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Simon looks suspicious.
They’re in Wille’s room on a Friday evening after a long week, and Simon has brought a small duffle bag over to spend the weekend at Hillerska so they can catch up. There was a math test earlier in the day which they had both been aggressively studying for all week, and on top of that, Wille had to field several video calls and meetings with his mother and other members of the Court as they try to increase his duties as Crown Prince in the fallout of his impromptu “it was me in the video” statement from last month. Needless to say, the quality time they’ll have together this weekend has been the one thing motivating them both to get through this awful week––“the hell week,” as Simon had dubbed it––and this is the first time in five days that they can take a deep breath and relax with no obligations looming over the horizon. It’s also the first time that Simon will be staying for more than just one night here at Hillerska, and Wille can’t help but think how different everything would be if that first weekend together had worked out and if Simon had managed to stay here after parent’s day like they had planned last term.
Boris would tell him he’s focusing too much on the past and on “what-ifs.” Simon would tell him he’s being a brooding prince.
Both are probably true.
Wille, in a fit of panic last night, cleaned out some of his drawers and some space in his closet, unsure whether Simon would want to pull clothes out of his duffle bag all weekend or put them away somewhere. It definitely was not the most healthy or productive thing to do at two in the morning, but he figured it was better than sitting in bed and going over worst case scenarios. Realistically, he knows that Simon’s spending the weekend here with him does not mean something bad will happen, but it doesn’t stop a little part of his brain from thinking so.
“You cleaned,” Simon hums thoughtfully, surveying the room. All of his clothes have been put in the hamper, he wiped down his sink, he made his bed, he even dusted (well, he doesn’t have a duster, so he just used a tee-shirt). And yes, this isn’t a date in any sort of conventional way, but that didn’t stop him from thinking that Simon might see it as a date and that, therefore, he had to do something date-like to make his boyfriend smile. This “something date-like” is a bouquet of flowers from a small florist in Bjärstad, half a dozen red and purple tulips sitting perfectly in a little Mason jar on his desk with a note reading “Simon <3” tied around the rim.
Also during his panic last night, he may have fallen down a rabbit hole of flower meanings on the internet as he tried to figure out which flowers to get Simon, and it took him a while to finally settle on pink tulips.
Love.
Royalty.
The first bit was to describe Simon, obviously, and the second bit is a bit of a joke that he’s sure Simon won’t get unless he’s also gone down the flower meaning vortex.
Wille should stop overthinking everything, probably.
Simon clocks the tulips and grins as his fingers brush over Wille’s handwriting––he’d used that calligraphy he had been taught to use but never actually needed––and his face gets all pink and flustered.
“You got me flowers?”
Wille nods and takes a seat on his bed. “If this is our first sort of real date, I thought I should set good expectations.”
Simon’s smile grows. “Tulips, huh? Not roses?”
Wille clears his throat and averts his eyes, his own cheeks heating now. “I thought roses might be…cliche? I don’t know,” he groans.
Simon chuckles and sits down beside him, still holding his duffle bag, and puts his arm around Wille’s shoulder. “You’re a dork,” he grins, “and I love you.”
Wille groans again and presses his head into Simon’s chest. “Shut up.”
Simon laughs and plays with Wille’s hair for a moment, letting the shorter strands slip through his fingers. “I like the haircut, by the way.”
Wille pulls his face off of Simon’s chest and looks up at him. “Yeah?”
He nods and tucks a piece behind Wille’s ear. “Yeah. It suits you.”
Wille grins and pulls Simon in for a soft kiss, relishing in the way they melt together so easily like this. Sometimes, when he’s overthinking and overanalyzing everything that’s happened, he isn’t sure how he managed to get through their time apart. At first, he thought that distance might make it awkward for them to try this all again, but he was pleasantly surprised to find that they still fit together the same as they had before, only there was something more this time. He noticed it after their first time after the jubilee, when they were cuddled up and catching their breath in his bed; there was something about the way Simon touched him, now, that made him feel like he was revered and precious. The first time around was certainly passionate, but this time has more love and tenderness guiding their touches, and Wille loves the way it fills him up from the inside out, making him feel full of electricity and adoration.
“I actually got you something, too,” Simon tells him sheepishly as he pulls away from the kiss and starts rifling through his duffle bag. Wille raises an eyebrow but waits patently for Simon to pull out a poorly wrapped, bulgy package and place it in Wille’s lap. The wrapping paper is probably from one of Sara’s birthdays, given the horses all over it, and the green ribbon looks like it was tied by a toddler, but Wille can’t help but think that this is already the most beautiful gift he’s ever received. He stares down at the package, his fingertips gently tracing the seams, when Simon nudges his shoulder.
“Open it,” he urges softly.
Wille nods and carefully opens the package, a bit startled by the extensive amount of tape holding it all together, and is confused when he’s met with green felt. He quirks and eyebrow and pulls the strange green thing out of the wrapping paper cocoon and is shocked into silence when he sees what he’s holding.
It’s a stuffed animal; a green frog with gangly limbs, a stitched smile, shining eyes, arms crosses over its chest, and a yellow crown sewn onto its head. There’s a swell of emotions bubbling up inside of them, and he doesn’t think he could even name or pinpoint half of them, but the biggest one is love. It’s always love when Simon’s around.
He looks over at the plate on his windowsill that holds the shattered remnants of the frog prince snow globe Erik got him, thinking that Simon must have seen it and thought Wille just liked frogs or something. He probably doesn’t know that Erik was the one who gave it to him with the words, “at least you’re not Crown Prince,” all those months ago, or that the snow globe broke when Malin tried to tear him away from his desk and make him leave Hillerska for good earlier in the term. If Simon had known all of this, maybe he wouldn’t have gotten this for Wille because it would bring back so many memories of Erik. And yes, of course, Erik is always in Wille’s mind and etched into his heart, but he likes thinking that this could be something with Simon, too.
Maybe memories don’t have to stay in the past, and maybe the hurt and grief he feels when he looks at the remnants of the snow globe don’t have to be all that he feels anymore. Maybe he can look at the snow globe or this plushie and think not only of Erik, but of Simon. He can think of love and support and not just grief, and he can think of the memories with Erik that he holds in his heart and the memories he’ll make with Simon in the days––weeks, months, years––to come. He’s starting to realize that things are never as black and white as he thought and that there’s a myriad of colors and feelings just waiting to be explored under the surface.
“Wille?”
He’s probably been silent for too long.
He looks at Simon and sees him looking back him, his bottom lip tugged between his teeth, brows furrowed. Wille smiles at him, his eyes a bit wet, and kisses him soundly.
“Do you like it, then?” Simon asks with a smile as they pull away. “I noticed your snow globe broke and that you might want something else.”
Wille looks at the snow globe, at the reminder of Erik, and takes a deep breath. “Erik gave it to me after the fight,” he explains softly. “He said…he told me ‘at least you’re not Crown Prince.’ He had a figurine of the frog prince on his desk at Drottningholm, too.” He takes another breath. “When he…when Erik…” he closes his eyes.
He’s talked about this before and he thinks about it all of the time, but he’s never said those words before. When I became Crown Prince, is how he’s used to phrasing it. Until now, he wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to say it any other way. But Simon’s hand is resting on his now and there’s a soft green frog wearing a crown in his hands, and Erik isn’t here anymore. Refusing to say it won’t make it any less true.
“When Erik died,” he manages for the first time, swallowing around how uncomfortably the words feel in his mouth, “I felt like the snow globe was all I had left of him. It broke when Malin tried to force me out of here, when mamma tried to make me leave Hillerska. It felt like…it felt like it was happening all over again?”
“Wille––“
He shakes his head and turns his hand over to squeeze Simon’s fingers. “I love the stuffed animal,” he promises. “I love that it isn’t sad or trapped inside of a bubble. I love that you gave it to me, and I love that Erik would have loved it, too.”
“I just thought you liked frogs,” Simon whispers, “and that it looked like you.”
This startles an unexpected laugh from Wille. “It does, doesn’t it?”
Simon laughs softly too, still seemingly unsure of how to navigate this situation.
Wille pulls Simon into a hug, the frog pressed between them, and realizes that he isn’t crying and that he doesn’t feel like he’s falling apart. It’s the first time he’s been able to talk about Erik without feeling like he’s breaking down and falling into pieces, and it’s the first time he’s managed to say that Erik died. He should be breaking down, he thinks, because that’s always what happens, but the frog prince is smiling up at him and Simon’s arms are around him and not letting him go.
He’s been so unsure of himself and of everything until this point, but now he knows.
Erik would be proud of him.
The stuffed animal: