Do You Know What It Feels Like?

Saturday, 6:00 PM
Bunk area

There are many, many times in your life when you can say how there are some things are just not when they so obviously are. Just like how Andy was so not bugging Patrick out in the main lounge, how Joe was not snoring so loudly, how Jon and Ryan were not in the back lounge, not seriously watching Spongebob, and how Brendon was so not still hurting from his spat with Taylor.

He does admit that he has moments when he could be considered as an absolute retard, but he didn’t realize just how much of a retard he could be to have his fian- girlfrien- Taylor so mad at him, so much so that he began to doubt exactly what they were to each other. He had been so sure that they would be one of those couples who would get to marry young and have kids young and not have to worry about their kids thinking they were old fashioned by the time they were teenagers.

He turned his head to the side slightly to look at the girl curled around him; her head leaned on his shoulder and her arm thrown across his abdomen, sleeping. It wasn’t exactly hard to believe that Brendon had been able to catch her interest, he knew he was good looking to some extent, but it was hard and near impossible to believe that maybe, just maybe, she just wasn’t that into him in the first place. Their first few weeks together had been explicitly enjoyable for the both of them, as far as he could tell. Could it be possible that he had, unknowingly, pushed her away from him and towards the arms of the ever-lovable Patrick Stump?

Brendon wasn’t oblivious to their growing closeness. He knew that Taylor spent more time with Patrick nowadays than she did with him. It would be prudent to say that Taylor was right in telling Brendon that he was immature – how could he not be when the person he was absolutely sure he loved and loved him back was having more fun with someone else?

He sighed, carefully pulling away from Taylor so as not to rouse her from her sleep and crawled over her. He pulled the curtains shut and cracked his neck a little while he padded towards the back lounge. He entered quietly, eyes falling upon the pair on the couch watching the television in front of them seriously. One of the two, Jon, looked up, saw Brendon’s more than forlorn face and immediately moved closer to the arm of the couch, pushing Ryan to do the same, making space for Brendon in the middle. Ryan obliged, looking up as Brendon neared the couch, his cheeks tinged red – like the way they had been a couple of months ago when he had shown up on Ryan’s doorstep, having been kicked out of his parents house.

Brendon plopped down in between them, curling up as soon as his body collided with the piece of furniture. He leaned his head on Ryan’s shoulder; at the same time that Jon took his hand, stroking the back of his hand comfortingly. Ryan leaned his head on Brendon’s and reached up to pat his cheek gently. Spencer might be the youngest out of the four of them, but Brendon was and always will be their baby.

“Am I- ... Am I annoying?” Brendon asked, his low voice hitching up a few pitches as his question ended, and winced. He had no idea it would hurt this badly.

Ryan sighed and lowered the volume of the television. “At some points, yes you are.” Though known for his brutal bluntness, everyone knew Ryan always had some point behind his answers.

Brendon winced and felt the sadness and pain he felt earlier building up again. “D’you think… I should… maybe… stop being so… me?” he asked, looping his arm through Jon’s, pulling him closer.

“Nah, where would we all be if you weren’t the way you were?” Jon asked, chuckling lightly, and patted Brendon’s thigh, hoping it would comfort the singer somehow.

“Why the sudden onslaught of sadness, Brenny-bear?”

“It’s just… Tay, she’s… I don’t think she likes me anymore,” he answered with a frown. There was a difference between thinking these things and actually saying them out loud to someone else – it hurt a lot more to share.

“Is this about earlier?” Ryan checked, making sure that the raised voices he heard earlier weren’t just his imagination.

“This is about everything,” Brendon confessed, sniffing quietly, “this is about how all of a sudden Tay likes hanging out with Patrick more than me, how all of a sudden, she hardly ever sleeps in my bunk anymore, how I’m realizing just how much of a burden I must have been to you guys-“

“Hold up, Bren,” Ryan cut in, pulling away from him the same time Jon did, “you can keep on thinking those lies about Taylor, but never, ever-“

“Should you ever think that you were ever a burden to us; you never were – you still aren’t.” Jon finished for Ryan, giving Brendon a pointed stare.

Brendon blushed slightly before nodding and murmuring a quiet ‘can we go back to the cuddling?’. They resumed their previous position closer together, if possible, and fell quiet.

“She just needs to get used to you, Bren. We were with you for a long period of time, she’s only had you for a couple of weeks – give her time.”

.

Saturday, 7:30 PM
Bunks area

Taylor stirred from her sleep and shifted slightly, expecting to bump into a warm body. When she didn’t, she opened her eyes slowly, looking around for the person she fell asleep with. She felt a painful tug at her heart before gathering her sense and thought that maybe he was just in the bathroom. She crawled out of the bunk and stretched, warming up her muscles after being cramped up in the bunk for a temporarily unknown amount of time.

When she noticed that there was a soft light coming from the open door of the back lounge, she approached the room quietly.

She knew that the four Panic! Boys were close, but no amount of preparation could have her react calmly about the picture she saw in front of her in the lounge. Ryan was pressed against the arm of the couch, one arm wrapped around Brendon, who was sitting on his lap, both legs stretched out on one side – Jon in between them - face pressed against his neck, sleeping. His other hand was stretched out to the same side that Brendon’s legs were in, resting on Jon’s head, which was propped up on one of Brendon’s thighs. One of Jon’s hands was limply holding Brendon’s hand above his head as he slept.

She quirked her eyebrow at the pretzel the three boys formed on the couch. One would think that such positions would be okay for girls to do, but with guys, it just seemed … odd. Though, of course, she had already been exposed to such oddities in the past few weeks she had spent on the tour, but even then, something like this was still hard to grasp.

She jumped out of her thoughts when Ryan’s gaze turned from the television to her. She noticed his arm around Brendon’s waist tighten slightly along with the thin line his lips made as he registered her presence.

“Uhm, hey,” she tried, hoping to lift some of the awkwardness that all of a sudden dropped down on the two of them like a heavy weight. “So, uhm, is… is Brendon okay?” It was hard not to notice the red tinge of Brendon’s cheeks and nose, even in just the soft glow of the television.

Ryan looked down at Jon and Brendon’s joint hands as his hand rubbed Brendon’s arm up and down gently. “The thing about Brendon is… he forgives easily,” he began, “but it’s hard for him to forget.” Ryan looked up then, his amber eyes practically boring holes into Taylor.

The guilt washed over her in new waves now, stronger and faster. To have someone look at her with so much disdain made her rethink just how much she might have hurt Brendon with her words.

“I know you’re Andy’s best friend, and Andy’s Pete’s sister, so, by association, you’re practically Pete’s sister too. I wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize the band now, but if you ever try to hurt my little brother again, I will kill you.”