Chapter Text
Pete, desperate for a window to be cracked open in the cramped tour bus, scouted one of his bandmates to figure out the circulation predicament. Andy was in charge of driving, steady gaze on the road. Joe was slumped over in the seat next to Andy, lids pressed faintly shut. Patrick was curled up on the singular plaid couch. Pete wished that could’ve been him. God knows he wasn’t resting much lately, evident by black circles that he tried to take attention off of with heavy eyeliner.
Pete took it upon himself to mess with the latch and force the creaky pane up. Despite his applied strength, the window only cracked slightly ajar. Stale summer air wheezed through the sliver of window he was afforded. Instead of a nice breeze washing over him, it was rather a pair of dilapidated lungs that could hardly inhale or exhale.
Pete returned to his hunched position on the floor of the bus and more importantly, his journal. He flipped through the water-stained pages with smudges and scribbles next to hastily written lyrics. Him and the black notebook had been through it all: Painstaking heartbreaks. High school rejections. Meeting the guys. It was all-purpose: sometimes serving as impromptu blog entries when he didn’t have internet access. Song ideas remained bound between binding. They were his sacred half-baked testimonies. He kept these ideas to himself, despite how Patrick would often try to creep over his shoulder while he wrote.
I don’t know when we’re ever going to get there. We’ve been locked in this deathtrap hours upon hours. I catch glimpses of the cloudless sky which appears almost teal through the filmy glass of the windshield. I want to feel alive. Just unadulterated fucking life coursing through my veins instead of injecting them with the substance of the week which keeps me artificially happy until it runs out and then I need more. Need more to feel less. I want to feel stars in my system. Or the sun, the most legendary star. It’s weird how we associate stars with the thick of night when the most powerful of all reigns supreme during the day.
Pete went to write the next line but was jostled harshly by the aforementioned deathtrap shaking. Ink stained his hand as he tried to regain his balance.
"Uh guys. I think somethings wrong."
Andy’s voice traveled from the front of the bus to where Pete was pushed up against the side. The bus slowed to a stop. Smoke poured over the hood. Pathetic window crack allowed for the thick gray to infiltrate its way into the vehicle. Pete covered his mouth and coughed.
Joe, roused from sleep, nearly jumped out of his seat.
"Fuck sake, what happened?!"
Andy shrugged, casting a worried glance at Pete.
"I don’t know. Everything was fine."
"That’s what you get when you pay 500 dollars," Joe said, waving vile plumes out of his face. "Patrick, you’re in charge of transportation next time."
Patrick sat up from the couch.
"I’m fine with that."
“We still have hundreds of miles to go.” Joe shook his head. “I have no clue what we’re gonna fuckin do.”
Patrick was quick to help in the way he always was. He began placing calls and speaking into the phone in a composed yet delightful manner. You would’ve thought he was talking with a long lost best friend rather than triple-a. His modulated voice soothed Pete, whose chest relaxed the longer he heard Patrick talk. Patrick smiled at Pete and waved, as if he figured Pete was waiting for some physical acknowledgment of his presence. Pete smiled and waved back. Sometimes silence said more.
"Good and bad news," Patrick started once hanging up his final call.
"We’re going to need to have the bus looked at which means we’re going to probably need to stay the night somewhere."
"We’re on a highway. Stating the obvious but. Yeah."
"There’s a motel nearby. We’ll have the bus towed and we’ll be driven there."
Joe crossed his arms.
"Fine. Hate this fuckin bus."
* * * * * * * * * * *
Nimbus Vertex, which Pete scoffed at sounding like a shitty pornstar name, was situated cozily between tall pine trees. Their needles shed underfoot. Pete kicked them, sending them skittering along the dirt path.
“I think Goldilocks is inside.”
The guys laughed at Pete’s quip.
"Careful, bears might jump out at us from the trees."
The line of rooms wrapped around sturdy trunks. Pete wanted to take in the scenery, but he was ushered into a small reception area the size of a large closet. The receptionist, a scruffy man with a tacky Hawaiian button-up, dealt with their check in; which consisted mainly of Pete zoned out ‘staring’ at the blue ocean and unblinking eyes of stark yellow tropical fish swimming across the man’s shirt.
His 3 bandmates secured their rooms. He and Patrick would take room 5 while Andy and Joe claimed 6. At least, that’s what they told him when he entered reality again. The pairs broke off and went to their respective rooms to put their few belongings they had gathered from the bus away. Pete was setting his plastic water bottle on the table while Patrick sat on the bed, legs crossed.
"Pete?"
"Yeah?" He glanced at Patrick, noting the quilted comforter Patrick was perched on. It really did seem like they were in a cabin of sorts, completed by the framed photograph on the wall of a mountain range and a mug on a bedside table; hopefully unused.
"I don’t want this to come off the wrong way."
"Saying that basically means you’re guaranteeing it does."
Patrick’s face collapsed into panic-stricken eyes and intense forehead creases. He started to stutter widely before Pete gently cut him off.
"Pat, it's fine. I think I can handle it."
His eyes softened slightly but the creases didn’t lift.
"I’m…"
"Gay? I know."
Patrick rolled his eyes, but a relieved sigh escaped his throat.
"Worried about you."
"I’d rather it have been the gay thing."
"I hear you in bed on the bus. You shift around a lot. You don’t sleep much."
"I sleep fine."
"Andy and Joe snore like crazy but not you. I hear more pen scratching than snoring."
"You know how us lyricists are. Inspiration in the middle of the night."
"It’s deeper than that, Shakespeare. I don’t think you sleep more than two hours a night. How are you even functioning right now?"
If Patrick considered ‘functioning’ being a walking zombie who zones out at a moment's notice whose brain feels like TV static without an off button, yeah. He was functioning exceptionally.
"Pete? Earth to Pete?"
"Right. Yeah."
Patrick stood up from the bed and got within inches of Pete’s face. He flinched.
"Hello, can I help you?"
"Pete, look at your eyes."
"My eyes were brown last time I checked."
"You have dark circles under them."
"I do not."
"You do. Come with me to the bathroom."
"That’s too far even for me."
"No! Not to pee in front of you, God. To show you your eyes."
"I know what my eyes look like."
Patrick balled his fists up in a way that Pete figured Patrick thought was menacing but he found cute; like a well-meaning puppy.
"Tell me what’s going on. Why can’t you sleep lately?"
"I told you, I’m sleeping fine."
"It’s just you, me, and this quilted cover. I’ll know tonight if you sleep or not."
"I’ll sleep on the floor."
"There’s no need for that! We have plenty of room." Patrick patted the quilt.
"Should we go see Andy and Joe?"
Pete nodded.
Anything was better than this pseudo interrogation. Sweat clung to his forehead. He trailed behind Patrick as they left the room.
* * * * * * * * * * *
Andy and Joe had located a stream out back and were standing in its depths. Patrick was hesitant to dip even a toe in. He complained that it would be hard to get his socks on afterwards his foot was sticky and wet. Joe called him a pussy and tried to dunk his foot in, sock and all. Patrick yelped and leapt back.
"Not funny! You watch it!"
"We wouldn’t want Princess Patrick to get his precious socks wet now would he?"
Patrick resigned himself to a horizontal log.
Pete tugged at the hem of his shirt and tossed it, landing near Patrick’s still dry feet.
"Ooh la la. Take it off!" Andy teased, whistling. Pete groaned and wished he hadn’t already thrown his shirt. He stripped down until only his boxers wrapped around his hips. Thankfully, he had more pairs back in the motel.
Walking into the stream, his body relaxed. Cool ripples that came up to his calf were welcome to roll into his leg as much as they pleased. He scooped up water and let it fall down his tattooed chest, making the ink shine. Some droplets dipped below his waistband and he shuddered.
"Did your room not have AC either?" Pete said.
"No. It was nine million degrees in there. I have no idea how I’m gonna sleep tonight," Joe replied.
"Miss the bus now?” Andy chimed in, glint in his eye. Joe groaned.
"Fuck no. I do not miss the deathtrap, thank you very much. It’s the reason we have an AC-less room tonight. Speaking of… Patrick? Progress on that?"
"I should call again."
Patrick patted his pockets and cursed quietly enough for Pete to miss the specific curse.
"I think I left it in the room. One sec."
Pete laid on his back, floating in the stream. He glanced up, sun beating down on his stomach. Arms drifted away from him; a less morbid autopsy.
If his journal was waterproof and he was alone, he would’ve written something like:
Why can’t all moments be like this? The ease of floating in a cool stream while water rushes around you. under you. on you. in you. It touches every part of you. It’s the ultimate vulnerability. You lay almost naked. A single article of clothing separates you from being entrenched fully. Perhaps that’s too much vulnerability. We as a species weren’t prepared for that. That’s why the number of nude beaches is so small. We were born naked and the rest of days are spent trying to cover ourselves and hide ourselves and disguise ourselves so no one can see the true us. The true essence that lies beneath it all.
Pete watched the pine branches sway overhead. They cast shadows down on the stream which warped off the water and bounced to the side where grass replaced current.
Patrick returned out of breath.
"They told me it won’t be ready by tonight. We’re going to have to stay."
"Woo no AC!" Joe sarcastically cheered. "Can this day get any better?"
"I won’t tell you how much the repairs are."
"Yeah, good idea. I’d rather enjoy the nice water than have an aneurysm from hearing the cost."
"Wanna get in now?" Andy said to Patrick, who firmly shook his head.
"I’m fine with just watching you guys."
Patrick sat back on his log, gaze at the ground. He seemed to be focused on something.
Pete turned over and swam up to the side of the stream where Patrick was.
"Is that a frog?"
Patrick grinned and held out his cupped palm. Inside, a small green frog stared up at Pete with round eyes. The underside of its head pulsed up and down.
"You’re gonna get a disease from that thing," Joe called out, distastefully looking at the amphibian.
"No. He’s a friend."
Patrick stroked the top of its back with no more force than a subtle breeze. The frog stayed in place.
"You cannot bring that into the bus," Joe said.
"I think he would make a good companion."
"We barely have room for us. It’s gonna end up on my head and I am not waking up with a damn frog on my head."
Patrick gave the frog a final stroke and set it back down. It stared at him before hopping off.
"That could’ve been the new Fall Out Boy mascot. You’ve been saying we need one."
"A frog mascot? I’m good, thanks." Joe splashed some water at Andy, who retaliated and splashed him back. "What do you think Andy?"
"I think he was kinda cute."
Joe groaned.
"You cannot possibly be on Patrick’s side about this. What about you Pete?"
Pete shrugged, and went back to gliding through the water. Joe continued making his case against a potential frog mascot while his voice faded into the sound of Pete’s arms moving through the stream.
* * * * * * * * * *
Pete was thankful when night fell. Andy and Joe had bid goodnight and Patrick was curled up in bed next to him. His plan to keep a watchful eye on Pete had fallen short the moment he nestled under the thick covers. Pete grabbed his pen, journal, and slipped outside.
The motel transformed under the moon. Pale yet powerful, the roof of the rooms were illuminated in a beautiful diagonal pattern. Trees reached into the dark sky. Tall pine points were among the stars. A light breeze brushed his cheeks and arms.
Pete set his journal and pen down, opting to lay on his back. His head was in that journal more often than reality. A series of printed lines and ink scribblings instead of a brain. He considered that perhaps tonight he should take it all in: the way the stars sparkled in their constellations that could be followed with ones’ attentive gaze. Chirping from distant insects. Chilled grass fronds circling his ankles. Slight swaying from the trees. The imposing shadows they casted.
For once, Pete felt insignificant in a good way. He was a small part of a much larger picture. A larger picture filled with majestic trees, a large moon and a trickling stream. Pete smiled at the moon, his lungs filling with fresh night air. He didn’t realize his sight was dimming. He saw a screen of stars and cloudless sky before his vision faded to black.