Bandom FIC: Operation Jealousy
Title: Operation Jealousy
Fandom: Bandom (with a splash of House)
Pairings/Characters: Pete/Patrick (with a guest cameo by Dr. Gregory House)
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Patrick has to make Pete jealous. Doctor's orders.
Word count: ~9,000
Disclaimer: Not real. Not mine. Never happened.
Author's note: This is for swanswan who gave me the prompts "jealous!Pete" and "earlydays" for the drabble meme thing. Big thanks to linaerys for the beta!
Operation Jealousy
By Lenore
"Get off!" Patrick takes vicious aim at Pete's shin, really fucking glad he's wearing boots.
"Little shit!" Pete yells.
He doesn't let go, though. If anything, his grip tightens on the scruff of Patrick's neck. Andy and Joe hover on either side, apparently ready to hunt Patrick down if he tries to bolt. They hustle him in through the doors marked "Emergency."
"I'm not sick!" Patrick insists for what must be the million-billionth time, not that it's done him any good so far. "There's nothing the fuck wrong with me."
"Oh, there's something wrong with you," Pete begs to differ.
Patrick glares at Andy. "Tell him he's fucked in the head."
"Well," Andy says carefully, as if trying not to hurt Patrick's feeling. "Lately you have been a little--"
"Seriously fucking evil," Pete supplies oh, so helpfully.
Patrick hauls off and kicks him again.
"Dickhead!" Pete's expression darkens murderously. "You're just proving my point!"
"Joe--" Patrick cranes his head, looking for someone who hasn't gone completely insane.
From the shrug he gets, though, it's clear that Trohman isn't going to be any help.
"If this is about me pissing in Joe's duffle--" Patrick starts.
There's a chorus of "gross!" and "when did that happen" and "what the fuck, Patrick?"
"--he totally had it coming. I called the last jelly donut, and the douchebag ate it anyway. And that's just bullshit." He glares at Joe. "Fucking bullshit, man."
"Dude. Just…dude." Joe looks kind of shell-shocked, or possibly just stoned. It's hard to tell the difference.
"Seriously, 'Trick," Pete says. "I mean, you're a fiery little dude, sure, but this is just--" He gives Patrick that look he only gets when he's genuinely worried.
For a moment, Patrick almost feels bad. Almost.
"Can I help you?" a pretty blonde doctor with a stethoscope around her neck asks them.
"Yeah," Andy pipes up, "we're looking for the place you go when you don't have insurance."
The corner of the doctor's mouth twitches. "That would be the clinic. Down the hall and to the right."
"Hey, thanks." Pete flashes an extra bright smile, showing off his big, stupid teeth.
Patrick manages to wait for the pretty doctor to turn around before jabbing an elbow into Pete's ribs, but it's a close thing. Pete lets out a big, pained "oof," mostly put on, Patrick feels sure. This is Pete. Patrick makes a mental list of things to do when he gets the hell out of here. It includes, in no particular order: replacing Pete's shampoo with Nair, scrawling "Pete Wentz has a tiny little pea dick" on as many venue bathroom walls as he can possibly deface, and dying all of Pete's hoodies a hideous Barbie pink. Although maybe not that last thing, since there's a fifty-fifty chance Pete might actually enjoy it.
Pete pushes Patrick in the direction of the clinic. "Seriously? If the doctor doesn't fix you, I'm drowning you in the next motel bathtub."
At the reception desk, Pete does the talking, "Our friend needs to see someone. Like, in the worst possible way."
The nurse turns a concerned glance on Patrick. "What seems to be the problem?"
"Nothing!" Patrick insists.
"We have no clue," Pete talks over him. "But it's something really…bad."
The nurse eyes Patrick warily and hands a clipboard to Pete. "Here. Fill this out, bring it back when you're finished. You can have a seat over there. Someone will be with you."
Pete drags Patrick over to an empty chair, pushes him onto it, and settles beside him.
Patrick pops back up. "This is stupid. When you're done being a melodramatic freak, I'll be in the van."
Pete grabs his arm and yanks him back down. "Dude. Seriously. It's this or an exorcism. And that shit isn't pretty."
Patrick stubs his toe at the floor, and the sole of his boot makes a satisfyingly annoying squeak against the linoleum. He does it some more, falls into a rhythm, a rubbery rendition of "Stairway to Heaven."
"Do we really need a singer?" Andy wonders aloud.
Patrick ratchets up the volume, really throwing himself into the squeaky chorus.
Pete snatches Patrick's hat and thwacks him on the head with it, and okay, that's just war. Patrick lunges, and Pete has never in his life had the sense to back down from a fight. Suddenly they're scuffling around on the floor. People stop and stare, and Joe hauls them up by their collars.
"We're totally going to get kicked out of here."
Patrick settles huffily onto his chair, shoving his hat down over his eyes. "That would be the best fucking thing that's happened to me all day."
"Dude," Pete says with exasperation, "what part of exorcism do you not understand?"
Pete takes the clipboard to the nurse and comes back. Patrick slumps forward, elbows on his knees, chin in his hands. He stares sullenly at the floor. It's not long before Pete starts to squirm. If there's one thing absolutely guaranteed to drive Pete insane, it's silence. Patrick smiles a mean little smile.
"Hey, um, you want some gum?" Pete holds out a pack of Big Red, which Patrick has only told him, like, a million times he hates.
He ignores Pete.
"This is for your own good, you know," Pete resorts to sounding like Patrick's mother.
Patrick doesn't answer, not even to point out how incredibly lame Pete is.
Pete sighs. "I really fucking hate you right now."
Not as much as I hate you, Patrick would say, if he were actually talking to Pete.
They sit there forever. Joe makes three trips to the gift shop for snacks and one trip to the bathroom. He comes back smelling faintly of smoke. Andy spouts conspiracy theories about HMOs and the CIA, and Patrick starts to reconsider his vow of silence as the impulse to shout "shut the fuck up" grows increasingly urgent.
At last, a man in a white coat, leaning on a cane, comes hobbling over.
"I'm Dr. House. Which one of you is--" He glances down at the clipboard in his hand. "Patrick Stump?"
"He is!" Pete leaps up, grabbing Patrick by the arm, pulling him to his feet. "He's got a brain tumor, we think."
"Or a personality disorder," Andy interjects.
Patrick flips him off.
"Possibly he's possessed," Joe offers up.
Pete pushes Patrick toward the doctor. "Fix him. Please."
"Oh, sure. Because this isn't going to be a big waste of four years of medical school," Dr. House says with a roll of his eyes.
He starts to walk away, and Pete prods Patrick to follow. Patrick draws his arm back to take a swing. Whoever said violence isn't the answer never met Pete.
"You're totally missing a symptom here!" Pete calls after the doctor.
Patrick sighs and trudges off to the exam room. The sooner he gets this over with the better, and he can always beat Pete senseless later.
Dr. House closes the door, nods Patrick to the exam table. "So, it says here that you've had a sudden change in personality and that you've turned evil. That's a technical term, I'm assuming." He turns a questioning look on Patrick.
"Pete filled out the form," Patrick says darkly.
"He's your--" the doctor prompts.
"Bandmate," Patrick mutters, like it's a bad word.
"I'm going to pretend you said legal guardian, since you're sixteen, and technically I'm not supposed to examine you without some kind of permission." He sits down on a stool and wheels over. He narrows his eyes, and Patrick starts to squirm.
"Let me guess," the doctor says finally. "You're the drummer."
Patrick shakes his head. "Well, I mean, yeah. I do play drums. Was going to until-- Pete. He thought. Now I sing."
Dr. House crosses his arms over his chest. "Let's hear it."
Patrick scrunches up his forehead. "What?"
"Your singing," Dr. House says loudly, punctuating each word. "¿Hablas inglés?"
"I don't know what to--" he stammers. "How is this relevant?"
Dr. House gives him a mock stern look. "Who here went to medical school? That immortal classic 'Dancing Queen.' Go."
"Um--"
Dr. House snaps his fingers in Patrick's face. "Busy man. Things to do."
Patrick sighs. It would be just his luck to get a doctor who is possibly more dementedly persistent than Pete. He swallows hard, his mouth stupidly dry, and he launches into, Friday night and the lights are low, looking out for the place to go, where they play the right music, getting in the swing, you come in to look for a king. His voice comes out scratchy, and the heat rushes to his face.
The doctor has the kind of expression that Patrick has to come to recognize as a sign that the audience is about to start throwing things. He clears his throat and starts to drum on his thigh, giving it more of a Motown beat. He sings out stronger, and it's better now. Everything is with a gloss of Motown on it. Patrick starts to get into it, the ABBA-ness of it notwithstanding, and it occurs to him that here's a reason why he really shouldn't murder Pete. Because Patrick never would have started singing if it weren't for him, and as freaky-scary as it can be sometimes, he really kind of likes it.
Patrick expects Dr. House to cut him off at any moment, but he doesn't. Patrick sings both verses and the chorus twice. He trails off on the last line.
"Um. So," he mumbles, staring down at his hands twisting in his lap.
"Well, you don't completely suck, which would not have been my first guess." Dr. House gives Patrick a more interested look. "If you hate your band, there are simpler ways to get rid of them than making them think your head is about to spin around and you're going to projectile hurl pea soup."
"I don't hate them," Patrick says with a sigh. "They're my friends. Pete's my best friend. It's just we're on our first tour--"
Dr. House holds up a hand. "If this is about bad touching in some dive bar bathroom, I'm going to need to go get someone else. Dr. Cameron is much better at giving a crap than I am."
"Please," Patrick snorts. "If there'd been any touching, I wouldn't be so--"
He stutters to a stop. He can't believe he's actually discussing his sex life, or lack thereof, with the doctor who has the world's worst bedside manner. Once again, he blames Pete.
Dr. House glances at the door and then back at Patrick. "Ah, so that's the problem. Mr. Look-at-me-and-my-emo-hair."
Patrick blushes fiercely. "How did you--"
"He's the ringleader of this little intervention. Which means he's probably been taking the brunt of your pissiness. Which means he's the source of the frustration."
"You have no idea what it's like to be stuck in a van with him twelve hours a day."
"Probably a good reason not to have signed on for it in the first place."
"I didn't know!" Patrick insists loudly. "I didn't figure it out until-- And now it's too late. And he's driving me fucking crazy! He hangs all over me on stage. And uses me as a human pillow while we're driving. And has had sex with pretty much everyone in five states except for me, and that--"
He has no words to express just how much that sucks.
Dr. House gives him an appraising look. "So you thought if you had to be miserable, then everyone should be."
"Well--" It sounds kind of shitty when you put it that way.
"Not that I'm criticizing," Dr. House assures him. "It's a strategy I have a lot of personal fondness for. But maybe I can prescribe something that will be less likely to get you pushed out of a van doing eighty miles an hour."
He wheels over to the supply cabinet, scrawls something on a pad, and grabs stuff out of a drawer. He wheels back over, hands Patrick a prescription, and pushes a handful of condoms and sample sizes of lube at him. This answers the question: Can a person actually die of embarrassment? Sadly, the answer is no.
Patrick does his best to ignore the sex supplies he's holding and focuses on the prescription. "It says--" He frowns, confused.
"Jealousy," Dr. House tells him.
Patrick blinks. "Um. You mean--"
"Short, dark and impulsive out there can be had. Oh sure, he may have some feeble chivalry where your virtue's concerned, but he's not going to stand around and let somebody else do the deflowering."
Patrick blushes so hard he's kind of surprised he doesn't pass out.
"Um--"
"If you keep hanging around here, I'm going to assume you have questions. Didn't your parents give you that talk already?"
"No! No questions!" Patrick jumps down from the exam table and flees.
A few steps outside of the room, he realizes he's holding a handful of stuff that practically screams, "Hey, I'm all set to have gay sex with my best friend." He shoves the condoms and lube packets into his jacket pocket.
"Patrick!" Pete leaps to his feet when he sees him.
Patrick has a pocketful of sex supplies. Maybe he is going to die of embarrassment after all.
Pete eyes him with concern. "Are you okay? What did the doc say? Are we going to have to make a stop at the local occult store for some chicken bones and powdered lizard guts?"
Dr. House comes thumping over. "I've got good news and bad news."
He doesn't seem the type to care about doctor-patient confidentiality, and Patrick's only hope is that the hospital will fall down around them. Do they have many earthquakes in New Jersey?
Pete turns a sickly shade of gray. "He's got a tumor, but you can operate."
"He's possessed, but you know a good exorcist," Joe guesses.
"Nope," Dr. House declares. "He's a teenager. A completely curable condition, although it will take several years for it to clear up. Four of them, to be exact."
"No brain tumor?" Pete sounds almost disappointed.
Dr. House raises an eyebrow and asks Patrick, "Him? Seriously?"
Patrick shrugs. It's not like he can explain this thing he has for Pete.
"So," Andy says slowly. "What you're saying is that we just have put up with him."
"Yep." Dr. House smiles ironically. "Good luck with that."
He heads off, leaving Pete, Andy and Joe to exchange "what the fuck do we do now"-type glances.
Finally, Pete puts a hand on Patrick's shoulder. "You're really okay?"
"I'm really okay," Patrick insists.
"Okay then," Pete says.
"Okay?" Andy's voice rises a little hysterically. "That's it?"
Pete shrugs. "You heard the doc. He's going to grow out of it."
"In four years," Joe reminds him.
Pete slings his arm around Patrick's shoulders and starts walking him toward the exit. "Just try not to make us kill you before then."
This close, Pete smells like Doritos and the fake chemical-tinged cinnamon of his gum, like warm body and unwashed clothes. There's no reason why it should smell good. There's absolutely no reason why Patrick should want to press his face into Pete's neck and breathe in like he's been oxygen-deprived for the better part of his life. He really is the most ridiculous sap ever.
"I'll see what I can do," Patrick says faintly.
He's not making any promises.
Pete grins. "That's my Lunchbox." He plants a big, smacking kiss on the side of Patrick's face and whispers in his ear, "You're still my favorite. Just don't tell the other guys. They'll get all jealous and shit."
"We can hear you," Andy singsongs.
Pete laughs and unhooks his arm from Patrick's shoulders and scrambles into the van. Patrick follows, and Pete sprawls all over him, back to his old tricks now that Patrick is doctor-certified tumor- and demon-free.
Patrick fingers the prescription in his pocket. Jealousy. Hmm.
***
Two days later, they play a tiny, oppressively hot little outpost of hell, with broken air conditioning and carpet on the walls, in some rusted-out town in Pennsylvania. Patrick never catches the name. Their set goes okay. A few kids with blue hair and nose rings crowd close to the stage, although Patrick suspects it's as much out of habit as any serious thing for their music. No one seems especially blown away by them, but then, if Patrick lived in a town like this, he's not sure how much enthusiasm he'd have for…well, much of anything.
They finish up. Patrick makes a beeline for the bar and asks for water. The bartender takes one look at him, sweaty and no doubt red-faced, and she lines up three large beer mugs with water in front of him. Patrick is gulping them down one after another when he hears a soft, "Hey."
He turns around, and there's a girl standing there. She's cute: short dark hair, big dark eyes, cheekbones sharp enough to cut. Actually, she reminds him a little of Pete. Patrick's face goes instantly hot at the thought, and he can't meet her eyes.
"Um, hey," he says feebly.
His lameness doesn't seem to deter her any, and Patrick always appreciates that in a person.
She smiles. "So, you guys were really good tonight."
Patrick ducks his head. "Oh. Um. Thanks. I mean, we were a little off in a few places--"
He stops himself. Just say thank you, Patrick. No one wants to hear your perfectionist's play-by-play. This is what Pete is always telling him.
"So. Yeah. Thanks," he says again, probably sounding stupid.
"I'm Tina," the girl offers.
"Patrick." He toys with the hem of his t-shirt. "So."
"So," Tina says hopefully.
Patrick would really like someone to tell him that talking to girls gets easier someday, although he's not sure he'd believe it. "Um, do you live nearby?"
Tina nods. "You know, until I can get out of here."
"Oh. Um. Yeah." Wait. Did he just diss this girl's hometown? "I mean-- Not that I think--"
Pete comes hurtling through the crowd, interrupting Patrick's pathetic babbling by slamming into him, knocking him into Tina. Patrick glares. Pete doesn't seem to notice. Or possibly he just doesn't care. "Hey, dude. We're going to this all-night diner some kid told us about for waffles."
"Dizzy's," Tina supplies. "It's where people around here go."
"Yeah, yeah. That's the one." Pete flashes his patented god's-gift-to-women smile at her, and then elbows Patrick. "Andy says if you're not ready to go in fifteen minutes he's leaving you."
Patrick darts a sideways glance at Tina. "So. Um. Waffles?"
Tina's face lights up. "That'd be cool. I can drive you. I've got my car."
"I'll see you there," Patrick tells Pete.
Pete shrugs. "Okay, dude." He starts back through the crowd, then turns around and flashes what would be a sleazy grin if it were a little less dorky. "Don't do anything I wouldn't."
Operation Jealousy is clearly off to a flying start.
Dizzy's is the real diner deal, slightly rundown, but with black-and-white checked tile, red leatherette booths, and a jukebox that plays actual records. They claim the big table near the back. Patrick ends up next to Pete, with Tina next to him. The waitress, who has hair the color of bubble gum, comes over to take their order. Pete folds his napkin into a triangle and starts to play table football with Joe.
Patrick smiles at Tina nervously. She leans in a little closer.
"So, have you guys been playing together long?" she asks.
He shakes his head. "Well--I mean. A little less than a year. That's not really that long."
Tina nods, and Patrick knows it's his turn to say something now. "So…" He searches around and comes up with this little bit of conversational dynamite, "You're in high school?"
"Yeah, it's super lame," Tina says. "But at least I'm a junior, so it's not for too much longer, you know?"
"Yeah."
Beside him, Pete twists in his seat, shouting at Joe, "Take that, bitch! I told you I had mad skillz."
Patrick sighs and turns back to Tina. She's got that hopeful smile again.
"Um. So. Do you go hear a lot of music?"
She shrugs. "You know."
"Yeah."
The bubble-gum-haired waitress mercifully shows up with their waffles. Patrick isn't sure he's ever been so happy to see anyone in his life. They start to eat, stopping occasionally to smile awkwardly at each other. This whole making-Pete-jealous thing has complications Patrick really hadn't anticipated.
At last, Pete taps Patrick on the shoulder. Finally. Patrick has seen Pete's jealous look aimed at…well, pretty much every girlfriend Pete has ever had. Patrick turns, hoping to be on the receiving end of it now, but instead it's Pete's "I've got an obnoxious request but I'm cute" look. Patrick gets that one a lot.
"Hey, you gonna eat that?" He eyes Patrick's plate proprietarily.
Patrick sighs.
Naturally Pete interrupts this to mean "no." He snatches half a waffle and the rest of Patrick's bacon. Then goes back to his stupid game.
Patrick turns to Tina, a little dejectedly. "Hey, you want to--"
He was going to suggest they go check out the jukebox, but the way she's staring at him, with big blink-blink eyes, makes the words stick in his mouth.
She leans closer and slides her hand up his thigh. "You guys aren't heading out tonight, are you?"
"Um."
"'Cause we could go to my house and sneak into the basement. My folks never go down there." Her breath puffs hotly against his ear. "There's a really comfortable couch."
"Touchdown, you fucker!" Pete waves his arms wildly, not paying the least attention.
Under the table, Tina's hand is getting frisky.
"Um!" Patrick's voice comes out a high-pitched squeak.
***
It takes a week for Patrick to work up the nerve to try again. In the meantime, he makes up a list of rules for Operation Jealousy:
1. Pick guys
(He figures it's possible that Pete has some kind of separate categories going on in his head. Sex with guys is not the same thing as, oh, say, sex with your girlfriend. This is Pete, after all. He's going to adopt a philosophy that means he gets to have the most sex possible.)
2. Keep it casual
(He keeps remembering the way Tina's face fell when he gave her a quick kiss in the diner parking lot and hopped into the van. Patrick wants to make Pete jealous. He doesn't want to be a douchebag. So. No awkward attempts at getting to know one another. Just making out, plain and simple.)
3. Three strikes and this jealousy plan is out
(There's only so much humiliation Patrick can take, and if he doesn't get Pete's attention soon, he's going to forget Dr. House's stupid prescription and sell his bandmates on eBay or something. Evil is a perfectly acceptable lifestyle.)
Tonight, the club they're playing is packed. Everyone is clearly in the mood for a good time, and energy radiates off the crowd. They take the stage, and Pete grins at Patrick. Joe bounces on his toes. They launch into the first song, and the kids in the mosh pit start hurling themselves around. Patrick forgets to be nervous. All that exists is the music, and he plays and sings until his throat hurts. He's glowing with sweat, and there's so much adrenaline pumping through him he feels like nothing can touch him and nothing will ever be better than this.
"Fuck, yeah!" Pete grabs Patrick in an enthusiastic headlock when they come off stage.
They chug some water and mop off the sweat and put their gear away. They don't have to be on the road for another few hours, so Patrick makes his way to the bar, in the mood for something more than water tonight. He throws a hopeful glance in the bartender's direction. The bartender pointedly ignores him.
"Hey, let me get you a beer."
Patrick looks, and there's a guy sitting next to him. He's older. Maybe in his thirties? Patrick is shitty at guessing ages. The guy's not bad-looking: blond and tan, in jeans and a Green Day T-shirt, a piercing in his lip that he's maybe a little too old for, but, hey, Patrick is trying to make his best friend jealous, so who is he to judge?
The guy waves down the bartender. "Two Coronas."
The bartender narrows his eyes at Patrick, who does his best to look like he's all grown up now, although probably that just makes him look like a budding serial killer. The bartender thumps down two bottles in front of the pierced older guy and gives Patrick a look like, I've got my eye on you, kid.
"Here's to a really great show." The guy lifts his beer, and they clink bottles. Patrick takes a sip, then a gulp. He figures he'll need it.
"So," the guy says. Patrick braces himself for more awkward conversation, but the guy gets right to the point. "You here with anybody?"
Patrick starts to say he's here with his bandmates, but duh. That's so not the point of the question. "Oh. Um. No. You know. Um. Not yet."
Smooth. Very smooth. He knows he must be blushing. He curses his fair-skinned ancestry yet again.
The guy doesn't seem to mind, though. "Cool." He leans in closer. "You like this band?" He touches the logo on Patrick's 504 Plan shirt, touches Patrick's chest, letting his hand linger there.
It's not just Patrick's face that feels hot now, and he has to resist the urge to squirm. "Yeah. I, uh-- Yeah. Um. What about you?"
"Cool. Very cool." But he's staring at Patrick, at Patrick's mouth specifically, and it doesn't seem like they're talking about music anymore.
"You, um--" Patrick stammers, not sure what to do now. Pete always makes this look so easy. It's really, really not.
The guy has ideas about how to proceed, thankfully. He slides his hand along Patrick's jaw and leans closer. Patrick feels breath against his mouth, and then the guy's lips are on his, the guy's tongue in his mouth. They kiss until Patrick is starting to feel dizzy. The guy pulls back and starts sucking on Patrick's neck.
"You want to go outside?" The words vibrate against Patrick's skin.
In case maybe Patrick isn't completely clear what he means, the guy takes Patrick's hand and guides it to his crotch. He's hard and hot through the fabric of his jeans.
Patrick's stomach does a vertical leap. "Um."
The guy bites Patrick's ear lobe. "Come on, baby. It'll be so good."
Patrick tangles his hands anxiously in the hem of his T-shirt. Pete is nowhere to be seen, probably off picking up some pixyish scene girl who has a thing for tattooed bassists. There are only about a billion of them in the world. Patrick frantically sorts through his options. If he goes outside with this guy but doesn't want to have sex, does that make him a cock tease? Then again, maybe he does want to have sex? Why is that even a question? Because he's saving himself for Pete? Is he really that pathetic?
At some point doing his anxiety-ridden inner monologue, Pete has materialized and is now lounging against the bar on the other side of the pierced older guy.
"Hey."
It's Pete's playing-it-cool voice, which means that "hey" isn't meant for Patrick.
The guy turns his head and his eyes bug out, as eyes tend to do around Pete. He's looking especially good tonight, wearing one of his skimpiest, tightest shirts, his jeans hanging off his hipbones, showing off a very tempting stripe of inked skin. Pete's eyeliner is smudged in a way that suggests he just crawled out of bed after a long night of sex. His pretty mouth glistens, probably because he's wearing lip gloss again, something Patrick mocks him mercilessly for to his face and then thinks about guiltily while he's jerking off.
"Nice." Pete brushes his finger over the guy's lip piercing.
That's it right there, all it takes, although Pete does spend a few more minutes turning on the charm and flashing big, toothy smiles. The older guy is so mesmerized he's probably forgotten Patrick even exists. Finally, Pete leans close, whispers in the guy's ear, and nods toward the door.
"Yeah, yeah." The guy licks his lips.
He slides off the barstool, takes off for the exit and looks back at least three times to smile at Pete. As predicated, there's not even a glance in Patrick's direction.
"Dude, you don't mind, right?" Pete takes Patrick's beer and finishes it in a big, noisy gulp. "I mean, you weren't in to him or anything, were you?"
All Patrick can do is stare.
Pete apparently takes this to mean, sure, fine, no problem. He slaps Patrick on the back. "Cool, dude. Don't wait up." He winks and then goes off to have sex with the guy Patrick was supposed to be using to make him jealous.
This plan is going so well.
Fuck. Pete even drank his beer. Patrick catches the bartender's eye and gives him a hopeful little smile.
The bartender shakes his head. "Forget it, kid."
Patrick sighs, thumps off the barstool and sulkily pushes his way through the crowd. He may as well go start packing up their stuff. It's not like he has anything better to do.
They're supposed to leave at two a.m. on the dot. Andy even made them synchronize their watches, although none of them actually has a watch. Patrick absolutely expects that Pete will show up late, straggling in just about the time Andy starts wondering aloud how much do we really need a bassist anyway? Pete has a sixth sense that way. He'll come thumping into the van, with that big, stupid grin and sex-messed hair, and Patrick will hate his life, Pete Wentz and the universe, not necessarily in that order.
So imagine Patrick's surprise when Pete actually turns up early, in time to help load up the van.
"Um." Patrick stutters to a stop, guitar case in hand. "What about that-- I thought you were--"
"Hey, I don't kiss and tell, Pattycakes. I'm just not that kind of guy." He winks.
Patrick feels like there's something in his stomach that's trying to claw its way out. And that's just great. He's jealous. That is so not how this was supposed to go.
They pile into the van. It's Joe's turn to drive. Patrick heads for the back seat, hoping that Pete will call shotgun. He doesn't, because that's just the way Patrick's suck-ass life goes these days. Pete makes a beeline for the back, thumps down onto the seat, bouncing a little, and swings his legs up, draping them over Patrick's lap. He's humming "Oops!…I Did It Again" tunelessly under his breath. Apparently, Patrick doesn't actually need to die to be in hell.
Andy comes to a stop at a light. Pete flicks Patrick on the chin, just to be annoying, because he's…well, Pete. There's a flood of light from the Exxon station on the corner, and Patrick notices scrapes on Pete's knuckles. He snatches Pete's hand and pulls it closer to examine it. It looks like he's been in a fistfight. Patrick should know. He's seen it often enough.
"Did you punch that guy?" he asks disbelievingly.
Pete waggles his eyebrows. "Dude, I can give you the blow-by-blow of everything that went down if you're really that kinky--"
"No!" Joe shouts, like a man who's afraid his brain is about to bleed out his ears.
"I'm pretty sure nobody is that kinky," Andy adds.
Pete settles his head on Patrick's shoulder. "Sorry, Lunchbox. Looks like you got outvoted."
He goes back to singing Britney songs--or screeching really would be more descriptive. Patrick would punch him if he weren't so busy mulling over those scraped knuckles. If he weren't starting to think that maybe Operation Jealousy was working after all.
***
Two nights later, they're in some tiny town in Indiana called Sandbar, playing at a bar off the Interstate, to an unlikely crowd of goth kids and long-haul truckers. They've been booked to open for Rough Ammo, another band from Chicago. Patrick knows a few of the guys, not all that well, but enough that it inspires the next step in Operation Jealousy. He has to get Pete to actually see him making out with someone if this stupid plan has any hope of success. So far, leaving that to chance hasn't worked out too well.
Of the guys in Rough Ammo, one has a girlfriend, one Patrick has never actually met, one kind of scares him, and that leaves Carlyle Firth, the guitarist. Carlyle goes to some tiny little college that Patrick can never remember, has a fountain of curly blond hair, and wears these little rectangular blue-tinted glasses that make him look vaguely like John Lennon. In short, he's hot, and Patrick has caught Carlyle giving him the once-over a time or two. He figures if anyone is going to agree to help him then Carlyle is his best bet.
Patrick is kind of distracted while they're playing. He messes up the bridge on the second song, and Pete squints at him, as if to say, you okay, dude? And no, actually Patrick is freaking out. Finally, they finish their set. Patrick mops up a little backstage, not that he imagines Carlyle has a policy against making out with sweaty guys or anything, but just in case. He goes to watch Rough Ammo play and waits impatiently in the crowd for the band to come out after they're done.
As soon as Patrick spots Carlyle, he makes a beeline for him, before he can lose his nerve. "Um, hey, man."
"Patrick Stump!" Carlyle wraps him in a big bear hug, thumping him on the back. "Good to see you, dude. How's the tour going? I hope you been playing better places than this."
"Yeah. Not so much. Um. Carlyle?"
He pulls him off to the side where no one else will hear.
"There's kind of this thing...that I was wondering--" Talking isn't Patrick's happy place, like, ever, and asking for the most humiliating favor in the history of the world doesn't make him any better with words. He might even be developing a stutter. "I'm kind of-- you know, desperate? And I thought, like, you won't punch me for asking? Well, probably not. So--" He runs out of breath.
"Dude." Carlyle puts on his serious face. Patrick isn't sure he's ever seen that before. "Stop freaking and spill it."
"Okay, okay."
Patrick takes a breath. He can't believe he's really doing this. Dr. House probably isn't even an actual M.D., and Patrick is a total tool for following his advice.
Nevertheless, he blurts out. "I'm trying to get somebody's attention, and I was wondering if you'd make out with me, you know, not for real, just to make him jealous, not that you're not, because you really, really are, um, what was my point, oh, yeah, so Pe--um, this guy, he doesn't get it, and it's been driving me crazy, which has made me, you know, maybe a teeny tiny little bit hard to be around, and I really don't want to be dragged to the exorcist."
Carlyle just blinks for a moment, and Patrick doesn't think this a particularly good sign. Apparently, though, the guy just needs a moment to catch up, because his face lights up in a eureka way. "Oh, you want me to help you make your guy jealous." He breaks into a grin. "That is so cute." His eyes travel up and down Patrick's body. "Plus, you're cute. So, yeah, I will make out with you, Patrick Stump, in the cause of true love."
Patrick suspects that even his toes are blushing, but he hastily babbles, "Thank you-- really. Can you wait here? I'll be back in, like, a minute?"
He dashes off to find Pete, who is lounging at the bar. He's talking up a boy with blue hair, flashing a big, white smile about every three seconds. It's the overly toothy grin that Pete uses for hook ups, not the easy, natural smile that he saves for his friends, definitely not the fond, "how do you even exist" smile that belongs only to Patrick.
Patrick kind of hates the blue-haired kid anyway. He grabs Pete's arm and spins him around.
"What the fuck--" Pete's pissy glare disappears when he sees that it's Patrick who's manhandling him. "Dude. Where you been?" Then he frowns. "Wait. This isn't, like, a relapse, is it? You're not about to set me on fire or something, are you?" He leans back warily.
"No," Patrick tells him. "I just need you to meet me outside in five minutes, okay?"
Pete scrunches up his forehead. "Why--"
"How many things do I ask you to do for me?" Patrick gives him a hard look that implies and how many millions of things do you talk me into doing for you in the average day? "So are you going to meet me outside or not?"
Pete holds up his hands, his eyes a little wide. "Okay, okay, dude. Don't get an aneurysm about it."
Patrick gives him one last glare, just for good measure, and then battles his way back through the crowd. He finds Carlyle leaning against the wall near the door, waiting.
"Oh, hey. Uh, you want to--" Go outside and pretend to make out? There are times when Patrick really has to wonder if even Pete is worth all this humiliation.
Carlyle gins. "Let's go to it, Jellybean."
He leads the way out into the alley and heads for a shadowy corner, as if he does this sneaking off to have furtive sex thing all the time, which he totally probably does, because he seems to have an actual, you know, strategy all worked out for it.
Patrick stalls beneath a streetlight. "Could we, uh--"
"Oh, right." Carlyle grins. "You want to get caught in the act. That's not usually what I'm going for."
He saunters over, and Patrick's stomach acts like he's on a roller coaster. He rubs his hands on his jeans, trying not to be too obvious about it. God, his palms are clammy. Carlyle is watching him, eyebrow arched, his lips curved up with just a hint of amusement. And the thing is: Carlyle really is hot, and he's going to make out with Patrick, and the fact that it's all to make Pete jealous doesn't change the fact that they're totally going to make out.
"So--" Patrick aims for smooth, suave if he can pull it off. It comes out squeaky.
"So." Carlyle smiles, but it doesn't seem to be the wow, how are you this retarded kind of smile, so that's something at least. "I think it's supposed to go like this."
He frames Patrick's face between his hands and moves in, closer, closer. Patrick's eyes cross and finally flutter shut. Carlyle presses their mouths together, and it's warm and soft and kind of nice. Patrick settles a hand gingerly on Carlyle's shoulder, not sure exactly what's allowed and what's not. Pretending to make out is even more of a guessing game than actually making out.
Carlyle makes an encouraging little noise and licks at Patrick's bottom lip as if asking permission. Patrick parts his lips, and then he has Carlyle's tongue in his mouth, stroking against his and getting to know his teeth. He shivers and presses closer, an instinct, one Carlyle seems to appreciate. He runs his hands up Patrick's back, tightens his grip on Patrick's shoulders. The air is August-hot, and every breath is liquid. Patrick's skin swelters everywhere their bodies are plastered together.
A few things occur to him at once: 1) if he ever thought that he wasn't into guys so much as just really into Pete, then he'd been wrong, wrong, so very wrong; 2) if Pete doesn't show up soon, Patrick is liable to start humping Carlyle's leg, a potential mortifying development; and 3) Patrick really should have thought of #2 much, much sooner. It has to have been longer than five minutes, and Patrick tells himself that Pete is going to show any moment. Any moment. Any fucking moment now!
Yeah. Not so much.
Patrick pulls away at last, panting embarrassingly loudly. When he can breathe enough, he says, "Pete is such a dick. I'm going to--" He waves his hand vaguely toward the door.
"Okay, cute stuff. But if you change your mind, you come and find me." Carlyle winks.
Patrick stares a moment, because a really hot guy in a band that's way better than his is actually willing to sleep with him. Somehow his answer to this is to make vaguely apologetic noises and rush back inside to find his stupid best friend who can't follow simple instructions. That really pisses him the fuck off. At Pete. He doesn't care if it's fair or not. Blaming Pete is far more satisfying than blaming himself.
He elbows his way over to the bar, where Pete is still flirting with the blue-haired boy. Patrick hauls off and punches him on the arm as hard as he can.
Pete jumps with surprise, nearly toppling off the stool. "What the fuck, Patrick?"
"You're a dick," Patrick informs him.
Pete's expression goes even more cartoon-like than usual, all big, wide eyes and slack-jawed surprise. "I repeat: what the fuck?"
Patrick's palm actually itches, that's how much he wants to hit Pete again. "Dude, you were going to meet me outside, remember?"
"I saw you with Carlyle. So." Pete shrugs. "I figured you guys were geeking out about music or something. Don't take this the wrong way, dude, but if I have to hear how Robert Smith is the under-appreciated voice of a generation one more time--"
"Fuck you! People don’t sneak out into the alley to talk about The Cure. They do it to have sex!"
There's a flash of something in Pete's eyes, something that reminds Patrick of the look Pete gets when somebody takes his favorite hoodie, a knife-sharp mix of outrage and murderous intent. It's gone in a split second, and then Patrick's not even sure he saw it at all, especially when Pete waggles his eyebrows and says, "Way to go, super stud!"
"Shithead!" Patrick slugs Pete again. He doesn't care if there is an exorcism in his future.
"Okay, asshole, stop it!" Pete's mouth goes tight and flat, which means he's starting to get mad for real. "You're supposed to be fucking cured!"
"You're supposed to be jealous!" Patrick blurts out.
Patrick can practically see the gears in Pete's brain lurch to a stop. "Wait." He blinks. "What?"
Patrick waits for the ground to open up beneath his feet, but the floorboards remain stubbornly solid. Where is a massive structural failure when you really need one, he thinks bitterly.
"You heard me," he says at last, kind of defeated.
Operation Jealousy has worn him the hell out.
"For fuck's sake, Patrick," Pete says, with an exasperated huff.
He slides off the barstool and takes Patrick by the arm and starts dragging him toward the rear exit. If he's going to act like Patrick having a thing for him is some big imposition, then Patrick is seriously going to have to kill him.
Outside, Pete crowds him up against the brick wall. "Dude, is this why you've been acting like a pissy little bitch ever since we left Chicago?"
Being called a pissy little bitch makes Patrick feel compelled to act like one. He shoves Pete, really putting his back into it. "Fuck you!"
Pete grabs Patrick's wrists. "Did it ever occur to you just to tell me?"
"Why would I?" Patrick shoots back. "When you can't be assed to care if I fuck everyone I meet in every bar in...everywhere? I know you, Pete. I know what that means."
Pete gives him this measuring look, which is really fucking annoying. "I usually think you're a pretty smart guy, Patrick, but about this, what we're talking about right now? You don't know shit."
Patrick is torn between "shut up!" and "fuck you!" and Pete doesn't give him a chance anyway. There is nothing nice about this kiss. Pete licks lewdly at the seam of Patrick's mouth and bites his bottom lip, hard enough to make his eyes sting. The wall is kind of slimy against Patrick's back, but there's nowhere to go. Pete is hemming him in. Patrick can feel the heat of Pete's body through his clothes, can feel Pete's hard on against his thigh. Pete rubs against him, just to make it perfectly clear.
Patrick swallows. "Oh."
"Yeah." Pete's eyes glitter in the half-dark. "I'm so fucking jealous of every second you spend even thinking of anyone who's not me that I could choke on it. I'm jealous of your stupid guitar because it gets to have your hands on it, and I don't. I'm jealous of the fucking air you breathe. But I do know you, Patrick. I know that if I pull any of my stalkery-ass shit with you you'll run the hell away as fast as your little legs can take you. So forgive me if I haven't knifed any of your admirers in the gut lately. Trust me, I've wanted to. But I'm just not that eager to see the back of you."
"You mean--" Patrick stutters stupidly. "You really--"
Pete surges against him, hips, mouth, his hands tangling up in Patrick's t-shirt. Pete's sharp hips drive Patrick more forcefully back against the wall, the heat of his body soaking into Patrick's bones. Pete tastes like beer and salt and vaguely of lip gloss. Each kiss is deep and kind of obscene and leaves Patrick shuddering.
"Told you that you don't know shit." Pete's breath is hot against Patrick's cheek.
"Fucker," Patrick says, without much force.
Pete grins and licks Patrick's neck. It's not the first time he's done that, not by a long shot, but it is the first time he's fucking meant it.
Patrick grabs at Pete's shoulders. "I want--" He can't even put it into words, except maybe everything.
Pete plants a quick, hard kiss on Patrick's mouth and sinks to his knees. Oh, shit. Patrick watches as Pete's quick hands undo his belt, unzip his jeans and push them down.
Pete is going to blow him. Patrick is going to get blown for the first time in his life. He bites his lip, so he doesn't blurt that out. Pete has some ridiculous Lifetime-movie ideas sometimes, and Patrick has no intention of waiting until there are candles and rose petals and Barry White.
Pete looks up at him, his eyes wide and surprisingly serious. He pushes Patrick's t-shirt out of the way and kisses his belly. It tickles a little, and Patrick squirms. Pete grins--Patrick can feel it on his skin--and then he hooks his thumbs in Patrick's underwear. There's a rush of air against Patrick's cock that feels cool despite the weather. He glances down. His cock is hard and wet and dark with blood. Pete stares at it, licking his lips.
"Oh, shit." Patrick digs his fingers into the loose mortar between the bricks.
Pete bends his head and slides his tongue the entire length of Patrick's cock. "Mmm," he says, as if he approves.
Then he sucks Patrick's cock all the way into his mouth. Patrick whimpers, because…fuck, he's only human. He unclenches his hold on the wall and moves his hands to Pete's hair, sifting his fingers through it, rubbing at his scalp. This makes Pete murmur encouragingly, and the sound vibrates along Patrick's dick, sending heat licking up his spine. Patrick's thighs tremble, and his stomach hurts he wants to come so much. He can hardly breathe.
He's been waiting for this for fucking ever, and it's his first time, and it's Pete. There's no way he can last. All he can hope is that he doesn't humiliate himself too badly. Pete takes his cock deep into his throat, and then there goes even that ambition. Patrick thrusts, pure instinct, and Pete doesn't stop him. Patrick curls his hands around Pete's shoulder, gripping hard, probably leaving bruises the shape of his fingers on Pete's skin. His hips stutter, and he bites his lip, and comes and comes in Pete's mouth.
Even afterwards, Patrick is still shaking. He can't help it, and he waits for Pete to make fun of him. Pete looks up at him, his thumbs sliding along Patrick's hipbones, and there's not a hint of teasing in his expression, just something warm and fond and…happy. Patrick blinks. He made Pete look happy.
Patrick tugs Pete to his feet and palms his dick through his jeans. Pete makes a pained, desperate sound. Patrick's hand trembles as he unzips Pete's jeans, pushes them over his hips and curves his palm around Pete's erection. He stares down at the space between their bodies, stares at Pete's cock, and sure, he's seen Pete's cock before, more than once, because "I'd rather be naked" is practically Pete's personal motto. But he's never seen Pete's cock hard and slick and in his hand.
He moves his fist, circles his thumb around the head. Pete groans and buries his face against Patrick's shoulder. Patrick gets bolder, start to do to Pete the things he likes to do to himself. Pete makes these wet, breathy little noises that Patrick can feel, Jesus, as if Pete is the one touching him. Heat curls in his belly, and he thinks he could probably get hard again if Pete goes on sounding like that for much longer.
But then the sounds suddenly break off, and Pete's entire body jerks, and Patrick has sticky warmth all over his fingers. Pete slumps against him, breathing heavily against his neck.
Patrick wraps his arms around Pete's shoulders. "I thought guys were supposed to last longer when they got older."
"Shut up," Pete says, grinning.
Patrick laughs and hugs him tighter. Pete angles his head for another kiss, and there's that look again, soft and happy and like Patrick makes everything better.
They zip up, and Patrick wipes his hand on his jeans. Pete throws an arm over Patrick's shoulder, and they start back inside.
Just outside the door, Patrick stops to make something clear. "This isn't just a crush."
Pete ducks his head "We'll see."
Patrick grabs a handful of his shirt. "Hey."
"Look, you're already my golden ticket. There's only so lucky I deserve to be, you know?"
Patrick hates it when Pete says shit like this, something Pete knows perfectly well.
"Don't be a dick," Patrick tells him.
Pete makes a considering face. "I'm not sure you get to call me that when I've just sucked you off."
"Oh, no," Patrick protests. "That's not going to be one of the rules in this relationship. Because when it comes to being a dick and bringing the awesome sex, I'm pretty sure you can multitask."
Pete's eyes go wide, and he murmurs, "Relationship."
Okay, so Dr. House was right about one thing, at least. Pete can so be had.
Patrick loops his arm around Pete's neck. "Come on. Let's go find the guys."
There's a blast of sound as they come through the door.
Pete yells over it. "Seriously, though. Jealousy?"
"That wasn't my idea!"
Pete makes a questioning face. "What?"
"It was Dr. House!"
Pete shakes his head. The music is more deafening by the second. Pete gives up trying to talk. He takes Patrick's hand and leads him through the crowd.
No one is ever going to believe that his doctor prescribed jealousy anyway, Patrick realizes. And it really doesn't matter.
The important thing is: he's cured.
Fandom: Bandom (with a splash of House)
Pairings/Characters: Pete/Patrick (with a guest cameo by Dr. Gregory House)
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Patrick has to make Pete jealous. Doctor's orders.
Word count: ~9,000
Disclaimer: Not real. Not mine. Never happened.
Author's note: This is for swanswan who gave me the prompts "jealous!Pete" and "earlydays" for the drabble meme thing. Big thanks to linaerys for the beta!
Operation Jealousy
By Lenore
"Get off!" Patrick takes vicious aim at Pete's shin, really fucking glad he's wearing boots.
"Little shit!" Pete yells.
He doesn't let go, though. If anything, his grip tightens on the scruff of Patrick's neck. Andy and Joe hover on either side, apparently ready to hunt Patrick down if he tries to bolt. They hustle him in through the doors marked "Emergency."
"I'm not sick!" Patrick insists for what must be the million-billionth time, not that it's done him any good so far. "There's nothing the fuck wrong with me."
"Oh, there's something wrong with you," Pete begs to differ.
Patrick glares at Andy. "Tell him he's fucked in the head."
"Well," Andy says carefully, as if trying not to hurt Patrick's feeling. "Lately you have been a little--"
"Seriously fucking evil," Pete supplies oh, so helpfully.
Patrick hauls off and kicks him again.
"Dickhead!" Pete's expression darkens murderously. "You're just proving my point!"
"Joe--" Patrick cranes his head, looking for someone who hasn't gone completely insane.
From the shrug he gets, though, it's clear that Trohman isn't going to be any help.
"If this is about me pissing in Joe's duffle--" Patrick starts.
There's a chorus of "gross!" and "when did that happen" and "what the fuck, Patrick?"
"--he totally had it coming. I called the last jelly donut, and the douchebag ate it anyway. And that's just bullshit." He glares at Joe. "Fucking bullshit, man."
"Dude. Just…dude." Joe looks kind of shell-shocked, or possibly just stoned. It's hard to tell the difference.
"Seriously, 'Trick," Pete says. "I mean, you're a fiery little dude, sure, but this is just--" He gives Patrick that look he only gets when he's genuinely worried.
For a moment, Patrick almost feels bad. Almost.
"Can I help you?" a pretty blonde doctor with a stethoscope around her neck asks them.
"Yeah," Andy pipes up, "we're looking for the place you go when you don't have insurance."
The corner of the doctor's mouth twitches. "That would be the clinic. Down the hall and to the right."
"Hey, thanks." Pete flashes an extra bright smile, showing off his big, stupid teeth.
Patrick manages to wait for the pretty doctor to turn around before jabbing an elbow into Pete's ribs, but it's a close thing. Pete lets out a big, pained "oof," mostly put on, Patrick feels sure. This is Pete. Patrick makes a mental list of things to do when he gets the hell out of here. It includes, in no particular order: replacing Pete's shampoo with Nair, scrawling "Pete Wentz has a tiny little pea dick" on as many venue bathroom walls as he can possibly deface, and dying all of Pete's hoodies a hideous Barbie pink. Although maybe not that last thing, since there's a fifty-fifty chance Pete might actually enjoy it.
Pete pushes Patrick in the direction of the clinic. "Seriously? If the doctor doesn't fix you, I'm drowning you in the next motel bathtub."
At the reception desk, Pete does the talking, "Our friend needs to see someone. Like, in the worst possible way."
The nurse turns a concerned glance on Patrick. "What seems to be the problem?"
"Nothing!" Patrick insists.
"We have no clue," Pete talks over him. "But it's something really…bad."
The nurse eyes Patrick warily and hands a clipboard to Pete. "Here. Fill this out, bring it back when you're finished. You can have a seat over there. Someone will be with you."
Pete drags Patrick over to an empty chair, pushes him onto it, and settles beside him.
Patrick pops back up. "This is stupid. When you're done being a melodramatic freak, I'll be in the van."
Pete grabs his arm and yanks him back down. "Dude. Seriously. It's this or an exorcism. And that shit isn't pretty."
Patrick stubs his toe at the floor, and the sole of his boot makes a satisfyingly annoying squeak against the linoleum. He does it some more, falls into a rhythm, a rubbery rendition of "Stairway to Heaven."
"Do we really need a singer?" Andy wonders aloud.
Patrick ratchets up the volume, really throwing himself into the squeaky chorus.
Pete snatches Patrick's hat and thwacks him on the head with it, and okay, that's just war. Patrick lunges, and Pete has never in his life had the sense to back down from a fight. Suddenly they're scuffling around on the floor. People stop and stare, and Joe hauls them up by their collars.
"We're totally going to get kicked out of here."
Patrick settles huffily onto his chair, shoving his hat down over his eyes. "That would be the best fucking thing that's happened to me all day."
"Dude," Pete says with exasperation, "what part of exorcism do you not understand?"
Pete takes the clipboard to the nurse and comes back. Patrick slumps forward, elbows on his knees, chin in his hands. He stares sullenly at the floor. It's not long before Pete starts to squirm. If there's one thing absolutely guaranteed to drive Pete insane, it's silence. Patrick smiles a mean little smile.
"Hey, um, you want some gum?" Pete holds out a pack of Big Red, which Patrick has only told him, like, a million times he hates.
He ignores Pete.
"This is for your own good, you know," Pete resorts to sounding like Patrick's mother.
Patrick doesn't answer, not even to point out how incredibly lame Pete is.
Pete sighs. "I really fucking hate you right now."
Not as much as I hate you, Patrick would say, if he were actually talking to Pete.
They sit there forever. Joe makes three trips to the gift shop for snacks and one trip to the bathroom. He comes back smelling faintly of smoke. Andy spouts conspiracy theories about HMOs and the CIA, and Patrick starts to reconsider his vow of silence as the impulse to shout "shut the fuck up" grows increasingly urgent.
At last, a man in a white coat, leaning on a cane, comes hobbling over.
"I'm Dr. House. Which one of you is--" He glances down at the clipboard in his hand. "Patrick Stump?"
"He is!" Pete leaps up, grabbing Patrick by the arm, pulling him to his feet. "He's got a brain tumor, we think."
"Or a personality disorder," Andy interjects.
Patrick flips him off.
"Possibly he's possessed," Joe offers up.
Pete pushes Patrick toward the doctor. "Fix him. Please."
"Oh, sure. Because this isn't going to be a big waste of four years of medical school," Dr. House says with a roll of his eyes.
He starts to walk away, and Pete prods Patrick to follow. Patrick draws his arm back to take a swing. Whoever said violence isn't the answer never met Pete.
"You're totally missing a symptom here!" Pete calls after the doctor.
Patrick sighs and trudges off to the exam room. The sooner he gets this over with the better, and he can always beat Pete senseless later.
Dr. House closes the door, nods Patrick to the exam table. "So, it says here that you've had a sudden change in personality and that you've turned evil. That's a technical term, I'm assuming." He turns a questioning look on Patrick.
"Pete filled out the form," Patrick says darkly.
"He's your--" the doctor prompts.
"Bandmate," Patrick mutters, like it's a bad word.
"I'm going to pretend you said legal guardian, since you're sixteen, and technically I'm not supposed to examine you without some kind of permission." He sits down on a stool and wheels over. He narrows his eyes, and Patrick starts to squirm.
"Let me guess," the doctor says finally. "You're the drummer."
Patrick shakes his head. "Well, I mean, yeah. I do play drums. Was going to until-- Pete. He thought. Now I sing."
Dr. House crosses his arms over his chest. "Let's hear it."
Patrick scrunches up his forehead. "What?"
"Your singing," Dr. House says loudly, punctuating each word. "¿Hablas inglés?"
"I don't know what to--" he stammers. "How is this relevant?"
Dr. House gives him a mock stern look. "Who here went to medical school? That immortal classic 'Dancing Queen.' Go."
"Um--"
Dr. House snaps his fingers in Patrick's face. "Busy man. Things to do."
Patrick sighs. It would be just his luck to get a doctor who is possibly more dementedly persistent than Pete. He swallows hard, his mouth stupidly dry, and he launches into, Friday night and the lights are low, looking out for the place to go, where they play the right music, getting in the swing, you come in to look for a king. His voice comes out scratchy, and the heat rushes to his face.
The doctor has the kind of expression that Patrick has to come to recognize as a sign that the audience is about to start throwing things. He clears his throat and starts to drum on his thigh, giving it more of a Motown beat. He sings out stronger, and it's better now. Everything is with a gloss of Motown on it. Patrick starts to get into it, the ABBA-ness of it notwithstanding, and it occurs to him that here's a reason why he really shouldn't murder Pete. Because Patrick never would have started singing if it weren't for him, and as freaky-scary as it can be sometimes, he really kind of likes it.
Patrick expects Dr. House to cut him off at any moment, but he doesn't. Patrick sings both verses and the chorus twice. He trails off on the last line.
"Um. So," he mumbles, staring down at his hands twisting in his lap.
"Well, you don't completely suck, which would not have been my first guess." Dr. House gives Patrick a more interested look. "If you hate your band, there are simpler ways to get rid of them than making them think your head is about to spin around and you're going to projectile hurl pea soup."
"I don't hate them," Patrick says with a sigh. "They're my friends. Pete's my best friend. It's just we're on our first tour--"
Dr. House holds up a hand. "If this is about bad touching in some dive bar bathroom, I'm going to need to go get someone else. Dr. Cameron is much better at giving a crap than I am."
"Please," Patrick snorts. "If there'd been any touching, I wouldn't be so--"
He stutters to a stop. He can't believe he's actually discussing his sex life, or lack thereof, with the doctor who has the world's worst bedside manner. Once again, he blames Pete.
Dr. House glances at the door and then back at Patrick. "Ah, so that's the problem. Mr. Look-at-me-and-my-emo-hair."
Patrick blushes fiercely. "How did you--"
"He's the ringleader of this little intervention. Which means he's probably been taking the brunt of your pissiness. Which means he's the source of the frustration."
"You have no idea what it's like to be stuck in a van with him twelve hours a day."
"Probably a good reason not to have signed on for it in the first place."
"I didn't know!" Patrick insists loudly. "I didn't figure it out until-- And now it's too late. And he's driving me fucking crazy! He hangs all over me on stage. And uses me as a human pillow while we're driving. And has had sex with pretty much everyone in five states except for me, and that--"
He has no words to express just how much that sucks.
Dr. House gives him an appraising look. "So you thought if you had to be miserable, then everyone should be."
"Well--" It sounds kind of shitty when you put it that way.
"Not that I'm criticizing," Dr. House assures him. "It's a strategy I have a lot of personal fondness for. But maybe I can prescribe something that will be less likely to get you pushed out of a van doing eighty miles an hour."
He wheels over to the supply cabinet, scrawls something on a pad, and grabs stuff out of a drawer. He wheels back over, hands Patrick a prescription, and pushes a handful of condoms and sample sizes of lube at him. This answers the question: Can a person actually die of embarrassment? Sadly, the answer is no.
Patrick does his best to ignore the sex supplies he's holding and focuses on the prescription. "It says--" He frowns, confused.
"Jealousy," Dr. House tells him.
Patrick blinks. "Um. You mean--"
"Short, dark and impulsive out there can be had. Oh sure, he may have some feeble chivalry where your virtue's concerned, but he's not going to stand around and let somebody else do the deflowering."
Patrick blushes so hard he's kind of surprised he doesn't pass out.
"Um--"
"If you keep hanging around here, I'm going to assume you have questions. Didn't your parents give you that talk already?"
"No! No questions!" Patrick jumps down from the exam table and flees.
A few steps outside of the room, he realizes he's holding a handful of stuff that practically screams, "Hey, I'm all set to have gay sex with my best friend." He shoves the condoms and lube packets into his jacket pocket.
"Patrick!" Pete leaps to his feet when he sees him.
Patrick has a pocketful of sex supplies. Maybe he is going to die of embarrassment after all.
Pete eyes him with concern. "Are you okay? What did the doc say? Are we going to have to make a stop at the local occult store for some chicken bones and powdered lizard guts?"
Dr. House comes thumping over. "I've got good news and bad news."
He doesn't seem the type to care about doctor-patient confidentiality, and Patrick's only hope is that the hospital will fall down around them. Do they have many earthquakes in New Jersey?
Pete turns a sickly shade of gray. "He's got a tumor, but you can operate."
"He's possessed, but you know a good exorcist," Joe guesses.
"Nope," Dr. House declares. "He's a teenager. A completely curable condition, although it will take several years for it to clear up. Four of them, to be exact."
"No brain tumor?" Pete sounds almost disappointed.
Dr. House raises an eyebrow and asks Patrick, "Him? Seriously?"
Patrick shrugs. It's not like he can explain this thing he has for Pete.
"So," Andy says slowly. "What you're saying is that we just have put up with him."
"Yep." Dr. House smiles ironically. "Good luck with that."
He heads off, leaving Pete, Andy and Joe to exchange "what the fuck do we do now"-type glances.
Finally, Pete puts a hand on Patrick's shoulder. "You're really okay?"
"I'm really okay," Patrick insists.
"Okay then," Pete says.
"Okay?" Andy's voice rises a little hysterically. "That's it?"
Pete shrugs. "You heard the doc. He's going to grow out of it."
"In four years," Joe reminds him.
Pete slings his arm around Patrick's shoulders and starts walking him toward the exit. "Just try not to make us kill you before then."
This close, Pete smells like Doritos and the fake chemical-tinged cinnamon of his gum, like warm body and unwashed clothes. There's no reason why it should smell good. There's absolutely no reason why Patrick should want to press his face into Pete's neck and breathe in like he's been oxygen-deprived for the better part of his life. He really is the most ridiculous sap ever.
"I'll see what I can do," Patrick says faintly.
He's not making any promises.
Pete grins. "That's my Lunchbox." He plants a big, smacking kiss on the side of Patrick's face and whispers in his ear, "You're still my favorite. Just don't tell the other guys. They'll get all jealous and shit."
"We can hear you," Andy singsongs.
Pete laughs and unhooks his arm from Patrick's shoulders and scrambles into the van. Patrick follows, and Pete sprawls all over him, back to his old tricks now that Patrick is doctor-certified tumor- and demon-free.
Patrick fingers the prescription in his pocket. Jealousy. Hmm.
***
Two days later, they play a tiny, oppressively hot little outpost of hell, with broken air conditioning and carpet on the walls, in some rusted-out town in Pennsylvania. Patrick never catches the name. Their set goes okay. A few kids with blue hair and nose rings crowd close to the stage, although Patrick suspects it's as much out of habit as any serious thing for their music. No one seems especially blown away by them, but then, if Patrick lived in a town like this, he's not sure how much enthusiasm he'd have for…well, much of anything.
They finish up. Patrick makes a beeline for the bar and asks for water. The bartender takes one look at him, sweaty and no doubt red-faced, and she lines up three large beer mugs with water in front of him. Patrick is gulping them down one after another when he hears a soft, "Hey."
He turns around, and there's a girl standing there. She's cute: short dark hair, big dark eyes, cheekbones sharp enough to cut. Actually, she reminds him a little of Pete. Patrick's face goes instantly hot at the thought, and he can't meet her eyes.
"Um, hey," he says feebly.
His lameness doesn't seem to deter her any, and Patrick always appreciates that in a person.
She smiles. "So, you guys were really good tonight."
Patrick ducks his head. "Oh. Um. Thanks. I mean, we were a little off in a few places--"
He stops himself. Just say thank you, Patrick. No one wants to hear your perfectionist's play-by-play. This is what Pete is always telling him.
"So. Yeah. Thanks," he says again, probably sounding stupid.
"I'm Tina," the girl offers.
"Patrick." He toys with the hem of his t-shirt. "So."
"So," Tina says hopefully.
Patrick would really like someone to tell him that talking to girls gets easier someday, although he's not sure he'd believe it. "Um, do you live nearby?"
Tina nods. "You know, until I can get out of here."
"Oh. Um. Yeah." Wait. Did he just diss this girl's hometown? "I mean-- Not that I think--"
Pete comes hurtling through the crowd, interrupting Patrick's pathetic babbling by slamming into him, knocking him into Tina. Patrick glares. Pete doesn't seem to notice. Or possibly he just doesn't care. "Hey, dude. We're going to this all-night diner some kid told us about for waffles."
"Dizzy's," Tina supplies. "It's where people around here go."
"Yeah, yeah. That's the one." Pete flashes his patented god's-gift-to-women smile at her, and then elbows Patrick. "Andy says if you're not ready to go in fifteen minutes he's leaving you."
Patrick darts a sideways glance at Tina. "So. Um. Waffles?"
Tina's face lights up. "That'd be cool. I can drive you. I've got my car."
"I'll see you there," Patrick tells Pete.
Pete shrugs. "Okay, dude." He starts back through the crowd, then turns around and flashes what would be a sleazy grin if it were a little less dorky. "Don't do anything I wouldn't."
Operation Jealousy is clearly off to a flying start.
Dizzy's is the real diner deal, slightly rundown, but with black-and-white checked tile, red leatherette booths, and a jukebox that plays actual records. They claim the big table near the back. Patrick ends up next to Pete, with Tina next to him. The waitress, who has hair the color of bubble gum, comes over to take their order. Pete folds his napkin into a triangle and starts to play table football with Joe.
Patrick smiles at Tina nervously. She leans in a little closer.
"So, have you guys been playing together long?" she asks.
He shakes his head. "Well--I mean. A little less than a year. That's not really that long."
Tina nods, and Patrick knows it's his turn to say something now. "So…" He searches around and comes up with this little bit of conversational dynamite, "You're in high school?"
"Yeah, it's super lame," Tina says. "But at least I'm a junior, so it's not for too much longer, you know?"
"Yeah."
Beside him, Pete twists in his seat, shouting at Joe, "Take that, bitch! I told you I had mad skillz."
Patrick sighs and turns back to Tina. She's got that hopeful smile again.
"Um. So. Do you go hear a lot of music?"
She shrugs. "You know."
"Yeah."
The bubble-gum-haired waitress mercifully shows up with their waffles. Patrick isn't sure he's ever been so happy to see anyone in his life. They start to eat, stopping occasionally to smile awkwardly at each other. This whole making-Pete-jealous thing has complications Patrick really hadn't anticipated.
At last, Pete taps Patrick on the shoulder. Finally. Patrick has seen Pete's jealous look aimed at…well, pretty much every girlfriend Pete has ever had. Patrick turns, hoping to be on the receiving end of it now, but instead it's Pete's "I've got an obnoxious request but I'm cute" look. Patrick gets that one a lot.
"Hey, you gonna eat that?" He eyes Patrick's plate proprietarily.
Patrick sighs.
Naturally Pete interrupts this to mean "no." He snatches half a waffle and the rest of Patrick's bacon. Then goes back to his stupid game.
Patrick turns to Tina, a little dejectedly. "Hey, you want to--"
He was going to suggest they go check out the jukebox, but the way she's staring at him, with big blink-blink eyes, makes the words stick in his mouth.
She leans closer and slides her hand up his thigh. "You guys aren't heading out tonight, are you?"
"Um."
"'Cause we could go to my house and sneak into the basement. My folks never go down there." Her breath puffs hotly against his ear. "There's a really comfortable couch."
"Touchdown, you fucker!" Pete waves his arms wildly, not paying the least attention.
Under the table, Tina's hand is getting frisky.
"Um!" Patrick's voice comes out a high-pitched squeak.
***
It takes a week for Patrick to work up the nerve to try again. In the meantime, he makes up a list of rules for Operation Jealousy:
1. Pick guys
(He figures it's possible that Pete has some kind of separate categories going on in his head. Sex with guys is not the same thing as, oh, say, sex with your girlfriend. This is Pete, after all. He's going to adopt a philosophy that means he gets to have the most sex possible.)
2. Keep it casual
(He keeps remembering the way Tina's face fell when he gave her a quick kiss in the diner parking lot and hopped into the van. Patrick wants to make Pete jealous. He doesn't want to be a douchebag. So. No awkward attempts at getting to know one another. Just making out, plain and simple.)
3. Three strikes and this jealousy plan is out
(There's only so much humiliation Patrick can take, and if he doesn't get Pete's attention soon, he's going to forget Dr. House's stupid prescription and sell his bandmates on eBay or something. Evil is a perfectly acceptable lifestyle.)
Tonight, the club they're playing is packed. Everyone is clearly in the mood for a good time, and energy radiates off the crowd. They take the stage, and Pete grins at Patrick. Joe bounces on his toes. They launch into the first song, and the kids in the mosh pit start hurling themselves around. Patrick forgets to be nervous. All that exists is the music, and he plays and sings until his throat hurts. He's glowing with sweat, and there's so much adrenaline pumping through him he feels like nothing can touch him and nothing will ever be better than this.
"Fuck, yeah!" Pete grabs Patrick in an enthusiastic headlock when they come off stage.
They chug some water and mop off the sweat and put their gear away. They don't have to be on the road for another few hours, so Patrick makes his way to the bar, in the mood for something more than water tonight. He throws a hopeful glance in the bartender's direction. The bartender pointedly ignores him.
"Hey, let me get you a beer."
Patrick looks, and there's a guy sitting next to him. He's older. Maybe in his thirties? Patrick is shitty at guessing ages. The guy's not bad-looking: blond and tan, in jeans and a Green Day T-shirt, a piercing in his lip that he's maybe a little too old for, but, hey, Patrick is trying to make his best friend jealous, so who is he to judge?
The guy waves down the bartender. "Two Coronas."
The bartender narrows his eyes at Patrick, who does his best to look like he's all grown up now, although probably that just makes him look like a budding serial killer. The bartender thumps down two bottles in front of the pierced older guy and gives Patrick a look like, I've got my eye on you, kid.
"Here's to a really great show." The guy lifts his beer, and they clink bottles. Patrick takes a sip, then a gulp. He figures he'll need it.
"So," the guy says. Patrick braces himself for more awkward conversation, but the guy gets right to the point. "You here with anybody?"
Patrick starts to say he's here with his bandmates, but duh. That's so not the point of the question. "Oh. Um. No. You know. Um. Not yet."
Smooth. Very smooth. He knows he must be blushing. He curses his fair-skinned ancestry yet again.
The guy doesn't seem to mind, though. "Cool." He leans in closer. "You like this band?" He touches the logo on Patrick's 504 Plan shirt, touches Patrick's chest, letting his hand linger there.
It's not just Patrick's face that feels hot now, and he has to resist the urge to squirm. "Yeah. I, uh-- Yeah. Um. What about you?"
"Cool. Very cool." But he's staring at Patrick, at Patrick's mouth specifically, and it doesn't seem like they're talking about music anymore.
"You, um--" Patrick stammers, not sure what to do now. Pete always makes this look so easy. It's really, really not.
The guy has ideas about how to proceed, thankfully. He slides his hand along Patrick's jaw and leans closer. Patrick feels breath against his mouth, and then the guy's lips are on his, the guy's tongue in his mouth. They kiss until Patrick is starting to feel dizzy. The guy pulls back and starts sucking on Patrick's neck.
"You want to go outside?" The words vibrate against Patrick's skin.
In case maybe Patrick isn't completely clear what he means, the guy takes Patrick's hand and guides it to his crotch. He's hard and hot through the fabric of his jeans.
Patrick's stomach does a vertical leap. "Um."
The guy bites Patrick's ear lobe. "Come on, baby. It'll be so good."
Patrick tangles his hands anxiously in the hem of his T-shirt. Pete is nowhere to be seen, probably off picking up some pixyish scene girl who has a thing for tattooed bassists. There are only about a billion of them in the world. Patrick frantically sorts through his options. If he goes outside with this guy but doesn't want to have sex, does that make him a cock tease? Then again, maybe he does want to have sex? Why is that even a question? Because he's saving himself for Pete? Is he really that pathetic?
At some point doing his anxiety-ridden inner monologue, Pete has materialized and is now lounging against the bar on the other side of the pierced older guy.
"Hey."
It's Pete's playing-it-cool voice, which means that "hey" isn't meant for Patrick.
The guy turns his head and his eyes bug out, as eyes tend to do around Pete. He's looking especially good tonight, wearing one of his skimpiest, tightest shirts, his jeans hanging off his hipbones, showing off a very tempting stripe of inked skin. Pete's eyeliner is smudged in a way that suggests he just crawled out of bed after a long night of sex. His pretty mouth glistens, probably because he's wearing lip gloss again, something Patrick mocks him mercilessly for to his face and then thinks about guiltily while he's jerking off.
"Nice." Pete brushes his finger over the guy's lip piercing.
That's it right there, all it takes, although Pete does spend a few more minutes turning on the charm and flashing big, toothy smiles. The older guy is so mesmerized he's probably forgotten Patrick even exists. Finally, Pete leans close, whispers in the guy's ear, and nods toward the door.
"Yeah, yeah." The guy licks his lips.
He slides off the barstool, takes off for the exit and looks back at least three times to smile at Pete. As predicated, there's not even a glance in Patrick's direction.
"Dude, you don't mind, right?" Pete takes Patrick's beer and finishes it in a big, noisy gulp. "I mean, you weren't in to him or anything, were you?"
All Patrick can do is stare.
Pete apparently takes this to mean, sure, fine, no problem. He slaps Patrick on the back. "Cool, dude. Don't wait up." He winks and then goes off to have sex with the guy Patrick was supposed to be using to make him jealous.
This plan is going so well.
Fuck. Pete even drank his beer. Patrick catches the bartender's eye and gives him a hopeful little smile.
The bartender shakes his head. "Forget it, kid."
Patrick sighs, thumps off the barstool and sulkily pushes his way through the crowd. He may as well go start packing up their stuff. It's not like he has anything better to do.
They're supposed to leave at two a.m. on the dot. Andy even made them synchronize their watches, although none of them actually has a watch. Patrick absolutely expects that Pete will show up late, straggling in just about the time Andy starts wondering aloud how much do we really need a bassist anyway? Pete has a sixth sense that way. He'll come thumping into the van, with that big, stupid grin and sex-messed hair, and Patrick will hate his life, Pete Wentz and the universe, not necessarily in that order.
So imagine Patrick's surprise when Pete actually turns up early, in time to help load up the van.
"Um." Patrick stutters to a stop, guitar case in hand. "What about that-- I thought you were--"
"Hey, I don't kiss and tell, Pattycakes. I'm just not that kind of guy." He winks.
Patrick feels like there's something in his stomach that's trying to claw its way out. And that's just great. He's jealous. That is so not how this was supposed to go.
They pile into the van. It's Joe's turn to drive. Patrick heads for the back seat, hoping that Pete will call shotgun. He doesn't, because that's just the way Patrick's suck-ass life goes these days. Pete makes a beeline for the back, thumps down onto the seat, bouncing a little, and swings his legs up, draping them over Patrick's lap. He's humming "Oops!…I Did It Again" tunelessly under his breath. Apparently, Patrick doesn't actually need to die to be in hell.
Andy comes to a stop at a light. Pete flicks Patrick on the chin, just to be annoying, because he's…well, Pete. There's a flood of light from the Exxon station on the corner, and Patrick notices scrapes on Pete's knuckles. He snatches Pete's hand and pulls it closer to examine it. It looks like he's been in a fistfight. Patrick should know. He's seen it often enough.
"Did you punch that guy?" he asks disbelievingly.
Pete waggles his eyebrows. "Dude, I can give you the blow-by-blow of everything that went down if you're really that kinky--"
"No!" Joe shouts, like a man who's afraid his brain is about to bleed out his ears.
"I'm pretty sure nobody is that kinky," Andy adds.
Pete settles his head on Patrick's shoulder. "Sorry, Lunchbox. Looks like you got outvoted."
He goes back to singing Britney songs--or screeching really would be more descriptive. Patrick would punch him if he weren't so busy mulling over those scraped knuckles. If he weren't starting to think that maybe Operation Jealousy was working after all.
***
Two nights later, they're in some tiny town in Indiana called Sandbar, playing at a bar off the Interstate, to an unlikely crowd of goth kids and long-haul truckers. They've been booked to open for Rough Ammo, another band from Chicago. Patrick knows a few of the guys, not all that well, but enough that it inspires the next step in Operation Jealousy. He has to get Pete to actually see him making out with someone if this stupid plan has any hope of success. So far, leaving that to chance hasn't worked out too well.
Of the guys in Rough Ammo, one has a girlfriend, one Patrick has never actually met, one kind of scares him, and that leaves Carlyle Firth, the guitarist. Carlyle goes to some tiny little college that Patrick can never remember, has a fountain of curly blond hair, and wears these little rectangular blue-tinted glasses that make him look vaguely like John Lennon. In short, he's hot, and Patrick has caught Carlyle giving him the once-over a time or two. He figures if anyone is going to agree to help him then Carlyle is his best bet.
Patrick is kind of distracted while they're playing. He messes up the bridge on the second song, and Pete squints at him, as if to say, you okay, dude? And no, actually Patrick is freaking out. Finally, they finish their set. Patrick mops up a little backstage, not that he imagines Carlyle has a policy against making out with sweaty guys or anything, but just in case. He goes to watch Rough Ammo play and waits impatiently in the crowd for the band to come out after they're done.
As soon as Patrick spots Carlyle, he makes a beeline for him, before he can lose his nerve. "Um, hey, man."
"Patrick Stump!" Carlyle wraps him in a big bear hug, thumping him on the back. "Good to see you, dude. How's the tour going? I hope you been playing better places than this."
"Yeah. Not so much. Um. Carlyle?"
He pulls him off to the side where no one else will hear.
"There's kind of this thing...that I was wondering--" Talking isn't Patrick's happy place, like, ever, and asking for the most humiliating favor in the history of the world doesn't make him any better with words. He might even be developing a stutter. "I'm kind of-- you know, desperate? And I thought, like, you won't punch me for asking? Well, probably not. So--" He runs out of breath.
"Dude." Carlyle puts on his serious face. Patrick isn't sure he's ever seen that before. "Stop freaking and spill it."
"Okay, okay."
Patrick takes a breath. He can't believe he's really doing this. Dr. House probably isn't even an actual M.D., and Patrick is a total tool for following his advice.
Nevertheless, he blurts out. "I'm trying to get somebody's attention, and I was wondering if you'd make out with me, you know, not for real, just to make him jealous, not that you're not, because you really, really are, um, what was my point, oh, yeah, so Pe--um, this guy, he doesn't get it, and it's been driving me crazy, which has made me, you know, maybe a teeny tiny little bit hard to be around, and I really don't want to be dragged to the exorcist."
Carlyle just blinks for a moment, and Patrick doesn't think this a particularly good sign. Apparently, though, the guy just needs a moment to catch up, because his face lights up in a eureka way. "Oh, you want me to help you make your guy jealous." He breaks into a grin. "That is so cute." His eyes travel up and down Patrick's body. "Plus, you're cute. So, yeah, I will make out with you, Patrick Stump, in the cause of true love."
Patrick suspects that even his toes are blushing, but he hastily babbles, "Thank you-- really. Can you wait here? I'll be back in, like, a minute?"
He dashes off to find Pete, who is lounging at the bar. He's talking up a boy with blue hair, flashing a big, white smile about every three seconds. It's the overly toothy grin that Pete uses for hook ups, not the easy, natural smile that he saves for his friends, definitely not the fond, "how do you even exist" smile that belongs only to Patrick.
Patrick kind of hates the blue-haired kid anyway. He grabs Pete's arm and spins him around.
"What the fuck--" Pete's pissy glare disappears when he sees that it's Patrick who's manhandling him. "Dude. Where you been?" Then he frowns. "Wait. This isn't, like, a relapse, is it? You're not about to set me on fire or something, are you?" He leans back warily.
"No," Patrick tells him. "I just need you to meet me outside in five minutes, okay?"
Pete scrunches up his forehead. "Why--"
"How many things do I ask you to do for me?" Patrick gives him a hard look that implies and how many millions of things do you talk me into doing for you in the average day? "So are you going to meet me outside or not?"
Pete holds up his hands, his eyes a little wide. "Okay, okay, dude. Don't get an aneurysm about it."
Patrick gives him one last glare, just for good measure, and then battles his way back through the crowd. He finds Carlyle leaning against the wall near the door, waiting.
"Oh, hey. Uh, you want to--" Go outside and pretend to make out? There are times when Patrick really has to wonder if even Pete is worth all this humiliation.
Carlyle gins. "Let's go to it, Jellybean."
He leads the way out into the alley and heads for a shadowy corner, as if he does this sneaking off to have furtive sex thing all the time, which he totally probably does, because he seems to have an actual, you know, strategy all worked out for it.
Patrick stalls beneath a streetlight. "Could we, uh--"
"Oh, right." Carlyle grins. "You want to get caught in the act. That's not usually what I'm going for."
He saunters over, and Patrick's stomach acts like he's on a roller coaster. He rubs his hands on his jeans, trying not to be too obvious about it. God, his palms are clammy. Carlyle is watching him, eyebrow arched, his lips curved up with just a hint of amusement. And the thing is: Carlyle really is hot, and he's going to make out with Patrick, and the fact that it's all to make Pete jealous doesn't change the fact that they're totally going to make out.
"So--" Patrick aims for smooth, suave if he can pull it off. It comes out squeaky.
"So." Carlyle smiles, but it doesn't seem to be the wow, how are you this retarded kind of smile, so that's something at least. "I think it's supposed to go like this."
He frames Patrick's face between his hands and moves in, closer, closer. Patrick's eyes cross and finally flutter shut. Carlyle presses their mouths together, and it's warm and soft and kind of nice. Patrick settles a hand gingerly on Carlyle's shoulder, not sure exactly what's allowed and what's not. Pretending to make out is even more of a guessing game than actually making out.
Carlyle makes an encouraging little noise and licks at Patrick's bottom lip as if asking permission. Patrick parts his lips, and then he has Carlyle's tongue in his mouth, stroking against his and getting to know his teeth. He shivers and presses closer, an instinct, one Carlyle seems to appreciate. He runs his hands up Patrick's back, tightens his grip on Patrick's shoulders. The air is August-hot, and every breath is liquid. Patrick's skin swelters everywhere their bodies are plastered together.
A few things occur to him at once: 1) if he ever thought that he wasn't into guys so much as just really into Pete, then he'd been wrong, wrong, so very wrong; 2) if Pete doesn't show up soon, Patrick is liable to start humping Carlyle's leg, a potential mortifying development; and 3) Patrick really should have thought of #2 much, much sooner. It has to have been longer than five minutes, and Patrick tells himself that Pete is going to show any moment. Any moment. Any fucking moment now!
Yeah. Not so much.
Patrick pulls away at last, panting embarrassingly loudly. When he can breathe enough, he says, "Pete is such a dick. I'm going to--" He waves his hand vaguely toward the door.
"Okay, cute stuff. But if you change your mind, you come and find me." Carlyle winks.
Patrick stares a moment, because a really hot guy in a band that's way better than his is actually willing to sleep with him. Somehow his answer to this is to make vaguely apologetic noises and rush back inside to find his stupid best friend who can't follow simple instructions. That really pisses him the fuck off. At Pete. He doesn't care if it's fair or not. Blaming Pete is far more satisfying than blaming himself.
He elbows his way over to the bar, where Pete is still flirting with the blue-haired boy. Patrick hauls off and punches him on the arm as hard as he can.
Pete jumps with surprise, nearly toppling off the stool. "What the fuck, Patrick?"
"You're a dick," Patrick informs him.
Pete's expression goes even more cartoon-like than usual, all big, wide eyes and slack-jawed surprise. "I repeat: what the fuck?"
Patrick's palm actually itches, that's how much he wants to hit Pete again. "Dude, you were going to meet me outside, remember?"
"I saw you with Carlyle. So." Pete shrugs. "I figured you guys were geeking out about music or something. Don't take this the wrong way, dude, but if I have to hear how Robert Smith is the under-appreciated voice of a generation one more time--"
"Fuck you! People don’t sneak out into the alley to talk about The Cure. They do it to have sex!"
There's a flash of something in Pete's eyes, something that reminds Patrick of the look Pete gets when somebody takes his favorite hoodie, a knife-sharp mix of outrage and murderous intent. It's gone in a split second, and then Patrick's not even sure he saw it at all, especially when Pete waggles his eyebrows and says, "Way to go, super stud!"
"Shithead!" Patrick slugs Pete again. He doesn't care if there is an exorcism in his future.
"Okay, asshole, stop it!" Pete's mouth goes tight and flat, which means he's starting to get mad for real. "You're supposed to be fucking cured!"
"You're supposed to be jealous!" Patrick blurts out.
Patrick can practically see the gears in Pete's brain lurch to a stop. "Wait." He blinks. "What?"
Patrick waits for the ground to open up beneath his feet, but the floorboards remain stubbornly solid. Where is a massive structural failure when you really need one, he thinks bitterly.
"You heard me," he says at last, kind of defeated.
Operation Jealousy has worn him the hell out.
"For fuck's sake, Patrick," Pete says, with an exasperated huff.
He slides off the barstool and takes Patrick by the arm and starts dragging him toward the rear exit. If he's going to act like Patrick having a thing for him is some big imposition, then Patrick is seriously going to have to kill him.
Outside, Pete crowds him up against the brick wall. "Dude, is this why you've been acting like a pissy little bitch ever since we left Chicago?"
Being called a pissy little bitch makes Patrick feel compelled to act like one. He shoves Pete, really putting his back into it. "Fuck you!"
Pete grabs Patrick's wrists. "Did it ever occur to you just to tell me?"
"Why would I?" Patrick shoots back. "When you can't be assed to care if I fuck everyone I meet in every bar in...everywhere? I know you, Pete. I know what that means."
Pete gives him this measuring look, which is really fucking annoying. "I usually think you're a pretty smart guy, Patrick, but about this, what we're talking about right now? You don't know shit."
Patrick is torn between "shut up!" and "fuck you!" and Pete doesn't give him a chance anyway. There is nothing nice about this kiss. Pete licks lewdly at the seam of Patrick's mouth and bites his bottom lip, hard enough to make his eyes sting. The wall is kind of slimy against Patrick's back, but there's nowhere to go. Pete is hemming him in. Patrick can feel the heat of Pete's body through his clothes, can feel Pete's hard on against his thigh. Pete rubs against him, just to make it perfectly clear.
Patrick swallows. "Oh."
"Yeah." Pete's eyes glitter in the half-dark. "I'm so fucking jealous of every second you spend even thinking of anyone who's not me that I could choke on it. I'm jealous of your stupid guitar because it gets to have your hands on it, and I don't. I'm jealous of the fucking air you breathe. But I do know you, Patrick. I know that if I pull any of my stalkery-ass shit with you you'll run the hell away as fast as your little legs can take you. So forgive me if I haven't knifed any of your admirers in the gut lately. Trust me, I've wanted to. But I'm just not that eager to see the back of you."
"You mean--" Patrick stutters stupidly. "You really--"
Pete surges against him, hips, mouth, his hands tangling up in Patrick's t-shirt. Pete's sharp hips drive Patrick more forcefully back against the wall, the heat of his body soaking into Patrick's bones. Pete tastes like beer and salt and vaguely of lip gloss. Each kiss is deep and kind of obscene and leaves Patrick shuddering.
"Told you that you don't know shit." Pete's breath is hot against Patrick's cheek.
"Fucker," Patrick says, without much force.
Pete grins and licks Patrick's neck. It's not the first time he's done that, not by a long shot, but it is the first time he's fucking meant it.
Patrick grabs at Pete's shoulders. "I want--" He can't even put it into words, except maybe everything.
Pete plants a quick, hard kiss on Patrick's mouth and sinks to his knees. Oh, shit. Patrick watches as Pete's quick hands undo his belt, unzip his jeans and push them down.
Pete is going to blow him. Patrick is going to get blown for the first time in his life. He bites his lip, so he doesn't blurt that out. Pete has some ridiculous Lifetime-movie ideas sometimes, and Patrick has no intention of waiting until there are candles and rose petals and Barry White.
Pete looks up at him, his eyes wide and surprisingly serious. He pushes Patrick's t-shirt out of the way and kisses his belly. It tickles a little, and Patrick squirms. Pete grins--Patrick can feel it on his skin--and then he hooks his thumbs in Patrick's underwear. There's a rush of air against Patrick's cock that feels cool despite the weather. He glances down. His cock is hard and wet and dark with blood. Pete stares at it, licking his lips.
"Oh, shit." Patrick digs his fingers into the loose mortar between the bricks.
Pete bends his head and slides his tongue the entire length of Patrick's cock. "Mmm," he says, as if he approves.
Then he sucks Patrick's cock all the way into his mouth. Patrick whimpers, because…fuck, he's only human. He unclenches his hold on the wall and moves his hands to Pete's hair, sifting his fingers through it, rubbing at his scalp. This makes Pete murmur encouragingly, and the sound vibrates along Patrick's dick, sending heat licking up his spine. Patrick's thighs tremble, and his stomach hurts he wants to come so much. He can hardly breathe.
He's been waiting for this for fucking ever, and it's his first time, and it's Pete. There's no way he can last. All he can hope is that he doesn't humiliate himself too badly. Pete takes his cock deep into his throat, and then there goes even that ambition. Patrick thrusts, pure instinct, and Pete doesn't stop him. Patrick curls his hands around Pete's shoulder, gripping hard, probably leaving bruises the shape of his fingers on Pete's skin. His hips stutter, and he bites his lip, and comes and comes in Pete's mouth.
Even afterwards, Patrick is still shaking. He can't help it, and he waits for Pete to make fun of him. Pete looks up at him, his thumbs sliding along Patrick's hipbones, and there's not a hint of teasing in his expression, just something warm and fond and…happy. Patrick blinks. He made Pete look happy.
Patrick tugs Pete to his feet and palms his dick through his jeans. Pete makes a pained, desperate sound. Patrick's hand trembles as he unzips Pete's jeans, pushes them over his hips and curves his palm around Pete's erection. He stares down at the space between their bodies, stares at Pete's cock, and sure, he's seen Pete's cock before, more than once, because "I'd rather be naked" is practically Pete's personal motto. But he's never seen Pete's cock hard and slick and in his hand.
He moves his fist, circles his thumb around the head. Pete groans and buries his face against Patrick's shoulder. Patrick gets bolder, start to do to Pete the things he likes to do to himself. Pete makes these wet, breathy little noises that Patrick can feel, Jesus, as if Pete is the one touching him. Heat curls in his belly, and he thinks he could probably get hard again if Pete goes on sounding like that for much longer.
But then the sounds suddenly break off, and Pete's entire body jerks, and Patrick has sticky warmth all over his fingers. Pete slumps against him, breathing heavily against his neck.
Patrick wraps his arms around Pete's shoulders. "I thought guys were supposed to last longer when they got older."
"Shut up," Pete says, grinning.
Patrick laughs and hugs him tighter. Pete angles his head for another kiss, and there's that look again, soft and happy and like Patrick makes everything better.
They zip up, and Patrick wipes his hand on his jeans. Pete throws an arm over Patrick's shoulder, and they start back inside.
Just outside the door, Patrick stops to make something clear. "This isn't just a crush."
Pete ducks his head "We'll see."
Patrick grabs a handful of his shirt. "Hey."
"Look, you're already my golden ticket. There's only so lucky I deserve to be, you know?"
Patrick hates it when Pete says shit like this, something Pete knows perfectly well.
"Don't be a dick," Patrick tells him.
Pete makes a considering face. "I'm not sure you get to call me that when I've just sucked you off."
"Oh, no," Patrick protests. "That's not going to be one of the rules in this relationship. Because when it comes to being a dick and bringing the awesome sex, I'm pretty sure you can multitask."
Pete's eyes go wide, and he murmurs, "Relationship."
Okay, so Dr. House was right about one thing, at least. Pete can so be had.
Patrick loops his arm around Pete's neck. "Come on. Let's go find the guys."
There's a blast of sound as they come through the door.
Pete yells over it. "Seriously, though. Jealousy?"
"That wasn't my idea!"
Pete makes a questioning face. "What?"
"It was Dr. House!"
Pete shakes his head. The music is more deafening by the second. Pete gives up trying to talk. He takes Patrick's hand and leads him through the crowd.
No one is ever going to believe that his doctor prescribed jealousy anyway, Patrick realizes. And it really doesn't matter.
The important thing is: he's cured.