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Rebound. Kenny’s used to it; he’ll take what he can get. He’s a good time guy, the one you call to give you weed and a blowjob. Look at the text; take a swig of something; I’m gonna swing from the chandelier, all of that. Party boys don’t get hurt. So when it’s eleven o’clock on a Friday night and he’s jolted awake by a text from Wendy, he rouses Red snoozing in his bed and says, “Get up.”
“What?” Red mumbles, moving away a mass of hair that’s clotted over her eyes.
“You’re kicked out, babe,” Kenny says, smiling at her. “Daddy’s gotta go to work.”
“Don’t refer to yourself as Daddy.” Red is still mumbling with her eyes closed but she’s rolled on her back. “That’s gross. Like, really gross. Like, serial killer levels of gross, Kenny.”
“Yeah, whatever, it was ironic, anyway.” Something he’s picked up from Stan: everything is ironic, always, it dulls the pain. So wear the t-shirts and drink the virgin mojito while smoking a joint. Talk about how you’re going to make it big in your band and get out of this town someday when you don’t have a single song finished and you’re not applying to any colleges at all. Everything is ironic and nothing hurts.
“What is it this time?” Red’s sitting up now, rubbing sleep from her eyes. “Who wants some weed? Or is it coke? Or a free fuck?”
“It’s Wendy, and she wants to talk.” Kenny’s out of bed, pulling on a pair of jeans, debating the benefits of wearing a shirt. It’s just crawling out of summer and all of his are dirty, but it’s the civilized thing to do, but he can pass it off as being ironic white trash. “Should I wear a shirt?”
Red’s eyebrows shoot up her forehead and she ignores the question. “She texted you and not me? Or Bebe? Or literally anybody else?”
“I got the goods that only money can buy.” It’s true--Kenny charges for all of his services, even for a conversation that’s any deeper than this surface-level irony thing Stan’s got him addicted to. “The shirt, Red. The shirt.”
“Wear a shirt. Be civilized.” Red’s out of bed now, too, and she picks two of Kenny’s shirts off the floor, one for her, one for him. “Jesus Christ, Kenny. I wish you’d stop spending so much time with Stan.”
“He gets me like nobody else does,” Kenny says. He catches the t-shirt Red tosses his way--gray, an advertisement for an automobile shop that doesn’t exist--and tugs it over his head. “We both got bitches with red hair to complain about.”
“It’s not nice to refer to Kyle as a bitch. Or me. But especially Kyle.” Red says this like it’s futile, because it is, because she doesn’t care, because she’s wearing Kenny’s (ironic) beat-up wife beater and running a hand through her hair to try to sort it out. “Well, I’m going back home now, I guess. Let me know how the thing with Wendy goes.”
Kenny pantomimes texting and nods. Red leaves through his door, holding her shoes in her hand. She doesn’t pay. She never does.
He calls Stan, who is awake and playing video games with Kyle, and asks for a ride. Kyle’s in Stan’s front seat when Stan shows up in front of Kenny’s house, wearing these bright red short shorts and big movie star sunglasses even though it’s dark outside, so Kenny rides in the backseat. Stan and Kyle take him to Wendy’s house and they shoot the shit; Kenny thanks Stan for the ride and tries to pay him gas money, which Stan rejects, says it’s no problem. Kenny watches Kyle’s nose wrinkle under the weight of those huge sunglasses, knows he’s going to bitch Stan out for that as soon as Kenny can’t hear.
He’s about to knock on Wendy’s door when she answers. She’s been crying, fresh tear stains on her cheeks, and Kenny’s heart sinks. He takes her in a hug before he even asks what’s wrong.
“I--Cartman and me, we--we broke up,” Wendy says, through these choked and broken little sobs, into Kenny’s chest.. “And Bebe’s out of town with her aunt and--”
“Shh, it’s okay.” Kenny leads Wendy inside her own house, closes the door and locks it. “I’m here.” Red echoes in his head, reminding him that it’s gross to refer to himself as Daddy, not that he would’ve done that right now, anyway.
“It’s not okay,” Wendy says. Kenny leads Wendy to her own couch and sits her down, grabs an afghan that’s draped over it and wraps Wendy up . She’s hot to the touch, but Kenny can tell from the shoddy stitching that the afghan is handmade and he feels that that is innately comforting, so he wraps Wendy up in it and gives her a squeeze to the shoulder.
“Tell me about it,” Kenny says, keeping his arm around Wendy’s shoulder but leaning back. He keeps his body angled towards her.
The story is not long, to Kenny’s surprise. Wendy and Cartman grew sick of each other’s opposing opinions on everything under the sun, so they decided, together, that they should not be a couple. “The hate sex just couldn’t do it anymore,” Wendy bemoans, and Kenny pats her on the back, knowing what she’s talking about. “But I’m still upset,” she continues, and Kenny continues to pat her on the back, though he stops knowing what she’s talking about. “I invested so much time in him and I didn’t expect to change him, but we had fun together, and when you’re in the middle of something you expect it to last forever. Like, you can’t imagine it ending. And then it does end and it just smacks you in the face.” She sniffs, wipes away some tears on her face. “I’m just being silly.”
“You’re not being silly.” Kenny changes from patting to rubbing. “You’re being logical and mature about this. You’re being you, Wendy.”
Wendy smiles at him. “How are you so good at this?”
Kenny pretends to contemplate it. “Well, I do get paid for it,” he says, trailing off and looking to the side. Ironically.
An expression overcomes Wendy’s face and Kenny feels like he’s just swallowed a stone, feels it hitting his stomach and sending acid sploshing up the sides. He hurries to say, “But you don’t have to, this is all for free,” and offers her his best crooked smile, one that would add extra to the bill if it were that kind of call.
“You know, I didn’t call you because of your...service,” Wendy says. The tears are flowing again but her lips are stuck in a sort-of smile. “I called you because, after Cartman and after Stan, you know, you’re my closest male friend. And I don’t trust Stan in a situation like this.”
Kenny laughs, adjusting it so that it’s more of a low rumble of a chuckle, more appropriate for the situation. He imagines Stan sitting beside Wendy on this couch, failing to comfort her, itching to return to Kyle. “He wouldn’t even have checked his phone when you texted or answered if you called,” Kenny says, because it’s true. A Friday night for Stan means two things, and two things alone: football and Kyle, in that order. It’s easier to get ahold of him on a Saturday.
Now it’s Wendy’s turn to laugh, and it sounds sort of like tinkling bells, not like Red’s deep growl. Wendy’s laugh makes Kenny feel like there are bells tinkling in his chest, sending pleasant vibrations throughout his body. He realizes that he wants to hear it a lot, as often as he can, and he’s trying to think of something funny to say to elicit more of it when Wendy speaks up.
“Thanks for providing, like, emergency damage control.” She laughs, but it’s a weaker, fainter sound that only makes Kenny feel sort of bad. “I think I’m going to Skype Bebe now. She can deal with me.”
Kenny places a kiss to her forehead, feeling like it’s the proper reassuring affectionate gesture to make, and gives her shoulders a final squeeze with both arms. “You’ll pull through,” he says, and he believes it.
He walks out of Wendy’s house before realizing he doesn’t have a ride home. At least Stan will always answer his calls, if sometimes begrudgingly.
The weekend passes and Kenny doesn’t hear from Wendy again. He makes another house call on Saturday morning, dealing Clyde some weed to split with Craig while they’re wallowing in boredom, then meets up with a college kid visiting family in a park that evening for a romp in the woods. Between the weed and the sex, Kenny makes bank on Saturday. He spends that night with Red, playing simple card games on their bed and listening to music on her phone. Sunday is much the same--it’s often a busy day for Kenny, one of the worst of the weeks for everybody, and he ends up mowing Tweek’s lawn while his parents are at church so Tweek can fuck Craig instead, doing Kevin’s English essay while he’s in the throes of a hangover and hearing Cartman’s side of the breakup story which is a lot less favorable and pays like shit, among some other, smaller favors for the middle school kids like informing others of crushes and doing their basic Pre-Algebra math homework.
Monday comes in, so nondescript Kenny’s just pulling himself through the day until lunchtime, when Wendy joins him, Stan and Kyle. Cartman’s made a point of sitting with a group of ninth-grade girls that find his expensive clothes and academic positions admirable.
“Hey guys,” Wendy says. She’s holding the strap of her messenger bag and smiling in a warbly kind of way. Kenny moves further on the bench to make room for her on instinct. “Mind if I sit here?”
“Only if you pay us,” Kyle says, his voice rich with irony, and Stan snorts into his sandwich.
“Nah, she gets the member’s discount,” Kenny says. Stan makes ironic, mock-offended puppy dog eyes at him. Wendy takes it as an invitation to sit down and her hip and shoulder hits Kenny’s. He guesses she misses the warmth of human contact, or something as sad as that.
Throughout the week Wendy asks to join them. The next week she doesn’t ask at all, just follows Kyle from their AP Art History class to lunch, talking with him about homework and tests and other nerd shit that excites the both of them. Kyle pretends he hates Wendy for stealing Stan away from him for a while, but Kenny knows the truth. Kyle forced him to take five dollars to listen to it as he sobbed it out, once, before he and Stan got together for real. Kenny gets a lot of money for a lot of gossip, but he tries to keep that on a lower key, be moral about it and all that.
The third week it feels more like two couples eating lunch together. Stan and Kyle are absorbed in each other; Kenny and Wendy are absorbed in each other; sometimes they part from their separate conversations to converse with each other.
The fourth week and Kenny and Wendy are eating lunch together alone, nestling in a nice secluded spot on the stone benches outside the library building. It’s almost atmospheric, flowers and a cute cobblestone walkway, a paltry bird bath sitting to their right.
Fourth week, Friday. Kenny’s got some extra money as they race to the end of a quarter and people are begging him to do his homework to free their workload up a little. He sits up a little straighter on the bench, puts on his best charming look, and turns to Wendy:
“Want to go out tonight?”
Wendy responds to this like she’s been waiting for that question and has prepared the best line to follow. “Like, on a date?”
“If you want,” Kenny says. Charming smile, flash it, show the whites of his teeth. He spends his salary on teeth-whitening strips, sometimes--best to keep the image up for the business. “If not, just as friends.”
Wendy takes a deep breath. She’s just gotten back into caring for her personal appearance after the Cartman catastrophe, the weather is getting much colder so her pale nose and pale ears are nipped with red, and Kenny is feeling smitten. “I think I want a date.”
A date it is. Kenny takes her to the nicest restaurant in South Park, treats her to the nicest meal. It drains his money, but it’s the best use he could think of for it, buying this fancy meal for this pretty girl that’s spending time with him. There’s no exchange of goods and services between the two of them, just between Kenny and the restaurant, and it’s nice to experience this sort of social interaction outside of his two and a half friends (the half is Kyle). So he laughs a little louder. So he speaks a little looser. So he pokes a little more fun. And it pays off, because when Wendy drives him home he works up the courage to kiss her, right there in the car in front of his house while the radio plays commercials in the background.
“I’m a kiss on the first date type of guy,” is the first thing he can think of when he pulls back. Charming smile. Of course he is--he charges ten bucks a handjob, fifteen if he hates the guy, and similar rates for similar things for the girls.
“Well, I’m a kiss on the first date type of girl.” Everything Wendy says sounds practiced, but Kenny doesn’t mind because she’s putting that mouth to better uses now, mashing and moving against his own. And holy fuck, does it feel nice to do this type of thing without being slid a crumpled up piece of currency first.
The windows fog before they separate for their night. Kenny presses his fingers to his lips and watches her car until drive away he can’t see it anymore.
“Somebody’s in love,” Red says. She’s suffering a cold and has nested in Kenny’s blankets, reading a book for school. She makes this observation as Kenny hums and rearranges his tiny wardrobe in order from most to least bad shirts and pants.
“Too soon for love, my dear,” Kenny says. He turns away from his closet, breathes heat into his hands because it’s getting cold and he’s saving up money to fix the air conditioning.. “Soon enough for like, and I like her a lot.”
“As your best friend, I have to warn you.” Kenny resists the urge to laugh at her grave and nasal voice. “She’s on the rebound, from Eric fucking Cartman, your old best friend. Why do you think this is going to end well?”
Kenny shrugs. “I don’t expect it to end well.” He takes a look at his closet, deems the new organization satisfactory, and walks over to join Red on the bed. “I don’t care if it it ends well. Hedonism is a fine way to live one’s life. There are no consequences, especially for me.”
“I don’t know why you think there are no consequences.” Kenny’s heart would pang if he hadn’t gotten used to people not remembering his constant death by the time he hit double digits in age. “Is hedonism some shit Stan taught you out of his five-dollar philosophy books?” Now she’s dog-earing the page and putting The Catcher in the Rye aside.
“Nah, it’s all mine.” Kenny waves his head. “I was born into it, like some people are born into religion. I just believe.”
“I’m just worried for you, is all.” Red frowns. A sneeze interrupts her frown and she looks just miserable, so Kenny pases her a dirty shirt from the floor to wipe her nose on and rubs her back.
“I know,” he says. “You’re the best friend a guy could ask for. Mostly ‘cause you’re not too far up Kyle Broflovski’s literal ass and everybody else’s ironic everything to not care about anything but the ass and the irony.”
“Oh, flattering.” But underneath all that sickness misery and faux outrage and literal concern, Red is smiling.
On the second date, Wendy pays. They see a movie that is forgettable in the long run but enjoyable in the short run, holding hands and drawing patterns with thumbs throughout it. Kenny gets a few texts from potential clients in the theater but he doesn’t tend to them, not yet. For now he tends to Wendy.
On the second date, Wendy asks them to make it official. The movie has ended, the literal first name popping up on the screen, and she turns to him as if moved by the small love story subplot and says, “Well, can I call you my boyfriend now?”
Kenny bleats out laughter. “We’ve been to dinner and a movie, and we’ve kissed, and we still seem to be enjoying this, and also you’re not paying me for my time.”
Wendy nods with each point. “This is all true.”
“So.” Kenny draws out the o until his voice cracks, then he coughs. “Yeah, you can call me boyfriend now, girlfriend.”
“Don’t call people by their titles alone. That’s so...derogatory. Or authoritarian, depending on the situation, I suppose.” She goes from crinkling her face up to smoothing it out in thought, and Kenny finds it so endearing he kisses her between the eyes, right where she gets the most severe wrinkle. People are leaving the theater and it occurs to him that they should, too. He moves his mouth from Wendy’s face to her ear, whispering that they should go now while brushing her hair back, hoping this trick works on her like it works on everybody else.
It’s dark outside. Kenny and Wendy stand in front of the small theater, holding hands and looking towards the sky. It’s clouded over, grayish-purple, and Kenny feels suffocated and nostalgic. Already he is taking this memory, this feeling and this girl, folding it and pressing it into the book that is his mind. Dog-earing the page. It starts to snow, a light dusting more like falling sugar, and Wendy extends her tongue, catching a snowflake.
She sticks her tongue back in her mouth and turns to him, sheepish. “Sorry,” she says. “I used to do that when I was little.”
Kenny shakes his head, dismissing her apology, and licks a snowflake out of the air for himself. “Is it safe to hate on Cartman now?”
“It’s always been safe to hate on Cartman, trust me.” People are passing around them, and they lift their conjoined hands so a little kid can run underneath to his parents, but they do not move.
“Okay, well. When we were younger and we’d do this, Cartman would say that I was trying to get, like, nourishment from the snowflakes because I was so poor. So stupid.” Kenny laughs at it, shakes his head so his shaggy hair smacks against his face.
“What an ass.” Wendy starts walking, leading Kenny out of the stream of people. “I don’t know why he hates poor people so much, it makes no logical or moral sense, I just--”
“Wendy.” Kenny’s grinning down at her, at the redness that’s rising in her face not from embarrassment, or cold, but from passion. She stops mid-sentence and looks up at him, confused. “It’s okay. He’s an ass. We both ditched him because of it. I understand.”
Wendy decompresses, the redness receding from her face. Kenny squeezes both of her hands in his.
Third date: walking in a park; falling snow; exchanging the snowflakes they catch with their tongues.
Fourth date: hanging out at Wendy’s house; homemade dinner; roasting marshmallows over a firepit in the backyard.
Fifth date: following the railroad tracks down and out of town; spilling secrets; making snow angels.
Sixth date. Seventh date. Eighth date.
So on. So forth.
Idyllic.
They morph back into eating lunch with Stan and Kyle. They talk of double dates, couple’s nights.
Kenny takes Wendy aside after their first plans are made with Stan and Kyle for the following night. “Wen,” he says, because he’s a nickname type of guy and he’s always liked the sound of a one-syllable masculine moniker on such a feminine girl, “I gotta say--I’m worried about my business.”
“Do you really need that now, though?” Wendy asks, tilting her head. “Now that you’ve got a proper social circle?”
“You think I do this shit because I feel like I’m lacking socially?” Kenny’s voice keels. Wendy’s eyes widens. “No, Wen, I do this shit because it pays. I do this because other people are lacking socially, sometimes even sexually. Because other people need some guy to do their homework. Because they need a dealer. They pay money for whatever little problem they need fix that I can fix, and I can fix a lot. I’ve got the skills. The charisma. And I’m broke as fuck and I’m sort of supporting my own family, and myself, and Red. That’s why I do this. You’re going to have to deal with that.”
Wendy’s mouth drops open, just a little. “I understand,” she says. “But--I think it’d be the proper, moral thing to do to cut the sex calls out now that you’re involved with somebody. As a feminist I support sex workers, but that’s hard to reconcile when you’re in a relationship and honestly, Kenny, you have other options.”
“I’ll just pass it off to Red,” Kenny says, flicking the switch and letting his charm come back into his face, full-force. Wendy smiles and even laughs, those tinkling bells chiming again, but Kenny’s serious. He fails to mention the higher price he charges for the sex calls.
He texts Red later, in his after-lunch study hall: thinkin McCormick Incorporated needs an expansion
He gets the text back in a few seconds. Good old Red. what the fuck do you mean
i’m not trying to be your john but you know i have wendy now and a big chunk of my clients like the sex stuff. u dont have to if u dont want to im not trying to make this prostitution. fuck i feel bad for asking you now. He considers deleting the text and asking somebody who might be a little more willing, but he sends it after a few minutes of contemplation.
what the fuck kenny no i’m not prostituting myself
Kenny sighs. Starts flipping through his contacts for somebody that might be a little more willing. He can’t bring himself to text Red back an apology, he feels so scummy.
His phone vibrates on the desk again when he’s reached the T contacts. ok so i just talked it over with one of the raisins girls and they said theyd do it for u if they got a cut of the profits. kenny i do not like this its disgusting and u need to think it over
Good old Red, indeed. thought it over and ur right tbh. guess ill just tell everybody to go fuck themselves. literally lol
Red doesn’t respond. Kenny doesn’t need her to.
On the date with Stan and Kyle, which is a drive over to a larger city to see a movie that’s playing at a drive-in, Kenny gets a sex call from Craig. He responds to it with a response that he’s saved in a note on his phone--Sorry, McCormick Incorporated has shut down that particular service for the time being. You may try again later in some unspecified time or request or something else.
Craig sends back a picture of him flipping the bird. Kenny laughs and shows it to Wendy, who finds it more outrageous than anything, which makes Kenny laugh harder and kiss her on the nose. Kyle tells them to shut up from the front seat of Stan’s car; he’s trying to watch the movie here, people. Kenny and Wendy excuse themselves from the car and laugh in peace.
They’re laying in the grass by Stark’s Pond and holding hands. The sun is high overhead. This is the prime couple’s spot, but they’re alone right now, under the shade of a leafy tree, bundled in their winter clothes and blissful.
“I’m going to tell you a story,” Wendy says.
“Go ahead.”
“We turn 18 and we’re legal. It’s the summer after high school. We enroll in the Peace Corps and go to Africa. We build a school together. You get a really nice tan and it looks good on you. I wear khaki shorts and it looks terrible but you still kiss my hipbones after you roll them down my thighs. We get married there, in whatever African country, by their traditions. It’s beautiful. The natives cry.”
“What a good story.”
“It won’t end there.” Wendy rolls her head to look at Kenny. The earnesty in her eyes makes him want to cry, and he remembers her words, when you’re in the middle of something it feels like it’ll last forever, or whatever. “We’ll come home after Africa. We’ll get the American marriage license and a little apartment. We won’t live here, God no, I’m thinking New York or California. A nice little apartment. I’ll work in a vegan grocery store and be stuck back in those damned khaki shorts.”
“What’ll I be doing?” Kenny smiles.
“I don’t know,” Wendy says, soft as the snow that fell this morning. “Probably join the military and leave me pregnant in maternity khaki shorts with unkissed hipbones.”
“That’s actually a really viable career option for me,” Kenny says, the idea just hitting him. The next part he dresses up with that fancy irony: “Since I can’t actually die and all.”
“You’re resilient, but I don’t think you’re that resilient.” Wendy laughs and places a hand to Kenny’s cheek.
Kenny just nuzzles into her touch and gives her his signature charming crooked grin.
They never get around to having sex. It’s weird for Kenny, considering what he does for money on a regular basis. The kissing and caressing is different--people don’t pay him for that, not often. It’s easy to cover Wendy’s skin in kisses, leaving imprints for remembrance. It’s not easy to do much else. When he explains that to her, she says: “I understand.”
“Thank you.” Kenny’s plucking petals off a dying flower while they sit on a bench in a park.
Wendy laughs, then covers her mouth. “I’m sorry, it’s just--not something I thought I would hear from you. Your reputation precedes you, Kenny.”
He pulls the last petal off and frowns.
Kenny paints houses, sometimes. South Park is too small a town to have a house-painting company and most houses don’t need regular painting, so when somebody becomes a little unhappy with their chipping paint, they ask around for Kenny until he shows up at their door in his (ironic) painter’s overalls and a bucket of the proper-colored paint.
“I think Stan taught you the wrong definition of irony,” Wendy says as she gives Kenny his lunch while he stands on the bottom rung of a ladder and she kisses his cheek.
Kenny shrugs. “Who cares.” He peers into the white bag passed from Wendy’s hands to his--two homemade sandwiches, a juicebox, fresh fruit and a note. “Love you, thanks for lunch.”
“Love you, you’re welcome.” Another kiss, no hug because Kenny is sweating despite the low temperatures and splattered in paint, and then Wendy is gone, off to her nice internship at Kyle’s father’s office. Kenny thinks about how lucky and easy Gerald’s life must be, two teenagers doing most of his work for free, the only duty left to him showing up in court. Even then, most court cases in South Park are lowkey--drunk driving, divorce, custody cases. Kenny’s attended all of them.
He climbs the ladder, adds another swipe of beet-colored paint to the house.
The end is near.
Not the end of the world--that’s come and gone a few times. It’s always temporary. It always fixes himself.
Not the end of his life--same deal there. He grew up without fearing death, isn’t about to start so late in his life.
Not even the end of high school--he still has over a year left there, if he chooses to stay, which he probably will if only for the business opportunities it provides.
The end of his and Wendy’s relationship. He can smell it coming in the air as if it were a summer storm. It’s a soggy spring, snow melting and sticking an icky gray to his clothes. Red’s allergies are acting up and she’s spending more time lethargic in Kenny’s bed than anything else. Flowers are struggling to grow in the gloom. And, apt as it is, Kenny can feel Wendy growing more distant. Sometimes during school he catches her staring at the rich boys with their nice clothes and haircuts, keys to their cars and houses clipped so genuinely to their belt loops. Stan does it ironically. Most of Kenny’s belt loops are torn from his jeans, but they’re hidden beneath the hem of his shirts.
Like Wendy said so long ago--when something ends, it smacks you right in the face. Your promise of forever is gone. Your security breaks. Kenny tries to prolong the forever and the security, but he smells the stormclouds collecting in Wendy’s eyes and at this point it’s useless to fight it.
So when Wendy and him are sitting beside a melting Stark’s Pond, not holding hands, Kenny watching ice chunks break off and dissolve, Wendy gazing into the distance, Kenny says, “You’re breaking up with me.”
“I’m breaking up with you,” Wendy says on the immediate end of his sentence. It’s hollow. Practiced.
“I’m gonna need some payment for this relationship.” His best crooked grin and Wendy doesn’t even turn his way. An awkward moment of silence passes and Kenny follows that up with, “Is that why you’re breaking up with me?”
“No, that’s not why I’m breaking up with you.” Every word of this conversation on her end is a line in a script somewhere, and it’s getting under Kenny’s skin. He wants to go off course, wants to improvise, if on principle alone.“I just think it’s time. I think it’s been time for a while. I’ve...grown past the point where I need this relationship.”
“Oh,” Kenny says, and he flashes back to that Friday night yet again. I need to talk to you, is what that text had said. It wasn’t the most colorful request he’d ever received; he’d thought nothing of it. He guesses she doesn’t need to talk to him anymore.
“We can still be friends,” Wendy says. “And I know everybodys says that, but I mean it. At least, let’s not make things awkward between us.”
“You know I don’t roll that way,” Kenny says. He is overcome by the urge to roll his jeans up and plunge his feet into Stark’s Pond, among the sad chunks of ice and rejuvenated fish. He might do it after Wendy leaves.
“I’m sorry, Kenny.” This is Wendy breaking script at last, turning to Kenny. He’s shocked to see actual tears in her eyes, but if she cried over a lost relationship with Cartman, she could cry over anybody. “I shouldn’t have done this to you. You shouldn’t have been my rebound. You’re a great guy, you really are, and you helped me tons, but this relationship--it’s a little girl’s relationship. I need to move past it.”
One word of that sticks to Kenny. He doesn’t respond, lets Wendy continue as he watches the tears spill over, thinks that the rain he’s been watching collect on the horizon for two weeks has arrived.
“Goodbye, Kenny.”
Wendy leaves.
Kenny rolls his jean legs up. They’re not fashionable, cheap and baggy, so it’s easy to push them to his knees. He takes his shoes off, then his socks, not wanting to ruin either. And he wades into Stark’s Pond, feeling the coldness on his calves. He closes his eyes. Thinks.
Rebound. Kenny’s used to it.
He’s not the type of guy Wendy would marry, or even date for long. He’s rough around the edges, has callouses on his hands, needs a haircut. She’s polished and prim and drives thirty minutes away just to get her nails manicured on a biweekly basis. He’s a breather. Somebody between serious relationships with serious men, somebody to reminiscence on when she’s older with kids, somebody like the physical embodiment of little girls’ fantasies.
Get the text; take a swig; swing from that motherfucking chandelier. Land on a table. Tie a tie around your head. The life of the fucking party, end up in bed with the white trash girl that you’re not fucking but means all of those I love you’s. Leave her sleeping in the morning to go to work. You’re going to marry her, one day. Not today. Not tomorrow. Not a year from now. But one day you’re going to marry her in a little church, she’s going to pop the next generation of white trash babies and you’re going to paint houses for a living. But for now you get paid to be everybody’s friend, except for that girl you’re going to marry because she means more to you than them all, except for that guy that knows you better than them all, except for that woman that broke your heart more than them all ever could. For now you’re wading into frozen water, a miniature collapsed Arctic, with all of your clothes on because you can’t die and it doesn’t matter. For now you can hear the ring of your phone from the shore, somebody asking for your services, so you plunge your head under the water and open your eyes to see life in front of your eyes. For now you’re going to drown.
It’s all ironic.