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It was cheesy and melodramatic. Rain pouring around their soaked figures as tears of fury and grief streamed freely down their faces. Of fucking course it ended like this, it was Pete Wentz after all; the revered King of Emo, the Tortured Soul, the Number One Dickhead.
One of their fights had finally grown too big. There was no way to talk or strangle their way out of this one. They’d finally popped the bubble they’d lived since the moment they met, the moment Patrick was dumb enough to open his door in a stupid outfit and Pete decided that he loved him. It was doomed from the start, and yet its pieces still sat heavy on their shoulders.
Patrick never wanted to be a singer, never wanted to become the make believe version of himself he’d been turned into. He never wanted to be Pete’s little pet that people had to go through before doing anything involving him. Pete always said he was protecting him, but they all knew it was just because the world had accepted that Patrick belonged to him. Patrick never asked to be Pete’s de facto caretaker, he’d loved him, but it was maddeningly codependent. Any time Pete had any kind sour mood surface, whoever was around him left to grab Patrick. It was always patrickpatrickpatrick. Patrick getting him out of bed in the morning, Patrick talking him down when he was already exhausted and hurting. Patrick who Pete never truly gave a shit about, not as a person, only as an idol on his bedside table. He just. Couldn’t do it anymore. He couldn’t be Pete’s saint anymore. He couldn’t be the only reason Pete stuck around. It was too heavy. It was grinding him down to the ashes of his former self. And he was trapped in it, he had been left absolutely no way out.
He just wanted out. He wanted to be a person again, be himself again.
And so there he was. Screaming in the rain because Pete had decided to corner him about it all on Patrick’s walk home from school. There was no way out. Pete refused to move or wait or think refusedrefusedrefused. Until Patrick burst. His lungs burned as the words fled from his mouth in a panic,
“You know you say you dreamed me, and it’s a joke but you fucking mean it. Sometimes it’s like you clicked your heels and wished for me, but I’m not your fucking wish, Pete. I cant be. Cant you see that? Cant you see that you’ve trapped my entire existence under the context of yourself? I’m not your wish. I’m not your anything.”
it was all in one breath. everything he’d been holding inside for months. He bent and put his hands on his knees as he caught his breath and tried to avoid eye contact, the expression he knew he’d taped to the face of his best friend in the world. And then he ran. He had said everything he had to say. He knew Pete would never accept it, Pete would never change, so what was the fucking point of staying to argue anyway.
Pete chased him and begged him to stay, begged him just listen to him. Pete screamed that he loved him, that he needed him. All that played in Patrick’s head was how fucked he was, how he was a fat kid with asthma that ruined everything he touched, that ruined his own life. How could anyone ever need him? That was the worst part of it, that Pete didn’t even know him. Pete didn’t see Patrick, he just saw argyle sweaters and lush lips that sang his blues.
When Patrick made it home he just barely managed to close and lock the door before Pete could shove his way inside. He just barely managed to close and lock the door before Pete cornered him again, stuck him under his thumb for the rest of their lives.
He slumped against the front door and let himself sink down to the floor. He hugged his knees to his chest and leaned back against the door. He sat and listened as Pete’s knocks turned into desperate punches and bangs against the door, that echoed through Patrick’s head again and again; trying to get him to come out, telling him how immature this all was. Patrick tried to keep his sobs quiet enough that Pete wouldn’t be able to hear them.
When had it gotten this bad? How was he so blind to it for so long? How did he let this happen? He was so completely pathetic. He couldn’t even stand up for himself right, his one attempt only ending with violence and heartache.
What was he going to do now? Could he even remember who he was before he was Pete’s?