Author's Note: Once again, I'm just going to say how much I REALLY HATE OKLAHOMA. Why am I doing this? I had to learn about bowling alleys. Really? I had to read reviews for bowling alleys in Oklahoma City. I'm so done with everything.
Also, spoiler warning, Important plot points are revealed about The Little Mermaid.
...I say that like there are people who haven't seen The Little Mermaid. I mean, honestly, who hasn't seen The Little Mermaid?
*sheepishly raises my hand* YOU PUT THAT HAND DOWN RIGHT THIS INSTANT.
Ahem. Chapter Six, enjoy and review~
I woke up warm but sore and lay still for a minute, basking in the comfortable heat, before trying to sit up. I failed miserably and looked over to figure out why; the answer came in the form of Sollux, who was sleeping heavily on my right arm. It took me a minute to remember why. The rain pattering — albeit much lighter — against the window soon jogged my memory. I tried not to think too much about what I was doing as I curled up next to the taller male and promptly fell back to sleep.
When I woke up again, I was warm in a different way and a bit disappointed to be able to roll onto my left side unrestrained. It wasn't anything out of the ordinary for me to wake up next to my roommate. It wasn't exactly a common occurrence, either, but it was something I'd come to expect after years of sleepovers under stormy skies. I blinked away my thoughts and wondered briefly where he'd gone until I heard a thump and a loud swear coming from the bathroom. I smiled to myself and gradually worked my way out from under the covers, deciding it was about time I woke up. Sollux apparently thought the same about exiting the bathroom, seeing as the door opened the instant I sat up.
"Mornin', KK," he called, words stifled by the toothbrush resting between his teeth.
I checked the clock before answering, which read only 8:27. "You're up early on a Saturday," I remarked.
"Th'ame to you," he replied, returning to the bathroom. The sink spurted into life and he came out a moment later, towling off his mouth with the washrag around his neck. "What are you doing up th'o early, anyway? You're not really a morning person."
"Not arguing with you there," I replied, holding back a yawn and stretching as gently as I could. "I don't know. I just kind of woke up." He looked at me curiously. "You wanna do something today?"
"Sure, KK, 'cauth'e that worked th'o well yeth'terday." I cringed at his words, but he didn't notice because he'd turned to toss the towel back into the bathroom.
"You forget, Sollux, yesterday wouldn't have gone to shit if you hadn't gone off on me about an injury I had nothing to do with," I stated irately, crossing my arms.
"Ah, and that'th' where you're wrong. You did have th'omething to do with it, and you could have prevented it if you'd th'wallowed your damn pride and told me about it in the firth't plath'e, th'o don't give me that malarky."
I snickered at his use of the word "malarky." It sounded childish and really cute coming from him. My enjoyment was cut short when I actually thought about his words. He retreated into the bathroom yet again and I thought about what I was gonna say. "Y-You're—" My voice came out quiet and squeaky, so I cleared my throat and tried again. "You're not still mad about that, right? I mean, we're still friends, aren't we?"
His head appeared in the doorway and he stared at me with the most incredulous expression I'd seen on him in a while. "Yeah, we're th'till friendth', dumbath'. What, did you think I'm juth't gonna th'uddenly hate you becauth'e I th'aid th'ome dick-ish shit to you that may or may not have been true? Dream on. You're not shaking me looth'e that eath'ily. Beth'ideth', I didn't take my medth' yeth'terday, th'o I realize I may have been a bit more of an ath' than usual. Juth't by a little, though," he snorted, removing his presence from the bedroom yet again. His voice came from the doorway, echoed by the magic of bathrooms that manages to amplify every noise a hundredfold. "Conth'idering thith' th'ort of converth'ation ith' what led to your mental breakdown lath't night, I'm going to take initiative and change the th'ubject before we de-eth'calate into blowth' again."
"You're a sassy son of a bitch, you know that?" I deadpanned.
"Of fucking courth'e I know that, KK. I am the Th'ath' Math'ter, goddammit." I broke into laughter, stifling it quicker than I would have liked due to the pain shooting up my side. It wasn't very often that I found things in life worth laughing at, so I took my pleasure where I could. Sollux popped out of the bathroom once more and shot me one of his trademark crooked grins, and I couldn't help but smile back. "But, I gueth' th'inth'e you're th'o hell-bent on leaving the houth'e, I th'uppose I can bring myth'elf to do th'omething with you."
I glanced out the window. "I never said I wanted to leave the house, asswipe, have you looked outside lately? It's raining. The shit are we gonna do?" I shook my head. "I was thinking something more along the lines of a movie marathon."
"I'm gonna th'top you right there, KK. There'th' not a th'nowball'th' chanth'e in hell that I'm gonna watch any of your shitty romcomth' with you."
"We don't have to watch a romcom, shitface," I shouted indignantly.
"Oh, really? Ith' that th'o? Alright then, O Great Math'ter of Movieth', tell me: what are we going to watch?" I opened my mouth to shoot him a quick answer, but soon found I couldn't think of anything to say and instead sat there opening and closing my mouth like a fish out of water. "That'th' what I thought. If you want to watch any movie with me, you have to help me th'et up, I get to pick the genre, and we watch both my movieth' firth't." I grumbled unintelligibly for a bit and eventually muttered something that could have been taken as acceptance of his terms if he so wished; in other words, I was excited as fuck. It had been forever since we'd gotten to have a movie marathon. I managed to climb off the top bunk by myself with two pillows in hand, even though Sollux had been watching me dubiously throughout the entire descent. I flipped him off as I jumped off the last step and reached up to grab my eggplant purple comforter from the mattress. He did the same with his puce one and stuffed two of his pillows under his arms as well.
I jog-sprinted out to the couch and tossed all my shit on it before rushing over to the windows to draw the blinds against the gray morning. Sollux followed more slowly, dropping his bedding on top of mine and going about spreading it out over the sofa. It wasn't long until the room was dark and the couch was a veritable blanket nest. "Alright," I began, walking into the kitchen, "you know the drill." We had a simple rule for movie marathons; we each picked two movies, but we couldn't tell each other what they were. We only said what genre we'd chosen so that the other could pick two to match.
While I put the popcorn in the microwave, he stated possibly the only genre that could have surprised me, aside from romcoms; "Dith'ney cartoonth'." I choked on air and coughed a bit for effect, which I then regretted because my false coughing quickly faded into real coughing and made my side hurt like a motherfucker. I recovered myself and stared at him.
"Hold the fucking phone; you're kidding, right? You have got to be shitting me. We're watching Disney movies? Disney cartoons? Like, kids movies? You're gonna sit through four cartoon movies?" I didn't even try to keep the astonishment out of my tone.
"Yeth', I'm going to th'it through four Dith'ney movieth'." I blinked at him. "What? There'th' nothing wrong with Dith'ney movieth'. Beth'ideth', it'th' been forever th'inth'e I've th'een any."
"I thought you hated Disney movies," I managed eventually.
"Th'ayth' who? I never th'aid that. I juth't don't get a chanth'e to watch them very often." I shook my head, still astounded at his choice, and turned my attention back to the popcorn. Hitting the preset, I walked back into the living room and leaned against the entertainment center.
"Alright, then. Pick your movies, I guess."
"Okay. Unleth' you have a problem with Dith'ney...?" he added hesitantly.
"No, no, I-I'm just... shocked, is all." He grinned and turned to the rack, picking out his movies. He tapped me on the shoulder to let me know I could choose mine while he put his first in. Minutes later, we were settled on the couch, a bowl of popcorn between us and our shoulders pressed together with a blanket wrapped around us. The movie Sollux had chosen was one of our few VHSes, so I immediately dug into the popcorn as he fastforwarded the obsolete previews. The popped kernels were still warm. Warm popcorn was the best.
He and I sank farther into the couch when the movie actually began, and I was pleasantly surprised to hear the introductory song for The Aristocats. About an hour and a half later, he put in his next movie. Once again, he surprised me with Lady and the Tramp 2: Scamp's Adventure. By the time we got to Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, I was half asleep and shamelessly resting with my head on his shoulder, and when The Little Mermaid came to life on the screen, my eyes were closed and only the pain in my side from awkward position kept me awake; I'd fallen part way onto Sollux's lap and was simultaneously leaning against his chest. I didn't even register his arms wrap around me as I faded into unconsciousness.
When I awoke for the third time that day, I found myself resting where I didn't remember falling asleep. I had to admit, though, Sollux's bed was unfairly comfortable. Even more comfortable, however, was the man himself sleeping practically underneath me. I glanced toward the window and instead found my blanket draped over the railing, blocking whatever light there was from the curtainless glass. Turning my head, I looked instead for the alarm clock. 3:48. I was about to give up on life and just go back to sleep when my stomach growled loudly. Oh. Right, I recalled. The only thing I've eaten today was half a bowl of popcorn. I groaned and slid my feet off the bed until they hit the carpet. Stretching carefully as I sat up, I used the edge of the upper bunk to pull myself to my feet. I was about to wake Sollux when I glanced back and found him blinking up at me from the pillow.
"Rise and shine, Sleeping Beauty," I teased. He smirked and I snapped my fingers. "Damn, I should have chosen Sleeping Beauty instead of The Little Mermaid." Sollux snorted in laughter and pushed me forward, climbing out of the bed after me.
"Yeah, becauth'e you would have been awake to watch it," he stated as he walked out of the room.
I stared after him. "What do you mean?" I distinctly remembered watching our last movie, down to the fireflies in the background when Sebastian sang Kiss The Girl.
He told me simply, "You fell ath'leep, KK."
"I... what?" I asked dumbfounded, following him into the kitchen. "But... no, I didn't. I clearly remember watching The Little Mermaid."
"Really? Well, I have to th'ay, my friend, that ith' complete and utter horth'eshit you're trying to feed me, becauth'e you were path'ed out cold, dead to the motherfucking world. If you do remember watching it, it wath'n't from thith' marathon."
"No way, I was totally awake. Triton destroyed Ariel's shrine of human stuff and Ursula double-crossed Ariel and Eric killed Ursula and—"
"KK, let me reiterate; you fell ath'leep. It's none of my buth'ineth'—" Shit, that's still cute as fuck. "—if you have the movie memorized, but I can tell you with two hundred perth'ent th'ertainty that you were ath'leep before any of the shit you just mentioned came within twenty minuteth' of happening."
"Lies and fallacy," I declared, effectively ending the argument and deciding with, as Sollux so eloquently put it, two hundred percent certainty that I was fully conscious throughout the duration of the movie and he was just fucking with me.
"Whatever, KK," he chuckled. "Well, anyway, I don't know about you, but I am fucking th'arving, and if there'th' anything I don't feel like doing right now, it'th' cooking. How you feel about take-out?"
"Fuck take-out. Just pour yourself some cereal, you'll survive. Better yet, pour us both some cereal, minus milk, and we can kick some ass in Baulder's Gate while we eat."
"That th'ounds fuckin' th'weet. Go th'et up the game. What do you want?"
"Whatever. Wait, no, not whatever, cereal can go fuck itself. Get the Medley."
"Fuck yeth'." Five minutes later, I'd loaded up our best save in Baulder's Gate: Dark Alliance II. I was Allessia, the Human Cleric, and Sollux was Ysuran, the Moon Elf Necromancer. To say the least, they were our best characters, and we were Gods at what we did. Sollux had supplied us with the Medley, which was basically a huge bowl filled with whatever we could find; various cereals, crackers, chips, pretty much anything that looked good, paired with a two liter bottle of Root Beer.
It was seated on either side of a bowl of cabinet fillers with an open, half-empty bottle of soda resting in my lap, cross-legged in front of a fifty-two inch plasma on full volume while slaughtering goblins that we were found when Feferi, Nepeta, and Kanaya walked through the front door.
"Sollux?" I called around a mouthful of pretzel and dorito.
"Yeah, KK?" my roommate replied, snatching up the Root Beer from my lap and taking a gulp.
I crunched the chips and swallowed before stating calmly, still mostly focused on the Goblin King. "It's Saturday."
"Satur... well, shit," he answered, just as coolly.
"What on Earth are you two doing?"
I paused the game and turned around to find the ever-classy Ms. Maryam staring down at us from behind the couch. "Hi, Kanaya!" I waved cheerfully.
"Karkitty!" Within seconds of the loud cry, I found myself tackled against the couch.
I let out a noise akin to a hungry bear being suffocated and hugged my little sister back, subtly adjusting her arms so that they weren't crushing my ribs. "Hey, Nep."
"Well, looks like we're a bit late to the party! Oh well. The sooner we start, the better! I was excited to get started back at Kanaya's!"
"Nith'e to th'ee you, FF." Sollux stood and embraced the short indian girl. She jumped into his arms before he could move. "Oof! Jeez, when are you gonna get a haircut? Not to th'ay that I don't enjoy a mouthful of your hair every time I hug you, but you know." He grinned at her and she grinned back. "It'th' about damn time you guyth' got here, we were wath'ting away without you. KK, fetch my Root Beer, I feel the need to th'elebrate."
"Get it yourself, dickass," I yelled back, a rare smile gracing my lips.
"Aww, such a bad servent! I keep telling you to replace him, Pawlux~!"
"Thanks, Nepeta, good to know I'm loved."
The newly-turned-eighteen-year-old threw her arms around my neck again, choking me as she squealed, "Of course we love you, Karkat!" Kanaya smiled at me and I scowled back from somewhere between the couch cushions; she was standing just as tall and regal as she'd been when she arrived, watching in amusement at our greetings.
"Yes, Karkat, Nepeta's right. Where would we be without our perpetually angry friend?"
"Aren't you just a ray of sunshine," I replied, smirking in spite of myself.
"Same could be said about you, dear," she returned with a wink, turning to Feferi.
"Alright guys, it's already six-ten, let's shape our shit up and ship our asses out! Our reservations are for six-thirty and they'll give our lane away if we're late." Sollux and I grabbed jackets and followed Feferi and the others out the door, leaving me to lock the door behind us.
That's right. It was Nepeta's eighteenth birthday party and she was dragging us out bowling.
Review, my loves~