Never Alone

Ch.20

It's now Christmas time. And I am still trying to recover from all the shit that happened. I see a therapist when I need to, and my own self harm has fallen to pieces. Karkles has as well, but the one thing we are constantly fighting are the nightmares. It's either me or him and it's mainly whenever we are together at night when nothing happens. It's gotten to the point where I moved into Karkat's room. The nightmares for me are all the same. And I have no clue why. Karkats nightmares from what he told me were of me getting hurt or his father. I guess the power that Ronalds had was frightening him. The others did their best to help us. But nothing fully worked. Rose told us to get a dream catcher to put above our beds and so far it's worked. Never fully believed it til now.

Today we were heading to the mall and for once in my life I have money to spend. All the money from the law suit went into my savings. And i also managed to get a job with Dirk at a regular comic and gaming store. So it wasn't bad. And with the extra hours it definitely wasn't bad. Karkat has a job at the grocery store and puts things on shelves. I tend to sneak up on him though just to mess with him especially when it's his lunch break.
Dirk got his licence so now we have a ride. We sat in the back of his truck with Cronus and Kankri. And Jake sat up front beside Dirk.

"So have you guys decided what to get for Christmas?" Dirk asks.

"I'm still thinking, but I have a good idea," I say.

"I have no fucking clue. This guy is hard to shop for,"

"I'll help you Karkat don't worry," jake says with a smile. "Believe me he's just like Dirk so I know a thing or two,"

"Sure ya do Jake. That's not what you said last night," Dirk says with a smirk.

"#no. #inappropriate! Strider please take into consideration as to who else is in this vehicle. Those words are inappropriate-" he trails off when Cronus grabs one of his horns. His face turns red and his hands turned into tight fists. He whimpers lightly.

"Leave it alone Kankri it's alright, no one else is offended right?"

"Nope not in the slightest," I said. Karkat only scoots closer to me away from Kankri who was gripping onto his own pants for dear life.

"C..Cronus...l..let..g..go I...immediately......"

"Alright," he lets go of his horn and Kankri breathes in deeply then turns to him.

"You will pay for that...." he says as he catches his breath. He reaches up and touches his fins. Cronus face turns to a shade of purple. He trembles a bit as Kankri rubs his fins with his thumbs to which he sinks in his seat to.

"Dude dude this is not the time or place for the both of you to be turning each other on," I said.

Kankri let's go of his fins," #payback #myapologiesdavid," he says and I can only nod. Meanwhile, Cronus was still blushing purple and was trying hard to get his composure back. Karkat just kept close to me almost to the point of siting his ass on my lap. Of course, I didn't mind in the slightest. Dirk only laughed upfront and Jake just shakes his head. I could only smirk as I held Karkat closer to me.

"Don't get any fucking ideas, Strider," he says with a hiss.

"Oh don't worry I won't," I said with a chuckle.

"Hey hey if you four decide to have some orgy pile back there then make sure you clean when your done,"

"Dirk!" Jake shouts with a blush.

"Dude we are not having live porn back here,"

"Just making sure,"

"#inappropriate! #no! #disgusting!" Kankri shouts preparing for a lecture. Cronus shuts him up and it all starts again.

By the time we get to the mall, we had to sit through a bunch of Kankri and Cronus flirtation mess. Dirk's negative mind and Jake's embarrassed expression. All in all, it was a pretty interesting ride. We all decided to separate into groups. Karkat and Jake were paired, Kankri and I got stuck together; whoopdie fucking Doo; and Dirk and Cronus ended up together. Pretty good pairs for deciding gifts. Me and Kankri walked around and the entire time he was listing all of Karkats interests and was also panicking on what to get for Cronus.

"Dude relax, and shut up," I said and walked into a hot topic store. This was where I would get my own skinny jeans. I mean shoot it's all I ever went to to get any kind of clothing. I walked around and tried to think of what to get for karkat, something he likes. Kankri meanwhile managed to find something that was more suited to Cronus's sense of style. A leather hooded jacket with no sleeves, perfect for the summer time, when it's too hot for a long sleeved jacket. I sighed. What could I give my karkles? I knew that one of the things he liked were crabs, and he also like romcons. I decided to go ahead and try to find something else in hot topic. As I looked around I noticed something on one of the racks where the Hewlett was hanged up. There was a pair of necklaces and one was red and was grey. And they were of little crabs in these small bottles. I grinned and grabbed it. When we walked out the store we ran into Karkat and Jake who were caring their own bags.

"So I see you had some luck," I said.

Karkat nodded,"This guy listed everything of Dirk and then fucking listed a list of things about you that I already know,"

"Dirk spoke of you all the time Dave so of course I shard my knowledge with Karkat "

"Wow never knew he spoke of me that much..." I smiled at the thought. Dirk was my bro andnow that shit was calming down, we had gotten closer than ever before. Which I'm grateful for. We decided to hang out every weekend if we could, which on most occasions was a definite.

"Well is anyone hungry? Let's get some food shall we?" Kankri suggested. We all agreed and called Diek to let him know. All the while though I felt as if someone was watching us. A pair of eyes just stabbing into my very back. And i knew that wasnt a good sign. That and the fact that my gut and intuition were on high alert. I haven't been this alert since the last incident at the court house, so this was bothering me exceedingly.

'God don't screw me over...not today....'