Archive of Our Own ^beta

Damon realized that he didn’t have many hobbies at some point in his teenage years.

“Dude! Have you seen the new Flower Rangers episode? That battle was so epic…”

With his nose partially buried in a book, Damon hesitantly peeked at his new classmates who couldn’t seem to shut up.

As they got even more agitated despite the teacher’s pleas to stay quiet, he caught himself staring at nowhere in particular — being unproductive, that is.

Damon thought it was nonsensical. How could they be so easily distracted during class just because of some TV show, and how dare they manage to distract him, too?

He eventually made a decision.

A few minutes later, when everyone was allowed to pack their things, he walked over to the two loud boys.

“Hey. I have a question.”

One of the classmates — he couldn’t remember his name, not really — looked at the other in mild shock, as if Damon wasn’t right there witnessing the whole exchange.

His friend was probably the most socially aware of the two, since he quickly straightened up and tried to smile at Damon. “Hi! You’re that… uh, Devon? No, Dave?”

“Damon,” he blankly corrected, “and you are Roland.”

“…Oh, yeah, sorry. Also, it’s Randal.”

Damon already knew that.

“So, my question.”

The boy scratched his cheek with a smile that faded more and more as the conversation progressed. “Uhh… go on, I guess?”

Finally. “Um. It’s about Flower..”

“Flower Rangers?!”

It was the boy who’d been quiet until then who spoke up.

Damon gave him a curious look. “Yes, that.”

“I didn’t know you were a fan, too! Man, I thought you were a totally boring guy, actually,” his classmate’s eyes sparkled, “since you’re a bookworm! But, but, you’re one of us? I know everything about the Flower Rangers, you can ask away!”

Damon felt like he had just experienced what talking to a clinically insane individual was like. And he was just thirteen years old. “…I was going to ask what the series is about.”

“Oh.”

Apparently, he had rendered a fellow human being unable to speak with just a few harmless words. The slightly calmer boy from before had to take the reins once again, awkwardly tapping his depressed friend on the back.

“Sorry about that, he’s just a huge fan,” he reasoned, as if that made any difference and his friend wasn’t just a lunatic, “It’s about heroes, the Flower Rangers! Each of them is, like, a different kind of flower! I think.”

That was surprisingly shallow.

“You think?”

After going home, Damon did his research on the show.

He watched two episodes, maybe.

“…Who thought this was good enough to be aired on television?”

And it went as well as you’d expected it to go.

“Kyaaa! Their new collection is so cute!”

Damon turned his head to take a look at the commotion.

Even though they were only in 11th grade, his classmate looked like she belonged in a sophisticated magazine — it was rare to have such beauty at that age, Damon could give her that —, although that charming effect completely vanished as soon as she opened her mouth.

“Do you think any of the boys would let us do their makeup for the festival…?”

“A boy? Oh, there’s—”

He and the girl locked gazes as she turned to his general direction.

Faster than the speed of light, Damon whipped his head to the wall.

“Hey! You! Daniel, right?” The girl insistently called out to him (probably), approaching his desk. He distantly wished that any god would strike him down before she could speak again. “Are you interested in getting a makeover?”

“Not at all.” He mumbled, mouth pressed to the palm of his hand.

“Please! The other boys won’t accept!”

He finally turned around to face his classmate, catching a glimpse of her friend shyly trailing behind. “And what makes you think I will accept?”

The girl’s smile suddenly became awkward. She glanced at the ground, then at a random dot on the wall, then at him. “Uh, well, because… you’re like that.”

The friend behind nearly choked.

Damon’s frown only deepened. “What does that even mean?”

No response came from the pair. He readied himself to get up from the desk.

“Okay, okay, sit down! It’s just— uh, you’re prettier than the other boys?” His classmate laughed a little bit and looked at her friend’s face, practically imploring her to offer help. “You have a… nicer face, that’s all.”

Damon was aware that his looks were better than average. Yet, for some reason, he couldn’t quite bring himself to trust those words.

“…Alright.” He relented, anyway. It took some courage to call a classmate good-looking right to their face, despite everything. “When?”

And perhaps he shouldn’t have asked, since the girl didn’t even wait for him to do the proper mental preparations before she took a makeup kit out of her bag.

Damon almost felt bad when he wiped the makeup off hours later.

Needless to say, he couldn’t go home with it, no matter how nice and simple it looked — he had only allowed it to stay on his face for so long because of the cross dressing event in the school festival.

In spite of the girls’ bad manners, they were actually… kind. And skilled, seeing as he’d left that classroom looking like a teen model.

He decided to go home and check a few fashion magazines online. Just because.

And it went… terribly. Not only did Damon feel like he was wasting a generous amount of study time, he also couldn’t bring himself to feel intrigued by fashion itself. It was nice to dress up with tidy, clean clothes — but that was all there was to it.

Another failure.

Damon was merely indulging in some coffee near his university when it happened.

“Damon!” An unfamiliar voice called his name.

“…?”

He didn’t respond, at first.

“…I, I mean. It is Damon, right?”

Despite his extreme lack of desire to talk to a stranger, he raised his gaze to the pink-haired man who’d decided to disturb his peace. Golden eyes shakingly stared back at him.

He paused, looking up and down to verify the individual’s body language; the stranger seemed more tense and nervous than anything, perhaps due to self consciousness, and showed no signs of hostility. How interesting.

A few words made him stop again. “That’s— not nice, y’know.”

Huh? The man shifted in place, clumsily tugging at his own sleeve with no apparent motive. The gesture seemed nearly timid to Damon’s eyes.

“What is?” He frowned, letting his genuine confusion show.

Now, the guy looked more exasperated. “Checking me out, man!”

Damon closed his mouth with a click.

“I was not doing that.”

“Yeah? Sure,” with a hand propped on his hip, the stranger looked away, biting the inside of his mouth, “you can tell yourself that…”

“…”

Damon was entirely ready to tell him to shut up and go to hell, see if he cares, go bother someone else, I don’t need this on a Tuesday morning, among other sweetly considerate words, but the other man chose that moment to clear his throat.

“Uh, anyways… I was just messing with you, aha….” Upon taking a quick look at his fidgety posture, it wouldn’t take a genius to guess that he’d deeply regretted this conversational approach. “Don’t take it seriously… ‘cuz, I needed to talk to you about something…”

Damon really needed to flee this deserted coffee shop before he started to get actually pissed. “Fine. But who are you, again?”

Nevermind the slowed down speech, now the guy had gone completely silent and immobile in the span of two seconds. He opened and closed his mouth multiple times — just like his koi fish back at home, Damon thought, if they looked like Barbie devotees.

After Damon had so kindly taken a few sips and shot him with several unimpressed looks, the stranger finally mustered the energy to speak up. “Y, You seriously don’t know me?”

The other man finished his cup with a long sip, blinking slowly — despite the piercing gaze on his peripheral, he had paid for this drink. And he would enjoy it. “Was I supposed to?”

“Kai! Kai Monteago! That doesn’t ring a bell?”

Damon put his cup down and paused to truly scan the innermost corners of his memory palace. Sadly, “Not at all.”

The stranger — whose name was apparently Kai, but a stranger nonetheless — gasped in horror. “Do you live under a rock or something…? Ah, shit, this totally ruins my plans…”

“Unless you’re a famous DJ, or politician, or something, I’m afraid I really won’t be able to tell.” Damon crossed his arms. “And what do you mean, plans? So you did approach me with second intentions.”

Kai was fast to jump and try to fix the situation. “Uh, no, I heard about you from Diana! You also go to Eden’s Garden, right?”

That only partially lessened Damon’s suspicions. “Right.”

“Aaand you’re looking for a roommate?”

Damon suddenly felt some kind of primal fear at the direction this conversation was heading. “Indeed.”

When Kai looked away with a tiny smile on his lips, his stomach nearly dropped to hell.

“…How interested would you be in sharing an apartment with the Ultimate Influencer?”

Followed by those words, Kai grinned and flashed him a peace sign with practiced ease.

Huh. Did he actually think the pitiful Ultimate part counted as a boost to his imaginary roommate curriculum, or something?

Damon opened his mouth, aware that he’d make someone cry that day.

“Absolutely no chance.”

So. Kai was moving in.

Damon couldn’t help it. He was so incredibly kind, after all, and his non consensual friend Diana had personally frequented the devil’s How To Convince Someone classes. He couldn’t fucking help it.

As he begrudgingly helped Kai unpack his electronic equipments, something caught his eye.

“Do you really need all of these fancy looking monitors just to post some pictures on Stargram?” He pointed to the open box.

Kai turned to look at it with an oh sound, carefully placing the box he’d been carrying on the ground. “That’s, like, my streaming stuff. It’s kind of a new thing.”

Damon raised an eyebrow at that. “Streaming? I thought influencers didn’t do that.”

“Some do,” Kai shrugged, picking up the box that had stolen his new roommate’s attention and putting it on his desk, “and I’m just trying it out because of a friend, anyway. She’s been giving me some tips, and…”

Kai proceeded to share unsolicited information about some girl who also attended Eden’s Garden, the Ultimate Pro Gamer. Damon unconsciously absorbed the new findings, storing them in his head to be reassessed later.

He decided on a small joke that revealed a true concern. “Should I begin to worry about you screaming over horror games at night, then?”

“Horror games? Hell no!” Kai pointed a finger to no one in particular. “I just play those when there’s someone with me. Plus, I’ve only been streaming cozy games, like—”

Despite himself, Damon’s eyes shined. “Animal Passing?”

“Oh, my viewers have been asking me to play that one, but no. I usually stream this other one a lot—”

“Finecraft?” Damon tilted his head to the side.

“No. And how is that a cozy game? I gotta fight for my life as soon as the sun goes away!”

“Maybe you’re just bad at it.” Damon huffed, knowing full well he hadn’t touched Finecraft ever since he was twelve years old.

“Okay, whatever. Are you gonna let me finish?” Kai crossed his arms with a sigh. “The game. I. Like. It’s called…”

“…”

“…….”

“…” Damon ran a hand over his face. “Why are you staring at me?”

“Just making sure you’re not interrupting me again. Okay,” Kai let out a relieved exhale, “it’s Stardust Valley!”

And Damon… had never heard of such a name in his entire life.

“Must be boring.” He remarked, ready to leave the room for his own errands. “Anyways, if you need me for anything, call me… in approximately three hours.”

As Damon walked away from the pink furnitured room, Kai’s offended screams accompanied him.

Damon had a vague feeling that he’d never get used to the fact streamers played such imbecilic games for a living. Not even after a whole year of rooming with one and occasionally (being coerced into) participating in those neuron-deteriorating activities.

No cameras were filming them. Still, with an unbelieving finger pointed to the computer’s screen, Damon scoffed.

“That’s simply absurd,” Damon felt his lips moving before he could even stop them, “30 thousand golds? For this?”

Kai raised his eyebrows and slowly wrapped his hand around his roommate’s, putting it down. “Man, it’s not even that serious. We can get that much in, like, a day if we work hard enough.”

“I know, because this game is nonsensical and holds no real substance or similarity to real life,” With crossed arms, Damon side-eyed the computer, “but really? All of that gold for a portrait of your significant other? The fact they actually think anyone would spend their savings on this is laughable.”

“…Dude. It’s a farm game’s currency,” Kai frowned, feeling a bit lost, “I don’t think it’s that bad.”

The blank look on Damon’s face gradually returned to its customary rage. Oh, that feels familiar, Kai thought.

“You don’t think it’s bad? Put that brain of yours to good use for just a few seconds.” Damon turned back to the monitor, promptly ignoring Kai’s scandalized look. “Just how many strawberry seeds could you buy with 30,000G? Yes, exactly, 300 of them.”

“W-What are you bringing up strawberries for? They’ve got nothing to do with this. Plus, you can only buy them with gold during the Egg Festival.” Kai extended an accusatory finger at him.

Mimicking the gesture he himself had been subjected to, Damon held Kai’s finger and pushed it down with an unimpressed look. “It’s the most profitable crop to plant during the spring, mind you. Not to mention, investing 30,000G on a small decoration is pointless in itself.”

“…You say all that as if the fun in playing this game was making profit.”

Damon blinked. “What is the fun part, then?”

Kai gasped. “You have to ask? Dude! Of course it’s creating relationships with other people!”

“People, as in… the NPCs?”

“Yeah, duh.”

One of Damon’s eyebrows shot up at this, but nothing came out of his mouth. Well, at first. “Pfft.”

A small moment of silence ensued.

“You— A, Are you laughing at me?”

Damon’s head snapped back to the colorful screen in record speed, with his expression now unreadable — in fact, only the slight trembling of his shoulders betrayed his hidden laughter.

“…It’s, it’s just a bit sad, I’d say.”

Kai looked at him like he’d just grown two heads, or maybe smiled at someone on the street. “What are you on about? Stop laughing!”

After a while, the shaking of his roommate’s shoulders ceased, so he assumed the other had finally stopped giggling to himself — perhaps realizing the inherent need to become a decent individual before trying to become a better member of society, or whatever it was that Damon wanted so badly.

(And okay, it would be a lie to say he wasn’t surprised to witness one of Damon’s rare genuine laughing moments, but all of that amazement simply evaporated at the undeniable knowledge that he was being laughed at.)

Without getting his eyes off the monitor, Damon let out a small, good humored sigh. “Well, it’s a bit sad that you only like this game because you can date the characters.”

“Now you’re just distorting my words! I never even mentioned dating.” Kai put a hand on his hip, leaning forward to get a better view of his roommate — still seated on Kai’s gaming chair like he owned the place, blissfully unaware (or maybe uncaring) of the other’s boiling frustration.

“Sure.” A click of the mouse could be heard. The game on the screen still displayed their farm in all of its pixelated glory, and Damon’s stupid avatar was seemingly busy with making fruit jam. “You thought about it, though.”

Truth be told, Kai didn’t notice that he was still playing in the middle of the argument. Bastard. “I’m not the type to focus on fictional or online relationships, as ironic as it sounds. It’s just… not as appealing, y’know?”

“Not as appealing as the real life relationships you don’t possess?” Damon went to sell the jam he’d collected before. “Wow.”

“Hey! I should be the one saying wow to that! Have you got no empathy left in that rotten heart of yours?” As if burned, Kai jumped away from his position next to his roommate; he could tell tears were beginning to form in his eyes, against all of his wishes. “I bet you don’t even have one. Seriously.”

Damon didn’t have much time to react before Kai stepped out of the room in a never before seen hurry, closing the door with a loud sound. He winced.

Oh, well. That didn’t go so well.

Because, in truth, Kai hadn’t been fair to the situation — as always, the influencer let his emotions get the best of him, making it difficult to have a proper conversation without eventually tearing up or running away. He only knew how to see things through his own limited perspective; for someone who enjoyed to call Damon egotistical so often, wasn’t that a trace of hypocrisy?

As he wrapped up the farm’s activities and made his little avatar sleep in game, Damon figured it was also time for a well deserved rest in the real world.

He cracked his fingers and turned the computer off, helplessly wondering if the earlier discussion could’ve been handled with more patience.

…No point in pondering useless scenarios, now.

Haley was the NPC Kai had chosen to marry in the game.

Damon frowned at that. In truth, he didn’t see that one coming. It happened in a live where the two were together, weeks before the 30,000G incident, skillfully dodging suspicious comments centered around their relationship and interacting as if nothing went wrong every time they played Stardust Valley whatsoever.

“Who are you guys going to marry?” Kai quietly read the question that kept being asked on his chat. “Uhh… you mean in game, right?”

“Of course they mean in game,” Damon sighed, “and to answer this, I’d say I have no interest in marrying anyone at all.”

For reasons Damon couldn’t fathom, Kai puffed his cheeks at that.

It was a strange little thing. Kai looked away from both the screens and his roommate’s gaze, seemingly in thought for a while.

Then, he whipped his head back to the main monitor all of a sudden. “I’ll marry Haley!”

Haley? Of all people? She’s a bitch, and quite literally treats you like you’re an inferior being when you’re new in town, is what Damon itched to say initially, and then Why? Why even marry a character that doesn’t exist?

Of course, Kai would have quick answers for all of that, and he was still recovering from the last time his chat nearly cancelled him on Twinner and Kai ignored him for days on end. Not a very fun experience. He kept his mouth shut.

“…Why her, though?” Is what he ended up settling on, much like the people on TwoWitches chat.

Kai didn’t respond immediately. “Uh… she’s cool, I guess. Plus, the extra room you get when you marry her is the prettiest room ever!”

Damon narrowed his eyes at that. “So you’re picking her because her aesthetics match yours.”

“Don’t word it like that. It’s a valid reason, anyway.”

“I beg to differ.”

“Of course you do,” Kai put his hands on his face and sighed, “you don’t know how to have fuuuun.”

Damon let out a disbelieving laugh. “Fun? You call marrying fictional characters fun? No, thanks.”

Kai whined and threw light punches at his right shoulder as a response. He supposed he deserved that.

…Out of the corner of his eye, he saw something on the chat.

Kai’s fans were just stupid. Moronic from start to end, to put it simply.

“They still think I want to marry you.” Damon broke the prolonged silence in the living room, resting on the couch with his phone in hands. “In Stardust Valley, I mean.”

Kai, who’d been as quiet as a rock until then, let out a small huff. He was laying down on the very same couch, legs thrown over Damon’s lap. “You don’t tell me.”

“…?” Was Kai still mad at the other day’s small misunderstanding, which couldn’t even be called a fight? “I thought we were over this.”

“You think and assume many things,” Kai pointed out, “in case you didn’t know.”

“Your argument serves no good point or credibility whatsoever.”

“Oh. So you gotta serve in debates?”

“What?”

“Ugh. Forget it.”

“You’re weird.”

Kai made another unsatisfied sound, turning his head to the left — that way, they couldn’t make proper eye contact.

Damon waited a few seconds, then rapidly grabbed Kai’s ankles in retaliation.

The reaction was almost instant. “H-Hey! Let go! Leave my legs alone!” He tried kicking the air, to no avail. “They’ve got nothing to do with this!”

Damon leveled him with an unimpressed look. “And you’ve got a real nerve to be pissy at me yet still treat my body like a leg rest.”

Kai apparently couldn’t come up with anything good to object to that claim.

Staring into Kai’s downturned eyes, Damon sighed heavily and let go of his legs — as if this conversation had never occurred whatsoever, he even moved them to their previous place.

That earned him a confused glance from Kai. The other man didn’t complain, though.

They fell into silence for a few more minutes.

“Hey. Damon.”

The man in question didn’t take his gaze off the phone screen, pretending to pay attention to his mystery novel. “Yes?”

“Have you got any hobbies?” Kai opened one sleepy eye to stare in his direction. He thought he’d fallen asleep, honestly. “Like, stuff you actually enjoy doing… or that you wanna do. All I ever see on your hands are books and your phone.”

The words on the ebook were starting to get incomprehensible. Damon sighed, turning the electronic off and pushing it aside. Why was he suddenly bringing this up?

“I study. And read.”

Kai looked at him with something akin to pity.

“I know. But aren’t those, like, synonyms? Isn’t there anything else?”

“…They are not synonyms.” He crossed his arms, thinking. “I’ve tried broadening my interests before, but I can’t say it worked. TV shows, fashion… not for me.”

For a moment, all that Kai’s brain registered was white noise. “You’ve tried getting into fashion before?!”

“Tried is the keyword, yes.”

“We’re revisiting this topic later. Okay. But nothing worked? And there’s nothing else you wanna do? At all?”

Damon’s face contorted into a grimace. “I used to like… playing Animal Passing…”

“Oh, that’s cute! What else?”

Damon rolled his eyes.

“I also play Stardust Valley. Haha.” He deadpanned.

Kai made a face. “Never do that again.”

“What? I just laughed.”

“That was anything but a laugh.”

“Haha. Sure.”

“Stop.”

“Hahaha.”

“Dude.”

“Hehe.”

“That’s even worse.”

“Ha.”

“I’m seriously gonna cry.”

Before Kai could mentally prepare himself, it happened again.

As if witnessing a suspenseful scene in a thriller movie, Kai tensed up and began to feel a strange palpitation in his chest.

Damon’s eyes were crinkling in front of him, slow motion-esque style, and it evoked a similar feeling to the one you get from watching a head get chopped off. He didn’t even have to watch Horrifier. He might’ve run out of breath before Damon even started actually laughing, as well.

No, he’d been mistaken, Damon was full on cackling. Kai was positively terrified. In a good way. Sort of. What happened? What did he miss?

Not wanting to screw this moment up, Kai momentarily morphed into an effigy (in spirit). He couldn’t speak. He couldn’t laugh.

After the laughter died out, Damon scratched his neck and seemed to instantly acquire a big interest in a random dot on the ceiling. Kai couldn’t help but chuckle.

“…What is it?”

“You’ve been laughing a lot these days,” Kai affirmed, leaving no room for Damon’s incessant wishes to disagree with him, “it’s kinda nice..”

Damon blinked. “Have I?”

“…Yeah. You haven’t noticed?”

His roommate paused.

“That’s stupid.”

“What is? Laughing? Experiencing joy and whimsy?”

Damon pretended to gag. “Now you’re talking like Tozu.”

“Oh, don’t bring a professor into this. Answer me.”

Damon narrowed his eyes, thinking.

“…Fine. You know what’s stupid?” Damon clicked his jaw, turning to Kai’s direction and finally, finally looking at him. “The way you keep tabs on me. You care so much.”

Out of every outrageous little thing he could’ve said, Kai was not expecting this, in fact.

“Yes, I do?” He tilted his head to the couch’s backrest, frowning. “What do you want me to say? That I don’t?”

“I hate liars, that's all.” Damon mentally received a pat on the back from the Ultimate Lawyer.

Kai scoffed. “Wow, that’s a lie. Also, I didn’t lie.”

“Hmm. All I hear is lies.”

Kai wanted to drop kick him into the moon.

“And all I wanted to say… is that it feels nice, okay? Wouldn’t it feel good to see a person you like smiling more often? Huh? Jackass.”

“…”

As expected, the room went silent — Damon didn’t grace him with an answer.

And that was okay, for now.

Kai was streaming.

Damon sat by his side, reading a new book Kai had bought for his birthday. He wasn’t participating in the stream, per se, but he occasionally engaged in whatever commentary his roommate was doing with the chat — only if it was truly necessary (read: if Kai made puppy eyes at him).

That, in itself, became another hobby to him.

On Kai’s main monitor, a little pink haired avatar could be seen watering a few crops in their shared Stardust Valley farm. Weird, since Damon wasn’t even playing with him.

When he voiced his confusion, Kai looked at him with a small pout. Had Damon started seeing things, now, because of their continuous proximity?

“Why I’m playing in this save?” Kai’s tone was the very same one he used when someone asked him an incredibly stupid question. “Because I’d rather take care of our farm, duh.”

Still, you should play in your solo farm sometimes for the viewers, is what Damon wished to say. However, no sound left his mouth.

He was totally overthinking this. Geez.

“This is why your followers always get the wrong idea,” he murmured, burying his face in the book at hand, “seriously…”

“Huh?” Kai tilted his head to the side, nearly dropping his headphones in the process. Oh, Kai. Sweet, sweet Kai. “Speak like you’re actually alive and breathing, dude.”

Now he just wanted to mess with him. “Oh, you can’t hear me? Good. You’re a loser.”

Kai blinked. “You’re trying to make me look bad here, aren’t you.” It wasn’t phrased as a question. Kai knew him so well.

Damon paused, looking at Kai from the corner of his eye. His gaze was quickly back to the romance novel in hands, though, as soon as his eyes met the one thing his stomach couldn’t handle.

He breathed in and out, silently.

“How could I? I love you.”

Contrary to the things Damon’s brain had been spewing to him the moment he had this idea, the windows didn’t shatter and Kai didn’t kick his ass to the streets. At least not yet.

He’d been reluctant to say this — after all, never in his life did Damon ever utter those little words at anyone other than his parents, thank you very much —, although the stakes were practically nonexistent. He wouldn’t dare name the uncomfortable feeling bubbling in his heart every time Kai spoke or, well, existed in the same world as him.

It was getting harder to deny this small inconvenience in his daily life. The thing that should only exist in books, much like the one which was currently accommodated in his hands, blissfully unaware of the horrors of the human experience its owner was devastatingly facing. The L word, if you will.

Sometimes, in fact, Damon felt like there was never a darker period in his life than the one where he initially caught himself daydreaming — it was the very first time in which lingering gazes weren’t directed at him, but rather done by him —, and then began to question his own values regarding crushes and relationships.

It was not like he was actually planning on doing something about it, because that would simply break the unspoken bond and familiarity between him and his (nauseatingly cute) roommate, crossing the invisible line drawn between friendship and something more. He also needed to work on this new problem of automatically adding disgusting adjectives to his Kai related thoughts. Christ.

(A well timed divine intervention would be great, yet, he wasn’t religious.)

Still, the three words? It felt almost unfair not to voice them out at least once, while he still could. The fact the subject of his speech couldn’t even hear him was completely besides the point.

(It was probably the only way he could bring himself to do it, and Damon wasn’t one to waste chances that were handed to him on a platter).

There was still something bothering him, though.

Why wasn’t Kai answering?

Foolishly bracing himself, he turned his head to the side, staring straight at the silent streamer.

His expression was almost entirely blank, save for the slightly open mouth and dash of color on his cheeks. After their eyes met, though, said effects multiplied by ridiculous amounts of times.

“W-What?” Kai breathed, but he wasn’t quite sure whether he still could or not. “Say it again.”

Damon should’ve ordered a coffin beforehand. Or two, perhaps, if he wanted to truly get rid of the knowledge of what transpired in this room. It was not like him to leave things unfinished, nevertheless. “…You heard that?”

“My chat… says they heard something, even though I couldn’t.” Kai explained, grabbing at his own arms. “So…”

Damon put the book down, balling his left hand into a fist. Of course. The microphone.

He didn’t think it would be able to capture his words — he chose not to believe it would.

He supposed it was only fair. With a sigh, “turn the stream off.”

Although he looked startled, Kai rushed to do as he was told — a conflicted expression adorned his face, contrasting the obvious blush —, and one by one, the screens went black.

(…The main one still remained intact, though.)

Damon took notice of it, eyeing the monitor that displayed so many colorful pixels, fond memories.

He turned to Kai, then, and that seemed to do it.

“I love you,” he said, a bit louder this time, “are you happy now?”

Kai’s tearful face quickly turned into an angry one.

“God, you… you’re fucking insufferable!” Kai’s voice rose in volume by the second. Looking closely, tears were still streaming down his cheeks. “Can’t you act like a decent human being for once?”

Apparently, that’s how the most improbable love stories start.

When Kai’s clammy hands grabbed both sides of his face, he didn’t question it nor complain. Better yet, he couldn’t, due to the undeniable reality happening right in front of his incredulous eyes.

This was unfair. When Damon finally assimilated the fact he had just been kissed by the very victim of his affections (who showed no signs of reciprocation whatsoever), Kai was already pulling back.

Like he would let that happen. Sneaking a single hand under Kai’s chin, he pulled his face closer once again, feeling his roommate’s cheeks get squished beneath his fingertips.

Needless to say, kissing Kai was akin to having a dream come true — in a much more literal than metaphorical sense, of course.

With narrowed eyes, he observed the way Kai’s eyes trembled slightly under the closed eyelids, and the effect it had on his fluttering lashes. The heat of the physical contact added to such a sight made Damon’s heart beat a couple times faster, if that was possible.

Stealing a final peck at the corner of his mouth, Damon backed away with a sense of fulfillment. It was hard not to. Still, leaning forward, Kai opened his eyes and frowned at him.

“…We’re done already?”

Damon huffed, despite his growing blush. Pointing to the computer’s screen, then, “Don’t make a habit out of abandoning your viewers.”

“What? Oh, no.” Kai turned to the monitor in the blink of an eye. “Oh, fuck! My stream!”

Damon couldn’t help but laugh; not exactly at his roommate-turned-lover, but at the situation as a whole. While Kai was deeply apologizing to his followers after returning to the stream, Damon was already being the productive one in this relationship and turning his own laptop on to earn gold in Stardust Valley. Truly, the grind never stops.

If the thought of spending thirty thousand, or maybe even thirty million golds for a portrait of his partner in this ridiculous game didn’t faze him all that much anymore, he blamed it entirely on Kai.

…Damon would make the money for it, anyway.