Chapter Text
'Mushy' feelings were not exactly his strong suit, actually they're rather far from it. This said, Strong Bad was being forced to confront his (honestly quite awkward) feelings from within his cubicle at work.
Revelation one: he might have a tiny, itty bitty, little crush on Homestar.
Revelation two: he had absolutely no clue on how to cope with revelation one.
He was now struggling to deal with these realisations as he curled up into a ball, hiding under his desk as he continued to avoid his actual work. Avoiding his work wasn't unusual for him of course, but he arguably had more of an excuse for his mind to drift elsewhere because this was all a lot for him to handle emotionally. He always tried to act like he was above these fluffy, mushy feelings anyway as well. These sorts of things seriously wounded his pride and he winced as he continued dwelling on it, he really needed a distraction.
As if his pleas were answered, he was suddenly reminded that his younger sibling currently had a temp job at the very same job. Perfect . He slinked over to Strong Sad's cubicle, a devious smirk proudly planted on his face.
"Hey dork," he greeted as he immediately reached after, knocking over a cup full of writing utensils. That would prove to be a mild annoyance to pick up. Right on cue, ae groaned at his pestering.
"Strong Bad," ae said firmly, refusing eye contact with aer older brother. "The one and only," he snickered, proud of himself for almost instantly getting under aer skin. Ae rolled aer eyes and shot him a dirty glare, "I hope you don't mind, but some of us actually have work to do unlike some of us who goof around instead of being productive, not naming names."
He opted to just dip and not push this little escapade any further, normally he got a ton of enjoyment from riling up his sibling but now? Right now, it just didn't seem worth it, his heart wasn't fully in it at the moment so he decided that he'll hold out for a better opportunity to mess with aer. He raised his hands in mock surrender as ae maintained aer glare, "All right, all right, I can take a hint, jeez."
He finally backed away from aer cubicle, so much for that distraction. Well, that was a total bust; he had to formulate a new game plan now.
He could go harass Homestar, however the immediate flushing feeling and anxious bile crawling up his throat made that option less than ideal. These fluttery, fuzzy feelings were too much for him to handle and it was going to make him hurl if he had to face the source of them.
He buried his face into his gloves and tried not to scream into them out of utter frustration.
He failed, resulting in a tiny, strangled scream barely escaping his throat.
Lucky for him, nobody seemed to notice so he took the chance to stalk back to his own cubicle and just pretend to be busy for the rest of his shift. He could do that, he does it all the time, it should be easy enough.
Except, it wasn't that easy because his stupid brain kept forcing him to think about the absolute fool that he unfortunately found himself enamoured with.
Soon enough, he found himself daydreaming about laughing at his shenanigans, pretending not to be endeared by them and teasing him before the two of them- okay , he was stopping himself there. He was embarrassed of himself for how soft this was making him, maybe he really was losing his edge.
Maybe if he did interact with Homestar, humour these little fantasies just a touch , he could hold them off for just a little longer. Just enough to make work bearable. He took a deep breath as he steeled his nerves, preparing his proper macho bully persona. He couldn't let him see through the cracks; he would literally rather die.
After he felt he was properly prepared for the interaction, he sauntered over to Homestar's cubicle with a devious look plastered to his masked face.
Now, he had to think of a good insult, nothing too over the top, nothing too lame compared to his usual stuff. It had to be perfect. Was he being quiet for too long? It usually didn't take him this long to come up with something, Homestar must be getting suspicious. He can't let him figure it out. He felt almost nauseated as he continued to stew this over.
"Hey…" he still couldn't think of anything, quick just say something , "...doofus." That sucked, like really sucked, but at least it was something. "Oh, hey Strong Bad!" Homestar greeted, beaming at him. Okay good, Homestar wasn't suspicious. Strong Bad's heart fluttered a bit at this, trying to hide his feelings were going to prove to be harder than it initially seemed but luckily, Homestar's obliviousness was going to provide him some cover. An awkward, quiet squeak broke its way from his throat and he was immediately embarrassed about the sound, desperately hoping the other didn't hear it.
"Boss got ya stuck doing all this lame stuff I see, looks boring, 's perfect for you." Yeah, none of this felt like his best work. "Oh yeah, it sucks," he said, sighing dramatically and dropping his face onto his keyboard while Strong Bad watched on, trying not to snicker over the key smash input that made itself on the report or whatever paperwork he was working on. "I dunno why Pom Pom's having me do this, feels like some sorta torture, like I don't think I did anything to make him mad at me, did I?" Homestar's face twisted and contorted as he sat there in deep, confusing thought. He stayed like that for a beat before shaking his head with full certainty, "Nope, sure didn't. Had to think about it for a second, though."
Strong Bad snorted, "Guess Pom Pom finally stopped playing favourites then, huh?" Homestar looked up at him, leaning against his computer monitor with a pout. "You thought he was playing favourites?" he asked, his tone painfully sincere. The other immediately cringed at the question. He really didn't realise how blatantly Pom Pom gave him special privileges, did he? "I mean, the guy is your best friend , it kinda only makes sense," he grumbled, leaning back and crossing his arms. He fell silent and Strong Bad almost felt guilty about bringing it up, almost. He didn't feel too guilty, it needed to be said.
The silence continued to uncomfortably hang in the air over the two of them while Homestar looked visibly upset. While he would never openly admit it, seeing him like this tugged at Strong Bad's heart. He could not stand how deeply this all affected him and worried that it was going to absolutely shatter his fragile facade.
Trying to avoid that crawling sense of bile creeping up his throat and hide his ever growing deep blush that stubbornly stuck itself to his face, Strong Bad ducked away while mumbling a goodbye to him. He needed to go home immediately and luckily for him, the end of his shift was mere minutes away so it was the perfect time to escape.
As the clock finally hit the hour, he quickly found his sibling once again to hitch a ride home with aer.
Once they both arrived back at the House of Strong, he dashed up to his room and fell back onto his bed with all of these fuzzy feelings forcing their way up to the surface. He had a lot to digest mentally after his shift today and he was not ready to come to terms with it all.
No, not at all.