You Could Feel The Sky

For the rest of the day and well into the night, Brendon sings and dances and quick-changes through about five different dances, five different songs, and so many different costumes that Ryan loses count half-way through. It's the most hilarious thing Ryan thinks he's ever seen, but Brendon seems to be enjoying himself. The only moment Ryan wasn't laughing was the one time Brendon almost danced himself down into a trap-door, but he managed to keep himself steady and recovered fairly elegantly, using a one-legged spin to make the notion seem non-accidental. Ryan remains worried for a few more minutes, but he can't keep from laughing for that much longer.

*

Something is weird when Ryan wakes up. For one, it's still completely dark in the room. For two, Brendon is sitting on his chest, outlined silver in the darkness and looking unnaturally lost.

"Brendon? What's wrong?" Ryan asks, voice thick with sleep.

"The radiation killed my whole family," Brendon says. The words are, in themselves, a knife to Ryan's heart. Brendon says them with absolutely no inflection, soulless eyes and emotionless features. Ryan wants to stop him, to say it’s okay; he doesn't have to explain it. To say he doesn't need to know, really. But Brendon doesn't give him the chance. "I listened to the radio every day, but nothing ever changed," he says. "When I thought about it, I didn't know what I was really hoping for, anyway."

Ryan doesn't say anything, so Brendon does. "There wasn't anything holding me back."

Silence. Radio silence. Radiated silence.

"If it means anything, now," Brendon says. "I'd probably still have had hope if I'd known you were hoping too."

Ryan doesn't say how he'd lost hope a long time ago, how nothing would be different. Brendon still would have gone on his lonely suicide mission. Ryan still would have joined him. Nobody's parents would've come back from the dead.

"Me too," he says instead. Brendon rolls off of him and settles to his right. The bed is big enough that Ryan doesn't mind sharing. He doesn’t think he would even if it weren't.

*

The next morning they spend a good thirty minutes pretending to be outraged about lousy service in the deserted Denny's Casino, which makes Ryan laugh so hard he gets a cramp in his left side. They walk around the Strip a little bit, and Ryan feels completely relaxed. It doesn't even bother him when Brendon lets their hands brush. It doesn't bother him when Brendon lets their fingers catch. It doesn't bother him when Brendon holds on tight and squeezes.

*

The door to their hotel room makes an annoyingly loud sound as it collides with the wall, but Ryan can't really let himself be bothered. Brendon's mouth is soft and warm against his own, and he's far too focused on tongues and lips and teeth to care about the stupid door and the noises it makes.

They shuffle in backwards, Brendon pushing back the sleeves of Ryan's hoodie until it slides off his arms and onto the tiled floor. He goes for Ryan's favorite shirt next, eagerly stretching the fabric enough to deform the neckline permanently, but Ryan doesn't care. He busies himself with Brendon's neck, biting and soothing when necessary, while Brendon reaches for the button of his jeans. The backs of Ryan's knees hit the edge of one of the beds and they fall onto it, Brendon on top of Ryan for the most part. They break apart for air and Brendon says, "Is this okay?"

Ryan kisses him.

*

"My mother listened to the radio every day too," Ryan says. They're walking through Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum, observing life-like reincarnations of famous celebrities and sometimes pretending to interview them. Brendon is the best fake reporter, Ryan thinks. He always comes up with the most entertaining questions.

"Yeah?" Brendon says absently, he seems more interested in posing in bunny ears next to Hugh Heffner. Ryan sits on the opposite side of the wax dummy, holding the fake champagne bottle.

"Yeah," Ryan says. "It was like church, or something. I didn't go to church much, but she treated it the same. For every day the levels didn't change, she cried another minute in the bathroom with the door locked."

"Oh?" Brendon says. His voice sounds less carefree than before.

"Mhm," Ryan says. "I don't think she really cares about the radiation levels," he says. "I think what she really wanted was for the radio to give us back my dad."

"What did you want the radio to do?" Brendon asks.

Ryan is a little taken aback by the question. Brendon is staring at him. Ryan stares right back.

"I dunno," he says, tossing the fake champagne bottle back into the costume trunk. But Ryan does know. He wanted to radio to take it all back. He wanted the past he couldn't have. He wanted somebody to say, "Ha-ha! We were only kidding. Nothing is ever that serious!"

But the radiation levels remained the same.

*

They spend a few more nights on the Strip, not doing much but coexisting with each other in their hotel room. Brendon is big on cuddling, apparently, and they spend a lot of the time just lying in Ryan's bed. Ryan feels kind of stupid, being thankful for Brendon. He doesn't understand how something so horrible could bring him something so wonderful.

Eventually, though, the Strip gets boring and unnerving. Ryan doesn't like the vast amount of empty space there is around them. He uses Brendon's dwindling food supply as an excuse to head back to the smaller parts of town.

*

They make it all the way back to the very first grocery store--the place where they met. The old radio is still in the parking lot, gathering dust, but Ryan walks right past it.

Inside, Brendon packs the bag full of all the things he knows are Ryan's favorite. Ryan head over to the canned foods isle, taking down a couple cans of soup and stacking them according to salt content.

When the bag is packed full, Brendon heads over to the canned foods isle with dinner in his hands. Upon his arrival, he sees that Ryan has fallen asleep against a pyramid of soup cans. Behind him is an identical pyramid of canned vegetables. A little ways down, a pyramid of beans.

Brendon sets the bags of chips he'd selected for dinner down on one of the empty shelves. He pulls Ryan's hoodie out of his bag and tosses it over the sleeping boy as a makeshift blanket. Brendon isn't tired yet, so he sits as close as he can without disturbing Ryan and lays a hand in the older boy's hair, soothing his scalp with his fingers and humming some notes from Hey Jude.

*

It's pitch dark when Ryan wakes up, and it takes him a moment to remember why he's sleeping on the floor instead of in his warm hotel bed. The grocery store atmosphere is refreshing, though, save for the lingering smell of rotten meat and dairy products. His hoodie is crumpled at his feet, and Brendon is snoring softly against his shoulder.

He looks at Brendon, then. His dark hair is soft and clean from his hotel shower. He's wearing a hot pink shirt that says 'I heart Las Vegas', and Ryan still thinks he's the most beautiful boy he's ever seen.

It's a little weird, the things he feels for Brendon. Sometimes, he wonders if it's some diluted form of Stockholm syndrome, or just the quiet desperation of loneliness. He wonders if, had the accident never happened, would he still have met and fallen for Brendon eventually?

Maybe he wouldn't have, he thinks. Maybe Brendon would have become a musician, like he wanted to. Maybe Ryan would have been a writer. Maybe he would have married a pretty girl and had a pretty baby. His dad would have been proud of him for that.

He's not so sure how proud his dad would be of what happened instead.

*

"I kind of miss my mom," Ryan says the next day. It's sort of a stupid thing to say, he knows. Brendon has a lot more to miss than Ryan does, but--but not really.

Brendon laughs a little. "No kidding," he says.

*

"Do you think it was a mistake?" Brendon asks. His voice is raspy and breathless, right next to Ryan's ear. Ryan closes his eyes. "Do you regret it?"

Ryan makes a helpless little noise in the back of his throat, the skin around his wrists burning bright red from the constant pressure of Brendon's hands holding them down against the linoleum floor. Brendon pushes his hips into Ryan's, rough, and Ryan gasps out, "No!" His voice is quiet, desperate.

Brendon grinds their hips together again, pulling away from Ryan's ear just far enough to bite at the line of his jaw. The light behind his eyelids is white and electric. His vision swims when he re-opens his eyes. Again, he asks, "Was it worth it, meeting me?" he breathes. "Would you take it all back?"

Ryan jerks his head so that Brendon can back up a bit and see his face. His eyes are dilated but serious when he says, "No." He forces his head further out until he can bite at Brendon's lips; kiss him like he means it.

"No," he repeats. "Never."

*

But maybe it's the radiation talking.

*

The next day, back in the grocery store parking lot, Ryan finds the old radio. He thinks that maybe if there wasn't radiation, there would have been some significant moss growth over one or both of the speakers. He imagines for a moment what it might look like, then reaches down to turn the dial to the only radio station he can remember.

"Good morning, Summerlin," the voice says when Ryan finds it. There's a customary pause, for those still desperate enough to keep tuning in.

"Radiation levels today are unchanged," the voice says. Brendon kicks the back of Ryan's foot to make his presence known. Ryan turns to him and smiles.

"Citizens are urged to stay inside."