Chapter Text
When Hillerska shuts down, Wilhelm knows people will probably turn the blame on him. But he’s already long gone.
Simon breaks up with him on his birthday. It takes some time, but eventually he understands it.
In the aftermath of his speech at the Jubilee, Simon had taken the advice of not talking to people, not posting anything, not looking at anything, and laying low. He cut himself off from the world, so maybe that’s why it’s easier for him to cut off contact with Wilhelm for good.
Now, Simon says he can't take it, can’t do this, and takes his heart with him.
Wilhelm stays home from school, and he doesn’t leave his room until he starts feeling like he's in a cage again.
Four days after the break up, he hears from Felice that the Erikssons are moving to Gothenburg after all. In fact, they're already gone. None of his calls or texts go through, and Wille doesn't get a chance to say goodbye.
Felice also says that she has heard rumors about a couple students, ones still attending Hillerska, are planning on coming forward about their initiations. And she says that she told the truth in her interview with the school board.
After he reads that text, Wilhelm starts pacing back and forth in his room, the corner of his phone pressing against the tight line of his lips.
He's thinking about everything related to those initiations. Everything he knows. Everything Felice has said about them and how othered, excluded, and unsupported she was made to feel on a daily basis at Manor House. About Simon's outrage when he learned more about Wille’s initiation night before the party.
Then Wilhelm thinks about his first week, walking back to his dorm from the main hall, suddenly being tackled to the ground from behind, a bag pulled over his head, and he doesn't know many people at the school, and there are several voices echoing in his ear drums, and he doesn't know the campus too well, and he's being dragged, and…
His knuckles are digging into his chest hard enough to hurt.
When his gaze catches on a photo hanging by the door to his room, several years old now and from a much happier and ignorant time, Wilhelm opens his phone and calls Farima.
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Crown Prince joins Hazing Victims of Boarding School
Royal Boarding School to Close After 120 Years
Not Even Crown Prince Safe from Hillerska Nightmare
matthew @mattjames22
Why is everyone making such a big deal over some light hazing? It wouldn't be highschool without it
Mr barker @spiderdog
@mattjames22 Because this is gross. I haven't seen hazing this bad in a decade. Have u even read any of the articles and statements people have made?
IN FRANCE! @burpycat
Wow when @WilhelmSverige said ‘question traditions’ he really meant it
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Wilhelm is part of the conversation this time in regards to his schooling. He’ll be homeschooled from now on, a standard education paired with ‘Crown Prince school’. He is setting his own pace, focusing on topics he’s actually interested in, and doing work he enjoys.
After a calm and well argued conversation that Felice hypes him up for, his mother agrees to let Wilhelm stay more behind the scenes until he is of age, followed by a softer reintroduction when the time comes, rather than the hard launch attempt after Erik’s funeral.
He makes it clear to her that he needs to be able to make his own decisions, and have some level of control over his life, so he may co-exist as Wille and as the future King of Sweden. Something has to change, otherwise he will force it to change.
They don't get to drag him out of school this time.
Frankly, it's going far better than he ever could have hoped for.
Wilhelm is grateful that, despite the school situation and the prince situation, he at least still sees Felice, Henry, and some of their former classmates often enough. None of them hold a grudge about Hillerska. Not to his face, that is.
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He lives like this for a year straight.
Wilhelm is doing good work with his foundation. He's in therapy, he’s got a diagnosis and real help with his anxiety. Yet Wille still desperately misses Simon. His voice, his hair, his smile, his everything.
He doesn’t feel as though the heartbreak will kill him anymore, but on the bad days, that hurts as much as the way they broke up.
His 18th birthday is spent in isolation, locked in his room and watching crappy horror movies, up until the evening. That's when Felice arrives to drag Wilhelm out of his room to the charity event that he actually enjoys co-hosting with his mother, even with the speech he has to give. The main part he really likes is seeing so many people gathered, having a good time, and listening to their stories.
His 19th birthday is spent joining the military before he gets a degree. It starts out as just another one of the duties required of him as Crown Prince. At its core, it's supposed to be a learning experience. But then he's being treated like just about everyone else, and he's making actual friends who are on the same level as him here, who don't look to him for opinions and orders because, in this job, he doesn't outrank any of them, and there’s no one hounding him for answers about his personal life. It's… good.
In a sudden shift to what had become a comfortable routine, Wilhelm is abruptly pulled out of his service for his 20th birthday celebration. The event for him to host this time is his coronation because his mother passed two weeks before his birthday.
Her health had been on the decline again, and she'd decided not to tell him. She is the third person he did not truly get to say goodbye to. Wilhelm doesn't want to celebrate his birthday ever again.
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His Majesty, The King, Wilhelm
Remembering Queen Kristina
All About the Coronation of HM, King Wilhelm of Sweden
Party Prince Now Party King?
HRH’s Ex Released First Album Months Before Coronation
pineapples @gotabadidea
Yes, he’s been quiet the past few years, but how soon does everyone think Party Prince will get into trouble again
Ur fav @bubblyfeelin
Why are people bringing up Simon’s music like it's a controversy? They haven't been seen together in 3years, the album is 4months old already, relax
Fite me @turtlefighter
@bubblyfeelin Idk, but it introduced me ot my new fav artist <3
Ur fav @bubblyfeelin
@turtlefighter Gasp! Whats ur favorite song
Fite me @turtlefighter
@bubblyfeelin Im not through the whole album yet, but so far it's cielo de mora. It's so pretty. Id guess yours is daydreaming based on ur name lol
Ur fav @bubblyfeelin
@turtlefighter YESSS!
COOKIES @TrashVase
@bubblyfeelin ummm … maybe because a bunch of those songs are def about Wilhelm
Ur fav @bubblyfeelin
@TrashVase We don’t even know anything about their relationship, just that they hooked up and wilhelm eventually came out/confirmed it. Maybe they weren’t ever even a thing
Sappy @girlsgirlsgirls
Wait but there is now a queer king for real… my little heart can’t take it
The first produced, professional, polished song Simon releases, Revel, gains a good bit of traction online. He’s so fucking happy. He's 18 and releasing music, and playing small shows at local places, and feeling on top of the world.
All the glow up and dance TikToks using the upbeat song means most people miss how do you revel in my agony? is directed at the press. At all the nosy journalists still trying to find out what happened to the Crown Prince’s secret gay love affair. He hasn't seen anyone poking around in a while, not really since they moved, but that feeling of being almost hunted is truly something that has stuck with him.
Simon feels stupid when Ayub records him dancing around to his song about being stalked, but his friends think it is ‘good engagement’ and necessary to grow his career.
Some of the attention he's getting might be from his loose public association with Wilhelm, but he can’t bring himself to care. Simon is just too excited.
Simon rides the high of his first three songs doing well for half a year. His family is so proud of him and his music, his beautiful Behind Your Door, daydreaming, and Revel.
Sara comes home nearly in tears to tell him she'd heard one of his songs playing on a major radio station.
Then, once he's out of school, in the first summer after starting university, Simon starts working on an album. Alone in his room, mostly, but when Rosh and Ayub come to visit for the weekend, he sneaks them into the studio he's recording in on campus to giddily share what he’s got so far.
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Of all the people he knew from Hillerska, Simon hadn’t expected to maintain best contact with Maddie. Maybe it was because they had been some of the only openly queer people at the school, but she latched on to him and he isn't looking to shake free.
Currently, she’s back in New York, getting a design degree. Maddie’s going on about how much she adores daydreaming, she caught it on the speakers at a mall and told the nearest person I know him!, and how he should come visit like she once planned for him, and then, without thinking, Simon asks “Could you design my album cover?”
She makes a sound like a squeak, “You’re doing an album? Fuck yes! Absolutely! You’ll love it. I think, as the designer, I should get first dibs on hearing the full, finished album, you know, to really get the vibe. But in person, like I'll pay for your ticket, seriously Simme.”
Simon is laughing, but he agrees to her conditions easily.
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Months later, when he works out a chord progression and some mumbled lyrics at home, it becomes Hallowed. Simon finishes it in a haze, then locks himself in his bedroom for a while, sobbing his heart out. The apartment they moved to is small enough that he can easily hear his mama puttering around, eventually sitting down against the door to his room, offering snacks and warm hugs.
Simon doesn't want to let her in just yet, but he does push an earbud under the door so she can hear the song.
Where is that boy I was last year? What would he think of me now? Be glowing and proud? Think it's a miracle? But in truth he's hurting inside because he realized that he's on his own. In his head, in his bed, while on tour, can't ignore what he left behind. I’d found you, it was true, now I'm blue, don't know who I've become, feeling hollow inside. Yes, I'm cold and hollowed out, on this dead and hallowed ground.
He is pouring his heart out into his work, revealing so much of what is bottled up inside, so Simon decides he may as well name it Por Dentro.
The artwork Maddie sends him just fits. And it makes Simon really want to get back on the plane to go visit her again.
maddie @madmaddie
Go listen to my bestie Simon’s new album! It's called Por Dentro and I did the art. Go! It will change your brain spotify/simo…
Felice @felehrencrona
@madmaddie YESSSS
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When news first breaks that the Queen has passed, and that the Crown Prince has returned home to be crowned in two days, Simon pulls up Wilhelm’s contact in a panic. He’d never deleted it, but he also hasn't touched it since the break up. He, at no point, has been sure if it’s still Wille’s number, but hearing that I'm sorry; the number you have reached is not in service. hurts, a whole lot.
And then Simon gets mad. At himself, and at Wilhelm.
It's stupid. Simon broke up with him. And of course Wille, with the secure phone that isn't truly a personal device, wouldn't have the same phone number after three years. Why should he expect to still be able to get in contact after so long?
But Simon is frustrated regardless. So he pulls out his lyric journal and starts writing.
The song is… bitchy, according to Rosh. Going on about being better off on his own, enjoying his own company more, and not wanting to settle for the first person who shows interest in him. The only time Simon ever feels anything close to what the lyrics describe is in those rare moments when he gets angry about how everything went to hell in their relationship.
At three in the morning, Simon sends the messy voice recording to Hanna. She was formerly the teacher’s assistant in his Public Relations course, now turned manager and producer who he hired after Por Dentro came out. She is also one of the closest in person friends he has made since starting university.
simon 🦋
PrettyPretty.mp3
Heard some bad news, I tried to call him but apparently he changed his number
2:53
Simon has never told Hanna who the man he writes so many songs about is, but she gets it.
Banana🍌
That sounds so cool pumpkin. cant wait to hear it fleshed out
7:34
Banana🍌
Cant believe ur already working on the second album 4 months after the last one dropped lol did u sleep last night?
7:36
simon 🦋
Eventually...
13:03
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Por Ahora drops a year later, after Simon has moved to New York, into a small apartment with Maddie, and joined an actual record label with a deal to keep making more music.
Simme @simoneriksson
Por Ahora out now! spotify/simo…
Ur fav @bubblyfeelin
The pick up music video was so fun!!! good choice for the second single
Pick ME Up @whalewatching
This album is my whole identity now. Also fuck whoever Older and Wiser is about
Ur fav @bubblyfeelin
Like talk about gaslighting!!!
Pick ME Up @whalewatching
Right?! and the change from "you're older and wiser" to "now that i'm older and wiser" destroyed me
maddie @madmaddie
@simoneriksson Go bestie! Go bestie! Everyone go listen to Pick Up now!