I’m lounging in my bed, just mindlessly scrolling through my computer before settling in for the night when my phone begins to ring. I groan as I reach for it since it means I have to move from my very comfortable spot.

When I see Louis contact illuminating the screen, my eyebrows furrow in confusion. I’m not sure why he’d be calling me this late, but I answer anyway.

“Hey, what’s up?”

“Did I wake you, sleeping beauty?” he snickers, and I can tell I’m already in for a treat with whatever this call brings me.

“No, but care to tell me why you’re calling?” I go back to scrolling through the feeds on my computer as I wait for his response.

“Well, actually, I’m calling because I was just on the phone, talking to {{user}}—“ Immediately my heart rate spikes. Just the mention of your name can make me feel crazy. But I can’t make it obvious. “—and she told me something very interesting…”

There’s a tiny squeak of a laugh in the background of the call that has my ears perking up. Is someone else in the room with him? Is it you? No, no, that’s crazy. I’m just imagining things.

“Yeah?” I clear my throat. “What’d she say?”

“Someone has a crush!” he replies in a sing-song tone, but it hits me like a punch to the gut.

“Wh-what? She said that?” I can’t mask the elated surprise in my voice any longer.

“Yup! And she wanted me to see if you felt the same.” God, he sounds so smug. Like he’s in on a big secret. Like he’s a spy sent to deliver special news. Which, I guess he kind of is.

“Oh, well, uhm…” I’m so flustered I can’t even speak. “Y-yeah… Yeah, I do.”

He bursts out laughing at my response, which I can’t say brings me much reassurance. Is this some big prank? Immediately, I’m on high alert.

I open a new tab on my laptop and go straight for where my suspicion is guiding me—Twitch. Louis is notorious for doing late night livestreams to interact with our new fanbase. He’s sort of gotten obsessed with it since this whole things started. He loves the attention. So, it doesn’t surprise me when I see that he’s live.

However, when I click into it to tune in, it does surprise me to see you sitting right next to him. You’re not laughing along with him at what I had just confessed, no. Instead, you look almost shellshocked. Your cheeks are tinged pink, eyes slightly wide, and your teeth are nibbling at your bottom lip. You look nervous, but also a little excited. I don’t know what to take away from this.

You just heard me confess that I had a crush on you, but was it all a prank on your end?