A week before Valentine's day, Watford was flowing with love letters and chocolates, confessions and rejections. Already, many of the students were helping decorate the school with paper hearts and cupids. Simon of course, could not resist helping out, which meant Baz was getting dragged in too. While Baz worked on cutting out decorations, Simon towered on a ladder to put up red and pink garlands and hanging paper cutouts.
"Isn't it ironic?" Simon said, "It's like the whole school is celebrating our love." It'd been three weeks since he'd been enchanted with the love spell and he grew a dreamy lovesick lilt to his voice. "Mm-Hm." Baz said. He'd been enjoying spending time with Simon until Valentine's day reared its ugly face. "Baz, will you be my valentine?" Simon twisted to face Baz, with a cute little heart cutout pinched in his fingers. Baz smiled and took the heart, but Simon was leaning too far off the ladder. "Crowley, watch out!" Simon tipped off the ladder and fell into a Baz's arms.
Simon chuckled and tangled his fingers in Baz's hair. "I've really fallen for you, you know." he whispered into Baz's ear. It was times like this where Baz felt the greatest, where he felt so great, he just forgot about the bow and felt the love as if it were real. Baz pulled Simon in for a kiss, and they went back to work, putting up decorations and thinking about secret Valentine's day surprises.
Later, Baz and Penelope met in their Charms classroom to work on a spell to cure Simon. Penelope, who was usually on task, especially on something so important as Simon's life, found it extremely difficult to focus. Even on the other side of the world, Micah was a fantastic romantic. Cards, candy and flowers were being sent out of the blue for her and that welled the most beautiful blooms of life, that made it hard to bring a love like Simon and Baz's to death.
Of course the love wasn't real; not exactly for Simon anyway. Though regardless of the love, the happiness was so real. Penelope had never seen either of the two be as happy as they were now. Baz even became a bearable person, a friend almost. Not just to Penelope, but more and more people found Baz a more approachable person, and less of a reclusive prick. And Simon, Simon smiled without remorse. He didn't worry much about problems with fighting the Humdrum or his destiny, but he'd found a reason to fight even harder for his life and the lives of his friends, and lover.
And yet everyday as Baz and Penelope met, the situation switched over. Baz turned again to a reclusive prick, but also anxious and confused. Simon turned into a manic obsessive over Baz, and proceeded in getting very strange. Recently Simon suggested sneaking Baz into Ebb's goat farm if he'd ever needed more blood. Luckily, both Penelope and Baz were willing to write off that statement, knowing his condition often lacked much judgement. Still, the signs of growing insanity were startling.
Before, Baz and Penelope turned their 'lab sessions' into hangout sessions. They talked about Simon, magic, and some of their favorite authors. When they weren't talking about these things, Baz talked about his mother and Penelope talked about the fears she told no one but Simon before. Baz turned out to be a great listener, especially while Simon was out of sorts, and Penelope could keep all of the secrets that Baz had told no one.
But now, as Valentines grew closer Baz and Penelope worked harder than ever to find out how to fix Simon. "Penelope, tomorrow I'm going to wake up to Simon sacrificing a goat to me, please help me figure this out and stop staring off into space." Penelope quirked a brow. "You don't have to be rude, I'm just thinking about Micah." she said. "He's been sending me gifts and it's so sweet. I've been missing him so much it hurts. I've never had a problem with our long-distance, until now." Baz dropped his shoulders and started raking through his hair. "It has been nice having a valentine this year." he said.
"Even if he's been picking up some strange habits?"
"Honestly, it's been killing me, knowing that someday I'm going to have to leave him."
"Maybe you can spend Valentine's together?"
"I don't think-" Baz sighed. "I don't know, I'd at least want to know what to do if Simon does something weird at the dance."
"A last hurrah then? The final memory kept between the two of you? Unless…"
"Unless what?"
"Forget about it." Baz might be blind as a bat, but Penelope wondered about how Simon would really respond when he woke up. Simon was so happy already, and Baz was really someone who'd be ready to give all the attention and love Simon would need. She believed it was possible for them to be together even after the weird things that've been going on lately.
"Okay, I think our list is finished." Baz said. On the desk was a list of spells that could work to break Simon's curse. After spells and reverse enchantments,they'd realized agreed that spells were the only way this was going to work.
"Should we start after the dance then?" Penelope asked. "Yeah, I think that'd work." Baz said dreamily as he stared out the window. "I feel like I'm going to regret this." he said after some time. "I know I won't but I still feel-" He started to choke up and went back to staring out the window. Penelope wondered if they were at a point where they were comfortable with physical reassurance, but decided on leaving him with time to himself and left the room.
