A Note From Ben: Sorry for the delay. It was my fault for breaking the computer, and I can't put the blame anywhere else. Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.

Chapter Fourteen – Bargaining Chip

Kyle steps out into the hallway, taking one last look at Stan sleeping against the wall before the door is closed and sealed once again with the padlock.

"We'll call this a little insurance policy," Alfonz says, grinning at him and patting the steel lock like a puppy. "He can't get out, and you're not gonna run off on me with him still here."

"Well what do you want?" Kyle asks, giving him his best go to hell look.

"Not here," Alfonz replies. "The office."

He walks down the stairs without another word and a sense of dread washes over Kyle. He doesn't like where this is going. Something about it seems off. There was a sinister look in Alfonz's eyes, a look Kyle can't quite identify the source of. What the hell could they possibly have to talk about in the office? Surely he can't be thinking of letting them go. If that was the case, he wouldn't have kept Stan locked in the apartment. That only means that he's up to no good.

They walk down into the customer area and Kyle finds himself thinking of that first day. He can't help but kick himself mentally for not listening to his instincts. If he hadn't found that ad, if he'd walked away when he first saw the neighborhood, if he'd backed out the front door the first time he saw Alfonz banging his knife and mumbling to himself like a crazy man; al these thoughts rush through his mind, filling him with immense guilt.

I got us into trouble once before, he chides himself. When we were back at the truck stop, I didn't listen to Stan when I should have and nearly got us caught. Now I've done it again. Stan would be so much better off without me.

They turn into the office and Alfonz closes the door behind them. He sits in his stained and smelly computer chair and motions for Kyle to take a seat opposite him. Kyle does so slowly, never taking his eyes off of his former employer.

.

“Kyle, you know I've always liked you,” Alfonz says in a friendly tone, as if this was just another ordinary day. “Remind me of meself when I was younger, I s'pose.”

“Is that so,” Kyle responds in a deadpan. He doesn't give a shit what this douchebag thinks of him.

“That's so.”

“So whats your point to all of this?”

Alfonz leans back in his chair and closes his eyes. He steeples his fingers under his nose and breathes in deeply, as if meditating. Kyle takes a glance at the wall above his head. Several framed certificates and awards are there, none of them from any kind of college and none of them on any kind of cleanliness. There is a commemorative cutting board there bearing the inscription FOR TWENTY YEARS OF SERVICE TO OUR COMMUNITY. He can't keep the bitterness from welling up inside him, and he finds himself wondering rather spitefully just how many awards the community would have given him if they knew what an opportunistic bastard he is.

“I want to make a deal with you,” Alfonz says finally, brings Kyle's attention away from another of the many wall hangings, this one a cartoon depicting a caricature of a stereotypical British person. The teeth are overly large and crooked and are covered with filth and he wears an outfit similar to Austin Powers, complete with cravat. The cartoonish heading reads I'M ENGLISH, SO I MUST SPEAK WITH EITHER A COCKNEY OR POSH ACCENT, LOVE TEA AND CRICKET, AND HAVE BAD TEETH.

“I'm listening,” Kyle says.

“Your Stan's happiness is the most important thing to you, right?”

“Y...Yes,” Kyle replies, his feeling of dread rising with every second. “Stan's happiness IS what I care for the most.”

“So what if I told you I'd be willing to let Stan go?” Alfonz replies, that Cartman-esque smile never leaving his face. Kyle has to fight the urge to slap it off.

“I'd call you a liar,” Kyle said simply.

“Ooh, now that's not nice, mate,” Alfonz says. “Here I am trying to do you a favor, and you're sneering at me and calling me names.”

“Don't act like you don't have it coming,” Kyle replies. “You sold us out.”

“And I'm willing to make amends for that.”

Kyle scoffs and rolls his eyes. He doesn't believe this shit. The look in his eyes at the idea of exchanging two kids for ten grand was too hungry, too excited. There's no chance in hell he's had a legitimate change of heart. Besides, he's only talking about letting Stan go. While that would be a wonderful thing, Kyle knows that Stan would never leave without him, even if the opportunity presented itself, even if Kyle asked him to go for his own good.

“Scoff if you like,” Alfonz says, “but you could at least hear me out.”

“Fine,” Kyle says. “Get on with it.”

“Fair enough,” Alfonz replies. “Here's me proposition: I've got a bit of a fondness for you that's...a bit more carnal if you get what I mean. The way I see it, you scratch my back, I let your Stanny go free. That's really what you want, isn't it?”

Ah, so everything has come full circle back to this. He's a little more polite than the trucker was, but his intentions are just the same. The man difference is, Alfonz is trying to barter for sexual favors by using his husband as a chip.

“You son of a bitch,” Kyle hisses. “You unbelievable son of a bitch.”

He no longer just wants to wipe the smile off of his face; he wants to cut his throat and watch him drown in his own blood.

“Do we have a deal, then?” Alfonz asks, ignoring this entirely. “Just a little bit of fooling around, we get our rocks off, and your Stanny is free as a bird.”

“No!” Kyle exclaims, his stomach lurching at the idea of this man's hands touching him, rubbing him, trying to extract some ounce of pleasure out of him. “I can't.”

“You can't?” Alfonz echoes, raising his eyebrows. “Thought you'd do anything for him. That's what you always told me. Always goin' on about how much Stan means to you, how you'd do anything for him. Now's your chance to prove that you weren't just talkin'.”

“Doing something like this would just break his heart,” Kyle says, shaking his head adamantly. “And I can't– no, I won't do that to him.”

“He'd never have to find out you know.”

“NO, DAMN IT! I CANT!”

He wishes that Alfonz would just stop asking and let him go back upstairs. He'd rather be there, spending these last few hours of freedom with his beloved than down here with this scumbag, fending off sexual advances.

“So you'd see your Stan taken back in shackles to save yourself a little attack of conscience?” Alfonz challenges. “Hmm. Maybe you and I aren't as alike as I thought.”

“We're nothing alike,” Kyle says, turning away.

He feels dirty just having been a part of this conversation. The looks Alfonz continues to give him certainly don't help. His eyes keep drifting up and down his body, lingering each time to admire the shape of his crotch. He's most likely undressing him with his eyes, and it makes Kyle want to vomit.

He'll be off-guard, a voice inside, that illogical and often repressed part of his psyche, suggests. If you do things with him, he'll be too caught up in it and you might have a chance to get away.

That's stupid, he shoots back. The only way that would really work is if I tie him up or knock him out.

Hey, if it works, Illogical Kyle replies.

I am not actually considering this.

Oh, but you are. That's what makes it so grand.

“Tell you what,” Alfonz says, cutting off his inner monologue. “I'll leave the offer open for the next minute for you to think about it. Ponder it. In sixty seconds, if your answer is still the same, I'll take you back upstairs and won't say another word to you the rest of the time you're here.”

Oh God, either way Stan and I are doomed.

I disagree, Illogical Kyle offers. I think this plan will work. All it will take is constant vigilance on your part and one lapse in judgment on his part.

But Stan...

Would never have to know. Alfonz was right about that.

“Thirty seconds,” Alfonz says.

I can't believe we're even a part of the same person, Kyle replies. You sound evil as fuck.

Not evil, Illogical Kyle replies. Just a little more willing to do what needs to be done, despite the cost.

That's...

Look, it's like this: there's a lot of guilt we both feel because of all the mistakes that have been made. We've been a real burden on Stan, this has all been our fault, blah blah blah. This is our opportunity to make it right! Redemption, Kyle. Think about it.

Go on.

“Ten seconds.”

The Christians are always talking about the self-sacrifice of Jesus leading to redemption. Maybe there's something to all of that. Sacrifice your dignity to set Stan free and redeem yourself.

This brand of logic–or illogic– is beyond Kyle's ability to counter.

“I...” he stutters. “Oh God...OK!”

The look that spreads across Alfonz's face– one that could only be described as a lion about to enjoy a freshly mauled zebra– makes Kyle's skin crawl.

“That's more like it, lovey,” Alfonz says, patting his lap. There's already a large bulge there, and Kyle feels his stomach give a fresh lurch at the sight of it. “Come over here then and we'll get started.”

He begins rubbing the bulge and Kyle sees it move. God damn it, it actually moves, actually twitches, in anticipation. Kyle's disgust keeps him rooted to the spot, and though he knows he should be getting up, moving over there, getting this shit over with, he cannot make any part of his body move.

Shit oh shit oh shit oh shit.

Alfonz grows tired of the rubbing and unzips his pants. He removes his bloated and throbbing penis and begins to stroke it gently.

“Come here, my friend,” he says, practically foaming at the mouth, “and let me show you loving like that husband of yours could never give.”

Insulting Stan's loving now? Oh, this dude must die.

“Leave him out of this,” Kyle says, hoping with all his might that Alfonz brings himself to orgasm before Kyle can get up and loses interest in him as a result.

“Whatever you say. Just come over here.”

He manages to make himself move this time and rises slowly to his feet. He moves across the room, each step feeling like a mile, and he wonders if this is the same way a condemned man feels heading toward his own execution.

Look on the bright side, Illogical Kyle replies.

There is no bright side, he responds.

Sure there is. He's so aroused already that there's no way he'll last very long before he explodes all over the place. It'll be over before you know it.

Somehow I don't find that very comforting.

When Kyle is within arm's reach, Alfonz reaches out and puts his hands on his hips. He pulls him closer, practically foaming at the mouth with lust.

Keep your eyes open, Illogical Kyle instructs. Don't let your chance pass you by.

“Oooh, yeah,” Alfonz growls, allowing his hands to drift from Kyle's hips to his thighs, his butt, his crotch. “That's more like it. Always had a fondness for you, I did.”

Kyle has to resist the urge to smack his hands away, especially when they start rubbing at his groin, feeling around greedily through the cloth, checking for some kind of sexual reaction.

“Why don't we....get these pants off?” Alfonz says, unbuttoning Kyle's pants. He undoes the zipper and lets them fall to the floor. Kyle is left standing there in his boxers, which Alfonz makes quick work of. The offending layers of cloth out of the way, he has full access to Kyle's private areas, which he seems disappointed to see have not reacted to his advances at all. Kyle's penis is still limp and doesn't even twitch when Alfonz runs his finger across it.

Disgusting fuck, he thinks. I wish I could get away with killing him.

Well, you can't, Illogical Kyle says, because I'm the side of you with homicidal tendencies, as limited as they are, and I can tell you that you'd never get away with it.

“Maybe I should start with a little...foreplay,” Alfonz says in an attempt at sounding sexy. He only succeeds in sounding like a creepy fuck, the kind who hangs out in parks and preys on children.

“If you say so,” Kyle mutters, staring at the wall above him. He doesn't care what Alfonz is doing down there. He's tuned it all out and can barely feel any of it, even when Alfonz begins trying to suck him off.

What do you see? Illogical Kyle asks.

Alfonz's shit, Kyle replies. Awards and photos and certificates.

And?

“Not exciting enough for you?” Alfonz asks, taking his mouth off of him and frowning at his still-limp penis.

“Of course not,” Kyle replies, still not looking at him.

“I can fix that, lovey,” Alfonz says, shifting away from Kyle. He begins tearing off his own clothes like they're on fire and soon sits there completely exposed. His belly sags in several disgusting folds, nearly enough to conceal his arousal, which juts up from his pubic hair like an exclamation point. He grabs a tube of lubricant from his desk drawer and begins greasing himself up. “Maybe we should do something a little more personal.”

Fuck, fuck, fuck, I've gotta think of something, he screamed at Illogical Kyle. Help me.

The cutting board, Illogical Kyle explains, frustrated at Kyle's inablility to see what is right in front of his eyes. That commemorative cutting board hanging right there.

Kyle is shocked that he never saw it before since it was almost literally right in front of his eyes. Some years before he became a filthy sleazebag with a failing store, Alfonz must have been quite a successful businessman, for his colleagues had seen fit to bestow upon him a commemorative cutting board engraved with the inscription TO AN EXCEPTIONAL BUTCHER AND AN EXCEPTIONAL MAN. It would be absolutely perfect if he could just get it without Alfonz knowing...

“No, wait,” Kyle says, trying not to vomit on his own words. “Do that...oral thing some more first. I was...just beginning to like it when you stopped.”

He isn't sure this lie is going to work, as transparent as it is, but Alfonz is too wrapped up in his own lusts to think clearly and he goes down on Kyle again. In order to keep him distracted, Kyle thinks of Stan and feels his own arousal begin to take shape in Alfonz's mouth. Alfonz grunts in delight and begins working it harder, clearly convinced that this is doing something for Kyle. He closes his eyes and buries his entire face in Kyle's crotch, until his nose is actually covered with Kyle's pubic hair.

Now! Illogical Kyle cries. This is your chance!

“Oooh, Alfonz,” Kyle groans, hoping it will be enough to keep him distracted as he reaches his fingers out, closer and closer.

“Mmmm,” Alfonz moans back.

Kyle's fingers slip around the board and he pulls it gently off the wall. He looks down at the top of Alfonz's balding head. Without a flicker of guilt from his conscience, he raises the board and brings it down onto his skull with a crack. He collapses to the floor with an “OOF!” sound and lies still. Kyle wonders briefly if he's killed him. The human head is a fragile thing and a good smack in the wrong place could be lethal. He decides he doesn't give a fuck whether this guy lays here decaying for two weeks before somebody discovers his corpse.

“As bad as Cartman,” he says, pulling up his pants. “You're both going to burn in hell. I hope you realize that.”

He begins digging through Alfonz's clothes, thankful that the guy took them off. This way, he doesn't have to ever touch the bastard's body again, even to find the keys, which he finds in the front pants pocket. That accomplished, he bolts from the office and back up to the apartment. He quickly opens the locks and throws the door open.

“Stan?” he cries. “Stan!”

Stan has apparently been awake for some time, because he's pacing the floor and smoking cigarettes when Kyle finds him.

“KYLE!”

They run to each other and crush each other in a tight embrace.

“Come on, lets get the hell outta here!” Kyle cries, pulling away from him and trying to pull him toward the door by the hand.

“Kyle, what the hell happened?” Stan asks, not moving “Where were you?”

“Don't worry about that okay?” Kyle exclaims, still trying to pull him. “Lets just go!”

“Where's Alfonz? How'd you get the keys? What the hell happened while I was asleep?”

Kyle can't figure out why Stan won't fucking move! The door is open, their opportunity to escape is now, and all he wants to do is ask a bunch of questions that could surely wait until a little later.

“Don't worry about that now!” Kyle cries. “Lets go!”

And to his surprise, Stan does.

“All right,” he says, allowing himself to finally be led out the door. He stops only to grab their backpacks, then they are flying down the stairs and out into the street. “I don't know how you pulled that one off,” he continues as they make their way through the dingy little neighborhood, no specific destination in mind, “but I think it'd be best to put as much distance between us and THIS place as we can.”

“And we can put it all out of our minds,” Kyle says, still feeling cheap and dirty.

“I've got some money saved,” Stan says “We can catch a bus back to the States and maybe find someplace warm to hide out for awhile. We probably won't have a deal like this one, but....”

“Anything is better then here and South Park!”

They walk past some homeless people trying to sleep in an alley that reeks of piss and booze. They look up at them, curious as to where they could be heading in such a hurry. Kyle tries not to give them too much thought, but he can't help but feel a tremor of fear at the sight of them. Is that to be their fate as well? Will their decision to run away from home result in a lifetime of sleeping in alleys and behind garbage cans, trying to ignore the reek of defecation and despair?

He banishes this with a shake of his head. There's no way that things could ever get that bad, not with both of them putting forth as much effort as possible and trying to take care of each other. They're gonna be just fine, just fine, just fine. He tells himself this over and over again, trying to fight back the panic and dread trying to rise up inside him and make him lose his mind. He just clubbed a man over the head, and now they're on the run in a foreign country. If it turns out that the blow to the head actually killed him, not even running back to the States will help them. He'll be a wanted man, a murderer, and they'd eventually catch him and

(just fine just fine just fine just fine just fine just fine just fine just)

“There's this place I heard about in Philadelphia,” Stan is saying when he finally manages to quiet his thoughts enough to focus again. “'Samaritan House', I think. They take in runaways and the police can't touch them while they're there.”

“Then I guess that's our best bet,” Kyle agrees.

“We can stay there for a couple of years where it's safe,” Stan explains, “then strike out on our own when we're eighteen.”

“Why didn't we go there first?” Kyle asks, listening to an approaching siren. He prays that it's heading somewhere else, that it isn't heading this way because of them.

“Because we couldn't get married in Philadelphia, for one,” speaking slowly and listening as the sirens get closer. “Hmmm...”

“Let's hurry!” Kyle hisses.

“Right,” Stan says, picking up the pace, “so I figure we make our way across Canada, then cross the border near Pennsylvania and work our way down to Philly. That'd be somewhere around Montreal, if I'm not mistaken and...oh shit.”

The cop cars slow as they come upon Stan and Kyle and Kyle feels his heart hit his shoes. Apparently, Alfonz was not only still alive, that blow to the head didn't incapacitate him for very long. He must have been calling for the cops as they were walking out the front door of his store. It doesn't take Stan long to connect the dots and figure out that Kyle is connected to this, because he turns to Kyle with an unhappy look in his eyes.

“What did you do?” he demands.

“Nothing!” Kyle retorts.

The police get out of their cruisers and surround them.

“Well, look what we have here,” the nearest one says.

“No! No!!” Kyle cries. “This can't be happening!”

“Okay, you two,” the cop says. “Keep your hands where we can see them. Quickly now.”

They raise their hands into the air, and Kyle gives Stan a do something look. Stan simply shakes his head and looks away. The message this body language conveys is crystal clear to Kyle: I'm so sorry. The cops move in and slap handcuffs on both of them and begin leading them back toward the cars.

“Apparently you two don't know how to keep a low profile,” the one controlling Kyle gloats. “First you break the law by running away from home, then you sneak across the Canadian border, also against the law; now you're assaulting people with cutting boards?”

Stan shoots Kyle a brief questioning look before he's hauled into the back of a police cruiser and disappears from view.

“Yes, indeed,” the officer continues, lording this power he has over him. Kyle imagines him to be some kind of power-crazed madman who goes home at night and beats his kids. “Your parents are going to be very happy to have you back.”

He is loaded into the back of another cruiser, away from Stan, and the door closes behind him. He thinks the catch of the lock sounds like their fate being sealed once and for all and it finally makes the tears fall from his eyes. After all their struggles and trials and heartache, this is it? It all ends with them being hauled away like common thugs?

He looks out the window as it pulls away, hoping to get one last glimpse of Stan, but all he can make out is his silhouette, then even that is gone.

“They can't keep us apart!” he sobs. “They just can't!”