Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

1.

if I could change the world

Brendon wakes to the sound of snickers coming from his kitchen.

He drags himself down the hall—he slept late again, it's weird. Maybe he's getting sick or something. Brendon is usually an early riser, but this is like the third time this week he's been the last one up. 

Spencer and Ryan are still laughing as Brendon shuffles into the kitchen. Their heads are bent companionably together over a bowl of something that looks a lot like cookie dough. Or at least, what cookie dough would look like if it happened to have been exposed to a whole bunch of radiation.

"Is that...green cookie dough?" Brendon asks skeptically, stretching his neck to peer into the bowl from across the counter.

Seriously, green isn't even a strong enough word. Brendon isn't sure there is a strong enough word to describe this color. Glow-in-the-dark might come close. Visible-from-space might come even closer.

Spencer looks up, laughing around a bright-green mouthful of dough. "Ryan found the food coloring last night at the grocery store. Isn't it awesome? We haven't had this stuff since we were kids."

Ryan grins around his finger, which is busy depositing another lump of dough into his mouth. "Spencer's mom used to make us green cookies when we were little, and tell us they were made of kryptonite and they were going to give us superpowers." He pauses. "I don't think she totally understood about kryptonite, actually."

Brendon snickers, still eyeing the dough askance. He isn't sure if actual cookies this color would be any more appetizing than the dough, but maybe to a five-year-old it wouldn't matter.

"If you want to bake them," he offers, still not quite clear on why there is cookie dough happening at—holy shit, is it seriously noon?

"Nah," Spencer disagrees, grabbing another glop of dough. "We're manly men now. We like to eat our kryptonite raw."

Ryan snorts, and offers the bowl to Brendon, who shrugs, and scoops out a fingerful. "Can I special-request the superpowers I actually want," he wonders, popping the dough into his mouth, "or do we just get stuck with whatever's randomly assigned?"

"I already called dibs on telekinesis," Ryan explains solemnly.  "And Spencer wants to fly."

Spencer suddenly starts laughing around another big bite of dough, half-choking himself to death. "Dude, remember—?"

Ryan groans, starting to laugh, himself. "That's right, holy shit. We had a pact, after—oh my God, how did we not kill ourselves?" He laughs again, and points at Brendon. "Okay, well, good news for you. Flying is back on the table—Spencer has to pick something else."

Brendon watches Spencer, who is still chuckling sheepishly with bright eyes, lost in some childhood memory. He feels a pang of something familiar and wistful, and swallows hard against it, because he is an idiot. He shakes off the feeling as best he can, and finds a smirk for Ryan.

"Yeah, well, I didn't want to fly anyway," he says. "I call teleportation. Soon, you will have lived in LA long enough to recognize and stand in awe of my brilliance and foresight."

"Too bad," Spencer puts in mournfully. "Flying would have come in handy for traffic, too."

Ryan pats Spencer sympathetically on the arm. "We'll just make Brendon take us everywhere," he offers. "And if he tries to refuse, I can throw things at him. With my brain." He takes a triumphant bite to punctuate this statement, clearly pleased with himself.

Brendon narrows his eyes. "Using your powers for evil, Ryan Ross," he says reproachfully. "That's not very nice."

"Ha," says Ryan thickly around his mouthful. "Watch me not caring. Also, the pact forbids me from telling you how I know this, but Spencer was totally going to use his flying power for evil, too, so there."

"Now, I'm going to use my invisibility power for evil," Spencer puts in absently, stealing the bowl.

Brendon sighs, although privately, he is thinking that an invisibility power would be pretty awesome to use for evil. "You guys just make me sad. Whatever happened to the superhero code of honor?"

Spencer and Ryan give him identical pitying looks. "Overrated," they say, at exactly the same time.

Brendon crosses his arms. "You know I think it's creepy when you do that." 

Truthfully, he doesn't think it's creepy at all. He thinks it's awesome. But it also makes him jealous as hell, and that makes him feel creepy, so it all works out the same.

Ryan shrugs, half-apologetic, half-unconcerned. "Quit hogging the kryptonite," is all he says, and snags the bowl back from where Spencer has taken possession.

—

Spencer and Ryan wander off somewhere together after a hearty lunch of grilled cheese and more kryptonite. Brendon flops down on his couch and wishes Spencer was still around. He wants to play Guitar Hero. Or maybe watch a stupid Will Farrell movie or something. Either way, Spencer is definitely the companion of choice—Ryan is currently in one of his "highbrow-humor" phases, and spends a lot of time decrying the Will Farrells and the Adam Sandlers of the world. Consequently, Spencer and Brendon spend a lot of time furtively darting around popping in movies the minute his back is turned.

Spencer is busy, though, and Brendon refuses to let himself resent it. Ryan is his best friend, and his LA house-hunting and, like, furniture-shopping and everything...that's all important stuff. Spencer-and-Ryan stuff. Brendon gets that. He's always sort of wanted a best friend of his very own to do all that stuff with.

Or...well. Truthfully, he's always sort of wanted Ryan's best friend for his very own to do all that stuff with. Spencer is just...Brendon doesn't even know. It's like, Ryan and Jon are completely awesome, and Brendon totally loves them more than they will ever know, but when it comes to Spencer, Brendon gets downright ridiculous and he knows it. It's almost embarrassing, like hero-worship or something. It's just. Ryan and Jon are awesome, but there is something about Spencer that just goes right past awesome and into amazing. Brendon isn't even sure what it is, although he has lots of theories—it's just, Spencer is kind of endlessly fascinating to Brendon. He's so fun and funny and laid-back and clever and protective and fierce and occasionally bitchy, and just—

Whatever, yeah, Brendon's kind of an idiot about Spencer. It's not like it's news.

It is kind of pathetic, though. Brendon feels a lot of the time like he sort of ends up just following Spencer around like an annoying little brother or an over-eager puppy. He doesn't even want anything from Spencer, except maybe a little attention—he just sort of wants to be around him. Like, all the time.

Ryan probably doesn't even know how fucking lucky he is.

But that isn't fair. Spencer is taken; his best-friend dance card is totally full, and just because Brendon would kind of kill to be in Ryan's shoes doesn't mean Ryan doesn't deserve what he's got. It's not like he's actually taking anything from Brendon—he was there first, like, really first, childhood first. And even if he wasn't Spencer's best friend, that doesn't mean that Brendon would be. Honestly, probably Jon would. He and Spencer have a lot in common. It's kind of depressing.

Brendon pushes himself off the couch, suddenly listless, and wanders over to his piano. He messes around for awhile, but gives up on that when everything he plays ends up being weirdly melancholy. Then he goes back to the practice room and fucks around on Spencer's drum kit for awhile, banging along with whatever song happens to be playing on his iPod at the time. 

Eventually, though, even that gets boring, and Brendon ends up wandering around aimlessly again, just sort of lost in his own house, moving from room to room, picking things up and putting them back down again. He stands in his kitchen for almost twenty minutes, flipping through a cookbook with every intention of amusing himself with some elaborate cooking scheme, but everything sounds boring and he isn't really hungry anyway. He really filled up on the kryptonite earlier.

His Sidekick going off sounds like a chorus of angels, and he leaps on it with embarrassing enthusiasm.

"Hello?"

"Hey," says Patrick, and that's a welcome surprise. "Are you busy right now?"

"God, no," Brendon tells him, maybe a little too fervently.  "You cannot believe how much I am not busy right now."

Patrick laughs warmly. "I'm in your area. Mind if I come by? We're going back into the studio soon, and we want you on vocals for one of the songs...again."

Brendon laughs, feeling something like happy for the first time all day. "Yeah," he says eagerly. "Yeah. Bring it by, or I can meet you somewhere to look at it. Or—"

"Brendon," Patrick says, and Brendon can hear that he's smiling. "I'll be there in half an hour."

—

Brendon and Patrick aren't particularly close, but two bigger music geeks would be very difficult to find, so it's no real surprise to either of them when "looking at the song," turns into "messing around in the music room until three-thirty in the morning." By the time they emerge, bleary-eyed, Brendon has half of three new melodies written, and Patrick has composed something that might require a full backing orchestra and possibly part of a jazz band to pull off, but which is going to be awesome when it's finished.

They finally stagger out, still babbling randomly at each other in half-sentences about all the stuff they've been working on, only to find Spencer in the hallway with a glass of water, obviously on his way back from the kitchen. He's looking at them both with a strange expression Brendon can't really decipher in the semi-darkness.

"Oh, shit, sorry," Brendon says, making apologetic eyes at Spencer. "Did we wake you up?"

"No." Spencer sounds funny, but he smiles easily enough at Patrick. "Had to pee. Did you guys have fun in your music coma?"

Brendon and Patrick laugh ruefully, and Spencer smiles at them both again before disappearing back down the hall. Brendon stares after him.

"I hope I didn't piss him off," he says worriedly.

Patrick bites his lip. "I should go."

"What?" Brendon looks back at Patrick, confused. "No way, dude, you're half-asleep. The guest room is taken, but I have a king-sized bed and you...well, you're in a band with Pete, so..."

Patrick grins. "Yeah," he says fondly. "Bed-sharing is not so much a big deal for me anymore. All right." He waves a hand at the hallway. "Lead the way."

—

Patrick, as it turns out, has a weird habit of humming softly in his sleep. Brendon alternates between finding this to be an endearing habit, and an exceptionally annoying one, depending on which of the five times it wakes him up that night you happen to be asking about.

By the time they both find themselves awake and ready to climb out of bed—Brendon has a really comfortable bed, if he does say so himself—it is nearly one o'clock in the afternoon, and Brendon feels less rested than he probably should after that many hours of ostensibly sleeping. 

He doesn't blame Patrick, though. Patrick is awesome, and, as it turns out, a totally easy-going snuggler. A lot of things about Pete make more sense now.

They stumble down the hall, Patrick tugging on his hat en route, and snicker sheepishly together when Brendon catches himself humming Patrick's sleep-song under his breath.

Spencer and Ryan are slumped on the sofa, watching some kind of documentary that appears to involve gazelles mating. They look up when Brendon and Patrick shuffle past on their way to the kitchen.

"Morning," Patrick says amiably. "Sorry if we were loud last night."

Ryan chokes, and Brendon starts giggling in spite of himself. "But baby," he says to Patrick, leering outrageously. "I thought you liked it when I was noisy."

Patrick blushes right up to the brim of his hat. "Shut up," he mutters, grinning in spite of himself. "Fucking idiots."

Spencer doesn't say anything at all. His expression looks a little pinched, and Brendon wonders if they really did piss him off somehow last night.

He doesn't want to ask in front of Patrick, so instead he busies himself making breakfast—("Pop tarts?" Patrick asks him, amused. "You really know how to treat a guy right." "Toasted pop-tarts," Brendon retorts smugly. "Nothing but the best for you, sweetheart.")—and puttering around making coffee for himself, and tea for Patrick, who he remembers from various studio sessions has a weird aversion to coffee. 

Pete calls Patrick halfway through their pop tarts, and he wanders aimlessly off down the hall, chattering around his mouthful about how much writing they got done last night.

Spencer studies Brendon silently while Patrick is out of the room. Brendon squirms under the scrutiny.

"I really am sorry if we woke you up," he says uncertainly.

"You didn't." Spencer frowns. "You seem happy this morning."

Brendon blinks, wondering why that would be the bad thing Spencer sort of looks like he thinks it is. "I am," he says cautiously. "We had...fun?"

Spencer blanks his expression. "Well, good," he says back flatly. "I'm happy for you."

Brendon shoots a helpless look at Ryan, who looks a little confused by Spencer's behavior, himself. "Um," he says. "...Thank you."

Patrick reemerges from the bedroom just then, wearing his shoes and socks and clutching his notes from last night. "I'm gonna get out of here," he tells Brendon, smiling. "Pete wants to hear the new stuff. Thanks for everything, though. It was fun."

"Any time," Brendon assures him sincerely. "Seriously, we should totally make plans."

Patrick grins, future music-comas already gleaming in his eyes. "I'll call."

Brendon walks him to the door, going along gracefully when Patrick hesitates, and then tugs him outside onto the porch. "Everything okay?" he asks, concerned.

Patrick pulls the door closed, biting his lip. "Spencer seems pissed," he says quietly. "Is it at me? Did we actually disturb him, or like. Did I do something...?"

"No, no," Brendon says hurriedly, despite having wondered the same things himself all morning. "He's cool, I swear. He was just telling me how happy he was we had such a good time.  He's just...I don't know. He has weird moods sometimes."

Patrick nods sympathetically. "Pete, too. I just wanted to make sure we were cool."

"We're cool," Brendon promises. Whatever Spencer's problem is, it's almost certainly not with Patrick. "We're all totally cool."

"Cool," Patrick agrees, and flicks Brendon affectionately on the forehead. "Okay, I'm out of here. I'll call about the studio times for the song."

"And about another writing party," Brendon reminds him cheerfully.

"You got it."

Patrick takes his leave, and Brendon watches until his car disappears from sight, and catches himself thinking that it's almost too bad Patrick already has Pete. Patrick really is awesome, and always seems genuinely excited to be talking to Brendon, largely because they are almost exactly the same kind of nerd, just in slightly different ways. If things had been different, maybe Brendon and Patrick would have been best friends, and then maybe Brendon's Spencer thing wouldn't be so out of control, and—whatever. It doesn't really matter. Patrick and Pete are BFF like Ryan and Spencer are BFF, and anyway, awesome or not, he isn't the best friend Brendon really wants, and Brendon knows it. 

He lets himself back into the house, only to be startled by the sight of Spencer disappearing into the hallway. A minute later, the guest bedroom door closes loudly.

"Seriously," Brendon says to Ryan, eyes wide. "What the fuck?"

Ryan looks bewildered, which is a rare sight where Spencer is concerned. "Dude," he says, shrugging helplessly. "I have no fucking idea."  

—

Spencer seems to shake off his mood within a couple of hours, and by dinnertime everything is mostly normal again. They all three go out together, heading for a little Italian place Ryan really likes, and Brendon feels happier than he has in what seems like a long while. Maybe he's starting to snap out of his funk.

When they get back to the house, Spencer plays Guitar Hero with him for an hour or so, until Ryan suddenly materializes from the guest room, where he'd been holed up with a notebook, and makes meaningful eyes at Spencer.

Spencer pauses the game. "What's up?"

"I was just thinking about that house we looked at yesterday," Ryan says. "And I realized there were a few things wrong with it."

Spencer raises an eyebrow, and shrugs apologetically at Brendon. "Rain check?"

Brendon resolutely does not sigh or pout. "Go," he says, as cheerfully as he can. "Do your best friend thing."

Spencer grins at him, and follows Ryan out of the room.

"I didn't realize they were secret house-problems," Brendon mutters crabbily to himself, once he's alone in the room. "Whatever."

He finds a different documentary on TV—one about various giant flowers in the Amazon that look like something out of Harry Potter's Herbology class—and settles in on the couch, feeling listless and melancholy again.

He doesn't even watch for twenty minutes before giving up and going to bed. 

—

Spencer and Ryan are whispering together when Brendon finds his way into the kitchen the next morning. Brendon ignores the now-familiar twinge of jealousy, the vague sense of left-out-unwanted-lonely that tries to creep over him.

"Morning," he greets.

Spencer wrinkles his nose. "Afternoon," he corrects. "You've been sleeping a lot lately. You're not getting sick, are you?"

Brendon doesn't feel like going down that road. "Just tired," he says, shrugging. "And maybe bored. You know how it is."

Ryan and Spencer look skeptical, which Brendon understands. Boredom tends to affect him the way depression usually does—making him twitchier, more energetic, more manic than he normally is.

It's still the best answer he has, though, especially because it's kind of true. If by "bored," you mean, "left-out-unwanted-lonely."

He'd thought having Ryan and Spencer stay with him while Ryan found a place would help with that, but honestly, he sort of thinks it might be making it worse. Living on a bus with them is one thing—it's hard to feel especially left-out of anything when everybody's living right on top of each other, and Jon's presence is a big help when Brendon does start to feel too much like an outsider in the world of Spencer-and-Ryan—but here in the house, the exclusivity of their friendship feels more obvious than it ever has before.

Brendon feels a sudden pang of longing for Jon.

"—Brendon?"

Brendon blinks. Spencer is staring at him, looking openly concerned now and sounding like he may have been trying to get Brendon's attention for awhile. The irony is not lost on Brendon.

"Sorry," he says, shoving aside his self-pitying thoughts. Those don't fit any better on him than depression does. They make him feel stupid and weirdly guilty. It makes his skin itch and his stomach swim. "I'm zoning. What's up?"

"He just asked about your plans for today," Ryan puts in, when Spencer only continues to stare at Brendon anxiously.

Brendon raises an eyebrow. "Well, I'm still waiting for the kryptonite to kick in, but then, you know, I figured I'd pop down to Antarctica and build a really ass-kicking snowman, and then I have sand-castles in the Sahara at four, and after that—"

"Fuck off, smart ass." Ryan rolls his eyes. "You really have no plans for today?"

"Dude." Brendon snorts. "I have had no plans for the last three weeks. You would know, you've been here. Why? Was there something you guys wanted to do?"

"No." Ryan exchanges a weird glance with Spencer; Brendon can't read it. "We—I mean. We have some more house-hunting stuff we have to go do—"

"Can I tag along?" Brendon wouldn't usually invite himself along, but they did just ask about his plans, so.

Spencer looks uncomfortable and suddenly deeply conflicted. "Um. We..."

Even Ryan looks weird. "The thing is—"

Brendon sighs, and turns around to pour himself a bowl of cereal. "Don't worry about it," he says flatly. "It's fine."

"Hey, no," Spencer says, sounding wretched. "Brendon—"

"Seriously." Brendon looks up from his cereal and forces a smile when he sees Spencer's expression. "It's no big deal. I'll...call Patrick, or something. You guys should go do your thing."

Maybe he'll call Jon. Maybe he'll call Jon and ask him outright what it is that is so wrong with him that apparently Spencer and Ryan would actually say no when he asked if he could come on their stupid boring house-hunt. Maybe he'll call Jon and ask if he can move to Chicago and be Jon's best friend.

Tom would probably be pissed about that. Brendon is maybe willing to risk it anyway, though. He's tired of everyone already having their best friend before he showed up. Maybe some people are just always destined to be that kid picked last in gym class.

Brendon has a lot of experience being that kid. It's funny how even being a rock star really doesn't really change anything: if you were that kid once, you're that kid forever. It's only the gym class that changes.

Spencer and Ryan don't seem inclined to leave, all of a sudden. They sort of hover, and exchange a lot of complicated facial expressions, and spend a lot of time eyeing the clock, but no matter how many times Brendon tells them to just go already, they seem suddenly reluctant to do it.

Brendon is just fine without their pity, thank you very much. Eventually, unable to take it anymore, he excuses himself for a shower and runs a hot bath instead. He doesn't come out of the bathroom for an hour and a half.

When he finally does, Spencer and Ryan are gone.

—

Jon isn't answering his phone, and Brendon feels weird about actually calling Patrick. He calls Shane instead, but Shane is a little distant, and Brendon feels bad. Shane is still a newlywed, after all, and is probably busy with Regan, as well he should be.

Brendon ends up spending most of the afternoon and early evening in the music room, fucking around on every single instrument he has. He teaches himself how to play That Green Gentleman backwards, and is halfway through turning Behind the Sea into something with all the joy and whimsy of a funeral dirge—namely, by playing it on the cello at half-speed and singing along with himself in the most tragic voice he can manage—when his Sidekick bursts to life.

"Hey," says Patrick, for the second time in two days.

"Hey," Brendon says back, smiling for the first time in, like, four hours. "I thought the rule was to wait three days before calling somebody you slept with."

Patrick snorts. "Dickhead," he says fondly. "Pete and I are going to grab dinner at this Indian place he's been bugging me to take him to. It's not far from you—aren't you a curry fan?"

"Yeah," Brendon says, surprised and a little flattered by the offer. "Sure, that sounds great. What time and where?"

"We'll swing by and pick you up," Patrick says cheerfully. "You're on our way. Pete's driving, so you'll be sitting next to a car seat, but...."

"Put the baby in the car seat, and I'll sit next to it all day," Brendon suggests hopefully.

Patrick laughs, and repeats the suggestion to Pete, who snatches the phone away and spends the next fifteen minutes chattering excitedly to Brendon about Bronx and how preternaturally awesome he is. Brendon grins helplessly at his phone.

"So is that a yes, you're bringing him, then?"

"No." Pete sighs dejectedly. "He's with the in-laws tonight. So is Ash, for that matter. I know I have to share sometimes, but it still sucks."

"That does suck," Brendon agrees sympathetically, but Patrick has already stolen the phone back from Pete.

"Dude, just so you know, we're actually calling from the car right now. You have like twenty minutes to get dressed before we get there."

"Do I need to be dressed up?" Brendon asks skeptically, eyeing his jeans and T-shirt with some suspicion.

"Um," Patrick says thoughtfully. "What do you consider dressed up?"

Brendon bites his lip, contemplative. "What hat are you wearing?" 

"What hat am I...um." Patrick laughs again, confused. "The black one?"

Pete starts laughing in the background, and snatches the phone back again. "Black cabbie hat," he says into the mouthpiece. "No trucker hat, so the place is nice, but not fedora-nice."

"Got it," Brendon says, nodding.

"I love you, by the way," Pete tells him earnestly. His grin is actually audible through the phone. "I really thought I was the only one who used the Patrick-hat scale."

"If that hadn't worked, I would have used the Pete-hoodie scale," Brendon tells him gravely. "Clan hoodie is more upscale than non-Clan hoodie. No hoodie at all means practically black tie event."

Pete laughs at him. "Go get dressed. You have fifteen minutes."

He hangs up the phone before Brendon can even say goodbye.

—

The ride to the restaurant passes in a happy haze of music talk with Patrick, and baby talk with Pete. Brendon basks in the unaccustomed level of Fall Out Boy attention—they're all friendly, but Pete is more Ryan's friend than Brendon's, and Patrick is sort of a friendly-colleague, not really a buddy friend—and doesn't think about Spencer and Ryan running off and ignoring him all day, again, even once. Or at least, not much.

He's so wrapped up in the conversation that they're out of the car and walking to the front doors before Brendon actually realizes that they aren't even at an Indian food restaurant. They're at some kind of nightclub.

"What--?" he starts to ask, but Patrick pushes him through the door, and then there's a strobe-light in his face and a second or two of unnatural silence before—

"SURPRISE!!!!!" shouts what sounds like roughly half of LA.

Brendon actually stumbles backward into Patrick, who catches him with a friendly arm around his shoulders and a beaming, self-satisfied grin that rivals even Pete's.

"What the fuck?" wonders Brendon—and that's when the light-bulb goes on in his brain. "Holy shit!" he exclaims, honestly shocked. "It's my fucking birthday!"

Laughter breaks out all around him, and then Brendon actually starts looking at people. Right at the front of the crowd stand Spencer, Ryan, and—

"Jon!" Brendon shouts joyfully, and flings himself forward and into Jon's arms with abandon. "Oh, my god, dude, I have missed you—oh! Is Cassie here? Spencer! Ryan! Did you guys do this? Oh, my god, I can't believe it's my fucking birthday!"

He feels all lit up inside, all light and fizzy like there's champagne bubbling under his skin, and he can't seem to stop himself from throwing himself at Spencer, then at Ryan, too. Then maybe at Spencer again, although he'll never admit to it later.

You weren't ignoring me, he doesn't say. Can't say. You weren't brushing me off! You weren't trying to get rid of me!

"I can't believe you forgot your own birthday!" Ryan tells him dryly, and Brendon pokes out his tongue, but he's already being dragged out of Spencer's comforting arms by various other insistent hands.

"You guys," is all he had the chance to say, as he's tugged away into the crowd by someone he thinks might be Siska. "You guys...thank you!"

Spencer grins at Brendon with so much warm affection that Brendon thinks he might just float away on it.

He's my best friend, he thinks, and it feels like an epiphany, even though it really isn't. He's my best friend. I wish I could have been his.

—

The party is long, and loud, and Brendon-the-birthday-boy—seriously, how did he forget his own birthday??—is very much in demand. He almost regrets that part, although he has an awesome time circulating and chatting with everybody. But it leaves him less time to dangle off the shoulders of his friends (especially Spencer, Brendon isn't kidding himself about that) and babble gratefully at them all night, which is sort of what he feels like doing most of all.

"Spencer planned the whole thing," Ryan tells him, during one of the spare moments Brendon finds to come hang off them for awhile. "It's been in the works for a month, and this last week we've been doing basically nothing else."

He sounds fond and long-suffering and sort of proud of Spencer. Brendon mostly just feels ridiculous with gratitude.

"Spencer Smith," Brendon tells him earnestly. (He may have had a beer or two. A few. A few beers, okay?) "Ryan is a lucky, lucky man to have you for a best friend."

Spencer flushes visibly, even under the flashing strobe lights. "Don't be an idiot," he says gruffly. "You're our best friend, too."

Brendon has no illusions about the reality of that statement, but the sentiment behind it is much appreciated. 

"Hey," Ryan puts in, kind of uncomfortably. "Speaking of party planning...leaving you alone today was really...."

"Fucking miserable," Spencer supplies guiltily. "And on your fucking birthday. Please tell me you didn't spend the day alone and sad."

Brendon resolves immediately never to tell them what his day was actually like. "I didn't even know it was my birthday," he says reasonably, instead. "And I totally found lots of stuff to do. Don't worry about it."

Spencer looks openly skeptical, but Gabe chooses that moment to materialize next to them and pour himself all over Brendon like really clingy molasses.

"I have a bone to pick with you, tiny birthday boy," he says, very gravely. Gabe's breath smells positively flammable. "A very serious bone. It involves birthday kisses, and the fact that I haven't been getting any."

Brendon braces his shoulders a bit more firmly under the deadweight that is Gabe, and points out, "That's probably because it isn't your birthday, dude."

Gabe eyes him narrowly, and Brendon smiles back hopefully and throws his fangs up.

"That's not going to work," Gabe tells him sternly, although he looks pleased in spite of himself. "Do not try to distract me. I haven't been getting any birthday kisses," he stresses, "from you. That is unacceptable."

Brendon glances, wide-eyed and faintly alarmed, at his bandmates, who all just stand there watching Gabe molest him with apparent fascination.

"My heart belongs to Patrick Stump?" Brendon tries uncertainly.

Gabe snorts. "Tell me about it," he agrees sadly, and, to Brendon's surprise, oozes away to molest another target.

"Ooo-kay," Brendon says, turning incredulous eyes on his friends. "That guy gets weirder every single time I see him."

Spencer's smile looks a little bit tight. "Fair warning, Beckett is around here somewhere, too."

Brendon wrinkles his nose, and Jon laughs at him, throwing an arm around his shoulders. "Poor pretty birthday boy," he sympathizes. "Too kissable for your own good."

"That never happened," Brendon objects, looking around shiftily. "We all agreed that never happened. As far as I'm concerned, Beckett wasn't even on that tour, and there was certainly no kissing, birthday or otherwise. You promised."

Patrick turns up then to drag Brendon back off into the crowd, this time to meet some new baby band Pete just signed. Patrick is producing, and apparently wants to talk to Brendon about doing yet more vocals on other people's albums. Brendon allows himself to be dragged away, but not without a pleading glance backward at Spencer.

Spencer, though, is looking determinedly in the other direction, and fails to come to Brendon's rescue.

At around midnight, several lights flash in quick succession, apparently as some kind of signal, because Brendon finds himself being shoved out into the middle of a rapidly-forming ring of party-goers. A chair has been set up at some point, and Brendon is pushed unceremoniously into it. 

Spencer, Ryan, and Jon do the honors, rolling out an actual, massive, tiered cake-on-wheels. Brendon's jaw drops. It is the tackiest, sparkliest, most enormous cake he has ever seen in actual person, and he could not love it more.

"If a naked lady is about to pop out of this cake," he tells his friends happily, "I am going to stab you all to death with the serving knife."

"We're not stupid," Ryan says huffily.

"It would totally be a naked man if it was anything," Jon adds.

Brendon sticks out his tongue, but secretly sort of hopes for a naked man. Whatever, that would be awesome.

The cake is lit with what look like actual sparklers, although Brendon hopes they're just fancy candles, or else that top layer is going to taste really weird. He leans forward at his friends' urging, and is about to blow them out when Ryan reminds him, "Hey, make a wish."

Brendon glances up, and his eyes meet Spencer's smiling ones. Spencer, who put together this whole party for him. Spencer, who is leaning comfortably on Ryan's shoulder like he belongs there, but is smiling so brightly at Brendon that it almost hurts to look at. A wish bubbles up inside of Brendon almost against his own will, the same one he's been having all night long.

You're my best friend, he thinks again, wistfully, gazing at Spencer. I wish I could have been yours.

He leans forward and blows out the candles.

—