Macystuck

Ugh!!! You can’t believe your sister is talking about you behind your back. Or well, er, you can believe it, it was mentioned yesterday when uh… Nepeta, right, Nepeta. It’s just- you didn’t- bluh! You know there’s something wrong- and Jade’s not wrong to be concerned, but- you’d rather she’d keep it to herself? You just want your conversations with other people to be normal and free of any social-induced guilt!

You can’t bring yourself to block Dave or anything, though, so his messages still pop up after you close the chat. You just ignore them though.

Instead, you stare at the chumhandle on the little paper you got yesterday, arsenicCatnip, unsure. 

You feel like not at least saying hello would be rude, but at the same time you can’t help but think that there’s no reason she’d really want to chat with you. It’s not like you were being particularly sociable before, so you probably didn’t leave a good impression. 

Sure, she gave you her chumhandle, but… bluh. There’s no way she’d want to talk to you, and just… bluh. You can’t get yourself to message her. You’re about to close Pesterchum and just crawl into your bed and die inside when you get a notification, though.

Oh. Right, you traded chumhandles. Or well, her handle was a trollian handle? Apparently pesterchum has different themes.

Huh. Well that was a conversation. You guess she doesn’t hate you though! Maybe you should never talk to her again, so her image of you stops there. She’ll never have to know the real you. 

You look at your class schedule, and then the clock. Oh shit- you’ve got a class to get to! You haven't gotten into the swing of things yet- it’s a new semester, so you haven’t exactly memorized your class schedule yet! You’re not even exactly sure where the building is- oh god.

You rush though putting stuff into your bag, pulling out your map of the campus and rush out of your dorm! You don’t see Jade anywhere, probably because she’s already gone to her class, but you do notice some sort of weird flag hanging up on the wall. It’s bright and colorful- which is the only reason you take note of it, but you don’t really have the time to investigate it!

You practically run across the campus. You pass a few people- most of them chuckling at your very obvious panic, and eventually(after going to the wrong building, twice), you make it to your biology class. You took it because you were already interested in the sciency stuff in highschool, though you’re not sure if you want to major in it or not.

You run up to the door and then prepare to ‘look cool’ like you’re only fashionably late, and not just normally late. You slowly pull it open, slip inside, and find the nearest empty spot. The classroom is less of a classroom and more of an auditorium. Luckily, your seat is a little near the back, and it seems like the teacher is late as well- you thank god for that, or whatever the hell orchestrated that event.

You start pulling out your things- mainly a notebook and pencils- when someone pokes you on the shoulder. “John?”

You turn to your side and see- wait is that… “Uh… Nepeta?”

“Hey! You’re taking biology too?” She’s dressed in a hoodie now, with her own notebook out on the table and a… green pen? You wonder why she doesn’t just use a pencil.

“Uh, yeah. I didn’t know you went to this college.” 

She tilts her head, which you’ve now mentally noted as something she seems to do when asking questions. “Didn’t Jade say something?”

You shrug. “She’d never mentioned you before… so…”

She’s about to say something when the professor comes in, and the both of you focus on the class.

* * *

You sigh. You’ve been trying to focus on the lesson the whole time, but honestly you haven’t internalized one bit of it(though let it be known you do have your phone recording it). You feel a bit distracted. From what, you’re not sure; it’s like you’re being tapped on the shoulder but every time you turn around, no one is there, but internally. 

You can’t tell why though. If you could, you’d probably be able to explain your issue to Jade. Then she’d leave you alone. You just feel a little too much like yourself. Like for some reason there’s an extra layer of clothing smothering you. Trapped, maybe? Rose would have a field day with this kind of introspection, at least if you cared to have her babble on about you having issues. It’s not like she doesn’t do it enough already.

You appreciate her efforts, but it also means you tend to just… not have any normal conversations with her. Rose(and Dave) go to a different college though, so at least you don’t have to deal with her pestering in real life that much. You do meet up with them sometimes though. 

You don’t hate her, it’s just annoying! A lot of your conversations are emotionally taxing nowadays. Maybe that’s just what having problems entails. Constant unending sympathetic prodding from all sides at all times.

You’re about to continue your inner monologue, further distracting yourself from the class, when something else distracts you. Prodding you, this time physically, is Nepeta.

“Hey are you alright?”

She looks at you, concerned, which just reminds you of Jade’s face. Ugh. Apparently you can’t go one second around a person before they immediately sense something is wrong with you. How about that, huh? 

“Hello?”

“Oh uh… yeah.”

Nepeta really doesn’t look like she believes you.

“You haven’t taken any notes though!” You glance at her notebook, which does have notes, as well as a few doodles? You can’t really tell what they are due to the angle of it from your perspective.

“Well… I’m just not really feeling it today to be honest.” You shake your head. Maybe it’s not the full truth, but it’s not a lie either.

She just hums curiously, but she doesn’t push it, thank god. Eventually class ends, and you mutter something goodbye-adjacent to Nepeta before walking out- “Hey John!”

Okay well apparently nevermind, you are not walking out. Well, you are out of the auditorium, but Nepeta’s sort of semi-grabbed your wrist? It’s not really a real grab, but sort of a half-committed grip. Like her hand is around your wrist, but it’s not really holding you. Frankly you’re not sure how you didn’t already accidentally yank your hand free, because your arms were swinging when you walked out. Kind of strange. Your focusing too much on the simple contact though, you think, and you stop thinking about it and half grunt half mumble out a reply. “Er, did you need something?” Oh Jesus, that was real smooth, huh? Just a completely politely normal polite response, nothing rude about that reply! 

She replies, unphased by your mood. “I think based on who Jade knows, this should be true, but do you know Karkat?” What?

“Karkat? Like, uh, Karkat Vantas?” That’s Dave’s boyfriend. Does she know those two? You yourself hadn’t really hung out with Karkat much, but you’ve seen him a few times when you were out with Dave and your other friends, but not that often. You kind of just remember him being passive aggressively friendly? He was nice, but also found a way to turn everything you said into some sort of personal insult hurled towards him. He’d then forgive you for it, due to your ‘nature’ or something. Kind of weird.

Nepeta giggles. “Knew it! Jade knew Karkat, so I figured you did too. He’s one of my furriends!”

You shrug, which makes you remember that Nepeta is still not-but-technically-is-but-not-really grabbing your wrist. You gently take your hand out of it, since mentioning it would be weird, you think. She also notices once you move your arm away and she puts her hand to her side too, where it now fidgets with a pants pocket. “Uhm… I don’t really talk to him much though, I only know him because he’s dating Dave.”

Her face contorts into what can only be described as the physical manifestation of the ‘:O’ emoticon. “Wait fur real??? He’s dating Dave???”

Oh shit, uh… whoops! You knew Dave and Karkat told your small group of friends, but they seemed so open about it now you didn’t even think about it. “Oh, oh man. Uh, yeah.”

She laughs, though not in the condescending way, just the ‘wow this is amazing!’ way. “I’ve gotta update my shipping wall soon then!”

“Your what now?”

“Anyways! I wanted to invite you to this little get together thing, though it’s probably gonna end up like a party. Karkat’s going, along with some of my other furriends!” You freeze. An invite to a social gathering? Where you must go of your own volition? With a majority of people you don’t know? Sounds like your personal nightmare. You’d probably arrive, talk to Nepeta and Karkat for a bit, and then cry in the corner for the rest of the night, alone and disheveled.

You figure you should be polite about your refusal, though. How about you feign interest at first? “Where is it going to be?”

“Well you probably don’t know her, but this girl named Rose-”

“Rose Lalonde?”

She looks at you, surprised. “You know her?”

“She’s uh, a childhood friend, though I only knew her online for a while until a year or two ago.” Huh. Seems like she knows all of your friends, except for you! You chuckle. “Seems like you knew all of my friends except for me!”

She grins. “Yep! And now I know you!” Her smile is pretty… big! Pretty big. She’s one of those people who are absolutely always positive. Or maybe paws-itive, in this case?

“So, do you wanna come to the party? I thought it might help me know you better, seeing how we kinda just met and all.” Shit. You almost forgot about that. She’s smiling at you now and… oh god now you feel a little pressured into this and- 

“…Uh, sure?”

Oh dear god, why, why did you say that?