A/N:
:)

The answer to Clyde's question, it turns out, is terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad surprises.

As soon as Craig catches sight of the group of people sitting inside the restaurant, at the big table right next to the window, he freezes in place on the sidewalk. Clyde and Kenny don't notice for a few seconds, and by the time they do, Craig is already crouching down as low as he possibly can get, hunched over the ground like his body's visibility is directly connected to his current height.

"Shit," he mumbles to himself, one arm wrapped around his legs, his other hand flat against the snow-covered sidewalk to hold himself up. "Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck."

"Dude!" Clyde rushes back to his best friend's side, Kenny lazily following after. "Are you okay? Did you have a hunger collapse?"

Craig lifts his head just enough to glare at Clyde; thankfully, the brunette is kneeling on his left, away from the restaurant, so he doesn't have to accidentally look through the window and see what is currently causing his heart to implode inside his chest cavity. "No," he says through clenched teeth. "I think I just lost my fuckin' appetite." He shifts his body, turning his back to the window, and adds, his words coming out as an angry hiss, "What the fuck is he doing here?"

Clyde blinks at him, hopeless confusion in his eyes, but also just the faintest, tiniest trace of guilt. "What do you mean?" he asks, with a nervous glance up at Kenny that does not go unnoticed by Craig. "I told you I invited Tweek–"

"I'm not talking about Tweek." Craig leans in closer, keeping his voice low and his increasingly red face tilted away from Kenny. "Why wouldn't you tell me that you invited Stan?"

"Stan's here?" Clyde's eyes widen and he peers around Craig to get a better look at the interior of the steakhouse through the window. Craig risks a quick glance over his shoulder to confirm that he isn't overreacting and that he had actually seen who he'd thought he'd seen – because if there was ever a time that he was going to make a humiliating mistake, the week where he's test subject #1 in a government experiment he didn't consent to would be it.

In this case, he would actually prefer being embarrassingly wrong, but sure enough, when he looks back, the scene hasn't changed. Gathered around the table, the entire group visible through the glass, are Tweek, that Lola girl, Redbecca, Stan fucking worst mistake of Craig's entire life Marsh, and a couple of other people Craig doesn't recognize who must be Kenny's coworkers from the hotel.

"I didn't know he was going to be here." Clyde sounds worried, which isn't exactly out of character for him. What is out of character is the way he suddenly stands up and crosses his arms, giving Kenny his attempt at a disapproving glare – on Clyde though, the expression just makes him look extra hungry. "Did you invite him?"

"Who? Stan?" Kenny shakes his head, running a hand through his dirty blonde hair. "No, I haven't actually talked to him in weeks. Ever since they put me on the overnight shift our schedules haven't lined up." He tilts his head, looking between Clyde and Craig curiously. "What's the big deal? Stan's not exactly a saint but it's not like he's as bad as Cartman."

"Could've fooled me," Craig mutters. His eyes linger on Tweek for a moment, his cheeks burning as he once again tries to figure out what miracle had occurred to bring someone who looks like that into existence. When Tweek shifts in his seat a little bit, Craig immediately snaps his head back around so quickly he wouldn't be surprised if he's just successfully given himself whiplash in the lamest way possible. Shit. Tweek hadn't seen him huddled on the ground out here like a fuckin' idiot, had he?

"Red Red Racer, he races 'round the world! Red–"

"I can't believe you still have that as your ringtone," Kenny laughs as Craig gingerly pulls his phone out of his pocket, looking at it like it's going to bite his face off like a rabid guinea pig. "How long ago did that show get cancelled?"

"It got rebooted last year," Clyde informs him. "Craig and I watched the season premiere, and it's actually way better than the old one."

With a scoff of disagreement, but not in the right state of mind to explain to Clyde just how wrong that statement is, Craig forces himself to look down at his phone, regretting it as soon as he reads the message on the screen.

Aw, come on, you don't have to get on your knees for me until later.

Craig's stomach churns and he drops his phone, hit with the sudden intense urge to vomit all over the ground, even though all he's got in his stomach at this point is acid and about a million fucking anxious butterflies. He'd never answered the text from earlier, but in typical narcissistic asshole fashion, Stan clearly assumes that Craig is just going to drop everything and come over, like Craig doesn't have a life of his own. Like he's that desperate.

The worst part is, he actually might be. Stan may be the worst person in the history of ever, and Clyde may be convinced that Craig deserves better than that, but all Craig knows for sure is that every time he was with Stan in any way, it was always annoyingly, infuriatingly good.

So he would be lying if he said he wasn't maybe just the slightest bit tempted…

Another text comes through to Craig's phone just as he picks it up, carefully wiping off the snow on his shirt and nearly dropping it right back onto the sidewalk when he sees the new message.

Hey, are you okay?

Well, that answers the question of whether Tweek had seen him or not. Fuck. Well, at least he hadn't actually tripped or anything, he was just hanging out on the freezing cold ground of his own free will. Not that that made him look like any less of a weirdo. What the actual fuck is your problem, Tucker?

Silently cursing everything about his entire existence, Craig types back, I'm fine, despite the fact that he knows he probably looks anything but fine at the moment. Why does Tweek even care anyway? He's got no reason to give two fucks about anything involving Craig, and every reason to want to avoid him until the end of time. But here he is, washing Craig's hat and helping him out when he fainted, and basically just treating Craig with far more kindness than he's ever known before – and far more than he deserves. But why?

Craig racks his brain, searching the archives of his mind for any logical explanation as to why someone as fucking phenomenal as Tweek would do anything nice for him at all. Could it really be that Tweek just is truly that nice of a person, with no ulterior motive?

Clyde's hand suddenly waves in front of Craig's face, jolting him out of his thoughts. "Craig? Please don't be mad."

Craig raises his head to see Kenny gone, and only Clyde standing in front of him. The brunette sniffles loudly, wringing his hands, and Craig calculates the ETA of a Clyde Meltdown at one point two minutes, unless he does something to defuse the situation.

"Where's Kenny?" he asks, reluctantly grabbing Clyde's arm and letting his best friend pull him up to his feet. Not that he particularly cares where Kenny is, but past experience has taught him that it's far better to know than not know, when it comes to Kenny McCormick.

"He went inside." Clyde swipes at his eyes with his sleeve. "Look, dude, you have to believe me, I really didn't know that Stan was coming. I swear I only invited Tweek!"

"Uh-huh." Craig still isn't quite sure he believes him. "Why, uh, why did you do that, again?" Fuck, there's that awkward fucking stutter again that he absolutely cannot afford to fall victim to in front of Clyde. His phone rings in his hand again and he looks down, the corners of his mouth twitching when he reads Tweek's response.

I can bring your hat out, if you don't want to stay?

No, I gotta eat something. Give me a sex. Muscle memory is a bitch and a half. For once Craig sees the typo, recognizes that it is a horrible typo, and cringes, intending to delete it and dodge the idiot bullet for the first time in what feels like forever. But thanks to years and years of practice with texting, he instead goes right ahead and hits the send button; his inner self watches, mortified, as the message disappears from the screen. He frantically taps his way back into his conversation with Tweek and types out, sec*********, dying inside the entire time.

"I told you, he called me after you guys went to the Red Racer thing," Clyde says with another sniffle, oblivious to Craig's typo traumas. "He told me he had your hat, so I invited him to come out tonight so he could give it to me and I could get it back to you."

"Oh." Craig is only partially listening. He's staring down at his phone so hard his eyes are beginning to water, praying to everything holy and unholy, in this world and any other that may exist, that Tweek won't think he'd sent the first message that way on purpose. "Okay."

"Do you want me to ask Kenny to get Stan to leave?" Clyde hugs himself with both arms as a chilly December breeze rushes past the two of them, making his teeth chatter. "He'll do it, no questions asked. He understands."

Wait. "What?" Craig whips his head up, his neck aching from all the sudden movements he's putting it through today. He narrows his eyes at Clyde, his heart suddenly thumping like crazy in his chest. "Clyde, I swear to God, if you fuckin' told him–"

"I didn't!" Clyde makes the sign of the cross with two fingers, realizes that doesn't quite make sense, and then draws a big X on the right side of his torso with his left hand. "Cross my heart, Craig, I didn't say anything about that! All Kenny knows is what happened in ninth grade."

"So how the fuck does he understand?" Craig feels sick to his stomach again. "Oh fuck, don't tell me he and Stan…?"

"No." Clyde shakes his head, looking almost equally as disturbed by the idea. "No, I guess Stan tried with him, but they never dated or like, did anything, I asked. Kenny said he's seen Stan go through too many relationships to ever be okay being more than friends with him."

"Kenny said that?" Despite everything, Craig is impressed. He'd always figured Kenny for someone who would sleep with anyone that offered, which was part of the reason he'd been so unsupportive of Clyde starting a relationship with him in the first place. But if this was true, then maybe he'd judged Kenny a little harshly. After all, anyone who could resist the advances of Douchebag McDumbfuck couldn't be one hundred percent stupid.

Never mind the fact that Craig hadn't been able to resist them, and that he was seriously considering not resisting them again tonight. In his defence, he had never claimed to be perfect.

Not like Tweek is.

"Yeah. You should really give him more of a chance, Craig. He's really matured." Clyde turns to look through the window of the restaurant again. After a second, Craig does the same, bringing a hand up to both adjust his hair and attempt to shield his face from anyone inside who might try to catch his eye.

Kenny has taken a seat at the table between Lola and Red, and he's talking animatedly, waving his hands in the air dramatically, no doubt telling the table some dumb story about some ridiculous situation he'd gotten himself into. Lola and Red seem to be incredibly entertained by whatever tale he's spinning, both of them leaning forward in their seats; but Stan couldn't look less interested if he tried. Craig watches as he picks up his cell phone, looks at the screen for two seconds, and then sets it back on the table with a roll of his eyes, but not a glance in Craig's direction. Asshole.

Craig redirects his gaze to the other side of the table, where the fourth member of the group is sitting. He's also got his eyes on his phone, but as Craig watches, a huge smile spreads across Tweek's face and he laughs. He laughs. God, Craig wishes he was inside to hear that laugh, the fucking incredible, musical, unfairly beautiful laugh. Even if he's laughing at Craig and his idiot typo, who the fuck cares? Craig just wants to hear the sound again.

He's just about to casually suggest to Clyde that they go inside the restaurant now, but before he can, Tweek turns his head, looking out the window, and directly at Craig. Oh, fuck. For future reference, hand shields do fuck-all to avoid eye contact, especially when you forget to actually hold your hand in front of your eyes.

Tweek lifts his hand up to wave at them. His heart in his throat, Craig has no idea how to respond; Tweek's smile has him completely frozen. He's pretty sure Clyde would only have to sneeze in his direction right now and he would fall flat on his fucking back. Too many seconds pass with him just staring straight back at Tweek, his eyes wide and his mouth open, and eventually Tweek's smile fades, being replaced by a look of confusion, and then he looks back down at the table.

No, no, no, no, no, fuck, come back, don't stop smiling. Goddammit.

"Dude, you okay?" Clyde nudges his shoulder and it's all Craig can do to keep his balance, instinctively throwing out an arm to try to balance himself and flipping Clyde off at the same time.

"Yeah," he lies, because of course he's not okay, he's a fucking moron. "We should probably, uh, go inside?"

Clyde's face brightens at the thought of the delicious food that's waiting inside for him. "Yeah! Come on, you have to try the teriyaki steak here, it's the best thing in the world!" He bounds towards the door, Craig trailing after him, just barely able to stop himself from correcting Clyde because obviously Tweek is the best thing in the world, and teriyaki steak could never compare.

Just as he's about to follow Clyde through the door, he gets one more text message. It's only five words, totally innocuous on their own, but together like this, they send a shiver up Craig's spine like he's never felt before.

Can we talk after dinner?