My Girlfriend's Father

by robert3A-SN

Butters girlfriend Julia returns, but under pretty bad circumstances as her dad was badly hurt while performing at a Texas prison, and he's sent to stay with the Stotches while recovering. As he does so, Butters tries to help Julia cope with the problem.

This was supposed to be a very happy moment for her. They were gonna be back in South Park in just a few minutes, and they would be staying with the boy she was in love with for a undetermined amount of time. She should have been overjoyed- and she would have been if it wasn't only happening because of her dad's accidents.

Julia Simmons was in the back seat of her dad's car, but her dad wasn't driving it, his doctor was. Julia's dad, Bill Simmons, was sitting next to her wearing the headband and cast on his right leg that he had been wearing for the last week. Luckly the cast on his arm had been taken off before they went on the road, so he was starting to recover. But he still wasn't close to the condition he was in before the attacks and the pill popping.

Mr Simmons had been traveling around the country to act with an acting troupe for years, taking Julia with him to several towns for only a few weeks time. But finally he had settled down in Texas to take a job entertaining death row prisoners, and he had become a hit among the prisoners who obviously didn't have much else to laugh about. It was the first time that Julia could remember that she had a perminant home instead of staying in a town every month or two. However, when she came home from school to find out that a riot had broken out in the prison her dad was performing in, and he had been beaten and almost raped in the chaos, she had very little time to be happy about that. Then when Bill found out that no prisons would hire him for work again because their convicts would be too tempted to actually rape him after hearing about what happened, that night he turned to taking too many of the pills he had to use to lessen his pain.

Once he went back to the local hospital to recover, the Simmons's doctor had to tell Julia some even better news.

"Julia, it appears your father took all those pain pills because of stress. From what I got out of him, he knows that since you and him have to move to another town because the Texas prisons won't hire him anymore, he needed something to distract him. And they gave him enough of a high to have at least 10 minutes of pain free forgetfulness."

"So what are you saying, my dad's hurt and he's a pill popping freak?" The doctor sighed and took a while to figure out the rest of the situation to Julia. "No, he isn't a pill popping freak, but he is extremely upset that he's lost his job just when you had a stable home life again. Obviously he can't finish his recovery from his injuries and stop himself from taking too many pills again from here, this place holds too many memories. Perhaps he has some friends from out of the state that can take him in or find someplace for him to go to."

"You really think it would be better for him to recover somewhere else?"

"Somewhere far away from the prison and your home here would help." Once Julia took that all in, she tried to remember if his dad had any family members he'd want to stay with, but he may not have wanted to let them know about these recent events. However, Julia nearly slapped herself for not remembering sooner that there was a family they knew very well that could take them in.

"Do you have a phone nearby? And do they accept collect calls to South Park, Colorado from here?"

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As the Simmons were on their way to South Park, the family that would be their hosts for the next few days were waiting around in their living room. Chris and Linda Stotch were sitting on the couch and listening for any cars to come, while their son, Leopold "Butters" Stotch, was actually looking for cars through the window and trying to spot if any of them had his girlfriend in them.

Since Julia had first visited South Park just over a year ago, her and Butters had been good friends, then closer and closer friends, until finally they officially became boyfriend and girlfriend over Christmas vacation. But after Julia's visit during Valentine's week, she hadn't been over to see him since, until now. Butters still remembered how shocked he was when Julia called him a few days ago and told him about what had happened to her dad. But that was before Julia told him that she wanted her and Mr Simmons to stay with the Stotches so they could help her dad recover from what had happened. Obviously Butters was happy that he would be able to see her again- but doing so while Mr Simmons was recovering from a prison riot beating and from taking too many pills to forget it, that kinda ruined a lot of the fun. But after she talked it over with Butters's parents, they agreed to let them come anyway.

And come by they did as their doctor finally arrived at the Stotch house and pulled up to their driveway a second later. "Mom, Dad, t-they're here!"

Butters immediatly left the house to head over to the car. Chris and Linda followed and saw the Simmons's doctor get out, then open the back door to help Mr Simmons get out. The Stotches cringed a bit when they actually got to see Bill Simmons condition instead of just hearing about it from Julia and the doctor. His hair was messed up, his arms still didn't look that good, and there was indeed a cast on his leg. He had to lean on his doctor with great difficulty for both of them until Julia came over and handed her father his crutches. He quickly took them and leaned on him as he got his posture back together.

"Chris, Linda, Butters. Thank you for not minding that I'm taking up your guest room for a while." It took a while for Linda to stop staring at Mr Simmons's leg before she had an answer for that.

"Oh! Don't worry Bill, it's absolutly no trouble. You just concentrate on not getting high and not breaking any more bones while you're here." Maybe that wasn't the best way to greet him, but it would have to do as Mr Simmons decided he should get in and get settled. His doctor went to the trunk to take his and Julia's luggage as Bill headed inside. Chris and Linda went to follow him in case he had trouble getting inside. Once that was settled, Butters was left alone with Julia for the first time in a few months.

He had been waiting to see her for some time, and he figured that when she showed up, he would run over and kiss her right away, or at least give her a hug. That was what boyfriends did for their girlfriends when they came to visit, at least that's what those old movies on the HBO Romance Channel told him. But under the current circumstances, with Julia obviously not feeling too well because of her dad's ordeals, he really didn't know how to greet her. Like Julia, Butters had expected that being together again would feel more pleasent than it did right now. But all he could bring himself to do was go over and hold her hand.

"Hey." Butters would have thought of something with a few more words in it, but he still didn't have much of a clue on how to talk to her without going back to referring to Bill. "So...."

"I'm okay Butters. The doctor said my dad would be better off being out of town and being around friends, and I would be better off dealing with it because I have you around to help me. So it shouldn't be so bad when you look at it that way." Julia put on a brave little smile and went back to the trunk to find any spare luggage the doctor might have left.

Butters looked at her and how it didn't appear that she was finished hiding any sadness she might have just hidden from him a second ago. Well, Julia was a strong and confident young girl and she wasn't really scared of anything, so Butters didn't really doubt that she had the strength to overcome this. But he'd been through enough hard times and seen enough trashy melodramatic movies to know that characters who have to deal with family troubles like this don't always come out of it so well, they go through real sad spells at some point. "And now i-it's up to me to make sure her s-sad spells aren't that sad or magical or something.", he muttered. Julia talked her dad into staying here to heal because they trusted the Stotches to be their friends and do whatever they could for them, and Julia trusted Butters to be there for her and help her feel better if she wasn't handling things very well. It was now his responsibility as her boyfriend to succeed in that job 100%, even though he wasn't sure how. But he wasn't gonna figure that out standing out here, so he went back inside with Julia once she got finished up. And not only did they walk in together, they were both hoping that wouldn't go down as the most peaceful moment of the whole visit.

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Once the Simmons doctor laid down the ground rules for treating Bill and left, the Stotches helped Bill head up into his guest room.

"So, what's the drill here? How is this gonna go?", Bill asked as he carefully sat down on the bed so as not to hurt his leg.

"Well, you're supposed to stay here and relax while your injuries heal. According to the doctor, staying here among friends should be better for you than recovering in the state where you got beaten up and got high on pain pills." It took a sharp elbow jab in the stomach by Linda for Chris to realize he should have chosen his words more carefully. But Butters didn't get such a wakeup call in time. "Hey, M-Mr Simmons, I don't get how you could get high from pills anyway!"

Before Julia could cover up for Butters's error, her dad let him off the hook by answering. "It wasn't that hard, actually. After I got beat up, none of the other prisons wanted to hire me since their prisoners might want the piece of me that my "friends" couldn't get. So since I didn't have a job, I knew I'd probably have to move to another town to get one, even after I finally had a stable home for the first time in years and years. Me and Julia would have to start moving around after I thought we'd never have to go through that again." After thinking a bit about that particularly cruel outcome, Bill willed himself to finish. "And I suppose since those pills were supposed to get rid of pain, I figured enough of them would make me forget about how I messed up for a while. Luckly Julia called the doctor in time so I could get back to Earth before I....messed other things up too."

"Well we didn't let you in here to remember that, did we? You're here to get better and no one's making that any harder for him, right?" Linda made sure to glare extra hard at her son and husband so they made sure that it wasn't a request, but a demand. They quickly got the point and helped Bill lie down. "You just take a while to relax and soon we'll have a nice dinner ready for you to forget the rest."

Linda's plan didn't exactly make Bill forget everything, but the dinner did help make him sleepy enough to have a nice rest. The Stotches led him right back to his room and he was out like a light at about the time his back hit the bed. Since that pretty much ended Chris and Linda's caregiving jobs for the day, they headed back downstairs to actually have some time to themselves, leaving the kids by themselves again.

"Well, since Dad's asleep, I should probably get some sleep too. Better get ready for a whole day of watching Dad heal." Julia commented with just a little sarcasm.

"Oh, well if that really i-isn't that much fun, you know you can h-hang out with me and the gang after school." Butters offered. "Hmm, I never thought of doing that, but I guess I can try and fit that in."

"Are you sure you w-won't have time to hang out with us in school? Now that Wendy's out of j-jail Mr Garrison's getting back to actually teaching us a-again, we could use another distraction from his creepy jokes." Butters chuckled a bit, then figured out that talking about some of the other recent events he'd been through might lighten the mood. "Hey, did you s-see us fight all t-those cops and crush their balls on TV?"

"Yeah, I saw it, we had to so we could see if you guys were gonna get Wendy out of jail. Dad did go on strike for that, you know." Butters nodded since he did remember that during the recent ordeal with Wendy being in prison, they had talked Mr Simmons into going on strike from entertaining prisoners until Wendy was released. That caused the prisoners to riot enough to bug the Texas governor like they planned, in the hopes that he would talk the Colorado state governor into getting Wendy out. It ultimatly didn't affect anything in the long run though. But Julia was starting to remember how things were right up until this latest ordeal.

"You know, those prisoners were happy to see Dad once he got back on the job, they all loved seeing his act. And once he came back, they loved it again. Then they liked him enough that they wanted to be, well, too aggressive in helping him with his act. Then....well, they didn't like him all that much." Julia took an awfully long sigh and recovered quickly before Butters could see anything else wrong with her. "But it's not all my problem, it's my dad's, and I'd better get some sleep to help him deal with it better."

"Oh, w-well okay. I could use a l-little 10 hour r-rest myself." Butters walked out of the room and headed for his room, right across the hall from the Simmons. He turned around to face Julia again and tried to find a good last word for the night. "Uh, good night, see you tomorrow." Julia nodded and waved good night as Butters went back into his room. Once he shut the door, he decided he'd rather kick himself for not saying something better after he got a visit from the sandman.

Across the hall, Julia took a while to close her door. This wasn't going to be an easy visit and having these kind of uneasy talks with Butters- her boyfriend and the person officially assigned to help her in this whole thing- wasn't helping. But perhaps she'd sleep better by thinking that she'd be able to have a better time with him and the others tomorrow. Yep, that was her plan of action, but she decided it'd be best to follow the plan of getting ready for bed first.

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With his bad leg, Bill didn't really have much to do the next morning except come down and eat a hearty breakfast and what was left of Butters's cereal. He then spent most of the afternoon watching TV in silence, and watching Julia's early afternoon shows with her once she took over the TV. There were at least a few times when Bill tried to find an opening to talk with Julia and try to have some kind of fun with her, but again, with his leg there wasn't much to do except sit around. And since they'd probably have more fun after he finished getting better and he didn't need to think about taking pain pills, he figured it'd be best to save it until then.

At about 3:00, Bill tried to move to another position on the couch, but the movement didn't do too many wonders for his leg. Once he stopped yelling in pain, Linda tried to think quicker about whether this was a time when he would actually need a pain pill. Julia would have tried to help her decision process, but Butters arrived back from school right then- which Julia thought happened just in the nick of time. "Hey Butters, you ready to go?"

"But I j-just got here, I w-wanted to spend some time washing my hands and putting away my school blue shirt before I went back out." After that, Butters noticed Bill trying to shake off his pain. "Hey, w-what's wrong with your dad?" Julia looked at her dad again and it looked like he was feeling a little better, so that was a good cue for her to go now.

"He had a little problem, but he should be fine now. Why don't you go get ready now, I'll be waiting for you outside." Since Butters didn't wanna get yelled at by the others for being late, he took that opening to run upstairs like the wind. Julia took another look to make sure that her father was okay, then went back outside. Maybe it was a little cold, but it was sure better than seeing him yell in pain like that, and remembering how much more pain he was in the first time she saw him in a Texas hospital as a result. Now was definatly as good a time as ever to hope her plan of focusing on having fun instead of flashbacks involving her dad was a successful one.

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The local arcade was not the biggest hot spot for fun in town, but it would serve just fine for Mr Garrison's 4'th grade class that afternoon. Once Butters and Julia caught up with the gang, they got to the arcade in enough time to split up and spend lots of money on the games pretty quickly. Butters went off to find some kind of game that he could win a stuffed animal for, while Julia figured she'd have an easier time playing with Wendy and Bebe. Maybe catching up with them and talking to someone who had a much more harder time than she recently had would make her more ready to have fun.

"So Wendy, are you getting used to life on the outside again?" Wendy answered Julia before Bebe could figure out whether to correct her for mentioning Wendy's jail time. "Once the media finished their last week of bugging me before the story died down, it got easy. Pretty soon it'll feel like it never happened and things are all normal again."

"That's a relief. I'm glad they got you outta there, if I had to hear another TV report about how you deserved to stay in jail, I'd probably stage some kind of protest like my dad did!" Julia quickly tried to think of something to change the subject, and promptly failed once Bebe spoke up. "Say, where is your dad? We should go see him and thank him for going on strike for us! I know he was doing really well as a prison entertainer and he didn't have to stop doing it to help us, but he did. Maybe we should go to Butters house to thank him when we're done here."

"No, you shouldn't!!" Even some of the kids who were shooting cops in their arcade games stopped after hearing that loud protest. "Heh, let's just focus on having fun here first, I'm sure there are some fun girl games here somewhere!" That made the others go back to their shoot em up games as Julia actually tried to find one that was more girl friendly, but Wendy and Bebe weren't all that at ease.

Butters had found something else to pass the time by playing the "Wack a Wacky Mel Gibson" game, if he smacked enough Mel Gibsons then he'd get at least 4 tickets at the most. But before he put the quarter in to start, Cartman came over, and since it'd be better for him to annoy Butters before the game started, Butters turned his attention to him. "Hey Eric, what kind of h-hurtful jokes do you have for me today? Go on, get it over with so I c-can wack Mel Gibson off."

"Actually, I wanted to thank you. I've had to see enough kissing crap with Stan and Wendy after that little prison thing, so I'm glad you haven't grossed me out with your girl yet. And you won't cause we're just here to have normal fun, right?"

"Sure Eric, I know how much you h-hate seeing us show emotions other than greed. You got n-nothing to worry about now." Butters went back to start the Wack a Mel game, but Cartman stopped him by blabbing his mouth off again. "Well thank God for small miracles. I mean, it's sick enough when someone slightly cool like Stan does that crap, but you?! It's already a fucked up world when someone like you can get a girl, let's not rub it in on how fucked up it is!"

Butters had heard Cartman's trademark remarks on his lameness before, so since Cartman seemed to be off in his own little world, he figured he could ignore him and wack Mel at the same time now. So he started the game and prepared to play as Cartman obliviously went on talking. "Look, there are tons of things wrong with the world, take Jews and hippies for instance, please. But it's really hard not to really shake your head at what the world lets slide by when it comes to stuff like this. I mean, what the hell is a girl without braces or pimples doing kissing you, even in private!"

"Yeah, s-she is neat and tidy, all right." Butters commented in a fruitless attempt to satisfy Cartman. So Cartman went on some more.

"I guess it's not that surprising since she obviously isn't normal." Lucky for Cartman, Butters was still trying to ignore his insults by playing the game and waiting for him to stop, but he was starting to wack Mel harder and harder as a result of feeling more upset over Cartman's editorial. "Come on Butters, she moves around all the time because her dad's a dumbass actor, it's no wonder she doesn't have a mom or anything with his dad's obvious, well, fruity job." Butters still kept taking his growing anger out on the Mel Gibson figures as they kept popping up. Cartman naturally was too caught up in accusing Bill of being gay to notice. "Yep, with that upbringing no one can expect a girl to grow up normal and know not to lock lips with, well, undesirables like yourself. Heh, but I guess since her dad has to be gay cause she's an actor, taking a job at a prison must be the perfect thing for him. I'm sure he has fun imagining those tough guys putting stuff up his as-"

Cartman had no time to finish as Butters, in his even greater rage at Cartman's insensitivity, hit one of the Mel Gibson figures right across it's head- in fact, he did it with such strength that the Gibson figure was ripped clear off, it deflected off the scoreboard, and Butters dived in time for it to hit Cartman in the head. Once Butters got back up and saw what he accidentally did to Cartman, he was very tempted to laugh out loud at how he managed to make him stop his horrible accusations. The joy didn't last that long though as Cartman got up quickly to turn his attention back to Butters. "Ey, what gives, asshole?! I make some funny jokes about how gay your girlfriend's daddy is and you have Mel Gibson hurt me, how could you let that happen?!"

Of course Butters knew how Cartman was so ignorant that he wouldn't know what he did wrong, but he really wanted to make Cartman stop about Julia and his dad now. So without really thinking, he told Cartman the truth. "Eric, you can't say that stuff about Julia and Mr Simmons, they're in r-real bad shape right now! Mr Simmons got beat up and a-almost got raped by those prison fellows, and then he took a lot of pills that m-made him hurt some more! The only reason Julia's here is because her dad needs support to get b-better again, and I have to help them do that! And that means I c-can't let you make fun of them or remind them of what's going o-on or do anything to trash them, so just please be quiet about it, okay?"

Butters only realized just how big of a mistake he made a split second after he was done. And in the next split second when he saw Julia right in his and Cartman's vicinity- probably because she wanted to see why Cartman was yelling a second ago. At that point he would have literally kicked himself if he didn't know Cartman would just laugh about it.

"Aw, s-son of a bitch!" Though Butters had started to say some bad words more frequently over the last several months, Julia knew he had to have been pretty embarassed if he said that. But she still had to remind him why spilling the beans to Cartman was the worst possible move. "Cartman, you can have time to make your jokes, and savor being healthy for a little while longer before I get done with you. Until then, I need to have a word with Butters."

Since Cartman was already thinking of ways to tell people about Butters's news and joke about it, he let Julia go to have her words with Butters. Once they got outside, her words started flying. "Butters, why the hell did you tell all that to Cartman? Cartman, of all people!! You know he's only gonna make all of this worse!"

Though being nervous was nothing new for Butters, this was still one of his more nerve wracking situations in a while, so it took him a while to think of a good excuse. "W-Well, u-uh....you said you're gonna k-kick his butt if he j-jokes about your dad, so he s-shouldn't have a chance t-to do that m-much damage!"

"That will be fun to do, but that's not the point! The point is that by then, he'll have told everyone about what happened to Dad, and probably make up a few extra details while he's at it! And you know that the media loves to cover stories based on lies like whatever he'll come up with! That sure isn't gonna help Dad's recovery process at all!" Butters searched frantically for another possible way to make this seem like less of a huge mistake. "B-But the press didn't b-bother your dad that m-much in Texas, why would t-they come here to annoy him now?"

"Well, on second thought, even the press has probably gotten tired of staying here after the Wendy contraversy, so that's good. But the guys here will probably show up too."

"That's n-not so bad, except for Eric t-they'll actually wanna help out your dad!" After pausing to see that that was true, Julia quickly found another fault with that arguement. "But I don't think that's gonna help Dad at all. He took those pills in Texas to forget that he had lost his job and that we might have to start moving around again. If the others bother us by trying to help him and remind him too much of what happened, it's not gonna help too much at all. Your parents got told by our doctor not to really rub in how bad things are for him, and I don't know how well I can get through to them if I have to! The last thing I need is more problems like that!"

"I guess I u-understand, so-"

"No, you don't, if you did then you wouldn't have told the most insulting jackass in South Park about my dad's tragedy!" Julia harshly interrupted, since she was a bit too much in the heat of the moment to stop herself. "We were supposed to get through this with a minimum of troubles thanks to you and your parents, and you didn't do your job!" Butters obviously felt hurt that she said that to him, but he figured she might feel better if he said why he did it.

"Hey, I w-was just trying to make him stop saying lies a-about you and your dad! I thought that might k-keep him quiet."

"It obviously failed, and now me and Dad are all the worse off because of it! I thought I could trust you to make sure that didn't happen, but that obviously didn't work!" Julia hadn't snapped at Butters like this since the first time she came to South Park, and Butters hardly liked it any better this time than before. But all he had tried to do was shut Cartman up so he would lay off her and Mr Simmons, any good boyfriend and friend would have done the exact same thing- Butters just did it differently in a way that backfired, is all. But Julia was acting like he really did something horrible because of that one mistake, maybe it wasn't that smart but he didn't think he should be yelled at and hated by her now because of it. And since Julia was still frowing at her and getting ready to go without saying an apology, he figured he should probably get through to her while he had the chance.

"Hey, wait! You're acting like I w-wanted to make Cartman insult you or s-something, like I told him that on purpose so he'd hurt your dad! You know I would h-have never done that if I had time to t-think straight, and, well, y-you darn w-well know I would never even t-think of making things worse for you and your dad on purpose! I like him and I l-love you too much to ever wanna do that!" With that brief, but very important declaration of Butters's true feelings, Julia began to stop feeling angry, and Butters took quick advantage of her softened state. "I know I m-messed up, but I r-really don't think our other f-friends knowing about this is gonna make your dad do something bad t-to himself again. Even if Cartman does s-something, you and everyone else hates h-him enough to smack him down before he pulls it off! So I a-am sorry, but please d-don't take your anger for this whole mess out on me, I'm s-still trying my best to help you!"

Julia took a few seconds to look Butters in the eyes again after he was done. She looked right at Butters, the first real friend he had ever made after all these years on the road, the first boy he ever liked in a certain way, her best friend, and the boy she was completly in love with. And, as he himself said, he was the guy who was still trying to help her through this difficult time and who would never even dream of making things worse on his own accord. Just because he said too much because he wanted to defend her and her dad from a fatass, that didn't give her the right to take her anger out on him, he didn't deserve that. So she answered his last claim that he was trying to help her with just two words. "I know."

With that she hung her head in a bit of shame and Butters thought he could see her trying not to cry or something. Since it didn't look like she was in much of a mood to go back to the arcade, he offered to walk her back home, and she quickly accepted without even willing to check back and see if anyone heard anything by now.

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Julia was a bit too embarassed and nervous to say anything on the walk back home, and she stayed quiet once they got back. Since Bill was taking a nap upstairs, they just sat and watched TV to pass the time until dinner. None of them were really paying attention to the show though. But eventually Julia concluded that it'd be better to say something before she wound up letting her feelings get out of hand this time.

"I am sorry that I yelled at you today, Butters, I really am. I know you were just trying to defend me. It's just that....this is hard enough for me as it is without having anything else get in the way. My dad took pills to forget about what was happening, and I kinda wish there was a less painful way to forget about it too."

"That's o-okay, I'm sure your Dad will m-make it outta this just fine. Mom and Dad and me a-are taking care of him like your d-doctor ordered us to." Butters said with a smile for the first time in about an hour.

"I'm not that worried about that, I know he'll be okay soon. But after that, who knows what'll happen? I told you that since Dad can't entertain in prisons anymore, we'll have to go somewhere else so he can get another job. And I was just starting to get used to calling my home in Texas an actual home. I never did that anywhere else other than here before. Now that's probably all gone." Julia sighed a bit before she suddenly started to look upset again. "Do you know how it feels to love your dad and be so mad at him at the same time?"

"Uh, w-well I was mad at my dad for b-being gay for only a few minutes before we went to B-Beniggans, does that count?"

"A little, but not like my problem. I've never had a perminant home for as long as I can remember because of Dad's acting, he kept going from town to town with his acting troupe because it was his dream to be a famous entertainer. Now when he finally finds something he's good at, he ruins it by getting himself beat up and high. So now we have to start all over again just when I found a good home. I wish I could help being a little mad at him for making that happen, especially when he's in pain, but I can't!" Julia stopped herself before she got more upset again, doing that once today was enough.

Butters naturally couldn't really relate to Julia's situation of not having a home, he was nervous enough going 10 blocks away from his house sometimes. However, that didn't stop him from figuring out something good about her lifestyle.

"Maybe it's n-not all bad. I mean, y-you did get to see a lotta sights in a-all kinds of towns throughout the whole country. We've done that too in South Park, b-but not because we like it, we're u-usually forced to go everywhere in the w-world." Butters quickly saw that that may not have been the best thing to say, since Julia really didn't have a say about going everywhere in the country either. But he did think of one really good point that canceled that out. "Uh, hey! If your dad d-didn't make you travel everywhere, you never w-would have come to South Park in the first place, and I n-never would have met you!" Butters broke into his biggest smile of the day after realizing that. "Yeah. Yeah, t-that really doesn't make it s-so bad after all, does it? We wouldn't have had all our fun t-together if your dad never brought you here to begin w-with."

Julia couldn't help but blush after remembering that little detail. "No, I guess we wouldn't have. At least when we were traveling around over the last year, I could keep busy by writing to you. And by visiting you when we had the chance." Butters laughed along with Julia at the memories those times had. "Oh boy. I really can't believe that it's been over a year since I first met you, so much went by so fast." Somehow this made Butters spring upright in such a way that he almost fell off the couch.

"Aw heck, that's r-right! We missed our anniversary while I was h-helping Stan get Wendy back and your dad was s-striking, didn't we?!" Julia thought a bit and realized he was right. On the anniversary of the day where they first met, they weren't together since Julia was in Texas and Butters was busy helping with the Free Wendy Movement, he didn't even remember that April 9'th had passed by and it was the anniversary of when he met his own girlfriend. But he did now. "Goddammit, if I w-wasn't so busy I could have a-at least sent something over to you as a gift. That sucks nutbunnies!"

"I don't think it sucks that many nutbunnies, you were busy trying to save Wendy and I had my own things to do. I know you would have done something sweet if you remembered, so don't worry." Butters wasn't that satisfied though. "That doesn't change t-the fact that I didn't, d-does it?"

"Well I still like you, you did too much for me over the last year for me not to. Tell you what, I'll honor our anniversary by not yelling at you anymore while I'm here, and you can do it by helping me relax and deal with what my dad's going through. Since I got my anger at him off my chest today, I should be fine. And I can count on you to show me a good time if things get too bad, I wouldn't let you do it today but I won't make that mistake again. Okay?" Butters managed to smile a bit and once Julia flashed her best smile back, Butters felt more relieved. She gave him a little kiss on the cheek before she finally went back to watching TV, and Butters joined her once he put his remaining disappointment at missing their anniversary aside- for now.

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Over the next few days, Bill was healing more and so he attempted to move around more. He still had to use crutches but he was getting more active so he wouldn't be lazy once the cast came off. Chris and Linda kept their eyes on him and monitored his progress, and although they had to give him a few pain pills, it wasn't enough to get him high again. Soon it became apperant that there wasn't a really big reason to worry that much, figuring that since Bill's cast would be off very soon, he wouldn't have a reason to mope or take anything anymore.

Julia talked things over with Wendy and Bebe and they agreed to make sure Cartman wasn't up to anything that would trash her dad at school. Their censorship of Cartman's words eventually got him to keep quiet- especially once he needed to see the freaky Nurse Gollum after Bebe hit him particularly hard in dodgeball. Also, Stan and Kyle and the other boys really didn't have time to talk about her and her dad since they were off on one of their own little adventures that they didn't need Butters for. Since that also meant she could spend more time around Butters, that worked for her pretty damm well.

Butters found time after school to do stuff with Julia, they watched TV and played with his toys and other kid stuff. They didn't go out or do actual romantic things, but it was still nice to know that they didn't need to be all lovey dovey to still have fun together, since they were technically still friends as well as a romantic item.

Once Friday rolled around, Butters was especially happy since it was the end of the school week and the others probably wouldn't need him to finish their latest ordeal for a while. He was in a good mood when he got home- then it turned to surprise for a second once he opened the door and saw Bill Simmons standing there to greet him- without a cast or the use of crutches. "Did you have as good a day as I did, Butters?"

"M-M-Mr Simmons! You're walking upright again!" Julia noticed Butters after he said that, then went over to hug him with much enthusiasm. "That's right Butters, we went to get his cast taking off his morning and his bruises should be all gone soon enough! He'll be back to being completly healthy in no time, and best of all, we can get rid of the pills!" She let go of Butters to go over to her father, since this was the first time in two weeks that she was truely happy to see him.

"I'm perfectly rested, I should be back to being as active as ever pretty soon, and I don't feel as much pain anymore! We can go back to Texas soon without any more trouble!" Butters was very happy to hear that- until he actually understood what the last part of his talk meant. Julia would be going back out of town soon enough, and with her father's current work troubles, who knows when she'd be back again. But he made sure that the disappointment didn't show for more than a second. "Congratulations, sir. This'll s-sure make Mom and Dad more relaxed and give t-them time to straighten up the guest r-room again. Well, might as well g-get ready for my TV time!" Butters headed upstairs to put away his school stuff and to stop looking that happy about Bill's news.

A few minutes later after Butters was actually finished putting away his stuff, he took some time to wonder when exactly he should come down to see Julia again, it might be a little uneasy for him after the news a while back. He was used to her leaving town all the time, she did that every time she visited, but he figured it was an adding perk of being her official boyfriend that he would miss her more this time. This wasn't their very best series of days together, but at least he got to see her and have fun with her for a while. Sometimes he really envyed Stan since he got to do that with a girl that he loved every day.

His thoughts went on pause once he heard someone knocking on his door, and he went to answer it to see it was Julia. "Look Butters, I guess we do have to leave soon, but not right away. Dad does wanna take a few more days to get things straight and prepare to search for jobs again, so we can still do stuff. And, well, you did want to make up for missing our anniversary."

"I t-thought you said it was enough f-fun imagining what I would have done for you." Julia chuckled and answered, "Yeah, that is fun, but not compared to the real thing. We have our anniversary to celebrate, and we can also use my dad's improved condition as an excuse to party. So what do you say we have a nice afternoon out tomorrow to be happy over both those things?"

Over the rest of the afternoon, the two kids planned out such an event where they would spend all of Saturday afternoon together, with Bill's recovery and their anniversary as the offical excuses to do such a thing. They'd go to some of Butters favorite places in town to enjoy themselves, and be back home well in time for dinner. Chris and Linda would obviously stay home with Bill as he regained more of his strength.

That was good for Julia since Bill had the strength on Saturday morning to wake her up after she overslept by about an hour. After that, she hurried to get dressed and eat her breakfast and lunch in enough time for her to leave early. Bill came down at about 11 to see how Julia was chowing down her cereal.

"Honey, calm down, you should be able to disgest some of that and your lunch in time. Butters will understand, and you don't wanna get a stomachache before you even go out." Julia took some time to wipe the crumbs off her mouth before she answered her dad. "Maybe so, but I said I wanted to spend the afternoon out and I don't want to lose that many minutes. We'll be leaving to go "home" soon and who knows when I'll be back here again, so I need as much time as I can get!" With that, she kept up her rapid eating and managed to finish breakfast and lunch in about an hour, only losing a few minutes out of her scheduled playtime. But what Julia had said to Bill stayed in his mind for a little more time than that.

Now that he was feeling better and all of his physical pain was pretty much gone, it was time for Bill to move on. Now that he had no job again, it was time to search for one again that may take him and Julia to yet another home. The Texas prisons couldn't afford to let him perform there after their convicts heard how easy it was to attack him, and there were no other entertainment jobs there that paid as well and were less dangerous at the same time- no amount of money was worth having bull horns plugged up his ass, that was for sure. So now what? Other than going back on the road to find some other fun job?

Bill had sacrificed a stable home for him and Julia for years because of his dreams of making it big in acting and/or entertaining. His stint in an acting troupe had taken up years of his and Julia's life, and just when he was ready to give it up, the prison entertainment job fell into his lap and gave him a taste of the acclaim and profit he had worked so hard to get. And now that he knew he could never have that kind of job again, what could he do? He couldn't give up his dream though, not after he did so much to get it and moved Julia around in so many places- after all that, he couldn't fail now. But if he couldn't give up, what was left to do but start moving around again, which they were gonna have to start doing in a few days?

His head hurt the more and more he thought about- thinking about how bleak the future looked was why he took pain pills to begin with, to forget about the road ahead. But now that he'd started thinking about it again, he had to do something to take his mind off of it, and Julia was already out with Butters. Chris and Linda were out at the store as well, so Bill was left alone to deal with his problems. Maybe he could have a drink. Yeah, they had some wine and beer in the fridge, perhaps a drink would help him relax for a little while so he could think clearly.

******************************************************

Butters first favorite place in South Park was Stark's Pond, so it was a logical first stop for him and Julia- which puzzled her for a bit. "Butters, we're obviously not gonna skate on the pond, and there aren't any games around here. So why is this your favorite place again?"

"It's k-kinda like a sanctuary f-for me to relax in when the world makes me feel like more of a p-punching bag than usual. Look, the spots behind the tree a-are still open, we can get them and r-relax before anyone else shows up!" Butters rushed over to the tree in Stark's Pond and sat down next to it, then started to lean back to relax. "Come on Julia, the g-ground's still as soft as it always is!"

"Wait, you just sit down and nap here? I thought you might want to climb the tree and hang out on the limbs or do something else fun." Butters was comfy, but not comfy enough to avoid shuddering at that point. "Nah, I c-come here to have fun, and f-falling and breaking my neck is a bit too, um, fun f-for my tastes. Maybe next time." However, Julia thought fast of a way to get Butters to go up there- she started climbing the tree herself. And sure enough, he began objecting and asking her to get down a second later, though she wasn't really listening. Once she started crawling on one of the branches, Butters got really nervous that she would fall, then he figured in his panicked state that the way to get her down was to do it himself, so he started climbing towards the branch like Julia did. It was only once he was on the branch that he realized what he had done.

Julia smiled that her plan to get him up had worked, and she went over and held him up so he wouldn't fall once he saw how high up he was. After a few minutes of having to do that, she saw he was shaking a little less, so she let go of him so he could balance himself on his own. Once he did and actually lay down on the branch, he felt something else other than fear- he felt comfy. "H-Hey, this doesn't f-feel that bad and t-there's only a couple splinters in my pants! I don't feel like I'm g-gonna break all my bones that much now!" By the end of their hour there, Butters and Julia were actually having fun balancing themselves on the strong branches as well as relaxing. It was indeed an added bonus for Butters in addition to what peace and quiet they allowed themselves to have.

After readjusting to standing on the ground, they went on to do some of their other favorite things- like use the wagon Butters had brought over to take turns riding it, with Butters pulling the wagon with Julia on it and Julia doing the same with Butters on it, and so on. Then after they jumped around in some puddles on the street, and played hide and seek by hiding behind all kinds of buildings around town, they eventually found themselves catching their breath in front of the school.

"Heh, I g-guess since the s-school's locked up for the weekend, we c-can't hide anyplace around here, huh?" Butters was now ready to go and find another new game to play, but since Julia was going over to stare at the playground, he figured they wouldn't be doing that for a while. "W-What's wrong?"

"That's where we were for much of the first day we met. And this is where we had our first kiss." Julia stated while pointing at the playground to make it clear what she was talking about. "Heh, to think if I never decided to come here to see you before I left town the first time, we sure as hell wouldn't be here today. That one decision and that one kiss made most of my best memories since last April possible."

"Yeah. It helped me a lot t-too, I sure wouldn't be d-doing this kind of stuff with anyone else today, so thank God you're h-here." Butters paused for thought before figuring out something else. "In fact, even if I wanted to do everything today w-without you, no one else would d-do it with me. This is really the first time I've b-been able to do my favorite things with someone e-else who didn't r-really mind. Sure, I had m-my moments with Pip and the others, b-but it didn't last the whole a-afternoon and t-the guys didn't really like doing the stuff I liked to d-do. You're r-really the first kid I know w-who's been that eager to spend a lot of time with me for a w-whole day without playing a prank on m-me or using me to get outta trouble or something. No one e-else did it just to have fun with me."

"There's a good reason for that, Butters. The nice guys in that group are stupid, and the mean guys will eventually burn in hell." Julia found that funny although Butters didn't really get it, but since she was making history by hanging out with him just to have fun for the day, he might as well laugh at her confusing jokes, and he did. "You can forget about those bad times, Butters, I'm not here because I want to laugh at you or make fun of your favorite things. I'm here cause I wanted to be here with you."

Butters got that a lot easier and it really made him smile. "Well if w-we're done with that, let's g-get going before we waste the last 90 minutes of the afternoon! We haven't even visited the petting zoo yet, so l-let's get going quick!" Butters regained his energy to head off for his next fun activity, and Julia headed off to continue to join him.

******************************************************

By that time, Bill was already on his fourth can of beer and fourth glass of wine. The first can and the first glass had done such a good job in relaxing him, he figured that having a few more drinks would really get him back on track. Luckly he had gone back upstairs before Chris and Linda could see that he was a bit too much on track. He was already starting to stumble as he headed back to his room to finish the last two cans of the sixpack, then when he gulped down one of them in a hurry, he stumbled some more as he tried to get his vomit in the toilet on time. He narrowly made it to the toilet to despoit the remains of his food for the day. Once he finished that, he heard someone knock on the door. "Bill, the alcohol in the fridge is gone and we heard vomiting. Do you know anything about that?" the voice of Chris asked.

"Do I disturb you when you have to shit or piss or do some kind of function in here?! Don't start doing that to me, I'm supposed to be your guest! Okay?!" Since Bill didn't hear Chris or Linda knock on the door and call for him for the next few minutes, he figured his plea had work. But now he had a bit of a headache to worry about. That bit turned into a lot by the time he went into the cabinet to find something to stop the aches.

At that point, he saw a sealed bottle of pills that seemed to be nearly full. By then, Bill didn't really remember much about his previous history with these pain pills, so once he read the label that they relieved pain, he figured it was worth taking at least one to get his head feeling well again.

******************************************************

About a half hour later, Butters and Julia returned towards the house, but instead of coming in they figured they could finish relaxing in the backyard. Once they lay down on the ground, they took time to actually look back on their antics, and Julia started laughing, which meant Butters couldn't help but laugh too. They were pretty much laughing for no reason, but they had enjoyed themselves enough today without having to care about that. After that, Julia was the first to talk in actual words.

"Thanks for everything today, Butters. We can only hope our future anniversary parties go something like this, huh? Maybe we'll have it in one place and have presents and dancing next time." The word "presents" made Butters get right up in shock, since there was one thing he had planned to do today that he had forgot to do, and that reminded him what it was.

Butters ran inside the house and ran upstairs, not noticing that Chris and Linda were in front of the guest room hoping that Bill would come out without any trouble. All he was doing was going through his room until he found what he was looking for, then he grabbed it and went back outside. He then remembered to put his item behind his back just in time before Julia noticed him coming out. "Uh, Julia, do you m-mind closing your eyes for a bit and holding o-out your hands?" Since it was extremely clear now to Julia that Butters was actually trying to make it a surprise that he had a present for her, she did as she was asked. Her eyes stayed closed for a few seconds, but they almost opened when he felt something soft touch her hands, and once she grabbed it, she didn't even wait for Butters to tell her to look and see what it was. She saw it quite clearly in the next split second.

"A stuffed cute lion? Wow, it's-" Whatever Julia was gonna say next got cut off by her shock when she saw what was on that lion- a tiny shirt with her name on it. "That's my....how did they....what's a shirt doing on there in the...." Butters took this as his cue to explain why the lion had a shirt with the name Julia on it. "It looks g-great, huh? I went to the arcade on Thursday to play that Wack a Mel game, b-but after I broke one of the Mel's a few days ago, those a-arcade guys begged me never to play it again! So I said I wouldn't in e-exchange for them giving me a stuffed animal for you, and s-since it was a defective lion with a shirt on it, I l-looked around till I found a place that'd put your name on it for about 10 bucks! So, u-uh, happy anniversary!"

"Oh Butters, it's, it's....wow." Maybe most other kids wouldn't be this excited over a mere stuffed lion with a shirt on it, even if it listed their name. But Julia hardly cared about them since, by her standards, it was the greatest gift she could have gotten to cap off the first great day she had in a long time. All thanks to her great boyfriend. "So, u-uh, what do you say? You like it?" Butters was answered by a big hug which took some breath out of him, but he recovered in time to hear her actually say something. "I love it. Thank you so much. And I love you too."

Julia had told Butters she loved him at least once or twice since Christmas, but this time it really made Butters stop and think. Here he was, someone widely regarded as the biggest nerd and goody two shoes in South Park, even with his recent success. And yet, despite all the mockery he had gotten over the years, someone as smart and fun and nice and beautiful as Julia was really in love with him. It wasn't part of a trick or prank either, it was because she liked him and, unlike many people he knew, was able to see him for the decent, well meaning guy he had always tried to be, instead of just seeing him as the nerd and wuss that others saw him as. That meaning really filled him up with joy as Julia finally let go and looked right at him. Once he started looking back, he shrugged and said "Ah, what the heck?", then he showed his appreciation by putting his hands on her shoulders and kissing her as gently as he could to really savor the moment.

Back inside, however, Chris, Linda, and especially Bill weren't having as much fun. As the adult Stotches had found out, in Bill's attempt to get rid of the headaches from drinking alcohol, he had taken the pain pills that they were planning to throw in the trash later in the day. Now Bill was in the guest room already feeling the groggy and delusional effects of all those pills and drinks. He felt like he was gonna throw up and so he went towards the window- but through that window where he could see the backyard, he stopped to see that his daughter was there, and it looked like she was making out with Butters. "What in the hell is she...."

With that, Bill finally made his way to get out of the room, despite nearly tripping a few times. He got out and went down the steps before Chris and Linda could recover from their shock enough to stop him. By the time they caught up to him, he was in the kitchen and looking out the back window where he could more clearly see what the kids were doing. They were still kissing and holding each other, as Julia's hands were on the back of Butters's head while Butters was running his fingers through Julia's soft red hair. He then put his arms right around her and moved his hands down to around her waist so he could pull her closer and deepen the kiss- unfortunatly for him, in Bill's weakened state he figured Butters was looking to do something more than that.

"Julia!! Get your hands off my daughter right now!!" Bill yelled as he stopped the kissing by barging into the backyard, and once the kids actually broke away from each other, Bill grabbed his daughter and got her farther away from Butters. "How dare you try and get to second base with my daughter at this age, she doesn't want her ass grabbed by boys yet and you should know that, you thoughtless brat!!"

"Dad! He wasn't doing anything like that!" But once Bill looked at Julia and she could easily figure out that he was disoriented and high again, she knew it might not be of any use to talk sense into him, and she was right. "And you! Are you trying to be a slut and let him go for the ass just like that?! Well that's not the image I'm going let my daughter have, get back inside!!" When Julia didn't move right away, Bill grabbed her wrist and made her come back right with him. Butters was still in a bit of shock over having seen that happen just seconds after his makeout session. But since Bill looked plently angry at Julia, he shook it off and went back inside to see what was going on now. Chris and Linda tried to warn against it though.

"Butters, I don't think Bill would like to be bothered now!" pleaded Linda. "We called the doctor after we saw that he drank down all the pain pills, he should be here any minute to take him away!" That made Butters relieved for a little bit, but once he heard Bill yelling at Julia upstairs, he forgot about that and ran up as fast as he could. When he got to the guest room, he saw Bill continuing to chew Julia out.

"Do you like having boys touch your ass?! It's not as much fun as you might think, let me tell you!! At least one of us is going to do something good in this world, and you won't do it by being a whore, got it?!!" Julia knew he was overreacting because he was high, but it still didn't stop her from being plently scared at seeing her dad's dishelved look. "Dad, calm down, w-we'll get you to the hospital and you'll be fine." But Bill's brain was hardly firing on enough cylinders to listen very clearly, he was still stuck in his new little world. "I'll be fine? At least I'm not the whore here!!"

At that point Butters joined in the fight. "Hey, M-Mr Simmons, don't say that word to her! I'm t-the one who got too c-close to her anus!"

"Butters, you weren't going for my anus in the first place, and you know it! Dad's just-" Bill stopped Julia's complaint by putting his finger on her lips to shut her up, and it would have hurt a bit more if he didn't go away to get to Butters. "What did you do to get her to defend you, pimp? Did you stop her from fighting back by getting her hooked on something, is that your game?!" Bill got even more offended when Butters was too frightened looking at him to give a denial. "You almost assault my slut daughter and you can't even brag about it?! Get out of my sight, bitch!" With that, any fear Julia had of facing her dad was 100% replaced by fury, as she came over to face him in the hallway.

"You don't ever get to talk to him like that, Dad!! You know he's not even close to a bitch, or you would remember if you weren't high off your ass!! What the fuck are you doing getting high and insulting us anyway, you're supposed to be clean and-" Unfortunatly, Bill found a quick way to make her stop before she went any further, and he did it by pushing her to the floor. "Don't you dare use that language and talk back to your father, I tell you what to do and not the other way around!" Chris and Linda finally got their asses moving and tried to get Bill away before he did anything else, but he pushed them away too. Butters was just frozen in place and trying to come to terms with the fact that Julia's own dad would do what he did to her, he didn't know how to react.

"You're not acting like my father right now, he wouldn't insult me or someone I loved, so why should I listen to you after what you've done?" Bill then headed for Julia again and pushed her down again, and once Butters saw that his hands were still raised up as if he wanted to keep going, he sprung into action. "Hey, leave her alone!"

Butters ran up in front of Julia to protect her from Bill, but Bill picked him up and put him down away from him harshly. But when Butters saw him getting ready to push Julia down again- or maybe do something worse- he suddenly snapped. Filled with anger at someone trying to hurt the girl he loved, and even more upset that it was her own father[especially since he knew what it was like to be hit by his dad once or twice], Butters ran like hell to get back in front of Bill, and before he could hit Julia again, Butters pushed him back as far as he possibly could. He was never a strong kid in the slightest, but Chris, Linda, and Julia had definatly never seen him be strong enough to push Bill far enough away so that he was about 3 steps away from the stairs, that was for sure.

Butters's push didn't make Bill fall down the stairs, but Bill turning his head to see how close he was to the stairs, stumbling backwards, and then falling down, did.

******************************************************

The doctor Linda had called got to the house about 50 seconds after the fall, so at least they were able to take him to the hospital quick. The Stotches and Julia followed them to Hell's Pass Hospital, and after waiting for an hour one of their doctors finally gave an update on Bill's condition. "Well, it looks like Mr Simmons took a rather nasty fall, he managed to break his leg again and break his arm this time. We just finished getting all the pills and the booze out of his system, so it should take a while longer for him to actually wake up." The doctor took Chris and Linda aside to ask more questions about the incident and who they could contact and so on. But Butters knew all too well what had happened today, and once he was alone with Julia, he gave his confession. "I did it. I pushed h-him down the stairs so he wouldn't hurt you. His leg's busted up again because o-of me."

"Stop it Butters, it was not your fault. None of this is your fault, you didn't even push him that close to the stairs! He's the one who stumbled those last three steps, he's the one who made you want to push him because he was hurting me, and he's the one who got high enough to fuck himself up like that!" Julia then looked around to see if any other doctors or nurses were around, then walked away to find one that would tell her where his father's room was.

It took her 5 minutes to find one of those, and once she got what she needed to know she headed right for her dad's room. Ignoring the pleas of the nurse that he wasn't awake to talk to her, she stormed into his room. He was unconscious and on the bed, with a twisted up right leg and a twisted up left leg. Butters cringed once he saw him, but Julia paid absolutly no attention to the injuries. She had some things she had to say whether he was awake or not to hear them, and she wanted to say them now while she was good and upset.

"Dad? You didn't answer me before and you can't answer now, but I'd better rub it in again? What the hell were you thinking doing that shit again?!" The doctor from earlier came in along with Chris and Linda to speak for Bill. "From what Chris and Linda got out of Bill's drug induced rantings, he was angry that he was gonna have to go back to Texas and find another job and move around lots of places again. Apperantly he started out by drinking and then he went on to all those pills."

"Just like last time." Julia muttered. Then she turned back to her one sided conversation with her dad. "You made things bad enough for me the last time you did that crap. Why did you have to do it again, especially today? I had one of the best days in a long time and you crapped all over it. But I guess I shouldn't be so surprised, I mean you crapped over a lot of my chances to be normal all my life." Julia had never actually said any hints of resentment for the life Bill had made her live, but she hardly was in the mood to hide any hidden attitudes anymore, not after what that man had tried to do.

"You drive me around from town to town and made sure I never had a normal, full time home until Texas, and then you screwed that up too. And why? Because you wanted to be an entertainer? Because you wanted to make it big somewhere?! Even after almost 10 years of failing at that crap, you didn't take a Goddamm hint and try and find a normal job! And now what do you have to show for it?! What have you left me to show for it?! No home, few chances to make friends except in South Park, and I spend more time writing to my boyfriend instead of actually being with him, like a normal girl does!! Are you proud of that?! Is all of that nothing but a sacrifice I had to make for you to get famous?! Have you even cared about my lack of a normal life at all, even once?!!" Right now no one had the guts to come up and try and stop her, the 4 other consicous people in the room were too intimidated by now. So she wrapped up her tirade with no trouble. "Well this is exactly what you deserve for all of that. You did all this shit to yourself and you hurt me in the process, so screw you! You can rot in hell for all I care, Bill Simmons, I hope you hear that!! You ruined today and the other parts of my life, so you've earned the right to rot in hell!!" Now satisfied that she had made her point to an unconscious man who couldn't talk or argue back, she ran out of the room as the other witnesses to her rant began to recover from hearing her.

Once Butters snapped out of it and left, he was the first to find Julia sitting against a wall and apperantly trying and failing not to cry. "J-Julia? Are you, uh...." He couldn't bring himself to find any words to say, she had just said enough words as it is. But she somehow was able to say a few more.

"I n-never felt that upset at him for having to move a-around and all that. I guess it just built up inside me until he gave me a reason to snap. He deserved everything I said, but that still doesn't mean I feel that happy that....that I hate my father right now." With that, her last defenses against her sadness and misery broke down, and before Butters could react she went over to him and cried on his shoulder, hugging him more out of a need for comfort than out of love like their last hug together.

"I, I can't stay here. Would you t-tell your parents that I wanna go back to your house now?" And once Julia let go, Butters had little other choice but to do just that.

******************************************************

Julia and the Stotches did not return to the hospital for the rest of the night, though Chris and Linda checked up on his condition over the phone. Bill did wake up eventually, and after he found out what he had done and what his daughter had said to him, he wanted to go right back to an unconsicous sleep. But after an hour or two of trying to get back to sleep, he finally did.

The next day, the Stotches decided to make time to go back and see Bill, but Julia wouldn't listen to any of it because she wasn't going back. After what she had said to him, especially now that that he got brought up to date on what she said, there was no turning back now in her mind. She couldn't face him again this soon. And neither Butters or his parents attempts to talk her out of it did a lick of good, so Linda figured she should stay home and look after her while Butters and his dad went to the hospital.

A while later, the two of them were on the road and heading for Hell's Pass, both of them silent for much of the way until Butters spoke up.

"I j-just don't get it. How'd Mr Simmons screw up enough for Julia t-to hate him so much? He never did anything to make her feel t-that way before, he was always so, uh, n-non violent all the other times he came here!"

"Well Butters, you know that he went through a hard time back in Texas, he just wound up repeating them here, only a lot worse. These kinds of situations can make otherwise loving fathers do things to their children that they'd never think of doing before." Since Chris knew what he was talking about because of those times he had screwed up and caused harm to Butters in the past, this made Butters understand it better. But he still didn't get a couple of things. "I still don't g-get why being afraid of finding a job would m-make him wanna get drunk or whatever he got last night. He moved Julia around all kinds of t-times before without doing that!"

"You know that they had just got settled into a perminant home for the first time in years until this happened. And now that he has to go find a new job somewhere and probably start moving from place to place again, I guess he couldn't handle the disappointment. It doesn't excuse what he did, but he probably needs to believe it does."

"But why, Dad? Why does Mr S-Simmons have to keep moving around? And why did he k-keep moving Julia around for most of her life in the first p-place anyway?" Butters did remember that it had something to do with Mr Simmons wanting to be a star entertainer, but since he still saw the world as a relatively simple place, he couldn't see why Bill wouldn't just find another job where he didn't have to move and Julia could have the perminant home she just realized she always wanted. Chris tried to clear things up though. "He still has a dream of making it big in show biz, he's had it practically since Julia was born. I guess he's so committed to making the dream work after all this trouble, he'll probably just keep on going so his sacrifices mean something."

"Well t-that's just stupid, he failed in a-acting and he f-failed in prison, he's probably not gonna be f-famous now! He should learn to g-give it up so he can make things right with Julia before she h-hates him forever, she s-should be all that matters to him!" Immediatly after saying this to his dad, Butters knew that that was exactly what he wanted to tell Julia's dad when they saw him.

******************************************************

Not wanting to lose his motivation to settle things with Bill, Butters told Chris he wanted to talk with him alone in his room. So Chris put aside any fears that Bill would want revenge on his son and waiting outside, while Butters went to see his girlfriend's dad. When he got to his room, he saw that Bill was still lying on the bed, and awake, but now he had a cast on his leg again and now he had one on his arm. He managed to bring his head up to see Butters coming in. After he pulled up a chair and sat down next to the bed, he started off with some small talk. "So, u-uh, I hear you'll be in that bed for another day and t-then you can sit in a wheelchair, r-right?"

"Being reminded of my troubles is what made this whole mess happen, so stop it." Bill sighed and gave Butters enough time to ask another question that he had just asked Chris, but now he wanted an answer from the scorce. "Were you r-really that upset about finding another job that y-you wanted to drink lots of bad stuff to forget a-about it?"

"I wasn't upset about finding a job, I know I can get that! It's just that....I came so close to being a real success doing an act in prison, I almost had everything I had worked for for 9 years. Then I lost it all. But the worst part is, now that I have a taste of success, I can't give it up now. I feel like somehow I have to get it back, but doing so would mean going back on the road and starting from square one again. And I just don't feel like I can do that again!"

Butters had what he thought was an easy solution. "Then don't d-do it then, find some other job you're g-good at and stay there."

"But there's nothing else I am good at! I devoted the last decade of my life to being someone important in the biz, and if I gave up now, it would all be for nothing! Do you have any idea how awful that feeling is?! Julia was right, I did take away her chance for a normal everyday life, but I figured it would all pay off someday. Now what am I supposed to tell her, that I took her from town to town and made her hate me for it, and it was for a failed dream that had no chance of working?! That all of our moving was for absolutly nothing?! I can't do that! I have no choice but to prove that all these years would lead to success, and the fact that I know there's no chance of that happening now and that everything was for nothing....I...." Bill moved his working arm forward to clear her eyes of a few small tears. "I just couldn't handle that reality. I still can't. I can't face either of the two options I have to choose from once I get out of here. Finish going after a useless dream and make Julia hate me for it, or give up, make Julia realize that her sacrifices were for nothing, and make her hate me even more."

It took quite a while for Butters to review that entire talk in his head so he could think of some kind of answer. But Bill still had another thing to say. "I can't handle this. It's too hard. I just wanna give up and hide if I had the chance." With that, Butters had his retort. "So, y-you just wanna give up because it's too hard?"

"It's not only too hard, it's hopeless!", answered Bill. "You wouldn't understand, you're just a kid. You don't know what it's like to face all these kinds of rough problems where there seems to be no escape, so how could you help me?!"

That did it. Butters had stopped being mad at Bill for what he had done about a minute after he fell down the steps- but he was getting to be that mad again now. But this time, he would express his anger with words that brought back some painful memories for him, but they had to be said anyway.

"You think you have it bad? You think you're the only one who went through hell and didn't know if he could get out of it? Excuse me, Mr Simmons, but you don't know what hell is! You wanna know what hell's like?!" Butters took a deep breath before letting all his memories come back in words.

"It's being called a whimp and a pussy almost every day by the dumbest, fattest, meanest son of a bitch in the world, and by the people dumb enough to call him their friend too. It's not being allowed to hang around with kids that you want to be friends with, ever! It's when you finally get the chance to be friends with them, all you get is pushed around and tricked into getting beat up by freaks and your own parents! It's when you think that no one will ever like you or have any respect for you just because you're not as tough or mean as they are! It's thinking that your whole life philosophy to do good and have fun with friends is nothing but shit, because no one in the world thinks they're lame enough to like you for actually being a decent, good hearted person, in fact that's their whole reason for making you so miserable! And you know what? You've been facing disaster and pain for only 2 weeks. I've had to face those kinds of hell all my life until recently!! I dealt with the worst, most evil, heartless, painful things from almost everyone I knew for 9 fucking years!! But even after all that, I just kept coming, I kept trying to make friends and get respect. I did it even though I knew that staying friendly and nice would result in me getting my ass kicked again!! Sure, I whined and cried about it a lot, but after that I went back out there and faced whatever they could give me, and finally I wore them out until they found a few reasons to stop shitting all over me!! I've heard some people say I was dumb and stupid to keep trying to hang around those guys when they didn't want me around, but I think I was brave! I'm supposed to be the biggest whimp and pussy in this whole town, but I kept trying my best to survive and hope I would come out on top someday, and finally that started happening for me! I'd never have the good things I have now, including having Julia for my girlfriend, if I gave up trying to live my life the way I wanted to every time I had that chance! I faced the worst types of hell a kid can face and I made it through, me, the biggest whimp of them all!! And, well, if someone like me can overcome all of that, why the hell can't you?!! Maybe you're the big pussy in this room, because I know at least I faced tons more fears than you and I never gave up until I made things better for myself and people I liked, unlike you!! You're a coward 10 times over compared to me!!"

There was a long pause as Butters got his breath back and Bill struggling to defend himself.

"But whatever I do, Julia's gonna think-" Butters decided to save getting his breath back for later and spring right back into action.

"All Julia's thinking right now is that she hates you! She's been hating the things you made her do to help you and your dream for years, and you gave her a reason to finally get it out! I think it's time you finally thought about what she wants to do." Now it was Bill's turn to get mad.

"You can't tell me that I don't think about her needs! You think I don't know what I've done to her by living this life?! I did everything I possibly could to make things easy for that girl, I taught her everything she needed to be the good girl you fell in love with! Except for the last two weeks, I have been a good father, I did everything for her! And who are you to say you know about her needs better than her own father does, Leopold?!" Butters wasn't giving up his ground on the arguement though, even though Bill was upset enough to use his actual first name. But Butters had another answer. "She trusted me enough to tell me how she really felt about you and her life before yesterday, did she ever do that with you? Did she ever even try and talk to you about how she really felt about all of this while you were well, Bill?!"

For that, Bill had no answer.

"Mr Simmons, I'm not trying to say you're a bad father. But I do know that I love Julia at least as much as you do, and if I had to give up something else I loved to make her happy, then I'd do it without even thinking twice. I'd be willing to make any sacrifice for her. But what does it say about you when her boyfriend is willing to do that for her, and her own dad isn't? You were so scared to give up something of yours even though it would have made her happy, that you wanted to stop t-thinking about it and you got drunk to do it. You even did it twice. I would have asked someone to punch me if I even thought of doing something like that once. I'd do whatever I had to for her, like my Mom and Dad would do for me because they love me enough to make me feel better no matter what. If you really know Julia better than me, then shouldn't you know that she deserves a dad who would do that for her too?"

Butters left right there since he had nothing more to say- and it wasn't like Bill was in the right state of mind to defend himself again anyway.

******************************************************

"So how was he?" Butters barely had time to get settled in his house again before Julia got up from the living room couch and asked him that question.

"I don't know, I left r-right after I got done yelling at him. But at l-least he was listening when I got d-done talking sense into him." The two kids sat back down to relax, which would be a rare thing for them to have done since yesterday. "But I d-didn't say anything that was worse than what you already s-said."

"Yeah, I sure made him look bad all right." She didn't look as proud to say that as she would have been yesterday. After the Stotches failed attempts to get her to visit her dad, she had some free time to go over her revenge speech, and had a chance to actually how fair and accurate it was more closely. Perhaps it wasn't all 100% accurate after all.

"You know, if he really was a terrible dad, I would have turned out a lot worse. I would have complained about our lifestyle a lot more than I did, and I would have been more bitter about it than I was. But he did make sure that most of my needs in every city and town were taken care of. In fact, he did spend just as much as time with me than he did doing his job, so I can't accuse him of neglect at all."

"He did say you turned out a-as great as you did because he taught you e-everything you know." Butters pointed out, sensing that perhaps this could be another opportunity to end the one sided war of the Simmons. "Do you s-still think he should rot in hell?"

"I don't know. I can't just forgive him for what he did to us yesterday, I know that. But....before the last two weeks, he was something. He actually is a pretty good actor and entertainer, he just never found the right big time producer or critic to notice him. I always supported his work and encouraged him to make it before. And he made sure I never used to have a reason to fight with him." Once Julia remembered yet again that she had a good reason to fight with him this time, she sighed in disgust and frustration. "But I don't know what to feel now that he showed that much of a dark side."

"Yeah, he isn't a p-perfect dad, I guess. But who is? My dad turned gay o-once and he spanked me a few times and got tricked into beating me once, and he made me so a-afraid of getting grounded. He probably did more n-negative things to me than Mr Simmons did to you, but I know my dad s-still loves me. He messed up a lot, but I know he'd protect me and help me with a-anything, like a good dad. Maybe once your dad gets better, he can be that way f-for you again." All Julia had to say to Butters' suggestion was, "I sure hope so.", though she didn't look all that confident.

Butters inched closer to Julia on the couch and patted her on the back as a sign of support. "Hey, maybe i-if you don't still hate him that much after a while, you could go see him with us tomorrow or some o-other time soon. I mean, s-since he's your dad you gotta see him sometime." Julia had to agree with him, though of course she sure wasn't ready yet. In the back of her mind she wanted to find some excuse to forgive him and see him again, but that may just have been because she was desperate to get back to the way things were. In those old days, she used to feel safe and secure that both her father and Butters would always be there for her and make things better for her if she needed help, no matter what troubles they were going through themselves. She wanted to feel that way around Bill Simmons again more than anything.

******************************************************

The previous night, Julia had had some strong nightmares about her dad and she had a hard time getting back to sleep. But tonight, the nightmare she had about him wasn't that bad, and when she suddenly woke up in her bed, she thought it would be easier to get back to sleep this time. Tiptoeing downstairs to get a glass of water might help more though.

She was very careful to leave the guest room and go down the stairs noise free, and though she wasn't quite noise free when she went into the kitchen to get water, apperantly it wasn't enough to wake the Stotches. She gulped down her drink pretty quick and felt refreshed enough to go back up- but her concintration was shattered when she heard the phone ring. Obviously Julia had no idea who could possibly be calling the house at this hour, but she figured she should answer quick and get rid of this likely crank caller before anyone else got up. But once she picked up the phone and asked "Hello?", she knew it was no crank caller.

"Julia? You're actually up already?!"

"Dad?"

"Yeah, yeah, it's me. Oh, I thought I was gonna hear from Mr or Mrs Stotch to start off, I could have warmed up with them! But I guess I can get it out of the way faster now."

"Dad, what's that supposed to mean? Are you all right, are you calling because something else happened?"

"A lot of things happened today, but before I get to that I have to ask you something. Do you really hate the kind of life we've been living, or was it said in the heat of the moment? Tell me the truth before I do anything else."

"I....I don't know. Obviously there are a lot of things I've hated about it, and I didn't think of saying anything about it until now. I might hate it, but I understand why you've been doing it, to follow your dreams."

"My dreams aren't going anywhere, and my last chance to make them go somewhere went away in Texas. It's a great thing to follow your dreams no matter what, don't get me wrong. But when you can see that still following them would just make you a joke at the expense of not finding something better, then you have to reorganize your priorities. Do you understand?"

"A little, I guess. So did you need my approval to change something around?"

"Yes I did. Because now I can tell the rest of our family to send the money."

"The rest of our family? I thought you said they couldn't know about what you did, you said it would be too humilating."

"Actually, I didn't feel that bad when I called them and told them about it this afternoon. Talking with them really filled in the pieces of the puzzle that Butters talk didn't fill in. They're gonna pay for the parts of my hospital bill that me and the Stotches can't afford, and they offered to help me with something else I was thinking about doing. And now that I know you never really liked things before, I can tell them to follow through with that idea."

"What are you talking about, Dad? You are in a right state of mind to make decisions, right?"

By then the phone conversation between Julia and Mr Simmons had indeed woken up the Stotches, and although she wasn't paying attention to anything else around her, if she had she would have seen Butters and his parents coming down the steps to hear what was happening. Of course, they couldn't hear what Bill was saying on the other end, but Julia could clearly hear the big surprise he had to say next.

"I'm gonna be in this hospital overnight, then they say I can start using a wheelchair. Once I get checked out I'll come back to the Stotches house, but before then I'm gonna tell our other family members to wire us some money. 500 dollars worth. And with it, I should have enough to make a down payment on an apartment somewhere here in South Park. Then once I find another job around here that I can do, we'll only be staying at that apartment until we have enough to buy a house. A house we won't be moving out from every few months, the kind of full time house you've never had before. But I want us to have it now."

"Wait....wait a minute Dad, are you saying....what are you saying? Are you being serious? You're not actually saying you want to buy an apartment and a house to stay in in South Park....are you?" It took all the energy Butters still had at this late hour to not jump in joy at the mere possibility that Bill's offer for Julia to live in South Park might be true.

"Julia, I got nervous enough to take those pills and drinks because I was afraid of what was in store for us. And all that really did was give me more things to be afraid of, like the fact that I might have made you hate me forever. But that ends now. Julia, did you really like Texas, or at least like it as much as you did being here in South Park?"

"I, I.....well, I hardly had as many friends there as I do here. I hardly had anyone there that I was really close to either, unlike here with Butters."

"Then you wouldn't miss Texas that much if we officially moved out of there to stay here? Be honest. How happy would you be in South Park compared to if you were in Texas?"

"I guess I would be....well actually, it's no contest, of course it's better here and.....wait a minute. Are you offering to stay here only because you're trying to apologize for hitting me and insulting Butters? Is that the only reason you want to do this?"

"It's, well, it is one of the reasons. I know I can't offer you the chance to live here and expect to be forgiven like that, since you're too smart to be that easily won over. Maybe you'll never trust me or respect me again like you used to, but I want to try and get something close to that. Finding a perminant home to do that in should be a good start."

"But what about your dream of entertaining, you know South Park is the worst place to show any artistic talent."

"I don't care about that anymore, it's not like my career was going anywhere. There's gotta be something else I'm good at that I can do in this town, and I'm sure once I call the other members of the family, I'll remember what it is. But once I find it and make enough money, we'll have that full time house of our own that I never let you have before."

"Dad, I...."

"I love you, Julia, and I forgot that when I let myself fuck up. But now I'd rather die than let that happen again, and you deserve a dad who would be willing to make those sacrifices. And I'm willing to take all the time in the world to earn your trust and love back. Will you let me do that?" Bill didn't hear anything from the other end of the line for some time. "Julia? Hello?"

"Could, could I come over tomorrow so we could work the rest of this out?"

"Of course, honey. I'm not going anywhere until tomorrow night at the latest, so come down sometime before then." This time Bill took a while to say the next few words. "Well, now that you know my plans and how I feel, I should probably get some sleep for tomorrow. You should go back to bed too."

"I guess I should. Well, uh, I'll see you tomorrow then. Good night Dad."

"Yeah. Good night to you too, sweetheart. Sweet dreams." And for the first time in what seemed like forever, Bill knew he would have those kind of dreams tonight as well.

******************************************************

Julia was true to her word as she finally went to see her father the next afternoon. There, Bill told her all of his plans for the future in person, as the money that the rest of the family had wired would be getting to him just as he got checked out. After that, the Stotches would drive them to find the right $500 apartment that they could stay in for a while. Julia easily agreed to that plan in about a matter of seconds.

It only took a few days for the plan to officially be carried out. Bill was checked out and would stay in a wheelchair until his arm healed and he could use crutches again, but he found no trouble navagating through his new apartment- which was actually one of the apartment buildings they had stayed in for a few days during one of their other visits to South Park. But this time they would be there for more than a few days, though he didn't wanna stay too long since he and Julia would hopefully be able to afford a better place soon.

And after talking things over with the other Simmons family members, Bill finally found the right full time job where he could make that kind of money.[Granted, the Mayor was mad at him after the last time he took a job in South Park, but since tons of other shit happened after that, she wouldn't remember that enough to protest him being back.]He would become a motivational speaker for pill and drug addicts in the hospital that were a lot worse off than he was, and he would sprinkle him some "inspirational comedy" acts to help get the message across. It was almost like the same thing as performing for convicts, but drug addicts were less likely to rape him, and if the act was bad enough, the addicts would want to quit drugs so they wouldn't have to see him anymore. Plus since he knew first hand the dangers of pills and drugs, he'd actually have a shot to convert some people back to normal. And he could do that job while meeting with doctors to make sure he didn't get tempted to take any more pills himself.

And while Bill was at work with his new job, Julia kept busy too- by officially enrolling in South Park Elementary, where she was now a full time member of Mr Garrison's class. Principal Victoria was taken back that she actually wanted to be put into that hellhole of a class, but she let her do it and figured she'd come crying back to her to be sent away from Mr Garrison soon enough, like all the other new students. But now that she was in the same class with her boyfriend Butters, and fellow girls Wendy and Bebe, and had the chance to show up Cartman on a daily basis now, she didn't think she'd be going back to the Principal any time soon. And if Mr Garrison was particularly insane one day, a nice afternoon out with Butters and the others would make things better, since she could do that every day now.

To celebrate the official arrival of a new family in South Park, the Simmons invited the Stotches over to dinner in their apartment one night after Bill's casts came off for good again. Soon they would start hanging out with the other familes in town, and fit in to their little social circle. But for now, their first social occasion at their new home involved inviting a family they were already friends with, and who they owed a whole bunch of stuff to. The night consisted of a pleasant dinner, small talk between the three adults and between the two kids- basically if you saw them all together then, you'd never believe that just a few weeks ago, they were part of a scene where someone fell down the stairs after trying to hit a kid.

At around the time that the Stotches had to go home, Bill noticed Butters in Julia's new room that had just got finished being put together. They were having fun with Julia's various toys- including the stuffed lion present Julia almost forgot to bring here- and would probably get ready for a good night kiss once Butters's parents called him over to leave. But before then, Bill called Butters over to have a private talk with him, which they had in his room a few seconds later. "Butters?" Bill started off.

"Y-Yes, Mr Simmons?"

"I never said I was sorry for hitting Julia and calling you a bitch. And I never thanked you for....putting me in my place in the hospital. I have a decent, less dangerous job now that may just make a difference, I'm pill free, I have a real home again, and Julia has a real home where she can see you and her other friends all the time. I couldn't have done any of that if it wasn't for you, and I'll never forget that. So thank you."

"Uh, s-sure thing Mr Simmons. Heck, I was due to d-do something right without making things worse a-at the same time sometime, right?" Butters got a slight chuckle at that before he figured it would be time to go soon. "Well, I guess I'd b-better get ready to go. Good luck at the hospital, I g-guess I'll see you soon, huh?" Bill nodded as Butters took his cue to leave the room. After waiting around for a while, he got up and left in time to see the Stotches preparing to leave. He said his goodbyes to Chris and Linda before they walked out of the room, but Butters stayed for an extra while as Julia came over to say her goodnights.

"I'll see you tomorrow at school, Butters." Julia said with an extremely wide smile- she was still getting used to having the chance to say that, and still savoring the fact that she could see him every day and at almost any time she wanted for the first time ever. And in her excitement, she put an exclamation point on her goodnights by giving Butters a big kiss on the lips- which Butters returned right after he could think straight again. After he was able to do that for a few seconds, they broke the kiss and Butters wished her good night verbally.

As Butters walked down the hall to catch up with his parents, he turned back to see Bill closing the door, but paid more attention to something else- Julia smiling at her dad with the kind of love and affection she had for him in their previous visits. Clearly enough progress had been made in the last few weeks for Julia and Bill to finally settle things and repair the damage to their relationship, and eventually every other thing between them was going to be okay now. Butters formed one last smile before he turned back again to head home, since Julia would fill him in on any extra details tomorrow at school. He could really look forward to hearing from his girlfriend every day of the year, and he had helped fix things between her and her father in the process. Overall, the last official visit to South Park from Julia and Bill Simmons before their move here turned out to be quite a successful one after all.

THE END