Chapter Nine - Crossing Paths.
A small, round stone went tumbling down the road as Kyle kicked it along the gutter. He huffed out an aggravated sigh as he approached the corner outside of South Park High School, waiting for the bus to come and get him. On any other normal day, Kyle wouldn't have to waste his time as he would always get a lift home with Stan. Although after what had happened at lunch that afternoon, his best friend had conveniently been able to successfully avoid Kyle for the rest of the day.
The teenager rolled his eyes at the mere thought of his situation with Stan. What the heck was stopping him from being so stubborn and just listening to Kyle's advice for once in his life? Everything that Kyle had said about Wendy up until this point – no matter how much Stan tried to deny it – had come true. And if that theory were to effectively continue onwards, Kyle shuddered at the idea of just how close Stan and Wendy might become again if his oldest friend insisted on talking to her.
All of a sudden, the noisy chatter and yelling of all the impatient high schoolers waiting for the bus was broken up by the sound of a car pulling up at the curb. The passenger side's window automatically rolled down before Kyle impulsively folded his arms across his chest and glowered at Stan.
Reading his friend's expression, Stan sarcastically shook his head, "Don't give me that look. I was actually considering driving home and not coming back for you at all."
Kyle wasn't going to lie – a very large part of him wanted to tell his deceitful friend to get bent and leave him alone. But as the school bus suddenly rounded the corner and made a beeline for the spot where Stan was parked, Kyle knew he had to quickly make a more logical decision. With a reluctant groan, the red head opened the passenger door and sat down beside his friend as Stan pulled away from the side of the road just in time for the bus.
With his arms still crossed, Kyle stared straight ahead, trying to ignore the fact that he could just see Stan glimpsing at him out of the corner of his eye.
The dark haired teen finally broke the silence that filled the vehicle, "So?"
Kyle allowed the word to linger throughout the car for a moment as he scoffed quietly to himself, "So, what?"
"So? Stop torturing me like this, dude," Stan urged, "I know you've got something to want to tell me. Or ask me. Or demand of me."
The attempt at a joke made Kyle grit his teeth together. Ever since he had been witness to Stan waving hello to Wendy that afternoon before escaping with Darcy, Kyle had wanted so desperately to get to the bottom of it all. But the Jewish teenager certainly wasn't feeling as keen if it was going to be this difficult. He supposed it was nice to see that Stan now had a much more positive and relaxed view on the circumstances of the past week, but still, Kyle suddenly wasn't so sure what was more annoying. Stan completely blocking out all conversation, or Stan turning everything into one big joke?
Breathing out one final irritated huff, Kyle turned to his friend while he continued to drive them along, "You spoke to her on Friday night, I'm guessing?"
Without taking his eyes off the road, Stan's answer came straight away, "Yep."
"So now you're all buddy-buddy again?" Kyle instantly snapped back, "She's started to reel you back in?"
"No, dude," Stan sniped, "No, it's not like that. We were just clearing the air, okay? We're not particularly friends, we're not particularly anything."
"Then why even bother?"
Stan sighed at the relentless nagging tone in Kyle's voice. Flicking on his left indicator as they turned around a corner, he took a second to hesitate while he licked his lips, "Do you have an idea how much effort it was taking for me to ignore her?" he queried, "That's the only thing that this has come down to, Kyle – what was easier. Being civil, or focusing all day every day around nothing else but trying to avoid her."
Letting this argument settle in the back of his mind, Kyle chewed down on his bottom lip, reluctant to admit that maybe Stan was right, "Well, did she at least have the decency to give you any kind of a real explanation about what she did?"
As much as Stan wished he had these answers for himself, he could only sigh at the thought of any kind of enlightenment as his car eventually turned into South Park's residential street. He quickly glanced to his right back at Kyle, "Nope. I sort of tried to ask her, but she wouldn't budge."
"So what did you talk about?"
Kyle's further prodding at the situation caused Stan to feel kind of relieved when they finally pulled up to the khaki green coloured house. He stopped out the front of it and put the car in park, pulling up the hand brake as he mulled over what to say in reply to his friend. One thing Stan knew for sure was that he didn't want to spend hours going into all the awkward details.
"It doesn't matter," he offered lamely, "She didn't want to talk about anything like that, so I'm still gonna' try and keep as much distance as I can without making things too weird."
"Oh," Kyle gasped. He was surprised by the sudden maturity in Stan's approach to the unavoidable predicament, "Oh, well good."
Stan could help but laugh subtly to himself. He truly did appreciate how much Kyle was trying to look out for him, but seriously, it was just as nice and just as helpful to be given some space to breathe, as well.
"Look, I do have the sense to see that I don't need all this drama back in my life, Kyle. I'm not an idiot," Stan spoke gently, "Just… stop overreacting so much, okay?"
Falling into an unwilling silence, Kyle reached down to the floor of the car to pick us his school bag.
It was certainly sort of abrupt how the tables had suddenly turned. It was almost as if Kyle's advice was pouring out of Stan's mouth before he had even given it to him. Of course, if everything was able to completely go Kyle's way, he would see that Stan and Wendy would continue to have absolutely nothing to do with one another – no hellos, no little waves, nothing. However, despite these severe emotions, the red headed teenager knew that his best friend was actually handling things way better than he ever would have expected. And Kyle also knew that he wouldn't be able to convince Stan of doing so any other way.
Finally conceding to admittance, Kyle swung open the car door and stuck one foot out onto the sidewalk before turning back to Stan once more, "And you stop keeping me out of the loop, okay?"
The two friends locked eyes with each other. As much as Stan may have felt that for once between the both of them he had been the one putting forward the most convincing, logical arguments, he knew that none of that was worth it if Kyle was still worrying about him.
The dark haired boy slowly nodded his head in agreement, scratching the back of his neck. He may have thought trying to avoid Wendy was challenging, but trying to hide things from Kyle was taking on a whole other extreme.
Curling his lips up into a sarcastic smirk, Stan called to Kyle right before he shut the car door behind him, "You can punch me in the face next time, if you want."
With a roll of his eyes, Kyle laughed, "Do not even tempt me, dude."
Echoing his best friend's laughter, Stan prepared to put his car back into drive.
It was definitely much more amusing to be messing around with Kyle rather than arguing with him. It always had been, no matter how old they were or what had been going on at the time. Even when they did argue, it didn't take long for the two of them to make up, anyway. But on top of all of that, Stan and Kyle knew how important it was to be able to look back on things that had happened in the past and joke about them – even their monumental blow up from two years ago.
"Hey, I'm just letting you know the offer's there," Stan mocked as Kyle at long last climbed out of the car and shut the door behind him, "I'll cya' tomorrow!"
There was an easing feeling in Stan's stomach as he pulled away from the curb and set off down the street towards his own house. After purposely skipping out on Kyle with Darcy and doing whatever he possibly could to evade him for the rest of the day, their confrontation had been surprisingly civilised. But even so, the second that Kyle had hopped out of his car and gone home, Stan's feelings of firm determination had begun to slip.
Stan was in two minds. Two utterly separate minds.
On the one hand, when he was discussing his circumstances with Kyle or Kenny or anyone in his family, his decision seemed absolutely certain. He was better off alone, concentrating on school and football, and being completely without Wendy. But then every time he saw her, and especially when he had spoken to her on Friday night…?
Groaning to himself, Stan felt a wave of exhaustion sweep over his mind as he drummed his fingers agitatedly against his steering wheel. When it came right down to it, the youngest Marsh was dreadfully confused. Confused about what he might say to Wendy when he saw her next, confused about how much he should let his guard down around her.
But more than anything else, Stan was confused how about how he was truly, truly beginning to feel about Wendy again.
A couple of days had gone by. It was now Wednesday, and Wendy was sitting in the school library during one of her study periods. She tapped her pencil against the wooden table where she sat, waiting patiently as Red tried her best to solve the equation that was written out in the text book in front of her.
The two girls had been sitting together in the library for about twenty-five minutes or so now. Red had asked Wendy if she had any free time in her day to help her with a bit of math work. The raven haired beauty may have been away from South Park for two whole years, but nobody had forgotten how amazingly intelligent she was. And besides from all of those obvious factors, Wendy was willing to do just about anything at this stage that distracted her from thinking about Stan.
Just as Wendy was about to look back down to the paper to see how Red was managing, her ears perked up at the sound of the chair opposite her being scrapped out from under the table. Curiously glancing up from her place, the teenage girl impulsively felt her skin start to crawl at the gorgeous female face that appeared in her line of vision. She suddenly wasn't so distracted anymore.
Subtly gawking around the rest of the room, Wendy felt her stomach twist up in agitated knots at the realisation that pretty much every other seat in the library was taken. There was nowhere else for Darcy to sit other than right opposite her.
"Wendy?" Red asked for a second time, abruptly snapping her long-time friend out of her deep, annoyed trance.
Quickly gazing back to see that Darcy had opened her own math book and was now studying as well, Wendy reluctantly put her attention back on Red, "Sorry. Daydreaming."
Frowning slightly at the odd nature that had suddenly consumed her friend, Red shrugged it off and gestured down to her notebook, "How'd I do? Did I get it right?"
Sighing to herself in an attempt to regain all focus and concentration, Wendy scanned over the scribbled numbers that Red had somehow been able to string together and successfully discover the correct answer.
"Yeah, girl, that's great," Wendy congratulated her, "There is one thing, though. Not to confuse you or anything, but there is a quicker way to solve it."
It a matter of mere seconds, Wendy easily adjusted Red's working out and then drew some lines and wrote some notes to help her remember for next time.
"See, it's easy. If you do it this way instead, you skip two whole steps and – "
"Wow," came a sudden burst of energy from the other side of the table.
Almost instantly, Wendy felt her blood run cold as she timidly glanced up and allowed her eyes to fall upon the image of Darcy smiling a wide, friendly grin at her.
The auburn haired beauty twisted the end of her wavy ponytail around her finger, "You're really good at that math stuff. Would you mind showing me how to do it?"
Wendy's throat was completely dry. What the hell were the odds, she asked herself, of this girl choosing to sit by her in the library that day – let alone actually talking to her and asking for her help? This girl, who Wendy was pretty much certain by this point had made out with her ex-boyfriend on an uncountable number of occasions. Maybe even done more than that.
Her brown eyes were wide as Wendy remained unsure of how to respond, "Uh…"
"Oh, sorry," the tanned girl spoke again, "My name's Darcy."
Swallowing all the pride that she could possibly muster, the dark haired girl licked her lips, "Wendy."
Still smiling at her, Darcy continued on, "Sorry to, like, interrupt, but I'm pretty bad with this stuff."
"Oh, that's okay," Red chimed back in, "Wendy makes it so simple to understand."
Cringing inwardly at the encouraging words from her friend, Wendy's foot began to tap with nervousness. There was clearly no getting out of this one.
"Well… okay, sure, I don't mind."
The genuinely sweet smile remained plastered on Darcy's lips as Wendy slowly got out of her chair and walked around the table to sit directly next to her.
She felt so incredibly uncomfortable. All of her limbs felt cramped and painfully attached to her sides as she shuffled a little more towards Stan's close friend. But the worst part of it all was why Wendy was feeling this way. Darcy did not seem like an intimidating or malicious person even in the slightest. That was the problem.
What would it mean for Wendy if Darcy just happened to be a perfect angel?
"So, these can be a bit tricky," Wendy began half-heartedly, scribbling down some instructions for her, "But there's always ways around them to make them easier."
Soon enough, Wendy had gone over the difficult equations enough times that Darcy eventually gasped in pleasant surprise when she managed to solve one all by herself, "Oh my God, this is easier than I thought," she said, thanking Wendy, "I normally get one of my friends to help me with math, but you blow them out of the water."
Smiling happily to herself, Wendy shrugged her shoulders. Maybe this ordeal hadn't been as horrible as she suspected it might have been, "Well, you can tell your friend I've saved them the effort."
"Yeah, totally," Darcy agreed with a laugh, "I was actually gonna' meet him to work on it a bit after he finished football practice today."
Immediately, Wendy felt her heart sink.
"But, hey, now that I know how to do it, maybe this afternoon can be no work and all play," Darcy sang playfully as she gently nudged Wendy in the arm, "Thanks again, Wendy!"
The dark haired girl felt like her chest was about to explode, until Darcy finally stood up from her chair and headed towards the library's exit. Staring at her from over her shoulder as she did, Wendy felt a wave of numbness wash over her. Not only was Darcy so sweet, but again, Wendy felt deterred by how beautiful she was, too. Her ponytail was long and flowing as it swayed behind her, and her slim body was complimented by perfectly placed desirable curves.
What hope did Wendy have to compete with that?
"Sorry, girl."
Slowly turning back at the sound of Red's voice, Wendy sucked in a brave breath. She needed to remain strong on the outside. She didn't want anybody – anybody at all knowing of the feelings about Stan she had been unable to shake since returning to South Park. Especially not anybody who could relay these feelings back to him.
Despite how horribly confused she was feeling on the inside, Wendy was determined to not let any of these feelings out.
"It's fine."
Gulping down an entire glass of orange juice, Stan gasped in delight and wiped the back of his hand against his lips. He was always exhausted after football practice. The quarterback refused to put any less than one hundred and ten percent effort into anything he did out on the field, whether it was just running laps or playing in a huge game. That was just the kind of determination Stan had always had.
There was something else about football, though. Something else that Stan was easily able to concentrate all of his efforts on. And that was the impulsive capability it gave him to completely block out everything else going on in his life at that moment.
Stan sighed. There certainly was a lot happening in his life as of late that he was more than happy to block out. For the entire hour that he had been training with his team mates, Stan hadn't once thought about girlfriends, or relationships, or parties, or awkward conversations, or Darcy. And especially not Wendy. But then, of course, the second that his practice session was over…
All of a sudden, an abrupt knock at the front door snapped Stan out of his mind boggling trance. Quickly placing his empty glass into the dishwasher, the dark haired boy dashed out of the kitchen and through the living room as he approached the wooden door. Upon opening it, Stan couldn't help but smile. It certainly was nice to have some other form of a distraction to keep his mind occupied.
"Good afternoon, my dear," he spoke with over enthused charm, gesturing for Darcy to join him inside.
Trying to hide the faint pink blushing in her cheeks, Darcy giggled quietly to herself as she walked through the door. Throwing her bag down on the lounge room couch, the teenage girl flicked her golden red locks out of her face as she grabbed the remote control and instantly turned on the television.
Darcy was all too comfortable being with Stan, and particularly so when they were at his house. They had been hanging out with one another for around about six months or so now, after all. They had met each other's parents, and Sharon loved Darcy. The only real thing that was missing from their relationship was that it still wasn't exactly a relationship. Definitely not an official one, that was sure. But Darcy wasn't prepared to let that stop her. She simply loved hanging out with Stan way too much.
"Okay," Darcy began sweetly as she rustled through her bag, "I brought a chick flick and a horror, so I guess you can choose what you want to watch, but the chick movie is a romantic comedy which is supposed to be really funny and I haven't seen it yet, so – "
"Whoa, wait a sec," Stan cut in with a small laugh. Frowning to himself, he walked over to the side table next to the couch and picked up his math text book, waving it around in front of him, "Are you forgetting the third option? The reason you came over here in the first place?"
Rolling her eyes at the teasing tone in his voice, Darcy brushed off the idea, "You obviously don't know how to have much fun."
"Darcy," Stan droned a bit more seriously, taking a seat next to her on the couch, "Come on, I know deep down how important getting good grades is to you. It won't take long."
"No need! I know how to do those equations now."
Stan raised a disbelieving eyebrow, "Oh yeah?"
"Yes, actually."
"Okay, well then prove it?"
Matching the challenging expression that was being projected at her, Darcy narrowed her eyes as she snatched the textbook out of Stan's hands and laid it in her lap, "Fine," she spat.
Motioning for her crush to hand her a pencil and piece of paper, Darcy smirked smugly as she quickly scribbled down a bunch of numbers and symbols and tossed the note paper back in Stan's direction, "There, happy now?"
Without saying another word, Darcy stood up from the couch, choosing one of the DVDs and strolling over to the television cabinet. Looking back over her shoulder, she smiled happily to herself at the look of pleasant surprise on Stan's face, "I'm going with the chick flick, is that cool?"
Stumbling over a reply, Stan pushed his hand over the back of his blue and red beanie as he cleared his throat, "How did you do that? I mean, not I'm saying I'm shocked, but this morning in class – "
"Calm down," Darcy joked, collapsing back on the lounge next to him, "I was in the library during my study period and there were some girls in our grade working on the same stuff. They helped me out."
Inching her way closer to him where they sat, Darcy gazed up at Stan with wide, twinkling brown eyes and an irresistible smile. Instantly taking the hint, Stan put the books down on the coffee table in front of him and opened up his left arm, allowing Darcy to cuddle into the side of him.
The sensation of her warmth against his body was so consoling. It always caused an extremely settling feeling to wash over Stan's entire being. He may not have been interested in having a real girlfriend, but the undeniable comfort he received from Darcy definitely filled the void of company that all teenagers searched for in each other.
However, Stan wasn't naïve. He knew that this was still much more to Darcy than just sharing some friendly company. As she had a thousand times before, the auburn haired girl then tilted her head up and grinned sweetly at Stan as she slowly leant in.
The smile remained firm on her face. The fact that they were at his house and not in a public setting meant she would get to share more than just a quick peck on the lips with him.
Darcy's lip gloss was smooth and tasted sweet against Stan's lips as he closed his eyes and dove into the tender exchange with her. His heart was racing ever-so-slightly as the scent of her perfume engulfed his senses. Goosebumps exploded across Darcy's skin as she daringly stuck out the very end of her tongue and delicately brushed it across the teenage boy's lips. She desperately tried to stop a tiny moan from escaping the back of her throat as for the briefest moment, she felt him return the intimate action. But, of course, before she knew it, the kiss was over and Stan slowly pulled away from her.
Staring down at her with a genuine look of affection, he gently pecked her once more. His heart swelled at how happy she looked. There may have been times in their friendship where Stan felt guilty about possibly stringing her along, but seeing the gorgeously perfect smile plastered on Darcy's face always caused his remorse to subside. After all, where was the harm in having a little bit of fun?
Letting her adjust herself into a comfy position, Stan relaxed into the back of the couch as Darcy loosely wrapped one of her arms around the front of him, "So, who was it that helped you with the math stuff?" he asked. As much as he tried to think about it, Stan couldn't really put his finger on any girl in their grade who particularly stood out in math class.
Shrugging her shoulders, Darcy pressed play on the DVD remote and waited for the movie to load, "Have you seen that new girl with the black hair? She hangs around with your girl friends, actually – Wendy?"
Before Wendy's name had even left Darcy's mouth, Stan's stomach turned itself inside out. The absolute slimmest gasp had expelled itself from the pit of his guts and out between his lips at the realisation of what the red head had said to him.
Although, unfortunately for the astonished teenager, he hadn't quite been as quiet as he thought as Darcy soon looked back up him, locking her eyes with his. Immediately, Stan tried to force a blank, unreadable expression, but still gulped as the teenage girl frowned at him, "What is it?"
Hastily putting his brain to work, Stan imagined the one thing that would faultlessly make Darcy change the subject as he tipped his head back down towards hers and kissed her again. Pulling back, he grinned, his plan working without a hitch, "Nothing," he firmly assured her, "Nothing, I'm fine."
Stan subtly held his breath, waiting and praying that Darcy wouldn't ask anything more. Luckily for the dark haired boy, he felt his breath glide easily out of his lungs as Darcy merely smirked, murmured a gentle 'okay' and went back to watching the beginning of the movie.
The second that her vision was fixated to the television screen, Stan's own eyes snapped tightly shut as he cringed at the thought of what he had just heard.
Wendy and Darcy. Darcy and Wendy. Interacting with each other? Talking to each other? Stan thought nothing could ever be more nightmarish than seeing Wendy appear back in front of him at South Park High School, but this newly discovered fact had rapidly proved him very wrong.
A million different theories and possibilities began cycling their way through his mind. Maybe Wendy hadn't actually known who Darcy was? But no, Stan thought to himself, Wendy had seen his Homecoming date run out of the room at the after party. She had even questioned where she was going and if she was okay. So that option was certainly out.
Sighing incredibly softly to himself, Stan tried to calm all his nerve-wracking ideas while Darcy huddled closer towards him. At least he could be assured that Darcy definitely didn't know who Wendy was. Not yet, anyway. But what would happen, he asked himself, if the two girls were ever to bump into each other again? There was still two years of high school left, and that was an awfully long time to go without ever coincidentally having another conversation with somebody. The pure notion of it all made Stan shudder. It seemed that his situation and the consequences of all his separate actions were starting to briskly crowd their way around him and suffocate him faster than he could keep up.
Not only that, but with football practice only being once a week and Darcy now being fully aware of Wendy's existence – there was suddenly becoming a lot less to keep Stan distracted from wanting to talk to and see Wendy again, as well.
Hello again lovely readers!
NOW, before I forget (again) there was something I was supposed to mention to you all at the end of my last chapter. And that was regrading my decision whether or not to include the timeline from the brand new season 18 episodes of South Park in this story. I thought about it a lot, but I eventually decided that I would include it all. If you haven't seen the new episodes, don't worry a whole bunch, I won't be going into distinct detail, so spoilers shouldn't be an issue :) I just thought I'd mention it in case Stan or Wendy said something from the past and you all wondered where I had got it from LOL
Anywaaaaay, on with this chapter! Wendy and Darcy meeting each other... what more is there to say? Please leave me a review and let me know what you all think! I appreciate it! :)
Till next time guys,
Reneyyyyyyyyyy x