Low-key basing Ham's school off of mine because we're chill af and I live for it. Don't get the wrong idea, though. We don't have desks in the traditional sense. Realistically, Ratio would already know where his desk is and there would be no awkward "tell the class about yourself" Oblivious To Our Struggles Teacher.
Hopefully what this lacks in punctuality it will make up for in length, fluff, and potential relatability??
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~ I'm using my PoV so often now, wow ~
Hamlet watched too many high school movies.
He'd always wanted to give a New Kid a tour of the lunchroom, pointing out the various cliques, who to avoid, who to befriend, and who would get you in trouble.
So, naturally, he was pumped when the teacher announced that there would be a new student to be introduced.
Hamlet didn't think much at first of the small boy at the front of the class. His head was down, he shifted his weight between feet, he clutched his binder and textbook like a lifeline, and his eyes darted nervously around the room as though someone might have jumped up from their seat and stabbed him.
"M-my name's Horatio," he said when the teacher asked him to introduce himself, and then winced slightly, presumably at his stutter.
"Why don't you take that desk over there, Horatio? The one next to Hamlet. Hamlet?"
At his name, Hamlet lifted his hand and gave Horatio the warmest smile he could offer. Horatio did not react and sat down without giving Hamlet a second glance.
Not ideal, Hamlet thought to himself, but he definitely needs a tour.
~ Teim skip to lunch because I'm hungry ~
"Horatio!"
And a-fucking-gain, Horatio winced. Hamlet had been keeping an eye on him all day, and Horatio's own name seemed to cause him distress. When it was spoken, his shoulders tensed and his knuckles whitened around his pencil. It miffed Hamlet greatly.
"Y-yeah?" Horatio said in the quiet, nervous voice that sounded like it was trying not to tremble.
"Hey. Um, I know you already know my name, but I'm Hamlet," he said, holding out his hand.
Horatio kept his eyes trained on Hamlet's shoes and shook his hand in silence.
"I'm not going to pretend to be your friend or anything," (Hamlet couldn't ignore Horatio's slightly crestfallen expression,) "unless you decide I'm not human trash, but I was wondering if you'd let me show you around."
Horatio, still silent, nodded a tad sooner and a tad more frantically than Hamlet would deem a natural reaction.
Hamlet brushed aside this strange gesture and placed a tentative hand on Horatio's shoulder, and thus prepared to mentally check this off his bucket list.
"Okay. First things first, the Dungeons and Dragons nerds."
Hamlet pointed to the nearest table where several people were fussing over character sheets, and a girl was crawling under the table to retrieve a set of runaway dice.
"They're friendly, but if you're not careful you'll get sucked into the game with them. That lot over there consists of visual arts elitists-"
A collection of seniors in the corner were raptly listening to a boy who was gesturing wildly, holding out his phone so they could see a picture on it.
"They don't call themselves elitists, but if you approach them with a question about pencil brands they'll turn their noses up. Over there are the weeaboos, also called the self-deprecating emo kids."
Hamlet paused to call, "Yan-chan, love the new hairstyle!" and then high fived the girl that turned around.
"Anywho, that's them. Oh, this is perfect, see the guy over there in the leather jacket?"
Hamlet nodded across the room at Puck, who had posed himself against a wall and looked like he was itching to pull out a cigarette.
"He is the one you absolutely do not go to for relationship advice. He has no qualms tricking you or your partner into some mind games that result in a breakup." (Hamlet noted the way Horatio's eyes lit up at the use of the gender neutral "partner.")
"But you'll learn enough about him no matter who you make friends with. Over there, we've got the classic thespian troup."
Indeed, Hamlet's thespians were looking thoroughly classic, several members peering over each other's shoulders at a script with yellowed pages.
"One of em got into classic lit and accidentally dragged the whole bunch in," he explained with a laugh. "They're gonna do The Scarlet Ibis soon, I'm pretty sure."
"Can't wait," Horatio sighed happily, then blanched and looked back to the ground when Hamlet turned to him in shock.
"You've read The Scarlet Ibis?"
Horatio nodded meekly, and Hamlet's face spread into a wide grin.
"Fucking finally. Okay, this is gonna sound a little weird, but hear me out here: Old Woman Swamp got its name because there's a witch living there, and Doodle accidentally uses her magic to walk, and that's why he falls when he gets too far from the swamp. Doodle has magic but doesn't know it."
Horatio, still timid but slightly less so, mulled over Hamlet's words. Finally, he said, "I suppose it would make sense, but if that's the case, where does the ibis come in? Did the witch send it as a warning or was it merely coincidence?"
He paused, an idea forming on the tip of his tongue, and Hamlet tried to ignore how much he admired the familiar glint of literary challenge in Horatio's eyes.
"Ooh! What if the ibis was Doodle's familiar, but because his magic had been tainted by an outside source, it couldn't get to him? Maybe if the ibis had reached him, he would've been able to walk and run just fine!"
Hamlet was surprised that he'd gotten Horatio to really talk, but suddenly wished he'd managed it sooner. Not only did Horatio's voice turn out to be undeniably pleasant (he reminded himself not to outwardly show this revelation), but Hamlet quickly found himself longing for the utter wit and genius with which Horatio composed his words whenever he was parted from it.
Over the course of the next few weeks, he realized just how very much he depended on Horatio's words to keep him grounded. It was no secret that Hamlet was a little bit mad, and Hamlet himself did nothing to dissuade those who thought this to be true, often aiding the rumors purposefully, but Horatio simply would not have it.
One day, sprawled in the grass over lunch, Hamlet brought it up.
"Ratio, why don't you avoid me?"
Hamlet almost regretted asking when Horatio looked at him with such dismay that he had to break eye contact.
"Why would I?"
"Whyever everyone else does." Hamlet gestured vaguely outward. "Because I'm scary, I guess."
Horatio clasped his hands together tightly to stop himself from reaching for Hamlet's.
"But you're not scary," he sighed. "You just have strange thoughts. There's a difference."
Now, Hamlet wasn't usually the type to take out frustration on those who didn't deserve it, particularly when those who didn't deserve it consisted of the single greatest person he'd ever met, but he was tired and grumpy and he hadn't taken his meds and he just wanted answers.
"You don't believe that," he snapped, and for the first time, didn't soften when Horatio flinched.
"Hamlet, you know I do, I-"
"You what? You're scared of me, too." He scoffed as Horatio's eyes drifted to the ground. "See? You can't even look at me when I talk to you."
It was cruel, definitely, but it made Hamlet smile wickedly at his half-victory.
Until he realized Horatio had drawn his knees to his chest and had quietly muttered an: "I'm sorry."
No, Hamlet didn't feel so victorious anymore. Instead, he felt like an awful person, because not only did he snap at his best friend for no good reason, but said best friend was probably more scared of him than before.
"I don't mean to be like this," Horatio murmured after a lengthy silence. "It's a learned practice."
Hamlet frowned, but decided himself unworthy of reaching to lift Horatio's chin.
"How'd you learn it, then?"
"N-nowhere, just, around, you know." Horatio shrugged nonchalantly, but he was betrayed by his trembling hands.
"Hey," Hamlet said, carefully scooting closer. "I'm not gonna hate you or anything. Unless you, like, killed someone."
"Ha. But, no, my old school was shit, and y-you kinda learn not to stick out unless you're ready for attention. Which I was not, I might add." Horatio laughed dryly.
"Fuck em," Hamlet proclaimed with an uncharacteristic sense of finality. "If they don't like you, just fuck em. They're not worth your time."
As the ghost of a smile graced Horatio's lips, Hamlet did an internal happy dance.
(A/N: it autocorrected dance to Dane and I cannot-)
"I wish."
Hamlet gaped silently as Horatio began scrambling for a recovery.
"No, w-wait, not like that- I meant, well kinda, but I didn't mean-"
"Did my Horatio have a crush?"
Hamlet smothered the stab of misplaced envy in his chest with a wide grin, nudging his friend suggestively. He pointedly ignored the way flustering Horatio made the envy feel a little less misplaced.
Meanwhile, Horatio was trying desperately not to let his face heat up; due both to the memory of his crush (Hamlet had been correct, of course), but also at the "my."
"Y-yeah, but it wasn't anything s-serious. Just the obligatory athlete crush," he stammered.
"Mhm. Sure. You can't brush that off, now you gotta tell me what she was like," Hamlet smirked, mostly because his smirk was his most-practiced mask.
"That's the problem!"
If Horatio had previously held a light tone, any trace of it was gone now. The trembling in his hands was back and the distress was evident in his voice. He'd probably turn some heads if he and Hamlet hadn't wordlessly agreed to sit very far away from people during lunch every day.
Hamlet, meanwhile, had decided Fuck it, the rules of no homo don't apply here, and wrapped a comforting arm around Horatio's shoulders. Not that he'd ever been particularly good at comfort.
"Hey, shh," Hamlet murmured, rubbing small circles in Horatio's arm with his thumb. If it worked for him for so many years, maybe it would work its magic here too.
"I w-want to tell you, I really do, but n-no one's ever been okay with it before, or okay with m-me, so I don't-"
"Wait. Back up." Hamlet halted his circles. "Okay with you?"
"Wait, shit, f-forget I said that-"
"No, Horatio, you gotta tell me what's going on," Hamlet said, trying very hard to keep his tone closer to concerned than to accusatory.
Horatio, looking anywhere but Hamlet, crossed his arms tightly over his chest in a protective hold that tugged on Hamlet's heart.
"Look, it's just some bad shit from my old school, it's really nothing."
If it weren't for the shaking of his hands and the strain in his voice, Hamlet just might have believed him.
"Ratio, you don't get like this over nothing. You don't have to say anything if you don't want, I'm not going to force you or go all shitty on you if you don't, but please believe me when I say I won't hate you over anything you could tell me right now."
Shaking hands ran through brown hair, and Hamlet scooted closer to gently move Horatio's arms away from his face.
"F-fuck, I'm sorry, I-"
Hamlet quickly cut him off. "Did any of what I just said get through to you? Seriously, you don't need to apologize."
Horatio sent him a grateful smile, took a moment to get his breathing back to normal, and closed his eyes.
"I'm gay."
Based on Horatio's immediate flinch, Hamlet gathered he assumed he'd be angry. Which was... all kinds of bullshit, really.
"Me too," he responded carefully, still rather confused as to why this was such a big deal.
Horatio's eyes shot open in awe.
"... Really?
Hamlet furrowed his eyebrows and tilted his head, the corner of his mouth curling up in a smile at the unneeded intensity of it all.
"Yeah. You didn't know?"
Horatio shook his head.
"Well. Damn. I thought all GRSM kids had gaydar," Hamlet joked, nudging Horatio's knee with his elbow.
"What's GRSM?"
It was Hamlet's turn to widen his eyes in awe. "How have you been at this school this long and not heard the phrase GRSM?"
Horatio shrugged self-consciously.
"It stands for gender, romantic, and sexual minorities. It's basically the same thing as LGBTQ+ but with less letters and more inclusive."
"Ah. Gotcha."
A comfortable silence fell over the two boys for a moment before Hamlet shattered it with a shit-eating grin.
"So. This crush of yours," he teased, leaning a bit closer. "What's he like?"
Horatio rolled his eyes and gave Hamlet a playful shove.
"Shut up, he was so basic," he groaned in a combination of mock and genuine embarrassment.
"Doesn't mean he wasn't hot," Hamlet quipped.
"Oh my God, fine, shut up. He was the soccer star, this purebred American dream boy. Dark brown hair, tanned skin, tall and muscled. He was crazy popular and nice to pretty much everyone, and I think that's what got me. He actually looked at me, even through the crowd of friends, and took the time to give me this big smile every day. Outgoing, happy, always winning things."
So, like, everything I'm not, Hamlet thought. Great odds.
"But I've got better taste now," Horatio added, which caught Hamlet's attention.
"Okay, you can't just say that and then leave me hanging," Hamlet said incredulously, frantically motioning with his hand in what he hoped was a "continue" gesture. "Does that mean you're into someone else?"
In response, Horatio, the evil man, smiled deviously and mimed zipping his lips.
"You're the worst," Hamlet declared, and then swiped and chugged the last of Horatio's cinnamon tea to emphasize this.
~ *elevator music* ~
When Hamlet decided to go to Ophelia for councel, he had not taken into account that it was Ophelia.
"What the fuck, Phe, please just help me out here," he pleaded to the unrelenting girl in a hand-embroidered flower blouse.
"Apologize for ratting me out in art and I just might," she hissed back.
Hamlet threw his hands in the air. "Jesus, okay! I'm sorry I told TJ you were stealing her charcoal pencils!"
Ophelia nodded, satisfied, and put her hands on his shoulders as if it made up for her being a head shorter.
"Good. Now what did you need help with?"
"I just need to figure out who Horatio likes," he sighed. "I don't know who it could be and it's driving me insane."
"You mean you want to know who's stolen his heart from you?" Ophelia said with a perfectly neutral expression.
"What? No! No, I just don't know who it is," Hamlet deflected.
"Bullshit. You're very obvious, Ham."
"Phe, please..."
Ophelia rolled her eyes and then just left him there, walking off behind him. Hamlet stared at the spot where she had just been in dismay.
"Hamlet," she said from out of sight.
"What?"
"Turn the fuck around."
So he did, and was met with Horatio, being dragged by a very put-out Ophelia.
"Phe, why did you-"
She cut him off, which, rude, but whatever.
"No, Ham, shut up." She looked at Horatio. "You like Hamlet." Then to Hamlet. "And you like Horatio." She released her hold on both of them, walking away to lean against a wall. "Now fucking communicate. I've done all the hard work for you."
Hamlet was at a complete loss, just staring at an equally bewildered Horatio. Ophelia banged her head on the wall.
"Oh my God! You two are insufferable!"
And then she marched over, planted a firm hand on the back of each boy's head, and pushed them together.
It was definitely an unconventional kiss, but enjoyable all the same. Hamlet got over the shock a second after Horatio and slid his eyes shut. The pressure of Ophelia's hands dissapeared and a satisfied sigh was heard before her footsteps clomped away. Horatio's hands moved to Hamlet's shoulders; Hamlet's to Horatio's hair. They stayed like that for a while, just slowly kissing, until Horatio broke for air.
"Holy shit," he panted, and Hamlet couldn't help but let out at breathy laugh.
"I mean it!" he continued. "That was- you're... Wow. Yep."
And Hamlet kept laughing, partly because of Horatio's magnificent post-kiss speech skills, but mostly because he agreed.
Holy shit, wow, yep.
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I cannot apologize enough for the snail-speed updates. All I can say is I've been working on something I think you'll enjoy. Maybe. Hopefully.
I also promise I've got like five drafts in the making that you'll see finished eventually.
Good morrow, my faeries, and may you never forget that you're loved.