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Thanos muttered a curse under his breath when a red shell locked onto him and bumped him from a humble third place down into sixth. He yelled a much louder curse, this time in english, when a driver, fucking god damn Bowser in the basic standard kart of all vehicles, drove into him and knocked him off the edge of the track and sent him all the way further down into twelfth place. Twelfth fucking place, dead last.
"This game fucking sucks, man!" Thanos complained, using every ounce of what little self restraint he had to not whip the damn controller at the wall.
Nam-gyu laughed softly beside him, not even looking up from his phone as he said, "Maybe it's just you and not the game."
"Nah, this is some certified bullshit and you can't tell me otherwise." Thanos quit the race before he even finished it and went back to the character selection screen. "The second I start doing good, I get hit with one thing — one fucking thing — and all of a sudden it sends me to last place. Bullshit."
Now Nam-gyu set his phone down, a shit-eating grin on his face as he turned to look at Thanos.
"We got two controllers, right? Let's make a little deal."
Of course they had two controllers. When Thanos picked up this cheap secondhand Wii at a pawn shop — neither of them could afford the newest console — he made sure they had two controllers so the two of them could play together. Nam-gyu usually opted to watch Thanos play instead of actually playing himself, but on the rare occasion they'd play something together.
"What kinda deal are you talking about?" Thanos asked with a raised eyebrow.
"Let's see how bullshit this game really is. If I do better than you, you have to admit it's just a skill issue and not that the game's busted."
Thanos pondered it for a moment. Nam-gyu had never played Mario Kart before, at least not that Thanos had ever seen. He wasn't even sure if he knew how to play. Thanos might not be able to place first, but this would still be the easiest win of his life.
"Alright, but when I win, you gotta admit I was right and this game fucking blows," Thanos said, a smile slowly starting to break out on his face. "How about the loser also has to cook dinner, too?"
Nam-gyu pushed out his bottom lip to give Thanos a dramatic fake pout. "Aw, that's no fair though. I'd lose either way in that case."
Thanos quirked an eyebrow up again, this time in confusion as opposed to intrigue.
"What do you mean?"
"Either I have to cook, or I have to eat your cooking."
"Oh fuck off, my cooking isn't that bad," Thanos laughed, grabbing a cushion off of the couch from beside him to lightly throw at Nam-gyu.
"Hyung, you've burnt instant noodles before," Nam-gyu retorted with a laugh of his own as he grabbed the cushion that was thrown at him, crossing his legs up on the couch and hugging the cushion in his lap.
"Hey now, that was only one time," Thanos insisted. He even held up his index finger as if that would help convince Nam-gyu it only happened once.
Nam-gyu knew better though, and he was not convinced. Not at all. He simply sat there staring at Thanos with his eyebrows raised and a very skeptical, unbelieving look on his face.
"Okay, two times."
Nam-gyu kept sitting there staring at Thanos, giving him a single slow blink in response.
"Okay, at least we aren't in the double digits with how many times it's happened, though," Thanos relented.
"We almost are," Nam-gyu commented with a giggle, taking the cushion nestled in his lap and lightly tossing it back at Thanos. "And don't forget that time you over boiled eggs for so long they turned fucking grey inside."
Thanos shook his head at the memory, moving the tossed around cushion behind him so he could lean back against it. "That there was only one time for real."
"Yeah, because I banned you from cooking eggs after that. Fuck, that was so weird."
"True that, shit looked fucking nasty," Thanos said. He turned his head back to Nam-gyu as a light bulb went off in his head. "How about a new deal, then? Loser has to pay for take-out."
Nam-gyu hummed, then smiled big and brightly at Thanos. "I like that deal a lot better."
Thanos leaned in to give Nam-gyu a quick peck on the lips before gesturing to the tv stand. "Alright, go grab the other controller and you'll see for yourself how fucked up this game is."
As Nam-gyu pushed himself up off the couch to do exactly that, Thanos backed out to the main menu so he could select the two player mode. After having to run around the living room for a brief moment to find replacement batteries for the second controller neither of them realized was dead, and then Thanos having to wait longer than he felt he should have while Nam-gyu meticulously chose his character and vehicle of choice, they were finally ready to race.
"We got four races to go, whoever has the best score by the end wins. And because I'm feeling so kind and charitable, I'll even let you pick the first track," Thanos told him with a cocky grin. "It won't matter which one you pick though, I'm gonna smoke your ass, baby."
Nam-gyu just simply grinned back at him, not backing down from the challenge.
"You're on."