Fortunately, the rest of the evening did not go as expected. They had all grown up too, so there was nothing to worry about. Still, he had the feeling that there was a strange mood between Cartman and him. To be honest, they didn't even know each other anymore, because they hadn't exchanged a word for almost ten years. And no wonder he hadn't seen him in ages, because he never looked for a woman. At first he was still too proud to inquire about the other, and as the years passed, he did not want to do it either because he was ashamed of his actions. Although he was learning, he was too cowardly to apologize. The idea of simply forgetting everything was good enough for him. At least until this class reunion. Although he heard beforehand that everyone would be there, but he never thought of Cartman for a moment.
Now he kept staring over at her and wondering whether he should chat with her after all. But maybe it would be better to leave the unsaid thing alone, because they will surely never see each other again after this evening. And yet Kyle had the feeling that he was being watched also. But every time he turned around, nobody looked in his direction. Surely he just imagined that she wanted to talk to him too. Because apart from the fact that they met in the store before, they had practically nothing to say to each other. Somehow he was talking to everyone, even Nichole. He had such a crush on her in high school and also thought that she was not losing any of her spells. Only he was simply no longer attracted to this magic. It was good for her that she had found someone who didn't just think about success and money. Token changed quite a bit and almost broke off contact with his old friends. Actually, he could express his opinion about it, but he didn't really act differently himself. If Stan didn't get in touch more often, he would have no more contact with someone in South Park other than his parents.
While cleaning up, he pondered again about just leaving afterwards. He certainly seemed to be the only one who interpreted too much into the situation. Most likely, Cartman forgot about him years ago and only he felt guilty after all this time.
But when he was the last to say bye for today to Stan and Wendy and was about to walk past the parking lot, he heard her cursing the car. Apparently because it doesn't want to start. Ok, just going home now would be shitty of him. Even if the conversation could be uncomfortable, he still strode over to the car.
"Hey."
"Fuck!" Probably she hadn't heard him coming, because she glanced at him, flabbergasted.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to scare you." Kyle immediately took another step away from the car.
"No, I .. Do you want something specific?"
"Well, your car seems to be causing you problems and .." But he didn't even get to the end of his sentence.
"And that interests you, because?" It was snapped at him while she was typing a number into her phone.
"No need to use such a tone like that!"
"Oh, pardon. How else should I react to a guy who doesn't talk to me all evening, but then harasses me in a poorly lit parking lot?!" At first he was willing to give her a snotty answer. But then he realized that Cartman was actually right.
"I .. I guess that's true. That was dumb of me. I'm sorry." Nevertheless he remained standing there and there was a brief silence. At least until someone answered her on the phone.
"It's me. Yes, the car is causing problems again. Can you pick me up? What? You also have a towing service for cars. So stop towing sluts!" With that she hung up angrily, got out of the car with her handbag and stepped past him with her head held high.
"Do you still want to play the gentleman? Then you can accompany me to the next bus stop." She ordered furious at first, but then sighed.
"No, it wasn't fair to take my mood out on you. You don't have to come with me. So, see you around sometime or whatever." She said then without looking at him.
"As luck would have it, I have to go in the same direction. So .." Again he didn't finish with his words.
"Come on. Stop it! It's clear you have a problem with me, that's why you didn't want to chat with me in public. We don't need to expand this." She led the way, but he followed her anyway. With a polite gap, of course. Why did he suddenly remember pinching Cartman's cheek?
"How do you come up with that?" Kyle inquired cautiously.
"Do you think I didn't see you giving me a derogatory look at the store and then just ignoring me in the parking lot? When you saw me again today, those looks came again. Then you almost vomited on me .."
"Do you want to hear the embarrassing truth? I didn't even recognize you in the supermarket. Of course I thought I'd seen you somewhere before, but I didn't know where." He tried it with honesty.
"Leave the excuses. Why else were you staring at me like that?" Cartman stopped and looked back at him. He did the same and waited, because he didn't really know whether to say the right thing. She almost pierced him with her eyes and then grinned briefly.
"Are you saying you were staring at my jugs?" Somehow that came more easily from her than anything else from before. Unfortunately, she hit the bull's eye and he tried not to let it show.
"Who would have thought that there was a little pervert in a professional athlete like you?" Strangely enough, that thing about the athlete stung more than the other word. Probably because he knew she wasn't serious. She walked on in a better mood.
"Oh, I won't do that anymore." The redhead didn't really want to share the topic with her when he was allowed to talk to her briefly. He doesn't really have to tell everyone that he has failed.
"What? Why not? You were something of a natural." She sounded surprised and really interested. Or was it just politeness? Definitely.
"And you know that because?"
"Do you think Stan didn't sometimes force us to watch your games?!" The taller one couldn't imagine the meeting of his old friends in which they watch his basketball games.
"Aha. He probably didn't mention that I had an accident and could never play again." Her sharp inhalation told him that he shouldn't have uttered this news so easily.
"Kyle, I ... I'm really sorry. I ... " This time he cut her off because he didn't want to talk to her to go fishing for pity. Even his ex-girlfriend couldn't find time for it, although she supposedly loved the sport as much.
"I came to terms with it. But that's why I didn't want to talk to you."
"But it was always your dream." Looking her in the eye didn't seem difficult when they were both talking about such topics. He could see that she really meant what she said. After all, she really didn't have a reason to lie to him. She could throw something contemptible at him and just let him stand here. The two of them will just never see each other again. But she didn't do it.
"So .. still Cartman, huh?" Kyle tried to distract himself and keep walking, because they didn't have to hang around here all night with the flickering street lights that did it already in his teenage years. Yes, some things didn't change that easily in South Park.
"Yes, it is my last name. Do you remember? But it's now Erica, if you absolutely have to know." Apparently she didn't like the change of subject because she looked irritated.
"Erica." So he tried the name on his tongue.
"But you can stay with Cartman!" She sounded a little embarrassed or was he already imagining things? Had to be the leftover alcohol.
"Why the change of the name, when people should use your last name?"
"Imagine there are people who use my first name. But also, so that I always remember what a shitty kid I was." Her gaze wandered into the distance. He noticed that the grip on her handbag was tightening and that her steps were quicker for a moment.
"Why did almost everyone just call you Cat at the event?" Sometimes he thought that would be her new name. He also tried to keep the conversation going without infuriating her. Or at least not more.
"They're all just jealous because my internet career works. And it's Cet with an E." She now declared proudly.
"All the first letters of your names?" He said as he combined that in his head.
"You found that out quicker than many others." From angry, too briefly grinning self-confident, her voice wandered again too easily annoyed.
"And that's our goal." She said, before Kyle could ask if he had said the wrong thing, they were both standing in front of the bus stop. He noticed that the direction of way wasn't going to Cartman's old home. Sure, he no longer lived with his parents either. So why should others still live in the same place? Although he thought, he had heard that some of them still lived in their parents' homes. It was also a question of money nowadays.
"The next one won't come for two hours." He glanced through the timetable briefly and then gave the result.
"Hm." She just shrugged and checked her phone again. There was a brief silence, except for the individual cars that drove past.
"You live outside of South Park?" Inquired the taller one, in order to continue chatting with her. This silence in between made him uncomfortable.
"You do that too." Her answer was again a little unfriendly. What made the conversation so difficult now?
"Listen! We'll go to my place, I'll drive you home and then we'll see each other never again. That is fine with me too." He suggested, because he got the feeling that she didn't really want to talk to him any further. Maybe she didn't want it from the start and forced herself to be polite.
"No thank you. Can't you just leave me here?! It's not the first time I've been on the bus at night. Or left alone." The last sentence was uttered more quietly, but he still understood it. He wanted to ask which idiot would do such a thing, but it wasn't really his business. Still, she could at least look at him when she talked to him, so he stood in front of her so he could see her in the face. He didn't want to touch her because he didn't know if it was okay, to act like it used to be after all this time. Certainly not.
"I'm really sorry for the way I treated you back then. You have to believe me. Maybe I should have started with that. But I thought all evening that you didn't care. That you had already forgotten about me and I wanted to leave it at that. But then that with your car came up. If you're upset about it, ok. But don't blame it on me." Because what else was she asking of him? It wasn't easy for him to jump over his shadow and remember how horrible it was.
"You didn't show yourself for years and I really thought, I ... And then you just come here, so shitty sexy and think you can remind me of the past?! You know, my life has been pretty good so far." Her body was trembling slightly. She crossed her arms and looked to the side. But was she just describing him as sexy? No, he definitely imagined that. The rest, however, came across very clearly and loudly. He didn't really know what to do with himself after this announcement. But he couldn't just leave her standing and he didn't even really know why. After all, 'just going away' was on the list of options because she is an adult and wanted him to do it. The thought, that they were both just strangers now, came back to him. Despite everything, he didn't want to be content with running away. He took a few steps back and leaned against the canopy of the bus stop from the outside.
"Cartman, all I can say is that I am sorry." He explained more quietly as he was watching the street.
"What else do you want to hear? If I could, I would undo the thing from then." He really meant that.
"I don't understand why you ... reacted so angry. You could have just given me a normal rejection." Her tone came softly to him and her voice sounded a bit muffled.
"A normal rejection? Did you expect me to reject you?"
"Um, of course. I was stupid, but not so much to notice what your type was and I absolutely didn't fit into the scheme." To that nothing occurred to him so quickly. So she just kept talking.
"I just don't understand why you .. freaked out like that. As if you haven't had to push off someone before."
In the past, it came out against Cartman's will that she liked him in a romantic way. A rumor spread and he wasn't at all amused when he found out about this from Bebe of all people. On top of that, Stan, Kenny and apparently everyone else knew about it, except he didn't. He had believed that Cartman could finally be trusted. That they both became something of friends after the guy left off the racism towards him. They both were still cursing each other, only the words like smart ass and redhead didn't hit him as hard as everything else before. Eric was learning in his eyes and maybe that's why it made him so angry when he found out that the guy liked him more. The thought, that Cartman was doing all this for himself to get the hands on him disappointed and disgusted him very much. As heatedly as he often reacted in his younger years, he confronted the concerned person. As if school didn't give him enough stress earlier, on top of that, someone who liked to dress in women's clothes had a crush on him. People still made fun of him. It just had to be a big bad joke.
"I was angry." Kyle replied briefly and was now ashamed of his former self, because who was he, to just judge another person like that. It seemed right to him back then, but how quickly was his world turning upside down and he began to doubt himself.
"No, really?" It was inquired of him rather sarcastic.
"Every time you dressed feminine for fun, I thought nothing of it. Or rolled my eyes over it, when I didn't like it. Because I always had the impression that you did some things just to get your own way or to annoy me. So also the time, when you started to let your hair grow and ran around almost exclusively in skirts and dresses. 'He's not serious, he just wants attention, like with everything before.' I wanted less and less to have anything to do with you or look at you." Kyle really believed that this inner turmoil would go away when he left Cartman alone.
"As if you liked 'the fat ass' me before or something like that."
"In high school, I thought we were kind of friends. But then you break it all down because you wanted to be a girl. I hated that you got good encouragement from others too. Also from other women who were close to us. I thought how stupid can they all be and not see that he's only doing it to play his games with you. As always."
"Ok. We can end the conversation here." But Kyle ignored that because he thought she should hear everything and then she can send him into the desert.
"What I didn't want to be true is that you got better ... at it every day. Of course, you also had to have an idea of how fashion, make-up and all the rest works. Getting out of the way was never enough. Somehow I saw you somewhere during the week and then I heard this rumor. I had problems myself and then there was that too. I believed it would all go away if I broke everything up with you once and for all." Then the college came, which tore the four of them apart anyway. Only then did he realize that he wasn't just attached to Stan and Kenny, as he always told himself before.
The air didn't get any better in the area either, Kyle noticed when he had to cough briefly.
"Cartman, I can only repeat myself and apologize." He finished his explanation, which he himself knew wasn't very good. An audible inhale and exhale was heard behind him. Was she crying? Damn it, he didn't get along well with this at all.
"You can't change the past, but your apologies mean something to me too. And I'm kind of happy that we were able to talk again." Abruptly, she stood next to him, brushed her hair on one side behind her ear, so that you could see her face and one earring better. Surely she did it out of habit, and not to offer him a better view. Her voice was almost back to normal. The redhead looked to the side, because his thoughts were so out of order. They're talking about a serious subject and he thought about how pretty she actually looks. Her eyes shone slightly in the light. So some tears had fallen.
"Before what?" He asked as not to let the conversation die.
"No idea. Before you get married. Aren't you engaged or something?" While he was fishing for more comforting words, she hit him with something completely different. How did she knows about that? Was Stan gossiping? Admittedly, he toyed with the idea of marrying his girlfriend at the time before his sports accident.
"Ah no. It's over. I guess I'm not good at holding something like that up long enough." Then she moved her head directly in his direction and he received the pity packet.
"Do not look at me like that! Shouldn't you laugh at me or something?"
"We are no longer children. I only thought so, because your mother chatted so nicely about your life lately and .." The sentence confused him very much that he had to interrupt it.
"Since when have you been talking to my mother?" Because that's something he can't even believe.
"Imagine your mother is someone who also goes shopping outside of South Park. One thing led to the other. Sometimes we even get our nails done together." Inwardly, he wondered how long this had been going on and he never heard about it when he visited his parents. Probably it was not important enough.
"Not that I mind, but what about your mother?" After the question, he noticed himself that he was not very sensitive, because it could be that Cartman's remaining parent was no longer alive.
"She .. is ok." Erica sighed and stared at the floor. Apparently he was stabbing sore spots just yet.
"Doesn't she accept who you are now?"
"Oh no. She thinks that's all right." There was a pause and she lifted her eyes to look directly at him again.
"Kyle, have you never wondered why I ... used to be like this?"
"Hm?"
"You know, racist, sexist, selfish and a lot more. If I list everything, the time goes by quickly before the bus arrives."
"Oh." Now that he thought about it, it made a lot of sense to blame Cartman's mum for a lot. Sure, they all figured out a lot in their childish minds, but there was also a lot that Cartman couldn't explain to himself. It was just like that. And back then it was never questioned because it came from the mother. Actually, it was almost the same for him. Sometimes he never thought twice about things when he heard them from his father, because he looked up to him in the past. But that was once upon a time and it will certainly never happen again.
"Yes, oh. While we're at this point, I guess I owe you a real apology for all the ugly things I've said and done. In retrospect, I've only ever done all of this because I've always somehow liked you. As a kid I just couldn't deal with all these confusing feelings and thought that I had to be really mean to draw your attention to me." After that there was silence between them, because Erica probably had nothing more to tell him and he didn't know how to react.
"Now the mood is really fucked, huh?" She said then loosely and he couldn't help but laugh.
"What's so funny about that?" She wanted to know a little offended and the taller one tried to calm down fast.
"I don't know how to explain it to you, but you are still you." He started to announce his thoughts somehow.
"Huh?"
"You used to be ok if you didn't want to get your will through in a shitty way. Fortunately, that still remains of your personality, just in a sensible and feminine form. If I can put it that way."
"I'll take that as a compliment, but dude, you really have to work on something like that." She said with a roll of her eyes, but then smiled a bit anyway. Strangely enough, they both managed to continue talking normally until the bus finally showed up. The thought occurred to Kyle, to ask for her number before she got in, but maybe that wasn't a good idea. Probably he should be glad that they parted for good and leave it at that.
A little dissatisfied with himself, he turned back to the bus stop, because he didn't want to look after the vehicle like a loser. Only to notice then, that Erica left her purse.