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Craig Tucker was a very routine-driven type of kid. He had a set times and days for doing his homework, cleaning Stripe’s cage, doing his laundry, and working all of those activities around watching his favorite shows and playing video games. When he and Tweek officially started dating, Tweek was mostly content to latch onto Craig’s routine as much as possible. They did homework together. Tweek made sure Stripe didn’t chew, or pee on anything while Craig cleaned its cage. When they watched a two hour block of cartoons, or a movie together, they held hands once they ran out of snacks. On sleepy days Craig would put his feet on Tweek’s lap and fall asleep.
There were also days where Tweek freaked out.
“Tweek, what’s wrong?” Craig asked. “You’ve been glued to your phone for over two hours and look like you’re about to cry.”
“Ngghhaa!” said Tweek, phone flying out of his hand. “Oh Jesus. Why don’t they just leave me alone?”
“Who is ‘they’ exactly?” said Craig. He didn’t like where this was going.
“I don’t know!” Tweek was twitching something fierce. There was only one immediate fix Craig knew of at that moment.
Craig got up and went into the kitchen. He selected a generic Donut Shop K-cup of coffee and put it in his mom’s Keurig. While the coffee brewed, Craig poured himself a glass of lemonade and called for Tweek. His boyfriend came in with his phone, trembling and bug-eyed like a cornered animal.
“Tweek, honey. I’m going to hand you this coffee, and you’re going to tell me what’s wrong. OK?”
“O-OK...” said Tweek, taking the hot cup from Craig’s hands. He blew on it a couple of times and took a few sips. Though it burned a little, the simple taste of coffee, no matter how crappy it was, got Tweek twitching less.
“Well?”
“Here, just. Here,” said Tweek, handing Craig his phone. He cradled his precious coffee cup in his shaky hands while trying to even out his breath, but to no avail.
“Ign Oramus? Who the fuck...?”
“I don’t KNOW!”
“Let’s see: Your relationship is fake and you know it. I know it. We all know it. It’s fake and was never going to happen for real. Stop pandering to yaoi fangirls already, you sick, nutless, PC faggot.”
“ARRHGGA!” Tweek splashed half his coffee onto his shirt.
“Dickie Small: You shouldn’t date just to make everyone else happy, or that makes you a liar and a rapist...
“Drippie Anis: It was only cute that one time, but now it’s stale...
“Cleggy Hill: Craig’s going to dump your bitchass for Clyde because they have the same voice and personality Oh Em Gee Oh Tee Pee...
“Savage Boner: Stop delaying the inevitable and break up.
“Who the fuck are these assholes?” said Craig.
“I don’t know! I don’t know who these people are, but they keep sending me these messages. ARG! I’ve been getting them all day! On facebook! On tumblr too!”
“Tumblr?” Craig frowned. “Oh no...”
Morbidly curious and more than a little pissed on his boyfriend’s behalf, he opened the tumblr app and wanted to punch whoever was responsible for this gem instantly.
“xxgenderella42xx: fuck off and die, cis whitey. stop trying to take the spotlight away from trans issues. all men suck and are entitled, including gay ones. consider this a call-out. coffeeandlegos is a transphobic piece of shit.
“Wow, what a cunt.”
“ACK! I don’t understand! Why would someone say that to me?! Why would anyone make a post like that? Why does it have 20 notes? I only reblog posts about Legos! How do you get transphobia from Legos? ARRGHH!?”
“Because they’re stupid fucking assholes who have nothing better to do,” said Craig, back to facebook, going through lines and lines of the hateful harassment and bullying his boyfriend was subject to. The more he read, the more he wanted to track these fuckers down and cut them. Once that occurred to him, he stopped and went right to his comfortable place: logic. “You know you can block these shitty people, right? You can also adjust your privacy settings on facebook. I’m surprised you don’t already.”
“There’s no point! Nothing’s private! The government can see everything I post anyway! AhhhG!”
“That doesn’t mean any random dickhole with Internet access should get to, though.”
“This isn’t helping!” Tweek said, pulling at his hair. “I... I can’t deal with that right now!”
Oh.
Right.
It was one of those again. Logic was Craig’s comfort zone, but he had to remind himself every now and then that it wasn’t Tweek’s, so he had to change his approach. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and thought: “How can I make Tweek feel in control again? Control... ah!"
Craig walked over to Tweek and handed him back his phone. “I was wrong. I shouldn’t tell you how to handle this, Tweek. That’s up to you.”
Tweek twitched and reluctantly accepted his phone.
“I still want you to know something. Can I tell you how I honestly feel about our relationship?”
“... Y-yes?” said Tweek, thoroughly freaked out, as though expecting to be punched in the stomach. He looked so small just then. His posture closed, defensive. Craig stayed an arm’s length away, in case Tweek needed to scream and flail some more, which was entirely likely.
“Our relationship isn’t fake. It did happen. It’s happening right now. I want it to keep happening. I’m dating you because it makes me happy. Why the fuck would I ever date someone to make anyone else happy? That makes no sense. Everyone else can go fuck themselves. If we ever get into a petty fight and break up over something stupid, we’ll probably get back together three days later like Stan and Wendy always do. These random people, who don’t even matter, are going to either get the fuck over it, or suffer. Not our problem either way.
“You are my boyfriend, Tweek. You make me so happy and I love you.”
Tweek stood there like a deer in the headlights, his rapid fire, yet chronically exhausted mind taking its sweet time processing everything Craig had just said. He followed it word for word, and then that last part did hit him right in the gut, but in a good way. Much better than he braced himself for. It was a good feeling. Wonderful, actually. It was warm, alive, colorful. Sort of like fireworks.
“Do you mean that?” said Tweek, his voice meek and sweet.
“Yes, Tweek.”
“... I love you, too, Craig,” said Tweek. Then he hiccuped and cried. “So much. I love you so goddamn much I just... ARGGH! Why do these people say these things? It’s cruel!”
“They’ll never have this, for one,” said Craig, reaching for Tweek’s hand and lacing their fingers together. Tweek looked down at his phone and cried some more.
“They don’t understand!”
“You’re right. They don’t. They suck and they don’t matter.”
“BUT THEY STILL HURT ME!” Tweek squeezed his phone. If he could, he would have crushed it. “It hurts. My heart hurts...”
“I know, honey. That’s the only thing that does matter and it sucks.”
“They make me feel like I have no control over my own feelings.” He sniffed, and wiped a tear away. “Like, ARHG! I can... I can too choose to be with the boy I love! Who cares if yaoi fangirls put the idea in our heads? Maybe we just needed a boost, or something.
“It’s... it’s our choice to date for real now! Only our choice! No one else’s!”
“Yup,” said Craig, smiling as he squeezed Tweek’s hand. He could practically feel the anxiety of the other boy drain away.
“Wow,” said Tweek, smiling through the pain. “It’s true. These jerks really don’t matter. The hell with ’em!”
So he blocked his every rotten nay sayer on all of his social media outlets, and subsequently blocked any others who wormed their ways in. Losers. Why, if they just festered quietly in their own hateful little bubbles, rather than fruitlessly tormenting every jumpy little Tweek in the world, then perhaps the world would suck a whole lot less.
Later that day, once Tweek was mellow, satisfied, and deleted his tumblr account, Craig took a selfie with his arm around Tweek, then set it as his new profile picture on facebook, which he hadn’t updated since his Feldspar days. Within two hours it blew up to fifty-six Likes, and Butters sent them a hearty-eyes emoji. Even Craig’s dad Liked it. Tweek’s dad was so overcome with emotion over it that he picked them up right away and treated them to ice cream. It was awesome.
And Craig would do it all over again, as he did at least twice a week, because Tweek freaked out over everything. That too was part of the routine, though. Some days Craig needed some boring nothing time, so Tweek came over and was boring with him. Some days Tweek freaked out, and Craig was there for him. He offered his opinion, and Tweek either accepted, or he didn’t. Either way, they made each other so happy.