So...had a really bad self-loathing episode last night and didn't know how to get to feeling better about the whole thing. John ( Formerly JVM-SP150) told me to write. This was the result. The bit at the end is based on a Tumblr post I found about how our good qualities are taped to our backs. I can't seem to find the actual post but I can't take credit for that idea wholly. Please read and review.
I own nothing. South Park and its characters are © Trey Parker, Matt Stone and Comedy Central.
Butters thinks about people a lot. People don't think a lot about him, but that's okay. Sometimes you can learn more about people when they're not noticing you. Just from snippets of conversations or sometimes even things they don't say. Sometimes, it's nicer that way. If they don't notice, you don't get told to fuck off or called a queerbait or asked to go and see if Daddy still has those men's underwear catalogues in his desk drawer (he wishes one of these days someone will please tell him what's wrong with men looking at men's underwear. It's FOR men, so why do people get so upset?). It also means that Butters doesn't get told about all the things that are wrong with him either.
Like the jeans. They're blue skinny jeans, just the kind he likes. Unfortunately, the only place that seems to stock the jeans he likes is a girl's shop. Eternally 36 or something, he can't quite remember. They were really cheap and they fit fine and they even have neato little hearts on the back pockets. But Mom doesn't like them. Men should be men, she says. And sometimes, Butters wishes he was manly. He tries but he's always preferred Hello Kitty to World of Warcraft. He went out for football and baseball like his dad said he should but honestly, they were kinda boring. You can't make things your own or just have fun with those sports like with dancing. You go in and you're mean to the other team and they're mean to you and by the end…well, by the end, everyone's just at each other's throats the whole time and if you stop paying attention, or even just make a mistake, well then, boy howdy, your whole team gets sore with you.
No, Butters doesn't need telling what's wrong with him. He knows anyway. As of last week, he's now the smallest boy in the class. It used to be okay because Tweek was always the smallest but now he's half an inch taller so Butters is now the class shortass. Why, even some of the girls are taller than him now. Heidi Turner's three whole inches taller. Butters wishes he was taller, like Kyle or Kenny. Not really really tall, like Token (who keeps hitting his head on things, poor guy), but just…tall enough to not be made fun of. Girls won't date a guy who's smaller than them when they wear heels.
Then there's his face. No wonder he got grounded for it that one time. It's a stupid face. His cheeks are too pink and his eyelashes are too long and his nose turns up at the end and Cartman says he has a pig nose. Personally, Butters thinks he'd rather have a pig nose than a pig face like Cartman has but he's not going to say that. That'd be mean and besides, he doesn't want to get another swirlie. It's true anyway-he does have a pig nose, not to mention the ugly, puckered scar across his left eye. His face is terrible and the rest of his body's not much better. He has hips like a girl. Why, just the other day, Bill and Fosse said hips like those should be used to make babies. Butters doesn't want to make babies-that's what ladies do and anyway, he has enough to worry about with this algebra homework. At least he's not fat-his parents will ground him forever if he gets fat again-but he wishes he wasn't quite so bony.
It's okay though. Lexus and Sally and people said he was cute. And he was #11 on the list. That's got to be kind of cute, right? And even the people who everyone thinks are cute have things they don't like about themselves, Butters has learned, from all the times people haven't noticed him. Sally Turner hates being flat-chested while Bebe thinks her boobs don't count because she's fat. Bebe isn't fat. She's not thin either, at all really, but she's rounded and curvy and most boys in the school, Butters included, think she's hot so he just doesn't get it. Kyle hates his hair and Craig never smiles with his mouth open because of his fucked-up teeth and even though Butters wishes he was as tall as Heidi, she hates being tall. Jimmy gets self-conscious about how his face looks and even though Stan's got a bunch of muscles, he thinks his belly's flabby. Henrietta cried the other day because she won't fit into the 2XL corset she found on etsy and Kenny hates not having muscles. Even Kenny's sweet little sister thinks she's ugly because she's dirty and can't afford nice clothes. Butters hopes Kenny never finds out about that-it'd break his heart.
Everyone Butters knows thinks they're ugly or not good enough. They don't concentrate on the good things. Butters thinks it must be like that game where someone writes a name on your forehead. Everyone else can see it but you can't and you just have to figure it out for yourself. Everyone in South Park has something-even Cartman's nice to cats. So maybe…maybe butters just needs to keep looking.