Chapter Text
August @ah.årnäs
Posts: 397
Followers: 199,072
Following: 218
August’s follower count jumps by 50+ when he posts shirtless pics as opposed to candid ones. He completes a round of pushups and ab crunches before he poses in front of the gym’s wall-sized mirror for his bi-weekly update.
After snapping a few side profiles with focus on his biceps, he posts them on his yet-to-be verified account.
August @ah.årnäs
#gym #no cheat day #love yourself #hillerska life
7k❤️ 336💬 98🔁
henri.slane05: ✨ drop ur routine
Lila_Abba: you make it look so easy 😅
alex-ander: thats dedication! Looking hot!
e.rikroll: good tags
NISSE.gnosh: usual wednesday🤗
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The comments roll in but August’s eyes are fixed on one name.
Erik’s online?!
August’s excitement dims. Erik commented from his private account. August can’t tell anyone that’s the Crown Prince. It’s rare for Erik to log onto his official Insta account for casual posts. August hopes despite it. One day, Erik might accidentally like one of his stories with the official HRH account and that would catapult August’s fame to sheer stardom.
For now, he DMs Erik.
Me (August)
finally free to traverse
the online world?e.rikroll
tell me about it
drill training is almost as bad
as court meetingsMe (August)
but the view from the ship
ought to be goode.rikroll
ha ha
how’s 3rd year?Me (August)
i like it actually
but already getting fomoe.rikroll
u won’t graduate till next year!
enjoy the moment
after hillerska, u have a full uni journey
to look forward to
life only gets betterMe (August)
i’ll hold you to that
how’s navy life?
August waits, but Erik doesn’t reply. He’s probably called away for something.
He sighs. He can’t share this chat with anyone either.
He goes back to his page. August’s latest post has racked up only about 400 hearts. He’s slipping.
August turns back to the mirror. His profile is not as sleek as the photo makes it look. He forces his eyes away from his reflection and goes back to his phone, logging into his Finsta and scrolling down till he finds Simon’s account.
His latest post is just a selfie of his eyes with Sara in the background looking bored.
Simon @simme.me
@sara-coltgirl is so excited to watch moon knight!
#marvel binge #moon knight #season 2 when #oscar isaac #may calamawy
53❤️ 4💬 7🔁
ayyyyub02: the enthusiasm is off the charts!
sara-coltgirl: It was nice. I like Layla. Her necklace is awesome.
rosh.midfielder: +1 layla is to die for ✨
tadgreenbluepole: love that show
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He’s not even looking at the camera. No wonder the post got him an abysmal number of hearts after an entire day. No sense of style or direction.
August did the right thing by dropping Simon.
His hair looks so soft.
He stares at those curls, knowing how gentle they can be and how wonderful they smell. His eyes are a bright brown in the photo, shining in the light of his screen.
He turns off his phone and stares back at the mirror. The burn of exercise has faded and his body now remembers reality: Simon left him. August is broke. He’s falling. Simon left him.
Reality is remembering the way those soft lips no longer smiled at August.
August likes to think of himself as a man of action. Someone who plans methodically, and executes that plan flawlessly. Someone who, when faced with a problem, will buckle down and figure out a solution.
- Problem: He’s at 199k followers and has to hit 200k this week.
- Solution: Post more shirtless pics but with class.
- Problem: He’s out of liquid assets with impossibly low figures in the bank.
- Solution: Charm and marry Felice to secure long-lasting fortune.
- Problem: He’s falling behind in his studies due to rowing practice and prefect duties.
- Solution: Get Vincent to supply him more ADHD meds to keep August perfectly high-functioning all through the week till graduation.
- Problem: The non-res socialist first-year boy is gorgeous and distracting.
- Solution: Kiss him and get the frustration out of August’s system.
That… that last one didn’t work.
(Not all of them do, but he doesn’t want to dwell on that. The lack of pills make him too jittery to think clearly.)
Reality is painful.
August spends an extra hour in the gym on the rowing machine, working his core and following through the motions to feel the burn in his calves, buttocks, abdomen, and arms. He is sweaty and greasy, and all he can think about is Simon’s closed fluttering eyelids, his wet parted lips, his pink tongue darting out, and his soft warm skin under August’s searching hands.
August’s heart beats even harder and it’s not just due to the intense workout.
Kissing him didn’t help. It just made things worse.
Simon’s face swims through his mind during the day, and his body haunts August’s broken dreams at night. The first time August touched his neck, chest, and back is burned into his mind. He recalls Simon sighing so quietly and leaning into the touch, seeking more from him. Every time they’re together, August is on fire and Simon stokes the flames to make him burn hotter.
The day in the showers when Simon’s graceful hand slides down to grip him… August loved it. But he hates it now. His own hand cannot compare. He has to run before he does something he regrets.
When Simon took off his shirt that day, August was startled once again. He knows Simon doesn’t have breasts. They’ve been pressed together several times and August has touched his neck, chest, and torso. He even felt his hardness that time in the showers. But it still bowls him over. Simon is a boy with all the parts August has.
And August wants him.
Am I actually gay? Or bi? Or whatever other options there are in the umbrella? How did that happen? I never thought about it before…
August runs away from Simon in a panic.
Every time August has admired the male form in the past, it’s just to examine the preferred body type he wants. He hits the gym to make sure he has no body fat. It’s why he avoids heavy foods, sticks to healthier food options, and snacks on just protein bars--no chips or greasy stuff for him. Alcohol is his only vice. But he avoids beer and sticks to heavy exercise regiments before and after a party night.
No one really wants a sports team captain with flab. He can imagine what people will say if he has fat in the wrong places.
(Girls are lucky in that respect. They’re allowed to have some fat and less muscle percentage or whatever those studies say.)
Shirtless Simon reminds August how much he spent the years looking at boys and men in various magazines. What exactly had he been looking at? The right way to get that body? Or just a chance to stare at men in Speedos?
But the worst is when Simon placed his hand on August’s chest, over his heart. There was nothing sexual about it. But August felt something crack. He felt…
He doesn’t know what he feels. Simon has done something irreparable to him.
August stays away when Simon messages him with song recommendations and silly jokes. He doesn’t reply until he pops in an extra pill than his usual routine.
He tries yoga. He increases his plank times. He does an extra set of chin-ups until his body burns.
His body is filled with endorphins one morning. He sees Felice’s post of a picnic day with her friends.
A distraction! Good!
He showers in record time and puts on his nice polo shirt and best jeans before strutting out and allowing the first years to goggle at him. He invites her out to check out Hermes and Gucci. Felice is busy on her phone, so he changes tactics and asks her about her horse riding. She doesn’t engage him in conversation for some reason.
It’s a bust.
August is out of balance again. Simon is making him feel things he’s never known possible. Felice is shutting him out. So maybe she doesn’t like the idea of shopping? He should ask her out to dinner. He should look up places that’s worthy of an Ehrencrona, and especially a Horn of Årnäs.
He briefly considers taking Simon to a Michelin star restaurant.
The thought makes him chuckle. That’s never going to happen. Besides, Simon probably doesn’t even think about stuff like that. He’s practical. He’s a guy.
God, August is so aware he’s a guy.
Felice shuts him out and August’s thoughts swing back toward Simon who’s waiting for him patiently. Perfect. That was the day he considered really getting them both undressed and going the whole way.
Then August fumbles. He invites Simon to his room with the intention of… well, it doesn’t work out, does it?
Simon refuses. After a mindblowing handjob in an open communal shower, you’d think he would be fine with another small step forward, in the comfort of a single dorm room.
It scared August then. It still scares him now. How does Simon make August think of turning his back on his entire childhood, the way his father raised himself to be a man’s man, the leader of the troop, a protector of their grand lands and history?
How does Simon make August want to close his eyes and pretend it’s just the two of them in the entire world?
Simon Eriksson is worse than the drugs. August should never have tried it in the first place. Because now, he’s hooked but Simon doesn’t want anything to do with him. Something happens in his room and he doesn’t understand why Simon thinks they’re dating. They never talk about it.
The boy leaves and doesn’t let August come close again.
And he tries. Messages him on Instagram - blocked. Sends SMS’s - unread & blocked. Simon slips into the crowds when he sees August’s tall form come into view. He refuses August’s idea of the initiation to allow him free access into Forest Ridge (and be able to sneak into his room).
I shouldn’t have been so hard on him in the common room, August thinks morosely, not in front of everyone. He pushed me away when I kissed him…
August shudders. He’s back in the gym, every day and night, punishing himself for having these thoughts even after swearing to forget them, to forget him.
But the barrage is insistent. Every time he rejects August, it makes the void inside break him all over again.
The fierce anger burning in Simon’s eyes makes August’s hackles rise, because doesn’t Simon realize how much he’s risking by being with Simon? He’s hiding this part of himself (a part that grows louder with every passing day) from his best friends, from all the third-years who look up to him, who don’t expect to see their leader trip or fall.
Especially for someone like Simon.
He tries to impress the boy by reminding him of how close he really is with Erik and Wilhelm. But Simon refuses to show up and see the photo sessions with not one, but two members of the Royal Family.
Instead, August is forced to share his plans about Felice with the princes.
Erik murmurs, “You’ll have to stop sleeping around then.”
And for a moment, August is stricken by the worry if Erik knows. If anyone knows about Simon.
He brushes it off with a comment that he knows would make the ex-Hillis chuckle.
Turning back to the choir, August listens to Simon and Felice sing the same lyrics at wildly varying pitches. They’re the same, just in different leagues.
When he recalls the night of Wille’s initiation party, it is with clarity. It’s bad enough that Simon didn’t help with the alcohol. But then he has to find Simon and Wille talking quietly, seriously, standing too close outside the Palace to be casual.
What the fuck does this mean? August is worried that Felice and Wille might have a thing, having known each other before, and being in close proximity in all their classes… but this is worse, isn’t it? Because Wille receives the kind of attention that August wished he had from that plain, uninteresting, unremarkable socialist.
He… he loses it a little.
He follows Simon into the trees. He gets loud and grabs Simon.
And Simon rejects him. Loud and clear. It hurts.
But arguably, the worst moment is that Wille sees them. He sees and takes sides and glares at August as though he, his own cousin, has done something reprehensible to the outsider.
Isn’t it obvious? August wants to shout. I want him back!
But a complaint from Wilhelm will cause so many more problems that August just isn’t equipped to deal with. Not now with all his financial trouble.
Maybe this is for the best. If I can get over Simon, I can get Felice. That will solve most of the real problems.