And A Big Band Sound

Jon thinks Brendon is the kind of person who will bring extra bread for ducks at parks and pick up lost hitchhikers on highways that stretch for miles and count clouds while everyone else is counting in binary one, one, zero, one.

So maybe that's why he's kind of, I don't know, curious when Brendon shows up at the studio with notepads filled with black and blue ink, countless pages visibly torn from the binding, and he's looking sort of lost, as if he hasn't been living in a studio on a solitary mattress with Jon for the past 5 weeks. Jon doesn't really know how to deal with this new Brendon that suddenly showed up at the studio with some fucking material because it's usually Ryan who's barging in and bustling around the room, papers with maps and words and worlds and drawings of birds flying everywhere, and it's usually Ryan who shows up with ink-stained fingertips, his temples rubbed dry and dusty looking like an old out-of-print newspaper. Oh, and it's usually Ryan who is annoying the shit out of Jon. But, not today.

"Dude," is all Jon says. Dude.

"Yeah."

"You went to get coffee."

And Jon is baffled because, well, Jon isn't a morning person. And when he sends someone to go get his fucking coffee, he expects some bitter black shit in a fucking cup with a fucking lid.

"Oh. Oh! Right. Your coffee. Well, see. Okay, I'll go back. Just-- I have ideas."

Brendon's smiling, like he hasn't smiled in a while. Jon missed that. He missed Bren's teeth, bright and pearly, that shined everytime he opened his pouty lips like God's shiny fucking light or something. And Jon's not exactly a poetic person, but he could write sonnets about Brendon's smile and his teeth and his molars and the spots left from the braces and his lips, oh his lips, and he could just kiss him, really.

But, then again, Jon doesn't do happy or kissy or lovey dovey. At least, not until he has some coffee.

"Okay. You have ideas? Share your ideas. See that wall over there? Talk to it. Tell it your ideas, because walls can't get mad at you when you forget their fucking coffee. And while you tell that wall your life story, I'm going to the coffee shop."

And Jon doesn't even look at Brendon, doesn't even give a shit because it's 7 o'clock in the morning and you know, it's a little too early to give a shit.

"No! Jon. Just, sit. Sit down. Walls can't talk, the wall won't tell me to shut up, not like you do," Brendon replies, batting his eyelashes. Batting his fucking eyelashes.

Jon rolls his eyes and takes a seat, right where Brendon pointed. Right on the couch. He sits Indian-style, ready for the slew of bullshit that is about to come out of Brendon's perfect mouth.

"Okay. Okay!" and Brendon is nearly twirling around the room like a fucking ballerina. "Step number one: we need to compose fight theme music."

And right away, Jon gets up off the couch and says, "The walls really like fight theme music. I'm getting some coffee."

"No! Just. You always listen when Ryan walks through the door with all his important papers."

Jon sighs and sits back down.

"Okay. We'll compose fight theme music. And then we'll clean the studio while everyone is away. It'll be great! I drew diagrams."

And then Brendon's spreading out all the papers on the small coffee table in front of Jon's knees. He puts the maps with the maps and the curly-q words with other curly-q words and then he puts a big pile of guitar tabs under the table because apparently cleaning the studio is more important than a new album.

"Listen, Bren," Jon sits up, biting his bottom lip. "This would all be perfect if we had an album finished. So, you know. You know that I would totally love to clean shit up with you and surprise the guys, but I think instead of that, I'm just gonna vomit under this couch later."

And Brendon isn't even listening. He's tracing his maps, fingers racing over the deserts and diving into the small streams, his eyes wide and round like bright-idea lightbulbs. His hands splayed out against the backdrop of an ocean of music notes. Jon curls up into the couch and watches him through Chicago eyelashes.

Jon doesn't really like to admit this, but sometimes he wishes he could be the songwriter. He could write circles around Ryan's your speech is slurred enough that you just might swallow your tongue's and he would write about Brendon. About his miles of pale, freckled skin, about how when Jon takes a bath and he's thinking about death, the warm water is Brendon's voice and it calms him down, and about how Brendon's flaws are perfect like broken chocolate chips in a bowl of mint ice cream.

But then Brendon's talking again.

"You know, I was thinking. About that time in Wisconsin. We stopped at this 7/11 in Milwaukee. Do you remember?"

Yeah, Jon knows exactly what he's talking about. But he shakes his head. No, he says he doesn't remember. But he just wants to hear Brendon tell it, wants to hear his voice trail around the adverbs and pronouns and consonants like cigarette smoke.

"Well, I went in to get Twizzlers and you came with. And you said that you liked the black kind better. And well, I kind of wanted to kiss you right then."

And when he says this, Jon kind of wishes he could touch it. Reach out and grab that sentence, hold it in his palm and let it wisp in and out of his fingers and over his arms like a gentle but cautious snake.

Brendon's slow fingers are still tracing along the continent's edge and right there, Jon wants to kiss him. Wants to kiss him like he's drowning, wants to kiss him like he won't breathe again after, wants to kiss him like he thinks he should. Wants to kiss him like a first kiss, a last kiss, a you-may-now-kiss-the-bride kiss, an eskimo kiss. Wants to kiss him as long as rivers are wide, as good as mountains are high, and as often as forevers are forever.

But Jon doesn't. Because Jon doesn't do this, doesn't do love. He dances around love like he's never been in it, ignores love like he ignores the loud hum of a tour bus at night. But he clings to Brendon like pen clings to paper, like lanes cling to bowling alleys, so. So.

Jon is definitely in denial. He also definitely needs coffee.

"Brendon, I'm going down to the coffee shop. Please try to not break shit while I'm gone."

Jon is up and walking and out the door before Brendon can look up from his map and shake his head with more reasons to stay, to listen, to watch, to believe.

But Jon stops about halfway down the hall. Suddenly, he's awake. He's walking back toward the door, the one that says STUDIO in big, bold letters, the one with Brendon behind it. He peers in quietly, spying. Brendon's still sitting there, tracing maps, humming. Jon's heart is racing, like he just downed everything in the Starbucks across the street, like his heart races for hurricanes and for burning buildings and for Brendon.

And watching Brendon just kind of feels like the last paranthesis closing, like the last page of the last chapter of a favorite book. Like the last riff on the last day of tour. The last haircut, the last feeling, the last time. And Jon, he kind of just loves.