Archive of Our Own

It's not even noon when Pete gets fired from the hat store on the first floor. As far as getting fired goes, this one is a really quiet affair.

"Listen, Peter," Mr. Anatoll says in his thick Greek accent, "I don't want to do this. You're a good boy."

Pete sighs and folds his arms, leaning against the display case outside the store. He had organized the hats in it just this morning from coolest to least coolest, berets on the left, baseball caps on the right.

"You don't wanna fire me but you have to, I know the drill, Mr. Anatoll."

The old man looks hurt, like Pete accused him of lying, but really, Pete's been through this process a dozen and one times already. He's figured out that making it short gives him enough time to apply for another job and still be able to get lunch before he has to start work.

"-and it's not even the way you treat customers," Mr. Anatoll says, and Pete tries to pay attention while simultaneously going through possible shops he could apply to. He can't work at the Cheesecake Factory for another month at least, because they only fired him two weeks ago and he still gets that sickly sensation in his stomach when he even smells cheesecake. Trying to see how many cheesecakes he could eat in one hour really hadn't been one of his brighter ideas, but hindsight is always 20/20. "-your passion for hats has just dropped considerably and I can't in good conscience let you-" Maybe he could try at the American Eagle that had opened on the ground floor. Since they were new there was a good chance they didn't know about his track record at the mall, plus it was directly across from The Music Store. Well, almost directly. A lot closer than the hat store was at least.

"Pete?"

Pete's attention snaps back to Mr. Anatoll. "Yeah?"

"I'm really sorry about this and I know you're upset." Pete tries his best to act the part and feels a tiny bit of regret at Mr. Anatoll's heartbroken look at having to let Pete go. "Listen, why don't you pick a hat from the store, take it as a lucky charm for your next job. I'm sure there's a store that you'll be just perfect in." Pete sincerely doubts that, since he's already worked at about forty-seven of the three hundred sixty-nine stores in the mall, but he smiles and shakes Mr. Anatoll's hand anyway, thanking him profusely.

When he goes into the back of the store to get his stuff, a black-knit cap stuffed in the back pocket of his jeans, he thinks that he may have been better off getting into acting. By now he's perfected his getting-fired-from-a-job routine to the point where he almost believes it himself when he says that he's sorry to be fired.

He stuffs the cap into the box of his other things that he never even unpacks anymore, knowing he'll get fired sooner rather than later, and takes one last look around. The back of the store is a tiny room with a small table, a fridge, a few lockers that Mr. Anatoll had bought off the local high school. He snags a few pens off the desk, a stupid habit he acquired after the fifth store he got fired from, taking stuff to remember the store by.

Pete is pretty sure he won't miss the musty smell of hats, some distinct scent that always makes him feel a bit uneasy even though he firmly kept telling himself that they were just hats and there was nothing wrong about their smell. Still, he realizes that for the first time in a while, he feels good again about being fired. The last couple of times he'd regretted getting thrown out, but today it seems like he has all the possibilities in the world again and a shot at the jackpot: a job at a store directly across from The Music Store where Patrick Stump works.

--

"Excuse me?"

Ryan lines up the new bottles of Warm Vanilla Sugar body creams in perfect rows, adjusting one a half a centimeter here, another a quarter of a centimeter there. He takes pride in the fact that the shelves he stocks are so uniform a drill sergeant would be proud. Not that Ryan thinks a drill sergeant would have much to say about the shelf stocking at a Bath & Body Works, but whatever.

"Excuse me, sir?"

The next shelf down is Cucumber Melon body cream, and Ryan narrows his eyes at a rogue tube of Cinnamon Apple lip balm sitting at the end of the row. People are so uncivilized. If it had been a bottle of Cinnamon Apple body cream, maybe he could have written it off as product comparison, but this is lip balm. In his body cream section. The depravity of people knows no bounds.

"Excuse me!"

Ryan turns around, slowly rotating himself so he gets a good view of the store as he goes. It's nearly empty, a couple of teenage girls testing out the body sprays by the door and an older woman squinting to read the label on a bar of soap. The other employees must all be in the back, and if they have touched his new shipment of exfoliating body scrub, Ryan will-

"Are you deaf? I've been trying to get your attention for five minutes! If this is the way customers are treated here, I might just take my business elsewhere." The woman in front of him sniffs haughtily, watching him expectantly. If she thinks she's getting an apology, or better yet, a coupon for a discount, she is sorely mistaken. Ryan gives her a haughty look of his own, looking her over from top to bottom with an obvious sweep of his eyes.

"There's a Target down the street, ma'am. Perhaps you might find what you're looking for there."

The woman's mouth drops open in shock, and her cheeks turn bright red. Ryan watches her leave with a sort of perverse glee, and even his boss calling him into the back for a lecture on customer service can't bring him down. He spends the entire lecture thinking about breakfast, how much he'd enjoyed it and how so much of that enjoyment had been based on the fact that his boss hadn't been present. In fact, once he starts thinking about it, he can pinpoint a lot of times that might not have been quite so fantastic if not for the sheer fact that he wasn't at work and he wasn't within a five-mile radius of this man.

"Sometimes I think you're trying to get fired," his boss sighs, and for a second, Ryan's heart leaps. It should not be leaping, and he has had this discussion with himself more than once - internal organs should not be leaping around just because something exciting happens or someone happens to walk by or talk to him and that someone happens to be Brendon Urie, which is no excuse - especially when getting fired is not something he can afford. If he had another job lined up, maybe. A job that required an extensive knowledge of music, perhaps.

He's halfway through imagining his dramatic quitting scene - complete with his boss begging him to stay because no one else knows how to arrange a shelf quite like Ryan Ross - when his boss says, "You can go." He's not really sure what happened between the last time he tuned in and now, but he's not about to ask for an instant replay. He gets out of there as quickly as he can, although it's not quick enough to miss the look of frustration and disappointment on his boss' face. He revises his quitting fantasy to include a benevolent gesture toward him and forces himself to smile at no less than two customers during the next hour. It's a pretty big gesture on his part.

--

Spencer is about ten seconds from a screaming fit.

"Of course I can look and see if these shoes are available in your size," he says politely, knowing that not even a bigger size will fit the guy he's currently helping. He has the biggest feet Spencer has ever seen, and Spencer has seen a lot ever since he became owner of his own shoe store. He's sort of an expert on feet.

It isn't the guy that's making him this angry at just eleven a.m. though. Spencer is used to customers who always have to insist that yes, pink shoes will fit wonderfully with their new red blazer. He learned a long time ago that not many people know how important choosing the right shoe is. As a matter of fact, there seems to be hardly anybody in this part of the country who has even the slightest clue about footwear. Spencer's pretty sure that he and Ryan are the only people in a fifty mile radius who have good taste in shoes.

The problem, however, isn't the customer with the giant feet. It isn't the woman with her two teenage daughters loudly exclaiming about the lack of service at the store and it certainly isn't the elderly gentleman comparing the thickness of the soles of two shoes clearly aimed at women. No, the problem is that Spencer is alone at the store, has been ever since they opened up at eight. The problem is that Brent hasn't shown up, hasn't called, hasn't given any sign that he wouldn't be there today.

Spencer usually considers himself a rational person, but right now he feels that throwing shoes at people's heads is a very viable option. It won't help at all, but Spencer has the distinct suspicion that it would feel deeply satisfying.

"Young man, we've been waiting for ten minutes for any sort of service," the woman with the two daughters says, and her voice clearly signals 'Serve me now or the consequences will be terrible.' Spencer gives her a polite smile as well, grabs the shoes she shoves at him and disappears into the tiny storage space behind the shop.

It's a small, long room, with shoe boxes stacked to the ceiling and one wobbly ladder that leans against the far wall. Spencer's been meaning to replace it ever since the day he'd bought the shop for a bargain from the previous owner, an old lady who retired and left him most of her horribly outdated shoes. He's never gotten around to it though; the store keeps him on his feet 24/7 even when he's not working there.

Now, Spencer almost trips and breaks his neck on a shipment of stylish Nike sneakers they'd gotten last week. It had been Brent's task to unpack them, and of course he hadn't. As Spencer hurries through the stacks to find the right sized pair of shoes for the two daughters of the furious woman outside and the man with the giant feet, he wonders, not for the first time, why he hasn't fired Brent yet.

They'd been fine in the beginning. Spencer had asked Brent to work for him because he knew Brent needed the money to finance college, and Spencer trusted Brent to not steal from the till and be able enough to sell a couple of shoes. And at first that had been enough. They'd established a good working relationship, Spencer selling the shoes to customers and Brent doing everything else. They got the store up and running and for a while Spencer was sure it had been the right decision to do this, quit college, have his own store. He didn't make a fortune but it was good enough to live on and that was all he needed.

Then from one day to the next Brent changed, something about him was different, Spencer sensed it that very first time but ignored it. Brent started showing up late, started leaving shoes lying around. At first Spencer cleaned up after him, rationalizing the problems away with, "Everyone has a bad day," and "Maybe he just forgot," and "Maybe I'm overreacting."

And then Brent didn't show at all. Spencer remembers the exact day, a few weeks ago, how he'd been looking at the door and at the clock every five minutes, hoping, hour after hour, that Brent would still show. In the end Jon from Starbucks helped him out during his lunch break and even Ryan helped to sell a pair of shoes, although he claimed it was only because he felt pity for the badly-dressed man.

Spencer had called Brent that evening, furious and hurt, and Brent had made excuses and promised that it would never happen again.

Two weeks later it happened again.

As he balances on top of the ladder now, trying to grab the pair of Mary Jane's in size seven from the top shelf at the back, Spencer slowly realizes that he needs to act now. He's been sheltering Brent for too long; hell if he's really, really honest with himself, he's probably been keeping him around for so long because he'd always sort of hoped that they could be...something more.

"Stupid," Spencer mumbles and carefully steps down the ladder, three boxes of shoes balanced in his arm. "So stupid."

On the way back out to the sales floor Spencer almost trips over the still-sealed shipment of shoes again, stumbling his way into the store. When he puts the three boxes of shoes down, he realizes the man with the giant feet has disappeared. So has the mother with her two daughters - he catches a glimpse of her as she rounds the corner outside in a huff. And the man who'd been comparing shoes has left as well, taking both pairs of shoes with him. It reminds Spencer that he'd asked Brent to figure out if the alarm system by the door was working properly.

Spencer blankly stares at the two gaping holes in the shoe racks and then heavily sits down on a chair.

"Shit," he says emphatically and looks at the clock. It's only 11:25.

--

"Heads up, Iero at three o'clock," Mikey says, not looking up from his comic book.

Gerard's head snaps up, and he looks around wildly, letting out a breath of relief when he doesn't see anything. "You are the worst brother, Mikey, that's not even-"

"My three o'clock, Gee."

Gerard whips around and slams his elbow into a pile of comics just in time for Frank to walk in and see them crash into a massive heap on the floor. Gerard ducks down behind the counter and stares up at Mikey pleadingly.

"Hey Frank. He's not in. Even though I'm pretty sure you were here long enough to see him...leave."

Frank leans his elbows on the counter and hoists himself up and over so he can peer down at Gerard. "You want some help picking those up?"

Gerard squeezes his eyes shut and counts to five. When he opens them, Frank is still there, grinning down at him, and Gerard's cheeks are still flaming. "Uh. Yeah, sure, just give me a second, I have to find this thing I dropped." He feels around on the floor, scowling up at Mikey out of the corner of his eye. "Aha!" He pretends to pick something microscopic up between his thumb and forefinger. "Got it."

When Gerard stands up, Frank slides off the counter and squints, trying to see what he's holding. Gerard quickly stuffs it in his pocket. "My uh. Contact."

Frank doesn't stop grinning. "I didn't know you wore contacts."

"Yeah, yep! Bad eyesight. Runs in the family, you know."

Mikey rolls his eyes.

"Won't it dry out in your pocket?" Frank props his elbows back on the counter and rests his chin in his hands, still smiling the cocky grin that's making Gerard stutter all over himself.

"Um...no? It's...they're new. Very durable. Hey, I should probably get those comics picked up." Gerard ducks down and starts shifting the comics into some semblance of order, rolling his eyes and mouthing very durable, oh my god.

Frank drops down to help, getting about five picked up before he zeroes in on one. "Oh, hey, the new X-Men is out? Mikeyway, I specifically told you to call me when this came in, you lazy fucker."

Mikey flips a page in his comic and raises his middle finger. "Gerard's in charge of calling for holds."

Gerard drops the stack of comics he'd picked up and splutters, "I. I am not! We don't even do holds!"

Frank giggles and grabs the comics Gerard had dropped, adding them to his own pile. When the comics are neatly stacked on the counter again, Frank goes back to leaning against it, his shirt hitching up in the back to reveal the swirl and dip of a tattoo. Gerard tries not to look - really, valiantly tries not to look - but Frank's also wearing a pink belt, which is very eye-catching, and Gerard really can't be blamed for just looking where his eye is drawn.

Frank smirks when he catches Gerard looking. "So does this mean you're finally gonna go out with me?"

Gerard forces himself to start doing some figures on a piece of paper labeled "The Black Parade - Monthly Expenses." There's a note from himself at the bottom that reads accountant says coffee can be deducted as a day-to-day business expense!!! He's trying to tally, and he's fairly sure that one hundred and seventy-nine minus eighty-four does not equal two hundred and eleven, but for some reason his brain isn't cooperating. Mostly his brain just wants to scribble down Frank! under every column of numbers. "No, it does not."

Frank goes into an exaggerated slump. "You wound me. Okay, let's hear it."

Gerard looks up, confused. "Hear what?"

"Your latest excuse. I think so far we've heard: you're too old, I'm too young, you're not ready to date again, we don't have anything in common, you won't date while Mikey's still single, you're too busy with work, and I think once you even tried to pretend you weren't into guys. At this point I'm expecting something good, Way. It better be a vow of chastity or a terminal illness."

Gerard draws himself up to his full height, which granted, isn't that much taller than Frank, but it makes him feel a little more authoritative. He needs that boost if he's going to make it out of this still single. "Those weren't excuses! Those were perfectly valid and true reasons why we shouldn't-" Frank opens his mouth, but Gerard corrects himself quickly. "Why we can't date."

Frank holds up a finger. "We are five years apart. I'm legal, you're not in a nursing home, that takes care of too old and too young." Gerard does not agree with that definition of "too old," but he refrains from saying so. It's not like it's ever gotten him anywhere with Frank in the past.

Frank holds up another finger. "Your last relationship was over a year ago, and I know for a fact you guys have worked it out amicably." Gerard frowns, and Frank amends, "After some serious issues, yeah. I work with your ex, believe me, I know all about them." Gerard flushes. His relationship with Bert had been short, loud, and exceedingly prone to being caught during awkward moments in public places. All things also true of Bert himself.

"That takes care of that," Frank continues. "We are both fans of comics, music, horror movies, cheese fries at twenty-four hour diners, and Mikeyway, and those are just the first things that come to mind. Mikey is not technically single, your business is steady but not overwhelming, and as for not being into guys, well. Example one: your ex, and example two: you staring at my ass just now." Frank ticks off three more fingers, and grins at Gerard like he's expecting an award any minute now for Figuring Out Ways Around Being Told No.

Gerard's speechless for about thirty seconds, and then he turns on his heel to glare at Mikey. "What do you mean, 'not technically single'? What does that even mean?"

Mikey finally looks up from his comic. "I didn't say I wasn't technically single."

"Oh, is it official now?" Frank grabs the comic out of Mikey's hands and flips through it, pretending like he's not leering over the top of the pages.

Mikey levels an even look at him before turning his placid gaze on Gerard. "It's nothing. We've gone out a couple times, that's it."

Gerard has a sinking feeling in his stomach. "Who?"

Later on, Gerard has to explain to a surly pair of security guards that when he shouted, "GABE SAPORTA?!?" he really didn't mean for it to carry all the way down from the first floor to the pet store on the ground floor, and he's very sorry that Gabe then felt the need to crow and do a victory dance that included taking off his shirt in the middle of a crowded mall, and he's really, truly regretful of any actions he took that may have led to said security guards having to wrangle a half-naked Gabe out of the public eye.

It is a small consolation that Frank looks genuinely sorry to have brought it up and offers to refrain from asking Gerard out for at least twenty-four hours.

--

Patrick's late, so incredibly late. The fact that the walk from his car at the back parking lot to his store seems to take forever today only makes it worse. He juggles two boxes of new records he bought over the weekend, a suggestion folder that has been sent down by the Mall Celebration Committee on top. It's full of helpful tips on how he could decorate his store for the upcoming tenth anniversary of the mall. Since his hands had been full, Patrick is now carrying his brown lunch bag in his mouth, full backpack precariously balanced on his shoulder.

As he hurries past the stores on the lower level, trying not to trip over his own feet, Patrick nods at the few people he meets. There's Ryland and Nate investigating the strange-colored water in the fountain in the middle of the central dome and Brendon Urie running in the opposite direction at top speed, probably because he's forgotten to lock up his car again. It happens about twice a week. Patrick's pretty sure no one would ever be silly enough to steal the train wreck that is Brendon's car, but the one time he'd said as much to Brendon, the hurt look on his face had haunted Patrick for weeks after. He ended up letting Brendon come play guitar at the store whenever he wanted. Actually, it hadn't been that bad a deal. It turns out that Brendon's incredibly talented with guitars.

Rounding a corner, Patrick's store comes into view, and he manages to smile despite the bag in his mouth. Patrick loves his store. He loves the mall and the friends he's made here too, but not as much as he loves walking towards his music shop every morning. It's a small store compared to the others, but it's painted a soft faded yellow and looks like it's in a secret back alley in the seedy part of town rather than a polished super mall. He shares the store with his friend Ray, who sells guitars and various other instruments. The store is evenly divided up between records and musical instruments, but usually each section spills into the other, like when they have impromptu improvisation sessions on the floor in front of the jazz records. Or when Patrick starts sorting his CDs next to the Fenders because he can see better there, big display windows never letting in as much light as they theoretically should. It's probably because there's so much stuff in the them. Patrick's pretty sure that the last time they changed the display case was two years ago.

Ray mocks him for being old-fashioned and running his business just like the music stores they visited as kids. Patrick's got a vintage cash register, the kind you have to crank to get the money drawer to pop out, despite all the other stores in the mall upgrading to computer registers years ago. They even have a lumpy old sofa, more vinyl than actual CDs and faded music posters on the wall. The posters had been custom-made to look older than they were; Patrick had paid Tom Conrad down at the photo shop a sizable sum for them. He'd been lucky enough to pick them up before Tom's store had gone up in flames again. No one knew why, but Tom always managed to find a way to set some part of his shop on fire. His friends from the food court regularly give him fire extinguishers for all holidays, but it never does any good.

Surprisingly, Patrick makes it almost to the entrance of his shop without dropping anything when three white rabbits appear out of nowhere, hectically scatter between his feet, and disappear. He turns around to watch them excitedly darting through the decorative greenery. A second later someone crashes into him and Patrick and his boxes go flying.

When he orients himself again he finds Greta Salpeter sprawled out next to him, looking confused.

"Patrick, what...uh. Shit, I ran you over, didn't I?"

"Mmpff," Patrick says, and then realizes he still has his lunch bag in his mouth. He carefully spits it out and gets up, giving Greta a hand. "Yeah, you did, but no problem. Were those rabbits yours?"

"I'm afraid so. Gabe dropped their cage and they took the chance to stage a big escape." Greta frowns and looks back the way she came from, probably sending death glares in Gabe's general direction. "I don't even know why I keep him around, he only causes trouble."

Patrick smiles. "It's because he can sell animals to people like no one else."

Greta rolls her eyes, but there's a smile tugging at the corner of her mouth. She'd hired Gabe a few years ago when she'd figured out her last employee Elisa had been stealing white mice. They never figured out why she did it, but then again Patrick was pretty sure he never wanted to know anyway. At first Greta hadn't wanted to hire anyone, claiming that she could run the store alone, but when she started sleeping there so she could keep up with feeding all the animals, Patrick forced her to find someone new. Gabe hadn't been what she had been looking for - he was loud and weird and he claimed he only wanted to work at the store to learn more about snakes. But he was also surprisingly good with animals - and people - and Greta realized she'd been right in hiring Gabe when he refused to sell a snake to a lady carrying a huge bag that looked suspiciously like it had been made from snake skin.

"Okay, Patrick, I gotta go find my rabbits. You're okay with picking your stuff up? I'm really sorry I can't help but-"

"It's okay," Patrick says. "Go find your rabbits before they start eating the begonias. We all know how management gets when their flowers aren't perfect."

Greta nods. "I'll see you around, Patrick, let me know if I broke anything." She jogs off, waving over her shoulder.

Patrick bends down to pick up the scattered records, haphazardly stuffing them back into their boxes. He'll need to sort them all over again in the store. When he stands back up, trying to find his key among the things still lying about on the floor, something catches his eye. The blue letter box right next to the door is slightly open and a piece of paper is peeking out of the slit. Patrick smiles and goes to take it out.

The letter box is a relic from when he first bought the store, meant for suggestions and complaints. No one had actually used it until a year ago, when someone had started dropping name suggestions in it. They were silly names for what the store should be called, because according to the anonymous person, the name The Music Store was too boring. After it had become apparent that the name suggestions were going to be a serious thing, Patrick had bought a box with flowery patterns at the Van Vleet stationary store to collect them in. Over time the name suggestions had become less frequent, replaced by weird lyrics and bits of words that were either random thoughts by the person or movie quotes, Patrick had never been able to determine which.

Today marks no exception. Patrick unfolds the paper and recognizes the tilted scrawl of the mysterious person. The paper reads: Where is your boy tonight? I hope he is a gentleman, and down at the corner, the writing even less intelligible, it says Patrick's Store of Music. The P of his name is carefully written, bigger than the rest. It makes it look more important somehow, and Patrick smiles. Whoever the lunatic is who keeps dropping these in the mail box, at least it keeps Patrick entertained.

"Is this some sort of riddle?" a voice suddenly says right next to Patrick's ear. Patrick jumps, giving an undignified yelp.

"Ray, what the hell? Stop sneaking up on me like that!"

"Sorry," Ray says, but when Patrick turns around to look at him he doesn't seem very sorry at all. Patrick's about to say something about how Ray is his friend and should therefore refrain from scaring him to death, but Ray leans the guitar he'd been carrying against the window and says, "Need help picking these up?"

Patrick nods. "Sure."

Bending down to collect the last scattered CDs, Patrick quickly stuffs the letter in his jeans pocket. He'll have a look at it again later.

--

"...and it's not like Target isn't a perfectly acceptable alternative to Bath & Body Works, I was just trying to be helpful." Ryan's standing in front of the store, watching an elderly woman suspiciously while he complains to Spencer. The woman keeps moving things around, picking up bottles like she's going to buy them and then setting them back down in completely random spots. Ryan has half a mind to call security, but the last time he did that, Ryland and Nate told him there was nothing illegal about moving things around and then threatened to handcuff him to the pinball machine in the arcade if he called them again. Ryan hates people who move his shit around, but getting stuck in an arcade full of kids is enough to scare him straight.

"At least you didn't get suspended this time," Spencer says, straightening the rack of brightly-colored sneakers outside his own store. He's not as anal about things as Ryan is, but he once flipped out on a woman who was trying to squeeze her size-ten feet into a size-seven shoe. Ryan can still remember the woman's look of horror when Spencer brought out the pictures of mangled feet and told her she had no business wearing shoes at all if she couldn't do it responsibly. Spencer's lucky, though. He's the owner, so there's really no one around to yell at him when he scares his customers off. Ryan hopes to achieve such an ideal working environment someday, preferably at the music store on the ground floor.

"I had to charm my way out of it." Ryan pulls his most charming face, which is mostly just lifting one side of his mouth and blinking.

Spencer says, "It all makes sense now. How could anyone resist that face?"

Ryan ignores him in favor of giving the elderly woman vague glares. She frowns at him and puts a bottle of shampoo in with a display of loofahs. "She's doing it deliberately," Ryan mutters in awe, and the woman narrows her eyes at him and takes one of the loofahs down to shove in with a bunch of candles. "The gall," Ryan says, and he's about to march over there and take down her information for banning purposes when Brendon skids up and grabs his shoulders.

"Ryan!" Brendon's panting, eyes bright and cheeks flushed, and suddenly Ryan can't remember why he was mad. "Oh my god, Ryan. You have to come over to Toys 'R Us right now, we just got Rock Band 3 and it is going to blow your face off!"

Ryan shifts his weight. "As fun as getting my face blown off sounds, I can't leave in the middle of a shift, Brendon." It's not a very effective excuse when he's done it before, usually to follow Brendon to whatever shiny new thing has caught his attention, but he's already on thin ice today.

Brendon deflates and lets his hands drop to his sides. "Oh. Right." He forces a grin that's obviously awkward. "Well, you should come by after work. I can kick your ass any time of the day."

Ryan scoffs, playing along even though that weird tension is still there. "You will try, Urie. You will try."

Brendon's just now catching his breath, and Spencer cocks a hip against the wall and asks, "You're right next door to us. Why are you so out of breath?"

Brendon grins at him, and the smile is so much more natural and easy than the awkward one he'd given Ryan that Ryan feels a sudden urge to accidentally spray Spencer in the eye with some hand sanitizer.

"I had to go see if Jon wanted to play!"

"Oh, so we're second best, I see how it is," Spencer teases, but Ryan can feel him watching his reaction out of the corner of his eye. Ryan's not mad. He's not. He is as cool as the cucumber in the body lotion he is furiously rubbing into his elbows.

Brendon shakes his head. "No way! You're third best, because I stopped in and asked Patrick and Ray if they wanted to play first."

Brendon dances away when Spencer mimes punching his shoulder. "And are they coming?"

Brendon pouts. "Jon said he might, but Patrick and Ray are too busy being rock gods and getting all the chicks, or something."

"Plus they actually have a whole store full of real guitars," Spencer points out.

"Half full," Brendon corrects. "And they have no drums in there whatsoever, and I have never in all my time here heard them play one Boston song. These are things that Rock Band 3 has that they don't!"

"In all your four months here, huh. The majority of which you've spent a whole floor away in a different store? They could be Boston's number one fans, for all you know."

"That position has been filled for a very long time!" Brendon starts back to his store, but not before he belts out, "It's more than a feeling, when I hear that old song they used to play..."

Spencer shakes his head after Brendon's gone. "That kid is nuts."

Ryan hums his agreement, but he doesn't take his eyes off Brendon until he's disappeared into the stacks of Barbies next door.

--

"So tell me," William says, cutting in front of three people in line and leaning over the counter, stopping only inches from Jon's face, "How in love are you with our little Cinderella?"

Jon smiles pleasantly at him and then turns to the young woman standing behind Bill. "What can I do for you?"

"Um, a tall chai latte. Please?" She looks uncertainly between Jon and William, who has hopped up on the counter next to the cash register, idly flicking through the assortment of chocolate bars there.

"Tall chai latte, coming right up." Jon looks at Cash, who nods and starts preparing the drink. The woman gratefully flees to the other end of the counter to wait for her beverage.

"Who are you talking about?" Jon asks, all the while turning his smile to the old lady who is next in line, impatiently tapping her foot. "What can I do for you, ma'am?"

"Spencer from the shoe store of course," William says at the same time the old lady says, "Venti white chocolate mocha with extra whipped cream and a double chocolate muffin." She thrusts her money decisively at Jon, who relays her order to Cash and puts one of the muffins in a brown paper bag.

"You know," William says, leaning towards to the old lady conspiratorially, "That much sugar will clog up your arteries." He smiles helpfully at her as he leans back.

"Excuse me?" There's an outraged look on the woman's face and Jon sighs and says, "I'm so sorry, ma'am. His outbursts are a symptom of his brain cancer. He doesn't have much longer to live."

The outrage on the woman's face immediately turns into pity, and she slips a dollar into Bill's hand on her way to pick up her latte. Jon's still amazed at how easily people believe that crappy excuse for William's terrible behavior.

"I don't believe you," Jon says, pushing Bill from the counter at the same time he takes the order of the next person in line - a man who's wearing a red top hat and looking vaguely menacing in the same way a clown on a dark street looks menacing. "Stop scaring my customers away and loiter somewhere else. Don't you have work to do?"

"I'm on a break," William declares and loftily slips the dollar bill into the tip jar. "Now I believe I just bought myself an answer. I'll have it with a mocha, black up and with extra whipped cream." Cash hovers over the coffee machine and looks uncertainly at Jon. He's only been here three weeks and still isn't used to Bill's antics. Jon on the other hand is and he knows that when William latches onto something he's not likely to let go until he gets what he wants.

"Go ahead, Cash, but leave out the whipped cream."

William pouts at that, but it's good-natured, and he leans forward again with a predatory look on his face. "So?"

"I'm not in love with Spencer," Jon says and shrugs, idly cleaning the shiny surface of the counter. His green Starbucks apron swishes with the movement, and he looks anywhere but at William.

"Ah, but see. Here's where I don't believe you," William declares, stealing a chocolate bar from the display. He slips it into the pocket of his jeans, which should be impossible given how tight they are. "You always make him his coffee yourself. And you always add an extra espresso shot to it."

"How the hell did you-"

William slightly raises his voice, pretending Jon hadn't interrupted. "And you always, always blush when he smiles at you. Please, Jon Walker, who are you kidding?"

Jon feels the heat creep up his neck when William mentions Spencer's smile, because of course it's true. William always likes to mock, but he also knows enough about Jon to interpret the signs. That, and Tom had probably spilled some information Jon had told him in private. Jon really needs to explain to him that keeping a secret also means not telling William Beckett.

"Listen, Bill, I don't really know what Tom told you, but-"

"Actually, he didn't tell me anything at all, but thanks for confirming my suspicions." The smile on William's face is nothing but devious as he plucks the chocolate bar out of his pocket again, unwraps it and takes a huge bite from it. "You should really just go ahead and tell Spencer that you want to sleep with him and then marry him," he mumbles with his mouth full.

"I don't want to sleep with him, Bill, and even if I did he wouldn't be interested in me."

"Uh-huh," William says, and hops down from the counter. He flicks his hair back and turns around to leave, running straight into Spencer who has stepped up behind them. Without missing a beat, William says, "Speak of the devil," saluting Spencer with his chocolate bar and then disappearing through the door. The little bell over it jingles cheerfully after him.

"I'm gonna kill that guy and he will never even see it coming," Jon says emphatically, wringing the towel with which he'd been wiping the counter between his hands.

A small smile appears on Spencer's lips as he moves closer to the counter. "If you give me a huge cup of coffee with a double shot of espresso, I promise to help you."

"Deal," Jon says, and feels an answering smile spread on his own face.

--

"You've worked at a lot of places, Peter," Ms. Jenkins says, waving his resume around. It's kind of an understatement, but Pete gives her his most charming smile and shrugs. “What can I say? I guess I had to figure out what I really wanted to do first.”

"And that's working at American Eagle?" She looks him up and down, but from the way her gaze lingers a little too long over his crotch, Pete can tell she's already sold. He wonders if he'll get fired if he tries to sleep with his potential new boss on the first day of work.

"It is. I think selling clothes is what I'm destined to do and you can trust me, I know a lot about fashion." Pete goes for the earnest face and sees her resolve crumble. He should have applied here a lot sooner if it's that easy to get the job. Usually he has to work a lot harder at selling his three-page, twenty-three-previous-jobs resume. And that was only counting the jobs he stayed at for two weeks or more.

"Okay, then let's see how you do today and after we've closed up, I'll let you know whether you've got the job or not."

"Excellent," Pete says, reaching for her outstretched hand to shake it. She blushes when he strokes his thumb over the back of her hand.

A few hours later Pete's wearing something mostly in line with AE dress code, sorting t-shirts by size, color and price. He's bored already but he needs to keep this job for a few weeks at least because he's behind on rent and he'd hate to ask his parents for money again. They've been far more generous than he deserves anyway.

He stuffs the corners of the shirts together, going for a look that pretends to be orderly and needs the least amount of work. Pete remembers now why he hates working at clothing stores. It's the fact that he organizes clothes only to have the stack be picked apart by pimply teenage guys looking for the right size, and then having to fold and stack them all over again.

The only upside really is that Pete can see The Music Store through the front window from here. If he cranes his neck just so, squinting a little, he can almost see Patrick standing in his shop on the other side, excitedly waving a CD at a potential customer. It involves a lot of fantasy but Pete's seen Patrick do it enough times to know what it's like.

He still remembers the time he lost a job (when the Virgin Megastore went bankrupt - ironically enough, the only time Pete had actually liked his job). Even back then Patrick Stump's tiny music/instrument store had been the talk of the mall. Pete knew absolutely no one who didn't want to work there. Even Andy from the health food store got starry eyes when he talked about the collection of local hardcore bands Patrick kept in the back. And it wasn't all because of the extensive and broad selection of CDs in such a small space (although that was a pretty nifty trick). It wasn't even about the amazing guitars Ray kept on his side of the store, polished and glowing, waiting to be played until your hands bled.

No, Pete was pretty sure that what made the music store so exceptional was Patrick Stump.

Patrick was something else entirely. He wore nerdy glasses, hid under a different hat each day and had this tick of scratching his sideburns when he was nervous. But he knew more about music than anyone else. He played every instrument (Pete had asked), he was way too smart for his own good (he knew all the names of all the presidents' wives) and well, he'd totally blown Pete off. Maybe that last point was why Pete felt so inexplicably drawn to him.

He side-stepped a customer to pretend he was unpacking bags that were already unpacked and caught a glimpse of Patrick in his store. He was showing a CD to Ray, talking excitedly. Pete remembered that Patrick had been like that a few months ago, back when Pete had applied at The Music Store.

It had been a bad day, the mall nearly deserted even though it had been a Saturday. The Virgin Megastore closing shop had alienated a lot of people in town and some probably stayed away out of protest. It wouldn't last until Monday; these things never did. Pete knew how fast people forgot, how fast they lost interest. He'd thought about the bass he owned, gathering dust in his closet, and about his boyhood dreams of starting a band that would have an impact on people, that would mean something. Maybe it had been madness, but he'd thought if only he'd started working at The Music Store he might get closer to that dream: Pete Wentz, rock star.

The Music Store had been empty except for Patrick, bent over a guitar lying next to the cash register. Pete had walked up to him, full of confidence, putting his resume down on top of the guitar.

"Hi, I'm Pete Wentz and I'm your new favorite employee."

Patrick had blinked up at him, puzzlement written all over his face. He had a pick between his lips, and he mumbled, "I'm sorry?"

Pete had given him his most winning smile and said, "I'm Pete Wentz and I'm your new favorite employee." It sounded a lot less convincing the second time.

Patrick took the pick from between his teeth and carefully put it down on the table like it would break any second. Then he looked back at Pete. "I'm sorry, but there must be a misunderstanding. We're not looking for any new employees at the moment, you must have-"

"No, I know," Pete interrupted, ignoring the crease forming on Patrick's forehead (later he discovered that Patrick hated to be interrupted mid-sentence), "But I used to work at the Virgin and since it closed down, I thought I could work here."

"Huh," Patrick said, and reached for the pick again, distractedly twisting it between his fingers. "What gave you that impression?"

"Well, I know a lot about music. I'm a musician myself actually, I write a lot of music. I play bass. Did I mention I know a lot about music? I'm also great at cleaning floors and organizing stuff alphabetically. Actually, it's sort of a hobby of mine and-"

"Pete." Patrick had put the pick down again and there was a small smile on his face. Maybe it had been that moment when Pete had fallen for Patrick, maybe it had been the one after that, when Patrick had said, "Pete, we don't need another employee. We can't afford one. I'm sorry."

Pete had looked at Patrick and it had taken a moment before the words sunk in. For some reason Pete had never even considered that Patrick might not take him. Sure he'd exaggerated a bit about writing a lot of music (he only ever scribbled down notes on a yellow legal pad he'd kept when he lost his job at Van Vleet stationary) and while he played the bass he wasn't exactly good at it (Gabe kept telling him so every chance he got), but he still hadn't for a second thought Patrick might not hire him. He stared dumbly at his resume on top of the guitar, then at Patrick who still had that smile on his face, half apology, half embarrassment.

"I'm really sorry," he said again, and handed Pete his resume. Pete took it without thought, his fingers slipping over Patrick's. In his head later that day, later that week, later that month, time had slowed at that moment, it had meant something. It was the reason Pete wrote pages and pages of lyrics afterward and Gabe had mocked him for weeks about his school girl crush. Only really time hadn't slowed, it hadn't been a magic moment. But it wasn't a silly crush either.

"Great guitar," Pete had said.

"You should play me your music sometime," Patrick had said.

And then Pete had walked out, rounding the corner and bumping his hip painfully into the faded yellow suggestions box outside the store. After that he sort of "ran away like a little girl" as Gabe put it, laughing until his face turned red. Pete pretends he walked out with dignity and pride and didn't stalk The Music Store until well after closing time just to see if Patrick ever took that hat of his off.

He didn't.

"Excuse me, I'm looking for capri pants?"

Pete blinks and focuses on a girl who is standing right beside him. He hadn't even heard her approach.

"Are you sure?" he asks, barely missing a beat. She has tan arms, a wide smile, dyed blond hair and a tattoo trailing up the inside of her arm. Not quite his type, but, well. "I think hotpants would look a lot better on you, plus they're definitely cheaper." The girl looks at him in surprise then blushes bright red. Pete grins at her and extends his arm to the back of the store. "They're over there. Let me help you pick out a good pair." The girl nods at him and starts walking towards the beach-wear section of the store. Pete follows her, getting an approving nod from Ms. Jenkins. He's pretty sure he'll get the job at the end of the day, especially since he's planning to sell the girl a lot more than just hotpants and possibly even get her phone number out of the deal.

He tells himself that he only looks back over his shoulder every so often to make sure the displayed shirts are still in order and not because he can almost see the front windows of The Music Store.

--

The mall doesn't actually close until ten, but most of the stores start locking up at nine. It gives people a chance to windowshop a little, grab something from the food court before they head home, sit in clusters around the fake trees in the courtyard and discuss their purchases. It also gives the employees a chance to go visiting without the constant presence of nosy customers, although Ryan’s fairly certain that wasn’t a priority when management set the hours.

"I'm gonna go get a coffee, you want anything?" Spencer pulls the chain fence down over his storefront and locks it, waiting for Ryan to finish ushering out the last of his own customers before he starts sampling the new lotions.

Ryan shakes his head, idly picking the crust off the rim of a tester jar of body cream. "No, thanks. I might just head home early."

Spencer pauses, frowning. "You're not going to see...if Rock Band 3's any good?"

Ryan gives him a wry smile. He's known Spencer a long time, and that's about as subtle as it gets for him. "Eh. I already know I'll like it. I'd rather wait until I can play it by myself."

Spencer wraps a warm, solid hand around the back of Ryan's neck and squeezes gently. "Better not wait too long. It might sell out faster than you'd think."

Ryan tips his head to rest it against Spencer's shoulder. He smells like leather and shoe polish, and a little bit like aftershave under that. "If someone else gets to them first, I guess they wanted it more. They probably deserve to have it more than I do."

Spencer squeezes a little harder, gently shaking Ryan by the scruff of his neck. "Don't do that. You deserve to have your own copy of Rock Band 3 just as much as anyone else."

Ryan sighs and shrugs, a jerky up and down motion without much sincerity behind it. "What do you know. You haven't even played since the first Rock Band came out."

Spencer eases away from Ryan, sticking his hands in his pockets and raising an eyebrow. "Just because I don't have my own copy doesn't mean I never play, Ryan." He smirks, turning his back on Ryan's narrowed eyes.

Ryan finishes closing and strolls over to the bench in the middle of the pavilion. From it, he can see partway into Toys 'R Us, so he takes a seat and crosses his legs, pretending not to pay attention to the whoops and crashes coming from inside the toy store.

"Ninety-seven percent, I totally owned your face," Brendon yells, leaping out from behind the electronic drum kit to point a drumstick at Joe.

Joe throws his hands up. "I'm not a drummer, dude! Let me try guitar."

Brendon grabs one of the guitars and hands it over, and Patrick takes Brendon's place behind the drums. Frank slips into view and claims the second guitar, motioning enthusiastically at someone out of Ryan's eyeline.

"Gerard, come on. We need a singer. Don't let Pete- No! I said don't let Pete have the mic!"

Pete bounds up onto the makeshift stage they've made out of empty pallets, grinning like a lunatic. "Hello, Cleveland! We're the Sweet Little Dudes, and we are going to rock you like a hurricane!"

Even from where he's sitting, Ryan can see Patrick roll his eyes. The drum beat starts up and then the guitar and bass parts come in, and before long Pete's doing what might be called singing and what also might be called butchering "Dude Looks Like A Lady".

"Enjoying the show?" Brendon slips out the side and takes a seat next to Ryan, brushing his sweaty hair out of his face.

"Oh, immensely," Ryan says dryly, and Brendon's face falls a little. Ryan leans over and bumps Brendon's shoulder, forcing himself to put those rarely-used muscles around his mouth to good use and smile. Brendon smiles back, huge and bright, and tugs Ryan's hand, standing up.

"We've got too much audience and not enough rock stars."

Ryan allows himself to be pulled along, and claps politely when Pete finishes the song with a truly astounding note that sends feedback blaring through the speakers. Pete is Patrick's friend, after all, or something like that. Ryan's not sure exactly where they stand, but anyone in good with Patrick is an ally. One day, Patrick and Ray will have an opening in the music store, and Ryan's damn sure not going to let some pimple-faced kid who doesn't even know who Otis Redding is take that spot. Ryan is like a ninja, stealthily building alliances and lying in wait for the day Patrick and Ray come to the simple conclusion that-

"...an!"

Ryan snaps out of it and blinks blankly at Brendon. "What?"

"You were staring at Patrick." Brendon almost sounds angry. At the very least he sounds irritated. Ryan's never seen Brendon anything but happy or vaguely disappointed. Now he sounds a little pissed off that Ryan was spacing off in Patrick's direction.

"Was I?" Ryan knows he was, but he's not really sure what this is all about. He can't admit or deny anything until he knows where it's going.

"Yeah. You looked like you were about to jump his bones or something." Ryan can't help the slight lurch of his stomach at the tone. If Brendon's jealous, that can only mean one of two things - Brendon likes Patrick, or Brendon likes Ryan.

"No, I didn't."

"You definitely did, you looked like you were about two seconds from like, blowing him."

Suddenly there's a whole group of people who have finished watching the show and look eager for an encore. Ryan feels his face start to heat up, and he crosses his arms. "I did not."

"Did too."

"Not."

"Too."

"I do not want to have sex with Patrick Stump, okay?" Ryan grits out.

Someone who sounds very much like Pete pipes up from the back of the group, sounding personally offended. "Why not?"

Ryan ignores him, ignores the confusion on Brendon's face, ignores the rest of them pretending not to be staring. Well, Frank's not bothering to pretend, but only because he's staring at Gerard and not Ryan. Ryan can feel his face starting to heat up, and he is not going to blush in front of a crowd of people, he is not going to blush and make it look like Brendon's right. And he's definitely not going to stick around and let Brendon clear up the matter of who he's jealous of in front of the entire mall staff. Ryan can dream all he wants, but the likeliest outcome is probably not going to be the one he wants.

Brendon's still staring at him, and beneath the irritation, he looks almost scared. Well. Ryan has no intention of embarrassing either of them any further. He spins on his heel, flipping the end of his scarf over his shoulder in what he hopes is a very devil-may-care manner, and walks away.

--

"You know," Patrick says, standing behind the counter, sorting through the cash, "Pete Wentz can't sing for shit."

Ray doesn't even look up from where he's tuning his guitar. He's probably kind of used to Patrick bringing up Pete by now. And it's not like Patrick isn't trying to keep it to a minimum, but seriously, Pete Wentz cannot sing to save his life.

"I mean, did you hear him? At the Rock Band thing?" Patrick shakes his head just thinking about the high-pitched sounds Pete made. It had been pretty ridiculous.

Ray makes a non-committal noise, intently staring at the guitar he's holding. Patrick can tell from where he's standing that it sounds ever so slightly off.

"He was horrible. His voice went all pitchy and warbly. I mean, he didn't even hit one single note. I think no one ever told him how horrible he sounds." Patrick puts the money back in the cash register and wills himself to shut the fuck up. There has got to be some other topic he could talk about.

"Yeah, uh-huh," Ray says and gets up, carefully setting the guitar aside. He walks over to the far wall, right where the music equipment meets the Z section of the CD cases. He crouches down in front of the shelf, brushing his hair out of the way, and opens the bottom drawer to find a new set of strings.

Patrick is a little offended that Ray doesn't even pretend to care about what Patrick's saying. They're best friends. Isn't it part of Ray's duty to listen to Patrick talk about Pete, even if it's the millionth time he's done it? Patrick walks over to Ray and tells him as much.

"You're not even listening to me, Toro." Ray jumps, almost hitting his head in surprise.

"Jesus, Patrick, I was listening. I was listening to you talk about your endless love for Pete We-"

"Am I interrupting something?" Patrick and Ray turn around at the same time, Ray less than gracefully. Out of the corner of his eye Patrick can see Ray wobble on his feet. Before he can even react to it or the fact that Pete Wentz is actually standing in his store, Ray loses his balance completely. He flails a bit, but falls over anyway, uselessly holding on to something, anything to stop his fall.

There's a ripping sound and when Patrick looks down, there's a long tear from the hole in the knee of his jeans almost down to the very bottom. At the entrance to the store, Pete Wentz is staring at them with wide eyes, and then he bursts out into a loud laugh that sounds a bit like an animal that got hurt. Ray more or less gracefully scrambles up from the floor.

"Sorry," he says and turns right around and disappears into the tiny closet they call the back of the store. Patrick stares after him feeling completely ridiculous. So much for Ray having his back.

"I see you need new pants," Pete says, and Patrick turns back to look at him. Pete's smiling broadly, arms folded in front of his chest.

Patrick's really not sure why Pete is happy that Patrick's pants are ruined, but he's too busy trying to look smooth and cool to worry about it too much. He says, "Yeah, it seems so."

"Let me take you shopping then," Pete offers, "I'm partly at fault for the destruction anyway."

Patrick stares at Pete, not really sure what to say. He can't quite tell why Pete's doing this; sure he was the one who surprised Ray, but really, the fact that Patrick is standing with one of his pants legs dangling right now is definitely all Ray's fault. On the other hand, shopping with Pete sounds like a nice idea. Patrick vehemently squashes down the part of his brain that helpfully suggests all the other things that involve Pete that sound like a nice idea.

"Sure, if you don't have anything else to do? I'll just have to check with Ray to make sure he-"

"Let me do that," Pete interrupts and walks past Patrick before he has a chance to answer.

The moment Pete's walked past him to carefully knock at the storeroom door, Patrick tries to somehow fix up his pants leg. He hears Pete say, "Hey, I'm taking Patrick shopping for some new pants. Will you be okay hiding in here for a bit?" and Ray's muffled, "Sure, yeah." Patrick definitely will make Ray pay for the new pants later and for embarrassing him in front of Pete of all people.

He hears Pete say something else to Ray, this time too quiet for Patrick to make out. Patrick considers tying up the loose ends of his jeans but then thinks better of it and straightens back up just when Pete walks back over to him.

"Ready?" he asks, grinning from ear to ear. Patrick nods and follows Pete out of the store, feeling vaguely nervous.

--

"So this is the famous Toe To Heel shoe store?" Jon leans against the entrance door to the shop. Spencer doesn't react, too busy ringing up the two pairs of boots for an elderly lady who's clearly in love with him, judging by the way she smiles. Jon watches Spencer put her purchases in a bag and hand it to her. He holds open the door for the old lady, who probably thinks she's landed in some sort of parallel universe where the men are still gentlemen and not rowdy idiots like everywhere else.

Once she's gone Jon walks up to the cash register where Spencer's apparently trying to fill out ten forms at once. "I said, so this is the famous Toe To Heel shoe store," he repeats, putting his hands on the counter. Spencer hums distractedly and keeps filling out his forms, scribbling his name next to little purple post-it notes. It looks like he's either applying for citizenship in a foreign country or trying to buy a house, judging by the sheer volume of papers.

"I missed you at the shop today and thought I'd come by, see if you got your caffeine fix somewhere else."

"I wasn't feeling like coffee," Spencer says, angrily dotting the i on Smith.

"Spencer Smith, your lie wounds me deeply. As a matter of fact I had Brendon come in today, buying an extra cup of coffee. And I know you guys don't allow Brendon more than one cup a day, so I bet you have an empty cup of coffee hidden under that cash register of yours."

This time Spencer does look up. "So what?" he snaps, looking at Jon challengingly. It's meant to wound but Jon's known Spencer for a little while now, and he's not easily fazed.

"I just wanted to check if you're okay or see if I did something wrong maybe."

Spencer looks at him and frowns. "What? No, it's not, I'm just...busy," he finishes lamely.

"Too busy for coffee and a quick talk with your friendly neighborhood barista Jon Walker?" Jon smiles winningly at Spencer, who curtly says, "Yes," and turns around, starting to sort the forms into different boxes. Jon looks at the bunched up muscles of his back and then takes a look around the empty store.

"Where's Brent?" he asks carefully, but really, he already knows the answer.

Spencer sighs. "He didn't show up. Again," he finally says, stilling.

"I'm sorry, Spence," Jon says quietly. "I know how that is."

"Do you?" Spencer's voice is sharp when he turns around, angrily pointing a bunched up piece of paper at Jon.

"Yes," Jon says. "You know William Beckett from Taco Bell?" Spencer nods. "He got me the job at Starbucks. We worked together for a while, became friends. Then I got promoted and he didn't. He started being late, then didn't get in at all and the manager eventually told me to fire him. It took a long time before he even spoke to me again after that."

Spencer's face softens and he carefully puts the crumpled piece of paper on the register. "I didn't know that."

Jon nods. "Not many people do."

There's a moment of silence, the only sound from people passing by outside. Jon watches Spencer, letting him make the next move.

Finally, Spencer lets out a breath, shoulders sagging a little. "I'm sorry I'm being such an ass. I'm just really tired."

"Yeah, I thought so," Jon smiles.

"Look," Spencer says hesitantly, coming around the counter to stand next to Jon. "Why don't we start over? You were saying..."

Jon looks confused for a moment and then he gets what Spencer means. "So this is the famous Toe To Heel shoe store?" he says.

Spencer nods, tired eyes searching Jon's before he replies, "Indeed it is."

"I like it," Jon says sincerely. "You need a hand unpacking those boxes over there?" He points at a pile of unevenly sorted packages, labeled with different brands, left half-unpacked.

"I-" Spencer looks like he's about to politely decline, then he seems to think better of it. "Yeah, that would be great."

"Sure thing," Jon says, calculating in his head that he can take a longer lunch break and make up for the slack tomorrow morning. Cash will be fine on his own a bit longer.

"Listen," he says as they walk over, pulling the protective plastic wrapping aside. "You should really start looking for a replacement. For Brent I mean."

Spencer rolls his eyes, but it's an easy gesture, a familiar one. "You think it's that easy finding someone who's good at selling shoes? Oh Jon, you have a lot to learn."

--

Gerard usually eats his lunch in the shop, but today he's spending his lunch hour at the food court, taking advantage of the free soda re-fills at Taco Bell and hoping the noise of the crowd will keep him awake. He'd been up all night working on a new comic, and he can tell this one's special. It might be the one he actually sends in to a publisher. Or it might be the one he sets next to the four other comics he's drawn and left to collect dust. He's almost done with the biggest scene, just a few more finishing touches in between bites of a sandwich, and-

"Gerard!"

Gerard slams his notebook shut and half-hunches over it like whoever shouted his name might follow it up with, "Nice drawings, they're mine now!"

Frank slides into the seat next to him and puts his hands up slowly. "I'm not here to rip you off, dude."

Gerard slumps down in his chair. He does not, however, release his death grip on his notebook. Frank's probably not there specifically to steal his drawings, but he's already stolen Gerard's wallet, his coat, and most recently, his car. None of them were gone for long, and Frank said he was just doing research, he wasn't some klepto nut or anything, but Gerard doesn't trust him around any of his things. "I have a hard time believing that."

Frank grins, and it messes up his attempt at an innocent face. "Come on, it was one time."

"Yeah, one time that you stole my wallet, one time that you stole my coat, and one time that you stole my car."

"Exactly."

Gerard shakes his head. "Those are my personal possessions. They could have had embarrassing stuff in them that I didn't want you to see, you had no right to take them."

Frank doesn't stop grinning. "Why wouldn't you want me to see your embarrassing stuff?"

"Because...because it's embarrassing stuff, that's why. I wouldn't want anyone to see it, you're not the exception or anything."

"What kind of embarrassing stuff do you carry around with you?"

"Nothing! I don't, but I could, and it's my right to carry...porn, or whatever, if I want to."

"What kind of porn?"

"Any kind! I could carry bondage porn around if I wanted, and I should be secure in the knowledge that it is my bondage porn, in my wallet or coat or car, and people won't steal it just because they can."

"Bondage, huh. Do you like being tied up, or doing the tying up?" Frank's grinning so wide his face must hurt, but he also looks a little distracted, and Gerard suddenly realizes what he's gotten himself into.

"I. Neither! I don't know. What do you even want, Frank?"

Frank's grin dims a little, and he looks so goddamned fond when he looks at Gerard that Gerard feels a little bit bad about yelling.

"Come to the pet store with me. Greta got a whole new litter of puppies, and they're really fucking cute."

"If you've already seen them, why do I need to go?"

Frank rolls his eyes. "Because you haven't seen them. Come on." He gets up and drags Gerard out of his chair, ignoring his protests about his half-eaten sandwich. "I'll buy you dinner later, come on. I only have fifteen minutes before I have to get back to work - if I let Bert cover my color job, the dude's gonna walk out with puke green hair. And believe me, fifteen minutes isn't shit. When you see these puppies, you are going to want to quit your job and just move into the pet store so you can play with them all day, forever."

Gerard doubts this, but he follows along. He hasn't seen Greta in a while anyway. He's just conceded to himself that it might be a fun trip when he remembers who else works at the pet store.

"Gerard!" Gabe throws an arm around Gerard's shoulders and squeezes him in close to his side. "Big bro! Or close enough!"

Gerard detaches himself from Gabe's side and gives him the dirtiest look he can muster. He has practiced this look in the mirror at home for just such an occasion, and he knows that it is withering. Gabe, however, looks unfazed.

"I'm not that much older than you, Gabe-"

"Aye, papi, don't remind me." Gabe puts a hand over his own chest and feigns depression. "That's why I gotta date your brother. He keeps me young. If you know what I mean." Gabe nudges Gerard in the ribs kind of hard.

"I assume you mean you guys spend a lot of time playing video games and watching cartoons." Gerard gives him a hard look, daring him to disagree.

"Actually, I meant-"

Greta reaches up and clamps a hand down over Gabe's mouth, giving Gerard a sweet smile. "You'll have to forgive him, Gerard, he keeps forgetting that I have a muzzle his size." She gives him a look even harder than Gerard's.

Gabe ducks away from her and wiggles his eyebrows. "Ooh, kinky! What would your boyfriend do if he knew you were propositioning other men?" Greta looks ready to tell him exactly what her boyfriend would do, but Gabe grabs her around the waist and dips her down, pressing his face close to hers and dropping his voice a few octaves. "Never fear, I promise I'll find a way to whisk you away from that brute of a man, and we'll run away together- oof!"

Gabe staggers away from Greta, who flexes her fist and examines her hand. "Now, Gerard, what can I help you with?"

Frank, who's been standing behind Gerard giggling the entire time, pops out and points at the clear plastic stall the puppies are in. "I brought him to see the puppies!"

Greta waves him over, and Frank tugs Gerard over to the stall. There's a massive pile of fluffy puppy going on inside it, so much so that Gerard can't really tell where any of them start or end. Frank, however, reaches in and pulls one out, tucking it under his arm and turning its face up toward Gerard. "I named him Rorschach."

"That's kind of a heavy name to put on a puppy."

"He can handle it. He's a badass puppy!" The puppy wriggles and barks to prove the point, and Frank laughs, depositing the squirming mass into Gerard's arms. Gerard takes it with a little bit of trepidation, but the puppy just nuzzles up under his chin and heaves a contented sigh.

"When are you taking him home?"

Frank's face falls. "Oh, he's not mine. My building doesn't allow pets and my mom said she won't take any more of my pets unless I train them to use the toilet and feed themselves, so five's the limit."

"So why'd you name him?" The puppy is snoring wetly against Gerard's skin, and Gerard grins a little at the tickle.

Frank shrugs. "Just liked him, thought he needed a name. Greta refuses to name them because she says it's not easy to let them go after you form an attachment, but I can handle it."

Frank's watching the puppy with all the wistfulness that says he definitely can't handle it, and Gerard sort of wants to slip the puppy into his coat pocket and make sure no one but Frank ever owns this dog. Luckily, Greta comes over and retrieves the puppy before Gerard can do anything rash, settling it back in with its brothers and sisters.

"There's a lot of them," Gerard notes, shuffling his feet awkwardly and trying not to think about why he suddenly wants to steal puppies for Frank.

"It's actually two litters," Greta says, reaching in to move a puppy who's trying to smother one of its bedmates. "A friend of a friend heard about this puppy mill that was going out of business, and they couldn't get these litters off their hands, so they were going to drown them." She looks furious, and Gerard's suddenly really, really fond of her. "We went in and got them out before they could, thank god. They gave us some shit, but I think Gabe actually threatened to drown one of the guys in their own bucket, so we got a box full of puppies free of charge."

Gerard is no more fond of Gabe than he was five minutes ago, but he's a little reassured by the idea that Gabe might actually be more than the Don Juan caricature he paints of himself.

"Gerard!" Gabe strolls over and puts his arm around Gerard's shoulders again. "I need your expert opinion. If I were hypothetically going to buy flavored condoms for a night of debauchery with an unnamed person, would aforementioned unnamed person like strawberry or cherry better?"

Gerard stumbles away from Gabe with his hands pressed tightly over his ears, even though it looks like all Gabe's doing now is laughing.

"Abstinence flavored!" he shouts, hands still over his ears. He doesn't take them away until Frank leads him out of the store and back to The Black Parade, where Gerard spends all afternoon glaring vaguely at Mikey and trying not to think about badass homeless puppies and badass puppy-less Franks.

--

"Lunch?" Spencer manages to sneak up on Ryan during a dead shift, startling him so much he drops a case of bath bombs. One shatters, and a plume of lilac-scented dust explodes all over both of them.

"Perfect," Spencer deadpans. "I actually came in here just hoping you'd cover me in something that made me smell like a French whorehouse."

Ryan stoops and starts collecting the undamaged bombs. "Sorry, we're all out of the stuff your mom usually buys."

Spencer crouches down to help, but shoves Ryan almost off-balance. "You love my mom, Ryan, don't even."

"I would tell you all about how much I love your mom, in excruciating detail and with the appropriate noises, but I haven't eaten all day and I'm starving." He grabs the last few rogue bath bombs from where they'd rolled under the counter and uses the toe of his shoe to try and sweep most of the settled dust into the corner.

Spencer straightens up and brushes himself down, mostly doing a good job of rubbing the fine purple dust further into his clothes. He's got a pretty sheen to him that isn't coming out anytime soon, and Ryan's feeling just mean enough today that he's not going to point it out.

"I don't know, you eat much more and I might have to put you on a diet." Spencer grabs Ryan's arm and wraps his fingers around Ryan's wrist, holding it up to emphasize the good inch of space between.

Ryan tugs his arm away and straightens his vest. "Just because you don't fit into any of your clothes anymore doesn't mean you get to make fun of me for still fitting in mine."

Spencer drops his hand and frowns. "What the fuck, Ryan. You've been a complete asshole for three days now. I've put up with it for this long, but don't push your luck. Whatever happened with you and Brendon-"

"Don't." Ryan can feel himself shutting down, can feel his face go cold, but he can't stop himself from doing it. "I'm fine. I'm just hungry. Let's go eat."

Spencer looks at him for a minute longer and then sighs and looks at his watch. "We'll have to hurry. I had to close the store just to take my lunch break, and I can't leave it closed for too long."

Ryan catches his co-worker's eye and taps his wrist, then mimes eating a sandwich. She nods and waves him off, even though Ryan's lunch break doesn't technically start for another half an hour. Julie's good people, and Ryan will remember to leave her off his list of people to glare at when he's feeling particularly bored or pissy.

"Did Brent not show up again?"

Spencer leads the way toward the food court, keeping up the conversation even as they weave through throngs of people. "Nope. Didn't even call in, just didn't show."

"You really need to just fire him already."

"Yeah, well, I'm pulling fifty-hour weeks as it is, if I fire him, I'm gonna have to put up a cot and just sleep next to the flats."

"Hire someone else, dumbass."

"You find me someone reliable who knows anything about footwear and I'll do just that."

Ryan doesn't have an answer to that because as simple as that suggestion sounds, he knows Spencer. Spencer's idea of knowing 'anything' about footwear is not really what most people's would be. He tries to come up with a solution while they ride the escalator down, but he has to concentrate on standing as near to the middle of the step as he can and then focus on jumping off before the step he's standing on slides under the floor with a piece of his pant leg or something. He's worked in the mall for almost a year now, and he still can't shake his fear of getting eaten by the escalator.

"Chinese today?" Ryan stands in front of the row of food stalls, hand on his chin as he eyes the offerings.

Spencer groans. "We had Chinese three times last week. Let's do pizza."

"I thought you said you got burned out on pizza." Ryan glances down at the pizza stall. Butcher's pulling a face at the girls he's serving. They giggle and he reaches over the counter to do something - poke at them or try to grab something, Ryan can't really tell - and next door in the Subway stall, Sisky gives the girls a narrow-eyed look that is most definitely jealousy. Ryan's always up for a little mall drama, especially food court romance. People still talk about The Breakup, the epic split between the Taco Bell guy and the ex-frozen yogurt guy. Ryan's pretty sure William and Tom have patched things up, seeing as at least half of the promo pictures in the window of the photography studio are of Beckett, but there's always the chance that Tom's just taken the pictures surreptitiously, and William can't stand the idea of making Tom take them down, hard feelings or not.

"I got burned out on frozen pizza because every time we have frozen pizza, it is actually frozen." Spencer gives him a sidelong glance, and Ryan drags his attention away from the romantic entanglements to defend his honor.

"Hey, I told you, my oven is broken. Not my fault."

Spencer crosses his arms, looking vaguely exasperated. "Forgetting to turn it on does not make it broken, Ryan."

Ryan flaps his hand and resumes watching Butcher. Now he's leaned over his counter, peering around the divider and trying to talk to Sisky, who's trying to talk to Chiz in the frozen yogurt stall on his other side. It's a little like watching some bizarre game of telephone. "Whatever. Are we getting pizza?"

Spencer nods an affirmative and they head down. Ryan's already got his slice ordered when he realizes exactly what's so enticing about the pizza.

"Has this Starbucks always been here?" he muses, holding his pizza in one hand and frowning thoughtfully at the barista behind the glass walls. Jon grins back, and Spencer elbows Ryan in the side.

Jon holds up an empty coffee cup, pointing at it and raising his eyebrows in question. He's mostly looking at Spencer as he does it, but Ryan appreciates the offer anyway. He's about to head in and give Spencer's truncated lunch break as the reason they can't wait around for a latte, but a familiar laugh drags his attention away.

Brendon's by Joe's candle kiosk, head thrown back, laughing at the sky. Joe's laughing, too, but he looks like maybe he doesn't think whatever it is Brendon's laughing about is quite as funny as Brendon does. Ryan's struck with a sudden need to be anywhere but there, and he shoves a ten into Spencer's hand to cover the food, mumbles something about eating in the storeroom, and leaves.

Julie gives him a weird look when he comes back without having been gone even fifteen minutes, but he shrugs and heads into the storeroom.

As much as Ryan likes organizing the front room, the storeroom is his hideaway. Everything's boxed up and in its place, it's cool and dim, and rarely do people venture in except to grab something and head right back out.

Ryan perches on the edge of a box and nibbles at his pizza. It's cooled off enough that the cheese is starting to go rubbery, and he only manages a few more bites before he loses interest. He's already starting to feel stupid for running away when Brendon wasn't even trying to talk to him; Ryan isn't the running away kind, he likes to tell himself. Except for how he usually runs away, it's pretty accurate. The problem is that he knows exactly how stupid he was for reacting like he did with Brendon. He could have stuck around and laughed the Patrick thing off, even if Brendon was, what? Worried about Ryan encroaching on his territory or something? And maybe Brendon wasn't even worried about that. Maybe Brendon wanted Ryan to be looking at him like that.

He dumps the pizza in the garbage and wipes his hands. Yeah. Brendon so wants Ryan's body. He'll believe that as soon as argyle and paisley start looking good together. He throws himself into unpacking a box of bubble bath. It's not a box of vintage vinyls, but it'll do.

--

Jon looks curiously after Ryan. "What's with him?"

"Don't even get me started. He's being an idiot." Spencer rolls his eyes and gives Jon some money. "The usual."

Jon smiles, reciting Spencer and Ryan's orders to Cash. When he's done he turns back to Spencer and says, with a huge grin on his face, "I see you are positively sparkling today, Spencer Smith."

Spencer frowns. "Excuse me?"

"You," Jon says like he's talking to a slow child, "are," and he leans forward over the counter right into Spencer's space, "sparkling." And with that he touches his fingers to Spencer's cheek, stroking it. For a wild moment Spencer actually feels like he's sparkling. Jon's fingers are rough at the tips but the touch is careful and controlled. Spencer's dreamy little bubble bursts when Jon suddenly pulls away and holds his hand right in front of Spencer's face. It's in fact full of pale purple glitter.

"I'm gonna kill Ryan," Spencer gets out before he turns right around and stomps towards the door.

"Don't forget your coffee," Jon calls after him, laughing, and despite his anger, Spencer's stomach does a little flip.

--

Patrick takes a sip from his coffee, burning his tongue for the fifth time in just as many minutes. Pete is sitting across from him, absently sipping his own coffee. Between them on the floor are a few scattered bags, all of which contain clothes bought for Patrick. They've been sitting in this awkward silence in the middle of the bustling food court for exactly six and a half minutes. Patrick's counted.

He's really not sure what they're doing here. He doesn't understand why Pete took him clothes shopping, endured Patrick arguing endlessly about black jeans versus blue jeans and why he really didn't need a new shirt. In the end Pete had won every argument, getting Patrick discounts in all the stores of the mall, because apparently he'd worked at half of them and had some sort of secret deal with the people in the other half of the stores.

What Patrick's not sure about the most though is why Pete even bothered going clothes shopping with Patrick in the first place. It's not like he tore apart Patrick's second favorite pair of pants. As soon as he's back at the shop he's going to mock Ray mercilessly for it.

Patrick raises his cup to his lips and almost takes that sixth sip that's sure to finally kill all the nerves on his tongue, but he thinks better of it at the last moment.

"So," he says, not sure where he's going with this.

Pete looks at him, waiting. Patrick has the sudden urge to hide. It's not like Pete's intimidating by any stretch of the imagination. He's a bit too loud and a bit too brash, and Patrick has the distinct feeling there's a whole different persona hidden under the one he shows everyone else. But something about his look makes Patrick think Pete is onto him, even though Patrick's pretty sure there's nothing to be onto.

"So," he says again, lamely, trying to find a good conversation starter. "You know a lot of people around here."

Pete looks like he was expecting a completely different question, but he nods eagerly, says, "Yeah, I've been around a while, working at a few places."

"You ever work at the bakery over there?"

"No?" Pete turns around to look at the bakery as if he needs to confirm that fact, then back at Patrick. "Why?"

"Well, the guy working over there has been staring at us pretty intently for the last ten minutes. I'm pretty sure he's either gonna kill us or throw pie at us soon." Patrick awkwardly tugs his cap in place and wills himself to shut up. Pete doesn't seem to mind his nonsensical rambling though. He laughs his loud braying laugh and then conspiratorially leans closer to Patrick across the table. Almost automatically Patrick leans closer too, their faces only inches apart.

"He's a spy," Pete says in a low whisper that's barely audible over the chatter of the people sitting at the tables around them.

"A spy?" Patrick tries to very sneakily look past Pete's head to the bakery but doesn't succeed.

"Yeah. See Alex is a friend of a friend of mine, Gabe? And I sent Gabe a text that I was going clothes shopping with you instead of having lunch with him, so now he's probably planning retaliation." Pete grins widely, but for some reason Patrick's not quite convinced that that's the whole story. He lets it go and instead asks Pete, "Gabe as in Gabe Saporta from the pet store?"

Pete laughs, "He'll be pleased to know that his reputation precedes him."

Patrick laughs as well and leans back a little, suddenly conscious of how close they'd been.

"So, how do you know Gabe?" he asks Pete, chancing another glance at the spy, Alex, just to make sure he isn't preparing pie bombs.

"We used to date, way back in the day, but discovered we'd be better off as friends." Pete shrugs easily but there's that look on his face again, calculating, gauging Patrick's reaction. Pete likes to act as if they've been friends for years, but Patrick's more than aware that he really doesn't know that much about Pete.

"Oh," Patrick says, feeling a lot more relived than he'd care to admit. He hadn't even known until now that he cared whether Pete Wentz dated men or women or both, but apparently he does.

"You got a problem with that?" Patrick's attention snaps right back to Pete. His brows are furrowed and Patrick realizes that his 'oh' could be taken many ways. Hastily he reaches out for Pete's arm, stumbling over the words to assure him that, "No, no, not at all, god, no."

Pete gives him an amused look, then points at Patrick's sleeve. "I think you just soaked your arm in coffee."

Patrick raises his arm and sure enough there is a slowly spreading dark spot of coffee on his sleeve. He sighs. So much for coolness. He's not sure when this turned into him trying to impress Pete but apparently somewhere along the way it had.

"So," Pete says, circling his hands around his cup, "How about you?"

"What?" Patrick's only half listening, trying to get the coffee stain out of his sleeve with a crumpled napkin.

"Are you seeing anyone?"

Patrick freezes, his mind scrambling to catch up with the conversation, to understand how they went from awkward silence to, well, Pete asking him if he was seeing anyone.

"Um, no. No, not really." Furiously scrubbing at his sleeve, Patrick looks anywhere but at Pete, instead fixing on a point somewhere over his shoulder where a couple is arguing, bent over a map of the mall.

"Cool," Pete says, tapping his fingers on the table. Patrick watches the play of the tattoos peeking out from under his sleeve as they lapse into silence once more.

Patrick's thoughts are racing as he tries to figure out what the hell Pete is up to. And if this is, maybe, possibly, kind of an accidental date. He's probably reading too much into the situation. Pete's probably just taking him shopping out of what, pity for his torn pants? Or maybe because he wants to convince Patrick to hire him after all? Patrick's really not sure.

"Soooo." Pete interrupts Patrick's thoughts, drawing out the o so long it sounds more like an exhale. "Do you write any music of your own? People probably show you their lyrics a lot, what with you working at a music store and everything."

Patrick smiles. "Yes," he says. "Yes, I do write music." This topic at least he knows how to talk about. "I don't write lyrics. Not good ones anyway." He looks down at his coffee cup and feels his cheeks heat up a little at the admission. "But since you brought it up, there is someone who keeps leaving random lyrics in our suggestion box."

"Oh, really?" Pete's face lights up with interest and Patrick starts telling him the story about how he finds a new set of lyrics almost every day. He's slightly surprised when Pete vehemently agrees that Patrick should try them out with his music. They start arguing over chord progressions and song verses, and Patrick soon stops feeling guilty that he's discussing the stranger's lyrics with Pete. Patrick gets so caught up in the conversation he even forgets about the spies and how Pete dates men and about the way Pete looks at him when he talks, gesticulating wildly with his hands.

--

Ryan seriously considers calling in the next day. He's pretty sure it has nothing to do with the fact that he'll have to see Brendon at some point, even in passing. He's mostly sure it's just that sale days are a pain in his ass, the slashed prices bringing out the worst in everyone, including him. Especially him.

He even picks up the phone to do it and then catches a glimpse of himself in the mirror. He puts the phone down, straightens his scarf, and sets his hat at a jaunty angle. He is Ryan Ross, most-senior-employee-who-isn't-a-manager at Bath & Body Works, and he is not about to ruin his perfect attendance history because of a stupid crush. When a spot opens up at The Music Store, Ryan is going to march in there with his resume, point to his experience, knowledge, and perfect attendance record, and say, "Just ignore the parts about me being hard to work with."

The day doesn't start off too badly, actually, which should indicate that there's going to be some balancing out later on. He manages to be friendly to the customers (well, he manages not to insult them, which is pretty close to friendly in his book), his boss gives him an approving look (the first one he's gotten all year), and by two, most of the products on sale are gone, which means he gets to take an extra-long break (which he spends trying on shoes).

"How about these?" He's standing in front of the full-length mirror, turning slowly so he can view the glossy black boots from every angle.

"They make you look like a dominatrix," Spencer says mildly, scribbling down a price on a new display.

Ryan hums thoughtfully. "Don't the scarves and vest offset any possible sexual sadist tones?"

"The scarves and vest alone indicate a severely depraved mind." Spencer finishes what he's doing and comes to stand behind Ryan, so close Ryan can feel the warmth radiating from him. It's familiar, comfortable, and he leans back into it. Spencer drapes an arm around Ryan's chest, plucking at his shirt collar. "You need to talk to Brendon."

It's such a non sequitur that Ryan goes blank for a second. When it hits him, he straightens up, stiffly starting to take off the boots. "About what." He doesn't bother making it a question, since they both know exactly about what, and they both know Spencer's going to tell him so.

"Don't be like that. Brendon's my friend, too, Ryan, and it's really shitty of you to make him feel like he did something wrong just because you like him." Spencer takes the boots Ryan's handing over, setting them aside without taking his gaze away from the back of Ryan's head. Ryan stares back at him in the mirror's reflection.

"I'm not making him feel like anything. And I'm not the one that accused him of wanting to blow somebody in front of twenty people." Ryan slips his own shoes back on and tries to ignore the cold, heavy feeling in his gut. He hates fighting with Spencer, but that's not it. He hates thinking about Brendon being upset because of him, hates knowing he should do something about it and instead knowing he'll probably just stick his head in the sand and try to pretend he's the one pissed off.

"That wasn't the smoothest thing he's ever done, okay, I admit. But did you stop to think that maybe he did it because he-"

Ryan holds a hand up and turns around, shaking his head. "Yeah, I did think of that. I'm not completely socially retarded, Spencer."

"Just mostly?" Spencer looks really angry now, and the ball of ice in Ryan's stomach expands until it feels like it's climbing through his veins, freezing out any warmth he'd absorbed from Spencer earlier. "You're my best friend, Ryan, and I wouldn't trade that for the world, but sometimes you are a self-centered asshole."

Ryan swallows past the rock lodged in his throat, tries to come up with anything to refute that. Eventually, Spencer shakes his head like he's done with it, done with Ryan, and disappears into the back of the store. Ryan cuts his break short and just forces a smile when his boss commends him for finally showing some dedication.

--

The hour before school lets out is always the slowest hour of the day in the comic shop. The rest of the mall has pretty steady business throughout the day, but The Black Parade doesn't see a lot of business until all the schoolkids get out. Gerard occasionally closes down for the hour and spends it in the food court, or talking music with Ray and Patrick, or annoying Brian in the administration offices. Today he's in Bob's tattoo parlor, ignoring all the weird looks he's getting.

"What?" he finally snaps.

Jepha shrugs and grins. "I don't know. I thought you had like, a phobia of needles. You've never even walked through the door here before." He dabs at the tattoo he's currently working on, and when the gauze comes away bloody and Jepha goes back in with the needle, Gerard whirls around to stare at the shop logo on the door instead.

"Yeah, well." His voice is thready, and he clears his throat before he continues. "Face your fear and all that."

Bob comes up behind him, looking over Gerard's shoulder, and says lowly, "Huh. I thought you were here because we're directly across from where Frank works and you like to stare."

Gerard turns around and scowls. "I was not staring."

"Gawking?" Bob supplies blandly.

"Leering," Jepha says decisively, and the guy he's tattooing lifts his head and says,

"Definitely leering."

Gerard glares at them all. "See if I offer any support when you decide to own up to your weaknesses and try to overcome them."

"What weaknesses?" Bob asks, already heading back to the counter. Gerard's too busy glaring at his back to notice the door opening behind him, and suddenly there's something sharp jabbing him in the back. For a split second, he thinks he's getting held up. In that split second, he manages to wonder at the robber that would choose a tattoo parlor out of all the shops in the mall, and to judge them accordingly.

"Oh, shit, sorry," Greta says, doing a complicated series of steps to get out from behind Gerard with the large metal crate in her arms. When she's safely situated near the counter, she frowns. "Why are you standing in front of the door? Why are you standing in front of the door in here?"

Bob comes around the counter to wrap his arm around her waist and kiss her cheek. Greta kisses him back distractedly, keeping one eye on Gerard. Gerard shifts. He can lie to Bob and Jepha, but he always feels weird lying to Greta. She always gets this look. Even if she doesn't call him on it, she always has this look like she knows, and it creeps Gerard out a little. Luckily, Jepha answers for him.

"He's 'overcoming his fears'." He says it with a very distinct mocking tone that Gerard does not appreciate.

"Well, good for you," Greta says, and for a second Gerard breathes easy and has a lot of appreciation for her support. But then she gets a knowing look on her face and says, "I don't know why you're afraid of staring at Frank, though." She stands on her tiptoes to look past Gerard's shoulder and out the door.

Bob laughs and Gerard huffs. "What's in the crate?" He's genuinely interested, but he's also genuinely interested in changing the subject.

Greta sets the crate on the counter. "Uh. Some stuff."

Bob looks wary. "Stuff like stuff that breathes and needs to be fed?"

Greta puts a hand on her hip. "Yes, as a matter of fact. Now, okay, I know we agreed no more animals at home, but I don't have room for these guys at the store, and Gabe will try to take them if I don't, and he doesn't have the room."

Bob sighs long-sufferingly, but he doesn't look like he's suffering even a little bit. In fact, he looks sort of stupidly in love, and Gerard's heart lurches a little. Gerard's seen that look before. Recently.

"Kittens?"

Greta grins and reaches up to kiss Bob. "I named the cuddliest one 'Bob'."

"I thought you didn't name them," Bob says, and Greta flips her hair.

"I only name the ones I plan on keeping."

"I see how important my input was in this decision," Bob says, lips twitching.

"I know you better than you think, Bryar," Greta grins, grabbing the crate and heading to the back of the parlor. "I'm gonna put them in the back until we go home, okay?"

Bob nods and watches her go. Gerard takes the opportunity to sneak another look across the way. He can just barely see Frank standing at his chair, brushing out a girl's hair and talking animatedly. Gerard jumps when the phone rings, and Jepha shakes his head. "I don't know who you think you're fooling, Gerard."

Gerard doesn't really know, either. If he's honest, the only answer he can come up with is himself. He makes his goodbyes and heads back to the shop to open up for the after-school rush. Mikey's already there, key in the lock. He looks at Gerard dolefully. "No coffee?"

Gerard usually prepares for the rush and Mikey's arrival with two extra-large coffees, but he's empty-handed today. "Sorry, Mikes," he says, pushing the door open and letting Mikey in first.

"I'll let it slide this time," Mikey teases. "I hope you have a good excuse."

Gerard doesn't think "leering at Frank" is a very good excuse. "I think I may have inadvertently become a stalker," Gerard sighs.

"It's about time," Mikey says, taking his seat behind the counter.

Gerard frowns. "What?"

"You are stalking Frank, right? If you're stalking someone else, I probably can't condone that."

"It's not a serious stalking. More like a one-time deal. But yeah. Frank." Gerard leans against the counter and rests his cheek against his hand, letting it smush his cheek up toward his eye.

"I don't think Frank would mind if it was more than a one-time stalking." Mikey grabs a pile of comics and starts slipping them into protective covers.

"Obviously," Gerard says. "But I'd mind."

Mikey's quiet for a minute, and then he asks, "Why?"

"Why would I mind becoming a stalker? I'm pretty sure you're supposed to be talking me out of any potentially illegal and or creepy behavior."

Mikey rolls his eyes. "Why do you mind Frank?"

Gerard scratches at the chips in the counter, avoiding Mikey's gaze. "I don't mind Frank."

"It's pretty common knowledge how much you don't mind him." Gerard looks up, ready to protest. He can't be that obvious, can he? Mikey's look is a pretty plain yes. "Why not go out with him?"

Gerard sighs dramatically and grabs a stack of comics to start helping sheathe them. "The reasons are many and varied. Far too complex to get into. It's just not a good idea," he says loftily, hoping the ploy will work. It's Mikey, though, so it doesn't.

"You think you're not good enough." Mikey's tone conveys how stupid he thinks that is.

"It's not that," Gerard admits heavily, playing with the corner of a plastic cover. "I mean, sort of. I know I'm not seriously gross or anything-" Mikey raises his eyebrow a fraction of an inch, and Gerard shoves at his shoulder. "Shut up. I showered this morning." Mikey's eyebrow climbs slightly higher. "Yesterday morning." The other eyebrow goes up. "Fine, the day before yesterday. That's not even- What the hell, we're not even talking about my showering habits. I'm saying Frank could do a lot better than some unshowered dude way older than him who's happy working in a comic shop for the rest of his life."

Mikey shrugs one shoulder. "I think he'd be pretty lucky to get some unshowered dude who's really not that much older than him and who's happy working in a comic shop for the rest of his life."

Gerard gives him a grudging smile. "Yeah, well, as an unshowered dude's brother, you have to say that."

"I really, really don't," Mikey says, putting the comics aside.

Gerard squirms a little. "Okay, but he's not gonna stick around forever. He probably wants a lot more than working in a mall for the rest of his life, I don't wanna be the thing that makes him stay."

"Maybe he wants you to be the thing that makes him stay."

A group of high school kids comes in and Gerard doesn't get a chance to answer. He can't say he's disappointed. The more he tries to explain the reasons why he can't date Frank, the weaker the reasons seem. If he keeps it up, he's gonna talk himself right out of saying no the next time Frank asks.

--

Spencer's carrying five boxes of shoes stacked on top of each other through the store, the top one wobbling precariously, when Jon slides into the store, barely stopping in front of Spencer. He's out of breath, a trickle of sweat running down his temple.

"Sorry, I'm late. There was a coffee emergency. Cash managed to get a cookie stuck in the thing you put the coffee powder into and it started to overflow and make weird noises."

Spencer carefully puts the boxes down and looks at Jon. "The thing where you put the coffee powder? As a barista, shouldn't you know what it's called?"

Jon laughs and waves his hand dismissively. "Details, details. So, let's get started, what are my jobs today?"

Spencer takes a deep breath, looking vaguely uncomfortable. "Look, Jon."

"I'm not going to like this, am I?" Jon says, that easy-going smile still all over his face.

"I really appreciate you helping me out here. I really, really do. But you already have a job. You're good at your job."

"Why thank you."

"You know what I mean," Spencer says exasperatedly. "You have a job already and it tires you out to work here too and I can't even really pay you when you're not a full time employee here. This is ridiculous. You should just go back to your normal job. I'll be fine."

"You know, you could hire me," Jon says and smiles, eyes crinkling at the corners.

Spencer laughs dryly, "Yeah, right."

Jon's still smiling and his voice is even and serious when he says, "I mean it, Spencer, you could hire me. Full time."

"Come on, don't joke about this." Spencer shakes his head and takes the topmost box off of the pile, stuffs it to the back of the shelf he's standing next to.

"I am being serious. Hire me, let me work for you full time."

"But you don't know anything about shoes!" The words are out of his mouth before Spencer has time to think about it, and he watches with horror as Jon's face drops, smile disappearing. Spencer fumbles the next box of shoes and barely keeps them in his hands. "I'm- I mean, you're always wearing flip flops. And so far you've only unpacked boxes. You've never even sold a pair of shoes before." It sounds more like an accusation than the apology Spencer meant it to be, but Jon's face clears a little as he nods.

"True. But that doesn't mean I wouldn't make an excellent shoe salesman. I know my stuff, trust me. Otherwise I wouldn't be offering."

And the thing is, as crazy as it sounds, Spencer does trust him. He surprises himself with the thought, wondering when Jon managed to win him over like that. Maybe it had been during the last few weeks after Spencer had fired Brent, when Jon started to help out. Spencer's not even sure now how it happened, Jon had just spent more and more time at the store, he'd brought coffee and then one day he'd started carrying boxes around, ran errands for Spencer. Somewhere along the way Spencer had started to rely on Jon, postponing hiring new help from day to day, making up flimsy excuses.

Looking back on it now, Spencer's pretty sure that somewhere along the way he accidentally did hire Jon without either of them noticing.

"Look, let me prove it to you." Jon looks determined now, like he can see Spencer's resolve crumbling. "Let me work here a day, give me a shoe test. Whatever it takes to convince you."

Spencer swallows and watches dumbly as Jon plucks the next box of shoes from his hands, opens it, and then proceeds to showcase the shoes next to the shelf just like they're supposed to be.

"But what about your other job, your real job?"

"Spencer." Jon steps up to him, grabs Spencer's upper arm firmly. "Let me worry about that, okay?"

Spencer looks at Jon's hand on his arm and then at Jon's face. "I- Okay. One day, just a test run to see how you're doing."

Jon whoops and lets go of Spencer's arm to do an extremely embarrassing dance right there in the middle of the store. "You're a seriously tough nut to crack, Spencer Smith," he gets out as he dances past Spencer.

"Wait until you get to know Ryan better," Spencer mumbles, but gets distracted from thoughts about Ryan by Jon gleefully picking a shoe up and waltzing it around the cash register. For some reason he feels relieved, like there'd been a problem that had needed a solution - a solution like Jon.

--

"Where do you want this banner to go?" Patrick turns around to the girl holding up a big flowery banner at least twice her size. He tries to remember her name - Cindy, Sandy, something - and then just gives up, pointing her to the ladders already in place where the banner is supposed to go up. "Over there," he adds uselessly, because the girl is already gone.

Patrick stares down at his clipboard and crosses off hang banner. He sighs, cursing himself once more for volunteering for this. Organizing the last preparations for the mall celebration decorations, what had he been thinking? Probably something along the lines of accidentally running into Pete Wentz again.

Ever since they went shopping, Patrick has been, well, more alert to Pete being around. And he had kind of been hoping he might meet Pete out here. There are certainly a lot of people from the various stores volunteering for the Organization Committee, probably because they thought it would get them out of work for a while. Patrick feels as sorry for them as he does for himself, because right now he really can't think of anything more mind-numbing than overseeing the preparations going on around him. He'd much rather sort through the shipment of Japanese punk imports. Or chat with Pete Wentz.

Since neither seems to be happening anytime soon, Patrick checks his list and walks over to the group setting up the booths for the individual stores. He goes along the row of booths in various states of completion. He nods at the people working on the stands until he sees a familiar face at the end of the row.

"Travis, hey. Do you guys need any help?" Travis is precariously balanced up on a ladder, trying to attach the banner to the top of the booth. On the floor, holding the ladder and the rest of the banner, is a woman Patrick doesn't know. She turns around when Patrick speaks and smiles at him.

"Yo, Patrick, we're good." Travis only gives him a fleeting glance, then leans forward even further than before to reach the other end of the wooden top to attach the banner. William introduced Patrick and Travis at some after hour party a few months ago and since then Travis occasionally comes into Patrick's store, usually only to discuss music and sometimes to buy a few picks for his friend Disashi who he's in a band with.

"Actually," the woman holding the ladder says with a sideways glance up at Travis, "Would you hold the banner up? That way I can support the ladder better, so Mr. I Can Totally Reach That Far Without Falling Off actually stays alive long enough to see the mall celebration."

"Sure," Patrick says and steps forward, taking the banner from the woman as she steps to the side, grabbing the ladder with both hands now. "I'm Patrick, by the way. I own the music store over there." He tries to point at it but ends up almost dropping the banner, so he aborts the gesture.

"Victoria," the woman says and smiles. "I work with Travie. Well, I'm sort of his boss, but he doesn't like to share that information with strangers."

Patrick smiles. "I bet. So. How many jokes a day do you get about working at Victoria's Secret with your name?"

"A lot," she says and her smile widens.

"She's gonna love you forever now because you didn't make one," Travis comments from up on the ladder, pinning parts of the banner onto the wood frame.

"Not like he'd manage to beat Pete's record of bad jokes per day," Victoria says good-naturedly, then she adds, voice a little deeper and more nasal, pretty close to a perfect Pete expression, "Hey Vicky-T, so what is your secret?"

Patrick smiles at that and then tries really hard not to look too interested when he asks, "Oh, so you know Pete Wentz?" Victoria laughs and Travis snorts above them.

"Who doesn't?" she finally says. "He worked for me for a few weeks once. I had to fire him in the end."

Patrick wraps his hands a little tighter around the banner to keep the material from slipping. "Why did you have to fire him?"

Victoria gives him a look that makes Patrick think that he may have unwittingly overstepped a line, and it's Travis who answers. "It was because Pete and I broke up. Pete didn't take it too well, I guess. I think he ended up sleeping with half the second floor just to piss me off. Even brought that guy who works at the comic store back to the shop once. I forgot his name, Micky or something."

Patrick fidgets a little, deeply regretting his question, never quite used to people who talk that openly about their sex life. Let alone if it involvs Pete Wentz. Before he can come up with a response, Victoria turns towards him, leaning a little closer. She whispers conspiratorially, "It should have taught Travie not to have affairs at the work place. Sadly, it didn't." There's a sly smile on her face and her whisper is just loud enough for Travis to hear. Patrick looks on as they exchange a glance and he's pretty sure he really doesn't want to know anymore about this. Carefully he raises his hands with the banner as Travis pulls on it, sticking the last corners in place.

"So, how do you know Pete?" Victoria finally asks, curiously looking at him as Travis pulls the last of the banner from Patrick's hands.

"Oh, from...around. We're sort of friends?" Patrick doesn't mean for the last part to come out as a question, but he's really not about to tell a pair of almost strangers about how he totally wants to make out with Pete Wentz. Victoria narrows her eyes at him as if she's onto him anyway, but just then Travis climbs down from the ladder and stands next to them. He slings an arm around Victoria's shoulder and grins at Patrick. "Friends, huh?" Patrick tries hard to look cool and at ease. Victoria seems to take pity on him because she shrugs off Travis' arm and says, "Leave it alone. You're worse than William. He always has to know everything too."

"Which is why he makes an excellent boyfriend," Travis counters and Victoria shrugs, but there's that look in her eyes again, like there's more there between them.

"So, uh," Patrick says, picking up his clipboard from where he'd put it down. "How about we discuss the arrangements of the, uh, flowers?"

Patrick spends the next few hours busily directing Victoria, Travis and the rest of the helpers, but there's a nagging voice at the back of his mind that reminds him over and over about Pete Wentz' sexual history, about how Travis is Pete's ex-boyfriend and how very bad an idea it would be to further entertain his crush on Pete. Patrick mostly manages to ignore it.

--

"What do you think?" Gabe slowly turns in front of the dressing room mirror, intently staring at his own ass.

"They're way too tight, Gabe," Pete says critically, arms folded in front of his chest.

"I know, right?" Gabe says, and he sounds extremely gleeful. "They're perfect."

He turns around once more as a pair of giggling girls points at them from across the shop, hands in front of their faces.

"I think those girls think your pants are too tight, too."

"Are they over sixteen?"

Pete decides not to grace that question with an answer and pushes Gabe back into the dressing room. "Try on the hoodie next."

"But it's not purple."

"Whatever, wear it."

Gabe gives a dramatic sigh but gets back into the dressing room, pulling the curtain shut behind him.

"So how's your plan to romance Patrick Stump going?"

"About as well as your attempts at getting Gerard Way to like you," Pete mutters darkly, sitting down in the plush armchair that stands in the corner of the room. It looks completely out of place for an American Eagle store but is surprisingly comfortable.

Gabe pokes his head out from between the curtains. "That well? Wow. What happened to your charm and sexual prowess? Oh wait, that's me." He laughs and disappears again.

"Dude, my charm and sexual prowess are still there. I just used them all up on your mom last night."

The curtain rustles and Gabe walks out, looking down at Pete with pity written all over his face. "Really? Your mom jokes? That bad? I thought Patrick liked you."

"Well, we talked a lot about music. But he never once mentioned the lyrics I keep dropping in the suggestion box. I had to bring them up myself."

"Maybe that's because he doesn't know that it's you who's leaving them?"

Pete looks thoughtfully at the orange hoodie Gabe is wearing. "But I was so obvious."

Gabe twirls in front of the mirror, then puts the hood over his head and makes gangster signs at his reflection. "Pete. Not even I get your metaphors and I know you, like, better than I know myself."

Pete frowns and is about to say more, but the girls from earlier burst into the dressing room and swarm around Gabe, talking excitedly and touching his hoodie a lot. Gabe shrugs at Pete, all what can you do, right?

Pete gets up, still thinking about Patrick. He's pretty sure he either needs to start signing his name to the lyrics or convince Patrick of how charming he is some other way.

"See you later, Gabe. I'll just go see Gerard for a bit. Chat. Hang out. Tell him all about how you're cheating on Mikey with my customers. You know, the usual." And he casually walks away, Gabe yelling after him. His boss gives Pete a critical look, but he shrugs as if Gabe is just another one of the crazy customers they get on a daily basis.

--

Ryan spends two days eating lunch alone before he works up the courage to take the three steps over to Spencer's store and say, "So. How's business?"

Spencer looks up from where he's trying on a bright blue dress shoe, and for a second, Ryan thinks he's actually going to completely ignore the question. But finally he shrugs. "Decent. Better now that Jon's helping out. I can finally catch up on all the paperwork."

"Doing a fantastic job of it," Ryan deadpans, eying the dress shoes.

Spencer rolls his eyes but grins, motioning Ryan in. "Hey, I did paperwork for three hours solid, I deserve a little reward."

Ryan takes a seat next to Spencer, stretching his legs out and butting his feet up against the shoe sizer. "Where's Jon now?"

"He had a shift at Starbucks. He's basically killing himself working both jobs, and I feel kinda bad letting him, but he can't quit Starbucks, he'd be taking a pay cut, and he says he really doesn't mind helping out here when he's not there."

"So hire him full-time and give the man some benefits."

"Oh my god, Ryan! You're a genius! Why didn't I think of that, it's so simple!" Spencer pulls a face and flips him off. "He's next in line for assistant manager there. It'd be kind of a douchebag move of me to ask him to move here full-time when he knows I'm desperate for the help. He'd probably say yes out of obligation. Plus, all his friends work in the food court, and they're pretty tight-knit."

Ryan picks at a thread on his pants. "It can't hurt to ask. Just make sure he knows he doesn't have to."

"Says the guy who spends his days mooning over someone he has yet to work up the courage to ask out and who is content to let the object of his affection think he's pining over someone else."

Suddenly the semi-comfortable atmosphere is gone, replaced by the lingering tension left over from their previous argument. Ryan stiffens, picking more deliberately at the thread. "That's a little different than offering someone a job."

"Semantics. We're both cowards."

Ryan stands up and takes a breath that feels like sucking in a lungful of cement. "I have to get back to work."

Spencer glares up at him, and it's pretty obvious they both know Ryan's digging up an excuse not to talk about it. "Yeah, okay. See you later, I guess."

Ryan forces a smile and leaves, not letting himself slump until he gets to the storeroom of Bath & Body Works. Somehow, he's managed to fuck up both of the most important relationships in his life, and the one person he'd go to for advice is one of the people he needs advice on.

He spends two hours organizing shampoos by active ingredient, and when even he can’t stand being around himself anymore, he gets the new girl to cover for him and leaves, very deliberately not looking to either side of him as he passes by Toys ‘R Us.

He spends half an hour in the pet shop playing with the new puppies and half an hour in the music store browsing CDs and simultaneously trying to look very knowledgeable and music store employee-ish whenever Patrick looks over at him. By five o'clock, he feels a little better, better enough to head back to the store to deal with the last few hours of his shift. He's even cheered up enough to approach the lone customer in the store to offer his assistance, since it looks like the guy needs it. He's hunched over the mix-your-own-scent oil shelf, enough of him obscured by the displays around him that Ryan's already said, "Can I help you?" by the time he realizes who it is.

"Maybe," Brendon says quietly. "I hope so."

Ryan freezes and belatedly forces a pleasant smile onto his face. "What can I help you with?"

"I think I did something kind of stupid, and now one of my best friends is mad at me. Do you have any like, calming lotion? Or hey-I'm-sorry-I-was-an-asshole-you-can-like-whoever-you-like-and-I'll-still-be-your-friend lotion?" Brendon's still kind of hunched over, staring at his shoes.

Ryan forces himself to take a breath. That's all he needs, one breath, a few seconds to remind himself why it would be a bad idea to shake Brendon until his teeth rattle and say, "You idiot. You, idiot."

Finally he says, "We just sold out of that." Brendon's shoulders hunch forward a little more. "But we do have a few bottles of no-I-was-the-asshole-I'm-sorry-can-we-pretend-this-never-happened left. If you were willing to, you know. Substitute."

Brendon looks up hesitantly, like he's not sure if Ryan's fucking with him, and Ryan gives him a tiny smile. Brendon's smile is Ryan's smile a million times magnified, and he practically launches himself into Ryan's arms. "I really am sorry, Ry, I don't know what got into me, I mean. It's Patrick, am I right? Who doesn't have a crush on him? I just have a hard time sharing. Youngest child syndrome."

Ryan lets himself fold his arms around Brendon, pulling him in close and savoring the warmth radiating from him. He's a bundle of movement, bouncing and squirming in Ryan's grip even though he's mostly just trying to get closer. "Yeah. He's the most eligible bachelor." Ryan tries not to sound so much like that's a bad thing, but dammit. It's pretty obvious Brendon was upset because he likes Patrick and didn't want to share him with Ryan, and not because of any other configuration of those names.

Brendon breathes heavily against Ryan's neck, and Ryan has to gently push him away before he does anything really pathetic, like try to convince Brendon he's way better than Patrick. It wouldn't work, and it's not true.

"Hey, are you guys doing a stall for the mall anniversary thing?" Brendon suddenly asks, and it takes Ryan a few seconds to shift out of 'emo pining' mode to 'party planning' mode. "Uh, yeah. I think so, anyway. My boss is kind of neurotic, he keeps going back and forth on it. As of right now, I'm running the booth, but it remains to be seen if someone else will piss him off enough between now and then and inherit the job."

Brendon grins. "I'll probably see you there, then. I volunteered to help build a Lego castle."

A Lego castle is the least exciting thing Ryan can think of, but watching Brendon be excited about building a Lego castle is enough of a draw that Ryan insults two customers and takes an hour lunch for the rest of the week. None of the other employees have a chance at that stall.

--

"I'd like two slices of Margherita pizza, two of the Hawaii and one of the um, Butcher Special?" Spencer looks doubtfully up at the tattooed guy serving the pizza. He's never actually bought pizza here, usually it's Ryan buying all the stuff. But, well, he's kind of still mad at Ryan, so he has to buy pizza for Jon and himself without Ryan's help. He's really not sure he should have taken that special when the tattooed guy - whose name tag helpfully says "The Butcher" - looks him up and down.

They stare at each other for a silent moment and Spencer wonders whether he did something wrong. Maybe he was supposed to tack on a please at the end there or-

"I'm sorry, but we're not serving any pizza today."

Spencer stares at the guy, then down at the display case where there are four perfect pizzas lined up in a row. None of them are even missing a slice. Spencer's also pretty sure that they're all real, edible food.

"I'm sorry?" he says, barely keeping his voice from rising towards the end.

"I said," the guy named the Butcher says, looking a little sheepish, "We're not serving pizza today?" It sounds like a question rather than a statement, but Spencer really doesn't care.

"Why the hell not?" he asks, feeling twitchy. He's never been good at containing his temper when he's hungry. He probably should have let Jon buy the pizza.

"Because, my allegiance is to-" Butcher rolls his eyes and then heaves a long-suffering sigh. "Look, I'm not gonna give you the stupid rehearsed line. I really have no problem with you, dude. And I'm really sorry about this but I can't serve you anything. I had to pick a side, and it wasn't Jon's."

Spencer blinks at him. "You're not serving me pizza because you're not on Jon's side? What?"

"In the feud. Turf war. I don't know what Bill's calling it today. But you and your," Butcher waves his hand vaguely, "friends stole Jon Walker from us, so we're pretty much at war."

Spencer stares at the guy and opens his mouth to say something, then closes it again. He's not quite sure what the appropriate reaction to that is. Destroy things? Demand a fair fight? In the end he opts for turning around and leaving in an angry silence. It's not ideal but it's really his only option. He vaguely wonders where they're going to get food now. They'll probably have to buy from the weird burger guy who has a little cart way out on the South parking lot. It doesn't sound like a very appealing idea, but it really seems like he has no choice.

--

Patrick's on his way home when he sees someone crouched down in the shrubbery right in front of the Gap. The other person is half-stuffed inside the bushes, but from the jeans and the brightly-colored sneakers Patrick's pretty sure he can tell who it is.

"Pete?" The bushes rustle alarmingly and then Pete sort of rolls out in front of Patrick's feet. He stares at Patrick for a moment, and then a bright smile appears on his face, highlighted by the stray leaf stuck behind his ear.

"Patrick! Excellent to meet you here. Have you seen how bright the colors of those shirts over there are?" Pete motions behind him to the store windows of The Gap. "It's a crime that needs to be stopped." Pete's smile grows even wider which makes him look vaguely manic.

"Are you okay?" Patrick asks carefully, taking in Pete's appearance - ruffled hair, loose shirt, unidentifiable stains on his pants.

"Great. Never been better. Got fired today and now I'm drowning my sorrows. As a matter of fact-" Pete stops mid-sentence to get up. He sways on his feet and then promptly sticks his head back in the bushes to rummage around. Patrick gets side-tracked from Pete's weird behavior by Pete's ass, which is hanging half out of his jeans and looks really, really nice.

Fucked, Patrick is so fucked.

Pete chooses that exact moment to turn back around, leaving Patrick with just a fraction of a second to jerk his gaze back up from Pete's crotch to his face. Pete doesn't seem to notice though because he's excitedly waving a bottle in front of Patrick's face. Tequila. That explains a lot.

"I was getting drunk with Gabe but he left me to smoke up with Joe and said I couldn't come." Pete pouts, which looks sort of adorable, and then takes a big swig from the bottle. The burp that follows is less adorable and still, Patrick is sort of charmed.

He is so screwed.

"So you decided to play fashion police at the mall?" Patrick offers in the hopes of having a conversation about a safe non-sex-with-Pete-Wentz related topic.

"Nah, I was following Gabe to steal his stuff. But, um, I think I got lost?"

"Here?"

"No, over there." Patrick stares at where Pete is pointing, which is the display window of The Gap again, and decides that Pete is really, really drunk.

"Look, Pete, maybe you should-"

"Drink this," Pete interrupts him, pressing the bottle into Patrick's hand in a sneaky move. Patrick stares at the bottle and then back at Pete.

"I can't, I still have to drive home. And we can't stay here anyway, I mean-"

Pete looks at him sternly. "Drink," he says again and frowns at Patrick.

It's something about his eyes maybe or the way the slightly ripped neckline of his shirt exposes his throat, Patrick is never quite sure afterward what exactly made him drink from that bottle but he does it anyway. The tequila burns down his throat warmly and the pleased smile on Pete's face, like he's just accomplished an impossible task, makes Patrick laugh.

"Come on, let me show you my favorite place in the mall," Pete says and grabs Patrick's arm, pulling him along behind him.

Patrick follows.

It turns out that Pete's favorite place in the mall is a small balcony. Its entrance is hidden between two walls standing to each other at a weird angle and Patrick's really not sure what its purpose is.

"I don't really think it has a purpose," Pete says like he's reading Patrick's thoughts. Patrick stares at him dumbly for a moment and then nods. He's pretty sure he shouldn't have had all the tequila he'd gulped down on the really long way up here. It had been one of the things where it seemed like a good idea to keep drinking, but now Patrick feels a lot more than just slightly tipsy.

Pete pulls him out on the small balcony, producing a blanket from who only knows where. The balcony's framed by glass, giving a view of the completely deserted parking lot of the mall. Patrick can almost make out his car on the far left. It's all really kind of surreal. Patrick clumsily sits on the stone floor next to Pete, waiting for a bit until the world stops swirling around him. He really shouldn't have had that much to drink.

The blanket wraps around his shoulders and he turns to look at Pete, who grins and shrugs. "I keep it for when I fall asleep up here."

"You sleep here?" Patrick asks and then has to giggle at how outraged his own voice sounds. Kind of squeaky and young.

"Sometimes," Pete grins and scoots closer, wraps himself and the blanket tightly around Patrick. It's an odd feeling, having Pete this close. Patrick thinks he should maybe object or move away from Pete a little more. Instead he moves closer and puts his head on Pete's shoulder.

"I'm really drunk," he informs Pete and feels him laugh softly. Somehow he has the feeling that even though Pete's just as drunk as him, Pete still seems to be a lot more able to move about normally. Patrick feels a little like he's underwater. The last time he felt that way he'd just gotten his store, just moved the first boxes of CDs in there.

"Hey, Patrick, hey." Even Pete's voice sounds like it's smiling, which is odd. Patrick hums to show he's listening but Pete doesn't go on, just sits silently, arms around Patrick.

"Why'd you bring me here?" Patrick finally ventures, after it becomes clear that Pete is quite content with staring out at the dark parking lot in silence.

Pete's motionless and quiet before he turns around next to Patrick in a clumsy attempt to get them face to face. Patrick's head slips off Pete's shoulder and he flails around a bit before holding onto Pete, staring at his face. Pete's biting his lip and looking at him with wide eyes.

"I kind of wanted to-" and he breaks off and leans in to press his lips against Patrick's.

Somehow it feels nothing like a first kiss. Patrick turns his head to change the angle, fists his hands into Pete's shirt and kisses back open-mouthed. It feels more like they've been doing this for years, Pete's mouth opening under Patrick's, sweeping tongues and muffled gasps.

They break apart to catch their breath, and when Patrick sees Pete's flushed face, his wide eyes like he can't quite believe he's doing this, he moves forward. Pete tips over, Patrick landing on top of him and then they start pulling at clothes almost at the same time, like they had the same thought, awkwardness saved for later. Patrick fumbles Pete's pants open and Pete pulls Patrick's shirt up over his head. Their hands meet on Patrick's jeans. Pete pops the button, Patrick slides the zipper down.

When their dicks touch, Patrick can't keep the moan in, buries his face against Pete's neck, where his ripped t-shirt moves against warm skin.

"I...uh. Okay?" Pete mumbles shyly and Patrick nods very emphatically, because really, Pete can't expect him to form coherent words right now, right?

"Okay," Pete says again and he sounds breathy, a little like that one girl Patrick dated in high school, who - did that thing. Patrick giggles but the sound immediately gets stuck in his throat when Pete wraps his hand around their dicks and moves them, one slow stroke. It burns a little but for some reason there's a little wetness there and Patrick really doesn't want to think about Pete maybe spitting into his palm. Although his alcohol-addled brain finds it kind of hot.

"So fucked," he mutters quietly, but it turns into an embarrassing groan on the last word when Pete twists his hand on the upstroke.

And of course all that ends up coming out is something that suspiciously sounds like 'fucking' and Pete laughs and says, "Later, okay? For now let's just-" Then he makes a series of noises Patrick's pretty sure he wants to hear every day forever, as soon as he's gotten rid of that weird drunk feeling that's making his head feel as light as a feather. Whoever invented alcohol seriously should have come up with a way to eliminate that feeling.

"Patrick, hey, are you still with me? Maybe we shouldn't do this right now. I." Patrick frantically shuffles around and presses his mouth to Pete's, hoping that he'll understand that the furthest thing from Patrick's mind right now is stopping that incredibly awesome hand touching his dick. Seriously. He can feel Pete smile into his mouth, tongue meeting Patrick's and yeah, this is so much better than talking about stopping. So much better.

The orgasm sneaks up on Patrick like, well, something that sneaks, and he's coming before he can warn Pete or pretty much do anything other than slump forward onto Pete again, holding on. He feels heat creep up in his cheeks for coming like a kid just hitting puberty, but his spine feels like liquid and his skin is buzzing and Pete's still stroking him slowly and yeah, he's actually humming something.

"Oh god," Patrick finally gets out and starts apologizing, words tripping over each other. "I'm so, so sorry. I didn't mean to, uh, this early and I don't normally, but."

"'Trick," Pete's voice is soft and okay, maybe he's laughing a little, but Patrick's pretty sure if the roles were reversed he'd laugh at himself too. "Just. Can you just-" Pete grabs Patrick's hand and pulls it between their bodies, where, oh. Patrick flushes even harder, but he wraps his hand around Pete's over Pete's dick and experimentally moves their hands up and down Pete's shaft. Pete moans softly, and that gives Patrick more confidence, because he can do this, it's not like it's the first time.

He squeezes Pete's hand under his a little tighter and Pete bucks up in response. Patrick's dick twitches with interest, and Patrick speeds up the movements, strong grip on Pete's dick, squeezing just a little too much. It really shouldn't be surprising that Pete likes it a little rougher, but Patrick is still caught up in the fact that he came way too fast and that, oh right, he's making out with Pete Wentz of all people and they're still on some weird glass balcony and-

"Oh shit. Can anyone see us here?" He didn't mean for it to come out this panicky, but right now he'd really rather not have anyone spying on them. Pete doesn't seem quite so fazed by the idea because he gets out, "Oh man, I wish," and comes hotly over their hands, shuddering all over. Patrick strokes him through it, caught between panic about possibly being on some security camera in Ryland's office and the way Pete's scrunched up face when he comes is possibly the prettiest thing Patrick's seen in a while.

"Holy shit, I think I just came my brains out," Pete declares and stretches, effectively rolling Patrick to his side. Patrick's pretty sure that's a move Pete's perfected over the years. Right now he's pretty sure he doesn't care, but he really has to talk to Pete about after-sex-bedside-manners. Later. He suddenly realizes how tired he is, sticky mess of their come still coating his hands and shit, his dick still kind of hanging out of his pants.

Pete throws the blanket over their bodies, wrapping them up into a tight bundle. "Sleep now, clean up later." He nestles against Patrick's side and falls asleep a second later. Patrick lies next to him, his hand still hovering in midair, not quite sure where to wipe it. Exhaustion makes the decision for him and he ends up pulling Pete closer, effectively wiping his hand on the back of Pete's shirt.

Patrick falls asleep with a satisfied smile, thinking about how great an idea it had been to come up here.

--

The longest Ryan and Spencer have ever gone without speaking is three days, and that was when they were kids and Spencer kissed the girl Ryan liked. To be fair, Spencer hadn't known Ryan liked her; Ryan hadn't told anyone but his tattered notebook, and even there he'd been far from straightforward. Even if Spencer had read the angsty poetry chronicling Ryan's crush (my eyes are blinded by light/my ears hear only that special song/my arms are empty without her/my heart has yearned for far too long), there's a good chance he would have thought Ryan was just pining away for the guitar his dad refused to buy him.

Spencer had followed Ryan around for two days straight (he likes to say he would have been tailing Ryan for the full three, but Ryan was always a quiet kid, and Spencer didn't even realize he was getting the silent treatment until Ryan set up the Nintendo for one player, not two) until Ryan finally told him what the problem was. It was a testament of thirteen-year-old Ryan's pigheadedness and twelve-year-old Spencer's perseverance. Not much has changed.

Ryan's pigheadedness has kept him hiding out in the storeroom during his shifts and kept him too busy being a coward both times Spencer's come in and asked for him. He's even been avoiding breaks. Julie takes pity on him and brings him a sandwich and a cup of coffee after her own lunch break, but Ryan barely manages to eat half of it. When he fights with Spencer, everything always seems off, like he woke up late and can't quite get into the rhythm of things. He wishes all it took with Spencer was waiting it out until he could go back to bed and hope for a better day, but Spencer rarely lets him off that easy. And Ryan was an asshole, he can admit that. This is going to take an apology, at least, and possibly some groveling. Ryan hates groveling. He is above groveling; it's coarse and he has way too much dignity for that. But he'll grovel for Spencer.

On the second day, Julie's not in, so Ryan has to fend for himself on the food front. He'd just skip lunch - the rock in his stomach should be keeping it plenty full - but he'd been up most of the night playing around on his guitar and trying to distract himself, and he needs caffeine.

Once he's in the food court, his stomach reminds him that first of all, rocks are not sufficient nutrition, and second of all, it's a metaphorical rock anyway, and those are even less sufficient. Ryan avoids the looks William-from-Taco-Bell is giving him (ever since Jon started helping Spencer out more, all the food court guys have been really weird), hurries through the line at the Chinese place (he feels he should be grateful that the guy that owns the place is like ninety and doesn't seem to hang out with the rest of the food court guys, and thus isn't subject to any of their weirdness), and keeps his head down while he hurries back to the store.

Unfortunately, that means he has no clue who it is he's run into until he looks up and Spencer's watching him carefully, completely ignoring the stain that's slowly spreading out over his shirt from where Ryan's egg drop soup has sloshed over.

Ryan clutches his tray like a lifeline, staring down at his food like his noodles might offer up some great wisdom. He could crack open the fortune cookie early and hope it has some advice, but the last fortune he'd gotten was you will receive a fortune (cookie), and that hadn't been all that helpful, to be honest. Accurate, but not helpful.

"Hey," Spencer says, and it's so weighted down with awkward tension that Ryan has a hard time not cringing.

"Hey yourself." This shouldn't be as hard as it is; Ryan's already made peace with Brendon - or as much peace as he's going to get, which isn't much when the thought of Brendon making cow eyes at Patrick keeps cropping up unbidden - so he and Spencer shouldn't have anything to argue about. But the argument still hangs there between them, and Ryan knows exactly what he should say, but he can't seem to make himself say it.

"So, you've been avoiding me." Spencer crosses his arms, but he looks more hurt than angry, and that's what finally unsticks Ryan's tongue.

"Yeah. This whole...I...everything's." Spencer waits patiently, and Ryan finally manages to say quietly, "I'm sorry."

"For avoiding me?"

Ryan's pretty sure Spencer knows that Ryan's apologizing for more than that, but he swallows heavily and shakes his head. "Well, yeah, for that. And for being, you know. A jerk. About everything. For being an asshole to Brendon."

Spencer sighs and uncrosses his arms, and Ryan's shoulders come down from around his ears. Spencer might still be pissed, but uncrossing his arms means one of two things: he's going to punch someone, or he's over it. Ryan doesn't think this warrants a punch. Still, he doesn't totally relax until Spencer reaches out and curls his hand around the side of Ryan's neck, squeezing gently. "I'm sorry, too. I shouldn't have pushed you about the thing with Brendon. Well, I was right to push you to apologize, because you were being an asshole, but I'm sorry I pushed the other thing."

Ryan ducks his head, way too grateful to have Spencer touching him like this again. He's never been overly-affectionate, but Spencer's been the one constant source of friendship in his life, and he always forgets how much he needs the occasional hug until he has no one to go to for it. "Brendon and I talked," he says.

Spencer drops his hand and finally starts to make disappointed noises over his ruined shirt. "Yeah, he told me."

"You guys talked?"

"We do that occasionally," Spencer says. "He was so amped up I figured Cash was giving him free espressos again. Turns out he was just high on Ryan Ross."

Now that things are mostly okay, Ryan's stomach reminds him that now that the metaphorical rock is gone, it would really like some non-metaphorical noodles. He takes his tray over to a table and sits down, waiting until Spencer sits down next to him to answer. "That would be a terrible drug."

Spencer barks out a laugh. "Side effects may include cold shoulders, a stubborn streak, and a deep love for the Beatles."

"Hey," Ryan protests, pointing his spoon at Spencer, "That last one's not a bad thing."

Spencer steals his spoon and takes a bite of soup, smiling. "The side effects are worth putting up with."

Ryan steals his spoon back and hides his own smile in a bite full of noodles. "Get your own food, lazy."

Spencer's mood suddenly goes dark. "I can try, don't know how successful I'll be."

"What?"

"I guess there's sides now? With the whole Jon thing, I don't even know. The pizza guy refused to serve me yesterday because he's loyal to Beckett, or something."

Ryan frowns. "They can't really refuse to serve you, can they? I mean, for that?"

Spencer shrugs, glancing over at the Taco Bell place. "I don't know. Seems like they can."

Ryan crumples up his napkin and stands up, just in time to see Brendon weaving and ducking through the crowd to get to them. "Guys, guys, I am so hungry, you don't even know. This like, five-year-old girl just handed me my ass in Dance, Dance Revolution, and I blame it on lack of carbs."

Ryan shoots a determined look at Spencer. "How does Taco Bell sound?"

"Awesome," Brendon says, already starting over. "My treat!"

Spencer looks wary, but Ryan nods forcefully. William's already glaring at them out of the corner of his eye, and Ryan's determined to get this squared away, but he's also kind of glad Brendon's going ahead of them.

--

Gerard shuffles the same stack of papers he's been shuffling for twenty minutes. He coughs a little, taps the edges of the papers to get them to line up, and coughs again.

"No, Gerard." Mikey finishes shelving the comics he'd taken down to inventory.

Gerard opens and closes his mouth like a fish, pulling a face. "What? I didn't say anything!"

Mikey turns around and crosses his arms. "I know what you're thinking. And no, I will not run a stall for you at MallFest '09 or whatever they're calling it."

Gerard drops the act and leans over the counter. "Mikey, please. It's you or me, and you know I hate crowds."

"I can't. I'm busy that night."

Gerard narrows his eyes. "Fine, but if you're busy doing what I think you'll be doing, don't tell me. Lie if you have to."

"Okay. I'm not going out with Gabe that night."

Gerard nods emphatically. "I choose to take that as God's honest truth. I also would have accepted 'going to visit Mom', 'Matrix marathon', or 'dressing the cat up in doll clothes'.

"I don't-" Mikey starts, but Gerard cuts him off.

"And I don't judge. As long as it's consensual."

"...are we still talking about the cat thing?"

Gerard's eyebrows snap together. "We better still be talking about the cat thing."

Mikey puts his hands up defensively. "I'm going to get coffee."

Gerard huffs around a little bit, not really getting much accomplished, and barely notices when Bob walks in. "Hey, Geeway. Frank around?"

Gerard huffs some more. "He doesn't work here, why would I know where he's at?"

Bob's eyebrows inch up a little. "...because he's in here all the time?"

Gerard can't find fault in that logic. Frank's in the comic shop more than he's at his own job, which Gerard still hasn't figured out. Frank gets people requesting him all the time for their weird post-modern haircuts, he's half the reason the shop's so popular, but he always seems to have time to come around and debate comics or hit on Gerard. A tiny, niggling voice at the back of his mind tells Gerard that Frank probably doesn't have that time to spare, that he makes time to do those things, and it isn't some stupid way to slack off.

He maybe sounds more contrite than is really called for in the current situation when he says, "Oh. Well, he's not here now. Did you check Hairbrained?"

Bob nods. "Bert said he took a fifteen-minute break an hour ago."

Gerard frowns. Frank takes a lot of breaks, but he's usually just across the way at The Black Parade or loitering between the two, trying to get Gerard to come out to watch Brendon racing remote-controlled airplanes across the pavilion or Joe accidentally pushing his candle cart into the fountain or Tom stalking somebody while they shop (and eventually while they try to find security to report the creepy guy with the camera).

Mikey comes back just about then. "I...think I just witnessed a turf war," he says, blinking owlishly.

Bob rubs his beard. "We've never had any gang problems here before."

Mikey shakes his head slowly. "No...I think the food court guys are challenging the L3 section guys."

"So, Bath & Body Works, Toe to Heel, and...Toys 'R Us?" Bob looks just as confused as Gerard feels. In fact, Gerard's starting to wonder if this is some elaborate practical joke, and he starts getting that feeling in his stomach like he got in high school when somebody would tell him one of the cheerleaders had a thing for him. Deep down, he knew it wasn't true, but there was still that small part of his brain that said, Weirder things have happened. Except in this case, Gerard can't think of anything weirder than a turf war going down between the food court guys and the kids from L3.

"Wait, why would they be having a turf war? They're like, two floors away from each other. This isn't a stake-your-claim kind of place," Gerard says, already grabbing the keys to close up the shop. He doesn't get it, but he's not going to miss seeing whatever it is he doesn't get.

Mikey shrugs. "Something to do with Jon Walker?"

Bob stifles a laugh. "Oh."

The three of them head down to the food court and get there just in time to see William Beckett throw a handful of ketchup packets at Spencer Smith.

"You snake in the grass! You deceptive backstabber! No you will not have a combo meal with a Coke, because you are banned from here!"

There's a pretty sizable crowd of people standing around watching the histrionics, and Frank's near to the middle of it, holding a basket of fries in one hand and happily stuffing his face with the other. Gerard pushes through the crowd to get to him. "What the hell is going on?"

Frank grins and offers him a fry. "Jon quit Starbucks to work at Spencer's shoe store full time. Bill took it as a personal insult and has banned Spencer, Ryan, and Brendon from eating anywhere in the food court. I think there might actually be a duel for Jon." Frank relays it all in a gleeful sort of voice, and for a second, Gerard's horrified. And then he pictures William Beckett dueling Spencer, realizes that their weapons of choice would probably be hairspray and flatirons, and suddenly he's trying to bite back laughter.

"This is ridiculous," he finally manages to splutter out, and Frank nods, but he's not watching the scene anymore. Now he's just staring at Gerard with this stupid, happy look, and then he leans up and presses his lips against Gerard's.

He tastes like fries, a little greasy, slightly salty. Both of their eyes are open; Gerard's wide and unblinking, Frank's crinkled up at the sides from smiling into Gerard's mouth, and they just stay like that for a few seconds, mouths closed but pressed together, staring at each other. And then Frank pulls away and pops another fry into his mouth, resuming his spot as spectator while Spencer glares at Bill, and Ryan and Brendon stand behind him, looking awkward and a little afraid.

Gerard considers going back to find Mikey and Bob, considers going to find just Mikey so he can freak out about what just happened, but Frank is warm and comfortable by his side, squeezed up close by the press of the crowd, smiling for all the world like there is no place he'd rather be.

Ryan's next to Spencer now, and William looks like he's considering dousing them both with the megasize cup of soda in his hand. Brendon looks vaguely confused, Mike Carden's looking at them all like he's trying to kill them with his brain, and Jon's standing halfway between both groups, looking massively uncomfortable. Gerard can't really think of anywhere he'd rather be, either.

Eventually Spencer, Ryan, and Brendon leave, and Gabe arrives to tell Bill how hot he looks when he's angry, effectively defusing Bill's anger. Gerard's offended on Mikey's behalf. He sort of wants to punch Gabe in the mouth for saying anyone besides his brother is hot, but he also kind of wants to punch Gabe for thinking his brother's hot, so. Conundrum. Mikey doesn't look worried about it, in any case, so Gerard stays where he is, trying to figure out what to do next. Now that the crowd's dispersing, Frank has plenty of room to move, but he stays tucked up close next to Gerard, finishing his fries. Gerard's not really up on what the post-first kiss etiquette is. He could be nonchalant and just say, See you later!, or he could be embarrassingly awkward and shift in place, not meeting Frank's eyes until Frank makes the first move. There's a good chance he's going to go for the second option.

"So," Frank says, setting his fry basket aside and hooking a finger in the belt loop of Gerard's jeans to tug him closer, "What time should I pick you up?"

Gerard tries to make his brain function while he's noticing how close their hips are. He can't remember making any plans. The only thing he can remember is being vaguely excited about The History Channel's new special on the roots of mythological creatures. "For what?"

Frank grins. "For dinner. I interrupted your lunch the other day, and I said I'd take you out for dinner to make up for it. You didn't say no."

Gerard remembers the conversation, but he hadn't put much thought into it beyond assuming Frank would promise a kidney if it meant going to see puppies. "I didn't say yes, either."

It's a lot less definite an answer than Gerard's given in the past, but Frank's face falls, and he carefully extracts his finger from Gerard's belt loop. He doesn't grin, he doesn't bargain, he doesn't try to guilt Gerard into it. He just backs off. The sudden tension between them is so, so much worse than the awkwardness of not knowing what to do after a first kiss, and Gerard kicks himself. He doesn't not want to go out to dinner with Frank, but he's been saying no for so long that it's habit, and now he can't get himself to take it back. He wants Frank to ask again, waits for him to push the issue like he always has so Gerard can smile, say yes, and watch Frank's reaction to that. But Frank looks...defeated is the word Gerard would use. Asshole is another one. Idiot. Frank looks like a kid that's finally letting that one last ember of hope that Santa Claus is real, no matter how many times his parents have told him otherwise, die out.

"Okay. I guess I'll see you around, Gerard." Frank turns on his heel and leaves, disappearing into the throng of people in the food court without a backward glance. Gerard stands there until Mikey comes over.

"Everything okay?"

Gerard nods, and his head feels heavy. "Yeah." It doesn't hit him until just then that everything is so far from okay he doesn't even know where to start. He feels disappointed, empty, lonely. If he didn't know any better, he'd think he felt heartbroken.

Mikey inclines his head toward the escalator. "You want me to go open the shop?"

Gerard would like nothing more than to just go home and crawl under the blankets and pretend nothing happened. He swallows and forces himself to start walking. He can mope around by himself, no need to drag Mikey down with him. "Nah. I'll get it. Why don't you take off early and get ready for your date?"

Mikey stops mid-step and blinks at Gerard. "...what?"

Gerard keeps walking, and eventually Mikey catches up. "Go home and get ready. I can handle the shop by myself for a while."

"No, I know, but. You're actually acknowledging that I'm going out with Gabe?"

Gerard steps onto the escalator and gives Mikey a tired smile. "I've been kind of a shitty big brother. You can go out with whoever you want, Mikey."

Mikey follows him on and shoves his hands in his pockets, staring down at his shoes. "You're not a shitty big brother."

Gerard wraps his arm around Mikey's neck and kisses the top of his head, mumbling, "Yeah, sometimes I am. Sometimes I'm a shitty person."

Mikey makes noises of protest, but Gerard just talks over him and insists he go home to get ready. Mikey finally agrees, and Gerard opens the shop alone. It's late in the day, so the trickle of customers is slow, but Gerard's heart leaps into his throat every time he hears someone cross the threshold. It sinks back down into his stomach every time the someone isn't Frank.

--

"I'm appalled," Ryan says, standing at the edge of the railing and looking down into the food court. "Totally appalled."

Brendon glares down, too, kicking his feet idly in the space between the bottom of the railing and the floor. "It's not like they own him, what the hell. Jon is a free market commodity!"

Ryan shakes his head. "He's not a commodity, he's a person, Brendon." Brendon looks duly ashamed. "But he's our person now."

Brendon grins, kicks his foot a little harder, and his shoe goes flying off, sailing down past the first floor and landing on a table in the middle of the food court. Brendon stares, horrified, and Ryan watches impassively - he's warned Brendon about the dangers of wearing shoes with the laces undone - as William comes out from behind his counter, grabs the shoe, and holds it up, shaking it at them like some spoil of war.

"Give us back Jon Walker!" William shouts, still holding the shoe.

"We'd rather go barefoot!" Ryan sneers, and pushes away from the railing, grabbing Brendon's elbow and tugging him along.

"But...my shoe..." Brendon protests weakly, limping along.

"We do not give in to terrorist demands," Ryan informs him firmly, repositioning himself in front of his store.

"I don't really think they're terrorists," Brendon says, hopping up on one foot and putting his shoeless foot on top of his lonely sneaker. "And I'd really like my shoe back."

"Regardless. They can keep the shoe. Jon's worth a lot more than a shoe."

Brendon frowns. "Yeah, except you're not the one that has to walk around with one shoe and a holey sock for the rest of the day."

Ryan takes pity on him and nudges him over to Spencer's store. "Spence?"

Jon's sitting near the cowboy boots, fiddling with a shoehorn. "I think he's in back. What do you need, maybe I can help."

Ryan gestures at Brendon's bare foot. "Footwear mishap."

Jon glances down at Brendon's feet and nods knowingly, waving them over. "Somebody steal it?"

Brendon sits down in a chair in front of Jon and extends his leg. Ryan frowns. "...no. Why would somebody steal one shoe?"

Jon kneels down and cups the back of Brendon's calf, sliding his fingers down Brendon's ankle and gently adjusting his foot in his grip. Brendon shivers a little bit, and Ryan's eyes narrow. Jon holds the sizer up to Brendon's foot and shrugs. "You'd be surprised. Shoes are really in demand right now. Even single ones."

Ryan watches as Jon fits the sizer to Brendon's foot, Brendon giggling a little when Jon's fingers catch the side of his instep.

"You're kidding, right?"

Jon looks up at him and grins. "You're onto me, Ross. Can't put anything past you."

Ryan rolls his eyes but can't hide a tiny grin. It doesn't take long for Jon to find a suitable pair of cheap, temporary replacement shoes for Brendon, and Ryan slides his wallet out before Brendon can protest. Jon waves him off. "The least I can do, right? Since you guys can't even get a decent meal around here anymore because of me."

Ryan shakes his head. "If you think we were getting decent meals before you defected, you are sorely mistaken."

Spencer comes out of the back, arms loaded up with boxes, and peers around them. "Jon, are you giving away the merchandise already?"

Jon holds out his hands. "Only to the truly needy."

Spencer sets the boxes down and looks Brendon up and down, shaking his head. "You're right; this one is pretty desperate-looking. I'd say we should get him a cup of soup or a slice of pizza or something, but if memory serves, we were banned from the food court."

Spencer's grinning, but Jon flushes under his beard, and Brendon takes the focus off by dramatically waving his arm and saying, "Desperate-looking? Please. I make minimum-wage look good." He does a fancy spin and throws his arms out, wiggling his fingers in true jazz-hands form, and grins at Ryan. Ryan can't actually deny that Brendon does make working a mundane nine-to-five look really appealing. Even in the monogrammed polo shirt, khakis, and cheap canvas shoes, Brendon looks like he should be on stage or flashing that Colgate smile in the pages of a magazine.

Ryan grabs Brendon's arm before he can embarrass himself out loud. "Thanks, Jon. I'll pay you back later."

The guy Ryan's on-shift with gives him a dirty look when they get back, but Ryan ignores it. He was gone five minutes, if even, and he's still working toward that celebration booth, so technically, he's doing the guy a favor by continuously proving himself a bad employee. That guy won't have to deal with swarms of people trying out every tester available and then shoving their wrists in his face to ask if the smell suits them.

"Thanks for that, Ry, seriously. Navigating the floor of a kids' store is dangerous enough without worrying about what I'm going to step on...or in." Brendon's standing in between Bath & Body Works and Toys 'R Us, although Ryan doesn't miss that he's standing a few inches closer to Ryan's store than his own.

Ryan shrugs. "It's okay."

Brendon shakes his head emphatically. "I totally owe you one, though. Isn't it like, a dude buys another dude a pair of shoes and he has to protect him with his life or something?" Brendon's grinning, so Ryan knows he's not seriously that misinformed, but he plays along anyway.

"Something like that. Maybe you just have to protect my feet."

Brendon nods seriously. "With my life!" He pauses and adds, "Maybe I have to protect Jon's, too, since he provided the shoes."

Ryan crosses his arms and stares down at his feet, trying to keep the sides of his lips from quirking. "I think Spencer's got that covered."

"Spencer's..." Brendon looks confused for a second, and then he lets out a whoop. "Oh, seriously? Spencer and Jon? I thought those two chuckleheads were never gonna get it together."

Ryan holds up a hand, glancing over his shoulder to make sure Spencer isn't coming charging out of his store to wreak his vengeance on anyone for saying that out loud. "Shh, shh. I don't think it's official yet or anything. Jon taking the job's a good start, though."

Brendon's grin could power the entire Vegas strip for a week. "Nah, I won't say anything. I'm just happy for 'em, you know? There's way too much pining going on around here. Nobody ever, like, actually gets what they want." His grin goes from high-wattage to dim in a split second. Ryan hates himself a little bit for sort of wanting Brendon to get together with Patrick. He doesn't want Brendon to get together with Patrick, he thinks he might write some poetry that would rival his third-grade self's epic atrocities if that happened, but if getting Patrick means Brendon will smile like that again, it might not be all terrible.

"Yeah," he says, kicking at a wadded-up receipt, "Well. I guess that's life."

Suddenly Brendon's way closer than he was before, close enough to put his hand on Ryan's shoulder and squeeze gently. "I hope you get what you want, Ryan Ross," he murmurs, and he looks so damn earnest, and the tiniest bit heartbroken, that Ryan can't feel as sorry for himself as he'd like. Brendon likes Patrick, and here he is consoling Ryan over what he thinks is potential rivalry.

"I hope you do, too, Brendon."

Brendon squeezes again and opens his mouth to say something, but there's a sudden high-pitched buzzing noise and they both look down in time to see a remote-contolled car crash head-on into Brendon's new shoes. There's a kid standing in the doorway of Toys 'R Us, eyes wide. "S-Sorry! I didn't mean-"

Brendon lets go of Ryan and strides over to the kid, taking the remote out of his hands. The kid looks like he's ready to get yelled at, but Brendon flips a couple switches and smoothly guides the car back to Toys 'R Us. "This one's the best, c'mon, I'll show you the ramp we set up in back for it. It gets serious air, dude, I'm telling you, it's awesome." The kid's face lights up, and Brendon throws Ryan one last beaming smile before he heads off with the kid.

Ryan slumps against the wall when Brendon's out of sight. His fingers itch for a pen, and he realizes with some dismay that it's not just the angsty poems he wants to write about Brendon. He wants to write odes to his smile, and even if they may be a little more sophisticated than his third-grade ode to his crush's honey-colored hair and orbs as deep and blue as the ocean, they're still odes. At least he's secure in the knowledge that Spencer won't be kissing the object of his affection this time. He's not secure in the knowledge that he'll be kissing the object of his affection this time, either, though.

--

By the next morning, Gerard's feeling even worse. Frank's not waiting by the shop with a cup of coffee for him, he's not even waiting outside Hairbrained with a grin. Gerard has well and truly fucked things up, and he'd spent the better part of the night before realizing that.

There's enough to do for the first couple of hours that Gerard can keep his mind off everything - shelving new comics, calculating the month's expenses, figuring out what he's going to display in the stall for the mall's anniversary celebration. But by eleven, he's out of things to distract himself with. Mikey has classes until two, and Gerard's never missed his brother's silent brand of companionship as much as he does right now.

At noon, Bert shows up.

Frank hadn't been wrong when he'd said that they'd worked things out amicably, but Gerard's stomach still flips a little when he runs into Bert, he still feels a little tongue-tied and awkward.

"Hiya, Gee," Bert says, hoisting himself up onto the counter without any preamble. Gerard unsticks his tongue from the roof of his mouth and forces a smile.

"Hey, Bert. What's up?"

"You tell me." Bert stares down at him, not unfriendly, but Gerard's hackles go up anyway.

"Uh, I don't know?"

Bert grabs a Green Lantern action figure off the shelf next to his head and fiddles with it. Gerard resists the urge to tell him not to play with it. Bert never has malicious intentions, but things tend to end up broken around him at a much higher rate than most people. "Frank's being weird. I figured it had something to do with you."

Gerard freezes up and stubbornly glares at Bert for about five seconds, and then he sighs and reminds himself exactly how much good it did to get stubborn and fall back into old habits with Frank. "Yeah. It probably does. I was an asshole yesterday."

Bert nods like Gerard's just confirming what he already knew, and grabs a Nite Owl figurine off the shelf, making it kiss the Green Lantern. "It used to be a lot easier to get into your pants."

Gerard bites back a laugh and rolls his eyes, trying to stay at least a little aloof, but he'd forgotten how ridiculous Bert was sometimes and how hard it was to resist going along with him. "Maybe I was just easy for you."

Bert ponders this, his action figure porn re-enactment moving towards dry humping. "Maybe. Maybe you're ruined for all other men now."

"That's probably it," Gerard says, falling back into the easy rhythm they used to have. "I'll probably die a lonely old man, wishing anyone could live up to my first love."

They both pause, Gerard kicking himself for bringing up the seriousness of their relationship when they were just getting comfortable, and Bert looking at Gerard like he's surprised to hear it. Eventually he puts the Green Lantern and Nite Owl in a sixty-nine position and says, "Frank could."

Gerard says, "Probably," sounding just as miserable as he feels.

Bert jumps off the counter and hands Gerard back the action figures. "You need a haircut."

Gerard shakes his head. "No, I just got one-"

Bert leans in and kisses Gerard on the lips, hard, and when he pulls back, he says, "Yeah, you do. Come over around four." He leaves before Gerard can say anything, too surprised by the kiss, and by the time he's come back around to realizing what going over there means, it's too late to say no.

He mutters, "Motherfucker," to the empty shop and spends the rest of the afternoon quietly freaking out.

--

"Shh, hold on." Brendon raises his hand right in front of Spencer's face and peers around the corner into the food court. At this hour of the afternoon it's mostly deserted, but Spencer still feels pretty stupid lurking while the few people who are there are eating and being, well, normal human beings. He sighs for the hundredth time in an hour but stays behind Brendon. He's just glad he didn't put on that ski mask Brendon had excitedly waved in front of his face. Spencer has standards after all. Even though he almost caved when Jon said he thought it would look good with Spencer's new shoes.

"I don't think they're paying attention right now. This is our chance." Brendon's whispering loudly in some sort of fake spy voice and his eyes are practically glowing with excitement. It's kind of scary actually.

"What are you, some sort of Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible imitation?"

Brendon whoops triumphantly and then immediately claps his hands in front of his mouth. He looks to see if anyone noticed him, but the little kids chasing each other around the food court are probably loud enough to drown out an apocalypse.

Leaning in, Brendon fake whispers, "Ryan said no one would ever guess because my imitation's so bad, but I knew he was wrong."

Spencer rolls his eyes. He really needs to ask Ryan how he managed to get out of this. There has to be a trick to survive Brendon's pleading puppy dog eyes of doom.

"So, what exactly is the plan?" Spencer asks.

"Well, it's fairly easy. We're going to cripple the enemy." Brendon beams proudly at Spencer.

"You wanna get into a fight?" It's not that Spencer doesn't trust his own fighting skills. He's no Schwarzenegger, but he's pretty sure he could take Beckett and that kid who constantly hangs around with the Butcher guy easily. He's not so sure about the guy from the yogurt stall with the Australian accent. That dude probably wrestled alligators when he was a kid. Maybe Brendon can fight that one.

"No. I don't like violence. We are gonna do something much cooler. We'll manipulate the shutters so they go down now instead of at closing time."

Spencer has to admit that is actually kind of a cool idea. "How are we going to do that?"

"I know a way. From a reliable source." Brendon peers around the corner again and suspiciously watches a family walk past them, giving them curious glances. Spencer tries to look as if he's never seen Brendon before. When they're gone he asks, "So who's that reliable source? I really hope it's not Gabe Saporta."

"Um." Brendon blushes and fidgets a bit.

"Oh my god, you based this whole plan on something Gabe told you?"

"It's okay, his information is totally trustworthy."

"Trustworthy? Like that time he told you there was a big hidden stash of candy at the back of the snake terrarium? You do remember the snakes that tried to choke you, right?" Spencer can, at least, and he's pretty sure he aged ten years that day, seeing Brendon's body hanging half inside the terrarium, three snakes wrapped around various body parts. The worst thing was he still believed there was candy in there after that. It took Gabe and Greta to convince him that the snakes were not in fact hiding a secret stash of gummy bears.

"Yeah, yeah, I remember. But this is different. Look. There's a box over there on the wall. It's the red one. Can you see it?" Spencer leans around Brendon and sure enough there is a red box on the wall at the other end of the food court. He nods. "In that box is a keypad. When you put a code in there the shutters come down around the whole food court."

"How the hell did you get the combination for that?"

"Gabe told me," Brendon says like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"Just like that?"

"Well, I walked in on him and Mikey doing, um, something weird with a spoon and a lamp. You don't wanna know. Anyway. The combination is totally easy, too. It's the first four chords from William's favorite Radiohead song. Each letter corresponds to a number. Like the first chord is C, so the corresponding number is three. I really could have guessed that on my own."

"Why does William have the code to that?"

Brendon rolls his eyes. "Because he's like the food court manager. How do you think he got all the other food court guys to conspire against us?"

Spencer stares at Brendon for a long moment and then decides for the sake of his own sanity to just accept what Brendon just said. "Okay, so how do we do this? You run over there and put in the code while I watch your back from here?"

Brendon looks a little offended for a second, then he says, "Keep up, Spencer. I will distract them while you type in the code. Here, I wrote it down for you." Brendon shoves a wrinkled receipt at Spencer, on the back of which four numbers are written. Spencer stares at the paper and then at Brendon. He wonders if arguing would get him out of this insanity, but it didn't help him when Brendon ambushed him behind the hiking boots earlier so he's pretty sure his fate is sealed.

"Yeah, fine." Brendon grins and picks up a bag from the floor. "On three," he says and before Spencer can protest, Brendon counts down and immediately runs into the middle of the food court. Spencer doesn't wait to find out what exactly Brendon's great distraction tactic is. He takes off to the other side of the food court, keeping his head down to try his best to go unnoticed. He's lucky, most of the food court employees seem to either be busy somewhere in the back or too bored to pretend to even look up at potential customers. He reaches the red box unnoticed.

From close up it's a bit scratched up, red paint fading. It doesn't even have a lock, just a little silver knob that gives easily when Spencer turns it. And sure enough there is the little security key pad. Spencer's kind of suspicious of how easy that was. He hesitates putting in the numbers and then he hears Brendon yell.

When Spencer turns around he's met with a spectacle he's pretty sure no one will believe if he retells it later. Brendon has jumped up on one of the food court tables, scattering old burger wrappers all around him. There's a look of complete madness on his face as he wildly waves his bag around. He pulls handfuls of, well, something out of it and keeps yelling, "Money for everyone! No one should be poor! Here at our mall everyone's a winner!" Spencer's pretty sure Brendon's seen Ocean's 11 one time too many.

He's also pretty sure that that's Monopoly money Brendon's throwing around.

Spencer whirls back around and quickly puts the number into the key pad. Right now everyone's still overwhelmed by the sheer craziness Brendon's giving off, but Spencer's pretty sure that won't last once someone calls security or worse, demands real money from Brendon. The pad gives a little bleep and the next second Spencer hears a familiar rumbling. When he turns back around the children are running back to their parents who look a little puzzled at the gates coming down over the food court stalls.

He really doesn't want to find out what the reaction of the food court guys is, so Spencer does the only thing he can think of and starts running in the direction they came from. Brendon joins him a minute later, skipping along easily, whooping triumphantly. "That was awesome," he yells, overtaking Spencer and rounding the corner towards the escalators. Spencer's too busy running to say anything. He's kind of scared that William Beckett is secretly an athlete, he has the legs for it anyway, and the last thing Spencer wants is to get caught like a loser.

Quietly though, he completely agrees with Brendon. That was kind of awesome.

--

Mikey comes in at quarter after two, slinging his bag down behind the counter and rubbing his eyes. "I never should've signed up for a seven AM class."

Gerard hums sympathetically. "At least it's Friday. Hey, do you have plans today?"

Mikey shakes his head. "Not really. I figured I'd hang out here and crash at your place tonight, if that's okay."

Gerard nods, but arches an eyebrow. "That's fine, but what's wrong with your place?"

Mikey digs in his bag and comes up with a history textbook, laying it out on the counter and uncapping a highlighter. "Nothing. It's just further away from the mall than yours, so I thought I'd ride in with you tomorrow for the anniversary thing."

Gerard beams, wrapping his arms around Mikey from behind him and resting his chin on Mikey's shoulder. "You're the best brother."

Mikey ducks his head and pretends to be studying. "Why'd you ask if I had plans?"

Gerard tucks his face into Mikey's neck and mumbles, "I have an appointment to get my hair cut."

Mikey turns around, displacing Gerard, and narrows his eyes. "You just got-"

Gerard waves his hands. "I know, I know. Bert told me to come over, though. I think he's expecting me and Frank to patch things up."

Mikey fiddles with the highlighter in his hand, his eyebrows coming together just a fraction of an inch. For as vocal as Gerard has ever been about Mikey's significant others, Mikey has been quiet. The only time Gerard can ever remember Mikey weighing in was after Bert, and he made it pretty clear he wasn't a fan. Even after Gerard and Bert patched things up, Mikey's held onto the enduring dislike that only a sibling can have for someone who hurt their brother or sister. "What happened yesterday, in the food court?"

"Frank kissed me."

"Did you kiss him back?"

Gerard nods.

"So what's there to patch up?"

"He asked me out and I kind of said no." The sharp pang of guilt and loss comes back full force.

Mikey sighs, recapping his highlighter. "You like him, right?"

Before yesterday, before last night, Gerard would have found a way to say no. "Yes."

"Then go get a haircut and fix things."

"But I-"

Mikey gives him a hard look. "I will give you full details about last night if you continue that sentence." Gerard shuts his mouth. Mikey nods. "I thought so."

Gerard does not want details, but he's also trying to be a better brother, so he asks, "How was it? The date," he quickly amends. "The date. Not...anything else."

By four, Gerard's heard as much about Gabe as he ever wants to hear. He's also heard about Travis (from Victoria's Secret), Vicky-T (also from Victoria's Secret - an irony Gerard and Mikey never fail to bring up whenever they run into her), and William. Apparently, Travis and William have a thing, and Travis and Vicky-T have a thing, and William and Vicky-T have been trading innuendos, and the whole thing is way too involved for Gerard to keep track of. He's still trying not to throw up from nerves at the idea of seeing Frank, but at least he's happy to escape Mikey's sordid gossip.

Hairbrained is one of the three hairstyling shops in the mall, and the only one that is staffed mainly by dyed, tattooed, and pierced employees. The people in the chairs are usually just as pierced and tattooed, and when they walk out, just as dyed. Dan owns the place, but for as much time as Frank and Bert spend there, they're almost silent partners. Except for the fact that they're never, ever silent.

Well, mostly never. Frank's sitting in his own chair, spinning a pair of scissors around his finger and staring morosely at the wall. Gerard hovers by the entrance, talking himself into going in. Bert's behind the counter with Dan, telling some elaborate story mostly with his hands, and the other stylists are all busy, even Bert's chair occupied by someone wearing a plastic cap smeared with dye. Gerard has a sinking feeling he knows what Bert's plan is. Before he can back out, though, Bert spots him and runs out from behind the counter to grab his arm and haul him inside.

"You came!" He's grinning like a lunatic, and Gerard can't help but smile back. "Okay, I had a walk-in, but Frank's free. Right, Frank?"

Gerard rolls his eyes at Bert's "walk-in," because Bert is so far from stealth he makes Gerard look smooth. Frank spins around in his chair just in time to see the expression. His face goes closed in an instant, and he stands up, scissors still in hand. "Not really. I'm just on my way out."

Gerard's stomach rolls, and he has to tamp down the urge to turn around and run back to the safety of his own shop. "Just a trim, it won't take long, promise."

Frank looks surprised, but after a moment of hesitation during which Gerard's pretty sure he's going to get punched, Frank grabs the back of his chair and gestures for Gerard to sit down. Bert grins, shoves Gerard toward the chair, and goes back to his own chair to peel the cap off his client.

Gerard sits warily, and Frank spins him toward the mirror and shakes a cape over him. All his movements are efficient, precise, and Gerard half-expects him to be the same way with his hair. But he runs his fingers through Gerard's hair gently, scratching his nails lightly over Gerard's scalp, and tugs at the ends. "How much do you want off?"

Gerard goes boneless in about three seconds flat, goosebumps prickling over his skin, and he has to forcibly restrain himself from purring. His hair's always been a weak spot, but he's never had it affect him quite like this. Then again, he's never had Frank cut his hair before, either.

"Just..." Gerard's voice comes out breathless and thready, and he has to clear his throat. "Just a trim."

There's a spray bottle on Frank's shelf, and he grabs it, deftly dampening Gerard's hair with a few squirts. He runs his fingers through Gerard's hair again, separating the clingy strands, and Gerard shifts awkwardly in the chair. Purring's not so much the problem anymore. He's grateful the cape covers most of his lap.

Frank takes his time, snipping tiny bits off the ends of Gerard's hair here and there, shaping the sides, and eventually he turns the chair so they're facing. He pulls the bits of hair Gerard calls bangs through his fingers, measuring the length. The side of his hand keeps brushing Gerard's face, and Gerard has to keep pretending he doesn't notice. Eventually, Frank's been cutting long enough that there's no way he's not dragging it out, so Gerard bites the bullet.

"About yesterday...I'm sorry. I made a mistake."

Frank freezes, scissors way too close to Gerard's eye for comfort. After a second he unfreezes, lops what has to be a fairly significant chunk of hair off, and says, "Me, too."

Gerard tries to ignore the sort of breezy area of his head. "Wait, what?"

Frank sheathes his scissors and grabs a whisk broom, briskly sweeping the hair off Gerard's shoulders. "I shouldn't have kissed you. I'm sorry. You're done, you can pay up front." He unfastens the cape and shakes it out, already turning his back on Gerard.

Gerard's stomach clenches, and for a second he's convinced the whole thing has been a mistake, Frank never really liked him, the kiss was a joke, there's nothing to do but pick up his dignity and go home. And then he remembers that this isn't a soap opera, and Frank's been pretty up-front about wanting to date Gerard. "Hey. Wait."

Frank turns back around, face drawn and wary, and Gerard stands up. Frank tenses. Gerard leans in and kisses him.

They stand there like that for a second, awkwardly pressed against each other at the mouth, both of their hands at their sides, and it goes on for just long enough that Gerard thinks, oh shit. I'm gonna get scissors in my eye. But then Frank wraps his arms around Gerard and pulls him closer, mouth opening under Gerard's, tongue licking in to slide against Gerard's.

Bert makes a "woooooo!" noise from the front of the shop, and Frank lets go of Gerard long enough to raise his middle finger. When they break apart, Frank still looks a little peeved, although well-kissed and a little flushed, too. "What the fuck was yesterday about?" he asks.

Gerard can't stop staring at Frank's lips, red and shiny and doing too much that is not kissing Gerard. "I got used to saying no."

Frank rolls his eyes. "Well get used to saying yes. You wanna go make out in the closet?"

Gerard doesn't hesitate. "Yes."

Dan says, "About fucking time," as they pass him. Gerard doesn't disagree.

--

Pete is pretty sure that taking Patrick to the balcony was the dumbest idea he has had in his life, ever. Well, maybe the second dumbest idea, right after the one where he thought it was a good idea to abandon Patrick there and sneak out the next morning. Yeah, okay, maybe the third dumbest idea after abandoning Patrick and definitely after avoiding him for the whole following week.

And it's not like the whole avoiding thing is really that easy. As a matter of fact it's pretty hard since Patrick kind of seems to be stalking him. Every time Pete so much as enters the mall it's like Patrick just knows and appears around the next corner. This has led to: Pete getting a warning because he stole some kid's cotton candy to hide behind, totally almost breaking his ankle jumping into the fountain in the main entrance hall, underestimating how very shallow the surrounding pool was, and him losing about three jobs in a row. American Eagle was of course inevitable because it was right across from Patrick's store, and as it turned out Pete's manager really wasn't too fond of him hiding behind customers. He worked for the mall committee after that, but since Patrick was on that one as well, Pete pretty much quit within the day (but not after voting yes on "security guards dressed up as animals for the festivities").

So, now Pete's pretty much unemployed, hiding from Patrick and nursing his broken heart by looking at tiny white gerbils through a glass window.

"Pete, stop loitering or buy a gerbil," Gabe tells him in passing, arm full of bird food, pushing Pete in the back on purpose. Pete grumbles something and keeps staring at the little gerbils as they move around their cage, eating and sleeping and pretty much doing nothing else.

"Man, I wish I was one of you," Pete tells them thoughtfully.

"Man, I wish you'd stop scaring away my customers," a voice says next to him and when Pete turns he's met with Greta, arms crossed in front of her chest. She looks kind of serious. Pete wonders if running away right now might make him look like less of a man. On second thought that doesn't really matter so much as the just running away part does.

Greta gives him a stern look and says, "Here, take this and follow me." She shoves a small blue shovel and some plastic bags into Pete's hands and turns around, clearly expecting Pete to follow.

Pete stays exactly where he is. He's not following Greta's orders like some smaller version of Gabe, who is totally Greta's puppet. But Pete is not a puppet, he is independent and he-

"Are you coming or what?"

Pete hurries to catch up with Greta.

"So, what is this stuff for?" Pete asks her as they make their way past rows of dog toys and cat food.

"Oh it's for the favor you're going to do for me in exchange for my very helpful advice."

Pete spends a moment trying to figure out whether he'd rather know the favor he'll have to do or the advice that he's going to get. He settles on, "I don't need your advice!"

Greta laughs and pats him on the shoulder as she steers them towards the front of the store. "Sure you do. You've spent two days staring at baby animals doing absolutely nothing. And moping over Patrick Stump."

"I'm totally not in love with Patrick!" Pete splutters and then immediately realizes his mistake. "I mean, I'm not moping!"

"Oh honey," Greta says and shakes her head sadly, "You really need to get with the program."

They stop in front of the stall with the puppies. Right now they're sleeping in a pile to one side, only one of them really awake, blinking up at them with his big puppy eyes. He's probably hoping for food. To the other side Pete sees the favor he's probably supposed to do. The piles of poo are tiny, but there are really quite a lot of them and Pete seriously considers running again.

"Let's get started," Greta says cheerfully and pushes at Pete until he has no other choice but to carefully step over the plastic wall surrounding the puppy stall. Pete's pretty sure he can hear Gabe cackling evilly from somewhere at the back of the store. "You scoop up the poop and I'll give you some advice. Ready?"

Pete stares at Greta as she steps in with him, sits next to the pile of puppies and pulls the one that's awake into her lap. "Whatever," Pete says and goes to his knees, carefully picking the first pile of poo up with his shovel, trying to maneuver it into one of the plastic bags.

"So, I advise you to go to Patrick and tell him you're madly in love with him and want to make out a lot."

The pile of poop drops from the shovel, missing the plastic bag and landing straight on the floor again. Pete stares at Greta with big eyes. "How do you even know that?"

"Because I have eyes?" Greta strokes the puppy's head, who closes his eyes contently. "Now whatever you did to mess this up, you go and apologize for it."

"He ran out on Patrick after they had sex," Gabe helpfully supplies from behind them. He's standing there with two cats draped over his right arm, little paws batting at the general direction of the cage with birds Gabe's holding in his other hand. Greta glares at him, puppy still carefully cradled in her lap. "Gabe. What did I tell you about traumatizing the birds?" Gabe quickly turns and walks away, disappearing behind a couple of shelves, before Greta can yell at him.

When Greta turns back around to Pete, her face is a bit darker and Pete's pretty sure he's the reason for that. He pretends to be very busy with getting a still fresh pile of dog poop into a plastic bag.

"You better buy Patrick something nice to go with that apology then. Seriously, Pete, can't you see that Patrick has the biggest crush on you? And that you're basically in love with him too?"

Pete halts mid-motion and looks at Greta, shovel full of warm poo halted mid-motion. "Patrick likes me?"

Greta stares at him like he's crazy and then emphatically nods her head.

"Oh," Pete says and absently ties the bag up, lowering it to the floor. A moment later he springs up so fast the puppy in Greta's arms makes a scared sound and hides under her arm.

"I'm going over to see him right now to apologize. And then I'll kiss him." Pete grins widely at Greta and practically jumps out of the puppy stall and heads for the door.

"Hey, Pete, aren't you forgetting something?"

Pete turns around and looks at Greta blankly. Then it hits him and he walks back to her. "Of course," Pete says, "a present," and picks the puppy out of Greta's arms. He turns back around to leave only to hear Greta again.

"Pete. Get back here."

Pete slowly turns around, puppy cradled to his chest. Finally he walks toward Greta again. "Poo?" he says and Greta nods.

Pete spends the rest of the day cleaning up the puppy pen, leaving neat little tied plastic bags in his wake. He doesn't stop smiling the whole time and at the end of the day Greta even lets him play with the gerbils while she cleans out their cages.

--

"William, gates open in fifteen minutes, we have to finish setting up the stands here." Jon knows that he's starting to sound really desperate, which is probably due to the fact that he is in fact incredibly desperate. He's been arguing with William for a solid half hour now because William categorically refuses to set his food court stands up anywhere within a five mile radius of Jon and his friends. Which of course ruins the whole set up plan as well as making it next to impossible for the shoe store cart to be in the display area at all.

The fact that William's pretending he's not talking to Jon doesn't make it any less difficult of course.

"Look." Jon's getting angry now because he's at least trying to solve this problem, despite William's childish antics. "I forgive you for not serving me and my friends food. Now can we please find some way to set up the stands so everyone's happy?" He knows he's made a mistake the moment William's head whips around, eyes blazing.

"You forgive me? You forgive me? Oh, then everything's fine. Great. Let's be friends forever," he spits, arms folded in front of his chest. "Like that's going to make me forget the fact that they stole you from us. Right from under our noses."

"I'm not a possession, William," Jon shoots back just as angrily, garnering surprised looks from the people standing nearby. And really, Jon doesn't get angry often, but William's always known how to push his buttons.

Just then Max from the Empires Photo Shop runs up to them. He's out of breath, hair disheveled. He's also waving his hands around dramatically.

"Guys," he says as soon as he's caught his breath, "Guys, Tom needs your help. I think...I think he set the shop on fire."

"Again?" William sighs dramatically when Max just shrugs.

"He said I should go get you guys because you know what to do."

"What, he doesn't know how to work the fire extinguisher? I showed him after the last time, seriously." Jon kind of has to agree with William on that one.

"Um, I don't mean to be rude, but my workplace is burning down so go help him already!" Max's voice gets higher and higher towards the end. For William it's enough to turn around and start running towards the photo shop that's just around the corner from the food court. Max stays exactly where he is, looking expectantly at Jon. Something is definitely up, but Jon can't definitely rule out a possible fire, so he gives Max another long look before he runs after William.

By the time Jon reaches the photo shop, William's already inside and even though he can see neither fire nor smoke, Jon goes inside anyway. Tom has a tendency to light up the back room anyway, rather than the front.

Inside the shop it's mostly dark and there's no trace of either William or Tom. Nor of a fire for that matter. Before Jon can call out to them or get the hell out of there, the door softly clicks shut behind him and then there's the distinct sound of a key being turned. A second later the fluorescent overhead lights go on and Jon has to blink against the sudden brightness.

When his eyes have adjusted, Jon sees that the complete entrance area of the photo shop is covered with photos. They're lying on all available surfaces and a lot of them are hanging from lines made of colorful threads that span the shop from side to side. William's standing over at the counter, hands on top of it like he was feeling around in the darkness earlier to orient himself. Jon turns around and sure enough there's Tom, standing by the door, hands shoved into his pockets.

As far as Jon can see nothing's on fire.

"What's going on?" William asks.

"You guys being stupid, mostly. Look at the photos." Tom's voice betrays no emotion really but he gives them a stern look, and Jon's learned over the years that when Tom's really serious you better do whatever it is he wants. So he walks over to the nearest wall and starts looking at the photos taped to it. He feels a bit silly at first, but he can feel Tom staring at his back and he hears William walking around, so he feels a bit better about it and starts looking at the photos in earnest.

It turns out that most of the photos are of William or Jon. It's surprising how many there are. Half of them Jon can't even remember Tom taking. Some are really old, back when they all went to high school together and Jon and William were still about the same height. There's one at band practice and one behind the rafters of the baseball field that's mostly cigarette smoke and parts of William and Jon's faces as they huddle together.

There are also newer pictures, like the one that shows William and Jon after The Big Coffee Incident of '07 when two of the machines at Starbucks had exploded due to a power outage. They'd spent three days scrubbing coffee powder and various other things from the floors and walls. In the photo Jon's mopping the floor and William's reaching up to a shelf, trying to brush off something white that's probably sugar. There's a coffee bean stuck to his pants, and Jon can't help but smile.

As he moves around the photo shop, completely caught up in the photographs, they start to involve more and more people. Now it's not just William and Jon anymore, there are also photos of people they used to know in school and back at the Wal*Mart they worked for during their last summer in high school. Jon finds photos of Butcher and Sisky, Mike Carden with hair in a really horrible orange, some experimental black and white photographs of Sean in a dress and a few scattered pictures of the first girl William went out with whose name Jon forgot.

At the very bottom, right next to one of the display cases, there's a photo that catches Jon's eye. It's shot from outside the Starbucks, showing him and William standing next to one of the tables. William's talking to Jon but Jon is looking outside, almost directly at the camera. There's a smile on his face that looks strange and incredibly happy. Someone's standing outside the window, and when Jon looks closer he recognizes Spencer.

Jon picks the photo up and looks at it closer. He's impressed by how well it's shot, taking in Spencer and William and himself. Jon clearly remembers that day, remembers how it felt when he saw Spencer outside, William lecturing him on giving Sisky high doses of caffeine. He's really not all that surprised by the existence of the photo itself. When they lived together, he'd occasionally woken up to Tom standing in the door of his room, quietly taking photographs. Jon got used to it, just another quirk of his best friend.

"Jon?" He turns around to the sound of William's voice, still holding the photograph. William's standing behind him, holding a handful of photos himself. There's an awkward silence and Jon can see Tom still standing at he door, carefully watching them.

"I didn't abandon you," Jon finally offers. "You're still one of my best friends, Bill. I just have other friends now too."

William is quiet, then he nods. "I'm sorry I was an ass. But they still stole you from us." Jon's about to protest, because seriously, he's trying to apologize here, but then William adds, "But since Spencer is totally in love with you, I can let that one slide, I guess."

Jon blushes bright red, pressing the photograph to his chest. "That's not true. We're just good friends."

"Oh listen to yourself," William says and smiles, and it's not one of his mean smiles but a genuine one. He looks happy. Jon feels an answering smile spread on his face.

"Okay?" he asks and William grins. "Okay."

"So I can send Brendon to get me pizza again without having to fight for his shoe?"

To his credit William actually looks a little apologetic when he says, "Sure. But don't expect that shoe back. It...disappeared."

Jon tries to nod seriously but fails halfway through and laughs instead. William grins at him in answer and Jon feels a little lighter, only then realizing how much this whole stupid fight had been bothering him.

"And you owe me one, Walker, for taking all the blame on that act of sabotage your new friends pulled."

"The thing with the gates?"

William nods. "Brian from admin came down and gave me a serious lecture about mall security and childish fights."

Jon tries his best not to smile as he imagines Brian trying to get through to William and probably failing spectacularly. "How about a free month of coffee at Starbucks as compensation? I'm sure I can work something out with Cash."

"Only if there's whipped cream," William says seriously, but Jon can tell he's happy enough with the solution. Jon's pretty sure he's about to say something incredibly mushy next, relieved that they managed to sort this out, when Tom coughs behind them and says, "Time to go, guys. I really need to get this mess cleaned up before the gates open."

William shrugs at Jon, all what can you do? and walks over to Tom. He pats his shoulder awkwardly, hands him the photos and unlocks the door. On his way out he says, "See you in a bit, Walker," before the door closes behind him.

"So, photos, huh?" Jon says and goes over to Tom. He's still holding the photo to his chest and Tom points at it and says, "Want me to blow that one up for you?"

"Why?"

"So you can hang it up in the shoe store and show the world how in love you are with Spencer Smith?" Tom's not smiling exactly but Jon can see the glint in his eyes. He punches Tom in the shoulder and walks past him, pulling the door open. He hesitates for a moment and then turns back to Tom who's already starting to take the photographs off the walls.

"Thank you," he says quietly. Tom turns to him and this time he really does smile. "Sure, Jon."

Jon turns back around and walks outside, door falling shut behind him. He stuffs the photo in his pocket and goes to find Spencer to help him set up the stand.

--

Gerard has never hated owning a comic book shop before. In fact, it's pretty much been his life's ambition since he was in high school, and he hasn't regretted choosing it as a career a day in his life. Until today.

The entire mall's packed. There's barely room to breathe standing in the crowd, and even behind his little display, he feels uncomfortably claustrophobic. He doesn't know whose bright idea it was to have all the stores open stalls on the ground floor, instead of in front of their actual stores, but he kind of hates them. A lot. He can't even hide behind the fringe of his hair, because after an (admittedly awesome) hour in the closet at Hairbrained, Frank had sheepishly shown Gerard to a mirror and let him stare in horror at the spot where a good-sized chunk of hair was missing. Lucky for Gerard, Frank was good at what he did, and he'd managed to mostly fix it with a few clever snips and a new styling suggestion. He'd also mentioned possibly buying a hat, but Gerard chooses to believe that was a joke.

"Coffee?" Bob fucking Bryar is Gerard's hero. If Greta wasn't standing right next to him, looking somehow fierce despite the white sundress with pink flowers and the cheery smile on her face, Gerard would kiss him. He takes the proffered cup and gulps it down despite the temperature.

"That's not going to help you calm down, you know," Mikey says from next to him.

"It will take my mind off you making googly eyes at your boyfriend," Gerard replies. Mikey stops making googly eyes at Gabe, who's a few booths down, long enough to steal the cup out of Gerard's hands and drink half of it in one swallow.

"Like you have any room to talk," Mikey says, handing it back.

"What are you even talking about?" Gerard knows exactly what Mikey's talking about.

Mikey glances pointedly at the Hairbrained stall, nestled in between the tattoo parlor booth and a cell phone kiosk. It's almost completely obscured by the inflatable crazy-arm things the cell phone stall has set up.

Gerard makes an exaggerated innocent face. "What! You think I'm looking at Frank? I can't even see him from here, is he even over there right now? He might not even be over there right now, I can't even tell." He squints, pretending to try and see far enough. Mikey doesn't seem convinced. Probably because Frank's climbed up on Dan's shoulders and is waving enthusiastically at Gerard.

Bob shoves his hands in his pockets, trying not to laugh. "You two are ridiculous."

Greta elbows him. "They're adorable, shut up. Just because you've lost all respect for romance doesn't mean everyone has to." She's fighting back a smile as she says it.

Bob wraps his arm around her and tugs her up close to his side. "I bought you a pretzel. With cheese and everything."

Greta rolls her eyes but leans into him. "Be still, my heart."

"I got the balloon animal guy to make you a whole litter of balloon puppies." Bob's looking down at Greta like she's the only person in the place, despite the fact that they keep getting jostled by people pushing their way through the crowd behind them. Gerard misses Frank.

"Robert Bryar, do not even pretend you did that for me." She's looking back up at him like she could die happy, and then they don't even bother finishing the conversation, they just start making out right there.

Brian pushes his way through the crowd and says, "Get a room. You're scaring away all Gerard's customers."

Gerard's about to say something about the lack of traffic even before Bob and Greta started sucking face in front of his stall, but then he notices Gabe's coming toward them. He stands almost a full head taller than the majority of the people in the crowd, so it's not hard to miss him. Plus, he's wearing a neon purple hat with a little spinner on top. He sidles up to Bob and Greta, leering at them. "Scaring people off, shit, this is what got me over here."

Brian mutters something lost in the din of the crowd and heads over to harass the food court guys. Bob angles himself away from Gabe. Greta isn't quite as subtle. "Get off my boyfriend or risk your balls."

Gabe backs away, hands up, and sort of crabwalks over to Mikey so he can keep his eyes on Greta. "I was kidding! I've got my own little love muffin right here." He leans down to cup Mikey's cheek and draw him into a kiss. Mikey looks less than thrilled about doing it in public, so Gerard doesn't feel too bad about throwing a pen - one of the complimentary ones the mall administration had given him to hand out - at Gabe's head. "I'm not actively protesting your involvement with my brother, but don't push it."

Gabe flops down in a chair next to Mikey. Greta frowns at him. "Aren't you supposed to be watching the stall?"

Gabe grins. "Andy came by and said he'd hang around for a while."

Greta suddenly goes pale. "Oh Gabe, no. He's gonna let all the animals out again." She grabs Bob's arm and starts looking for a gap in the crowd. "I'll handle Andy, but I'm gonna need you to round up the kittens." They disappear into the throng.

Mikey arches an eyebrow at Gabe. "You do that on purpose?"

Gabe grins. "Maybe. Besides, I said 'Andy' and she jumped to conclusions. It's Butcher, the animals are fine." Gerard ponders the irony of that statement. After a second, his phone vibrates. There's a text from Jepha. u busy?

Gerard texts back, Kind of. why?

frank's drving us nuts becuz he wants urs. take a break & give the guy a bone

Gerard's glad he's far enough away from their stall that his blush will go mostly unnoticed. "Mikey, can you watch the stall for a while?" Mikey nods, and Gerard doesn't miss the lecherous look on Gabe's face, but he's far less concerned about what might be going on in the stall when he's gone when he has a Frank in his immediate future.

Fighting his way through the crowd is near impossible, and he keeps his arms tucked into his sides as much as he can, trying - completely unsuccessfully - to avoid contact. Eventually he makes it over, and Frank leaps on him. Gerard doesn't mind getting touched so much when it's Frank.

"So," Frank says, grinning at him. "Your shop's closed right now, right?"

Gerard grins back. "It is."

"Didn't you have some new inventory you were gonna let me see before it gets put out?"

Bert snickers from their stall. "'Put out'."

Gerard ignores him and takes Frank's hand, steeling himself for the trek back through the crowd. "It's probably not as awesome as you think it is."

Frank squeezes his hand. "It's the awesomest."

Gerard rolls his eyes but doesn't hide his pleased grin, and they delve into the crowd together.

The comic shop is eerily empty. It's different than when Gerard opens in the morning or closes at night - usually the mall's just as empty then. Now, there's a crush of people wandering around, and it makes the shop feel like something hidden, a secret place no one else can find. Next to him, Frank bounces a little on his feet and inclines his head toward the back room. "So, inventory?"

Gerard's suddenly tongue-tied, feeling stupidly awkward, and he has three false starts before he finally says, "Yep."

Frank laughs and tugs him toward the storeroom. "You'd think you weren't looking forward to making out with me or something."

Gerard splutters, stumbling after Frank. "No, I am, definitely, I mean, last time was pretty good-" Frank arches an eyebrow, closing the storeroom door behind them. "No, I mean, really good, it was really good, I just-" Frank pins Gerard to the door with his hips, tilting his chin up.

"Gerard?"

Gerard blinks owlishly. Frank's so close he has to go a little cross-eyed to see him. "Yeah?"

"Shut up." Frank tastes overwhelmingly like cotton candy, and Gerard has time to wonder if he'd gotten the blue stuff or the pink stuff from the cotton candy vendor in the food court before Frank's fingers are in his hair, nails scratching against his scalp just above the back of his neck, and then his brain sort of turns off.

They kiss for what feels like forever, and by the time Frank breaks away for a breath, Gerard's lips feel puffy. He's honestly surprised no one's come knocking at the door to tell him to clean his stall up, that's how long it feels like they've been in there. Frank grins at him, his own lips kiss-bruised, and then he drops to his knees. Gerard gapes down at him, brain just starting to unfog from the kissing. "Hey..."

Frank makes a mock stern face. "Don't you dare. You don't even know how long I've been waiting to do this, and you have been kind of insufferable, so you owe me." Gerard thinks it's a little backward that if he owes Frank, he's the one about to get a blowjob.

He puts his hands up, licking over his lips and catching the sugary-sweet taste of Frank's mouth. "I was just gonna ask if you wanna come over later." When Frank smiles at him, Gerard feels a little light-headed. That could also just be the amount of blood rushing to his dick at the sight of Frank on his knees, but whatever. "There's a new episode of Life After People on tonight."

Frank pops the button on Gerard's jeans and groans. "I love it when you talk nerdy." Normally, Gerard would flush and try to find a hole to crawl into, but there's no trace of teasing in Frank's tone, and the way he's scrabbling to get Gerard's underwear down, there's a good chance he was serious.

"I think-" Frank's breath ghosts over the tip of Gerard's dick, and Gerard has to suck in a breath and focus. "I think there's a special on Star Wars on after that."

Frank leans in and sucks Gerard into his mouth, groaning deep in his chest. Gerard has to reach down and tangle his fingers in Frank's hair to stay steady on his feet, and Frank reciprocates by grabbing Gerard's thighs and digging his fingers in.

It's been a while since Gerard's been in this position, so it's not surprising that he suddenly feels like a teenager again, all the warmth in his body rushing to his stomach and curling around his back, creeping up his spine until he feels like someone's grabbed both ends of him and pulled him taut. He scuffs his feet against the floor, squirming against the wall, desperately trying to get himself under control, but Frank's mouth is hot and wet and eager, tongue flicking against the underside every time he pulls back. The room's silent except for the slick sounds of Frank's mouth, his harsh breaths through his nose, and Gerard's embarrassingly high-pitched, needy noises.

Just when Gerard thinks he's going to humiliate himself, Frank pulls off completely. Gerard's relief only lasts a second, though, because he looks down and Frank's palming himself through his jeans, eyes half-lidded and lips spit-slick. It's the hottest thing Gerard has ever seen in his life, and he has seen Princess Leia in a gold bikini.

"Keep talking," Frank says, voice rough, and he doesn't wait for an answer before he's licking the pre-come away from Gerard's dick and then wrapping his lips around it and sucking.

He might as well have asked Gerard to recite the periodic table of elements. Gerard's tongue feels thick in his mouth and he has to keep swallowing big gulps of air to keep his lungs working. He's not sure he could say his own name at the moment. Frank hums around him, a sound that turns down into a growl at the end. It pretty clearly conveys come on, and Gerard would attempt to speak Greek if it meant Frank kept that up.

"I...There's, oh god, there was this special about these - oh my god, Frankie - about this scientist, and he was, fuck, he was talking about how there's e-evidence that if technology keeps up, if it, um, if it..." He completely loses his train of thought, losing himself in the warmth of Frank's mouth until Frank taps at his thigh insistently. "Oh, right, if uh, if technology keeps up the way it's going, there's a realistic ch-chance that zombies might, oh, oh, oh, thatzombiesmightactuallybepossibleinthefuture." The last bit comes out in a rush as he comes, all his breath slamming out of him like he's gotten punched in the chest.

Frank keeps licking over the head even after Gerard's completely spent, and between that and the fact that Frank definitely did not pull off to spit, Gerard's dick twitches with interest. There's no possible way he could go again this soon, but not for lack of wanting to. Eventually it's so sensitive that Gerard has to push Frank back by the shoulders, making a noise halfway between a giggle and a whine. Frank grins up at him and gives him one last lick, and it feels like every nerve in Gerard's body is attached to that particular spot. He dances away, tucks himself back in, and presses his forehead against the wall, trying to get his breathing back under control. He can hear Frank stand up and come up behind him, hard-on digging insistently into his ass, and then Frank grinds a little and Gerard groans, shivering so hard the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.

"I could get off just listening to you talk," Frank says in his ear.

"I personally don't find my voice to be all that exciting," Gerard says a little shakily, "But I guess it's a plus my boyfriend likes it."

He pauses. Yep, he definitely just called Frank his boyfriend. Out loud. Before they've discussed any kind of official stance. It sounds so juvenile, boyfriend, so middle school-

"Your boyfriend likes a lot more than your voice," Frank murmurs. Boyfriend is such a good word, Gerard thinks. He turns around, grabs Frank's hips, and kisses him hard. Frank still tastes a little bit like Gerard, and still a little bit like cotton candy, and slightly like cigarettes. It's probably not a flavor combination that's gonna get any cuisine awards, but Gerard can't get enough of it. Maybe it's just Frank he can't get enough of.

Frank's hips are stuttering forward, and he's clutching at Gerard's shoulders like he's trying to climb him. Gerard wouldn't actually mind that, but he has better things in mind. He breaks away, breathing heavy. "Can I...you know?" He reaches down to rub the heel of his hand over Frank's erection, and Frank sways a little on his feet.

"I don't-" Frank has to catch his breath, and then he grins. "You can do anything you want. Especially if it involves more of that." He bites down on his lower lip, teeth sliding slowly backward as he tips his head back, eyes fluttering shut. When his lip pops out from under his teeth, Gerard stares at it, completely caught up in the redness left by Frank's teeth, the slight indentations just below his lip where his teeth had dug in for a second. He can't help but lean in to soothe over the marks with his tongue, and from there it's a short trip up to Frank's lips, and then he gets lost in the kissing again. He can't even help it; Frank is an amazing kisser, and Gerard's not sure he regrets anything more than he regrets not giving into Frank sooner. He's been missing out on this? Yeah, he sucks.

Eventually Frank starts making desperate, high-pitched whining noises into Gerard's mouth, and Gerard can feel himself getting hard again just from that. Jesus. He's gonna need to take a vacation from work just to get his fill of Frank. That, or take a lot of breaks in the storeroom. He somehow doubts Mikey would appreciate that.

Gerard fumbles with Frank's jeans, fingers refusing to cooperate, and finally Frank just reaches down and deftly unbuttons and unzips them. Gerard tugs them down until they're just barely hanging off Frank's hips, and then he takes a minute to admire the artwork on Frank's skin. He traces a finger over the swallows, follows the lines of the 'search and destroy', and suddenly Frank's skin is covered in goosebumps.

"Gerard," he moans, "Gerard, Gerard, Gerard..." Gerard doesn't need to be told again. He wraps a hand around Frank's dick, thumb sweeping over the head. Frank shudders against him, hips jerking erratically. Gerard starts slow, fisting Frank loosely, but Frank takes a ragged breath and says, "Please, fuck, please," and Gerard can't say no to that.

He tightens his hand, jerks fast and steady, and says, "The new Wolverine comic's out. I held a copy for you." Frank comes hard, his whole body shaking with the effort. He drops his head onto Gerard's shoulder, hair damp against Gerard's neck. Gerard strokes him through the aftershocks, trying hard not to groan in response to the tiny, exhausted sounds coming out every time Frank breathes.

They stand there like that for a few minutes, until Gerard's hand starts cramping and the mess starts cooling. He really enjoys having his hand down Frank's pants, but not so much that he wants to be stuck like that. He personally probably wouldn't mind having his hand permanently down Frank's pants (he's got a whole other hand for smoking and drinking coffee and stocking shelves and drawing), but he thinks his mom might raise an eyebrow at it.

Frank helps him clean up, and Gerard helps Frank get his clothes mostly back in order, and then they slump down against the wall. Frank rests his head on Gerard's shoulder, yawning and flexing his toes. "You hungry?"

Gerard is ravenous. "I could eat."

"I still haven't bought you that dinner I owe you."

Gerard hums thoughtfully, hungry but not quite willing to get up and try moving around just yet. Frank is warm and comfortable next to him, more than enough to make up for the cold, hard floor of the storeroom.

Frank settles in more comfortably against him, wrapping his arm around Gerard's middle and tucking his face into the crook of Gerard's neck. Gerard strokes his fingers through Frank's hair absently. "Think Mikey'd mind if we took off?"

Frank mumbles, "If Gabe's still with him, probably not."

"Would you mind if we took off?"

"Depends on what we're taking off." Frank laughs against his throat, and just the sound makes Gerard grin.

Gerard pushes himself up, dislodging Frank long enough to get on his feet, and then he reaches down and hauls Frank up. "Take-out counts as dinner, right?"

"A breath mint counts as dinner if it means I get to see you naked."

Gerard grabs his hand and fishes his phone out of his pocket, already texting Mikey goodbye. "I've got a pack of mints in my car."

Frank grins. "I know. You've also got a picture of Mikey from fifth grade, the complete Queen discography, fifteen empty cans of Red Bull, and a pack of condoms."

Gerard had forgotten about the condoms. "I forgot about those."

Frank tugs him toward the front of the store, and Gerard follows willingly. "They're feeling very neglected. You'll have to give them a lot of attention to make up for it."

Gerard plans on making up for a lot of things.

--

"So, um, I heard you sorted things out with William?"

Jon turns around and looks at Spencer. He's holding a stiletto in one hand and his hair is sticking to his forehead. Spencer hadn't even realized how hot it must be over here with all the people and now he kind of wants to take back what he said. He's pretty sure right now is probably the worst time to bring this up. He mumbles something, not really sure himself what he's saying and is about to turn back around to help Ryan at the cart they've set up for Bath & Body Works. Seriously, who would have thought it was going to be that popular?

"Spence, hold on." Spencer stops and turns back to Jon, who puts down the shoe and carefully compliments the two ladies away he's obviously tried to sell the shoes to.

"I...yes, I sorted things out with William. Why?" He takes a step closer to Spencer, still carefully keeping the cart with the shoes in eyesight. And it's exactly that act of caring and being alert that's kind of gotten Spencer into this mess in the first place.

"I was just worried. I guess. I never meant for you to get into so much trouble just by trying to help me out." Spencer feels supremely uncomfortable and fidgets a bit, intently looking over the crowd that keeps pushing up against him in waves. Spencer remembers now just how much he hates big crowds.

"It's fine, Spence. You know I really like working with you."

"More than working at Starbucks?" It just slips out and Spencer immediately presses his lips together, uncomfortably shifting from one foot to the other.

"I...of course, Spencer, of course. I mean it's different, but I really like working with you. And hanging out with you. And of course with Brendon and Ryan too. The hanging out I mean." Jon is still smiling, but there are two red spots on his cheeks peeking out through the beard, and Spencer thinks they're really kind of adorable.

Actually, he's pretty sure that it's all of Jon he finds really kind of adorable.

"Great," is what he finally says and fakes his best smile. "If it's okay with you I'll go help Ryan out a bit longer, okay?" Spencer turns away again, already cursing himself for being a stupid, stupid idiot. And then Jon grabs his arm and pulls, Spencer tripping back against him. Jon looks serious now, eyes on Spencer and only on Spencer.

"Be honest, Spencer. Are you regretting hiring me? You can tell me. I could probably get my old job back as soon as you find a replacement. I hear Cash's kind of doing a terrible job anyway."

Spencer feels panic rise up in his throat, because this is totally not what he was getting at and maybe it's Jon who regrets leaving his job behind. So Spencer blurts out the first thing that he can think of.

"I really like you!"

Jon stares at him like he's gone completely crazy and Spencer really regrets spending so much time with Brendon, it's obviously rubbing off.

"I like you, too?" Jon says, looking confused, hand still wrapped around Spencer's arm like he forgot to pull it away.

Spencer tries to think of a way out of this one and decides that really, at this point he doesn't have much to lose anyway. "I really like you, Jon. And I know you will probably never like me back that way and I'm worried it's going to make working with me difficult. Maybe you'll regret ever coming to work for me and I wouldn't. I'd never want to do that to you, because you're my friend too."

It feels like he's been talking forever but when he's finished, Spencer still thinks it hasn't been enough. He still wants to tell Jon how much it meant that he quit Starbucks to help Spencer out, how he accepts every lecture about appropriate shoe selling from Spencer even if it's about stupid stuff like color combinations. He still wants to tell Jon that it makes him smile when Jon makes funny faces behind the back of asshole customers and how he always gives Brendon a piggy back ride even after a long day, just because Brendon said please.

"Oh. Oh." Jon flushes bright red now and Spencer braces himself for the inevitable letdown. It's been coming for a while now, really, so he's prepared.

What he really isn't prepared for is Jon's face breaking out into a blinding smile and then Jon pulls him into a hug right there in front of everyone. "Oh, Spencer, you have no idea," he says into Spencer's hair and Spencer awkwardly hugs him back, trying to understand what the hell is going on. He manages to pull out of Jon's hug eventually. "What do you mean I have no idea?"

"I like you too," Jon says a little too loudly, and a few people nearby turn towards them curiously. Jon lowers his voice a little and leans in, face only inches away from Spencer's. "Spence, I like you a whole fucking lot. What, you thought it was coincidence I always was on shift at the 'Bucks during your lunch hour? Or that I just worked two jobs at the same time because you're a friend of mine? Seriously, Spencer. I think I've liked you like that from possibly the first moment you walked into Starbucks and ordered a double chocolate latte with two extra espresso shots."

Spencer stares at Jon, dumbstruck. His thoughts are running a mile a minute and all he can think of is that Jon likes him. Jon likes him back.

"Really?" he asks and Jon grins even wider.

"Really."

It's something Spencer hasn't even considered. He made himself not hope because it's been way too long since he's liked anyone more than as a friend and even longer since the other person liked him back. It's a little terrifying to be honest.

"It's been a while," Spencer finally says quietly, "Since. Since I did this." And he motions between the two of them, trying to indicate, well, the possibility of a romantic relationship.

Jon looks at him seriously and nods. "Yeah. Let's take our time then." The corner of his lips turns up into a small smile again and he leans in, right there next to the booth with all the shoes and the aisle with a steady stream of people passing them by. He leans in and kisses Spencer softly.

Spencer stands there, unmoving, not quite sure whether Jon is really just kissing him or whether he's actually at home, asleep in his bed. It feels way too nice to be a dream really, but sometimes it's hard to tell with dreams.

"You know," Jon says, pulling back, "it might help if you actually kissed me back."

"Oh." Spencer leans in so fast their noses bump together and Jon reaches up, squeezes his shoulders and kisses back just as hard. This time Spencer concentrates on the kiss, taking in the way Jon's tongue trails over his lips, pushing in, how Jon holds onto him like he can't quite believe this is happening himself.

Someone in the crowd whoops and Spencer breaks away from Jon and licks his lips nervously. "Do you think we could maybe, uh, pick this up later? With less people?"

Jon laughs, happy and free, and it's kind of Spencer's new favorite thing. "How 'bout I'll take you out for dinner after we're done here?"

Spencer smiles and nods. "That sounds really good."

--

It's quiet in the health food store when Patrick steps inside. Since Andy's the only one who seems to have found a way out of the mall celebration raging on outside, that makes this the ideal place for Patrick to gather his thoughts about Pete Wentz and make some sort of plan on what to do. Or really how to kill Pete slowly with the power of words for leaving him on that damn balcony like an idiot.

Slowly, Patrick walks through the aisles, pretending to study the various tins and colorful boxes advertising all kinds of vitamins and nutritious supplements. There are some vitamins there that Patrick's never heard of before in his life but then again he's not really known for his healthy living habits, so that might be it. He rounds a corner into the next aisle, where he's met with a variety of different vegan power bars. He picks one up that is tuna-flavored and puts it down again quickly, grossing himself out as he tries to imagine what it'll taste like.

In the end Patrick chooses a bottle of some toxic green energy drink. It's called "Float Up" and Patrick's pretty sure that even if it tastes horrible it will look great dumped over Pete's head.

Behind the cash register Andy's sitting on a chair, leafing through "Vegans Today" and looking as enthusiastic as always about his job. He looks up when Patrick puts the bottle down in front of him and nods.

"Hey Patrick, how are you doing?"

Patrick considers the question carefully before he says, "Pretty shitty actually. I hooked up with Pete Wentz and now he's ignoring me."

Andy blinks at Patrick like he's hoping that didn't just happen. "You mean Pete Wentz who works at the, ah-" Andy looks a bit puzzled and Patrick can almost see him going through the different places Pete's worked at.

"It doesn't matter," Patrick interrupts him impatiently, waving is hand around. "The point is he just left me there and now I feel like a complete idiot. I mean what was that night even supposed to mean? We were drunk, okay, but I feel like it meant something. I'm sure it did and-"

Andy snaps his fingers triumphantly, "American Eagle!"

"-and now he's acting like a little girl," Patrick goes on, ignoring Andy's interruption.

There's an awkward lull and then Andy grabs for the energy drink, puts the price in the cash register. "That's $2.35."

Patrick blinks at him, too lost in his own thoughts. Andy has to repeat the amount before Patrick remembers that, right, he's supposed to pay. He hands Andy the money and takes the energy drink, wondering whether he can justify hiding here after he's bought something. Andy's already deeply immersed in his magazine again and even Patrick isn't desperate enough to hide out that he'd interrupt Andy again.

He steps out of the door, energy drink tightly clutched in his hand. He should probably get back to their stall again, since the mall's getting fuller by the minute, people pressing against each other to try the free food and see all the sale offers. Eventually Patrick decides that Ray will be okay on his own for a while longer. He rides down the escalator from the second floor and works his way through the tight throng of people towards his store. He manages to find an opening in the crowd and while he tries to find his keys in his pockets, he runs right into someone in front of him.

When Patrick looks up, the first thing he sees is the suggestion box of his store and an arm outstretched towards it. The tattoos curling up around the wrist are pretty unmistakable.

"Pete," Patrick says, and Pete looks at him like a deer caught in headlights. Patrick feels the anger rise up inside him again, anger at Pete for leaving him on that balcony, for sneaking out the next morning. Anger at himself for even allowing himself to fall for Pete in the first place. Anger about Pete avoiding him for the better part of a week and then trying to pass the whole thing off with a letter of all things.

Patrick snatches the piece of paper out of Pete's hand before he has a chance to say anything. He folds it open and freezes when he sees the handwriting. It's the same one as all the notes that have been left in his suggestion box over the last weeks. The first lines read, in a hastly scribbled line of words: And my back has been breaking from this heavy heart/We never seemed so far/I'm hopelessly hopeful, you're just hopeless enough and further down the page, after a long stretch of nothing, there's And I want to be known for my hits, not just my misses. At the very bottom of the page it reads I'm sorry. Pete. in tiny block letters.

It takes Patrick a tremendous effort to look back up from the page. Pete is steadily looking at him with weary eyes. He looks tired and defeated. "I really am. Sorry, I mean," he says and takes one halting step towards Patrick but doesn't do anything else.

Patrick stares at him. "You're sorry? For sleeping with me and then leaving me behind like just another of your endless conquests?" Pete actually looks hurt at that but doesn't say anything. "And then you have the gall to avoid me, trying to apologize with a letter?" This time Pete actually flinches. He looks a little helpless and Patrick feels the anger drain out of him as fast as it had come. "I just," Patrick begins, then takes another breath and says, "I just want to know what that meant to you. Like. Was it just a one time thing?"

Pete looks at him with wide eyes, clearly surprised. "What? No! I kind of," he looks down to the floor in a move that could actually pass as shy, which is a very un-Wentz emotion as far as Patrick knows, and when he looks back up he's completely serious. "I kinda want to do it again. And I want to take you out for dinner and talk to you about music. I want to learn more about your life and I want to be there for you when mean customers steal your CDs. Because I really, really like you. I'm sorry I just left you there, after we, uh, had sex, but I didn't know what to do and I kind of thought you didn't want more and then I wasn't sure how to apologize for it, so I-"

Patrick grabs Pete's face with both hands and shuts him up with a kiss. Pete barely hesitates before he kisses back, moves forward to press his whole body against Patrick's. For a while the only thing Patrick can hear is the quiet noises Pete makes and not the noise from the full mall around them.

It's Pete who finally pulls back, just enough so that they can look at each other. "I really am sorry, Patrick. I didn't mean to be such an ass. I really-I really like you."

And the thing is, looking into Pete's face, open like he's letting Patrick see everything there is to know, Patrick completely believes Pete. "I like you too," he says quietly and reaches for Pete's hand without thinking about it, tangling their fingers together. Pete's whole face lights up and he looks at Patrick like he can't see anything else. It makes a warm feeling spread through Patrick's entire body.

"I brought you an I'm really sorry gift, too," Pete says and fumbles for his back pocket. He pulls out a little bundle and presses it into Patrick's free hand. Patrick shakes the bundle and realizes it's a black knit cap. It's not really that special but Patrick feels his face heat up anyway as he mumbles, "Thank you," and squeezes Pete's hand.

"So, you wrote all those lyrics in the suggestion box?" Patrick finally offers, and Pete shrugs.

"Just random stuff I came up with. I'm terrible at writing music for them."

"Why'd you give them to me, though? You didn't know I wrote music until I told you that day we went shopping."

Pete smiles. "I just wanted to get to know you. I thought that would be a good way to do it. Obviously it wasn't the best idea I've everhad."

Patrick smiles too and leans in to press a kiss to Pete's lips again, just because he can. "I actually wrote music for the ones you left me last week," he confesses, "After, you know, you told me to." Pete's eyes go wide and he looks at Patrick like he can't quite believe this is happening. Actually, Patrick feels the same way.

"Can I hear it?"

Patrick shrugs. "Sure. But I have to tell you, I'm really not that great a singer."

"Can't be worse than me." Pete grins and turns towards the door of the store, pulling Patrick along behind him.

--

Brendon's standing by the Lego castle, looking like he just single-handedly built the Great Wall of China. Ryan would be more dismissive if the castle wasn't an actual, you know, castle.

"It's not to scale or anything," Brendon's saying, hands flapping excitedly, "But it's big enough to walk around in, you want the tour?"

Ryan stares up at the gargantuan piece of toy architecture, trying to imagine just how long it would have taken to build. It's set squarely in the middle of the open pavilion, surrounded by all the other vendor stalls, and it reaches up to the second floor, at least.

"How many people worked on this?" Ryan asks.

"Um, me and like, thirty other people? Plus the guys that drew up the blueprints, but they didn't actually build it, just sat around and pointed at stuff." Brendon looks embarrassed, but he keeps smiling and looking at Ryan out of the corner of his eye like he's pleased. "It took like three months just to build all the pieces, and then we had to haul them in here and put them together."

"You never said anything about it," Ryan says, dragging his finger down the glossy side.

Brendon stares at the floor and actually scuffs the toe of his shoe bashfully. It's kind of the most ridiculous thing Ryan's ever seen, and if it were anyone else, he'd think it was a ploy to look cute. On Brendon, it just looks adorable. "I kind of wanted to surprise you."

Ryan's eyebrows arch slightly. "Me? Why would you want to surprise me?"

Brendon looks up, and his eyes are wide and a little wary. "I uh. I don't know."

Ryan doesn't think that's the truth, but the little flicker of hope that's taken up residence in his chest is pretty fragile, and he doesn't want to blow it out just yet. "So, tour?"

The inside's less impressive than the outside; it's basically just one big room with a couple of windows, but it's still a castle made out of Legos that's big enough to stand in, so Ryan's suitably impressed. Brendon holds an arm out to display the room, grinning lopsidedly. "Here's the inside. Your tour is now complete, please stop by again soon and don't forget to check out the gift shop!"

Ryan knows there isn't, but he asks anyway. "There's a gift shop?"

Brendon drops his arm. "No, but it'd be cool if there was, right? Or like, a moat?" His whole body perks up like Ryan's noticed it does when Brendon's gearing up to talk about something he's super excited about. "I tried to get them to let us build a moat, but Brian said there was too much liability involved or something." He 'psh's. "There wouldn't have been alligators or anything, just some water. And maybe a drawbridge."

Brendon goes to the window, presumably to look out upon the sad lack of a moat, but then he tenses. Ryan moves to peer out over his shoulder, and for a second, he's distracted by the sheer number of people in the mall. The room they're in is set slightly above floor level, high enough to see over most of the crowd. He can see the Bath & Body Works stall, and next to it, Spencer's stall. Just beyond that is The Music Store stall, and Ryan's a little miffed he's not there.

And then he sees what Brendon must be looking at. Ray's manning the booth, but Patrick's off to the side, and Pete's wrapped around him like a spider monkey. They're kissing, Pete looking like he's never been happier and Patrick looking like he'd only be happier if they were somewhere less public.

Ryan feels like he should be happy, or smug, or relieved, or something. Something other than the deep pang of regret and sympathy, something other than the spark of anger. Ryan's got nothing against Pete, in fact, he gets a little tongue-tied around someone with his reputation, but Patrick could have Brendon. How could he just pass up that opportunity without even trying?

He shifts awkwardly and backs up, not sure how to address the situation. Brendon turns around, and he doesn't look angry, or jealous even. Ryan tries to imagine what he'd look like if he'd just caught sight of Brendon making out with someone else. He definitely wouldn't look apologetic, or sympathetic, which is exactly how Brendon looks.

"So that's..." Brendon starts, crossing his arms and laughing nervously. "Awkward."

Ryan nods. "Guess someone else got what they wanted."

"Good for them." He sounds genuinely happy for them, but catches himself and reaches out to take Ryan's arm. "Not, I mean. I know that really sucks for you, I didn't mean I'm glad you're not getting what you want."

Ryan's brain feels like it's a couple of ticks behind the whole conversation, so he says slowly, "Well...for you, too."

Brendon frowns. "For me, too, what?"

"It sucks for you, too. Patrick...being with Pete...and everything." The whole thing feels like the weird recurring dream Ryan has where people say "duck" in place of every third word and nothing makes sense.

"I...what? Why would I care if Patrick was with Pete? Other than like, you know, for your sake."

Ryan blinks a few times. It won't help what has to be his fucked up hearing, but it brings Brendon into sharper focus, and that's never a bad thing. "Because..." He doesn't really want to say it out loud, but the way this conversation's going, someone has to say something that makes sense. "Because you're not with Patrick."

Brendon looks seriously alarmed, like he's just realized this whole thing is completely beyond the realm of sense. "What? I don't even, what are we even talking about?"

Ryan feels a laugh bubbling up inside him, and he shakes his head and throws his hands up. "I have no idea."

"Wait, okay, so." Brendon's trying to talk through laughing, the weird, stilted kind of laugh that's a reaction to a situation you have no idea how else to respond to. "You're not upset about Pete and Patrick hooking up?"

Ryan shakes his head. "Aren't you upset about them hooking up?"

Brendon laughs again. "We're going in circles. Why would I be upset about that?"

The giddy feeling in his stomach isn't laughter anymore. "Don't you like Patrick?"

Brendon's eyes go as wide as dinner plates, and his mouth drops open. "Like Patrick? Like, like like him? Dude, no! I thought you did!"

"No! I like-" Ryan has no idea why that almost slipped out - too caught up in the moment of finally getting things sorted out, maybe, but he catches himself in time and finishes weakly, "...someone else."

"Who? And wait, you let me think you liked Patrick." Brendon almost looks hurt, and Ryan's brain finally clicks into gear and the past couple weeks come rushing back. If Brendon doesn't like Patrick, then the Rock Band thing, the wanting what he couldn't have - Brendon likes Ryan. It's so perfectly clear in Ryan's head, simple and right and so obvious Ryan feels like he's been wearing a blindfold for a month.

"You." He doesn't bother explaining the Patrick thing, there'll be time for that when they've both stopped being the failiest failers that have ever failed. Right now, Ryan just wants to make up for lost time.

"Me..." Brendon looks confused for about half a second, and then he smiles. Ryan has seen a lot of Brendon's smiles, from the nervous, half-formed ones to the blinding grins. This one makes the rest of them look like frowns.

They stand there like that for a minute, and then Brendon launches himself at Ryan, kissing him with more enthusiasm than ability, and for a second, Ryan tenses. And then he remembers that oh yeah, this is the guy he's been pining after for months, and the guy he's been pining after for months is kissing him, and the guy he's been pining after for a month is kissing him in a Lego castle he built for Ryan. Well, kind of. He wraps his arms around Brendon and pulls him in closer, kissing him back. Brendon makes a small, surprised noise into Ryan's mouth and awkwardly puts his hands on Ryan's back. Ryan's just a little too tall to make it comfortable, and their noses are smashed together, and Brendon's standing on one of Ryan's feet, but it's the best first kiss Ryan's ever had, and they've got time to work on the details.

--

Gerard wakes up early Sunday morning, and for about ten seconds, he's grumpy he has to be up this early on a Sunday. And then he rolls over and comes face to face with Frank, and suddenly he's a little grumpy he didn't wake up earlier. Frank blinks awake, focuses on Gerard, and grins. Gerard grins back.

"We don't actually have to go in and help clean up, do we?" Frank wheedles, kissing his way up Gerard's jaw.

Gerard groans. He would give up almost every first edition comic he owns to be able to say no, but since Mikey covered for him yesterday, he doesn't feel right leaving the stall there for him to clean up. He tips his head back to give Frank more room and mumbles, "Probably."

Frank makes a disappointed noise and trails his fingers down Gerard's side. "Are you sure?"

Gerard is sure, but he doesn't really want to say so just yet. "Maybe."

By the time Frank gets a definite response out of him, Gerard's on his back, Frank straddling his hips and sucking on his collarbone. It's possibly the worst idea he's ever had to interrupt that, but he knows if he doesn't say something now, he will never say anything, and he really is trying to be a better brother.

They get into the mall a little after nine, and they are quite clearly the last ones to arrive. It's mostly just lower-level employees and the few people that own and work in their own shops - all the management's at home still in bed, Gerard thinks enviously.

Bert comes to steal Frank right away, and Frank barely has a chance to give Gerard a kiss goodbye before Bert's jumping on his back, demanding a piggyback ride the whole ten feet to their stall. Gerard watches him go, self-deprecates a little over how head over heels he is for Frank, and makes himself walk over to his own booth.

Mikey's already there, sweeping up. Gerard grabs one of the life-size cardboard cutouts (this one's Rogue) and starts disassembling it. "Thanks again for covering yesterday."

Mikey gives him a knowing look and hides a smile. "No problem."

They work in silence for a while, and then something occurs to Gerard. "How'd you get home yesterday? You rode in with me..."

"I stayed at Gabe's."

Gerard squeezes his eyes shut and forces down the urge to cover his ears and go "la la la I'm not listening!" "That's good."

Mikey laughs. "You think I don't know why you left? I accept that my brother has sex sometimes. You're gonna have to accept it someday, too, Gee."

"Accept that I have sex sometimes? Yep, I will definitely work on that. That's a good thing to accept, I agree." Mikey shakes his head, but he's smiling. Gerard grins back. "No, okay. I accept that you and Gabe are together and that you are both consenting adults, and that sometimes you kiss. That's all I'm willing to think about. But Mikey?" Mikey looks up, eyebrows arched warily. "I'm happy for you. Gabe's okay."

Mikey smiles with teeth, which is basically equivalent to jumping up and doing the splits in the air. Gerard ducks his head, grinning. Suddenly, there's static on the intercom, and everyone in the area looks up, waiting for whatever announcement is coming.

Ryland's voice comes out over the speakers, although he's using some kind of accent. British, maybe. "Mikeyway, you are needed in Gabe's pants. Mikeyway, please report to Gabe's pants immediately. Thank you for your time." The intercom crackles and dies, and Gerard narrows his eyes at the floor.

"Did I say 'okay'? That might be too strong a word."

Mikey pats Gerard's shoulder soothingly, but he also disappears shortly thereafter. Gerard finishes clearing up his stall around the same time the guys from Toys 'R Us are setting up Rock Band in the newly-empty pavilion. He wanders over, catching Frank's hand when he finds him in the crowd.

"Gonna sing today?" Frank asks, tipping his face up for a kiss.

"Do I get any motivation?"

"Other than preventing Pete from singing?"

"Point."

Jon's already up on the makeshift stage, trying to explain something about the game to Spencer. "But we work in a shoe store," Spencer's saying, staring down at Jon's bare feet. "I'd give you a pair of shoes. Or at least give you a discount."

Jon smiles at him indulgently. "Relax, Spencer Smith. Kick your shoes off. Stay a while." Spencer looks like the idea of taking his shoes off is a physically painful thing, but after a minute, he toes off his shoes and wiggles his stocking feet. Jon grins. "I'll have you wearing flower-patterned headbands in no time."

Spencer frowns. "Don't bet on it. Ryan's tried." Jon laughs and pulls Spencer in for a kiss to a rousing chorus of applause.

Brendon's off to the side of the stage, whipping the microphone cord around like he's a lion tamer. Ryan's looking on fondly while he talks to Patrick - Gerard catches, "Otis Redding, really? He's one of my favorites, too," from Patrick, but then Pete's suddenly there, tugging on Patrick's arm, and Patrick says, "We should talk. Come by the store later." Ryan looks guardedly hopeful, and Gerard really hopes Ryan isn't nurturing a crush, because Pete looks like he'd take a man's head off if they tried to get between him and Patrick.

Ray comes up behind Gerard and nudges him, nodding toward the stage. "You getting up there, rock star?"

Gerard sighs. He's never been great in front of a crowd, but the people standing around the stage aren't really a crowd - they're all Gerard's friends, and if he's going to fail spectacularly, there's no one he'd rather fail in front of. Besides, Pete's over in the corner, whispering fervently to Patrick and looking shifty-eyed, so there's a good chance he's plotting to take the mic again today. He has to be stopped.

Gerard climbs on stage and accepts the microphone from Brendon. Butcher's already behind the drums, and Jon's on bass. By the time Gerard turns toward the front, Frank's there with the toy guitar strapped over his shoulder, grinning at him. Gerard grins back, and Frank does a practice twirl, jumping halfway through. He lands at the same time someone presses play, and the music kicks in. Frank runs over and kisses Gerard, fast and sloppy, spinning away too quickly for Gerard to kiss back. The crowd cheers, and Gerard opens his mouth to sing.