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Wally truthfully doesn’t know when it started, probably around when Charley showed up… a lot of their habits started when Charley showed up, this was almost certainly one of them.
Wally liked to have exercise buddies, none of his friends really liked exercise that much, which led to the meet in the middle solution. Wally would exercise and someone would chill with him. Which evolved into Wally would exercise and someone would actively make it harder for him.
As an example: someone (usually Charley or Rhonda, but today it’s Quinn) sitting on his back while he’d do pushups.
The extra weight was good training, plus spending time with the people he cared for.
Today Rhonda and Charley were off on the football field, walking laps and talking shit about something- maybe new fashion trends, he didn’t know.
Wally was in the library, with Quinn, perched on his back, book in her hands. They weren’t talking, which was half the point for Wally but it was whatever.
He’d come to like Quinn. She was nice, worked her way into Rhonda’s heart even faster than Charley had, which was the biggest testament to her character since breaking herself out of her loop. He found himself surprised that he liked her, only slightly though, he didn’t usually appreciate people taking Charley and Rhonda away from him, he found he had a jealous streak, Quinn and Yuri by that logic should not be people he enjoys, but Yuri was fine, and here was Quinn, sitting on his back while he did pushups.
Weird how he’s changed without really noticing.
He was around twenty pushups in when Quinn spoke.
“Hey Wally?”
Wally just grunted in response.
“What’s it like being a man?”
“Dunno,” he said lingering on his up to catch his breath, “never made it that far.”
“Okay well then like- to be a boy.”
Wally lowered himself on shaky arms, “Quinn hop off, we’re having this conversation face to face.”
He felt Quinn almost tentatively slide off his back and sit crisscrossed on the floor in front of him, he sat up too, looking at her. Mind racing over what could be happening here.
“Why do you ask?”
She shrugged, “dunno, I’m just… curious.”
Wally leaned back on his hands, “well… I think it’s probably pretty different for everyone. But for me, it was playing football, and laughing at jokes really loudly, and rough housing and… well honestly it was stifling.”
Quinn frowned like she couldn’t imagine how so he continued.
“I had to hide that I liked to dance and sing, I felt like I had to fit in with the guys, be one of the boys, it was exhausting and it made me someone I didn’t like being… and I hated football.”
“But the stadium-“
“Was my moms thing. I just went along with her like I went along with the guys. Dying- as sad as this’ll sound -dying really freed me from all that,” Wally watched as emotions warred on Quinn’s face. He still didn’t know what any of this was about, or well- he had a theory, but he definitely didn’t have the vocab to talk about it… Why him not Charley?
“So you don’t like being a boy?” Quinn asked, so tentatively, and in such a revealing way. His theory was seeming closer to right by the second.
“No,” he said gently, he didn’t want Quinn to be confused if she- they, for now, thought they had common ground on this, “I like being a boy fine… now that I can be a boy the way I want to be.”
God. He didn’t know how to do this.
“Oh.”
He smiled a little at them, “what’s being a girl like?”
He cringed at himself, that wasn’t the most elegant way that he could have gone about that, he just wanted to get them to say whatever they were actually thinking.
“I- I don’t like it much,” they pulled their legs up to their chest and rested their head on their knees, “I- I think I’d like to be a boy- cause I don’t- I don’t feel like a girl- or if I am then-“
“You’re a boy then.”
“What?” Quinn looked up over his knees, there were tears in his eyes, he looked confused.
Wally shuffled over, and slung an arm over Quinn’s small frame, pretty effectively engulfing him, “you’re a boy. Congrats. Shout it to the rooftops, no one here will care.”
“Well…” Quinn leaned into him, face buried into his knees again, “Rhonda might care.”
And in a way that confirmed something else for him. He and Charley had been theorizing about something… going on between Rhonda and Quinn. But neither were sure.
“Why would Rhonda care?” He asked, just to be sure.
“She likes girls,” Quinn said through what sounded like a sob, “and I’m not- I can’t be a girl anymore, I can’t.”
“Rhonda won’t ask you to be a girl for her Quinn…” god this sucked, “truthfully I don’t know whatever way Rhonda swings, but she might like both girls and boys!”
Quinn sniffled, “is that an option?”
“I like both.”
Quinn’s head jerked up, “What?”
Wally just nodded, “truthfully that fact about myself is another reason being a dead boy is better than being alive… or well- nowadays it’d probably be at least a little better.”
“That’s so sad.”
It was strange to receive pity from someone actively curled up and crying. Wally decided he hated it.
“I didn’t have it too bad. I could hide behind my physique and the football team and the fact that I liked girls too. No one knew until two decades after I died, and even then it was just Charley and Rhonda.”
Quinn frowned, but said nothing, just moved to rest his head on Wally’s chest.
And Wally held him, because when it came to comforting people, that’s what he was best at. The physical stuff. He didn’t have words like Charley, he didn’t have real experience being actually helpful like Rhonda. He was just a shoulder, and a warm hug.
“Hey Quinn?” He spoke after a long while, “why me?”
“What do you mean?” Quinn asked, moving to face Wally again, his face was dry now, he looked more at peace.
“Why wouldn’t you go to Charley or Yuri about this?”
“They aren’t… as masculine as you?” It was said like a question, like he wasn’t certain in his words.
Thank god for it because that was insane. Society has come farther from 2004 than he’d realized.
“What’s masculine to you?”
“I- I don’t really know anymore. You sorta threw it all out the window the second I asked.”
Wally let out a surprised chuckle.
“Well I think being a boy is whatever you make of it, and being manly is excelling at whatever standards you set. Charley is brave and bold and stubborn like no one else I know, he’s way more manly than me.”
“Hell yeah I am.”
Wally’s head shot up to where Charley and Rhonda were now standing in the doorway.
Charley walked over to Wally and leaned on his shoulders, resting his chin on Wally’s head, “like 90% of being a man is confidence that you are a man.” He said sagely, looking a Quinn with something knowing.
“The other 10?” Quinn asked, gazing up at him like he had the secrets of the universe.
“Well- five of that ten is crippling self doubt and the other five is compensating for that doubt by playing football, driving a raised truck and revving your engine really loud as you blow through school zones.”
Wally elbowed Charley in the side, “don’t spread those lies- why’re you two here anyway?”
“School play is tonight,” Rhonda reported, “wanted to see if you wanted to come.”
“Yuri’s out, said he didn’t want to risk getting yelled at by Mina,” Charley informed, “but Wally and… Quinn,” Charley said Quinn like he wasn’t sure that was correct, belatedly Wally realized he probably should have asked, “open invite.”
“I’m down,” Wally said, truthfully he wasn’t sure if he wanted to risk being yelled at Mina either, especially considering she threw a wrench at him a few years back, but he liked a show.
“Actually-“ Quinn started, “I kinda wanted to go spend some time in the music room.”
“Can I join? I didn’t really want to go see that dumb show anyway.”
Rhonda. Rhonda who hated the music room, but Rhonda who loved(?) Quinn.
Wally could feel Charley’s eyes boring into him, they were going to have a long fucking conversation through this play and Mina was going to yell that them weren’t they?
“Y-yeah!” Quinn said, standing up so fast Wally reached out to stabilize him.
And then Rhonda and Quinn were gone, and Charley wheeled around to him.
“What the fuck was that?”
“I- I don’t think it’s my place to say?”
“Oh fuck off with that.”
And Wally stood walking towards the theater he knew he was going to get kicked out of, telling Charley just enough to let him connect the dots on his own.
Quinn and Rhonda would be fine.