HAHAH OH MAN
guys. i got this request. in FEBRUARY
the anon probably doesn't even follow me anymore ;;;
anywho, i wrote this over... six months...
and well, it was fun! i might not like vriska very much as a person but she's a helluva fun character to write. and a good character in general. y'know how it is.
pay mind to the warnings, too. pleeeeease? for me? there's a mention of abuse in here, nothing graphic.

The familiar friendly sound of an incoming call startles you out of your doze, and you jerk your head up, inhaling sharply as the bright screen of your desktop computer breaks through the dull lighting of the room.

"Gwuh...?" With this sage sentiment, you push your hair out of your eyes and blink around hazily, trying to figure out what you'd been doing when you fell asleep. Your open math textbook is lying on the edge of the desk, kept open to page 254 by a chewed nub of a pencil. All the lights are off except for the desk lamp, whose soft yellow light is muffled by the backpack propped up against the wall. The windows are open, but the sky outside is a dull, clouded black. You glance at the clock. It reads 1:28. Groaning, you let your chin slide out of your cheek until your face is resting on the desk again and close your eyes. It's so eeeeearly. What's going on? Why did you wake up...

The persistence of the Skype call breaks back through your consciousness and, mumbling under your breath and reaching under your glasses to rub at your eye, which seems for some reason to be covered in plastic wrap, you wake the computer from its screensaver. Your glasses are skewed, and you squint through the blurriness, to lazy to fix them, to read the screen name of whoever's calling you. Can't be Dave. He'll be asleep. Rose knows better than to pester you during finals. Dad wouldn't know how to use the Skype call function if the FAQ came up and started screaming gibberish at him, and-

Ah, shit.

You fumble for the mouse and click wildly for the Answer button, sitting up straighter and trying to smooth back your hair, adjust your glasses, wrestle a leftover piece of broccoli out of your teeth with your tongue, before-

"You stopped answering!" Vriska says.

She's gently rocking back and forth in the black, spinny chair that she keeps in her office, absently twirling her hair between two fingers. The black eyepatch that covers one eye glints, velvety, in the dimly pixelated light. She's wearing that blue lipstick again, and even though you tease her about it to no end, she sure looks a hell of a lot more amazing than you do right now, even smudged and messily applied as it is. To your relief, she's not in one of her weird fussy moods, so you allow your head to drop, mumbling a bleary "Oh... mmhmm... hey," even though sleep is still clouding your senses.

She stops rocking in the chair long enough to give the camera an accusatory stare. "I'm so heartbroken. Don't you like me?"

"Mhm, yep. Sorry, Vris. Fell asleep," you mumble into the crook of your elbow, glad she's not actually mad. You've gotten used to reading her dramatic gestures and expressions, and you can tell she's just acting for her own amusement.

"Joooooooohn!" A smile splits her face and she leans in closer to the camera. "Am I too boring for you?"

You pick up your pencil and throw it at the camera. It drops idly to the keyboard with a clack. "No, but differential equations are. Boring as heeeeeeeell. And it's one thirty in the damn morning! I'm slaving my ass off over here!" You draw your syllables out in the way that makes her grin, but she isn't smiling this time. Instead she folds her arms crossly.

"I have no sympathy for you. It's your fault you decided to take such a high level class."

"You know my dad," you protest halfheartedly.

She tilts her chair back, rolling her eyes. "You would've taken it even if your dad didn't tell you to."

"Bullshit." You're fully awake now. There's no going back to sleep. Instead of making an attempt you know will be futile, you yawn and stretch exaggeratedly, leaning back in your chair. Your foot had gone numb when you'd fallen asleep on it, and you shake it, wincing as the feeling comes flooding back to your toes. "I wouldn't be studying bio at all! I'd be helping Grandpa run the joke shop."

"Sure, sure. I've told you once and I'll tell you again, John, your joke shop's kinda stupid. There's no money in it! Your grandpa can barely pay his rent, remember?" she informs you smugly.

"But he's happy, and that's what matters." You clasp your hands together solemnly in front of your mouth and look at her over the top of your glasses. God damn. You're just like Mr. Miyagi from Karate Kid. Look at all this great wisdom you're dishing out. Wax on. Wax off. Like a fucking housecleaning master.

"Oh, for God's sake, John!" She rolls her eyes. "Don't you dare start talking about any one of those creepy Japanese senseis."

You wonder how she knew.

"Look at me!" She kicks a foot in the air and spreads her arms with a flair of drama. "I'm gonna get this gig if it costs me my right arm! Which it won't, because I'll be paid buckets when I get it, and it'll be totally sweet. Money, John. It's what makes the world go round."

"But will you be happy?" you poke at her.

"Puh-leese!" She stands, putting her face so close to the camera you can see her freckles. "A famous actress like me? Once I'm rich, I can buy whatever I want! A new car... a signed copy of Con Air... a plane ticket to Washington..."

The teasing attitude disappears from her voice. Her face falls into an expression that's not quite sad just yet- her pride won't allow that- but glum. Wistful, almost. She gives a tiny sigh, pursing her lips, and her eyes flicker away from the camera. In a flash, you remember what you'd been IMing about before you dozed off.

Right.

Shit.

There's a sigh and Vriska plops back in her chair, the usual confident grin coming back to her face. "Anyways... that joke shop's so old, John! It's going to collapse on itself, whether you run it or not. Then what? You'll spend all your money on repairing it."

"I'm not that sentimental!" you protest, a note of seriousness dripping into your voice despite your best intentions.

"Whatever you say, ya fuckin' wuss."

But her attitude is half-hearted now. Her eyes flicker up from the desk to your face, just briefly, before returning to the scratched-up wood. The slump in her shoulders is barely noticeable, but you've memorized every angle in her body, every slope of the muscles, every curve of the joint, and you can see it without even squinting. She almost looks defeated, and it unsettles you.

"...Hey." You reach forward and put a hand on the side of the computer. The cool, polished edge is nothing what you imagine her cheek must feel like, but it's a hell of a lot better than nothing. She looks up at you, the smile stuttering, faltering, before returning, looking only a little forced. "Yeah?"

"We're gonna figure it out. M'kay, Vris?"

She nods silently.

"Come on. A couple hundred bucks, some obnoxious online forms to fill out... not a big deal, right?. You'll be in the air. Sooooooooarin'... flyyyyyyyyin'... s'not a star in heaven that we can't reach..." You give her a beaming smile. You know she loves when you smile.

And it seems to work. She lifts her head just a fraction, the creases around her eyes smoothing out, and returns the smile, genuinely this time. "Maybe it wouldn't be such a big deal if you'd get a job, you lazy ass."

"Hey!" you protest, mouth falling open. "I was going to look over the weekend! Not my fault my professors decided they're all gonna flood us with reading, now is it...?"

You're about to continue when a distant car door slams.

Both of you fall fearfully, swiftly silent.

You twist to look behind you, making sure the door's shut, and then face her again. The screen's reflection flares up against the flat lenses of your glasses, reflecting her distorted shadow directly onto your retina. Her eyebrows are drawn together, lips pressed into a flat line. She's tensed all over. She might as well be preparing for battle. And she may look fierce and independent, but behind the tight lines of her cheekbones and the flattened curve of her lips, you see dread coursing through her.

"Your end?" you confirm quietly.

"My end," she hisses, and then she's looking behind her as the clicking and creaking of keys in the door echo through the tinny speakers, and you can just see her hand fly up to the blue-green-purple bruise that stains her right shoulder in an inane, automatic gesture of self-defense before the view on the screen flies into a blur, there's a staticky shout from someone much older, much bigger than she, and the call ends abruptly.

You breathe a tiny, quiet sigh that's more of a squeak of relief than anything, thanking whatever gods happen to be smiling down at the current moment who are the ones that must have ensured that she got the computer closed in time. You're not entirely sure what you would do if she saw again, but you're certain that it would be... well, fairly bad.

You give a tired sigh and pull out your phone. You know hers is always on silent, because if it went off then both of you know which Serket would get there first (and it wouldn't be Vriska), so you send her a text, knowing she'll check as soon as it's over.

hey, text me when she leaves, okay?

Then, recalling the look on her face just before she closed the laptop, you send her another.

you'll be fine, i promise.

Then, feeling vaguely sick to your stomach, you let your head drop back down to the math book, eyes focusing dismally on Marquise Spinneret Mindfang's user profile ("Make a move and the 8unny gets it!" her mood message reads, and your heart jumps a little closer to your jugular) and the little cloud icon next to it, which flickers silently from green to white. Yep, there's no chance of you finishing your studies when your mind is determinedly set on her. No way. You sigh and close your eyes. Might as well try to sleep before facing the wrath of your professor tomorrow.

this is hopefully gonna be part of a series on AO3 (CHECK IT OUT THERE THE FORMATTING IS SO MUCH BETTER). a series so that i'm not tied down. going to college in two weeks i CAN'T TIE MYSELF DOWN TOO MUCH OKAY AAH

big thankies to mlpmike, who proofread : (i was going to try and make a pun with "bro" and "beta" but it's kind of)