Another morning, another clock thrown against the wall with alarming strength.
Alarmed by the noise, a young man in a bright red sweater opened the door to our protagonist's room, only to sigh in exasperation.
"Karkat, you did it again", his calm voice had a tint of irritation to it, as he shook his little brother awake.
"WHA- what the fuck do you want, asshole?", the man referred to as 'Karkat' asked, not too sure of what was going on. His voice was groggy, and the seemingly eternal dark bags under his eyes looked darker than ever.
"University. And you broke another alarm clock. That will have to come off your own wallet this time, I hate to inform you", the older sibling explained in his soft demeanor, as he stood up again and left the room. "You have around fifteen minutes to be ready, or you will not be able to come with me", he warned him.

Karkat Vantas groaned, and decided to close his eyes again, when realization kicked in. Fuck, it was still Wednesday. He had classes today.
He jumped off the bed and ran to the bathroom next to his room. He managed record time by showering in 6 minutes, and getting dressed and ready in another 6, with three extra minutes to spare. Time management was his bitch.

He ran down the stairs, tripped, fell, cursed the wooden structure, and left for school with his older brother.

Class flew by uneventfully, as always. He sat by his own, took notes by his own, and left as fast as possible in order to avoid any kind of social interaction. Sometimes there were a few curious idiots, who approached him with a shinny ass smile and a charming attitude, to talk to the loner kid and feel a little better about themselves; he simply chose to ignore them, most of the time, in order not to indulge in one of his formerly famous outbursts.
Of course not EVERYONE went away just as easily.

"Hey Karkat!". That voice. He growled. It was that asshole again. "Karkat? Karkat? Hey wait up!".
The alluded picked up some pace to get the fuck away from there. He really couldn't deal well with John Egbert.

For some reason that Karkat couldn't care less about, Egbert had been approaching him more and more often lately. He wasn't easy to ditch, especially with our protagonist's policy of zero-interaction, and the blue-eyed guy's incredible persistence.
The first time had been over a week ago. His first approach had been as obnoxious as his stupid smile. He sat next to him in chemical theory on a Monday. Karkat had made sure to place his bag on the seat to his right, but Egbert had the cunning of sitting on the one to his left.
"Do you mind if I sit here?", he asked, his stupidly blue eyes shinning behind those square glasses of his. Karkat simply glared at him, one of those glares that made people afraid to approach him. Rumors had it he could kill a shark with one look.
"I'll take your silence as a yes, you know?".
Karkat turned his back on him, resolving to simply pay attention to the class and ignore the bastard.
Of course, that might not have been the best course of action, as Egbert continued trying to make conversation for the rest of the class, indulging in monologues when he realized he wouldn't get a response from the guy.
"…In reality, although I appreciate Nic Cage on a nostalgic level as well, one can't deny that—", the class ended to cut him off beautifully, and Karkat ran away with his life. But, the same happened the next day, on the other class they had together. And the next one. And, on the third occasion, Karkat realized he needed to start actively avoiding the idiot, if he didn't want to slip up and call him for the insufferable piece of shit fucKING ASSHAT HE WAS.

-cough-

That's why today Karkat decided to fuck everything and abscond by running away as fast as possible -and, let me clarify this, he was a very fast runner.

A few blocks away, it seemed as though he'd lost him. "Good", he thought, as the place he was heading towards now was somewhere he didn't want Egbert to find out about. Or anyone from his school, for that matter.

He entered the cafe with his characteristic scowl, and nodded at the manager. "You're early, Vantas", the woman said, as she cleaned a table.
Karkat simply grumbled and headed to the back of the cafe, where the bathroom for the employees was located. He changed into the uniform -a very classical waiter's uniform, with black pants and a white button-up shirt-, and looked at himself in the mirror. A short and slender man with olive skin and some freckles looked back at him, his hair a dark brown mess beyond anyone's understanding, his eyes a dark chocolate that often looked red under the right source of light, surrounded by dark circles that denoted his nocturnal nature. His reflection was frowning, as he usually did. Kankri, his brother, always told him to try and smile a little more. But no can do when you're a bitter motherfucker like him. The only people who ever got as much as a chuckle out of him, were his friends. Well, more like internet friends in pesterchum. They were the only people he could be himself around.

Speaking of.

-ectoBiologist [EB] started pestering carcinoGenetist [CG] at 13:25-

EB: hey CG!

CG: WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU WANT, BIOLOGIST. I'M ABOUT TO ENTER MY SHIFT AT WORK AND I DO *NOT* NEED ANY OF YOUR PATHETIC RAMBLINGS TO DISTRACT ME OF MY DUTIES RIGHT NOW.

Yes, this was his real self. A... fucking asshole.

EB: just wanted to talk. I'm a little depressed...

Karkat raised his eyebrows. EB? Depressed? He was the cheeriest idiot he knew! Always optimistic and joking, always going on and on about his crappy movies and Nic Cage. What could possibly be bothering him?

CG: ...

CG: WHY?

Many people got confused because of Karkat's behavior. Yes, he was a bitter asshole, with a loud mouth, although he tried not to show it now a days. He was blunt and harsh all the time. But that was only on the outside; in truth, he was very sensitive, and was very good at comforting and listening. He was good at reading people as well, and usually knew what was going on with his loved ones, however few they were.

EB: I'm just wondering whether I'm annoying... am I annoying, CG?

CG: YES. YES YOU ARE. YOU ARE ANNOYING AS ALL FUCK.

EB: *sigh* I knew it...

CG: BUT THAT'S ONLY BECAUSE YOU'RE ONE CHEERFUL MOTHERFUCKER, WHO DOESN'T KNOW WHEN TO GIVE UP, AND WOULDN'T TAKE A NO FOR AN ANSWER EVEN IF IT WENT AGAINST THE DESIGN OF EVERY HOLY ENTITY RULING THIS PIECE OF CRAP ROCK WE CALL 'EARTH'.

EB: heh

CG: YOUR STUBBORN OPTIMISM AND GOOD OUTLOOK ON LIFE ARE AN INSULT TO BITTER-ASS EMPIRISTS WHO TRY TO LIVE OUR LIFE AND JUST DIE IN PEACE, LIKE ME.

CG: BUT IF YOU WEREN'T AS IMPOSSIBLY STUPID AS YOU ARE, YOU WOULDN'T BE EB. SO STOP SELLING YOURSELF SHORT, ONLY *I* CAN DO THAT, YOU ASSHAT.

EB: heheheh. Alright. Thanks, CG.

CG: FOR WHAT? INSULTING YOU? ARE YOU ACTUALLY THANKING ME FOR TAKING MY TIME TO INSULT YOUR SORRY ASS? ARE YOU SOME KIND OF GOD-FORSAKEN PIECE OF SHIT MASOCHIST OR SOME CRAP LIKE THAT?

EB: maybe :B

CG: UGH, AS ALWAYS, YOU MAKE ME SICK.

CG: MY SHIFT IS STARTING. YOU CAN GO TOUCH YOURSELF IN INDECENT WAYS WHILE THINKING OF MY BASHFUL OF INSULTS WHILE I GO OUT AND DO SOMETHING ACTUALLY PRODUCTIVE WITH MY TIME, LIKE EARNING MONEY.

EB: bye, CG.

-carcinoGenetist [CG] ceased pestering ectoBiologist [EB] at 13:53-

With a satisfied nod, Karkat put his cellphone in his pocket, and tied a black apron around his hips, ready to work.

A/N: Hello! Thanks for reading so far. This is my first fanfic and it will consist of several chapters, some following Karkat, and some following John. This is mostly the result of me wondering how someone with Karkat's crabbiness and language-flexibility would do in our day-to-day world -my answer was, not too well xD.
I'm sorry if any of this characters seem a little OOC, I swear I'm doing my best! And writing Karkat for like two weeks straight has been messing with my head and speech in ways I had not foreseen.

Anyways, please leave a review if you have a critic or something like that, and look forward to the next part.

-Mila.

PD: almost forgot, I do not own Homestuck nor its characters, blah blah. Seriously, who would think that?