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hanukkahmas - senior year
It was below freezing, beyond below freezing, and Kyle kept extra sweaters in his closet. The oldest Broflovski kid had skipped the trip to visit his Cousin Kyle in Connecticut in favor of downtime after his big trip to a lab for his senior AP Psychology project, and Stan volunteered to house-sit with him to give his parents a Christmas solely for them, the first time since they got married. Shelly and her friends out in college were fine with their all-night parties.
Naturally, housesitting means teenagers lounging for a few hours, Kenny brings the cigarettes and Stan brings the alcohol and Cartman brings his mom’s latest boyfriend’s weed brownies. By two in the morning, they cleared: Kenny stumbling over to Tammy’s or Butters’ and Cartman being physically forced out the door by Stan once he was drunk enough.
Kyle, after getting through a couple of nicotine sticks, lent Stan another sweater and stared at the wall, because Stan’s shoddily-painted nails and Stan’s arms around his chest prevented him from flying away.
“What are we gonna do, Stan?”
“Whatcha mean, Ky?” Stan looked down at his super best friend turned super boyfriend as the redhead pushed up his glasses.
“What are we gonna do, Stan? I’m supposed to go into psychology and I’m addicted to smoking, and I hate this stupid town but I never wanna go anywhere else.” Kyle snatched the glasses off of his own face, put them aside, and rolled to shove himself into Stan, folding into the comfort to the best of his ability. “I hate it all.”
“I don’t know.”
Kyle picked up his head, eyes filling with panic. “You don’t-“
“No one knows, Ky.” Stan’s fingers traced his forehead. “And it’s fine.”
The redhead swallowed and took a deep breath.
“We don’t need to know, and it’s scary, but life will keep going so long as you’re here, at least for me, it’ll all be water under the bridge. We can’t know everything that’s gonna happen. But I’ll have you for it.”
“I hate…”
“Anxiety? The world? Your mom? Cartman?”
“Yeah.”
“...Terrence and Phillip’s Crazy Christmas?”
“Only if it’s the 1997.”
They smiled at one another, shifting closer, as Stan turned the TV on.