You are someone else,
I am still right here.

—Johnny Cash, Hurt

Tweek's point of view:

I don't know how long we were sleeping like we were. We could've been like that all night. I'd allowed myself to drift off so near, but I was still startled when I comprehended our position by the next day. I mean—it was... vulgar.

And I liked it. I liked it a lot.

My body was splayed out haphazardly across my back, one leg spread and bent at the knee, the other locked between Craig's thighs. Both of my arms were wrung around his shoulders. He laid on top of me, his skin this wonderful warm blanket, his weight a secure presence holding me down. A hand was cradling the nape of my neck. I was aware of how firm his fingers were, how they grounded me. His head was on my chest, resting just above my heart.

This—all of this—caught me by such surprise that my pulse began to pound. Suddenly I was hypersensitive of everything: the heavy sound of his breath and the steady touch of his skin. My heartbeat was so thunderous that I was terrified it'd wake him. I forced myself to take deep, slow breaths and tried to talk myself into a calmer state of mind by stating simple facts. Craig and I fell asleep together. We're barely wearing clothing. Those were the only two thoughts it took for a insatiable smile to split my face in two.

Bottom lip between my teeth, I bit down and slid one of my uncontrollable hands down the expanse of his back, mapping out the uniform protrusions of his spine and the curve of his body. Our skin was so smooth, rubbing together like it was. My other hand wandered into his hair, fingers curling around his thick tresses. He exhaled a long sigh and I hugged him to me, not wary of the strength I used because of his thick skin and strong bones. There was a lightness expanding in my chest and it wanted to come out, but I didn't know how to uncage it, so I bit my lip harder, inhaled Craig's scent deeply so the feeling would have more room to grow.

It came out shaky, unstable in contrast to the unwavering massage of my fingers in his ebony locks. This made me happy, just laying here like this. I could take care of him, scratch his scalp the way he liked and forget that I wasn't normal. That I wasn't allowed to do this and needed to take my medication otherwise my stutter and anxiety would be unbearable. But I wouldn't leave yet. I'd wait for him to wake up so I could continue existing here while he breathed against me. All I had to do was have a night terror and moments like this were mine. It was so simple.

He began to stir, this light rustling of his limbs—and then we were flipped around. My face was buried in the pillow next to his head while I thought absolutely nothing but, I'm laying on top of Craig. Today would be a beautiful day if this continued. His arms coiled around me, tying me in place against his broad chest. In place, in place, a place. This was a place. My place. There was an ache beginning to form in my lungs. I could feel his heartbeat, paid attention to only that for some time, and let it seep into my bones. Something was right when my own began to correspond with his.

Something that lulled me into a daze where the only thing I did was run my fingers through Craig's hair.

I laid there the most relaxed I've ever been and cherished every goddamn second that I didn't think some paranoid thought or twitch uncontrollably. Craig was like a sedative. A relief. He was that breath of fresh air after being underwater for so long, trapped and kicking and always looking up at the light reflecting in the water like splintered glass.

Withdrawing my face from his pillow, I lifted myself up onto one of my elbows until I could take him in without my vision blurring. It hurt to look at him, to see everything that I wanted bundled together in this single man and not know how that could be. He was one person made up of the most attractive, tempting, captivating stuff that attracted, tempted, and captivated me so badly. The Craig from before, the one from South Park—he'd been untouchable then. He'd been awful and dangerously attractive. Restricted and in control. But this Craig—he was haunting. This was a man that instantly fell into a different category. A suave, sexy thing that permeated all of that refined history he used to be.

His features were masculine without being overbearing. It wasn't a rugged masculinity, but polished in a gentlemanly way. There was a supple curve and plushness to his lips, a sculpted arch to his eyebrows, a definite line constructing his nose. When I looked at his jaw, I could see him angry and clenching it in my head, grinding his teeth together. The tightness suited him, punctuating his strong bone structure. His pale skin—a healthy, creamy color—contrasted greatly with his ebony locks. They were all mussed from sleep and tickled his forehead while in other places they stuck up. Just looking at him made me smile.

My thoughts delved deeper, returning to two days ago when Kenny and I had shown up. Craig had been singing and entertaining the dogs. His voice hadn't even sounded bad, a smokey tone that worked well with the old songs he'd been singing. Every time he went out there I liked to listen to him. It was the discovery of these little quirks that really made the trip down here—the growing pile of homework and disgruntled parents and discomfort at being away from home—manageable. Kenny had taken to singing with him though, ultimately breaking the allure of Craig's voice. The dogs didn't like it as much either, but Craig liked having a buddy to belt out lyrics with, so the three of us were forced to deal.

For a quick second his expression pinched. I watched curiously as it immediately smoothed out. He began to stretch and move, bones cracking and muscles clenching as though I weren't even there, lifting me when his back arched and sighing this grizzly monster of a breath right into my face. It stopped when we rolled over onto our sides, twisted in his sheets and fused together because of them. They were doing me a huge favor I noticed, lips lifting when Craig blinked momentarily, this splash of icy blue in a black and white backdrop.

A noise somewhere between a growl and a whine slipped from his mouth before he promptly made an exaggerated attempt at burrowing his head against my chest as well as wrapping himself around me, legs included. My hands sought the back of his head and the tip of his spine upon reflex to scratch the distress right off of him. It must've been the light seeing as it'd gradually begun to turn lighter and lighter since I'd woken up.

Craig mumbled something completely incoherent. I asked if he could repeat himself. He did, and I was caught off guard just as much as I was humbled. He'd asked how I'd slept.

"G-Good." He pulled away and I chose to stare off into the distance, particularly at something interesting that didn't exist.

"You've been awake for a while," he observed, investigating how my features held no signs of sleep. Fucking wonderful. Now he knew that I'd been creepily watching him the entire time. I didn't remove my eyes from the make-believe object on the wall.

"A while i-is kind of pushing it," I mumbled in an attempt to stave off my creepiness.

"Oh?" His snicker had a husky edge to it. "So I'm definitely exaggerating? Just a little bit, then?"

I grinned, relenting just so I could look at his eyes still drowsy from sleep. "You're getting there."

"Is a minute or two short enough for you? Or am I supposed to fake how awake you are?"

Craig Tucker and I are flirting in his bed~ I wanted to do some stupid little dance along with my blissful little thought. What ended up happening was this extremely nerdy laugh. It was embarrassing. I tried to cover it with a cough and put cement overtop of that by saying, "Faking would be n-nice."

There was this twist to his lips that told me I'd done a horrible job of hiding the laugh. He didn't say anything about it, though. "Okay, then."

My gaze dropped. I was scared I'd give myself away if I continued to stare into his eyes. It was like my own wanted to tell him "I am obsessed with you," and I just couldn't allow that.

"Can I draw you?" Whenever he asked me that—always, always at random moments—my heart pulsated erratically. I liked that question so much that it made me nauseous.

"R-Right now?" Craig was a fiend at mastering the capture of emotions. He got me spot on every single time and it was a frightening thought to imagine he might just figure me out if I let him draw me right now. But how the hell was I supposed to decline him? Saying no to Craig was like Craig not being able to get rid of Julibob when the beagle first showed up. It was impossible.

"Yeah," he yawned, flopping onto his back. "Your eyes are kind of inspiring me and I don't want to lose it. You don't usually look so happy." Fuck. Shit. Fuck—fuck. This wasn't good. I was so screwed. I kept my eyes diverted and fought against the blush forming on my cheeks. There was this pause where neither of us said anything, and then Craig had to go and obliterate my decision that godfuckno—I was not going to let him draw me like this. "I think your eyes are beautiful." My breath caught and he must've heard it because he continued with a sly smirk. "Irregularly beautiful. Nobody has eyes like you."

To Craig, I have something that nobody else does. I've got something on every person he's ever encountered. And eyes are important, right? They inspire him. "Fine," I agreed, attempting to grumble so he wouldn't be able to tell how swooned I was. I made a quick getaway to the other side of the bed where I attempted to get out as smoothly as possible. It was kind of hard in a waterbed. To be honest, my nerves were buzzing and I felt light on my feet.

"I'm actually going to paint you." Craig got up much more gracefully and situated himself at his dresser where he began to pluck certain paints and brushes off the cluttered top. It was a daze I found myself in, ogling at what I could of him, my throat going dry. He was so tall, his body so lanky. His upper half straight and lean, bottom half slim with its slight curves. That butt of his was the cutest little thing. The entire expanse of his back and the redness at the top of his spine where I'd scratched him was ridiculously attractive to me.

Before I could school my expression, Craig turned around and caught me.

"Are you checking me out?"

There was absolutely nothing I could do but nod my head. I wasn't even in control of myself anymore. I'd completely shattered into millions of dead molecules and something else was controlling me. Something that I didn't even know existed.

His grin was just about the most darling expression I've ever seen. It was so cheeky that a dimple appeared, one of which I didn't even know he had. That indent alone rebuilt me, jolted me back into myself.

I needed my medication now.