Chapter Track: Clap Your Hands – Pale Young Gentlemen

Sometimes Kenny wonders how his clients would act if they found out what he did in his free time, that he's not anything like the slightly-tousled, made-up, sultry God of sex that he pretends to be in the confines of Polly. That he's a normal guy. Maybe he's not the most normal – he does tend to die and come back, to begin with. But overall, his joys are fairly standard, and his daily activity even more so.

For example, he is now sitting on top of his apartment complex's dryer after feeding both his freshly cleaned clothes and his quarters to it, reading an old issue of The Incredible Hulk.

And as if somebody heard his curiosity and made it so his wish came true, who should come into the communal laundry room at that exact moment carrying his own basket of laundry, but Kevin fucking Stoley. To be fair, Kenny has run into Kevin a few times before. He gathers that Kevin lives in a much-nicer double, paying full rent, on the first floor of the complex. He can't be certain, but he thinks that the guy might have once helped him up the stairs. Kenny died directly afterward, however, and the events leading up to that death are a little hazy, due to the head wound he'd been dealt.

Neither of them speak to each other as Kevin opens up the washer and piles his clothing into it (which Kenny finds strange. He'd pegged Kevin as the type of guy that would separate lights and darks and colds and warms and all that jazz. Apparently not). This is fine by Kenny. They try to avoid speaking to each other at all costs, he's found. Or maybe it's that Kevin tries to avoid speaking to Kenny at all costs, which is also perfectly fine. Maybe Kevin feels guilty that he's got such a fancy-ass position underneath Cartman (right-hand man, really, if you don't count the beefcakes that wander around looking like they could kick your ass, presumably the same beefcakes that follow Kenny around from day to day), and that he's found Kenny bruised and beaten to hell more than once at the foot of the apartment's stairs.

That is why, after Kevin has pushed a suitable amount of quarters in with his Tide, Kenny is surprised that Kevin opens his mouth and asks, "Is that issue #330?"

"Uh…yes?" Kenny answers. The issue number is on the front of the comic book, of course, but Kevin's too far away to be able to see the number. In fact, he's so far across the laundry room that Kenny isn't certain that the guy isn't trying to stay as far away as humanly possible from Kenny. Some people do that – like if they stand too close to Kenny, they'll get a disease. This pisses him off beyond belief, of course. It's stupid on so many fucking levels, the first being that Kenny is clean. If he didn't die and get a new body every time, he would still make each client wear a fucking condom (or he'd wear one, depending on their preference), like he does anyway. And you can't catch a disease from breathing the same air as Kenny anyhow.

"I didn't know you were a comics guy," Kevin remarks slowly, approaching Kenny like he's a wild animal.

"One of my few joys in life," Kenny says, sure to coat his words in sarcasm, even though he's telling the truth. Comics and old records – both kind of suck up his extra money from time to time, but he figures that if he can't escape South Park soon, he should at least spend a little money making himself marginally happier in the meantime. He narrows his eyes at Kevin and says, "Why the fuck are you talking to me, Stoley? In case you've forgotten, allow me to remind you that you're all buddy-buddy with my pimp, dickhole."

Kevin frowns and responds, "I'm not buddy-buddy with Cartman."

"Don't tell me that you're sleeping with him too," Kenny says icily. Cartman doesn't make Kenny do it often – despite everything, Cartman tends to prefer women. But some days, he does like a little dick in his life. Thankfully this event seldom happens. It makes Kenny feel especially disgusting, not that he feels fine and dandy with a regular john. It's just that Cartman enjoys pretending that he's the whore, and the kink is that Kenny talks to Cartman the way that Cartman treats Kenny, with rough hands and cruel words. And Kenny doesn't really like that. Once upon a time, dirty talk was fun for him. Now that the things people say when they're talking dirty apply to who he is in reality, it feels a little degrading. And for whatever reason, it feels even worse when Kenny's speaking like that to somebody else.

Maybe it's because he doesn't want anybody to feel the way that he does on most nights.

Whatever it is, sleeping with Cartman is fucking uncomfortable. He acts like it isn't, of course, so he'll put Cartman in a good mood and maybe squeeze a tip out of the frigid bastard, but really, it's an act that Kenny is looking forward to never being subjected to again once he's out of this shithole town.

Kevin stammers, his cheeks turning barely pink, "Dude, sick! No! I just…don't like him, either. I'm just saying."

Kenny lifts a brow. He doesn't see how somebody as fortunate as Kevin could possibly hate Cartman as much as he does. Kevin does accounting on Cartman's command, for fuck's sake. Kenny fucks people for profit on Cartman's command. The occupations are in two entirely different categories, and as far as Kenny knows, Kevin is doing this financial shit of his own volition.

He goes back to flipping through his comic book, though now it's more of a ruse, because Kenny's too distracted to actually read the print on the pages.

Kevin looms a little closer to Kenny, as if he's decided that Kenny is not going to give him a sexually transmitted disease and it's safe to be nearer. He continues talking, "I'd be concerned if anybody likes Cartman, to be frank."

"I'd be careful what you say," Kenny warns, flipping the page, "he has guys following me."

Kevin pales, "What? Why?"

"I dunno," Kenny shrugs, but he has sort of an idea as to why the beefcakes tail him almost constantly. There was one time – almost a year and a half ago, now – when his sister tried to get him to leave South Park. They made it maybe ten miles into the mountains, toward Karen's apartment in Denver, when the Park County police pulled them over and brought Kenny back to South Park in handcuffs. Cartman picked him up from the county police station. Instead of beating the crap out of Kenny like he'd expected the asshole to, Cartman cuffed Kenny by his foot to Cartman's desk at Polly for three days, only letting him go to work. Kenny thinks he might have preferred the beating to being trapped in Cartman's office, honestly.

It was extremely off-putting to be attached to Cartman's desk while he made underhanded deals with extraordinarily creepy men. Cartman wined and dined them in the sort of way that men in illegal businesses do, with Cuban cigars and very old scotch, and an offer of the services of either Kenny or one of the girls. Typically, they chose one of the girls. But, from time to time, they selected Kenny. Allow Kenny to tell you – those business types, they're the meanest and freakiest in bed, either from the awful things they do for a living, or because of their defunct marriages with spouses that they've come to hate.

"That's fucking creepy," Kevin mumbles. Kenny had almost forgotten that the guy is still in the laundry room with him.

"Mm," Kenny responds, because as creepy as it is to be followed by Cartman's lackeys, he's used to it by now, and he doesn't bother putting up a fight anymore. What would be the point? He owes Cartman a great deal. If the way to pay that debt off fastest is to be a cooperative little whore, then he'll do it.

As if a gift from God, Kenny's phone starts ringing in his pocket. His phone is an old piece of shit, a pay-by-month flip phone, but it's definitely better than nothing. He's had to use to it to get himself out of some sticky situations. He feels a funny little smile rise up on his face when he sees that the person calling is his sister, and flips it open with a warmly spoken, "Hey."

"Where are you?"

"What do you mean 'where am I'? I'm at home," Kenny says.

"No, you're not. I'm in your apartment and you're not here," Karen says. She must have used the key that Kenny gave her. He gave her the illegally-made copy of his key after an incident that she will not remember – she'd been on the other side of his apartment door begging for him to let her in, but he'd been too sick to move, and died that way, with her at his door.

The deaths with his sister at his side are the worst. Even though Kenny knows that he'll be back in a handful of hours, if Karen is with him when he dies, he always thinks, I'm not ready to go yet.

"I'm doing my laundry," Kenny says, "I'm here. I promise."

"I'll be down in a sec," Karen replies, and before he can even ask why she's not down in Denver working, she kills the call. Kenny sighs, and shoves his phone in his pocket.

Out of all of the McCormicks, Karen has become by far the most successful. She works as a nurse in a hospital down in Denver. Kenny's fucking proud. She told him once that the reason she wanted to go into medicine is because of him, because he 'gets injured' so often. She's studying now to become a doctor. The schooling is goddamned expensive, even with her grants and loans. Kenny helps out as much as he can, yet another expense dipping into his escape fund. But, Karen is more important to him than he is. She deserves success. She deserves to be happy. She doesn't deserve to get pulled back into the world that they grew up in, the world that he lives in.

"Who was that?" asks Kevin.

Kenny answers, "My sister. Not that it's any of your business, asshole."

Kevin holds his hands up in defense and murmurs, "So-rry. You're fucking moody."

Karen chooses that moment to burst into the room. Kenny slips off of his perch on the dryer and she throws her arms around his neck, squeezing him close to her. He kisses the top of her head and says, "You look good." She does. From looking at Karen, you'd never guess about the hellhole that she grew up in. Her light brown hair is pulled back into a braid and she is wearing minimal makeup, with a classy-looking cotton dress and denim jacket. She looks like a well-to-do young woman. Kenny, in comparison, looks like her shabby, failed-at-life older brother. Which he is.

She says, "You look a lot better than the last time I saw you, thank God." Only then does she notice Kevin Stoley hanging out awkwardly in the corner of the room, where he is pretending not to be listening in on their conversation. She holds a hand over her mouth like she regrets her words.

Kenny says, "It's okay. He's seen me like that. Kevin here works for the fatass, too." He doesn't elaborate that Kevin is not a hooker, but that he takes care of Cartman's money. It'll serve Kevin right if Karen thinks that he's a stripper. Because he's a jerk, most of the time. Probably an aftereffect of being friends with Craig I-am-leaving-you-all-to-find-myself Tucker.

What he is referring to, of course, is looking like he's been beaten to hell. The last time that Karen saw him is also the last time that he died. She'd found him flopped over his couch, still in his work attire (the standard leather pants and heavy makeup, hair all gelled up), with Esther whining beside him. The guy that had fucked him that night had taken everything out of Kenny. He was bruised almost everywhere that there was room, bleeding from where his head had hit the corner of the bed when the client had thrown him backward.

Karen held his head in her lap and cried while he died. It was fucking miserable, and he's grateful that she will never have to remember that shit.

Karen turns and eyes Kevin, like she doesn't trust a guy like him to take proper care of her brother. She takes Kenny's hands and laces her fingers through his, saying softly, "I worry about you."

"I know you do," Kenny responds, "but I'm fine. Really. Why are you even here? Not that I'm not pleasantly surprised, but aren't you on call for the hospital or something?"

"I asked for a couple days off," Karen says, "I needed to make sure you're okay."

"Did somebody indicate to you that I'm not?" Kenny inquires.

Karen shakes her head, drawing him back into another hug. She explains, "I just had this terrible dream that you had died last time that I was here, instead of getting better. I felt like I should drive up and hang out for a bit."

That about stops Kenny's heart. She dreamt about his death? How is that possible? Surely it's just a trick of her mind. She can't know that that happens, not even unconsciously. Right? He hugs her closer and makes sure that she can't see the frown firmly set on his face, and says, "I have to work tonight."

"I know," Karen sighs, "I figured I could just crash on your couch. You can wake me up when you get back. Or call me. You know…if something goes wrong."

Jesus, he hopes that that isn't some sort of terrible omen.

"I thought I'd treat you to some pizza," Karen suggests.

That gets Kenny's attention. One of his few loves in life, he fucking swears, is pizza. Probably because he can't afford to treat himself to a slice most of the time. And he is not above letting his little sister buy him pizza, not at all.

"Would you?" Kenny perks up hopefully, "I have to wait for my shit to be done drying, but we can go after that. Right?"

Karen grins. She kisses him on the cheek and says, "You are the only person I know that gets this excited about pizza."

"I'm also probably the only person you know that can't afford pizza," Kenny responds, but the statement is meant in good humor.

"You can't afford pizza?" Kevin suddenly asks.

Both Karen and Kenny's heads turn sharply. Kenny glowers, feeling like Kevin has intruded on his moment with his sister. Karen is probably the only person in the world that gives a crap about him, that loves him, and here's Cartman's precious little accountant, being a dick. He spits back, "You'd know, wouldn't you? You're Cartman's fucking bookkeeper."

The dryer could not have chosen a more appropriate moment to finish drying his clothes. Kenny dives and wrenches open the door in relief, shoving his clothes into the ugly plastic laundry basket he uses to transport them down here. He snatches his The Incredible Hulk comic off of the top of the machine and says, "Come on, Karen, let's get the fuck out of here."

He glares at Kevin for good measure, because right now, he really dislikes the man. Maybe it's unfounded, but anybody on Cartman's good side is no friend of Kenny's.

After they've dropped Kenny's laundry off in his living room, Karen and Kenny drive to Pizza Hut. Even if Kenny could afford pizza, he probably wouldn't go to Pizza Hut that often. It is filled to the brim with people that he knows and people that know him, namely what he does for a living. Sadly, the only other option is Whistlin' Willy's, which is meant for children.

"I've started seeing somebody," Karen mentions, just as Kenny is taking his first glorious bite of sausage and pepperoni pizza.

Kenny decides to calmly swallow the greasy bite of meaty, cheesy goodness, instead of choking. But he lowers the slice and says, "Excuse me?"

Karen is notorious for having bad taste in men. Not that Kenny is any better. He doesn't date anymore, but back before all his bullshit with drugs started, he'd dated around, always choosing the worst pieces of shit in the history of the human race. Maybe it was because of how they grew up. He's heard statistics before that if you're treated like a waste of space as a kid, that you unintentionally seek out people that will treat you like a waste of space. If Kenny had a dollar for every boyfriend of Karen's that he ended up kicking the crap out of and sent to the curb, he'd be a much richer man.

To contrast, their older brother sits firmly on the other side of the spectrum, which is probably why Kenny and Karen avoid him like plague most of the time. He brings around suspiciously bruised girlfriends, and sometimes Kenny wants to tell those women that he's sorry, that maybe it's not really even Kevin's fault, that he grew up getting thrown around by their dad. That is, until Kevin got bigger than Stuart McCormick. Then Kevin started throwing him around, and sometimes, their mom, too. Their family was just always a clusterfuck of horrible things. Still is. Kenny avoids his parents like the plague. He's fairly certain that they avoid him, too. Stuart never shows up at Polly, and as far as Kenny knows, that man adores strip clubs. Just doesn't want to see his son working in one. That is fucking fine by Kenny. He likes it that way.

Carol McCormick is another matter entirely. Kenny occasionally sees her at the grocery store or shuffling around the church donation bin looking for clothes. He doesn't know where she works these days. Kenny just hopes that she hasn't gone back to helping his dad with meth in the back yard.

When he sees her, his first instinct is always to hide. He's ducked behind racks of potato chips, or behind the pews if he's at the Catholic church on one of the days that they let people come in and take clothes and other things from the donation bins (They're called 'Donation Days,' and Kenny isn't sure whether or not he should be ashamed that he's there every time the church holds one of these events).

Call it mother's intuition, but she manages to fucking find him no matter where he hides. His mother always greets him with a, "Are you hidin' from me, Kenneth McCormick?"

And he'll tend to respond dishonestly, "No," and tack on an excuse about what he was doing ("I was just looking at these Doritos, ma," or, "Just saying my prayers, ma.").

What usually comes afterward is an excruciatingly awkward conversation about how they're doing. Kenny always lies and says that things are going well, that he's fine, that she needn't worry about him, he's got his life under control. She'll lie to him and say the same, that things are going well at work, that she and his father are trying to work some conflict out or another. Inevitably, one of them will bring up how Karen is doing, because she's the only McCormick who's doing something with her life that's worth a damn.

"This one is a good guy, Ken," Karen insists, bringing Kenny back to reality. He feel like he should thank her for that.

Still, he doesn't ever like when Karen tells him that there's a new man around. It's typically bad news. Then there's also the fact the he's reluctant to meet any of them – their first question is always something like, 'Hey man, so what do you do for a living?' to which Kenny will deadpan, 'I'm a stripper.' And they'll laugh, like he's told some hilarious and witty joke, when he's just telling the truth. The glossed-over version of the truth, at that. After all, 'stripper' sounds better than 'I fuck guys on my pimp's command because he paid off my debts to my ex-drug dealer.'

No wonder Karen has bad taste in guys. She also has bad taste in brothers.

"You know why I'm not sure about that, right?" Kenny says, eating his pizza more slowly, now. It's incredible how concern for his sister can kill his appetite.

Karen picks at the mushrooms on her own slice of pizza and responds, "I know, I know. But this one…we've been together for awhile, actually. I didn't know how to tell you, because I know I'm bad at choosing the right people. But this guy, he's – he's great, Ken. I want you to meet him."

That's odd. In the end, Kenny usually ends up having to demand that Karen drag the man to meet him, because he feels the need to inspect them. He thinks back, and realizes that she has not once asked him to meet them. Not even one fucking time.

"What's his name?" Kenny queries slowly, moving onto pizza slice number two.

"He's from here," Karen prefaces.

Kenny narrows his eyes, "That isn't usually a good thing."

"It is this time," she insists.

They eat for awhile in silence, but hearing that Karen's new catch originated from South Park, Colorado, puts him on edge. He finally asks, "Okay. Spit it out. Who is it? It's not Craig, is it?"

"Ew, no," Karen says, "Craig is gay, anyway. We found each other on OKCupid."

"Why the hell were you on OKCupid?" Kenny asks.

"Because! I wanted to be able to read about the kind of person that they are before even talking to them," Karen says, "I'm sick of being so stupid. I was trying to be rational," she fiddles with her necklace, a gold heart on a chain. Only then does Kenny notice that there's a ring on her left hand.

"You're getting married?" He exclaims, snatching her hand forward to inspect the bit of jewelry. It looks like it's white gold, with smaller diamonds going along the band. It must have cost a fucking bundle. He demands, "Why didn't you tell me? What the fuck, Karen. I'm your fucking brother. God, I know I'm an embarrassment, but the least you could do is drop me a line when you get fucking engaged to some dude that I haven't even met yet. What the hell?"

"Could you quiet down?" she whispers harshly, "You're making a scene. It only happened yesterday. It was a surprise, Kenny!"

"I still don't know who you're getting married to! Who the fuck is this guy?"

"Clyde," Karen snaps, "Clyde Donovan."

"Clyde?" Kenny's voice winds down to a shocked sort of whimper. Of all the people that Karen could have chosen, he didn't expect it to be Clyde. When he was about thirteen, he and Clyde had hung out all the time, looking through their fathers' Playboys or watching something from Kenny's porn collection.

But still, last he'd heard, Clyde is still a nice, if a little dense, guy.

"He's sweet," Karen says, "I love him."

"I – um – I – What does he even do, now?" Kenny squeezes out.

"He does real estate," Karen says, "He's very good at it. They like him there."

Kenny looks down at the table and says, "Okay. Alright. You're getting married. Let me just like, take a second to get this all in."

Karen reaches across the table and pats his hand. He immediately takes her hand and draws her fingers through his, resting his other hand against his forehead. He feels like he might cry, which is ridiculous. It's just that…Karen's his sister, and the only person in his life that he cares about enough to care that she's getting married. He feels foolish, like if she gets married that she'll be being taken away from him. Which is stupid, and Kenny knows that. He just feels possessive and upset.

Karen says gently, "I want you to give me away."

"What about Dad?" Kenny asks.

"He's not invited. Neither is Kevin," Karen replies.

Kenny doesn't want to respond to that, not yet, anyway. He withdraws his hand and clenches it into a fist in his lap while he eats his pizza dejectedly, and Karen pays for their food.

They get into Karen's car without any speaking at all, until Karen finally asks, cranking up the heat, "Aren't you happy for me?" Her voice is so small and so sad.

He can't help it, after that. He rests his forehead against the dashboard and starts to cry.

"Kenny?" she says. She starts rubbing his back, and he feels incredibly stupid. She asks, "Kenny, why are you crying?"

"Because I can't afford a tux," he says tearfully, wiping at his eyes, "I can't afford a wedding. I can't make it what you deserve. I'm poor as shit and I'm not good for fucking anything, I can't –"

"Stop!" Karen shouts, "Stop it. You're good for lots of things. You're –"

"Yeah, fucking people," Kenny says mournfully.

"Stop it. I'm serious," Karen says. She yanks him into a hug and lets him put his head on her shoulder, rubbing his back again. She goes on, "Clyde and his parents are paying for everything. They already said that they would get you your tux. Now stop this. Kenny, you're always taking care of me. Let me take care of you for once. Please."

The conversation comes to a miserable close, and Kenny promises to go to lunch with Karen and Clyde tomorrow at some nice restaurant that Clyde will pay for. He spends the hours following moping about feeling like a worthless piece of shit.

When it starts to get dark, Kenny retreats to his bathroom and slips on his leather pants and his boots. He feels stupid and awkward and horrible when he passes by his sister in this attire. She is sitting in the kitchen, eating a bowl of ramen.

He clears his throat and says, "I won't be back until late."

"Wake me up," she says, "I keep odd hours because of my job, too. You know that."

"You can sleep in my bed, if you want," Kenny offers, even though his bed is only a marginal improvement over sleeping on the couch.

Karen gets up and pulls Kenny into another hug, tugging him close up against her, rocking him a little, even though she's a good number of inches shorter than him and it makes the movement strange. She draws her body up onto her tip toes and kisses his forehead, saying, "Be safe. I love you, okay?"

"Love you too," he says, still feeling miserable. He's made even more miserable by the prospect of having to pretend that he's not miserable, and even more miserable with the knowledge that he's probably be going to be spending a few hours in an upstairs bedroom pleasing Stephen Stotch.

o.o.o.o

It's three in the morning when Kenny gets out of there, smelling of sex and covered in glitter that originated from an unknown source. He wraps his coat around him and pulls out a cigarette from the fresh pack that he'd purchased on his way over to Polly earlier in the night. He'd bought a lottery ticket, too. He always does when he buys cigarettes. He knows logically that he's wasting his money with every ticket that he purchases, but Kenny can't let go of the ridiculous fantasy that maybe he'll win millions and he'll be able to buy a house for himself and his dog, someplace far away from here. Maybe near an ocean. He's never seen the ocean. He'll have all the pizza and comic books and blues records that he wants, and nobody will bother him ever again.

It's a silly dream. He knows that. But he knows that he'll never let go of it, and so Kenny just keeps buying lottery tickets.

He wants to go home. He wants a hug from his sister, because she's the only person who loves him and the only person that he loves back.

At least those are achievable dreams.

Everything and everybody else can just fuck off.

As if on cue, a motorcycle pulls up next to Kenny, engine rumbling. On it is sitting Butters Stotch, though Kenny did not see him in the club tonight. He's wearing his leather jacket and gloves and fruity snowflake scarf.

"You need a ride?"

o.o.o.o

Sorry for the small delay! I actually left my house this weekend *collective gasp.*

Thank you to my wonderful reviewers: KeliMaxwell, KirstenTheDestroyer, sadpeople56, Mallory, Miroir Twin, TheAwesome15, and Kuutamolla.

Enthusiasm around here wanes fast, I see.

Anyway, here I am going to plug a fic that I firmly believe everybody ever should read: Bright Lights and the Big City by Chasing Rabbits. It's a Bunny fic, though I am of the firm opinion that anybody in the history of the SP fandom ever should look it up and read the fuck out of it, because it's beautiful. Yes? Yes.