“THE PINK FROSTING JOHNNY, PINK!”

“I’m TRYING SI-!”

“ARE YOU COLOUR BLIND SERGEANT?”

“HAUD YER WHEESHT-!”

you, who grew up being everyone's friend, but nobody's first choice. people have always politely tolerated you, nothing more. there are no new messages on your phone when you return from month-long deployments. you can't really remember celebrating your birthday outside of drinking at dingy bars with your colleagues. but there is not much to do apart from take all of it. smile until the corners of your lips ache from the strain, go to sleep in a cold room, sit just outside of the little circle that your friends make when they talk. you suffocate in the loneliness, but you'll say that there's it's the only way you can breathe.

but simon notices. it's all he does, considering the vacancies in his life. he's more acqainted with isolation than you are, so much so that it has woven itself into the fibres of his soul- irreplaceable, irremoveable. it would unravel him if the threads were plucked out. he is solitary, not because he has no choice, but because he choses to be. so why does he hate that seclusion when he sees it on you? you don't think you are seen, sitting one of the emptier corners of the room, but you are the first person he looks for in every new place he enters, every corner he attends. simon knows your name, even though you barely know his- and it is the most company he can offer before he has to stop himself, even in spite of the pinprick discomfort that pains all the wrong parts of his head and chest when he sees you alone. because he doesn't want anyone else to make a new hole in his heart, does not want anyone to try intefere in the cavity that johnny had left. a monument in his head that will be left untouched by time, by everyone else, by the other memories that have left their marks on his body.

but one day, simon sees you in the infirmary. bandages tight around your wounds, glass of water on the table still undrunken. the singular plastic chair next to your bed is painfully empty, and he decides that the right time to fill it is now. now, more than ever, because you are bearly breathing because without having someone to lean on, you may not be able to walk again.

widowed!simon who grieves for much longer than he wanted to. a month of bereavement, frequent visits from price, and an order to go to fucking grief counseling. widowed!simon who's just about ready to give up.

and widowed!simon tries so many things, he really tries everything in his power that he can live without you. he knew that even in death, you would want him to take care of himself.

so he tried.

difficult therapy sessions that left him tongue tied while he tried to explain his grief, seeing other people to fill the you shaped hole you carved into his lungs, going to bars to see how many drinks he could have until he stopped thinking about you.

he loved you to shreds, absolutely fucking adored everything you were. widowed!simon who takes a while to get over your passing. for a second he wants to just.. join you. maybe he'll get a chance to have the other half of his forever.

but.. in time and many tries, widowed!simon who does learn to move on. not to forget you, to cherish you. for his world to commemorate you rather than mourn you.

widowed!simon who incorporates you into his life without making you the center of it. he says goodbye to your picture that sits on the fireplace mantle, he buys your favorite tea to drink it sometimes, he goes to your gravestone to say hi. widowed!simon who finally starts living again.

widowed!simon who finds love again, in a man with a mohawk, blue eyes and a vivacious personality. widowed!simon who tells you about him, how he loves that man, and how you would have loved him too.

you watch him giggle to himself, cheeks red with blood pumping and when he turns around to meet your eyes he sees the curled lip, the slight annoyed expression you give him, before annoyingly speaking “that was so fucking gay, ugh”

simon started fucking you a few months after johnny died in the tunnel.

he crawls between your sheets after dark and buries his face in the crook of your neck, losing himself night after night in the feel of you; in the sharp sting of your nails raking down his back and in the soft warmth of the way you clench down around him.

he never says your name. never moans it into your mouth or whimpers it in your ear. his eyes stay closed most of the time, face tucked away where you can't see it.

you tell yourself he's just lost in the moment.

he stays, after, limbs loosely tangled with yours, breathing slowly evening out as his last orgasm lulls him to sleep. he seems to sleep better with you there, with company, with the weight of another body next to him.

like he isn't used to sleeping in an empty bed.

every night after he falls asleep you lie there and stare at the ceiling, pretending he isn't just occupying your bed because he's scared to be alone in his own now johnny is gone.

That means texting Johnny, Kyle or Price at three a.m with some random fucking thing because he felt sad and knew he should talk to someone. He doesn't know nor exactly want to talk about it, but he wants to talk.

So he sends random ass things to his friends and is delighted when they all text him back, some earlier than others (Johnny has his phone notifications on just for Simon, no Simon does not know, yes Johnny loves Simon a lot and wants to be there for him whenever Simon needs him to.) (Kyle is an insomniac, you can't change my mind.) (Price answers in the morning, a few minutes after he wakes up.)

(They're happy that Simon trusts them enough to reach out some way when he doesn't feel good.)

Ghost is wearing Soap’s scarf. And I know it’s not canon and someone at Activision was just cutting some corners and saving a bit and reused assets but jfc that broke me.

Ghost is a character whose lore is fucking devastating and he built all these walls that he barely even exists behind to convince himself that he wasn’t worthy of softness or connection. And none of that mattered to Soap.

He saw Ghost not just as Ghost but as SIMON, who Ghost had buried years ago. And he saw him at his worst and he loved him anyway and I just .. I was not prepared for this level of emotion on a Friday at 9 PM.

I’m over here in a puddle fucking bawling my eyes out and then I’m annoyed at myself because I’m having emotions about this and I’m like it’s a fucking game you’re fine BUT YOU KNOW WHAT I’M NOT FINE GUYS I’M NOT FINE!!

THIS is why I write fan fiction, because FUCK YOU Activision. You got it wrong and I will NEVER forgive you for that and I don’t care how silly that is. 😭😭😭