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"Terezi," Rose is saying, urgently, in your ear. "Terezi, get up. Christ. Are you only responding to your CB handle now? Legislacerator Truthmurder."
You manage to roll a quarter of the way over, but it takes most of the muscles in your body. "That is not even close to any of the elements of my name."
"Oh good, you're alive," Rose says, showing her usual lack of priorities. "Let's skip the next twenty minutes of banter, shall we? Where are we?"
You sit up.
You lie back down again immediately.
"Las Vegas," you say, eventually, when the contents of your head have made friends with each other again. "Which is in Nevada, which is in the western province of the democratic republic of the United States of America, on Earth. Which is where we were last night. Please tell me you have a good reason for this question."
"My reasoning," Rose says, patiently, "is that what I remember from last night consists of the first bar. When did we get to Vegas?"
You count backwards. "Not much happened at the other six," you say. "Except outside the last one you said that 'anything that makes it through my liquor tolerance should be celebrated', and then you called up Jade, and then we were in front of an extremely tacky seventh."
"That's all right," Rose says, with a breath of relief. "What makes you think a bar is tacky? I didn't know you had the capacity to judge."
You wave a hand. "Ugh, there were so many cars, and this unpleasant man in a gold suit came out and tried to sit on ours. And they had a very dramatic bouncer. He kept telling us that we weren't in a position to make reasonable decisions, and I am obviously newly qualified to make reasonable decisions for everybody, forever--" You pause for Rose's remark, but she's gone a sour milk color. You frown. "It wasn't that big a deal. I just tipped him most of my wallet. Anyway, then they let us in, but there was some weird ritual going on, and you said it was 'the best'--"
Rose covers her face with both hands, and presents you with the wafting, unmistakable scent of despair. "Please tell me," she says, "I didn't tell you it was a traditional coming of age ceremony."
"No, you told me it was 'the best traditional coming of age ceremony,'" you correct her. "You put in a lot more consonants too. Obviously I am not going to try to live up to that in daylight."
At this point, you'd gotten to the bottom of your own flask, and your memories grow a little more dim. There was something about a man asking you whether you were going to honor and obey, and you'd said, probably. Which seemed to be good enough. You sniff your finger. The little ring is still there, and so is Rose's.
"What's the matter?" you say. "Did it not work?"
"The matter," Rose says, "is that it worked perfectly well, and we are now legally married."
"What? No we're not. I am a member of a distinct species, and your intermarriage laws--"
"Fine. Assuming that no court on earth discovers that you are an interdimensional spy in deep disguise," Rose corrects herself, flopping down on the bed to lie next to you, "we are now legally married. In the State of Nevada. You are now my beautiful wife."
You think about this for some time.
After a while, you say, "We have to tell everybody."
Kanaya is first, to prevent serious misunderstandings. When Rose makes the call, however, Kanaya won't let herself be told. Rose's eyebrows keep contracting and she keeps adding, "But, darling--" in tones meant to indicate that everyone here is being terribly ridiculous. The effect is completely spoiled by the fact that whenever she tries to modulate her voice, it creaks alarmingly, and she has to grope for the bottle of water she's been nursing. Meanwhile Kanaya's voice spikes in and out of audibility on phrases like "--completely out of your questionable mind--" and "--only the assurances of your clutchmate--"
After ten minutes of this you hit speaker on the hotel phone. "What Rose has been trying to tell you," you say, and luckily your voice always creaks, "is that we have been ritually joined in the bonds of love in the temple of Las Vegas, and it is very romantic."
Kanaya says: "…"
"How are you, my little aschenputtel?" you say. You lean into the phone. "We have had a complicated night. Are you ready for me to come by and celebrate?"
"If either of you pull each other out of your quadrants with me," she says, categorically, "I will leave the other one's decapitated head on your picket fence."
Rose massages her forehead. "Could you do it before the hangover dissipates?"
"Of course, Rose," Kanaya says, instantly solicitous, and you mime vomiting until Rose pushes you off the bed.
It takes you three hours to figure out how to get a rental car. Some of this is because every time you speak above a dull roar, Rose buries her head under the pillow. Some of it is because stepping outside of the hotel presents you with such a bewildering array of neon that you have to take a couple minutes to brush the delighted tears out of your eyes. Most of it, however, is because neither of you have any idea what you're doing.
"I still say that the traditional course of action at this point is to steal a Camaro," Rose says. She's dialing Jade again, in the futile hopes of escaping your driving. Since you have taken the precaution of changing the number in her phone to the hotel's fax line, you are not too worried.
"Yes, and I still say that I am not inaugurating my bar passage with a flagrant disregard for the law," you say. "And before you ask, your discriminatory anti-troll policies do not count as 'law'."
Rose frowns at the whirring noises coming from her phone, and dials another number.
"Heyyyyyyy," says Roxy. In the background you can hear Jane say, "Is that your daughter? Rose, transdimensional calls are expensive!"
"I wanted to notify you of my recent marriage to Terezi Pyrope," Rose says.
Roxy shrieks like a banshee. There's a scrambling noise, and then Dirk is on the line. "So, you don't think you need your father's permission to give yourself away?"
"Hi, Dirk!" you yell. The truck in front of you honks. "Will you be my sexy affair?"
"Hell no. I'm here to tell you what your responsibilities are," he says. "It's cool. I spent like my entire childhood researching her fuckin'--"
"Shut up shut up," Roxy intervenes. "Dirk knows zilch and also nada about Rose's native culture! Okay, first you have to hate your mother-in-law. That's me." You can pretty much hear her waggle her eyebrows over the phone. "There is room enough in my quadrant for everyone. Second, you gotta get her pregn--"
Rose hangs up the phone.
"That was educational," you object.
"That was a conversation that was leading to you buying a turkey baster," she says, incomprehensibly. "Do you think that perhaps you could manage to direct your nose towards the road?"
"Excuse me. My nose is on the road. My nose is perfectly oriented towards the--same to you!--northern highway of 95, as directed. What's in Mammoth Lakes, anyway?"
"My bungalow," Rose says. "The winter. A route that avoids Barstow. I'm reliably informed there are motels along the way."
You tap your fingers against the steering wheel. "What do you do in a marriage?"
"I've never been married before," Rose says. "But from my observations, the purpose of the institution is to stabilize human romantic relationships into a shell of their former self. A wife supports their husband, and provides them with food and attention at regular intervals, as well as estrangement and a sense of loss of greater possibilities."
"Huh," you say. "That sounds doable."
"You did what?" Karkat yells. "No, no, I'm sorry, go right ahead, tell me again. I am prepared to listen to this entire batshit story, beginning with 'once upon a time I decided to celebrate my new post with Rose Lalonde instead of the troll who sat up with me every day for the entire eighth perigee' and ending with 'and we went on a road trip to the fucking frozen north instead of going back and immediately demanding to get this thing shredded.' And they lived happily ever after, for about three days, which is how long it is going to take for me to finish cataloguing this record, and come out to that godforsaken planet and beat some fucking sense into your heads, plus two days for me to go out to Kanaya Maryam and let her turn all of my suits green with her shitty tears! You are going to call that troll and you are going to apologize for your rampant infidelity, and then you are going to call me up again and I am going to walk you through how we're going to actually hold your wedding, and you are going to look like a fucking magical dream and if you try to leave out one piece of lace from the gown Kanaya makes you I am going to decorate it with the glass from the fucking bottle of wine, do you hear me? I--"
Your ears are still ringing by dinner, though, to be fair, some of that is from the convulsive laughter and the accidentally breaking the rental car horn. You're having it in a Denny's, and the sweet solace of an entire Santa Fe Skillet goes a long way to soothing your shattered nerves and your driver's callouses, which Rose says, in defiance of the facts, are not "a real thing". She's nursing tomato juice, and eviscerating your jokes.
It's cold up here. You put your hands over the skillet and say, "So how is your book going?"
She narrows her eyes at you. "Was that in spite?"
"Why?" you say. "Are married women not supposed to be spiteful? That is ridiculous. It is easily one of my top ten emotions."
"No," she says. "It's a time-honored element. That's why I'm suspicious. Are you sure you've never been married before?"
"I'm married to this Santa Fe Skillet," you offer, but she doesn't think that's apposite.
"My book is fine. Though I prefer the term 'seminal creative act of American letters'," she informs you. "I was going to retire to my bungalow of great literature and demolish the third chapter, but I happened to get a phone call from one of my good friends informing me that she required 'urgent party help in partying'."
You frown. "Mrs. Pyrope," you say, "are you implying that you have regrets?"
"Happily for your inquiry, I have to part from your side for just one painful moment," Rose says, getting to her feet. "Why don't you take the opportunity to plan the honeymoon."
She wends her way between tables--still unsteady, you realize, fondly--and you turn your attention to her phone, scrolling through her remaining contacts. You take the opportunity to change Jade's number back. John will require a tactical assault. Dave deserves something special. This leaves Gamzee Makara, whose name you sniff, and then you blanch. The last call to that number is from four in the morning yesterday, and you have a faint memory of making it. Fuck. You deleted his handle from your computer sweeps ago and his number from your phone after the night you woke up with Sollux laughing hysterically next to your head, playing back a recording of you asking him to rekindle your timeless passion. "We didn't even have timeless passion," you tell the Skillet. "He was terrible in the sack!"
The skillet doesn't answer. It is the only one who understands you.
You reason, "On the other hand, it can't actually have been worse than that."
"It can," Rose says, settling back into her seat. "You told him you were his teenage wasteland and you wanted to have a shitty affair with him because he probably wasn't currently sleeping with anyone else. Don't worry. I changed the number after you opened your flask."
"Oh," you say. "So who did I serenade?"
"They Might Be Giants Dial-A-Song," Rose says. She lifts a finger for the waitress. "We can call and tell them about our nuptials, if you'd like."
"No, no, that's fine," you say. "I will send them an e-card."
John calls while you're putting on your snow chains. You have one ear buried in the snow, and despite your repeated requests, Rose won't balance the phone on your other ear. Rose also keeps walking around to the other side of the car, in a completely futile attempt to shield the conversation.
"I didn't know," she says, as you trap your finger under the chain for the thirteenth time. "I'm sorry. The joke was ill-timed. But John, you must be aware--"
Over the exhaust fumes, you can just make out the blood rushing to her cheeks. "John!"
"Give me the phone!" you yell.
"Absolutely not," she hisses. "John, I'm sorry, you were saying."
That's it. You did not come out of the apocalypse with superpowers for nothing. You pinch shut your nostrils with an oily hand and inquire of yourself what would happen, in the emotional state of those around you or connected telephonically to your immediate vicinity, if you got up and stole the phone.
Then you get up and steal the phone.
"…and I just," John is saying, his voice uncharacteristically subdued, "I don't know… I think I really love her, Rose. I think I've always really loved her. I don't know when it started. Maybe it was ever since she sent me to get eaten by my denizen for literally no reason."
"You," you say to John, "always give me a good reason."
"Hi, Terezi!" he says. "Wait, did she miss the punchline? Fuck! Can you improvise something? I know it's not your forte but I am here for you and I will totally coach you through the hard parts."
You turn to Rose, who is looking at you with worry and the vulnerable throes of friendship. "I'm sorry, John," you say. You try to look grave. "I have never meant to trifle with you. Surely you know that. I have always been one hundred percent serious about how much I want to make you my love muffin."
Rose turns purple.
"Thanks. You're the best gremlin I know," John tells her cheerfully. "When are you going to visit Seattle? Do you think you can make it for the new year? Sorry, I mean, in, uh. I think it's like two perigees for you."
"Not if we die in the mountains."
"Snow chains," John says, sagely. "Make Rose do it. She's just pretending she doesn't know how."
"I will," you promise. "So explain to me how you do that thing with your voice."
By the time the car rolls into Mammoth Lakes, it's completely dark, and you are shivering with cold. Rose has piled up a series of blankets on you in an attempt to preserve the life of her chauffeur, but that has only made you also itchy and clumsy on the snow-filled mountain pass, and privately you consider, as you climb out of the car, that compared to this, your bar exam was really only a duel to the thirty-five-to-life. Rose is just as run down as you, and when she tries to dial Jade's number again, it is more out of mechanical reflex than hope.
Instead of the fax noises, there is a shriek, and Jade appears out of thin air with a pop.
"I heard!" she says. "I heard, I heard. You guys are the best!"
"Hello, Jade," Rose says, weakly. "I take it you're here to offer your condolences."
Jade, who is, of course, barefoot, is now hopping from foot to foot in the hopes that she will not freeze to death. "No, no," she says. "I'm your chaperone. I realized when I got the text from Kanaya that you wouldn't know how to do it right. I mean, Kanaya didn't even know about it. Listen. When you had your wedding, did you--" She leans in, conspiratorily. "--do it??"
"No," you say, regretfully.
"No!" says Rose, in a very different tone of voice.
"Well, did you kiss?" she demands. "Because I can tell you that that is mandatory."
You can't remember. You might have kissed, but you're pretty sure that memory is of you trying to pry your face out of the hotel sink.
"Well, that's why you need a chaperone," Jade says, triumphant. "I mean you just can't share a cottage together if you're only half married. Anything could happen. And if it happens I'm gonna watch. Come on, I bought popcorn."
"All right," Rose says. "I feel this has gone far enough. There is a simpler solution to this problem. This marriage is hereby annulled due to an incredibly fortuitous lack of any kind of consummation, none of which, Jade Harley, is going to be happening in my cabin tonight."
"Oh," Jade says. She deflates. "John said this would be hilarious."
"If John actually knew it was going to be hilarious, John would have done it," you tell her. "It is the temperature of death here, Mrs. Pyrope! Let me into your cottage!"
"Not a chance. And it's 'Miss Lalonde'. I am now virginal once more. I believe my chaperone will escort you out?"
Jade looks at her with the beginnings of a frown, but Rose puts a hand on her arm, and they have one of those irritating eye-locking moments of nonverbal communication, and Jade sighs and turns back to you. "Sorry," she says. "I guess I should delete the wedding registry I made, too, huh?"
"What's a--" you begin, but by the time the sentence is over you're in Houston, halfway up the stairs to Dave's apartment.
Dave opens the door after a solid three minutes of knocking. He's fumbled on his sunglasses, but he hasn't managed to find sweats or a shirt. His pimply chest and his Space Invaders boxers do not bring you your usual joy. "What the hell?"
"I married your sister, but she has heartlessly left me," you say. "Let me in. I need your couch."
It cheers you, in your time of trouble, that Dave almost chokes to death on his tongue.
Dave's phone wakes you, and you manage to knock the phone off its cradle, then hit the speaker button with the whole of your fist. "Hello?"
"Terezi! I'm calling to congratulate you," Aradia says. She gets terrible reception when she's working as a psychopomp, but under the pop and crackle you can tell she's in a good mood.
You groan. "It's off," you say, more tragically than you mean to. "I'm told it is called a 'divorce'."
"Uh," she says. "What is? What happened? I don't understand. Did I get the wrong guy? Olive, right? Huge horns? He definitely said you decapitated him. Was that just recreational?"
"…Oh," you say. "Congratulations on the bar. Hey, you saw him?"
"I've been keeping an eye out," Aradia admits, cheerfully. "That was impressive! He was very very unquiet. I had my hands full just shuffling him away from the revenant options and into the bubbles. You must have gotten a commendation. Sollux! Tell Terezi how impressive that was!"
"It was okay," Sollux says. He sounds like he's had the phone pushed into his cheek. "Congrats. So what are you doing to celebrate?"
You scrub at your nose. "I got married to Rose," you say. "I thought that was what we were talking about."
Sollux snorts with laughter. "Oh, man, and she dumped you?"
"She made Jade send me to Houston," you say. "I'm on Dave's stupid couch. It smells like Cheetos."
"You live on Cheetos."
"That is not the point, Mr. Honey Bunches of Oats," you yell, and the light clicks on and Dave is standing in the doorway. "Uh. I have to go."
Dave is always, of course, red-eyed without his sunglasses, but he seems particularly so just now. "It's five in the--" he starts, and then gives up. "This is really bothering you, isn't it."
"No!" you say. "I am an island. I am a rock. I am a licensed professional and an adult."
"Jesus." Dave runs a hand through his hair. "I can't believe I'm saying this, but let's talk about it."
"At times like this, we have to get all Fiddler on the Roof," Dave announces in his bedroom. He has spread an array of hot chocolate mugs in front of you, which is why he is your best friend, and he has drunk out of all of them 'for taste', which is why he is a turd. He clears his throat. "What are your intentions, man? Did she get you pregnant?"
You cloverleaf your tongue at him. "You and your ancestor need to stop texting."
"Do you want to date her?"
"No."
"Do you want to poison her for her money?"
"I am offended."
"Do you want to make her a happy home with half a kid and a dog?"
"No! I have a happy home! It is called my ship. And I am a lizard person."
"Do you kind of want to hook up with her?"
This, after a hesitant pause, gets a lifted shoulder. "I treasure the sanctity of her and Kanaya's delicate sex love," you say. "But I would not kick her off a mating platform."
"It's okay, I already know you can't resist these genes," Dave says, somehow reaching back into the misty depths of time and killing the entire universe's supply of suave at one blow. "All right, we have now officially established you absolutely should not be married to my sister. So what are you doing?"
"I don't know." You turn to face the wall. His room always smells more like his aftershave than anything distinct, and you inhale it for comfort in this difficult time. "I had all these big plans. I was going to wake up her at four in the morning and tell her we had a sacred tradition of trading secrets on The Wedding Night and see what she came up with. I was going to make her the best sandwich. I wanted to see if Kanaya would really make me a dress out of glass. I thought we could go to the Falls of Endor and bodysurf for our honeymoon. It made Karkat so mad."
Dave thinks about this, or pretends to. Finally he says, "You want my help staying married to Rose because this is, like, the Boardwalk and Park Place of your fucked up game of friendship chicken."
You nod, miserably.
"Well, you're in luck," Dave says. "I know just the ritual for you."
Dave's description of the ritual is very, very complete, and comes with a script. You have never been more aware that someone is fucking with you.
It's snowing outside her Bungalow of Great Literature, and you wipe it off your face, then surreptitiously lick your gloves. Dave has, agreed, assembled a party. You can hear the murmur of voices as you slip through the door. You push play on the boombox. "Hello," you say. "Hello." You sniff your script, then look up again. "I'm looking for my wife."
Jade puts her hand to her mouth, which is on point. John says, "That song wasn't in the movie, was it?" which is not.
"I'm not letting you get rid of me," you say. "How about that?"
Rose is leaning back in her armchair, her lips pressed very tightly together. She manages, "I would like to see you try."
"That isn't in the script," you protest, and flip through it. "Dave, this ritual sucks."
"I don't say that about your sacred moments of great drama," Dave avers. "Did I say that when you made me hold your ashen gourd so that Kanaya wouldn't see you throwing bones at her door? No, I manned the fuck up and did what was what, and that thing was fucking heavy. This is like, eight lines."
"Ugggh," you complain. "Fine. 'Tonight my little project had a very big night.' Excuse me, my practice is not 'little'. 'But it wasn't complete, wasn't nearly close to being in the same vicinity as complete, because I couldn't share it with you. I miss my wife.'"
You glance hopefully up at Rose. Her lips have grown even whiter.
"You complete me," you say. "Especially when neither of us know what is going on. And I just had--"
There's a long pause.
Dave leans back. "Rose," he hisses. "It's your line."
"I don't know what it's my line of," Rose says, mildly.
"What?" John demands. "You haven't seen Jerry Maguire? Is this a sick joke? How long have we been friends? How long have you been friends with Karkat?"
"I haven't seen Jerry Maguire," Rose confirms. "Whatever that is. Does she take her wayward husband back?"
"Yes," you say. "She says, 'You had me at hello'. In your case I would also accept 'You had me at the best traditional coming of age ceremony.'"
Rose lifts a shoulder. Her expression is threatening to break into a smile. "I suppose I don't have anything better to do with the immortal bonds of marriage."
"I will make you grublegs every time we are on the same planet," you add, helpfully. "I am not a jealous soul. You can have conjugal visits with your matesprit every other week."
"That's extremely generous of you. Can I also have your name?"
"At the price of a moment of heavily veiled emotional honesty," you say. You wiggle your fingers. "Come on. Spill."
"You had me at 'grublegs'," Rose says. "If we're being specific."
"KISS," Jade says, apparently unable to contain herself any longer. "OH MY GOD, YOU GUYS, SERIOUSLY, JUST ONCE."
"How long have you been friends with Karkat?" Dave mutters, but you are already converging on Rose to get her weird, feathery hair in your hands. Her eyes are dancing. She bends in and makes the first attempt. You slip her some tongue.
"With the space power invested in me," Jade announces, "I now pronounce you space wives again."
Rose murmurs, "As your double wife, my first act will be to help you set fire to my brother's film collection."
"It's all on drives," you whisper back. "We need propane."