Semantically Challenged

That Spaz

Craig

"ACK, NO! THEY'RE COMING FOR ME!"

Thunk.

It was quite possibly the most common and predictable occurrence in all of South Park. At least, Craig Tucker was convinced it was. Heck, the rest of the class didn't even bother to look up from their paper as a soft moan of terror filled the room. Call it callous, but it was just kind of expected at this point.

Bored with his handout on the Mongols, Craig's eyes wandered to the source of the distressed sounds. They often did, he wasn't very good at pretending he didn't stare at the curious phenomenon that was the town spaz.

Though to be fair, Mr. Garrison wasn't exactly the most riveting of fourth-grade teachers in the world. Who could blame him for trying to find something to keep himself occupied?

"Oh, Jesus..." whimpered the object of Craig's attention. Reaching spindly fingers into his wild mane of blond hair that stuck up in every direction, the boy tugged hard and twitched violently, rattling his desk. "They w-want to harvest my –ngh- brain!" Another hard pull on blond locks, almost like he was trying to rip them out of his head.

The rest of the class kept ignoring the twitchy boy, but Craig just tapped his pencil lightly on the side of the desk and wondered, as he often did, if the boy was going to finally just explode. Spontaneously combust even. Token had told him that things like that didn't happen all that often and when they did, it was usually because of too much alcohol in the blood but who knew, maybe caffeine was flammable as well.

As if on cue, the boy fumbled for his large, heavy silver thermos and attempted to open it with shaking and unsteady hands. It didn't work. With a cry of destress, he fumbled it, dropping it onto the carpet floor. Craig watched its progress and passively noted that luckily for the trembling boy, this time, it was closed. Nearly falling out of his chair, the boy scrambled after it. It took several tries, but finally, he managed to get his hands on it and quickly gulped down several long sips of coffee before clambering back into his seat.

The smell of it filled the small classroom.

Okay, so maybe he would just die of a heart attack, Craig mused, drawing loose concentric circles over his paper. That or just never grow past five foot five. Someone should have really told his parents not to give him so much caffeine, it couldn't possibly be healthy. Besides, maybe if they cut back, he'd stop twitching all the time. Or maybe he was addicted and withdrawal would make it worse.

Mr. Garrison started saying something to do with the lesson, but Craig sort of just tuned him out. The spaz, on the other hand, instantly fixed his attention forward, even though he could hardly sit still in his seat. He was trying, god, Craig was pretty sure he was always trying, but it never lasted.

As if on cue, the boy thunked his head on the table again and screeched. The teacher didn't even pause. He's going to leave a bruise there eventually... Craig thought, rolling his eyes. The boy had pale skin, after all, the kind that showed bruises easily and took a while to heal. Was it any wonder then that his arms and legs were always covered in black and blue marks? Still mumbling to himself, something about flesh-eating aliens, the blond scribbled something down on his paper while tugging at his hair with his free hand. Dispassionately, Craig wondered how much hair the boy had if he could just indiscriminately tear it out.

"Craig? Craig!" Jolting out of whatever world he'd been lost in, Craig quickly swiveled his head to face a distinctly displeased teacher. "I have asked you this question twice and you keep ignoring me. Where is your head?"

Craig didn't bother answering this question, it wasn't as if he'd tell the truth and he couldn't think of a good lie to tell instead. Besides, it wasn't as if Mr. Garrison didn't know who he'd been staring at. As if I don't end up staring at him every single day... And he couldn't say that either because he knew the kind of shit he'd get for it if he did.