I Wish I'd Known Who You Were From the Start

Chapter 1: Running Man, Running Man, Breaking Down the Door

"PANIC! AT THE DISCO frontman BRENDON URIE breaks silence on SUDDEN DIVORCE"

Ryan stared at the headline with weary eyes, blinking sleepily against the false light of his computer. As if his plans for the day hadn't been nerve-wracking enough.

"Fuck," he said to himself. "Now I can't even go on Twitter."

Going on any sort of social media today would be just plain stupid. He knew he would have an onslaught of questions from fans, demanding answers that he didn't know the first thing about. He didn't want to read the comments and the questions and the rude statements and all that shit that made him cringe whenever he looked in the mirror. He didn't want to face the ruthlessness of fans that were misguided and probably got it in their heads that this was somehow Ryan's fault. How could this be Ryan's fault? He hadn't seen Brendon since Adam Levine's Halloween party. Brendon was still content with pretending Ryan didn't exist unless Ryan was in his personal bubble, and god, Ryan was only just now becoming okay with that.

He was only now starting to cope with how fucking shitty it was to lose every friend you'd had from when you were a kid and having to make new ones. He'd rebuilt his life and was finally moving forward, and yeah, a speed bump was coming up, there was definitely something awful about to happen in his life, and he knew exactly what it was, so he was going to just duck his head and avoid social media to ignore the screams of enraged fans who had it in their head that Ryan was still a major deciding factor in Brendon's life.

Then Ryan realized that the entire reason he'd gone online was to talk to Paul, and he could only talk to Paul on Twitter, the very sight he was planning to desperately avoid.

Ryan's heart sunk as he continued to stare at the article on his phone, wondering if it was even worth reading. He wondered why Brendon was divorcing Sarah. Ryan had had the chance to talk to her a couple times over the past few years, enough to know that she was a genuinely nice person who loved Brendon dearly. She was also really pretty, fucking gorgeous, to say the least, and Ryan had seen the appeal in her eyes alone. He'd known that Brendon was over him, he wasn't going to delude himself into thinking there was anything left between them, regardless of whether or not he wished there was. Ryan was an adult now. Nome useless pining for someone who'd broken his heart as much as Ryan had broken his.

Ryan sighed, then the sigh turned into a long groan, because of course he was going to have a shitty day. Dot had thrown up her breakfast, Ryan had broken one of his shoelaces early this morning while getting dressed, and now he couldn't talk to Paul, the only person who made him feel okay, the only person who could comfort him through what he was about to do. Ryan looked around, then, hoping his long groan hadn't disturbed the other coffee-drinkers around him.

He was in some local coffee joint a block away from his regular place near his apartment, so there wasn't a sense of familiarity that could calm him either. Ryan had purposefully chosen a place that he didn't find comfort in to do this because he couldn't stand associating negative feelings with another place that used to enjoy. He liked that little coffee store down the street from his apartment. He didn't really care about the place he was in now, which made it perfect. If things went horribly, then Ryan wouldn't ever have to come here again. And if they went well, then who knew— maybe Ryan would have a new place to get his coffee whenever he grew bored of what came out of the machine at home.

Ryan sighed again and pulled out his laptop, setting it down on the small round table in front of him and starting it up. A few files of songs long abandoned still sat on the desktop screen, and he did his best to ignore them. He'd been doing that a lot, lately; ignoring his problems so they couldn't hurt. Gabe had called it a coping mechanism and Dan thought it was just plain stupid. Ryan didn't care what they thought, either way. He was doing his best.