Hi! Again, extremely sorry for the slow update. Double sorry for my lack of review responses; I’ll do better with that this time. It was just a stressful few weeks. Thank you so much for your comments! You guys are incredible!

Warnings: Tiny pieces of KennyxButters, strained StanxKyle. Emerging complications. Mentions of background-character drama that will definitely be addressed later. I think most of the students will get a moment, actually, because I love them all. Forgive unsavory characterizations; not everyone is what they seem. Also, sorry this fic is moving so slowly--like, only twenty-four hours have passed in four chapters? I’ll try and pick it up a bit.

I know now that this is going to get fairly dark. Please tell me if this begins to merit an M rating (if it hasn’t already). Thanks so much! Read on.

November

Chapter Four

Kyle wasn’t okay.

Conversation on the bus was strained and infrequent. Eric only threw out a few token insults before he put on his headphones, drowning us out with jagged alternative metal. Stan just stared vacantly at the road. He’d always been pretty useless after his fights with Kyle, but this one had left him badly shaken. Their disagreements usually didn’t last longer than a few hours, and Kyle seemed to have very little interest in resolving the conflict. I assumed his pride was still hurt. Refusal of sex was a pretty injuring thing, no matter how sensible the rationale.

I tried to make small talk with him, but his answers were monosyllabic and tense. He’d started biting his lip and smiling, as if he weren’t completely closing himself off. I only got one good sentence out of him after I demanded to know how he was feeling.

“Kenny, really, I’m no better or worse than anyone else my age,” he said finally, his voice completely without sentiment. “This is South Park, remember? Everyone’s been through the wringer.”

I glanced around briefly. The bus seats had filled up with our classmates, all of them looking exhausted and glum in the thinning light of winter. Before yesterday, I’d never really noticed the toll living took on people. Then again, it had been a pretty crazy year for us…three dropouts, a pregnancy, Pip’s illness, the car crash a few weeks ago. Typical teen stuff, but it was exponentially harder when everyone knew everyone. No doubt we’d built up armies of skeletons in our collective closet. We all had some battle scars.

It was only then that I noticed Kyle was scanning the bus too, but not for peers…for suspects. Something in his eyes seemed broken. I’d been doing the same thing earlier, but it hurt more to see that scared distrust in someone else’s face. I touched his shoulder and made him jump.

“I totally understand not wanting to broadcast this to everyone, but don’t just dismiss your problems,” I said. “That’s not going to make them go away.”

“Sure,” said Kyle. In acknowledgement, not agreement.

“Seriously. Forgetting about this doesn’t solve anything.”

“Right.”

I was clearly not getting through to him at all. Stan tugged the sleeve of my shirt and shook his head slightly, trying to get me to leave him alone. I hesitated. Even if we had to talk about the most inane shit ever, I wanted someone to be reaching out for Kyle at all times. Stan apparently thought we should be doing the opposite. Incidentally, neither of us was being very helpful.

“Hey, Jew,” Cartman said suddenly, speaking a bit too loudly to hear himself over his music. “Wanna hear some crazy shit? I mean, I left my ‘Fiddler on the Roof’ soundtrack at home, but even you might like this. I think it’s a Michael Jefferson cover.”

“Michael Jackson,” Kyle said.

“Whatever. It’s good.”

Kyle groaned, but he let Eric take off his headphones and settle them over his ears. He winced at the volume. “Isn’t it a little loud?” he yelled.

“Not as loud as that rad green shirt of yours,” Eric said. “Just listen, asshole. You’re going to miss the beginning.”

Kyle shrugged and closed his eyes, open to the distraction. His expression softened as he listened, apparently finding some solace in the angry, rapid guitar. The track probably mirrored his inner voice pretty well; I could hear the bass, wide riffs running out of control. Eric waited until he was nodding his head to the music before leaning forward, peering at me and Stan past Kyle’s oblivious form.

“I can handle this, guys,” he said calmly.

That elicited more of a reaction from Stan than I’d gotten all morning. “Fuck you, you don’t even know him!” he shouted, hitting me in the chest with his elbow as he leapt up in his seat. “You’re doing okay because you’re the only one here who doesn’t care! You’re doing this to spite us!”

“Hey, if it’s working,” I said.

“This isn’t fair!” he yelled.

I just blinked, suddenly realizing how furious he was. It had been so long since he’d completely lost his temper that I’d almost forgotten the signs--the abrupt loss of gentility, a defiant inclination of his chin. He’d been the “still waters run deep” type ever since puberty had mellowed him out, and he was more prone to silent brooding than outright fury. Kyle usually played fire to his ice. But Kyle sure had lost his own spark, too.

“What, Stan?” I asked in honest confusion. “You’re freaking out.”

His breath rasped between his clenched teeth. His eyes didn’t leave Eric’s. “You’re giving this bastard way too much credit, Kenny,” he hissed. “Don’t be stupid. He wouldn’t even go to church if he couldn’t steal from the fucking donation plate.”

“Better get Stannie back on a leash,” Eric returned, also towards me. “Remember, our fearless leader hates it when other people can do what he can’t.”

I hadn’t heard such an ugly exchange since sixth grade, and I resented being pulled into the middle of it. “Christ. Both of you need to grow up.”

Stan glared and sagged in his seat, properly mollified, but Eric went on without a trace of guilt: “You see what happens when something fucked up happens to one of us? The dynamics go to shit. I don’t even have to care about you guys; we just have a natural balance. Us four, I mean. Like the corners of a building.”

“Your point?” Stan said curtly.

“I didn’t say this is about Kyle,” said Eric. “Maybe I’m just doing this for me.”

The idea worked a lot better with Stan and Kyle’s perception of him, I had to admit, but Stan’s face didn’t change. He just sat very still, his eyes hard. “I’m not buying it, Cartman,” he said finally. “You don’t ever have kind ulterior motives.”

I groaned. “Stan.”

“Just go ahead and do it for yourself, then,” Stan continued coldly. “Fix our ‘dynamics,’ O Compassionate One, then back the fuck off. I’m warning you.”

Eric’s eyes finally darkened. He hated being threatened. I subtly scooted forward, ready to interpose myself if they resorted to physical violence, but Eric just shrugged after a moment and smiled a slow, lazy smile.

“That’s not up to me, now, is it?” he said gently.

I was opening my mouth to ask him what the hell that meant when Kyle removed his headphones, shaking his head to fix his hair. “Not bad at all,” he admitted to Eric, handing back the player. “I still like the original version, but they definitely did it justice. That guitar, holy shit.”

He faltered in our silence, glancing over his shoulder at us. Stan was still rigid with tension. I quickly tried to wipe the perturbed expression off my face, pretending I’d been looking out the window or something. “I bet it’s going to snow tonight,” I offered lamely. Eric rolled his eyes, confirming I sounded as retarded to them as I did to myself. I subsided. At least I’d tried.

“Guys, what’s up?” Kyle said. He looked past me. “Stan?”

Stan flinched, surprised that Kyle was deferring to him so suddenly. “N-nothing,” he mumbled. I could see the longing in his eyes, the embarrassment. “We’re just…you know. Talking sports.”

Kyle nodded, apparently accepting that answer as an excuse. We did get pretty heated over our football, I supposed. “Big game coming up,” he said. “Who are you rooting for?”

“Broncos, of course,” Stan said.

A brief lull in conversation.

“You know, I’m actually thinking it’ll be the Giants,” Eric countered smoothly.

There was another pause, this one longer, and Eric and Stan finally looked up at each other. The air between them felt almost electric, and I suddenly sensed that neither was actually talking about sports teams. Stan’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “They don’t have a chance, fatass. Broncos will be on home turf. They’ve been around here for long enough to know how the game is played; it’s their field.”

Eric grinned. “The Giants are better than you think. Don’t underestimate the appeal of away teams--they’ll shake it up, Marsh, believe me. The Broncos aren’t ready for this.”

“So, anyway,” I said.

“Who’s your money on, Kyle?” Eric asked.

Kyle thought about it. One of his hands absently touched Eric’s knee, then he shrugged, smiling briefly at Stan from across the aisle. “I have no idea, guys, they’ve both got their own strengths and weaknesses,” he said, glancing thoughtfully between them. “I think it could probably go either way.”

The brakes screeched as the bus came to a halt in front of the school.

“He wouldn’t be acting like such a douche if you hadn’t accused him unjustly,” I told Stan, dumping flour angrily into a plastic bowl. Powdery clouds sailed onto my clothes. “Blame yourself. You’re the one who put the thought in his head.”

“Trust me, he was thinking about it way before I was,” Stan said.

“No, he wasn’t. You’re paranoid.”

“Damn it, look, you’re his best friend! You don’t see him the way Kyle and I--”

“Gentlemen!” the teacher interrupted, her voice irritatingly chipper. “Something to share with the class?”

I sighed. “No, ma’am.”

“Wonderful,” she said brightly. She waited for us to separate before continuing. “Now we’ll be using the breadcrumbs we set aside earlier. Sprinkle them carefully, like so--an uneven coating will cause your soufflé to fall! Do not break the egg whites, and make sure you’ve saved all the yolks. We’ll need them for the omelets while your other dishes are baking.”

Wendy was a whore, I decided, pushing Stan aside so I could preheat my mini-oven. Since the opening of South Park High, cooking class had been mandatory for only the female students (progressive redneck town as we were). Only last semester had Testabitch decided to cite it as sexist, picketing at the mayor’s office and petitioning and everything. Now it was a required credit for all graduates. This new change resulted in a class period made up entirely of pissed-off male students. They hadn’t even gotten around to buying aprons without frills. I nudged my soufflé into the oven with the shiny edge of my spatula, wondering if it was sharp enough to sever any major arteries.

Eric and Kyle had left with half of the class to gather ingredients from the cafeteria. As soon as they were out the door with the teacher, Stan joined me again at my kitchenette, carrying Butters’s binder inside his cookbook.

“No one saw Kyle from one-fifteen on,” he said, reading.

“At least, no one I’ve talked to yet.”

“And someone actually marked his cup?”

“Yeah, I remembered it last night in a dream.” He cast me a skeptical look. “No, I know this was real. There were a few things I wasn’t sure about, so I didn’t write them down.” The fight with Craig, Kyle being led away on the stairs, the circumstances of his and Stan’s get-together. That reminded me. “Hey, Stan, do you remember hooking up with Ky that night or what? You guys were getting pretty close.”

“Close? Like, how?”

“Feeding each other. Kissing. There was this whole mess with Wendy when she saw y--”

“Kyle and I didn’t get together until Sunday!” Stan argued, a little too loudly. I shushed him frantically. He dropped his voice a few notches, sounding tired and frustrated. “No, dude, we didn’t ‘hook up’ at the party. How could we have, when neither of us even remember it? We hung out Saturday night and I finally admitted that Wendy and I were through. I don’t know what happened--we talked for a while, and I kind of broke down, so he held my hands and talked to me and stuff. I freaked out. I tried to kiss him. He panicked and left right away, but he called me up the next day and asked if I wanted to…you know. Try it out. So…we did.”

I frowned at him. That was their moment of truth? Stan getting distraught and planting one on his best friend? It wasn’t like being drunk was more original, but it was at least daring, controversially romantic, even. I wished I could tell Stan how beautiful they had been without inhibitions. “God. I mean, really? You don’t even remember your first kiss in that hallway?”

Stan rubbed his forehead. “Kenny, don’t make me feel worse about this.”

“Sorry.”

“That’s what I don’t understand.“ He leaned over onto the counter, his bangs shadowing his eyes. “This party was an entire month ago. How the hell is it I’m only hearing about it now? Why didn’t you or Cartman or anyone else talk to me about it?”

“We did, just not directly. I mean, I’ve made a hundred jokes about the beer pong. ‘One, two, seventeen.’ ‘Watch my balls bounce!’” I made a jerk-off motion and laughed.

Stan just looked blank.

“See? That kind of shit, is what I meant. I guess I didn’t realize it was all going over your head.”

“And this huge bash generated no discussion whatsoever?” Stan said.

“No, not here.” Some crazy shit had gone down at Craig’s party; it was the most embarrassing, extensive, alcohol-saturated get-together we’d ever had. Generally, the attendees wanted to forget what they had done. Except for the ones who couldn’t remember in the first place, of course. Talk about irony. “The whole thing is pretty hush-hush. Think about it: if anyone mentioned it at school and a teacher overheard, our entire class would get nailed for underage drinking. Everyone has pretty much decided that it never happened.”

Stan didn’t respond to that. He closed his eyes in concentration, then went back to reading our notes. I cracked a few eggs into a bowl and messily separated the yolks. Kyle wasn’t back yet with the rest of the dry ingredients. I stared longingly at our milk carton and decided no one would miss a few sips.

“So who do you think did it?” Stan asked suddenly.

I paused mid-swallow and choked a little, coughing. He watched me sputter the whole time, his face impassive. He honestly expected me to answer out loud? “I don’t think we should be talking about this here,” I muttered finally, under my breath.

“I need to know. I trust your judgment--tell me before I start hating everyone.”

I put down the carton and began to slowly whisk the contents of my bowl together. We were at the very back of the classroom. Up ahead, I watched Jason perform a puppet-show with his oven mitts, making Pip smile despite his obvious headache. Kevin and Jimmy snickered together and tried to pour raunchily shaped pancakes. Butters reached for a cup on one of the high shelves, balanced on a stepstool and his tiptoes and still a good six inches too short. He stumbled when he saw me looking at him. Token dropped a carton of eggs in his rush to catch him.

“C’mon,” I said helplessly, indicating them in a wide, exasperated gesture. “You’re really going to start hating all of them? It’s an insult. Not everyone here fits in your little police lineup.”

“Well, who does?”

“You’re a fucking cynic, Stan.”

“Then single some out so I can be optimistic about who raped my boyfriend,” Stan persisted flatly.

He did that on purpose, using the harsh language to unnerve me. I set down my whisk. “No, and you’re wrong to make me do this,” I said, crossing my arms. “Innocent until proven guilty, isn’t that what people say? My suspicions aren’t going to confirm or disprove what really happened. This isn’t right of you.”

“Write them down,” he said, grabbing my wrist. He pulled a pencil from his pocket and tried to curl my fingers around it. “Just write them.”

“Stan!”

“Kenny, I just want to see…like, f-find out if--”

I finally realized he was trying not to cry. His abused fingertips were still swollen. He pissed me off and hurt me at the same time; he was so fucking upset, so innocently manipulative in his vulnerability. “Stan, damn it, I hate you,” I whispered, and I snatched the pencil out of his hand.

“I know,” he whispered back. “But I need your help. I can’t think straight anymore.”

He looked just ashamed enough that I believed it. After a systematic glance around the room, I opened the notebook to a fresh page and closed my eyes, drawing in a deep breath. Slowly, I began to write. Each stroke felt like I was stabbing someone else in the back.

Bradley. Francis. Leroy.

Stan nodded.

Butters saw Terrance and the others, doesn’t mean they weren’t involved.

“The three of them coordinating?” Stan said softly.

I nodded. Wasn’t Tweek, but don’t trust him. “Because no one I’ve talked to remembers where he was,” I said, keeping my voice low. “And even if we knew, I don’t know how reliable a witness he’d make.” I wrote the next part down, hesitantly: Because of all his meds and stuff. Probably doesn’t even trust himself, you know?

“Alright.”

I had to will myself to continue. I felt like a piece of shit.

And Clyde.

“Fuck,” Stan muttered. He and I both glanced up unconsciously. Clyde was standing at his counter, carefully measuring salt into teaspoons, his brow furrowed in concentration. He spoke absently to Timmy as he worked, letting him mess around with the bottles of spices. God, none of it felt right. I smiled wryly at Stan and hoped he felt at least as low as I did.

“Now doesn’t that make you feel better?” I said, dripping with sarcasm.

Stan bit his lip. “How about Craig?”

Craig. He’d left with Kyle and Eric to go to the storage room. They were finally filtering back into the room, toting ingredients, Craig’s stride strong and deliberate among his classmates’. I thought briefly about his brusqueness, his too-rough hip checks whenever we played lacrosse or street hockey. The person in my dream was like a different person. Just a normal kid instead of the emotional bombsite, startlingly sharp-witted, fatigued from the effort of living. “I’m not sure yet,” I said, speaking fast as Eric and Kyle drew closer. “Let me talk to him after class, and I’ll let you know.”

“Sure,” said Stan. He swept the notebook off the table and into my backpack, out of sight.

“Miss Hume says we can go ahead and do the scones while the omelet’s cooking,” Kyle said as he approached, taking his place next to Stan. They smiled at each other awkwardly. Neither of them managed to look genuine. They resumed their projects with too much noise, Kyle being strange and formal, Stan just plain clumsy. I winced as they reached for the same spoon and stopped short. Kyle waited a beat before grabbing a different one on the opposite side of the counter.

“Wow, it’s like one of those embarrassing made-for-TV movies,” Eric said, snickering. “Or candid camera. Something like that.”

I hadn’t had a chance to chew him out yet over what had happened on the bus. “Eric, seriously, will you back off a little? This is a really difficult time for Stan, not just Ky. The last thing he needs is for you to act like you’re replacing him as his best friend.”

“Who says I’m acting?” he said, ripping open a new bag of flour. He peered into our bowl. “How much is in there?”

“Um--a cup, I think.”

He dumped in a little more and added the baking soda, smoothly moving the ingredients from hand to hand. I watched him for a long time, trying to figure him out. He had no right being such a graceful cook, with his big fingers and lumbering, ungainly movements. Everything I’d discovered about him in the last day seemed contradictory.

“You want to be friends with Kyle now?” I asked disbelievingly.

He looked at me. “I think of it more as, like…a lesser form of hatred. I can get him to pull it together if you assholes can’t. Jews need a hard hand, I’m telling you.”

“Except we’re not trying to discipline him. We’re trying to help him.”

“Hm, are you? Guess it’s the thought that counts.”

I started to respond, turning around to snap at him, but I paused when I spotted Butters looking at us from a few counters up. He flushed bright red when I met his gaze, ducking uselessly behind his colander. Inexplicably, I found a smile tugging at my lips. “Hey, he likes my shoes,” I said, without thinking.

“That’s wonderful,” Eric enthused. “Now you wanna grab our soufflé before it explodes?”

“It shouldn’t be done for a while.”

Eric sniffed. “Then what the fuck’s that smell?”

As soon as he said it, I smelled it, too. It was the thin, acrid scent of something burning. Frowning and sniffing, both of us followed it to the counter next to us, where Stan and Kyle seemed to be having some sort of contest avoiding each other’s eyes. Stan was slowly chopping mushrooms. Kyle stared distantly at the oven door. Their skillet sizzled on the stovetop, letting out tiny streams of black smoke.

“Hey, guys,” I said, pointing. Then Miss Hume shrieked shrilly from the front of the room.

“Group four, your omelet!” she wailed, screaming it as if the world would end if someone didn’t rescue the defenseless piece of cookware. Everyone flinched. Stan jumped about a foot in the air and stooped over to grab an oven mitt, but Kyle just seized the handle without thinking and dragged it off the burner. The plastic hissed violently in his palm, creating new clouds of smoke.

“Holy shit!” I shouted, dropping my cookbook. “Jesus, Kyle, holy shit!”

“What?” he said vacantly, then Eric barreled past me, seized his wrist, and yanked him back towards our sink. He plunged Kyle’s hand into our cooling dishwater. The water sizzled angrily. As the steam cleared, Kyle just stared at his own injured hand, numbly wriggling his fingers. It had to be at least a second-degree burn, already bubbling with fresh blisters.

“Are you okay?” Eric demanded. “God, you’re so fucking stupid!”

“What happened?” Stan yelled.

Miss Hume had booked it back to our kitchenette, skidding in her high heels. “Someone get a cold towel and call the nurse!” she ordered, suddenly without her airy homemaker inflections. She put an arm on Kyle’s shoulder, peering into the water. “Are you alright, Kyle? How bad is it?”

“Oh my god,” Kyle whimpered, sounding confused and scared, but not pained. “What did I do?”

“Something stupid,” Eric snapped.

Butters rushed up with the towel. I helped Miss Hume lift Kyle’s hand out of the sink by his elbow and place it into the cool fabric. Butters folded the towel around it tenderly, not touching the blisters, his eyes huge with concern. “Am I hurting it?” he mumbled, cradling his curling fingers. “How are you doing?”

“Fine,” Kyle said. “I’m fine.”

Eric pushed through to look. “Holy fuck. You really burnt it.”

“Just take him to the nurse,” Miss Hume told Eric. Stan made a small protesting sound.

Still dazed, Kyle allowed Eric to lead him out of the room. Everyone was silent as they left, their own cooking forgotten. Stan started after him, but Miss Hume gently held him back, shaking her head. She followed them to the door, and Butters and I exchanged glances. In the hallway, Kyle finally let out a cry of pain.

“Sounds like it’s hurting an awful lot, now,” Butters said quietly.

“Better late than never,” I said.

His eyes widened. “Y-you saw that too? I thought I was going crazy!”

“No. God, this is bad.”

“What?” Stan said, pushing between us. “What the fuck was that?”

I turned to him. “He didn’t feel the pan. He didn’t even realize he’d been burnt until he actually saw it, and even then, I don’t think he knew what was going on.”

Stan’s head jerked up. “That’s it, I’m going with him,” he said, and charged after them. Miss Hume yelled, trying to call him back into the classroom. It was a lost cause. Butters turned back to me and moved a little closer, his eyes huge and concerned. He waited until everyone was absorbed in Stan’s fight with the teacher before speaking.

“So, wh-what does that mean?”

“That Kyle’s a lot more fucked up than he--or we--thought he was,” I said. I hadn’t been aware that there was even a connection between emotional health and pain reception, but I knew it couldn’t be good. I kept picturing Kyle like that, his skin burning, unable to recognize the obvious signs of his own pain. My voice cracked a bit. “Butters, I think he needs serious help. I’m at a complete loss here.”

“Well, of course you are,” Butters said, bewildered. “You just got caught up in this like everyone else, you know? You don’t have to be the strongest just because you heard first.”

I looked at him, startled. He was right. When had I become Kyle’s keeper? Until yesterday, I’d just been a good friend--I wasn’t the counselor, I wasn’t their goddamned pillar of strength. And I certainly wasn’t the authority on mental wellbeing. “I have to do this,” I said, trying to keep the bitterness out of my voice. The stress hurt my shoulders, my whole body. “Stan is cracking, Eric’s got a vendetta. If I stop trying, who’s going to pick up the slack?”

“I’m here,” Butters offered timidly. “And I can talk to Kevin for you…if th-that’s okay.”

“Butters,” I said, after a pause. “You are an angel.”

He blushed.

There was a click as Miss Hume reopened the door and walked in, smoothing her skirt with as much dignity as she could muster. Stan was not with her. “Well, I hope we have all learned the importance of kitchen safety,” she chirped into the silence, back to her airhead verve. “No confection without protection! Now, let’s finish the pancakes.”

Shyly, Butters reached down to pick up the cookbook I’d dropped, tucking it carefully back into my hands. I smiled at him. “I’ll need two eggs,” I said, draping a fresh apron over his head.

I caught Craig standing by his locker after class. He had his back turned, but I could read the tension in his shoulders--he was shoving his books around on the shelves, trying to arrange them so they hid his cigarettes. I could never tell if he was actually pissed off or not. He’d had a sort of harassed, impatiently adult air about him ever since middle school, easily irritated, deceptively complex under his pretenses. It had gotten a lot worse since the car crash. I still remembered how unhinged he had been in the week afterward…cursing at the teachers, refusing to use the locker room, taking his lunches into the bleachers and not eating them. His behavior was only just stabilizing. That didn’t necessarily mean he was better.

Most of the accident’s details were kept quiet, but according to the rumor mill, he’d been the one driving that night. The car had rolled at a high speed; it was a miracle no one was killed. Token broke a finger, Tweek was bruised like a peach, Clyde walked away without a scratch. Only Craig had sustained serious injuries. He’d hemorrhaged for an hour before help finally found them on the back road to Middle Park. Neither he nor his friends spoke of it, except to say that there would be no charges pressed. We didn’t even know if another car had been involved.

The crash had happened a few days after the party. I didn’t see how the two events could be related, and I felt incredibly awkward, questioning him about something trivial that had happened a month ago. Tactless, too. Surely he’d had more important things to think about recently.

I watched as he pulled a book out of his locker, dropped it, leaned over to pick it up again. It looked like he was getting ready to leave for his next class. Finally working up my nerve, I crossed the hall and stood against the row of lockers next to him.

“Hey,” I said.

He glanced at me briefly, raising his chin. “Sup.”

I glanced at his locker. He’d tied a noose into his gym shoelace, dangling it from the top shelf. I played with the loop, choking my finger in it. “So how’s it hanging?” I said, not registering the pun until it was out of my mouth. “Uh…that’s not what I meant. I was just, you know. How are you?”

“I’m cool,” Craig said.

I nodded. “That’s great.”

We stood in silence for a few seconds, then he took pity on me. “And how are you, Kenny?” he said patiently.

“Fine. Just thinking.” I was ready to give up on creating a good lead-in; it sounded like the extent of our conversation was going to be this how-are-ya crap. “Craig, I know this is really random, but I needed to ask you a question about something that happened at your party.”

His head jerked up at. He glanced around quickly for teachers, spotted none, and let out a quick breath in relief. “Hey Ken, you ever heard about taboos?” he demanded in a low voice. “It’s a principle of silence and tact. Mostly silence. Which means, you don’t ask, I don’t tell. Trust me, I’m doing you a favor.”

“Yeah, but I need to ask,” I said.

“Why’s that?”

“I can’t tell you. It’s taboo.”

A marginal lift of the eyebrows. That was about as interested as he got. His roughness might’ve deterred a lot of people, but I thought it was intriguing. Craig was just a kid who’d been through shit, grown up a little too fast. That was the kind of damage I could really relate to--if he ever actually opened up.

“See, I was drinking that night,” I said haltingly. “And I’ve got this real hazy memory. I just wanted to see if you could confirm it? Or prove it false, even?”

“Try me,” said Craig.

“Alright. Well, we were playing beer pong, right? I got pretty wasted and had to sit down. I think I remember you sitting next to me, and we got to talking a little…some stuff about Stan and Kyle Broflovski. We got into sort of an argument. I don’t remember what we said…it wasn’t really anyone’s fault, though. Again, this is just something I dreamed up, I don’t know if anything really happened.” The more I talked, the more retarded I felt. Nothing in Craig’s demeanor recalled the conversation I’d had with him in my dream; there was no openness, no vulnerability or resentment. He just stared at me, his face completely neutral. We could’ve been strangers. Probably were, in fact. “Shit, I think I dreamed this up. Forget I said anything, alright?”

“Yeah, because we definitely didn’t talk,” Craig said.

“Figured,” I muttered, turning away. “Thanks anyway.”

He snorted. “No problem, Schwinn.”

I was four steps away when I realized what he’d said. Schwinn. That was a fucking bicycle brand. A very fitting nickname, giving my mantle as the class’s free ride. I turned back around, my eyes narrowed. He stopped rearranging his books and looked at me impatiently.

“What?”

“We did talk that night,” I told him, taking another step forward. “We got into this fight about the meaning of love or something. I remember it.”

“Did we?” he said. “You’ll have to remind me.”

“No, you’ll have to remind me. You’re the one who couldn’t get drunk. I’m pretty sure your memories are more vivid than mine are.” I searched his posture for something, anything to give him away. He just stood there with his arms at his sides, letting me dissect him with my eyes. An ironic smile flashed at the corner of his mouth. I got pissed. “Craig, you better talk to me right now. I don’t know what part you played in all this, but if you don’t tell me, I’m going to make your life hell.”

Craig picked at his fingernails. “Are you done?”

“I--”

“We didn’t talk, Kenny,” Craig said calmly. “I told you that.”

My body was cold with fury. “You’re a fucking liar, Craig.”

He slammed his locker shut hard, inches from my head, stepping in towards me. People passing by would think we were swapping confidences, just two friends having a chat between classes. He was taller. His eyes were blue-gray, like steel. “What do you want me to do, Kenny?” he said, his voice deceptively soft. “Take an oath? Swear it in blood?”

I just watched him, standing my ground.

“Because I’m actually still working on my circulation. Lost a lot in the crash, you know. Probably would’ve died if Tweek hadn’t staunched the bleeding with his sweatshirt.” Something strange flashed in his face, something not as tough as the rest of him. I blinked, and it was gone. He let out a breath, then smiled kindly. “So lemme get you a rain check on that blood oath, Kenny,” he said. “Don’t know what you’re trying to do, but hey, I can play along.”

“If you know anything, I will find out,” I promised.

“Fair enough.” He grabbed his backpack and tucked it over his shoulder. I thought he was going to leave. He paused, then leaned an inch closer, his lips right next to my ear. “Get off my back,” he said softly, and turned away, melting straight into the crowd of students without a single backwards glance.

When he was gone, I finally let myself close my eyes. My limbs were wobbly from the confrontation. Sinking to the ground against the wall of lockers, I reached into my bag and took out Butters’s binder, flipping to the correct page. The suspects page was still curled from use.

Craig, I wrote at the top, my hands still shaking. I circled it. Underlined it twice.

Phew, that was a long one. Please forgive how generally unpleasant this chapter is; it’s starting to get a little darker. Still hasn’t gotten good, but it will. Maybe. Someday.

Thank you for reading! Let me know what you think.