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“Consumption of troll liver is linked to a number of rare, incurable, and fatal diseases which infect and afflict the think pan and smooth muscle tissue, leading to slow, agonizing death.”
The tape measure wraps around a gray bicep, then slips away to hug Karkat’s chest.
“Cool story.”
“Prolapsed waste chutes and internal bleeding are not uncommon, although you’re more likely to die from heart failure or an aneurysm after a short bout of complete memory loss and insanity.”
“So a Prion disease.” The waist, now. My hands linger. “Humans get those from eating brains, but the liver is considered a delicacy by the more refined cannibals.”
“That’s why I’m warning you.”
“I’m not going to eat you, Karkat. That’s some Silence of the Lambs shit. I hated that movie.”
“I know.”
“You can put your arms down.” His neck.
“Kanaya already has all of my measurements, you know.”
“I’m not about to ask her for them with Rose connected to her like a Siamese twin. She’ll read into it way too much. Plus, they’re in those weird troll units you guys use.”
“You mean the metric system?”
“Yeah, that.”
“You just wanted an excuse to feel me up,” Karkat says, pushing my hands away.
“You got me. Does that mean I’m not allowed anymore?”
“Yes.”
“Fuck.” The tape measure goes into a cloth bag. “Eh, I got what I needed, anyway.”
Karkat puts his shirt back on. I weep internally. “So what are you making for me?”
“Who said I was making you anything, you presumptuous shit? Maybe I found a hole in the meteor and it’s got these very specific dimensions and I’m taking measurements of everyone so we can explore that shit.”
“No such hole exists. I’ve been wandering this dead rock longer than you. You’re making me something. It’s about time, too.” Karkat starts counting his fingers. “Your first scarf for the Mayor. Two hats for Terezi. A lace shawl with beads and shit that you bitched at me about over the course of two weeks while you put it together. Kanaya. You’ve made about a million pairs of socks for yourself—don’t even try to deny it, I know godtier outfits don’t come with Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff socks.”
“I am the bomb at socks, though, man. My size two DP’s are never cold. I can’t help myself. I’ve even got this blanket I’m making progress on that’s made out of the leftovers called a beekeeper’s quilt. Hexipuffs are a serious addiction. I think I have a problem. There aren’t support groups for this shit anymore.”
“Hexipuffs?”
I captchalogue the bag and retrieve one of the joyous little puffs made of variegated sock yarn, tossing it to Karkat. “You make a whole bunch of them and stuff them with polyfill and stitch them together and you get a blanket that looks like honeycomb on LSD.”
Karkat turns the thing in his hands, giving it experimental smooshes. “Every iteration of Sollux Captor in existence will fight you for that blanket when it’s finished, Dave,” he concludes.
“Man, I am so fucking ready for it.”
Karkat gives the puff back and rubs at his eyes. “If you’re so good at socks, then make a pair for me.”
“Yeah, if I made them out of steel wool, maybe. Your toenails are nasty sharp. You’d ruin them in a week. Over the course of a month they’d probably be entirely new socks I’ll be darning them so much.”
“Come on.”
“The more you whine about it, the less I wanna make you anything,” I tell him, raising an eyebrow. Karkat crosses his arms.
“Fine. Be that way.”
“I will.”
If the pneumatic sliding door could slam, it would have as Karkat storms out of my room. I look over the measurements and wonder how long this is gonna take.
“Sweater patterns?” Rose sounds as surprised as a Seer can sound. “Yes, I have some… but don’t you think that’s a bit advanced for you?”
“I’m almost as good as you. First time for everything and all that. Show me your stash.”
Rose shrugs and acquiesces more quickly than I really expected and retrieves a heavy stack of papers contained within a battered folder. “If you don’t mind me asking, for whom are you making this labor of love?”
I snatch the thick file and start leafing through it. “Uh, me? Who else?”
“You don’t strike me as the type of person to wear a sweater when your godtier pajamas are already disputably stylish and comfortable, not to mention serve as a status symbol of your godhood.”
“Think of it like a milestone. I figure the sequence of achievements in knitting oughta be Thing 1, Thing 2, shitty scarf, shitty hat, bitchin’ socks, shawl, sweater. Doesn’t hafta be for anyone.” I select a pattern and hand back the file. “I’ll make a copy of this one.”
“A turtleneck worked in the round with a plain bodice…” Rose says, noting the chosen pattern. “Perfect for some experimentation with colorwork in black and silver, perhaps for an astrological symbol of some sort representing an important Alternian historical figure?”
“Yeah, whatever. Say, if I wanna do just one bit of color on the front, how can I do that without worrying about carrying the accent color all the way around the middle? My tension’ll be all wonky weird.”
Rose offers an unapologetic half-smile. “You’re not making this for yourself, Dave.”
“So what if I’m not?” I captchalogue the pattern and abscond, making my way for the alchemy room, but Rose was a fucking sheepdog in her past life or something and keeps biting at my heels, quickening her pace to match my longer strides. “Get off my case, Rose. You already know who it’s for, so unless you’re dying to suggest the perfect yarn to go with this pattern or actually answer my question about colorwork, kindly step off.”
“Dave, I believe it’s time we had a little heart-to-heart about this knitting business.”
“What is there to say? Are you jealous I picked it up so quick?” Really, though, which fiber would he like? Wool or cotton? An acrylic blend, maybe. God knows Karkat will felt and ruin anything made of pure wool trying to wash it.
“Nonsense. I’m brimming with pride at your swift advancement in this art. No, this is about Karkat.”
I pause in front of the Alchemiter and rummage with the cards before booting up the machine. “What about him?”
“You two have gotten pretty serious, haven’t you?”
“That’s not really your business or anything, unless you need material for your erotica, in which case you should probably ask Kanaya. I hear troll bits are all the same.”
“I assure you, I am sufficiently read on troll anatomy.” She tucks a piece of hair behind her ear. Trying too hard to look nonchalant. I lean against the humming machine. “You made this my business when you asked me to teach you how to knit. You may ignore my advice about catching your floats every four stitches instead of five. You may incorporate beads any way you like, even though your method is inconsistent and, in my opinion, messy. But do not ignore this:” She looks me in the eye, quite seriously, and I get the feeling that she’s about to fuck with me. “Your relationship with Karkat will be in jeopardy if you knit this sweater for him.” Yup. Fucking with me.
“Rose, I swear to god, if you put a fucking hex on this pattern–”
“Oh, no, this isn’t my curse. It’s a curse as old as knitting itself. It is the Curse of the Boyfriend Sweater.”
Boy, the ceiling is super interesting all a sudden, but I can’t manage to move my head to look at it. Maybe if I just move my eyeballs up there for a quick glance—what? No, I’m not rolling my eyes. “You’re so full of shit that it’s coming out your eyes. Superstition ain’t gonna dictate what I do for Karkat or anyone on the meteor.”
“It would be wise to at least consider the possibility that after putting months of effort into a garment so complex as a sweater, something could happen to cause your relationship to crumble, putting all that work to waste.”
“Since when do you buy stocks in superstitious bull?”
“This isn’t so much a superstition as it is common sense, although my aspect might have something to do with it. Vriska would agree with me.”
“Serket’s a sociopath or something, and also full of shit.”
Rose sighs. “Please think about this seriously, Dave. Consider how much Karkat means to you. Will he really appreciate it? Is he worth an entire sweater?”
The Alchemiter, which had been humming and clicking in the background as it processed the card, goes silent and creates a perfect copy of the sweater pattern. I pick it up and turn on Rose.
“What a great fucking question. Allow me to respond with another: Are you worth any of the dresses Kanaya makes for you?”
Rose’s eyes, which had been laughing until this point, suddenly can’t meet mine, and that fucking tears it.
“Well?” I insist. “Are you?”
“I didn’t mean it like that–”
“Kanaya sure thought so.” God, this is so low and shitty to say, but Rose fucking started it. “She thought you were worth the months it took her to design, scrap, redesign, cut, and sew all those dresses you only ever wear on formal occasions. You must feel worth it. You must feel really fucking special and lucky to have such a talented, caring girlfriend.”
I can’t tell if that’s hurt or surprise or pride in Rose’s eyes, but I don’t care at this point. Nobody shits on Karkat like that.
“I want Karkat to feel that way, yanno? Want him to know he’s wanted and cared about and stuff. So. Yeah. He’s worth an entire sweater. He’s worth fuckin’ everything to me. And maybe you should look at yourself before throwing around accusations of not being appreciative.” I captchalogue my copy of the pattern and hand the original back to Rose. “Here’s your fucking cursed pattern back. If you’ll excuse me, I have like a million yards of yarn to alchemize.”
Okay, so maybe it was more like three thousand yards of yarn, but I still have to make a mad dash to hide it all whenever Karkat gets within earshot. What am I knitting? Oh, you know. Socks. What do you mean this is too much yarn for socks? Have you even seen my feet. This is a perfectly reasonable amount of yarn. I want socks for days. No, you can’t have a pair.
…Et cetera ad infinitum.
And Rose wasn’t exaggerating, and I can’t be angry at her anymore, because damn, it takes over a month just to finish the bodice, and I’m about to rip my hair out by the time I get to the fucking sleeves (don’t get me started on the motherfucking sleeves) and goddamn I’m worried as all hell that Karkat won’t get it, that he won’t understand just how much torture it is to make one fucking sweater.
After a point, it gets pretty obvious that I’m not knitting a pair of socks for days because socks for days don’t have sleeves and neck holes. I knit like a motherfucking crafting ninja while the rest of the meteor is asleep, or pretends to sleep. Whatever they all do. Point is, progress slows down, and I’m barely sleeping, and goddamn I swear about a million times that I will never knit again, but then I start to imagine Karkat’s face when I give this to him, this shy, guarded quirk of the lips that slowly spreads into a full-blown idiotic grin, and I imagine him hugging me so tight he picks me up a little before putting it on and telling me it fits perfectly. I imagine him wearing the thing everywhere, scrunching his face up and hiding in the collar, pulling his arms into the sleeves and stretching it, abusing it, but loving it, and I start making plans for the next one.
But in the final stretch, when I’m attaching the sleeves and weaving in the ends, Rose’s stupid ignorant words come back to me fifty fold, and I start getting images of a captcha card shoved in the back of a sylladex with a lonely, handmade sweater that will never caress Karkat’s rockin’ bod. What if we break up? What if such a huge project freaks Karkat out and makes him feel like this whole thing is going too fast, like I’m being too obsessive or weird about it? What if, what if, what if. Goddammit, Rose and her fucking mind games and powers of suggestion.
What if, what if. If, then I’ll have made a sweater. My first sweater. Maybe that’s good enough. Maybe I’m kidding myself.
The needles are cold, loose ends tied up, the demon garment soaked, pinned, and dried into shape. I fold it up so the cancer symbol stands out in stark contrast on the chest. Damn, that is some impressive colorwork. And now the moment of truth. The presentation. How to approach this gently, lovingly, and with class…
“Wanna fuck?”
Karkat looks up from his drawing and shoots a glare that could melt steel beams, yeowch. “Look who decided to grace me with his presence. Dave motherfucking Strider. And he thinks he wants sex.”
“The one and only, and yessir, I do.” Fuck, he’s angry. Why is he angry. Play it cool. “Got an unquenchable urge, ya feel me? The combined efforts of Lefty and Righty can’t fix this. I need me some tender lovin’. How’s about we saunter back to my place and–”
“Can’t.” He turns his attention back to the paper. “I’m busy. As I’m sure you’ve been.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means what it sounds like. You’ve obviously been real busy these past few weeks. You haven’t shown up for movie nights, you don’t talk to me, you never wanna hang out. You stay holed up in your block all day doing nobody knows what and only show up for meals. We haven’t met in the bubbles in forever. Have you even been sleeping? I mean, I know I can’t talk about that cuz I hate sleeping, but I thought you loved that shit? And now after leaving me high and dry for so long, outta nowhere you wanna fuck? Where have you been?”
He’s standing up now, pencil thrown down somewhere, drawing forgotten.“Holy shit.”
“Relationships take upkeep and attention, and you keep ignoring me and it feels like…” Realization dawns on his face. His eyebrows furrow, a bitter frown curling his lips. “…Are you avoiding me? Did you think that would be the best way to break up instead of coming up and telling me and behaving like functioning adults? We live on the same fucking meteor, Dave. That shit doesn’t work.”
“Fuck no.” Holy shit, overreaction much? Or maybe not at all? Fucking hell, this wouldn’t'a happened if I hadn’t wanted this to be a surprise. New rule: no more ninja knitting. “Well, I mean, yeah, kinda? But not on purpose? I’ve been working on something mad awesome and it’s finally done, so if you wanna stop freaking out and come look…”
“I don’t care. You’re an asshole. You haven’t spoken a single word to me in over three days.”
“Dude, no. Come on. I’ve been working on this for so long.” This can’t be happening. Rose can’t be right. She can’t be. “Please, Karkat. I just wanted this to be a surprise, but apparently you can’t even handle that. Just come look at this and I promise no more surprises.”
Karkat keeps frowning but doesn’t fight when I grab his hand and start to drag him towards my room.
“You’re gonna freak.”
He doesn’t freak. He stares at the folded garment for a full thirty seconds—I should know—before he takes a step towards the bed and picks it up, still folded, runs his hands over it, reverent and angry, loving and pissed off, combinations of emotions only Karkat is capable of, surely. He runs a finger over the smooth stitches in the colorwork and pride swells in my stomach.
“Unfold it.”
“I’ll unfold it when I’m good and ready.” He unfolds it. Stares even longer. Holds it against his body and looks down at himself as if trying to gauge if it will fit, but I know the only way to find out is for him to try it on. He paws at the long collar. “Why’s this part so big?”
“It’s a turtleneck. It’s supposed to look like that.”
“That’s so stupid.” The insult doesn’t hurt. Not when I see his mouth quirk at the edges like I imagined.
“Try it on,” I push. He takes off his shirt and throws on the sweater, being mindful not to pull at it. The unrolled collar covers up his mouth, and I reach forward to fix it for him so the folded top barely reaches the underside of his jaw. Pulling the garment over his head caused his hair to stick out every which way with static. The sleeves are almost perfect, if only because the cuffs cover the first inch of his palms. The whole thing has a pretty positive give except for the ribbing of the cuffs and collar, but that just makes it better for layering on this cold hunk of rock. I can’t keep from grinning. “Oh my god you are so cute and fluffy in that.”
“I am neither cute nor fluffy.”
“You are both cute and fluffy. Don’t deny it. This whole sweater just screams “you.” You’re all soft and cuddly-looking right now and I could just pick you up and blow a big raspberry on your cheeks–”
“You will do no such thing,” he says, but he’s grinning now, wider and wider as he holds out his arms and does a turn for me, and I hope he’s thinking, damn I look good in this, because that’s definitely what I’m thinking.
“Pretty good for my first sweater, eh?”
“I don’t know how you do this shit. You and Rose both. This is crazy.”
“Yeah. Well. Yanno. Witchcraft and stuff.” He looks outright giddy now, and I have to mirror it. “Sorry for pretty much ignoring you for the past few months.”
“Yeah, don’t do that again.” He punches me, halfhearted. I grab his fist and pull him into a hug and goddamn I love how he’s short enough that I can rest my head on top of his. His hair’s full of static and tickles my nose.
“Promise. Pinkie swear. Cross my heart and hope to die; stick a needle in my eye.”
He squirms out of my hug. “C'mon, let’s go to the common room. I wanna gloat in front of Rose and Kanaya and their seemingly perfect relationship.”
I let myself get dragged along and smirk and say, “Yeah, me too.”
And so we go to the common room where everyone is already eating dinner and Karkat shows off his sweater to Kanaya, and I show off my still-boyfriend to Rose, and in the following months Karkat almost never takes that sweater off, and Rose starts wearing Kanaya’s formal attire all around the damn meteor, and it’s a goddamn near-perfect happy ending and nothing else interesting happens.
Nothing interesting except I finally finish the bee quilt and every iteration of Sollux Captor comes to fight me for it and it’s awesome and I totally pwn all of their asses, the end.