Chapter Track: Here We Go Again – Pixie Lott
When Kenny ends up like this – in an upstairs room in Polly, alone, with a client that turns out to be a sadist – he tries not to think about anything. He tries to keep his mind blank. If he thinks of good things when he's here, they'll feel ruined to him, somehow. Either that, or he'll just feel dirtier, because he'll wonder whether or not he deserves the good things that come to mind.
So he doesn't think of Karen.
He doesn't think of his dog.
He doesn't think of comic books, or old blues records, or pizza, or his old friends from high school.
Kenny keeps his mind at a blank buzz, allowing nothing to enter it but white noise and nothing to exit but fake moans and gruff dirty talk.
It's only a belt, after all. It's not like Kenny's on the ground with somebody's shoe kicking into his stomach so hard that he can't breathe. Belts aren't so bad. He's dealt with belts before and he will no doubt deal with them again. He just wishes that he could shout, because it hurts. It doesn't hurt as badly as plenty of things he's endured, so he knows he can get through this. But that doesn't stop it from hurting.
Kenny accidentally starts to think of Butters.
Not because of the belt slamming against his back, really – more the deliverer of the blows: Stephen Stotch.
When Kenny was little and did something stupid (and he did a plethora of stupid things), sometimes his dad would take a belt to him. Not for long, and not like this, but it happened. It makes Kenny wonder if the same thing happened to Butters. It makes Kenny question if Stephen Stotch did hit his son like this, did it go on this long? Did he hit him this hard? Kenny feels like he's been sitting here, on his hands and knees, for hours. Beyond that, he doesn't feel much of anything, except that he knows that he's bleeding. He started bleeding awhile ago.
Stotch is angry because he couldn't get it up. Kenny didn't want to say the usual things one would say to an older man who can make himself hard anymore. He didn't say anything snarky, like, let's get you a prescription for Viagra, then, eh? Or something vaguely comforting, like, it's okay, it happens all the time. Don't sweat it. He said nothing. He feels that choice may have been best. He feels like Stephen Stotch is on this constant razor-thin edge of calm, and if you tip him just barely one way or the other, he'll explode.
Kenny feels like Stephen Stotch would not hesitate to kill him.
It would be more frightening if he could die permanently.
Or maybe that's a soothing thought. Kenny isn't sure.
As Stotch keeps the blows coming, as Kenny bleeds more and tries to think less, the man keeps talking. He maintains a constant stream of degradation, clearing getting off on the words that flow from his lips, "You're a whore. You're my whore. You love being my whore, you fucking worthless slut."
Kenny mindlessly agrees with these things, mumbling out whining affirmations. Yes, I am your whore. Yes, I love being your whore. Yes, I am a worthless slut.
By the time that Stotch has worn himself down, Kenny can't wait to leave. He's dying to get out of here. His only problem is that Stotch left the room – left him here, and he's attached to the bedposts. His arms are sore from being tugged around. He'll have bruises on his wrists when somebody finally gets the fuck up here and gets these belts off of him.
He'd be more upset if this wasn't routine. But it is routine, and so there's no use in being upset.
Stotch hasn't been able to get it up for a couple weeks, now. So, instead of fucking, they've been doing this.
Kenny lets his head hang, wondering if he'll have to fall asleep like this. It isn't as if that hasn't happened before. He's been left up here all night more than once.
The universe must have heard his silent pleading for somebody to find him, though, because the door to the bedroom creaks open. Kenny turns his head and sees, with gushing relief in his gut, that it's Bebe.
She says, "Goddamn," very simply, because in a situation such as this, there really are no other words to say. No platitude will help Kenny, because in a couple nights, he'll be back in this room, with the welts from the last time opened back up and bleeding again. Mercedes has to cover them in makeup before they take the floor each night. He hates that. Having other people's hands on him.
"Please get these off of me," he says hoarsely.
Bebe is careful to keep the contact to a minimum while she unbuckles his wrists and says, "Y'alright?"
"Peachy," he replies, massaging his wrists gratefully once they've been freed.
"This is getting out of hand," Bebe says, her eyes sweeping over the damage on his back, something that Kenny doesn't want to see.
"You think?" he replies sarcastically, "Fuck, I just want to go home. Can you help me, uh." Kenny pauses. He doesn't know why it's so hard to ask for help cleaning himself up. Maybe it's because he actually despises the process. Unfortunately, Bebe's the only one that he'll trust with the job. He does care about the girls – there's something that he'll always have with them – but he's not really they're not as strong allies as Bebe. He doesn't know why he thinks that. Maybe it's because he and the girls get their asses whooped on a regular basis, and Bebe is the one doing the whooping when shit goes bad.
"Sure thing, sweetie," Bebe tells him. He likes that he doesn't even have to say the words 'clean up my back,' that she just knows without words.
They have a first aid kit in this room for this very purpose. It's hidden under the bed, so as not to make the atmosphere less aesthetically pleasing to clients of Polly. Bebe shimmies underneath the massive frame of the bed to retrieve it.
Kenny hisses at the sting of pain when she starts rubbing down his back with anti-bacterial formula, though he likes to concentrate on that sensation instead of her hands, which seem to be all over him when they're this close to each other. She tries to make it quick, though, for both their sakes. Bebe bandages up the worst of it, where the skin is broken.
When she's done, she says, "All finished. You go home and get some sleep now, baby."
"Mmph," Kenny agrees halfheartedly.
He takes the back stairs down to the dressing room to gather his things, even though it's late into the night and there shouldn't be any customers left. You can never be too careful around here, and the patrons of this joint are shockingly concerned if they see one of the employees wandering around with evident injuries.
As he prowls down the hallway, Kenny is stopped by a shout.
"Ken? Ken!"
"What the fuck are you doing in here?" demands Kenny, when Butters skids up to Kenny's side.
Butters, however, does not answer his question. Instead, he stares at Kenny's back and says, "That a belt that did that?"
Kenny doesn't know what he was expecting to come out of the guy's mouth, but it wasn't that. Maybe it was something more along the lines of, 'Gee whiz, what happened to your back?' or 'Oh hamburgers, that looks like it must hurt.' But Butters knows exactly what happened already. Kenny concludes that his Stotch belt theories must hold true.
At first, Kenny can't decide how to respond. He eventually opts for, "Butters, seriously. What the fuck are you doing here?"
"I was worried for you," Butters supplies, "It's past four in the mornin', Ken. You're usually outside by three thirty at the latest. So I came inside."
For the past month, Butters has been giving Kenny rides home from work. Kenny stopped resisting and/or bitching after about the fifth time that Butters pulled up next to Kenny on his Harley (which, Kenny has been informed, is named Christine). To be honest, Kenny kind of likes being able to get home sooner, even if Butters tends to be a bit of a lingerer. Butters likes to sit on his couch and start up and endless stream of chatter while cuddling with Esther. To Kenny's irritation, he thinks that his pitbull may like Butters more than she likes Kenny.
"I'm fine," Kenny says shortly, "Just gotta get my shit."
To his chagrin, Butters doesn't dismiss himself and say he'll wait for Kenny outside, he trails after Kenny like a puppy, into the dressing room. Kenny pulls on his t-shirt and slips his winter coat over that, listening to Butters out of one ear as he goes on about something. Kenny thinks he's talking about baking, but he isn't really paying attention. He's tired tonight. He just wants to crawl into bed and forget everything.
The intensity of this feeling heightens when, just as he and Butters are exiting the dressing room, Cartman's voice drawls behind them, "Poor boy, I need a minute."
Kenny doesn't sigh, he doesn't swear, he doesn't shout – even though he wants to do all of these things. Instead, he freezes and tells Butters, "Sorry. I'll be out in awhile if you still wanna give me a ride home."
"A'course I'll wait for you," Butters says, too brightly for somebody that's awake at four in the fucking morning.
Cartman closes the doors to his office as soon as Kenny enters. He doesn't make a move to sit down at his desk, an action that signals to Kenny that this conversation will be thankfully brief.
Cartman narrows his piggy eyes and asks, "What are you doing with fucking Butters?"
Kenny didn't really expect this question. He might have thought that Cartman might be telling him that he's going to ask Stephen Stotch to lay off the belt a little, but Cartman doesn't resort to that unless he thinks that his people are going to be irreparably damaged. Instinctively, Cartman knows that Kenny can take a belt.
"What are you talking about?" Kenny asks.
"You've been hanging around him a little too much, if you ask me," Cartman supplies, "I'm looking out for you, Kinny. You're his father's whore. I'm just saying, watch your step."
"Uh," Kenny manages, "I'll keep that in mind, boss."
"See that you do," Cartman nods.
Kenny waits for a beat, and then queries, "Can I go now?"
Cartman shifts his weight, sweeps his eyes over Kenny, and replies, "Yeah, get the fuck out of here."
Kenny exits Cartman's office, scowling. What does Cartman care if he hangs around Butters, anyway? And it hasn't been that much. Besides, Butters is nice. Kenny doesn't mind his company because Butters is like, the anti-asshole. He's the opposite of everything in Kenny's life, and Kenny's life is a shithole. So, yeah, he's hanging around Butters.
And just to spite the fatass, he'll continue to fucking do so.
Butters is waiting for Kenny just outside on the street. Like always, Kenny climbs behind him and grabs onto the edge of his jacket and they speed off.
And like every night, Butters asks cheerfully, "Do you want me to walk you to your door?"
Sometimes Kenny answers that yes, he would like Butters to walk him to his door. Mostly, he tells Butters to just go home. Tonight, he says something entirely different. He asks, "Uh, do you wanna chill, or something?" Kenny is still in pain, and his back is totally wrecked – but he's used to this kind of pain. And, honestly, he has this weird notion in his mind that having Butters around for a little longer might cheer him up. It's not an unfounded idea.
Butters sort of stares, having clearly not expected this to come from Kenny's mouth. He cocks his head slightly to the left and asks, "Uh, really?"
"Yes, really," Kenny responds, "Otherwise I wouldn't have said it."
Butters' face breaks out into a shy grin. He says, "I, uh, I've got some movies with me – or, um, maybe we could play a card game, or –"
"Dude," Kenny says, "Slow down. My DVD player is broken, so I think movies are out. But I can like, make coffee or something?"
"I have my laptop with me," Butters says brightly, "and I got, uh, Tangled and Wall-E, too." When Kenny blinks at Butters for a moment too long, he tacks onto the end of his sentence, "I know they're kid movies, but they're awfully good, and you look like you had a long night, and uh, Disney movies always cheer me up. But maybe they don't cheer you up. T-That's fine. We don't have to watch them." His face turns pink, like he's committed some cardinal sin by enjoying children's movies.
Kenny says, "Calm down, dude. We can watch something on your laptop, sure."
Looking relieved, Butters flips up the back of Christine's seat and pulls out a plain navy blue backpack and slings it over his shoulder.
Kenny changes into regular clothing while Butters sets pulls his laptop out, setting it on top of Kenny's television. As Kenny is wiggling into some sweatpants and a hoodie, Butters calls, "Which one do you wanna watch?"
"Er," Kenny replies, emerging from his bedroom, "Tangled? I haven't seen it yet."
In turn, Butters smiles and places the DVD in the disk drive. Once it's started, he sits on one end of Kenny's couch and motions that Kenny should sit on the other end, which he does. Kenny calls to Esther to come sit on his lap, but instead, she goes for Butters, resting her head on his leg.
"Damn dog," he mutters, but he soon becomes distracted by the movie.
Oddly, Kenny does start to feel better. It's a strange brand of feeling better, too, not how "feeling better" usually seems to be for him – which is having an okay day as opposed to a shitty day. He doesn't have good days. At least, he hasn't in a long time. He doesn't remember his last good day.
He doesn't remember the last time he was this comfortable with another person, either. Sure, he's kicked back and watched movies with Karen, and they've fallen asleep beside each other or with her head on his lap, usually. But with Karen, Kenny sometimes feels an underlying worry – one that Karen has. He knows that she worries that he'll fall back on drugs again. Sometimes he's tempted to. She worries that she'll lose her brother again. She's worried that he can't keep his shit straight.
Butters is…trusting. When he shouldn't be, if Kenny were to tell the truth. Kenny is just what people tend to consider the "bad sort." Butters is everything opposite, everything that society says makes the "good sort" of young man. He's served overseas. He got sparkling grades in high school. He takes care of his mom.
But then, who gives a shit what the people that think Kenny's the "bad sort" believe? Those same people would condemn Butters for liking men, when everything about Butters is this inherent goodness.
Butters inches a little closer, laughing at the screen with his dopey, too-young-for-his-face smile. A bizarre sensation crawls through Kenny's body. He can't tell if it's from Butters being too close or from Butters not being close enough.
He finds this a little alarming. He hasn't felt this feeling – a creeping, climbing…desire of sorts – since he was maybe fourteen or fifteen, and a bag of raging hormones.
His brows sweep together. He doesn't know what the fuck to think about the twist in his gut that shoots off like firecrackers every time Butters gives him that lazy smile.
As the ending credits of the movie roll, Kenny notices that they've shifted even more. Butters is a lot closer than he was when the movie started, close enough that Esther is sitting on both of him (he gets the business end, of course. Butters gets the cute, lolling smile end). Almost as if he could feel Kenny looking at him, Butters turns and offers a steady smile. He asks, "Did it make you feel better at all?"
"Yeah," Kenny mumbles. It strikes Kenny as odd that he's telling the truth about that. But he is. He feels calm. His back hurts, and everything around him is this sucky stew of bullshit, but he's okay.
The last thing he expects to happen upon this realization is Butters swooping forward and pushing his lips up against Kenny's.
Kenny's first instinct is to push Butters away – so he does. He puts both hands on Butters chest and shoves him back.
"Oh, shit-sticks," Butters swears. His face flushes vivid red and he says, "Shit. I, ah, I'm real sorry. I-I'm just stupid, is what I am. It popped into my head, Ken, and I shouldn't have listened, but I wasn't actually thinkin' so hard, and…fuck. I'll, uh, I'll go home. Jesus, I'm sorry."
Kenny holds up a hand, interrupting Butters' rambling apology. He has to remind himself to breathe, mostly because he doesn't kiss people. It hasn't happened in so long. It's too intimate, too close. It's something that people that actually give a damn about each other do. Not Kenny. Kenny doesn't give a damn about anybody. This leads him to realize that he might give a shit about Butters.
Maybe he always gave a damn about Butters.
Kenny told his friends to stop making fun of the guy when they hit middle school.
He told it to them the day he saw bruises on Butters' arm. It had been an accident, of course. Butters was his lab partner in science class, and his sleeve just barely hiked up, revealing fingerprint shaped bruises close to his wrist. Butters had caught Kenny staring and tugged his sleeve down, blushing. He'd smiled at Kenny and that smile made him forget a little bit, but maybe not a lot. He understood, and still understands, what it's like to have a family that gives you things you want to hide. Bruises. Inclination toward drugs. Alcoholism. Fear. You want to bundle them up and stash them where nobody can see.
That's part of what makes South Park such a fucking hellhole on some days. Everybody knows everybody. During his childhood, his shitty-ass family got constantly put on display. His parents got arrested with the neighbors watching, he and his siblings got shipped off to foster homes for indefinite periods of time. But they always came back, and they always came back to the same thing. His family were those McCormick people, and that hasn't changed. Now he's just that McCormick boy. People don't talk about his brother and sister because they made it out of here.
People just adore making themselves feel better by comparing their lives to his. His job. His family. His world. At least they're not that McCormick boy.
"K-Ken? You okay? I'm real sorry," Butters apologizes again.
"Why would you do that?" Kenny finds himself asking. Because, really, who the fuck would actually put their mouth on his?
Butters, naturally, takes his rhetorical question and answers as though Kenny meant it. He mashes his knuckles together and responds, "Ah, I dunno. 'Cause I like you, I guess. You're always taking care of things that need to be taken care of and just for the record, you're not bad looking either. I don't mean to be presumptuous, it's just that –"
Kenny interrupts, "Butters, I am fucking your father. I am a hooker."
"Well, shit, sure you are. But that's not who you are, that's what you do. And those things are different," Butters responds.
Kenny opens his mouth, and then closes it again. He repeats this process a few more times, realizing that he can't think of anything at all to say. Because, shit. Nobody has ever said something like that to him in his life. Everybody has always defined him by his unfortunate career. That's who Kenny McCormick is to this town. He's the resident dude-prostitute, available for purchase by any horny fucker that pays the right price. But Kenny himself – he's never considered that a part of his identity. It's not in his makeup. It's what he has to do to get by.
"Butters," is the first thing that finally slips out.
"That's me," Butters says, just a drop of sarcasm in it. Kenny tries not to smile at his tone of voice. He likes when he can tease out wry Butters.
"I want to try that again," Kenny says slowly, "But…stay still. And tell me if you want me to stop. I'm just trying to figure something out, okay?" The part that he's figuring out, of course, is whether or not he liked that kiss.
Butters doesn't react right away, but gradually, he nods his head.
Kenny prefaces, "Don't touch me or anything, okay? Just like, hold your hands in your lap or something."
"Yes sir," Butters jokes quietly, and Kenny watches him clench his hands into loose fists.
Kenny moves his dog, first, banishing her from the couch so that he can scoot forward. He leaves space between them, only a little. They're both sitting cross-legged, with about a half inch of space stopping their knees from touching. Kenny scratches the back of his head, trying to figure out how he should go about this. He finally decides on placing his hands on either side of Butters face and drawing him closer.
Butters lets out a small puff of air, a breath that he'd been holding in, and his face is hot under Kenny's hands from blushing. Somehow, Kenny takes these things as encouragement.
He ducks forward and presses his mouth to Butters'. It's only for an instant. He pulls his head back, but not too far, maybe a few centimeters from Butters' face.
"How was that?" Butters asks.
"I haven't decided yet," concludes Kenny.
This leads Kenny to his next move, which is to kiss Butters again. Their lips connect for a couple moments more before Kenny withdraws again. He still doesn't know how to feel. His head is swimming. So he kisses Butters again. He repeats the process several times, each kiss a little longer than the last, until one kiss extends long enough for Butters to make a small whining noise in his throat, and prod at Kenny's lips with his tongue. When Kenny opens his mouth and Butters starts stroking the inside of his mouth with his tongue, Kenny thinks he's come to a fairly solid conclusion.
He definitely likes kissing Butters Stotch.
Kenny tugs himself away, however, when he deems that the kiss has officially gone on too long.
At this action, Butters remarks, "You're g-goddamn confusing, mister."
Kenny laughs, but quiets after a second and confesses, "I haven't kissed anybody since high school."
Butters openly gapes at this admission before saying, "Well, Jesus. I guess I'll count myself lucky to be the first one you kissed in that long."
"I don't know about lucky," Kenny says, but he's flattered.
After that, the energy slowly begins to ebb, and Butters declares that he should really be going, as the sun is coming up and he doesn't want to worry his mother. Kenny helps him gather his things and tuck them back into his backpack.
At the door, Kenny stops Butters with the barest brush of his fingers and tests out another kiss on him, this one more chaste than the last. Butters flushes again and stammers out a goodbye, and Kenny goodbyes him in return with a little more finesse, before shutting the apartment door and locking in behind him.
He stands with his back against the front door, trying to process what he and Butters just did. This uncertainty is the kind of thing that people feel after they've had a one night stand with a stranger, not kissing somebody that they've known since preschool. So why is Kenny so charged with insecurity and doubt?
God, this is so fucked up. He's getting this stirring feeling of enjoyment around Butters. This is all so fucking inconvenient. He can't like Butters, because his motherfucking job is to fuck Butters' dad, or get him off, or let him tear up his back with a belt. His job is to please the man. Kissing his son is not supposed to be in the cards, and yet, Kenny wants it in the cards.
In the weird, hellish game of poker that is his life, Kenny wants Butters in his hand.
That is so fucked.
He blows out all of the air in his lungs noisily and rubs a hand over his face, before saying to Esther, whose tail is wagging, "I am too wrecked to deal with this fucked up shit. Let's get some shut-eye, baby doll."
o.o.o.o
Happy Thanksgiving, you guys! I finished this by mistake, so enjoy.
Thank you as always to these fine people, who I am certain are dapper as fuck: Lying Honesty, KirstenTheDestroyer, Miroir Twin, Reverse Psychology, Kuutamolla, KeiMaxwell, Mallory, conversefreak3, prettyoddrydonfan, and TheAwesome15.
Comments/Questions/Suggestions? Hit me up.