The final chapter! I hope the ending wasn't too obvious. I did my best to make it exciting. I hope you all enjoy it, because this will be my last thing for a while. I'm going to focus more on art and drawing now. I'm gonna make a manga... I hope.

Disclaimer: I don't own South Park or any of their characters.

Enjoy!

Because You're Always There

Chapter 6

"Damn it, Stan! Why do you never listen to me?"

"Who the hell do you think you're talking to anyway?"

"You brought the flowers?"

"Is this bottle full?"

"We usually try to refrain from telling people that. Especially if we think they'll react like that patient did."

"Should I make something for Kyle as well?"

"But…. How did you get in? They lock the doors at night."

"Could you possibly be a gentleman for once an open the door for your boyfriend?"

"Have you been eating?"

"But I don't think you understand. You know what kind of place this is! We have people who-"

"Seriously, I have no idea why I'm still in this hospital."

"I thought of all people, you, Kyle would be able to understand what those flowers meant to me!"

"I thought I asked you to water them for me."

"You really should eat something, Stan."

"It's okay, Stan. Really, it is. If you want, you can get rid of those flowers. You know… it was so long ago anyway."

"I'm not letting them go!"

"Can't you see, Stan? They're dead already. Maybe you should just let go."

"… Just let go…."



Stan was rushed through the halls of the hospital, floral wallpaper glaring angrily down at him as the wheels of the stretcher skidded over the polished tile. Words flying at hundreds of miles an hour echoed in his ears, but he couldn't concentrate. He tilted his head back and forth trying to clear his clouded vision, but to no avail.

Frantic commands and urgent orders were shouted over top of Stan's motionless body as he stared into the blurry void of the skyward lights. He licked his lips and marveled at how dry they were. Where was he? What had be doing? Had be been driving on that road? Maybe he should have slowed down. His leg… his stomach….

He tried to reach across his chest to clench the throbbing pain on his torso, but his hands were either too weak to move or tied down to the stretcher.

"He's moving!" shouted a feminine voice as if she had just seen a ghost.

"Sedate him, we have to operate STAT!" Stan barely even felt the needle or the IV drip enter his arm. But he didn't care. The last bit of consciousness that remained in his mind told him that the blood loss was so severe that he was actually slipping away. He could very possibly die.

Stan must have blacked out, because the last thing he remembered was waking to the sound of his own heartbeat blipping across a monitor. It was eerie feeling of déjà vu as he glanced across the room and swallowed, his throat parched. He flopped his head to the right and was nearly blinded by the pink and flowery wallpaper. A figure sat in a near by chair and a faint smile spread across his lips.

"Kyle?"

"No, honey," answered his mother, her voice small and sad. "You're fine. You're going to live, Stan." She came closer and laid her hands gingerly upon Stan's. "Randy, he's awake finally!"

"Where's Kyle?" Stan asked, his mind still disoriented.

"Good, I'm glad he was able to pull through," Stan's father said as he entered the room. "But I'm still concerned that he tried to escape in the first place."

"It's Kyle!" Mrs. Marsh growled, clenching her fists so tightly that her knuckles grew white. "It's all because of him!"

"We can't talk that way in front of Stan," Mr. Marsh warned, but her anger could not be quelled. She stood up with vigor and paced the floor, tears straining from her eyes.

"I don't understand," Stan mumbled, confused. "He was aiming for Kyle. He was right between the two of us. How could he have missed Kyle and hit me?"

"I can't take this anymore!" Stan's mother broke, flailing her fists at her side.

"No! We mustn't!" Randy shouted, trying to hold his wife back, but it was too late. He recoiled in anguish as she opened her mouth to speak again.

"Kyle's dead, Stanley!"

"A whole year now, he's been dead," she continued, all her anger spewing out like pressured steam. "He died the night of the prom in the car crash! You killed him when you lost control of the car! You killed him, Stan! Kyle's not here! He's never been here! All these months you've just been hallucinating!"

She staggered backwards with a gasp, horrified by what she had said. Completely shocked, she began to weep again. How could she blame her own son for the death of his only loved one? She sheltered herself into her husband's arms and cried out that she was a terrible mother.

"No," Randy tried to comfort, holding her close, keeping his eyes locked on his son. "It's alright. You were far stronger a parent then I was. I already snapped to him seven months ago. I know what will happen… just watch…."

Stan stared at the too of them, his mouth agape and his eyes dim… glazed over and foggy. Slowly, he closed his mouth and turned his head to the door of his hospital room. His face brightened and a grin creased his lips. "Kyle!" he exclaimed.

Sharon and Randy glanced at the empty doorway and let out a depressed sigh. "Kyle, I have so much to tell you! How did you dodge the bullet?"

Sharon tried to reach out to her son, but Randy held her back, shaking his head. It was too late… without taking his medication… Stan would never let go….

Kyle had to have been somewhere near. I heard his voice. I shouted in agony as I used my arms to pull my limp legs across the grass. "Kyle!" I shouted, my voice not my own, but horrible, breathless ghost.

"Stan," Kyle answered weakly. I looked at the over turned car and could barely keep myself from shouting; the shock of the sight stealing away my breath. The only visible part of Kyle's body was from his torso up, the rest of his body crushed beneath the impossible weight of the vehicle.

"My god," I whispered, feeling hysteria set in, the pain of my legs dissipating with an empathetic surge. "H-how… w-what… w-we'll… don't w-worry… w-we'll get you out of there."

Kyle reached up grabbed my hand in his, shaking his head slowly. A single tear parted the dirt and blood upon his cheek. "It's okay Stan," he told me, his voice calm and quite, barely audible over the crackling flames of the wreckage.

"It's okay. I don't feel any pain. It will be over soon. You'll be fine, I know it." He swallowed, his red hair growing even more crimson as blood blossomed from his fair head. His face grew grim and serious. "Stan, listen to me. I know you. You're going to blame yourself. You're going to blame yourself for all of this and you're going to live in hell."

With his other hand, Kyle laid the bouquet of flowers from the prom into my lap. "Don't blame yourself. You lived for a reason. I want you to be happy." Tears streamed down his face as he felt his soul being wrenched from his body. "I just want you to be happy. But you'll never be able to grow if you keep rooted here. I want you to do one last thing for me, Stan. One last favor… let go. They'll be here soon, Stan. They'll save you. But y…you'll h…ha…have to let go… let go of me."

Kyle's hand went limp and would have slipped from my grasp if I hadn't tightened my fist around him. "No!" I shouted through my sobs. "I won't let you go, Kyle! I'll never let go!"

"Why don't y…you ever listen t…to me Stan?" Kyle wept with his last breath. "Stan… you have to let go…."

XXXXX

Sharon Marsh entered the white washed room of the psychiatric ward and laid down the books she had recently checked out of the library and arranged the dead flowers on Stan's bedside stand. For the past three months after Stan was shot, she had dedicated her life to staying by her son's side. They had started administrating his medication into his food, forcing him to eat on a schedule.

As she straightened out her back, she chocked on a gasp as Stan was sitting up in his bed for the first time in weeks.

Tears fell from him like rivers and his eyes were bloodshot. He sniffled and looked to his mother. "M-mom?" he called, his voice cracking from his sobs.

"Yes, dear?" Sharon replied, trying to keep herself collected.

"I… I can't see Kyle…." Stan whimpered, his tears pearling as he wept. "I can't see Kyle anymore, Mom."

"Oh…" she replied, taken aback. "Maybe… maybe he's finally moved on to collage, honey."

"Mom," Stan said, his voice stern even through the tears. "What happened? A year ago… what happened?"

Sharon looked away, it hurt her to see her son like this. But it had to be done. This was for the best. She could see it in his eyes. Stan was finally awake at last.

"That night… on prom," she began. "There was a fight that involved both you and Kyle. As a result, you were forced from the dance. I suppose you were angry, because you hadn't buckled your seat belt. There was… there was black ice on the road left over from winter. It had been a very cold month. The car went out of control and caught… caught on a bank. The car flipped so quickly that you were… you were ejected through the front windshield."

"Kyle however," Sharon sighed, feeling a burn begin behind her eyes. "Kyle had buckled his seat belt. He would have been tossed from the car as well, but the belt held him back. He only made it halfway through the windshield and was… was caught underneath the car."

Stan gasped as if it were all new to him, the memories flooded back like a sea of blood. "The paramedics that arrived," Sharon continued, finding it harder and harder to relay the facts. "They said that the hardest part of evacuating you to the hospital was… they had to… they had to pry you away from Kyle's lifeless body. They said that when you screamed his name that it was like the very embodiment of heart break."

The two stayed silent until finally Stan's sobbing trickled away. He sniffed one last time and looked up to his mother again. "You made me a promise," he said confidently. "You said that… as soon as I got better… you would take me to see him."

"Oh, Stan," Sharon whispered.

"Take me to see him," Stan insisted. "Take me to his grave."

XXXXXX

Sharon and Sheila Broflovski looked on from a good distance as Stan approached the grave stone ahead of him.

Stan tried to make words, but his mind was too muddled with disbelief. Had it really been that long? Had he really been hallucinating for months upon months? His heart dropped in his chest as he read the name: "Kyle Broflovski."

Gradually, Stan knelt down and laid the brittle flowers at the base of the stone, finally watering them for the first time with a single tear drop. He stood. He nodded. He turned to leave his past behind. But he knew that he would not be able to let go so easily.

"Not even going to say anything?" asked a voice, and Stan whirled around with wide eyes. "I've waited here so long for you, Stan."

Kyle sat smugly on his gravestone, simpering lovingly under his rose red locks. For an instant, Stan was in awe. He had never seen Kyle look so beautiful!

Stan snapped from his trance and pounded his head with his fists. "I'm not crazy! I'm not crazy!" he growled, clenching his eyes shut.

"Of course you're not," Kyle responded. Stan looked up with his ocean blue eyes in wonder. "It's really me, Stan. But enjoy it, cause this is a one time deal."

"How?" Stan gawked.

"I can't tell you that," Kyle sighed. "It's against the rules." He glanced down to the flowers at his feet and pursed his lips. "You kept the flowers? I thought I told you to let go, Stan."

Stan felt the tension break and he let out a hearty chuckle. That was Kyle all right. "Easier said than done…."

"Obviously," Kyle spat. "I knew you'd blame yourself, but you went really far, dude! So… did you enjoy spending time with that cheap imitation of me?"

"He could never live up to your greatness," Stan answered with a genuine smile.

"Everything's going to be fine now, Stan," Kyle informed. "With this, you'll let go. I just want you to be happy. And if you meet someone that you love later on in life, don't do the fucking "What would Kyle want" shit! I'm telling you now, for all future reference, that you should go out with him! We'll be together again eventually, so don't sweat the small stuff."

"But why did you have to die?" Stan asked, his face melting into a frown.

"Because Stan," Kyle laughed. "It was my time. And it wasn't yours. There is a purpose for everything, Stan. Yeah, I know it's cliché, but you'll learn why you got live. 

You're going to do great things in your life but-" Kyle laid a finger of his lips and smiled. "Can't spoil the surprise, you know?"

"So is this it?" Stan asked, feeling sad again.

"This is never just it," Kyle answered. "Ooh! But watch this!" Kyle turned his back to Stan and a light shimmered around his body, growing brighter than the sun. When the flash disappeared, Kyle was standing tall, sporting a pair of white wings.

"Wow…" Stan gawked, amazed at how angelic Kyle looked.

"Yeah," Kyle snickered. "I know how you like dramatics!" Kyle spread his wings and winked once more at Stan. "Love ya!"

The End