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Eric stood in disbelief at the boy in front of him, who was holding his own, trembling hands to console himself as he anxiously waited for a response from the brunette.
Naturally, it was dark out. Everyone had gone home, but Stan and Cartman stayed behind. Ever since the sleepover when they were 10, they had wordlessly vowed to spend time together weekly. This was one of those times, and Cartman whined for his mother to allow them to stay up past curfew and play video games for longer, which quickly turned from an extra thirty minutes, to three hours. The controller lay still, but limp, in Eric’s sweaty palms, Stan and Eric’s characters dying on the screen from lack of control input. At any other time, the bigger boy would have thrown a fit. He had been working notoriously hard to beat that level, and all of them knew not to mess with it.
The world around them seemed dim, expecting; still. As if it had stopped spinning just for the two of them. But this wasn’t a comforting feeling. They both knew that.
It made sense. Everything did. The way Stan looked at him in a crowd of people, sickeningly stunned. The way Eric himself would sneakily prolong the simple, physical contact they’d share, careful not to disturb Stan. The brunette teen would constantly “test” how long he could hold his hand or hug him before Stan succumbed to his own vomit. He would constantly pick on the black-haired boy in front of the others, trying to disguise it for himself. Every time that Eric thought Kyle had “too much time with Stan”, he would poke fun at them much more frequently, and with more anger in his heart than usual. The thought of truly liking Stan would only mess everything up. He made sure to keep the hangouts a secret. He didn’t want to mess things up. He didn’t want to be alone.
“Stan…” Cartman slowly dragged, unable to look at the boy sitting next to him. “I…I- know how it sounds. Okay?” Stan continued. “I know it sounds stupid, and I don’t want to mess anything up between us, but…I just can’t keep losing my lunch, dude. And...”
Eric looked up at him and furrowed his brows. Stan quickly realized his mistake, and began to stammer.
“Uh- Fuck, I’m sorry. I meant—“
Eric interrupted.
“So…you want to tell me this and get over me so you can be with Wendy? Is that how this works?” Stan tried to reply, only to get cut off by the bigger teen again. “I know you two are on a break, you know. It’s not like you don’t make it obscenely obvious with your wet-cat pretty boy face. I’m sure Wendy would LOVE to know that you’re talking about her as if she’s some second choice.” Cartman spat, rolling his eyes and crossing his arms. “Seriously?!” Stan yelled, defensively. “I’m not treating her like a second choice, dude! The problem is that I like both of you, and I don’t wanna-“ Eric narrowed his eyes. “Tell everyone we’re stupid little sissies? Have Wendy realize you picked me over her? Marsh, I swear to fucking god I’ll make you march right out of this fucking house.” “Cartman, please. Seriously. I’ve been thinking a lot. Just let me talk. Please.” Stan looked up at Eric, his distressed, round eyes winning him over. God how I hate this guy.
“Fine!” He widened his eyes as he impertinently turned away from stan, keeping his arms raised and letting them fall to his sides.
“Cartman…I know I can’t just pick both of you. I love Wendy, but I can’t ignore this anymore. It wouldn’t be right if I did. And even if you’re a selfish asshole a lot of the time, I don’t want to be. I know that what I’ve been feeling for you lately didn’t just come out of nowhere. Sure it may be different from how I felt with Wendy, but I feel like this has always been there. I just...never considered the idea that I could be with a boy until recently." Eric let his expression soften, still out of the other boy’s sight. He looked down at his feet in a desperate attempt to not look at him. He felt heat come unto his cheeks and nose, lips quivering as Stan spoke.
“I like you, Cartman. And if you don’t like me, we can just forget everything ever happened. But I need to know if you feel this too.”
“It won’t work.” Cartman croaked out, posture unchanging. The raven haired boy’s eyes widen, taking the sentence like a bullet.
“I’ll ruin everything. You know I will. I’ll just get in the way of your happiness with Wendy. It fucking sucks to see you do bad things to yourself, Stan. You’re not like that ginger boy Kyle that constantly takes you away from me. You know I can’t help it. And if I have to be the son of a bitch that ruins everything, I’d rather trample this before I make things worse.” Stan could hear the shaking in Eric’s hoarse voice, and soon he himself couldn’t see, and his eyes became glassy as hot tears slid down his cheeks.
“Cartman..How could you say that..?” Stan hid his face in his arms, sniffling loudly. Eric couldn’t help but let the tears fall, too. He hated doing this to Stan. But he was so scared. And Stan was scared too. They both sat in silence, only accompanied by a couple sobs.
“I’m sorry, Cartman. I don’t know what I was thinking. Ever since you’ve been going to therapy, you’ve been making progress. I just thought that things would be different now that the guys like you more. But I’m scared, too. I don't know what they would think. What Kyle would think. I don’t know what I’m going to do. I don’t know what the best choice is. I don’t want to hurt you, dude.”
The air suddenly feels thick, as if an abandoned mortuary holding the bodies of only them. The pain cut through the tension long ago. With depressed, bloodshot eyes they now faced one another, closer. They understood each other all too well. Perhaps for the last time.
The black-haired teen hated seeing Eric’s face that way, even when he would get a toy he didn’t want, and was throwing tantrums. He would always find himself clenching his fists, holding his puke, trying not to put Eric’s face in his hands and pepper the boy with gentle pecks. Cartman got away with a lot of things that way.
“You don’t ruin things, Cartman. You’re a huge piece of shit a lot of the time, but you’re trying. You’ve always cared for the guys. You’ve always cared for me." Stan wipes the tears from his face, and sucks up the snot through his nose. "Deep inside of you I know that you want something more than this. It’s not like you’ve been making excuses to touch me and hold my hand for pranks. You tell the guys that all the time, but you act like I don’t notice. Maybe I'm just a dumb fag to you, but I know the way we exchange things isn’t what normal friends do. I want to try, Cartman. And if we don’t work out, we’ll never have to talk about this again. I’m not asking for us to be public, or even official. I just want to try. Please.”
Eric remained motionless. He needed to act fast. He wanted Stan out of his sight so he wouldn't be able to give in. But all failed when Cartman ran into Stan's arms, making them both fall to their knees on the floor beneath them in a puddle of sobs and wails. Cartman began kissing Stan gently as he wiped the remainder of Stan's tears on his hands. He couldn't say no to him. "Fuck, Marsh. You are one miserable bitch." Eric choked on a laugh, still pouring tears onto the smaller boy. They put their foreheads together, cradling each other in a desperate embrace. Stan was able to hold the vomit in his mouth, relieved to himself that he wasn't losing it right now.
"So, can we keep this between us, just like always? So we don't have to mess anything up? We probably wouldn't hear the end of this for weeks with the guys." Stan smiles weakly, having a playful tone to his voice.
Cartman snickered, rolling his eyes. "Yeah, hippie. Like always."