willmack. frat au. wm childhood best friends. frat president wsh. rated e. 7k words. complete.

“I mean, it has to be Mack, right?” Dickie says predictably, making Will twitch.

Top five most romantic things they’ve ever done tbh.

Imagine you meet a boy, and you play beautiful hockey together, and that boy makes you laugh so hard you forget what silence sounds like. Suddenly, you’re inseparable. Suddenly, a day without seeing him or hearing his voice feels like a pulled muscle you can’t skate through. But that boy is a star, and stars are meant to be in the sky with other stars, so you let him go. You watch him shine through a screen and hold your breath every time he shoots, praying he buries it in your own team’s net, the team you’re supposed to represent in four short years. You can’t bring yourself to care because every gasp, every flinch, every frown on that boy’s face costs you another hour of sleep.

You’ve never held the rosary around your neck tighter. Never prayed louder. And of course it would all be for him: the restlessness, the sleepless nights, the hollow days where you go through the motions but your body is still with him on the ice, passing to him blind because you can feel him in your bones. So of course you feel it the second the momentum shifts. Of course you know, before anyone else does, that your boy is watching in horror as your team gets handed gold.

I’d say that’s a frankly boring and uninspired take!

Listen, I know we’re all Will Smith down in this house. His face is too handsome, his rizz too unmatched, his personality too endearing, his harem too brunette, etc. But Macklin Celebrini is so much more than just his hockey

Here’s a kid who absolutely radiates joy around his friends, peers, and mentors. Someone who goes above and beyond for the people he cares about, defends them against bullies, media nonsense, and whatever else gets thrown their way. Someone who can walk into a room and earn not just the respect, but the actual heart of seasoned veterans who can sniff out opportunistic try-hards from miles away.

Mack’s the real deal. Genuine, kind, humble. Yes, of course he has a bratty side. He has impossible standards for himself, high expectations for others, and a very specific idea of how his life should be run. But he’s also the same person who says he hopes everyone in the locker room feels welcome.

He’s a kid who can’t do anything in moderation. He slams six espresso martinis in one go, parties for a whole week in Boston like it’s the last time fun will ever be legal, gets excited over meeting silly robots, becomes so intensely passionate about golf that he hires a coach, gets unnecessarily competitive over pre-game sewer, and celebrates his teammates’ accomplishments like they’re his own.

He gets visibly uncomfortable when his teammates start scrums in his honour, but he’s the first to jump in when things escalate for someone else. He’s the kid who calls off a penalty against the opposing team because it wasn’t a fair call and he wants to play hockey the right way.

He’s incredibly sweet with children. Play-fighting with them, asking them adult questions, making their day with game-worn pucks, birthday wishes, and hospital visits. He’s goes along with every single one of his best friend’s whimsical side quests and takes interest in his hobbies because he wants to experience being a regular teenager for once, and because he loves that boy so much his heart could probably implode on itself.

He’s also notoriously a terrible liar, the kind of boy who couldn’t act casual if his life depended on it, who can’t lie about one single solitary thing without his whole face betraying him. So he keeps quiet. He keeps his cards close to his chest, because somewhere along the way he learned what handing his bleeding, exposed heart to the wrong person could do to him.

Mack’s not boring. He’s not weird. He’s not too much.

Ok so while I thoroughly enjoyed the RPF potential of that line, I’m actually not sure that’s what Mack said. Unlike this clip, where I can say with a reasonable amount of confidence that he’s saying “Think it’s time we bought shelves,” or Will’s clip from the same night where he says “You need to be proud,” Mack’s lip movements here are just too non-specific for me to call it. It could honestly be anything!

Well *rubs hands* Now that we’ve gotten the boring realism out of the way, let’s say “Don’t look at me like that” is exactly what Mack said. In which case, given the context of that night being Mack’s 100th goal of the season, I don’t think it was bedroom eyes that undid him. I think Mack looked over and saw a level of pride and fondness there that he genuinely could not process in the middle of a game.

This is a guy who famously hates hyping himself up or talking about his own accomplishments to the media. He visibly squirms on the bench and clenches his jaw when his coach highlights his goals in the locker room. And yet, when Will praised his first NHL game day outfit, Mack turned around and told him in an almost giddy little voice: “I love getting compliments.”

And something about that makes me insane. Because Mack grew up under Rick’s whole “you’re never as good as everyone tells you when you win, and you’re never as bad as they say when you lose” philosophy à la Lou Holtz, which sounds healthy on paper, except it also means Mack probably learned very early that praise always came with an asterisk. You’re good, but not that good. You’re special, but don’t get carried away. You did well, but there’s still something to sharpen, tweak, refine, improve. So maybe Mack has never really known what to do with love given freely, abundantly, and without conditions. Because some part of him is always waiting for the reminder that he still has work to do.

He can tell himself he’s never as bad as his inner demons say he is after losing the Olympics, or after every meaningless October to November game that still somehow feel like they’ve taken a chunk out of his soul. But he also never lets himself believe he’s that good either. He’s good enough. Acceptable. Meeting expectations. Exceeding expectations, even. But is he ever just right? Perfect? No need for improvement? No room left to grow? Probably not.

And then there’s Will, looking at him like that. Proud in a way that doesn’t ask anything from him. Fond in a way that doesn’t feel like a prelude to even more expectations. Saying nice things that somehow don’t make Mack’s skin itch or his hands sweat with the immediate need to prove himself worthy of them. Maybe compliments from Will’s mouth land differently. Maybe Mack actually believes him. Maybe the tingling in his stomach isn’t anxious nerves, but butterflies. Maybe the heat at the back of his neck isn’t discomfort, but contentment.

that zoning out with a little smile that he always does whenever he talks about will 🥀

so i just came back to this vid of wm when will noticed mack was clearly annoyed and didn’t want to talk, but instead of forcing a conversation or backing off completely, he just watched him and waited, giving him the time and space he needed, but still got the answer in the end

and i feel like it pretty much sums up their whole dynamic

Toff and Julie made Willmack sound like a prim and proper courting couple because they are … interesting…

But in relation to how they see themselves as equals, Will seems to be the only person outside of coaches who has been upset with Macklin during a game and Macklin just listens. Or Will will make faces to what Macklin says. Maybe I haven’t seen other clips (and if there are, ignore this :D), but I haven’t seen others do that. And the fact Will feels confident and comfortable arguing with Macklin about the game shows the importance of the dynamic - Macklin respects and values Will’s opinions to listen during the heat of the game regularly. This element intrigues me for some reason.

Not sure if this makes sense but it’s just something that I noticed after watching old games because I miss the team.

Oh you’re onto something here, anon! We have to remember that Will’s just as hockey-pilled as Mack. He has plenty of opinions, takes notes on everything, never forgets a detail from a game, and centered the most dominant line in college hockey. He’s not some “uwu yes whatever you say Captain, oh Captain, my Captain” sidekick.

The clip you’re referring to reads less like Will being upset with Mack and more like him venting about a frustrating situation while Mack agrees. As Toff himself pointed out, these two are incredibly respectful of each other, so I don’t think they frequently butt heads when it comes to hockey. If anything, we’ve heard Mack say time and time again that they see the ice the same way and enjoy making plays together. That sounds like two people with a very united professional front. And I do think Mack values Will’s input. He’s said as much in this direct quote: “It’s nice to bounce ideas off him or talk about the game, just his thoughts, what he saw, obviously I trust his opinion. So it is really cool to have someone like that.” We’ve even seen Will pointing to where he wants Mack to shoot the puck, and the two of them are constantly having intense little conferences (the famous dick to ass maneuver) before faceoffs.

I know we’ve all seen this interview after the pens game but why has no one mentioned how he acts at the beginning when he hears Toff say smitty.

He was so shaky and his voice was so wobbly. Plus the way he kept on fidgeting with the strings of his hoddie.