It's about time you know Simon's lore (sensitive topics, you're warned)
Hi folks!! So, since Simon has become a smidge wee little bit known by some people in the sub, I decided to tell you guys his backstory in full. Keep in mind I AM writing a webcomic about him (the main character) and the other characters in his universe, meaning that this WILL be one extremely long spoiler for essentially everything. If you do read it tho, please please pretty please I'd love some feedback (positive or negative) since I'm not 100% confident writing or sharing my written work, so anything helps! If anything in the formatting is strange, it's because I wrote it on Discord 😭 forgive any typos/grammar mistakes, and lastly, I can share about the other characters as well, but this is already a massive wall of text as is, so any questions will be answered in the comments!!
TRIGGER WARNINGS: Eating Disorders, toxic relationships, bullying, self-harm, suicide attempts. Generally, difficult topics to discuss, hence the NSFW marker. Nothing is graphic or described in graphic detail though.
Simon was born in 2001 in California, to an american dad and russian mom. He was born with a congenital hereditary heart condition (to be specific, Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy or HCM) AS WELL AS developing hypothyroidism early since both of his parents have it. This is important, because his heart condition makes it so he can't exercise much due to it being a risk, and his hypothyroidism causes his metabolism to be VERY slow, both of which are the main reasons why... well, he is very overweight. Not only that but his dad is autistic, and so is he. Growing up being the chubby autistic kid wasn't very fun: although he was an optimistic and friendly kid, he was excluded from most activities, was not good at making friends and the other kids bullied him relentlessly. Children are quite cruel, the things he heard his whole life were nothing short of depressing, after all, when nearly every interaction is ridicule or contempt, it's hard to keep up the optimism. As he grew up, he became more and more shy, socializing was never easy but now it was anxiety inducing. Of course, there's a small detail that his parents knew he was autistic, but due to his dad's trauma regarding the condition, they opted to just never tell Simon. This was tough for a kid to handle: all he knew was that he is not like the other kids and everyone hates him, "why can't I just act normal?? I must be fundamentally broken" he thought. Given the loneliness he felt, he turned to his gadgets for comfort, so his games were his favorite way to pass time, and he explored the internet a lot. He learned to code because it seemed that machines were easier to talk to: they didn't judge the person typing, did they? There weren't any social cues he could miss, and what's written is what is meant, no need to second-guess if someone was being ironic or not. Being very smart, he skipped an year in school, so now not only was he "the fat autistic kid", but also the youngest, and the shortest.
Now he was older and a little bit wiser, he was in therapy and his therapist told him about his possible autism diagnosis, which he indeed took the test and turned out to be true, as everyone expected. He was conflicted, now he understands his behaviour, he knows how to deal with it better, but... Once he told his parents, they admitted to him that they knew, but never told him or tried to get a diagnosis. This made him as angry as he was sad, had they told him he wouldn't have spent so long thinking he was just "fundamentally broken". His parents were very caring and always were, so despite the resentment regarding the topic, still loves his parents. After finding out, he learned techniques to mask his autism, and used them as soon as he started highschool. It seemed to work, he made a few friends, very few, but any is better than zero! One in particular, Max, eventually became his girlfriend because... "that's what boys are supposed to do", which didn't last long since during the relationship Simon found out he was gay and Max, similarly, found out she was a lesbian. They remained friends regardless, and still very close until the end of highschool. Now, it's important to mention another character, Oscar. He was part of one of the groups that bullied Simon the most, that group of boys in school that are just insufferable but still popular due to bullying other people. One day in the last year of highschool, Oscar asked Simon out, which was out of character of course, but Simon already had the belief that he is unloveable so he'd never miss that opportunity. They started dating and Simon was over the moon, but Oscar wasn't that enthusiastic, after all, he wasn't actually gay, right? He did eventually decide to give him a chance, and well, he found out that he was indeed gay. His friends were deeply homophobic so he only came out to Simon, which... "I'm your boyfriend, of course you're gay", but was also extremely understanding.
Once Oscar's father found out about his son being queer, he kicked him out, so Simon took him in. Given they were about to go to college now, Simon's parents gave them some money for them to rent their own place, and so they did, and their relationship became a lot more enjoyable: Oscar was free to act and dress how he wanted, a lot more feminine than the guy he was, and his increase in spontaneity and generally being less uptight definitely helped their relationship flourish. However, as much as Oscar was attached to Simon, he wasn't in love. One day, Simon saw a strange notification in Oscar's phone, decided to snoop and found out that well... it made sense why it was out of character for him to ask Simon out. It was a bet. Oscar's friends had made a bet and pai him to date Simon, and they'd constantly poke fun at him in their groupchat, and say extremely degrading and humiliating things. Clearly, this was devastating to someone with Simon's history, of course. One detail: it had been 10 months, and Oscar did feel attached to Simon and cared a lot about him, he felt guilty for what he did, but he felt like he had no choice. Well, Simon broke up on the spot and kicked Oscar out, they both lost someone they cared so much for, and Simon had never felt worse. It was his own boyfriend, the ONLY person he expected to love him and enjoy his company and find him beautiful.... apparently didnt. Skip a few years, Simon got out of college and had just moved in to a new place to work, it's a huge housing/industrial/business complex, where he met two other characters who will be important from now on: Wolfram and Paul. Wolfram was his roomate, an extremely friendly and outgoing guy, who welcomed him like he was family. They quickly became friends, and Wolfram seemingly didn't mind anything about Simon, who was always a bit hesitant. After a few months, Simon felt comfortable enough to be more vulnerable with Wolfram and talk to him about all of what I said here.
Wolfram was really the only person who seemed not to mind, who seemed to not have judged Simon in any way. However, nothing good lasts too long (not yet), and Wolfram was reallocated to another dorm due to his work and general internal logistics. Simon was sent to live with Paul in his dorm, and well, Paul is the complete opposite of Wolfram: vain, mean and very much narcisistic, but above all, a serial dater and cheater who gets involved with anyone he can take advantage of for any reason. After very little time, he asked Simon out, which for the same thoughts of "no one will ever love me so I can't miss the opportunity", accepted the request. This time, Paul's incentive is financial, he owns a failing business and Simon, as the son of an accountant, could help it get back up (not to mention he needed someone to pay the bills and Simon was awfully convenient). Paul is very manipulative and has a tendency to lovebomb his partners to instill the idea of "how could they hurt me if they're so affectionate sometimes?", and Simon was no different. Paul criticized Simon to no end, made fun of his looks and demeanor publicly and would often express disgust and shame in having Simon as a partner, which was not very good for Simon: he already self-harmed and felt suidical but now it was considerably worse. It was like having all of his worst flaws spat back at him over and over. A few failed suicide attempts later and over the course of half a year, Paul's constant remarks started to wear down on Simon: he started a diet to maybe make Paul like him more if he lost weight. To say it was carried too far was an understatement, Simon starved himself very often and developed anorexia, and Paul would always congratulate him with every pound lost even though it was very clear this had crossed disordered territory. Paul would be intimate and lovebomb Simon way more, but also... Simon is now weaker so it's a lot easier to get physical with someone who starves themselves.
It has now been a little over a year, the relationship was clearly toxic, in every possible way, physically and mentally, and it's very much obvious Paul cheats on the regular as well. Paul forced Simon to do things he didn't want to and controlled most of his life, because what would Simon do, try to hit him or push him away? He wouldn't make a dent. And besides, Simon knew it was clearly a toxic thing, he isn't stupid, but... "If not him, who else? This is better than being alone. Than dying alone. No one else will ever want me so I should be thankful at least someone does". One day, amongst this entire situation, Simon's friend runs into his apartment looking for help because Paul had just done the most horrible thing someone can do to someone else, and it was against her. That was the last straw: The next day, Simon wrote letters, left messages, locked himself in the bathroom and... well, he wounded his body with the intention of bleeding to death. He ALMOST did, had Wolfram not barged into the bathroom after reading his message in time. He took him to a hospital in time, but he had to spend a good few weeks in the hospital until he was stable enough to go back home. He broke up with Paul definitely, and Paul was sent to jail for all the crimes he commited. Wolfram talked to management and they allowed Simon to move back in with him, so they were together again. The atmosphere was still very somber, so Wolfram decided to just be emotional support for Simon, who was VERY reluctant to take the antidepressants he was prescribed, since back in his teens and early 20s he gained a lot of weight from the medicine, but Wolfram convinced him to take them as he should. Simon opened up about how he will die alone and he doesn't want to take the meds if it means he'll gain weight, after all it is one of the main reasons people demeaned him in the past, but Wolfram reassured him it would be okay. "But if I gain weight I'll look hideous, no one will ever love me again", he said, to which Wolfram admitted "well, I think you still looked beautiful when I met you... and... someone already does love you....". Wolfram decides to confess his feelings, although they don't start dating immediately. A while later, maybe a month or two, once Simon is feeling a little better, they DO start dating and here comes a somewhat long path to recovery, with some relapses but Wolfram is there now, every step of the way. It almost feels too good to be true, but this time, it isn't, this kind of love took some time to get used to, after all, Simon isn't used to feeling appreciated and desired. Any perceived flaw was just a cute fearure, and all the things Simon hates about himself are the things Wolfram love the most abour him, the same also being true, everything Wolfram thinks he lacks is exactly what he is to Simon. They stay together and eventually get married and adopt a kid! Happy endings!
Originally I was not gonna focus at all on his relationship with his parents, but there are gonna be a couple scenes to exemplify what it's like. Overall they have a very healthy relationship dynamic and everyone is quite close, and his parents are very concerned about his health overall and do what they can. Since this story has a lot, and I mean a LOT of characters, I chose to not focus on family too much during Simon's story (family is a stronger topic in Oscar's backstory, and an important aspect of Ýcaro's, Max's and Sumiko's). However his work life IS an important aspect since I try to show the struggles that being neurodivergent can bring, but since he works from home (only going in-site occasionally), the work part of his lore is also tied to his mental health. Overall the work related part of his story doesn't follow plot beats (that's why I don't mention it much) and the overall narrative is "I thought working with what I love would make me love working, but working still overwhelms me and it just feels like I turned my hobby into a chore, so I no longer feel happy doing it". Again, there is another character, Wolfram, where work life is the most significant part of his lore.
Hi folks!! So, since Simon has become a smidge wee little bit known by some people in the sub, I decided to tell you guys his backstory in full. Keep in mind I AM writing a webcomic about him (the main character) and the other characters in his universe, meaning that this WILL be one extremely long spoiler for essentially everything. If you do read it tho, please please pretty please I'd love some feedback (positive or negative) since I'm not 100% confident writing or sharing my written work, so anything helps! If anything in the formatting is strange, it's because I wrote it on Discord 😭 forgive any typos/grammar mistakes, and lastly, I can share about the other characters as well, but this is already a massive wall of text as is, so any questions will be answered in the comments!!
TRIGGER WARNINGS: Eating Disorders, toxic relationships, bullying, self-harm, suicide attempts. Generally, difficult topics to discuss, hence the NSFW marker. Nothing is graphic or described in graphic detail though.
Simon was born in 2001 in California, to an american dad and russian mom. He was born with a congenital hereditary heart condition (to be specific, Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy or HCM) AS WELL AS developing hypothyroidism early since both of his parents have it. This is important, because his heart condition makes it so he can't exercise much due to it being a risk, and his hypothyroidism causes his metabolism to be VERY slow, both of which are the main reasons why... well, he is very overweight. Not only that but his dad is autistic, and so is he. Growing up being the chubby autistic kid wasn't very fun: although he was an optimistic and friendly kid, he was excluded from most activities, was not good at making friends and the other kids bullied him relentlessly. Children are quite cruel, the things he heard his whole life were nothing short of depressing, after all, when nearly every interaction is ridicule or contempt, it's hard to keep up the optimism. As he grew up, he became more and more shy, socializing was never easy but now it was anxiety inducing. Of course, there's a small detail that his parents knew he was autistic, but due to his dad's trauma regarding the condition, they opted to just never tell Simon. This was tough for a kid to handle: all he knew was that he is not like the other kids and everyone hates him, "why can't I just act normal?? I must be fundamentally broken" he thought. Given the loneliness he felt, he turned to his gadgets for comfort, so his games were his favorite way to pass time, and he explored the internet a lot. He learned to code because it seemed that machines were easier to talk to: they didn't judge the person typing, did they? There weren't any social cues he could miss, and what's written is what is meant, no need to second-guess if someone was being ironic or not. Being very smart, he skipped an year in school, so now not only was he "the fat autistic kid", but also the youngest, and the shortest.
Now he was older and a little bit wiser, he was in therapy and his therapist told him about his possible autism diagnosis, which he indeed took the test and turned out to be true, as everyone expected. He was conflicted, now he understands his behaviour, he knows how to deal with it better, but... Once he told his parents, they admitted to him that they knew, but never told him or tried to get a diagnosis. This made him as angry as he was sad, had they told him he wouldn't have spent so long thinking he was just "fundamentally broken". His parents were very caring and always were, so despite the resentment regarding the topic, still loves his parents. After finding out, he learned techniques to mask his autism, and used them as soon as he started highschool. It seemed to work, he made a few friends, very few, but any is better than zero! One in particular, Max, eventually became his girlfriend because... "that's what boys are supposed to do", which didn't last long since during the relationship Simon found out he was gay and Max, similarly, found out she was a lesbian. They remained friends regardless, and still very close until the end of highschool. Now, it's important to mention another character, Oscar. He was part of one of the groups that bullied Simon the most, that group of boys in school that are just insufferable but still popular due to bullying other people. One day in the last year of highschool, Oscar asked Simon out, which was out of character of course, but Simon already had the belief that he is unloveable so he'd never miss that opportunity. They started dating and Simon was over the moon, but Oscar wasn't that enthusiastic, after all, he wasn't actually gay, right? He did eventually decide to give him a chance, and well, he found out that he was indeed gay. His friends were deeply homophobic so he only came out to Simon, which... "I'm your boyfriend, of course you're gay", but was also extremely understanding.
Once Oscar's father found out about his son being queer, he kicked him out, so Simon took him in. Given they were about to go to college now, Simon's parents gave them some money for them to rent their own place, and so they did, and their relationship became a lot more enjoyable: Oscar was free to act and dress how he wanted, a lot more feminine than the guy he was, and his increase in spontaneity and generally being less uptight definitely helped their relationship flourish. However, as much as Oscar was attached to Simon, he wasn't in love. One day, Simon saw a strange notification in Oscar's phone, decided to snoop and found out that well... it made sense why it was out of character for him to ask Simon out. It was a bet. Oscar's friends had made a bet and pai him to date Simon, and they'd constantly poke fun at him in their groupchat, and say extremely degrading and humiliating things. Clearly, this was devastating to someone with Simon's history, of course. One detail: it had been 10 months, and Oscar did feel attached to Simon and cared a lot about him, he felt guilty for what he did, but he felt like he had no choice. Well, Simon broke up on the spot and kicked Oscar out, they both lost someone they cared so much for, and Simon had never felt worse. It was his own boyfriend, the ONLY person he expected to love him and enjoy his company and find him beautiful.... apparently didnt. Skip a few years, Simon got out of college and had just moved in to a new place to work, it's a huge housing/industrial/business complex, where he met two other characters who will be important from now on: Wolfram and Paul. Wolfram was his roomate, an extremely friendly and outgoing guy, who welcomed him like he was family. They quickly became friends, and Wolfram seemingly didn't mind anything about Simon, who was always a bit hesitant. After a few months, Simon felt comfortable enough to be more vulnerable with Wolfram and talk to him about all of what I said here.
Wolfram was really the only person who seemed not to mind, who seemed to not have judged Simon in any way. However, nothing good lasts too long (not yet), and Wolfram was reallocated to another dorm due to his work and general internal logistics. Simon was sent to live with Paul in his dorm, and well, Paul is the complete opposite of Wolfram: vain, mean and very much narcisistic, but above all, a serial dater and cheater who gets involved with anyone he can take advantage of for any reason. After very little time, he asked Simon out, which for the same thoughts of "no one will ever love me so I can't miss the opportunity", accepted the request. This time, Paul's incentive is financial, he owns a failing business and Simon, as the son of an accountant, could help it get back up (not to mention he needed someone to pay the bills and Simon was awfully convenient). Paul is very manipulative and has a tendency to lovebomb his partners to instill the idea of "how could they hurt me if they're so affectionate sometimes?", and Simon was no different. Paul criticized Simon to no end, made fun of his looks and demeanor publicly and would often express disgust and shame in having Simon as a partner, which was not very good for Simon: he already self-harmed and felt suidical but now it was considerably worse. It was like having all of his worst flaws spat back at him over and over. A few failed suicide attempts later and over the course of half a year, Paul's constant remarks started to wear down on Simon: he started a diet to maybe make Paul like him more if he lost weight. To say it was carried too far was an understatement, Simon starved himself very often and developed anorexia, and Paul would always congratulate him with every pound lost even though it was very clear this had crossed disordered territory. Paul would be intimate and lovebomb Simon way more, but also... Simon is now weaker so it's a lot easier to get physical with someone who starves themselves.
It has now been a little over a year, the relationship was clearly toxic, in every possible way, physically and mentally, and it's very much obvious Paul cheats on the regular as well. Paul forced Simon to do things he didn't want to and controlled most of his life, because what would Simon do, try to hit him or push him away? He wouldn't make a dent. And besides, Simon knew it was clearly a toxic thing, he isn't stupid, but... "If not him, who else? This is better than being alone. Than dying alone. No one else will ever want me so I should be thankful at least someone does". One day, amongst this entire situation, Simon's friend runs into his apartment looking for help because Paul had just done the most horrible thing someone can do to someone else, and it was against her. That was the last straw: The next day, Simon wrote letters, left messages, locked himself in the bathroom and... well, he wounded his body with the intention of bleeding to death. He ALMOST did, had Wolfram not barged into the bathroom after reading his message in time. He took him to a hospital in time, but he had to spend a good few weeks in the hospital until he was stable enough to go back home. He broke up with Paul definitely, and Paul was sent to jail for all the crimes he commited. Wolfram talked to management and they allowed Simon to move back in with him, so they were together again. The atmosphere was still very somber, so Wolfram decided to just be emotional support for Simon, who was VERY reluctant to take the antidepressants he was prescribed, since back in his teens and early 20s he gained a lot of weight from the medicine, but Wolfram convinced him to take them as he should. Simon opened up about how he will die alone and he doesn't want to take the meds if it means he'll gain weight, after all it is one of the main reasons people demeaned him in the past, but Wolfram reassured him it would be okay. "But if I gain weight I'll look hideous, no one will ever love me again", he said, to which Wolfram admitted "well, I think you still looked beautiful when I met you... and... someone already does love you....". Wolfram decides to confess his feelings, although they don't start dating immediately. A while later, maybe a month or two, once Simon is feeling a little better, they DO start dating and here comes a somewhat long path to recovery, with some relapses but Wolfram is there now, every step of the way. It almost feels too good to be true, but this time, it isn't, this kind of love took some time to get used to, after all, Simon isn't used to feeling appreciated and desired. Any perceived flaw was just a cute fearure, and all the things Simon hates about himself are the things Wolfram love the most abour him, the same also being true, everything Wolfram thinks he lacks is exactly what he is to Simon. They stay together and eventually get married and adopt a kid! Happy endings!
Originally I was not gonna focus at all on his relationship with his parents, but there are gonna be a couple scenes to exemplify what it's like. Overall they have a very healthy relationship dynamic and everyone is quite close, and his parents are very concerned about his health overall and do what they can. Since this story has a lot, and I mean a LOT of characters, I chose to not focus on family too much during Simon's story (family is a stronger topic in Oscar's backstory, and an important aspect of Ýcaro's, Max's and Sumiko's). However his work life IS an important aspect since I try to show the struggles that being neurodivergent can bring, but since he works from home (only going in-site occasionally), the work part of his lore is also tied to his mental health. Overall the work related part of his story doesn't follow plot beats (that's why I don't mention it much) and the overall narrative is "I thought working with what I love would make me love working, but working still overwhelms me and it just feels like I turned my hobby into a chore, so I no longer feel happy doing it". Again, there is another character, Wolfram, where work life is the most significant part of his lore.