Addict
A/N: This is a Christophe-heavy chapter. So for those of you who don't like him or don't care about him, sorry, but there's a lot of his and Craig's friendship in this as well as his own life. I like to explain why he is how he is. In case you haven't noticed, while this is a Craig/Tweek story it's, in reality, a story about a lot of the boys, not just the two in the pairing. After this chapter we'll get a lot more action between the two and then - well, then you'll see. But for right now, hang in there. And Jesus, this chapter is the longest one out of all of them, I swear, I don't know how it got so long...
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't claim to, wouldn't dream of it, got it memorized?
Warnings and Pairings: You know these by now, kids, no need to reiterate.
Chapter Ten: To Get By
The word 'emotional' confuses me. Typically someone who is considered 'emotional' is very sensitive and shows their soft side to everyone. Shouldn't the word 'emotional' just mean that you cycle through emotions and you're constantly feeling one extreme or the other? If that's the definition of emotional, then that's the definition of me. I don't cry often, I don't break down, not in front of people, at least not when I can avoid it. And now I can't avoid it. The second - I mean the second - that Kenny walks away from me I know it's coming.
For a minute I can't move. I'm suspended in time, watching him walk away and then it's all gone. Everything is a big blur of color, like a little kid spilt paint everywhere and everything has been mixed together. I hate myself the second this happens, because I've always been good at not doing this. In second grade when Cartman told me my hat was stupid, in seventh grade when I failed my first test, in ninth grade when I failed my first class. I felt shit at those times and I always wanted to just cry, for no reason other than to just get rid of my emotions that way.
But every time that I've felt that way, I've held back. Until I can get home and take a shower or lock myself in my room. Somewhere that no one will hear me, because I would be mortified if people knew that I got so upset over things like that. I like to get good grades, I like to pass tests and most of all I like my fucking hat. The problem is that everything, right now, has just been thrown in my face. Damien reminded me that Christophe isn't talking to me, I'm sure as hell not talking to Tweek and now no one can help me through this.
Except Christophe and he won't say anything, I know he won't, and he doesn't, when I ring the doorbell and he opens it to find me standing there and crying. No words needed, he lets me in, we bypass explanation and go up to his room. Christophe lives at home even though I know he hates it. He'll be eighteen in January but I don't know if he'll even move out then or after he graduates. He has the money, he has a job, he could get a nice apartment easily, but I know why he stays at home. Unlike mine, his family actually exists.
When I go into Christophe's room I'm reminded of that fact easily. The walls are white, everything is very clean and in earth tones. Nothing would catch your eye if it wasn't for the postcards. I remember being here back in middle school, it was nothing to look at then. Now you can't find a bare surface anywhere. The desk, the floor, the dresser, the windowsill, even the wall for fuck's sake. Covered in postcard after postcard, all of them from one person, Christophe's brother, who his mother affectionately calls Jordy.
It's a nickname for something that I never bothered to learn, and I only know him as Jordy, Christophe's older brother. That's all, nothing more. Jordy was, and is, the favorite. Parents always say that they don't have a favorite and they love all of their kids equally. I think if you smoke it's a good way to figure out if that will be true for you or not. Some people can only stand one specific kind of cigarette and that's it for them. Other people like a few different kinds, they don't play favorites and will smoke whichever they can find. Or, like me, it's simply about smoking and you could care less what the package looks like, it's all about the release you get.
It's the same with kids. Some parents, my own for example, really don't have favorites. We're just part of the routine, kids, maybe they didn't plan on us but there we are and they have to make it work. Christophe mom is as Christophe is to cigarettes funnily enough. Only one is her favorite, and it's Jordy and it's easy to tell. Oh, sure, she loves Christophe and he wouldn't be able to deny it. But, and think about this, if he wasn't her kid she wouldn't want him to be. Jordy is the kind of guy that mom's wish was their son.
He looks like Christophe, except less messy, from what I recall and he's some sort of prodigy in his parents eyes. He's not really, I mean, he's probably smarter than me, but he's not a genius. Christophe says that he just likes it, that learning thing, and did a lot of it. Fluent in several languages, reading well before he started school and understood the human mind at sixteen. I never actually met him. I saw him around when I went to Christophe's house in middle school and Jordy didn't actually live here so even then it was rare that I saw him.
Christophe's mother isn't divorced or seperated from his father, but his father lives in France. Jordy lived in France too, maybe because less people are complete retards there. I'm not sure what the exact reasons are. Christophe would always just rant on about how his brother was ruining his life. And, Jordy, whether he meant to or not, has ruined Christophe's life. Jordy went to church and Jordy got amazing grades and Jordy was nice to everyone. Christophe is nothing like that, and it's not his fault it's just the way things are.
Call Christophe a jackass and he'll probably just ignore you, but compare him to his older brother and he won't hesitate to kill you and hide your body. He's done it before and he'll do it again.
There was a day in eighth grade, near the beginning of the year, that was the last time I went to Christophe's house. His mother has never liked me, she must remember me, but she hated me because I flipped her off. Christophe always thought it was amazing because his mother couldn't actually punish me since I wasn't her son. The thing is that his mother always made a huge deal out of me being in the house, but that day she didn't say anything. I stayed over for a while and left before dinnertime and didn't think anything of it until the next day when Christophe told me his brother was missing.
At the time Jordy had to of been seventeen. And, big deal, people leave home at that age all the time. But Jordy is not just a 'people.' I'm sure Christophe's mother wanted to raise some sort of security alert in France and have all the authorities there looking for him. Most mothers would feel like that, like the world should stop when their kid goes missing, but things didn't stop. Things never stop for anything and nearly six months went by and at some point during that time frame Jordy turned eighteen and Christophe got his first postcard.
The postcards come once or twice a month from wherever in the world Jordy happens to be at the time. They're all addressed specifically to Christophe and that's all I really know. Jordy was smart and promising, he threw it away to travel around the world, he sends a postcard from where he is and Christophe hasn't mentioned him besides the few times that he's told me about the postcards and that's always been in a very detached fashion, in the same way that he might tell me I'm saying something wrong in French class. Offhand, casual and indifferent. Not how you would expect one to talk about their older brother.
Christophe's room is like a museum of postcards of famous places in the world. There are cities, Moscow, Amsterdam, London and Tokyo. The only continent he hasn't touched is North America. There are places, the Parthenon, the Eiffel Tower, the Berlin wall. All in little rectangular, glossy pictures on the front of postcards. Some of the postcards are turned to the other side where you can see Jordy's precise, simple writing, all of it in French and all of it hard for me to read unless I really concentrate. Right now from where I am, on the edge of Christophe's bed, laying down, done crying, I can sort of read one. I can't imagine how disappointing that is. To know your brother only through a postcard or two every month.
Christophe, it says, I am finally back in Paris. I doubt I will be staying long though, as Father said he would tell Mother that he has been paying for all of my trips if I insist on staying in the city for much longer than a week. I thought this would be a nice place to write you from seeing as we used to take vacations here in the summer. There's another sentence that I can barely make sense of, Jordy's normally polished writing is rushed and I have a headache as it is so I skip over it. Hope you are doing well, Jordy. It's dated about two months ago, in August.
That's Jordy, from what I know. Short, to the point and not very detailed. Christophe is his opposite in every way, rambling, almost nonsensical and exaggerated. I can't say that it doesn't bother me, but I also can't say that it does. From the moment that Christophe and I first started talking I knew that he was one of those people that you can't stand to be around, but I've always been around him in one way or another. To understand that, you should know how Christophe found me, or how I found him. It's not like I started sixth grade and had the objective of hanging out with the French kid from the private school.
Reluctant as I am to admit it, there is a certain element to Christophe that makes him something akin to a soulmate to me. A platonic, please never touch me even if it's by accident, soulmate, but one nonetheless. When people talk about their soulmates, they make it into a big deal. Time stopping and everything melting away and only seeing that person. That didn't happen to me. It happened to Christophe. In sixth grade I was innocently miserable and alone, and Christophe was not the former but was certainly the latter.
Lunch is the worst thing in the world when you have no friends at school. I spent the first week in the art classroom since the teacher took pity on me until she wasn't there one day and I was forced to make a choice. Between eating in the lunch room - out of the question, because I would have had to sit alone and there is nothing worse than sitting alone at lunch - and going outside. I chose outside and that's how I found Christophe, standing between the two schools, past the Goth Kids, smoking a cigarette and looking angry at everything. He looked about as angry as I felt.
Then he looked up at me, I later found out he had just gotten his hair cut, bangs only just in his eyes as he took a drag on his cigarette and I looked back, prepared for him to kill me with his cigarette or something. Time didn't stop, but my heart did, from fear. Christophe is the only person I've ever known who actually, honest to God, scares the living shit out of me. Sure, Damien is creepy, but Christophe is a whole new kind of intimidation. So there I was, petrified, and Christophe, of all the things he could have done, handed me a cigarette - my first one - and asked what my name was.
I told him that and what grade I was in before the bell rang telling us that lunch was over. In-between choking on cigarette smoke, I mean. He told me he would see me the next day, I think he touched my shoulder or something, and I called after him, asking him what his name was. He turned around, grinned and told me. Christophe DeLorne, with a wink. Now, I wouldn't want anyone to misunderstand things. Christophe is my soulmate in the way that a 67 year-old woman's cat is her soulmate.
Christophe has always been a friend when I don't have anyone else.
I went back the next day, because it wasn't like I had anyone else to hang out with, coughed over another cigarette and from then on it was Christophe and I. Eventually Pip started following me around - after I punched Cartman in the face, not for the first or last time - and it was us three. Seventh grade was when Christophe really gave up on me and at first I thought it was because I started dating Porsche. That wasn't it at all, although he never seemed very fond of my relationship with her and I don't blame him.
I wasn't very fond of my relationship with her. It was, however, my first break-up that pretty much emasculated me for life. She broke up with me and it damaged my ego for a good year. Kenny insisted I date Bebe in ninth grade, but even then it was never the same. Porsche did exactly what television had taught me to expect. She pushed me away, looked at me for a long moment and told me we had to talk.
What I'm saying is, it wasn't a surprise, but it was still shit. She told me everything she was supposed to. I'm not a good listening and we were better as friends and, worst of all there was someone else. It's not like she was cheating on me, or maybe she was, but that wasn't the point. I didn't give a fuck that Porsche and I weren't dating anymore, it was the fact that she had ended things and me reevaluate myself. Except I didn't decide that I could change and become better and finally have a successful relationship.
No, I became worse, I became angrier and even more introverted and convinced I wasn't cut out for a relationship. And who knows, maybe I'm not. That might be what the world is trying to tell me, that I'm too much of an asshole to ever get that close to anyone ever again. I think I could do it, if I really loved someone. I don't know if I do though, if I love Tweek. Of course I love him, but there's a part of me that thinks it's just infatuation, that I spend so much time around him I've manufactured fake attraction and if that's the case then it will never work out between us.
Tweek and Porsche aside, Christophe gave up on me in seventh grade. I wish the problem hadn't been what it turned out to be, because if it had been as simple as Porsche then maybe my life would be a tinge less complicated. It all had to do with this Jew, with red hair and the stupidest green hat in the history of the world. But that's a large group; I should narrow that down. Kyle. Fucking. Broflovski. I think I stared at Christophe for quite a while when he told me that one and he just kept talking about him.
Christophe saw Kyle and, well, God knows what he saw that captivated him so much. I mean Kyle is...okay, now Kyle is rather attractive. I don't see what's so great about him that he has both Christophe and Stan fighting over him, he's not that great, but I can admit that he's alright. But in seventh grade? In seventh grade Kyle was wearing sweater vests and one Chess Club membership shy of complete nerdom. He wore glasses all the time back then and spent his time reading. I know all this because, out of everyone, Kyle was the one person who acknowledged my existence, and that's where things began.
One day Christophe and I are standing around 7-11, smoking, thinking we're really cool, and Kyle walks by, face in a book and smiles at me and says hi and I say the same. And Christophe just stares, and Kyle leaves and Christophe is suddenly obsessed. Mind you, he knew nothing about Kyle at this point. Well, he knew Kyle, but you can hardly count their history before that point as actually knowing one another. They were aquaintences at best, but Christophe is the sort of person who doesn't think that knowing someone is important. It's not knowing someone, he once explained, but rather knowing it's meant to be.
And it's always been that way, I think. Really, that's why the two of them surprise me so much. Well, why they did surprise me so much. Because Kyle always seemed annoyed by the French boy's come-ons and Christophe was always following Kyle around. I always assumed it was a very one-sided thing. That's what Christophe does when he likes you, though, as odd as it sounds. I suppose I didn't notice it because I was always around him as it was and I knew how he felt I've just always chosen not to acknowledge it, even to this day.
Christophe transfered to our school in tenth grade. He always says that he got kicked out of private school, like he did something really hardcore that he can't even tell you about. Truth is, he skipped church one day and they have a very strict rule about going to school every Wednesday. Christophe could sit around calling God a faggot and there was nothing they could do except pray that God struck the French boy down with lightening. Anyway, I remember introducing Christophe to everyone. He had contempt for all of then, except Kyle.
And he avoided us. He found Gregory, who had transfered in ninth grade, and he avoided the rest of us. Kenny, for a short time, was convinced that somehow he and Kyle would end up together and I always thought that was the stupidest thing I'd ever heard. I guess I was really wrong. I knew Christophe still liked Kyle, he was always asking about the redhead when I got a cigarette from him. He knew where Kyle's locker was and, had he been anyone else, I wouldn't have really thought that was weird, but Christophe probably knew his combination, so it was just creepy.
I always kind of got the feeling that Christophe was Kyle's stalker, in a less threatening way than a real stalker, yet just as annoying. That's a mean evaluation though. Christophe spent a few years not even knowing Kyle and then all of a sudden they went to the same school and he had a chance and, well, maybe he freaked out. I don't know, because I never knew he even took the chance, but he obviously did at some point that I'm not aware of. That's my fault, for drifting away from him once I had my old friends back.
"It's stupid," I say, for no other reason than to obliterate the silence in the room.
"What?" Christophe replies, looking at me wearily.
"Crying," I mumble, sitting up, "is stupid." It's only then that I realize he's not the Mole. It didn't occur to me that he shouldn't have even let me inside. He's supposed to hate me right now and since he's talking to me he's just himself. My best guess is that I have something to do with it, but that sounds a bit arrogant. So, yeah, it was probably me. Maybe me, showing up on his doorstep for the first time in years, bawling my eyes out and ringing his doorbell, snapped him our of it. It seems plausible, if not a little embarrassing on my part.
Whatever the cause, he's Christophe and I'm glad he is. "Et iz not stupid if you 'ave a good reason for et," he says. He's not really asking for it, but I'll just pretend he wants to know.
"I don't have a reason, really," I tell him.
"Zen et iz stupid," he decides, easily, like he has the last word in all of this.
But all I say is, "Yeah, I know." And then I reach out and grab the postcard from Jordy that I was reading. It has a picture of Sicily on the front of it. Or a picture of Sicily. I don't know, it says Sicily in really nice, cursive letters. "What does...that say?" I ask, pointing to the part that I couldn't read. Christophe grabs it from me, sitting so that he's next to me on the bed. For a moment I think he's going to hit me or something and tell me not to look at his 'sheet,' but then I realize he's reading over the message.
"Ah," he says, quietly, tracing a finger under the rushed writing of his older brother, "you know zat I miss you." Then he throws the postcard to the ground and glares at it.
"Where is he right now?" I ask, probably getting more into his personal matters than he cares for me to be.
"Last we know he is in Greece and 'eading across the Mediterranean to Morocco," Christophe says. Apparently he has gathered all the contempt in the world and is currently hurling it as his brother in little, biting statements. Not that he's ever thrilled about Jordy or anything, but usually he seems a little sad about it. Right now he simply sounds utterly pissed off. Or maybe he's pissed off at me and not his ghost of an older brother. I'm not sure.
"Morocco yeah, it's always seemed like a nice place to me," I lie, agreeably. Christophe gives me a little look telling me I don't have to pretend to know what the fuck a Morocco is. I'm guessing it's a country or an island or a tourist destination or - something you would go to. Basically, Christophe is just warning me to stop myself from looking like a complete retard. I hate to break it to him, but it's too late for that. "Well, he'll send you a postcard, anyway." Christphe groans at that and gets off of the bed, motioning for me to follow him.
I do, follow him that is, but I get held up by his desk. Off to the side is his shovel, looking like it's been used very recently, not exactly a surprising fact seeing as he's been even more introverted than usual this past month and, I mean, someone had to dig that tunnel by Stark's Pond and it certainly wasn't me. That's not really what catches my eye, however. What I do notice is the letter. Being me I pick it up and carry it with me out into the hallway and to the kitchen where Christophe is simply passing through. I swear if he could survive without eating he would do it.
The letter is from Christophe, to Jordy. It mainly surprises me because I never thought of Christophe as the type of person who would write letters. I though that he, like his brother, was sending postcards. Or Post-It notes. Something that he could just scribble an answer down on and get rid of quick, never giving it a second thought. But Christophe definitely the type of person who writes letters. Three page letters, back and front, in fact. It's dated yesterday so I'm assuming he'll send it today.
"I send et to my fazer," he says, when he sees me reading the letter. "Zen 'e sends et to my brozer and, some'ow, every time, et gets to 'im. And zen 'e writes me back two sentences on a postcard 'e found in some...tourist infested gift shop. At least, zat iz what I zink. But, I suppose I should be 'appy zat he writes at all." Either Christophe has forgetten to sound pissed off at the world in general or he's just given up. I can't be sure which it is.
"I don't understand half of it," I admit to him. I don't, because Christophe writes in a very complex manner. Jordy writes simply, in basic French that anyone who knows a thing or two could decipher given the time. There are parts of Christophe's letter that look familiar, a word here or there, a sentence or two, but it's just fucking, just - complex. Christophe obviously puts a lot of effort into his letters. I guess it's sort of represented in how they each choose to correspond. Postcards show you the big picture on the front, you know where it's coming from and what they've seen. You have to really read a letter to get the big picture - and I can't read his letter. Maybe it's for the best.
"Et does not matter," Christophe confirms, taking the letter when I hold it out to him. He sighs and looks over the papers before folding them neatly. "I wish zat - you know, I wish I could stop sending 'im ze letters, because I know zat I will not get much in return. I just sometimes 'ope zat he will one time sit down and tell me what iz really going on. It iz probably too much to 'ope for, zough, oui?" He isn't looking for an answer, he knows what it is, so I just follow him out of the kitchen while he sighs like angsty French boy he is.
"You know, I'm sorry," I say as we enter the family room. "For what I said, I mean." It only then occurs to me that his mother isn't there. Christophe's mother would yell at him - in French probably, so I couldn't understand - if she knew I was here. Christophe pretends to hate her, pretends to resent her for liking him less. But he wants her to like him just as much as she likes Jordy. That's why he stays around, why I think he'll always be here until she dies. He would never admit it but the one thing that's important to him is his mother.
"Zat seems like so long ago," Christophe replies, with a shrug, his way of forgiving me. The family room is exactly how I remember it, completely different from my own. Dimly lit with only a few lamps here and there, golden walls that are probably a brighter yellow than they appear to be, a dead plan in the corner that no one bothers to do anything about and a slightly scary picture of Jesus above the equally forboding fireplace. I can kind of see why Christophe hates religion. The one thing that is missing, that you would normally see in someone's family room, is a television. I'm starting to remember why I never liked Christophe's house in the first place.
"Yeah, well, we kind of didn't talk for a month," I remind him, like it's going to make him admit he missed me. Christophe is rifling through the stuff next to the chair I always see his mom in. Reading or knitting or whatever his mother does, I'm not sure, that's the chair she always did it in though. He finds stamps and an envolope stuck into an old book. Just a testament to his family's weirdness that those things are in a book that looks like it hasn't been touched for months. I follow him outside to the mailbox, he stays silent until he's pushing the little red flag up to let the mailman know there's something inside.
"We are talking now," he says. And it sounds stupid, but he puts so much into those few words, it says more than what you would think the words mean. There is meaning behind their meaning when Christophe says them.
"Okay, technically true," I say, ignoring that fact as we walk down the road, taking the words at face value because it's what I always do. "I'll give you that, but, um, Christophe - you look like shit, you know that, right?" Because hd oes. Worse than usual, I mean. This isn't his normal fuck-you look to the world thing, this is like he's defying hygiene. Like maybe he lost his comb and he's decided he's better off without it. I'm not one to talk, really, but at least I'm wearing a hat. You can probably tell I've been crying like a pussy, and I'm not excited about letting the world know, but I follow the French boy anyway.
"I never look like sheet," he spits, literally, at the snow, vehement in this statement. I would beg to differ, he's looked like shit on numerous occasions, but we're on thin ice as it is and I'm not entirely worried about whether or not he can admit that he isn't the most attractive guy in the entire world right now. So I just kind of not like I'm agreeing with what he said, when I'm really just agreeing not to bother him about it any more.
"So how have you been doing?" I'm directly behind him, quite literally following in his footsteps. There's something calming about doing it. I used to do it when I was a little kid and I wanted to hang out with the older kids in the neighborhood, stepping into the imprints they made on the snow we were trudging through. I feel that way right now, like I'm a little kid just following Christophe around. He kind of growls at my question.
"I am sure zat you 'ave noticed Nommel, zat I am not exactly doing, ah, wonderful," he tells me. I can hear the clicking of his lighter and I'm reminded of how nice a cigarette would be right now. We handle the exchange quickly and I'm suddenly breathing in the toxic fumes like the cigarette is giving me pure oxygen, I need it to survive and it stops me from shaking like I'm doing. That shaking that threatens to turn into dry sobs if you don't get a hold of yourself in time. Thank God for cigarettes or whoever the hell it was that invented the things.
"Yeah, I've noticed," I say, truthfully.
What he means is he hasn't been himself for a while. What I mean is, well, I've noticed that. I kind of say it like I'm hurt though, like he needs to apologize to me when we both know he doesn't. "In case you were wondering how I've been doing," I say, completely sarcastic, since I know he doesn't give a fuck about how I've been, "I hasn't been much better than you. Well, not that you weren't able to tell from the fact that you had to drag me up to your room while I was sobbing."
"Non, I could not tell," he says, equally as sarcastic. "What was zat about, zough?"
"I told you I didn't have a reason," I remind him, although that's staring to sound a bit false, even when I think about it. "But I guess it's just everything, you know? Right now I don't really have anyone left."
"Not even ze twitchy one?" Aw, man, that's some classic Christophe right there. Notice how he doesn't do the whole you-have-me-dude thing, he just digs the knife in deeper? Totally like him. Yeah, I missed stuff like this. I give him a look that says I do not want to talk about it and he takes the hint. "Well I do not 'ave anyone eizer, so we are, as zey say, in ze same boat. Iz zat not delightful?" We both just kind of grimace. I'm not very fond of boats. Christophe wouldn't have anywhere to dig. We'd probably kill each other.
"Well, uh," I point out, "maybe if you had done what I told you to and talked to your stupid Jew one of us would be happy."
"Point taken," he says with a tiny shrug. "But I am allowed to freak out, you know. And I did. Et iz not so easy when 'e iz standing right in front of you. You would zink zat et would be easy but, non, et iz not. I just ran away from et and, in doing so, let 'im get away. A stupid move on my part, but my choice zat I cannot blame anyone else for."
"You're growing up," I tell him, giving him an awkward pat on the shoulder, "tell me how it feels and maybe I'll consider doing it too."
"Ah, oui, I suppose I am," he relents with a sigh, taking a drag of his cigarette and expelling the smoke out into the air. We're near Kyle's house now and Christophe makes sure we turn left towards town so we don't end up walking near the redhead's home. "I kind of 'ad a stupid idea," he tells me as we walk past 7-Eleven and consider trying to buy cigarettes there.
"Stupid ideas are what life is made of, tell me," I say with a shrug as I try and decide if I look anywhere near twenty-one. I really don't. I'm perpetually going to be stuck looking fifteen and I know it. It's like I haven't changed since ninth grade, inside and out. People say it's cute, you know, since I look a bit younger than most of the guys in my grade, but I have the temper of, like, a college kid. Woohoo, I'm a rebel who looks like his favorite hangout is church. Go me. I hate mirrors. I know I have this perpetual arrogance thing going on, but when I'm this low I start think I'm not all that great. Depression can do that, I suppose.
"We should date," Christophe says, catching me completely off guard as we walk into 7-Eleven, having remembered that, while I look like a ninth grader Christophe can pass for twenty-one, especially since he has this way of acting like there's no reason anyone should think he's any younger. I'm a bit too shocked to even say anything, but he makes me go into one of the little aisles they have set up. Basic procedure, you have to buy cigarettes and something else, not just cigarettes, or they'll get suspicious and card you. "Let me explain," he says, pretending the different flavors of chips are really interesting.
"Yeah, you better," I exclaim, getting the Indian guy behind the counter to stare at us for a long minute.
"I do not mean zat we would actually date," he says, quietly, ignoring my little outburst, "but zat we could pretend to so zat we could each get what we want."
"Was there a marathon of 80's movies on or something?" I scoff at his idea. "Honestly, this sounds like something that Molly Ringwald would kill to have a part in." By now we've picked out chips and we're walking up to the counter. Christophe asks for his brand of cigarettes. The Indian guy looks at both of us and we just glare at him and he hands over the cigarettes. Christophe pays and I flip off the guy once we get outside.
"He did not do anyzing," Christophe says, snorting at my actions as he opens up the new pack.
"He totally thought I was, like, twelve," I explain, "if you had been in there alone he wouldn't have hesitated for a second to hand over a pack of cigarettes, but I barely even look my own age." Christophe just kind of sighs like, well, you can't blame him and I know he's right, but it still pisses me off. Of course a cigarette helps to calm me down a little bit. "Explain your stupid idea some more," I say after a few silent moments.
"Et would make Kyle jealous," he immediately says, like that's really going to appeal to me.
"Oh, yeah," I say, "I can see how this one is working out for me."
"Well I do not know, perhaps et will make ze twitchy one jealous as well," he says, smirking as I blush. "We do not actually 'ave to date, you understand. We do not even 'ave to do anyzing at all, we just 'ave to imply zat we are doing zings at ozer times." He says this all very slowly, calculated, like for the past month he's been thinking up this idea for the last month. Knowing him, he probably has.
"Oh, like…oh," I say, suddenly getting where he got the idea from. He nods. Like Kyle and Stan, I wanted to say, but I couldn't. "I guess I could see that working. But it doesn't mean anything and we don't actually do anything, right?" I just want to make sure that he isn't turning this into some elaborate excuse to fuck me or something, because I know Christophe isn't really above doing something like that.
"Believe me, Nommel, I do not want to do anyzing with you," he says with his stupid half-smile. Because we both know if it wasn't for Kyle, he would.
One time, a long time ago, or what feels like a long time ago, we all skipped school. Together. Like no one would notice that the eight kids who all hung out together just so happened to all be absent on the same day. Kyle was the only one who protested, he had a math test or something like that, but Stan managed to talk him into it. We were in ninth grade and all of us were relatively nervous about it, although none of us would admit it.
Somehow, and to this day I don't know how, Cartman got his mother to let him borrow her minivan. I'm pretty much perplexed by that, I mean, how dense do you have to be to actually let your kid borrow your only car while he's supposed to be in school? And, oh yeah, when he's fourteen and doesn't even have his license. Such is the Cartman family though. Letting her fourteen year old son borrow her car certainly wasn't the weirdest thing Cartman's mom had ever done. I would know, I have internet, after all.
Still, Cartman wasn't even the one who drove. It was Kenny who had been driving for almost a year, secretly of course, with his older brother, Kevin, teaching him. Not that Kenny was or is a good driver, but he was the best out of all of us at the time. He's one of those people who lives to be on the highway, going seventy constantly and hating stop lights and stop signs and managing to avoid ever getting into an accident or receiving a ticket.
Kenny was driving, excited as hell that he finally got a chance to show off his driving skills. Clyde was sitting next to him, nearly bursting into tears because he was so sure we were going to get caught by a police officer or something. Token and Cartman were arguing about where to go. Cartman wanted to get something to eat even though it wasn't even nine in the morning and Token had this weird idea that we should do something educational since we were skipping school. Yeah, right, only Kyle agreed with him.
As for Kyle, Stan, Tweek and I, we were forced to sit in the very back, but none of us really complained. Sure, Tweek was practically sitting on my lap but at the time it didn't even faze me. I was trying to calm him down because he thought we were going to crash and the minivan would catch on fire and we would all die and no one would ever identify our bodies. Normal Tweek stuff. Stan and Kyle were talking about something that I only just remember. Stan wanted to get Wendy something and Kyle wasn't giving much in response besides 'mhmm' and 'that's nice' typical stuff for the redhead whenever Stan's once-upon-a-time girlfriend was brought up.
I don't remember, really, where we went. I mean, there's a reason we never skipped again and it doesn't rest solely on the fact that we were all punished when we got home. Kyle especially. I guess I can see now why he was so worried about skipping; his mom's a total bitch about shit like that. I think we might have gone to Fairplay or somewhere else nearby. Kenny had his heart set on Denver, trying to entice us with the idea that we might see gangs or something.
"Yeah, Kenny," I had said, sarcastically, "to top off this wonderful day we could get shot." Honestly, what did he think we were going to do? Hang out with some gang and learn how to shoot people? As fun as that might have sounded to him the rest of us were alright with wherever we went. I think it was Fairplay, but that doesn't really matter since whatever town it was, fuck, it was boring. It was basically South Park except ten times bigger.
Nothing that we wanted to do could be done at the time we were there. Eight obviously young kids walking around town was weird enough without us drawing suspicion on ourselves. What I mean is, we couldn't run around and actually enjoy anything like we wanted to because then everyone would know we were skipping school. It was actually really lame. We had to leave around one anyway so we could get back home at a reasonable time and have some chance of not getting in trouble.
We all got in trouble, even I did, mostly because my dad was home at the time and the high school called to make sure I was actually absent. Kyle couldn't hang out with anyone for ages, the rest of us were grounded for at least the weekend. Except Cartman who just didn't get to watch television for the rest of the night or something unfair like that. It had been his idea, too, the fatass. We never skipped again after that, at least not all together and not for quite a while.
The reason I remember stupid stuff like this, though, is that I really miss it. Back when nothing was complicated and we were all just us. Nobody was in love with anyone, except maybe Stan, but he wasn't one to bother us with all his talk about how wonderful Wendy was, he knew we didn't care. We were just eight guys doing really stupid stuff and not caring about the consequences all too much. Now it's like that's all that matters.
Part of me wished nothing had ever changed, but at the same time I know it was bound to happen. It's just that it happened a lot faster than I ever thought it would and it leaves me wondering, what if things had never changed? What if Christophe and Kyle had never met and Stan and Wendy had stayed together and we all just stayed friends and nothing more? Surely things would be a lot less complicated if that was the case. But I have the feeling that things would be a lot emptier than they are now, that despite any hurt the events we have gone through recently may have inflicted on all of us, it will end up being worth it in the end.
Well, that's what I hope, anyway.
We don't start it right away. That would be kind of stupid and besides, I'm not all too excited by the idea. I'm sure Kyle will get jealous once he catches on to what Christophe and I are implying, he has quite the temper so he might even confront me later, but I'm not worried about how it will affect the redhead, he's not my priority and he never has been, that's Christophe's problem, not mine. The thing is, Tweek isn't exactly the jealous type. I mean, not where it concerns me and romance. Sure it bothered him when I claimed Thomas as my best friend back in middle school but this is completely different. It had nothing to do with romance.
I suppose, for me, it's either going to crush my hopes or bring about ones that could be completely false. If Tweek doesn't get jealous then I'll know he could care less if I'm romantically involved with anyone and that won't just suck balls, it will pretty much be devastating to my simple little mind. If he does get jealous it might just be for the same reason he did when Wendy made her stupid assumptions and told him about them. Then he'll just return to his practically catatonic state and where am I then?
Back to square fucking one, that's where.
So I guess that's why nothing changes the next morning. I sit with Tweek and we have meaningless conversation. He's a bit warmer to me now, like he thinks maybe the kiss thing was an accident, but I know he's still worrying about it even if he doesn't voice his concerns. I don't touch him, at all, because that would probably hinder any progress that he's made concerning this whole ordeal. I can imagine that he would freak out if I went to hold his hand now, which bothers me a bit, because up until my slip up he didn't consider it anything more than a friendly thing. Then again, up until recently, I thought of it in the same way.
Everything is completely normal. I walk with Tweek to his locker then with Stan, Token and Kyle to Psychology, the morning goes normally, until French class that is. Christophe gives me a fucking note. I think my sister passes notes in class; I definitely don't pass notes, ever. But I bet Stan and Kyle do now. We're not supposed to be talking and the room is pretty much silent. I'm supposed to be conjugating verbs but of course I don't really know how to do that.
I decide to open the note and read it, especially when I notice Kyle looking at it in surprise. As he should be, of course. I just kind of grin at him like I know something he doesn't and make sure to open it where he can't read it, leaning over it like it's so secret. It doesn't even really say anything, just something in French that I can't understand and that I know the French boy just put there to annoy the fuck out of me and then it just says we're going to spend a little bit of time during lunch together. Oh, I can only imagine what people will think of that.
It's been a month since I've hung out with Christophe during lunch so no one's going to think lightly of me suddenly taking up that pastime again. Instead of doing my work I just fold the note back up and sigh, like it was oh so important. I'm sure Kyle notices and he probably thinks it's a bit weird but nothing beyond that. You know, yet. I sit there, not doing my work, honestly kind of excited about this now. Maybe I won't even get a reaction out of Tweek but Kyle certainly is fun when he lets his temper get to him, so I have that to look forward to. If he believes it - if he honestly gets upset by this because he believes it...it's one of my best lies yet.
Before lunch Christophe makes me go to his locker with him. This means that Tweek is probably wondering where I am and I can't say that I really care. Of course, I do care, but I like to think that he's at least a bit worried. That maybe he's wondering where I am and who I'm with. But he sees me when he walks past with Clyde as they make their way towards the lunchroom and I pretend not to see him as Christophe puts his arm around my shoulders.
Way to be inconspicuous.
They stop at Clyde's locker and I just kind of watch them. Tweek's doing that thing that people do, where they look everywhere but where they want to look and he currently wants to look at me, but won't, at least not directly. "I do not see what you see in 'im," Christophe intones, with a little sigh. "All 'e does iz twitch and worry about everyzing, I find it to be very annoying." He leans in when he says that last bit and I smile a bit, like he's saying something sweet to me. Right.
"Aw, come on, he's fucking adorable," I mutter back, keeping my eyes on the blond. It's the first time I've really said something about Tweek out loud in that sense and it kind of makes me blush and smirk. "He still kind of looks like a little kid. Not that I'm into that shit, but still, it's cute." Christophe just kind of snorts at that. "Don't even," I tell him, "you like Broflovski, who's, like, the epitome of effeminate boys."
"At least Kyle does not look like 'e iz twelve," Christophe says, adding something in French after that, but I don't listen enough or even bother to understand. Tweek and Clyde leave for the lunchroom although Tweek gives this sort of forlorn look at me over his shoulder and I just ignore it and smile at Christophe. Oh, goodness, I am such a tease. "Speaking of Kyle," Christophe says, softly. Things get even more interesting when Kyle and Stan walk down the hallway. Christophe puts on a show for his favorite redhead, like I knew he would.
He grabs my hat and at first I get kind of pissed and flip him off, but he's taller than me and makes me reach for it. I can tell Kyle, at least, much be watching us, or else Christophe wouldn't be doing anything like this. He kind of ruffles my hair and instead of getting even angrier like I have the instinct to do I actually laugh, all coy, like I really enjoy this and let him drag me off to the back of the school. I spend all of two minutes with him, basically just laughing at how ridiculous we just acted and then he lights a cigarette, I borrow a few and I'm off.
I do have a knack for the theatrical, I will admit. I sit down next to Tweek breathlessly, my hair messed up, Christophe still has my hat, and when Cartman makes a joke about how I was with the French fag I just shrug and grin at him instead of defending myself like I usually do. It figures that me not getting angry gets more attention than me actually getting pissed at him. Kyle's staring at me like he's putting everything together. The note, what he saw in the hallway, how I look now, the smile on my face, he knows what it's all meant to mean, it's just whether he believes it or not.
"Where's your hat?" he asks, the words sounding vaguely familiar.
I look up at him and remember, for some reason, a conversation we had over a month ago. I just smile. "What?" I ask, blinking a few times as if I misunderstood him. He starts to glare at me; he knows where this is going. "Christophe has it," I say, looking down at the table with a smile, like I'm actually shy about this or something. I know Tweek is looking at me now, almost in horror, I'm happy to see. The rest of them don't seem to give a fuck where my hat is.
And for a while it seems like Kyle doesn't either. Until he punches me in the face, I mean.
A/N: Next time: Kyle's jealous Jewness, sexy wimmenz, sex-starved!Craig, news from Tweek and oh so much more. If anyone was expecting what happened in this chapter, I'll pay you ten dollars. But not really becuase I don't have ten dollars. Lots of Tweek in the next chapter, oh just lots of him. He's making a comeback in a big way, I promise. By the way, I'm so proud of 'Tophe, fighting for his man, yes he is.
Thanks for 100 reviews, you guys! That made me really happy to see. I usually reply to all the reviews I get, but for some reason I didn't get e-mail alerts about any of them, so I'm sorry I couldn't do that like I usually do. Know I read them all though and appreciate each one. :D
Until next time, tweekers