There's Just No Winning {Kyman}

Guilt

The night sky loomed over the town of South Park, barely a cloud in sight. Moonlight glittered on the empty streets. Most people were peacefully resting, recharging their slumbering bodies for the next sunrise. Cartman, however, was wide awake, mind racing a mile a minute.

Eric sat in his bed, contemplating hard. He may have decided recently that he wanted to try being nice to Kyle, but actually committing and putting that thought to action was a lot harder than anticipated. Somehow, every time he attempts to talk to Kyle they always end up arguing and Cartman gets too caught up in the moment to put an end to his banter. He wants to be nice and friendly, but the thought of opening up or being vulnerable was sickening. It took a long ass time for him to even open up to his therapist and stop lying to him. Oh yeah, therapy. Kyle- along with everyone else- doesn't even KNOW about therapy. Not like he'd ever tell them, that would be the equivalent of admitting he has actual emotions- and more specifically ones that he doesn't like.

Kyle- right, Kyle, that's what he's supposed to be thinking about. Cartman wants to apologise to him. For what, specifically? That's a good question. A lot of things really, but more specifically what has he done TODAY that he wants to make amends for? All Cartman knows is that he feels bad. He feels... Guilty. He shivers, that's an emotion he doesn't experience very often. In fact, it's quite a new emotion. Usually, guilt isn't even an emotion he has, but his days of manipulating people have long passed.

Cartman rethinks the day, specifically everything he did to piss Kyle off. Firstly, he called him a Jew at LEAST twice. Secondly, he wouldn't stop following Kyle even though he yelled at him to stop. Oh, and he made a bunch of suggestive flirty comebacks.

At this point, Cartman isn't sure if there even is a chance at friendship with Kyle.

But he has to try.

Cartman gently picks up his phone and cradles the device in his palms. The screen flashes on, illuminating the room and temporary blinding Cartman as he fumbles to pull up the settings in order to darken the screen. After successfully changing the brightness to a percentage that wasn't physically painful, he tapped on the green application labelled "messages." Cartman took a breath in and exhaled slowly in an attempt to slow his furiously increasing heart rate. He really was about to apologise. To KYLE of all people! What happened to him?

'Hey' Cartman slowly typed out. He forced himself to hit send before he could second guess this action. What was he thinking? What is he doing? Kyle will just see this as him trying to rip on him more! It's too late now, Cartman decided. He glanced back at his device to see nothing but the word "read" underneath his message. Rude.

'I want 2 talk' he quickly fumbled his fingers across the tiny keyboard. Cartman has always had awful texting, he knows it irritates the hell out of Kyle and that's why he started doing it in the first place. It pisses him off beyond belief. Now it's just a habit Cartman doesn't care to correct.

His phone vibrated in his hands. '*to'  is all the text read. Cartman scoffed but was happy to get a response.

'Ok pissbaby' Cartman hit send and immediately regretted it. He's trying to be NICE. God damn it this should not be so hard. 'Sry u arent a pissbaby' he sent not even a minute after.

The message was left on read for a minute and fifty-two seconds- Cartman counted- before Kyle started to reply. 'What do you want, fat ass? I'm trying to sleep. Whatever it is, hurry it up.' Cartman read.

Finally, Cartman has acquired the attention of the elusive Kyle Broflovski. Only one problem, Cartman didn't even think ahead to what he was planning to say. Sure, he knew he wanted to APOLOGISE, but how to phrase it and sound genuine was beyond him. No matter what he said, Kyle was bound to think it was bull shit anyway so why should he even care? But he does care, he cares more than he should.

The sound of a quick buzz brought him back to the situation at hand, the message 'well?' was received. Cartman had to think quickly on what to say or else it would make things so much worse. 'im sry' he sent. 'I mean, I'm sorry' he sent soon after. If he spelt words correctly maybe, just maybe, Kyle would actually listen to him. No, probably not, but it was worth the effort to at least try.

'... For?' Kyle sent back. Cartman was aware that being vague wouldn't do anything, but he has officially gotten Kyle's attention and curiosity.

Well, there is a lot of things Cartman wants to apologise for that happened today. But what to start out with? 'For calling you a Jew' he decided on.

'Okay' was the only response he got. Cartman sighed, this really wasn't going to work, is it?

Cartman typed 'I'm serious' in a sad attempt to persuade Kyle. 'I'm also sorry for following you a bunch today and not leaving u alone' he added. After rereading his message he realised he made an error, '*you' he corrected. He truly just wants to make this friendship possible, so he will correct these mistakes as much as he can.

'Seeing you type in actual words is alarming... Are you okay?' Cartman tried not to smile at Kyle's concern, 'Seriously, are you good?' He sighed. Emotions suck.

'Idk' he typed back without thinking. Shit! Don't be vulnerable! 'Oh and also sorry for any weird shit I said' Cartman thought back to the few sexual remarks he made that really got under Kyle's skin.

'Like what? You say a lot of weird shit.' Kyle replied.

Cartman guesses he doesn't remember, or at least he assumes that it didn't actually affect Kyle that much 'Nvm' he sent back. 'Still sorry though'.

Without another second to think, his phone lit up and started frantically vibrating. Cartman was getting a call. He read "Jew" labelled at the top of his screen. Cartman quickly hit the decline button, forcing the call to end. Texting his feelings was hard enough, TALKING about them is a whole lot worse.

Another text came in from Kyle, 'Are you okay?' A second later another came in, 'Pick up the call. Now.'

The phone went back to its previous state of buzzing, this time Cartman accepted the call. He reluctantly held the phone up to his ear. He almost felt nervous. Almost.

"Hello? Cartman?" A voice rang from the other side of the phone. Cartman sighed.

"Yeah, I'm here," he replied. There was no denying it, he truly was nervous. When they were texting he felt like he had some sort of control. Cartman felt like he could at least somewhat predict the next message that would pop up on his phone. However, he was at a loss at this very moment with no idea where this was going.

A sigh of relief could be heard from Kyle, "What the fuck were all those messages?" Cartman didn't know how to reply, so he didn't, "Were you actually trying to apologise?"

Cartman hesitated, his first instinct was to shout no and call him a Jew, but that would ruin everything he had been trying to accomplish. "Yeah..."

"Bull shit. Are you drunk right now? High? Does someone have you at gunpoint or something?" There was a wave of silence, Eric wanted to say SOMETHING but he couldn't for the life of him think of something. "Answer me, Cartman."

"I'm not high," he spoke firmly, "and I'm not being threatened. I just wanted to say sorry." Kyle didn't respond. "Hello?" Cartman spoke making sure Kyle was still there.

"No, no. I'm here. I just don't believe you," he replied. Ouch. "So what's your next big scheme? Are you trying to become my friend just so you can make me look like a fool for trusting you or something?"

"Next big scheme? Well I guess become friend with you could work, but I don't see the point in making you look like a fool," Cartman attempted to be honest, but even he realises how much that sounds like absolute bull shit.

"I'm going to sleep. Goodnight," Kyle stated.

"Goodnight," Cartman tried to reply, but by the time he started to mutter the words the phone call was already over.

That went better than expected.