Chapter Text
"My blood runs cold, my thoughts are plasmic
From not letting go
And letting go could be orgasmic
But I guess I wouldn't know"
-Wet, Dazey and the Scouts
Aaron had been pissed off all day, between having to deal with Andrew bringing his freaky ass boyfriend home, and dealing with people at school, he was ready to just lock himself away in his room. Coming home and finally being able to come down.
The first thing he always did once he got home was lock his door, and go over to his computer. He can hear Andrew and Neil walk off to Andrew's room, Aaron tries his best to ignore the many implications of that. And he quickly goes over to his desk, seeing his gaming setup he's spent so much money on, and having to move cans, monster and redbull cans, around to make his desk more neat.
He quickly opens up discord and checks his notifications. Seeing many from the servers he's in, from his friends he plays games with, but there's one in particular he's looking for. Kevin's. He sees he has many notifications from Kevin.
2 notifications from BlameItOnMy🧬
BlameItOnMy🧬: Look at this new article I found on weight loss, thought you'd be interested in it as well.
BlameItOnMy🧬: Also, check out this new BP edit I made
Aaron had met Kevin in a looksmaxxing discord server. While Kevin focused mainly on his looks overall and apparently succeeded, Aaron knew his height completely bombed any attempt at progress, and the fact that no matter how much he worked out, he still had a stubborn amount of fat stick on him. Nicky had "lovingly" called it baby fat that would go away.
But here he is, 18 and a senior in highschool, not because he failed but because of his late birthday, and the weight is still there. He'd complained about it before to Kevin and now Kevin is taking it upon himself to help Aaron's journey along. They've been talking online for 3 years. Calling too. But never with webcams.
Kevin has helped Aaron through so much, while also being the only person he can share his actual thoughts and feelings with.
Aaron and Kevin have never shown each other what they look like, besides Kevin's occasional pic he sends of him standing on a scale(which include his feet in the picture), he doesn't know what Kevin looks like at all. And Kevin doesn't know what he looks like.
After watching the edit, which Aaron had liked and reposted, he responded to Kevin.
From MSIFAN to BlameItOnMy🧬:
MSIFAN: You won't believe how shitty my day today was. First these annoying fucking guys in my homeroom were bragging about all these girls they were sleeping with, and one of them mentioned this girl I've been trying to talk to. Like fuck my fucking life.
MSIFAN: Also, cool edit. Told you they'd get better
With nothing else left to do besides wait for his response, Aaron loads up a match of COD and waits for that notification ping to finally go off.
It doesn't take long for Kevin to respond, it never does.
2 notifications from BlameItOnMy🧬
BlameItOnMy🧬: Just take all that anger and put it into your workouts dude. No point in being upset over it now, all you can do is move on.
BlameItOnMy🧬: I am sorry though. If it makes you feel any better, the person I liked started dating my best friend.
MSIFAN: kek that does make me feel a little bit better. How did that even happen. This the friend you told me about?
BlameItOnMy🧬: Yes, it's the one I told you about. I had introduced them to each other, since we all play exy. They had already known of each other, but I introduced them. And I found out they had been hanging out without me and behind my back. Now they're dating.
MSIFAN: I'd be pissed. From what you described, you sound much better than them anyways. Don't think too hard about it, some people just don't realize what they've got
And that sentiment is beyond true. People just don't realize what they have. Aaron has always been made to feel inadequate. First from his mom, then the rest of his family, and now people his age. He's always felt like the last choice, or like he's second to Andrew. Like the worst version of Andrew, which is something Andrew and Andrew's boyfriend love making jokes about.
Aaron tries to ignore it. But he's 18 and he's never had a girlfriend. Never kissed a girl. Never had sex with a girl. He's never even hugged or held hands with a girl. He feels doomed. He's told Kevin about this, all he tells Aaron is that Aaron still has a lot of time for that to happen.
Aaron doesn't think it'll happen ever, he feels doomed. Girls aren't attracted to him. People online joke and tell him that because of his height, he's either got to be gay, or take the pink pill. He instantly gets called a sub-5 in all looksmaxxing communities if he says his height.
Kevin doesn't know his height though, he's purposefully kept most things about himself vague. Only mentioning that he was below average height, not how much below. He doesn't want the other man to see him as lesser, doesn't know why he cares but looking at the community both of them are in, he's wary of the other man's reaction.
He's probably worried about it because he looks up to Kevin.
1 notification from BlameItOnMy🧬:
BlameItOnMy🧬: Do you want to call tonight? Have a game I want to show you
MSIFAN: yeah, I just need to wait till I'm sure Andrew and his weird ass boyfriend are asleep.
BlameItOnMy🧬: I'll wait up
Like usual, the talked the whole night. Aaron fell asleep while on the call with Kevin.
When Aaron woke back up, Kevin had still been in the call. Also asleep.
***
Aaron stayed in his room for as long as he could, so long in fact that Nicky had to come knock on his door and force him to come down for breakfast. Finding Neil and Andrew already there eating. Neil annoyingly talking about some game, and Andrew listening with a blank face while tearing his food into small pieces.
Lately Aaron had been hating that they eat as a family. In the beginning when he moved in here, he disliked it just because he wasn't used to it, him and Tilda definitely didn't ever eat together, except on very rare occasions.
Now he hates it because it feels like a trap everytime he sits down to eat with them. Like he's being judged.
He's been watching his weight, trying to cut back on most things. He's mostly been doing this by not eating as much as he probably should. And what he does eat, is low in everything and not a big portion. He knows everyone knows what he's doing. They haven't said anything but he can feel them watching him.
Neil always looks like he wants to say something, but he doesn't, it's probably a sore topic with Andrew.
This is another thing Kevin doesn't know, he knows Kevin does the exact same thing, to a worse extent, but if Kevin knew Aaron was doing it, Kevin would try to talk him out of it.
And Aaron wasn't gonna stop. He'd get down to his goal weight and then he'd allow himself to eat more, while also working out more, he'd try to maintain that weight, or a weight around it.
He's just thankful, kind of, that no one else is saying anything about it.
So when he finally sits down and starts putting stuff on his plate, he can feels eyes on him, but no one stops their conversation. Despite the embarrassment and shame he feels, he gets his usual amount.
"So Aaron, I heard you up talking last night! Talking to someone we don't know about?"
He hears Neil let out a snort and he sees how Andrew instantly becomes a little interested in this conversation, it's a small difference from his usual blank look, but it is hard to notice unless you really look for it.
"No, just talking to my friend"
"A girlfriend?"
Neil snorts again and looks down at his plate, avoiding eye contact with anyone, as if even just looking at anyone will make him laugh.
"No Nicky. Not a girlfriend. A friend. A friend who is a guy"
"Oh, well I was just curious, I walked past your door last night and heard you laughing and talking about something"
"He was showing me a new game he bought. It's no big deal"
"Hmm alright"
But Nicky didn't sound convinced. If anything, the eating problem seems to have put Aaron into the spotlight and now everyone's paying attention to everything he does.
Aaron spends the rest of the meal purposefully ignoring everyone and not joining in on the conversation. Pushing his food around, picking pieces up just to set it back down, and taking a small bite every so often. Just to end up leaving the table before even finishing half of his plate. He can feel their eyes on him as he leaves.
School wasn't any better than at home. Because of his few friends and all the pressure put on him. He was constantly made fun of by his friends for not having a girlfriend and for being a virgin, he had accidentally told that to one of them once while he was high a couple years ago.
His friends made it their personal mission to try and set him up with someone but the dates always went horribly, no matter what. Mostly because his friends almost always never told the girls what to expect when they saw him. So when they showed up, they were almost always disappointed. Some coming out and saying he wasn't what they expected, and some saying it in harsher words.
Every single date he went on was like a humiliation ritual. And when he would come home from the failed dates, he'd lock himself in his room and try to forget about everything, and try to ignore the thoughts in his head telling him that the girls probably told their friends about the failed date.
Worse was the fact he knew everyone else in the house also knew about it. Andrew was the only one who never mentioned it. Aaron had a feeling that Andrew didn't say anything about it because Andrew was a firm believer that Aaron should be focusing on his future instead of a relationship, since Andrew wanted to see Aaron succeed in his dream of becoming a doctor.
Aaron was thankful for Andrew's silence on the matter. But even worse than Neil's shit talking about it, was Nicky's pity. If Aaron had to listen to one more talk about self love, or about all the fish in the sea one more time, he'd go crazy.
He knew Nicky meant well, but each word just felt more embarrassing than the next. But he didn't blame Nicky for trying, since Aaron had never exactly told anyone before about how horrible it constantly made him feel.
Well, no one except Kevin. But Kevin never judged him and he certainly didn't pity him. He was blunt and always offered his view of things. Which is something Aaron appreciated about Kevin. Kevin never sugarcoated things.
***
All of this just to say, that Aaron had once again went on another date after school that day. One that went just about as well as others. Aaron had a feeling his friends were now just doing this on purpose for entertainment.
Aaron felt miserable, he felt disgusting. He had put on a good outfit, did his hair and practiced a nice smile in the mirror before going.
All of that, just for his height to be mentioned not even 5 minutes into the date. The girl had obviously been disappointed. Though she never outright said anything demeaning. Just saying his height was unexpected to her. He knew as soon as she said that, the date was basically over from there.
He walks straight pass Nicky, Andrew, and Neil all sitting on the couch and stomps his way to his room. Hearing Nicky call after him. He doesn't respond and just locks himself away in his room.
Over this. Over all of it.
Aaron just dropped down in his gaming chair and quickly went onto discord. Ignoring all the notifications from his severs and going straight over to Kevin's DM's.
From MSIFAN to BlameItOnMy🧬
MSIFAN: went on another date today. Went as it usually did. I don't even know why I try anymore.
BlameItOnMy🧬: Giving up just proves them right, Aaron. All your work would have been for nothing if you give up.
MSIFAN: I know. I'm just so tired of this. I don't even understand why it's like this. I'm not that ugly. It's just my height.
BlameItOnMy🧬: Is it that bad?
Aaron hesitated before responding. He didn't know if he wanted to tell Kevin the actual truth. It was beyond embarrassing but also because he didn't want the other man to lose any respect for him. If he even had respect for him at this point.
Aaron knew others saw him as pathetic.
He quickly sent off a message telling Kevin his actual height and then set his status to offline and DND. He'll check Kevin's response when he's not still upset. He's too stressed out to see whether the other man will make fun of him or not.
***
The next morning when he checks his notifications, he sees Kevin hadn't responded to his message saying his actual height.
Time passed, days passed, and Kevin hadn't mentioned it again. Choosing to ignore it and not mention it. Aaron decided he preferred this over Kevin making a big deal of it.
After months of normalcy he comes home from school to a message notification from Kevin.
1 notification from BlameItOnMy🧬
BlameItOnMy🧬: You live in Columbia, right?
MSIFAN: yes, why?
BlameItOnMy🧬: my team is traveling to Columbia for a game
MSIFAN: oh that's cool. Did you want recs for where to go or something?
BlameItOnMy🧬: No I want to meetup in person
Aaron just stared at the screen. His fingers tapping nervously against his keyboard. Trying to come up with something.
A small miracle was granted to him in the form of him being called for dinner. Something that would usually make him upset, but was now a good distraction.
He hurries to dinner
***
Like usual he gets the smallest amount he could, ignoring the others looking at him and he sits down.
"Why is your face red?" Andrew says as soon as he sees Aaron.
"No reason. Just leave me alone"
"Giving romance another go?" Neil snorts out.
"No, my online friend was just telling me he's gonna be in Columbia for an exy game"
"Oh, the same friend you talked about last time?" Nicky said, suddenly interested for some reason.
"Yeah, he wanted to meetup" Aaron says, pushing his food around some more.
He can feel all three of them looking at him, Neils eyebrow raised with a smirk on his face. "Give up on trying to date women?"
Instantly Aaron's okayish mood was ruined. The small amount of food he had ate now felt like it'd try making it's way back up. "Fuck off" Aaron says angrily, slamming his hand down on the table, grabbing his plate and storming out of the kitchen. His nerves too fucked to deal with this right now.
***
After eating, he quickly washes his plate and then basically runs back to his room. Locking the door then going straight to his computer.
Finding 2 new notifications.
With a shaky breath he decides to respond.
2 new notification from BlameItOnMy🧬
BlameItOnMy🧬: no pressure though. I can meet up any time between the 16th-19th
BlameItOnMy🧬: I know this is short notice, but still.
MSIFAN: okay. I know some places we could meetup.
BlameItOnMy🧬: want to call?
MSIFAN: give me a second to get set up.
"so what suddenly made you want to meetup?"
"Just thinking about how convenient it is I'll be traveling to where you live. You know, if you really don't want to, we don't have to"
"I know. And I do want to. I'm just...."
"Don't worry, I get what you mean. It's a lot of pressure. We've known each other for 3 years. And we've never seen what each other look like"
"Do you think it'd be better if we did face reveals before we met?"
"It'd probably make things easier. But I think not doing it would make things more interesting"
"Maybe you're right..."
"Stop thinking too much about it. You always worry too much"
*
*
*
Once again, like most nights, the call continued all night. There's just no one who got Aaron more than Kevin did.
It doesn't matter what Nicky, Andrew, or Neil thinks. Him and Kevin are great friends. And he's not gonna let their jokes spoil his time with Kevin.
He has just a couple weeks to try and prepare himself for what may be the end of their friendship.
***
The weeks go by too quickly, and he's now sitting at the dinner tabel, the day before he's meeting up with Kevin.
He can't even pretend to be interested in the food. It's the 15th, he's gonna be meeting up with Kevin tomorrow on the 16th at 12:00. And if all goes good, Aaron is gonna ask to hangout more with Kevin for all the days he's free, or at least for one more day until he has to leave again.
"You look pale"
"It's nothing Nicky, leave it alone"
"Why are you so stressed? Is something wrong"
"No I'm just... I'm going out tomorrow"
"On a date?"
"No, with a friend. We're going to a museum"
"That sounds like a date"
"Well it's not. I don't want to talk about this anymore" Aaron is done with this conversation, not wanting to give too much information away. He just goes back to picking at his food.
Once it feels like he's been sitting there long enough, listening to Nicky talk, he decides he's done eating, even though he didn't take a single bite of it. He sees Nicky shoot Andrew a look and Andrew doesn't acknowledge it. Aaron rolls his eyes and just continues leaving the room.
Him and Kevin call again that night. Talking about how nervous they are for tomorrow. They fall asleep on call again.
Today is the day. When Aaron woke up this morning, him and Kevin were still in a call together. Aaron felt a little guilty about having to hang up, since Kevin was still asleep, so he quickly sent him a message explaining it.
Then Aaron spent 2 hours obsessing over his appearance. Before dates he usually takes an extremely long time to get ready because he's always convinced he'll be able to get a girlfriend if he just dresses good enough, but even now, meeting Kevin, the pressure to look good feels higher.
He wants to look good for their first meeting. Doesn't want to disappoint.
So he spends forever getting ready, and then it's 10:00. He has 2 hours to waste time and he spends most of that time freaking out.
***
Before he knows it, it's time to meet up with Kevin. His heart is beating quickly and he feels kind of nauseous.
He's walking to the meeting space, he doesn't have his license. And now he's standing up against the wall waiting for someone who looks approximately like Kevin's description of himself. He's picking at his fingers and rocking slightly back and forth. Extremely nervous.
That's finally when he spots him. Tall, dark hair, built, athletic looking and great skin. He looks so....
Aaron wants to turn around and run straight home as soon as he sees him. Wants to leave right then and there. But because the world hates him, as soon as he goes to leave, Kevin notices and pauses for a second in his stride. Before walking towards him.
Kevin doesn't stop walking until he's standing right in front of him. Looking down at him, Aaron looking up. "Aaron?"
Aaron just nods in response. He can feel Kevin's eyes looking over him.
"You look different than I expected" Aaron feels his heart sink. He's heard that many many times before.
"Yeah I know. You look different than I expected too."
"Are you ready to go in?" Hmm? Aaron had expected Kevin to just walk away after seeing him.
"Yeah I'm ready"
***
The next couple of hours could only be described in a couple words, tense, insightful, and calming somehow. The act itself was calming, but there seemed to be some tension between him and Kevin. Not exactly unknown tension, there always seemed to be tension coming off of Kevin, but Aaron was just happy Kevin wasn't acting any different than he did online.
He was still such a know-it-all. Aaron appreciated it. He appreciated listening to Kevin randomly start talking about stuff they saw at the museum.
He appreciated Kevin not pointing out anything about his appearance. Everything was going according to plan and it was making Aaron feel warm inside, happy to have such a good friend.
By the end of it, him and Kevin were just walking in comfortable silence. They circled back through Kevin's favorite part again before going outside. Once outside, Kevin turned to him.
"Can we hangout one more time before I leave. I still have 2 free days"
"Yeah we can.."
Kevin makes an awkward facial expression, one that looks like it's attempting to be a smile. Aaron can't help but let out a chuckle at that.
"Bye Kevin" Aaron said, looking up at Kevin who is still standing in his space.
"Bye, Aaron"
"(Why can't you get it up? Why can't you get it up?)
It must be your face
Or it's your body
If it ain't your body, then it must be your face"
- Get It Up, Mindless Self Indulgence