A/N: Didn't you think that little "I'd like a little respect around here, Nikolai," comment came out of no where. I'm kind of toying with the idea of the two of them being lovers. We'll see where it goes anyway.

It was a typical Saturday in his house, impossible to say which one; they all ran into each other after a while. In fact, when he really thought about it, Dirk couldn't really differentiate any day in his life from another. His time was divided into two different categories: before meeting Nikolai, and after meeting Nikolai. He never really went anywhere before meeting the troubled boy, and when he did go places they were never worth mentioning later. He never did anything before, and when he did do something it wasn't worth thinking about.

Nikolai lay on his back, spread out across Dirk's bed, staring up at the ceiling like a corpse. His eyes were so dark that they were almost black, his eyeliner only made them look blacker, emptier. It was like looking into two eye sized voids, two empty portraits of space devoid of stars. He looks like he hasn't combed his hair at all, maybe not ever; wouldn't that be just like him too? He makes dirty look good.

"Is there something on my face?" He doesn't move his eyes toward the boy sitting on the floor, and Dirk can't imagine how he actually can see him staring. All the same he turns red and looks at the wall because he can't think of anything else to look at.

"Before I met you nothing ever happened to me. "

"Nothing ever happens to you now, either." He sat up, and turned around so that Dirk could see the sarcastic smirk he gave him. He was hoping to be praised for bringing light into an otherwise dark life. It was the only thing he ever really appreciated, perhaps the only reason he even kept the other boy around. "Why do you always sit on the floor anyway? You look like an idiot."

He didn't dare say that it was because Nikolai took up the only sitting space in the room. He vaguely considered mentioning that his stretching out across the bed made it impossible to sit anywhere else. Instead he shrugged his shoulders, aware that it made him look all the stupider. "Everyone thinks I'm an idiot anyway, so it's all right."

"It's because you listen to everything everyone tells you to do. They think you can't think for yourself."

He knows he should be angry, he should be indignant. He should scoff or insult, ruffle himself up in someway to show how offended he is by this idea. Instead he glances up through his bangs over his eyes, and he grins. "Not everybody; just you."

"That isn't the point, Dirk," surprisingly, Nikolai doesn't look annoyed as he corrects him. He does his best to look exasperated though, "They don't really think you're an idiot; they think that we're fucking."

"Doesn't matter, does it? I don't care what they think." It's been Nikolai's litany. He's drilled it into everyone else's head that he doesn't care what anyone thinks of him. It's what makes him different than anyone else. So Dirk repeats it, because he's sure that is what his friend wants to hear.

"Yes, you do, actually. You're just like everyone else."

They're quiet for a few minutes; he doesn't know what he should do. It upsets him, and he bites his lip because it's what he always does when he's unhappy. "You're the only one who's any different from anyone else, Nikolai. We're all faceless, nameless clones; except for you. That's why no one understands you and everyone wants to." He thinks it in a very sarcastic tone; he wants the words to be glib, snide, and biting. He wants them to bring all of these adjectives to mind when heard. It doesn't come out that way though, he sounds meek and honest.