You like what you do to Dirk Strider.
You’d like to preface the above statement by saying: you have absolutely no clue what it is. There’s something a little forbidding involved, some sensation telling you LOOK NO FURTHER when you think about it.
But you know you like what you do to Dirk Strider.
(What he does to you).
You like him. You like his name, flash and cool and ever-so-slightly self-conscious like the rest of him, the quicksilver gleam of his spiking hair, the clean sharp lines of his form. You’ve not encountered many other physical people in your life; even now you have so many around, there’s a giddy little spark that rises in you when you see him, a thrill, a novelty - he’s here, he’s alive, not just clementine-coloured text and a collection of metal parts wrapped in parcel paper.
You don’t know if everyone feels the same heady rush when they see another in the flesh, or if it’s just a quirk of yours lent by a deprived existence. There’s something molten and visceral and heart-pounding about the sight of him - you’re endlessly fascinated by the pale shift of muscles when his shirt rides up his back, the slender, bony column of his ankle braced against the floor, the shimmer of sweat and machine oil on his sheet-thin skin. God, he’s pale, pale like ash or bone or some shrinking plant, smothered by soil and denied light. A lonely colour, and you swear you could find bally well every vein in his body through the translucence. You’d like to try, sometime: It’s strange, how even the mundane feels so rich and so priceless to you when it’s him.
And what of the not-mundane? Dirk Strider is, after all, anything but quotidian. Actually, he makes you think of a skittish hawk. His face has that delicate, angular structure, a long, sharp, once-broken nose and very harsh cheekbones, a thin mouth that rests in a tense line. And his eyes - you never thought you’d get to see them in person, really, and you never bothered dwelling on it. You used to be so good at shoving the tragically impossible out of sight, out of mind. But his eyes are just brilliant, in the original sense of the word. They’re startling and dazzling, an incredibly vivid amber like nothing you’ve ever seen before.
When you were still a fresh little anklebiter, your grandma used to drink Oolong tea. You remember, partially because you were so very enraptured with everything she did, and partially because she was so dashed finicky with it. You haven’t drunk tea in years, haven’t touched it since she died, but you could still go through the motions in your sleep: she’d spoon the whisper- crinkling leaves, yellow-green and twisted like flowerbuds, into her teapot, rinse them with the boiling water from the silver flask, watch the first stain drip through the strainer, and only after all that would she pour a delicate, steady stream of just-steaming water into them. She made you smell it every time you helped her, the pale gold of the liquid turning smoky and bronze with every new steep, the fragrance curling from sweet grass and honey to something darkly floral and heady.
You do miss her. You never used to like tea very much, but you liked how her green eyes, so similar to your own, would glint when she sipped at her cup. She was not a woman to stop and breathe, if that makes sense, and so any rare moment of calm was sacred to you.
Dirk’s eyes are the precise shade of that tea, honey and nectar in the sunlight, whiskey-tangerine in the dark. You want to tell him that. It’s another thing you feel you oughtn’t.
You do a lot of things you feel you oughtn’t, nowadays. You can’t help being a thrill-seeker, and by gad is Strider thrilling. He’s all wound up in himself like an elaborately rolled tea leaf, and you’d like to introduce him to the hot water, as it were. He’d be a gorgeous blossom, you’re sure.
You’re sure metaphor isn’t your strong suit.
Confound it, you’ve only really ended up confounding yourself. What you’re trying to say is, Dirk is a pane of glass made up of a thousand fractures, holding himself together despite it. Or, no, that’s how he sees himself - how do you see him? He’s a sleek, well-paced machine, gears starting to squeak under strain. No, no, maybe he’s an automaton, terrified to break the routine he’s accustomed to. Dirk is... well, Dirk clutches at his own bones and measures every word. He’s Machiavellian, but only towards himself, playing thirty-steps-ahead chess in a game that doesn’t really exist and never would if he’d just trust himself a little more. He’s a skittish hawk.
He grew up alone, also.
You feel more connected to him than any other. Maybe because of your similar childhoods, maybe because you’re both lads and share that extra aspect. Maybe you’re beautiful opposites.
You like what you do to him. You like to spin his gears out of place? Or maybe to gain the hawk’s trust, have him shift towards you? To see thin crystals of glass start to rain down?
You don’t know what it is, but you know how to do it. You like to rest a hand on his lower back as you pass, casual and unassuming, and feel the visceral shudder go through his bones. You like to sit an inch too close to him, to see his words slow minutely and drag, the way his hands twitch at his sides. You like the glossy intensity of his eyes late at night, when your voice is scratchy with sleep and he blurs in the low light like an angelic silhouette.
You’ve never met someone- well, you could stop there. Or, you could’ve. You’re not looking to get a kick in your rump from either of the lovely ladies of your acquaintance, of course.
But you’ve never met someone who complements you so nicely. When you slide by close to his body, he follows you for a half-moment, like a flower turning towards the sun. When he stretches, catlike, and tilts his head back down to his work, your fingers trace out the shape of his shoulders.
It’s - you’re - starting to feel really rather giddy.
You like the pitchy wheeze of his breath when you press up against him under the pretence of getting down your tea - you’ve started drinking it again. You like the way he sits opposite you when you sip, eyes never moving from your face. You like the uncontrollable flush on his face when you hold the cup to his lips in silent offer. The guilty skid of his pulse when you thump him on the back, pull him into a hug. You like- oh, what point is there in sheltering pride? You love the cool slide of his skin and the way he starts to shake, always, when you touch him longer than a second. He’s as much of a novice as you are when it comes to skinship, maybe more - and you can’t deny, there’s a particular pride to being more naturally inclined to something than Mr Competent Man.
You’re memorising him. His hair smells of smoke and amber, and you like it so much you went to find his shampoo to confirm. Vain little prize bird, with his painstakingly arranged toiletries. You buy it in bulk.
He runs cold.
His skin is soft, except for the pale flickers of scar tissue that dust his long, bony limbs and for his calloused hands. Rough skin at the knuckles, the pads of his index, the joint of his thumb.
You’re trying to catalogue him in your head so precisely, you can register every minute change in him. It’s all to flatter your own ego, honestly. To indulge in every minute change you cause. But as obsessions go, there are worse ones out there. You find a certain unforeseen serenity in the game you play.
You don’t know why he hasn’t said anything about what you’re doing - and again, you don’t know what you’re doing. You feel like you’re teasing a wild animal, like Grandma always warned you against, jabbing a bear with a big stick until it turns and roars in your face. Equally, you feel you’re gently gaining the trust of a flighty doe. You feel powerful and you feel reverent.
That’s why you don’t stop. Maybe that’s also why he hasn’t stopped you.
You’re getting bolder, drunk off nerves and success. You’re something like addicted to it, now, the touch of his skin, his attention, his presence. Possibly it’s the feeling of winning, for once, that has you grinning and golden with thrill.
Right now, he’s working in the engineering block. He’s leant over a counter, his baggy sleep trousers slung low around his hips - his lanky frame makes it difficult to find well-fitting clothing - and his stained shirt rucked up his abdomen. You can see the pale pearlescent stretch of his side, the fine arch of his back, and you want to see what he’ll do if you touch him.
You want to touch him.
And you can, so you do.
He jerks when your hand lands on his bare skin, first in alarm and then something like shock. You are being forward, to be fair, but oh, look at that: the dark tan of your skin against his ghostly ash, the sun-warmed broadness of your hand in comparison to his steel-strong, slim body. It’s art, really.
“Jake?” He asks, voice as weak with confusion as the first rinse of tea.
Who else would it be? You squeeze his side lightly, feeling muscle and bone, soft silky skin, and he strangles out a tiny gasping noise.
“What are you doing?” His voice is flat and monotonous, but he quivers like a strung bow under your fingers. He’s so good at hiding things from you, or he was; but he’s absolutely hopeless when it comes to body language. Lean on him, literally, and you can read his thoughts in the way he stiffens or melts.
It’s not really like you can read his mind, of course. You wouldn’t want that, even if you could have it. But he’s always been so dashed good at seeming calm and unaffected while he’s working himself into a nervous breakdown, and you relish the way you can drop his guards with a touch of your finger.
You slide your hand down, a little entranced by the curve of him, the way his ribcage flows into abdomen and then to his hip- and now you have to touch that, the slender swell of his hipbones against taut skin. Oh, the way he looks, locked in place.
“Jake-“ Dirk repeats, louder, a hint of shock in his ever-expressionless tone. You like that, too: you like the challenge of making that measured pitch fumble and catch, every so often.
His voice cuts out when you squeeze him again, his hip this time, enjoying the sensation. Dirk’s an inch taller than you, or maybe more, but he’s substantially slighter. Really, he’s just a good deal less substantial. It works for him, obviously - he slinks like a cat, moves like a crack of lightning through the sky, wields a sword with lithe confidence - but when he’s all dressed down and shivering like this, he almost looks delicate. The set of his hips and waist are finely sculpted, so much so you could almost mistake him for a girl-
Oh, phooey! Really, that’s just the talkies talking. Most women you know aren’t some caricature of a teeny heaving-bosomed damsel, after all. What you’re really feeling is just an instinctive protectiveness, you assume, and a need to apply that to your embarrassing movie collections. Now isn’t the time to slip back into your knight-in-short-shorts phase, English! And who says a chap can’t feel protective of his friends, gentleman or lady?
“You know, I really ought to make you eat more, chap,” you tell him, and the lateness of the hour has your voice coming out husky and quiet. He shivers again (he’s such a textural creature, you notice), all tensed up but making no move to push you away.
“…what?” He asks. His voice is minutely higher.
“Bony as a stock pot, aren’t you?” You rub your hand against his slim hip, watching a pink flush slowly saturate the backs of his ears. “You’re a whisper of a thing, really.”
Under usual circ*mstances, Dirk would already have cued up a clever retort, one that would make you feel both amused and a tad thwarted. Now, though, he just breathes out slowly, looking down - neck red - and tells you, “…oh.”
You stay like that for a moment longer, partially to warm him up, because you can just feel the cold radiating from him, and partially because he’s not stopping you. Then you’re stepping back, returning to business, trying not to grin when he mutters something about bathrooms and absconds. Probably just going to his room to handle the excess of physical contact, you suspect; lord knows you sometimes get overwhelmed.
Another thing you like is how Dirk can’t look away when you walk around shirtless. It’s only fair, because you sometimes feel like you can’t look away from him either - that’s the way it is, to have another human in close proximity, you suppose. Neither of you’ve had much of an opportunity to study eachother, so why not take advantage?
He’s rather genteelly embarrassed when you catch him looking, though. He ducks his head down at your laugh, crimson, even while his face stays blank. There’s a euphoric rush to the way he reacts to you, you can’t deny.
You take to wandering around sans shirt, half to see his face and half to acclimatise him to the concept. You’re both bros, after all, and you can’t see the harm in it! Plus, there’s something very soft and lovely about Dirk shirtless, a sweet domesticity present in the work-warmed ripple of his back as he plays around with his mechanics, jeans hugging at his hips. Old jeans, the beaten-soft ones, spattered and stained. He looks like he’s at home when he’s like that.
You want him to be at home with you, always. You’re starting to realise it’s a possibility.
“Jake?”
You look up from an absolutely rip-roaring novel from the 1920s to see one of the aforementioned lovely ladies of your acquaintance. It’s dreadfully rude of you, now you get to thinking about it: show up to the Crocklonde household, ready to socialise, and then bury your nose firmly in one of Jane’s detective novels. You can’t help it, though, it’s rather scary when both those two start analysing you.
But Roxy’s here now, Jane in the kitchen, and the time for novels is past.
“I say,” you say redundantly, “Roxy! You gave me something of a startle there. What’s up?”
“Can I ask you something?” She starts, and you’re already nervous at the look in her eyes. A year-odd ago and you’d have scrammed on the double, but you’re trying to be a tad more stiffer-lip about this awkwardness thing, so you nod slowly instead.
“Ah. S’pose so.”
“What’s going on with you and Dirk?” Roxy asks gently, and your head whips up to look at her. There’s the tiny crinkle between her eyes that means she’s serious.
“What do you mean?”
She chews on her lip, measuring her words. “…It just- lately, you’ve been kind of, uh, touchy? With him?”
“What?” You pause to consider. You suppose that yes, it’s true, to an outsider the increase in tactility between you must seem rather strange. But that’s just because they don’t understand the game. “Oh. Well, a fellow can expect some good manly skinship, can’t he?”
“Yeah,” Roxy says carefully, “but… Jake, you get what you’re doing to him, right?”
“Touching him?”
“Yeah, touching him- no, you dumbass! I mean, doesn’t this seem, uh, kinda cruel to you?”
“Cruel?”
She stares at you, massaging her temples. “Jakey boy. J-dog. I know you ain’t this dumb.”
“Well, really! I resent that!” You retort. For one thing, you certainly aren’t nearly as smart as she, and you wish she would remember that. For another, you’re prickling all over at the implications in her voice. “And what do you mean, cruel? I can’t clap a pal on the back, now?”
“Don’t be- calm down, Jake, for reals. You know that’s not the problem. It’s not like you’re just smacking him on the shoulder, or whatever.” Roxy points out. “But. Considering you… and him… you understand being careful with the touching, right?”
“You’re making me sound like some kind of right dastardly lecher,” you snap indignantly. “And I’m not sure I do understand! Are you saying he doesn’t want me to?”
“That’s absolutely not what I’m saying.” She sighs. “I’m just not sure it’s good for him.”
“Well, if that’s the case, he can bloody well tell me himself!” You hiss, smarting with the thought of him doing just that. “It’s Dirk, for Jehovah’s jodhpurs, it’s not like he has any compunctions in giving a firm no.”
“Jake!” Roxy steps forward, eyes narrowed with frustration. “Dirk isn’t going to say no to you, that’s the goddamn point! You’ve got to see it’s selfish, though, to keep stringing him along like this.”
You blink, taken aback. “I’m what?”
“No one’s saying you’ve got to feel the same way, but it’s not exactly gentlemanly or whatever to keep feeling him up when you know he’s just going to let you-“
“Feel him up?” You choke. “Roxy, you are seriously misinformed about, well, plum everything, I’m just engaging in some friendly-
“Yeah?” She says defiantly, hands on her hips. “Jake. Jakey. My boy, my pal, my bro. Friendly affection is a loosely defined concept, okay? But let me tell you, even if you mean it that way, when you slide your hands up Dirk’s shirt or rest your head in his lap or whatever, he doesn’t see it as platonic.”
“Oh.” You look down, more disappointed than you could logically account for. “So you’re saying, uh, Dirk thinks I’m making cow eyes?”
“…Jake,” she heaves a sigh.
“I thought we’d passed that awkwardness! You think I’m too familiar? I’m hardly aiming to have a pal running scared, I just-“
“Jake, you f*cking idiot, he’s still into you!”
“He what?” You blink for a moment, processing that sentence, before a warm, glowing relief cracks through your confusion. “Oh! Oh, that’s why you- well, really, Rox-star, you had me thinking I’d screwed the pooch a smidgen! No, no, that’s all in the past. We’re none of us sixteen anymore, are we?”
“Every time I talk to you, I wish you came with a translator,” she snaps, a mite unfairly, you feel. “Jakey, come on! You’d have to be blind not to see it. I know it was a f*cking apocalypse last time this happened - literally, ha - but you know this won’t end well.”
“It’s not like that!”
“You can’t actually believe that.” She snaps, fuchsia eyes narrowed in frustration. “Jake, don’t do this, seriously-“
“Cheese and f*cking crackers, woman, I’m not doing anything!” You insist. Roxy’s stopped looking at you like a weaselly rake and started looking at you more like a medically miraculous brainless life form. You hate it when she does that. “We’re just expressing some manful affection!”
“Maybe you are,” she continues, arms crossed. “But seriously, Dirk is the least touchy person I’ve ever met, and again, he let you slide your hand up his shirt the other day. You get that that’s weird, right?”
You squirm. “Well, if you phrase it like that- he had a bruise, really.”
“Not the point.”
“It jolly well is!” You send her your best defiant expression, arms akimbo. There’s little you wouldn’t do for your friends, but you’ve been getting better at standing up for yourself and setting boundaries, as the paper bundles say, and you’ll be dashed if you cave now. You’re allowed to hug your friend, for Pete’s sake! “Roxy, it’s just not a good time to be raising snakes.”
“This is going to implode hard,” she warns you, and then whisks back to the kitchen as fast as she came.
You make your excuses like a cowardly cuttlefish and flee before Jane can get involved. Jane, sweet as she is, could scare the bajeesus out of a damn rockside. Not today!
You try to dismiss Roxy’s words all day, but ludicrous as they are, there’s something about them that snags tightly in the uncomfortable part of your brainbox.
It’s no secret in your friend group that Dirk used to have a certain tendresse for you, way back when. You were all sixteen, you ended up having a very unpleasant experience with romance vis-à-vis your best and only male friend, and that mess was all over and done with by the time the game ended. It was quite a relief, returning to your friendship: not because you don’t like Dirk, or because he was a guy, just, well…
You’d always thought being desired would be quite flattering and thrilling, but it ended up closer to invasive and controlling. You didn’t want to have to think about how you dressed or behaved, to anxiously scrutinise every word you spoke or action you made in the fear it’d ‘lead someone on’, you didn’t want to be the asshole who tore your whole friend group apart saying ‘no.’ You also didn’t want to tear your friend group apart by saying yes, and potentially upsetting the unpleasant tug of war your friends were playing with you. You took the path of least resistance, like a bloody coward, and it blew up in your face.
You don’t exactly-
You guess you do want to find a lover, of course, what gent doesn’t? And you want to like this theoretical future lover, as well, but you don’t really want to ever date someone that close to you again. If you’ve been truly vulnerable with someone, if they know you all to the core and through, what’s to stop them using it against you?
You really, really hate being told you’re ‘leading someone on.’ God forbid you touch someone! Maybe they have some sort of thing for you, and then it’s your fault for being someone they like. It’s messy, is romance, and awkward, and even just reflecting on it makes all your current relationships twist and warp unpleasantly.
Bugger. You loathe loathe loathe this cumbersome thoughtalley.
Your point is, yes, maybe Dirk had something of an amorous affection for you a long time ago, but that’s all done and dusted with now. No wonder, too; you’ve always got the feeling it was more to do with lack of options than you specifically, which was oddly reassuring back in the early days of your ghosting.
Maybe that’s why you ended up so close. You already were, of course, but after that whole Incident, you abruptly realised your life was worse without Strider around. You both sort of decided that you really mustn’t drift apart, so all the romantic guff had been left on a shelf to grow dusty. There was a whole new world, new friends, new species, for chrissakes - not to mention the absolute dog’s breakfast you made of all your friendships. It was absolute dickens trying to pretend everything was fine with Roxy, and fighting mingled guilt and resentment towards Jane, and…
…and then there was Dirk. Austere, in his own way, dryly funny and brilliant and cynical, and so reserved he’d rather stab himself in the foot than express an unwelcome interest explicitly. There’s a possibility you were a little selfish, taking advantage of his reticence, but his renewed friendship was just the ticket to get you back into tip-top shape. He was just as lonely, just as socially stunted as you, and the moment you accepted you’d both rather keep being friends than risk it all, it felt like everything was resolved.
Dirk’s talkative. He’s not good at avoiding a subject. Even before you dated, he used to hint at you, flirting or joking, always just enough to signal interest without the risk of rejection. Once you shut him down, he stopped. That must mean it’s over, right?
Right, you decide. Right! You love Roxy, and she’s very clever, but in this instance she is simply just wrong. You like Dirk, and he likes you, and that’s allowed. No need to overcomplicate it.
That considered, you conclude there’s no reason for you to stop. Roxy simply doesn’t get it. Really, you should just stop thinking about it, before you overanalyse everything and ruin your hard-won best broship.
Learning that your friends aren’t always right was a difficult lesson; you should heed it.
When you get back in, Dirk’s sprawled casually over your loungeplank, lanky and tense as ever in his customary wifebeater and jeans. You stare at him for a moment and gulp, scrutinising the narrow jaw, the tiny flash of pale skin exposed at his navel, the faint dusting of hair on his calves.
He looks the same, you realise with relief. God, what were you even thinking? Of course he’s the same, it’s Dirk. You really mustn’t let Roxy get in your head like this. Even his body language, the way he tilts his head up when you enter, is just as familiar as your own.
“Sup, English?”
You startle guiltily and scratch your neck, laughing. “f*ck! Gave me a fright there, chum!”
“How?”
“What do you mean, how?” You move towards him.
“How did I give you fright, man? You walked in here and stared me straight in the eyes for two seconds before I said anything.” Dirk’s eyes are covered by his shades, but you can feel them scanning you for potential issues. “What’s got your short shorts in a twist?”
“Oh, ha ha,” you say, flicking a rebukeful glance in his direction. “My shorts are a very modest length! And nothing’s in a twist, I’ll tell you that for free.”
“For free? Damn, you’re underselling yourself.” He keeps looking up at you as you approach, but his legs remain pointedly strewn over all available space. “If you were charging for those perspicacious nuggets of wisdom, you’d have enough to pay me to move.”
“Hmm.” You grab his bony ankles in one hand and heave, sliding in comfortably beneath them. “I’m afraid we’ll have to bally well coexist, Strider. You’ll get not even a penny from me!”
A tiny tremor goes through him when you arrange his legs comfortably atop your lap, but his voice is steady as ever. That’s Dirk for you - sometimes you wonder if he’d even break facade during, cough, intimate moments. It’s just one of those fascinating things about him.
“No one uses dead British currency anymore, dude.” He tells you, shrugging a shoulder.
“I hardly think many people still talk like you,” you retort tartly. “I’m just chivalrous enough to consider it a charming eccentricity.”
“Wow. Charming eccentricity, print that on my business cards.”
“Business cards?” You shoot him a smug little look. “In this modern day?”
He nods, acknowledging your point, before he’s prodding your thigh with his jabby toes. His socks have little horses on them; you let him ramble on about irony when he bought them, but you’re long past believing it. “I don’t want to hear about modernity from you, English.”
“Just pointing out the hypocrisy, good fellow.”
“Touché,” Dirk replies, instead of a longwinded explanation on how you’re wrong and also dress like a stripper version of Indiana Jones, which sends alarms ringing in your head. “So.”
“So what?”
“Great question. So, what were you and Roxy talking about?” He asks, and you feel your ears grow hot.
“Dirk! That’s not-“ deflect deflect deflect, “That is to say, I’m going to be absolutely bloody pissed if you’ve got the AR monitoring my conversations again!”
He raises a judgemental blonde eyebrow, which, let him look blank, you know he’s done it before. “No, dude. Jane pestered me to say sorry for chasing you out of their place. Apparently she looked up and you had fled.”
You don’t stop squinting suspiciously.
Dirk sighs. “Scout’s honour?”
“You weren’t in the dashed scouts, you chump.”
“Hey, how would you know?” He protests. “Maybe my bro’s last action was to set me up for a future of fun, camaraderie, and dubious adults telling me to meet them behind the shower cabin type sh*t.”
“You grew up in a post-apocalyptic wasteland, you shyster, there weren’t shower cabins or pervy counsellors, and-“ consarn it, he got you off topic. “The point is, it’s really rather not on-“
“Jake. The AR is not my circus, not my monkeys, hasn’t been for ages,” Dirk finally reassures you. “I’m a free agent, man.”
You furtively glance over. He’s as close to relaxed as he ever is - not much, but enough - and you wouldn’t usually do this, but your conversation with Roxy has you jumpy and reckless.
“Oh, alright,” you sigh, and then lunge for his glasses.
“Wha-“ It takes him a second to realise your intention, uncharacteristically, so you’ve already scrabbled back to your end of the sofa with his shades in your greedy little mitts by the time he’s mustered enough comprehension to be inching a frown at you. “Dammit, Jake.”
You fold the shades with two satisfying snaps, then snag them in your neckline. “What?”
“Jake.”
“A fella can’t hope to see his fellow fella’s smouldering burnished orbs?”
You relish the pained silence that follows.
“Every day, I regret letting Roxy show you her old fanfiction stash. Every day.”
“Ah, well. Since they’re already off, then-“ he makes a pounce for the glasses and you rear back, laughing, foot planted lightly in his side. “Ah, ah!”
“Give them back.”
“Why?” You whine, fending off another swipe with a swift manoeuvre. Quick and clever, that’s how Wellington did it…
“Why not?”
You flutter entreatingly in his direction. “Perhaps I long for the sight of those pretty peepers you keep stashed away.”
Said pretty peepers, currently the colour of the sort of whiskey stored for centuries in cut-crystal decanters, boggle back at you. Without his shades, Dirk is so much easier to read - and now you can see you might’ve gone a little far.
“I didn’t- too slow!” You crow, dodging his hand as he hisses and flails. “I say, Strider, keep up this behaviour and I’ll stash them in a more secure location.”
He stops to shake his head when you indicate your shorts, apparently mystified. “Why?”
“Can’t see that you’ll be eager to rummage around in there, eh?”
“Well, if you’re that eager for the sensual Strider touch on your family jewels…” Dirk sighs when you chortle, crossing his arms in what constitutes a grand display of emotion for a Strider. “What’s with you straight dudes and the obsession with your junk?”
“You’re a dude, also,” you repartée quickly. “And I’m not that.”
“There’s a specific subcategory of dudes who are somehow exceptionally straight, regardless of actual sexuality,” he explains. “You’re one of them, English. You’re weird about guns and you track dirt through the house. Sorry, bro, you’re assigned het at birth.”
“Honestly, I’ve a sneaking suspicion that may in fact be more hom*ophobic than just saying I’m too manly to be gay,” you correct.
“Forget Roxy’s fanfiction, I regret letting you pick up Rose’s queer theory books.”
“Most importantly, you know I’m not straight, anyhow.” You interrupt, beaming up at him. “And junk-wise, I like to view it as more of a personal fascination.”
“Uh huh.”
Your face’s ended up close to his neck. He smells very nice. “You smell very nice.”
Dirk almost topples over. “Excuse me?”
You can’t help it. With his eyes uncovered like they are now, you can see every tiny iota of surprise register, and you’ve always struggled to leave well enough alone. You lean in and press your face to his neck, breathing in ostentatiously and grinning against his galloping pulse.
“You smell very nice, chum. Like amber.” Your open mouth kind of catches his warm skin, and he doesn’t taste bad, either. Another fact on your list, an old memory regained. “…Dirk?”
You’re kind of expecting him to either laugh, if he’s ticklish there, or to cut back with his classic withering wit. You’re absolutely not expecting him to flip the f*ck out and shove himself backwards, scrabbling out of your lap (oh yeah, how’d he turn up there?) and landing on the floor with unexpected gracelessness.
“Jegus frig on a hot tin roof! Are you okay, chap, I-“
From the looks of it, Dirk is transparently not. He’s quickly turning an unhappy crimson, hair flipped forward to cover his eyes, as he pushes upright and makes like a cat on crack to the exit.
“Dirk!” You insist.
“I’m fine,” he croaks, back turned. “Just. Uh. You know me, irons in fires, ouch, so hot, burnt my f*cking miracle sticks-“
“I think you burnt your miracle oven, by which I mean that clever brainbox of yours,” you tell him frankly. “Did you crack your head?”
“No, no, I’m hunky-dory-“
“Well, now I know you’re not, because the last time I used that phrase, you said there were ‘laws about this sh*t’ and mentioned some kind of Swiss convention?”
Strider lets out an audible huff, still facing away. “Dude. Do you know the twentieth decimal of pi?”
“What? Not off the plum top of my noggin-“
“I do, it’s 3, I’m fine,” he cuts you off shortly. “Bye.”
“But-“ and he’s gone. At least you probably don’t have to worry about a concussion.
Did you just traumatise him by touching him too much? Maybe Roxy’s right, and you are being weird. No, you know what, maybe he’s just not used to good old-fashioned physical contact! Not used to being given affection by anyone he’s not dating, or something to do with all that rot Jane was telling you about toxic masculinity. And wouldn’t it be better, then, to slowly wean him into it?
Despite your best efforts, you can’t help but spend the next few days haunted by Roxy’s words. It’s nothing, really, definitely not worth dwelling on…
…but you and Dirk, your little home and the space you’ve carved out in this world for the two of you, your best broship, it’s everything to you. After the game, you needed someone to lean on, and that was him. Your life has consumed his and vice versa, and now you feel like one half of a symbiotic relationship. He’s the fungi, you’re the plant roots, and you’re both dependent on the mycorrhizal bonds of friendship for continued existence!!
Might’ve gotten slightly off the rails there, ahem. What you’re getting at is, you care very deeply for your friendship with Dirk, and the thought of it going wrong again is so terrifying, it pervades your life. You find yourself overanalysing every little gesture, every bloody word, until you’re so hopped up on your own anxiety, you just decide to come right out and say it.
“Uh, Dirk? Best pal, chum of chums, Dirking nine to five?”
“Never, ever say that again,” Dirk says flatly. He’s leaning on the counter again, pointy hip co*cked and elbows crossed, looking like a birch tree that just exploded into your kitchen one day and adopted insouciance and a vague twitchy aura of guilt. The coffee machine you still can’t figure out is chugging elegantly in front of him.
Your throat is dry as tinder.
“Don’t be a grumpy grubface,” you tell him, pulling a face when you realise who you picked that phrase up from. “All Dirk and no play makes-“
“Don’t even think about it. Why are you looking at me like that?” Dirk demands, voice as monotone as ever but presence growing in intensity. You don’t know how he does it, when his face doesn’t change at all, but somehow by the sheer tension in his posture, he’s able to unsettle everyone in a room should he choose to. “What happened?”
You hesitate, long enough for his fingers to start flexing unconsciously. Guilty. “Nothing happened, chum, I was just thinking…”
“Bad habit, can’t recommend.” He turns back to the whirring coffee machine, the bony protrusions of his shoulder blades poking out like ineffectual shields.
“Uh. About- it’s just, Roxy said something, that, uh, well…”
You can see your roommate tense up further with each word, like his joints get tightened every time you speak. “What.”
“Roxy, uh-“ you laugh brightly. It rings hollow. “Well, you know, I think she just got rather the wrong idea of our relationship, you know how she can-“
“What did she say?”
“Uh, I suppose- there was so much,” you lie, eyes fixed on the creaking clench of his jaw. “Well, she implied that I was, ah, touching you inappropriately-“
Dirk cuts you off with a bark laughter, forced. “Oh, that’s it? sh*t, man, I thought it was important. Just tell her you’re not smashing me on the regular and she’ll drop it.”
“First of all, I fear our foxy broad is rather more persistent than that,” you tell him frankly. “And she didn’t, well- she didn’t say she thought you and I were, ah, knocking boots, she was more saying that I should be careful how I-“
“Jake-“
“You know, touched you, because you would read into it. That it’s, uh, more than platonic for you,” you finish in a rush, eyes glued to his hunched shoulders. He’s very still. Dangerously still, like a cornered animal, and your heart starts to beat a frenzied pace. “Pretty bananas, right?”
Dirk nods, not quite fast enough. Your lungs shrink.
“Dirk?”
He jerks. “Uh, yeah. Obviously. I guess she doesn’t- uh-“
Your friend’s voice is trailing off the closer you get, and you keep waiting for him to turn and laugh in your face, but instead he’s just getting stiffer and stiffer, hackles raising - defensive. Almost guilty.
“Dirk?” You repeat tentatively, when you’re so close, your chest is just inches from his back.
He shudders, slow and helpless, and you watch as gooseflesh raises on his arms. His voice is hoarse and breathless. “What?”
“Is it…” you brace your hands on the counter edge, bracketing his hips, to steady yourself. Your centre of gravity feels a touch off. Dirk hisses air through his teeth when your hip brushes his rear, and you’re so close you can feel his slight warmth, and your whole throat is burning with nerves. “Dirk, the, the touching. Is it?”
He doesn’t say anything.
“Is it like that for you?” You press, forceful words coming out coated in gentle concern.
And Dirk doesn’t say no.
You stand there in stunned confusion for what feels like centuries, watching the back of his neck, listening for the most eloquent and capable person you’ve ever met to spring to his own defence. Because Dirk is far out of your league, and he’s moved on, and you’ve moved on, and it’s a friendship now and-
He’s not saying no. He’s just standing there with his bones clenched together like organic armour, staring fixedly ahead, shivering. He’s not saying a word.
You have no idea how to handle it. You’ve seen Dirk in crisis mode and Dirk in depression and Dirk in a f*cking righteous rage, but he usually gets more and more verbose the less composed he gets. This is unprecedented, unthinkable: a knight without his sword.
“Dirk,” you say again, and he twitches. There’s red creeping up his neck, the downy hairs leading to his scalp, and there’s your answer. There’s no reason for this response except-
Your brain twists violently in your head, thoughts shifting and settling, realigned and confusing.
You can tell when he gets that you get it, because he kind of slumps.
“Oh dear,” you say, tongue feeling thick and useless in your mouth, and the humiliated red shade just keeps crawling up Dirk’s skin, and he’s shaking so hard, and all you can muster is, “Oh dear, that’s…”
You wait increasingly desperately for him to interrupt the silence, as eerily self-possessed as ever, but all his lips do is thin into a tighter line, and he’s really shaking, you’re worried he’ll fall over and you automatically adjust your stance so you’re taking his weight and he lets out the most pitiful breath and all you can say, numbly, is, “Oh, Dirk.”
His mouth parts but no words come out.
“I-“ you stumble, fumble, and he’s really not as heavy as he should be, his pretty thin mouth is going white with how forcefully he’s pressing it together, and you grip him tighter to anchor him. “I say, Dirk-“
“Don’t.”
It’s the tiniest, least casual thing he’s ever said. He sounds like you’re ripping out his heart - and god, you never knew someone like him would keep his heart so in reach. You thought there were steel cages and shields and traps for the unworthy, yet here you are, with all your flaws and a handful of throbbing viscera.
“You- you’re pale as a ghost, chap,” you continue. You know you shouldn’t stroke the tips of your fingers over his exposed hipbone, but you do anyway; you’re so selfish, and you’ve got such a partiality to the bird-boned maze of his body.
It’s occurring to you, slow and syrupy as molasses, that you’ve thought of this before. Of course you have, you dated him, but it’s been a long time since you acknowledged an attraction to Dirk Strider. But that’s what this is, isn’t it? Attraction?
Why else would you be thinking about the junction of his shoulder and neck, and how extraordinarily necessary it feels to lean down and mouth at it?
Ah. It’s possible that when you were thinking about if he’d still say your name the same - the same weight and emphasis that only you seem to get, the way you first heard back when you were sixteen and in love and drunk on your first kisses - you were also thinking about what it might be like to hear him sigh it because you were touching him in ways you never got to.
“Jake,” Dirk starts, voice jumping wildly, “Bro, I think you should stop before-“
You hum, still dazed from realisation, and hook your chin over his shoulder to look down. There is, to your unexpected interest, a very obvious growing issue in his trousers, just a few inches from where your index is playing between waistband and hip.
He breathes in sharply when your finger traces along the pale skin of his lean abdomen, teasing at the silvery hairs of his happy trail as he gets tenser and tenser.
“Jake-“
“I see the problem,” you tell him, and you really thought you would sound nervous, but you don’t. You just sound calm and husky, sort of like you’ve been woken abruptly.
“Ah-“ a tiny gasp sneaks out of his mouth before he clamps it shut again, and you take advantage of the opportunity to tilt him forward a little, so he’s got more of his weight on his hands. You’re getting the loveliest picture of where this might go, and it has him pigeon-toed and sobbing. God, you feel sixteen again. “Jake, what are y-“
“Hush, pal,” you whisper, and to hell with drawing it out, you’ve got a free hand and you send it to cup his pointy rump through those worn, thin jeans. He jumps, chokes, tries to look back at you; you just squeeze, enjoying yourself and oh, what a sweetheart, he just lost balance for a second.
You can’t believe it took you this long to realise. Remember, maybe. Strider’s got nothing on you for repression.
Dirk lets out a low strangled noise when your lips brush over his shoulder, gasping breaths as he stands frozen. You can feel a muscle jump in his neck when you tease your teeth at his skin, and when your hands muss his crown of spun-starlight hair, the rumbling vibrations of his muffled choke are delightfully textural.
You like it.
“I, I’m conf-“ you like him stammering. You like him breathless and wary and too lust-drunk to do anything about it, you like the terrified clench of his shoulders and the way he lets you move him, leaning further down and hissing when you stroke down the elegant arch of his back. “Ah- Jake…”
He stops even trying to talk when you tentatively reach down to touch him through his trousers, the worn-soft denim providing only the most cursory resistance. Dirk’s nails slide across the counter, squeaking, as you grow in confidence - he’s so hard, and he’s trembling like he’s fit to break, and you’re a little thrown by how much you want to continue.
You like this potential intimacy more when it’s you instigating it, you suppose.
You can feel him twitch in your hand, fists clawing for balance, and how is he still so tense? He’s breathing short and sharp, like he’s spiralling into a panic attack, but you can feel the way he’s unravelling against you. It’s a sheer, unadulterated thrill.
Dirk tightens his jaw so hard it crunches when your lips find his neck again, soft and sweet as you can manage. He’s crimson-faced, grimacing, absolutely gorgeous, and suddenly you want to crush him into you like a bloody meteor collision.
But you don’t. You can’t. Dirk the perpetually unbreakable is two seconds from fracture under your hands, and you want him whole. You press closer to the counter, let your hips fall into his as he squirms like a caught fish.
When you pull back his pointy, appealing backside to rub slowly against your own erection, his knees buckle - no exaggeration, they really do, there’s just a cough like he forgot to breathe and then he folds like a collapsing chair, panting harshly.
You catch him around the waist (such a nice curve to him) but he’s really not able to stand, so instead you kneel on the ground and pull him into your arms, raising a brow.
He’s so flushed and there’s a glow of sweat about him; if you didn’t know better, you’d think…
“I need to go.” Dirk blurts, flimsily toneless and frantic. “Cool story, bro, great, ten out of ten out of twenty million thousand, got to go tell people about-“
“What’s wrong, chap?”
“Everything and nothing and Nietzsche said it best and-“ he supports himself against the wall as he sways upright, hands waving, and only seems to realise he’s put you at eye level with his crotch - with incriminating stain, fascinating - when you cough politely.
“…f*ck.” Dirk sags, flustered and trembling. “Well, guess I really put my foot in it, difficult to imagine putting one’s foot in it more, unless it’s a Wellington and you’re Prince George and-“
“It’s alright, chum,” you laugh, half-tempted to savour this rare, wrecked Dirk, but not sad*stic enough to draw it out. “I reckon I understand.”
“…you understand,” he says slowly. “And… you’re alright?”
“Of course. It just occurred to me, what with Roxy and all-“ you watch in furtive interest as his face tightens, “Well, you’re quite sensitive, aren’t you?”
Dirk looks down, mouth twisting. “You’re a goddamned comedic wunderkind.”
“I didn’t- I mean, you know, we neither of us have partners, and you’re awfully tense sometimes, so really it makes sense that you’d need a helping hand, as it were.”
For a long, simmering moment, Dirk doesn’t move, doesn’t even breathe. Then he’s exhaling, a deep horrendous whoosh of breath, as he puts his face in his hands. “Tell me Roxy didn’t tell you to jerk me off.”
“Oh, no, quite the opposite. She said I was giving you the wrong impression. I didn’t get why, but that makes sense, now - you really are very sensitive.”
“Oh my f*cking god.” Dirk mutters into his hands. “Why did you do that?”
You contemplate for a second. “I wanted to see what it’d be like, I guess. And I was curious whether you’d let me do it.”
Instead of swatting you or calling you a socially dense loser, your roommate jerks like you’ve professed an enduring love for disarmament. Or slapped him. “What?”
“I wanted to see what your reaction would be,” you explain, because obviously you did. Of course you wanted that reaction, as you want to know every one of his reactions, just like he does yours. It’s a strange and hungry thing, human connection. And now you know there’s a mutual sexual attraction between you, bolstered by your healthy platonic bond, you understand why Roxy mistook it for romance.
“Jake,” Dirk says, muffled and flat. “Jake, I don’t even- I can’t tell if you know how sh*tty that was, but f*ck you.”
“What?”
“Dude!”
“I don’t-“
“Don’t- don’t pull that sh*t again,” Dirk continues, pulling his hands back down to stare at you. “I don’t like it.”
“You didn’t seem to mind!” You snip, honestly rather aggrieved, because now is an odd time to be drawing arbitrary limitations.
His mouth twitches down, an unusual break in his forcible calm. When Dirk Strider puts up a facade, it doesn’t typically come down so easily. “Jake. You don’t even f*cking get it, man, just leave it alone-“
“Then tell me!”
“No,” he snarls, rearing like an untended fire, and you stare at him with wounded dignity. “I don’t- don’t f*ck with my head, English, not cool.”
“Jesus!” You throw up your hands, more worried than genuinely irate. “I was just trying to do something nice for you.”
“I can’t tell whether you’re joking or not.”
“I’m sorry?” You try, and send him the bashfully apologetic look that usually makes him soften. “I didn’t mean to put my foot in the Wellington, or whatever it was you were saying. I didn’t-“
“I genuinely believe you didn’t,” Dirk tells you gravely, passing a hand over his flushed face. “That’s why you’ve still got both hands. Just. f*ck. I’m just going to… shower…”
“Okay,” you call after him, chastened.
“…”
Well, that was a resounding failure. On one hand, you gained so much new experience with Dirk, but on the other, even after he forgives you, he just seems sad. Mournful and melancholy, quiet. Your cosy cohabitation has shifted off-kilter, slightly, and you think you may have really hurt him.
Perhaps you’ve reminded him of the past, your brief fling that ended so badly. Maybe you didn’t make it clear enough that you understand the romance aspect is off-limits. Maybe he’s worried, just like you were, that your friendship will be hurt if you act on any sexual urges - but it’s quite the opposite, you think. Romance is a relationship killer, but you don’t see why you can’t make love. If anything, it’ll solidify your friendship, eliminate the need for random hookups and the like.
Maybe you misread him. Maybe he realised he didn’t want you like that at all. And as much as you enjoyed it, you’d never push him into something he didn’t like…
It’s just, well, you liked it a lot. Certainly more than you expected. You’re not all that accustomed to random boners as a result of accidental musing, but every time you think about Dirk now, you can’t help but remember the noise he made, the hot shudder under your hand, the way his knees gave out-
Well. You can hereby clarify that you are very much sexually attracted to Dirk Strider. Although that was always less in doubt than the rest of your relationship. He was the first real person you ever dreamt of inappropriately, and such. Maybe you were the idiot all along, trying to convince yourself you could ‘go back to normal’ after your failed romance, like your normal wasn’t defined by a casual obsession with Strider.
Obsession is an unattractive way of putting it. Passion, maybe? He’s just always been so much to you.
Your point is, you’ve never been sure exactly what role you want Dirk to take, but you know you want him around, and you know you’re interested in tumbling around with him. Everything else is a tad too complicated for your liking.
But dash it all, you can tell Dirk’s upset, so you put down your rediscovered libido and work to untangle the complex tomfooleries that’ve led to his case of the morbs.
Unfortunately, you’re not exactly a genius when it comes to matters of the heart, and by the second week, you’re growing twitchy with frustration and confused hurt. As the third week dawns, you finally get tired of his silent inching away, his half-fraction frowns, and decide to take matters into your own hands.
By which you mean, it’s damn cold outside and you’re feeling rather cold inside, as well. You last until 1 AM in your unwelcoming bed, thinking with increasing desperation of Dirk’s capable hands and the flush on his face when you’re both warmed off eachother’s heat, until you abruptly hit your breaking point.
Fine. If Strider’s going to sulk in his fortress of solitude, you’ll bally well take the fight to him!
You pad out of your room and down the hall with a sort of righteous fervour, sock-feet and dressing gown and all. Dirk makes fun of you for the robe, says you look like Rhett Butler, but you don’t make fun of his ‘ironic’ MLP blanket.
Oh, Dirk. Below your baffled indignation, you’re lit up with fear.
You don’t bother knocking on his door before you open it, slipping inside his bedroom like a cat-thief. It’s no trouble to navigate your way to his bed, pitch dark or no - you don’t spend a lot of time in there, but it’s Dirk. You know him.
He exhales in low, reluctant sighs, like even in sleep, he begrudges letting anything internal escape. When you lift up his blanket and neatly slide yourself into his blanket-clad cocoon, Dirk makes a noise like a disgruntled cat and shifts fitfully.
“Jake?” He mumbles softly.
Your heart clutches, a tide of sudden and inexplicable affection washing over you. “Right on, fellow.”
In his dark nest, you find sleep swimming through your head quite easily. It’s thus quite alarming when Dirk abruptly bolts up, eyes wide. “What the… Jake?”
“Yes, it’s me,” you assure him, relishing the messy crinkle of his gorgeous hair and the way he rubs sleep from his eyes. He’s definitely not dressed for the weather in that wifebeater, and you’re glad you’re here to share your warmth. Roxy says you’re a space-heater.
Dirk is gaping at you, looking half-asleep and half-gobsmacked by your sheer gall. Perhaps best not to think of Roxy, right now.
“Jake,” he repeats, voice trembling into the danger range of volume. “What the f*ck are you doing?”
“I’m cold,” you try. He glares. “Lonely?”
“I’m too f*cking tired for your mind game bullsh*t,” Strider mutters out, and you frown with sudden exasperation.
“As absolutely rib-tickling as it is to hear you of all people accuse me of mind games-“
“Jake.”
“-and as illuminating as I’m sure asking what the diddling f*ck you’re on about would be-“
His voice cracks. “Jake!”
“-I must confess it’s Satan-pissing two a.m. in the morning, and I’m cold, and I’m tired of you acting like I’ve got a nasty and contagious STI!”
Dirk pauses, eyelashes glinting palely in the almost-absence of light. “…that’s not how STIs work.”
“Frankly, my dear,” you say sweetly. “I don’t give a damn.”
Then you roll over onto him and weave your limbs into his, pressing your face back into the crook of his neck and happily inhaling his Dirk Smell. He shivers, lets out an ungainly squawk, but the moment you settle, his arms are vice brands around your body. He missed you, also.
That thought maybe shouldn’t make you so pleased.
“See?” You ask, possibly a little pointedly. Everything is just so obviously better when his forearms are crossed over your back, when you can hear the shuddery zigzag of his pulse and breathe in tandem.
“What the f*ck is happening right now?” He questions the ceiling.
“Shh. Turn off that mighty tired machine you have in your noggin for tonight, genius boy, and just sleep.”
From what you can recall, he did just that.
You wake up gloriously cozy and warm, in a bed that is very much not your own. It smells like him, though, enough that you don’t even have to think about where you might be. Dirk’s here, you’re fine.
Speaking of…
When you finally blink open your eyes, you accidentally make direct eye contact with Dirk, who is - you double-take - lain out close but not inappropriately so to you, who you feel may have been just watching you for some time. There’s a certain quality to his guilty startle that implies he forgot to be vigilant, and now here you are, staring at eachother.
“…hi.” Dirk manages, unusually brief.
You smile up at him hopefully. Perhaps he’s forgiven you? “Good day to-“
“English, you know you’re an asshole, right?” He cuts in, kind of desperately. “You act like a Boy Scout, but you know you suck?”
“What?”
“You have to,” he urges, eyes wild. “f*ck it, you can’t be this-“
“Uh, chap, I-“
Before you can attempt to even discern his meaning, he leans in and all you can muster is:
“Mnnghf?”
-as he swings himself down to kiss you with an almost unhinged desperation, a flaming punch of a kiss that still feels indescribably delicate.
You’ve wondered since the Incident if he’d taste the same, if the feel of his hair gripped a little too tight would be as lovely, whether he’d repeat those noises he used to-
“sh*t!” Dirk mutters, jerking away from you abruptly.
-He does. He’s just as endearing as ever.
Unfortunately, Strider’s pulling back before you can even really enjoy the kiss, and you see no reason why you should let that happen. Grinning, you affix your hands to his waist and flip him over with ease, settling cozily between his lanky legs.
“f*ck,” he blurts as his head lands on the pillow, appearing a tad discombobulated. “Jake, I’m sor-“
Then it’s your turn to cut him off with a kiss. Very movie star of him, and now you, you suppose! You appreciate it.
Far more than that, you appreciate the decadent glide of his tongue against your own, the gentlemanly way he lets you lead, the tiny noises he makes when your hands venture down to his hip and up to his hair, respectively.
Oh, you like Dirk Strider’s hips. You like them a lot. They’re bony and appealing and fill your mind with all sorts of filthy, filthy thoughts. You’d like to dig your hands right in and use them for leverage, frankly.
For now, you focus on sucking Strider’s obfuscating asshole tendencies out through the mouth, revelling somewhat in the simple glory of physical sensation.
Dirk seems lost for words when you break the kiss for air, immediately liquefying when your lips move to the elegant column of his neck.
“Ah- Jake,” he groans, tilting away and pushing forwards at the same time. His head lolls back when your teeth catch his skin, eyelashes fluttering, and you revel in the hummingbird pace of his pulse under your mouth. “Jake, f*ck, we really shouldn’t do this-”
Oh, for the love of God. Just about at the end of your rope concerning his bizarre mindf*ckery, you pull away from him, supporting yourself on your hands, to stare him intensely in the eyes.
“Do you want me to stop?” You ask, every measured word strained with the effort of not losing your patience.
Dirk grimaces back at you, pink-cheeked and dazed. “N-no.”
“Then I’m not going to,” you tell him firmly, and press your body back down into his. A breath hisses from his lips, seemingly without his knowledge, as your hands knead his hips; a moment later, he’s opening up his legs for you, pretty as you please.
Interesting. You’d never gotten this far, back in the day, but you’d always assumed Dirk - fast, sharp, impenetrable, unfathomable Dirk - would be just as spiky and impossible in the bedroom. Now, he’s smooth and silky as spilled cream under your blandishments. He’s shaking like a leaf, expression conflicted, but you can’t stop touching him and he can’t seem to stop melting against you.
“Oh, sweetheart,” you murmur, and he lets out the most piteous noise.
“Jake…”
“It’s alright, plum.”
It’s bizarre, how similar this feels to comforting him after a bad jag. He’s got that tremble in his voice that says he’s helpless, and you’ve got all the authority to mould him into anything you want. It’s fortunate that he’s already ideal.
Dirk lets you peel his wifebeater up his torso, eyes shut and mouth half-open. You run your fingers over scars and discolourations, take in the effect of a life given to discipline, and you kiss and kiss like an apology you can’t verbalise.
He doesn’t know how to handle it. You think it’s cute when Dirk gets flustered, of course, particularly whenever it comes to emotion, but this is something else. He’s breathing fast and shallow, twitching, choking out your name as you delicately ring his neck with teeth marks; his hands are balled in the sheets below him, so hard he’s probably ripping the fabric.
“Jake-“ he repeats thickly, like he’s swallowing back tears. “Jake, f*ck, I don’t-“
You look up from the perfect fan your hands make of his ribcage and quirk a brow. “Too much?”
He shakes his head, and you continue daringly.
“…not enough?”
Flushing a deep and breathtaking crimson, Dirk slides his face to the side so he can avoid your stare. You lean over him, brush your lips clumsily back against his jaw, and grin at the way he moans helplessly at the contact.
“Do you- do you want me?” You ask simply, a little hoarse. You know the answer, you’re sure you do - it’s written all over the tense, wistful line of his body, the scorching heat in those lovely amber eyes, the way he can’t even string a sentence together right now - but what’s the point if he won’t say it?
“Jake…” he says again, still avoiding your eyes. You can hear the plea in it, to stop talking and just take what you want from him, but you’re a damn gentleman and you’d like verbal consent first.
Dirk chokes when you flick his nipple, eyes flying back to you as his back arcs. “f*ck- English!” He sounds honestly astonished at your hutzpah.
“Yes or no answer, chum.“ You grin at him, the same slightly sheepish smile that never fails to generate an exasperated huff.
“I don’t know how to, agh,“ he stumbles over his words, still arching up towards you, deliciously rumpled and frustratingly untouchable. “f*ck, bro-“
You cup his jaw gently and turn him to face you. “Please just answer the bally question,” You manage, and you’re really revealing your clumsy inexperience now but you need him to answer, you need him to. “I think we ought to be clear, here.”
He pauses, licking his lip absently, and sighs. “Yeah.”
You’re not sure why he seems so shocked when you kiss him again; for a moment, you’re convinced he’s changed his mind, but when you draw back, he finally relinquishes the sheets in favour of twining himself around you like a particularly affectionate climbing vine.
“So, can we?” You ask, hanging on by a thread at this point, and Dirk tightens his grip around your back.
“Yes,” he’s mumbling, low and disjointed. “f*ck, yes, whatever, please, c’mon, f*ck it-“
You draw back to clear your head, almost overwhelmed by the satisfaction of finally getting an answer out of him, and also just to admire the view. Dirk Strider, sprawled below you completely defenceless and visibly aroused, is a gorgeous, hard-won sight.
“Well, chum, I couldn’t possibly refuse such a pretty request!” you tease with a pointed stare, not quite able to hide the unevenness of your tone. “Even if the supplicant’s bally well given me a near apoplexy, at times.”
The apoplexy-inducing suitor, for his part, doesn’t offer even cursory protest. “Are you gonna f*ck me, English?” His pupils are frigging huge, these dark voids lined in golden brocade, and you think he might’ve been trying to reclaim some of his sarcastic cool with that comment, but he sounds absolutely breathless and reedy with want.
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you, plum?” You reply, perhaps a little meanly. Good Lord, is it intoxicating just getting him to tell the blunt truth for once, though! You want him to ask you for it, you’ll admit. You would do insane, unhinged things to get Strider to beg for you.
Dirk just stares, face blank but for a tiny tremble in his lower lip. “Yeah, you- you f*cking win, I guess.”
“Oh ho! And what’s my prize?”
You grind your leg up between his as he formulates an answer, smiling at his hiss of breath.
“What- sh*t- whatever you want,” Dirk whispers, and your grin grows a fraction.
“Really?”
“That’s what I said, yeah.”
“You’re putting a lot of power in my hands, here, chap,” you feel compelled to point out.
He turns his face away from you again, face drawn in shadowy tired lines. “Stop acting like you don’t know you’ve already got it, English. I’m f*cking prostrated before you, what more do you want, a literal treaty of surrender?”
Your answer surprises you as much as it does him. “I want to make you tea,” you blurt, even though you’re pretty sure he was expecting a sexual request of some kind. It’s quite the tonal shift, honestly.
Dirk’s whole face freezes. “What?”
“I don’t mean- I would like to make you tea,“ his mouth tightens and you scrabble to explain, “don’t get me wrong, chap, I’d like to f*ck you too, but correct me if I’m mistaken, I think that may already be on the table.”
He stares.
“And possibly it’s best, considering our relationship, to make sure any romps we get up to aren’t framed as, uh, transactional,” you say awkwardly. “The point is, I’d like to f*ck you, chap, but I’d like to make you tea also. It doesn’t have to be one or the other, does it?”
For the next few moments, Dirk keeps watching you like a startled owl, eyes wide and lips parted. “What are you- the f*ck is that supposed to mean?”
You squirm. Talking is important, communication is essential, you can’t fall into the same traps as last time… oh, but it’s so difficult to look into his hawk eyes and expose your weakness, trust he won’t attack it. Strider’s so very, very clever, clever enough to run circles around you, and how can you ever fully trust someone like that?
But the Dirk tense beneath you isn’t a distant idol; he’s warm and real, flushing in blotchy patches and not quite able to control his breathing. He’s everything you like about him, right now.
“I. Well, I’d like to be intimate with you,” you admit, not even trying to sugar it up with coy wording. “I know this sort of stuff wasn’t pleasant the first time around, Dirk, but I suppose I’m trying to be more candid about things, so. It’s on the table, plum. If you’re interested.”
“If I’m interested?” Lord, but he’s got a poker face to rule them all.
“Bingo.”
“In- in getting intimate with you?” He coughs, eyes drilling holes into yours. “Dude, am I correct in assuming that’s not just a weird outdated euphemism for playing scrabble, or?”
“f*cking,” you say plainly. “I’m rather, uh, amenable to the concept.”
“Of you?” Dirk clarifies. “And me?”
You face heats. “Yes,” you reply, a tad testily, “For the love of- yes, Strider. Who the hell else?”
“Literally any other being in this universe,” he mumbles, and you don’t think you were meant to hear that.
“I’m not currently on top of any other being in this universe, chap,” you tell him. “A fellow can’t help but feel I’m being quite bloody clear, here.”
His eyes are on your lips; you swallow, nervous and entranced, and feel as much as see the trail of his gaze as it crawls down your neck. His pupils are wide as anything, the gold only a thin horizon - a planet blocking the sun, light leaking out at the edges.
“Okay,” he murmurs, and you’re kissing him before either of you can overthink it. He’s so incredibly vibrant, a twisting cyclone of real genuine Dirk beneath you, and his mouth pulls at yours like he’s trying to swallow you whole. It’s enjoyable, to say the least.
He goes limp when you drag your lips down to his throat, and the expression he’s pulling is not unlike that of someone hit with a brick. You chuckle into his skin, bite at it playfully; how long have you wanted him right here? How long since you moved back in with him did this become such a thing?
“You do smell,” you breathe, “very nice, chum.”
“That’s a characteristically buckwild thing to say,” Dirk mumbles, but he’s blushing again. “You smell like-“ he pauses. “I don’t know.”
You can’t hold back another chortle - he sounds so exceptionally frustrated at the idea that he doesn’t have every detail about you written down. It’s so incredibly typical of him, half creepy and half sweet.
Despite your amusem*nt, you can’t help but notice just how fast your chum is breathing when you return to his mouth. His heart sounds one frenzied increase away from ripping straight out of his chest, especially when you sneak your hand up his shirt.
Concerned, you pull back. “Are you alright?”
“I’m 100% f*cking dandy,” he tells you, lips slick with your saliva. You suppose if he’s well enough to mock your lexicon, it’s alright- but good f*cking Christ, you kiss his neck and he’s shaking, his breaths shallow enough to sound wounded.
“Dirk,” you say reluctantly, trying to move away again. “Mnghf- Dirk, come on, love, you’re not- you’re clearly not alright.”
Dirk stares up at you, mouth distractingly swollen and eyes like twists of flame. “I’m fine, English. Finer than fine, in fact. I’m cooler than a stirred martini in the gloved hand of a British spy. Were you aware that you shouldn’t actually shake martinis? It-“ he falters as you look at him. “-melts the ice faster…”
“That’s absolutely fascinating, my good chap,” you inform him. “I can’t see that it has much to do with the rum tum ragtime your heart seems to be dancing at, though.”
“Nice try, dude. It takes more than some hormonal tonguegroping to get a Strider palpitating.”
“Dirk.” You repeat. “You haven’t breathed in the last minute.”
He reddens, avoiding your eyes. It’s something of an impossible endeavour, considering how you’re snuggled between his thighs - and oh, now you’ve had the time to focus on anything but his engaging mouth and equally engaging discomposure, you can’t help but notice the hardness prodding your hip.
“Listen, man, I don’t know how to inform you that not all breathing is created on an equal footing. For all you know, I’ve pioneered an ingenious alternative-“
It’s difficult not to smile when he’s rambling on like this; online, Dirk’s vast and terrifying paragraphs tend to rain down on you like bricks, transforming every conversation into a baffling maze of tangents and hidden meanings. In person, though, it’s easy to tune past the static and receive the short and near of it: he’s nervous. He’s reacting like a prickly little hedgehog, or one of those sweet plants that shiver and flop when you touch them.
It’s rare for you to feel so confident, but it’s less rare than it used to be. It helps that you like Strider so, so much.
“Dirk.”
His mouth snaps shut with a click when you squeeze his waist again.
“What are you-“ Dirk’s voice cracks. You’re both staring at his crotch like an uninvited houseguest. “Plato.”
“Plato?” You ask, dancing your fingers closer. There’s a slightly unkind inclination in you to see just how long he’ll keep going for, but you’ve got bigger fish to fritter at present.
“Plato,” he strangles out. “Ancient Greek philosopher, and he thought breath was linked to the human soul. And some- some other guy thought it was the essence of intelligence.”
“Then you’re definitely not taking in enough of it,” you say firmly. “I’d like you to keep breathing, especially if it’s key to maintaining that gem in your noggin.”
Dirk quivers, voice strained, as your fingertips inch towards his belt buckle. “There are some probably apocryphal accounts that he died from holding his breath and-“
You cup his jaw, turn his face to yours. “Dirk. Chum. Would you be down for a tumble, or would you prefer to keep talking about ancient boffins?”
“…is it not working for you?”
You look at him, the painstaking attempt at cool detachment on his face, and a rush of affection slaps into you like a tidal wave. You dare to lay a hand straight on his rather prominent boner. “May I-“
“Yep,” he blurts immediately, followed by an awkward cough. “Sure. Cool.”
Jumping Jehoshaphat, he’s just- it’s sweet, really, how very guileless he is like this. You find the vulnerability in Strider’s facade so charming, you can’t help but want to reward him for it. You want him to feel as euphoric as you do, now.
And so you make quick work of his buttons and zip et al, take a quick second to pray you don’t bungle this glorious moment, and then take him neatly into your mouth.
Dirk doesn’t so much gasp as rattle like a dying animal. You’d be concerned if he didn’t wriggle so enthusiastically.
You can’t say you’re not enjoying yourself, either. The basic mechanics are easy, and the way he’s arching and gasping is more than worth the strain in your jaw. It’s manageable from a physical perspective, and deeply, deeply gratifying in terms of response.
There’s something absolutely disarming and lovely to seeing your pal look so unguarded in his enjoyment, frost-pale eyelashes fluttering and mouth open at an odd angle. His head lolls back, hands flexing at his sides - you’ll have to tell him you don’t mind a little hair-pulling next time - and of course Dirk Strider is the type to wind up even tighter when he’s getting off. He’s an ever-coiling spring, but you haven’t yet given up hope of relaxing him a tad.
You dig your nails into his thigh, grin at him when you pull off to kiss the tip of his dick, and he can’t take his eyes off you. It’s really rather flattering. “Any good?”
“Mnghfm,” Dirk croaks.
You take that as encouragement, and let yourself go a little wild; you haven’t done this before, but as long as you’re both enjoying yourselves, you don’t think you can really go wrong. And the challenge is quite fun! You make a game of it, see what noises you can wring from him when your teeth graze a certain way or your tongue sweeps just so. Dirk, for his part, arches against the sheets and just f*cking spasms, like you’ve bally stolen the hinges from his joints.
“Ja-“ he starts, when the odd hesitant movement of his hips is becoming sloppier. “Jake, I-“
You disengage for a moment. “Quite alright, chap. Do feel fre-“
A moment later, he’s chomping down on his wrist as he comes in pearly streaks on your chest. You look at it with vague curiosity. You’ve never… well. Curiosity is integral to knowledge, and Dirk’s not the type to judge you, you’re sure.
You dab a finger in the mess and suck on it thoughtfully. A little bitter, a little salty. Nothing too bad.
Dirk rasps quietly and you look up to see him gaping at you, eyes wide, pants around his hips. He looks like a freshly-turned vampire in a B-movie flick - very attractive, of course, but somewhat horrified by existentialism and the like. You frown.
“I didn’t think I did that bad, ch-“
“Holy f*ck.” Dirk flops backwards bonelessly. You’ve never seen him look so… fluid. “Holy sh*t. This is fine.”
A hideous thought strikes you. “I didn’t bite you or anything, did I?“
“Everything is fine.”
“Did you not like it? Listen, I’ve not got all that much pra-“
He flaps a hand at you, splayed across his bed with the sheer liquidity of a stoned jellyfish. “That was. f*ck. You don’t have anything to, to worry about, f*ck, what am I talking about? Stop letting me talk, bro, I-“
Oh. Holding back laughter, you shuffle your way over to his supine sprawl and nestle yourself into the curve of his neck, beaming. “I suppose you’d rather I brush my teeth than cut you off with another kiss, eh?”
“You just sucked me off,” Dirk tells you blankly. You nod, and he continues to stare like he’s waiting for you to correct him. “Like. Your mouth was on my- English, what. I mean. It’s cool. It’s fine. It’s- holy sh*t, this is alright. Copacetic. Quotidian.”
“It is indeed,” you assure, snuggling him a tad more firmly. On one hand, you seem to have finally found a way to relax him at last - you worry about the steel set of his shoulders, the tension everpresent in his joints - but on the other, he’s now mouthing to himself madly, eyes flickering between you and the wall. “Come on, it’s no big deal. Frankly, I reckon you could use a nap.”
“We just slept for the whole night.”
“And yet you still closely resemble a dishy teen vampire. I dare say I could fit a Pekingese in those eye bags, even. Come now, chum, we’re in the right place for some shuteye and everything.”
“This is insane.” He mutters.
You chortle.
There’s a long pause, and then. “You put my ji*zz in your mouth.”
“I did do that.”
“Gross, man.”
You think about it. “I don’t see why. It’s not that bad a taste, or anything.”
“Jesus, that’s not the point, just-“ his eyes drill into you, almost accusatory. “Since when are you remotely okay with putting my bodily fluids in your mouth?”
“I’ve never said I wasn’t,” you hedge. He boggles at you.
“I think it was tacitly implied at certain points,” he manages through gritted teeth. You deserved that.
“Well.” You take a deep breath and prepare for more excruciating discussion. “I did say I wanted to f*ck you, chap. Bodily fluid exchange is rather considered a part of that, although I understand you’re sort of particular about cleanliness-“
“Wait. Do you-“ Dirk’s eyes fly open. “f*ck. Very un-bro-ly behaviour of me, dude. Do you want me to, uh-“
He gestures to your trousers and you demur, patting his shoulder. “Oh, that’s alright, chum. No recompense expected, I just thought you could do with some relaxation.”
“Oh,” he says flatly.
“Not that I don’t think you’d be good at it, though! I mean, you’re dashed legendary at most things, Strider, I just don’t want you to feel obliged-“
“Right, because that’s the only possible reason for me to jack you off,” Dirk monotones. “What if I want to?”
You still. You hadn’t expected that, necessarily, but… “Oh. Uh, do you?”
“Yeah, kinda.” He fidgets.
“Oh,” you repeat dimly. “Oh, well, I suppose we coul-“
You’re cut off by a startling cacophony - Dirk’s bloody ringtone, which he changes every month to whatever new jingle he finds most disturbing. It’s currently blaring something about ‘icies.’
“Christ in the Colosseum!” You bark, flinching back and scrabbling for the object of affront. “Dirk, I worry about your eardrums, really I do-“
“f*cking- don’t, just leave it, English, it’s not important-“ there’s an audible note of frustration in his tone.
You glance down. “It’s Dave.”
Dirk stiffens, drawing himself up and returning, piece by infinitesimal piece, to his reserved facade. “…sh*t.”
Torn, he hesitates, then grabs the phone from you. “This isn’t over. Dave, what the f*ck is it?” You smile sappily at his back when he stomps away, words fading into the distance.
As it happens, whatever Dave’s issue is, it’s important enough that Dirk has to go stomping out of the house to remedy it. He changes quickly and without theatrics, yanking on his typical black tank and jeans like a suit of armour. You don’t try to pretend you’re not watching.
He pointedly doesn’t acknowledge your liquid-hot eyes on his back, arms, thighs, but his ears are scarlet as he tosses you a dismissive wave. “See ya.”
“Abyssinia!”
Dirk casts you an odd look, which transforms into an unreadably intense one when he sees how you’re staring at him.
A moment later, he’s gone, and you’re alone.
You pause.
Alone in Strider’s private abode. The two of you don’t have all that many rules for cohabitation, but you do like to respect his space. However, he did leave you in here alone.
Part of you says to snoop like a madman. A slightly better part of you points out that his sheets smell just like him, and you’ve got something of a problem in your pants.
Well. When in Rome…
You roll over and bury your face in his pillow, inhaling the warm amber scent of his hair. You blew Dirk Strider ten minutes ago. He said he wanted to touch you.
When your hips jerk forward, rolling against the mattress, you surprise yourself with the noise you make. You’re not usually so invested in these things, but the moment is suddenly white-hot and crushing and all you can do is ride the wave.
Dirk’s hand on you. Dirk’s eyelashes when his head tipped back. The taste of his mouth. His dick. The noises he made.
You wonder if he’d let you f*ck him.
You lie in the aftermath and pant, content like you’ve exorcised some demon. It’s been a long denial, sure, but now you’ve finally admitted an attraction to Strider, you feel clean and fresh and excited.
You think, with a sleepy delight, that this might be the start of something lovely.
By the time Dirk returns, it’s dark out. You putter around all day in a trance of post-coital bliss, pester all the friends you’ve been meaning to get back to, and even watch a simply excellent film that leaves you with a sense of deep contentment.
All the while, you wonder if Dirk’s as upbeat as you - he’s not exactly the most cheerful of guys, of course, so you snicker to yourself thinking about him spooking all of Dave’s pals. He’s so unexpectedly charming when he’s happy.
Your roommate finally sneaks through the door in the evening, stiffer than ever and sending you a typically paranoid look that says he can’t tell if anything he remembers is real.
You nod at him peaceably. Let him approach, that’s probably the best course of action; when Strider’s panicky, he likes to feel as in control as possible. You used to find it suffocating. Now, it’s just a foible.
Dirk goes slinking to his room like he’s expecting you to jump out from behind him, then screeches right back out again with an accusatory look on his face.
“You changed my sheets.”
You nod, gently jostling your steaming teapot. “Yep.”
“Why did you do that?” He prods, brows furrowing.
“Well. I made something of a mess of them, to be extremely candid,” you tell him.
Dirk stares at you, bug-eyed. “What?”
“Oh, you know. There were miscellaneous stains and all sorts of foxing, much of which was my fault, I admit, so I figured the linens could use a little refreshing.”
Your roommate continues to drill his eyes into you, apparently temporarily lost for words. “I- is that a roundabout way of saying that when I left, you jacked off on my sheets?”
“Uh…” You pause for a second, then grin at his gobsmacked expression. “Well, yes.”
“Oh.” He mutters, seemingly lost for words. “That’s- oh. Uh-”
Taking pity on him, you return your eyes to your teapot and begin to pour. “Listen, pal, if it wasn’t for you, we can forget it happened-“
“No!” He blurts, fast enough to be a touch flattering, and steps closer to you. “I mean, yeah. If you want, sure, fine, wipe the record clean like you stole it from a roadie- ”
You twist around, startled. You’d thought you were on the same page, but maybe not. “What? No, chap.”
He blinks. “No?”
“I’m-“ You take a deep breath and turn, leaning closer. “Actually, I was hoping you’d want to do it again.”
Dirk makes a noise that sounds roughly like ‘mimble.’
“If you’d rather not-“
“No,” he emphasises again, and his hand comes up to hover by your bicep. You take another pace forwards until he’s pressing up against you; your fingers land over his when he mumbles an apology. “sh*t, I’m- you know I’m cool for a downtown dick party, I just, uh-“
“What?” You push, when he trails off hesitantly.
“Are you?” Dirk asks finally.
You box him in against the counter, because you sort of get the impression it’s allowed now. “Well, I wouldn’t have bally well suggested it if I wasn’t, would I?”
His glasses have slipped down his nose enough for you to see his eyes dilate, and that gorgeous tell-tale blush start to bloom on his cheeks. “I, uh, I guess not?”
You snort affectionately and move to press your lips together. “Come here.”
He obliges manfully, breaking away after a good long while to rest his forehead against yours. His breathing’s gone fluttery again, especially after your hands finds their way to his ass, and his own fingers fist in the fabric of your shirt like he’s clinging on for dear life.
Your voice is lower, husky, when you speak again. “Shall we?”
“Your- f*ck, Jake- your tea’s gonna go cold.”
You stop nipping at his neck again to flap a hand dismissively. “There’ll be more tea, Strider. Unless you’d rather-“
“No, we can, yeah, two peas in a pond-” he rambles incoherently the whole way to your room, then goes abruptly silent the second you’re both on the bed.
“You alright, chum? You look a little peaky.” You frown, move your hand to his head. “We don’t have to-“
“Please,” Dirk mumbles, low enough for plausible deniability. “Just- f*cking hand me the lube, English, alright?”
“Alright,” you say reluctantly. “You know, there’s no pressure-“
“I know there’s no pressure,” Dirk snaps, a touch too fast. “I want to. Okay?”
You put your hands up. “Okay! No need to yell, chum!”
He doesn’t respond, just stares at you flatly until you remember his request. He still looks slightly surprised when you toss him the bottle, though; that’s Strider for you. Cool and contrary as a stray cat.
“Cool,” he says, and then repeats it, licking his lips dryly. “Cooool.”
“Strider-“
“Give me a second, man,” Dirk monotones, and then he’s stiffly stripping off his clothes again, awkward stilted movements that contrast endearingly to his air of forced calm. “…dude.”
“Hm?”
“Are you just gonna… stare at me?”
You can’t resist the urge to grin at him then, perhaps a tad lasciviously. “Well, it’s a nice view!”
“Jesus,” he mutters, flush rising again. You’re starting to expect it. “Take your shirt off, at least, I’m not gonna be the only one getting naked here.”
You hold back a quip, wriggling from your shirt impatiently - you’re twitchy whenever you’re not looking at him, this mesmerising spectacle of angles and spikes. When you finally poke your head out from its cloth prison, Dirk’s down to his undergarments - oh, that’s a sight - and staring at you with an odd intensity.
“What?”
He coughs, looking away, and you try not to preen. “Nothing. Uh. Tattoo. You’ve still got the tattoo.”
“That’s the thing about tattoos, they tend to stick around,” you tease, shuffling forward to break up some of the tense space between you. One of the issues with you and Dirk is space: you have to stay close, or the distance between you becomes a widening chasm of sorts, a jittery no-man’s-land that repels interference. It’s already a little spiky, but you’d rather shatter through thin ice than thick glass.
He goes rigid when you lean down to kiss him, and you almost draw back, but then he’s pulling you close and it’s warm and lovely and a little bit desperate. Dirk is, after all, something of a black hole; he’s starved for touch, and for someone who tries to project such an aloof persona, he’s incapable of letting it go.
It’s almost unsettling, how many things you’re realising you don’t mind anymore - Dirk’s clinginess has always been one of the traits you found impossible to manage, a constant barrage of tidal waves that would batter you until you ended up down and out, spitting sand. It’s difficult to maintain hope in a relationship when you inevitably end up underwater.
Maybe you’ve learned to live with his foibles, in a way you hadn’t back then: you weren’t exactly compatible on first meeting. The two of you had dealt with a lifetime of isolation so differently, you barely seemed like the same species. Strider gorged himself on human contact like a traumatised animal, but unlike Dirk - overwhelming event-horizon Dirk - you’d adjusted to starvation rations to the point that any excess touch made you sick. Rich food after a famine doesn’t end well, you suppose. Best to ease in. You and him never really had the time for that, though.
Years seem like such an insurmountable gap, when you’re young and hormonal and light-headed from just the feeling of brushing elbows, but you’re older and wiser now, and you think you’ve finally reached a level of comfort with your own need for touch. You’re acclimatised to Dirk, and now he’s melting in your hands, letting out breathy little noises that are almost comedically unusual.
“So. Mind letting a pal in on what you’re planning to use that lube for?” You ask finally, when you’re both short of breath and rumpled from eachother’s hands. You can feel him, hard against your belly. It’s thrilling.
“Right,” he says, dazed. “Right. Uh. How familiar are you with-“
“I’m assuming you’re planning on shoving those fingers up your rear,” you cut in, and he chokes. “Or mine?”
“Ah. Uh. Whatever you- I mean, I’m cool either way.”
You grin. “So am I, chum. The ball’s in your court.”
Dirk makes a production of rolling his eyes, fiddling with the cap of the lube as he does. “I guess I’ll, uh, show you the ropes, then. One sec.”
You shift obediently backwards as he rolls his underwear off, feeling a little giddy off the rush. He’s so gorgeous, scars and fine silver hairs and a dusting of freckles… impossible not to marvel at such a beautiful thing, you suppose. Sublime in the original sense!
Strider stares fixedly at the sheets as his hand slides down between his legs with the same steady deftness as when he’s holding a sword. He detaches slightly when he’s focused, but you made sure to snag his glasses at the door, so he’s still open to you in the most delightful way.
“You’re staring,” he repeats, crimson crawling up his neck and face.
“Where else could any man look?” You ask, trying for levity but ending up almost uncomfortably honest. You want to touch him so badly, it’s like your very particles are alight. “How could a mortal tear their peepers from Heaven, eh?”
“Jesus Christ, no wonder you’re single,” Dirk mutters, all cool detachment like you can’t see his boner spruce up at the praise. “What’s with the, the Byronic sh*t?”
“Byron rhymed.” You tell him absently, focused on the delicate movement of fingers.
“I know.” His eyes flick up for a second. “Wait. How do you know that?”
You can’t help but roll your eyes - he’s an absolute gem, but he’s also a pretentious asshat who apparently considers you illiterate. “It’s a mystery, chum. As we all know, I spent every hour of my childhood ignoring my extensive internet access to chase monsters and kiss spidergirl posters.”
“Shut up.”
You shift closer to him, nudging your chin against his shoulder. “Can I help?”
“Uh.”
Oh, he’s so scarlet you can almost see the heat waves emanating from him.
“…sure.” Dirk says finally, looking half-dubious and half-dazed.
You press your lips to his neck for a moment in thanks, then shuffle your way down to see what you’ve got to work with. Admittedly, this sort of thing isn’t your specialty - you’ve always been quite a simple chap in these matters - but you’ve explored the concept on the internet, same as any other teen boy with a computer and a confusing crush.
It’s so much prettier than it looks on film, though. He’s real, no artificial smiles or forced dialogue, and he’s wincing as he works a finger into himself, and it’s absolutely stunning.
“…you look like you’re, uh-“
“Yes?”
Dirk blinks. “I was gonna say, uh, studying an engineering textbook, but now it’s more. It’s more cat and mouse. Are you going to-“
He squeaks slightly when your finger replaces his, sending you a brooding glower when you snort. Strider’s got the long, elegant fingers of a master swordsman; yours are quite a bit less smooth and slender. You try to go slowly, let him adjust, but he’s so tight and hot and-
“Agh, f*ck-“
You pause in crooking your finger about to look at him. “You reckon it’s time for-“
“Yes,” he grits out.
Finger two, as it happens, is the bridge between sitting awkwardly close and having a dashing partner straddle your lap.
“Well, I must say I like this!” You announce cheerfully, working Dirk hard as he exhales hot breaths into your shoulder.
“Mnngh shut up-“
“You’re very light, you know, and all slinky - I feel like a Bond villain.”
The chum in question groans, hiding his face in your neck. “f*ck, that’s-“
“Perhaps you should meow,” you suggest, just for the sh*ts and giggles.
Dirk pulls back and tries to send you a fearsomely unimpressed stare, only it’s the opposite of intimidating when he’s flustered, out of breath, and desperately grinding down onto your fingers. His co*ck is dragging along your abs at this point, a thin slick line forming on the skin, and he looks close to passing out when you tell him he’s lovely.
“So,” you say, when he’s slicked open enough for your fingers to easily glide. His eyes are low-lidded and dreamy. “I don’t suppose-“
“f*ck me,” he interrupts. “Don’t- don’t prevaricate back into the bottomless, ah, p-pit, English, just-“
Dirk breaks off into another muffled groan when you tweak his nipple.
“Are you ready?” You ask courteously.
He scuttles back and rearranges himself clumsily, propped up on his elbows. “Yeah. Are you?”
“Of course,” you tell him. “Come on, snake, let’s rattle.”
“…cool.” Then Strider’s making a move like he plans to turn over, and you grab his arm automatically. You cough when he turns a startled look on you, slightly embarrassed.
“I- there’s no need for- that is to say, love, I’d rather you stay frontup for this. I’d like to see you.”
He stares.
“…Dirk?”
Shaking his head, the other finally responds. “Uh. f*ck. Sure, whatever, just, uh. Yeah.”
That’s not exactly enthusiastic agreement, but when Dirk sees you hesitate, he rolls his eyes and snags you around the shoulders. “Just- come on. I want it.”
“Are you going to ask nicely?” You tease, not really expecting a genuine answer.
You’re definitely not expecting Strider to take you at your word, grimace, and speak as quietly as possible. “Please.”
“What?”
His eyes burn into you, matching shards of jagged amber. “Please,” he grits out. “Is that pretty enough for y-“
You kiss him again, a little sheepish and a little affectionate, and absolutely drunk on the sheer adrenaline of it all. It’s just- it’s him, and his freckles and coltish movements and blush and the way he looks at you, like spikes could grow from the ground and he wouldn’t stop. The way his voice bloody quavered when he asked you.
“You-“ you kiss him roughly, hand rising to mess up his hair. “Are an absolute treat, bucko.”
You can tell he’s enjoying it, because instead of mocking you mercilessly for your vernacular, he just hitches his skinny legs up around your waist and sighs breathlessly.
“You’re, a, uh, a right sexy spindly grasshopper, aren’t you?” You mutter, stroking appreciatively over just about every bit of his skin you can find. “Gorgeous? Do you mind if I say that? You know you are, don’t you?”
“Too many questions,” Dirk husks back, voice rough. You shiver all over, heady anticipation throbbing through you as he guides you into place. “You can, uh, say whatever you want, English, ju-ust-“
He stops talking when you finally push into him, words dragging out long and distorted like unspooled tape from a cassette. And no, this isn’t something you’ve ever done before, so it could just be the novelty-
-but oh jesus, he’s so hot inside it burns, a tight almost-ache that gives way to you slowly as he adjusts. And he’s- god, Dirk’s eyelashes are resting on his cheeks and his hands are flexing and he’s the most lovely thing, just completely perfect, and you think you could die a happy man as long as you don’t stop.
“How’s that, chum?” You manage, gingerly manoeuvring your hand over to cup his face. It’s silly, considering how you’re literally inside him, but somehow the simple act of touching his jaw is so intimate, private, that it feels more obscene than anything else you’ve ever done.
“Good, we’re chill, we’re f*cking- penguins and sh*t- you, you know you’re talking out loud, right?”
“Oh.” You grin at him nervously. “I must’ve lost focus there, what did i-“
“Eye- f*ck- eyelashes,” Strider starts whimpering out tiny noises when you try to move, and you can’t make yourself continue. “You can go, man, it’s good.”
“If you’re sure…”
“Eyelashes?”
You smile down at him then, a proper gleeful one. “Oh, yes. You’ve got the most delightful ones, sweetheart.”
You rock into him gently as he opens his mouth, almost certainly ready to make fun of you.
“Beautiful, even,” you continue casually, and he clamps down around you with an expression of bemused heat, like not even he expected that to get him-
“Harder,” Dirk gasps. “Faster.”
“Better, stronger?”
He quite literally grabs your shoulder in his steel cable grip and yanks you closer, and you’re abruptly back to being a teenager hiding a boner from a robot again. Dirk grunts when you f*ck into him, pinning his hips to the bed, and then he’s arching and quivering and completely helpless again. A mass of contradictions, is Strider. You love it.
“That was fuh-f*cking awful, English, you asshole,” he mutters breathlessly into your neck, bites at you, and you can’t help but grin.
“If you’re going to do that, make it count?”
“Oh-“ His teeth break your skin just as he twitches, jerking up against you like he’s having a f*cking seizure. There’s a tiny little groan stifled in your neck, hot lips against the cool rush of a little - maybe a lot of - blood.
When you stop and stare, Dirk looks relaxed, almost, for the first time you can remember in years. It’s as though you’ve snipped one of the metal twines around his lungs, and he’s breathing heavy and loose.
“Should I-“ you give him a moment to recover, then gesture down to where you’re still joined, so to speak.
Boneless, Dirk shakes his head at you, your blood a startling streak along his mouth. “Don’t stop.”
“But aren’t-“
“Please don’t stop,” he whispers, so instead of pushing the issue, you curl in close and kiss your own blood off his lips.
He rolls his head back and groans, husky, when you stroke your hands up his sides and kiss at his neck, as sweetly as possible when he’s rocking up into you so roughly, and you don’t want to hurt him, you don’t want him to hurt at all-
“Slow down, sweetheart,” you murmur, and your best pal squeezes his eyes shut and nods. “Is that alright?”
“Better.” Dirk gasps, and his fingers rake down your back. “Sh-hit, sorry-“
“It’s fine-“
“I didn’t mean t-“
You card your hand through his hair and tug experimentally, grinning when his eyes fly back to yours. “You can, um, you can scratch me up any day, dove.”
“…Mngh.”
Jesus f*cking Wallachia, you just can’t handle it when he stares at you like that, speechless and flustered and vibrant as technicolor. Despite the tight frantic heat coalescing in your belly, you find yourself softening like molten caramel, melting over him almost protectively. You bow your head down to kiss him, using the wheezes of his breath to guide your movements, and the mood transmutes into something different: your grip on his waist becomes some form of embrace, and you’re slowing down even as your temperature boils over -
“Ah-“
-and so when you come inside him for the first time, it’s not rough at all. It’s, dare you say it, close to making love.
Not that you’ll share that thought. For one, you fear it may be a quote from Roxy’s ironic Dreadful Smut collection, and for another, you can’t even picture the look on Strider’s face if you said that out loud.
Probably not a positive one, though.
That being said, Dirk’s oddly calm and serene in the aftermath, like you’ve f*cked the words and nervous energy right out of him. Another very likeable Dirk, you note gleefully.
You like him all the other ways too, obviously, but- it’s just, it’s difficult to explain the fizz of delight that goes through you whenever the light shines across a new facet of the Strider gem - especially this one. How many people can say Strider’s untensed, even just a fraction, for them? How extraordinarily lucky are you, for him to trust you enough to see him so wrecked?
His eyes twitch towards you when you mutter sweet words into his skin, but he seems content to stay spilled like rich velvet along your bed. A deity, accepting worship with reserved grace.
“In another life, you’d be a sacred cat, chap,” you say sleepily. “Some kind of crocodile god.”
“Mm?”
“I hazard there’s not a damn man out in this world who wouldn’t drop to their knees for you.”
Your words sound raw and unguarded, beating blood-red and meaty like a heart on a platter; you wince, turning your face away before you can see his discomfort. You didn’t mean it like that, an imposition over the line that came embroidered in rich damask, the foolish love-words you pretended to laugh at as a child.
Strider’s silent for a long moment, then you’re prickling all over with surprised delight as a long, water-cool arm draped over your waist.
“S’okay?” He asks, and you’re taken aback by the sheer vulnerability of it. Strider doesn’t instigate physical contact. He never ever does that. Even when he’s so desperate for human touch that he’ll actually seek it, it’s only through sidling up to you and hoping you get the message.
“Of course,” you manage, heart thudding, and roll back over. “Can I?”
“You’re, uh-“ Dirk’s trying to be delicate, which is hilarious, but he’s not quite able to hide his scrunched nose at the mess on your chest.
“Oh, right.” You scrabble up, eager to sustain this soap-bubble moment before it pops, ephemeral and shimmering, and the beauty is lost to memory.
Strider lets you sponge him clumsily with a wet washcloth, and to your unrestrained joy, you find that apparently, f*cking him means he’s willing to cut out all his usual macho bull about snuggling. He doesn’t even try to explain it away with the usual elaborate rituals and such - oh, it’s cold, my bed is itchy, maybe I’m allergic to the new detergent, I’m bored, I was tired and I didn’t mean to fall asleep on you-
Listen, you know you’re in no position to point fingers when it comes to avoiding the elephant in the room, but you’re more than pleased you don’t have to field the Dirk Strider Masculinity Excuses Express tonight.
“Good?” You ask, when you’re pillbugged around him to your satisfaction.
He casts a droopy-lidded look back at you, slightly less guarded than usual, and smiles a half-fraction. “Yeah.”
Oh. Your heart beats fast enough for two. You hide your grin in his neck, but you think he sees it anyway.
You wake up in the early hours, alone in a bed that feels abruptly far too large. You like your space, but you suppose you’ve gotten accustomed of late to having company at night.
The sheets beside you are folded back, but the imprint of Strider’s body is still warm. That makes sense; dimly, you remember shoving your face straight into his hair and squishing him into you, so he must’ve stayed most the night. You rest a hand on the spot, smiling helplessly to yourself, and then get up to go find him.
Thin golden light is spilling through one of the windows, the kind that promises a dawn much before it actually arrives. Good f*cking gravy, it’s practically still dark out- Dirk isn’t exactly a morning bird, what’s he doing up at this hour?
Then again, your roommate’s sleep cycle is a mystery you can only boggle at. Sometimes up late, sometimes up early, almost always vaguely tired, occasionally lit up from within with divine inspiration. Maybe the endorphins from a good roll in the hay’ve stimulated his clever noodle.
Your kitchen is something fey and delicate in the almost-morning light, and Strider fits right in. The slow rumble of the coffee machine is rising in the background, and you can just make out the man of the hour all the way over at his bench, fiddling.
The half-light gleams gold in his silvery hair, just barely outlining the wiry, slender strength of his bare back. You’re more than half sure those are your grey sweatpants lapping at his hips - no wonder they don’t fit. You can’t say you’re complaining, though.
The bones of his spine protrude spikily from his neck when he’s craned over like that, and you already know the face he’s making. Eyebrows low, lip tugged ever-so-slightly down, hair-line furrows at the bridge of his nose. Strider Focus Type A, common.
Actually, you take in the way his shoulders are hunched and amend your diagnosis. Type A-B, Strider Frustration. Also common. Uninterrupted, he’ll stay like this for hours.
You’re not sure how long you just stand there and watch him work, completely silent but clearly unable to figure out his thingummy - occasionally snorting irritably through his nose like a ruffled horse. He really is a truly excellent bloke, you think.
Eventually, you realise gawking at your best pal from the corner might be a tad creepy, and make your way over to greet him. Affectionately! Because you get the idea that’s allowed now.
Dirk’s so absorbed in what he’s doing, he doesn’t seem to notice you at all until your arms are circling him from behind. He jerks, sputtering, then goes deadly still when you press your mouth to the warm, exquisite curve of his freckled shoulder.
“What- Jake?”
“Morning, plum.”
“Wha-ah- what are you doing?” He mangles pitch, his fingers flexing absently on the counter.
“Uh. Well, chap, I’m currently laying some manful affection at your person.” You freeze awkwardly. “Would you prefer I can it?”
“No, I just-“ he shifts, voice oddly thick. “Why are you- uh-?”
Ah. He’s leaning subtly into you, you think you know what that means. “Because you have a delightful pair of shoulders, dove. Positively spiffing. Very mackworthy.”
“Jake.” Uh oh. He sounds frustrated. “I wasn’t fishing for compliments, dude, I just, uh. Is this. Is this a thing you’re going to be doing, now?”
“Is what?” You ask, chin resting comfortably in the crook of his neck.
“This!” Dirk emphasises hard enough for his voice to crack, then stares down, face aflame. “I mean. This kinda- Getting all up on the touching and sh*t of that- of that f*cking ilk?”
Ilk? It hits your still-groggy mind like a runaway bus that he’s nervous. Why is he nervous? Did you do something wrong?
“I don’t see why not,” you say, maybe a little plaintively. “Would you rather I didn’t?”
You’re slightly gratified by how swift his denial is. “No. No, it’s just, uh. I don’t know.”
He’s stammering again. You made him stammer. Oh, you sound like a pubescent rube, you know that, but Strider’s so good at staying outwardly cool and collected, and now you’ve got him stammering.
It’s terribly endearing, paddling around outside your comfort zones together like this. Neither of you have any real experience to speak of, and the spectre of your past fling does tend to hover, but he trusts you anyway - enough to sacrifice his all-consuming need for control, which is both humbling, you suppose, and quite attractive.
Now you’re blushing, too. “Do you mind if I continue?”
“…no.”
On one hand, it’s not a refusal, but it’s also not exactly the enthusiasm one hopes for. Dammit, you’re supposed to be acting smart about this, remember? You need to be careful not to rush him, or you’ll end up in a hideous collision again. “If I’m really making you uncomfy, chap, don’t-“
“I-“ Floundering, Dirk snaps his jaw tight, but his hand flies up to keep your arms looped around his bony waist. You can practically feel the words vibrating in his throat - he’s never been one for long silences - but you’re more than content to be patient; you wait with your head against his, engulfed in the pleasant scent of metal and oranges, until he finally clears his throat.
“You want coffee?”
“Strider, you're an angel. It is you.”
He sighs at the mangled reference but doesn’t move away. You count it as a win.
Dirk still looks half-surprised when you sidle up to his door that night. “Are you- oh. You still want to?”
“Of course,” you tell him, and kiss him against the doorframe. “I haven’t thought about anything else at all, pet. You looked so lovely-“
“Jesus, okay,” Dirk blurts, and then devotes all his focus to shutting your mouth with his own. You snicker at the shade of crimson his face’s turning, and wonder how he’d react if you tried to swoop him up right now, movie-style. “What’s w-“
“Could I pick you up?” You ask bluntly. He flushes, stammering.
“What?”
“I’d like to heft you up and suchlike,” you explain. There’s plenty of things you’re embarrassed about, but sex with him is not one of them. “You’re very good-looking, Strider, and honestly it’d be something of a dream fulfilled.”
“Oh,” he says, kind of wheezy like you’ve punched him straight in the gut. “sh*t. Have at it, English, I’m yours for the-“
“Good to know,” you grin, and hoist him up in your arms. He’s not nearly heavy enough, and you’re reasonably strong, so it’s no effort - and f*cking Christ in cahoots, the noise he makes.
“You are absolutely light as a feather, Strider.”
“Jesus f*cking Christ,” he mutters under his breath. You get the feeling he may not have intended to say it out loud, because a moment later, he’s gripping his face with both hands. “f*ck.”
“It’s alright.”
“How are you the calm one, here?”
You consider his words as you lay him down gently on his sheets. “I don’t know. This seems sort of simple in comparison to everything else, doesn’t it?”
“Simple,” Dirk repeats flatly.
You start peeling off your shirt, which has the flattering effect of transforming his perplexed frown to a glazed goggle. “Well, yes. Relationships, even platonic ones, are a muddle of emotions and whatnot. Sex is simple.”
“Is that so.”
You discard your shirt and hook your fingers in your waistband, grinning as rakishly as possible. “Well, I’m no expert-“
“You’re f*cking lame, man,” Dirk tells you, but he’s all lit up with amusem*nt.
After you tackle him into the sheets and ravish him thoroughly, he’s lit up with a whole different glow - luminous and absolutely magnetic, a panting creature twined around you like ivy. You wind up grinding against each other like horny teenagers, all friction and no finesse, and he comes the moment you turn your attention to his tragically unmolested chest. He’s sensitive, he really is, melting into goo when you play with his hair, and then you’re leaning against him contently as he sticks a hand down your trousers and figures it out through trial and error.
“Okay?”
“Lih- little bit harder, that’s a chap.”
“And-“
“sh*t, yes, love-”
“-Oh, okay. That’s- Cool.”
Something about hearing Strider sound so endearingly bemused is incredibly sexy. You suppose you like to see the human in him, when he’ll let you, and there’s little more human than awkward first-time handjobs with your own ejacul*te gumming up your stomach. As soon as you’re done thrashing about like a sexually satisfied eel, you lock your arms around him and bolster him with praise.
“Perfect. You’re an absolute treasure,” you tell him, and peck his forehead. Then his cheek, then his ear because you sort of miss his face, then his chin and his mouth and-
Dirk trembles like a tree in the wind, and you give him a second to reorient himself.
“Okay,” he says finally. “Um. That was pretty f*cking sick.”
“And simple, correctamundo?”
He stares at you with faint betrayal, like you’re a mislabelled food product he’s been eating for years. “…I can’t believe you’re good at this.”
“Now you know how the rest of us feel, genius boy,” you say sweetly, and nip at his earlobe. He groans, turning to nudge you with his chin, and you chortle helplessly at the look on his face.
“You can ask me a question, if you want,” you offer.
Dirk speaks straight into your collarbone. “What?”
“A question,” you clarify. “I feel like I’ve made you answer all sorts of queries recently. If you’d like to even the scores, I’d be happy to sally forth into truth-telling territory.”
Dirk glances at you out of the corner of his eyes, and you mentally prepare yourself for a no-doubt Machiavellian and excruciating interrogation.
Instead, he looks away, carefully blank, and asks you, “The stuff you said earlier, about- f*ck. I guess what I’m asking is, have you thought about this before?”
“Near-constantly,” you reply without shame. What’s the harm, after all? “Can’t see you near a flat surface without imagining you over it, chum. Really quite wicked of you to always be in those trousers.”
Your best pal stares at you again, gape-mouthed. “What?”
“Oh. Didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable, chap, it’s just - you know, you’ve got such a nice rear, and a fellow can’t help but notice.”
“Oh,” he says faintly, and rests his head back on your shoulder. “Okay.”
“Okay?”
“I need to. f*ck. Process that.”
“Really, I didn’t mean to make you self-conscious-“
“You want to f*ck me.”
You raise an eyebrow, feeling that that particular fact has been well-established at this point. “Yes.”
“Regularly.” He clarifies.
“That would be ideal.”
“Jesus.” Dirk mutters. “And you like my trousers?”
“I like you,” you tell him earnestly. “I think you’re gorgeous, and I like how you look when you’re all focused on something. Also, none of your trousers fit. That’s not a complaint, I’m just saying, I am getting some prime hip real-estate on view.”
He blinks.
“You do have lovely hips, sweetheart,” you tell him, getting in an appreciative squeeze. When Strider doesn’t muster a response to that, you squint your tired eyes open and realise he’s not half-asleep, he’s just absolutely painted scarlet.
“Oho!” You declaim, and he burrows his face into your side. “Dirk, you’re blushing!”
“Shut up.”
“No, you really are-“
“I’m not blushing, I’m physically exerted.”
“Between you and me, pal, I think I was doing most of the physical exertio-“
Dirk makes a noise like a wet cat and yanks your chin down to kiss you, which turns out to be a very effective way to end your jibes. For two emotionally stunted orphans, you two do seem to be doing great at conflict resolution!
“Mmgonna- gonna have to tell Rose about this technique,” you manage between breaths.
Dirk licks your teeth distractingly. “No.”
You concede with good humour. See? Conflict resolution.
tipsyGnostalgic [TG] began pestering golgothasTerror [GT]
TG: yo so
TG: have you n dork burnt down yoiy house yet
TG: * dirk
TG: * yuor
TG: f*ck IT
GT: As a matter of fact we have not!
GT: *Folds arms and sends you a steely look.*
TG: uh huh sure
GT: Its the truth and nothing but!
GT: Really its some malarkey to act like two adult men cant hug occasionally.
TG: jesus tucking kennedy
TG: jake babe i worry about u2 ok
TG: you can talk yo me if you wanna
TG: call on me all blondie up in this bitch
TG: you know rolals got cha back
GT: Look Roxy dont think i dont appreciate the offer.
GT: But everythings absolutely tippy toppy up in this bitch!
GT: Better even. :D
TG: …………
TG: the f*ck does gath mean
TG: whats wth that slimey
TG: * smipey
TG: did you oityf*ck him jake wtf
GT: ????
GT: Roxy lalonde i ASSURE you i did *NOTHING OF THE SORT!*
GT: Good f*cking goliath woman!
GT: How drunk are you?!
TG: m not drunk im tispy and yore mene
TG: * meat
TG: * meef?
GT: Ah youre actually drunk.
GT: Hold on a sec chum.
TG: did u jut pester jne
TG: !!!traitor!!
GT: Goodnight roxy.
GT: *Sends you double finger guns and jaunty wink that dont quite cover my bemused concern as i nervously perspire.*
TG: *flupat you n hmiddleer ginger and kites it up upk
tipsyGnostalgic [TG] ceased pestering golgothasTerror [GT]
Perturbing conversations with inebriated pals aside, life is actually pretty smooth sailing! Somehow, you and Dirk seem to have found the perfect sweet spot for a relationship: platonic affection mixed in with sexual attraction, without the need for complicated emotional bullsh*ttery.
It’s surprising, how much of a weight feels lifted off your chest. Dirk doesn’t bother making excuses to sleep in your bed, anymore. He doesn’t flee like a startled animal the second you express any sentiment too intense. You feel like you can relax, truly; if you want to, you can hold him. You can f*ck him and talk to him and he won’t get twitchy if you kiss his jaw while he’s scribbling away at his schematics.
You start bringing him things. Dirk’s a magpie, a skittish hawk, and there’s always some small part of you that’s on the lookout for shiny things. Your eyes snag on violently orange movie posters and sh*tty novelty robots, ironic shirts and bizarre soda flavours. You’ve wanted to give him more gewgaws, to show your worth in some archaic bird way, but Dirk gets so prickly and tense about gifts. You decided it wasn’t worth the days of distance.
But now, you can get away with it. So you ply Dirk with those absolutely hideously disgusting gummy sweets he inexplicably adores, and leave a notebook with an eccentric little alien cover on his bed. You bring home unspicy takeout, and even coffee grounds for his pet abomination, which still smokes threateningly every time you so much as look in its direction. Dirk eyes you when he sees them, but he seems to let it stand for now.
It’s the perfect equilibrium: finally, you can be calm and open with eachother, without the constant fear of misinterpretation. Even better, there hasn’t been a single excruciating emotional talk so far, and you’re still doing excellent. Take that, therapist, you’re not conflict averse, you just prefer alternative resolutions.
It’s nice to have an understanding between you. With Dirk, space is always either a tense 1v1 game or entirely invisible; you don’t even think about the rules now. No more obsessing over the fractions of space between you, nights watching TV together where you spend the whole time desperately begging the forces of the universe for him to forget his personal space and knock your thigh with his. Now if he sits down, you like to crawl atop him, laughing at the way he shivers and tries to play cool. He never knows where to put his hands, and occasionally if you’re feeling especially playful, you’ll guide them to wherever flusters him most - usually right on your ass. That aside, Dirk’s the perfect shape for falling sleep on, and you’ve become quickly addicted to the steady pace of his pulse along with yours.
Of course, that comes with its own set of issues. Traditionally, you’ve always been the one so bone-chillingly terrified of laborious emotional conversion that you’d rather put up with constant smothering, but for once Dirk is the reticent one. You’re still not entirely sure why so many people think he’s the brooding quiet type - he’s quite stoic, you guess, but the more nervous he gets, the more his metaphors stretch tellingly. If you still only knew him through a screen, maybe you’d be taken in…
…but you don’t. And your relationship is all the better for it! Even back in the day before you met in person, when he was a frustrating, idealised mixture of lovely and remote, you used to lie on your bed and think about him. Touching him, sometimes. You wanted to touch anyone, back then, but him most of all.
You used to imagine yourself into the rare pictures he’d send you, always half-blurry hipster shots, oh-so-ironic. You remember distinctly that in one, the hem of his black tank top was rucked just the tiniest amount up his hip, revealing this infinitesimal sliver of pearl-coloured belly. You used to stare at that photo for hours, thinking about what he’d feel like. What someone else’s skin would feel like. He had a leaner build than you, although you were sure he was stronger, and his hair looked thin and soft as cornsilk.
Dirk used to ask you things - the first time you kissed longer than five seconds, you buried your shaking hands in his hair and held on like you were drowning, and he slid casual questions at you until you told him to stop. He always wanted to know what you were thinking, is the thing, and it was terrifying. He disguised the queries as throwaway comments, but he could never seem to understand why you were always on the knife’s edge of euphoric and heart-burstingly petrified every time you touched.
You used to resent him for the unnerving questions - ones you didn’t know how to answer, or even how to receive. You’d retreat into your head or go for a walk, and when you’d return, he’d bury his face in your side and not speak until you did. Strider sometimes reminded you uncomfortably of a kicked dog, and it wasn’t fair to isolate him like that when he so clearly needed to be around someone, but you just-
Well. You just ripped him to shreds, is what you did, and you didn’t even have the guts to be the one to break it off with him.
Now, Dirk doesn’t ask questions when you sidle up to him, peering at a bookshelf, and slide your hand into his back pocket. You got him to leave the house despite being ‘so f*cking close to finishing this hackneyed sh*t,’ and promptly rewarded him with a trip to the nearest source of pretentious literature.
He does startle somewhat, and you watch with amused familiarity as a hint of pink begins to glow at the tips of his ears. “Dude.”
“Find anything interesting, bro? I must say, you seemed rather lost in your own thoughts and suchlike.”
He shrugs, deliberately vague. “I figured I’d, uh, give you space.”
You peer at him. “Hm?”
“…you know, so I wasn’t hovering around like a deflated party balloon on an unsecured string, awkwardly quashing your every chance at flirtation?”
“Um.” Baffled, you lean in closer. “Chum, I haven’t the foggiest idea what the f*ck you’re on about.”
Dirk looks at you like you’re an idiot. “That girl- you know she was trying to put the moves on you, right?”
“The one from earlier?” You stop, bemused. Sure, she’d been friendly and personable, but you didn’t think unusually so. “We weren’t flirting!”
“Uh huh? You might want to tell her that,” he says coolly, still flicking through the most incomprehensible-sounding manuals you’ve ever encountered.
Rolling your eyes, you hook your chin over his shoulder and nudge him, pulling him back into you. “I really don’t think that’d even be necessary, Strider. She’s probably gone by now.”
“Actually, she’s not,” Dirk measures his words carefully. “She’s watching us - you - from the Self-Help section in a display of beautiful cosmic irony. Also, there’s a phone number sticking out of that book.”
You glance down, and it turns out he’s right. Of course he is. There’s loopy handwriting on a receipt poking out of the novel she picked up for you, and now you feel like a complete buffoon.
You can’t help but be impressed, though. He really is quite Holmesian.
“Well,” you say cheerfully, turning your face back into his warm skin. “I suppose she’s getting rather a show, then, isn’t she?”
You can almost hear Strider’s heart stop for a terrifying second, and then he’s red-faced and biting his lip and trying to look composed.
“Oh.”
“Oh?”
He stammers, and you raise your brows. “Nothing, just- I didn’t take you for some kind of spontaneous exhibitionist, English.”
You make to step back. “I don’t mean to make you uncomfortable-“
“No,” Dirk says quickly. “No, it’s just- not a bad thing, necessarily. Just. Uh.”
You peer at his flustered face, the way he’s working his lower lip between his teeth. Oho. Forget hiding in the bookshelves, he wants to give her a show.
A match snaps and lights in your stomach.
“And I, uh…” His words trail off when you shift, shoulders stiffening again, and then you’re rotating him swiftly by the hips to back him up against one of the walls. Despite his attempts to seem disinterested, Strider lets you pull him around easily, and then there’s not much he can do to conceal the boner he’s sprung in the Advanced Mechanics section of this large and usually empty store. He’s practically shaking with arousal. Very unexpected!
That being said, this place is probably the best one for any kind of, uh, hijinks to occur. Very little supervision, a large and sprawling maze of well-hidden alcoves and such… Is this why Dirk likes it here so much? Has he thought about-
Well, you intend to take full advantage.
Strider makes a soft, shocked noise when you lean forward to kiss him. “I was joking, man, it’s fine, you don’t have to-“
“Would you like to?” You ask, almost painfully aware of how close your thigh is to his erection, slid neatly between his legs. It’s a cursory question, obviously, but you think it’s part of the point, for you, to hear him say it. “Get up to risky business, that is?”
“f*ck, Jake,” he groans when your tongue flicks over his, and then he’s yanking you closer with the lack of restraint he only ever seems to have in the bedroom. “Mm, okay-“
“Quiet,” you whisper, and he quivers like a live wire. He’s so hard, holy Christ, you’re dizzy with it. “Shh-shh, sweetheart, don’t want anyone seeing this-“
“Mngh-“
“Seeing what I’m doing to you?” you improvise. Dirk clutches at your shirt, slapping a hand over his mouth. “Stars above, you’re absolutely helpless, pet-”
“Oh god.” Strider sways, nails digging into your side, and you keep your hips moving in a slow, steady grind against his. “Oh, f*ck, Jake-“
“You’d let me do anything, wouldn’t you?” Possessed by some odd demon, you find yourself stroking up the wiry lines of his torso without worrying about the words spilling from your mouth. “I could bend you over the cashier desk, and you’d let me. Beg me, right?”
“Yeah, Jake-“
“I bet that girl isn’t even watching, is she? You just wanted me to mark you as hands off, didn’t you, love?”
Instead of freaking out about the bizarre contents of these frankly rude comments you‘re making, Dirk whimpers quietly into his hand and lets his head falls back. “Oh.”
Well, well. Apparently p*rn is the best teacher!
A little taken aback by your own daring, you lean even closer, grinding your hand up against him. He wheezes through his teeth, pushing frantically back - ‘sh*t-f*ck-sh*tf*ck’- and then you’re moving with him, an ungainly hurried motion of hips and friction.
A few moments later, Dirk’s stiffening and hissing and flopping back against the wall. There’s a sheen of sweat on his brow, and he looks sticky and human and utterly delightful. You almost pull backwards, but then he’s yanking you close and pressing his lips to your neck, and you can feel yourself burn up like paper consumed by flame.
“sh*t, Jake…” he whispers, reaching almost nervously down to palm you through your jeans, and you pant into his hair. His tongue is teasing over one particular spot on your neck in little hesitant motions, and then you realise it’s a bruised half-scabbed bite mark from last time.
“Dirk,” you mutter, blood singing in your ears. His hand is just f*cking perfect, and he smells so good, you want to bury your face in his neck and never leave. “Dirk, chap, you can-”
“What?”
“Freshen it, uh, up,” you manage. “Hands off, right?”
He lets out a tiny choked noise as he sinks his teeth back into your skin, a stuttery groan, and you bury your face in his neck and chase the high his fingers bring. It’s not long for you, but every moment feels like a bloody eternity, your heart pounding and tiny noises leaking out from between your lips and the way Strider is taking you apart, neat and even, like one of his mechanical doodads.
He bites you again and you come a second later, dizzy and seeing stars. Your accomplice is a perfect gentleman about it, holding you steady while you make disturbing noises and sway on your feet and suchlike.
When you’re both done exhaling deeply, Dirk tilts a look at you.
“…dude. I liked these trousers.”
“p*rn did not offer any sort of advice on getting home afterwards,” you say mournfully, wincing at the unpleasant sensation in your boxers, and he chokes on his own tongue laughing at you.
For the most part, life continues to get better. Everything is the same, everything is massively different. You and Strider used to dance around eachother, now you dance with eachother, and you can’t really be bothered to hide how elated you are.
You’re not a very social person - easily overwhelmed, uncomfortable in crowds, not one for new people, you suppose. But Dirk is an extrovert in pasty antisocial wrapping, and you find the house terribly boring without him, so you let him persuade you to join him in visiting his brother.
Dave is the most incredibly peculiar mix of cool and lame - bizarre personality, but handsome enough to get away with it. He’s got the pretty Strider looks, all angles and bones and luminously pale hair, only he’s a lot darker than Dirk. Not as dark as you, obviously, but clearly he inherited the ability to tan from Roxy’s side, that’s all you’re saying.
That being said, he’s very odd. You sort of like him in a vaguely amused way, but you don’t think you could tolerate being around him as often as Dirk. Dirk is, of course, the exception to every rule; but even if he wasn’t, Dave is still absorbing in a way that makes you itchy. He’s impossible to ignore, while Dirk’s good at letting himself fade into the wallpaper when he wants.
Inevitably, you slip up.
Despite his usual deadpan calm, Dave’s eyebrow quirks when he sees you holding Dirk’s hand - nothing too provocative, but he’s got nice hands, dammit, and you find the touch reassuring. You’ve gotten used to the casual affection, and now you keep forgetting that it might seem strange to lightly squeeze Dirk’s hip when you pass by, or hook your fingers into his belt loops to tug him closer when you’re bickering.
“So,” Dave says. “You two-“
“We’re late,” Dirk interrupts, standing up so fast he almost overbalances.
“Late?”
“Late,” he repeats. “To dinner.”
“It’s noon.”
“Shut the f*ck up, Dave, dinner is in the eye of the beholder. The platonic ideal form of dinner is that of a meal, not an oppressive social hierarchy enforcing military meal times, you- uh, f*cking jingoistic fascist.”
Dirk says all of this in one long breath, releases your arm, and stalks out.
“Wow,” Dave mouths. “So, uh, English.”
“Yeah?” You ask nervously.
“What are your intentions towards my brother?” He asks, completely blank-faced.
“Um.”
“Sorry, dude, gotta ask, it’s the bro code.”
You twitch and plaster on a grin. “…dinner time.”
“It’s f*cking noon.”
“It’s supper somewhere!”
Dave sighs as he follows you, effortlessly keeping up with your best speedwalk. “Dude, this is embarrassing both of us.”
“Toodle-doo-“
“Don’t make me get Kark-“
“Lovely seeing you-“
“Jesus, man,” he finally yells over your shoulder. “Just- learn how to f*cking use concealer, okay?”
When you get back, you pull Dirk down onto the couch with you - for the purposes of discussion, you swear! - and somehow end up in a purring puddle of limbs. You pull away from his mouth just long enough to ask Dirk why you need concealer, and when he’s done simultaneously combusting from humiliation and amusem*nt, he’s more than wiling to show you.
You glance in the mirror next morning, see that you look like the victim of a wild bear attack, and decide outsiders will simply have to deal with it. You like the way Dirk is staring at you far too much to contemplate covering any of the marks up.
He lets out a bruised noise when you continue on with your day, fiddling his fingers together. “English?”
“Mm?”
“You’re not going to…”
“What’s the point?” You say lightly, and grin to yourself when he coughs, ears aflame. Sensitive - Dirk’s very sensitive, you think.
You absolutely adore it.
For months, you and Dirk continue on your excellent path, ravaging eachother to and fro and not particularly trying to conceal it. Or at least, you’re not. You still can’t see a reason why you should, but Dirk’s more private when it comes to these things. You try to remember that.
It’s honestly quite fun, though, sneaking around like teenagers - except when you were teenagers, you didn’t do that at all. It was more about trying to convince eachother everything was fine with awkwardly overt physical contact, you guess. Either way, you can’t deny you enjoy making Dirk squirm sometimes.
You’re currently engaged in making eyes at your pal across the room, the kind of eyes where you’re picturing him with much less clothing on and he can somehow tell, when Dave’s boyfriend approaches you. It takes a second for you to notice, because Dirk just stammered - visibly and flatteringly flustered - and Dave is thumping him on the back. You can’t stop yourself snorting.
Karkat makes a small disgusted noise and prods you directly in the chest. “Hey.”
“Oh!” You turn your head to him, slightly taken aback. “Hello, there.”
“So.” Karkat says flatly, and your grin freezes at the familiar words. “You and him, huh?”
“Look, chap, if Dave’s-“
“Dave’s not anything, f*ckwit. This is my personal investigation for the purposes of avoiding being the one to scrape up my matesprit’s pseudo-hatchmate’s bloodpump off the floor if you stomp on it again.” The troll snaps, and despite his small stature, you abruptly feel very loomed-over.
“Ah,” you reply faintly. “…swell.”
“So you two are f*cking,” Karkat says bluntly, holding up a finger when you open your mouth. “Don’t even start, bulgelump, it’s obvious and I don’t care. But if you screw him around again like last time-“
“Chum-“
“It’s going to be a massive f*cking inconvenience and I will haunt your gogdamn floorboards, got it?”
You balk. “Listen. I have no intentions of ‘screwing him around’-“
“You did last time,” Karkat tells you defiantly, and you sigh.
You deserve that.
“Yes,” you admit. “I handled the situation like a dolt, panicked, and acted dashed ungentlemanly. I was a complete horse’s ass about the whole thing, and I’m not going to tussle with you on that.”
Unexpectedly, the troll looks entirely unprepared for your answer. “Oh. Well… good.”
In the awkward silence that follows, you become uncomfortably aware that both Dirk and his brother are staring at you. Goggling might be a more accurate description, actually.
“Dammit, Dave, I-“ Dirk starts, and Dave flinches, so Karkat swells up like a bullfrog, and you panic.
“Chum, it’s really not a big deal-“
“I get that you two are biased, but it was my f*cking relationship and I ruined it, okay?” Strider hisses, fingers to his temples. “Don’t hound him about it, that’s- Jesus. Mad uncool, yo. Wicked lameness being perpetuated.”
Oh, Lord. You haven’t heard him bust out the slapdash 90s lingo in months. “Dirk, it’s fine.”
“Maybe both of you suck,” Karkat says loudly. “Maybe you’re both idiots with no communication skills! Maybe it’s deeply tiring watching you two f*ckheads orbit eachother like horny meteors-“
“Dude,” Dave mumbles. “Shut up.”
Your flicker a glance over and confirm that Dirk is approximately two seconds from explosion, jaw clenching as the other two bicker on in the distance.
“-just saying, this is some grade-a bullsh*t-“
You try to catch his eye discreetly, but he’s very diligently avoiding your gaze.
“Okay, but could you just calm down? It’s two dudes being idiots, babe, it’s not-“
Instead, you sidle up to your chum and delicately snag his elbow. “Could we have a little heart-to-heart, chap?”
“It’s not my fault your idiotic alien romance system is so incredibly, inexplicably, untenably vague and useless!”
“f*ck,” he mutters, and you realise he’s shaking.
“Right, because four types of rigidly defined affection based on horniness and hostage negotiation is so much simpler-“
“Okay,” you decide. “We’re going to go get some fresh air. Alright?”
“Sorry,” Dirk rasps as you pull him along. He goes easily, though, letting you slide your arm around his waist. That just concerns you further; it’s more affectionate than he seems really comfortable with in public, but you guess your company is currently having a domestic behind you. They’re not exactly observant, right now.
Dave and Karkat’s house - hive, you suppose they call it - is honestly quite charming. Lots of windows, soft upholstery, absolutely no puppets, and it’s located near the woods. It perches right up close to the trees, and from where you stand, you can see the sun melting in a great heap of yolky gold over the tall ferns. Almost the same colour as Dirk’s eyes, you realise, even if they’re currently stashed away behind his shades.
You pull him down to sit with you on the front steps, tentatively relieved when he lets his head loll on your shoulder. He’s warm and lovely, a beautiful creature splashed by the sunset, and the quiet intimacy more than makes up for the cold seep of moisture into your legs.
“Are you alright?”
He breaks away and flops his head into his palms with a quiet groan. “Don’t ask me that if you don’t want the answer.”
“Um. I do want the answer. That’s why I asked, pal?”
“No you don’t.” Dirk pinches his temples, and you tighten your grip on his hip. “You want me to tell you something reassuring so you can move on with your life.”
“Not true!”
“Yeah it is.”
“It’s not!” You insist, and then yank him up by the shoulder until he’s looking at you. “Dirk, sweetheart. I am long, long past any illusion of you ever being reassuring.”
To your mixed relief and delight, Strider’s thin lips twitch- and then he’s snorting and leaning back into you, and you’re feeling really rather capable inside.
“That’s- you’re still around, though, man,” Dirk says, mouth very close to your skin. “Any longer, and I won’t be able to survive on my own.”
“Oh, the horror.”
“However will I function when you meet a nice broad and squeeze out some progeny,” he continues, and you scoff.
“Lord, no. Not the goal, anymore.” You can’t seem to stop squishing him into you; he’s practically on your lap by this point. You’d stop, but you don’t think he minds. You don’t think anything could break this strange companionable moment, right now. “At this point, I wouldn’t know how to handle it.”
Dirk scoffs. “Psh. I don’t think you’re that out of practice.”
“Mm, not sure I was ever in it,” you admit. “And I can’t say I want to be, you know?”
“Really?”
You nod, and he looks bemused.
“What’re you going to do, then?”
“What do you mean?”
He sighs, this tiny quiet thing into your hair. “I don’t know. Dave and Karkat are looking at grubs, Rose got married, Roxy’s engaged and sh*t. You reckon you’ll be the next one to do something crazy?”
“Oh,” you realise at last, and turn to look at him. “No. No, I’m not planning- listen, chum, you know I’m not very good at words, but- uh. Well, I’m very content with where I am. In fifteen years, I sort of hope we’ll still be doing exactly this. Is that odd?”
“Us?” Dirk whispers. “You and me?”
“Who else?” You say, like a helpless idiot. “You’re the only person I can stand to be around, sometimes.”
“Oh.”
“I, um. I like living with you, I like, uh, life? What I’m trying to say is, this all sort of feels like enough, if you catch my drift. I’m not really a kid person and romance seems far too complicated, but you and I have something good going, don’t you think?”
“Yeah,” he murmurs faintly. “Yeah, definitely.”
“And obviously you’re probably going to get up to all kinds of stuff, and I’d never try to stop you, I’d just- well, I’d like to still be a part of it,” you confess. “I had a taste of life without you, and I can’t say it was pleasant.”
“Oh,” Dirk repeats, and you notice that he’s very still. His fingers are twisted in the fabric of your shirt. “Oh. So you’re- we’re gonna keep living together for the foreseeable future, then?”
You grasp him gently by the shoulders and smile as sincerely as possible. “As far as I’m concerned, I’m in it for the long run, dove. I’m staying until you tell me to go.”
To your surprise, Dirk lurches forward and kisses you, a proper semi-public kiss with teeth and tongue and a kind of raw, ineffable passion. He rarely initiates, is the thing, and he’s gone from being fragile as bone-china to a full bloody force of nature in your lap, but you can’t bring yourself to pause and ask questions.
Instead, you cinch your hands a little tighter around his waist and haul him bodily into you, heart thudding double-time when he lets out a low noise. When he pulls away to breathe, it’s really quite a tragedy.
“Do you mean that?” Dirk asks, inches away and so precious to you, it burns. His lips are shiny with spit, hair rumpled from your wild tussling, and you think he’s just- magnificent, really. A work of art. “Jake?”
“Hm?”
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
“You’re absolutely stunning, plum,” you tell him, and he goes the rich flushed colour of a rose. “Can I snag your glasses?”
“I don’t know.” He says quietly, and you pat his back as comfortingly as you can manage.
“That’s alright.”
“Oh, well. To hell with it,” Dirk mutters, removing his glasses with unusual drama. He folds them neatly, two firm clacks, then holds them out to you.
You recognise the offer for what it is - you’re cradling his heart in your palm, messy and frantic and quick as a hummingbird’s wings. You hook the glasses carefully in your shirt, then lean in to take his face in your hands.
Dirk stares back at you, half-stubborn, half-terrified, and you realise the cause of his atypical theatrics; his eyes are the familiar gold-orange of maple syrup, but for the first time you can remember, they’re unmistakably misty.
You kiss him before the intensity of the moment crushes you back into teenage cowardice. He makes a strange, strangled noise and clutches you, tension visibly uncoiling from his body, until you’re both just clinging to eachother in shaky silence.
“…sorry.”
You kiss the spot behind his ear that makes him wheeze. “It’s alright.”
“Sorry.”
“It’s fine.”
“I-“
“It’s really alright, love. I’m not sixteen, anymore, and I’m afraid it’ll take more than some tears to run me off.”
Dirk snuffles into your shoulder. You think it’s a laugh. “Dude, I’m so f*cking wet.”
“What?”
“No, it’s just- we’re currently situated on moisture-laden ground and my face appears to be leaking inexplicably, and now I feel two steps away from transforming into a squirmy slime-secreting worm.”
“I’d still love you if you were a worm, you know.”
He snickers damply. “I don’t think I’d be as good a lay.”
“Never know til you try.”
“Ugh.”
You grin at his pure disgust and take the win - it’s not every day you get one over Strider, after all.
Still, though, even when he’s happy, Strider’s the most bizarrely capricious, moody chap you’ve ever met. You don’t think he really knows how to be happy, and he’s often tight-wound as a springtrap.
You have excellent, creative sex, and he lets you hold him in the afterglow, but when you wake up, half the time you’re alone.
Sometimes, when he’s been unusually pliant and open with you, you’ll find him tinkering in the middle of the night - always hunched over his projects and gears, the technology that he can easily understand. He’ll be rigid and hostile as a mechanical creation until you sigh and flop yourself around him, and even then he’s more tired than calm.
Those are nights when you make him tea.
You did say you were getting back into it. Dirk seems to enjoy the tea, but he only drinks it when you offer; you suspect the eccentric specificity of your private tea rituals appeals to the hipster in him. He’s not cruel about it, though. He’s always been kinder than most give him credit for, and you can tell by the way he stares that he savours the trust you give by allowing him to participate.
Dirk has hungry eyes, eyes that slice into all they see like a heated spoon through sorbet. His stare tends to devour. It was unnerving at first, but it feels fair by now - after all, half the time it feels like Strider’s heart is in your mouth, and you’re just trying to chew around the viscera without breaking anything. He’s simultaneously the most and least human person you’ve encountered - half-flesh, half-machine, fully divine.
“You’re staring at me again,” Dirk tells you hollowly. He’s a vision, silhouetted in the window by moonlight - the dressing gown you brought him’s slipped down his shoulder, and the line of his body is a slender streak of milk-white against the striped fabric. Strider makes you feel very human in comparison, like a modern Pygmalion, wrapping the stars up in blue flannel. His head is tilted just so, the almost-flawless indent of your teeth marked along his long, long neck, and his trousers are washed-out black, clingy and baggy in areas dictated by no rule known to physics. You don’t think he’s slept in days, though, and he’s shaking with the strain - hairline fractures in his facade, the one that’s as transparent as glass to you by this point anyway.
You look at him, and you know you really meant it: you do hope you’re still doing this in fifteen years. Fifty. Five hundred. However long it goes. You don’t know if godhood lasts forever, but you could imagine two skeletons waltzing in the grave.
Lord, and people think he’s the intense one.
“Jake,” Dirk repeats, eyes flashing in the odd lighting. It’s started to rain outside, very lightly, and the world is just shades of blue and the flare of his hawk-eyes. “If you’re tired-“
“I’m going to make some tea, love,” you tell him, and turn your face down before you get distracted again. He’s so endearingly odd, staring out into the wild night like a bird that landed on your windowsill. If you lived a thousand years ago, you’d probably have thought him some kind of shapeshifter, a flaxen fey creature. You still sort of do. Hope is a vague and all-consuming realm; Dirk has always been its anchor for you. He's Hope and Belief and the first bloom of spring. All the sorts of things that straddle the line between the real and the divine.
You smile to yourself, flick on the amber-tinted lightbulb above you, and go about making tea. “Would you like some?”
Dirk’s eyebrows and jaw are set, voice flat in a way you’ve come to associate with aloofness, but he still answers. “Sure.”
You nod, pull out another cup, and let him marinate in his own juices, so to speak. It doesn’t take him long to flutter closer - you shove down a wider grin when you hear him pace up to you, skittish but warmth-seeking.
He finally gives in, coming close enough to see what you’re doing, but he doesn’t touch you. You are very much a fan, when it comes to Dirk, of draping yourself over him when he’s fiddling with his projects, but he’s less comfortable with doing the same to you. You wish he’d sidle closer, though. Your whole side is tingling with the phantom ache of his warmth.
You focus your attention on the tea leaves, spooning them out meticulously. Of the two of you, you’re rarely the meticulous one, but what can you say? Current Jade measures her tea leaves like a slapdash scientist, too interested by experiments to attempt consistency, but the legacy of your late grandmother lives on in the painstaking quantities you apportion.
You lean on the counter while the kettle heats, drowsy and surrounded by the fragrance of honey and grass. You only blink fully awake again when Dirk makes a frustrated noise, still lurking in the shadows beyond your circle of light.
“What’s up, sweetheart?”
“You have no idea, do you?” He mutters darkly, an element of wry amusem*nt in his voice.
“No idea of what?”
“You’re just-“ he takes a deep breath in, and the water boils. “The universe is made up of energy, alright? On a larger scale, that roughly translates to heat. And the universe hasn’t reached entropy, yet, so there’s an uneven distribution of heat throughout spacetime.”
“Uh huh,” you say, as billowing clouds of steam rise from your teapot.
Dirk leans towards you, but stays fixed in place. “And the average temperature of the space vacuum is cold, because it’s huge and there’s large areas of empty space, no heat-passing particles and no pressure to ramp them up through collisions, and- not the point.”
You swirl your teapot thoughtfully. You’re not smart in the same way Dirk is, and he finds it very difficult to explain concepts sometimes, so you imagine his sleep-deprived ramble must have some significance. “Mhm?”
“The point is, space is on average cold, because of numerous environmental factors. That being said, sometimes I think space is cold because you’re the f*cking sun and source of all warmth in this heartless bitch of a universe.” Dirk sighs, rubbing his eyes.
Caught somewhere between dumbfounded and too tired for shock, you raise your brows. “Oh?”
“Does that make sense?”
“I don’t know,” you tell him.
He yanks a hand through his hair. “Listen. You’re- you don’t even get it, Jake, there’s no possible verbal manoeuvring I can fathom to tell you, you’re just- everything is so cold and you’re so f*cking warm.”
“…do you need me to get you a shirt?”
“I’m using metaphor!”
You blink at him again, finally processing the delicate meaning behind his blunt words, and feel yourself start to glow. “I see.”
“You don’t,” Dirk mumbles, frustrated. “You don’t, you don’t get it, and if I could tell you, it’d freak you out so bad, it’d be full Lovecraftian geometry up in this bitch-“
“Dirk, you’re the only person I share tea with,” you interrupt, pouring the honey-hued liquid into the prepared cups. “You’re my best friend, and you’re bony and magnificent, and you’re also the only person I’d ever make tea for.”
“…Oh.”
“Do you want some lemon?”
He looks at you like a drowning man looks at a helpful dolphin. “…I’ll have it your way.”
You consider for a second, then squeeze a tiny drop of lemon into both cups. “There we go. A little touch of bitterness makes it sweeter in the end, you know.”
Dirk’s smile ticks up a fragment, a reluctant yet heartening improvement. “Wow. Try to be a little more heavy-handed with the symbolism next time, English, I can’t handle this level of Dostoyevskian complexity-“
“Zip it, plum.”
You twist yourself up with him on the couch, cocooned in blankets half-upright, and whisper over your tea into the dead of night for hours like real teenagers. Something in you feels satisfied, finally; it’s nice, to experience the simple luxuries of companionship that most others consider mundane.
Dirk falls asleep with his head in your lap, his silky strands of white-gold hair tickling your belly and his nose pressed to your hip. You stay awake far longer than you should, just to treasure the moment - the tick of the clock’s second-hand punctuated by his low, dragging breaths, and the warmth of him burning like a candle against you. The simple domesticity of two empty cups, side by side, and him in your clothes, and the scar on the back of his ankle, exposed by blanket, that you know as well as your own.
Love makes humans, warm and real, of you both.
Dirk wakes up in one of his quiet good moods, all half-inch smiles and swift verbal repartées. When you roll over to kiss his neck, he groans easily and flips you over, which is how he ends up riding you before breakfast.
You really expected that he’d be as much of a control freak in the bedroom as out of it, but Dirk absolutely frigging adores it when your hands are holding him in place, when you’re moving slow and torturing him, when you tell him how extraordinarily gorgeous he looks and how good he’s being for you as he’s taking your co*ck to the base, and he comes like a knot pulling loose. It feels, if not without occasional awkwardness, natural as breathing.
You chuck the blankets into the laundry basket while he freshens up, and promptly return to the kitchen just in time to see Strider set the eggs on fire.
He panics and blusters, caught mid-crisis, and you chortle as you fetch a damp cloth. Yes, you think you’d sign up for five hundred more years of this. At least.
Inevitability comes knocking down your door, oddly enough, at Roxy’s house. You’re certain there’s some kind of divine irony at play here, but at present you’ve got more pressing concerns.
Currently, inevitability takes the form of your best friend’s titillated expression and incoming commentary as she looks between you and Dirk, fire in her neon-bright eyes.
“So,” Roxy starts, which is what sends alarm bells ringing through your head. You’ve encountered far too many horrendous questions starting with ‘so’ and ending with invasive speculations about your sex life of late. You know your friend group is entirely made up of socially-maladapted orphans, but good Lord, social skills are one area in which none of you specialise.
Actually, Tavros isn’t too bad, but you haven’t been able to look him in the eyes since you found him in a, uh, compromising position with the murderous clown who scares the sh*t out of everyone. You suppose it makes sense on some cosmic scale that the most anxious person you know is completely unbothered by that codpiece-clad maniac, but you really think he could do better.
Then again, he told you Vriska used to send him the old eye with vigour, so perhaps he’s simply doomed to a life of horrendous romantic suitors.
Anyhow, where were you?
Ah, right. You and your best pal of eternal bro-itude are currently situated in the house of your other two best friends, the irrepressible Roxy Lalonde and the incomparable Jane Crocker.
They are both corking people, and old friends, and you wouldn’t trade them for the world-
Dirk twitches next to you.
-but they also have a disturbing ability to scent blood in the water. You’re not entirely sure what they’re conspiring about right now, to be honest - perhaps they’ve got some salacious gossip to spread - but you have no doubt it’ll come up.
And come up it does, although not exactly in an ideal way. Pretty much the opposite - although for once, it’s not your habitual clumsiness that spoils the pudding. Oh no. It’s Mr Sexy Ninja who gets caught red-handed today, and how.
What happens is, you’re all cheerfully flapping on about life happenings - the book Dirk read that had him hissing profanities into your neck for a solid four hours, Roxy’s odd conversation with the troll hacker guy, your latest venture to the house of one Eridan Ampora (it’s a long story), and Jane’s prank war with John. It’s all very cosy and fun, no hint of storm clouds on the horizon.
Shortly after your spirited discussion, Jane exclaims something about food and moseys off to the kitchen. Roxy, presumably angling for sneaky nibbling, disappears after her. Only two remain: you, a suave and yet boyishly enthusiastic ‘himbo’ - Eridan made you take a magazine test on your ‘sexy status’ and you find the word oddly charming - and your good pal and habitual f*ckbuddy, Dirk Strider. Who, you might add, has (a) not slept in actual days and (b) is wearing one of his sleek black tanktops, the ones that emphasise the wiry swell of muscle in his truly delightful arms.
…It’s not what it sounds like. No one discovers you in mid-coitus.
Arguably, it’s worse.
“How’re you holding up, dove?” You ask him, a tad worried by his obvious exhaustion.
“M’fine,” Dirk mumbles, head tilting furtively back and forth to check for witnesses. Apparently satisfied with your privacy, he then shocks the living bajeesus out of you by liquefying in a droopy puddle onto your lap.
“Bro?”
“Sorry,” he whispers, and noses at your hipbone.
“Don’t apologise, sweetheart,” you tell him, and start scratching his scalp out of habit. He pushes into your hand and sighs with contentment and essentially does all he can to convey catlike approval without the ability to purr. “There we go, that’s a doll.”
“You’re wearing that f*cking belt,” Dirk points out accusatorially.
“What of it?”
“I want you to tie my wrists to the headboard with it and go to f*cking town, man.”
You grin down at him, interest piqued. “I reckon I could take a whack at that.”
“Do you promise?”
Good f*cking gyromancy, but he’s all wild owl-like creature when he glints up at you like that, pale tufts and arresting eyes, and a saucy response dies on your lips. “Anything you want, plum.”
He turns his face into your hand, pressing his lips almost gallantly to your wrist, and you can’t quite muffle your pleased sigh. You are an absolute fool for the tiny, genteel gestures he makes so thoughtlessly, the way he angles his whole body in your direction and notices your loose shoelaces before you do.
It’s your fault for leaning over and tipping your forehead against his, lost to the beguiling siren’s call of his smirk; it’s his fault, though, for pulling you down against him, mouths connecting in a slow and lazy dance. He’s been drinking orange juice, and he sighs against your lips, and you could die happy, you really could.
The moment is shattered conclusively a second later, when a bone-chilling wolf-whistle slices through your cosy intimacy.
Dirk jolts upwards so fast he knocks you with his jaw; your face whips towards the door.
“Dirk Strider, you smooth operator,” Roxy Lalonde coos, Cheshire smile splitting her face in half.
“Uh-“
“Don’t.” Dirk says stonily, with what you feel is disproportionate sternness.
Roxy ignores him, mega-watt grin somewhat blinding. “Uh-uh, too late! Cat’s outta the bag, Mr ‘I’m gonna die alone’-“
You feel your face crinkle with confusion.
“Roxy, it’s not-“
“Spider.” You blurt, idiotically.
They both pause to look at you.
“What?”
“Little, um, spider crawling on you, chap. I think I… got it?”
“Uh. Yeah, I think you got something,” Roxy breaks in, and Dirk begins to crank up his icy gaze to a full bitchstare. You sweat.
“Pardon?”
“By which I mean, I think you got into his pants.”
“Roxy.” Dirk hisses again, vaguely thunderous. “Don’t start.”
“Dirk,” Roxy parrots. “For someone who just got laid, you’re really acting like someone who needs to get laid.”
“It’s not- you don’t get it.”
“Sure I don’t. C’mon, this is silly,” Roxy continues, and trepidation swells inside you. “I’m not gonna make it weird, it’s just-“
“Stop-“
“It’s just nice that you guys finally worked things out,” she says, then winks ostentatiously. “Jane’n’I, we’re real proud. I expect to be the best man at the wedding.”
Oh.
Oh, she thinks you’re- well, that makes sense- but-
But Dirk. But Dirk and the whole Romance Situation and how uncomfortable he got when he thought you might be angling for something more than what you have.
You look over despite your growing dread, and your suspicions are confirmed: Sat bolt upright, Dirk is not so much a man as an experimental sculpture carved from the forbidding cliff of a craggy mountain, a mountain which has borne the harsh beatings of sun and snow for a thousand seasons, and is grimly determined it will outlast you, too.
You can fix this- well, you don’t know if you can, but you know you need to. Your thing with Dirk is the foundation of your new life, and you love it, and your feet are starting to slip through the cracks.
“We’re not-“ you start uselessly. Your roommate sighs.
“You guys are basically in eachother’s pockets,” Roxy points out, smirking.
Abruptly, Dirk stands. “Drop it, Lalonde.”
She rolls her eyes. “Jesus, Di-Stri, I don’t get the big deal. If I tamed that pony, I’d find it hard not to pat it too.”
“Pony?” You say.
“Tamed?” Jane asks, from the doorway.
“I didn’t- we’re not-“ Dirk starts, and then his mouth is moving but no sound comes out, and crossdressing Christ on a cracker, she’s rendered him speechless.
“Dirk,” you try. “Uh-“
Your attempts at comforting him are cut somewhat short when he disperses into an odd flicker and the door slams behind him.
And then there were three.
“Roxy.” Jane says sternly.
“Jaaane,” Roxy sighs.
“Drat!” you hiss, psyching yourself up, and barrel after him.
Strider hasn’t gotten too far in the minute since he left, which is lucky for you as he’s striding at full-speed away from the house, and you’re no sprinter. You jog after him, calling out his name, but he doesn’t acknowledge you at all.
When you finally catch up, you grab his arm and turn him towards you, panting slightly. “Chap? Are you alright?”
“No,” Dirk tells you flatly. “Since you apparently can’t muster up a shred of critical analysis to interpret the tragically overt implications of me slamming a door in your face and then running away, I am not alright.”
“Oh.”
“Is that all?”
“No,” you tell him firmly, tightening your grip on his wrist. It’s sharp, a bracelet of bones, and he’s so indestructible and so fragile, all at once. “No, love, what’s going on?”
“You tell me,” he dismisses.
“Dirk.”
He takes advantage of your distraction to try and rip his arm from your hand, but you automatically clench down and he hisses through his teeth instead. “f*ck!”
“sh*t,” you release him immediately, then pick his wrist right back up again to inspect it. “Oh, hellabeluga, did I hurt you? I’m so sorry, pet, I didn’t mean to.”
“It’s fine,” Dirk mutters. When he pulls away this time, you let him. God, you are the sh*ttiest friend known to mankind. Or womankind, or trollkind, or- “Just. I’m going.”
The notable absence of ‘home’ from that last sentence is enough to make you worry. Gingerly, you reach for his shoulder. “Chap, I really-“
He turns again, this time with the force of a hell-f*cking hurricane behind him. There’s something exceptionally dangerous about the way Dirk holds himself when he’s ready for a fight - and you know he’s not going to attack you physically, but you brace nonetheless.
“You want to know what’s going on?” He grits out. “Those two- they think we’re-“
Strider gestures between the two of you significantly, seeming to mistake your incomprehension at the severity of his reaction for incomprehension of the situation at large.
“I know what they think,” you say blankly. “Who cares?”
If Dirk burned any hotter with rage, he’d be a bloody human candle. “Who cares?”
“Yes, who cares,” you tell him. “We know we’re f*cking, they think we’re f*cking. Who cares? The details of our relationship aren’t really anyone else’s business, anyway.”
“They don’t think we’re f*cking, you unbelievable asshat!” He gestures wildly for a second, incoherent, then drops his hands down. “Jesus. They think we’re dating.”
You freeze for a second. Here it is, English, moment of truth: it’s time to dance through this minefield like it’s the opening night of a balletic opera.
Even your monologue is starting to sound a little like him.
“Same difference?” You try.
He laughs hoarsely. “It’s really, really not.”
“Dirk,” you try. “It’s okay. We’re not, and they’ll get bored soon. Again, who really cares? It’s not going to change anything between us.”
“Maybe I care,” Dirk mutters.
You sigh, resting your hand on his shoulder. “Then I’m sorry, chap. I know it’s awkward, and probably brings you back to an unpleasant time where I acted like a thoughtless oaf. I imagine they’ll get bored, soon.”
“It’s not awkward,” your best chum says thickly. “It’s not- f*ck, it’s not awkward. Maybe I don’t want people thinking that, okay? Maybe I don’t want all of our friends and their f*cking friends assuming we’re together.”
Right. A lead weight settles in your chest. He tried that, and he absolutely doesn’t want a repeat. Doesn’t even want people thinking that.
“So you’re upset they think you’re my boyfriend?”
“f*ck it.” Dirk slumps, taking a step backwards. His arms are wrapped around himself, and he’s swaying slightly, and there’s this odd tension to him as he starts to speak. You’re unaccountably terrified. “No, man, I’m not upset they think you’re my boyfriend. I’m upset that they’re wrong.”
“What?”
“I’m upset they’re wrong,” he repeats, so quiet you almost don’t hear it through the wind, let alone understand it. “I want- f*ck. English, you know I love you, right?”
Despite the confusing, distressing situation, affection melts through you. You step closer, touched. “Well. I love you too, Strider, our manly camaraderie knows no bounds.”
“No,” Dirk says, strangled. “You know I- I’m in love with you, right?”
Startled, you crane your head to take in his expression. “What? Like, romantically?”
“Yeah,” he confirms, like he’s admitting to murder.
Your heart starts to pulse like a f*cking police siren. “I- What?”
Strider winces, hands clenched at his sides. He only does that when he’s losing his sh*t, so to speak, and he’s doing it hard enough to hurt, and you don’t understand but you don’t think he’s lying-
“I don’t understand,” you whisper.
He stares at you with those clear whiskey-coloured eyes, and you can’t look away. “They think you’re my boyfriend. I wish you were my boyfriend. f*ck, sometimes I think you think you’re my boyfriend, English.”
“What?”
“You-“ Dirk’s face twists, and you realise with horror that he’s near tears again. You really, really doubt you’ll be any help this time. “It’s just meant to be f*cking, isn’t it? It’s probably really f*cking tragic that I read into it, but you know this isn’t normal, right?”
“I don’t- None of us are normal,” you manage.
“Yeah,” he says, bitter as the battery-acid coffee he drinks when he’s on day three of a weeklong all-nighter. “Yeah, no sh*t. Listen, you knew I was a clingy creep when you moved in with me, so let’s call it quits, okay? Please?”
The ground is tilting under your feet. “What?” You parrot helplessly. “Dirk, what are you talking about?”
When he looks at you again, Dirk’s expression is tired and sardonic - the face of a self-fulfilling prophecy, of someone who knew all along that it would go wrong, and you recognise it because it’s just how he looked when he broke up with you that first time.
“No, chap, come on-“
“I thought I could handle it,” he tells you simply. “Because I’m a pathetic self-indulgent idiot, I thought this might be enough. And you know, the sex I can handle. But Jake, you just- you treat me like your boyfriend.”
You shake your head automatically. You don’t treat him like a boyfriend, you treat him like Dirk.
He laughs humourlessly. “You do, man. Pet names and lending me clothes and giving a sh*t about my mental health and all that good stuff. But you know what? f*ck that. You don’t get to be my boyfriend unless you’re actually my boyfriend, okay?”
“I don’t-“
Dirk sighs. “I know you don’t. So it’s over, okay? My bad, no harm, no foul. It’s the same story: I thought I was in control, and then I f*cked everything up with the only man I’ve ever loved.”
You stop trying to make words and just gape instead.
“I’m really sorry,” he continues, scrubbing a hand over his face. “I’m really f*cking sorry, man. There aren’t words enough in the Bible to convey how deeply apologetic I am for making you take another ride on the Strider carousel of mindf*ckery.”
You goggle.
“Just- f*ck. Just one thing, I know it’s sh*tty, but- can we. Can we still be friends, please?” Strider asks, voice wobbling like unset gelatin. “I. I like you. In friend ways. I’ll get over this sh*t, please don’t avoid me forever. Please.”
“I wouldn’t do that,” you manage to croak. “I- I don’t-“
“Okay,” he says, tremulously. “Right. Bye.”
And before you can even ask where he’s going, Strider’s flickering off again to god-knows-where.
You stand and gape in the rain so long, Roxy comes out and pats you awkwardly on the back.
“He’s a complicated dude, you know?” She smiles. “But he knows you love him, and that’s what matters.”
“I don’t think he does,” you reply vaguely, and then with growing urgency, “Roxy, f*ck, I think he’s in love with me.”
“Yeah?”
“And we were just- we weren’t- we were friends who had sex and conversations and we weren’t dating.”
“…Oh sh*t,” Roxy says, with gravitas. Then she smacks your shoulder.
“Ow!”
“Are you kidding me?”
You’re terrified that he’ll already be gone by the time you get to your house, even with Roxy using her… odd void stuff. She can steal speed from nothing, but you’re not sure there’s speed enough to fix this situation.
His shoes aren’t by the door. You panic for a second, thinking he’s gone, then hear footsteps upstairs and realise he’s in such a rush, he’s willing to track dirt into his room. That’s no comfort - Dirk is, above all else, an absolute menace when it comes to cleanliness. In fact, his willingness to live with you despite your habitual griminess is suspect, now you think about it.
You don’t want to think about it - why he’s stayed despite your differences, why he puts up with you. You really don’t want to think about whether you’ve been taking advantage of him, this whole bloody time.
Instead, you tear upstairs. You can tell he hears you coming, but there’s not much that can stop you when you’re on a mission.
“Dirk,” you say, with a sort of desperation you can’t describe.
He’s facing away from you, his posture rigid as he leans over his closet, and he’s packing, oh god oh no.
“Dirk!” You repeat, uncomfortably plaintive. “Dirk, I…”
Dirk stiffens and turns to meet you like you’re his maker. “Jake.”
“You’re not-“ you choke on the barrage of words vying at your throat, breathless and twitchy. “You’re packing?”
Strider looks away, tossing some metallic gizmo into his bag. “I’m gonna stay with Dave for a while,” he tells you dully. “Figured I’d just get the f*ck out of your hair for once.”
“What?”
“It’s cool, dude, believe it or not, I can tell when someone wants to be f*cking miles away from me. It’s fine. I’m out, it’s cool, no worries, no foul-“
“What the bloody dickens are you talking about?” You exclaim, and he winces.
“You don’t need me hanging round, creeping you out, man,” Dirk mutters, refusing to look at you. “We both need me to get the hell out of dodge before this goes tit*-up. More than it already has.”
“But-“ you gape at him, dread tugging at your spine. Because this is his choice, and you aren’t meant to raise snakes or push back, even if it feels like your ribcage is splitting down the middle. You never do. “I- Well, I guess if you’re sure, pal….”
The pause you leave throbs with potential, your ears straining and eyes burning as you beg him silently to disagree, but all he does is nod grimly.
There’s not much you can do with that.
Dirk takes long enough rummaging upstairs that you have time to sit in your kitchen, shaking with distress, and gulp absently at the cold tea you left on the counter this morning. Dirk’s leaving. Dirk’s everything, and he’s leaving, and you’re suddenly back on the island with your grandma’s body long dispersed to the winds, and you can’t let this happen, you just can’t. If Dirk leaves now, everything you’ve built will crumble, and you’ve got a hideous sinking feeling it won’t be retrievable again.
Strider twitches when you go wavering through his door a second time, but his face remains in steel-smooth default state. He doesn’t say anything, even when you wobble over to him, even when you’re just standing above him as he mechanically organises his possessions.
He looks up when you speak, though, shades slipping down his nose with how fast he raises his head. “What?”
“I said,” you repeat, voice trembling, “What would being your boyfriend entail?”
Dirk’s whole face, slack with complete surprise, twists in on itself in misery. “Jesus, Jake,” he says softly, sitting back on his hands as he stares at you. “No.”
“No?”
“No,” he repeats, shaking his head. “No, you’re not gonna force yourself into this sh*t for me. I’m a big boy, I can handle rejection, I just-“
“Answer the question,” you whisper.
His jaw tenses. “Jake, there’s no point-“
“Please!”
“It entails liking me,” Strider snaps abruptly, then covers his face and hisses through his teeth like a wounded animal. “f*ck. It means screwing me because you like me, not ‘cause I’m here and willing.”
“I do like you,” you say blankly. “I like you a lot.”
“Yeah, but not-“ he sighs. “Not how I want.”
“How do you know?”
“sh*t, Jake, I just- do you even like guys, really?” He mumbles, raking a hand through his hair.
You goggle at him in disbelief. “Excuse me?”
“I know you’re-“
“Yes, I bloody f*cking like guys! I’ve been turning the old screw with you for a month, at this point, and that’s what you’re worried about?”
Dirk’s words quiver with restrained emotion. “How do you really know you do? What if I made you think that? What if I did what I always f*cking do, and weaselled my stupid awful fingers straight into your brain like a doctor probing for lumps, and what if I convinced you-“
“Oh, piss off,” you tell him abruptly. “I know you’re rather the reigning emperor of self-pitying conjecture, but that takes the damn cake, Strider. I’m not a plastic doll, you absolute muppet, and I’m more than capable of making my own decisions-“
“You want me to stay,” he points out, voice thick. “I made you dependent on me so you’d want me to-“
“You didn’t make me want anything! I just like you, is that so hard to believe?” you demand.
Dirk’s mouth shuts with a snap, and you realise suddenly just how close you are. Your shoulders slump just as his hand, gesturing in the air, falls; you sweep forward and yank him into a hug, shaking like a f*cking ammeter.
“You’re an idiot,” you say fiercely, “But you’re my best- well, you’re you. And I don’t want you to go anywhere.”
He pulls back just a fraction to stare at you, eyes wet and mouth slightly open. For a long, crystalline moment, you stare at him and he stares at you and the rest of the world is completely irrelevant; then he deflates like a pipe dream, beautiful even when you’re currently in a worst-case scenario, and you’re leaning in to catch his mouth with your own without even thinking about it.
His lips are warm and chapped, a faint coppery tang lingering - he’s been biting them nervously again. You rest your forehead against his, heart pounding, and go about doing what you know.
Dirk freezes long enough to ice your blood, then suddenly he’s letting out a strange hiccupy noise and bodily throwing himself into you. You clutch him back, so tight you’d normally be afraid of hurting him, and then you’re colliding on his bedroom floor and there are f*cking flames lapping through you as his hands map out every bloody inch of your body.
You open your mouth to say something, probably his name, before his tongue licks into your mouth and ruins any semblance of thought in your head. Groaning, you roll over him, his fingers raking wildly through your hair, and send your hands disappearing up his tank top, fever-hot against the cool hidden skin of his torso.
“f*ck!” He arches and hisses like a wildcat when your teeth scrape roughly at his throat, bruising pale delicate skin, and claws your shirt up until your chest is exposed. You make your way down, biting his collarbone, taking a nipple into your mouth and sucking until he keens. “f*ck, Jake-“
You think you’ve won, whatever it is you’re competing at, but a moment later Dirk’s back on top; he flips you and plants his weight firmly over your centre of gravity, his mile-long legs locking your hips down and his teeth clicking hard against yours. Your arms slide down to circle his waist, hands on his ass, and he’s squirming around in your lap like he’s dying and you’re dying too and-
“sh*t!” Dirk rears backwards, panting, shaking his head. “Stop.”
You still in the act of reaching for him. “Dirk?”
He stares at you, eyes so dilated you can barely see the iris, then jerks his stare away. “We can’t do this.”
“What?”
“This,” he says abruptly, gesturing between you, with your shirt hiked up to your collarbone, dazed and f*ck-crazy, and him, absolutely f*cking debauched and completely irresistible. “I can’t keep doing this.”
“You-“ you stop, punched in the gut by sudden guilt. “You don’t like it? Oh, god, Dirk-“
“I- Calm down, English,” he tells you, still heaving for breath. “It’s not, it’s not that I don’t like it, it’s just. I can’t- It’s bad for me.”
“Oh,” you say, and lay your hands safely down on the floor. “Why?”
Dirk lets out a deep, reluctant breath. “I’m in love with you,” he says, “full f*cking doki-dokis, man, I’m completely ass-over-teakettle, and I can’t- f*ck, Jake, I can’t keep screwing with my own head. Every time this happens, I let myself think it means something, and I can’t keep doing that.”
You can’t think of a single response to that.
“Either we’re dating, or we’re not,” he finally continues, sitting back on his knees. “I can’t be your friend who you f*ck and kiss and look after, bro, I can’t handle this. It works for some people, but let’s be real here, I knew I’d f*ck this up.”
He gives you a courteous second, heavy and tense, to interrupt or contradict him. All you can do is stare. Apparently understanding your reaction, Dirk sighs again and shifts off your lap, leaving you bereft and useless.
You’re back to square one; Strider stands and turns back to his closet, the fine set of his shoulders tight and defensive. “I told you, English, we both need me to hit the road for a while. It’s supremely chill of you to be taking this so well, but-“
“Don’t go,” you mumble, and he stalls in place.
“Jake…”
“Please,” you say, standing as well, putting every iota of longing you’ve ever felt into your voice.
“Jake,” Dirk repeats, a thin pitchy hysteria rising in his tone. “Jake, I need to get out for a while. I need to go and I need to try to get over you, dude. I don’t know if I even can, but I know I can’t when you’re here and you’re everything I like about you.”
“But isn’t that a good thing? If I’m not irritating you?”
He laughs like his lungs are bleeding. “Not if I’m trying not to be in love with you.”
You open your mouth to ask why he wants to not be in love with you so badly, and then shut it immediately, appalled at yourself. You’re a monster, you’re a selfish rake and an awful friend, and you don’t deserve Dirk’s constant affection for you. You can’t give him what he wants, because that’s romance and romance ruins everything, but you want him anyway. You want him so, so badly. You want to keep him here, safe in your little bubble, and you want him to keep kissing you and looking at you like he thinks you built the stars, and you don’t want him to leave you alone.
“Please don’t go,” you whisper, approaching him slowly. He gets tenser with every step, but he doesn’t move, and then your arms are wrapping around him, pulling his back flush with your chest, and you’re begging him, “Sweetheart, don’t go.”
Strider doesn’t immediately refuse, which is when you know you’ve got him snared. It’s an equal stab of crushing guilt and reluctant joy, followed by another pulse of hideous self-loathing when you realise you’re getting some sick gratification out of this. If you were a good friend, you’d tell him to leave, but…
“Stay here with me,” you breathe, lips brushing the side of his neck as you coil around him like a venomous snake, and Dirk’s breath stutters.
“…you want me to stay?”
“I need you to stay,” you tighten your grip, inhale the machine-oil-and-amber scent of him, and your heart thrashes in your ribcage like a trapped animal. Your boner is pressing awkwardly into his ass, but you barely even notice, too occupied with how his teeth are worrying his lip and the conflict you can see in the sliver of his eyes behind shades. “Don’t leave, please, Dirk. Stay. I need you.”
He lets out his breath in one fell swoop, the fight going out of him as he falls limp against you. “Fine. Whatever, man. Your funeral.”
“As long as you’re there,” you say, and it sounds like a joke, but there’s an undercurrent of truth to it.
“I meant what I said,” Dirk tells you, even as he’s stretching out the long ivory expanse of his neck for your lips to trace more easily. “We can’t- no more ‘turning the old screws’ or whatever you call it over in the 1930s. It’s going to f*ck everything up, otherwise.”
“That’s okay,” you kiss that spot behind his ear, voice husky from all the talking, and he trembles, face aflame. “That’s- mn- whatever you want, chap.”
“I want you to toss me on the floor and f*ck me ’til I can’t think,” Strider admits, swaying back against you. You hesitate on the spot, hot and cold by measure. “But I need you to go put more clothing on before I do something I regret. Also a cold shower.”
Well, that’s that, then. You nod reluctantly, shuffling back while you have the willpower, and tug your shirt back down over your chest. Dirk turns around and averts his eyes until you’re semi-decent, still glowing the most tantalising rose colour. “Sorry.”
“It’s fine,” he mutters. It sounds like a lie. “Seriously, dude. Not like you’ll find it hard to get laid elsewhere.”
You don’t like that, but there’s a bone-deep weariness building up in your joints. You take the loss and push your hair out of your face, sighing.
“You need a haircut,” Strider comments absently.
“I know.” Before he can change the subject, you clear your throat and step in. “Dirk, not to- not to push you any further than you’re willing to go, or any such malarkey, just-“
“What?” He cuts in, wary.
“May I kiss you again?” You ask. His eyes widen. “You can say no! Just. One for the road. If you don’t mind.”
“You’re going to f*cking kill me, English,” Dirk mumbles under his breath. You start formulating an apology in your head, but then he’s got both hands cupping your face and he’s tilting it up to meet his. Tall bastard. It’s… you don’t even know how to describe it, now you know you won’t get another chance. It’s just f*cking lovely, like nothing else you can think of.
Strider lets you kiss him hungrily, quiet and desperate, for a good long while before he finally steps away. You certainly weren’t going to be the one to break it; it’s only been two seconds and you already feel like life is pointless without your best friend’s thin, clever mouth on yours. Still, you’re attempting to preserve a shred of your dignity, here, so you pull away when he does and hold back any plaintive noises.
“Cool,” Dirk manages, face red and hair mussed to hell and back. “I’ll just… unpack my sh*t, then.”
“Do you want a hand?”
“Jake…” he looks to the heavens then pointedly indicates his crotch, and you swallow hard. “No.”
“Oh! Okay, right, I catch your- drift, or, or whatever the phrase… bye,” you mangle, and flee.
Not an ideal outcome, you decide, hand around yourself in the icy cold shower. Speaking of, the space is big enough for two, you need to get Dirk in here one of these days - except, shoot, obviously those days are very much past.
Well, that took care of your boner, at least.
How do you go from friends to lovers to exes to friends to f*ckbuddies to this? You’re stuck somewhere between friends and exes and it’s goddamn excruciating. It doesn’t help that the chaotic awfulness of that conversation, the complex knot of guilt dragging at your ankles, does absolutely f*ck-all to stop you panting after him. He’s just unfairly handsome, you’ve always known it, and now you’re expected to simply forget.
You burn when his shirt slips down his shoulder, revealing a delicate stretch of tragically unblemished skin; you ache when he stretches, and the little divots at the small of his back are briefly exposed. You suffer when he’s slouched over his coffee - neither of you can bear to look at the thrice-damned tea, let alone touch it - when his nose crinkles in concentration, when he’s sat wide-legged on the couch and you can practically trace your own shape in between his thighs. Dirk is extremely desirable in everything he does, and you live with him, so you’re not exactly moving on well.
He’s gone into full shutdown. You can’t tell whether your abysmal behaviour’s helped him get over his inexplicable attraction to you or whether he’s just being very careful with hiding it, but half the time, he’s checked out and distant. And you even find it frustrating when he slips up - when you can feel his eyes land on your ass, your arms, your chest when you forget your shirt, which is often because you’d gotten used to that being a good thing. Dirk always flushes and stares when you forgo your upper-vestments, and that hasn’t changed, but now it just makes him look miserable. You overhear him muffle your name in the shower once, and almost burst in to save him from presumed drowning/catburglars before you cotton on.
To be fair to him, your response to that is to sink down on your bedroom floor, face buried in one of his shirts, and yank your crank frantically to the thought of him wet and naked and wanting you. And that’s the frustrating part; he wants you. He does. You don’t know if he still thinks he loves you - God knows he could do better - but you know he wants you. And you want him. But your friendship is more important, but you want him so bad, but your friendship, but-
The worst part is when you start dreaming about him. It’s to be expected, you suppose, because Dirk is one of the only two people you’ve ever been genuinely sexually attracted to, and frankly you doubt the authenticity of your lust towards the blue spider troll very much. What you felt for her, regardless, is f*cking flimflam next to your Strider fixation - you imagine him in just about every position possible, sighing or panting or screaming your name, and wake up to embarrassingly sticky sheets. That’s not the hardest thing, though. The really dreadful dreams are the ones where his head is on your lap or you’re curled up in bed together, tea mugs in hand, and instead of waking up in a puddle of your own bodily fluids, you wake up feeling like a rib’s pierced your heart.
There’s the true rub of the situation: you haven’t just lost the sex, you’ve lost the casual intimacy that the two of you once shared. Dirk never touches you if he can help it. He sits a foot away from you when you watch TV together. He switches sides of the kitchen when you enter. In the rare moments when you do forget the shattered glass between you, when you’re snickering together or playfully arguing, there always comes a moment when Dirk’s Strider-facade comes sliding down and he goes skulking off to his room.
It’s dreadful, because the reason this chasm exists is because you want to preserve your friendship, and yet at this point you’re barely interacting. Neither of you are feeling particularly social, either, so you’re both wound up like f*cking badminton shuttleco*cks bouncing off the walls. His elbow knocks into yours when he dodges you in the hall, and your knees feel weak. You think you may be going insane.
So when you finally muster the will to live, you leave the house with a mission. Maybe this is all a misunderstanding. Maybe you’re just sexually pent-up after acclimatising to regular rendezvous, like any young man, and maybe you just need an outlet. You’re going to find someone nice and attractive and uncomplicated, have sex with them, and then never see them again. Hopefully, it works.
It doesn’t work, possibly because you have no faith in it from the start. You have a surprisingly easy time picking up people, which is nice - you’d always assumed your unorthodox vernacular and isolated upbringing would hinder your flirtations, but luckily it’s not so. You’re rather regretting that, now, because it means the only flaw in your plan is yourself; namely, a pretty curvy brunette leans over and asks if you’d like to accompany her home, and you can’t even feign enthusiasm. She gives you a sympathetic peck on the cheek, like you’re an adorable puppy, and rejoins her friends. This happens multiple times, most notably when you’re attempting to engage in a little necking with a very attractive vampire lady, who has you firmly bracketed to the wall with her magnificent décolletage. She’s beautiful like statues of terrifying Greek goddesses are, and she clearly knows what she’s doing, so you let her take the helm. It goes fine until she smoothly insinuates her leg between yours and finds you about as disinterested as physically possible.
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s cool, kid. Is it a human thing? Like, the gender sh*t?”
You smack your head back against the hard surface and sigh piteously. “No. I wish! That was a very easy crisis to get over, relatively speaking.”
The seductive vamp - literally and figuratively - leans against the wall and raises an eyebrow, looking genuinely intrigued. “Is that so? Tell me about it.”
You squint.
“I’m fascinated by human anthropology,” she shrugs.
“Oh. Well, I had a whole thing about whether I was genuinely attracted to both or if I was just extremely lonely and in possession of attachment issues,” you explain. “Turns out it was both! But yes, my doubts only lasted so long, and then I kissed a guy and went, oh, right, I’m as queer as the day is long.”
“Mm,” the vampire says.
“It’s not you,” you tell her wistfully. “You’re absolutely radiant, really, it’s just- I’m trying to get over something.”
“Oh,” she folds her arms and gives you a very sharp, wry grin. “Unrequited flush, right? It’s a bitch.”
“No, not really, just… kind of? The only person I’ve ever felt, um - I guess you’d call it flush - for, he’s in love with me. But we already did the whole dating - matespritship - shebang, and it was just an absolutely kerfuffle. I’m not all that interested in romance, anymore.”
“Huh.” The vampire twirls a strand of hair around her talon, considering. “So you feel guilty screwing around, or something? Sugargrub, that’s not gonna help anyone.”
“No, well. He’s the only one I really…” You blush, struggling to maintain eye contact, and accidentally stare directly down her cleavage in your attempt to avoid her piercing gaze. In your defence, she’s a head taller than you, it’s basically eye level. “Oh Jesus, sorry-“
“It’s fine, if it wasn’t you’d know about it,” she grins, golden piercings glinting in a pale face, and offers you her hand. “Listen. I’m Porrim Maryam, I’m bored, and I’m buying you a drink.”
You stumble home unravished but slightly more at peace with yourself, black lipstick spelling out a number on your arm.
Dirk takes one look at you and vanishes to his room. You don’t see him for days.
Eventually, your friends grow worried enough to intervene. You think Jane still has Roxy firmly in the doghouse, but John and Jade show up out of the blue, without rhyme or reason, and spirit you over to the Harley hive.
You wind up sitting at their table, laughing nervously. “Well, uh, been a while, eh?”
“This is an intervention,” John says casually. “Jade, you got his stuff, right?”
“Excuse me?”
“Yep!” Jade confirms, scrolling through her texts. She turns her eyes on you and smiles. “You’re gonna be staying with us for a few days, Pops!”
“What?” Your spine straightens abruptly. “Why on Earth - I bloody well won’t, thank you! This is not the way to ask, at all.”
“You raised her,” John shrugs and leans back in his chair. “Okay, but you kinda are staying. Sorry.”
You try to stand up, only to realise the air around your legs is trapping you in place. “John! This is literal kidnapping!”
“Why don’t you want to?” Jade asks. “Come on, it’ll be fun, why not?”
You boggle.
“Because I have a life! And no inclination to reward this fruitcake behaviour!”
“Too bad, this is still an intervention,” she dismisses. “You and your f*ckbuddy are way too wrapped up in eachother, okay? You look two steps away from losing your sh*t and pissing on your desk right now! It’s dumb.”
“True.”
“I don’t- oi!” You stare from one to the other, gobsmacked. “I don’t even know where to start.”
“Start with a few days,” John encourages. “Anyway, we already told Weeb Dave, so you’re kinda stuck.”
“I- What’s a weeb?”
Jade laughs uproariously, a slight canine husk in her voice, and pats your shoulder. You don’t think she means it to be hard enough to bruise, but geesus wilikins, the woman’s got a grip. “Sweet summer child!”
“Like, Dirk, you know?” John gestures vaguely. “Like Dave but pointier and with more sincere weird interests. Like a gay blonde ninja.”
“Dave’s also kinda gay,” Jade reminds him cheerfully.
“Yeah, but whatever. He said Egbert, I will get the worst sh*t on you from Dave. but Dave’s got nothing, so I told him it’s on. Unrelated, I’m gonna need more shaving cream.”
Your blood turns to ice. Right. Dirk. Dirk wanted space, maybe you should give it to him? Unless he thinks you’re running away from him, which is kinda fair, or that you’re angry at him, which is the furthest possible thing from true.
What if he’s relieved? The odds are reasonable that Strider’ll realise what a selfish hoon you are in your absence, and then he’ll never speak to you again. But what if that happens anyway, and you alienate all your friends by refusing to do a stupid intervention?
You don’t want to be alone. Maybe it’s better for the both of you that you just go along with this ridiculous scheme.
“Fine,” you concede reluctantly. “But I’m not going anywhere near your moirail, John, understand?”
He snorts. “Joke’s on you, my very epic and badass moirail doesn’t have time to improve you by association anyway!”
“Vriska’s up to shenanigans,” Jade explains, and you shudder. “Anyway, I want to do sleepover stuff! Braid my hair, Jake, and I’ll braid yours. Capisce?”
You stare at your beaming genetic-granddaughter and your snickering genetic-grandson, and sigh. “Oh, to hell with it. When in France, eat dessert first or something.”
It’s not terrible, staying with Jade. The oliveblood troll she’s seeing teaches you some anime terms - most disturbingly, you finally learn the meaning of ‘manbro bukkake theatre’ - and you get on well with John’s cat, a grumpy fluff goblin named Rambo. He claims it’s he and Vriska’s ‘moirail-lovechild’ which is absolutely the worst thing you’ve ever heard. All in all, you have fun and socialise, etcetera…
…And you loathe it with every fibre of your being, because you miss Strider so much it feels like you’re missing your own dratted reflection. You’re used to seeing him in the morning, bumping into him throughout the day, lazy comments and casual nudging. Even in this strange frosty ceasefire you have going on at current, you’re still comforted by his presence, the sheer human tangibility of him near you. The absence is not alike being dunked repeatedly in a dish of ice-water every time you think about him, which is roughly five times an hour.
The separation also offers some other unwelcome information: Maybe it’s just because they’re your relatives, but you realise quickly that Jade and John aren’t like Dirk. They’re just… other people. You don’t want to study them like you do your roommate, you don’t get needlessly distracted when they break routine or feel the urge to touch every sliver of exposed skin. In some ways, that’s a relief, because you’re not on sure how you could handle that overwhelming intensity in more than one person, but on the other hand-
Well, on the other hand, you’re suddenly and crushingly aware that your interest in Dirk isn’t just the natural curiosity of a socially stunted chap towards his peers. It’s something specific and dangerous and terrifying.
You are, to borrow a phrase, ‘screwed like a damn ham sandwich to the wall.’
Eventually, your ecto-relatives release you from dubious sleepover captivity. John gives you a firm handshake accentuated by a handful of shaving cream, and Jade accidentally slaps your back so hard you cough uncontrollably.
You wish you could say you felt reluctant to leave, but in truth, it’s all you can do to make your excuses before you make your way back home, panicking. John said Dirk was staying with Dave, or something of that nature, so you’ll be alone. You’ll be alone in Dirk’s home, though, which is infinitely preferable to companionship from outsiders.
That’s assuming he hasn’t just packed up everything in his room and left forever, brain cleansed of whatever bullsh*t you put there.
Bad thought. You swallow your heart back down your throat and open the door, more relieved than you should be to see familiar shoes lining the hallway, everything as it was. He’s still here, or at least he’s only gone temporarily.
As soon as you establish that fact, several days worth of repressed panicking hits you like a bullet train and your knees wobble. You lean against the wall, struggling for breath, then realise that the only thing you want right now is to see him. Bad idea. You just got in, come on chap, you should just go shower or something.
Instead, you go to his room, heart racing, and steal one of his shirts like a complete libertine. It smells like Strider, just the scent enough to have you swaying on the spot again, and you decide you can’t put it back. You’ll just say it got mixed up in your laundry if he asks.
Your scheme to retire to your room and rub your face all over one of Dirk’s shirts like a f*cking nutjob is foiled, decisively, by an unexpected figure on your bed.
You slip in, heart in your mouth, and-
-and oh holy martyrs, Dirk Strider is burrowed into your sheets like a lost animal, tangled and vulnerable and dreadfully, pitifully alone. His hair is all out of sorts and his face is ashen, tired, almost spectral. He’s the best thing you’ve ever seen.
You almost drop the shirt. “Dirk?”
Dirk lurches upwards, sees you, and recoils so hard he almost falls off the mattress. You swoop in to try to help but he flinches at your touch, and then you’re just standing there in the doorway, gaping.
“You’re back,” he says, eyes so wide they look like coins. “Oh.”
“Yes,” you reply slowly. “I… Jade said she texted you that I’d be returning?”
“Ha.” He chuckles, complete humourless, and curls his knees up. “You don’t exactly have the best track record for coming back, Jake.”
You sit down heavily on the bed.
He waits for a moment, then drops his gaze. “Sorry.”
“You’re not wrong,” you tell him, and he sighs.
“…You came back.”
“I didn’t want to be gone.”
“Sure,” Dirk says dully. “I bet they forced you at gunpoint to back slowly away from the controlling narcissistic douchewad you share a house with. Look, dude, I don’t blame you, you don’t have to lie-“
“I’m not lying- look, it was a bloody-f*cking intervention,” you cut in. “They didn’t exactly give me a choice.”
“Intervention?”
“They thought I needed to get out more,” you hedge, and he eyes you with clear disbelief. “And some, uh, other stuff, but that’s not important.”
Dirk tilts his head, bird-like. You haven’t seen him without his glasses for far too long; just a glimpse of burnt-honey amber and you’re fighting back all sorts of pathetic useless statements. “But you’re back.”
“It was complete misery, fellow, trust me when I say I’m glad to return.” I’m so unbelievably glad to see you, you don’t say. “Why, uh, why are you in here?”
He freezes. “No comment.”
“No-“
“Is that my shirt?” He asks, nodding to the fabric clutched in your sweaty little palm.
“What?”
Dirk’s eyes narrow. “That shirt. Is it mine?”
“Oh,” you laugh guiltily, ears aflame, and drop it down the side of your bed as fast as possible. “No. It’s mine. Why would I- it’s mine, chap.”
“It has horses on it.”
“Maybe I like horses!” You snap through a strained grin. “Pardon me, but I don’t recall you having a monopoly on furry single-toed mammals, chap.”
“…right,” Dirk says slowly, eyes not moving from your face. “Okay.”
“Alright.”
“Cool.”
“Fine.”
“Sick-“ he stops, rubbing at his face, and sighs. “f*ck. This is so stupid.”
“Um. Sorry?” You apologise weakly. “I can go.”
Go where, you don’t know. You’d just do anything to remove that excruciating look from his face.
“No,” Dirk drags his hands down again, groaning, and stares at you with bleary eyes.
“How long’s it been since you got some shut-eye, pal?” You feel compelled to ask.
The corner of his mouth turns up, joyless. “Too long.”
“Oh.” You shut your mouth around concern, pushing it down to a locked box in your lower belly. He said you weren’t allowed to worry about him, to take care of him. You can’t risk ruining this moment, the most sustained interaction you’ve had since the fight.
Dirk leans back on his elbows, gaze still locked on you, and sets his jaw. “You know what? I need a drink.”
“A drink?” You ask, startled. Strider’s far too much of a control freak for much inebriation, usually. “Of alcohol?”
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
“Because,” He sighs, shooting you a gossamer look, filmy and thin as an insect’s wing. “-Because I’m this f*cking close to throwing away the tattered remains of my mortal dignity and doing something incredibly stupid, and I want an excuse if I do.”
“Stupid?” You repeat, brain sluggish in his presence. “Wait, you mean… chap, you know I’d never take advantage of you when inebriated, don’t you?”
“I know,” Strider says archly, pushing himself up and vertical. “That’s why you’re drinking too.”
“I am?”
“Consider it an offer extended, bro.” He shrugs, a fluid twist of his shoulders, and a familiar heat starts to well up inside you.
Dirk passes you a beer on his way past - absolute swill, but you drink it anyway - and then continues on to his room, returning with a strange glass apparatus.
“What the devil is that?”
“I figured we’d need something stronger,” he tells you blandly. “You ever smoked weed before?”
You chew your lip, intrigued. “No,” you admit. “Can’t say I’m opposed, though.”
Strider makes his way back to your bed, only he’s moving slicker now, emboldened or loosened by alcohol. There’s something of a panther in his movements, the sleek power of his form - he’s a sliver of pure muscle, a machine made for efficiency.
You sip your beer and force yourself to look away.
“How are you with smoke?” your roommate asks.
“I grew up on a jungle island with all-natural energy resources, love,” you tell him, wincing at the slip.
“So not great.” Dirk finishes packing the - you don’t actually know what it’s called - pipe thing and returns his eyes to your face consideringly. “Have you heard of shotgunning?”
“Riding passenger in a car?”
He snorts, shifting towards you. “No, English. It just makes it easier to, uh, inhale.”
Dirk’s so close. You’re cross-legged and he’s close enough that he’s almost within the bow of your legs, close enough for his warmth to spread to you.
“Okay,” you agree blankly, even though you’ve not got the faintest clue what he’s suggesting. You trust him. You already feel high from sheer proximity. “Coolio, chum. Pal. Bud.”
He lowers his head over the mouth of the pipe and inhales, sighing. Smoke billows from his mouth; haloed and lovely, he’s a f*cking angel fallen on your bed. Within reach, still so very unreachable. “Cool.”
Then he starts coughing lowly, restrained.
“Have you done this before?” You raise a brow, intrigued.
Pink tints his face. “Not much, no. It’s- sometimes, it’s overwhelming. You get used to it eventually, though. Your turn.”
You eye the proffered device dubiously, trying not to let nerves show on your face. You get the terrible feeling that the two of you are speeding to a car crash, a danger hanging in the air, but. Well, when he looks at you like that - half challenge, half hope - you can’t refuse.
You breathe in deeply, feel something thick and toxic singe your lungs, and start choking so hard you almost lose balance.
“Jake?”
Dry-heaving, you gulp down beautiful sweet clean air and push the pipe away, grimacing. “That’s- that’s the most unpleasant horsesh*t I’ve ever encountered.”
Dirk favours you with a tiny half-inch grin, and your heart soars.
“Did I at least do it right?”
He pauses. “Uh. No. Sorry, man, you f*cked the scenery on that one.”
“What?”
“You coughed it everywhere. You need to keep it down if you want it to work.”
You stare at him, incredulous. “How the f*ck is anyone able to do that?”
Dirk shrugs and blows smoke at you. “‘S not that hard.”
Mournful, you glare at the pipe. “Isn’t this supposed to be relaxing?”
“You wanna try shotgunning?” He asks abruptly.
“What do I have to lose?” you mumble.
As it happens, more dignity than you’re entirely comfortable with. Dirk leans even closer, his hand coming up to angle your face right; his finger traces so bloody delicately over your lips, and a shiver ripples through you.
“Open your mouth,” he murmurs, and you do it without thinking. “Good.”
His thumb is still hovering over your mouth. You succumb to temptation and turn your head to catch it between your teeth - somewhere in your brain, you thought it’d be funny, but the reality is both visceral and terribly exposing.
Dirk’s pale complexion flames. Jerking on the spot, he stammers, eyes wide. “Wha- no, dude, not- uh, not that.”
“No?” You ask, and fail to resist the temptation to tease him with a flicker of tongue along his hot skin. He averts his eyes hurriedly, pulling his hand back. Ouch.
“Just- keep your mouth open, okay?”
“Okay, dov- Dirk.”
He takes another inhale, eyelashes flicking down as he focuses, then his hand is back on your face and tipping it towards him. You gape, nervous, as he brings his face to yours - is he really going to-
Your lips meet, and his breath is hot against yours, a smoky curl of the same singeing taste without the suffocating texture. You freeze, accepting but not taking, and then he’s gone again.
Not a kiss. Disappointment is wet coals in your chest.
“Breathe in, man,” Dirk’s voice is rough, abraded - from the smoke, probably. That’s the best answer for your peace of mind. “Jake. Breathe it in.”
You swallow and cough lightly, flustered. “Ah. Right, yes.”
“Better?” His knee is knocking against yours. You want to put your hand on it.
“Yeah. Much.”
“Again?”
You tingle. “Yes,” you reply, too eager. “I don’t- that is, I don’t feel any different.”
He takes you in, a familiar calculating sheen over his eyes. “You won’t, yet. It hits you when you don’t expect it. One more should be enough.”
You nod, unwilling to say anything when he’s swaying back towards you, like he’s compelled or magnetised or-
You manage to keep yourself obediently still for him when he exhales smoke into your mouth, but when Strider makes to move away, your hands fly up without your consent to hold him close. He’s as cold as ever, stiff as a board, but his arms still feel like your favourite place to be.
Odd thought.
“Jake?”
You rack your brain for an excuse. “…I think maybe one more wouldn’t hurt.”
“If you take too much, it won’t be pleasant,” Dirk says lowly, but his eyes are fixed on your mouth. You twitch under the heat of his stare, simultaneously uncomfortable and euphoric, and lick your bottom lip nervously.
“I can handle it, chap.”
“Can you?”
“I’m not so weak and delicate as you seem to think, love,” you murmur, unthinking, and agonise in the tiny hitch of his breath. He still won’t look away from your mouth, slightly parted and ready for him, and you can feel his stare like a physical weight.
Your clothing is starting to feel itchy and restrictive.
He measures his words carefully as he speaks, fidgeting the glassware under his hands. “You don’t think it’s too much to handle?”
“I am very capable of handling all manner of things,” you tell him in an arch tone, not even trying to pretend you’re still talking about weed, and he flushes darkly. Your fingers flex around his waist, just tight enough that he might have faint shadow-bruises in the morning. Dirk is always lovely in bruises. “Dirk.”
“…Okay,” he breathes out, eyes fixed on his knees. “Fine. Sure. You ready?”
“As a rooster, sweetheart.”
Dirk doesn’t acknowledge the marked looseness in your words, adjusting his glasses and pulling deep on the pipe. You stare at him, transfixed by his casual beauty: he’s a marble statue in motion, an old master smoking the devil’s dirt, and you’re finding yourself less and less willing to hide the hunger in your eyes. It’s becoming difficult to remember why you ever stopped.
He cuts off your thoughts with a delicate hand on your jaw, a last drag of the smoke on his breath; you accept it, breathe in nice and slow, and then strengthen your grip on his hips when he goes to move back.
“Jake?” Strider mutters, practically into your teeth with how close he is, and you snake forward to mouth along the curl of his jaw. “Oh-“
“You have the most gorgeous eyes,” you inform him, casual even as you’re slowly pushing him down under you. He doesn’t struggle, staring up at you with mile-wide eyes when you carefully remove his glasses, his face left open and surprised. “Do you know that?”
“Uh,” he blinks, ears scarlet. “Oh.”
“And lips. You have very nice lips, old pal.” You lick your own, imagining the taste of him on them. “Inviting, a fellow might be inclined to say.”
“Um…” Dirk swallows, a convulsive movement that brings attention to the long line of his throat and collarbones. You bring a hand up automatically, tracing out the filigree of his bird-bones, and he trembles like a leaf.
You fall a little too deep into the moment - Dirk has to cough, calling your name, before you snap back to reality and see that he’s held down by your weight, the comparative broadness of your palm starfished against his solar plexus. You blink, suddenly more lucid, and slide back.
“Ah. Sorry.”
He straightens up, fiddling with his hair self-consciously, and laughs a brittle laugh. “That’s- that’s fine, man. It’s hitting you, I guess.”
“No,” you feel compelled to contradict. “No, and, and yes, I suppose. But I wanted to do that anyway.”
“Oh?”
You can’t quite hold back a sliver of a grin - Strider tries to sound detached, urbane, but you can hear the lilt of interest in his tone. He wants to hear you say he’s beautiful, he wants to hear you wanting him.
He yelps when your hand slips back around his waist, yanking him to rest against your side. You’re clumsy right now, you realise; he doesn’t resist. “Dude-“
“Would you like me to tell you how beautiful you are?” You ask him genuinely, smiling the smile you know flusters him. He doesn’t disappoint: instead of fleeing back, reinforcing his strict, masoch*stic distance, Dirk freezes in place.
“What?”
“You do. And you are,” you tell him, stroking the tip of your finger up the fragment of exposed skin between hipbone and shirt. He flaps his hand, a flimsy excuse for dismissal, and you laugh a little. “You’re just- you’re immensely beautiful, chap. Quite the finest-crafted thing I’ve seen, you know?”
He gulps. “I have no, uh, no f*cking clue what you’re talking about?”
Oh, doesn’t he? The fabric of his trousers is starting to strain. Heat is spilling out of both of you, the curves of your sides clicking together like perfectly fitted magnets.
You turn your head and speak directly into his ear, knowing your lips are a hot brand against the icy cold of his skin. “You have hair like, um, like bally frost in the trees, chum, and eyes like the fire at the centre of a hearth. You’re a mess of willow limbs and- and lord, the most exquisite freckles. Do you know how many freckles you have?”
“N-“ Dirk pauses, shaking his head, as his voice squeaks. “No?”
“I’m going to figure it out,” you promise. “I’ll chronicle the broody- the bloody topographical map of your body, and then I’ll bally lay claim to it like the tyrants of yore.”
“Jesus Christ,” he whispers, almost soundless, but he’s leaning closer. “You won’t- that’s not f*cking possible, English, you can’t-“
Dirk yips again when you take his shoulder in hand and turn him firmly, your depth perception a little off but not enough to pose a challenge. When you place a tender hand on the back of his neck and push down, he makes a noise you’re certain you’re not supposed to have heard - a quiet breathless little sound, one certainly not of indignity. “What are you-“
“Expedition,” you announce, and hook your fingers under the thin black cloth of his shirt. He shifts uncomfortably but doesn’t protest when you send it up his back, exposing the knobbly dips and valleys of his back, but he does gasp when you press your lips to the very top of his spine.
“Jake, I don’t-“
“Hush, pretty thing,” you manage, entirely diverted by the star-spray of freckles along his milky skin. “You’re being admired.”
His laughter is a pleasantly textural hum, a vibration that travels through the particles that separate your mouth from his. You hate those particles. You’ll shoot them all. “That’s- you’re high, man.”
“You’re high in my esteem,” you retort playfully, and then bite mercilessly down on the flawless expanse of his scarred skin. Dirk, tellingly, doesn’t squawk or grunt - he sucks in a breath and goes abruptly still, tensing under your ministrations but not trying to stop you. You know what that means.
You take your time, whispering numbers to him as you trace out the patterns on his back, feeling that same glittering burn consolidate in your guts. You’re feeling warm inside, a furnace oven slowly heating, and Dirk is soft and pliable for you as artist’s clay. You could do anything.
You think he’d let you do anything, right now.
“Any freckles on your front, chum?” You ask, and your gentleman friend manages to croak a reply.
“You- you’ve seen me shirtless before, English-“
You hum thoughtfully, rubbing your face into the sensitive crook of his shoulder as he shivers. “I have, haven’t I?”
“And how.”
“Mm. I suppose you’ll have to remind me,” you say. You have a vague feeling that doesn’t make sense, but nothing between the two of you makes sense - after all, Dirk’s been acting like your touch is something contagious and unwanted, and now he’s leaning into your hands like a lonely cat. “Turn around, chap.”
“Why?”
You don’t give him an answer, just sit back. Quirking a brow, he follows the order almost immediately - hell’s f*cking bells, that’s a rush - and you waste no time in pushing him back down, pressing your lips to his belly and almost getting your f*cking head stuck up his shirt when it snags on your glasses. He squirms and chokes as you kiss your way up his abdomen and nip his hipbones, tiny helpless noises, and you continue your flimsy excuse: one freckle, two freckle, the feather-lines of his ribs, the peaked pink of his nipples.
You’re feeling unusually mischievous, now; instead of cutting to the chase, you breathe lightly over his chest and laugh huskily when his breathing stutters.
“Feeling sensitive, are we, plum?”
“I, ah-“
The first lap of your tongue against the tender flesh of his nipple is enough for him to arch his back and whimper, stopping a moment later in appalled self-disgust.
“sh*t, sorry-“
You lick down harder, pointed, and play him like a bloody instrument. You try to be gentle, but he’s there and he’s so pale, so unmarred, such a perfect canvas for your teeth and tongue: by the time you move away, his skin is swollen and ringed with the marks of careful bites, and Dirk is staring at you with glazed eyes.
You smile at him serenely. “What?”
That seems to jolt him out of his trance and back into reality; you frown when his eyes shatter like so much stained glass, arms coming up around his knees to hide the unavoidably prominent erection he’s sporting. “Nothing, dude-“
Sighing, you swat away his hands and place your fingers on his inner thighs, spreading them as gently as possible. He covers his face, but you won’t allow that either.
“Stop that.”
“Stop what?”
You slither between his legs and grasp each of his wrists firmly, pulling them down. Dirk’s crimson enough to paint a damn cardinal, pretty in his complete discomposure, and you don’t even try to stop yourself kissing him. He tastes like weed and beer and those disgusting gummy sweets you bought him; you only realise you’re grinding down against his painful hardness when he lets out another weak, desperate noise.
“What’s wrong?”
Strider stares at you, hazy. “You know.”
“What do you want, Dirk?” You ask him, voice hazy and distant.
“I want- I want you.”
You tug lightly on a strand of silver hair and make note of his pleased shudder. “How do you want?”
“I don’t know,” he mumbles, pushing up into your hand. “…your choice, English. Dealer picks the poison.”
You pause as arousal stabs through you, unexpectedly precise, your temporary squeeze of his wrist turning to a bone-grinding crush. “What?”
“I’m just- f*ckin’ use me, man. I offer myself up. Anything you want.”
“…okay,” you whisper, doing your best to ignore the rush of high-muzzy memories and feelings. “But what do you want?”
He bites his lip. “You tell me.”
“I want to f*ck you,” you tell him simply, and he squeezes his legs together and quakes. “You’re always gorgeous, but you’re bloody inconceivable when you’re on my co*ck, Strider.”
“Okay.” Dirk nods so fast his neck cracks. “Okay, okay, please? Please, yeah, come on. G-give me the business, man, show me-”
You raise an eyebrow, staring at the strain of his trousers. “Are you going to last that long?”
Dirk flushes impossibly harder. “I don’t-“
“You’re very sensitive, dove,” you say, knee grinding between his legs as you relish his stammering fluster, “I feel like if I just touched you the right way-“ your fingers dance down his skin, kneading and shocking him out of the dizzy high for a moment, “Or maybe breathed too close, you’d-“
“Jake, that’s- uh-” He hisses, trying to wriggle away from the overstimulation; your grip on his shoulder suddenly tightens, probably too hard, and then your roommate’s eyes are squeezing shut as he bites back a stream of curses and spasms under you like a beached whale. “Ah- hah- sh*t-“
“-Do that.” You tell him.
“f*ck,” Dirk manages, when he finally gets his breath back. “f*ck, English.”
“Are you sure you’re up to it?” You tease, leaning yourself down on an elbow over his panting body.
“You’re such an asshole,” he bites out, already hot under the collar again. “How do people think you’re so f*cking nice and naive, man, you’re the world’s biggest asshole-“
You grin and just take him in, the loose lazy fluidity of his joints post-org*sm. He blushes again when he sees you staring; you think you’ve frightened him into retreat, maybe, but the next second you’re pushed flat on your back and happy about it.
“Mfh?”
“You. You’re lucky you’re pretty,” Strider murmurs, pinning you down with his knees on either side of your hips. You imagine he’d look more threatening if he wasn’t still a dreamy-eyed mess, the sort of opponent one rather hopes to end up under.
You laugh, hands coming up to rest on his thighs. “Oh, am I?”
“Like you don’t know,” he dismisses, leaning down close to you with an open intensity in his eyes. “Jesus, English, you’re so f*cking gorgeous. It’s insane.”
Intrigued, you quirk a brow. You’ve been called good-looking before - you imagine everyone has - and you’ve certainly been objectified before, but you were always rather under the impression that Dirk’s attraction to you was largely motivated by a lack of options. You suppose you should’ve reconsidered that in light of recent events, but under the current soupy fog of your high, all that permeates through is a soft delight.
“Thank you,” you say earnestly, because how else do you reply to that? Dirk groans, hands pushing against your chest in the faintest approximation of a shove.
“Don’t do that.”
“What?”
“Smile. Look at me,” he mutters. “I don’t know. You’re so- f*ck, Jake, you’re driving me crazy.”
“Is this crazy?” You ask, and delicately buck your hips up against his. The flicker of stimulation is like kerosene to a match; suddenly aware of your own urgent arousal, you hum, chasing the sensation of his weight on your body.
Dirk gasps, using his grip on your chest to steady himself. “Ye- yeah. Don’t have a, a f*cking clue, man.”
“Then tell me?” You cajole, hands travelling up his thighs to the spiky vee of his hips. You have the vague feeling that it might be too tight, you might be hurting him - he’s seems so bloody fragile despite his incredible strength - but you can’t stop, can’t pause, and he’s writhing under your touch like you’re blowing his mind. “C’mon, partner, why not let me into that noggin of yours-“
Abruptly, your roommate shifts back, hands steady on your skin even as he breathes low and shaky. “Wait.”
“Alright?”
“I want-“ Dirk swallows, hard, then looks at you. “I want to take your shirt off.”
You nod, more than willing to oblige. His deft fingers make quick work of your buttons, and then he’s stripping the fabric from you with swift, calculated movements that suffer a little from how hard his hands are shaking.
“Was that all, pal?”
“Um.” He bites his lip, hard, and hovers his fingers over your bare chest. You’re broader than him, honey-brown to his milk-white, and he can’t seem to look away. “sh*t, man.”
He acts like he’s never done this before. Your voice curves with amusem*nt. “You know you can touch, right?”
He gulps. “Yeah.”
You wait another second. “…Dirk?”
“Uh huh.”
“Stop me if this is too much, but…” your hands close around his wrists, each big enough to circle them, and you guide his fingers to your skin. His eyes are wide, heart beating so fast you can feel it in his wrist, and part of you wants to laugh- but he looks so lovely, so reverent, you can’t quite manage it.
“Uh.” He manages, and you stifle an affectionate grin.
“Dirk,” you start gently, your own hands wrapping securely around his pointy waist. “Touch me.”
Strider stares straight at you for a second, mouth slack, and then flushes a magnificent carmine. “Say that again,” he demands, strangled.
“Touch me,” you repeat, playful. “I’m not going anywhere, sweetheart, you can take your time. I’m yours for the having.”
“God,” he says, shaky. “Jesus f*cking christ. Jake, you’re so f*cking pretty, it’s not fair. Look at- look at that.”
You glance down; his hands are spread along the bone and muscle of your shoulders, light as feathers in his tentativeness. “What?”
“You’re- I’ve been in- uh, wanted this for years,” Dirk whispers, and somewhere in your addled head something creaks. “I wouldn’t care what you looked like. But you’re a f*cking Adonis, man, you’re so beautiful it makes my teeth hurt - you’re the goddamn opposite of me in every way, and you’re perfect. How’s that for f*cking irony?”
You frown. “But you’re lovely, Strider. None of-“
He presses a finger to your lips, wild-eyed. “Don’t- just don’t-“
“But-“
“Don’t f*cking lie t-“
A moment later, he’s whipping that finger away as you bite down hard enough to startle him, rolling his resisting form back under you to bracket with limbs.
“I’m not going to,” you tell him hotly. “I’m going to tell you that you’re the most beautiful creature, and you’re the only man I’ve ever been- you’re the first one, and- you’re the only one I’ve done this with, alright?”
“Jake.” Dirk says, hollow and astonished. Head rushing, you lever yourself off of him, half-aroused, half-sick with a kind of protective anger. “Don’t- wait, I’m sorry, man, don’t stop.”
“It’s true,” you mumble. “You’re not- I thought this was just how it is, when you’re in close proximity to others. Wanting to touch them and to f*ck them and hold them and be with them all the time. But it’s not- other people are so overwhelming.”
“Didn’t you f*ck some lipstick goth?” He asks.
You flush darkly, face in your hands. “I- listen, she was very nice about it. But we didn’t- I didn’t want it, alright?”
His breath is on your neck. “Why not?”
Focus regained, you twist, catch him up in your arms, and press him, wriggling, back down into the sheets. “She wasn’t my, uh, type.”
“What’s your type?” Dirk breathes.
You answer with a kiss, the sort of kiss that ends movies and seems to last forever. If the blood in your ears wasn’t roaring so damn loud, you’re sure some swelling violin would have started - as it is, Strider groans and grips onto you, legs tangling.
“Are you going to f*ck me?” His voice is reedy, breathless. You pull away an inch to talk, get distracted by the sheer excellence of his body under yours, and swoop right back in again.
“Do you want that?”
(Whatever you want).
Dirk chokes out another moan, nails scratching your back as you return to his swanlike neck. “You- f*ck, English, you have no f*cking clue. Yes.”
“Then tell me,” you ask again, only this time it sounds like an order. He stiffens, but you don’t relent. “Tell me what you want, and I’ll just- I’ll give it to you as sweet as sweetness, whatever you’d like, plum.”
“I want you to f*ck me,” he tells you, quiet but determined. “Please.”
You pause, and even through the dizziness and the vague hilarity of the weed still swirling your thoughts, you can see a terrible sincerity in his eyes.
“Okay,” you say, hushed. “Okay, chap, no need to worry. I’ll look after you.”
Strider nods once, twice, then stumbles over to your bedside drawer. “Lube?” He asks, anguished.
“Other side.”
“Oh, thank f*ck.”
You snicker, running your hand up his back as he retrieves the bottle. “You couldn’t bear the thought of waiting two seconds for me to raid your dresser, sweetheart?”
“No,” Dirk replies firmly. “God, no.”
When you look up at him, standing with his clothing all mussed and his expression conflicted, fidgeting with the cap on a bottle of ‘extra-glide’ lube, your heart does a full acrobatic routine in your chest.
“Come here,” you say tenderly, and gesture him over to sit on your lap. He crawls awkwardly forwards, then lies himself down on his stomach.
“’S a better angle.”
You wrinkle your brow, concerned. “Did I hurt you last time, peach?”
His voice sounds thick. “No, just- trust me, this is good.”
“I want to see you.”
Dirk pauses a long moment, then rolls over, trying to affect nonchalance. Oh, he’s blushing, so soft and so delicate-
You get lost in kissing him again, sloppy and hungry and entirely mind-consuming, and only return to your task when he gets a hand between you and gently pushes your face away.
“Focus, bro."
“Right on!” You slide yourself over to admire his half-clad form, taking the time to finally remove his dark shirt in its entirety and begin to work down the waistband of his trousers. He shifts his hips up to help, determinedly avoiding eye contact, and between the two of you, you get his baggy black trousers off and flung far away.
“Okay, so- Jake?” Dirk’s voice squeaks hilariously when your lips brush his hipbone; he watches from above, wide-eyed, as you carefully tug his ruined underwear down with your teeth. "Oh god, what the f*ck are you doing?”
“I wanted to see if I could!”
He muffles a odd croaky noise into his hand, squirming when you squeeze his hips, and thrusts the lube towards your reaching fingers. “Your scientific curiosity is going to get in you in trouble one day, man.”
“Is that so?” You press your palm to his rather prominent erection and snort. “Not today, I suppose.”
“Asshole,” he repeats, pupils so wide they eat up his irises.
He’s not saying anything when you lean your weight down to lap along his dick with the sort of enthusiasm mostly observed in well-paying adult films. You’re only too satisfied, though - you’ve been longing to do this for him for a long time, touching yourself alone and knowing he was doing the same rooms away, and now you’ve got him naked and eager, you’re not squandering the chance.
For his part, Dirk lets out a tremulous warble and fists his hands in the sheets, eyes fluttering shut. “sh*t, Jake, give a guy some wuh-warning-“
You take him deep into your throat and send him big apologetic eyes, grinning mischievously when he rattles like a dying snake.
“Oh god. Jake. Jake, man-“ he babbling, now, one hand coming up to push lightly at your forehead as he rocks his hips, taken apart as always by growing pleasure. “Stop, you gotta-“
You pull off with an obscenely slick noise and place your hand on his shoulder. “Dirk? Oh, shoot, I didn’t mean to upset-“
He turns to you, a hint of hysteria in his eyes. “Don’t apologise,” he manages through deep breaths. “Never f*cking apologise for doing that, Jake, just- God, you’re so f*cking good at it, I forgot.”
“Perhaps I should remind you more often,” you suggest, and grin gleefully when certain parts of his anatomy visibly twitch.
“Stop,” Dirk tells you, tormented. “I want your dick in me, and I’m this f*cking close to going off like a f*cking rocket for the second time tonight. Shove your fingers up my ass, English, let’s get this show on the road.”
“Are you sure?” You ask. “I don’t mind, love. Seeing you is- well, any man would be quite content with such a view, believe you me.”
He pulls you in for a moment, lips against the shell of your ear, and emphasises, “I want you to f*ck me hard, man. You don’t know how f*cking bad I’ve needed it - fingers aren’t the same, you know?”
“You’ve been thinking about my dick,” you say, trying not to sound too smug. Dirk rolls his eyes, parting his legs eagerly for your hand as you trail a finger over his perineum.
“Yeah,” He sighs wheezily when your fingertip slowly pushes inside, even white teeth chewing his bottom lip. “f*ck, Jake, it’s- it feels better than my fingers, okay?”
“Is that so,” you repeat, circling your finger as he gasps and tenses. “Does that mean I’m better at getting you off than you are?”
It’s nice to be good at things.
Dirk sends you a flat stare. “I wouldn’t go that far-“
“I would,” you say cheerfully, and crook right where you remember he likes. Dirk hisses through his teeth, wincing, and hooks a leg over your hip; you smile, indulgent. “Don’t you agree?”
“See my comments re: asshole.”
“I feel there were tacit implications made!” In goes finger two, and Strider is so much melting butter in your hands. “Have you been thinking about this, plum?”
You can tell from the thoughtful stall in his breathing that he’s weighing his response - before he can respond, you introduce finger three and watch him forget how to speak in real time.
“I don’t- f*ck-sh*tf*ck-“
“Go on?”
“I, uh, f*ck-“ Dirk muffles a moan in his wrist, a quicksilver strand of hair sticking damply to his forehead. “Yeah, I’ve been- sh*t- thinking about this. Obviously.”
You twist your digits experimentally, and press another little kiss to his hipbone when he whimpers. “Is this what you think about, uh, when you touch yourself?”
One of his eyes, gold-fringed and lazy, opens to squint at you. You can see the very tip of his tongue gleam slickly from between his lips - your dick reminds you that you have approximately single-digits minutes until you explode from sheer violent arousal. “You r-really want to go there, English?”
“I don’t see why not,” you say, affecting normalcy, and then, quieter, “I think about you, you know?”
Strider’s eyes fly fully open as he pushes up on one elbow to gawk at you. “f*ck- f*cking excuse me?”
You studiously flex your fingers. “You seem ready to rumble-“
Cool hands cup your face, and there’s nothing in the world that could stop your gaze meeting his. “You think about me?” Your best friend says, almost like he’s touched as well as taken aback, and you blush a little yourself. “When you touch yourself, you think about me?”
“Well, you’re very good-looking!” You mutter defensively. “And you’re an absolute fiend in the bedroom, I don’t see what else I’m supposed to think of-“
A finger returns to covering your mouth; irritated, you raise a brow. Strider stares back with a shivering fervency.
“Shhh, English,” he demands- pleads, even. “f*ck, if you say one more word, I’m going to explode into a fine mist of my own bodily fluids. Please.”
Not breaking eye contact, you drag your tongue along the half-moon of his nail. He wobbles.
“…Yeah, I’m ready to rumble,” Dirk manages. “Locked and loaded, etc-“
He glares when you pull him into your lap, but you just smile unrepentantly. You have him, you’ve got Dirk Strider back in your bed, and if you’re going to f*ck him, it’ll be with his eyes on yours and his legs around your hips.
“…You’re-“ he gulps when you press up against him, fingers flexing on your shoulder. “You know you’re speaking out loud?”
“I don’t care,” you mumble, lips against his shoulder as you push slowly into him.
“How d-do you not, uh, care?” Strider hisses, nails scratching you pleasantly. He’s so f*cking tight, so hot and so very easy to gather up and press your mouth to, and you swear to god you’ll kiss every part of him one day. “Oh sh*t, I get wh-why people f*ck high so often-“
“I don’t care. You’re- you’re smarter than me, don’t you always- always know what I’m thinking?”
When Dirk pauses to chuckle, it sends both of you reeling with unknown sensation. “No- f*ck, ow, sh*t! - no, I have no f*cking clue what goes on in, in that pretty, ah, pretty head of yours, ‘specially now-“
“Mhm?”
“Fuh-f*cking the psycho gay friend never ends- it doesn’t end well,” he pants out, when he’s sunk always halfway down on you. You frown, hands running up and down his body.
“I don’t have any ‘psycho gay friends,’ sweetheart.”
“I’m gay,” he chokes on a groan when you thrust your hips up, but unfortunately continues his disturbing train of thought. “And you m-make me a f*cking psycho, Jake, what am- what am I even f*cking doing here?”
Mid-coitus is not the time for your heart to spontaneously combust. “What?”
Dirk shooshes you, flopping his arms around your neck and moving against you, this incredible wall of stimulation on your poor neglected dick that you can’t quite ignore. “It’s- it’s going to end so bad, Jake. f*ck, you’re so good-“
“I don’t,” you rock into him, unable to stop even as he’s straying dangerously close to a genuine confession. “I’m getting some, ah, mixed messages-“
“You’re so good, f*ck, Jake, you shouldn’t- I’m gonna burn you,” he mumbles. “This- I’ll f*ck us both up.”
“No, darling, it’s-“
You yelp as Dirk lands his hands on your chest and shoves, all strength and no grace. You fall backwards, catch yourself on your elbows, admire the sight of Dirk trembling above you, and then open your mouth to ask.
“Dirk-“
“Shh.” He plants a palm on either side of your head as he rides you, hips swivelling, complete chaos in his eyes. “f*ck, god, Jake…”
“Plum-”
“Tell me you love me,” Dirk demands abruptly, and you tense up all over.
“Pardon?”
“Tell me you love me,” he repeats, hypnotic, strange and wild as an albino snake, and even through the pleasant dizziness of intoxication you know this won’t end well. But he’s not even ordering, he’s pleading, and he’s perfect, and he feels so good-
-and you do love him, right now. You don’t know how to verbalise all the ways you feel about Dirk Strider, but you love him so badly it burns a hole in your chest. For once, that doesn’t feel like the death knell of your friendship.
So you hold him tighter and step towards the danger. “I love you.”
Dirk hiccups, wet-eyed. “Jake-“
“I love you,” you murmurs, pressing him into your chest like a startled animal, breathing the words more than you say them. “I love you, sweetheart, so much.”
“Mnghf*ckJake-“
“I love you so much it hurts,” you whisper, and he trembles like a leaf. “I’ve missed this- I’ve missed you so badly, Dirk.”
Strider half-sobs when he comes, a fragile papery thing, and you’re following him not long after. You wrap yourself up in him, bury your face in his neck and wind your arms along his waist, as much touching as possible, and pray through the ashy drowsiness consuming you that this won’t feel so tragic in the morning.
When the morning does come, you’re roused by the abrupt, startling noise of your best pal slamming his head into his hands and letting out a barely-restrained growl.
By the time you can muster the will to roll over and acknowledge reality, he’s up and almost gone. You make out the slim pale curve of one ankle, swivelling through the doorway, before Strider flits away again. Ephemeral, you think sleepily, and bury yourself back in your pillow before you can face the consequences of your actions.
“Morning, chap-“
“English.”
You gulp, only just having ventured down for food and already regretting it. Dirk’s wearing one of his all-encompassing hoodies, faded and worn, and a pair of old plaid pyjama trousers, and all you want in the world is to drape yourself into his side.
From the way he’s refusing to look at you, face set in rigid apathy, you have a feeling that you’re better off staying away. You’ve invaded his personal space quite enough already, haven’t you?
Ah, the feel of battery-acid guilt churning through your guts in the morning. Classic.
“Dirk,” you say gently.
“What.”
“About last-“
“No,” Dirk cuts in forbiddingly, still refusing to look up. His face remains blank, but his knuckles are white on the counter.
You blink. “No?”
“No,” he continues harshly. “No discussion. We were high and it was a mistake. It was a stupid, awful mistake, which is my f*cking specialty at this point, whoop de f*cking doo. I didn’t- just f*cking forget it, alright? It’s over.”
Torn, you swallow. He’s offering you an out. A way to move on without discussing what you did, what he said; worse, what you said - ‘I love you,’ kissed a thousand times into his skin as you held him afterward. Leave the emotions raw and unhealed but also blessedly unacknowledged.
“Alright,” you tell him reluctantly. “If that’s what you prefer…“
When you go to pat his shoulder, he finally sends you a look - head whipping around like an owl’s to send you a petrifying orange-eyed glare.
“If you touch me right now, I’ll break your fingers, English.”
And that’s a no, obviously. It’s so clearly, unambiguously, a rejection. He’s allowed those, you don’t want to touch him if it’ll make him uncomfortable. But for some reason, an odd awful part of you takes the threat in his words as a challenge, doesn’t even register the danger, so your hand keeps moving. You’re not scared. You should be, shouldn’t you?
You grip his shoulder lightly. He remains as still as a frozen lake, lip between his teeth. Red seeps into his ears.
It may be over, but your fingers stay unbroken.
It’s not over. It’s not nearly over. You f*ck on his desk and against the wall and in the shower and all over your bed, and every time, it’s all heat and barely verbal. Every bloody time, he treats it like a lapse in self control, and every f*cking time, he flees in the morning and won’t sleep for days after.
It’s … you’re not even sure how to properly articulate the incredible crushing misery of watching him punish himself with sleep deprivation and over-rigorous work, scribbling away at his schematics like he can wash you off his skin with enough productivity. It’s something like torture, not being allowed to help him; you bring him coffee once and he leaves it, untouched, until it’s ice-cold. You’re honestly surprised he didn’t just toss it at you.
You’re not exactly coping well either.
You barely spend time together anymore, except for the sex, and that’s always a lapse in self-control for you, too. It feels like taking advantage if you f*ck him, hurting him with almost-enough, but then it’s late at night and he’s drawling your name. Irresistible. Strider’s always been unstoppable when he wants something - it feels wrong until he’s on your lap and his mouth is an insistent heat on yours, when he’s pulling off his shirt in one clean movement and moaning like an p*rn star as you do the same. He’s always been the disciplined one, the one with self control and plans and mazes of checks and balances, and now you’re watching him go wild, rudderless.
Somewhere inside you, you know that if he’s only going to talk to you when he’s getting railed to hell and back, you’ll take it. You miss him. No matter what you do, you end up missing him.
So yes, if sex is the only thing tying to the two of you together now, you’ll take it. You and him get lost in one another, forget everything when the switch flips and the magnets change from repulsing to attracting; once, you both drink too much at a party hosted by Dave and Karkat’s, and end up pawing at eachother frantically in a room full of people.
“Mm,” Dirk kisses your ear, perched on your thigh like some kind of sexually enticing yet incredibly bony phoenix. Flame hair, flame eyes. Burning you constantly. “Lemme- lemme suck you off, dude.”
You play with the hem of his shirt, thumb stroking along his tailbone. “You want to?”
“I want to,” he confirms, husky and enthralling. “I wanna see you lose your mind ‘cause of me, English.”
Grinning, you squeeze his ass. “We’re in public, you shan’t- can’t suck me off, or I’ll- I’ll never be wed. Or suchlike.”
“Who cares?”
You groan when he presses his hand down on your boner, seriously considering it. “No, no, its- that’s private. No one gets to see you do that.”
“Except you?”
“Mm. Just me, love-“
He whimpers and plasters himself against you. “Let’s go- bathroom, or something, let’s- please?”
“Oh hell no,” a voice interjects before you can respond, and then you’re being forced firmly apart by a scowling Karkat, who is holding a spray bottle of water and looks ready to use it. “No, no, no. Not on my couch, not in my hive, not in this world- what is wrong with you people?”
“I kinda want to suck his dick, Vantas,” Dirk mumbles. “You get it. C’n you show us the bathroom?”
“I-“ Karkat takes one quick, sharp breath in, and then the very fury of the heavens rains down upon you. He insists on driving you both home, muttering angrily the whole time, and then frogmarches you to separate rooms with aspirin and bottled water in hand.
You later regain a confused memory of calling him ‘Papa’ and asking if you’re a good successor to the throne. He just sighs and pinches his nose bridge. It’s possible that you don’t deserve your truly excellent friends, terrifying though they may be.
Speaking of excellent friends, you end up bumping into one during one of you and Dirk’s now-rare expeditions together. Rose is having what she calls a ‘soirée’ and Jade calls a ‘wine and cheese art party,’ and no sooner are you in the door than you catch sight of a familiar face.
“Well, well,” Porrim says, resplendent in black leather and lace. “We meet again, green-eyes.”
“Ill met by moonlight, fair Titania!” You jest back, genuinely enthused.
She pulls a face and crosses her arms in a cacophony of clinking jewellery. “Cast no aspersions on my tit*, thank you. They’re foremost in my arsenal.”
“Second only to your devastating wit, I’m sure,” you rejoin, grinning. “Dirk, this is-“
You turn, only to see Dirk slam his way out of the room.
“Huh.”
“So that’s the guy, hm?” Porrim asks. “The one you’re f*cking who’s in human-love with you and wants your wrigglers?”
“I- Goodness no,” you say nervously. “I’m not even sure where to start with that. Well, firstly, two biological chaps generally don’t have eachother’s wrigglers, and I don’t- why do you ask?”
She sends you a sooty-eyed look. “Are you trying to tell me that wasn’t The Guy?”
You slump. “What gave it away?”
“Other than the look of withering fury he sent my cleavage?” Porrim inspects her deadly-sharp nails, smirking. “Maybe it’s a hunch. Or maybe it’s because you were all over him.”
“I was not!”
The vampire sends you a stare that says a thousand words.
“Perhaps I’m a touchy fellow.” You sniff.
She tilts her head back to laugh, hair falling in a glimmering dark waterfall over her shoulders. Somewhere in the distance, an unfortunate onlooker collides with a bookshelf. “Darling. That’s a lie. As far as I’ve seen, you get very antsy with too much closeness, even when you like the person.”
“He’s an old friend.”
“What about your other old friends?” Porrim inquires. “Roxy and… damn, I always forget the four-letter human names. Like Jaenne.”
“Jane,” you correct. “And I’m not very physical with them, but-“
“When was the last time you hugged a friend who wasn’t ambassador anger issues over there?”
She gestures and you look over, wincing, just in time to see a returning Dirk chomp savagely on a water cracker. There’s a thin scar on his wrist you’ve kissed a million times.
“He’s… socially anxious.” You clear your throat. “I’m not really a huggy fellow, you know?”
“And when was the last time you went, say, a day without touching the albino aggressor?”
You pause, flummoxed, when you realise you can’t actually remember.
“Look, your wordplay is honestly very witty and all, but-“ oh lord, Dirk is now sniping at some unassuming-looking troll. “Ah. I’d better run some interference over there, sorry. One sec!”
You can already hear his monotone hiss escalating to full vitriol. Dagnabbit.
“Listen, Crabcake or whatever your incomprehensibly stupid name is, if I wanted advice about my sexual habits from a whistleblowing douchenozzle with a voice like a cheese grater, I’d have f*cking asked for it.” Strider is honestly magnificent when he’s angry, and you get momentarily distracted. The troll, who is short and sweater-clad and bears an ominous resemblance to Karkat, sputters.
“Excuse me, I was only trying to advise that-“
“I don’t want advice-“
“Casual sexual relationships raise the chance of STIs and only lead to emotional dysfunction-“
Dirk throws up his hands in a rare display of public emotion. “How the f*ck would you know, man? Aren’t you like a monk?”
“I did take a chastity vow to remove myself from the unnecessary indulgences of carnal intimacy,” Krispy Kreme or whomever sniffs. “However, it is extremely problematic to insinuate I am any less qualified to speak on the matter than you. In fact-“
“Have you ever sucked dick?” Dirk asks him bluntly, and you watch with guilty satisfaction as the troll flushes crimson.
“Excuse me! Of c-course not, that’s-“
“Yeah, get back to me on the sex advice when you can talk about it without losing your sh*t like a f*cking thirteen year old. Asshole,” your pal finishes succinctly. He walks towards you, rolling his eyes as he leaves his opponent behind.
(You are. Oh boy. There’s a certain familiar heat oozing through you, spreading lava through your limbs).
“f*cking asshole,” Dirk mutters, and you realise you’re staring.
“Ah. Yes, seems so. Do you know him?”
He scoffs. “No. He just walked up to me, tried to give me a lecture on smiling more to avoid scaring people with my ‘unwelcoming apathy’ and then went into a whole speech on why promiscuity is the enemy of all good.”
“That’s bizarre,” you say, and then can’t resist adding, “I find your unwelcoming apathy very enticing, chap.”
Dirk does that thing where he simultaneously huffs out sincere laughter and sends you a look that’d corrupt a bishop. “Scandalous, English. You always know what to say.”
Your lips twitch up in response reflexively, a look that’s probably far too gentle and tender for the strained oddity your relationship’s becoming. Meanwhile, Dirk leans in a fraction closer, speaking in a hushed voice. “Is he still looking?”
You stifle a grin - Dirk’s good with a sword, yes, good with biting words, but other things elude him. Handling awkward staring without resorting to violence is not exactly in his wheelhouse.
“Yes,” you murmur back conversationally. “He looks somewhat torn between complete brain-bursting apoplexy and a hideous resilience.”
“No.”
You wince. “Unfortunately so. He’s moving closer-“
“Jake, can I-“ Dirk sighs. “For social reasons, and social reasons alone, would you be up for sloppy makeouts with me to disgust a puritan?”
Your tongue is in his mouth almost before he finishes his sentence.
Minutes later, you’re kneeling down between his legs in the secluded closet, one hand in your pants and one on his hip.
“Jake? f*ck-“
You take him all the way, work him as best you can, hints of teeth and teasing strokes of your tongue. This fantasy is what you touch yourself to constantly, so you find the pace easily - your fingers jerking around your co*ck to the rhythm of his hips, the bob of your throat as you relax the muscles and let him take his pleasure from you.
“Ohgod-“
Dirk smacks his head back against the wall, moaning helplessly, and you realise you’re dangerously close just from the view.
“No no don’t stop-“ he blurts when you move off for a moment.
“I’m not,” you say, voice rough and amused. “I just wanted to say you can grab my hair, if you’d like.”
“sh*t, man, I’d- I’d f*cking pull it out trying to hold on-“ Strider sways when you return to lapping at him, happy as a clam.
“You don’t want to, to f*ck my mouth, plum?” You ask casually. “Tug me around a little?”
“You’re- ah- insane, Jake,” he says - half fond, half breathless - and then his fingers are moving to rest on your head.
You’d always imagined, for whatever reason, that Strider might be rough with you like this. Instead, he sighs reverently when you lick him back into your mouth, and winds his fingers softly in your curls.
“Oh, god-“
You nose at his skin, a little proud by just how astonished he is when you swallow him to the base.
“How’d you- how’d you learn that?” Dirk grits out.
Taking a glance through your eyelashes, coy and conspiratorial, you shrug. “You didn’t think those guns were just for shooting, did you?”
“Oh-f*ck-jesus-sh*t,” Dirk babbles, and comes so hard his knees give out.
“Dirk?”
“English-“
“That-
“Mistake.”
“We weren’t drunk!”
“Don’t rub my f*cking face in it, man.”
Life continues on with the new normal - a normal where you forfeited affection for constant strained tension and excellent, if emotionally destructive sex. You don’t ever initiate it, that would feel… off, but he comes slipping up to you fairly often.
You’re getting laid regularly and spending time with the bro of your life, and you should be ecstatic. Instead, you lie awake all night and recite old movie scripts off by heart, plagued with thoughts about what he might be up to, and then, one night out of the blue, a storm rolls in over your area.
Dirk appears in your doorway, fittingly enough, with the crack of thunder.
“English…”
You look at him, shivering in his baggy sweatshirt and flannel trousers, and lift your blankets without a word.
He slides into the warm coziness hidden within, and then cautiously drapes a hand over your waist.
“Thanks.”
You let yourself lean towards him, helpless as a reed in the wind. “Don’t mention it. You know you’re always welcome here, dove.”
Dirk sighs and turns into you fully, so close you feel like one person. “I missed you.”
“Me too,” you admit, and card through his sleep-tousled hair. Outside, the rain thuds relentlessly into the ground. “But I’m not the one who can barely stand to be in the same room as his best friend, chum.”
He yawns. “M- I’m trying, Jake. It’s just. It’s difficult, being so close and so f*cking far.”
“Okay,” you say. What other responses are there to that?
“Always trying to be cool about it, you know? The Strider grind don’t stop, homeslice. No sleep til Brooklyn.”
“…I see.”
Dirk rests his hand on the nape of your neck, thumbing lazily at the hairs there. “You got a haircut, man.”
You nod. “Porrim did it.”
“Oh,” Dirk stills, and you can feel him chilling to perfect, impenetrable ice like a bloody lake in the winter.
“I’m not sleeping with her, you know,” you tell him bluntly. “It’s not like that. She’s just a friend.”
He laughs, a slight bitter edge of hysteria to his tone. “I don’t know. I’m your friend, and you f*ck me.”
“You’re different,” you don’t even bother to elaborate. You both know that Dirk is just- he’s different.
“Whatever,” Dirk mutters, even as his tense shoulders relax. “It’s not like I have a right to care, dude.”
“Rose says all emotions and feelings are morally neutral areas and we can’t be judged on them, only how we act in response.”
“Yeah, well, Rose is happily married to the love of her life, so…”
Wary of the stony tint to his tone, you change gears. “Mm. Do you think Rose is just naturally good at the whole romance kerfuffle?” You ask him wistfully.
Dirk snorts. “Rose isn’t even slightly naturally good at romance, man. Don’t fall for her slick facade, she’s still a Strilonde - you know she got drunk and fell down the stairs on her first date with Maryam?”
“No! Really?” You grin, sleepily titillated. “That’s- well, I suppose you’re right, then. She just seems so capable, doesn’t she? I’m something terrified of her.”
“No one starts out good at this sh*t, man.”
Your laugh is pitchy and awkward. “Ha! No, I suppose- I suppose not. Still, that’s almost as bad as my first kiss.”
“Yeah.” Dirk says woodenly, and you flame with panic. Why the hell did you say that, you dunce?
“Ah- not to make things weird. Or anything,” you correct. “It wasn’t so bad.”
“I don’t count the volcano sh*t,” he mutters. “That was a gross exploitative phase in my dipsh*t success plan. Doesn’t count.”
“Mm. Alright, well, you’re still my first kiss,” you tell him. “Remember?”
There’s almost a lift to the corners of his mouth when he answers lightly. “Difficult to forget. Still astonished my knees didn’t give out, honestly.”
“You do know how to flatter a chap.”
“It was good,” Dirk smiles distantly. “You were f*cking perfect, and I’d never kissed anyone before, and I was so f*cking terrified-“
“What do you know, we’re just staring at eachother nervously, and then I lost patience and figured fortune favours the brave.” You snicker. “So I put my best foot forward-“
“-Stepped straight on my toes, I panicked and accidentally headbutted you right in your perfect face,” Strider finishes, actually laughing for once. “I thought it was all over-“
“Little did you know I found it to be very attractive.”
It’s all true - you spent your first real kiss with a bruise swelling on your face and coppery blood in your mouth, and when Dirk gripped you close and forgot to hide his enthusiasm, you thought you finally understood all the poetry you’d read before. It’s difficult to understand love when your only examples are all dead or fictional; you’d gotten it, at last, and felt you knew why people had died for it. Isn’t that, after all, the true aim of the heart? To extend one’s fingers to the hawk, and have it skitter closer?
“So I kissed you-“
Dirk grins reluctantly. “And I couldn’t f*cking believe you were the one who kissed me first-“
“And then I just kept going until you figured it out,” you tell him. “I take it back, that was a great first kiss.”
“Yeah?” Strider asks, smooth as syrup.
“Yeah.” You take a deep breath, lips loosened by late-night intimacy. “I’m glad it was you. I wouldn’t change it for the f*cking world, sweetheart.”
“You make it really f*cking impossible for me, sometimes,” he says softly, smile fading.
You can’t even begin to muster an answer to that. You wonder if Dirk’s still thinking about Rose and her happy marriage - oh, f*ck, you wonder if Dirk wants to marry you. That’s a logical progression to the hidden line between you right? You and him, and maybe rings, and an eternity that looks just like this.
You shut your eyes and tilt your head down so he won’t see your expression - the question is a tight throbbing growth in your chest, giddying and stifling and such a bad idea. Don’t touch it, don’t even think about it, or the abscess of everything the two of you aren’t saying will burst fatally.
You’re almost asleep, soothed by the Pavlovian security of his hair crinkled against your neck and his warm hand on your skin, when Dirk speaks again.
“Jake?”
Oh god. His voice doesn’t sound different, but something - maybe the lateness of the hour or your gnawing anxiety or god knows what else - imbues it with a deadly significance.
You freeze, and he slants a glance your way.
“Jake,” he whispers again, a tentative barely-audible breath.
“…yes, plum?” Your voice is softer than you want it to be - but aren’t you always the soft one, between you?
“Do you think you’d ever-“ Dirk pauses, struggling for words. He’s so bloody good with guess, please just let him forget them for once, please- “f*ck. Just. Would it be- is there any chance?”
“Chance of what?”
Dirk sighs, tired. “You know.”
You do. The cage of iron constricting your heart can attest to that. “…Oh, love.”
“So that’s a no,” he mutters, and you dare to flick your eyes over. He’s silhouetted in a sliver of moonlight, the sharp jut of his nose and the swell of his mouth illuminated as he stares up at the ceiling, and your breath catches in your throat. “Okay.”
“No, it’s not- that’s-“ you choke on your own words, flustered and foolish, and squeeze his hand. “It’s just- it’s just that I like you, chum.”
“Right, just not like that,” he finishes dully, pulling away.
“No, no, sweetheart, sugarplum-“ you shuffle over, reaching for him, and Dirk’s eyes drill into you with a kind of frantic intensity. “No, it’s not. Uh. I like you, Dirk. You’re my best friend. I don’t want that to end.”
“Okay.”
“And this, this romance malarkey-“ you are such a dunderf*ck, good lord, what are you saying, “It ruins things, makes them messy and all that. I don’t want to stop liking you.”
“That’s…” Dirk shakes his head. “sh*t, Jake, that’s honestly such a bad excuse that I’m kind of offended. I don’t even merit a ‘you’re like a brother to me?’”
You shake your head, stare into his eyes, and pray for him to understand. “No, I mean it! Blasted love nonsense ruins everything.”
He gawks at you.
Your voice softens. “Dirk, you’re- you’re my favourite person, alright? There are so many new people to meet, and everyone else is okay, but you’re- you’re just different. You make me feel safe. We’re happy, right? Why would we ever risk that for some doomed-to-fail fling fiasco?”
Strider’s eyes drill into you, his lips twisting down.
You sigh. “Isn’t this enough?”
“No,” he says bleakly. “It’s kinda f*cking not, man.”
His words hang heavy in the air, tolling some dread sense of finality. Your lungs wheeze.
“Oh.”
It’s kinda f*cking not. He said it.
“I don’t-“ Dirk’s voice is slightly hoarse, but missing the drag of sleep that dogged you both earlier. You don’t think either of you are still drowsy now. “f*ck, Jake, you don’t get it, it hurts. It’s not the same for you.”
In the dark void of panic encompassing your insides, a spark of fury starts to crackle. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I-“
You sit up abruptly, hot and shaky with emotion. “You don’t- you think this isn’t terrible for me, too? You’re my best friend, Strider, you can’t act like I’m not allowed to be upset-“
“It’s not the same,” he repeats, eyebrows raising. “It’s just not, man.”
“So, what, just because you’re- you think you’ve got some sort of crush on me, that means you care about me more than I do about you? That’s-“ you stare at him idiotically, mid-gesture, until a memory of Rose Lalonde comes to save you. “Reductive! That’s bally reductive and stupid, and frankly-“
“Stop,” Dirk says bluntly, mouth pressing into a dangerous line. “English, you’re not enough of an idiot to go there. Don’t try it.”
“Maybe I am,” you hiss back, and cross your arms. “Maybe I will. You honestly think I’m not suffering here, too?”
“Jake-“
“Again, you’re my best friend, and-“ you swallow, throat suddenly thick. “And you won’t even bloody look me in the eyes, half the time. You only spend time with me when we’re screwing, you avoid me constantly- I mean, at this point I’d be justified in thinking you maybe just hate me.”
“Right,” Dirk snaps drily. “It’s a kind of secret hate that has me trailing around after you like a damn puppy, English. That’s so f*cking idiotic, I don’t think even you believe it.”
“Well, what am I supposed to think?” You demand. “You- you act like my touch burns you. When was the last time we hung out without this, this- this utter tosh getting in the way?”
Strider knuckles at his eyes. “Tosh, he says. f*cking crush. You know what, f*ck that, man. It’s not the same for you, and you know why? Because you’re not constantly inches away from everything you want and simultaneously further than you can imagine. You’re not f*cking counting down the minutes until I meet someone non-psychotic and flee the clingy ex. You’re not-“
“Well-“ overwhelmed, you open your mouth and poison trickles out. “Well, it’s not as though it’s easy for me, okay? It’s not exactly wonderful to find out that the only reason you’ve ever put up with me is because you have some- some sort of romantic designs on me!”
Dead silence.
Dirk stops rubbing his nose bridge and turns his head to you. He’s eerily still, almost mechanical, and then there’s a hideous grating noise and the glass in his shades is shattering into his lap, jagged macabre confetti. “What the f*ck, Jake?”
Half-mutinous, half tearful guilt, you stare him down. “You heard me! I thought you were my friend, I thought we were past this, and then it turns out that you don’t actually like me, you want to date me.”
“…are those things mutually exclusive to you?” Astonished, Strider gapes at you for a moment, then he’s back to white-lipped lividity. “Jesus, English. f*ck you. That’s the worst- god, f*ck you so much.”
“I-“
“You don’t have f*cking clue, man- you, you think love is some kinda bear trap? English, do you genuinely believe that I’ve been trying f*cking trick you into dating me this whole time? You’re the one who start goddamn groping me-“
You flush. “That’s- you’re the one who made it odd! Friends can have sex. You’re the one who-“ ruined it, you think, but you can’t say that. You cannot bloody say that.
Dirk hears it anyway, or sees it in your face. He’s even paler, ashy, eyes like f*cking coals in his face, and you’re simultaneously guilt-stricken and terrified. “No. I told you when I realised this was f*cking with both our heads, and I nipped that sh*t in the bud. You blurred the lines, you still touch me and f*cking cosset me and treat me like someone you give a sh*t about, which is not the impression I’m getting right now.”
“Why can’t I just be affectionate without it being-“
“It is to me. You know that, Jake,” Dirk’s voice wobbles. “I’m sorry, alright? I can’t do the casual sex. I can’t do f*cking casual anything. But I also can’t keep pretending this isn’t f*cking withering my will to live like pesticide on a goddamn rosebush. I can’t even f*cking leave.”
You pause, about to ask, then remember with another sick burst of shame. Stay here with me, sweetheart. You’re a snake-
-You need to stay angry before you dissolve into a pathetic pile of goo and self-pity.
“You-“ you hug your arms around yourself, feeling abruptly small and stupid. “You’re a grown man, Strider, I’m not locking you in here. You can leave any time you want.”
“You know why I didn’t just go?” He asks, deceptively light and ominous. “Because I know how f*cking awful it is when someone you trust and care about ditches you and stops answering your texts. That’s why, Jake.”
You stiffen like you’ve been sucker-punched. “Oh, that is- I was sixteen!”
“Yeah. And you’re still f*cking with my head years later,” Strider tells you, point-blank. “You know, I’ve pretty much come to terms with the fact that I’ll never get over this sh*t, and you’ll never feel the same way, but damn, English. You could’ve fooled me.”
“Stop-“ you point at him, jittery. “Stop acting like I’m the manipulative one, here! Goddamn it, Strider, is it any wonder I’m confused? You tell me you love me, then you act like I’m f*cking contagious. You tell me you don’t want to mess around, then you drag me off into a supply closet. Every time we fight, you threaten to leave, because you know I’m terrified of losing you! It’s complete and utter bullsh*t, man!”
Dirk stares at you, seemingly lost for words. You can’t stop talking, words spilling out of you in hideous spurts, and it’s cathartic and awful and insane all at once.
“And you- all of you used to treat me like some kind of prize trophy, or a f*cking game level to beat, and now you all treat me like my every move is some sort of calculated action! God forbid I touch you, Dirk Strider!” You fling your hands up, panting. “Maybe you’ll convince yourself you’re in love with me again, and then everything goes to sh*t! Why does this have to be complicated?”
Strider continues to gaze at you for a moment, eyes hard and flinty. “Let me get one thing straight,” he says finally. “I didn’t convince myself of sh*t. I’m in love with you, god knows why. I’m so f*cking in love with you and it sucks, I’d change it if I could, but I can’t.”
A painful silence stretches between you; you slump back down, suddenly exhausted and numb. “That’s- you’re attracted to me.”
“No, man. I’ve been in love with you since before I knew what you looked like,” he folds his arms almost challengingly. “You know I never fell for that action hero bullsh*t. I love the scars you got from doing stupid things and I love how excited you get about guns and awful films and I love how you track dirt all over the hardwood floors like a f*cking philistine and-“
“But that’s normal!” You emphasise desperately. “Pals and chums and buds and bros can like things about eachother! I’ve got a whole bloody list of things I love about you, Strider, and-“
He shakes his head, frustrated. “No, English. I’m not- listen, you can’t talk me out of this sh*t. I think about you all the time, I want to f*ck you, I want to look after you, and-“
“Dirk-“
“And I’m kinda borderline obsessed with you, bro,” Strider finishes, laughing slightly manically. His head is back in his hands; you have to pull your eyes from the lonely curl of his spine as he hunches over.
It takes you a second to process his words, then you’re frowning even deeper. “But that’s normal friendship stuff.”
“Are you sh*tting me.”
“It is!”
“Jake,” Dirk says, in the high-pitched tone of someone far beyond the brink. “It’s really f*cking not.”
You glare. “It absolutely is!”
“Jake, I like my friends,” he explains slowly, like you’re a child. “I’m not openly obsessed with them. I don’t f*ck them. I don’t kiss them or sleep in a bed with them or-“
“Well, maybe you’re the weird one!” You say defensively. “Perhaps the rest of us do.”
Dirk groans. “Name one friend you feel that way about.”
“You,” you reply. “Obviously you.”
He breathes in sharply. “Anyone else?”
You think. “…well, no.”
“Would you ever even want to f*ck one of your other friends?” He continues, stony with patience.
It’s a weird question. You contemplate for a second - you do have lots of friendships, albeit none as intense as what you have with Dirk, and you suppose many of your friends are objectively quite attractive. Not in the same way, though. They’re attractive like, well, nice art. Sunsets and flowers. An elegant vase, or something. Dirk’s attractive like something you want to eat, like you want to chain your wrist to his just to keep him close.
It sounds f*cking unhinged when you put it like that. Come on, there has to be one of your other friends you find… sexually stimulating…
Oh Jesus, no. Friendship is not the area for- you’re a little uncomfortable just thinking about it.
Roxy, no, Jane, no. Too sibling-like? Porrim - no, she’s a friend. Eridan, no, he’s like an obnoxious nephew. Rose, Dave, Karkat, Kanaya - you cycle through names in your head, blank and detached.
“…No,” you admit eventually. “I already told you, you’re the only- you’re the only person I’ve been involved with. Intimately.”
You watch balefully as Strider’s face tints, but his voice remains as steady as ever. “You seriously can’t think of anyone else you’d bone if given the chance.”
His eyes are like a bally microscope, and you’re an iodine-stained onion cell sample, exposed and bare. You squirm. “Look, it’s not that weird. You’re the only person I’ve had those sorts of feelings about.”
“You… you haven’t ever wanted to f*ck some random stranger? Or thought they were sexy?”
You scrub a hand through your hair, tired and flustered. “No, why would I- it’s just you, alright? It’s different with you, probably just because we’re so close. Oh, there was the older Serket, but those memories are still… artificial. Sticky bubblegum blue and all.”
“Jesus, Jake,” Dirk says, and you can tell he’s genuinely flabbergasted by the way he stands, posture loose. “Not like- what about the spider girls? Or blue ladies?”
“For the love of- I thought they were pretty! Why would I have some kind of weird boner for someone fictional I don’t even know?” You demand.
“It's an extremely common phenomenon.”
“Yes, well, I think it’s more of an exaggerated pop culture thing.”
“It’s not,” Dirk says.
“What?”
“It’s not a pop culture thing.” He peers at you. “So. Sorry. Again, you’ve- the only person you want to-“
“Yes, it’s you!” You snap. “I like you, you’re very handsome, and I happen to find your ridiculous neuroses charming. Is that so bizarre to you? That sounds completely normal to me.”
“…You were serious about not meeting some random chick and moving out,” Strider mutters, like that’s news.
“Why in the fresh furnace of hell would I lie about that?” You can’t decide whether to be perplexed, infuriated, offended, or some mixture of the above.
“Telling people sh*t they want to hear because you’re too f*cking nice not to is kind of your modus operandi, Jake,” he tells you. You bristle. “Since tonight is insane enough, would you mind elucidating the f*ck out of what you consider love to be, then?”
“I don’t know.” You dare to glance over. He looks as genuinely lost as you are, swept up on the vicious riptide of this confrontation. “Does anyone? It’s just this murky nebulous thing that ruins perfectly good friendships. It makes people crazy. Or it’s a hormones thing, isn’t it?”
“It’s… kind of chemical?” Dirk hedges. “I don’t know how to explain it.”
“Try,” you suggest. “Maybe it’s not what you th-“
“Cut that sh*t out,” he orders, rising to the challenge with a steely glare. “I’m a prince of heart, I am well f*cking aware of my own emotions. Love is - well, I guess the best way to explain it is, I’m pissed off and miserable and a nervous wreck, but I’m still just… I’m f*cking happy when I’m with you, man. When you’re not around, I think about you - I’d rather be miserable with you than fine without you, if that makes sense, because I don’t know how to be happy if you’re not here. You kinda f*cking hacked my brain, English.”
Your heart is beating a traitorous march inside your chest. “Me too.”
“What?”
“That’s not strange, I feel that way too,” you chew your lip. “Rose said it was normal to miss your friends and such.”
She also said you and Dirk were a terminally codependent gay wreck and told you self-reflection was becoming inescapable, but he doesn’t need to know that.
“Look, people define love differently. I just know that I want you to be happy, and you make me so f*cking happy, even when we’re dealing with this bullsh*t. I let you wear your hiking boots in the house. I found a fully loaded gun with the safety off under the couch and I smiled like a f*cking dumbass the whole day.” He sighs. “I think about you the way Rose looks at Kanaya, if an external example helps.”
That, above all else, weakens you. Rose and Kanaya, the two most quietly, passionately in love people you can imagine. They were able to handle the incomprehensible net of romance, through luck or skill or sheer devotion, and you can’t say you don’t wish you could as well. Sometimes it’s all you can think about.
You look at Dirk, handsome and tragic and completely vulnerable, and your whole ribcage cramps.
“Listen, chum, it’s not that I don’t want-“ you pause, wretched. “It’s just. The romance thing works out so damned rarely, and we only just survived it last time, and- if it wasn’t such a mess, if it wouldn’t ruin anything, you know that I-“
He stares, eyes wide, and you fumble for words.
“If I didn’t value our friendship so very f*cking unbelievably much, chap,” you say, tremblingly earnest, “I’d bloody propose to you right now.”
For a long, interminable moment, all is hushed. The air in the room lies flat with its ear to the door; the rustle of wildlife outside is suddenly, conspicuously absence. There is not a single witness to this early-morning confession but the two of you, trapped in a timeless space.
Then Strider lets out the most awful choking noise and buries his face in his hands. Oh god. Oh f*ck. Oh god. What were you thinking?
“You-“
“sh*t, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable-“
He looks up, thankfully mostly dry-eyed. “Jake, you- You’re the worst person I know, Jesus f*ck, you’re so uniquely good at making the worst scenarios impossibly worser, it’s the world’s sh*ttiest talent, you superlative bastard asshole.”
“I-“
“You think it can’t possibly get worse than sad unrequited love for an ex, then he’s your roommate, then he’s your f*ckbuddy, then he finds out that you’re still pathetically hung up on him and everything goes to sh*t, and you think, Jesus Christ, this is the nadir,” Dirk throws his hands up, speaking so fast his words jumble in dizzying scatters. “But then guess what, Jake f*cking English tells you that the only thing stopping him from f*cking proposing to you is the way you screwed up his brain as an adolescent! Brilliant! f*cking magnificent!”
“I don’t understand,” you say blankly.
He turns his head to you, ruffled and manic. “I preferred thinking you’d never feel the same, man. Outside the realm of possibility. Now it’s so f*cking close and it’s my f*cking fault. It’s always my f*cking fault. sh*t. I thought this was hard before.”
“Dirk,” you reach for his arm, dread trickling through your veins. “Dirk, that isn’t-“
Your best friend lets out the most broken laugh you’ve ever heard, then he’s spinning around and grasping you by the shoulders, pressing his mouth firmly to your own. Taken aback, you indulge him for a second then gently push him away.
“Dirk, sweetheart, I don’t feel right about-“
“It’s fine-“ he mutters, tilting to fit his lips against yours again.
You curl your fingers over his jaw and pull away more firmly, shaking your head. “No, love, it wouldn’t be right.”
“Since when do you-“ He sighs again, a melancholy wisp of sound, and flops his forehead down on your shoulder. “Yeah. Kinda too late for that now, huh?”
“…I don’t know what you want me to say to that, chum.”
Dirk lifts his head and stares you directly in the eyes, as powerful and impossible to resist as ever. “Jake, man. I- I am in a bad place, right now. I feel like my self control is approximately one pixel in a huge-ass screen, and I want to stop f*cking everything up, and I can’t do that if I stay here. I won’t go if you tell me not to. Please let me leave.”
“You don’t need my permission,” you manage, throat thick.
“You asked me to stay.”
“I-“ you tentatively rub his back. “Dirk, do what you think is best. I- I won’t hold it against you, I promise. Unless it’s arson. Actually, unless your target is-“
“Thank you,” Strider says, with a sincerely startling level of emotion. He seems to catch your surprise and looks away, blank expression returning. “I mean, cool. I’m going to… go now. Like, for a bit.”
“How long?”
“I have no f*cking clue, man,” he gestures helplessly, still unusually emotive, and then you find yourself enveloped in the quickest, most awkward-yet-charming sidehug possible. “Sorry. I. Yeah.”
“Bro-“
…And he’s gone. You can just about make out his afterimage. You wish you had sick speed powers; it feels like Strider, as ever, is several levels ahead of you in this baffling game.
Right now, all you have is a sore, unavoidably seeping burst emotional abscess. You’re covered in the pus of romantic turmoil. You’re veritably seeped in the serosanguineous fluid of guilt and regret. You’re stewing in the fetid soup of your own body’s internal defence mechanisms, and this metaphor sucks, Jesus H Kennedy, now you’re bloody nauseated, too. The hits do keep coming.
Your name is JAKE ENGLISH and you’re freaking the f*ck out. As it happens, it turns out that blurting out a half-formed love confession towards your friend-lover-something while mid-argument is not a winning strategy for your mental health. What’s worse is, you blurted out an uncomfortably erudite love confession, crumpled with confusion, and then realised upon further reflection that you meant it. If Dirk wasn’t your best friend and your roommate and your first really close pal and a foundational pillar of your universe, you would be proposing to him. You wouldn’t hesitate to ask him to be yours and to tell him all the things you think about him and-
You still think he could do better. You still don’t believe that his feelings towards you necessarily match the intensity of yours. But for the first time, you’ve looked in the proverbial mirror, and instantaneously ran headfirst into a drywall of horrific knowledge. You want to marry Dirk Strider. That’s not platonic! That’s not even sexual!
Actually, you need to take a step back and stop framing this in marriage terms, because just the thought of that much commitment is going to bring you out in hives. It’s just- it felt so natural, wanting Dirk around, wanting to breathe his air and be his favourite person and tie yourself to him in a thousand ways. Love, if that’s what this is, was not the expected event of sudden, irreversible devastation and loneliness; it turns out that love was quiet warmth, expanding over time until it saturated your life. Oh god, you’re in love with Dirk Strider. You’re in full gay love with him.
This is terrible news, it throws a cog into everything you’ve tried to build, so why are you so bloody happy? You feel like a lunatic, sitting beaming in the smoking aftermath of your conversation with him, but…
Dirk Strider is in love with you. He means it, for real. He likes you even though you forget to take off your shoes and get dirt on the floor, even though you’re an oblivious dipsh*t and nowhere close to as smart as him, even though he doesn’t expect anything to come of it.
I’ve pretty much come to terms with the fact that I’ll never get over this sh*t. That’s a promise to stay - stop smiling, English! - that’s a statement that implies he’s never going to stop looking at you like that - goddamn it, are you shaking? - that means you have him. Strider, slippery and fey as the strange creatures that lurk in the deepest trenches of the ocean, has handed you his heart for keeps. You don’t need to worry about him leaving. You have him!
For a single, gorgeous moment, everything is perfect as a polished diamond. Then you collide with reality and it shatters into a thousand beautiful, deadly-sharp pieces. f*ck. It’s been weeks since he said he loved you. It’s been months since you started screwing around. It’s been bloody years since he first told you he cared about you. Dirk’s spent infinite eternities waiting for you to remove your head from inside your own ass, and good lord, you’ve pissed all over the upholstery in the process. How do you even begin to start piecing together the fragments?
That’s when a proverbial flood of crushing anxiety smacks into you with all the force of an ocean, and there are no survivors. Your brain shuts off to reboot like one of Dirk’s overheating computers; you sleep on and off for bloody days, niggling away at the sore spots in your mind until you can finally address the issue.
You’re in love with him. And he’s in love with you. Logically, there’s a solution here. How do you reach it?
Your first thought is to wait until he comes back. You quash it immediately - you’re half hope and half doom right now, and if you give yourself any longer to process all the potential emotional fallout on the line, you know you’ll chicken out. Or worse, you’ll talk yourself out of it. You need to admit this to someone who knows you, who you trust to call you on your bullsh*t-
Dirk, although the automatic answer, is obviously not the best candidate. But in place of the - god, the love of your life, you think - you know who to turn to. Unsettlingly perceptive, willing to be sharp and dangerous…
Everyone knows that if you want bullsh*t quashed, you go to Rose Lalonde.
“Jake,” Rose says, measured. Short and delicate, she stands in the open doorway like the breeziest gauze curtain, but somehow manages to radiate all the menace of a heavyweight boxing champion. You wilt. “My brother’s not here, so if you planned for another jolly afternoon of snipping his heart out sliver by sliver, I’m afraid you’re ‘sh*t out of luck.’ To borrow a phrase.”
“Rose!” You start, vaguely offended. She arches her brow, so like Dirk, and you sigh. “…I’m not- I’m here to talk to you.”
“Me?” she repeats, tilting her head to look at you in the manner of a watchful bird. “Why?”
“I, uh-“ feeling suddenly, unpleasantly exposed out in broad daylight, you shift closer. “Could I come in?”
Rose considers. “No.”
“Rose-“
“Pardon the slight, English, but my sympathies are somewhat limited by passionate and overweening sororal loyalty,” she folds her arms, immovable. “I advise you to get to the point before said loyalty overwhelms my better judgement and I fetch my DSM-V for some scathing analysis.”
“I-“ you squirm, flustered. “I- um, I wanted to know. Uh. How did you- how did you know you were in love with Kanaya?”
“…Ah,” Rose replies flatly. “Well, if that’s not a sentence to strike fear into the hearts of mortals. Whyever do you ask?”
“Well- look, could you just answer the question first?”
She stares at your way a second longer, assessing, before indulging you. “Fine. Firstly, Kanaya doesn’t experience our human concept of ‘love’ so much as flushed feelings in my direction. It’s a small yet tangible distinction, culturally, although I suppose that has little relevance to your perspiration-soaked hom*oerotic relationship with my emotionally constipated human brother.”
You grimace.
“But I digress. Nonetheless, you’ll understand if I’d rather keep much of the details of our relationship to myself, but-” The barest smile twitches at her dark-painted lips. “It wouldn’t be entirely erroneous to say I fell ass-backwards into the relationship. To continue to steal from Dave’s eloquent if earthy lexicon.”
“…Oh?”
“Maryam’s pulchritude is matched only by exceptional prescriptivism. Her tongue is sharper than my needles, and she’s almost as elegant as she is petty. A meddlesome broad after my own heart, so to speak.” Rose shrugs. “I was, in effect, doomed from the moment I laid eyes on her gloriously viridescent overtures.”
You fidget. “But when did you know?”
“Oh, the eternal question.” She pauses, seeming to soften. “I’ll only tell you this once, English, and bear in mind that the consequences will be gruesomely dire should you betray my confidence. On my very first outing with Kanaya, I foolishly prepared with profligate inebriation and ended our first kiss with an inglorious tumble down the stairs.”
“Dirk told me that one.” You blurt.
Rose shoots you a withering look and you gulp. “Yes, well. Our relationship to that point was very much a battle of wits between intellectual equals, so my gracelessness was something of a glimpse behind my ubiquitously aloof facade - a flash of the neck, even. As it happened, she proved to be more than an amusing opponent in snarky oratory.”
She smiles slightly less ominously than usual. “Upon awaking with a hangover I can only describe as ruinous, I realised a future without her would be something of a worst-case scenario. Also, despite the obvious temptation, she’s protected my pride with regards to that… indiscretion.”
“Oh,” you say, maybe a little starry-eyed.
“Hm. It really must be love, if Dirk’s letting you in on the family secrets like this.”
“I. That’s- uh-“ reminded of your purpose, your heart start to skitter like a bloody metronome. “Love?”
“I’m not what most people consider patient, Jake,” she leans her hip against the doorframe. “Furthermore, despite common misconceptions, I have very little interest in the minutiae of your romantic ordeals. I assume you’re here for Dirk-related reasons, because of course you are, and you claim you’re not here to see him. One can only conclude you’re either here to ask for advice on how to finally put him out of his misery - knowing you, in the most oblivious yet brutally cruel way possible - or to ask for his hand. Which is it?”
“Uh. Latter.” You respond automatically, then smack your hand over your mouth like an idiot. “I mean-“
Violet eyes widen. “…You proposed to him?”
“No!” Hurriedly, you wave your hands in the air. “No, no, god, no, it’s just- look, Rose, it’s just that I very recently realised I might sort of want to, uh, do that. In a romantic way. It’s definitely not out of the question. And I’m… not sure what to do next?”
She still looks startled. “I’m told a ring is traditional.”
Your laugh is stuttery with nerves, but your whole body feels lighter - years and years and bally years of stomping down thoughts into dust, and now you’ve coughed the calcified remains up and out, you feel like you could fight a gorilla. “I’m, um. I don’t know his ring size.”
“Oh?” Rose sends you an unnervingly knowing glance. “And here I thought you were routinely familiar with his fingers.”
“…I, uh. Moving on. The point is, I didn’t realise that, um, I might be in love with him? I think? And, and-“ you stall for a moment, crashing down from your high as abruptly as rock off a crumbling mountaintop. “…and, f*ck, Rose, I’m somewhere between ecstatic and close to pissing my britches. This is going to ruin everything-“
“Pace yourself, Jake, I don’t have a swooning couch on hand,” she thins her lips. “It’s not exactly a secret that your first and last liaison into romance ended in flames, but-”
“It was f*cking apocalyptic, last time!” You cut in, shuddering at the thoughts. “It was awful, and terrible, and the second we started dating, it f*cking ate us alive. I almost lost him just because of, of stupid teenage drama. Look, romance is for people like you and Kanaya, Rose. People who can handle it. I can barely handle my own dickening life, let alone be made responsible for someone else’s happiness.”
“Do you think I’ve never faced romantic issues, before?” Rose asks you acidly. “Perhaps you’ve forgotten my previous foray into alcoholism and the strain it put on my relationship? Or maybe you’re under the impression that the only lasting relationship is one unmarred by conflict?”
You quail.
“‘Love,’ however you define it, is rarely considered easy, Jake. The difference is whether or not the afflicted party sees value in pursuing it nonetheless.”
“No, but-“
“Your problem, from what I can glean via Dirk’s near-constant soliloquies, is that you are extremely averse to potential consequences,” she continues, and you nod weakly. “Ergo, you appear to believe that the moment you allow yourself to become romantically entangled, you will be suddenly and irreversibly subjected to forces beyond your control and turmoil you are unable to handle.”
“I-“
She sails on, ignoring your increasingly flustered flapping. “A fairly childish understanding of your own emotions that was no doubt brought on by an isolated and perilous childhood punctuated by ghastly antiquated British adventure novels. In essence, your problem isn’t a fear of romance, it’s an aversion to conflict.”
“Is that so bad?” You demand, stung. “Romantic relationships lead to fighting, and fighting means the end of friendships. It’s not that bally out of pitch field to say-“
“And yet, you only seem to apply this conviction to your personal relationships.” Rose observes, and you feel yourself flush darker. “You certainly aren’t suggesting that my wife and I are locked in eternal machinations, for one.”
“Rose-”
“As gently as possible, I think you should just admit by this point that you don’t believe conflict is ultimately indefeasible, you simply don’t have faith in your own abilities to navigate it.”
You shut your mouth and boggle.
“Unfortunately for you, conflict is not something you can continue to swerve.” Rose finishes, merciless.
“…Fine,” you admit, somewhat lost for words. “Fine, whatever. Sure. I’m not- I’m not particularly confident in my own ability to maintain a liaison, can you blame me? It took me years to realise Dirk wasn’t going to stop talking to me when he realised what an insufferable dimwit I was back then.”
“And your solution to that is to never love again.”
“Well, it sounds stupid when you put it like that…”
“That’s because it is - undeniably - extraordinarily stupid,” Rose shakes her head. “You know, if this is how you handle every problem, I’m honestly just astonished that you realised so soon.”
“That’s-“ you shut your mouth on your protests, refusing to get distracted. “Rose, I don’t know what to do. He’s got this thing for me, and I also have a thing for him, and every time it comes up, everything goes to hell.”
“A quandary, to be sure.” Lalonde stares at you like you’re a previously-undocumented species of brainless frog; half fascination, half contemptuous disbelief. “Has it ever crossed your mind that these miscommunications may occur due to your both being emotionally repressed imbeciles who’d rather watch the world burn than ever discuss feelings?”
“Well!” You fold your arms, scowling. “That’s not fair, don’t drag Dirk into-“
“Jake.” She interrupts, fixing you with an unamused gaze. “You came here seeking advice. I have an excellent novel to be returning to, and I’m justifiably eager to end this bizarre therapy session for which I am neither qualified nor over-enthused to participate in. My advice is to talk to him, and to be f*cking transparent for once, for the love of every eldritch abomination I can name.”
You blink.
“Which is a vast and dazzling array,” Rose adds pointedly, flicking her hand at you. “Goodbye, English. I’m afraid I have no particular affinity for stray dogs.”
“But-“
“And should you need romantic advice in the future… consult with Karkat.” She advises as her door swings shut, your ignominious defeat cemented by the firm thud of a lock clicking back into place.
“…Well.”
Rose does have a sort of clean-slice quality to her, an impression of being stripped down to your essential parts, and you find yourself feeling half-comforted and half-exposed in the aftermath. There’s also the fact that you still have no idea where Dirk is, or what to say, or if you’re losing your bloody mind. You think you may need a second opinion.
Karkat’s outside his hive when you arrive, leant over doing something vicious to a bush with paring scissors. He cranes his head up and catches sight of you, eyes narrowing, and you gulp and step back. Always wise to maintain a safe distance from an apoplectic fellow brandishing a sharp object, as a rule of thumb.
“…Hello?” You start nervously.
“Well, well, well. Look who’s come prowling with his tail between his legs, huh?” Karkat straightens, sending you a look that promises cardiopulmonary failure. “He’s not here, dipsh*t.”
“What?”
“Your ironic douchebag bone-buddy, he’s not here,” the short troll says irritably, returning to his snipping.
“I- okay, well, first of all, that’s not why I’m here,” you retort, already off-foot again. “And really, how do you even know I’m looking for him?”
“Are you sh*tting me?” He throws you an unimpressed glance. “Dirk told Dave he was gonna be away for a while. That’s a pretty good indicator to anyone with aural fronds that sh*t has hit the goddamn fan, English.”
“What?”
Karkat snorts. “He’s not exactly aloof, is he? He’s kinda f*cking obsessed with you, it’d be absolutely horrific if you weren’t equally weird. It’s still reasonably horrific, honestly. Irony schtick aside, Striders are clingier than f*cking spindlebeasts with abandonment issues. Were I not so familiar with Dave’s anatomy, I’d assume they were just a mutated albino freak version.”
“I-“
“Still, human though he may be, your Strider is absolutely the unhinged stalkerish type. Frankly, I’m not sure I want to know what it took for you to get him to abscond. Dave suggested something about lotion and baskets?”
“Karkat, that’s bally well uncalled for-“ you say hotly.
He cuts you off with an eye roll so magnificent he almost loses balance. “Oh, oh, a thousand effusive apologies, English. I forgot the only person allowed to call Strider a twitchy creep is the man who’s been jerking him around for years. Mea f*cking culpa, dicklord.”
“I-“ flabbergasted, you gawp at him. “How many bizarre people are going to claim to know the intimate details of our relationship?”
“You haven’t seen yourself drunk. You almost f*cked in front of me once, remember?” he reminds you. “You were both too absolutely sh*t-faced to keep your human junk in your cloth confines like mature adults, and Dirk would not stop rambling on about you- I don’t know, I tried to block most of it out, there was definitely some corny sh*t about your ganderbulbs and bastardised romantic drivel. Only it was Dirk, so it sounded less like an ardent declaration of passion and more like if a self-loathing toaster gained sentience and was trying to scam someone into giving them card details with ai-generated love poetry. I was forced to wade in with the spray bottle.”
“Oh.” That’s… a lot.
“It was a traumatising experience and I’m charging you next time.”
“I- how do you know there’ll be a next time?” You ask, strangled.
“On my couch, you better f*cking hope not. The only ones allowed to defile my couch are me and my matesprit, you audacious bumblef*ck. But you’re seriously questioning the idea that you two will end up being horny and embarrassing in public again?” He stares at you sardonically. “"I mean this in the least affectionate way possible when I say it’s kind of your thing.”
“It is not!”
“Yeah.”
“No-“
“Who between us is the romance expert here, English?” Karkat demands.
“…I suppose, you?”
“You suppose correctly, dipf*ck mcgee. And as long as the sun continues to menace me with its suspiciously nonfatal rays, you two will be making everyone you sit near uncomfortable.”
You glower. “We don’t do that! We’re usually very, um, restrained.”
He curls his lip. “Incredibly, your human jokes get better every day. I think I just sprained a rib with my ebullient mirth.”
You glare.
“Get serious.” Karkat barrels on. “It’s not like your hand has to be down Strider’s pants for it to be uncomfortable, nookworm. There’s also the weird eyef*cking and the way he follows you around like a woofbeast, seriously, it’s like watching a meteor crash in action. No one wants to get involved, but it’s impossible to look away. We’re all transfixed by the sheer majestic lunacy.”
“I-“
“Speaking of which,” he barrels on. “What the f*ck did you do this time?”
“What do you-“
“Listen, this isn’t larvae’s first rodeo. If I know Strider - and unfortunately I know far, far more about him than I’ve ever yearned to - he’s not going to have left his sad pining sexden for something small.” Karkat reasons. “So out with it. What’s the catastrophe? Did he finally express an emotion or some such mortally unforgivable sh*t?”
“Uh-“ you stare, stammering, for a moment. Karkat’s like Dave: they both go so fast, words like skittering cars on a motorway, and it’s all you can do to hang on sometimes. “Um, well, sort of. The thing is, he’s uh, we- you know, we’re very close pals, and-”
“Pause,” he cuts in. “Let me warn you before you start, if you allow a single soggy detail of your unhinged sexcapades with my brother in law to escape your damnably chiselled mouth, I won’t just get my plant mister, I’ll fill it with gogdamn vinegar and shove it up your human orifice of choice.” The troll waggles his scissors threateningly, mania in his eyes, and you try to shift back as subtly as possible.
“No, cripes, there’s no need for any of that!” Hands held up in surrender, you continue, “Well, he’s, uh. He’s been saying he’s in love with me.”
You look at Karkat, then, expecting to see some satisfying degree of astonishment on his face, only to be utterly disappointed by his unfazed expression.
“…Was that supposed to be a shock line, or something?” He asks. “Jegus, like it’s a secret? Colour me baffled and bemused, the blatantly obvious strikes again.”
“Wait, he told you first?”
Karkat rolls his eyes again, dripping scorn. “Believe it or not, I’ve got functioning ganderbulbs just like any other troll, boy wonder. It’s the worst kept secret of all time that Strider’s nub over nugbone for you. Although judging from this conversation, I can’t imagine it’s your sparkling intelligence that so captivates him.”
You gape. “It is? Not a secret, I mean-”
“Yeah. I’m at least halfway convinced there’s some kind of carapacian betting ring on whether you know or not.”
“I’m sorry?”
“You probably should be,” Karkat agrees, brushing his hands on his trousers. “f*cking around with someone that in love with you is pretty much the embodiment of scumbag behaviour, English. I always assumed you were too oblivious to realise - you’re not as stupid as you act, but holy f*cking Dolorosa are you bad at noticing the obvious - but if you knew and you were doing it anyway, I think I’m contractually obligated by matespritship to kick your ass.”
You peer at him apprehensively until he sighs.
“I’m being sarcastic, bulgesucker. I don’t want to fight you, I use a scythe and you have f*cking guns. Also biceps. I’m just saying, sh*tty actions merit verbal abuse.”
“Right,” you realise. “Oh, right! No, I didn’t know. Uh. He told me recently, and then, you know, we sort of… stopped doing things, but neither of us could really stick to it.” You falter under Karkat’s unimpressed stare. “Look, he’s very- he’s difficult to say no to, alright, especially when he’s being so bloody distant, and he’s very pretty, and he does this th-“
He cuts you off with gargled cursing.
“Shh, shut up, stop talking- I’ll confiscate your shoutbox, I swear to Gog,” Karkat hisses, bright red. “Ugh. Not relevant at all, f*ck, my eyes are burning. What did I say about the mister? Was my very sincere warning a joke to you?”
“Oh come on, chum, it’s not like I’m being graphic-“
“No.” He says, with decisive finality. “I have already seen too much, English, and if you want this hellacious conversation to continue, you will shut your word holster and spare me the details.”
“Fine. The thing is, um, it’s been bad. We haven’t been talking very much, and then we ended up talking properly, and, well.” You pause, struggling to verbalise your thoughts. “I, uh. It’s really very daunting, bro, because I ended up sort of, uh, blurting out that if he wasn’t my best friend, I’d probably have a ring on his finger by now-“
“What.” Karkat cuts in, eyebrows shooting up his brow, but you forge desperately.
“And he panicked and tried to kiss me and I said no, because he was- lord, Karkat, he was shaking like a f*cking leaf. And he said he had to go for a bit. And I said okay.”
“Holy-“
“And then I was sitting on my bed and thinking in numb horror about the end of our friendship and then I realised-“ you pause, gulping for breath. “I meant it.”
“-sh*t,” Karkat finishes, eyes wide and astonished. “Wait, you mean the proposal thing? You meant that?”
“I think so,” you admit, shaking a little yourself. “I don’t know. Romance stuff. It’s terrifying, because I’m usually so nauseated at the thought of, of committed bonds as such, but for some reason I’m not right now and that just scares the living f*ck out of me, chum.”
“Holy sh*t,” he repeats.
“And then I realised that I’ve been like this for ages, Karkat, and it’s probably not even that platonic to want to live with someone forever and have your skeletons intertwined in the grave and suchlike-“ you gulp for air. “And it is really frankly making me question my previous notions of good platonic friendship!”
“Holy f*ck,” Karkat gawps at you. “That’s- I’m just going to ignore most of that, because I don’t have the time or the scientific knowledge to explain how f*cking weird the two of you are. All I’m getting here is… you like him? Romantically?”
“Yep.”
He keeps squinting at you, mouth slightly open. “You - as in, Jake English - are telling me you have romantic feelings for him - as in, Dirk Strider?”
“Yes,” you reply, slightly offended by the persisting disbelief on his face. “Is that so crazy?”
“Genuinely?” Kar shakes his head. “Yeah, Troll Casanova, it kinda f*cking is.”
You bristle. “I don’t see why! He’s beautiful and smart and very funny, in that sort of dry way, and he’s so awkward sometimes, it’s really very endearing, and-“
“And it’s weird, because he’s been so obviously in love with you for years and you’re acting like this is something new,” he cuts in bluntly. “It’s just one of those sempiternal pillars of the universe, like time and space: sopor is inedible, Troll Jennifer Coolidge is a f*cking treasure, and that blonde dipsh*t is trapped in an eternal cycle of tragic moping over the handsome idiot in the corner.”
“You think I’m handsome?” You ask, taken aback but sincerely flattered.
He sends you a flat look. “The flesh is hot but the spirit is bizarrely perky and apparently socially illiterate. If that answers your question. If it doesn’t, I could physically not care le-”
“I think you’re a very good-looking chap, too,” you say enthusiastically, and clap him on the back. He sighs.
“Yeah, whatever. So. You and him, huh?”
Your face flames like an over-torched creme brûlée. “I- Well, I hope so.”
Karkat hisses air through his teeth and tosses his hands up again. “Well, great! How extraordinarily reasonable and rational of you to finally f*cking discern that after years! It’s not like this situation is basically closer to complete collapse than a hive of cards constructed by a psiionic wriggler, that would be terrible. I’m so glad this is a normal and fine scenario that you’re chosen to stumble upon like a three-legged antlerbeast instead of a massive f*cking clusterf*ck!”
You nod, unsure how to respond.
He sobers and banishes the theatricality, eyes hardening. “English. You’re aware this is gonna be an approximate sh*t ton of trouble to fix?”
“Oh, is that your prognosis, Dr Medicine?”
Karkat, always unable to resist a good pop culture reference, valiantly tries to hide his snort. You grin victoriously for a moment, then pause to consider.
sh*t ton of trouble doesn’t even begin to cover it. Just the thought of how much talking you’re going to have to do, the exhausting give and take of emotional vulnerability, makes your limbs feel numb and heavy.
But what’s the alternative? Worse. The alternative, whatever it pans out to be, is undoubtedly worse than sucking it up and enduring a little discomfort. For the love of god, man, you’re talking about Strider, here! Even if it all goes to sh*t, you think he at least deserves a fragment of the effort he’s put into your relationship over the years returned.
Despite your nerves, your resolve stays firm. “Maybe. I think it might be worth it?”
And there’s a look Karkat only awards you during certain movie discussions: the rare Vantas gaze of Grudging Approval. “Yeah, maybe. So?”
“So what?”
“So why did you come here, if you’re not looking for him?” He asks. “I assume not for the pleasure of my exuberant jocularity."
“I, uh. You’re good at romance stuff, correct?”
“I’m glad there’s someone on this fetid landmass that respects my trade, at least.”
You scratch your neck, grinning awkwardly. And people say your dialect is weird. “Aha, I suppose? Anyway, I- I have no idea what to do, chap.”
“What are you trying to achieve? What’s the objective, here?” Karkat’s face settles into focus.
“I don’t know,” you confess, “I just know I have to find him and tell him stuff, but every time I try to put it into words I end up with ‘Strider, if you leave me I’ll haemorrhage spectacularly and probably exude radiation and disintegrate into bone fragments and-“
“Jegus!” He interrupts, face screwed up in sheer disbelief. “What the- Is the dusty panbowl of your nugbone f*cking cracked? Do not f*cking say that to him!”
“…Help me?” You ask, as pathetically as possible.
He makes a noise like a disgusted cat and gestures you inside his hive. “Yeah, okay. For the greater good of this world as a whole, I’ll save you from your own incomprehensibly sh*tty attempts at sweet talk. Good f*cking grubs, man, how do you live like this?”
You smile gratefully and he hisses again. “No! The smile doesn’t work on me, English, I’m not your ninja boytoy.”
“You’re smiling.”
“You’re about to get a foot up your chute.”
Karkat pins you to the spot with the intense glare of peregrine falcon locked onto a juicy and pluckable marsupial, and then proceeds to brute-force his romantic advice into your head inch by painful inch with all the tenderness of a co*ked-up polar bear rummaging through a seal’s intestines. You absorb approximately none of it, but manage to pass scrutiny by nodding and looking thoughtful every time your intimidatingly intense friend checks that you’re listening.
He dumps you out an hour later, head a-spin and knees a-quiver, with firm instructions to ‘go to him.’ And also something about ‘completing you,’ so god only knows, frankly. You’re beginning to think perhaps romantic comedies from an alien planet aren’t the best source of advice as it pertains to your love life.
“I don’t think I can ‘go to him,’ I don’t know where he is, and also I think he wanted space-“
[Karkat, through the window: “Damn his space! Damn it to hell!”]
He then closed the window, which was, you have to admit, something of a relief.
You suppose you may as well try to find Dirk, not only because he’s- you know- everything, but also because all of your friends are completely unhinged or terrifying or both.
So, where to find a Prince of Heart?
“Oh ho! So you’vve come at last, Troll Judas!” Predictably, Eridan is dramatically monologuing before you even get through his door. Your surprisingly good pal is spilt dramatically half-vertical over his culinaryblock counter, dressed as perplexingly as ever: today, he’s clad in an ostentatious, feathered purple robe over what appears to be regular pyjamas. The way he looks like he’s just rolled out of his alien cocoon, or whatever it’s called, does absolutely jack to soften his glare as he points a finger at you. “About damn time - I cannot believve you’vve been runnin’ around towwn like a bloody vvillage twwo-wwheel-devvice wwisdom-harlot, takin’ romantic guidance from evvery f*ckin’ tommas-didick-an’-sallea, an’ only noww do you come to me! f*ckin’ iniquitous.”
“What?” You say stupidly, still somewhat overwhelmed by the… everything. “I mean- what? Why would I come to you for romantic advice?”
“Wwoww, okay. I guess I’m the only one wwho still believves in gorgeous-hope-aspect-havvers solidarity, then, but wwhatevver.” He folds his arms and pouts to the best of his ability. “Maybe I should start a club of gorgeous-prince-classes instead, hmm?”
You briefly picture Eridan trying to kvetch about his friendships with Dirk and suppress a grin. “Well, chap, I won’t stop you.”
The seadweller contemplates for a second, then shrugs. “Actually, maybe not. Your ninja guy barely talks an’ f*ckin’ Kurloz creeps the hell out a’ me. He doesn’t even talk either. Wwhat’s the of solidarity if you’re the one ray of sociability in a dark and murky cavve of apathy?”
“You could braid eachother’s hair?”
He shudders theatrically. “Nooo. Those twwo incompetents are gettin’ their prongs precisely nowwhere near my hair. An’ like hell am I touchin’ them. Strider looks like he bites an’ Makara’s moirail definitely does. Ugh.”
You can confirm that Dirk has quite the teeth on him, but you don’t think you’ll disclose that fact. Instead, you snort and Eridan grins for a moment, acknowledging his own ridiculousness; a second later, he’s back to his performance.
“Anywway, you can’t distract me wwith your big beautiful doe eyes, English. Wwhy didn’t you ask me before seekin’ out f*ckin’ Lalonde? Does Dirk look like a fearsome elegant vvampire lesbian to you? Are you plannin’ on seducin’ him wwith knitwwear an’ snarkily circumlocutory diatribes about mid-century gothic architecture an’ gogdamn literary analysis?”
Eridan waits until you shake your head, reluctantly amused.
“Then she’s not exactly qualified, is she?”
“In terms of romantic experience, putting it delicately, you and I are both something of neophytes, chum. I didn’t-“
“Oh, I’m a neophyte, am I?” He glances down at his nails, a coy smile tugging at his mouth. “Think again, English.”
“Is that a roundabout way of saying you got your leg over?”
He flushes, fins fluttering around his face. “Cod, that’s such an upright uncouth wway a’ puttin’ it. But yes, English, you’re talkin’ to a newwly-minted matesprit.”
You stop and stare. “Matesprit?”
“Mhmm,” Eridan nods, basking. “Official an’ evveryfin.”
“Oh,” you blink, pleasantly startled. “I had no idea, chum! Been keeping it under wraps, have you?”
“It’s neww,” he says, and goes back to fiddling with his rings. “Pretty f*ckin’ neww. Wwe’re takin’ it sloww, an’ wwhatnot. You knoww.”
“Who is it?”
Shark teeth flash at you in an amused grin. “I don’t knoww if I should evven honour you wwith the knowwledge, English. Frankly f*ckin’ malapert a’ you to just drop in, insult my romantic record, an' expect all my secrets.”
You take him in for a second - Ampora is an odd friend to you, you have to admit. On face value, he’s about a thousand things you dislike, all wrapped up into one entitled, obnoxiously pretty package. But under his facade, you genuinely like the person he hides: he’s far more self-aware than most people realise, and far more at peace with himself than he used to be. You enjoy the talks you have with him, even if they started out more as a duty of concern than any particular enthusiasm. You’re glad to see him grin like that, half smug, half soft.
You can also understand the urge to hide the details, cupping away the secrets of a relationship like pearls in the palm of your hand. There are snapshot moments of Dirk that you are fiercely, irrationally possessive of: those memories are just you and him, a thousand little facets to the plum jewel of your bond.
“Well,” you say, instead of prodding. “Is he nice to you?”
Eridan snorts. “‘Course he is. Surprisingly so, really. He ain’t exactly a romantic, but he keeps bringin’ me bloody-raww fish like some kinda traditionalist. It’s f*ckin’ hilarious ‘cause he gets all kinds a’ nauseated wwhen I eat ‘em, but he does it anywway. So. That’s cool or wwhatevver.”
He’s blushing, and you’re never going to let him live this down. For now, though, you’re content to let him revel in his newfound relationship.
“Well. You’ll have to let me know if he’s ever not, chum, and I’ll show up with an old friend to sort him out.” You offer.
“Old friend?” he inquires.
“A beautiful lady I like to call Madame Beretta,” you explain, and pat your holster when his puzzled frown doesn’t change. “… that’s a gun name, my fishy friend. It’s quite funny.”
“Uh huh,” Eridan rests his chin in his hands, proffering a challenging eyebrow. “Wwell, I ‘appose that’s kinda swweet of you. In a presumptuous wway. Wwhat, you don’t think I can handle myself?”
You succumb to the urge to ruffle his hair into his eyes, and he loses all semblance of composure, tipping backwards and shrieking like a child. “Whatever happened to gorgeous-chaps-with-hope-aspects solidarity, then?”
“Alright!” The seadweller concedes, slapping your hands away with flimsy dignity. “Alright, f*ck- fine, English, I’ll be sure to tell my quad you’ll light him up if he’s an asshole. Actually, that wwould be hilarious.”
“Always happy to be of service,” you declaim - Ampora always brings out the thespian in you - and you mean it. You’re not entirely joking about your offer, either; you’ve seen Eridan shake and panic when he cuts himself by accident, the way his fingers rub over his ribs like he’s trying to assure himself he’s still all together. He, like all of you, has been left with scars from the game. You feel a sort of brotherly responsibility to make sure no dastardly rake rips those wounds open again.
“Anywway,” Eridan says, eyes narrowing ominously. “I really f*ckin’ doubt you came by just to listen to me bein’ all besotted an’ wwhatnot. So wwhat do you wwant, seein’ as you’vve already rejected my generous offers of counsel so gracelessly?”
“Do you know where Dirk is?” You ask, after a moment of deliberation. He crosses his arms.
“Wwhy wwould I knoww that?”
Why ask me, his stare seems to demand.
You consider it may not be wise to point out he’s enough of a gossip to know and enough of an asshole to tell you despite being held to secrecy. Instead, you do your best to look innocent. “Because you’re so very savvy and astute, my good fellow?”
Eridan looks at you with amused doubt. “Uh huh. You mean that Davve probably wwouldn’t tell you, ‘cause Dirk asked him to keep it quiet, but I’m a safer bet?”
“See, astute!” You try, grinning hopefully. “Come on, chum, it’s for, um, romance. Romance stuff.”
“Spoken like a man vvery comfortable wwith his owwn feelings,” he retorts dryly. “Havve you considered maybe wwaitin’ him out, if he wwants time to himself so bad?”
“It’s been days,” you say pitifully. “Haven’t I made him wait long enough?”
Eridan’s expression doesn’t change.
“Please?” You cajole. “Listen, these are eleventh hour type shenanigans, Eridan! This is the airport scene in a dashing romcom, or it would be, if the protagonist’s plucky best pal would just give the errant suitor the bloody gate number!”
“English, you f*ckin’ scoundrel,” The seadweller’s fins flap dramatically as he sighs. “You knoww I can’t resist a good romcom. Damn. Alright, just pretend you’re a competent alien for once, can you do that? ’Cause if you f*ck this up, I’m not gonna be the one pattin’ your hair wwhile you snivvel into my exquisite scarvves.”
“Yes you will.”
“Yes I wwill,” he repeats, long-suffering. “An’ I think wwe’d both like to avvoid such an appallin’ fate, so don’t f*ck this up, understand?”
You nod enthusiastically. Eridan sighs again, harder, and writes down a transportaliser code.
If you didn’t already have suspicions about the identity of Eridan’s mysterious beau, you certainly do the second Captor open his hive door. The sleepy-eyed yet perpetually wired psiionic looks much the same as usual, all bizarrely captioned shirt and mismatched socks, but for the large and extremely conspicuous mess of bites covering every square inch of his bloody neck.
You open your mouth to say hello, and instead find yourself blurting, “Holy Toledo, what happened to you?”
Shameless, Captor sends you a smug, uneven smile. “Thhark attack.”
Quite. On further inspection, you can see the full f*cking range of a seadweller’s dentition bruised into grey skin, thin puncture mark rows of needle-prick hunting teeth and all.
“That cannot possibly be safe,” you manage, torn between morbid fascination and discomfort.
“Yeah, you know blood lothth maketh you kind of trippy and dazed?” The troll wiggles his eyebrows. “Hot.”
“…okay,” you give him a wide berth as you step inside, twisting your hands nervously. “Um. Eridan said Dirk was hanging around?”
“Oh,” Sollux’s eyes open wide. “Oh, yeah. You’re the guy- right. Yeah, he’th been moping in my thpare block for dayth. Man’th tech work ith f*cking gorgeouth, but he’th like f*cking Troll Morithi or thome thhit.”
“I see?” You have no idea who that is.
“Theriouthly, I’ve never theen, like, a phythical aura of angtht manifetht before.” The troll snickers and you smile awkwardly.
“Excellent!” You say. “I’ll just-“
Before you can go trampling in the direction he indicated, you find yourself stopped in place by a prickling wave of electricity.
“Hold up, not tho fatht, Romeio,” Captor holds up a finger. “One, no loud thex noitheth. Two, don’t break the platform.”
Horrified, you stare. “I- I don’t know what you think I’m here for, but it’s not that! Nothing of that kind will be-“
He just waves you off, his psii vanishing back into the ether. “Uh huh, thure. Jutht make thure ‘nothing’ thtayth at reathonable noithe levelth, becauthe no offenthe but I have like, zero interetht in hearing Thtrider get dicked down into next Twothday. Don’t tetht me, bitch.”
You blink in stupefaction at his back when he turns, whistling, to shuffle away. Then another wave of anticipatory adrenaline hits you, and you’re bounding through Captor’s bizarrely structured hive, dodging all matter of electrical gizmos and c.
A flight of hexagonal stairs leads you up to a door, and you’re already reaching halfway to the handle when a flash of hideous anxiety, pure and shocking as a thunder strike, renders you motionless. Oh god. Okay. This is it. This is the moment of reckoning, where everything could go terribly, terribly wrong.
…it’d probably be rude to just burst in, wouldn’t it? Shifting nervously, you knock instead.
Jumping jalapeños, footsteps. You hear footsteps. Okay. Just remember what Karkat said: hello good pal. Can we talk? Don’t tell him you want your skeletons buried together. Just say I missed you. Definitely not ‘I just realised I have an itemised list of things you like and it’s pages, plural.’ If you don’t want to talk, that’s fine, I will respect your boundaries like a good little barkbeast- no wait, he told you not to say that part. And absolutely do not f*cking say ‘I’m going to expel blood from my face because of you.’ Nothing about consarned husks, understand?
Remember. Be polite and respectful, don’t say-
The door opens slowly, tentatively, until he catches sight of you. Dirk Strider gapes, eyes huge, mouth half-open and hands held up almost defensively in the air before him.
He’s as glorious as a thousand azure-skinned dames. You want to kiss every single millimetre of him.
“Jake?” Strider rasps, still gawping.
You open your mouth, brain one blinking error message. “I- that is-“
Oh god oh god.
“If you don’t want to talk I’ll expel blood from every consarned orifice in this mortal husk,” you hear yourself say, like some sort of hideous possession. Strider’s mouth drops open further. You wince. “I mean.”
He stares at you a second longer, apparently lost for words, and then understandably closes the door right in your face.
You stare for a moment, deflate like a popped balloon, and turn on your heel. This was a bad, stupid idea, and you are a bad, stupid chump who can’t even think of better descriptors than bad and stupid. You knew this would happen. You knew it-
You’re at the top of the stairs when the door flies open, crashing against the wall. You swivel just in time see Dirk open his mouth, freeze, then flash-step towards you so fast he overshoots and smacks straight into your half-swivelled body.
Despite your bemusem*nt, your arms come up naturally to steady him, and he slams into you like a tidal wave - you think for a dazed second that he’s going in for a kiss, but then his chin tucks over and around and he’s pressing his face into your neck, shaking a little. He fits against you just right, even as you barely manage to stop the both of you crashing down the stairs.
“Woah!” You pant, swaying on the spot. “Woah, there, cowboy-“
“sh*t, sorry-” He breathes, like he’s got a damn thing to be apologising for, and drat it all, affection is something of a wave one can’t swim against. You could no more resist the tides of the ocean than you can could stop yourself pulling him close, hooking your arms around the dip of his waist and squeezing like he might disappear.
Neither of you are in any danger of toppling ass-over-teakettle down the stairs, anymore, and he gets his balance back almost immediately. There’s no reason for Dirk to stay clutching at you, you know that, but you can still feel your disappointment colour your face as he starts to move back.
He stops, mid-motion, staring down at you. His hair and eyelashes are pale, frost-like, and his mouth is parted, and he’s so lovely - and then, before you can even try to reign yourself back to common sense, Dirk’s leaning in towards you without a word.
He kisses you first, slow and gentle, and your stomach flips like a burnt pancake.
“Mngh-“ You spend a half-second in stupefied silence before some integral wire finally connects in your brain, and then you’re pulling him up against you so hard he lets out an odd gaspy noise, his capable hands sliding up your sides to link around your neck. He’s wearing his leather gloves, you note, the texture smooth and inhuman next to cool skin.
You like it. A lot.
A moment later, the glorious reverie shatters with an irreverent wolf whistle. Dirk breaks away, flushed to his ears, and extends a dignified middle finger over your shoulder; you let him pull you from the stairs, towards privacy, with barely enough brain capacity to process the situation. You just- it occurs to you, in a strange sort of way, that that was the first kiss you’ve ever had with him where you didn’t have a voice in your head, reminding you that you’ll pay for it, one way or another.
Strider shuts the door behind him and sits on the bed with stilted, awkward movements, face almost as smoothly blank as it was the first day you met in person. His ears are still crimson, though, and he’s got the tiniest hint of a traitorous flush on his cheeks, and he somehow looks terribly uncertain and terribly beautiful, all at once.
“Hi,” he says finally, throat working.
“Hello, lov- Hi. It’s- you’re going to think this is overdramatic, it’s only been a few days, but- I missed you, chap.” You swallow.
Some invisible tension in the room starts to release, relaxing in time with Dirk’s wire-strung shoulders. “sh*t, man. You don’t need to tell me. I’ve been staying with Captor, and he’s great, but he’s-“ Strider pauses, considering. “Have you ever been heartbroken and living with someone who’s insanely happy and newly in love?”
You think back to those first unbearable months after the Game, before you and Dirk started talking again. John and Roxy, Dave and Karkat, Rose and Kanaya… You know what he’s talking about. It’s not jealousy so much as a deep and gnawing hunger, an emptiness that expands to push out your internal organs until you’re just hollow inside. Your stomach twists when you imagine Dirk lying here in a guest room at night, that ravenous void chewing up his insides.
“Yeah,” you reply softly. “Reckon I do, chum.”
“Good.” He lets his head drop back onto the sheets, sighing. “It’s been f*cking miserable. I paced so much I think there are probably track marks in the ground.”
“Ah,” you hover awkwardly, trying not to gawk too obviously at the sliver of almond-pale midriff exposed by his stretch.
Unexpectedly, Dirk sits back up, ramrod-straight. “I’m sorry. Uh. sh*t, that wasn’t exactly f*cking eloquent, but I needed to say it before my cowardice overcame my last vestiges of decency, so. There you have it. I’m sorry, I’m a demanding parasitic creep, and I regretted leaving the second I got here.”
Taken aback, you stop in your nervous fidgeting to boggle at him. “Wait, I’m sorry, you’re apologising to me?”
“Yeah, man.” Damn his stupid shades, damn them to hell, why is his voice so flat? “I acted like a clingy dipsh*t. No wonde-“
“Dirk,” you say tightly, abruptly bludgeoned with a new wave of determination to rescue him from his own dreadful self-esteem. First, though, you think you should sit down. You’re looming over him by now like some sort of Frankenstein’s monster, only rude enough that it’d be Dr Wankenstein’s creation instead.
Returning to the point, you need to sit down. You could sit on the floor or lean against a desk or something, but…
Dirk’s arranged himself with space accommodate another person, and in any other time, you’d already be crawling all over him - bickering over the remote, trying to playfully confiscate his sunglasses, pressing a laughing kiss to the jut of his cheekbone - but right now, that feels wrong. There’s an invitation, maybe, in the loose sprawl of his arm and the way he’s angled himself, but you’ve made enough mistakes. Now is not the time to avoid your shared issues and personal boundaries by simply hurling yourself in his direction and pretending they don’t exist.
This is Dirk’s game, at current.
You stare at the floor, face hot and hands sweaty, and ask, “May I sit next to you?”
You catch a flash of surprised amber behind those shades, followed by an indecipherable snort and mouth-twist. “What? Of course, man, my block es su block, you don’t even have to ask.”
“Okay,” you reply, and settle down hesitantly at his side. You breathe in deep first, collecting yourself. “I- One sec, chum, I need to, to line up my words before I accidentally make a gaffe worse than that one earlier.”
“I didn’t mean to, uh, slam the door in your face,” Dirk offers, and you feel a tiny glow of hope start to emanate within you. “I just- sh*t, I was gonna say nevermind, but it’s not like I can make this worse. I’ve basically been imagining you knocking on that door ever minute of every hour for the past few days, and I had this brief horrific moment of thinking I’d progressed to pathetic hallucinations.”
He looks at you, wide-eyed and furtive, like he’s still not a thousand percent convinced. Hesitantly, you hover your hand over to his; he takes it, and your fingers twine, and the most ridiculous fluster overwhelms you. You’ve had your bloody co*ck in ass, for the love of God, but this is just- it’s different. This is very much not the same.
You need to consider your words. How long has it even been, really, since you fell in love with him? How do you quantify that? Was it when you kissed, when you met for the first time, when you realised he was human at last?
You’ve been thinking a lot about your past relationship in these few days. The first failed attempt, the one that vindicated all your fears; you’ve tried to avoid the memories since, growing more and more mortified over time, but on reflection, it’s not so bad as you remember. The bone-deep humiliation and anxiety seems less like doom the older you get. Undisputedly, you f*cked up, a lot. That being said, for someone raised off British lads’ adventure novels from the 1920s, you like to think you could’ve done worse.
On the other hand, it’s hard to deny that you pretty much let Dirk take all the responsibility for the relationship. It’s hard not to let him take over, sometimes - Dirk is so smart and so desperate for control, he’ll never let on when he’s struggling - but you were being a coward. You were so scared to want something for fear of the loss, you let him handle the burden. It’s so much easier to ignore potential devastation when the choice isn’t your own, after all.
That’s always been the difference between you - all your life, you’ve been very good at staying content. Your dreams are far-flung and fanciful, but you’ve never been one to long hopelessly for what you can’t have: orange eyes and cold feet pressed to yours under the covers. You’re distractible.
But Dirk? Dirk wants voraciously, with an all-consuming, single-minded hunger and vibrancy. He likes to keep himself pale and emotionless on the outside, but he saves all the Technicolor for his brain. The intensity of his feeling is so unbearably huge and intimate, it sometimes feels like an intrusion to look him in the eyes.
You found it uncomfortable, being wanted like that. Back then, you still thought he wanted you, but only parts: your legs, your eyes, your smile, your manner of speaking. You always thought his fixation on you was half idealisation, half amusem*nt at the novelty. You hadn’t realised then that Dirk wants wholly and ravenously and without prejudice.
Just a month or two after you started talking again, you accidentally walked into his block when he was on his bed, looking at an old shirt you must’ve left the first time. Not doing anything, just looking at it, one hand stroking soft, worn fabric - mouth a thin line, eyes a blur of ivory lashes.
When his head whipped up, his shades were off - a rare moment of vulnerability - and when he saw you, the golden liquor of his eyes shattered like stained glass. You’d never seen him so devastatingly, piteously humiliated as when you caught him in a moment of seeming mundanity: just your old shirt, one you wore to sleep in, hideously unflattering and probably stained from gunpowder.
It was the look in his eyes that made it significant. Big owl eyes, beautiful and hawkish as the rest of him, ringed with shadows and staring at you like you’d gazed straight into his soul. You’d never seen Dirk like that before.
He really, truly missed you.
You expected to feel terrified, to feel the dread weight of obligation shackled to your ankles, ready to turn the slightest fall into a fatality. You weren’t expecting the luminous rush of gold through your veins, sparkling in every f*cking cell of your body, fresh as sprouting vines and just as promising.
That’s when you asked him to move back in with you. You haven’t regretted it yet, and what few regrets you do have concerning him, they’re nowhere near enough to balance out the sheer unmitigated happiness Dirk Strider brings you.
You think you want this enough to try, and that’s half the battle, isn’t it?
So now, you breathe in, turn to him, and ready yourself. “Strider,” you say, and then, “Sweetheart.”
“Oh god,” he murmurs. “What is it?”
“It’s not- just hold on,” you suggest, already out of your depth. “Um. So, the conversation we had-“
“Oh no.”
“Certain things were said,” you hedge. “And I really shouldn’t have said them-“
“It’s fine!”
“Dirk-“
Your best pal pushes his shades up and rubs his eyes. “Seriously, English, could we just. Not? I wasn’t going to hold you to some half-dazed proposal sh*t, it’s fine.”
“No,” you interrupt, more severely than intended. “No, shush. The thing was, I shouldn’t have said those things because I didn’t even bother analysing them first. But now I have.”
“Jake-“ he says desperately.
“And I meant them,” you push on, as the precipice crumbles below you.
Dirk lets out a choking noise. “What?”
You twist your hands, more nervous than you’ve ever been. “I- look, you have to understand, chum, I find all this confusing, and I’m not good at it, and you’re under no obligation to reciprocate-“
“What did you mean?” Strider grits out, and you smile despite yourself.
“Just bear with me here. The thing is, chap, I’ve always been led to believe that love is something that transforms you. And it’s taken me so f*cking long to become a person I don’t hate, and I’m - god, I’m absolutely f*cking terrified of change, Dirk. I don’t want you to change. I don’t want to change. I don’t want either of us to change, because-“ you pause, trembling. “Dirk, I know this sounds foolish, but I can’t imagine a better existence than the one I have with you. You’re confusing and I care about you so much it makes me stupid, but- well, it’s like you said. I’d rather be miserable with you than alone. And I’m not miserable, chap. I was nowhere near miserable, except when I realised just how much of an oaf I’ve been.”
“Oh, Jesus, Jake,” Dirk says, face wildly conflicted between dismay and hysteria. “You sound like a medieval villain when you speak like that.”
“Well, I’ve bally acted like one!”
“No,” he shakes his head, shifting closer. “No, man, you’re still the hero, okay?”
“I don’t think any of us are bloody heroes,” you reply, and try bolster your nerves. “The point is, I don’t- I don’t know how to want things, Dirk.”
“Oh?”
“I mean, I do want things,” you rattle on, somewhat nonsensically, “But- but growing up on an island, and all that, there was always something I wanted but knew I could never have. Most of it was. At that point, all wanting and hope and whatnot ends up just seeming a way to make yourself sick and miserable.”
He nods, a shaky little thing.
“And, you know, I don’t think I ever really grew out of it. Wanting something is absolutely spine-chilling for me, Strider, because it feels so bally futile. But, um, and you can completely correct me on this-“
Dirk huffs out the tiniest laugh.
“-But this? Our relationship? It doesn’t feel so fragile that it can’t withstand a little hope.” You scratch your neck, sheepish. “And I meant it. I meant it when I said that you’re beautiful, and clever, and very charming-“ he groans, covering his face again. “And I meant it when I said that if you weren’t my best friend, I’d probably have proposed to you by now.”
He stares at you like he’s waiting for a punchline. “Is that- Jake, what are you saying?”
“I’m saying,” you take another breath, “I- I like you a lot. Romantically. I love you. I love you, and I miss you passionately, and I- it’s been dawning on me, of late, that I have a lot of issues, bro, but you’re the only person I’ve ever felt this way towards. I don’t know exactly how you define love, but it’s different from any other feeling, and it makes me feel crazy, and I have to be honest..”
You pause when you realise you’re squeezing his hand so tight his knuckles are creaking. “…I am f*cking terrified.”
“Well, that makes two of us,” Strider says faintly. “Is this- Is this the world’s most f*cked-up prank?”
“What? No,” you jerk back, flailing emphatically. “No, no, no, that would be- no.”
“Then what are you doing?” He asks, with air of crackling desperation. “Jake, man. What the f*ck is this?”
“I-“
“Because it sounds like you’re-“
“I am,” you cut in, refusing to break your eye contact. “Dirk, I am. Confessing undying romantic love, that is.”
“…What?” He sways on the spot.
“I… don’t know how else to phrase that. My heart is yours, fellow. My sword is at your service. You’ve got me 'round your little finger, my head over my heels, all the breath that’s in my lungs, and-“
“Jake,” Dirk interrupts, hand resting firmly on your knee even as his voice trembles. “I have enough energy for precisely one more iteration of this f*cking conversation. Do you promise? Because if this is a friend thing, or if you’re just trying to get me to move back, I’ll go. I’ll do whatever you want, man, just please don’t say that unless you mean it.”
You think about him, and his smile and knobbly elbows and quiet vanity, and you place your hand over his. “I mean it. I promise.”
“Are you sure?”
“I am very, completely, a thousand percent sure,” you confirm. “I’m even peer-reviewed, dove.”
“Well then.” Dirk smiles, a wry sliver of a thing, and then he’s swinging a knee over you to rest on your lap. “This is all going to go down in flames, but you can’t say I didn’t check.”
Before he can affix his lips yours and irreparably vanish your train of thought, you lean back. “Dirk-“
“Talking time over, initiate macking time-“
“Dirk.”
He stiffens. “…Or not?”
“I’m afraid not,” you say regretfully, and he slumps.
“I cannot believe Jake English, of all people, is co*ckblocking himself to talk about feelings.”
“You and me both, chum, but, well,” you tilt your forehead over to rest on his shoulder, thinking. “I just want to make sure we’re on the same page.”
“Okay…”
“I love you,” you tell him, mouth against his neck. He jolts, fingers flexing on your shoulders.
“I already said I’d move back in with you, man.”
“That’s not why I’m saying it,” you tell him, and then, even though it hurts to even think, “You don’t have to.”
“What?”
“You don’t have to do anything. I’ve finally taken a good look in the confounded mirror and pulled my head out my own rectal cavity, and I’ve realised that I want you to be happy more than I want to keep you around. Nothing would make me happier than to continue seeing your dazzling grin every morn, but if you don’t want to live with me, you don’t have to. I’d prefer you didn’t force yourself.”
“Oh,” Dirk mumbles. “Sincerely?”
“Yes.”
“Huh.”
“I love you,” you repeat, and he continues to squirm. “I love you, I really really do, and I promise I’ve thought this through, and also I braved Rose Lalonde to make sure-“
You stop when you see he’s shaking, as in, really shaking, full tremor and everything.
“I’m sorry,” you move back an inch. “I’ve gone and overwhelmed you like a frigging pillock-“
“Last chance,” Dirk says.
“What?”
“Last chance to dip out, English,” he continues. “Because I’m about to be incomprehensibly stupid and let myself trust something too good to be true.”
“No dipping here,” you reassure him. “But, you know, you’re not held to anything-“
“I gave up on that a long time ago,” Dirk mutters, his hands sliding to the back of your neck. You shiver pleasantly at the feeling of sleek leather against your febrile skin; he notices, clever as ever, and keeps trailing his hands over you. “It seems you, uh, you’ve got a thing for the gloves, English.”
“I do,” you admit readily. “You look dashed striking in them and I like the texture. I like a capable man, you know?”
“How do you feel about flailingly ironic losers?”
“Don’t know any,” you say, voice firm, and lean in to kiss him again before he can cue up any more self-deprecation.
Dirk kisses you as if you’re the last bottle of hair gel in the whole damn universe. You let him lead, for once, content to be gripped in his lanky arms and kissed like the heroine in a drama film just before the credits roll. You think he’d pull off the dramatic protagonist fairly well, and considering how you act around him, you can’t imagine you’d struggle to play the smitten sexy lamp character.
“Are you laughing?” He demands.
You smile and squeeze his waist, a little tipsy off your own joy. “No, no, I was just- I’d make such a dreadful movie love interest, wouldn’t I?”
“You’d be f*cking great,” Dirk tells you brusquely, ducking his face into your neck. “You make me tea and remind me to eat food and perform all sorts of amatory hijinks, you’d be great.”
“Is that your way of saying I’d be a decent boyfriend?”
He releases your neck from his blandishments to look at you, chewing his lip. “I guess so.”
“Um. I-“ you scratch your neck. Why is the tongue part always so much easier than the words? “I would, uh, I think you’d be an excellent boyfriend too, Strider.”
“Uh huh?” Dead stare.
You give up and sigh, beaming sheepishly. “I, uh- I’m just going to come right out and say it, dove, I think you’d be just- just absolutely wonderful as my boyfriend in particular. If you’d be interested at all.”
He maintains his flat stare, even though he’s so close you can hear his heart thrumming like a wild creature’s. “Really?”
“Yep!” Your voice crack. “Please, uh, please be my boyfriend?”
And Dirk manages to muster up a genuine, sincere if shaky smile from somewhere, when he tells you, “About damn time, English.”
“Is that-“
“It’s a yes.”
You grin so hard your cheeks hurt. A minute of serene cow-eyes is all you can handle, and then you’re pushing straight forwards to kiss him again, groaning as he pants and sends his nails raking down your back.
“f*ck, Jake-“
“Captor- Captor said no loud sex noises-“ you offer token protest and do absolutely nothing to stop him.
“f*ck Captor,” Dirk says viciously, fingers twisting into your hair. “I- ah- I fixed every f*cking monitor in his house, ‘cause I was- was so f*cking depressed, he owes me this at least-“
“You’re beautiful,” you tell him unabashedly. “You’re so absolutely divine, dove, Venus must’ve seduced the stars, because-“
“Yeah, yeah,” he dismisses, then pauses. “Wait. Do you actually mean that?”
Offended, you stare. “Of course!”
“Huh.”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
“I thought you were into bizarrely romantic dirty talk,” Dirk explains casually, even as an almost-shy smile twitches at his lips. “I didn’t think you actually meant it.”
“I meant it,” you assure him, a wave of exasperated affection thrashing you. “Good lord, sweetheart, I meant it every time.”
“Oh.” Oh ho, the rare and elusive Strider voice crack-flush combo.
“You’re ludicrous,” you tell him fondly, and slide your hands into his back pockets for better leverage.
“Throwing stones in a glass house-“
He wriggles and oomphs when you topple him onto his back, letting your weight fall on him. You’re creating something of a giggly puddle of hormones, you’ll admit it, and you have the vague feeling you should be embarrassed, but who could be, when you’re so damnably happy?
He runs cold, but he’s warmer from all the close contact - still cooler than you, though, enough to squirm when your burning-hot hands go sneaking under his shirt. He lies back on the sheets, head tilted; you take a second to truly savour the view, the moment, the way you’re allowed to acknowledge the softness in his eyes, then find yourself yanked abruptly forth.
“Mngh-“ Dirk pulls you down onto him, sighing, and rolls his hips straight up against yours. The rough glide of friction is incredible, shattering your daze: his hands are starfished against your back, your fingers curled in his hair as he grinds against you. When he looks back up at your gobsmacked face, his lips tick up a fraction.
“It appears I’ve finally found a way to fluster the great Jake English,” Strider says drily. “Who’d have thought?”
“You just look- capable,” you mumble. “I like a capable chap. And you’re always able to fluster me, dove, it’s unending.”
“Sure.” His brow crinkles. “One of us came in their pants when they realised the other had a boner, and one-“
“You fluster me very much, bro,” you assure him. “I thought you knew, really - I’m the one who’s always rambling about you and whatnot.”
Dirk pauses, looking contemplative even as he continues to rub against you. “No- actually- unexpectedly, you may have a point. I just kind of assumed you knew? As in, it was too mortifyingly obvious for words?”
“You’ve got quite the poker face, chum.” You admit. “It’s difficult to tell how, uh, how you feel about me sometimes. What parts you like, and such.”
“That’s- uh- fascinating,” he concedes, trailing his hands down your back. “I suppose from the outside, it might not seem- I’m not used to verbalising any of this sh*t. It’s more like a constant, hideously obvious secret everyone figures out.”
“I didn’t.”
“Yes, well.” Strider shudders briefly. “You know that kittycat shipper troll? She came up to me, apropos of f*cking nothing, and told me I looked at you like you were the last man in the world. Then she walked off. That girl scares the hell out of me.”
“Now you know how I feel about your sister.”
He groans when you slide your hand down his ass, hair mussing in his eyes. “Oh-okay, new rule, no mentioning family me-mbers during sex-“
“Strider,” you ask hesitantly, trying to match his rhythm. “Could you- Would you maybe tell me? Just, in words?”
“Ah-“ Dirk chews his lip, and you think for a second he’ll refuse, but then he’s talking again. “Where do I even f*cking start? I like- I like it when you look at me. Always. You’ve got- um- you’ve got really f*cking gorgeous eyes, man. f*cking smaragdine orbs. Uh.”
You tug lightly at his hair; he squirms, voice rasping.
“f*ck- okay. I like it when you remember things I say- just, just, sometimes I talk into an empty void, right? But- ah- when you’re there, you listen. It’s-“
He cuts off when you hook your fingers in his shirt, a silent question. You frown. “Too much?”
Dirk’s mouth is hot on your skin. “Do you want to?”
You can feel his jaw working, brows furrowed in focus, when you trail your hands over sides. “Affirmative, Captain.”
“Jesus Christ,” Dirk says, eyes rolling dramatically even as he grasps your wrists and guides them up, briskly squirming out of the shirt. “Uh. Even the score?”
“Strider, you have permission to divest me of any such clothing you consider unnecessary,” you tell him fervently, and he performs something between a blush and a snort.
“Start with the shirt.”
You sit back on your knees and pull the garment up and over. You’d do it seductively if you knew how, but you know your limits - and judging by the way he’s staring at you, it’s seductive enough to work for him.
“What next?”
He swallows, eyes flickering over you. “Uh.”
“Oh, sorry,” you interject. “My turn, right?”
“It’s not f*cking truth or dare.”
“I truthfully dare you to remove your pants, best beloved.”
Dirk holds out for a second, like he’s trying to prove he could say no if he wants to, then studiously looks away as he makes quick work of the zip. You don’t try to pretend you’re not watching, the pale curve of his ass and the slender sinew of his scarred legs as he folds the fabric tightly.
“Strider?”
“Dude, I’m pleating.”
“Come back to me,” you say plaintively, “I’m languishing, bro-“
“Uh huh.”
“Darling, sugar lump, apple of my eye-“
He finally glances back up and pinks, presumably at the sight of you with a hand on yourself, palming your poor neglected co*ck through fabric.
“f*ck. No fair, man, that doesn’t count as taking ‘em off.”
“Perhaps you’ll have to persuade me.”
Dirk smirks despite himself, sidling over to you like an unlucky cat. “Alright, then. I suppose it’s mad sick and tubular-“
“There goes my boner, chum.”
“Looks fine to me,” he says, and plops down straight back onto your lap. You waste no time in getting your hands back all over that soft expanse of skin, freckled and scarred and gorgeous, and Dirk melts for you like high quality cooking chocoolate. He nips at your neck and leans into your touch and it’s- well. It’s an uncharacteristic show of trust, you think. The Dirk you know tends to hold himself more rigorously in check, you think, but the Dirk you know isn’t exactly the type to count on you to stop him falling down the stairs, either. This is a new and exciting incarnation of Dirk, one who’s willing to shut his eyes and ignore the cold mechanical parts of his brain and trust you. You’re dizzy with the sheer delight of it.
It takes you too long to realise your hands are clenching down on his hips, probably hard enough to bruise. You only notice when he inhales sharply, and then you’re rearing back. “Oh, sorry, such a-“
“It’s fine,” he pants, glassy-eyed. “Do it again.”
“Really?”
“I’m gonna have some pretty magnificent bruising there tomorrow, that’s all.” He presses his palm down on your lap, and you nip gently at his neck, clasping him close again. “Oh, sh*t-“
“Alright?”
“Touch me,” Dirk rocks against you with a kind of burning desperation. “Mmph- talk later, touching now, English?”
You cue up fifty witty retorts. You look at him, flushed and slender with eyes like sun-warmed galaxies, and you forget every single one of them.
“I missed you,” you say instead, and he moans quietly.
“Show me.”
“I-“
“In a sexual way,” he continues impatiently. “Show me in a sexual way, English, words later.”
“I’m going to absolutely lampoon you for that sentence the second blood flow returns to my noggin,” you tell him seriously. “There will be wild, excessive and mortifying japery. Now, just- let me shift you, and- perfect. You’re just perfect.”
Dirk shivers as you fumble with his fly, tugging his jeans down his hips with a clumsy haste. “Jake…”
“You’re such a sight, sweetheart. You could launch more ships than any Helen, you know,” you murmur, and then you’re nosing at his jaw as he does the same for you. He fumbles the zip and pulls a face, and you only worsen it when you try to help him - the two of you have about as much coordination combined as a pair of drunk parakeets, but you figure it out eventually.
Dirk snakes a hand into your underwear and you make a distinctly unmanly noise, flustered.
“Oh, f*ck, gloves, right-“
“No-“ you break off, choking on your own words, when he slowly starts to curl his fingers around your dick; he snaps his wrist experimentally and you hiss through your teeth, trying not to look like a man deranged. “It’s- I like it.”
“What?”
You grin, pushing into his touch. “If it’s all the same to you, chum. I honestly find it pretty frigging sexy, the, the leather and all.”
“Oh,” Dirk repeats, eyes hazy. “That’s- that’s weirdly hot. I can’t believe you made the word frigging hot.”
“Alright, no need to be a wise guy,” you mutter.
“Au contraire.”
You yank Strider forwards and kiss him thoroughly, until he doesn’t look deeply smug so much as he looks intent. Intent Dirk is a very good thing. Intent Dirk-
Intent Dirk both proves your point and robs you of all words when he shoves your trousers down further, slides closer, and gets his hand around both of you, stroking in long glorious motions.
“Oh,” you manage, breath hitching.
“Okay?”
You wrap your hand over his, a gesture that somehow comes off as equally romantic and obscene, and kiss at his jaw, delighted by how bloody flustered it seems to make him. “Divine and, and sensational, chap.”
“That’s the- f*ckin’- that’s the Strider guarantee,” he grits out, and you can’t help but melt a little. He is so absolutely ridiculous.
It doesn’t take very long for either of you, which feels fair - you’ve both had a lot of catharsis to experience, stamina is not key here - and you find yourself coming all over his stomach in short order, sighing. “Ah- goddamn flibbertigibbets, that's- mph.”
Dirk squints at you, then you must stroke the right area because he’s following you, loud and pretty. His eyes flutter shut, and you steady him with an arm around the waist, beaming as only a smitten schmuck can.
As soon as Dirk’s brain recovers, he turns and snickers at you. “f*cking- f*cking flibbertigibbets?”
“It’s a word!”
“Your face is a word,” he mumbles nonsensically, pointedly wiping himself clean with your discarded trousers. “sh*t, bad retort. Think you, uh, screwed the brains out of me. Still want to be, my, my boyfriend?”
You don’t even have to think about it. “Yes,” you emphasise, and twist to plaster yourself against his back. “Indubitably. Really. Try to get out now, buddy chum, I think you’ll find I’m a man of persuasion.”
“I’m too tired for any more persuasion,” Dirk rebuffs, but he’s smiling.
“Then continue to little-spoon for me, bucko.”
“…I’m not a f*cking little spoon.”
“Yes you are.”
“I’m not.”
“Well, I’m currently spooning you, making me the big spoon, so what does that make you?”
Your boyfriend - ! - considers for a second. “…shut up.”
“I don’t want to shut up,” you admit happily. “I am amped and psyched and pepped up the wazoo, boyfriend mine.”
“…You can still call me bro, man, it’s fine.”
“No. You’re my beau, now, which means I’m allowed to call you sunflower and snooku*ms and muffin and lovebug and-“
He tries to glare at you. It’s not even slightly convincing. “What the- do you have a list?”
“And here I thought you’d be delighted to engage in some ironic endearmenting,” you say, shaking your head.
He knocks you with his pointy little elbow. “Endearments are uncool even when ironic. I’ve been trying to tell Dave for years, dude, you’re such a bad influence.”
“But what of my heart, sweetling?” You ask, tucking your chin over his shoulder.
“What of it?”
“Perhaps it yearns to garnish you with odes.”
Dirk laughs, then, an actual laugh he tries to hide. “Oh, god, man, no…”
“Maybe I should go combing through some Shakespeare, even-“
“Are you post-coitally unhinged?”
“With love, perhaps.”
His lips twitch into a subtle grin again. “…Whatever. I guess if you want to proselytise insane endearments to me, I’m helpless to resist.”
“As a poet, it’s not a want but a damn need, sugarplum,” you tell him gravely. “But I’ll try to keep it at bay, for you.”
“Yeah?” Dirk says, and rolls over to look at you square in the eyes. “What do you want, then?”
You pause. “…Is this still about poetry?”
“It could be, if you’re secretly harbouring an urge to go that route.”
“I just-“ you almost avoid his piercing stare, then ginger yourself back up and face him like a man. “I don’t know? I mean, there’s a lot of things I want, I guess, but it’s like I said, I don’t really know how to want them."
“Yeah,” he says, and turns to look at you properly. “But you said you’re trying to, right? So tell me what you want.”
“Gadzooks,” you laugh nervously. “I, uh, I don’t know where to start. There are about a million things, really: I mean, I want to keep talking to you, and I want to remember to invite you into the shower sometime, and I’d like to move your things into my room or vice versa, and- there’s so much.”
Dirk smiles, just a fraction. “I think that could be arranged.”
“Alright,” you gather steam. “I, um, I want you to continue to be my boyfriend, if you’re so inclined. And for you to tell me things.”
“Yep.” He winces. “I mean, I’ll try.”
“And I want to be allowed to kiss you in public.”
He lets out a shallow breath. “Seconded, I’m cool with that.”
“And I get to buy you that disgusting candy you like.”
Dirk snorts. “Sure.”
“And-“ you pause, twisting your fingers. “I- stop me if this sounds stupid, chum, but… I’d like to take you on a date.”
Strider stills entirely when he turns to look at you. “A date?”
“Yes, well, I know we already spend lots of time together, but I really want to- you know- romance you a little. I never really got the chance, but I always wanted to.”
“Oh,” he says, eyes wide. “Uh- f*ck, dude, that’d be- really? You want to?”
“Yep,” you reply tentatively. “Maybe more than one, if I’m not pushing the envelope or whatnot.”
“No!” Dirk’s voice cracks slightly as it increases in volume. “I mean, no, I’d- I’d enjoy the f*ck out of that.”
“Really?”
He smiles at you again, and your face kind of hurts again with how hard you’re grinning. “Yeah. What kind of date?”
“Whatever you want, chum,” you say ardently. “We could go see a movie, or eat food somewhere, or go to a horse place-“
“A horse place.”
“Farm or whatnot, you know what I mean,” you send him a look and he smirks back, unrepentant. “We could even just drink tea and talk, or whatever, I don’t mind-“
“Ah.” Strider stills. You raise a brow.
“Ah?”
“Nevermind.”
“No, go on.”
He squirms for a second under your curious gaze, before he sighs. “…Don’t lose your sh*t.”
“Why would I-“
“In the interests of full transparency, I, uh, I feel compelled to admit I don’t actually… like tea?” His pitch rises with every trailing word. “I know you do, and I know it’s an important trust thing to you, I just… I kind of can’t stand the taste? At all?”
You pause, staring, until he fidgets.
“English?”
“Wait.” You blink, processing. “Wait, so you’ve been drinking tea for months just because-“
“I-“ Dirk freezes when you burst into raucous laughter, crimson flooding his face. “What- why are you laughing?”
“Jesus friggin’ cornucopia, man, why didn’t you just bloody say something?” You howl, overtaken by mirth.
Strider sulks back at you like a soggy cat. “What the hell was I supposed to do, refuse your emotionally-important dead-grandma tea? I’m not a monster."
“I can’t believe you-“ you hiccup, inexplicably amused by the thought that Dirk’s been- oh, he’s such a sweet idiot. He really is. The smartest person you know, and he’s an absolute nitwit. “That’s what you were so shifty about?”
“I didn’t- it was clearly something important to you,” he mutters. “You don’t talk about your Grandma frequently, and you don’t tend to use words when you want to say something, and- I didn’t want to reject the act of trust, alright? It was kind of f*cking touching, that you trusted me enough to share it.”
“Oh,” you say, kind of touched yourself. “Oh, Dirk, you f*cking nugget, it’s not about the tea. I mean, it sort of was a gesture of trust, I suppose. But after that, it wasn’t about the blasted tea, it was about doing something for you.”
“What?”
“It’s like you said. I find words tricky, bro, but I care about you. You’re so self-sufficient, it’s easy to forget you’re human - but you are, plum. And I like being allowed to look after you, you know?”
Strider’s perfectly still as he files that away, then he lets out a deep breath and slumps into your shoulder. “Oh indeed.”
“I’d make you anything you like,” you assure him, petting his silky head. “Even battery-acid coffee with no cream.”
“It helps me focus,” he mumbles. “I’m a dumbass.”
“We’re all dumbasses,” you say affectionately. “What about you, Strider? What sort of suavely ironic date hijinks do you propose?”
Dirk leans into you, just a tad closer, and you smile at the scent of amber.
“Whatever you want, I guess. I’m easy.”
“You can choose the next one.”
He considers. “Deal.”
When you finally emerge, shame-faced, to abscond back to your hive together, you’re greeted by a stone-faced Captor. He’s wearing the most ostentatiously large headphones you’ve ever seen.
“You’re both dead to me,” he says flatly.
You sheepishly shuffle your way out and make note to tell Eridan he has your blessing.
The evening is cool and windy, an autumn night despite hints of spring still on the breeze. You whistle as you walk, hands tucked into your most presentable shorts, matched as elegantly as possible with one of your bowtie vests. Kanaya said you have all the fashion sense of a man in crisis; you patted her back for a good two minutes and told her she was an angel.
You’ve been in a good mood, lately.
You can see him standing outside the Strider-Vantas hive from a block away: the moonlight reflects off a familiar spiky silhouette, framed in chiaroscuro by dark glasses and clothing. He looks very out of place in the ordinary street, and he looks like he’s exactly where fate has led him.
He’s waiting for you. You said you’d pick him up from his brother’s hive, because apparently there was some sort of important talk Karkat was insisting on. You privately suspect it was a proof-of-life check, but that’s fair enough. With clearer eyes, you can see that you’ve been driving the rest of your friends insane for bloody years. You can wait a little, now, to assauge that insanity.
His teeth flash in the darkness when he catches sight of you, a small intimate smile that has your heart thudding like a thousand-mile trek.
“Howdy,” you greet, sidling up to him with as much feigned nonchalance as possible. You’re nervous, obviously, hard not to be.
Dirk nods, face perfectly composed behind his glasses. “English.”
“One of these days, we’ll be familiar enough for you to use my first name, sweetcake.”
“Not if you keep calling me that.”
You proffer an arm and, despite his eye-roll, he takes it. “I’ll win you over, I’m sure.”
“Maybe.” He grips your bicep tight for just a second, like the tiniest reminder that the game’s already won. “So?”
“Shall we?” You ask, and swallow back the trepidation. He’s here, and he’s lovely, and you’d never have gotten to this point if you chose to keep being a coward.
Dirk Strider looks at you, a hint of humour on his face, and slings an arm around your shoulders. “I guess we shall.”
And off you go, into the great unknown, with rather less fear than you’d always expected.
“Remember when you drank tea for months to get in my shorts?”
“I hate it when you tell that story.”
"I think it was very romantic!"
"I hate you."
"You don't."
"...I hate tea."
"It's the little things."
![aporia magnifica - Le_VI - Homestuck [Archive of Our Own] (2024)](data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAEAAAABCAQAAAC1HAwCAAAAC0lEQVR42mP8/h8AAvMB+NzmkbcAAAAASUVORK5CYII=)