Just Once - A Peterick Fic

Chapter 26

        "You know what January 6th is?" Pete asked me. We were sitting my living room, cuddling on the couch, and half watching the evening news. I'd lit the fireplace and we'd finished putting the tree and such decorations up a little bit ago. Our Christmas spirit was in full swing. All we needed were wrapped presents under the tree. Tomorrow my mission would be finding a present for Pete.

        I directed my thoughts back to what Pete had said about January 6th and frantically tried to come up with what it could possibly be. I didn't have a clue so I hoped it wasn't anything big.

        "Uh, no, not really," I admitted, moving so I could look up at him. He'd had his arm around my shoulders and I was curled up against his chest. That position wasn't prime for making eye contact.

        He shook his head as if he didn't really expect me to know, but had hoped anyway. "Guess."

        "Hmm...Hemmingway's birthday?" I tried, talking about his little English bulldog that was currently at the kennel still because we hadn't gone to get him yet. He went there whenever we were on tour and Pete planned to pick him up tomorrow.

        Pete laughed, saying, "Nope, more important that that. Has to do with us."

        "Is it an anniversary?" I tried, figuring that was my safest bet.

        "Yup. Two months since I snuck up to your bunk," he told me with a smile, not seeming to really care that I hadn't remembered. At that, the memories came flooding back to me as if it were yesterday.

        "Pete? W-what are you doing?" I asked, nervous, confused, and stuttering a little, the last probably a result of the first.

        "Sshh," he whispered, gently pressing a finger to my lips. "Trust me. Just once."

        It had been a night I couldn't forget and wasn't sure I ever wanted to. Sure, it's resulted in a hell of a lot of stress, but ultimately it's ended up wonderful. I wouldn't take it back for a moment, not even change anything. I had no doubt this was the path I wanted to be on right now.

        "Has it really been that long? Wow, feels like yesterday," I told him, sounding impressed that we'd made it this far. I mean, two months really isn't that long, but I never dreamed I would have any relationship of this sort with Pete, let alone one of decent length. I'd never thought we'd work well as a couple before we tried it out - I thought all those fan fics I'd seen were insane ideas - but now that it's a reality, we felt perfect. We felt infinite, as if our relationship was bound by nothing.

        "I want to tell our families before then," Pete blurted out as if he hadn't really wanted to say it, but it came out against his will. He looked nervous afterwards, worried about what I might say.

        "Oh," I said, not sure if I really agreed with that. I was pretty sure my parents would react positively, but Pete's were another story. They were nice, great people - I loved them as if they were my own parents - but they were a little conservative, little being an understatement. "Are you sure about that?"

        He sighed forcefully as if he'd been holding his breath as he awaited my response. "No," he admitted, undoubtedly thinking the same thing I had about his parents. "I'm just tired of hiding us. I wanna hold your hand and walk down the street, kiss you on stage, do normal couple things."

        "Well, to do that, we'd have to tell the fans and I'm very against that at the moment. I don't think they like us much at the moment anyway," I told him, keeping my tone cautious, as if I didn't want to set him off. "But I understand where you're coming from. I'm tired of Andy, Joe, and our team being the only ones knowing; I'm just not sure it's the right time."

        "What if we only told our parents, not the fans? I want to tell someone that I love you. I'd scream it from the rooftops if I could because, Patrick, I want the whole world to know you're mine and I'm your's," he told me, pleading at this point.

        "Pete, I'm worried about your parents..." I told him, a sad smile curving my lips.

        "Who cares if they react badly?" he asked, standing up and throwing his arms up theatrically as he tended to do when he was worked up about something. "What're they going to do? Cut me out of their life?" Before he spoke again, he knelt down in front of me, taking my hands in his. His voice was hardly a whisper and I had to strain to hear it. "I'd rather have you in my life than them if I had to choose."

        I shook my head, speechless. How was I supposed to respond to that? We haven't been together that long and he was already ready to do this? Our relationship was moving awfully quickly, but I think that was because we'd been friends for so long before we were a couple. Still, our speed scared me. What if we were going too fast and lost control because of it, crashing and burning?

        "Pete, slow down," I told him, holding my palms up to him in a "stop" motion. "I love you and you mean the absolute world to me, but I don't want to take things too quickly and mess it up." My tone had been soft, but very persuasive as if I were willing him to agree with me, my words a poison that could slip in through his ears and to his brain to change his mind. "Please."

        He shook his head, standing back up and turning away from me, running his hands through his hair. "No, I'm begging you, not the other way around. I want to tell our parents if no one else," he told me, his back still to me, his hands resting on his temples as if this whole thing were giving him a headache. Pete was the kind of guy that once he set his mind to something, no one could stop him and this was no exception. Talking to him about it was useless when he got like this. I needed to change the topic. Now.

        "Can't we discuss this later?" I asked him, shaking my head a little although he couldn't see it. In fact, it was probably best he hadn't seen it.

        At that, he turned back around to face me again, crossing his arms in front of himself. He stared at me, his gaze hard and unforgiving. "Why are you avoiding it all of a sudden?"

        "I'm not avoiding it; I just think the conversation at the moment isn't-"

        "Isn't what? Rational? Yeah, because I'm always irrational. I've got bipolar disorder, so I'm crazy and all my emotions are unjustified," he said, throwing his hands up in the air in frustration. He looked angry, but wounded at the same time as if the person who'd stabbed him had called him a certain three letter word that ends in a G and starts with an F just before puncturing his skin.

        "That's not what I was going to say! Productive is the word I was going to use, and we're still moving in that direction," I told him, raising my voice slightly as I spoke. I didn't want this to turn into a fight, but that's what it seemed to be. We just had to talk about this right before Christmas, didn't we? "But it's slowly becoming irrational, too."

        "How's it irrational, hm?" he asked me, and with the tone he used, I knew I'd have to be careful with my response. If it wasn't perfect, he'd storm right out the door and not come back for a couple hours. With how late it was getting, he might be gone all night, but at this point, I thought some time apart might be good for us. Maybe I shouldn't be careful with my answer.

        "How's it becoming irrational? You're acting as if I always treat you as if you're helpless simply because you're bipolar. First of all, I don't. Second, that has nothing to do with anything!" I told him, my voice progressively getting louder with each word. By the end I was screaming and he had that same hurt/angry face as earlier.

        I was right about him storming out the door, though. That's exactly what he did; he turned on his heel, grabbed his coat from the rack, and headed right out the door without a word.

        Please don't be gone long, Pete.

A/N: Hey so this chapter isn't late even with finals all week (they're over now so I'm in a good mood) and stuff so that's gr9.