The Fall of the Aftons

110: William Afton

A few weeks passed since Sammy's funeral. Things finally started to die down. Henry was starting to calm down after his daughter's death. For whatever reason, he believed that Charlotte was still alive, even though she was the one who died. He believed that Sammy was the one who was killed. It was weird to see Henry still dealing with the grief of his lost daughter.

The boys at Fazbear's finally managed to befriend Michael. After being bullied by them for years on end, Michael clearly didn't trust them very much. That wasn't surprising. He already had a difficult time trusting others, so it didn't surprise William at all that he was having trouble trusting his bullies-became-friends.

What was surprising, though, was that Michael's new friends began to tease and scare Evan with their masks from work. And it seemed like Michael was hesitantly starting to join in on it, too. Evan started hiding around William whenever the whole family was at one of the restaurants.

Miraculously, though, the brothers remained as close as ever. William had no idea how or why. But it was great to see that they were still close.

At the moment, William was working on paperwork, sitting at his desk in Fazbear's. The day was almost over, so there he was at his desk, slightly paying attention to the sounds of his children and Henry's children playing together in the dining area.

Suddenly, Henry draped himself over William, grabbing William's pen and sticking it in the pencil cup on the corner of the desk. He tried to grab William's calculator, but William moved it away from his reach and tucked it away into one of the desk drawers before he could do so.

"Are you being clingy?" William asked with a slight chuckle in his voice. "Or are you just tired and want to go back to your house?"

"Both," Henry willingly admitted with a small smile. "But you love me, so I know that you don't mind."

"You're my friend," William felt the need to remind him.

"You still love me, though," he joked as he stood up. He crossed his arms, a teasing smile on his face. "And I know that I'm right. You can't hide it from me."

"You're my friend," William repeated.

"You love me!" Henry insisted.

"You're my friend."

"You love me!"

"You're my friend!"

The two of them continued to go back and forth like bickering children for about fifteen minutes before William started to get fed up with their stupidity. He tried to keep it in. To keep himself from snapping. But it didn't last very long. So, a few more minutes later, he finally snapped.

"Okay, okay! Yes! I love you, Henry! So what?!" he shouted, his voice irritated.

Henry laughed as he started to repeat his three words. But just before he could get the first word out, he quickly realized what William had said and shut up. His teasing smile faded as his smiling eyes widened in surprise. His expression was stunned. Blood rose to his face, filling his cheeks with a deep shade of pink. His blushing turned his many freckles a sullen red as the fingers on his left hand twitched ever-so-slightly, just as they always did when he was genuinely perplexed.

He clearly wasn't expecting William to snap and spill just then.

"Wha... What?" he whispered. His voice was so quiet that William almost couldn't hear him.

"You heard me," William said proudly, crossing his arms over his chest. But they quickly fell back to his sides when he realized something.

He just confessed one of his biggest secrets.

And he confessed it to the one that the secret was about.

He could feel his face warm--shit. He just told his best friend since childhood that he loved him!

"Crap. Crap, crap, crap--Henry, I'm so sorry! I don't know what came over me!" William exclaimed desperately, standing up to step closer to his friend.

"It... It's okay," Henry mumbled. He took a slight step forward before he gave William a small, quick kiss on his cheek. "I do, too, you idiot."