Act III Part II

Let's Not Be Decent People

Being married against his will was almost always a pain in the neck, but there were some things that having a unwanted wife could not stop Dave from doing. One such thing was meeting his friends for lunch if they were available, and the only reason Rose wouldn't keep him from doing that was that if he hung out with his friends during the day, he wouldn't invite them at strange hours. So, as close to weekly as possible, Dave arranged a lunch with every single one of his friends, and the ones who made it were his best friends for the week.

Like every week before it, the only people who showed up were Karkat and Terezi, for several reasons: the day that the lunch was on was always meeting day at John's work, and he couldn't skip a meeting for his friends, no matter how much they meant to him; Tavros also had to work, but he was almost always at work during the afternoons and lunches couldn't be held at dinner time or else they would be known as dinners; Jade was busy not only watching Casey but Snow and Dante as well, meaning she wouldn't be able to leave even if she had wanted to; and last but not least, Vriska couldn't go because Dave made sure to schedule the lunch on one day of the week when she was always working.

The reason for that was simple, he wanted to be served by her and get to tip someone who he knew really deserved the money. She gave service that deserved a quality tip, not the fifty percent that Dave would leave for her, on top of whatever everyone else left, but she didn't argue with it, and the restaurant's management knew that she wasn't faking the tips. The job she had and the money she got from it were not things she'd risk losing when she was always with barely enough money to get by.

This particular lunch, things went downhill fast when, while he was getting ready to go out and eat, Rose called him from work and asked him if it would be okay if she had lunch with them as well. He didn't say no to her, because his friends did like her, and they were legally married and should do things every once in a while to prove that. She never once mentioned that she'd be bringing her girlfriend Meenah along, and when the two showed up arm-in-arm, Dave knew that trouble was brewing.

"I got a table for four, Rose, not five. We can't sit with Vriska if there's five of us," he said, pointing at the black-haired woman that was linked with his wife. "She needs to go."

"We can pull a chair up to the table and they can all deal with it. Meenah and I haven't been spending much time together lately, and a nice lunch with friends will remedy that problem." As rude as always Rose glared at Dave until he gave in to the reality that this woman he didn't like or really know would be dining with them, all because of another woman he really didn't like.

It got worse when Karkat and Terezi showed up, bringing with them two children that Dave hadn't actually seen since that baby shower adventure he had put together the previous summer. "Sorry that we brought these brats along," Karkat said, his voice rather apologetic for the gruff guy he tried to be, "but we're in charge of them for the foreseeable future and they won't go to any babysitter without a fight."

"That makes seven of us, and last time I checked, seven asses can't fit in four chairs." Instantly realizing that he had cursed in front of small and impressionable children, he covered his mouth, before turning to glare back at Rose (who was still glaring at him from when she arrived). "We can't sit with Vriska and that means she doesn't get a tip from me this week. Fuck."

"Covering your mouth doesn't mean Justice and Cherry can't hear you still!" Terezi's voice was grating as always, but added in with the fact that his weekly event that did good for a friend in need was effectively ruined, and it almost gave him a headache.

"Listen, I don't really care if those kids hear me, okay? I've got a bigger problem to deal with, and that is how we're going to include Vriska in all of this if there's too many of us!" Luckily there was a slight fix to the problem, seating them all in a cushy booth right near where their friend was taking her tables, so that she could stop by and chat with them if she wasn't busy. And, as a bonus, the woman who was serving them, some short and very curvy lady named Feferi, was a friend of Vriska's who she had been working with since way before she had this particular job. Things, although not how he would have liked them, were starting to actually go well.

"What are all these people doing here?" Everyone at the table, aside from the children, turned their heads at the sound of the shrill voice. Standing at the side of the table was Vriska, notepad for taking orders in hand and a confused look on her face. "I told you I only had tables that seat four, Dave. Can't you listen?"

He rolled his eyes behind his shades. "I can listen just fine, thanks. Rose brought her girlfriend along, and Karkat couldn't get out of babysitting duty. Sorry if you've got a problem with that, but it's just how it's gotta be today."

"Eh, it's really whatever. I'm sure I'll be able to squeak by without your tip money this week." She laughed, before walking off to one of her tables that had been recently sat. Everyone watched her, especially Dave, who did feel quite bad about not being able to help her out. The sarcasm in her voice before she left told the story, that his money helped her family a lot.

"See, this is why we don't bring extras to lunch," he hissed once he knew she wasn't possibly going to overhear him. "We fuck Vriska over if we bring extras to lunch."

"Language!" Terezi yelled, at the same time Karkat began explaining why they had brought extras along for the second time since they had arrived at the restaurant. Rose just sighed and lovingly stroked her girlfriend's arm, not caring that she was angering Dave even more by doing it. But she was angering him, and if it weren't for the fact that their server came to the table, he would have snapped and sent them all home.

The sight of someone much shorter than Vriska at the head of the table did catch Dave off guard a bit, but when she started asking for orders he had to calmly remember that she, this Feferi chick, had to take care of them because his friends had failed to inform him they were bringing others along. She seemed friendly enough, although she did have an air about her that felt like she didn't need the money she'd be making off of them. "You're all Vriska's regulars, right?" she asked, once she had their drink order down. "Her friends?"

"That's right. We come in and see her every single week." Karkat pointed to himself, Terezi, and finally Dave. "Or, rather, the three of us do. We, ahem, fucked up a bit this week and brought some other people along." He was slapped on the shoulder by Terezi for it, but he knew that the curse word was well-placed and needed.

She laughed, a distinct bubbly giggle that made Dave want to sock her in the face. "Well that's okay! It's nice to get to serve you and my family today!" She motioned to the table next to the one they were at, a small set-up for no more than two people. "Maybe you all will be friends and we could all hang out sometime! Vriska's always talking about how great her friends are, after all."

"Yeah, I think we'll take a rain check on that one," Dave sarcastically replied. "We don't hang out with anyone outside our group. Hell, it's only because I'm married to the damn bitch that she's here." He pointed a finger at Rose, who flipped him off. "And it's only because we're married against her will that this other chick is here." His pointing turned to Meenah, who gave him the same gesture Rose did. "So don't think we're gonna be friends with your family."

Feferi took a step back, nodding as Dave went on, and the second she finished she turned and headed out of the room. "That's no way to treat the wait staff, you know," Rose said, her voice condescending. "You should be more polite. Now you'll have to tip her double, and she'll be able to rub it in Vriska's face."

"Listen here, Rose, I don't have time for your bullshit. I told it like it is, and she couldn't handle it." He shrugged. "And before anyone tells me to stop cursing, I really do not give a rat's ass if those kids can hear me. They shouldn't fucking be here." His outburst, even if it was all said calmly and in a near-monotone, angered everyone he was with aside from the two children, who stared at him in wide-eyed wonder. The group remained silent until they were given their drinks, but the second Feferi stepped away again after getting what they wanted written down, they were back to not speaking to each other in anything above a whisper.

Dave started to stand up, to walk around and cool his head before he did anything rash, but Vriska's appearance stopped him. "I think I just saw someone I never thought I'd see again," she hurriedly said, taking a few deep breaths. "How the fuck did he end up here?"

"Which he are you talking about?" Terezi, having completely given up on stopping anyone from corrupting her nephew and niece with the cursing, didn't so much as mention Vriska's word choice. "Is it your dad? Wait, have you ever even seen your dad?"

"No, it's not my dad." She knelt down next to the table and rested her head on her hands. "It's someone worse. Someone I thought I left behind when I got with Tavros."

Terezi paused for a second, before trying again. "Your...mom?"

"Ugh, no!" Vriska got back to her feet and shook her head, wringing her hands as she did. "I'm going to go talk to my tables and hope he doesn't see me. Don't start shit with him, you hear?" As no one knew who she was talking about, no one really knew how to react, and so she left with a deep sigh and more head shaking.

"Auntie, I gotta go potty," one of the children said, tugging at Terezi's arm. Dave looked over long enough to see that it was Justice, the older one, who was saying it, and as he was male, she deferred it to Karkat, who required Dave to get up so that he could get himself and the child out of the booth. Once he was re-situated, the other child, Cherry, started to whine in broken sentences that she had to go too. Since Terezi was mostly blind and probably not the best adult to have escort a kid who wasn't fully potty-trained to the bathroom, she managed to convince Rose (and by extension Meenah) to take her instead.

That left just Dave and Terezi sitting at the table when things started happening around them. Those bubbly giggles were heard, and as Dave turned to look to see what Feferi was doing, and if she was bringing them their food, he saw that she was leading some scrawny-looking guy into the room, and he looked like he was talking to her about something. She led him to the table next to theirs, leading Dave to believe that he was either Feferi's brother or lover, and since he was the exact opposite of her physically, his features sharp compared to her rounded ones, it had to have been the second option.

She scurried off once he was seated, and Dave stared at him, something about this man that seemed so familiar to him. "What's going on?" Terezi asked in a hushed whisper. "I can't tell what's happening over there."

"Eh, just looks like our waitress is banging a decently attractive guy, that's all." He shrugged, trying to figure out where he had seen someone who looked like him before. "If you could see, I'm sure you'd be all over him. He looks like your kind of guy."

"I don't know about that," she replied with a laugh, before thanking Dave for filling her in on what she was missing. The giggling started up again, and Terezi was about to ask what was causing it, if there was another guy or something, but Dave happened to turn and see what Feferi was doing now and audibly gasped. It was one thing for him to gasp ironically, but this was gasping in genuine shock.

Their waitress was leading in someone Dave knew as Rose's ex-girlfriend, who was most definitely as bisexual as Rose herself was, and she was sporting a rather sizable stomach bump. When she was directed to the table, it left Dave with many more questions than he knew he'd get answers for, the most pressing of which being what the fuck was going on with Mr. Pointy Face, Rose's ex, and the too-bubbly Feferi.

"That's definitely her," Rose said, once she was back to the table with her arms wrapped around Meenah in a tender embrace to bother anyone who would care. Her face was red with anger, though, and it was apparent that she was a bit peeved that her ex was in the same building as her. "I can't believe this."

"You don't think they're sisters or something, do you?" Karkat was attempting to help the situation a bit, by throwing out any suggestions he could think of. "Because if they're not, then this is something really fucking weird that we're witnessing."

"No, no, I would have heard of it if she had a sister, and the only cousin she has is tall, slender, and nothing like Feferi." After taking a few deep breaths to control her anger, she continued to speak. "I think that she left me for the sake of a threesome. It's not something she would ever do, but it seems to be the only logical explanation right now."

At the same time as each other, Dave and Meenah, who had remained mostly silent the entire time, looked at Rose and said, "Fuck logic." They then glared at each other, due to the other stealing the sentiment they were feeling and wanting to share.

"I would love to fuck logic, but I simply cannot do that. I dated that girl. I know how she works. She did prefer men to women after all. I told her that was how it was, and she assured me that it wasn't true. What a liar." She rested her head on Meenah's shoulder. "I never thought I'd see her again, and here she is."

They all hushed up as Feferi approached the table, bringing with her their meals and a bunch of unanswered questions that no one wanted to address. As tempting as it was to ask about the duo at the table next to them, it was the safe option to just ignore it all and act as if nothing was going on at all. She could sense that there was something wrong, and left them rather quickly to go talk to her special guests, but once she was done with them, things took a turn for the weird. They were maybe a handful of bites into their food when the gentleman from the table came over to them, his eyes set solely on Dave. "Excuse me," he said, giving Dave a small wave. "Are you a local DJ?"

"As a matter of fact, I am," he replied, looking up and smiling at the man. Sure, he looked oddly familiar and was involved in something strange, but if he knew who he was, then Dave just had to be polite. "How do you know of me?"

"I saw you on a billboard ad the other day and tuned into your show that night." Some of the letters in the man's sentence were said with extra emphasis, a speech tic that only slightly bothered everyone who was listening—except for Terezi, whose mostly sightless eyes were narrowing in disgust. "You were very entertaining, and it's nice to see such talent in the flesh."

"Hold off on the compliments, you dirty pig." Dave was just about to thank the man, but Terezi's angry words interrupted him. "I should have guessed she was talking about you."

"Who the...Terez?" The man stepped closer to the table, leaning forward to look closely at Terezi to see her better. "Terezi Pyrope? Went to school with me? Used to play some D & D back in the day?" He sounded very excited to be recognized, but then he snorted. "Guess you really did go blind, huh? Deserved it, bitch."

She attempted to stand up, but the table prevented her from getting to her feet. "If I was closer to you, I'd sock you in that ugly face of yours."

"Whatever." The guy gave a dramatic sigh, accompanied by an eyeroll behind his big-rimmed and fake glasses, as he stood back to full height and smiled. "I'm just here to meet DJ Stride Swag, that's all." The way he pronounced the name Dave had taken for his business in music made everyone start to laugh, angering the man more than being called a pig did. "What the fuck is your problem? Did Terez there tell you a bunch of lies about me? You can't trust her, she had her mind tainted by that ignorant slut Vris..." He shuddered, and the laughter stopped, replaced by questioning stares and displeased huffs. "What's the problem now?"

"'Kay, dude, thought you were just a fan, but now you're getting a bit too weird for my tastes." Dave slid out of the booth and stood, his full height barely an inch under the new guy's. "What's your problem, talking shit about our friend when she's not even here?"

"Only person I talked any shit about was Vris, and why would someone with such refined tastes in music like yourself know who she is? She's a disgusting wench." Without so much as a warning, Dave attacked the guy, grabbing his arm and twisting it behind his back, before demanding that he say who he was and explain himself. "Ow, you fucker! The name's Eridan. Not like you've ever heard it before, I'm sure."

"Hey hey, what is happening here?" Feferi, rushing to the scene, was able to get Dave off of Eridan without even getting physically involved, as her being a witness to the event could potentially have gotten him banned from the restaurant, and the last thing he wanted was to be unable to help his friend out anymore. "Were you two really just fighting?"

"Wasn't much of a fight, Fef. He attacked me for doin' what I do and talkin' shit about Vris. You know how it is."

She looked from the two guys, Dave sitting back down and Eridan just standing there, staring back at her with an expression that simply said he felt he was innocent, over to where Vriska was in the opposite corner, helping out one of her tables. "...You mean, this entire time, you've been talking bad about someone I work with and I didn't know it? Better yet, you dated someone I've known for years?"

"Vriska isn't a common name, Fef! How could you have thought there'd be more than one bitch by that name!" He threw his hands in the air, purposely knocking a plate off of the table as he did. "I can't believe you're friends with her and you work together an—wait. Get her over here. Now."

The malicious smile that was forming on his lips was enough to get Dave to stand back up, cracking his knuckles as he did. He wasn't going to let this guy get anywhere close to Vriska. But it was Rose, with a few words, who did more damage at that moment than any fist could. "May I ask a simple question?" she started, but continued without getting any answer. "What relation to you both is the woman that came in with you, Eridan?"

"Hm, Kan? She's our fuckin' girlfriend, that's who she is." He focused his attention on Rose, who was shaking her head in disbelief. "Do you have a problem with that, just like everyone else seems to have a problem with somethin' or other?"

"I do have a problem with it. What did you do to my Kanaya?" The use of the word my in her sentence earned her a few whispered objections from Meenah, but Rose was more worried about what had happened to her ex-girlfriend than the issues her current one had with the situation. "She wouldn't ever want that for herself."

"How would you know that? She's not yours and she did want it, so stay out of our personal business." Eridan had taken to the defensive, and he had Feferi repeating over and over that it was something that they had agreed to, that Kanaya had wanted it, that she had been eager and willing to participate.

Yet Rose didn't buy a word of it and ended the conversation abruptly when she got up, spat directly in Eridan's face, and demanded for Meenah to follow her. The dark-haired woman almost followed through without any issue, but when she was passing by Feferi, she stopped in her tracks. "You're a Peixes. A fish babe, ain't ya?"

Thinking that all the arguing and fighting was over, even with Eridan standing beside her fuming that he had been degraded by some woman, Feferi cheerfully nodded. "Sure am! What makes you bring that up?"

"A fish babe workin' in a place like this for li'l money? Somefin don't make sense here, but I'm not shore what it is." She placed her hands on her hips and leaned into her face. "Water you doin' here, fish babe? I fuckin' looked up to your family, changed my name to Peixes 'cuz of your family, and yet you work in a place like this! What's up with that?"

"Well, you see, when I met Eridan, my family made me pick between him or their money, and while living the life of an heiress was fun, falling in love was so much mo—" She was cut off by Meenah screaming. "—huh? What's the problem?"

"You gave up bein' head fish babe for a shrimp like him? Ugh, water ya gonna do when he leaves you for the woman you let him sleep with? Really, water ya gonna do?"

"As she's my girlfriend just as much as she is his, I don't think that'll ever be a problem." It wasn't the answer Meenah wanted, and she returned to following Rose out of the place, grumbling the entire way out about how her dreams of fish family royalty were dashed by the behavior of someone who had been her idol.

At the table, Karkat got close to Terezi's ear and whispered to her, "Are you listening to what you started? Call one guy a pig and we end up learning about a threesome and someone's weird-as-shit fish kink."

"In hindsight, maybe attacking someone I haven't heard about since graduating high school wasn't the brightest idea. But, hey, free entertainment." She shrugged. "I bet Vriska's having fun listening to all of this, if she is."

"I don't think she is, Terezi. I think this has managed to get her upset, because she hasn't taken one fucking step closer to us than the furthest table in the room." He scanned the room for Vriska and, like he had just said, she was over in the corner, assisting the guests there and trying not to pay any attention to the commotion. "Maybe we should go now, before she does get involved and these kids see a cat fight."

Terezi didn't argue with the logic, and without any fanfare or additional attacking, the couple and the two kids they were now in charge of left the same way Rose had minutes before. That just left Dave standing there in a fighting stance, Eridan clearly angry and ready to hurt someone, and Feferi blinking in a stunned silence from what Meenah had said to her. When Eridan decided to sit back down and ignore Dave completely, that was his cue to take his leave, first asking for the check to pay and then leaving only the exact amount of money to cover the meal, no more and no less.

He expected to be able to leave with no more trouble, but no sooner than he reached the front door did he feel a hand on his shoulder. "Unhand me, or I'll swing," he threatened, before looking to see who was there. Instead of that rude Eridan, like he had thought it would be, it was Vriska.

"What did you do all that for?" she asked, letting go of him just in case he would still throw a punch at her. "Did you guys really have to start a fight with them?"

"It's your fault in the end. Terezi started it, and then he said some shit about you, and then it went downhill from there. I shouldn't have greeted him, but he was a fan." He pushed his shades up on his nose a bit. "A fan that I knew from someone. Wish I would have remembered I'd seen him in one of your old yearbooks, to be honest."

She gave him an exasperated look as he turned to face her. "I'm really okay with you trying to put him in his place, and that's not the problem. The problem is that you did it here, where me and Feferi work. So maybe I should have learned she was dating him...that they've been together ever since I met her...but that's not the point!" She put both hands on his arms and shook him a bit. "The point is that you are known as my guests, and you behaved like this. What if they fire me?"

"They're not going to fire you, Vriska. They try and I will pay them to not." He smirked, but let it fade when he saw the look that was still on Vriska's face. "You're not pleased, are you? Damn it."

"I'm not pleased because I'm pretty sure they're going to send Feferi home for the day, and that means double work for me. All because you guys started this fight." She sighed. "Guess it's a good money opportunity, since I didn't get your tip today..."

He thought for a second, sticking his hand into his pocket and pulling out his wallet. From inside the wallet he grabbed a small amount of cash, lifting it to show Vriska as he put his wallet away. "Here, take this. Dirk can suck it up and understand that you need money."

She gasped, taking it and shoving it in her pocket. "Dave, you're such a great friend. A huge jerk, but a great friend." She was going to hug him, but the sound of Eridan's voice yelling for the "rude asshole" to not leave made her get nervous and step away. "I can't deal with him here, sorry," she apologized. "Just don't fight too much more. I really don't need to lose my job over my ex."

"Got it, got it," he said with a handwave, and she walked away as fast as she could to escape any possible confrontation and to get back to work. Eridan appeared within seconds, his pale face bright red with lasting anger. "Yo, fuckface, what do you want from me now?"

"I want to know why that fuckin' happened, and I wanna know right now." He pushed Dave up against the glass a bit, a hollow noise echoing through the lobby as he hit. "Tell me, Stride Swag. Tell me why a cool dude like yourself is a huge douche."

"I'm a douche for standing up for my friend? Oh that's nice to know. I'll make sure to ask my listeners how they feel about that on my next broadcast." He tried to get free of Eridan's grasp but couldn't manage it. "Let me go, dude."

"I need answers. Fef's in there cryin' thanks to that fish bitch, and she's questionin' ever getting with me. Why did that happen?"

He attempted to shrug. "No idea. Meenah isn't my friend and I couldn't justify her actions if I tried."

"Whatever. I know Fef won't leave me. As for that other woman...why was she askin' about Kan? It's obvious me and Fef and Kan are all together, so why would she accuse me of doin' unspeakable stuff to Kan?" He sighed and loosened his grip. "I'm just a loving guy. A loyal man. Ive got two girlfriends, yeah, and almost kids with them both, but did I do somethin' wrong?"

Dave, finally squirming away, couldn't help but laugh. "You started shit with me and my friends, that's what. Next time, keep your dick comments about Vriska to yourself, will you?" He didn't stick around for an answer, leaving without any more resolution to the problem. There just didn't seem to be much more he could do without causing someone to suffer, and with the chance that it would be Vriska who would pay for his behavior, he couldn't risk it.

"So that Feferi girl you've worked with forever, she's been dating Eridan the whole time?" Tavros' voice was filled with skepticism, as if the proposition was just too unreal. "And you didn't find out until now?"

Vriska nodded, as she played her Gameboy with Snow on her lap. "Yep, that's right. It never came up, I guess. But now I know never to invite her over to dinner." She cracked a smile and laughed, which caused the chain reaction of Snow giggling and, from right between his parents, Dante started to snort from happiness. "Aw, you kiddos, that wasn't a 'ha' laugh, that was a sad laugh. Not like you get the difference."

Tavros shifted his eyes from his family over to where Dave sat, up against the door with his phone in hand. "Did you make him pay for attacking you?"

"Nope, didn't even handle the situation. I just got out of there. Your wife convinced me to not beat the shit out of that dick." He shrugged, flipping through a bunch of incoming messages to his phone. "If it weren't for her, I'd probably be sitting in the slammer right now."

"'Reeps!" Snow started screaming, causing everyone to turn their attention to her. She had her hands wrapped around the game, trying to pull it from Vriska's grasp. "Give 'Reeps, game!" Her outburst, which continued on for several minutes, left everyone there at a loss for words. They had been discussing the incident at the restaurant ever since Vriska had gotten home, and Snow and her little electric sheep fascination was the first real distraction the entire time.

"She's so cheerful. Kinda cute for a little brat." Dave, not looking from his phone's screen, frowned when Snow's screaming turned from Pokémon to wanting to play with his phone. "Hey, no little babies touching this, you hear? I had to deal with kids today and I wasn't prepared for that. These two, yes, I'm always up for playing with my best bro's kids. Those kids...no."

"Since when am I your best bro?"

He shrugged. "Since you became cool, actually hung out with me, and didn't unexpectedly bring children with you to lunch. Guess I taught Terezi's nephew a few choice words, though. Karkat's telling me he's been cursing up a storm, and I guess he also punched his sister in the face?"

"...Maybe you should leave before you teach Snow something she shouldn't know, mijo." It was very rare for Tavros to slip any sort of Spanish into conversation, but when he did it meant that he was being serious, and it almost always involved his kids. "Or, at least, if you're gonna curse around my babies, do it so they can't understand it."

"Your fuckin' kids can't grasp most of what I say, so I don't think there's a problem."

"Cierra el hocico, Dave." He stood up, metal braces clanging against the floor. "I asked you to leave, and that means go." He started for where Dave was sitting, but the message had been given loud and clear, and within a minute Dave was gone. "Ugh, I hope he doesn't hate me for that. But he should know that cursing around these guys isn't allowed."

"You still cursed around them." Vriska, holding her game far from Snow's insistent hands, smiled at him. "You just did it in a language no one else understands."

From the other side of the door he had just closed, Dave tried to search the internet for whatever Tavros had told him, because a curse to use in front of Terezi's niblings would be a curse that got him kicked out of an easygoing family's apartment. His attempt at spelling whatever he had been told was futile, and so he made his way back down to his place, hoping that his adventures of the day and the fights that had happened were a one-time thing, and that when he'd wake up the next morning, he'd never have a real argument with hurt feelings again.

A/N: Originally posted to Tumblr on March 12th, 2014.

What Tavros says at the end roughly translates to "shut the fuck up." And what's going to happen next? Who knows. See ya next week.