Chapter Text
“Drugs,” the headmistress says, “on this campus.”
Simon ducks his head, focuses on his lap in an effort to keep from crying. He pulls the inside of his cheek between his teeth and bites down, hard.
The headmistress’ office has two wide windows overlooking the green hills of Hillerska Boarding School’s sprawling campus. It’s an imposing sort of place, like all the spaces in the school meant to impress wealthy parents and prospective students. The desk is a dark but finely carved wood, the kind of artistry Simon can appreciate distantly. The chairs are cushioned with tufted velvet, likely older than both him and the headmistress herself. There’s a glittery crystal chandelier over their heads, just there for decoration. The rug is faded in the kind of way Simon had learned means it’s an expensive heirloom and his sneaker bounces anxiously atop it, shaking his leg with a violence he hopes the headmistress can’t see.
“Not to mention the scandal of that . . . video,” she continues, face twisting unpleasantly, which matches Simon’s stomach. Her hands are folded tightly, sternly, atop her desk. “You’ve brought quite a lot of trouble to our hallowed halls since your enrollment.”
He can almost hear the sound of her thoughts: and what can we expect, letting a charity case with a family history of drug addiction and alcoholism attend our school? Never mind his passable grades. Never mind his stellar work ethic. Never mind his singing voice, the way it’s helped their little church choir gain notoriety. Never mind that most of these so-called noble assholes come from even more fucked-up families than he does, with their drugs and their embezzlement and their incest.
“Headmistress,” he breathes, because she’s clearly waiting for a response, “I am . . .” His chin wobbles helplessly. He can’t apologize for the video, he won’t. He hadn’t known he was being filmed. He isn’t the one who posted it. But what else is there? No one else will face any consequences for it. And, as for the drugs . . . “so sorry. I can’t un-film the video.” He swallows. “I can’t un-sell the drugs. It was a mistake. I wouldn’t have — it doesn’t matter why I did it. I shouldn’t have done it.”
“Unfortunately, Mister Eriksson, sorry isn’t good enough. The attention you’ve brought to our institution, not just from the press but from our royal family, cannot be swept under the rug.” She sighs, like this is a challenge for her. “Students from better circumstances have been expelled for less.”
“You mean,” he says, sullen and small, “students can who buy their way out of trouble.”
She inclines her head in agreement. Her slight embarrassment at the admittance almost makes him want to laugh. “You are a non-resident scholarship student. It would be well within my rights to revoke that scholarship and rescind your enrollment.”
His heart stutters to a stop.
“Please,” Simon wants to lurch out of his seat and throw himself across her desk to plead, “you can’t. If you expel me, my mom will pull Sara out, too. And Sara needs this school, okay? She needs it like no one else here does. She loves it here. I love it here. Please, Headmistress, I’m so sorry.”
Sara will be devastated, pulled from the only place she’s managed to make and keep both human and equestrian friends, and it will be all his fault. She’ll be bullied all over again. He can’t let her go back there. He can’t go back to Marieberg, either, especially not now that everyone and their mother has seem him receiving a mind-blowing blow job, not after having his face splashed across every grocery store tabloid in his neighborhood. He’d never live it down. Ayub and Rosh wouldn’t be able to do anything to stop it. No one would be able to stop it.
The headmistress holds up a wrinkled, placating hand. “I’m not going to do that, however. We’ve had conflicting accounts of who, exactly, brought the drugs onto campus — yourself or Alexander. Your peers just can’t seem to get their stories straight. And our crown prince swears rather vehemently that you had nothing at all to do with it.” Simon’s . . . well, everything flutters. Wilhelm, looking out for him, even after everything. Simon loves him. Simon hates him. Simon doesn’t know how to feel about him. “With regard to your video, there isn’t much we can do, as an institution, to reprimand you for that. I imagine the shame is punishment enough.” He can’t even bring himself to flinch. Shame. He should be ashamed of what he did with Wilhelm, that’s what they all think. “As such, your punishment will be minor and it will be quiet. We don’t need any more bad press than we’ve already gotten out of you.”
He nods eagerly. “Yes, ma’am. Thank you, ma’am.”
“Don’t thank me just yet.” She unfolds her fingers and flips open a folder. “Mister Englund assures me that you’ve improved significantly in his class. One of his best students, in fact.”
“That’s very kind of him to say,” Simon says. It’s an . . . odd segue and he can’t tell where it’s supposed to be going.
The headmistress smiles. “He does not give out compliments lightly.” She takes a paper from the folder, lifts it slightly. “We sometimes commission our third-years to assist the teachers in tutoring struggling students during what your peers have so affectionately named workies. I’m sure you’ve noticed this.”
“Yes, ma’am, I have.”
“This is to be your punishment.” She turns the paper to face him. The school crest, at the top, and then a bunch of words with an open line at the bottom for him to sign. A contract. “Starting in the new year, you will be our first first-year tutor. Every day, during workies, you will assist your teachers in educating your fellow students. While this is usually a position paid in letters of recommendation and extra credit, you will receive no compensation of any kind for your work. Failure to attend these study sessions on a day you have not been excused from them will result in expulsion. Is that clear?”
“Yes, ma’am. It’s more than fair. I’ll do my best to—“
“In addition, you’ve been removed from the rowing team.”
Simon blinks. Not that he really enjoys the rowing team, full of pretentious assholes who get off on tormenting him, but it’s been surprisingly nice to learn to move his body in a new way. And he’d liked watching Wille on the rowing machine, the flex of his biceps, the curve of his shoulders, the sweat on his brow. Not to mention the extra credit it’s earned him. But he guesses that’s the point of it — no extra credit. Another layer of punishment.
Who cares what the punishment is? It’s not jail and it’s not expulsion. It’s the best he can hope for.
At least it’s not the choir.
“Okay,” he agrees.
“Mister Eriksson, I want you to understand the severity of your actions. This could’ve resulted in your arrest. If you ever — and I mean ever — bring so much as an aspirin onto these grounds again, I will be contacting the authorities.”
“I understand,” Simon says. His hands are sweaty and he wrings them together, squeezing tight, in an attempt to stop their shaking. “I completely, totally understand. Thank you. Thank you so much.”
He’s dismissed promptly after signing his name with a fancy fountain pen.
The halls of Hillerska are not his friend, but then they never have been. Once upon a time, he walked around without much of anyone noticing him and that had bothered him, that he was so invisible unless someone needed a target to needle at, that they treated him like he was nothing. But now he can’t avoid the stares, as much as everyone looks at him out of the corner of their eyes, under their eyelashes, through their laughing smirks. It’s weird, to have people glance at him and know that they’ve seen him . . . well, getting his dick sucked. All of Sara’s friends have seen him come. All the boys in class have seen him naked and intimate. And they’re all laughing at him.
The instinct to hunch in on himself and keep his head down, to keep his eyes on the ground and make himself small, is hard to fight. He can’t give them that satisfaction though. He can’t walk down the halls in shame or embarrassment.
So he holds his head up high, rolls his shoulders back, and resolves to make eye contact with anyone brave enough to meet him head on.
I am who I am, he thinks, and fuck anyone who has a problem with it.
The meeting with the headmistress has cost him his first period class of the day and he’s forced to linger impatiently outside the second until it lets out and he can take his seat. Missing class this close to winter holidays, this close to mid-term exams, this soon after all the drama — it’s not a good look. He’s sure everyone’s noticed his absence. Maybe they think he’s been kicked out. Maybe they hope he has. Well, he’s still here. And he’ll be here until they force him out.
He’s sure they’d like to. Force him out, that is. Even the headmistress. His scholarship costs the school more than he gives in return. His only friend — well, Wille was always more than that and Simon doesn’t even have him anymore.
At least there’s only a few days left until break.
He can survive a few days.
Class lets out before his knees start to ache from being locked in place too long. Students — second years — file past him with their books and their bags, giggling when they catch his eye. Some of the guys avoid his gaze entirely. Too scared to catch his cooties or have anyone think maybe they were the boy he was with. If the crown prince can be accused, anyone’s fair game. None of them want to be next. As if he would ever waste his time with them — or want to trap one of them in his web of lies.
All he wanted was to be with Wille.
Which was foolish, obviously. That’s not how the story goes. The prince doesn’t fall in love with the pauper and he certainly doesn’t stay by the pauper when their sex tape gets leaked.
Not that it was a sex tape. Sex tape implies setting up a camera, filming yourself, consenting to something being made. Simon hadn’t consented to his first time being filmed and he certainly hadn’t consented to it being posted on the internet for the whole world to see. Just thinking about it makes him nauseous. What had been quiet and intimate and beautiful was now sordid and shameful and horrible. But he doesn’t have a better word for it.
Mister Englund welcomes him to the classroom, shuffling lesson plans around on his desk. His pot belly reaches the desk before he does, rotund and merry like Saint Nicolas. “Good morning, Simon.” He looks up from his paperwork. “I presume you’ve been made aware of the arrangement going forward?”
“Yes, sir.” He sets his books down and approaches the desk, his sneakers landing tentative and quiet on the tile floors. “Thank you, for sticking your neck out for me.”
“See to it that the opportunity is not wasted.”
“No, sir. Definitely not.”
Mister Englund puts a hand on his shoulder and gives him a small shake. “You’re a bright boy, Simon. I see it. Your other teachers see it. It’s time you make choices that reflect that.”
Better choices. That’s really what it comes down to. Simon needs to make better choices. He needs to do a Google search — Wikihow: how to find men who won’t abandon you to save themselves — because clearly Mamma and Micke didn’t set him up for excellence in this. Bad choices run in the family. “Yes, sir.”
“It will all look brighter in the new year.”
Especially if August really can’t afford to return. That would be a blessing he’d get down on his knees and thank god for.
The rest of the class starts slipping in one by one. Walter hisses something about Simon trying to go after teachers, now that the crown wants nothing to do with him. Desperate for tuition money, Henry agrees. He wants to bite back that they’re idiots, that he doesn’t even pay tuition because that’s what being on scholarship fucking means, but his disappointment outweighs his anger. Henry and Walter were followers, desperate to fit in, but they’d never given him any trouble before. The video — Wilhelm’s denial of the video — has emboldened them all.
The semester ends with one last service in the chapel. It’s all decorated for Christmas, with vibrant holly and candles everywhere, even though the building will be empty while the students are home for break.
The choir sings. His last solo of the year, maybe of his life; he’s sure they — the teachers, the headmistress, the royal family — want him to draw the least amount of attention possible going forward. Simon tucks himself into the back row, closes his eyes, and sings like no one is watching. Wilhelm likes listening to him sing, he knows; he told him as much, over and over. Voice like an angel, he’d whispered into Simon’s neck. It hadn’t been the first time he’d ever heard it, but no one had ever said it with so much affection before. My angel. Their voices ring together as perfectly as they always do, floating high up to the domed ceiling and the body of Christ hoisted above them. And his voice rings out the loudest, the clearest, the brightest.
“Fall on your knees,” he sings. A few snickers come from the congregation and he knows what they’re thinking. “Oh, hear the angel voices. Oh, night divine!”
They bid their teachers goodbye in a long, stagnant line. It’s laborious and tedious, to shake all the hands and wish everyone well, but he needs all the good grace he can get. After shaking the headmistress’s hand one final time and wishing her a very happy holiday, he sticks with the choir kids. Most of them haven’t shunned him and are just relieved he’s not leaving them without a soloist again, as far as any of them know.
But then Wilhelm, beautiful Wilhelm, walks by and makes deliberate eye contact with him. It takes Simon’s breath away; it always has, since the first moment their eyes met.
He steps out of his group. He can’t help himself.
“That was beautiful,” Wilhelm compliments.
“Thanks,” Simon says.
Unexpectedly, suddenly, Wilhelm hugs him. “I’m sorry.” He holds Simon tighter, squeezing him hard. It can’t be good for him, for either of them. People are staring. They need a clean break. But Simon closes his eyes and buries his face in Wilhelm’s neck and lets himself be held for a long moment. It feels so good to be held. He wishes Wilhelm could hold him forever. “I love you.”
Simon forces himself to take a step back. “Hope you have a nice Christmas.”
But his heart beats I love you.
Winter break is bleary and miserable. It passes in a haze of fairy lights and Christmas carols, the feeling of Mamma’s fingers brushing through his hair, the steady stream of reporters outside their door slowly trickling down into nothing. It’s all weekly drug testing because Mamma doesn’t believe he’s sober, especially after everything that happened with Micke. It’s two days of snowfall and then he’s forced to shovel the sidewalk for their elderly neighbor, who pays him in cocoa and mildly homophobic comments. It’s video games with Auyb, falling asleep in the middle of the day to the sound of virtual gunfire. It’s letting Rosh keep his phone so he doesn’t do something desperate like call Wilhelm and beg him to come back to him. It’s being stared at in the shops when he’s buying tampons for Sara and milk for Mamma and three different bags of chips.
Someone yells faggot! from a car while he walks down the street. He throws up the middle finger and shouts back: get fucked!
He spends most of break in his bedroom, his keyboard in his lap. Music is his solace. Always has been. It’s the one thing in the world that makes sense to him, a language more native to him than Spanish or Swedish or English. Sure, he still can’t read sheet music, but he can feel it in his soul. He plays a simple song, then something more difficult, then just presses random keys until Sara shouts at him for making a racket. He sings in the shower. He sings in his room. He sings in the kitchen. He has a voice — he has a voice — he has a voice — and he’s going to use it. It’s one thing no one can take from him. The keys feel right under his hands, the melody coming to him like it’s always been with him, and the words flow from his heart right out of his mouth.
It’s embarrassing to admit that the song he’s writing is about Wilhelm.
It shouldn’t be. He shouldn’t be writing love songs. He should be trying harder to get over him. But if music is his truest love, Wilhelm is his first. All the books and movies and songs, they all say it’s almost impossible to forget your first love.
He flirts — if it can even be called that — with a cute boy who isn’t Wilhelm and the world doesn’t end. In fact, he actually feels a bit better.
The last night of break, with the nerves of the new year creeping in, he’s forced to saved Sara from her apparent initiation. Fucking rich people and their fucking weird-ass traditions. From what he can tell in the video on Instagram, she’s drunk and in her pajamas. Totally out of place. There’s alcohol and a weird bib and a fucking fire at the Palace. Her friends should take better care of her, keeping an eye on her, stopping her from taking things too far. They know how she is. But it always comes down to him to save her. She’s his responsibility. He runs to her rescue, like he always does.
He hates the way the third-years talk about her when he starts asking around, calling her name over the sound of the pulsing music. The lunatic. The freak. She’s just a girl. She’s just a girl who needs someone to give her a chance, to take care of her. Why the fuck aren’t her friends taking care of her?
And there’s Wilhelm, utterly impossible to ignore, at the end of Simon’s tunnel vision. The world shrinks down to the two of them, his heart beating a steady drum solo in his ears. or maybe that’s the pulsing bass and strobing lights.
And then there’s Wilhelm, taking care of Sara for him. Like a total Prince Charming, he presses his cell phone to his ear and finds her with one call.
His scarf is stupidly handsome, hanging loose around his neck. His coat is stupidly expensive, clearly, dark and woolen. His hair is different, shorter. His skin is clearing up, like he’s doing better without all the stress Simon added to his life. He looks regal, the way a young prince is supposed to look, like the kind of boy who gets bronzed and installed outside monuments. And he grabs for Simon when he tries to leave, catching him by the wrist.
Even through his puffer coat and sweatshirt, Wilhelm’s touch burns.
“Hi,” he says, “by the way.”
“Hi,” Simon answers. Stop being so beautiful when I’m trying to get over you.
Wilhelm gestures uselessly at his head. “I got a hair cut.”
Being mesmerized by Wilhelm is easy. Those brown eyes, earnest and wager for Simon’s attention. That mouth, slightly chapped from the winter cold. He’s lucky his phone chimes with a text warning him his ride is leaving or might’ve done something really stupid, like kiss him.
When he gets home, he curls up small in his bed and plays the song, or as much of it as he has written. It’s been coming together slowly, but it finally feels like something real. A goodbye, or something like it. An acknowledgment that he and Wilhelm are done — and that Simon will never properly be over it. He’ll love Wilhelm forever, probably, even if they both move on to other things.
Other things, like a new semester of classes.
Showing up late on his first day back is a terrible look. He’s totally missed the church service and the choir’s song. Rosh and Ayub don’t help, egging him on while the bus rattles around them, chanting rebound rebound rebound. He leaps off the bus before it stops properly and rushes up the stone steps of the school.
Of course the only open seat is beside Wilhelm. That’s what he gets for being late.
“Hi,” Wilhelm says, soft.
“Hi.”
There’s an awkward tension over their little desk, his pencil case forming a useless barrier between their notebooks. Almost too casual. But Miss Ramirez commands attention, thankfully, and Simon can get away with keeping his head on the board.
The lunch table in Forest Ridge House provides space for Simon to breathe. He has to eat somewhere — and somewhere doesn’t have to be near Wilhelm. He sits as far away from him as he can without it seeming a deliberate attempt to avoid his eyes. The lunchtime coup Wilhelm provokes makes his breath stutter, the sheer challenge and command with which he confronts the room. He makes August kneel, metaphorically. Bend the knee, like in Game of Thrones. This is Crown Prince Wilhelm. Simon’s never met him before. Not like this. And it’s so fucking unfair to learn that he’s so incredibly hot. He shifts in his seat, uncomfortably turned on, until he’s dismissed to grab his lunch before the third-years.
Fuck the monarchy, indeed.
But he focuses on stuffing his face as quickly as possible. The third-years don’t usually leave them much more than table scraps compared to what they eat. Simon never much cared; free food is free food to him. It feels good, though, to stick it to the third-years who’ve tormented him in some small way.
It tastes like victory, just a little bit.
Afternoon classes roll around, the winter sky outside dipping into a deeper blue. He’d been hoping for a seat beside Sara, but she’s so excited to sit with Felice and work together. Friends don’t come easy to Sara and they never have. For the first time in her life, she has someone genuine to sit with; he can’t take that from her.
So he ends up sat beside Alexander.
Alexander, who partially took the fall for his drug deal.
Ugh. He hates to think of it that way, think of himself that way. He can still hear Wilhelm calling him a dealer, looking down on him for it. But that’s what he’d done. No wonder Mamma can’t trust him anymore.
Simon Eriksson. Son a of drug addict. Drug dealer. That’s not how he wants to be remembered.
Alexander’s gaze settles nervous and jumpy on him, like he doesn’t know how to act around him. No one does, really. They pull their notebooks out in silence, flipping them open without looking at one another. Simon pulls his cheek between his teeth, chews anxiously for a short moment, and makes a decision.
“I’m glad to see you’re still here.”
Alexander snorts. “You know, I’ve heard that a lot today, but you’re the first one I believe.” He looks up from his notebook. “I’m glad to see you’re still here, too.”
“I almost wasn’t,” Simon admits.
“Because of the video? Or the drugs?”
Simon hadn’t realized anyone but Wilhelm and August and the headmistress knew about the drugs. But someone must’ve known, more than just the three of them. Some of the other boys, the headmistress said, had blamed him. “I’m sorry,” he whispers. “If I had never brought the drugs—“
“If August hadn’t asked you for them,” Alexander corrects. “If he hadn’t left them with me. If he wasn’t such a prick. A lot of what ifs. Nothing we can do about it. We’re in a hell of August’s making.” He knocks the eraser on his pencil against Simon’s. “You and me? We’re good.”
Simon taps his eraser in return. Sharing a smile with one of the other boys is nice. “I’m still sorry you got in trouble.”
“Barely.” It’s so blasé. It’s so casual. Getting in trouble for drugs is nothing to a guy like Alexander. “They threatened me with expulsion and my father threw some money at them. The new court? That was me. No one on the board wants to deal with an investigation.” And Alexander’s father could afford to force one, unlike Simon’s family.
“No community service for you?” Simon asks.
Alexander frowns. “Do they have you doing community service?”
“Tutoring.” He shrugs. “And I’m off the rowing team.”
“That’s not too bad,” Alexander acknowledges. It could be worse, Simon reminds himself. It could be worse. “And least you don’t have to go to rowing practice. One less place you’ll see him.”
Whether him is Wilhelm or August, he never finds out.
Classes let out for the day and his phone chimes with a text message. He closes his cheery green locker and swipes it open. The screen is almost too bright, hadn’t adjusted automatically to the artificial indoor lighting like it’s supposed to.
AYUB :: [00:00]
Just be honest with him about your feelings
Put yourself first
He’s right. Ayub is always right and he always has been. He’s never steered Simon wrong.
Simon meanders into the library, where he can see Wilhelm backlit by the afternoon sun streaming through the windows. Even his silhouette is handsome, holding a book open in one hand like a leading man in Hamlet cradling poor Yorick. He’s the only one in his aisle, totally alone, and his pale eyelashes catch the light in a way that makes soft, ethereal music play between Simon’s ears.
“Hi,” he says.
“Hi,” Wilhelm answers — and keeps his voice low. Is it that he doesn’t want to be overheard, doesn’t want to be seen with him? Or that he can’t? His loyal bodyguard, Malin, is the only one to hear. He looks so good, though, in his burgundy blazer and crisp white collar. The haircut suits him, makes him look more mature and handsome somehow. It’s so hard to keep away from him, when he’s so beautiful. And the last thing he’d really said to him, back before the holiday: I’m sorry. I love you. What a way to say goodbye.
But Simon is the one who chose to walk away, he has to remind himself of that. He’s not interested in being a secret. If Wilhelm needs time to figure himself out, that’s fine. Simon can respect that. He doesn’t have to let himself be pissed on, though. He doesn’t need to be hidden behind walls and loved around corners.
He can’t help but think briefly of Marcus, Lottie’s son. He was sweet, asking Simon to karaoke and driving him to look for Sara on her disastrous first night in Manor House. Of course, he might not be gay and, even if he is, he might not even like Simon. But maybe Simon should try to fall in love with someone more like him, someone from his own world, someone who can understand his situation, someone in his league.
He has to persist and resist the temptation to turn to Wilhelm, to fold into him, to ask if things could’ve been different for them.
He has to set boundaries.
He has to keep his priorities straight, even if he’s not.
“Can we talk?”
Wilhelm’s eager hum of agreement almost does him in. He’s just too cute. It makes Simon want to cup his face and kiss him all over. They step towards the window, away from all the others gathered in the stacks, discussing upcoming projects and their extravagant holiday destinations.
Focus, Simon, focus. Be honest about your feelings. Set a boundary, for once in your miserable life. “You know how we’re . . . we’re pretending like nothing’s happened?” He swallows. “It’s not working.”
Wilhelm’s hand finds his shoulder, so warm even through his blazer. It would be so easy to fold into him. His teeth are still slightly crooked behind his smiling lips, so charming and unexpected to see on a prince. “Can’t we just . . . ?”
“Wille . . .” He takes himself out of Wilhelm’s space, just out of arm’s reach. They can’t touch. He can’t stand it. He won’t be able to hold his ground, if they touch. He’ll give in. He can’t give in. “I’ve been thinking about you all Christmas.” He shrugs. “But I’ve also felt that it’s been nice to get some space.”
Lonely, but nice.
A frown creases Wilhelm’s perfect face. “So we can’t talk to each other?”
The idea of never speaking to Wilhelm again makes his chest hurt. “Maybe not forever.”
“Simon,” Wilhelm sighs in irritation, like Simon’s inconveniencing him by asking for something he needs, “you’re the only one I can talk to here.”
And Wilhelm had been the only one Simon could talk to, the only one he trusted, his only friend. Couldn’t he see that? That he’d taken that away from Simon, by pretending they’d never been anything at all, by telling the whole world he’d never known Simon? It’s enough to break his heart — and reignite his resentment. Wilhelm gets to walk away without a scratch, without any repercussions, and Simon’s the only one punished, in every aspect of his life. Not Wilhelm. Not August. Not Alexander. Only Simon. Always only Simon.
“Wille, don’t you get that you hurt me? I have to keep my priorities straight this semester,” Simon walks away, past the line of books about art history, without looking back. “And that can’t include you.”
He goes to karaoke with Marcus that night, to keep his mind off Wilhelm’s melted-chocolate brown eyes. The arm around his shoulders is heavy, the microphone on his face funny, the body heat of a bigger and broader boy borderline protective. It works — for a while.
He still dreams of Wilhelm at night.
Tutoring starts the second week of the semester.
Nobody needs it right off the bat, after all. Or they shouldn’t. That’s the expectation, anyway. Hillerska prides itself on its educated, prepared student body.
They set him up in one of the cubicles in the back of the library, the ones usually used for privacy because some kids like Sara need total quiet to take tests. It’s a small block of space with three walls and two chairs, a table large enough to spread books out and maybe a coffee if you’re not too dedicated to not spilling it over your papers. It’s secluded and, for a moment, Simon worries that anything could happen to him here and no one would ever know — but the walls are painted a bright and soothing blue, the table and chairs lined in sunny orange, and there’s another student being tutored on the other side.
It’s all headed by the school librarian. Students willing to pay top-dollar for help can go directly to their teacher. He and the other tutors, he’s told, will get the overflow. That’s just fine with him. All the other tutors are third-years looking for extra credit, with two additional years of schooling under their belts. Honestly, Simon isn’t sure how much help he’ll be. He gets one of the Manor House girls, who was clearly expecting him to be someone else. She sighs in defeat and ties her hair back because there’s no reason to look good for a gay boy.
“Sorry I’m not whoever you were expecting,” he says with a smile.
“I came to tutoring every week last semester,” she admits. “And I thought we had something special. But then he didn’t contact me once over break. He didn’t even like my story on Instagram.” She winces. “But I guess you’ve had a harder time of it than me.”
Oh. So she’d seen the video. But then basically everyone had. He’ll be hard-pressed to find someone who hasn’t. “Right. Well, if you’re actually looking for help with math, I promise I know what I’m doing.” He makes a face, rocking his head side to side. “Or — I mostly do. As long as you’re not taking trigonometry, because I haven’t gotten there yet.”
It makes her laugh. “Geometry 2?”
Simon flips his textbook open. “I think I can handle that. So — what problem are you stuck on?”
She doesn’t bring up the sex tape after that, though he can see that she wants to. It’s in the ardent, focused way she stares at his profile. Was it really the crown prince? What was it like? Did you have to sign an NDA? She’s burning with questions, ready to burst like a bubble, but she keeps it to math. He guides her through her problem sheet with confidence. He’s good at math. He used to get straight As at Marieberg. She finishes the last few problems without his help and the satisfaction of a job well done settles in his chest. I’m good at this. I could be good at this. For a moment, he even thinks he’s made a friend.
At least, until she’s gathering her things.
“Why’d you do it?”
“Do what?”
“Share that video?”
He looks up, heart pounding in his chest. It sounds like a punk-rock drum solo in his East’s. Sticky, stinking sweat breaks out under his arms, at the hollow of his throat. “What?”
“Why’d you leak your sex tape?” she asks. “I mean, I’ve sent stuff like that to guys, but I’ve never posted it to the internet.”
“I didn’t post it.”
She leans in with a conspiratorial grin, whispers: “I won’t tell anyone.”
So that’s what people think about him. Attention whore. Liar. Leaking his own sex tape and declaring to the world that the Crown Prince of Sweden sucked his dick, whether or not it’s true. Looking for his five minutes of fame at the expense of the royal family, whether they claim it’s a lie or not. And it’s not just at school. He’s seen the comments online. His Instagram had to go private because of all the DMs he was getting. It’s the whole world — or at least a good part of it — that thinks that’s the kind of boy he is. He’ll never be able to escape it, will he?
His breath leaves him shakily. “I didn’t post it.” He grips his pencil tight, digging his nail into the soft wooden shell. “I didn’t even know the video existed until it was online.” Mamma’s words come out of his mouth, the words she’d coached him on when reporters were banging on their door. “It was a violation of my privacy and my consent and I’m not comfortable talking about it.”
“Okay. Jesus,” she stands. “It was just a question.”
He asks the librarian if he could please be paired up with someone else next time. Anyone else. Literally anyone else in the whole school, he begs.
He needs to stop saying literally when he doesn’t mean literally.
The next week, Monday afternoon, he’s sitting in his little cubicle and waiting for his newest match with little enthusiasm. The doodles he’s scratching into his notebook are mindless and ugly, little lopsided hearts and unfortunate stick figures. He’s stupid and hopeless enough that he barely refrains from pathetically putting S + W in all the little hearts. But then a neat, expensive school bag in a regal navy blue plops down on his table.
“Hey,” Wilhelm says, standing over him framed by sunlight from the window like a saint in a painting. “This seat taken?”
“Yes,” Simon bites out. “By the student I’m meant to be tutoring.”
But Wilhelm doesn’t listen. He never does. He pulls out the chair and plops himself down. His voice is borderline chipper — but not in a natural way. None of his genuine happiness shines through. Simon would know; he’s seen Wilhelm at his happiest, at his most vulnerable, at his most beautiful. It’s performative and stifled, a society persona more than it’s actually Wilhelm. “That’s me!”
He raises an incredulous eyebrow. “You need a tutor?”
Wilhelm shrugs, so casual. Malin hangs distant in the doorway, her back to the wall. “So they say.”
“You’re good at math,” Simon protests. And he knows it’s true. Despite his disinterest in his studies, Wilhelm is a stellar student. He has to be, is expected to be, as the Crown Prince.
“Evidently not,” Wilhelm smiles blithely. He begins unpacking his books, his pencils, his thermos of coffee, and pushes his beautiful hair out of his face. “I’m failing, actually.”
“Failing?” It bursts out of Simon, accusatory and too loud, his whole body turning to Wilhelm in surprise. God, how embarrassing. The students at the next table over definitely heard him, even if they can’t see him over the cubicle wall. He grips the back of his chair so hard his knuckles turn white to keep himself from reaching for him. He lowers his voice. “What do you mean, failing?”
Wilhelm waves him off. “Only a test or two. But it’s enough that they’d like to keep my grades from slipping any further.”
Suspicion slithers down his spine. His eyes squint at Wilhelm, like that will make everything clearer somehow. “And the royal family didn’t bring in a royal tutor?”
“Why would they, Wilhelm says, “when Hillerska provides tutoring for residents?”
“And they assigned you to me, without a problem?” Simon’s mouth twists. “After everything that happened?”
Wilhelm swallows. “I guess the headmistress didn’t see any issue with it, considering . . .”
Considering I said it wasn’t me in that video, he hears, even though Wilhelm doesn’t say it out loud. And he’s right. Why would they care about pairing him up with Wilhelm, if he and Wilhelm were never together? If there was no actual scandal for the crown, only a misunderstanding? Just stupid Simon, putting himself in a bad position with a nameless, faceless boy no one will ever be able to prove sits beside him.
He turns his body back to the table, keeping himself as compact and to himself as possible. No reaching for Wille. “Right.” He flips open his textbook. “So, what are you struggling with?”
“My mamma,” Wilhelm answers. The Queen. “But I might finally be getting somewhere with her. We had a productive conversation. You know, after she lost it over my grades and tried to pull me from the school.”
Simon has to force himself not to snap his neck with the force of raising his head. He keeps his eyes stubbornly on his paper, but his pencil creaks dangerously in his hand. “She tried to pull you from the school?”
Wilhelm nods, so casual and unaffected. “Yeah. But I stood my ground. I hold her I wasn’t leaving. That I couldn’t be the prince or the king they want if I’m not free to be myself.” He inches his hand over until the sleeve of his expensive navy sweater brushes Simon’s yellow sweatshirt, until their bare skin of their pinkies drag together. It’s mesmerizing, just that small touch. “She listened. She understood. She agreed that I could come out when I’m eighteen. Or, at least, we can discuss it.”
“That’s great,” Simon says.
He even means it. It’s great that Wilhelm’s mother — the Queen! — is accepting. It’s great that they’re coming to an understanding, working together instead of against each other. Simon has relied so heavily on Mamma, on her love and support. He can’t imagine what he would’ve done, if she’d seen his coming out at age twelve as a situation to be handled by a team of press agents and then kept quietly under wraps for years. It’s would’ve shattered him. So for Wilhelm to get even a modicum of the support he’d gotten from Mamma, from his own mother, that’s a big comfort to him.
Wilhelm smiles. “So we can — it would only have to be a secret for two years.”
And Simon’s heart plummets past his stomach, right into his ass and then to his ankles, and finally splatters on the floor. He pulls his hand back. Even still, Wilhelm’s touch lingers like a brand. “Come on, Wille,” he says, “do you really expect me to sit around and wait for you for two years?”
“Simon, we could be together.”
“In secret. For two whole years, with no guarantee I won’t still be a secret at the end of it. You couldn’t even be honest about it being you in that video. How am I supposed to trust you?” He watches the blow land, the way Wilhelm folds in on himself. He shifts uncomfortably. “We can talk in school. We kind of have to, if I’m tutoring you. But I can’t — that’s all.”
“So you mean, like friends.”
“Yeah,” Simon agrees. “Like friends.”
Wilhelm inhales deeply. “I don’t want to be your friend, Simon.”
No one does, he thinks bitterly. “That’s all I can give you, Wille. Or you can find another tutor.”