The Monster and the Mute [JohnDave]

John and his Birthday

Welp, it's now night and you're ready to begin your birthday party. Jade should be here any minute now, and Karkat and Jake are already here. You haven't heard from Vriska, yet, but it would be nice if she contacted you early.

A knock sounds from the door, and you rush to turn the handle to welcome in Jade. Well, when you say welcome, you mean you and Jake kind of tackle-hug her while she screams and Karkat rolls his eyes, probably calling you embarressments to the human race or something. When everyone else goes in, you cast yet another look around for Vriska. Your heart sinks as you realize that she probably isn't coming.

Inside, you and the rest of them turn on the Wii u and you put in the game, "Splattoon" which Jake just brought you for your birthday.

You each take turns having battles on teams with random people around the world, and you think you can all agree in saying it was fun, except for Karkat who continuously begged for an actual game or one of his romance movies. Jade managed to hush him somehow, and that's an impressive skill which you need to learn someday, but you highly doubt that he would respond the same to your writing as well as he would Jades words.

Your dad comes in the living room announcing that the pizza has arrived. Everyone grabs a slice and comes back to sit in their original spots. You put the pizza box on the floor between the few of you so you wouldn't have to get up and down every few minutes. The game is left on pause for the time being, and everyone is chatting. You have your notebook ready for conversation and Jade is by your side to help you out. Jade learned sign language for you, Karkat, however, tried and got mad, giving up quite easily. Jake made a better attempt at learning, but he got confused between signs too often, so he thought it better to just not.

"Has anyone seen those two new kids?" Jake starts off the conversation.

You raise your hand to indicate your awareness of them. You feel like you're actually too aware of them. Jade says, "Me!" and Karkat looks like he's about to throw something, which means he probably hasn't seen them.

"So you've seen the older?" He inquires, and you nod your head in response. "He's quite dashing if I may say so myself." The brunette added.

You tilt your head in question. You must admit, he does have some good features to him, but in all honesty he is kind of intimidating to you, and you have yet to figure out why.

Actually, you find the other more intriguing. Dave is so familiar and more of a cool persona, and he isn't so much as intimidating as he is an enigma. You think you'd like to get to know him better, more so than his brother.

"DON'T TELL ME YOU HAVE A CRUSH ON A NEW BARFMUFFIN SHIT STAINER." Karkat yelled in his indoor tone of voice, which just so happens to be his out door one, too.

"Karat, language!" Jade hisses, reminding the angry one that your dad resides in the house as well.

"I-I'm not saying anything!" Jake stuttered back to Karkat, and you think he's blushing a little. You smirk. In a childs tone of voice, you can hear a little tune singing in your head, "Jake has a crush! Jake has a crush!" You can tell Jade's thinking the same thing, too, because she also has somewhat of a smirk dashed across her face.

At that moment, there's a knock at the door. You hop up, setting your pizza to the side, and go to answer. Joy swells in your chest as you open the door to Vriska. "Hey, sorry I'm l8, you got any food left?"

You nod enthusiastically, then make a maneuver indicating for her to come inside. "Nice pl8ce you got here. Much nicer than I thought it'd 8e." She stepped into your house, gazing around at the room.

You sign back to her, "Why, what did you think it would be like?"

Since Vriska met you, she had been extremely into learning sign language to talk to you. The first day you met, she introduced herself and you wrote back on paper. Serket found it strange at first, making a joke saying, "What, are you mute or something?" When you wrote back with a positive answer, she apologized and carried on talking anyway. Eventually, she started getting tired of having to wait for you to write and wanted to pick up the pace, so she started learning ASL to make your conversations easier.

"You know? More like your personality and not so fancy and clean. I can't even 8egin to talk a8out those Harley Quinn dolls." Her eye that wasn't covered with an eye-patch made its way to the corner where you had stuffed all of the visible dolls into. You can't stand those dolls, and frankly, you think it's weird and out of character for your dad to like them.

"Well, it is my dad's house." You sign. "Anyway, pizza's over here." You lead her to your group of friends who is now making knowing eyes and grins at you like you were at Jake a few moments ago. Your eyes bulge and you sign, particularly to Jade, "No! No, it's not like that!"

Jade doesn't seem to care, thinking otherwise. And then you start to think about it. Do you like her? Could there be something between the two of you?

Vriska doesn't seem to notice or care about the odd looks on their faces. She grabs a slice of pizza, herself, and then begins to speak. "So, whatcha people talking a8out?"

"We're talking about those new kids. You know, the Striders?" Jake replies.

"I have second period with the one with the normal sunglasses." Vriska replies. "Seems like he's just another lame-o if you ask me."

You tap her shoulder, and then sign, "What's so lame about him?"

She thinks for a moment. "Well, he's just someone trying to 8e all cool and mysterious. It's like when you have a dog, and then you 8uy a new puppy who acts like he's 8etter and takes all of the attention. That's what he is. A puppy."

You bite your lip. It doesn't seem like that to you, and it doesn't sit right with you leaving it at that. "I don't think I'd read so much into him. He seems different than that."

"Eh, whatever. Opinions, opinions, am I right?"

You almost reply back, but then Karat blurts out, "CAN I HAVE A TRANSLATOR IF JOHN IS GOING TO SIGN? I NEED TO KNOW WHAT I'M MISSING FROM THE CONVER-THATHION." This moment is beautiful. Jade slaps Karkat across the face with a pillow while he yells his complaints, cutting him short. He also lost is balance, and he landed halfway against the front boards of the couch from his spot on the ground. A single, angry, "OW," escapes his mouth a few seconds later, his face has the look of someone who is done with everything.

"Sorry." Jade apologizes with a sarcastic tone. "Karkat, do you wish to continue?"

Karkat glares at her, and then mutters, "I'd like to keep my brains from leaking onto the pathetic excuse for a couch."

"Glad we're on the same page."