patd ficlets: all six pairings, PG-13
Six ficlets on the prompt: golden
One for each Panic at the Disco pairing
None rated above PG-13; appx. 4000 words total
warning: I'm feeling a bit melodramatic and/or kind of fluffy at the moment; which, of course, makes bandom headspace (specifically, that of tiny earnest boys in a hippie emo band) the very place I need to be, muse wise, yes?
These are unconnected; no need to read them all to make sense of any one of them.
1. Tequila
(Brendon/Jon, 439 words)
Life looks better through a glass of glowing golden liquor, Brendon decides. Something strong and nasty that Wentz assures him is the good stuff. He likes the burn, but he likes even more how it makes nothing else burn anymore. Actually, he feels quite disconnected, fuzzy.
Except how he's kind of beautifully, wonderfully touchy, too. Tequila makes Ryan mopey and it makes Spencer an asshole, but apparently it makes Brendon just the opposite: happier than normal, clingier than normal.
Hornier than normal.
But, honestly, it's not so much the tequila as it is Jon Walker. Jon always inspires all of those feelings in Brendon, it's just that Brendon spends most of the time going overboard making sure nobody knows, swallowing down words and trying not to cling to him too much. But given the way Jon goes hot all over right now when Brendon slides across the room and slips his arms around his waist, he's starting to think that, fuck, maybe it was even more obvious for all that.
So why, exactly, hasn't he been cuddling gorgeous perfect Jon Walker anyway, then?
"I don't know, Bren," Jon replies, voice warm and gravelly. Brendon can feel the rumble in his chest when he says it.
"Fuck," Brendon moans.
"Didn't mean to say that out loud, huh?" Jon says, smirking a little, but fondly. His eyes are such a rich brown Brendon gets lost for a second.
Brendon pulls his eyes away and whispers against the warm skin of his neck: "Did mean it, though."
"Yeah?" Jon asks softly; tentatively, even his hand reaching up to stroke the back of Brendon's neck.
Brendon doesn't know where this whimper he's giving comes from, but he tries to muffle it after the fact by burying his face against Jon's shoulder. Jon's arms tense around him, but he doesn't let go.
"Bren..." he sighs. "You're--"
"Drunk," Brendon says with a giggle. "But not..." He sighs, and the world reels around him. The only stable thing is Jon, but having Jon so close actually makes him feel a little wobbly, oddly enough. He knows what would fix it, though.
"Jesus, Jon," he whines. "Just fucking kiss me. Please?"
His heart? Starts tripping over itself. It almost hurts.
"Bren..." Jon says again.
So Brendon turns his head and lets his lips find Jon's, and when Jon finally starts kissing him back, hot and wet and carefully desperate, he thinks he feels even drunker than he did before. Or at least more dizzy. And there's definitely a burn starting slow inside him, worse than any swallow of tequila ever thought about being-but better, too.
2. Eyes
(Brendon/Ryan, 602 words)
It's not like he remembers much about getting bottled, not exactly. But what he does remember is almost worth it. Almost. Really, though, he'd prefer that his tiny sparks of hope about getting everything he wanted in the world were fanned under different circumstances, ones that didn't involve so much fucking literal headache.
It was like this: he was on his feet, singing, then he was on the ground. Once, when he was a kid, he sliced his finger open with a kitchen knife. It was like that: quick, and he didn't feel it when it happened, the actual cut, just when the blood and swelling started a few seconds later. Since the bottle knocked him out, it was more than a few seconds, but, still, the first thing he remembers once he woke up wasn't pain but shock; and then following hard upon that shock, Ryan.
He tells people everything was fuzzy when he opened his eyes. And it was that, in a way. Chaotic: people scurrying, or else swaying, towering over him; a lot of talk, things barked in all directions, and sometimes accidentally at him. Because they were worried. Of course. Bren? and How many fingers? and Are you okay?.
"Three," he murmured, and then, "Yeah, yeah. I'm okay. I'm. Yeah."
Everything whirled around him, then: Spencer and Jon turning away despite their hands anchored on him, pulling and pushing but mostly holding; Zack looming protective, rising up out of nowhere like a storm cloud, and a fucking terrifying one; noise and sunlight and a mass of people spreading out around him, the ones onstage and the crowd he could still feel offstage. Everything--suddenly beating down into his brain.
Really, it did kind of hurt like hell for a while, but there was never a moment he couldn't see one thing clearly: Ryan's eyes, their warm brown squinted down at him. Ryan's hand was the tightest around his arm, and he didn't move. Couldn't seem to, not even when everything else began to do that whirling thing.
Ryan didn't bark orders, and he didn't ask and beg and console. He didn't seem to even breathe, actually, not until Brendon smiled, finally, and made the kind of epic and intentionally overdramatic grumpy face he makes when they try to wake him up with a hangover. For a second, Ryan's mouth softened out of that hard line, almost to a smile. Then a look so black crossed his face that he turned away from Brendon with a jerk and joined the whirl of people and noise and light.
It's not the concern that makes Brendon know, that fanned the spark. They were all worried. It's not even the wild-eyed fear. He's seen Ryan freeze up enough times to know it was about friendship, the band, or a million other complicated emotions that might not have had a damn thing to do with what Brendon hopes is love, the kind Ryan can't ignore, not forever.
No, Brendon's pretty sure that he's nursing hope because of the way Ryan's eyes went from shining gold to a deep muddy brown, his body from relief to wanting to hurt something. Or even if Brendon's wrong and Ryan was just springing away from him in shock before he had too much time to think about it, or before Brendon could know--even then, it's something.
What's funny is it was shocking to Brendon, too, even if he had been looking for it so long. Looking for it, apparently, the same way that expecting all those bottles didn't mean one wouldn't knock him the fuck out anyway.
3. Opportunity
(Brendon/Spencer, 687 words)
Spencer isn't a cuddler. He doesn't seem scared of or repulsed by close human contact or anything; he's just not the cuddling sort. The only person Brendon's ever seen him really cuddle was Hayley, but that's been over so many weeks now he's starting to feel kind of sure that maybe nobody's snuggled Spencer anytime recently, which is sad. And totally the only reason he often sort of desperately wants to curl up in his lap.
Spencer isn't a cuddler the same way Brendon isn't a pothead. It's not that he doesn't like it; it just isn't something he needs to do, like, daily, like some people. It didn't used to be for Spencer either, but since it seems to be lately, Brendon finds himself smoking more, too. Which is kind of tragic, because it makes him want even more to cuddle Spencer. Spencer with the blue blue eyes that look somehow sad and happy at the same time right now, like he can't make up his mind. (Brendon totally gets that, by the way. It's kind of like wanting, how it sucks but in a good way; or it's great but it hurts.)
They're at a campground somewhere in the desert, and even if Brendon's been seeing the desert all his life, enough to get used to the bigness and emptiness of it (another one of those two things at once: awful and wonderful), it seems ridiculously open and relentlessly quiet after the tour. Ryan and Jon are lying around by the fire, laughing at shit nobody else even fucking understands, definitely not Brendon. Or apparently Spencer, either. A few minutes ago, he retreated to one of the tents.
Brendon followed soon after. He couldn't not. It didn't even occur to him not to. He tries not to think about anything when he's high or else he'll start to think too much. Which is maybe what Spencer is doing now, judging from his expression. This, of course, makes Brendon think too much, too-about how many days it's been since anyone reminded Spencer that he's a human being.
So he's torn between staying (because he needs to, Spencer needs him to) and going (because he should, maybe). In the end, he just drops down beside Spencer and just puts his hand on his leg, testing the waters. When Spencer rolls over and opens his arms, Brendon has his answer. He's totally not about to miss this rare opportunity to be wrapped up in Spencer's arms.
Spencer's pretty strong. He already knew that, of course. From him being a drummer. But it seems like Spencer's holding him more tightly than is strictly necessary. Not that Brendon minds. Everything he's ever had with Spencer or felt for Spencer has pretty much been the opposite of minding.
He doesn't say anything for a long time. He thinks he probably shouldn't. Maybe it would break the spell, anyway. His head is on Spencer's chest, and the sound of his heart thumping is mesmerizing. Steady, too. And steadily speeding up until now it's racing, which sounds pretty awesome.
"Spence," he says, voice thick from disuse. "Do you know your heart's doing this thing where-"
It makes him dizzy how fast Spencer's turning him on his back and rolling half on top of him. Then Spencer's mouth finds his, lips grazing smooth and pressing soft, and then so quickly his tongue, slow and taking Brendon by surprise and he kind of gasps into the kiss. Because he's kissing Spencer and he didn't even know he wanted to kiss Spencer, except he always kind of did. Know, that is, despite trying so hard not to get himself into that kind of tug of war in his brain.
Spencer pulls out of the kiss a moment later, breathing hard, talking in broken sentences. Brendon can't put most of it together, except: wanted and didn't know if you'd let me and didn't know if I- fuck, if I even could anymore.
Brendon just pulls his face down so he can kiss him quiet, and he smiles to feel Spencer's arms drawing him close again.
4. Record
(Jon/Ryan, 853 words)
Ryan calls him at 4:30 in the goddamn morning to tell him about Pretty.Odd. going gold. Which is awesome, but, still: the sun is not up yet. He knows the motherfucker isn't so stupid he's forgotten the time difference between Chicago and Vegas, so he makes himself let out a breath, counting to ten, then to twenty, before he speaks. Because if Ryan's calling at ass o'clock, it's because he really needs to.
"I had no doubt," Jon says, a kind of giddy smile coming over his face that he didn't realize was lurking there until he said it.
"Well."
"Ryan, you can't tell me you did."
"I specialize in doubts, Walker."
"Bullshit."
"Bullshit?"
"You made a record that wasn't A Fever."
"I know."
"No. I mean, look at what that record is, what it's about, you dumb fucker."
"Stubbornness," he says with a snort. "That's all. A big old fuck you to..."
Jon can practically see the wave of his hand, the roll of his eyes.
Before Ryan can sigh and begin snapping off sarcasm, or else throwing out the same tired and self-protectively flippant words he's been using about the album since they wrote it, Jon rushes into the pause.
He says, "I still get kind of excited every time I play Mad as Rabbits."
"I know," Ryan replies. "Me, too."
The line goes quiet for a time. This is nothing new. They have lots of these silences, the same as they do when they're in the same room. It used to bug the shit out of him until he learned that enduring them patiently is the best way to get at what's underneath that Ryan thing he projects so much of the time.
Ryan suddenly cuts into it to say: "We made."
"What?"
"We made a record that wasn't A Fever. I couldn't have done it without you."
"Okay."
"I'm serious. It was me, but it was a me I didn't know that I could... I mean, I can't--"
Ryan's voice breaks there, and that's when Jon realizes he wasn't quite awake yet-only because now he's been startled into sudden alertness.
As he sits up in bed, Jon thinks of what to ask, how to ask, but he doesn't think long before Ryan says:
"Come back. We need you."
And that? Even more infuriating than the 4:30 wake-up call. It's always Spencer and Brendon need you and You're the best thing that ever happened to the band and We have a Jon-shaped hole in Nevada; come home. Always we; never I miss you or you scare me or this isn't just about four but two.
"We?" Jon says through gritted teeth.
It's possible Jon doesn't pull his punches so well when he's tried and cranky. This can be good or bad, because Ryan's always way more open about his feelings when he's playing neurotic insomniac.
"I," Ryan corrects himself. "I need you." He draws in a sharp breath and starts talking too fast: "I'm going fucking batshit here, and I can't tell them, because they might not understand, and I don't even know if I can tell you, or if it's fair to dump that kind of--"
"You don't have to tell me," he says quietly, evenly, sweeping up the scattered pieces Ryan's laid in his hands, tonight and every night, every day. "You're worried about what comes next. What kind of record we'll make. Who we'll be."
"Which we've already-"
"And you're scared shitless that we can't do it again."
Ryan pauses a long time, totally silent, then he says, softly, "Probably."
"I already know this," Jon replies. "I've been knowing it. And I get it. I do."
"Yeah."
"So let me tell you what comes next. Like, immediately next. I spend another week out here with my family and you spend a week actually talking about this shit to somebody you have to look in the eye--like your two other best friends who are, in fact, aware that you're not a robot or John Wayne or something. And then I get on a plane and come back because I miss the hell out of you, too. But, seriously, in the meantime, unless we go fucking platinum, if you call me again at 4:30 in the morning, I might consider murder a fair response."
That earns him a chuckle, the kind like he normally hears when they're tucked into Ryan's bunk in the wee hours, rambling at each other and trying not to touch each other like they mean it.
"Sorry," Ryan says.
"Bullshit."
"Yeah, bullshit. Still, thanks. Seriously."
"Hey, drive yourself over to Spencer's and curl up on his couch. You sleep good there, right?"
Ryan laughs. "I'm kind of already there."
"Okay, then."
After he clicks the phone shut, he lies back down in bed, heart pounding, his whole body a little too warm. He wishes he could say he was already there, too.
The clock reads 4:57 when his face stretches into a wide grin which he'd hate to admit to Ryan was equal parts pride and relief. Fucking gold. Goddamn.
5. Sunrise
(Jon/Spencer, 767 words)
Secretly, Jon believed camping on the beach would be a disaster. They'd probably be cold and definitely be cranky, and it might lead to fights. And no sex, maybe not even when they got back on the bus the next night. Which would suck. Royally. But Spencer had looked so hopeful, and Jon had no good way of combating one of Spencer's faces of Blind Optimism. They made him think of Spencer as being way younger than he is, of needing Jon's protection. Or at least his cooperation in attempting, against all odds, to make an overnight at the Shell Beach State Park campground less than soul-crushing.
What happened was this: it rained that evening. Not catastrophic rain, but rain enough not to go out, not when it wasn't the world's warmest day and neither of them wanted to explain to Ryan why they were sick because they caught a good old fashioned Victorian chill in the night air. Ryan actually believed they were at the hotel. Nobody wanted to undeceive him about that, although the fact that Brendon knew where they were and promised to run interference...well, that almost guaranteed a snarky text from Ryan before the evening was out.
It hadn't rained all afternoon, though. They'd had a couple of hours to lie like lazy dogs in the sun, then run like happy puppies across the shoreline, attempting to tackle each other into the rolling tide. Spencer stopped several times to tinker with his digital camera, standing there looking like the world's biggest dork in jeans rolled up to his knees and a too-tight pink t-shirt, hair flapping in his eyes, and Jon thought...
Well, Jon already knew he was a goner. It's just that sometimes he was reminded all over again. Like when Spencer turned the camera on him and he didn't protest like any good photographer does when he's being made the subject. Spencer just smiled at him, warm and overwhelming, and he smiled back and stood still there in the water, waiting., maybe even posing.
He took some pictures of his own, too, mostly of the sky and the other people milling about. A few of Spencer when he wasn't paying attention. All in all, he considered it a successful day--until the gray cloud swooped in out of nowhere. The first raindrops were starting when it occurred to them that they hadn't set up the tent yet.
By the time they got everything set up, they were soaked through, and without a fire to warm and dry them. So they shucked their wet clothes, flinging them into the corner of the tent, put on their dry going home clothes, and curled up together. He thinks maybe they didn't say anything for a solid hour, just held each other until their adrenaline subsided and they were both breathing steadily, calmly. Actually, now that Jon thinks about it, it was kind of perfect--just being together, away from the stress of the tour. Cramped, still, but at least it was somewhere new. And he couldn't think of anyone else he'd rather be cramped together with.
Luckily, dinner wasn't thwarted by the rain; they hadn't planned on cooking, so they had some fine gas station fare to keep them in calories. He's not sure when they fell asleep, but it must've been freakishly early because it was freakishly early the next morning when they both started tossing and turning. They were wide awake but still making cranky morning noises and faces at each other until Jon crushed his lips over Spencer's, and then they were vigorously licking into each other's mouths and pressing their hands in under clothing. As soon as they got warmed up enough they couldn't feel the chill of the morning anymore, they tugged each other's pants down far enough to jerk each other off slow and teasing, like the best sort of contest.
After, when Jon unzipped the tent so he could go out to piss, he found that the sky was starting to come over yellow-white, the glow before the sunrise. They sat there at the tent flap watching as gold swept up into the sky, dragging behind it a pink-orange ball, sharp and bright through a few thin, lingering clouds.
"Why don't we get up for more sunrises?" Jon wondered aloud.
Spencer's hand on the small of his back traced a figure eight, or maybe infinity.
He replied, "Because you're an asshole in the morning."
Jon just laughed and shoved Spencer back down on top of the blankets and prepared to tickle the everliving fuck out of him.
6. Band
(Ryan/Spencer, 583 words)
Ryan kind of hates how everyone acts so fucking nonchalant about him and Spencer's marriage. As if it was inevitable. Or easy. Or like it's perfect or something.
For the record, they fight all the goddamn time. Really. But they've been fighting so long that trying to live without it would be like forgoing oxygen. Besides, they kind of like to fight. Makes the sex better.
And that? The sex thing? Not easy. They were both pretty much freaked out about it-that they were both guys, that they were Ryan and Spencer. Not to mention other issues they couldn't even really pinpoint much less make sense of. Those problems still rear their ugly heads sometimes, but they've learned to work around and against them.
That's the thing: they figured out how to deal with each other. About almost everything-and what they haven't, they at least know how to try. That's why Ryan resents the of courses when he shows people the ring, how they already know it's Spencer even if they haven't seen either of them in years. He resents the implication that what they have wasn't work, wasn't the hardest thing either of them ever tried to do. Because it was. And he managed to make it work-because he had no other fucking choice.
So this is his quandary: he's not sure why wedding bands are these simple circles of gold. He thinks that's ridiculous, that they ought to be tangled knots--but beautiful ones, maybe like tree branches or roots: gnarled and twisting, with dark pockets in between, but also with something to make the long, smooth, exposed parts shine. Accent diamonds, maybe.
He says all that to Spencer one night when he's lying on the couch, the TV on mute. Spencer's in the kitchen, washing the dishes.
"This does not surprise me," Spencer says. "You'd make anything you could get your hands on more complicated, overdone, and fucking diamond-encrusted if you thought you could get away with it. Why not add some lace and ruffles, too."
"Fuck you," Ryan murmurs.
"I know," Spencer replies serenely.
A moment later, Ryan asks, "You don't agree with me?"
"In theory, I guess. But, one: I'm not wearing something that fucking tacky. And, two: I kind of, I don't know, like having an ideal to live up to? You know, for love. Or commitment, I guess."
He's quiet for a second, and Ryan thinks he's done or else he's thinking, but then he continues:
"Gold's better when it's simple and not so flashy. I mean, this…with us? So not flashy, you know? But still kind of…bright? In a natural way, I mean. And, still: precious metal. Valuable, lasting. And a circle--I kind of like that. A lot, actually. Closed in on itself, but open in the middle. Constant, neverending, unbroken. You know, what we want this to be and all that shit."
There's a long pause as Ryan listens to Spencer set something down in the water with a swishing clunk before he picks something else up. He's done.
So Ryan snorts and says, "All that shit? What a fucking romantic."
"I try," Spencer replies warmly.
If maybe Ryan turns the TV volume up again after that, it's certainly not to stave off further heart-so-full-he-can't-breathe conversation. And it's definitely not to make sure that if he just fucking gives himself over to it and starts sniffling a little, Spencer doesn't hear him over the clank of silverware in the dish drainer.
~
One for each Panic at the Disco pairing
None rated above PG-13; appx. 4000 words total
warning: I'm feeling a bit melodramatic and/or kind of fluffy at the moment; which, of course, makes bandom headspace (specifically, that of tiny earnest boys in a hippie emo band) the very place I need to be, muse wise, yes?
These are unconnected; no need to read them all to make sense of any one of them.
1. Tequila
(Brendon/Jon, 439 words)
Life looks better through a glass of glowing golden liquor, Brendon decides. Something strong and nasty that Wentz assures him is the good stuff. He likes the burn, but he likes even more how it makes nothing else burn anymore. Actually, he feels quite disconnected, fuzzy.
Except how he's kind of beautifully, wonderfully touchy, too. Tequila makes Ryan mopey and it makes Spencer an asshole, but apparently it makes Brendon just the opposite: happier than normal, clingier than normal.
Hornier than normal.
But, honestly, it's not so much the tequila as it is Jon Walker. Jon always inspires all of those feelings in Brendon, it's just that Brendon spends most of the time going overboard making sure nobody knows, swallowing down words and trying not to cling to him too much. But given the way Jon goes hot all over right now when Brendon slides across the room and slips his arms around his waist, he's starting to think that, fuck, maybe it was even more obvious for all that.
So why, exactly, hasn't he been cuddling gorgeous perfect Jon Walker anyway, then?
"I don't know, Bren," Jon replies, voice warm and gravelly. Brendon can feel the rumble in his chest when he says it.
"Fuck," Brendon moans.
"Didn't mean to say that out loud, huh?" Jon says, smirking a little, but fondly. His eyes are such a rich brown Brendon gets lost for a second.
Brendon pulls his eyes away and whispers against the warm skin of his neck: "Did mean it, though."
"Yeah?" Jon asks softly; tentatively, even his hand reaching up to stroke the back of Brendon's neck.
Brendon doesn't know where this whimper he's giving comes from, but he tries to muffle it after the fact by burying his face against Jon's shoulder. Jon's arms tense around him, but he doesn't let go.
"Bren..." he sighs. "You're--"
"Drunk," Brendon says with a giggle. "But not..." He sighs, and the world reels around him. The only stable thing is Jon, but having Jon so close actually makes him feel a little wobbly, oddly enough. He knows what would fix it, though.
"Jesus, Jon," he whines. "Just fucking kiss me. Please?"
His heart? Starts tripping over itself. It almost hurts.
"Bren..." Jon says again.
So Brendon turns his head and lets his lips find Jon's, and when Jon finally starts kissing him back, hot and wet and carefully desperate, he thinks he feels even drunker than he did before. Or at least more dizzy. And there's definitely a burn starting slow inside him, worse than any swallow of tequila ever thought about being-but better, too.
2. Eyes
(Brendon/Ryan, 602 words)
It's not like he remembers much about getting bottled, not exactly. But what he does remember is almost worth it. Almost. Really, though, he'd prefer that his tiny sparks of hope about getting everything he wanted in the world were fanned under different circumstances, ones that didn't involve so much fucking literal headache.
It was like this: he was on his feet, singing, then he was on the ground. Once, when he was a kid, he sliced his finger open with a kitchen knife. It was like that: quick, and he didn't feel it when it happened, the actual cut, just when the blood and swelling started a few seconds later. Since the bottle knocked him out, it was more than a few seconds, but, still, the first thing he remembers once he woke up wasn't pain but shock; and then following hard upon that shock, Ryan.
He tells people everything was fuzzy when he opened his eyes. And it was that, in a way. Chaotic: people scurrying, or else swaying, towering over him; a lot of talk, things barked in all directions, and sometimes accidentally at him. Because they were worried. Of course. Bren? and How many fingers? and Are you okay?.
"Three," he murmured, and then, "Yeah, yeah. I'm okay. I'm. Yeah."
Everything whirled around him, then: Spencer and Jon turning away despite their hands anchored on him, pulling and pushing but mostly holding; Zack looming protective, rising up out of nowhere like a storm cloud, and a fucking terrifying one; noise and sunlight and a mass of people spreading out around him, the ones onstage and the crowd he could still feel offstage. Everything--suddenly beating down into his brain.
Really, it did kind of hurt like hell for a while, but there was never a moment he couldn't see one thing clearly: Ryan's eyes, their warm brown squinted down at him. Ryan's hand was the tightest around his arm, and he didn't move. Couldn't seem to, not even when everything else began to do that whirling thing.
Ryan didn't bark orders, and he didn't ask and beg and console. He didn't seem to even breathe, actually, not until Brendon smiled, finally, and made the kind of epic and intentionally overdramatic grumpy face he makes when they try to wake him up with a hangover. For a second, Ryan's mouth softened out of that hard line, almost to a smile. Then a look so black crossed his face that he turned away from Brendon with a jerk and joined the whirl of people and noise and light.
It's not the concern that makes Brendon know, that fanned the spark. They were all worried. It's not even the wild-eyed fear. He's seen Ryan freeze up enough times to know it was about friendship, the band, or a million other complicated emotions that might not have had a damn thing to do with what Brendon hopes is love, the kind Ryan can't ignore, not forever.
No, Brendon's pretty sure that he's nursing hope because of the way Ryan's eyes went from shining gold to a deep muddy brown, his body from relief to wanting to hurt something. Or even if Brendon's wrong and Ryan was just springing away from him in shock before he had too much time to think about it, or before Brendon could know--even then, it's something.
What's funny is it was shocking to Brendon, too, even if he had been looking for it so long. Looking for it, apparently, the same way that expecting all those bottles didn't mean one wouldn't knock him the fuck out anyway.
3. Opportunity
(Brendon/Spencer, 687 words)
Spencer isn't a cuddler. He doesn't seem scared of or repulsed by close human contact or anything; he's just not the cuddling sort. The only person Brendon's ever seen him really cuddle was Hayley, but that's been over so many weeks now he's starting to feel kind of sure that maybe nobody's snuggled Spencer anytime recently, which is sad. And totally the only reason he often sort of desperately wants to curl up in his lap.
Spencer isn't a cuddler the same way Brendon isn't a pothead. It's not that he doesn't like it; it just isn't something he needs to do, like, daily, like some people. It didn't used to be for Spencer either, but since it seems to be lately, Brendon finds himself smoking more, too. Which is kind of tragic, because it makes him want even more to cuddle Spencer. Spencer with the blue blue eyes that look somehow sad and happy at the same time right now, like he can't make up his mind. (Brendon totally gets that, by the way. It's kind of like wanting, how it sucks but in a good way; or it's great but it hurts.)
They're at a campground somewhere in the desert, and even if Brendon's been seeing the desert all his life, enough to get used to the bigness and emptiness of it (another one of those two things at once: awful and wonderful), it seems ridiculously open and relentlessly quiet after the tour. Ryan and Jon are lying around by the fire, laughing at shit nobody else even fucking understands, definitely not Brendon. Or apparently Spencer, either. A few minutes ago, he retreated to one of the tents.
Brendon followed soon after. He couldn't not. It didn't even occur to him not to. He tries not to think about anything when he's high or else he'll start to think too much. Which is maybe what Spencer is doing now, judging from his expression. This, of course, makes Brendon think too much, too-about how many days it's been since anyone reminded Spencer that he's a human being.
So he's torn between staying (because he needs to, Spencer needs him to) and going (because he should, maybe). In the end, he just drops down beside Spencer and just puts his hand on his leg, testing the waters. When Spencer rolls over and opens his arms, Brendon has his answer. He's totally not about to miss this rare opportunity to be wrapped up in Spencer's arms.
Spencer's pretty strong. He already knew that, of course. From him being a drummer. But it seems like Spencer's holding him more tightly than is strictly necessary. Not that Brendon minds. Everything he's ever had with Spencer or felt for Spencer has pretty much been the opposite of minding.
He doesn't say anything for a long time. He thinks he probably shouldn't. Maybe it would break the spell, anyway. His head is on Spencer's chest, and the sound of his heart thumping is mesmerizing. Steady, too. And steadily speeding up until now it's racing, which sounds pretty awesome.
"Spence," he says, voice thick from disuse. "Do you know your heart's doing this thing where-"
It makes him dizzy how fast Spencer's turning him on his back and rolling half on top of him. Then Spencer's mouth finds his, lips grazing smooth and pressing soft, and then so quickly his tongue, slow and taking Brendon by surprise and he kind of gasps into the kiss. Because he's kissing Spencer and he didn't even know he wanted to kiss Spencer, except he always kind of did. Know, that is, despite trying so hard not to get himself into that kind of tug of war in his brain.
Spencer pulls out of the kiss a moment later, breathing hard, talking in broken sentences. Brendon can't put most of it together, except: wanted and didn't know if you'd let me and didn't know if I- fuck, if I even could anymore.
Brendon just pulls his face down so he can kiss him quiet, and he smiles to feel Spencer's arms drawing him close again.
4. Record
(Jon/Ryan, 853 words)
Ryan calls him at 4:30 in the goddamn morning to tell him about Pretty.Odd. going gold. Which is awesome, but, still: the sun is not up yet. He knows the motherfucker isn't so stupid he's forgotten the time difference between Chicago and Vegas, so he makes himself let out a breath, counting to ten, then to twenty, before he speaks. Because if Ryan's calling at ass o'clock, it's because he really needs to.
"I had no doubt," Jon says, a kind of giddy smile coming over his face that he didn't realize was lurking there until he said it.
"Well."
"Ryan, you can't tell me you did."
"I specialize in doubts, Walker."
"Bullshit."
"Bullshit?"
"You made a record that wasn't A Fever."
"I know."
"No. I mean, look at what that record is, what it's about, you dumb fucker."
"Stubbornness," he says with a snort. "That's all. A big old fuck you to..."
Jon can practically see the wave of his hand, the roll of his eyes.
Before Ryan can sigh and begin snapping off sarcasm, or else throwing out the same tired and self-protectively flippant words he's been using about the album since they wrote it, Jon rushes into the pause.
He says, "I still get kind of excited every time I play Mad as Rabbits."
"I know," Ryan replies. "Me, too."
The line goes quiet for a time. This is nothing new. They have lots of these silences, the same as they do when they're in the same room. It used to bug the shit out of him until he learned that enduring them patiently is the best way to get at what's underneath that Ryan thing he projects so much of the time.
Ryan suddenly cuts into it to say: "We made."
"What?"
"We made a record that wasn't A Fever. I couldn't have done it without you."
"Okay."
"I'm serious. It was me, but it was a me I didn't know that I could... I mean, I can't--"
Ryan's voice breaks there, and that's when Jon realizes he wasn't quite awake yet-only because now he's been startled into sudden alertness.
As he sits up in bed, Jon thinks of what to ask, how to ask, but he doesn't think long before Ryan says:
"Come back. We need you."
And that? Even more infuriating than the 4:30 wake-up call. It's always Spencer and Brendon need you and You're the best thing that ever happened to the band and We have a Jon-shaped hole in Nevada; come home. Always we; never I miss you or you scare me or this isn't just about four but two.
"We?" Jon says through gritted teeth.
It's possible Jon doesn't pull his punches so well when he's tried and cranky. This can be good or bad, because Ryan's always way more open about his feelings when he's playing neurotic insomniac.
"I," Ryan corrects himself. "I need you." He draws in a sharp breath and starts talking too fast: "I'm going fucking batshit here, and I can't tell them, because they might not understand, and I don't even know if I can tell you, or if it's fair to dump that kind of--"
"You don't have to tell me," he says quietly, evenly, sweeping up the scattered pieces Ryan's laid in his hands, tonight and every night, every day. "You're worried about what comes next. What kind of record we'll make. Who we'll be."
"Which we've already-"
"And you're scared shitless that we can't do it again."
Ryan pauses a long time, totally silent, then he says, softly, "Probably."
"I already know this," Jon replies. "I've been knowing it. And I get it. I do."
"Yeah."
"So let me tell you what comes next. Like, immediately next. I spend another week out here with my family and you spend a week actually talking about this shit to somebody you have to look in the eye--like your two other best friends who are, in fact, aware that you're not a robot or John Wayne or something. And then I get on a plane and come back because I miss the hell out of you, too. But, seriously, in the meantime, unless we go fucking platinum, if you call me again at 4:30 in the morning, I might consider murder a fair response."
That earns him a chuckle, the kind like he normally hears when they're tucked into Ryan's bunk in the wee hours, rambling at each other and trying not to touch each other like they mean it.
"Sorry," Ryan says.
"Bullshit."
"Yeah, bullshit. Still, thanks. Seriously."
"Hey, drive yourself over to Spencer's and curl up on his couch. You sleep good there, right?"
Ryan laughs. "I'm kind of already there."
"Okay, then."
After he clicks the phone shut, he lies back down in bed, heart pounding, his whole body a little too warm. He wishes he could say he was already there, too.
The clock reads 4:57 when his face stretches into a wide grin which he'd hate to admit to Ryan was equal parts pride and relief. Fucking gold. Goddamn.
5. Sunrise
(Jon/Spencer, 767 words)
Secretly, Jon believed camping on the beach would be a disaster. They'd probably be cold and definitely be cranky, and it might lead to fights. And no sex, maybe not even when they got back on the bus the next night. Which would suck. Royally. But Spencer had looked so hopeful, and Jon had no good way of combating one of Spencer's faces of Blind Optimism. They made him think of Spencer as being way younger than he is, of needing Jon's protection. Or at least his cooperation in attempting, against all odds, to make an overnight at the Shell Beach State Park campground less than soul-crushing.
What happened was this: it rained that evening. Not catastrophic rain, but rain enough not to go out, not when it wasn't the world's warmest day and neither of them wanted to explain to Ryan why they were sick because they caught a good old fashioned Victorian chill in the night air. Ryan actually believed they were at the hotel. Nobody wanted to undeceive him about that, although the fact that Brendon knew where they were and promised to run interference...well, that almost guaranteed a snarky text from Ryan before the evening was out.
It hadn't rained all afternoon, though. They'd had a couple of hours to lie like lazy dogs in the sun, then run like happy puppies across the shoreline, attempting to tackle each other into the rolling tide. Spencer stopped several times to tinker with his digital camera, standing there looking like the world's biggest dork in jeans rolled up to his knees and a too-tight pink t-shirt, hair flapping in his eyes, and Jon thought...
Well, Jon already knew he was a goner. It's just that sometimes he was reminded all over again. Like when Spencer turned the camera on him and he didn't protest like any good photographer does when he's being made the subject. Spencer just smiled at him, warm and overwhelming, and he smiled back and stood still there in the water, waiting., maybe even posing.
He took some pictures of his own, too, mostly of the sky and the other people milling about. A few of Spencer when he wasn't paying attention. All in all, he considered it a successful day--until the gray cloud swooped in out of nowhere. The first raindrops were starting when it occurred to them that they hadn't set up the tent yet.
By the time they got everything set up, they were soaked through, and without a fire to warm and dry them. So they shucked their wet clothes, flinging them into the corner of the tent, put on their dry going home clothes, and curled up together. He thinks maybe they didn't say anything for a solid hour, just held each other until their adrenaline subsided and they were both breathing steadily, calmly. Actually, now that Jon thinks about it, it was kind of perfect--just being together, away from the stress of the tour. Cramped, still, but at least it was somewhere new. And he couldn't think of anyone else he'd rather be cramped together with.
Luckily, dinner wasn't thwarted by the rain; they hadn't planned on cooking, so they had some fine gas station fare to keep them in calories. He's not sure when they fell asleep, but it must've been freakishly early because it was freakishly early the next morning when they both started tossing and turning. They were wide awake but still making cranky morning noises and faces at each other until Jon crushed his lips over Spencer's, and then they were vigorously licking into each other's mouths and pressing their hands in under clothing. As soon as they got warmed up enough they couldn't feel the chill of the morning anymore, they tugged each other's pants down far enough to jerk each other off slow and teasing, like the best sort of contest.
After, when Jon unzipped the tent so he could go out to piss, he found that the sky was starting to come over yellow-white, the glow before the sunrise. They sat there at the tent flap watching as gold swept up into the sky, dragging behind it a pink-orange ball, sharp and bright through a few thin, lingering clouds.
"Why don't we get up for more sunrises?" Jon wondered aloud.
Spencer's hand on the small of his back traced a figure eight, or maybe infinity.
He replied, "Because you're an asshole in the morning."
Jon just laughed and shoved Spencer back down on top of the blankets and prepared to tickle the everliving fuck out of him.
6. Band
(Ryan/Spencer, 583 words)
Ryan kind of hates how everyone acts so fucking nonchalant about him and Spencer's marriage. As if it was inevitable. Or easy. Or like it's perfect or something.
For the record, they fight all the goddamn time. Really. But they've been fighting so long that trying to live without it would be like forgoing oxygen. Besides, they kind of like to fight. Makes the sex better.
And that? The sex thing? Not easy. They were both pretty much freaked out about it-that they were both guys, that they were Ryan and Spencer. Not to mention other issues they couldn't even really pinpoint much less make sense of. Those problems still rear their ugly heads sometimes, but they've learned to work around and against them.
That's the thing: they figured out how to deal with each other. About almost everything-and what they haven't, they at least know how to try. That's why Ryan resents the of courses when he shows people the ring, how they already know it's Spencer even if they haven't seen either of them in years. He resents the implication that what they have wasn't work, wasn't the hardest thing either of them ever tried to do. Because it was. And he managed to make it work-because he had no other fucking choice.
So this is his quandary: he's not sure why wedding bands are these simple circles of gold. He thinks that's ridiculous, that they ought to be tangled knots--but beautiful ones, maybe like tree branches or roots: gnarled and twisting, with dark pockets in between, but also with something to make the long, smooth, exposed parts shine. Accent diamonds, maybe.
He says all that to Spencer one night when he's lying on the couch, the TV on mute. Spencer's in the kitchen, washing the dishes.
"This does not surprise me," Spencer says. "You'd make anything you could get your hands on more complicated, overdone, and fucking diamond-encrusted if you thought you could get away with it. Why not add some lace and ruffles, too."
"Fuck you," Ryan murmurs.
"I know," Spencer replies serenely.
A moment later, Ryan asks, "You don't agree with me?"
"In theory, I guess. But, one: I'm not wearing something that fucking tacky. And, two: I kind of, I don't know, like having an ideal to live up to? You know, for love. Or commitment, I guess."
He's quiet for a second, and Ryan thinks he's done or else he's thinking, but then he continues:
"Gold's better when it's simple and not so flashy. I mean, this…with us? So not flashy, you know? But still kind of…bright? In a natural way, I mean. And, still: precious metal. Valuable, lasting. And a circle--I kind of like that. A lot, actually. Closed in on itself, but open in the middle. Constant, neverending, unbroken. You know, what we want this to be and all that shit."
There's a long pause as Ryan listens to Spencer set something down in the water with a swishing clunk before he picks something else up. He's done.
So Ryan snorts and says, "All that shit? What a fucking romantic."
"I try," Spencer replies warmly.
If maybe Ryan turns the TV volume up again after that, it's certainly not to stave off further heart-so-full-he-can't-breathe conversation. And it's definitely not to make sure that if he just fucking gives himself over to it and starts sniffling a little, Spencer doesn't hear him over the clank of silverware in the dish drainer.
~