This is a drabble I made for the website 750 words, but somehow I felt like it should make an appearance here on FF. So yeah. Just boys being hurt and sad.
Sometimes you like to tilt your head up in the rain and open your mouth, let the water droplets splash on your tongue, let it trickle down your throat and leave you with an acidic aftertaste. It's something like a hobby, a ritual you must carry out whenever you walk back from college and it rains. You'll shove your books inside your sling bag and you just stand wherever you are, and taste the rain.
People call you crazy, call you an imbecile for letting the water soak you through, soak your scarf and the fabric of your bag, matting your hair onto your scalp. You don't care. Being in the rain, with your mouth open is the only time where you're totally okay with being laughed at. When you're okay with being criticized. Not anytime else, of course.
Today is different. Today, you're crying under the rain, letting the raindrops fall onto your cheeks and mix with your tears. You don't open your mouth because if you do, you'll gag and choke on the water, your eyes expelling and your mouth taking in, hell, that shit ain't going to work. You cry because of the things Sollux said to you, and you cry because of how Feferi looked at you when you screamed, when you yelled at the asshole how utterly worthless he is, how fucking pathetic. You're crying because every word you said to him, you actually direct to yourself.
It's painful how the water drops splatter over your eyelids at times; you've taken off your glasses, clenching them in your fist. You stay under the rain, waiting for it to wash the filth off you, which is impossible. You're the filth in your eyes and you don't know how to wash yourself clean. And yet.
If only they'd give you another fucking chance.
It seems unreal at first, a weight against your hand at your side, nudging and then lifting, your fingers suddenly settling in between someone else's and your eyes fly open, shocked by whoever's touching you. You thought you're seeing an angel, because no one in the universe could ever possess that sort of hair color. You are wrong.
Dave Strider; sophomore, class 2-E, a coolkid, you recite in your head; is standing next to you, his shades covering his eyes and the weight of his hand terribly, terribly warm in yours. You stare at him, your vision a little blurry by the lack of your glasses before you frantically slip them on, then continue to stare at him. Strider's lips curve lightly into a smirk which is alarming, you've heard rumors that he never smiles, ever. He reaches up to take your glasses off you, pushing some wet strands of hair from your face while he's at it.
"You look like a lost deer without 'em."
At first you thought he said 'a lost dear', and that wouldn't make much sense. But he could have said anything at all and it wouldn't have made sense. The hand on your face slips down to touch your cheek, and then he's kissing you, the hard curve of his shades pressing against your cheekbone, heavy and solid, and there.
He pulls back just a little, speaking against your lips.
"Happy birthday, Eridan."