It was so incredibly hot in Ranboo's basement. It was almost as if he lived inside the sun and not some suburban middle-class unfinished basement. The little windows by the ceiling did nothing to ease the stifling heat, if not making it worse. The poster lined walls were sticky with humidity, the air thicker than Tubbo's accent. It was a terrible space, but Ranboo refused to change it.
And despite all of that, there they sat.
On Ranboo's messy bed, in that disgustingly warm room. Tubbo was sweating even more than his best friend, adjusting his shirt collar as Ranboo spoke excitedly about the new record he had bought.
"It's vintage, Tubbo!" He insisted, carefully placing the vinyl on his bed, the black covers contrasting the vivid artwork. The smaller one laughed.
"Its barely ten years old, what do you mean vintage, big man?" He teased, to Ranboo's annoyance. "I'm surprised it hasn't melted yet, your room is hot as fuck."
"You know me, I like it warm," He replied defensively. "It's not even that hot, you're being dramatic."
"I am not," Tubbo groaned. "Nothing is hotter than this basement, I swear. Invest in an air conditioner."
"I'm not changing my comfortable room to fit your standards, Tubbo," Ranboo shot back, wrapping himself in a blanket.
"Are you a lizard, goddamn," He snickered, tugging at the fabric that Ranboo had pulled around himself tightly. "It's unhealthy to live in a sauna, you know."
The argument continued like that, for much longer than necessary. Tubbo insisted that Ranboo's room was disgusting and Ranboo defended his right to live in a hotbox at all times. It wasn't a new conversation by any means. Tubbo had complained about the basement since he'd first stayed over, half a decade ago.
Not much had changed since the boys were twelve. Five years later, Tubbo was still a neat freak and Ranboo a whirlwind of grime. A match made in heaven, they had joked. But it was unfortunately true. Ranboo's room alone was littered with discarded food wrappers, paper, and various pencils and charcoal. If Tubbo hadn't known better, he would have thought that the charcoal stains on the walls were a product of demons trying to escape.
"I really wish you'd clean those," Tubbo commented, gesturing at the grey handprints.
"They give the walls character, don't be like that," Ranboo replied, smiling at a patch of prints. He had a tradition with those handprints. Every time he or someone he loved did something that he wanted to remember, he would coat his hand in his drawing charcoal and press it against his wall. He wouldn't write anything beside it, but when he looked at them, he knew what each meant.
"Why couldn't you have printed them on a book or something?" Tubbo asked, shuffling across Ranboo's bed to touch one, brushing his fingers over the long settled coal dust. Ranboo sat beside him, touching the same one. "When we leave, you can't take them with you."
"I know," He said, briefly brushing against Tubbo's hand. "I hate it here as much as you, you know that. I just..." He trailed off, stopping his movements before turning over and laying down, staring at the ceiling. Tubbo stayed where he was, thinking.
The pair had met on the first day of middle school, planning their escape from this town they hated on the second. It wasn't the people, or their friends, or their parents that made it insufferable. But only the feeling of incompleteness. That feeling that only comes from living in the same town, the same house for your entire life. From that very first day, they knew that they were in it together forever.
