Stan

The sound of metal clangs off of sleek blue tiles, echoing loudly in the damp room, coming from Clyde slamming his goalkeeper helmet on the locker doors. The rest of the team join him in a smattering of howls like wolves after a kill, famished from the dry season, feral from the month long wait between seasons. Now finally full again, they hang off of one another and pant with mouths open, boyish and primal, grabbing fistfuls of jerseys, their collars tugged taut and tight. Stan is among them, saying nothing, the jagged shape of Kyle's name clamped tight like a mouthguard between his teeth. Those two or three minutes that passed in the parking lot feels like a physical thing pressed hard against his ribs, beating vigorously - every one of Kyle's movements replaying in him like a muscle contracting: Kyle reaching out an open hand, the warmth of his fingers on Stan's skin, Kyle staring intently, the straight stern lines of his brows, those green irises quivering back and forth, one slightly paler than the other, the other flecked with blue.

(Stan remembers when he first noticed that they were different, remembers moving their heads close, Kyle whining childishly underneath him muttering be careful be careful while Stan pressed the pad of his pinky into that eye to fish out some small dust mote swimming on its glassy surface).

Kyle's face was a sheet of paper and Stan imagines himself turning it over and over again, running his fingers over its smooth surface looking for secret messages, raising it high to the light, seeing nothing in it but a soft, blank glow.

A voice in his head whispers he's a stranger, another says you used to be read Kyle's eyes like arithmetic flashcards.

Craig leaps onto his back, exhaling fuck yes fuck yes near his ear, the fervent breathlessness of his voice making something in Stan twitch and whimper. He worries that the others can see all of his half-remembered secrets whirling in his skull so he starts fixating on numbers, counting his even strength goals, his power play goals, his short-handed goals, ticking them off like shiney prayer beads, willing himself to feel like they had meaning. He pictures the black bold writing on the whiteboard hanging from his bedroom door, pictures his dad's clenched fist dragging across the smooth surface, erasing last season's stats. Always the same post-game ritual: Stan, feeling small and empty, leaning against the cold wall of the hallway, his chest tightening as he listens to the the dry erase marker squeaking and thudding. His dad's writing, crazed and proud: 34 assists for 48 points in 26 games! Stanley Marsh top 15 high school NHL prospects!

He tosses his stick against the lockers and starts to pull with shaking hands the layers and layers of pads and velcro, unstrapping, unhooking, unlacing, his skates thumping onto the ground, fallen like limbs. Reveling in the feeling of weightlessness, a creature finally molted, Stan drags himself silently to the showers away from the others, gripping a towel tightly around his waist, occasionally bending against the weight of someone's hand . The assistant coach breathes in his face, shaking him forcefully by the scruff of the neck, calling him his golden boy, his winning horse, Stan grinning back at him, feeling shittier by the moment.

The squeak and hiss of the shower nozzle is a welcome sound. Thick steam covers him from the others and the loud echo of water against tiles masks the rest of their murmurs. He stares hard at the drain below his feet, at the wild twisting of water as it pooled near the brass-colored lattices. He senses the usual bouquet of post-game pains: the ache of his hands and forearms, the swelling on his temples where his helmet pressed, all the tender places where he made contact with other players already budding into pretty bruises. He places a finger on each part, pressing down hard, testing the pains against one another.

His body thumps. He closes his eyes and gives himself permission to binge on the thought of Kyle; but even so, he couldn't bring himself to think of him directly. Instead, he thinks about the dusty yearbook in the box under his bed, dog-eared from the few days it spent in his backpack. He can't remember what his own picture from that year looked like, but he remembered all the details in Kyle's: the hideous sweater Kyle's mother had made him wear that day, how they both made fun of it, browny-green and lumpy like fresh vomit they had agreed. It itched the delicate skin on the slender curve between his neck and shoulders and Kyle spent the whole morning tugging and pulling until Stan had helped him trim it of its thick, wool pills with classroom scissors. He remembered the bright, frenzied look lingering around Kyle's eyes in the photo, remembered the slightly crooked smile, his cheeks looking pink and sore. He remembered how it was because he had made Kyle laugh until he doubled over as they stood in line waiting for their turn in front of the photographer.

Right before the others came rumbling in, Stan has a thought that flashes like lightning behind his eyes, like a sharp pain shooting up his spine. But among the clatter of voices and footsteps, he forgets it almost as soon as he thinks of it: was there some other boy, he had wondered, who now knows Kyle as well as he used to?

They go to Stark's Pond to shotgun an armful of beers that Cartman stole from the convenience store last night, warm and bitter from a day spent stuffed in his backpack. Most of them are dented or curved at the top, ready to burst open. Sitting on the damp grass away from the others, Stan watches Cartman and Clyde standing shoulder to shoulder on rocks by the edge of the water. They bend down to take the beers out one at a time, delicately run the pads of their thumbs over small valleys in the aluminum can before holding each one up into the deepening red light of dusk like jewelers inspecting the purity of precious gems - the emerald green of Rolling Rock, the sapphire of Milwaukee's Best Light, the citrine of Simpler Times. Craig talks about how this is a mountain town hick tradition, holding his hockey stick out in front of him like a bat, swatting fireflies out of the air, the bugs bursting in small clusters of neon fireworks, leaving just the afterglow of their luminosity on the black wood. No way Jefferson County does dumb shit like this he keeps saying. But he watches on eagerly, watches Clyde place them gently in the sand, submerged in the still, green water dotted with flies and skimmed with bright algae - a half-witted attempt at chilling them.

Cartman comes and grips Stan by the collar of his sweatshirt, almost dragging him to the edge of the pond. He presses a wide hand on the back of his head. His other hand shoves the rounded side of the beer can between Stan's jaws like a muzzle, his teeth clanking against the aluminum. Stan squeezes his eyes shut, feeling his stomach lurch at the at the salt and the gritty texture of algae, pond water dripping down his chin, the barbed edge of the slit where Cartman stuck his pocket knife nicking at the tender tip of his tongue. Then his mouth and nose are full of beer, half fizz and half air, Cartman's finger expertly popping the tab in one smooth motion, it hissing like a gas leak in his ear, most of it ending up down his front, the rest siphoning into his stomach.

He squirms away from Cartman's forceful embrace when it's done, muffling his coughing in his sleeve, while Clyde yells the sacred doctrine of Park County Hockey into the quiet of the woods: you have to do one for every goal you scored and you scored two okay we have to keep you lucky. Stan wipes his face with his sleeve, blurts out this beer tastes like piss. Somewhere behind him, Token finishes his first easily, the triumphant crunch of aluminum beneath his shoe, giving one wild bawl into the still air before calling out for another. Stan straightens himself up, feeling words still forming deep in his throat: you poked a hole in it like an asshole Cartman I think there's blood in my mouth it tastes like a puck to the face - Cartman laughs harder still, stupidly thumping his meaty fist on the flat bark of a sapling, a boy incapable of staying away from small acts of violence, the heading toward the water to pluck another ripe fruit to pop and juice.

Sour-faced Bebe comes from nowhere and wraps her slender fingers around Stan's wrist, her grip like five small razorblades, half of her strength in her nails sinking into his skin. She pulls him in the opposite direction, pulls him toward her car where he can see Wendy waiting for him in the back seat. Her face glows behind tinted windows, a moon behind clouds, a flashlight shining through curtains. Clyde glares at her, something like annoyance washing over him, calling out Bebe what the fuck, Bebe responding with one pretty middle finger raised above her head, Stan shrugging, his eyes catching sight of the the dainty ring Clyde had given her last month, a heart-shaped pearl flashing and flashing in the sunset.

Wendy tugs him into the backseat, the hardtop pulled up now, dark and constricting with the doors closed. He feels wildness flaring up in him, an animal caught in a trap, feels it kicking like anger, constricting like guilt, and he wants to put his fist through the glass. In front of him, Wendy's hands are folded neatly over her gingham skirt, her dark eyes pinning him down. When she speaks, her words are quiet and urgent, no bullshit, all business, like his mother when she reprimands him in public for bad behavior. She says if you need to tell me anything tell me now. Stan, scanning her face to assess the damage, his head murky already from the beer turning slow and viscous like thick syrup, hears himself reply nothing there's nothing what are you talking about?

Then he's thinking about Kyle taking off his jacket in the parking lot and the way he had gripped the hem of his collar with one hand, tilting his jaw upward to reveal the small cluster of pale tawny freckles on his throat.

(Stan at 13, peering from behind his locker door, watching Kyle shake powdery snow from his hair, his hands fumbling over a lumpy home-knit mustard yellow scarf before pulling it free, Stan catching the smallest glimpse of Kyle's bare neck before he forces himself to turn away. Those same freckles like constellations. Those same freckles like late-summer fireflies.)

Then he's thinking about the noise of Kyle's zipper, crisp and full and quick, the sound of single match being struck - something in him shuddering softly from the heat of it.

Wendy wraps her arms around his neck tight as a noose, her hands buried in his hair, pulling off his snapback, kissing him and kissing him, the kind of hard-lipped wide-open half-urgent kiss that he knew was a test. Outside, Bebe leans her back against the passenger window, her pretty sheeny skin leaving frosty imprints against the glass, taking part in a shouting match with Clyde, Clyde calling her a cunt, a bitch, Bebe responding only in the affirmative, yes yes I am you you dumb sack of shit. Their voices scratch at some tender part of his brain and he feels the rumbling of dangerous potential in his bones, the whole world seemingly in flux like he has no control, no control anywhere. Every time Wendy moves, the leather seat whines underneath her and his skin crawls at the sound of it. So he sinks his frozen hands into the small ring of her waist and lifts her up onto him. He runs his fingers gingerly over the taut elastic of her cotton panties like he's touching some ancient stone rune, looking for answers in its strange, raised lettering.

There's a terrible black mass in the center of his brain and his thoughts claw their way toward it. He tries to stay in the car with Wendy. He focuses hard the gentle pressure of her full weight on top of him, on the small sea creature of her tongue scurrying around his teeth. He focuses hard on everything else in the world but Kyle. It repeats in his head, a thousand hail marys: don't think about Kyle, don't think about Kyle, don't think about him, don't think about him in the library, hidden away in the dense shelves of the reference section the last time they saw each other, Kyle's eyes avoiding his gaze, looking as if he had something to confess. Don't think about Kyle sitting on the heavy mahogany table, hands pressed obediently between his legs. Don't think about that small pocket of his mouth and how it looked sticky and sweet and fire engine red from a ninety-nine cent corner store popsicle.

But how could he not? How could he not think about Kyle's downturned eyes, the tilt of his head, a feathery softness in his voice, saying Stan I have to tell you something please please don't be mad, Stan feeling his heart like a tight-fisted knocking. His whole body had gone prickly with anticipation, convinced that this was the culmination of all the half-touches and hand-grazes, of all the times Kyle had caught him staring at bus stop, in fourth period geometry, in the middle of unlocking their bikes from the chain link fence behind the school, Stan always turning quickly away, pretending to be fascinated by the tapping of Kenny's foot against the gravel of the street, or by the clattering of sudden spring hail against the classroom window, or by the clicking of the combination bike lock in his hands. When he realized that Kyle had left, when Mr. Broflovski had finally let him in and shown him the skeleton of Kyle's room, the flesh of it scraped off and shipped away, he had thought back on it all, thought back on that whole year and saw in every one of those memories a tiny countdown ticking and ticking and ticking.

Stan and Kyle saw that summer before freshman year as two different animals all together. To Stan, it was a summer of small confessions - Kyle's calling him late in the evening, almost every Friday, asking if he could spend the night, then crawling through his window with a limp backpack over one shoulder, a toothbrush and tomorrow's tee folded neatly in its belly, Kyle looking hungry and guilty like a stowaway. Kyle always acting like he had something right on the tip of his tongue whenever they were alone, saying Stan's name tenderly as if prompting for something difficult that would come next (I can't stop thinking about you, I wont stop thinking about you, I just want to be around you all the time, Stan had hoped, because those were the words always threatening to bubble up in his own mouth), but nothing ever followed except silence, ripe with potential and embarrassment.

And then there was the strange moment that passed between them one damp morning in the heat of early August, before a baseball game at the school. Already in their crisp red and white uniforms, they walked slowly through tall lush grass along the edge of the woods, talking lazily about the usual clutter of things - new games, new movies, the girls in their class - when Kyle, stopping in mid sentence, gingerly reached out and touched Stan's wrist. Then Kyle pushed the whole of his small, warm body against him, and Stan, without even thinking, squeezed his eyes closed and wrapped his arms around Kyle's middle. It felt like magnetism to Stan, the way Kyle grabbed at his shirt, the way Stan buried his face into the crook of Kyle's neck; it reminded him of the frenzied way that two magnets in science lab fell into each other, how they wriggled and the spun excitedly before clicking into place. Kyle fumbled over him for a second, tugging and pressing hard, his breathing shallow and labored, and for one dizzying, dreamlike moment, the corners of their lips brushed together.

Stan couldn't rid himself of that moment, couldn't go one week without finding it pulsing in him so powerfully that he would wake in the middle of the night, his boxers sticky with cum, his cheek still tingling from the wet heat of Kyle's heavy exhale.

But for Kyle, Stan came to understand, that moment had only been one of many small goodbyes. The whole summer was pocked with them. The frequent sleepovers were a small goodbye, the late night phone calls were a small goodbye, all the notes folded neatly and slipped into Stan's hand when others weren't looking (lets meet at the library lets bike to the pond lets sneak out, just you and me), they were all small goodbyes. Kyle had spent that entire summer hollowing things out, taking every piece into his hands one by one, examining and savoring all the luminous details, but Stan had spent that whole summer feeling like he was being filled to the brim. And toward the end, he could hardly stand it, could hardly contain it from spilling out of him. He couldn't look at Kyle without those small fantasies whispering in his ear, those small fantasies telling him that he wanted Kyle in ways he could barely fathom at fourteen, those small fantasies of pressing a tightly closed mouth on to Kyle's, the tartness of a mealy pear from Kyle's lunch still lingering there.

It had only become real sex a few times in his head, all the carnality, all the violent parts fuzzy and uncertain, smudged away so that he could swallow it a little easier. He remembered the dread he felt staring at the dark walls of that place inside of himself, remembered those dimly lit images of getting a handful of something, a mouthful of another, of Kyle spread out on the baseball field, all the little metal buttons on his uniform carefully undone, blades of grass sticking to his wet skin, bare and warm and open. He remembered the shame he felt after, the gut-wrenching shame that pressed itself against him and made him grind his teeth together when he came, the post-masterbation shame and emptiness that made him squeeze his eyes shut until he saw stars.

The rest of it was slow-burning desire, simmering away; he'd barely noticed it until it became a hard, violent boil. When had it all began? When did it become what it became? When did he first notice? Hadn't he seen Kyle once, in the middle of the night during a sleepover, slipping into the bathroom across the hall in nothing but loose wool socks and boxers? Hadn't Stan craned his neck from his bed, trying not to make any noise, watching Kyle fumble for the light switch, Stan feeling half-frustrated that he could see just a slit of him between the angles of the two sets of cracked doors? Was that when he first realized what it all was?

Kyle had examined his reflection in the mirror before bending down - the curve of his body bending over, the terrible curve of it making Stan's head spin - and Kyle had wrapped his mouth, swollen from sleep, over the head of the faucet, drinking his fill from the small trickle of water.

Stan remembered turning away when he heard Kyle returning, turning toward the window as he listened to Kyle tuck himself back in, the rustling of the polyester material of his sleeping bag on the carpet sounding like soft shushing.

(A shushing like the mean-faced librarian, holding her finger to her lips commanding be quiet Stan from the circulation desk, threatening some terrible consequence if he didn't obey. A shushing like schoolyard secrets being passed from one ear to another, everyone giggling with secret knowledge, whispering don't tell don't tell anyone they can't know.)

Stan had closed his eyes and pretended to be asleep, feeling lecherous with his hard-on pressing against the springs of his mattress, his head filled with all the peaks and valleys of Kyle's hips, the shape of his body bent over the sink, the darkening shade of his mouth wet and filling with water. The desire had felt like an actual physical ache, something deadly and cancerous, something growing on him that he could nurse tenderly with his fingers.

And he hadn't been able to sleep for the rest of the night, listening to all of Kyle's movements (the sleeping bag still shushing, always sounding like urgent shushing), the soft puppy moan Kyle makes when he rolls over killing him, killing him, killing him.

Wendy says something right into his ear, but he doesn't register her words. His skull rattles with Cartman's voice, far away but booming, shouting faggot faggot faggot amidst crackling laughter, his usual insult for everyone and anyone. But Stan feels the word tunneling deep into him, feels the word coiling tighter and tighter in his stomach. Wendy latches himself back onto his mouth, her hands forming a tiny delicate cup around the crotch of his jeans. He thinks about last week, between class and practice, when Wendy's parents had gone for the afternoon. He thinks about the white bare flesh on Wendy draped over her mother's velveteen couch, about the small yellow bows on her bralette twisted around her ribcage, about dainty pink of flush of her chest. And he thinks about how he struggled to finish, his whole face screwed up, just trying desperately to finish, picturing plastic-faced girls in a million technicolored pixels on his computer, girls whose mouths gaped and gasped like fish out of water, picturing Bebe and Heidi and Red and Kelly, stupidly making his way through the whole roster.

In one frantic movement, Stan throws open the car door and slides Wendy off of his lap. He leans his body out, all the blood rushing to his head. The familiar sour tinge fills his mouth, and he dry heaves once, twice.

But nothing comes. Nothing at all. He wants desperately to be purged of everything, to be hollowed out completely. But all of it is in him still, all of the secrecy and confusion and longing, all of it dense and thick and deep. Wendy places a hand on his back, says oh oh, says his name quietly, mostly to herself. He can hear the tiny tremor in her voice, can sense it pulsing on the palm of her hand. He holds his breathe, says nothing back to her, stares hard at the rocks and dirt and grass nudged against the car tire. From somewhere not so far away Cartman, oblivious, still laughs and shouts.