Fire Meet Gasoline || Karl Jacobs

one

Karl doesn't know how he got here, sitting in a call with his friends and the one person he couldn't understand. He never truly understood why she hated him so much, why his laugh would make her want to strangle him. He never understood how throwing insults his way helped anything, but he tried his best to ignore it. It was just times like right now, completely off camera and trying to enjoy his time with his friends and her persistence to insult him every chance she got, that he couldn't stand.

At this point there were so many ignorant comments thrown out he was just on airplane mode, going through the motions of playing minecraft but blocking everyone out. The only thing he focused on was what he'd done to make her hate him. Had he said something? Had he hurt her first? He felt it was unprovoked, unwarranted, but there was nothing he could do.

"Karl~" Alex sang, his voice pulling him back to reality.

"Yeah?" He asked, trying to force a happy tone into his voice.

"You alright? You went a bit silent." Alex said, voice flowing through Karl's headphones at a high volume. He cringed softly, turning his volume down some as he continued to walk through the world.

"God, you made him talk again Alex." Nadia groaned in response. Karl closed his eyes, pulling his hands back from the keyboard and rubbing them down his face.

"C'mon, Nads, cut it out." Alex laughed back.

"I'm back! Is Karl still on?" Sapnap asked, the sounds of him getting repositioned and playing once more coming from his end.

"You know it baby!" Karl said with a fake laugh, letting the words fall from his mouth in regret.

"Gross." Nadia spoke under her breath. The words came through Karl's headphones clearly despite how low she said the words. One more jab and he was done, one more comment and he'd have his entire night ruined and he wouldn't be fucking around with his friends anymore.

"Nadia's grouchy today." Sapnap laughed. He thought it was a joke, everyone did. The viewers, their friends, sometimes even he thought it was a joke but the lengths she goes really proves otherwise. He doesn't understand why it effects him, why he cares so much about some unimportant person's opinions about him. Truth is the words hurt more than he lets off.

"Only when Karl's around." Nadia said, an obvious eye roll accompanying the sentence.

"Why such a vendetta on him anyway?" Sapnap asked. Karl deafened after that. He stayed on the world, continued gathering materials for his survival of the game.

Incoming call from Nick :]

Karl let it ring, not in the mood to talk about why he deafened. He'd undeafen in a few minutes, say he had something to take care of, another call coming in or something. He just needed a minute, a minute to just focus on the game and not the people around him. He needed a minute to let the insults go to his head, he needed a minute where it was okay that the words hurt.

"Alright, I'm back, sorry I had to take care of some business." Karl laughed off, undeafening and becoming himself once again.

"Nobody missed you." Nadia said, laughing it off as a joke.

"That's okay, I wasn't gone that long anyway." Karl responded quickly.

"Wish it was longer." Nadia said, tone of voice flat and unamused.

"Ha! Me too! My mom called me and-"

"News flash, nobody cares." Nadia cut him off. Karl closed his mouth, ignoring the statement and just playing the game now.

"What did your mom call you about, Karl?" Sapnap asked, Alex humming in agreeance.

"Nothing important." Karl spoke, feeling his eyes burn with tears he was holding back. "Just asking when I'll see her again."

No response, just silence. She was right, nobody cared. Either that or he just pushed things off so much now there was just nothing to respond back with. Either way, Karl just wanted to get off and go to bed. He wanted to lay with his cat and scroll aimlessly through twitter. He wanted to be dead to the world for just a little bit.

"I'm gonna-"

"Oh, Alex! Can you get me some iron please? I need iron tools." Nadia said, cutting off Karl for the umteenth time. He was too tired to fight for his friends attention. Karl left the discord and then the minecraft world they'd been playing in.

Nick :] - have a flight booked to stay with you for tomorrow morning. I'll be there around 10. I know you're with Jimmy so I'll come there and then we can just spend a few weeks together. Night buddy :))

Karl left him on open. His eyes felt heavy and his head was pounding. He stared at the long forgotten food on his desk for a few minutes before grabbing it and throwing it away in his trashcan. He changed into more comfortable sleep wear and crawled into bed next to his cat. She sensed his off mood and stood from her laid position to curl up next to him on the bed.

Karl fell asleep with the lights on and dried tear tracks on his face