Collegestuck - Johnkat

3. Devious Intervention

Tucking in the covers around John's neck and making sure that he had set everything--from the fever-reducer to the fresh soup and hot tea, right down to the note he left--just as he'd planned. John's medication should have worn off and so he'd wake soon. He was always the type to rise with the smell of a hot meal lingering at the tip of his nose. 

Standing tall Karkat smiled, biting his lip as he did so. After a moment of pure enjoyment in looking into the gently slumbering face of his best friend, he ducked out. "Smooth exit, bro," Strider noted, giving a huge yawn as Kar avoided his trudging figure, the dark one having just slid down the stairs himself. Unlike Karkat, Dave was utterly exhausted and on the verge of passing out, later followed by a peaceful death. The ugly side effects of writing a Psychology thesis at four in the morning then rushing down to the main hall on campus to fall asleep at the door of your professor's office and turning it in by seven, sharp. 

Brutal. 

"Morning, Kay-kay," Sollux snickered, rubbing his chipped canine teeth that had ever bothered him into a state of utter discontent. After all, they gave him one hard lisp against that Korean accent that he'd been given due to a late arrival stateside. Eridan, his best friend and "secret" boyfriend, also Korean, was slumped over the kitchen table beside a mountain of books on Ancient Greek theatre and the arts. Kar gave this jumbled mess one look and smirked. 

The way that Eridan's wore his disheveled white dress shirt and boxers he could tell that he realized the urgency of his assignment in an untimely situation. Sollux only grinned delightfully and took a sip from his cup of coffee. His dark brown hair hung in his blind eyes, the signature 3D glasses hiding those milky irises. Karkat had been best friends like brothers with Sollux and so any news of anything got to them first, the rest of the house second.

"What's up on the house? It's quiet?" Kar asked, pouring a piping travel cup full of Front Porch blend coffee, tossing in a splash of cream and some sugar. "Rather, it's peaceful." 

"Rare, right? S'theems that thi'th week wa'th end of term week. And Eridan over here ha'th nearly blown it," he snickered through that lisp, Eridan staring at his pencil that was turning in his right and highly ambidextrous hand. With a thoughtful scratch of the dyed purple streak in his slicked back bangs, he shot it straight at Sollux's head. 

In a moment of pure accuracy and silence the pencil skid across the blue lens of Sollux's glasses and dropped on the table. "Hah, you're such a..." Sol began, freezing when his ears, as well as Kar's, picked up an unheard of cracking noise. Kar sucked in a breath as three pieces of triangular glass clanked against the marble island's counter top. "Y-you... you th'on of a bitch!!" He snapped, tearing his glasses off and rushing over to Eridan who simple closed his portable Toshiba's top and ducked out of the way. 

"A little payback never hurt anyone," he spoke in his clear English accent, hissing something in Korean as Sollux shouted it back, something mad spitting from those words. 

Karkat shushed the snapping pair and then with a wave, made his exit. 

After all, he couldn't, shouldn't be there when John woke up. 


The coffee house was rather empty, only two gossiping medical interns sitting across from each other in a booth causing noise. They took one glance at Kar's eyes and jolted to the farther of the booth's ends. It had been that way since the house residents were children. People jumped in surprise whenever Dave, Terezi, Sollux, or himself looked up or showed their eyes. People found blindness and the sharp eyes of albinos to be threatening somehow. Probably because most senses were heightened in such bodily conditions. 

However, one chipper English barista leaning over a fresh quiche that came from the oven in the back of the work station had no ruffled feathers over the matter. "Morning, Vantas," Jake smiled the same toothy grin, black frame glasses perched mid-nose as he began cutting slices. "Assuming your back as planned and here, I'll take a gander you want one of these?" He smiled, offering a slice of the Tuscan sun-dried tomato, spinach, and feta cheese quiche. 

The hot scents filled Karkat's nose, mouth watering. All he had was the coffee and even then it wasn't quite the same as a Viennese Waltz made by the coffee-mad espresso worker, Strider. Dave's dad that had a relaxed and almost childish sense of bliss about him. Barely a crease in the man's face from the stress of single parenting, it seemed as if there wasn't a care in the world on the man's shoulder other than Kar's order. 

"Morning, Mr. Strider," Karkat nodded as he slid his checking account's card through the reader and punched in his four digit security code. 

"Man, what have I said," he grumbled. "Feel old. It's Bro." 

Karkat could only smile and nod, apologizing, "Right. Sorry, Bro." 

"So what's up?" Jake threw his apron aside and took a seat on the love seat in the farthest room from the chatty girls and the few obnoxiously loud high school photography students that entered as they took a seat. 

Karkat sipped his coffee, closing his eyes as he relished in the taste of a fine cup of Swiss water decaf, espresso shot for taste, chocolate flavor shot, and frothed milk and whipped cream that filled his mouth. the chocolate syrup swirl and sprinkle of almond slices atop it all only made it better, but it wasn't fooling Jake. The look on Karkat's face was a satisfied one, but only in taste. Something was bothering him to the point that it shone in his eyes like at-the-ready tears just waiting for someone to say the right words and let them gush over. "John, am I right?" 

"Damn it, why does everyone know?" He groaned, setting the coffee down. "Someone's gonna slip up and then what?!" 

"Calm, it's not that bad. People could know and have told him, which he hasn't gushed to me, so you're safe," Jake smirked, pulling his feet together as he crossed his ankles and wove his fingers together thoughtfully. Eyes as clear as green peridot pendants stared up at the ceiling, lips winding into a pleasant smile. Ah, young love. Envious of you, Vantas. I'll never tell you, he thought with a smug look upon that sun-freckled visage. 

"But... it's not their reactions I'm worried about," Karkat bit his lip in frustration, closing his eyes as he pressed his forehead to his tightening knuckles. "John, even if we've been friends since the stars burned, he's..." 

"Highly anti-homosexual in undertones and has always seemed to flirt but then strongly reminded you that you're nothing but friends?" 

Vantas shot Jake the hardest look he could make with his young face. "Accurate sources of the ladies of the house have, however, confessed their frustrations of your lack of advancement. Girls, those anyway, love a good show of chivalry." 

"Ch-chivalry!?" Karkat jumped, face going pink with the very notion. 

"Verbatim," Jake sipped his own cup, the soft notes of bergamot that filled his Earl Grey dancing around the tip of his nose as he enjoyed the calming drink. Vantas, however, was on the edge of his seat with his head held in his hands. With a sigh he deemed it his duty to impose on his friend's dire straights. "Listen, you have quite a bit of time left, so don't take things too seriously." 

"Too seriously?!" Karkat jumped, "I love him, not like him, English!" Within seconds Vantas had his mouth covered, staring straight at Jake, past him even. 

English could see this frozen thought as well, sipping his tea without much thought and even a little respect for his friend's paused thinking. Karkat seemed to be well under the waterline in his thoughts, biting his lip as he let his hands fall from the air where they once stood in protest, relaxing his jaw. The back room, besides the adjusting of Jake's chair, was utterly still. Karkat smoothed over his face and looked into his coffee, eyes wide and clearly watering from all the sunlight. Even so, choked out three words, "I love him." 

"There's the fighting spirit," Jake smiled, setting his cup down. 

"But..." 

"There's adversities, yes. Expand on those," Jake was encouraging the thought process like a professor helping a fresh mind along the finish of his thesis. "What do you have to do?" 

Without much more depth to the matter, Kar rose his head and said, "Tell him." 

"Good!" English exclaimed in joy that his dear friend was getting somewhere. "Excellent, so now what?" 

"Now?" 

"Well, not now. A little later, but the present and near future! What will you do then?" 

The back room because quiet again as he thought for a moment, drinking his coffee quickly. Vantas's eyes glanced at his watch and widened, throat inducing a choking motion as he realized how close he was starting to shave down the minutes. "First, sprint to Theory Reductions and Bio-economics. Second... I don't know, work on kissing in the rain," he rolled his eyes as he jumped over the coffee table, grabbing his bag and rushing out the door. 

"Vantas, wait a minu--... damnation!" He snapped, snatching up Karkat's phone. "You stupid little.... augh!" 

English ground his teeth as he walked back behind the counter, turning the phone over in his hands for a moment as he stopped at the phone where he was about to call Jade for a letting affecting on the minds of the house. However, something gave him a spark of creativity in his methods, switching the numbers that he dialed. 

Ring... 

Ring...

Could you be ANY slower?!

"Hello?" The slightly tired voice came from one end of the line. "Hello?" 

"Morning, Egbert," Jake smirked, rolling his English accent as he watched Karkat run down the street from his view on the porch of the coffee house. He had paced out to watch him, wondering if the call was even worth the effort. Oh, what fun his bill from me will be, Jake snickered to himself as he sighed in acted discontent. 

"Jake? What is it?" 

"Well, seems that Vantas came around to say hello and in a rush to his bio-chem class he left his phone. The shop's swelling and I can't find leave," he lied through his shockingly straight teeth. "Would you mind picking it up and taking it to him?" 

The air gave Jake a brisk shove back inside of the coffee house, foot nudging the tied up pack of papers as he waited for John's response. "Yeah, sure," the boy seemed ecstatic about it, already seeming to be in a better mood about the whole thing. "When do you want me to come by?" 

"Now's fine. Whenever you can," Jake smirked, shrugging the whole thing off as he shortened his chat and closed the phone. 

Behind the counter Bro was staring at English without moving so much as a muscle, a strange talent that he'd been given by his attentive mother. Jake could feel the stare and sighed, slamming his hand down on the counter, whipping his head to the side. "What?" He groaned, eyes narrowing behind his black framed glasses. 

"I didn't say anything," the blonde barista shared a coy smile with his life-long best friend. Jake could only glower in distrusting stiffness, the man smiling wider. 

"You don't need to, you're like that," the proper gentleman shook off the stare and waited, eyes watching the clock. The clock, ticking, telling time, and ringing to the hour would keep tabs for the two for all of the day. Jake could only hope that John wasn't his usual klutzy and tardy self. Then again, that was as simple as willing an elephant to fly.