Eighth story. Kenny/Kyle (as usual) and tons of storytelling. Unfortunately, I was unable to make this story longer; I just didn't have any ideas. However, this is the original plot that I had come up with while writing my seventh story (and forgot about, temporarily). So I already have a second plot all worked out.

Note: This story has a "darker" setting than the others.

THREE YEARS AGO

Stan was having a hard time with his cynicism. He tried to endure it, for his friends' sakes, as he was the one who kept them all together. He knew that if he left, Kenny and Kyle wouldn't stand Cartman's idiocy anymore and after that, Kenny and Kyle would also break apart, unable to admit their feelings to each other. However, it was getting worse. To him, everything looked, smelled and tasted like shit.
Stan couldn't take it anymore. He had to leave South Park. He had it all planned out. He saved a large amount of money so he could start over somewhere new; rent an apartment, get a job... all he had to do was keep his parents and his friends from ever finding out where he went.

Stan had already called a taxi, which was now waiting for him outside of town. He finished writing his "Goodbye" note and left.

The following morning, Stan's sister was the first to find the note he left. It was wet from Stan's tears and it was clear that his hands were shaking while he was writing it. She picked it up and read it.

"I'm sorry, I just can't take it anymore.
The world is full of shit. I tried to pretend I didn't see it, I tried to pretend I was happy, for your sakes, but I can't do it anymore. Mom and dad are not getting back together and no amount of therapy is going to fix me.
I need to get away from all of this.
Goodbye."

"...That stupid turd..."

Although Shelly used to pick on her brother, over the last couple of years they had been growing closer together, mostly due to his cynicism. She tried to help him through it by listening to his complaints and trying to cheer him up. Sometimes she went with him to therapy, but it was of no use. Shelly knew that, eventually, Stan was going to do something stupid. She just never expected this. Shelly warned her mother, who called the police and all of Stan's friends. Nobody reported seeing him anywhere.

A few hours later, the entire town had been turned upside down by the police in a futile effort to find Stan. His parents were freaking out and blaming each other, while his friends were looking for him everywhere. They kept on searching the town, knowing that the police were incompetent. However, like the police, their attempt resulted in failure. Stan was gone. He left his cellphone behind, cleared his text messages, phone calls, emails and anything else that could have been used as a lead to find him.

PRESENT

For three years, the police didn't give up on searching for Stan. His parents never lost hope either, but they stopped talking to each other permanently. Shelly hadn't tried to get them to talk to each other again. She knew it was pointless. They each blamed the other one for Stan's disappearance and they were too angry to talk it out.

As Stan thought, Kenny, Kyle and Cartman split up. Following his disappearance, Kenny had started doing "mild" drugs again, like alcohol. It was the only way he knew of to deal with a problem. Kyle became obsessed with school, thinking that if he attained enough knowledge, he could fix everything. Cartman, on the other hand, just started eating more and more, becoming fatter than ever, and mocked everyone he could. Like Kenny, it was the only way he could deal with this.

One year after his disappearance, Kenny and Kyle had had enough of Cartman and his bullshit and told him to go hang out with someone else. Since then, Cartman, Tweek, Token and Craig had been hanging out together. Kenny and Kyle were unable to "fill the void" caused by fatass leaving the group and, during the following year and a half, slowly stopped talking to each other to the point that they only talked when it was either necessary or they were forced to. Kenny being drunk most of the time and Kyle always hitting the books didn't help much.

However, unlike what Stan thought, it wasn't just Kenny, Kyle and Cartman that split up.
Stan didn't know it, but he was one of the few people responsible for keeping South Park held together. Butters became cold. He stopped caring about everyone and everything except for his most basic needs: food and rest. Craig, much to everyone's surprise, took it very hard and became silent. He barely communicated with anyone, even his own parents. It was the only reason he was able to deal with Cartman being around him. Token and Tweek, however, supported each other and were just glad to have someone to talk to other than Craig.

Kenny woke up in a bed for once. Usually he just woke up anywhere in South Park, covered in bruises from a fight, so this was somewhat of an improvement.
He looked around and noticed that he was late for school, again. He slowly got up from the bed, groaning. He looked more carefully at his surroundings and noticed that this wasn't his room, it was Tweek's.

There was a small note taped to his chest. It had clearly been written by Tweek. Even after giving up coffee when Stan left, his handwriting was... unique.

"Kenny, you came into my room last night, talking about Stan, Kyle and something else I can't remember."

"I must've been more drunk than I thought to talk about Kyle..."

"You threw up on my shoes (thanks for that, by the way)-"

"Fucking smartass..."

"-and passed out on my bed. I tried to wake you up, but it was of no use, so I just cleaned you up as best I could and used my sleeping bag."

"That explains why my shirt is missing... I guess I should be thankful he didn't call the cops."

"You're my friend and all,-"

"Aw, that's sweet..."

"but I really hope this doesn't happen again."

"So do I. Now how do I get out of here?"

Kenny looked around and noticed the window was slightly open, and that there was a ladder next to it.

"Thanks, Tweek."

Kenny used the ladder to get out of Tweek's house, since it'd be hard trying to explain to his parents why he was there in the first place.

Meanwhile, as Kenny raced home, Kyle was getting bored listening to Mr. Garrison's long speech about his ex-boyfriend. He looked outside and let his mind wander. First he was thinking about Stan; where he was, how he was doing... then about Stan's parents; specifically about whether they had given up hope like almost everyone else or not.
Eventually his thoughts turned to Kenny. He thought about why Kenny drank so much. It caused Kyle great pain to see him like that. Kyle knew Kenny was just trying to deal with Stan going away, but this was no way to do it.

After a while he started daydreaming about Kenny, as he usually did while taking breaks from studying. He imagined that Kenny had stopped drinking himself half to death every single night and that they were together. Then reality stabbed Kyle's fantasy in the gut and left it bleeding to death in a dark alley. Kenny wasn't going to change. He was going to keep drinking until one day his body couldn't take it anymore. The only question was how long that would take. Even if Kyle and Kenny started dating, Kyle knew the blond boy wouldn't change.
They could never be together.

By the time Kenny arrived, their first class had already ended. As usual, Butters was nowhere to be seen. He was probably home, like he had been for the past three weeks. Everyone was worried about him, but he kept pushing them away, telling them that he was fine and that they shouldn't worry. However, this wasn't new. Ever since Stan left, Butters stayed at home for a few days at a time, though it had gotten worse in the past year. He used to stay home for a few days, a week at the most, but since this year he stayed home for two to three weeks, sometimes a whole month. If he wasn't so smart (and if the teachers weren't so forgiving) he'd have flunked a long time ago.

Kenny looked over at Kyle, who was sitting alone, studying. He never stopped studying while he was anywhere near the school, not even during recess. Kenny admired his intelligence, but he also thought that, lately, Kyle had become too obsessed with studying. When they were still hanging out, Kyle used to stay up studying until he passed out from exhaustion, and Kenny had no reason to believe that had changed.
However, that thought brought back memories from that time. After Kyle passed out, Kenny used to carry him to his bed, taking great care not to wake him up, and carefully put all his stuff back in its place before. Sometimes Kenny wasn't entirely sure Kyle was asleep, as he used to smile in his arms before he laid him down on his bed, although he never asked Kyle about it, as he was afraid that he wouldn't share his feelings.

The bell suddenly rang and Kyle noticed Kenny was staring at him. The latter quickly looked at random things, pretending that he wasn't paying attention to Kyle. Afterwards, Kenny raced inside, sat down and took out his things to get started for his class.

The day went on without any incidents. Kyle kept studying during the recesses, Kenny stayed alone, sometimes with a cigarette in his hand, Cartman was hanging out with his new group and Butters never came to school.

School was finally over and everyone left. Ever since Stan ran away, the end of schoolwork for the day didn't mean that everyone would be running home as usual. The kids tended to stick together for as long as possible, slowly moving towards their respective homes. Nobody knew exactly why they did this except Mr. Mackey. As the school's counselor, it was his job to know what the kids were thinking. He knew they thought that if they stuck together, nobody would leave again.

Only Kenny and Kyle were walking together now. They didn't say a word to each other on their way home. They finally came to a stop in front of Kyle's house. Kyle looked around and, once he was sure nobody was listening, turned to Kenny. He wanted to see if Kenny could, in fact, change. He wanted to give him a chance.

Kyle: ...Kenny.

"This should be good..."

Kenny: Yeah?
Kyle: ...I'm worried about you.

"Oh, great. Here comes a long boring speech about how drinking is bad and how I'm 'destroying myself'."

Kenny: Kyle, if you're going to tell me to stop drinking, don't. I've heard that speech so many times before it's not even funny anymore.

"Just like I thought. I'm wasting my time with you, Kenny."

Kyle: ...Goodbye, Kenny.
Kenny: ...I guess that means you don't want to see me again.

Kyle didn't answer Kenny, he just turned around and went upstairs to his room. Kenny knew what this meant. Kyle was never going to talk to him again, regardless of the situation.

Kyle looked out his bedroom window and saw Kenny walking away. He then glanced over at the town. Even though it was Winter, South Park seemed unusually dark.

"Could Stan's absence really influence the town this much?"

Kenny slowly walked home. He felt sad because he had just pushed the guy he loved out of his life because of his pride. Kyle was never going to talk to him again.
As soon as Kenny got home, he took some beer out of the fridge, went upstairs, locked his door and window so he wouldn't wander during the night and started drinking it. Before he finished the fourth bottle, he rolled off his bed, onto the floor and passed out, crying.

Meanwhile, Butters was in his bathroom, looking at himself in the mirror. His skin was pale, his hair looked like crap and he had large bags under his eyes from lack of sleep. He had even lost weight.

"Fuck this."

Butters had had enough. For three years he'd been overreacting to Stan leaving. He was going to clean himself up and tomorrow he was going back to school.

Well, that's the first chapter. It's shorter than the others, but I hope you enjoyed it anyway. I'll be working hard on the second one.
Also, a friend of mine came up with a third plot (for my tenth story) which will be at least 4 chapters long. I'm gonna try to make it 8 chapters long, but I can't make any promises. I'll try to finish this one and the ninth one as soon as possible without lowering quality (and without screwing up my schoolwork, obviously).