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You know, I was really surprised at just how awkward the next few weeks were when I was around Daren (though it wasn't as if my entire life wasn't already one big blob of awkward). Not that it was his fault or anything, but here's the thing: in all the gay romance stories you read online these days, the two guys who fall in love get together always get together immediately after one asks the other out, right? But you never hear the story about the guy who... hold on a second...

*Inhales deeply*

The guy who went on a basically blind date with another guy he immediately fell for and asked to be his boyfriend but then was sort of rejected only not really because the second guy had some sort of emotional baggage from his past that he first guy then sort of helped him out with it so now he's on hold to find out if the second guy is going to say yes or no but he doesn't want to pressure him whilehe'sdecidinghowhefeelssoallromanticvibeshavejustkindofdieddownandnowtheyreinthisawkwardstateofbeingjustfriendsexceptthat theyrealsokindanotbecausethefirstguyisstillwaitingforthatresponse."

*gasps for air*

Yeah, nobody writes about that shit. I mean, fuck, what kind of boring-ass love story would that make? Sheesh...

So anyway, for the past two weeks-ish Daren and I have just been kind of... hanging out. Like, sometimes after school I'd head over to his house to play video games or do homework together or whatever. Well, the days he wasn't busy anyway. It's kind of impressive how much shit the Rottie has to juggle in his day-to-day life. He's taking four AP classes, works out at the gym for like 5 times a week, and he also said he had a part-time job, but he wouldn't tell me what it was, so I have no idea how much of a commitment that is on top of everything. Oh, and he's also hot. Did I mention that yet?

But the thing is, hanging out with him was great at first, when we were doing it at his place and _away_from my family. It wasn't so much that I didn't want him to meet my parents (though him meeting my sister wouldn't be much better either, believe me...), I just had a few apprehensions that if he met my family before we were committed, he'd see what he'd be getting himself into and dump my ass faster than I got into his, heh. But in the end, my avoiding of my family was pointless because Daren... We'll, maybe I'm getting ahead of myself. Let me cut this omnipotent narrator bullshit and let me begin from where this all started (even if I didn't realize it at the time), one Thursday after school at Daren's house when Daren and I were playing a few rounds of Super Bash Bros Mele:

*

"C'mon c'mon c'mon," Daren said as he was frantically mashing buttons on his controller, trying to knock my character off the stage with a string of A button attacks and trying to conceal his attack pattern, which I had already caught on to.

We picked random characters for each of our battles: he got Princess Apricot, and I had Murth (The character from that Fire Crest game that nobody played). I was at 77% damage and his character was at 89%. Daren was tense as all hell and his hunger for victory almost palpable; this was the closest he'd ever been to defeating Vidya Gaem Champ Rob, and even though I let my guard up for most of the battle, I wasn't about to yield victory to an opponent who's best strategy was button mashing.

Dodge

Forward-A-tilt

Counter

Short-hop

Forward-aerial

Down-A

Meteor smash!

GAME!

"Nononono, ah dammit!" Daren said with an intense frustration as the sweet notion of victory was all but stolen from him, MUAHAHAHAHAHA. You see, it was our ninth battle, and I happened to win every one of them. I couldn't help but grin at the sweet feel of victory at the expense of another. After all those times Scott had mercilessly kicked my ass at this game, it felt sooo satisfying to make somebody else suffer through the same crap I did! Now I just needed Daren to start crying and everything would be complete!

Granted Daren wasn't so pleased by the outcome, as evident by the dour expression on his muzzle. "Man, fo' real! I couldn't even do shit there! How come you so good at this game?"

You know, I love it when I'm actually acknowledged as being good at something. It's almost as satisfying as getting told that you have a really big dick! "Oh, I used to practice this game all the time with Scott. He's like, crazy fucking good. He can wave dash and L-cancel and everything," I said as we exited the end battle statistics screen. It's not like anybody really reads that shit anyway.

"Man, I ain't even know what that shit is..." the Rottie said with a grunt as he lightly tossed his controller onto the ground, and slumped farther back on the couch (which he remembered to clean up this time, so there weren't any random pick bras lying on it like last time, thank god). "I guess it's gonna take a tonna practice to get on your level..."

Heh, he said 'get on your level', non-ironically. "So, do you want to play another round?" I asked, feeling pumped up and ready to kick some more ass in another round.

Daren gave me a noncommittal shrug. "Dunno... I'm actually feelin' kinda tired right now," he said as he collapsed sideways on the couch, causing a surge of electricity to shoot through me upon contact. His head was resting on my lap, eyes closed. The whole thing was a bit out of nowhere, so I was surprised, but at the same time it was the first bit of sort of intimate-ish contact I've had with him for the past two weeks! Was that a good sign? He was getting comfortable with me... did that mean I was making progress? Gah, why was this so confusing?!

Goddammit Daren, you've already friend zoned me up the wazoo, the last thing I need is you leading me on now! I already have to deal with one nine out of ten teasing me all the time... or would Scott be a ten? Maybe I'll just go with nine point five for now, but ANYWAY the point is that I already have to deal with all this fucking awful molesting and shit, which is made worse by the fact that he does it naked half the time BECAUSE SCHOOL LOCKER ROOMS SUCK SWEATY ASS so I would really appreciate it if I could just get an answer from you already because I can't deal with any more of it!

"Yo Rob, mind if I ax you something?" Daren asked with his eyes still closed, snapping me out of my jumbled racing thoughts.

"Oh, yeah sure go ahead!" I said, trying not to let the inanity of my random thoughts spill into what I hoped was a normal response.

Daren opened his eyes and then looked up at me; his hazel eyes were beautiful as always. "You uh, you think I talk strange?" he asked with a hint of hesitation.

I half-laughed at the out of the blue question. Something about the uncertainty of the way he asked it just struck me as funny. "I mean, the way you talk is different, sure, but I don't think it's funny or anything. Why do you ask?"

He gave me a contemplative frown, and then placed his paws behind his head, fingers twined. Guess I wasn't that comfortable of a pillow. Guess I can cross 'living pillow' off my list of potential job fields I might want to look into. "I dunno, just thinkin' maybe it scares people off... makes them think I'm all ghetto an' dangerous an' shit."

"Daren, of all the scary things about you, I think the way you talk is the least threatening." I couldn't help but snort a little bit: of all the things he could have possibly thought made him seem scary... the way he talks is what he came up with. Herp.

He cocked an eyebrow at me in disbelief. "Watchyou talkin' bout, man? Am I really _that_scary?"

"Well... have you looked in a mirror lately?"

Daren responded with a dubious glare, and then sat back up. "You implyin' somethin', son?" His voice was dripping with sass.

Did he just call me 'son'? So does that mean when we had sex we committed incest?

Goddammit mind, get back on track mind! Daren asked a mildly serious question here, and we need to keep _some_bearing on what's actually going on! "No... All I'm saying is that your appearance and demeanor are the biggest offenders of your scariness." I cleared my throat and then licked my lips... it was a sort of habit of mine, something that I do before breaking the news to somebody. "First of all you're freaking huge. You're pretty tall to begin with, but then you have like, professional body-builder levels of muscle on you. Whenever you're by yourself you look totally serious, which makes you seem pretty unapproachable. And there's the way you dress... You're always wearing hoodies with the hood up half the time, which sort of makes you look like you're about to mug someone. Oh and there's-"

"'Aight, 'aight point taken," he interjected with an exasperated roll of his eyes. "God, you sound like my mom..." the Rottie said, visibly irritated. He then gave me a sly look, brought an index finger to my forehead and leaned forward as if to size me up or intimidate me. Considering the now close proximity of our muzzles, naturally I couldn't help but flush up a little. "But here's anotha' question. How come we always hangin' at my place? You know I ain't got shit here."

Shit, I didn't think he'd bring that up. I could just tell him that it's because my family's psycho levels have long since passed the 9000 threshold, but he'd just think that I was being a pussy if I said that... But I've definitely learned my lesson about blatant lying, so I guess the best method of hiding the answer is just to answer truthfully, but to withhold certain key bits of information...

"Uh, because it's less hassle to go to your place! I'm the only one with a car, so if we hung out at my place then I'd have to drive you back!"

I mean, hey it _was_a true statement. Misleading, but definitely true!

Daren retracted his finger from the area where my third would inevitably be if I had one (Hey I know it was a bad analogy, but I'm trying to keep things entreating with my stupid-ass sense of humor here, don't judge!). I could still feel a slight impression from where his finger used to be, funny how the body worked like that. "Aight', that's a fair point," the Rottie said with a noncommittal shrug. "But ya know, I'd still like to see your digs at least once."

Implementing bullshit retort protocol in three, two, one...

"...Yeah but it's, not where you do stuff, it's all about who you do it with... or something like that," I said with an awkward wave of my paw, well aware that the last bit I added on definitely helped me sound liked I knew what the fuck I was talking about.

Daren gave me a smug grin, "You sure you're not just hidin' somethin' from me?" he said, his tongue playfully sticking out of his muzzle.

"Naw, noting like that. It's for purely pragmatic reasons, only!" I... well, lied. I knew he probably wasn't going to buy it (because nobody EVER buys my lies, goddammit), but fuck I had to keep him as far away from my family as possible... Maybe, as a preemptive measure, I should just chloroform my family members and mail them to the most remote parts of Greenland, or maybe one of those Slavic countries that nobody can pronounce...

To my surprise, Daren's reply was a simple 'Aight, Aight, I guess it doesn't really matter much,' which, quite honestly surprised the bejesus out of me. Though I couldn't help but feel that he gave up too easily on that, hmm...

Ah, fuck pondering things, I just successfully lied! Hell yes!

And with that the topic was dropped, we hung out as normal for the rest of the day, and for once absolutely nothing was about to wrong.

Oh shit. I did not just say that. ...Oh fuck I did! Holy cum-caramelizers, that's possibly the worst thing to ever narrate to yourself, ever! AND I ENDED THE FUCKING CHAPTER WITH IT! If this follows the pattern of every TV where that was said, then my life is about to be fucked three ways! SHIT NIPPLES!