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Love was meant to be painful.
If there was one thing Dave Miller had learned in all his long, lackluster years of life, it was just that.
Love wasn’t like the sappy fairy tales that the girls at the orphanage gushed about, the ones where the prince saves the princess from the evil dragon and two live happily ever after, nor was it the sickly saccharine affection he would hear about in songs that played from bars at ungodly hours of the night. That was a love too rare for the merciless streets of New York City, if it even existed. It was a twisted, wretched thing that involved more sacrifice than sanctuary, a complete and utter loyalty to someone no matter the struggles it brought on.
Dave had known this better than anyone at a very early age. He heard of it all the time, while living off of garbage and spare change. Mainly in passing, but he had heard it nonetheless. Tales of broken hearts that almost always ended in the two going back to each other, of bitter friendships in which neither could quit the other, of tortured relationships between parents and children who would die and kill for each other nonetheless.
Sure, sometimes the stories were happy enough to make him crack a smile, however small. Those kinds of stories were always his favorite. They spoke so delicately about care and affection, warm hugs and feather-light brushes of cheekbones, that Dave would somehow find himself reconsidering all he knew about the dreaded emotion. But after a while, they would always go back to being as bleak and dreary as the rest of the world around him, and their simple bliss would become nothing but a memory.
Perhaps it was just because he’d been lonely all his life, but he had never quite understood how someone could subject themselves to the chore of loving another when they knew it would never end well. Logically, it seemed like a waste of time to him, especially in his position as a measly trombone player who barely managed to make two nickels a day. Love wasn’t needed to survive, so in turn he didn’t need it. He already had enough to worry about without it, anyway. Besides, it would only end in pain, so why bother?
But deep down, in the darkest pits of his being, he felt he craved it more than the food he needed to keep himself from kicking the bucket. He wanted it so badly, he would sometimes stop to stare at couples and families as they strolled along the sidewalk, huge grins on their faces as they chatted excitedly, imagining that their affection for each other wasn’t as difficult as the one he’d heard about and wishing he were in their place. He shouldn’t have wanted it, but he did.
He wanted someone to care enough to die for him too. Someone who was willing to go through that kind of pain just for him. He wanted someone to spend time with, someone to laugh with, someone to cry with, someone who would make the pain of love worthwhile. At certain times, he wanted to be loved more than he himself wanted to be alive.
For the longest time, Dave ridiculed himself for feeling that way. If love was truly as vile and pointless as he thought it was, why did he yearn for it so badly? He would attempt to push down the feeling, bottling it up and hiding it where not even he could feel it, and force himself on simply focusing on his survival. He tried to make himself loathe the emotion, scowling whenever he saw a father taking his daughter out for ice cream and telling himself he didn’t need that kind of validation. As long as he had food, water, and somewhere to sleep, he was alright. But no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t find a way to extinguish the desire for more.
Then came the one encounter that changed everything for him.
The day Dave had met Dr. Henry Miller was embroidered into his brain in golden thread. It was his most beloved memory, and he treasured it like it was worth all the stars in the sky.
Dave had been young, and Henry had been nice enough to let him tag along his circus like a puppy, eventually taking him in and even enlisting his help in the fulfillment of his plans of opening a diner.
Not many people were fond of Dr. Miller, mostly due to his offputting appearance and cold demeanor, but they didn’t know him as well as Dave did. In Henry, he found a man who cared for him, who saw him. He was like the father he had wanted all his life but never had. He would teach him all he knew about science and robots, and would tell him stories about his life like any good parent did. After so much time spent alone to fend for himself, he finally had someone who loved him.
He knew Henry wasn’t perfect . He had witnessed it firsthand, during all those times in which he’d do the wrong thing and Henry would get mad at him. It was then that he would wonder if the pain was truly worth it for just a drop of care in return, the ache of wrenches and springlocks searing through his skin and down to his very bones. But this was the only love he had ever experienced, and he was terrified of it being the last as well. He couldn’t deal with a lifetime of loneliness. He didn’t want to go back to being the kid on the streets who saw the emotion all around him and wondered if there was any for him.
And he loved Henry, didn’t he? He had saved him from his misery, granting him endless food and shelter, and giving him the attention he hadn’t received as a child. He was his only family in a world that had abandoned him as soon as he was born. How could he ever separate from someone like that?
So, he stayed. He grew used to the constant berating as time went by, and found that he was happy despite the bruises. As long as he was with Henry, he was glad to be alive. He would’ve done anything for Henry. He would’ve died for him. He would’ve killed for him. He did kill for him.
And slowly, he understood why people let themselves love others so unconditionally. Love was like a brilliant rose: It was beautiful, sure, but to get to the beautiful part you had to touch the thorns. After all, if there were no ugly parts of love, how could the softer moments be considered special?
Which was why Dave stopped questioning it when Henry ignored him, or when he treated him carelessly, or when he did anything to hurt him. He knew it was just because that’s how love was. And if he wanted to be loved, he had to endure it. Those were the ugly parts of love that he had to soldier through in order to get to the happy ones.
Henry loved him like a son and he loved Henry like a father. There was no doubt in his mind about that.
But how was Dave meant to feel as he kneeled on the floor of Henry’s office, the static of the tapes crackling as that bloodcurdling voice spoke so carelessly about all the terrible things he’d done to him?
He could hardly believe the words that sounded from the cassettes as he played them all back, one by one, to make sure this wasn’t just some cruel hallucination he was having. They resonated against the cold office walls, hitting him like a tonne of bricks.
"William is the only test subject I need now"
"This is what you wanted"
“William is a monster. My monster”
Was this all he had been to Henry all along? Just some sort of science experiment, to be played around with and then dropped when most convenient? The tape player fell out of his shaky hands as the cassette ended, and he could almost taste the blood on them as he pressed them against his mouth in horror.
Was this love? Dave wasn’t sure what the word meant anymore. He had dedicated such a huge part of his life to Henry and his work, and the entire time he had held him in such high regards. He had been convinced that what he and Henry had was special, that they were family. He had taken his son’s name, for Fredbear’s sake. He had lived with Henry for years, eating at the same table as him all the while treating him like some unreachable god, worshipping the very ground he walked on, only to get dissected like a frog in a high school biology class in return. But maybe it was on him for believing Henry loved him. Gods didn’t love the monsters they created.
And hell, he was exactly that, wasn’t he? He was a monster. Henry’s monster. He had still somewhat been human before Henry had come along. He had still had a heart, a brain, a life. Now what was he? An empty shell of whatever he was before, broken apart and put together again by Henry, although this time all the shards were in the wrong places. By God, he had killed for someone who viewed him as nothing more than a study.
He felt disgusting. It had been so easy for Henry to deceive him, to manipulate him into doing things he would’ve never done himself, and he hadn’t even tried to fight it. The signs had always been there, but Henry had pulled the wool so far over his eyes he’d been blind to it. Now, in this dingy office, he could see all the thorns in his and Henry’s relationship, while the petals drooped and decayed right in front of him.
He hadn’t even noticed he was crying until he heard the door behind him open.
“Willy,” The sharp footsteps of the man echoed throughout the room as he approached Dave’s hunched body, sending chills shooting down his spine. Not him . Not now .
Dave scrambled to dry his eyes. He couldn’t let Henry see him crying, Henry hated crying. Henry hated a lot of things about him, apparently.
“I see you’ve found my cassette tapes” Henry commented. Dave didn’t answer him.
The silence that pervaded the gloomy office was deafening. Neither of them dared to make another sound, almost as if they were fighting some quiet battle and whoever spoke first lost. Maybe if he had cared less, or if he were more stubborn, he would’ve stopped speaking to Henry entirely just to win this one war against him.
But Dave didn’t need to win anything at that moment. He just wanted answers.
“Why did you do this to me?” The words were frail and shaky, just like him, but they cut through the silence like a knife.
Henry’s voice, on the other hand, was arrogant in its response. “I’ve done many things to you, William. You’re going to have to be more specific”.
Dave hated him. There was no other way to express what he felt towards Henry. He hated the sound of his voice, his plans and what Dave had to do to make them become reality, his pretending to care about him all those years. He hated that this was the one person he’d allowed himself to love. He hated that he’d let the bastard break him until he was nothing but cracks. But mostly, he hated how it was impossible for him to actually hate him, how it was impossible for Dave to see him as anything but the man who had rescued him from a life on the streets all those years ago, had taken him under his wing as a father would his most cherished son.
“Why’d ya make me think you cared about me?”
Henry laughed. The icy sound would’ve broken Dave’s heart if he still had one. “Oh please, William. I never did anything to make you think such a thing. You convinced yourself I cared because you were so desperate to prove yourself loveable”
More tears rolled down Dave’s cheeks. This time, he didn’t wipe them away. He simply spun around to face the other man, who’s thin lips were stretched into a mirthless smirk “Are you–? You’re a psychopath, Henry! Look what ya made me do! All those kids–did they even have bad lives like ya told me? Did we help any of ‘em in any way at all ?”
“Oh, Willy, you’re so naive” Henry tutted in a tone meant to be soft, but all Dave could hear was condescension. “It’s a wonder you survived so long without me”
“Answer the fuckin’ question, Henry!”
Henry’s smile widened. “So, maybe I lied to you a little. You still did it, William. You could’ve refused, but you didn’t. You’re just as bad as me”
A sobbing gasp escaped Dave’s lips as he clenched his fists. “Don’t fuckin’ compare me to ya! You made a monster!” He screamed as loud as he could, slowly inching towards the stout man.
“Like you were ever human in the first place. Just look at yourself. Humans aren’t pur–”
It happened so quick not even Dave himself was sure he’d done it at first. He lunged towards Henry and grabbed him by the collar, pushing him against the dull office wall. His teary eyes met the other’s emotionless ones. “I was more human before than you could ever even dream to be. You stole everythin’ from me. My life coulda been better than this, but you had to– fuckin’ –”
Dave really did try to resist, to yell and scream and sob at him about everything he’d done to him over the years to hurt him. All the pent-up rage he’d been storing was begging to be let out. He wanted-no, needed-to make himself heard for once in his life. He wanted to tell Henry all about how just how much he cared for him, how he felt betrayed by him, how all along he’d just wanted someone to be kind to him, even if his cries fell on deaf ears.
But he didn’t do that. He couldn’t have, never in a thousand lifetimes, just like he could never truly hate Henry. He would always be tethered to him in one way or another, and he didn’t want to sever the bond with the only person who somewhat looked out for him.
So instead, he collapsed into Henry’s arms and sobbed into his shoulders, repeating the word “dad” over and over again, and for once, Henry did nothing to stop him. He simply gripped his shoulders in a makeshift hug and shushed him.
“There, there, Dave ” He muttered, his voice quiet but just as laced with vitriol as it always was. “It’s okay. I’m not mad. I’m still here with you”
Dave didn’t want to be with him. He never wanted to see him again, as a matter of fact. But he kept his face buried in Henry’s shoulder and allowed him to rub soft circles into his back. Just like the father he had never been.
He knew the affection was a fabrication. The second Dave let go of Henry, he would go back to being the same emotionless prick he always was. But in the end, it didn’t really matter if Henry cared for him or not. He loved him and that was enough. Even wilted roses could be beautiful.
After all, wasn’t love meant to be painful?