Since When Did You Become a Romantic?

Chapter 13: Boy Scouts, Chicago, and Being Punched by Homeless People

When they get to the hotel room they make a pleasant yet annoying discovery. Mikey has flopped onto one bed as Gerard and Frank stand. There are only two beds. Frank is actually really glad as is Gerard but no homo. "Well," Frank starts, "He's your brother." He sits on the edge of the other bed.

"No! That's not fair," Gerard leans up against the dresser. "When we were little Mikey used to kick me out of the bed and he sweats in his sleep." Gerard starts pulling random facts about his brother up from hell probably.

"Okay I was like six," Mikey defends.

"Boy Scout camp," Gerard replies.

Just the word makes Mikey physically recoil. "You weren't even there. That was Pete."

"I still know."

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FLASHBACK TO BOY SCOUT CAMP BECAUSE WHY NOT

Mikey was twelve and the only reason he went to boy scout camp was because his best friend, Pete Wentz, was going. In reality, Mikey hated the outdoors and he wasn't even a boy scout. He lied on the application and said he had completed the life saving badge or something, when no other scout had yet. So now he's at a camp in the middle of nowhere with Pete. Oh what an adventure it will be.

Mikey sits on his top bunk across Pete. Sure camp is better than sitting at home and dealing with Gerard and his parents but he doesn't know anyone but Pete. "You okay, Jack?" Pete asks while looking up from his comic book.

"Eventually, that nickname will get old," Mikey smiles from his comic.

"Never. Anyway, Way, I heard you lied on your paper. Thats pretty bold, bro," Pete chuckles.

"Nah it's not a big deal. I think lifesaving can't be that hard right?" Mikey replies.

"You'll have to show the master that you can get a ten pound weight from the bottom of a pool."

Mikey stops reading and looks up. "Master? What is this pokemon?"

"Yeah scout master. That's what we call her," Pete answers.

Some kid on the bunk next to them looks over. "She's hot af," he winks.

"That's a bit creepy, bro," Mikey says.

"She's in high school, not someone's mom, weirdo," he laughs at Mikey a little.

The words high school, makes a bell ring in his head. From what he knows from his brother, and that's not much, he knows two things about high school girls: they're hot and they ignore you. Well, that might be because everyone ignores Gerard but Mikey decides to listen to him. "Whatever, girls are annoying," Mikey tries to act casual with Pete, his low key crush, there.

Like a clock, the scout master enters. That weird kid and Gerard are both right. She is hot. She tied her hair into pigtails and tied the bottom of a scout shirt up. Wait a minute, Mikey knows her. It's Sarah, my queen my love. Sarah is a girl in his brother's class. "Okay boys, we're doing the next three badges outside," she read from the clipboard. "Leather weaving, archery, and lifesaving."

Oh fuck Mikey thinks.

Pete does leather weaving because he can sit by the grimy lake and watch Mikey. Sarah paces the sand shore while the boys wade into the water. "Ready?!" She shouts to them.

Mikey looks around as the other boys laugh and chatter to their friends. "Please no," he whispers.

"What you scared," a boy laughs.

"What no. I didn't say anything," he tries to play it off.

"Okay GO!" Sarah shouts and does a hand gesture. Immediately, all the boys are dashing to find the weight in the lake. Mikey looks around in the murky water. He looks back to Pete who is failing at making a leather bracelet and Mikey decides it's okay if he fails too. He dives into the water and before long his lungs are filling with water. His vision fades into a dark blurry mess and before he knows what's happening, Sarah is pounding at his chest. She's covered in water from swimming in to get him. Mikey eventually stops coughing and Sarah makes his stay in the cabin all day. Pete volunteers to stay with him.