The Pages Between Us (Karkat Vantas x Reader)

Chapter Nine

A/N: I had a little too much fun with recreating the doodles from that one chapter. I made the doodles look like you're sitting to the left of the paper (all words written from that angle are yours) and Karkat is sitting to the right of the paper (all words written from that angle are his).

"How the ever-loving fuck did we get a bloody C when those idiots over there got an A-minus?" Karkat fumed, gesturing harshly at the desk many feet away.

You followed his glare and found John and Dave currently playing a round of tabletop football, using their index and middle fingers to kick around a wad of crumpled paper that served as the ball. John scored a goal and victoriously pumped a fist in the air. Dave whispered out his complaints, flicking their makeshift ball onto John's forehead. Intensely whispered bickering ensued when the ball left a red mark on the ravenette's skin.

Karkat growled. "This is un-fucking-believable."

You stared down at the morally-degrading C on the first few entries of your partner diary, scribbled unceremoniously with a pen that didn't have enough ink to complete the curve of the letter. You bent your body and leaned towards Karkat in such a way that he could see you in his peripheral vision (he was still glaring at the duo). "What?" Karkat snapped in annoyance, averting his stare to you.

"Tell you what: we'll do what we can to improve our grade. It's only been two weeks since we started writing, so if we start working hard right now, we'll get a better grade than the idiots next time." You tried smiling in reassurance, hoping to lessen the tension. The nubby-horned troll only scowled deeper.

"You look stupid. Get your face away from my face." Karkat scrunched up his nose and leaned away from you.

"YoU LoOK sTuPiD nyE nYe NyE." You mocked, mimicking his voice in the worst way possible.

The raven-haired troll turned to face you, sporting on his most annoyed scowl. Your terrible mimicry of his voice seemed to have consumed what remained of his patience. "Now I understand how you and Dave are related: you're both fucking idiots. You can't even make a decent fucking joke. You just copy-paste the last person's statement and go, 'iS THiS fUNnY yEt?', then hope that someone pity-laughs at it." Karkat snapped in a single breath.

You sat back and stared at him in surprise. "Whoa. I think your blood pressure just shot up to the heavens. Calm down before you faint or something." You held your hands up in an I-come-in-peace manner. "Like I said, we can improve this shitty grade. It's just the first two weeks, we have plenty more pages to write in the journal."

"She fucking wants rainbow farts and glittery unicorn word-vomit slathered all over the journal. Those buttheads over there probably just made shit up." Karkat muttered spitefully as he shoved the notebook into his backpack.

"Why don't we just make shit up?" You asked.

"Because we have standards."

"Yeah, well your standards suck." You snorted, watching as Karkat pulled out his phone. You didn't mean to look, but you caught the vague image of a pesterlog on his screen— Karkat noticed and quickly tilted his phone away.

"Hey! Avert your eyes!" Karkat scolded.

"Pestering your girlfriend?" You teased slyly. Your words brought an intense blush to his cheeks.

"I don't have a girlfriend, you presumptuous simpleton. It's an internet friend." Karkat muttered in response as he turned his attention back to his phone.

"I have an internet friend, too. We've been close for nearly six months. We haven't met yet, though." You felt your phone vibrate and you checked it. The screen lit up brightly with a notification from PesterChum, stating that carcinoGeneticist just sent you a pester. "This is him!" You said brightly, pointing to your screen. When he leaned over your shoulder to look, you held your phone away and tutted disapprovingly at him. "No peeking."