Chapter Text
It all began with Mathew Williams.
What a curious phrase that is. It began with Mathew Williams. Nothing ever seemed to begin with Mathew. Ordinarily, things began elsewhere, started with people who got out and Did things, and Mathew trailed along behind, observing and ignored.
One could argue, of course, that it all began with Gilbert Beilschmidt, but plenty of things begin with Gilbert Beilschmidt. Where a thing begins is a matter of perspective. Nothing begins from nothing, one event follows another and at every stage there are many people acting to pull at the strings of fate. So, this story is about Gilbert Beilschmidt, but it starts with Mathew Williams.
Towards the beginning of the second semester of his freshman year, Mathew Williams’ life was beginning to fall into order. He was actually enjoying school, and he had what he might cautiously dare to call friends.
He was considering all this, and how life changed without dramatic turns, but rather with practice, with hope, with the desire to live in it, as he tried to think of who to nominate for the Most Inspirational Classmate of the Year.
Mathew thought the Inspirational Classmate award was incredibly stupid, but it was always a big deal, and Mathew was required to nominate someone since he was on the student council.
Who had inspired him?
It was such a dumb question. They always ended up electing either someone who had a public battle with cancer or a sports captain. It was shallow and silly, a popularity contest where you couldn’t nominate anyone too popular, because then everyone would protest that you were just turning it into a popularity contest.
“What are you thinking about?” Alfred interrupted.
Mathew shrugged off his apprehensive annoyance, and replied, “Who I'm going to nominate for the Inspiration contest.”
“Oh, well, obviously you’ll nominate your amazing big brother, right? No need to even think about it.”
“Please,” Mathew said, “As if you were ever a positive influence in my life.”
And maybe the way he said it was a little too frank, a little too raw, a little too angry . Because Alfred actually looked hurt when he said it.
“I just meant,” Alfred said, “That it doesn’t matter, you can pick whoever. I mean, who else would you pick.”
Which was exactly the conundrum Mathew had been grappling with to begin with, even though he did know it didn’t matter. But somehow, maybe with the thoughts of all the ways in which Alfred hadn’t been there when he needed him, maybe in the remembrance of darker times, maybe because Alfred volunteering himself made his mind turn away from the sort of popular, generally rule-abiding, successful in both sports and academics model student that Alfred represented, suddenly the choice seemed obvious.
“Gilbert Beilschmidt,” Mathew said.
Towards the beginning of the first semester of his freshman year, Mathew Williams was not what one might call okay .
Mathew was Tired. He was tired of his parents’ constant bickering. He was tired of his brother’s loudness. He was tired of being quiet and small and unobserved and good. He was tired of being tired. He was tired, in a word, of living.
He felt as though he would like to shrink into himself, or explode outward, or do something be something that wasn’t this…
Nothing.
But he was too tired to want to do anything but stop.
And that’s what it came down to, in the end. He wanted to be seen and he wanted to be forgotten, and he wanted somehow to make everything okay, but he didn’t know how and he’d lost the will to try.
It was with these not-thoughts droning around in his head, that Mathew wandered through the corridors of the school and out a back door with no definite destination in mind.
“Hey,” someone said, and Mathew almost jumped. He wasn’t used to people noticing him, he felt so invisible most days he thought he might fade away into nothing.
“You’re Matty, right?” the person continued, “Alfred’s brother.”
It was Gilbert Beilschmidt, leaning against the wall and smoking a cigarette.
Gilbert was easy to recognize on sight because he had albinism. Gilbert was a senior, and was the sort of person that everyone knew about, but wasn’t exactly popular or hated. He was a bit of a rebel, apparently, and he seemed to skip more classes than he attended, but always turned his homework in on time and did well on tests. People suspected him of cheating.
“Mathew, Mathew Williams. Only my brother calls me Matty. You’re Gilbert Beilschmidt, right?” Mathew said, hoping he remembered the name right. Wondering how he could escape this conversation without being rude. Wondering if he wanted to just be rude anyway.
“Yep,” Gilbert said, “So, Mathew, what brings you out here this fine morning?”
It was a dull-skied, blustery sort of day, with the cold bite of autumn creeping through it. Mathew shrugged.
“Ah, it’s one of those sorts of days,” Gilbert said. He flicked his cigarette onto the ground and stomped on it, then stooped down, picked it up, and stuck it in his pocket. There weren’t any trashcans around.
It was an odd sort of conscientiousness, Mathew thought vaguely, for someone ditching school for a cigarette break.
“Hey, wanna see something cool?” Gilbert asked, and then, without waiting for an answer, actually grabbed Mathew by the hand and started walking, “C’mon, I’ll show you.”
Mathew, too surprised to protest, allowed himself to be pulled along.
Gilbert walked to a mostly abandoned building in a forgotten corner of the school and scrambled up onto a dumpster pushed up against the wall, and from there, jumped to swing himself up onto the roof.
Mathew opened his mouth in surprise.
“C’mon,” Gilbert said again, his eyes sparkling, “I’ll give you a hand up, I know you want to.”
Mathew wasn’t sure how that would work, physically, given that he was pretty sure he was quite a bit heavier than Gilbert was. He considered, again, just walking away, but the question of where suddenly felt too big and empty to contemplate.
He climbed up onto the roof after Gilbert.
“Now, walk quietly,” Gilbert whispered, and Mathew followed silently in his wake.
Gilbert led him to a corner of the roof where a tree was growing close by, and pointed. From where they stood they had the perfect view to look down on a birds’ nest and four chirping fledglings.
It felt like a precious secret, the birds sitting there, so small and vulnerable and innocent, here in this far, overlooked corner of the school.
“Isn’t it too late for them to be nesting,” Mathew asked. The idea that these small creatures might not make it felt too terrible to bare.
“Nah,” Gilbert said, his voice just barely loud enough to be heard, “These are goldfinches. They don’t nest until late summer. Look, the mommy bird’s coming back.”
A bright yellow bird, like kind sunlight in the gray mid-morning, swooped home to her nest, and began to feed her delighted young.
Mathew sat and watched them in silence, with something like contentment, and something like peace. Gilbert, beside him was quiet and still as stone, and his face was soft with a sort of child-like awe.
Mathew and Gilbert sat together and watched as the little birds struggled to learn to fly as their parents encouraged them. The wind was cold, but not so much to be unbearable.
At last Gilbert said, “We’d better get back to class.”
Mathew glanced at his phone, his next class was in twelve minutes, they’d been up here for close to an hour.
When they reached the back door to the school, Gilbert said, “You’re a pretty cool kid, Mathew, you know that, right?”
Mathew laughed a little bitterly. He had begun to feel as though he had returned to the real world where the air was solid and real and suffocating again. “You don’t know anything about me,” he said.
“Not true,” said Gilbert, “I know at least two things about you. One, you care about baby birds surviving the winter. Two, you pay attention to the people around you. I think that’s pretty neat.”
“How’d you get the idea I pay attention?” Mathew asked. It wasn’t wrong, he realized, he spent so much time unobserved that he naturally ended up doing a lot of observing.
“You knew my name,” Gilbert said.
Mathew snorted, “Everyone knows about you,” he said.
“Sure,” Gilbert replied, “But not everyone knows my name, especially not brand new baby freshmen.”
Mathew still didn’t think it was that much of an achievement, especially not considering that Gilbert had known his name too, or at least sort of known it. But he decided to take the compliment.
“You’re pretty cool too,” Mathew said, “And thanks.” He meant for the birds, he meant for noticing, he meant for everything. The word felt too small and sufficient at once.
“I’m the best ,” Gilbert said, and then more sincerely, “And no problem. Now go, or we’ll be late.”
Mathew had only spoken to Gilbert, what? Two? Three times after that? Nothing that happened was so very profound, nothing was so very important. Mathew couldn’t pin his improving mental health on that day. Improvement was a messy, backsliding thing, influenced by many factors both external and internal (including, in all fairness, Alfred learning to be less of a jerk).
But on that dull gray fall day, Mathew was fairly certain, he had meant to end his life. And it was Gilbert who had noticed him, who had stopped him and shown him something soft, and kind and beautiful, and walked him back to class, and told him he was pretty cool.
Mathew did not know how much Gilbert guessed of where his head was at, but in that moment Gilbert had been exactly what he needed. What’s more inspiring than that?
“Shit, you’re right,” Alfred said, to Mathew’s surprise, “Why didn’t I think of that?”
“How do you know Gilbert Beilschmidt?” Mathew asked.
Alfred shrugged.
“He helped me out,” he said, “With all that shit in freshman year with Arthur. He sort of taught me to be myself, I guess. That I didn’t need Arthur’s validation and I could make my own way and shit. I mean he also had his own grudge match thing going with Arthur and was low-key using me to get back at him, but he’s a good dude.”
A few months ago, Mathew would have resented this, would have felt as though he was once again only getting Alfred’s left-over afterthoughts. But now it just felt fitting. He wondered how many other people Gilbert had influenced for good. He wanted to find out.