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Simon
“And how are things going with Baz?” Stephanie asks. She asks me this in every session.
“I don’t know,” I say. “He’s still here. He’s… He’s still being so fucking patient. And I… I’m not… I don’t… ” I rake my hand through my hair. My words are getting twisted and stuck. All that comes out is bluster.
“It’s okay, Simon,” Stephanie says. “Take your time.”
I close my eyes and breathe. Magic used to spill out of me at times like this. Now I don’t have any. I’m a Normal now. A Normal with wings and a tail. Baz could do so much better than me. He could have anyone. I don’t understand why he stays.
But he’s always here. Always telling me I can talk to him. Always trying to help. Sometimes it works. I can usually forget enough to hold his hand. Sometimes I can kiss him and let him hold me. Those are the days. I want more days like that. But those days also break my heart. They shatter me because they can’t last. Baz will have to move on, and I’ll only be able to keep the memories.
I lost Ebb. I lost the Mage. I lost my magic. I lost being the Chosen One. (I was never the Chosen One. I was never even a mage.) I’m always losing. I lose everything. It’s only a matter of time before he figures it out.
There has to be a way for him to see how broken I am. How unfixable. How hopeless.
“I just wish there was an instruction manual for all of this!” I mutter.
“For love?”
“For people!” I groan.
“Is there any reason why you can’t make one?” Stephanie asks. Who knew that therapy would involve playing make believe about nonsense?
“What?” I say.
“Could you make a Simon Snow instruction manual?”
“Umm… Well…” I bluster.
Stephanie pushes on. “Maybe take a step back and imagine what your technical specs and operating instructions would be if you were a machine.”
“I’m not a robot,” I mutter.
“Of course not.” She shakes her head. “I wasn’t trying to imply that autistic people are robots, Simon. I mean that writing about yourself like that might help you figure out what others can do to support you. It could help you name how others’s actions make you feel.”
“How is pretending that I’m an appliance going to tell anyone anything?” I snap.
“Imagine someone holding a Simon Snow instruction manual while you are having a meltdown. What would it say to do?”
I take a moment to think. “It would say to coach me to breathe. It would say to offer to apply squeezing pressure, but not insist before I’m ready. It would say to give me time to recover in the dark and quiet.”
“That’s great!” Stephanie nods. “Do you think you could write that down?”
“I guess,” I say.
“Maybe you could get a new notebook just for this so it isn’t mixed into your private therapy notes?”
“Okay,” I nod. “I’ll try it.”
Baz
Simon Snow is up to something. He has a new notebook. I know it isn’t his therapy notebook because it is shaped differently and spiral bound. I’ve only glimpsed it a few times as he put it away. I haven’t even seen the cover because he hides it as he slides it under his mattress. He never talks about it, so I haven’t asked. But I’m dying to know what it is. (Figuratively. I’m already dead, literally.) Bunce doesn’t know either. When I asked her, she said she had no idea what I was talking about.
Simon doesn’t even hide his therapy notebook. He leaves that all over the place. He knows Penny and I won’t read it. What could be more private than what he shares with his therapist? What would he keep from Bunce when they have a no secrets pact? What is he writing?
Simon
I don’t know what to write. There isn’t an instruction manual for making a personal instruction manual. I don’t even know if the finished product is going to make any sense.
I figure that the purpose of the thing is to make my confusing mess make sense. It’s supposed to make me make sense. What does someone need to know to understand me?
I start with stories. I write about my time at the care homes and with the Mage. I write about being introduced to magic and the world that came with it. I write about my friendship with Penny. I write about my friendship and shallow relationship with Agatha. I write about my confusing rivalry with Baz and how it shifted to being boyfriends. I write about what it was like to only get passing marks out of pity while living with the top student of our year. I write about what happened and how it felt.
There is more to explain that aren’t stories. I write how my magic felt and what its absence feels like now. I write about what it felt like to go off and how my meltdowns feel now. I write about shutdowns and what it is like when my words get stuck. I write about what my wings and tail feel like. I write about what it feels like to have magic cast on me. I write about my nightmares. I write about how it felt to wield a sword and how much I miss having one. I write about what my impulses feel like. I write about hunger and how it feels to have access and choices about food. I write about having nothing and what it’s like when people give me things I can’t repay.
I write about Baz. What I love about him. What loving him feels like. All the little details of him and how they affect me.
I write about how I feel like I’m always losing. Failing at classes. Failing at missions. Failing at being the Chosen One. Losing Ebb. Losing my magic. Killing my mentor. Losing my sword. Being absolute piss at being a boyfriend. Seriously. I’m already screwing this up so badly that it’s only a matter of time before I lose Baz too. Who the fuck needs to give their boyfriend a user manual like they’re a fucking appliance?
I write about my coping strategies. About stimming. About breathing. About curling up in the dark. About shutting off my thoughts. About crying until feelings pass.
None of this is instructions. None of this says anything useful, does it? It doesn’t tell Baz what to do with all of this random information.
I don’t know how to do this. I don’t know how to ask for what I need. If someone who wasn’t me felt how I felt, how would I tell a stranger to help them? I decide to switch to writing in third person. If I’m writing a user manual, I might as well write it like it is actually about an appliance instead of me. Maybe I can get the words out that way.
I write about what helps when I can’t speak. I write about how to brainstorm problems the way I do with Penny. I write about what kinds of touch feel good and what makes my skin crawl. I write about how to tell when I’m upset or spiraling or feeling worthless and how to help me through each scenario.
I write until the notebook is full. When I get to the last page after writing for two months, I don’t know what to do. Do I get another notebook? Is this enough? Is it done? I think it’s done. I look it over. My handwriting is still atrocious, even though I tried to be careful. I think Baz will be able to read it, but only just.
How do I give this to him? Should I make an event of it or just hand it over? Baz is a pretentious prick, but part of that is an act to hide the fact that he’s also a romantic sap. He’s going to see this as me giving him my heart, and he’ll be right. If I want to do this right, I should make a gesture of it.
Baz
I know something is up with Simon as soon as he lets me into his flat. He isn’t wearing a jumper and joggers. He’s got on slacks and a blue button down shirt that I bought for him. His hair is still a little wild, but it looks like he’s tried to tame it. He’s wearing shoes and his wings are spelled away.
“Are we going somewhere?” I ask.
“Yes,” he says. “Dinner. Our reservation is in half an hour.”
I clear my throat. “Does that mean we need to leave right away?”
“No,” He smiles at me. “I’d say we have about ten minutes.”
Simon Snow looks fucking edible right now. I pretend to adjust his collar as an excuse to touch him. I’m testing the waters. He doesn’t flinch. I keep my hands on his shoulders as I cross the threshold and kick the door closed so that I can turn him around and push him against it. I’m gentle enough that he could resist with ease, but firm enough that there’s no mistaking my intentions. Simon lets me pin him against the door to his flat and looks up at me, his hands on my hips.
I look into his blue eyes until he nods and then I kiss him. He pulls me against him and runs his warm hands up my back under my shirt. He is so warm. I resist the urge to drag my fingers through his curls. (Later.) Instead, I slide one hand down to his chest to keep him pinned against the door and feel his heart hammering beneath my palm and slide the other one behind his head to cushion it and hold him close.
I lose track of time, but Simon doesn’t. I can feel him smiling against my lips when he pulls away. “Dinner,” he says, reaching down to pick up a smart looking messenger bag that I never see him carry. Yes, Simon Snow is definitely up to something.
He takes me to a steakhouse that we’ve gone to before. It’s dimly lit and Simon’s reserved a table that’s tucked away in a private nook where people won’t be able to see me eat. He chooses the seat that faces out of the nook so that I can sit with my back to everything but him. When the waiter comes, he orders each of us prime rib- mine as rare as they’ll serve it as his medium rare- and a bottle of red wine.
“What’s the occasion, Snow?” I ask after the waiter leaves.
“I have something for you,” he says.
“It isn’t my birthday,” I raise an eyebrow in a way that always gets a reaction from him. “It isn’t our anniversary.”
“No,” he agrees. I see him watch my face and a smile twitches at the corner of his mouth. “It’s just today.”
“I’m not used to you being mysterious, Snow.” There’s no way that he’s planning to ask me to marry him. He wouldn’t need a messenger bag for a ring box. And he’s been so hot and cold since we got together- since he lost his magic. No, he’s not going to propose. So what is he up to?
Snow blushes and there’s that small smile again. “No, I suppose not.”
“How long will you leave me in suspense?” I ask, trying to sound bored. I know he doesn’t buy it.
“Not too long,” he shrugs.
I nod and relax into my chair. He’ll get there in his own time. I’ll have to be patient. I can do that. I’m on a date with Simon Snow. A proper date. He’s dressed nicely and we’re getting dinner. He could have nothing else planned and this evening would be a gift.
Our conversation wanders and meanders. It’s easy and relaxed. The waiter brings the food not long after the wine. It is all excellent. Simon orders lava cake a la mode. When the waiter walks away to get it, Simon refills our wine glasses and then reaches into his messenger bag.
I sit taller and lean forward slightly.
He pulls out a gift wrapped in silver paper. His face has gone crimson and his hands are a little shaky. Simon is nervous. He takes a shuddering breath, bites his lip, and then releases the breath and his lip in a determined sigh. “This is for you,” he says, holding out the silver parcel.
I open it gingerly. Simon stares at the table, fidgeting with his fingers. I can hear his heel tapping against the floor as his leg bounces a staccato beat under the table.
When I’ve removed the wrapping paper, I’m holding a notebook. It’s spiral bound. It’s the one he’s been hiding for months- I’m sure of it. Every page is full. I look at the cover. It’s blue like Simon’s eyes and custom printed with a title; Simon Snow Instruction Manual.
“What’s this?” I ask.
“I told my therapist that I wish people came with an instruction manual, and she suggested that I write one for myself.” Simon’s heel is still tapping. He gives himself time to think by taking a sip of wine. “I know that I’m a mess. I… Um…” He closes his eyes and presses the pad of his thumb against the tines of his fork.
I reach my foot forward and rub it against his ankle. “Take your time, love.”
He nods and I wait. I want to open the notebook and see what’s inside, but I know he has more to say. The waiter brings our dessert, but neither of us make a move to touch it.
“I know I said I wanted to be your terrible boyfriend, but I never thought I’d be this shite,” Simon says. I shake my head, but he holds up a hand to stop me from speaking. “I know none of this has gone the way you hoped.”
Now I do interrupt. “Simon, love, the most I’d ever hoped for was to steal a kiss before you rid the world of me. I didn’t dare do more than dream of anything like we have now.”
He sighs. “I know I’ve been a nightmare. I know sometimes you have no idea what to do with me. I hope this helps.” Simon picks up his fork and uses its edge to cut off a piece of cake.
He’s done speaking, but now I’m lost for words. I open the notebook. The first page is a table of contents. It promises everything from stories about all of the parts of his life that I missed to what it feels like to exist as Simon Snow to tips for helping him when his brain puts him through hell. He’s written his heart into a book and handed it to me in gift wrap.
I choke back a sob, but I can’t help but gasp. My eyes burn. Simon jumps out of his chair and moves around the table to sit in the one next to me. He wraps his arms around my shoulders and draws me to him. I bury my face in his shoulder, breathing in his scent and willing myself not to cry in the restaurant.
What did I do to deserve Simon Snow?
“Thank you,” I whisper. “I don’t know what to say.”
He laughs. “Welcome to my world, Baz.”
“The whole world is your world, Simon Snow,” I say. “You’re the sun. The rest of us are but planets in your orbit.”
“Once upon a time, maybe,” he says with an edge in his voice. “Not anymore.”
“Now,” I say. “My world will always revolve around you.”
Simon
Even though I am technically the one taking him out on a date, Baz insists on paying. He knows how much money I make and he’s loaded, so he said it only makes sense. I don’t argue with him because for once, I don’t really care. My goal was to give him the experience of tonight, and I did that. His pocketbook won’t even notice, but I’d have to budget carefully for the next fortnight to afford this. Baz seems surprised that I relented so easily about the bill, but he doesn’t comment on it. He probably thinks it’s too good to be true and I’ll change my mind and fight him for it if he says anything.
Instead, he hands the waiter his card and runs his fingers along my jawline. He hasn’t been able to stop touching me since I gave him the book and moved next to him. I don’t mind. For once, an evening is going exactly as I expected it to. Nothing has gone wrong. Nothing has blown up in my face. I can hardly believe it.
We hold hands as we walk back to my flat. Baz has the manual in his other hand. I offered to carry it in my messenger bag, but he didn’t want to let it go. I wonder if he’s worried I’ll get scared and change my mind about giving it to him. That would be reasonable. I’d be lying if I said this isn’t terrifying. But I’ve had two months to get ready for this.
Nothing could have prepared me for Baz’s reaction. He’s being so soft and treating my notebook full of chicken scratch with so much reverence. He looks at me with the city lights twinkling in his eyes and shining in his hair. He won’t stop grinning. We don’t make it halfway home before he’s tugged me into an alley and started snogging me senseless, still holding the manual against my back with one hand while the other tangles into my curls. His kisses are desperate, starved. He growls against my mouth and I giggle into his.
He pulls back. “What’s so funny, Snow?”
“You,” I say, brushing our noses together. “I didn’t think you’d make it back to the flat, so I chose a route with plenty of alleys.” I smirk at him. “You picked the first one.”
“Is that what you wanted?” He leans harder into my space, pressing forward until my back is against a brick wall. “Did you want me to ravish you in a dark alley?” He holds up the manual. “Will I find the instructions for that in here?”
“You’ll have to read it and find out.”
He chuckles and then kisses me some more, lazily, relaxed, taking his time to get his fill before we continue our walk home with puffed up lips.
“Do you want to be around when I read this?” Baz asks after a while.
I shrug. “I’m fine with whatever. My handwriting is still shite, so you might have to ask me what some of the words say. I hope not, but you never know.”
He nods and squeezes my hand.
When we get to my flat, the manual disappears into Baz’s school bag and he’s on me in an instant. (I dimly hear Penny say, “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” the slam of her bedroom door, and the words of a silencing spell.) Baz manhandles me to my room and tackles me onto my bed, kissing me until I feel like I’m going to melt into the mattress.
“Perfect,” I sigh into his hair when he rests his head on my shoulder.
“What’s that?” he whispers.
“Tonight’s been perfect.”
His answering chuckle rumbles through me. I twirl his hair around my finger as I fall asleep.
Baz
I wait until Simon is fully asleep before I slip out of his bed. The first thing I do is hunt. If I’d known about his date plans, I would have sorted that out before arriving at his flat, but he surprised me with this whole night. (He surprised me and surprised me and surprised me.) With the blood of half a dozen rats in my system, I let myself back into the flat, vampire quiet, brush my teeth, and fish the manual out of my school bag. I take it with me back to Simon’s room and use the dimmer switch on his bedside lamp to cast a dim light.
Simon’s handwriting is a disaster, but I can make it out if I squint. Some of the pages have doodles in the margins. I think he must have made them in moments when he was struggling with what to write. Next to a story about the care homes, there’s a doodle of a sphere. I realize after a moment that it’s supposed to be the red ball he used to carry around all the time. I sigh at the memory and keep reading. I knew the care homes were awful, but I had no idea how awful.
I couldn’t speak a word until I was five years old, and couldn’t string a simple sentence together until I was eight. The homes gave me speech therapy, but there was no consistent schedule, I had to start over with a new therapist every month or two, and nobody practiced with me between sessions. The other boys took advantage. The younger ones stole my toys and food because I could only protest with my fists and then I’d be the one in trouble. The older ones would beat the shit out of me. I always had bruises.
At one of the homes, there was a set of twins, Roger and Barry. I was six, and they were probably at least twelve. They would drag me into a nook, shove a rag into my mouth, and then take turns holding my hands behind my back and punching me everywhere that my clothes would cover. They told me they knew how to get into the kitchens and that they’d bring a knife to our next session if I ever told on them.
I’m only three pages in, and I’m already crying into a handkerchief, fighting to stay as silent and still as I can to avoid waking Simon. Look sharp, Baz. You’re only reading this. Simon had to live it. I take a shuddering breath and press on. The stories from the care homes don’t get any brighter. I read about how hungry Simon was, how lonely. He doesn’t say he was scared. I get the sense that he didn’t know he should be. This was his life. It was always this way. It was normal.
The first thing I did when I came into my magic was go off. I was so hungry that my stomach felt like a separate creature trying to claw its way out of me. I tried to sleep it off, still wearing my clothes, but I had a nightmare that my stomach was on fire. And then I woke up and everything was on fire. I could feel it exploding out of me. It burned and burned. I knew I was crying, but the tears steamed off of me instead of falling. I screamed. The flames consumed everything. The entire care home was reduced to ashes around me, but my pyjamas weren’t even singed. I thought I’d killed everyone, but they were all teleported blocks away. I was the only one who stayed. I sat in the ashes and bounced my ball between my knees to try to calm down. A firefighter found me and brought me to everyone else. We were put on cots in a school gymnasium. I was barely there for an hour when the Matron came for me and brought me to meet the Mage for the first time.
Fucking hell. Most mages our age and older remember the night when Simon came into his magic. I’d recently come into my own as well and was creating little fireballs in my fingers (I was flammable, but I was still a Pitch) when my hands suddenly turned into fucking flame throwers. Thank Merlin I was outside. The flames shot out of my hands for several minutes before I thought to plunge them into a fountain.
I was terrified and alone. I’d resented Simon for putting me through that- for putting everyone through that. It was one of the reasons I gave myself to hate him from the moment we met. I’d hated what he could do to me when he hadn’t even met me. I’d never considered what that night was like for him.
And then it was out of the frying pan and into the fire, wasn’t it? Because then he met the Mage.
I check the time. Midnight came and went ages ago. I should probably go to sleep. If I read about the Mage, I probably won’t be able to. I feel a powerful urge to hide the manual so Simon can’t take it back and keep it hidden from me again, but I put it onto the bedside table. I have to trust him to trust me.
I scoot closer to Simon until we’re touching. Without waking up, his arm and wing wrap around me, holding me close. I can feel him snoring into the hair at the nape of my neck. I close my eyes and drift into uneasy dreams.
Simon
The manual is on the bedside table when I wake up. Baz must’ve started reading after I fell asleep. I wonder how much he’s read. I wonder what he thinks about it.
At some point during the night, we went from spooning to facing each other. Our noses are inches apart. His face is mostly peaceful now, still asleep in a tangle of limbs. His brows are slightly furrowed. It’s not quite his nightmare face, but it’s near enough.
I push his hair out of his face and kiss his cheek. He sighs in his sleep, but that furrow is still there. I massage it with one of my thumbs and then use both of them to massage along his brow line to his temples and down his hairline.
Baz wakes with a gasp and urgency in his eyes. His hands jerk forward to grab my shoulders and he stares at me for a moment, catching his breath and coming back to a reality where we are together and safe.
“Nightmare?” I ask. I love being what he grabs onto for comfort.
“Something like that,” he nods. “Reading your memories is rousing mine. Our childhoods really were a mess, weren’t they, Snow?”
“Our adulthood could be a mess too if you’re feeling roused enough.” I smile innocently at him.
“Is that so?” Baz smirks.
“Certainly.” I run all of my fingers dramatically through his hair in all directions, massaging his scalp and leaving his hair completely mussed. He closes his eyes and sighs while I do it, and there’s a fire there when he opens them again after I take my hands away to admire the damage.
He chuckles and then rolls me onto my back, straddling my hips. My wings are splayed wide beneath us. Baz returns the favor, tangling his fingers in my curls and drops his full weight onto me and kissing me hungrily enough to push my head back into the pillow. He’s wearing nothing but his pants. (I didn’t even bother putting my own back on before going to sleep last night.) The spade of my tail hooks on his waistband and he lifts himself up enough to allow my tail to yank them out of the way. My wings pull him back down and then the claws scratch gently down his back. He moans into my mouth. I’ve got him exactly where I want him.
Baz
After I’m done debauching Simon Snow, I am eager to get back to reading. I need to know what he’s written in that manual. He sees me glancing at it and announces that he is going to go make breakfast. I steel myself for reading about the Mage’s abuse while he gets dressed and grab the notebook as soon as he’s out of the room.
You might expect someone to ease a child into the World of Mages, but the Mage told me everything at once. He told me that magic was real, that I was the Greatest Mage, and that it was going to be my job to vanquish the biggest threat to magic that ever was in one conversation. I was only eleven. I just wanted him to show me that trick again where he unrolled the map of the dead spots with his wand. I was so excited to be out of care. I was so excited about magic. It was all too good to be true. I was ready to do anything to save magic and anything for the man who saved me from care. As I saw it, he took me from nothing and gave me everything. I got one night of sleep, and my training started the next day. It started with just my wand, but when the Mage had to make me his Heir to get me into Watford a week later, he added swordplay to my regimen. Our first term started only a couple of weeks later.
I’d never thought at the time about what it would be like to go from living as a Normal to being a Watford student in a matter of weeks. I had always known that’s what had happened because I’d been told that the Mage had found the Chosen One among the Normals and waltzed him into the school on technicalities. I’d been told that we’d be life long enemies and to give him hell before I’d ever met him. He must have been so confused.
There is a detailed sketch of the Sword of Mages in the margins of the next section.
Did you think that we used practice swords when the Mage taught me how to fight? We didn’t. We used live blades from day one. He cast healing spells on me if I got hurt until the middle of second year, when I was supposed to have learned to cast “get well soon.” He said it was because I needed to be ready to take care of myself if I was in a fight with no backup. Then because I couldn’t get the spell right, Penny took over healing me after I was out of sight.
What the fuck? Who hands a real sword to an eleven year old? Who swings a real sword at an eleven year old? The fucking Mage, apparently. No wonder Simon was so good with a sword when he was hopelessly clumsy with everything else. You’d have to learn fast and well if your mentor might slice you open and leave you that way.
And I was always such an arse about him practicing in our room, even when it was raining or snowing outside. It was because he was too beautiful and I couldn’t stand to see him like that. It hurt to see the focused determination on his face and his muscles move under his skin. It hurt to hear his blade cut through the air and his blood rush through his veins. It hurt to hear his heart race and not be the reason, to smell his sweat and not be able to hold him against me to anoint myself with it. So while Simon was practicing to not get hacked to pieces, I was an arse to him about it because I was worried that he’d see a tent in my bedding.
I’d always known that he was practicing for something real. I’d always known that he was going on missions to fight monsters with the Mage, even when he was so young. Was I as bad as the Mage for denying him his best chance? I can’t dwell on what I can’t change. (I most certainly can.) I was horrible to Simon and I’ll always have to live with that. I still don’t know how he trusts me.
My first mission with the Mage was a month into term when I was eleven. I was still clumsy with my sword and useless with my wand. A targoyle was melting a road in Essex. The Mage warned me that I couldn’t use the Sword of Mages because anything that touches a targoyle sticks to it. I stepped too close and my shoes sank into the road. The targoyle came at me as the Mage stood back and watched. It didn’t have to move quickly because my feet were completely stuck. By the time it grabbed my wrists, I was sunk as deep as my ankles.
I still don’t know what The Mage wanted me to do. Maybe he was just curious to see if some kind of instinct would kick in and make my spells work if I didn’t have another choice. Instead, I went off. The targoyle exploded in my face. The Mage let me keep sinking into the tar until it was up to my knees and was starting to cool and harden before he spelled me out. It had to have been at least an hour. He didn’t spell me clean. He spelled the seat of his Range Rover slippery so I wouldn’t stick to it. The only thing keeping my shoes from sticking me to the spot when I walked was a coating of fall leaves.
I might have dwelled on how the Mage should have helped me, but you know what happened when I got back to the room. Do you remember? I think you must.
I’ve never seen a targoyle. Looking at Simon’s drawing of it, I hope I never do. Yes, I remember what happened next. Simon walked into the room covered in tar. A decent roommate would have asked what happened. A decent roommate would have asked if he was okay. But I wasn’t a decent roommate. I couldn’t be. (I’d been told I couldn’t be.) So I laughed cruelly and ripped his pillow over his head, leaving him eleven years old, scared out of his wits, exhausted from going off, and tarred and feathered in the room where he was supposed to feel safe sleeping at night. He didn’t move. He curled up right there and cried until I couldn’t stand the noise. He couldn’t get up if he tried because he’d wrapped his arms around his knees and gotten them stuck there. After making a show of scolding him to shut up and pull himself together, I finally told him he stank like a pit and spelled him clean.
I wish I didn’t remember. No, I wish he didn’t have to remember. I wish none of this ever happened. Great Snakes, I don’t know which of us was worse to him that day. No, I know. The Mage was an adult. He was Simon’s guardian and mentor. I was a manipulated child just like Simon. It isn’t a good reason. It doesn’t excuse the depths of how cruel I could be. But at least I can say that I didn’t choose it all on my own. At least I didn’t want to be that way.
I still don’t know how Simon ever forgave me.
Simon
Baz doesn’t seem to hear me when I call him for breakfast, so I go into the room to check on him. He doesn’t look like he notices me walking up to him. He’s staring through the page with the targoyle. There’s a storm behind his eyes. I kiss his cheek and he jerks like I’ve stung him.
“Whoa, Baz,” I say. “It’s just me. And breakfast… On the table, that is… I didn’t bring it in here…” Now I’m blustering because he’s still staring. “Do you… do you want me to bring it in here?”
Baz blinks. “What? No. I’m coming.” He still doesn’t move. “It’s just…” He trails off.
“What is it?” I ask.
Baz gestures at the page. “How could you ever like me after this? How could you ever trust me?”
I drag him out of bed, teasing the manual out of his grasp and dropping it on the side table. I hold his face in my hands so he has to look at mine and cocoon us in my wings. “We were kids,” I say. “We were a pair of pawns who grew up to toss the entire chess board. If you can move past me trying to out you as a vampire to the whole school when we were fifteen, then I can move past you being a prick to me when we were eleven. You have and I have.”
Baz bristles for a moment and then deflates against me, his hands pressed against my chest. If I was wearing a shirt, I’m sure he’d have it gripped in his fists, but I’m only in my pants. So is he. He doesn’t seem like he notices.
“Breakfast is getting cold, darling,” I say. He always perks up when I call him darling. As if on cue, my stomach growls loudly.
“We can’t have that,” Baz sighs and lets me lead him out of the room.
Baz
I want to hold Simon for more time after what I just read. I want to feel his heart beating under my hands. But after everything I put him through, I don’t want to stand between him and a hot breakfast.
I pick at my plate. The manual has made me too anxious to eat. I manage a few bites and then sit back to watch Simon devour everything on his plate and then almost everything on mine. Good. He fucking deserves it. I help him with cleanup and then go back to reading. Simon puts on headphones and climbs in bed next to me to watch Doctor Who.
The next several pages are an account of every mission Simon remembers. Every monster. The dragon. The werewolves. The worsegers. The goblins. The swing cats. The jitterbugs. The ne’erdowolves. The giant. So many others. There’s a sketch next to the first instance of each creature like he knows I haven’t encountered them all and doesn’t know which ones he can skip. Simon’s fought everything. He’s killed everything. Hell and horrors, he was just a child.
Finally, there’s a scribble that takes up an entire line, marking where Simon is moving on to a new section. It’s like he needed to clear his pen and clear his head before changing topics. I check the time. I’ve been decoding his handwriting and sitting with what he’s written all morning. I set the manual aside. Simon notices immediately. I see him glance at the scribble line and close his laptop.
“Are you okay?” he asks.
“Are you?” I counter.
“Do you want to talk about any of it?” he asks.
“Do you?” I say.
Simon takes my hand. “Why do you keep flipping my questions back on me?”
“Because it’s your life and your trauma and this manual is meant to teach me how to help you with it.” I frown. “Isn’t it counterproductive if you have to coddle me through it?”
Simon shakes his head. “No, no, no. You don’t get it,” he says.
“What don’t I get?”
“This part of the manual is to fill you in on the things you didn’t know about and help you understand and predict my triggers,” Simon says.
Oh.
Simon never feels understood. He never feels heard. Because he struggles with words and because he has always been a fish out of water. A mage among Normals. A know-nothing orphan among mages. A walking bomb among students. A repressed and closeted queer teen among people he thought were straight. An unidentified autistic among neurotypicals.
He never fit in. He never had his own niche. He never had his own people. He’s picked me. I’m supposed to be his person now. We match in that we’re both messed up, but the details are different.
He wants me to ask him for anything I need clarified so that he knows I understand what he’s written. That I understand what it means to go through what he’s describing- or at least that I can imagine it.
“Okay,” I say. “I think I understand.”
He sighs.
“I’m sorry I don’t know what to say,” I admit. I’m so rubbish at this. “I wish I could kill the Mage all over again. I’m sorry he put you through this. And I’m sorry I was always such an arse about it.”
“Please stop apologizing, Baz,” Simon says. “That isn’t what this is for.”
“I don’t know if I can do that. I’ll always be sorry about how I treated you.” I’ll always be ashamed.
“I get it and thanks for that,” he gestures at the manual, “but… This is… A piece of me, and I don’t want you to be sorry I gave it to you.”
I squeeze his hand. “Simon, love, there is nothing you could have written that would make me sorry you gave me this.”
He smiles. “Do you want a break? We could go for a walk.”
I want to keep reading, but I also want to please him. “Sure,” I say.
We get dressed, I spell his wings away, and we walk around the neighborhood, talking about nothing important. After half an hour or so, I ask, “Are we going for a walk because you thought I needed a ‘break’ after reading about the Mage and your missions or is it because you are worried about me reading the next section? Or did you just want my attention?”
“Can I say all three?” Simon smiles.
I frown. “What is in the next section that worries you more than what I’ve already read?”
“I wrote about the development of all of my closest relationships, for better or for worse.” He is determinedly looking straight ahead of us. “I don’t think the sections on Penny or Ebb will surprise you too much. I don’t even think you’ll be terribly shocked about the section on you.” He stops and turns to look at me. “But I don’t know how you’re going to feel about the section on Agatha. It felt strange to write it all out for you to read.”
He looks so nervous. Is he worried that I’m going to hold his past feelings against him? Is he worried that I’m going to accuse him of wanting Agatha back when he woke up in my arms this morning and she fucked off to California, doesn’t talk to Simon, and only texts Penny back because she’s a relentless pain in the arse?
“Relax, love,” I say. “I am well aware of what happened during our school days. I assure you that reading about you and Wellbelove in the past while you are literally next to me in bed won’t have the sting that watching you two together while hopelessly pining had.”
Simon searches my eyes. He’s trying to tell if I’m lying to make him feel better. I try to show him that I’m not. I try to seem as open as he is. I don’t know if he got what he’s looking for, but he relents with a nod and we walk back to the flat. We settle next to each other in bed, him watching more Doctor Who with headphones and me reading.
His description of his relationship with Penelope is enlightening, but not surprising. His stories about Ebb are bittersweet. I’m grateful that they gave Simon what I couldn’t through the years.
And then…
I hate that I have to write this. I hate that you’re going to read it. But I have to be honest and you know how this story ends: I knew I wanted Agatha from the moment I saw her. We were eleven years old. I grew up in boys’ homes, and Agatha was the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen. I had a schoolboy crush from day one. But it was only ever that. We became friends. In that sense, she was always dear to me. Always important to me. I didn’t know what being in love was supposed to feel like. I didn’t know that valuing a friendship and thinking someone is beautiful don’t necessarily add up to being in love. There was so much I didn’t know about love.
Everyone expected us to get together. The Chosen One and the gorgeous blonde. I was supposed to solve all of the World’s problems and then marry her and make magickal babies or whatever. But we were always going through the motions. We didn’t really go on dates. Ever. Unless you count rescuing her from kidnappings as dates. (Sorry I didn’t rescue you. I wish someone had told me you were kidnapped.) We didn’t even kiss very often, and when we did, it was nothing like what we have. It was nice. Comfortable, soft, safe. But there was no fire, no intensity, no insatiable desire.
Penny could tell. She said we had no chemistry. She said we were both miserable and would be better off as friends. But I didn’t listen. I refused.
I was so wrapped up in the idea that Agatha was my future that I never examined how our relationship actually felt while we were in it. It didn’t matter how underwhelming things were then because happiness with Agatha was this idealized thing that I had to look forward to if I beat the odds and survived the Humdrum and the war. I almost went off the night she broke up with me. It felt like she took my future away. But she told me she wanted to be someone’s right now, not a trophy for the Chosen One to win.
I couldn’t give her that because I was too busy tearing Watford apart looking for you. Your absence was all I could think about. I couldn’t keep myself together. I couldn’t sleep or eat properly. I didn’t understand why.
This is what Simon was so worried about me reading? What the fuck! Does he think I’m going to be jealous because he liked her before me? Or because he kissed her? Or because he fantasized about their future together? None of that is news. What is news is that he felt so little for her that even while they were together, he spent so much time and energy neglecting her in favor of obsessing over me that she dumped him. And he still didn’t figure it out until faced with a forest fire. I swear this man is so oblivious it’s amazing that he figured it out at all.
It really is amazing that he did.
I feel a grin spread across my face and a laugh escape me. Simon glances at what I’m reading and looks at me, puzzled.
“You really are a gift, Simon Snow. You know that?”
“What?” he frowns.
“You were fretting about me reading that you never felt about Agatha anything close to what you feel about me?”
Simon blinks. “I was anxious about you reading about how it felt like love at first sight with her, but it wasn’t like that with you.”
I laugh. “I’m not jealous of an eleven year old who had practically never seen a girl.”
He thinks about it and smiles. “We’ve been sat here for a while, yeah? I want lunch. Should I make something or pick something up?”
“Up to you, love.”
He nods and I hear the front door a moment later. I wonder if he just wanted whatever he plans to pick up or if he is purposefully leaving me alone for the next section.
He’s right that what he wrote about our years of feuding is unsurprising. I already knew that he would have been friendly to me if I’d given him a chance. I already knew that he was brainwashed to think I was evil and that he always suspected me of plotting something. He’d even told me that he refused to think about the implications of thinking I was fit and feeling compelled to follow me around. And I’m familiar enough with what made him figure it all out because I was there.
The next section is about how his magic used to feel and how its absence feels. There isn’t much there that he hasn’t told me (though reading about how he still misses it breaks my heart), but it provides helpful context when he transitions into his meltdowns.
Before I came into my magic, my meltdowns felt like electricity and fire jolting my nervous system. I would scream and cry and wallop anyone who came near me. There were times when multiple adults would restrain me. Once, I almost suffocated because of it.
Seven snakes, I want to murder someone. My fangs pop and I have to get myself under control before I can keep reading.
When I got my magic, meltdowns became going off. It’s not just that I would go off when I had a meltdown or have a meltdown when I went off. Going off is how I melted down. It’s what my magic did when my nervous system couldn’t cope anymore. It was still electricity and fire, but instead of staying inside of me, it burst through me and out. It made the feelings inside that I couldn’t begin to handle manifest in utter destruction. Everything you saw on the outside is how it felt on the inside. It hurt. It hurt so much. It consumed all of my senses, and it took days to recover and be able to process sensory input like normal. Noise grated. Bright flashes stabbed. I’d startle when touched. Random smells got stuck in my nose and wouldn’t stop piling on top of each other until I flushed them out with the smell of your shampoo. (That really should have clued me in, but we know how it all ended up.)
I know what you’re thinking now, Baz. You’re probably spiraling over the fact that you used to make me go off on purpose. You’re probably feeling guilty now that you know how much it hurt.
Yes. Yes, I am. I can barely breathe. I want to set my past self on fire.
Don’t. Please don’t. We can’t pretend that you didn’t hurt me when we were younger. But I can tell you what meltdowns are like now and tell you how to help. You’re already doing a lot of it so well. I couldn’t get through this life without you, Baz.
When I lost my magic, it started feeling like my meltdowns were incomplete. Unlike tantrums, which are a behavior, meltdowns are a neurological event. My magic was so bound up in my neurology that it feels like I don’t get the entire event out of my system without magic exploding out of me. It’s all contained inside and can’t get out. The electricity and fire can’t go anywhere. It jangles up and down my nerves until it saps all of my energy out. My movements get all jerky because it is taking everything in me not to punch something or someone to give the fire somewhere to go.
I think back to how Simon’s magic laid waste to monsters and blew up classrooms. All of that destructive force is still there, but it’s trapped inside? I try to imagine it, but I can’t. I can’t imagine how it feels to have an explosion that would leave a burning crater in the place of a chimera fill me up with nowhere to go. It sounds horrible. I don’t know whether it sounds worse to be a ticking timebomb or an implosion waiting to happen.
How to help the 1997 model Normal Simon Snow when he melts down:
1. Your Simon needs to be grounded and kept from hurting or breaking things, but also needs to feel free to fidget and stim. Take a firm hold of his biceps. Do it vampire tight if you have to. Don’t force eye contact as that might further overstimulate your Simon, but be available for it.
2. Help your Simon breathe. Put his hands on your chest and guide his timing.
3. Keep your voice calm and soothing, but not patronizing like you’re talking to a child as this may anger your Simon. Don’t lie when you’re talking your Simon down from whatever caused the meltdown. You need to believe whatever it is you say.
4. Once your Simon seems to calm down, create a recovery environment that is quiet and dark. Your Simon may need to be held tight or may need space. A bath might also help.
5. Be frank in your inquiry about recovery needs and expect initial responses to be nonverbal. Recovery from a meltdown is an entire system reboot. Your Simon’s speech centers buffer after conscious thought returns.
Did he really just write the instruction part of his instruction manual as if he’s an appliance I bought at Tesco? I find myself laughing. I read the instructions a second time and it feels like a weight lifting off of my chest. It feels simple and doable when it’s all written out and I don’t have to wonder. Okay, Simon. I can do this. I will do this.
Important warnings and best practices for touching your 1997 model Normal Simon Snow:
Always commit when touching your Simon. Touches should have proper elocution, not whisper across his skin.
Do not touch your Simon like you think he might break. Your Simon’s neurology will interpret this as patronising, whether it is logical or not.
Do not tickle your Simon as this causes sensory overload.
Your Simon’s wings are extremely sensitive. The above instructions are doubly important there.
Any time you consider touching your 1997 model Normal Simon Snow, there is a high probability that he also wants you to touch him. There is a moderate probability that he is too self conscious to ask. There is a low probability of rejection.
Verbal confirmation is not necessary every time you touch your Simon, but being told what you want in plain language increases his confidence and releases hormones in the brain that make fulfilling your desires more likely.
I spent years suppressing my fantasies and now I’m supposed to tell him what I want? Just like that? Merlin, why does that sound so daunting?
I hear the sound of the apartment door opening and closing and a bag being placed on the table. I walk out of the bedroom. He’s reaching into the bag to pull containers out. I take the curry out of his hands, place it on the table and wrap him firmly in my arms, committed, and kiss him squarely. He relaxes into my grip and his fingers find my hair. I feel him smiling. I pull back, but keep my hands solidly on his shoulders.
“I want to eat lunch while it’s hot and fresh,” I say, “Then I want to take a hot bath together. I want you to feel relaxed.” I thought this would be difficult to say, but the way Simon meets my eyes encourages me. “I want to spend approximately twenty percent of the time discussing what I’ve read and eighty percent of it washing your hair with my shampoo and massaging your muscles until you feel like melting butter. When we get out of the bath, I want you to pick what we do next, and when we’re through with whatever that is, I want to continue reading the most important book I’ve ever been given.”
Simon grins. It’s like the sun is shining in my face. “Sounds great, Baz. Let’s do that.”
Simon
He’s clearly read the touch section. That was fucking perfect. Crowley. Baz is so fucking perfect. I need to thank Stephanie for making me do this.