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Wilhelm stared at the white ceiling that hung, suspended above him.
A golden chandelier bared its obnoxious gleam, it drew the weakening light to it, holding his poorly controlled attention, forcing him to take it in and appreciate its beauty.
At some point he had spread into a star-fish position so that if the chandelier somehow were to become too heavy for the ceiling that it clung to, it would crush him completely under its arms.
It would be a bit like killing two birds with one stone, he mused. No more chandelier, no more Crown Prince.
Wilhelm thought that the days had rolled by, far faster than any experience of time he could remember. His mind was in a liminal state, suspended between thoughts that were too painful to attach to.
Any happy memories he attempted to conjure now had their own baggage. They were tainted. There would always be the shadow they cast which was much too dark to make it worth the light.
He tried to remember soft curls - softer than the fluffiest palace towels, brushing against his skin. Intense brown eyes, soft yellow light swirling through their depth, clinging to him like he was something sacred. Soft lips, warm under the pad of his thumb, the same mouth telling him that they couldn’t be together. Building a horrible heavy wall between them. The same eyes, where frozen shadows of betrayal and hurt sheltered.
Wilhelm had sinned, and Simon had enacted his punishment. But for a short time, for the first time in his life, Simon had allowed him into heaven.
Of course, thinking about Erik was out of the question.
So it seemed he had no options, other than to lie very still, attention bouncing off the décor in his room, recoiling when the blurs of a memory chased it.
Despite this, a slow burning beneath his skin made him sure that it would not be like this for much longer. It was a constant reminder of the decision he had made the same moment that he had pressed his shaking thumb to the ‘end call’ button on the phone to his mother, of the clean slice it made through her gun-shot ramblings.
The night of his return, he had made a blood-pact with himself not to experience life out of this room, until he found a way to fix what he had done.
On the day of the interview, his mother’s vulnerability had halted him; It was only then that he had realised that if he went through with this interview, and came out as a queer Crown Prince, there was every possibility that she would disown him as her son, and he would have no family left.
The thought drove through his conscience like a stake, because of course, it was not what Erik would have wanted.
But finally, after the phone call, the bitter truth had presented itself, spat by the Queen over the grainy signal.
She had already disowned him.
Wilhelm did not feel how he expected himself to feel at the revelation. If anything it was...freeing. The queen had chosen for him; she had removed his obligations to her. And now, he owed her nothing.
It was Christmas Eve, when the tingle had grown so strong that it thrummed beneath his skin, urging him to move, get up, take what he wanted.
One thing he was absolutely sure of, was that he could not spend Christmas in the same space as his mother.
Undoubtedly she would call for him to show his face. They would need to go through the annual Christmas and New Year’s photoshoot, and he would have to suppress the nausea making him want to throw up, ignore the clutching panic in his chest and plaster on the face of a grateful Crown Prince.
He would also have to ignore the itching under his skin that screamed at him to put as much distance as he could between him and his mother, the person protecting the person who his and Simon’s lives.
Each moment he stayed away from Simon, the thrumming seemed to amplify. It was as if something was bursting open inside of him, and it made his heart ache. Simon had planted a seed there, claiming it as his own, and now it was desperately trying to flower, except it needed Simon to breathe, and to grow. The feeling was destroying him.
This must be what withdrawal is like, he thought.
It had been almost seven whole days, 186 hours, 604,800 seconds, since he had last touched the only person who had ever made him feel real.
His limbs were electric, there was too much inside them and nowhere to transfer it to.
It was getting dark. An artificial stream filtered past the thick blue curtains, which had not been drawn open since his return. It was just enough to make out the shadowy picture of Erik which had been hung on his wall in his absence.
He arrived in Bjärstad when the night was pitch black, and the stars blinked sleepily at their posts above Simon’s house.
Malin had not taken much convincing to drive him here, only accepted the demand with a twinkle in her eye.
Wilhelm also realised that he definitely should have stopped to put on a coat, or even anything other than his apparently paper-thin pyjamas. The air chilled at his nerves.
He hesitated at his angel’s window. There was no plan; he didn’t need one. Simon was taking care of his heart in that little room, and he needed to feel it again, to feel Simon. To pray for forgiveness.
Simon blinked away the light from his fish tank, as it splashed the room in gold, a mimick of a sunrise.
A tired hand reached over to check the time and he groaned, marvelling at what could have possibly woken him up at 1.20am, when Sweden was supposed to be silent. Perhaps it was his own fault.
He grimaced, as images of his dream arose and prodded through his mind’s hazy veil.
Warmth, vanilla, large hands running up his back, holding him close to a warm chest where a heart beat beneath his, steady as his own, and gentle yellow light pooling in through a window.
A shudder wracked him, and he willed it all to just go away, and leave him alone. His heart beat felt larger than usual, an unhelpful reminder of its presence. It yelled at him, that it was still there, his life force, to keep him alive and aware of this torturous state of existence, where he couldn’t have anything he wanted.
A soft knocking at his window chased the silence away. How had he not noticed that before?
A wave of panic surged through him at the image of herds of reporters and journalists, coming to kidnap him in the dead of night.
But there was no reason. Didn’t they know it was over?
He reached for the curtains, and yanked them back before his instincts could tell him better.
There was the boy from his dream, standing in a pyjama t-shirt with a feral look in his eyes, staring back at him.
“Shit, Wille” He frantically reached to open the window, flinging it open only to curse again as the literally below-freezing air hit him.
“Simon.” Wilhelm’s breath curled upwards, his words crystallising in the air, the boy's eyes darting to where Simon was gripping his upper arm in an attempt to haul him in through the window.
Simon almost rolled his eyes at the smile that spread like lightning across Wilhelm’s face, when he seemed to realise that Simon was letting him in. Did he seriously think Simon could just leave him there?
Wilhelm’s gangly legs were of little service, as he attempted to swing them over the window sill, and Simon definitely would have laughed at the image of the Crown Prince of Sweden stumbling into his little room. He would have found it much funnier, if the hand that Wilhelm had curled around Simon’s upper arm wasn’t so tight, so desperate, and if the touch didn’t make him feel so damn confused.
It hurt, so much, like pressing his finger into an open wound. And yet, the relief and lightness with which his heart gasped with was so overwhelming, that he couldn’t bring himself to push the boy away.
Simon pulled him farther into his room, and closed the window. He still couldn’t be sure that he wasn’t dreaming, or hallucinating, or something, because his foggy mind could not comprehend what the fuck Wilhelm was doing here.
“Wille, what the hell are you doing? It’s freezing out there!” Simon brushed a hand through his hair, trying to compose himself to address the boy who had broken his heart. He turned around.
Wilhelm looked different, and it wasn’t just the way his nose and his lips were slightly reddened from the cold.
As Wilhelm stepped closer to Simon, the way he towered over him was suddenly more noticeable. His shoulders, although beneath a soft t-shirt, were broad and sharp. Not like they were when laced with panic, then. A good thing.
His hair was ruffled, the front delicately framing his face, and a strand brushed the tip of his nose as his dark eyes looked down at Simon in the dull light.
Simon’s breath hitched at the sudden proximity.
Or perhaps it was the intensity with which Wilhelm’s eyes seemed to pin him still.
He wanted to step backwards, to put some space between them. But all he managed to convince his body to do was to close his eyes. Since when had Wilhelm been able to do that? Surely they didn’t teach him this at the palace. It was just something he had an innate talent for, Simon expected. An innate talent for silencing Simon’s self-preservation instincts.
Suddenly Wilhelm broke eye contact, and shifted towards the window. Simon watched him steadily as he pulled the curtains shut. He wondered if Wilhelm also had an irrational fear of open curtains now.
The Prince did not give Simon long enough to get his breath back, before he resumed that look. At this point if he didn’t say something soon, Simon was just going to climb out of that window himself, and hope that the December air would return his abilities for rational thought.
But what Wilhelm did next was far worse than simply not speaking.
Simon was helpless to do anything other than watch, frozen, as Wilhelm dropped slowly to his knees, not once breaking his damned eye contact, until he was sitting fully on his heels beneath Simon.
Simon’s breath shuttered. He scanned Wilhelm’s face. The boy looked tormented. By what, Simon didn’t know, but he could certainly relate, he thought hysterically as he watched the golden light dance across Wilhelm’s cheek bones.
“Wille,” Simon murmured, but Wilhelm just shook his head softly, now not meeting his gaze.
Instead, Simon felt cold fingers trace his own, where they hung beside him. Wilhelm tugged on them gently to bring them together between them.
Simon tried to move them, to do what, he didn’t know, but his body didn’t know how to react to the boy acting like this.
But Wilhelm simply tightened his grip, ceasing Simon’s shifting, still leaving the silence alone to rest between them.
He rested his forehead against their joined hands, Wilhelm’s gentle breath warmed his skin. Simon shuddered. His thumb rubbed an infinity symbol into the back of Simon’s hand, before a soft kiss was pressed over the same spot.
Simon’s eyes fluttered closed. Surely that was the only way he could survive this. His fingers curled tighter around Wilhelm’s.
“Please-” he tried, but Wilhelm was having none of it. Simon felt him take a breath, the silence ebbed.
“I don’t want,” his gaze lifted to Simon’s, those dark eyes which stole his thoughts. “anything else,” he continued, planting another kiss on the sensitive skin between Simon’s thumb and forefinger, “except this.”
Simon swore that his brain was short-circuiting, or something was going wrong, because he couldn’t form any kind of thought - no matter where, or how hard he searched for the right words. He could only stare, as Wilhelm glowed, half-shadowed by the light, looking up at Simon as if he had the solution to the world’s problems.
He couldn’t do this. This was going to break him.
“Please,” Wilhelm continued, perhaps oblivious or uncaring towards what he was doing to Simon. “One last chance. Give me one last chance.”
Simon’s jaw tightened, because what right did Wilhelm have to do this? What was he supposed to do? Simon was weak, surely Wilhelm must know that. He must know that by doing this, he was not giving Simon a choice at all.
“I don’t know if I can.” He carefully removed one of his hands from Wilhelm’s, and tried to keep his expression blank as he moved it to cup Wilhelm’s cheek.
He ran a thumb over the hard line of Wilhelm’s cheek bone, breath hitching as Wilhelm’s eyes shuttered closed. “You’re going to kill me,” he finished, pressing his thumb harder into the curve.
“I’m sorry Simon.” His voice faltered. “This is killing me too.” He grabbed onto Simon’s hand again, holding it against his cheek and finally opening his eyes again to look up at Simon.
“I think I hate everything except you.”
Simon pulled at Wilhelm’s hands, and the boy rose slowly to his feet, as if the moment he moved too fast, this thing they had created would shatter. Wilhelm was still looking at Simon with those sorry, tortured, dark eyes, and Simon decided that he hated it. He hated this. And then, he found the right words.
“I hate you.” He said softly. And then pulled Wilhelm into him.
The boy’s arms immediately curled around him, one around his waist, the other encircling his shoulders and he held him there, pressing his face into Simon’s shoulder. “I love you.” Wilhelm responded, fingernails digging into Simon’s waist. Simon buried his face into Wilhelm’s neck, so, so warm, and clutched at his back, material caught between his fingers.
Simon was the first to pull away, but Wilhelm still wouldn’t let go of him completely. So Simon guided them to the bed gently, pulling Wilhelm down under the blankets with him.
He at least had the decency to look a little bit guilty, but didn’t let that stop him from shuffling further into the bed. Simon sighed, slipping his leg between Wilhelm’s under the pretence of warmth, and Wilhelm knew not to comment, only drew Simon closer so that he was tucked under Wilhelm’s arm.
The room became dimmer, and for a moment his heart felt impossibly full, next to the slowing beat of Wilhelm’s, that he thought he could die.
Wilhelm woke up to the ghost of Simon’s breath against his collarbone, and warmth pressed up against his body. His mind blanked. And then he remembered.
Fuck.
He brought his hand to his face and covered his eyes, trying to sort out his thoughts, which was an exceptionally difficult task for a multitude of reasons. He chanced a glance down at the boy, who was practically draped across Wilhelm’s body.
Simon was far easier to appreciate in the morning light that filtered in through the curtains, than the dim light that the fish tank could provide. Not that the soft golden lighting hadn’t worked very well for Simon’s sharp angles, because he could recall clearly that it very much had. But now in the clearer morning, he could appreciate how Simon’s skin was golden and radiant, and his hair brushed against Wilhelm’s cheek, perfect, gorgeous deep warm brown curls that were soft as well.
Suddenly glad for the arm that was draped over Simon’s body, he trailed it up Simon’s back to wrap around his shoulders, while he brought his other hand up to reach his hair. He took a curl and rolled it between his thumb and forefinger. Jesus christ it was so soft.
Simon stirred. He groaned softly, and his lips pressed into Wilhelm’s collarbone, soft and warm, and Wilhelm was trying so so fucking hard to think about literally anything else. But it didn’t work, so Wilhelm just deliriously covered his face with his arm and prayed that this torture would end soon.
It wasn’t long before Simon groaned against him softly, and Wilhelm uncovered his face. Simon had his eyes open now, and was looking at him strangely.
And then he froze, possibly realising their proximity.
“Erm, sorry for lying on you?” And then he had the audacity to smirk sleepily at Wilhelm, to which all he could do was grin back, and laugh as Simon buried his face in Wilhelm’s chest.
Wilhelm said nothing, just wanted to appreciate the boy in front of him. He started to trace a lazy pattern over Simon’s shoulders.
That seemed to wake Simon up properly.
“We need to talk about last night.” Simon murmured, reaching across Wilhelm to grab his phone from the bedside table. “Shit, it’s 10am already.” He placed it back down. “So, are you going to explain what inspired you to knock on my window at 1am last night, and scare the shit out of me?”
Wilhelm grimaced. “I’m really sorry, but I didn’t want to face the wrath of Linda, so it was the only way,” He trailed off.
Simon rolled his eyes, “She still loves you, you know.”
Wilhelm blanked for a moment. Linda still loved him. He still had a family, really. With Linda, and Simon. Maybe Sara didn’t like him, but that was okay; he could work on that.
Wilhelm reached up to touch his fingers to Simon’s hair, and ran his fingers through it when he didn’t protest. A delicious warmth bloomed across Simon’s cheeks.
Wilhelm could do nothing but take him in, his gaze burning. But then, something changed, and Simon began to pull away. He shifted over Wilhelm and got out of the bed.
He felt like an idiot, for letting it happen again. Hated himself, hated Wilhelm.
For letting him have this and then inevitably taking it away again. He felt slightly sick.
Then, Wilhelm’s fingers were wrapping around his wrist and pulling him back down towards him.
“Wille, what are you doing?” Wilhelm did not stop until he had pulled Simon onto the bed with him, and grabbed his phone. “Wille, I can’t do this.”
Wilhelm seemingly ignored him, in favour of typing away furiously on his phone. Well, as furiously as he could with only one free hand anyway. The other one was still planted firmly around Simon’s wrist.
“Okay, before we do this, I just need to double-check with you that you are okay with going public with me.”
What?
Simon took a moment to form a reply. “Wille, of course I want that, but please. I don’t want to pressure you into anything. This has to be your decision.”
Wilhelm smiled softly. “I know. It is.”
“Okay then.”
Wilhelm’s fingers trailed slowly from Simon’s wrist, up to his arm, pressing warmth there and pulling him into his chest. He opened the camera on his phone, and kissed the top of Simon’s head. Simon felt so soft, and warm, and all he could smell was vanilla, and home, and Finally.
It was a cute picture, Simon was not ashamed to admit.
His heart flickered as Wilhelm pressed ‘post’ on the official Crown Prince Wilhelm account, and he took a moment to send a silent prayer to the royal PR team.
That night, they lay locked together. Wilhelm couldn’t conjure even a slither of remorse about what he had done.
His mother’s calls went unanswered.
With the boy he loved curled up in his arms, he had never felt so free. He knew there would be a lot of PR shit to sort out, but for now he was happy to hold Simon close, and allow their hearts to realign in peace.
Just before sleep took him, Wilhelm felt soft lips press an unmistakable I love you over his heart, by a boy bathed in a golden glow.
Finally.