so much but we genuinely romanced each other," you mused with something both horrified and awed, right before bursting out into laughter, "oh I kind of already hate us, that's sickeningly cute, what the fuck?"
And as you wriggle awkwardly to face him on the sofa, he's regarding you with fond adoration.
"I love us, we might be the worst," he concedes.
And you hum with delighted agreement as you kiss him again.
{sequel: its a hell of a feeling though}
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straighttohellbuddy · 3 years
Text
if you were church i'd get on my knees {Wilbur Soot}
Summary: Reader co-hosts one of Wilbur's 100 Players streams.
Request: you asked for requests- you shall receive. cc!wilbur x reader fluff in which one of them accidentally confesses their crush on the other somehow? idk, im just starved for wilbur content. either way tysm and have a wonderful day!
A/N: 2996 words. I fully intended on going to sleep but I saw this at 2am and said What If I Write 3k in 2 and a half hours? Is this good? not sure. it's 4am. but also i love this. they're so chaotic. unedited. i hope you have a wonderful day too!! i'm worried this is ooc. anyways.
Warnings: swearing, blasphemy (yes that's a warning lmfao)
Citrus Scale: 🧡 ORANGE 🧡
"- I should have made sure my seat was at the right height before we started," is the first thing the chat hears when Wilbur finally turns on his webcam for his latest stream.
[100 Players Ruled By A Clueless God ft. Y/N] was the title, and the viewers are greeted by the image of you, half in frame and fiddling with the height of your chair as Wilbur gives you a bewildered little smile.
"It's at a fine height, you don't need to -" he's trying not to laugh, tone all kinds of fond and amused, and he casts a glance to his monitor for the moment.
"I do!" You insist, "it's off, I need to be at the right -" but when you look up, eyes wide and serious, your gaze locks with his, "why are you looking at me like that?" Tone suddenly soft, your seriousness melts to something almost flustered, before you catch sight of his chat going off out of the corner of your eye, and you look to the screen, "wait are we live?" And there's that hard edge to your voice again, that seriousness that seems to now border on embarrassment at the realisation that you have an audience.
"Yes, we are," he snorts, turning back to the monitor, greeting the chat, asking how everyone was doing, while you proceeded to go back to trying to find the right height for your chair.
"What is- Y/N explain to me what is wrong with your chair? Why is the height bothering you so much?" Finally, after hearing the chair move up and down at miniscule increments for arguably longer than necessary, he turns back to you, eyebrows raised.
Chat was alternating between asking who in the hell was in his stream, and just spamming your name, but you saw none of this, choosing instead to raise your chair to the fullest height, which put your head out of frame.
"This makes me feel more like a God but I'm out of shot," you huffed, playing at being terribly put upon, "I need to be taller than you here -"
"You don't," Wilbur sighed, "and anyways, I'm your co-God, we can be the same height, it's okay," he tried to insist, though he was still smiling at your antics, reaching beneath his own chair for the lever to lower it, sinking down to the lower half of the video frame, the difference between you two almost comical now, "better?"
Lowering yourself back into frame wearing a cheery grin, you were pleased for all of five seconds before insisting that it now felt wrong, tugging on his arm, insisting that he raise himself up again.
"This bit has been going on for five minutes, do you want to introduce yourself already or do you want me to?" He asked, finally, as you pulled your chair closer to fit into the webcam's frame better.
"Oh they remember me!" You coo with delight upon seeing your name in chat, expression bright and fond as you waved at the camera, "hello to all of Wilbur's dear viewers! I'm the only person willing to come to his office at nine at night to make content!" This, of course, startles a laugh from your companion, who's ducks out of frame while laughing, "it's deeply sketchy," you continue, just as animatedly as before, "I think we're the only ones in the building, so please know that if I don't get home safe, Wilbur has either failed to prevent my murder, or he has murdered me!" And then, finally, "oh, and I'm Y/N!"
"I am already regretting this," Wilbur announces, returning as his laughter dies down, though he's still beaming from ear to ear as he watches you reading the chat -
"Not the kind of content I expected from you guys alone at nine pm..." you read from the chat under your breath before trailing off, and while Wilbur's already reprimanding his chat for the implication, asking them to not be weird, you lean back, eyes glazing over momentarily as you seem deep in contemplation.
Only after a few minutes of speaking to his chat and reading donos does Wilbur turn back to you, asking if you're alright, to which you finally snap from your thoughts.
"Wil, you'd subscribe to my OnlyFans to support me if I had one, right?"
Evidentially it's not the question he's expecting, since it takes him a few moments to process, then respond, though his tone remains light and conversational.
"Of course, and I'm sure you'd do the same for me," he says, despite going pink around the ears.
"Naturally," you agree, before, again, seeming to realise that you have an audience, "not that I have one-" you clarified, sitting forward again, "neither of us do, as far as I'm aware," your smile turns sly as you prop your chin up on your hand, gaze drifting to Wilbur, who looks like he deeply regrets every decision leading to this moment.
"Why- Y/N why would you say that? No, I don't have an OnlyFans," he had to clarify for himself, sighing deeply, and though you opened your mouth, teasing retort clearly on the tip of your tongue, he shoots you a warning look, telling you that he's really not interested in being banned from Twitch today. Closing your mouth quietly, you hold up your hands in surrender.
Of course you know you only get away with it because you've known him for arguably far too long. As a long-time friend and member of the British commentary crew, it was inevitable that you would be pulled into his orbit. His chaotic nature matched your own quiet well, though it seemed that you could pull each other back from being too much, just as often as you could egg each other on.
While at first you had found yourself admiring him for his work ethic and content, it had developed into a strong friendship, and that friendship had quietly evolved for you; you'd never risk your friendship by admitting that you'd developed feelings, you'd rather just enjoy what you had with him as one of your best friends, and hoped your feelings would eventually fade away. So far they most definitely hadn't, but you'd learned to deal with them a long time ago.
You'd been something of a streamer for a few years, mostly to amuse yourself when writing, researching, and editing your main channel videos was getting to be too much, and you were always more than pleased when any of your friends would invite you to be a part of their streams or videos too. Usually it was flash games, or popular, competitive games, and somehow you'd steered clear of Minecraft.
"Don't get me wrong, I've watched a lot of other people play it," you clarified as you and Wilbur were switching seats so you could sit properly in front of his laptop, "I watched you play it a lot -" you say before you can stop yourself.
"You do?" He sounds genuinely touched and surprised by your admission, before clearing his throat, "I mean, I would hope you do."
"Yeah man, your videos are good, you know I think your videos are good," you double down, looking at the laptop keyboard and trying not to look at the little corner of the screen where you can see his smile growing wider as he watches you. You flex your fingers and hope chat can't tell what you're thinking, "what buttons do I press? WASD?"
"God, you're so cute," his voice is so syrupy it's almost comical, and you hang your head so the camera doesn't catch how hard you're trying to repress your smile; he can't just say shit like that!
It's not uncommon for the two of you to flirt and tease each other, which was probably part of the reason your feelings for him weren't able to go away, but sometimes it still caught you off guard.
"Can you not simp for me for like five minutes while you teach me how to play?" You ask, raising your gaze again to the screen where the world he'd built in Minecraft stretches out. You'd managed to school your expression into something of a smirk, looking over your shoulder at him, to which his grin only got wider.
"Only five minutes? I'll try my hardest," and he moves closer to you, probably to get closer to the screen, but with the two of you shoulder to shoulder, his voice warm and kind as he talks you through the basics, you can feel your heart beating hard against your ribs.
Chat is eating your interactions up, and you're not sure whether to ignore them, or feed them more.
The purpose of the stream, like most of Wilbur's 100 player streams, is chaos; this time, the community must come together and create a religion out of you, while you barely know what you're doing, with only Wilbur in your ear to guide you.
"Do I have lightning?" You ask, less than five minutes into the players having arrived.
"You have a flint" Wilbur offers as an alternative, his chin practically perched on your shoulder.
"And slash-kill," you recall, and he chokes on a laugh.
"I thought you meant to start fires in like, a biblical way or something."
"No, I need to smite people," you said with as much seriousness as you could manage.
"Not a particularly benevolent God, I see," you can hear his smile in his words, the very sound warming your own heart, your composure cracking with a grin of your own.
"I'm benevolent if they're good little disciples, but - look, there!" You spotted something in the game, a large 'A' being built in a circle at the top of a little wooden hut. The hut itself read that it was for Atheists, to which you huffed that they were foolish for building an anarchy symbol, and then asked Wilbur how to give yourself a bucket of lava, before declaring that it was time to prove that this world had a God.
Wilbur's pressing his laughter to your shoulder blade, the sound filling the little office, the movement shaking you as you try to keep going, keep your commentary running, though you can't stop yourself from grinning from ear to ear, delighting in the fact that you could amuse him.
"They're building me a statue," you say with faint pride, not long after, and Wilbur hums thoughtfully, tipping his head to rest it against yours. It's a quiet moment, if only because the gentle contact had all the thoughts leaving your head.
"Is this giving you a God Complex?" He asked idly in response, and matching his tone, you'd responded.
"Maybe."
With that, he sits forward, breaking the contact between you and gently pushing your hands out of the way of the keyboard and mouse. Making his way to the statue in game, and pouring lava on it, despite your vocal protests, he wears a shit-eating grin as he types in the game's chat 'new god is wilbur soot'.
"You don't need a God Complex," he reasoned, sitting back, out of your space for the moment, though you rounded on him instead of going straight back to the game.
"And you do?"
But his grin just grew wider, and so you pushed yourself back from the desk, partially out of frame, gesturing for him to step up.
"Mum said it's my turn on the God Complex," he snorted hands coming to rest on the keyboard. You shuffled back in beside him, crowding him to see the screen, no longer worried about the clips that would arise, just glad to be close to him.
"I didn't like their statue of you," he muttered as he surveyed the land.
"Jealous?" You asked, and his answer comes so immediately you're not even sure he knows what he's saying.
"It didn't do you justice."
"You're biased," your voice is gentle and fond, your cheek pressed to his shoulder, glad that all he can see of your smile is in the little window in the corner of his stream. You're feeling too sappy by half right now; the room is warm and comfortable, and the sounds of the game and of his commentary are a familiar comfort.
"I am," he agreed easily, "but you're also just objectively leagues more attractive than Minecraft can depict, I think it's fair to say that."
You probably shouldn't be smiling as hard as you should be at that, and you turn to press your grin to his shoulder, which only serves to make him laugh.
"That's what gets you flustered? That I think you're hotter in real life than depicted by a block effigy in Minecraft?"
"What can I say, you really know the way to my heart," you're trying to make your tone sound sarcastic, mostly because you feel kind of foolish knowing he's right, "you tell me I'm prettier than that player skin you have for me and I'll kiss you right now."
"Now that one's a tough one," he muses, tone light and joking, and you turn to see him looking at himself in third person in the game, in the skin he'd added for you.
"You dick," you mutter with a grin, nervous heartbeat calming down somewhat.
"Hey, I never gave the final verdict," he counters, "what's wrong, too chicken to follow through?"
"This really did give you a God Complex, didn't it?" You hear yourself mutter, looking at him in the little window of the stream, and not at chat losing it goddamn mind, "I'm not playing chicken with you on stream, that sounds like a terrible idea."
"You're right," he muses, though his humble tone sounds distinctly like a ruse to someone like you who has known him for so long, "that's what we play on your other website." And there's that grin again, cheeky and knowing, the implication of it all having you sit up, expression playing outrage.
"How come you're allowed to reference OnlyFans but I'm not!?"
"It's my channel," he's wearing a grin that's all teeth, "and I didn't say OnlyFans, you did; I could have been talking about YouTube," his grin grew wider, "get your mind out of the gutter, Y/N."
With that, you huffed through your nose, nudging him out of the way declaring that it was your turn on the God Complex. Wilbur, for his part, was laughing too hard to stop you.
Your little crush on him has never been more irritating... but you can't help yourself.
"So, you never did tell me if I was hotter than the skin," you pointed out, and his laughter quickly died down.
"Well of course you are," leaves him before he'd even had time to think, and in anticipation of this, you'd steeled your nerves, and you lean over to peck him on the cheek quickly.
"I'm not a chicken," you told his decisively as you turned back to the game, and after a beat, he shifted himself out of frame. After a few minutes of silence, you finally turn, and see him bright red and looking at the screen intently.
"You okay?" You ask, tentative and quietly apologetic. He waves you off, giving a thumbs up, and at that you finally muted the microphone, "we're muted, dude, seriously, are you okay? I'm sorry, I should have -"
"No, I'm fine, seriously, I just- I just keep remembering that there's about eighty-four thousand people watching," he says, and you go to apologise again, "no, you're fine I promise, I just... it's very difficult to not kiss the hell out of you already and I--" and then he finally meets your gaze, realising what he's just said, voice faltering, "I should be fine," he says awkwardly, "I just need a minute to bang my head against a wall and pretend I never said that out loud."
"We need to talk about this after the stream," you told him seriously, heart suddenly thundering with vindication, though you were doing all you could to keep your cool.
"No, we really don't; I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said anything -" he tries, though you look back to the stream, holding back a placating finger to the webcam, as if asking them to wait. Then you stand, crossing to him.
"Would kissing the hell out of you now help you get back on stream?" You asked, glad to no longer have to be coy or joking in your affection.
"What? Yes? Really? Really?" And as you leaned in, he pulled you closer, "oh, we really are going to have to talk about this after," but at least this time when he says it, he sounds delighted by the prospect.
When the two of you are back in front of the stream, but before the mic is unmuted, you carefully ask what he wants to tell them happened; he shrugs.
"I'll say you had cooties or something."
"I cannot believe I have feelings for you sometimes," it feels like a weight off your shoulders finally admitting that out loud, despite your exasperated tone, and it seems that Wilbur enjoys hearing it, judging by his beaming grin. He has to push himself out of frame again.
"That's the kind of thing you can't just say out loud"
"Oh fuck," you realise, hiding your own grin behind your hand, glancing at the camera before your gaze turns back to him, "I'm gonna be real with you, man, I've wanted this for a long time so all our teasing and flirting now is just gonna make me all sappy and make you all red, isn't it?"
Wilbur makes the executive decision to end the stream so you can both hopefully save face, not that either of you really expect it to work. Unsurprisingly, you're both trending on Twitter within the hour for your confusing and chaotic stream with it's abrupt and mysterious end.
Unsurprisingly, neither of you care.
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