Archive of Our Own

Once upon a time, Saturdays meant cheap liquor and worse choices. But those days were gone, buried with the rest of Kenny’s youth. Now, when he drank, he did it quietly. Frequently. 

And alone.

The bar was dimly lit. Gilded sconces cast a soft, amber glow over mahogany paneled walls. A string quartet played low through the hidden speakers, the notes curling gently through the air like cigar smoke. The scent of aged leather, expensive cologne, and the faintest trace of sandalwood lingered in the quiet. Kenny liked it here, not because it was anything special, but because of its exclusivity. 

You had to be like him: rich and sad and mourning, or rich and smug and too far up your own ass to notice him. Either way, no one bothered him here.

In his younger years, he’d have hated a place like this. Would’ve scoffed walking past the pristine glass panes and the pretentious lettering etched in gold: Orion Bar. The gentle music, the spotless marble floors, the absence of sticky counters or jukeboxes. Young Kenny would think it’s no fun.

His older self, though, didn’t think it was half bad. Maybe it was because he wasn’t fun anymore. Or anything, really. Just a shell in a suit.

“Sir, would you like me to close your tab?” the bartender asked, Kenny’s only company for the night. He had plenty of years above him, though he spoke to Kenny like Kenny was the older one. 

Kenny didn’t lift his head. Just let out a soft breath and dug his fingers into his scalp. His suit felt fucking suffocating. “No… jus’… gimme another,” he muttered, voice thick and slow.

The bartender’s brows lifted, concern flickering across his face. He looked like he might say something, maybe urge Kenny to reconsider. But instead, he gave a nod and turned away, starting on what would be Kenny’s sixth shot of whiskey.

Some part of him missed it—missed being called out, told off, put in his place. If he were back in South Park, drinking in some peeling dive bar, someone would’ve already shoved a hand on his shoulder and told him, “Go home, Sonny. And I better not see your sorry ass back here for a while.”

But this wasn’t South Park. No one here would even meet his eyes for longer than a second. They all knew his name but not who he is. They knew what he’d done, what he could do, and that was all they saw. Just the glossy surface. The curated success. The handful of polished, acceptable parts they mistook for the whole.

“Ya know you’re the one who pushed that image, right?”  

Kenny froze. He could hear his voice. That soft, familiar Southern lilt, cutting clean through the haze in his head. That’s how he knew he was at his limit. But then again, he was trying to get there. So he could hear that voice. 

“Ain’t this what ya wanted?”

Kenny blinked, his vision swimming. He barely managed to lift his head from his hands.

“No,” he slurred, thick and broken. “No…”

But it was happening again. The same argument, the same damn words. It was all too clear, too real. Like the bar had vanished around him, and he was back there, one year ago, in their living room. Watching his baby cry. Watching everything fall apart.

“It’s just not the same anymore,” Butters was sobbing now, voice cracking as he wiped his own tears, “ I don’t recognize you.”

And Kenny is not happy. He hasn’t been happy in a long, long time. 

And if he was honest, he’d lost Butters long before he was served the divorce papers. 

The ringing of his phone pulled Butters out of his sleep. An easy thing to do, when you were sleeping as poorly as he was. Always restless, always too warm, and the space besides him far too empty. Though one would think he would be used to that by now. 

He let it ring for a while, before he realized that not a lot of people would call at—he squinted the clock— 10 pm? 10 p.m, for no specific reason. With a sigh, he reached over to the nightstand, fingers fumbling around until they brushed against his phone. He pulled it just close enough to peek at the screen.

Ken <3

The name gave him whiplash. First, because he could hardly believe it. And second, because he never changed it. They weren’t that close anymore, not enough for hearts and emojis like they were still back in high school. And yet, there it was. Still Ken <3. Frozen in time.

His finger hovered over the green button, but it trembled, and he froze. When was the last time they spoke? What could Kenny possibly want at this hour, after everything?

But of course he remembers what day it is, and Butters quickly turned the phone face down and let it ring. When it stopped, he rolled to the far side of the bed and closed his eyes.

A few seconds passed, then Butters rolled back over, picked up his phone, and hit the callback button. It only rang twice before someone picked up, but it wasn’t Kenny’s voice who answered. 

“Hello?”

The deep voice startled him. He’d been bracing for that familiar, melodic drawl, not this stranger. For a second, he didn’t know what to say. And as he was figuring it out, the person spoke again. “Hello, is this Buttercup?”

The nickname, his nickname, spoken in someone else’s voice hit him like a slap. It stunned him enough to stammer out a reply.

“No—yes. Yes, that’s me.”

“Oh, thank goodness,” the man said, clearly relieved. “Hello, I’m sorry to bother you this evening, but Mr. McCormick isn’t doing so well.”

Butters sat up straighter. “What d’you mean?” he asked, voice tense. Now that he was paying closer attention, he could hear music in the background, classical, soft and distant, like it was playing from somewhere upscale.

“Well… he’s drunk, sir. Can barely stand. I didn’t think it would be safe to send him home alone, so I checked his emergency contact. That’s you, right?”

After all this time… Butters swallowed hard.  “Yes…I guess so.”

“Are you going to be able to pick him up?”

Butters paused. He hadn’t seen Kenny since the divorce settlement. But if Kenny needed help…  “Yes, where is he?”

“Orion bar, sir. South side, just off North Street.”

Ah, of course. 

Sometimes, Kenny really believed he left his old life behind. But then he’d end up drunk, face down on a bar, and realize maybe he hadn’t gone that far at all.

His head was a mess. Full of noise and heat and static. He couldn’t focus. Couldn’t think. Even the damn lights hurt. Words came at him sideways and didn’t mean anything when they landed.

“Don’t you think you’ve had enough?” The voice curled into his ear. Kenny didn’t lift his head, but his fingers twitched where they rested against the edge of the bar. It wasn’t real. Couldn’t be. But God, it sounded like him. Sweet Buttercup.

Kenny shook his head slowly, like the movement might keep it from disappearing. “No,” he mumbled, barely audible. “Not yet.”

He shifted in his seat, gripping the counter as the room spun in slow, nauseating circles.

“Barely getting started,” he muttered, almost to himself.

“You look like you’re ‘bout to keel over.”

Kenny huffed a humorless laugh. His forehead dropped to the bar with a soft thunk.

“Good,” he said, eyes closing. “I’d like that.”

“Like what?” 

His voice was clearer now, no longer distant or dreamlike. It cut through the fog with unsettling precision. Kenny stilled, heart stuttering for just a beat, but he didn’t lift his head. He was too afraid that if he looked, it’d vanish again.

“To pass out,” he murmured, the words dragging like syrup off his tongue. He blinked slowly, eyes fixed somewhere past the rim of his glass, “Maybe I’d get to see you.”

Butters used to visit him all the time, in dreams spun soft as cotton. On quiet porches, in sunlit kitchens, in moments where the world felt still. Sometimes they’d talk. Sometimes they’d just exist beside each other. But then one day, the dreams stopped. 

And with them, the last place Kenny still had him.

“What’re you even sayin’ anymore, silly?” Butters’ voice teased. “Look at me.”

Kenny didn’t. For obvious reasons. He knew it wasn’t real. Just another trick of the bottle, a mirage stitched together by whiskey and regret. 

There were certain lines he knew better than to cross, even in a drunken haze. Looking would only make it worse, and he already looked crazy enough, slumped over a bar, whispering to ghosts.

But then a hand settled on his shoulder, grounding him with a heat that hallucinations weren’t supposed to have.

“Come on,” the voice said again, closer now, more anchored. “Raise your head.”

Kenny blinked slowly, as if that would reset the world, but nothing changed. The touch remained. And so, almost against his will, he lifted his head.

The world didn’t come into focus all at once. It swam and tilted, blurred at the edges, but in the middle of it stood something unmistakable. Someone.

Blond hair, soft and familiar. Blue eyes wide with concern. A face so warm it made Kenny’s chest twist. He stared hard. Waiting for the shape to flicker and the illusion to crack. Surely, this version of Butters conjured from memory would fade like all the others.

But it didn’t.

He blinked. Once. Twice. Still there.

“…Butters.” Kenny muttered.

Butters nodded. No words, just that soft, sure tilt of his head. Then he slid onto the stool beside Kenny, as if no time had passed at all.

And maybe that was the cruelest part, because Butters looked good. Not the blurred echo of a dream or the pieces of memory Kenny often summoned after too many drinks, but good in the way only the real thing could be. 

There were differences, of course. Subtle ones. His hair was shorter, the golden strands neater now, curling slightly at the edges like he’d let them dry on their own. His face had changed too—slightly slimmer, more defined in the jaw. Yet there were some things that stayed exactly the same. The curve of his smile. His eyes, impossibly blue. Even his lashes, long and golden, still cast soft shadows on his cheekbones when he blinked.

Kenny stared, completely frozen. His heart hammered beneath the weight of a presence he’d only known in fragments and fading images. How drunk did someone have to be to summon this? To conjure the person they’d lost so vividly that even their damn nails were the right shape?

He didn’t dare reach out. Didn’t dare speak. Because if this was just another hallucination, he wasn’t ready for it to vanish.

“Still fallin’ into old habits, huh?” Butters asked, the corners of his mouth turning up.

Kenny blinked at him, slow and stunned. “…Which one?” He has thousands.

“Drinkin’ or sex. Whichever grabs ya first.” His eyes drifted to the row of empty glasses in front of Kenny. “Guess I don’t need to ask which it was tonight.”

Kenny could only gape at him. He was losing it. Butters was beautiful, but Kenny was losing it. 

“Think you can stand?” Butters asked softly. He reached out, fingers hovering just inches from Kenny’s shoulder, as if he was about to steady him like he’d done so many times before. But the hand hesitated, held there for a moment too long… and then dropped.

“You oughta be headin’ home,” he said. “Call it a night, Kenny.”

The gesture seemed innocent enough, but Kenny’s eyes caught on one small, glaring absence. Butters’ ring finger was bare. 

It hadn’t always been.

Once, Kenny had slipped a goddamn mountain of a ring onto that finger—a 13-carat diamond so big it caught light from across the room. Stan had joked it could take someone out if thrown hard enough, but Kenny had seen it as proof.

The more it shined, the more it reassured him that he was no longer the seventeen year old boy with messy dreams and a busted car who talked Butters into running away from everything—his family, his home, his roots—to chase a future so fragile it could’ve cracked under the slightest weight.

That ring had been Kenny’s greatest triumph. Not the patents. Not the money. Not the speeches or the magazine covers. But that, because it showed everyone Kenny had made it. That Butters made the right choice. 

He had disregarded the fact that Butters didn’t even like wearing rings, especially ones so big they caught on his clothes and tangled in his hair. He had chosen to comfort himself with lies instead: Who wouldn’t want a diamond like that? 

Knowing well that Butters wouldn’t, yet choosing not to see it anyways.

“Hello? Are ya there?” Butters waved a hand in front of his face, brows drawn in concern.

Kenny blinked slowly, then gave a small, dazed nod.

“We need to get ya home,” Butters said gently. “Did you drive here?”

Kenny shook his head. He didn’t drive much anymore, even though he used to love it. Back then, it was one of the few things that made him feel free. Now? He had drivers waiting at his beck and call, cars he didn’t touch, bodyguards that flanked him whether he wanted them to or not.

There wasn’t much room for freedom in his life anymore. Only scheduling. Only protocol. Only glass walls and cameras and people who said yes before he finished speaking. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d gripped a steering wheel just to feel the road under him.

“Well, good thing I do. Come on, I’ll drive ya home.” Butters stood up, and this time he does touch Kenny—even though it’s only to help him walk straight. But this touch was enough, it was more than enough, because it proved that this actually was real.

Kenny’s eyes widened as the warmth sank into his skin. This wasn’t a hallucination. No dream ever carried heat. No memory had weight or gravity or the faint tremble of breath.

He looked up slowly, throat dry. Butters was there. Entirely. Whole. Not a ghost.

“You’re…” Kenny couldn’t finish. His voice cracked. “I didn’t think—”

Butters flashed him a careful smile. “I know.”

“Why’re you here?” Kenny asked breathlessly. 

Butters gave a breath of a laugh, though his tone stayed gentle. “Because someone called and said the Kenny McCormick was about three shots from passin’ out cold in public, and I figured you’d rather it be me who found you than a camera crew.”

He glanced toward the row of empty glasses, then back at Kenny with that iron steadiness he’d always had. “You’re real lucky the bartender was such a kind man,” Butters added.

Kenny nodded, barely. “Right… right.” 

Butters helped him up gently, steadying him with firm hands. But the moment Kenny’s weight shifted, the world spun out from under him. He stumbled, collapsing forward and right into Butters’ chest.

“Whoa, hey. Steady now,” Butters said, arms tightening reflexively around him.

Kenny didn’t register the words, all he noticed was the scent. Whipped cream, lemon zest, Butters. It yanked him right back to the past, to the mornings wrapped in blankets, a cramped apartment but laughter caught between kisses, gas station runs at 2 a.m. 

His body shuddered from remembering all of it at once. Kenny tried to pull away, to give Butters space, but his limbs didn’t cooperate. His brain issued the command, but nothing obeyed. His arms were sluggish, his legs unsteady, and it was like his body had forgotten how to carry him on its own.

This was a view Kenny used to know well. Butters looking up at him, close enough to see the gold in his lashes, the way his pupils widened slightly in the low light. It was the closeness before an embrace. A kiss, if he got lucky. 

Now, under the bar’s dim amber lights, it was a flicker of the life they once lived.

“I can’t go home.” Kenny confessed, and he sounds pathetic and weak. Not the way he wants to present himself to Butters at all. “I don’t have one.”

Butters’ eyebrows knit in confusion. “You could buy an entire island, last I checked. What d’you mean you ain’t got one?”

“I don’t.” Kenny said, and then amended, “I have a house.”

“But not a home?” Butters asked, catching on. Kenny nodded. 

“And you don’t…wanna head on back to your place?”

Kenny shook his head. 

Butters looked at him, really looked, his eyes narrowing as if trying to read something written behind Kenny’s silence. Kenny didn’t know what he was looking for, didn’t want to know. He dropped his gaze, unable to hold the weight of it.

“What about a hotel, then?”

Those words stung more than it should’ve. This was how far they have grown apart. And maybe that’s how it should be, considering they were no longer married. But to see it so upfront hurt. 

His chest pulled in on itself, the pain coming in slow but heavy, like the press of something sitting too long on his ribs. His eyes burned, vision fuzzing at the edges. He tried to swallow it back, to breathe through it in the hopes it wouldn’t materialize; but then warmth trailed down his cheek. His face didn’t even move. It just… fell.

Butters froze. His tone changed immediately.

“K-Kenny?” he whispered, startled. “Hey, hey… no, don’t—don’t cry…”

But Kenny couldn’t stop it. His body began to shake, barely noticeable at first. But it built, trembled down his spine, clenched in his stomach. His lips parted like he might try to explain, to apologize, but no sound came out.

Butters’ hand came up slowly, fingertips brushing against Kenny’s jaw before settling gently against his cheek. Kenny leaned into the touch without thinking. It was instinct. Muscle memory. His whole body softened beneath it.

Butters’ thumb moved slightly, just once, a hesitant stroke across skin that trembled beneath it. His eyes searched Kenny’s face again, and whatever he saw there—whatever raw, broken thing Kenny couldn’t hide—must’ve pierced through the walls tht were still standing between them.

“Then… how about comin’ with me?”

Kenny heard: How about coming home?

He wants to nod, but he also knows he’s intruding and Butters is uncomfortable. Picking up your ex-husband from a bar was quite frankly pathetic, and Kenny made it worse by bursting into tears. 

There was distance between them, but even now, Butters could still read his silence. Kenny had never been a big talker. There were empty spaces where there should’ve been words. Yet, Butters never had a problem with that. 

With a small smile, Butters reached up and gently wiped a tear from Kenny’s cheek, his touch feather light.

“It’ll just be for tonight,” he said softly.

Kenny knew he meant it to be reassuring. Something temporary. A kindness. But all Kenny could think about was how once, not so long ago, they’d promised each other eternity.

And now eternity had been reduced to just one night.

It splintered something in him, leaving a hollow ache behind, a sore thing. 

But Kenny nods nevertheless, because that’s what he does. Take what’s offered. Pretend it’s enough. He’s always been that way—grateful for the pieces, haunted by the whole.

As they walked toward the car, billboards lit up the night, each one bigger than the last.

Kenny’s face was everywhere, bathed in light and frozen in perfect angles. His name is stretched bold across the top, followed by glowing praise, or the sleek emblem of some luxury brand. He looked devastating in them, of course. Handsome in that effortless, natural way he always coveted. Butters never liked to look at them for too long, or at all, if he could help it.

Because the truth is, when your ex-husband is a genius, so beautiful that he turns heads, and charming enough to make the world swoon—you lose him twice.

First to ambition. Then to everyone else.

It’s natural, of course. Butters was never meant to keep someone like Kenny all to himself. The light of him, blinding, golden, and impossible not to follow; was always going to belong to more than just one person.

When Kenny had his first breakthrough, an elegant solution to a long unsolved protein folding problem,it was like watching a star catch fire. Then came the real wave: synthetic neural webs that mimicked the human brain but ran on a fraction of the power, the cancer detection bioscanners, the synthetic carbon spine overlays that helped the paralyzed walk again. 

The world had welcomed him with open arms. They called him The Golden Crop of Eden. The Man of Tomorrow.

And Butters? He had been the first to see it. One of the few to believe in it. But somewhere along the way, the world caught up, and then took Kenny farther than Butters could follow.

Funny thing is, when Butters thinks about his ex-husband’s brilliance, he doesn’t think about the things that made headlines. Not the awards, or the innovations that reshaped medicine, or the breathless praise from people who only knew Kenny through polished press releases and billboard smiles. No, if you asked Butters, he’d tell you something else.

He’d tell you about the soft whir of the coffee maker Kenny built just for him, the one that brewed his exact favorite blend at precisely 9:43 a.m., because Kenny once teased him for setting his alarms at weird, arbitrary times.

Or about the self-warming blanket Kenny cobbled together during a snowstorm, in their first apartment where the heat was busted and the windows leaked cold. Kenny hated seeing his fingers turn pink, and hated himself even more for being cold blooded, and therefore unable to provide Butters adequate heat. 

No one wrote about those things. No one saw them. But they were the brightest proofs of his brilliance Butters ever knew.

He glanced at the passenger seat, at Kenny, pressed drowsily to the window, his face briefly lit by every flashing billboard bearing his name. Butters knew Kenny saw them. And he wondered, achingly, if the boy who used to whisper ideas in his sleep and build machines out of love still lived beneath the man the world adored.

Kenny thought of these streets as familiar, but didn’t allow himself to gain hope until they arrived at the house.

Despite everything, Butters hadn’t moved. He still lived in the place they once called home together. Kenny found it ironic. He had shed everything else. The wedding ring. His last name. The future they imagined side by side. Kenny. But not this place. Not the house they chose when the world first started turning its head to look at him.

They lived in Dunwoody, a suburb on the richer side of the city; because they could afford that now. The lot had a gentle slope; at its crest had been a small cottage with a tire swing in the backyard that the bulldozers had razed the first day of construction. It didn’t fit the new image Kenny had of their new beginning. They were rich now, and rich people didn’t live in small old cottages. But now, Kenny remembered how Butters had once stood on that patch of overgrown grass and said he found the cottage charming. And still, Kenny had called the demolition crew the next morning.

He doesn’t deserve to be here. 

But Butters is already moving toward the house, keys in hand, and Kenny forces himself to follow. The last thing he wants is for Butters to turn back and help him again.

The drive had sobered him just enough to stay upright. The world still tilted, but not enough to knock him over. He opened the car door on his own, dragging himself out with slow movements. Butters glanced over his shoulder and offered him a small smile. It nearly undid him.

The door creaks open, and Kenny holds his breath as they step inside.

The place is mostly the same, though it looks much emptier now. During the time they lived together, Kenny filled the place up with shit they didn’t need. Useless things, like sculptural light fixtures, sleek tech, pretty gadgets. It was all clutter, bought in an attempt to flaunt their wealth. Now that he moved out and all his stuff with him, the house only carried traces of Butters. 

Three pairs of shoes by the door, one for each season. Houseplants, nothing rare or exotic, lined the windowsills. Machinery, simple and functional, without smart interfaces or AI. The furniture was soft but modest, not draped in imported animal hides or polished to sterile perfection. It was nothing like the home Kenny had tried to build. But it looked more like one than his version ever did.

They walked into the living room, and Butters disappeared into the kitchen, leaving Kenny standing alone beneath the high dome ceiling he once insisted was essential. Above him hung the chandelier, grand, glittering, and far too large for the space. It had cost more than a car and took five men to install. Oh, how proud of it he was back then. 

Now he stood here, surrounded by the echoes of his own excess, and realized, too late, how ridiculous it all was.

Then something catches his eye, making Kenny freeze.

Butters always kept things neat. Obsessively so. A habit ingrained from childhood by his parents. Now everything in his home was color coded, alphabetized, and arranged with acute precision. Kenny hated the Stotches, but boy did he love their son. 

Yet, draped carelessly over the couch, was a corduroy jacket. It was brown, worn, and far too big to belong to Butters’ narrow frame. Kenny frowned as he stepped closer, fingers brushing the fabric. It wasn’t just the size, it was the scent. Woody, unfamiliar. Masculine. Not Butters. It didn’t take Kenny long to connect the dots.

He didn’t know why it crushed him so—well, at least not beyond the obvious. Kenny was still in love with Butters, and forever will be, but he thought he made peace with this possibility. When he signed the divorce papers, he thought he’d braced for the idea of Butters loving someone else. He’d accepted it, hadn’t he? Told himself it was only fair. That Butters deserved happiness, even if it didn’t include him.

But now, holding the jacket that didn’t belong to either of them, he realized just how thoroughly he’d been fooling himself. Kenny squeezed his eyes shut. No, he would not start crying again. 

He turned from the couch as Butters walked back into the room, water in one hand, a plate in the other. Kenny’s breath caught when he stepped closer and the shape on the plate came into focus. He knew what it was instantly, though it was hard to believe.

“Banana bread,” Butters clarified, following Kenny’s gaze. “your favorite.”

It was. And he knew, without a doubt, that Butters had made it himself. The crack down the center, the slightly golden edges, the little dome top. Kenny would know it from scent alone, would know it just from just a glance, because he’s eaten it a hundred times and always thought he’d get to eat it a thousand more. He gapes.

“It is still your favorite, ain’t it?” Butters asked hesitantly.

“Of course.” Kenny nodded eagerly. He took the plate and the glass carefully from Butters’ hands, his fingers brushing Butters’ for a second too long. “Thank you.”

They sat on the couch, and Kenny gripped the plate with both hands, mindful not to spill a crumb. The water went down in one long swallow, then came the first bite of bread.

The only way to describe the taste is this: Kenny is 21 and stressed. He spends most of his days hunched over his desk, but the soft, comforting hand on his shoulder is his pillar and reason. Butters’ hand. Butters’ comfort, the sweetness of it.

He hadn’t realized how hungry he was until now. The only thing he’d eaten today was a granola bar, and even that had felt like too much. He didn’t think he could stomach much more knowing what day it is. 

This day used to belong to them. Now it just sat like a bruise on the calendar, and it made him feel sick. So this morning, he hadn’t eaten. Convinced that if he didn’t, he’d have less to throw up. 

“Fuck, this is still—still the best banana bread I’ve ever had,” Baby, would’ve been the next word, but Kenny is mindful of what he’s allowed to say, now. “Butters.”

Butters chuckled. “You sure it ain’t just the hunger talking?”

Kenny grinned. “Okay, yeah, I’m hungry. But I’ve had it before on a full stomach, too. And guess what? Still perfect.”

Butters’ smile stretched wider, eyes crinkling at the corners.

It made something catch in Kenny’s throat. He looked down at the plate, suddenly too shy to meet his eyes.

“Why? You think you’ve gotten stale?” Kenny teased, though the question came out softer than he meant.

He couldn’t understand why Butters would still make banana bread. He never liked bananas—or bread, for that matter.

“Nope, not one bit,” Butters said with a shake of his head. “I keep buyin‘ bananas. They go brown. I bake banana bread as a habit. Muscle memory. Then I realize—“

Butters snaps his mouth shut, and Kenny is able to put the rest of the sentence together. “ And then I realize you aren’t here.”

He doesn’t know how to respond to the admission, doesn’t know what face to make or what words to offer. But the emotions hit fast and hard, happiness and hope, the latter which he quickly squashed. He refused to let it bloom only to watch it wither when this night ends. 

So, Kenny swallows what he can and forces himself to speak. “No, I get it. I still sleep with the lamp on.” 

Butters freezes, and turns towards him slowly, “…You do?”

“Yeah.”

The silence afterward gnawed at him. Maybe he shouldn’t have admitted that. 

Kenny hated this version of them. Where he didn’t know how to ask simple things like How have you been? without it sounding like he’s prying. He doesn’t know how to talk to Butters anymore, afraid that every word was too tender and too much like he was still in love. There was no use banging on the door Butters had already closed.

“I guess some things never change,” Butters muttered.

Kenny let himself think. Just for a second.

No, he didn’t think he’d ever sleep with the lights fully off again. Not because he feared the dark, but because keeping the lamp on let him pretend, in his most exhausted moments, that Butters was still there. That someone was still sleeping on the other side of the bed.

How could he have turned the light off on his sweet Buttercup and leave him scared?  

So he looked up and said softly, “No. I guess it doesn’t.”

The silence fell hard, pressing into the room like fog. Kenny ate slowly, savoring each bite while also being hyper aware of the sound of his fork against the plate. Butters sipped from his cup, his fingers wrapped tight around the ceramic, shoulders drawn in, sipping in an almost methodic rhythm. 

Between bites, Kenny’s gaze drifted across the room. Something tugged at the corner of his eye, a set of wooden shelves, still propped against the wall, untouched.

“Hey,” he said, tilting his head, “any reason those haven’t gone up yet?”

Butters followed his line of sight and let out a soft, amused sound. “Oh, yeah. I’ve been meanin’ to, but…” His voice trailed off, eyes flicking toward Kenny, a wry smile forming on his face. That’s when it dawned on Kenny. 

“Oh, shit.” And Kenny laughs. 

Of course he hadn’t. That was always Kenny’s job, stepping in with the tools, happy to help. Proud, even, to be needed in small ways. And later, when Kenny had money, those little chores had vanished. Taken care of by maids and assistants and staff. 

Clearly, Butters had done away with all that. No extra hands, no polished life of staff and service like they used to have. Just Butters and whatever he could manage on his own. He truly was living here—all alone. 

Even though Kenny had promised him he would never be. 

“I’ll do it,” Kenny said as he set the empty plate aside. The last of the banana bread was gone, but something else was taking root in its place.

Butters stared at him incredulously. “What? No.”

“You want them up, don’t you?”

“Well, yeah, but—” Butters hesitated, eyes flicking away. “I didn’t say that so you’d… I mean, ya don’t have to.”

“I know,” Kenny said, already moving toward the shelves. “But I want to.”

Kenny traced the edge of one of the boards, noting the pre drilled holes and neat packet of screws. It was nothing, really. Twenty minutes. Maybe less. 

He turned to Butters with a crooked grin. “Call it payment for the banana bread. And for picking my drunk ass up from the bar.”

Butters looked unsure, and Kenny couldn’t help the small smile that tugged at his lips. “Really? Don’t tell me you forgot the time you woke me up at one in the morning because the cabinet door was squeaking and ‘it was driving you insane.’”

“I never did that!” Butters protested.

Kenny laughed, the memory vivid. “Tell that to the version of me that woke up to you standing in pitch black muttering about the cabinet hinge. I nearly threw a pillow at you.”

“You did throw a pillow at me.”

Kenny lit up. “So you do remember!”

They laugh together, and for a second, Kenny feels alive. No, more then that—happy. Oh, how it scared him so, to know he could still feel it so wholeheartedly, and know that it will change once he leaves. 

Butters looks at him with something like a challenge. “Do you still know how?

“Do I still know how?” Kenny grinned. 

Butters shrugged, feigning innocence. “I dunno, figured you’d be pulling out your phone by now to call your assistant or somethin’ like that.”

Kenny laughed, but it came out a little softer than he expected. The kind that fades quickly.

He didn’t move right away. His hand rested on the edge of the shelf box, fingertips brushing the worn cardboard. The rough edges caught against the pads of his fingers, grounding him.

He looked at the shelf. Then at Butters, and smiled. 

“I used to love doing things for you,” he said softly. He thought of his early inventions—half baked ideas held together with tape and hope. Most barely worked. Some were downright ridiculous. But he’d made them anyway, pouring love into every wire and screw.

“Even the stupid stuff,” he added, and then with a chuckle, “Especially the stupid stuff.”

Butters didn’t blink. Just looked at him with something Kenny couldn’t decipher in his eyes. “They weren’t stupid to me.”

And just like that, Kenny is back there again.

Back in that cramped apartment with wires strewn across the floor like ivy, schematics taped to the wall, his fingers raw from overuse and his eyes rimmed with sleeplessness. He remembers the sting of ridicule, where hope was a fragile thing he soldered together with shaking hands.

But through it all, Butters had been there. Sitting cross legged on the couch with a notebook in hand, cheering every time a spark lit the right way, celebrating every hum of machinery that didn’t result in smoke.

And when things fell apart, and they always did at first, Butters was the one who stayed. Who cried with him, held him like it meant something, told him he was brilliant even when he felt like a joke. The soft light of a desk lamp and Butters’ silhouette curled up nearby, never leaving, was something Kenny would never forget.

Kenny blinked, and the room come back into focus. Butters was still there, not across years this time, but just across the floor. Older now, more guarded, but his presence still felt the same. Steady.

How did Kenny lose that? How could he have had everything and lost it?

No. Worse—how do you have something like that, something so good, and be too blind, too wrapped up in yourself, to see it for what it is?

He blinked the past away, forcing his voice to be solid, “Are the tools still kept in the garage?”

Butters nodded, and Kenny didn’t respond. He just stood. And the act of moving, of walking through this house again, felt like stepping into something deeper. Something almost sacred.

The hallway swallowed him slowly. The air changed. The walls, once familiar, seemed to press in around him. The floor shifted beneath his feet, like the house had been holding its breath this whole time and only now dared to exhale.

There was no light.

Just memory.

Just him.

At his core, Kenny was a man who wants. He wanted towers of gold. He wanted to be remembered, bathed under the shine of a thousand spotlights. He wanted to be liked and seen and appreciated. And, once upon a time, he wanted Butters.

Until he got all of those things, and suddenly they weren’t enough. For a man like Kenny, it never would be. 

This was a realization Butters had to come to learn the hard way. Thing is, there was no big fight. They didn’t have a dramatic blowout, or shouting matches that echoed through the house. That would’ve been easier, maybe. At least then Butters would have something clear to point to. Something to blame.

Instead, their relationship gave away like an erosion.

Day by day, Butters watched as Kenny reached higher, smiled wider, chased more. And the more he gained, the less he came home to.

Until one night—just an ordinary, unremarkable night—Butters found himself lying beside the man he loved and thinking, “Ah. Nothing will ever be enough for him. Not even me.”

It had made him cry, though Kenny never noticed.

But maybe that shouldn’t have surprised him. Butters doubted he would’ve noticed much in those days. He was somewhere else, even when he was home.

Each day, Butters felt a little less seen. A little less chosen. A little more like a ghost haunting a life he used to belong to. And through it all, Kenny remained oblivious, caught up in a world that loved him louder than Butters ever could.

Or at least that’s what Butters told himself. Because the alternative, that Kenny had noticed, and chose to do nothing, was something that would completely break him apart. The Kenny he used to know, the boy he loved, would have never allowed that. 

He watched what used to be a familiar sight. Kenny, tapping the old stud finder against the wall, still giving it that extra little smack like it might work better if he bullied it into obedience. The way he gripped the drill and leaned in to squint at his measurements. When Kenny concentrated, he always wore that same look—eyebrows knitted, mouth slightly parted, just a little too serious for what he was doing. Butters used to tease him for it, and then kiss the crease between his brows until it smoothed out.

Even now, it was still adorable. And Butters hated the way his heart ached upon seeing it. 

“Okay, last one,” Kenny said as Butters approached. He had two shelves already mounted and was working steadily on the third. There was a light sweat on his brow, and his sleeves had been pushed up, exposing the forearms Butters always remembered as surprisingly strong for a man who lived in his mind so much.

“Would ya like a drink?” Butters asked, holding out a glass of pink lemonade.

It was one of Kenny’s favorites, though only in very specific circumstances. He only ever seemed to crave it after building something. Said the sourness helped “spark his brain back to life.” Butters never really understood it, but he never forgot it either.

Kenny glanced at the drink, then up at him. The look in his eyes was one Butters couldn’t quite place. Surprise, maybe. Or softness.

“Thank you,” Kenny said, and the gratitude in his voice was so genuine, so unexpectedly gentle, it caught Butters a little off guard.

He reached down from the ladder, one hand still gripping the drill, the other reaching for the glass. Butters stepped closer, holding it up carefully. Their fingers brushed for just a second, barely anything, but it lingered.

Then it all happened at once.

Kenny shifted his weight, reaching a little too far to grab the drink, and his foot slipped off the edge of the step. The ladder wobbled beneath him, a screech of metal on wood, and in a flash, he was falling.

Butters moved instinctively. “Kenny—!”

He caught him. Sort of.

Kenny’s body collided into his chest with a loud thud, knocking the wind out of him. They tumbled together, Butters’ arms scrambling for balance, the glass of lemonade still in his hand until it wasn’t. It flipped in the air, the liquid arching like a pastel comet, before landing with perfect accuracy, soaking both their shirts in sticky, cold pink.

They hit the floor hard, Kenny half sprawled on top of Butters, one leg tangled in the rungs of the fallen ladder, breathless and blinking up at the ceiling.

For a second, neither of them moved.

Then Butters snorted. He couldn’t help it. The absurdity of it all, Kenny toppling like a poorly stacked shelf, the lemonade, the sheer mess of them, bubbled up into laughter.

Kenny chuckled too, face pressed against Butters’ shoulder, body shaking with it. “Okay,” he said between gasps, “I deserved that.”

Butters laughed harder. “You really did.”

Their laughter faded slowly, like ripples across a pond. The air between them changed, and Kenny lifted his head.

They were close. Too close. Their chests were pressed together, damp fabric clinging to skin, and Kenny’s face was only inches above his. His hair was a little messy, his lips parted like he’d been about to say something, yet no sound escaped him. Butters didn’t dare to breathe.

Kenny’s hand, meant to brace himself, lingered against Butters’ ribs instead. His touch was light, uncertain. His eyes searched Butters’ face, the humor fading from them, replaced with something Butters didn’t understand.. 

And for one suspended heartbeat, Butters wondered a simple question: would Kenny still taste the same?

Kenny’s gaze dropped, first to Butters’ mouth, then flicked back up to his eyes. Butters felt his heart stutter in his chest. He knew that look. He remembered it. The way Kenny used to look at him before leaning in, before stealing kisses in kitchens and hallways and late at night when it was finally just them. 

Just when the space between them felt impossibly thin, when Butters thought he'd lean in more—Kenny pulled back.

No, he lurched back, like he’d been burned. 

The warmth vanished in an instant, replaced by distance and the sound of Kenny scrambling upright. Butters felt the absence like a blow, cold air rushing in to fill the space Kenny had left behind.

For a moment, Butters just laid there, blinking up at the ceiling. He could still feel the weight of Kenny’s hand, the heat of his breath. But now it was gone.

And worse than the distance was the look Kenny wouldn’t let him see, because he wasn’t looking at him at all.

“Sor—sorry. Are you okay?” Kenny asked, already climbing to his feet. He offered a hand down to Butters. “Hurt anywhere?”

“…No,” Butters said. “Not at all.”

He took Kenny’s hand. The skin was slick, sticky with lemonade, and as Butters stood, he realized just how drenched they both were. Shirts clung to their chests, the fabric semi translucent in patches, cold and smelling faintly of citrus and sugar.

“I think we’re due for a shower.” Butters chuckled, a little dry. It might take him a few minutes to recover from a touch he only felt for a couple seconds. But then again, that was always the effect Kenny had on him. 

“I can just—“

“You are not headin’ home in that state, Kenny. Why, in fact, you ain’t goin’ home tonight at all.”  Butters said, and Kenny blinked at him. 

“Are you sure? I’m definitely sober enough to ca—“

“Go on and get yourself a shower. You can use the one in my room, it’s the only one with any shampoo left.” Butters said, turning toward the mess. “I’ll clean this up.”

There were friends that came and visited him, yes, but no one Butters let stay the night. This house felt like all he had yet a prision all at once. 

He didn’t hear movement, just the soft hum of the room settling. When he glanced over his shoulder, Kenny was still standing there, motionless, gaze fixed on him.

There was something in his expression—unguarded, boyish in a way that he had no right still looking like that after all this time. The same expression that once convinced Butters to throw logic out the window and follow him wherever he led.

Kenny opened his mouth. Just two words, low and sincere.

“Thank you.”

Butters held his gaze for a long second before answering. “You can thank me by not catchin’ a cold.”

And still, even as Kenny turned and finally left the room, Butters could feel the weight of his stare lingering like heat that had nowhere to go.

This was a trap. The bathroom smells of Butters.

His soap was lemon, his shampoo had that soft sweetness of whipped cream. Kenny walked into the room and felt like he’d just been wrapped in Butters’ arms. Good God.

He stumbled back a little, one hand catching the doorframe. For a brief moment, he considered using another bathroom, maybe one Butters didn’t frequent as often. But then remembered what Butters said about this being the only one with shampoo. Shit. Then this wasn’t really a matter of choice, was it?

Kenny stripped out of his sticky clothes, the fabric falling heavy and wet to the floor beside the hamper. A hamper they used to share, now filled only with Butters’ clothes. It's stuffed with old sweaters, soft cotton, things Kenny used to fold beside him on laundry day. He tore his gaze away.

He turned on the shower and waited for the water to warm, leaning against the sink and pressing his fingers into his temples. His head throbbed, no longer from the alcohol. 

It wasn’t a lie when he said he was sober enough to leave. He couldn’t drive, not yet at least, but he could’ve called one of his drivers and made it back to his penthouse without a problem.

But Butters had told him to stay. And that single sentence had swept every plan from his mind.

The tips of his fingertips still burn from where they touched. God, it’s been so long. Butters skin was just as smooth and soft as he remembered. Still just as warm.

They spent the majority of their youth fucking, breathless and hungry, teenagers driven by hormones and consuming love. Back then, Kenny had memorized Butters’ body like scripture. Sometimes he thinks he knew it better than his own.

He could still recall it all even now, the curve of his hips, the fine scars on his knees from playing too hard, the stretch marks from that sudden, awkward growth spurt at sixteen. Kenny used to trace them with his fingers, used to kiss and lick at the features that made Butters, Butters. His Leo. His sweet Buttercup.

When Kenny looked down and realized he was hard, his first instinct was to groan and smash his forehead against the porcelain sink. It really has been too long since he’s got laid, if even just the scent of Butters combined with images he should not be recalling is enough to get him so hard so quickly. 

He gripped the edge of the counter, knuckles white, willing the heat in his gut to settle. But the images kept coming anyway. Butters’ skin under his hands. The soft sound he made when kissed just beneath his ear. The way his back arched when—

No.

Kenny shut his eyes. He hadn’t come here for this. He was supposed to shower. Sober up. Be a decent human being, for once.

But then his eyes flickered to hamper. And Kenny only realized what he was doing while he was already doing it. 

In his hand, he held Butters boxers. No doubt used and most likely from yesterday. He swallows thickly and shakes his head resolutely. He can’t. He can’t . He forces his eyes to the ceiling and keeps them there, breathing harsh and steady through his nose. He wills his eyes shut. He can’t.

But he does.

His hand snaps out and takes the boxer, wrapping it around his length gently, quickly, before he can think better of it. Before he can convince himself this is insane.

He pictures Butters on the bed, boneless and blissed out. Smiling and laughing, eyes like the pretty blue sky telling Kenny he still wants him, that it’s him, that it will always be him. “Let me take care of you,” he’d been about to say. Kenny wanted it so bad he could scream. He took himself in his hand, whimpering at the relief. He imagines sinking inside Butters’ pretty pink hole, hot and wanting. “There ya go, Kenny,” Butters soothes him. “All yours now.”

He throws his head back and pants, his hand working himself over. He tries to keep it slow and controlled, like how he’d be with Butters. Like how he wants to treat him. He could do it, he could be so better this time around. In all aspects, especially the ones that matter. 

Then he pictures Butters without the boxers. How it would look hanging off one of his leg. He groans and strokes harder, thrusting down into the tight circle of his fist, feeling the fabric against the rock skin of his cock. His other hand grips the edge of the sink, hard enough he fears it would crack if it was wood.

“Yes, Kenny,” the Butters inside of his head encourages him. Enabling this behavior in him, reveling in what he’s made of Kenny.

He clenches his teeth and growls. He wants hot hands on his back. He wants sweet kisses along his jaw. He wants Butters under him screaming for it. He works himself faster, all ideas of being gentle and sweet burnt to ash inside of him. The Butters in his head loves it, open mouthed and panting, his tight little body dragging Kenny straight over the edge greedily and happily.

He manages to toss the boxers aside just in time to spare it from ruin. He sinks his teeth down into his own hand, trying to muffle his groans as he works himself through his release. Butters’ name is chanted over and over. Even when he can’t catch his breath, he keeps the mantra up in his head. The version of Butters that exists in there smiles, so innocently devilish and sated.

Kenny blinks his eyes open and there’s nothing there. No pale skin that's hot to the touch. No clear eyes of blue. No giggles fanning against his skin. Just another big fucking mess for Kenny to clean up.

The ache in his body may have dulled, but Butters lingered everywhere. On the steam coated tiles. In the lemon sweet air. In the warmth of the water that clung to his skin like memory.

And now, layered over it all, was shame.

He rinsed his hand, avoiding his own reflection, and stepped into the shower, hoping the torrent of warm water would wash it all away.

When Kenny stepped out of the bathroom, steam still clinging to his skin, he found Butters in the corner of the living room, watering the plants.

“I’m done,” Kenny called out. 

“Alri—”. Butters turned and froze mid word. A beat. A blink. And then Butters whipped around like a maiden in an old romance novel, nearly spilling the watering can. “Oh—oh my hamburgers! Where are your clothes?”

Kenny blinked, then looked down at himself. He had a towel cinched tight around his waist, another draped casually over his shoulders. Nothing scandalous, especially if you count all the ways Butters has ever seen him before. 

“They’re covered in lemonade,” he said flatly, not quite hiding the amusement in his tone.

The realization seemed to settle Butters, his shoulders lowering a notch. “Oh, right. Of course,” he said, almost sheepishly.

Kenny couldn’t help the grin that tugged at his mouth. “Besides,” he added, voice softer now, laced with just a hint of something old, “nothing you haven’t seen before, right?”

Butters glanced over his shoulder, his face flushed a deep, telltale red. “I—I’ll go throw your clothes in the wash. I, um… don’t really got much here that’d fit ya.”

Kenny’s eyes flicked toward the brown jacket draped over the couch, but he didn’t let them linger. That would fit me, he thought, but didn’t say.

Instead, he gave a small nod. He didn’t offer to do it himself; he knew Butters would refuse, like always. “Thanks,” he said. “You go take a shower, too. Wash the night off.”

Butters nodded quickly, then turned and scurried out of the room like a startled bunny. Kenny watched him go, lips quirking despite himself. It was so adorable Kenny nearly gave chase. 

A few minutes later he hears the washer go, another couple of minutes, the shower. Kenny sat on the couch, staring up at the ceiling once more. 

If it was possible, Kenny would stay in this night forever. Where Butters still knew what kind of bread he liked, and Kenny still knew how to make him laugh.

When they decided to leave South Park behind, they talked about traveling the world. It was something you needed money for, of course, so Kenny told Butters when he made it big (and he always said when, not if) that the first thing they’d do was fly out of the country.

He lied. They did leave the country, but only a handful of times. And each trip was tied to work. 

Why didn’t he invent a Time Machine with all the others things he’s created? It would fix so much, if he could get the chance to do it again. He wouldn’t have stopped creating, his inventions had helped people, but he would’ve drawn the line somewhere. The fame, the money, the endless praise—in the midst of all, he would’ve remembered what mattered more. Who mattered most.

A knock at the door pulled him out of the thought. 

Kenny blinked and slowly sat up. For a moment, he wondered if he’d imagined it, until the second knock came, firmer this time.

He glanced toward the hallway. The shower was still running. No sign of Butters.

With a quiet sigh, Kenny rose to his feet. He’d handle it. Besides, nothing good ever came knocking this late. At best, it was a mistake. At worst, it was news no one wanted to deliver.

He approached the door with caution, peeking through the peephole just to be sure there weren’t armed men or flashing lights on the other side. There weren’t. It was just one man standing alone. 

Kenny unlocked the door and opened it.

“Leo—” The man’s sentence broke off the moment he saw Kenny. His eyes widened comically, caught mid thought. “Oh—uh, hello.”

He was around Kenny’s height, with tousled blond hair and bright blue eyes that didn’t quite match the sharpness of his angular face. Early thirties, maybe younger by a few years. Clean cut.

Kenny decided immediately that he didn’t like him.

“Can I help you?” he asked, leaning against the doorframe with his arms crossed. Kenny had a hunch who this was, and he prayed he was wrong.

“Hi,” the man said, still visibly thrown. “I was hoping to maybe speak to Butters…?”

His eyes flicked past Kenny’s shoulder, trying to catch a glimpse inside. Oh, so it’s Butters now.

“He’s in the shower.”

“Oh. Well…” The man’s gaze dropped then, and Kenny realized—with some delayed, distant amusement—that he was still shirtless, barefoot, and wrapped in nothing but a towel. The man blushes, frowns, and then looks away. “I came for my jacket. I think I left it here?”

I fucking knew it, Kenny thought, a bitter twist pulling at the corner of his mouth. He was almost startled by the absence of anger. His fist didn’t itch with the old, familiar urge to swing, not like it would have when he was younger. No, all he feels now is a dull, aching weight of something lost. A sadness so deep it felt like standing at the edge of a well with no bottom.

In hindsight, Kenny probably should’ve just turned around, grabbed the damn jacket, and handed it over like a civil adult. But apparently, the years haven’t made him that mature yet, “You make a habit of midnight wardrobe runs?”

The guy froze. Scratched the back of his neck like he hadn’t prepared for this exact scenario. He looked harmless. Nervous, even. And Kenny felt the shame creep in slow and bitter.

With a sigh, Kenny muttered, “Stay here,” and shut the door in the man’s face without waiting for a response.

He walked to the couch, snatched the damn jacket— that damn jacket—and made his way back. The door opened again, and Kenny tossed it at the guy. The man fumbled, nearly dropping it, and for a second, Kenny thought he might miss it entirely. 

“Thanks,” the man said uncertainly, clutching the jacket to his chest. 

“If you want to see Butters,” Kenny said, pushing some of the hair that fell on his forehead back, “don’t come after nine. He’s usually asleep by then.” Now here Kenny is, giving tips to the enemy… 

“But you said he was in the shower,” the man replied, brows pinched.

Kenny’s grin widened. He couldn’t help himself. “Unless something’s keeping him up.”

Someone goes unsaid, but the man gets it nonetheless. The words hung heavy in the air. The other man blinked, clearly caught between offense and confusion. Then he opened his mouth, maybe to reply—but the sound of soft footsteps cut through the moment.

Both of them turned.

Butters stood a few feet away, freshly showered and dressed in pajama bottoms and a faded tee that clung slightly to his damp skin. His hair was still wet, curling slightly at the ends, a few strands clinging to his forehead. Kenny froze.

“Jake?” Butters called out, blinking in surprise. His tone was warm—too warm. Kenny sort of wanted to die.

“L-Leo!” ‘Jake’ exclaimed, lighting up. “Hey!”

Kenny pressed his lips into a line and stepped aside, making room for Butters at the door. He tried to school his face into neutrality, but it was an uphill battle. Especially when Butters gave the guy a wide, easy smile, the kind that used to belong to Kenny.

“You came for your jacket,” Butters said once his eyes landed on the bundle in Jake’s arms.

“Yeah! It’s my favorite one,” 

“Oh, well I’m sorry for hangin’ on to it so long.”

How long is long, exactly? And how did Butters get this guys favorite jacket anyways? A hundred scenario plays out in Kenny’s head, each one leaving him sicker then the last. A cold night out with Butters shivering, Jake draping the jacket over his shoulders. Butters smiling, teeth chattering, thanking him in that adorable way he pulls off so effortlessly.

By the time Kenny pulled himself out of it, the nausea had already started to creep up the back of his throat.

“No, I’m the one who showed up in the middle of the night. I didn’t mean to bug you. I just—”

His eyes flicked toward Kenny, and whatever expression Kenny was wearing must’ve thrown him off. Jake hesitated, searching for words.

“I didn’t think you’d have company over. I thought…”

Butters raised a brow. “Thought?”

Jake swallowed, then said with a little too much hope in his voice, “You were single.”

The audacity. Kenny nearly choked. He had to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from saying something he’d regret.

“I am,” Butters said calmly, and Kenny flinched like the words had been aimed at him. “This is my ex-husband.”

Jake blinked. “Ah. Ex-husband.” His eyes narrowed as he studied Kenny. “Wait, have I seen you somewhere—?”

“No,” Kenny cut in. He turned on his heels and walked back into the house without waiting for a response, not trusting himself to stay standing there a second longer. He didn’t need to see the rest, nor did he want to hear it.

Its only a couple more minutes later till Kenny hears the door close and approaching footsteps. So—okay, maybe he isn’t as ready for this as he thought he might’ve been. Maybe he will never be okay with the thought of Butters being with another man. And maybe, yeah, he still had the emotional maturity of a jealous teenager.

At least he could admit it now. That was progress, right?

“…You went and gave him the wrong idea ‘bout what we were doin’.” Butters said. Kenny shifted, suddenly aware of how obvious he was. Damn it. He hadn’t thought Butters would overhear, let alone catch him in the act of being petty.

He turned to face him. Butters had his arms crossed, expression unreadable, but his eyes were clear.

Does that bother you? Kenny wants to ask, but what comes out instead was, “I wasn’t thinking,” Kenny muttered. “Didn’t know who it was.”

Butters raised a brow. “But you knew what you were doin’.”

Kenny tried to hold his gaze but couldn’t. He looked down at the floor instead.

“I swear, sometimes I just can’t make heads or tails of you.” Butters sighed, and the disappointment in his voice hit Kenny harder than he expected.

It stung, enough to make him scoff, to feel that old heat rise in his chest. Anger, sure. But jealousy, too. Bitter and sour and burning slow.

“If you’re worried about him still having the wrong idea,” Kenny snapped, “don’t. You made it very clear I’m your ex husband.”

“Well I had to clear up the misunderstanding you created.” 

Kenny let out a dry laugh. “Right. Of course. Gotta keep your new boyfriend from thinking I still mean something.”

Butters’ brows knit. “He’s ain’t my boyfriend.”

“You sure?” Kenny shot back. “Because he looked pretty damn hopeful.”

“Hopeful don't mean nothin’,” Butters said, his voice rising slightly now, eyes narrowing. “You’re the one who made it weird.”

“I made it weird?” Kenny took a step closer. “You’re the one who came in and saved him like—”

“And And you’re the one standin’ there in a towel actin’ like you live here!” Butters shot back, gesturing broadly. “What was I s’posed to do? Just stand there and pretend you ain’t half naked in my house while Jake’s at the door?”

“I didn’t plan that, Butters!”

“Sure seemed like it, the way you were actin’.”

“Oh come on,” Kenny snapped. “So now me answering the door is a threat to your little pajama party?”

The words hung in the air, bitter and too loud. And then it hit him.

A memory of their youth, Butters in soft sleep clothes, wide eyed and laughing in the dark, Kenny slipping in through the window that was always left unlocked for him. Nights that always ended the same way: skin on skin, mouths pressed close, Butters curled around him like home.

The past slammed into the present, and something ugly rose in his throat. The next words came out before he could stop them.

“Or what?” he said, voice low. “Is the real reason he’s here so late to… fuck you?”

Butters’ face changed in an instant. Shock, then hurt crossed with fury. Then his expression shifted, scrunching in a way Kenny knew too well. It was the warning sign before a storm, and Kenny braced himself.

“Maybe he was!” Butters snapped, voice cracking open with fury as he stepped forward. “Remember when you used to do that? Sneak into my room at night just to sleep with me?”

Kenny surged forward, closing the last bit of space between them. Now they were chest to chest, breaths clashing, eyes locked like they were each trying to break the other first.

“I came because I wanted to talk to you!” Kenny shouted. “It’s not my fault it always ended with me inside you!” 

Butters stared at him, his eyes flickering to each part of Kenny’s face before he inhaled. 

“You really wanna know the truth?” he said, voice low, trembling, but not from fear. From fury.

Kenny’s heart thudded once. Hard.

“Yeah,” Butters went on, practically nose to nose. “Maybe I was goin’ to sleep with him.”

The words hit like a slap, but Butters didn’t stop.

“But you don’t get to be disgusted by that, and you sure as hell don’t get to question it. You gave me away, Kenny. Left me all by myself in this house while you went runnin’ after every other damn thing. And now you wanna throw a fit ‘cause someone else might actually want me? I ain’t yours no more.”

Kenny opened his mouth. Nothing came out.

“I waited,” Butters said, voice cracking now. “I waited on you for a long time. Hoped you’d come back. Hoped one day you’d choose me instead of your work. But you never did.”

“I never meant to lose you,” Kenny said, barely above a whisper.

“But you did,” Butters snapped, his voice cracking under the weight of it. “And now you’re mad ‘cause I ain’t still standin’ right where you left me.”

The silence that followed was thick. Kenny felt it settle on his chest like a stone. But then Butters’ face crumpled, his anger unraveling all at once.

“You went and did every last thing you promised you wouldn’t do,” he said, voice small, broken. “Why are you surprised I’m gone?”

And then it happened. His eyes, already glassy, spilled over.

Butters brought his hands to his face and sobbed, just like he used to, the same way he had since he was a kid. Kenny remembered every version of this cry, every moment he’d pulled those hands away to kiss the sadness out of them.

This time, it wasn’t even a choice. It was instinct.

Kenny wrapped his arms around him, pulling Butters into his chest. Butters collapsed into him with a sound that broke straight through Kenny’s chest, his hands clutching the front of Kenny’s shirt like he didn’t know where else to go.

He rests his chin against Butters’ temple, his hands moved slowly, one settling between Butters’ shoulder blades, the other cupping the back of his neck, cradling him as gently as he could. 

Butters’ sobs cracked through the quiet, and Kenny could feel them against his ribs. So he swayed, just a little. Rocked him the way he used to. Like the two of them were still young and nothing outside this moment could touch them.

“I’m sorry.” Kenny whispered into his hair. “I’m sorry, baby.”

It had been so long since he’d held him like this. The shape of Butters in his arms hadn’t changed. He still fits the same way, folding into him like he belonged there. Kenny closed his eyes. God, he missed him.

“I should’ve…” Kenny searches for the right words. No, he searches for the words he should’ve said sooner. “I wished I treated you better. I wish I didn’t get so lost in it all. But I had so much to prove. And I’ve been chasing a single goal for so long that I put aside my other dream that was more important then that.”

He swallowed hard, gaze lowering.

“I thought I could have both. You and the rest of the world.” Kenny admitted with a wince. “Greedy, I know. I thought if I worked hard enough, that you’d wait and understand why I had to put you second. But I didn’t just put you second. I forgot you came first.”

Butters sobbed. “You didn’t even fight for me,” he whispered, voice cracking. “When I—when I gave you them papers.”

Kenny’s brows pulled together, pain flashing across his face. “You told me it was better this way.”

“And thats when you finally chose to listen?!” Butters snapped, and Kenny paled. “I’ve told you so many things, so many times, and the one time I say somethin’ I don’t even truly mean, that’s when you finally choose to hear me?!”

Butters struck Kenny’s chest with a closed fist, not hard, but it landed like a blow all the same. Kenny didn’t move. He let it happen. 

“You had me thinkin’ I didn’t mean nothin’ to you—that you didn’t want me no more!” Butters’ fists trembled against his chest. “You went and changed so much, I could barely even recognize you anymore!”

Kenny stood there, his heart breaking into a thousand pieces.

“And now you're here and you’re acting like—like—“ Butters went on, his voice breaking. “Like the boy I fell in love with,” he said softly.

It had never occurred to him that Butters had hoped he would fight. That handing over those papers might’ve been a final plea, and not a sealed decision like he believed. 

When he’d first been served the divorce papers, Kenny had been blindsided, yes, but when Butters explained why, something inside him had simply folded. He hadn’t argued or begged, because in that moment, Kenny believed him. It was too late, he had ruined everything.

He realized only then how bad things had gotten. That the warnings Butters had whispered late at night, the confessions in bed and the silences over breakfast were cries for help he hadn’t heard. No, he heard them, he just hadn’t truly listened. 

And then the papers came. He hadn’t fought because he had no right. He’d accepted it. In his mind, there was nothing left to fix. He no longer deserved Butters anymore.

As if he ever had.

Kenny drew in a slow, unsteady breath. “You’re right,” he said quietly. “I should’ve never let you leave me.”

Butters looked up, eyes glassy and wide, and something in his expression made Kenny’s chest ache. Kenny reached up and brushed a damp curl from Butters’ cheek, tucking it behind his ear. He swallowed hard.

“I should’ve begged you to stay.”

Butters stays silent for a moment before he says, “Do it now.” 

Kenny’s breath caught. His eyes widened as he searched Butters’ face, unsure if he’d heard it right. But Butters held his gaze, unflinching, completely serious.

“Please…” Kenny wets his lips. “Please stay with me, for—for more then just tonight.”

Butters’ eyes didn’t waver, so Kenny kept going, his voice growing rougher with each word.

“I know I fucked up, believe me. I have spent every day and night since you left me living with that. Its hell.” He gathers both of Butters hands into his own. “I thought I knew what I wanted, the glory and riches and recognition, and I thought if I could get all of that I would be happy. And I was, for the first few years I had it. But then you left me, and I realized those weren’t the things that made me happy at all.”

Kenny took a deep breath. 

“I liked the money because I got to finally take you out to all these expensive restaurants we’ve always wanted to try together.” Kenny said. “I liked the fame because it proved to your parents you were right in taking a chance on me. Everything good that came with all of it—it always led back to you. You were the reason it meant anything at all. Not the headlines. Not the awards. You. And I’m sorry it took me losing you to get that through my thick head.”

Tears fell from Butters eyes again, and Kenny catches them with the pad of his fingers. “You were always the dream, Leo.“

Kenny cradled Butters’ face in his hands, his thumbs brushing gently along tear warmed cheeks. “So… if you let me, I’d really like to prove to you that—”

Butters surged forward and kissed him.

Kenny’s rational mind tried to remind him there was probably a better way to do this. That they should slow down, talk it out, build something careful and new. But Butters’ lips were warm and trembling against his, and Kenny’s body betrayed him instantly, his mouth parting the moment he felt Butters’ tongue brush his lower lip.

They moaned together as their tongues met. The kiss was messy, uncoordinated, an urgent press of lips and sliding mouths. Kenny kissed Butters like he’d been starving for it, like he might find forgiveness at the back of his throat, or something sacred tucked beneath the wet edges of his tongue.

He knew he should slow down. Knew he should show restraint, show Butters the man he’d become, the patient, changed, grown up version of himself.

But Butters was in his arms again, kissing him like he still belonged there. And for the first time in what felt like years, Kenny didn’t know if he was dreaming, or waking up.

On the day they took those divorce papers to court, and they were splitting up their money and property, they had sex in the bathroom. 

It was just for one last time, for memories. And as Butters was clawing Kenny’s shoulders and his toe brushed against the bathroom stall, he’s distinctly reminded of high school and how young and in love they were. They truly believed, at least back then, that love could fix everything. That love would be enough.

There is, maybe naively, a part of Butters who still believes it is.

“Butters,” Kenny groaned when they parted. His mouth wandered to Butters’ jaw, where he sucked and nipped until Butters was wriggling beneath him.

“Oh,” Butters’ hands snaked around Kenny’s back. He could barely embrace the expanse of it, but his fingers dug harshly into the skin. “Kenny, ah,” Butters trailed off when Kenny sucked at the pulse point along his neck. Butters moaned, louder than he would like to admit. His head was spinning; all he could think about was Kenny. The feel of his heavy pressed against him, the smell of his skin, soapy and smelling just like Butters. The taste of his mouth lingered with a tingling sensation on Butters’ lips and on his tongue.

“Upstairs,” Butters managed to murmur against Kenny’s mouth, voice breathless. His hands clutched at the back of Kenny’s neck, fingers curling like he was afraid of letting go. “Take me upstairs.”

Kenny froze for a second, as if those words snapped him out of something, and then his arms slid firmly around Butters, and before Butters could blink, he was being lifted off the ground.

He let out a soft gasp, legs instinctively wrapping around Kenny’s waist. His arms tightened around Kenny’s shoulders, face buried into the crook of his neck. Butters cheeks burned bright red. 

Each step Kenny took up the stairs was slow, missing the rushed, frantic energy Butters had half expected. Butters could hear his breath, warm and uneven against his ear. Could feel the strong, steady thud of Kenny’s heart pounding against his chest. Whatever Butters was feeling, it grounded him to know Kenny was feeling it, too.

The bedroom looked almost exactly as it always had. Same soft light casting golden shadows on the walls. Same blanket, still folded with neat corners at the foot of the bed, untouched like it was waiting. In some ways, it made pretending easier, on the lonelier nights, Butters could almost convince himself Kenny was just out late, that he’d be crawling into bed any minute now with cold hands and a tired smile.

But now that Kenny was actually here, standing in the space he’d left behind, Butters didn’t know what to feel.

Did Kenny know what it was like to lie here, night after night, with too much space and not enough warmth? Did he know how loud an empty bed could get? Did he know Butters has bought men into this room, hoping to replicate the joy he’s once received in these sheets? 

Kenny set him down carefully. Those large hands stayed at his waist, grounding him as their eyes meet. His gaze searched Butters’ face, for what, Butters didn’t know. Kenny reached out and brushed a hand against Butters’ cheek.

“I missed you,” he whispered.

Kenny leaned in and kissed him again, slower this time, and deeper. His hands slid up Butters’ back as their bodies pressed close. Butters sighed into his mouth, fingers sliding into Kenny’s hair, pulling him closer. His back hit the mattress gently, Kenny’s weight coming down over him like a tide. 

It’s all so familiar, despite the time they spent apart. Kenny kissed him like he never left, memorizing all of Butters’ weak spots—mouth, jaw, throat. Butters gasped as lips pressed against the soft spot beneath his ear, his hips arching instinctively.

“I’ve been an idiot,” Kenny whispered against Butters’ skin. His tongue lapped at the bruise he made bloom on Butters’ neck. He tugged, rather harshly, at Butters’ collar.

Butters laughed breathlessly. “Ya think?”

“I know.” Kenny kissed him again. “How did I ever let you go?”

Kenny leaned back and his hands immediately worked Butters’ shirt open. With his knees on either side of Butters’ hips, Kenny’s towel had long since abandoned its efforts at modesty. It lay forgotten on the bed, half draped over Butters’ leg, giving Butters an obscene view to Kenny’s hard cock. Flushed red, and already dripping from the tip.

Butters’ mouth went dry. He was huge. Gods he knew Kenny was huge, but perhaps time had dulled Butters memories on it’s actual size. It was considerably bigger than his. Both thicker in girth and longer. Kenny didn’t eat much growing up, but whatever he did eat seemed to fill him up in that department just fine. 

Eventually Butters’ shirt was finally stripped off him, Kenny’s now rough action as he tugged it off of Butters went straight to Butters’ own hardened cock. The moment Butters was shirtless, Kenny’s mouth fell to him, like bees to honey. He kissed the scattered freckles on Butters’ chest. Reverent presses of his lips, before Kenny’s mouth closed around Butters’ perked nipple.

“Ah!” Butters keened, his back arched off the bed. Kenny’s hot mouth was closed around his nipple, and his talented tongue was circling the nub as if he intended to suckle from him.

“The sounds you make,” Kenny said in a low voice when he pulled off. The string of saliva connecting his lip and Butters’ nipple sent coiling heat directly to Butters’ groin. He was growing uncomfortable in his pants. The wet tip of his cock dampening his underwear. “Fuck, I miss them.” 

As if hearing Butters’ thoughts, Kenny’s hand trailed along his side, lingering along Butters’ waist, where his fingers wrapped possessively. 

“Has anyone else heard them?” Kenny asked, and Butters’ eyes widened. 

“You mean—“

Kenny bent forward, and his body loomed over Butters. “How many?”

“That’s…” Butters averts his eyes.

His hesitation makes Kenny’s face cloud over. He pressed his naked cock to Butters’ clothed one. A roll of his hips, and the rough friction, made them moan against each other’s mouths. Butters cursed under his breath, but Kenny only repeated the action, except his fingers dipped ever so slightly, teasingly, under the waist of Butters’ pants. “Tell me, I can take it.”

Butters threw his arm over his eyes. Anything to hide from the fiery gaze of Kenny’s eyes. He had never been one for hiding, and certainly not from Kenny. Now he wanted nothing more than to disappear. 

“Ah , Kenny,” he moaned. Their hips were rolling in tandem. The bulge of Kenny’s cock turning Butters’ synapses into honey. Any thoughts are drowned by pure desire. 

Kenny’s hand left Butters’ waist abandoned, and instead moved to trail down Butters’ thigh. Butters’ leg involuntarily bent at the knee. Kenny kissed him. Tongue domineering as it slipped forcefully into Butters’ mouth. He rolled his hips in slow and languid movements. Even if Butters could feel Kenny’s body taut and strung out, he was exercising enough control so as to torment Butters. They would lose their minds before Kenny ceded.

”Double digits?” Kenny’s hand dug into Butters’ thigh. “What is it?”

“Three!” Butters gasped, the truth slipping out of him before he could stop it. His mind was reeling, his entire body was uncomfortably hot and the friction of Kenny’s body pressed against his own just wasn’t enough. He was losing everything, both his calm and his mind.

Kenny’s eyes darkened. “Then three is how many times you’re coming tonight.”

They grunted as their hips rolled deliciously together. They were both hard, and the bulge in Butters’ pants was becoming painful. If they were on that topic, Butters was afraid to ask Kenny the same question. 

Even before the world knew his name, Kenny was already something special in South Park. That dangerous boy, too pretty for his own good, too wild to be ignored. But here in the city, it only grew. He became a name, a face and a fantasy too wonderful to be true. How many times have Butters read all the posts online about Kenny? The edits? Or watched, in real time, people trying to get with Kenny as if Butters wasn’t right there? 

Something vile rose up in Butters at all the memories, and a question just as awful slipped out.

“You’re not going to ask if they were better?” 

Kenny threw his head back and laughed. “I’m not worried.”

And there was nothing more to say. Because he was right. No one compared to him. No one ever had. And the worst part? Butters kind of hated that Kenny knew it.

“Then what about you?” Butters blurted, even though he wasn’t ready to hear the answer at all. “How many since…?”

Kenny didn’t answer right away. Instead, he leaned down, the heat of his breath brushing Butters’ lips. His eyes burned, not with mockery, but with devastating passion.

“Zero,” he whispered.

And then he kissed him. It was full and sudden and deep, and it knocked the air right out of Butters’ lungs.

Every last gear that makes up the entirety of his mind screeches to a slow, grinding halt. Butters head snaps back from the kiss, unsure of what he’d just heard. Hold on...

“What?” He asks, brows drawn together. “Not one? You?”

Kenny laughed again, harder this time, like the disbelief in Butters’ voice was the most entertaining thing he’d heard in weeks. “That’s the most impressed you’ve ever sounded with me.”

Before Butters could respond, Kenny was pulling him back in, kissing him deep. This time there was nothing gentle about it. He parted Butters’ lips with a sigh, tongue slipping inside like he was thirsty. Their mouths moved in a hot, open rhythm, teeth clashing, lips slick. Butters moaned softly into him, caught off guard by the sheer need that trembled between them.

And then, between kisses, Kenny murmured, “It wouldn’t have been fair to anyone else. I would’ve spent the whole time wishing it was you.”

Butters barely had time to gasp before Kenny whispered again, slower now. An admission.

“And honestly? I don’t think I could’ve gotten it up for anyone else but you.”

Oh.

Butters continues to answer Kenny’s kisses, though his mind is still reeling. All of Butters petty jealousy melts inside him on the spot. The instant headrush would have knocked him over if he wasn’t already laying down.

Kenny’s hand quickly worked Butters’s pants open and tugged them down in one swift, and unceremonious, movement. Butters barely had to move at all. Kenny’s arm raised Butters’ hips with such ease that he was back on the mattress, now fully naked, before he could really understand what was happening.

Now when their hips rolled together, both their bare cocks pressed in a wet slide against one another.

“Ah!” Butters moaned. “K-Kenny—”

With a curse, Kenny pulled away, and Butters let out an audible whine, low and wanting. His lips were kiss swollen, his breath ragged, and for a moment he nearly reached for Kenny’s arm to pull him right back down.

But then he saw Kenny step to the side, open the drawer of the nightstand with practiced ease, and start digging around.

He found it in seconds, the bottle of lube Butters kept stashed in the back corner. Kenny paused when he held it in his hand, and Butters saw the flicker of something cross his face. His brows twitched, his mouth pulled slightly to the side. The bottle was half empty.

Still, Kenny recovered quickly. He popped the cap open, poured a generous amount onto his fingers, and coated them with steady, practiced motions.

Butters’ breath hitched. He arched instinctively. But just when he thought Kenny would finally touch him where he needed it most, Kenny surprised him by wrapping a calloused hand around Butters’ flushed cock. 

“You’re so fucking beautiful,” Kenny’s hand stroked with an increasingly steady rhythm. He mumbled something, praise and words of adoration against Butters’s mouth. They kissed. The intoxicating taste of Kenny’s tongue, the smell of him, drowning Butters’ senses. Kenny permeated every corner of his mind, and Butters wasn’t one to fight it.

Kenny seemed content to leave his own erection, dribbling down his length and onto Butters’ thigh. But Butters was growing increasingly restless. He writhed in Kenny’s arms, his legs parting to show his intent. Kenny ignored him. His other hand kneaded Butters’s thigh, and that was also extremely distracting.

“Kenny,” Butters groaned.

Kenny ignored him still. 

“Please, Kenny. Please, please, just—” A hot trail of tears fell down his cheeks. A fact Butters will never forget about Kenny, found rather early on in their relationship: dacryphilia, a (not so) hidden kink.

And he was rewarded immediately.

Kenny licked up the salty tears, and without preamble, dipped a finger between Butters’ cheeks. Kenny kept his gaze on Butters as his finger pressed in. Butters’ mouth fell open, and Kenny’s pupil dilated so widely it must not have been natural. He stared, entranced, watching Butters as his finger dipped past his knuckle. Sunken deep into Butters.

Butters’ hands scrambled for purchase, and Kenny groaned as Butters’ nails carved into his skin. The sound, guttural and animalistic, made Butters’ cock twitch with excitement. It must have been written on his face (he realized, belatedly, that he was smiling) and Kenny smiled back in turn. 

Butters pressed their chests together, his mouth against Kenny’s ear, he whispered. “Hurry.”

“Baby,” Kenny moaned. He added two more fingers without warning. The sudden stretch punched the air out Butters’ lungs.

“Fuck!” Butters mewled.

“I want you, so much,” Kenny groaned. His fingers fucked into Butters incessantly. There was no delicacy to Kenny’s actions. This Kenny was rough, despite his initial tenderness. He was desperate and starved, and Butters adored it.

Butters chased his fingers, hips pushing back weakly. “You, ah, have me,” he moaned when Kenny’s fingers curled inside him, pressing exactly where Butters wanted him to. Butters’ legs trembled, his whole body was on fire. He had no problem locating all the spots Butters thought he might have to relearn.

“I’m yours, Kenny,” the words spilled, unbidden, “I always have been.”

Kenny’s movements stuttered. “I’m sorry,” he kissed Butters’ neck, “for taking so long,” his fingers slipped out of Butters, and his hand guided his own cock to Butters’ entrance. “I’m yours too,” he pressed the tip into the tight heat, “I’m also yours.”

The two of them moaned. Kenny’s cock was nothing like his three fingers. They never could’ve prepared Butters for the sheer stretch. The sting of it sending a spark up Butters’ spine. Kenny now pushed slowly, fully aware, finally, of how Butters’ body struggled to accommodate his girth. It hasn’t been a while since he’s had anything down there, but it has been a long time since he’s had anything so big. 

“A-are you okay?” Kenny was sinking slowly into him, and Butters thought his insides were slowly being scrambled. What the— ? He cursed. He couldn’t form a response. His lungs strained for air. Too much. Too much too much— 

“You feel so good,” Kenny continued. His praise helped. Finally, after an agonizing amount of time, Kenny sunk completely into him. His balls pressed flat against Butters’ ass.

They stayed still, panting against each other’s mouths like two animals in heat. When he finally catches his breath, Butters rolled his hips. “Kenny,” he drawled.

Kenny licked Butters’ jaw. “Hm?”

Butters pushed against Kenny’s chest. And Kenny, caught off guard, didn’t resist.

It was a testament to just how unguarded he was with Butters, how open and pliant he’d become in his hands. With a twist of limbs and a shuffle of breathless momentum, Butters managed to roll them, flipping their positions until Kenny’s back met the mattress with a soft thud.

Now Butters straddled him, flushed and wide eyed, hair slightly mussed, chest heaving. Kenny blinked up at him, clearly startled but not displeased. His eyes flared, wide and dark, and his hands instinctively rose to steady himself, bracing on either side of Butters’ waist.

Butters could feel the heat of those palms through his skin, grounding him.

For a long beat, neither of them moved. They just looked at each other, Kenny laid out beneath him, lips parted, expression unreadable but open. Waiting. Butters had seen him like this before, in a hundred different ways, but never quite like this.

There was no smug grin this time. No teasing glint in his eye. Just reverence. Complete surrender.

And Butters felt it again, that aching knowledge that for all the years and all the fame and all the mistakes, Kenny had never looked at anyone else the way he looked at him.

Not like this.

Butters inhaled slowly. He ignored how it trembled, and the quivering of his thighs, too. He rose, using his strength, and nearly pulled off of the entirety of Kenny’s sizable cock. They moaned. Butters’ hands found purchased on Kenny’s taut abs. Gods, his whole body was fashioned out of marble, just as cold and perfect as Butters remembered. The years have done nothing to him in appearance. Butters could feel his heart hammering in his throat, his ears ringing. In one swift, and surprisingly controlled movement, he sunk fully down to the hilt. He felt Kenny’s cock against his stomach, his eyes rolled back.

They were both loud and babbling nonsense to each other. Garbled praise punctuated by the most vulgar moans. Kenny’s hands dug at Butters’ sides, helping to support Butters’ movements. He had found the right angle, leaned forward slightly, and he was keening in Kenny’s lap. 

His cock dribbled onto Kenny’s stomach. Filthy beads wetting fair skin. He knew he wouldn’t last long, but he was also growing increasingly tired. 

“Ah, ah, K-Kenny, ah, fuck—!”

Sensing his frustration, Kenny’s arm wrapped around his waist and with all the grace of a mountain lion, he spun them once more. Butters’ back hit the mattress with a surprisingly soft thud. Kenny, somehow, had cradled Butters’ head tenderly onto the pillow. They only paused for a short moment, and then Kenny was pounding into him with renewed fervor. Butters’ hand threaded through Kenny’s hair, pulled at the long strands harshly. His nails scraped Kenny’s scalp. His hair was still wet.

If Butters was to describe their sex in one word, it would be indecent. If he was more honest with himself, he’d admit to it being pornographic. His ankles gripped by one of Kenny’s large hands, angled in a way that allowed his cock to drive with expert precision into Butters with each harsh thrust. Maybe, just maybe, Butters begged for him to keep going. To be rough. Rougher. If it hurt, Butters didn’t register it. He was an enraptured mess. Nothing had ever made him feel like this. Kenny fucked him like the world was ending, and that was the only thing he wanted to do before reality crumbled. 

The wet squelching sound they made each time Kenny pulled out, just barely to the tip, before driving back into Butters was only drowned by the hoarse sound of their moans. Sweat dripped down Kenny’s chest, and in the few moments of clarity Butters lapped them up with his tongue. Pressed open mouthed kisses to Kenny’s neck, marked him as he’d always wanted to. A sign that let the world know that he belonged to Butters.

The first orgasm rips through Butters like a spark of lightning. He comes when Kenny’s rough hand wraps around his weeping cock. It only takes a few strokes for Butters to spill all over Kenny’s hand. And then, as if nothing had happened, Kenny keeps fucking into him. Kenny’s stamina both unsurprising and utterly terrifying, he repositions Butters like a rag doll. Legs flung over Kenny’s shoulders, and his hips thrusting shallow like a dog in heat. His second orgasm is a hot and heady thing, with Butters once more on Kenny’s lap, chests pressed together. The third, promised one came utterly out of nowhere. Bursting from him weakly, wringing out the last of what Butters had to give. 

At some point the human body gives in. Butters, spent and overstimulated, can’t come anymore. He feels thick trickles of come trailing down his thighs and ass. Both he and Kenny were spent. Butters’ cock lay, finally flaccid, against his stomach, but every nerve ending was wired; his brain inebriated and useless, he kissed Kenny sloppily. They remain like that for some time, bodies pressed together, bare and sticky with sweat and come. Kenny’s arm curled securely around Butters’ waist, while his other hand wandered lazily up and down the length of Butters’ spine, tracing idle, feather light shapes.

Butters had his forehead tucked against Kenny’s, eyes closed, lips still curved faintly from the last kiss.

“Do I still got it or what?” Kenny murmured, voice low and a little smug, but softened by the aftermath.

Butters huffed out a laugh against his mouth. “I think you know the answer to that.”

Kenny grinned, and for a moment, everything between them felt warm and effortless again. Kenny had a way of making Butters felt as if he was 18, like no time had passed at all. 

It could be like that, again. Butters really, really wanted to believe so. 

“I was lyin’, by the way,” Butters said quietly.

Kenny stilled beneath him. His hand froze mid stroke along Butters’ spine. “What?”

Butters didn’t look away. “’Bout Jake. He wasn’t here to sleep with me. Not tonight. Not ever.”

Kenny’s brow furrowed, eyes searching Butters’ face as if trying to catch the lie before it could escape again. But there was nothing there, just the truth.

“I said it to hurt you,” Butters admitted. “Because I was angry. Because you were actin‘ like I’d already moved on and I—” He broke off for a moment, his voice catching. “I didn’t want to correct ya. I wanted you to feel it. Just for a second.”

If they wanted to build something again, better their foundation start with honesty rather than lies. 

Kenny exhaled slowly, the tension draining from his shoulders all at once. He closed his eyes. 

“I mean… if he was here for that, then that’s—well, that’s not any of my business,” Kenny said, rubbing the back of his neck, eyes darting away for just a second. “But I was jealous.”

He gave a breathy, almost sheepish laugh. “Which, uh… guess that’s something I haven’t grown out of. Apparently.”

Butters chuckled. “You ain’t ever gonna grow outta bein’ jealous, Kenny. That’s just who you are.” And then he adds, “And it ain’t like I don’t get jealous too.”

Kenny’s eyes widened. “You? Jealous?”

Butters nodded. 

“Since when?”

“Since always?” Butters gave a small shrug, eyes drifting down for a second. “Any time I saw pictures of you with somebody good-lookin’. When I’d read all them comments online, folks callin’ you a genius, actin’ like you belonged to them.”

“You’re kidding.” Kenny said, as if this was all some big revelation to him. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

“You were at the height of your career. How could I be the one to stall it just ‘cause I was feelin’ petty and jealous?”

Kenny’s face twisted, equal parts guilt and disbelief. “It’s not petty. Shit, baby, if had known—“ He stopped himself, mouth hanging open for a breath, then closing with a swallow. “I would like to think I would’ve done something, but looking back, maybe I would have brushed you off.”

Butters stayed quiet, watching as Kenny dragged a hand down his face in visible frustration. Kenny may have been an absent husband, but he’s got in multiple scandals for the blunt ways he’s shut down dating rumors. He had made his relationship with Butters known, so Butters had no real reasons to be jealous, and yet he had been anyway.

“I’m not that guy anymore,” Kenny said, and this time, he met Butters’ eyes without wavering.

There was so much packed into that look—remorse, hope, fear, love—that Butters couldn’t begin to name it all. It’s like seeing the boy Butters thought he lost.  

“I know words don’t count for much, so I don’t just want to say it, I want to show you.” He reached out, hand on top of Butters. “I’ll prove to you I’m not that dumbass who left you lonely anymore.”

The warmth of Kenny’s hand in his was steady, but it didn’t wash away all bad things like it used to. Butters wanted to believe him, god knows he did, but trust wasn’t something that came back with a kiss or a promise. Not after everything. 

“I want to believe you,” Butters said softly, fingers curling slightly around Kenny’s. “I really do.”

Kenny didn’t move. 

“But I’m scared,” Butters continued. “I don’t think I could survive going through all that again. Watchin’ you slip away. Feelin’ like I ain’t enough.”

His voice broke on that last word, and he hated how raw it sounded.

Kenny nodded once, solemn and slow. “I will never let you go through that again. Just…give me another chance, please. I won’t mess it up this time. I won’t.” 

Butters looked down at their hands, his thumb brushing absently over Kenny’s knuckles. His heart thudded, loud in the silence. 

“And if you decide you don’t want me after all,” Kenny continued, more softly now, “or if it stops working—if it hurts more than it heals—then you can walk away. You won’t hear from me again, if that’s what you want.”

Butters glanced up, and Kenny’s eyes were wide and unguarded, sincere.

“But please don’t give up on me before I get the chance to fight for this. I know I hurt you, I know I failed you, but let me try to make it right. Just once. That’s all I’m asking for. One shot.”

Butters exhaled through his nose, a short breath that might’ve been a laugh. He gave the tiniest smile, the kind that didn’t quite reach his eyes but tried.

“Okay,” he whispered, the word wrapped in a breath that felt like letting go. Like opening a door he thought he’d locked for good.

Butters shifted closer, pressing a soft kiss to Kenny’s shoulder, chaste, but meaningful. “A part of my heart still beats for you, Ken,” he murmured against his skin. “Please don’t break it again.”

Kenny leaned forward, resting his forehead gently against Butters’. Their breaths mingled in the stillness between them. Kenny closed his eyes and exhaled, like the weight of hope had finally landed in his arms.

“I won’t.”

Butters smiled, just barely, and brought his free hand up to Kenny’s face, cupping his cheek.

They kissed, gentle this time. No heat. No urgency. When they pulled apart, Butters kept his hand where it was, thumb brushing along Kenny’s jaw.

“This is your last chance,” he murmured, voice even but low. After this… that’s it. If you go and break my heart again, Kenny, I ain’t gonna be here to help you pick it up.”

Kenny’s arms slid around him without hesitation, pulling him in like muscle memory. Butters closed his eyes and let the silence settle, softer now, filled not with distance but the breath of someone finally returned.

Outside, the world went on—cars passing, a wind brushing the window glass—but in that bedroom, there was only stillness. Only warmth, and the sound of two hearts trying to remember how to beat in rhythm again.

And for the first time in a long time, Butters let himself believe they just might.