Archive of Our Own ^beta

“And then she kissed me, Linus!”
“What is this, an obscene phone call?”

For a moment, Charlie Brown was struck dumb.

“Oh. Uh.”

From the other end of the line came an annoyed sigh. Charlie Brown gulped uneasily.

“I thought it was Linus.”
“Oh, he thought!”, Lucy said in a sneering voice, her teeth grinding audibly, “You know, maybe the turkey thought something too, right before it ended up on the feast table for Thanksgiving, you blockhead. And by the way, YUCK. Who would have imagined a day would come when some sweet lady would lose all self-respect and decide to kiss—”
“Ugh, ENOUGH!”

Charlie Brown's face flushed, and he was almost ready to hurl the phone against the wall.

“No, seriously, what's wrong with this unfortunate girl? Honestly, she's hideous, right?”
“NO! Lucy, no. Peggy Jean is the most beautiful girl in the world.”
“Is she dumb?”
“No.”
“Does she not exist?”
“She exists.”
“Does she have bad breath? Is she blind? Deaf?”
“NO. She’s wonderful. She’s very beautiful, sweet and kind, just like Linus.”

A moment of silence hung in the air.

“Kind, just like...?”

Charlie Brown bit his lip.
“Well, it’s just that Linus is kind, right? I mean... Ah... well... He is kind, and Peggy Jean is like him in that she's just as kind and—”
“Weird way to set your love standards, Charlie Brown.”
“What?”
“Nothing.”

There was an irritated grumble, and Lucy hung up the phone with a sharp motion.

***

“I think I’m starting to like Marcie a little.”
The sound of the piano faltered for a second, then resumed again.
“Well, good luck. And... if there’s a fight, I’m betting on Peppermint Patty”, said Schroeder without taking his eyes off the keys.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, Charlie Brown. That’s the next move. You, Peppermint Patty, and a duel for the heart of the girl with glasses.”

Charlie Brown sighed heavily.

“Since when do you like Marcie?” Schroeder raised his gaze to him. “I thought it used to be the other way around and SHE liked YOU, and you didn’t—”
“Well—”
“Like you switched places, huh? Took an interest when she didn't care anymore,” Schroeder flicked his bangs off his forehead and leaned back from the piano, crossing his arms over his chest.

Charlie Brown rolled his eyes and almost sarcastically asked, “How's it going with Lucy, Schroeder?”

The musician's face fell, and the tips of his ears turned red.

“What does that have to do with...” Schroeder sighed heavily and shook his head in annoyance, “Yeah, uh, touche,” he mumbled to himself, “So... you like Marcie?”
“I think so.”
“And why all of a sudden do you like Marcie?”
“We were recently sitting together in the library. She really helped me with one of my literature assignments. You know, usually Linus helps me, but he had some event at the chess club, and if it weren’t for Marcie, I probably wouldn’t have managed.”
“Oh...” Schroeder shook his bangs again.

“Marcie is really interesting. And she’s very smart, you know, just like Linus. And they have similar glasses.”

For a moment, both fell silent. Then Schroeder returned to the keys, quietly humming to the music.
“Not sure you actually like Marcie.”
“What?”
“Nothing.”

***

“Hey, um, Patty?”
“What’s going on, Charlie Brown?”
“Is something wrong with Violet? She looks very...”
“She looks good.”
“I’m not arguing with that!”
“What’s the matter, Charlie Brown? Have you fallen in love with her?”
“I...What?” he flushed slightly.

Lucy jumped into the conversation.
“That passion for the most beautiful Peggy Jean didn’t last long, huh?” Van Pelt smirked mockingly.

“Um... Well..”
“Oh, just admit it, you like Violet, don’t you?”
“Wha...”

Patty and Lucy leaned in closer.

“Not sure you’re worthy of her, Charlie Brown.”
“You’re so nervous all the time!”
“But I...”
“Come on, tell us why you like her.”
“What’s really happening...”
“Speak!”
“Well, uh... okay.. alright. So. She looks good. She’s confident. She has great manners.”

All this time Patty and Lucy were staring at him with narrowed eyes, nodding at each word.

“And she can be serious enough!” Charlie Brown's face suddenly shifted, as if he had an epiphany. “Exactly! She can make this, well, serious face! And she seriously approaches problem-solving if something comes up—”

For a moment, Patty and Lucy exchanged glances, and their stern faces softened slightly. At least until Charlie Brown finished... “Well, you know, just like Linus sometimes.”

Lucy’s eyes widened, her lips barely moving as she almost whispered, “again?”

Patty stared ahead in confusion. “Like Linus?”
“Yeah. He’s also quite serious.” Charlie Brown exchanged looks with Lucy, and for some reason, the way she looked at him made him a bit nervous, and he quickly added, “Well, that’s just, like, as an example.”

Patty and Lucy exchanged glances again.
Charlie Brown, genuinely not understanding what was going on, tilted his head a bit.
“What?”
“Nothing.”

***

“Are you still talking to Mary Jo?”
“Huh?” Linus looked up from some textbook, his expression bewildered as if he hadn't quite grasped the topic at hand.

“Mary Jo. Remember? Are you guys still in touch?”
“Oh, no. Not anymore.”

Silence hung in the air as Linus adjusted his glasses on his nose. Ever since they’d prescribed him spectacles, he found himself doing that every five minutes, whether they were slipping down or not. Perhaps he believed that by fiddling with them, he appeared smarter and more serious. There was something to that...
“Why do you ask all of a sudden?”
“I... um... I saw her recently. She’s really sweet, you know.”

Linus rolled his eyes.

“You have a new “really sweet, I'm so in love” every week.”
“But Mary Jo is the sweetest! You remember, don’t you? She’s very pretty... I realized that when I was eight years old. Well...” Charlie Brown furrowed his brow, “When you stole her from me.”

Linus choked on his words. “It wasn’t like that!” Van Pelt said with a hint of accusation in his tone, setting his book aside, his cheeks tinged with a slight blush. “And besides... she’s a lady, not a sheep or a tethered kid goat. You can’t just steal her.”
“Yeah, but I asked you to tell her about me and...”
“And I told you from the very beginning to go and talk to her yourself!”

Charlie Brown turned away, almost indignantly.

Linus sighed and asked in a tone that was almost casual, “So, do you like her again now?”

Immediately, Charlie Brown turned back to him and burst out. “Yes! I swear! I saw her not long ago, and she looked simply charming.”

Linus chuckled softly.

“She has a really beautiful smile and such lovely features! And oh, most importantly, she looked ridiculously adorable when she was hugging her childhood blanket—”

Van Pelt noticeably dimmed, looking a bit bewildered at his friend. But Charlie didn’t notice and continued enthusiastically.

“No, but seriously. She was holding it in one hand and looked so sweet. Just like you, Linus.”
“Did you just—”
“What?”
“Nothing...”

***

“When she’s not yelling, she seems very... well... pretty, right?”
“Who, Lucy?” Frieda squinted against the sun, adjusting her baseball glove. In middle school, the girls had almost stopped coming to baseball games, at least not as players. They appeared very rarely and mostly played friendly matches for fun.
“Y-yeah. Lucy.”

Frieda tried to tuck her hair behind her ears, attempting to keep it neat without making it messy. “Well, yeah, she is pretty” the curly-haired girl shrugged “Didn’t know you liked her.”

Charlie Brown sighed.
“Not sure "like" is the right word here,” he kicked a small pebble with his foot, feeling his face heat up from the rush of blood to it.

Frieda rolled her eyes and scoffed with some vague disdain.

“Lucy is liked by a lot of people.”

Charlie Brown sighed in irritation. “I know. I don't get it. She... she... always yells and acts like everyone owes her something. She is always too much. She places herself above others.” He let out a gloomy sigh and shifted his gaze to Schroeder, who was fiddling with his marbles. He recalled how Schroeder once said, "Lucy sure has beautiful eyes."

Well, yes, perhaps there was something to that. All three Van Pelts shared a similar almond shape to their eyes, faintly reminiscent of crescent moons, differing only in shade. But those eyes were indeed beautiful. He could easily picture them in his mind.

“Brown, you zoning out?” the curly-haired girl raised an eyebrow in mild annoyance. “Go on, take your position.”
“Yeah. She has beautiful eyes.”
“Oh, for goodness' sake.”
“Just like Linus.”
“I'm sorry?”
“Well...,” Charlie Brown nodded his head slightly, “they're siblings. It makes sense that her eyes would be beautiful too.”
“Beautiful too,” Frieda pronounced the last word slowly, suddenly looking at the manager as if he were something foreign.
“What?”
“Nothing.”

***

“Oh, by the way, how's it going with the redhead, huh, Chuck?” Peppermint Patty opened a can of soda, leaning against one of the arcade machines.

In the background, a computerized sound of "whoosh" echoed as Franklin stood by the Periscope, grinning widely as he watched a torpedo hit its target.
“Oh, right! How's Heather doing?”

Charlie Brown blushed lightly and beamed. “Yesterday, she greeted me at the school entrance.”

Peppermint Patty and Franklin chimed in unison with a sarcastic, enthusiastic "OOOH."

“Do you like Heather Wold again?” Lucy interjected, planting her hands on her hips. She wore a teasing smirk, “What about Violet?”
“I... uh...”
“Violet? It wasn't about her a couple of weeks ago, was it?” Schroeder, who hadn’t shown interest in the conversation before, suddenly spoke up.
“A couple of weeks ago, it was about Peggy Jean.”
“What? No. I meant Marcie. It was about Marcie.”

The bespectacled girl looked up, intrigued by the discussion. Peppermint Patty seemed very interested too.
Charlie Brown turned a deeper shade of red.
“Um... I just...”

Franklin stepped back from the Periscope.
”Got a crush easy, huh?“
Patty leaned on a small table, hands planted firmly. “Sly-y-y dog.”

“No, I just...”
“Just not in love with any of them,” Schroeder calmly concluded.

“What? Uhm! Well... That's not... I mean, I really do like Heather. She's very...”

“Beautiful?” everyone around chimed in almost in unison.
“'The most beautiful girl in the world,'” Lucy added teasingly.

“Not just that!” Charlie Brown shouted immediately, “She has a pleasant voice, she's very tidy, she has beautiful handwriting, and she always seems ready to help other people. Just like Linus.”

Lucy's gaze bore into him as if Charlie Brown was the most delicious rabbit in the world, and she was the hungriest python around.

Patty raised an eyebrow, exchanging glances with Marcie.

Schroeder placed his hands on the table.
“You know, Charlie Brown, maybe the thing is that you’re the one who just like Linus.”
“Oh, that’s unlikely. We do have a lot in common, but...”

Franklin smiled softly, shaking with quiet laughter as he placed a hand on Charlie’s shoulder.

“I’m almost certain that’s not what he meant.”
“I mean, that you just like Linus like Linus.”

Charlie Brown opened his mouth to respond, but Lucy cut him off. “Ugh, Charlie Brown, are you mooning over my brother?”

Peppermint Patty let out a loud snort, grinning.

Charlie Brown felt his throat suddenly become drier than any desert.
“I... What?!”
“Nothing.”

***

Good.

Grief.

It was a strange feeling when you’ve lived your life so quietly until someone pointed something out, and now all your thoughts revolve around that one thing. Because of this, Charlie Brown was getting more and more nervous. Everything that once seemed clear now took on a completely different meaning.

Because, in truth, Charlie Brown had never even considered the hypothetical possibility of being in love with his best friend. Everything he felt when he was around Linus had never caused him any doubt.

He didn’t get nervous or blush. He didn’t fear picking the wrong word. He simply... was. Usually. Day-to-day. Just as he was.

Because he had never even thought that...

But now everything felt turned upside down, and he didn’t understand what was going on. He genuinely didn’t understand. Furthermore, Charlie Brown was utterly terrified. After all, he didn’t even have a decent argument to deny the fact that he just liked...

Rats!

His thoughts were completely restless, and even sitting beside Linus in the library had become awkward. Every time Van Pelt encroached even slightly on Charlie Brown’s personal space, he would start to panic inwardly, afraid of something he couldn’t quite comprehend. Linus? But Linus wasn’t scary; why was there anything to fear at all?

What the hell is going on?

His thoughts became a constant white noise in his head, and he literally stopped thinking about anything else. It would have been better then, at the arcade machines, he would not have heard anything and would have continued to live without worrying about why suddenly all the most attractive features of the girls that he liked were so strikingly close to those of his best friend.

Charlie Brown suddenly felt a light shake on his shoulder.

“Were you even listening, Charlie Brown?” Linus raised an eyebrow and tilted his head slightly to the side, resembling either a baby bird or a kitten. His glasses had slipped a bit down his nose.

For some reason, Charlie Brown felt himself blush. Not immediately understanding what was happening, he frowned, wondering why the air had suddenly become so heavy and the temperature so hot. His gaze darted from side to side, his mouth felt dry. Finally, he looked at his best friend standing next to him.

Best friend.

Friend.

That word suddenly felt like something burdensome. Was it even the right one? The understanding of what was happening felt like several ice cubes sliding down his back or like a sudden drop from the tallest mountain in the world. Charlie Brown didn’t know what the highest mountain in the world was, and he didn’t know what it would feel like to fall from it, but he guessed it would feel something like this.

Linus, not understanding what was troubling Charlie, shrugged slightly and smiled gently as their eyes met.

Charlie Brown wanted to sink into the ground. Even better, he wanted to sink Linus into the ground. It felt like all his organs had contracted, and a strange chill and incredible warmth surged through him simultaneously. He had felt something like this before. When Linus had offered him his blanket, almost in tears and barely able to stand. When Linus elbowed him at the lunch table. When Linus had parroted his words with that silly grin that made Charlie want to hit him on the head. When...

But, okay, maybe before this was different.

Van Pelt’s expression shifted to something more anxious. Charlie Brown, for crying out loud, simply stared at him, completely lost in his thoughts and blushing like mad.

“Are you okay, Charlie Brown?”

Linus squinted, finally adjusting his slipping glasses with his finger.

“Me?”
“Yu-huh.”

What the hell is going on...

Now it felt like the whole world had turned icy. Charlie Brown thought his tongue had petrified, as he couldn’t move it at all. What did this all mean? Communicating with him had, for crying out loud, been simpler before. Charlie Brown stupidly opened his mouth, hoping that words would just tumble out by themselves. At least one word. At least one sound...!

Linus's face grew even more anxious. “Are you feeling unwell?” He stepped closer and leaned his head forward, significantly reducing the distance between their faces.

Charlie Brown instantly recoiled as if scalded. He took a few ragged steps back, pressing his lips together. The only thought spinning in his head was, "stay away." Anywhere but with Linus. Charlie Brown feared his impulsiveness. He was afraid of doing something wrong.

And the fact that it was Linus Van Pelt made everything more complicated.
Linus was his best friend.

Best.

Friend.

Charlie Brown couldn’t ruin everything they had with his foolishness. He didn’t want to accidentally lose control and do something that would spoil everything for good.

The truth was, Linus clearly interpreted his actions differently. Those sudden steps back... Van Pelt suddenly looked like a newborn kitten thrown out into the street.
“Sorry, I didn’t...“ Linus took a step back himself. “It’s just that you look strange, so I thought maybe something was wrong, and... Am I doing something wrong?”

Whoa. So stepping back also means that Charlie Brown has messed everything up? What an incredible talent for turning everything into ruins, Charles!

Brown shook his head quickly and stepped back up to Linus.
“Yes. I mean, no. And you're doing nothing wrong. And, uh... Yeah, yes, I think I’m feeling unwell. Um. Maybe a fever.”
“What?”
“And I don’t want to infect you.”
“Oh?”
“If I’m sick.”
“Oh.”
“I think I’ll go home.”
“Do you want me to walk you home?”

Charlie Brown took a deep breath, feeling as if his soul was leaving his body. Then he weakly nodded, barely restraining himself from reaching out to grab Van Pelt’s hand and intertwine their fingers.

Yes. That was exactly how it was.

He just likes Linus.