The very tell-tale breezes of Spring tickled trees silly. The Sun beat down on this troll like Hell fire, something he had come to reason with after giving up the debating of seasons last year when December had hit him like a bus, leaving snow piled so high he was forced to skip work for a whole week should it ever hoped to melt. He had also come to appreciate the warm weather, at least for a little while. That was until he decided that every sweater and jacket he owned was rendered useless against the sky above, a sweat breaking out should he even take his chances in the sunlight. Sometimes, it just flat out made him feel like a vampire.

Spring always had its tendencies of warm weather, but times came hard when Mother Nature took its toll and released a years worth at least of water supply onto the city. Those were the days Karkat didn't mind the weather all too bad, at least when he was inside during it. The gentle pitter patter of the rain along his windows and the scurry of raindrops sprinting down relaxed him. When he was outside in the rain, he truly just hated it.

It seemed that today happened to be one of those days.

Down pour. It was chaotic. The only credit he gave to the weather man was that he really knew how to cram a pole a mile up his ass, spout about Sunny with a chance of Spring showers, and remind Karkat that he was to be sprouting wings and turning into the fairy princess he'd always known he could be. With a fit of curses spewing mildly from his chilled lips, he ducked into a lit up store and out of the pelting rain, one he'd seen before but had never bothered to peek inside. The chime of the door bell reflected exactly the opposite of his mood and Karkat soon found a scowl resting sinister on his face. He was soaking wet, but the others sifting between shelves seemed not to notice, as if they had all been in the same boat and it was nothing knew. The clerk offered a hello, but he paid them no notice. Today was not the best of days.

It took a moment in the pleasant music from the shop for him to trudge forward, and holy shit did one step make him feel like led. With water sloshing chills up his foot cast aside, he found himself trudging to a very isolated booth located deep in the back of the library tucked behind the occasional rows. A small coffee shop set vacant, not a single customer but the staff seemingly alert. There was the shuffling of feet, raindrops pattering on the window his booth was installed in the corner near, and the occasional steaming of a pot, but other than that there carried a pleasant silence throughout the shop. There was that same ting of a bell that sent Karkat's nerves up a stage, but he brushed it off with the sense of ice trickling over his spine, offering a shiver from the troll. The warmth from the coffee nearby did nothing to warm the tattered jacket over his shoulders, nor dry him, and he decided quickly that it'd be best to peel it off, though as he slid his arm out of one worn-down sleeve, the air conditioning had begged to differ and sent shivers through his skin in waves, much like pins jabbing into your skin.

Plop. A droplet of water was sent askew as he dropped the garbage of a jacket heavily onto the seat beside him, now stuck in a T-shirt that stuck uncomfortably to his body with moisture, only allowing the breeze of the air conditioning to whisk through the fabric like it might as well have had holes in it, only adding to the chill. He let his gaze drift up towards the coffee station, considering for a moment to purchase one, but the idea was long forgotten as soon as it had come. He didn't have enough money, and pay day came Sunday. It was fucking Tuesday. Karkat wasn't sure what he'd do when he tried to get home. His "home" had probably been destroyed. His home consisted of multiple tossed clothing articles he'd gathered from the Good Will he normally nested out by where they tossed items broken by children or clothes too old to sell. They were aware of his presence and actually acknowledged his presence and sometimes gave him clothes.

There was a grinch of an elderly woman there who had a scowl like none other, but she was diagnosed with Cancer. It pinched his heart that she made the best of it at a place that helped others, even if she didn't like others that much. People called her Snowy, or Snowman from her icy personality. It suited her. There was a very spiffy couple there, one that happened to have some Australian tone or something that set him off, and the other who sported a set of frames that could jab somebody's eyes out. The two were Dirk and Jake, and Karkat hated them with a passion that burned brighter than the Green Sun. Another girl worked there with them that had abnormally white hair that she always tended to dye, but the colors were either black, white, or green. She was seemingly obsessed with Trolls and.. was surprisingly polite. Her name was Calliope, but she preferred some kind of alternate name (That was the exact same thing as her other name) in quoting of her "Trollsona," Callie Opeeee. He also hated her. Lukewarm. Ish. Okay, if he was being honest with himself, she was probably the least of the group that he hated, but he had trouble expressing his ease at how easy it was to talk to her and eventually just started arguments that always led to her in tears. Callie was a very sensitive person, and he'd learned that the hard way.

Somehow, he had managed to befriend them all and sometimes was invited to their houses to sleep occasionally, should a storm be coming or things like that. He appreciated them more than he could put into words in the end though and would take a bullet for any of them should it come down to it. There was a growing silence in the shop, the rain taking his attention entirely until he noticed that his gaze was left to linger towards the coffee shop where a very intimidated-looking girl was blinking at him. Shit. He was staring. "What-? I- Shit." He let the words fall out before he could process them and cast his gaze away hastily. The woman, from the corner of his eye, gave a defeated sigh (Assumedly from relief) and returned to her work, sending the suspicious glance to him infrequently. Golden orbs of the troll had been set on another contender in the growing line of Karkat-incidental-glare-down-targets, though neither of them had taken note of his gaze yet, the neither of them retaining to the cashier of whom had offered him the greeting upon entrance and an anonymous blonde of which suspiciously toted a pair of aviators atop his nose. It reminded him momentarily of Dirk, and he took a second to question what the fuck was up currently with these hipster tyrants and their shades. Seriously, should he see one more pair of sunglasses inside a building being bluntly unnecessary, he will immediately take for them rocketing to the top of his shit list faster than Neil Armstrong on his fuckall vacation to the moon.

The blonde offered a nod and turned away, and Karkat let the attention sent towards the other to hang about, if just for an instant longer. There was a lean to the boy as he strutted some kind of hipster-doo-dad where you jammed your hands into your pockets and gave a very odd curve to your waist as you strode. It sent some kind of "intimidation" vibe apparently, though Karkat felt nothing of that. Actually, to ones shock, he felt curiosity. It wasn't that same boiling wrath—Okay, maybe a little, but that was the minor to the major, here, that he normally felt when he looked at Dirk, though it may have been because he generally knew Dirk to be an asshole, whereas he didn't even know this persons name. It took a moment, but his attention was forcefully divided to the small rack of vinyl records that the bespectacled boy was flicking through, that he took notice that this store actually held those, tough he supposed it shouldn't have come as much of a surprise. Some libraries sold movies, even. It was a small town, after all.

He found his mind lingering towards a movie once that he'd watched, A Star Is Born, from 1854 where Norman Maine struggled with her career in acting from the faults of Esther Blodgett, an alcohol-addicted problem that stood in the way of Miss Maine's lifetime goals and future. The movie was a real heart puller that yanked on his arm and asked him what the fuck he was doing. Wait, what?

Only now had he realized that he'd allowed himself to completely loose track of his actions, resulting in the blonde standing directly in front of him, tugging at his arm lightly and inquiring just that.

"What the fuck are you doing?"

A silence followed as Karkat readjusted himself to reality, blinking up into those abyssal frames perked atop his face with rather golden orbs in comparison.

"Don't touch me," he started off, tugging his arm away, "and what the fuck is it that YOU'RE doing?" he finished, allowing his eyes to linger over the other for a moment. He was tall. Really tall. But that may have been the fact that Karkat found almost anyone, and that meant everyone, larger than him. It just happened to be that Karkat was naturally small and the world was abnormally… big.

"You've been staring at me like a creep for at least ten minutes." The boy gave a very monotone blink down to the troll. Karkat felt like a sweat was coming on, but chances were high that it was a drop of water trickling down his spine, causing him to shiver.

"I was looking at.. The records. Clearly." Perfect retort, Karkat. Fucking grade A. He gave a roll of his eyes, more towards himself, though the other standing above him seemed to take this offensively and raised his brow.

"What happened?" The boy took a seat across from the troll, setting his elbows up onto the table and resting his chin onto his laced fingers.

"Should I feel honored that a stranger just invited themselves to sit down with me and dig into my business or feel mortally disgusted? Because I'm pretty sure it's the latter."

"Well I originally thought I would have to punch somebody and make a scene for creepin' on me, but you're a lot smaller than I originally thought and, correct me if I'm wrong, but it looks like you need a jacket." The upturn of the corner of his lips was the only sign that he may have been joking, but Karkat couldn't decipher whether or not he was sincere. But then again, unless he was some shit-eating hipster aspirant, he wouldn't have had a very good reason to be talking to Karkat in the first place. The dust settled between them as Karkat allowed his eyes to drift over the other, representing something of a judgmental once-over.

"Sure, I'm cold, but who isn't? It's pouring outside and I'm certain I wasn't the only one who hauled my ass in here soaking with a pound or thousand of water, so why give the critique to me?" He raised a suspicious brow at the blonde across from him. Seriously, at moments like these, he just wanted to be alone, AWAY from people like him.

"Well if you were listening, I already mentioned that you were staring.. In my general direction. But," he raised his hands indignantly. "if you want me to go that bad, I'll leave." And he stood, adjusting the scarf around his neck and tossing a single glance back to his seat before he strode away. Karkat shot a pointed look at his back as he went. Something looked out of place about him.

And then it hit him.

Karkat slammed his hands onto the table and leaned up, peering over to the other side at the beige sweater the boy had been wearing. How the hell did he slip that off? He had a scarf on and everything, and Karkat was watching him the whole time! Did he do it before-hand?

"Fucking hell.." The troll muttered to himself, extending his small arms and swatting at the hipster attire until it touched his fingertips and eventually was taken into his palms. He blinked at it, because it was shockingly soft compared to the sticky shirt he wore now. It was also clean, again better compared to the goodwill shirt he'd been sporting for at least a week now. So he tossed it over his arm and turned, striding forward towards the bathrooms. It came as quite a relief to get the rain-infected shirt off and took an unnecessary amount of paper towels to get the water that came with the T-Shirt off, but slipping the sweater over his head onto the chilled skin of his torso felt like a blanket over him. It might as well have been, seeing that the sweater was huge on his small frame. How tall was that guy, anyway? He rolled his eyes and tucked the sleeves up above the forearm, giving himself a quick glance towards the mirror and then exiting the bathroom. It kind of made him feel bubbly somewhere deep in his chest, the idea that people would give things away for the sake of another's happiness, despite Karkat being a little bitch baby about it. He didn't even know the guy, and speaking of..

Karkat gazed out of the large windows in the front near the door he'd entered in, curiously searching for that same blonde hair and shades from before. It took only a moment of eye squinting to confirm it, but he noticed.

It had stopped raining.