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Whatever his friends had planned today, it didn’t sound like good news.
All they said was to come to some very specific coordinates for an ‘event’ 36s was hosting for a video. Not that suspicious at first, really, but the so-called friends just happened to be JudeLow and Tai.
Yeah, he pretty much knew he was fucked.
The place was kinda hard to find at first; only a few seconds of wandering around the coords and he found himself falling down a hole. The amount of traps he’d fallen down from could immediately tell this was JudeLow’s doing. He’d teach that stuck up trapper a lesson after he got out of…
The fall felt rather long. By now he should’ve been completely stuck in a red stone contraption and mercilessly killed. Yet he felt himself reach for the bucket in his inventory and clutch just in time to survive the fall.
“Here comes the star of our show!” boomed a voice. Though Sharpness couldn’t pay it much attention as he was being attacked by the brightness of the room but he did recover fairly quickly.
The whole room was made of white marble with an oak door in front of him decorated with vines and lanterns. On his side was a smaller room which seemed like a studio observation room. Inside were JudeLow and Tai both talking in low voices. Tai had an undeniable smirk plastered on his face with JudeLow seemed more annoyed than usual. JudeLow’s ears were getting especially redder and redder and looked like he was about to strike Tai square across the face if he didn’t shut up.Tai turned slightly and his eyes immediately caught Sharpness.
“Oh! Jude your boyfriend’s here~”
“Shut up!” JudeLow punched Tai in the arm as he shot Sharpness, a penetrating look. Sharpness knew JudeLow hated that kind of teasing but something had really pushed him to be in an anomalous stage of being pissed-off today.
Tai put his arm around, his smirk getting wider and wider by the second.
“He’s just having a hard time processing that…” He let go of JudeLow and spun around dramatically in a silly but melancholy way and stopped with the back of his hand on his forehead with his body slightly bent. “The love of his life won’t be his anymore!”
That earned him a few more punches from JudeLow as Sharpness just stood there utterly puzzled.
36s clapped his hands and the three of them all turned to look at him. Their host was dressed in his usual tropical neon pink shirt and ripped jeans with his cap backwards.
“Settle down boys!” He beamed. He turned to Sharpness and moved towards him, giving him a few soft pats on the back. “ It’s Sharp’s lucky day today!”
“Unlucky for Jud–Owwww!”
Tai stumbled back in pain and JudeLow turned his back to Sharpness as he looked down to see on the floor pretending to be in excruciating pain.
“Looks like they’re excited!” 36s whispered to Sharpness. It had a slight re-assuring undertone to it. It seemed to be rather mixed with some anxiety. Sharpness couldn’t blame him for feeling that way. Tai and JudeLow were hard to handle.
36s made his way to the studio observation room between Tai and JudeLow and took his seat.
“ Let the Dating show begin!”
Tens stunning, cute and hot girls were lined up in front of Sharpness.
He really did know he was fucked.
🧪🧪🧪
“Jude, are you sure you're ok with this?”
Tai narrowed his eyes with a hint of concern. Meanwhile, 36s was telling Sharpness about how the game would work and what to expect. They had just gotten a minute in recording and with every passing second, Jude felt himself get tenser and tenser. Tai had obviously noticed.This whole thing ticked him off and he didn’t want to be a part of it.
“Hey. Listen,” Tai’s voice softened. “Being in denial isn’t going to solve anything.”
“ Ok then I admit it, I don’t want to be here!” Jude biting the inside of his cheek as he shot Tai a firm side-eye.
“I meant, admit that you like him.”
Tai’s voice was direct, serious. He knew exactly what Jude was going through but Jude’s denial wouldn’t stop. It was as if he was battling his feelings in his own way to root for Sharp while Sharp,between every meeting with a girl, kept sneaking looks at Jude.Some of the girls had noticed this and called him out. Every time the girls pointed it out, Jude’s eyes seemed to gather just a slight glimmer of hope before darkening again and with Jude immediately shifting, trying to keep the playful atmosphere of the show.
Jude’s professionalism was admirable in a situation like this. It really did hurt to see Sharp talk to girls. Especially the ones who showered him with endless compliments and fluttered their lashes and twirled their hair to look cute.
Jude knew Sharp wasn’t particularly a fan of that. He could sense the cringe he must’ve been feeling.
Overall, even he could admit this was a rather funny skit to film with the constant embarrassment of Sharpness him, Tai and 36s were orchestrating, but this was the most uncomfortable one for JudeLow.
At the end of the show, Sharpness did pick a girl. She was pretty and nice and despite the weird,embarrassing things Sharp had done during the show, had still liked him. In fact, out of all ten of the girls, she had managed to have the least amount of awkwardness with Sharp. They looked good together too : her gentle figure next to that of a tall and strong armour-clad knight. Didn’t they look better? She seemed nice and perfect for Sharp. She could cook, she was patient and wasn’t afraid to let the person she likes know that she likes them.
She really was the opposite of Jude. Jude only knew a few basic meals with surviving on takeout mostly.Jude would immediately exact revenge on anyone who’d wronged him and easily got mad at people. Jude couldn’t tell Sharpness he liked him.
He couldn’t. They were rivals. That’s all. Maybe borderline friends? That was it wasn’t it. He knew this was going to happen. One day he’d get with a pretty girl while Jude…
He liked the attention Sharp gave to him. How everytime he’d log on he’d go to Jude first. In a fight he’d call out to Jude first. How Sharp only looked at him. Even if it was through a rival’s eyes, those eyes would be in his direction only. Only on him.
This wasn’t fair. Some random girl who didn’t even know Sharp that well. She could but not as well as him. She couldn’t take him away.
“Screw this shitty game show.” Jude murmured quietly.
“Jude?”
Suddenly, polished black armour with blood red lining came into view. Jude lifted his chin to meet the smoke-gray eyes of the man in front of him. His eyebrows were furrowed with a worried expression written on his face.
“You’ve been acting strange is…Is there anything–”
“Congrats bro,” Jude swiftly cut him off and forced a smile. “Well now this whole Sharplow thing is finally gonna end.”
“Yeah but–”
“No more lovey dovey edits or weird fanarts…”
“Jude.”
Sharp’s voice grew firm. That was enough to shut up Jude’s rambling.
“Can I speak now?”
Jude hesitated but slowly nodded as he broke off his gaze from the other man’s eyes,
“Do you not like that girl?”
“Do you?”
To that, Sharpness seemed to go quiet. Jude looked up again but Sharp’s eyes just looked down.
“ I-I mean…”
“Do you or do you not Sharpness?”
⚔️⚔️⚔️
Sharpness really couldn’t tell. What did Jude want the answer to be?
Him and Tai were the ones who invited him. Jude was always going on about how much he hated the whole ‘Sharplow’ ship.
To be honest, the girl he picked was nice but… He wasn’t really into her. For the sake of the skit he just picked the one he’d be around less painfully. He didn’t want to break her heart but he couldn’t bring himself to like her. It just didn’t feel right.
He shook his head with shame and slammed his eyes shut. He didn’t want to look at Jude reaction. He didn’t want to…
“That’s ok.”
Sharpness’ eyes shot straight open and met JudeLow’s eyes once more.
“You don’t have to, that’s ok, it’s just some skit anyway. Everyone’ll just forget it in a week.”
“But you planned this? Don’t you want the Sharplow thing to be over?”
“Oh who cares! These shippers are insane. Some dating shows won’t stop them.”
The corners of Sharpness’ lips twitched into a smile. JudeLow seemed to loosen up as well and seemed almost at ease now. All the tension just seemed to have evaporated. It was as if a raging strom finally drifted into clear skies.
“You know,” Sharpness began. “ After we properly wrap this up, wanna hang out?”
“You know where to find me, Sharp.”