Chapter Track: Raining Again – Moby
Kyle is having trouble remembering how he got suckered into this.
Okay, no, he knows exactly how he got suckered into camping for a week. But he hates camping. Like, a lot. It's some combination of having to shit in the woods and sleep on the ground and how fucking freezing it is at night. It's not that he dislikes the outdoors. Or maybe he does. Because, actually, this started with being in the great outdoors and his desperate need to get back inside and play Xbox or something.
It began with a hike - Kenny's suggestion.
Neither he or Stan had known, but Kenny became somewhat of an outdoorsman in the past few years. Kyle didn't know because, well, he lived across the country. Stan, on the other hand, should have known. Maybe. Since he's been around in South Park this entire time. But Kyle knows how disconnected Stan has been from the rest of the world. He's witnessed it himself. The drinking, the holing himself up in his house without speaking to anybody else, generally separating himself from the rest of the world. And they don't speak about it. Kyle doesn't feel like he can, really.
He doesn't want to feel stupidly consumed with guilt for not knowing about this whole situation with Stan. But he is.
And he can't bring it up, because he was never around to pay attention to the problem in the first place.
For now, it's not an immediate issue.
Now, Kyle's immediate issue is that he's fucking freezing.
He shouldn't be. It's not that fucking cold, but somehow nighttime while camping is about ten times worse than it is when you're safely inside a normal, insulated structure, in a warm fucking bed.
"Kyle, will you just go to sleep already?" he hears a sleepy demand from across the tent. It's one of those huge five person tents, even though there are only four of them - him, Stan, Kenny and Wendy, the last of whom Kenny demanded to be present, because evidently, Wendy enjoys camping just as much as Kenny does. And Kenny is trying to embrace whatever he has in common with her to the very fullest.
"I can't, I'm cold," Kyle complains. Extra blanket aside, he's shaking like a leaf, probably because he has hardly any body fat.
Beside him, Stan rolls over and snuggles closer. He whispers, "Dude," simply, as if to say, for the love of Christ, just stop your inner complaints and go the fuck to sleep.
But it's not that fucking simple. First of all, he doesn't want to share a tent with Kenny. Kenny snores like a fucking truck. There's also the second problem of Wendy being simultaneously present. And Kenny just can't stop being as cuddly as he feels it is necessary to be around her. At least Kyle remembered to lay down some ground rules. Like, not having sex at all on this camping trip. This has been admittedly difficult from his side. Being around Stan makes him kind of randy. He feels far more randy than usual, actually. Maybe it has something to with the camping environment.
You know, all primal and shit.
Fuck, that's one of the stupider things that he's ever thought about.
Stan scoots even closer to Kyle, their sleeping bags rustling together as Stan's stomach presses against his back. His lips touch Kyle's ear, and he nuzzles the back of Kyle's neck with his nose. He says, "Does this help?"
It kind of does. No, it really does. Stan is radiating body heat. When his arms slide around Kyle, he feels about ten times more warm, even though it's just been a mere moment tucked into his arms.
"You guys are adorable," Wendy remarks from her place beside Kyle.
Well, that kills the mood.
Kyle almost forgot that he's sharing a tent with two other people, that are also all cuddly together.
How can she even see them? It's pitch fucking black, another thing that Kyle loathes about camping. He's embarrassed to admit it, but he actually slept with a night light until he was like, sixteen years old. And even now, he still prefers to sleep with a bathroom or hallway light on. When he asked to keep their electric lantern on, Kenny laughed and Wendy flat out said, 'Fuck no,' because apparently she can't sleep if any tiny bit of light is touching her. She insists that even while she's wearing one of those weird eyemask things, she can still see light out of the corner of her eye.
At least there's a little bit of moonlight streaming in through the mesh window. Unfortunately, that is coming with a frigid breeze.
Still, he feels strangely warm and a lot better with Stan pressed up against his back.
Just, not good enough to fall asleep. He tosses a little, rustling around with that fucking sleeping bag fabric rubbing up against the floor of the tent.
"Fucking hell," Wendy moans in complaint, "Kyle, go the fuck to sleep."
Kenny, meanwhile, is out cold. Snoring. Like a goddamned bear. How can she be annoyed by Kyle's tossing and turning and be fine with Kenny's ruckus?
"Here," mumbles Stan, sounding like he's mostly asleep, or that he would be, if there wasn't so much inner-tent conflict. There's a bunch of noise from Stan, who draws away from Kyle. With the little bit of moonlight coming in, Kyle can see Stan's silhouette standing up.
"What are you doing?" Kyle asks.
"Move over, asshole," Stan mutters, "I'm getting in your sleeping bag."
"There had better be no funny business," Wendy says irritably, "Kenny and I are following the rules, so you have to, too."
Stan tugs open Kyle's sleeping bag and slips in. It's a damned good thing that Kenny didn't own any of those skinny little sleeping bags - he only had the giant-ass jumbo things.
Now Stan's arms come around him fully and they tuck together tightly, fitting like two pieces of a puzzle. This is far too comfortable. Stan's bit of stubble that he's grown in the last day and a half of camping scratches the back of Kyle's neck, and it actually feels wonderful. Like everything about Stan feels wonderful.
He probably shouldn't think of that, since they're supposed to be on their best behavior and following the rules of the tent like gentlemen. Kyle whispers, "Maybe tomorrow we can -"
Stan 'mmm's and murmurs in agreement, "Yeah, but we have to wait for these two to find other things to do."
"They can go take a hike," Kyle says back, and he means that as literally as he means it figuratively. This whole thing BEGAN because of a fucking hike. He and Stan and Kenny all decided to go blaze some trails. More accurately, Kenny hiked while Kyle felt like he was dying because of the altitude and the sun, while Stan hung back to help Kyle by providing sunscreen and water, when he really could have been participating fully.
Kyle is really fucking out of shape, basically. And being like, and mile and half higher in altitude than he has been in four years doesn't help anything.
Stan starts kissing along Kyle's ear absently. It's the brand of affection that you don't really think about, you just do it. Kyle feels a little tingly at the knowledge that he and Stan are already at that point, the subconsciously cute point. They seem to have a skipped an entire era in their lives, sort of like those eight years happened...but didn't, really. That they're picking up right where they left off. And as far as Kyle is concerned, the place where it 'left off' is at that one time. Now something else is growing between them, like vines that crawl up the side of house. They're getting all tangled and meshed together, at an almost incomprehensible speed.
That's how Kyle finally falls asleep, thinking about getting tangled up with Stan emotionally, while they are quite literally tangled into each other. It's easy to fall asleep when he's next to Stan. He likes how Stan's chest rises and falls against his back in tune with the breath that comes out hot and even against the exposed skin of Kyle's neck. And, despite Kyle's definite loathing of camping, he likes that Stan smells like campfire and pine trees, and that they're falling asleep to the sound of crickets, and underneath that, dead silence.
Morning is rough. It always is when Kyle camps. Every morning sucks, because someplace in the middle of the night, the temperature swings dramatically from fucking freezing to hot as hell, and then you're covered in sweat by the time that you're up. He hates to admit it, but in addition to being all sweaty and gross, he's also feeling a little pissy about waking up alone in the tent. He hears the other three laughing and talking outside, and smells camp coffee, which makes Kyle's stomach rumble with want.
Oh, and his back hurts. From sleeping on the fucking ground.
Maybe he would be less angry about it all if he had woken up next to Stan, like he wanted.
He is never camping again, no matter how tempting it is to get out of a physical activity (like hiking, for instance).
Kyle stumbles out of the tent to be met with blaring Coloradan sun. He groans, "Fuck me, what time is it?"
Kenny checks the digital watch slapped around his wrist (in addition to the no sex in the tent rule, they established a no phone rule as well. Kenny insisted, saying that cellphones would take away from the 'experience.' Kyle just wishes he'd taken phone in spite of that rule, because he could be playing Scrabble with Ike instead of tossing pine cones into the campfire for amusement), and answers, "Shit. Like, one?"
"Dude!" exclaims Kyle, "Why didn't anybody wake me up?"
"You were out like a light, man," Stan says, "I'll make you some scrambled eggs, okay? Don't worry about it."
Kyle has a hard time being mad at Stan, so he just stays quiet, with his arms folded, and pouts.
Plus he looks like shit when he camps. And somehow, Kenny and Stan and even Wendy all look good, in that outdoorsy rugged sort of way. But, especially Stan. His hair is mussed in an almost cheesy romance-novel level way, he has on khaki cargo shorts and flips flops, and looks generally fucking good. Especially when he weilds a frying pan and and the eggs they've been keeping in a cooler in Stan's Ford and tin shakers of salt and pepper, creating some of the most delicious scrambled eggs that have ever been forged.
Seriously, Kyle has never tasted anything so good. Or maybe that's just because he woke up in the afternoon after having not participated in last night's marshmallow roast and smores assembly line (he was too busy being angry about having to shit in the woods. They brought toilet paper, sure, but there is stil something utterly undignified about popping a squat over weeds and pine needles and whatever bugs are crawling around in there).
While Kyle eats, Kenny and Wendy duck back into the tent. They emerge in swimsuits. Kyle tries to side eye Wendy's baby belly without being too obvious about it, but she catches his eye and snaps, "Yes, I have stretch marks and everything, Kyle."
"Sorry," he mutters.
But he's already been beaten to cheering her up, because Kenny wraps a loose arm around her waist and is whispering something in her ear - something that's making her smile and laugh and push him away. And she's blushing. Kyle decides that he doesn't want to know, but he suspects that it's probably something about boobs. With Kenny, that is typically a pretty safe assumption.
"We're gonna head down to the river. You guys coming?" asks Kenny, arm still curled around Wendy's waist. Not too long ago, she would push him away when he did that. They must really be in a good place with each other. Must be all the sex.
Fuck, Kyle can't stop thinking about sex. And with Stan working around camp, he looks all...manly. And well. Kyle likes men. A lot. Particularly this one, who is stoking the fire.
"I might come down later," says Stan, "I'm just gonna wait for Kyle."
"Uh...huh," says Kenny, giving them a playful wink, "We'll see you later, then."
Stan and Kyle glance at each other, and watch and Kenny and Wendy walk down the trail that winds down to the shallow section of river where swimmers hang out.
Stan snags the seat next to Kyle on one of the logs surrounding the campfire, and leans in to kiss him.
Kyle gives Stan a little push back and says, "I taste like eggs, you'd be grossed out."
Stan gives a careless shrug and says, "Whatever," before ducking back in and smothering Kyle's lips with his own. Kyle melts into the embrace and lets Stan's arms coil around him. He hums happily against Stan's mouth and parts his lips. Okay, so they do both taste a bit like camp coffee and scrambled eggs. But whatever. All Kyle can think about at this point is how he felt last night with Stan pressed up against his back, and the friction with every little shift either of them made. At least he fell asleep before he got a boner. But he's kind of getting one now.
When one of Stan's hands falls away and his hand lowers to Kyle's crotch, not having a boner is simply not an option. Kyle has discovered that Stan knows just the right way to stroke and rub and tease, and it's as delightful as it is tortorous.
"Stan," Kyle mumbles. It's a protest, but it's half-moaned, and Stan appears to just feel encouraged. He tries again, "Stan, there are kids around. Let's just go to the tent."
"There's a 'no sex in the tent' rule," Stan replies.
Kyle snips back, "There's also a 'no sex in public' law, you asshat."
Stan rolls his eyes but grins his boyish grin, and seizes Kyle by the waist, lifting him up and tossing him over his shoulder all Viking-style. Kyle protests, "Stan! Aghh, put me down, damn it!" But Stan keeps Kyle on his shoulder, struggling aside, and unzips the tent door, where he dumps Kyle unceremoniously onto a pile of sleeping bags and pillows.
"What if Kenny and Wendy come back?" Kyle asks. He doesn't know why he's arguing against sex, especially since they haven't slept together in two whole days and all he's been thinking about since the last time that he and Stan fucked is fucking again.
Stan shushes him and says, "For being so smart, you can be awfully fucking dumb."
Kyle gives him a blank stare.
"Dude, they went swimming to give us this opportunity," Stan says. He unzips Kyle's hoodie and discards it in the corner of the tent, where Kyle jammed his duffel bag. Stan leans down and feathers kisses along the column of Kyle's neck. He tugs off Kyle's shirt next, which is fine – Kyle sweated all over it sometime during the night and it's kind of damp and disgusting. He hates camping so fucking much, but he can tell that he's the only one that isn't enjoying himself, and so he is trying his best to keep his mouth shut.
Stan sits up, crouches and sweeps his eyes over Kyle.
"What?" Kyle says, "I'm sorry, I know, I look gross." He tosses his head to the side so that he doesn't have to look at Stan.
"Why do you keep saying shit like that?" asks Stan, and his voice isn't the same eager voice that it was a few moments ago, when he had solely sex on his mind.
Kyle feels himself turn red. He knows that he should stop with the self-degradation. He knows that that kind of talk annoys other people, no matter how true he believes it be. And it is. True, he means. Because he can literally feel the grossness on his body. He mumbles, "Uh, I dunno. Sorry. C'mere," he opens his arms and hugs Stan close, pressing a hard 'let's forget about it' kiss to his lips.
Stan pulls away and says, "Dude, no, really. I want to know. I don't get it. Do you really think you're 'gross'?" Stan puts air quotes around the word 'gross,' which annoys Kyle a little, because he doesn't simply think that he is gross, he knows that he is.
"I –" Kyle begins helplessly, "I'd rather not, okay? Can we just, um, you know, before they come back from the river?"
Stan shakes his head, "Nope. Not until you tell you me why you keep saying shit about how you look."
Kyle heaves a long sigh, feeling as though he probably doesn't have a way out of this one if he wants sex, which he most definitely does. He turns his head off to the side, because he doesn't want to look at Stan's face while he's explaining what he thinks are the possible roots of his bad self-esteem. He says, "I don't know, Stan. I try not to just sit around fucking analyzing why I hate the way I look. But I'm pretty sure it started when we were in fourth grade and the girls made that list. You know. Where I was the ugliest boy in our class."
"You weren't, though," Stan says, "The list was corrupt, or whatever. Plus we were nine. Why does that matter anymore?"
"It doesn't," says Kyle, "I said I think that's when it started. Like it was something in the back of my mind, starting then. And it got worse in middle school, because puberty sucked hardcore, and then Cartman got worse, like fucking terrible. And I was always trying to pretend it didn't matter to me, because I wanted to impress you."
Stan chuckles, but stops when Kyle sends him a glare. He asks Kyle gently, "Why in the world did you want to impress me?"
"Because I liked you," Kyle says, "I mean, I didn't really know it yet, but I knew that I kept trying to do things I thought you would think were cool or funny. And at first I just thought it was because you were my super best friend, and I dunno. I just... wanted you to like me, too."
"We were so fucking dumb," Stan mutters, "But really, dude? This is all lingering bullshit from middle school?"
"No, high school sucked worse. 'Cause I had Cartman on my back, but I didn't have you. And after that one time, I just assumed you thought I was ugly."
Stan assumes a look of incredulousness and says, "You're fucking with me, right?"
"I wish I was," Kyle mumbles under his breath, but he then adds more loudly, "No, I'm not. I know it sounds stupid."
"So this stuff lingering from high school, then?" Stan tentatively presses.
"Not exactly," Kyle says, "I'm trying to illustrate that I've never exactly felt okay about myself. I mean, how I look. I think I'm awesome. I just don't think that I'm attractive. Now shut up, otherwise I'm not talking about anymore, because I don't want to talk about this, okay?"
Stan frowns, but nods. He smooths a hand over Kyle's slightly-greasy-from-camping hair and pushes a kiss up against his hairline, saying nothing, and looking at Kyle expectantly.
"So, I spent life up until graduation believing that I'm repulsive," Kyle says, and he can tell that Stan wants to respond, but is fighting to keep his mouth shut. He continues, "I mean, because I thought that I was the only gay kid in South Park – which I guess I definitely wasn't, but I was the only one out. So, uh, college was like a fresh start. I thought I'd be able to meet people like that," he snaps his fingers to punctuate, and goes on, "but I didn't. I'm bad at making new friends, it turns out. Like, fucking terrible. So I went to a lot of parties and got drunk a lot so I'd loosen up a bit. That's where I met my first boyfriends during my first two years of college, at parties. Those relationships did not last long."
"Okay, but – " Stan starts, but he hushes himself when Kyle glowers.
"So I stopped doing that. Partying, I mean. And I just focused on school instead. And then I got a job and my own place, but I was like, really separated from the rest of humanity. The only people I ever spoke to other than my professors were like Kenny and Ike on Skype."
Kyle hates thinking about that, how lonely he was. How badly he missed seeing his friends, but how much he didn't want to interrupt his friends' lives, so he forced himself to stay away from South Park altogether. He clears his throat, "So, it was like, really fucking fantastic to me when I met Mitchell. I was working on a paper in Starbucks, and he just…sat with me. And we started talking. And then we exchanged numbers. And then we were having sex. Like, a lot. When we finally started dating, it went really shitty really fucking fast. He wanted to know where I was all the time. If I needed some time to myself, he'd text and call me and then everybody we knew until he found me."
"Jesus," expresses Stan.
"I know. He wouldn't let me out of his sight. It finally got to the point when he refused to let me go anywhere other than work and classes. I had to be with him," Kyle explains, "all the time. He told me it was because of the people he'd dated in the past, that they all cheated on him and left him. And so I felt bad for him, and rationalized it in my head as being perfectly normal. Until, uh, after work one night, I decided I was gonna get some coffee and just read alone for awhile. You know, totally normal thing. When I came home, he went berserk. He kept shouting at me, and then he goes, 'I don't give a shit about your feelings, nobody else wants you because you're an ugly sack of shit.' And I believed him, I guess."
"Aw, Kyle –" Stan starts, but Kyle glares again, warning him that the story isn't over.
So, instead of speaking, Stan presses little kisses to the base of his neck. Kyle finds it comforting, so he strokes Stan's hair while he keeps speaking, "I just got it into my head that of course nobody else could possibly want me. Nobody ever did before. And it made sense to me that it's because I'm unattractive. I was like, 'Okay, I guess I've gotta take what I can get.' And I thought that Mitchell wasn't even that bad. He just wanted to make sure that I was safe, or something like that. But you know me. I need my alone time. So I started feeling all suffocated. I started lying about having hours at work just so I could like, go to the park and just walk around or some shit."
Stan's lips move up Kyle's throat, until he settles at Kyle's ear and begins to nibble casually. Kyle feels like he should finish this sordid tale the fuck up, because he would really just like to have sex right now. All the damp kisses and biting and teasing is going straight to his cock. He feels the energy in his brain leaking away. He stammers out, "He found me out, 'cause he started opening my paychecks and looking at the hours I worked. And when I came home after he'd gone through all my crap, he hit me. I fell and hit my head on our coffee table and passed out. That's when I knew I had to leave. So I did. But I guess shit is still lingering from that time in my life, because not many people like having me around."
Stan is staring at him with huge, almost puppy-like eyes, and he says hoarsely, "I love having you around. I missed you so fucking much."
"I missed you too," Kyle says, and he means every word of that.
Stan pulls himself up off of the ground and swings his legs over Kyle. He tugs off his own shirt before lowering his mouth over Kyle's again, initiating a long, heartfelt kiss. They press together, chest to chest, even though it's already hot as all fuck with the sun streaming in from the mesh windows. It's probably around a hundred degrees, and the fact that the tent is a dark green doesn't do much to reflect the sun away from them. No, it invites heat in.
"Kyle," Stan breathes, "I love your hair," he says, and he buries a kiss at the top of Kyle's head, "I love your nose," he kisses Kyle's nose, "I love your chin." He put three kisses to the edge of Kyle's jaw.
"My chin?"
"Yes, your chin," confirms Stan, "I love your shoulders. I love your neck. I love your stomach. I love your hips." With each body part that he names, Stan places a kiss or two against it. Kyle's heart starts to hurt. He doesn't understand why anybody like Stan could possibly like him, but he's so fucking happy that Stan does. Stan pulls off the sweatpants that Kyle wore to bed with practiced ease, balling them up and shoving them into Kyle's duffel.
"You know what else I love?" Stan says, staring at Kyle through hooded eyes.
"Um," Kyle manages, but he doesn't get to finish that thought, because Stan is already pulling his briefs away from his body and tossing them back with the rest of his clothes.
"This," he says, and he licks a long line up Kyle's cock, before taking the head into his mouth and ducking down.
"I – uh – oh my god. Shit. Fuck. Stan," Kyle says, because he can't think of coherent words, other than feeling very flattered that somebody is fond of his dick. He takes two fists of sleeping bag in his hands and gasps, arching into Stan's mouth.
Stan pulls away with a devilish smile playing on his lips. He says, "I'm gonna show you what you do to me, okay?"
Kyle likes the sound of that, but is simultaneously scared out of his wits. He's discovered that Stan has a penchant for making him feel all kinds of emotions that he'd rather not put into words, instead opting to keep quiet about them and let Stan do his thing.
Stan strips his own remaining clothes off before shuffling around in his own bag. What he retrieves is a bottle of lube – Kyle recognizes it, Stan purchased the lube quickly after they first started having sex, and they've used it a few times.
Kyle wryly queries, "You didn't ever intend to follow the 'no sex in the tent' rule, did you?"
"Nope," says Stan, "I'm not as bad as Ken, though. He has a pair of fuzzy handcuffs in his backpack. I found them when I was looking for sunscreen yesterday."
"Oh, sick," Kyle says, making a face.
"Yeah, I think we might have to 'go swimming' later to pay them back for letting us have the tent," Stan gives off a short laugh, his eyes twinkling, and squeezes a bit of lube onto his hand. Kyle spreads his legs a little in preparation, but Stan stoops down, kisses him, and murmurs, "You don't have to do that." Kyle doesn't understand what Stan is talking about at first. Of course he should spread his legs, that makes the whole damned process a lot easier.
Except that, then, Stan's hand disappears behind his back.
Oh.
Oh.
Stan's mouth falls open slightly as he pushes his fingers into himself. He makes an involuntary noise – a little "Ah," escaping him.
"Holy shit," Kyle can't help but say, his mouth agape. Nothing has ever turned him on more than this. He watches, unable to anything other than seize his erection and pump it lazily while he watches Stan finger himself. Stan hits his own prostate – his breath catches and a groan whizzes from his throat before he can stop it.
Stan smiles, then. It's that barely crooked, boyish smile that Kyle has come to know and love. He will never stop wanting to be the one that makes that smile appear on Stan's face. Stan says, all sweaty and panting, "This is what you do to me."
So Kyle repeats himself, "Holy shit."
Stan withdraws his hand with a little whine, and picks the bottle of lubrication back up off of the tent floor. He expels more out into his palm, and leans forward to slick not his own cock – but Kyle's. Kyle's eyes widen a bit and he lets slip an, "Oh." He hasn't topped in a long while. Since before Mitchell. He's not very good at it, either. But then, he wonders, as Stan scoots forward, does it still count as topping when he's not actually on top?
"Is this okay with you?" pants Stan, though his ass is hovering literally directly above Kyle's dick, and he may have well just asked if the sky is fucking blue.
"Does a bear shit in the woods?" asks Kyle in response, because it seems fitting, considering their current location.
Stan laughs. He takes a deep breath – Kyle watches him sort of center himself, because this is crazy, how can he trust Kyle this much? – before spreading his knees further apart, and slowly, much, much too slowly, lowering his body over Kyle's cock. Stan's eyes are closed as he takes Kyle in inch by inch, and he makes small, choked noises that rumble in his chest, his mouth still half-open, until he bites down on his lower lip, like he's in pain.
Kyle reaches for Stan's hand and folds it within his own, asking gingerly, "Have you ever, um, done this before?"
Stan laughs again. Kyle's noticed that Stan likes to laugh during sex, which is fine, it actually makes Kyle feel happy himself. And sex can be funny anyway. Kyle hates making sex into this extremely serious and important affair, because all sorts of things can go strangely wrong or even strangely right. Stan answers, "Uh, like, twice? But not recently."
Kyle can buy that. Stan's body is tense and tight, but they fit together like a damned glove. He gives Stan's hand a comforting squeeze. He moans, too. Quite a bit. And loudly. He hopes that the people in the campsites on either side of them are doing something else. It just feels so fucking good to be surrounded by Stan's heat, sliding up into him. Kyle has never felt closer to his super best friend.
"We can –" Kyle swallows back the lump in his throat, "– take it slow. If you need that." He moves his hands, resting them on Stan's hips.
Stan nods, "Just for a second."
For a few hot moments, they breathe heavily together without moving. Stan's sweat drips down off of his brow and splashes onto Kyle's abdomen. He releases a shuddering breath, and then lifts, up, surging back down onto Kyle's shaft with a strangled cry of pleasure. Kyle digs his nails into Stan's skin, but neither of them fucking care.
Kyle lifts his body up to meet Stan's short, decisive thrusts. He realizes that Stan is trying to find the perfect angle to bounce into that sweet spot. Kyle knows when they've found it, because Stan shouts, "Jesus fucking Christ!" and smacks his body against Kyle in that exact manner again. And again. Kyle's afraid that if he moves, he might fuck up Stan's angle, so he sits back and pulls one hand away from Stan's hip to grip Stan's cock, pumping it in time with each hard thrust.
They're reduced to grunts and the sound of damp skin slapping on skin, over and over again, before Stan moans, running his hands through his hair, and spills over Kyle's fingers. He sounds exhausted from the combination of the heat and sex, but he keeps going up and down, determined, until Kyle follows suit, coming mostly on Stan's leg.
They don't move for a long time. They just stare at each other, with Stan still straddling Kyle's lap. Their eyes are hazy and their heads are heavy, and suddenly, Kyle is extremely happy that he decided to come on this camping trip. This may very well have been the best sex of his life.
At last, Stan huffs, and lets himself fall on his back beside Kyle. He says, "Wow."
"Shit," mumbles Kyle, "Wow is right."
Eventually they sit up. Kyle wipes the semen off of himself with the sweaty t-shirt he'd been wearing earlier, and he pulls on his swimsuit as Stan does the same, so they can go down to the river and give Kenny and Wendy a chance for alone time. He just hopes they don't mind that the tent already reeks to high heaven of sex and sweat and not being bathed because they're fucking camping.
Stan kisses Kyle and grins at him, unzipping the door the tent. Fresh air, at last.
"Holy fucking shit," Stan breathes.
"What?" Kyle asks, trying to peer around Stan's broad shoulders.
There is no question as to what the cause of Stan's alarm could possibly be.
It is a bear.
And said bear notices them right as they stick their heads out of the tent.
"Oh, shit," Kyle says, "What do we do? Oh my god. Shit."
"Kyle!" snaps Stan, which unfortunately gets the bear's attention. Stan takes a deep breath and says through gritted teeth, "You are supposed to speak calmly."
"I can't be calm, dude," Kyle replies, voice high, "It's a fucking bear!"
That's when his 'fight or flight' instinct kicks in, and Kyle definitely does not want to fight a bear. So, he does what the survival instinct in his brain tells him to do – he tears his body away from their tent, and runs like hell downhill, toward the river. He's heard that you should run downhill. Something about making it harder to chase you.
"Kyle, you fucking moron!" he hears, and Kyle turns his head briefly, only to see that said bear is running after him. Fuck. Holy shit.
Oh my God. I can't outrun a bear, he thinks, but he speeds up anyway. He's sort of tall. His legs are sort of long.
He hears Stan calling out something behind him. Kyle ignores it at first, Stan can suck it, he just needs to get the fuck out of here, get to safety. Would he be safe if he was at the river? What if he climbed a tree? But bears can climb trees, he reminds himself.
"KYLE!" He hears Stan boom at the top of his lungs. He glances back again.
He should have done that. Fuck. The bear is gaining on him. Stan is chasing the bear, holding a large tree branch in his hands. Stan yells, "Climb up a tree, you fucking idiot!" But there are no trees. He's in a clearing.
Kyle's feet pound the ground. He can feel his skin getting cut up by rocks and the weeds and God only knows what else.
Oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck.
He's running through trees now. There's no fucking time to climb, he doesn't know what Stan is talking about. There's only enough time to run like hell. The bear is almost on top of him. Does it matter what kind of bear it is? He wonders. He should have paid attention when they learned about bear safety in high school. He has no idea what to do. He just keeps going – until the bear roars and swats at Kyle.
He's slammed onto his back on the path. He curls up, trying to scoot away, trying to keep running. He hates bears, holy shit. There are actually people that find these creatures cute. Oh my god oh my GOD. He's terrified. A horrible, tearing pain rips through his back, and he knows he's been clawed at.
Kyle hears footsteps pounding toward him, and abruptly, the shadow the bear lifts.
He dares to crane his neck after a moment.
Stan is hitting the bear with the branch. Stan must notice him looking out of the corner of his eye and says, "Stay curled up, dude!" in between panting breaths.
What happens next must be some sort of miracle. As Stan fights back with the bear, it begins to back away. He swats it with the stick, and Kyle realizes that Stan isn't trying to do any real damage to the animal, he's trying to frighten it. It cowers a little, shrinking back, and when Stan makes another lunge, the bear starts to bound away, dashing across campsites and toward the woods in the distance.
Stan drops the branch on the ground and falls to his knees beside Kyle. He says, "You dumbass. Why didn't you listen to me? I'm a veterinarian, for fuck's sake!"
Kyle's too scared to talk. He's still trying to process the fact that he's not actually dead. He's alive. He is alive. He is a survivor of a goddamn bear attack.
"Let me see your back," Stan says, voice a little more soft than before. Stan gingerly touches Kyle's stinging skin. He says, "You got lucky, dude. These are pretty shallow. Can you get up? We'll go back and I can clean you up with the first aid kit."
Then there are more feet in his vision, a pair in leather flip flops with a tattoo of Death that goes up onto a calf, beside another, more delicate-looking pair, with a chipped purple pedicure.
"Oh my god," he hears Wendy say.
"What the fuck happened?" asks Kenny, "We heard you guys shouting and – holy balls, what did that?"
"A black bear," Stan is still panting heavily, but he seems to have calmed down a lot more quickly than Kyle, because Kyle is still trying to process that he lived through a bear attack, "This idiot decided that running would be a good idea."
"How did –" Wendy begins.
Kyle feels himself being lifted. Stan is heaving him up, supporting Kyle's body with his own. A second later, Kenny grabs Kyle's other side. Stan explains, "I forgot to clean up our fucking food. I'm an idiot too. We were just, uh. Distracted."
"I'm sure you were," mutters Kenny.
Kyle somehow manages to work up enough brain power to say, "Suck my dick, Kenny."
Kenny rolls his eyes, and Stan breathes a sigh of relief, "Good. Okay. You're here."
They stumble back to their campsite, which thankfully, is now bear-free. Kenny and Stan set to work on cleaning up the mess of food, some of which has been compromised by a bear feasting on it. Wendy sits beside Kyle and cleans up his back with Neosporin. She bandages him carefully, and when he doesn't speak, she massages his shoulders and tries to cheer him up. She says in a quiet tone, "We had a scare of our own." He doesn't respond, so she says, "Except, we did the scaring. Or really, Kenny did. There were these boys, you see, and they were – well, they were picking on another boy. All he did was walk up to them and stand up looking all frightening, but it was pretty funny."
Kyle can imagine that perfectly. Kenny, in all his tattooed and pierced glory, scaring the shit out of some bullies for his own amusement. Wendy must feel his body becoming less tense, because she goes on. She opens Kyle's palm and puts a smoothed-out white rock in it. She says, "We were given a rock for our troubles. Kenny had me hold onto it, but I think he's actually keeping it. It's sweet, don't you think?"
"Can we leave?" asks Kyle, suddenly.
"Of course," Wendy assures him, "We're leaving in the morning, okay? It's just that it's getting kind of dark, and we don't want to have to pack up quite yet." She sounds so fucking soothing. Kyle has to hand it to her, she will probably be a great mom.
His back hurts.
Today sucks.
After a sprawling silence between them ensues, Wendy pats his shoulder and says, "I'm gonna go get a jacket on. It's getting kind of cold."
It is actually getting a little chilly.
Kyle looks up at the sky. Only a couple hours ago, it was blue and dotted with happy, puffy clouds. Now it's all gray and sullen. He gets it. It's kind of how he feels. It figures that with his luck, the greatest sex of his life would be followed up by getting chased by a fucking bear. Not that he helped. He feels stupid, but he's never liked bears, and well…it just. Happened.
After Wendy changes into warmer clothes, Kyle follows her example and puts on some jeans and his zip hoodie again. Outside, Kenny is kindling the fire, and Stan has the food that had been left in its proper place in the Ford.
Kyle, as Stan is handing off said food, stumbles into Stan's arms.
"I'm sorry," he says into Stan's shoulder.
Stan ghosts a hand over Kyle's back, considerate of the hurts-like-hell but not-actually-as-bad-as-it-could-be injury, his hands finally coming to wrap around Kyle's waist. He says, "Ah, it's okay, dude. Bears are scary motherfuckers. If I hadn't known what to do, I probably would have run like hell, too." Kyle knows that Stan is lying about that, but he also can't imagine a world in which Stan doesn't know what to do with an animal. Stan just knows animals. Logically, Kyle should have listened to him. But he didn't. And now he has a bear scratch on his back. Awesome.
Stan goes on, "Stop worrying about it, okay? You're fine now. We'll have some food, go to sleep, and leave first thing in the morning."
"I am never going camping again," sulks Kyle.
"I don't blame you," Stan responds. He sounds amused.
Kyle finally breaks away when he feels Kenny and Wendy staring at them. Stan keeps a hand on Kyle's shoulder, though, and when they sit at the fire and roast corn cobs, Stan's arm lingers around Kyle's waist. He can't decide if he likes that or not. They agreed to never indulge in public displays of affection. Kyle knows he started it, though, and he knows that Wendy and Kenny already know about the nature of their relationship. So why does it feel weird? Why does this still, after all this time and intimacy, feel surreal to Kyle? He doesn't know why, but it bothers him.
A few minutes after they finish eating, it begins to rain lightly. It's not enough to do much but be irritating, but still, Kenny commands the other three go wait in the tent while he cleans up. They don't bother arguing with him (especially Kyle, who practically dives into the tent), and instead, hang out, safely dry, with the electric lantern turned on bright. They talk while the clang of pots and pans and food being put away starts up, and the patter of rain becomes louder and more persistent against the fabric of the tent. At least it's water proof. It's fucking cold, but at least they're dry.
Kyle falls asleep with his head in Stan's lap, with Stan running his fingertips over the bandages on his back.
o.o.o.o
A clap of thunder and a bright flash wake Kyle. He's comfortable, tucked into his sleeping bag and pressed up against Wendy, who's sleeping soundly with her eye mask on. Kenny is snoring. The rain is fucking pouring, now. It's coming down in torrents, and the whole tent is shaking with the force of the wind. It sounds like bullets. Hundreds of bullets hitting their tent.
And Stan is…
Where is Stan?
Kyle jerks into a sitting position in his panic, scanning the dark tent. Stan's sleeping bag is empty. He's gone. Missing. Vanished.
"Guys," Kyle says. Neither Kenny nor Wendy stir from their sleep.
"Guys," Kyle says a little louder.
Wendy wakes with that one. She mumbles sleepily, "Whaaat?"
"Stan is missing," Kyle whispers back urgently.
"What?" Wendy sits up and pulls her mask onto her head.
"Stan isn't here," Kyle repeats.
Wendy looks around. She asks, "Maybe he just had to go to the bathroom or something. I'm sure he's fine."
"Um, hello? It's pouring fucking buckets," Kyle argues.
"I'm sure he's fine," Wendy says, "I'm going back to sleep, Kyle. Good night." With that, she pulls her mask over her eyes and lays back down. Kyle notices, though, that she takes advantage of Kenny being asleep and wriggles underneath one of his arms. If Kyle didn't know better, he would say that the infamous Wendy Testaburger is falling for Kenny.
For Kenny's sake, Kyle hopes that that is actually what is happening.
But fuck that, where the hell is Stan? He could just sit here and wait, but – damn it, Kyle doesn't like this feeling. He knows that he usually misinterprets situations, or doesn't listen when he should (see: that afternoon's bear incident), but he doesn't like this. He doesn't think that he would normally wake up and have Stan be missing. Stan sleeps like a fucking rock. There is nothing that will wake that man.
Kyle debates with himself for a few seconds more. In the end, he finds his body standing up of its own accord, shoving his slip-ons onto his feet, and pulling his hood up, before venturing out into the rain.
Outside, it's a full on fucking storm. Kyle is out there for maybe thirty seconds before he's soaked to the bone and shivering. He cups his hands around his mouth and calls, "Stan! Stan?" But there's no response. He tries calling louder, but nothing happens.
Where in the world could Stan have gone?
Kyle runs over the places in his mind, but all he can come up with is Wendy's theory – that Stan woke up and had to go to the bathroom. Kyle squashes through the mud and into the trees a little, toward the area that they established as the designated "crapping region." He calls out, "Stan, are you there? Dude, where are you?"
"Kyle, is that you?" he hears, someplace far more distant than the "crapping region."
"Yeah!" Kyle shouts over the rain. Fuck, he's so cold. He wishes that he could just be back in the tent all dry and warm and safe, away from thunderstorms and bears, and that Stan was with him. "Where are you, dude?"
"I'm stuck," distant-Stan says.
Kyle stumbles forward, wandering toward Stan's voice. He can hear Stan getting louder as he approaches, he's calling Kyle's name. He sounds upset. And what the hell does he mean, 'he's stuck'?'
Finally, he spots something – a flash of red. It's the puff ball on the top of Stan's knit hat, the hat that's he's had forever. Kyle dashes forward, splashing mud and rainwater all over himself.
Stan is, indeed, stuck. His foot is all tangled up in the roots of a tree, twisted at an uncomfortable looking angle.
"Holy shit, what happened?" Kyle asks. He falls to his knees beside Stan's head, and Stan looks up, hiccupping.
Oh. He's drunk.
Stan explains, "I had to – had to take a piss, okay? And I thought I saw a fox, I wanted to make sure it was okay, 'cause it's all cold out here, but it ran off and I tripped and I –" he hiccups again, "I can't get out. My ankle fucking hurts."
"Stan, what did you drink?"
"Just some shots," Stan whines, "I waited until you guys went to sleep, but I was just thinking too hard, and I got overwhelmed and – you asshole, will you help me already?" He wonders where Stan got the alcohol, but realizes that he probably brought the booze himself, since he had no qualms about smuggling lube with them, too. Not that Kenny would ever invade people's privacy. It's just that they all trusted each other not to bring what they said that they wouldn't.
Kyle shakes his head but scoots through the mud to where Stan's ankle is. He somehow managed to get it stuck under one tree root, but above another. He should be fairly easy to get free, but he's too drunk to do it himself. Kyle says over his shoulder, "This is probably going to hurt," because he's going to have to move Stan's foot in such a way that there's no doubt it'll aggravate what injury has already been done to it. He grips Stan's heel and tugs.
Stan makes a noise of pain and Kyle says, "I'm sorry, it's okay, I've almost got it." He yanks a final time, and Stan shouts a curse.
"Hey, it's alright," Kyle says. Stan saved him from a fucking bear today, the least he can do is be comforting. Or something. He scoots back and pulls Stan up so that his head is resting in Kyle's lap. He says, "I've got you, okay?"
Then he realizes –
Stan is crying.
Not just crying. Stan is full-on sobbing.
"Oh, shit," Kyle ducks his head back to look at Stan's foot. From the space of soaked skin that's poking out from over Stan's sock, it looks swollen, but nothing too bad.
Then Stan says, "It's not my foot. It's not my fucking foot, Kyle."
Kyle lets Stan cry into his hoodie, and wraps his arms around Stan's back. He doesn't care if Stan is drunk, something real is obviously very wrong. He rocks Stan back and forth and says tenderly, "You can tell me, Stan. You don't have to, but you can."
"I'm scared," Stan confesses, pressing his nose into Kyle's abdomen, weeping.
"What are you scared about?" Kyle inquires, trying to keep his voice calm, even if he feels anything but fucking calm.
"I can't tell you," Stan cries.
That worries Kyle even more, and he almost stops rocking Stan in his fear. He says, "That's okay. You don't have to tell me. But I'll be here if you want to tell me." He wants to know why Stan says he's scared, Kyle desperately wants to know. Because Kyle, Kyle is afraid of a lot of things. Too much dark. Camping. Gross shit. Bears, now. Fuck. But Stan, he's always thought of Stan as fearless. If Stan is afraid of something, it must literally be the worst thing in the entire universe. It must be terrifying on a whole new level.
But Stan doesn't tell Kyle why he's scared. He just keeps crying, letting them both get pummeled by the freezing rain as thunder sounds and lightning strikes, lighting up the entire sky with bright white.
"If I help you up, can you walk?" asks Kyle, when Stan's sobs are reduced to sniffles.
Stan nods, releasing his fists of Kyle's hoodie.
It takes some effort – Kyle's not exactly strong and Stan is far from sober. They slip and trip through the first few steps, but soon, with Stan mostly draped over him, Kyle starts walking them both back to the campsite. Stan is still obviously upset, and so as they walk, Kyle just starts talking. He talks about everything he loves about Stan, just like Stan started saying when they slept together earlier that day.
I love your hair, Stan.
I love your eyes, Stan.
I love how you always beat me at video games, Stan.
Somewhere in his encouragement, he slips up and instead of calling Stan by his name, Kyle ends up saying "baby" instead.
I love how you love animals, baby.
I love the way you kiss, baby.
I love the way you like to laugh when we have sex, baby.
This seems more effective in calming Stan down, so he keeps saying it. It doesn't seem weird, it seems totally normal. And soon enough, the tent is in sight, and Kyle knows that they're going to be okay for at least another night.
When they come crashing into the tent, Kenny and Wendy are already awake.
"We were about to come looking for you!" exclaims Wendy, and Kyle knows that she must be telling the truth, because she and Kenny are all suited up in outerwear and warm clothes. She demands, "What happened?"
"He's drunk," Kyle says, pulling off Stan's wet clothes before he bothers with his own. He doesn't give a damn about modesty at this point, only that it's cold as shit and that Stan'll get sick if he doesn't get warm soon. Kyle has no idea how long Stan was out in the rain, but he hopes, God, he hopes it wasn't too long.
Kenny tugs his orange sweatshirt off of his body and tosses it to Kyle. It smells like Kenny – like cigarette smoke and campfire and kind of like Wendy's designer perfume. He dresses Stan in a fresh set of pajamas and finishes the ensemble with that hoodie. Stan babbles drunkenly about not needing help, but he doesn't protest when Kyle tucks him into his sleeping bag. Only then does Kyle trade his own soaking clothes for fresh ones.
He didn't realize how freezing he was, he'd been too concerned about making sure that Stan would be okay. Kyle's teeth are chattering, and feels like he'll never be able to be warm again. That's how fucking cold he is. But another article of clothing is tossed at him – it's a gray sweatshirt, with NYU emblazoned across it. Wendy's sweatshirt. Kyle mutters his thanks and slips it on. It's a little too small, but it's warm from Wendy's body heat.
He slips into the same sleeping bag as Stan.
Stan isn't sleeping, he discovers. He's watching Kyle through slitted eyes. He can smell the liquor on Stan's breath now that he's close, but Kyle places a tight kiss on Stan's lips anyway.
Sleepily, Stan repeats, like they hadn't ever been out in the rain with Stan crying in Kyle's arms, "I'm scared."
Kyle doesn't give a flying fuck if Wendy and Kenny are listening in (which he knows that they are, not that eavesdropping can be avoided when you share the same damned tent), he strokes Stan's wet hair and responds in the gentlest voice he can muster, "I know, baby."
o.o.o.o
Thank you to my darling reviewers: Porn Mercenary, ObanesHarvest, Kath, lucy sinclair, conversefreak3, MariePierre, KirstenTheDestroyer, NightmareMyLove, sephyroth19, Miroir Twin, Chasing Rabbits, Mallory, lily's mom09, TheAwesome15, prettyoddrydonfan, and Feta-Fingers32.
From here the story will be picking up quite a bit. No more idle fun. ;D
Umm and I'm sorry? This chapter lacks the quality I hope it would have. If any of you guys have some con crit about what I could do to improve/fix it, remember, that's always welcome.
