Chapter Text
Two was sitting in Gaty’s new room. They learned their lesson with the other contestants asking for their rooms to be flipped the proper way, so her room is how it should be. They watch her as she inspects and unpacks her things to put on shelves on the wall. It’s been a few days since she came back from the void, and this is the first time she’s been able to get up and walk without feeling lightheaded.
The curtains are closed most of the way, keeping out the sunlight in order to make the room less bright; she’s still sensitive to lots of light. So, as a compromise, fairy lights twinkle softly, bathing the room in rotating colors.
A white noise machine hums on the far side of the room. Gaty had requested it because she said the complete and total silence was unbearable. It reminded her too much of the void.
Two had agreed immediately. Whatever Gaty requested, she would receive.
Some contestants would say favoritism, but to Two, Gaty was the object they cared about the most.
Okay, maybe they can see where the favoritism is coming from, but they can’t help it! Gaty is adorable! She’s the first person to listen to them talk and understand where they’re coming from. On multiple fronts.
They just really love hanging out with her. She’s patient, has a lovely smile…
“Can you help me put this photo on the shelf, Two?” Gaty says, interrupting their thoughts, holding said photo with her foot and leaning against the dresser. She still hasn’t fully recovered her balance yet.
“Of course!” they say, hopping off her bed and taking the photo from her grasp.
Now that they’re able to see what the photo is, it’s a noticeably older photo of Saw and Gaty. The two of them look so young and smiling into the camera. Gaty looked freshly painted and Saw with her old handle.
“When was this taken? You both look so young!”
“I think around the time both of us got out of the LOL? Definitely after BFDIA. I don’t really remember; I’ll have to ask Saw.”
“You’re adorable! Look at you!”
Gaty laughs nervously, and Two thinks they might’ve said too much or taken it too far. “Thanks, you know I don’t miss that old handle of Saws.”
Two hums, they didn’t even know she had an old handle, “What happened to the old one?”
“Burned in lava during a challenge back in BFB, her current one suits her much better.” She smiles softly, clearly thinking about her girlfriend.
An unfamiliar feeling stews in Twos stomach; they don’t know how to describe it, but it feels uneasy. Wrong.
Before Gaty can comment further, they put the photo up on the top of the dresser.
Hopefully, this isn’t a symptom of that sadness, depression they think Fanny had said once back when she was doing research on One in their room, that they thought they were over now that Gaty is back.
Two had hoped that these awful, sad feelings would go away. However, they have not. So that will be something to unpack later, maybe.
“Do you like your room?” two asks, a smile on their face.
“Yeah! I like it,” Gaty hums, “thanks for the help, Two!”
“No problem! Glad I could help.” They smile at her.
Gaty looks away. If there was anything wrong, Gaty is hiding it from them. “I should show Saw, she would love the fairy lights,” she says with a soft smile on her face, moving to walk out of the room to go get her, still a little wobbly on her feet.
At the mention of saw, that same feeling pangs inside of Two again, this time in their chest. A frown forms on their face involuntarily. Even if two could work up the courage to admit their feelings, would Gaty reciprocate? They spent so much time together, but does it even matter now? Saw is back, was two just a replacement?
They couldn’t be. Two couldn’t be Saw’s replacement. Gaty wanted to hang out with two today; she wanted them to help her with her room, not Saw.
They’ve seen the looks the two of them gave each other, then and now. Two has seen how much love saw has for Gaty. They can’t take that away from her, can they?
Two feels uneasy. Two does not like this feeling. They can’t feel this way about Saw; they shouldn’t, after realizing what this feeling is hits Two harder than they would like. They’re jealous of Saw. That’s what the uneasiness is.
But if Two can’t give all the love they have in their heart to Gaty, would they eventually have to be okay with seeing the two objects so in love? Without them?
Two loves Gaty so much that their heart hurts. How do they deal with this?
They flop face first onto Gaty's bed. Do they just have to deal with this forever?
When Gaty returns with Saw, who keeps her eyes tightly shut, the shorter figure leads her into the room, breaking their train of thought. Two sits up, so it doesn’t seem like they were moping on a bed that wasn’t theirs.
“Come on, where are you taking me?” Saw giggles.
“We’re here. You can open your eyes.”
She opens her eyes and gasps, “Oh my sheet metal, Gaty your room is so cute!” she squeals, “Oh my gosh, it’s the photo we took on our first date! I didn’t know you still had this!” Saw cooed at the photo, picking it up off the dresser with a look of adoration on her face.
“Yeah, I thought I lost it, honestly,” she chuckles softly, “Two helped me decorate a bit!”
“The fairy lights were her idea,” Two says, hoping that their voice wasn’t too strained. “I just helped put things on shelves.”
“Oh!” Saw blinks. Two thinks they can see her smile waver, but it might just be their mind playing tricks on them. “That makes sense! I really like it.”
Two suddenly feels like they aren’t welcome in Gaty’s room. They don’t know why, but maybe it’s because of how Saw reacted? Does she not want them there? No, that shouldn’t be why. It feels like they are interrupting a moment, but somehow worse.
The feeling is there and now they can’t shake it.
“Well, if you ever need anything changed in your room, Saw, just let me know and I will be happy to help!” they say quickly, putting on a hopefully convincing enough smile, “I’ll leave you two to it!” Two then quickly leaves out the door, nearly runs face first into Tree.
“Woah, somebody’s in a rush.” Tree jokes, stepping aside so the Algebralian can get to… wherever they’re going. Notably, though, he isn’t being trailed by Marker or Fanny.
But maybe Tree can help them? He is in a relationship with three other people.
“Tree, wait, I have a question for you.”
Tree pauses, “hm? What’s up?”
“So this might seem odd of me to ask, but how did uh, you and your partners get together? Was- was there any jealousy? Sorry if that’s weird. I- I don’t exactly know how to go about this”
Tree hums, a small smile on his face as he leads them to his own elimination suite, “probably not the best idea to talk about that kind of stuff directly outside of Gaty’s room. I’m assuming it has to do with her, right?”
“Am- am I really that obvious?”
Tree gives them a look as he opens the door, “You were literally lying in bed depressed for a long time when she disappeared, Two, it can not be more obvious than that.” He closed the door behind them. “Everyone knew how close you two were before then.” Tree says in a much quieter voice.
Two notices that the lights are off in Trees room as well, aside from the bedside lamp he doesn’t move to turn the lights on either, moving over to the bed where two notices that Fanny’s tail is poking through a pile of blankets, the rest of her is burried deep within them.
Said pile shifts slightly when the door closes, tail flicking slightly as the only sign that she’s even alive underneath all of those blankets.
Tree moves the mass of blankets back slightly, apologizing quietly when she lifts her head up, looking disoriented. Pressing a kiss to her forehead as he hands Fanny a granola bar.
Two can vaguely hear her say thank you, her voice uncharacteristically quiet as she slumps back underneath the blankets that Tree covers her with.
“Is she doing okay?” Two asks in concern, they don’t think they’ve ever seen fanny act this way before.
“She’ll be fine. She’s just resting and recovering,” Tree says quietly, putting a hand on the lump of blankets with a sigh, “the past few days have been a lot for her and she woke up in a lot of pain this morning, exceptionally grumpy.”
The lump that is Fanny makes a grumbling noise, tail flicking in irritation.
Wordlessly, tree leads two out of the room, as to not bother the girl in the blankets any further, “but to answer your question, I think there was a little on markers end, but with everything that was going on between the four of us already, it was too much of a mess for jealousy to even happen.” He says, then has a look of realization on his face, “Are you jealous of Saw?”
Two flushes in embarrassment, “n-no! I- maybe? I dont know, I was in Gaty’s room helping her decorate her room and she went and got Saw and…” they trail off.
“And you didnt like how that made you feel.” Tree finishes their sentence for them
They look away from him, feeling ashamed of themselves, for even feeling that way about saw, they’re sure she’s lovely!
“I don’t have any experience dealing with jealousy. Maybe there’s someone else around here who does?” Tree suggests, “there’s plenty of people in relationships in this hotel,” he says, putting a hand on their shoulder, “I'm sure you’ll be able to figure this out.”
“Thanks, tree.” Two smiles uneasily as he walks back into his room, likely to check up on Fanny again.
Two knows that Price Tag is in a relationship with Book, who they think is dating Ice Cube? Two is friends with price tag, maybe they can go talk to them?
With a snap of their fingers, they imagine themselves ending up wherever Price Tag is.
There’s a collective yelp as two appears in the middle of a circle of objects. Most of Just Not plus Ice Cube and Winner.
“Oh, hey, two!” Price Tag grins. “We were just playing Goiky and Dragons! Did you need anything?”
Two sheepishly stepped off the board that was currently being used in the middle of the group. “um, yes, actually. But if you lot are busy it can wait.” They say moving outside of the circle.
“Is it about Gaty?” Book supplied, causing two to freeze in place. How did she know!?
“Uh, maybe? Kind of?”
“You know, you aren’t… exactly subtle.” Winner says, causing Two to sputter in disbelief. This is the second time they’ve been told that today!
“First tree, now you, winner, I feel betrayed!” they say in mock offense, dramatically putting a hand to their head.
“I don’t think The Pact is a good example of how to get into a relationship, no offense to any of them.” Book says, “I would know, I am a romance guide book!”
“So you can help me?”
“I guess we can end the session here if Two needs help,” Price Tag says, (-3-) <- making that face
“Finally! A session ending with no one dying violently!” Nickel cheers, flopping onto his back and kicking his legs around in celebration.
“I wouldn’t mind helping,” Bomby says, smiling down at Nickel.
“All of you? Okay, well, uh, I wasn’t really prepared to talk to all of you,” they wave their hand around, “but that’s fine! I had a question.”
“About what?” Book wonders, her hand hovering over her pages, ready to open herself up to give any advice if needed, which, it most likely will be.
“How… how do you deal with jealousy?” they winced.
“Huh… not the question I was expecting, but book, ice cube, do you two have an answer for them?” Price Tag gestures with their string.
Book lets out a long sigh, “Oh gosh, id rather not talk about how Pencil treated us when we were actually dating and in a relationship, and outside of it. But sure, why not. She’s not here anymore, so it doesn’t matter.”
Ice Cube glowers, “It was back during BFDIA and she didnt treat us all equally back then either; it was obvious she favored Match more over the rest of us Freesmarters. At one point she was favoring needle and hanging out with her every moment she could, back when needle was briefly a part of the polycule, anyway.” She says with venom in her voice.
“Oh, I remember that! Didn’t pencil not take her breaking up with you all well?” Nickel questions, but Two assumes that the question will go unanswered as Ice Cube glares at him.
“Yeah… I love Needle; she’s one of my best friends, but at the time I was envious of her. I was angry with her. I felt so many negative emotions: jealousy, envy.” Book sighs, “All because she took all of Pencil’s attention away from me, Ruby and Ice Cube, the ones who were actually around.” She glares down at the carpet and Two doesn’t think they’ve seen her more upset or angry than in this moment before.
“Most of all, it felt like…” she trails off, “gosh, I dont know…”
“Like you wanted to throw up?” Bomby adds.
“Kind of? It felt like I was going to be physically sick, and it hurt to be ignored and put to the side.” Book shrugs, “but also I was more anxious and barely able to stand up for myself back then too, so that didnt help either.”
“Book summed it up pretty well,” Ice Cube says as she kicks the die that was in front of her away from her foot, “but for me it was more anger and relief when Needle left the relationship, but of course Pencil still focused on her? Especially when Book won BFDIA. But then Match was back, so she was the focus again for her. She always was, still is, and always will be.”
“So you just felt sick? Angry?” Two asks, definitely feeling one of those emotions.
Ice cube grimaces, but nods, “I don’t particularly enjoy thinking about this part, but back when book and I weren’t on speaking terms because of events in BFB,” she stops and gives Price Tag and apologetic look, who smiles back at her, “I saw book and price tag having fun and it just made me feel sad, envious, jealous that they had what we used to have.”
“Aw, Icy…”
“No, you let me take my time, and I'm really grateful for that. I really missed what we had. I’m glad we could work things out between us after taking a break from each other.” Ice Cube gives Book a sincere smile as Book pulls her into a hug.
“In order to make things work, Two, you have to have communication.” Winner says, “This goes for friendship and dating, id say. But for both Loser and Clock, for me, when Loser did Losercake without me and when Clock was treating me differently than everyone else, both hurt me in different ways.” They sighed, “Clock and I made up after we had a talk. We're on good terms now, and Loser apologized for leaving me behind. The importance of having a healthy relationship, friendship, romantic or platonic, is to communicate.” Winner says, giving Two a smile and a big thumbs up.
“Maybe you should go talk to Saw? She is dating Gaty,” Book says reassuringly, “she’ll understand, I'm sure.” She smiles.
“She probably already knows about your crush, anyway. I think Pin might’ve told her when she got eliminated.”
Two puts their head in their hands with a groan, “I'm not sure if that makes me feel any better about this.”
“Well, maybe if you two didnt spend almost every moment together between challenges, then maybe it would be less obvious.” Bomby shrugs, “but whatever, I'm not sure if Gaty even knows either.”
“Yeah, none of us are close to Saw, anyway?” Nickel says, not noticing how Book winces, “Well, actually, Book and Ice Cube were on a team with her in BFB.”
Ice Cube nods at Nickel's words.
“Okay, so you think I should talk to Saw?” Two fiddles with their fingers, “you don’t think she hates me? For having a crush on Gaty?”
“Why would she hate you? She’s literally the sweetest object ever,” Book says, “she was nice to me in BFB after… uh… well, everything.” She chuckles nervously.
“I don’t think she hates anyone? Except maybe profily.”
Book groans, putting her head in her hands, “That was a disaster in The Exit.”
Two chooses to ignore those last two sentences, “That's a good point! She probably doesn’t even hate me!” they say with a nervous smile. “I’ll talk to her! I’ll ask her if I can have permission to ask out Gaty!” they say, raising their arms up into the air in triumph.
The group cheers for them, and Two walks out of the room with renewed confidence and a brand new goal to achieve.