With the final click of a mouse, you let out a relieved sigh and smiled happily as you leaned back into your chair. Another successfully edited Smosh video ready to upload.
It may seem weird to some to shut down the opportunity you were given to become a full fledged member of the Smosh Squad, but you preferred to keep your position as an editor. It kept you away from constant prying eyes and media vultures, just the way you liked it.
Although past adventures with the Smosh family have taught you to toughen your skin and forget about what other people think of you...many discussions with a therapist gave rhyme and reason to your concern. It gave you the proper validation of your feelings about not wanting to be a full-time internet personality.
Feeling a little tense from sitting in the same spot for so long, you lean back even further into your chair, squeezing your eyes shut and letting out a big yawn while simultaneously stretching your arms as far as they go in hopes for some muscle relaxation.
What you didn't expect to see when you opened your eyes was piercing blues to be staring back at you.
"Jesus Christ!" You squeaked, nearly jumping out of your chair and placing a frantic hand on your beating heart. You take a few seconds before glaring at the man who was currently hunched over with boisterous laughter shaking his body.
"Uncool, Shayne!" You hissed with a twinge of annoyance, said person still laughing at your reaction. You furrowed your brows and puffed your cheeks.
Rolling your chair back over to your desk, you started to close all of your programs, trying your hardest to ignore the presence behind you.
"C'mon, Y/n." Shayne sighs out, catching his breath, "You know that was funny."
You continued to act annoyed while filing away videos and clips until you felt large hands start rubbing your shoulders and creeping their way down to your waist, making you shiver.
Too stubborn for your own good, you fought the blush creeping up your neck and tried your best to ignore the fingers circling around your waist as you continued to work.
"Y/nnnn!" Shayne whined.
It made you break your façade a little, cracking a small smile. He was never good with not having your attention at all times, which was very entertaining to you. You two were like golden retriever and black cat.
Shayne quickly grew frustrated and decided to try a different approach...which was to start shaking you.
You couldn't help but to burst into laughter, "Okay, I get it!" your voice broke between laughs and the shaking came to a halt. You tipped your head up to look at Shayne with a lopsided smile, "I'm sure you saw me at a very attractive angle while I was yawning my face off."
"Every angle I see you from is attractive."
Your face started to burn bright from embarrassment as you halfheartedly pushed his face away, "Kiss ass."
He chuckled a little before grabbing your cheek gently and bringing you into a Spider-Man-esque peck on the lips, making your face feel even warmer.
Ever since Summer Games, it was weird to say the least adjusting to the new atmosphere between you and Shayne.
It was obvious to any outside perspective that it was a sort of puppy love, still in the beginning stages, and to you that was scary. You've only had a few partners prior to this new 'relationship' (you were still unsure if it were seriously official) and the last one you were in took a serious mental toll on you.
If anything, it made you sort of non-committal.
It was scary learning how to trust again. You built up all of these walls, some mental part of your brain creating an impenetrable shield to your heart.
The only person that seemed to wiggle their way around your mental forces was Shayne, and you hoped it would be for the better.
"Hey, are you alright?" Shayne's voice makes your eyes refocus onto his face, and you couldn't help but notice a forehead crease forming. You turned yourself fully around to face him properly and used your thumb as a pathetic attempt to wipe the worry off of his face.
"I'm fine," You reassured, "just thinking."
To at least show you were telling half the truth, you placed a small kiss on his lips.
"My poor virgin eyes!"
The immediate embarrassment you felt hearing those words made you quickly distance yourself from Shayne in every way possible.
"Shut up, Courtney!" You yelled back at her, flustered that she caught you two. Out of everybody it could have been, of course it was her. Your best friend somehow always wound up in your business, and you couldn't seem to hate her for it.
Courtney snickered at your reaction as well as at Shayne awkwardly rocking on his feet and scratching the back of his neck, feeling your shared embarrassment while she started to saunter over to your desk.
"If you two are done making out now, I've come here to tell you the meetings about to start." She stated smugly, nudging Shayne's shoulder and wiggling her eyebrows to rub more salt into the wound.
You couldn't help but shove her a little bit, the continuous teasing would never give your cheeks the opportunity to return back to a normal colour.
"We weren't making out!" You hissed quietly, "and I don't remember having to go to a meeting today?"
"Well my little sugar muffin," She starts, pinching at your cheeks to make them even more red. It's like she got a sick satisfaction out of embarrassing you. "it's a surprise meeting just for you!"
You could feel your anxiety spike after hearing those words, "Just for me?"
Oh fuck, we're you about to lose your job? Is office PDA with a coworker too much around here? It's not like you even really participated in that much often, well not in open areas—
"Y/n, you're overthinking it too much. I can see it by the look on your face." Courtney huffed, flicking your forehead in which you reacted to with a small 'ouch!'
"The meeting isn't only for you, I was just kidding." She starts to explain, "It was just a last minute decision to have you attend is all."
You could feel a frown working onto your face."Oh." You stated simply, unsure how to feel about this whole last minute meeting. "What is it for?"
A slightly evil smile started to grow on your best friends face, that little shit.
"I guess you'll just have to come and find out." She shrugged nonchalantly and started to walk away with a small pep in her step. Of course she wouldn't tell you, she loved putting a sense of mystery behind her words because she knew you were nosy (un admittedly, of course).
"Damn it, Court." You whispered under your breath already feeling defeated in the fact she knew you too well. Even though you really did not want to go to this meeting, you would now.
"Well," Shayne piped in awkwardly, which almost made you jump because you totally forgot he was even there. "I guess we should go now."
You let out a sigh. "Yeah, I guess so." you said, overpowered by the past words of Courtney. Before leaving with Shayne, you turned toward the computer and took your time closing all of the programs in hopes to bring your mind to some sort of ease.
After it was all said and done, you stood up and quietly linked your pinkie finger with Shayne's, dejectedly making your ways to the meeting room.
***
"You want me to be in another Smosh Games?"
"Listen, I know last year was rough—"
"You could say that again—"
"—But I really feel like you should give it another shot! You can't lie and say you didn't have a good time last year."
You couldn't help but roll your eyes at Ian. The meeting just so happened to be about discussing the upcoming Smosh Games and sneakily throwing in the part where you would be invited to make the teams even, again.
You were getting serious déjà vu.
"Ian you can't be serious. I literally went to therapy because of the last one." You joked dryly. Even if it was a little distasteful, it was true.
"Well...yeah..." you could hear the awkwardness in the brunettes voice, "but I'm assuming your therapist helped you push past the whole social media thing, right? Or at least helped you come up with some coping mechanism?"
A sigh escaped your lips, "Yes she did..." you answered bitterly. You still weren't seeing what he was getting at or where he was trying to go with this, but you didn't like it one bit and you wouldn't be giving in that easily.
"If I can recall, you did say you would participate this year." Courtney butted in. You glared at her with no real menace behind your eyes.
Of course your words would come and bite you in the ass. You do remember saying that you would gladly participate in another Smosh Games...but in hindsight, it was on a whim. You thought that if you didn't say that, you wouldn't continue to have a job...you were a stupid people pleaser.
You knew Courtney didn't have evil intentions with what she said and she was only trying to help. But, having her two cents would eventually make you cave because she knew how to make you feel safe with big decisions. Which for right now, you did not want.
Thick fingers weaving into your small thin ones pulled you out of your spiralling thoughts.
Your head sheepishly lifts from looking at the table to look at Shayne, and he wore barely a smile. "If you really don't want to do this Y/n, you don't have to." His thumb rubbed against your hand with reassurance.
Gratefulness spread through your heart and your anxieties started to slowly wash away. You appreciated that he was understanding where you were coming from and that he was learning your social cues about certain situations. It made your heart ache.
"Yeah, Y/n. I'm sorry if I was making it seem mandatory, but it is completely your decision if you would like to be the one participating or if we have to pick another co-worker." Ian reassures.
The soft feeling of the thumb rubbing against your hand keeps you grounded while you thought about your options.
Of course your crippling fear of being basically cyber bullied again was very prominent, but you also had major FOMO.
Ian was right, you did actually enjoy the majority of the trip and the more you thought about it, you didn't know how you would survive a couple of months without all of your friends to spend time with.
You can't live in fear forever, Y/n.
Well, you guessed it would be no better time to put your coping mechanisms to good use.
Sighing defeatedly, you squeezed Shayne's hand softly and put on a brave face.
"Okay, let's do it."
***
A/n
Hey everybody!
Before we actually get the plot rolling I would like to say that even though the desc. says sequel this can also be read standalone. I would also like to address the timeline of Summer and Winter Games! I am fully aware that this season of winter games is technically before summer games camp but logically for the story it would not make sense to replace Boze! Oh yes and Anthony will be in this my little baby girl. alright enough of me repeating myself enjoy the story muahaah :>
(Will probably have slow updates)
(Will most definitely not be edited to fix spelling mistakes so if you see something wrong no you didn't)