A/N:
:)

The second time Craig wakes up, it's because of the dazzling gleam of sunlight streaming in through the dorm room's small window, at just the right angle to shine directly onto his face. He can practically see the sun's rays through his eyelids; it's uncharacteristically bright for a mid-December morning in Colorado and Craig drowsily wonders if that means the apocalypse is coming. It figures the apocalypse would pick the coldest fucking month to show up, he thinks, cringing when he moves his head slightly and his cheek lands in a disgusting puddle of drool. Ugh, gross.

He cracks one eye open, noting with a small smile that his vision of the room is completely obscured thanks to the mess of blonde hair in front of him. Tweek's hair looks even more golden than usual thanks to the sun blessing him with some temporary highlights. He's still sleeping with his head on Craig's shoulder, in exactly the same position he'd been in when Craig had fallen back to sleep mid-song hours earlier. His arm is still coiled tightly around Craig's torso, and he's cuddled so close that Craig can feel the rhythmic thumping of his heartbeat.

Sometime between dumbfuck o'clock in the morning and now, Craig had wrapped his other arm around Tweek in his sleep, so that now they're both holding each other. Craig's heart literally skips a beat or two at the thought, and he opens both eyes, blinking the sleep away as he watches Tweek's chest rise and fall with every breath he takes. He looks so peaceful in this moment; there's no trace of anxiety or fear from the nightmare lingering in any part of his expression.

Craig feels just the tiniest tingle of pride, along with a bigger wave of uneasiness; he's hoping that at least part of the reason Tweek is so calm is because of him, but he really wants to know what Tweek had been dreaming about that had freaked him out so much – and what he can do to make it so it doesn't happen ever again.

Reluctantly, he retracts his arm from around Tweek as carefully as he can, so as not to wake the actual sleeping angel next to him, and wipes the drool from his chin with his sleeve. Thank God he'd woken up first. Even just the idea of Tweek being the first one up and seeing Craig laying in basically a lake of his own saliva is enough to make the noirette's face turn as red as Red Racer's car. If he and Tweek are going to be sleeping next to each other more often, like he desperately hopes they will be even though the logical part of his brain that does still exist knows it's too early to assume shit like that, he's really going to need to find a way to make sure he sleeps with his fucking mouth closed.

Craig goes to put his arm around Tweek again, but just before he makes contact with the blonde's back, he freezes, having an internal mini-crisis. Wait, shit, he can't do that, his sleeve is covered in fucking drool and he doesn't want to cover Tweek with it too. Kissing someone and swapping saliva that way is one thing, but wiping your drooly arm all over him without his consent? That's just greepy. What? Fuck, now he's even fucking up the English language in his thoughts. Craig groans, the sound barely audible, as he pulls his arm back, somehow resisting the urge to punch himself in the face. Gross and creepy, he'd meant, not greepy. Jesus fucking Christ, he needs to get a grip.

Tweek shifts slightly next to him, his eyelids twitching a couple of times as he starts to wake up. Eyes still closed, he yawns, a squeaky little, "Hummm,' escaping his lips and absolutely killing Craig with cuteness. God, is there anything about him that isn't fucking incredible? No. The answer is no. The list of incredible things about Tweek is longer than the list of shit Craig has to count at the bookstore, and he would happily write it all out if he was ever asked to cite his reasons for claiming that Tweek should be declared a national treasure.

Craig suddenly realizes that he's staring and he forces himself to avert his eyes. He could look at Tweek all day, and God, does he want to; but if he woke up and saw someone just sitting there silently watching him, he would definitely have some reservations about waking up next to that person ever again. Shit. He anxiously starts tapping the tips of his thumb and index fingers together. What if Tweek regrets inviting him over last night? After all, Craig was only supposed to come over here so Tweek could talk to him. True, neither of them had expected to fall asleep, but what if he gets pissed at Craig for not respecting his boundaries? Fuck. Craig's stomach clenches. Maybe he should have left before–

"Mmmmorning," Tweek mumbles, his voice crackly with sleepiness. "What time is it?"

Craig doesn't even have a chance to open his mouth before a loud voice from his right blasts through the air, scaring the absolute shit out of him and making him jump almost a foot off the mattress.

"Girls will be boys and boys will be girls, it's a mixed up, muddled up, shook up world except for Lola! Girls will be boys and–"

"What the fuck?!" Craig blurts out, only realizing once the words are out of his mouth that he's not about to be stabbed by some weirdass musical intruder, and that it's probably just Tweek's cell phone going off. Sure enough, when he looks over to the desk, the device that Tweek had plugged into the charger the night before is vibrating like crazy, the screen lit up with a picture of a rainbow. Craig reaches over to get it for him, detaching the charging cable much more carefully than he does for his own phone, giving the thing a look of utter bewilderment as he hands it to Tweek.

"Kinks," Tweek says with a smile, stretching his arms out in front of him. He scoots up to sit against the headboard, taking the phone from Craig.

Craig's face heats up instantly. What?! "I don't have any– I mean, uh, I, what?"

"No," Tweek laughs. "It's by The Kinks. It's called Lola." He swipes his finger across the screen of the phone to accept the call, pressing it to his ear. "Hello?"

Craig leans back against the headboard, covering his face with his free hand, his other arm still wrapped around Tweek's shoulders. He wants nothing more than to pull the comforter up over his head and die right there in the middle of the room. Really? He'd really thought that Tweek was just casually asking him if he had any kinks after just waking up and seconds before answering a phone call? Jesus Christ. At least he'd had the presence of mind to fib and claim to be a kink-free human being. It would be so much worse if he'd actually admitted to anything.

"Hey, hey, slow down, are you okay?"

Craig frowns as his arm slips off of Tweek's shoulders when the blonde leans forward. All of the sleepiness has vanished from his voice, replaced by the same concerned tone that Craig remembers him using every time he's nearly given himself brain damage. He lets his hand fall from his face back onto the blankets, cocking his head at Tweek, wondering who he's talking to and what could be causing him so much worry.

"Okay, just– Hang on, just a second." Tweek covers the bottom half of his phone with one hand and turns to Craig. "Hey," he whispers. "It's Lola, she's really upset, I'm going to go take this in the hall, okay?"

"Oh, uh, okay," Craig says, already feeling an anxious knot beginning to form in the pit of stomach, but not sure why. It's not like Tweek is using this as an excuse to just ditch and then ghost him; this is his dorm room. That wouldn't make any sense. "I'll, uh, I'll be here."

"I hope so." Tweek leans over and gives Craig a quick kiss on the cheek before hopping up off the bed and crossing the room to the door. "Hey, Lola, I'm here. Oh, um, nobody– I mean, nothing." He pulls the door open and slips into the hallway, closing it behind him before Craig can hear his next words.

Craig lifts his hand up to touch his cheek where Tweek's lips had just been, the biggest, goofiest, most Clydelike smile ever blossoming across his face. Yeah, no, he's pretty confident he's not going to get ghosted. With a dreamy sigh that he would totally deny ever letting out of his mouth, he fumbles for his own phone on the desk. He clicks the side button a couple of times and then groans, shooting the device a grumpy middle finger and mentally trying to calculate how much he can afford to spend on a new one. He's just come up with absolutely fucking nothing when he remembers that he'd actually turned his phone off last night, and he redirects the middle finger to himself for being a dumbass.

The second his phone turns back on, Craig instantly wishes he'd never touched the fucking thing. He's immediately flooded with text after text, the messages coming in so fast that they don't even pop up on the top of his screen anymore; the little bubble in the corner of his messaging app just keeps going, counting up as fast as its internal processing power can handle.

"Holy fuck," Craig mutters when it finally stops, a small '57' staring back at him. Fifty-seven? Who the fuck texts someone fifty-seven times? The knot in his stomach tightens as soon as he asks himself that question, because he knows exactly who would do something like that – especially since Craig had made the decision to ignore him for an entire night. His eyes flick up to check the time displayed on the screen, only a tiny bit surprised to see that it's just about noon; it's later than he'd figured it was, but he's definitely slept later so it's not like it's abnormal for him. The abnormal part is that he hadn't been sleeping alone this time.

Sighing heavily, Craig taps on the messaging icon. He really doesn't want to see what kind of shit he's been sent from the bane of his entire fucking existence, but he can't stand unread notifications. The only way to get rid of them is to go into the app and scroll through the messages, so…into the app is where he goes.

Not literally, though. This isn't fucking Tron.

He's a little bit relieved to see that Stan isn't the only person to have texted him; there's a bunch of messages from Clyde, too, and while that always has the potential to be dangerous, Craig would much rather read fifty-seven messages' worth of barely decipherable emojis than anything that fucking literal garbage heap masquerading as a person named Stan Marsh has to say. He taps on the conversation with Clyde, not shocked in the slightest when the first thing he sees is a fuckton of sobbing emojis. He scrolls up to where the messages begin, raking a hand through his messy bedhead and vaguely wondering where his hat had ended up.

Hey dude, did you get something to eat? Of course Clyde's first message is about food. Craig would roll his eyes if not for the fact that it's actually really decent of Clyde to be asking. He can be annoying as shit, yeah, but they've been best friends their whole lives for a reason.

You're not mad at me about Stan are you?

I swear I didn't know he would be there!

Wait, are you actually sick?

Did Tweek have to take you to the hospital?

Dude, come on, text me back!

Craig?

There's a few more messages after that which are ninety percent emojis, two of which had been sent only twenty minutes earlier. Craig stifles a yawn, bringing up the keyboard and typing out, I'm fine, just woke up, hoping that will be enough to stop Clyde from sending an army to the dorm to check up on him. Not that an army would even find him at his own dorm.

He stares down at the screen as the message sends, knowing he's going to regret moving to the next conversation as soon as he does it. Stupid fucking phone, it's the fucking twenty-first century, why isn't there a way to delete notifications without looking at them? Assholes. He doesn't even know who exactly the insult is directed at, but he hopes they know they suck.

Craig finally, resignedly, backs out of the Clyde conversation and goes into the Stan one, swiping his thumb down the screen to scroll up as soon as the messages load. He just wants to get this over with before Tweek gets back in the room. He lifts his head, a concerned frown on his face as he stares at the dorm room door for a moment. He hopes whatever is going on with Lola isn't going to affect Tweek negatively.

The messages from Stan are about as cringey as Craig had expected, at least to start with. There are a few more impatient, "Where the fuck are you?" texts, like by being a demanding douchebag he's going to be able to get Craig to give in and go over there. Ignoring the little voice inside his head that points out to him that he had been this close to doing just that before Tweek had invited him over, Craig keeps scrolling.

The next ten or so messages are full of spelling and punctuation errors that are far beyond even autocorrect's capabilities, and Craig feels his skin prickle with goosebumps. These are definitely the text messages of a drunk and angry person.

You got no indea what ur doiin

THe fuxk is wrng with yoiu Tucker/

Jist u wait

He's not afraid of Stan Marsh, per se, but after some of the things he's heard about and witnessed himself, Craig knows that it's better to stay the hell away from him when he's been drinking. He can't help the shiver that runs through his body when he continues reading through the texts. God, he'd dodged a fucking bullet and a half.

The last message from Stan is from an hour ago, and even though all it says is, Alright, it unnerves Craig like nothing else because he doesn't know what it means.

Suddenly feeling incredibly nauseous, Craig goes back to the list of messages. There's only one left, and it's from Kenny of all people, who hasn't texted Craig for probably a year and a half at least. The fact that he's got a message from him now, sent a little over an hour ago, doesn't do anything to soothe Craig's urge to vomit; sure enough, when he taps on the conversation, he sees that his gut feeling was right.

Jesus, Tucker, what the fuck did you do? Watch your back - he's pissed.

The he in question can only be Stan. He and Kenny both work at that stupid fucking hotel. Craig tosses his phone down onto the bed and grabs the comforter with both hands, burying his face into it and letting out a muffled, exasperated scream. Fucking fucking fuck. He knew he shouldn't have gone last night. He'd been worried about Kenny being perceptive enough to pick up on his feelings for Tweek, but as soon as he'd seen that Stan was there he should have been more worried about Kenny seeing whatever the fuck was going on between them. Because of course he would notice.

"...Craig?"

Craig drops the blanket at the sound of Tweek's voice, fighting the hardest he's ever fought in his life to keep his expression calm despite the storm of emotions brewing inside him. "Uh, hey," he says, as casually as he can. "Everything, um, okay?"

"I was going to ask you that." Tweek slides his phone into his pocket and straightens his shirt with both hands, tilting his head in concern. "Are you all right?"

Alright.

"Yeah!" Craig lies, his voice much too loud. "Yeah, I, um, I slept good, so."

Tweek's cheeks turn a little bit pink. "I did too," he says, fidgeting with his hands. "I actually, um, I haven't slept that well in...a while."

"Oh." Craig doesn't know what to say in response, but there's that feeling of pride again, almost enough to counter the other emotions he's feeling. "That's, uh, I'm glad."

"Me too." Tweek sighs. "I was going to ask you, um, if you wanted to go to that breakfast place today, but, um, I have to go to Lola's." He bites his lip, crossing his arms over his chest. "I guess…Stan broke up with her this morning. She's not taking it well."

"Oh," Craig says again, a cold feeling of dread enveloping his entire body. Oh, God, this can't be good.

"Yeah… But, um, if you want, I can walk you, um, back to your dorm?" Tweek offers shyly. "It's sort of on the way. And if you don't work today, maybe, um, I can come back over to finish cleaning when I'm done?"

"What– oh, yeah, I work." Craig's mind is racing, trying to figure out what kind of fucking game Stan is playing, and it takes twice the effort to focus on the conversation at hand. "Uh, but if you want, I could, uh, give you my key."

"Don't you need it?"

"No, it's okay, we have, uh, a bunch of spares. Clyde kept losing his keys in September so I just made a bunch of copies. I can use one of those and you can, um, have me– mine." Craig blushes, grabbing his keys out of his pocket and taking the shiny silver dorm key off of the keychain. He holds it out to Tweek, who gives him the sweetest amused smile Craig has ever seen.

"Maybe you should wait until we get there, so you can get back into your room?"

"Oh, uh, no, I have one of the extras on here too." Craig shakes his keys at Tweek like they're some kind of new musical instrument, his face burning like crazy. He and Tweek make eye contact, and Craig immediately realizes that it's fucking stupid to offer his own key when he has a spare key right there with him.

Judging by the sparkle in Tweek's eyes, he knows it too, but like the fucking incredible angel of a human he is, he saves Craig from humiliation by not saying a word about it; he just takes a few steps closer and takes the key sitting in the palm of Craig's outstretched hand before offering his arm to the noirette.

"Come on. There's a lot of ice out there and you need someone to protect you." He laughs, and Craig falls a little bit more in love – so much so that when they leave, he doesn't even notice he's left his hat behind again, lying on the floor of the room.

It's a really short walk over to Hunter Hall, less than ten minutes. Tweek keeps his arm looped through Craig's and their fingers laced together the whole time. About halfway there, Craig realizes that Tweek is humming something, and after a minute he recognizes the melody to be the song he had sung to him in the middle of the night. Oh, shit, he'd heard him. But then why hadn't he said anything? Does he really think Craig's voice is that terrible? Craig misjudges his next step, his foot landing on a particularly nasty looking patch of ice, and he skids forward a little; flailing his arm like a moron, he somehow miraculously keeps his balance, but loses a little pride in the process.

"Careful!" Tweek pulls Craig closer to his side, holding onto him tightly. "You okay?"

"Uh-huh, uh, what, um, what are you humming?" Craig's voice cracks and he prays Tweek doesn't notice.

"Oh, um, I don't know what it is," Tweek says, having absolutely no idea what a relief those words are for Craig when he hears them. "I think it was in my dream? I woke up with it stuck in my head. I can stop if it bothers you."

No! "No," Craig says, shaking his head. "No, it, uh, it doesn't. You, uh– I like it."

Tweek just smiles and squeezes Craig's hand tighter.

When they reach Craig's dorm, he reluctantly lets Tweek unlink their arms and lets go of the blonde's hand. "So, uh," he says, taking a step towards the front doors. "I'll, uh–"

"Wait, before you go." Tweek grabs Craig by the arm again, leaning in and planting a kiss right on his lips when Craig turns his head. "I'll see you later, okay?"

Craig nods, dumbly, not sure he'll ever get over how it feels to have Tweek kiss him. "I'll be later. I mean, I'll be here. Not here, I'll be at work, but I'll be, you know, around, for you to…see."

"Have a good day at work." With one last bright, beautiful, amazing smile, Tweek begins walking to wherever it is that Lola lives.

Craig practically floats through the doors of the dorm and all the way down the hallway to his room, he's so fucking happy. He seriously doubts he's going to be able to concentrate on inventory today, but who the fuck cares? He has Tweek. He gets to kiss Tweek and sleep next to Tweek and hold Tweek's hand. The hottest fucking guy on the planet wants him. What the fuck could possibly ruin that?

"Hey! Tucker!"

Oh.

Fuck.