Shotgun!

First Times

"You've never tried this before?"

Butters watches as Kenny packs the itty-bitty green nuggets into the pipe's bowl, anxiously squeezing his crossed ankles. "No. Well, I've smelled it once I think while walking over the bridge near the storage place, but I'm not sure if it was weed or if smelling it counted."
"No," Kenny says, smiling a little, "it doesn't count, Bunny."
They're sitting in Kenny's backyard up against his house, facing the field of dead grass that's poking through the melting snow. They would have been inside to do this but Kenny's mom showed up earlier than she was supposed to. Spring means longer sunsets, but the light is fading fast, and so is the warmth; Butters shivers, and his breath mists in front of his face as he waits for them to get started. Kenny is either immune to the cold or choosing to ignore it, his hand steady as he pulls out a blue lighter from his parka's pocket. 
"I'm gonna let you get used to it," Kenny says, snapping the ignition on the lighter a few times and watching the flame as it fights the breeze. Butters admires the glow of it reflecting on his face.
"What does that mean?"
Kenny shrugs. "Gonna take a few hits myself, show you how to do it right, and let you smell it for real."
"Uh. Is it... something that requires getting used to?"
"Eh, yeah. People react to things differently. It might make you anxious."
"Huh?" Butters nearly squeaks. "But I thought you said it takes away anxiety?"
"It does, but if you're apprehensive it might make it worse at first." Kenny presses the butt of the lighter into the bowl, packing the weed tighter inside while he talks. "You'll be fine, don't worry. We'll take one hit and see what happens."
Butters exhales and nods. He trusts that Kenny won't let anything bad happen to him. "Okay."
Kenny sparks the flame, brings the pipe to his lips and lights it. Butters watches how he closes his eyes, how the herbs in the bowl burn a bright orange as he breathes in slowly and deeply, and then holds it. Soon, smoke issues from his lips in a steady stream into the air. The smell immediately hits Butters and his face contorts.
"It gets better," Kenny says, his voice a little raspier and lower in a way that makes the hairs on Butters' skin rise. His head falls back against the wall. "Much better."
"Uh..." Butters fidgets, unsure if he should be responding or doing something else. Kenny then offers the pipe, not pulling his sleepy gaze from the fading skyline.
"Just breathe in while you light it. Make sure to hold the hole closed on the side with your thumb."
Unable to believe that this is already happening, Butters accepts the objects with stunned, complacent silence.
The pipe is made of glass and cold against his fingers like a door handle in January as he takes it in one hand and the lighter in the other. He doesn't want to have to ask Kenny what to do again, so he tries it on his own.
The mouth of the pipe is a little wet from where his lips pressed against it. Butters can feel his ears burning at the thought as he presses it to his own, lights the flame over the bowl, and breathes in.
Fire sears down his throat. He nearly drops the pipe as he's seized by a terrible coughing fit, his eyes watering and his mouth flooding with saliva as it tries to heal the sensation of scorch marks inside his lungs.
Out of the corner of his eye he sees Kenny offering him a bottle of water. He takes it gratefully, gulping down half of it in one go. He wipes his face with the back of his hand and makes a loud 'Whoo!' noise.
"Wow! That hurt. But I did it!" he says proudly, handing the pipe back to Kenny, who hasn't stopped staring at him. "I smoked."
"No, you didn't."
Kenny turns to face Butters, looking inside the bowl. He holds his hand out for the lighter, and Butters places it in his palm with his head hanging. "You just burnt it."
"O-Oh. Sorry." Butters is starting to fidget with his hands. The smell is everywhere, trapped under his nose, in his mouth, inside his head. "It sure feels like I did, though."
Kenny takes another hit, the flame briefly casting light onto his sandy blond fringe, the speckle of dirt on his nose next to a week-old bruise. He holds it for a long time, but rather than let the vapor escape from his mouth, it oozes from his nose like steam from a dragon. Butters can't restrain his hushed wow.
"Maybe a little, but not really. Here."
Kenny tries to help Butters this time, holding the pipe to his mouth and lighting it for him, instructing him step by step when to breath, but the same thing happens. As soon as Butters feels the smoke entering his lungs he drops his head and starts hacking, his cheeks boiling with pain and mounting embarrassment. Nothing goes right for him– he can't even be a proper delinquent. 
"I-I'm sorry, Kenny," he says, his voice cracked and tired, unable to face his friend sitting patiently in front of him. "I'm just not cut out for this sort of thing, I guess. It figures. But I don't wanna ruin your good time. You can keep smoking if you want."
Kenny purses his lips, the corner of them turning up as he quietly observes Butters. He's thinking pretty hard about something, Butters can tell– probably about all the weed that was wasted on his pathetic smoking attempts.
"We can try shotgunning," he says casually, and Butters looks up, realizing that Kenny is closely studying his face, anticipating a strange reaction.
"What's that?"
Kenny laughs under his breath, turning his attention down to the pipe in his hand and poking at the weed with his finger. "It's when someone else breathes the smoke directly into you. It's pretty common. The effect wouldn't be as strong, but it'd still work. And you wouldn't feel that burn."
"Directly...into you?"
Butters' mind helplessly conjures a familiar image, a forbidden one in Kenny's actual presence, and his hands fly up to cover his mouth.
"You don't mean..." He swallows, the muffled word barely able to escape through his fingers. "...Kissing."
"No, I mean, kind of. But no. Our mouths don't have to touch– I could just blow onto your face. But..." As if to prove his point, Kenny ignites the lighter and the flame whips violently in the wind. "It's pretty breezy. The smoke will get everywhere else before it gets into you."
The image morphs a little, becoming slightly more bearable, more possible, and part of the knots in Butters' stomach unwind, but sneaking in their place is a small pit of disappointment. Butters drops his hands into his lap, twiddling his thumbs rapidly as Kenny moves to sit back against the wall. He can no longer feel the cold.
"You don't have to," Kenny offers gently, and Butters looks over at him as he lights the pipe and takes another hit. He's pulled the hood of his parka over his head though; Butters can only see his nose and then the smoke spilling into the air. "It's no big deal. I can finish this bowl."
"No."
Butters surprises himself too when he blurts it out so bluntly; Kenny turns to meet his eyes, but Butters is quick to drop his gaze and start fidgeting again.
"N-No, I mean, I want to do this. I said I would, and I don't want to back out."
Kenny chuckles. It's loose, tumbling freely from his chest. "You're funny. It's not like you're failing an exam if you don't do it."
"But..."
He wants to. Gosh, he really wants to. An opportunity to kiss Kenny has been handed to him on a silver, slightly smoky platter and he will not pass it up just because he's nervous about being upfront about it. Butters gulps, then face Kenny directly, sitting on his knees and squaring his jaw.
"I want to, Kenny." He probably looks so serious. "I want to get high with you."
Kenny sort of freezes there. There's a misty, faraway look in his eyes; he stares so long that Butters thinks he's going to turn him down, but eventually, he nods.
"Sure. Cool."
Butters' heart kicks high into his throat, beating boldly against his eardrums. It's happening. Kenny scoots to sit in front of him, seeming much more at ease in his crisscrossed position. He bites his lip as he moves the weed around in the bowl, taking his time, and Butters fights the need to bounce his leg or tap his finger on his thigh.
"Ready?"
Butters licks his lips and nods. He swears Kenny's eyes flick briefly to them before moving away. Kenny holds up the pipe, brings it to his mouth, and lights it. His chest expands as he breathes in, and then he's setting it aside and leaning into Butters until their lips connect.
Butters almost forgets that his mouth has to be open, waiting awkwardly for something to happen while they're both as still as petrified wood. He thinks Kenny's eyes are open, but he's not sure, too afraid to sneak a peek. Kenny makes a grunting sound, and Butters remembers what they're actually trying to do and opens his mouth, and then Kenny's lips part and breathe a lung full of smoke into him.
The taste is what's most immediately overwhelming, along with the smell, pouring into his head and making him forget for only a moment that Kenny's lips are attached to his. But he feels tension easing out of him, muscles unwinding, and slowly everything makes a lot more sense. Like how Kenny pulls back to take another hit and immediately leans back in, or how when he makes a strained keening sound Kenny mirrors it, and it's so normal, so alright, that he doesn't question it when Kenny lifts his hand to hold his jaw or stop his own from resting on his bicep.
"Whoa..." he says, registering that he's speaking a second too late. He likes seeing the vapor spilling out from his mouth. "It's...nice."
"Mhm." Kenny sits back, not dropping his hand from Butters' face. His fingers are icy. It feels good. "You want to try a real hit now?"
Butters considers it, but he just shakes his head. "I wanna keep kissing."
Kenny laughs. "Shotgunning?"
He giggles with him. "Yeah? Sure seems like kissing to me, though."
Butters can't control his laughter, especially when Kenny won't stop smiling at him like that, or looking at him, and he feels like the star of a show he never knew he was casted in, but he loves it. He loves how his thoughts are free-floating in his brain like little bumblebees and there's nothing to stop them, he likes how close Kenny is, how warm he is, how squishy and malleable he is in Kenny's gentle hands.
"Your lips are really soft," he says while Kenny is trying to breathe more smoke into him, but the talking lets it all escape and Kenny seems to give up, too. "Like, wow, Ken. Kenny. Kenneth? Does anyone call you Kenneth?"
"Haha, nope." Kenny is cupping his face in his hands and pecking his lips repeatedly, and Butters is falling into his chest, a melting pile of slush. "I think my mom did, once, when I was younger."
"It's a real nice name." Butters is kissing him back between words. He thinks he hears his voice dropping. A shiver runs through his body when Kenny sighs. "I like your name. Kennnnnnnny. Ken. Kenny." He dissolves into a fit of giggles. Kenny's smile presses against the corner of his mouth.
"I like when you say my name." A hand wanders to the back of Butters neck, slipping under the collar of his shirt. "Everything that you say, you mean. You're sincere. "
"Really?"
"Mhm." 
Kenny is practically holding Butters upright now; he wants to wrap himself around Kenny's body, soak up his heat, open himself up so that he can share everything he's seeing and feeling with Kenny. Instead he just opens his mouth, letting out a light, fluttery giggle when his tongue slips out to lick Kenny's lips and Kenny licks back. Butters has never kissed anyone like this– it's wet, messy, warm spit and cold hands, and Kenny tastes like weed and watermelon bubblegum as his tongue moves against his own. He groans, grabbing a fistful of his orange parka to pull him closer.
"Hey," Kenny says, raspy and deep, leaning slightly back from Butters' persistent lips. "We should go inside. It's getting cold."
"I'm not cold?" Butters says with a sing-song lilt, but as soon as Kenny is apart from him he feels the windblast against his face and his throat dry up, in dire need of water. Reality sneaks itself into their moment and breaks it.
Butters looks into Kenny's half-lidded eyes. He must know how late it is. How long have they been out here? A half-hour? How long have they been kissing? His lips tingle a bit with numbness, and Kenny's are red like his splotchy, pale cheeks. His heart sinks as he reaches up a hand to touch them, his thumb brushing over a healing split lip.
"I-I should go home." The sun has set long ago, but at least the sky retains some greyish light; once the stars are out it's past his curfew. He sees Kenny deflate a bit, his sleepy eyes blinking slowly at him. "I'll get grounded."
"Oh. Yeah, I know." His hand falls from Butters' neck. He reaches for the pipe, sticking the lighter in his pocket and dumping the leftover weed and ashes into a little baggy. "It's cool."
"Um..." Butters stares at his hands as he rubs them together. The air between them has gone stale. He tries to fit the words together in his head before he says them, but they come out anyway. Unrefined but raw. "Do you wanna do this again?"
"This?" Kenny glances at him. "Hang out? Of course."
"No, I mean. Smoking." He scoots closer, closing the distance that Kenny had created between them. "I want to again. I like it. But..." He laughs again, better the more that he allows himself to speak. "I want you to help me like you did."
"Shotgunning?"
"Kissing."
Kenny goes quiet, but lets out a soft 'oh' that gets muffled by his parka as he buries his chin into it. Butters is satisfied with it, content to watch Kenny be quietly flustered with himself. He's grateful for what the weed has allowed him to see, this new side of Kenny that he never would've known, how it's brought them closer. 
He walks home by himself. Kenny was right; he feels almost no anxiety when he sees his parents, anticipates no argument, no chastisement. He just calmly heads to his room, gets ready for bed. It's really nice.
Before he falls asleep, his phone lights upon his pillow. He reaches for it, opening a text from Kenny.
tmrw night lets use the rest of the weed. i will help u.
A grin encompasses Butters' face. He buries his happy whine and all his wiggles in the blankets before he lets himself respond as calmly and gracefully as he can.
I'd love to!!! :) <3