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Kenny doesn’t remember the first time he died.
He must have been really young, maybe even younger than one year old. He may have died from starvation or by choking on his own vomit, as he had heard it happens to some babies. A silent, lonely death of which his parents may have been completely unaware of. By the next morning he would wake up perfectly fine, as if what had happened had been nothing but a dream— a nightmare. And that would become something that would keep happening to him to this day, the biggest difference being that, as time would go on, the ways he would die would start to become more painful and just plain ridiculous— as if it all were just a big bad joke the universe was playing on him; a comedy with the whole world as its daily spectator and a laugh track included (oh my god they killed Kenny, you bastards!).
It doesn’t matter. He has gotten used to it.
Or at least that's what he tells himself. Even when he feels tired of everything. When he wants to scream to the whole world, to whoever had decided to make things this way, and tell them to fuck off. Moments where he hates himself for being born with this curse, and hates the others even more for not being able to remember. For moving on with their lives even after witnessing him explode, or getting eaten by a wild animal, or being burned alive or stabbed to death, or getting crushed by a building or a machine or some meteorite that would coincidentally fall in the middle of town. Whatever it would be, they just wouldn’t remember, they just wouldn’t care.
(He suddenly remembers the feeling of a gun against his head and the scared looks on his friends’ faces. All of them wrapped in their disguises of children-heroes capable of saving the world just by trying— but who would save him?
He remembers the anger, the desperation in his voice, as he told them to remember, to just try to remember this time .
He remembers pulling the trigger— just to wake up in his bed some hours later, as if nothing had happened.)
It doesn’t matter anymore. He's used to it.
(He isn’t. He never would be.)
The thing is that Kenny has always had Death as a close friend. An eternal companion who haunts him in the cold nights when his old sheets are not enough to keep him warm and he can’t remember the last time he ate something. Or when the four of them ended up getting involved in dangerous situations even in the most mundane of days. In this town full of weird people anything could happen.
In the end, Kenny is the immortal boy who dies almost every day. It couldn’t be any other way. He has had years to get used to it.
He can’t.
(Carpe Diem has never meant anything to him anyway.)
X
There are times when Kenny can’t help but think that Stan’s an idiot. Even after all these years he’s still tangled with Wendy in that relationship that consists solely of breaking up and making up just to break up again. Not that Kenny blames it all on him or on Wendy, of course; they’re both at fault. They keep trying and failing to make their relationship work. Maybe because, no matter how much they tried to pretend, they were still not mature enough to know how to let it go. Or maybe because they just didn’t know any better.
And so they would keep trying to save their little elementary-school romance until the next time Wendy decided to break up. Then Stan would sink into one of his depressive episodes, and he and Kyle would have to stay by his side to keep him from drinking too much. That's the reason why he’s keeping him company in the park they used to play at when they were kids, sitting on some old swing that can’t stop squeaking every time they move.
Stan remains silent. He had replaced his usual outfit with a combination of dark clothes. His eyes look dull and tired, he must not have slept well since Wendy once again broke up with him some days ago. Kenny lets out a sigh; well, at least he got him to leave his room instead of staying inside all day. That was something.
“Hey Kenny,” Stan says for the first time since they arrived at the park, taking Kenny by surprise.
“What?” he mumbles, his voice muffled by his old parka.
Stan doesn’t answer him, and Kenny wonders for a moment if he had imagined it. But then Stan turns to look at him and says; “Have you… Have you ever wondered how it feels to die?”
The question lingers between them as Kenny stares at him, almost stunned. He blinks and furrows his brows in a sudden fit of anger. This is one of the reasons why he thinks Stan can be such a complete idiot without even trying. And why most of the time he can’t stand having to deal with him when he acts this— but he does it anyway .
That if he has ever wondered how it feels to die? How stupid, he doesn’t need to wonder how it feels when he knows it. He dies almost every single day, dammit. And Stan is just like all the other idiots, incapable of remembering, of giving a damn about it.
(“Nobody seems to care when I die!”)
And he could easily get mad at Stan for making such a dumb question, for acting as if he knew anything about death. He should get mad, he has all the right to do so. But he doesn’t. He can’t. Not when Stan is looking at him like he genuinely wants to hear him. Like his question hadn’t come with any second intention or influenced by his self-deprecating state. Like a suicidal thought or something like that. He’d know if that was the case. Stan looks at him expectantly, his eyes looking a bit brighter than they were before. Kenny ends up sighing.
He can’t believe he is going to answer him.
(It seems that, even after all these years, he still can’t deny Stan anything. It’s just like when they were kids and Stan would drag them to one of his protests for animal rights that would probably end up in a disaster. Like everything they did.
He just couldn’t say no to him when he looked so excited and passionate about something.)
He takes off his hood, before starting to speak.
“Dying sucks, Stan,” he says, plain and simple. “Don’t believe those lies about death bringing peace to the soul or whatever. Death’s never peaceful, not even to those who have craved it after spending years suffering. Do you really wanna know what I think death is like? Well it’s fucking painful, no matter if you die because of an accident or a disease or you get killed. It’s painful, and cold and lonely. Whether you die alone in an alley or in a hospital bed surrounded by your family, it doesn’t matter. In the end you just die, alone, wondering if someone will remember you, what they will remember about you. Or if they’ll just decide to forget all the memories you shared in order to get over the loss. Death is not how the television paints it or how your gothic friends may think it is. Death is not redemption, it’s just… it’s just death. And that’s it.”
Kenny bites his lower lip once he finishes talking, not used to saying so much at once. And much less used to talking about something that affects him so much. Stan stares at him and Kenny lowers his head. He probably wasn’t satisfied by his answer, but he’d rather Stan stay quiet for once and not act like a jerk about it. Dismissing his opinion when he knows firsthand what he is talking about.
“... I wouldn’t forget it.”
“Eh?” Kenny looks up until his eyes meet Stan’s.
“You said that, uh, that in the end we all prefer to forget about the ones that have died,” Stan starts to say quietly. “And you’re right. You’re also right when you say that death is cold and it hurts and all that, but…” he stops, struggling for the words to say. Then he looks back at Kenny with an expression that makes his heart stop for a second (and without killing him, much to his surprise). “I wouldn’t forget it, or I wouldn’t want to forget it. If you or Kyle or even Cartman died, I wouldn’t want to forget you guys. If—” he stops again and his face suddenly contorts as if he were remembering something. It only lasts a moment though, and Kenny can’t help but feel a sting of disappointment when the moment passes. “If you died Kenny, I would be really sad, but I wouldn’t want to forget about you.”
(“...Where’s Stan?”)
“Kenny, are you okay?” Stan asks with concern and that’s what takes for Kenny to notice the tears welling up in his eyes.
And it doesn’t make any sense, because Stan’s words, no matter how touching they may be, were nothing more than empty promises. And Kenny knows that very well. That no matter how much Stan could assure him that he wouldn’t forget him if he died, in the end he would do it anyway. He would forget the fact that he had died in the first place. It has happened hundreds of times before, and he has already shown him that he doesn’t really care, right?
(After all, he didn’t even bother to visit him when he was sick and dying in the hospital, asking Kyle why he wasn’t there.)
Stan’s an idiot. Saying things like that like he knew anything, like he could make them come true. And his words shouldn’t affect him like this, but they do. He can’t help it, maybe he doesn’t want to. No matter how well he knows that the next time he died no one would remember it, and Stan would break his word without knowing it.
But— he said it. He said he would care. And maybe Kenny just wants to find some comfort in that declaration and forget everything else, just for once, just this time. Perhaps he’s settling for nothing, but right now he finds that he doesn’t care.
“I’m fine,” he replies, wiping his eyes. “I’m fine.”
“Uh,” Stan nods, not entirely convinced, but then the corner of his lips quirk up in a small smile and he says. “Thanks for keeping me company, Kenny. I know I can be quite a handful when I’m like this, but you and Kyle always try to help me anyways.”
“It’s nothing,” Kenny shrugs and tries to ignore the fuzzy feeling he gets when Stan’s smile widens a bit as he looks at him with genuine gratitude.
“I should go home or mom will ground me if I skip dinner again,” Stan sighs and jumps off the swing. He stands in front of Kenny, his silhouette dressed from head to toe in black contrasting against the sunset sky and leaving Kenny breathless. Stan smiles again and Kenny feels his cheeks warm up a little bit and if he didn’t know any better he would think that—
“See you tomorrow Kenny,” he hears Stan say, pulling him out of his thoughts.
“Yeah… see ya,” Kenny replies, forcing a smile on his lips.
And with that, Stan leaves. Kenny stays in the park a little more, absently glancing at the sky and the few stars that have started to light up. He can still feel his face warm due to Stan’s words, but it’s not a bad feeling.
It’s kinda funny, actually. He was the one supposed to help Stan feel better, not the other way around.
But—
X
(“And Kenny?”
“Yes, Stan?”
“Stay gold.”)
X
Moments later, when the sky has darkened in its entirety and the stars reach the horizon, Kenny leaves the park and heads to his house; the ghost of a smile still present in his curved lips.
The cold touch of Death leaves him alone that night.