"Tweek?"

"Ngh. Yes?"

They were sitting on Craig's bed, watching Red Racer, but Craig wasn't focused on the TV all that much. He'd seen the episode at least ten times over, so he paid more attention to his 'boyfriend' beside him. He observed his profile, his pointy jaw, the flow of his blonde hair that had reached between his shoulder blades by now, some loose strands that fell across his face.

"How long is it since you had your last haircut?"

"Ack, I don't know? About four years I guess?"

"I see."

"Oh man, why are you asking? Do you think my hair looks stupid? Oh god, you too think I have to get a haircut!?" Tweek freaked a bit, stared wide-eyed at Craig and started to pull on his hair.

Craig reached out to push Tweek's hands back down, away from his hair.

"No dude, I was just wondering, if you're going for some specific look."

"Huh? Oh. No. I just. Ngh. I just don't like haircuts I guess."

"You could be a mad scientist." Tweek chuckled at that. Craig thought he could definitely pass for a mad scientist. He was smart enough to be one, eccentric enough, his hair was a crazy mess when he wore it short and it was a crazy mess now, only longer. Like a lion's mane. Ironically enough, Tweek was born in the sign of a Leo.

"Or a lion."

"Hehe. Rawr!"

"Or maybe, if you let someone shorten them just a little bit, so they reached like, to your shoulders, you could totally look like Kurt Cobain."

"Ngh, not happening. Besides, I can't play guitar for shit."

"You have a good singing voice though. And playing guitar can be learned, dude."

"Agh! No way man, too much pressure! I've already had enough problems with drugs and depression without becoming a famous musician! Idon'twannashootmyselfintheheadwhenI'monlytwentyseven!"

"Tweek, Tweek! Relax, man, I was just kidding."

"Ugh. Thank god."

Craig just smiled at him. After a short silence, he asked another question.

"Why don't you like haircuts?"

Tweek's face turned slightly pink, as it tended to do when he was questioned about things about himself that may have their roots in one of his anxieties. He was clearly stepping out of his comfort zone, but Craig had no intention to push him, and Tweek trusted Craig more than others.

"It's kinda embarrassing. Uh... agh.. I just don't want someone I barely know, someone I can't be sure if I can trust, waving razor sharp scissors around my neck!" Tweek started pulling his hair again, overthinking how easy it would be for a barber to cut his jugular vein and claim it was an accident because he twitched suddenly (which Tweek was known to do) and got his neck impaled on the pointy blade just as he was snipping away his overly long hair.

"Hey. Relax dude." Craig calmed Tweek and pushed his hands down for the second time. "It's okay. I'm not judging you or anything."

"Thanks."

Craig looked at Tweek for a while, who was returning the look with a bit confused, wide-eyed stare. Noticed how his hair looked. How it flowed around his face. Those strands, that that fell into his face so effortlessly, touching his chin.

"Let me braid it for you." Craig said suddenly.

"What?"

"Come sit over here," Craig said and patted the space on bed before his lap. "I'll braid your hair."

"Craig, isn't that… kinda gay?"

"And us two pretending to be boyfriends for five years, holding hands and all, going on "dates" isn't kinda gay?" Craig dryly remarked.

"Well, I guess… "

"C'mon, I know you want to."

"But… we're going to school tomorrow!" Pretending to be in a gay relationship and being shipped by the whole town had its perks. Such as that they were allowed to have sleepovers even on school days. Of course, after they had both turned fifteen, only after their parents had the talk with them. "People will stare, and ask questions! It's too much pressure!"

"Relax Tweek, if you won't like it, you can unbraid it then."

"So you'd waste time braiding my hair only so that I could then unbraid it again?"

"Yep. But you won't, because I know you'll like it."

"Ugh. Okay then." Tweek shuffled a bit to sit in front of Craig, but Craig just smiled, ruffled Tweek's hair as he got up and left the room. Tweek heard him knocking at the door of his sister's room, asking her for a comb or something. After a while, Craig came back in the room brandishing a hairbrush, and sat behind Tweek.

"Do you even have any idea what you're doing?"

"Dude, of course I do, I have a younger sister. Tons of experience. Trust me."

"I trust you."

Craig set to work on Tweeks hair, first trying to straighten his hair a bit with the brush. Tweek's hair was very unusual, just like Tweek himself. Sunny blonde, nothing like either of his parents; his dad had curly brown hair and his mom's hair was more towards the darker shade of sandy. It was soft, but at the same time quite a handful to tame. First he braided small short side braids above his ears, then splicing them into one single large braid starting at his nape.

"I kinda wish I had at least one sibling, too." Tweek sighed.

"Hah, you should be glad you don't. Actually, why didn't your parents have another child?" Tweek's parents could easily afford another child.

"Mngh, my mom said, the doctor told her it was likely she couldn't have another baby, after she had me."

"Oh shit, I'm so sorry Tweek. I shouldn't have asked..." Craig suddenly felt guilty for asking such a personal question.

"Don't be. You couldn't know." Tweek smiled, though he knew Craig couldn't see, and he couldn't turn around, because Craig was doing his hair, and if he moved, it would all probably be for nothing. "Heh, maybe it's for the better. Having one fucked up kid is bad enough as it is. For my parents at least. I guess I take after them."

"You're not fucked up Tweek." Tweek responded with a dry chuckle. "But if you don't mind me saying so, your parents are slightly off their rockers."

"Yea, I know."

"But then, all parents in this town are."

Craig finished doing Tweek's hair and ended the braid with an elastic hair band he also got from his sister.

"Okay, all done. Go check it out in the mirror."

Tweek and Craig got up from the bed and went to the bathroom to evaluate Craig's hairdressing skills.

"See? It looks cool!" Craig said, admiring his own work. It really looked good on him, he observed. Tweek has always been beautiful, but more like the cute, fluffy lion cub kind of beautiful. Now though, he seemed… more like the 'hot' kind of beautiful. Craig couldn't really put his finger on it. Maybe it was that this new hairstyle better accentuated his bone structure? From close up, he noticed that Tweek's cheekbones now seemed more prominent, so he looked more... chiseled? Either way, Craig found it very attractive.

Hold on, what? Craig wasn't really gay, so why was he pondering about Tweek's attractiveness?

Whatever, he was just admiring his appearance, that was it. There was nothing sexual about it. At all.

"Yea, I like it. Thanks, Craig." Craig felt a lump rise in his throat as Tweek sent him a sweet smile.

"N-no problem. Just please, don't tell anyone at school I did that. I'd never hear the end of it."

Tweek agreed that it was probably a good idea. The other boys would tease them endlessly, Clyde would wail how cute they are, all the girls would squeal and the Asian girls would probably go on a non-stop yaoi drawing spree until it would claim their lives, and ugh. Tweek didn't want to be held responsible for that. Waaayy too much pressure.

Craig didn't realize yet that he may have made a mistake. He would find out the next day.

…

It started when he and Tweek went downstairs to eat breakfast with the Tucker family before heading out to school.

"Morning boys," Craig's mom greeted the two. "Oh Tweek, your hair looks so nice! Craig, you did that?" She beamed with joy. Craig just rolled his eyes and flipped his mother off, and she happily returned the gesture.

"So that's what you needed the brush and hair band for! Oh my god Craig, you're even gayer than I thought," Ruby remarked, and they traded another flip-offs.

"Ruby, stop irritating your brother!" Craig's father intervened and flipped his daughter off.

"I'll irritate whoever I want!" Ruby stood her ground stubbornly and flipped everyone off. Maybe having a sibling wasn't so great, Tweek thought. At least not when they are eleven and on the brink of puberty and just being insufferable brats all round.

…

Things weren't much better when they arrived at school. The first person they had to meet, of all people, had to be none other than Kenny McCormick.

"Hey coffeebean."

Kenny was known to flirt, and god knows what else, with literally everybody above the age of fourteen.

"Wow, a manbraid, huh? You look pretty hot." Kenny winked at Tweek. "Does Craig like to pull your hair when you guys do the nasty?" Kenny teased Tweek, already kinda desensitized but not entirely impassive to this behavior of Kenny's, who also completely ignored the murderous stare that Craig, standing right beside Tweek, shot him.

"Ngh!" Tweek blushed a bit.

"I bet you love it, huh? Did you get the braid for that? For Craig?" Kenny grinned at Craig "Oh man, the things I would do for the pleasure of having such a devoted lover. Mmmhmm." Kenny sighed dreamily and felt Tweek's hair on his temple, trailing his fingers slowly down, along Tweek's jaw, before he grabbed him by his wrist and stopped him.

"Dude, that's enough."

Craig was furious. He didn't want to punch Kenny, or at least realized he shouldn't, but he really wanted to punch him at the same time. He didn't want to, because he knew doing so would make him look like a jealous, over-protective boyfriend, and he didn't want Tweek (or anyone, for that matter) to think he was really gay for him, because he wasn't, and he knew Tweek wasn't. The whole fake gay relationship was making them look gay enough as it was, so why make it worse. But he did want to punch him, because Kenny coming onto Tweek like that? That was just unacceptable. That should not be tolerated; didn't Kenny realize Tweek was off limits? Of course, Craig knew Tweek could handle himself. So why did he still feel so fucked off?

…

Throughout the day, it only got worse. Various people felt the need to positively comment on Tweek's new hairstyle, including but not limited to Wendy ("Oh Tweek, you look handsome!"), Bebe ("Wow Tweeks, you're a hottie! Where did you get this?"), Clyde ("*sniff*. Token, look at them, they are even cuter together now!"), Token ("Cool braid man, you look fine.") and of course the Asian girls who insisted that Tweek and Craig pose for them so they could draw new pictures of them. Craig hated how much attention Tweek had attracted because of it, and he couldn't even take any credit for it, because he didn't want everyone think he was gay. Scratch that, everyone already did think he way gay. But this was different, like a whole-new level of gay. If they knew, this would like, really seal the deal, and then there would really be zero chance of him ever getting into an actual romantic relationship, with a female. Nonetheless, he felt jealous, and conflicted because he couldn't even decide what to feel jealous about without making him feel gay. Because he wasn't. Alright?

…

Tweek found Craig being alone in the boys' bathroom, standing at the sinks and staring at his own reflection in the mirror.

"You were right Tweek. It was a bad idea. I shouldn't have..."

"No!"

"Huh?" Craig turned to look at Tweek. Once again he had to admit, he really looked good. That wasn't news, but somehow, this new hairstyle (How did Craig come up with it anyway? Had he seen some celebrity, or some famous athlete, sporting it? He didn't really remember, where or whom it was. It didn't matter anyway) really flattered his looks. Craig looked at him – really looked at him, and it made Craig's stomach feel all fluttery.

Wait, what the fuck? He wasn't supposed to feel fluttery about his completely platonic, completely straight friend! Especially when he was straight himself, too!

"I mean, gah, no, I like it! I mean, sure, eventually I'll have to unbraid my hair when I'll need to wash it, but then I could ask you again to redo..."

"No, fuck. No. Bad idea. All the attention. I don't like it."

"What do you mean? Ngh, the attention's all on me! Everyone's asking me about it and yeah, it's too much pressure, but I hope they'll, agh, get tired of it, and I thought you'd like when they left you alone for a change – wait, are you jealous?" Tweek stared wide eyed at Craig, who flinched at the accusation.

"I'm not jealous! What would I be jealous about?"

"Idon'tknow, ngh, maybe that everyone compliments me about my hair and you can't take credit?" Tweek said teasingly with a smirk.

"Tweek, what the fuck. That's so gay."

"Like you," came a familiar cocky voice from behind them.

Fuck. Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck, why didn't Craig check the stalls first.

"McCormick," Craig, whose face turned red, seethed, "didn't anyone tell you it's rude to listen to other people's private conversations?"

"What was I supposed to do, plug my ears?"

"Yes! Or, I don't fucking know, leave us alone or let us know you're there and listening, fuck. Get lost now before I throw your sorry ass through the door!"

"Really scary, Tucker." Kenny said with a snicker.

"I'm serious, asshole, get the fuck out of here," Craig spat through gritted teeth as he grabbed Kenny by the collar and started escorting him out of the room. "And if you tell anyone about -"

"About what, that you're faking it the whole time? What, did you think I wouldn't realize?" Kenny yanked the boy's hand gripping his parka away from himself, and scoffed at the shocked-expressions wearing 'couple'. "Dude, if I wanted to tell anyone, I would have done it already long ago. You two just need time to talk things through. So I'll leave ya lovebirds to it." Kenny winked at them as he backed away towards the door and left the bathroom with an amused grin on his face.

...

For the first time ever, the silence between Craig and Tweek was heavy and really, really uncomfortable. Craig stared, stone-faced, at Tweek, who was becoming nervous and twitchy, and raised his hands towards his hair to pull it.

"Don't." Craig stopped him and caught Tweek's hands in his. "You'll damage it."

"Huh?"

"You really look hot - I mean...".

Fuck.

Did he really just to call Tweek hot? Nevermind that Tweek acually was hot, which Craig was very much aware of, but he shouldn't just say it out loud like that. Craig took a couple of deep breaths and squeezed Tweek's hands tight.

'His hands feel really nice in mine. How have I not noticed before?' Craig thought. 'Wait, what? No way, no, no, nononononononono!'

What was happening to him? This wasn't supposed to happen! Craig was definitely totally straight, and so was Tweek, he was certain of it, so how the hell was it possible that as they were standing in the empty boys' bathroom and under Tweek's green gaze, of all things possible the fluttery feeling in Craig's stomach intensified tenfold and now they were gravitating closer? And any reason would tell Craig that he must stop this, because this didn't make any sense. But sense be damned, because the fluttery feeling was getting stronger still, and now they were just millimeters apart and Craig didn't know why, but his eyes close at the same time as Tweek's, but his lids didn't feel heavy, and it seemed so wrong, and yet felt so right, when at last, the boys' lips touched.

Fuck reason. Fuck sense. Fuck logic. Fuck the bell announcing that their next period has already started. So what if they come late. There are far more important things in life than another hour of boring lecture. Such as the knowledge that...

His lips taste so sweet.

And they're so soft.

And his tongue is tangled with mine.

And now he's nibbling at my lower lip and I can't help but moan a bit.

His hair feels nice.

He smells so good.

My head is spinning.

..

..

I'm so happy.

…

"Well, well, well, our famous couple, Mr. Tweak and Mr. Tucker. Any explanation why you two are twenty minutes late?"

"Erm, we were just, agh-"

"- in the bathroom-" This earned a few snickers and giggles from the room.

"- and we lost track of time -"

"And you two just couldn't keep it in your pants before you got home, could you?" Their teacher sighed as they both just shrugged sheepishly. "Y'know, just because PC principal has a soft spot for you two, doesn't mean I'm going to tolerate your being late for class. So I'm going to mark you both as tardy, and I'll need you two to keep your hormones at bay for at least until this class is over."

"We're sorry," Craig apologized.

"Yes, we, ngh, really are."

"Whatever, just sit down and pay attention."

…

"Psst. Hey, Craig. So, how did it go?"

Damn, why did the seating plan have Kenny right behind him? Worse yet, why was Tweek so far away from him? Even if it was just the distance between their desks, which were right next to each other.

"Shut the fuck up McCormick," Craig hissed. "You already know too much anyway."

Kenny smirked. "That's just me. But I guess it went well, judging by the hickey on your neck."

"What?!" Craig whisper-shouted and instinctively covered his neck with his hand.

"Just kidding dude. You don't have a hickey on your neck."

"I'm gonna fucking kill you Kenny."

"You should thank me instead."

Craig closed his eyes tight, balled his fists and sighed. He looked to his right and exchanged a look with Tweek – a look that made his throat dry and his heartrate skyrocket. A look that could only be described as lovestruck. Craig held out his hand and Tweek took it in his, as they did many times before. But this time, it was different.

Maybe he should thank Kenny after all.