Steven was on the porch of the Mizushima-Papadakis house, smoking a cigarette. He had drifted between his dorm, Wallace's home, and Winona's dorm in the wake of Wallace's suicide attempt.

His dad had been texting him earlier—"How are you doing son?" "How's your friend?" "If you ever need to come back home, your old man's door is always open". Steven didn't want to respond, and luckily Dad was probably too busy anyway to read any responses.

Too busy to scold Steven for smoking.

He couldn't even remember when or why he had picked up the habit. Probably in middle school or high school, when he wanted to stick it to his dad or teachers, when his poor study habits finally caught up to him, when he needed a way to deal with a new ADHD diagnosis. It wasn't pleasant, but… well, it was always there when things were rough.

It wasn't a pretty habit, and deep down… maybe Steven really did want to drop the habit, even with Winona's teasing pleas that she didn't like a man who reeked of tobacco. Maybe—

"Need a smoking partner?"

Steven jumped at the voice and looked up. Oh, it was just Raphael.

Steven sighed. "Don't you have a daughter?"

Raphael sat in one of the porch chairs. "Social smoker. Try not to make it a habit."

Steven chuckled, handing Raphael the box of cigarettes. "How do you do it?"

Raphael raised an eyebrow at the label on the box. "Camerupt Luxury?"

"What else would I blow my dad's money on?"

Raphael said nothing in response, instead taking a cigarette and letting Steven light it for him. The two sat in silence for a few minutes. Steven wanted to strike up some sort of conversation, but that had never been a strength of his.

Luckily, Raphael started the conversation: "Seen any… movies lately?"

"No."

Well, never mind. That conversation died about as quickly as it started.

"Well…" Actually, maybe Raphael was going to try again. "How are the… Rustboro Cradily? Is that your baseball team?"

Steven smiled. "My dad would probably know. He loves baseball. Made me try out for the little league and everything. I think he thought it would do me some good."

Raphael turned to Steven. "Your dad's the president of Devon Co., right?"

Steven fought the urge to roll his eyes. "Yeah. Why?"

Raphael shrugged. "I don't really know a lot about you and Winona, really. Wallace doesn't talk a whole lot about you." He paused and thought for a moment. "Well, he was over the moon when he met Winona and first introduced her to use… But Megalos didn't like her." He stifled a laugh. "Wallace's family sure didn't like her."

Steven's heart broke a bit at that. Sure, he and Winona had gotten used to the fact that they couldn't make their relationship with Wallace public, but… the fact that Wallace felt like he couldn't talk about them with his own family, even as a friend…

"I mean," Raphael continued, "Nicole liked Winona. Lisia liked Winona. I liked Winona. But…" he groaned. "Their family, I swear. They think we have some curse because Nicole was born out of wedlock or Lisia was born out of wedlock or Wallace wore dresses or—"

He collapsed against the back of his chair. "Sometimes I wish they would just ostracize us already so we wouldn't have to deal with them."

Wait, Wallace used to wear dresses? And Raphael… didn't seem to show disdain for it?

"It's kind of sad, really." Raphael's voice was much quieter. "I barely know anything about Wallace, and we've known each other for almost a decade. Are Nicole and I… really any better than the rest of the family?"

Steven's heart broke. Raphael looked… well, he looked stoic as always, but… it felt like a different kind of stoicism. Was he hiding something?

"Y-Yeah," Steven stammered. "Well… when I came out to my dad as… as not straight, I didn't come out immediately after I found out. I…" He bit down on his cigarette. "I didn't have the best relationship with my dad as a kid. But we… tried opening up to each other, allowing ourselves to be vulnerable, and only when he showed that he unconditionally loved me, I… I felt like I could be myself around him."

His hand fell against his side, the flame on the cigarette dying away.

"I think you just need to make sure Wallace feels safe being himself around you, right?"

Raphael looked up.

"Steven, how do you know Wallace?"

Shit. Shit shit shit.

"I… Well I… I'm the Champion." Steven stood up, holding his cigarette in a shaky death grip between his fingers. "Of course I would be there for Wallace! I—"

"Raphael? Steven?"

Nicole was standing in the doorway, expression… expression uncharacteristically emotionless.

"You… you need to come see the news. Megalos is dead."

-

Megalos had succumbed to cholera. He was fifty five years old.

His death set Sootopolis politics on fire, with his followers mourning him and turning their attention to memorializing a symbol of Sootopolis's rise from near destruction, while City Hall scrambled to choose a successor.

Nicole, meanwhile, celebrated with a bottle of her most expensive Asírikó wine.

She wasn't intending to get drunk, but she deserved to treat herself. Megalos could never hurt Wallace again. Megalos could never beat or rape Wallace again. Megalos was gone, and Nicole couldn't be happier.

…But Ren was still out there in the world. There were still so many predatory socialites in Sootopolis. The world was still so scary.

But without Megalos, Wallace wasn't shackled to publicity and Sootopolis City. He had no reason to stay, and he had every reason to leave.

-

"Lisia," Nicole said one morning, "we're moving to Lilycove City."

Lisia looked up from her cereal. "But… why?"

Nicole looked over at Raphael, the gears in her head turning.

Of course.

"Well, you know how Tàta works at the museum in Lilycove City?"

"Yeah."

"Well, it's been getting harder to commute between cities, and so we're moving to Lilycove City to make it easier."

"But what about school? What about my friends?" Her eyes widened. "We're not leaving Uncle Wall behind, are we?"

Nicole couldn't help but chuckle. Cute Lisia, watching out for her uncle. "Of course we aren't leaving Wallace behind! Wallace is family, and we'd never leave him behind!"

Lisia crossed her arms. "You're a bad liar."

The whole table went silent. Then, Lisia's voice came back, louder and harsher:

"You said that Wallace is okay! You said that he would be okay! But he's not! He's never going to be okay!"

"Lisia—"

Lisia ran out of her chair and out of the kitchen.

-

Wallace eventually went from just barely above 45 kilograms to a healthier, albeit still below healthy weight. The withdrawal symptoms lessened as the months went on. Most importantly, Wallace was back in touch with reality, and he wasn't at risk of killing himself the second he was left alone.

He moved to Lilycove City with his sister and her family. Steven didn't have an excuse to follow them, not unless he wanted to out his true relationship with Wallace.

So instead, he tried to focus on college. He tried to focus on his studies. And somehow, he even managed to get himself to do Devon work. Anything to distract himself from Wallace.

And hey, maybe it was a good thing that he wasn't thinking about Wallace. After all, being a caretaker was exhausting. It took a lot out of Steven. It gave him panic attacks and self harm thoughts and—

Fuck.

What kind of a boyfriend was he, thinking of Wallace like that? Wallace was the greatest man Steven had ever met. Wallace was calm and kind. He loved art and Water types. He… He…

Who was Wallace? And did Steven even know the real Wallace? Wallace had lied for so many years that he was okay, that he loved everything about his life, that he was perfect. How could Steven know what the real Wallace was like? How—

His Pokénav was ringing. It was Nicole.

"Hello, Ms. Papadaki." Shoot, was it 'Ms.' or 'Ms.'? 'Papadaki' or 'Mizushima'?

"How do you know Wallace?" Nicole's voice was direct. Was she mad at Steven?

"I-I told Raphael already, I'm the Champion! And a good Champion cares about the other League members! And—"

"Then why is Wallace begging me to let you and Winona share a bed with him?"

Silence. Cold, cold silence.

Nicole sighed. "I'm not mad at you, Steven. I don't care if my brother is gay or straight or whatever. I just… I just want him to be happy." Her voice cracked at the end. "I—"

"Wallace and I are gay." Fuck it all, it's not like anything even mattered. "We're gay and we have gay sex and—"

"Steven, Steven, you don't need to go into detail. I don't—" Nicole was cut off by a laugh that took her out for a few moments. Honestly, it was nice hearing her laugh.

"Then what," Nicole asked once her voice had calmed down again, "what about Winona? Did she and Wallace break up?"

"No. She's…" Shit, how was Steven supposed to explain this? "She and I are dating Wallace. And I'm dating Winona. We're all dating each other."

…Thinking for a moment, Steven realized that maybe using "gay" implied he was only dating Wallace. Maybe he should have used… what was the word… bisexual?

"I really don't know anything about Wallace, do I?" Nicole sighed. "I've known him since he was a baby, and I feel like he's a stranger."

Steven chuckled awkwardly. "I don't even know if I'm dating the real Wallace or some made-up fantasy."

"Steven… from now on, we need to be honest with each other. All of us. Me, Raphael, you, Winona, and Wallace."

Someone was missing. "What about Lisia?"

Nicole was silent for a bit. "We… We'll have to figure that out."

-

Wallace wordlessly looked around the new house, ducking in and out of the rooms. Unlike the home in Sootopolis, this house was one floor. The kitchen, the living room, the dining room, the three bedrooms, and the garage. That garage probably wouldn't be getting much use; cars weren't really a thing in Sootopolis City, and surely Lilycove City had public transport. It was better for the environment than a car.

Well, as Wallace looked around the garage, he could imagine it as an art studio of some sort, with all of his paints and canvases and folders… but Megalos wouldn't like that. Megalos would want the place dedicated to something more useful, but how did one make a politics studio?

What would Megalos think of Wallace taking lithium instead of his government-mandated drugs? What would Megalos think of all of the mean things the doctors said about him? What would Megalos think of the false accusations of abuse? What would Megalos think of Wallace no longer living in Sootopolis City?

What was Wallace supposed to do now, after he had attempted suicide, after he had been hospitalized for drug addiction and an eating disorder, after his whole life had almost ended several times over? What—

"Hey, Wallace."

Light flooded into the garage as someone opened the door… Steven. And Winona was with him, too. They had come! They… They looked... They looked off, but Wallace couldn't pinpoint why.

"Can we talk to you about something?" Steven asked as he looked around the garage. "Like… sitting down… there's nowhere to sit here—How about the kitchen?"

Wallace's heart raced as he followed the two out of the garage, down the hall, and into the kitchen.

"Are you breaking up with me?" Wallace asked.

"No," Winona replied.

"Are you pregnant?"

"No."

"Do I have some sort of terminal illness that the doctor didn't tell me about?"

"No."

Now they were sitting at the kitchen table. Winona and Steven occasionally glanced at each other.

"Is Ren pregnant? Are Ren and Megalos going to jail? Is Megalos still going to be the mayor? When do I need to go back—"

Steven raised his hand, signaling Wallace to stop talking.

"Wallace, I love you. Winona loves you. Nicole and everyone in your family loves you. Juan loves you. Your Pokémon love you." There was a resigned smile on Steven's face, genuine love, genuine exhaustion. "But this… All of these things… the alcohol, the drugs, the self harm, the purging, the constant lies and coverups… they're all hurting you, and they're hurting us. You can't go on like this and expect to live very long or very well. If it's all for Sootopolis… you can't really do much for Sootopolis if you're dead. And you're just…" Steven sighed, rested his head in his hand. "You're living for someone else and you're not even living your true self."

Steven looked back up. "So I'm going to give you a choice." He pointed to the front door. "Either you walk out that door and return to living for Sootopolis City and return to the drugs and the purging and the self harm and the lies"—Steven took a deep breath—"or you stay here and start living for yourself, you start living your authentic self, and we can all start figuring this out together. Coming from someone who's been there… it gets better, with the help of others, and help from within. There's nobody that can snap their fingers and make everything go away. It's a long, long road, and it's not an easy one, and, well, only you can make the first step."

Wallace's heart stopped. He had… hurt Steven and Winona. No, that couldn't be... No... looking back on their time together—the cancelled dates, the ghosting, the fighting, the nights of migraines and drunkenness—he had hurt them…

...and they still loved him. They still wanted to stick around to help him. They wanted him to stay. They wanted him to get better. They still loved him after all of the pain he put them through.

And he had to do his part.

"I don't…" Wallace whispered. "…I don't know where to start. I want to get better, for you. But I want to start somewhere, and I don't know where to start."

It was Winona's turn to smile, to speak: "You can start by answering a question: How are you feeling? And be honest."

Wallace stared back down at his feet. "I'm scared. I don't know..." He swallowed back the lump in his throat. "...I don't know how to keep living... much less live for me."

"Well," Winona said, "what makes you happy? Forget about the things that others want you to do or like; what makes you happy?"

"I like... Water types." Wallace searched through the depths of his mind. "I like art. Making art, looking at art, talking about art. I like Nicole and Raphael. I like Victoria and all of my other Pokémon. I like Juan. And I like..." He smiled, and this time he didn't have to force it. "...I like you two. I like your hugs, too."

Steven chuckled. "Are you trying to ask for a hug?"

"Yes. Your hugs are good touch. Very, very good touch."

Their touch was good—great. He trusted them. He loved them. He wanted to do his very best to give back for everything they had done for him.