In the dark of the night, under the safety of his bed covers, Clyde cried. He laid awake, curled up in a little ball, and allowed his tears to flow freely. He sniffled and wiped at his damp cheeks, his throat burning with the want to wail and scream in despair, but he had to hold it in so as to not attract his father's attention. His father was suffering enough too without having to deal with his son.
Clyde wasn't even sure whether his father could bear to look at him. It was all his fault after all, that his mother was dead. His mother had told him to again and again, over and over, but still he had not put the toilet seat down, and because of that she was gone, and would never be returning.
Never again would she sing him Dutch lullabies, or read him bedtime stories, or comfort him on a bad day with a pat to his head and a kiss to his forehead and a promise to make his favourite food for dinner. He wouldn't be able to cuddle her on the couch, or hold her hand in the grocery store, or see her smiling at him every day like she loved him.
"Mommy…" Clyde wept quietly into the depths of his pillow, as though saying her name would bring her back, "…Mommy…Mommy…" She usually swooped straight to his side as soon as he called her, there to give him anything he needed. That time, she did not appear. She would not appear anymore.
Clyde didn't know who to turn to. His father would be unable to grant him any comfort or support, too busy mourning for the loss of his wife, just as grief-stricken. Nobody at school had lost their mother, so Clyde was alone in knowing the pain of it. Furthermore, he wondered whether he even deserved someone to tell him it would all be okay. He had essentially killed his mother, after all. Murderers weren't worthy of mercy.
"I'm sorry, mommy." Clyde sniffed, wiping his eyes of their blooming tears. "I didn't mean to. I'm sorry." No matter how much he apologised, his guilt was not alleviated. He had told her how sorry he was, back in the bathroom, just moments before she had died. She had not forgiven him. She never would.
Clyde buried his head deeper into his pillow to let out a throat-shattering wail. Everything hurt. He didn't know how anything could go back to normal anymore. From then on, there would only be three people seated at their table instead of four. From then on, the looks he would receive in the school hallways would either be pitying, sad for the boy without a mother, or repulsed, disgusted by the blood on his wiener. He would be defined by his mother, or lack thereof, and nothing more or less.
Clyde wailed louder yet, no longer caring who heard him. Even if his father heard him he was sure he wouldn't go to him anyway. His father couldn't do anything to make it all better. But, amidst his wails, he heard something unusual: an incessant tapping at his window.
Clyde quietened and listened harder, and his eyes widened as the tapping continued. The tapping was too loud and regular to be that of tree branches, Clyde realised, and so, fearfully, he jerked up from underneath his covers and turned his head to the window to see what it could be.
There was nobody there. Clyde breathed a sigh of relief, glad that he wasn't about to star in the type of story that belonged in a horror movie, but then, just as he was moving back under his covers, he saw that though there was nobody there, there was something.
Clyde jerked up again, and blinked in surprise at it, once, twice, multiple times in quick succession. He rubbed his eyes good and hard, but it was still there when he opened them again, so he cocked his head at it in confusion. He never thought that he would ever see a taco on his windowsill.
Curiously, but cautiously, Clyde crawled across his mattress to the window, where he lifted the latch and pulled it up and open. Clear as day, sitting unassumingly on the sill, was a plated taco. Clyde wondered whether he was dreaming at first, since tacos often appeared in his dreams, but when he reached out to touch it, it felt too real to be of his imagination, no matter how surreal it seemed.
He picked it up and brought it up to his nose, and he smelt it. He smiled as it smelt absolutely delectable, and it was still warm too, so it was soft and squishy. Clyde wanted to sink his teeth into it right away, but he still found it questionable. He twisted it this way and that, inspecting it for clues, but it was just an innocent taco. He then peered at the plate, and there he noticed a strip of paper.
He picked up the paper, which was lined and looked as though it had been ripped from a notebook. It had writing on it, smudged, blocky and messy, but still able to be read if he looked closely enough.
Your last bastion of American freedom has been desecrated, so take this compensatory taco.
Clyde gaped at the note, recoiling from it in shock. He turned it over, and then back again, but there was no name to accompany the writing. Whoever had written it though knew much about him – his mother's death, the cause of it, and his favourite food. It was kind of creepy, honestly, but with a taco in hand Clyde failed to be as concerned as he should have.
The note-writer-slash-taco-sender seemed to mean well, so Clyde felt no qualms with shoving the paper into the top draw of his bedside table, settling down on the edge of his bed, and sinking his teeth into the taco. He hummed in delight as he chewed, for fireworks went off in his mouth and his taste buds exploded. It was one of the best tacos he had ever had.
He felt that he should have savoured it more, but Clyde couldn't help scarfing it down as though it would disappear if he wasn't quick enough. Even after he had devoured it he still picked at the crumbs that had landed on his lap and ate those, and licked each and every tip of his fingers clean. His smile was wide on his face, and he felt much better.
Clyde paused. He felt much better, he realised. The taco had been a simple gesture, but for a moment it had taken away the pain and hurt and brought him back to another time, to the days where he was just a boy in elementary school whose favourite food was tacos, and nothing more, nothing less. The sender of the gift had done that for him – comforted him – and it felt as good as his mother's pats on the head and hugs and assurances had.
Clyde crawled hurriedly back to the window, and leant out of it. Again there was nobody there, neither were there footprints in the snow to lead him to the sender. Stuck for whom exactly to show gratitude to, Clyde looked up to the starry night sky and whispered into the quiet, "Thank you." He hoped that whoever the sender was, even if they couldn't hear it, would at least be able to feel his gratitude blended into the chill of the air.
Clyde closed the window and shut the latch before returning to bed. He pulled the covers up over himself, snuggled into a ball, and rested his head against the pillow, finally closing his eyes to the day and welcoming sleep. No more tears threatened to fall, his frown replaced by a faint, peaceful smile. Clyde was content with the knowledge that somewhere out there, regardless of who he was and what he had done, someone was looking out for him.
Author's Notes:
This is dedicated to Sakazaki-Chan: a reviewer of one of my previous stories, who politely requested a Clydeman fanfiction. I don't ship Clydeman myself, but she was so nice, and I feel so bad for the small fandom of that ship, that I wrote for Clydeman anyway. It's subtle Clydeman though - you have to squint, and you have to have watched S16E01 'Reverse Cowgirl', and you have to have noticed that, in that episode, Cartman referred to the bathroom as "the last bastion of American freedom." If you did all that and you still didn't notice the Clydeman, then my bad. But know that it is a Clydeman fanfiction, so take it, Clydeman shippers, as a gift to your small fandom. May it help your ship support grow, and allow you to have many more people to fangasm about the ship with.
Also, it's my third week anniversary! *Puts on a party hat and blows a party blower* Don't be fooled into thinking that I'm always going to update weekly though, because that is not the case. I will do my best to write as much as possible though, believe me in that!
Thanks for reading this, and I hope you liked doing so as much as I liked writing it!
Disclaimer: South Park belongs not to me, but to its creators, Trey Parker and Matt Stone.