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Damien wasn’t terribly uncomfortable with having Keith resting on his lap, almost asleep at this point, but he was sitting straight as an arrow. Panning out, this is a stark contrast to the glassy rooms of Defy, getting obliterated, stolen from, hell, probably even pissed on, they stuck out like a sore thumb in this whole apocalyptic insanity. They weren’t undisturbed, some odd person would come up and babble a faux-congratulatory ‘happy unemployment, guys!’, or check up on them, asking if they were okay, or offer a drink. Damien would just reassure that they were okay, or say something like ‘no, I don’t drink, man, but thanks anyway’ and at this point it was getting repetitive, yet it wasn’t that often and they had their moments of peace and quiet. Whatever it meant among torn papers, broken, unusable props, music booming at the maximum volume, different from each speaker.
But even Damien didn’t escape liquor, even though he started refusing them in an annoyed voice, as Noah shoved a beer bottle between his lips, making him almost choke on a drink, as people around him cheered, Olivia probably the loudest among the Smosh staff. He had a suspicion that it all was her idea and she persuaded the taller guys to hold his wrists behind his back.
“Good boy,” Keith grinned, giddy as alcohol pulsed through his veins. Falsely confident, a few hours later, he ends up hugging Damien’s kneecaps with his palms, experiencing a massive energy crash. His desire to show off his moves probably just made him exhausted even quicker.
Damien, still feeling the bitterness of hops on his tongue, was either in deep thought or had no thoughts at all – he was unsure of that himself. It was probably not the weirdest thing that could happen in such a situation. He was certain that his now former colleagues were just generally better at hiding their feelings or did whatever to not have a breakdown in the office, which was fair. Maybe there were more people like him, but then again, Keith was comfortably resting on him, so he couldn’t go check if there were any more lonely, desperate souls hiding in the crevices of the offices.
“I think I’m queer or something,” he mouthed, barely letting sound escape his lips. He didn’t realize he said that out loud, not until Keith snickered in acknowledgement.
He has never said that out loud. Nor he intended to; it was just a self-crippling doubt that he would never admit to himself, he would lie saying that it didn’t creep on him during restless, sleepless nights.
He never told it to Shayne, either. It was a huge secret, sure, but he felt that he knew Shayne’s darkest thoughts, they were not above sharing whatever bothered them. They were best friends, brothers, but not bros, not in the traditional sense anyway, they didn’t need feel a need to say ‘no homo’ after saying I love you. Because he did love him, just not in that way, and they both knew it.
So why did he feel scared and unsure? Was it just a general anxiety, making sure his brain was malfunctioning or was there actually something he could legitimately and reasonably fear?
No, he just didn’t want to make things awkward. He wasn’t blind, he saw the things he got tagged in, mostly with Shayne. Sure, most of it seemed to be in good fun, platonic and that made sense - they were friends and he was content with that, but all that other stuff… it seemed like the whole world knew his secret. They just didn’t get it completely right, so that was a condolence of sorts.
It was an open secret that Keith wasn’t straight. He didn’t feel any need to talk about his personal life, not only online, but in person, too. Damien now wished he had that option, but he was too anxious, too introverted, too shy, too everything to try to correct this.
“Hm. Good for you, man. If and when you need to talk, just let me know,” and that was all Keith said, not even lifting himself up, his palms still clasped around Damien’s knees. Was it the reaction Damien expected? Hell no. But the more he thought about it, the more he appreciated it. It was normal, after all, and he surely didn’t want to cause a scene.
“Roger that,” he nodded, and smiled after a long while.
Damien almost forgot what happened, after all, that night was absolutely bonkers. That was until a few weeks later, Keith messaged him, out of nowhere, asking how he was holding up. Strange, as Keith was not only bad at replying, but he never messaged people first, he was kind of notorious for that. Well, almost never.
Nothing much, a couple auditions here and there. Oh, that? He wasn’t sure how he was feeling about that, yet. He didn’t tell anybody else.
Oh, so he was his first? No wonder why he was so silent.
No need to put salt on the wound, Keith.
He was just messing with him is all. But if he wanted, they could meet up and talk about it.
So they met up. And then again, a couple of days later. And then again. And again.
It was strange at first, talking so openly. He didn’t know Keith that well, but it seemed like he didn’t know Damien that well, either, which was a relief – he always felt like an open book, for better or for worse. Usually, for worse. But it wasn’t bad, not at all. Once one of them opened up, the other listened, often having felt the same way before, and if not, trying to relate in some other way, or just offer a chance of being listened to, of being understood.
Too much of a good thing. Damien never thought that saying was true, he thought it was straight-up BS.
But either his brain was convincing him of things that had no foundations, or he was, indeed, getting uncomfortable with the comfort that his friendship with Keith provided. Not that he ever did anything wrong, looked at him wrong, said anything wrong – he could never do anything wrong in Damien’s eyes.
It took him an awfully long time to realize that he, in fact, caught feelings for his friend. He tried to rationalize it, maybe it was the whole situation they bonded over at fault, but to no avail. He even started not responding to Keith’s messages, suggesting they meet up again.
Honestly, he started thinking that it worked, maybe now he could move on from that, since there was no news on Smosh being acquired by anyone yet. That was until he heard a buzz and loud, intense knocking on his front door that woke him up. Sun wasn’t up yet, and he half-lifted his lids, squinting at the neon green digital alarm on his bedside. Fucking 6:38.
He got up, not bothering to dress up, in his boxers alone, thinking it must be an emergency for someone to knock on the door this early. Or late, depending on your sleep schedule.
Half-way through the hall he heard a familiar voice.
“Damien Haas, I fucking know that you’re there, open up!” It was Keith, somewhat upset and energized. What in the name of hot lord he was doing here at this time, Damien had no clue.
“You just don’t ghost a professional ghoster like tha-“ he didn’t get to finish, as his rant was interrupted by Damien unlocking and opening the door.
“You better have a good reason for being here now; I don’t have a spare bed, so don’t even ask.”
“I don’t need a spare bed! What? Are you out of your mind?”
“How the fuck I am supposed to know what you want here?”
“What I want,” Keith said, stepping in Damien’s apartment, “is for you to fucking text me back. And don’t give me that bullshit that you’ve been sleeping or busy for five days in a row, I know you fucking weren’t,” he added having calmed down, and Damien sighed, closing the door.
“And it’s okay when you do that to everyone else, huh?” he rested his back against it, arms crossed against his bare torso.
“Dude! That’s what I’m telling you! You’re not everybody else!” Keith lost his nerve again, almost shouting, probably not even thinking of what he said. That made Damien smug for some reason, somewhere deep in the part of his heart that wasn’t shocked by this revelation.
“Wh-what?” God, he be damned if he didn’t sound like a naïve, oblivious anime girl.
“You heard me,” Keith shrugged off his lack of confidence as if everything went according to plan. As he stepped closer to Damien, he felt smug, his arms were losing the grip. Damn, if that confidence wasn’t sexy.
“I guess that’s the same reason I didn’t text you back, I didn’t want to ruin anyth-“
“Shhh, nothing will ever be ruined, not between us,” Keith interrupted him, inching closer and closer, with no way to escape. After a kiss that followed, Damien wasn’t sure he’d ever want to escape.