the best of unexpected ~ a kozume kenma fanfic

youtube/streams

yeah, believe it or not, i was the one who convinced him to start youtube and streaming.

i pretty much had no idea what gamer youtube and twitch streams were, but i occasionally caught kenma watching and studying them so that he could improve his skills.

the first time i saw him watching them, i kneeled behind him on the floor and peered over his shoulder. when i saw the unfamiliar video onscreen, i asked him what it was. "oh. it's just another gamer playing league. you wouldn't like it." he responded, nonchalantly.

"people record themselves gaming and put it on the internet?" i said in wonder. "that's pretty smart. do these kinda videos get a lot of views?"

kenma shrugged and picked at the edge of his phone. "well, the popular ones do. and you're only popular if you're actually good and uh, likeable."

i made a noise of agreement and continued to watch his screen with him, placing my chin on the top of his head. we both chuckled a little at the jokes the gamer made and flinched when they died onscreen.

when the video was over, i placed my hands on ken's shoulders to stop him from clicking on another video. "wait. ken."

he stopped and made a mlrph sound as i sandwiched his cheeks with both my hands to tilt his head up and catch my gaze upside down. "naaani..." he whined a little.

"why don't you try it?" i asked, completely serious. his eyes went wide, but then he frowned and looked away. "well. i don't know." he mumbled.

i let go of his cheeks and moved in front of him, bending down to his face. "what do you mean you don't know? you're good at video games, and you're plenty likeable." i listed off my fingers. "you'd be super popular." i said, smiling as i tilted my head at him.

kenma still wouldn't meet my eyes as he scratched his fingers a little. "i'm not likeable." he said. "i can barely talk to one person in person, how can i talk to so many people, maybe even hundreds of people? and online? it's super different." he shrugged. "i wouldn't be good at it."

"you don't know that."

the tone of her voice surprised me a little, and i turned my head up so i could look at her. "you don't know that," she repeated. "you won't know anything until you try it. what if you're actually really good at it? you never thought you'd be good at volleyball until you tried it, right? what if it's like that for this too?"

her eyes were sharp and dead serious as she leaned in closer to my face.

"try it. i really, really think you should."

her words hit me harder than i expected it to. so... i did. i tried it.

looking back, i wished i'd gotten kenma into streaming/youtube way way earlier. with how much he enjoyed it, and how he gained popularity and followers so quickly, it made me so happy. it was interesting to see my boyfriend so immersed in something other than his own video games and occasionally volleyball.

he was finally able integrate his favorite thing to do into something more fun for other people, and it helped him become slightly more social too. and confident, since he was never really given the opportunity to get attention.

now every time he streams or is shooting a video, i'll have to be careful to not get into the shots, since we had both decided to keep our relationship secret, especially once he got bigger and bigger every week.

i kind of regretted asking her to keep it secret. i wanted to show her off, to everyone. to the whole world, i wanted to tell everyone she was mine. that i was so lucky enough to have... her.

streaming was good. it gave him more of a sense of purpose to video games, if that made sense. and also it meant i could hear him talk more and more, and be happy for him. the only downside was since he was getting so popular, and since my boyfriend is naturally very pretty, girls started hitting on him online. it made me mad, and it amused kenma immensely. 

but other than that, i enjoyed and supported kenma's online presence as much as i could.