Title: "Are We Still Friends"
Rating: T for language.
Summary: Karofsky takes the first steps to a better life for himself: telling his best friend the truth. Karofsky and Azimio friendship.
Song: "Poker Face" by Lady Gaga.
.O.O.
"I want to hold 'em like they do in Texas, please."
The steering wheel was cutting into my forehead, but it was a nice change from the painful tension between my shoulders. I slumped lower.
Kurt Hummel.
"I'll get him hot; show him what I've got."
"Oh God," I groaned and cringed internally.
I turned the volume up another four notches. I was going for full-out deafness and alienation. I wanted to be separate from myself at the moment. The Lady Gaga was only a coincidence; it's what was on the radio.
"He can't read my poker face. She's got to love nobody."
"Fuck!"
I jammed my finger onto the "up" channel button angrily. I even smacked the thing once when it refused to change quickly enough. I jumped when thunder crashed loudly outside my car. I took that as a sign to head for home, but I ignored my better judgment this time.
I forgot the radio and just sat in the quiet of my car outside of the library. Rain pattered on the roof and the hood, and I adjusted the seat to recline a little and just listen with my eyes closed.
"This is insane," I said aloud. And I meant it. This was insane.
I pulled my cell from my pocket without opening my eyes and pressed "send." The last person that had called me was Azimio, so I pressed "send" again and waited for it to ring.
"Az's phone," I heard him say when he picked up.
"Azimio," I greeted emotionlessly.
"Yo, Dave."
"You busy right now?"
"Naw, man, geometry homework."
I snort despite myself and roll my head to the side on the seat but keep my eyes closed.
"I've got to ask you something, something serious," I say and feel my chest clench a little apprehensively, though I don't plan on actually admitting anything.
"Shoot," Az says after a second, and I can tell he's curious.
I'm quiet for a moment, mulling over what I wanted to say. The rain picks up speed and drowns out the quiet a little more.
Finally, I say, "Suppose you had a favorite color." I stop, unsure how to word this.
"This is serious?"
"Yes," I reply, my tone sounding so.
"Okay..."
"Well," I began, "Suppose I had a different favorite color."
"...and?"
I cringe even though my words are innocuous, though what I actually mean isn't.
"And... well, you're bedroom's painted in your favorite color... blue, I guess. And mine's painted red, my favorite color."
"Dude, my room is blue." Azimio sounds totally confused and I don't blame him.
"Just go with me," I ask him.
"Right."
"Okay, well. More people prefer blue bedrooms... and I've got a red one." I stop, confusing myself.
"Huh? Dude, are you okay? You're making even less sense than my geometry homework. You been drinkin' Red Bull again?"
"No," I say in frustration, and I clench my jaw trying to come up with what I want to get across. "Humor me, okay? It's not like you enjoy math."
"Fine. Go on."
I get a better grip on my words when I realize that Azimio might hang up on me, and I don't think that I'll have the strength to try this again.
"The thing is, everybody likes your bedroom, but they hate mine. They hate red. It... sickens them." My voice goes a little funny on that last sentence, and I hope that Azimio attributes it to bad reception.
"Okay."
"Okay?"
"Why don't you just, I dunno, paint your room blue then?" Azimio says this with a verbal shrug, and I feel my shoulders fall.
"I—I can't just—" I stop myself there and take a breath and mentally punch myself. Chill. Out. You're talking about bedrooms here, okay?
I grip the phone harder and go back to what I was saying, and the words come out more truthful than I was expecting, and I wasn't sure that was a good thing.
"I... It's my favorite color. I... like it. I just like red, okay?" I say defensively, almost angry for no apparent reason. "But lots of people hate it." Maybe even you, I add mentally.
"Why would anybody hate the color red?" Azimio asks me, his tone falsely interested, which I ignore. The corner of my mouth goes up into a partially bitter look. I tell him the truth.
"They, well, they... it's just very different from what they're used to. They think it's bad—er, that red is bad." I feel like an idiot talking like this, but it's the best that I've got at the moment.
"Okay." I hear some papers shuffling and then Az's voice is louder in the phone, clearer, like he's readjusted the phone closer. "...so, everyone hates the color of your room. They hate it, but they like the color of mine... What exactly is your question?"
Azimio sounds unusually serious, and I know that's because he can't figure out what my angle is. I'm easy to understand, so when I'm not, he knows that something's up. I swallow convulsively and run a hand through my hair, my nerves a little on edge.
"Are we still friends?" I ask him. The weight of my words hangs in the air, but I know that his answer essentially means little to what I'm really asking him without his knowledge.
"Dude, who cares? You're talking crazy," Azimio accuses of me, and I nod to myself in agreement. "I've really got to finish this, Dave. We done?" Azimio sounded like he was just a second from pressing the "end" button.
I sigh quietly and tell him, "Yes." And the line's quiet in the next moment.
"Fucking... fuck."
.O.O.
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