"Stan, dude, you're going to love this one" Kyle said when they had settled down on their first plane.

"What am I going to love?"

"There's a place in Seattle, a neighborhood that used to be a town, called..." Kyle paused a moment for dramatic effect.

"Yeah?"

"South Park"

"No way! Are you kidding?"

"Nope, I'm serious," He grinned. "I decided one day to explore the city, and I saw a sign saying South Park Recreation Area so I checked google. It's real, and it's about twenty minutes away from where we'll be living."

"Weird," Stan laughed. "Seems like no matter what we do, we'll never get away from South Park."

"Never, even when we die I bet heaven will have a South Park too." He laughed with him, just as the seatbelt sign lit up and the plane doors began to close.

They only had to make one connection in North Carolina, and just over five hours later they finally touched down in Seattle, Stan still as excited as when they first started their journey.

"I can't wait to see our place!"

"You'll love it" Kyle grinned, pulling down their hand luggage as he was closest to the aisle. Stan had refused to take anything but a window seat, otherwise the motion of the plane alone would have been enough to give him travel sickness, but the fact that he knew that they were safely in the air distracted him from all that.

Stan looked away from the window and back to Kyle, smirking when he saw his shirt was riding up as he stretched his short body upwards.

"Put it away!" He teased as he smacked Kyle's exposed stomach.

"Hey!" He stumbled back slightly before resuming his task one handed, the other hand keeping his shirt pulled down. Stan sniggered.

"It's your fault for being so short."

"Shut up" He responded as he threw Stan's bag at him, grinning in satisfaction to see Stan, who had just started to stand up, fall back down on to his seat.

Once they made it out the airport, they realised just how late it actually was. Luckily, Kyle had kept his car there overnight.

"I've come to the conclusion that you're rich, Kyle" Stan said as Kyle paid the expensive parking fare.

"Facebook pays well" He said with a shrug.

"I bet it does, almost makes me wish I'd studied Computer Science too"

"Well, it's not really all about the money... It's about getting a job you love, money is just a bonus"

"I guess, although I don't know how enjoyable it will be to work with loud, annoying kids"

"Don't even start, Stan, not on moving day" He said lightly, but there was a slight threat hidden in there too. "I don't want to hear how crappy it will be to be an elementary school teacher, you chose to study elementary education" Stan just shrugged, deciding to forget about it for now and turned on the radio.

I was the one who let you know.
I was your sorry-ever-after.
Seventy-four, seventy-five.

Stan leant his cheek against the cold car window, watching as buildings and trees passed them by. As the song progressed, however, his lingering smile began to fade. It just hit him, he had just left three years of his life behind, that was it, over. He looked over at Kyle and remembered the day they had graduated high school together, and he wondered if they would ever be the same again.

It's not easy, nothing to say 'cause it's already said.
It's never easy.
When I look on in your eyes then I find that I'll do fine.
When I look on in your eyes then I'll do better.

He thought about what life would be like, being room mates with Kyle. He had accepted the offer without a second thought, but now he really thought about it... It wouldn't be like high school at all, they wouldn't see each other for most of the day and he was scared that would, somehow, push them further apart than any distance ever could.

Kyle looked over at Stan, and saw his excitement had completely fizzled away. He looked a little lost, slumped against the window pane and sighing. Kyle decided to change the station, hoping that a happier song would pull him out of it.

"Almost here!" Kyle said with a smile as he turned left in to the next, and final, street. When the car stopped, he shook Stan's knee. "Stan? We're here now..." He prompted, and Stan looked up to meet Kyle's gaze. Kyle pulled his hand away from Stan's knee, but stubbornly held their eye contact. Eventually, Stan smiled and opened the car door before making his may around the back of the car to the trunk. Kyle followed him and helped him take his bags in to the apartment.

"Dude... Dude..." Stan put his bags down by the door, his mouth hanging open in awe. "This is awesome!" He smiled and went to explore. This was theirs, their very own apartment, no parents and no teachers to tell them what to do. He felt a strange sense of achievement that clashed with his previous worries as he spun around in the centre of the living room, grinning from ear to ear.

"You haven't seen your room yet" Kyle stood up from his position against the wall and lead him in to the corridor leading off from the living room. Kyle opened the first door on the right and let Stan in to his already furnished bedroom.

"Perfect" He grinned as he saw his bed already made with blue sheets and a red pillow. Kyle leant against the door frame, smile still lingering.

"Your bathroom is in the door opposite"

"I have my own bathroom?!" He ran across the hall to check, and Kyle just chuckled. "Honestly, Kyle, this place is the best!" He said once he left the bathroom. "I love the kitchen" he made his way back in to the living room and sat up on to the breakfast counter. "Perhaps you chose the wrong profession, Kyle, you would make an awesome interior designer" he said as he gestured to the arrangement of furniture in the living room and the decorations scattered around.

"Flattery will get you nowhere" Kyle said as he pulled out a bottle of wine from the fridge. "Ready to celebrate?" Kyle popped the cork, causing Stan to spin around on the counter to face in to the kitchen.

"Wine? Really?"

"We're grown ups now, we should be drinking classy grown up juice" Stan just laughed. "Oh shut up and get drunk" Kyle laughed a little as he spoke and poured the wine in to two glasses, knowing Stan didn't really care about what he drunk, as long as there was alcohol in it. This was confirmed when Stan snatched up his glass and downed half of it.


"I love your- no, no, OUR apartment. Dude. I love it"

"I know you do"

"No no no I mean it"

"Whateverrrrr, I knew you would"

Stan and Kyle were out on the balcony, looking out at the view of the city as police sirens could be heard in the distance.

"You're just so awesome," Stan poked his chest "I love you man"

"Yeah Stan, I know you do"

"I mean it!" He slumped against Kyle's side and wrapped his arms around him. "Iiii loooooveeee you Kyyyyyyyyle" he sang and then hiccuped.

"No more wine for you"

"No, I need a bed now" Stan turned around and went back inside, going down the hall and walking through the door at the end, Kyle following behind him.

"No wait, Stan, that's..." He trailed of as he walked in to his bedroom to find Stan already asleep on his bed. "My room" he finished with a sigh, going back to the living room and switching the stereo off, making sure all the windows and doors were locked before making his way back to his room.

He stood in his doorway, trying to decide if he should sleep in Stan's bed or not. It seemed like an easy decision, but then he remembered how drunk Stan had got and thought it best to stay with him, just in case he ended up choking on his own puke in the night. He made a face at the thought as he got in to his pajamas and turned out the light, getting in to bed and hoping that wouldn't happen.

"Good night" he whispered, and Stan just mumbled back in his sleep.


The song mentioned in this chapter is 74 75 by The Connells. It doesn't entirely fit to this situation, lyrics wise, but when I heard it it made me think about how Stan would feel about things changing (not necessarily the lyrics, just the sad tune mostly, though some words fit...), and it would have been too obvious to put Landslide in there haha. OH and about South Park in Seattle, I had no idea there was a neighborhood with that name. I found it out by accident when I was looking for apartments (I wanted to make this as realistic as possible) to use in the story and my reaction was pretty much the same as Stan's, so I had to mention it in the story XD