John's face turned pale. "Uhh..."
Shit. He probably looked stupid, just sitting there with his mouth partially open, his face drained of its usual color. "I...don't have one," he murmured quietly. "Oh. That's fine. Sorry I freaked you out so much, dude," Dave laughed, noticing how uncomfortable his best friend looked. "It's okay, John," Jade started; that familiar, friendly smile, "I don't have a crush yet either! I'm sure you'll get one soon. This is the age everyone starts getting crushes and dating and stuff. It seems kind of scary, but I'm also excited!" the girl nodded, her long, dark hair bouncing as she did so. "Thanks Jade," the brunette returned a slight smile, the sick feeling in his stomach fading away.
Eventually, everyone stopped talking about crushes, and Dirk put on a movie. It wasn't Nic Cage, so John couldn't say he liked it, but it was still good. There was lots of action and cool fast cars. Halfway through, Dave broke out the pizza and soda and whatever else he could find in the cupboard. John was so hungry that he probably could've eaten the entire box of pizza, that was, if Dave hadn't eaten like half already. That was one thing he hated about sharing food with his best friend, he always fucking ate like half. "Sorry my dude. I'll get more," the blonde nodded, getting off the couch and getting another box of pizza. "Hey, about earlier, why'd you seem so freaked out when I asked you who your crush really was?" Dave asked. "Is there something you gotta tell me, bro? I won't judge. Whatever makes you happy," the younger Strider laughed a bit, wiping some pizza sauce from his mouth.
"I'm not gay, Dave," John deadpanned, rolling his eyes. A slight smile reluctantly pulled at his lips, and he gave in to it. "Okay. Whatever you say, man. Even if you are gay, you're still my best friend, no matter what," the blonde smiled ever so slightly. "Thanks. I'm still not gay though," the brunette retorted playfully. Dave simply nodded, glancing over at his older brother, who he could see staring at Jake with a dazed, dreamy look in his eyes and a soft smile on his face, as if he'd just seen an angel.
Talk about someone who was gay. At first, Dave didn't really suspect anything. Dirk seemed straight enough, besides the fact that he liked My Little Pony, but he liked cars and swords and working out and stuff. But then he found Dirk's weird journal thing, which his psychiatrist made him keep so he could write about his emotions and stuff. There were a lot of pages with drawings that the younger Strider reluctantly admitted were pretty good, even if they were drawn in shitty, moe anime style, of Jake and Dirk holding hands, kissing, and generally being together. Most of the pages were full of ramblings about how much he loved Jake or how cute he thought he was. And every single time his older brother saw Jake, he got this look in his eyes that could only be described as love and desire. Jake was oblivious to Dirk's feelings, and just saw him as a friend. For his brother's sake, he kind of hoped that Jake would reciprocate his feelings.
He glanced back over at John. Was John gay? Probably not. If anything, he was probably straighter than a fucking ruler. And not the fun, bendy kind. John didn't seem like the gay type, and he never looked at boys the way Dirk did. In fact, he didn't seem interested in romance at all. Maybe he was just gay and in denial? Whatever the case was, he was still the same John that had been his friend since elementary school, and things would continue to stay that way.
As the night went on, a majority of the kids still awake decided to watch movies to stay up. Dirk and Jake were honest to goodness spooning at this point, but Jake, being the good Catholic boy that he was, thought nothing of it, merely that he and his very best friend (who just so happened to be a boy) were lying together on the couch. Dirk looked very happy, and the two eventually sneaked off to Dirk's bedroom with a bag of popcorn and some cheesy action films. John noticed, but thought nothing of it. He merely assumed two good bros were going to watch some movies, although he did notice that Dirk had his arm around Jake's waist, which seemed a bit strange. Whatever made them happy, though. "Don't get AIDS!" Dave laughed as the two headed to Dirk's bedroom, which caused the older Strider to flinch and blush darkly. "That's gas, Dave, but we're just going to relax and then probably crash," Jake nodded. "If that's anything remotely like Netflix and Chill, use protection," the albino commented from the couch. John snorted at that comment, because he knew what 'Netflix and Chill' meant. It was cool teen slang for 'doing the do,' which made John laugh just to think about. It was just so silly.
Jade was the first to fall asleep, which wasn't surprising, given the fact that she was a narcoleptic and would fall asleep randomly at any given time. Next was Jane, who had fallen asleep resting against Roxy. Roxy was still wide awake however, half watching the movie and half absorbed in some game she was playing on her phone. Rose had fallen asleep leaning against Kanaya, and a faint Jade blush could be made out on the troll's gray face. John assumed Dirk and Jake were sleeping, or maybe doing something else, but the bedroom door was closed, and he didn't hear any talking. Dave was still very much awake, wrapped in a red blanket and staring intensely at the TV screen. It was probably the six cans of soda he drank that were keeping him awake. John was a little tired, and it felt impossible to keep his eyes open for more than a few minutes. He ended up falling asleep on the couch, which was kind of nice, since the couch was pretty comfortable.
When morning came, John was shaken awake by Roxy, who didn't even look tired, despite how late she'd stayed up last night. "Get up John! Jane made breakfast for everyone. Don't you wanna eat?" she asked, her violet-gray eyes sparkling. "Yeah, totally," John mumbled, rubbing the sleep from his eyes and fumbling around for his glasses. "Roxy, have you seen my glasses?" the brunette questioned, blinking slowly and tiredly. "Nooooo," the girl laughed mischievously. "Give them to me, Rox! Come on!" the boy laughed, standing up from the couch. "Aw, fine!" the blonde girl sighed, handing the younger boy his glasses. He simply glared at her playfully and put them on, relieved that he could finally see. Everyone was sitting at the table, but since only Dirk and Dave lived in the apartment, most of the chairs were just makeshift seats, like two boxes stacked on top of each other, a beach chair, and some pool floats stacked up. It was actually kind of funny, in all honesty. "C'mon! We saved you a seat!" Roxy waved at John from where she sat at the table. "Okay!" he replied, haphazardly combing through his hair with his hand.
John made his way over to the table, sitting down on a makeshift seat that had been saved for him. Jane was definitely the best at cooking out of all of them, although nothing rivaled his dad's food. Everything was going pretty smoothly, until Dave asked what Jake and Dirk did last night, causing Dirk to almost fall out of his chair. "Well golly, Dave! Are you writing a book?" he questioned playfully "We just watched some action flicks," Jake shrugged. Dirk sat up a bit straighter, coughing a bit, his face still flushed. "We're not on the hook," the other said calmly, which only made Dirk more flustered. He was really the only one who understood Jake's weird mid-1900's slang; everyone else just kind of pretended they understood what he was talking about. Everyone at the table laughed, and got back to their individual conversations.
"Dave," John started, glancing over at his best friend, who was calmly drinking some apple juice that was probably from the secret collection he kept in his room, "are Dirk and Jake gay?" he asked, smiling a little. It was a bit of an odd thing to think about, considering that Jake was extremely oblivious (and also Catholic), and that Dirk was...Dirk didn't seem gay at all, besides the fact that he did enjoy My Little Pony and anime. "Dude. He's totally fucking gay. A circle is straighter than he is. I peeped on his weird ass diary thing, y'know, the one he has to keep for his BPD? Yeah. Anyways, to say the least, there was a lot of gay-ass shit written in there about Jake," the blonde glanced around, speaking quietly and quickly. "Really? He doesn't seem like the gay type..." John trailed off, glancing over at Dirk, who was staring at Jake again.
A bit after that, Dirk stood up and cleared his throat, getting everyone's attention, including Jake's. "There's something I have to say to you guys. Listen, I don't like labels. I don't. But I'm going to come out and say this now," he took a long pause, inhaling deeply.
"I like guys. Only. I hope you can still see me as the same person," his voice wavered slightly before he sat back down. Everything was quiet for a bit, but after the momentary pause, everyone offered words of general support, excluding Kanaya. "Rose," the troll asked, turning to face her friend. "Why was that necessary?" "What do you mean by that?" the blonde asked, brushing a strand of hair out of her face. "Why did he need to say that he was attracted romantically and possibly sexually towards other males?" The Jadeblood inquired, raising an eyebrow. "Oh. Well...humans are different than trolls in that most humans are heterosexual, meaning that they're attracted to someone of the opposite sex. Some humans like both sexes, and some only like the same one as them, which is called homosexuality," Rose explained. Kanaya looked very confused. "Humans have a term for that? How strange. All trolls are...whatever your human word for liking both sexes is. In our culture, being attracted to someone explicitly due to their sex would be considered fetishism. Human sexuality sure is strange!" Her gaze traveled over to Dirk, who was still blushing a bit awkwardly.
"So, does that mean that only one type of human couple has reproductive capabilities?" the troll asked. "Well...yeah. Only a heterosexual couple can reproduce, but a homosexual couple can raise a kid just as well. Sometimes, they can get someone else to have a kid for them, or they can adopt a child," Rose nodded, smiling a bit. The gray-skinned girl looked confused still; as this was a lot to process. "I know that humans don't reproduce the same as trolls, but I was not aware of the fact that only a male and a female human could have reproductive compatibility," Kanaya looked at Rose. "Yeah. I guess our cultures aren't as similar as we'd like them to be," the younger Lalonde sighed. "Does that mean that humans have a different romantic system than trolls?" the Virgo asked. "I don't know. What kind of romance do trolls have?"
Rose found Kanaya's explanation of troll romance to be very interesting. "So, what would we be considered?" She asked, assuming that moirailship was off the board. "I...don't know, to be quite honest. What is your human version of Moirailship called?" "Friendship. Except it's not considered a type of romance by humans, since friendship is strictly platonic," the blonde told her. "I guess humans really only have one kind of romance, and it's probably closest to your troll matespritship. Romantic attraction for humans is defined as wanting to date or even get married, and can sometimes lead to reproduction. We don't really have anything like the troll Ashen or Caliginous quadrants."
"Strange. Humans sure are odd.