Across a Sea: Chapter Two
"Craig…?"
"She's dead, Tweek. She's dead."
Craig stared up at him, his eyes immersed in layers of darkness. A shadow from the window covered his face, contrasting brightly with the sunlight that illuminated his tired features. He curled up further into the cushion on the floor, his hands far too stiff to be human. Tweek stood there in utter shock, just gazing down at him with wide, concerned eyes.
"I'm sorry," was all his hoarse throat could muster, before he collapsed to his knees and pulled Craig into a bruising hug. "I'm sorry this happened..."
"...Me too."
Pizza was always a great after-school food. Every Friday, Clyde, Tweek, and Craig would go to the pizza hut a few blocks from the school and pig out. Token used to join them before the accident involving Craig's sister, but ever since it had happened, he stayed away from Craig, not wanting to get the brunt of his depression. Craig had lost a lot of his friends that way, really. The only ones that stayed - Tweek and Clyde - were too close with him to part.
Tweek peeked under each pepperoni, making sure that he wasn't going to eat any cameras that the government might have planted, or accidentally consume spider eggs that had somehow been laid in the cheese of his food. Clyde threw a fry his way, grinning widely as he laughed. Tweek shrieked, before he grinned, and feigning annoyance, tossed one of the loose pepperonis at his friend. Clyde caught it in his mouth, before taking a loud slurp of his soda.
"Dude, so like, today, in English class, freakin' Stan Marsh sat next to Gary Harrison and stole his pencil right out of his hand. I was like, whoa dude! And Gary just smiled at him." Clyde exclaimed with a mouthful of pizza.
"Oh Jesus!" Tweek shakily nibbled on his slice. "What i-if he poisoned that pencil before taunting Stan into taking it? I- I mean, not before taking an antidote for himself, first. Christ! No one can be that nice for real, man. It's not natural!" Tweek yanked on his hair.
Clyde laughed and shook his head. "Tweek, man, you are a trip."
"I-I'm serious, man! That Harrison kid scares the shit outta me. What if he like, tries to make me a Mormon or something? I don't want to be a cultist!" Tweek furiously twirled his hair.
"Don't worry, he's going to be leaving to go on his mission in a few years anyway." Clyde flippantly stated, pushing his pizza crust into his waiting mouth.
"Oh God, I hope so! He freaks me out. So does that Stoley kid! He always tries to talk to me, but I think it's because he wants to beat me to death with his lightsaber." Tweek tugged his shirt at the very thought.
Clyde laughed. "He wants to be your friend, dude."
"G-gah! I don't want to be friends with a cultist Mormon or an art obsessed Star Wars fan!" Tweek yanked at his hair.
"You're friends with me, and I draw a lot," Clyde commented.
Tweek glanced to Craig, who was being eerily silent. The boy was just staring at his pizza, not eating any. Tweek shared a look with Clyde, who shrugged in confusion. Tweek looked back to Craig in frightful anxiety. He was so unmoving, so stiff, as though he were some mechanical being piloting a flesh suit with dark intentions - one that had run out of battery. Tweek jolted in horror at the very thought.
"Oh God, gghghaah!" Tweek nervously shoved the rest of his slice into his mouth, chewing anxiously. "Oh man, oh man. Craig, you- you're not a robot, are you? I mean, you would tell us, right? Oh sweet Jesus!"
Craig's eyes slid over to glance at Tweek, raising an ebony brow at the exclamation. "I'm not a robot..."
Tweek sighed in relief, relaxing in his seat as he took a gulp of soda.
"...But Clyde is." Craig glanced over to his brown haired friend, expression fairly neutral despite the content of his words.
Tweek shot up in his seat, gazing wide eyed in terror at Clyde. "Gnhnah! Oh lord, are you, Cl-Clyde?"
Clyde shot Craig a frown that Tweek distinctly identified as his 'don't scare him like that' frown (he often gave people this look), before he smiled at Tweek.
"Could a robot do this?" He exclaimed, throwing a pizza slice up in the air with the intention of catching it in his mouth. It smacked him in the face.
Tweek smiled. "I-I guess not?" Classic Clyde.
Clyde chewed the pizza off of his face, Tweek gagging at how odd it was to watch. He went back to eating his pizza, making sure to chew carefully so he could catch anything that might've been wrong with the food, just in case. To his luck, he didn't seem to find anything unnatural.
Long after their pizza was gone, the three remained in the booth, Tweek entertained by Clyde's antics all the while. Craig, on the other hand, remained distant and stoic as he stared out the window. Tweek bit his lip anxiously as he thought of the note from earlier, which was probably the thing on Craig's mind.
The walk home was a relatively quiet one when they parted ways. Clyde went off to his house, where Tweek and Craig - whose houses were in similar directions - continued to walk together. Craig just kept his eyes forward, horrifically apathetic as he walked almost mechanically. Tweek was a mess of twitching and alerted yelps as he walked along at erratic paces. Craig was making him nervous. He wasn't one to talk a lot on a regular basis, but his silence this time was just out of control. Craig was fingering his pocket knife from his pocket, Tweek could see. It was a shiny, slick silver blade with a golden brim. It was a gift from his grandfather, apparently, before the old man had passed. He carried it on him with all times, almost like a deadly comfort item. He never let anyone touch it, save for himself. Ever.
When they arrived in front of Tweek's house, they both halted, and Tweek turned to Craig in utter concern, knowing for sure that he wouldn't be toying with the pocket knife if something weren't truly on his mind.
"Look, man. I know you're nervous about like... The note thing. I-I am too!" He shrieked out the last sentence, eyes glancing this way and that.
Craig's eyebrows fell downwards, low on his forehead as he stared down in awkwardness. "I just don't know what it means, or why someone would give it to me."
Tweek and he stood there for several moments, the air humid around them as Tweek's eyes swiveled back and forth in search of what to say. Finally, he rested a hand over Craig's shoulder, sending him the most earnest smile he could possibly muster.
"Just know that no matter what, I'll always be your fr-friend. Okay?" His head twitched to the side, disrupting his sentence somewhere in between the words as they cracked, but he was sincere and genuine.
A soft smile pulled at Craig's lips and he nodded. "Thanks dude. I'll see you later, okay?"
"Okay. B-be safe, Craig!" Tweek called after him as he walked away, before he sighed and headed off to his own house.
All he could do was hope for the best and worry about the worst.
I sincerely apologize for the late update. I try to update every week, but I was on a trip in a different city for a conference and I ended up not being able to have access to the computer.