This is just something small. Because it's raining and I have a cold and I had a maths exam today. Yeah.

Cartman's POV

You know those babies in hospital cribs? The babies who look the same, smiling blankly and their big, bottled eyes can barely stare into the light?

I'm convinced I never was one of those babies.

I came out of the womb a monster, trying to devour myself.

And it kind of hurts because... If I was like that from day one, then what hope is left for me now?

People have told me I have my mother's eyes.

Ugly, acidic, greedy and bitter.

In her sockets they're pools of gold.

So when that guy, that stranger who had spent the afternoon in my mom's bed came downstairs and leaned in ever so slowly. Ever so closely. Ever so deadly and breathed out, reeking of booze, still ragged and threadbare that I had my mother's eyes.

I think something broke.

I didn't push him away.

I didn't look at him.

I didn't make a sound.

I love fighting.

Having blood on my knuckles.

Seeing, fucking hearing, tears.

But more often or not, I was sent to the principals office for my tongue, barbed and merciless, rather than my still pudgy fists.

I could bring people down in a second with a roll of my tongue.

It was like a fixed coin flipped in my head and the words would be out of my mouth before the coin even landed.

Because I could be quiet.

I could keep my mouth shut.

People could not acknowledge my flaws.

I could save my breaths and my stares.

But they tease and they push and prod and they cry when I punch them in the face. Or talk back.

They sneer and I hate that.

"You're such a fucking fatass, Cartman!"

"Where's your dad, Cartman?!"

"How many guys has your mom fucked this week, Cartman?

I don't need to sneer.

"I don't know. But odds are that your dad is banging herpes-ridden prostitutes in a motel room somewhere."

"It's your fault that you're parents split up. They were much happier before you came along and ruined their lives, even my mom told me."

So it's not too difficult to figure out why nobody speaks to me now we're in high school.

Except for Bebe. But I think she's just trying to be polite.

I don't bother covering them up. My scars.

I don't make a point of showing them. They're hideous.

But I just don't care. If someone screamed, actually gave a shit and held my wrist in a hysterical frenzy, crying for help.

I wouldn't look. I'd close my eyes and lull my head and drown them out.

The first time I was scared.

I'd planned it. When I get home I'm gonna lock myself in the bathroom and do it.

Doing it was easy.

And I felt no control. No power. No relief. Just disposable pain and numbness.

I'm not apathetic. I feel everything in heady droves. I imagine things and scratch my skin to crave the itch, to peel them away and chunks of bloody hallucinations cling beneath my chewed fingernails.

But when people ask, people who care, people who are morbidly fascinated or just plain confused as to why we do it, kids like me, I don't think there's one definite answer.

For me it drains the sea of waves.

It pulls the plug.

Cuts the chord.

Stops the record.

Craves the itch.

With numbness.

And you can't move or speak or even think about how great you feel and how you didn't realise how red blood is and how strong the smell is. But you don't really feel great. It's not pure, clean or unadulterated. It's bittersweet, to say the least.

But yeah, the first time I was terrfied.

How I drove this far out into the wasteland. How desperate I felt. And lonely. And God, am I sick?

I guess this was the first horseman of my own personal apocalypse. The end is nigh, folks.

I wanted my mom. I wanted somebody and she has to love me no matter what. But she's tired. And if I wasn't so stubborn and mean I'd tell her not to give up on me just yet. I'll do something to make her proud someday, I swear.

But now?

Now it's intrinsic. The fear. The numbness. You feel what you want to feel. Mind over matter, right? I don't want to feel scared because I know it's not frightening.

And the railroad, ribbons, sore and fleshy, violent and bloodied that are embroided on my pale forearms would scream back the same thing.

I don't drink. But I smoke. Much more therapeutic and stress relieving if you ask me. Or Bebe.

We've been meeting up, smoking silently underneath the bleachers for eighteen months now. She was the only voice I had heard in half a year. "You got a light?" she asked, all ironically preppy though she's a cynical bitch. Or has come to be, anyway.

We say things to ourselves and expect the other to reply, things we wouldn't normally say in any other circumstance.

She's beautiful. I mean, I don't want to fuck her. I don't want to fuck anyone. Because that's just disgusting. But I can still appreciate a girl being hot.

"You know I tried out for the cheerleading squad in freshman year?" She says it like she doesn't really care.

"Really?" I mumble.

"Yeah. But they said my legs were chunky. And my ankles were fat." Bebe sighs indignantly before spitting "Fucking assholes"

"So what did you do?"

"Wrote 'Fuck You Coach Pullen' in red paint on the girls' lockers in the gym"

Kids like me.

You know what's horrifying? Thinking that there are other kids like me. Finding effort, tedious, pointless effort in every moment of their lives, battling with themselves and looking for answers while destroying the little salvation they have. Themselves. Because if we can't look out for ourselves, then what can we really see?

I wish there weren't kids like me. I feel bad for them.

The fact is, there's not enough help.

There's not a big jump, leap of faith or just a push to let all these asphyxiating, monstrous things go and be vulnerable and exposed. Letting someone in and giving you that hand that will break your fall or that drop of water before you dry out completely. God knows I wouldn't be able to do it.

I don't know who'd be willing to be that for me.

Because everything is a defense mechanism. Or a way of coping with a problem that I know there's a way to solve.

It's not unusual for me to be sat outside the principal's office.

I don't know what I've done. But there's gonna be a lot of faux concern. I can't fucking wait.

"Hey" a voice that sounds familiar, deeper, knowing, fiery. Kyle.

I haven't spoken to him in two years.

"Hey" I mumble back, concealing the trembling shock that he's actually talking to me.

Perhaps he's gone stupid.

I look at him and fuck, he's average. Perfect. Wearing typical, innocuous clothes, fresh faced and his hair is cropped and curly and alarmingly red. He seems vivid, lucid, taking life in his stride while I, in comparison, look decrepit. He seems invincible.

"I like your shoes" He smiles awkwardly, strangely genuine.

I look down at my ratty, cherry red converse and grimace.

"You sound like a chick" I reply.

He just giggles, rolls his vicious eyes and says "It feels like we haven't talked in forever"

"That's because it has been"

And he laughs again.

Going into the principals office before me.

"I don't think I miss out on much..." Bebe begins, going off on another tangent.

"Yeah?"

"But I wonder what it feels like to be close to somebody, you know? Like when everything is all warm and damp and blurry and you're just letting someone touch you and be close to you... And after they're done exploring you they just hold you afterwards and let things go cold for a while." Bebe says simply, almost wistfully. I can't bear to think about such things.

"Well, shouldn't you already know what that feels like?"

"What?"

"Well, you've had sex, haven't you?" I ask, shrugging.

"No!" Bebe snaps defensively "What makes you say that?!"

"Because... Well... I don't know... Forget it."

"I sure will!" Bebe shouts "God, Cartman, you think I'm a slut, don't you?! Just like all the close-minded hicks at this school! In this whole fucking town!"

I shrug awkwardly and wish she would shut up.

"You know, just because I have big boobs and like to wear make up doesn't mean I put out for every truck-driving cowboy who pulls up next to me!"

And I'm sure I see tears in her eyes.

I eat lunch on my own. Well, I pick at it.

"Hey" And who should sit across from me? Super Jew.

"Hi" I mutter. "Shouldn't you be sitting with Stan or Kenny or whoever you hang out with now."

"I didn't think there was assigned seating in here..." Kyle smirks obnoxiously as he takes a sip of his diet coke.

"You're a smartass" I remark, rolling my eyes.

"Says the biggest smartass of all time." Kyle smiles back. But he drops this happy-go-lucky, optimistic act and it's when he frowns in defeat and confusion that I have a little more respect for him.

"What are you doing here?"

"I just thought I'd sit here" Kyle shrugs innocently.

"And?"

"And what?"

"I'm not a fucking charity case, Kahl. I'm fine" That's a lie and by the way he's glaring at me, figuring me out, studying me with a keen sharpness he knows I'm lying too.

"I never said you were" Kyle finally says. "I just think you're interesting."

If that's what we're calling it.

"You've changed, Cartman" He sounds pleading, torn. "And I wanna try to get to know you again."

"Maybe I've changed for the worst?"

"I'm a big boy, Cartman. I think I'll decide that. And if you have I can handle it" He smirks becoming arrogant again.

"Just let me have lunch with you" He reasons gently.

And we didn't talk for the rest of the lunch period. But I felt him looking at me. And I felt my eyes sting.

Bebe asked me if I'm a virgin.

And I don't know what to tell her.

Suicide isn't a thought.

A consideration.

To me it seems like the way nature has mapped things out for me.

Peaceful. Sweet. Looking for Heaven.

I think God loves sinners. They turn to him in their hour of need and they pray the hardest. Promise themselves to him like whores.

"I don't blame you for being a loner" Kyle says after we've played video games for two hours and are now sitting at the bottom of his bed.

"You don't?"

"No" Kyle admits, exhaling like he's going to say something that will make everything alright. "See, I'm independent. I don't crumble without people around. But I like company and support and attention. Like everybody else. But... 60% of the people you surround yourself with are poisonous. They just make you feel like shit, that you're not good enough. You want to impress them the most and that's not right is it, to have that much poison in your life? Your supposed to suck all that out if a motherfucking snake bites you. Yet you can't siphon out all the venom from your life, can you?"

"No" I don't look at him. I hardly do. "Sure can't"

"Is that why you don't hang out with anybody? Why you just stopped trying?"

I appreciate him for putting it bluntly. "No. There's lots of reasons. Stuff I don't wanna get into."

"You don't have to"

"I'm the exact opposite to you. I'm too dependent. At least I want to be. I want to want to depend on people and appreciate the need to be around people but I can't bring myself to. I don't know how... I guess I never feel lonely because I can't remember feeling anything else."

"Oh" Kyle whispers. I don't care if he feels uncomfortable. It's his own fucking fault.

Then he grabs my arm and his fingers tread over the braille on my arms. He's reading everything about me, the things I've kept hidden. But he can't understand, he can't decipher it. My sleeves provide protection. But he feels it. I know he does.

But he doesn't flinch and I feel like there's hope. "Why don't you look at me when we talk?"

"You want me to look at you?" I whisper roughly. My pulse rattling, quivering under his fingers.

"Yes" He breathes out, his hold tightens. The word is warm, thin and is just as weak as me.

When I look up I realize how close he is to me.

I could count every freckle.

Breathe in every green hue.

Taste his sweet breath on my mouth and feel like I'm worth more than what I am.

It's strange. How he looks at me and doesn't squirm or grimace.

He stares at me. Curious.

And he doesn't let go.

He's transcendent. I've come to realize.

And when I cut, I think of him.

And I'm not numb. I'm aroused and fond and guilty.

"I'm sorry" He pipes up during lunch.

"What?" I look at him more often now.

"I said I'm sorry. I know that... I feel like it's my fault that things are so, you know-"

"Bad for me?" I finish, saving him.

"Yes" He blushes, rolling his eyes.

"Don't say you're sorry." I reply sternly, making his guilty eyes meet mine. "I don't know who's fault it is yet"

"It could be mine" Kyle says quietly, staring down at his lunch.

"Eat your damn food, Kahl"

Ugly thoughts manifest themselves into the worst kind of things.

Tangible things.

Pale skin.

Dark circles.

Bones straining from paper skin, carnivorous, begging like a stray for meat.

And scars.

"There's beautiful people and ugly people in this world, Kahl!" I argue. I spend my Saturdays in his room, watching TV, eating pizza, playing video games and talking about the most fleeting shit. "Just face it!"

"That's ridiculous!" Kyle retorts "Give me an example"

"Okay, let's see, you've got the 'beautiful' people in our school, the ones who smile for the yearbook and walk down the halls without a care in the world, the jocks and the homecoming queens and the kids who get good grades without even trying and then there's the 'ugly' people... The people who are fucked up, who hide, who get pushed around, who live in constant doubt and fear, who loathe everybody and everything because they're the cause of all of their problems! And those kids were once beautiful but the world has turned them ugly and unforgiving and cold!" I snap and I feel my eyes sting.

"Tha- that's not true, Cartman" Kyle mutters uncomfortably, looking around his room. "Just because people get pushed around and are fucked up doesn't mean they're ugly"

"Well, I don't fucking know" I sniff, tears already breaking my voice "I mean, I'm ugly. I know I am. I look in the mirror. I think a single thought. I fucking breathe and I feel ugly. But you-"

Kyle looks up then, his own eyes damp and he's clinging for the word. He's dying to reach out and touch my horrid face.

"But you're beautiful, Kahl." I whimper "You've got everything together. You have control over yourself, you're strong. Fuck, I wish I had that."

Kyle smiles, blushing and lost momentarily in that strong word being associated with him. But then his attention is hooked on me. And he whispers, warm and unwavering "Cartman, you are beautiful"

He moves closer and he elicits that heat that he loves so much. That he yearns for and that I'm starting to get an appetite for too. "Cartman, you're beautiful and amazing and just downright impossible. But it's these" Kyle pauses to raise my limp arm, tracing the grooves on my flesh.

"They're holding you back. They're clipped wings, don't you see?" Kyle murmurs painfully and his lips are so close-

"But what can I do now?" I beg

"I'll teach you how to fly again" Kyle promises. And I pray that he means it.

I didn't fly.

Beaten people, we can't. We've taken that away from ourselves in a blind moment of fear, panic, despair, anger, resentment, self-loathing...

All we can do is jump.

And he was there.

Which means that I wasn't afraid.

I'm not done yet.

But I'm brave.

"I did it once..." Kyle says flatly as we walk home from the bus stop.

"You, you did?" My mouth dry. "Why?"

"It was a couple of years ago" Kyle begins "My parents were fighting a lot at the time. I can't remember why but they were considering getting a divorce and that thought, well, it killed me. And I realized that I had really no control over my parents' feelings and I just hated feeling so helpless, you know? I needed that control, over something. That reassurance that there were things that I could do for myself that I had total power over. So I studied a lot. I pushed myself to get 100 on every quiz, to get an A+ on every essay because that was control and I was controlling it well. But, uh, my parents and their fighting started to distract me more and more and I forgot about school and studying and I let it all slip by... And then, one night, I couldn't sleep and I kept thinking about this kitchen knife. This really big one that was in my kitchen. So I went downstairs and got it and shut myself in my room and as I started to cut I thought to myself that I can't scream because it would wake everyone up. Those couple of seconds, I just forgot about my parents and my brother and my failing grades, all I could think about was this knife and what I could do with it."

"Did you just do it the once?" I ask, wincing at Kyle's honesty.

"No, I did it for a couple of months" Kyle replies "I thought it would help me cope or whatever. But my parents are fine now and everything, I guess, is back to normal"

"Where did you cut?" I almost whisper it.

"On the inside of my thighs. My stomach" Kyle says matter-of-factly "I didn't want them to be noticeable. I skipped gym, so nobody would see them when I got changed"

"I think I'm addicted to it" I blurt out "I don't get how people can just stop."

"Well, they can. In their own time."

Kyle had a party at his house and invited me, God knows why.

But the moment I walked through the door, he burst out of the teeming crowd with that much-pined-for enthusiasm and led me to his room.

"Why did you think it would be a good idea to invite me to a party, Jew?" I try to joke when Kyle pushes me through the door and hastily shuts it behind him.

"You're my friend, Cartman. I want you to be here" Kyle replies and he's not joking. That's weird. "Sit down" he whispers as he leads me to his bed.

We sit down in the familiar spot and I roll my eyes and mutter angrily "I don't even wanna be here" Just the noise of the thumping music, drunken cheers and laughter is irritating.

"Then go home. No one's making you stay" Kyle snaps. He's an asshole.

"You're so annoying, Jew" I mutter.

"Yeah?" Kyle smiles, biting his lip and moving in closer.

He's all I want to look at right now.

"You're delusional" I continue.

"Go on"

"You're stubborn. You're angry. You're always right. You don't realize how great you are and how many people would kill to be like you"

Kyle smiles, all flattered and giddily embarrassed, he presses our foreheads together and I look at his lips with unabashed hunger.

"You wanna kiss me right now, don't you?" He asks huskily and I can taste the electricity on the tip of my tongue.

I nod before my lips brush against his in a cautious kiss. We don't move for a while, just let our lips make still contact, trembling as we try to understand the situation.

Kyle finally opens his mouth and I groan at that plush, wet heat. His tongue licks me open and we capture each others mouths over and over again.

"I don't do this a lot" I confess as Kyle breaks away slightly, the presence of his mouth still ghosting across mine.

"Me neither" Kyle smiles and I take his soft, full lower lip into my mouth.

My fingers glide across his hot neck and meet his curls, he smiles, almost gratefully against my kiss. His own slender digits purl around my wrist, supporting my hand as I tangle it in his hair.

"I've waited for this for so long" Kyle moans and only when I hear him say it do I realize that I have too. Without even questioning it.

"Yeah" I manage to reply.

Our kisses became faster and rougher, stinging as teeth nipped at the plump of our lips.

"What about your party?" I breathe out.

"Who cares?" Kyle laughs under his breath "They'll be fine without me"

I don't think the same can be said for me.

His kisses I crave more than my cigarettes. Even the blade. Even the numbness.

"Are you in love with him?" Bebe teases as another anecdote about Kyle slips out of my mouth.

I think. How can I not be? After all, he saved me.

"Yeah" I say, nodding to myself in reassurance. Smiling when I say "I think I am."

"Oh God" Kyle moans above me, sultry, heavenly as I work him open with my mouth.

He's like a dove in my arms and his cries and moans are like birdsong.

He kisses the scars, now dried and desired to be forgotten on my arms, while I kiss the scars on his stomach and thighs.

We're tied together. It's kinda nice.

"Now" Kyle pleads, whimpering with effort as he moves to meet my tongue "Fuck me now"

I release him. My act of mercy met with a pleasured sigh.

I crawl up his body.

I intertwine our fingers.

I look into his eyes.

I have my mothers eyes. Golden Brown.

I'm not lonely.

I'm not ugly.

I'm not numb.

I'm not weak.

I haven't seen my blade for over a year.

I still smoke.

I jumped.

And I'm in love.

Red Chrysanthemums mean: a proposition, invitation to ignite a new relationship.

I don't even know.

P.S. I like the idea of Cartman and Bebe being buds. I think they would just have a really cool friendsship.