Winter break had always been a sort of respite for Dirk.

It was the time between the last summer and the next, and a convenient way for the school district to break up both semesters. Half the school year was done. Dirk had finished his first semester tests with predictably high grades. It had bothered him to get a B on his English exam, but he kept that to himself while Roxy bemoaned her varied report card. Wisely, Dirk chose not to remind her that her grades would be higher if she paid attention in class instead of giggling at her phone during lectures.

Dirk liked to use the breaks for much-needed self-care. Which was a fancy way of saying that he wouldn't pull himself out of bed until noon and then he would lounge on various surfaces around the house for the rest of the day before hauling himself to bed at two in the morning, having accomplished nothing.

It was down-right therapeutic.

The Strider household had a long-standing tradition on Christmas morning. Hal would wake both Dirk and D up at six in the morning, and they would both tell him to fuck off until the clock reached the double digits. They usually caved in by nine, though. It was amazing how compelling a thirteen-year-old could be when he was willing to resort to any means necessary in order to see what a jolly, fat fuck with a serious home-invasion fetish brought him as a gift instead of coal.

So when Dirk was abruptly and rudely forced into the waking world by getting a pillow slammed into his face, he instinctively latched onto Hal's wrist and tossed him to the floor.

Had he been more awake, Dirk might have appreciated the maneuver. He wasn't out of shape, and he had never had too much difficulty keeping up in gym class, but throwing his brother to the floor so easily wasn't something that he did regularly. It probably helped that Hal was both as light as a feather and caught off guard.

He groaned, running a hand over his face and rubbing the sleep from his eyes. "Y'know how this works, Hal," he drawled sleepily. "You're gettin' nothin' from me until at least ten."

There was a huff of annoyance from the floor where, Dirk assumed, Hal had just rolled his eyes. He pushed himself onto his hands and knees before getting to his feet, dusting himself off. "It's not about gifts," he said impatiently, ignoring how Dirk was glaring at him through half-lidded eyes. "It's only Christmas Eve. God, can you even pretend to keep track of the days when you're out of school?"

Dirk gave a disinterested grunt, rolling onto his side to face Hal fully. "What do you want?" He sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. "It's—" he glanced at his alarm clock, "—barely even seven in the morning. Don't you have anything better to do? Like, sleep? Which I am currently trying to do, not that you care." He rolled his eyes.

"Well, I was asleep," Hal said as he crossed his arms, "but I got woken up by Roxy. Apparently, you weren't responding to her texts. Did you know that I have her number, by the way? She got it as soon as D got me a phone because she knew that you would pull something like this one day. Fun fact; you and dad have the same habit of putting your phone on silent when you're sleeping." He unplugged Dirk's phone from where it was charging on his nightstand, tossing it to his brother. Dirk didn't bother to catch it, opting to let it hit his chest. "It's like I'm the only one in this house with any common courtesy."

At that statement, Dirk gave a sarcastic snort that Hal chose to ignore. He knew that he should probably see what Roxy was freaking out about but, to be honest, Dirk was too tired to be a good friend.

He had been up until two in the morning chatting with Blue, and then stayed up another hour tossing and turning after they said their goodbyes, picking apart everything they had said and trying to find the intent behind it. Was Blue flirting when he said that Dirk was funny? Did he say that all of his friends were cute? Maybe reading his words in a British accent made everything sound more enticing to Dirk.

Either way, he was due some much-needed sleep. He turned over so that his back was to Hal, flipping his pillow over for good measure and burying his face in it. He didn't say anything, but his actions were a clear indication that their conversation was over.

"So, uh," Hal spoke up after an awkward beat of silence, "are you gay or what?"

Dirk shot up in bed, almost falling over himself in his efforts to grab Hal by the shoulders. First thing in the morning was generally not a good time to ask people important questions, but Dirk was too sleep-deprived and stressed enough about that particular question to think rationally. He knew that he was gripping his brother tighter than he had to, but he couldn't convince his fingers to loosen. Still, he gave Hal credit for keeping a completely straight face.

"What," Dirk hissed, "the fuck kind of a question is that? Where did hear about it?"

Hal winced, only to roll his eyes and scowl at Dirk. "Uh, what do you think Roxy was so anxious to talk to you about?" He raised an eyebrow. "I mean, it's not like she told me about it, but the link she gave me said plenty."

Instantly, Dirk's anger gave way to fear.

He let go of his brother, getting to his feet and almost tripping over his blankets in the process. Half of his pillows ended up on the floor and his sheets hadn't turned out much better, but he hardly cared. Still bleary-eyed from sleep, Dirk sat down in his desk chair and impatiently booted up his computer. His phone would have sufficed, but the last thing Dirk wanted to see was walls and walls of pink text.

Especially since he had a bad feeling that he knew what Roxy was going to be asking him about.

It seemed to take both forever and no time at all for his computer to boot up. The whole time, Hal was hovering curiously over his shoulder, but Dirk paid him no mind. As soon as his computer finished starting up, he opened a new browser and hurried to type in the familiar URL to the school website. There was always the chance that he was wrong, but if he wasn't…

He clicked on the tab for the gossip board and there it was.

Dirk sat back in his chair, stunned as he stared at the words emblazoned at the top of the feed. "MORE THAN ONE FAG AT SCHOOL." He winced. The board was organized by the most viewed posts, but did it really need a heading like that? It was posted anonymously, a little under an hour ago, but it already seemed like half the school had seen it.

The post had the screenshots of his early conversations with Blue and the paragraph accompanying it went into detail about Dirk's identity. There was his full name, age, phone number, address, even chunks from his schedule. Numbly, Dirk was surprised that Cronus even had this information. Didn't he have better things to do than stalk him? The obvious answer was no. Ever since Meenah had rejected him in front of the entire school, Dirk had barely seen Cronus. He hadn't received any texts from him or seen him in any of their shared classes. This must have been what he was waiting for — the perfect day to stick a knife between Dirk's shoulder blades and really twist it in good.

And, to his surprise, Dirk began to laugh. Hal was looking at him oddly, but Dirk couldn't seem to make himself stop laughing. The whole situation was so hilarious! He was exposed to Blue and the rest of the school now, and Roxy was probably going to hate him for this, but he would deserve it because he had broken her heart, hadn't he? No one was going to look at him the same again, because he was gay, and wasn't that just terrible?

He laughed until his sides ached and he couldn't breathe, until his face was tinted purple and his eyes were watering.

"Dirk?" Hal's voice reached him and Dirk, still chuckling, looked over his shoulder at his little brother. "Dirk. You… you know that… this isn't…?" He sighed. Then, in an action that genuinely caught Dirk off guard, Hal leaned down and wrapped his arms around his brother, clutching him in a tight hug.

It was weird, but not in a bad way. Dirk couldn't remember the last time he had hugged his little brother. Still, it felt good to gradually put his arms around Hal and hug him back. He hadn't realized that he missed the sensation of touch like that.

After a long moment, Hal slowly pulled back. He turned his attention back to the computer screen before glancing at Dirk. "You… they're not wrong, are they?" He asked quietly. "You're gay? Dirk?" It was obvious that Hal found the idea difficult to wrap his mind around, but regardless, Dirk gave a little inclination of his head as a nod. He was gay. It was about time that he stopped trying to deny it.

Hal pursed his lips, eyes narrowed as he went back to scanning over the words on Dirk's computer screen. Even though he didn't try to stop his brother, Dirk didn't like that Hal was looking over that post. There were a lot of things said about him and gay men in general that he didn't want his thirteen-year-old brother exposed to.

Abruptly, Hal was in motion, hunched over the keyboard before Dirk's brain could process the movement, typing away with such speed that Dirk found himself genuinely impressed.

Still, that was his computer, and years of friendly antagonist had taught Dirk that he was never to let his little brother on his computer. "Hal?" He stood up, putting a hand on his brother's shoulder. "What are you doing?"

Without looking up or slowing down, Hal merely shrugged his hand off and continued. "Insults and threats to your personal safety were being leveled at you," he said calmly. "Not to mention, anonymously posting another student's private information is another breach in the website's user safety agreement. I know that I can't undo the long-term effects, but…" he pulled back from the computer, looking moderately pleased with himself. "I can at least get the post taken down and flagged for review by the administration."

Dirk blinked, looking at the reloaded page. Whatever Hal had done, the post from Cronus was now gone. He was fairly certain that anonymous hate posts got taken down as soon as they were reported, with or without review, but that didn't make him feel any better about the situation.

Regardless, Dirk mustered up a smile. "Thanks," he told Hal. And, for once, he meant it. There had been no reason for his brother to help, and yet he had done so anyway.

"You're welcome," Hal nodded. He shifted awkwardly and then spoke. "Also, um, for the record, Dirk… It doesn't matter to me. The gay thing, I mean. I've, uh—" he coughed into his hand, looking away, "I've pieced together that your sex life is none of my business. So. Yeah."

Despite his bad mood, Dirk managed a laugh. "Yeah," he agreed. "Especially since you're thirteen and my brother, who shouldn't be thinking about sex in any context." He gave Hal a pointed look, earning a sheepish smile from his brother in return. "Oh, um…" Dirk turned his computer off and stood up, not looking at Hal, "I'm sorry, you know. About yelling at you the other day. I shouldn't have. I was just stressed." He sighed.

Hal didn't answer immediately. He lifted his hand like he was going to put it on Dirk's shoulder, but then seemed to decide against it and let it fall back to his side. "It's fine," he said finally. "You should probably tell dad about this, you know. Before he finds out from someone else."

"I know," Dirk said quietly, still not turning around. "Just… not today. Actually, I kind of want to be alone right now." The situation wasn't as hilarious as it had been a few minutes ago. Quietly, he was struggling not to freak out. He needed to keep a level head and work through this problem calmly. Yeah. Because Dirk was so good at being calm recently.

Thankfully, Hal didn't argue. "Okay," he agreed. He walked over to Dirk's door and paused in the threshold. "I know that you probably don't need it, but you can, um, talk to me about it if you need to." It was a statement, but the way Hal said it came out as a question.

Dirk chuckled, turning to give a smile. "I will," he promised. As awkward as it was after years of mutual antagonism, it was nice to know that he had his brother's support when he needed it.

The door shut behind Hal with a soft click, and Dirk let out a tired sigh. His smile slipped like the bad disguise it was and he felt a wave of tiredness run over him. It wasn't even 7:30 in the morning yet. Why did he have to deal with this drama? He slouched over to his bed, falling on top of it with a soft grunt.

Even though he didn't want to, he stuck his hand out and found his phone tangled in his mess of sheets. He turned it on, wincing at all of the texts and missed calls he had. Some of them were from numbers he didn't know, and he promptly ignored them. He briefly scanned over some of the texts, but they were mostly a lot of threats and insults. A few people were reaching out to offer support, but Dirk didn't feel like responding to anyone.

He wasn't eager to read the texts from his friends, but the ones from Roxy were nearing one hundred and didn't show any sign of stopping. Dirk was going to have to read them sooner or later anyway, so he tapped to read what she had said.

ROXY: dirk
ROXY: dirk cmon i know your seeing this
ROXY: i need uto answer me
ROXY: meenah sent me the link to that post on the school website
ROXY: its not true
ROXY: right?
ROXY: she says that it is but
ROXY: but u wouldntve told her somethin that imporatnt b4 telling your bff would you?
ROXY: i know u wouldnt
ROXY: dirk im kinda freking out right now and it owuld be real great if you would respond

After that, Dirk had to stop. He couldn't get through 80 more texts of his best friend having a mental breakdown. He wanted to comfort her, of course he did, but he doubted that either of them were in the right space for that to become anything but a screaming match. He was going to have to apologize to her later but, for now, he just let her continue with her frantic texts.

Cronus's text was about what Dirk had expected.

CRONUS: yor getting wvhat you dservwe ya fucjin faggot

And that was it. There were no images and no links. There was only one line of text. Dirk wasn't sure how to feel about it, so he settled on just ignoring it and moved on.

MEENAH: ey you feel like explainin why i got woken up to a text from cronus outing you for all of your gay glory
MEENAH: i dunno how he found out but the screenshots look really convincing
MEENAH: wait
MEENAH: has he been blackmailin you?
MEENAH: is that why youre always so weird around each other?
MEENAH: is that why you kept trying to get us alone together and why he tried confessin to me in front of the whole school?
MEENAH: dirk
MEENAH: you betta fuckin answer me

Dirk winced. He had expected Meenah to be pissed, so her texts were disheartening, but not surprising. At least she hadn't gone on endlessly like Roxy. He was going to owe Meenah any apology too, but he really wasn't up for pulling the pin on that grenade.

Which left just one last option for conversation.

JANE: Dirk, Roxy is having quite the fit wondering where you are.
JANE: She said that she contacted Hal to see how you're doing, but he hasn't replied since then.
JANE: Dirk?
JANE: Are you okay?

He set his phone down back on his nightstand, squeezing his eyes shut to keep any tears from escaping. God, he needed to hug Jane the next time he saw her. Hugging anyone, actually, would have been amazing. Dirk wasn't about to reduce himself to clinging to his pillow like a twelve-year-old girl who had just found out that Justin Bieber had a girlfriend or some shit.

As pathetic as it was, as much as he hated himself for the stinging in his eyes and the lump in his throat and the hopeless sinking sensation in his gut, Dirk was most definitely not okay. It felt like something inside of him had died, and he wasn't sure if that was being overdramatic or not. His experience with extreme emotion was practically non-existent, and he wanted to pull his hair out or hide in his bed for a month or cut the ability to feel right out of his chest, anything to feel normal again. Any hope of having a social life was ruined now and so was more than half of his already few friendships. No one would ever look at him the same way again. It was all his fault.

Dirk wasn't sure if he should feel relieved or not that he had no texts from Blue.