Sorry this took forever and a day to get up, guys. I kind of…took a break, lol.
I owe much of this chapter to Macy Gray's "I Try", which made up much of my soundtrack as I forced myself to write. That lovely lady's harsh vocals made all my words so sparkly-pretty, just as you crave them, children. Give that song a listen if ever you get the chance.
…That, and Jamiroquai's "Canned Heat". Yes. I apologize. Disco makes me want to write random crap.
Anyways, I hope you like this piece of the pie, even if it might seem really short and more than a bit rushed. This part's not important because it doesn't involve adorable Greg/Chris interaction, which is the point of this whole story. Yep.
…
Allan, shut up. XDDD
Chapter Eleven
"Aló?"
It was like a dream to finally hear it: that hard voice, whispered so softly and anxiously into the mouthpiece of the phone on the other end of the line. Gregory shuddered as the lead bricks in his stomach shattered. It felt like years had passed between them.
"…Hey, Mole."
"Gregory…" A gentle breath of a word. The blonde couldn't keep himself from smiling at the sound of his own name as the lead melted and evaporated. "I…'ow are you? I mees you…so much. What…are sings…going all right with you …?"
"…I…I miss you, too," Gregory murmured, pulling on the curls of the phone cord. There was a long pause between them, then, all the unspoken words and all of the sad thoughts clouding between them and making a silent static. Gregory suddenly realized that he had next to nothing that he could say over the phone, and he hated himself for that. The Mole coughed wetly, and Gregory remembered the cigarettes. He felt something strange in his chest that he couldn't place.
"…I want…I w-want to see you…" the French boy said quietly. There was some bizarre kind of adult yearning in his voice that Gregory didn't recognize, and it made him feel stupid to not know it. He couldn't make words in his mind for his mouth to say. His face was flushing in rage and embarrassment, his feet shifting angrily against themselves on the tile floor below. "…Gregory? Are you zer…?"
"M-Mole, I…" he stammered, "…could we maybe…meet, sometime? There's this place called Stark's Pond, I think it's right between our houses…we could go ice skating, that would be fun."
The Mole's smile seemed to shine through the phone. "Zat sounds…nice. Tomorrow? Are you free?"
"I…" Gregory's heart sank. "I would love to…but I have…s-school…"
There was a cold, strained pause. Mole coughed. The static took over. "…I see," Mole murmured, his voice reflecting despair. "Well…maybe…some ozar time, when you are not…busy. Muzar eez calling me now, I mustn't keep her waiting. Good-bye, Gregory."
"Oh," Gregory mumbled, crushed. "Bye—"
The Mole hung up. Four seconds later, Gregory was struck with the sickening realization that Ms. Delorne hadn't really been calling her son.
Gregory decided immediately that he hated public school.
It smelled like garbage and murky sewer water, and the water in the fountains was warm and tasted like metal. And not only that, it was dirty. He realized ten seconds after setting foot in his third-grade classroom that every rumor he had heard about the nose-picking, trash-talking children of South Park, Colorado had been one hundred percent true. He focused particularly on the four boys he had seen at Stark's Pond the other day—Stan and his friends, the ones who had seen that Canadian film…Terry and something, was it?—who were all talking and laughing excitedly about said movie. He shifted bitterly away from them and found a spare seat near the back, not wanting to be noticed, if it could be helped. He watched the door, hoping to see a face enter that even hinted at intelligence.
His heart leapt when a familiar raven-haired damsel entered the room, and he caught that hint of The Mole in her smile again when she saw him. Wendy quickly took a seat beside him, touching his shoulder pleasantly. He flashed his best smile back at her.
"I'm so glad you're in my class," she said sweetly, making him sigh. She definitely had that special quirk, he thought to himself, though he was still having a hard time placing exactly what it was.
"I am, too," he replied humbly. "It's nice to have someone sensible nearby, especially in such a wild town."
She ran her tiny fingers through her silken hair and laughed at him from behind ebony strands. He couldn't take his eyes off of her all day, lost in the fog: held deep in the startling realization of her overwhelming beauty.
She was so like Mole that it scared him.
Days passed like wind through vacant space, bringing snow and conflict, and with that conflict, politics and fire.
A war broke out. Its arrival was shocking in all senses of the word: it all began with the death of one of Stan's friends—a little boy named Kenny McKormick, Gregory heard—and it quickly grew to be something inexplicably insane. The attack was against Canada, for that senseless film that all the kids were erupting in foul language about, and it was fronted by some nutty woman named Sheila Broflovski: the mother of Stan's best friend, whom Gregory quickly learned was named Kyle.
Kyle was one of those boys who could never speak up and therefore could never make anything out of himself, Gregory thought angrily, and that was why he couldn't talk any sense into his own mother. He wound up calling The Mole several more times throughout the early- and mid-stages of the war, and though they never met in person, they shared heated discussions about the occurrences in the world that Gregory could have sworn amused his French friend greatly. After Gregory had piped down about the war, Mole would go off on a tangent about something completely irrelevant, like the fact that his neighbors had guard dogs that barked all night and that he swore were rabid.
"I fucking 'ate guard dogs!" the French boy cackled into the phone.
It made Gregory extremely mad that The Mole could just laugh the whole situation off so easily when there were lives being lost and necessary action was failing to be taken. Yet at the same time, he felt like such a hypocrite for getting mad about that: he wasn't really doing much to rally anyone against the war effort, either, so he shouldn't have been complaining like he was.
To make himself feel better, he began searching the Internet for some sort of local resistance organization that he could join to soothe his own riled emotions and possibly impress Wendy at the same time. He was appalled at how little he found: the only thing available was a one-page web post about something called "La Resistance", and he felt more than a little edgy when he realized that it could very well be a joke posted by The Mole himself. After all, Mole had a way of reading Gregory's mind and playing his cards against him like that.
Nonetheless, Gregory somehow found himself sneaking out of the house and meeting up with Wendy in front of her house late on the designated night, walking carefully through the dark streets toward Carl's Warehouse, where the La Resistance meeting was going to be taking place. Wendy gripped his hand tightly in hers and led him, knowing the way, and he tried not to breathe too loudly so she wouldn't notice how nervous he was. They found the site easily and Gregory knocked on the door when Wendy nodded at him.
A slot moved near the top of the door so someone could look out at them. "Who is it?" a voice asked.
"I…I'm here for La Resistance!" Gregory whispered back.
A brief pause. Wendy stifled a sneeze.
"…What's the password?" the voice demanded.
Gregory blinked stupidly and exchanged a blank look with Wendy. "…I…don't know…"
"Guess!" the person behind the door hissed.
Gregory stared at the door. "Uhh…bacon?"
Another moment of hesitation before the door opened. Stan, Kyle, and their fat friend, Eric, all stared out at Gregory and Wendy, and Gregory felt his heart sink.
Oh, great, he thought miserably. This is going to be a barrel of fun.
La Resistance did, in fact, turn out to be an extremely pathetic, waste-of-time excuse for an anti-war effort. All Stan and Kyle were worried about was the well-being of their precious Canadian TV stars (who were apparently being held captive and were to be executed at an upcoming USO show). Neither of them, however, had formulated any sort of tangible plan for retaliation, save the garden-variety prank phone call (which wouldn't have done anything productive, anyhow). Gregory had been forced to take the meeting into his own hands, and he realized very shortly into his own speech that The Mole's services would come in handy in such a situation.
Mole had recently been telling Gregory of his plans to become a mercenary after he turned eighteen, and although Gregory in no way supported such a misinformed decision, he decided to humor his best friend by sending him recruiters from La Resistance. He gave Stan The Mole's address and told him that he was "a mercenary for hire" with a good deal of experience in this field (which was only partially true, but still, Mole would definitely agree to go along with such an adventure, especially once he heard that Gregory had sent the pigeons to him). Stan and Kyle did seem slightly impressed, though Stan was still rather standoffish toward Gregory…mostly because of Wendy.
Not that the blonde cared in the slightest. Wendy had, after all, chosen him over Stan.
…The next evening, Gregory was once again running alongside Wendy to the rendezvous point that he had designated during the La Resistance meeting, the other children heading the pack. Wendy's hand was clutched in Gregory's, and he was trying to get her to speed up, but she ran terribly slowly, and soon the others had moved ahead and it was just him and her jogging through the dark, eerie woods.
She gasped for breath when they entered a clearing. "Gregory…" she whispered, stopping and pulling him back. He whirled around and found himself pressed extremely close to her, both of them panting and wide-eyed. She bit her lower lip and hesitantly brushed a few strands of blonde behind Gregory's ear, and he shivered beneath her gentle touch. "…I need to…rest for a minute…" she breathed.
He nodded in understanding and looked around for somewhere to sit, finding only an ancient, rotting log and offering it to the lady uncertainly. She gave him a look of approval and sat, and he heaved a quiet sigh of relief, lacing his fingers against the back of his neck. He paced through the thick snow in front of her, staring up at the moonlight, so unsure of what to say, now that they were alone. It was obvious that she had stopped him for more than just this reason, he thought. She wanted…to talk.
His lips burned.
"Gregory," Wendy murmured, brushing snow off the log with her gloved fingers, "…have you ever…liked anybody before?"
He stopped pacing and met her watery blue gaze, his blonde eyebrows furrowing anxiously over his own sapphire eyes. "…Of…of course, Wendy."
She sort of nodded and looked down at her lap, swinging her legs and toeing at the loose snow below her. "…What happened to her?" she asked softly.
Gregory's face flushed, thoughts of The Mole's smooth laughter plaguing him. "…W-well…we were…sort of separated, when I m-moved here…" he half-lied, burying his fingers in his hair and wishing the heat in his cheeks away. Wendy sniffed.
"What was she like?"
Gregory coughed, his head spinning with frantic memories of Mole. "…I…jeez, Wendy, I…I don't know…how do you d-describe someone that you love? Not necessarily the kindest or the s-sweetest…but…definitely the most beautiful person…I've ever known…" he sighed, shaking his head and hiding his eyes in his palms. A knife suddenly ran through his heart as he realized something that made his blood run cold with sickness. "But…b-but it's all gone, now. That relationship…as long as I'm here, I'm never going to have it back in the same way again."
"Oh," Wendy said, sounding a little upset. "N-no, Gregory…you shouldn't say that…there's always hope that you two will meet up again!"
Like that's what you want.
He laughed dryly, feeling nauseous. She watched him precariously from her seat, and he could see her blushing distantly in the moonlight. He stared over at her, and a long, thick silence fell between them. She stood up, beautiful and majestic, holding that aura that he both hated and loved so tenderly.
"…W-Wendy…" he choked.
"Yes?" she asked, her voice barely audible, even in the stark silence of the woods. She smiled that Mole smile at him, and he melted. Words dribbled out of his mouth that his brain hadn't yet properly registered.
"…I guess I was just thinking that…now that I've lost all of those things…that first love, my old l-life…maybe I could build it all back up again, here, with…with you," he said quietly, blushing against his will. He paused on the makeshift path his fellow Resistance members had made and he stared down at his feet, his heart thudding hard against his ribcage. Why did she have to look at him like that? He met her gaze again carefully, so afraid of rejection, now. Blue poured into blue, and the world sparkled for a moment when she smiled even more broadly at him. She stepped up to him and slid her hand into his softly, tracing her fingertips over each of his knuckles. She kissed him on the mouth and giggled.
"Gregory," she whispered, making his breath hitch in his throat. He closed his eyes and wondered where that trace of cake frosting had come from in her voice. She kissed him again, so expertly, and he opened his eyes to see their breath fogging between them. Her pink cheeks were pretty and pale in the distant moonlight, accented so temptingly by her raven hair. Kissing her was like kissing a mermaid, Gregory thought; something secret and mysterious that no one else would ever truly understand in the same way that he did. And stranger still was the fact that kissing a mermaid was like kissing The Mole had always been; rare and dark and fantastic and so full of twisted affection every time it happened. Her lips were soft and pink; so unlike his had always been, hard and chapped and dry. Gregory's stomach dropped. He suddenly didn't want this mermaid anymore. "…Gregory, you're so sweet."
He said nothing. He could only look at her; could only realize now just how much she truly reminded him of his lost friend. The way her cheeks were slightly sunken, and the way her ears stuck out beneath her hair. The way her long eyelashes covered big, expressive eyes that could go from bright and happy to black and hellish in an instant. The way she never laughed through her teeth. He found that his fingers were shaking in her grasp, and he hated that she didn't notice it. The Mole would have noticed it. The Mole noticed everything. So that was how the two of them were different, then; Wendy had a head full of air.
Fuck it, but she's all I've got, now…
He swallowed tears and let her embrace him, snow crunching beneath her boots. He hated that he had been so blind. This girl…this senseless redneck South Park girl…could never replace his precious Mole. He was a selfish, ignorant fool to have thought otherwise.
He sobbed just as a bomb went off at the USO stadium nearby, and Wendy screamed.
All Hell had broken loose.
Gregory ran, frantic, separated from Wendy by the bloodshed and gunfire around him. He felt sick but tried to stay strong, scanning the crimson landscape for any sign whatsoever of the pitiful La Resistance banner. He ran up alongside a chain link fence that encompassed a small courtyard and a warehouse outside of the USO stadium, and he grasped it tightly with his shaking, gloved fingers, leaning against it and pressing his face into the cool metal in an attempt to calm himself down. War had never been like this before. At least, not with The Mole, it hadn't.
…Something growled menacingly on the other side of the fence, and he jerked around, wide-eyed, to stare into the gleaming brown eyes of a very vicious-looking dog. He backed away from the fence and kept his eyes locked fearfully on the Doberman's vengeful glare, and the dog licked its bloody chops and hunched back over a strange-looking form that was slumped in the snow that the warehouse was casting its shadow over. The boy's blue eyes rested on that snow-encrusted shape for a few seconds, and as a strange feeling weaseled its way into his stomach, he felt his body gravitating through a hole in the fence and toward it.
What the hell is it?
The dog lost its bearings and bowed its head when it saw that Gregory was approaching, and it decided on the spot that it would be better to spend its last few minutes on Earth doing something other than protecting some now-worthless cargo. It turned tail and ran off, barking, into the heat of War, and Gregory's eyes widened in sickened fear as the shape revealed itself to be a body. Its clothes were torn and exposed bloody bites and gashes where the dog that had been guarding it (and possibly a few other dogs, as well) had attacked the poor soul. One muddy boot had ripped open at the ankle, and the filthy half-gloved fingers, pale pink from the cold, were wrapped around what looked like a shovel. The body's face and its possession were half-buried in the snow.
Gregory paused four feet away and stared down at the scene, dumbstruck and terrified.
"…Christ," he murmured to himself, running trembling fingers through his hair, fixated on the body even though he longed to look away. "…Kuh-Christ…he…he's dead…he's really d-dead…" A foul-smelling wind cut through the desolate courtyard, and the corpse's hair fluttered eerily in it, sending a painful chill down Gregory's spine. He hadn't thought that the dead could look so terribly peaceful, especially when covered in blood, face-down in the snow in the middle of nowhere. People who died in wars shouldn't have looked so…perfect.
He embraced himself, frightened by his own thoughts, and he backed away slowly, his breathing strained. What a horrible way to go, he thought half-consciously. Mauled by guard dogs.
And the body was so small…almost like…he was a— "Gregory!"The Brit whirled around at the sound of his own name and spied, to a sudden burst of half-relief, Wendy and several other Resistance members running like scared rabbits across the warpath. He dug his heels into the snow and broke through the hole in the fence again, leaving the body behind and praying to God that none of them had seen it. He really had no desire to even so much as think about it anymore.
"Wendy!" he called back, and her hands went for his when they met. He let her cling to his fingers simply because he didn't want to feel alone anymore. "Wendy…where are all the others? Did you find Stan and Kyle?"
"I…no, we haven't found them yet," she said, her voice shaking with tears. "…B-but I think I heard them talking just over that hill, there! We have to go find them!"
"Right," he agreed, nodding and trying to ignore the cold, painful sting in the pit of his heart. "Okay, then, everyone! Let's go…viva La Resistance!"
"VIVA LA RESISTANCE!" they echoed, throwing their trembling fists into the air. The tiny group of third-graders took off across the bloodstained field again, and Gregory headed the pack through the chaos so that—even if only for an instant—he could feel normal again.