After hesitating for a moment, Kyle finally stepped over the threshold.
He walked deeper into the room and stopped near the middle. Turning back, he shifted awkwardly from one foot to the other and glanced briefly at his guest. Predictably, he immediately met the direct gaze of blue eyes. And for some reason, it felt like Darren wasn't looking at the room at all.
More like… at him.
Unable to hold that open, too-steady stare, Kyle quickly dropped his eyes to the floor. One hand immediately closed around the other forearm, fingers rubbing nervously at the skin.
He cleared his throat.
"…well," he mumbled without looking up, "welcome to my humble abode."
Only then did Darren finally look around properly.
The dark graphite walls were crowded with bright posters, a long shelf along one side stuffed with books, manga, and comics, while the bed looked so crookedly made it was obvious someone had tried to fix it at the last second.
Another world entirely. After the marble, pale wood, and almost sterile perfection of the rest of the house, everything here felt alive, messy, real. Slightly hidden from other people's eyes. Slightly too personal.
Kyle shifted his weight again.
"You listen to Twenty One Pilots?" Darren asked, glancing from a poster back to him.
"Mhm," Kyle answered shortly.
"Me too."
Kyle finally looked up. For the first time since Darren had arrived, something close to genuine interest flickered in his eyes.
"Really?"
Darren nodded.
"Leave the City."
"What?"
"My favorite song," Darren explained with a small smile. "Leave the City. What's yours?"
Kyle froze.
"…same," he answered quietly.
Some of the tension finally loosened from his shoulders. His arms dropped to his sides.
Darren slowly scanned the room once more.
"So where can I sit?"
Kyle gave a short nod toward a small armchair beside the bed.
Once Darren sat down, it felt like Kyle's legs finally came unstuck from the floor. With visible relief, he settled into the chair by his desk and absentmindedly turned on the monitor. The screen instantly lit up with a bright Solo Leveling wallpaper. His desktop was almost empty — no shortcuts, nothing unnecessary.
"Oh," Darren suddenly said.
Kyle flinched and looked back over his shoulder, brows lifting warily.
"Solo Leveling?" Darren nodded toward the screen.
"Yeah… you know it?"
"Yep. Read the manhwa."
Kyle stared at him.
"You read the manhwa? You?"
"Well, yeah," Darren replied calmly. "Twice, actually. I liked it that much." He shrugged lightly. "Never got around to the anime, though. What about you?"
"I watched it."
"And?"
"The manhwa's better."
Darren laughed quietly, and somehow the tension between them eased a little.
"That's what I figured," he said. "Guess it's good I never started it."
"The first season's decent," Kyle added. "I think it's still interesting if you already read it. And the opening's really good."
Drifting into familiar, safe territory, Kyle finally started to relax. Another layer of tension left with a quiet breath.
"Really?" Darren raised a brow. "If you say so, maybe I should watch it after all."
"Mhm," Kyle muttered.
A cautious silence settled between them. If there had been tumbleweed in the room, it probably would've rolled right through.
"Did you read Omniscient Reader?" Darren suddenly asked.
"Obviously," Kyle answered too fast and with far too much emotion, catching himself a beat too late. "It's literally a must-read."
Darren only smiled softly.
"Agreed."
The monitor had long since gone into sleep mode.
Darren kept catching onto things around the room — books, posters, figures, things carelessly left lying around — and asked about everything that caught his eye. Anime, games, rock bands, books. Almost everything Kyle liked, Darren somehow knew too. And not just on a surface level.
"I've rewatched that anime like ten times," Darren said at one point. "Still think it's a masterpiece."
"I don't know," Kyle huffed. "I didn't really like it."
Against all expectations, Darren wasn't as far from Kyle's world as he'd assumed. Not from some other planet. Closer than Kyle could've expected. And for some reason, that unsettled him more than anything else.
Kyle leaned back in his chair, arms folded across his chest, fingers fidgeting against each other now and then. He listened quietly while Darren talked. And whenever Darren asked him something — even when Kyle took longer than normal to form an answer — he never rushed him. Never tried to fill the silence himself.
He just waited.
And somehow, that almost completely eased Kyle's awkwardness.
After a while, Kyle reached toward the shelf and pulled out a volume of the manga they'd been discussing.
Darren's gaze followed the movement of his hand — over the colorful book spines, the empty mugs scattered across the desk, the glowing keyboard — until it finally landed on Kyle's old worn-out mouse.
Its red light blinked weakly, as if stubbornly insisting it was still alive.
Darren leaned forward slightly. The armchair creaked softly as the distance between them shrank, and he looked down at the manga spread open across Kyle's knees.
Kyle could feel Darren's breath against his fingers — barely there, almost weightless against his skin.
Outside, the afternoon sun blazed through the windows, filling the room with heat.
Darren leaned back for a moment, loosened the top button of his shirt, rolled up his sleeves, then leaned closer again.
Lifting his eyes from the page, Kyle first met Darren's gaze.
Then, involuntarily, his eyes drifted lower.
His Adam's apple shifted faintly whenever he spoke. One hand reached forward, long fingers turning the page. Veins stood out slightly more beneath the skin with the movement.
Kyle tracked those details far too closely. For far too long.
He swallowed almost imperceptibly.
"…what about sports?"
The question yanked him out of his thoughts so abruptly he flinched.
Kyle looked sharply at Darren, held his breath for a second, then exhaled slowly through his nose.
"What?"
"Sports," Darren repeated. "You into anything? Football, hockey?"
Kyle shook his head.
"Nah. Not really. I don't get the appeal of watching people physically destroy themselves."
Darren narrowed his eyes slightly, still watching him carefully.
Then asked more quietly:
"Not even boxing?"
"Boxing? I don't—"
Kyle froze.
The image flashed through his head instantly: the black shirt soaked with sweat, sharp movements, muscles tightening beneath skin.
With an expression of practiced indifference, he slowly looked back up at Darren from beneath his bangs.
The smile disappeared from Darren's face.
He leaned even closer. Barely — just enough to matter. But now the fingers holding the manga page hovered dangerously close to touching Kyle's.
"You watched it," Darren said calmly.
And before Kyle could answer, he added in an even lower voice:
"So…" his voice lower, his fingers closer, "…what did you think of my story?"
"Your…" Kyle stumbled. "…story…"
He wasn't blinking. His gaze felt glued to Darren's fingers resting against the page.
Heat rushed into his face before he could stop it. His neck burned too. Another second and it would probably reach his ears.
He had absolutely no idea how to react.
What to say.
At some point something inside him short-circuited — motherboard overloaded — and Kyle's expression turned cold and still.
"I watched it," he said.
This time, Darren's fingers twitched almost imperceptibly.
And right then, the vibration of a phone cut through the charged silence between them.
Kyle immediately broke eye contact, yanked the manga away, and grabbed his phone instead.
His fingers trembled slightly as he opened the message.
"Meg's on her way," he said quickly without looking up.
His heart was pounding so hard he could hear the pulse ringing in his ears.