Words couldn't possibly describe how she felt at the moment. Just emotions. Cold, sick, brutal emotions that attacked the chasms of her heart, eating away everything she worked hard for.

He never saw. I wasn't good enough.

I tried so hard, but in the end it didn't even pull through.

He never ever returned those feelings. I'm such a moron.

He'd never want me. He'd rather have a perfect girlfriend, I'm just not good enough—

"Nepeta."

She didn't see him come in. She didn't notice when he sat in the squeaky chair at her bedside, clasping her hand in his big, soft hands.

She sniffed miserably in acknowledgment. He returned the gesture by gingerly wiping her tear stained cheeks with the back of his index finger. Her rib cage fluttered wildly as she drew in a shaky breath, then letting it go through trembling lips. After repeating the process several time, she turned her head to him, blinking back tears.

"… I…. I got rejected…" the last word came out in pieces, the dam she had built up beginning to tear back down. Her shoulders shook as desperate sobs broke free from her throat. "I tried… I really did.. It just… It wasn't enough." It was her turn to wipe her tears with the back of her eerily pale hand. "Equius, it hurts so much. Everything really really hurts right now." The tiles scraped in protest as the burly man scooted closer in his rickety chair, enveloping her hand in both of his. Through her blurry vision she could see him blink slowly behind those cracked shades, trying to piece together an appropriate response.

"… I would have to say I strongly disagree with your last statement."

"Which one?" she sniffed. "You'll have to be spetifi… Specifi…" A shuddery sigh. "Specific, my bad."

"There is nothing to apologize for. As I was saying, I do not agree with the statement of 'I got rejected.'"

"But you weren't there to see." The gentle breeze from the outside crept through the open window into the room, gently stirring the transparent curtains. Miniscule snowflakes fluttered in lazily. "C-can you shut that?" The room remained quiet as her friend slowly retreated for a brief moment, staring at the indigo skies before turning back, taking up her hand as he sat back down.

"I may not have seen. But I have heard."

"Oh no Equius, you didn't hurt him right?"

"I refrained from touching a hair on him. I knew it would upset you, though I had a terrible urge to land him in one of these rooms himself."

"Don't think like that." She paused for a moment, collecting her thoughts as she held back sniffles.

"… Visiting hours end in a half hour."

"What time is it?"

"Eight fifteen." Was it that late already? The world had spun terribly slow since that morning. Everything had passed her mind as things progressed around her, while she drowned in her own thoughts, wallowing away at the very core of her being. The door opened slightly as a stout nurse poked her heavily made up head in, glancing at the two.

"Am I interrupting anything?"

"N-no. Is everything okay?"

"I just thought I'd peek in and check on you. Also, you have another visitor. Whatevers' going on I suggest you hurry, okay?"

The air in the small room quickly shifted from sorrow to brutal hostility as the cause for her misery stepped in, hands shoved in his pockets. Equius slowly rose, hand now fixed to his bedridden friend.

Through glasses the two telepathically battles. Nepeta struggled to sit up as the hand clasped tightly around hers began to shake furiously.

"Equius, stop it's okay—"

"Hey, don't move-"

"I strongly advise you not to even send a word in her direction through your exceedingly filthy mouth. You have done more than enough."

"Stop it." If anything, a fist fight was one thing she wouldn't be able to handle right now. The grip connecting them loosened, a thumb brushing ghosting over the veins in her wrist. She returned the gesture. "… Equius? Equius I'll see you tomorrow, right?" It was deathly quiet until Karkat started tapping an impatient rhythm. "Tomorrow, right when they open, okay? It'll be Saturday, right?"

"… I am impressed that you have kept track of the dates. I will see you then." He gently squeezed her hand once more before letting it slide from his fingers. He passed by the albino with dangerous closeness, stopping only to engage in another glare down before snorting with rage and continuing out the door, which he closed rather loudly.

She could hear him ask the nurse for a towel. Heh. Hostile turned from aggressive to awkward as she turned to look out the window. It wasn't really worth it however. She couldn't see the outside from this angle. The silence was broken by slow, hesitant footsteps, and the sound of that poor chair being flipped around and straddled. Her hands began to shake as her throat started to constrict again.

The silence lasted for a good ten minutes before it was finally shattered.

"You're a fucking dumbass." Her heart plummeted. Her gaze casted down to her bed sheets, blinking frequently.

"I know, okay? I know."

"That's the problem, no you fucking don't." she didn't say anything. He inhaled slowly before speaking again. "You have no fucking idea how worried I was. Have you ever had a pounding migraine that would never go away because you were so fucking worried that sitting still was beyond possible? Nepeta, I sat right in this very spot, watching what looked like a corpse just lay motionless on a fucking bed, with none of the doctors seemingly not give a single damn, while I just-." He stopped talking, drawing in another breath.

"… You were worried?"

"WAS I WORRIED? Holy fucking shit you aren't even listening, when you were admitted I didn't even leave my fucking spot, alright? I thought you were going to DIE." Finally she snuck a glance at him, only to be ensnared in those dark strawberry scarlet colored eyes. They burned with rage and… was that desperation? He blinked a couple times, convinced that he now had her attention. "You're so fucking clumsy and dimwitted, I fucking hate the way you walk, like you have no care, and do you know how agonizing it is when I imagine you walking around at night?" He threw his arms up in the air in furious desperation. "What is wrong with you? It's like you don't even care what happens to you, like you don't give a single shit and—"

"No, it's you who doesn't get it." This time her own eyes blazed as she struggled to sit up, staring him down. After a couple of moments she found her voice again. "You know what, I think you're the one who's really oblivious. You never notice the smallest things in life until someone throws them in your face, you don't know when you're so exhausted and you can't go on but you do anyway, and you don't pick up any hints, and no matter what I did y-you never e-ever seemed to c-c-care and—"

"Leijon—"

"No matter how hard I tried you just went on with your life like you didn't give a single care about my feelings while I worried over you d-day and night, and I just loved you so much it tore me apart a-a-and, it didn't even matter in the end, you just didn't care—"

"Shut up!"

And she did. She was forced to. It's really hard to talk when the fabric of someone's crimson hoodie is against your lips, the bridge of your nose lined perfectly with the indent of their bony shoulder.

The chair was cast away as he leaned over completely to engulf her in an embrace. His arms wrapped around her so tightly, snaring her to his body while her buried his face completely in her wispy hair, a hand clawing into it from the back of her head, threading slender fingers down her neck while the other hand fitted around her back. There was not gentleness. There was no caution for her bruised back, and pain shot up her spine all the way up to her neck as he practically lifted her from the bed.

But she didn't care. She couldn't care less as she threw her arms around his own neck, clinging to him as tightly as he was to her. Just this once, just this one moment, she pressed the side of her cheek around his choppy white hair, the hair that she'd always admired from afar, the hair she longed to caress as he was doing to her own now. She had hurt him, just as he had her earlier this day. And he accepted it, just as she had. They were even, but again, that was something she couldn't care less about. What was important to her as of this moment was the fact that she couldn't get any closer to him, that if she let go he'd be completely out of her reach, forever lost in the cruel world they lived in.

Apparently he thought the same as his grip became constricting. She had broken some restraint deep down inside of him, the grip made it obvious, and she was slightly furious that she couldn't return the strength of the embrace due to the painkillers in her bloodstream. It was so unfair and it made her want to rip her hair out; it was like she couldn't express her affection as much as he could.

"I was terrified." Even though his lips were grazing her unruly hair she hardly caught the whisper. Nepeta clung to his neck as tight as she could, silently shedding tears in his shoulder as she buried her face into the crook of his neck. This was probably the only moment she was allowed to be this close, to forget the fact that she wanted to watch from afar, relishing every single moment time spared for her. "It was awful, they were saying that you were a goner, they told me that you were in fucking critical and I sat in that waiting room crying my eyes out because there was nothing I could do."

"I thought you'd leave me this morning, I thought you left—"

"Never,"

"You were so angry, I'm so sorry, you were leaving—"

"Never,"

"It just hurts so much, I love you so much I'm hurting—"

"Just stop."

It felt that if she rose her voice to be louder than a whisper, they'd shatter. She couldn't recall having a conversation so intense, fueled with the need to be heard in the most inaudible way. But she could almost feel the stress radiating from him; it was as if it were her own, the desperation to be heard, the frenzy to be felt and know that everything would be okay, everything would be fine even though your mind kept telling you that it wasn't.

His tears were warm as the clung to the strands of her hair. But she didn't care. She was soaking his hoodie anyway. It was a reasonable payback.

"I love you."

"I hear you."

"I like you a lot."

"I know."

"But you don't feel the same way.."

"I'm so fucking sorry."

"It's okay."

"No it's not." His chest raised against hers as he inhaled a shuddery breath, sniffing loudly. She felt as if her spine would snap against the force of her arms, that she'd meld into his being. Had time stopped, or was it speeding up? What day was it? Thursday? Monday? The world was lost to them now, lost in a world that belonged to them, and only them.

"You accept me."

"I do."

"You don't care that I'm so horrendously different?"

"I wouldn't care less if your hair were a bright pink." He laughed slightly.

"That's a really fucking weird thing to picture."

"But you know I wouldn't care."

"Thank you."

"Terezi doesn't care?"

"She's blind, idiot."

"Oh right."

"Thank you."

"You're always welcome."

Always.

She felt light, as if that heavy weight detached itself from her being. It was refreshing, the feeling of life slowly creeping back.

He heard her. He knew. He knows now.

But he loved someone else.

It didn't matter. She knew that she could do something Terezi couldn't. She could appreciate his difference, his paler than heck skin tone, his fiery eyes that burst with emotion, the way the dim light above their heads would reflect off his ivory hair, making it seem as if it were glowing.

He would live with the fact that she accepted him. She heard him when no one else seemed to want him. But she knew that Terezi could do something she couldn't. She could hold her heart in her hands in a gentle cradle, blessed with the privilege of placing her lips softly against his.

They both accepted him.

He could only choose one.

He chose her.

That's fine. He knows I'm here. He pulled away slightly to look at her. She looked awful. With tear stains printed on her cheeks, hair unkept, tired looking eyes. She offered him a small smile. He returned it.

She'd protect them. She'd protect their happiness. Because they deserve it.

She lost. But it felt as if she won. A part of her settled finally, returning to the depths of her soul to rest. He broke the embrace, standing to his full height.

"..Thank you."

"No fuck that. Thank you." He brushed the back of his palm against his eyes, sighing. "I'm sorry."

"Oh shut up." After a moment she held out a hand. "Help me stand?"

"Why? Don't start anything stupid, you're supposed to relax and recover."

"I've done nothing but sprawl around on a bed for months without consciousness, gosh darn it Karkat, help me up so I can look out the darn window!"

"You could have seriously just said that, god dammit." He carefully took her hand. It was difficult, but somehow they made it happen.

Her knees shook under her weight and she nearly toppled over. Instead she got caught on his arm.

"This is stupid."

"Hee hee." Slowly but surely they made progress to the window. The cold, hard floor shot tingles on the base of her feet, cold are chilling her to the bone in her thin hospital gown. But it didn't matter. The warmth that she felt all on its own kept her at a toasty tempreture. Karkat brushed the curtains aside.

Maine was covered in a thin sheet of soft white fluff. Snowflakes fell painfully slow, seemingly glowing in contrast with the star speckled sky. The streets far below were congested with cars of all colors, head lights gazing ahead with seeing. It the distant horizon she could spot the lighthouse by the coast, its light forever spinning in a slow, rhythmic circle.

It was beautiful. It was worth the struggle. Nepeta elbowed his ribs.

"This would make a killer calendar theme."

"It'd be a fantastic picture all on its own, dumbass."

"It'd be a perfect picture."

"If you say so. You say the weirdest fucking things."

"Hee hee."

"Speaking of pictures, you know I'm coming tomorrow with a bunch of make up notes, right?"

"Aaaaaaaaaugh, Karkitty you totally butchered the moment!"

"Shut the fuck up, I'm bringing them and your gonna do them!"

"I don't want to!"

"Too fucking bad, you're gonna catch up!"

Even if it seemed impossible, she knew that in some special way, she reigned victorious. She poured her heart out to him.

He heard her this time.

And she heard him.

They both won.

Together.