Spencer
His door swung open, slamming the bookcase behind it. He froze for a second before grabbing a fistful of his towel and smushing it over his exposed parts.
“What the hell?” Daisy roared, blazing in, paying zero mind to his state. “Now you’re making fun of me online?”
Spencer sat on the bed in an effort to further protect his honour.
“What are you talking about?” He said, finally stringing words together.
She threw her phone at him, and if not for the fact that he knew she wasn’t trying to break it, he’d have sworn she was aiming at his head. It hit him in the chest. He scrambled for it, comprehension dawning when he saw the video.
“She said we looked good together; I reposted it. What’s wrong with that?”
“Look at the comments.” She bit out.
He scrolled through the comments, giving them a cursory glance, his heart sinking with each comment. He looked up at her.
“Aki pole. I didn’t know…”
She grabbed the phone from his limp hand, her long nails scratching him as she did, then stormed out of the room.
He pulled on a pair of shorts and followed her. Oh fuck. One of his followers had seen them together at a local market, taken a picture and posted it online with a cute caption. He’d liked and shared it. Now people were being so unbelievably mean in the comments, making jokes about how they looked together. Making fun of her big size next to his lanky frame.
How could she think he’d known that would happen? They’d been friends from their first year. They were now in their fourth year, their final semester. How could she think that about him?
He knocked on her door softly, then pushed it open. She stood, pacing.
“I’m sorry, Daisy, for real. I thought it was just a cute post.”
“You boosted it, and now all your incel friends are sharing it.”
He wanted to protest the incel label. None of his friends would be caught dead or alive bullying girls online. He didn’t run with those kinds of guys, not least of all because he always ended up as the brunt of the joke because of how slender he was and how soft his features were. He was a carbon copy of his little sister but for his beard.
“I’ll make a video right now calling them out.”
“No. That’s not what we’re doing.” She walked up to him. “Nope. We’re officially dating.”
“What?”
“It has over 265,000 views, all powered by their fatphobia. We’re going to milk that all the way to the bank.”
“Daisy…”
“What?” She barked.
He stepped back, softening his voice. “I think we should just let it blow over.”
“No. They must pay for this.”
“Daisy…”
She paced about. “I can’t make them pay, but I can make sure they know their hate not only fuels my success, it also gets me paid. Literally.”
“Daisy…”
“No. We’re going to use this. We’ll start a new couple’s channel so we both maintain our own channels.” She nodded. “You want to get to 100,000, right. This is how you get there.”
He sighed. He hadn’t even gotten to 10,000 after two years, and now she was talking about 100,000 subscribers. This was insane.
Daisy met his eyes. “It can work. You know it can.”
He was silent.
“Spencer, tell me you’re not sick of having non-existent followers.”
“I know you want revenge, but this will not affect them.”
“It’s for me; even if they don’t know, I’ll know that their hate is putting money in my bag.”
He rubbed his beard, considering.
“If you won’t do it for yourself, will you do it for me, please?”
He nodded. “Okay.”
How could say no to that?
Daisy
Daisy spent the entire night preparing a detailed content calendar for the next three months. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d pulled an all-nighter where she was not watching movies or a series. Turns out vengeance was the ultimate power source. She was going to show those hateful assholes if it was the last thing she did, she vowed just before passing out at four in the morning.
At nine am, she plopped into one of the uncomfortable chairs at the shared dining area and waited for him to appear. Their other two roommates had already left, presumably for class, but who knew? Daisy and Spencer were done with classes and were supposed to be working on their respective theses.
Daisy stared at Spencer’s door until she’d nearly memorised the grooves and changing shades of brown. If he didn’t show his face in five minutes flat, she was going in. Just as she was getting to her wit’s end, he trudged out, gave her a questioning look and disappeared into the shared bathroom. Five minutes later, he emerged looking alive.
He walked up to her. “What’s up?”
She slid the sheets of paper across the table. “The content calendar. Our content calendar.”
“Slim_Thicc? That’s our channel name?”
“Yeah, Slim,” she pointed at him, “And Thicc, yours truly.”
He skimmed through it. “Daisy, this is insane. We can’t post three times a day.”
“Why not?”
“We have lives.”
“We can sneak in the time. We don’t have classes.”
He turned over the pages. “This is too much, Daisy.”
“We have to hit while the iron is hot, ride the wave while it’s there, you know I’m right.”
“Can we at least start small, with the things we kind of already do so it doesn’t look like we’re doing too much too fast?”
She nodded. “Like what?”
He flipped through the pages. “Movie and product reviews, lip sync battle, the occasional slideshow…”
“We have to have cute couple things. That’s what will get us views.”
“I know, babe. I’m just saying… we need to take things slow so it doesn’t look suspicious.”
“Fine. Don’t call me babe.”
He winked at her. “Noted. We’ll workshop something, sugar.”
She smiled despite herself. “Yeah, no.”
Spencer
3 weeks, 300 subscribers in – professional pictures
Spencer was done. He could not possibly smile one second longer. She’d said the photoshoot would take a maximum of one hour. This was hour four with no end in sight. They’d changed outfits not less than twelve times. She’d changed her hair, her make-up, jewellery, and God knew what else with the outfit changes. Plus, the positions the photographer was putting them in? Joh! Way too much touching and too little distance, if any, between them. Before this, he hadn’t done anything more than hug her for at most 8 seconds per hug; now he’d spent the better part of the afternoon pressed up against her in one way or another. He needed a second to get himself under control.
“Okay, this is the last one.” The photographer announced.
Yes!
“Spencer, I want you to try and kiss her. Daisy, your job is to dodge it.”
Great.
They stepped into position, his arms around her waist, hers around his neck. The music came on, something playful bringing lightness to counter the sudden heavy tension.
She bit her lip and smiled lightly before looking over his shoulder. Her nervousness was reassuring. He laughed softly, his eyes riveted on her lips. “You ready?”
She met his eyes. “I have lots of experience dodging kisses.”
“Not mine.” he went in for the kiss, and she moved with a laugh. Laughter bubbled out of them as they did the song and dance. When the director stopped calling out his supportive instructions and announced it was a wrap, Spencer wanted to protest.
She stepped out of his embrace, and suddenly he wasn’t ready for it to be over.
Three days later, the pictures arrived. He sat on his bed and stared at those final pictures until they started to fade into each other.
Daisy
8 weeks, 1000 subscribers in – movie review
Daisy looked down at Spencer on the couch. He leaned back and spread his legs, creating room for her. She sat and pulled herself up until she was leaning on him, her legs stretched next to his slightly raised one.
She wiggled, trying to make sure she wasn’t putting all her weight on him as she leaned back. “You good?”
“Yeah,” he answered, his soft exhale tickling her ear. He wound his arms around her waist and pulled lightly. “It’s okay. Relax. Lean back.”
Okay. Relax, she silently ordered.
He nodded. “That’s good.”
She held up the camera.
“Hey guys.” She said with a tiny wave.
“Hey,” Spencer said, leaning closer until their heads were touching so they both fit in the frame.
She smiled. “It’s Friday night, which for us means movie night.”
“What are y’all doing this evening?” He asked, the rumble of his chest unexpectedly comforting.
He placed a soft kiss on her exposed shoulder, and she leaned further back into him, exposing more of her neck and shoulder. He did it again, sending tingles throughout her body.
She giggled. “Oh, I know this move, and it’s not going to work on me.”
He laughed close to her ear. “You sure about that, sweetheart?”
“Oh, I’m sure.” She laughed. “We gotta go, guys. Bye.”
She stopped recording and popped off the couch. What was that? She did not feel electricity or whatever that was when they touched.
“So is sweetheart in?” He asked, looking up at her.
“Nope,” she answered, walking to the kitchen to stick her head in the freezer. “Sweetheart is not in.”
Spencer
15 weeks, 3,000 subscribers in – Couples game
They were at an event pitting four social media couples against each other in a raunchy truth or dare game.
Daisy had just lost that round. He squeezed her hand in support.
The host laughed. “The player must sing and dance appropriately to Khia’s My Neck, My back.”
Groans and laughter followed the announcement.
Spencer’s jaw was on the ground. First, Daisy would not be caught dead or alive dancing publicly. Second, calling that song raunchy was the understatement of the year. Third, the internet would never leave her alone if she did.
“Can I do it for her?” He asked.
Her head swiveled to his, her hair shimmering beautifully. He winked at her.
“Whatever works for y’all.” The host said.
He started to stand up, then stopped when she held on to his hand. He bent closer to hear her.
“Thanks,” she said with a kiss to his cheek.
‘You’re welcome, mi amore.”
She shook her head, a smile playing on her lips.
He smiled, then walked off to the stage amidst thunderous applause to embarrass himself for the girl who, with one tiny kiss, had made it more than worth it. He took the microphone and gyrated obscenely, serenading her when it came to the chorus. Around them people laughed, hooting and hollering, but she kept her eyes on his as he crooned, “My neck, my back…”
Daisy
28 weeks, 57,000 subscribers in – Q&A (LIVE)
Daisy’s heart slammed erratically in her chest. More than 80,000 people were on their live. Holy shit. She looked at Spencer. His eyes were trained on the screen, reading through the comments and questions.
“Spencer, what’s one thing Daisy does that makes you figuratively blush?”
He gave her a quick look, then leaned back. He rubbed his beard.
“She does this thing where she rubs my neck almost like I’m a cat.” He laughed softly, looking away from the camera and directly at her. “That shit fucks with me.”
She’d done that exactly one time when they’d had the photoshoot. Daisy remembered the way his breath had hitched. She’d dismissed it, attributing it to exhaustion after the long day of pictures.
The most liked comment was “find you a man that looks at you the way Spencer looks at Daisy”, with a gif of the moment. She’d downloaded it and the many other screenshots, telling herself she was paying attention to their fans.
Spencer
36 weeks, 101,000 subscribers in – GRWM couple’s edition
He met her eyes in the mirror. Who knew purple and gold eyeshadow would make her eyes so arresting?
“Okay, what’s wrong?”
She asked, tossing her makeup brush on the counter that served as her make-up station.
“Nothing.” He murmured, convincing no one.
She turned her seat so she was facing him, her eyes soft with sympathy. He hated it. They, more specifically, he’d been trending for days after he’d said men were the problem in one of their lives. It had been an off-hand comment that someone had clipped and run with, and now they were calling him, among other things a self-hating sell-out simp. Every other video seemed to be about how she was controlling him, and he was letting her. Videos of him dancing the raunchy song were cited as exhibit A.
“Remember what you told me when it was me? You said it would pass, and it did. You just need to ride it out until the next thing catches their attention.”
“Yeah, except you didn’t listen; instead, you dragged us into this convoluted vendetta.”
“Are you seriously going to sit there and pretend this has been bad for you? You didn’t say a single word when the money was flying into your account, but now that you’re facing a little hate, it’s the convoluted vendetta I forced you into?”
Tense silence filled her small room.
“Daisy, I-”
“Don’t say you want to quit. Say anything but that.”
How had she figured it out so fast? He’d been thinking about it for weeks, had in fact only stayed on for her. Her updated content calendar covered the following six months, and the thought of disappointing her was all that kept him going.
“You can’t quit because of this. You can use it to benefit you. I mean, come on, you’ve seen the comments about me on every single video. If I let them run me off, I’d have quit after the first video.”
His heart sank. She wasn’t exaggerating. The hateful comments about her body were unrelenting.
He shook his head, his voice a murmur. “It’s not just that.”
She matched his tone. “Then what?”
“I can’t… I don’t want…” He rubbed his hands through his hair. “I like you, okay? And I don’t want to pretend I don’t or pretend I do… or whatever. I just want to like you for real. Because I do, Daisy. I like you.”
She buried her face in her hands.
Okay. His heart shattered. So, he was alone in this, as he’d feared.
“It’s okay if you don’t… if you are not there. It’s fine. It’s totally fine. I promise.”
“I like you, too.”
His heart soared, then came crashing down. “You don’t have to say that. We can finish the rest of the calendar. We’ll do what we’ve been doing; it’s fine. I’m not going to leave you hanging, I promise…”
She stomped up to him. “You seriously think I’d say that just to get you to stay on the channel? Is that really what you think of me?”
“No,” he said, standing up.
“It is-” she interrupted.
“No, I just…” He took one step closer so he was right in her space. He lightly lifted her chin so he could look into her eyes. “I thought it was just me catching feelings.”
“I like you, Spencer.” She smiled. “I’ve liked you since you danced my neck and my back for me, and it’s only grown since.”
He laughed and laid his head on her shoulder, hiding his embarrassment. “That is the cringiest thing I have ever done.”
“It’s the sexiest thing you’ve ever done.”
“So, embarrassing myself does it for you?” He asked, pulling back to look into her eyes.
“Embarrassing yourself for me.” She corrected.
“I hate all the lying. I just… I want something real, with you.”
“So you’re saying you don’t want to do couple’s content anymore?”
“Did you ever think we’d get to 100k? Tell the truth.”
She shook her head. “Nope.”
“We don’t have to scrap it, but can we at least slow down and keep it honest?”
“Yeah. Heck, we can take some time off, first figure out what this is and then decide.”
“I like that; it protects us from the haters just a little bit.”
She nodded. “Fuck the haters.”
He laughed. “Fuck the haters.”
They stood in the kitchen warming the rice and beans they were going to have for dinner.
Spencer laughed, piercing the comfortable silence.
“What?” Daisy asked, turning to look at him.
“I can’t believe this is happening. I’ve been crushing on you since that photoshoot, and I was so sure I was alone in this.”
“That photoshoot was hot.”
He drew her into his arms. “You’re hot.”
She draped her arms around his neck just as she had during the photoshoot, his arms around her waist.
He leaned in close, her breath indistinguishable from his. Everything about her intoxicated him, from the flare of her nostrils to the lavender scent that seemed to float around her like a cloud. “Don’t dodge.”
She laughed, and he used her distraction to go in for the kiss. He could taste the lingering mirth, the growing desire as she took his lips in hers, her grip on him loosening as she moved to that spot behind his head and caressed lightly.
He pulled back to catch his breath.
“Jesus, Daisy.”
She laughed. “Yeah, not that one either.”
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