Chapter Text
Leaning against an oak tree, Patrick closed his eyes and released his head, as if he was trying to soak in the last of the sun’s rays before it finally set beneath the horizon. The sunset bathed his pale face in a gorgeous, yet soft red color, adding some cool factor to the already nonchalant aura he was emanating across the entirety of Yoomian Island.
This has become a nightly ritual for Patrick. As soon as the island’s caretaker had given him his little quirk, he’d become a natural at sporting a smug stance in no time. He’d learned that so long ago, too—back in the days before Iris, his wife, had moved to the island. Hell, that was even before Angie had confessed her feelings to him. Wow, he’d almost forgotten about her. Ever since her confession, an awkward tension that was so thick you could cut it with a knife filled the air between them. Maybe Patrick might’ve purposely avoided her because he didn’t want to deal with the discomfort, he wasn’t sure. All he knew was that they were good friends before, and now they were so estranged she hadn’t even shown up to him and Iris’s wedding. Did he even invite Angie in the first place? He couldn’t remember.
He felt bad, in a way. It wasn’t Angie’s fault that she fell victim to his irresistible charm and sparkling blue eyes—most did. It also wasn’t her fault that Patrick tended to go for those with heavier makeup and darker aesthetics. He liked the edgy types, and that wasn’t Patrick’s fault, either. No one was to blame.
Last he’d heard of her, she was rejected by the island’s local jester and pretty-boy, Hugh Morris. Ugh. Patrick sneered just thinking about him, and he quickly had to smooth out the disgruntled expression on his face, lest it’d ruin his cool aura. How did a guy like Hugh Morris end up being such a hotshot, anyway? He had ghostly white skin, pointy ears, and to top it all off, he wore the most ridiculous paint around his eyes every single day. How was he never seen without it? Perhaps it was the actual coloring of his skin, Patrick wasn’t sure. If that was the case, it only served to prove that Hugh Morris was even more of a freak of nature than he’d initially thought. Patrick was barely acquainted with the guy, but he knew Hugh was always at the top of the charm ranking board, putting yours truly at second place every week without fail. How was that possible? Patrick wasn’t jealous, he just knew the whole thing had to be rigged somehow.
Through his eyelids, Patrick could see a dim, yellow light, and he startled, jumping out of his very cool, very smug stance. However, upon realizing that it was just the glow from his favorite sweater (the one with his handsome face stamped all over it), he felt a pang of embarrassment wash over his body. His cheeks burned as he tried to restore his former position.
Shit, I hope no one saw that.
Before Patrick could close his eyes again, he looked up, and, speak of the Devil, there was Hugh Morris himself, standing on the shoreline next to his wife, looking directly at Patrick. Of course.
They stared each other down for a few moments; just long enough for Patrick to realize that the man just a few meters away from him was shirtless, because duh, he was on the beach. That’s a normal thing for people without…breasts. The jester might as well have had some, though, he had surprisingly huge pectorals. They were even larger than Patrick’s, and, Patrick started to notice, so were his biceps. Oh my God, what did a Jester even need all of that muscle for? Patrick had no idea the other mii was built like this, he must’ve kept it concealed under that stupidly baggy garb he wore everyday.
…
Why did Patrick’s face feel like it was burning?
Before he could begin to reason that one out, Hugh Morris smiled, and, oh God, his shoulders were shaking, was he laughing? That asshole was chuckling at Patrick’s brief, uncharacteristic startle—of course he saw that—and as Patrick started to scowl in response, Hugh Morris turned around, his back facing the tree. Great, he was probably going to tell Dr. Winters what he’d just seen. Not that it mattered, nobody would believe them. Right?
Patrick couldn’t be upset for too long, though, because now he’d been blessed with the privilege of getting to watch Hugh Morris’s pale, muscular back glimmer in the last of the sunset’s rays. His back muscles rippled gracefully under his skin with every movement as the two made their way down to the shore. Hugh Morris playfully bent down to flick the ocean’s water onto his wife. Dr. Winters splashed her husband back, and Patrick absently watched as a drop of water slowly trailed down the nape of Hugh Morris’s neck, narrowly gliding past his wet, burgundy hair and slipping down his back. The droplet slid down every ridged divot of the jester’s spine, and Patrick followed with bated breath as it leisurely, so slowly it was almost teasingly, slipped down the back of his half-red, half-purple trunks. This was the moment Patrick realized what he was doing and forcibly tore his gaze away, his mouth suddenly dry and his cheeks even more flushed than before. What was he even doing?
Thankfully, a distraction in the form of Patrick’s wife arrived.
“Patrick,” Iris walked towards him, her voice as soft as her eyeliner was sharp.
”Wuh,” Patrick gracefully said, blinking away the last of his thoughts of muscular jesters and water droplets. The heat on his face abruptly cooled upon seeing his wife’s peculiar expression. Her eyebrows were drawn together and her teeth were worrying on her bottom lip, a face he definitely wasn’t used to seeing on her. “Iris? Are you okay?”
“I need to tell you something,” Iris said, her voice still soft, but her tone urgent. Patrick suddenly felt like a hard rock had sunk to the bottom of his stomach.
“Right now?” Patrick asked, trying to keep a smile on his face, but he couldn’t help but let his eyebrows knit together in concern. During their entire one week of marriage, Patrick couldn’t think of a time where him and Iris had run into any kind of problem, so he wasn’t really sure what to expect. “Don’t you want to wait until we get home to tell me?”
“I can’t wait, I had to come find you. You were taking too long to come home,” Iris admitted, averting her eyes. Suddenly, Patrick felt a lump in his throat. Had he really spent such a long time ogling Hugh Morris that he was late coming home to his wife?
That was the wrong adjective, he was never ogling. He obviously despised Hugh Morris, he was just surprised to learn the other mii had all of that. Any other islander would’ve been staring a little, too, it’s not like the jester ever wore anything other than his usual oversized attire. He doubted most miis had any knowledge of Hugh Morris’s unfortunately impressive physique. To Patrick’s knowledge, this was probably Hugh Morris’s first public appearance without it. Maybe Patrick was even the first mii to see him shirtless. Well, besides Dr. Winters, who was currently at Hugh Morris’s side and absolutely drenched in water. Her salt-and-pepper hair was suddenly twice as long and veiled over her face, covering her eyes and leaving only her disapproving grimace exposed. Patrick could hear Hugh Morris laugh sheepishly in response. She was obviously seeing her husband topless right now, but they were married, so surely she’d seen him like this before. Maybe just not this wet. Unless it was in the shower or something. Okay, this was getting weird, Patrick’s face was a little hot again.
He shook himself out of his thoughts once more, focusing back in on his wife.
“Okay, so…What’s wrong?” Patrick cautiously inquired.
Iris stared at him for a couple of very long seconds, like she was debating whether or not to tell her husband what was on her mind. Patrick struggled to keep eye contact with her, her gaze was incredibly intense right now. Or more intense than usual, at least.
She closed her eyes, sucked in a deep breath of air, and exhaled slowly. As her eyelids slowly fluttered open, her sharp amber gaze was clearer and more serious than ever. Patrick felt like she had directly pierced his soul.
“I’m pregnant.”
…
Patrick froze, his eyes instantly growing as large and round as saucers. Beyond that simple form of expression, he showed no signs of intelligent thought (which wasn’t entirely uncommon). His mind was just as frozen as his body was. The sudden announcement that he was going to be a father was simultaneously so anticlimactic he barely processed it, yet so overwhelming it casted a colossal shadow over his brain, essentially booting him into system overload.
The concept of fatherhood wasn’t really something Patrick had ever spent much time thinking about, even when he got married. He already dedicated so much space in his mind and world to himself, it was difficult to imagine giving any of it up for someone else. It’s not like he really had anyone to compare himself to, either; he’d never had a father, and none of the couples on Yoomian had raised a baby, yet. That meant that him and Iris would be the first.
At least the child would be well-loved by everyone. Being the first baby born on Yoomian Island would make it a novelty, so he was sure plenty of islanders would want to come see it for themselves. Most of them would probably shower it with love, too, which was basically loving on Patrick by association. Being the first mii to become a dad didn’t sound half-bad, either. That basically made him the number one daddy of Yoomian Island, and when you put it that way, it sounded a lot less geriatric and way cooler.
Maybe Patrick could get on board with this whole fatherhood thing after all.
”Babe, that’s great!” Patrick beamed, grabbing his wife’s hands and clasping them in his own. Iris’s eyebrows raised in surprise, her eyebrow piercing glinting in the newly darkened sky. “We need to get home so we can phone the caretaker and let her know!”
”Hold on,” Iris unlaced her fingers from Patrick’s and crossed her arms in front of her chest. She looked him in the eye as her expression became one of great concentration and sternness, like she was pulling apart every minuet detail of Patrick’s reaction with her gaze alone. “Are you even sure that you want this? Because we’ve never talked about it before and I’m not even sure if I-”
”C’mon, babe,” Patrick shifted to Iris’s side and draped his arm around her in an attempt to be comforting. She bristled slightly, but he could feel her start to relax as he soothingly rubbed her shoulder with his free hand. “I wouldn’t have been so excited if I didn’t want it. Try not to think too hard or you’re gonna psych yourself out, because really, how bad could it be?” He turned his head to face her, offering a laidback smile. Honestly, his wife still didn’t look fully convinced, but she shyly smiled back at him, and Patrick would take what he could get.
”Yeah…” Iris managed, her faint smile not really reaching her eyes. “I guess having a kid wouldn’t be the end of the world.”
”That’s the spirit,” Patrick smiled, planting a kiss on his wife’s cheek. “Now let’s go home, we can think of baby names on the way there. I already have some ideas myself: What are your thoughts on Patrick Jr. if it’s a boy, and Patricia if it’s a girl?”
Iris chuckled, and Patrick took that as a win, although he wasn’t sure what was so funny.
They started to walk home in the dark, listening to the island’s cicadas softly chirp and the waves of the ocean crash against the shoreline. Hearing a crunch in the sand, Patrick looked over his shoulder to see Hugh Morris and Dr. Winters. They were presumably doing the same as Iris and himself, walking home together to the house they shared, except their hands were clasped together instead of Hugh Morris keeping his arm wrapped around his wife like Patrick was. Nothing was abnormal about any of it, except Patrick could’ve sworn Hugh Morrison’s seafoam-colored eyes were just boring into him. However, his head was whipped back around quicker than Patrick could process any of it, so he just believed it to be a trick of the mind. The jester’s eye makeup must’ve created some sort of illusion or something, like a monarch butterfly’s wings mimicking the gaze of a predator.
Patrick spared one more lingering glance at Hugh Morrison’s pale, muscular back, savoring it. Not because he wanted to or anything, just because he still couldn’t believe it. Yes, that was it. No other reason. Not only was Hugh Morris muscular, but he practically glowed in the night, reflecting the little moonlight that was steadily making its way into the sky. It was weirdly beautiful, kind of like the jester himself.
Patrick was gonna blame that one on becoming weirdly sappy due to his newly earned fatherhood.
Finally, he turned his head back to Iris, and tried to abandon all thoughts of Hugh Morris as they continued their descent to their house. Except now, it wasn’t just their house, but the home they would soon be raising their very own baby in.
For some unknown reason, Patrick suddenly felt the urge to throw up.