Stan Marsh had never been involved with student government. He barely paid attention to elections, although he seemed to have a foggy memory of them taking place near the end of May last year. One morning he'd walked into school, determined to head straight to his locker. He was hungover that day, and it was perhaps the only reason he could recall the morning of elections at all. He didn't know why he'd gone to a strip club with the football team, but they all liked him and wanted him to come. So he did come — oh, hilarity, he probably didn't have to be that drunk to go do it in the alley with a stripper. But he had been, anyway, and then he contracted Chlamydia.
Whatever, whatever — these details were unnecessary to recount his hazy memory of voting in student government elections. But they weren't unrelated, which was why he remembered them even in the slightest.
He could barely see, and he walked — well, no, staggered — toward his locker, passing some girls with clipboards and a huge, hand-painted banner. He nearly slammed into the locker's metal door, and held his stomach in an attempt not to vomit all over the hallway, when Butters has bounced up to him, looking very dapper in a suit with a tie.
"Hey Stan!" he'd cheered, and it just made Stan want to heave all that more intensely.
Stan had muttered a "Hey, Butters," and covered his mouth in case he did spew on Butters, the idea of which would have been real damn funny any other day.
"You don't look very good," Butter said with concern, and at this point in his mind Stan recalled Butters himself holding a clipboard behind his back.
"I'm fine."
"Oh, well. You should take care of yourself," memory-of-Butters said with genuine concern. "You don't want to be getting sick during finals week, that sure would suck."
"Sure."
"Hey, have you voted for student government yet?" Stan shook his head 'no.' "Oh, that's good! I mean, because, well, I'm running for head of the social committee, and, well, it sure would mean a lot to me if I could have your vote."
"Fine." Stan remembered Butters handing him the clipboard, and Stan filled out a pathetic, Xeroxed ballot, rendered in size-14 Comic Sans.
And, in fact, after this, Stan did vomit in the bathroom — for 19 minutes straight. It was glorious, and some boy who was then a senior (who was working at a gas station now, Stan believed) had exclaimed "sick, dude!" sometime in the middle of it. He had been very late to intermediate geometry.
XXX
"It's a turnabout," she said, pulling on a curly lock of her yellow hair absentmindedly.
"Why would Butters throw a turnabout dance?"
"To shake things up?"
"Bebe, he's gay!"
"I know that, Stan."
"Well, then there's nothing to turn, is there?"
"I don't know," Bebe said thoughtfully. "Have you ever seen Butters?"
"More than I'd like to," Stan admitted.
"All right, fine. Be a dick, if you'd like, but I think you should know that most of the hot girls already have dates."
"I'm not planning on going."
Bebe gave him a look. "You owe it to me!" she exclaimed.
"Oh?" he crossed his arms. "And why is that?"
"Your dad puked on me!"
"That's got nothing to do with me," Stan said defensively. "I have no control over what that retard does or says."
Bebe sighed, and groaned in frustration. She was trying to be quiet, as it was study hall, but she wasn't going to let her inhibitions ruin this moment, if one could call it a moment. If nothing else, it was the first time she'd seen Stan without one of those guys he called 'friends' clinging to him in quite some time.
"Look," she said slowly, trying to make this argument as convincingly as possible. "It'll be fun. We'll be drunk, I'll put out, you'll like it."
"I'm sure I will," Stan agreed. "Just, why does it have to involve going to a fucking dance?"
"Girls like dances. I mean, have you ever asked a girl to a dance?"
"No."
"Have you ever been asked?"
"Um, yeah. Actually." Stan coughed, not involuntarily. "Kyle asked me to one once. In eighth grade."
"Well, fine," Bebe said huffily, standing up and gathering her books. "But don't bother waiting for him to ask you to this one."
Stan just rolled his eyes. "I wouldn't go with him, either."
"Fine, good. Because he's already going with Craig." She flipped some hair over her shoulder.
"Oh, Craig."
"Yep." He flinched. "Are you okay?" she asked.
"Yeah, I'm fucking super. Tell you what, I'll go with you to your retarded little dance."
"Technically, it's Butters' little retarded dance. But okay, good. I'm glad."
"Me too," Stan said. She bent and kissed him on the top of his head. He gave her an odd look. He was suddenly so angry, and despite the fact that he'd just agreed to go to some idiotic school dance with Bebe, her kissing him just made him angrier.
XXX
Predictably, Stan marched through the halls of the school that afternoon, not caring if he was late to football or had to do extra pushups or whatever. All he knew was that he was pissed. Pissed and insulted. He knew it wasn't rational. He knew he was being sort of a prick about it. He didn't care.
A few girls said 'hello' to him as he pounded the linoleum, but he didn't even acknowledge them. He stomped up behind his friend, who was (as was his way) kneeling in front of something, although this time 'something' was his backpack. Stan knew he needed a dramatic way to get Kyle's attention, so he slammed his fist into the locker next to his friend's. The sound reverberated and Kyle kind of fell backward off of his knees and onto his ass. He looked up to see Stan standing with arms akimbo, eyebrows knitted. "Jesus shit, Stanley. What?"
"You're going to that dance," he growled, not asking, just saying.
"Uh huh."
"Well, it would have been nice of you to tell me."
Kyle stood up and brushed off his pants. "I don't know, Stanley. Maybe I just assumed that you would be able to infer that I would be attending with my boyfriend."
"Yeah, your boyfriend of three weeks."
"Hell yes, three weeks. Have you ever kept a girlfriend that long?"
"Maybe."
"No," Kyle informed him. "You haven't."
Stan raised both of his eyebrows. "You've been keeping track of how long my relationships last?"
Kyle blushed, and shrugged, and rubbed his eyes. "Well, it's not hard!" he exclaimed. "Besides, you're the one who knows how long I've been with Craig."
Stan pointed to a piece of paper taped to the inside of Kyle's locker. "Fuck you, dude. You're the one who has 'three-week anniversary' written on a fucking calendar in your locker with a goddamn heart around it!"
"Craig drew that."
"Oh, Craig is just so fucking cute," Stan growled.
"Oh, I know, isn't he just?"
"No. No, dude, he is not."
"Well, that's fine for you, you put your tongue in vagina."
"Yeah," Stan sighed, finally relaxing a little and leaning back against the locker next to Kyle's. "Well, I just wanted to say that I'm, ah, I'm going with Bebe."
"Oh." Kyle lowered his eyes. "That's cool. Didn't think you'd want to go."
"I don't really." Stan flashed a wicked smile and began to speak quicker. "But she said she'd put out, so … well, how do you turn down that offer?"
"Haven't you … haven't you already had Bebe?"
"Yeah. But look, she puts on a solid show. Once you're in repeats you have to watch the ones you liked the first time, if you know what I mean."
"Um." Kyle was shuffling his feet, trying hard not to look at Stan.
"Well, this was enlightening," Stan said casually, patting Kyle on the shoulder. "See you around, dude."
Kyle remained in the middle of the hallway, jacket half-off one shoulder, mouth agape. He shut his eyes tightly. "God dammn it," he moaned, making damn sure he didn't see Stan walking away. Again.
XXX
By mid-April things were looking up. Kind of. Stan and Kyle were speaking — a little. They didn't have much time to talk now that Stan scrimmaged with the other kids from the town who played regional football. On top of that, Kyle's life had totally become Craig. It was nearly impossible to have a conversation with him without Craig being brought up. Stan convinced himself that it wasn't so much that he didn't like Craig. Craig was just utterly boring, and the things Kyle had to say about him were boring.
For example, Craig wanted to be a merchant mariner. Just kidding, he wanted to be a hairstylist. Just kidding! He wanted to be cinematographer. His parents bought him a camera for Christmas. Oh, what didn't Craig take videos of? Stan imagined that if he were interested — which he wasn't — he could find footage of Kyle online, probably hogtied with some manner of something stuck up his rear. How upsetting.
Although to be fair, Stan hadn't heard anything about their sexual exploits after the initial hook-up. It didn't make any sense — he and Bebe were spending a lot of time together these days (as much time as he could spare, in any case) and she was the biggest gossip in school. After her, the student with the second-loosest lips was probably Craig. So Stan felt he should have received some information by this point, so maybe nothing was happening. He couldn't imagine Kyle not telling him, anyway. The old Kyle certainly would have. This Kyle was probably too busy enjoying Craig's business to bother wasting his time talking to Stan about what was going on down at the store.
XXX
The week before the dance found Butters sitting at a little card table in the middle of the hallway during lunch periods, selling tickets. They were 4 for a single and 7 for a couple, if you bought in advance. At the door, tickets would go up exponentially … to 5 for a single and 8 for a couple. Despite having been asked by Bebe, Stan found himself sneaking up to the table one day, 7 in hand, looking to buy a ticket.
Butters was, as always, pretty happy to see Stan. Stan was, of course, less than happy to know that Butters' ass crack was peeking out of his pants back there. Still, he approached with a smile, pretty pleased with himself for no real reason.
"I'd like a couples' ticket, please, Butters," he said cheerfully, slamming seven singles down on the table.
"Why isn't Bebe buying your ticket?" Butters asked, tearing one off his giant roll.
"Oh, I just figured this was something I should pay for."
"She cheaped out on you, didn't she?"
"Of course."
"Well, that's not very nice."
"Whatever. It's 7, I can afford it."
"I know what you mean. My father pays me 2 an hour to sweep the basement, and the garage. If I don't do it, he says he'll ground me, but I've never not done it. Do you think he would?"
"I honestly don't know."
"I'm sure glad you're coming to the dance, Stan."
"Oh, yeah," Stan lied. "Me too. See you around, Butters." As he turned around to depart, he smacked right into someone.
"Ow!"
"Sorry," Stan mumbled, stepping back to see that he'd just walked into Wendy Testaburger.
"Oh, it's okay," she said airily. "What're you up to?"
"Nothing much. I was just buying a ticket to the dance from Butters."
Stan and Wendy both turned and look down at Butters, who was looking up at them with his hands folded on the table, grinning widely. "Hiya Wendy!" Butters cheered.
"Hi," she sneered. It was odd — she wasn't usually this nasty to someone who didn't warrant it. "Give me a ticket." She pulled a 5 bill out of her pocket and tossed it, crumpled up, into Butters' face. He attempted to catch it, but it toppled down his striped scarf and landed on the ground.
"Sure thing!" Butters bent over to fish his money off the floor.
"So." Wendy turned back to Stan. "You and Bebe again, huh?"
"I guess," Stan said ambivalently. "I would have gone with you if you'd only—"
"Only a single?" Butters asked over him.
"Yes," Wendy spat. "One, one ticket. One ticket costs 4, you owe me 1."
"Oh. Okay."
"Sorry," Wendy said to Stan, giving Butters the finger off to the side. "That's kind of you to say, Stan, but I already have a date. Or I thought I did, but it turns out that sometimes men actually don't think with their dicks."
"Huh?"
"Here you go," Butters said, handing Wendy a ticket.
"Thank you." She snatched it out of Butters' hand, along with her change.
"Bye again, Butters," Stan repeated, walking away with Wendy.
"So, the after party," she said leadingly.
"I haven't heard about an after party."
"Well," she scoffed. "Of course you haven't. It's completely on the down-low. A select crowd. But you know you're welcome."
"Because I'm going with Bebe."
"Well, of course." Wendy stuck her ticket into her back pocket. "Not really a party so much as post-gaming." She paused. "You in?"
"Of course."
"Great! My parents are out of town that weekend. But seriously! Keep it down, okay? I don't want a bunch of underclassmen and pathetic fags showing up. Got it?"
"Got it," Stan confirmed. "No pathetic fags."
"That's right," she nodded. "No pathetic ones."
XXX
Stan decided to flout Wendy's orders, in regard to issuing invitations to 'pathetic fags.' Wendy had never come off as homophobic, although she was resolutely heterosexual, or at least as heterosexual as Stan himself was. He liked to think of her as a giver, particularly because she gave stunning head, and because she never acted indignant about the whole thing. She had never thrown herself on him, which many girls in town were wont to do, and she encouraged the pursuit that Stan yearned for. This lovely dynamic resulted in the most mind-blowing sex, so Stan didn't want to piss her off. Still, his mind was on other things (or rather people) these days, so he told himself he would tread carefully, and invite no pathetic fags to her house — only Kyle.
For the past month or so Kyle had been sitting with Craig during study hall. Today, though, he was by himself, flipping through his Latin text, unquestionably checking some kind of syntax. Stan could tell that his little notebook was open to a page of half-completed sentence translations.
He approached with caution, but it was a wasted effort, because Kyle's head jolted up in shock the moment he slammed his book down on the opposite side of the table. "Oh, Jesus," he panted, sticking a pen in his textbook and shutting the cover.
"Hey."
"Don't do that, dude, I thought you were Craig."
Stan rolled his eyes. "Oh, I am."
"That's not funny."
"I wasn't being funny."
Kyle blinked and said, "Right," drawing out the I. But after that they sat there for a few seconds, just looking at one another. Kyle shuffled his feet. Stan coughed.
"So," he began cautiously, his lukewarm smile dissolving into seriousness. "Have you heard about Wendy's party?"
"I don't talk to girls," Kyle said in all seriousness.
"Well, I don't know, maybe you heard through your boyfriend."
"Mmm, no, he hasn't said anything about a party."
"Okay. Well. Saturday night, after the dance, Wendy's having people over."
"This is the first I'm hearing of it."
"Well, of course, it's totally on the down-low."
"The who?"
Stan just waggled his eyebrows.
"What's on the down-low?" a third voice asked. A black-clad torso seated itself in the chair next to Kyle and began remove books from a backpack.
Stan tried to wave this off. "Nothing, Kenny."
"Stanley says Wendy's having a party."
"No she's not!" Stan hissed.
"You just said she was, dude!"
"So she isn't having a party?" Kenny asked, blinking. He pulled a felt-tipped pen from his back pocket and removed the cap with his teeth.
"You just said she is!"
"She's not!"
Kenny put his hands up, the pen still uncapped between his middle and index fingers. "This is one of the pressing issues of our time," he said slowly. "So think very, very carefully. Is Wendy having a party?"
"No," Stan said very clearly. "She is not."
"You just told me she is!"
"All right, fine!" Stan pounded his fist on the table for some reason. He then shrugged. "Okay, she's having a party." He lowered his voice. "But you both understand, she told me to keep it on the down-low."
"It's pretty low down if I haven't heard about it," Kenny mused. "Why would you lie to me about it anyway?"
"Well." Stan lowered his voice again, really not wanting to risk someone overhearing. Or, worse, Wendy hearing him discussing it. Or, even worse than that, Bebe hearing him, and deciding maybe she wasn't horny for his loving, or whatever thing she'd concluded she had to gain from making him endure the torture of a school dance. "It's just that she told me—" He blinked. "Well, she said she didn't want me to invite any pathetic fags."
"Then what the hell were you doing telling him?" Kenny exclaimed, jabbing the bottom of his pen into Kyle's arm.
"Um, wow," was all Kyle would manage.
"Her words," Stan reassured them. "Not mine."
"Well, sailor." Kenny grabbed Stan's hand and began doodling something on it. He didn't look down at this, fairly certain that he deserved whatever he got from Kenny. "Well," he mumbled again while drawing. Stan continued to ignore him, staring right at Kyle.
"I just thought it would be nice if you were there," he said simply.
"All right," Kyle muttered. "We'll go."
"We? Me and you?" Stan asked.
"No, we, me and Craig."
"Craig?" Stan cried out, pulling his hand away from Kenny.
"Hey!" he cried. "I wasn't done! You messed me up!"
Stan glanced down at his hand, turning it over in disbelief. "You … you drew a penis on me."
"Yeah, because you're a motherfucking dickhead," Kenny said conclusively.
"I take offense with that."
"Oh, bitch, please. Like I should care what you give a shit about since you're being such a cock about this party, not inviting me and all."
"It's not my party! And it's not even a party, it's more like a post-game," Stan parroted, not knowing how to defend himself.
"Well, I'll forgive you if you invite me."
"It's not his party," Kyle offered, trying to be helpful.
"It's not a party at all!" Stan sighed in exasperation. "Fine, dude. Kenny. Please come to Wendy's party … deal. I know you're good for some drinks if nothing else."
"That right," Kenny said smugly, recapping his pen.
"I didn't even know you were going to the dance," Kyle said.
"Oh," Kenny said lamely. "Well, I'm not. But I can still go to the party."
"Well, maybe if we're all there it won't blow nearly as hard," Stan reasoned.
"Nope."
"Aw, come on, dude," Stan pleaded. "Why not?"
"Because, Chris doesn't want to go."
"What?' Stan asked, suddenly surprised. "What the hell do you care what that freak does?"
Kenny's face immediately went red, and he gritted his teeth. "Well," he spat. "Some friends you are."
"I don't understand," said Kyle.
"Me neither."
"All right, well, let me spell it out for you: Chris—"
"You mean, Christophe," Stan said, not really asking.
"He hates that name, but yes, Chris is my boyfriend."
Kyle and Stan both stared at Kenny like he had a disgusting skin disease. It was, in all honestly, about the most stomach-turning thing Stan had heard all day. "You what?" he shrieked, the pretense of study hall quietude going right out the window. Kyle, not knowing what to say, just stared at Kenny, and when Kenny tried to make eye contact, he quickly averted his gaze, turning his face down to bore his sights into the table.
"We've been dating since the school year began," Kenny continued. He was audibly angry, his voice tinged with hurt. "I was sort of wondering if you guys already knew and you just weren't bringing it up because you're assholes or what, but I guess you're really both too absorbed in your bullshit sexual-tension drama to notice what's going on with me."
"But you were … you were with Red two months ago!" Stan protested.
"Yeah, well, the thing with that is, Sherlock, we have an open relationship. I'm with a lot of people a lot of the time."
"You should have just said something!"
"Well, don't feel too bad, Stan," Kenny said, standing up. He made guns with his fingers. "He doesn't like you guys, either." He shook his head. "Man. You guys are such selfish pricks."
As Kenny was walking away, Stan looked to Kyle, whose head was still hung low. "Hey," he said softly. "I wouldn't worry about him."
Kyle lifted his head and rubbed his eyes. "Him?" he asked. "Dude, it's not him I'm worried about."
"Oh."
Kyle didn't bother removing his pen from his Latin book, which he shoved into his backpack before hightailing it out of the library as quickly as possible, leaving Stan sitting at the table on his own, wondering what the hell Kenny was thinking, and what the hell Kyle was talking about.
XXX
It had been Kyle who had asked, actually. Craig liked dancing, obviously. But he liked to do it on his own terms, in his own room, with his own friends. Dancing was supposed to be fun and sexy and there was nothing even remotely fun and sexy about school. Therefore, in Craig's mind, the term "school dance" was oxymoronic, or perhaps just moronic. He spent all week long sitting in classes wishing he weren't there, his mind virtually clamoring to get out, to escape, to run out into the streets and far, far away from anyplace where he'd be told what to do, or who to talk to. The idea of dancing at school, where he was trapped for seven hours, five days a week, didn't sound like a good time regardless of who he went with.
And honestly, he wondered why Kyle wanted to go anyway. Kyle was a horrible, horrible dancer. When they danced together, late one night in Craig's room, funky music bleeping along carelessly, Kyle had been slightly drunk on mojitos but for that matter, so had Craig — who had to admit that that was something rather secretly pretty about seeing Kyle turn and wriggle his hips giddily, for Craig's own enjoyment. But, yeah, in front of the school, not so much. And what else was there to do — sit around on the bleachers, watching everyone else stumble around the gym? If it had been anyone else, Craig would have resigned himself to an evening of playing fashion critic, scoping out the ill-advised choices on the parts of ninth-grade girls. But Kyle was too precious to waste on something so boorish, albeit entertaining. Besides, being with Kyle was entertainment in itself. He was prone to random outbursts of unguarded emotion, verbally sparring with both sworn enemies and random passersby. It made Craig a little lascivious just thinking about it.
He was still one part confused and one part excited when he banged on the Broflovskis' door that evening, one hand clutching a bouquet of calla lilies, although perhaps 'bouquet' was stretching it — it was a bunch of about four majestic stems, each one crowned with a sleek white head. Craig didn't know why, but they felt phallic to him, or about as phallic as a flower could be, considering that blooms were generally accepted as a metaphor for the female anatomy. He'd tied a ribbon around them, but when he'd gone to the gift store to look for an acceptably masculine style, the best he'd been able to do was black. "I'm so sorry for your loss," the saleswoman had said.
"Who?" Craig had replied.
"Oh," she said sheepishly. "You know, when someone dies, you wear a piece of back ribbon."
"You do?"
"Well, some people do." She handed him back his change. "I think particularly in the Jewish faith."
"Oh really?" he'd asked, making jaunty eyebrows.
"Um, sure," she'd hastily agreed, a little weirded out by him. "Thanks for shopping."
"Thanks for your sympathies," Craig had responded. He also helped himself to a handful of starlight peppermints on the way out the door.
But here he was, chewing up the end of a mint, and slamming his fist against the front door of Kyle's house, not really sure just what the fuck he was doing going to this dance. When the door did swing open, he was fully expecting to see Kyle there, ready and waiting to go, hopefully wearing something hot. This prompted Craig to think about what sorts of hot little numbers Kyle might own, but he really didn't see his boyfriend as the kind of guy to make Daisy Dukes out of an old pair of jeans, or own a fishnet shirt. Kyle barely knew how to dress himself, although he figured it was something they could work on later.
And this was what Craig was pondering when Mr. Broflovski opened the door and gave his son's caller a warm, broad smile. "Kyle's upstairs getting ready," he said gently. Craig seemed to not hear this.
"It is I, Craig." He raised his unencumbered hand into the air and flashed a toothy grin.
Gerald Broflovski looked at the boy in front of him, whose eyes were rimmed in black makeup. "Yes, Craig," he said. "I've known you since you were 4."
"I am here for your son."
Gerald smiled again. "And what are your intensions toward my son?"
"Um." Craig blinked. "Uh huh." He began to dig around in his back pocket and he pulled out a condom. "Protected, I assure you," he said haughtily, waving it in Kyle's father's face.
"Um, yeah." There was a moment of silence before Gerald cocked an eyebrow and said, "You might want to be careful of whose face you wave that around in." Craig shrugged, and crossed his arms. "If I were a less reasonable man, I might not let you go out with my kid now. I mean, I'm not stupid, but it might be in your interest to refrain from flaunting your plans."
"You asked me my intentions."
Gerald just sighed. "Do you want to come in, Craig?"
Craig did indeed want to come in, and he pushed past the man blocking the door, proceeding to stomp up the stairs. Gerald shut the door and smiled to himself, turning to his wife, whom Craig hadn't noticed standing off to the side.
"He's a very brazen boy," Sheila said carefully. "I don't trust him with Kyle."
"Kyle is old enough to make his own decisions."
"Decisions? He's going to make mistakes!"
"And we're going to let him."
"But," Sheila sniffed. "My baby."
"Yeah. I know," Gerald sighed. "I know."
XXX
Kyle was, in fact, getting ready, although as far as Craig could perceive this process involved a lot of cursing, and apparently sitting in front of a mirror with a spray bottle of water and a straight iron. The scent of burning hair lingered in the bathroom. "Straightening your hair? How ironic!" Craig cried happily.
"What? Oh, fuck." Kyle slammed down the hair straightener. "Why are you so early?"
"I'm not early. You're late."
"Well, as you can see I'm not really done here."
"What are you doing to your head?" Craig asked, approaching Kyle from behind. He took a warm lock and yanked on it.
"Ow!" Kyle tried to swat Craig's hand away from his head. "Don't do that."
Craig refused to budge. "Not that it's not flattering, dear, but I don't require this sort of effort." He removed his hand, but not before giving an untouched, bouncy curl a quick tug. "I like your pretty hair just how it is."
"Well," Kyle huffed, turning himself to face Craig. "Maybe I'm not doing it for you."
"Aw. Well." He lifted the flowers. "Look what I bought you."
"What the hell." Kyle voice pulsed with amusement and a touch of confusion
"They're for you." Craig extended the bunch of flowers in offering.
"I know that." Kyle snatched the lilies away from Craig and lifted then to his nose, taking a whiff. "Smells nice."
"I didn't think they smelled like anything. I think you're smelling cooked hair. Where the fuck did you get this, anyway?" Craig asked, picking up the iron and sniffing it. It smelled like a kind of fried chalkiness. "What the fuck."
"If you must know, I swiped it from my mother."
"She straightens her hair?"
Kyle rolled his eyes. "You've obviously never looked at it up close."
"And I'm sure I never will."
Kyle laid the flowers down on the counter. "Well, I'm not really ready to go. I mean," he indicated his head, "I'm not sure I should go out with half of it wilted and half of it just as hideous as ever."
"Why are you doing this?"
"I don't know," Kyle said honestly. "I thought I should."
Craig sighed and put his hands on Kyle's shoulders. "Listen to me," he said slowly. "I will fix it for you."
"You will."
"Yes, I will. I've been doing my sister's hair forever. I will make it look spectacular. But you have to promise me something."
"What?"
Craig leaned into Kyle's ear. "Promise me you will never, ever touch it again."
Kyle swallowed. "Okay," he agreed. "If you insist."
"I insist." Craig picked up the iron and cranked up the heat setting.
XXX
To Kyle, the turnabout dance was quantifiable in measurements of who said what about his hair. Craig pronounced it "breathtaking," but Craig always felt his work was on the brighter side of spectacular — he also rated his rimming skills at 17 out of 10, and had once made himself a "best pick-up truck parallel parker" award certificate, which he actually bothered to have framed. It hung in his bathroom.
Heidi Turner, in passing, mumbled something about not knowing his hair could do 'that.' When Kyle asked what exactly 'that' was, Heidi just shrugged. A few people just kind of looked at him funny, like they didn't know who he was or what he was doing there with Craig. But the remark that made Kyle blush with abandon was when Stan came up to him near the door and said, "New look?"
"It's not permanent," Kyle had replied, fanning himself a little.
"Neat." And if it felt like Stan was about to lean in and kiss him, or just whisper something dumb about his hair, Kyle would never be able to verify it, because it was at this moment that Bebe ran in and grabbed Stan's arm, yanking him toward the dance floor. Kyle watched him stagger off with his date, the smell of rum wafting around where his wet breath lingered. Kyle held his bottle of water and sighed — he knew Stan would never kiss him.
Perhaps this dance was even lamer than projected because he was totally, horribly sober. Craig had made him promise not to drink — sworn up and down that he had a very good reason why Kyle needed to be mostly sober at the end of the night, "but not too sober," and Kyle had a pretty good idea of what Craig was getting at. He also knew himself pretty well, and he was quite painfully aware that if he began drinking, the likelihood of being able to halt was fairly low. And so here he was in the gym, lingering by the entrance with his bottle of water, watching Stan and Bebe flounce off to make asses of themselves on the dance floor.
It was not a particularly memorable event. A couple of sophomores vomited, and were thusly sent home. Stan and Bebe ground their pelvises into each other, clinging to one another as if to a life preserver. Bebe in particular flounced her butt in time to the music, joyously shaking with her arms in the air while Stan looked awkwardly detached from the scene. Obviously, he'd helped himself to some of his father's rations on the way out the door. Kyle could only hope that Bebe hadn't been involved, but he knew it was too much to expect. He was painfully aware of what was coming.
A distinct sense of gloom lingered throughout the dance. It didn't matter that Craig was his usual self, alternately gentlemanly and crass, running off to talk to random people the entire night only to return with another bottle of water and a story about 'accidentally' snapping a freshman girl's bra. "But that's what you get for not going strapless," he reasoned. Kyle just shrugged. He didn't realize or care that bras may or may not have straps; the possibility of touching one of these bra straps was likewise uninteresting to him. As was this entire dance. The cheesy flashing lights, the boring soundtrack … all any of it did was provide a backdrop to his misery as he sat on the bleachers watching Stan. Then Craig would run back up to him with some more water, and God, how Kyle hated Craig's ability to make this situation any fun at all. He didn't know why he wanted to go to this. At first he'd figured that it was what real couples did, and weren't he and Craig a real couple? But the longer he sat with his head in his hands, staring at his best friend's date with the hot ire of a thousand energy-wasting 150-watt lightbulbs, the more he began to feel that he and Craig were just as able to be a real couple without ever going to another school function again. Fine, done. He'd made a mistake, but now he'd made a decision.
It seemingly dragged on forever, but of course, that was mere hyperbole — it was over by midnight. And so before he knew it, Kyle found himself trudging through town along the side of the road, Craig's arm around his shoulders, the material of each other's coats making small noises as they rubbed together in the frigid darkness. Craig was kind of talking at great length about someone's outfit, and Kyle allowed himself to drift back to the dance, where sad little Butters sat by himself at the ticket table twiddling his thumbs and sighing. "Cartman not a dance fan?" Kyle had asked him, looking for people to speak with to stave off his boredom.
"Huh? Oh. I guess not." Butters tapped the cash box. It made a satisfyingly metallic sound. "I'm meeting up with him after."
"He's making himself awfully scarce these days."
"Aw, don't I know it." He smiled sadly. "He's always talking to that Frank Granger fella, or hanging out with Wendy. People just want his attention so bad, and if it's not them, it's the football team."
Kyle raised an eyebrow. "Wendy, huh? Butters, don't you ever—"
Butters cut him off. "Don't you say it. I know you think I'm just a naïve little thing, and, well, I'm not. And I don't want to fight with you or anything."
"But don't you—"
"No." His fingers tensed on the cashbox,
"All right, fine. Good dance, Butters."
"I know you don't mean that."
Kyle had been turned around, planning on finding someone else to bug while Craig played social butterfly with Thomas and a bunch of sophomore girls, but this comment of Butters' just caught him, as if it were a hook on his black shirt, and he turned, frowning.
"Well, fuck it, Butters. Who the fuck says what they mean all the damn time?"
"Gee, I don't know. Some people."
"Some retarded people."
Now, in the murky cold, with the purple sky lit by tiny white stars, Kyle let Craig drag him along the dirt shoulder of the street. He was babbling about nothing, as he was wont to do. But Kyle wasn't listening. He thought about Butters, and his stupid — well, gay — little dance. What had any of it accomplished for any of them? What had it accomplished for Butters? Nothing, that was what. Nothing that boy did would ever get him what he wanted. All he would ever be was strung along, made to grope for the love of a boy who was too preoccupied with his own agenda to even notice beyond amusement. And that was fine, Kyle guessed. In his heart he pitied the blond boy, but he knew, rationally, that anyone that simplistic and naïve was just begging for what he deserved.
XXX
"Kyle, Craig," Wendy said curiously. She leaned against the door, hand on her jaunty hip, thigh exposed through a slit in her skirt. "I, uh, wasn't expecting you guys."
"No? How weird. You look totally hot, Wends." Craig flashed his toothy smile. "Dig the top."
"Yeah?" she asked, fingering the lacy material. "I got last week, it was on sale."
"No way."
"Yes way. I was like, they won't have this in my size, but they did. I don't know, things don't usually fit over my…" She pointed to her chest and mouthed the word 'cleavage.'
Tapping his foot impatiently, Kyle sighed. It was cold out, and he had no interest in discussing women's clothing, or really any clothing, pretty much ever. So he interjected: "I'm really sorry, Wendy. I know it's supposed to be small, but Stan asked me to come, and I couldn't not bring Craig, and—"
"It's fine," she said, cutting him off with a belabored sigh. "Basically half the school is here anyway." And she stepped backward with the door to reveal a full house of revelers, many of whom Kyle did not recall seeing at the dance, or even in school before at all. But he saw Clyde and a younger girl talking near the staircase, and spied Thomas lurking in the background, drinking and flinching, probably cursing. "So you guys want to come in, or just hang out here?"
"Oh, no." Craig stepped over the threshold and pulled Kyle along with him. "I think we'll join you in there." He removed his coat and helped Kyle remove his. Wendy, who was pursing her lips while observing this scene, slumped when Craig handed her their garments. "Put those somewhere," he said.
"But I—"
"Thanks, Wendy!" Craig was already stalking off, Kyle's hand in his, dragging the redhead toward the kitchen. "You're the best!"
As he was led through the Testaburger living room, Kyle looked for any of his closer friends, but seeing none of them he just let himself be dragged along until Craig stopped near the kitchen.
"I have to go talk to Token," he said.
"Oh, godammit," Kyle moaned. "About what?"
"I can't tell you."
"What?"
"It's a surprise."
"What!"
"Calm down. I asked him to get me something."
"Oh, Jesus Christ. Now Token is selling drugs?"
Craig rolled his eyes as a skinny senior girl with dingy bleached dreadlocks slithered between the two of them into the kitchen without giving even a word of acknowledgment, let alone apology.
"Fucking hell," Kyle sighed.
"Just trust me." Craig leaned in and gave Kyle a quick peck on the nose. "Why don't you go mingle?"
"I've been mingling all night! I don't like mingling."
"Go find someone to talk to. Why don't you talk to Thomas? He's really nice."
"He's impossible to have a conversation with!"
"I know," Craig agreed. "Don't you find that a little adorable?"
"Oooh." Kyle crossed his arms. "So that means you find him adorable."
Craig smirked, and cupped Kyle's cheeks in his hand. "Is my little boy jealous?"
"Don't be a dick, Craig."
Craning his neck to get a better look into the kitchen, Craig spotted Token and gave a quick nod in his direction. "There's Token," he said. "I'm going to talk to him. Just try to relax or something, okay?" Craig gave Kyle another brief kiss, this time on the temple, and he walked away with his hands in his pockets as Kyle heard him call out Token's name.
"Relax," Kyle said to himself. "Who does he think he is telling me—"
He turned away from the kitchen, only to smack into what he might easily have mistaken for a wall.
"Oh, hi, Kyle."
"We're not doing this, shithead." Kyle tried to side-step Cartman, but the larger boy just side-stepped along with him. "Get out of my way."
"I like your hair," Cartman continued, pretending not to hear Kyle's order. "You do that for Craig? Or for Stan?"
"I'm not in the mood for this, Cartman."
"Oh, right. Well, I'll tell Frank you said hi."
"Yeah, please also tell him I said he can rot in hell."
"That's not very nice," he replied, but Kyle maneuvered his way around the large boy, making quite sure not to brush up against him at all, or, failing that, as slightly as possible, on his way. He heard the fading refrain of Cartman's amused chuckle, but he didn't stop to return any insults. He fled.
He wasn't sure where to go. He nearly walked straight into Clyde and his younger lady friend basically chewing one another's tongues off, and for a moment Kyle was worried he might have to speak with Clyde or worse yet apologize, but neither of them noticed him before he made a mad dash into the dining room.
Kyle thought about Clyde, who was whiny and passive, completely unsure of himself and not afraid to make these things known to everyone he came across. And yet somehow, he managed to find someone at this party, let alone countless others. Remembering the time he'd kissed Clyde, Kyle shuddered. He liked to think it wasn't his fault — he preferred to blame so many of those little indiscretions on the Captain, or whatever it was he was drinking that night. Still, it didn't go very far. Clyde had been lying on the bed of the current senior whose house they were at, his lips scented like the cheap McCormick-supplied beer and Doritos he'd been consuming. As soon as he felt Kyle's mouth, he'd literally thrown the other boy off of him and gotten up off the bed, clutching his middle. "Get off me!" he'd shrieked. "I'm not gay!" And then he'd run into the adjacent bathroom. This was a year ago.
And they really hadn't spoken since.
Kyle wandered around the house. He tried to get upstairs, but some seniors he didn't know were using them for their own purposes, and stepping over people was just awkward. He silently cursed Craig, whom he was beginning to resent for throwing him to the wolves like this. Some partygoers attempted to make eye contact, or began to say something. Kyle wanted to speak to no one, save maybe two people. Instead of being here, he could be at Craig's, doing whatever it was Craig wanted to go do, not that he didn't have a fairly direct knowledge of what this thing was. Usually he enjoyed parties, and he wondered why this one was so god-forsakenly horrible. Then he realized that this was probably the first party he'd been to since age 12 at which he'd actually been sober for more than a brief period following his arrival.
Not really wanting to keep wandering around, and fearing someone with more than a cursory interest in speaking to him popping out from behind a piece of furniture, he fell onto the couch with a couple of typical stoners who were giggling about string cheese. Man, stoners were boring. He curled up and averted his gaze from them and the rest of the room, which left him staring at his own knees.
XXX
Stan hated beer pong for a good reason: He was awesome at it. He never missed, and as a result, whoever was across the table from him would begin to falter more and more frequently, until Stan and whoever he was playing with was left with a nearly full set of cups for the other team to drink up. He was too good a pitcher for this game to ever get him drunk, and his buzz from the dance was quickly fading.
And yet here he was, in Wendy's basement, facing off against the unlikely duo of Tweek and Butters. It was pathetic.
"Oh Jesus!" Tweek pulled on his hair and grimaced. "I missed again!"
"Aw, it's okay," Butters reassured him. "You did your best."
"Uh huh." Stan rolled his eyes. He turned to his partner, Mark, and sighed. "Your turn," he mumbled.
"All right." Mark carefully picked up a ball from the table, and shut one eye, focusing in on one of Butters and Tweek's cups.
"Ah, shit! He's going to make it! Oh my god, ah!"
"It'll be all right," Butters soothed, calmly patting Tweek on the back. "Maybe he won't—" A ping-pong ball plopped into one of their remaining cups. "Oh, I guess he did."
"Ah!" Tweek accepted the red plastic cup Butters was offering him, and as his hands trembled on the way to his mouth, little splashes of beer were lost. Stan pinched the bridge of his nose, mourning the loss of alcohol he could have been drinking, in theory, if not for this fucking game.
"Woo!" Bebe shrieked. She was sitting a chair, drinking a wine cooler. "Go Stan!"
"It was my shot."
"Whatever, Mark," Stan said. "Let's just get this over with."
"Well, don't you think it's rather unfair of you to be taking credit for my shot?"
Stan gritted his teeth. "I'm not. It's Bebe—"
Stan and Mark saw a little white orb whiz passed their heads. "Aw, hamburgers," Butters moaned in the distance. "Missed again."
"This game is so much pressure!"
Mark leaned in. "I think we need a strategy," he whispered.
"What? No, that's retarded." He looked away to eye Butters and Tweek — the former was quite obviously picking his underwear out of his ass; the latter was hugging himself tightly, whipping his head from side to side.
Stan turned to speak to Bebe. "This is retarded," he said.
"But you're doing so well."
"I forfeit," Stan announced.
"But we're going to win!" Mark protested, arms akimbo.
"The point of the game is not to win."
"What's the point of doing anything and not making a valiant effort to be the best?"
"Shit, Mark, dude, I don't know." Stan paused. "Getting loaded?" Both Stan and Mark turned to see Team Tweekers clumsily handling the alcohol.
"These cups are all sticky," Butters sighed, wiping a hand on his plastic pants. "Blech." Then he kept drinking.
"Ohhhhh no," Tweek moaned in response. "How the fuck am I supposed to drink all of this? What if I drink so much I have to go to the bathroom and then I try to get into the bathroom and someone's in the bathroom and then I can't hold it so I try to go in a plant and then someone sees me and I get shy so I try to go back to the bathroom but someone is still in there and oh my god, it's getting real dire so I go upstairs and then I can't hold it anymore I just can't so I pee on myself, and everyone sees me and they laugh at me, and of course I've ruined Wendy's carpet, dear god, she'll get pissed at me and I'll be sued for underage drinking and vandalism and then—holy shit! Her parents take me down to the station and they give me a drug test!" Somewhere in the middle of this crazed rant Tweek had grabbed Butter's by the collar of his shirt and was now shaking him. Butters, for his part, was calmly drinking beer. "Butters, what if they give me a drug test! It's just so freaking, like — seriously, I can't go to jail! Do you know what they do to guys like me in there? They'll rape me! Oh shit!"
"There there," Butters said calmly after swallowing a mouthful. He patted Tweek on the head but scowled when he touched the little skitzo. "Your hair is all clumpy," he remarked.
"Ahhhhh! Oh lord!"
"Okay," Stan said again, shaking his head. "I've had about enough of this." He grabbed Bebe by the wrist and yanked her out of the chair.
XXX
"Here," Craig said warmly, sticking a red plastic cup in Kyle's line of vision. "Drink this."
"Uh." Kyle sniffed it. "What is this?" He peered down into the cup, where a frothy liquid in an unusual neon-pink color was sloshing around. Kyle was immediately turned off by the color — but to be fair, he figured that some of it might have had something to do with the vessel the drink was contained in, and the questionable mood lighting of the Testaburger living room.
"Buck's fizz," Craig said simply. "I bought the Moet off Token. It's classy. You'll like it."
Kyle swirled the glass, and put it to his lips. He glanced at Craig, who was giving him an annoyed look. Not wanting to seem like he was too hesitant, Kyle took a sip, and wiped his mouth.
"It's just a fucking mimosa," he said, wondering if Wendy's family didn't own any champagne flutes.
"Correction: It has grenadine in it."
"And that makes it something else?" Craig nodded. "I thought you didn't want me drinking."
"They say alcohol is a social lubricant."
"I know."
"Well, that's not the only thing it lubricates." While Craig was speaking, Kyle continued to drink his champagne and juice. But then he nearly spit a mouthful of it back into his cup.
"No way this shit is going to lube up my ass, Craig."
"Well, not literally, no. Just trust me. Drink up."
"Then why—"
"Well, it wouldn't do me any good if you were too drunk to get it up, would it? Or worse yet, totally blacked out. Or violently ill."
"Yeah," Kyle agreed. "No. I mean, what kind of guy would barf on someone he wanted to have sex with?"
It was at this moment that a mass of entangled limbs landed on the couch right next to Craig, who merely rolled his eyes and inched away from a mop of curly blonde hair and a red shirt that was cut low in the back.
"Stan?" Kyle asked, reaching over both Craig and Bebe to poke the black-haired boy kissing her aggressively.
"Huh?" When Stan plied his lips away from Bebe's, a loud suction sound made Craig grimace — and Kyle didn't look so pleased about it either. "Oh, hey." Stan wiped his lips with the back of his wrist and took a breath.
"Shouldn't you guys be doing that in private?" Kyle asked.
"Yeah," Craig agreed lamely, as he had actually begun many a night of passion on someone's couch, or in the middle of a party.
"Oh, Craig," Bebe sighed, adjusting herself and scowling. "Get over yourself. I was basically scarred for life when I saw you going at it on Red's couch with Mark in ninth grade."
"Looks like you recovered to me," Craig replied.
"Ugh, that is so like you, not acknowledging my emotional pain."
"Says the girl using Stan Marsh as her own personal Hitachi."
"Ah, hey," Stan said coolly. "I'm here on my own volition."
"Me too," Kyle added quickly, feeling his heart beat a bit faster.
"We were here first," Craig said.
"You don't own the couch, Craig."
"I do too, Bebe."
"Oh, don't you give me the finger!"
"I'm not the one basically getting fingered."
"Yeah, I'll bet you do the fingering. Doesn't he?" Bebe directed this at Kyle.
"You don't have to answer that, baby. Let me take care of this."
"Don't you talk down to him!" Stan erupted, standing up. A few people in the room looked over at him, but most were too involved in drinking or displaying their own affection publicly to notice.
"Stan!" Bebe snapped. "You are my date, and I expect you to defend my honor!"
"Ugh, Bebe," Stan groaned. Then he turned to Craig. "What the fuck, dude?"
"I didn't do anything."
"You started a fight with my date." He paused. His pursed lips trembled as he tried to avoid adding the next part, but he couldn't stop himself. "And you can't order Kyle around like a piece of meat!"
Now Craig stood up, and a few more people turned their attention to the scene. "You can say whatever you want, guy, but the fact is he is my piece of meat. Not to mention you're mixing your metaphors!"
"I'll metaphor you!" Stan threatened.
"Scary!" Craig cried, getting up. "Is that some kind of breeder football thing?"
"Why are people always calling me that?"
"I don't know." Craig rolled his eyes again. "Let's think." He put his hand to his chin in mock-thoughtfulness. "Can you help me, Bebe? I'm trying to figure this out."
"Craig," Kyle said softly. He pulled on the sleeve of Craig's shirt.
"I said I'd take care of it," Craig responded.
"Why do you let him talk to you like that?" Stan asked. Kyle let go of Craig's shirt and looked up at Stan, who was frowning in consternation.
"I'll talk to him however I want because he knows I treat him like a fucking human being, which is better than I can say for you."
"He's my best friend! I'd never do anything—"
"Exactly."
"I don't even know what you're talking about!"
"I am so sick of this!" Bebe shouted, and the entire room, give or take, looked over at the couch.
"Bebe!" someone cried, and soon Wendy was hopping over some boy who was lying on the floor, and a lamp that had been knocked over. "What's wrong?"
"Fucking Craig is what's wrong!" Bebe pointed to Craig. "He's fucking fighting with Stan over this idiot." She pointed to Kyle, who furiously blushed and put a hand to his chest, not knowing how to defend himself. "And all Stan and I were trying to do was make out, and Craig is being a fucking cock-block, like if he's not getting any no one else can."
"I'm getting plenty," Craig said calmly. Stan's eyebrows shot up with immediacy, and he looked down to Kyle, who gazed back up at him, mouth open, hoping beyond hope he could think of something to say. He knew Stan so well, knew that the other boy's eyes were trying to read his, looking to know the truth, if any, in Craig's statement. It was as if Stan could read classified documents in his gaze, deciphering the jargon of his emotions with decoder glasses.
He no longer wanted to be here, and he didn't know what to do. Why did Bebe have to be such a melodramatic whore?
"Oh, please," she was saying, prodding Craig with her aggressively female tone.
"All right, okay," Wendy said tentatively. She put a hand on Bebe's shoulder. "You and Stan can use my room."
"That's sweet of you," Bebe said. "But it doesn't change the fact that Craig is a little douche and he ruined the mood."
"It's not really ruined for me," Stan blustered, trying to retake control here from the women.
"It's fine," Kyle added, because he was finding it impossible to let Stan say anything without following with his own comment, regardless of how inane or innocuous.
"We're all having a really nice time here," Wendy tried to rationalize. "We don't need to ruin it with this fighting."
"Then make Bebe get the fuck off my couch!" Craig snapped his fingers in Bebe's face to go along with this suggestion.
"You get off the couch, Craig! It's my couch since it's in my best friend's house!"
Wendy coughed. "Technically it's my couch."
"I don't know why you're friends with this bitch, Wends," Craig sneered.
"Craig," Kyle pleaded, the only participant in this argument still seated.
"You keep the least savory company," Craig continued.
"And just what is that supposed to mean? Don't insult me in my house, Craig!"
"Yeah, don't insult her in her house!" Bebe smirked.
"Can we please just leave here?" Stan asked.
"Craig," Kyle continued to wheedle.
This time, instead of ignoring the red head, Craig whipped around and looked down at Kyle. "What?" he snapped, and then almost instantly as he realized what he was doing. He immediately shook his head and said, "Sorry, I—"
And whatever he was sorry for, he didn't get to finish, because with no more than a furtive glance at Stan and Bebe, Kyle leapt up and crushed his lips into Craig's, clutching the ties on his hat like they were the handles of a pool ladder.
Craig's eyes slowly opened and, from behind Kyle's blinding hair, he gave Stan and Bebe a satisfied grin, allowing Kyle to lick his curved lips while he silently gloated. They fell back down onto the couch together, and Craig managed to lift Kyle onto his lap so that he was straddled. Unable to move without throwing the redhead off of him, Craig shut his eyes again and allowed himself to smooth his hands over Kyle's behind, leisurely groping his property.
"Ugh!" Bebe squealed. "Come on, Stan."
"Where are we going?" Stan asked as Bebe dragged him away by his sleeve.
"Who cares? Away from here!" Her voice trailed off.
"Yes, yes!" someone cheered, clapping, approaching the couch. "Good god, that was entertaining."
Even with Craig's hands over his ears, Kyle knew that voice anywhere.
"Seriously Eric," Wendy shrilled. Even when Craig and Bebe were fighting, she hadn't sounded this angry. "Just what the fuck are you doing?"
"Me? What am I doing? Why, I'm just trying to enjoy the bitch fight between Craig and that bottle-blonde ho." Kyle opened his eyes and glanced up to see Cartman cupping Wendy's sharp chin with his thick fingers. "And might I add, bitch," Cartman slurred. "It was quite amusing."
"Get off me, Eric," Wendy warned.
"Aw, come on!"
"I told you," she said threateningly. "If you bring that pathetic little wretch anywhere near my house—"
"Ay! You know he's insignificant!"
"I'm what?" Butters' voice rang like a little bell, and it was disconcerting, because Kyle hadn't realized he was at the party, let alone in the room.
"—there would be severe consequences."
At this statement, Kyle pushed away from Craig, and they both stared up at the disturbing tableau of Wendy, Cartman, and Butters, spit-slick lips still hanging open.
"I'm a reasonable girl, Eric." Wendy breathed his name with a kind of thick importance, like just chanting the syllables made the mucus in her lungs congeal a little faster. "I asked you not to come here with him."
"He's nothing!"
"Hey!" Butters cried. "I am not nothing! My mother says I—"
"Oh, shut up, Butters," Cartman sighed.
"Okay," Butters agreed sadly.
"Look, he listens to everything I say," Cartman announced. "I said, 'Ay! Butters! Don't get between me and Wendy!' And he listened."
"But you don't listen to me!" Wendy hissed. "I said not to bring that thing into my house!"
"Now, I am getting mighty sick of—"
"Shut up, Butters!" Wendy and Cartman roared simultaneously.
"See, it's fine."
"It is not fine!" Wendy choked. "Don't you see what you're doing to me?"
"I told you—"
"And I told you, if you're going to fake-date that pathetic little faggot, don't you ever bring him near me, or my house, or my friends! You told me all you were going to do was use him to piss off Kyle. Now look what it's turned into! He's following you around everywhere! People think you're dating him!"
"No one's dumb enough to think that!"
Butters sighed dramatically, and shrugged off, struggling to fit his hands in the pockets of his skin-tight, pink vinyl pants.
Wendy and Cartman continued hollering at one another
"What the fuck dude?" Kyle whispered to Craig.
"Shhh." Craig put a hand on Kyle's knee. "We gotta listen to this shit. Lie low." Kyle hopped off of Craig's lap and hunkered down on his shoulder.
"When I fell in love with you it was because your plots had meaning!" Wendy was crying. "Now look at you! Pretending to be gay with Butters! Why can't you pretend to be gay with me?"
"Because you're a chick, bitch! It wouldn't work!"
"Work what?" Wendy shot back. "Where is the end of this scheme?"
"I don't know!"
"Exactly!"
"Why do all my schemes have to have a point?" Cartman asked. "Why can't I just do something because I enjoy it?"
"But your enjoyment is coming at my expense!"
"But that's what you like about me!" Cartman protested. "You like that I put me before you all the time. That's what you said!"
"But now you're fake-putting Butters before you!"
"Only to get to Kyle!"
"Oh, fuck Kyle!"
"I'm going to," Craig whispered. Kyle put a hand over his mouth. He couldn't believe no one was paying attention to them on the couch. The entire room was gaping at Cartman and Wendy and the unbelievably surreal fight they were engaged in.
"I need someone who inspires me," Wendy moaned. "Why can't you blind some puppies or something? Why does it always have to be Kyle?"
"Because puppies don't cry when you slap them. About the only similarity between Kyle and a puppy is the uncontrollable urge to stick its nose between Stan Marsh's legs."
"Oh, he doesn't even care! He's too busy with Craig on the couch over there." Wendy stopped and turned. Craig and Kyle both sat up sheepishly.
"Hey Wends," Craig said cheerfully. "How's that relationship with Cartman going?"
"Godammit Craig!" Wendy burst. "Just go."
Craig shrugged and pulled a still-shocked Kyle off of the couch. He toddled off to go get their coats, leaving Kyle by the door on his own, with about 40 or so pairs of eyes staring at him
"Uh," was all Kyle managed.
"Thanks for the hospitality!" Craig cried as he bounced back into view. The door slammed shut behind them as they left.
Outside the house, Kyle heard someone call his name. He looked into the distance to see Kenny standing there, flanked by a shadowy figure who was apparently lighting Kenny's cigarette. Kyle scrunched his face oddly, and Craig whispered the identity of Kenny's suitor into his boyfriend's ear.
"Huh," Kyle replied, neither surprised nor impressed.
"Where are you guys going?" Kenny asked, exhaling some smoke.
"Probably to commit sodomy," Christophe said, bored. "Where else is there to go?"
"Exactly Chris," Craig said amiably. "My thoughts exactly."
"We've just been there," Kenny said with a grin.
"Oh, fucking shit," the Frenchman slurred. "God resents braggarts, mon amour." It was at this point that Kyle noticed that Christophe was holding both a cigarette and bottle of wine in a paper bag in the same hand. Switching his grasp to take a drag, Christophe proffered the wine to Craig, who took the bottle and happily gulped some down, finishing with a dramatic wipe of his palm against his grinning lips. Craig angled the bottle at Kyle, who scowled down at it, then back up at Craig. Kenny and Christophe gave each other a meaningful look, while the both continued to smoke.
Noticing Kyle's discomfort at this odd moment, Kenny snatched the bottle back from Craig. "How's the party?" the blonde boy asked.
"Pretty bad," Kyle said. "But how the hell would I know, being this sadly sober?"
"Oh, bitch," Craig said dismissively. "It's hilarious. If you hurry you'll catch the tail end of Cartman and Wendy slugging it out."
"Really? They're speaking again?" Kenny asked. "Poor Butters."
"I don't feel sorry for him," Christophe announced. "I can tell you about suffering."
"See, that's what I think," Kyle announced, finding it curious that he and the Mole apparently agreed on something.
"Well, this is great," Craig said impatiently, laying a muffled slap to Kyle's behind. "But we have places to be."
"People to mount?" Kenny asked, rubbing his hands together, cigarette dangling from his chapped lips.
"Yeah, probably," Craig garbled, no longer really interested in talking any more.
"Let me know what happens," Kenny said, giving Kyle a lewd, albeit sarcastic, wink .
"I don't think so," Kyle said simply.
"Chris," Craig said warmly, giving the shaggy-haired boy a brotherly nod.
"Craig," Christophe replied. He and Kenny proceeded into the Testaburger home, and Craig and Kyle continued on their way, the vibration of bass in the ground stilling as they moved closer toward their final destination.
