Other Table 8/10

[sekritomg]

Title: The Other Table (8/10)
Author: sekrit_omg
Pairing: Stan/Kyle; various
Rating: R
Summary: It's human nature to want to know everything about others, and nothing about ourselves.
Author's note: Happy fucking Valentine's fucking Day, yo. It also happens to have been, like, a year since I started this. I am really hoping with all my heart that it's not another year before it's finished. I mean, that would sure suck.

Kyle noticed the horrible pain in his neck before he even opened his eyes. Being who he was, he rarely had a chance to fall asleep directly on someone’s floor, or in this kind of uncomfortable position. (Sharing a bed with Craig, Kyle knew, was a whole different kind of uncomfortable.)

 

When he did open his eyes, though, he saw two blue dots glaring down at him, and it took him a moment to realize what was going on before he jumped up with a scream, clumsily thrusting himself into a wooden crate full of crumbling Playboys.

 

“Kyle, dear,” Kenny’s sarcastic voice cooed. “You do look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

 

“I may as well have!” Kyle shrieked. “Jesus Christ!”

 

“Oh, what’s wrong?” Kenny asked, inching toward Kyle. “Did someone’s cell phone go off and wake you up at 7 a.m.?” Confused, Kyle shook his head slowly. “Yes, that’s right. That would be my morning.” Kyle gradually fished his phone out of his pocket and glanced at the message telling him he’d missed a call. “Yes,” Kenny sighed. “What a wholly pleasant morning.”

 

“Jesus Christ,” Kyle repeated, dropping the phone. “You—”

 

“Me?” Kenny asked. “What do you mean?”

 

“You! There!” Kyle pointed to the chair that remained flat on its side in the middle of the room. “Jesus!”

 

“Oh, yes.” There was a sort of self-satisfaction in his voice, and it was making Kyle uncomfortable. “That was a good one.”

 

“Oh my god,” Kyle sighed. “How could you?”

 

“Hmmm. What’s this? Why all the concern? I mean, I’m here now, aren’t I?”

 

“It’s so violent,” Kyle squeaked.

 

“I find it rather peaceful.”

 

“Your stomach is covered in cigarette burns!”

 

“I’m here now, aren’t I?” Kenny said forcefully. Kyle shuddered; he’d never heard his voice so eerily cold before.

 

“You said to come over,” Kyle pleaded, although for what, he was unsure.

 

“I said to come over directly after school, and you didn’t, and you walked in on something you shouldn’t have seen.”

 

“You couldn’t have waited?” Kyle gasped.

 

“No, Kyle,” Kenny snapped. “The world doesn’t always manage to fucking stop and wait for you to get with the fucking program.”

 

Kyle felt like he wanted to say something. He knew he was being insulted, and what was more, Kenny was angry — and Kenny was never angry. “Are you … okay?” he managed, although his words sounded uneasy and tentative.

 

“I’m indestructible.”

 

“But your—”

 

“I’m fine,” Kenny droned. He stood, and this was all it took for Kyle to realize that Kenny was wearing only a T-shirt and a pair of graying white briefs. “Like what you see?” Kenny asked insidiously. He gave a weird little smile.

 

“Maybe a little,” Kyle admitted. He reached forward toward the waistband on Kenny’s underwear, but Kenny sighed and took a step backward, leaving Kyle to nearly face-plant.

 

“Oh, no you don’t,” he cautioned. “I’m not gonna be your Craig rebound.” Seeing Kyle’s face go completely pink, Kenny grabbed his wrists and pulled him to his feet. “You’re pathetic,” he said cheerily.

 

“I don’t understand what is wrong,” Kyle panted. “Why don’t you just tell me?”

 

“Your sudden concern is misplaced, if refreshing,” Kenny admitted. He bent over and picked up his single pair of pants from the floor. “We’re gonna be late for school anyway. You want to suck me, it’s going to cost you. I want a new pair of pants.”

 

“Who said I wanted to suck you?” Kyle asked. “And shouldn’t you pay me?”

 

“Pay you?” Kenny snorted, and stepped into his jeans. “Kyle, I’ve had you, and you’re not worth any money.”

 

“Really?” Kyle asked, sounding genuinely bereft. “Craig said I was—”

 

“Look, I don’t want to know what Craig said.” Kenny began to gather up some school things to shove into a bag, but he saw Kyle standing alone and forlorn. He stopped. He sighed. “I’m sorry, okay?” Kyle didn’t respond. He just looked at his shoes. “All right, dude, look. I was drunk, it was a couple of years ago … I’m willing to give you the benefit of the doubt.”

 

“Oh, gee,” Kyle sighed. “That’s … that really makes me feel better about it.”

 

“All right.” Kenny crossed his arms. “I didn’t mean to upset you, okay? Breaking up is hard, and so on, and … I’m sorry. Just … let’s … let’s just go to school, okay?”

 

“Fine,” Kyle said sharply. Kenny bent over to get a shirt off the ground, and he lifted it over his head, pulling it on.

 

“We can take my brother’s car, if you want,” Kenny suggested. “He doesn’t need it, he’s still on probation, and—” He pulled his head through the orange T-shirt to see that Kyle was no longer in his room. “Kyle?” he called, sticking his head out of his room. “Oh, shit.”

 

He raced down the hall, into the living room, where his mother was sitting on the couch, playing solitaire. He stopped when he saw her look at him, although he wondered what she was doing up so early. “Kenny, what are you doing?” she asked, laying a hand down on the crates that served as their coffee table.

 

“Did Kyle just run through here?”

 

“Who, your little friend?”

 

“Yeah, Kyle.”

 

“Yeah, he went out the door a minute ago. Why, you do something to piss him off?”

 

“Probably,” Kenny said lamely.

 

“Shouldn’t you be going to school?”

 

“I’m going.”

 

“I don’t want two drop-out sons and a failure of a husband,” she said bitterly.

 

“Oh, no,” Kenny agreed. “I’m going to school, Mama. I’m taking Kevin’s car.”

 

“Okay,” she agreed. “He don’t need it.”

 

“Thanks.”

 

“Do good, baby,” she said miserably, picking up her hand of cards and looking at it. “You go after that boy, if that’s what you want.”

 

“No,” Kenny said carefully. “I don’t know. I think I’m done with him.”

 

“Oh, okay.” She picked a card from her hand and slapped it on top of a pile. “Have fun.”

 

“Oh, sure,” Kenny said with a laugh. “School always is.”

 

~

 

For the first time since he got his car, Kyle walked to school. It was about a mile, and he was late. He didn’t care — for the first time since he was a boy, he didn’t care about school. His family hated him, he had no friends, and it just seemed like everything was beginning to come crashing down around him. His backpack was still at his house, and it did occur to him as a fourth and fifth car whizzed by as he trudged along the shoulder of the road that perhaps going to school was pointless. But as little as he cared, it was an automatic behavior, something mechanical — he was programmed to wake up, go to school, do well, and go home. But maybe by the end of the day he wouldn’t care anymore. He was actually quite surprised at how little he was beginning to care about most things.

 

The day dragged on forever. He was half expecting someone to ask if he was okay, for some teacher to pull him aside after class and grill him about his innermost feelings. As much as the idea of some busybody getting too personal offended him, he was desperately hoping that someone, anyone, would talk to him. When no one did, he was forced to face a grim realization: He was isolated, and he always had been. He was in calculus — the rest of his friends took trig. He took AP classes — no one else did. The only class he had with anyone he even remotely cared about was Latin. And while he generally loathed the idea of having to see Cartman at all, as the day dragged toward lunch, Kyle began to hold out hope that maybe Cartman would deign to hassle him in class. If nothing else, it would feel sort of normal.

 

He felt less hungry than usual, so he skipped lunch altogether. He had another realization — he never went to lunch to eat; only to socialize. But he was avoiding everyone — he certainly wasn’t going to sit with Craig, and he was avoiding Kenny, now, too, so the other table was out. It occurred to him that there were other tables — for one thing, the school did have three other grades. And of course, there were always the girls. Kyle didn’t know what girls talked about at lunch, and he didn’t care. After realizing that he’d been standing in the hallway alone mumbling to himself about tables in the lunchroom for three minutes, he turned around and headed to the library, where he took a seat at the table in one of the empty study rooms in the back. He put his head down in his arms. Although he couldn’t sleep, he knew he’d benefit just from closing his eyes for a while.

 

Kyle raised his head when he heard someone speaking to him. “Excuse me,” a girl’s voice pressed in an agitating tone. It was so out-of-place, and yet he knew it was familiar, that he should know it…

 

“Hey,” the little voice nagged again. “Kyle? Are you okay?” He knew this voice. It belonged to Stan’s first crush. Kyle’s heart sank a little, but he looked up at her anyhow.

 

“What do you want, Wendy?”

 

Wendy’s eyes darted around suspiciously. “Can I sit down?”

 

Kyle wanted to say no. “It’s a free country,” was the best he could manage. He hoped that, coupled with his absolute snottiest tone, it would do the trick. It didn’t. She sat down.

 

“I heard about you and Craig,” she said softly. With some trepidation, she gently touched his upper arm. He yanked it away with a sudden seize. Who was she to bust into his study room when he was having a perfectly fine time feeling miserable? “I just wanted to say I’m sorry,” she continued. He could hear in her voice that she really didn’t want to upset him. “He’s pretty bummed about it. I think he really liked you.”

 

“Thanks!” Kyle barked out in his loudest tone, definitely not a library voice. Sheepishly, he lowered his volume after catching the Quiet sign looming over the doorframe ominously. “Who told you that?” he hissed in his loudest not-loud tone.

 

“Bebe,” Wendy said matter-of-factly. Kyle pursed his lips, completely unsurprised, and then she added, “Well, and Craig.”

 

“Fabulous.” He rolled his eyes. “I so love being gossiped about.”

 

“He’s quite upset,” Wendy tried.

 

Kyle had no patience for this. “Well!” he huffed. “You tell that bastard that he has no right being upset just because he left me! If he’s so damn upset why doesn’t he just come fucking over here and, um…” Kyle trailed off. Wendy continued to look at him with concerned eyes. “He is such a prick!” he finally concluded.

 

Wendy rolled her eyes. “Oh, that’s mature.”

 

“Just tell me what the fuck you’re doing here,” Kyle demanded. He was getting pretty sick of this.

 

“Because,” Wendy said slowly. “I think we have a common enemy, here.”

 

“I’ll say,” Kyle agreed. “You should get over Cartman. He’s only going to drag you down.”

 

Wendy sighed, and then she frowned. “You misunderstand me. I have no problems with Eric,” she said, waving her hands. “I’m not angry at him.”

 

At this, Kyle snorted derisively, and made a great show of rolling his eyes as apparently as possible. “Oh, sure,” he drawled. “Of course you’re not.”

 

“I’m not,” Wendy said firmly.

 

“Oh, of course. Of course you wouldn’t be pissed that boy you’re sleeping with and probably in love with is dicking you over.”

 

“Really,” Wendy stressed. “Really, really, really.”

 

Kyle snorted again. “Sure, I believe that. And why the hell wouldn’t you be?”

 

“Because, I can’t be angry at Eric for being a douche.” She paused. “It would be like hating a wolf for attacking a sheep. It’s in its nature. It can’t stop itself.”

 

“Oh, sure.” Kyle nodded, all the while completely doubting everything she was saying.

 

“And of course, I think I love him.”

 

Kyle gagged on this; it was the second time in as many months that he’d heard someone confess his or her love for Eric Cartman — a concept that up to this point in his life, he’d considered something of an impossibility. Butters’ infatuation could be written off in any number of ways; he was a weak, pathetic little boy, drawn in by Cartman’s pungent masculinity and strong personality. But Wendy — Kyle didn’t really know her, not in the way he felt he knew Stan or even Cartman himself. Despite this, though, he felt that he knew enough, or at least what he needed to know. She wasn’t crazy, she wasn’t stupid, and she seemed to know what she wanted. The realization that someone something less than insane or pathetic wanted to be with Eric Theodore Cartman made time stop for Kyle Broflovski, and he began to choke on something, although it had to be air, because he wasn’t eating or drinking anything.

 

“Are you all right?” Wendy asked, hand hovering over his, hesitant to offer real comfort.

 

“Fine,” he managed to squeeze out.

 

“He gives really fucking amazing head,” Wendy said abruptly.

 

Kyle immediately stopped choking to cough out an abject, “Excuse me?”

 

“I mean, what do I have to tell you to get you to believe that I don’t want to go after Eric? I want him back.”

 

“Well,” Kyle sniffed, trying vainly to regain some dignity in this ridiculous exchange. “I, um … I guess it makes sense that the thing he’s good at is, like … you know, eating.”

 

Wendy cracked a smile, and even Kyle had to think that she was rather captivating, if not his personal cup of tea. “That’s funny,” she remarked through a giggle, tucking some hair behind her ear. Her nose was too small and too pointed; she was wearing pink lipstick, and to Kyle it just looked greasy. Kyle had often felt his life was full of sadness and let-down, heartbreaks and disappointments and heaving sighs, but looking at Wendy’s pink drop earrings made him sadder than ever, for two reasons. She was what he was going to have to compete with in life, being smart and pretty and charismatic and most importantly, normal. On the other hand, this whole thing reinforced for him the hard truth that she was using her cunning to go after Cartman, and although thinking about Cartman generally made Kyle angry or simply just nauseated, thinking about Wendy and Cartman just made him sad. It was unfair that someone should want him that much — let alone two people, and here Kyle barely had anyone. He knew they would end up back together, too, and he would be left all alone again, and that would be that. Triumph of the normal, and he was anything but, with his enormous ass and kinky hair and affinity for Wendy’s leftovers.

 

“Kyle,” she said warmly, waving a hand in front of his face. He snapped back to attention, shaking his head.

 

“What?” he snapped.

 

“I don’t want to go after Eric. Pissing him off doesn’t help anyone.”

 

“Well.” He crossed his arms and sniffed again, hoping she got the message that he had no respect for that viewpoint. “Who do you want to go after, then?”

 

“Well, I think it’s best to go after the person consuming his attention, don’t you think?”

 

Kyle gaped at her. “You want to go after Butters? He’s completely benign.”

 

“No, I do not want to go after Butters,” she hissed. “Although I definitely hate him.”

 

“How can you hate Butters?” He really didn’t know how you could hate Butters. There was nothing vaguely hate-worthy about him. “He would have to pretty much be something to inspire any kind of ire, wouldn’t he?”

 

“I’m talking about that friend of yours. You know, Frank?”

 

“You mean … Frank Granger?”

 

“Yeah, he’s the one.”

 

“He’s not my friend!” Kyle bellowed in his tardy indignity. “He fucking sucks! He’s the douche who got me into this mess in the first place!”

 

“Maybe you should calm down…”

 

“Calm down? Calm down?” Kyle got up and began to pace back and forth, pulling at his hair as he ranted. “How could you even say that to me, calm down? Do you even know what the fuck is going on in my life?”

 

“Well, kind of, but…”

 

“You think you have problems, with your, ‘Oh, Eric Cartman gives great head.’ Do you know that I’ve given head to pretty much every boy in our grade except for Cartman, and the first time I ever got any back was like two months ago?”

 

“Well, no…” Wendy stammered hesitantly.” I didn’t know that.”

 

“No, you fucking wouldn’t, because you’re too busy being a goddamn girl to notice anything that’s happening with me. I’ve been in love with someone since like forever, and he has no idea, and on top of that he totally fucking hates me, and Kenny like tried to rape me this morning, and all of this is part of my normal life except that I just fucking got dumped by the only person who ever gave a modicum of a flying fuck about me, and you think Cartman is so fucking great, well, he’s helping Frank fucking Granger do the same bigoted, narrow-minded things he’s always trying to do, and to top all this shit off my family fucking hates me and treats me like shit, and so does everyone else, but it’s their goddamn fucking fault I’m in this position to begin with, because if my mother weren’t a crazy fucking psycho whore, I’d pretty much have none of these problems! Do you understand?”

 

Kyle stopped pacing, and he planted his hands on the table and leaned into Wendy. He gave her what he hoped was his most insidiously manipulative look of pain, and he was expecting her to say something generically comforting like, ‘Oh, that sounds awful.’ He would also not have been surprised if she had asked who he was in love with, or actually just come out and admitted that she knew it was Stan, everyone knew it was Stan, and there was no getting around that. Instead, she did something he found unexpected and a little off-putting.

 

“What are you doing?” he asked, curiosity and disgust mingling in his tone.

 

“I’m giving you a hug.” She spoke into the crook of his neck; her grasp was loose and tentative. She drew away, giving him a small, questioning glance. “What’s wrong?” Kyle shrugged his shoulders, and backed away from her.

 

“I don’t like this,” he mumbled.

 

“You’re being really weird.”

 

“No, I’m not.”

 

“Kyle,” she sighed. “Have you ever considered being friends with some girls?”

 

“What? No!”

 

“Well, why not?”

 

“I … I don’t know.”

 

Wendy swallowed, and clasped her hands. “I think we could be friends,” she said. “We have a common enemy.”

 

“Having a common enemy doesn’t make us friends!” Kyle protested. “Besides.” He cleared his throat. “I’m not sure I have it in me to be ‘friends’ with someone who’s sleeping with Cartman.”

 

“Look, it’s very simple. We obviously need help, so why don’t we just help each other?” Kyle opened his mouth, but she cut him off. “You don’t want to be my friend? Think of it as an alliance.”

 

“Wendy, I’m not—”

 

“What are you afraid of?”

 

“I’m not afraid,” Kyle lied.

 

“All right, that’s good. You think I don’t care about some homophobic douchebag? I care. Some of my best friends are gay.”

 

Kyle snorted. “Well, of course you care about some homophobic douchebag, hence all the plotting for Cartman’s attention—”

 

“He’s not homophobic,” Wendy interrupted. “I mean, I get how you might see it that way, but … no.” Kyle looked doubtful, so she added: “Trust me. If Eric were a homophobe, do you think he’d be running around school in those fucking tight jeans pretending to be dating Butters?”

 

“Honestly?” Kyle asked. “I put nothing beyond him at this point.”

 

“That is pretty smart.” She paused. “But no, really. Here’s how I see it: I’ll help you take care of Granger. He’ll get put in his place, he’ll stop courting Eric, and Eric’ll come back to me. Plus, you’ll piss him off. And he hates that. Sound good?”

 

Kyle moaned, and slouched against the wall. “I don’t know,” he whined. “I really … I’m sorry I just don’t trust—”

 

“—anything that bleeds for five days and doesn’t die?” Wendy filled in.

 

Kyle raised an eyebrow. “How’d you know?”

 

She smiled. “Oh, that? I’ve heard it somewhere before.”

 

“I don’t like you.” Crossing his arms, Kyle sighed. “I need to think about it.”

 

“All right,” Wendy said brightly. She swallowed. “Take your time.” He gave her a nasty look, and she backed out of the study room.

 

~

 

At lunch Kenny was silent, choosing to eat his side of macaroni and cheese without getting involved in the forced conversation between Stan and Clyde. They were talking about football; apparently, the guys from South Park who played were spending their afternoons scrimmaging out by Stark’s Pond, because the regular season hadn’t started, or was over, or something like that. Now, even Kenny knew that the NFL didn’t start until September, but he couldn’t figure out high school football at all. So as Clyde bugged Stan about the team’s prospects (“We should be okay,” was Stan’s reply) and Tweek nervously tapped his nails on the laminated table surface in counts of three, Kenny sighed, and picked up his empty styrofoam bowl.

 

He was nearly out the door when Stan caught up to him, breathless, clearly having just made it out of there. “Kenny,” he breathed uneasily, tugging on the thin sleeve of a hooded black sweatshirt. “I need to talk to you.”

 

“Okay,” Kenny said. He tossed his lunch trash in a nearby bin and pulled his lighter out of his pocket. “I’m going out for a smoke before French.”

 

“Oh.”

 

“Oh?”

 

“You take French.”

 

“Um, yeah.” Kenny frowned. “I’ve been taking it—”

 

“I get it,” Stan said rapidly, cutting him off. “I think that’s sort of sweet.”

 

“Oh, thanks,” Kenny said bitterly. “I don’t need you telling me what’s sweet, Stan.”

 

Stan frowned, and put his hands in his jean pockets. Kenny smiled at how baggy they were; that was Stan, never wearing pants that suited his athletic assets. What a waste. “I’m sorry,” Stan muttered, lowering his head.

 

“For what?”

 

“Not sure,” Stan admitted. “I just feel like such a bad friend these days.” He paused, and shifted out of the way of a couple of girls who were coming into the cafeteria, and then he leaned toward Kenny and said in a small way, “I really need your help.”

 

“Well, I’m going out,” Kenny repeated. “But you can come.”

 

“Thanks, dude.”

 

“Ugh, don’t thank me. Just, let’s go. I haven’t had a cigarette in four hours.”

 

Outside, Kenny leaned against the side of the building, and lit his cigarette in the most dramatic way possible. He inhaled deeply, and exhaled with a loud groan through his nose. “Oh, yes,” he sighed. “You have no idea.” Stan was still standing there with his hands in his pockets, and now he was smiling awkwardly. “You … want my help?” Kenny asked slowly, fine wisps of smoke curling out past his lips as he spoke.

 

“Yes, please,” Stan replied brightly. “I don’t know what I’m doing.”

 

“With what?”

 

Stan groaned, and sat down, not caring if his baggy pants got dirty in the muddy April ground, which was cold and mostly solid, but slick on the surface. With a sigh, Kenny joined him, adding another layer of grime to his only pair of pants. “I like someone,” Stan said very carefully. “And I know you know who,” he added preemptively when he saw Kenny’s chapped lips part slightly. “And I can’t say it. So please, don’t make me. I know you know. I know you do.”

 

“Okay,” Kenny agreed. “I do. So what?”

 

“So what?” Stan asked. “So what, is you’re my friend, and friends help each other out.”

 

“Uh uh.” Kenny shook his head, and Stan watched the cigarette bob around between his lips while he did. “I’m sick of just being there for people who want to bitch, and then left hanging like a fucking slaughtered calf when it’s inconvenient for you people to try and do something for me for once.”

 

“I try to be such a good friend to you,” Stan said morosely, defensiveness seeping through his solid exterior like smoke from Kenny’s lips. “I think for what it’s worth, I should get an A for effort.”

 

“Look, Stan. Just because you’re a little bit more attentive to me than Kyle and Cartman doesn’t mean you’re some kind of saint.”

 

“Oh, my god. I really take offense to that.”

 

“All right, fine. What kind of saint do you want to be? The martyr kind? Because Chris has some crossbows, I’m sure he’d enjoy a good hunt through the forest before stringing you up on a cross.”

 

“Dude, sick, no. That’s not what I meant.”

 

“Then what?”

 

Stan was very quiet. “You can’t group Kyle and that fat ass,” he said. “It’s not even close to the same.”

 

“Oh really?”

 

“Really.”

 

Kenny pulled up a handful of grass and squeezed it in his hand before dumping the muddy clump on the ground. “Maybe Kyle would never feed anyone their own parents—

”

 

“You’re damn right he wouldn’t!”

 

“—but quite honestly, as far as I’m concerned, they’re about equally as selfish.”

 

Stan’s eyes widened and he shook his head. “How could you say that?”

 

“I’m not sure insulting Kyle is a productive line of discussion for us.”

 

“Oh, no. You started this.”

 

“You’re the one who followed me out here!”

 

“Well, you’re the one who thinks Kyle is selfish, and I’m still going to have heard you say that no matter what comes next, so you might as well tell me!”

 

“All right!” Kenny threw his hands up. “The old Marsh charm works again. Well, let’s see. All he cares about is himself. All he does is walk around in a complete Kyle fog, seeing everything as an assault on his well-being. ‘Oh, gee, my life is soooo horrible, Stan doesn’t love me, my mother outed me to the whole town when I was 11, my parents bought me a $20,000 car — and now they expect me to get it washed! How dare they. Oh, it’s all so unfair, my younger brother wants me to drive him to a friend’s house — so I beat him up even though he’s so much younger and littler than I, why can’t I have an older brother who works at a liquor store and is a registered sex offender?’ ”

 

“Kenny, this is—”

 

“ ‘Why did Craig dump me?’ ” Kenny continued, louder. “ ‘All I did was tell him I’d never love him because I’m so fucking obsessed with Stan! How could he not understand that what I feel for Stan is as pure and fresh as newly fallen snow and all I want to use Craig for is a distraction? Why isn’t he perfectly happy being my distraction? Nobody will ever love the way I do. I’d better just go back to sucking off everything that moves. That was a better distraction.’ ” Kenny cleared his throat of the falsetto he’d been using. “Okay, I’m done now.” He paused. “And that’s not even counting me, by the way. I guess one of your oldest friends killing himself is rather boring if it doesn’t involve checking you out in the locker room and then angsting about it all the time.”

 

“Oh,” Stan replied stupidly. “Well, I can’t always help that.”

 

“I’m surprised you notice it,” Kenny said honestly.

 

“He’s my best friend!”

 

“So then, you do know how much he likes you?”

 

Stan rolled his eyes. “How dumb do you think I am, Kenny? I’d have to be an amazingly bad friend to not know. It’s the most fucking obvious thing.”

 

“Oh, but me dating Chris, that’s not obvious?”

 

“Not really.”

 

“Well, you should have asked!”

 

“You could have just told me, you know.”

 

“Oh, what am I supposed to do? Send out a fucking press release? ‘We invite you to acknowledge the fact that Kenny’s dating someone. Please treat his significant other with accordant respect.’ Maybe that would work.”

 

“Come on, dude. Don’t be a prick about this. How the fuck was I supposed to know you were dating Christophe?”

 

Kenny slumped, and sighed. “You make all these noises about friendship, and what friendship is about. But tell me this.” He paused. “What does it say about our friendship if you and fucking Kyle can’t tell that I’m dating someone? How well do you know me — how much of a shit do you give about me — if you can’t perceive that I’m in love?”

 

“Please, don’t take this personally, Kenny,” Stan said softly. He put a consoling hand on Kenny’s thigh; Kenny removed it. Stan continued: “You’ve said yourself, you’re with a lot of people.”

 

“So?” Kenny asked, unimpressed.

 

“Well, so … how am I to know if you’re serious about any of them?”

 

“Oh, I’m serious about all of them,” Kenny said boldly, quite serious, in fact, in his statement.

 

“But don’t you think…” Stan slurred his words, nervously trying to determine what kind of impact they would have on Kenny, who was stubbing out his cigarette butt in the grass. “Don’t you think you’re just, well…” Stan trailed off.

 

“Oh, out with it, already.”

 

“...kind of a whore?” Stan squeaked out in conclusion.

 

At these words, Kenny’s eyes went wide and his nostrils flared out. He choked back guttural, angry noises, and said very smoothly, “What makes you think I’m any more of a whore than you, Stan, with your fucking every chick in town? Or Kyle, who can’t see a dick without falling on his knees and shoving it into his mouth? Tell me, do you think that makes either of you incapable of loving just one person?”

 

“I … I — oh, God, Kenny. You’re right.” Stan rubbed his nose. “I guess I’m not capable of love.”

 

“What?” Kenny asked. “No! Wrong!” He smacked Stan across the face, causing the boy with black hair to drop his hand from his nose.

 

“Hey!”

 

“You can love, Stan! And you do, and I know you do! I see right through both of you. You’re kids, dude, you can fuck whatever you want. It doesn’t make you any less capable of having emotions. And you know what?”

 

“No, what?”

 

A bittersweet half-smile spread across Kenny’s face. It was nearly beatific, and Stan knew that he’d never seen his uninhibited friend express this much outward, genuine emotion before. “Being a proponent of free love doesn’t make me unable to feel it, either. I’ve sat here watching our whole class rip apart over who likes what, and it’s so fucking lame, dude. So fucking lame. Just because I can’t pick one or another makes me some fucking pervert. Why should I have to? I’m not going to throw away the best fucking relationship this school’s ever seen just to make you people feel more normal about yourselves — hell fucking no!”

 

“Shit, dude,” Stan gasped. “What made you so inordinately wise and perceptive?”

 

“Uh, gee, I don’t fucking know,” Kenny said mockingly. “But I bet it’s got nothing to do with the fact that I’ve had to face my own mortality every week since I was 6. Or that I’m dating a French mercenary who gets off on gun play.”

 

“Jesus fucking Christ!”

 

Kenny grinned mischievously. “It’s such a fucking turn-on. You have no idea.”

“Good. Let’s keep it that way!”

 

“All right, fine, I’ll sit here and listen to what you do with Bebe or whoever and then when it’s my turn you can just be like, ew, fags. That’s fucking fair.”

 

“It’s not that,” Stan clarified. “That guy just fucking creeps me out. He’s, like, skeazy as hell. And you let him what, put a gun in your mouth?”

 

“My mouth if I’m a good boy.”

 

“Sick!”

“See?” Kenny sighed. “That’s what I mean.”

 

“Well, what do you fucking want, dude? You want to know what I do with chicks!”

 

“Not just with chicks, Stan. What the fuck are you going to do?”

 

“Me?” Stan put his head in hands. “I don’t fucking know. Honestly I was assuming that the situation would kind of resolve itself, without me having to do anything.”

 

“That is so fucking lame.” Kenny reached around and pulled a nearly empty carton of cigarettes out of his pocket. “You want one?” he asked, helping himself.

 

“No. Wait a minute.” He paused. “Yes.”

 

The lit each other’s cigarettes. Stan was not a smoker in the most literal sense of the term, but like most 16-year-old boys he was not unused to tobacco, having let himself be drunkenly talked into sharing one or two in someone’s backyard. He gagged a bit on his first inhalation, but Kenny helpfully slapped him on the back. “We need to formulate a plan,” Kenny said slowly, licking his filter thoughtfully.

 

“What?” Stan asked, his voice ragged. “You’re not suggesting I do something.” Kenny nodded. “Well, fuck that, dude! I’m not putting myself on the line like that!”

“Stan,” Kenny said softly. “Don’t be afraid.”

 

“If something’s going to be done here I’m sure as fuck not going to do it! This isn’t on me.”

 

“All right, well. You’re going to have to do something, because I can tell you quite directly, nothing is ever going to happen if you just fucking sit here waiting for it.”

 

“Why?”

 

“Well, for one thing, the other member of your party doesn’t know you made reservations.”

 

Stan’s eyes widened. “What, really?” Kenny nodded. “Oh.” Pause. “How can that even be possible?”

 

“Don’t know, don’t care. Doesn’t matter. What are you afraid of?”

 

Stan sighed and glanced down at the burning roll of paper and tobacco in his finger. He smiled gently and stuck it into the ground, imagining that he heard a little hiss or crackle — a little sign that something was being extinguished. If nothing else he yearned for poetry, for some kind of magic in this moment of uncertainty. But he also knew that as much as magic was pretend, he should really be saving this sliver of grace and delusion for a different time.

 

“Well,” he breathed. “The same thing we all are, I guess.”

 

Kenny exhaled a little, smoke gently seeping out of his nostrils. “You’re afraid of loss, and possibly humiliation. But please, take it from me, as someone who has nothing to lose and no sense of shame: Those things are immaterial, and they’re also transgressive. The world won’t stop spinning if you strike out, Stan.”

 

“Oh, my god,” Stan gasped. “Why are you saying these things? It doesn’t even sound like you!”

 

“Anything to help a friend get laid,” Kenny said, a kind of warm friendliness in his stubbly cheeks.

 

“So,” Stan said cautiously. “You’ll help me with a plan.”

 

“Yes, yes.” Kenny rubbed his hands together furiously, the end of his cigarette dangling out of his mouth. His eyes were wide and clear. “Let’s plot together. But I mean it, Stan.” He paused remove the filter of his cigarette from his lips, stubbing it into the concrete building they sat against. He coughed and brushed his dirty hands against his legs. “I want pictures.”

Continued herez0rs.