and she told me that she fucking hates you

CHAPTER 1

"Y/N is bringing Mark home for Christmas," Tommy mutters with distracted disdain one evening over a Discord VC; Wilbur's the only other one in the chat with him, the two of them waiting for Charlie and Tubbo to join to film a video. Tommy's tone comes as a surprise; for all that his online persona is boisterous and rather egocentric, the kid himself was quite kind and well mannered, so genuine dislike, bordering on actual contempt, was enough to pique Wilbur's interest.

"Not a fan of Mark, are we?"

"He's really ruining the name Mark," Tommy answers without hesitation, the thoughts clearly having plagued him for a while, "but Y/N got mad at me the last time I called him The Inferior Mark over text -"

"Sorry," Wilbur cuts him off, "Y/N?" That's what breaks Tommy from his distracted ranting, giving pause and sighing deeply. The clatter of his keyboard stops.

"My older sister;" he says, tone far warmer, "she's in London doing cool Uni things, but for some stupid reason is still dating Milquetoast Mark, who is decidedly less cool, but he was nice to her in high school so now I have to look at his face every time she comes home to visit."

"Milquetoast Mark?"

"The man is the very essence of beige, Wilbur," Tommy groaned, pitching himself back in his chair, vaguely muffled, as if holding his face in his hands, "he looks like a clown themed whack-a-mole, but I still couldn't pick him out of a line-up of one!"

There's so many things Wilbur wants to ask as he's trying not to laugh, but before he can decide which to go with first, Discord alerts them to the fact that Tubbo joined the call, and he doesn't even get to say hello before Tommy's groaning loudly.

"She's bringing Milquetoast Mark, and I'm going to eat dirt," Tommy whined, and Tubbo made a noise of understanding.

"Yeah, she warned me that she'd just told you," he says with an air of commiseration.

"Tell Wilbur! I don't think he believes me that Mark is the personification of bloody nothing!"

"Mark is..." Tubbo muses for a moment, but as soon as he can get a word in edgewise, Wilbur pipes up.

"Okay, hold on, I do believe you, but how long have we known each other? How is this the first time I'm hearing about you having a sister?" He's half laughing, though there's confusion in his voice.

"Mark's not a fan of being known or having fun, so I don't mention them a lot," Tommy mutters, "she's wanted to do YouTube for ages but -" he huffs irately through his nose, but doesn't finish his thought.

"She only made friends with me to spite Tommy," Tubbo added, "she called me The Superior Brother," his voice was gleeful, Wilbur didn't have to see him to know he was practically preening.

"I assume this was not long after Tommy called her boyfriend The Inferior Mark," Wilbur snickers, and Tommy's loud sigh, and Tubbo's delighted laughter is confirmation enough.

Charlie joins not long after, and the video goes on ahead without a hitch, though in the back of his mind, something about the name of Tommy's sister was familiar to him. He's not quite sure, but doesn't think much more about it.

Tommy messages him with various plots against this mysterious Milquetoast Mark, including serving him actual milk-drenched-toast as a snide reminder of how Tommy feels about him. It's usually accompanied by screenshots of his messages to his sister, who's already shot down whatever ludicrous idea he's had.

Wilbur's not quite sure why Tommy keeps messaging about his sister, but it's rather endearing; considering only himself and Tubbo know of Y/N's existence online, he takes it as a sign of trust. It's not often enough for him to really notice at first, once every few days, asking for advice on potential Christmas presents, or telling Wilbur about how he's excited to hang out around town with his sister and Tubbo, but as Wilbur learns more, he gets more and more of that sense of strange familiarity, like he's met this woman before. Maybe your name's familiar, or your choice of study, Literature of all things, or maybe it's a weirdly familiar sentiment he thinks he hears in Tommy's words, knowing he's heard it before -