South Park High

Chapter 10-A Heart To Heart

Kyle nervously taped his fingers along the side of the small wrapped present he was holding. Glancing around the desolate parking lot outside the church, he realized he was extremely early for the wedding reception. Even though the wedding was to take place on Tegridy Farms, the Marsh's had decided to do the rehearsal at the church.

Thankfully, Kyle had brought along ear buds to listen to music to help pass the time. At the moment, 'Mr. Brightside' by The Killers was streaming on Spotify.

He sighed in relief when he saw a Red Toyonda Pious pull up, but tensed when he realized the owners of that car. The entire Marsh family along with Skylar filed out of the car.

When Mrs. Marsh saw Kyle sitting on the concrete steps leading up to the door she quickly hurried over.

"Oh you poor dear! You must be freezing out here in the cold!" Mrs. Marsh exclaimed worriedly clutching Kyle's ice cold face with mitten covered hands.

October had just begun and the weather had become a lot colder recently. "Don't worry Mrs. Marsh. I'm fine," Kyle responded trying to assuage the woman's motherly instincts.

Looking down disapprovingly at Kyle, Mrs. Marsh shook her head and scolded him, telling him that he's going to get sick while simultaneously frantically trying to open the doors of the church. Kyle just smiled watching Mrs. Marsh.

She had always been like a second mother to him. When the church doors were finally open, Kyle was greeted with a warm gust of air that soothed his chilled hands and frosty cheeks.

As Kyle was about to enter, someone called his name. Turning around, Kyle was greeted by the very person he was doing his best to avoid. "Can we talk?" Stan begged giving Kyle a pained expression.

Even though he wanted to ignore Stan, Kyle knew that he should at least hear Stan out. "You've got 5 minutes," Kyle replied coldly. Avoiding Stan's gaze, Kyle brushed past Stan and headed to a secluded area by the forest surrounding the church.

Stan, realizing that his family was watching the interaction, understood the need for privacy and quickly shuffled over to where Kyle was waiting for him. His family and Skylar quickly headed into the warm church and right before the doors shut, Stan heard his mom call out "don't be outside for too long!"

Stan looked up at his long time best friend with regret. "I'm sorry. I was an insensitive jerk." Kyle just huffed in agreement still refusing to meet Stan's eyes.

"I should have been there for you when you found out your mom was cheating on your dad."

A few moments of silence later, Kyle looked up and took in the sincerity in Stan's eyes. "It's okay man. I definitely overreacted about Wendy. She's your girlfriend. Of course you are going to want to talk about her."

"Friends?" Stan offered, holding out a hand as a gesture of good will.

"Sure," Kyle agreed. He grasped Stan's clothed hand and gave it a firm shake. Smiling at the boy before him, Kyle gestured towards the church "Do you wanna go in? It's getting cold out here." Stan agreed silently by nodding, and followed the red head back towards the church.

Since Stan was Skylars best man, Kyle was left alone waiting for the wedding rehearsal to begin.

After an hour, the wedding rehearsal was beginning at last. It had taken forever for everything to be set up and all the guests to arrive.

Sitting in the hard wooden seats was starting to take a toll on his back, so Kyle decided to sneak out of the ceremony hall to stretch his legs for a bit.

Since Kyle was Jewish, he had never spent much time in the church and was excited to explore it. The church was a massive historic building with colorful stained glass windows depicting scenes from the bible and adorned with golden embellishments.