No One Really Understands

Revelations.

There were a lot of questions left unanswered, a lot of things I still wasn't sure about, and a lot of uncertainty. But the one thing I knew for sure was that Karkat was getting better. He had started going to therapy and he'd been prescribed some stuff, and I could tell it was helping. He was starting to sort of warm up to me; I was seeing more and more of his true self every day. It had only been a couple of weeks since he'd woken up, but he already seemed miles better than he had before.

But at the same time, it wasn't like he got better immediately. It was still clear he had a long way to go. He still had more bad days than he did good ones, and he still couldn't go more than a week or so without relapsing. And every so often he'd have an especially bad night and I'd have to stay on the phone with him until 1 or 2 am trying to calm him down and distract him from hurting himself. Sometimes, he'd get so scared that I'd have to get up at 10 or 11 or whenever and walk over to his house so that I could be with him, so that he wouldn't have to be alone. We would lay together, him clinging to me and crying as I held him and murmured softly into his ear, until one or both of us fell asleep. Dirk never cared, I explained it to him early on, and Kankri... Well, he never said anything to me or Karkat directly. But then again, ever since Karkat woke up it seemed like he was speaking a whole lot less than before in general. He really only ever spoke if you talked to him first, and even then they were short replies with minimal words. When I asked Karkat about it, he just tensed up and refused to talk about it, no matter how much I bothered him. He didn't talk about a lot of things with me. A couple of weeks into his therapy, I asked him how it was going. He wouldn't answer, not at first, only looked down and pressed his mouth into a straight line. Eventually, he sighed and mumbled, "I don't wanna talk about it."

It was like that every time I asked, and every time it cut me to the core. Because I did understand. I went through the same thing, the same hell. I suffered through it. If anything, I was the only other one who really understood. I'd lived through all the same shit. I would have killed to have had someone who'd gone through it too back then, someone I could talk to who would actually get what I was saying, not just analyze it. Why didn't Karkat get that? Why didn't he see? Why didn't he--

"Hey. Earth to Dave? Hello?"

I blinked. Karkat was looking up at me, a confused look on his face. We were lying on my couch, my back against the cushions with him between my legs, his head against my chest.

"I've been trying to get your attention for like 5 minutes. What's up?"

"Oh. Um, nothing. Just... thinking."

Karkat rested his chin on my chest. "What about?"

I hesitated. Could I tell him? I couldn't know how he would react, and I myself wasn't sure if I was ready to dredge up all those memories I'd spent so long trying to push away.

I exhaled softly. "About how you never talk to me about your therapy."

I saw Karkat's jaw tighten. There it was. He looked away.

"You know why," he muttered, sitting up and wrapping his arms around himself. He turned away from me, his shoulders still tense.

"Karkat, really," I said gently, sitting up as well. "Why don't you?"

He didn't say anything. I reached out to touch his shoulder and he twisted away from my hand.

"Karkat. Please, talk to me. Why don't you ever talk about it?"

"I said, you know why," he said coldly. "I don't want to."

"Why not? It's not like it's--"

"Because I don't like to think about it!" Karkat said suddenly. I froze, slightly alarmed by his sudden outburst.