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Double D pressed the eject button on Eddy’s PC in order to remove the featureless CD in it. He got up and walked over to his stereo with a relatively blank, concentrated expression in order to place the CD in it. After a moment, the intro to Guilty Conscience by Eminem began booming throughout the room, to which Double D jolted and immediately turned it down.
“Well, Eddy, I do believe I’ve sorted it out, though I can’t say I exactly feel the greatest about it…” Double D sighed, and peered over his shoulder to look over at Eddy, who’d been doing nothing but lying back on his bed reading a magazine, absolutely zoned out. Double D wasn’t exactly expecting Eddy to kiss the ground he walked on for performing an act of service for him the way he did so often, that wasn’t the nature of their relationship in the slightest, but the lack of acknowledgement was a little insulting. Double D simply rolled his eyes. “…You are now the proud owner of about as many songs from your list as I could fit on that CD, the royalties for which never to be seen by the bands you seem to like so much you felt the need to have me pirate them for you. We may very well go to jail for this. Are you quite happy with yourself?” Double D fully turned around to face Eddy, arms crossed and unamused.
Nothing.
“Eddy?” Double D slightly tipped his head.
Eddy simply turned the page.
Double D groaned and approached the side of the bed opposite to Eddy in order to press the weight of his arms on it and disrupt it about as much as he could, given how little weight that was. “ Eddy? Are scantily clad women really more important than this conversation right now?”
Eddy raised his eyebrows, then finally lowered the magazine to look over at Double D. “Mm?” He huffed, then furrowed them. “I was totally listening, sockhead. You figured out the whole…thing. Took ya long enough. Thanks, or whatever. What, you want a cookie or something?”
“A little appreciation that I essentially just committed a crime for you will do.” Double D stood up straight again and crossed his arms tight. “You know, I have my concerns about the media you choose to consume. The fact that I can’t seem to hold your attention for more than two seconds here adds evidence to the idea that you may very well be developing some form of addiction.” He scoffed.
“Oh, don’t be such a buzzkill. Just because your parents won’t let you watch shows where people hold hands before marriage doesn’t mean that I can’t enjoy a magazine or two. I basically only read them for the articles anyway.” Eddy rolled his eyes, then patted the spot beside him. “Just look.”
Double D sighed, but ultimately scooted onto the bed beside him. Eddy immediately leaned in close with a smirk on his face to show him what was on the page. Double D simply glanced at it unamused, then at Eddy. “…And?”
“…And?” Eddy scoffed and pulled the magazine aside as if Double D was undeserving of looking at it. “The fuck do you mean “and?””
“This really isn’t my thing, Eddy, not that this particular path to self discovery is paved with you specifically showing me items from your personal collection.” Double D groaned and rubbed the bridge of his nose.
“Pssh. Whatever. You gotta be, like, busted or something if you can’t appreciate this shit.” Eddy rolled his eyes and held up the magazine again, turning his attention back to it. “What, you queer or something?” He spoke mockingly with a smirk just to get under Double D’s skin, not bothering to look up as he simply waited for Double D to blow up over it. He waited for a moment, before peering back over at him, noting that Double D had gone from rubbing the bridge of his nose to simply silently hiding his face in his hand in frustration and embarrassment. Eddy squinted at him and slowly closed the magazine. “…Like, seriously? Shit.”
“Of all the ways for this to become a topic of conversation…” Double D grumbled.
“Okay, conversation starter aside then.” Eddy tossed the magazine back under his bed, finally offering Double D his full attention with intrigue. “So, what, you got a crush on me then?”
“Eddy, why is that your first assumption?” Double D drew his hand down his face and looked at Eddy, unamused.
“I dunno, jeez, I’m just curious.” Eddy rolled his eyes, though his expression wasn’t nearly as mocking as it was before. “I mean, I just kinda seem like the obvious choice here.”
“ Riiiiiiight , you’re the obvious choice.” Double D gave an amused scoff, giving some leeway to the fact that Eddy might just be stupid and curious, as he gave leeway to his ignorance far too often.
“Well, yeah, I’m smart, I’ve got interesting shit to talk about, I’ve got a great personality, I’ve got a collection of cool stuff so my place is a pretty sweet place to hang out at…” Eddy counted off on his fingers, quite pleased with himself.
“You’re forgetting “humble.”” Double D huffed.
“I was getting to humble.” Eddy raised his finger.
“Goodness…” Double D sighed and rest his forehead in his hand to shake his head.
“Why can’t you just admit that I’m basically the perfect specimen here?” Eddy scoffed.
“Eddy, why, exactly, is it so important to you that I find you palatable in this sense? Surely I tend to your ego enough as is.” Double D leaned down to his level, speaking just a big patronizingly.
“I’m just saying, clearly you find me attractive! I mean, have you seen the way you look at me sometimes? You got so clingy when we were going to see my brother.” Eddy started getting a bit more defensive as Double D questioned his motives.
“Eddy, as I may recall, a lot of that touchiness stemmed from you.” Double D squinted at him. “Does the hypothetical of me finding you attractive actually carry a certain weight to you?”
“It does not! You’re the one who still hasn’t outright said that you don’t yet, so you’re basically admitting that you do!” Eddy scoffed and sat up on his knees to glare Double D down. “Just admit that you like me!”
“You’re the one who keeps pushing this, Eddy, I’ve never even so much as alluded to feelings for you, the fact that I’ve simply not explicitly said that I don’t have any may very well be because you’ve been talking this entire time.” Double D huffed and got up in his face. “Why don’t you admit that you like me if this topic is plaguing your mind so much?”
“You first!”
“No, you first.”
“Oh, do I have to do everything for you, like always?”
“Eddy, you’ll find that our relationship is quite the opposite. Would it kill you to admit that this is a topic of importance to you?”
“I said you first!”
As the two argued, with Eddy huffing in his frustration and Double D getting more and more frustrated by proxy, the CD changed over to Thank You by Dido. Like a movie moment, once the song had shifted to something softer, they went silent and simply looked at each other, expressions dropping. Eddy took a moment, made a small awkward noise, then began to lean in as he felt this was the part in one of the movies his brother left lying around where he just dropped it and kissed the girl. There was usually stuff after that, but it probably applied here too. Double D was frozen by this, one of these brief moments of Eddy intimacy. He closed his eyes for just a moment of anticipation. He felt Eddy grip his shirt and his lips just barely graze against his own before feeling him jerk away.
“…This isn’t fucking Stan.”
Double D slowly blinked his eyes open, bewildered. “I…beg your pardon?” He muttered, head spinning.
“This is the chick version. Not the Eminem version.” Eddy scoffed, then scooted as far away from Double D as possible on the bed. “You clearly messed up the CD, sockhead. Probably shoulda just done it myself and not even asked you over, then you wouldn’t have whined on and on about how we could get arrested for this.” He side eyed him.
“Well, I’m sorry that since you weren’t helping and some of those links are improperly…” Double D squinted at him, before taking note of his denial. “…I’ll…try again. Either way, it’s a good song, your discomfort with the fact that it doesn’t fit within your typical genre aside.” He muttered, then scooped himself off the bed to return to the computer, Eddy following his every footstep. “Was there anything else that wasn’t on your list you’d like me to add to the next one?” Double D glanced over his shoulder at him.
“…I mean. This one’s probably fine. We could just hang out or something instead of you risking more jail time.” Eddy shrugged.
“Oh, please don’t joke about that.” Double D glanced over at the computer with some concern, though an underlying content feeling that Eddy was lightening up a bit. Eddy had finally bent first, impulsively, like he was always going to if he ever was. Something about that was nice.