#and when viola came out in men's clothes well something happened in my brain for sure

[walterdecourceys]

twelfth night this afternoon queen

[jsteneil]

“an adorably misshapen cap that I like to imagine Percy knit for him”

— The Lady’s Guide to Petticoats and Piracy, chapter 2.

it’s Percy knitting time, baby! 

for @novakstiel

The woman selling pie outside the theatre is there every single day, come rain or sunshine. It’s the kind of hard-earned dedication Percy never used to understand, but now he makes a point of greeting her every time he passes by. She watches him with squinting eyes and a sneer—although the rictus is there every time that Percy sees her, whether she looks at him or not—and only answers after a month of selling him overcooked pies and lukewarm tea after work. 

He doesn’t know her name. She doesn’t know his; they’ve never actually talked more than the few words necessary for the basic exchange her trade commands. 

It’s a few days after the holidays when Percy looks up, running across the street with his face down in his collar against the wind, and doesn’t see her in her usual corner. He reaches the side of the theatre house, following the building to the stage door, and only when he’s safely out of the hail does he look back. He’s curiously concerned about her. His own situation is far from stable, but a stuffy orchestra pit and mice-infested flat still seem like a great deal better than having to sit in a corner of the street all day. 

The wind blows hailstones into his face. Percy turns his back to the it, clutching his violin case tighter against his body under his coat, and that’s when he sees her, sitting under an rickety awning across the street. She’s sitting upright like she always does, with an old blanket covering her legs and a small brasero glowing red for tea-making purposes. He sees her, absorbed with something in her lap, and her fingers snapping back and forth—snip, snip. She’s knitting. 

Relieved, Percy shoulders open the old door behind him and hurries to practice.

*

The crowd in front of the theatre the next week is loud and messy. Percy can hear it from several streets away. He buttons up his coat over his violin case to protect it from flailing limbs—it’s impossible to live and work in London for more than a few weeks and not become familiar with the violent behaviors of incensed crowds—and runs the rest of the way.

He can’t approach the theatre. The way in the front is blocked, with men yelling and shaking their fists all the way up the steps and women egging them on right up in the middle of the crowd. 

Percy elbows his way across the back of the crowd, where onlookers are as numerous as protester. He can see Jacob and Martin standing by the pie lady’s stall, looking grim.

“What’s happening?” he asks as they greet him. 

“Stage workers’ protest,” Jacob says. “The show was a dud; they haven’t been paid this week or the last.”

Percy looks over the crowd. “That’s a lot of people.”

Jacob shrugs. “Boss isn’t exactly popular.”

“Is the way in blocked for us?”

“You wanna try your way into that crowd?” laughs Martin. “I’d be throwing bricks with them if I didn’t have my case with me.” He pats his viola case, leaning against his leg. Percy glances at him. Musicians aren’t exactly well paid—this is far from being the royal company—but he won’t take the risk of mixing with this crowd. The watch will be summoned quickly, and Percy has no desire to spend a night in jail. He thinks briefly of Monty, left asleep in their warm bed—the only part of the flat that’s really ever warm. 

“Are you gonna buy something or stay there and gossip like old maids?” a voice says behind them.

Percy turns. It’s the pie lady, her voice surprisingly shrill. In spite of her words, she seems to be packing her things into a old wicker basket. 

“Where you going, grandma?” Jacob asks, not meanly.

“Not here, to get caught up with this mob by the watch,” she replies. “If you have a grain of sense, you’ll disappear too. ‘Specially you,” she adds, nodding at Percy.

Percy feels the familiar flame of frustration rise. “I know,” he answers, not to say more. “There’s an pub right at the corner of the street. I want to keep an eye on it.”

Jacob nods. Martin scowls. “Can’t go home now,” he mutters. “Let’s go.” They traipse forward, but Percy turns to the pie lady, who’s hefting her basket on her hip. “Do you want to come?” he asks. 

She shrugs. “Buy me a drink.”

Percy mentally counts the money he’s carrying. “Sure.”

Martin and Jacob spends the morning flitting around the other patrons in the pub and loudly talking politics as the time passes. Percy nurses his beer and makes small talk with the pie lady—Mary Thomas, as she introduces herself. At some point, she seems to understand his unwillingness to talk and whips out a small bundle from her basket.

“What’s that?” he asks her, having only glanced at her hands from the corner of her eyes.

She looks at him. “Can’t even recognize knitting needles when you see them?” 

“Oh,” Percy says, and he spends a long time watching her hands fly over the threads and the needles.

He’s not sure what she’s making; something in dark blue wool, apparently. After a while he just asks her and gets his answer: a sweater for her son. 

“I’ve always wondered,” he says, gesturing at the every-growing square of wool hanging from her needles. “How do you get something shaped like a sweater when you can only knit rectangular shapes?”

She throws her head back and laughs. It’s such an expectedly frank noise that Percy forgets to feel miffed. He listens patiently as she explains the logic of it, how to assemble pieces and twists shapes from her the stitches, and watches as she shows him, one stitch on a side and the next one on the other. That’s more difficult to follow, because her fingers slide and clench on the needles several times. 

“Damn my old fingers,” she says, shaking her hand. “You young men playing instruments. Pray you don’t get old.”

“I’d rather,” Percy says, not mentioning what he would prefer it over. He gestures to the abandoned work in her lap. “Can I try?”

Positioning his fingers on the needles in a way that satisfied Mary takes some time, but he gets the hang of it. He’s a musician, after all, aware of his fingers’ positions at all times. 

“Sloppy, sloppy,” Mary mutters at him. “Tighten your stitches, or my son will catch his death. You call that fit to make clothing? I’ve seen fishnet tighter than this. Not too much! You’re straining the wool. You have to slide your needle in here, you know.”

It’s a delicate balance. But at least it passes time; by the time the watch has come and dispersed the angry mob in front of the theatre, Percy has the movements ingrained in his brain like muscle memory, even if he doesn’t yet have the talent, according to Mary.

“Practice,” she tells him. “Should be familiar with the concept!”

*

January drags on, colder than ever. Percy doesn’t remember ever being this cold, even if he lived far more in the North. Icy winds shake the streets of London, with snow and hail on their tails. Monty comes back every morning with his nose red from outside and feet that could ice fish in the summer. They take warm bricks with them in the bed, but Monty always grimaces at first when he takes off his shoes, shaking blood back in his numb feet.

“I can’t feel them,” he says one day. “But it’s so much worse when I do.”

Percy woke up before he even came back home. The wind is tugging fiercely at their shutters and the whole building is creaking as if it’s going to collapse any minute. At least they’d get wood for the fire, Percy thinks darkly as he watches Monty shiver in front of the stove. 

“Sometimes I miss the wig,” he says as he slides into the bed with Percy. “At least they kept the ears warm.”

They exchange places so that Percy won’t have to step over him to get out tomorrow morning. The other side of the bed is colder, but Percy doesn’t mind. He feels off, tired and restless at the same time.

“You should invest in a hat,” Percy tells Monty. “That luscious hair of yours isn’t doing enough.”

“Invest,” Monty scoffs. “A funny word.”

“I’m the face of humour itself.”

“You’re the funniest person I know.” Monty says it earnestly, as always, which rather spoils the banter but does wonders for Percy’s feelings. He folds himself against Percy. “Now imagine how terrible Felicity must be feeling right now, all the way up in Edinburgh.” 

“She works in a bakery,” Percy counters. They do a complicated dance which ends with Monty pressed against Percy’s chest but his cold feet away from Percy’s legs. They’ve had plenty of practice at that, this past winter. “Fire and stoves all day.”

Monty closes his eyes. “Nooo,” he moans. “Stop, I don’t want to be jealous of Felicity, of all people.”

“Bakeries are overrated. Bread! Who needs it?”

“Bakeries don’t have you in it,” Monty says sleepily. “You’re the only bread I need.”

Percy pulls away, staring at him until Monty cracks, opening his eyes and sniggering at the incredulous face Percy is making. “That was bad even for you,” Percy tells him.

“I’m a poet, darling,” Monty says dramatically. “You love me.”

“One of these statements only is true.”

Monty pretends to push him off the bed. Percy clings to him, gasping theatrically, and then he has to push Monty’s cold feet away. Monty’s nose is cold against Percy’s arm when they fall asleep, but getting out of bed a few hours later is the hardest thing Percy’s done. Warmth and Monty will be the death of him, probably. 

His head spins when he gets up, and he spends a long time doubled over in a chair waiting for the pounding in his head to recede before he gets to work. 

Warmth, Monty, or goddamned epilepsy. 

*

He’s bed-ridden all of the next week. The theatre actually closes after a fire takes during the show on Monday night, and Percy collapses on the bed all clothed. He only stirs when Monty comes in. 

Monty gently moves him into changing into warmer and drier night clothes, and then guides them both into bed. It’s Percy’s turn to fall asleep with his face buried against Monty. The space against Monty’s neck is dark and welcoming; he never wants to come back up. 

Percy wakes up in the late morning, far too late for to come into work. 

He flounders among the sheets for a while, trying to disentangle his foggy mind. Should he get up? Race there? Or will he collapse on the way there, weak as he feels?

Monty comes barging in before Percy can make a decision. 

“The theatre’s closed,” he says. “Hello, darling.”

Percy falls back into the pillows. “What?”

“I went there this morning for you. The theatre’s closed; no work for you this week. They’re still putting things in order. It’s a madhouse. I almost got stepped over by three different people before they recognized me and gave me any news.”

He gently pushes the covers back up under Percy’s chin, sitting on the edge of the bed. He looks tired too; it’s too early for him to be have had a full night of sleep after coming in so late last night. 

“A week?”  Percy says. That’s a lot of time and money lost. 

“Well, not today or tomorrow, that’s for sure. I’ll head back there on Thursday, see how things improve.”

“I need—”

“You need to sleep.” Monty brushes Percy’s forehead, gently, like he’s pushing his hair away or subtly checking for a temperature. “You’re exhausted and frankly, darling, you don’t look good. We can hold on without your wages for a week. We have some savings left.”

It’s true, to an extent. Percy is too tired to care about it for long. He lets himself be lulled to sleep by Monty’s presence.

*

The theatre doesn’t open for another five days. It’s roughly the amount of time Percy would need for his health anyway, and he spends the first few days dozing off and letting Monty hold almost one-sided conversations. 

By the third day, however, he grows restless. Monty’s away during the day—he picked up a shift of something or another during the afternoon, which leaves him more exhausted in the morning. But Percy’s not stepping a foot out of bed all day, and their meagre collection of books soon ran out on the first day. 

“Give me something to do,” he complains to Monty. 

“Like what?”

“Anything. What do people who stay at home do?”

They look at each other. They used to be among the “people who stay at home,” but that was a lifetime ago. At his uncle and aunt’s house, Percy would be recluse in a room far grander than this one, with books and Monty’s company whenever he wanted it. He was absolutely miserable. 

Monty, though, is still there. 

“You could learn how to embroider,” he’s saying currently. “I know Felicity loved spending hours on a cushion.”

A bald-faced lie. Percy doubt that embroidery ever invoked any emotion in Felicity except pure rage. The idea isn’t entirely outlandish, though.

“How are your ears?” he asks. 

Monty’s look tells him he’s not following Percy’s train of thought. “Is this a joke?”

“Get me some knitting needles and yarn,” Percy tells him. “You’ll see.”

*

While Monty flies down to get him the supplies, Percy carefully rearranges the bed, stuffing the pillows behind his back so that he can recline comfortably. He feels less tired with a goal in mind, and he’s quick to take up the needles Monty comes back with. 

“Since when do you know how to knit?” Monty asks, sitting cross legged on the bed. He’s watching at Percy with intent, chin on his fist, and it reminds Percy so much of their youth—spent outside in pubs and gardens, and inside, in and out of each other’s apartments without care or propriety. For a moment the memory makes him falter, but the soft contact of the yarn under his fingers jars him out of it. This is the present—poorer materially, but without the weight of a deadline that stares Percy in the face. Time: a much more precious currency. 

He handles the needles the way he remembers from Mary’s lesson, finding the rhythm of it even more easily than on his first try. She showed him how to start and tie off a project, in that knowing way that older people have sometimes when they recognize a useful skill among others. 

“Someone taught me,” he answers Monty.

“Who? I can’t believe you ever hid it from me.”

“I didn’t hide, I just forgot.” He finishes his first row of stitches, showing off to Monty who nods appreciatively. “The woman who sells pie outside the theatre.”

“Oh.” Monty reaches for the ball of yarn, playing with it until it unspools messily in his lap. “Oops. Well, you’ll use it anyway.”

“I need it without tangles,” Percy precises. “You look like a bored kitten, playing with the yarn.”

“Just wondering what you’re making.” Monty slowly spools the yarn over his hand, looking pensively at the stitches on Percy’s needles. 

“You’ll see. It’s a surprise.”

Monty doesn’t look convinced, but the leaves the newly spooled ball of yarn on the bed, tucked against Percy’s thigh so that it doesn’t fall off. 

“I have to go,” he says. “Will you be done when I come back?”

“Probably not.”

“Then you have to tell me what it is! I can’t wait that long.”

“I can tell you it’s for you,” Percy offers.

“That makes it worse.”

He leaves with a kiss, then comes back for another, forgets his coin purse and rushes in again a minute later. Each time he glances at the work in Percy’s hands, probably expecting it to have grown in the minute he’s been absent, but Percy doesn’t let Monty distract him. 

It takes him the better part of the next day, too, before Percy is satisfied and ties off the yarn. His first knitting work looks back at him as he twirls it around his fingers in the dim light of the candlelights. It’s not perfect—a bit misshapen, a bit uneven—but he feels a greater sense of satisfaction than he’s felt in a long time. 

He hides it under his pillow and goes to sleep, a light sleep that is sure to be disturbed by Monty coming in back from work. 

“I’m done,” he tells Monty as he undresses in the dim light of a lone candle. 

Monty startles so much that he backs into the chair, poking himself in the ribs with the spindly back of it. “Ouch,” he says, hopping on one foot to unlace his stockings. “Done with what?” 

“The knitting project.”

“Ohhh.” Monty drops his clothes on the chair and pads to the bed. “Show me?”

Percy takes it from under his pillow and shows it grandly to Monty, who takes it gingerly and examines it. 

“Ah,” he says. “Uh, what is it, exactly?”

He’s turning it around, peering at it from one side to the other. 

“A hat,” Percy says, taking it from him. He gestures at Monty to come forward and hooks the hat on his head, where it flops down sideways. Monty arranges it blindly, which somehow makes it worse. “Maybe not my greatest creation,” Percy adds.

He’s disappointed but unsurprised. He remembers Mary’s comments and warnings about proper wool tension and how to keep to a regular shape. 

“Oh,” Monty says, reaching for the shaving mirror. He peers into it, angling his head this way and that, in the same almost coquettish way he’s always done. The sight makes Percy fond with familiarity. “I love it,” Monty declares. “Thank you. It’s the best thing you’ve done.”

“You know I’ve composed a few pieces, right?” Percy asks. 

“Better than that,” Monty claims, laying his hand on his heart. “I’m going to wear it all winter long. Thank you.”

Percy smiles at him. The hat is awkward at best, terrible at worst, and he knows that Monty means it. He loves him for that. 

Monty bends down to kiss him, hat still on, and Percy doesn’t even mind when it slides down between them. 

“Maybe not for inside activities,” he says in between kisses. 

“No,” Monty protests when Percy reaches up, “leave it on.”

Percy rolls his eyes but obliges him. What can he say? He was never good at refusing Monty. He might not be good at knitting either, but he’ll practice this skill rather than that one.