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prince-rowan-of-the-forest · 2 years ago

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(Vi)vianne Marie Zephyr (1/2)

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Here’s a list of things that Vivianne Marie Zephyr knew.

One, she was twelve years old.

Two, twelve-year-olds should not be trusted to make their own decisions.

Three, twelve-year-olds didn’t know anything about themselves or the world. (at least, according to her extended family they didn't.)

Four, Vivianne is not a girl.

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| Ao3 | Next -> |

Warnings:

Virgil gets deadnamed, mostly by himself but also by people who don't know he's trans.

Pairings: Virgil & Remus

Word Count: 5535

Notes:

This fic is basically exploring Virgil's story more or less up to the point of 'Mine is a World of Rooftops and Love Songs', the first chapter especially focuses on him discovering that he's trans. Because of this there's a lot of deadnaming/using the wrong pronouns for him at the start because he's learning.

This is also written from the perspective of a twelve-year-old learning about the idea of being trans for the first time, so obviously he's not going to get the terms exactly right, etc.

I'd also like to note that I myself am not trans, so I'll apologise now if anything here is inaccurate, feel free to correct me if the need arises.

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Disclaimer over, this fic is a precursor to 'Mine is a World of Rooftops and Love Songs', the fic I wrote for New Years exploring Virgil's backstory. This one will(should) have two parts!

I'm hoping to write a similar 'backstory' fic for every side before moving onto oneshots in the 'present day'

I've decided to name this AU Forests and Rooftops, (at least for now, I might change it if I come up with something better lol)

I'll be tagging fics from this au with 'Rowan's F&R verse' on Tumblr, and they'll all be collected in a series on Ao3 :D

Happy reading!

(and apologies for such a long note

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Here’s a list of things that Vivianne Marie Zephyr knew.

One, she was twelve years old.

Two, twelve year olds should not be trusted to make their own decisions.

Three, twelve year olds didn’t know anything about themselves or the world. (at least, according to her extended family they didn't.)

Four, Vivianne is not a girl.

Now Vivianne knows very well that she has girl parts and long hair and because of that everyone seems to think it’s ok to pester her-

Actually, if she’s not a girl, surely she shouldn’t use girl words to refer to herself, like those pesky ‘she’ pronouns that made her feel all icky and gross whenever anyone talked to her.

Maybe she should try ‘he’ instead. That’s what all the boys used. Now she- no, he - wasn’t sure if he - ok no stop that thought, the ‘he’ actually made her- him? Feel really good, all warm and fuzzy inside.

Ok, well that’s the first step. Vivianne was a ‘he’ not a she.

Obviously this revelation didn’t come immediately or all of a sudden.

She- he - had always hated it when her- his! ( Why was this so hard? It was what he wanted for gods sake!) parents called him a girl, especially hated it when they called him their little princess, or tried to style his hair or make him wear a dress for some fancy occasion. Couldn’t they see that he wasn’t a girl? Weren’t parents supposed to know that kind of stuff?

Oh well. Vivianne thought as he was going into his seventh grade homeroom for the first time after a summer moping by himself in his room doing nothing as usual. Maybe his parents just didn’t realise. Maybe he should tell them, but- uh- later. Once he’d figured out everything himself first.

Because at the moment, though he had concluded that he liked ‘he’ much, much better than ‘she’. Vivianne was still only twelve years old, and he still had a lot to learn.

—-

It took almost a week for Vivianne to get used to referring to himself with the different pronouns in his head but he was pretty sure he’d gotten it down by now. Despite that, though, he still didn’t tell anyone. He was pretty sure the other kids in his class would laugh at him, and he didn’t really have any friends he could talk to about it either. So for now, he decided he’d just do his own research. (Oh, he really really liked he pronouns).

So, that weekend, Vivianne walked to the local library, wearing the biggest and cozyist hoodie he owned (both for comfort and anonymity, even at only twelve years old, Vivianne knew that gossip at their school spread like wildfire and he didn’t want to be called a nerd on top of everything else). At the library he sat himself down at one of the old computers, pulled an empty notebook out of his bag as well as a few pens and started researching.

Now it might be weird that he did his research in the public library instead of within the safe confines of his own home, but he wasn’t quite sure about what adults would think about him not being a girl yet, especially not his parents. His parents were the last people he wanted to know about this right now, not when he wasn’t sure.

His researching took up a lot of the cool Saturday afternoon. He learned about a lot of new terms and ideas, things like ‘trans’ and ‘nonbinary’. He discovered that he wasn’t weird for not feeling like a girl and he definitely wasn’t the only one. He learned that there were also girls who had originally been boys, and people who didn’t feel like either. He discovered that there were people who sat at every point inbetween and even some people who didn’t fit on the spectrum at all.

There were so many more pronouns out there too, more than just ‘he’ and ‘she’. There was ‘they’, for starters, and then whole anthologies of other sets that he’d never even heard of. (He was a little intimidated by how large the list of neo-pronouns he found was, so he just wrote down the term and underlined it a few times in red, hoping it would remind him to come back to it later). He tried out ‘they’ pronouns on himself for now, by whispering them under his breath. They didn’t give him the same fuzzy feeling as ‘he’ did, but it still felt considerably better than the thought of ‘she’ so he would accept it.

The research session had been groundbreaking and he walked home swinging his arms back and forth, happy with the pages he’d filled up with notes.

—

“Vivianne?”

A few weeks later, when someone called him by his name he found himself so overcome with revulsion at the thought of that name belonging to him that he almost didn’t even respond to the teacher who had called on him. Because of the shock, he had muddled up the words he had been trying to say in response to her question and ended up being laughed at by most of the class. He shrank back into his seat, mumbling the last of his answer so quietly that the person sat beside him had to repeat it for the teacher.

So, Vivianne didn’t like that name. Which, now that he thought about it, actually featured in his research a little. He remembered a section about how trans people (which he had concluded was what he probably was) as well as other’s who didn’t identify with their birth gender quite often chose new names.

Now that he considered it, he hadn’t always been as comfortable with the name his parents had given him as he had thought. It was a nice name, objectively, it would have been a lovely name if he had actually been a girl and he was sure he would’ve loved it in that case. But… well he wasn’t a girl, he was aware of that much by now, so obviously ‘Vivianne’ didn’t fit.

For a few days, he tried referring to himself as ‘Viv’ instead. It was just a short version of ‘Vivianne’ and his parents called him that sometimes anyway, a nickname at best and it still felt pretty feminine. After that it was shortened just a little more to ‘Vi’.

‘Vi’ stuck for much longer than Viv had. He’d managed to co-erce his parents into calling him Vi as a new nickname and it felt good, much better than Vivianne, or even Viv. He liked the ‘V’ sound. For some reason there still felt like something was missing. Vi wasn’t his . Not in the way he thought a name should be. But it was good, better than Viv and definitely better than Vivianne. He liked it, even if it wasn’t perfect, he could search for something better later and use Vi for now. Until he found his name.

—-

About three quarters of the way through seventh grade, Vi cut his hair.

It had been in the spur of the moment and he regretted it immediately. Regretted it so much it almost brought him out of his current mental breakdown and into another one.

He had an awful day at school. The teachers kept picking on him to answer questions even though he could hardly ever find words to speak normally in school nowadays. At lunch a group of older girls had been picking on him for hiding himself away in the corner and he’d ended up going to the nurse with a scraped up knee where he fell trying to get away. His favourite hoodie had ended up getting covered in dirt and mud where he fallen. And then of course he’d had to go back to class, where everyone had laughed at him for not being able to answer a question he was picked on for because he just couldn’t force himself to speak.

During the walk home he’d worked himself up into a panic, thoughts spinning round and round his head and everything was just so much bigger and brighter than it usually was.

“Hey Vi!” His mother called from somewhere inside the house when he opened the door, “How was school, sweetheart?”

Vi didn’t answer, instead he burst into tears right there on the spot, unable to hold it in anymore. He choked back a sob and ran for the stairs, slamming his door and collapsing on the bed. He couldn’t breath, no matter how tight he curled himself he couldn’t get himself to take even breaths through the sobs.

And then he looked up, and though the tears he saw his reflection in the mirror.

He saw his long black hair, hair that fell in thick waves down his back. Now pooled around his tiny curled up form like a shawl. It made him sick. Every time he looked in a mirror, every time he saw his reflection, every time someone called him a girl .

Before he could think, Vi was standing again on shaky legs. He stood in front of the mirror, looking into his own wide blue eyes, his pale skin, his hair that fell over his shoulders. He looked like a girl. It made him so angry.

In one swoop, he grabbed the scissors from his desk and cut off the chunk that hung over his shoulder.

‘Her hair looks so beautiful!’

‘Such pretty hair for a beautiful little girl’

‘I would kill for hair like hers’

‘I would love to braid her hair…’

With each thought came another chunk, everything people would say to him, every comment about how lovely his hair was and how he should never cut it, until there was hardly anything left to cut. His hair made him a girl, and now it was gone. It felt almost a little like he’d cut away a part of himself. He felt lighter, almost, relieved, maybe.

And then he realised what a mistake he had made.

He stood in his room, finally calmer than before, but his floor was covered in hair, his hand holding the scissors was still shaking and all he could think was that his mum was going to kill him for this.

It looked horrific. He had cut some bits far too short and now they stuck out from his head, his bangs were now the only part of his hair that looked presentable, being the only part he didn’t touch. The rest of his hair made him look a little like he’d been mauled.

Some parts were cut so short he could see his scalp.

Cutting his hair hadn’t made him look like a boy. It had just made him look stupid, he would be a laughing stock.

He didn’t know what to do. So for a long while he just stood there, staring at his own reflection as silent tears dripped down his face. What the hell would happen now? What would his parents say when they found out? He’d get in so much trouble, and then- school was a whole other issue.

If he was already being bullied for barely speaking and altogether being skinny and small for his age, Vi would be bullied tenfold for this, he’d have the whole school after him, if his parents didn’t murder him first.

Speak of the devil, someone knocked on the door.

“Vi… honey? Are you in there?” His mother called through the door, “I heard you crying before, may I come in?”

“N-no-!” Virgil said as loud as he could, it was still barely an inside voice, “Please- don’t.”

“Alright,” She said, “I won’t come in, but… if you’re up for talking you can come to the door?”

Vi sniffed, before taking a deep breath that ended up choked by a sob. In the end he was able to step over the hair and sit down with his back to the bedroom door.

“I- I’m here,” Virgil said, resting his chin on his knees and trying to wipe some of the tears from his face. He could hear shifting on the other side of the door. His mum must be sitting down as well.

“Good,” She said, her voice quiet, “Now, are you ok?”

“No,” Vi said miserably, he wasn’t ok, he really wasn’t. Not right now. He knew by now that keeping his feelings a secret was no way to deal with them, this kind of conversation- with the bedroom door between them- had been happening since Vi had his own room in the house. There was no point keeping his feelings from her anyway, she could always tell, somehow, even if he didn’t tell her.

“Can you tell me what you’re feeling?” She asked, Vi squeezed his knees tighter to his chest.

“Upset, angry,” He mumbled.

“Can you tell me why?”

“School,” Vi answered, “Mostly- teachers keep calling me and- I can’t say the answer even though I know it a-and everyone laughs at me-”

“Oh sweetheart-” His mom paused, “Why are you angry?”

“At- at myself, mostly,” He almost whispered, “I… did something stupid.”

There was a long pause before his mother spoke.

“Can you tell me what you did, sweetheart?”

“I don’t- I don’t wanna,” He mumbled, “You’re- gonna be mad…”

“I won’t,” she said, “I promise you, whatever has happened I won’t be mad at you,”

“You promise?” He asked, he was still certain she’d be angry, one of his hands had come to clutch at the uneven strands of hair that jutted out from his head at odd angles now, she had always loved his hair.

“I promise,” She told him, her voice firm and reassuring. Vi still didn’t believe her, but she would find out at one point or another anyway. So he stood up, took a step back and opened the door.

She gasped when she saw him, hand flying to cover her mouth and eyes wide in shock.

Vi looked away, “I told you you’d be mad,”

“Oh honey I- I’m not mad,” She said, taking a deep breath, “Just- shocked! What happened?”

“I… I just got so angry- with- with myself and with everyone else and- I did it before I even realised what I was doing…” He said after a few deep breaths, looking away as he spoke so she wouldn’t see the tears welling up in his eyes again.

“Oh, darling that’s ok,” She said, crouching down to look up at him, “What were you so angry about?”

“Just- just the way everyone talks- and- how my hair looks so girlish and makes everyone say stupid stuff about how pretty it makes me a- and I don’t like it- so- so I just-” Vi cut off, he hadn’t meant to say that, he was trying to keep all this boy stuff a secret until he was sure about it-

“You don’t like being pretty?” His mother asked, Vi shook his head.

“No- it’s- it’s not about being pretty,” He sniffed, wiping away more tears, “It’s- it’s um, it’s that pretty is a girl thing…”

His voice was barely audible now, but she heard him and smiled fondly.

“So you don’t like girl things?” She asked. Vi nodded, hand fisting in the hem of his sweater, “Any reason why?”

“They- they make me feel uncomfortable, all icky and gross, like I’m sick,” He mumbled, oh well, he was deep enough into it now, “Cuz I’m not a girl,”

“I see,” She nodded, “If you’re not a girl, then what are you?”

“A boy,” He said, before pausing, “I think- I um- I didn’t want to tell you until I was sure… but…”

“I understand,” She nodded, before tapping his head lightly, “Now, we can fix this.”

“We can?” He asked, “Wait- you’re- you’re ok? With me not being a girl?”

“Of course we can,” She nodded, “We might need to wait for it to grow out a little bit, but we can take you to a hairdresser who can cut it however you’d like, ok? And- of course I’m ok with it! What sort of mother would I be if I stopped caring for you because you’re not a girl?”

Vi sighed in relief, slumping forwards and hugging her around the middle, she returned the gesture, squeezing him tight.

“Now, lets clean up this mess together and you can tell me all about not being a girl, okay?”

—-

The next day, Vi wore a beanie to school to cover up the absolute mess that was his hair.

He’d left his bangs out, and actually he quite liked how it ended up looking. He didn’t look as much like a girl with the beanie, and that felt… really nice.

It was weird, not having all of his hair anymore. It was weirdly relieving, even if he was absolutely terrified all day that someone would ask him a question or a teacher would ask him to remove the beanie. Or worse, that someone would take it off by force.

Which, of course, because Vi can never have a nice day, is what happened at lunch.

He was cornered by the bullies again. They were taunting him about his new lack of hair and had backed him against the wall. One of them had reached forward and snatched the beanie whilst he wasn’t looking at her and all four of the girls had gone silent before bursting out into peals of laughter. Vi had ran, trying to hold back tears until he’d gotten somewhere away from people. He’d ended up hiding himself away behind the bushes surrounding the old bike shed- it was usually quiet at this end of the school and he hoped no-one had followed him as he sank to the ground and tried to fight back tears.

“Hey!” Someone called, followed by the sound of said person forcing their way through the bushes despite there being a path just on the other side. Vi’s head snapped up to look at them and they grinned when he met their eyes, “Hey! I got your beanie back!”

Vi blinked slowly, he’d never seen this kid before, so they must not be in the same classes even though they looked the same age. He had a white streak in the front of his dark brown hair, which was cool. Bright green eyes and a curly mustache that looked to be drawn onto his face with marker. He was holding Vi’s beanie, just like he’d said, and was still grinning ear to ear.

“Oh right, you don’t talk much, do you?” He said, “I heard rumours, but anyway, here,”

He came over and held out the beanie. Vi hesitated, before reaching out to take it. The stranger grinned, before turning and slumping down next to him with a thud, making Vi jump.

“So! What’s the story with the hair?” He asked, leaning forward, “Oh, wait, what’s your name? I’m Remus!”

Vi made a quiet noise, trying to collect his thoughts. Should he tell Remus his name? He should tell him his real name, right? But then Remus would call him that- but then what if he changed Vi and then- well, Remus probably wouldn’t stick around long enough for that anyway, so… maybe it didn’t matter what he said, or, didn’t say because no matter how hard he tried, the words ‘I’m Vi’ wouldn’t make their way out of his mouth. He huffed, before reaching for his bag and grabbing a notepad and opening it to the front page. He turned it to face Remus and tapped the inside front cover, on which he’d written ‘Vi’s Research Notebook’.

“He speaks! Speaks through the book, at least!” Remus cheered and Virgil was immediately stunned by the use of ‘he’ because to everyone else he was a girl, being called ‘he’ by someone else felt almost like a metaphorical punch to the gut, but… in a good way? “Um- why’re you looking at me like that?”

Vi shrugged uselessly, though he couldn’t seem to get that astounded expression off of his face.

“Was it cuz I called you ‘he’? Cuz that’s just what I thought you were- I couldn’t really tell by looking at you-”

Virgil cut him off by shaking his head, frantically tapping the book where, underneath his name he had written down ‘He/him’. Well, at least this book was coming in useful now.

“Oh great! Me too!” Remus grinned, “Wait then why were you looking at me weird?”

Vi paused, taking a deep breath before flicking to the back of the book and grabbing a pen, writing quickly: ‘Most people think I’m a girl, that’s why I cut my hair.’

“Oooooh!” Remus nodded after leaning forward to read the words, and Vi was once again stunned, because… that was ok? “Well you did a real shoddy job but I respect the effort! So, Vi, what’s school really like? I’m new see and I’ve just gotten out of doing tours and stuff with my stupid brother cuz for some reason they thought it’d be best to leave me with someone I knew even though my brother’s a donkey.”

Vi couldn’t help but let out a soundless laugh, something he tried not to do in school- mainly because people would prod at him for it. He hated questions from them most of all. He grabbed his pen again and wrote down ‘Why’d you join late?’ on the line below the previous statement. This was actually a pretty good way to communicate with someone who was actually willing to wait a second for his answers. Maybe he should talk to his parents about it.

“Oh ‘cuz a few years ago I skipped a grade but like all this year I’ve been in hospital so they put me back where I was supposed to be cuz I missed most of this year.”

He hummed, nodding along while he fidgeted with some grass, before flicking through the book and opening it to a double page on which he had written down things he’d noticed about the teachers- which would let you off with homework, who was best to go to with problems, who was worst. Once Vi was pretty sure Remus had read enough of the page to get the gist, he flicked back to the back and wrote ‘I can show you all the good hiding spots are too.’

“Perfect!” Remus grinned, bouncing a little, “I think we’re gonna get along great, new friend!”

—-

It turned out that Vi only shared one of his classes with Remus, which was annoying because he might have been able to get through all of the bullying about his hair if he had a friend with him (he’d never really had one of those before, wasn’t that exciting?). But for now he was stuck being passed notes with horribly ugly drawings of him, or whispered name calling and even more notes that called him mean names.

At least even after learning Vi’s real name Remus kept calling him Vi, and kept using ‘he’ too, even though people called him weird for it. It made Vi very happy, which was all that seemed to matter where Remus was concerned.

—-

It was only a few days later, after he’d spent lunch behind the bike shed with Remus (it turned out to become a good meeting spot) that his teacher had arrived late to class.

Usually a teacher being late would mean extra time to chat with your classmates. Usually the three kids who already had phones would be gathered around while they played some stupid video of kittens chasing lights, or something else that they considered funny enough to save to their phones.

Not today though, because a teacher being late to Vi’s class meant that the kids in the class who liked to pick on him could gang up on him like they did during lunch.

Someone spooked him from behind his desk, making him flinch and cover his head.

“Not even gonna stand up for yourself? Scrawny little freak?” Someone called from over his head, Virgil only squeaked pathetically and curled up further in his chair as someone pushed him roughly, almost enough to move the chair itself, “Look at her! She’s so pathetic!”

“What’s wrong? Cant hide behind your hair anymore?” Someone else mocked, “Oh yeah, cuz you hacked it all off, what’d you use again, a hedgecutter?”

“She does look a little like a dead bush,” A boy commented, “She looks a little like the thing my dad ran over in the road this morning!”

The people around him broke out into noises that were a mix of disgust and laughter, Vi just curled further into his seat, gripping his own arms in a death grip as the other students continued to poke and prod at him.

“Hey!” Someone yelled over the noise of the students, Vi shuddered, even without looking he could feel the magic from whoever this kid was, and Vi doubted he was even doing anything right now, “What’re you all doing? Get away from her!”

Most of the students paused then, turning to face the voice, some of them whispered.

“It’s him!” They said, “The kid who lives in the forests with the faeries !”

“Really? I thought that was just a rumour!” They said.

“I’ve seen him going with my own eyes!” They said, “It’s true! He goes in and comes out, every time, completely fine and safe!”

“Is he cursed? Does he have magic? Is he a faerie himself?”

“No need for all the whispers,” The someone they were all talking about called over the frenzied whispers, silencing them immediately, “Why don’t we all calm down and go to our seats, ok?”

“Or what?” Someone with more bravery than common sense yelled from the crowd, “You’re gonna get your pixie friends to come and giggle at us?”

“You’d probably be smarter not to insult the fae,” The person said, “They don’t like being mocked, and they have ways of finding out…”

Most of the class had scrambled back to their seats by now. Now that the crowds were gone, Vi felt that it was safe enough to look up and when he did he saw that the only students who were still standing were Kailee, one of the girls who liked to bully him, and a boy. The boy must be the one speaking, because who else could it be. He was short, but nowhere near Vi’s level. His eyes were blue, but not in the same ghostly-pale sometimes creepy way Virgil’s were, they reminded him more of a sunny day, kind and warm, though Virgil felt the tingle of something supernatural when he looked into them too long. Instead he looked at the other boy’s hair, dirty blond and falling in waves down to his chin. Most notable, though, was the brightly coloured flower crown he wore atop his head. Intricately weaved better than anything Virgil had ever seen with what looked like real flowers, pink and baby blue and a soft yellow.

What really surprised him was the magic, though, the feeling of magic rolling off of him. Vi knew he had some kind of… sense, for magic, but it had never felt half as strong as this before… whoever this kid was…

He and Kailee stared at each other for a minute before she gave up, rolling her eyes and stomping back over to her seat. When their eyes met, the other boy smiled and gave him a thumbs up before walking away and sitting down at the edge of the room just before the teacher had come in.

…No matter who he was, Vi thought he couldn’t be anything but trustworthy.

—-

Vi never talked to the faerie boy, to be fair on him, he never talked to anyone. He also didn’t like referring to him as ‘the faerie boy’ because even though the kid was easily beautiful enough to be, he wasn’t actually fae, he just lived with them, but he didn’t have a better name to call him and Vi was far too anxious to ask. He really wanted to thank the boy for standing up for him, both the first time and the few times it happened afterwards too. Vi was so grateful to him, and probably owed him a whole lot- which might be bad, actually, if this kid really did live with the fae- but because of his intervention people had started to leave him alone.

There was always the occasional thing, someone would trip him or push him or throw little taunts or quips, but the majority of people had decided to leave him alone for the most part. It seemed that knowing Virgil was protected by the boy who befriended the faerie courts was enough deterrent for the most part.

Vi still couldn’t speak and school still wasn’t great. He and Remus still spent lunches behind the bike shed because even though Vi wasn’t followed by bullies everywhere he went now, people still stared and whispered and it made him uncomfortable. Teachers still found amusement in picking on him during class and watching him struggle to answer, in classes he didn’t share with the faerie boy people still laughed at him for it.

But it was… better. Vi decided it was much better than it had been.

—-

The rest of seventh grade passed in a blur for Vi.

Somehow, he had managed to remain friends with Remus. The rumours that had been spread hadn’t scared him off and somehow neither had Vi’s inability to speak nor his limited fashion sense (Remus had tried to persuade him to wear something other than hoodies and baggy trousers a few times to no avail over the time they spent together).

They had quickly started hanging out outside of school too, since it turned out that both of them had a lot of free time on their hands. His parents had been ecstatic to find out that he now had a friend and Remus said that his own parents were glad to have some peace and quiet for once. They’d started slowly, just with Remus coming over for an evening after school one day or another, but that had very quickly become them spending every weekend they could together. If the weather was good they’d go out, to the park mostly where they’d get ice-cream or a chocolate bar and then sit and just exist together for hours. If the weather wasn’t so good they’d spend time in Virgil’s house, or at the library- though Remus didn’t like the library that much- or the coffee shop near the school.

Vi really thought this whole thing was brilliant. He had someone he could connect with, who wanted to spend time with him. Someone who was loud and boisterous and downright intolerable at times to make up for Vi’s quiet and anxious dimeaner. They balanced each other out perfectly. Vi’s mother said it was fate, Vi didn’t believe in such things, but… he couldn’t deny that having Remus as a friend was… pretty cool.

And even more importantly, now he had someone to study for his finals with.

Since 6th grade was ending and exams were almost on top of them, Vi, of course, was already getting incredibly stressed over them. He’d found- after finally getting Remus to sit down to study after half an hour of insistence- that ssitting in his bedroom and listening to Remus ramble about whatever units they had been learning was far better in comparison than making notes on a textbook for the hundredth time. Listening to Remus made it interesting, like he was using the biology they’d been learning to tell a story without leaving any of the gross bits out. Vi had found himself laughing so hard he wheezed by the end of it and came out confident that he wouldn’t forget the bio content any time soon.

Every exam came and went with just as much stress as usual. Vi was sure he’d had more panic attacks than last year- not that he was keeping count. Even with the increased amount of panic, though, he found himself going into every exam calm- or as calm as he could, given the circumstances- after Remus found him and talked him down from his worries every time.

Having a friend made the problem so much easier for him to deal with and Vi couldn’t be more grateful for it. Remus managed to drag Vi out of his little ball of stress after every exam he had and take him to get ice-cream (something else he’d definitely had more of than last year) all whilst saying with no hint of a doubt that Vi aced them.

As summer began and Vi prepared to have Remus breaking down his door every morning for the next eight weeks, got ready to be busy over the summer for the first time in his life, he couldn’t think of anything better that he could be doing.

Finally, his life was just a little bit better.

And all it took was the knowledge that he was not a girl.

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#sanders sides #sanders sides fanfiction #fanfic #fanfiction #Rowans R&F verse #NewYears Verse #gpnna put the old and new tag on there in case anyone is confused #sanders sides virgil #ts virgil #virgil sanders #remus sanders #ts remus

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