This was the day that Sollux Captor found out how shitty of a guitar player Eridan Ampora really was.
He made sure to set his internal alarm clock fairly early by psyching himself up the night before. Over the years, Sollux Captor found that if he went to bed with some mortifying thought replaying in his head, that thought would usually rouse him before any sort of sunlight or obnoxious noise could. And the thought of Eridan waking up curled in Sollux's arms was as mortifying a thought as any.
And so Sollux found himself snapping awake at about four o'clock in the morning, Eridan's head resting on his chest and the man's arms wrapped around his waist. Sollux lifted his hands up and crinkled his nose as if he'd just discovered himself waist-deep in vomit. He reached for his sunglasses haltingly, trying not to move his torso and rouse the young man wrapped around him. After he'd set his shades back in place, he used a thumb and forefinger to gingerly pluck up Eridan's wrists and remove them from his body. Eridan himself might as well have been in a coma. He never stirred as Sollux slowly slid out from under him and stumbled to his feet. He just curled up into a tighter ball and continued to breathe softly against the covers.
Sollux wiped his hands on his shirt as if he'd been handling infectious materials, his teeth bared slightly in disgust. He felt his fingers brush against a wet splotch on his chest, and he had to stifle a groan of revulsion as he realized that the asswipe had drooled on him in his sleep.
A shower was now definitely in order.
Sollux snuck from the room and backed carefully out of it, moving the door slowly so as not to make it creak. He pulled it shut and carefully released the handle before wheeling around.
"Hey, shitass."
Sollux jerked back so hard his head slammed against the door. He ran a hand through his hair as he stared down at the short, angry boy standing before him.
"Christ, do you all have some sort of agenda lined up to give me a heart attack or something?" he wheezed, carefully pulling himself away from the door and hoping that the sound of his skull knocking against it hadn't been enough to rouse the idiot inside.
Karkat shrugged. "Sure. But the question the audience is really wetting their pants to hear answered is why the ass-rotting fuck you invited captain pretty pants over here to spend the night choking down your dick."
Sollux's brows lowered. His roommate's tone was more hostile than it usually was. This wasn't one of his usual grouchy fits. So his own voice was strained as he replied, balancing on a wire between quelling and defensive. "Nobody choked down anyone's dick, KK."
"Right, because you're about as endowed as a Eurasian shrew and he's got a mouth to make a basking shark jealous. Yeah, you know what? I really do doubt there was a lot of choking going on while he was orally servicing you."
Sollux felt a red heat flare up behind his eyes. He straightened a bit, glaring down at Karkat from his full height. "Hey. Why don't you back off, all right? All the fucking moron did was fall asleep in his Chinese food. I don't need you jumping on my dick like you're my crotch's personal guard dog, okay? I can take care of myself."
He attempted to push past Karkat to make his way to the bathroom for a much needed shower, but the shorter boy planted himself firmly in Sollux's path, his dark eyes snapping with fury.
"If you think I give any sort of flying fuck where you decide to stick that sad little pill worm you call a penis, think again. Because I don't. I'm just wondering when you became such great buddies with lieutenant lightweight back there. Unless he released some kind of nerd-trapping pheromone in his vomit that's been drawing you to his ass with the force of a thousand buzzing electromagnets ever since." Karkat's tone continued to barrel down a cliff of antagonism, his entire body now taught with rage.
Sollux's own frame was becoming tense as well, an electric fury snapping from his chest and through his limbs. "I don't know what the hell I did to piss you off, but can you just put a sock in it so that I can take a shower? I don't have the energy to deal with this."
"Let me just take a moment to step back and tear out my hair while I scream 'HOLY SHIT' because am I so god damned surprised by the statement that just managed to wake up and roll its fat ass off your tongue. Sollux doesn't have the energy to deal with something? I think my spleen is going to rupture from this massive shock. Call an ambulance, fucker, because this gravy train isn't stopping now." Karkat was nearly spitting in rage.
Sollux exhaled derisively through his nostrils. "Whatever, KK. Flip your shit, it's not like any of this is fucking new." He put a hand on Karkat's shoulder and tried to push the guy out of the way.
Karkat knocked Sollux's hand away. "Why don't you ever come out of you room?"
Sollux blinked. "What the fuck? I just did."
"Yeah, for him," Karkat snarled, swatting his hand furiously toward Gamzee's bedroom door. "Do you have any idea what that arrogant shitstain even said about you? Do you?"
"I don't have time for this—"
"He called you a waste of space. That your existence was a fucking offense to his divine, upper-class, gold filigreed cock."
Sollux closed his mouth. He stared at Karkat acidly through his darkened glasses.
"Yeah," Karkat spat, breathing as if he'd just run around the block. "Nothing to say to that, shithole? He's pretty good at pulling the fuzzy alpaca fleece over your eyes, isn't he?"
Sollux took a deep, calming breath before he exhaled and replied, "He's a dick, yeah. I don't like him, KK. But what about any of what he said is wrong?"
It was as if he'd just thrown water on Karkat's sparking fuse. The boy looked at him, his eyes sputtering with confusion. "What the fuck is that supposed to mean?"
"I mean, look at this," Sollux replied, gesturing to himself. "Look at me. Can you seriously look at any of this and make a truthful statement about how awesome and wonderful my life is right now?"
Karkat seemed to have been completely derailed. The rage vanished from his eyes to be replaced with a lost and confused expression. As if Sollux had just dumped him in the middle of a cold ocean without a scrap of driftwood to cling to. His eyebrows contracted and relaxed as if he wasn't sure whether to be angry or not. And when he finally spoke again, his voice was cracked and small, "Well, you've been getting over shit and…nobody blames you for that…"
"Well, they should start," Sollux snapped. "Somebody has to start looking at me and telling me exactly what they see. I'm tired of all this fucking bullshit, KK. I'm tired of people just patting me on the head and telling me to just keep crawling around on my belly because I'm 'getting over shit' and so no one expects anything out of me."
Karkat's lips pulled back in another snarl as he finally got his footing on Sollux's words. "You act like none of us has ever tried to get you out of this goddamned funk before. How many times have I tried to get your old friends to come over so we could all hang out? How many goddamned times have I fucking knocked on your door and invited you into the world of the living so that we could all share a fucking beer like a couple of normal guys that actually acknowledge each other's mutual existences? How many times has that never been fucking good enough, you self-righteous, cum-guzzling ass?"
He could hear the waver on Karkat's voice. Could see the way the boy was beginning to shake, his ears and nose getting red with frustrated rage. He pressed his own thin lips into a sharp line.
"I'm not that guy anymore, KK. I'm fucked up. I'm fucked up and I'm sick of you trying to fix me with beer and memories."
"Then what the fuck do I use?" Karkat shouted, and Sollux could see the way his eyes glistened. "Write me an instruction manual or something because I don't know how the fuck I'm supposed to fix this anymore."
"I don't want you to fix it," Sollux said, his voice quiet. "I just want to start living again."
"And you're going to do that by pushing the rest of us away and dry-humping your new best asshole friend? After all the shit we've been through together, that's how it's going to be? We just forget it and start frolicking through a field of flowers with our dicks up the asses of our own personal hipster cumbuddies?"
"He doesn't expect me to be anyone," Sollux burst out, balling his fists at his sides. "I don't have to be this jackass who took comp-sci and drank beer and made fun of kids with incisor problems and their white rapper friends."
"So none of that stuff matters," Karkat remarked, his voice suddenly frosted over. "Everything that's happened before—your personal history in its entirety—none of that means jack shit. That is information that is completely unessential to being friends with brand new game-fapping Sollux. Is that how it is?"
Sollux could feel his bitten nails cutting into his palms. "Just get the fuck out of my way."
"Yeah, that'll work. You let me know how your brand new scheme to ignore everything works out. Because I've got box seats to this show, asshole, and I can see how it's going to end even from over the lip of my fancy crystal champagne glass."
Karkat stormed off down the hall to his room, slamming the door shut behind him. Sollux was equally as ruthless in the bathroom. After barricading himself inside, he tore off all his clothes, ripped back the curtain, and wrenched open the tap. Water hissed over his body, first in an icy rain and then in scalding jets. He exhaled sharply through his clenched teeth, scrubbing at his body until his skin was raw.
Karkat thought he knew everything. Thought he had everyone pegged. Fashioned himself some kind of guru of the emotionally malformed.
He knew nothing. He was a selfish fuck who only wanted a past that didn't exist anymore.
That would never exist again.
Because some things just didn't come back after they left.
Some people just didn't fucking come back.
He tore out of the shower and sucked in the steam, his body pulsing and pink from the heat. He felt his throat constrict on the thickness of the air. Felt his lungs struggle to expand. He knelt down on the carpet and pressed his face to the tile.
Karkat didn't know anything. Karkat knew jack fucking shit.
It took several minutes of gasping desperately against the floor before the heat finally leaked out of the room from under the door. Sollux lifted his head, his damp hair sticking straight up from where it had been pressed against the ground. He got to his feet and gripped both sides of the sink in his hands, his legs shuddering as he stared at the mirror. He pressed his hand to it and in one motion slicked some of the condensation away. He saw his eyes in the gap he'd cleared. Staring back at him. One black and sharp. The other the color of milk, surrounded by a spider webbing of scars.
He stared at those eyes. Stared at them, shaking and trembling, his throat tight. Daring them to say something. But the steam just recollected on the mirror, and his reflection slowly disappeared.
There was a knock on the door and Sollux jumped. He turned his head slightly as Gamzee's voice sounded through the wood.
"Hey, man, can a brother get his pee on?"
"Just a second," Sollux replied, quickly wrapping a towel about his waist. He scrubbed his fingers through his damp hair before grabbing up his dirty garments and making his way out of the bathroom. Gamzee smiled and shuffled past him to the toilet.
Once in his room, Sollux threw the towel over his chair and the dirty laundry over his floor. He then plucked up some fresh clothes from the pile on his bed, sniffing them to make sure they really were honest residents of the 'clean pile.' As he finished tugging on a plain black T-shirt and put his sunglasses back in place, he was interrupted by yet another knock.
"Hey, Sol, are you in there?"
Sollux blinked. He opened the door a crack and peered out at Eridan, who was still rubbing the sleep from his eyes.
"What do you want?" Sollux asked scathingly.
"Just wondering if I can shower. I feel like I slept in grease or some equally disgustin' shit."
"Knock yourself out," Sollux replied before snapping the door shut again.
He spent the next hour bent over his keyboard, letting blue-white light of his monitor and the clack of the keyboard slowly drain the anger from his body. Soon his body felt heavy and thick. As if he'd pumped himself full of general anesthetic. His mind quieted as well, until it was pulsing with the predictable throb of Minecraft updates and forum announcements.
But one stray thought refused to be smoothed out by the iron of routine.
As he finished scrolling through his usual forum haunts, he sat back in his broken chair and sighed, letting his mind drift to the stranger taking a shower in his house. He pushed himself into a standing position and shuffled out of his room.
The bathroom door was open. Inside, Eridan stood, squinting into the mirror. He had on a fresh set of clothes that Sollux could only assume had been pulled out of his ass, since he hadn't seen the guy packing any spare outfits the night before. Eridan didn't register his presence immediately, being all too consumed in his personal journey to hair perfection. Sollux had to squint at the bottle of gel sitting on the sink, wondering if that had also been pushed from the copious void that was Eridan's anus. No one in the house used hair products. The little tube was completely foreign in this environment.
"Oh hey, Sol," Eridan said at last as he finished teasing his hair. "If you've got to use the bathroom, I'm gonna have to deny your request and let you know that you'd be able to relieve yourself a lot faster if you kept your bathroom properly stocked so that I didn't have to make completely un-fucking-necessary trips back to my house."
He picked up his tube and brandished it. Well, that explained where everything had come from. Sometimes Sollux forgot that Eridan lived just across the street.
And then another thought struck him. "Wait, so you're saying that you went all the way back to your house because you didn't have your shit just to come back here and use our hot water to shower?"
Eridan stared at his tube of hair gel for a minute, as if it contained the answer. He then looked back up to Sollux and shrugged. "Yeah, that's pretty much what happened."
"You cock-sucking prick. I'm going to start documenting all the resources you waste around here so that you can start making payments on the utilities."
"Fuck, Sol, I've only ever been here once, I really don't think those kind of extremes are necessary," Eridan rebuked, pulling his hair gel close to his chest, as if he meant to defend himself with it.
"You've been here twice, actually, and both times you were a major inconvenience," Sollux snapped. And yet, inexplicably, he felt that smirk creeping over his lips again. The one that seemed to crop up with irritating frequency whenever Eridan was around.
Eridan didn't fail to notice the tiny grin. He glowered at Sollux. "You're just givin' me a lot a shit. That's what this is. Makin' jabs at me for your own personal amusement, don't think I don't know what's goin' on here, Sol."
Sollux was about to respond when Gamzee traipsed past behind him. He turned away from Eridan to watch as the tall man walked toward the door. Eridan poked his head out of the bathroom as well, just in time to see Gamzee give them a lazy wave before exiting the house.
"Where the fuck is he goin'?" Eridan asked, his tone blank with confusion.
"He likes to visit the park sometimes on nice days," Sollux said dismissively.
"The park, are you serious?" Eridan asked, snapping his gaze to Sollux as if he'd just been told Christmas had been moved to tomorrow.
Sollux leaned back in hesitant bemusement. "Is this another exciting discovery to rival that of the pool next to the library?"
"This is even better, Sol, and I think we should go with him."
Eridan darted past him to the door, shoving his sandals on and loping across the street. Sollux followed dazedly in his wake, standing just inside the open doorway and watching as Eridan launched himself into his own house before emerging seconds later with his guitar and running down the sidewalk with as much grace as could possibly be possessed by a skinny guy in sandals carrying an instrument with both hands. Sollux watched his lumbering gait as the moron chased after Gamzee, the tail of his thin summer scarf fluttering behind him.
Sollux sighed and stuffed on his own shoes. He had no great desire to go traipsing off to the park and be exposed to natural sunlight, but his desire to stay in the house with Karkat was even less.
It didn't take him long to catch up with Gamzee and Eridan. Mostly because Gamzee had slowed his pace to a crawl for Eridan, who was huffing along behind him, his face already slicked with sweat and his glasses halfway down his nose.
"Hey my brother. Come to join a motherfucker in his quest to get some green summer miracles in between his toes?" Gamzee said, raising a hand in greeting as Sollux fell into step beside Eridan.
"I'm not so sure that living vegetation will react so well to my basement flesh." He cast a sidelong glance at Eridan, who was wheezing as he tried to lug his guitar case up the hill. "You look sort of like you're about to die."
"No shit, do you want a fuckin' award for your top-notch sleuthin' skills, Sol?" Eridan snapped. "I was gonna wait for somebody to offer to carry this for me, but since you're both uncivilized bastards I guess I'm gonna have to do it the direct way and demand that one a you able-bodied meatsacks help me out."
"That was such a thoughtful request that I'd feel guilty fulfilling it," Sollux replied, making sure to inject his tone with an acidic sweetness.
Eridan glowered at him before halting and dropping his guitar to the ground with an unceremonious thud. He exhaled sharply then and pointed at it. "Gam, I order you to carry this fuckin' piece a shit for me."
"All right, bro, I can adjust my arms into motherfuckin' lifting mode to help out a friend." His perpetual lazy grin never wavered as he doubled back and plucked Eridan's guitar from the ground in his large hands. He then continued on as if he'd never been interrupted at all.
Eridan wiped his palms against his pants and followed after him, his lips pursed. Sollux regarded him quietly.
"I don't want to hear a fuckin' word outta you," Eridan muttered peevishly.
"I wasn't going to say anything," Sollux replied, lifting his hands up in surrender.
"He's so fuckin' laid back and okay with everything, it's disconcertin'. I honestly feel really fuckin' uncomfortable around him, Sol." Eridan cast an uneasy glance at Gamzee as he spoke, grabbing the tail of his scarf and using it to dab at his brow.
Sollux stared at Gamzee's back as the gangly man's long strides carried him ahead of the two of them. "Well he practices this weird spiritual bullshit, so I guess it makes him okay with just about everything. I don't think I've ever really seen him get upset about stuff, now that I think about it. So I guess that's kind of weird. I sometimes suspect that all the substance abuse has actually destroyed the portion of his brain that allows him to get pissed off."
"I don't know, Sol. I don't believe in magic or miracles or any a that bullshit, so I maintain a healthy suspicion a people who base their whole lives around that sort a thing. I think he might be hidin' a stash a bodies somewhere is all I'm sayin'."
Sollux laughed before he turned a devilish grin to Eridan. "Who knows?"
"Don't fuck with me, Sol, I am bein' dead serious about this," Eridan whined, his eyes glistening with worry.
Sollux shrugged before stuffing his hands in his pockets and continuing on beside Eridan, slightly hunched over as he walked. "So what's with the guitar and your sudden urge to haul ass to the park?"
"I wouldn't expect someone like you to know about this but parks in the summer are prime locations for doin' a bit a playin' for tips," Eridan remarked.
Sollux's face fell. "Are you serious?"
"A course I am, why would I joke about something like that? This is my future we're talkin' about Sol, and if I'm to be known around this area as a promisin' musician, I have to put myself out there." Eridan adjusted his scarf as they walked, exuding enough confidence to equal the volume of sweat that was pouring down his face.
Sollux could only stare in abject mortification.
He decided not to broach the subject again as they continued on. Instead he turned his talk to Minecraft despite Eridan's objections that he was still sick to death of the game and that no amount of coaxing from Sollux could get him to play it again any time soon. It led to an argument that carried them the rest of the way to the park, Gamzee loping happily ahead of them, swinging the guitar case in his hand.
The park wasn't as green as Sollux remembered. Many of the old dirt paths had been paved with quaint red brick, and the old fountain that served as the hub of the area had been completely replaced. Where once a decapitated angel stood, a large marble statue of a fish arched, a silver stream of water pouring from its mouth and into the pool undulating about its tail.
Sollux let his Minecraft discussion fall to the ground as he broke away from Eridan and Gamzee. He approached the fountain and stared up at it through his sunglasses, gazing into the fish's gaping maw.
"Does it get all up in your dream juices?" Gamzee's voice sounded behind him suddenly. Sollux looked back to see the man staring up at the fish as well, his hands behind his head.
"It's creepy as shit," Sollux remarked, turning back to the fountain as Eridan shuffled up beside him. "What happened to the old one?"
"The feds all got to thinking that it would be some motherfuckin' wicked business to be tearing out the old shit and getting it switched out with some fresh stone cut right from the motherfuckin' quarry. Looks all sparkly like a smile. I think our big scaly friend has got some happiness all leaking out of his gills." He put one foot on the edge of the fountain and stepped up, reaching a long arm out to the fish and patting it on the head. "He likes to get his motherfuckin' self all rubbed up with some loving. Gets all smiley then. Look at him go."
The fish continued to stare blankly ahead with its wide, unmoving eyes, water pouring impassively from its stone jaws.
"Sollux, I'm gettin' the feelin' like my personal comfort zone is bein' violated," Eridan muttered as Gamzee reached out his other hand and began rubbing the fountain's chin.
Sollux gave Gamzee a stare of hopeless confusion before he shook his head and called out, "Hey GZ, we're going to take a walk around. Don't wait up."
Gamzee gave no indication of having heard him. Instead he pushed himself on top of the fountain and laid down on the fish's arched back, staring up at the clouds.
As Sollux shook his head and shuffled away, Eridan grabbed his guitar from off the ground where Gamzee had left it and scuttled after him.
"So where's the spot in this place that gets the most traffic? I need to set up a prime location where my musical endeavors are gonna pull in the biggest audience," the young man yammered as he lugged his instrument along.
Sollux felt his stomach clench. But it wasn't as if the idiot knew where the most populated area in the park was. Lying about it was easy enough.
Or it would have been, had the park not been completely transformed in the year since Sollux had been there.
He wandered down one of the paths, walking along it with only a tiny awareness of the babbling moron clomping along beside him. He took in the trees lining the path, and formed a fairly certain hypothesis that they had not been there before, despite being full grown. Unless they had been there, and Sollux had just never paid enough attention.
He paused as the path opened up and he was led out of the shelter of the trees. Several picnic tables stood in the cobbled area, around which were a ring of open grills. One of them was being used by what looked like a family of four.
"This is fuckin' perfect," Eridan proclaimed, his eyes alight with excitement. He lugged his guitar over to the nearest open picnic table and set it on the seat, quickly flicking back the latches and lifting the instrument onto his lap.
Sollux groaned, wanting nothing more than to back himself into the bark of one of the trees surrounding the picnic area and disappear completely. Against his better judgment, he approached Eridan and sat beside him at the table as the man began plucking at his guitar, tuning the strings.
"Dare I ask about your taste in music?" Sollux grumbled as Eridan continued to fiddle with his instrument.
"It's probably nothing like yours, Sol, I mean you haven't even heard a Wavves for fuck's sake. But it's not like I'm lookin' to duplicate Wavves' style, so it wouldn't help you to know about them in this case anyway. Goin' back to your question, my taste in music is pretty eclectic but I like listenin' to actual musicians performin' on instruments and not that computerized bullshit that you're always goin' on about." He finished plucking at his strings and adjusted his guitar in his lap, giving it a practice strum.
Sollux rolled his eyes. "Right, I forgot. I can't ask you questions about the shit you like because everything has to turn into some competition of taste with you."
"If it's taste we're concernin' ourselves with, then there's hardly a competition, Sol, a few a your game preferences notwithstandin'," Eridan sniffed before flicking his guitar with his fingers again.
"Then you can pick a game next time, since you're such a great judge of quality," Sollux grumbled, leaning back against the table and watching uneasily as Eridan continued to pick at his guitar without actually playing it. "So… Do you even know any songs on that thing?"
Eridan gripped his instrument tighter. "Well, it's like I was sayin', I'm just tryin' to explore my musical style right now, Sol, so it's not goin' to do me any good to just start copyin' other musicians right off the bat and warp myself from the outset."
Sollux stared at Eridan wordlessly for a moment as the young man became suddenly fixated on tuning his guitar again. At last Sollux remarked, "You've never played that before in your life, have you?"
Eridan shot him an acid glare. "I know the basics and that's good enough to start establishin' myself as a musician."
"This sort of bullshit coming from you shouldn't even surprise me. And yet I'm still managing to be completely horrified by the fact that I let you drag me down here so that you could play an instrument you don't even know how to use."
"I do know how to use it, it's like you don't even fuckin' listen when I tell you things," Eridan rebuked. "I'm just gettin' warmed up here, all right?"
He set his case down by his feet, propping it open before leaning back and beginning to strum on his guitar again. It didn't even sound like Eridan was producing any recognizable chords. He just put his fingers on the neck of the instrument and ran his thumb over the strings and made some kind of tinny acoustic noise. Sollux soon found his ears burning with residual embarrassment.
"Oh god, this is horrible. This is the worst thing I think I've ever been subjected to."
"Wow, thanks for all your fuckin' encouragement. Real nice," Eridan snapped.
"Seriously, pick your case up, nobody's going to give you tips. Not unless some particularly sadistic mugger comes along and forces his victims to drop money in your case just to provide them with some humiliation before he picks it right back up again and makes his getaway. Except he would probably mug you too before he did. Not even to steal from you, just to protect the public from your auditory assault. That's how bad this is, Eridan. Your guitar playing would make muggers undertake random acts of kindness."
"Put a fuckin' sock in it, Sol, I'm tryin' to concentrate here," Eridan retorted as he continued to pluck and strum aimlessly at his guitar.
"No amount of concentration is going to make music out of this auditory trash heap. Sweet christ, this is just so bad. How can you even live with yourself knowing that you're producing sounds at such brain-melting levels of terrible? There are kids here, Eridan. Innocent human life. They never asked for any of this."
"I am going to take this thing and shove it up your ass if you don't shut your fuckin' face hole," Eridan hissed, his cheeks pink.
"Yes. Please do. I will accept the role of martyr if it means relieving the world of your ability to produce these sounds. Then I can be like some religious figure and give people a list of rules that they have to live by, and one of them would be to burn all instruments that ever came into your possession again for as long as you lived."
"I am hedgin' on committin' a disgustin' act a violence right now, so if you have any kind a notion about what's good for you, then I suggest removin' your ass from my immediate vicinity," Eridan snarled, slapping down on his guitar and bringing his thrumming strings screeching to silence.
"Done," Sollux replied, pushing himself to his feet and making his way out of the picnic area at a brisk walk. He refrained from breaking out into a sprint, but his neck was burning with enough embarrassment that he nearly gave in.
Eridan was literally an affront to humanity and all things good in the world.
And it was one thing to deal with him in a private server. Managing him in places that daylight touched and other gazes were keen was turning into a series of painful and humiliating experiences.
As he made his way back to the park's central area, the fish fountain crawled back into sight. As it did, he saw Gamzee slide into view as well. The man was no longer reclining on top of the fish's back, however. Instead he was sitting on the edge of the fountain, a little black bundle squirming in his arms. At his feet squatted a boy with dark skin and a fluffy mohawk.
Sollux wanted to simply edge around them to avoid being forced to make contact with some random bystander that Gamzee had managed to snipe for conversation. But his housemate caught him before Sollux could duck out of the park and back onto the sidewalk. Sollux cursed inwardly as Gamzee smiled and waved.
"Hey, my brother," the olive-skinned man greeted him as Sollux trudged over. As he drew closer, the little fuzzy black ball in Gamzee's lap looked up, two pointed ears flicking up and a pair of huge yellow eyes staring at him. Sollux blinked.
"Where did you find a kitten?" he asked flatly.
"Little guy found me," Gamzee replied, smiling and petting the kitten, who proceeded to promptly bat at Gamzee's hand and wrap its tiny jaws around the man's index finger. Gamzee seemed oblivious to the pain, if there was any, and continued to grin lazily even as the kitten began kicking his wrist with its back feet.
"I'm really, sorry," the boy on the ground said haltingly. "He's really, um, quite spirited for such a small cat. I'm usually, pretty good at making friends with animals but, he's kind of hard to handle, most times."
"The little fucker up and crawled right on top of the fish by me and all started chewing at my hair like it was some extra big yarn ball," Gamzee explained, trying to pet the kitten again even as it continued to attack his forearm.
"I thought taking him for a walk, out here, would maybe help him with his, excessive energy," the boy continued in the same hesitant fashion, trying to reach out to relieve Gamzee of the cat that continued to maul him. "He tends to be less violent if I, hold him, so, I can do that, if you want."
"It's cool, he's just getting his motherfuckin' chill on," Gamzee replied, nodding slowly as the kitten continued to gnaw on his fingers.
"I really don't think that, that sort of behavior could be qualified as, uh, 'chill,' but maybe you're right, in a way that, doesn't make much sense," the boy admitted, withdrawing his hands and setting them in his lap, watching the kitten with nervous eyes.
"Here," Sollux said, unceremoniously plucking the cat from Gamzee's arms and plopping it on the boy's lap. "This guy tends to forget he's holding shit, even if it's squirming around and being generally hard to fucking miss. So you should probably just take him. It's not like Gamzee gives a fuck. Do you?" He turned to the tall man, who simply waved a hand in front of his face.
"Nah, man, it's like, I want to be doing the cat whatever kind of motherfuckin' good I can be offering to it, you know?" he replied.
The boy adjusted the kitten in his arms before looking up at Gamzee, his eyes wide with interest. "Oh do you, like animals too?"
"They're living creatures with souls about as real as I got floating around in my own self," Gamzee replied, patting himself on the chest. "If you don't love that, then what the motherfuck is there to be giving love to?"
"I'm not, quite sure what you mean by that, but, it sounds like you were trying to answer yes, and, maybe also, say that animals are a lot like people, so that's nice." The boy offered Gamzee a smile.
Sollux sighed. Listening to the boy speak was a little frustrating. It was as if there was a faulty typewriter in his brain which had keys that would get stuck as it attempted to transcribe all of the kid's thoughts into words. And Sollux just didn't have the patience for it now.
"GZ, I'm going to be heading back," he cut in, rubbing his fingers against a temple.
"All right, my brother," Gamzee replied before turning his lazy gaze back to the boy. "Want to get your feet shuffling along with us?"
Sollux fought the urge to smack himself in the head.
"I guess that depends, maybe, on where you're going," the boy replied, scratching his kitten's ear.
"Just to my motherfuckin' living space, bro. Get my chill on with a few chocolatey squares that were birthed straight from the hot womb of my oven."
"That sounds kind of, uhm, unpleasant, the way you described it, but if Rufio is allowed, I can maybe stop by, for just a while," the boy responded.
"Yeah, brother, there aren't no judgments in Gamzee's motherfuckin' miracle shop saying that cats aren't allowed to enjoy a spot all of their own having to hunker down in," Gamzee said, grinning. He then stood, taking the boy by the shoulder and beginning to lead him out of the park. The kid looked somewhat less that completely all right with everything, but Gamzee was, as always, exceedingly difficult to refuse.
Sollux gave a growling sigh, taking off his sunglasses for a moment to rub his eyes.
"What's your problem?"
He jerked and squinted through his eyelashes to see Eridan standing beside him, his guitar packed back in its case once more. Sollux shoved his shades back on before saying, "Did your guitar's screeching death throes kill the other picnickers that fast?"
Eridan's cheeks turned slightly pink. "This park just isn't as busy as I would like and I don't want to be pigeon-holing myself into this small-time type a business, so I figure it would be best if I don't associate myself with this one area for the time bein'."
"You make up the most elaborate bullshit to avoid criticism, it is really fucking astounding," Sollux remarked flatly.
"It's not bullshit, but that's besides the fuckin' point because the point I was tryin' to make had absolutely nothing to do with me or my musicality and everything to do with why it is you look like you just got hit broadside by a speedin' sports car."
Sollux sighed before waving at Gamzee. "He picked up some random guy and I just don't feel like dealing with it."
"Picked up?" Eridan asked as he watched Gamzee walking off with his arm wrapped around the kid's shoulders. "Like, to have sex with?"
"No, to play board games with. God you're a fucking moron," Sollux snapped before making his way off down the sidewalk as well.
Eridan glared at Sollux as he carried his guitar along beside him. "Well how the fuck am I supposed to know what Gam gets up to? He's this super spiritual vegetarian guy so maybe havin' sex is against his made-up religion or some equally ridiculous bullshit."
"More like the exact opposite of that," Sollux remarked, snapping a twig off a tree as they passed beneath it. "He has sex the way he does most things. He decides he wants it and then wanders around until he somehow trips over it. Then he moves on to the next thing."
"Oh I see, so he's sort of like a casual bed hopper. I guess that makes sense."
"If that's really the term you're going to commit to, then sure. That's what he is. I guess I'm just pissed because it means we can't jack his room again." He picked the leaves idly from his twig.
"Wait, you lost me," Eridan panted as he continued to heave his guitar along. "Jack his room…? Am I bein' invited over again?"
Sollux shrugged, shredding up the leaves from his twig. "If you want. Karkat's being a pissy jackass, so I'd rather not leave myself alone in that house to serve as an open target for his bitching. Plus you gave me Castlevania blue balls, you narcoleptic shit."
"I would apologize but I told you at least five fuckin' times last night that I was tired so you can't make me feel guilty about fallin' asleep," Eridan snapped. His tone then dropped steeply into softer territory. "But playin' Castlevania wouldn't be so bad since you got me kinda excited about the fuckin' thing."
"And that's great and everything, but like I said, we can't use GZ's room and that's where I had the fucking thing set up."
Eridan gave him a puzzled look. "So just set it up in your room."
Sollux felt his neck get hot and he proceeded to rip his leaves into even tinier pieces. "My room isn't exactly habitable right now."
"Yeah, I kinda figured as much. Since the last time I caught a glimpse of it, the place looked like it had been hit by some rogue, room-specific hurricane. Not to mention it reeked like a fuckin' gym locker." He ran a hand over his brow as he continued to drag his guitar case along beside him. "Don't you ever fuckin' clean that place, Sol?"
Sollux grew even hotter, and he stared hard at the shredded vegetation in his fingers. "Nobody ever goes in there except me, so there's never a point," he mumbled.
"Well, I'm goin' in there now. So how's that for a fuckin' point?" Eridan rebuked.
Sollux shrugged, letting the leaf fragments flutter to the ground.
"We're cleanin' your room, Sol. Just as soon as we get back. And I've revoked your right to refuse so you can fuckin' try but it's not goin' to do you any good."
Once they were actually knee deep in Sollux's refuse, however, Eridan was suddenly not so gung-ho.
"Oh my fuckin' god, how is it even possible for you to consume this much shit? I mean, there's nothing to you. You're just bones and a little bit a skin, but I've never seen this many Taco Bell wrappers in my life," Eridan whined as he picked through the pile of garbage beside Sollux's desk.
Sollux himself was busy gathering up dirty laundry. "This is the culmination of several months' worth of trash, dumbass. It's not like I'm making trips to that place once a day."
"Once a year is one time too many if you ask me, that place's food is fuckin' shit," Eridan scoffed, dropping a wrapper back to the floor.
"Well some of us didn't grow up on caviar and cocktail weenies, lord douchebag," Sollux snapped, throwing an armful of used socks in a laundry basket.
"Cocktail weenies are shit too, okay, if you're gonna make a point a mockin' cultured eatin' habits, at least give it some fuckin' effort," Eridan replied, peering over Sollux's desk. He nudged at the mouse and watched the monitor crackle and hum to life.
"Hey," Sollux snapped, his sunglasses catching the light as he turned his head toward Eridan from over the laundry basket in his arms.
"Calm down, it's not as if I have any interest in your porn stash or whatever other unmentionable material you got stored on here. I just want to check some a my band websites." Eridan lowered himself onto Sollux's chair and brought up the web browser.
"So much for cleaning my room, I guess," Sollux seethed, throwing dirty underwear into his basket with even more force.
"I've been doin' shit, okay? My constitution is more delicate than yours and I'm fuckin' tired, all right?" Eridan rebuked, scrolling through web pages with his cheek resting on his palm.
"You've picked up maybe five pieces of garbage. Six, tops. You were the one that was basically pissing his pants with excitement over getting my shit cleaned up."
"Well sorry for bein' exhausted after walkin' around all day with a guitar that you never once offered to carry for me," Eridan replied indignantly. "Besides, this is your shit, so I can quit whenever I want. I got nothing ridin' on this."
Sollux threw more underwear into the basket. "I thought you were the whole reason we were doing this. If you weren't here, I wouldn't even bother."
"Well, you should want to bother, Sol, regardless a whether or not second parties are involved. I'm teachin' you valuable life lessons, here."
Sollux sighed exasperatedly. "You know what? Fine. Just sit on your ass. I'll do the rest of this."
He stormed out of the room to deposit the laundry in the wash. After slamming the washing machine's lid shut and turning the knob to the most powerful setting available, he stalked back to his room. As he scooped up a trash bag and began tossing empty food wrappers inside, he saw Eridan squirming around in his chair a bit. The young man felt around under the seat, trying to lift the handle to adjust the height, but it wouldn't budge. Irritated, Eridan ducked his head down to inspect the lever more closely.
"Hey, Sol, there's something goin' on with your chair I think," he proclaimed.
"No shit, jackass. It's broken. Has been for a while now."
Eridan frowned up at him. "Why do you keep it around, then?"
Sollux shrugged. "Because it died in service to me. It's like a crippled old veteran. You don't throw vets in the trash."
"Except it's not a veteran, it's a chair. And if it can't do it's job as a fuckin' chair then it doesn't belong in use." He was yanking harder at the handle, jiggling it around to try and get the seat to adjust.
"It does its job for me," Sollux snapped, his tone darkening. "Stop fucking with it, Eridan, I'm serious."
"Well you're not the fuckin' issue here, are you? I'm the one sittin' in it and it's too low for me, like I'm getting' neck strain already." Eridan jimmied the handle again, his teeth bared with exertion.
"Quit messing with it. Hey. Stop touching it. Stop!" Sollux dropped his garbage bag to the ground and lunged forward to knock Eridan's hand away.
But not before there was a loud snap.
Sollux froze. Eridan stared at the lever in his hand as the chair gave a feeble whine and slowly sank down to its lowest position.
For a few heartbeats there was silence.
Then Sollux shoved Eridan out of the chair so hard that he sent the man crashing against his desk, nearly tipping over his monitor. Eridan grabbed the computer and steadied it, staring back over his shoulder at Sollux in shock.
"What the hell, Sol?" he snapped indignantly.
Sollux didn't reply. Couldn't reply. His throat was too tight to push air through. It was an effort just to breathe. He grabbed the lever with trembling fingers and tipped the chair back, trying to fit it back in position. He felt like he was drowning. He shoved the seat up, but it only whined and sank back down. Shaking, he tried to jam the handle back in again.
"Jesus, calm down, it's just a chair," Eridan said, though his own voice was shrinking with fear. "I'll get you another one if you're gonna go this fuckin' nuts over it."
"Shut up." Sollux's voice was no more than a ragged whisper. His eyes burned as he tried to shove the seat up again, to no avail. His breaths came shorter. Harder. His whole body felt as if it were coming under attack by electric shocks. He swore, shaking the seat savagely before shoving it against the bed and pressing his fists to his temples.
"Sol…?" Eridan's voice was barely audible.
"Get out."
Eridan didn't move. "What?"
"Get out!" Sollux roared, rising to his feet and taking Eridan by the shirt collar. The other man tried to protest, but Sollux threw him toward the door. Eridan's foot caught on the garbage bag lying on the ground, making him stumble and fall to his knees. But Sollux heaved him back up again, kicking and shoving him out the door.
"Fuck! Sol, I said I'd get you another one, I'm sorry!" Eridan yelped as he was beaten down the hallway.
"I never want to see your fucking face back here again," Sollux heaved, his body shaking and taught with rage. "Get out. Get out! Get the fuck out!"
He began pounding on Eridan, delivering vicious jabs to the man's back as Eridan dashed to the door. He continued to try and force whimpered apologies through his lips, but they were all cut short by Sollux's blows. He tried to stuff his flipflops back on, but Sollux kicked the door open and threw Eridan bodily out of the house before he could. The man fell to the pavement, his sandals flying from his hands.
"Sol, what—"
Sollux slammed the door in his face.
He went back to his room. He dropped to his knees. He pulled his chair close with shaking hands. He cursed loud enough to bring Karkat out into the hallway.
And then something bitter and hot like acid carved its way down his cheek.
...
((Just a note: if you have a question for me, anonymous reviews will not let me reply. I don't want to clutter chapters with author's notes and replies, since most of us are just here to read about Homestuck boys. So if you want something answered, either leave a signed review or drop me a message in my Tumblr askbox. I've provided a link to said box of askings on my profile page if that's the route you choose to go.
AN double reacharound: I'm not mad, I just want to talk to some of you guysssss but you leave anon reviews and I cry inside. Weh.))