She Even TS'd Me
Now she's gone and TS'd me too? Yushiro, you crazy bitch...
"Wh-what the hell is this, all of a sudden?"
Yu Hyeok stared at the Kketalk Yu Siyoung had sent him, and for a second the shock just sat there.
"Is this what popular people just... do? We're not even dating..."
Turn it over as he might, the situation refused to make sense. Not understanding it, though, wasn't the same as being unable to swallow it. He'd only sent his reply in a vague yeah, sure, I guess that's how it is sort of way.
And then an answer came back that he had not seen coming.
"...?"
"Is that funny?"
"..."
He changed the name in his contacts on the spot, and he didn't forget the screenshot.
"..."
She called that a question? Obviously...
It wasn't just okay. It was a thank-you-so-fucking-much! A junior this cute calling him oppa, and she'd even stuck a heart on the end!
There was no way he could actually send the text sitting in his head, so he let it slide.
"...This doesn't look like I'm hitting on her, right?"
The worry hit him out of nowhere. He had said it because he wanted to get closer, so technically it was him shooting his shot. Still.
Now that he thought about it, Monday was Yushiro's only day off.
"Stream starts at six-thirty, and it's six-ten now... so she must be right in the middle of getting ready."
The text landed at the same moment as the thought.
"Uh..."
Right. She had never once told him that she streamed. As of now, the fact that Yu Siyoung was Yushiro was a secret only he knew.
...How do I cover this?
He worried for a second. The answer wasn't hard.
Sorry, Horang. Gonna drop your name.
He wasn't really sorry. Friends could sell each other's names a little.
...Did I just write that like a total tryhard?
The worry flickered up, and he let it go. Better than blurting out a secret she had never told him in the first place.
Surprisingly, it was real. She might decide he was just seasoning the story, but if anything, thirty was him being generous. Count the little ones and it cleared fifty.
The text arrived right on the heels of that thought. He checked the clock. It was already 6:25.
"She's about to start her stream, though..."
And she'd been texting him right up until then. Yeah. Popular kids really were built different.
He didn't ask when later was. After the stream, obviously.
"Oh."
The stream alert popped at the same time.
"Tonight, then... chicken, and Yushiro's stream."
He tapped the notification, and Pajijik bloomed across the screen.
And with it, a flood of chat.
"Maybe I'll drop one too."
He typed Yuha into the chat box.
"Ah, fuck. Right..."
He still hadn't changed his nick. He went into his Pajijik profile, hit edit, and tapped change nickname without another thought.
"What do I even put?"
What kind of name would actually get him a reputation for changing it well? The pondering didn't last.
"Yeah, this'll do. I can change it later."
When he dropped back into the stream—
"Uh, kiddos~ Hellooo~ It's been so looong~"
What came through was nothing like the Yu Siyoung he knew. This was Yushiro: a voice that purred, soft and drawn out till the ends of the words frayed.
"...Yeah. Being a VTuber really is rough."
Rough enough that you had to retune your whole voice to fit the rig. And if the voices matched, there was always the risk of the red pill slipping out.
"Mmm, me toooo... I missed everyone so much on my day off I was a wreckkk..."
The chat had bristled out of nowhere, so he tried tossing in a line to nudge the mood.
The moment he sent it, Yushiro — to his surprise — actually read his chat out loud.
"Stream every day with no days off, let's gooo... ah, that's a liiittle... heh..."
"Nooo, kiddos... I have to rest toooo... Going to schooool... streaming... do you know how hard it iiis..."
"..."
Into the rush of chat, he added one more.
And once again, Yushiro read him.
"Sooo... on your day off... what do you dooo...? Uh... kiddos, for real... on my day off... I drank!"
"Huh? No, why would you say that...!"
As if to prove his dread right, chat detonated all at once.
"Hmm... a boy~ or a girl~?"
"No, don't do that...!"
He swallowed the urge to fire off a text telling her to stop, right now, and made himself focus on the stream.
"Hahahak! Nooo, why are your reactions so funnyyy?"
"..."
"Hahak! Kiddos~ A girl, a girl! I drank with a girl sunbaeee..."
"Hm?"
For a second he didn't trust his own ears. He was very clearly a man.
"No, kiddos... I said it's a girlll... I drank with a girlll... Like I'd ever drink with a guyyy..."
"No, hold on..."
Now she'd run out of things to do, and she was TS'ing him too.
Yushiro, you crazy bitch....