Something Complicated

17/09/2022

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How Fish Invaded your Privacy Page
There are many ways to get someone’s attention. One way is through the use of a phone, an ad for weed, or just plain stalking. But none of those methods seem to have any effect on Shiro when it comes to his best friend. He knows exactly what he wants and it takes little effort for him to make it happen. It may take longer than he anticipates in some cases; he doesn’t want Shiro to know about his obsession at all—it’s embarrassing enough being caught checking out his profile and that stupid number. And yet he cannot help but be curious when he sees the number popping up over and over again. If only he had known it was so fascinating to watch him talk on his cell phone with such passion that they would not even notice the number on his screen if he hadn’t been staring intently at their conversation, he might have done this ages ago. However, the number on the screen seems too distracting to be worth wasting time searching for information online instead of asking the guy himself.
He decides that he will approach him one day, when the need arises. It’ll be during lunch break and he won’t even bother to look around because no one else will even be near them at that time. He’ll casually stroll up behind him as he’s eating with Keith, pretending that he wasn’t there the entire lunch period—but he does notice the way he jumps slightly when Shiro touches his arm before taking a seat next to him. It looks like he’s trying really hard to remain calm and collected and Shiro can respect his dedication. His best friend must really care about someone very much. But still, he has other things that interest him and he has plenty of time until he needs to get back into class. The sooner he gets it over with the better and he figures it’d be good to finally meet his new friend as well.
So, as the next day dawns and classes start getting less intense, he sits down in his desk right in front of Shiro’s and makes sure he notices him first. He puts on his biggest smirk and tries not to appear menacing as he asks, “Hey, I don’t think we’ve formally met yet! My name is Lance.”
Shiro stares at him blankly but says nothing and then glances away from him to his lunch, obviously not interested in talking. He doesn’t want to push it any further and it takes him awhile to gather his thoughts before deciding whether he should keep going and risk being ignored or give up on talking to him altogether. After thinking through the pros and cons for a while, he ends up making the decision to stick with his previous tactic; the way to Shiro’s heart is through his stomach, which he supposes is also pretty straightforward considering how hungry he is by now. So, he leans forward, putting his hands on the desk in front of him to make sure he is completely on display, and places his mouth just inches from his ear, saying, “You should come over sometime. You know, when the rest of us aren’t around. We could hang out!”
As soon as Lance finishes his sentence, he realizes he might have gone a bit too far and quickly moves back to his seat in hopes that Shiro hasn’t caught on yet. As expected, Shiro continues ignoring him and goes back to focusing on whatever he was doing before. At least that didn’t change the fact that Lance had made it clear that he wanted a reaction from him—not that he would have ever told him that he had been watching him talk on his phone if he had noticed. Still, that’s the kind of response that Lance needs after he has shown off how attractive he finds him. And, well, Lance has never tried being subtle before, so maybe this isn’t exactly unusual behaviour for him either. Still, he feels a tad bad about it and wants to do something nice for Shiro since he’s so friendly and charming.
It takes another week before he gathers the courage to do something that will truly be surprising to his friends. After one particularly difficult test where the professor called out names in order to answer the questions, everyone decided to go home early and Lance went with him because he didn’t want the exam result to affect Shiro negatively, or at least he hoped that wouldn’t happen. They talked about anything and everything and Lance was delighted when he learned that Shiro was part of the student council at U.A. He knew that it wasn’t possible for two people to attend the same school, but somehow Shiro managed to convince his parents to let him attend the Garrison. It sounded incredible to him that such an awesome person existed outside of the school. That night, though, he couldn’t stop thinking about his encounter with Shiro; he wondered what it would be like to actually have a conversation with him without it ending awkwardly and with the end of their friendship hanging over them. Maybe he should try to find out more.
That evening, Lance spends an hour researching Shiro on Facebook before finding a profile picture he thinks he likes a lot. He spends some time on it looking for comments that might match the ones he sees, but he ends up deleting most of them before hitting send. It’s obvious that Shiro is probably super straight and doesn’t have any interest in boys. Not that he minded but he’d rather have someone who would appreciate his efforts than just anyone—he knows that most boys find the idea of having a boyfriend creepy. Besides, if Shiro doesn’t appreciate the effort then at least he knows it’s sincere. In the meantime, he’s determined to find other ways to make sure that Shiro’s attention will shift towards him instead. He wants him to enjoy his company.
After a few days, Shiro starts asking questions about him. When asked why he keeps following him on social media, he shrugs and answers honestly that it’s because he has fun watching him. He doesn’t mention the part where he’s interested in him or how he found his username. He doesn’t want to scare him away. Even though he thinks he’s gotten the message across well enough by sending Shiro pictures of himself or showing off his latest video, his nerves are getting worse every single day. He keeps waiting for it to be too late and for Shiro to suddenly realize the mistake he’s made.
When Friday arrives, he spends most of his morning pacing around the apartment nervously. It’s ridiculous; he has literally spent hundreds upon hundreds of hours thinking and planning what to say and do. This shouldn’t feel any different from any of the times he has planned conversations with Allura or Keith, and yet it feels so different. He tells himself that he is doing this for the greater good and that this is for Shiro’s own good. He knows deep inside that he just can’t stand seeing his best friend unhappy so he doesn’t even try to pretend to himself that there’s nothing wrong. There just seems to be a lot of pressure involved and he knows that he would be lying to himself if he said that he felt totally fine about it. Nevertheless, it’s a necessary evil.
Lance waits until after dinner to make his move and he doesn’t even bother trying to hide the excitement in his voice. “Guess what?” he says and he waits expectantly for someone to respond, but none of the others reply and he frowns in confusion. Then Keith opens his mouth to speak and he knows that Shiro hasn’t picked up yet.
Before he can start panicking, however, Shiro speaks up.