Sollux groaned and rolled over in bed, reaching for the glasses he kept on his nightstand. His head still hurt and he could only remember half of what happened the night before. Not that he couldn't guess. Careful not to wake the seadweller lying in bed next to him, he slid out of bed, grabbing a pair of pants laying on the floor and pulling them on over his red and blue boxers. Sighing, he picked up the rest of the clothes littering the floor and carried them into the laundry room. Measuring out the right amount of fabric softener, he threw in the clothes and turned on the washing machine. Sollux watched as the water began to slowly fill before closing the lid. Not wanting to return to his room quite yet, he sat down next to the machine. He rested his head against the metal and listened to the churn of the wash.

wiiiiiish

wiiiiiish

wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiish

After about a minute, Sollux decided that listening to washing machine was a stupid, boring idea. He picked up a magazine off the floor. The floor was covered in dozens of magazines that Fef had left behind months ago when Sollux had kicked her out.

Sollux was halfway through an article titled "Is He Mr. Right (or Mr. Wrong)?" when he was interputed by a call back in the bedroom. "SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!" Thinking Eridan had somehow managed to kill himself, he threw the magazine aside and ran into the room. But instead of finding some sort of tragedy, he found the other troll sitting on the bed in nothing but his boxers, warped up in Sollux's sheets like some kind of cloak.

"eriidan, what the fuck?" Sollux spat, angered he's gotten so worked up over nothing.

"wwhere is my fuckin cape?" Eridan asked, looking somewhere between pissed off and utter hysteria.

"ii put iit in the wa2h. that thiing wa2 a fucking me22. 2seriously, do you EVER wa2h it?"

"you did WWHAT?" Eridan jumped out of bed, still wrapped in the sheets, and pushed past Sollux and ran to the small laundry room down the hall. Meantly sighing over Eridan's over-the-top reaction, Sollux followed. When he entered the room a couple of seconds later, Eridan was pulling his cape out of the washing machine. Or at least, what used to be his cape. The purple garment was ripped all over and was soaking wet, dripping water onto the clean floor. "it's not fuckin machine wwashable!" he shouted at Sollux, waving the wet cape in his face. Unexpectedly, Eridan crumpled to the floor and began to whimper, clutching the cloth to his chest.

"dude, iit'2 just a cape. ii'll buy you a new one. hell, ii'll buy you a dozen more," Sollux said as gently as he could, sitting down next to Eridan.

He just shook his head and held the tattered remains closer. As appealing as a dozen capes sounded, he didn't want a new cape. He wanted his cape. He knew it was childish, but he didn't care. He'd had that cape forever. It was kinda special to him. No, not kinda. Really special.

"hey, calm down," Sollux whispered, pulling Eridan into an awkward hug."you know what? ii bet ii could get kanaya to fiix iit for you."

"really?" Eridan asked, pulling his eyes away from the cape to look at Sollux.

"2ure," Sollux said, showing a toothy smile. He gently rubbed the Eridan's horns, making the seadweller's face flush purple. "go put on 2ome clothe2 and we'll go. we're not goiing two a lady'2 house in boxer2."

Eridan grinned, and looking significantly less hysteric, he got up and pulled his clothes out of the wash.

"aren't tho2e 2oakiing wet?" Solluz asked, giving him a quizzical look.

Eridan slipped the clothes on. "so?" He smirked, looking more like his old self, pulling Sollux into a wet bear hug.

"ii thiink ii liiked you better when you were all depre22ed," Sollux mumbled against Eridan's shoulder.