Chapter Text
“Oh no!” Eret said with a chuckle. “ Oh you poor thing, I’m never going to let you live this one down,”
His taunting felt like poison. Bad grumbled as the rest of the group continued laughing away the serious mood he brought to them.
“I came to you for advice, not to get laughed at,” he complained.
“Well, you came to the wrong guys then,”
Great. Just great.
Bad sunk into his chair, not even trying to block out the banter in his headset. He deserved this, he decided. It was a punishment he’d have to accept. Though, that didn’t mean he wasn’t bitter about it. As he fiddled with the loose fabric of his shirt, pulling it over the lower half of his face to hide from the non-existent camera view, he tried to reason with himself. He broke his promise to Skeppy . A serious, important promise. All he had to do was keep his mouth shut, and he tried. He tried. But it was so, unimaginably hard.
It had been a week or two, or five. Days and days of drudgery that depressed him more than they should of because, well, from what he saw it seemed to be one sided.
Things were a tad slow at first, but Skeppy warmed back up to his usual self in due time. Chatting and joking like normal, all while Bad still suffered with that uneasy feeling in his chest whenever he thought of the night they shared. And he thought of it often. Every day, in fact. Almost constantly.
It was added to his collections of memories played on loop, weaseled its way into his dreams like everything else. How could it not? And hell, how could he be expected to keep the secret so close when it ate at him like that? Unlike everything else, that moment in time was real.
“ Bad, come on,” Antfrost managed through his laughter. “How’re we not supposed to laugh at that? I mean, you two-”
He couldn’t finish his sentence. The whole story Bad told them made it impossible.
“Stop!” Bad insisted, but it did little to pacify them.
He was laughing at all the “ juicy details,” as he would have called them, Bad was sure of it. Admittedly, he didn’t have to say as much as he did, but was there a point fussing over that when he shouldn’t have spoken a word of it at all? Bad grimaced to himself and clenched his eyes shut. The regret of admission was almost as painful as the stress of the secret.
Ugh, he thought.
What’s wrong with me? Why am I like this?
He asked me to do one thing- just one thing! And I should’ve done it, I know, but...
“ Helloooo ~ Bad? You still there?”
Bad groaned and hoisted himself upright.
“Yeah,” he mumbled. “Still here,”
Eret interrupted Antfrost’s teasing, a newfound calmness in his voice.
“Aw, Bad. You know we’re just playing, no one’s really making fun of you. Come on, what was it you were asking again?”
Bad was quiet for a moment. Asking the first time was difficult enough, and with the clarity that came after, repeating himself felt like pulling teeth. After a fair bit of psyching himself up, he offered a barely audible, “Did we do it all right?”
“Define ‘ all right’” Ant said.
“You know- all right! Was that how it was supposed to go, or did we do it wrong...?”
“Ohhh,” Eret trailed on. “There’s not really a right or wrong there. Were you having fun?”
Bad sheepishly responded with “Yes,”. Though, he was beginning to question whether or not he really meant that.
“Well, that’s what really matters. There’s not much else I can say about it if you two were both having fun, I’m not going to judge what other people do in private,”
If you two were both having fun.
That struck a chord in Bad. Did they both have fun?
It was the night of his life. All worries aside, he wouldn’t ever change it or wish it away. It was what he waited so long for, desperately wished for, and finally got, but Skeppy ? He was so off, for lack of a better term. Nothing seemed wrong in the heat of the moment, but afterwards was a mess. Did he have fun?
Bad piped up.
“That’s the thing, I don’t know... if he had fun?”
He could tell neither Eret nor Antfrost liked his hesitation.
“What do you mean?” the latter asked.
“I mean, everything was fine, right? Skeppy was smiling and k-” his voice broke with a nervous snicker. He cleared his throat. “-kissing me. I think he liked it, but the next morning he was so upset. He said it was just hangover but I don’t know, it didn’t feel right.”
The three were silent. Bad worried if he should say more, explain what he thought, but the lump in his throat wouldn’t allow it. He waited impatiently for one of the others to give him no choice but to speak.
Eret broke the quiet.
“What about since then? Surely you’ve been talking?”
Bad nodded as if they could see him. He caught the brief lapse in judgement and tried to cough away the stuck feeling in his throat to force out whatever explanation he could.
“Yeah, he’s fine now...”
His thoughts drifted to more recent events. They spoke as often as they usually did, even did a video call a day ago. Bad grew somber at the sight of Skeppy ; the first glimpse he had of him since that night. It was hard adjusting to him not being a room away anymore. The blue tint in his hair had faded away almost completely. Barely any hints of it remained in his raven locks to prove that it was ever there in the first place.
Bad hated to see it go. Hated to see how quick time passed while he was too busy in his own head. The closest he had to reliving the joy of being with him was admiring each new smile Skeppy offered as they chatted. That was the closest he’d get to experiencing the affection he did their last night together too, he worried.
“It’s just... I don’t know. I got what I wanted, I guess, but not really. I’ve spent so long having feelings for him that I kinda hoped this would start something new, and I think it could, but right now it’s not.
“How long exactly?” Antfrost asked.
Bad sighed. “Long,”
He emphasized the word as best as he could to get the point across. He wasn’t about to go into detail about everything he’d been struggling with since he first realized his feelings were more than platonic. He’d exposed himself enough already.
“And,” Antfrost continued. “I’m assuming you told him at some point? That’s why he showed a little interest?”
“No, actually. Never. I’ve told some other people, but not him,”
“Huh. Sounds like you’re doing a lot of talking with random people and not any with him. Have you considered that maybe you should just tell him?” Eret asked.
Bad huffed. “Of course I’ve thought about that,”
And he didn’t like the prospect. All he needed was to move too fast for Skeppy’s taste and their whole friendship could fall apart. That’s what he believed.
Bad was well aware now that so much of what he’d been through was, frankly, worrying. It was too much, and unhealthy as well. He’d even call it unnatural. It may have been the result of some obsession gone horrifically wrong, or a debilitating amount of repression, but either way it wasn’t right- wasn't natural.
It’s a stupid, guilty conscious .
But how do you shake that kind of guilt?
“ I’m just not ready. I’ve got a lot to lose if things don’t go right, y’know ? That’s scary, snd I feel bad about it anyway,”
“Do you really think he’d be upset?” Eret asked.
“Yeah, I never pegged Skeppy as the type to care,” Antfrost tuned in. “I feel like he’d either feel the same way or be chill with you liking him. He wouldn’t hate you or anything. He just doesn’t seem like the kind to be grossed out by that. I mean, he did want to fool around, after all,”
Bad groaned and rubbed his eyes.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t know how he feels anymore. I want him to like me, I think that he could, but I have to be honest with myself. Why would he?”
Eret winced and uttered a small “Oof,” at that.
“Are you being honest with yourself or just critical? That sounds a bit harsh,”
“I- Both?”
Definitely both.
“ I guess it’s harsh but I think it’s true. I’ve been thinking about it a lot. In hindsight, it was like he was showing me sign after sign that he did like me, but now? Nothing. Maybe he regrets me, or...”
“Or just doesn’t know what to do next?” Antfrost posited. “Kinda like you right now?”
Bad didn’t know how to respond to that. Between the new option he hadn’t considered and the green dot appearing over one of his friend’s profiles on discord, an indication that they were online, he was too taken aback to respond.
The other two waited for Bad to speak on it, not daring to make any further assumptions without his word, but it was all in vain. He barely got out a “Well-” before someone new joined the call.
“Hi,” the voice greeted them, almost shyly.
Bad tried to compose himself as much as he could.
“Hi, Dream !” he said, the others joining the welcoming party.
“Hey, you guys, this a bad time or...?”
Before either Antfrost or Eret could respond, Bad jumped in to answer.
“No! It’s fine, we’re just hanging out,”
Eret took the cue and chimed in with a similar tone.
“Yeah, just hanging. What’s up?”
Dream mumbled something on the other end. A clicking of keys could be heard from his end of the call.
“Nothing much, nothing much. Just saw you guys were talking and wanted to see if I could join,” he said. After a few final clicks, he continued.
“Actually, I kinda wanted to see how Bad was doing. It’s been a while,”
“Oh?”
Bad was taken aback by him. He wasn’t expecting that. Well, he wasn’t expecting Dream to join in at all, but still. He supposed he was right; it had been at least a week since they last spoke. He may have owed him at least some insurance that he was alright after spending so long venting about his troubles.
“Yeah,” Dream said. “I’m not gonna keep you too long, just wanted to check in. I’m sorry if I’m interrupting or anything-”
Bad interrupted to stop the rambling that would have come next.
“No, no, no! It’s fine, don’t worry,” he said, with Eret and Antfrost chiming in to agree. They were a choir of “ No big deal,” and “ always good to talk to you”. Bad waited for the other two to finish saying their piece before giving Dream the closure he had come for.
“I’m fine, by the way. Everything’s going good on my end,”
He tried his best to make sure Dream could hear his smile through his voice. As anxious as he’d been, forcing a smile could never be too difficult for him.
“Alright, cool. Good... Everything alright with-”
Dream stopped himself short.
With “you know what,” Bad knew.
“With...?” Antfrost questioned.
Dream cleared his throat. He tried to reject the conversation with “Nothing. Nothing important, just-”, only for Bad to sigh and calm his worries.
“I already told them, Dream,” he confessed.
Dream was silent for a moment, then scared the others with a yell.
“ What?” he demanded. “Wh- Bad?! You told them?”
“Well, yeah!” Bad retreated lower into his chair in defense. He could feel an embarrassed blush spreading across his face already. Now he’d done it for real.
“I don’t-? I- Bad? You said you were only going to tell a couple people you were close to,” he said.
“Yeah...”
“You’re telling everybody!”
Bad grumbled in frustration. Dream’s sudden outburst only served to humiliate him and reignite the laughter in the call, and that was the last thing he needed.
“ Oh my goodness,” he managed. “You don’t have to point it out,”
“How could I not! You went on this whole spiel about- you were like ‘ oh, I'm only telling the people I know the best’ and were like... You made me tell George and Sapnap because you couldn’t do it yourself! What does Eret have to do with this?”
“My god,” Eret laughed. “Do you really want to know?”
Dream insisted “Yes, tell me!”, spiting Bad’s pleading for Eret to just stay quiet. They dragged it on, fighting back and forth incessantly. Bad growing more annoyed with every second of the exchange until finally, he found himself kicked from the call.
Huh?
Did he leave accidentally? Did discord glitch, or... then it hit him.
Dream removed him.
Bad rejoined as quick as he could and heard hooting and hollering on the other end. Dreadful, mortifying jeers.
“You told them everything?” Dream asked.
Bad couldn’t find it in him to even be angry anymore. He got him.
He had a bad feeling he was going to suffer at least another hours' worth of teasing before he would be able to calm them. So much for advice and serious conversation.