the band-aids are in the left cabinet

Chapter 4

tubbo is busy.

he's sorting through papers, currently, trying to figure out expenses and debts and bills he has to pay in order to keep living in ranboo's expensive ass mansion. well, technically they split the bill, but that's not important now. all that matters is the fact that he owes foolish for making the stupid place, and he has nowhere near enough resources.

"i'll handle it," ranboo had said, all confident, the way he was sometimes. just another thing tubbo could love about him.

the thing is, he never specified exactly how he would handle it, so now tubbo was left dangling with nothing, with a bunch of unpaid debts he needed to get through in order to keep his stupid, stupid house. what idiot let him have a mansion? (ranboo, apparently.) he groans and lets his head drop down on his desk. his back aches, and the bones in his wrists feel stiff and uncomfortable.

instead of focusing on his precarious living situation, he's decided he's going to work on blueprints for his greenhouse. he has no idea how he's going to build it, especially without his ranboo here to help him, so he'll settle for remaking the blueprints until he finally gets enough motivation to actually build the damn thing. he knows how to handle papers, distinct designs and shapes that create a whole idea without using a single word. he knows this. and he knows his hands are too unstable to handle building anything right now. stupid fucking body.

the scars across his right hand are a bit itchy today, and he scratches them carelessly. they stopped bleeding a couple months after he got them, which is honestly fine. he can live with damaged nerve endings, he can live with mutilated skin and only one working eye. sure, it fucks with his depth perception, but he has tommy to see for him － he barely even notices it anymore.

ranboo used to joke that michael inherited the shitty eyesight and half destroyed face from tubbo, that it was simply meant to be that they had all found each other. a family that, somehow, against every odd, worked perfectly.

tubbo outlines the dimensions of the greenhouse dome, translating the picture in his head into numbers, equations, and thin pencil lines. his hand isn't shaking.

he barely notices how quiet it is.

he doesn't notice the ticking of the clock, the way the sun dips lower and lower in the sky, until all that's outside his window is the dark blue of a sky without a sun. he barely notices when tommy opens the door.

michael runs into the room, and that finally breaks tubbo out of his own head. he smiles at his son and picks him up, giving him a tired smile. tommy is leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed against his chest. he looks exhausted.

"what's wrong?" tubbo asks. michael is in bed, conked out completely, and the silence of the empty house has returned.

tommy presses his lips into a line, then purses them. he looks down. "i feel like you're ignoring me," tommy admits, quiet. "you're always quiet around me, and you spend every day in your office. what do you even do in there, man?"

tubbo pokes his friend in the shoulder. "work," he says simply. "and i'm not ignoring you. i'm just busy. thanks for taking care of michael, by the way. i'm thinking i'll take him tomorrow, you can get a day off."

the look that tommy gives him is downright comical. "you're not my boss, asshole."

"i might as well be."

"you're a dick."

"mhm."

he laughs, loud and bright, the way he always did. good, tubbo thinks. please don't change. please stay this way forever.

"seriously, though," tommy says once he's stopped laughing. "are you alright, man? i jus-"

"it's getting late," tubbo cuts him off. he'd rather die than have this conversation again. he's fine, he really is. he's just busy. he can deal with being busy. "you wanna stay the night?"

tommy wilts. he opens his mouth to say something then closes it again, not unlike a goldfish. "sure," he says, defeated. "i'll take the spare room."

tubbo nods. "wake me up if you need me."

"you too, man."