Stan finishes my milkshake whilst I do my best to reassure him that Kyle will be okay.
The clock on the wall tells me that it's almost time for school and the bus will be leaving in seven minutes, but I don't want to rush him.

"He never comes home late," he says for what feels like the hundredth time, "he always calls me every night."

"He'll be okay, Stan. How about we go to school? I'm sure he'll be there."

"You promise?"

"You know I can't promise that, buddy. I'm not promising anything I can't be certain of because if he's not there you'll be even more upset."

"You're right," Stan sighs, wiping his eyes with his sleeve. "Let's go."

When we leave the house, we hear loud knocking and yelling from across the street.

"Open up you stupid Jew!" Cartman shouts, banging on Kyle's front door with both fists, "if I'm late I'm going to kill you!"

The front door opens, but it isn't Kyle.
Instead it's a short, younger looking boy with black hair and what looks like black eyeliner lining his tired eyes. Even from across the street I can see how thick he's done it.

"What do you want, ass licker?" The short boy asks.

"Where's the Jew rat?" Cartman demands.

"Who are you talking about?" The boy rubs his eye, smudging his eyeliner a little bit.

"Kyle!" Cartman throws his arms in the air as he yells the name.

"Kyle didn't come home last night. I thought you knew aboot that."

"Uhh no," Cartman groans loudly, "whatever man, if he's late then it's his fault."

"I told you, he isn't here." The boy rolls his eyes.

"Shut up Ike! You're just hiding him. I bet he's got a zit or something."

"Cartman!" Stan shouts. "Kyle didn't come home last night. He said he'd call me but he never did. Let's just go to school, he's probably already there."

Cartman stomps over to us, muttering under his breath about 'stupid syrup guzzling Canadians'

"Why didn't Kyle come home last night?" He asks as he crosses the street, "isn't he totally terrified of his mom?"

"He is but she messaged me on Facebook because she thought he was with me." Stan shrugs.

"You have Facebook?" Cartman raises his eyebrow.

"I only use it to water Kyle's crops so don't even think about adding me," He pokes the fat boy's chest. "Anyways, let's go. We don't wanna be late."

We walk towards the bus stop in silence. The smoker kids Kyle yelled at yesterday aren't stood at the bus stop, much to my disappointment, but Kenny is there!

"Kenny!" I squeal, running over to him, finally remembering to use his nickname.

"Hey, Leo," he smiles, "how did your project go?"

"Pretty well. How about yours?"

"Eh," Kenny shrugs, "Kyle didn't want to do my idea of how we should ban school. He said it was unrealistic and a waste of time."

"What're you doing instead?"

"Schools should teach students about mortgages, taxes and shit like that," he rolls his eyes, "I still think we should ban school."

I don't say anything since I quite like school. I just look at him, his body, his face. My eyes linger at his crotch for a moment before I feel a blush creeping over my face and I have to look away.

"You okay there?" Kenny asks, lifting my chin with one of his fingers so I'm looking at him. "You're blushing."

"I'm fine, totally fine, yup, totally." I say quickly, turning away from him so he can't see how badly I'm blushing.

"Are you sure you're okay? You're acting kinda odd." Kenny puts his arm around me and pulls me into him.

I feel as if I can't breathe. I can, but it's as if my body doesn't want me to.
I also feel as if I'm going to throw up... in a good way.. if that makes any sense.

"Leo?" Kenny whispers into my ear, his breath tickling my skin.

I again feel the urge to tell him I love him, but I also feel like I need to run far away.
Should I tell him how I feel? Obviously leaving out the part about wanting to run away from him.

I wriggle out of his arms and face him, rubbing my knuckles together awkwardly.

"Whenever I talk to you I just feel the need to pour my heart out to you," I admit, "and I get this awful funny feeling in my stomach, as if I'm about to throw up."

Kenny blinks a couple of times, but a smile slowly forms on his perfect face.

"Leo, you have a crush on me." He grins, elbowing me playfully.

"I do?"

"Yeah," he puts his arm around me again, "which is good news because I kinda have a thing for you."

How is he so casual about this? If he feels the same way I do, then why isn't he freaking out and feeling the need to throw up when he sees me?

"Looks like the bus is here," he points out, "wanna sit with me?"

"Sure." I smile.

We get into the bus and sit down in the middle. Stan and Cartman sit a couple of rows behind us, chatting about Kyle.

"I hear Token's having a party tonight," Kenny says, "are you going?"

"Maybe," I shrug, "are you?"

He doesn't reply. I take that as a no.

"Why not? It could be fun. Plus, I'll be there."

Kenny smiles a little.

"Those guys don't really like me, Leo," he sighs. "I don't know what I did to them. But, I might see if I can sneak in to see you."

"Really? We're going to have so much fun!"

"Drinking until we can see sounds and taste purple isn't what I'd call fun, Leo." He chuckles.

"That's not what I meant," I roll my eyes, "we're going to be dancing and socialising. That's fun."
(I don't think I could disagree any less ~Author-Chan)

"Socialising also isn't what I'd call fun, but I know what will be fun." He smirks.

"What?" I ask, not sure whether I'm missing out on something or I'm just too innocent to understand.

"It doesn't matter." He waves his hand dismissively.

We finally arrive at the school. Miss Crabtree, the bus driver, luckily remembered to open the bus doors this morning unlike yesterday.
We all exit the bus and enter the large yellow building that almost smells of depression and broken dreams.

Stan literally runs to our first class, shop class with Mr Adler, to see if Kyle is already there. Much to his disappointment, the red headed Jew is nowhere to be seen.
Stan's face crumples up and has to bite his lip to stop himself crying in front of everyone.

"Okay boys let's continue with out projects," Mr Adler shouts over the loud chatter of students, "new boy, I'm gonna show you the basics after I do a quick registration, that okay?"

I nod.

"Good!" He grabs the register, "please answer 'yes sir' when you hear your name. Kyle Broflovski?"

There's a loud clatter from the back of the class. Everyone turns their heads to see Stan bent over the back workbench, sobbing his eyes out. The loud clatter was the result of him dropping his tenon saw.

The students who he's sharing the workbench with all reacted differently.
Pip cut his finger in shock, grabbing the attention of Damien who was previously lighting scrap wood on fire with his index finger and attempting to knock Pip's hat off with it.
Gregory pulled his cutlass out of nowhere in an attempt to defend himself from whatever had 'slain' Stan (his words not mine)
Damien looked quite pleased with the events.

"What's going on?" Mr Adler asks, waddling over to the back workbench. "I hope you're not screwing around. You screw around too much."

"Stan's having a breakdown, sir." Damien smirks, somehow floating above the ground.

Mr Adler murmurs something inaudible from the front of the class before telling Stan to pull himself together or go to the councillor's office.
He gets up and leaves the classroom, presumably to the councillor's office.

I look over at Kenny, who looks half sad half amused.
Why does he look amused?