“Do you ever feel like a bad person?” Wille asked, an awfully quiet question for the force with which it hit Simon.

Simon looked down to where Wille’s head rested in the crook of his outstretched elbow, hand extended to curl loosely around Wille’s shoulder.

One of his gangly legs was straightened, ankle tucked between Simon’s feet. His other foot was flat on the bed, knee bent. Wille was rubbing the knuckles of his first two fingers up and down his thigh.

Simon loved watching Wille’s hands.

They always found something to do, something to touch.

His fingers were searching, always, for textures and sensations that reminded him he could feel things that were good. He’d trace the grooves in the wood of tables, nodding along to their conversation and only rarely glancing up from his meandering hand.

Wille loved soft blankets and running his fingertips along the wall as he climbed stairs.

He loved to trace the spiral of a single curl that fell over Simon’s eyes. He marveled at the world beneath his hands—running a nail under the seam down the side of his jeans, touching Simon’s eyebrows to soothe the furrow between them.

Simon slipped his arm to wrap around Wille’s chest, hoisting him closer. Wille hummed, nearly a purr, always so gorgeously receptive to being touched.

He rested his chin against Wille’s head.

“Wille,” he said. “Do you think you’re a bad person?”

Wille didn’t speak. He didn’t move. Simon smashed his cheek into Wille’s hair and tightened his fingers inadvertently.

Wille took in a quick breath and shakily exhaled.

“I asked you first,” he huffed weakly.

Simon shrugged, amused and saddened by the deflection but deciding to cave, hoping if he answered first it would help Wille be honest with him.

“Not really. I try not to be an asshole, and some people think I am, but it doesn’t bother me cause I know that I’m not. I’m not like, perfect, but I don’t really regret many of the choices I’ve made,” he mused, letting his own fingers dance loopy lines up and down Wille’s sternum.

Wille’s abs twitched, ticklish as Simon’s fingers danced too softly along his ribs.

Simon found the mark on Wille’s side and cupped his fingers around it.

He tugged Wille’s body closer, digging into the bruise and cuddling his chin down onto his shoulder.

Wille exhaled.

“I have this crush,” Simon said.

Wille’s finger tucked itself into the elastic of his black briefs, Simon’s, technically, which he had once again found and stolen. They were tight around his body, elastic cutting into the layer of fat above his hipbones and Simon’s mouth watered as Wille twisted the waistband tightly around his finger.

It was just a nervous tic, something to distract him from the vulnerability, but it cut the fabric more tightly into his hips and Simon ached with want.

“Oh yeah?” Wille said.

“He’s pretty hot,” Simon added, and Wille’s torso twitched with a laugh.

“He used to really intimidate me, cause he’s really tall, and like, self assured, and his clothes fit really well and sometimes make it look like he has an ass which is an impressive feat,” he couldn’t keep the grin out of his voice as he reached down to grab at Wille’s flat ass.

“Hey,” Wille whined, squirming, “Fuck you.”

“I like your ass,” Simon stated, squeezing it again. “You’d look weird with a bubble butt,” he giggled at the thought and Wille turned to meet his eyes, shaking his head affectionately.

He dropped it back onto Simon’s chest. A moment later, he nuzzled closer, warm ear against a steady heartbeat.

“Anyway, this guy I like, he’s not intimidating when you get to know him, he’s just shy, and quiet at first.” Simon continued.

“And he’s really smart, but you don’t even realize just how smart he is until you’ve known him for a while because he spends a lot more time listening than he does talking. But when you get him talking, he knows so much, about, like everything. And you’re like woah, there’s so much in his head that I don’t know, and I want to,” Simon said, feeling himself get carried away with the detachment this particular dramatic choice allowed him.

He only meant to gas Wille up a bit, help him see the good things.

“He’s really sweet, too, like, always walks on the side of the sidewalk with the cars. I feel like I’m in Pride and Prejudice or something,” he rambled on.

“And I always think about this one time, we were walking to the bodega, and there was a man rolling crates of soda, struggling to hold the door with his shoulder and get the like, rolly thing in there, and he just held the door as we passed by, didn’t even pause our conversation, or like, one time, this baby literally stopped crying when he started smiling at it on the train,” Simon went on.

Wille shifted his body on top of Simon, face down in his chest with his torso pinning Simon to the mattress, one leg bent and resting between Simon’s own, clinging to him like a barnacle on a ship’s hull.

Simon’s heart tightened and so did his grip.

“He’s just like, I don’t know, kind, in this like, glowy way that everyone can see,” he slid a hand into Wille’s hair and Wille shuddered underneath him.

Simon’s torso felt oppressively hot under the weight of Wille’s head.

“And he gets really uncomfortable easily, he doesn’t like being looked at for a long time, or talked about,” Simon said, nearly spitballing his perceptions of Wille, unsure how accurate his read on this man even was.

“He’s strong, too, like, he can run for like, over an hour. Like, that’s crazy,” Simon said honestly, and Wille snorted.

Simon wanted to cry.

“He’s not a bad person,” he pressed into Wilhelm’s hair desperately, whispering to keep his voice from cracking.

Wille was so beautiful and Simon felt heavy with the newly acquired knowledge of just how much he disliked himself. He didn’t know what to do or how to help but Wille nuzzled hard into his body like he could crawl inside Simon’s perception of him and live inside it, a new home, a respite from the guilt and shame that had been weighing on him his whole life.