Rui is a huge huge Shizuku oshi. Like, one of he biggest fans ever. Ever since day 1 he's supported her, bought merch, made handmade lightsticks and oshikatsu gear, and even went to a couple of her concerts.
Something that sets him apart from other fans is that Rui could kinda sense that something was up with Shizuku while she was in Cheerful*Days. He couldn't pinpoint it at the time, but he could tell she wasn't quite satisfied with her current position. Another thing he noticed was some of her subtle imperfections, but not in a critical way. No, he admired the humanity that leaked through. He's always hated how perfect many idols are, so one of the reasons he started supporting Shizuku was because she wasn't like the other idols, and she was someone similar to Rui in many ways.
When Shizuku abandoned Cheerful*Days and joined More More Jump, Rui was definitely ecstatic, especially when she started to show her true colors and become more comfortable with herself. He was also very much mad with the snide comments from Cheerful*Days and their fans. There was a huge paragraph posted anonymously calling out Arisa and her abuse against Shizuku, but Rui will neither confirm nor deny if he was the author of said paragraph.
When they met on that trip, Rui put a bit of a chill face up as to not draw unnecessary attention to Shizuku and Airi that they would have already garnered, but the two became pretty close friends without Shizuku ever knowing about Rui's dedication to her. So for a bit, when they started chatting and hanging out outside of school trips, he kept his dedication a secret, mostly not to ruin their current friendship and out of fear of what could happen if her fanbase found out that one of her dedicated fans got to get close to her.
Eventually, he came clean about being her fan, and went on a whole rant about why he stans Shizuku, leading to her getting reasonably flustered, but she accepted Rui being her fan pretty well, and wasn't too bothered.
Now they're pretty close friends, with Rui still being one of her biggest fans when she's an idol, but not letting that affect their personal relationship.
Eventually their feelings will become slightly less platonic, but it will probably take the two idiot a good while before they come to that realization, nevermind them actually getting together :3
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