It is Valentine's Day on the meteor. Rose and Kanaya were off in some corner of their inhabitance and Dave wasn't about to go find them. He didn't really know how to handle this day though. He kind of wanted to take things further in his relationship, but didn't want Karkat to feel pressured and every time he tried to initiate the anatomy talk Karkat would change the subject. He still had no idea what was going on under the troll's pants, and he couldn't deny that his curiosity grew every day. How different was it? I mean, it can't be that big of a deal, c'mon it's been over a year since he had first been made aware that there were differences and he didn't want to force anything, but some info would be nice. He tried to talk with Karkat, just talk, the troll didn't have to strip for him or anything, but Karkat almost seemed scared to talk about it. Dave didn't understand why.
This wasn't the day to get into it though. No, he was going to downplay today. Karkat didn't know about the holiday, so Dave could kind of downplay it; or maybe. Okay, that would be totally geeky and not ironic or cool…but maybe?
Dave set-up their room with a husktop tv and booted up the proper entertainment. He hadn't called Karkat in yet, he wasn't sure where the troll was actually. He wanted everything to be perfect. He had alchemized flowers, some Alternian flower that kind of looked like daises, Karkat had mentioned that they were his favorites once when they were looking at an Earth botany book. He was disappointed though when he learned that they didn't smell like cotton candy. Dave had also alchemized chocolates, Whitman's, he had some once and they were pretty good. Now, for his clothes. Dave once again, dressed in Karkat's clothing, a symbol of devotion right? That's the theme of the night. Karkat came in at that moment, hair wet from the shower. Dave allowed the idle thought of whether or not Karkat used the apple shampoo again, cross his mind.
Karkat just looked at him, a small blush passing his across his face. Truth was, Dave wore his clothes often; at least once a week. Something about refreshing the scent; like it's cologne or something. It still made Karkat blush every time. So blatant that one. For all of his cool kid act, Dave was probably one of the sappiest, goofiest, most adorable people Karkat had ever met. He loved Dave so much. That's why it terrified him to talk about their respective anatomies. What if Dave was freaked out by his body? So far he's been pretty cool about the grub scars and the horns and the pointy teeth; but it just wasn't the same. There was a fear of being some sort of disappointment to his matesprit. He never really thought he would be in this situation; never thought he'd fall in love with a human; he didn't know how to handle it.
"Hey, Kitkat. Come here."
"Just a sec." Karkat changed into Dave's clothes; it just didn't feel right not to when his boyfriend showed such affection. Still, he was glad that his boxers shielded him from Dave's wandering eyes. "Okay."
Karkat sat down next to Dave. "Okay, so there's this holiday for humans –"
"Another one?"
"Yes, and it's one that matesprits celebrate with each other. There are a variety of ways to observe the holiday." Dave's face became a little red in spite of himself. He couldn't help it; damn hormones. "But, I thought, since I'm clearly big on displays of devotion, I thought we could …um kind of do a human version of…this." He gestured at their clothing.
"There's a human version of this?"
"Kind of, it's called marriage."
"Oh, I think Jade said something about this."
"What?" Dave couldn't help, but feel a jolt of possession and jealousy. How was Karkat talking to Jade? Dream bubbles? And marriage? Why were they taling about marriage?
"Yeah, during the game. I upset her, some shit was going down and she said if I hate myself so much why don't I hate marry myself."
"Hate marry? What?"
"Oh, at some point during the bullshit I was explaining kismesis relationships to her."
"Oh, well humans don't really have hate marriages; it's purely a flushed thing." Now he felt kind of stupid for feeling jealous. He pushed that aside though.
Karkat nodded. "So, is that what we're going to do?"
"Sort of? We can't really do it on the meteor; we don't have an officiant or anything, but I thought we could do it …kind of symbolically?" Okay, now he was really starting to feel stupid. This wasn't even cute this was just stupid. "You know what, never mind; I think I got caught up in the whole devotion thing. My idea was stupid let's just…forget it okay?"
"No."
"What?"
"No, I wanna do whatever you had planned. The fake human marriage or whatever." Karkat could tell Dave was just feeling insecure about his idea. The boy really was far more self-conscious than he led on to most people. So what if it wasn't a real human marriage? It was something that Dave had clearly put some thought into.
"No, dude it's stupid. Really, painfully stupid. Here, I, um, I got you these."
He handed Karkat the flowers and the chocolate. "Human tradition for matesprits day."
"Is that what it's really called?"
"No, it called Valentine's Day, but I prefer my name."
Karkat looked down, they were his favorite flowers. Dave remembered, when did he even tell him? It had to have been in passing. Yet, the goof remembered. Karkat was incredibly touched. He reached out and pulled Dave in for a sweet kiss. Pulling away and pressing his forehead against the human's he said "Dave, we're doing your thing. Your marriage thing. I don't care if it's stupid, just show me."
Dave reddened considerably as he revealed the husktop screen. Karkat saw to characters, one that looked just like Dave and another that looked just like Karkat. "It's a game called Fable III, you can get married to other players in it. The ceremony isn't anything like the real thing, but I thought I'd be nice…for our characters to marry."
Karkat smiled. "Alright, how do we do it?"
"Seriously?"
"Seriously."
"Well first I propose."
"Okay."
"Then you accept."
Karkat pushed the button and the two picked out their house in the game (after much debate) and a venue for the wedding. When the short cinematic was over Karkat looked at Dave. "And that's it?"
"That's it, oh, but one more thing." Dave leaned in and kissed Karkat lovingly, lingering just long enough to express his love, but pulling away before it could get heated. Taking the trolls hand in his, he said "Love you Kitkat; I pledge my loyalty and love to you. I promise to protect you until my last breath and do my best to make our every day together filled with happiness."
Karkat had tears streaming down his eyes. This is was human marriage is? It's like he was in one of his own romance novels. He smiled through the wetness. "Me too, I pledge my fealty and heart to you. I will defend you against all that would do you harm, until my pulse stops. And I will do my best to fill our days together with joy."
Dave reached under his pillow, another super cheesy idea of his. It was a pair of scissors, he cut a piece of his hair and extended it to Karkat. "You were actually paying attention to the Jane Austen stories?"
"Yep, only ours are too short to wear as rings, so I got these." He placed the lock of hair in Karkat's hand and reached once more under the pillow, this time producing two simple lockets. Brass and plain, as masculine as he could get them, each inscribed with his initials on one side and Karkat's on the other. He handed one to Karkat who put the blonde lock securely in place, sealing it. Dave help him put it on. Then Karkat took the scissors and cut a piece of his hair off and handed it to Dave. He placed the hair in his own locket, sealed it and Karkat helped him put it on. "Now, no matter how far we're apart; we will always have a piece of each other with us." Dave stated. Karkat was sobbing with happiness. Such a goof, a loveable perfect human goof. The two just sat there, hands in each-others, kissing and snuggling for the whole afternoon.
Notes: I really view Dave as the type who is secretly a hopeless romantic, but incredibly insecure about it. His personality to me, seems like a geek who tries hard to be like the cool kids. And he's not, he cares too much about others and what they think about him. At least that's how I view him.
Guest: Seriously! XD I don't know why, but I thought "Drunk Dave" and ran with it.