Chapter Text
"Morning, Wifies."
He gently shuffled himself up from bed.
"Morning, Parrot. How have you been feeling?" Wifies set his bag on the chair next to the bed, taking out a few leather books and putting them in a pile on the bedside table. "I brought new books for you like you asked."
Parrot takes one from the stack, tracing his fingers along the spine before flipping it open, the feel of paper against his fingertips. "Just the usual, nothing else. How's school?"
"Eh, same old routine of getting my butt kicked every week." Harvard is not really for the weak. It's even a miracle he can manage to go visit Parrot every two days, considering the amount of workload he's under. But it's fine, Wifies thinks, an extra cup of espresso a day wouldn't hurt.
He takes out his laptop and sets it on his lap, Parrot choosing to begin the book he's holding in his hands. They fall into their usual routine—Wifies coming in with new books he borrows from the school library for Parrot, and they sit comfortably in the silence, accompanied by the sound of pages flipping and keyboard typing.
"Did you seriously get me a book about birds?" Parrot looks through the first few pages and stares at Wifies with a mildly amused look. "Like, bro, are my wings just for show?" He closes the book in exasperation as Wifies chuckles behind his laptop.
"Ay, it's like getting to know your very distant family, you know. Don't tell me you know everything about every single bird out there." Wifies shuts his laptop halfway, it's funny seeing Parrot getting his feathers riled up over something as silly and stupid as this
"Bro, I'm a freaking avian hybrid, like- bro, I am a bird." Fair enough.
"Okay, then how long can parrots live up to?" Wifies pushes his chair forward and leans against the metal handbar on the bed. Kind of a stupid question now that he thinks about it.
"Well, it depends. Lovebirds can live from ten to fifteen. If you're talking about a parakeet, then six to ten. If you're talking about an African grey, even up to like fifty. A hyacinth macaw can live up to eighty. Sun conures, fifteen to thirty—" Parrot's triumphant expression is hard to miss—Wifies can't have an excited Parrot get carried away, he'll be talking for hours.
"—Alright, alright, yeah, you're right, mister bird expert." Wifies stifles a laugh as the blue and yellow wings on his friend's head flutter slightly. Wifies pulls his laptop open again.
"Yeah, well now you know who's boss bro." Parrot opens up the book again, might as well brush up on his avian knowledge—even though he practically knows everything at this point.
Parrot's so enthusiastic about birds, so excited whenever he sees Wifies walks through the door; it's easy to forget that he's, well, sick.
But it's in these moments of tranquility where Parrot is content with sitting in silence with his best friend next to him, that the thoughts in Wifies' head start to wander off, even if he doesn't show it. No amount of enthusiasm and joy can hide the frail body that sits in the hospital bed in front of him. He sees the pale skin and the tiny veins that peek through whenever he exerts himself a little too much, the arm that trembles as he tries to lift his hand to flip a page, and the metal tray with a bowl of porridge that's half eaten and gone cold.
His best friend is dying, and Wifies is just left to watch it happen.
But they've both established that fact five years ago, when Wifies heard Parrot regurgitating the lunch he had made for him, and Parrot found himself struck with a disease he didn't even know he had until that fateful day. Maybe because Parrot's part human, that he's managed to last this long. Maybe Wifies can pray a little harder, so Parrot can get through another night without his heart flatlining more than once.
"Wifies?" Parrot shifts his gaze onto Wifies' floppy ears. It's a little hard to pretend that his best friend isn't upset when his fluffy ears and tail are literally drooping into the ground.
"Uh, yeah?" Wifies perks up when he hears Parrot's soft voice—had it always sound so weak and feeble? Wifies doesn't really remember anymore.
"The nurses said something about a winter festival somewhere out of town, like two hours away from here." His fingers graze the corner of his page, and Wifies can basically tell what he's thinking from the way his eyes dart across the room.
Parrot used to love winter. Used to, but Wifies doesn't want to remember why he doesn't like it anymore.
Wifies taps his fingers against the keyboard. "You wanna go there and take a look?" It's not a tall request perse, Wifies can spare a few hours out of town. But that's a different thing when it comes to Parrot, who can't even get out of bed without a crutch or someone to hold him. He needs extra blankets in the night, and even more when the winter hits, he'll probably snap like a twig the moment he steps out into the snow. "But like you said, it's like two hours away. You sure you can handle that?"
Parrot's tired eyes stare back at him. When he blinks, his eyes shut a little too long to his liking—it's slow, and his eyes open almost forcefully, like it's a torture to be awake. Wifies figures it probably is. "Yeah, I think I can. You'll come with me, right?" In that sleepy gaze is an anticipating child that Wifies will never know how to refuse.
"Then sure, I'll bring you to that festival when winter comes. I'll pack warm clothes and stuff so you don't freeze the moment we step out the hospital." …Will Parrot even get to step out of the hospital? Wifies doesn't want to answer that question.
"I'll be sure to stay alive until then." Twi months. Parrot just needs to stay alive for two more months.
"Just don't die on me right after that, okay?" Wifies jabs at him, as much as it hurts to even think of Parrot leaving like that. But he's stayed for five whole years, surely Wifies can be greedy and ask for one more.
"Yeah, yeah. You know I won't die that easily." The wings on Parrot's head flap and briefly cover his face — Wifies doesn't miss the bitter smile on his face in that tiny moment. There's an awkward pause as they stare at each other for a few seconds, Parrot's lips quiver as if he wants to say something. His brow twitches slightly; Wifies pretends he doesn't understand. "Wifies—"
"—Yeah, you promised that like what, four years ago. And you're still here, aren't you?" For the first time, Wifies doesn't know what Parrot wanted to say, and it feels him with inexplicable dread. He doesn't know, doesn't want to know. Doesn't need to know. It seems like Parrot can see that too, judging from the way he huffs and turns back to his book quietly. Maybe some day he'll let Parrot say it.
They return back to what they were doing for a bit more, until both of them get bored and start talking about whatever the two has done over the past two days.
He talks about Derapchu being the most unserious guy like usual, spamming his messages at three in the morning. Or Avery trying to drag him into their shenanigans by jumping him outside campus. He recalls Kenadian and Wato trying to play a prank on him a day ago, so he tells Parrot about the two's very ridiculous plan and how it totally failed because he is just way too smart — he may have tweaked the story just a liiiitle bit.
"Man, I miss Derap, he was really funny. Now I only see him every week for like three hours." Parrot picks at his nails, clearly dejected by the fact he can't see one of his good friends from high school as often anymore. "Don't tell him that though, he's gonna brag and laugh at me for saying that."
"I'll ask him to visit more often if you'd like, maybe I can drag him along when I visit." Wifies grabs Parrot's hand and starts fiddling with the slim fingers, his own grazing over the jagged nails. "And stop plucking at your nails bro, I swear you started doing this when Dean and—" His hands abruptly stop, and Wifies can feel Parrot's gaze piercing through him. Maybe now is a good time to—
"—Hah, my bad bro," Parrot cuts in. "But I don't really have a lot of stuff to do in here. It's just sleep, read the books you bring me, talk to myself, and then sleep again. Not including the crazy tests in between, of course. But it's too bad, I have to be here for a while." But Wifies knows, that Parrot doesn't have to be here. He shouldn't have to be here, because everything was going perfectly fine until it wasn't. And neither of them have ever brought it up, but the way Parrot glances at the birds whenever they fly by his window is enough. Parrot shouldn't be here.
It doesn't matter what should or shouldn't be, Wifies thinks. What's happened has already happened, and there's no going back anymore.
They spend the remaining hours of visitation just talking. When the nurses bring the usual meal of porridge and broth, Parrot looks sick of it — naturally so, he's probably been eating that for the past five years here. Wifies grabs the spoon and scoops the porridge, blowing on it gently before bringing it to Parrot's lips.
"I can still feed myself, you know." Parrot tries to take the spoon back, but it trembles in defiance, his own body going against his own words. "Well, somewhat."
"Yeah, and you'll end up spilling half of it on your clothes rather than in your mouth. Here." Wifies brings another spoonful to Parrot's quivering lips, and he accepts it begrudgingly.
At least he still eats, Wifies thinks. It's slow, but at least he's getting something into his system. Wifies waits, because Parrot now has to take a little longer to chew and swallow. He waits, because he doesn't want to accidentally rush him and end up causing Parrot to puke everything back out like he used to when he first got entered into this ward. He waits, because that's all Wifies has always done.
"Are you done?" Wifies looks at the leftover food — Parrot seems to have eaten just a little more compared to this afternoon. Better than nothing. "It's okay, slowly."
"Yeah, yeah. I don't think I can stomach any more." Parrot responds as Wifies grabs a napkin and gently wipes at his chin. He blinks groggily, wings fluttering in a similar fashion that Wifies recognises.
"Mhm, that's fine. You sleepy?" Wifies sees Parrot nod slightly, so he helps to adjust Parrot's position before pulling the blanket up and tucking him in tight. "Then don't stay up, goodnight Parrot."
It's at these times that it gets harder to pretend, Wifies realises. It's hard to act like everything's normal, even harder to act like these moments don't reveal something fragile inside. He glances at Parrot's frail figure, his sickly skin that makes him blend into the white walls of the room; Wifies still remembers, the playground they first met when they were just nine, he found a little boy named Parrot getting picked on for being small.
Wifies sees a terrifying resemblance between the two, both helpless and forced to simply accept their situation, because there wasn't any way out. But that's not true — Wifies tells himself — if he could save Parrot from those mean bullies all those years ago, he can find some other way to protect Parrot now. Watching the blank expression on his face, he could almost see it — that same face is probably what he'll see when Atropos decides that Parrot's already fraying string of life should snap.
But for now, he'll just watch the subtle rise and fall of his dear friend's chest, the only thing proving that Wifies isn't staring at a cold, empty body.
The nurse knocks at the door after some time, she doesn't need to say a word — it's basically routine now. Wifies packs his things into his messenger bag, whispers a quiet goodbye to the Parrot that's peacefully asleep before turning out the door.
When Parrot wakes up the next day, it's to the familiar sound of bickering — he keeps his eyes closed, because he's sure whoever's there are too stupid to notice.
"Dude, bro, you're going to wake him up bro…!" Yep, that's one idiot.
"You're the one that's gonna wake him up dude!" And the other idiot.
"Guys, he's already awake man." Okay, why are there three idiots in his ward right now? And how the hell did he even know?
The trio falls silent, and Parrot opens his eyes to see them staring right back. Well, good morning to him too. He already misses Wifies, but he won't be here today. Sadly. Maybe they should've talked more last night — but he was really tired, and he just had to get some shuteye.
"Morning." It's nice to be greeted by familiar faces, at least. He can already tell that Wemmbu is hiding something behind him, Flame is just fiddling with a bouquet in his hands, and Spoke- well, is just being Spoke.
"Uh, well I got you some new games. I know you said it got a lil' boring sometimes, which I mean- I guess that's kinda true," Wemmbu sets a paper bag on the nearby table, taking out a few board games that Parrot genuinely can't believe he has. There's chess, go, clue, and a few more familiar puzzle games that Parrot's seen on the internet before. "I, uh, I don't really know how to play some of these, so like you might have to teach me or something—"
"—Okay, okay, stop yapping bro. I, uhh, Lomedy told me to bring these, and your room looks mad depressing, so I guess it can like, liven it up a little? I'll put it over at the window." Flame carefully places the bouquet of chamomile flowers in a mix of lilacs and sages into a small vase and positions it nicely against the windowsill. Well, Lomedy was right, it does add a nice splash of colour to the place.
"Uh, I brought the answer sheet for one of our exams if that counts." Spoke waves a few sheets of papers as Wemmbu and Flame look on amusedly. Wemmbu bumps his shoulder, and Flame laughs as Spoke has to try not to tumble over. "Okay fine, jokes aside, I brought you a little beanie and sweater for you. You've been complaining about the night being a little cold, right?" He sets the two new items on the side of the bed.
"Wow, why'd you guys suddenly bring so many goodies for me? I've been in this room for like five years." Parrot doesn't mean to sound condescending or mean, but it does feel slightly suspicious that- Oh. Well, he should've known. "…What did you guys do this time…?" Surely it's nothing too bad, right?
"It's literally Flame's fault—!"
"—Bro what? Like- what are you talking about bro!?"
"I for one, actually did not contribute to the chaos this time—"
This is great. He hears a few lines from Wemmbu about some fight in the cafeteria and Flame screaming about the fact there were like a thousand people, in contrast to Spoke who's just leaning against the wall watching the two tussle back and forth. Something about almost getting suspended— Well, Parrot's more shocked that they didn't get expelled.
"Okay bro, calm down you guys. It's literally like, ten in the morning." Parrot doesn't care much about noise, but it would be nice if these three troublemakers could keep it down for once — he can't remember the amount of times the nurses had to come in and tell them to shut up.
"Okay well, we got you those things since uh, you've been here for a while and we never really got you anything, and winter's coming and stuff or whatever." Wemmbu scratches the back of his head, the other hand fiddling with the keychains on his bag — Parrot likes the eyeball keychain that's kind of set apart from the rest — and his black tail waving back and forth.
"Bro's tryna be nonchalant or sumn." Flame earns a little jab in the stomach for that, so he slaps Wemmbu in the back in turn, "Okay bro, but yeah. Hope you like those things."
"Yeah, well, thanks for all that." Truth be told, Parrot does. It's nice to receive gifts like these; he doesn't really get them since the incident with—
—Never mind.
The next few hours are spent with the trio, the nurses came in once and scolded the two demons for being obnoxiously loud, and confiscated Spoke's soda cans for some reason. Parrot pretends he doesn't hear the devastating results from their latest exam, only choosing to listen to the nice parts about their life — which is close to none if he really thinks about it.
But it's nice to know Flame made up with Lomedy after everything that went down and Wemmbu finally stopped chasing after an unnecessary title — maybe the two can truly call each other friends now. Though, looking at the way they play fight with each other, seems like they already do. Spoke still seems the same, although Parrot doesn't hear him talk much about Mapicc, but he won't push even though he is still very curious.
It's nice, Parrot thinks. He won't say this out loud, but he does feel like a normal kid again, even if he can't really move. He misses the times after class where the four of them would just hang out at one of their houses until the sun sets.
When the late afternoon arrives, he's slightly disappointed to hear that they have to go for some arcade trip. Without him.
"We'll play your share as well, maybe I'll win some plushies for you, you know." Wemmbu leans against the door as Flame and Spoke wave goodbye.
"That's nice. See ya." The door shuts with that familiar click, and Parrot is left to hear the voices of his friends fade into the distance.
Parrot misses the arcade. The moments where he wins a 2v2 air hockey match against Wemmbu and Flame, and the feeling when Spoke starts hugging him out of excitement, jumping up and down and shaking him. The feeling of the shitty steering wheel in his hand as Wemmbu tries to beat him on some weird car racing game. The way his hand wraps around the knob of the claw machine, his eyes darting between the claw and the prize because he swears he can get it on the first try. How he'll offer a bag of chips to Flame and the other two will come running to snatch some for themselves. How he watches Wemmbu and Flame go against each other on the dance machine and see them scramble about trying to hit the notes, and he will laugh while Spoke films the entire thing so he can use it as blackmail. Parrot misses a lot, and he misses it all.
The nurse comes in and clears the meal tray that's left untouched, gently pats him on the head and asks if he wants a snack in case. He shakes his head, there's not much he can eat and what he can eat doesn't taste all that good anymore. Maybe when he gets better, he'll stuff his mouth with a buttload of chocolate chip cookies. Not a good idea, dude. He can imagine Wifies flicking his forehead for even thinking of that. Yeah, because if chocolate being harmful to parrots wasn't enough, he's unlucky enough to get hit by this stupid disease that'll leave him bedridden for life at best, dead at worst.
He hears a notification from his phone, and as his trembling hands scramble to grab it, he curses himself for putting it on the far end of the bedside counter. It's a message from Theo, and there's multiple pictures of him standing at familiar graves with fresh flower bouquets set next to them.
Oh
thsnk you
Yeahhh u know
came to see Speps cuz its his anni
Thought you'd want to see Dean and the rest
yk cuz their graves r like close by
Yeh fhanks a lot Theo
Yeah its np
Lmk if you need anyt okay?
Yyeah i eill
Right, Parrot forgot that it was Spepticle's anniversary. He struggles to type out the final message, fingers trembling and the typos making him cringe internally. But trying to correct them would probably take longer. He shoves the phone under his pillow. He didn't really expect Theo to visit Dean and Luigi for him, let alone buy the same flowers Parrot used to get for them. He wonders if Theo will have to visit his own in the future, but that's a thought for another day.
That's kind of crazy, forgetting Spepticle's anniversary, maybe sitting in this boring hospital room for five years has really gotten to him. Will he forget Dean's next? Or maybe Luigi's? Maybe he already has. Parrot hopes he doesn't forget Wifies next.
But Parrot will still remember much more than he forgets. Wemmbu, Flame, Spoke, Wifies, Derapchu, Jumper, Theo, and so many more. He'll remember faster than he can forget. The games Wemmbu brought for him, the beanie and sweater that now sits nicely beside his pillow, and the flowers where their petals glimmer underneath the sunlight from the window of his room.
The window is open, and Parrot can hear a lot of things when his room is just on the second floor. The car engines revving, the sound of a bicycle bell, birds chirping and flying away into the distance when the leaves rustle too hard, a group of teenage girls laughing a little too loudly as they walk past the building.
Parrot imagines himself to be in the midst of it all right now if he wanted, if he could. But he needs a crutch or someone to carry him just to get to the bathroom because his legs can barely support his weight, someone to feed him because his hands shake when he uses too much strength. It's not the cold or the dust outside the building that scares him, but the fact that even trying to step out would render him completely useless and needs to be taken care of like a toddler.
But this hospital room is just another prison wrapped in a pretty shade of white for Parrot and his never ending thoughts, and the feeling of having to watch his friends leave every time they visit has always gnawed at his heart. He wants to leave, but something tells him that he won't be able to without a proper plan.
Or maybe he could convince Wifies to bring him out. He slides his hand under the pillow and drags the phone out.
Wifies.
?
Parrot? You okay?
YeaH, wanted ti ask if u could birng me out of te hspital
?
You wanna leave?
Yeah
imbored inher e
No reply. Parrot sees the text bubble appear and disappear — he guesses that Wifies is probably trying to form a response but keeps untyping and retyping again and again. Is he going to say no?
W ifies?
He waits.
Uh, we can discuss that tomorrow when I visit? I'm in class right now…
Ohh
yEas thats okay w me
See u tmr
See you Parrot
At least it's not a definite no. Maybe Parrot will be able to put up a more proper argument if it's in person, as compared to sloppy typos and slow messages. And compared to before, Wifies is much more easier to talk to when it comes to his requests, he can't remember the last time Wifies said no to him and actually stuck to it. But for now, he'll imagine running through a field of white hyacinths under a sunny sky, the scent of fresh flowers in his lungs and feeling of soft grass between his toes. Wifies will be there right behind him, and they'll frolic through the land and laugh like little kids again.
He'll watch the clock hands tick as afternoon turns to evening, barely touch his food again when dinner comes and the doctor has to come back in and remind him to eat more. When the fatigue hits, he'll imagine Wifies chuckle at his futile attempt at keeping his eyes open as he tucks him in with the blanket.