Craig
"This is shop class."
Otherwise known as the most irritating class they'd take all year. Craig would have rather been anywhere but here. Okay, maybe that wasn't strictly true, at least it wasn't home economics. That would have sucked. But it didn't really matter, he was still bored, and the class had literally just started. Just another day in hell, really. To be honest, he existed in a perpetually bored state and this wasn't making it any better.
"My name is Mr. Adler." The teacher was a heavyset man with quivering jowls and a scowl on his face. He definitely looked like he belonged in a shop class, right down to the band-aid stretched over his balding head. His voice was irritating to say the least, not that Craig bothered to get actively annoyed. That sounded like too much effort to expend on something like this. He just let his eyes wander slowly as the man kept talking.
"For the next week, rather than your normal schoolwork, you'll be learning how to make things." As if Craig really wanted to build something. But what did anyone care about that? Nope, this was basically a required course, how fun. Because putting a bunch of nine and ten-year-olds in a room full of sharp and dangerous objects was a really smart idea.
Beside him, Clyde was listening intently to the teacher. That hardly surprised Craig, at least he wanted to be there. Turning the other direction, the bored boy let his eyes wander over the other people in class with him. Huh, Kenny's not here. Probably a good thing. Craig might have despised the disgustingly flirtatious blond, but he knew that Kenny and dangerous things didn't really go well together. At least, he was pretty sure they didn't.
The rest of Cartman's gang was there however, all lined up as usual. Total dicks, all of them. Snorting, Craig overlooked them as his eyes kept moving. There was Token, paying attention just like he always did. Sometimes, Craig couldn't help but marvel at how focused the black boy could be when all they learned was bullshit, chopped up and mixed in different ways. He even managed to get perfect grades, a fucking miracle.
"Now, does anybody know why you're in shop class?" Mr. Adler asked, his words hardly even registering to Craig. He did, however, catch sight of Stan raising his hand though, which drew his attention for a moment.
"Yes?"
"Because we had to choose between this and home ec and we didn't wanna be sissies?" The answer was absolutely typical of Stan, who was always worried about his image whether he knew it or not. He'd always been rather vain. Not that Craig really gave much of a shit about him at this moment or ever, no his eyes had finally found the thing he'd been subconsciously looking for.
Someone had put Tweek on an off-balance stool, which didn't seem like a particularly good idea. He was shivering and twitching as he watched the teacher, his eyes darting and fast. I wonder when he had coffee last… There was a new bruise on the side of his face, an ugly thing that's shape resembled the lip of one of those useless grates that were on the school lockers. Craig's lip curled. Either Tweek had fallen… Or someone shoved him. It was probably the second one.
People in this school weren't exactly nice to Tweek, after all.
"Wrong!" That loud proclamation from the teacher forced Craig's attention back to the man. "You are here because you are America's future!" Oh yeah, sure, like anyone believes that. Craig's mind strayed back to the bruise on Tweek's face and he grit his teeth. Okay sure, everyone got shoved around sometimes but Tweek should be different. He had enough problems without people hurting him.
"You may someday be doctors, or lawyers, or scientists," Mr. Adler was continuing, his mumbling tone serious. Craig just wondered why he gave a fuck over why Tweek was hurt or not. The boy was always fucking bruised; he needed to get over himself. Token was right, it was like he was obsessed. "Most of you, however, will be pumping gas, or cutting sheet metal, and that's why we have-" His ruler smacked the board. "Shop class."
Walking away from the board and towards his desk, the teacher continued, "Now let me make one thing crystal clear: I don't like kids that screw around!" Well then he's just going to hate us, isn't he? Craig thought absently. Between Cartman and Stan and Kyle, someone would be dead by the end of this week. That or seriously injured. They did nothing but screw around.
"You screw around in shop class, you can lose a hand or an eye," Mr. Adler warned, eliciting a squeak from Tweek, who nearly toppled his stool at the idea. Picking up a picture frame, the teacher vaguely said, "I have a- I have… uh, I have a…" At which point, Craig lost interest again.
Leaning over to Clyde, the boy softly muttered, "How long do you think it's going to take Cartman to screw everything up?"
Snickering softly, Clyde muttered, "I'd give it a day dude. I bet Tweek is going to be the one to lose an eye." Though Craig's face didn't so much as twitch, inside he cringed. After Kenny, Tweek definitely was the next worst one at handling anything dangerous. Too much pressure, probably. That being said, the idea of Tweek managing to seriously hurt himself was disturbing to Craig for reasons he couldn't even put into thoughts.
"Fuck off dude," he muttered, straightening quickly and simply glaring at the teacher, who was still lost to his own mind.
"Mr. Adler?" Kyle asked, worried. Finally, Mr. Adler jerked out of his daze and set the picture down.
"Huh?" Looking about the classroom in apparent confusion, the man quickly stuttered, "Oh, uh, I was just saying that I want to know who is the biggest troublemaker in your class?"
Craig almost rolled his eyes. Well, that was an easy question. Cartman clearly was the worst. Even if Craig tended to get in fights, he only did so when provoked. Cartman was an instigator at heart. If something horrible was happening at the school, it was usually the fatass's fault. Craig was about to say as much when Stan spoke up.
Pointing to his right, he announced, "Tweek is!" Craig blinked. Wait, what?
Tweek leaped and almost toppled off his stool again. "ACK!" he screeched, trembling under the attention of the teacher. "No, I'm not!" Which Craig wholeheartedly agreed with. Tweek wasn't a bad kid, and if he was then what did that make Craig, who'd sent several students's to the nurse's office just this year? Really, Tweek should have just ignored Stan's claim, it's what Craig would have done, but this was Tweek and he currently looked absolutely panicked, as if the thought of causing trouble terrified him.
Kyle, however, didn't seem to care that Tweek was growing progressively more stressed, he just shot back, "Yeah you are! You always get into trouble."
"AUGH!" Tweek screeched, yanking on his hair hard. The only thing he ever hurts is himself, Craig thought, watching as the blond jerked and rocked on his stool. He wouldn't even slap another person, much less cause trouble on purpose. Can you even get him mad? Absently, Craig wondered what that would look like.
It would probably be kind of like a kitten, pretending to be a lion. The blond was just so harmless looking, Craig couldn't picture himself taking Tweek seriously, even if they were in a fight. Wait, what? Who said I was going to fight Tweek? Why am I even thinking about this? Not that he particularly cared, Token and Clyde were full of shit, he could think about whomever he wanted, and it didn't matter to him what anyone else thought about it.
And if it was someone as interesting as the blond, who was now tossing his head around as if in search of his thermos that wasn't there, then Craig felt justified.
"Oh, hello," Cartman drawled in his irritating voice that had always grated on Craig's nerves. "Excuse me, but Craig is the biggest troublemaker in our class." Fucking really? Craig shot a glare at the boy, who entirely ignored him. Talk about calling the kettle black. He really didn't want to have to deal with this, why should the teacher even care at all? What did he think Craig was going to do, put someone through the table saw?
At least they're not stressing Tweek out anymore.
"That true, Craig?" Mr. Adler asked anyway, his already beady eyes narrowing suspiciously. "You a troublemaker?"
"No," Craig answered, voice flat. As if he'd have literally any other answer.
"Well, you better not be," the teacher huffed, his jowls quivering with righteous purpose. God, what an insufferable idiot, Craig thought, tuning him out. For good measure, he flipped the man off. Of course, Mr. Adler noticed, not that Craig cared. "Hey! Did you just flip me off?!" he demanded loudly.
Hiding his hand beneath the table, Craig passively answered, "No."
"Yes, you did!" Mr. Adler protested. Clearly, he didn't know how Craig operated yet. Well, he'd figure it out eventually. Most teachers did.
"Told ya!" Cartman informed his friends, just annoying Craig further. God, I want to hit him. Wouldn't be the first time. But that sounded like too much effort, so instead the Noirette just turned back to Tweek.
The spaz was already staring at him, eyes wide and mouth opened in fear. What now? Usually, Craig didn't give a shit what people thought of him, but the way Tweek looked at him like he was a monster, it made the tall boy feel uncomfortable. He wasn't a monster, not really. He knew what real monsters looked like. He lived with one of them after all.
Craig wasn't like that, he wasn't evil. Except Tweek was making him feel an awful lot like he was. Uncharacteristically, Craig's mouth turned down in a frown as Tweek's fingers twitched upwards towards his hair. The moment his expression changed, Tweek actually did fall off of his stool with a shout of fear, hitting the floor with a loud thunk.
"HEY!" Mr. Adler barked. "Stop screwing around! You kids screw around too much." Which was quite possibly the most useless thing he could have said but then, no one had ever accused a South Park Teacher of actually being intelligent. Craig on the other hand simply looked away, ignoring the knot that had formed in his stomach. Fuck Tweek, he was a spaz who couldn't even stay seated on a stationary stool. Thinking about him was stupid and feeling guilty that he'd managed to scare him when the boy was probably scared of his own shadow was just idiotic. It didn't matter.
So he stopped thinking about him and focused on following his classmates as they pushed in their chairs and headed to various parts of the room to familiarize themselves with the equipment while their teacher sobbed over a photograph. This pretty much summed up how shitty the school was in one sentence.
Ignoring Token and Clyde, who'd migrated to one of the band saws, Craig dragged his feet and ended up beside the box of wood scraps. Directly across the room from Tweek, not that he'd done that on purpose. The boy was sitting on the floor, tugging on his hair. Though he couldn't hear the boy over the sounds of the machine's surrounding them, Craig knew he was probably moaning in distress.
Really, he needed to stop watching him, it wasn't okay. But at the same time, he was bored out of his mind and kind of annoyed in general. Why does everyone have to suck so much? He couldn't help but stare at the bruise on Tweek's face as he brooded silently. It stood out starkly against his pale skin, and Craig couldn't help but wonder how many of those other bruises he sometimes caught sight of were caused by someone else and not just the blonde's own actions.
Suddenly, an image flashed across his mind. One of him knocking Tweek aside, laughing as he went crashing into the floor. Stomach turning, Craig looked down at the box of useless wood scraps and glared at them as if he could set them on fire. Just because he found Tweek interesting did not give his mind any right to torment him about it. It pissed him off, but he had no idea who he was supposed to direct the anger at so he just picked up a piece of wood and stared at it, forcing his expression to go back to being blank.
From across the room, Tweek picked up a belt sander and screamed as it revved menacingly.
"Craig, could I talk to you real quick?" At the sound of that particular voice beside him, Craig's middle finger reacted before his brain did. Turning away from Tweek, who'd just been accosted by Kyle and Stan of all people, Craig found Eric Cartman next to him, his palms extended placating. "Er, just a second, please, Craig." Craig didn't bother reacting, he'd found that sometimes staying silent was more intimidating than speaking. It helped that he was a good five inches taller than Cartman.
Looking mildly perturbed, Cartman continued, in a deceivingly friendly tone, "Craig, I'm not normally one to get involved in this kind of thing-" Craig blinked, conveying just how little he was buying Cartman's innocent act. "But, well, I was just standing over by Tweek, and, he called you a big poop-eater."
Well, that was bullshit because Craig had seen Cartman talking to Stan and Kyle not moments before and hadn't seen him anywhere near the twitchy blond. And even if he had been near Tweek, what would have possessed the blond to say something like that? Nevertheless, he was already pissed off, so he bit out, "He did?"
Looking disturbingly pleased, as if happy Craig had risen to the imagined insult, Cartman nodded wisely and said, "Yeah, he said you eat poop, and that it makes your breath smell like poop, and that, eh, well, you like it." No way in fucking hell did Tweek ever say a word of that, right? Except that when he looked over at Tweek, he found him watching Craig as if scared about what he and Cartman were talking about.
Jesus Christ, this is bullshit.
"Why would he say that?" Craig demanded, frustrated that he was even giving Cartman the time of day with this shit. Fuck him and fuck Stan and Kyle for talking to Tweek. Whatever they were saying to him was clearly stressing him out and Craig didn't like it. It reeked of a stupid, contrived game and he didn't want to play it.
That being said, Cartman seemed bent on convincing him that Tweek was saying shit behind his back. "I don't know, Craig, I don't know." He sounded properly mystified as if the whole thing confused him. God, I want to hurt him. "But now he's over there, telling everybody that you're a poop-eater and he chooses you."
So they wanted him to fight Tweek. That really did piss him off. He had no reason to fight Tweek, nothing but a bunch of stupid insults that the blond hadn't even said but talking to Cartman wasn't going to solve any of that. Glaring at the two boys next to Tweek, then at Tweek himself, who jerked and looked horrified.
The only way I'm going to figure this stuff out is if I talk to him. Looks like Token's about to get his wish. "Well," Craig muttered, hardly able to disguise his anger. "I've got to go over there and-"
Cartman stepped in his way, holding him back. "No, no!" he said quickly, reasonably. "Craig, you can't fight him here; Mr. Adler would just break it up." When the hell did I say I even wanted to fight him? Frustrated, Craig stopped trying to get away from Cartman. "Tell you what, I'll go and tell him you accept his challenge, and set it up for after school today."
As Cartman spoke, Craig watched Tweek glance between him, Kyle and Stan with wide eyes. Why is he even talking to those people? I bet they're telling him I said shit about him. The worst part was, Craig was pretty damn sure that Tweek was going to believe them. After all, he already thinks I'm a monster.
Irrationally frustrated with Tweek for never giving him a chance when literally the worst he'd ever done to him was stare at him in class, Craig bit out an, "Okay," to Cartman and flipped the twitching boy off. Unexpectedly, Tweek glared at him.
Glaring back, Craig waited for the blond to look away but he didn't, he just looked more pissed off. Fuck, what did they say to him? Strangely enough though, he almost liked seeing that expression on Tweek's face. It was so different from his usual fear, it was refreshing. He still didn't want to fight the boy, but as Stan and Kyle got in his way of seeing Tweek, Craig realized that he did want to talk to him.
Because if Tweek could stand up to him, when most of the rest of the grade would have been terrified at the prospect of fighting him, then maybe there was more to him than Craig had initially imagined.
And though usually he couldn't care less about most everything, Craig definitely felt something at that thought.
