#featherless wings

It shouldn't have be a shock. All of the Sides shared some of Thomas' features. However, in the mindscape one of Virgil's eyes tended to have a sheen of green or purple reminiscent of his puppet form. In this moment, past his wide pupils, Virgil's irises were a chocolate brown that sent a sunburst of fondness alight in his chest that Virgil felt any time he thought of Thomas.

Virgil paused, and drew closer to the mirror.

After mere moments, there was a shine of purple that took over his right eye, but the shape remained the same. He drew his hand up to lightly touch the corner of his eye, as if shocked by the familiarity he found with the shape. After all, for all of Virgil's thoughts that swarmed with self disgust at his state, he had forgotten that the ones he cared about so deeply shared many features with him.

Virgil smiled softly and drew away from the mirror. He took a breath, one for once that wasn't marred by the pressing panic he had been pressing down for so long at this point. And yes, at the moment he still had greasy hair and probably stunk worse than Remus beneath all of his layers and deodorant, but that could all be fixed.

With determination, Virgil stripped himself from the rest of his clothes and turned the water on.

His wing covers remained on, the cloth against him slightly with his movements.

Self compassion was easier when he was reminded of the others because he liked resembling the others. And Thomas took such pride in his own wings. It was a pride that reflected in all of the others. to some degree for another. So, for all of his previous bravery, Virgil's confidence flickered like the meager candle of hope it was.

He stuck his hand into the water, but it was still cold. He checked the water knobs, and the hot water had been turned on, but just wasn't ready for Virgil to hop in yet. Was this a sign? The anxious side took in a deep breath that filled the bottom of his lungs. Even if he didn't deal with his neglected wings, the covers getting water logged would only make things worse. Either he would be exposed in front of the others, or the extended wet on his feathers might make things worse. He knew that sometimes damp towels were used during preening, but for everyday moments? That sounded like a nightmare that had the potential to damage his feathers even further than they currently were. Could his feathers mold? Mildew? Grow mushrooms?

Prolonged dampness would do him no good.

Virgil's fingers began fumbling with the straps to his cover. The top strap popped loose, and Virgil tugged the second one free as well. Instantly, the fabric lifted from the base of his wings. With a couple of wiggles, the fabric fell to a clump on the ground in a cloud of feathers and stench that set Virgil's mouth agape.

Shedding a couple feathers every so often was normal. Collecting those normal sheds in one place while at the same time irritating his already messed up wings was not.

The worst part was that some of the feathers had collected inside of the wing covers instead of floating into the air or scattering across the ground. What feathers he could see were dulled from dirt and grease and little strings from the black and gray cotton. Said fabric seemed to be darkened by grease at the fabric that rested on the base of his wings, which was a spot he didn't often see considering it's awkward position. Had it bled through and he hadn't noticed? Virgil could only be thankful for Patton's foresight of using a dark fabric to make his wing covers. With just one glance at his actual wings, he noticed how his feathers were so clumpy, they bordered on mats where his wings bent and at the base of his wings—all places where the fabric would muss the feathers the most.

In all honestly? Virgil's sugar inspired mania was not enough to deal with this.

Still, it was refreshing for his feathers to finally have some breathing room. Across his chest, there were red indents from where the straps had dug into his skin in a fit that he thought was comfortable. His ribs ached slightly now that they were free from their binding. He didn't think had been wearing the covers for that long, Virgil grumbled internally. Still, he longed to stretch in a way impossible to manage in the small bathroom to relieve the ache Virgil had misattributed to solely his wings.

Virgil was tempted to examine his wings more deeply, but he stopped himself. At this point, he would rather start fresh than properly deal with the mats, so it would be better to not touch his wings at all for the moment.

Probably.

Maybe.

Truthfully, Virgil really didn't know anymore. It wasn't like anyone gave him a handbook on what to do if things got too far. And to get one would invite too many questions. His mind swirled with all of the possibilities that could go wrong and suddenly the task seemed so huge but—baby steps.

He could do baby steps.

Virgil reached his hand into the shower's stream and felt the warmth. Virgil stepped into the soothing spray while purposefully keeping his wings outside of the water. He could have borrowed the plastic covers Roman created just for this, but he didn't want to dirty it. Still, even with the extra work he was finally showering. His eyes closed and tried to let his muscles relax, because isn't that what happened when people showered with water so hot it turned their skin red? Of course, Virgil's water was only a comfortable warmth instead of a searing heat, but he found it relaxing all the same.

He lathered ample shampoo in his hair once, and dirt and flaking skin came free beneath his scratching nails. He shampooed his hair again, making sure that all of the grease was truly out. Virgil put a dab of conditioner in the end of his hairs, and he imagined what it would be like for his hair to finally be soft instead of slick. He grabbed a puff ball and pulled it towards him to get it wet. Onto the wet puff ball, he squeezed body wash that smelled vaguely like citrus. He worked it into a lather against his palm despite knowing it would do that regardless on its own. He scrubbed his body vigorously once, twice, three times. He even borrowed some of Roman's fancy face wash.

Once he finally finished, he just stood there, basking in the water.

He thought he would feel victorious at this point. He did the big scary task that he had been putting off, and everyone said that would give him a sense of triumph. Unfortunately, Virgil knew that there were even bigger tasks he was still neglecting. Besides, who considered showering as an accomplishment?

As Virgil dried off, he couldn't help but realize that despite it all, he did feel clean. He finally felt fresh and like he could lie in bed without dirtying his own sheets. So maybe he didn't feel the rush of a task complete, but the relief was still rather nice. Maybe he could be proud of himself for this afterall, even if this wasn't something that he would brag about.

Nodding as he slipped on his fuzzy pajamas, Virgil walked back to his room while carrying his wing covers in his arms. This was a good way to end a day, Virgil thought.

A very good way indeed.

...

Based on the way his eyes burned when he didn't get enough sleep and the headaches he got from too little food or water, Virgil knew that he was, despite his wishes, not spared from consequences from his actions. Thomas may have thought of his sides as imaginary, but it was more of a an intertwined but still separate existence. Which meant that even if him getting cavities wouldn't impact Thomas, his mouth would still hurt.

He was still cursed to the confines of a body despite being imaginary. Perhaps Logan could give him some tips on how to like. Not. Virgil couldn't help but scoff at the idea. Even Logan was confined to the rules of existence, even if they had all the power to shape reality somewhat. In the real world, Logan could deny anything that happened as simply "imaginary" so completely, he was incapable of being hurt. Meanwhile, Roman and Remus had the most power while not in the real world, but were the best at conjuring in both realms.

Virgil sighed. No matter how much he longed to distract himself, the task at hand was unavoidable. He needed to clean himself. He… he didn't really want to. Sure, he hated feeling grimy and disgusting. But what if he spent all that time, all that energy, and he felt worse at the end?

Then again, today had been a good day for him. He had talked, and laughed, and did his job. He saw the others eat his ugly cookies and other than some gentle ribbing, they had nothing but nice things to say. Yet looking back, he realized how careful he was to not… to not be gross? He kept his arms down whenever possible. He tried to keep some distance when he remembered. He existed in his own dirtiness.

He felt the kind of filthy that baby wipes couldn't fix.

For now, Virgil was hiding out in his room. He didn't want the others to think of him as gross, yet at the same time he didn't want the others to see him going to the bathroom to shower and brush his teeth because what if they realized how dirty he had been all day and— yeah. He was Anxiety, so of course he was going to worry.

Thankfully, after desert it didn't take long for all of the others retire to their respective rooms, leaving Virgil to a peaceful house. Hopefully. For all he knew, Remus might be creeping around in the shadows waiting to scare him still. Even so, this time Virgil was determined to not back down.

Virgil ran his tongue over the cookie stuck in his teeth, allowing the burst of energy from the sweet taste to propel him towards the bathroom.

...

As it turns out, now that the cookie bag was pulled from the corner he had hidden it, Virgil felt more horrified than excited to share the fruits of his arduous labor of love. The cookies he had laid out for the others were the best ones he could scrounge up from both batches he taken out from the oven, and not a single one of those fit the bill of a picture perfect cookie considering how rough and asymmetrical they were. The ones he had hidden away were even worse considering how thin, crumbly, and hard the edges were. In fact, some of the cookies were entirely thin crust that was both brittle and hard, making it extremely crumbly in the worst way.

Honestly? Virgil hadn't expected to be around when the others discovered the ugliest batch of cookies in existence that he had hidden away. Now, the cookies were set to be publicly shamed right before his eyes, and the cut on his left thumb he had earned in the process of their creation hadn't even finished healing.

Thinking of the injury drew Virgil's attention to its soft ache. He acknowledged it silently, deciding that he would need to put a new bandaid on the cut later, but for now he put the pain to the back of his mind since he had bigger things to worry about.

Desperately, Virgil wracked his mind for what he could do to stop Patton from handing out his sad attempt at the cookies to the hopeful sides surrounding him. Roman and Logan had already been promised a treat, and those cookies had already been revealed. But perhaps there was one thing he could try… the good old bait and switch.

"Why don't we eat some of the cookies you made Patton?" Virgil suggested, his hands shoved in his pocket to hide his sweaty palms. Despite his efforts at nonchalance, Virgil's wings were pressed tightly against his back, betraying his nervousness.

Patton's brows scrunched in confusion. "Uh-"

"We should eat the older cookies before the newer ones, right?" Virgil rambled on, pulling his hands out of his pockets to gesture as he talked in an unconscious bid to be more convincing.

Logan raised an eyebrow and set a hand on Virgil's shoulder, causing the anxious man to freeze in his tracks. His hand was so warm that Virgil felt some of his nerves melt away at the small contact. "Virgil, I'm sure its fine."

Hold on a minute. Logan was disagreeing with this? It wasn't like crofters were on the line, and he wasn't being too unreasonable (hopefully). He actually thought that Logan would be all for about eating older cookies before they went stale.

Virgil tried again. "I mean, Patton's baking is like a thousand times better than mi—"

"Did you, our benevolent midnight baker, just imply that your cookies would not be enough to suite our tastes? Perish the thought!" Roman proclaimed. He put a hand to his chest in mock offense.

Virgil scrambled for a defense, but what could he say other than outright admitting that his cookies were terrible? At this point, the jig was up. Virgil ran a hand down his face.

"We already ate the ones you had laid out and they were delicious. I'm sure that these ones are just as good!" Patton reassured.

"Fine. But this was my first time baking on my own and these ones aren't as pretty as the ones I laid out for you guys," Virgil warned.

In response, Roman rolled his eyes and grabbed a cookie out of the bag. It was large, but somehow both flat and bumpy at the same time from Virgil's poor shaping before it went into the oven. Roman took a large bite, and his eyes went wide. Mouth still full, Roman gushed about how delicious the cookie was.

Scoffing, Virgil hit Roman's arm. "Don't talk with your mouth full," Virgil reprimanded, but it was undeniable that the knot in his chest loosened.

Roman swallowed his bite of cookie and smiled. "Sorry," he said sheepishly.

Patton handed one of the misshapen cookies to Logan, who examined it with amusement. "Did you add enough butter?" Logan asked curiously.

Virgil shrugged. "I used the amount of butter the recipe said to. The dough was just so crumbly and wouldn't stick together no matter how much I mixed it."

Patton handed Virgil a cookie as he spoke before setting down the bag and getting a cookie for himself.

"Did you try adding milk?" Logan inquired.

Vigil threw his hands up in exasperation. "The recipe didn't say to add milk though! Besides, me and Patton have never added milk to our chocolate chop cookies before."

Patton giggled. "Don't worry, it still tastes like a normal, delicious chocolate chip cookie. It is a bit weird that the dough was so crumbly though… What recipe did you use?"

"I found an easy chocolate chip cookie recipe online that was rated 5 stars and had a bunch of reviews, so the recipe shouldn't be the problem," Virgil explained. He exasperatedly nibbled on his admittedly very yummy cookie, but he had to be careful to catch all of the crumbs in his hands since for some reason, the cookie was intent on falling apart.

"Hm," Logan hummed in acknowledgement about how weird that was before taking a large bite of his cookie. As it turns out, Roman had already inhaled his entire cookie in that time and now looked dejected at the cookie's betrayal of actually being gone.

"Can I have another one?" Roman asked Virgil with pleading eyes.

"Why are you asking me?" Virgil wondered. His eyes flickered to Patton, who would normally be the authority figure about this, but he looked completely nonplussed so his gaze returned to Roman's eyes.

Roman's lip jutted out in a pout. "They're your cookies."

Virgil rolled his eyes fondly. "Help yourself. If you like them, your free to have however many you want."

"Thank you! This act of kindness shall go down in the history books! In fact, we should erect a statue in honor of your delectable cookies," Roman half joked, already grabbing two more cookies.

Virgil rolled his eyes. "There is no need to go that far, Princey."

His cookies may not have turned out exactly how he hoped, but the fact that Roman thought they were great meant that maybe they were worth making them after all. To his surprise, Logan and Patton complimented the cookies and thanked Virgil for sharing them too.

So this is why Patton loves to bake so much, Virgil realized as their words made his lingering worries melt away.

...

He could have tried to shower in that time, but Virgil was worried he wouldn't actually have enough time and then would throw off Patton's dinner plans to the point where dinner got burnt or something. Besides, he was content to exist more as a function than a person at the moment. In fact, Virgil wouldn't haves even been able to tell Thomas himself what it was he watched during the the fortyish minutes it took for the ham noodle casserole to cook. It was… nice. He really did need more brain turning off activities in his life that didn't have anything to do with his feathers.

"Here you go!" Patton said.

Startled out of his musings, Virgil noticed that a heaping plate of noodles and two slices of garlic bread was being held out to him. With a mumbled thanks, Virgil set the plate in front of himself as he waited for the others to be served. Thomas parents mentioned that it was rude to eat before everyone had their food when at a restaurant once, and since Virgil couldn't break the habit of wanting everyone to have the food until he began eating.

Of course, that's why he had a tendency to avoid group meals occasionally. When he was in the wrong mindset, there were a thousand things that Virgil could imagine going wrong. Which could be said of any scenario, but that wasn't the point.

As it was, Virgil poked at his plate full of so much food that he doubted he could finish it all while pointedly avoiding eye contact with everyone at the table. The whole ordeal was made worse by the fact that despite Patton and Logan trying to fill the silence with Patton's explanation of what the dinner was and Logan's comments about the nutritional benefits of each part, there was a noticeable lack of interruptions by Roman who would typically bring up something from his day or at least attempt to direct the conversation to a more interesting direction.

"I'm sorry for everything."

Virgil bit the inside of his cheek as he reminded the note Roman had left him. Glancing across the table, he noticed how surprisingly still Roman was in his silence. There were no grand gestures or cheeky grins, just a polite smile on his face as he pretended to pay attention. The man didn't even drum his fingers on the table like tended to do when he was lost in thought cooking up his next grand project. Roman being still seemed… wrong. For all of his claims to princely charm, Roman wasn't polite. He was honest and kind, and he had some really awesome ideas for painting nail, but he looked more like a damsel in distress holding still in hope of avoiding harm rather than a knight in shining armor willing to do whatever it took to save the day at the moment.

In a bid to resist touching his wings, Virgil shoveled a forkful of food into his mouth. The melty cheese, soft noodles, and juicy ham were quite delicious. Letting Patton do his thing when it came to the spices despite his nerves begging him to consult an actual recipe for measurements definitely paid off.

If only his stance on Roman was as simple as his opinion about the food.

With all of their sleepover hangouts, Roman had been becoming something akin to a best friend. He trusted him, relied on him. Which meant that the fact that he had been working with Deceit behind his back, someone that Virgil thought that Roman could be trusted to not work with at that point, hurt. Virgil wasn't ready to confide in Janus again, and he probably never would. Yet Roman didn't care about what he wanted. He would rather just talk to a snake.

"you don't have to be alone."

Despite his own hurt, a part of him still hated seeing Roman so clearly unhappy.

When Logan joked about there being more than enough food to fulfill all of their caloric intakes for the entire day, Virgil took the chance to jump into the conversation to bring up how he had to actively convince Patton to save the funeral potatoes for another day.

"It would have made good leftovers," Patton pouted.

Virgil raised an eyebrow. Considering the fact that all of them knew the extremely full state of the fridge, the whole table burst into laughter.

There was a brief silence after that. Before it could grow awkward, Virgil adjusted his wings as he steeled his nerves.

"How was your day, Roman?" the anxious side asked.

Roman's shoulder straightened. "M-my day?" he squeaked in surprise.

Virgil rolled his eyes. "Yup," Virgil said, but his snark lacked any bite.

Roman beamed as he launched into a descriptor of his day. He kept it on the shorter side, but the conversation after that felt normal. Clearly, there were still words that all of them left unsaid, but the conversation remained light. There was no use talking about the other stuff and potentially ruining dinner, right? For once, the others were on the same page about that since Virgil was pretty sure the others were scared that one wrong word would send him running back to his room.

As an act of good will, Virgil slipped Roman his two slices of garlic bread when he caught the creative side gazing longingly at the empty bowl despite already having eaten two serving of casserole. Virgil nibbled on some cucumbers instead.

Unexpectedly, Patton frowned when he noticed the exchange, but he covered the small moment up with a joke about how he should have made more bread. Virgil pointed out that they only had the one baguette in the first place, but Roman began lamenting that they should have bought three for them to have enough, and the small moment slipped Virgil's mind.

...

Thankfully, even the worry about kitchen shenanigans potentially being afoot turned out to be unfounded. They were just making a crap ton of food for whatever reason. The menu, according to Patton, included two main dishes (a funeral potatoes dish and a noodle casserole that was the same thing but with noodles instead of potatoes), a vegetable plate (including sliced cucumbers and cut up bell peppers), and then garlic bread to top it all off. Because clearly the meal wouldn't be complete with out it, which was probably linked to the way Roman would consume a whole loaf of garlic bread by himself if they let him.

"Will the fridge even have room for all of the leftovers?" Virgil asked with wry amusement while Virgil began putting oil in the pan in preparation for the onions Patton was chopping.

Patton froze for a second. Fiddling with his cat cardigan, Patton replied, "We should have room."

"And if we don't?" Virgil pressed.

Patton smiled mischievously, and refused to elaborate, which was Patton for he would likely pack up anything that they couldn't fit in the fridge and have Roman give it to denizens of the imagination. Still, it stirred up a memory that made Virgil chuckle.

Virgil hadn't thought such a claim was any laughing matter when he had first heard Morality's nonanswer. Back then, Virgil was more familiar with Remus' ability to creatively use his limited resources for pranks than Morality's actual character, so could you blame him for being wary? Besides, even if Virgil knew that even Remus' pranks had a tendency to back fire, the off chance of actually getting hit by a plate of food from a Rube Goldberg machine Morality created had seemed like a real threat when Virgil saw the mischievous glint in Mo's eyes. Of course, Virgil quickly realized just how hilarious off the mark he was once he started actually talking to him in more than just passing.

It was only after Virgil had known Patton for awhile that Virgil first made an offhand mention to the Rube Goldberg machine he imagined Patton building. Since then, Patton had taken to reminding Virgil of that moment. He might not have still found it funny after all this time if it wasn't for the fact that it always made Virgil laugh.

Patton reminding him today was just another of the small olive branches he was extending for a war Virgil hadn't even realized he was waging.

The rest of dinner prep went similarly smooth. There wasn't much conversation, but it didn't weigh down on Virgil anymore—especially with Patton's occasional jokes and Virgil murmured reminders about timers and recipes occasionally breaking the silence. It helped that the involvement required to make the meal kept Virgil's hands and mind too busy to stand around awkwardly. (Not being able to be helpful was the worst for Virgil's nerves.)

It was exactly what he wanted. The conversations flowed and silences stretched just like it was before—which is probably why the back of his mind screamed wrong, wrong, wrong about their interactions. Virgil shoved that feeling down in favor of the comforting film of light nostalgia that settled over him from properly cooking with Patton again. His and Patton's unresolved talks poked at his heart and begged to be addressed, but that was a can of worms that Virgil would never have to open if he played his cards right.

So, dinner preparations went without a hitch. Thankfully, Patton even seemed to realize that Virgil was likely right about there being too much food after he took a look in the fridge for himself. Instead of popping both of the casseroles into the oven, Patton covered the funeral potatoes in saran wrapped put the whole pan in the freezer to be cooked another day

The noodle casserole went into the oven, and now all there was to do was wait. Finally feeling content with his amount of social interaction for the day (and knowing that it was a miracle he hadn't had a true run in with Roman yet), Virgil decided to retreat to his room until dinner. At least then he could finally charge his headphones.

...

Finally, finally, Logan released a deep sigh, and his glare softened to the vaguely haughty face Logan made when he was trying to pretend like he was never bothered in the first place, which was frankly rather suspicious to Virgil. Was it truly that easy? Neither of them had even apologized yet!

Logan straightened his tie and strode past Patton's place at the table and into the kitchen, only stopping until he was right in front of Virgil. The anxious side froze like a baby deer without its mother, unsure of what Logan wanted.

"Excuse me, Virgil," Logan said, in a tone usually used to convey that Virgil was to get out of the way. Virgil glanced at the cabinet behind him, back to Logan, and then stepped to the side. Logan pulled out a glass cup from the cabinet.

"Is that all?" Virgil asked incredulously, thrown off by Logan's uncharacteristically calm behavior. "You can't be serious. You didn't even warn us to not touch your Crofters again!"

Logan filled his glass with water purposefully before turning to Virgil. "I'm wearing a necktie, so of course I'm serious," Logan declared gravely.

Virgil's eyes widened in shock. "But-," Virgil began to argue, and then he realized that Logan letting them off was better for him, so he would be better off leaving him be. "Ugh. Fine."

Logan raised an eyebrow, and Patton gave him a pointed look.

"Thanks for letting us eat your Crofters," Virgil mumbled, because Logan truly was being strangely gracious about it.

Logan sniffed. "Its fine. Just… don't make a habit of it. The store doesn't always have the Loganberry flavor in stock to replace my stash…" Logan explained, slightly pouting at the thought of not having his go to flavor on hand.

Virgil nodded. He hadn't realize that Logan had an actual realize why Logan wouldn't want people eating his Crofters considering that most of the Sides enjoyed cycling through the different Crofters flavors (which is why eating Logan's Crofters seemed so tempting at times), but Virgil could respect that.

Logan left the kitchen with his glass of water in hand, leaving Virgil with a slightly better understanding of the logical side than he had before.

...