parodeity | subnautica ic inbox 2.0;

[No, that doesn't help.]

The point is that I would have liked to have been there instead. The two of us dumb toddlers barely reaching the top of the turntables, spinnin' the vinyls without a clue what we were doing.

I would've liked that too. But that's all it was. Realizin' that some things I just - already fullstop missed out on. Which is obvious? We're seventeen.

[ so. there was a lot to miss out on. duh. ]

I just didn't know how to word it.

You've managed to bring the idea across now, and I understand. We'll work on it.

[Also, Dirk is still standing in the metaphorical doorway since Dave... never gave him metaphorical permission to come in this is so stupid.]

How did I hurt you?

I shouldn't have said that. Or I shouldn't have said it like that.

[ since it'd been a stupid aside and dirk hadn't meant anything but it and dave understood the whys. ]

It wasn't anything you did. Not really. It was just...conceptualizing a concept first, I guess? Call it lonely instead of upset.

Okay. Tell me about it.

[There's a pause and he just breaks.]

Also, is it cool if I sit down somewhere if we're going to spend some amount of further time together? If that's going to be a thing.

[let him out of this damn liminal space please.]

Ummmm. [ a pause, but not because the answer is "no". ] I...yeah I don't have a couch. Are you cool with floor. Or like. Well, we set up the beds. I mostly have just been chillin' on the floor?

Floor or bed works.

[And then will he Find Out]

[ dave literally just drops down and sits cross-legged where he is lmao sorry if you expected like pillows or blankets or whatever for this dirk???

actually no instead of crosslegged he's going to shift and just flop onto his back, arms crossed over his chest. ]

My floor is your floor, I guess literally at 5am but also like, right now.

[Well that's stupid. Dirk considers this for a moment.

Then he lies down on the ground beside his brother, like a fucking idiot.]

Okay.

[So. Yeah.]

[ dave's quiet for a minute or two. when he speaks, he says this: ]

A month or two months or three months ago I would have told you when you pushed the issue that it upset me when you told me the Magister was lucky to have me, or when you told me that understanding me had never made you love me less.

[Oh.]

Sorry.

[They were moments he had wondered about, looking at Dave's reactions.]

Saying the right thing is still not a skill I've gained much competency in.

No, that's not what I meant. And they weren't the "wrong" thing, I just...couldn't take hearing them. But what I meant -

[ what he meant. what he meant by how he'd phrased it. ]

Even at the start of the month. I would have told you those were the things that upset me, and it would have been true, and you would have listened and that would have been that. You just did. You're not as slick as you think you are, bro.

[ dirk missed the sidestep, the subject shift, because sometimes the shift doesn't mean changing gears entirely but just giving just enough so he thinks he's got what he's asked for. ]

Because those would have been an acceptable loss, because they weren't the things that hurt most, but they were enough to get you not to ask more.

[Oh. Another oh. And is it dumb that the thing that hurts most, in the most stupid way, is You're not as slick as you think you are?

(You aren't good enough with his Bro's voice and his Bro's accent and his Bro's importance and more.)

Dirk exhales, slowly, carefully. He closes his eyes.]

A feint, or using an afterimage.

Hey, don't, you're not listening.

[ he has to talk faster now, doesn't he, before dirk has time to settle and dream up worst case scenarios. ]

You shouldn't have to be. That's why I said it. You're not, but I don't want you to be. Not so you don't catch on, but - [ he just keeps speeding up, attempting to get it across as quickly as humanly possible. ] If you really want to know the thing you said that hurt most I'll tell you, no feints or tricks. That's what I mean, earlier I wouldn't've and you wouldn't've known but I - if you want to know you have the option. I don't want to do the thing I would have done before. I'm - you asked me not to treat you like an enemy.

[ he's trying. he'd shoved the topics around to sidestep things but refusing to answer a direct question toes too close to the line and he'd said he wouldn't. ]

I want to know.

[That at least comes instantly.]

It was really, really stupid.

[ to clarify. ]

And I'm not sayin' any of this well so I mostly deserve any hurt I did acquire throughout this. It ain't like I haven't stabbed you metaphorically an equal or greater number of times in this exact conversation than you have me.

[ but okay. dirk wants to know. ]

I just felt kind of stupid for doing another thing first, again. Orange makes me happy.

[It takes Dirk a minute, not because he doesn't know the conversation, but because he doesn't understand what Dave means because didn't Dave understand what he meant? He ends up having to turn it over in his head to figure out the way to put this.]

I might not have explained what I meant properly, or talked about the colours in the right way. Can I... would it be okay if I tried to clarify?

Yeah?

[ a hand wave. ]

Go for it, you can't possibly out-terrible me at clarifications.

Looking back over it now, I think I used 'predisposition' in a misleading way, since that isn't exactly what I meant. Really, it's the exact opposite.

The first three colours I named are the colours I grew up with. They signalled an interruption of isolation. Red, if it meant anything, meant Crockercorp and Condesce Drones. Later, my auto-responder. If anything, I was predisposed to hate red.

[Red is an unpleasant colour. His Bro wasn't red, but the things he hated most were. Red was the colour of things he wanted to destroy.]

What I was trying to express, by selecting red for that and not for the bit about happiness, is that the first three were the experiences of the first sixteen years of my life. For sixteen years, they were the signifier for happiness, the only real signifier for it.

By saying that it was a predisposition to think positively of red, I was retreating into my most inarticulate loquaciousness to try to explain that you completely altered what red signified. That encompasses happiness, but in a unique manner different from breaking isolation. Not that you don't do that, it's just... Red makes me happy in part because of the re-signification, which merits its classification separately from the others.

[Ugh. Ugh, this is stupid. He puts his hands over his face.]

The happy colours are friend colours. The soothing colours are family colours. The predisposition colour is the one that changed everything.

Oh.

[ okay he's. not sure how to take any of that. it was very loquacious and he thinks dirk pretty much stated that red doesn't make him not happy but it's hard to say. or not hard to say, but hard to - believe? it was easier to buy that he wasn't on the list for happiest to look at because he didn't belong there, than that he simply belonged in another category that included some measure of happiness. ]

You listed them in order, so. The lack seemed kind of damning.

I can see that now. But the thing is, you do make me happy. [He... groans at himself pre-emptively and then just says the stupidest thing about this.] It was important to me to set you apart so you'd realize the important, unique role you play in my life.

[AND INSTEAD HE STABBED DAVE IN THE GUT, HE GUESSES?]

Oh. [ YEAH DAVE TOOK THE LACK AS AN INDICATION HAPPINESS WASN'T A THING. good job idiots. ] So yeah, I would have taken that misunderstanding with me to my grave a few weeks ago.

[ fun times ]

The level of idiocy we bring to the table is truly beyond the pale.

[whyyyyy is this how things are. God.]

Thank you for telling me.

[For not throwing distraction powder in the air to keep him from knowing.]

It would help I guess if we were less willin' to believe the worst-case scenario every time.

[ so. ]

I...promised to try to give you a choice.

Probably, yes.

[That is usually when they misunderstand each other. They're very good at understanding so many things, but when it comes to self-loathing their perspectives skew towards the catastrophizing.

He turns his head towards Dave, his hands dropping to his sides.]

You did.

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SNAAAAAAAAAAAAKE MEEEEEEEEE

JOKE'S ON YOU SOMEONE ELSE LITERALLY SAID IT 2 SECONDS AGO IM ALREADY LAUGHING

IS THE JOKE REALLY ON ME THOUGH

no im still laughing

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