knightime | [Closed] Day(care) Dreamers

John's eyes widen, he knows exactly what Dave is talking about. every detail is just running back into his mind. Every single thing he ever said to Dave, every single thing he and Dave shared in common. All the movies they streamed together, all the chats they ever shared. All the logs were still on his old computer, which he refused to sell or get rid of for certain reasons that may pertain to that.

Nevermind the fact that Dave knew that John had shot a glance at his hip. Nevermind the fact that he's talking to Lily right now as every detail of his pre-teen years is leaping back into his dim brain. John shuts the car door and takes a moment with Dave himself. He has to confirm the reality of what Dave just said.

"We got into a huge fight and never spoke after that." John lets it slip out of his mouth. "I changed my Chumhandle, and I assume you changed yours and we never spoke after that. Until right now at this very second."

If it were possible, Dave just dug his hands even deeper into his pockets. He's quiet and his head is tilted downwards slightly and he's hunchbacked, and this obviously is not the same cocky coolkid that Dave had tried so hard to be online.

This was just Dave. Kind of socially awkward albino kid who was trying to act like they were strangers, despite knowing exactly who John was. "I think you're mistaking me for someone else." He wonders if he can somehow convince the other that he isn't the same guy. Considering it's impossible to pass this off as coincidences...

Well it was worth a try since he's pretty sure John doesn't want anything to do with him anymore after that.

With that kind of body language John is beginning to wonder whether this guy just didn't want to admit it, or he really was wrong. There wasn't really any way at all to tell so John ducks his head in apology. "Oh shit, I told you this was awkward. It just really awkward."

John was just the dork who had a social reputation only because he knew people. He was also cool and gave people his discount on movies sometimes when his boss wasn't looking. But there was only one guy in the world that ever really got to see who John Egbert really was and he was dead set certain it was this guy.

For now John is just going to let that go completely and try again another day. "I'm really sorry if I made some sort of crazy stupid mistake. Er, I'll probably see you another day this week if Rose and Kan want me to pick Lily up!" John ducks into his car quicker than lightening after waving a little goodbye and backing up to leave.

Dave doesn't say anything much and watches John leave in a hurry.

Oh. Okay. He's pretty sure that excuse wasn't going to fly, but that at least gives him time to sort this out on his own.

At the very least, spam Rose's phone with very unhappy texts her way, because that really fucking sucked. And he's going to go clean up the daycare and then head home so he can get drunk. Except not really. He has work tomorrow. So it'll mostly just him being anxious about this whole stupid thing.

And sending her more unhappy texts. Yep.

That earlier agreement had included John picking Lily up the very next day. How does John know this? Because he's rushing to the time clock once again with Kanaya angrily biting his head off on the phone. Dave had to take Lily home with him, and neither of them could leave to go get her and he barely knew where the dudes house was after the directions were yelled at him.

There would certainly be no dinner reimbursement today, he would being going home to eat his ramen and maybe have a sick wicked grilled cheese sandwich while he mulled over the laundry and all the times recently he's let his mind wander and not pick up his niece.

John is now driving just a mile or two above the speed limit to find exactly where he was being directed to, Dave's number had also been barked at him in a hurry. John decides while he's going down the road it would be best to call Dave.

So he waits at a stop light while the phone rings.

The first you can hear is probably My Little Pony in the background. Little girls sure do love My Little Pony, and Dave had other things to do than keep a vigil watch over Lily. Like reply to e-mails and text Rose or Kanaya about what the fuck is he supposed to do with Lily.

Dave is surprisingly formal on the phone. But he also has no idea who's calling him, because the number was unknown. "Dave Strider speakin'." There was definitely a drawl in that. But Dave was also tired and catering to the wants of the small child of Rose and Kanaya got kind of hard sometimes.

Like what kind of little kid craves ice cream cake so suddenly? Jesus dicks.

"Yeah this is really embarrassing. I seem to be making an ass out of myself lately. Not only was I more than fashionably late, I'm so late the Daycare is closed and I have to no clue where the hell your complex is." John is just rambling on and on. "Oh christ, this is John by the way. I'm trying to find your place so I can pick up Lily."

He feels so extremely bad right now and he's tired. He's so worn out, he's not even sure he'll be able to make it back to his apartment. But he will keep his safe driving skill to the max while he's taking that precious child home, just making to his own home seemed a little difficult.

"I need directions from the intersection in front of the Quick Mart about five blocks away from the Daycare."

There's a pause and the sound of clicking, probably from a computer is heard. "You know where the IHOP is from there? It's like the only one in the general area, mind you, so it's not like I'm asking you to find a needle in a haystack or anything. If you know where that is, you can head there and we can walk over to where it is. She's basically going to murder me if I don't get her an ice cream cake and there's a Baskin Robbins near there. It'll be easier to find IHOP than find my place," Dave says into the phone.

"We can head back to my place since she has stuff here anyways and I can drive you two back to your car and things are going to be easy as cake. I got to head out soon anyways, so it's not like I'll mind."

He also has a box with stuff in it for Rose because Rose either keeps having shit sent to his place as a joke or because Rose purposely leaves stuff at his place as a joke.

It's really just some passive aggressive friend ritual they do.

"Yeah, I know where the IHOP is." He goes there when he has no food in the house and no resolve to go the grocery store. So he turns at the intersection and heads out that way, not really meaning to keep Dave on the phone it sorta just happened. "She wants an ice cream cake?" Well okay, that child wanting something is not surprising. But that choice of want was surprising.

"I'll just call Rose when I get to IHOP and tell her we're keeping Lily for a little while. I mean no harm in letting her have the cake at the Baskin Robins, or I could get us something while we're at IHOP." John totally had enough money for that now that he thought about it. His gas tank would suffer for a day or two and then everything would be peachy keen.

"She's really adamant about it. So I'll meet you at the Baskin Robbins."

The line goes dead right after as Dave hangs up. He shoves his wallet and phone in his pockets before ushering Lily to get her shoes on and out the door. They'd get her stuff after since the silly girl wants her stupid ice cream cake.

Why does she want an ice cream cake? I mean, sure, he fucking loves ice cream cake as much as the next guy who loves them, but what the hell. Ice cream cakes are expensive.

He makes sure they get there safely, holding Lily's hand the entire time.

John puts his phone in his lap and continues his short drive with some rad tunes, nothing like a little 80's and 90' rock to complete your day. Maybe you even secretly listened to 'How do I live' on the way there. You'll never tell anyone that you hold a soft spot for crappy love songs ever. It was a little secret between you and Lily.

John pulls into IHOP and walks himself over to Baskin Robbins. He didn't see Dave or Lily inside so he takes a moment to sit on this bench and recollect his thoughts once again before seeing Dave. He was certain that this Dave Strider was THE Dave Strider from his childhood, he had to be! John remembers the fight more vividly than he wanted to. It was an awful feeling to remember. John and Dave had fought over something as trivial as whether going to High School was worth it, and how people would make fun of Dave's looks. At that point John had never seen a picture of Dave, and Dave had caught glimpse of John once when they voice messaged over Pesterchum (he had accidentally turned the camera on).

Somewhere amidst his thoughts Lily is slapping his knee now and pointing at the door. John takes the notion to look up- oh man. "Hey."

Dave was already heading inside to talk to whoever was at cashier. Compared to Lily and John, Dave looked overdressed. He handled weather terribly, and it was way too fucking cold to be wanting an ice cream. But Lily gets what Lily wants, and he didn't want to try arguing with the little girl if he could avoid it.

"Lils. Go pick out a cake from the freezer so I can buy it." It wasn't until the cake was paid for and the box securely in the small girl's arms did Dave really address John. "Sup. Sorry for making you go drive all around the city. I wasn't freezing my a-behind off at the daycare and I couldn't drop her off at home. Not that she's complaining. She's got herself an ice cream cake out of the ordeal."

Except now she's demanding they go back to Dave's place. Someone sure is high maintenance today!

John just follows them inside and watches that sweet little girl pick out a cake. John notices it's not something she would normally pick out, which tips him off a little. Eh, maybe it's just Lily doing something out of the normal- her mother would definitely dive into that with her when John brought her home finally.

"It's cool man, I think she's got something up her sleeve though. Haha, look how excited she's getting." John takes one hand, Lily of course reaching out for the other. If someone were paying attention to this little episode it would seem like Lily was John and Dave's child really.

"I'll call Rose when we get back to your place, I told her I would bring her back after IHOP and Baskin Robbins, but a little longer away from home shouldn't be too bad on her."

"I guess. Rose probably doesn't care as long as she comes back happy and in one piece. If she's neither of them, that's when we start having problems." The walk back to Dave's apartment was mostly the sounds of Lily speaking. She talked a mile a minute, so Dave usually resorted to short responses to let her ramble on.

When they get back to Dave's apartment, the girl automatically demands for candles. The apartment is surprisingly clean (at least everywhere that isn't Dave's actual bedroom). At some point though, while Lily is carefully putting candles into the cake, Dave just stops. He stops and stares at the calender on his wall.

John listened to her ramble and ramble about something special. She kept insisting it was a special day that needed a party and a cake and hats and everything! She was quite a handful when she wanted to be. When they get back to the apartment and got ahold of those candles- it might have clicked for John.

Lily picked out colors Dave would usually wear, she also picked out what she said was Dave's favorite flavor. He looks to check on Dave who is staring blankly at the calender. Oh. Today is circled.

"Everything okay Dave?"

Dave doesn't respond for a few minutes, just keeping his eyes on the calender and his back to them. It takes him a moment before he responds. He was pretty sure his voice would have cracked if he had not given himself time to actually thinking over his words. "I only have seventeen candles left in that bag. I never went and bought more." He stopped really doing candles by that time. They decided other ways to celebrate when he didn't really want to keep celebrating with birthday cakes.

Lily didn't seem to mind, putting all the candles out. Dave doesn't seem to say anything else, and lights the candles himself, before Lily makes him sit down in front of it and whines to John that they had to sing happy birthday for him.

This is still confirming it for John all too well. He completely lost track of Dave right before he turned seventeen. Stopped talking to him just as he got into High School, and stopped trying to keep up with him around that age. John sits at the table with Lily and rambles out happy birthday in the cutest way possible because Lily didn't know all the words.

Lily demands now that Dave blow out ALL of the candles and make a big happy birthday wish. She doesn't want Dave to tell though since if he did it would never ever come true. She's also asking how old her favorite preschool care taker is because he needs to have a proper celebration of his age.

Dave blows out all the candles. Demanding little girl. Who's birthday is this? After, he plucks all the candles out and serves slices to the three of them. "Did you want to take this back home? I'm sure your moms would like to have a slice too." He didn't really want it. He wouldn't be able to eat it without feeling torn about it. God, this is dumb.

"One demand at a time, Lily. I'm twenty-one. Now I'm more legal than I apparently was at eighteen."

John helps Lily as she devours the ice cream cake, scolding her when she eats it a bit too fast and figures out it's a bit too cold for that he just wipes her face a little with a napkin and lets her finish. He finishes his after that.

"I have an idea Miss Lily." She brightens up of course. "How about Dave and I walk you back to my car and we take you on home, and if it's okay with the birthday boy we can take him with us." She seems to like the idea of hanging out with Dave longer, and refuses adamently to take his cake because it's not her either of her mommy's birthdays!

Dave has already finished his slice. Why the hell wouldn't he? It's his favorite flavor. Rose must have taught her that. Damn it, Rose.

There was very weak protesting from Dave. He knows at this point that once Lily wants something, she wouldn't stop until she got it. By the time they've packed up Lily's bag, the cake is safely tucked into his freezer, and Dave has gotten his coat and everything on to go out. "Had to tell her it was okay that I would come. You just had too." There was also a box tucked under his arm. The name was addressed to Rose Lalonde but was his address.

Rose taught her a lot of essential things about both of them, it seemed. She always knew where to tell John to go when he was hungry on the way home, or that her mommy was making dinner for the four of them.

"Well, she likes you. Plus I have to take you home now anyways." John is pleased with himself as he zips Lily's coat and put her little hat on her head securely. "Now Lily you have to hold my hand and Dave's arm when we cross the street."

This was again looking like they were the parents, endearing indeed.

Dave doesn't say anything, walking in step with Lily walking between them.

It's funny how damn chatty he usually is, but how dead silent he has been since being in the presence of John. It's ironic. Not the good kind of ironic. At the very least, he can talk to Rose and tell her how she's ruining his life.

But for now, he just makes sure Lily doesn't trip and fall or nothing bad happens to her on the way to the car.

Well, he was going to get drunk tonight, but guess that isn't happening. Oh well.

John isn't really talkative on the way back either. They both listen to the four year old ramble on and talk about how this was the best birthday party for Dave ever and she tricked him into getting the cake for himself and it was the best plan. Looks like someone took after their Uncle John in the tricky department.

They arrive at the car and John let's Lily in the car to buckle herself up in her big girl seat as usual.

"You're alright with me driving you back, right?"

Dave just goes to take a seat in the passenger seat. His expression is blank as usual. He does kind of look like he's giving John a deadpan look.

"No, J-Egbert. I don't want you to drive me back so I'm just going to walk all the way back. This is a wonderful idea to do in December. Of course it's alright. It's not like I have a choice. Going against a pampered child raised by those two? I knew it was a bad idea to let them adopt."

He hates everythingggg.

He can't tell behind those awesome shades, and it's like getting really dark soon. Why in the blazes would Dave want to wear sunglasses in the nighttime? He would never understand.

"Well, I was just checking since you seem to have some sort of weird hesitance around me!" John is throwing that out there. "Rose and Kanaya are wonderful mothers, really. But I swear to goodness they've made her into a child genius before she's even ready to graduate preschool."

John is unsure of everything right now.

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