Chapter 10 – Farmhouse red.

Kenny drops the phone between his lap, pressing his face into his hands and heaving a long, heartful sigh. Stan leans across from the driver's seat to press a hand against his thigh. He's debated saying something to appease Kenny's grieving, but he's all out of words that he hasn't already tried. He keeps to silence, and Kenny follows. It's a tormented, twisted silence; sacrilegious in its offering of thought. The stillness is exploited by the chundering engine of Stan's car, the white noise only adds to the sticky atmosphere. He must remove his hand to use the gearstick, sparing a side glance as Kenny rolls himself up, pressing into the window. His palms press into his temples, huffling to himself which each movement. He still looks so sickly; this is definitely only adding fire to the cause.

"We'll be there soon, it's barely past the hill of my dad's farm." Stan tries. Kenny gives no response other than a hum of acknowledgment. They resume silence. It's worse than before, reaching their out-of-pocket destination means finally having to face the understanding of what's happened. Neither feel really equipped to do so. It felt so parallel to who Kyle was– is. Saucy videos, texts of hurt and disgust; the way he phrased Kenny's name through the phone just now. It had hurt more than the information he'd sent them yesterday, the piles and piles of messages that erupted from nowhere.

Kenny halts himself up, pulling at the sunshield to look himself in the eyes. His blackened fingernails and scabbed skin hover over the glass, his silver engagement ring still glistening bright. He sighs and Stan can't tell if it's relief or pain, or just a confirmation that this is his current reality. And, just like that the car pulls to a halt, disgusted breaks screech and a final chunder of protest as the engine is switched off. Kenny flips the mirror up, huffing another sigh as he takes off his seatbelt. "It doesn't make any sense." He says, finally pulling himself away from his reflection. "This isn't right, not at all."

"Things like this never feel right." Stan responds, knowing nothing more than trying to relieve him.

"Where the fuck did it come from, what the fuck happened. He was so angry at me before he left, but not like that – angry that I defied his trust, that I questioned his love. Not that I was right and had him figured out. I knew why that ratty man was there – so Kyle could find the guy who hit me, I don't care about it though; why would I? I just wanted him and, now I've–" Kenny cuts himself short, exiting the vehicle in a persuasion against crying. He looks to the rental barn, it was so fitting; colonial style porch and stereotypical red wooden walls. He grimaces to himself, pushing the car door to before turning around to marvel at the structure. It sure could be a picture, if it wasn't his get out of jail free card right now. "Think about it Stan," he says at the front door, Stan's typing in a pin to the key safe, he doesn't stop to look, but Kenny knows he has his full attention. "You ever seen Kyle react like that?"

"He can be very spiteful – righteous, I mean." It's baritone and forced, like the words aren't right but are enough to speak finally.

"Righteous like this though?"

"This isn't being righteous, it's- I don't know what it is." Stan puffs as he opens and steps through the door, perhaps in a different reality they'd marvel at the interior, but instead they dump their bags at the door and find themselves immediately sitting in the lounge. "Want me to get your medicine?" He asks, trying to delay the conversation for as long as he can.

"I'm not taking it; I know it's what's making me worse."

"Ken, you had your dose this morning, stop taking 'em tomorrow at least."

"I didn't take it this morning. I didn't even bring them with me."

"Oh." He'd watched Kenny smack his palm to his mouth this morning, gulping water afterwards in what was a grand theatrical performance. He'd watched Kenny pack his little white paper bag of pills into his duffel, never looking at the duffel bag, only at Kyle's spot of their bed. He'd been stumbling about, barely able to walk, but he'd managed. Stan knew it to be indication of how many emotions were whirling through him in that moment.

"Is it because of Kyle?" he finally asks, assuming the answer. It's probably smarter for Kenny to realise and hear it himself, but Stan wants to push him towards the answer first.

"No, I wanted to before all of this. It's what started it, you know."

"Nothing you could've done would've started this."

"Sure…" Kenny responds, passively shutting Stan off from whatever speal he would've gone on a tangent on. He unlocks his phone and gazes at the screen numbingly. Stan watches as he scrolls mindlessly for a moment, halting when he finds what he's looking for.

"Are you really going to watch them? I thought you said it was too much?"

"Grab me a beer, maybe two." Kenny responds, immediately pressing play and watching the dark shaky video Kyle had sent him. It's obviously Kip, he's flashing himself at the phone and giggling to get Kyle to turn it around, there's some gentle persuasion before it's Kip holding the phone down at Kyle; getting fucked. He's on his back grunting, head twisting side to side. There's no pleasure in it, perhaps just spite and harm; which meant Kyle would win this. Perhaps it would be easier if Kenny let him.

He's never seen Kyle get fucked like this, even at his drunkest – there's no strength in his arms and he is whispering incoherently to himself, the smacking of limbs and Kip's loud grunting cuts off whatever words Kenny tries to pick out. He eventually turns the sound off, clicking through to the next video, it's practically the same, Kyle flat on his back, Kip gesturing him about like his puppet master. Kyle's not even moving, just lying there pliantly, it's so bizarre to see Kyle give no effort to something – he's more active than Kenny most times, he must've been really drunk for him to be practically immobile.

Afterwards there's a flurry of texts, telling Kenny to kill himself, how disgusting and inadequate he is. He stops thinking about how Kyle looked whilst he was being fucked, starts redigesting the words written for him. You are insignificant to me. You will always hold me back. Your family were right for leaving you, I am too. I've found real love, it was never with you – you were just a placeholder to me.

Stan returns beer in hand, clinking another one onto the table next to him, they're both warm from the boot of the car, Kenny guzzles one practically empty until he really notices, taking his final gulp before reaching for the second one. "Chill." Stan remarks from the sofa, finally regaining his place and trying to chuckle like he hasn't already finished one himself.

"I don't know if I really believe all this." Kenny says, "I'm really starting to believe there are bigger things at play here."

"Are we sure this isn't just denial?"

"He's passed out in the videos but sending the most coherently and grammatically correct texts I think I've ever seen from drunk Kyle. He's not even the one filming any of them. He would've called me knowing, he never forgets."

"Dude, you think he's been set up then?"

"There's a possibility, it might be me not wanting to give up on him like this, but we gotta try, Stan."

"Ok, let's do it." Stan replies, standing up from his seat like he's ready for action, he sits back down once he realises that they're not rushing off to change anything just yet. He knows that Kyle isn't like this, can't have been the one to propose, to throw away almost all his friendships whilst Kenny was comatose for him to turn like this a little over a month later. He wants both his friends back, even if they themselves don't get back from together. He thinks of little Alice at home and, his long rocky relationship with Wendy, the people they saw outside of each other and how they always seemed to reconnect. He thinks of his lifetime spent by Kyle's side, they're budding friendship and how Kyle had always been diplomatic, a leader. Giving silly speeches his entire life and allowing people the fresh perspective they need throughout the chaos. Stan could really use his expertise now, sat around a computer digging for information together, running about the town on a wild goose chase. Only, it's Kenny who needs him now, more than ever.

"I have a plan, but you're going to need to trust and believe in me one hundred percent, no matter what I do or say, ok?" Kenny asks, when Stan wholeheartedly agrees, perhaps he isn't sure how much he is agreeing too.

.

It does strike him as a mistake firstly when Kenny reveals the secret behind his heterochromia, why he was looking at himself in the car mirror. Immortalised through a deal with the devil's son catalyst by a yearning for protection from the devastating events of his family, how he needed to protect Kyle, how he couldn't save Karen, or his mum, nor the men in his family either. How it was now Kyle or nothing, how he died, how it felt – the afterlife. It felt surreal and wrong and somehow so out of pocket for something that Kenny had mentioned before – Kyle too. It was incredibly out of pocket now, with Stan stood outside the farmhouse looking up at the roof, Kenny shouting down to him.

"Dude, I believe you – this is going too far! I believe you, ok! You don't have to prove it to me like this!" He shouts, terrified as Kenny sways from the high point of the roof's ledge.

"You need to remember, follow my steps and do only what I told you. I need to reset. You need to remember. This will work!" Kenny shouts down, he's stood in his jeans and t-shirt, shivering and blearing down at Stan far beneath him. His parker is set up in the bed of his room, laid perfectly on the bed as if it itself was tucked up sleeping. Kenny uncurls his hands from his arms, pulls them to his mouth to lengthen his shouts, "I'm not this stupid, I'm aware – please trust me, follow my plan."

Stan's mouth quakes, he's freaking out and pacing through the frozen landscape blackened by night, he looks around him, trying not to watch as Kenny prepares himself. "I trust you." Is all he says, barely loud enough for Kenny to hear him, but just enough. So, Kenny jumps, and falls, and dies and Stan watches him crumple into the ground. He immediately throws up, screaming and hyperventilating and failing to avoid panicking.

It takes a moment, but finally he stumbles to where Kenny lies, reaching down to touch the blood pooling in the frosted mud. He will follow his plan; he begs it works. It doesn't feel out of pocket anymore, almost familiar enough to be mundane, so Stan revels in that feeling, trusts in Kenny and this. "Oh my god, Kenny! You're- you're dead." He whispers to himself over the corpse, and in the corner of his mind, the deep wrenching of his gut he swears out there, in the frosted distance he hears Kyle scream to him a reply.

.

He awakes confused, cold, stiff and disorientated. His hands are bloody, and he shoots up to inspect himself, he isn't bleeding anywhere, there is no pain. He looks around at the mirror KM imrtl written in blood on the mirror, it's dried and trailing off at the end into incoherence, its written by fingertips – easily Stan's handwriting, and he runs his fingers over it. KM? He questions to himself, how did he get into bed last night, how much beer did he drink? He doesn't feel hungover, but perhaps it's this situation that has removed any sense of nausea from him. He needs to check on Kenny for some reason, maybe he'll know why there is blood everywhere.

He charges out of his room, noticing that the blood on his hands doesn't transfer onto anything as he pulls open Kenny's door to find him asleep, huffing to himself with quiet snores. It's then that it clicks, Kenny jumping, the ritualistic steps he had to follow, it took him over an hour to wipe blood from Kenny's corpse to taste it, to bloody his hands and write his initials on his walls. This is Kenny's blood, Kenny died – Stan remembers it all, violently enough he vomits – enough to wake Kenny who immediately grimaces startled by Stan's entrance.

"Ew, Stan gross." He starts, barely continuing before Stan cuts him off.

"I remember! I remember, you died, I saw you – I remember, holy shit, dude, holy fucking shit!"

"You do? It worked?" He startles, awake and new and in a body that glistens free of any harm or threat. He looks anew, clean – free of his ailments. He runs to check his eyes, before turning to face Stan. "It's still there!" He remarks, excited and alive for the first time. "Then, it's time to begin our plan."

I can't believe that it's now 2022 and I started this in 2015. I am actually determined to finish it, I will this time. I've pretty much written all of it so far and I'm just gonna start uploading weekly until I do.

Yeah, so... enjoy!

:)