Work Text:
My Chemical Romance rules \m/
Those four little words were enough to make Terezi angry. She knew a lot of people in her school were idiots, but she would’ve never thought that they could have such a bad music taste and be so ‘emo’. She sighed and shook her head, looking down at the table to see those words again. She couldn’t believe someone could’ve dared to write those words on her desk out of all the desks that were in the room. She couldn’t even pay attention to what the teacher was saying anymore. She was okay with everyone’s taste in music, but these emos who thought they were better than everyone else because they listened to My Chemical Romance and all these other bands were really starting to get on her nerves. She adjusted her glasses on her nose and grabbed her pen, scribbling something on the table to correct the person who had written the most outrageous thing ever. As the bell rang, the young girl rushed out of the classroom and hoped that whoever had managed to make her this angry would see what she had to tell them.
The Ramones are much better than MCR.
Karkat widened his eyes when he saw those words scribbled in some horrible green color under his own handwriting. Who the hell had written this? Who could even think that My Chemical Romance weren’t the best band ever? None of this made sense, and this angered Karkat. Of course, he should’ve realized that this stupid school he hated more than anything was full of weird punks who thought they were superior to everyone just because of what they listened to. He rolled his eyes and groaned to himself, thinking of what he could reply to that person, whoever they were. And he spent most of the period wondering what he was going to scribble on the desk. That person had started a war, and they would lose. Karkat would personally make sure of this. As the bell rang, the young boy felt proud of himself for managing to find something that would shut his new worst enemy up.
The Ramones were just a bunch of boozers trying to make money out of being ‘different’ or ‘outcasts’. They weren’t even talented. And anyway, how old are you to listen to such an old band? 55? What are you doing in high school, you dumbass?
And when Terezi saw those new words on her desk during her next math lesson, she hated that stupid emo kid even more than last time. And so, the two teenagers started exchanging insults and hating each other without ever seeing each other or having any idea about who they were talking to. Their conversation, which was more of an argument, pretty much went like this:
Oh, so you really think they would let a fifty-five year old in high school? Congratulations on having an extremely shitty music taste and being the stupidest person I’ve ever heard about. But that’s not exactly the point. You just insulted the best band ever by saying that they were just trying to sell out by being themselves, but isn’t that what MCR do? Aren’t they supposedly ‘outcasts’, too? Think about the things you listen to before insulting the classics.
Ever heard of irony? I know you’re just one of these teenagers who think they’re so cool because they listen to ‘old’ bands that ‘invented everything in the music we have nowadays’. And MCR aren’t sellouts, they’re just being themselves, and I’m sorry you can’t see that. I’m sorry that you have your head too far up your ass to realize that you’re the one who idolizes fake people and who has a shitty music taste.
And it went on and on and on like this for a few days. The two teenagers really loathed each other but at some point, the janitor wiped their whole conversation, and that’s when Terezi decided that they had to take it somewhere else. She definitely couldn’t let that person get away with insulting The Ramones like this. She felt like she had to talk some sense into them, to make them realize that they were the one who were wrong and needed to get over themselves and that it definitely was not her. Besides, she had to admit that she had hope for that person. They didn’t seem as stupid as what she kept telling them and she actually enjoyed their little war. And there was something about the way that person expressed themselves that made Terezi want to know them, although she still thought she was much better than them for many different reasons. And for all these reasons, the young girl simply scribbled a few words for her enemy and added her chumhandle on her desk during her next math lesson.
Hey, looks like the janitor isn’t too happy with us fighting here, so maybe you should pester me some time: gallowsCalibrator >;]
And when Karkat got home on that day, he wasted very little time studying before sitting in front of his laptop and thinking about what to say to start a conversation with the person who had just given him their chumhandle. And somehow, he was excited to be able to talk to that person privately even if he really had no idea who they were, since he was going to a relatively big school and a lot of people could have sat at this desk and scribbled all these things that were destined to him. He really hated that person for being so obnoxious, but there was still something that made him want to talk to them. Karkat thought they were interesting despite their lack of intelligence and all the things that made him despise them. He really did have mixed feelings towards them, but since Karkat was one of the angriest people in the world, hatred and scorn were the strongest things he felt. Once he had figured out that the best thing to do was to start insulting them as he greeting, Karkat began pestering that person.
carcinoGeneticist [CG] began pestering gallowsCalibrator [GC]
CG: APPARENTLY EVEN THE JANITOR CAN’T HELP ME GET RID OFF YOUR OBNOXIOUS AND ANNOYING ASS. WHAT THE HELL DO YOU WANT FROM ME? DID YOU FALL IN LOVE WITH ME AND MY AMAZING WRITING STYLE OR SOMETHING?
GC: OH MY GOD DO YOU S3R1OUSLY TYPE 1N GR4Y
GC: I C4NNOT B3L13V3 TH1S
GC: OMG SOOOOOO 3MOOOOO!!!
CG: COMING FROM THE ONE WHO TRIES TO USE LEET SPEAK AND WHO USES THIS TERRIBLE WEIRD GREEN-ISH COLOR TO TYPE I WON’T TAKE OFFENSE. SERIOUSLY WHICH ONE OF THESE DUMBASSES FROM THAT FUCKING DUMB SCHOOL ARE YOU? PLEASE TELL ME, I’M INTERESTED.
GC: 1 R3ALLY D1DNT 3XP3CT TH1S QU3ST1ON COM1NG FROM TH3 ON3 WHO 4SK3D 1F 1 H4D F4LL3N 1N LOVE W1TH H1M. BUT MY N4M3 1S T3R3Z1. YOU M4Y OR M4Y NOT HAV3 S33N M3 IN THE H4LLW4Y OR H34RD OF M3 SOM3HOW
CG: I’VE NEVER HEARD OF YOU, SORRY. LOOKS LIKE YOU’RE NOT AS POPULAR AS YOU THINK YOU ARE. WHICH ISN’T FUCKING SURPRISING AT ALL, CONSIDERING THE FACT THAT YOU ARE AN ABSOLUTE ASSHOLE.
GC: 4ND YOUR3 SO COOL TH4T YOU ST1LL H4V3NT TOLD M3 WHO YOU 4RE
CG: I’M KARKAT VANTAS. IT ISN’T A PLEASURE TO MEET YOU, TEREZI WHATEVER YOUR LAST NAME MIGHT BE. NOW IF YOU’LL EXCUSE ME, I HAVE BETTER THINGS TO DO THAN TO TALK TO A PUNK KID WHO THINKS SHE IS COOLER THAN EVERYONE BECAUSE SHE LISTENS TO THE RAMONES.
GC: OH MY GOD 1 4LMOST FORGOT WHY I H4D G1V3N YOU MY CHUMH4NDLE. YOU R34LLY N33D TO R34L1Z3 TH4T 3V3RYTH1NG 1 S41D 1S TH3 TRUTH
And the two teenagers’ conversation went on like this, and they both were unable to find an argument until the clock struck two in the morning and they were both too exhausted to keep arguing, no matter how much they would’ve wanted to keep their little war going on. They had agreed on the fact that Green Day was one of the most influential bands of the past decade, and that no one could really dislike them because they were simply amazing. After all, Terezi thought that Karkat wasn’t so bad for an emo kid, even if he stuck to his guns about The Ramones. And for Karkat, it wasn’t really different. However, they still truly loathed each other for some reason. It was as though nothing could change that. This didn’t stop Terezi from wanting to meet Karkat, nor did it stop him from saying that he would meet her in the park that was near their school once his classes would be over on the next day when she told him that she wanted to know what someone as dumb as he was could look like. Both of them went to bed feeling quite excited about what would happen when they would finally meet in person after days or arguing about music and who was the best of them.
While she was waiting from him, sitting on a bench in the park, Terezi started imagining what Karkat would be like, in terms of physical appearance. She really had no idea who he was. She suspected him to be the typical emo kid who always dressed in black and had constant messy hair, as if he didn’t know that hairbrushes existed and that he could use one. She laughed to herself at that thought and bit her lip. She didn’t know how this would go, and she was sort of nervous. Karkat made her nervous, and she couldn’t really tell why. She usually didn’t really care about others, but there was something about him. And that thing had made her want to talk to him, and to meet him today. She felt a bit stupid for acting this way with him. He probably wasn’t even worth her attention after all. But she was too close to know what made him so special to leave now. It would be even more dumb than doing all these things she had done since she had noticed the stupid words he had scribbled on that desk they shared for their different math classes.
As he was walking out of the school and towards the park, Karkat tried to imagine what Terezi was like, too. He expected her to be weirdly-dressed, with some weird associations of colors that she would be the only one to like because she was so different from everyone else. And she really was special, since she was the only person who had managed to somehow capture Karkat’s attention and to make him interested since he had started high school. Yet, this was something that he couldn’t really explain. He definitely hated her, but this hatred had made him want to know more about her, and this didn’t make much sense to him. It was almost as if he was in denial and actually was in love with her, or at least had a crush on her.
Reality met the two teenagers’ expectations as soon as they caught a glimpse of each other. Indeed, Karkat was wearing black ripped skinny jeans and some merch of a band Terezi had never heard about (it’s important to say that the crewneck was oversized but still fit him perfectly and that Terezi couldn’t help noticing that he was strangely attractive no matter how typically emo his outfit was). His hair was extremely dark and looked fluffy and soft (which made Terezi want to touch it) and he looked like he hadn’t slept in ten days. That impression was highlighted by the guyliner Karkat had put on a few days ago and hadn’t bothered taking off. There was something that didn’t stick to the emo kid stereotype, though: Karkat’s skin was relatively dark, which made Terezi suspect some Hispanic origins. But it all suited him, and Terezi loathed him even more for looking so outrageously perfect. And just the way Karkat had imagined her, Terezi was some pretty skinny (actually fit, but Karkat didn’t want to admit that this was the first thing he had thought when he saw her) white girl, with straight light brown hair that was weirdly stained with some red patches (and Karkat assumed that she had tried to dye her hair by herself but had failed), who was wearing a The Ramones shirt with some leggings on which Karkat could make out the British flag. She was also wearing red glasses that added up to the fact that she really looked like the typical white girl who tried to be punk and was not like the other girls, or at least tried not to. He nonchalantly chuckled at how punk she looked. But deep inside, he started hating her even more because of how attractive she looked. They both hid what they really thought of each other by starting to argue about music again as soon as Karkat said something about how The Ramones were so shitty, and how Terezi was just a wannabe punk girl. This went on for a few minutes, during which Karkat leaned against the tree that was near the bench on which Terezi was sitting a few minutes ago. As he spoke, or more sort of yelled in his raspy voice (that made him even more attractive, Terezi couldn’t help thinking), the young girl was staring at his lip ring and she almost lost it.
“Are you even listening to me or are you just too dumb to respond to what I told you?” Karkat asked, snapping her out of her thoughts.
“If I look like punk trash or whatever you just called me,” she said angrily, trying to remember what he had said although she wasn’t really paying attention to his words, “then you are walking garbage. There’s no adjective to describe the way you look right now. You simply look like you just got out of the trash.”
“Oh my god, you’re so fucking stupid you just repeated the exact same words I used to insult you. Just shut the fuck up if you have no repartee whatsoever.”
“Why don’t you make me shut up?” Terezi bluntly asked, blinking as she was still looking at Karkat’s lips. She was dying to kiss him. She hated him so much that it felt like the right thing to do to let all the hatred she felt towards him out.
“Wh-what?” Karkat mumbled, finally toning his voice down for the first time since he had started talking to Terezi. He blinked as she moved closer to him and let his mouth open slightly in anticipation. He knew what she was going to do, and as much as he hated to admit it, he wanted this kiss as much as she did.
Their lips eventually met, but they didn’t give each other the kind of kiss you saw in the movies. It was an angry kiss. Terezi kept on biting on Karkat’s lip ring and he groaned in response, always trying to act like he hated her and what was happening at that moment despite how good, how right this kiss felt. He then bit on her bottom lip too, making her grunt and gasp as well. As they both pulled away, they stared into each other’s eyes, wanting more. Karkat wrapped his arms around Terezi and sighed, clearing his throat before talking again.
“Did you fucking do all of this to kiss me?”
“Maybe,” she replied, winking at him and squeezing his hand. “I guess emo kids aren’t bad kissers, despite how much they suck at everything else."
