South Park © Matt & Trey

I like ruining Craig's life. All my Kenny/Craig fics have the weakest plots I just want an excuse to torture this cute lil shit (and use Jason to do it). Kenny's POV.

Warnings: humiliation, druggie/OOC Craig, a creepy hick, Jason/Craig

The consequence of desperate emotion comes swiftly and surely.

It's hazy. I dream about Craig and he's one of those fucked up kids – the kind who stays out late with old men, smoking and drinking and laughing. I dream about him becoming something I thought most people moved far away from. But I suppose it's nothing out of the ordinary in this pestilent hellhole called South Park.

Summer has arrived and the night is warm. There isn't a snowflake on the ground. Craig stands in a pair of loose basketball shorts and a torn t-shirt, talking to a bunch of old farts outside the pub. The mustached redneck sitting on a couple of stacked milk crates gropes his ass, giving it a hard smack before croaking, "Why don't you give us a little show?" They always want more. They are never satisfied. He could let his shorts ride low enough that his pubes were showing and they'd still want to see more. If he stripped down, the next thing they'd want is for him to bend over and spread his cheeks so they could look up his damn rectum.

Skeeter lets out a drunken laugh and says, "That's my nephew you're groping." He thinks it's funny.

Craig lips quirk upward but it is void of all human emotion. There's nothing there – not in his eyes, not in his smile. It's like he's empty, searching desperately for thought and feeling. He sits on the hick's lap, grinding his hips in a suggestive downward motion before settling. He's quiet. He says not a word, but he looks content amongst the silent dysfunction.

The cool wind sings in his face as Skeeter offers him a cigarette. With another void smile, he takes it – pressing it to his lips as his uncle lights it. He closes his eyes, inhaling deeply.

The night continues and midnight passes. Skeeter leaves his nephew and drives home drunk. Everyone else follows. Soon, Craig is left alone with the hick who is all hands. He stands up, turning around to stare at the man. "Do it," Craig challenges him. These are the first words he's spoken all night.

"Do what?" he asks.

"Fuck me," Craig says in a demand. "Hurt me. I want to feel something. I want to feel scared. I want to feel alive." Because, to Craig, it's the same damn thing.

The redneck moves forward in a slow and hazy motion, wrapping calloused fingers around Craig's throat. Craig cranes his slender neck and stares up at the man with those tragic blue eyes of his.

It's a humid night. They move into the man's pick-up truck and Craig inhales before peeling his clothes off shamelessly. It smells like tobacco – nothing atypical. He mounts the man and grinds his hips in a way he's done so many times before, releasing soft, breathy moans.

When it's over, Craig feels numb again. He lifts himself off of the man, letting out a shuddery breath. He feels wet between his legs – unpleasantly so. He sits in the passenger seat, ignoring the mess he's making, and grabs his clothes. "Just let me out," he says, rattling the locked door handle.

"You're not going to get dressed first?"

"It's raining out so there's no point," Craig points out. "Plus, it's late. No one will see."

"You really should get dressed… You'll get sick…"

"I don't care," Craig says flatly, growing impatient. "Let me out, old man."

Nothing.

Craig turns around and gives him a look of disbelief. "Hurry up!" he snaps.

The man doesn't look swayed. Instead, he reaches into the back seat of the car and what he pulls out makes Craig's heart stop in his chest. "What's that for?" he asks weakly, staring at the hammer.

"I'm going to kill you," the man says easily.

Because sluts don't get to choose.

Craig begins to panic. When the tool is swung, he holds out his hands, trying to block the brunt of the hit. He feels his fingers snap and the pain is blinding. He lets out a ragged scream that sounds like a string of sobs and he's unable to block the hits that follow.

There's nothing worse than knowing when you're about to die. For Craig, it happens quickly. There's pain in the back of his head and then there's nothing at all.

Across town, the prostitutes are finishing work. At four in the morning, Frida makes her way home after a long night. She walks past familiar alleyways, strolling effortlessly until something catches her eyes. It looks like a person but as she moves closer, she sees two dead eyes staring up at the sky as if it's home. What was once a boy is now a slab of meat, limp and still left on the street like road kill. But this was no hit and run. Realization dawns upon her weary self and she screams, calling for help.

Then it's quiet – just the rain, just the wind, just the soft whispers of a curious night crowd and the wail of approaching sirens.

"Just a boy," she tearfully tells the cops. "He was just a boy." And she saw this one around before – always with the older men, he was the kind who looked for danger. She never paid it much mind. She lets the kids do what they want. It's not her business who lives on the edge.

But this one bit the dust. Danger found Craig Tucker and it was hardly kind. The back of his head is like a bog, muddy and matted with blood – soft and splintered with debris and wet with gore. Then there are his wide eyes – dull and glazed over with a fear so strong it still remains present even in death. There are specks of dirt stuck to his eyelashes. His lips lost color – parted with sudden shock that went hand in hand with the pain. He is white as a sheet and cold as the winter snow. A streak of silt clutters his otherwise unblemished face – still beautifully intact like the statue of a marble angel whose wings were clipped.

But Craig was no angel.

Six broken fingers. Three cracked ribs. A blow so hard and deep to the chest it could've crushed his heart, but no, none of that is what killed him. The coroner's report reads BLUNT TRAUMA. It is a hit to the head that did him in when he tried to get away.

One year later his mom will still sit at home on the sofa in a housecoat, watching home videos of his youth and looking through old photo albums – when the times were still happy.

Mommy will cry and Daddy will get drunk and Ruby will be all alone. She'll put her head on her Mommy's lap but her Mommy won't even notice. They'll do anything to forget that their only son was found naked and sprawled out in one of South Park's gnarly orifices by a hooker. They'll do anything to forget about the rumors that spun around screaming whore, whore, whore! Your baby boy was a dirty whore!

Good things come to those who wait but death isn't kind to those who don't care. Perhaps Craig realized all too late that life is precious. He didn't want to die, that much was clear… but still, for the first time in my life I understand what Kenneth Kramer meant when he said death is an art because Craig was eerily beautiful even in parting.

.

.

.

Butters is going to bring a bologna sandwich to school tomorrow. Red is going to break up with Jason in exchange for an open relationship with Kevin Stoley. Kyle is going to score the final shot in this week's basketball game. Stan is going to skip class and get an untimely weekend detention. Randy is going to get drunk and arrested. Bebe is going to find twenty bucks on her way home. Wendy is going to get her feminist article published in the local newspaper. Token will ask Nichole to the school dance and she'll happily accept. Lola is going to get a haircut and she'll thank me for being the only one to notice. Eric will continue suppressing every homosexual urge he feels when he sees Kyle and instead, he'll act ten times as cruel to compensate. Clyde will get a promotion at Wal-Mart. Tweek will green out in class again. Jimmy and Timmy will have another fight, but they'll make up at the end of the day.

These are the kinds of things I typically see. These are the kind of happy, mindless or typical events I dream of. They always come true. But this is different. I wake up sweating and I wake up scared. Just like midnight, I now know Craig's dirty secret. I know where he'll be when the snow melts away and I know what will happen because of it.

I've dreamt about Craig before, but nothing like this. Last month I dreamt about him stepping on a wad of gum on his way to the bus stop, cussing the entire way. A few months before that, I dreamt about him and Jason having an argument – a seemingly pointless one that blew over rather fast. That's nothing compared to this. I've never dreamt about someone dying. I've never dreamt about something this vile. I feel like I'm suffocating. I rip the blankets off of me and get out of bed, pacing and wringing my fingers through my stringy, unwashed hair.

I want to help him. But can I? This is new territory for me. I've never intervened before, but I've questioned. I've asked time and time again why I have these dreams. Maybe it was leading up to this – saving somebody's life.

I've never seen that man before. I don't know how to figure out who he is. I wonder if Craig saw him around, or if he'll be meeting him for the first time. He doesn't care who he lets slip inside of him and I think that's kind of sad. But I always knew that. Craig has a famous reputation that he doesn't seem to care about. There's all kinds of shit he should be careful of, but he's not.

I close my eyes and take a string of slow, deep breaths. It's time for school and I can't be late again. There is still snow on the ground outside. That means I have time, so I push all thoughts aside. I get dressed in yesterday's clothes, grab my school bag and leave. No time for a shower and even if there was, we have no hot water. Livin' the life, I am. These are the perks of being poor white trash.

I run to catch the bus, arriving just in time. I sit down in the first empty spot I find. When the bus starts moving, I turn around. Kyle and Stan are sitting in the back with Butters and Eric. Craig is sitting with Red. She's talking and he looks bored. I never really understood their friendship, but I see them kiss sometimes. I think they hook up.

I don't even want to fucking look at him, to be quite frank. All I can see is him lying in an alleyway naked and dead. How degrading. I don't want that image to be one I associate with him for the rest of my life.

I face the front and lean my head against the window. It rattles unpleasantly as the bus drives, but I don't even care.

Shit happens. Shit always happens and things change because of it. Change is ever-present in my life. I've changed a lot as I grew up. Out of us all, I think Stan changed the least. He wears the same haircut and moons over the same girl. Similarly, Kyle still looks a lot like that nerdy kid he used to be. He still has a lot of curly hair, but he keeps it a bit shorter these days. He's pretty willowy, but he's not quite as tall as Eric. Believe it or not puberty was kind to Eric. He's still broad and little chubby, but he's handsome. He wears his weight well these days. I can't help but wonder if Kyle thinks so, too. Kyle is a virgin. You can practically smell it on him. He's the only virgin in our group of friends. Even Butters isn't a virgin. But I guess Kyle wants to wait until he's found the right person. I can respect that. It takes a lot to hold fast and not go along with what everyone else is doing.

I lost my virginity when I was twelve. I was far too young. I get that now, but at the time I just wanted it gone. I was a horny little shit. I still am. Some things don't change.

I lift my head and stare out the window, watching the houses go by. The ride is fairly short and soon enough, the bus pulls to a halt. I get off and make my way inside, strolling to grab my books.

Craig shoves his way through the hallway, paddling past his peers. Clyde is next to him, looking somewhat wary. I grab him by the arm and decide to be nosy. "What the fuck is wrong with Craig?" I ask Clyde as his volatile best friend swerves past me.

"He hasn't been taking his pills this week," Clyde answers in a hushed tone, "So, don't talk to him. He's kind of mental."

Contrary to popular belief, Craig is volatile. One wrong move and he'll snap. That's why he's not big on people. According to Bebe, "All Craig does is sit around smoking weed and jacking off." It sounds like a pretty empty life to me, but I guess he likes it like that. She says he has very limited personality and people just want to fuck him because he looks nice. She'll add that the saddest part of it all is that he always lets them. Even those who don't know Craig personally have heard the rumors. When it comes to sex, he's capricious. And talented. I guess, for kids like Craig, sex is just another form of self-harm.

For some reason, knowing he's being medicated doesn't really surprise me – especially not after last night's dream. Or maybe I should start calling it a nightmare. That's what it was. There has to be something wrong with his head for him to be acting out so insanely. Even I wouldn't touch that nasty, old hick. Everyone needs to have standards.

"Duly noted," I mumble. Nonetheless, Craig hears us. He spins around at rapid speed, darting towards me. He grabs me by the scruff of my shirt and punches me square in the face.

Crack!

The Crystals had it right. He hit me and it felt like a fuckin' kiss.