Dirt Wizard

by dancearoundpizza

Five short stories on Stan and Kyle's relationship through high school. Stan/Kyle, minor Kyle/Craig

I.

The funny thing was that they did talk about it – or, they did at first. It may have been a secret, but it didn't happen out of the blue. It started after Christmas break in eighth grade, when already everyone was talking about the big dance at the end of the year. This was their last year of middle school, and their first real school dance. Only the eighth graders got to have dances, but they'd stuck their heads into the gym in previous years to sneak a peek and it was an event. A dark, loud, poorly supervised, spiked-punch event.

So, it happened at Stan's house. The first time it happened. It was a Wednesday night after dinner and Kyle was lying on the floor of Stan's room with his ear pressed to the floor through his honours chemistry homework, watching the end of Sixteen Candles in the dark. He could hear the humming of the house, Stan's parents walking around downstairs. Stan sat next to him with a binder across his legs, trying to rub the hat-head out of his hair.

It was Stan who spoke first, dark eyes flashing in the glow of the screen.

"Do you ever worry about that?"

Kyle rolled over to look at him, face still pressed into the floor. He pushed his hair out of his eyes. "Worry about what?"

"Kissing a girl."

Kyle squinted at him, paper crinkling under his head. "Dude."

"What? That's …" Stan scratched his arm. "… a normal concern."

Kyle knew he could take one of two routes right now: admit he had never kissed anyone, or pretend he had. But it wasn't like Stan wouldn't know he was lying – in what universe would he kiss someone and not brag to Stan?

He sighed. "Whatever. Everyone's probably bad at kissing, she wouldn't notice."

"But what if she's kissed other guys? She'll know I'm bad if she has a frame of reference."

Kyle sat up.

"Who do you want to kiss?"

"Wendy. There's that dance at the end of the year, everyone fools around."

Stan's room was hot and dark and Kyle wanted to take his socks off because his feet were too warm, but he didn't. Stan was sitting on the floor against his unmade bed, bare arms glowing pale in the scrolling credits. His t-shirt was wrinkly and thin.

"Wait, haven't you already kissed Wendy?"

"Kind of, when we were kids. Not for real."

"And she's definitely kissed other dudes. Ow!" Stan kicked him in the leg, and he laughed. "Sorry, sorry."

Stan sighed and closed the binder in his lap, sliding it away across the floor. "I don't wanna fuck things up with her! If I'm bad at it, she'll tell everyone, and won't wanna do it again."

Kyle rolled his eyes. "So just don't be bad at it. It doesn't look hard."

"It has to be."

Unconsciously, Stan chewed his lips. He wasn't sure how he'd gotten to be thirteen without making out with a girl, but here he was. Of course he'd kissed Wendy, but that was nothing, he knew it wouldn't hold up. Not in a dark crepe-papered gym, head buzzing with pilfered shandies and hormones. He peered at Kyle through the dark of his room, who looked like he wanted to be anywhere but here having this conversation. It was the middle of winter and his freckles were faint, eyes bright and apprehensive. Red eyelashes glowing strangely, under-eyes dark from a winter vacation full of video games.

"You could always …" Kyle wagged his hand. "Like, practice? Find another girl you don't like and make out with her instead." He sniggered. "Find a fat chick who won't rag on you."

Stan shuddered. "No way, dude. So, so not worth it."

"If you did that, I'd rag on you. I'd tell fucking everyone." Kyle laughed, and Stan kicked him again. Kyle kicked back and a scuffle ensued, fists in the front of shirts, elbows jabbing, Kyle rattling off imaginary scenarios where Stan played tonsil tennis with middle school's most untouchable girls in between giggle snorts. The loose sheets of Kyle's homework crumpled under their knees.

Stan shoved him back against the bed frame, laughing, and Kyle planted a socked foot in the middle of his chest to keep him back. He tried not to sound breathless.

Stan started to say, "We could always …" and trailed off. It was supposed to be a joke, but he realized after he said it that he wasn't smiling.

And then Kyle wasn't smiling either. And Stan felt his toes move against his chest before he lowered his leg and drew it up to his chest. He knew he had to say something else, and fast. It was easy: I'm kidding. I'm fucking with you. But it didn't come out that way.

"Like other guys in our grade haven't."

Kyle's mouth was open just enough to see a hint of his teeth, glinting. Rust-coloured eyebrows raised, shocked and skeptical. But not angry. He quickly moved his leg away from where it was touching Stan's.

"You're kidding," he said slowly, not even blinking. Stan was silhouetted by the TV and he couldn't see his face.

"Do you … want me to be kidding?" Stan stopped and shook his head. "Whatever. It's stupid. I just didn't – I mean, I know you wouldn't tell anyone. It's like … it's normal, right? Practicing? I heard …" He had to let that sentence end. This was a weird, unexpected turn. He was surprising himself. Where had he heard that guys did this sometimes? The word experimenting stuck out in his head, but was it still an experiment at thirteen? It must be.

He searched Kyle's features for any signs, but he was frozen, staring glassily. He squeezed his eyes shut tight for a moment then opened them, fixing on a spot on Stan's chest. His mouth moved wordlessly for a bit before he found anything to say.

"I've never kissed anyone either."

"I know."

"This is so fucked up."

"Okay."

Kyle looked at him then, and tensed. He realized they weren't that far apart. He suddenly had to set rules.

"Once."

Stan nodded.

"Just to see."

"Right."

"If you tell anyone –"

"Why the fuck would I tell anyone?" Stan snorted. "Bragging rights?"

"Fuck you."

Kyle took a deep breath and moved, and Stan sat back. He folded his legs under him, and Stan stretched his out. He cracked his knuckles nervously.

Stan felt like he should say something else, maybe make a joke, but he couldn't figure out how to force it. Kyle looked like he was going to either shatter into a million pieces or kill him, because it was a fine line. Vulnerable, in any case. He leaned closer slowly, to give Kyle time to back out or smack him. He didn't.

Their noses smushed and Kyle hissed air between his teeth. Stan moved back.

Kyle rolled his eyes even though Stan couldn't see him and grumbled, "Jesus Christ," tipping his head to the side before leaning back in.

Stan made a noise in the back of his throat when their lips touched, his hands balled into fists. For a second they just stayed there, not moving, holding their breath. Adrenaline spiking from closeness. But Stan knew he'd only get one of these so in the interest of not wasting it, he tried to move his lips. He didn't know how to do it and it was clumsy and wet, drawing one of Kyle's lips between his, sucking, testing his tongue against the inside of his lip. Nothing could prepare either of them for the feeling of another tongue on their own, slick and impossibly smooth and so intensely sexual in a way neither of them really got yet. Kyle twisted his fist in the sleeve of Stan's t-shirt and pressed closer, feeling a hot, clammy hand against his forearm, just up from where his hand was clenched white-knuckle tight in the leg of his jeans.

Only when their teeth accidentally clacked did Stan shoot back, red-faced and sweating nervously, looking down and seeing Kyle wipe his mouth with the back of his hand out of the corner of his eye.

"Uh …" Where to start? He couldn't even look at him.

"Spitty," Kyle said quietly. Not meek, but quiet.

"Sorry."

"No, it's –" He stopped. Stan couldn't look at him but watched the hand on his knee lift then drop again a second later. "You'll be fine. Watch your teeth, I guess."

Stan felt his ears go red. He heard the looping music of the Sixteen Candles DVD menu behind him, tuned out until now, and was glad they didn't have any other lights on.

"I'm gonna go," Kyle said, cracking his knuckles again.

"Yeah."

He sat on the floor as Kyle jammed his hat on and stuffed his homework back into his backpack, slinging his coat over his arm at the door. He did look back at him, though, sitting by the bed with his kiss-swollen lips.

He said, "See you tomorrow, I guess," and left.

Maybe they didn't talk to each other much that week, but it could have been worse. They had most of their classes together but Kyle ditched half of Thursday, and when Stan did see him he touched his lips a lot, silently or when he was thinking, or when he didn't think anyone was looking. Then Stan started doing it too. But on Friday they all went to Cartman's and played Call of Duty until three in the morning and everything was normal, so maybe it wasn't that big of a deal in the end.

The next week, Stan nudged Kyle as they were packing their books up after English.

"Do you wanna come over and watch a movie?"

Kyle stopped a moment, textbook held over his open backpack. He was lost in remembering what happened the last time they watched a movie at Stan's, and something in his tone implied more of the same.

"I told Kenny we'd hang out."

"Tell him you have homework."

"I do have homework."

"You can do it at my place."

Kyle threw his bag over his shoulder and sighed out his nose as Stan raised his eyebrows, expectant.

They walked out of the room together and Kyle finally grumbled, "I'm picking the movie."

Their movie nights became a weekly occurrence, excused to Kenny and Cartman under the pretense of the only thing the two of them had exclusively in common, which was honours chemistry. They rented a movie every week from the one dingy rental place in South Park after school and took it to Stan's on a day when they didn't actually have any homework, and watched none of it. Their teeth didn't hit anymore, unless they wanted them to, and sometimes they did. They didn't have to talk about it anymore; it was just expected. A new thing. When they were out with their friends, they didn't do anything. They didn't even walk close to one another. But when they were at Stan's, with his bedroom door locked and a movie to be ignored, it was different. It was just something they did – pushed back against the wall on the bed, doing nothing but make out for hours like horny, uncoordinated teenagers. Wanting as much to brag as they did to keep it a secret to themselves forever and ever.

.

II.

It was June and time for the school dance, and because Wendy didn't believe in gender roles she asked Stan to go with her as soon as the posters went up, not one to wait for him to ask. He said yes on the spot.

Something weird and twisty inside him told him he should tell Kyle about it, though. Not permission, but … something like that. He reminded himself that that was how this whole thing got started, anyways, and he was more than ready for it.

So he asked when Kyle was over for one of their movie nights. The window was open and the curtains fluttered with a breeze still sharp at night, even in June. The movie was Trainspotting but he was on his back on the bed, head pushed back into his pillow and up around his ears so he could hear the sound of Kyle's tongue in his mouth. He tentatively put his hands on Kyle's knees, drawn up as he sat on top of him, leaning down. Kyle jumped.

Stan didn't know how to start, so when Kyle inched back to catch his breath, he tripped all over himself to say, "I'm taking Wendy to the dance."

Kyle sat back. "What dance?"

"Wh – the big end of year school dance."

"Oh." Did he really forget? "Sure, whatever."

For a second Stan thought that was it, but then Kyle looked at him, then away, and climbed off him.

"Hey, what –"

"No, it's fine." Kyle sat on the edge of the bed, rubbing his wild, woolly hair. He'd gotten it cut last week so it didn't hang into his eyes as much anymore, and was almost shaved at the back of his neck.

Stan got up on his elbows, watching him. He was so small. They were both skinny, even for thirteen, but Kyle was a couple inches shorter than Stan. Last year it had only been one inch. "C'mere."

"Naw, I wanna watch this."

"Trainspotting?"

'It's supposed to be good."

"You didn't care about Scarface last week."

"Well, I care about this one." He slid off the bed and sat on the ground, stretching his legs out.

Stan didn't want to sigh because he'd hear him. It's probably better that they actually watch a movie once in a while, he thought. He didn't want things to get weird.

No amount of convincing could make Kyle go to the dance, not that Stan tried very hard. Cartman did, though – even though they all knew it was because he didn't want to go alone, because Kenny and Stan had dates – but when he said Kyle didn't want to go to a boy-girl dance because he was gay, Kyle gave him a bloody nose by banging his face into the flagpole and everyone watching and hooting missed the way his eyes flicked to Stan's, except for Stan.

Stan sweat into his stupid collared shirt at the dance, which was as packed with eighth graders as it was with sexual tension. As usual, the supervision was lax and the punch was almost half liquor – vodka, gin, beer, and several other things because no one thought to organize the spiking, so it tasted horrible, but it did what it had to.

Wendy looked really nice. She had her hair pulled back and she didn't wear a lot of make-up but enough of it, Stan thought, and she'd obviously taken the time to learn how to dance well, which Stan belatedly wished he had done. Part of him wondered if Kyle knew how to dance. He got them punch and Wendy didn't mind the booze, and they yelled over the music to Bebe and Kenny but still couldn't hear. Wendy was wearing a black skirt and a purple sweater that fell off her shoulder and down her back, and he watched her shoulder blades move when she swept her hair aside and tried to untangle a hard knot of feelings in the pit of his stomach.

Towards the end of the dance, almost half the couples were on or under the bleachers, depending on what base you thought you were going to get to. Stan and Wendy were on the bleachers but at the back, ears ringing from the constant din of music, fingers buzzing with alcohol.

Because he was a gentlemen, he asked, "Is this okay?" before he kissed her and she laughed. They kissed and he thought, she's so small. She tasted like terrible punch but he did too, and he closed his eyes and relief washed over him when he realized it felt natural. He'd gotten used to kissing. He brushed her hair behind her ear with his thumb and was startled by how soft and straight it was, like silk. And the same colour as his own.

He coaxed her tongue to his and held her face in his hands, tipping her up, going at it in earnest because if it wasn't good enough after all this time, he wasn't sure what to think. Especially when he knew Kenny would be finger banging Bebe under the bleachers below them. He squeezed his eyes shut and it was just like movie night – her teeth were smaller and her lips were fuller, and when she ran her fingers through his hair she didn't dig them into his scalp partly to be mean, but it was almost the same.

But Wendy made a quiet keening sound and at first he thought that was good because he'd heard something like it before, but she put her hands on his chest and moved him back. His heart was racing, hands on her back nervously touching her bra.

"You're hurting me," she said quietly, half laughing. She touched her thumb to her lip. "Wow, Stan," and she sort of trailed off. He couldn't tell if the face she was making was a smile, but in any case, they didn't keep kissing. When she told her friends about it, she said he was good.

On his walk home, he passed Kyle's house but all the lights were off, so he kept walking. He texted him and it took forever with his mittens on: are you up?

Not even a minute later, it buzzed in his pocket. how'd it go?

the punch was hella boozy.

He smiled when this text, too, was instantaneous. did you kiss her?

yeah. He paused, and typed and deleted a few things before deciding on, she wasn't very good.

He got the next text as he was slipping silently into his bedroom, groping for the light.

HA!

.

III.

Things were a little different after the dance, but movie night was always the same and they realized they'd started to look forward to it, and had them more often. Then it wasn't just movies but video games and television and comics – any time they were alone in Stan's room, or the kitchen or living room if his parents were out. They got in the habit of kissing hello and goodbye and just doing it for the sake of it, and didn't tell a soul. Eighth grade became ninth became tenth, and then the problem wasn't not knowing how to kiss but not knowing how to fuck, because everyone bloomed early in South Park. In a town with so little to do, you turned to sex, drugs and alcohol pretty quickly if you didn't want to die of boredom, and sixteen was ripe for the picking.

They'd end up fooling around sooner than a lot of their peers, not that anyone knew about it. It had been an elephant in the room since they were fourteen, maybe fifteen, but the thought of talking about it made each of them, secretly, want to jump out a window. Hey, I like shoving my tongue down your throat and everything but have you ever thought about touching my dick?

It presented a problem beyond the obvious, even, because there was no justification for it. You could learn to kiss to be better at it for girls, but there was no reason to jerk each other off. It wasn't a transferable skill. Both of them thought about this obsessively, looking at it from every angle to figure out if there was a way to make it not incredibly, undeniably gay. Trying to figure out why they even wanted to in the first place, and what that meant.

When they couldn't come up with anything, they just avoided it for years in place of really obvious boners and grinding they never, ever talked about. That is, until one Columbus Day when they were sixteen, home from school and in Kyle's room – they'd started going to Kyle's more often when his parents started to question why he was always out of the house. His door didn't lock so they'd shoved his desk chair up under the knob to slow down prying parents.

This time was different because Stan started to take Kyle's shirt off. They never really undressed, another inexplicable barrier neither of them felt like crossing. Maybe their hands went up under shirts, but that was different, it wasn't taking your clothes off. But Kyle was in his lap, hands on his throat and kissing him so hard his head hurt from getting ground into the wall, and he felt different. Maybe it was because they hadn't seen each other all weekend, or maybe because they were both so hard that no amount of thinking about their grandmothers or cold showers could make it go away.

He grabbed the back of Kyle's shirt and pulled it up over his head before he could stop him, but he didn't anyways. He let him tug it down over his arms and tossed it down on his bed. He didn't want to but he sat back and looked at Stan, trying not to feel like an idiot. Kyle had gotten a lot taller but not much less skinny, and the past summer's freckles still marred his chest and arms and shoulders like constellations from dozens of days spent swimming outside. And of course Stan had seem him with his shirt off – he'd seen him naked, even, but not lately and maybe he didn't even look – but that was the other Stan, the one he'd been friends with since he was a baby, not the new Stan who gave him secret hickeys on the semesters when they weren't taking gym.

Stan would have smiled if he wasn't so nervous all of a sudden, but Kyle didn't seem to mind.

He rubbed his shoulder and laughed, then said, "You, too," and tugged at the bottom of Stan's t-shirt.

Stan got that same knot in his stomach because why did this feel so easy? He didn't have to practice with anyone else to practice with Kyle. So maybe that was it, because he ripped his shirt off and threw Kyle down on the bed, listening to him trying to stifle his laughter in the quiet house.

He climbed on top of him, all sharpened edges and ribs and elbows, and dove his hands into his hair and kissed him, feeling his hands scrape up his bare back. When he started fumbling with his jeans Kyle started to laugh into his mouth.

He stopped, resting his forehead on his. "What?"

"Nothing, sorry."

"Are you laughing at me?" he asked, but even as he said it, he was laughing too.

"It's just funny," Kyle laughed, more quietly this time. His hands fell down Stan's back to the bed.

"Bad funny?" he breathed.

"No."

Stan pushed his jeans down, and Kyle lifted his butt so he could do the same. They didn't look at their hands or each other, Kyle staring up at the ceiling, Stan's face pushed into his shoulder. They didn't make a sound, arching, breathing, sweating, furiously jerking each other off but God was it different than doing it yourself. It lasted about two minutes; they'd already been hard for an hour, in some way waiting for this for years, and it was the first time they'd been touched by anyone but themselves. Two minutes tops. Stan gasped when he came, like he was surprised.

They only looked at each other afterwards, not laughing anymore. Stan sat back and sort of hung his jizz-covered hand in the air, not wanting to touch anything with it. Kyle grinned and hit it with his own hand, so it smacked into Stan's chest.

"Dude, gross!"

"Go get a kleenex," Kyle laughed, nodding to his nightstand, and Stan reached across him to grab a handful. They pulled their jeans up and sat next to each other on the edge of Kyle's bed, until Kyle started laughing again. He shook his head and went to run his hand through his hair, but stopped just short.

"I can't believe we just fucking did that."

"I can," Stan snorted. He tossed the kleenex into the bin by his dresser. "Wanna play Soul Calibur?"

For a second, he thought he was going to leave him with another 'see you at school,' followed by a week of careful avoidance. But it never came. He watched Kyle move his jaw back and forth, thinking.

"Tekken," he said decidedly, and stood up to grab controllers.

.

IV.

They went to the end-of-year dance in Junior year together, kind of, and then everyone started to suspect they were dating. And they weren't, not really, but they didn't have another word for it anyways. Like everyone hadn't suspected it since elementary school. Kyle asked if Stan was taking Wendy this year, and when he said no, Kyle said, "Maybe I'll go," and that was that. He hadn't gone to any previous dances, not for longer than a couple minutes.

So they showed up together halfway through, seventeen and already drunk, wearing t-shirts and jeans and beat-up sneakers. They had flasks shoved into their back pockets and sat at the back of the bleachers, watching and laughing the kids dancing below. Heads turned because most people in their grade knew that Kyle Broflovski had never been to a school dance, and that Stan always went with Wendy but never scored.

Heads also turned because maybe they weren't football stars, but they had shaped up into decent looking boys. Both perpetually skinny and knock-kneed with wide, sloping shoulders and pale skin. Stan was a little bigger, maybe by a couple inches, but if it weren't for Kyle's fire-red hair and freckles they'd look like brothers.

Their shoulders touched when Stan leaned in, his head bubbly with whiskey.

"Look at Bebe's hair," he laughed.

"So eighties," Kyle hissed, taking another swig of his little silver flask and letting it burn down his throat. "Did she pay actual money to get that done?"

"So harsh." He looked over at Kyle, smiling kind of goofily. "Your hair looks good today."

Kyle elbowed him in the ribs, grinning, "Well, you look like a fucking retard. Cut it out."

"It looks nice shorter."

"You're so fucking drunk."

"Want me to suck you off in the bathroom?"

"Oh my God, Marsh,go home!" They dissolved into a fit of laughter, gasping for air.

A yell cut through the music from down below them. "You guys holding out on me?"

Kyle wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. "Kenny!"

Kenny raised a hand in salutation and bounded up the bleachers. His jeans were torn and his white t-shirt was too big and holey, but Kenny McCormick could make a garbage bag look good if he wanted. "Gimme some of that." He snatched Stan's flask and plopped down next to him, gulping it down

He handed the flask back to Stan and reached across him to ruffle Kyle's hair. "So what're you doing at a dance, Broflovski? You lost?"

"Nah," he said simply, letting his head loll back against the wall. He wasn't that drunk, but drunk enough not to worry – and lately he'd been thinking, what would it matter if Kenny knew? They'd been friends since before he could remember, would he even care? Could he already tell? "Thought I'd give it a shot."

"No kidding." Kenny looked between Stan and Kyle, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees. "You guys look pretty fucking cozy up here."

"Nah," Stan stretched his feet out to rest on the row of seats below. "Just drinkin'. Here." He pushed his flask towards Kenny, who gratefully downed the rest.

"Christ," Kyle laughed, smacking him, "You're gonna be a vegetable when you're older, dude."

Kenny pulled a face and wiped his mouth with the back of his arm. "God willing."

Kenny sat with them after that, helping them make fun of how people danced and helping drink their booze. But then there was a silence as they passed around what was left of Kyle's flask, when they were reeking of whiskey and sniggering at everything, and Kenny held his hands up.

"Guys, I'm gonna be real for a second. Are you ready?"

"Sure," Stan said, smushing his shoulder into Kyle's so he could get a better look at Kenny.

"Kyle, you ready?" He pointed at him.

"One hundred percent."

"We've been friends forever, right?

"Always will be," Stan agreed, clapping a hand on his knee. Kenny laughed.

"Exactly. So, you're gonna have to like, pardon me for asking this, but I gotta fucking ask, and it stays between us. Are you –" He wagged a finger between the two of them, and Kyle flinched. "– or are you not, fucking?"

Stan's ears went red, but Kenny didn't know to look for that. Kyle did. The two of them laughed at the exact same time kind of nervously, and that Kenny did notice. He stood up and sat on the row below them, looking intently up. "No way," he gaped.

Stan flipped his empty flask around in his hands and grinned widely, looking down at it. "Uh, define fucking."

Kenny roared laughing so hard that everyone in the gym looked, and he flipped himself backwards down a row of seats. Stan flushed red from his ears to his throat and Kyle punched him in the arm so hard he lurched forward.

"Dude!"

"He won't care!" Stan insisted, and Kyle knew he was right but that didn't mean it wasn't scary anyways. What if he told people who did care? What if he told their parents, and they packed up and moved? They were seventeen now, he figured. They could leave if they wanted.

When Kenny reappeared in front of them he had his hands over his mouth like a tittering school girl.

He said, "You're fucking with me."

If he wasn't drunk Stan might not have been smiling, but as it was he couldn't stop. "I dunno what to tell you, man."

Kenny stared at Kyle. "Kyle?"

"I dunno, dude." He rubbed at his mouth to hide his smile.

"This is fucking hilarious," Kenny concluded, climbing back up to sit with them. "I don't believe you."

Stan grinned at him and took another sip of whiskey. "Then don't."

"I don't fucking believe you," he repeated. He stared at them like they'd each grown second heads. "Prove it."

"What?"

"Kiss or something, I don't know!"

"Fuck you," Kyle laughed, but as he did Stan slung an arm around his neck and gave him a sloppy kiss on the cheek.

"Agh! Dude!"

Kenny believed them after that – not because of the stupid kiss but because Kyle's hand had come up to grab Stan's, hanging off his shoulder, and he hadn't even noticed. He kept holding it until he shoved Stan away, laughing.

"Jesus fucking Christ, you guys!" Kenny whined. "Don't let me in on your fucking secret club or anything, we've been best friends for how long?"

"Why would we tell you?!" Kyle threw his hands up.

"Why wouldn't you?" Kenny grinned. "This is insane."

"Nah."

"You know what I had a girl say to me once?" Kenny leaned in. "A girl in our grade, doesn't matter who. But we were fooling around, and I didn't read too much into it 'cause, you know, girls, but she said something like … I wish you looked at me the way Stan and Kyle look at each other."

The two just about ignited in flames, and Kenny hooted with laughter. "I shit you not," he said.

"Well that's bullshit," Kyle griped, snatching the flask that'd grown warm in Stan's hand. He tossed the rest back. "Who was it? I'll kill her."

Kenny made a motion of zipping his lips.

"Well, fuck you too."

"How long has this been going on, though? I'm – I'm borderline insulted over here."

Stan kicked at Kenny with his sneaker. "We're not talking about this."

"Oh, c'mon, like you're not bursting to gossip." Kenny grinned wolfishly.

"Fuck off, dude."

"What, like, a year? Two? Am I getting close?"

"I don't even know," Kyle shrugged, scratching his neck. He let his knee knock against Stan's and looked over at him. "What, since like – seventh, eighth grade?"

"I don't remember."

"Aw, shit!" Kenny clapped his hands together. "You fuckin' dogs, you probably got lucky before anyone in our grade!"

"We are so leaving."

Stan stood and cracked his neck, dropping his flask back into his pocket. He couldn't remember how long they'd been here; the music was still pumping, but most of the couples had paired up and were on the bleachers around them or underneath them, getting hickeys they'd have to hide from their parents.

Kyle stumbled standing and braced a hand against the wall. "I am so drunk."

As they stepped down the bleachers after Kenny, Stan rubbed Kyle's back, hot through his t-shirt. "I'll get you home safe, princess."

Kyle flipped him off and in doing so, tripped down the last step. Stan laughed and caught up to him, looking at Kenny, who was turned around and waiting for them.

"What're you gonna do?" Stan asked him, hand still on Kyle's back because he didn't think to move it.

Kenny shrugged. "Walk home. Hang around and hook up with any left-overs."

"Cool. See you later, I guess?"

"You guess," Kenny snorted. "Yeah, I fucking guess." He winked as the two passed him. "Don't do anything I wouldn't."

"That's horrible advice."

The night air was freezing cold and Stan didn't smoke often, but he wished he had a cigarette. Kyle was thinking the same thing. They didn't bring coats to the dance and crossed their arms against the cold, but after seventeen years in their shitty mountain town, they'd learned to stand it.

"Was that as bad as you thought?" Stan asked, peering down into Kyle's face.

Kyle cracked a smile. "No."

"Knew it."

Their breath clouded in the air and the night was clear, the streets empty, stars speckling the sky. The shock of the cold was sobering in a good way. There were no street lights out this way, the only light coming from the porch lights they passed.

Silence stretched. Stan eventually said he wished they had a pack of smokes and Kyle agreed, and they tried to figure out whose eighteenth birthday was closer. They tried willing themselves to be less drunk by the time they got home to their parents.

Suddenly, Kyle chuckled to break the silence, his breath puffing brightly into the air. His cheekbones threw shadows down his face from the glow of the stars and house lights, and he rubbed his forehead.

"You know you lied to Kenny, huh?"

"No, I didn't. How did I lie?"

Kyle looked over at him, and Stan was already looking back. His hair was thick and coarse and clean. Maybe getting a little long, but it suited him. His t-shirt was big and grey and hung low around his neck, collarbone and adam's apple throwing shadows. His eyes were inky black, and his eyelashes went for miles. "We've never fucked."

Stan looked like he tried to stifle the smile that bubbled to the surface, turning away. "We've fucked around."

"It's different."

"You think?"

"Yeah."

Kyle looked over his shoulder, and to the left and right. The street was dark and still and there was no one in sight, so he uncrossed his arms and let his hand drift to Stan's side, and Stan dropped his own and touched his. Kind of holding hands. Not really.

It was Kyle that finally mumbled, "We could, though."

Stan didn't say anything at first. Maybe it was because he was drunk but he rolled the sound of those words around in his head for a while. It wasn't that he'd been waiting, per se. Not any longer than Kyle had.

"Are your parents home?" he asked slowly, fingers buzzing. Two of Kyle's fingers were between two of his, long and cold and dry.

"Yeah. Yours?"

"I think so."

Kyle hummed. "What about your car?"

"Dude, we split a fifth. I'm not driving."

"Not far. The woods by Stark's Pond. We're right by your place, anyways," Kyle insisted, waving up the street in front of them.

Stan looked at Kyle and sucked his teeth and thought that it was kind of flattering how much effort he was putting into this. He thought about how much he had to drink and how intensely sheepish he had looked in front of Kenny. Embarrassed, but not ashamed.

"That could work," Stan admitted, moving his hand to hold Kyle's properly. Kyle looked nervously over his shoulder again. "But I've got a serious question for you."

"Dude." Kyle said tersely, squeezing his hand. "We're not talking about that."

"We're gonna have to."

"I don't care."

"You don't?"

"No, I mean like – I don't wanna talk about it."

Stan laughed and it echoed off the houses. "Don't be a pussy."

"It's embarrassing!"

"You're embarrassing."

Kyle huffed. His vision wasn't quite swimming but not not double, and his teeth felt scummy. He was too drunk to be nervous, but didn't think he would have been anyways. Not really.

He dropped Stan's hand.

"I'll race you for it," he laughed, grinning.

"You'll fucking race me for –"

"Yeah. First one to your front door fucks, no cheating. Go!"

He took off down the street, roaring laughing, hearing Stan's sneakers slapping the pavement behind him. He ran so hard his lungs burned, chest aching with the night air, eyes stinging. Stan was in track in Junior High and had longer legs anyways, and caught up to him easily, passed him just a little to make him run harder.

"I –" Kyle panted, "– fucking – hate – you," but Stan just laughed.

Kyle nearly biffed it spinning around Stan's front walk, and by the time they hit the front door they were too focused on running to remember to check who got there first. If it wasn't a tie, it was very, very close. The force of them slamming into the door shook the house, and they tried to hide their laughter behind their hands.

They choked on their breaths trying to calm down, deciding they'd drank way too much to have done that, their hearts racing, stomachs churning.

Doubled over, looking down at Kyle sitting hunched on the front stoop, Stan asked him, "Did you win?"

It took Kyle a second to get his gag reflex under control, head in his hands to stop the spinning. He put his head on his arms on his drawn up knees and looked back at him, and tried to sound like he was being honest when he said, "I think you did."

Stan ran up to his room to grab his car keys and a few other things while Kyle waited on the stoop, hopefully not throwing up into the bushes. He pulled a toque over his head and took a coat for Kyle, too. His parents were watching TV and didn't notice him dart out. He didn't bother taking anything else to drink, because he wanted to remember this.

He forbade Kyle to talk in the car and stared almost unblinking at the road on the way into the mountains, because if he got a DUI his parents would never forgive him. He went ten miles below the speed limit, the only car on the road, and for the first time in a long time felt Kyle's presence like an atom bomb next to him. The same Kyle he'd grown up with, now on their way to do … this.

"Better crank the heat," Kyle laughed, twisting the heater on. It started to roar.

Stan shushed him.

"You're not gonna hit anyone, man. It's a Tuesday night."

"Shh!"

"You're hilarious."

He wound his beat-up station wagon up a back road behind what used to be Stark's Pond but was now the Wall-Mart, gigantic and dark and foreboding in the middle of the night, parking lot empty but lit up like a prison. The old road was still here from where people used to go camping, and sometimes still did, but it was kind of stupid to camp next to a Wall-Mart now. It went up through the trees to where it started to get steep, and ended in a kind of clearing. He knew kids did mushrooms up here sometimes, but they couldn't hear anyone tonight.

Stan turned the car off.

"Hey, keep it running," Kyle said, reaching for the keys.

"No, it'll drain the battery."

"Dude, we're doing this in the back seat of a car, I at least wanna not freeze my dick off."

"Fine." He snapped the radio on. "But you're getting mood music."

"Oh my God."

Kyle got out of the car and stretched, arm hairs standing on end in the cold. It was a really nice night, he thought. Surprisingly clear. He ran fingers through his hair as if fixing it somehow, and got into the back seat.

Stan had the stereo going.

"Is this Red Fang?" Kyle asked.

"Yes." He climbed into the back seat.

Kyle was laughing. "You're gonna fuck me to Dirt Wizard?"

"Maybe."

They toed their shoes and socks off and listened to the music over the heater blasting stale air into the car, and Stan took his toque off and fiddled with it in his hands.

"How drunk are you?" He looked over at Kyle, who was pulling his shirt over his head. His shoulder blades stuck out and his back was freckled with faded acne scars, glinting pearlescent in the faint light. It was almost midnight dark out.

"Not very," Kyle half-lied, tossing his shirt into the front seat. He grabbed Stan's toque from him and threw it against the dashboard. "C'mon, we don't have all night."

"Don't we?"

Kyle climbed on top of him and lifted his shirt over his head; it was warm and threadbare and smelled like his bedroom, and thus like him. Secretly, Kyle had always wanted to wear one of his shirts to bed, but couldn't imagine justifying that to his family if they found out. He'd never mentioned it to Stan. He took his face in his hands and kissed him, tipping his head back against the seat. Stan made a noise into his mouth and dug his hands into his hair, scratched his nails down his back.

"You nervous?" he asked Kyle, who obviously didn't want to talk, hand grinding against his dick through his jeans.

"If you ask me that one more time I will be," he grumbled against his lips, kissing him again; tongue stroking his, hand pressed to his throat. Stan lifted him up and laid him down on the seats, tugging his jeans off. He couldn't move fast enough. He'd never seen Kyle so quiet – he was normally always laughing, complaining, either shit-talking him or moaning. Now he just lied there, propped up on his skinny arms, short enough to fit reasonably in the back seat of a station wagon. Watching him apprehensively. But he didn't ask if he was nervous again.

Stan smacked his head on the ceiling taking his jeans off and laughed to himself. Kyle watched him, sitting up a little. They didn't talk about taking their clothes off but even if it was in a car it was still, technically, their first time and it somehow felt stupid not to. Stan leaned down over him and lifted his legs, kissing him deep, touching him, trying to un-worry his face. He was bad at lying.

He groped around the floor of the car for the bottle of lube he'd taken from his bedroom and Kyle stared up at the ceiling, breathing shallowly.

"It won't be so bad," Stan said slowly.

"I'm fine."

Stan chuckled and leaned over again, lining up. He gave him the same sloppy kiss on the cheek he had in front of Kenny, nuzzling his neck. "You're cute when you're freaking out."

"Hey, fuck y–" His protests died in his throat and his fingers dug into Stan's arms when he started to push in, and he went very still. It wasn't like they hadn't done stuff like this before, but never this exactly. He ground his forehead against Stan's shoulder.

"You okay?" Stan asked, breathless, every muscle in his body taut with trying not to fucking destroy him. Nothing could've prepared him for how good this felt.

"Fine," he said again, voice high and thin.

"Can I go?"

"Yeah."

He lifted up on his knees and pushed in deeper, achingly slow, until he was buried in him. He grabbed the back of Kyle's neck and gurgled into his shoulder, "Jesus Christ, Kyle."

"That good?"

He didn't say anything. He slid his hands from his neck, down his chest to his hips and grabbed him, feeling his control ebb away. When had he not done that to him? Made him feel like he was insane, out of control, outside of time. He made him feel like an idiot without even trying.

He started to move in earnest and the old car creaked to itself in the woods. The heater hummed, and they were sweating now. The car was full of the sound of slapping skin, cursing, and quiet stoner metal from the front seat over the whirring air. They swore and tried to breathe and dug nails into skin hard enough to leave marks, kissing hard enough to hurt. Locked around each other like a puzzle.

Stan hissed, "I'm gonna come," and Kyle just clung to him tighter, face buried in his shoulder, spitting an unintelligible string of curses that sounded a lot like fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck, and then he was coming too. It felt like it stretched for eons, suspended there just coming.

He didn't know how long it was before he came back down. Lying there in the seconds afterwards, arms across the tops of Stan's shoulders, he shuddered. "That was the worst feeling in the world."

"The whole thing?"

"No, the end. You couldn't have pulled out?"

Stan couldn't move enough to half-heartedly hit him, his face smushed into the side of his head. He pulled out and Kyle made a noise.

"I take that back, that was the worst."

Stan laughed. Kyle squished over so he could kind of lie next to him, but it was awkward, so they both half-sat, half-lied down. Kyle's hands were shaking and he ran a hand through his sweaty hair.

"Fuck, man."

"I know." Kyle rubbed his face and smiled. "Jesus fucking Christ."

They were leaning back on opposite sides of the car, staring at each other incredulously. They didn't remember meeting for the first time, but it probably felt something like this. Kyle squirmed.

"Pass me my boxers."

"No, you look nice."

"Non-negotiable."

Stan threw them at him and watched him struggle to get them on. He wasn't sure what he was supposed to say. Fooling around was one thing, but that was another level. That took an embarrassing amount of trust. He listened, and the CD had looped to play the first song again.

He sighed. "C'mere," and held his arms out. Kyle screwed his mouth up for a second but then went willingly, tucking himself into Stan's arms. There wasn't much room, but they were small and it worked. He was impossibly warm and sticky with drying sweat. "You okay?"

"Managing," Kyle mumbled.

Stan kissed his hair. "Are you still drunk?"

"Kind of."

He folded his arms around him and pulled him into him, back to his chest. Stan sighed again, pressing his cheek against his head.

"Why do you keep sighing?" Kyle asked.

"I don't know what to say," Stan told him, honestly. He bumped his fingers down his ribs, just there through his skin. He'd gotten skinnier as he got taller over the years, growing up but not out. Not that Stan was much less skinny, and only an inch taller now.

Kyle chuckled, but it came out as a weird sort of cough. "What, are you in love with me?" he tried to joke.

Stan turned his head and spoke into his hair. "Yeah," he said quietly. Solemnly.

Kyle didn't say anything for a full minute, playing with a rip along the seam of his boxers. He felt Stan's arms tighten around him, slowly, the longer he didn't speak.

"Good," he said finally, definitively. "Me too."

.

V.

They broke up for a month in Senior year.

It was the middle of the worst part of winter and they got into a loud, violent fight at Kyle's house when no one was home, after a day of hot chocolate and coffee and video games.

It was about their parents.

"I don't get why this is such a big deal!" Kyle yelled, hands in his hair. "We're leaving next year, how bad could it be?"

"Living here isn't the point!" Stan had been sitting, but stood three minutes ago and started pacing one minute ago. "The point is having to live the rest of our lives with our parents knowing we're –" He stopped.

"We're what," Kyle screeched, "gay?! You can't even fucking say it!"

"Maybe you are," Stan snapped. "I'm not."

Kyle's nostrils flared in anger. "Don't you fucking start with that, Marsh, I'll fucking flip."

"You're not flipping now?"

"Christ! Ex-fucking-scuse me if it's 'flipping out' to want to take my boyfriend to prom. The secret boyfriend I've had since eighth fucking grade!"

"Since when do you care about a stupid dance?" Stan shouted.

"Since when do you care what your retarded parents think?"

"Don't fucking talk about my parents!" He barged over to where Kyle stood and backed him up against the kitchen counter.

"God, you don't even know what you're saying!" Kyle screamed into his face, shoving him back. "You know what, Stan? You're right! You're not gay. You're too much of a coward to be gay!" He bared his teeth. "You're too much of a fucking pussy to love me!"

Without thinking, Stan drew his fist back and punched Kyle in the face.

He instantly regretted it.

Kyle fell back against the counter, swearing so loud it rang through the empty house, clutching his face.

"Oh my God," Stan blubbered, going forward, "Fuck, I'm –"

When he whipped back up, Kyle's eyes were wide and red and manic, and the left side of his face was an angry, mottled red. "Get the fuck out!" he screeched, shoving Stan as hard as he could.

Stan almost slipped in his socks on the linoleum of the kitchen. "No, no no, I'm sorry, I'm –"

"Get out of my house!" he said again, and when Stan, frozen with shock, didn't leave, he wound his skinny fist back and punched him in the mouth. He burst one of his knuckles on his teeth. "Get out! Get out!" he screamed, clutching his hand, and this time, Stan did. He grabbed his shoes and ran out the front door in his socks.

No one at knew for sure if Stan and Kyle were dating, but everyone definitely knew when they broke up.

When the two refused to speak to each other in any of the classes they had together, not so much as even looking at each other, and showed up after the weekend sporting twin injuries – Kyle's bruised cheek was a deep, angry purple and his cut knuckle was bandaged, and Stan's top lip was split – there was no one who didn't assume that's exactly what had happened. What no one knew was why, as the two refused to talk about it. Kyle wouldn't talk about Stan, and Stan wouldn't talk at all.

The following Monday, Kyle was in the cafeteria at lunch with Kenny, Cartman, and Butters. Stan hadn't been eating lunch with them anymore; no one was really sure where he went during his lunch hour. They were debating if it would be worth it to get a Psychology degree just to meet girls, because girls were always in Psych, when someone walked up to their table. Kenny noticed first, and Kyle looked up when he saw the look on his face.

It was Craig Tucker.

Kyle stared back up at him, not sure what to say because he couldn't remember having spoken to Craig since ninth grade. Because Craig was obviously looking at him, specifically, he said, "Hey," at a loss for anything else.

"Wanna go for a smoke?" Craig asked, nodding his head towards the doors.

Kyle looked back at the table, where conversation had ceased. He wondered if they were thinking the same thing as he was.

Cartman batted his lashes up at Craig and said, "Where's my free smoke, Tucker?"

Craig sneered at him and said, "Go buy your own," knowing full well that since it was January and he had his eighteenth birthday only weeks before, he was one of the only kids in their school who could buy smokes. He'd been buying them for people ever since – not without a fee.

"Why does Kyle get to bum smokes?" he whined, but Kyle was already standing, wanting to avoid the brawl that would take place if Cartman made a gay joke.

He looked up at Craig. "I'll go."

They didn't say anything as they walked out to the smoke pit, and Kyle didn't want to ask to get his coat, so he froze. Craig stopped at the edge of the little clearing, a pit full of gravel and a semi-circle of graffiti-covered K-rails kids sat on, and knocked two cigarettes out of a pack of shitty Newports. He lit both and passed one to Kyle, and Kyle was too confused to thank him.

So they stood there smoking together, a few feet apart. Kyle watched Craig, who looked right back, and was still utterly confused. He felt like a preteen girl standing next to Craig Tucker, like he assumed most people would: Craig was the tallest guy in their grade at over six-foot-four, and Kyle, who told people he was five-foot-eight but wasn't really, hardly reached his shoulder if you didn't count the added height of his hair. Craig was on the football team, even if he wasn't very good at it, and had shoulders as wide as two of Kyle and forearms like Popeye. There were rumours that he had a tattoo. His hair was a lighter kind of black than Stan's, more brown, and a lot shorter; he had it longer on top and shaved on the sides. He had a tiny hole under his bottom lip from where he had it pierced in tenth grade, though he never wore anything in it anymore. His teeth were big and a little crooked. His eyes were very, very blue.

Kyle realized he'd never really looked at him before – probably because he was too tall to really see his face. And because he was an insufferable asshole, and a little scary.

Kyle jumped when he spoke.

"You break up with Marsh?" he asked.

Kyle absentmindedly rubbed the darkening mark on his cheek, going through the various colour-changes of a nasty bruise. It was in dark purple, well on its way to sickly yellow. "I don't know what you're talking about," he told him in deadpan, a conditioned response he was starting to hate. He immediately regretted saying it, and stared down at the snow and Craig's black on black chucks.

Craig ashed his cigarette. "I'm not an idiot. Try again."

Kyle sucked his smoke until his lungs burned, held it, and exhaled slowly as he corrected, "Yeah." He paused and twiddled the cigarette with his bandaged finger. "Kind of."

"Did you or didn't you?"

Kyle snapped his head up to face Craig because he appreciated a free cigarette as much as the next guy, but this was fucking ridiculous. "Yeah, I did! What the fuck do you care, are you gonna beat me up for being a faggot?" he spat.

Craig's eyebrows rose in what Kyle thought looked like genuine surprise.

"I was gonna ask if you wanted to come over on Friday."

Kyle's eyebrows rose in what he knew was mind-numbing shock. "To your place?"

"No, to the fucking moon, Broflovski." When Kyle couldn't speak, he added, "Yes, to my place."

"Are you asking me out?" Kyle croaked.

"Are you saying yes?" Craig countered.

Kyle stared at his split knuckle. He thought about Stan's face after he hit him. He thought about Red Fang. He thought about the future.

He looked up at Craig and said, "Sure."

He'd expected Craig's parents to be out when he showed up, but there were two cars in the driveway and Mrs. Tucker answered the door. Kyle flushed red as he asked if Craig was in, like it was third grade all over again, but Craig showed up towering behind his mom before he could finish.

Craig didn't explain anything to his parents, Kyle noted, as he waited for him to take his shoes off. They smiled at the two of them, and walked away as they climbed the staircase. No we're doing a school project, or he's helping me with my homework. Just I'm bringing this kid to my room. Kyle felt like a toddler in their gigantic house.

When Craig shut the door to his bedroom behind him, Kyle asked, "What do your parents know?" nervous as he watched him take off his hoodie.

Craig shrugged. "Enough."

Kyle dropped his coat on the ground and rubbed his bare arms. He felt like an idiot. Craig's room was dark and messy and overwhelmingly masculine; plaid quilt, crooked band posters. Craig came up to him and he flinched as he touched the side of his head, gigantic palm against his ear, fingers back in his hair.

"God, you're skittish," Craig chuckled under his breath. Kyle was violently, painfully confused. Somehow excited. Really, really mad. More than a little bitter. "Have you even done this before?"

"Yes," Kyle snapped at him, because he was no fucking virgin; he'd more than earned his stripes. He got the courage to look up at Craig and his eyes were such an icy blue that they seemed to glow in the dark. His face looked nothing like Stan's. "Have you?"

Craig pushed him back onto the bed with one arm like he was a rag doll, and climbed on top of him to kiss him.

He didn't answer him until an hour later, when Kyle's face was pressed into the sheets and his skin felt so hot he thought he'd burn them. Craig's hand was on the back of his neck, the other dug into his hipbone, up on his knees behind him fucking him so hard he'd buried his face in the bed by choice. His hands hurt from being clenched for so long. He wanted to come so bad he thought he was going to die. It had never been like this.

Craig bent down and tightened his fingers on the nape of Kyle's neck.

"You've had a boyfriend since you were fucking born," he hissed. "The rest of us fags haven't been so lucky."

If Kyle had paid attention to anyone but Stan the past four years of high school, he would have known that most people knew Craig Tucker liked guys. But Kyle got what he wanted: Craig didn't hide. He found Kyle at school on Monday and kissed him in the hall, then slammed his elbow into Cartman's nose when he wouldn't stop howling with laughter. He walked with his arm across Kyle's shoulders, and kids took up smoking just to see if they'd kiss in the smoke pit at lunch, and they usually did.

Stan had made himself very, very scarce at school, and sat in his car or walked around outside between classes and at lunch – on the days he actually went, which were less common than they used to be. He didn't know how to cope with this. He only found out about Kyle when he came into English Lit with a dark hickey at the base of his throat, and he went fucking ballistic.

Kyle didn't find this out until later – Craig explicitly didn't tell him – but Stan followed him out of class that day and saw him with Craig. The next morning, Stan found Craig alone in the cafeteria before the first bell, stormed up to him, and tried to punch him. He didn't think it through, he was just angry. Blindingly, white-hot, soul-crushingly angry. So Craig saw him coming a mile away, grabbed his fist when he threw his punch, and slammed his head into the table. Everyone saw, and he spent the rest of the day in the nurse's office with a mild concussion.

The day after that, now sporting a split upper lip and a nasty, swollen bruise, he went up to Wendy in homeroom when she was sitting with her friends and asked, "Do you wanna go out?"

She stared up at him like he'd grown another head. They'd stayed friends over the years, sure, but Wendy had known the score since ninth grade, and had long since dropped out of the race for Stan Marsh.

"Stan?"

"Yes or no?" he asked, urgent. His hands were jammed in the pockets of his hoodie.

She looked nervously at her friends, then stood and said, "Come here," and led him into the hallway.

Class had already started and it was quiet. "Stan, what are you doing?" she asked him. She'd heard what was happening, everyone had. If she was being honest, she never genuinely thought Stan and Kyle were dating. Having known them for so long, she knew they were just close, and didn't like the others for ripping on them for it. But since winter break, and seeing how Stan was and seeing Kyle with Craig Tucker, she didn't know what to think.

"What do you mean? I'm asking you out."

Her heart ached to hear him like this. She hadn't seen that lump on his head yesterday, that was new. The harsh, hard edge to his words was new, too.

"Do you really want to go out with me?" she asked, skeptical. He kind of looked older, and more tired.

Stan said, "Yes," but he said it too quickly.

Wendy asked, "What about Kyle?" and instantly regretted it, because he shouted.

"What about him?"

Wendy nervously fiddled with a ring on her index finger, trying to figure out how to word this. She couldn't, and ended up saying, "Nothing," and tried to smile. "You wanna go to the movies tonight?"

"For sure." Stan tried to smile too.

Three and a half weeks after he broke up with Stan, Kyle was creeping into his house at eleven at night after walking home from Craig's. He reeked of sweat and his legs were still shaking; they didn't do much else other than fuck, and they did that a lot. And God, was Craig was ruthless. He asked Kyle who had fucked who, and when Kyle grudgingly told him they'd swapped, he made it clear that wasn't how it would be with him, like Kyle didn't already know. And he knew Craig was gorgeous, sure, but beyond that he just made him sad. He didn't talk much, and he didn't play any video games – he didn't even skate, and he didn't care if his friends knew about Kyle, but that didn't mean he ever got to hang out with them.

He toed his boots off in the dark foyer, but realized the kitchen light was still on. His parents always went to bed at nine. He took his earphones out and crept through the quiet house on socked feet into the kitchen.

His mom and dad were sitting at the table, with two cups of coffee.

"What are you doing up?" he asked them, smiling. Hoping against hope that they didn't notice his beard burn.

"We wanted to have a chat, sweetie," his mom said quietly, but she didn't seem happy. Sheobviously wasn't happy.

"It couldn't have waited 'til tomorrow?"

"You're always out of the house."

Kyle rubbed his hair and put his backpack down next to the counter. He tried leaning against it, but felt stupid and stood up straight.

"Come sit," his dad offered.

"I'm okay." He sucked his teeth. "What's up?"

"Kyle, baby," his mom started. He watched her, and maybe she wasn't unhappy, exactly, but nervous. "You know your father and I will love you no matter what, but –"

This was it. Kyle's insides turned to glass. He broke up with Stan over telling their parents and here it fucking was, happening to him anyways. He hoped, bitterly, that Stan would never have to be where he was if he hated it so much. Was it going to be as bad as Stan always said? His palms started to sweat.

"– are you dating Thomas Tucker's son?" she finished, wringing her hands.

She didn't even know his name. She'd obviously heard about it; in such a small town, kids telling their parents telling their friends. Maybe she'd even spoken to the Tuckers' themselves. Kyle wrung his hands too, a family habit. After all this time, he kind of wanted to cry.

"You won't get mad?" he asked. His voice was thin, eyes watery. He wanted to love his parents, and he prayed to God they didn't make him change his mind.

Both his mom and dad bit their lips and shook their heads, looking like they wanted to shatter into a thousand pieces just like he did.

He'd always sounded bold and defiant when he told them in his head, all these years, but when he spoke it came out quiet and wavery.

"Yeah."

His parents deflated. He couldn't imagine what they would say next, but it was such a weight off his shoulders. He watched his mom look at his dad. They didn't seem angry. He imagined the typical love you for you speech. What else could they possibly have to say?

His dad turned to him and cleared his throat. He spoke.

"What about Stan?"

Stan only slept with Wendy once. They went to the movies like she said, but she hadn't wanted to drink so Stan got Shelly to boot him a mickey of whiskey anyways, and he drank it by himself and acted like a dick before, during, and after the movie.

He didn't remember a lot of the night, but woke up looking at a ceiling dotted with phosphorescent stick-on stars. His head spun in the throes of a violent hangover, and his mouth tasted like sick, but he turned his head on the pillow and saw a head of flowing black hair on the pillow next to him.

"Aw, fuck," he said aloud.

"I knew you'd say that."

She was already awake.

"I'm sorry."

Wendy rolled over. She was still naked and, having not remembered seeing her naked the night before, Stan's ears went red. She wasn't wearing any make-up, and her hair was tangled.

"I'm sorry, too," she said quietly. She lied her head on the pillow, watching his face in profile. She remembered him blubbering the night before. She remembered with aching clarity how stupid she'd felt, and how intensely she pitied him.

He looked over at her. "What could you possibly be sorry for?" He ground the heels of his palms into his eyes and the sore lump on his forehead from Craig's table slam throbbed. "I'm sorry I got so drunk. I shouldn't have, it wasn't you, I'm just –" he stopped. How to finish this? "– working through some shit, I guess." He got a lump in his throat, and realized he'd never felt worse in his entire life.

When Wendy didn't say anything, he mumbled, "Did we have sex?" without looking at her. Even though he kind of knew they did.

She sighed.

"Kind of."

He turned his head. "What do you mean?"

"It didn't work for very long, and you called me Kyle."

Stan rolled over and screamed for a long time into his pillow. Wendy chuckled sadly and pulled her hair up into a ponytail, waiting for him to finish. When he rolled back over, his face was beet red and he was breathing hard.

"I'm really, really, really, really, sorry," he told her miserably. He couldn't remember having been so embarrassed in his entire life. Getting knocked out by Craig in front of fifty people because they were fighting over a boy was less embarrassing than accidentally coming out to Wendy Testaburger during sex.

"I understand." She watched the rise and fall of his skinny white chest above her purple striped quilt. She looked at the clock; they were already missing class. Stan had passed out and she wasn't going to leave without him. Very, very quietly, she finally asked, "You really were dating, weren't you?"

He looked at her. "I thought everyone knew."

There it was.

She shook her head. "No one knew for sure. They just … figured."

"It doesn't matter," he groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose, squeezing his eyes shut so tight colours danced against the blacks of his eyelids. "Anymore," he added.

Wendy rolled onto her back and groaned loudly, anguished. Stan jumped.

"You're an idiot, Stan."

"Obviously."

"No, I mean –" She sat up. Stan stared at the ceiling, too guilty to look at her naked. "– if you could look at Kyle for one stupid second, you'd know he's crazy unhappy just like you are, you asshole."

Stan frowned. "I'm sure he's very happy fucking Craig Tucker, Wendy. He sure got on it fast enough. Ow!" Wendy punched him in the arm.

"Don't be a baby. Did you ever try talking to him, this whole time?"

"No," he admitted.

"Of course you didn't." She flicked him. "Whatever you did, he has to forgive you. You're … you guys. You've been going out for what, like two years?"

"Since eighth grade," Stan mumbled.

She all but pushed him out of bed. "Go talk to him."

Stan waited for him outside that day after school, after having not gone in at all himself. He spent the day at home drinking ginger ale and popping advil like candy, but couldn't wait another day to talk to him. He can't believe he'd felt so sorry for himself that he didn't even try.

When Kyle did come out, it was with Craig. Stan was relieved to see the bruise on his cheek had faded. God, it had been a long time since he'd really seen him. But Craig Tucker, of all fucking people. Gigantic, fit, blue-eyed Craig Tucker. Stan was livid, but knew he had absolutely nothing to be mad about.

When Kyle saw him, leaning on his beat-up station wagon, he stopped dead for a second. Then Craig saw him too. He saw him say something to Craig, who said something back, louder, then Kyle said something even louder, and then Craig threw his hands up and walked off in another direction. Kyle came right towards him.

Stan's hands were sweating inside his mittens. This was Kyle – the only person he'd ever been able to talk to, the only boyfriend he'd ever really had. Hell, the only friend. But he was so nervous now, and he just kept picturing him and Craig and how tall and strong Craig was and he felt like an idiot for even trying.

But then Kyle was standing in front of him, waiting.

He took his gloves off with his teeth and put them on the roof of his car.

"Hi," he said, breathlessly.

Kyle eyed him warily. "Hey." When Stan didn't say anything else, he said, "You look like shit."

Stan laughed. "Thanks."

"I heard Craig did this," Kyle mumbled, reaching up to touch the welt on his forehead. "I'm sorry."

He shook his head, and Kyle's hand fell away.

"No, I'm sorry." He cracked his knuckles nervously. "I slept with Wendy."

Kyle inhaled sharply in sudden knee-jerk jealously. But after the moment passed, he thought about everything he'd done with Craig in the past couple of weeks and realized he had no right to be mad.

"It's okay." He frowned at him. "What else are you sorry for?"

"Everything," Stan said quickly, stepping forward, and it all came out like the opening of a floodgate. "I can't believe I fucking punched you, I'm so so sorry, I mean, I know we always fight and wrestle and stuff but that was way too far, and I'm so fucking sorry about everything, we can go to my parents right fucking now and tell them everything, I don't even care and I don't know why I ever did but it's just scary, dude, I don't know what to do and I don't like how people are gonna look at me but I love you so fucking much I wanna scream sometimes and I don't know if you're happy with Craig or whatever but I'll be your real, public boyfriend right now for as long as you still want me."

He ran out of breath.

He ran out of more when Kyle slammed him up against the car and kissed him, mouth wet and warm and he still smelled like him and moved like him, and it hadn't been that long but already he'd forgotten what it was like, and it felt like coming home.