#beta squad

Like I get it, you have a preferred group of people that you decide to watch. That's lovely. Good for you. I'm happy for you even.

But when you start posting about how much better this group is than ALL the other groups or people in the community?

OHH MY GODDDDDD

Like I don't know any nicer way to phrase this but nobody gives a single fuck who you watch and who you don't watch. Why must we always compare? You can like watching Stephen Tries and WillNE or whatever and just...leave everyone else alone? You're not better than anyone just because you have a preferred group of youtubers you watch.

For instance, the whole beta squad vs sidemen debate that came from FUCKING nowhere. Like, it's okay if you prefer one group over the other. Fine, whatever. It's not okay when you start making fuckass comments like; "the sidemen could never have the same chemistry the beta squad do," or "beta squad are literally knockoff sidemen". OH WHO IS YOU??? TF???

Mind you, the beta squad and sidemen in question do NOT care. They've collabed on multiple occasions and members of the sidemen have had beta squad members on their channels and vice versa. WHY ARE YOU BEEFING FOR PEOPLE THAT HAVE NO BEEF TO BEGIN WITH?

The beta squad aren't going to be like, "Oh, thank you Betasquadbootylicker24 for hating on other youtubers and youtube groups and choosing us to be your favorite. Come over to my house so we can give you a BIIIIIG smooch." They won't call you by name and give you an award just because you prefer watching them over others and have successfully wasted your time hating on other groups and people just because you like them. The same goes for any other youtube group and/or creators.

Like idc if you like watching FFW, I like watching FFW too. When you start with all the, "beta squad is unwatcheable now", "the sidemen are washed compared to these guys," "bov boys could never,". Now you're getting on everybody's nerves and causing UNNECESSARY discourse in the comments.

And people now start acting like you can't watch and enjoy both at the same time? Like what? Sorry to break it to you like this, but we are all cognitive human beings that can process having more than one thought. I can enjoy beta squad AND the sidemen AND bov boys AND friends from work all at the same time. Me liking one does not mean I have to automatically dislike and shit on the other.

You can like something without hating on another thing, the world isn't going to end. You're not special or better than anyone because you have a specific niche of people you watch. My God.

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summary AJ was having a bad day. she could tell. she always could. the problem was getting him to let her do anything about it.

prompt – bad day AJ, reader tries to reach him, established relationship warnings – light swearing, AJ being AJ about his feelings word count – ~1.5k note – AJ shabeel and his complicated relationship with letting people in - thank you for this request 🫶

requests are open :)

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She noticed it the moment he walked through the door.

Not that AJ would ever announce it. That wasn't him. He'd sooner shave his curls than sit someone down and say I'm having a bad day, please be nice to me. No — with AJ, you had to learn the language. The specific, subtle, thoroughly inconvenient language of a man who felt things deeply and showed them sideways.

Today's dialect: he came in, dropped his bag by the door instead of putting it away, and went straight to the sofa without saying a word.

No stupid joke. No wallahi you would not believe what happened today. No dramatic retelling of something that had happened to him on the way over.

Just silence.

She let him have it for a bit. Made herself busy in the kitchen, put the kettle on, listened to the specific quality of the quiet he was sitting in.

Then she went and sat beside him.

Not too close. Not right on top of him — she knew better than that. Just. Beside him. Near enough.

"Aight?" she said.

"Yeah," he said. Flat.

She looked at him.

He was staring at the TV, which wasn't on.

"You're staring at a blank screen," she pointed out.

"I know."

"Okay." She reached for the remote and turned it on, flicking to something neither of them would pay attention to. "Cool."

They sat there for a few minutes. The TV played. AJ stayed in whatever room he'd gone to in his head.

She tried again.

"You eaten?"

"Yeah."

"When?"

A pause. "...This morning."

"AJ."

"I wasn't hungry."

"It's seven in the evening."

"Yeah." He shifted slightly on the sofa, still not looking at her. "I know."

She looked at his profile — the set of his jaw, the way he was holding himself, the specific tension of someone who had been carrying something all day and hadn't put it down yet. She'd seen it before. Not often, because AJ was frustratingly good at being fine, at being funny and loud and filling a room until there was no space left for anything else. But sometimes, on days like this, the performance dropped and she could see the underneath of him.

She hated that she couldn't just fix it.

She also knew that saying that would get her nowhere.

"Do you want to talk about it?" she asked.

"Nah."

"Okay."

Another few minutes of TV neither of them watched.

"It's just—" AJ started, then stopped.

She waited. She was good at waiting for him.

"It's nothing," he said. "Forget it."

"You brought it up."

"I said forget it."

"AJ."

"What?"

She turned to look at him properly. He was still doing the thing where he wasn't quite looking at her — eyes somewhere adjacent, jaw tight, the specific posture of someone who wanted to say something and had decided against it and was annoyed at themselves for wanting to say it in the first place.

"You're allowed to just tell me," she said. Simply. "Whatever it is."

"I know that."

"Do you?"

He finally looked at her. His dark brown eyes doing the thing she'd learned to read — the flash of something real before the deflection arrived.

"It's embarrassing," he muttered.

"More embarrassing than the time you tried to do that backflip at Niko's and knocked over the whole table?"

Despite himself, the corner of his mouth moved. "That was Niko's fault."

"You said that at the time. Nobody believed you then either."

He made a sound that was almost a laugh. Almost.

"It's just been a long day," he said finally, quieter. "One of those days where everything's a bit—" he shrugged, searching for the word, "—a lot. You know?"

"Yeah," she said. "I know."

"And I don't—" he stopped again. Exhaled through his nose. "I don't want to make it a whole thing."

"It's not a whole thing," she said. "It's just me."

He looked at her for a moment.

Then, slowly, some of the tension in his shoulders did something. Not gone — just less. The specific release of someone who had decided, against their better judgement, to let something in.

"Come here then," she said. Soft.

AJ looked at her. His eyes narrowed slightly, suspicious of the gentleness the way he was always suspicious of gentleness when it was directed at him, like some part of him was still waiting for the catch.

"I'm not a child," he said.

"I know you're not."

"I don't need—"

"AJ." She held his gaze. "Come here."

He looked at her for another second.

Then, with all the dignity he could manage, which was not very much, he leaned over and let himself rest against her. His head on her shoulder, his whole tall awkward self attempting to fit into the space she'd made for him.

She didn't make a big deal of it. Just let him settle. One hand coming up to the back of his neck, fingers moving through the curls at the nape, slow and gentle the way she knew he'd never in a million years ask for.

He exhaled.

Proper — the long kind, the kind that meant something had been let go.

"There he is," she said quietly. Not to embarrass him. Just because it was true.

He said nothing. But she felt him press slightly closer, and that was its own kind of answer.

They stayed like that for a while. The TV played. The light in the flat changed as the evening moved through it.

"The curls thing," AJ said eventually, his voice low and slightly muffled against her shoulder.

"What about them."

"You can — I mean." A pause. "That's — yeah. That's fine. If you want."

She bit her lip to keep from smiling. "Noted."

"Don't make it weird."

"I'm not making it weird."

"You're smiling."

"You can't even see my face."

"I can tell." He shifted slightly, getting more comfortable in the most elaborately casual way possible. "Wallahi, you're always smiling when you've won something."

"I haven't won anything."

"You've got me laid on you like a labrador, don't you."

She did laugh then — properly, the helpless kind — and she felt him smile against her shoulder despite himself. The specific reluctant smile of AJ Shabeel when something was funny and he didn't want to admit the mood had lifted.

"You're an idiot," she said.

"Yeah, yeah." He was quiet for a moment. "Thanks, by the way."

She looked down at the top of his curls. "For what."

"For not—" he stopped. Tried again. "For not making it a thing."

"I told you it wasn't a thing."

"Still." A pause. "Ta."

She pressed a kiss to the top of his head. Felt him try to act like he didn't care about that and fail completely.

"Anytime," she said.

And meant it.

ꨄ︎ character description: reader is described as female & uses she/her pronouns.

ꨄ︎ 𝐈 𝐝𝐨 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐨𝐰 𝐦𝐲 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤𝐬 𝐭𝐨 𝐛𝐞 𝐩𝐮𝐛𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐡𝐞𝐝 𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐞, 𝐬𝐨 𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐞 𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐜𝐤 𝐢𝐧 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐦𝐞, 𝐨𝐫 𝐚𝐭 𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐭 𝐠𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐜𝐫𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐭!

wc: 677

Note: who knew kenny wld pull me out of a writing slump , anyway here are sum beach day headcanons w kenny !!!

𑣲 Before anything else, [Name] would insist on applying sunscreen for Kenny before letting him go anywhere near the ocean.

– Once the couple arrived at the beach, [Name] wasted no time in laying out her beach towel and setting up all the essentials. She had barely finished setting her things down when she caught sight of Kenny jogging toward the shoreline.

“Come back, Ken!” [Name] yelled, clutching the bottle of sunscreen in her hand as Kenny glanced over his shoulder with a guilty smile.

“Do I have to?” Kenny complained, walking toward his girlfriend with a pout.

All [Name] had to do was to give him a knowing look before squeezing some sunscreen onto her hand and applying it on his face.

Being impatient, Kenny kept eyeing the sea while she applied all over his chest. “You know this would wash off in the water.”

“That’s why you have to reapply it every two hours.” [Name] said, looking at Kenny with an amused smile as the man looked back at her in disbelief.

Instead of complaining any further, Kenny leaned into her touch as she continued applying the sunscreen.

Once she finished, she gently patted his cheek. "You're all set!"

[Name] closed the cap of the sunscreen bottle as she walked towards their area.

"I don't get to apply any on you?" he asked, voice gentle yet teasing.

[Name] shook her head with a smile and returned back to her post. "Maybe later."

𑣲 Kenny is the kind of guy who’d do the most at the beach. He’d start digging holes and just doing all kinds of random stuff in the sand.

– One moment, Kenny would be sitting beside [Name] as she sunbathed, relaxing a bit. The next, she'd look over to find him digging into the sand with both hands.

"Ken..." [Name] called, lowering her sunglasses to take a better look.

"Yeah?" he answered without looking up, focusing on the sand as he continued to dig deeper.

[Name] was confused yet she couldn't say that she didn't expect this from Kenny.

"What are you doing over there?" she asked, smiling in amusement.

"Digging!" Kenny huffed as if it was the most casual thing to do.

"I can see that." [Name] said, turning her body to face Kenny's direction.

Kenny finally looked up for a second, traces of sand covering his lower half and a small grin on his face, before he started going back to business.

Whatever kept him entertained, [Name] didn't mind, especially when it meant he stayed right beside her.

𑣲 When the sun started setting, [Name] would call him over to take pictures of her before the sun sets. Somehow, he keeps messing each picture up.

– By the end of the day, the sky was emitting shades of orange and pink, [Name] had decided it was the best time to take advantage of the sunset.

"Ken, come here." [Name] exclaimed as she grabbed her beach bag in search of her digicam.

Kenny immediately jogged over, brushing the sand off his hands as he approached her.

"Could you take some pictures of me?" she asked, handing her Canon camera towards him.

Kenny carefully took the camera from her. "Of course, baby," he said with a smile.

After a moment of posing in the sand and water, [Name] grabbed the digital camera from Kenny and eagerly looked through the photos.

With every swipe, the smile on her face faded as Kenny's photography skills didn't look like the Pinterest girls she had seen.

"Ken!" [Name] whined, looking over at the culprit who had a smile on his face.

"What?" Kenny asked, this guy genuinely doesn't see anything wrong with these photos.

[Name] turned the camera around and pointed at one of the photos. "What is this?!"

"A picture of you?" Kenny said as he leaned in for a closer look.

"You can barely see me!" - "I didn't know what to do. The camera kept getting blurry!"