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Every time they get together, it starts out fine. Casual, because what the fuck else would it even be? Gamzee isn't looking for anything, she already told him that when the two of them started meeting up again. And why would she be? She's had more than enough heartbreak for a dozen lifetimes over from just his bumbling inadequacy alone, not to even mention everybody else's, and after everything that he did (or worse, maybe, everything he didn't do) Karkat can hardly understand why she wants as much as a friendship out of him now.
He isn't looking for anything either, after his last foray into intimacy. And hadn't that just been an absolute joyride, more than enough for one lifetime, surely. A car crash of a relationship nobody wanted to admit was crashing, devolving at breakneck speeds into a flaming wreck, bleeding smoke and putrid burnt rubber to choke out everybody unfortunate enough to bear it witness. Over faster than it started. Composed of two emotionally constipated freaks of nature each desperate to prove they could be the more functional half of a completely dysfunctional whole. An accident waiting to happen from inception, that did happen, and now all of their mutual friends have to skirt around a massive trunkbeast shaped hole in the room and act like any of them like being around the two of them equally. Probably forever, which is only fair to everybody involved.
Anything beyond platonic is too much for him, and is probably always going to be. He's known that his whole life, because of how much he's wanted otherwise. It's just how it is.
So it should be fine. It is fine. Inconspicuous and friendly and fucking normal. It's just hanging out, like friends are allowed to do. Gamzee's always been touchy, when she likes someone. Karkat's always been sensitive. And he's clearly the one making things weird; because as always he is a blight to to the people around him, on any planet he inhabits, and any attempts at convincing himself that his biggest problem was the looming horror of a world that wanted him dead and forced him to know it rather than the moment of his inception followed by every subsequent moment he wasn't swallowed up by someone bigger before he could pupate is utter delusion. He's just gross, creepy, incapable of behaving himself because when Gamzee drops her head atop his legs she reminds him that his repulsive body isn't the only one in the room. That languidity is as envious as it is infuriating. Sometimes he's so god damn jealous of her ability to just relax, not get caught up in horrible cycles he does of beating himself into a paste for thinking or wanting, and sprawl out like nothing is capable of hurting her.
Except that isn't true, and he knows they both know it. Gamzee's been hurt more than he ever has, probably more than anybody he knows combined. The reminder stings like bile rising in his throat.
A hand moves to his face, draws his attention to the way his brow is furrowed, and with a little sigh Karkat finally lets his thoughts be pushed aside. It's better to focus on the way that she's sprawled out in his lap than all the reasons she shouldn't be, on the golden slits peering teasingly up at him that almost seem to glow against the shadows of the room, draw him in like anything else he could notice instead of them is irrelevant because it is. The look on her face makes him so embarrassed he can hardly even remember to know why it's embarrassing him. He's an idiot. She's calling him one and he wants to argue but Gamzee knows better than anybody else. That frond rests at his cheek, fingers slowly spreading to feel out more of him inch by inch, up along his temple and then into his hair, and he can innately feel that she's waiting for something of the same.
"Relax, brother," she says in a way that makes him forget instantly that he's being made fun of. It's soft, like she always speaks to him when he gets like this, airy and distant how she gets when she splays herself open. A way that tugs at something deep and ancient and instinctual in Karkats pusher and makes his ribcage feel too restrictive. She's so fucking vulnerable, and she's aware of it, wants to be, even, because she trusts him not to let anything happen. It's nonsensical, after everything he did let happen, and how he treated her, and is treating her even now by tracing eyes down the concave of her throat and wanting to lay claim on it like it could ever be his to lay claim to. Like he's done already and then hated himself for, refused to see her for the days it took to get over himself. The only reason he can fight through getting caught up on the thought all over again is because he finally has enough sense in his stupid, broken thinkpan to focus on her. On now. Right now, she is looking up at him with eyes that betray the state she's in, mind gone fuzzy and soft. She's got her whole neck bared and if he doesn't do something about it right this second he's going to fucking implode. He's absolutely sure of it.
Leaning the whole of himself over her, Karkat drops both arms to Gamzee's sides, boxing her in beneath him as if he can hide her from the rest of the world that way. Something must manage to be more alluring than ridiculous this time, because he can feel her purr where he meets her skin before he can hear it.