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(REWRITE) Pt.1 > Musing on Tempe/William :p

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I wanted to take some time to "rewrite" my old musings about Tempe and William, now that I've gotten more writing experience. I think it'll be interesting to explore the way their dynamic used to look! Pt.2 rewrite is also on the way :3

I think it's technically less of a "rewrite" and more supplementary? Extra information, a new perspective. Either way, I hope it's a nice read!

In the early 1980s, Fredbear's was an inescapable name in its home town. Children begged their parents to take them, finding any excuse to warrant a big celebration at the new family diner. It wasn't unheard of at the time for a pizza place to have animatronic mascots, but Fredbear's was special. Even the parents, who begrudgingly brought their children in for the restaurant's mildly overpriced festivities, could recognize the ingenuity at work.

Mascots that seemed to really talk and sing, mascots that could juggle and dance, mascots that walked off the stage and personally played with the children. It was something nobody had seen before... because it had never been done before.

And what of the owners? Perhaps Henry Emily was an awkward man, but he was simple and hardworking. People could appreciate that. When he stepped out of his office to keep an eye on the dining room floor, it was an opportunity for the adults to pester him about how he'd managed to pull this off. Even if he was unwilling to share all his secrets, it was obvious that Fredbear's was a passion project that he'd invested more than just time and money into. It was something deeply important to him.

The real show-stealer, however, was his business partner and best friend, William Afton. An eccentric and colorful man, he contrasted Henry in almost every way; tall, slender, outgoing, and incredibly charming. While Henry may have been content to stand along the sidelines in his work stained flannel and denim, William had seemed incapable of such a thing. Ostentatious purple suits, glittery yellow ties and shining leather shoes, and an almost suffocating sense of theatricality. When he wasn't busy, he walked the dining room floor, chatting with parents and personally entertaining the children with magic tricks and jokes.

That's how it was back then. Things could not be more different now.

Late 1993, the state of the company's reputation is precarious. A sharp decline in the public's interest in animatronic entertainers, coupled with the many tragedies associated with the brand, have pushed the last remaining Freddy Fazbear's Pizza into hard times.

The only people who frequented the restaurant were parents that couldn't be bothered to pay attention to their own children, and morbid teenagers hunting for ghosts and horror stories. Sometimes a transplant family from out of town would stop in... and quickly realize why the restaurant had fallen from grace.

The animatronic performers were more lifeless than ever, permanently trapped on their stage to perform the same loop of bland songs. One of them seemed to be in a state of perpetual ruin, constantly needing repairs and being declared out of order for weeks at a time. Even if visitors could get close to the robots, they would've been disappointed to see how old and filthy the things were.

The once passionate Henry Emily had long since left the company, following the tragic murder of his only daughter. Where he had gone since was anyone's guess– As far as anyone was concerned, the man had fallen clean off the face of the Earth.

His former partner did not fair much better. William Afton might have been a vibrant man in the 80s, but he was hardly a shell of his former self now. Pleasantries, jokes, and wide smiles had given way to reveal a cold, miserable interior. Whether he had secretly always been this way, or he had been worn down by the many misfortunes in his life, was something the general public could not be sure of. The nicest thing anyone had to say about Mr. Afton was that they felt sorry for him.

The truth, of course, was that William had always been a miserable person. A nasty, hateful, immature person had always lurked underneath the brilliant facade he had carefully crafted. Performing was something he loved, but people were not. When the audience for his theatrics dwindled, his willingness to play the part of the vibrant, friendly entertainer did too.

Things William would never have done in his prime had become routine in his life now. The curt way he speaks to strangers, the harsh reprimanding he dishes out to his employees over the slightest mistakes, and his complete dismissal of the few children that visit his restaurant were just the tip of the iceberg.

In his private life, he'd taken up vices that would have been foreign to him just a few years ago. Cigarettes were something he gave up as a very young man. Now, he spends a great deal of time on his back porch, smoking a hole in his wallet. Drinking was another bad habit he had picked up, although maybe not to the extent of his chain smoking. Still, most of his nights are spent between cigarettes and the bottle.

His employees avoid him like the plague when he comes into work. They know better than to try and be pleasant with him. There wasn't a single thing in the world any of them could do to win his favor, and none of them cared to anyway. Only a small handful of his staff had stayed longer than a few weeks or months. The turnover rate was steep.

William doesn't care, and William doesn't tend to pay attention to who had and hadn't stayed...

With one exception.

Temperance West. A ratty, plump, nervous little thing. Out of all his employees, as of the current moment, Temperance had stayed the longest. They'd usurped the previous record holder by almost 2 months now, after she had quit suddenly with an explosive outburst during her last shift.

Normally, William wouldn't have paid them any attention, but their persistence was hard to ignore. Everyone left eventually, so what kept them pinned here? He couldn't help but be curious. They were the only vaguely interesting or mysterious thing that had cropped up in years.

He digs out their application from the back of a filing cabinet. They had provided the absolute bare minimum of information about themselves. They were born in December of 1968, which would make them twenty four presently. The address they'd listed was smack in the middle of a particularly bad part of town. They had just one previous employer, linked to a business all the way out in California. No other contacts, no resume, no education besides highschool.

God. The managers really were just hiring anyone at this point, weren't they?

Unsatisfied with Temperance's barren application, he decided to start observing them as they mill about the restaurant.

The first thing he notices is that Temperance is not exactly good at their job. Outside of busing tables or cleaning the floors, which they did with little issue, they seemed to struggle. The worst of it was their customer interactions. They weren't great at providing even basic information about the restaurant or its policies, despite having worked there for so long, or accommodating customer complaints. Their tone needed work, too. They spoke plainly, too casually, but stumbled over their own words constantly. It was a bad mix.

They didn't get along with their coworkers, either. Most Freddy's employees were teenagers, or especially jaded twenty-somethings. They clumped together to gossip whenever they thought William wasn't paying attention, but Temperance never joined them. They didn't speak unless spoken to, or unless they had to fetch a manager for some reason.

The only person in the building that Temperance seemed to acknowledge was William himself. He hadn't caught it before beginning his observations, but Temperance stared at him quite often. He would catch them sometimes when he came into work in the mornings, or as he was leaving for lunch in the afternoons. Whenever they noticed that he had noticed, they would look away in a flustered hurry.

It was a little odd, but easy enough to explain away. It was only natural that their boss would make them nervous, moreso than they usually were. It was also not unusual for people to stare at William, given his loud, monochromatic wardrobe. He was used to that by now.

When Temperance went to lunch, they didn't eat with any of their coworkers that took lunch around the same time. They scurried off to the outside of the building with their medium cup of soda and their cardboard-adjacent slice of pizza, the allotted amount of food the restaurant allowed its employees to take for free, if they were inclined. The place they always sat was close to one of William's office windows. He wasn't sure if they had realized that.

He peeks at them through the blinds of his window everytime they eat lunch. They eat very meticulously. Even though nobody is around to see them, they cover their mouth while they chew. They wipe their face after every single bite, and after almost every sip of their drink. When they reach the near-end of their slice of pizza, they flip it around, and eat the crust, then eat the last bit of the cheesy, saucy part. Every. Single. Time.

They never wipe their hands or face on their clothes, only ever with the ludicrous amount of napkins they take outside with them. They never touch anything with the hand they'd used to eat until they're able to go back inside and wash it. He could appreciate their apparent dedication to cleanliness, even if it bordered on neurotic.

One evening, when business is particularly slow, William catches Temperance slacking off. It wasn't a common occurrence. In fact, Temperance was never off task. Although they weren't the best at their job, they never shirked their assigned duties. They wouldn't have had any reason to.

He watches them across the dining room floor. They were supposed to be mopping, but they had stopped in front of the stage to idly watch the animatronics perform. Nothing was special about today's show; one of the same bland songs, the usual repetitive movements from the robots. Still, Temperance seems to be entranced.

Quietly, William approaches them from behind. They dont't notice him, even when he comes to stand only a foot or so away.

"Enjoying yourself?" he asks.

Temperance startles, dropping the mop in their hand to floor with a loud clatter. They quickly turn to face him with an utterly mortified expression.

He gets his first good look at their features. Messy, slightly greasy black hair that falls around their face like tendrils. Big, miserable black eyes framed by dramatic eyelashes. They're even shorter up close, the top of their head only barely reaching William's shoulders. Their clothes are oversized. The dress pants they're wearing are a little too long for their legs, and bunch up over the tongues of their raggedy black sneakers.

Before William can say anything else, Temperance begins rambling apologies and explanations. Something about being a robotics student, loving the animatronics, and "Please don't fire me." It's hard to focus on any one thing they're saying. William is shocked to hear them speak at all; getting more than a word or two out of Temperance was usually like pulling teeth.

Their prattling exhausts him immediately, but he did catch something interesting amongst all of their nervous chatter.

"You're interested in robotics?" It was perhaps the explanation he had been searching for as to why Temperance had decided to stay at Freddy's for so long.

"Uh..." suddenly, all of their chatter is gone, "Yes, I was a robotics student."

"Was? You were... but you're not anymore?"

"I dropped out of school–" As they speak, they bring their hands together in a gesture not dissimilar to praying. "That's why I really need this job. Please don't fire me, I promise I won't get distracted again."

He laughs at them. They look distraught.

"I'm not going to fire you over one little incident," William crosses one arm over the other, and taps his chin, thinking very loudly, "If you're really that curious about my animatronics, perhaps we can arrange time, outside of business hours, for you to take a look at them."

Temperance sputters, "Really? That's..." They don't finish their sentence, instead trailing off and staring up at William from behind their long black bangs.

"If it will keep you from slacking off, then I don't mind you asking me a few questions, so long as you make it quick. I'm a very busy man."

He wasn't, not anymore, but they didn't need to know that.

---

Temperance wasn't exactly a model employee, and they had annoyed William greatly during the one interaction he'd ever had with them. There was no reason to indulge their curiosity, but William couldn't help himself.

It had been years since anyone showed any interest in his work. The glory days of Freddy's, or rather, Fredbear's, were long behind him. People didn't care about his animatronics. Nobody was fascinated by his technical achievements anymore.

Nobody except Temperance.

After finishing their closing duties, they meet with him in front of the stage, the same spot they'd had their first conversation.

"I'm not going to repeat myself, so if you're serious about this, you need to pay attention," he tells them. He leads them up the steps of the stage, a place most employees would never be allowed to go. Impractical as it was, the only person who ever dealt with his robots was the man himself.

It was easy to pass it off as a safety precaution, after everything that had happened in his restaurants. In reality, he just didn't trust any of the idiots he employed to not break his machines.

He spends the next twenty or so minutes going over the most basic procedures for Temperance. Occasionally, he clicks a piece of a robot's costume out of place to show Temperance something on its endoskeleton.

Temperance doesn't speak. They don't ask him any questions. They take quick notes in a sketchbook, and do their best to follow everything he says. Their undivided, deferential attention pokes at William's ego in just the right way. The more he speaks, the more notes they take. The more notes they take, the more he finds himself enjoying their presence.

Temperance is obviously terrified of him. More obvious than their terror, though, is just how much they value this opportunity to learn from him.

In the middle of his lesson, he stops to ask them a question.

"You really like these robots, don't you?"

The question, and the tone he had taken, catches them off guard. He had been clinical and detached for most of the lecture, but his voice was now softening into something more personable. Just enough for Temperance to notice.

"Oh, uhm..." They cannot hold eye contact with him, instead choosing to stare at their sketchbook, "I just... really admire your work."

"Mine specifically?" He asks, raising his eyebrows.

"Yes..."

How interesting. He doesn't think he can get much more information out of them, so he continues with his lesson. They fall back into it easily.

"Well, that's the absolute bare minimum you would need to know to understand how they function. Do you have any questions?"

Temperance shakes their head, and closes their sketchbook. William finds himself momentarily curious as to what else might be inside. Are they an artist?

"Nothing at all?"

Irritation sets in when he doesn't get a response from them.

"Are you deaf?" He snaps.

They fidget with the rings of their sketchbook, before finally answering him, "You told me to be quick... I don't want to waste your time."

"So you do have questions. You understand you're wasting my time right now, making me run around in circles to get answers out of you, right?"

They continue to fidget, but they don't say a word.

"Whatever. We'll cut it short here. Learn how to talk to people before we next meet."

"Next...?"

With his stature, it was easy to intimdate others by simply standing around. Still, he chooses to lean into Temperance's personal space. If they'd been a cat, he thinks all their hair would have stood up on end, with the way they recoil from him.

"Next time. Next lesson. Don't be daft."

He leaves them wide-eyed on the stage. "Make sure you close the building up properly before you go home," he says as he descends the short stairs, "We'll meet here same time next week. Figure out how to form complete sentences in the meantime. That's your homework."

He's already decided that the ego-stroking is worth having to endure Temperance's aggravating social ineptitude. Unbeknownst to William, another vice begins to sink its fangs into his life.

---------

Writing William's catty bitchy dialogue is so fun ♪ Sorry Tempe.

This one is short, but I like how it came out. Just a little more context and interactions from when the two of them first met! I plan to rewrite pt.2 as well, so look forward to that maybe?

Thank you for reading, as always. ♡

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You have a knife through your heart