Chapter Twelve.2: He's Not Shameless

"Keith, I'm Tristan, the president of the club. It's nice to have you here." Tristan smiled radiantly at Keith. This senior wanted to recruit the two from the beginning, but it was hard to approach him, and on the other hand, Drake was uninterested before.

When Keith scrutinized Tristan, he thought that he was someone who would join athletic clubs because of his frame and bright aura. Then he looked back at his boyfriend, who was still held back by a swarm of girls.

"Drake! Here!!! We have to fill these in." Keith ordered him to help him out and leave the maiden flock.

"Oh!!! Okay!" Drake fled, sat beside his boss, and wrote their names and other details.

"May I ask why you're interested in the Drama club?! We're really short on actors. You're a lifesaver!" Tristan raised a question to them straightforwardly.

"I'm interested in filmmaking, and Keith likes writing," Drake replied for them.

"But it would be best if you act, Drake!!!" Mae suggested, which was seconded by others too.

"You write?" Darryl asked Keith, beaming with curiosity.

"Well, I guess you can say that."

"On what platform? I write online. Can you tell me your pen name?" a tall scrawny-looking guy beside Tristan asked. He's called Alex.

Keith forced a smile on him. "I haven't tried writing online yet." And then, he continued filling out the forms while feeling uncomfortable about being crowded.

Drake noticed Keith's uneasiness and noticed the part they had to tick for the roles they wanted to take. Keith's pen was just sticking to the box before 'scriptwriter.' When he looked at his own form, he saw the lists of roles, but he was not familiar with the obligations that come with those titles.

So, he whispered and slightly chuckled, "Keith. You haven't checked that box yet. You're not sure about that? I'm not sure about this either."

"Hmmm?" Keith observed Drake's unmarked paper and figured that his silly normie boyfriend was unfamiliar with the terms yet. "Oh... Tristan, you have workshops, right? Can we join that first before we complete our forms?"

"What a miss. We just finished our workshop last week." Tristan felt dejected, and suddenly cheered up, thinking of a new idea to please the two. "We can just do another workshop for the two of you!"

"Oh. Geez, no need. This club looks so busy. We can't impose it like that." Keith struck a smile again for that uncalled kindness. "Can we just borrow learning materials you have used in the workshop, so we can study it by ourselves?"

"Sure!!!" Tristan pulled a girl in charge of teaching in the workshop and took all the learning materials as fast as possible.

They lay a pile of papers and a hard drive on top of it. "These are a lot, I know! But everything we taught is all in there!" Tristan looked so proud. After all, he was the one who compiled them.

"Thanks."

After a few chats, the two left with the files.

Tristan slumped and stared at the two membership forms in his hands, "Wow!!! I thought Keith Lim was rude and indifferent like what the rumors say, but he's so polite, and he even smiled at me!!!"

"I'm so happy I joined this club!!!" The girl beside him squeaked. She's Dianne. She's a scriptwriter too, and she was one of the girls who wrote fiction inspired by Drake and Keith online. She was so inspired that she did not even bother to change their first names.

"You must have gained a lot of motivation, huh?" Alex read her works. He believes Dianne's writing style is promising, but he doesn't like how perverted her plot can be because there's always sex in every chapter. And it was not just regular sex, but it was straight out of porn kind of sex. It made him wonder where she gets those ideas from.

With her cheeks blushing, she grinned at Alex. "Hell, yeah!"

"Keith is tolerant of boys, but he won't even take a look at girls. He's very suspicious, isn't he?" Mae complained and made suggestive implications as to why Keith was not friendly to girls.

"Of course! Because he's only attracted to Drake!!!" Dianne wildly hit Mae while giggling. "My ship is real, and it's sailing perfectly!!!"

"Oh! God help her. She's going to hell at this point! Not because they're good-looking, they're gay like your imaginations!" Alex told her off but it did not reach her when she's already in dreamland.

Darryl scanned the script in his hand. There are six scriptwriters, and they all submitted their scripts for their short films. He was reviewing Dianne's writing at that time, which was based on Drake and Keith. He can't help but find it so realistic and annoying.

Meanwhile, after class, the two went to Drake's place again, and by the time Tristan went to their classroom to call them along with Darryl, they were already gone.

Keith opened the flash drive in Drake's MacBook while lying on Drake's bed. Drake was cooking rice and chicken at that time. Keith saw that the flash drive was so full. It contains the club's previous short films, scripts, management files, club expenditures, and a folder filled with drafts of Keith and Drake's rated 18 novel… He skimmed through it and felt so nervous and got scared because there were photos and edited videos of them too. He copied the folder immediately. In those drafts, every chapter, there was a chapter number and title and a note below it— written by: Keith's_Booty.

Keith immediately opened the browser and went to all the writing platforms he knew to search for the pen name. Two out of seven sites showed results, and all of her works at those sites have their pictures. Her profile page has so many pictures of them. She's followed by ten thousand readers, and her works have hundreds of thousands of views. From her profile, Keith saw her social media accounts. When he viewed it one by one, there it was… he found a group page of people shipping them with more than a thousand members.

His head hurt from reading. He liked the photos, of course. There are so many handsome pictures of Drake. Some photos were candid pictures of the two of them hanging out while the other three guys in their group were cropped out. And lastly, there were photoshopped pictures of Drake and him in intimate positions.

Since they're hiding their relationship and their sexuality, the existence of all these can ruin them.

On the page, they're currently discussing Drake's recent post of them with the twins on the arcade, and they're trying to deduct that Drake's accepted now in the Lim family.

"Babe, are you okay?" Drake sat beside him and stretched the frown in Keith's eyebrow.

Keith sloped on Drake's shoulder. "There's someone in the Drama club who writes fiction about us, and I found this group!"

Drake looked at the screen and read. "They'd probably blow up once they find out we're really going out." He laughed.

"Yeah. And my parents will blow up too, just imagine! How about your parents? Won't they get angry once they find out you're dating a man as handsome as me?" Keith slipped a joke despite feeling so dreary.

"Well, maybe. But they won't erupt and raise hell like uncle and auntie."

Keith hugged his man. "Babe… we're not even celebrities. Why the fuck are they making a big deal out of us?!!! As far as I know, I wasn't born to be their clown!"

"I'm doing modeling now, and you have a fan base, babe," Drake informed him. Then, he searched and opened a group page. Keith didn't find comfort when he saw it. "There were videos of you when you were still in middle school, like when you joined the math Olympiad, Science Fair, and even when you read the English paragraphs in Teacher Ma's class. They're all here. I recently found this, and my alt account is a top fan now."

"Ironic. I was singled out since elementary." Keith closed the laptop and couldn't help but let stress get the best of him.

"Maybe it's because you always have that look that says, 'Don't come to me, dog shits!' "Drake smiled, but his little joke did not help.

"How about we eat first? I cooked chicken to cheer you up!"

"Let's stay like this for now. You smell like chicken."

"Well, sorry about that."

"No, babe, I'm saying you're delicious!" Keith grinned, then puckered his lips, waiting for a kiss.

At the table, they ate together and joked about the "fans" and their image on the internet.

Keith washed the dishes while Drake was packing the leftovers again.

"Babe, I know I'm the one who suggested joining a club relating to our dream, but I'm having second thoughts about this club! I mean… They have so many scriptwriters already, and there's a bitch who writes porn about us."

"Is the mighty Keith Lim having insecurity?"

"Oh. Tell me about it… I can't help it. It's like when we go there, we're being watched. Not just for our uncultivated skills but simply for being together. It's hard enough that I don't get to kiss you now at school. And now we have to mind whether we're being sweet or ambiguous to them."

Drake gazed at Keith's frowning face that still makes his heart churn. He noticed how much Keith overthinks, and he tends to think about the negative side of things and people more. It's not that he can blame Keith for overthinking too much and being so negative. So, he hugged Keith from behind while Keith was doing his chore.

"Babe. Don't worry. We have friends who can cover for us. Don't overthink."

Keith sighed. "How about you, babe… Have you thought about what you want to do?"

Drake acted overdramatically and cried, "I don't know yet. I just want my name to go up on the credits roll. I don't know what I want and what I am good at. I don't know if I have what it takes to do anything other than display my face!"

"Have you thought about acting? Your face will do you good in that field." Keith suggested even if he had a feeling that Drake wanted to play at the back of the camera instead.

"You think your boyfriend is too handsome that my face should be on the screen in the entire film?" he joked and landed a kiss on Keith's neck.

"Oh, hell no! I don't want you to act boyfriend and kiss other girls in front of everyone!"

Drake pecked his ear and whispered. "Why are you so possessive?"

Keith blushed. "Babe, go back to your room and read. I have to finish this, or I will never be able to hold back and eat you from head to toe!"

"Give me a kiss first!" Drake demanded, which Keith happily fulfilled.

Drake was flushing red when he returned to the bedroom, but the bliss disappeared suddenly. His phone rang, and he already knew who it was without looking at it. His mother was calling him again.

"What do you want?"

"You know where all this money comes from. You can't call me more than once a month to ask me for money."

"He called me last week about how much I spent. I can't give you anything anymore."

"Are you serious? Why should that be my problem?"

"No! That's not-"

"I gave you money twice this month already."

"Then ask him for money yourself. I'm sick of you using me."

"It's not my responsibility to raise my mother's little boyfriend, isn't it?"

"No. I'm not the obnoxious one here."

Keith washed the plates and did not wipe them, so he could go to the bedroom and flirt with Drake for the remaining time, but he stood still at the door when he heard Drake talking to someone on the phone. He heard it all. And he went back to the kitchen and wiped the plates because it didn't feel right to eavesdrop. He thought about the times when Drake talked about his family, which was… almost nonexistent… A busy father in China and a mother who has a boyfriend and asks her own son for money. Keith's parents can be controlling and strict sometimes, but that may be because he's the favorite child. He can't help but feel sorry for Drake. "No wonder he doesn't like talking about his parents," he mumbled.

After a few kisses, Keith left all the learning materials for Drake to read and took with him the flash drive. He took the plastic food container with him, filled with chicken prepared by Drake.

He was back ten minutes before 7 PM, and only his father was in the car because his mother was talking with her colleague.

"You had dinner with him again?" His father asked with a cold tone.

Keith gulped and smiled at his father. "He cooks so many delicious meals. Of course, I'd go there to have dinner again!"

"Mr. Tan just talked to me earlier. He said you're joining the drama club with Drake. Why did you do that without talking to us first? Is it because of him?" Even without looking at the rearview mirror, Keith knew his father was fuming with anger.

"I told you already that I like literature, novels, and films. it's only natural that I'd join a club to write a script. And please, I'm doing it for myself, not just because of him." Keith reasoned out. He can't help but feel angry because his father is stern with Drake… he can't help but imagine how things would turn out if he finds out that he's dating Drake already.

"It already stretched our patience when you enrolled in the Liberal Arts program. We had an agreement before that you would still join competitions related to math and science for your transcript because universities will look at your entrance exam score, your grades, and your extracurricular activities. You're still a member of the Math Society and Natural Science Society… even if you only show your face there once in a while. And now, you want to join a club that will take up all of your time at school? Don't be so unreasonable. You won't join that useless club."

"Kylie, Kyrie, and Kiara did not pursue Science careers… why can't I? A useless drama club can also give me a good transcript if only you allow me to decide my career path, which can't be science!" Keith blew up and spoke up to his father.

"Keith! We only want the best for you!!! Don't ever try to raise your voice to talk with me like that again!!!"

Their conversation was even heard outside the car.

The suffocating atmosphere inside the car made their temper hotter.

"I'm going to do all that. Sign me up for all those competitions... Okay! I can do that! But whether you agree or not, I will still join the drama club and do whatever I like."

"Is this what you learn from hanging out with that kid?!!!" Mr. Lim circled back to Drake again. It made Keith wonder if they're arguing about the educational career plan they want him to follow or about his relationship with Drake instead.

"Oh, please! I didn't have a good mouth way before I became friends with Drake! Don't blame him if I didn't like to do all the things you imposed on me!"

His father scoffed and left the car, and slammed the door abruptly.

"Honey, how did it go?" Katherine asked her husband, trying hard to calm himself down before hypertension attacked him.

"He said he will do all the competitions we sign him up for, but he will still join that drama club."

"Honey, once he's made up his mind, we can't negotiate with him by getting angry at him. Calm down. He'll come around. I promise, Rowan Lim... Let's just wait." She rubbed her husband's head.

"He raised his voice to answer me, honey. He's never done that to

me before." The wet teary eyes of the no.2 tyrant flowed rare tears.

"Seriously?" She can't help but laugh inwardly at the sight of her pitiful husband.

"He also didn't call me Pa the entire time."

"It's okay..."

"He will have a cold war with me like Kiara." Mr. Lim complained about feeling wronged with the result of his intervention.

"Well, honey… you deserve it!"