Craig of the Dead

24. Craig Comes Bearing Gifts (Jerky)

"Ugg...." I groaned, drowsily opening my eyes to the bright light. I could hear many voices chattering at once, their separate conversations becoming one gigantic buzzing noise in my ears. I was lying on my back, curled up in a fetal position on the floor. I blinked again, trying to force my eyes to adjust to the sunlight pouring in through the windows. Every time I blinked, something on my left cheek would throb, which made me wince, which made it sting even more. I would have to sort that out later though. Right now I had to figure out where the hell I had been sleeping.

I propped myself up with one hand to get a better view of the room. I saw a ton boys who were all strewn about, some sitting on desks, some standing around chatting, a couple were drawing dicks on the chalkboard and then having a laughing fit, and a few were asleep on the ground, like I had been. There were also a good amount of girls sitting around, but they were just talking with each other. My legs wobbled as I shakily stood up. I shuffled over to Butters, who was the only person in the room not currently having a conversation. He was sitting quietly in a desk drawing something on a sheet of paper. I passed by Token, who had his arm around Nicole and was telling her a story while she giggled. He paused for a moment to tell me hi. I gave a tiny wave and continued to the back of the room.

"Lu lu lu, I've got some apples. Lu lu lu, you've got some too..." I heard Butters half-sing, half-hum under his breath as he drew. He was drawing a figure, I couldn't tell who, that had ropes restraining their entire body. Despite the cords digging tight into their skin, despite the fact that their eyes were replaced with dark pits, they still held one of the brightest smiles I had ever seen on their face, their hollow eyes beaming. Butters never struck me as the artistic type, but it was a pretty damn good drawing. I could never draw like that. My hands, even at their steadiest, would shake too much to even draw a straight line, much less a whole picture.

"Who's that?" I asked, stopping him in his song and making him jump and drop his pencil on the floor. "Waaa! I didn't mean to frighten you, I'm sorry!"

"It's okay, don't worry." He leaned down to pick his pencil up off the floor and resumed his drawing. "It's no one, just forget about it." He mumbled, concentrating on adding some black liquid dripping out of the eyes and running down the face. The whole thing was pretty dark for Butters "Ray of Sunshine" Stotch. I stared at the sketch a little longer until Butters noticed my gaze and crumpled the sheet up, tossing it on the floor.

"GAH, I JUST MADE YOU RUIN YOUR DRAWING! I'm sorry, I didn't mean to stare!" I exclaimed, reaching to fetch the crumpled ball from underneath the desk, but Butters held it down with his foot.

"Don't feel bad, it was a sucky drawing anyway." He laughed. "So what can I do for you? I'm glad to see that you're up and kicking, with only a few scratches here and there. I didn't get to see you in action, but the stories that some of the fellas are telling are amazing!"

"I really don't remember what happened... it was just all happening so fast, you know?"

"You're so brave, it's crazy. How you took out a whole swarm of zombies single-handedly? Dang..." A warm feeling erupted inside me, it almost took me a moment to process what I was hearing. Someone thought I was.... brave? And it was Butters saying this, so I knew he really meant it.

"Wow, thanks..." I grinned. "But honestly, I had no clue what I was doing the entire time."

"That's okay, that's me every day all day. Oh wait, you're probably wondering where Craig is, he should be popping in any minute now. He's been waiting until you were awake, but he also had to do something with Wendy, so he's just been poking his head in to check up on you."

"Really? I wasn't keep him from doing anything, was I?"

"I dunno. Also, you might wanna wash off your cut, it's looking pretty gross." He said, pointing to my face. Ohhh, so that's what that was. That explained the throbbing at least.