Chapter Text
Tubbo makes it two weeks before it happens.
He’s coming home from school, Tommy walking ahead of him as he shuts the door and readjusts his backpack strap, when Phil steps out of the kitchen and says, “Tubbo, I need to talk to you for a second.”
Tubbo freezes for a moment, already knowing and dreading what this conversation is going to be, but he eventually steels himself together and takes off his shoes. Tommy is giving him and Phil a worried look, so Tubbo casually responds, “Let me drop off my backpack first, then I’ll come down.”
“Alright with me, mate,” Phil approves, and Tubbo grabs Tommy’s hand as the two of them go upstairs.
Tommy follows Tubbo into his bedroom and watches Tubbo set down his backpack on the edge of his bed before asking in a whispery tone, “Why does Phil need to talk to you?”
“No fucking clue,” Tubbo lies. “I think. Uh. I think it’s probably a school thing?”
“But you’re really smart.” Tommy leans against the doorframe, looking confused. “Surely you aren’t failing anything?”
Tubbo isn’t, not really. He has a D in English, but it’s such a borderline C that he knows he can get it up by the end of semester. The rest are mostly As and Bs, so he’s doing fine, honestly. But he needs something to say, because he remembers what Tommy told him two weeks ago about not letting anybody take Tubbo away, and that’s exactly what Phil is going to be talking to Tubbo about. In the daylight of 3 PM, on a Wednesday. Surely there are better times for it, but what the hell does Tubbo know?
Either way, he sticks to the lie, trying to be as casual as possible. “I mean, I missed a week off of school, bossman. And English is kinda kicking my ass right now. I dunno, I haven’t checked much, I guess.”
“Well, I can help you with English,” Tommy offers, “but don’t worry about Big Man Phil. I failed every class in middle school and he would say, ‘Now Tommy, why did you do that?’, ‘cause Wil and Techno both got really good grades, and I would say, ‘Phil, I simply do not like school.’ And he would say, ‘Okay, Tommy, give me a hug,’ and I said, ‘Okay, Phil,’ and then we hugged.” Tommy grins. “Those were the good days for Big Man Tommy and Bigger Man Phil.”
Admittedly, listening to Tommy’s stories is actually really good practice for keeping himself focused when Phil starts dumping a bunch of technical terms about housing on him. “Well, if this gets me a hug from Phil, then I guess I’m in.”
“Shouldn’t keep the man waiting,” Tommy tells him, and he knows that he has to go down at some point, but a selfish part of him wishes he could delay it and stay with Tommy. “That is a phrase we say in the biz, Tubbo, you must know this. I watched The Godfather before.”
Tubbo squints. “I don’t think they say that in The Godfather. ” He’s pretty sure that’s one of the movies the Film Studies class is covering next semester.
Tommy sighs. “Well, I haven’t seen it, Tubbo.”
“That sounds like a you problem, bro.”
“You are my least favorite brother.”
That’s not going to be much of an issue in a minute. “You’re my least favorite brother too, Tommy,” Tubbo counters, but it lacks a lot of the bite it needs.
Tommy doesn’t notice, straightening himself up and kicking the door open a little wider so that he can head back to his room. “Whatever. After you do work and stuff, hang out with me, yeah? I’m clingy. Like a praying mantis.”
“Praying mantises aren’t clingy,” Tubbo corrects, “they literally commit mariticide. Like, all the time.”
Tommy shouts, “What the fuck? Why do they do that? That is very- that is very unsexy of them, I think.”
“They do it after reproducing, I think,” Tubbo adds.
“I hate you so much, Tubbo.”
“You love me.”
Tommy flips him off, and Tubbo laughs, going down the stairs two steps at a time until he hits the ground floor and is hit with the sobering realization of what comes next.
Well, might as well get the hard shit out of the way now, when he can at least expect it.
He walks into the kitchen, and sure enough, there’s Philza. His blonde hair shields his expression somewhat as he leans over the counter to take his freshly-brewed cup of coffee, posture always a little hunched like he has something on his back weighing him down. There’s the side to him that’s the scientist in academia, and there’s the side to him that’s a father, but Tubbo’s never really seen him as either. The father of his best friend, some other student’s teacher. Never really Tubbo’s, even if, for the past few days, Tubbo’s been like a son to him.
“Hey, Phil,” he greets casually.
Phil’s shoulders tense before he turns around, and then, he’s almost relaxed. A smile easily settles across his face, and Tubbo can tell that he must be sort of tired and sort of stressed, but not overly either of the two. Phil’s always been able to detach from things if he has to. Tubbo’s seen that in action and has hated him for it before, but it’s not like Tubbo doesn’t do the same.
“Hi, mate,” Phil replies, voice seeping in some kind of fondness with the way he says it. It makes Tubbo kind of on edge, considering what they’re talking about, but he guesses they all have ways of coping. This is probably a change for Phil, too. “Sorry to call you down to chat, I’ll leave you be in a bit.”
“It’s fine,” Tubbo assures, because there’s no way in hell he’s rushing this talk. “I don’t have anything I need to be doing, anyway.”
“Alright,” Phil agrees easily, taking a drink from the coffee before holding it with both his hands. He still wears his wedding ring, black with engravings on it. Tubbo’s never mentioned it, nor has anybody else. The person Phil was formerly married to is more like a ghost than anything, despite the photo frame in his office betraying that she was full of life.
Photographs can be deceiving, though. Tubbo knows that for a fact.
(He thinks of the one in Schlatt’s room. He thinks of the ones Ranboo takes.)
“So,” Phil starts, “as you know. Things have been kind of shit.”
Tubbo snorts. He’ll give Phil this: he has a decent sense of humor for someone kicking him out of the house. It’s a lot better than some kind of social worker could do, but then again, Phil’s kind of like a social worker who doesn’t have to pretend he’s not desensitized.
“Yeah, I’d agree with that.” Tubbo isn’t sure whether it’s best if he sits for this or not– doesn’t want to make it too official, like some sit-down talk, but doesn’t want to collapse on the fucking kitchen tile either– so he settles for hopping up on the countertop, which Phil would ordinarily stop him from doing but seems to let it go this time.
He doesn’t hide his sigh, though, coming from Tubbo’s bastardry. “So. I’m just gonna cut to the chase, mate, ‘cause it helps neither of us to beat around this,” Phil admits, with a laugh, and Tubbo can give him credit for that, too. He doesn’t let his guard down, though, even as Phil tries to stay loosened up, and Tubbo braces himself for the worst, seems to have appropriately done so when Phil says, “I’ve been in contact with some social workers.”
Tubbo lets out a deep breath, because he knew this was coming and he needs to treat this logically. Maybe he can bargain with them– the third stage of grief, haha, haha, something like that shit– and see if he can stay longer. Or- or something like that. But Tubbo has to treat this rationally, because no option is ideal with Schlatt gone, and he can’t get his hopes up.
“What are our options?” he asks carefully.
“I think Quackity said you two talked,” and Tubbo hasn’t been able to forget that conversation, “so you know he’s not going to be able to adopt you. You’re technically, eh, close to being 18? But not close enough that you could live alone, not without a shit ton of loopholes.” Ranboo does, sort of, now that Tubbo thinks about it, but he wouldn’t be surprised if Ranboo’s situation was far more complicated than Tubbo wants to make his life at the moment. “That leaves us two options, and I talked to some legal people and I think we’ve hammered out the best choice.”
Tubbo nods. “I understand.”
This is it.
Tubbo will go upstairs and heave everything out from under the floorboards, take the posters off the wall, and steal some more change from the kitchen drawer to shove into his backpack and take with him. He’ll break the news to Tommy, if he doesn’t already know, and he’ll give him a tight hug and promise to keep in contact so long as his shitty old phone stays alive. He’ll listen to Wilbur play his guitar one more time, pet Boreas and the rest of them and muster up the strength to say goodbye to Whiskers– because it was pushing it, caring for her back in Schlatt’s house, and there’s no way in hell that Tubbo can take her with him to a random foster home–, and he’ll find some way to tell Ranboo goodbye. Maybe, if he can still salvage what he has with Quackity, he can apologize to him for everything, too.
Tubbo will go into the system and land into a foster home until he can fend for himself. He’ll snag a shitty job in the area, if he even stays in the area, and will work until he can afford somewhere to live. He’ll take homelessness, or the constraints of a high school diploma in the workforce: whatever it takes to live.
And, honestly? Compared to all the other shit he’s dealt with, he thinks he’ll fare just fine.
With that confirmation settling the conversation, Tubbo turns to go, but Phil places his hand on his shoulder. And suddenly, Tubbo feels frozen, and it’s stupid how it can still make him freeze, someone doing that, because surely people have done that before and it’s been fine, but it’s something about the firmness, how some people can do it gently but the pressure coming from Phil makes Tubbo think of large hands patting his back and clamping down, and it’s such a stupid Achilles’ heel to have so he reminds himself he’s fine, fine, fine, grits his teeth,
but the worst part isn’t the hand on his shoulder, because that’s too easy of an act for Achilles to die to.
It’s the way that Phil states in a clear tone, “Tubbo, the plan is to adopt you.”
Tubbo is dealing with the death of his older cousin, and the grief of that feels like pin-pricks of panic all along his skin, bone deep, and this unrelenting torrent of complications that will trace him thereafter for the rest of his life. Grieving over Schlatt feels like stagnation with a fast-beating heart, like how it’s easier to shut your eyes when the sun’s out and so much harder to lull yourself to sleep when every cicada reminds you of the first time you heard a glass bottle break. It is the glass bottle breaking, honestly, every second, and Tubbo is eight years old bent over a sweat-stained shirt left on the bathroom floor, trying to pick all the pieces up so he can stand on his toes and look himself in the mirror and brush his teeth with expensive cinnamon toothpaste stolen from someone else. Grief feels like that, all of that, and nothing, because Tubbo has his defenses strong and it’s not right for him to grieve, and he understands denial is all part of the process but it’s not denial if he knows it’s real, like there’s a gun pressed against his temple but he doesn’t turn his head to look at it, like constantly moving forward without checking his periphery.
The words that Phil tells him now feels nothing like that, but part of Tubbo acknowledges that it has to be a similar sort of sensation, because even if he knew from the very second Wilbur handed him the phone that this was a very likely possibility, part of him never thought that Phil would take the plunge and do it.
To anybody else, it would be obvious. Tubbo has been living with them consistently for around three years, and he is referred to as a part of the family. Ranboo thinks that Tubbo is Tommy’s brother, and all of his other friends think so too, and even the ones who have known him since before he moved in with Tommy still see the two of them as brothers. Tubbo and Wilbur look sort of similar, too, and Tubbo has the same eyes as Tommy, and it’s obvious that all of them are more like a family unit than Tubbo and Schlatt and Quackity ever have been.
But Tubbo isn’t on the outside anymore. He gave up that privilege when he moved in. Now, he understands the situation, and he knows the bounds, and he knows that no matter how much he’s forced himself into the lives of his best friend’s family and how much he’s simultaneously destroyed and resolved by being part of it, he has never truly been part of the family.
He never could be.
Phil tells him that the plan is to adopt him as if it’s an easy, obvious, straightforward decision. It’s never been that. Tommy and Wilbur and Techno and Phil are a family for a reason– because all of them work well together, because they have that bond and that familiarity and ultimately, even if Tommy and Techno are adopted, they all have the same sort of traits that makes you think this is a family.
But Tubbo has always born the mark of a Schlatt, of an Underscore, of whoever the patriarch was in the fucked-up family tree with two sons and a daughter that all married shitty people and gave birth to shitty kids– or whatever the hell happened to Tubbo’s aunt, but he digresses– all of that, all of that, is who Tubbo is. He has the hard eyes and the predisposition to facial hair that’s a little lighter than the ones on his head and the alcoholism and the problem that makes him shut down every December and the hatred of the holidays and the financial insecurity and the temper and the violence and the abusive tendencies that all make up a Schlatt, an Underscore, of whichever bastard knocked someone up and started all of this.
Tubbo’s least favorite science is biology, if he had to take his pick. Chemistry, physics, and computer science are all far more mathematical in nature, and Tubbo still struggles sometimes to wrap his brain around every single nuance to biology, even if he’s pretty good at scoring As on tests for it. What he does know about biology, something that tests drilled into him since he was a kid, is how invasive species are brought to foreign populations and mix in with the natives, and they destroy crops and kill livestock and kill other animals and become parasites and are impossible to remove.
Tubbo has left himself uprooted for years, in this fickle state between being part of Tommy’s family and still being under the legal care of Schlatt, and he is terrified of burying his roots into the soil of a family that has already lost so much and can’t afford another tragedy to strike it.
For all these reasons and thousands more, Tubbo can’t let himself be adopted. Even if the thought of living away from his best friend is uncomfortable, it’s the best decision to keep Tommy safe. Tommy has always had a fear of having people in his house that didn’t belong there, and Tubbo never quite got it, has had to see it with Ranboo as that tension still lingers but doesn’t know keenly where it all stems from inside Tommy’s brain. All Tubbo knows is that him living there is invading a native ecosystem, and that’s not keeping Tommy safe, and Tubbo is sacrificing all of them just to keep a roof over his head when he knows that he can survive on the streets alone if he had to.
And it’s selfish. It’s selfish because Tubbo knows this, but part of him wants to celebrate, because if he’s successfully adopted– and he will be, seeing as Phil has done this twice and so long as Tubbo fucks nothing up, he’ll be taken in– then he won’t have to move anything, his life will stay the same, nothing will fundamentally be different.
The only difference is that he would be part of Phil’s family. It’s a matter of morals.
Phil looks at Tubbo like he’s expecting some kind of response, but Tubbo knows it’s only a matter of courtesy. Nothing can talk Phil out of adopting him, because it’s the most logical option legally, it covers everyone from the absolute monstrosity of a child endangerment case Tubbo’s former place of residence was, and ultimately, Phil has this soft spot for kids despite never really knowing how to communicate with them.
Tubbo feels as if the hand on his shoulder is wrapped around his vocal chords instead, squeezing them hard enough that he can hardly say a word, can barely even breathe. But he swore to himself that he would be logical when doing this, and even as his heart tugs at him to make the right decision, to step away before he ruins everything, he knows that this isn’t the place to fight it.
And so, as casual as he can make himself sound, he tells Phil, “Okay.”
Phil smiles and releases his hold, and Tubbo feels like cradling his shoulder as if it might be bleeding, as if he might be some mass on the floor shaking and stumbling as he tries to piece together what to do from here, but Tubbo is still just standing there by the end of it, seventeen years old and not on the edge of his life, but rather facing the truth that he’s going to be legally adopted by the family that has already taken him in.
He wonders if Schlatt ever thought of this outcome, but he knows that deep down, Schlatt could never think about anybody but himself.
Tubbo’s trying to be different in all the ways he never could be.
“Okay,” Phil repeats. “You can go do homework now, mate. Just wanted to let you know how all that was going. And it’s gonna take a bit– although, to be honest with you, this isn’t exactly the first time I’ve been looking at all this paperwork within the past year– so, it’s-”
“You were already planning on adopting me?” Tubbo blurts out before he can stop himself, because that’s an entirely separate thing, something that he doesn’t want to process at all.
“It was on my mind,” is all Phil says, continuing as if he hasn’t just admitted to something that is surely worthy of martyrdom in some other place. “And, uh, one last thing, Tubbo.”
Tubbo can process what he just learned later, after he’s already heard Phil out fully. “...Yeah?”
Phil gives him a bitter smile, like swallowing down a truth you don’t want to bear. “The two of us need to talk at some point about your past living situation. ‘Cause the social worker can glean a decent amount, but not all of that can be figured out just by a crime scene, and nobody has the information that you do. Yeah?”
And the thought of telling Phil about Schlatt feels worse than swallowing an uncomfortable truth. It’s a little more like shoveling broken glass bottle shards past his tongue. Around it, Tubbo smiles and says, “I’ll think about it.”
“You do that,” Phil concludes, “and you go off and do your work, now. Sorry to keep you. Just, a lot of stuff to clear out, yeah?”
“Yeah.” God, Tubbo doesn’t want to face Tommy.
“It’ll be easier soon,” Phil adds, and Tubbo doesn’t want to face Tommy.
Tubbo nods.
And without so much as a goodbye beyond that, Phil goes back to drinking his coffee and Tubbo runs up the stairs two steps at a time, and he shuts the door behind him as he walks through his room and into the bathroom attached to an attic like one of many basic commodities he’s never deserved. And he turns the shower on to the hottest setting, and he leans against the wall fully-clothed as the room fills with steam, and he fiddles with the phone in his hands.
Tubbo: Hey Boo?
[
Ranboo: yeah?
Tubbo has never been more grateful for how fast Ranboo answers texts.
Tubbo: can we hang out today or tomorrow or something
[
Ranboo: can’t do today :( I’ll be free tomorrow or Friday
[
Tubbo: do you leave school early tomorrow?
[
Ranboo: no, sorry
[
Tubbo: can you just like wait for me afterschool and let me come with you back somewhere
Tubbo: or something like that
Tubbo: Please
[
Ranboo: yeah of course
Ranboo: everything okay, Tubbo?
[
Tubbo: yeah. Just miss you
[
Ranboo: I’ll see you tomorrow at lunch
[
Tubbo: yeah but
Tubbo: idk
Tubbo: kind of want to hang out just like
Tubbo: us and nothing else
Tubbo: does that make sense i don’t know
[
Ranboo: it does
Ranboo: I’ll wait for you afterschool then
[
Tubbo: bike rack rendezvous point
[
Ranboo: did we ever actually use that plan
[
Tubbo: no
Tubbo: I’ll be at your car
[
Ranboo: okay :)
[
Tubbo: Ty
[
Ranboo: ofc
Tubbo sinks to the floor until his arms are around his knees, counting out the seconds in his head until he can convincingly turn off the shower. It’s a few minutes of undisturbed quiet, where he doesn’t have to think about the world outside of him. It’s a little lonely, and a little terrifying, but mostly a numbness throughout his body.
Even without Schlatt, he feels close to home in that instant. For all those times he was with him, sitting beside a tub and waiting for some miracle, Tubbo never thought it would resolve to this.
–
There’s a sub in Tubbo’s Calculus 2 class.
Which is a fucking fantastic thing, honestly, because nobody likes the Calculus 2 teacher. Ranboo is literally afraid of him, according to what he said that one time over the phone, and Tommy has gotten into arguments with him and got put into ‘time out’ as if this place is a pre-school. Tubbo didn’t hate his teacher back then, really, but it took a single stray comment about Tommy for that to change.
So everyone is pretty happy about being a sub, and almost instantaneously, everyone moves around the classroom and swaps seats to be beside their friends. The substitute is none the wiser, projecting an assignment up on the board that nobody makes any moves to do.
Tubbo puts his math notebook back in his bag as Tommy comes over, who throws his stuff on the ground and kicks it underneath his desk before saying, “Hi.”
“Hey, bossman,” Tubbo replies, pausing as he watches Tommy slide something out of his backpack. It looks like a laptop, but not the shit ones that the school provides– it looks genuinely decent, and also definitely not like anything that Tommy owns. Tubbo raises his eyebrow, watching as Tommy grins and sets it on his lap. “The fuck is that?”
“It’s Jack’s,” Tommy explains as it boots up. “He offered to give it to me, but Aimsey told me that he’s trying to pick up flipping laptops and charging way higher, and there is also the tiniest chance that he stole this from his dad. And so I told him, ‘Jack Manifold, I am no criminal, and you should let me rent it, except for free’ and he was all like, ‘I’m not letting you rent it for free, dickhead, pay me something!’ And then I told him that giving me his computer would help him get women, and he seemed to disagree. Which was really quite annoying, honestly, because giving me it for free would guarantee my happiness and therefore draw in women by the thousands, but anyway, I lightly pestered him until he finally gave in.”
Tommy is out of breath by the time he finishes, and Tubbo can only stare at him and say, “Woah.”
“It doesn’t have a lot of games on it, and it’s also loud as fuck,” Tommy warns, “but I reckon it’s at least got Skyrim downloaded or something. Or like, Sims 3 or some shit. I dunno what kind of stuff Jack Manifold plays. Probably something violent.”
“GTA 5?” Tubbo suggests.
Tommy nods. “So much GTA 5. He’s a sick, sick man.”
“Sounds about right.”
As Tommy starts navigating to Steam while frantically trying to hide the sound of the laptop overheating from the sub who appears to be either sleep-deprived or hungover– which, mood, but Tubbo’s hiding it better, maybe because he was worried Wilbur would pop out of nowhere again to be a budget AA or whatever– Tubbo finds himself just… watching Tommy.
Which might be kind of weird, but his stomach has been churning all day, and there’s this prick of paranoia in his head telling him that he has to remember all of Tommy’s mannerisms, as if the other is going to disappear.
Which is also the opposite of their situation. Tommy isn’t going to disappear, and that’s both the best thing about it and the main problem. Tommy and Tubbo are going to be related soon legally, which means Tubbo is going to have to grapple with the social part of it, that he’s currently watching his brother cuss out a Software update pop-up.
He doesn’t think Tommy has the slightest clue that Tubbo is going to be adopted, because he would definitely tell Tubbo the second he realized or at the very least be beaming, which he’s not at all doing– and that’s another thing, actually. Derailing off of the first thought and the adoption and all that shit Tubbo is trying to forget, there’s also the whole, Tommy’s mental health thing. Which is significantly easier to think about, and Tubbo will jump at the chance to think about literally anything else other than the elephant in the room.
Tubbo has spent some time rethinking over and over again whether he made the right call with the whole Ranboo and Dream situation. After outright trying to get Ranboo to talk about what could be going on whenever he decided to leave school alone– which was invasive, sure, but Tubbo was nervous– Tubbo confirmed the fact that Ranboo is going to be unwilling to open up. Which is exactly what he was worried about, because that’s the same way Tommy was while Dream abused him.
Tubbo truly, genuinely believes that Ranboo wouldn’t be running with some abuser. And Tubbo knows that shitty people are hard to detect, and Ranboo could be a shitty person, but Ranboo is also someone who trusted Tubbo way too easily and clearly has a lot of personal shit going on in his life, and Tubbo is inclined to think that that’s more proving of his innocence than anything else.
(Tubbo leans guilty before innocent in a lot of cases. This won’t be one of them. Jury bias, and all that which goes unspoken.)
That doesn’t mean that this must be any easier on Tommy. And, yes, Tubbo isn’t going to sacrifice his friend for his other friend, isn’t going to trolly tracks this whole situation, but he can tell even as Tommy tries to hide it that he’s a lot more jittery now, that he has more anxiety pent up in him that is at least partly Tubbo’s fault.
The only people who really knew Schlatt were Tubbo, Quackity, and fucking Connor, and Tubbo barely talked to Connor because he hardly knew he existed and Connor wasn’t even that close to Schlatt in reality, just some kind of acquaintance or associate or classmate or whatever. And still, Connor leaves a bad taste in Tubbo’s mouth.
Which must be similar for Tommy, but worse. And Tubbo doesn’t want Tommy to hate his friend, but he also doesn’t want Tommy to feel guilty about avoiding him. Because one of the things that Tubbo knows about Tommy, something that he’s supposedly talking out in therapy and trying to sort out, is the fact that the morality of situations when it gets legitimately serious can keep him up for days at a time.
Maybe it’s on Tubbo, too, for making this all ethical. But this isn’t some argument between Jack and Tommy– this is something fucking serious– and Tubbo can’t write it off, either.
(It’s kind of weird, though, that Tubbo hasn’t observed the same anxiety about it from Ranboo. Tubbo’s coming to realize that Ranboo is sort of a very anxious person, apparent in a lot of stuff that he does, but he must also be repressing a whole other side of it for Tubbo to constantly feel as if he’s missing out on some inside joke that’s actually trauma and shouldn’t even be metaphorically compared to an inside joke, for fuck’s sake. Point stands, though.)
Skyrim finally gets sorted out, and Tubbo pays one last glance to the restlessness of Tommy’s face, as if the expressions are afraid to be at rest even if nobody is watching, and averts his eyes to the bouncing of Tommy’s lanky leg with a familiar stain along the jeans as Tommy asks, “Are you ready to game, Tubbo? Are you ready to romance a vampire lady and kill bitches?”
This is the way that Tommy skirts around the tension lingering just under the surface. For Ranboo, it takes the form of blinking away tears in a church and making up bad lies about his family life, layered over with a bandaid of awkward jokes and sweet sentiments.
For Tubbo, it’s scooting over so that he can see the screen over his soon-to-be-brother’s shoulder and saying, “Serana isn’t a marriable character, dickhead, and you’re gonna be on level 1,” so that the conversation will blow up into easily consumed banter, and Tubbo won’t have to dry swallow the interventions before they inevitably come as some preventative measure to keep him and his two best friends afloat.
-
Tommy is surprisingly quiet about Tubbo not coming home on the bus with him.
That doesn’t mean he’s okay with it, because by the look on his face, he has to know that Tubbo is going somewhere with Ranboo. But also, he seems to piece together after a few visible seconds that the act of Tubbo’s vague exclusion is a way of telling him that he doesn’t want Tommy to be about Ranboo in these circumstances, and a full minute of stuttering over words is the last it takes for Tommy to rationalize that Tubbo doesn’t have malicious intent, here.
All he ends up doing is shrugging and saying, “Okay,” with a somewhat stunted, “Let me know if anything- if anything- anything- anything happens, yeah? Uh. See you.”
“Will do,” Tubbo returns, and then Tommy is off to go on the bus, and he at the very least runs into Eryn before he gets there.
Content with knowing that Tommy won’t be alone in his own thoughts– because Tommy can try, but he and Eryn have been friends for almost longer than Tubbo and him have, and Eryn is really fucking stubborn when he needs to be– Tubbo starts wandering into the parking lot and looking for Ranboo’s car.
He ends up finding it, first noticing the actual car itself that has grown to become familiar, and then seeing Ranboo leaning against it, on the phone with someone.
Tubbo frowns, walking slowly as the call carries on, but after he hears Ranboo say, “Okay, bye Niki,” his shoulders relax and he rolls his eyes at himself for being so worried in the first place. At the very least, his mind is one ounce lighter, even if he can feel the tension from everything creeping up the moment he’s not actively fixated on something.
But, hey, at least Ranboo’s okay. That counts for something.
“Hi, Ranboo,” Tubbo says once Ranboo swaps out his phone for his keys and opens up the car for the both of them. Tubbo climbs into the passenger’s side, and it has the comfortable scent of a vanilla tree decoration that people hang up in their cars to avoid the loom of petrol. Tubbo’s pretty grateful, ‘cause he likes the scent of gasoline but can’t deal with the strange difference it has to car emissions.
Ranboo waits until he’s inside the vehicle and backing out of the parking space before he replies. “Hi, Tubbo. Uh, where do you want to go? You didn’t, uh, mention anything over the phone, and lunch was weird, so, uh, yeah. Sorry about that, by the way.”
Tubbo waves it off, because it’s not Ranboo’s fault that the Humanities teacher gave him a bullshit test and he had to swap lunch slots because of it, and also because Tubbo wouldn’t have had a plan to tell him even if they did have lunch together. Which is to say, Tubbo didn’t have any location in mind in the first place, because he had been on the brink of breaking down in his bathroom when he asked Ranboo to hang out and wasn’t exactly racking his mind with the geography of their town. And then continued to not think of places because he was still, y’know, breaking down a bit.
All that being said, Tubbo’s brain defaults to the first viable location range: parks.
Because despite the temporary relief of laughing over Tommy continuously getting killed by frost trolls in Skyrim and overhearing an intriguing anecdote Aimsey was sharing about trade school emails that Jack kept accidentally interrupting, Tubbo can still tell that this afternoon, this day, is just going to spiral from here, and privacy is ideal for that.
Not that a park is exceptionally private, but if Tubbo and Ranboo go to a secluded enough part of it, no random child or dog mom is going to come up to them and pry into Tubbo’s deep emotional distress.
(Though they still could, come to Tubbo like they always used to, what’s wrong, kid, is everything okay? Where are your par- )
There are a few options in the park range. There’s the one that Ranboo took him to after the Quackity phone call, but Tubbo honestly found that park kind of lame albeit decent for what Ranboo’s intent had been at the time. There’s also the park that he skipped stones at and talked to Ranboo in, which might be nice to revisit.
And then there’s this one other park, one that he doesn’t think Ranboo will have seen before, just because it’s also a little shit. But, it’s Tubbo’s favorite place in town, maybe, ‘cause it also has a pond and is usually pretty private, and also because it was one of the places Tommy took him to when they were younger.
Considering what Tubbo’s mind has been concentrated on since Phil’s conversation with him yesterday, maybe it would be a good idea to revisit what could be considered the origin of his friendship with his best friend soon-to-be-brother that is at the heart of what is threatening Tubbo’s stability.
In a vastly underwhelming way of introducing this place, Tubbo casually tells Ranboo, “There’s this park. I’ll put in the address, but it’s kinda cool. Shouldn’t be far.”
“Okay,” Ranboo agrees easily. “Do you just want to like, hang out there and everything?”
“Yeah.” Tubbo goes ahead and punches the address into the GPS, which is slightly a struggle and Tubbo has no fucking clue how Ranboo navigates it while wearing gloves all the time, but he manages to get it in there and relaxes back in the seat with a huff. “Just needed some Ranboo time, y’know?”
Ranboo’s lip quirks up in a way that feels a little bit snarky, the bastard. “Is Ranboo time so highly desirable?”
“Yup,” Tubbo says decisively, and Ranboo turns from smug to a bit flustered. Serves him right.
The car quickly goes back into silence with that, though, and Tubbo feels the anxiety under his skin creep the second it’s quiet, and even if he has to keep talking every second until they get to the park in order to keep it at bay, he will, because he’s not going to break down in front of Ranboo, not here, not now, and-
-and look at him, getting worked up at five seconds of silence, that’s not the way that Tubbo is supposed to be. Five seconds of silence, like that band, isn’t it? Just like that bad. Or, no, five seconds of summer? Silence? Slumber? Something? Tubbo needs to get a grip because he has nobody to serenade and if he doesn’t reel himself in within the next three seconds-
(Over and over, can’t be idle for a second or it hits, can’t be here, have to say something, this isn’t meant to happen but you need to hear his voice- )
“If you, uh,” Tubbo’s voice comes out too forced, yet not loud enough, but also quieter than he wants. It catches Ranboo’s attention, though, and Tubbo swallows before finishing the question he didn’t even realize he was starting to ask, “if you had to go somewhere. Where would you go?”
It’s a stupid question, and probably the worst possible conversation topic Tubbo could pick considering that it’s incredibly relevant in his own life, like, the literal thing he is trying to avoid talking about. But, Ranboo being Ranboo, he lets out a humming noise as he thinks, humoring Tubbo even though he really shouldn’t have to.
“Uh, I guess like, just in general?” Ranboo asks to clarify. “Because I mean- I mean, there’s a lot of ways I could take that.”
“Just,” Tubbo responds, feeling a little out of breath, “just anywhere.”
“I- well, hm, actually. That’s a- that’s a good question, actually, yeah.” There’s something calming about Ranboo’s voice, and there’s something distressing about the way that Tubbo wishes he could just keep talking forever, because Tubbo has this stupid thought, sometimes, that if Ranboo’s talking, Tubbo can breathe again. “I think it would be nice to be in the forest, maybe.”
“Yeah?” Tubbo replies. “I like forests.”
“They’re really cool, yeah,” Ranboo agrees, a smile on his face again. “Though I think if I, uh, could go anywhere, then maybe- maybe, like, outer space?”
Huh. That’s an interesting thought. “Have you heard those shitty like, would you rather questions, the one that’s like ‘outer space or the deep ocean?’ ‘Cause I feel like space is obviously the better answer to that.”
“Yeah,” Ranboo’s smile grows a bit smaller, but he nods all the same. And it’s not gone entirely, so Tubbo’s breath doesn’t catch yet. “I don’t really like the ocean much, I don’t think. Water kind of unsettles me. Like, the way it hits you all at once in waves, and like, you can’t really do much aside from latch onto an anchor or try to swim out? Like, in space, you’re kind of just out there, existent or not, but in water… you like, have to exist. But not really. You know?”
There are a few times, Tubbo thinks, that Ranboo says something and Tubbo doesn’t really understand what he’s talking about. That there has to be something more to what he’s saying, because God knows that the same dynamic happens between Tubbo and Tommy and that Tommy has been trying to puzzle out all of Tubbo’s vagueness over the years.
But with Ranboo, it’s different, because everything about Ranboo feels like a metaphor that Tubbo is always too late to catch.
“I like jellyfish,” Tubbo says, which is a stupid counter to the obviously significant piece of information Ranboo just gave him, but Tubbo can think that over later when every second isn’t threatening to suck him up and eject him like some useless piece of astral matter. “And sharks, and fish and stuff. They’re cool. But yeah, space is way fucking cooler. I like the planets a lot.”
“Mhm mhm. Do you, uh, do you have a favorite?”
“Jupiter,” Tubbo answers quickly. “But Mars is kinda cool too. You?”
“Saturn,” Ranboo tells him, which is such a Ranboo answer to give, honestly. “Neptune is cool, too.”
“Not a Uranus fan?” And Tubbo punctuates every last syllable of it, for the sake of the low-hanging joke of the galaxy.
Ranboo’s clearly not above it, because he only barely tries to hide the way he snickered at that. “Well I- well I liked that planet, before people started saying that. ”
“Kind of close-minded of you, Ranboo,” Tubbo points out, “you should be more accepting of Uranus.”
“How is that- I’m- I hate you.” Tubbo laughs at Ranboo’s attempted angry expression, which he’s not really good at and also immediately breaks when Tubbo starts laughing. “You’re just the worst, actually.”
“Oh, I’m sure.”
Ranboo rolls his eyes and Tubbo snorts, kicking one of his feet up on the dashboard. “Anyway. Yeah, space is cool as fuck. I wanted to be an astronaut when I was a kid.”
“Really?”
Tubbo nods. “Yeah. I mean, I kinda wanted to be a lot of things.” Professional scuba diver, because jellyfish are cool. Accountant, because that’s where the money is and he kind of needed that at the time. Teacher, because all his classes were really boring and he was determined he could do a better job. “But astronaut was the big one. Dunno if- actually, I guess you haven’t been in my room, right?” Because the last time Ranboo came over, they were in Tommy’s.
“I haven’t,” Ranboo confirms.
Huh. “Yeah, well, there’s a lot of star shit in there. Like, posters and stuff. Did you know NASA has, like, Halloween-themed posters of planetary things every year?” The ones this year were kind of eh compared to last years, but considering he’ll have to pack everything up an- wait, no. He- well. Point is, he doesn’t need any more. “When I was a kid, though, I didn’t have a ton of star stuff, so I kind of just pretended I did. I really wanted to go to space, though, and- and, uh. This sounds kind of stupid.”
Ranboo shakes his head, “Go ahead.”
What Tubbo wants to say is really, really embarrassing, only, just ‘cause it’s kind of dumb, but if Ranboo asks to hear it then Tubbo thinks he might be fine spilling it. Better here than with someone like Jack, who’d bully him the second he’d say it. Unless Ranboo does, too, which is fine, Tubbo likes being made fun of, but, just. Not now. Maybe. What the hell.
“I thought it’d be kind of cool, y’know, to- to, like. Stargaze on a different planet. I guess.” Even though astronauts don’t really do that. There’s a lot of technical shit, a lot of eating the same food and observing small changes in your surroundings and staying all bundled up in a shuttle too at risk to get that far outside it. Maybe that’s why Tubbo got sick of the dream; maybe that’s why he had it in the first place. Or whatever.
Ranboo doesn’t laugh at him, though, because he’s Ranboo and he’s polite and he humors all of Tubbo’s stupid thoughts. “I think that sounds nice,” Ranboo replies softly, “I think that’d be cool, actually. You’d be able to see the stars a lot clearer.”
“I dunno if you could even look at them,” Tubbo realizes as he thinks more about it, “‘cause wouldn’t it hurt your eyes and stuff? Like, to stare directly at them?”
“Well, I guess you just don’t stare directly at them,” Ranboo counters easily, which, fair enough but also doesn’t really fix the issue, here. He continues, though, “I mean, I think you can just look out of the corner of your eye, if you wanted to. The stars are still there. They’re looking at a lot of stuff, and you’re looking at a lot of stuff, so you don’t really have to- really have to look at each other? I don’t know if that, uh, if that makes any sense, actually.”
“I get it.” Because Tubbo kind of does. “I think that would still fuck up your eyes, though.”
“Oh, definitely,” Ranboo agrees, “but maybe that’s worth it, y’know?”
Tubbo thinks about that for a second, then nods. “I think stars are probably the only thing worth going blind for.”
“I can- yeah, actually. Yeah.”
Tubbo considers asking what Ranboo cut himself off from saying, because of how abrupt that transition was, but he also doesn’t want to push, so he’ll leave it be.
“How close are we to the park?” Tubbo asks, then immediately notices that the GPS is right in his face and he could probably just check. “Oh, seven minutes. That tracks, this park is walking distance from my- or, uh, I guess Tommy’s house?” Well, his too, but- he’s supposed to not being thinking about that, for fuck’s sake. “Anyway. Yeah.”
“Yeah.” Ranboo echoes, braking at a stoplight and turning to look over at Tubbo. He meets his eyes and asks, “Do you have any, uh. Any stories from the park? With you and, uh- well, you didn’t say specifically, but- just, stories in general from it?”
And Tubbo has so fucking many stories to tell, ones from Tubbo and Tommy’s excursions out afterschool to hang out until Wilbur swang by to pick them up after his shift, all stories that have grown to feel both sacred and dangerous with the current situation the two of them are in. But, if Ranboo’s asking despite everything between Tommy and Ranboo– which is a whole other layer, and Ranboo’s repeated lack of regard to this tension unnerves Tubbo, but no, he’s shoving that down, actually– then Tubbo will give him what he asks for.
Tubbo clears his throat as the car starts driving again, and he only takes a second longer of silence before he fills the silence with, “Me and Tommy accidentally broke a swing, once-” and doesn’t stop talking even when the car is in park and his feet hit the concrete of a parking lot.
-
“-And yeah, so that’s the worst thing that happened to me in middle school,” Tubbo concludes, grinning as he sees Ranboo’s shellshocked face following the vivid story of how Tommy started profusely bleeding at this park at midnight because of a crayfish incident.
It takes a few seconds for Ranboo to regain his words, which is fine, because he and Tubbo are now in the park, walking down to where Tubbo loosely remembers the water to have been, and the nature sounds are keeping the silence dead, or the noise alive, or something like that.
Eventually, though, Ranboo simply replies, “... Wow.”
“Yeah, that’s what I was up to at age twelve.” Tubbo shoves his hands into his pockets, looking up at the sky. It’s overcast, which makes sense for the first day of December, but it’d be nice if the weather wasn’t really depressing right now. The atmosphere should at least give him some fucking encouragement.
“That’s, uh, exciting,” Ranboo comments. “I was definitely not doing that when I was 12, I think.”
“What were you doing, then?”
Ranboo pauses in his steps. After a few seconds, Tubbo turns to look at him, curious at the prolonged silence, but Ranboo suddenly answers, somewhat distractedly, “I just read a lot, I think. And, uh, listened to music. I didn’t- I didn’t really do much.”
Tubbo gets the sense that Ranboo might not be entirely honest about that, because of the way he looks a little nervous, but to be fair Tubbo had left out the part of his middle school anecdotes where he was taste-testing different brands of whiskey, so he can’t really judge Ranboo for this. “Fairs,” he says agreeably, shrugging before playing off Ranboo’s lie. “What kind of stuff do you like to read?”
Ranboo flushes, which is an interesting response to that question, but it makes sense when Ranboo says, “Uh. A lot of romance, actually.”
“Aww-”
“Shut up,” Ranboo cuts him off, but there’s no bite in his voice. “It’s interesting, because I don’t- this, uh. This sounds kind of weird to say, but. I don’t really… get romance a ton? Not really, anyway. I just don’t think I’ve found the right person, I guess-” he clears his throat, “-but it’s still interesting to read. I like, uh, I like reading about how people interact and uh- happy endings, and stuff.”
It’s a somewhat unexpected response from Ranboo, because on one hand, Tubbo probably could have called that he’s a romance novel reader from a mile away; the sappiness gives him away. The other part of that, though, is what Tubbo’s more interested in, because Tubbo also doesn’t really ‘get romance a ton’, as Ranboo put it. Mostly just because Tubbo hates PDA, and he gets awkward and uncomfortable in romance movies, and it’s fine if his friends want to kiss whoever they want to, so long as he’s not around. He likes his friends a hell of a lot, and there’s nothing he would logically gain from a romantic relationship that he can’t get in a friendship.
Maybe that’s his problem. That he’s being too logical about it. At one point in time, he might have taken that as like, a problem, when his main role-models were broken marriages and shitty relationships and whatever Schlatt and Quackity had going on. Now, though, years later from that realization (is it a realization if he’s always kind of known that?), he’s just kind of resigned to it. He finds people hot sometimes, but he doesn’t want to date anybody, unless they can overthrow the government and commit crimes together, but then again, Tubbo would probably just get Tommy to do that with him and he definitely does not want to kiss Tommy. Jesus fucking Christ. That’s awful. Why did he think of that even hypothetically? He wants to shove his face into the dirt and die.
He’s with Ranboo, though, who might take some concern to that gesture, so Tubbo just smiles at him and says, “Yeah, fairs. You also like, uh, Edgar Allan Poe and shit, don’t you?”
“Mhm mhm,” Ranboo confirms, “horror is my second favorite genre, I think. I like mysteries, too, but I don’t think I’m smart enough for the good ones. Like, Agatha Christie ones. The ones at our school library kinda- they kinda suck, I’ll be honest.”
Tubbo has no idea who Agatha is, but he hopes they’re doing well. They’re probably dead though, admittedly. That’s unfortunate. “Yeah. I don’t do a lot of reading, but I like sci-fi and horror movies. I reckon the two of us would be a kickass team doing mysteries, though. Wilbur used to try and get me and Tommy to help him figure ‘em out in games and such. Tommy was pretty okay at them, but supposedly I was really good.”
“I can see that,” Ranboo replies, and there’s a smile on his face that’s filled with some kind of emotion that makes Tubbo’s chest hurt in a kinda-good way if he looks at it too long, which he chalks up to his hubris and tries to push through.
“I like ciphers. Do you know much about them?”
“Not really, actually.”
“Oh. Fairs.”
“Do you want to tell me about them?”
Tubbo’s not sure why that takes him by surprise, but it’s been a while since he’s actually gotten to talk about ciphers, so he immediately launches into a whole tangent, “Yes, okay. So. I learned Enigma first, which is kind of a shit place to start ‘cause it’s super fucking complicated, but it’s really fun to do. That one, like, you’re given a string of letters with the number of characters, like, matching the message, but it goes through a lot of complicated shit to translate. Like, there are rotors that can start at different positions and that completely can throw off the code ‘cause it shifts all the letters, and there’s the plug board and alphabet ring and shit. It’s kind of a lot.”
“I really liked it, though,” Tubbo continues, Ranboo guiding them around the park and giving him small looks as he talks, “because I used to get my school friends- well, kinda friends, anyway, it was like, elementary school middle school-ish, to send me a bunch of phrases and I would shove them in. Think they got a bit sick of my shit, but it was so fucking fun, dude. Oh my God, and there was also- there’s also this one thing, uh, I couldn’t ever pronounce the name, but it looked like Vinegar. It’s a cipher with this huge fucking table and, like, it matches up the English alphabet letters on two axes and each row has all the alphabet letters, but they shift as you go down the column, and it’s like- it’s like a shit does of Caesar shifts ontop of each other. Y’know?”
“Mhm mhm.”
“Yeah, and- and, okay, hexadecimal is really cool for like, data storage purposes, but like- that’s a whole other thing, it’s really fucking sick though. And then there’s base64, which is like, a really easy just- transfers code into ASCII, or, transfers words into ASCII characters, which, I kinda know Java so it’s sort of easy for it to stick in my brain. So that’s an easy one. Super cool, though. Anyway, yeah. Sorry, kind of rambled a lot there.” Tubbo feels a bit out of breath and also doesn’t recognize where they even are within the park, now, which is weird because he feels like not a lot of time has passed, but maybe he just got really carried away.
Ranboo doesn’t seem to mind, though. “That seems really cool,” he says, adjusting one of his gloves up his wrist and fidgeting with the end, giving Tubbo another smile. “I don’t know computer science, but I know a little bit about ASCII and stuff, so that’s- so that’s really cool. Yeah, that’s just- that’s just super cool.”
“It’s so fucking cool,” Tubbo repeats, because it really is, and he’s also glad Ranboo tolerated him rambling on about it. Is honestly really glad Ranboo got him started on this, anyway, because the more he talks about it the less he has to think about everything else. “Techno and Wilbur got me back into it after like, a bit of time of inactivity. Like, I mentioned it to them, and turns out Wilbur is super into this stuff even though he hates mathematics and shit, and he’s really analytical so he’s good at it, and I think Techno just had a phase with them and memorized a shit ton of ciphers, so he taught me some weird ones. That’s how I learned about the Vinegar cipher and shit.”
“I think Techno’s mentioned ciphers to me once or twice,” Ranboo says. “He hasn’t gone into much detail, so I still don’t know them beyond what you’ve said now, but he’s mentioned them, yeah.”
Tubbo nods, opening his mouth to add something, but in the seconds before he can force words out, he’s keenly aware of the stale air in his mouth, lingering as his brain pushes to keep talking about Techno and Wilbur, even though he shouldn’t. He closes his mouth and nods, because he’s here to avoid all of that, just wants a second away from it, but it’s difficult to recollect memories of doing ciphers with them because half his brain is split between thinking oh, bonding with my best friend’s brothers and the other half says one of the first shared hobbies between me and my older brothers. Both are technically correct, but neither are right, and it makes him feel a little sick.
“Yeah,” he says to conclude the topic before suggesting, “Let’s sit down somewhere.”
“There’s some rocks beside the water,” Ranboo offers. “Want to go there?”
Tubbo used to go there all the time with Tommy. That’s where the crayfish story happened, because a lot of them are in the waters there. It’s a fond place and not exactly where he wants to go, because he remembers standing there not that long ago with his best friend thinking I’m finally happy and having that crumble down hours later with another Schlatt nightmare.
He was fifteen then, and he’s seventeen now, and he doesn’t want to think about this shit. Not when he’s with Ranboo, not when he’s fine.
So, he shoves down his emotions in an effort that almost feels like physical exertion, which, yeah, there’s a bit of that in everything, but it’s not supposed to feel so difficult.
Regardless, he follows Ranboo to a little rocky side to a pond. Ranboo tucks his legs underneath him, so long that they’d probably submerge in the water if he tried to hang them over, and watches Tubbo sit cross-legged and start running his fingertip through the water. It feels cold, which makes sense for the winter, but he likes the jolt it gives him.
“This place is pretty,” Ranboo comments.
“Yeah, it’s real nice.” Tubbo’s voice sounds a little wrong. He doesn’t know why, but he plunges his finger a bit further into the water, tries to draw penises out in it– which don’t hold, obviously, because hydrogen bonding cohesion shit– and takes a deep breath. He’s not sure why his voice sounds wrong. Is it even possible for voices to do that?
(Well, yes, he’s trans so, like, voice is part of that- point is, yes, but not like this. He doesn’t get what this is.)
Ranboo stays quiet for a second, and Tubbo half-worries that he can hear what he’s thinking before realizing that’s a stupid though, illogical and stupid and Tubbo isn’t meant to have those. Maybe he just fucking woke up wrong today. The past couple of days. Week. Year. Lifetime. Seventeen years old, planning a runaway or an adoption or something, and still not sure how to wake up on the right side of the bed.
It’s so fucking stupid of him. He was fine just now. He’s always fine, just, as a person, he always is fine. He’s not sure why Ranboo makes him feel weird. Not that it’s Ranboo’s fault, necessarily, because this happens with other people too, like Tommy, but he hates this emotional shit.
It was always so easy back at home. Schlatt shoved all his feelings down because there was so much there and if they came up, they’d kill him faster than the heart attack did, and Quackity felt too much all the time but slowly started to shut it down, a process that Tubbo saw– and of course, he was the stupid little kid with too many emotions, but he learned fast. He’s his mother’s son, whoever the fuck his mother was– Tubbo’s pretty sure the story goes that she killed herself in the hospital, but he doesn’t really care about it, knows she’d abandon him either way, ‘cause there’s a reason he doesn’t have a dad and it’s not like every parent can just casually kill themselves after labor happens, frequencies are not that high for that– which means he shoves it all down and doesn’t think about it, or he’ll drown.
But Tommy makes it hard, with his heart on his sleeve that he never takes off even after he goes through hell, just shoves another layer that Tubbo can peel back easily. And Phil and Techno and Wilbur are all so much more quiet with their emotions, tiptoeing around the parts of their history that Tommy and Tubbo obviously don’t know, but they’re still leagues better than Schlatt which means Tubbo is leagues more emotional with them.
And goddammit, Ranboo makes it so fucking difficult. Because Ranboo makes Tubbo want to feel, and Ranboo makes Tubbo feel shit that he doesn’t even have a name for yet, and it’s so fucking difficult because when Tubbo breaks, people like Ranboo and Tommy and Phil and Techno and Wilbur help piece him together, and that’s not what’s supposed to happen.
It fucks with his head. It’s been years of unwinding all the things that kept him strong, what kept him alive when he was a kid. He’s not going to survive in Phil’s house because the emotions laid dormant are going to eat him alive, and he’s not going to survive out in the streets because he’s not strong enough anymore, and he’s not going to survive the next five minutes because Ranboo is looking at him with concern, and Tubbo’s plunging his hand deep into the water like he’s digging for something that can fix this-
-but Ranboo is gently pulling Tubbo’s hand out of the water and asking, “Is everything okay?”
And Tubbo has nothing in his palm but Ranboo’s gloved fingers, and for all the ambiguity of them, they don’t bury any lies. Tubbo’s left honest under the overcast sky, and he hates himself for it.
“I’m fine,” he tries to lie, words coming out a little strained. “Just a little, like, stressed. Y’know?”
“A lot’s going on,” Ranboo tells him, which is a laughable sentence if Ranboo wasn’t trying to be deadass genuine, “and you’ve been, y’know. You’ve been- yeah. Yeah. It’s been a lot.” There’s a pause, one tense with Ranboo trying to piece together how to respond, an effort that Tubbo notices keenly with every passing second. It eventually culminates to a simple but genuine, “You can, uh, you can talk to me about anything. If you ever need to or, uh, want to.”
And God, Tubbo wants to. That’s the worst part. He wants to say everything that’s ever happened to him, all the awful and unspeakable shit, the stuff he swore to take to his grave, spill it all out into this pond of nostalgia holding his friend’s hand, just wants to get it out there and never think about it again. He wants to be selfish just for a second longer, just long enough to tell Ranboo the story from the start to the end, how Tubbo lost his parents before he ever had them to how Tubbo is spiraling at the prospect of having a family again. He wants to peel himself apart and reveal to Ranboo that he’s a terrible, pathetic, fucked-up person, and still have the other hold his hand gently by the end.
He wants to cry, but Schlatt always said that criers are pussies and that’s why Schlatt cried a lot into his bottle and Quackity cried a lot all the time and Tubbo had to be better, had to be stronger, because everyone cries but Tubbo doesn’t.
(He already has, though. He cried after an argument at Tommy’s house and he cried over fishing and he cried to himself after the funeral and he cried watching a children’s movie and he cries so fucking much, but his eyes are still burning, and he wishes they could stop for just a second, stop fucking reminding him of how much is left.)
Nobody deserves to hear Tubbo’s baggage, though. It’s too fucking much, and Tubbo knows that he can’t just tell someone all of that, can’t drudge it up out of him, because it’d be selfish and it’d be embarrassing and absolutely nobody would stay after that, even if he wants them to. It would only take a piece of his story to send people spiraling away, and Phil is going to learn that soon if he hasn’t already, and Ranboo will, too, and then Tubbo will be alone.
And he’s fucking scared of being alone, because what is Tubbo when he doesn’t have anyone to be strong for?
Ranboo’s waiting patiently for an answer, and there’s nothing Tubbo can say to satisfy him, just slaps on the generalized, “It’s a lot of shit, Ranboo,” and prays that the other drops it, that the other forgets about all of this.
But Ranboo’s built up of kindness and waterlogged wood. “I don't mind.”
Tubbo tries to focus on the shallow taste of lingering air in his mouth that swallows up the unsaid words he hasn’t formulated yet. He focuses on that taste, that feeling , and he focuses on the sound of Ranboo’s jeans shuffling against the rock, and he focuses on the way that the water felt touching his skin, and he focuses on the way that Ranboo’s smile made him feel, and he focuses on everything that makes him feel just a little bit alive.
Nothing makes him better, though.
And so, taste bitter and sound rotten and touch undeserved, Tubbo says, “Phil wants to adopt me.”
Ranboo scans his face with his gentle gaze, and Tubbo gets the courage to turn his face a little in his direction, but not enough to meet his eyes. He thinks that would kill him. But he can still feel how Ranboo looks carefully, tracking his expression as he replies, “Okay. And that’s…?”
Tubbo laughs, because this is so ridiculous. You’d have to cock a gun in eight year old Tubbo’s mouth to earn the confessions he’s willingly giving to Ranboo for no fucking reason. “That’s bad, yeah,” and that’s one hell of an understatement.
“Why?” Ranboo asks. His knee brushes Tubbo’s, and his other hand props him up on the rock, and Tubbo selfishly wants to hold both his hands, even though one should be more than enough. Maybe he should stand, fight off the feeling.
He doesn’t know how to answer Ranboo’s question. There’s so much context behind all of this, and he’s not going to brief him on the years of his life that occurred in order for this very circumstance to be happening. It’s an open secret that Tubbo was related to Schlatt, that Schlatt wasn’t the best person, that Tubbo is living with Tommy’s family and pretending like they’re related.
He sometimes forgets how much more there is to that, though. That even if Tommy and Phil are aware of that, there’s so much else – Tubbo’s scars and why Tubbo never went to the police and what the fuck kind of context was behind all of this for Tubbo to have lived with his older alcoholic cousin for years and then suddenly break away. There’s so much to it that Tubbo doesn’t know how to explain, and he wishes that he could just send it telepathically to Tommy or something and let him explain it, but everyone has the pieces that Tubbo is trying to hide without the framework of a puzzle they’re trying to make.
And Tubbo is terrified to let them know what the final result is meant to look like, but there are only so many combinations.
Ranboo asks Tubbo why it’s a bad thing that Phil’s adopting him, and Tubbo realizes that to Ranboo, Tubbo has been part of Phil’s family for years already, that he already was adopted. Tubbo has to explain that he never really was, that it was always a pit-stop for something greater, that you don’t get attached to the gas station on your road trip of dying in your 20s even if they have the best priced chips. That Phil’s family is already complete without him, that he’s just excess that drove the family apart, that he’s the reason Wilbur went away and he’s the reason Tommy struggled so hard with his trauma and he’s the reason that Techno doesn’t remember the family traditions anymore.
He knows that nothing he could tell Ranboo would make him believe that, because Ranboo has it in his head that Tubbo’s a good person, when Ranboo’s on the same kind of road trip, too, getting attached to every deer crossing sign and turning on the headlights because there’s nobody else out there in his life, just him and one road.
He can’t back off now, not with the way his throat chokes up like he’s suffocating on something awful, can’t leave Ranboo here when Tubbo doesn’t know how to drive, doesn’t know how to live a day on his own, and maybe Tubbo’s dying out here, this final test he’s meant to pass, but he’s already fucked it up because Ranboo is a deserted house tucked into the side of a mountain and Tubbo needs a rest stop before he keeps walking to his grave.
“I need to learn how to survive on my own,” Tubbo finally says, because that’s a true statement and Ranboo, working a job and doing research independently and driving a car, would have to agree with it. “And I- I forget how to be an adult when I’m with them.” Because Tommy’s just a kid. And Tubbo’s trying to be better than that.
Ranboo’s eyes furrow. “You’re seventeen,” he states, and Tubbo sighs because he knows what Ranboo is going to say. “You don’t- you don’t need to learn how to survive on your own yet. You- people can help you, they can- yeah. You don’t need to be on your own.”
“You are,” Tubbo points out. “You’re surviving basically on your own.”
“I’m not- well, I’m not exactly the best case study, or, like- I’m not the best example for this kind of thing,” Ranboo gets out, anxiously laughing as he does. And Tubbo wants to ask him, still, how does he live by himself, how did he get to the place he’s in right now, what is he doing so right that Tubbo’s fucking up?
Tubbo tucks his knees up to his chin, head so heavy it feels like it’ll roll off his shoulders and fall into the pond in front of him. “There’s a difference between you and me,” he says, “there’s a difference between me and Tommy’s entire family.”
“We’re both seventeen year olds with a- with a complicated family situation.” Ranboo is facing Tubbo entirely now, and Tubbo wishes he could pry the heterochromatic gaze off of him, because it’s a pretty stare and Tubbo doesn’t deserve pretty things when he feels so ugly right now. Internally, at least. Though he knows he doesn’t look great, either. “What makes the two of us so different?”
If Tubbo were to be cruel, here, he’d call Ranboo stupid for not being able to see it. He knows how idealism works, though, that he gave Ranboo rose-colored glasses because Tubbo is his mother’s son and he manipulates people like that without even trying.
He doesn’t want to be an abuser. But he doesn’t want to be a victim, either, and there’s no room for anything else when his family tree is populated with people that managed to be both.
He lets out a slightly choked laugh, looking down at the pond, wondering how Tommy could have stood beside him here years ago and not been able to see it. Fifteen year old Tubbo bled his horribleness out like some blood-letting disease, and he’s never been able to stop it, something chronic and forever and he’s bleeding out on Ranboo’s hands, stained red for the crime of trying to hold Tubbo gently.
Tubbo’s voice sounds weird when he speaks, sounds quiet and resigned and cold, but he’s known this his entire life, just has to choke out five words. And he does with a bitter smile and a shaky hand, telling his newest friend: “Because I’m a bad person.”
Immediately, he can tell that Ranboo wants to contest that point, but everything is spilling out of Tubbo’s throat like he has to hack out all the disease; plague-holders are victims and abusers and Tubbo is a victim and an abuser and he doesn’t know how Tommy ever let him into his house when he’s so terrified of victims and abusers-
“I am,” Tubbo insists, “and that’s fine, that’s- that’s been fine, because I’m trying, I- I’m trying to be better. But I- I was never meant to be a good person, y’know, some people don’t get the chance , and- and nobody wants someone like me, right? Born wrong and speaks wrong and is wrong- and I know you don’t know them all well but Phil’s family is made of good people, and I’m- I’m not that? And I’ll- I’ll ruin it, because nobody wants- nobody wants someone inherently awful, y’know? I- I know I wouldn’t. Right?” Tubbo’s voice cracks, and he feels like a pre-teen again, stumbling through the years of optimism and thinking it gets any better than what it was. “So- so it doesn’t make sense, to adopt me when- when he knows that he doesn’t want me, right? It doesn’t make sense, and- and no one wants me, Ranboo, not even me.”
There’s a silence that follows Tubbo’s ramble, one that he knows means he must have fucked up more than he already knows he has, for Ranboo to be so silent, watching Tubbo as his mishappen mouth spills out the words and his eyes tear up before he bites back the tears, because this is all just logical and he’s not crying, he and Ranboo are talking about logic and there’s nothing wrong with that.
It’s terrifying, because there’s a moment where Tubbo realizes that Ranboo has enough on his plate, enough bullshit he has to fight through with a compassionate smile just to make it through the day, and if he let go of Tubbo now and left him in the park, his life would be all the more easier for it.
Tubbo waits for the moment that Ranboo stands up to leave, but instead, he hears Ranboo make a hum of acknowledgement, the same way he listened to Tubbo’s bullshit talk about ciphers, and then tells Tubbo with a low, soft voice, “What if I want you?”
Ranboo still doesn’t fucking understand.
And that’s good, because- because Tubbo doesn’t want him to understand, wants to stop talking wants to shut up wants to turn off the part of his mind that’s making him say this– but he needs Ranboo to get it, too, needs Ranboo to understand what’s so awful about him so that he can leave and Tubbo can be rid of one more person he has to feign strength for.
Tubbo pulls his hand out of Ranboo’s grip and pushes himself up, hands immediately jumping up to his face, cradling the scar along the right side that reminds him that permanently makes him unwantable, because he can still remember how it felt when he got it, has tried to outrun that memory for so long but Ranboo is still sitting down, looking up at him like he expects some answer from Tubbo he can’t give,
and Tubbo starts talking, haphazard and desperate to get Ranboo to understand.
“I’m- I- I’m just like Schlatt, Ranboo,” Tubbo confesses, “I’m a- I just fucking hurt people, and I was in that house, and I- and I saw everything, I was everything, was the reason that Schlatt was like that, the reason Schlatt’s dead, and- and Ranboo, I- I’m a fucking criminal, I-” The world is starting to get blurry, but Tubbo blinks back his tears because Ranboo deserves to know- “I drink and I steal and I- and I do so much shit, and it’s not- it’s not even funny, it’s not okay, I- there’s nothing good about me, Ranboo. My body’s all fucked up and my mind is- I still feel like a child but I need to be stronger like you, need to be better like everyone , but I can’t because I was born wrong and- there’s no shot I could have just became this, that I grew into this, I’ve tried to be good but I can’t, and- and there’s so much better, so I don’t- there’s no way that you could want me because there’s nothing to- there’s nothing to want. I’m nothing, Ranboo, just a- just a pawn, and I- I’ve manipulated everyone into thinking that I’m some good guy when I’m just not. I’m just not.” Tubbo feels his entire body start to shake. “And I can’t- I can’t- I’m not what you want me to be, I- I can’t be, and -”
“Tubbo.”
Tubbo stops rambling, hands tugging out strands of his hair as Ranboo speaks, voice calm, “Tubbo, please just look at me.”
For a second, Tubbo wants to shake his head and hide, scared of what Ranboo’s thinking, what Ranboo is planning to do. But, there’s a desperation in Ranboo’s voice, too, and Tubbo remembers that no matter how disastrous this may be, Ranboo is terrified . And Tubbo would do anything to take away that fear.
He slowly moves his hands to look down at Ranboo, and he feels a sob build in his throat at the way that his eyes are filled with something soft, like Tubbo’s just told him about a new band he likes, not confessed to the things he swore he would never tell anyone. Ranboo looks at Tubbo the way that he always does, with this affection that Tubbo will never understand, that Tubbo will never deserve, but he can’t tear his eyes away, drunk on the care Ranboo still shows him no matter what his next words are.
“What if I want you?” Ranboo repeats even softer,
and Tubbo feels something in him break.
In seconds, the fervently tucked away tears come spilling out, and Tubbo’s hiccuping through ugly sobs, stricken with grief and wrenched painfully out of him. His entire body shakes, and he tries to wipe away his tears but more keep coming, and he needs to stabilize himself because he feels like he’s collapsing inward, the pain of losing Schlatt and the fear of Phil’s decision and the agony of knowing that Ranboo still sees something worthwhile in him all overtaking him. He needs an anchor, needs something to latch onto because he’s flailing out at sea, body sinking from the fatigue of having made it this far with so many years left to go, and Tubbo’s tired of this, tired of everything, wishing none of it ever happened. He hates crying, needs to be strong, needs all of this to stop, but he can’t get himself to cry, both can and can’t remember the last time he let himself, doesn’t understand why he has so many more tears to cry now but can’t conceptualize how much he’s deprived himself of it. The world’s spinning, and Tubbo wants it all to end in that instant, because he can’t take this, wants to swallow back his words and choke on the guilt of saying what he should have taken to the grave, but he can’t go back now and his trajectory is just this panic forever more-
-and suddenly, Ranboo’s in front of him, asking, “Is it- is a hug okay- can I-”
Tubbo surges forward, head colliding with Ranboo’s shoulder as he wraps his arm around him and lets out a wail, tears burning into Ranboo’s sweatshirt.
Without hesitation, Ranboo wraps his arms around Tubbo tightly, one holding him up and the other in his hair, keeping him upright against his chest like Tubbo is someone deserving of that affection. And he’s so, so wrong, but Tubbo can’t bring himself to tell the other to go away, to save himself, because Ranboo is so warm and his hugs feel like the anchor keeping Tubbo safe, and his breath hitches again because he just wants to be safe-
Ranboo whispers, “It’s okay, I- I’ve got you, it’s- you’re going to be okay. You’re safe, I’m right- I’m right here. I’m not going anywhere, I- I promise, I- you’re going to be okay. It’s just us, just- just me and you, Tubbo, it’s okay, I promise.”
It’s not just them. Because yes, the park is empty and the weather is shitty and it feels like it’s started to rain, but Tubbo can feel Schlatt behind him sobbing into his drink, and Quackity shouting to the 911 operators, and Tommy screaming at another night terror, and the way Ranboo sounded when he cried in the church. And Tubbo can feel his skin start to fry and his bones start to ache and his kidneys start to burst because of everything that’s happened, and the two of them aren’t alone, not when Tubbo has so many things haunting him.
Still, he listens to Ranboo’s assurances, drinks them up like honey tea after a rough night of drinking. “You’ve been through so much, Tubbo, I- I can’t even imagine, but you’re not a terrible person.” Tubbo sniffles, trying to argue, but Ranboo pushes on, “You’re not. You’re my best friend, and you- you’re important to me.”
“I’m sorry,” Tubbo says, because it physically hurts to hear Ranboo talk about him like he’s special and not just something to be picked up and thrown away. Tubbo’s never needed to be treated like a person, but everything’s making him crave it, and he feels so awful for that. “I’m so sorry, I-”
“I don’t- I don’t think your body is- is ‘all fucked up’, as you put it,” and Tubbo’s never heard him swear before, but there’s a conviction in Ranboo’s voice, one that’s so absent of his usual hesitation, “And I think you have a nice voice, and I like hugging you when- when I can, of course, not to- yeah, but I like it because you’re just- it just feels right-” and nothing about Tubbo has ever been right- “And I think you have the- just, just really nice eyes, actually, and- and I don’t mind your scars, if that’s what you mean, I- I have scars too, all over my face, and- and you’ve never been mean about them-” and Tubbo would punch anybody who ever made fun of Ranboo’s face- “and I think- Tubbo, your mind is brilliant, you’re- you’re just about the furthest thing childish or weak, you’re- you’re incredible. And- and until the day you want me to leave, Tubbo-” never, never- “I will still be here, for- for you.”
“I don’t- I- fuck, I-” He wishes he could say all the things he needs to tell Ranboo, how sorry he is, how wrong Ranboo is, but most of all- “I don’t deserve you.”
Ranboo shakes his head. “You deserve a family that cares about you and a- a house that isn’t so- a house that’s stable, and you deserve help and you- I- and you, actually, you- you deserve way better than me, honestly.”
How can Ranboo say that as if he’s a bad person, as if he’s not the best person Tubbo’s ever known, as if he’s not one of the biggest reasons Tubbo still gets out of bed? “Ranboo, I- I want you, don’t- don’t say- I- I need- ”
“Tubbo, I… I think of myself really- really similarly to how you see yourself. My mind and body are, uh, are all messed up, and it’s not something I think I can ever change from,” Ranboo admits, “but- but hey, you still like me! You still like me, and- and I like you too, Tubbo, so just… just know that all the awful things you say about yourself, they don’t- they aren’t true. They just aren’t true.”
Tubbo pulls out of the hug just slightly to look at Ranboo, lifting one hand to rest against his cheek. There are so many tiny scars on his face, and his eyes are so vividly brown in a shade that Tubbo’s never seen before, and it’s all laid over with exhaustion written in every feature, but he still thinks that Ranboo’s the prettiest person on this planet.
“I’m a bad person,” Tubbo repeats, unable to articulate the way that he looks at Ranboo and can’t find a single bad thing about him, “I steal Phil’s alcohol and I- I lie just to see if I still can, and I make everyone so angry that they want me gone. I’ve done terrible, terrible things, Ranboo- You can’t compare us. You just can’t.”
“I've done awful things too, Tubbo,” Ranboo argues. “I’ve done some- some really bad things, actually. Just- I’ve done a lot of really, really awful things. You’re- what you’re forgetting right now is that you’ve- you’ve done so many good things, too. You’re stronger than I could ever be.”
Tubbo brushes his thumb under Ranboo’s eye. “That’s not true.”
“I’m a coward.” Ranboo laughs, and Tubbo wishes Ranboo could know how much Tubbo cares about him, how much- how much Tubbo- how- how much he cares. “I run away from what scares me. I forget everything I don’t like. I… I’m not strong, Tubbo. Not at all.”
“Well, I think you’re incredible.”
Ranboo smiles, a little more sweet than bitter now. “Yeah. And I think you are, too.”
Tubbo laughs, voice raw and wet from crying. “You’re such a fucking sap. I hate you.”
“Mhm mhm. You love me,” Ranboo teases back.
And Tubbo’s starting to think that he does.
He just buries his face back into Ranboo’s shoulder, though, because that’s too much to think about on top of everything.
Muffled against the fabric, Tubbo says, “I wish I could stop. I- I wish I could stop, Ranboo.”
“Have you told someone?” Ranboo tucks the strands of hair plastered to the sides of Tubbo’s face away, just behind his ear. “I- I really think you should mention some of- some of that stuff, Tubbo, I don’t- I don’t want you to, uh. To hurt yourself, or- or anything like that.”
“I think Wilbur knows.” Even though Tubbo wishes that the other was clueless, he can tell from the stray glances and the few encounters they’ve had that it’s another open secret between the two of them. “Quackity definitely knows. That’s… I think that’s it.”
Ranboo nods. “Tell- tell Phil, at least. He- he should know. You should have help, I don’t… I don’t think it’s good for you.”
“Of course it isn’t.” Tubbo’s body is already destroyed though, so what’s the- no, no, Ranboo doesn’t think that, but- this is fucking confusing, and Tubbo hates this, doesn’t know when the catharsis is meant to kick in. “I- I’ll try, Ranboo, I’ll try.”
“Thank you.” Ranboo sounds so relieved.
“Can you-” Tubbo swallows. “Can you do me, uh, a favor. Or- or two, I guess, but-”
“Anything,” Ranboo immediately responds.
Tubbo takes a deep breath. “Can- for one, can you keep, uh. Can you keep- just- this? What we’re- yeah.” He feels embarrassed for even asking, but Ranboo just pulls him closer in lieu of an answer, and Tubbo breathes out shakily. “Two, is- is that, uh. If… I know I have a lot, uh, a lot happening, but. If… if you’re upset, Boo, can you- can you tell me?”
Ranboo stiffens a little, hand running through Tubbo’s hair, and he lies, “I’m not upset.”
“Yeah, but we both know that’s bullshit,” Tubbo retorts, and Ranboo falls quiet again. “I know it’s- I know that I’m not the best person to confide in, and-”
“It’s not you,” Ranboo cuts him off, “it’s not. It’s… it’s nothing I can’t handle on my own, that’s all.”
Tubbo sometimes gets scared, wondering how much Ranboo has tried to handle on his own. Breakdown notwithstanding, Tubbo knows he can handle bad shit, but he doesn’t want to think about Ranboo struggling with his own alone. “I know that you- that you can, probably, uh- that you could do it alone. That doesn’t mean you should, though.”
“I…” Ranboo pauses, and Tubbo waits with held breath until he finally asks, “Can I tell you something, then?”
“Yeah.” In a selfish way, it’s a distraction for Tubbo, to listen to all of this. But he’s also really, really glad that Ranboo’s saying anything at all.
“Okay. I… so. This is, uh, this is kinda hard to explain, actually.” Tubbo can hear Ranboo’s heartbeat from where he’s laying against him. It’s faster than he thinks it should be. “So I- yeah, okay. Long story short, I got back in like, contact, with my- with my- I got back in contact with my old foster brother.”
Tubbo had not at all been expecting that.
“Oh,” is all he can think to say, which is a shitty response to give, but he- well, he had no idea that Ranboo was even in the foster-care system, much less that he had foster brothers looking for him.
Ranboo laughs. “Yeah, it’s- it’s a little complicated, but, uh, yeah. That’s… it went fine, but, y’know. I guess that’s something I’m dealing with. But like, again, it’s not- it’s not something bad, you know? If I was scared of, uh, weird conversations with near-strangers, I wouldn’t have a job at a bakery where we tend to, uh, tend to get weird strangers.”
“Mm.” Tubbo understands that, and Ranboo doesn’t seem too upset, but still. That’s… that’s a difficult thing, and Tubbo feels kind of stupid for complaining about Phil wanting to adopt him while Ranboo’s dealing with old foster brothers and the like. “Has it been stressful or anything? I imagine it’d be kind of a lot.”
“Eh.” Ranboo shrugs, but there’s some strain in his voice. “Nothing too bad, again. Got to see some old photos of me, which was- which was interesting.”
“Aww.” Tubbo smiles despite himself. “I bet baby Ranboo was cute.”
“It was more, like, thirteen year old Ranboo,” he clarifies, “but, uh. Yeah. I guess so. I mean, I just kind of looked like a- like a person, I don’t know.”
“A pretty person,” Tubbo adds.
He can hear the way that Ranboo’s heart reacted to that, which is really cute and also funny as hell. “Yeah, I- uh- I mean. Whatever- whatever you say, I guess.”
“I reckon thirteen year old me would take thirteen year old Ranboo to parks and shit too.” Because Tubbo can’t really imagine a setting in which he wouldn’t like Ranboo. “And maybe I would actually be able to teach you how to skip stones.”
Ranboo lets out a short laugh. “Hah. Maybe.”
The rain is starting to actually fall down now, and Tubbo feels the way that Ranboo starts to tense at the droplets hitting his skin. They’ve been out here for a while, too, with Tubbo clinging onto him for an embarrassingly long fraction of that time, so maybe they should head back to his car. Not that Tubbo really wants to go home and be left with the guilt of telling Ranboo everything he did, but he also doesn’t want to force Ranboo out here where it’s uncomfortable.
“Maybe we should head back to the car,” Tubbo suggests.
Ranboo quickly nods, letting go of Tubbo with some reluctance. “Yeah. Don’t want you to get soaked.”
Tubbo notices his face seems a little more worn out, but to be fair, the two of them have gone through a lot of emotions, so Tubbo just keeps walking and tells Ranboo over his shoulder, “Sorry for dumping all that on you.”
“It’s okay,” Ranboo reassures. “I’m here for you, Tubbo. You’re… I mean it when I say you’re my best friend. And I’ll always, uh, you can always just call me, y’know? Yeah. You get me.”
“I do.” Tubbo’s starting to think he may mean it. “I’m here for you, too. Obviously.”
“Thank you.” Ranboo says, gently but emphatically.
Tubbo smiles, even though his face feels all gross from tears. “Of course. What would I do without my glorified taxi driver?”
“Oh, alright then,” Ranboo sighs, and Tubbo laughs. “You just brought me out here to bully me, huh?”
“Yup!”
“Well. I wouldn’t have it any other way, I guess.”
“I hate you.” Tubbo does. He truly hates him and definitely doesn’t have some kind of feeling about him that this excursion only amplified. “Go to hell.”
Ranboo laughs. “Let me drop you off at first, at least. Just- just give me a chance man.”
“Hm.” Tubbo considers it. “Fine. But only if you let me play this atrocious rap song that Wilbur showed me ages ago in the car.”
“That seems like a fair trade,” Ranboo agrees, even though it definitely isn’t and Tubbo probably has him wrapped around his finger.
The two of them leave the park, and Tubbo tries to bury his feelings back in the pond, because his chest feels free for the first time in a while, but he knows there’s still more to get through, still more to face.
With Ranboo, though, Tubbo’s starting to think that maybe, just maybe, he’ll have the strength to take it.
-
Ranboo: hey Tubbo guess what
[
Tubbo: what
Tubbo: it’s fucking 1 am bossman go to bed
[
Ranboo: Z29vZG5pZ2h0IHR1YmJvIDop
[
Tubbo: u fucking sap hold
Tubbo: I forgot you cuold encode smileys
[
Ranboo: how did you translate it that fast?
[
Tubbo: internet
Tubbo: hold on lemme do one for you
[
Ranboo: okay
[
Tubbo: here
Tubbo: IDJJWMWLJAYXSPUA
[
Ranboo: oh
Ranboo: what do I do?
[
Tubbo: https://www.dcode.fr/enigma-machine-cipher
Tubbo: long slash name for the machine, i ii iii, B, ADC, AAC, A-B C-D
[
Ranboo: okay hold on
Ranboo: oh!
Ranboo: oh that’s so cool :D
[
Tubbo: haha yeh
Tubbo: gn boo
[
Ranboo: goodnight tubbo :)
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Tubbo: my hot glorified taxi driver
[
Ranboo: oh okay then
Ranboo: At least I’m not an ugly glorified taxi driver?
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Tubbo: yep :P
Tubbo: K gn
[
Ranboo: night!
Ranboo: <3
[
Tubbo: <3
Tubbo: also sorry
[
Ranboo: Tubbo go to bed and please stop apologizing
Ranboo: it’s okay I promise
[
Tubbo: okay
Tubbo: gn <3 (again lol)
[
Ranboo: night <3