Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Pete’s reclining on the bed in his hotel room, deeply invested in his twentieth consecutive round of Candy Crush, when he’s interrupted by Patrick’s name and photo appearing on his phone screen. Hoping his game paused itself, he taps the green rectangle—which cuts off the Ghostbusters ringtone Pete has assigned to his best friend—and asks, “Yup?”

“Have you read it yet?”

No greeting, just that single, pointed question. The bassist immediately knows what Patrick’s referring to and glances over at the untouched packet of paper on his bedside table. “Uh, yeah,” he lies.

Patrick replies immediately with not a hint of a smile in his usually cheery voice: “No you haven’t. Do it. Call me back after.” Click.

Huh. Pete stares at the phone for a few seconds, then sets it on the nightstand before picking up the packet. The bold typewriter-style text on the cover page reads simply:

“THE KIDS AREN’T ALRIGHT”

OFFICIAL MUSIC VIDEO SCREENPLAY

Directed by ALAN FERGUSON/BRENDAN WALTER

Pete had been planning on reading it tomorrow morning before filming started, but Patrick had seemed pretty intent on him reading it, like, now, for some reason. So Pete sighs, sits back on the bed, and flips to the first page.

By the time he reaches the last one, his pulse is racing and his eyes are nearly bugging out of his head. He feels like he’s just been hit by a train, but at the same time, he’s equal parts stunned and confused with a strange-yet-familiar thrill racing up his spine that he’d rather not think about. He wills the blush out of his cheeks and clears his head.

I should’ve actually read through the thing before I approved it, he thinks grudgingly.

This is totally not what he’d had in mind when he’d pitched his idea for this video, yet it’s not the absolute worst thing he can imagine. Far from it, in fact. He can work with this. But Patrick…what must Patrick think of it? He’d seemed almost angry on the phone. Of all the reactions Pete would expect from him about this, anger seems a little extreme.

With shaking hands and wide eyes still fixed on the screenplay in his lap, Pete swings his legs over the side of the bed and sits up straight, picks up his phone again, and dials Patrick.

Two weeks ago

“Yeah, I mean, I know I said when it was released that it was about, y’know, a—a guy and a girl breaking up but still wanting to be friends or whatever, but…” Pete shrugs, picking thoughtfully at a fray in the sleeve of his jacket, and tries not to think about the directors and producers listening to him talk. He swallows, gripping his phone more tightly in his clammy hand. “…I mean, the kids were right when they sorta read into it and said it was, uh, more about me and Patrick’s relationship than anything else, so I feel like we could, like, work with that angle instead. It’d be easier casting-wise, and I’m sure Joe and Andy wouldn’t, y’know, mind a break from everything for a few days.” He knows he’s rambling, but even after all the growing up he’s done, he still hates opening his mind to anyone besides his band—no one else really understands him like they do.

“So a video about you and Patrick, then?” Alan, one of the best directors the band has ever worked with and an old friend of theirs, asks. There’s a weird tone in his voice, an almost mischievous lilt, but Pete chooses to ignore it. “Like, a fictional story, or based on true events, or…?”

“I dunno, I was thinking maybe…a sorta dramatized re-telling of, like, everything that happened leading up to the hiatus, then the stuff during the hiatus, and maybe a little after that?” Alan hums and Pete can hear him scrawling quick notes on the legal pad in front of him, hanging on Pete’s every word. Inspiration strikes him, and he starts babbling again. “Like, start with us having a fight before a show on the Folie tour, and—and then me, walking out of a trailer or something, just fuming, and then the song starts, and cut to a few months later…”

Half an hour later, Pete’s sure each person around the table has about twelve sheets of yellow lined paper filled with his mental vomit in the form of blue and black ink, and Alan starts quietly discussing technicalities with Brendan and Eric. They sound hopeful, and Pete feels a twinge of pride in his chest. Not bad, Wentz.

Hm. He should write that one down.

He doesn’t have time to revel in his possible success, though. A few seconds later, Brendan pipes up, and all excited chatter in the room stops: “It’s deep, Pete, and it sounds really fun, but compared to your other videos, it’s a little…dull.”

Pete blinks. “Dull?”

“Well, I mean, there’s nothing that’s gonna make anyone really go, ‘WOW!’” the director clarifies. AT Pete’s silence, he continues. “The fans aren’t gonna want to press repeat a million times like they have with your videos in the past unless there’s something…something daring.”

“We could add vampires again.”

“No, not like that, I mean…” Brendan trails off helplessly, grasping for words that won’t come to him.

“I get it, I get it,” Pete assures him, and thinks for a moment. An idea starts slowly forming in his head, and he grins to himself. “How’s this, Al—you guys wow me. Surprise me. Throw in a twist on the last page that’ll make me shit my pants. If it works for me, it’ll work for the kids.”

Alan is quiet for a few moments, seemingly trying to decide if Pete’s bluffing or not. “Seriously?”

“Yeah.” It couldn’t hurt, could it?

“You’re giving me total creative control over one of your music videos, which have historically been your brainchildren.”

“I’m giving you control over some of it,” Pete corrects. “I do the plot, you do the twist. And I still have to give it the green light before anything moves forward. Seem fair?”

“Alright then,” Alan says, and Brendan voices his agreement.

Pete hangs up on the meeting with a healthy sense of curiosity and optimism. Stretching, he climbs out of his bunk and into the bus’s lounge, where he steals a bag of Bugles from a half-asleep, indignant Joe.

They’ll probably just do vampires again, he thinks idly, and munches on one of his (Joe’s) chips.

It’s not vampires. But Pete is definitely shitting his pants.

When Patrick picks up on the second ring, the first thing Pete says is, “Well. That was, uh, interesting.”

“I know,” the younger man grouses, sounding tired but tense. “It’s not what I had in mind at all.”

“Yeah.” Something about Patrick’s obviously disturbed tone leaves Pete feeling strangely…disappointed. He shakes it off.

“I mean, I get we’re supposed to film the whole thing this week and it’s a little late to change the script, but if this is what we’re gonna be doing, I-I don’t…” Patrick’s voice trails off into a heavy sigh; Pete can just picture him running a hand through his hair and tugging.

“I feel you, bro,” Pete soothes. He’d ask Patrick to meet him here at his hotel so they could discuss this in person, but it’s almost midnight and the younger man is across the city in a hotel near his parents’ house. He’d much prefer to see Patrick’s face during this conversation, even though he can practically hear the different expressions in that strained voice. “Um, just for the record, though, what’s…what’s your biggest problem with it, exactly?”

Incredulous silence greets him from the other end of the line for a number of prolonged seconds. Then Patrick says, somewhat exasperatedly, “Pete. You read to the last page, right?”

I knew it. “…Yeah.”

More silence. “And you’re asking me what I have a problem with?”

“The, uh…the fact that you get stabbed by a crazy fan while trying to save my life?” Which, to be fair, had been another thing that had made Pete’s heart clench while reading that page. When Alan goes all-out, he goes all-fucking-out.

“No, Pete,” Patrick says dryly. “I’m used to being covered in fake blood by now. Guess again.”

Pete stares resolutely at a stain in the hotel carpet beneath his socked feet. He knows, of course he knows, but he doesn’t want to say it.

Patrick scoffs in the silence, probably shaking his head in disbelief at his dumbass bandmate. “Are—are you trying to say you’re okay with it? Kissing me in a fucking music video?”

He sounds horrified at the very notion of it. Pete does his best to not feel personally offended. “No, I just…” …actually want to kiss you, have for more than a decade, and this video might be my only chance. Fuck, I’m a selfish prick, aren’t I? Pete sighs deeply. “Just calm down, man, it’s really not a huge deal—”

“Not a huge deal? Pete, it’s a kiss!” Aaaand cue the melodramatic freak-out Pete had been expecting. Patrick’s shrill voice escalates in volume and pitch with every breath: “You told me it was about our friendship, not a fucking relationship! I don’t give a shit that it’s two men, but it’s us! They want us to kiss! Like, your lips and my lips fucking touching each other in a fucking romantic embrace, ON CAMERA, while a goddamn love song plays in the background! I—I just—It’s—”

A frustrated growl ends the rant. Pete pictures Patrick’s pink cheeks and the over-exaggerated hand gestures he must be making; in any other situation, the image would be amusing.

“Technically it’s supposed to be read as a breakup-slash-friendship song with a dose of nostalgia,” Pete says levelly, ignoring the sinking weight in his stomach brought on by Patrick’s apparent disgust at the thought of having to kiss him. He’d anticipated some shock, but. Wow.

“The video was your idea,” Patrick says when he’s caught his breath, as though this thought has only just occurred to him. “And you’ve had some batshit ideas in the past. Did you—did you suggest this? Behind my fucking back?”

“No!” Pete exclaims, and this time he’s really telling the truth. As much as he’s privately longed for his best friend for years, even he wouldn’t do something as shady as this, go behind Patrick’s back just to get a kiss. “No, Patrick, I would never—I’d never pitch something like this without talking to you first, you know that.”

“Do I?” And that…actually hurts a little. But Patrick’s clearly flustered out of his mind, so Pete can let it go this once.

“You should,” Pete says. “Yes, I said the video should be about our relationship since that’s pretty much what the song’s about—”

“—and I’m fine with that concept,” Patrick interjects.

“—but that idea clearly got romantically warped somewhere along the grapevine.” He won’t tell Patrick about the whole “wow me” thing; he cannot find out about that part. The shit that would go down…

“Clearly.”

“So…what exactly do you wanna do about it?” It’s the defining question. Pete selfishly knows what he wants the answer to be, but this is ultimately up to Patrick.

“I want it cut,” the singer says, but not before a beat of hesitation. Pete’s heart sinks. “I really don’t care about the whole getting murdered again thing, but…I want the whole last scene, at least the kissing part, gone. Out of the video. We can change it, alter it somehow. It’s…I-I don’t think I can do it.”

Wait. Doesn’t think he can do it? There’s a big difference between “won’t” and “can’t”. A tiny spark of hope ignites in Pete’s chest, and he’s about to speak when Patrick continues in a rush:

“It’s not that I have a problem with kissing a guy, I really don’t, but it’s the fact that it—it’s you, Pete. It’s us.” He says “us” like that one word explains his entire train of thought and sighs deep in his chest, blowing a static-y breath into the phone. He seems a little calmer now. “You’re my best friend in the universe and I love you, I do, but that just isn’t how we work. We don’t…We don’t do that shit. We agreed not to. Remember?”

Yes, Pete wants to say, but for the record, you’re the one who was so adamant about it. That late-night conversation in the back of their old white van all those years ago comes rushing back to him with heart-bruising clarity. He can see, even in the dark, the apologetic look in Patrick’s blue-green eyes, magnified by the thick lenses of his glasses; he can hear the earnestness in Patrick’s young voice as he’d whispered as gently as possible the three words that broke Pete’s heart forever: “Pete, we can’t.” They haven’t talked about it again—in fact, this is the first time since that night that it’s come up. Through every casual fling and unsatisfying relationship that had ended too soon but not soon enough, they’ve faithfully kept their unspoken vow. Through Pete’s divorce and Patrick’s awful split with Elisa during the hiatus, the “rule” has remained in place and it’s never come close to being broken.

Until now.

Maybe…maybe Pete’s tired of avoiding it. Maybe he wants to finally throw caution to the wind, grab onto the happiness that’s been just out of his grasp for so long and never let it go again.

“So your only problem,” he reiterates slowly, trying to clarify this for the both of them, “is the fact that I’d be the one you’d have to kiss?”

“…Yes.” A pause. “No? Ugh, fuck, I don’t know anymore.” Patrick sounds utterly defeated. “I just…not only have I never kissed anyone on camera before, okay, but I just know it would be gif-ed and spread everywhere within ten minutes of the video’s release—”

“—making it probably our most popular video ever,” Pete points out, and he can practically feel Patrick’s wince. “Dude, I kissed a Kardashian in one of our videos and it didn’t mean anything. It was all for the camera. This doesn’t have to be any different.” No matter how badly I might want it to be.

There’s a long silence after this, full of heavy thinking and intense mental deliberation from both of them. Pete hates himself for feeling hopeful that Patrick will work through his reservations, but he’s been pining after the singer for almost fifteen years and he’s only so strong.

“Well, I respect your feelings, man, but I’m only being realistic when I tell you it might be a little late to change anything,” Pete explains carefully when Patrick’s been quiet for a while. “Every crew member has a copy of this screenplay probably, and there’s so much subtext woven throughout the entire thing that we’d have to do a full-on re-write. Either we postpone filming—which would make several people very upset with us and fuck up a bunch of schedules—or trudge onwards and get through this like professionals.”

“Us? Professionals? Yeah, that’s likely.” That’s not an explicit “no,” Pete notes.

“This is up to you,” he says, and he means it. “Personally, I know I can get through it.”

“You sure about that?” Patrick chuckles lightly, but there’s an edge of nervousness to it. He sighs loudly into the phone, and after that there’s about fifteen seconds of half-awkward silence, during which the only sounds Pete can hear are Patrick’s soft breaths and his own heart pounding in his ears.

Pete’s about to open his mouth and call the whole thing off, suggest they do a video for “Novocaine” or some other new song instead and just scrap this screenplay entirely if it will keep Patrick from hating him forever, when Patrick’s soft, uncertain voice crackles in his ear: “One take.”

It takes a moment for Pete to find his voice again—his throat suddenly feels as dry as the fucking Sahara at the sound of those two words and what they could mean. “Huh?”

“We do it in one take,” Patrick repeats, slightly more confident now. Pete’s heart jolts almost painfully in his chest. “That’s it. You’re right—if we try to change the script now, they’ll just tell us we should’ve done it earlier and it’ll screw everything up. We don’t have a choice. But we’ll do the kiss in one take—the first shot we get of it is the final shot. And we’ll be goddamned fucking professionals about it, like you said. Okay?”

“Okay,” Pete says, then clears his throat and repeats himself when a squeak is all that leaves his mouth.

“Good.” And that’s that.

A few long moments pass before Pete’s heart is no longer lodged in his throat and preventing him from speaking. He tries to lighten the mood by pointing out, “Hey, you should be thankful it’s me you have to kiss—just imagine having Trohman’s grody ‘fro that close to your face.”

This actually earns him a barked laugh from his best friend. “Yeah,” Patrick chuckles. “Probably hasn’t washed it in a week. And I bet Andy’s beard would itch. He probably tastes like stale tofu or some shit, too.”

“Euugh!” Pete shudders dramatically and Patrick laughs again. This feels better, easier, safer than the previous conversation. More typical, despite the context. “Dude, don’t even put that thought in my head!”

“Sorry,” Patrick says, and yes, there’s the smile in his voice Pete’s been listening for. He’s so goddamn lucky to have a friend like Patrick Stump.

After a couple more minutes of good-natured friend-mocking, Pete hears Patrick stifle a yawn (a fucking adorable one, shit) on the other end of the line. “Hey, listen,” the singer says, and his voice sounds warm and affectionate again, “it’s like quarter after twelve and we gotta be on location at eight, so we should get some sleep.” He pauses. “That means no binge-playing Candy Crush until three in the morning, Peter.”

“I told you, I deleted that app a week ago!” Pete lies, trying to hide the grin in his own voice.

“Bullshit.” Patrick yawns softly again. “You picked up on the second ring when I called you first, which means you still had your phone on and in your hand at eleven thirty at night, so, quod erat demonstrandum, Candy Crush. Don’t underestimate my deductive reasoning skills, bitch.”

“Ugh, you suck.” Pete pulls himself back onto his bed and flops back against the unbelievably fluffy pillows. “Still love you, though.” More than you know.

“Yeah, yeah. You’re lucky I love you back.”

Do you? “I know,” Pete says, and it sounds a little more solemn than he’d meant it to.

Right before Patrick goes to hang up, the bassist murmurs into the phone, “Wait. ‘Trick. Hold on.”

“Hmm?” Patrick sounds half-asleep already.

“I’m sorry.” It comes out as barely a whisper; the guilt prevents him from raising his voice too high. “Sorry you have to do something that makes you uncomfortable. It’s just like that fucking nurse all over again, and I really didn’t mean for it to happen, I swear—”

“Pete.” The gentle-but-firm way Patrick says his name forces Pete into silence. “It’s okay. I know it’s not your fault, and I shouldn’t have acted like it was. I was just a little shocked, but…it’s really not that big a thing, I get that now. I…we’ll get through it, okay? Together.”

Together. Just like they’ve gotten through everything else. “Yeah,” Pete breathes, and his stomach unknots a little.

“Go to sleep, Pete. See you tomorrow.”

“’Night. See ya.”

Pete plays through fifteen more levels of Candy Crush before his mind is calm enough to allow him to rest.

The location for the first scene is a parking lot filled with borrowed white trailers, just like the ones that would be at any of their shows. Pete walks around one and sees Patrick talking to a few of the camera guys, who are explaining that he’s not gonna be in the first scene. When the singer catches sight of Pete, he turns and smiles kindly at him, eyes sparking behind his thick hipster frames.

Pete smiles back, but his stomach does a really annoying flippy-twitchy thing as Patrick walks over to him.

“They’ve got this hilarious wig they want you to wear,” the younger man says as a greeting, pulling his leather jacket tighter around himself as a shield against the early morning chill. They’re in California, but it’s still February. “Looks just like your old emo ‘do. Pretty impressive, actually—said it was for ‘authenticity.’”

“Yeah, I saw that in the pages,” Pete replies, easing into the casual conversation. “They’re gonna put eyeliner on me and everything—they’ve even got one of my old hoodies for me to wear. I’m gonna look just like the over-sensitive, impulsive, emo heartthrob train wreck I once was.”

Patrick laughs a little at that, but there’s a slight mournful glint in his eyes. “Just don’t let it convert you back, alright? I kinda like this version of you better.”

“I’ll do my best.” Pete claps him on the shoulder and lets his hand rest there. “Speaking of that, I should head over to makeup. Could you tell Al I’m here?”

“Yeah, sure. See ya in a bit.” And Patrick’s walking away towards the crew, hands in his pockets and a spring in his step as always. Pete most definitely does not check out his ass in those black skinny jeans.

The makeup crew make him shave his stubble—and consequently, about ten years—off his face before getting him primped. The wig frightens him when he puts it on, because when he looks in the mirror it’s like looking back in time six years—he’s so glad he decided to go blonde. The black fringe just makes him remember what it was like when he would get too depressed to shower for a week, leaving his hair all greasy and stringy and limp against his forehead. He remembers accidentally burning himself on his flat iron (he still has a few little scars near his hairline) and wanting to do it on purpose somewhere else, somewhere more noticeable. God, he’d been miserable back then. If it hadn’t been for Patrick, there’s no telling what he would’ve done, where he would’ve ended up.

When Patrick sees him walking back to the trailers for filming, he does an honest-to-God double-take and looks momentarily spooked. “Holy fuck,” he exclaims, taking in his friend’s appearance: the hair, eyeliner, hoodie, and ripped skinnies combo is haunting. There’s even a fake gold wedding ring on his left hand. “Dude, you look younger than me for a change!”

“It feels really weird and I wanna get out of this shit as soon as possible,” Pete admits, his voice a little tight, and Patrick nods understandingly. “It’s almost like drag.”

“Drag would be a lot hotter,” Patrick says, and Pete finally smiles.

“Yeah, and comfier,” he agrees, squirming in his tight jeans. “I like skirts. They’re flowy. These aren’t.”

Patrick just blinks at him in bewilderment, an unreadable expression passing briefly over his face. Pete consciously decides not to imagine Patrick imagining him in a dress. “Whatever, dude. They’re waiting for you at the cameras—better go smile for them.”

“Right.”

The first scene is pretty much exactly what Pete had pitched: him storming out of a trailer with Patrick’s name on the door, presumably after a huge fight with Patrick, and looking very upset—he’s told to decide for himself exactly what “upset” means in this case. Pete decides to try a few different emotions a couple times to see what feels the most natural.

Angry is his go-to at first. Naturally. The first couple shots consist of him slamming the trailer door shut behind himself, growling in frustration, and then punching it violently a couple times before stalking out of frame. He thinks back to when scenes like this hadn’t been scripted and planned out, but actual, real-time situations—there had been points where Pete had felt ready to actually kill Patrick for his pig-headedness—and he tries to draw on those emotions a little, but for some reason it doesn’t feel quite right.

“It’s just not entirely believable, Pete,” Alan says from his director’s chair. Patrick is standing just behind him, watching, with a pensive look on his face that says he agrees.

“Did you ever feel anything but anger after these arguments?” Brendan asks, and Patrick’s eyes flash behind his glasses. Pete’s heart clenches—yeah, he’d felt other things. More painful things. Things that had taken a lot longer to recover from and forget. He’s not sure he wants to reveal all that on camera, though, for everyone to see.

But then he thinks, fuck it. Every one of his fans has seen his infamous dick pic at least once, and they’ll be seeing him practically making out with his best friend by the end of this video, so what’s so bad about a little more honesty?

Pete nods stiffly at Alan, briefly makes eye contact with Patrick, and disappears behind the flimsy door of the trailer again. While he hears the cameras being returned to their original marks and the mics being re-positioned, he psyches himself up for this take more than he had for the others: he imagines Patrick has just screamed at him for fifteen minutes and called him a talentless, crazy, pathetic narcissist who needs pills to keep from jumping out of every window he walks past—unfortunately, this happens to be a direct quote from one of their ugliest spats. Pete can still hear the unbridled hatred in Patrick’s voice and feels thick black tar building up in his lungs and his soul; he knows it’s his old self-loathing coming back for a brief visit, and he hopes he’ll have the strength to shake it off later.

Finally, Alan calls “Action!” Pete takes a deep breath, brushes his fake fringe further down over his eyes, and mentally slips back into late 2008.

He opens the trailer door with a lot less gusto this time, still huffing, but with more frustration than anger. It slams shut behind him and he just stands there a few feet away from the steps, fists clenched and shaking, staring blankly at a spot just past the camera that’s slowly creeping closer to his face. He glances over his shoulder at the trailer and makes an aborted motion to walk back up to the door (perhaps to reconcile?), but he stops himself and turns away, chest heaving with the effort. Finally, he takes a few halting steps forwards and, on impulse, collapses to his knees and buries his face in his hands, wincing as gravel digs into his skin. He pulls at the black hair of his stupid wig, wishing it were his real hair so he could feel the sting in his scalp.

This is how he’d felt after the majority of the fights he’d had with Patrick back then, before and during the release of Folie—completely and utterly drained, guilty for hurting his friend, ashamed that he couldn’t be a better person, wishing he’d never started the band and dragged the three of them down into his dark, fruitless ambition and desire for fame beyond the underground Chicago scene. If anything in this video is the honest truth, this is it. And it’s only within the first minute.

Once Pete’s been kneeling with his head down for about ten seconds, Brendan calls “Cut!” and Pete hears the cameras retreating. He slowly raises his face, blinking in the sun, and when his eyes focus the first thing he sees is Patrick.

Patrick, who looks stricken and borderline horrified at what he’s just witnessed. His eyes are wide and almost hurt, and he’s looking at Pete like Pete’s just admitted to a murder. His arms are wrapped tightly around himself, his mouth pressed in a thin, taut line; after a moment’s hesitation, he moves from behind the directors’ chairs and walks up to Pete, who’s still on the ground.

Instead of moving to help Pete up, Patrick drops to his own knees right in front of him and grabs him in a desperate hug. The bassist is a little surprised, but he returns the embrace, winding his arms around Patrick’s soft middle.

“I had no idea,” Patrick murmurs against Pete’s right ear. His nose digs into Pete’s cheek. “I knew you got angry, but I never knew you got like…like that.”

Pete tightens his grip on his best friend and shakes his head minutely, a little surprised at this sudden show of emotion. “Not your fault,” he says, his lips brushing the skin of Patrick’s neck. “’S all mine.”

“No, no, Pete, it was never your fault. I was always the cruel one, I made you hate yourself, I made you feel…fuck, I’m so sorry.” Patrick pulls back and his eyes look like they’re brimming with tears when they meet Pete’s. “I’m so sorry,” and his face is twisted with desperation, silently begging for Pete’s forgiveness.

Pete cups the singer’s cherubic face in his hands and gazes at him earnestly as he repeats, “It wasn’t your fault, ‘Trick.” This is scaring him a little, to be honest. “We were both fucking stupid back then, and sometimes we said shit we didn’t mean. It’s alright. Calm down.”

Patrick stares at him and he’s breathing like he does right after he walks offstage at the end of a great show. “Never again,” he finally rasps, voice strangled. “Okay? I’m never—we’re never doing that to each other again.”

Pete just nods and falls into the next tight embrace.

He hadn’t been expecting this reaction from Patrick, but as he breathes in the younger man’s sweet, comforting scent, he supposes it’s not all bad. He’d known this video would be an emotional one to shoot when he pitched the idea for it in the first place—he just hadn’t anticipated something like this happening so early in the process. And if anything, he’d pictured himself being the one to break first, not Patrick. He doesn’t like seeing Patrick break.

Just wait till he has to kiss you, Pete’s traitorous mind whispers, and all at once the nerves he’d managed to shake off for a few hours return with a vengeance.

They re-shoot the first scene a couple times to get some more angles, and Pete has to remain in a funk for another forty-five minutes to get it right. After the last shot, he sighs long and deep and leans against the wall of the trailer with his head back and eyes closed, trying to remind himself that it’s 2015, and he and Patrick are closer than they’ve ever been, and fights like this don’t happen anymore. Patrick comes over to him again and just stands next to him, close enough so their shoulders are brushing, and Pete lets himself fall against him just a little. It’s like re-charging—Patrick’s touch has always had an inexplicably calming effect on Pete.

The next couple scenes are supposed to be set in a pair of hotel rooms, so everything is packed up into buses and vans (luckily they hadn’t needed much equipment for this scene, so it only takes about an hour) and they head out across town to the next location: a pair of hotels conveniently close to each other on the same street. Pete and Patrick still aren’t going to be working together here—Pete is going to one hotel and Patrick to the other, to make it look like they’re on opposite sides of the country or something. Distance is the main theme in this scene. Loneliness, even.

Today’s turning out to be pretty fuckin’ cheery.

When they arrive, a team of cameramen follow Brendan and Patrick to the farther hotel, hauling their equipment on carts and in bags. Patrick sends Pete a reassuring glance over his shoulder as he departs, and Pete acknowledges it with a grateful smile. He leads his own posse through the doors of his hotel and they’re sent up to the reserved room on the tenth floor.

The makeup team trim the wig to make it look a little more like Pete’s hair from 2010-ish and style it into a little fohawk once it’s firmly on his head. He’s not wearing eyeliner anymore, but Pete still feels a twinge of nausea when he looks in the bathroom mirror. He slips the gold band off his ring finger and leaves it on the marble counter next to the sink—they need a shot of it sitting there abandoned, since this scene is set around the time of his divorce—before heading to the bedroom.

What he sees matches the description in the screenplay exactly. The room has been suitably decorated to match what pretty much every hotel room he’d stayed in back then had looked like: notebooks are scattered all over the king sized bed, some open, some closed, and loose lined paper is stacked up in collapsed piles everywhere. Every sheet is covered in unintelligible scrawl that’s supposed to be Pete’s handwriting, giving the impression that he’s been up all night madly spewing broken, troubled sentences out of his fingertips. Pete has to admit, it looks pretty authentic—there’s even a few open pill bottles on the bedside table. He puts on the black tee and sweatpants the costumers hand him and gets some nice dark bruises artfully smudged under his eyes by a member of the makeup team. Alan goes through the run-down of what he’s expecting in the scene before Pete gets into position on the bed in the middle of a sea of papers.

Someone draws the curtains and dims the lights in the room, leaving only the bedside lamp fully on; Pete notices out of the corner of his eye that the digital clock next to the pills reads 4:13 a.m. Scarily accurate. He grabs a random notebook and a pen and starts scribbling nonsensically when Alan calls “Action!”

The only legible thing he writes is “my heart is like a stallion / they love it more when it’s broke in”—the rest is just scribbles for the camera zooming in on his furiously writing hand. He makes sure to pinch his face into an expression of tortured concentration as he feels another one looming close to his head, capturing every scowl and twitch of his nose. After following that up with a few angrily crossed-out lines, he tosses the notebook onto the floor and flops bonelessly back against the papers and pillows behind him, knees against his chest, hands in his hair, ever the tortured artiste.

Once seven-ish seconds of this have passed, he pretends like something has just occurred to him and looks over at the laptop sitting a few feet away, half-buried by papers. He blinks at it a few times, schooling his features into a familiar, blank “I-haven’t-slept-in-72-hours-and-I-might-be-hallucinating” expression, before reaching over and pulling the computer onto his lap.

Alan cuts here for some lighting adjustment or something and tells Pete to stay put. In the interim, Pete digs his phone out of the waistband of his sweats and taps out a message to Patrick: things goin well by u??

He gets a response about a minute later: Yes. Gotten a few shots done. They’ve got me half-dressed in a suit I would’ve worn during SP and the blonde wig I’m wearing itches a little

Pete chuckles at the image. cool cool im in a tee n sweats n they drew circles undr my eyes 2 make me look tired lol

Patrick’s reply doesn’t come right away, like there’s hesitation: I’m sorry

??? for what bro Not this shit again.

I should’ve been there for you more back then—took me too long to realize you needed me

This fucking video was a bad idea. omfg TRICK stop apoligizin 4 shit that wansnt ur fault!!!!!!!! Pete types hastily, ignoring typos in the interest of getting his message across as quickly as possible.

You were alone and I was selfish and I’m sorry. Please just say you forgive me or I’ll never be able to sleep tonite

It’s not very often that Patrick starts to sound more like Pete than Pete himself, but this is apparently one of those times. Though he thinks it’s self-evident, Pete sends back, fine i fuckin forgive u i forgave u yrs ago ok??? stop worryin

Thank you

Sorry I’m getting all emotional over this shit—it’s this damn video man. I knew when I read it that it would be kinda hard but I didn’t think anything besides the kiss would make my stomach turn like this

Pete blinks a couple times at his phone screen. His heart sinks. thinkin bout kissin me makes u feel sick????

U know what I mean. Just nervous about it that’s all

Pete would really like to reply to that, to tell Patrick it’s gonna be fine, basically repeating what he said last night. His fingers hover over the touch keyboard and he’s about to type when Alan tells him they’re ready to continue; he manages to send off a quick so am i dont worry before tucking the phone under a pillow and resuming his position against the headboard.

They film a few shots of him googling “soul punk” and watching a few of Patrick’s performances from that era (thankfully the laptop is on mute so he can’t hear the delicious grunts his friend was known to make onstage during these shows) with a sad look on his face, chin in his hand. Finally he “stumbles” across Patrick’s “Confessions of a Pariah” post, and this makes him stop short. He reaches over and picks up an old iPhone 4 (“period-accurate,” Alan had called it) to pretend to send Patrick, who is supposedly across the country, a text. In the other hotel room less than a block away, Patrick will be pretending he just got a message from Pete saying, “you need your band. wanna try again?” In actuality, this conversation had happened via a late-night, emotionally-charged telephone call, but this is easier to film.

“Cut!” Alan says fifteen minutes later after the final shot, and Pete closes the laptop. As if on cue, Alan’s phone rings a few seconds later—it’s Brendan, telling him they’re about to wrap up with Patrick’s scenes and asking where the next location for the day is.

“We’re heading to Pete’s place,” he says, projecting his voice so everyone who’s packing up can hear him. “It’s a couple hours away, so we’ll grab something to eat on the way.”

Pete takes off the wig and scratches his real hair as he climbs off the bed. As he heads to the small bathroom to wash off the little makeup he has on, he sends a real text to Patrick.

you ok??

Yup, everything went well. Little drained. Packing up now. Kinda hate the way I look in this suit too—doesn’t fit me right anymore.

shut up im sure ur bootyful

the fans will drool over ur smexy bod as always

Silence. See u on the bus

yup im makin the driver stop at tacobell

You mean taco HELL?

u love it :P

Lucky for you ;)

Pete shakes his head as he reads over their conversation, gazing with fondness at the pixels forming Patrick’s name on the screen. He really hopes filming this video doesn’t change the relationship they have—it’s pretty much the most important thing in Pete’s life at this point, the one thing he just couldn’t live without.

Well. A kiss is gonna change a lot, whether they mean for it to or not, but he decides to ignore that thought for the time being.

He decides right then that if anything else in this video causes either of them to spiral into another guilt trip, he’ll force Alan and Brendan to change it up a little—keep the premise, but fewer heart-breaking memories. He’ll even scrap the death/kiss scene he really (desperately) wants—anything to avoid seeing that remorseful sheen over Patrick’s eyes again.

It takes another hour for everything to get packed up again—Pete really hates music video production sometimes; so much running around—and finally, Pete and Patrick are reunited on the bus. The younger man is back in his normal clothes and he offers Pete a tight smile when they meet up, but there’s something almost haggard in his face. He does look “drained,” as he’d said in his texts, and it’s understandable—the days they’re reliving weren’t pleasant ones.

Pete just hugs his friend in the lounge of the bus and the little tremors running through his smaller frame make Pete’s heart ache. He apologizes once again for the video and offers to call it off right here and now if it’s too much for Patrick to handle, but the singer just shakes his head against Pete’s shoulder and pulls back a little to meet his eyes.

“It’s okay,” he says softly. “I can handle it, I promise. I’m more worried about the effect it’s having on you, actually.”

“I’m fine,” Pete assures him, and it’s just barely the truth.

They arrive at Pete’s house in L.A. a little after one in the afternoon, once everyone’s sufficiently fed and more awake than before. The scene they’re shooting here is a pretty short one: Pete’s curled up all lonely and tired on his couch, looking lost, when he hears a knock on the door. He gets up to answer it and finds Patrick standing on the other side with his guitar slung over his shoulder, ready to work. They embrace, smile at each other, and Pete invites Patrick inside. Then there’s a minute or two of writing and talking, one last shared grin, and they’re done until Wednesday—they have a gig at a local TV station tomorrow, so the creative team is going to use that day to cut and splice together everything from today in a rough approximation of the final product. Patrick and Pete are both looking forward to seeing how it turns out, how the lyrics match up with the emotions on their faces in the different clips.

The camera operator that had tagged along on their bus asks if he can get a few shots of them together on the couch, just laughing with each other and looking like a classic pair of BFFLs. “It’s filler footage,” he explains. “For, like, the transitions and instrumentals and stuff. Doesn’t have to be anything fancy, just—just look like you like each other. Look natural.”

Pete decides it’s probably smart to not ask for clarification of the phrase “like each other” and just goes with it. He tells Patrick lame jokes, Patrick laughs—a bright, cheerful sound that’s always made Pete’s heart do jumping jacks in his chest—and touches his arm lightly as he doubles over. The smile that breaks over Pete’s face at that isn’t forced. This feels natural, like a normal thing they’d do together on the road between shows or at one of their houses during a late-night movie marathon. Pete adores the feeling.

In a sudden surge of inspiration, Pete grabs the hand Patrick has resting on his thigh and squeezes it, trying to maintain his broad grin. Patrick doesn’t even miss a beat—he meets Pete’s eyes, still chuckling, and his smile softens a little as he squeezes back. The cameraman—John something—loves this, and he has them do it three more times before he’s satisfied with the footage he’s gleaned.

“It’ll make the kiss seem more like a natural culmination at the end,” Pete explains to Patrick later, and the younger man just nods in silent agreement and says nothing more about it.

Pete dons his wig and gets his makeup re-applied as the cameras and lights are being set up in his living room. When they’re ready for him, he flops himself down on the couch and puts on his best “I’m-so-fucking-lonely-and-my-soul-is-an-empty-void” face—muscle memory kicks in after a few seconds. As soon as he’s properly dismal, the cameras start rolling.

He lies there, staring dejectedly at the ceiling, for a good fifteen seconds before he hears his doorbell ring. Acting confused, he makes an almost too-dramatic show of dragging himself off the couch and trudging to his door.

The cameras turn off as Pete walks to the door, then re-position as he gets ready to open it. Alan calls “Action,” and he does, revealing his kind-faced best friend on the other side. Patrick’s got on a platinum blonde wig that’s been styled to look almost exactly like his Soul Punk hair, but otherwise he’s dressed pretty normally: black boots, black skinny jeans, black-and-white tee and a black denim jacket with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. The only thing missing is the hat, but Pete doesn’t care. He looks perfect, like a vision from a dream, and the awed stare he receives from Pete isn’t entirely scripted.

Patrick smiles hopefully, eyes warm behind his glasses, and gestures to the guitar on his back. He doesn’t even have to ask the question before Pete’s hugging him tightly and inviting him inside.

“Cut! Perfect, guys, absolutely perfect,” Alan gushes, reviewing the footage. “You’re makin’ me emotional over here. Great job.”

Before they shoot the writing scene on the couch, Pete nudges Patrick’s shoulder with his own. “Hey.”

“Hi,” Patrick says back. It’s so strange, seeing him blonde again; Pete thinks that if they both put on fedoras they’d really look like twins now.

“I did miss you, y’know,” the bassist admits, talking more to his hands in his lap than to Patrick beside him. “Back then. It…I was really fucking lonely. I didn’t even have a dog—Hemmy was already gone before Ash moved out, so…big empty house, all by myself after the Cards. Plenty of time and space for thinking, but I didn’t always like what I thought.”

Patrick looks over at him, understanding in his opalescent green eyes. “I missed you too,” he says almost timidly, like it’s a secret he’s never voiced. “I was touring basically non-stop with a great band and crew full of awesome people, but…none of them were Fall Out Boy, y’know? None of them were you.” Pete’s heart leaps into his throat. “I never felt quite right onstage with them—sorta like a ship without an anchor. I was half the person I was with you, and I wanted that other half back so badly.” Patrick glances down at where his knee is touching Pete’s and presses them together more deliberately. “I looked confident in those suits, like, dancing around onstage and shit, and I did feel really good, but I was still a terrified kid with stage fright at my core. Not having you there made it so much harder.”

This both sounds and feels like a three a.m. confession, complete with the averted eyes and lightly flushed cheeks, and Pete’s heart just longs. He wants so badly to press Patrick against these leather cushions and kiss him and tell him exactly how amazing he is; he’s wanted to do that since the day he met Patrick, really. “What a Catch, Donnie” wasn’t a hard song to write.

“I went to a couple shows,” Pete nearly whispers, also staring at their knees. He feels Patrick glance up at him in surprise—Pete’s never told him this before. “In D.C. and Chicago. Made sure to stay in the back so you wouldn’t see me. You were fucking amazing up there—not just your voice, but everything—and I wanted to go and find you backstage after, say hi and whatever, but…you just looked so happy without me, floating on the fucking clouds, and I didn’t wanna drag you down. Again.”

There’s silence for a few long, torturous seconds before Patrick finally murmurs, “Pete.” His tone is indecipherable, but it’s definitely weighted with guilt.

Pete just swallows hard and continues. “I bought the CD the day it was released and listened to it on repeat in my bedroom with the lights off, just feeling…well, depressed as hell, but also so fucking proud of you, of what you’d become. I was sure you’d never need me again.”

“I always needed you,” Patrick says before Pete even finishes speaking. He grabs Pete’s hand and actually tangles their fingers together; Pete’s positive his heartbeats are audible now. “Never stopped needing you, not for a single day. We needed the break, all four of us did, but that doesn’t mean I…”

His voice trails off into oblivion, but Pete gets what he’s trying to say and illustrates his understanding with a gentle squeeze of Patrick’s fingers.

All at once, this video doesn’t seem like such a bad idea anymore.

Alan tells them to take their positions, and they disconnect from each other, snapped harshly back to reality.

When the scene’s finished and everything’s packed up, the two of them head back to the bus and spend the whole ride to Joe and Andy’s hotel in comfortable silence, sharing a pair of earbuds and watching the California scenery pass by the bus windows at seventy miles an hour. Pete can’t remember the last time he’d felt this content.

Judging from the way Patrick’s completely pressed up against his side on the couch (in a completely innocent and platonic manner, thank you very much), he’s not the only one.

Apparently Pete’s subconscious doesn’t know what “completely innocent and platonic” means, because it manages to stew up a wonderful concoction for him that night based on the day’s occurrences. It’s almost amusing, really, except for how it’s not. At all.

It’s barely three in the morning when Pete startles awake in his shared hotel room after living through a dream in which he’d snuck into Patrick’s dressing room after a Soul Punk concert and fucked him senseless. In front of a full-body mirror, no less, which. Private kink of his. Curse his subconscious for knowing him so well.

Panting and painfully hard, Pete glances over at the other bed and sees the real Patrick still blissfully asleep in the darkness, making soft snuffling sounds into his pillow.

“’Trick?” No response. Thank fuck.

He barely makes it to the bathroom before he’s shoving his hand down the front of his boxers and coming in less than ten seconds, the echoes of Patrick’s high-pitched whines and desperate moans ringing in his head.

Feeling slimy and polluted, Pete slinks back to his bed five minutes later and crawls under the covers, curling himself into the tiniest ball possible. Sleep doesn’t re-claim him for another two hours.

“Dude, you look fuckin’ awful. Didn’t you sleep last night?”

Pete gives Joe a tight-lipped smile across the breakfast table in their bus. Patrick and Andy are on the other one, discussing the rhythm section technicalities of the acoustic version of “Centuries”, which they’ll be playing at the TV station in a couple hours. “Filming just wore me out, man,” he lies, taking another small bite of his bagel.

“Right,” the guitarist says with a nod. He breaks his PopTart in half and sets it back on his plate, looking at Pete with a dangerous curiosity in his gaze. “What’s the video even about, anyway? I mean, Hurley and I don’t mind the time off or whatever, duh, but, ‘s kinda weird that we don’t even know, like, the storyline.”

Pete gulps down a mouthful of lukewarm milk and blames that for the grimace that twists his face at Joe’s question. “It’s a surprise,” he says finally, forcing another smile for his friend.

“A ‘surprise’?” Joe says incredulously with a chunk of PopTart halfway to his mouth. He looks skeptical. “Since when are our music videos fuckin’ secret projects laced with mystery and coated with tantalizing intrigue?”

The bassist wants to laugh at this, but instead he just winces. “It’s not, like, top secret,” he offers weakly. Joe quirks an accusing eyebrow at him, unfazed. “Just…a surprise. The plot, it’s, uh, hard to explain—it’s kinda about real events, but…not, at the same time.”

“What events?”

“Like…the hiatus and stuff. I dunno, man, it’s a work in progress, we’re kinda making it up as we go.”

Something about his evasive babbling must reveal Pete’s reluctance to talk about this subject. Joe, because he’s smart and knows not to press issues (if it’s safe to assume they’re not life-threatening) when Pete’s like this, just shrugs and takes another sip of his orange juice. “Whatever, man,” he says coolly. “I’m sure it’ll be great. You gonna be good for the show? I got some extra Redbull in the minifridge if you need it.”

Pete tells him he’ll keep that in mind and calls his breakfast finished once half his bagel is gone. He gets up, drops his disposable dishes in the garbage bag under the kitchenette sink, and retreats to his bunk with a muttered “Gonna catch a few z’s” thrown over his shoulder at Joe. He ignores the look the younger man gives him as he walks away, like he knows something Pete doesn’t know he knows. Fuckin’ Trohman.

As usual, Pete’s wide awake the moment his head hits the pillow, and all he can fucking think about is Patrick fucking Stump. Which isn’t unusual, per se, but the context sure is.

He’d be lying outrageously to himself if he said he’s never wanted more out of his and Patrick’s friendship. From the moment he first saw the shy, awkward sixteen-year-old wearing his grandpa’s argyle sweater vest and knee-high black socks, he’d been drawn to the kid, and as soon as he’d heard that golden voice, well…he’d known he was fucked early on, honestly. It was attraction at first sight, adoration at first note, and love at first smile. Every girl Pete’s dated since that initial meeting—or at least, since his and Patrick’s “conversation” in the van that cold, rainy night—has, in some way or another, reminded him a little of Patrick: Jeanae’s laugh had sounded like his; Morgan’s eyes were the right color; Ashlee had had the same sort of magnetism. And that’s not to mention every hookup he’s ever endured since the band hit it big: every one, both girls and guys, had been as close to Patrick clones as possible. While that’s not exactly his M.O. anymore (hello, 35-year-old divorcee with bleached hair), he has no doubt it would be the same today—if, that is, the hiatus hadn’t happened.

Truthfully, Pete’s never let himself think too much about the hiatus. He isn’t able to remember a lot of it anyway, thanks to his friends Xanax and Klonopin and a couple others, but if he could, he’d find one overarching theme: missing the hell out of Patrick. His best friend—whom he’d thought of as a new ex-friend for a year or so—had haunted his dreams nearly every night with his voice, his laugh, his scent. Not all of them had been sex dreams, though admittedly, there were a few. Mostly, they were just dreams about him and Patrick sitting on a couch together watching Game of Thrones, or writing a song, or trying to have a conversation entirely made up of John Hughes movie quotes. Those had been the dreams that hurt the most, because they’d seemed so real and felt so good and forgetting them after waking up had felt like being burned alive.

The smoke curls around my throat and it’s shaped like your hand / but unless I’m breathing my next breath from your lungs, I’ll gladly stand here and choke. Pete quickly digs his phone out from under his pillow and types the words in his Notes as they flood into his head.

your hands are drenched in my blood / but all I can think is how good you look in red

you’re royalty, and I’m your pawn / I’m nothing but rust on your crown

my thoughts are spiders crawling out my ears and down my arms / most nights the only thoughts I have are ones that do me harm

your smile is my spotlight / I’m lost at sea / you’re the only thing that still makes sense to me

Fuck, he’d been lying when he’d said he was over his emo phase.

In summary: 1) This music video is bringing back both happy and painful memories for Pete; 2) He hopes both he and Patrick can make it through another couple days of shooting; and 3) He is still hopelessly, insanely, irrevocably in love with Patrick, and it’s not that easy to ignore anymore.

There have been moments in the past twenty-four hours where Pete has looked at Patrick and seen something in his blue-green eyes, something warm and fond and completely undeserved. Pete would like to think Patrick’s hand had lingered in his on those two occasions where they’d been linked; he’d like to imagine Patrick had hesitated before releasing him from that hug after filming the first scene. Little things like these—things his brain is making him believe he saw and felt—are what plant that dangerous seed of hope in Pete’s chest. That seed is what will eventually kill him, he knows. And yet, he waters it still.

is there any better way to die / than from an overflowing heart?

With a heavy sigh, Pete pulls the curtain shut and rolls over to face the wall. He snags his earbuds from between the mattress and the wall and plugs them into his phone, resolving to find solace in music. Who knows—maybe someone’s voice will be soothing enough to lull him to sleep for an hour or two.

(In reality, of course, he knows Patrick’s voice is the only one powerful enough to do that for him. Insomnia hadn’t stood a chance against the younger man’s dulcet tones, either crooned through a phone or whispered directly in Pete’s ear; the few times he’d be able to sleep during the band’s first years were the times he had his own personal iPod full of punk lullabies to cuddle with. He wishes Patrick were here now.)

(Then again, the thought of how Patrick had looked, sounded, and felt in his dream last night might have made being in close proximity to him a little…hard.)

With a long sigh, Pete hits shuffle and closes his eyes, burying his nose in the corner of his thin blanket. Of fucking course, the first song to play on his “CALM THE FUCK DOWN” playlist is “Fallingforyou” by The 1975. He makes it through most of it and almost drifts off with an aching heart until Matty’s soft but earnest voice sings I don’t wanna be your friend, I wanna kiss your neck—after that, Pete rips the headphones out of his ears and throws his phone to the foot of his bunk, not even caring if Joe hears the racket. He doesn’t.

Pete feels empty as he curls up on the paper-thin mattress and eventually slips into a dreamless, unsatisfying sleep. He wakes up two hours later, when Joe shakes him awake to tell him they’ve arrived at the station, even more exhausted than before.

Patrick takes one look at Pete’s bloodshot eyes and half-assed grin and wisely chooses to say nothing, electing instead to offer the bassist a heartfelt pat on the shoulder. “Filming wear you out, too?” he asks.

Pete just nods, ignoring the way Patrick’s touch is making his entire body hum. They’re backstage at the gig; he can’t afford any embarrassments now.

“Was Joe interrogating you about the plot, ‘cuz Hurley wouldn’t fuckin’ leave me alone about it.”

“Yeah,” Pete says and walks over to where a tech has just propped his acoustic bass up on a stand. “Told him it was a surprise, then said it was sorta based on the hiatus. No real specifics. He let it go after that.”

“I said the same thing.” Patrick, looking concerned, helps Pete get the bass’s strap over his head. “I think they’re conspiring.”

“Totally. They’re gonna show up on set tomorrow and squirt silly string all over the cameras until they can read the screenplay for themselves.”

“Sounds like them.” Patrick chuckles a little, but his smile falters after a second or two. He looks down at his scuffed black boots almost bashfully. “Hey, um…d’you think they’ll, uh, freak out or anything? About the kiss?”

Pete’s stomach lurches and twists like it does every time he imagines Patrick’s mouth on his, but he shakes it off. He contemplates his friend’s question for a long moment, blindly plucking out chords with calloused fingers, before he forces a casual shrug. “You want the honest answer?” he finally asks.

Appearing unsure, Patrick nods after a second of hesitation.

“Well,” Pete says carefully, “I’m pretty sure Joe and Andy have been betting on when we’d get together for at least a decade, and they’ve been planning our wedding too.” Because honestly, the mocking Pete and Patrick had had to endure from the two of them in the early days was almost unbearable—some of it still lingers even now. “They won’t freak—if anything, they’ll record it on their phones and fanboy over it together later.”

Patrick scoffs at this and looks away from Pete, but there is a distinct blush rising slowly on his face and painting the tips of his ears pink. Pete watches, mesmerized, and thinks about tasting that blush with his lips and tongue.

“You really think so?” Patrick asks finally, and Pete replies, “Oh yeah. I’m at least ninety percent sure.”

“Who—” The singer’s voice cracks. He swallows hard; Pete tries not to track the movement of his throat with his eyes. “Who d’you think would bet we’d get together, like, before Folie?” The question is phrased innocently enough, but something about the way Patrick says it has cogs turning in Pete’s skull.

“Joe. Definitely,” Pete replies without missing a beat. “He’s always ‘shipped’ us or whatever, and he’d hold out hope that his fantasies would become realities sooner rather than later.” A string on his bass is still out-of-tune, so he takes a few seconds to tighten it a little. “Andy’s a little more realistic, so I think he’d bet it would happen either during or after the hiatus, if it even happened at all. He knows how emotionally constipated we both can be.”

Humming, Patrick considers these notions with a series of thoughtful nods. After several long, almost tense seconds, he asks quietly, “And who—who would you have sided with?”

Pete’s heart is suddenly racing like he’s just downed three espressos. “Huh?”

Patrick looks him dead in the eye, face as red as a fucking tomato, and asks, “Do you think we’d’ve worked better together before or after the break?”

Pete just blinks at him. “I thought we decided we wouldn’t ‘do that shit’ at any point in time, so what does it matter?” he grouses, perhaps a little too bitterly.

“But pretend we hadn’t,” Patrick says, and Pete’s really starting to miss his Xanax right about now. “Pretend…that night in the van…it didn’t happen. Do you think we could’ve…?”

Is he fucking asking me if I think we could have been a couple? Where the fuck is this coming from?

The only response Pete can properly articulate is an incredulous, confused stare.

Patrick gets the message quite quickly and drops his gaze again, reaching up to sheepishly rub the back of his neck. “Right. Right. Never mind, just—just forget I even—yeah. I’m gonna go, uh, warm up. My voice. Over, uh, over there.”

Pete watches him as he trots over to his own guitar at the other end of the stage. The bassist clenches his fist around his fretboard, reveling in the feeling of the strings digging into his fingers, and tries to silence the whirring in his head.

“Do you think we could’ve…?” Could’ve what? Lasted more than a week, unlike most of Pete’s romantic relationships? Maintained a healthy, supportive relationship even under the increasing pressure of being a world-famous rock band? Loved each other unconditionally and worked through their problems without getting into borderline fist-fights? Avoided years of pining and failed relationships by taking a fucking chance, being brave for once, and realizing that a love between the two of them could turn out to be the best goddamn thing to ever happen to them?

“Yes,” Pete whispers, but no one hears him.

The performance goes off without a hitch, as usual, and Patrick and Andy are praised for their genius and expert application of bongo drums. They leave the station about an hour after their performance, dividing up into the same pairs for the buses as before, and drive another hour to their new hotel. Pete broods in his bunk with his music turned all the way up for the whole ride.

Pete and Patrick, while they may not have shared a bus, are sharing a hotel room again, which causes a painful knot of muscle to form in Pete’s right shoulder. The two of them barely look at each other in the elevator and organize their things on separate halves of the room, unlike most hotel nights, when their respective crap ends up all jumbled and mixed together from lack of care. They aren’t meeting the guys for another few hours for dinner, so Patrick shucks his boots and jacket and sets his hat on the nightstand beside his bed before digging his laptop out of his backpack. His stereo headphones go on, GarageBand opens, and Pete knows the rest of the world has now faded out of his sphere of awareness.

Because of this, Pete figures it’s okay to turn on the TV. Lucky for him, a Game of Thrones marathon is on, so he plops down on his own bed and loses himself in a re-run. There’s tension hanging in the air like wet clothes on a line between him and his best friend, but he tries to ignore it. Only Joffrey’s douchiness and the faint tapping of fingers on a keyboard can be heard in the room; Pete feels like he’s suffocating.

Halfway through the third episode, Pete can’t take the awkwardness any longer and violently hits the mute button on the remote next to him. One look at Patrick, though, and whatever he was about to say gets caught in his throat: the singer looks more concentrated than he has in a while, brow scrunched and eyes focused behind his glasses as he fiddles with the program on his Mac.

Pete clears his throat tentatively. “’Trick?”

“Hmm?” Patrick hums without moving his eyes from the screen.

“Uh…whatcha workin’ on?”

“’S just something that’s been in my head for a few hours. Y’know, a melody, a loop. Trying to re-create it but I can’t get it quite right.” The singer taps at his keyboard with two fingers, probably laying down a drum beat, the tip of his tongue caught between his teeth.

“Lemme hear it,” Pete says, sitting up straighter on his bed, and Patrick finally turns to look at him with a guarded expression. “C’mon, it’s just notes and sounds, nothing personal, right?”

Patrick doesn’t reply, but he does unplug his headphones and click the touchpad a few times. Finally, he turns up his laptop’s volume and hits the spacebar, and the room is filled with sound.

It’s the most melancholy thing Pete’s ever heard. There’s violins and low brass and some subtle, quiet guitar riffs, and the notes swoop and dive and climb and blend together effortlessly in a truly haunting amalgamation of sound and music. Perhaps the most prominent thing is the bassline, thought—heavy and low and steady, like a beating heart, adding that final touch that sends goosebumps creeping over Pete’s arms and neck. It’s almost like the score of a really depressing movie; Pete doesn’t think he could ever come up with lyrics to properly suit it without taking at least four Ativan a day and not sleeping for a week.

The loop ends rather abruptly after about thirty seconds, and Pete can only stare at a now-blushing Patrick as the enchanting sounds of the harmonizing strings echo through his mind and fade. Patrick is avoiding his eyes, fixated on the screen again.

“Where did that come from?” Pete asks, surprised at how hoarse his own voice sounds.

Patrick shrugs a little. “Just been in my head.”

“Then there’s something either really scary or really fucking sad going on in your head, ‘Trick,” Pete says. He feels his own cheeks heat up and thinks about their conversation before the show—could that have inspired those mournful strains?

“It’s fine, it’s nothing,” Patrick insists shortly. “You weren’t even supposed to hear it. Don’t worry about it.”

Pete wants to press the issue, wants to keep interrogating until he gets the definitive answer out of Patrick and find out if he should feel guilty about something, but just as he’s about to open his mouth, his phone buzzes in his pocket. “Joe and Andy are downstairs at dinner already,” he tells Patrick after reading the text. “C’mon, let’s go eat.”

Patrick saves his work, closes his Mac, and slides slowly off the bed to grab his boots. Before they walk out of their room, Pete grabs him by the arm and holds him still, studying his face closely. “You sure you’re okay?”

The shorter man keeps his gaze downcast, but he nods.

Pete swallows hard. “This isn’t about our, uh, discussion before the gig, is it?”

“I thought I told you to—”

“You should know by now,” Pete says dryly, “that I don’t usually listen when you tell me to do things.”

Patrick sighs long and heavy and his shoulder droops under Pete’s hand. “I was just…wondering what you thought about…that,” he explains haltingly. “It’s no big deal.”

Pete opens his mouth, but nothing comes out. He wants to tell Patrick what he really thinks—that the two of them could’ve worked brilliantly and still could if they weren’t so stubborn and afraid—but now isn’t the time for that conversation. To be honest, he’s not sure if there will ever be a right time for it.

All he can do is gently tilt Patrick’s chin up so their eyes are finally locked again and offer him a small smile. “I think,” he says, “that you’re my best friend, and I wouldn’t risk losing that for anything—not then, not now, not ever.” It’s a slightly warped version of the truth, but it’s the truth nonetheless.

He only realizes that statement could be taken as a rejection when he sees a flicker of something like disappointment flash ever-so-quickly through Patrick’s beautiful eyes. It’s gone a moment later, though, replaced by an amused glint. “You’re kinda unintentionally cheesy sometimes, you know that?” Patrick mocks, grinning.

“Soul of a poet,” Pete laments dramatically and reaches over to open the door for them. “Both a blessing and a curse.”

“Makes for some damn good songs, though.”

“Fuckin’ right.”

The tension is virtually gone between the two and they’re making stupid jokes and flicking food at each other from across the table like always when Pete’s phone buzzes again. Still chuckling at Patrick’s adorable reaction to having a small blob of mashed potatoes flung at his face, he digs it out of his pocket to check the message.

It’s from Alan. And it’s…not entirely good news.

Patrick’s own broad grin slowly falls from his face as he sees Pete’s eyes widen. “What?” he asks, glancing between Pete’s face and his phone.

“Uh…” Pete meets his eyes briefly, then turns to Joe and Andy. “Guys, Patrick and I gotta go back to the room and discuss some shit for tomorrow’s filming, okay?”

Joe mumbles “That’s cool” with a full mouth and Andy nods in assent at the same time Patrick asks loudly, “The fuck is going on?”

“Just come on,” Pete insists and stands up from the table, nearly rattling the silverware onto the floor as he forcefully pushes his chair in. Patrick follows, but not without a hasty apology to his other two bandmates.

Once they’re in the elevator, Patrick turns and stares at Pete with a questioning, borderline pissed look. “What the fuck?”

“I just got a text from Alan.” Pete takes out his phone again. He opens the text and holds it out to Patrick with a shaking hand. “It’s an updated filming schedule. They’ve had to, uh…make some changes.”

“What kinds of changes?” Patrick asks warily, slowly reaching out to take the phone from Pete. “What could be so—oh.” He stares at the small screen, eyes widening incrementally. “…Oh.”

Pete takes the phone back. “Yeah.”

“…Tomorrow? I-I mean…already?” Patrick’s face is rapidly approaching maximum blushocity; under any other circumstance, Pete would be smiling at the sight. “I…I was expecting—”

“—Thursday, yeah, but something came up and they gotta cram everything in tomorrow,” Pete explains as the elevator doors ding and slide open. “Including the stabbing scene. And, by extension…”

“…the kiss.”

“Yeah.”

The walk to the hotel room seems longer than it had before. Pete’s stomach feels like it’s full of lead and cinderblocks and his heart is about to burst out of his chest in some grotesque imitation of Alien. His hand is shaking so much he almost misses the keycard slot when he goes to unlock the door of the room.

Pete has to kiss Patrick tomorrow. On camera. For a music video that millions of people who do and don’t know their band will see.

Fuck. This had seemed like a better idea when it was only an idea—abstract, a daydream that would be realized somewhere in the relatively distant future.

Now, Pete only has about twelve hours to psych himself up enough so he’ll be mentally and emotionally prepared to kiss his male, most-likely-straight best friend and basically pretend to be in love with him. Which. Won’t actually be pretending.

And Patrick—Patrick’s in this too, being forced into something uncomfortable even sooner than he’d thought, and it’s all Pete’s fault. As usual.

They were supposed to have more time.

Pete looks over at Patrick once the door closes, trying to assess the singer’s feelings about this development. He’s pacing in a small circle just inside the door, arms crossed, staring unseeingly at a spot on the carpet just in front of his feet. The expression on his face is unreadable, something between mildly apprehensive and outright panicked. Pete has seen him like this before, usually backstage before a sold-out arena, but there’s something significantly more intense about it now, in this context.

“’Trick? You alright?” Pete knows it’s not usually wise to talk to Patrick when he’s in this state, but this time is an exception. He has to know.

“We gotta do it tomorrow,” Patrick whispers incredulously, not really answering Pete’s question. “Fuck, Pete, tomorrow! How could they just spring that on us like this? We—I’m not ready!”

Pete sits down heavily on the edge of his bead and leans forwards with his elbows on his knees. “Neither am I,” he admits, both sounding and feeling more vulnerable and confused than he has in a long time.

Patrick seems to notice this, because he stops his pacing and lifts his head to look at Pete for a long moment. He doesn’t say anything (thank God), but he does slowly walk over to the bed and sit down on it beside Pete. They stay like that for a few minutes, shoulders and thighs pressed together, and Pete wants to tell him anything and everything he’s been thinking for the past two days. He wants to tell him about his dream, about how painful memories are easier to relive when Patrick’s around, about the sheer immensity of his feelings for Patrick and how they’ve only been magnified because of this stupid song and its stupid music video. But that’s not what he ends up saying.

Pete feels the apology bubbling up inside him long before it bursts from his mouth: “I’m sorry. Again. And before you try to tell me it’s not my fault, it really kinda is, since the concept of this video was my idea—”

“Pete?”

“—and it was obviously pretty easy to warp it into a romantic narrative, and I should’ve suggested something else because now we’re both freaking out but I think you might be freaking out a little more than I am, which just proves how badly I fucked up—”

“Pete.”

“—and I’m gonna call Alan and Brendan tomorrow and tell them to scrap everything and just forget about this whole thing and I’ll pay them back from my own—”

“Pete, oh my god, shut up.” Patrick claps a slightly sweaty hand over Pete’s running mouth and looks him in the eye. “I’m freaking out about the suddenly shorter time constraint, not really the kiss itself, for fuck’s sake. Calm down and breathe for a sec, will you?”

The bassist is still for several seconds before he slowly nods his head. Patrick takes his hand away and places it lightly on Pete’s knee while Pete breathes, in through the nose, out through the mouth, still trying to process Patrick’s words with his sleep-deprived brain.

“I just needed a minute to accept the fact that I’m gonna be kissing my best friend on camera tomorrow instead of the day after,” Patrick says more quietly, and Pete stares at him in surprise as he basically speaks Pete’s thoughts out loud—though, to be fair, this isn’t the only time that’s happened. “If anything, I’m pissed at the team that overscheduled themselves and is now forcing us to do this before we’re entirely ready. Not very professional.”

“Not at all,” Pete rasps, eyes still wide and glued to Patrick’s flushed but calmer face.

Patrick smiles at him a little resentfully. “Sorry I scared you. ‘S just…you know how I get. Perfectionist and shit. Yeah, I’m still nervous about actually kissing you and it’s still a little terrifying to think about, to be honest, but this whole scheduling thing just made me snap. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. It’s totally understandable,” Pete reassures him. Relief is starting to flood through his tense muscles and allowing him to take deeper, more even breaths. “And, uh—I-I’m still nervous about it too. Just for the record.”

Patrick huffs a laugh through his perfect nose and smiles, giving Pete’s knee a squeeze, and a wonderful, awful idea pops into Pete’s head like an unwelcome dinner guest. It’s fucking crazy and could screw up a whole lot of shit, but for some reason Pete selfishly wants to try it out. Backfiring is always a possibility, which terrifies him briefly, but he mentally shakes his head and digs in his heels.

“Y’know—y’know when you said one take?” Pete starts, hoping he doesn’t look too much like a terrified schoolboy in the principal’s office.

“Yes, and I’m adhering to that rule firmly,” Patrick asserts.

“Yeah, and that’s fine, but you…you never said one kiss.”

Patrick blinks, puzzled. His face is equal parts shocked, mildly outraged, and disbelieving, with the smallest hint of curiosity. “What?”

“You said I had to kiss you on camera in one take,” Pete explains, his blood pressure rising with every word, “but you never said that was the only time I could kiss you.”

Their gazes remain locked for a heartbeat or so before Patrick breaks the connection and stares at the wall opposite them, expression carefully blank. He parts his lips, but says nothing. He’s searching for words again, and Pete feels like he should explain himself.

“I think we should…rehearse,” he says, and his voice shakes from the nerves he’s suddenly feeling. He doesn’t actually think Patrick will agree to it, but it’s worth a shot. “It might make us less nervous. And I think it’d be kinda easier to film, too, since we wouldn’t be going into it completely inexperienced. Having our first kiss be on camera would be a little nerve-wracking, don’t you think?” (Well, it’s not technically their “first” kiss—Pete’s been laying smacking kisses on Patrick’s cheeks and the corners of his mouth since they met—but it’ll be the first real one, the first one that could potentially hold some sort of significant meaning.)

Patrick is quiet. Not his usual thoughtful quiet, but a deep, deliberate quiet. He’s not looking at Pete, but Pete can still see the internal battle raging in his eyes as he weighs his options. He’s clearly conflicted, but he’s not panicking, which is…unexpected, but calming in a way. Pete’s eyes widen as he realizes holy shit, is he gonna—?

“That’s…not a bad idea.”

Pete’s brain short-circuits. His lungs are burning with the breath he’s holding in. “R-Really?” He hopes the disbelieving squeak in his voice wasn’t as loud as it had sounded in his own ears.

Patrick nods slowly and finally looks at the older man. His features are carefully schooled into an expression of neutrality, but his breathing is rapid and shallow, and his eyes reveal his anxiety. “I mean—at least we’d have an idea what it’s—what it’ll be like, right? We’ll know what to expect.”

“Uh-huh,” Pete agrees dumbly. Holy fuck, holy fucking fuck—

“Okay then.” There’s a pause, then Patrick shifts a little on the bed so he’s facing Pete. His eyes flicker up to Pete’s face, then dance away again. “Let’s, um…how should we—”

“Let’s just—” Pete turns towards him too, snapping himself out of his stunned daze and trying to wrap his head around the fact that he is about to kiss Patrick right here and right now and his heart is exploding and he thinks the planet might be too. He clears his throat a little awkwardly, then stands. “Well, you’re gonna be, uh, on your back in the video, so—”

“Oh. Yeah. I’ll, um…” The singer scoots back on the bed and lies down, crossing his ankles and awkwardly placing his hands on his stomach. His thin, soft hair fans out around his head on the white pillow like a dirty golden halo and his eyes look so big behind his glasses as he glances everywhere around the room but directly at Pete. “And you’re—”

“—over you, yeah.” Pete sits almost daintily on the edge of the bed again, then mentally shakes himself and inches closer until his hip is lightly touching Patrick’s. He leans over Patrick a little, planting one of his hands on the bed next to Patrick’s waist and the other beside his shoulder. Their faces are still about three feet apart, but Pete can feel his best friend’s breathing accelerating further and his heart is beating so hard, his thin blue T-shirt is fluttering with it.

They remain like that, Pete hovering above Patrick uncertainly and Patrick staring up at him with a million questions in his eyes. The singer pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose with one shaking finger; Pete murmurs, “Here, let me,” and carefully removes them, folding them and placing them on the nearby nightstand. He knows as Patrick blearily blinks and squints that he’s now the only thing Patrick can clearly see, and that thought makes something in his stomach quiver. He goes back to leaning over his best friend and blows out a slow, steady breath, gazing down at the beautiful creature below him: Patrick looks so bare without his hat and specs, so young and almost childlike. Pete knows Patrick hates the way he looks like this, but when Pete looks at him, he sees what he’s always seen—his best friend, his other half, the most gorgeous and talented man that’s ever walked the planet—and he feels so damn lucky just to be in his presence.

This is all so intimate, unlike anything they’ve ever done before, but Pete still has to remind himself it isn’t real.

Patrick looks away from him again and pulls his lower lip between his teeth. Hesitantly, he reaches up and rests one hand on Pete’s side, curling his fingers in the fabric of Pete’s shirt. Tension is coming off him in waves, conducted through his fingertips, but he seems to be waiting for something—Pete realizes now that he’s gonna have to make the first move.

In one swift motion, Pete closes his eyes and cranes his neck down, resting his forehead gently against Patrick’s slightly sweaty one. Patrick exhales shakily and his breath buffets against Pete’s mouth like it never has before. The feeling is electric; Pete barely suppresses a shiver.

“Relax,” Pete manages to say, voice barely a whisper. He wishes he would heed his own advice.

Patrick nods minutely and his hand slides from Pete’s side to the small of his back, drawing him closer and forcing Pete to drop down onto his elbows. Their chests are brushing now and this isn’t exactly how they’ll be positioned in the video, but it feels so nice and Patrick is so warm that Pete just can’t bring himself to protest.

He swallows noisily, licking his lips. “Can I…?”

“Yes,” Patrick breathes, and to Pete’s utter shock, the younger man cranes up and touches his soft, plush lips to Pete’s slightly chapped ones before Pete can even move.

That’s all it is for a few seconds—two closed mouths slanted together, firm and still, at a slightly awkward angle—but then Pete exhales through his nose and moves his lips a little, and Patrick responds in kind, and all of a sudden there is absolutely nothing else in the entire galaxy that Pete is aware of.

Pete’s imagined this moment countless times over the past fourteen years—it’s been used to fuel both lyric writing sessions and sessions of self-love (or was it self-abuse?). But not even his best fantasies compare to the way Patrick’s fingertips press more firmly into the bassist’s back as he tilts his head a little, opening his mouth wider. And now, oh, now they’re actually kissing, huffing small breaths into each other’s mouths, and Patrick’s nose is digging into Pete’s cheek and there’s an arm tightening around his waist and a warm hand on the back of his neck and Pete finds his own hand slipping under Patrick’s head to hold him in place; his hair is so soft, but not as soft as his saccharine lips and—and fuck, his tongue, which is now tentatively prodding and nudging its way into Pete’s mouth, and Pete slides his own against it which produces a gasp and an actual whimper from Patrick, who tastes like coffee and spearmint and a Lake Michigan breeze and the only sounds in the room are their stuttered breaths and the quiet, wet sounds of their mouths connecting and disconnecting, and, and—oh god—

Pete breaks away for a split second to suck in a small breath of air and shift his position so his back doesn’t ache quite as much from twisting, then dives back in again, and Patrick reciprocates like there was no pause at all. God, Pete thinks foggily as he runs one hand down Patrick’s side, eliciting a shiver, he’s kissing Patrick—no, he’s making out with him here in the dim light of their shared hotel room, and it’s like his first kiss ever all over again but it’s so much better. He sinks his teeth gently into Patrick’s plump lower lip before releasing it with a soft pop and Patrick shudders against him and moans, so softly, so beautifully, he’s so beautiful, and Pete’s drinking him up like the sweetest wine, and—and he—he fucking can’t. He can’t believe this is happening, can’t believe he finally has Patrick under him like this, warm and pliable and practically melting in his arms.

It’s too much and it’s not nearly enough and it feels so fucking real that Pete’s heart morphs into a sore, leaden weight in his chest, but God help him, he keeps going. He knows he should stop when he feels his jeans tightening ever-so-slightly, but this is just too good, too addictive, and Patrick’s so gorgeous and perfect and he’s everything Pete’s ever wanted. There’s a physical force that’s holding Pete here, and he’s only partially aware that they’re both shivering and he’s not sure if he’s dizzy from a lack of oxygen or an overdose of Patrick Stump.

That’s it, he decides a moment later when Patrick hums against his mouth again—he’s gotta stop or he’s gonna climb further onto this bed and straddle Patrick’s hips and do something totally fucking awesome but insanely regrettable. But then Patrick tilts his head even further and draws one of his knees up so it’s touching Pete’s waist and a high-pitched, breathy whine breaks free from his probably-bruised mouth as he captures Pete’s tongue briefly between his lips, and—Pete’s just so fucking in love with him, it’s almost stupid. He never wants to get up, never wants to leave this room or Patrick’s arms or Patrick’s kiss—he’d forgotten how good it felt to be kissed like this; it’s been so long. Pete hasn’t loved or been loved (does he love me?) like this in years. He knows he can’t have this forever, will probably never get it again, but he wants it; he fucking needs to hold Patrick down on this mattress and strip him of every scrap of clothing and just worship—

Suddenly, like a slap in the face, Patrick pulls away and breaks their connection with no warning at all. Pete opens his eyes dazedly and looks down at the singer just inches below him as they breathe together—his pale face is bright pink and his lips are red and spit-slick and his eyes are dark, filled with an indecipherable emotion. His chest is also heaving quite rapidly and Pete barely has time to think asthma attack…? before Patrick is shoving him away and scrambling off the bed.

Patrick grabs his glasses from the nightstand and his jacket from his own bed and leaves the room, still panting, without a backwards glance. The heavy door slams shut behind him with a damning finality and Pete stares at it, completely lost and confused, as numbness creeps into his limbs.

He’s alone again. He always ends up alone, and that’s how it’s supposed to be. He’s not good enough for anyone, least of all someone kind and smart and perfect like Patrick. No matter what Pete does, no matter how hard he tries to be good and honest and loveable, he fucks up, and he deserves the loneliness that’s now filling the room and slowly suffocating him.

He sits on the edge of the bed, half-hard and longing for something he will never have, and he stays there for two hours. Patrick doesn’t come back. There’s no calls and no texts from him, Joe, Andy, or anyone else important.

Fourteen years. Fourteen years Pete’s dreamt of kissing Patrick, holding him like that. And for about three minutes, his life had finally been complete. But now it feels just as empty and broken as it had five years ago.

Pete falls asleep fully clothed, on top of the sheets, with tears streaking his face and his nose buried in the pillow that still smells like Patrick’s hair.

The blood is hot and sticky and thick, oozing sluggishly between Pete’s fingers as he presses his hands firmly against the wound. This elicits a low whine of pain from his “patient”, and his heart clenches at the sound. He has to stop the flow, though, no matter how much it hurts, or…something terrible could happen.

Well, something worse than this terrible thing.

He hadn’t seen her coming. She’d been hiding behind a graffiti’d dumpster in the alley next to the venue and jumped Pete as soon as he was close enough. He’d barely had time to register that she was both wearing a Fall Out Boy T-shirt and wielding a huge knife before he’d been tackled to the ground, breath knocked completely out of his lungs. He’d fought with her—she’d been surprisingly strong, for a short girl who couldn’t weight more than 140 pounds—for a good fifteen seconds before she was completely lifted off of him and dragged away.

He’d rolled onto his side just in time to watch her stab Patrick, his rescuer, in the abdomen and take off running. Pete had let her go in favor of leaping to his feet and catching Patrick before he could collapse onto the cold pavement.

Now here he is, waiting for the ambulance that their manager had called to arrive, with tears rolling down his cheeks and his hands and arms covered in his best friend’s blood.

“Just stay awake a little longer, ‘Trick,” Pete whispers urgently, staring down at Patrick’s unnaturally pale face. The younger man’s eyes are closed and his features are pinched with pain; Pete tries to ignore the thin line of scarlet trailing from the corner of his mouth. “You’re gonna be okay, I promise, just stay awake.” He’s not sure if it’s the overpowering stench of iron and copper or the thought that he might be losing his best friend because of a psycho fan that’s making him nauseous.

Patrick grunts and grits his teeth as Pete adds even more pressure to his injury. He starts to cough, and blood sprays from his mouth onto both his and Pete’s shirts. Now his chin and lips are coated in it, and there’s even a few flecks on the lenses of his glasses. The contrast between his paper-white skin and the bright red fluid is jarring. “Hurts, Pete,” he rasps, and his eyes slowly flicker open.

Pete chokes out a hoarse sob and locks eyes with him as best he can through his tears. “I know.” He strains to listen for any sirens anywhere close by, but there’s nothing but the sound of Patrick’s labored, wet breathing echoing through the alley.

The thought that Patrick is dying passes through Pete’s mind, and it only makes him cry harder. Fuck, Patrick had taken a knife for him, and now he’s dying, right here in front of Pete, and there’s nothing Pete can fucking do about it.

“Why’d you do that, you fucking idiot?” Pete asks before he can stop himself.

Patrick blinks a couple times and he looks so sad, making Pete’s heart splinter even further. He moves one cold hand and weakly clasps it around one of Pete’s blood-covered wrists. “My best friend,” he forces out through a mouthful of blood before launching into another short coughing fit. When he has enough breath back, he adds, “Had to.”

“No you didn’t,” Pete whimpers, shaking his head. “Should’ve just let her hurt me. You didn’t deserve this.”

“Neither did you.” Patrick’s breaths are rattling loudly in his lungs, one of which is most definitely punctured. He swallows hard, closing his eyes tightly, and writhes a little. “Fuck, this hurts.”

“Ambulance is coming,” Pete tells him, though he still can’t hear any sirens at all. Now that he thinks about it, the equipment band, tech crew, and buses are gone too—he and Patrick are completely alone here, one dying and the other wishing he were.

Patrick’s eyes fly open momentarily and he gasps for breath, mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water. His hand grips one of Pete’s a little more tightly, but it’s still so fucking weak that Pete can barely feel it. His cloudy, unfocused gaze meets Pete’s tearful one from behind his blood-spattered glasses. “’M scared, Pete,” he wheezes.

Pete can’t speak anymore. He just breaks down in a fit of sobs and closes his eyes. He wants to reassure Patrick and tell him he’ll be okay, there’s doctors headed here right now and they’ll be here in a few minutes, but he knows it’s a lie. He’s losing the most important person in his life in a cold, filthy alley behind a small music hall, and he wishes so much that the deranged fan had killed him instead of subjecting him to this torture. This hurts worse than a knife in the gut; it hurts worse than anything ever could, and he can’t fucking believe it’s happening.

Suddenly, he feels Patrick’s cold, shaking hand touch the side of his face, and he opens his eyes. The singer is looking up at him with a deeply sorrowful expression, but there’s love in it too, and Pete clings to it with everything he has.

“Don’t regret it,” Patrick gasps, and his eyelids start to flutter. “I don’t regret a thing. I’d do it again. All of it. For you.”

It’s a goodbye, Pete knows it is, and his throat closes up with grief. “Don’t leave me,” he whimpers pathetically and grabs Patrick’s hand, clutching it desperately. “Please, pleasepleaseplease, I can’t—”

“So sorry,” Patrick rasps, his hand going limp and heavy in Pete’s. A tear rolls down his temple when he blinks, and his breathing is getting more and more shallow. “I love you.”

Pete’s heart shatters irreparably. “Oh god, I love you too, Patrick please don’t go,” he babbles, utterly helpless. He’s loved Patrick for so long, and now that he’s finally admitted it, he’s losing him.

“Love you, Petey.” Patrick’s words are slurring and his eyes have closed. His head slowly lolls to one side. “Loveyou somuch.”

One final, quiet exhale, and Patrick’s chest goes still. Pete drops his hand, and it flops lifelessly onto the pavement.

Pete just stares numbly down at his now relaxed face, uncomprehending. Patrick’s gone. He’s fucking dead. His best friend, his soulmate, the only person who will ever completely understand him, is dead, and he’s alone again.

“Patrick,” he whispers, and all at once the grief hits him full-force. “No, Patrick, no, nonono, Patrick, PatrickPatrickPatrickPatrick…” The name sounds like a funeral dirge but he can’t stop saying it, won’t stop saying it, if he stops he’ll forget it and Patrick will die for good. An animalistic wail breaks free from his sore throat and he leans down to bury his face in the soft skin of Patrick’s neck which, he notes with a pang of horror, is already growing cold. “Patrick, Patrick, no, no, NO!” He breathes in the last of Patrick’s scent (he’d always smelled like home to Pete; Pete will never be home again) and weeps until his body can’t physically produce any more tears.

When he finally lifts his swollen face away from his best friend’s still body several minutes later, a metallic glint of light flashes in his periphery. He turns his head and sees the knife that killed his best friend lying bloodied and abandoned a few feet away—the fan must’ve dropped it when she’d fled like the cowardly, murdering bitch she is.

Sniffing, Pete reaches over and picks it up, turning it over in his hand and watching the way the late-afternoon sun reflects almost seductively off the stainless steel blade.

Pete turns back to Patrick and does something he’s always wanted to do: he leans down and presses the lightest, most tender of kisses to his best friend’s cold, unresponsive lips. “I love you,” he breathes against them one last time.

Then he sits back, emotionless and resolute. He presses the tip of the knife against his own chest right above his heart, tenses his arms…

…and jolts awake, sitting up and panting noisily, fresh tears streaming down his face in rivulets.

“Pete! Holy shit, man, you’re scaring me, say something!”

Patrick’s here, kneeling beside him on the bed. He came back, he’s alive, and he’s staring into Pete’s eyes from about a foot away, gripping his shaking shoulders in firm, steadying hands.

“Wh—What—?” Pete chokes out, absolutely bewildered.

“You were fucking screaming like someone was murdering you,” Patrick says, and Pete finally registers the panic on his face, the fear in his eyes. “I’ve been trying to wake you up for like five minutes; what the fuck—”

He’s cut off by Pete’s arms wrapping around his neck and holding on as tightly as humanly possible. Pete closes his eyes and revels in the contact for all he’s worth, trying desperately to not burst into tears again. But when Patrick’s arms wind around his middle and hold him close, he’s overwhelmed by the younger man’s presence and he can’t help but start weeping against the (warm, gloriously warm and pink and alive) skin of Patrick’s neck.

“You left me,” he bawls, and Patrick holds him tighter. “I fucked up and you left me and you weren’t coming back and I couldn’t…I-I can’t…” His voice dies in his throat and his breath hitches.

“Sssh,” Patrick soothes quietly and moves one of his hands to the back of Pete’s head. He weaves his fingers into the short bleached hair and slowly strokes. “Breathe for me, Pete. I’m right here and I’m not leaving again, I promise.”

Pete can’t speak; he can only sob as he lets himself be rocked slowly back and forth in his best friend’s comforting arms. He clings to Patrick like he’s a lifeline, and that’s exactly what he is; he’s Pete’s lifeline and Pete would be utterly lost and empty without him.

“I shouldn’t have walked out like that,” Patrick murmurs against Pete’s temple after a minute or two of cooing and hair-petting. His voice is full of remorse. “I was—I freaked out. I’m so sorry.”

Pete sniffs wetly. “When did you c-come back?” he stutters, trying to get his breathing under control.

“About an hour ago. You were asleep and I wanted to wake you up, but you looked fucking wrung out so I didn’t.” The singer heaves a guilt-ridden sigh. “I guess I should’ve.”

“Yeah, maybe.” Pete huffs out a humorless laugh into Patrick’s shoulder and closes his eyes. The tears have stopped, for the most part, but he doesn’t pull away, and neither does Patrick. He’s silent for another several seconds before he says in a small, childlike voice, “I was so scared you weren’t coming back.”

Patrick shakes his head and makes a pained sound in the back of his throat, tangling his fingers tightly in Pete’s hair. “No matter what,” he says solemnly, and his voice is starting to sound a little quivery, “I will always come back to you.”

And Pete believes him. He starts crying again, but it’s not as heavy or loud as before—they’re more tears of relief than sadness, because Patrick is alive and he came back and he still loves Pete, as a friend if nothing else, but that’s enough for now. Patrick holds him through it, keeps him from completely falling apart, and Pete is so fucking thankful for him that his soul burns with it.

Another ten minutes go by before Pete has calmed down enough to let go of Patrick and pull away. His head is throbbing and his eyes are so puffy he can barely open them; he’s so drained he feels like he’s about to faint. Before he can lift a weak tattooed arm to wipe at his runny nose, Patrick is shoving a wad of tissues into his hand and urging him to blow. He does, sniffs one more time, and drops the mess onto the floor.

“’M tired,” he mumbles, and Patrick cups his face in his hands.

“Go brush your teeth and change into your sweats,” the younger man says gently, rubbing the remnants of tears away with his thumbs. “I’ll get some aspirin and a glass of water for you.”

Pete loves that Patrick can tell when and where he’s hurting and he offers Patrick a small smile in thanks. He forces himself up off the bed and shuffles over to his suitcase in the far corner of the room while Patrick heads to the kitchenette—Pete notices then that Patrick’s already wearing a thin white T-shirt and blue plaid sweatpants; he hopes he didn’t wake his friend up with his screaming.

He strips down to his red boxers and tugs on his favorite pair of grey cotton sweats before digging out his toothbrush and heading to the bathroom. When he emerges, Patrick’s sitting on his bed again with a glass of water in one hand and a bottle of ibuprofen in the other. Pete pops two of the brown pills in his mouth and swallows them dry, chasing them with a couple gulps of the water. He sets the glass on the nightstand beside Patrick’s hipster frames before glancing up at Patrick, a little embarrassed at his breakdown—nothing like this has happened in years.

“Thank you,” he says, and he’s surprised at how hoarse his voice sounds—he can’t remember the last time he’d cried that hard. Good thing I’m not the singer.

“C’mon; it’s midnight and you need some actual sleep.” Patrick stands and pulls back the covers on Pete’s bed. Pete climbs in and burrows under the thick white comforter, suddenly so exhausted he can barely keep his eyes open.

Patrick switches off the lamp on the nightstand and the room goes dark; before he can move another inch, Pete reaches out blindly for him. “Stay with me,” he begs, suddenly needing Patrick beside him more than anything else in the entire universe; he’ll burn and shrivel up and disappear if he doesn’t have Patrick there touching him, holding him, reminding him he’s real.

Without a word, Patrick walks over to the other side of the bed and slips under the blankets. Pete immediately shifts closer to him and slings one arm over his soft, perfect belly. Patrick tucks Pete’s head under his chin and tangles their legs together, and Pete breathes in and out and lets his eyes close against Patrick’s collarbone. This is the first time they’ve shared a bed like this since before the hiatus, but it feels just as natural as it had then, like they’d never stopped doing it at all.

Before Pete can even ask, Patrick encompasses him in his warm arms and starts to quietly sing, his melodic, golden voice filling the too-silent room: “What time you comin’ down / We started losing light / I’ll never make it right if you don’t want me ‘round…”

Pete’s heart seizes briefly at the song choice, but eventually it relaxes and Pete lets Patrick’s voice wash over him like a cleansing rain. As the song progresses, Pete remembers how Patrick had felt beneath him, how he’d tasted, how he’d responded to Pete’s touch, and he gets a little sad again until he registers the fact that Patrick picked this to sing over anything else in his endless mental music library. Hesitantly, he digs his fingers into the flesh of Patrick’s side and scoots an inch or two closer, praying he’s reading this message right. Patrick responds by holding him even tighter and bending his head ever-so-slightly so he’s singing directly in Pete’s ear. Pete sighs, presses an unconscious kiss to Patrick’s neck, and melts against him.

The last thing he hears before he finally drifts off is Patrick crooning, “According to your heart / my place is not deliberate…”

I think I’m fallin’, Pete thinks, and his mind goes blank.

They film two scenes (thankfully they’re done with the itchy wigs) with all four of them at the next location and a few shorter filler clips on the buses before the “finale”, as Alan calls it, which Pete is grateful for—he’s not sure he would have been able to watch Patrick fake-die in his arms so soon after his nightmare last night without some distractions first.

(Surprisingly, Pete had woken up to an empty bed and a puffy pillow tucked between his arms this morning—Patrick had woken up before him and decided to shower right away. When he’d emerged from the bathroom, wrapped in a towel with damp hair and steam curling out of the doorway to frame him in an ethereal mist, Pete had been too mesmerized by his beauty to even open his mouth to ask about last night. Patrick had responded with a bashful smile before getting dressed and padding barefoot to the kitchenette to make them both some coffee. And…that had been that.)

(Pete wonders if they’ll talk about it later. He’s not entirely sure if he wants to, though.)

When they arrive at the small concert hall they’re using for the finale—well, they’re using the alley behind it, anyway—it’s already been a long day, and Pete and Patrick have gone a little quiet. Truth be told, Pete is a lot less nervous about the kiss ever since they, er, “practiced” yesterday, but he’s still worried that Patrick might not be completely comfortable with it. Joe and Andy are also here to watch it this time, and they have no idea it’s coming—because they’re only in a few short shots for this scene, they haven’t been given copies of the screenplay to pore over. All they know is that Patrick’s gonna get stabbed, and they’re gonna be by the equipment van looking panicked as Pete tries (and fails) to save his life.

They do, however, notice their bandmates’ strange behavior, and try to decipher the cause. Joe walks up to Pete after the bassist has finished talking to one of the lighting techs and hands him a Styrofoam cup of coffee. “I don’t get it,” he says as Pete takes a sip.

“Get what?” Pete asks, his heart starting to thud ominously against his ribcage.

“You and ‘Trick just seem really…tense about this scene.” Joe studies the older man’s face and swigs a mouthful of his own coffee. “Like, I’m getting weird vibes from both of you. Hurley’s a little concerned, too.”

Pete shrugs as nonchalantly as he can manage. “I dunno, man. I mean, ‘Miss Missing You’ was a hard video to film too, y’know? We didn’t like having to fight and hurt each other. I guess…I just don’t like seeing him coughing up blood, and he doesn’t like that I have to see him like that again.” The lie (which is only a half-lie, really) rolls off his tongue easily, and to his relief, Joe nods in understanding.

That relief is gone a second later when the guitarist says tersely, "You’re full of shit, Wentz.”

Pete’s chest floods with panic and he fights to keep his expression neutral. Do they know…?

“You’re hiding something from us, and that’s not cool, bro.” Joe’s right. Guilt joins the panic in Pete’s lungs. “We agreed not to do that anymore. So whatever the two of you don’t want me and Andy to know, we’ll find out about it eventually, so you might as well spill the fuckin’ beans now.” His piercing blue gaze is level and serious; Pete knows he’s fed up with the secrecy, and honestly, he can’t be blamed. The shooting process for this whole video has been pretty unusual for them, and they agreed after the hiatus that all four of them would have equal say in everything the band does from now on—they’ve sort of breached that agreement with this video, but up until filming started, it hadn’t been a huge problem. This conversation was bound to happen eventually.

Pete gulps, staring down into his coffee and trying to keep his hands from shaking. That’s it, he decides—he’s gotta be upfront. Tell the truth. Let them know what they’re about to witness, then scurry away with a red face and sweaty palms. It’s simple. Except for how it’s not. At all.

Finally, he decides to be as honest as he possibly can without outright giving away the “wow me” twist and says in a rush, “Wait till the very end of the last scene. That’ll pretty much explain everything, okay? Just wait till the end.” That’s all he can force out of his dry mouth.

Joe looks at Pete for a long moment, seemingly trying to determine if he should trust him. He can tell pretty easily when Pete’s lying, though, and he apparently sees no evidence of it now because he nods slowly and the look in his eyes lightens a little. “So…it’s something even more shocking than Patrick getting killed again, huh?” he asks, a smile creeping into the corners of his mouth.

You have no fucking idea. “Yeah. It’s pretty crazy.”

“Well if it’s crazy enough to surprise us, the fans are gonna go apeshit, I bet,” Joe chuckles.

Pete nods, hoping his smile doesn’t look as forced as it is. “It’ll probably be our most popular video ever just because of the last, like, thirty seconds,” he admits. “It’s not—it’s something a lot of them probably, like, want to see, but they don’t think it’ll ever happen.”

At this, Joe’s smile falters, and he stares at Pete in confusion. Just as he’s opening his mouth to speak, Alan calls Pete over to him, and Pete flees, thankful to escape an interrogation that he most likely would not have been able to BS his way through.

Patrick’s with Alan when Pete reaches him under the impromptu white canopy they’ve set up on the sidewalk. "Okay, boys,” Alan says, standing in front of them and clapping them both on the shoulder. “You ready to do this thing? We’re all anticipating some nervousness from the both of you, so don’t worry about using as many takes as you need to get something right.”

Pete pipes up at this with a quick glance at Patrick. “We might need a few takes for some stuff, but we’re gonna to do the kiss in one—”

“No, that’s—that’s fine.” Patrick cuts him off before he can finish. When Pete turns to stare at him in confusion, he meets Pete’s eyes for a moment with a barely-there smile on his lips, and Pete’s heart leaps into his throat in an instant.

The singer turns back to speak to Alan again. “You’re right. We’re probably gonna need some extra for a few things, I think, so—thanks for understanding.”

“Anytime,” Alan says, but he’s glancing skeptically between the two men like he knows something significant has just happened. He shakes himself out of it after a few seconds. “Go get ready at makeup, guys. Let’s end strong.”

As they’re walking to the makeup trailer, Pete nudges Patrick’s elbow with his own. “You sure you’re okay if the kiss needs more than one take? You were pretty adamant about it at first.” That damned seed of hope is ready to burst where it’s firmly planted between his lungs, and he find himself holding his breath as he waits for his friend’s response.

Patrick shrugs, hands in his pockets. He takes a deep breath. “I was at first, yeah,” he says, not looking at Pete. “’Cuz I was terrified. I was terrified I’d feel…things, if I had to kiss you more than once, a-and I…wanted to prevent that. At all costs.”

Pete’s pretty sure he’s about to spontaneously combust. This is not the place to be having this conversation, he knows that, but he has to find out how it ends—his eternal happiness hangs in the balance here. In a carefully steady voice that he’s pretty goddamn proud of, he asks, “Did something change?”

They’re right outside the door of the makeup trailer now, so they stop walking and Patrick turns to finally face Pete. There’s something alarmingly vulnerable in his face now, like he’s getting ready to tell Pete his biggest secret—which, the bassist figures, he probably is.

“After…yesterday,” Patrick explains quietly, “I realized I already felt ‘things’ for you, and…they weren’t gonna go away no matter how many stupid ways I tried to stop them. I want to kiss you, Pete,” he says, looking Pete dead in the eyes, and Pete’s heart fucking stops. “I’ve wanted to for a while—years, actually—and I wanna do it as many times as I fucking can. And based on your, er, enthusiasm last night, I don’t think it’s just me. So I guess I just figured…” He shrugs a little and grins shyly. “…fuck it, y’know?”

Fuck. Fuck seeds. There’s a fucking forest of elation sprouting up in Pete’s chest. He’s surprised his skin isn’t fucking glowing after hearing Patrick—Patrick, Patrick, his Patrick, the Patrick he’s wanted and needed and loved for what feels like his entire fucking life—admit to having feelings for him. The thought that Patrick’s been in the same boat as him for all this time, wanting what he couldn’t have, longing for something just barely out of his grasp, is overwhelming.

But then Patrick’s fucking taking it back like he’s reading Pete’s silence as rejection: “B-But I know you said you wouldn’t risk our friendship for anything, and neither would I, so if you, like, don’t feel like this and I was just fooling myself, that’s, that’s fine too, I’ll live with it—” and Pete’s thinking no, no, fuck no, not losing this already, and he can’t help it when he grabs his best friend’s arm roughly and drags him into the space between the makeup trailer and the brick wall of the alley.

He presses Patrick against the coarse bricks and wedges himself in front of him, hands fisted in the lapels of Patrick’s leather jacket. They’re pressed together from knees to chest and Pete’s glad they’re out of sight of any circumstantial passers-by, because this position would be hard to explain. He can feel how hard Patrick’s heart is pulsing—can see it fluttering in his neck like a trapped bird—and he knows he’s panting himself, but that’s because he feels like he’s suffocating under the weight of this monumental revelation. He stares into Patrick’s riptide eyes, studying intently, searching for any signs of deception or teasing because he needs, he needs to know if Patrick means it.

Ignoring the stunned but mildly heated look on the singer’s face less than a foot away from his own, Pete breathes out hoarsely, “You’re not fucking with me, are you?”

Patrick, breathless, hat knocked askew, simply shakes his head. Pete watches in awe as the shorter man flicks his eyes down to stare at Pete’s slightly parted lips, and his tongue darts out to swipe over his own. His hips shift a little where they’re pressed awkwardly against Pete’s and he sucks in a quick gasp of breath at the friction, eyelids fluttering.

“Fuck,” Pete chokes out in utter disbelief, because Patrick isn’t lying. “Fucking fuck, ‘Trick, oh my god.” All of a sudden he’s huffing out a relieved laugh as he closes his eyes and tilts his head down to press their foreheads together. He’s hyperventilating and smiling so hard he thinks his face is gonna break in half, and when he opens his eyes, he sees that Patrick’s smiling too, but it looks a little melancholy.

“I shouldn’t’ve left last night,” he murmurs, so quiet Pete can barely hear it. “You were alone again and you probably thought it was your fault, but it wasn’t. I just got scared.”

Pete’s heart is aching. “Scared of what?” he asks, equally quiet.

Patrick swallows hard and glances at Pete’s mouth again. “Scared that if I didn’t leave, I wouldn’t stop until…” Another, more deliberate hip movement reveals that, hello, something interesting is going on in Patrick’s pants, and Pete fucking Wentz caused it. Warmth spreads through Pete’s stomach at that knowledge and he leans more of his weight against his best friend, working up the courage to grind forwards once, teasingly. Patrick’s eyes drop closed and he bites his lip, breath hitching. There’s a tiny wrinkle of concentration between his eyebrows and a soft blush is rising in his pale cheeks and Pete couldn’t stop staring at him if he were blind.

“Patrick,” Pete whispers, his breath fanning out over Patrick’s face as he draws out the two syllables. There’s so much he wants to say, so many lyrics and lines of incoherent emo bullshit that he’s scrawled and hidden away in secret notebooks for years, but all he can get out is, “You have no fucking clue how bad I wanna get down on my knees for you right here.”

Patrick whines deep in his throat at this and Pete feels the bulge in those tight jeans twitch. He feels an answering one in his own—Patrick’s noises are just as beautiful, if not a little more desperate, as they’d been yesterday—and inhales sharply through his nose. “But if I did, we’d really fuck up a few schedules, I think,” he finishes, voice tense.

“I know,” Patrick replies, but there’s a desperate edge to his voice that says he really wishes Pete were wrong.

“So let’s just get this shit over with. Alright? And then…” Pete just barely brushes his lips against Patrick’s and slides his hands slowly down Patrick’s broad chest until he’s slipping his calloused fingers between the singer’s warm, soft skin and the waistband of his jeans. “…we’ll go back to the hotel, and I’ll—”

“Stop, stop, don’t,” Patrick blurts, grabbing Pete’s wrists and halting their migration towards his (delicious) ass. His eyes crack open and he jerks his face away from Pete’s, presumably to prevent himself from sticking his tongue down Pete’s throat. He’s breathless and flushed bright red, shaking with the effort of holding himself back and looking so wanton it’s nearly pornographic. “We can do whatever the fuck you want when we get back to our room, I promise, but for god’s sake, you—you can’t fucking describe it here. I wouldn’t—I-I can’t—”

He’s clawing at Pete’s arms and Pete gently shushes him and grabs his hands, tangling their fingers together. He leans back as far as he can in the limited space to give them both some room to breathe. “Sorry,” he says sheepishly, but he knows he’s smirking. He’d had no idea something as simple as his words could have this kind of effect on Patrick—he wonders if this is a new development or if it’s something Patrick’s always had to deal with. He finds the second possibility slightly hotter than the first.

Patrick just shakes his head at Pete fondly. He looks flustered and a little embarrassed, but there’s a small, genuine smile on his lips. “Just save it for later, alright?”

Pete nods, pecks him on the nose (because he has to kiss him somewhere; it’s a physical need), and starts to nudge them both out of the cramped space. “Let’s go gross out our bandmates.”

“Good plan.”

While he’s walking up the stairs of the trailer, Pete registers the fact that Patrick promised they would have sex when they got back to their hotel room, and he nearly trips.

This video was his best idea ever.

The final scene is one that they’ve actually had to draw in some outside cast and props for—a few people dressed in paramedic garb and driving an off-duty ambulance, some of their actual tech crew, and, of course, a pretty blonde teenage girl to play the psychotic fan. She’s given a FOB shirt and a fake knife and they introduce her to Patrick, who tells her, like the angel he is, not to feel bad for killing him. They take a selfie together while Pete looks on in fond amusement.

Everyone goes over a few last-minute details—fight choreography, specifically—while the cameras and lights are set up in the alley. The equipment van is backed up into the alley a few feet and a lumpy, musty-smelling green mat is placed about twenty feet away from it for Pete to fall onto when Katy initially jumps him. Patrick, since he’s not in the first thirty-ish seconds of the scene, stays behind the cameras with Alan and Brendan as Pete and the girl—Katy or something—get into position at the end of the alley, near the back exit of the concert hall. Joe and Andy and a few techs gather behind the equipment van parked at the alley entrance, and they signal when they’re ready.

Joe and Andy, Pete notices, look a little apprehensive—probably since they don’t actually know everything that’s about to happen here.

Pete gulps and exhales loudly, shifting his weight awkwardly from foot to foot as he waits for his cue. He still isn’t looking forward to the whole stab-the-Stump bit, to be honest, and he seeks out Patrick’s face behind the cameras for reassurance. The singer flashes him a grin and the most adorable thumbs-up, and Pete feels so in love he almost starts crying.

Another minute or two and everyone’s in their proper places, so Alan counts down and calls “Action!”

The group near the van starts acting busy for the cameras and Pete walks towards them, making an effort not to look at his own set of cameras that are following behind, beside, and in front of him. He’s carrying a box of black amp cords in his arms like he’s helping to pack up after a show, and he’s smiling contentedly, completely unaware of the horrible fate that’s about to befall him and his best friend.

He’s right beside the mat when Katy takes her cue and lunges at him from behind a dumpster (just like his fucking dream)1q with her knife bared and a vicious snarl on her face that would actually be frightening in any other circumstance. Pete drops his box as she collides with him and they both tumble onto the mat.

“Cut!” Alan shouts from the sidewalk, staring at a computer screen connected to the cameras. “Good, you two—let’s do the tackle a couple more times just so we’ve got some extra stuff to work with, yeah?”

Pete nods as he stands up with a proffered hand from Katy. “Didn’t hurt you, did I?” she asks teasingly, but Pete thinks he also detects a note of concern in her voice.

“I’m fine, don’t worry,” he reassures her with his signature dazzling smile, and she seems more confident after that.

They shoot three more takes of the tackle before the directors are satisfied, and then they drag the mat away so Pete and Katy can do some tousling on the actual pavement. It’s nothing too complicated—mostly just some kicking and wrist-grabbing—but some editing should make it look a lot more strenuous. Joe, Patrick, Andy, and the techs are in this shot too—they’ll be acting confused and a little shocked from their vantage point several feet away near the van, and after a second or two, Patrick will lunge in and save the day. Simple enough.

Katy almost elbows Pete in the eye at one point during their second take, but otherwise it goes pretty well. She looms above him with the (alarmingly realistic) rubber knife poised and ready to strike and he holds her wrist up with one quivering hand, trying desperately to keep it from coming down and putting the six-inch blade right between his eyes. He hopes his staged expression of terror is convincing enough, and that his bandmates look adequately concerned for his safety. After one more take of this, Alan lets Patrick know they’re ready for his “valiant rescue.”

Pete feels a little sick, but he doesn’t say anything.

While a member of the makeup team is taping a packet of fake blood to Patrick’s belly, Pete walks over to him and just stares. The younger man must sense something’s wrong, because he looks up from the petite hands touching his pale skin (Pete isn’t jealous at all) and meets Pete’s gaze with a furrowed brow. “What’s up?” he asks quietly once the woman leaves.

The bassist shrugs and stuffs his hands in his pockets. His eyes fall from Patrick’s face to the slight bulge under his shirt where the blood packet is now concealed and his stomach knots into a nervous ball.

“Pete?” Patrick puts a hand on Pete’s shoulder and bends to meet his eyes again.

“’S just…this was my dream last night,” Pete mumbles, ashamed of his cowardice. Patrick hums softly in understanding, though, ever the supportive friend. “The whole scene, me getting jumped, you getting murdered—fuckin’ died in my arms, man; it was horrible.”

“That’s why you were screaming,” Patrick whispers in realization.

Pete nods. “But, y’know, it’s whatever. I mean, I know it’s fake this time, and the blood won’t be all hot and thick in my hands like before, so—I’ll be okay.”

Patrick blinks at him somberly. “You sure?”

“Yeah, ‘course,” Pete insists. A sly smirk finds its way onto his face as he straightens his back a little. “Besides, I’ll get some sweet Trickster lovin’ to make me feel better, right?”

Patrick blushes scarlet and shoves Pete’s shoulder, but he doesn’t deny it. Pete feels like a lottery winner.

The next take turns out to be the only one they need of the rescue because it goes so perfectly: Pete’s starting to lose the fight with Katy, it seems, when Patrick suddenly appears in a whoosh of sunshine and sexiness and pulls her up and off his best friend. They wrestle for a few seconds on their feet until Patrick loses his grip on her hand and she pretends to plunge the knife into his stomach—thanks to the camera angles, it’ll probably look pretty realistic. Patrick’s shocked, pained face hurts Pete’s heart, but he snaps out of it in time to jump up from the ground and catch the singer as his knees buckle and he falls to the ground. Katy runs down the alley, away from her crime, but Pete can only stare as a pool of fake blood starts to well up under Patrick’s fingers where they’re pressed against his abdomen. A camera gets a good close-up of it over Pete’s shoulder.

It’s not hard for Pete to stay in character between takes as more blood is applied to Patrick’s stomach and some is drizzled in his mouth for him to cough up. His white-knuckled grip on Patrick’s hand might be just a little too tight.

The next segment goes by in a blur. Pete knows Andy is pretending to call an ambulance from where he’s still standing by the van and the tech crew has rushed off to find any and all paramedics in the concert hall. Joe, on the other hand, has taken up his position on Patrick’s other side and is pressing a ratty towel down against his stomach, trying to stop up the flow of blood. Pete has only one job to do: hold Patrick’s hand and mutter calming things to him as he coughs and pretends to gasp for breath—never once do his eyes leave Patrick’s face, and he doesn’t care if Joe notices. To tell the truth, they’re both sorta ignoring Joe at this point.

There’s a few pauses in shooting where someone will come and pour fake blood on the concrete beneath Patrick to make it look more like he’s bleeding out, but for the most part the scene is done in fewer than five takes. All too soon, Patrick is clenching his eyes shut and arching his back as he fights off a brief wave of pain, and Pete recognizes the cue when he sees it. Those enchanting blue-green eyes flicker open and Patrick looks up at him sadly, chest heaving, lips and chin flecked with red. There’s so much emotion in his eyes (Pete’s always known Patrick is a good actor, but he’s really going for it here) as he raises one shaking, sticky red hand to ghost his fingertips over the side of Pete’s face.

Here we go.

Pete hopes the cameras capture the confusion on Joe’s face and the desperate, raw emotion on his and Patrick’s as he bends down and captures Patrick’s mouth with his own.

It’s a stage kiss, slow and open-mouthed but reasonably chaste, and it’s made more slippery from all the fake blood but it’s strangely perfect. It tastes terrible, Pete thinks, but he’s kissing Patrick again and that’s enough to distract him from both the taste and the multitude of cameras surrounding them, recording every quiet huff of breath and movement of lips for posterity. He knows Joe is only a few feet away, probably staring at them in shock and exchanging looks with Andy across the way, but despite all this, it’s so much better than his dream.

In the end, it goes by a lot quicker than Pete had anticipated. When he pulls back and breaks the kiss after a good ten seconds, he slowly opens his eyes to look down at Patrick. The singer’s eyes are barely open and his breathing is getting shallower and shallower, but he’s got one hand on Pete’s shoulder and he’s squeezing as tightly as he can, which is not tightly at all. There’s blood smeared over his lips and Pete can feel it on his own, as well. It all looks so real for a brief moment that an actual pang of grief seizes his heart.

Shockingly, real tears brim in Pete’s eyes when Patrick takes two more wheezing breaths and closes his eyes. His chest goes still and his hand slips lifelessly from Pete’s shoulder, landing palm-up on the pavement.

He keeps staring down at his best friend as a group of paramedics surround them out of nowhere, and a few seconds later Alan says, “Cut! Guys, I think that’s a wrap!”

Thank fuck. There’s some cheering from the crew as the medics disperse and the cameras back off. Pete and Joe help Patrick peel himself off of the blood-soaked pavement as he catches his breath—telling an asthmatic to stop breathing for twenty seconds isn’t very wise in most situations. A tech hands Pete a towel when he asks for it, and he uses it to wipe the blood off both his and Patrick’s mouths. They’re staring at each other, bashful but giddy, and everything else around them sort of fades into the background until a typically soft voice is exclaiming loudly from behind them, “What the actual fuck did I just watch?”

Pete turns back and finds a very confused Andy Hurley standing above them, looking down at them in utter shock. “Uh…” he tries, but he’s cut off by Joe.

“Dude, I thought it was, like, a joke or something, but they kept fuckin’ rolling!” The guitarist grabs Pete’s shoulder and turns him back around to face him. He looks completely befuddled; Pete might actually laugh at him. “That was the big secret? You two sucking face in one of our music videos?”

“I-I mean, we thought it might surprise you a little, so we just didn’t say anything,” Patrick pipes up quietly. The other three turn to look at him. He shrugs. “We thought if we just sorta did it, it would be, I dunno…easier?”

“Plus, we needed really good surprised looks from you guys,” Pete interjects jokingly. “Pretty sure we got those.”

“Yeah,” Patrick chuckles, eyes squinting. Pete can’t look away.

They keep staring at each other, smiling dumbly, until Andy snaps them out of it with a wry, “Something you two wanna tell us?”

“Have you finally sorted out all that suffocating sexual tension, or do you still need a nudge?” Joe asks.

Pete’s words catch in his throat as he opens his mouth to respond, but as always, Patrick ends up being his voice: “Yeah, I…really think we have.” He turns to smile ever-so-sweetly at Pete and tangles their fingers together, ignoring the congealing slime still coating them. Pete feels his face heating up, but he smiles right back. I must be dreaming.

Their bandmates stare at them for several long seconds, then at each other. After an intense silent deliberation consisting only of eyebrow raises and small shrugs, they finally reach a decision. Joe looks between his two friends and just says, “’S about fucking time.”

Before either of them can respond, Andy adds, “You two do whatever the hell you want, just keep it out of public areas.”

“Like the bus lounge.”

“And backstage.”

“And dressing rooms.”

“And the—”

“Alright, sheesh, we get the picture!” Patrick cuts off the drummer and covers his scarlet face with his free hand. Pete giggles—actually fucking giggles, damn it—at how cute he is.

“Yeah, we’ll make sure to preserve your precious innocence,” the bassist says. “But make sure to knock on our hotel rooms from now on, lest you walk in on…activities.” He winks at Patrick, and the younger man’s flush deepens.

“Oh, fuck, shut up!” Joe’s face twists in horror and he turns to bury his face in Andy’s shoulder. “Tell them to stop, Hurley!”

“I don’t think we’ll be stopping anytime soon.” Pete squeezes Patrick’s hand and feels an answering squeeze seconds later.

Patrick’s just about beside himself with embarrassment, so he tries to change the subject. He’s pulling at his red-soaked shirt with his nose wrinkled in disgust—Pete knows that, despite his claims of being “used to it,” he really hates the fake blood. “God, I gotta change.”

“I’ll help,” Pete offers, and tugs him to his feet. They head off to the costuming trailer together, shoulders deliberately brushing, and Pete can’t help but grin at the fucking amazing day he’s had so far.

If he gropes Patrick’s ass just to hear Joe’s horrified yelps, well. He can’t be blamed.

It’s six p.m. and they’ve just finished a slightly awkward bus ride with their bandmates. They’re in the elevator headed up to their room again, staring straight ahead at the doors, not touching. There’s an awkward, heavy silence draped over them in the small space, but Pete’s sure the pounding of his heart can be heard when he glances quickly over at Patrick—the shorter man has his hands shoved into the pockets of his jeans and there’s a tangible anxiousness rolling off him in waves as he watches the red number above the door climb towards fourteen.

Pete swallows hard. “Um,” he stammers tentatively, “so—are we—do you wanna—?”

“Pete, just…” Patrick closes his eyes and takes a deep breath through his nose. After a long pause, he says, “I know I was kinda—forward before, but…gimme some time to sort this out in my head, okay?”

“Yeah, of course, that’s totally fine,” Pete rambles, turning to face the doors again. He ignores the way his stomach feels like it’s sinking back down to the lobby and keeps quiet for the rest of the short ride, feeling douchey.

The exit the elevator on the fourteenth floor and head down the hall to their suite. Pete digs the keycard out of his back pocket, swipes it, and opens the door. Once they’re both in the room, Pete flicks on the lights and kicks off his shoes and cautiously meanders over to where Patrick’s shucking his jacket and dropping his hat on his rumpled bed. He reaches up with one hand and ruffles his soft, thinning hair—Pete notices the returning bald spot but thinks nothing of it; he’s always found it just as adorable as the rest of Patrick.

As gently and non-forcefully as possible, Pete presses his chest against Patrick’s back and loops his inked arms around Patrick’s middle. Propping his chin up on the singer’s left shoulder, Pete whispers in his ear, “We don’t have to do anything you’re not comfortable with. Hell, we don’t have to do anything at all, if that’s what you want. I’m happy to just spend time with you—always have been.”

Well, apart from the sex dreams and the pining and the way I want to strip you down to your fucking skeleton and just ravish every inch of your skin until you’re screaming my name. But we’ll ignore that for now. This is all on Patrick, and Pete won’t cross any line that’s drawn no matter how much he wants to.

Patrick heaves a deep sigh and slowly turns in Pete’s arms. When they’re facing each other, he brings his arms up to rest on Pete’s shoulders, crossing his wrists behind Pete’s head. He meets the taller man’s eyes and quirks a tiny, heart-melting grin. “I just…” he starts, trailing off when his fingers find their way into Pete’s bleached curls. “I-I probably seemed pretty confident earlier, but the truth is, I don’t—I-I’ve never done anything, like this, with—anyone besides girls.” He pauses thoughtfully. “Well, if you don’t count that one time I let Gabe blow me—”

“You—Gabe—?” Fucking Saporta! Pete’s gonna annihilate him. Cobra’s never having another hit again. He opens his mouth and is about to launch into an indignant, pissy rant when Patrick silences him with a quiet laugh.

“I was kidding, asshole,” he says through his giggles. Pete relaxes once he determines Patrick’s telling the truth. “But seriously, I’m really sorta out of my depth here, so…if I seem a little hesitant, uh, that’s why.”

Pete nods at him reassuringly. He’d had a feeling this would be the case—to be honest, he’s used to being the more experienced one in his relationships. But he’s never felt so responsible before, like he can’t just take over and drive and hope his partner can hang on for the ride. Patrick is—he’s special. Like no one else ever has been. And Pete wants so badly to make this perfect for him, to take his hand and lead him through it and show him how good it can be.

“Well don’t worry, babe,” he says with a smirk, trying out the pet name. Patrick’s eyes light up when he says it, so he takes that as a green light. “I’ve got enough experience for the both of us.”

“Oh my god, don’t you fucking dare treat me like some blushing virgin, Peter,” Patrick demands with a challenge in his eyes. “I’m not a monk. I know how sex works, and my feedback has always been pretty fucking fantastic, if I do say so myself.” As if to demonstrate, he slides his hands achingly slowly from the back of Pete’s neck, over his shoulders, down his chest, and around to his sides before boldly reaching down and grabbing two handfuls of Pete’s ass. Pete can’t contain the gasp that leaves his mouth when the singer hauls him forwards and gifts him with the filthiest goddamn hip swivel ever performed by anyone in the history of the world.

“That’s what I thought,” Patrick breathes, lips now mere millimeters from Pete’s.

Fuck, Pete thinks, I’m getting upstaged. So much for the hand-holding. Tightening his arms around Patrick’s waist and completely eliminating the rest of the space between their bodies, he whispers, “You’re insufferable,” and presses his lips to Patrick’s smug grin.

Kissing Patrick standing up, Pete soon discovers, is just as delightful as kissing him lying down. But when Patrick tugs at his hair and tilts his head and swirls his tongue into Pete’s mouth without an inkling of warning, Pete figures any version of kissing Patrick would be pretty fucking perfect, because it’s Patrick. They stand there, kissing and panting and trying to melt together to become one being with two rapidly-beating hearts, for what feels like hours until Patrick’s fidgety fingers slip down Pete’s sides and start rucking up the hem of his T-shirt. Pete sighs into his best friend’s mouth as he feels a pair of warm, slightly clammy hands skimming over the skin of his lower back. They’re not hurried or rushed, just touching and feeling, just exploring, and it feels like heaven. Callouses trace blindly over the tattoo in the middle of Pete’s back, like Patrick has the exact location of every drop of ink on Pete’s body memorized, and Pete’s not sure if it’s the touch or the thought that makes him shiver.

The need for skin-on-skin contact becomes demanding and immediate quite soon after this. Pete reluctantly breaks the kiss and steps back barely a foot, raising his arms over his head. Patrick’s eyes darken on the spot and he swipes his tongue over his swollen lips as he grabs the bottom of Pete’s shirt and tugs it over his head, leaving him with a sea of tanned, inked skin to explore.

Pete can’t count how many times Patrick’s seen him shirtless. There were times in the “old days” when he’d offer to pay Pete actual money to “put a shirt on like a normal human being, you reek, holy shit”. But from the way the singer is looking at him now, the weight of his gaze almost like a second pair of hands tracing and caressing every dark line of ink and every curve of muscle, you’d think it was completely new territory for him. He reaches out one shaking hand and carefully touches the thorns over Pete’s left collarbone, and Pete leans into the touch encouragingly, letting his eyes drop closed. Patrick becomes more confident then, and it’s not long before he’s gripping Pete’s hipbones and digging his thumbs into the bartskull while tracing the thorn necklace with his tongue and teeth.

“’Trick,” Pete gasps, tugging his friend closer and tilting his head back. Patrick hums against his shoulder and nips gently. “Fucking shit, Patrick, I—” A sudden swipe of tongue over a nipple shuts him up, and he should be embarrassed by the whine that emits from his throat, but he couldn’t give a shit right now. He’s getting hard faster than he ever has in his life because Patrick Stump and his fucking illegal mouth are molesting him—he doesn’t have time for any second thoughts.

“Should’ve done this years ago,” Patrick mutters against the skin of Pete’s chest. He drags his nails down Pete’s ribs and moves his mouth back up to the juncture of Pete’s neck and shoulder. “Thought about it, wanted it, but I—too cowardly, too insecure, I couldn’t—”

Pete grabs a fistful of his hair and tugs him up to kiss the breath out of him. “Doesn’t matter anymore,” he gasps against Patrick’s cheek when he can no longer ignore his lungs screaming for oxygen. “We’re here, we got here, and we’ve finally got our shit together. So stop second-guessing yourself and just…trust this, okay?”

Patrick pulls back a little to look at him, and a few seconds later, the final shields fall from his eyes and it’s like he’s a different person. “I do,” he murmurs, “I always have,” and he leans back in.

Pete falls into him and basically tries to climb into Patrick’s body through his mouth, but eventually he settles for just tasting him and letting himself be tasted in turn. There’s a blend of coffee and black licorice on Patrick’s tongue, and Pete can’t get enough of it. Without his explicit permission, his hands wander to the hem of Patrick’s shirt and start fiddling with it. He immediately feels Patrick’s entire body tense and the kiss breaks off, leaving both of them breathless but maybe for different reasons.

Their foreheads knock together and Pete looks down at his friend through lidded eyes. Patrick’s are closed behind his glasses, and he’s biting that plump lower lip as he breathes heavily through his nose. “’Trick?” Pete murmurs, though he’s pretty sure he knows what this is about.

“I—” Patrick’s brow furrows and his face caves in like he’s about to cry. His shaking hands curl into fists against Pete’s chest. “I-I’m sorry, I just…”

“I know,” Pete says and kisses him so gently he surprises himself. Then he leans back and removes Patrick’s glasses, figuring that’s someplace to start. He sets them carefully on the nightstand beside them before returning his hands to Patrick’s shirt. “You don’t have to,” he tells the shorter man, offering him one last out.

But Patrick pauses, straightens his back, and looks up at Pete like Pete holds the galaxy in his eyes. With one final deep breath, he slowly brings up his arms and nods.

Pete kisses him, unspeakably proud, and removes the shirt. He’s left with an endless expanse of gorgeous porcelain skin that no one gets to see ever and he feels like the luckiest person on the fucking planet. He can’t help it when his hands immediately migrate to Patrick’s sides and he dares to squeeze the small folds of flesh just above those deadly hips. There’s a few stretch marks there that feel a little bumpy beneath his fingertips; Pete thinks of lightning storms and the way the air smells before it rains. Patrick bites his lip again and clenches his hands around Pete’s shoulders, but he doesn’t push him away.

In fact, when Pete leans in and licks a hot stripe over one of those succulent-looking collarbones, Patrick actually pulls him closer.

There’s more kissing and touching and even some light biting—Pete’s quite proud of the silver-dollar-sized bruise he leaves right over Patrick’s heart—before Pete’s jeans are bordering on painful. From the way Patrick’s hips keep twitching forwards, seeking any friction at all, he’s not the only one who’d like to lose his pants. Of course, since they’re telepathically connected, Patrick reads Pete’s mind before he has time to voice his request and his hands start fumbling with the buckle of Pete’s belt. Pete moans in encouragement and reaches down to assist him. In no time at all, he’s peeling his skinnies down to his ankles and kicking them off. He quickly helps Patrick with his own until they’re standing in front of each other a little awkwardly, stripped to their boxers.

Without a word, Pete takes Patrick’s hand and sits on the edge of the bed, beckoning him to follow. Patrick takes the cue and climbs onto Pete’s lap, straddling his waist. He gasps at the sudden onslaught of friction against the bulge in the front of his red boxer briefs and hitches his hips forwards desperately, looping his arms around Pete’s neck and throwing his head back. Pete bucks up and grinds his own erection against the soft cushion of Patrick’s ass and he has to dig his teeth into Patrick’s shoulder to keep from shouting at how good it feels.

“Pete,” Patrick whines as they work out a rhythm, up-and-down-and-back-and-forth. There’s a beautiful blush spreading from high on his cheeks all the way down over his chest; his pupils are so huge that there’s only a thin ring of blue-green left around them, and his hair has started to stick to his forehead with sweat. He’s so fucking beautiful Pete could cry. “P-Pete, please, you have to—you gotta touch me. Please.”

Pete cranes his neck up to kiss him and they fall backwards onto the bed, Patrick’s weight pressing Pete into the comforter. The bassist’s hands trail downwards and cup Patrick’s ass; he pulls the smaller man forwards in a rough grinding motion and raises his hips to meet the forced thrust. Patrick lets out a shuddery moan as he gets the picture and plants his knees more firmly on either side of Pete to give himself some leverage. He shoves his hips against Pete’s once, pressing down hard, and they both cry out at the feeling of their cocks brushing through two thin layers of fabric.

They keep this up for another minute and Pete feels himself getting close embarrassingly quickly. He can’t be blamed, though—he’s got the only person he’s ever truly loved on top of him in a sweaty, moaning mess, and while this might be the most clothed sex he’s ever had, it’s also undoubtedly the hottest.

Pete only remembers Patrick’s earlier request when the younger man stops his sinister hip motions and lifts himself off of Pete, panting and beautiful. “Please,” he whines, pulling Pete up by his shoulders and kissing him sloppily. “Touch me.”

“Where?” So Pete’s feeling a little devious. Sue him. He smirks against Patrick’s lips.

“You know where.” Patrick settles himself back down in Pete’s lap and rolls his hips, breath hitching.

“I dunno, I think you’re gonna have to be more specific than that.” Pete’s honestly surprised he still has enough blood in his brain to form sentences this long, but he’s glad he does. Teasing is fun.

Until the other person gets sick of it, that is. Patrick gives him a borderline murderous look and says in a serious, yet somehow still pleading voice, “Peter Wentz, if you do not put your hand on my dick right this second, I will cut yours off.”

And. Well. Enough said, really.

Pete scoots further back onto the bed, holding Patrick steady in his lap, until his legs are no longer dangling off the edge. He lies back again and Patrick falls down on top of him, capturing his mouth in another wet kiss. Pete finally stops his taunting and slides his hands down Patrick’s warm chest until his fingertips brush elastic. Patrick whines into his mouth and his hips cant forwards. “Yes,” he breathes, “yesyesyes, Pete.”

Pete dips his hand inside and wraps his fingers tightly around Patrick’s (substantial) cock with no hesitation. Patrick keens and thrusts into his hand. “Yes, oh, fuck yes!”

It’s a little dry, the only lubrication being sweat and the precome that’s been leaking from Patrick’s dick since probably before his shirt even came off, but soon Pete’s moving his hand in a decent rhythm and swiping his thumb over the head and pressing his index finger against a particularly sensitive spot that makes Patrick shudder. Patrick is braced on his elbows over Pete, bracketing Pete’s hips with his thighs, and he’s switching between kissing Pete so thoroughly he’s practically sucking his tonsils out and digging his teeth into Pete’s neck as he whimpers and groans. He’s thrusting in time with Pete’s strokes, just barely making contact with Pete’s still-clothed cock, and it’s enough to leave Pete shaking and wanting and moaning as he jerks the singer off.

“I’d fuck you,” he finds himself gasping into Patrick’s mouth, and Patrick’s hips stutter. “I would, I want to, but I wouldn’t last. Not—not tonight.”

“’S okay,” Patrick chokes out, kissing his forehead. “’S fine, this—this is enough. Next time.”

Next time. Pete smiles to himself and speeds up his hand.

Just when Patrick’s noises are creeping into the higher end of his vocal range and Pete thinks he might be close, he reaches down and grabs Pete’s wrist, stopping his motions. The amount of willpower needed to do such a thing blows Pete away, and he stares up at an absolutely wrecked Patrick Stump with a question on his face.

“Lemme see you,” Patrick whispers when he’s caught back most of his breath. “Wanna—wanna feel you against me.” He reaches down and blindly tugs at the waistband of Pete’s boxers; Pete lifts his hips obediently and Patrick shoves the offending fabric as far down Pete’s thighs as he can without lifting himself off of them.

And then, in a shockingly bold move that Pete hadn’t been expecting at all, Patrick takes both of them in his slightly smaller hand and starts jacking them together.

“Oh—oh god, oh fuck, oh, ‘Trick,” Pete chokes out into Patrick’s neck as he bucks his hips into Patrick’s surprisingly skilled hand. Those delicate fingers that Pete’s always admired are now wrapped around his cock in the most amazing fulfilment of a fantasy that’s ever happened to anyone, and he can barely contain himself. He’s gonna come so soon, he just knows it.

From what he can tell, Patrick’s in the same boat. The smaller man is gasping right in Pete’s ear and whimpering so sexily that Pete almost can’t stand it. “Pete, Pete, Pete,” he chants, repeating that name like the most sacred of prayers and the deadliest of sins all in one. “Pete, Pete, fuck, Pete!”

“I know,” Pete rasps and he reaches down to cover Patrick’s hand with his own. He tightens the grip and relishes the way Patrick’s cock feels pressed against his own for a moment before speeding up the strokes to a short, quick pace.

“Ah, ah, ohmygod,” Patrick whines breathlessly against Pete’s ear and he presses an open-mouthed kiss to Pete’s temple. Pete digs the nails of his free hand into Patrick’s back and holds on for dear life as he feels something warm and electric pooling in his gut.

“I—I think I’m—” he says in warning, tightening his fingers further.

“Do it.” Patrick kisses Pete long and deep before breaking it to gasp noisily into his mouth. “Do it, come, Pete, come on me, please, oh, please—”

Those words said in that voice are more than enough to send Pete careening off the edge without a parachute. He comes harder than he has in probably a decade and he can’t hold back the near-scream of Patrick’s name as his back arches off the bed, nearly knocking Patrick over.

Patrick looks even more ethereal with white streaks painting his pink chest. He strokes Pete through his orgasm before taking hold of his own cock and just going for it, his hand a blur. “Peeeeete,” he sobs, drawing out the syllable.

“So hot,” Pete pants, still out of breath. He manages to swat Patrick’s hand away and replace it with his own, stroking him fast and hard. “So beautiful, fuck, Patrick, you’re gorgeous, come on, come for me, let go, come—”

“Pete, fuck, I—” Patrick pitches forwards and buries his face in Pete’s neck, thrusting uncontrollably into Pete’s fist. “I—I—oh, god, Pete—!”

Finally, with a broken, high-pitched wail that Pete will forever have engrained in his auditory memory, Patrick comes, streaking Pete’s hand, Pete’s chest, and his own belly with thick white ropes. His breath is hot and damp against Pete’s skin as he whimpers through the aftershocks, shivering so hard that Pete wraps his free arm tightly around his waist just to keep him somewhat steady.

After a good ten seconds of convulsing, Patrick sighs deeply and his arms finally give out, causing him to drop heavily onto Pete’s chest, smearing sweat and jizz from both of them all over Pete’s hot skin.

It’s simultaneously the best and grossest thing Pete’s ever felt in his life.

They manage to completely tug off each other’s underwear and use them to clean themselves up a little before tossing them carelessly somewhere across the room. Pete stumbles to the light switch and pulls Patrick off the bed for a few seconds so he can yank the covers back, then collapses beside him and buries them both in the white linen. Patrick rests his head on Pete’s still-heaving chest and draws abstract patterns on his stomach with his fingertip, perhaps mapping out new tats. Pete would get them if Patrick asked.

“That was…” Patrick’s voice trails off when he can’t find the right word to describe quite how he feels. Pete takes that as a huge compliment.

“Yeah,” the bassist sighs, holding Patrick closer. “It really was.”

“I’m glad we finally, y’know. Sorted that out.”

“Me too.”

They’re silent for another few minutes, the only sounds in the room their calming breaths and the surprisingly even beat of Pete’s heart.

“Hey,” Patrick pipes up after a while, startling Pete out of his half-asleep state. “I, um…y-you know I—”

“Yeah, ‘Trick,” Pete murmurs, pressing a kiss to the crown of Patrick’s head. “I know. And, uh. Me too—I mean, I do, too. Okay?”

“I know.” Patrick yawns softly against Pete’s neck and his eyelashes tickle the sensitive skin there as his eyes close.

Pete follows him into sleep soon after, warm and content for the first time in a very long time.

i know when we released this song, i fed you guys a story of lost love and found friendship and escaped carnival bears. and while some of you might like that interpretation and even relate to it, there were others who read into it something completely different—a story about lost friendship and found love and a strange little band that somehow managed to change your world forever. i’m here to tell those dizzy dreamers that you were right. this song is about us, four misfits who saw when you needed us and came back to do more than just fill up the trophy case.

this video, on the other hand, focuses on one half of our group—two misfits who found out they actually fit with each other pretty well. and i can assure you, what you see here is real—maybe not all the events, but the emotions and the devotion you see are more honest than i can tell you. maybe even too honest. but i wouldn’t change a thing.

watch and enjoy. maul the world.

- PW

(p.s. patrick is now accepting peterick tweets)

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