The headcanon I'm using for King Hamlet in this one is that he's a homophobic bitch that literally no one likes. Don't like don't read.
EVERYONE IS GAY IN THIS ONE and I have no regrets. Some inter-play ships because there are a total of two female characters in Hamlet and I couldn't put Phe and Gertrude together with a clean conscience.
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Warning: strong homophobia and mentions of abuse
~ My PoV ~
"Yo, Ham, you feeling okay? You're a little greener than usual."
Hamlet nodded hesitantly. Normally he would tell Ophelia all about his problems when he was nervous, but today was not that kind of problem.
"She's right, my lord, you do look stressed. How much sleep did you get?"
Hamlet avoided Horatio's concerned gaze, muttering a quiet "three hours" to his boyfriend.
Horatio took Hamlet's hand and squeezed it gently, fully believing him about the three hours part, but he'd developed a sense for when the prince was hiding something.
It really wasn't that hard, though, so not exactly one of the scholar's greatest achievements.
He exchanged a glance with Ophelia; a silent agreement to keep an eye on Hamlet and figure out what was scaring him. (And then to viciously annihilate it, but that part was mostly Ophelia.)
The two, true to their nonexistent word, analyzed their friend throughout that day.
Horatio noticed Hamlet's concerning lack of initiated PDA. He'd barely even reach for Horatio's hand, and he'd nervously scan the area beforehand when he did. He was particularly tense in the busy halls, where he hardly even looked at Horatio.
Ophelia noticed how Hamlet was constantly fiddling with the ring on his left middle finger, a large gold piece that signified his royal status that no one really paid attention to anymore. He'd also stare worriedly at the many other LGBTQ+ couples, a glint in his eye bordering the line between apology and panic.
Even Mercutio seemed to have picked up that something was going on. Or maybe Benvolio noticed and told him.
The confusions of Hamlet's classmates would be resolved in the politics lecture they were currently preparing for.
Looking around the room, one would be hard-pressed to find a straight couple. Or even a straight person.
Ros and Guil were giggling hysterically about something together, Demetrius was was going over homework answers with Helena while his boyfriend and her girlfriend quoted musicals at each other, Romeo and Laertes were tossing paper airplanes back and forth, Mercutio was doing something on his phone while Benvolio looked on in a combination of amusement and mild horror, Ophelia was happily doodling flowers and hearts on Juliet's arm with her fancy art pen, Paris was working tiny braid number eleven into a quietly suffering (but still brooding) Tybalt's hair, and, of course, Horatio was trying desperately to figure out what the hell was going on with Hamlet.
In other words, pretty normal pre-class activities.
The students fell relatively silent as an intimidating man with a strong aura of importance strode straight from the door to the desk at the front of the room, only seeming to acknowledge the abundance of other humans in the room when his many papers were in order.
His cold eyes swept around the room. He plucked a piece of paper from the organized mess and only glanced up from it as he spoke.
"Mr. Montague had other business to attend to today, and requested that I teach your sorry asses. Now, I know some of the troublemakers in this group," he shot a pointed look at Ros and Guil, "but I'm sure they won't give me any trouble," another look, "and I hope nobody else will."
Mercutio subtly winked at Juliet, who snickered under her breath.
"Let's make sure we don't have any skippers. Benvolio!" He barked.
Benvolio, ever the sharp student, realized this was roll call and responded, "Here."
"Demetrius!"
"Here."
"Guildenstern!"
"Present!"
The teacher's eyes narrowed carefully.
"Hamlet."
"Here, sir," Hamlet said in a quiet voice that set Ophelia on high alert.
"I would hope so, son," the teacher chuckled menacingly.
After his own name was called (not without an unwarranted glare at him on the teacher's part), Horatio turned his full attention to his boyfriend.
Hamlet was stiff as a board, with perfect posture and a sickeningly neutral expression. It was so completely un-Hamlet that several sets of eyes sent concerned glances his way.
His hands were folded neatly on the table in front of him. Horatio reached up and placed his hand on Hamlet's wrist, but was immediately shaken off.
Baffled, he looked to Ophelia. She pointed to her left middle finger, then at Hamlet, then at the teacher.
Oh.
This man was Hamlet's father.
By blood and blood alone, from the stories Hamlet told. "Told" being relative; Hamlet started crying about two-thirds of the way through each time and Ophelia or Laertes would finish it while Horatio held him.
Hamlet, currently, was considering either stabbing the man at the front of the room with Ophelia's pen or holding his breath until he passed out. Maybe even died. Yeah, the second option was pretty tempting.
Until he felt Horatio place a tentative hand on his knee.
He let out a shaky breath in relief at the grounding contact. Horatio seemed to recognize the fact that this was helping and kept it there.
Meanwhile, Tybalt was growing more and more suspicious of this substitute teacher. If the Dane clan was any guide, this was not a person they liked or trusted. His "son" remark to Hamlet was also a large tip off.
He looked over at Paris, who seemed completely oblivious, but was absorbed in the sketch he was doing on the back of his homework. Tybalt recognized the graphite image as the teacher.
Where do I know him from? Paris wrote under the picture, then slid it to Tybalt's side of the table.
Paris, being Paris, quite overshot the force necessary to move the paper and it nearly went flying off the table. Tybalt's fencing reflexes kicked in at the last second and he slammed his hand on the paper, creating a loud bang.
The teacher turned, glaring, and fixated on Tybalt's hand.
The only thing of interest was the little splotch of color against an otherwise black wardrobe. There was a pride bracelet on Tybalt's wrist that Juliet had made that was too big on her, so had been given to him.
The teacher, his eyes not moving away from the colored string, asked through clenched teeth, "Would that item on your arm happen to signify, by any chance, that you are a homosexual?"
The word "homosexual" was said in the same tone you or I might use for the phrase "Egeus x Demetrius." Aghast disgust with a touch of incredulity.
Tybalt was bristling; he looked quite ready to strangle the man, but visibly softened when Paris touched his arm.
Instead of murder, which would have been messy and inconvenient, he took a page out of Mercutio's book.
"If being 'a homosexual' means I enjoy fucking my boyfriend into the mattress from time to time, then yes."
Said boyfriend flushed deeply, and several people in the room laughed.
"I never thought I'd say this to you," Mercutio chuckled, "but that was good."
But Tybalt wasn't laughing. He pretty much never laughed, so that in and of itself wasn't news, but he wasn't even faintly amused. He was engaged in an intense staring contest with the teacher.
"Have you got an issue with us, professor?" He spat.
The teacher took a deep breath. You could cut the tension in the room with a sword.
"There is nothing inherently wrong with it..." he seethed. "Other than the fact that it goes against God's will, is a sickness of the brain, is completely unnatural-"
Benvolio cut him off. "Actually, about four hundred and fifty animal species contain individuals who exhibit same-sex attraction, but only one of them also exhibits homophobia. Who's unnatural, I ask you?"
If this were a cartoon, the teacher would have steam blowing out his ears.
"With all due respect, sir," Horatio added, "This is a school. This institution has always been accepting of LGBTQ+ people, so if you would kindly-"
"You!" The teacher roared. "I always knew there was something wrong with you! Turns out I was right! You're a freak, a fag, diseased, digusting!"
Horatio shrunk a little bit with each insult, and that was what made Hamlet snap.
"Father!"
Everyone's heads turned to him at once.
"Father, please," Hamlet continued quietly. "He's my friend, you're hurting him. Please stop."
A heavy blanket of realization fell over the room. Anyone who had been smirking was no longer doing so.
With a voice like frozen steel, Hamlet's father said, "Hamlet, let's go talk in the hall."
Horatio's mind was going a thousand miles an hour. The pure terror in Hamlet's eyes as the words hung in the air, how his hands were noticeably trembling as he slowly stood up, and Horatio remembered the times he'd found bruises in odd places that Hamlet had anxiously brushed off as falling or running into something.
Everything clicked into place. It was an awful picture, but it made sense.
Horatio grabbed Hamlet's wrist.
"No," he said. "Stay."
He turned to Hamlet's father.
"Anything you have to say to him can be said in front of us."
Several people nodded, and murmurs of agreement bounced around the room. Hamlet's father clenched his fists and slowly let out a breath.
"Alright. I'm going to be very clear. Hamlet, are you straight?"
The room collectively held its breath.
Ophelia, thinking fast, grabbed Hamlet by the arm and kissed his cheek.
"Yes. Yes he is," she said.
His father glared at her, but he couldn't prove her wrong at that moment, so he settled for the next most painful blow.
"Horatio, are you?"
Helena stood up and grabbed Horatio's hand across the table.
"He is," she said.
Hamlet's father realized he was running out of ammunition.
"Laertes?"
Said Laertes vaulted his table and sauntered to Juliet's, who stood to wrap an arm around his waist.
"Of course," he shrugged.
Hamlet's father was losing the power in the conversation. His eyes widened as he stared around the classroom. He briefly settled on Ros and Guil, but they were exchanging looks with Hermia, and he realized that accusation would be fruitless.
Finally, he let out a shout of rage and stormed out the door. Before it could close behind him, Puck had hopped from his chair and deftly taped a piece of paper to his back.
"What did that say?" Benvolio asked.
"Homophobe," Puck replied smugly.
After sighs of relief and grins of victory had been given, all eyes returned to Hamlet.
The prince's hands were cupped over his nose and mouth, his body shaking with silent sobs, and his eyes welling up with tears. Horatio pulled him into an embrace.
"Shh, my lord-" Hamlet's fist tightened around his shirt, and something in Horatio's face changed, and then "Hamlet. Hamlet, it's okay, we're okay," he murmured. "He can't hurt you anymore."
As she often did, Ophelia joined the comfort circle by wrapping an arm around the shoulders of each boy. Juliet inserted herself by holding Ophelia's waist and placing a gentle hand on Hamlet's back. Laertes followed suit on his sister's other side.
After a moment, everyone in the room made their way into the wall of protection around the shaking prince. Even Tybalt was connected via Paris, who was holding his hand as well as Helena's.
It was this scene that a group of teachers walked in on when they came to ask why the substitute had stomped into the faculty lounge with a piece of paper taped to his back reading Homophobe.
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Me: I'm gonna write some nice, pure fluff!
Also me: *writes this*
I've got that Mervolio/Bencutio/whatever-the-hell-their-ship-name-is one shot coming, I promise. I just needed to finish this one.
Adieu, adieu, adieu, faeries. May your wit always be sharper than your anger.