Work Text:
Wendy sat on her bed, reading through the replies Stan had sent. She wished she could go back to that blissful ignorance, back to when she thought Stan was really writing all of these, back to when everything was perfect between them.
She was so happy, talking to anyone and everyone who would listen about how Stan had finally started listening to her. She was delighted, saying that she only needed to tell him and he started to care! Maybe he loved her all along, he just didn’t show it as much!
In retrospect, she should’ve known. None of these sounded like Stan. And he never read them, either. He never even took the time to skim over the texts. He didn’t care what she had to say, at any point? She thought back to the time in the café, Stan’s nervous laughter, inconsistent stories and sudden departure. She could kick herself; it had been so obvious.
Maybe she had known. Maybe she just pretended, because she wanted it to be real. At least Stan had tried. He tried to find a solution and make her feel loved. He gave her a couple of days of delusional happiness, at least.
Stan started miserably at his phone. He scrolled up, finally reading the texts that he had sent. He read all of the poetic messages, expressing his love and adoration for Wendy. He read the delight in her replies, a happiness coming through the words that he'd never seen before.
He felt so, so guilty, that he could never write like this. He didn't even know what half of the words meant.
It was like the ai was taking his girlfriend from him, talking in a language he couldn’t understand.
His heart sank as he read further. He read about Wendy baring her soul, telling her deepest secrets. He read the ai comforting her, understanding her. He hadn't even known. He didn't even know, and he went up to her the next day at school and spoke to her, not knowing anything at all.
Texts and texts, going on for so long. He hadn’t even realised how much they had been talking, because the copy and pasting had become such a second nature that he didn’t even remember doing it.
He typed out the words 'I'm sorry'. They weren't enough. They’d never be enough. But he didn't know what else to say, and could only pray Wendy would understand. He didn’t deserve to be understood.
Wendy stared at the words on her screen. What was she supposed to say? That she couldn’t believe that he had to use ai to talk to her? That he wouldn’t make an effort at all, even now? That he’d go back to just a giving thumbs up, eventually leading to the situation they were in before? She started to type, but paused. She sighed and turned her phone off, laying it on her nightstand, turning the light off and pulling the covers over her head.
Stan watched the little dots at the bottom of his screen, awaiting Wendy’s response. He didn’t know what she was going to say, he didn’t know what he was going to say.
The little dots disappeared.
Stan frowned at his phone. He waited for a moment, because maybe Wendy was stuck with a word, maybe she had just paused for a second. He sat there for two minutes, the dots never reappearing, before his heart started to slowly sink.
He waited patiently over the next hour or so, before realising that Wendy wasn’t going to respond to him. He felt a little sick. She always responded.
Stan called Kyle and took a minute for the ring to go through. He was scared because he thought that maybe Kyle was mad at him too, but after only a moment the line went through.
‘Hello?’ a tired voice said .
‘Kyle. I need your help’ Stan said, bouncing his leg up and down anxiously.
‘Dude it's like, 1:00 in the morning,’ Kyle said. He did sound like he had just woken up, but Stan just ignored it because he had bigger problems right now
‘Say if someone was using an ai to talk to their girlfriend. Because they were busy all the time and it helped them and it made everything so much easier! What if that happened and what if their girlfriend caught them?’ Stan asked. Kyle paused on the other end, then said ‘Holy shit, whoever did that is such a douchebag. Was it Clyde? I’ll bet it was Clyde,’ ‘That doesn’t matter,’ Stan mumbled, dejected. Kyle didn’t seem to notice, and went on
‘That’s be an awful thing to do to your girlfriend, I mean, why have a partner if you don't even know what to talk to them? Imagine having to use an AI to talk to someone! At that point they’re better off without you,’ ‘Oh my god,’ Stan burst out with despair. ‘What’s wrong?’ Kyle asked him, confused.
‘I was talking about me! I did that to Wendy,’ Stan exclaimed. ‘You're joking, right?’ Kyle asked, a disappointed disbelief evident in his tone as Stan mumbled a small ‘no.’
‘That’s horrible, Stan,’ Kyle told him reproachfully, sitting up in his bed. ‘Wait, is that what you were doing that whole time on your phone?’ Kyle asked. ‘Yeah,’ Stan sighed. He hadn’t been allowed to tell anyone about the ai per his and Cartman’s agreement, so Kyle hadn’t known what he was doing.
‘What do I do?!’ Stan asked desperately. ‘You need to go and apologise and make it up to her. Shit, is she okay?’ Stan hesitated before saying ‘She hasn't replied to me.’
‘Did you even think about what you were doing to her? At all?’ Kyle asked.
‘Well, she was happy, and I didn’t have to do anything…’ Stan trailed off.
Kyle muttered a small ‘Oh my god,’ before earnestly telling him ‘Dude, you need apologise,’ ‘I did,’ ‘Did you tell her in person?’ ‘…No.’
‘It’s that bad though, right?’ Stan asked in a last ditch effort to make himself feel better ‘It's that bad,’ the other said quietly, and the line went dead. Stan stared at the screen as it slowly dimmed, guilt and shame settling in as he realised that he really fucked up this time.
Stan was determined to make it up to Wendy, though he didn’t know how. He was rehearsing a speech in his head on his way to school, when he saw some flowers on the side of the road. He decided to pick them and present them as a bouquet, because girls liked flowers, right?
He waved at Wendy when he got up to the school. Bebe asked her something before shooting Stan a glare and going inside, leaving Wendy to wait for Stan to walk up to her. 'Wendy, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean-' He began, before Wendy cut him off. ‘Just drop it, Stan.' she said. 'What? he asked, hurt.
'Just leave it. It’s fine.' she didn’t take the flowers and she just walked away, leaving Stan standing in the hallway with a bouquet of flowers for a girl who didn’t love him, not anymore. He could keep trying, but what was the point? she'd never take him back. it was over. He had fucked up royally, and there was nothing to do about it anymore.
He was a little upset, too, because he was trying. Look at him, with his flowers and rehearsed speeches. He found it unfair that Wendy was just ignoring him, when he was trying to tell her about his feelings.
He never once stopped to think about the irony.
Kyle found Stan sitting on the steps, a sullen expression on his face. 'What’s going on?' he asked. 'I thought you were supposed to make it up to Wendy,'
'She won’t take me back,' Stan mumbled.
'Of course she's going to say that, dumbass. Do you think she'll take you back after one gesture?' he glanced at the poor excuse of a bouquet on the steps beside stan. 'Jesus christ, is that what you gave to her? No wonder she didn’t take you back.’
Stan buried his face in his hands at Kyle’s words. 'Look, I know you’re upset, but from what you’ve told me, she has it a lot worse. It’s going to take some work to fix this, whether you like it or not. A relationship is all about work and communication, especially after an argument or… whatever you did,’ Kyle sighed.
Wendy stood in the hallway in front of her locker. She was looking at the poorly worded love letter sitting in her locker, along with the paper cut out hearts stuck on it. She didn’t know what to do. She took out the love letter and traced her finger over the ink splotches, and the words with extra letters shoved in so they were spelt correctly.
Bebe’s opinion was that Stan wasn’t worth it and that Wendy should’ve left him a while ago. Bebe had been furious after finding out about Clyde and would stop at nothing to get revenge and to make sure it didn’t happen to anyone else. She was disgusted when Wendy told her Stan’s sorry excuse.
Kyle walked past Wendy’s locker. 'Kyle!' she called. He turned around and stood beside her. 'What is it?' he asked. 'Should I forgive stan?' she said. 'I know what he's done is bad, but... I mean, he’s trying, right?' she said, gesturing at the locker. Kyle looked at her sadly. ' I think he could try harder,' he said, giving her a pat on the back and walking away.
Wendy was left in the hallway, a love letter from a boy who didn’t care enough about her sitting inside it. She faced her locker and started to peel the paper hearts off the front of it, gathering them into a handful and throwing them into the bin. The love note, now sitting in her pocket, felt as heavy as a rock. She took it out and looked at it. Her heart and her brain fought against each other, one with reason and the other with love, saying to leave Stan or to stay with him.
Wendy looked at her locker, with the gluestick stains and little paper scraps still stuck to it. She didn’t want to think about this anymore, she didn’t want to have to agonise over whether Stan deserved to be forgiven or not, whether he was trying hard enough.
She put the note back into her locker and closed it.