Work Text:
Some things might not have been meant to be. Craig knows this more than anyone. To have grown the slightest feeling for the wrong person was the worst mistake he had made in his eighteen years of life.
Craig takes a cigarette out of his pocket and puts it between his lips, lighting it with his lighter as he goes out onto the porch of the house. He closes the glass door and the loud music is muffled. He draws in the hot smoke and squeezes his eyes shut, trying to push the involuntary thoughts away. Craig shoves his free hand into the pocket of his sweatshirt, watching the sky that covers the entire city in its majestic navy blue. Releasing the smoke in a shaky sigh for the third time, Craig burns the cigarette on the balcony ledge, giving up on smoking the rest.
He stares up at the stars, seeing figures and constellations where none exist.
The door opens behind him, he knows because for a few seconds the music gets louder, but then it is muffled again. He doesn't look back to see who it is.
— Hey, Craig.
Craig wished he had stayed home the very instant he heard that voice. Stanley.
It's not like he didn't know Stan would be there, after all, everyone in the class had been invited to the party, he just didn't expect them to be talking.
— Hey, dude.
— Why are you here alone?
Craig shook his head, looking down at the snow covering the lawn and the frozen lake. Stan leaned on the ledge as well, his body turned inward.
The two of them were silent. Being alone with Stan was strange. Not that Craig didn't like it, but it gave his mind more freedom to think about things he didn't want to think about. The thought of Stan doing anything, times that never happened and never would happen between the two of them made his face burn with shame.
Since he was sixteen, Craig had dreamed of one day being able to act truthfully with his friend, without having to hide all the time, without having to act differently for fear of looking strange if he seemed too close. This was all being kept inside his chest, and even more so when Stan started a relationship with Wendy Testaburger. Craig didn't have to look very far to know that this wouldn't last long. Stan had other priorities. Someone else to direct all his attention and devote all his time to.
That person was not Wendy. Least of all Craig Tucker. Not even in his dreams.
In less than a year, they broke up, but Craig still knew he wouldn't have Stan. He knew there was nothing he could do. He knew even more that Stan would never talk to him when he was away from the other boys.
So when Stan appeared on the porch of Bebé Stevens' house while Craig was alone, Craig felt weird, and a shock ran down his spine.
Stan was not the first person, but Craig hoped he would be the last. A six-month fake fling with Tweek when he was twelve. A less than two-year fling with Clyde that started at fifteen and ended before Craig even turned seventeen in January — Maybe Clyde had realized that Craig's stares were no longer for him. Craig knew that there was no point in insisting on trying something with Stan, because they weren't supposed to have something. They weren't supposed to be something.
— Would you like a beer? — Stan asked softly, as if he were holding back his true intention.
— What do you want, Stan?
Stan cleared his throat, scratching the back of his neck and looking away.
— How do you... how does this work?
— "This" what, Stanley?
— About liking guys. How do you know? Like, how is it?
Craig arched his eyebrow at him, as if he had asked for the answer to the meaning of life. Craig doesn't know how he found out. He just felt it happening, but never questioned it. Maybe because he was comfortable being with just boys, maybe because he didn't feel any need to have a girlfriend, or kiss a girl to prove something to others. It was cool. It was different.
— It's nothing new. How did you feel when you were with Wendy?
— Oh, good. She made me happy. At least in the beginning, I liked being with her, I wanted to be with her all the time, I thought about a future with her... that kind of stuff.
— So. That's how I felt with Clyde. It's the same thing. But instead of a girl with curves and long hair, it's a boy with short black hair, with a face like an idiot, a voice like a cracked taco...
Stan thought for a while.
— But Clyde doesn't have black hair.
Craig wanted to jump off the ledge and run away, go deep into the woods and never come back. Being found dead might have been an incredible idea.
— It was an example — it wasn't. — Do you get it?
— But how do I know that this feeling is real and not paranoid?
— Ah. You wanna find out?
— Yeah — he answered innocently.
Craig mumbled, getting out of his place and standing in front of Stan, leaning his hands on the wood of the railing and holding tightly, his eyes fixed on Stan's blue eyes.
He thought for a moment and brought his body closer to Stan's in the blink of an eye, bringing their lips together at the same time. This certainly bewildered Stan, not knowing what to do — he had been caught off guard like a deer in headlights. His hands were firmer on the ledge, while Stan's hands held onto his coat, as if trying to bring him closer, as if Craig was too far away.
Craig knew that this was a lie. He knew that that wonderful feeling of finally kissing Stan's lips was merely temporary, covered in a burning lie. That the warmth that coursed through his body was an unfortunate illusion. Craig felt minimally good in the middle of the kiss, but for Stan, it was just an experience. Nothing more. Craig knew that he wasn't the one Stan would want to be kissing, and he knew that it would make him sure what he liked and push him right into Kyle's arms and kisses.
Craig wasn't even a thought in the back of his mind.
He moved his hands off the ledge and onto Stan's waist, deepening the kiss. If Craig was only going to feel it once, let it be enough to imprint the sensation in his mind. He took Stan's lower lip between his teeth before moving to the other's neck. The sigh that came from Stan's mouth was an encouragement to Craig, who continued his task of covering the skin of Stan's neck with hot seals, but holding back from leaving any marks, much as he wanted to.
Stan moved his hands away, squeezing Craig's shoulder and hair between his fingers. Craig turned his attention to Stan's mouth fiercely, invading it with his tongue and feeling Stan return the gesture.
Holy shit. That night would be hard to forget, and Craig was doing everything he could to make it even harder on purpose, because he really didn't want a single second to slip from his mind.
As much as it would hurt for the rest of his life, he at least had the opportunity to feel Stan's lips on his and his body between his arms, his fingers tangled in his strands of hair. Craig was neither drunk, nor high, he was fully aware of what he was doing and there would be no excuses to make later. All that remained was to be totally honest. He would never have that chance again.
It was hot and cold, it was calm and wild, it was good and horrible, it was painful and pleasurable, soft and strong. A sharp contrast of sensations, all at the same time.
Craig wanted to sink into that pool of pleasure forever, he would never get sick, but he felt Stan slowly slip between his fingers and pull away — not too far, his lips still brushing Stan's, their breaths colliding.
— So?
Stan didn't answer, Craig watched him press his lips against each other in a thin line and felt him squeeze his shoulders tighter, the answer stuck in his throat. Craig waited.
— I think so.
— Do you want to be sure?
— No. — It came out as a whisper.
Craig knew what that meant: "I do, but not with you". Honestly? Fuck it. Craig didn't give a shit, Stan was no longer his problem, he would let Kyle put an end to this matter. He did what he could to help Stan, and he hoped that it would really help take some steps towards Kyle. Craig didn't want Stan to look for him anymore, and he wouldn't chase after him either.
He wouldn't ask if Stan liked it, he preferred to believe that he did, after all, if he hadn't, he wouldn't have continued or reciprocated the gestures, he wouldn't have weakened under Craig's touches. He gave Stan one last kiss on the lips before returning to the mess inside the house in search of a bottle of liquor.
He didn't want to forget what had just happened, didn't want to forget the good feeling of having Stan's lips on his, didn't want to forget where Stan had touched him and how perfectly their bodies fit together. He just didn't want to see what would happen next.
Craig didn't know how much time had passed between the moment he kissed Stan and the moment he walked in, said something in Kyle's ear near the stairs, and disappeared with him to the second floor, but Stan was no longer his problem, no longer a thought.
Great.