#nothing motivates me more than my kamioshi's cuteness

[mokaisathome]

Can you be parasocial with your own boyfriend? (part 2)

   Kalim was often half-asleep by the end of Jamil's streams, fighting against his eyes closing to support him until the end – even if Jamil told him off for doing that – but he still looked at the chat from time to time. There wasn't any special reason to it because he rarely if ever talked in there – he simply liked seeing people cheer on Jamil. He nodded at the ones complimenting his boyfriend on his play style and performance. If he were allowed to talk in the chat, he'd surely boast about Jamil beating him seven times out of ten during their last (friendly?) competition – and while it was frustrating, Jamil's skills were definitely something Kalim was proud of.

   Among all the comments on the screen, one caught his attention, making him think “There's a lot of people like that recently, huh” without really expanding on it… Until another one came. And another. Kalim glanced at Jamil sitting in front of his monitor and whose eyes were focused on the game, only occasionally opening his mouth to explain a move. Too busy to look at what his fans asked of him… Kalim needed to tell him.

*   *   *

“Hell no.”

“But why?”

“I don't have to explain– Kalim, stop bothering me!”

“I'm not!”

   Jamil's frown told him that yes, he was in fact bothering him but Kalim didn't see things that way. He was just hugging Jamil and hugs weren't a distraction to cooking so he wasn't a bother for real – if he really was, he didn't doubt Jamil would have thrown him out of the kitchen and left him there. Plus, this hug was actually a very advanced method of interrogation (he got it from Floyd), meaning he couldn't let go, or else his plan who'd fail.

“I can't move.”

“That's the point,” Kalim announced proudly, ignoring Jamil clicking his tongue at the words. “I'm not letting you go until you tell me why you don't want to talk to people!”

“You're never letting go of me even if I talk…”

“True!”

   If there was one area where Kalim could win against Jamil, it was stubbornness so he admitted defeat with a sigh, turning down the fire, so the ingredients in the frying pan wouldn't burn. Dinner would be a little late – Kalim’s stomach growled in disappointment – but there were more pressing matters at hand.

   Kalim's question wasn't a particularly hard one to answer in his opinion – “Why don't you do some chatting streams from time to time? People who'd love that” – yet Jamil refused to even entertain the thought, something he didn't quite understand.

“It’s about putting a distance between me and the viewers,” Jamil explained while stirring vegetables, “I don't want them to know anything about me other than the games I play.”

“Why?”

“Of course you’d ask,” Jamil sighed, “you don't understand anything about boundaries in the first place.”

   Unfortunately for Kalim, he couldn’t refute Jamil’s statement and only mumbled a vague “I’m trying” – everything he did was called an invasion of privacy, but Jamil didn’t even seem to mind, so what was the problem? Jamil was the same anyway, but he never changed his attitude so why did Kalim have to? That was unfair (like a lot of things Jamil did).

“I still think it’d be fun… I’m happy people can see how good you are at games, but there’s more to you than that…”

“Like I said–”

“Yeah, yeah, they don’t need to know, got that! But that’s a waste to hide how awesome you are at other things! Like cooking! Did you know some people cook on stream? I’m sure you’d do something amazing! Talking is a no-go,” he said, sounding a little regretful, “but that’d be fine too, right?”

   Still, that was a shame Jamil didn’t really want to talk other than the few times he’d point out something to his viewers and during donation reading. Even before it changed during middle school, Kalim thought his voice had a unique charm to it, a little something that kept Kalim listening to his words even if he didn’t follow or understand them all. If he talked on stream, others would find out about every lilt and intonation of his voice, and there was no doubt in Kalim’s mind that they’d like it – falling for Jamil wasn’t hard in his (very, very, very informed) opinion.

   If possible, he’d want everyone to know how cool Jamil was outside of video games, but it seemed to be a pipe dream (for now as he didn’t intend to back down that easily in the future). Sighing, he rubbed his cheek against Jamil’s hoodie – ignoring his pointed “Stop that and let me finish dinner now” – lamenting the world being deprived of witnessing his boyfriend’s amazingness (all their friends knew about it, but that was only a small part of the wide world) when something clicked inside his mind.

   If his boyfriend refused to share any private moment or thought with his fans and he even had to shut Kalim up in front of their friends to stop him from talking too much about him, that meant the only one who knew every part of Jamil was him… Right? How as a kid, he couldn’t watch Pinocchio because he disliked Jiminy Cricket (still disliked it a lot now), how he once spent a whole day training because Kalim beat him (once) in a race, how delicious his cooking was… The only person who knew all these aspects of him was Kalim. 

   With a satisfied smile, Kalim nodded. “Jamil, I’m really your number one fan.”

“I already knew that,” Jamil stated, his voice flat as he gently pushed Kalim away so he could go back to cooking peacefully.

“I love you more than anyone!”

“What’s wrong with you?”

   Kalim felt a little bit sorry about all the fans who’d never know how cute Jamil was every day – like now as he dodged Kalim’s tackle hug (a dangerous thing to do in a kitchen) – but his number one fan deserved some privilege after all.