Archive of Our Own

⇒ BE GAMZEE MAKARA

Tavros’s car will be in the repair shop for the next week.  A random careless driver had accidentally backed into it a few days ago, leaving a large dent in the hood.  It’s an annoying and unfortunate affair, but you just think it was a miracle no one, especially Tavros, had been inside the vehicle at the time.  If that motherfucker had put so much as a scratch on your boyfriend…

Anyway, because of his lack of car, Tavros asked you to pick him up from work this afternoon. Tavros interns at the police station, training dogs for the canine unit (hell of a motherfucking lot cooler than your job, for sure).  Which is why both of you agreed that you would pick him up from the park one block away from the station. Your heavily spray-painted rusty old purple car would probably look out of place, to say the least, among the sleek black police vehicles in the station parking lot.  

You turn your car into the park, scanning the winding paths for your boyfriend.  The weather is nice today, so there are lot of a people here. Nameless strangers walk past—families with young screaming children, dawdling teenagers, a jogger or two, here and there a couple making out under a tree.  None of them are Tavros, though.

Then you spot a figure on the other side of the park—an individual in a wheelchair with a head of fluffy black hair sitting under the shade of a tree.  It’s gotta be him!

With a lazy smile on your face, you drive towards the person you’re sure is your boyfriend.  When you’re near enough to see his face, you notice the frown adorning his features. Bad day at work, perhaps?  But it’s rare to see Tavros wearing a sour expression, especially after working with those animals he loves so much...Hmm.

No matter, you’ll cheer him up later when you get home.  You pull up closer and stop close to him, but he still doesn’t even look in the direction of your car, which is really strange, considering that your car is loudly colorful and also just plain loud (the engine rattles like a motherfucker).  Instead, he just continues to squint at something in the distance.  You decide that this solemn expression doesn’t suit Tavros at all, so you decide to roll down your window.

“Heyyyyy brother,” you grin, and he turns to look at you, the frown turning into a startled expression.  “I'd say you were a motherfucking angel if those sexy wheels weren't hotter than hell ."  You know how much Tavros loves your intentionally shitty pickup lines, despite the fact that you already "picked him up" long ago and that your lines truly are shitty as fuck.  "Maybe you oughtta think about gettin' offa those motherfuckin' fire wheels and go for a little cooler ride in this baby...you and me?"

You wait for the smile--for the adorable, squeaky little giggle of Tavros's that you know so well.  For him to try to make a decent comeback, only to trip up on his words and give up. For his eyes to crinkle up, for his hand to cover his mouth as he tries to hide his amusement at your silliness...

But it never comes.

Instead, the young man in the wheelchair gapes at you with traces of fear and disgust in his eyes.  Confusion grows inside you, and the longer the silence stretches, the more it morphs into unsettling dread.

No , you think desperately, please don't let this be what I think...

And when the boy finally opens his mouth to reply you, the weight in your stomach settles into complete and utter distress.  

"W-who are you?" the stranger says.

-----

You weren’t born with this condition.  

You can kinda remember when things were normal—when you were normal—but unfortunately those memories are marred with bitterness now, and happened so long ago they feel as though they were from another life.  

You like to think that he loved you, back then.  Your father, that is. Really, for the ten years after your birth you had no reason to think otherwise.  A single father, he raised you alone. He didn’t work, but for some reason the two of you lived in an ostentatious house.  Inherited wealth, probably. He cooked for you, he drove you to school every day, he played with you, told you stories. And you loved him, too.

Starting from when you were ten years old, he started disappearing.  Not for long, at first. Only for a few hours at a time. But you would stand outside your school after the bell rang, waiting alongside your slowly dwindling classmates until you were the only one left, until the sky had gone dark and you were scared—before his lone car finally rolled into the school driveway to pick you up.  

Then those hours started turning into days.  Two, three, then four, five, and even six days, before you saw him again. Then, a week .  Then, multiple weeks at a time.  

At some point, you were starting to not see him more than you actually saw him.  And during those times of not seeing him, you started forgetting what his face looked like.

You hadn’t realized you’d forgotten. Not until he came home one day after one of his mysterious disappearances, and you nearly shrieked in fright when you saw a strange, tall man step through the threshold of your home.  But when he opened his mouth and rumbled in his deep voice, “Gamzee,” you relaxed. It was just Dad. Ha motherfucking ha , who else would it be?  And as you got a better look at his face you started remembering again.  How could you have forgotten what Dad looked like? That was just absurd!

It continued like this for three years.  He would leave, his face would melt from your memory, he would suddenly return, you would see him again and wonder how something as important as his face could have slipped your mind.  It’s not like you ever had trouble remembering anything else about him: his tall form, or gruff voice, or purple clothes.  

After a while, you stopped panicking during his random returns.  It didn’t matter that you didn’t recognize the man who walked through the door; it had to be Dad.  Ha motherfucking ha, who else would it be?

He wasn’t ever bad to you.  He never raised his voice at you, or, god forbid, hit you.  Sometimes you wish he did. It would make it easier for you to hate him.  But all he did was become more withdrawn, more distant.

When you were thirteen, after a month of living alone (and either ditching school or spending it in a daydream), there was a knock on your door.  You immediately perked up, hastily clearing the empty Faygo bottles you’d decorated the dirty floor with. Even though you were a teenager now, and used to your father constant absence, the idea of Daddy coming home still made toddler-like giddiness rise up within you.  You opened the door and saw a tall man there. “Hi Dad,” you grinned, because who else would it be?

Your father had been found dead on the beach in the next town over, several miles away.  

The man at the door was a police officer.  He was there to take you away.

You never remembered what your father looked like ever again.

——-

And then you found out that there was something actually wrong with you.  Besides being an eccentric, profanity-loving kid in foster care with a delinquent—oops, you mean dead —father.  There was something medically--chemically--fundamentally wrong inside your head.

You couldn’t remember faces anymore.  It wasn’t just your father’s that had evaporated from your memory.  It didn’t matter anymore if you’d merely glanced at someone for a few seconds or had spent the entire day with them.  The moment you looked away, the memory of their eyes, nose, mouth, everything —just started swirling together into one unrecognizable blur.  And unrecognizable they became indeed, if you ever saw them again.  You could remember everything else with precision, from their clothes to their voices to the exact conversations you’d had with them.  But they might as well have been wearing a paper bag over their heads.

You started to feel fear every time someone smiled at you, because you didn’t know whether they were a stranger smiling out of courtesy, or an acquaintance trying to catch your attention.  How could you give them your attention when you didn’t know who the fuck they were?

School became hell.  Your teachers thought you were disrespectful and your classmates thought you were disrespectful.  But you weren’t trying to make fun of Damara when you called her by the name of her nemesis Meenah instead: you just couldn’t remember what either of them looked like.  And you were sorry you thought Mrs. Maryam was a man. Her short hair really threw you off, okay?!

It was okay though, because you never stayed at one school for long. You kept changing foster families.  Again, no one was ever bad to you or raised their voices at you or hit you, and you sometimes wish they did because then you would have a reason to hate them.  No, you were almost unbelievably lucky in that sense—your temporary guardians were always nice ladies or kind men, and even though some of your foster siblings were obnoxious dicks, could you really expect any less from a bunch of kids?  No, in the end, you were sent away from all of your foster families because they were convinced that they weren’t a good match for you—that you didn’t like them, not when you couldn’t remember your foster mother or father every single morning after waking up in their house.

It was humiliating.  You saw yourself as broken and became convinced that the reason why your father had left was because he didn’t want to look at his defective son.  How could you expect a foster family to love you if your real father didn’t? And how could you call yourself a son if you didn’t know what your family looked like?

You started getting into drugs, because it was easier to blame your inability to recognize anyone on the weed than it was to admit that something in your brain was fucked up.  You started acting violent so that people wouldn’t want to get close to you.  You wouldn’t remember their faces anyway, so why not make ‘em bloody and swollen while you still could?  You had more one-night strands than you would care to admit, but you never let the girl or guy tell you their name because it was easier if he or she remained both nameless and faceless in your memory.  And so you wouldn’t be expected to acknowledge them if you ever saw them in public. You wouldn’t be able to remember you had fucked them by looking at them, anyway.

It wasn’t like you were really all that sex-hungry, though.  Your libido was healthy like any other teenage boy’s, but not obsessively ravenous.  You think you did it because you were sure that no one would ever love you for real, anyway.  Not with this disgusting sickness you had. And you were sure that you didn’t want anyone to love you, because if they did you wouldn’t want to ever forget what they looked like.

Even though you would.

——

You met Karkat in the last year of high school.  

You were already nineteen, having been held back a grade, and no longer in foster care.  He was only sixteen, having been one of those smartass motherfuckers who skipped like, a hundred grades or somethin’.  

He had gotten into a huge fight with the English teacher about something grammar-related.  Something about nouns or verbs or both, maybe, not like you can motherfucking remember. You were too busy watching his face.  

His face : pale as ash with jet black hair falling into bloodshot eyes, which were rimmed with dark eye bags.  Teeth in rather desperate need of braces. And the mouth that seemed to rant nonstop.

You had never seen a face move the way his did, with such shocking dynamism.  You were utterly entranced by the spark in his eyes, by the rage in his brow, how his cheeks puffed and deflated with every hollered profanity.  It was... beautiful .

You waited for the inevitable after he was sent away to the principal’s office.  For the striking image of Karkat Vantas’s face to fade from your mindscape as so many others’ had.  But English ended, P.E. came and went, and you somehow survived science and math at the end of the day.  

And still, you didn’t forget his face.  It stuck in your mind, as though the fiery Karkat himself had rudely gone in and superglued the memory to your brain.  

It scared you at first.  Then, angry. What right did that motherfucker have to invade your peace like this?  You had half the mind to march right on over to him and turn his pretty bloodshot eyes into black eyes.  But you stopped yourself, because it somehow seemed wrong to ruin the only face you had ever been able to remember.

Finally, after nearly three weeks of inner turmoil, you decided to approach him.  You had no idea why, or what you were going to say. Somehow you caught his eye from the other side of the cafeteria during lunch, and he stared at you unflinchingly the whole time you made your way over and sat down across from him.  

“I like your face,” you ungracefully blurted out.  

“Go fuck yourself on a spiky condom,” he shot back without missing a beat.

Somehow he became your best friend.

——

Karkat wanted to become a doctor.  For all his prickliness, he actually had a genuine passion for helping people.

You never paid any mind when he would read giant textbooks thicker than the Bible and probably just as boring.  But one day, as the two of you sat in his room, you sorta just staring at the ceiling and him studying, he suddenly bolted upright and exclaimed, “Fucking finally ! I’ve been looking for months !  Gamzee, get your bony ass over here.”

He pointed at a passage in his textbook from a chapter about brain disorders.  

Prosopagnosia (face blindness) is a neurological disorder that can be both genetic and/or acquired.  Those with prosopagnosia have difficulty, or are unable, to recognize faces...

You were unable to speak for several long, emotional minutes, as you absorbed the text that so accurately described the difficulties you had been suffering for so many years.  

Finally, in a choked voice, you said, “Then how come I can recognize you, best friend?”

——

Karkat hadn’t known what to respond, but you actually knew the answer all along.  Karkat was a miracle. He was your salvation.

Life after that fateful day in his bedroom became so much better, so much less confusing, so much more hopeful .  You started making friends, and it was so much easier to approach the world, in general, knowing that the “defect” that you had was just a somewhat common disorder that had a name.  You started making a conscious effort to recognize people by their clothes and voices, and if you had trouble Karkat was always nearby to explain that you were better with names than faces.  

And because of Karkat you actually managed to garner the motivation to get a job.  It was a shitty one, being a clerk at a local convenience store, but being around Faygo all the motherfucking time was your definition of happy.  And when the two of you graduated high school, you decided to go with him two states over where he would be attending college, and become his flatmate.  You’d long since decided that university life wasn’t the one for you, but at his insistence you took some classes at the local community college. You also rediscovered your passion for music and started writing songs for amateur bands in the area.

It wasn’t easy.  Despite the change you had gone through, the damages and insecurities of your youth stuck to you like wet tissue paper.  Karkat may have fished the remnants of your sanity out of the toilet, but ultimately the inside of your head was still toilet-regurgitation.  You may have developed a bit more confidence in yourself, but you weren’t rushing off to forge new social bonds.  The few people who knew you didn’t know just how bad you were with faces.  Prosopagnosia may have been a lot more common than you expected, but severe cases like yours were still a lot rarer.  You didn’t want people to know. You were embarrassed. In your heart, you irrationally feared that if they knew, they would all start disappearing again, just like all of those anonymous one-night stands, like your foster families, like your long-dead dad.

Karkat remained the only person who knew.

——

But above all, Karkat was the reason why you met the most miraculous miracle in the whole motherfucking world: Tavros.

“You have a date tonight,” Karkat told you nonchalantly, on that fateful day.

You choked so badly on your cherry Faygo that you spent five straight minutes coughing up the red liquid.  To a stranger, it might have looked like you were dying from motherfuckin’ tuberculosis or something.

Karkat just looked at you with mirth in his eyes, not at all concerned about the health of his best friend.  Tch.

You and he had had many a conversation about your love life, or lack thereof.  You, knowing your best friend very well by then, understood that he was an evil mastermind who was obsessed with romance.  He was convinced that you needed a significant other, while you gave him every excuse in the book—that you weren’t interested, that you didn’t have time for relationships, that you didn’t need any other motherfucker when you already had Karkat (to which he responded, “Stop being so fucking gay,” which was a hypocritical statement—but you digress).

It all boiled down to one fact, though: you were motherfuckin’ scared .  

You hadn’t ever been in a serious relationship before, and for good reason—why would anyone in their right mind like you ? Why would anyone want to go out with someone who couldn’t do the most basic of things: recognize them?  

“His name is Tavros. He’s one of my classmates. I told him to come over at five-thirty and that you’d take him to the carnival.”

“I don’t wanna go to the carnival.”

“Bullshit.  You’re gay as shit for that circus crap.”

“The why would he want to—“

“Nope, nope, stop right there; he was the one who told me he wanted to go, but that he didn’t want to go by himself.”

“So...it’s just a motherfucking friend thing?  Not a date ?”

“Oh no, it most definitely is a date.  I made it two hundred fucking percent clear that if he wanted to go, I would set him up with someone.”

“You manipulative motherfuckin’ son of a bitch.”

“Thanks for the compliment.  I’ve been called way fucking worse.  Regularly, in fact.”

“Look, best friend.  I don’t even motherfuckin’ know him.”

“So?  Get to know him, then.”

“Best friend, the stars can motherfuckin’ count how many times I’ve yapped to your unlistenin’ motherfuckin’ ears that I ain’t gonna do no shit like this.”

“Yes, you fucking are.”

“I motherfuckin’ said I AIN’T, MOTHERFUCKER!”  

You stood up, knocking your chair over, fuming, but Karkat was one of the few people who could deal with your episodes of rage without blinking an eye.  He stood up, too.

“Listen, you whiny piece of goddamn shit, for once in my shitty life I’m not doing this for you .  I’m actually doing this for him, because the stutterfuck seriously needs a good lay and a supportive partner while he tries not to fuck up at having a microscopic shred of fucking confidence.  I just happened to choose you because you happen to actually be the most compatible compared to all the other fucktards I am so unfortunately forced to call friends.  So don’t you fucking dare stand him up make me lose face.”

You buried your face in your hands.  “What the motherfuck do I do ?  I’ve never taken anyone on a motherfuckin’ date before!  And what if we get separated and I can’t find him ‘cause I can’t remember his motherfuckin’ face? I’m just gonna disappoint the kid, brother.  What if he thinks I’m motherfuckin’ pathetic, Karkat?”

Karkat’s face softened.  “Don’t you think I thought I thought of that, fuckass?  I spent weeks deliberating if this was a good idea.  Trust me, Tavros isn’t like that. He’s an asshole, but not the judgmental type of asshole.”

“Then I’m already not motherfuckin’ good enough for him…”

Karkat shook his head, having had this argument with you far too many times.  “Listen, it’s kind of not fucking possible for you to beat his ex-girlfriend in terms of shittiness.  She was such a bitch she was probably the spawn of two lesbian cunts, because I didn’t fucking know a bitch could actually be so fucking bitchy.”

“That don’t mean the brother gotta settle for this motherfucker, though,” you mumbled, gesturing at yourself.

“I already told him about you.  He knows that you’re tall as fuck and that you look like a ugly-ass ape dying from anorexia.  He knows that your stupid mouth likes cussing as much as the Pissing Brussels Boy’s dick likes pissing, that you’re obsessed with clowns, and that you have mood swings.  I didn’t exactly paint him a cutesy, pretty picture of you. He was still willing to meet you. Apparently he’s a huge fan of rap, too.”

Your ears perked up slightly at the mention of rap, but you quickly deflated again.  

“Does he know about...the motherfuckin’ face thing?”

“No,” Karkat sighed.  “That’s for you to tell him yourself.”

You fell silent.  

“Look,” Karkat finally continued after a long moment.  “Just give this a chance. I wasn’t kidding about his ex.  Bitch was abusive and as if it wasn’t bad enough verbally, she fucking crippled him for life.  The fact that he’s willing to give relationships another shot is a big fucking step, but he’s just as scared about it as you are.  That’s why I thought you’d be a good match for each other. You have a lot in common, besides an abysmal taste in music and inclination to make me want to sock myself in the goddamn stomach.  I’ve never met anyone who fucks up social interaction more than he does, and I’m fucking roommates with you .  He’s just unlucky because his problems are a lot more obvious.”

This caused you to perk with interest.  

Obvious, after all, is good for you.  Obvious people are easier to recognize.  Take Karkat’s sometimes-girlfriend Terezi, for example.  Like any other motherfucker other than Karkat, you don’t remember her face, but her bright red glasses and dragon-headed cane are always a dead giveaway.

”Well, what motherfuckin’ way do they up and present themselves?” you asked.

“He’s in a fucking wheelchair.  When I said his ex crippled him, I literally meant that—she paralyzed him from the waist down,” Karkat said, and your eyes widened.  “I met him because he went to some experimental therapy our class was holding for patients with spinal issues. He fucking wanted someone to go with him, because didn’t want to get weird looks if he went by himself. Fuckin’ pussy, if you ask me, but that’s Nitram for you.”  Karkat looks at you meaningfully.  “He stands out in a crowd. Probably because he’s the only one not fucking standing.”

——-

What Karkat didn’t tell you, though, was that Tavros wasn’t just some poor kid in a wheelchair.  No, turns out Tavros was a motherfuckin’ angel .  In a wheelchair, of course, but that was besides the miraculous point.

He hesitantly rolled his way into your life at precisely five twenty-five that evening.  Karkat had been one to open the door for him, but you were peeking out from the gap between your bedroom door and the wall.  

“Glad to see you had the fucking guts to show up, fuckface,” Karkat greeted amicably.  “Who’d you disembowel to get them? ‘Cause the Tavros I know would’ve been too much of a fucking coward.”

“In light of the, uh, circumstances, I am going to ignore that jab, because--ha, ha, well, uh, I did promise you.  And also, I’m sorry for, uh, being a bit early.”

Karkat rolled his eyes.  “Come back when you’re not sorry about something that’s not your fucking fault.”

“Oh, uh, I’m...not sorry, then?”

“Shove it, asshole.  Anyway, the dumbass clown is in the bathroom taking a shit.  He should be ready soon.”

“Oh, well...I’d tell him to take his time, but I wouldn’t want to interrupt his, er...restroom...session?”

You waited for five more minutes for five-thirty to arrive, pointlessly delaying the dreaded introductions. When there were no more seconds left to dawdle, you tossed your bedroom door wide open, accidentally making it BANG loudly against the wall.  You strode up to Karkat and your new date, hoping that the wide grin on your face concealed your inner anxiety.  “‘Sup, motherfucker!”

You kinda regret that those were the first words that you ever said to him, but to be fair, he didn’t do much better.  Blushing a brilliant red at the sight of you, he immediately began to ramble, his hands alternating between fidgeting in his lap and gripping his wheels in a death grip.

“Oh, hi there, I’m Tavros, and you must be Gamzee, and uh, I know that because Karkat told me about you, and not because, I’m a, uh, stalker or something.  I wouldn’t be a very good stalker, if I wanted to stalk, anyway. W-which I don’t. Um, yeah. And uh, what is up, is uh, I’m here to, well, meet you, obviously, and then…”  He seemed to realize what was happening and slumped defeatedly in his chair. “Oh, ugh , sorry, I’m being stupid and I’m just really bad at this, in general…”

For some reason, his genuine nervousness calmed you down considerably—apparently Karkat was right, ‘bout this motherfucker being just as scared as you were, even though you hid it better.  But something about his self-doubt didn’t bide well with you; after all, that was a hella admirable self-introduction in your opinion.  So you plopped down on the couch next to where his chair was parked.  You really were way too fucking tall at full height, especially since he was sitting down, and that made you self-conscious.  “Don’t worry, motherfucker, I’m so motherfuckin’ bad at this too,” you reassured. “I just ain’t adorable like you are, though.”

He blushed while you continued to (try to) smile disarmingly.  Silence reigned for several seconds until Karkat firmly said, “The level of gay in this room is fucking astronomical.  Congratu-fucking-lations, now take the porn out of the fucking house.”

Tavros had a car which could be hand-controlled without the use of foot pedals, and you thought this was so fucking cool that you practically begged him to drive the two of you to the carnival.  Your childish, not-so-gentlemanly behavior seemed to surprise him at first, but then he looked extremely pleased. He confessed to you that you were one of the few people who hadn’t responded with the condescending glance at his chair and the inevitable question, “ You can drive ?!”

“Actually, I just motherfuckin’ assumed you used a motherfuckin’ magic carpet or some shit ‘cause that’s how all you cool motherfuckers get the fuck around, right?  But awww, I got total understandin’ on for wanting to blend in with the rest of us boring motherfuckers even though we’re boring as shit. But your car is like, a video game car and I’m so motherfuckin’ hot with that.”  You were rambling, and acutely aware of how stupid you sounded, but you figured being stupid was the right thing to do if it could make Tavros laugh so sweetly.

And so the two of you went to the carnival for your first date.  Not two minutes after paying the admission, you decided to buy two sticks of cotton candy.  You and Tavros ended up sitting on a bench to enjoy to the fluffy treat, and after finishing it, continued to sit there to people-watch, chat, and get to know each other.  Time quickly became an alien concept. Before you knew it, it was ten-o-clock and the carnival staff was impatiently telling you to vacate. You hadn’t even done any carnival stuff yet.  

You jokingly begged for his forgiveness for wasting his time because of your inability to shut up in the face of cute motherfuckers.  He kiddingly replied that he would consider forgiving you if you took him out again.

“Tomorrow, same time?” you asked hopefully.  “I can pick a miraculous brother up if you’re down with makin’ yourself less motherfuckin’ cool to ride my common motherfuckin’ automobile.”

And for some reason, he was down with having another date with an uncool loser like you.  Except the two of you did almost the exact same thing the next night—paid admission and this time, bought ice cream, and talked and laughed till you got kicked out by the cleaning staff again.  

Tavros was unavailable the next two nights because he had evening classes at the university, so you spent them sulking at home and trying to ignore Karkat’s triumphant I fucking told you so ’s (flipping him off didn’t work because he would flip you right the motherfuck back and no one wielded The Middle Finger as expertly as Karkat).  The night after, however, you happily ditched your roommate and hung with Tavros again, wasting money on a carnival neither of you bothered to participate in.  It seemed as though both of you were irrationally worried that the games and rides would distract you from each other, even though logically, you’d be doing it all together anyway .  It wasn’t until two more evenings had been spent in a similar fashion that the disgruntled cleaning staff, still annoyed but used to your presence by now, informed you that there was only one day left to the carnival before it would be leaving for another city.  So you and Tavros decided to finally give the rides a spin.

That was a special night, and not just because of all the colorful balloons you managed to pop with those toy darts, or the stuffed goat you managed to win, or the blinking lights or the face paint or the popcorn.  

No, it was the night that you realized that this thing with Tavros wasn’t carnal sexual attraction (otherwise you would have fucked him and left, long ago), or the cliched love at first sight.  You couldn’t be sure if it was love, but the feeling that blossomed in your stomach as you sat across from Tavros at the very top of the Ferris Wheel was one of happiness almost childlike in its purity.

When you went to bed after Tavros dropped you off at home (he’d been the driver that night), you tried as hard as you could to recreate the scene in the Ferris Wheel in your memory.  Everything fell into place, from the color of the sky’s orange sunset to the scratches on the seat inside the capsule. Everything—except his face, and for a few long moments you wondered if you had made a terrible mistake going out with him.  You thought that if you could recognize him, then maybe he could become important to you, just like Karkat had. How could Tavros be different from every other motherfucker if it didn’t take you ten minutes to forget his mere countenance ?

But the happiness you felt was so real, and in your memory its presence was even more prominent than the absence of Tavros’s face.  You couldn’t kid yourself that Tavros’s company hadn’t been responsible for that feeling. Ferris Wheels and carnivals were miraculous and all, but even they didn’t have the power to misplace every negative emotion in your body and replace it with simple joy.  

You wanted to feel that joy again.  You wanted to feel it over and over for the rest of your life till you inevitably croaked.  In fact, you were deathly terrified that you would never feel it again.

——

Which was probably why you never told him.  

Well.  Maybe that was oversimplifying things a bit.   There were a combination of factors that ended up holding your tongue in place, but that fear was the root of all of it.

It wasn’t as though you’d intended to keep it a secret at first.  In fact, during those hours immediately after Karkat had told you that he had set you up with someone, you had resolved to tell the mysterious wheelchair-bound date about your disorder right off the bat.  Best get it over with before either of you got too attached.

But from the moment you first saw him, you were already too attached.  His personality was too innocent, too disarming; you took to it immediately and got wrapped up in it, and, as pathetic an excuse it sounds, you simply forgot to mention your condition.

And in your subsequent dates with Tavros, the general mood was always so pleasant that you couldn’t bear to spoil it by bringing it up.  Besides, as nice as Tavros was, you had only just barely gotten to know him, and you couldn’t be sure that he wouldn’t judge you for your condition.  

So you held your tongue, waiting for the moment when Tavros would show his “true” colors, revealing that he wasn’t actually as nice and accepting of others as he acted, so that when you told him about your condition, there would be nothing to lose.

You waited for the right moment. And as you waited, you continued to date him.  You waited and dated for several months and with each passing second your surety that Tavros would be critical of you began to crumble.  Surely, no one could keep up a facade of genuine kindness for so long. Especially since Tavros had nothing to gain from being so nice to other people.  

He was the type of person who would offer a few coins to every homeless person on the corner, but not before engaging in conversation with them first.  You asked him why he did that, since if it were anyone else would have given those hobos no more than a disgusted leer. Tavros said it was to make them feel a little less lonely, even for a few moments.

He was the type of person who would sit and smile politely while some redneck motherfuckers loudly accused a “lazy brown-skinned beaner” like him for “stealing real citizens’ tax money by pretending to be crippled.”  And Tavros actually motherfuckin’ held you back when you tried to rip those motherfuckers’ dicks off and feed them to their own insolent mouths.  When you asked Tavros why he he held you back, he said it was because those people didn’t need any more reason to hate.

Karkat didn’t agree with your opinion that Tavros’s reaction was downright saintly.  “He’s too fucking soft,” Karkat snorted. “He’s just making it easier for those racist fuckers to rip him apart.  Those people need to learn an actual fucking lesson, and sitting there and just fucking taking it is only gonna encourage them.  And make it even worse for the next Hispanic idiot they decide to fuck with.”

Maybe Karkat was right, like Karkat usually was.  But that didn’t stop you from gaining new respect for your boyfriend, because you would never have been able to execute restraint like he did.  You always settled matters with violent confrontation, and thinking back, did that ever do anyone much good?

And Tavros, as much as he tried to be cool with his wheelchair, was always worrying.  Not for himself, but for you —would his disability inconvenience you?  Would showing up in public with him make people look at you funny?  

It made it feel even more wrong to burden him with knowledge that his own boyfriend had a disability-of-sorts.

It was easy to pretend around him.  Pretend that there was actually nothing wrong with you, that your traitorous mind didn’t automatically erase the memory of the faces of anyone you met.  Time that you and Tavros didn’t spend alone together was usually spent with Karkat (who was still your one exception) and Terezi (whose annoying voice was just as identifiable as her scarlet glasses and cane).  Sometimes a motherfucker called Dave Strider would join as well, but you hated him for some reason, so everyone easily excused your failure to recognize him as simple refusal to acknowledge him. Through Tavros you also met his childhood friends Sollux and Aradia.  Sollux, the geeky Asian nerd, was easy enough, with his unique bicolored glasses. Aradia was much harder—sometimes she wore horrendously tattered skirts that gave her away, but not always —still, there were few girls that Tavros was as familiar with as Aradia, so if you saw your boyfriend happily chatting away a chick it was probably her.  

As for Tavros himself...it tore you up with guilt on the inside, but the fact was that you used his wheelchair to recognize him.  Normally, the fact that he was in a chair easily melted away from the forefront of your mind. But if you had to pick him out from a crowd, you couldn’t deny that those big circular motherfuckers he was always riding atop were very effective visual indicators.  You hated it, because you knew how much he desired to be identified and acknowledged by something other than his disability. How would he feel if he knew that his own boyfriend did the very thing that he so feared…?

Part of your silence may also have been because of your fruitless hope that over time, you would be able to memorize Tavros’s face.  “You’re so motherfuckin’ beautiful,” you would tell him every time you saw him, because he was. Perhaps because of the fact that you couldn’t remember it, his beauty never failed to astonish you every time you saw him.  Perhaps you believed that if you said it enough times, it would finally stick in your memory.

He would color those beautiful mocha-tinted cheeks with his pink blush, and in bashfulness he would try to turn away, but you would catch his chin with your fingers because you weren’t finished looking at him yet.  

“You always say that,” he’d mumble with a small smile.

“Well, why would I go squawking it over and over like broken motherfuckin’ record if it weren’t nothing but the sacred motherfuckin’ truth, my brother?”

“Oh, well I thought maybe you’d be...bored of my appearance by now,” he’d say, and your heart would drop to your stomach.  

“Shit...I don’t think that all’s in the motherfuckin’ realm of possibility,” you’d say, because how the fuck were you going to explain to him that you couldn’t possibly get bored of his face because it always felt like you were seeing him for the first time?

He would miss your dejected tone completely, and the way he leaned against your fingers would make the confession die on your lips.  “Uh, well, I...I think you’re beautiful too.”

———

But there was one incident that sealed your decision for good.  Your decision to never let Tavros in on your secret.

It started with the massive fight you had with Karkat the night before.  

You’d casually let slip to your volatile roommate that you’d been leaving Tavros in the dark about the prosopagnosia.  In reality, you wanted to gauge Karkat’s reaction, wanted some reassurance from the self-proclaimed Expert of Romance that your actions wouldn’t put serious harm on the miraculous relationship you shared with Tavros.

You didn’t think Karkat would care all that much. After all, he constantly claimed not to give a fuck about anything to do with your “infuriatingly spineless, crippled boytoy” (a comment you only forgave because...well, Karkat will be Karkat and he never had anything positive to say about anyone, anyway).  

You never would’ve brought it up if you’d known how Karkat would react to the information, though.  

“GAMZEE FUCKING MAKARA.  FOR ONCE IN YOUR GODDAMN LIFE I TRUSTED YOU NOT TO COMPLETELY FUCK SOMETHING UP.  AND THIS. THIS IS WHAT YOU FUCKING CHOOSE TO DO?”

Dread exploded in your stomach, but you tried to keep a watery smile on your face. “What...what’s so motherfuckin’ wrong, best friend?”

“What’s WRONG? Fuck, Gamzee, if you used that pile of horseshit you call a fucking brain for five fucking seconds you would be able to tell me exactly what’s fucking wrong!”

“But I ain’t seein’ the motherfuckin’ wrongness all clear, best friend.  Tav and I have been goin’ strong for a motherfuckin’ long time just like this, and the face blindness—it ain’t never been up and causing problems for us before!”

“The fucking blindness isn’t the point, the point is that you haven’t fucking told him after so long!  You’ve been shoving your horny dick up his ass for a fucking year , Gamzee.  And this whole time you’ve been breaking his trust?”

“I haven’t been lying to that motherfucker!  ‘Snot like I told him I wasn’t all fucked up in the motherfuckin’ noggin,” you protested.  “Just didn’t give the motherfuckin’ specifics. And I laid all kindsa shit on his miraculous self already!”  It was true. You’d told Tavros about your childhood, about your father, about foster care and the derision you had suffered from your peers, about your anger issues, and even about the nameless pimps you used to fuck.  You told Tavros everything .

Well, almost everything.  You may have...conveniently left out some details.

“Yeah,” Karkat snorted.  “All kinds of stupid shit except the most important shit.”

You recoiled, hurt.  “I thought you said it wasn’t that motherfuckin’ important.  You said I didn’t have to be motherfuckin’ defined by that shit or something.”  Then you got mad. “YOU GOTTA MAKE YOURSELF MORE CLEAR, BROTHER. All this motherfuckin’ contradiction’s makin’ a motherfucker get his mistrust on for your wicked self.”

“I’m not fucking contradicting myself, fuckass.  It may not define you but there comes a fucking point where it’s still pretty fucking important!  Look,” he pinched the bridge of his nose, “how would you feel if for the entire time you dated Tavros he never told you he was paralyzed?”

You opened your mouth to bite back a retort, but actually had to stop and reflect upon Karkat’s question.  “Motherfucker...sooner or later any motherfucker’s gotta notice that my miracle brother...ain’t climbin’ no stairs anytime soon.  So how’s that...even motherfuckin’ possible?”

“Exactly.  He doesn’t hide shit like that from you because he can’t , that ugly-ass chair is a fucking eyesore for anyone with fucking eyes.  But the point is still that he doesn’t hide it. How is he supposed to feel when he finds out that his boyfriend has a handicap too and you didn’t tell him because what?  You were fucking ashamed ?  Might as well tell the fuckass to hide his crippled carcass in a cave forever because his boyfriend thinks disabilities are something to be ashamed of!”

You’d never even remotely compared your condition with Tavros’s legs.  “But--but--it’s not the motherfuckin’ same thing--”

“No, the only difference is that unlike him, you have the luxury of fucking hiding it!  God, Gamzee, if I didn’t give two actual fucks about your happiness I would’ve gone straight over to Tavros right the fuck now and told him that he could do better than the likes of you!”

The words “Tavros” and “could do better” in the same sentence struck a chord within you, and you felt your loose hold on control unravelling completely.  “DON’T YOU MOTHERFUCKIN’ DARE TAKE HALF A STEP IN HIS MOTHERFUCKIN’ DIRECTION, MOTHERFUCKER.  The miracles Tav and I up and share transcend your unenlightened conception.  YOU CALL YOURSELF A MOTHERFUCKIN’ EXPERT ON THE MIRACLES OF HUMAN PARTNERSHIP.  But you’re just another motherfuckin’ two-timer--”

“OH NO, YOU FUCKING DON’T.  AT LEAST I TREAT ALL MY PARTNERS WITH RESPECT, YOU FUCKING HYPOCRITE--”

“BROTHER’S GOTTA BE PRETTY DAMNED TWISTED IN THE MOTHERFUCKIN’ HEAD.  If you all up and call this kind of treatment respect--”

“I’M JUST BEING HONEST WITH YOU.  OR AM I NOT FUCKING ALLOWED TO DO THAT EITHER, YOUR ROYAL FUCKTARDNESS?  YOU WANT ME TO SMILE IN YOUR STUPID FACE AND REGURGITATE LIES? WELL, TOUGH LUCK, I’M THE WRONG BEST FRIEND FOR THAT.   YOU’RE THE ONE WHO’S TWISTED IF YOU DON’T SEE ANYTHING SERIOUSLY WRONG WITH DECEIVING THE PERSON YOU CLAIM TO LOVE--”

“MOTHERFUCKER, YOU’RE JUST JEALOUS YOU AIN’T GOT SOMEONE LIKE MY TAV--”

“JEALOUS?  HA FUCKING HA HA.  AND SPEAKING OF JEALOUSY.  HAS IT EVER OCCURRED TO YOU WHAT YOUR BOYFRIEND MIGHT THINK IF HE KNEW THAT NOT ONLY HAVE YOU BEEN HIDING THIS FACE BLINDNESS THING FROM HIM, BUT THAT THERE’S ACTUALLY SOMEONE YOU CAN RECOGNIZE, BECAUSE OF SOME FUCKED UP JOKE THE SADIST GODS DECIDED TO PLAY ON US, AND THAT IT’S NOT HIM ?”

And then you opened your mouth without thinking.  “Motherfucker, I’d forget about you in two motherfuckin’ seconds if it meant I could remember Tav’s face.”

There was a beat, a blissful moment during which Karkat opened his mouth to yell something back, having not yet registered exactly what you’d said.  But then you saw the change in his eyes, so clear it was almost tangible : pure rage morphing into a combination of disappointment, disbelief, betrayal, and hurt.  

He turned on his heel and left the room without another word, slamming the door behind him.  It was the first time you’d managed to shock Karkat into silence and you weren’t proud of it.  

You went to bed that night, troubled.  You knew that you would be seeing Tavros the next day, and you didn’t know what to do.  In your heart of hearts, you knew that Karkat was right; that, by keeping your silence, you had been, in a way, betraying Tavros, and that you should probably ‘fess up to your boyfriend as soon as possible before it was too late.  If it wasn’t already. Which it very well could be.

But the more stubborn, spiteful part of you wanted to prove Karkat wrong.  Prove that one dirty little secret being kept in the dark wouldn’t come in the way of the healthy, trusting relationship you shared with Tavros.  While your disorder certainly affected your interactions with most of society, it certainly hadn’t affected Tavros; he hadn’t even noticed anything wrong with you!  And it had been more than a year!

Not to mention that you were still deathly afraid.  No, you were even more afraid.  You’d only brought the issue up with Karkat to gain some reassurance.  But instead you’d gotten a busload of newfound doubt. “ And this whole time you’ve been breaking his trust...his boyfriend thinks disabilities are something to be ashamed of…”   Karkat’s words continued to circulate your mind relentlessly.  

Then you thought about the look of hurt and betrayal on Karkat’s face the moment before he left the room.  It was a painful expression, and on Karkat’s face it made you feel extremely guilty and restless. But if Tavros were to look at you that same way, with that same disappointment, that same betrayal...you didn’t know how you would be able to survive that.

You dreamt that night.  You’d been sure that after a fight with Karkat so severe, you wouldn’t be able to fall asleep.  But your miserable wakefulness eventually eased into miserable slumber. You were working your usual shift behind the convenience store counter, muttering shitty rap lyrics under your breath, when the bell rang to indicate a new customer had entered the shop.  You gave the tall young Hispanic man a routine friendly smile, only for him to lope up to you excitedly, a limp in his unsteady gait, and—

Grab your shirt collar and kiss you full on the lips.

“Look, Gamzee,” the man breathed into your mouth with Tavros’s voice, “I can walk now!  I don’t need the wheelchair anymore—“

--You went over to Tavros’s the next morning, and even though you smiled and wished him a good motherfuckin’ morning like always, he immediately noticed something was off with you.  You could tell by the way his hands hesitated before pushing the wheels of his chair, and the quick glance he tossed you over his shoulder. It gave you pause, how well the two of you could read each other, despite him not knowing your secret and you unable to remember his face.

You sank down onto the couch while Tavros went to the kitchen to fix up drinks.  You tried to find comfort in the sounds he was making—the tune he was mindlessly humming, the clinking of glass as he fumbled through his cabinets, the squeaking of his wheels on the tile floor—but they only served to sow the unease further into your heart.  Tavros returned with a tray carefully balanced on his lap, with a steaming cup of tea for himself and a tall glass of purple soda for you--Faygo, stock of which Tavros only kept for your sake, since he didn’t really favor the miracle elixir.

To tell or not to tell him?  

You took a deep breath, and opened your mouth--

“Is there any motherfuckin’ chance of you walking again?”

You blinked at yourself in surprise, because those were not the words you intended to say.  Tavros, however, didn’t blink; instead, he froze up, and his hands began to tremble. You quickly leaned forward and snatched the glass of Faygo from the tray he was holding before it spilled all over him.

“Sorry,” he mumbled as he shakily set down the tray.  Thankfully, he’d managed to avoid spilling the hot tea on himself.  “I just, I just wasn’t um. Expecting that.”

“Brother shouldn’t ever have any motherfuckin’ thing to be sorry about ‘round this here clown.  ‘Sides, it was my fault for...kicking up that motherfuckin’ shit noise…”

“Oh no, it’s okay.  You have, um, the right to know, I guess.  It’s just, ah...what brought this on...if you don’t mind me asking?”  He cast a worried look at his lap. “Are you, are you okay with me being...like this?”

“If by ‘being like this,’ you mean bein’ like a motherfuckin’ miracle, then fuck yeah, I am more than so motherfuckin’ okay with it, my man.  Even if you all up and couldn’t walk or talk or do nothin’ besides sit there all pretty-like in your wheelchair like the perfect motherfuckin’ angel that you are, I’d be o-motherfuckin’-kay with it if you’d be my perfect motherfuckin’ angel.”  You almost got distracted by the beautiful scarlet that lit up his face, but you forced yourself to continue and not get carried away.  “But okay for me is all good and shit, but it doesn’t mean it’s motherfuckin’ okay with you.  I...had a fight with Karkat yesterday.” At this, Tavros shot you a worried look.  He knew how much you valued your friendship with Karkat. “Don’t worry about it, brother, just another fuckton of meaninglessly unmiraculous shit we threw at each other,” you said to placate him.  “But...he got me thinkin’ that maybe...maybe I haven’t been all too considerate ‘bout the way you feel about...havin’ a motherfuckin’ disability, since it ain’t easy livin’ with one, or shit.”

Tavros looked at you with his big brown eyes for a long moment, and suddenly you couldn’t read him at all.  Then he looked away. “Inconsiderate, huh?” he said softly. “Well, uh, what I can say, definitively, is that you don’t understand what’s it like, not being able to walk.”  

You clenched your eyes shut as you felt a wave of guilt and dread washing over you.  But then you felt the warmth of his fingers on the side of your cheek. “Look at me,” he said firmly, but not unkindly.  Never unkindly. “Gamzee.”

It took several more of his repeated insistences before you finally dared to lift your eyelids.  There was inexplicable affection and patience in his eyes, and once more you were reminded of just how much you didn’t deserve this miraculous boy.  “Gamzee, you don’t understand what it’s like, and I don’t want you to, because the only way you really would understand, is if, uh, you had broken your back, like me...and I swear to God, that’s the last thing I want.  But what’s, uh, different about you, and all the other people who don’t understand, is that you don’t ignore the fact that I’m in a wheelchair, or pretend to understand what it’s like.  You’re just—you’re just there for me, when I need help, and you keep me company, when I don’t need help, and—God, if I had to ask for more, I wouldn’t even know what to ask for.”

Tavros made it sound like you had done so much for him, when really, he was the benevolent one for allowing you in his miraculous presence.  “Tavbro, you give a motherfucker way too much credit.”

“No, uh, I don’t.”

“Yes, you motherfuckin’ do.”

“No, I don’t. You really have no idea.”

“Mmhm, I guess I motherfuckin’ don’t, motherfucker.”

“You—“  He cut himself off as a thought suddenly occurred to him.  “I have, uh, something to show you,” he said after a moment.  “I’ll be right back, okay?”

You watched with perplexion as Tavros turned his chair away and rolled into his bedroom.  After a few minutes of silence, he reappeared, parking himself in front of you. In his lap was a single, dusty, cracked picture frame.  Before you had the chance to take a peek, he set it face down on the table, before transferring himself onto the couch next to you. You pulled him close to your body and kept him balanced while he arranged his legs in front of him, his knobbly knees knocking into yours.  Even though you’d barely done anything, he smiled at you as if you had annihilated all evil on Earth, before all too quickly turning away and picking up the picture frame he had set down. He took a moment to brush off all the dust from its surface, before handing it to you.  

In the photo, a strikingly handsome couple was standing in front of a fancy blue car.  It was one of those cheesily classic photos, with the girl resting her arm on the guy’s shoulder.  You stared at the photo in confusion, trying to figure out if you were supposed to recognize either of its subjects.  The guy, who was tall and brown-skinned with a head of lusciously-gelled black hair, looked familiar. Then you glanced at Tavros and back at the photo, and everything suddenly clicked in place.  

“I was, uh, still going through puberty, back then, so forgive all the acne on my face,” Tavros joked softly.

You had no words with which to respond.  It was Tavros-- your Tavros! --standing on his own two legs!  He was probably high school age, so tall (it was hard to tell from a photo, but you estimated that he was only an inch or two from your height, which was saying something) and so good-looking that you wanted to cry.  

But then, your attention was drawn to the female standing next to him.  She only came up to his shoulder, but she made up for it in confidence that oozed even through the old photo paper.  She wore a wide smirk on her blue lipstick-glazed lips, and dark eyes glistened menacingly from behind a pair of large glasses.  You didn’t recognize her--not that you would’ve, if you had known her in real life--but the expression on her face made a foreign feeling of unease course through your body--a feeling which would surely have remembered had you met her in person before.  and you were sure you had never met her in person before. It didn’t take long for you to connect the dots.

“She’s pretty, isn’t she?” Tavros asked sadly.

“ Vriska ,” you snarled under you breath.  

Tavros had only mentioned his sadistic ex-girlfriend a couple of times, and that was only to tell you the tragic tale behind his paralysis.  She had done something along the lines of throwing him off the edge of a small cliff while they were hiking, intending to make it look like an accident.  At which she succeeded, especially since Tavros refused to press charges back then.

Tavros rarely brought up his feelings regarding the matter, though; he only spared the cold facts of his history and nothing more.   However, you didn’t have to trace your fingers along the broken vertebra in his spine to know how badly she had truly hurt him.  As such, you hated Vriska with a passion—a burning passion that could only be rivaled by your love for the one she had hurt so badly.  In fact, the moment after hearing about Vriska for the first time was the moment you realized you were capable of worse than murder, because if you ever met the bitch in real life, you wouldn’t hesitate to kidnap her, lock her in your basement, and torture her till she begged for sweet motherfuckin’ DEATH…

Thanks to your influence, even Karkat had come to have a special hatred for Tavros’s ex-girlfriend.  Because Karkat was usually the one who bore the brunt of your episodes of rage (you somehow never mustered enough of the unpleasant emotion when you were around Tavros), and your temper could get unbelievably turbulent when it came to Vriska Serket.

“Do you think she ever really loved me?” Tavros suddenly asked.

You stiffened, reining in your simmering anger with all your strength.  You didn’t want to upset him. “I’m not all to thinkin’ that Satan’s motherfuckin’ WHORES know what love is,” you spat.  “In this motherfucker’s eyes, it don’t really change things, though.”

“I used to cry myself to sleep looking at this picture, after she, uh, broke up with me,” he continued.  “I really missed what I had, back when the photo was taken. Legs, yeah, I mean, of course I wasn’t okay with, uh, not being able to walk, at all.  But, uh, I was even less okay, with the idea, that she didn’t love me anymore.”

“But... why , motherfucker?”

“Because I thought I’d lost my chances at love, for like, um, ever .  She, uh, she used to say, that she loved me, and that a charity case like me ought to be grateful, about that.  And uh, she’d roll me in front of the mirror, and ask how anyone else could love something so crippled and pathetic.  I don’t know if she was just convincing, or if I was blind, or stupid...but it got to the point, where I started doubting, that my dad and brother even cared about me.”

“Now that’s just plain motherfuckin’ ridiculous.”  You’d met the two older Nitrams a handful of times, and even though they were eccentric enough for you to think they were weird, their love for one another would be questionable only to an idiot.

“I know, I know...I don’t think that now , but...I guess you could say that, uh, I was in a really dark place, at that time.  But I’m, much, much, better now. You wanna know why?”

“Yeah?”

“You wanna know why, I stopped looking at this photograph every night?”  He gently took it from your hand. “To be honest, I’d kinda...forgotten about it.”

“Really?”

“Really, because, even though I still can’t walk, uh, the truth is I’m so much better off now, than I was back then.  Because I have you now, and you’re the one person who makes me feel, 100% comfortable, and happy, being me .  My legs...they annoy me, of course, but, they don’t make me hate myself anymore.  Because somehow—I don’t, uh, know how—but somehow I can make you smile the way you do and that’s worth being crippled 100 times over.”

That would’ve been a really good time for you to lean over and kiss those angelic, miracle-spouting lips.  Or maybe at least wrap your motherfucker up in a hug. Or at the very least say thank you.

Or, considering how much he had opened up to you, return the favor and tell him about your secret.

But instead, you clawed the front of his shirt and buried your face in his chest, and started sobbing. A little voice in the back of your mind was still chanting tell him tell him TELL HIM any other time will be too late , but you were too moved by his words to pay it much attention.

“Oh, um, so to answer your question, there’s no chance.  But I’m okay with that too,” he said soothingly, rubbing circles into your back.  It took you a while to connect his statement with your earlier inquiry of whether or not he’d ever possibly walk again.  His answer made you start bawling even harder.

And so, I’ll motherfuckin’ tell him, tomorrow , you told yourself.

But something terrible happened before tomorrow you got that chance.  When you went home that evening, Karkat didn’t even glance up from the textbook he was reading, instead picking it up and marching straight for his bedroom and slamming the door shut behind him.  Without Tavros around to quell your negative emotions, your anger started to come back. Karkat’s coldness was only making it worse.

It’s a good thing you managed to lock yourself in your bedroom before you went full-out rage mode—otherwise, there would have been a lot more property damage.  Still, you managed to smash your bed frame into three separate pieces, disembowel your mattress of its stuffing, and somehow scratch yourself to the point where your forearms and shins were covered in vermilion rivers.

You made a hell of a lot of noise during the whole thing, but Karkat didn’t come to check on you even once.  You knew you deserved it.

You thought about a whole lot of nothing during your rage party, and you thought about a whole lot of everything.  But mostly, you thought about Vriska and the little snippet of insight Tavros had given about the way she had treated him.  Even though you had only ever seen her in that photo, if you closed your eyes, you could picture it so clearly—the bitch standing over Tavros’s hunched form, taunting your precious angel with that pure-evil smirk on her face.

Wait.

You could picture her…

Face ?

You closed your eyes again, willing it not to be true, but there she was, in your mind’s eye: a woman whom you’d only ever seen for a few seconds through the fading colors of a photograph.

As if she had gone into your brain and branded the scarily vivid image of her face into your unwilling memory.

Oh, the blasphemous motherfuckin’ irony!  You’d spent years waiting and hoping that you would one day be able to remember another face besides Karkat’s.  Of course, you hoped that face would be Tav’s, but you’d have taken having to wake up every morning to Dave motherfuckin’ Strider’s ugly face greeting you from behind your eyelids to...this.   This .  

You couldn’t stop thinking about what Karkat had said to you about jealousy.  How would Tavros feel, indeed? It’d be like double betrayal, if he found out that you had a disability you’d been hiding from him, and that there were two faces you could recognize that weren’t his and that one of them was his motherfuckin’ abusive ex-girlfriend’s.   You felt jealous on his behalf just thinking about the wretched situation, even though that didn’t make any sense.  

Eventually, it became clear to you that, despite what Karkat said, telling Tavros about any of this motherfuckin’ shit was never even an option.  And, after all, everything had been just fine and dandy before, so why should that change now? Tavros didn’t deserve a boyfriend who could barely even tell two humans apart, but what didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him.  And he seemed to have just gotten over his disastrous liaison with Vriska.  He seemed happy now, so what right did you have to start diggin’ shit up that would upset him? The guilt of lying would cast a shadow upon your conscience forever, probably, but you were used to having monsters in the closets of your mind.

You would lie to protect him.  If anything, the conversation you’d had with him proved that he was aware of how much you loved him.  He’d understand, if he were in your shoes. Wouldn’t he? That you loved him too much not to lie to him.

And you’d always be able to tell him apart by his chair.  He’d made it clear he wasn’t moving around without it anytime in this life.

Motherfuck, were you a horrible person.  Reaping benefits out of the fact that your boyfriend couldn’t walk...

Well, Tavros didn’t need to know that either.

-----

And so, life went on.  You and Karkat eventually reconciled, though things were...different.  You used to be able to talk to him about everything, but now, it seemed that both of you wanted to avoid any topic that would dig up memories of that fight.  That left you with a whole lot of meaningless nothing to talk to Karkat about.  Dinners were a much quieter affair, and with two loud individuals like Karkat and yourself, it was awkward.

As fuck.

...You missed your best friend.  

You had a feeling you really hurt him, but at the same time your pride kept you from apologizing, since you were still doing the very thing you had fought with him about.

On the flip side, however, your relationship with Tavros was only blooming skyward.  It was blooming like the miraculous beanstalk of that Jack motherfucker, ‘cept you and Tav found the castle in motherfuckin’ space , that’s how high your love had grown.  Sometimes, you would look down at the Earth from high up on your cloud of ecstasy and wonder how you’d allowed yourself to dig yourself so deep into a relationship, considering that you’d once been positive that no one would ever want you.  If you were to lose this relationship, now…

It wouldn’t be painful.  It was just be plain motherfuckin’ fatal.  Tavros didn’t rock your world anymore, he was your world.  

Sure, the two of you had your little cat fights, but nothing a few hours of lonesome time wouldn’t heal all up on its miraculous own.  Nothing major that could put a serious scar in what the two of you shared, or worse...break it.

Like the uncovering of your secret.  

You’d been dating for almost two years now.  The more time passed, the more confident you got that he wouldn’t ever find out.  You didn’t ever have trouble recognizing him in his chair.
He didn’t seem to suspect anything other than your usually spacey self, so all was chill.

In fact, there were only two things you could think of that would rat you out to him.  One, Karkat could spill the beans. You were pretty sure that Karkat still cared enough about your happiness not to do that, but it still made you wary.  

And the other would be Vriska.  If you somehow ran into her one day...you wouldn’t be able to hold yourself back.  And in the midst of all the blood that would most assuredly be spilled from the confrontation, you might accidentally spill your secret.  Tavros had already told you, some time after your fateful heart-to-heart with him, that Vriska had moved to England after their breakup, and he hadn’t heard from her since.  The likelihood of you running into her at some obscure corner of the world seemed far-fetched, but the slim possibility tormented you every time her evil face flashed behind your eyes.

-----

You guess you shouldn’t have been so paranoid about these unlikely events, and much more wary of a far greater danger you’d been ignoring all this time: yourself . Maybe if you’d been more careful, this wouldn’t be happening right now.   This , your greatest nightmare.  That you would fail to recognize Tavros, that you would ask, “Who are you?” to the one you loved more than the all the universes combined.  

...But this is worse, isn’t it?  Because you aren’t the one asking the cursed question.  The humiliating, dehumanizing, cruel question you’d been forced to direct at people you were supposed to know for countless times in your life, all because of the disease in your brain…

“Who are you?” the boy in the wheelchair asks you, instead—

—and—

—Gamzee sees his life flash before his eyes. He isn’t dangling from the precipice of a cliff, or hurtling full-speed towards a truck, or facing the tip of an executioner’s knife.  But he had committed a sin far worse than he imagined himself capable, and for him, that was the ultimate premonition of his own demise.

He had mistaken someone else for his Tavros.

In his view, it’s worse than failing to recognize someone that was actually Tavros.  It’s a mistake he’d made only once before, in his life.  When he’d stupidly made assumptions off of the question, “Who else would it be?” and mistaken the police officer for his own dad .  And this time he’d seen a wheelchair, and since he’d already agreed to meet Tavros here at this time, had ended up asking himself that same question.  How could he have forgotten that there was more than one person in the world who used a wheelchair, especially in a place as public as a park?

Gamzee’s expression, sly and teasing only a few seconds earlier, is now composed entirely of shell-shocked horror, as if his eyes were resting upon a corpse.  The boy-in-the-wheelchair-who-is-not-Tavros sneers at Gamzee in disgust at his flirtatious words, then backs up with a huff and quickly wheels away. Gamzee’s eyes follow him as he retreats.   He probably thinks I’m one of those motherfuckin’ sex predators who preys on disabled people , Gamzee thinks with an ever sinking heart.   I didn’t just fail Tav as a boyfriend.  I motherfuckin’ scared that stranger kid just ‘cause he’s in one o’ those chairs, and now I’ve failed everyone in the motherfuckin’ world who uses those miracle four-wheel devices.  

Gamzee becomes vaguely aware of the sound of honking coming from behind his car.  Gamzee dimly registers the fact that his car is still stopped in the middle of the parking lot and that he’s holding up a few other vehicles behind him.   Fuck those motherfuckers, he thinks as his fists tighten around the steering wheel.   Can’t they motherfuckin’ tell that there’s a black hole right in the middle of the fucking street suckin’ out all my happiness—

“Gamzee?”

His head whips around at the sound of his own name being called.  It’s a motherfucker in a wheelchair rolling up to the window of his car—

“Gamzee, what’s, uh, going on?”

This time, it’d be ridiculous to conclude that this person is anyone other than Tavros, but because of the blunder he’d just made a few mere seconds ago, Gamzee doesn’t dare openly acknowledge his boyfriend.  He simply stares with wide eyes. He’d been so sure that that other person was his boyfriend, too, so he doesn’t trust any of his senses anymore.

“Gamzee,” Tavros says, big brown eyes shiny with worry.  He stops right in front of Gamzee’s window, panting from the exertion of wheeling there so hurriedly.  “Gamzee, please. We can talk about what happened later, okay? Right now you need to, uh, move the car out of the middle of the road.”

But all Gamzee hears is We can talk about what happened later, okay?

Gamzee realizes that Tavros had witnessed the entire thing.

“Gamzee?”

Witnessed him flirting with another guy.

“Gamzee, please!”

Seen his accursed prosopagnosia at work.

“Gamzee, look,” Tavros sighs, when none of his shouting seems to get through.  The cars in the back are getting angstier. “My hand controls are in your car, right? Let me drive.  We’ll talk later.”

After staring into Tavros’s earnest eyes for a few more seconds, Gamzee finally gives an almost imperceptible nod.  With robotic movements and numbness permeating his body, he opens the car door and unfolds his tall, lanky body from behind the wheel.  Tavros tries to smile at him, but isn’t quite successful because of the worry he’s radiating. Tavros doesn’t even seem angry at all. It makes Gamzee sick to his stomach.  

Gamzee watches as Tavros transfers himself into the driver’s seat.  Then Gamzee helps Tavros disassemble the wheelchair and stow it in the back seat of the car.  Then he gently closes Tavros’s car door.

“Come on,” Tavros says to him through the window, patting the passenger seat next to him.

But Gamzee doesn’t “come on”.  He looks at Tavros’s beautiful face one last time.  He’s not going to remember it, he knows that.

If he runs, he can make it to the bridge from here in twenty minutes.  That’s twenty minutes of not remembering Tavros’s face and knowing that he isn’t ever going to know what his boyfriend looks like again.  

He can do it.

He closes his eyes, turns on his heel and absconds as fast as he can, covering his ears as he does so, so that he doesn’t have to hear the sound of Tavros’s voice frantically calling out to him.

——-

He’s already standing at the edge of the bridge, looking down at the white sea foam curdling on the surface of the blue-black water.  The sea breeze is cold, and he’s not wearing a jacket, but he doesn’t shiver. He doesn’t even feel it. He doesn’t really feel anything.  When he looks into the dark abyss below him he feels like he is staring at his own reflection.

Then his phone starts ringing.  At first, he dismisses it, resolving not to jump until the annoying vibrating device has stopped.  But it becomes apparent that whoever’s calling isn’t just some telemarketer, because for five straight minutes they don’t give up.  

Finally, Gamzee pulls his phone out of his pocket, resolving to hurl the damn thing in the ocean below, but by some inexplicable magnetic force he swipes “Accept Call” instead and brings it to his ear.  He says nothing, not that he would’ve needed to.

“GAMZEE FUCKING MAKARA, WHAT THE HELL DID YOU DO THIS TIME?”

“Karbrother...it sure is miraculous as motherfuckin’ hell to be up and havin’ your voice rattlin’ ‘round my motherfuckin’ head again.”

“Mind telling me why the FUCK your shitty boyfriend came rolling his pansy ass to me in fucking tears ?”

Gamzee’s heart feels a painful twinge, but he ignores it.  “I wasn’t ever no motherfuckin’ good for him ‘cept to cause his eyes to make all that watery motherfuckin’ sadness, anyway.”

“Did you...did you BREAK UP WITH HIM?” Karkat yells.  “He told me...you were talking to some other crippled fuckass he didn’t know and that—“  Karkat suddenly stops, and the moment of his realization is audible over the silence.

“He found out, didn’t he?” Karkat asks flatly.

“Listen, man,” Gamzee sighs with the most dejected tone Karkat has ever heard.  “I’m sorry for what I said way back then. I was mad and shit, okay? Every motherfuckin’ second since I saw your face for the first time has been a motherfuckin’ miracle.  I’ll never motherfuckin’ forget you even when the motherfuckin’ reaper tears this motherfucker’s brains outta his skull—“

“What reaper.  Gamzee what the FUCK are you talking about, you fucking weirdo?  WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU?”

“Nowhere.”

“What the fuck are you trying to do?  Oh fuck, oh god, oh hell…”

“Hey best friend...calm the motherfuck down.  You’re giving this motherfucker a wicked headache.”

“I WILL NOT CALM DOWN YOU PIECE OF SHIT !  You’re god knows where doing god knows fucking what and you ask me to calm down?  Shit, Gamzee—think of me , if that even fucking matters to you anymore—think of Tavros —don’t even lie to me say you don’t care, you stupid —“

“Karkat.  I’m just a stupid motherfuckin’ freak and I overstayed my time, okay?  I just...I motherfuckin’ don’t wanna care anymore.”

“Ha!” Karkat barks harshly.  “You think death is going make everything stop hurting?  That’s as much bullshit as the government saying they don’t fucking spy on us.  You’re just going to burn in eternity in a hell made out of your own fucking regrets.”

“I thought you were motherfuckin’ atheist.”

“Let me tell you something, Gamzee Makara : if you do anything... stupid , to yourself, I’m gonna fucking tell Tavros that you did it because he was a piece of shit boyfriend to you.  I’m gonna make sure he understands that it was his fucking fault .  And I’m gonna remind him about it, every single fucking day.  He’s gonna live the rest of his pathetic fucking life wallowing in pathetic fucking guilt just because his cowardly excuse of a boyfriend couldn’t tell him the truth.”

Gamzee gasps.  “You wouldn’t—“

“I’m a heartless asshole times four-hundred and thirteen divided by point six to the power of fucking pi.  Try me, motherfucker.”

Gamzee immediately inches away from the edge of the bridge.  It’s not that he fears death, and it’s not that he fears getting hurt, either.  Being the shitty human being and friend that he is, he can sometimes even turn a blind eye on Karkat getting hurt.  But the same never , ever , not in a billion years , applies to Tavros.  

And even though he’s already the cause of Tavros’s current suffering, it’s not like those were his original intentions.  Now, however, if Gamzee jumps off the bridge, and Karkat makes good of his unholy oath, then Tavros would be even more hurt, and Gamzee can’t knowingly stand by and let that happen.  

And if Tavros was told that he was at fault for causing Gamzee’s fate, Tavros would most certainly believe it—and be devastated. Vriska Serket’s evil face surfaces in the forefront of Gamzee’s thoughts.  No; only she would intentionally hurt or implicate Tavros like that.  

“Karkat,” he pleads, “I’m so motherfuckin’ far away from doing somethin’ motherfuckin’ stupid that I’m in Stephen motherfuckin’ Hawking’s house.  Just don’t lie to Tavros about that.”

“Only if you come back and tell him the truth yourself.”

“How am I supposed to face him,” Gamzee wails.  “DON’T MOTHERFUCKIN’ TELL ME WHAT TO DO IF YOU CAN’T GIVE A MOTHERFUCKER A CLEAR HOW-SO.”

“TAVROS!” Karkat yells suddenly.  “I HAVE SOMETHING TO TELL YOU—“

“STOP!” Gamzee practically screams in a frantic.  “He’s motherfuckin’ with you right now?”

“He came straight over after you scrammed, hoping you’d fucking come home.  He’s practically losing his fucking shit and if you don’t do something right the fuck now I’m afraid he’s gonna vomit the rest of the shits he’s got left to lose all over my inexpensively shitty, eBay ripoff of a couch.”

“That’s a motherfuckin’ waste of puke.”

“I’d say that’s a waste of perfectly shitty sofa, but what the fuck ever.  Just get your stupid ass back home.”

Gamzee sighs, and he sounds much older than his twenty-odd years at that moment.  “I really don’t wanna, Karkat. I don’t wanna see him, and I...I don’t wanna see you either.  I can’t motherfuckin’ look at the two of you without knowin’ deep down in that bright red cardiovascular organ o’ mine what motherfuckin’ miracles you are.  But I don’t wanna remember how I done wrong by the messiahs’ most precious motherfuckin’ gifts to me.”

There’s a long pause before Karkat answers again, and this time, there’s a sadness that’s evident beneath the roughness of his voice.  “Then don’t look,” he says. “Just—close your eyes or something, when you talk to him. I’ll leave the house, if that makes it easier for you.”

“I ain’t all up and motherfuckin’ badass and fearless like you, Karkat. I...I ain’t motherfuckin’ strong enough for this.”

“You’d do anything for him, wouldn’t you?”

“I’d pluck stars outta the motherfuckin’ sky like little fishies out of a pond if that’s what he wanted—“

“Yeah, well good news for you, buddy: Tavros doesn’t give a flying fuck about your batshit plans to destroy astronomy.  He just wants you to come back and tell him what the fuck is going on with you. If you can shoot down stars and potentially massacre alien civilizations on his behalf, then you sure as fucking hell can do him this this tiny favor, too.  Unless you’re just so full of shit that all those inflated claims were lies, too--”

“NO,” Gamzee interrupts emphatically.  “I wasn’t motherfuckin’ lying.”

“Then prove it, coward.”

Angry, frustrated, worried, miserable, and scared out of his mind, Gamzee hangs up the phone.  It’s the first time he hangs up on Karkat and not the other way around. He lets out a tortured scream into the darkening night and flings the cellular device over the edge of the bridge into the

-----

Two bitter hours pass before Gamzee finally reaches his and Karkat’s shared apartment.  He knows he could’ve called a cab or Uber, but had walked the long trek instead, if only to delay the dreaded confrontation with Tavros.   

Karkat’s grey Toyota is missing from the driveway, meaning he’d gone out.  Gamzee hates himself for feeling relieved, but he honestly just can’t face his best friend right now.  His own car, however, is evidently present, a clear indication that Tavros had driven it here and was still waiting.  

The front door is slightly ajar; Tavros must have left it open for Gamzee, since the latter had left his keys in the car.  After several deep exhalations, Gamzee fixes a steely mask on his face and enters the apartment.

And there he is, the motherfuckin’ angel who takes Gamzee’s breath away, sitting in his wheelchair with his hands buried in his thick black hair.  At the sound of the door being opened, Tavros bolts upright, a dizzying smile lighting up his face. Once again, Gamzee is amazed by how beautiful he is—but this time, he doesn’t dare acknowledge it.  The words “ Who are you? ” echo ceaselessly inside his head, and he is terrified by the slim chance that this isn’t Tavros, even though it logically couldn’t be anyone else.

Tavros grips the armrests of his wheelchair, and Gamzee can actually the see the moment when Tavros, in his excitement, forgets that he can’t stand and tries to jump to his feet to greet Gamzee.  It breaks Gamzee’s heart, but he doesn’t move even an inch in the direction of the disabled boy.  Tavros blinks at his legs in confusion for a fraction of a second, before gathering his bearings and hurriedly wheeling himself in front of Gamzee.  He wraps two tan arms around his boyfriend’s middle.

“You, came back,” Tavros breathes against Gamzee’s stomach.  “You came back.” It’s all Tavros seems capable of saying at the moment, but he doesn’t he relinquish his tight hold around Gamzee’s frame.  

Gamzee wishes that Tavros were angry at him—that he would yell, scream, glare at Gamzee with hateful eyes—after all, that would make Gamzee’s job so much easier.  Every cell in Gamzee’s body screams at him to melt into Tavros’s embrace, and return the hug—to say something comforting or apologetic—but he does none of those things.  Allowing his arms to dangle limply by his sides, Gamzee pointedly does not look down at Tavros as he slowly and tonelessly says, “I don’t. Motherfuckin’ know. Who you are.”

Tavros doesn’t move away from Gamzee, but his movements still completely, as if he had been frozen in shock.  

“Did you not. Motherfuckin’ hear me.  I said. I don’t know. Who you motherfuckin’ are.”

When Tavros still doesn’t move, Gamzee pries himself away from the embrace.  In two long strides, he reaches the couch and collapses on top of it, folds his arms, and closes his eyes.

Following Karkat’s advice, Gamzee keeps his eyes clenched shut as he begins to talk.  It really is so much easier this way, not having to look at Tavros’s face and be reminded of how miraculous that motherfucker is.  Gamzee starts speaking, but with little emotion, and with the exception of a curse word here or there, there is an uncharacteristic clinicalness to his testimony.

It comes easily.  He starts at the beginning, with the first face he failed to recognize: his father’s.  He goes on to tell Tavros about the real reason why all of his foster families abandoned him.  The real reason fueling his teenage drug addiction and insatiable propensity for anonymous sex.  

Because he was defunct fuckup of a human being no one in their right mind would want, not when he came with such a glaring abnormality.

Gamzee tells Tavros about the miracle of meeting Karkat; how the younger man came to be an oasis in the bleak desert of Gamzee’s life.  But even Karkat, miracle though he was, wasn’t a miracle-worker; Gamzee remained marked with bouts of rage, violence, and hopelessness. And the stupid goddamned fucking prosopagnosia. He was already a flawed product to begin with; no amount of Karkat could change that.

Then, Gamzee tells Tavros about how there were two faces he could recognize. That neither of them were Tavros’s.  And, to add insult to injury, that one of those faces is Vriska Serket’s.

“I mean, you’re beautiful, yeah.  So motherfuckin’ beautiful. But for some reason my motherfuckin’ brain decided that you weren’t special enough to remember but that...that bitch ...is.”

And finally, Gamzee tells Tavros that throughout the course of their two-year relationship, he had been lying.  And that even though he’d come close to telling Tavros about his disease several times, he’d ultimately decided to lie about it forever, intending to fool Tavros into thinking that he wasn’t dating a degenerate human being.

“The only way I ever motherfuckin’ knew who you were was ‘cause o’ those magic wheels,” Gamzee finishes.  “You made it easy ‘cause you always looked so motherfuckin’ out of place, y’know? Everyone else just doin’ the motherfuckin’ walk like normal, and there you are sittin’ in that big-ass shiny chair.  It was so easy. ‘Cept just now, y’know, ‘cause I didn’t expect to have two motherfuckin’ dudes with fucked up legs in the same place.”

Gamzee opens his mouth to continue, but closes it again when he realizes that there’s nothing more to say.  That’s...it. The end of his story. The end of his lies. Is this...the end of him and Tavros?

It is so unnervingly quiet for the few minutes after Gamzee finishes his confession that he has to open his eyes to verify that Tavros is actually present. He regrets it, because Tavros is indeed there, staring at Gamzee with a stricken look on his face, his knuckles white from clutching the armrests of his wheelchair so tightly.  Tears are streaming from his brown eyes.

Without another word or sign of acknowledgment, Gamzee gets up off the couch.  Tavros breaks the silence by letting out a choked sob, and covers his face with his hands.  Gamzee heads resolutely for the door of the apartment, fully intending to leave for god-knows-where once again, but at that moment Karkat suddenly enters and blocks his path.  

“Where the fuck do you think you’re going?” Karkat barks, spreading his arms out so that Gamzee can’t sidestep him.

Gamzee can only growl and head for his room, instead, slamming the door shut behind him.

He falls onto his bed with clothes and shoes still on, and succumbs to a dreamless sleep that is somehow even more restless than a nightmare.

——-

By all accounts, Gamzee expects it to be over.  

When he wakes up the next morning, he muses that he’s not sure what “it” means.  His friendship with Karkat? His relationship with Tavros? Both? His happiness? His life?  He decides that it doesn’t matter; to him, the revelation of his face blindness to Tavros sealed the deal as surely as an executioner’s axe. Everything he had before was just motherfuckin’ over, and it was time for him to move on.  

Got motherfuckin’ less than NOTHING to move on to if it ain’t got Tavros in it , he thinks depressedly as he opens his bedroom door—

Someone is sitting at the table drinking coffee, hair askew and eyes red and puffy, and it isn’t Karkat.  The stranger looks up when he hears Gamzee’s door open, and he and Gamzee stare at each other.

Then the stranger seems to realize something and quickly says, “Oh! Gamzee.  Gamzee, it’s me--”

Gamzee recognizes the voice, and a second later he notices the wheelchair on which the stranger sits.  

Holy shit .  He slams his bedroom door shut again so quickly that he nearly gives himself whiplash.  

What the motherfuck is Tavros still doing here?

-----

For the next week, Gamzee barricades himself in his bedroom like his non-existent virginity depends on it.  Still, the thin, cheap walls of the apartment don’t do much in terms of blocking out the sounds of what’s going on outside.  

Tavros is still there.  

Tavros makes small talk with Karkat every morning and evening, which in it of itself is weird because Gamzee’s best friend and boyfriend never seemed to even remotely enjoy the company of each other in the past.  Even weirder is the fact that Karkat responds to Tavros--whom the fiery Vantas had once referred to as an “insufferable conversationalist who makes me want to dissolve my eardrums in sulfuric fucking acid”--with nothing but civility, if not a bit of tiredness and mild irritation.  

They make arrangements for Tavros’s temporary stay.  From his eavesdropping, Gamzee finds out that Karkat and Tavros are taking turns between sleeping on Karkat’s bed and the living room couch at night.  Tavros shyly assures that as long as he has an extra pillow to support his back, sleeping on the couch won’t do him much damage, while Karkat awkwardly claims that he doesn’t give a fuck about Tavros’s shitty spine anyway.  Gamzee finds out that since Tavros’s car is still being worked on, Karkat is temporarily driving him to and from work.

And the two talk about Gamzee, too; he hears his name mentioned several times every day, but the moment either Karkat or Tavros says it, they slip into hushed conversation that Gamzee can’t decipher even through the thin slab of wood that is his door.  It’s like they know he’s trying to listen in.

Gamzee hears Tavros and Karkat somewhat getting along, and even though he knows he has no right to feel this way, he actually feels... jealous of Karkat for interacting with Tavros in this way.  

Gamzee only exits the safety of his bedroom when the danger outside is gone—that is, when Tavros isn’t home.  He doesn’t know why he perceives Tavros as a threat. Maybe because he knows Tavros wants to talk to him, and Gamzee can’t bear to even think about what horrible things Tavros has to say about him (that Gamzee knows he totally deserves).

When he does come out of his bedroom, Karkat tries to talk to him.  Gamzee resolutely ignores his roommate as though he were as invisible as the molecules of air surrounding them, but still he hears the blasphemous lies coming out of Karkat’s blasphemous mouth.  ‘Bout how Gamzee needs to grow up, how Tavros wants to talk to him and it really “is not nearly as fucking bad as you think, because the stutterfuck is putting to shame the previous holder of the Guiness title for Tolerance of Human Shittiness.”  Gamzee tunes it all out, and all he can think about is Karkat driving Tavros to work, Tavros and Karkat sleeping on the same bed (albeit not at the same time), Tavros finding out how miraculous a motherfucker Karkat actually is and how Gamzee never even held the dried wax of an extinguished candle in comparison.

Holy fuck.  He’s jealous of Karkat.   His best friend.

——-

It’s the afternoon of the sixth day of Gamzee’s self-quarantine and Tavros’s pseudo-sleepover that the repairs on the latter’s car are finally finished.  It’s also a Saturday, which means that both Tavros and Karkat have neither work nor class to attend to. Karkat drops Tavros off at the body shop, then drives himself to Dave Strider’s house to spend the night.  Tavros had specifically requested to have privacy with Gamzee the next morning, and even though Karkat would under normal circumstances be pissed at being kicked out of his goddamn apartment, he is all too happy to comply this time.  He’s frankly dying of the fucking plague—that’s how fucking sick he is of all the ridiculous tension between the two stubborn, lovesick fuckasses.  

And for the sake of his best friend, Karkat genuinely does hope that the two of them reach, at the very least, an understanding.  Given how spectacularly Gamzee managed to drive shit down the hole this time, Karkat under normal circumstances would have considered the situation unsalvageable—

But for the first time in his life, Karkat is putting his faith in someone else.  Karkat, the self-proclaimed scholar of all things romantic, is putting a romantic situation in the hands of someone else.  And that someone else is actually Tavros fucking Nitram.  And Karkat actually believes that Tavros , of all people, can save Gamzee from...from this .  This grave that Gamzee’s dug himself into.  

Even though there isn’t a single heartstring in Karkat’s tiny body that’s romantically inclined towards Gamzee, Karkat doesn’t need a therapist to know that he probably cares too much about his best friend—who, by the way, has hurt his feelings deeply.  He sighs, sends a prayer to the deity he doesn’t believe in that everything will be okay by tomorrow, and thanks the fucking Lord that he now gets to take his anger out on Dave Strider. Karkat’s got several human punching bags, but Dave is the best punching bag.  It is him.

——-

It’s Sunday morning. Tavros knows that Gamzee’s sleeping habits are unpredictable at the best of times, and has no idea when he would get up in a time like this.  That’s why Tavros makes sure to get up extra early, because Gamzee would most assuredly protest his entry into his bedroom if he were awake.

Tavros feels like a shitty vigilante as he picks the lock to Gamzee’s bedroom.  To be honest, he is scared shitless about confronting Gamzee after this week of heartbreaking silence—its the longest time the two of them have spent without contact.  He would’ve tried to reach out to his clownish boyfriend sooner, but what with work and school, he simply hadn’t had the time to rehearse every single possible scenario of this encounter in his head.  He’s never been so scared of talking to Gamzee in his life.

But he’s even more scared of permanently losing Gamzee in his life, and Tavros hopes that his second fear will override the first and give him confidence in some reverse-psychological way, or something.  Tavros knows that whatever pain he feels in his heart, Gamzee probably feels tenfold, perhaps hundredfold ; Tavros has no choice but to be the stronger partner this time.  It’s a small favor, considering how many times Gamzee has stayed strong for him .

After all, Tavros isn’t stupid.  He knows about Gamzee’s anger issues—even if his boyfriend has never really shown it in his presence—and he has his theories about what Gamzee was doing those few hours when he disappeared.  Thank goodness for Karkat, really; the shorter boy wouldn’t spill about what happened, but his eyes were speaking as loudly as his angry voice, at that point.

Tavros silently cheers when the door unlocks with a soft click , then curses at the loud groan it makes as he pushes it open.  He freezes when he hears another groan, this time deep and growly, and distinctly human.  He catches a peek of Gamzee shifting on the bed, but the taller male doesn’t wake up.

Tavros gingerly opens the door a bit wider and is dismayed, but unsurprised, to find Gamzee’s bedroom floor looking like a war zone.  Pillow stuffing, soiled clothes, crumpled plastic bottles, suspicious stains, and clumps of matted hair decorate the worn carpet from wall to wall.  The reek of Faygo, weed, and sweat hangs heavy in the air, and Tavros gags a little bit. He looks at the mess and is thankful that Karkat had the insight to remove all of the sharp, potentially harmful objects from Gamzee’s room beforehand.

He sighs as he observes the dozens of bicycle horns also littering the ground.  Those little fuckers that Gamzee is so fond of are nothing short of land mines for Tavros’s wheelchair; impossible to avoid, and guaranteed to detonate in an explosion of sound that would most assuredly wake Gamzee up.  Tavros makes the decision to abandon his chair by the doorway and crawl his way to Gamzee’s bed. Besides , he thinks, this will make it harder for Gamzee to kick me out, since he wouldn’t be able to stand watching me drag myself across the floor.  

Tavros doesn’t like using his disability to play the pity card, but he can’t deny that it’s sometimes necessary.  He tries not to pant too loudly from exertion when he reaches Gamzee’s bed, and arranges his useless legs by his side where they won’t get in his way.  For a long moment, he looks at Gamzee’s long-fingered, bony hand, which is hanging off the side of the bed, tries not to think about how many times Gamzee hasn’t washed his hands this week, then carefully takes it in his own.  Tavros is careful not to wake the sleeping man, but can’t help giving his fingers a gentle squeeze—despite, everything, it feels good to be touching his boyfriend again.

He can only hope that Gamzee will return the squeeze when he wakes up.

——-

There is no gradual fade from sleep to wakefulness; one moment you are unconscious, the next, you’re not.  You are bombarded with the sensation of something gentling tracing the veins of left hand. Even though the touch is light, you are forced to suppress a violent shudder, because you recognize the callousness of the initiator’s fingertips.  You are suddenly furious. What the fuck does Tavros think he’s doing in here? Don’t doors have locks for a reason?  Why is he tormenting you with his irresistible touch?

You sit up from bed like a motherfuckin’ jack-in-the-box, springing from dormancy to wild-eyed wakefulness, and, with more force than necessary, shove his hand away from yourself.  Your heart is beating so wildly that you can’t even muster up the feeling of guilt when Tavros lets out a surprised gasp at your sudden roughness and somehow ends up sprawled across the floor because you pushed him so hard.  Where is his chair…?

“Gamzee…” he groans, “it’s just me—“

“I motherfuckin’ KNOW THAT,” you say.  

Whatever you would’ve said next becomes an eternal mystery, because the words die in your throat as you watch Tavros push himself back up into a sitting position.  Tavros looks different. Not his face—he could’ve gotten a plastic surgery overnight and you wouldn’t have been able to tell. But something you can recognize is undeniably different: his hair!  He’s cut his hair!

As in, Tavros had had both sides of his luscious black hair shaved off, leaving a punkish, scarlet red mohawk in its wake.  

Part of you feels like crying; you would never have betted on Tavros adopting this kind of brazen look, but he still looks so inexplicably beautiful in it.  You want to run your hands over the fuzz on the sides of his scalp, to thread your fingers through the freshly dyed ‘do—

But then the angry monster inside you rears its ugly head. You scramble upwards and suddenly you’re standing on your bed.  Given your height and the fact that Tavros is on the ground, he looks so tiny and so far away. “What the FUCK?” you shout. “What the hell have you been motherfuckin’ up to?”

“W-what?” he asks, looking baffled.  “Do you—not like it—“

“LIKE IT?  Ha!” You throw your head back and laugh cruelly.  Inside, you’re scrambling and panicking—you’d promised yourself to never ever be cruel to Tavros, or lose your temper at him, or mock him—but you couldn’t stop.  You aren’t even truly mad at him, why are you doing this?  “Don’t pretend like what I motherfuckin’ think means any single shred of goddamn shit?”

“I—I mean, if it really is so, uh, atrocious, it should only take a few weeks to grow out—“

“Motherfuckin’ messiahs Tavros, were you always this motherfuckin’ obtuse?  Or maybe, you wanted to get the motherfuckin’ feel of disobedience up and crawlin’ all over your skin because did I not motherfuckin’ say NOT TO PRETEND LIKE YOU GIVE A SHIT ABOUT WHAT THIS MOTHERFUCKER THINKS?”

Tavros’s big doe eyes look terrified—after all, he rarely gets to witness you in such a mood. As he shrinks against the dirty carpet, looking as though he wants to melt into a puddle, you plow on relentlessly.

“Oh, but I’m puttin’ all my motherfuckin’ dollar bills on the motherfuckin’ miracle platform that says your NEW BOYFRIEND likes it a whole hell of a motherfuckin’ lot,” you snarl.

At your words, Tavros seems to suddenly forget about being scared; an indignant look crosses his features instead.  “What are you implying?” he hisses. “I don’t, uh, sell my body, like a, like a prostitute-- ”

“Yeah, well who would motherfuckin’ want your body if they could have your heart instead?”

Emotions flash across his face like those miraculous rainbow colors spinning on a motherfuckin’ wheel of fortune.  When he looks down and gives his legs a withering look, you realize that your statement sounded like a jab at his disability, even though that’s not what you meant to imply at all.  He looks back up at you, torn between deciding whether you were trying to insult or compliment him.

You don’t give him the chance to make that decision.  “But I don’t motherfuckin’ UNDERSTAND, MY BROTHER. What motherfuckin’ good is your miracle-spun bloodpumper o’ gold to a motherfucker like Karkat ?  I never thought he’d want your shit, he always motherfuckin’ said his chest cavity was too heartless for you and that he was FUCKING PROUD OF THAT!”

“ Karkat ?” Tavros shouts disbelievingly.  “What does he have to do with-- wait.  Wait.  Oh, my god. Unexpected, doesn’t even cover--god.  G-gamzee, are you-- jealous of Karkat ?”

You feel your cheeks heating up, and this time you know it’s not because of your anger.  “B-because there ain’t no holiness up in this here motherfucker and my love for you ain’t the selfless kind, motherfucker.  ‘Cause you were motherfuckin’ mine, and generosity and me are up real close like fuckin’ enemies, man.  I don’t wanna motherfuckin’ share, even if it’s with my motherfuckin’ BEST FRIEND, and you can sure as motherfuckin’ hell kiss goodbye to any chance that I want you to happy with him even if I know you MOTHERFUCKIN’ DESERVE IT.”

“Well you don’t have to worry about that ,” Tavros snaps.  “Happiness, is certainly not even close to being what I feel, partly because, uh, I’m not fucking together with Karkat!   Or anyone, but-- Karkat?  Why would you--why would even think that?”

“I dunno what kind of fucked up movie you’re tryna audition for, motherfucker, but your acting chops might need a motherfuckin’ miracle. I heard with my own two motherfuckin’ ears—‘bout the two of you sharin’ his car and his motherfuckin’ bed— ”

“That’s not the basis of anything!” Tavros exclaims.  “I only stayed here to be closer, to you. And the car—that’s, uh, because mine was in the shop, remember?  It’s fixed now, by the way, which is beside the point, but uh—Karkat wouldn’t touch me with a ten-foot pole, anyway, and you know that.”  

“Haha, I motherfuckin’ thought I ‘knew’ a whole lot of miraculous shit before today.  Like I thought I knew all up in my heart the way sinners pray for the devil, that you wouldn’t be spendin’ your time gettin’ motherfuckin’ haircuts while— this was happenin’.”

“What exactly do you classify as this ?”

This time, it’s your turn to splutter at Tavros in disbelief.  “Oh, I don’t MOTHERFUCKIN’ KNOW, maybe the motherfuckin’ intelligence that your face isn’t the one l dream about at night?  Maybe I’m just bein’ TOO MOTHERFUCKIN’ SELFISH again, but I was kinda puttin’ my faith in you bein’ A LITTLE MOTHERFUCKIN’ UPSET about it, y’know?  But I guess I wouldn’t expect you to understand.  You’re a motherfuckin’ angel and Envy’s one of the deadly sins, ain’t that motherfuckin’ right?”

And for some reason, Tavros looks at you, sits up a little bit straighter, and gives the teeniest hint of a triumphant smile.  “I knew, uh, that this wasn’t really about Karkat,” he says. He clears his throat, looks you straight in the eye, and says, “Gamzee, are you mad at me for not being jealous of Karkat?”

You open your mouth with the intention and furiously denying it, but no sound comes out.

“Gamzee,” Tavros continues patiently, “of course I’m jealous of Karkat.  I’ve always been a little bit jealous of him, even though I know it’s, uh, irrational.  I mean, he’s known you for so long, and he gets to see a side of you that, uh, I don’t think you’re comfortable with showing me.  He’s your roommate and he’s your best friend, and...on top of that he’s better than me at being, well, um, a man , I mean he’s so confident and he’s not obsessed about ‘girly games’ or Peter Pan.  And even though he’s pretty short, he can, uh, walk… But , I’ll always be grateful to him, because I know he helped you during difficult times, and because, well, he reintroduced me to the dating scene after the Vriska disaster and, well, he frankly couldn’t have done a better job.  

“My point is to say that I am jealous of Karkat for uh, certain things, but they’re petty and can’t really compare to what he means outside the context of my, uh, jealousy.  The fact that you can recognize his face—that doesn’t really even register in my mind because, well, it’s obviously not a conscious choice, from either of you, and uh—it’s just a face.  That’s not a big deal.”

Not a big motherfuckin’ deal ?  That’s a motherfuckin’ miracle if you’ve ever heard of one.  You narrow your eyes at Tavros, trying to figure out how the fuck he could possibly believe that your face blindness isn’t a big deal.  “Then how about the motherfuckin’ bitch—Vriska?”

“What about her?”

“Well?  Aren’t you motherfuckin’ jealous of that?”

Tavros sighs.  “On what basis would I be jealous, though?  You’ve never even met her, and you already hate her. I don’t envy that, at all, because, uh, I’d really prefer if you didn’t hate me.  Again, it’s just a face. She does have a pretty one so I’m not, uh, that surprised, I guess.”

“‘Pretty’ clearly don’t matter ‘cause her motherfuckin’ face would be a pile of spider vomit next to yours, Tav,” you moan in distress, pulling at your hair.  “So why doesn’t my stupid brain think so? Maybe I can recognize Kar because he was like a motherfuckin’ miracle to me, what the hell ever. Then ain’t the same science gotta apply to my motherfuckin’ angel, too?”

“Maybe your brain is better at remembering scary people,” Tavros says, looking entirely too calm.  “Or maybe, uh, it’s got something to do with your subconscious? I dunno, I don’t think you actively tried, to remember either of their faces, um, right?”

“...No.”

“And right from the start you were trying to recognize mine.  Regardless,” he says, “you don’t have to, Gamzee. I cut my hair—“ he gestures at himself—“because I thought it would be, um, a little more obvious?  In case there’s someone else in a wheelchair nearby. Then you just have to, uh, look for the one with the weirdest hair!”

For the second time this morning, you are stunned speechless.  You have to replay Tavros’s words several times in your head before your brain finally catches up and you realize what he just said.  “You motherfuckin’ did it...for me ?”

Tavros blushes slightly, and nods.

This is not the way it was supposed to go.  Once Tavros found out about your prosopagnosia, he was supposed to be disgusted by your condition and wounded by your deceit.  

And instead he had gone and made a motherfuckin’ miracle out of his hair.  For you .  Before today, you’d never even considered that hairstyling could have any other purpose outside of vanity.  When is Tavros ever gonna stop surprising you?

And here you were accusing him of...what, going out with Karkat?  Not being upset enough about the fact that you were total piece-of-shit boyfriend?  The guilt that suddenly rises up within you threatens to drown you from the inside out, and you feel like you can’t breathe.  You scramble off of your bed, leap past Tavros, ignoring his startled cries of your name, and rush into the bathroom. Without bothering to take off your clothes, you jump into the shower and turn the water onto its coldest setting.  You nearly yelp when the icy deluge hits your skin, but you grit your teeth and bear it. The almost unbearable coldness can, however temporarily, distract you from what reality is trying to feed your brain.

You stand there, under the shower, for about five minutes, until your breathing is even and your skin a little numb.  You turn the water off, because as much as you’d like to you can’t just stand here forever; you’d either get sick or Tavros would come in and try to drag you out.  

You shed your sopping clothing, leaving them on the shower floor, and walk in your dripping birthday suit back to your bedroom.  Tavros is on his stomach, crawling his way towards his wheelchair, and he looks up sharply as you march in. You throw on a pair of pants, not bothering to find a shirt.  Then you walk straight over to Tavros and without warning, gather him in your arms. He lets out a little yelp, and you shiver at the warmth of his small body against your bare chest. You glance at his wheelchair but walk right past it, instead marching to the couch and dropping him, a bit too roughly, onto it.  Then you drop to your knees and kneel before him, wordlessly looking at him for a long time. He looks back. You search and you search, and despite your efforts you find not a single speck of anger or spite in his eyes.

Then, with shaking arms, you reach up and touch his head, starting from the surprisingly soft fuzz on the sides of his scalp, before allowing your fingers to explore the voluminous mohawk. Despite having been dyed, it feels just as soft as you remember.  

“Gamzee…” he exhales, eyes fluttering.

You quickly drop your hands back to your sides, and before you can stop yourself, you burst into tears.

“I motherfuckin’ tried , man,” you sob, burying yourself your face into his bony knees.  “Not just ‘cause I wanted to frame your pretty face and hang it up on a motherfuckin’ wall inside my mindscape, ‘cause I really want that too.  But I wanted to be the best motherfuckin’ boyfriend for you, ‘cause you’re such a motherfuckin’ miracle, man, you deserve more than fucking scum .”

“Oh Gamzee.  How does this possibly make you scum ?”

“I recognized you by your motherfuckin’ wheelchair !  Which motherfuckin’ way doesn’t that make a motherfucker just as damned as the ableist assholes who treat you like—like—“

“Gamzee.  It’s not like you did that with the intention of degrading me, right?  Seriously, I don’t kid myself into thinking that the chair isn’t, like, uh, really fucking obvious, especially when I’m in public, okay?  It’s just, uh, part of my image. Like clothes, or an accessory, maybe. I’m okay with that, now. If anything, this shows that, uh, you can acknowledge my wheelchair, without seeing it as a red flag taped to my crippled ass saying I’m a second-class citizen.”

You lift your head to look up at him, and despite yourself you feel a wave of relief wash over you.  How many sleepless nights had guilt plagued you over this exact issue? And yet, with one simple statement he put those fears to ease, in a manner almost earth-shattering in its anticlimacticism.  

“But,” you croaked in a scratchy voice, “that still doesn’t mean I can’t—motherfuckin’ can’t .  Remember your face.  I couldn’t even tell someone what the love of my motherfuckin’ life looked like if they got their inquiry all up upon me.  Tavros—that day at the park—I mean, if that other motherfuckin’ dude had responded to my shitty pickup, how long into the sex before I would’ve realized I wasn’t fucking you ?!”  The words leave a bitter taste on your tongue, but you need Tavros to understand the gravity of the situation.

But he rolls his eyes.  “We both know you would’ve realized at some point, probably fairly quickly, and uh, definitely way before the sex, uh, would even have been brought up.”

You can’t practically argue that.  So you say, “I motherfuckin’ fucked up, though.  I embarrassed that poor motherfucker in public and—you had to see me layin’ down’ those disgusting words to a goddamn stranger —“

“People make mistakes, Gamzee.  I accidentally roll over people’s feet, on a regular basis.”

“That just makes a sore motherfuckin’ toe is all, though—it ain’t the fuckin’ same—“

“Well, then there’s always the possibility of me, knocking someone down with my wheelchair and causing them to break their arm.  Uh, that’s pretty serious, right?”

You shake your head miserably.  “I don’t wanna have to worry about smooching up the wrong motherfuckin’ pair of lips when I wanna kiss you.  I don’t want you to have to worry about me messing up—“

“I don’t want you to have to worry about my paralysis, either.  I also don’t want to not be able to hold your hand, when you’re walking next to me.  I also don’t want my fucking, cock, to not work, sometimes, when you’re trying to get me off.  But these things happen and I know you worry about them. The same way I definitely worry about you.  Doesn’t change how much I love you, though.

You look down at the floor, feeling vulnerable and ashamed.  Tavros sighs and puts his warm hands around your face. “Come on, Gamzee,” he says, patting the spot on the couch next to him.  

Robotically, you unfold yourself from the floor and climb onto the couch next to him.  You, who are normally touch-feels and affectionate to an extreme, are stiff and unsure what to do.  But Tavros takes the lead, snuggling into your side as best he can, and you can’t help but relax a tiny bit into the warm miracle attached to your side.  

After a long while, Tavros softly says, “You’re always telling me, uh, that legs are overrated, and that it doesn’t matter that mine don’t work, right?  They’re just a body part, it’s what’s inside that matters?”

“That’s the motherfuckin’ truth if I ever preached it.”

“Well, faces are technically just another body part, too.  Doesn’t matter if you can’t recognize other people, because you’re already good at being sympathetic to other people.  And even if you may not remember my face, I know you know what’s inside me, better than anybody else.”

You stare at him for a long time.  “That sounds like a dirty joke, motherfucker.”

And the two of you break out into ridiculous laughter.  “More like, the dirty truth,” he chortles.

You try not to laugh too loudly, though, because you don’t want to drown out the sound of his tinkling laughter.  As you listen to it, you finally allow yourself to accept reality. That your secret is finally out with Tavros. And he doesn’t seem to have a problem with it.  You never dared dream that this would be a miracle that could actually happen. You don’t understand why you deserve this.

“I thought you wouldn’t have wanted me, after all this,” you sniff, laughing and crying at the same time. “Thought you’d roll away like your brakes were motherfuckin’ broken on the top of a really steep hill.  Even Karkat motherfuckin’ said—“

“Well, I’m not Karkat,” he retorts with surprising forcefulness.  “He may be right, about a lot of things, but now I know his track record isn’t perfect, because, uh, I’ll be leaving you over my dead body.  Uh, which isn’t something that’s possible, which is the point.

“I mean, there are a lot of things about you that drive me insane, Gamzee Makara .   You don’t brush your hair, or do your room, or do laundry, and uh, in the, uh, gentlest way possible, you eat like a pig.  And I’m still mad at you, for what you said to my brother that one time.”

“Hey!   He was the one who motherfuckin’ threatened me first—“

“ Anyway ,” he interrupts pointedly, “I’ve tolerated you despite all that, I even love you despite all that.  If you thought some face blindness was going to be a problem, you’re going to have to try, way, way harder than that!”

This, however, causes you to sober up a little bit.  You bite your lip. “Well, uh...you see, Karkat didn’t think you’d actually have any motherfuckin’ problem...with the face thing.  It’s just...well...brother kept it from you for so motherfuckin’ long, aren’t you...mad?”

Tavros’s smile fades a little, and fear starts to grip your heart again, until he closes his eyes and shakes his head.  “I wanted to be,” he admits. “I wanted to, uh, lose my shit, and ask why you didn’t trust me with the information. I probably would’ve, if I didn’t understand, what that kind of shame feels like.  It made really sad, to think about everything you’ve been going through, ever since your dad...I mean...I’m so sorry about what happened, Gamzee. Don’t think it was your fault.” He takes your hand in his.  “To be honest, I think if I had the choice not to tell you about...my legs, I wouldn’t have told you either. I’m just lucky that’s not a decision I have to make, because the chair makes trying to hide...sort of obsolete.”

You quirk your eyebrow in surprise.  “Karkat always motherfuckin’ claimed it was a motherfuckin’ misfortune that those miracle wheels are so obvious.”

“Wrong again.  It’s hard to deal with it upfront, but it only gets easier down the line.  People don’t have high expectations for me when they see I’m in a chair. I get to prove them wrong.  But for people like you...people don’t see that you have any visible conditions and then they’re a little too hard on you.”  

You hum, having not thought of it that way before.  “Brother’s always findin’ ways to open my eyes to the miracle light,” you say fondly.  

“It’s never gonna be completely easy, I think,” he says.  “And I won’t ever completely understand, what it’s like for you.  But at least you’ll have me to help you this time. Just like you do for me.  And so, uh, no—I’m not mad, because of these aforementioned reasons, and also, because, uh—well, you kept the secret from me for two years.   Two years isn’t that long, considering that I’m planning to spend the rest of my life with you.”

These words turn out to be your final undoing.  You turn and tackle Tavros onto his back, locking your lips with his even as he lets out a surprised giggle.  “I’m gonna motherfuckin’ put a reminder in your head ‘bout what you just said, every single motherfuckin’ day, brother,” you breathe.  “Ain’t lettin’ my miracle go after what you just said, and even after I’m cold and dead I still ain’t lettin’ go. I love you, so motherfuckin’ much .”

“I love you too,” he smiles into your lips.  

The two of you make out for several minutes, but then the events of the past week take their toll and you collapse in exhaustion on top of him.   With some tricky maneuvering, you manage so that your positions are reversed, and he is lying on top of you, stomach to stomach, his forehead resting in the crook of your neck.  You protectively wrap your legs around his unmoving ones, taking care not to crush the fragile limbs with your weight.  He can’t feel it, but he does feel you shuffling around underneath him and turns his head to see what you’re doing; when he sees the tangle you’ve made out of your lower limbs, he rolls his eyes and smiles at you.  He makes to burrow his face into your neck again, but you stop him, bringing your hand up to stroke his new mohawk.

“You do like it, right?” he asks, actually sounding worried.  “I don’t look, um, like a tool, do I?”

You laugh.  “Motherfucker, the only tool you look like is a master key to the kingdom of heaven.” You smile for a bit, then, taking your chance, you drop your voice to a whisper.  “Tavros, I’m sorry.” Your voice cracks a little bit as you infuse into those three words the burden of what you’ve been carrying for the past two years—for your whole life, really.  

His response is to kiss you again.  

“Don’t be sorry,” he comforts you.  “You don’t have anything to be sorry for.  Well—“ He hesitates. “Not to me, anyway. Karkat...on the other hand…”

This causes you to groan loudly.  “Damn, do I owe that son of a bitch a motherfuckin’ apology.”

“Uh...yeah.  I wish I could disagree but it’s true.”

Reconciling with Karkat will be both much easier and much harder than it was reconciling with Tavros.  On one hand, you don’t have to worry about disappointing Karkat because he’s already seen the worst of the worst of you—on the other hand, Karkat is not known for his patience when listening to apologies.  Or anything, really.

But you can’t help but feel excited at the prospect of finally getting your best friend back.  For real .   Not that weird, awkward arrangement the two of you had had in the previous months, where the two of you crudely skipped around any relevant topic.  And now that Tavros knew your secret, the fight you’d had with Karkat all those months before could finally be put to rest.

You realize that it’s Tavros’s generous and forgiving heart that’s giving you the chance to have your best friend back.  Yet another motherfuckin’ miracle.

“I’ll bake him the best motherfuckin’ pie ever assembled in all the universes aligned,” you finally settle for saying.  “It’ll be the motherfuckin’ bomb, he’ll be shittin’ grenades or miracles for weeks .”  

“I’m sure he would appreciate—well, uh, maybe not the pie, but, definitely the sentiment.”

You yawn, and hug Tavros closer to your body.  “But can we get our motherfuckin’ cuddle nap on before I do that?”

He chuckles.  “Okay.”

“...Can we also have some motherfuckin’ bomb-ass sex after we wake up?”

——

THE END