Parasocial Family

The strangest phone call yet.

College had only been getting more and more stressful for both Wilbur and Phil. With the workload getting heavier, and the work itself getting harder, they were pretty swamped. Wibur's hair was permanently messy, they immediately ran out of bananas after every grocery shopping trip, and Phil wore a look of frazzled exhaustion constantly.

True lack of assignments was a rarity. Whenever Wilbur had freetime it was because he did all the homework that needed to be turned in quite soon. He still had other homework, but it could be put off slightly. Phil was awfully good at doing schoolwork. He was swamped with homework too, of course, but he was less swamped. Wilbur envied and feared him in equal measure.

Wilbur was enjoying one blissful night where he'd gotten all of his schoolwork done. Well, he'd gotten the pressing ones done so he was entitled to indulge in some free time. It was late at night and Wilbur was tired from previous all-nighters. Still, he endeavored on with his Minecraft excapede. Wilbur was lying on the couch with his head on the side, staring at his switch while he killed the animals that displeased him.

Wilbur must have fallen asleep at some point, because he was still on the couch with his switch lying on his chest when he woke up to the sound of the phone ringing. Wilbur's foggy brain screamed at him to make it stop. As he fumbled to accept the call he distantly registered that Phil might have been woken up by the ringing. Wilbur was rubbing the sleep out of his eyes when he finally managed to accept the call. Tommy's voice exploded out of the speaker.

"Phil! Phil, I need your help!" Tommy yelled. Wilbur sat bolt upright, flinging his switch to the end of the couch. Adrenaline pumped through his veins. His mind cleared instantly, sleep nothing but a far-off memory.

"What's the matter, Tommy? Do I need to call 9-9-9? I mean, 9-1-1?" Wilbur said frantically. He knew Tommy often over-dramatized things, but Wilbur had heard the story of the boy who cried wolf. He'd heard it far too often. Wilbur thought that it would be a better idea to react to everything Tommy said as if it was a real emergency, just in case. Better safe than sorry. Then again, Wilbur's mind raced, he'd never said he was in trouble, just that he needed phil's hep.

"What? Where's Phil? Math guy? Nevermind, I need help and you are going to provide me with it," Tommy started off confused, but his voice grew determined by the end. Wilbur relaxed a little. Tommy was fine. Well, maybe not fine, but he wasn't in any mortal danger. Unless he was bleeding out and had gone into some form of shock. Some people could talk for like half an hour with a stab wound and not be worried because, hello, shock.

Tommy continued to talk loudly about his problem. As he went on it became clearer that he wasn't hurt physically, which was good for Wilbur because he didn't want to have to explain to Phil what happened. Wilbur was trying his best to solve Tommy's issue with his sleep deprived brain when Tommy's voice filtered out of the phone.

"Shut up, Tubbo," Tommy said. Some instinct inside of Wilbur kicked in. Wilbur didn't know it, but that was his big brother instinct, and Tommy had just triggered it.

"Tommy," Wilbur said sternly. "Apologize to Tubbo." Tommy gave an indignant squawk.

"No!" Tommy whispered loudly.

"Yes," Wilbur said forcefully. Tommy quailed.

"Tubbo? I'm... sorry," Tommy said in a tone that clearly implied he was not.

"Tommy. Do it properly," Wilbur insisted.

"Fine," Tommy hisses into the phone. "Tubbo, I'm sorry." This tone was sincere.

"Good. Now offer to help with his problem," Wilbur ordered. He'd caught snatches of Tubbo talking earlier, and he seemed to be having a problem himself.

"What? But..." Tommy sighed and offered to help Tubbo. Wilbur could hear Tubbo talking from the other end of the phone.

"Quote!" Tubbo exclaimed desperately. Tommy's screeching was the last thing Wilbur heard before Tommy hung up. Wilbur groaned into the darkness. The lights turned on and Wilbur caught a glimpse of a sleepy Phil before hissing and squeezing his eyes shut.

"Wilbur?" Phil yawned. "Why do you have my phone?" Wilbur looked at the phone in his hand. It was indeed Phil's. Wilbur put it down on the table.

"I... Don't actually know," Wilbur admitted. "Tommy called. He just needed some help. I forced him to apologize to Tubbo," Wilbur added the last sentence thoughtfully.

"You got him to apologize? Teach me your ways," Phil said. "What do you man you don't remember?" Phil asked curiously.

"Um. I was playing Minecraft on my switch last night because I got a lot of homework done. I must have been pretty tired from it because I fell asleep playing," Wilbur guiltily avoided Phil's stare of disappointment that he was neglecting his sleep. In doing so, his eyes landed on his switch which was on the couch by his legs.

"It's actually right here," Wilbur said, picking up his switch. "I guess Tommy called, because I woke up to your phone going off. I was pretty tired so the only thing on my mind was making the noise stop. I accepted the call and it was Tommy. After our lovely conversation where I bullied him into apologizing to his friend, you showed up. I hadn't noticed I was holding your phone. Though it doesn't make any sense why Tommy would have called me. He even expected you and was surprised when I was there which seems pretty suspicious now that I think about."

"Wow. Okay, that seems reasonable enough. Sorry my phone woke you up. You should probably go to bed now," Phil said, and picked up his phone from its position on the table. Wilbur set his switch down on the table, and trudged off to his room. Phil chuckled when he was gone, then stared at his own phone thoughtfully.

"Got Tommy to apologize, huh." A smile spread on Phil's face. "Sounds a lot like the Big Brother Instinct to me," Phil whispered quietly before he too, left for bed.