by the stars, we hope

"I know," Simon whispers back. "But I tried the side door on my way past and it opened. I figured I was less likely to get caught that way."

Begrudgingly, Wille has to admit that Simon is probably right.

"Besides, I couldn't pass up an opportunity to scare you. Seriously, Wille, you're so tightly wound!"

Wille doesn't asnwer immediately, just drags Simon along the last few steps to his room, tugs open the door, and bundles them both inside before shutting the door.

"I'm tightly wound because I'm trying to sneak my boyfriend in when we've been explicitly forbidden from having overnight guests."

"Hmm," Simon says, stepping close to Wille and looping his hands round his neck. "'Boyfriend'. I'm still not sure I'm used to that."

Heat rises to Wille's cheeks. Because he isn't either, but it feels so good calling Simon his boyfriend—a title they only agreed on the previous week when Sara had made some comment and they both just blinked at each other and then, through lots of blushing and smiling, agreed that she was probably right.

"Boyfriend," Wille murmurs again, this time against Simon's lips.

Simon hums and presses their lips fully together, sending a familiar thrill down Wille's spine as he starts walking them determinedly towards the bed, pushing Simon's jacket off in the process.

With a small squeak, Simon falls onto the mattress, dragging Wille down with him in a tangle of limbs and elbows and giggles. "Shh!" Wille says, without much heat. "You'll wake everyone up!"

"I don't care," Simon says, peppering kisses on the underside of Wille's jaw.

"Yes you do," Wille replies, running his palm down Simon's side to find the edge of his hoodie.

"I'm already not allowed to be here," Simon says, kissing back up to Wille's lips and placing several quick kisses there. "What difference does it make?"

"They'll… tighten… the rules," Wille says between kisses, sneaking his hand under Simon's hoodie and splaying a palm over his stomach. "We'll… have no chance… sneaking you in."

"Hmm…" Simon mumbles, gasping a little as Wille's hand moves further up. "Then we'll have to start using the window."

"Someone will catch you." Wille detaches his mouth just long enough to get Simon's hoodie over his head and then leans back as Simon tugs off his own t-shirt before reaching up to help Wille.

"No they won't. I'm sneaky."

When they resettle, skin on skin, it takes a moment for Wille to remember what Simon is talking about.

"You're not sneaky," he mumbles, nudging their noses together.

"Yes I am." Simon leans up and kisses Wille more deeply. "I crept up on you didn't I?"

Wille groans into Simon's mouth—partly mortification, partly arousal. "I was tense."

"You're always tense." Simon's hands skim down Wille's back and make it to his waistband where he barely hesitates before slipping his hands inside.

A noise makes it out of Wille's mouth and Simon smiles against his lips.

"Let's see if we can do something about that, shall we?"

Wille looks just as stunned as him, his voice pinched. “Oh, I. I’m just back for a few days. For the ten-year anniversary.” His eyes rove over Simon’s face. “Simon.” Just the sound of his name on Wille’s lips again is enough to make Simon feel like crying. “Um, thank you. I mean, for your message.”

“Of course.”  Simon hadn’t been sure whether their no contact agreement applied to sibling death anniversaries, but had ultimately decided he’d rather err on the side of reaching out than staying silent. He still cares about Wille. That’s one thing that has never wavered. That was never their problem.

“I didn’t know if it would be... welcome,” he goes on helplessly, when Wille doesn’t say anything more.

“Of course it was,” Wille cuts in softly. “I-, it meant a lot.”

“So, uh.” Simon feels a little sick with the heightened awareness of how awkward this is. A part of him wants to just swoop Wille into a hug, but another part of him looks at the man before him, whom he hasn’t spoken to nearly a year and a half, except for a couple of brief messages, and just thinks: Are we strangers now? “How has it been?” he finally manages. “Being back, I mean.”

Wille pauses, considering. His eyes flicker to the window, watching passersby on the street, before he trains them back on Simon with that intense fixity that has always made Simon felt so seen.

He’s relieved Wille doesn’t reflexively offer an immediate dismissal of “fine,” which might have shattered Simon, to be on the receiving end of that kind of protective superficiality.

But also: this is new. Wille also isn’t launching into complaints about his mother, or the rigamarole of the palace norms, or otherwise vetting his emotional bandwidth through Simon.

“It feels… odd,” Wille says at last. His voice has a bit of a questioning tone, like he’s speaking his feelings into a shape he can understand. “Different than I anticipated. Certain things feel exactly the same, and it’s familiar, of course. But also so strange. It feels really... far away, somehow. Not just being with my parents, or dealing with the palace again. But even being back in Stockholm.” He clears his throat, suddenly seeming a bit hesitant. “I hadn’t been back, before.”

Simon nods. He had already known that. He had pieced together some details from things Felice had inferred, or from what she didn’t say, after visiting Wille.

“So. Berlin feels like home now?” Simon asks.

He desperately wants the answer to be yes, wants Wille to affirm what he’s understood from Felice – that Wille is doing so much better, and feels more free, more normal, and is finding his way, making a life for himself there.

“Yeah,” Wille says, a touch wistfully. “It does.”

Something blooms warm and sharp in Simon’s stomach. “Good. I’m really happy for that,” Simon says, and he truly means it. But it also hurts more than he thought it would. His throat feels tight.

“I’m still not coming back for the holidays or anything,” Wille goes on. “But I agreed to come for the anniversary, as long as it didn’t have to be public. ‘No one needs to know,’ I told them. I mean, I came back for my mother. Not for the monarchy. I just wanted to remember my brother… not ‘Crown Prince Erik.’”

“I’m glad.” Simon swallows around the lump in his throat, trying to convey with his tone the swell of pride pulsing through him, hearing Wille say that. “I’m glad they respected that.” He can’t help but add, with a wry twitch of his lips: “Took them long enough.”

And it’s true: Wille hadn’t been included in the televised memorial proceedings. Just Kristina, Ludvig, August, and his fiancée. Simon had been a little embarrassed, looking up the press photos. But then he’d firmly reminded himself that it was normal, understandable. Of course he wondered. Wille still mattered to him. A lack of mattering wasn’t what had led them to take space.

In fact, the degree to which Wille still mattered to him was exactly what had led him to end things, as gently as he could manage, with Jakub.

If the initial months after Wille left had felt like having his heart hammered flat, Simon had been relieved – if also pained – to realize he could feel something for someone else. But the deep fondness he felt for Jakub, their physical chemistry, the steady care he felt with him, and the light-hearted fun they had together didn’t ultimately feel like enough.

When Simon had gotten the notification last month that his apartment was going to be sold, and he was distraught at having to find an affordable rental partway through his second-to-last semester of his Master’s, Jakub had easily suggested Simon just move in with him.

But suddenly, the reality of what that would mean had jolted Simon. To accept Jakub’s offer had somehow felt like accepting that he was really going to move on.

What he and Wille had agreed would be a break while they each pursued what they needed – Simon, to stay, to complete his education and pursue his career, and stay close to his mother and sister and friends; Wille, to get away from the recognition and scrutiny and have a chance at figuring out what life could like for him – would no longer be an ellipsis to the eight years they’d been together, but a decisive ending.

It felt like truly letting Wille go.

And Simon had realized then, with horrifying clarity, that it’s not that he couldn’t do that. He cared for Jakub a great deal. He could say yes, and close the door on the period of his life when he was with Wille, and have as good a shot at happiness as any.

But the real issue was that he didn’t want to.

He hadn’t quite known what to do with that realization, but now he’s standing here, taking in the fond grin that spreads across Wille’s face at Simon’s entirely predictable dig at the court. “No kidding,” Wille jokes back. Then, more haltingly, he admits: “It’s been better, though. Being elsewhere. Or, maybe I’ve just gotten better at dealing with it, separating from it.”

“Good,” Simon says, which is such an understatement he almost grimaces. “You deserve that.”

He could swear Wille flushes, whether at the earnest tone in Simon’s voice, or perhaps a shared awareness that this felt almost wrong. For so many years, Simon had known all the ins and outs if Wille’s communications and negotiations with the court and his family. They had thought after stepping out of the line of succession it would change, and while it had gotten better, sometimes Simon felt that the more Wille strained against the web of the court and precedent and the media, the more tightly they both became ensnared.

“So,” Wille pivots, “are you here to study? This is still your favorite spot?”

“Yeah, trying to wrap up my thesis proposal.”

“What’s it about?”

Simon can’t contend with the genuine interest plastered across Wille’s face, and he wants to tell Wille about it, and so they fall easily into conversation, Simon still standing beside the table, his cappuccino long forgotten, Wille perched on the edge of his high stool.

When Wille surreptitiously check the time on his phone, Simon suddenly returns to himself. “It’s… I… It’s good to see you,” he acknowledges.

 “It’s really good to see you, too.” Wille’s smile is small but genuine. He fiddles with the buttons of his jacket. “I wasn’t, uh. I didn’t expect to.”

“Yeah.” Simon lets a slow smile spread across his face. He wonders if that’s really true, if Wille really didn’t expect it, or if some part of him was hoping they might run into one another, even if there’s no way he could have known? Simon isn’t sure truth would be less painful.

“I swear, I wasn’t trying to-“ Wille begins, but cuts himself off. He swipes a hand through his hair, which he’s let grow long, longer than Simon’s ever seen it. “I just wanted to come some place that holds a lot of good memories.” He stares intensely. Some things don’t change. “That still mean a lot.”

Simon has to intentionally banish the flood of images that rise up, of all the times they stopped in for coffee while out for a walk, or running errands on the weekend, or studied here together, or met up with friends they hadn’t seen in too long, or friends they were trying to set up, or sometimes if one of them (usually Simon) had forgotten to buy more coffee one of them (usually) would dart over first thing in the morning for takeaway coffees. All of the memories were mundane. The kinds of everyday moments that you didn’t focus on too much. All the in-betweens, that actually make up a life. A life together, he thinks.

Simon swallows the lump in his throat. I miss you too, he doesn’t say.

“Well, I’d better.” Wille jerks his chin towards the door, but doesn’t move yet. He’s still studying Simon’s face. Simon wonders if Wille is trying to memorize his face, all the ways its change, all the ways it hasn’t. The same way he’s drinking in Wille’s.

Is there ever a final goodbye, for us? Simon thinks, feeling on the verge of tears, or laughter, at how surreal this is. Are we really just going to walk away from each other again?

Wille glances down at his photo screen. “I really do have to go now, or I’ll definitely miss my flight,” he says apologetically. “I’m already tempting fate.” He ducks under the counter to retrieve a small roller bag, which Simon had missed earlier.

So this really is it.

“Would it-“ Wille starts and then stops. “Could I give you a hug?” His voice is quiet but doesn’t waver. “Or… does that make this weirder?”

“No.” Simon grins, suddenly relieved. “Nothing could make this weirder than it already is,” he jokes, except they both know it isn’t a joke. He feels a sense of levity, suddenly, at just acknowledging it together.

Then Wille is stepping forward and wrapping his arms around Simon’s waist, and Simon slips his arms around Wille’s shoulders, slotting his face against the side of Wille’s neck, just like always, and if he inhales the smell of Wille just below his jaw, who’s to know, and besides, he’s almost certain the way Wille nuzzles the side of his head is not an accidental jostle.

A beat longer than one might expect from a parting embracing between old friends, but all too soon, Wille pulls back. He lets his arms drop as he says, terribly softly, like he isn’t sure if he should let Simon hear, and is giving him the choice to pretend he hasn’t: “I’ve missed you.”

Simon’s heart hammers. “I’ve missed you, too.”

Wille smiles, but his expression is slightly pained. “I’m sorry, but I really do have to go.”

As Wille quickly swaddles a scarf around his neck, Simon clutches at this moment even as he feels it slipping away. “Would you maybe let me know next time? When you’re back in town?” He doesn’t feel he can ask for anything more, but he knows he’ll regret it if he doesn’t at least say something.

“I…” Wille fusses with the end of the scarf with one hand, the other already grasping the suitcase handle, white-knuckled. “I don’t have any plans to come back.”

There’s a bitter taste in Simon’s mouth. “Oh. Right.” He swallows it down and forces a wan smile. “That makes sense.”

“But… could I message you later?” Wille ventures. “Would that be okay?”

“Yes,” Simon says, perhaps too quickly, but he doesn’t care anymore.

“And… maybe we could talk too?”

“I’d like that.” Simon smiles, beyond pleased.

He didn’t realize quite how much he wanted this until now, but for fuck’s sake, he already ended things amicably with Jakub. If not now, then when? “Is Berlin nice at Christmas?”

“No, not really,” Wille laughs. “All bleak and monotone and somehow it feels colder than Sweden even though it’s not,” he explains distractedly, clearly torn between needing to go but not wanting to end the conversation. “But the Christmas markets are very festive.”

“Hm.” Simon is filled suddenly with such aching want. “Maybe you can show me?”

The look that passes across Wille’s face is caught somewhere between disbelief and a desperate kind of hope. “Please,” he finally say, sounding a bit choked.