Better Off In Love (Peterick Au)

Stupid for You

Patrick had quite happily wasted a good two days moping and ignoring any attempts Pete or Hayley may have made to contact him. By ignoring, he meant he'd just turned his phone off, so in reality he wasn't even sure they'd tried to contact him. A part of him hoped they had, a part hoped they hadn't.

If nothing else, Patrick was in mourning for all the years he'd wasted crushing on Pete only for it all to be thrown back at him as a stupid publicity stunt that he hadn't even been let in on. The sad thing is, if Pete had asked him to be his fake boyfriend for a promotional thing, he would have said yes in a heartbeat, just so he had an excuse to spend time with him again, and to see what it would be like to live out the future of his high school dreams. He'd had a real taste of paradise now, but it had all just gone to shit.

It felt strange after spending all their time together for the last couple of weeks to now go cold turkey. But Patrick reasoned that he needed some time to process his feelings and maybe calm down a little to make  sure he didn't post anything too emo on Twitter and get people worried. Or maybe he did want people to worry. Specifically Pete fucking Wentz.

How could he just turn back up in Patrick's life like that, make Patrick think they were falling for each other and then have it turn out it was all just to sell more albums?! Were all those songs about him all lies too? He knew he got stupid around Pete, but this really took it to the max.

Somewhere in the middle of this particular angry monologue, there was a knock at the door. Without thinking, Patrick padded over to the door and swung it open carelessly.

When he saw Pete stood there, he started, and then tried to swing the door closed again. Unfortunately, Pete stuck his hand out, and the door just bounced open again.

"What the fuck, babe?" Pete asked, stepping forward to enter the apartment, gently shutting the door behind him. "You've been ignoring my texts for the last couple days, and there was that Buzzfeed article about you crying at GDY,"

Pete looked his boyfriend over. He looked maybe a little worse for wear, and he didn't like the deep frown he wore at that moment, but he was there, alive and whole. Pete was glad of that.

"I didn't know what to think. I was worried about you,"

Patrick looked his ex-boyfriend over. The man who broke his heart looked perfect as ever, showing no signs of remorse. He wanted to scream, but thankfully he had enough impulse control not to do that and get complaints from the neighbours.

"Are you for real?!" Patrick laughed without humour.

Pete looked at him in disbelief, not sure what he'd done to cause this sudden change of attitude.

"I heard what you and Hayley said, Pete," Patrick shook his head, trying to focus on the anger and not break down crying again. "Did you think I was an easy target or some stupid shit like that? Did you fucking pity me? You could have told me what was going on,"

"I'm not sure what you mean," Pete wore an expression of deep confusion, trying to guess what Hayley and him and done to anger Patrick so much. "What did you hear us saying?"

"How she couldn't have come up with a better plan," Patrick's voice cracked, losing its bite and becoming a little above a whisper, "And you said you'd tried your best or some shit. This whole thing was a fucking PR stunt, wasn't it?"

Pete's mouth fell open. How could Patrick think that what they had was anything but real?

"Oh, shit, Patrick, no, that's not it at all!" Pete took a tentative step towards his boyfriend. "Hayley was saying how nice it was that the timing was right for you and me, and jokingly made a comment about it being good for promotion, yes, but God, I promise you this is real,"

Patrick looked at Pete with wide, watery eyes. "Really?"

"I swear, Patrick. I couldn't do that to you," Pete shook his head, looking down at the floor. "I care about you way too much for that,"

Patrick only had to glance at Pete to know he was being sincere, and he quickly embraced him, letting the tears he'd built up over the past days fall onto Pete's chest.

"It's okay, babe," Pete soothed, rubbing circles on Patrick's back, "It's all going to be okay,"