Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Your name is Dave Strider, and this might be a fucking awful idea, but it’s too late now.

Well, maybe it won’t be that bad… But with the people you know, it probably will be.

See, your boyfriend made puppy dog eyes at you until you gave in and got permission from Bro, to let him throw a birthday party for you in the apartment. At this point, you’re only inviting close friends, but you know that it will most likely grow to more.

Who are you kidding; you haven’t a fucking idea on how this is going to go. All you know is that you have to keep everyone in the main room and pray the Tez doesn’t call everyone in the school, like she did when her girlfriend threw a party. Now that was a disaster.

“Dave, Dave! Tell me if I got the guest list right…” John bounds over, list in hand, grinning at you. you nod for him to get on with it. He grins wider.
“Rose is brining Kanaya, Jade is brining Feferi, Karkat is brining Sollux, who is brining Eridan, and Terezi is brining Vriska… eeep, Vriska? Is she the one who tried to molest me?” You nod, and his grin falters, but he keeps going.

“Nepeta is bringing her friend Equius, Bro is going to ‘supervise’ with that weird Jake guy… And that Aradia girl we met at the con is coming. Is that all?” Sadly, it is not all, but you nod anyways.

See, there is also your old best friend-slash-ex-boyfriend, who is bringing his new druggie boyfriend. But you’re not gonna say this shit to Egbert. You might just be a little sore from it still.

John shrugs and crumples up the paper he has the names written on, and shoves it in his pocket. You sigh and wrap him in a hug. Frankly, you’re more nervous about this than you’re been for anything in quite a while. You don’t know any of these people very well, except for your sister and John, which is still a stretch when it comes to Rose.

“Hey, lil’ man. Come ‘ere.” You squish down a flinch and glance at Bro to let him know you’re listening. He nods for you to come closer. You roll your eyes, but do.

“Sup, douche canoe?” You deadpan, shoving your hands in your pockets. Bro gives you a slight smirk, actually surprising you.

“Two things, kid. One,” He holds up a finger, still smiling. “One, don’t you dis me. I could still call this shit off, you know. Or get anchovy pizza. We’ll see how that goes over.”

“It’ll be ironic. Especially since we have cat girls coming to this shit. They’d love it.”

He only shrugs and puts up his second finger.

“Two, do I really have to safety proof the kitchen? For the sound o’ it, some of these dumbasses could stand a dose of natural selection.” You roll your eyes, but you admit, it was kind of funny. And you wouldn’t mind if Sollux found himself impaled on a katana, if not for the factors of paperwork and the matter of cleaning up the blood.

“As much as I agree, I don’t think the fragile Egbertian mind could handle that shit. Just stuff the crap in your room and get on the pizza thing.” You turn to leave, back to John, who is busy putting up streamers, but instead you smash your face against a solid wall of Bro.

“That was kinda rude, lil’ man. Did you not learn from our ironic manners lessons?” In your mind there’s a flash of the last said ‘manners lesson’ and you can barely contain a shutter. Bastard.

“Yeah yeah, I remember. Please put your bullshit in your room and pretty please order us some god damned pizza before our guests arrive.” You sing song it bitterly and glare at him, but Bro just chuckles and shrugs, as if to say ‘close enough’, then flashsteps, presumably, to the kitchen.

This is going to be a bigger disaster that Armageddon and the holocaust put together. Watch out, the motherfucking anti-Christ up in this bitch, with Hitler as his Super-Saiyan sidekick. It’s the end of the world as we know it, men.

Then the doorbell rings, sending John sprinting to answer it. Oh dear god. The end is here.

Your name is Dave Strider and you never should have agreed to this bullshit.

Okay, first of fucking all, you’re pretty sure a majority of the people here hate you and are only here because of someone else. Vriska, Karkat, Eridan, Sollux, Equius, Kanaya… Hell, it’s almost easier to list who isn’t shooting you death glares.

The second thing: John.

Apparently, he’s not used to this many people, because he’s spent a majority of his time glued to your side, not talking to anyone but Karkat and Jade and Rose.

This is something you’re perfectly fine with, especially once Tavros shows up. And even better, the boyfriend is painted like a clown and looks like he’s high. Bro shoots him a peace sign, which he lazily returns. You don’t like him already.

The pair walks over to you, the clown’s arm looped around Tav’s neck. You brace yourself, reinforcing you poker face. John looks up at you questioningly, but you ignore him. Bad boyfriend. Bad.

“Uh, hi Dave. It was… really nice of you to invite us.” Memories flit through your head, triggered by his voice. That stuttery, nervous, airy voice. Couldn’t rap worth a shit and could barely hold a conversation. You loved to torment him, watch him squirm.

Oh fuck. You should answer. Proper interaction and all those non-optional social conventions.
“Yeah man. No problem. Food’s in the kitchen and shit, by the way.” He nods nervously, making his long Mohawk flip slightly. Okay, ignoring that. You look back to John as the walk away instead, and he just smiles at you nervously.

“Who were they? I didn’t have them on the guest list…” And that was the dreaded question. You own John the honesty. You try to ignore Terezi’s sightless stare off to your left.

“No one important, just my ex and his boyfriend.” You shrug and hug him to you tighter. Terezi cackles.

“Cherry Cool Kid, I think we should start the festivities! High Judge Pyrope would like to propose a game.” John perks up, and you can only barely suppress a groan. This wouldn’t end well.

“The prosecution would like to make a statement: This party is dead! I declare it rainbow rumpus party town!” she cackles again, and most everyone else laughs with her. You hate them. All of them.

“Noooowww… Anyone up for strip poker?” she waggles her eyebrows at you, a chorus of ‘yes, hell yes, hell fucking yes!” sounding behind her. Well. This could be interesting. Even though john looks like a deer in the headlights that just go run over.

Everyone starts moving around furniture, making a circle and sitting beside whoever they came with. You sigh loudly as you catch Bro sneaking off with the Jake twit out of the corner of your eye. Of course he abandons you now. Smart, but not good supervising. Bastard.

A deck of cards is produced, and Vriska starts to deal to all 16 players. Surprisingly, no one objected to playing. No one wants to be ridiculed for being a chicken here.

Fortunately, you’re good at poker and fairly lucky. You do well the first few hands as minor things come off, like shoes and jackets. John isn’t near as luck as you are, and he loses 3 of the first 6 rounds, leaving him in just his shorts and shirt. You wouldn’t mind seeing him naked, it’s just the fact that everyone else would too.

Finally, you lose the 7th round with a lowly pair of threes. Vriska loses the eighth, her first, and begrudgingly kicks off her shoes. By the thirteenth, nearly everyone has lost once, except Aradia. She’s surprisingly good.

But by far, Gamzee is doing the worst. He either doesn’t know what he’d doing or doesn’t care. You suspect the latter. He seems like he’s high, after all. By the twentieth round, he’s down to his underwear. You avert your eyes, unlike most of the room, Tavros in particular.

Before you know it, it’s been nearly an hour and a half, and nothing is going anywhere fast. Kanaya and Rose are both one away from just underwear, as well as most of the rest of the girls besides Aradia, who was still only shoeless. Gamzee was the only shirtless guy too.

Hell, even you had managed to keep almost everything. Maybe you needed to spice it up a bit… who better to call in than the master of flavors?

“Yo, TZ.” You whisper to your best friend, nudging her bare leg. She looks in your direction, which is creepy because of her eyes, but you ignore the fact.

“Yeah Cherry-berry?” she asks sweetly, leaning against Vriska, who’s deal it is again.

“Care to spice it up and take the lead? Do your magic shit.” A shit eating grin spreads across her face, and you smirk at her. She stands up, and most everyone looks at her.

“I have a proposition! If you don’t want to take of a piece of clothing, you may take a dare from the winner of the round. It can’t involve taking off clothes, but anything else is good, okay?” She grins wider and a few people make sounds of confirmation. Okay. This works.

The next two rounds are uneventful still. You lose one and have to take off your shirt, which is such a shame considering all the stares you get. John runs his fingers up and down you sides almost… possessively, shooting a couple glares at people who look your way. You’ve never really seen this side of him before. You kind like it.

Finally, near the thirtieth round (you’ve been counting this shit), Rose is down to just her underwear and has to take a dare. And it comes from Vriska.

“Okay Rose,” She starts, smirking evilly, “You must kiss one person on the cheek, one on the lips, and make out with a third. In that order. But I get to pick who.” Rose frowns almost imperceptible, but nods and stands. Vriska points to Kanaya first. Rose kisses her cheek.

Second, she points to Terezi. Rose kisses her on the lips. Vriska seems a bit flustered by this.

Then, after a moment of thinking, she laughs and points to you. What. She wants Rose to make out with you. Aw hell no.

“Go on Rose, you have to do what I say or forfeit the dare and take off your underwear anyways.” She grins at Rose, who only glares back.

“Serket, you are asking me to engage in incestuous activities with my brother. I believe that this is a bit wrong and I’d ask that you would direct me to someone else.” For once you really have to agree with her. Other people murmur in agreement and Vriska growls, giving in.

“Fiiiiiiiine. Kiss him then.” She point to Equius unenthusiastically and Rose grudgingly obeys, making out with the sweaty weirdo for about 30 seconds before making her way back to Kanaya.

Then things get boring again. Aradia loses twice, you once, Equius again, losing his shirt, Tavros twice… It’s actually staying pretty even, as far as losing. Jade and Nepeta are the only ones not in their underwear, surprisingly.

Then, John gets a dare from Gamzee, who somehow won for the first time all damned night. John looks scared as Gamzee looks at him lazily. You’re a little nervous too, actually…

“Okay man… I think I got a bit of an idea up in my head. How about you up and all go in one of the rooms with Strider for the next…” He cuts off, and Tavros finishes, speaking softly.

“The next ten hands… Ter… Terezi will come get you.” You nod gratefully at Tavros, grabbing John’s hand and leading him to your room. As much fun as that was, you want John all to yourself.

And when he kisses you roughly as soon as the door closes, you know he feels the same way.