#i guess i only write about dewey and louie now asdkjfsj

[stargaze-sunflower]

More Dewey and Louie bonding!!! Hope you like it!!! :]

Summary: After the events of Emma Glamour's party, Dewey and Louie have a lot to talk about.

Ao3 Link     Word Count: 4138

Louie really should’ve known that things wouldn’t go according to plan, but despite everything that had happened to him and his family, he had still managed to hang on to some hope. He was sure that he’d collapse into a puddle of despair and shame if he ever let go of hope entirely, and that wasn’t the type of life that he wanted to live. It was hard sometimes, because hope was fragile, and Louie himself felt easily breakable, most days.

He hadn’t wanted his scheme to be as vulnerable as he was. Seeing the angles was supposed to be the thing that he was good at, the one thing that was his. In a family full of adventurers, he’d thought that he had finally found his place as the strategy guy, as someone the others could trust to be on top of things. Someone that they could rely on, rather than someone they merely tolerated.

Emma Glamour’s party had been a chance to prove himself. A chance to finally show that his schemes weren’t all dangerous and harmful and worthy of getting him kicked out of the family selfish. He had wanted so badly for it to be a success. He’d thought that if he just tried hard enough – Scrooge was always telling him to just try – then it would all work out fine, and he’d finally stop feeling like there was something wrong with him. He’d stop feeling like everyone was always trying to fix the parts of him that they didn’t like.

It was a failure. But then, his schemes usually were, weren’t they? They brought nothing but bad things – caused nothing but trouble. At least The Caballeros got to play at the party, even though they hadn’t made the It List. Even though Louie had done nothing right.

Dewey had been the one to save the day, in the end – ever the hero – and Louie was proud of him, he was, but there was still a pit in his stomach growing bigger and heavier and harder to ignore.

.

(“You’re nothing new.

You’re not original.

There is nothing ‘It’ about you.

So tell me, why would I ever listen to you?”)

.

Louie sighed deeply, just the memory of the words enough to send sharp, aching pains bursting in his chest. He gripped the glass of water in his hand a little tighter, trying desperately to ground himself. But just like the rest of the ideas he’d had that night, it didn’t quite work out.

Currently he was standing behind the desert table, leaning against the wall and trying to pretend that he wasn’t hiding. Quite a few of the party guests had left already, but some had stayed to listen to the music that José and Panchito were playing – Uncle Donald had gone to sit at a table to talk with Daisy – and to enjoy the free food. Multiple people had even gone up to Dewey to congratulate him for winning the approval of Ms. Glamour. Something that Louie had not been able to do, at all, in any capacity. But he was fine. It was all fine.

He took a deceptively calm drink of water, trying to stop the rising wave of emotion that threatened to clog his throat and spill out of his eyes. He supposed he could only lie to himself for as long as he could ignore his feelings, and he was admittedly having trouble with that, at the moment.

“Thirsty?” a voice asked brightly, way too close to his right ear, and Louie almost choked on the water he hadn’t been able to swallow yet.

Dewey was standing next to him, smiling widely and rocking slightly on his feet, probably still absolutely ecstatic about the attention he’d received for his yo-yo ‘tricks’.

“Did you sneak up on me on purpose?” Louie asked, half accusing and half resigned.

“No,” Dewey said, grabbing a cookie and taking a bite out of it. “I called your name, like, twice before I got here.”

“Oh,” Louie said, any other possible response having fled his brain.

Louie set his glass of water down on the table in front of him as Dewey popped the rest of his cookie into his mouth, finishing it in record time.

“Still aren’t listening to me, huh?” Dewey teased, although there was something genuinely questioning in his tone.

The knot in Louie’s stomach twisted sharply at the reminder of how he’d treated his brother that night. Dewey hated feeling like he wasn’t being listened to, or acknowledged, or seen as useful. Louie knew that, and still he’d spent most of the night ignoring everything Dewey had tried to suggest.

“I guess not,” Louie replied, guilt tangling in his stomach and crawling up his throat. “I’m really— I just—”

He shoved his hands into the pockets of his suit, but it didn’t bring the same comfort as his hoodie might have.

“I…I’m sorry,” Louie finally managed, and he felt like it wasn’t enough, like he it would never be enough. “I didn’t mean to— Well, I did, but…”

“Don’t worry about it,” Dewey said, waving him off, and Louie glanced at him in nervous surprise. “I mean, I’m not gonna say that it didn’t hurt, because it did. You know how I am with, uh, that sort of thing.”

Dewey rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly, and the guilt in his stomach turned into sharp stabs.

.

(“Look, your plans, your schemes, they only lead to bad things for your family.”)

.

“But you’re not normally like this, all high-strung and whatever, which— which makes me think that maybe something else is bothering you,” Dewey continued, and Louie gaped at him in shock, his hands falling out of his pockets to hang still at his sides. Dewey’s brow was furrowed, and he was staring at the table in front of them intensely, obviously in deep thought. “And that doesn’t make it okay, but like, it makes it understandable? I don’t know.”

Dewey shrugged, shaking himself a bit before turning towards Louie with a little smile.

“I forgive you, you know, in case you need to hear it,” Dewey told him, and there was no trace of a lie in his eyes or deception in his voice.

Louie had to blink back tears at that, at the pure, sincere way that Dewey had just spoken to him, at the way he just understood Louie and his emotions, and how he was willing to forgive the mistake he’d made, especially when he already felt terrible about it. Dewey was his brother, who could apparently tell when something was bothering him, and Louie was both intimidated by that and thankful for it.

.

(“If you want to be a part of this family, you’ve gotta stop.”)

.

“Thanks, Dew,” Louie said, his voice softer and calmer than it had been in hours.

“No problem,” Dewey said happily, and he reached up to ruffle Louie’s hair before he could protest.

Louie glared sideways as he fixed his hair, not actually all that mad. Dewey just grinned at him, but a few seconds later it softened around the edges, and something concerned crept into his expression. Louie winced.

“You wanna talk about what was going on with you tonight?” Dewey prompted, nudging his shoulder lightheartedly, and Louie huffed.

“Not really, no,” Louie said.

“You sure?”

He turned to Dewey with his beak open, fully intending to repeat himself with confidence and grace, but the words died in his throat. Dewey was looking at him too honestly, too concerned, too ready to listen to him when Louie had done nothing but ignore him for the whole night, and it was enough to change his mind. Dewey deserved an explanation, and Louie was tired of lying, anyway. Because apparently - according to Emma Glamour - he wasn’t very good at it.

“No,” Louie admitted, voice strained as he practically forced the words out. “This is just… I really wanted things to be perfect, and I guess it kind of got out of hand.”

Him and Dewey took a moment to take in the messy room and remember the hostage situation. None of that had been Louie’s fault, really; sometimes it felt like chaos just followed their family around wherever it went.

“Why was it so important to you?” Dewey asked eventually. “Like why tonight, you know?”

Louie frowned deeply, brow furrowing as he tried to think of how best to explain how he felt.

“You know how Huey is super into being a Junior Woodchuck?” Louie asked, deciding to just wing it, and Dewey gave him a strange look, but nodded. “Okay, so, that’s his thing. He wouldn’t mind if we did it with him – he even wants us to, sometimes – but if we were better at it than he was, I think he’d lose his mind.”

Dewey chuckled a little, and that was enough to tell Louie that he was still listening, so he barreled onward.

“And then there’s— You’ve got that talk show thing, Dewey Dew-night, and that’s something that’s yours. But if I made my own talk show, like, uh— like Lunar Louie or something—” Dewey snorted, and Louie couldn’t help but smile a bit, even as he kept going almost frantically. “If I did that, and my show was more popular, then you’d feel like you weren’t— you’d feel bad.”

Louie trailed off into silence, and Dewey didn’t try to fill it, possibly sensing that he wasn’t quite done, but needed some time to think.

“I… I do schemes. That’s my thing. It’s basically the only thing I can do—”

.

(”This is the one thing I’m good at. Why can’t you see?”)

.

“—and then you kept telling me that you could do more to help, but I was scared that if I let you, then you’d be better at it than me, and if you’re better at scheming then me then what even— What else can I do? I’m not—"

.

(“You’re nothing new.

You’re not original—“)

  .

“I don’t know,” Louie finished. “I just— I wanted to prove myself I guess.”

“To who?” Dewey sounded like he’d been punched in the stomach. Louie avoided looking at him.

“Everyone, I guess. Mom, Uncle Donald, you.” Louie put his hands back in his pockets, attempting to conceal their trembling. “Myself, most of all.”

“Louie, you— you don’t have to prove anything—”

“But I do!” Louie whipped around to face him, suddenly irrationally angry. He was surprised to find that the tears in his own eyes were reflected in Dewey’s. “Our family are a bunch of adventurers, Dewey. That’s what they do. And I can’t— I—”

Dewey reached out for him, but Louie backed up a step, not ready to be comforted.

“Uncle Scrooge thinks I’m lazy, and Mom thinks that I— that all I do is cause bad things to happen, and I just— I don’t know what I’m supposed to do,” Louie said, his voice ending in a broken whisper, and he pulled his hand out of his pocket for the sole purpose of wiping at his overflowing eyes. “I can’t do anything right. Or—or good.”

Dewey stared at him for a few long, agonizing seconds, and then his trademark expression of determination took over his face, stronger and more serious than Louie had seen it in a while.

Oh, boy.

“C’mon,” Dewey said, leaving no room for argument, and he grabbed Louie’s sleeve on his way by, dragging him along behind him.

Louie glanced nervously around them as he was tugged along, taking note of Uncle Donald, who was still sitting at a table with Daisy on the other side of the room. And speaking of tables—

Dewey stopped next to an empty one. Just like the others it was covered in a long white tablecloth that touched the floor, and Dewey gestured downwards pointedly. Louie raised an eyebrow, which was probably a strange expression on someone who had just been crying, but whatever. Dewey just gestured again, a bit more forceful, and Louie sighed before dropping to his hands and knees. He crawled under the tablecloth and Dewey followed, letting it fall back into place behind him when they were both in.

They were left sitting in soft lighting, on a squeaky-clean floor – Daisy probably wouldn’t have settled for anything less – and Louie had to admit that it was less overwhelming than standing at the edges of a large room feeling sorry for himself; feeling sorry for everything.

“Okay, look,” Dewey said, sitting there in his DJ Daft Duck suit and still managing to sound like he meant business. “You remember when Uncle Donald was racing against Uncle Gladstone ‘cause of that weird luck vampire thing?”

Louie could only nod.

“And he was gonna give up, but you stopped him. You kept him going. You inspired him,” Dewey said, every word said clearly and sincerely. “You’re good at that.”

“Yeah, but—”

“And what about that time with Mom,” Dewey continued, “when you were able to convince her to go back to help Uncle Scrooge and the others stop the moon invading? We may never have left that island – or gotten home in time to help – if it weren’t for you giving her a pep talk.”

Louie exhaled shakily, remembering how stressful that whole situation had been. Dewey grabbed his hand and held it gently between them, even as he kept talking, looking at him with warm eyes.

“You helped Webby when she lost her optimism, and you were able to make her start believing in people again. You were able to help her remember that there are good people,” Dewey said, and he squeezed his hand, smiling gently as Louie blinked against the moisture in his eyes. “There are good people, Lou, and you’re one of them.”

Louie sniffled, wiping at his face with his free hand as he avoided eye contact.

“It doesn’t always feel that way,” Louie said.

“I’ll believe it when you can’t,” Dewey said simply, and Louie finally looked at him.

Dewey was staring back at him with a slightly nervous expression, like he wasn’t sure if he was saying the right things or not, like he was worried that he wasn’t being helpful. The knot in Louie’s stomach and the pain in his chest finally abated, and he tried out a small smile.

“Thanks, Dew,” Louie said softly, and he wasn’t feeling up to a full-on hug just yet, so he leaned his side against Dewey’s and squeezed the hand he was still holding.

Dewey exhaled quietly, his shoulders dropping as he relaxed.

“Anytime,” Dewey told him, and he sounded like he meant it.

They sat in silence for a few seconds, the sounds of the party muffled through the expensive tablecloth. There they were in fancy clothes, at a fancy – wrecked – party, and they were hiding under the table like they used to hide in clothes racks at the store as little kids. Louie suddenly couldn’t help but chuckle a bit.

Dewey turned to look at him, possibly a little confused, but as soon as their eyes met, they both lost it. They sat there giggling on and off for at least two minutes, and every time they’d almost calmed down, they’d make eye contact and burst out laughing again.

“This isn’t funny,” Louie said helplessly, wiping away tears of mirth. “We shouldn’t be— Why are we laughing?”

“Would you rather cry?” Dewey asked, grinning like a loon.

“I am crying, Dewey.”

“That’s good crying, though,” Dewey pointed out. “You’re smiling at the same time.”

Louie shoved at him playfully, and Dewey started giggling again, swaying with the force of Louie’s push before popping back upright.

“I could comment on how weak of a shove that was, but I’m not going to,” Dewey said, with a teasing lilt to his voice, and Louie rolled his eyes.

“How gracious of you,” Louie said, words dripping with sarcasm. “I’ve been insulted enough for one night, anyways.”

Louie leaned back on his hands, finally feeling relaxed and mostly at ease. It was amazing what Dewey could do, really, when he put his mind to it.

And speaking of his brother, Dewey was suddenly being creepily silent. Louie turned to check on him with a raised brow, and Dewey was looking back at him with confusion and a sort of vague concern.

“What do you mean?” Dewey asked, dead serious, and Louie blinked.

“Uh, what do you mean what do I mean?”

“The insult thing you just mentioned,” Dewey clarified. “What did you mean by that?”

“Oh,” Louie said simply, trying to buy himself time to think of how to distract Dewey from the subject, which his brother was picking up on, if the narrowed eyes were anything to go by.

“Don’t lie to me,” Dewey said, somewhere between a plea and a warning.

“Look, it’s nothing—”

.

(“You’re nothing new—")

.

Louie cleared his throat and tried again. “It doesn’t matter anymore,” he said. “It’s not even worth mentioning.”

“Your hands are shaking, Louie,” Dewey said pointedly, and he grabbed the one nearest to him to hold it once again. Louie huffed in frustration and glared at his traitorous appendages.

“I’m doing jazz hands,” Louie deadpanned, and Dewey snorted.

“No, you’re not.”

Louie sighed resignedly, and Dewey squeezed his hand.

“Tell me?” Dewey asked, and Louie forced himself to meet his wide, pleading eyes. “Please?”

Louie groaned, tilting his head back to stare at the bottom of the table, because now he absolutely had to explain himself, or Dewey would go around looking like a kicked puppy for days. Louie couldn’t have that on his conscience; it already had enough to worry about.

“You remember when I went to talk to Glamour, right?” Louie began, sitting up, and Dewey nodded. “Well, she definitely had some interesting things to say about what she thought of me.”

Dewey’s hand tensed in his. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“…Like what?”

“It wasn’t that bad,” Louie rushed to say. Emma Glamour was one of the people that Dewey looked up to, and he was reluctant to crush his dreams, and maybe even a little afraid that he would agree with her. “It— It wasn’t anything that isn’t true.”

“What did she say?” Dewey reiterated, and Louie figured that he couldn’t put it off for any longer.

“Just— Just that I was, uh—"

.

(“You’re nothing new.

You’re not original.

There is nothing ‘It’ about you.

So tell me, why would I ever listen to you?”)

.

“—that I was nothing special. And not worth her time, or— or even worth listening to,” Louie said haltingly, doing his best to pretend that he wasn’t bothered. “She had me all figured out, and she— she didn’t think that what she saw was very impressive. Or ‘It’, as she put it.”

There was complete and total silence after he finished talking, Dewey unnaturally still next to him. Louie breathed slowly and deliberately, trying to calm his nerves.

Without warning, and certainly without grace, Dewey suddenly stood ramrod straight next to him, shooting up so quickly that Louie dropped his hand and leaned back in surprise. Being under a table, of course, Dewey didn’t make it very far before bumping into the bottom of it, hitting it with such force that the whole thing rattled; Louie very faintly heard a fork fall to the ground a few feet away. Dewey dropped back down onto his knees with a grunt of pain, rubbing the top of his head.

“Dewey, what the—”

“She can’t talk to you like that!” Dewey exclaimed angrily, already changing course to crawl out from under the table. “She just— I can’t believe—"

Dewey continued his nonsensical furious rambling as he made it out from under the table, Louie following behind him frantically, getting the vibe that his brother was on his way to do something stupid.

“Dewey, wait—” Louie grabbed him by the wrist, keeping him from storming off. “She was well within her rights to call me out on trying to con her—”

“There’s calling you out, and then there’s straight up mean—"

“She was right, though, okay?” Louie said desperately, his arm shaking with the effort it was taking to hold Dewey back. “I needed to be taken down a notch.”

“You’re eleven, Louie! None of what she said was helpful, she just— She’s an adult and she said that to a kid!”

Dewey was still attempting to barrel onwards, and he was very slowly making progress. Louie groaned in frustration and leaned even farther backwards to try and slow him down.

“Okay, but— Dewey, what are you even gonna do?” Louie asked. “You can’t just flat-out attack her at her own party, and Uncle Donald already yelled at her ‘cause of Daisy—”

“She’s about to see my yo-yo skills way up close and personal,” Dewey said, almost muttering, and he stumbled a bit from the persistence of Louie’s grip on his arm.

“Dewey, stop,” Louie said sternly, although there was an element of begging in there, too. “Dewey, please.”

His brother finally came to a halt, and though it felt like they’d been going for hours, they’d only made it about five feet from the table they’d been hiding under. Dewey turned to look at him, his gaze fiercely protective and maybe a little lost, and Louie kept his grip on his sleeve, just in case.

“It’s not worth it,” Louie said quietly but clearly.

“Yes, it—”

“It wouldn’t change anything,” Louie amended, and then he tried for a smile, although he was sure it looked awkward. “And Huey would be disappointed in us if you got arrested.”

“Huey would already be throwing punches,” Dewey said, but some of the tension in his shoulders was gone.

“Please,” Louie said lightly, “he’d give a stern lecture at worst.”

“Agree to disagree,” Dewey shot back, shrugging a little, a small smile forming on his face, reluctant but persistent.

Louie huffed a laugh, looking around nervously to see if anyone was staring at them. He ended up making eye contact with Uncle Donald, who was staring at them with his brow furrowed in concern, already halfway out of his seat. Louie grinned, infusing as much reassurance as he could into it, and gave a thumbs up with the hand that wasn’t latched onto Dewey’s wrist like an octopus.

Their Uncle hesitated for a moment, obviously conflicted, but then he sunk back into his chair, shooting them a look that clearly said ‘Be Good’. Louie sighed in relief and turned his attention back to Dewey.

“You sure you don’t want me to avenge you?” Dewey asked, a bit teasing but with an undercurrent of truth. If Louie wanted him to, he really would give Emma Glamour a piece of his mind.

But Louie had had enough drama for the day – maybe even for the rest of the week – and just knowing that Dewey was ready and willing to defend him made him feel lighter and happier than he had been in a while.

“Nah,” Louie said, finally releasing his hold on his brother. “I think we’ve caused enough chaos for one night.”

“Barely,” Dewey said jokingly, and Louie rolled his eyes.

After a moment of comfortable silence, just enjoying each other’s presence, Louie couldn’t help but yawn. Dewey glanced at him in amusement.

“Tired?” Dewey asked, and Louie just shrugged. “D’you wanna leave now? I think Launchpad would come get us if we called him.”

“What about Uncle Donald?”

“I don’t think he’d mind if we left without him,” Dewey replied, jerking his head to indicate where their Uncle was sitting with Daisy, listening to her talk with rapt attention. “He seems pretty busy.”

“He’d freak if we left without telling him, though.”

“Yeah.”

“…So who’s gonna tell him?” Louie asked, and Dewey huffed.

“Why can’t we do it together?”

“Because one of us has to call Launchpad.”

“We can do that together, too,” Dewey said, beginning to grin.

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Efficiency, Dewford,” Louie shot back, already pulling his phone out of his pocket.

“Ugh, you sound like Huey,” Dewey complained, but his tone was light.

“One of us has to,” Louie said, dialing Launchpad’s number.

Dewey stared at him as the phone rang, and Louie raised a single eyebrow as he stood with it held up to his ear. Dewey groaned.

“Fine.” Dewey threw his arms in the air, turning away to hide his smile. “I’ll go tell Uncle Donald we’re leaving.”

Dewey walked off, and Louie finally allowed himself to grin fully. Nothing could quite cheer him up like lighthearted bickering with one of his siblings, and no one could pointlessly argue for as long as Dewey and Louie could. It was something that Louie felt was special; something that was theirs. Maybe it was nothing new, but it mattered.

And that was enough.