Archive of Our Own ^beta

There is something strangely satisfying to gorge himself on bread and honey in the middle of the woods. Wilbur is barefoot, having kicked off his shoes hardly five minutes into their impromptu picnic. It felt right, to relax bare feet in the dirt, muddying them in a way that he will have to scrub to remove the stains. His pants are in a similar state, too light and too nice for the gallivanting about the tavern, the market, then woods he’s done today. Wilbur thinks the grass and mud staining them can probably never be lifted. He hopes so. He wants every stain. He wants to trace across every patch of green and brown for the rest of time, remembering this day just as it was. 

For a man who spent the better part of his morning with anxiety coiling in his gut as he let himself be led from the castle garden to the local town’s most popular tavern, Wilbur is possibly the most relaxed he’s ever been. The nerves were in part of going to the unfamiliar town he has lived by all his life, praying that he is not recognized by the people of it. They were also in part the lie he told his fiance as he kissed her goodbye, citing a busy day ahead of him with his father. The man next to him is certainly not his father. 

Underneath a tree that lets just a few rays of the sun’s light through its thick cluster leaves, Quackity sits so their arms are pressed together, shoulders knocking every time one of them shifts. They could probably find a more comfortable position if they weren’t leaning against each other. In the past 10 minutes, the only move either has made is to get closer. The furthest they are apart is Quackity’s leg closest to Wilbur bent upwards, just close enough to touch if he were to lay it flat. Wilbur is not fixating on it.

Quackity wears a more quaint version of his usual outfit. A pair of tan, baggy worker’s pants replace the usual form-fitting dress pants. The shirt is nearly exactly the same, puffy and white with one too many buttons undone, just lacking the usual bold collar bar across it. He’s missing a lot of jewelry, actually, just sporting a small silver ring and the chain he always wears with a rather large crucifix adorned to it.

“When was the last time you came out here?” Quackity asks.

“I already told you.” He did not give a specific amount of time, just said it’s been a little while, which actually means it’s been ages, which actually means Wilbur doesn’t think he has ever explored the kingdom quite like he did today. There were good things. Raising a glass with a group of strangers in a tavern, trying samples of bread from the market, laughing with people he may never see again. There were bad things too. People without homes wandering the streets, begging for just a few coins, angry shoppers harassing the market stall-owners, Wilbur’s own wallet almost falling into criminal hands if it weren’t for his very extensive training from knowing Tommy’s sticky fingers for nearly a decade. It causes an ache in his chest, the unbearable humanity that he has been blind to for longer than he could ever admit to anyone, let alone Quackity.

“Here, Wilbur, specifically. These woods.” That is less unbearable. Wilbur hums like he’s thinking but he knows the answer. He could never forget.

“Used to wander a little more,” he answers. “Stray outside the castle, outside the garden. I was probably 16.” He was 16. He knows because Tommy was 8. It was the closest he got to a real rebellion as a teenager, his constant meandering just outside the castle confines. It was one of the few times his father gave him express orders to stay within the castle; they had guests that he suspected were more likely to harm than help, but Wilbur was known to get silly with it on occasion and strayed a little farther. 

Probably somewhere around here, actually. A poor excuse for a sword pointed at his throat and a wallet less stolen than given. When he got back to the castle, covered in dust and smelling so clearly of earth, he got shouted at by the guards for it, but he would never regret it. Nor would he regret the next few weeks of doing exactly the same nearly every day, wandering back to the woods with whatever food and drink and coin he could nab without much questioning. It wasn’t long before he chose to bring Tommy in rather than continue going out, and King Philza’s cousin from across the pond no one had ever heard of just so happened to have a child they could no longer take care of. 

Wilbur does not say all of this. While Wilbur does not doubt Quackity can be discreet, he will not risk Tommy’s identity.

“A decade?” Quackity questions, disbelieving and judgmental to a fault.

“Give or take,” Wilbur shifts his arm to pick at the dirt on his palm. Their shoulders knock together. Still neither moves. “I’m very busy, you know. Can’t satisfy every whim I have, even if you think I’m cut off for it.”

“You are cut off. You fucking admitted you’re cut off.”

“Doesn’t change my statement.” There are a lot of preparations to be king, even if his father is in fine health and will not be giving up the throne anytime soon. Meetings and classes and weddings. Hours in the mirror, looking at all the pieces that make Wilbur up, wondering if his capacity for leadership could ever trounce the panic that has him struggling to breathe in the middle of the night. 

Wilbur has always known he was going to be king eventually. There is no other choice, no other option, because his parents had one son and decided to be done with it. Even Tommy, adopted and a son in his own right, could not be king. Not that he would be a particularly good choice, even if Wilbur didn’t want to do it. But he does. It is his responsibility and he is the only one who could ever bare it.

“So doing this, what, once a week? Once a month? That would kill you, Wilbur?” 

“The bread might.” The temptation may. To so wholly admit he prefers the brash life of a drinking song to one of a waltz.

“Hey,” Quackity shifts now, laying the leg next to Wilbur flat, so their thighs are touching as well as their arms. It’s like an itch scratched. Not that Wilbur was fixating on it. He turns his head to face Wilbur. “I’m serious. You’re gonna go crazy. You’re gonna go fucking crazy if you stay in that castle, Wilbur, all the time. You’re gonna stay single-minded, so self-absorbed all you think about is your family who are already fucking set. You need to think about them. Your subjects. Your dad’s, whatever.”

“I think about them.” Before today, they were something like scarecrows in his head. It’s not that he’s never left the castle. It’s not that he has never once in his life interacted with someone that wasn’t his family. But when he pictured the people of L’manburg, he imagined straw and smiles. His own face in the mirror, pulling up at his mouth, trying to get the seam just right.

“But you don’t fucking know them! You don’t know them, Wilbur, you don’t know their issues, their needs, their wants! You don’t know anything, Wilbur!” Not for the first time, Wilbur thinks Quackity wears anger very well. He calls Wilbur self-absorbed, but Quackity’s anger is personal, self-important, conflating his issues bigger than anyone else’s. That passion lights a flame in dark brown eyes, a furious flush across his face, and every moment he isn’t speaking (a feat for Quackity, truly), his lips are pursed in a way that is very… distracting. 

It’s like a couple weeks before, when he pissed Quackity off enough that he pinned Wilbur to a tree in the garden, arm against his throat keeping him in place. Wilbur should have been just as angry, attacked and disrespected in his own home, but he could only focus on Quackity’s lips caught in a snarl. Maybe if he didn’t wear anger so well Wilbur would stop pissing him off. Probably not, but he does love to shift the blame.

“And what do I know now, Quackity?” Everything. The good, the bad, the sunrise over the square. “That the local baker makes some fine bread?”

“If you came out more-”

“The concept of busy, that not sticking for you?” Quackity’s anger is like a coin flip. Sometimes it will pull him forward, hands fisted in your collar to keep your eyes on him as he tears you to pieces with words wrapped in barbed wire. Sometimes it will push him away, and all you will get is a quiet, neutral gaze with rage simmering underneath as he tires of playing to a stalemate. Wilbur tends to bet on the former, but Quackity shifts until all that touches Wilbur is a lingering warmth where there was once a burn.

“Can you just admit it’s been good?” Wilbur thinks he would choke on the words. Not for lack of truth, but because honesty is easier when it is two arms against each other without having to say a word. Telling Quackity this is one of the best days of his life and Quackity was, in fact, right, is almost a fate worse than if Wilbur lost his entire kingdom. And that is a very reasonable thought to have. “It’s been a good day and you just wish you didn’t need someone else to open your fucking eyes.” 

It is, in fact, very frustrating that he needed someone else’s guidance to leave his fucking home and face the scarecrows and learn they’re just human. Learn he just is too. That the 16 year old who loved to wander, loved to learn, was still inside of Wilbur, just buried as deep as possible beneath the shadow of a crown. 

Wilbur is not fixated on the lack of burn against him. He is not staring at the side of Quackity’s face, willing him to face Wilbur. He is not reaching for the caught words in his throat, willing himself to vomit them out. “It was a good day,” he manages. It isn’t quite what he needs to admit, he knows, from the thing he can still feel stuck in his throat, from Quackity’s lack of reaction. Wilbur looks away as he fights against the urge to swallow the words like he is allowed to keep them and admits, “With you. I had a good day with you.” It hangs in the air for a moment, and Wilbur wishes desperately he could take them back. But Quackity shifts, a burn like a balm against Wilbur, and their honesty shifts from words.

Quackity still uses them as he says, “I did too.” Wilbur turns, to speak or tease or just see Quackity’s eyes on his, but any words or intentions die in his throat as he finds Quackity closer to his face than he was before. Wilbur finds he wears satisfaction as well as he does anger. Dark eyes burning into him the same as his touch. Flush across his face no longer tinged by anger. Like he can’t help himself, like he needs that final parallel, Wilbur’s eyes flicker to his lips. They’re no longer pursed, rather set in a pleased smile. For some reason, all Wilbur can think about is how soft they look. The scar along the right side of Quackity’s face rages to his lips, leaving a raised section of his bottom lip. Wilbur wonders how it would feel against the pad of his thumb. Wilbur wonders what it would feel like if he leaned in and-

“Do you want to dance?” He blurts out. He hardly knows why except it’s the first thing his mind latched onto. Maybe it’s just the closest thing to what he wants that wouldn’t have dire consequences. With the way Quackity smiles at him, eyes crinkled in amusement, he thinks it may still.

Quackity asks, “Here?” Wilbur is not in the position to want the way he does.

“Nowhere better.” Wilbur needs to marry Sally.

“There’s no music.” Wilbur needs to be back at the castle, focused and frustrated and isolated, finding peace with a life that lacks the adventure, the passion he so desires.

“If you need music to dance, I don’t think you’ve had very good partners.” Wilbur needs to be fit to fill his father’s shoes when the time comes. He needs to be a man fit to be a king.

For now, Wilbur stands barefoot in the dirt, reaching a hand down, letting these woods be a testament to his wants. It isn’t the first time he’s let himself get carried away with an idea in them. But he was willing to fight for Tommy. He was willing to stick out his neck to convince Phil that as a lonely, only child, he not only wanted but needed a little brother. His current whim would be a harder sell, especially with a wedding right around the corner. A few weeks ago he could have sworn that thought made him happy.

“I don’t think you dance well enough to be making fun of past partners, Wilbur.” But Quackity takes his outstretched hand and lets himself be pulled up. Quackity doesn’t need this either. He has a kingdom, he has marital prospects, he even has the favor of his people. Wilbur does not further his goals, is a distraction to them even. But that’s the funny thing about want. It doesn’t care what you need.

Wilbur does not drop his hand as he stands to full height, instead settling his other hand against Quackity’s waist. Quackity says, amused, “I don’t think you dance well enough to lead, either.” But he does not drop Wilbur’s lead, instead letting his hand lay atop his shoulder with a firm squeeze. Quackity takes their other hands and threads their fingers together, holding them away. 

“I think I can figure it out.” There is hardly an inch between them, a far cry from the dance they shared just a few weeks ago, stiff and official and as far apart as they could. As it is, Wilbur wonders if he can justify pulling him closer. He toes a very close, very thin line that he risks dancing them both off the edge of.

One, two, three. One, two, three. One, two, three. Despite keeping to the waltz’s rhythm, Wilbur does not feel as stiff as he did in the ballroom. In shoes on the marble floor, he felt an imposter of himself. Barefoot in the woods with nothing but dirt and twigs beneath his feet, he cares more about the grip of Quackity’s hand in his than whether or not he’s doing it quite right. It’s hardly the dance they partake in. 

Their eyes meet each others and stray no further. They hardly even blink. Wilbur wonders if this is what hunger is, if he can keep standing to chew and chew and chew but never allow himself to swallow. Even if he can’t stand it, he’ll keep this unnamed thing lodged in his throat. The cost of want is far greater than the cost of need. All need costs is an inch between them for the rest of their lives.

Far more willing to accept the cost of want, far less to lose if his next step sends them careening off the edge, Quackity leans further forward until his arm snakes around Wilbur’s shoulders and the inch becomes nothing more than the thin fabric of their shirts. Emboldened, a little drunk on the way Quackity’s hand clasps the back of his neck just as tightly as he does his hand, Wilbur takes the hand against Quackity’s waist and wraps his arm around until he has practically sunk into him. They’re close enough the warmth of Quackity’s eyes has been replaced by the warmth of his body.

“This doesn’t have to be a one time thing,” Quackity says in a tone that tries to be casual but is said too quietly, too close to Wilbur’s ear not to mean more than either should be saying. Not to make Wilbur hide a shiver with a sigh. “Still so much you haven’t seen.” A thousand layers to that. So much he hasn’t seen inside the kingdom, so much he hasn’t seen out of it, so much he hasn’t seen held right here in his arms. 

“I don’t need an escort.”

“I’m not asking what you need, Wilbur,” it’s almost cruel the way Quackity pulls away just enough to look him in the eyes, but his body still stays pressed against Wilbur’s enough to make him a little dizzy. They hardly step anymore, swaying just enough to be able to call it dancing. 

Like it isn’t obvious, Quackity asks, “What do you want?” It isn’t fair that Wilbur is the only one trying to keep them grounded. Quackity doesn’t have anything to lose. Quackity doesn’t have anyone to disappoint. If Quackity were kinder, he would lend pity to Wilbur and make himself scarce or the kind of angry that doesn’t have Wilbur memorizing the shape of his lips. 

Of course, Quackity is not kind. He is categorically selfish, unrelenting in his dedication, a force of nature that bends his wants into needs and closes his eyes to the reality that someone else may not be able to. Wilbur finds himself wanting to bend. Of course, a bend becomes a twist becomes a snap, and Wilbur has enough self control not to fall into a snare of nice hands, dark eyes, and soft, scarred lips. But it is only human to waver.

As he unthreads his fingers from Quackity’s, he gets a frown and noise of protest for the trouble, but Wilbur does not unwrap his other arm from around Quackity’s waist. Before he can second-guess himself, he cups Quackity’s cheek. In return, he gets a sharp inhale of breath, but Quackity makes no movement further. Just watches Wilbur’s face. Wilbur hardly cares what his own face looks like, conflicted or enthralled or red beyond measure, as he lets his thumb fall to Quackity’s bottom lip. 

As he swipes his thumb across, eyes and thumb both tracing every ridge and line, Quackity opens his mouth just enough for warm breath to hit Wilbur’s hand. His thumb stutters for a moment and Wilbur wonders whether disappointing everyone he’s ever loved might not just be a little worth it. 

Of course it’s not. Of course this is just a passing fancy, something that will be nothing in a decade but a strange memory he avoids his wife's eyes when he has. But as Wilbur’s thumb finds the bump of Quackity’s scar along his lip, he lets himself live in that wonder. Of what it could mean to let this be more than a constant fantasy. He flips another coin in his mind, not to push or pull but whether to push or lean , and he already knows he cheated the odds. Whatever he lands on, it will be push. 

As Wilbur begins to drop his hand, the coin lands directly in the middle. Quackity uses his free hand, frozen since Wilbur removed his, and lays it atop Wilbur’s to stop his descent. Quackity stares head-on, determined in his goals, the way Wilbur wants to pretend he is but can’t stop finding himself pulled apart from the middle. 

Too quiet, Wilbur says, “We need to go back to the castle.” Wilbur does not make a further attempt to remove his hand from underneath Quackity’s.

“You’re not answering my question.” Wilbur still does not. Just lets his thumb make another pass across Quackity’s lips, another memorization. “Answer my question, Wilbur.” It is strange to feel him speak, lips moving against the pad of Wilbur’s thumb the way they could a myriad of things if Wilbur let him. If Wilbur let himself. Wilbur could let himself.

“I want,” he begins. The words echo in his mind. Another lodge in his throat. Wilbur is selfish in a thousand ways, but there is no one who does not suffer for this. Phil would. Sally would. A kingdom of people depending on him to be stable, to be present, to be grounded would. Quackity’s eyes, hands, mouth do not ground him. Wilbur pays the price of need as he lies, “I want to go back to the castle.”

It’s almost immediate. Quackity’s hand ungrips the back of his neck, slipping from Wilbur’s shoulder to fall at Quackity’s side. Wilbur mirrors him by letting the arm wrapped tight around his waist fall. All that remains of the fantasy is a hand on a hand on a cheek, one pair of angry eyes meeting ones resigned to their fate. They stand there as long as Quackity needs, as long as Wilbur can take, until in a flash Quackity has kissed the palm of his hand and dropped it. Wilbur does not know if anything has ever quite burned him. He wonders if a kiss as gentle as that could leave a scar.

There is hardly any hesitation in Quackity’s departure. He looks at the little picnic they made, opens his mouth like he has something more to say, then seems to think better of it as he leaves Wilbur to burn. As Wilbur stares at the remains of their day, their fantasy, he wonders just what he could do with them. All that comes to mind is burial. Instead, he leaves the remainder of their bread and honey for whatever animal or vagrant comes across it. Let them wipe this plate clean the way Wilbur cannot. 

The walk back to the castle does not clean him, but it does clear him of coin flips and fantasies. Not quite of want. He makes a poor go of climbing the castle walls, the weak point he showed Quackity that Wilbur really should have reported to his father years ago but always stopped himself with what if, and Wilbur slinks through the garden much like another snake he knows (he is the tempted, but it is him who found the apple and keeps it shined and waiting for his teeth) before warily making his way through the halls. He doesn’t know what his plan for when he got back was originally. Something like this, with Quackity at his side he supposes. 

As it is, he runs into two guards who are on high alert before realizing the man covered in dust and burns is their prince. It isn’t until their eyes are on him that he realizes he forgot his shoes. They just eye him, not-quite warily, and let him through to his room. He knows they’re seeing him at 16, sneaking out daily and worried their king will be upset Wilbur managed to sneak from their view. But Wilbur is not 16 following every whim and idea he has. He is 24 and knows his place in this world. Quackity is a due reminder of that.

When Wilbur finally manages to make it back to his room, he is thankful that Sally is not anywhere to be seen. He doesn’t know if he could face her, still in these clothes and this skin. Wilbur steps into the bathroom, feeling almost like he’s walking in a dream. It is tempting to call for a warm bath, but that’s just one more person he has to speak to, and he has to do something to clear this want. He fills the tub with cold water. He drops his clothes in a crumpled pile on the floor and hardly feels the cold as he slips in.

For ten minutes, he just shivers. It is not comfortable. The water around him is already tinted with the dirt and sweat and grime he’s accumulated. He didn’t bring a cloth to wash proper. He gently rakes his fingernails across the arm that held Quackity against him. Then, he scrapes. He scrapes at every part of him that touched the dirt, touched the fantasy. From head to toe he scrapes with his fingernails, if he just gets off the dirt he will be fucking rid of this. He will be rid of burning eyes, burning hands, burning want, and he will survive it. Wilbur is not the first person in history to want something and know he doesn’t get to have it. He’s doing the right thing, no matter what he may feel, no matter what Quackity may. As the cold bathwater becomes stained, as Wilbur’s skin becomes rubbed red raw, he stands very suddenly to not let himself soak in whatever remains. Officially, he is clean.

As he steps out, he realizes in his daze he did not grab anything to change into or dry with. He lets himself drip a few minutes, to let it all stay in here and affect the outside world no longer, before stepping into his room and finding something simple to change into. As he tugs his pants on, the door opens and Wilbur lets himself smile as Sally enters the room. She looks in a daze too.

“Are you alright?” Wilbur asks. Sally notices him now, leveling him with a smile that would usually soothe his nerves. It leans a little too heavily into the bitter of bittersweet for that, almost knowing and almost loving. Wilbur thinks if he were to use one word to describe their relationship, it would be almost. 

“Oh, I’m fine,” she answers easily. “I spent most of my day with Tommy. He’s been dying for someone to come see the flowers, you know.”

“I do know,” Wilbur says with a tired, regretful little smile. “Been begging me for weeks, I’ve just been-”

“Busy,” Sally finishes for him. It feels a little mocking. Wilbur shifts on his feet. “You’ve been busy, he said. You keep saying.”

“What, you think I’m lying?” Wilbur laughs incredulously. “Every day’s been a different meeting since Las Nevadas arrived, and I’ve been shadowing Phil practically every other moment. If I had the extra time to see Tommy’s garden, trust me, I would take it.”

“And how was the meeting today, Wilbur?” That question is mocking, decidedly. Wilbur supposes he deserves it, but it still makes him frown. As if he’s not the issue. As if their bathtub isn’t stained. “How was Phil?” Wilbur finds he doesn’t quite know what to say. He doesn’t want to lie. He could, easily, but he doesn’t want to. Not with her own warm eyes boring into him. They do not burn, but they do make him sweat. She sighs, sitting on their bed. She leans forward, making herself look a little smaller. Like she’s too tired to be angry, she asks, “How was your day, Wilbur?”

“How was yours?” It’s a terrible deflection. It’s almost embarrassing it came out of his mouth. But she just smiles up at him like it’s what she expected.

“It was fine, like I said. Tommy makes good company.”

“He does,” Wilbur agrees. 

“If you don’t want to get a word in,” Sally amends. Wilbur can’t help but smile. “He had a lot to say today.”

“He always does.”

“He had a lot to say about Quackity.” Wilbur has scraped this day from his skin, but her tone has his heart beating just a little too fast. The only comfort he has is that Tommy knows nothing. He wasn’t lying about the fact that he’s been much too busy to see him for any longer than a few passing conversations, mostly consisting of Tommy begging him to ditch his cringe work and help him dig in the mud. That does not mean, however, that Quackity has not had time to speak to Tommy.

“Oh?” Is all Wilbur finds himself saying.

“More precisely, a lot to say about what you had to say about Quackity.”

“How?” Wilbur blurts out, then realizes that does not bode well for his innocence except he is innocent because he did nothing, and he’s washed the dirt from his skin, and he did nothing . A dance in the woods and a little… exploration of Quackity’s lips. But only with his hands!

“You’ve had a lot to say about him to me too, Wilbur. I hardly see you and when I do you’re ranting and raving. You’re not particularly subtle.” It’s almost teasing. If it were not for the strained anger underneath the tone, Wilbur could let himself laugh.

Instead, tone desperate, he says, “Sally-”

“Tommy made me realize something,” she continues, shutting down Wilbur’s desperation with her anger. “He was trying to explain all his flowers, their meanings, all his- everything he’d been working on for the past few months, and all I could think about is that I’ve never heard you talk about me. Not even second-hand.”

“I talk about you.” He tries to find an example in the recesses of his mind. All that comes to the surface are the tens of conversations he’s had in the past few weeks of how aggravating, frustrating, captivating he finds Quackity.

“It was worse when Phil came to the garden looking for you. Said he’d given you the day off but figured you’d be in the garden. He thought you could see Tommy’s flowers together.” The guilt eats away to feed the rotten thing inside of him. “It made me sad. It makes me sad. Very, very angry,” she says in a huff that confirms her words. She wrings her hands together, staring at them. “Then I had another realization.” The strain to her words does not negate her surety. “I don’t talk about you either.” Wilbur opens his mouth to say something, anything, and finds he doesn’t have the words. Luckily, Sally has enough for the both of them. “I could say I don’t feel the need to. Everyone here already knows you, already loves you. But what does it say that I don’t want to? That I don’t find myself giddy and annoying and talking about my wedding with bells on?”

She looks to him now. Searching for something he doesn’t know how to give. This isn’t how it’s meant to go. Wilbur is supposed to wash himself of want, marry Sally, and live a perfectly respectable life as he grasps at the remains of Phil’s leadership even as it falls from his hands like sand rather than clinging like dirt. It was all going to work out according to plan because it was just him that did not love Sally. Now Sally does not love him either.

To push past this all, he tries one last time, “I talk about you.” It isn’t fair to her. To beg her to try and love him the way he can’t love her, just make this almost work for the rest of their lives. She scowls at him. He looks away. Softly, he amends, “I want to talk about you.”

“You want to want to talk about me.”

Wilbur feels his shoulders sink. It’s not up to him now. He cannot languish in an almost good life because Sally, angry and determined, will not let them. She wants more than almost. Wilbur does too, even if he would have made this work, for the sake of his father if no one else. Sally does not have quite the same dedication to Philza Minecraft. He sits next to her, placing a hand on her fidgeting ones. She does not push him away.

“If it is any consolation,” Wilbur begins, though he knows it will not be. It’s not for him. “There was a time I talked about you.” There was a time Wilbur could see himself loving her, could make time to plan for this wedding he was sincerely excited to have, because Sally is a funny, sharp, beautiful woman that he could have found it in him to almost love for the rest of his life. If it were not for Quackity, he really thinks they would have made it.

“I don’t think I ever did,” Sally admits. It hurts in a way he doesn’t have a right to considering he spent the day in love with someone else. Sally takes one of her hands and clasps the top of his. Like a joke, she says, “I know what you’re thinking.” Wilbur smiles. 

“What am I thinking?”

“Phil’s gonna be so mad.” It causes a flare of panic in Wilbur’s chest, not because his father has a particularly fiery temper, but because the idea of his father’s eyes like a hearth becoming cold and disappointed is worse than any punishment Wilbur could ever face. But Sally is laughing and Wilbur can’t help but join in at the sheer ridiculousness of everything. The fear is not expelled, but it is loosened as they lean into each other and laugh, Sally against his chest and him against her shoulder. 

As they slot together in their laughter, he remembers now rambling to Niki about Sally some months ago, talking about pieces of a puzzle that just fit . He was naive, love-struck, because she was lovely and good for their kingdom and Wilbur always feared but ultimately accepted the idea of marrying for convenience rather than for love. Phil and Kristin got lucky that they managed both. Wilbur thought himself lucky too. But Sally and him do not complete each other. They are just two different puzzles that make a very pretty picture when stacked on top of the other but don’t quite work when one is dancing in the woods and the other is swimming in the ocean.

Wilbur is not getting married. All the work Phil and a thousand other people have done in the past few months is for nothing. This relationship has been built for nothing. Except with her laughter against his chest, he thinks that they could be very good friends. Despite the engagement, despite what he knows was a betrayal to everything they built even if they don’t really love each other, Wilbur thinks he and Sally could be very good friends. 

“Well,” Wilbur says against her shoulder. With a little laugh, he asks, “What now?” Sally shifts away from Wilbur’s chest, and he mirrors her by taking his face from her shoulder. They smile, warm.

“Tell me about your day,” she requests. Demands, really. Wilbur supposes she has been patient enough. He wonders if he should lie. Stay neutral at the very least. But she is imploring, and he has lied to her enough.

“It was good,” he says, breathless. A little embarrassed laugh comes out. “It was- it was very good. Incredible, even, but that feels like a very stupid word to describe something like that.” Sally laughs too. “Of course, I fucked it up in the end. I’m very good at that, I think.” It causes a pang in his chest, the sad smile she gives him. He wishes she would be vindictive rather than pitying.

With a soft pat of the hand, she says, “But you always make it spectacular.” He manages a laugh, but it feels as choked as every word he’s spoken today. 

“I think I just only know how to ruin the spectacular.”

“Then fix it.”

“How?”

“I don’t know,” she answers honestly. “I don’t know what you’ve done. I don’t know how you’ve hurt him. But you’re this deep, aren’t you? Would it hurt to try?” It would be like tearing out each organ, piece by piece, and presenting it in the hopes that the rot growing from the inside can explain his actions. He would have to show off the stitching that just barely holds whatever is wrong with him at bay, because it is easier to hold off the rot than take it out of him and he doesn’t know what would be left if did. If he were to try, he would have to bare someone else’s eyes along the stitches. If he were to try, he would have to let Quackity see them for himself.

“This hurt,” he says instead. 

“And aren’t we better for it?” She lifts his hands to her heart, squeezes, and lets them go. It takes a moment more, his hands frozen in the air without a place to land, but he folds them in his lap and lets her go too. Sally rises from the bed without a lingering hand and leaves Wilbur to hurt. The click of a closing door echoes in his mind.

It takes a week. Wilbur does not love Sally, but he did plan a life with her, and it is one he effectively must mourn. Even then, other than the last time, he is not lying to anyone when he says he is busy. Every day is still shadowing his father, a round-table meeting of L’manburg and Las Nevadas where Quackity hardly cares to respond to Wilbur’s comments even when he so clearly disagrees with them, more shadowing his father, another personal L’manburg meeting to go over what they discussed in the prior meeting without Sam and Quackity’s ears, even more shadowing of his father, and then a dark, lonely bedroom that still holds too many of Sally’s things. 

There is also the matter of his very public wedding that he now has to cancel. Neither of them really know how. “We don’t love each other” doesn’t seem like a very good reason. “I can probably pull another viable prospect if you give me a couple months and a few apologies” seems a bit… crass. People just keep asking his opinion on things, on this wedding he was so excited to plan just a month ago, and he struggles not to tell them, “For the love of God, I don’t care about the canapes because there isn’t going to be a fucking wedding.” 

This is all for the simple fact he has yet to tell his father. Because telling his father requires a level of emotional maturity that he does not feel like having. Both dread telling their parents, so Wilbur is not the only hold-up at the very least, but Sally has many viable prospects, and her parents weren’t too keen on Wilbur to begin with, so things will be more or less fine for the Soot family. The Minecrafts have a little more to lose, a little more to mourn, a little more to not want to face a father’s disappointment. 

But it has been a week since a dance, a subsequent break, and Wilbur thinks he’s ready to… fix whatever he can. Make Quackity listen at the very least. Wilbur probably does not fully deserve it, but he does not deserve the forgiveness Sally works toward him either, and Quackity is a less than innocent party in this whole thing. It still requires an apology, which Wilbur is not very good at giving based on past experience, but he’s trying. Doing what Sally said and letting it hurt. He is more than aware of how equipped he and Quackity are to hurt each other.

Wilbur raises a hand to knock, hesitating for only a moment, when a very aggravated voice shouts from down the hall, “There you are!” Because God forbid Tommy have any good sense of timing. Any good sense at all, really.

“Tommy,” Wilbur starts, already aware of what Tommy’s going to badger him about. “I really am-”

“If you say you’re busy I’m going to start a coup, Wilbur, I swear to God, Phil will be thrown to the wolves while I commit all sorts of terrible crimes.”

“Listen, I know- I know I promised I’d come by the garden soon, and I will, I swear, but-”

“Just for a minute, man!”

“I have something very important to do, Tommy!”

“I just disagree, Wilbur!” 

Wilbur tries to reason, “If you’ll give me just an hour-”

“I gave you a month!” Which is… accurate. It’s actually giving Wilbur a little more credit than he deserves, because Tommy’s been working on this project for nearly half a year, and Wilbur said he would be there when the first flowers bloomed. He was decidedly not. A month ago Las Nevadas showed up with trade and border disagreements and forced Wilbur to busy his life with meetings and receptions and a Hell of a lot of paperwork. Other things too, but Wilbur chose to busy himself with Quackity’s attention. Not to mention the canceled upcoming wedding. 

The garden itself Wilbur has actually only been inside twice in the past month, once yesterday going to and fro the town, and once a few weeks ago when Quackity became something more than a gnat to him. Wilbur lowers his hand from Quackity’s door with a sigh. He can give Tommy ten minutes when he’s hardly been able to give him anything in the past month (the past year).

As always, it is easy to have Tommy fall in step with him as they make their way to the garden. Back and forth has always come easy between the two of them, and by the time they step through the garden door Wilbur feels lighter than he has in ages. He really can’t remember the last time he allowed himself the respite from work and his own inner turmoil. Everything still festers inside him. Everything with Sally, with Quackity, with the thousand expectations from Phil that Wilbur hardly knows if he can half complete, but he’s laughing too hard for any of it to matter in this moment. 

The garden itself is massive. Most who take care of it are Technoblade, Tommy, and an assortment of help they call upon, but Wilbur has always enjoyed the spoils of their efforts. A massive potato farm with a more reasonably sized carrot farm next to it. The giant tree at the side, hiding the weak point, the same one Wilbur has spent much of the past few weeks day-dreaming about. Tons of other little bits and bobs, pumpkins and watermelons, a pond, things he doesn’t care much about but thinks look pretty anyway. Tommy leads him directly to the middle, to the little garden within a garden, and Wilbur is, admittedly, impressed.

It’s like a half-circle staircase, starting with bunches of roses threaded together to make a veneer. Right inside the roses are alliums, waving in the gentle wind, curving into the pink tulips. Lily of the valleys come next, then oxeye daisies. At the heart of the entire thing are cornflowers. Less than the rest, but making the picture complete. Wilbur smiles.

“Seriously, you should’ve come a month ago,” Tommy complains. “Tubbo and me, we watched the Lily’s bloom, it was cool.”

“I would have if I could.” It genuinely would have been nice. He tries to think about what he was doing a month ago. Probably something to do with listening to Phil and Technoblade discuss finances with Wilbur’s commentary neither really cared about cutting in every once in a while. As much as Phil wants to prepare him, as much as Wilbur has genuine thoughts about the kingdom at large, he still does not consider Wilbur’s judgment much more than one would a toddler who you think is just so cute for trying. 

“I would have if I could,” Tommy mimics in a sour tone. “Just quit your job.” What a world that would be.

“It’s less a job than a life, Tommy.”

“Quit your life.”

“Then I’d be dead, king.”

“And all the more time to garden for it.” Wilbur supposes his ghost will have more time to garden than he ever will. Wilbur doesn’t even like gardening, but the thought makes him sad as Tommy excitedly rambles about Technoblade and him debating over color composition, which Tommy thought was less important than it “looking fucking sick”. Wilbur listens to him explain nearly every flower choice, every annoyance he had during the process, every little excitement and worry over the past few months of planning and growing. Wilbur comments sometimes, a joke or observation here and there, but mostly thinks about how he wishes he hadn’t missed the entire thing.

At some point, in the middle of Tommy’s tirade about how much of a bitch the roses were to place, he asks Wilbur, “Do you like it?”

“I do,” he says. “I really do.” Wilbur wonders how much else he’s missed. He knew, logically, that he had missed an astronomical amount of time in the lives of everyone he loves, but it has never hit him quite like seeing a garden of flowers that weren’t here the last time he stood next to Tommy in this garden. They weren’t even seeds in the ground. It’s all a little too much to bare, to say, so he says instead, “And the pink tulips? You never- when we talked about it before, you didn’t say anything about tulips.”

“Oh, well,” Tommy crouches, inspecting the tulips like they’ve wronged him. “Tubbo said if I didn’t then I hate gay people. And my brand can’t take that right now, Wil, not after the firecracker incident.” 

“That was Phil, though.”

“Yes, but the royals and the gays, I can’t have them both on my back.” Wilbur shakes his head and laughs.

Six months ago, Tommy nearly got the entire castle evacuated because Phil’s seat in the war room went up in sparks, but Tommy’s cackling made it more than clear exactly who the culprit was. Phil hardly cared, thought it was a little annoying in terms of timing but rather funny overall, and Wilbur was not quick enough to hide his laughter from Phil’s advisors as they tried to give Tommy a lecture, not realizing that lecturing Tommy really only works if it’s coming from Wilbur. 

He did not attempt to help them until they were red in the face and Tommy showed no signs of stopping. Swallowing his amusement, he turned it into disappointment and said, “Tommy, we’re at the precipice of a war.”

Tommy replied, “It was funny, though.” 

“You can be funny anytime, right now I need you to think .”

“Okay. I think I’m very bored .” 

“Curb it outside the war room.” Tommy sighed, properly harried to not be allowed to set explosives against their king, and started his flower project. The advisors had berated Wilbur for not just giving him the talking to in the first place. He did not say it was the most he had talked to Tommy in months and he was enjoying every second. If it were up to him, Tommy would have been in that war room at his side. If it were up to him, Tommy would be in the meetings they’re having with Las Nevadas too. As it is, it is not up to him, and he cannot express these frustrations without Tommy making more of a fuss than either are allowed.

As Wilbur wanders around the half circle of flowers, he notices a clipped rose within the bushes. It looks out of place. “This on purpose?” He asks. Tommy uncrouches, coming over to give the bushes a critical eye. 

With a furrow to his brow, he shouts, “What the fuck?” He looks over his other flowers, like he’ll find them gone too. In a dark tone, he says “There are thieves in this garden, Wil.” It is then that Wilbur remembers speaking to Niki very briefly earlier, a pass in the hall as she told him to visit the kitchen with a rose behind her ear. Perhaps Puffy had a little business in the garden this morning.

“Well, the thief may have had a very good reason.”

“Like what?”

“Giving her girlfriend a pretty flower.” 

“What?” Tommy questions. Then he groans, “Oh my God, you are joking . Romantics have stormed my garden. Putting a ban on romantics in the garden.”

“Shall I go then?” Wilbur jokes.

“My own brother,” he shakes his head,  faux-disgust across his face. “You’re lucky it’s Sally you’re gross over, else I’d’ve put you down months ago. She’s much cooler than you. Like a fish.” A lot there that is hard for Wilbur to really process. Most conversations with Tommy are like that, but this one has the added issue of the fact that Wilbur is not, in fact, gross over Sally anymore. But yet again, he cannot fucking say that because he still hasn’t told Phil, and if he hasn’t told Phil, he absolutely cannot tell Tommy because Tommy will not manage to keep his trap shut and-

“The wedding’s off.” Or nevermind all that and Wilbur’s going to speak without thinking anyway. Tommy’s face goes from jokingly annoyed to genuinely confused. 

“What?”

“The- listen, it’s a secret, so try not to-”

“What do you mean the wedding’s off?” Tommy shouts as loud as possible. 

Wilbur whisper-yells, “I mean the fucking wedding’s off!”

“Does Sally know?”

“Of course Sally knows! Why would Sally not know?”

“I don’t know! I didn’t know!”

“Well, Tommy, no offense, but you’re not exactly in the need to know in that regard.”

“I’m your best man! Or I was! Because you’re not getting married, apparently .”

“I needed to tell Phil first!”

“Oh my God, Wil, you haven’t told Phil?” Wilbur goes to speak, but Tommy continues, “No because, seriously? When’d you two even-” Tommy narrows his eyes. “How long’ve you known?”  Wilbur puts his fingers to his eyes and sighs, deeply. Darkly, Tommy asks, “Wil?”

“‘Bout a week.”

Booming voice, he questions, “A week?”

“We’ve been busy!” he hisses. “Me and Sally both, I’ve- a week’s basically nothing.”

“Your wedding’s in three weeks!”

“And before those three weeks are up, Phil will know! Just please, try to keep your mouth shut.”

“I’m not gonna tell Phil!”

“Oh, you’re gonna go,” Wilbur affects a high, annoying voice to say, “Wilbur isn’t it so funny how you fucked your relationship, isn’t that so funny, Phil? Oh, shit, Phil, um, erm, well-”

“I would not!”

“You would too!”

“Oh, fuck you!” Tommy kicks him in the shin and plops down on the little dirt path, annoyed. Wilbur huffs. He really isn’t in the pants to be doing so, but he jabs Tommy’s side with his foot before sitting down next to him. After a moment of silence, Tommy asks, “So you fucked it?”

“It was mutual, calling the wedding off,” he answers. “But I… fucked it more, I suppose.” Certainly. Completely and utterly certainly. 

“How?”

“Not important,” he says too quickly. If there is one thing he will not be telling Tommy, no matter how the dominos of the next few weeks fall, it is anything close to what happened between him and Quackity.

“What did you do, man?”

“I didn’t do anything!” He insists. By the slimmest technicality, he didn’t. Nothing substantial anyway. A dance that included a little… light groping. “Just- we just weren’t right for each other, Tommy. That’s all.”

“But you seemed so-” Tommy huffs. He hits Wilbur’s shoulder with his own. “I liked her’s, all. And you just- you seemed so excited, man.”

“I was,” Wilbur says. “I really was. It just… didn’t work, is all.” 

“Guess the last we really talked about it was like, two months ago. And that was less talking, more you complaining about chairs while I was in the room.”

“The chairs were ugly, I stand by that.”

“You are such a-” Tommy shakes his head with a smile. Then, he suddenly frowns. “You said a week ago?”

“Yes, Tommy, a week ago.”

“The day me and her hung out?” Wilbur rubs his fingers against the dirt.

“The very same.”

“Is that why she got so mad when I brought you up?”

“No, no, it was- we had the talk after.”

“But she did, though, she got so mad when I brought up you and Big-” Tommy looks at Wilbur in sheer disbelief. Wilbur thinks he should be making his escape now. Tommy shouts, “Big Q?”

“I’ve got no clue what you’re talking about,” Wilbur lies.

“That’s why she got so- oh my God!” Tommy shouts. “And why you were at his-”

“I’ve got no clue what you’re talking about!” Wilbur does not even try to make the lie believable now, instead getting up from his position on the ground. “The flowers were lovely, Tommy, but I really should-” Tommy kicks him in the shin and Wilbur falters back to the ground. “Oh, you are such a-”

“You cheated on Sally?” Wilbur does not think Tommy has ever looked this angry with him. 

“I didn’t!”

“Oh, so it’s just a coincidence?”

“Look, there are- in your assumptions there are a few truths-”

“Talk like a normal person!”

“Things with Sally are ended, things with Quackity are complicated, and both are very fucking pissed with me, alright?” Wilbur slumps, hitting his back against the flower bed. Tommy’s glare does not waver. “I didn’t cheat, I just… fumbled some things.” Wilbur hears the door to the garden open but does not think much of it. It’s big enough for whatever worker or Technoblade to have their peace while Tommy glares into Wilbur’s soul.

“Oh, fuck,” Tommy says, straining to look at the door. His glare is gone and his eyes are wide. “Oh, that’s gonna make this so fucking awkward.” Wilbur squints. 

“Make what awkward?” Tommy tries to smile but it looks more like a grimace. Wilbur asks urgently, “Make what awkward, Tommy?”

“I didn’t know I’d even run into you!” Tommy starts defending himself without actually explaining anything, but Wilbur has a sinking feeling. “I ran into him first and he was actually busy at the minute, so I just said, no problem Big Q, come later.”

“I was also actually busy!”

“What, committing a-dult-ery?” He pronounces very annoyingly.

Wilbur hisses, “I was not-”

“Tommy?” Wilbur hears Quackity’s voice, just a little ways away. “You still out here, man? Sam had a fucking laundry list of complaints to air out before he let me leave, let me tell-” Quackity cuts off when he sees Wilbur beside Tommy in the path, who probably looks as surprised as he feels. He was still half-trying to get up after Tommy’s assault on his leg, but now Wilbur sits himself fully on the ground. Quackity does not frown but the warmth in his eyes dims, giving him away. Quackity directs all of his attention to Tommy, reiterating, “Sorry it took so long, Sam’s an asshole.”

“He could’ve come too, could’ve had your little anti-L’manburg meeting in the garden instead.” 

“Well, I didn’t realize it was a party.” Tommy laughs nervously, scratching at his neck.

“Oh, well, uh, I ran into Wil on the way and all,” Tommy explains as if he has to have an explanation for why Wilbur is in his own garden. “Funny story, actually, ‘cause I found him-” Wilbur puts his hand over Tommy’s face, who yelps and tries to bite him immediately. Luckily, Wilbur is practically a professional on not getting bitten at this point. 

“Wilbur.” Quackity greets neutrally, like it’s the first time he’s noticed Wilbur sitting there. 

“Quackity.” Wilbur reflects his tone. Tommy pushes his hand off, elbowing him in the side. Wilbur scowls at him. Wilbur may be an asshole, but Quackity isn’t the only one who gets to be a little petty, alright? If Wilbur thinks about it, Quackity’s basically just mad at him for not cheating on his fiance. Wilbur is not the only asshole in this situation.

“You wanted to show me the flowers?” Quackity asks, ignoring the obvious conflict between Wilbur and Tommy because commenting on it would involve actually paying attention to Wilbur for more than two seconds. Wilbur has a lot of conflict in this room right now. 

It immediately sends Tommy back to show-off mode, and he pushes himself up from the dirt saying, “Oh, have I got flowers to show you, Big Q.” Wilbur stays sitting, quietly listening to Tommy excitedly show off his little garden for the second time today. Quackity follows along, smiling and laughing and looking significantly lighter every second. Whether that is the flowers or Wilbur’s closed mouth, one can only guess. 

“This is awesome, Tommy, this is- and you did it all yourself?”

“Techno helped. Minimally, since he’s always on those damn potatoes. Tubbo likes to watch them with me, but he does not put his back into the actual gardening, let me tell you,” Tommy says with a shake of his head and an elbow to Quackity’s arm, making him laugh. Tommy then complains, loudly, “And Wilbur did not help at all . Busy and whatnot.” Quackity just makes a little humming noise, still not wanting to directly care about anything Wilbur has to do with.

Wilbur just says, “I don’t like gardening.” 

“You wouldn’t,” Tommy says like a scathing indictment. “Wil’s favorite flowers are the ugliest too.” 

Quackity asks, “What, the alliums?” Wilbur laughs as Tommy narrows his eyes.

“I trusted you,” he says, voice like he truly has been betrayed. Quackity just laughs.

“What, I’m sorry! They’re ugly, man, they’re an ugly fucking purple… thing.”

“What’s your favorite then?” Tommy snarks.

“Well, I don’t know, Tommy, I don’t think a lot about flowers,” Quackity admits. Tommy shakes his head. “The- I don’t know, the cornflowers? I like blue.”

“Oh, you are kidding me!” Tommy shouts, annoyed for a myriad of reasons. The same myriad that makes Wilbur smile, both genuine and a little motivated by pettiness. “You and Wil have the same shit taste.” Isn’t that the truth? Quackity looks at him, and Wilbur can admit the genuine to pettiness ratio of his smile does lean a little more in favor of pettiness now. Quackity does not show it, but he’s annoyed, and Wilbur can feel the coin in his mind itching to be used.

“The roses are pretty too,” Quackity amends, needing to separate himself from Wilbur. The coin flips.

“You would think that,” Wilbur says. Quackity narrows his eyes. Tommy looks between them with a frown.

“And what does that mean, Wilbur?” Quackity asks, perfectly pleasant. There are quite a few parallels Wilbur could make, actually. He has more knowledge on flowers than any man who doesn’t particularly care about them should because of his little brother’s green thumb, so he is more than aware of what a rose is meant to signify. He could comment on Quackity’s passion, both for work and the people around him. He could say something about desire, the way Quackity lets it lead his life and makes no attempt to hide it. He could draw attention to Quackity’s need to love and be loved. Easily, he could make comparisons to beauty, something dangerous lying underneath. 

Instead, Wilbur says, “Thorny, innit?” The coin doesn’t even need to land for Wilbur to know exactly what kind of angry this will make Quackity. He doesn’t know if it’s what he wants, the way Quackity’s expression closes like shutters, but it feels strangely gratifying. He wants Quackity to leave. He doesn’t want to apologize, he doesn’t want to make any of this mean anything. More accurately, he doesn’t think he can. He looks at the words he has to say, the apologies he has to make, how genuine he needs to be to spit this rot up and let it fester into something as beautiful as Tommy’s garden and Wilbur just can’t .

Quackity turns to Tommy and says, “Thank you, Tommy, for showing me this. I’ll let Sam know he can come by, alright?” Without another word, Quackity leaves the garden. Wilbur feels that gratification turn sour. 

“Wow. You really fumbled that,” Tommy says, unhelpful as always. “Like, astronomically. Like, I can’t even comprehend that you were supposed to be a married man next month levels of-”

“Yes, Tommy, thank you,” Wilbur grits out. He leans back in the path with a sigh, covering his eyes with his hand and letting the other hit the path with a thwack. 

“You are so dramatic.” Wilbur does not answer. Just lays, trying to decipher the inner-workings of his mind, of his rot, of why he needs to ruin spectacular things. Maybe this just isn’t going to work. Maybe it never was. Maybe Wilbur’s engagement was just a convenient excuse for why he could never make this stupid thing with Quackity work because it’s not Sally, it’s not Quackity, it’s hardly even the fucking pressures of royalty on Wilbur’s shoulders, it’s just his own self-important, selfish, horrible- 

Wilbur feels a kick against his leg. He lets an eye peak through his fingers. Tommy holds out a cornflower with a stormy expression. Impatient and miserable, Wilbur says, “Yes, Tommy, it’s very pretty.” Tommy drops the flower directly on his face.

“It’s for you to figure your shit out.” Wilbur huffs a laugh and feels the petals flutter against his face. He grabs it from his face, looking it over. 

“You’re giving me permission to use your flowers for cringe romance purposes?”

“ One flower, Wil. If you lose this one I hope you remain bitchless forever.” Wilbur smiles. He does not think one flower will fix a lifetime of rot, but he appreciates the gesture nonetheless. “Means patience, y’know.”

“I know, Tommy.” 

“Hope, too. And you better hope he’s the most patient man on this fucking earth.” Wilbur sighs. He twirls the flower between his fingers, enjoying the way the petals fall flat when he stops. It gives him something like an idea. One he’ll need a little time to put together, but an idea that could help him not be fucking this up forever. Of course, the biggest help would be to just stop fucking up. Baby steps and all.

“Thank you, Tommy,” he says sincerely.

“Help me weed?” Wilbur sets the flower a little out of the path, making sure it will not be stepped on, then obliges. He spends the rest of the day with Tommy, digging his hands in the dirt, talking and laughing, and forming a plan.

In three days, Wilbur sees Quackity again outside of meeting context. He is, in fact, meant to be shadowing his father again today, but Phil let him loose citing Wilbur’s distraction and Phil’s own exhaustion with the ongoing attempt at dealings with Las Nevadas. Phil decided to spend the day with Kristin, and Wilbur found himself in the garden yet again. Today he leans against the tree, scribbling in his notebook something that is like a poem but has been erased and written back over so many times one could hardly tell.

When Quackity appears, Wilbur does not expect it. Quackity is back at Tommy’s flower garden, looking it over with a curious, thoughtful eye. The cornflower is back in Wilbur’s room, pressed between the heaviest book he could find. The book in his hand is filled with pointless words. He isn’t ready to make things right, and he’s almost grateful that Quackity does not notice him as he meanders the garden.

Of course, Wilbur is best known for making life a little difficult for himself. When Quackity turns to leave, Wilbur knows he should keep quiet, but he seeks Quackity’s attention with, “You’re a very difficult man to get a hold of.” Quackity’s head shoots in his direction, a look of surprise he tries to school into neutrality. It does not work.

“I go to every meeting, Wilbur,” Quackity says, as if that is in any way what Wilbur means.

“I know. There’s discussion on whether or not you’re planning to kill the king.” The past week and a half, Quackity went from being a little quieter during the meetings to using all of the pent up energy he usually gets out by disagreeing with Wilbur by disagreeing with Phil, or Kristin, or Technoblade, or on one very funny occasion, Sam. At least he makes sense when called upon. Wilbur finds his mind distracted enough he’s forgotten where he is a few times. 

“I wouldn’t kill the king,” Quackity says easily. 

“And his son?”

“Murder takes devotion, Wilbur.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“Oh, so we’re in the habit of actually answering each other, now?” Wilbur has struck a nerve. The biggest one he could when he’s not ready to face the consequences of his actions right now. A coin flips in his mind.

“You asked a rather big question, Quackity. I was just taking time to chew the fat. I know you tend to swallow without thinking, but I need to think through my actions.”

“Inaction,” Quackity corrects. Wilbur can’t help the small smile that graces his face.

“Inaction,” Wilbur repeats. They sit in a few more moments of silence, as Quackity expects Wilbur to continue and Wilbur finds he likes making Quackity squirm. Wilbur turns his attention back to his notebook, pretending to look over his terrible poem. He hears a scoff and smiles.

“That’s it?” Quackity demands, struggling to keep a hold on that practiced neutrality he’s so gifted at. “You chewed the fat and you’re still an asshole?”

“Well, I’ve also been writing.” Wilbur says easily. 

“Okay,” Quackity says, and Wilbur can practically hear him slam the shutters closed. “Okay, Wilbur.” He turns to leave. Wilbur lays the coin flat.

“Do you want to know what I’m writing?” It makes Quackity stop, rigid in his frustration but unfortunately curious, though he does not turn to face Wilbur. “It’s not finished, but I think you’ll appreciate it.” 

“Is it good?”

“No,” Wilbur answers honestly. He’s rewarded with Quackity turning around, coming to stand beside the tree Wilbur leans against. “Are you going to sit?” Quackity probably shouldn’t, considering the clothes he wears are on the higher end today, but Wilbur has muddied himself for Quackity’s company before. He figures Quackity can do the same.

“No.” Wilbur has to admire the petty fury, even if he has to strain to look at it splayed on Quackity’s face.

“Fair enough,” Wilbur half-closes his notebook around his finger, raising it to Quackity’s sight but not high enough to grab. “I started writing a poem.”

“You write poetry?”

“Mm.”

“That explains… a lot.” Wilbur quirks a smile. He supposes it does. A practice with a hold on the dramatic, the romantic, the one who feels just a little too deeply to say a word that means anything close to what he feels. He used to be better about it. Over the past few years, the past year especially, he has found himself closing up more and more. He has found his rot, his doubt, his fear just too much to bear. His love as well. It all goes hand in hand. 

“I don’t show it to many people,” he says. It’s true. It’s the closest to the stitches he allows people to see, and even then that is just too close. “Shared a few with Niki. A few more with Tommy. Nearly gave one to Sally but I tore it to bits before I could.” He shared one with Kristin some number of years ago, when he was hardly 12. A rat died in a bag of corn and they had to throw the entire thing out. He sobbed for hours, all alone, not knowing why it tore him up so terribly. He didn’t care about the rat. He didn’t care about the corn. But he wrote something, almost an apology in the perspective of the rat, for loving something so much that he ruined it. As a child, he showed it to Kristin because he knew she liked the macabre, and had taken special fascination to poetry about death. When she read it, she asked Wilbur if he was feeling okay. He told her it was just a story, did she like the story? She did. Phil has never seen a single line of his poetry. 

“That bad?” Quackity asks. 

“Oh, the poem was fine, it just wasn’t honest,” Wilbur knocks his notebook against his knees as he talks, genuine frustration in his voice. “Generic shit about love that seemed right as I wrote it, but it didn’t… come from me. It was the easiest one I’ve ever written.”

“What are you writing now?” They both have hope then.

Wilbur lays a hand on the root beside him, patting as he says, “About this tree.” 

“A tree?” Quackity asks, not even trying to hide his annoyance now. “A fucking tree, Wilbur?” 

“Well, I like this tree.” 

“I hope you and the tree are very happy together.”

“This tree,” Wilbur continues amidst Quackity’s pettiness. “It’s been there for a lot of things in my life. It’s the first place I broke my arm. Second place too because Phil just couldn’t get me to stop climbing it. It’s where he took me to explain that one day he would die, and I would take his place as the king. It’s where I took Tommy to teach him guitar. Just the first few strings, ‘cause he got bored and decided he’d rather just listen to me play,” despite Quackity’s frustration, he lets out a little laugh. Even if he thinks Wilbur unforgivable, he will always be fond of Tommy. “It’s where you called me a self-absorbed, entitled child who would make as good a king as he does a host.”

“And I’m sure you will,” Quackity says with a smile. Wilbur’s neck hurts from looking behind him, but he still follows the movements of Quackity’s lips.

“It’s where I realized I wanted to kiss you.”

There is almost a minute of silence. Wilbur’s almost impressed, if he weren’t worrying that he’s let himself be seen too soon. That he really isn’t ready. Calling Quackity over was a mistake he made on a whim because all he does is based on whim, everything except the one thing he’s meant to do, and Wilbur finds it is as terrifying, as exhausting to be honest as it is to know he will one day be king. 

Wilbur turns his head now, keeping a focus on his notebook, waiting for footsteps because he has never known Quackity to be silent like this, and he is aware there are only two endings here. A step forward or away. The coin tucked in his mind begs to flip, but Wilbur keeps his hands firmly on the notebook. Then, Quackity sits. It’s Wilbur’s leg now that is bent, where if he laid it flat they would be touching. He will be fixating on this.

“Were these the same moment?” Quackity asks. A bit judgmentally, in Wilbur’s opinion. 

“In the vicinity of the same moment,” Wilbur half-answers.

“How in the vicinity?”

“When your arm was against my throat.” Wilbur looks at him again and finds Quackity’s own eyes are locked on the notebook in Wilbur’s hand.

“Is that in the poem?”

“It will be,” Wilbur taps his finger against the book. “It’s a work in progress.”

“You said it was bad?”

“It’s just taking some time,” Wilbur admits. “All the important ones do.” The rat poem took him two weeks, and by the time he presented it to Kristin, good enough for someone else’s eyes, the incident was practically forgotten by everyone else. They hadn’t fixated on the rot.

“Don’t you have better things to spend time on? Wedding arrangements?” Quackity is very dedicated to being bitter. He’s very good at it too.

Like he’s been trying to tell Quackity for a week and a half, Wilbur finally says, “There’s not going to be a wedding.” It comes out too soft, too clear in its meaning, and Wilbur resists the urge to make it into a joke, make it into an argument, make it less than what it means. He just sits and watches for Quackity’s reaction.

“Does your fiance know that?” 

“Why is that everyone’s first question?” Wilbur wonders. First Tommy, now Quackity. “Yes, Sally knows, she’s the one who- she made the decision.” Wilbur thinks he should have kept that tidbit of information to himself. Maybe Quackity didn’t need to know that after everything, that despite the fact it was Wilbur in love with someone else, Sally still had to be the one to let the dominoes fall. Wilbur was too busy frantically setting them back up. But Quackity just keeps his eyes on Wilbur’s hands, a little furrow to his brow.

“Everyone’s first question?” Quackity asks. “Who- does everyone know?”

“No, just- Sally and Tommy are the only ones. You, now.” 

“So you haven’t told Phil.”

“Ah, well,” Wilbur starts. And finishes. He does not continue the sentence. Quackity actually looks at his face now, wholly unimpressed.

“You have serious issues, Wilbur.”

“Why do you think my fiance left me?” He asks like a joke. It is a joke, but it’s also very accurate. Everything, all of Wilbur’s hesitation and doubt, comes from that fear of disappointing Phil. Comes from that desperation to sew up the leaks in him, push the straw back in, make the rot imperceptible.

“So this whole castle’s planning your wedding right now and it’s not even gonna happen?” Quackity questions, disbelieving. “Niki had me trying canapes an hour ago, Wilbur.”

“Is that why you came here to mope?”

“I was not fucking moping.”

“What were you doing, then?”

“What were you doing?” Quackity turns the question on him. It’s a fairly pathetic deflection. 

Wilbur holds the notebook up and points to it. “Poem.”

“Can I read it?” Wilbur moves the notebook from sight, setting it beside his leg that is not almost touching Quackity. “What, you’ve been talking up this poem since I got here and I can’t read it?”

“I specifically said it was shit.”

“What, is poetry the one thing your ego doesn’t touch?” 

“Oh, it’ll get there eventually, don’t you worry.” Every poem Wilbur writes starts as something too confusing, too raw, and it takes a thousand tweaks to make it into something beautiful. He hardly has a poem he hates, though, and those ones he tends to rip to shreds. 

“Y’know, Wilbur, I really wasn’t.” His eyes stay fixated on where the book hides from his prying eyes. Wilbur really would have to burn everything he’s ever written if Quackity read this unfinished poem, so he tries to change the subject.

“What were you doing then?” Wilbur asks again. He gets no response and laughs. “I showed you mine.”

“You very pointedly did not show me yours, Wilbur.”

“Show me yours anyway?” It’s not a fair ask. Often, Wilbur is not a fair man. He asks to see when he still hides. But as Quackity stares at him, searching for something in Wilbur’s expression, he tries to let something show. Anything. Anything that matters. Want or desperation or just plain enjoyment of his company.

“Does it change anything?” Quackity asks, still searching. Not just for Wilbur’s expression, but for a declaration he is hardly adept to make. “You’re not getting married and you’re writing a poem about me. Does it change fucking anything?”

His mouth too fast for his brain, the coin finally taking its place, Wilbur says, “About a tree, actually.” If he had any sense he would say, everything, obviously it changes fucking everything . Quackity moves to stand, angry words ready to flow, and Wilbur reaches up to grab him, to pull him back to Wilbur’s level. Instead, Quackity hovers, lovely rage hovering over Wilbur with the bottom of Quackity’s shirt fisted in his hand. Quackity stares, that angry fire, that furious flush, and Wilbur just can’t get the words to come. All that he manages, too quiet and too desperate, is the question, “Do you want it to?”

“Do you, Wilbur? What do you fucking want?” Wilbur opens his mouth and nothing comes out. His skin knows, his mind knows, every part of him but his fucking mouth can seem to get with the program. “How are you the most selfish, egotistical, stubborn asshole I’ve ever met and you still can’t- you can’t take one thing you actually fucking want!” Wilbur has, though, he’s taken and taken but he always tosses it away before it’s too much, before it’s too real.

Still too quiet, he admits, “Sometimes I think I’ve bitten off more than I can chew.”

“Eat me or spit me out, Wilbur.” 

“And if I choke?”

“Then at least you’ll die happy.” For a minute, they stay in stasis. Wilbur has made his bed and now he must lie in it, ready or not, to make a decision. Whether he can stand the inch apart from Quackity for the rest of their lives, whether he can stand explaining to his father the nature of their relationship and what he ruined to form it. Whether he can stand to love someone, genuinely, and not let the rot drip through. One more time, his own desperation leaking through, Quackity asks, “What do you want, Wilbur?” Wilbur has bent, he has twisted, and with Quackity’s own frustration and desperation boring into him with burning eyes, Wilbur snaps. His grip on Quackity’s shirt turns into a tug.

A sharp gasp against his lips turns to hands on his face and a kiss so bruising the back of his head hits the tree. Wilbur pays it no mind, no mind to the pain in his head or anxiety in his chest, just wraps his arms around Quackity and finally gets to know exactly what the lips he has been so fixated on feel against his. They are not as soft against his lips as they were the pad of his thumb, but it is hardly a disappointment as they move against him, real hunger more than making up for a fantasy.

Wilbur only gets to breathe again when Quackity,  warm eyes and flushed face and slightly chapped lips, decides they get to breathe. Wilbur trails him without thinking, breathing the last thing on his mind. He is not pushed away, Quackity just lays a gentle, chaste kiss against his lips that makes his head spin as much as the one that possibly gave him a concussion.

Wilbur leans his forehead against Quackity’s chest, struggling to catch his breath. A hand rises to his hair as a kiss is planted against the crown of his head. Despite not knowing if he was ready, Wilbur does not feel like he is going to buckle under the weight. In fact, like a picnic in the woods, he thinks this makes him happy. For a moment, they just sit there, breathing together as Quackity holds his head and Wilbur holds him in his lap. Then, Quackity begins to laugh. It’s something quiet at first, but quickly turns to full-blown hysterics against Wilbur’s head.

“Are you fucking okay?” Wilbur asks, humor to his voice but wondering if he should be offended or not. 

“No, no, I just-” Quackity doesn’t stop laughing. “Just- I was just thinking and-” he laughs even harder.

“You thought?” Wilbur prompts. He pulls his head from Quackity’s chest now, eyeing his face flushed with laughter.

“I fucking thought,” Quackity placates him with a kiss against his cheek. “I thought, this is going in the fucking poem, isn’t it?”

“Oh, fuck you,” Wilbur whines, letting his head fall against Quackity’s shoulder as he continues laughing. “You’re never seeing it now.”

“No, no, you have to show me.”

“Do I?”

“It’s about me, you have to show me.” Wilbur laughs.

“Keep talking and you’ll get a line, nothing more.” But Quackity just laughs again, a soothing rumble against Wilbur. He snakes a hand under Wilbur’s face, pushing him back until Quackity can kiss him again, and Wilbur cannot find much to complain about.

It takes five days before Wilbur gets an opportunity to knock on Quackity’s door again. It already goes better than last time because he actually gets to knock. He puts both of his hands firmly behind his back. It’s early, so early most of the people awake in the castle are staff cleaning and preparing for the day, but Wilbur was watching the sunrise. He tends to, he tries to at least, but he sort of fell off the habit in the last year. It was an incentive to wake up in the morning, something beautiful and quiet that felt almost like his, when everything else that is his feels so rotten.

After he was done admiring the sunrise over the kingdom, he went back to his lonely room and looked over the flower between the stacks of books, deciding it was as good as it would ever be. The poem too. It is shorter than he would have liked but satisfying all the same. He hopes Quackity finds it similar.

Since the garden, he’s hardly seen Quackity except for meetings, stolen words in the halls, even fewer stolen kisses in private, narrow corridors. Wilbur has still not told Phil. Even Sally is ready to tell her parents, and Wilbur thinks Kristin would understand well enough, but the idea of telling his father feels… mortifying. Almost like he’s failed something. It’s not fair, and Sally is ready to kill him, and Quackity will be soon enough because he is not a man who is very good at hiding what he wants. Wilbur will get there. Eventually. For now, he will live the day like his last.

Only a few moments after he knocks, Quackity answers the door looking more awake than Wilbur expected. In plainer clothes than Wilbur expected too. “Are you making the rounds?” Wilbur asks.

“I was planning on it.”

“Do you want company?”

“I wouldn’t mind it.”

“Ah, but I asked what you want.” Quackity levels him with a look of unimpressed amusement. Wilbur smiles. “Before we go, though, I have a gift.”

“What, for me?”

“No, for Phil. You just know him so well I thought I’d get your input.” Quackity gives him a bitchy smile but opens the door wide enough for Wilbur to step through. The second the door is shut, Quackity’s hands are on his face, pulling him down for a kiss, making Wilbur smile and almost forget he’s meant to have his hands behind him in his desire to reach out.

“What’d you get Phil?” Wilbur laughs against his mouth.

“Well, I’m not sure he’ll like it,” with only a little hesitation, Wilbur presents the paper he held behind his back. “Not sure he’ll get it, really.” With no hesitation, Quackity takes the paper from his hands with curious eyes. 

“Did you finish the tree poem?”

“Sort of scrapped that one,” Wilbur half-lies. It will be a very long time before he can finish that one. There are too many threads to weave, of childhood and adulthood, of brotherhood and love, so he hopes the snapshot of want he has written in its absence will suffice. He really hopes. Aggressively so as he fends off the rot. “Couldn’t seem to care about it more than a line.”

Quackity smiles, still looking at the paper, taking in the words now. This is agonizing to watch, actually. Wilbur sort of wishes he had just left it underneath his door or something, risk of destruction be damned. The last time he watched someone read his poem, it was Kristin, and he remembers watching the curve of her smile fall to worry. He was nauseous then too.

There is no greater Hell than showing someone his work and knowing it may be laughed at, scorned, a cause for concern. Worst of all, that it may be unwanted. Quackity rubs a gentle thumb against the dried and pressed cornflower taped to the corner of the page, reading the words with a wrinkle to his brow. Wilbur does not think it is particularly confusing, unless Quackity is a moron, but he has long since left the group of people Wilbur regards as such.

“Do you need a play-by-play?” Wilbur asks anyway. The continued silence makes him itch for a coin.

“Can’t entertain yourself for 20 seconds?” Quackity asks, but he sounds… choked. Ah. Wilbur curbs the itch in his mind by grabbing Quackity’s hand that does not hold the paper.

“You like it, then?” Wilbur asks, amused and pleased.

“Go fuck yourself! No one’s ever- ugh,” he pulls Wilbur close again, this kiss a little more bruising. “It’s nice. It’s really nice. You should do this more.”

“You want more?” It floods both nerves and warmth through him.

“Yes.” It’s not that Wilbur won’t write more. Quite the contrary.

“I write a lot, I just- I don’t tend to show it.”

“Show me.”

“Okay.” Wilbur doesn’t know why he agrees so easily. Maybe it’s a lie, a placation, so he doesn’t have to explain that his writing is like carving a piece of himself out, laying it raw and bloody on the page, letting the rot be seen in all its horrible, unpalatable glory. Maybe he just wants someone to want to see him raw and unpalatable. 

One more kiss, then Quackity says, “Come on.” He lets go of Wilbur’s hand to step toward his nightstand, laying the poem on top. Wilbur thinks he would do better to hide it inside, but he is more than aware that Quackity is not very good at guarding his heart. “We should- Tommy’s bringing Sam to the garden today, we should get out of here before they get there.”

“Shall I change first?” Wilbur is not in especially nice clothing, but the morning was chill and he put on a jacket he never bothered to take off that may be a little nicer than he should be sporting in town.

Quackity just flattens the collar of his jacket and says, “No, you look good. We’ll just say you’re bougie.”

“Strong words for the man adorned in jewels.”

“I compromised, alright?” Quackity wears the largest ring he owns and the chain with the rather large crucifix, but Wilbur supposes for Quackity that is compromise. “Are you ready or not?” 

They stumble down the castle corridors, giddy like teenagers, a reflection of themselves from two weeks ago. Wilbur was brimming with anxiety then, nothing running through his mind but Sally and Phil’s disappointment. Now, he just focuses on Quackity’s hand in his as Quackity helps him up the garden wall.

Much like two weeks ago too, they head to the tavern. This early, it is mostly people enjoying a sober breakfast, but they find some of the group they met two weeks ago still knocking back pints and Wilbur lets himself get lost in the performance he and Quackity put on for the townspeople. Just two humble men, passing through town to do dealings with a few of the antique shops in town, stopping in for a couple hours of fun with strangers.

It’s an hour into their morning, Wilbur warm on company and beer, that Wilbur sees her. He is half-leaning against Quackity in a way that probably, hopefully, comes off a too-friendly drunk to everyone else. Amidst their laughter, Wilbur catches her eyes across the room.

Sally, who he mistook as a townsperson in a rather ugly hat and dress, giggles into her hand at the words of a pretty, smiling man sitting across from her. For a moment, Wilbur is very confused by the sight. Despite everything, the rot inside of him wants to curdle and spit at his failure. But when her eyes meet his, frozen in shock, Wilbur knows he is not angry. He would have no right to be, but his feelings are not always cohesive with facts. As it is, he is just happy to see her happy, and hopefully soon he can will himself to tell Phil what makes him happy so she can go home and make something substantial. He sends her a smile, clutching Quackity a little tighter, and she returns it before turning back to the man who vies for her attention.

It’s then that Wilbur realizes it hardly matters. If they recognized him as the prince, they would have a whole other league of problems. Namely a mob. No one here knows who Wilbur is. No one knows he is supposed to be engaged to someone else except for his ex-fiance who sits across the room making eyes at someone else. He wonders if she’s done this before. Not the flirting, but going into town disguised as someone else. To find a connection she wasn’t told she had to make. Perhaps they both have more a sense of adventure than their marriage would have called for. He hopes to get to know it outside of a romantic context.

With all that in mind, Wilbur kisses Quackity’s cheek, having the intended effect of making him turn and look at Wilbur in confusion that turns into a smile against Wilbur’s lips as he kisses him proper. There are no real reactions from the others in their group, just a wolf-whistle from one of the more annoying bar patrons, and a few laughs. Wilbur pays them no mind. 

When he gets his fill, more accurately when his hunger is momentarily sated, he pulls away and asks, “Do you want to dance?” 

“Here?”

“Nowhere better.” It gets him another kiss. They excuse themselves from the group, stepping onto the mostly bare dancefloor. On mornings like these, it’s just for those who can’t find a seat. As it is, Quackity settles a hand on Wilbur’s waist and threads the fingers of his other hand between his. Wilbur hardly cares to waltz, so he moves their hands to the side of his own waist that is not already being held. He slides his own arms across Quackity’s shoulders. They lean against each other in a way that is not particularly comfortable, but he is warm and happy and the slight strain to his back is worth the feeling.

“So,” Quackity says. “Once a week? Or will that still kill you?” Wilbur laughs.

“At least I’ll die happy.” The echo of Quackity’s words from days ago are a joke, but Wilbur is ready to bury himself in bread and dancing and want. He is ready to take without tossing it back at the last second. He is ready to allow himself the humanity he thought he had to reject to be a proper king. Phil is human, but Wilbur feared he felt too deeply. He feared the things he wanted could never conflate with the things he needed because Wilbur cannot care about something without letting it rip into him. But he is allowed a dance in the woods. He is allowed a walk through the garden.

Wilbur still has not figured everything out. Namely with his father, who he has a limited time to explain the situation he’s gotten himself into. Hopefully he manages to do it before he and Sally’s vows because he has a feeling Quackity would not be very pleased. Wilbur hardly knows if he’ll ever figure out everything with the rot inside of him and seams holding it back always threatening to tear. But lips against his neck promise to never let him get away with loneliness, with almost, with that ugly anger that festers inside him until it comes out against himself or the ones he loves, and Wilbur thinks he can at least try. He wants to, even if he knows without question it will hurt.

They stay there, dancing or swaying or just holding each other, for a very long time.

we are making wine
with bare, dancing feet

we are dripping honey
with wide, open mouths

we are breaking bread
with desperate, hungry hands

we are wanting animals
with your lips on mine