I know my updates have been getting shorter and I'm sorry for that but I was in quite a time crunch tonight.

Many thanks to SlytherinUnicorns, iDreamBig, Fabylou55, FanficFinatic2, GardenAquarium, obsessed01616, SmileyFacesSmile, LinkinPark X, Bitblondetoday, DarkBlueMahogany, thepeopleofthecrysis, and CatastrophicAquarius for your reviews to the last act! I love getting new readers!


Eridan blinked, as if unsure of what to make of Sollux's information. "Vris?" he asked finally. "Where was she?"

Sollux gestured vaguely to the building. "Um. She came out of there. And she had someone with her—another girl. They looked pretty friendly."

Eridan looked at Sollux's shoes for a moment, chewing on a knuckle. "Well," he said slowly, "she hasn't come up to talk to me since last week so maybe she's focusin' on someone else."

"That 'someone else' needs to know what she's getting into," Sollux said gently.

"You know who she was?"

Sollux shook his head.

"Well, keep your eyes open an' see if you notice her around campus, I guess. Aside from that, what can you do?"

Sollux looked off in the direction that Vriska and the other girl had gone. They'd completely disappeared from view, and Eridan was right—he had no idea who the other girl was. He'd have to content himself with Eridan's suggestion and hope he encountered the other girl, whoever she was, by herself sometime soon. "Alright, well, ready to go?"

Eridan downed the last of his coffee and tossed the cup in the trash can next to the building entrance. "Yeah, you?"

"Yeah, I guess so." Sollux hoisted his backpack onto his shoulder and followed a half a step behind Eridan to his car even though he knew where it was, since it was exactly where he'd parked it that morning. Eridan seemed to be caving in on himself, hunching over as they walked, and Sollux had a crazy impulse to grab his hand, but he resisted. That was probably stupid, and for all he knew, it might make Eridan feel worse. He shoved his hands in his pockets and didn't say anything.


The fact that Vriska had been that close to him without his knowledge had stunned him, for sure. A cold chill coursed through him as Sol told him what had happened, but he tried to hide it. He probably didn't do too good of a job, but he tried. It wasn't that he still liked her—in fact, it was quite the opposite. He wanted nothing to do with her. But she'd hurt him, and something like that was hard to forget. Time had eased it, deadened the pain, but her reemergence and the fact that he could theoretically run into her almost anywhere had reawakened the hurt.

Sol didn't make him feel like that, though. Being with him was so much easier than being with her—even from the beginning, Vriska had seemed to be holding something back, like she didn't even see him as a person, but he'd been a stupid eighteen-year-old who'd been more preoccupied with his still-intact virginity than with people who actually cared about him, and he'd paid the price for it. But now, although Sol also seemed a bit withdrawn, it wasn't the same as she'd been. Eridan was pretty sure Sol was still a bit skittish, afraid to push anything too far. He didn't want to get too far into something that could end just as quickly and abruptly as it had begun, and Eridan sympathized with that. Of course, he could have been completely wrong about that—it was entirely possible that Sol was genuinely standoffish and didn't really like him, but he tried not to entertain that notion. Mostly, he just wished he could grab Sol's hand, but he'd already put his hands in his pockets and effectively killed that prospect.

All he knew was that he didn't feel so bad when Sol was around, and he wanted to be around Sol as much as possible. It was easier. Sol made him laugh. He drove Eridan nuts sometimes, but he found something to laugh at, too.

"So," he said once they were back in his car, "are you really gonna be a bee for Halloween?"

"Yes," Sol said stubbornly.

"How do you not have any other costumes besides a bee costume?" Then he realized what he was asking. "How do you even have a bee costume?"

Sol rubbed his eyes beneath his glasses. "I should probably be a drunk bee this year."

"I've never seen a drunk bee."

"There's videos on YouTube. They're actually pretty funny."

"I return to my previous questions. How do you have a bee costume an' no other costumes?"

Sol shrugged. "I think I've been a bee every year since I knew what Halloween was. I never wanted to be anything else. They fly around, they sting people who annoy them, they build really cool hives, and they make honey. What's not to like?"

"The buzzin'?"

"It's calming."

"Maybe for you," Eridan laughed. "Mostly I just find it annoyin'. An' the stingin' kinda sucks if you're on the receivin' end a' it."

"That's why you don't piss off bees. Seems pretty obvious to me."

"Or they could just not buzz around my damn face," Eridan grumbled.

"Bad bee experience?"

"It stung right below my fuckin' eye," he said, rubbing reflexively at the spot.

Sol covered his laugh. "And what were you doing to incur the wrath of this bee?"

Eridan sulked for a minute. "I don't know, I was six. Probably bein' a dumbshit six-year-old."

"That seems to be a theme."

"Shut up," Eridan said, but he was smiling.

"So if your costume is so superior, what are you going to be?"

"Maybe I'll show you. Maybe you'll have to wait until Halloween to find out," he said mischievously.

"Oh, I see, you're going to be a huge dick for Halloween."

Eridan let out a snicker.

"Oh, come on, that's not what I meant."

"I didn't say anything—I can't help where your mind went," Eridan said innocently.

Sol rolled his eyes but grinned.


This time, when they got to Eridan's apartment, Cronus was sitting on the sofa, watching TV with his feet kicked up on the coffee table. He took one look at the two of them before his face split into a wide grin. "Hey, look, the boyfriend's back!"

"Shut up," Eridan grumbled, grabbing Sol's hand and dragging him through the living room and away from his older brother, but he was pretty sure Sol was smiling a little.

"No funny business now!" Cronus called after them as Eridan's bedroom door slammed behind them.

"He's jokin'," Eridan said, reluctantly letting go of Sol's hand and setting his backpack on his bed. "I hope," he added quietly.

Sol let his backpack drop to the floor. "Laundry?"

"Yeah, we should probably get on that." Eridan glanced at the bed—that definitely needed to be washed, too. "Can you help me strip the sheets?"

They pointedly ignored the looks Cronus shot them as they dragged the laundry basket full of bedding and clothes through the living room and out the door. Once the door closed behind them, Eridan felt a little less awkward—his neighbors didn't know him very well and wouldn't immediately guess why he happened to be washing his sheets—but he couldn't imagine how Sol was feeling. "Sorry this is such a shitty second date," he said as they hefted the basket into the laundry room.

"Compared to the first, it does leave something to be desired," Sol joked. He paused in front of one of the washing machines and opened the lid.

Eridan glanced up at him, and sure enough, Sol was looking at him with a shy almost-smile. Once Eridan caught his eye, he quickly looked down and started tossing clothes into the washing machine.

Eridan lobbed a balled-up T-shirt into the washer before pulling out his sheets and loading them into the washer next to it. He went to the laundry detergent vending machine (he normally used his own detergent, but he'd forgotten it in his room and he really didn't feel like going back up to get it), picked two Tides, and put one into the washer along with his sheets. He started up the washer and went back to helping Sol load up the other one, and once they were finished with that, he dropped the other container of Tide into the washer and started it up. The whole time, he kept looking up at Sol and meeting his eyes through those ridiculous bicolored glasses of his and Sol kept looking down and then back up and Eridan could just tell that they were both thinking the same thing: they really needed to start kissing, and soon. The tension between them was mounting and all Eridan really wanted to do was back Sol up against the closest wall or maybe sit him on one of the washing machines and kiss him, but he forced himself to behave anyway. There wasn't anyone in the laundry room besides them, but he supposed anyone could have just walked in and, while he didn't mind if his neighbors gossiped, he didn't want any of them to complain to building management about the two gay boys who'd been nearly fucking in the laundry room.

"Well, that'll be like a' hour," Eridan said. "Might as well wait upstairs an' get some food in the meantime."

"This was all just a carefully-constructed ruse to get me back here, wasn't it?" Sol joked.

"Like I need one a' those to get the pleasure a' your company."

Sol laughed and Eridan looked at him and realized that any time now would be the perfect time to kiss him. Witty bantering was being exchanged, they were alone, he was pretty sure Sol wanted to—he was leaning closer to him than normal and his head was hardly ever more than a foot from Eridan's—but he didn't. He could tell Sol wasn't about to make that move himself; he was waiting for Eridan to initiate it, which he appreciated, but right now, if Sol were to swoop in and instigate another round of sloppy makeouts, Eridan definitely wouldn't push him away.

Last night had been different—he felt it. Last night, there hadn't been this label of "boyfriends" to complicate things. He wasn't sure why, but somehow, that label had brought along with it the expectation of something to happen, and now, both of them wanted the other to start that something. It was strange.

He hit the up button for the elevator, and the two of them waited in a comfortable silence for the elevator doors to open and Eridan to hit the button for his floor and the doors to close, and then Eridan decided in a split second that he needed to not be worried about what whatever it was he was worried about, and he grabbed Sol by the collar and kissed him hard. Almost immediately, his hand went to the back of Eridan's head to keep their mouths together and Eridan's heartbeat was rising by the second, rising with the elevator, and when had he ended up with his back to the wall? He slid his fingers beneath the collar of Sol's shirt—well, his shirt, since Sol was just wearing it, but damn, he made it look good, far better than he'd ever done—and Sol exhaled sharply into Eridan's mouth (when had he parted his lips? Was it right around the time Sol had run his tongue across them? Was that really all it took to get him to respond like this?) and pressed his whole upper body against Eridan's but he needed something more, he needed Sol to touch him, but before he could voice it, the elevator slowed and stopped and the doors slid open and they disentangled themselves and went down the hall to the apartment.

"Hey, you plannin' on orderin' dinner?" Eridan asked Cronus the moment they walked in, as if thirty seconds before, Sol's tongue hadn't been shoved down his throat. He wondered if he was as flushed as he felt.

"Thought about gettin' burritos," Cronus said. If he suspected something, he didn't say it. "They make vegetarian burritos, right?"

"Depends on where you get 'em from," Eridan said.

"Ah."

"Okay, well, whenever you plan on orderin' somethin', let us know, okay?"

Cronus grinned. "Is Boyfriend stayin' for dinner again?"

Eridan groaned and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Yes, Boyfriend is stayin' for dinner again. Come on, Boyfriend," he added, taking Sol by the hand again and leading him (although by now, that was probably unnecessary) to his bedroom.

Sol was definitely grinning this time.


I solemnly swear that next act will pick up right where this one left off.