To put it simply, the rest of the night sucked balls.

After finally letting that secret of four years off my chest, the feeling of holding back tears was becoming more intense, and my voice was trembling. I calmed myself down with a glass of water. I fell asleep on her bed, laying on top of the covers with my shoes still on. In a way, letting all that off my chest was a relief. But the relief is outweighed ten-fold by the uncertainty of what this means for me.

Wendy was stunned. I was hoping that she would've been better by morning, but no. She still looked as if she had seen a ghost. I'm not worried about her outing for me or anything, she's always been very supportive of gay people. I think she just doesn't know how to react: I mean, I DID just confess to being secretly gay for my ex-best friend/current enemy.

I ended up leaving her house pretty early the next morning, even though I was still kind of drunk. Normally when I fall asleep at her house, we fall asleep in each other's arms, as if we were still together, and we wake up the same way. Last night was different. She kept her distance, and went to fall asleep on the couch instead.

I think she just needs time to process this, and I don't blame her. Despite getting the cold shoulder , I don't think I regret what I said. Admittedly, I don't think I would have done it if I was sober, but fuck it! There was something so liberating, so eye-opening about just saying it out loud. I needed that.

I stumble down the sidewalk, feeling like shit. That euphoric feeling is drowned out by nausea. I'm not ready for this hangover, not again. Each one feels worse than the last, and each time I promise myself it'll be the last time I'll have to go through this. But here we are, hangover count off the chart!

As I aimlessly trip through the front door, ready to collapse on the couch, I hear music playing from in the kitchen. Oh fuck! My brain goes into panic mode, not having planned for anyone to be home right now: Shelly is back in Denver for college, and my mom is normally at work by now. She steps out of the kitchen and stares at me, first puzzled, then disappointed.

"Stanley. Have you been drinking?"

"What? Pfft, no, why would I? I'm just tired," I attempt to plaster a reassuring smile on my face, in hopes that my attempt at gaslighting will work. I think through every word before I say it, forcing myself to properly enunciate them to hide the slurring. Unfortunately, every calculated move wasn't enough to hide the smell of booze coming off my jacket.

With every silent second that goes past where my mom just blinks, I become less hopeful that my coverup story is actually hiding reality. She lets out a long shaky exhale and stares at me. First my messy hair, then my face, then my sloppy outfit. She begins to fidget with her hands, held neatly by her side, but eventually her hands move in front of her face, as if she is trying to hide the frown that is growing. 

"Oh Stanley," she lets slip out of her mouth in a wobbly tone, instantly making my stomach drop. Even drunk as fuck, I can understand the severity of everything unfolding: My constant, stupid, mistakes is not only messing me up, but bringing my mother to the verge of tears

I grasp for an explanation, or for a way to give her reassurance, but I'm only able to stutter "mom-" before I'm cut off by her.

"What do you need from me? Should I find you a therapist? What kind of support do you need right now?" She asks me, relatively calm.

I'm annoyed by how big of a deal this all is, "No I'm fine, I-"

"Stanley. You said that the last time, right after the divorce was finalized" She cuts me off

I did. She's right. Its Deja Vu: She found me drunk as hell in the months after, multiple times. I told her it was fine, promised I'd stop. the promise lasted a few months, before I continued like before, just being more cautious about how obvious it was. Over the last few months, I've gotten lazy, and gotten caught 3 times like this.

Maybe I'm not fine.

I take a deep breath, trying to let the attitude fade away. "Can we please talk about this later? My head hurts a lot."

The hurt on her face goes away, and the disappointment comes back. It's the same disappointed look I've seen a thousand times, but most of those times it was in response to something Randy did. I hate it. "Okay. That's fine. I need to go to work now, though. There's Advil on the top row of the cabinet upstairs. Please call me if you need anything. Even when I'm upset with you, I love you. And I'm here for you." She gives a quick hug, and is out the door. I'm still standing in the same spot, trying to mentally catch up with everything that just happened.

Mental catch-up isn't gonna happen when my head hurts this bad, and I'm not dragging my ass up the stairs for some mediocre Tylenol. I drag my feet towards the couch and let myself drop like a bolder, face first into the pillow. In an instant, I'm asleep

Knock Knock

I'm forcibly awoken. My ears are assaulted by someone's fists crashing against the wood with a level of urgency that seems extremely unnecessary.

Without lifting my heavy head, I peer around the room. The sunlight no longer peered through the blinds, and the digital clock underneath the TV read in PM now: 6:37. Holy shit, I slept 10 hours straight.

I peer at the door again.

"Not my fuckin problem" I mutter, resting my head onto the pillow again and letting my eyelids collapse

Knock Knock Knock KNOCK

Out of instinct, my eyes fly wide open, and my vision is directed at the damn door. After rolling my eyes, I once again close them, and covered the blanket over my head and ears, as if the thin cotton was a sound proof barrier from the world around me, or at least whoever the hell was outside.

I can't even drift back into unconsciousness this time before hearing a creaking at the front door. My heart rate skyrockets as the worst scenarios play through my head: are we getting robbed? Is Cartman finally following through on his threat to kill me? I impulsively dig my fingernails into the covers and yank it from off my face.

"Kyle???" I murmur.

He takes a step into the house, and closes the door being him, "Stan."

"You know knocking doesn't mean you're invited in, right" I remind him sarcastically.

"I'm making sure you're alive, dipshit" he says, entirely unamused.

"Why wouldn't I be al- oh fuck! I didn't follow up on the text last night!" Despite a burning feeling in every muscle, I sit up quickly, folding my legs underneath me. From this view, I can see him a lot better. His hands were tucked into his pocket, he stood in front of me, looking down at me. I can't decipher whether he's annoyed or disappointed, but either one doesn't make me particularly happy. "Kyle I'm so sorry I-"

Kyle smiled weakly at me, "It's fine Stan, I called Wendy an hour after you left to make sure you got there fine. She seemed pissed off, but said you  were safe and asleep."

At least I'm not the only one who thinks Wendy is unusually upset right now.

I raise an eyebrow and tilt my head to the right, "so then why did you come over? I clearly made it to her house alive."

Kyle sighs, and raises his voice, "Because no one has heard anything from you all day!" After noticing how started I was, he takes a breathe and lowers his tone once again. "You drank, like, a lot last night dude. And no one's texts or call were going through. Maybe Cartman was fine with that, and maybe Kenny and Craig were unbothered by that, but I wasn't."

I sat with wide eyes, perplexed. It weird way to see him worried over me. Especially when he's the ONLY one besides my mother worried. Speaking of-

"Where's my mom?" I say out loud, not realizing my thoughts were slipping off my tongue.

Kyle looks confused for a moment, but just shrugs. "I don't know, shouldn't you know?" He says casually, unbothered by how random my little remark was.

I glance around the house and notice that the only light on is the table lamp beside me, the same light that illuminated the room before I passed out. "Huh, I guess she's at work late. Thanks for checking in on me I guess, I'm alive though, I'm gonna go back to sle-"

"No"

"...huh?" I stare at him.

"We need to talk." Kyle says hesitantly. "Put on your jacket and shoes, it'll probably be good for you to get some fresh air as well."

Instantly, I got slammed with a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. I felt my eyes grow wide and my breathing come to a halt, as I try to avoid jumping to the worst case scenario once again. It was impossible to think rationally though: there's no way it's a coincident that Kyle wants to have "a talk" less than a day after I admitted to Wendy my feelings for him.

Emotionlessly, I reach for my jacket and slowly move my hands through the sleeves. Then, I reach for my hat, and throw it on top of my messy hair. It's only then that I realize how much of a toll that nap took on me. The hat pushes my hair to my skull, and I'm finally taking notice to the sweat that I woke up in. Fuck, I'm a mess.

I slip my feet into the shoes that I left in front of the couch and look up at Kyle innocently, waiting for him to hurl more demands my way, instead, he puts out his hand, and I just... stare.

What the fuck am I supposed to do with that?

I grab his hand cautiously, and immediately feel a wave of excitement come over me as he grips my hand. Before I could even process that though, I'm pulled onto my feet, off the couch that has been my hangover safe-place for the past 10 hours, and his grip instantly is loosened.

"Ready?" Kyle asks.

"Sure" I shrug.

We make it out the door and the cool mountain breeze blasts into me. Jesus Christ it's freezing! I've lived in Colorado all my life, so I'm used to the cold, but this was as if the sun had been taken out of our galaxy. Kyle notices the way I tensed up, my nose scrunching as the wind whipped into us.

"You good dude?" Kyle questions, almost chuckling at my reaction to the blunt temperatures.

"Mhm, neeeever better" I sarcastically reply through chattering teeth.

We walked for what felt like eternity in silence. The whistling of the wind filled my head, despite the constant tug-of-war I was playing with my hat to cover my ears. Occasionally I let out a sniffle as my nose begin to drip, even though by this point, I was so cold I couldn't even feel the tip anymore. The horrible temperatures were enough to distract me from my looming anxiety, at least for a little.

After what was probably 10 minutes, I become impatient, and shatter the silence. "What is this about?" I ask.

I think I know what it's gonna be about

It's about last night for sure

He knows about the-

"Stan, I'm worried about your drinking habits. It's like every time I see you, you're totally shit faced."

Oh.

I don't know if I should be relieved that he seems blissfully unaware about what I told Wendy, or if I should be pissed off he dragged me all the way out the house for this.

"Dude, not this again. You don't think I get enough shit from my mom about it?" I slightly laugh. This whole thing is fucking ridiculous. "Holy shit I'm fine, are we good now?"

"Stan I just-"

No. I'm not listening to any more half-assed reasons on why everyone needs to find some aspect of my life to bitch about. I snap back before he can finish, "I mean, why do you even care??? Kenny doesn't. Wendy doesn't. You've been GONE for years and now you wanna act concerned? I can't-"

"Do you ACTUALLY wanna know why I "now" care? Or do you just wanna keep bitching at me FOR caring?" Kyle screams, with attached air quotes emphasizing "now." I'm used to him screaming at Cartman, or at Clyde, but not at me. It catches me off guard and my mouth stays barely open without a word coming out. I can feel my throat tense up as I prepare myself to scream back, but the small part of me that actually wants to hear him out prevails.

I'm still speechless. All I can do is nod once.

"Trust me, I'm sure you get shit about your stupid, stupid, STUPID drinking habits enough. But clearly you don't get it enough, because you still do the SAME shit over and over again." Kyle yells 

"And maybe your closest friends don't care. Maybe Kenny finds it funny to watch you embarrass yourself at parties, and maybe Wendy finds it cute that you become extra clingy when you're too drunk to even get to her doorstep without tripping. But I find it fucking awful! You always get sad after the first few hours, and the aftermath is ten times worse. Watching you drag your feet in the halls, or watching you hold your head because of a migraine? Or not even show up because you can't get out of bed? It's a warning sign that its problem, Stan. It's not normal to feel like that, or to let alcohol make you feel like that." 

He pauses for a second, breathing becoming shaky. 

"I wouldn't have noticed all those demeanor changes if I didn't care, Stan. I care. And I always have," Kyle says with tears filling the brims of his eyes. With a tone that finally softened, he continues, "Trust me, I've tried to NOT care. I've tried to just let you slip out of my mind. But every single time, I found myself using Kenny as a proxy to check in on you, or changing the way I walk to class to see if you were at school. And its because I care that I dragged us in the nipple freezing cold to tell you that I'm here for you. I don't wanna yell at you, I wanna support you. Whether that's as your super best friend, or whether I'm just someone who you know the name of. I don't care what relationship you want us to have. Just know I'm here" he finishes in almost a whisper.

We both stood facing each other in tense silence. I could feel his stare on me, but I couldn't bring myself to return eye contact. I was worried seeing him right now would break me. Instead, I broke the quiet between us.

"...Kyle?" I say softly

"Yes Stan?" He replies

"...Why did you leave?" I ask, void of any emotion.

Kyle looked like a deer in the headlights. His eyes were wide, his shoulders stiff by his side as he froze

"I'm not trying to argue. I just need to know." I say, trying to not come off as aggressive.

Kyle no longer had his gaze focused on me, instead his eyes were past me, focused in on nothing in particular. He starts fidgeting with the collar of his jacket, nodding slowly.

"I uhhh," He freezes. I raise an eyebrow, confused why he's hesitating to answer such a simple question. He catches this, and weakly chuckles, telling me "sorry, thinking. It caught me off guard, I wanna be able to give you a good answer"

The world around us goes quiet for what could have been the millionth time that night. Finally, he nods slowly. "Remember sophomore year? When you slapped me for making a joke? I think that was breaking point. After years of trying to help you with your depression and anxiety, with the last 12 months of it being severe, I realized I just couldn't do it anymore. It was destroying me. And that slap? It was the slap in the face I needed to realize that there was no good for either of if I sunk with you. You weren't getting better no matter what I did. And it was taking a toll on me. I know that sounds selfish bu-"

"No it doesn't" I cut him off. "For the first time ever, I understand. I don't blame you or hate you for it. You did what you needed to do for you."

"Yeah" he whispers. "I started resenting you after we stopped being friends. I blamed you for being the reason I lost my super best friend."

Unfortunately, that sentiment sounded very familiar. It was almost an exact reflection about how I felt about Kyle for the last 2 years: I hated him because I thought it was his fault for our friendship crumbling. Hearing him use the word super best friend to refer to me felt like daggers being shoved and twisted in my heart. I blinked repeatedly to wash away the tears welling up.

"Y'know, I never connected the dots. About how I got blocked the same week we had that fight where I... slapped you," I said quietly, trying to mask the shame I felt. "I'm so sorry Kyle."

A sentence I hadn't uttered in years.

"Even if I was depressed, I should have never done that. You didn't deserve that, it was abusive. You had every right to get yourself out of the situation, and to resent me for it." I ramble. My chest tightens, as the severity of the situation finally hits me like a bus, and I begin to put all the dots together.

I had no right to hate Kyle for the last 2 years.

Kyle smiles ever so slightly, and tilts his head to look. "It's fine now, Stan. I think you've changed a lot. Genuinely. Besides for the drinking, you seem to be taking good care of yourself for the most part. You seem happier too."

"Trust me, I am. My mom and Randy's divorce is over, I have my super best friend back, I-"

Pause.

I slap my hand over my mouth, realizing what I had just stringed into a sentence. It was one thing to refer to each other in the past tense as super best friends, but now I had slipped up and referred to him now with the title? I feel a wave of heat come over me as my nausea forces me to gag. This is equally as embarrassing as the time I accidentally told Wendy that I loved her a week after we broke up. My eyes grew, as my glance shot over to Kyle.

It was as if I was looking into a mirror; his eyes were equally as wide as he stood stiffly facing forward, only his head darted in my direction. After a few moments, his muscles relaxed slightly and his shoulders were no longer held tensely against his side. His eyes glisten as his lips curl into a smile.

"Yeah, you do."

////Corny ending. I don't care, sue me. I felt with how heavy the rest of the chapter was, it was deserving of a sweet ending. There we have it! Our 2 SBFs are officially SBFs again. Pls leave your comments!