Kyle Broflovski sat up in bed at one in the morning on a Tuesday night. He didn't know quite what had woken it up, but he knew something had, because he was a deep sleeper and generally didn't wake up at one in the morning for no reason. So he gazed about his room for a moment, analyzing the position of all his possessions, his green eyes flicking to the shut door, and found nothing of interest. It wasn't Ike, because if it had been Ike it would have been loud and obnoxious, and he wouldn't have stopped pounding the door or kicking the wall or whatever he had done to wake Kyle in the first place.
The red-haired boy was about to resign himself back to bed with the thought that it had just been a car honking in the distance or something, when he heard a tapping noise from his window. He almost jumped right out of his bed at the startling noise, but after recovering himself he turned to the dark window to see who at this ungodly hour was tapping at it.
Kyle made out a figure, and of course, his initial reaction was that a murderer was outside his room; but the figure continued the incessant tapping, and Kyle eventually realized that no murderer would tap on a window – Kyle could have easily called the cops before any murderer would have been able to get inside – and made out an orange parka in the dark outside his room.
Sighing, Kyle clambered out of his bed and moved to his window. He glared at Kenny McCormick for a moment (who else could it have been at one in the morning?), and then he sluggishly unlocked the window. With a gust of chill winter air and a flurry of snowflakes, it was opened, and within moments Kenny had climbed gracelessly into Kyle's room.
The boy landed on the floor in a heap of orange, blond and snow, and Kyle quickly closed the window behind him. Once Kenny had stood and brushed the snow from his head and shoulders so that lay on his floor and began to melt into the carpet, Kyle crossed his arms over his chests.
"What are you doing here, Kenny?" he growled in a whisper. "It's one in the morning on a school night."
"If it's one in the morning, it can't be a school night, can it?" Kenny replied sardonically, and Kyle took a moment to understand his warped humor.
"Oh, shut up!" he snapped. "I'm tired, Kenny, and I've got a huge Chemistry test tomorrow, and by golly if you don't leave I'm going to have to call my mother!"
Kenny rolled his eyes, stuck out his tongue and sat on Kyle's bed. "Well, you're just cheery."
Kyle tugged Kenny right back up. "You're soaking wet, don't sit on my bed. Why are you here, anyway?"
The blond shrugged. "I died on Sunday, and I was feeling a bit depressed so I thought I'd kill myself again. But then I figured it'd be funner to have you talk me out of it."
"It's more fun, Kenny, not funner, and you did not die on Sunday, you absolute idiot!"
Kyle looked around nervously, realizing that he had raised his voice, but no one had woken. His house was silent, save for the two teenage boys' breathing.
"I did die on Sunday," Kenny insisted airily. "You weren't at the funeral, though. No one ever is." He sat down on the bed again.
"If you are going to sit on my bed, take of your stupid parka," Kyle snapped. "And no, you did not die, and there was not a funeral, and if there was, people would be there. I would be there."
Kenny McCormick unzipped his orange parka and shrugged it off, tossing it aside. He leaned back onto Kyle's mattress, closing his eyes in ecstasy. Kyle stared at his friend. The shirt he had been wearing under the parka was obviously a hand-me-down… in fact, it was one of his own father's old shirts that had been given to Goodwill. The Jewish boy shifted uncomfortably. It was the shirt that his father had given away because it had been stained when Ike spilled Kosher spaghetti sauce on it, and then when Gerald Broflovski had tried to bleach the red out, it had gone horribly wrong. Kyle had tried to persuade his father against giving it to Goodwill, because it had been transformed an ugly, puke-ish orange color and no one would ever want to buy it. It had been priced at ten cents.
Kyle wondered why Kenny had been desperate enough to buy that disgusting old shirt, especially if he could have bought others for only a quarter. Maybe he had only had ten cents to spend, and no shirts.
"God dammit, Kyle, your bed feels so nice," Kenny murmured. "My parents sold mine for crack a couple days ago. Granted, it was just an old mattress, but still."
"That's not why you 'died,' is it?" Kyle asked sarcastically. "You died of lack of mattress? I hear it's a spreading epidemic around these parts." It wasn't a funny joke, Kyle knew; in fact, it was rather cruel, stabbing humor at Kenny's lack of any proper bed. He had no new clothes, and now he had no bed. And most of the time, he had no food.
"Nope," Kenny replied, smirking. "I died after Cartman and Clyde thought it would be funny to push me into the street."
Kyle crossed his arms. "You didn't die, Ken. That truck missed you by a mile."
"Yeah, go on believing that. You always do."
"I know it, dude. That truck swerved and missed. Remember? Afterward, Clyde bought you ice-cream 'cause he's an absolute pansy, and Cartman just laughed and said that it was your white-trash-ghetto reflexes that saved you."
Kenny frowned. "No, I don't remember that. I remember dying, and I remember that no one cared, as usual."
"Dude, we care."
"I know you think that."
"I care."
"Keep believing, some day it might come true."
"Shut up, Kenny! I care if you die, okay? I don't want you to die!"
Kenny opened one eye and looked at Kyle lazily from his position on the boy's bed.
"It would be nice if that were true."
"Kenny!"
"No, seriously. It would honestly make my day if someone would care, just once."
"Shut up, you freaking asshole!"
"Actually, it would make my whole life. All my lives. Yeah." He smiled and gazed at the ceiling. "If someone cared, just once, I'd be satisfied until I finally died for good."
"You're a retard, Kenny, you know that?"
"Shut it, Kyle, that's derogatory."
"I don't care. You're retarded. Stop talking about dying and stuff. You barge into my room at one in the morning, and the only thing you want to do is convince me that I don't care about you!"
The two boys went quiet when they heard a noise from somewhere in the house, but relaxed when there was no further sound. Kyle breathed a sigh of relief. If his mom caught him awake at one in the morning with someone in his room, there's no telling what she would do.
Kenny heaved himself up onto his elbows and looked at Kyle. And he wasn't smiling, just looking… looking at the red-haired boy with those piercing blue eyes of his. Kyle couldn't help but notice how pale he was. Pale, pale, pale. Except for the skin under his eyes. That skin was black. A boy shouldn't look that tired, Kyle thought.
"I'm sorry," he said simply. He stood shakily. "I'll go if you want." He moved over to where he had tossed his parka, and as he bent over to get it, Kyle glanced out the window and noticed just how hard it was snowing, and just how cold it must be outside, and just how wet Kenny's parka was, and just how thin his pants were. Kyle Broflovski noticed that his friend still didn't have gloves and that he still hadn't bought new boots, and he realized how incredibly cold and lonely he would be, out in the snow at one in the morning with nowhere to go.
"You don't have to," Kyle said. "I mean… you don't have to go. You can wait here, you know, until the snow lets up some."
Kenny straightened and looked at Kyle, and he didn't smile, but he moved back to the bed and sat down, leaving his wet parka on the ground. Kyle hesitated before moving to sit next to him.
The anger Kyle had felt when Kenny had first entered the room had dissipated, and now the sight of the boy didn't make him angry. He could think rationally.
"Did you really mean what you said?" Kyle asked. Kenny smiled now.
"Which thing?" he asked.
"About you… you know, committing suicide," Kyle whispered, as if even just saying the word was a sin.
Kyle kicked off his boots and leaned back again, crossing his arms behind his head.
"Well, yeah," he said. "Why would I lie about that?"
"Ken, man, that's a sin," Kyle said. "You know, you'd, like, go to Hell."
Kenny shrugged. "It's really not so bad. Satan's a pretty cool guy."
"Satan's the god of Hell," Kyle stressed. "Like, eternal pain and torture, dude. You don't want that."
"It's not that bad. I mean, the fire and brimstone part sucks, but overall it's a pretty good place."
"Dude, cut it out. You did not die on Sunday."
Kenny sighed. "Do we really have to argue about this? Because I'll always be right. I died on Sunday, I died the Tuesday before that, and I've died lots of other times too."
"No," Kyle started, "Because if you died, Kenny, you'd be dead. You know, as in six feet under. Not alive."
"I'm an anomaly. What can I say?"
"You're an idiot."
"I'm special."
"You're an asshole."
"I'm just totally awesome."
"You make no sense."
"I'm immortal."
"Dammit, Kenny, why do you have to be like that?" Kyle burst. There was utter silence until the blond stirred.
"I don't know. To cope, I guess. It's the same reason I like to kill myself."
"Don't kill yourself, Kenny. I don't want you to die."
Kenny sat up really quickly and stared into Kyle's eyes with a ferocity that Kyle had never seen before. He leaned away from his friend, averting his eyes from that fierce, terrifying, electrifying glare. It was too intense.
"Kyle, will you try?" Kenny asked.
"Try what?" Kyle replied, still trying not to look at the boy.
"Try, next time I die, try to be sad," he said. "Can you? Because it seriously would, Kyle. It would seriously just make my whole pitiful existence worthwhile."
Kyle Broflovski tried vainly to smooth down his curly red hair and frowned and his friend.
"Don't even talk about dying, Ken. It's really not funny to me."
Kenny looked at him for a moment longer, and then it seemed as though all the intensity left him as he exhaled, and he sat back, looking defeated and deflated and small. Kyle was baffled. Kenny McCormick never looked small.
"Kyle," he said quietly, not a whisper, but quiet; like the sound of snow falling to the earth. "Do you remember that night?"
And somehow, Kyle knew exactly which night Kenny was talking about. It was the night when he'd found the boy alone on the playground, with a black eye and no food in his stomach.
"Yeah," Kyle answered.
"I went home," Kenny continued. "I went home and I gave those cookies to Kevin and Karen. And then I went into my room, and I looked at my pocket knife, and at my dad's gun, and I didn't kill myself."
Kyle didn't know what to say. What was he supposed to say?
"That's good," he finally managed. "I'm really happy."
"But," Kenny started again, "but, the thing is that I usually do, you know?"
No. Kyle didn't know. Not at all.
"I don't even know what you mean," Kyle said. "Is that a metaphor?"
Kenny just went on talking, ignoring Kyle's question.
"And I thought about it, and it feels a lot nicer to not kill myself than to kill myself. And it's great, you know, that you can make me not want to die."
"I'm happy about that," Kyle said slowly. He sighed. "Kenny, I really don't want you to die. You keep talking about it like it's all a big joke, but to me, it's not. So please stop."
Kenny looked straight into Kyle's eyes and grinned.
"Just try to be that caring next time, okay? I was being honest about what I said. It would make living worth it."
"Yeah," Kyle replied warily, not really knowing what else to say. "Okay, Ken, I'll… I'll try."
Kenny sat up and jumped off of Kyle's bed, chuckling slightly and walking over to grab his damp parka from the floor. He shrugged it on over his shoulders and moved over towards the window. Kyle sat up with a start.
"Where are you going?"
"Home," Kenny answered. "I feel better now, dude."
Kenny started to open the window. He couldn't, though, because Kyle had locked it and he hadn't known.
"Do you want something to eat?" Kyle asked, standing and moving over to his friend. "I mean, mom made some hamantashen and we still have some left over."
Kenny raised an eyebrow. "Hamantashen?"
"You know, dude, Jewish cookies."
Kenny laughed, and it made Kyle smile.
"Sure, fine, thanks," he said, and Kyle grinned and quietly opened his door and backed out of his room.
"Just wait a minute, I'll be right back."
Kenny leaned against the wall, staring out of the window as he waiting for the red-head to get him the cookies. He grinned and pressed his face against the cool glass, feeling content.
Kyle Broflovski returned a few minutes later, flushed from rushing and carrying a paper bag filled with hamantashen. But his room was empty.
Kyle stood there for a moment, looking around, somehow expecting Kenny McCormick to be hiding in a corner or something of the sort. But the blond was nowhere to be seen.
Kyle walked slowly to the window, his smile somewhat diminishing, and noticed that it had been unlocked. He opened it deftly, leaning out into the night, snow landing in his air. There were footsteps on the ground beneath his window.
Hesitating, Kyle continued to stare into the dark for a long moment. But his friend had gone.
"You forgot your cookies," Kyle muttered sullenly, but his voice disappeared into the soft snowfall. He turned his eyes down to the bag in his hands. He had carefully handpicked only the best. There were cherry, chocolate, apple, and caramel… no prune ones.
Kyle reached his arm out and dropped the bag into the snow beneath his window. "Oh well," he said. "Maybe he'll come back for them."
The Jewish boy shut the window heavily, a gust of air blowing some snowflakes into his room. He wrapped his arms around his chest, cold from the mild exposure of sticking his head out the window, and returned to his bed. He settled down under his covers and hugged his pillow to his chest. As he drifted off to sleep, he couldn't help thinking Kenny doesn't have a bed.
He slept restlessly.