Work Text:
William Wisp has never been very responsible with his money. Whether it be spent on new ghost hunting gear when he was back in his home of Deadwood or on a stupid amount of snacks for his team, he’s never held onto his money for long.
Yet, William had been trying to save up the money he gets from his part-time job at Rusty’s for the past six months. The keyword of that is trying, because right now all he has is a twenty-dollar bill and a single penny to his name.
Now why does all that matter? Well, it’s a week out to his best friend, Vyncent’s, first Christmas, and he still needs to get some kind of gift for said very homesick best friend, hopefully a gift that could remind that friend of his home he could most likely never return to, Fauna. Plus, Dakota ran off yesterday saying something about visiting his aunt? William guessed that he might not be back before the group exchanged gifts based on the size of the bag Dakota was lugging on his back.
So, giving Vyncent his first taste of Christmas magic is put firmly on his shoulders.
William is so screwed.
...
Vyncent hasn’t been on Prime long enough to really get the grasp of this whole Christmas thing. He knows that it has something to do with gifts due to all the advertisements on every surface possible showing their Christmas catalogue or something.
The most informative thing he saw was a movie he and William watched because of how appalled Will was that he and Dakota didn’t know such a “Christmas classic”, whatever that means. So, the three of them squished together on their small communal couch and watched a movie that taught Vyncent a lot about setting up traps in indoor settings.
Vyncent really wants to get something nice for Will. He has noticed that Will has been really struggling recently, speaking about missing the heavy snowfall that’d cover the forests of his hometown, and the time spent cooking up various soups with his mom.
With that in mind Vyncent decided he was going to look for a really nice pen for Will. He’s always enjoyed writing poetry to “channel his raw emotions”, and, however cringy it gets, Vyncent has always encouraged Will’s hobby.
Plus, he’s had a gift ready for Dakota for months that he's really proud of (a new skateboard that Dakota is sure to like) and wants William to have the same experience.
So Vyncent hit the streets to find Will a new pen.
...
William quickly realized that if he’s ever going to be able to afford Vyncent’s gift, he’s going to have to sell something. He’s been going in and out of various charity shops, and he’s not been able to afford anything.
The nail in the coffin was a motorcycle helmet that’s a perfect fit with Vyncent’s motorcycle, with an inside smooth as silk, but the price was a solid hundred dollars. That bike has seen some things, but it’s been one of the few constants in Vyncent’s life here on Prime.
Which is why William tried to bargain with the cashier, but she did not make enough money to care and gave him the ultimatum of, “One-hundrd dollars, take it or leave it.” He, of course, had to leave it. Believe it or not, he also hates having to argue with fellow minimum wage workers. It always feels like crossing a comrade.
Leaving that last charity shop left William at square one. He knew he had to get that helmet. So, he started his trek back home to find something to sell.
...
Vyncent had to immediately turn back home after he realized that he, in fact, had no wallet. He has only a bit of money from his home world in his pockets, but there really isn’t anywhere that will take it.
Once he gets back to his room, he throws things around in his already cluttered room, looking for his wallet. William helped him decorate his room when he first arrived in Prime with posters and trinkets, but now it always just feels like the mess of it all is eating up his entire room.
Eventually, he finds his wallet stuffed into the pocket of a dirty pair of jeans and hits the streets for real this time. Though Vyncent swears it was just midday, the sun is starting to set, making Vyncent feel like he's going up against a ticking clock. The fact he only has two more days before he and Will give each other their gifts is not helping either.
According to Dakota, the best place to find gifts is always the thrift shops in the city. He says that if you go to any of those big-name stores everything is triple the cost and most times anything you get thrifting is equally as good or just needs a small fix to make it even better.
Vyncent can agree with Dakota on that part; his mother has had him learning how to mend his own things since he was a little curious kid. Often, he would come home roughed up from the adventures with a new hole in his pants, so the next day she would have him mend them for himself. Even though he has the skills, he is learning that he does not know how to mend everything. Mainly his motorcycle, it has been needing constant repairs for the past four months, and it feels like nothing has been able to fix it for more than two weeks.
So he follows Dakota’s suggestion and his motorcycle roars to life, and he rides over to an antique shop he and William visited a few weeks ago. William had been looking for a gift for Dakota and found him a couple of spoons that Dakota had put on his Christmas list for some reason? Vyncent still doesn’t know why Dakota loves spoons so much, but he isn’t about to get in between that man and his spoons.
He eventually finds his way over to the pen display and spots the perfect pen for William. It’s a beautiful pen, with a gradient of black and blue with silver embellishments.
He snatches the pen up and walks over to who he would call a shop to keep on Fauna, but definitely has a different name here, but he can never remember it for the life of him.
“Sorry, do you know how much this pen costs?”
The older man springs to life and grabs the pen out of Vyncent’s offered hand, “Hmm, where’d you get this son?” The man walks over to the pen case and paused in an awkward silence, “The pen’s price tag is normally next to its spot, so if you could just point to-”
Vyncent blushed, “Oh! So sorry sir, I got it from here,” He pointed.
“Great, then that’ll be eighty dollars. Seems like you picked out a quality one.”
Vyncent rummaged through his wallet and produced a credit card. The man took it and paused for a second, “Sir, this is a Rusty’s credit card. That will not work here.”
Vyncent, with genuine confusion, asked the shop keep, “Why not?”
The man looked around and replied, “Because this isn’t a Rusty’s?”
“Oh,” Vyncent says with a sad look on his face. He fishes out another credit card, “Would this work?”
He looks down at the credit card incredulously and stares back at Vyncent, “No. This is a Donut King credit card.”
“Why not?”
“Same reason as the last credit card, son.”
Vyncent’s face contorts into even more confusion, “But that isn’t a Rusty’s credit card?”
The man sighs and rubs the bridge of his nose, “Look son, if you’re playing some kind of prank, I need you to cut it out. Either pay or leave my shop.”
“No! I promise I’m not playing some prank, I’m just trying to buy my friend this pen for Christmas,” Vyncent said desperately.
“Please just pay in cash or leave my shop. There’s people waiting to check out and you’re clogging up the line,” He replies impatiently.
Vyncent looks back and realizes there’s ten whole people queuing up behind him. Offering the man a hurried “Sorry,” Vyncent hoofs it out of the antique shop.
Alone with the nearly set sun, Vyncent forms a plan.
...
William is currently ripping apart his room to find something worth selling. He has got a few options, but he already knows what he has to sell. Nothing else could cover the cost, and due to his blunder earlier that day, he won’t be able to get the price down. And so, William must sell his beloved poetry book.
Well, it’s not technically a poetry book yet; he’s yet to write in it, but he’s had this book since he was eight years old, and his grandfather gifted it to him before he passed. The book was made of exquisitely carved leather, covered in intricate lines.
He’d told himself he’d only start using it once he felt like his poetry was worthy of being written in the book. And, of course, he finally felt confident enough to start writing in it. But, if this is what it takes, William will sell this book to get Vyncent the gift he deserves.
William leaves home and starts his way to a familiar place, the pawn shop. Will, Vyncent, and Dakota have gone on many adventures that involved them finding some expensive stuff, taking it because no one needed it, and, because they’re all broke teens, selling it to the pawn shop. It’s gotten the team through a few rough spots, so William doesn’t see any reason not to. Plus, there’s a chance he could buy back his book.
“Hey, Tony,” William calls out to the owner.
Tony responds with a smile, “Well look what the cat dragged in. What’d ya got today, William?”
Will chuckles nervously, “Not much compared to usual, this one special though.”
Tony raised an eyebrow, “What kind of special?”
Setting the book on the counter, William replied, “The old kind.”
“Aha!” He exclaimed, picking up the book, “You were right, this’s got a rustic charm, as you’d say,” He sniffed, “Good quality too. How does ninety sound for my favorite customer?” He said with a toothy grin. William notes that he’s missing his left canine, odd.
“Great.” William replies stiffly.
“Good,” Tony hands him the cash, “Alright now get out of my sight you rat,” he says with a laugh.
William walks out, muttering quietly to himself, “Yeah, great talking to you too, Tony. I’m doing good, thanks for asking Tony. God, I hate that guy.”
He walks for about fifteen minutes through the grimy back alleys of Rockfall City before making it back to the charity shop he was at just a few hours ago.
Upon entry, he sees his prize, still untouched thankfully. Grabbing the helmet, he finds to his dismay; it’s the very same cashier from earlier. But, instead of being more annoyed because of their previous interaction, she continued on not caring, and he bought the helmet for Vyncent.
William may not be nearly as screwed as he thought.
...
Vyncent is realizing this may not be a good plan.
He’s currently walking to a street corner while leading his bike alongside him. Though he adores this motorcycle a whole bunch, it’s started to need bigger and bigger repairs, ones that Vyncent can’t do.
Dakota's been of some help, but his knowledge only goes so far, and Will is next to useless when it comes to any type of vehicle. Love the guy, he’s got his strong suits, but this is not one of them. Plus, Vyncent is pretty sure if you name any vehicle; William has crashed it before.
All that is to say that it’s time for Vyncent to get rid of the motorcycle. The only problem is that Vyncent does not know how much to ask for it in exchange. So, using Vyncent's ability in bargaining, Vyncent plans to ask for one hundred dollars so that once the buyer tries to low ball it, they can agree on eighty dollars.
Vyncent, feeling better after thinking out the plan, arrives at the street corner he was looking for. He is getting worried about the time though; the sunset is about to start after all.
A crowd of people start walking past where Vyncent stands, so he calls out, “Hey! Do you want a new motorcycle?! Only one hundred dollars!” For some reason, the only reaction he gets are weird looks and the group speeding up to walk past him. He repeated this routine a few times, mostly getting the same reaction before a scraggly looking man with a bread approached Vyncent.
“Did you say one hundred dollars for the bike?” The man asked, looking down at it.
A little taken aback, Vyncent responded, “Yes?”
The man looked up at Vyncent, back down to the motorcycle, and grabbed a hundred-dollar bill. He hands Vyncent the bill and walks away with the bike without a word. ‘Weird, but at least I got my money,’ Vyncent thinks.
Arriving back at the antique shop, Vyncent rushes to the pens and grabs the pen he’d been trying to buy.
Thankfully, it seems like there was a shift change because the old man was nowhere in sight. He bought the pen and spoke with the surprisingly nice old lady working there, who gave him some advice on how to wrap the gift. Leaving for the long walk home, Vyncent began to regret selling his bike so hastily. ‘Oh well,’ he thought, ‘I’ll probably have to just buy one. How expensive could it be?’
...
It’s finally the day William’d been waiting for, December 25th.
He’s been excited for this gift exchange mostly because of how proud he is of his gifts for the team. Even though they want to wait for Dakota’s arrival, they have no idea when he’ll show up, (thanks to the fact Dakota phones magically break after almost every mission) and William wants Vyncent to experience the stereotypical Christmas morning.
“Alright, Vynce, how about you open your gift first, and then I’ll open mine?” William asked.
“Sounds good, Will,” Vyncent paused to yawn, “just let me clean up breakfast, I’ll meet you in there.”
William got up from the table, “I can’t just let you clean up alone; it wouldn’t be fair.”
Vyncent sighed dramatically and said with a smile “Fine, I never get to do things alone.”
William replied slyly, “Shush your mouth, drama queen and let me scrub in peace. Plus, it’s your first Christmas, most people just leave this for later.”
“Well, I am not most people,” Vyncent smarted. For a moment, the only sounds were the scrubbing of William’s sponge against the pan and Vyncent loading the dishwasher.
“So, do I get any hints to what my gift is?” William breaks the meditative silence.
Vynce laughs, “Absolutely not. I may not know much about Christmas, but I do know any good gift giver doesn’t give spoilers.”
“Eugh, you’re no fun,” William says with heavy sarcasm while draining the sink.
“Love you too, Will,” Vyncent responds while closing the dishwasher.
“You’re so mean to me,” William says while walking out of the room, extending the syllables of the words. Vyncent snickers in the kitchen.
The two sit down on the couch, each with their respective presents. William grins, and motions to Vyncent, “Alright Christmas boy, open your gift.”
“Can I make a Christmas wish first?”
Will shrugs, “I think you mean like a birthday wish, but sure? Shoot your shoot.”
“I wish, I wish,” Vyncent begins wistfully, before snapping a finger towards William, “I wish you would open your gift first!”
“What?!” William squawks, “But you’re the Christmas boy!”
“The Christmas boy gets Christmas Wishes.”
William sighs with a grin, “I shouldn't have given you made up power. The power’s already gone to your head.”
“You really shouldn’t have. Now,” Vyncent excitedly motions with his hands, “Open!”
“Sighh,” William says, voice practically dripping with sarcasm, and unwraps his gift, and finds a pen that perfectly matches him. “Oh my god, Vynce this is perfect! You have no idea how much I’m gonna write with this. Mark my words Vynce, I’ll be unstoppable!”
Vyncent smiles, “Do you think it’s worthy of your special book? Afterall, I did sell my bike for it.” Will pales in response. Vyncent’s smile waivers, “What’s wrong?”
“I- uh,” He take a deep breath, “Well, one, I had to sell the book to Tony to get your gift,” Vyncent’s face falls, “And two, well, just open your present.” Vyncent looks down at the box, now with a whole new layer of curiosity. He rips into the box to be met with a beautiful motorcycle helmet.
The two of them locked eyes, devastated, but, before long, William snickered. That opened the flood wall, and all they could do was laugh.
As the laughter tapered off, William realized exactly what Vyncent had said.
“Wait, you sold your bike?!”