You're Magic

It takes an hour to get Peter out of bed the next morning. I scream and yell but he won't budge. "Peter Wentz! It's seven-thirty. If we're late I won't have sex with you for three months!" I scream, pulling on his ankles. He jumps out of bed and runs over to my suitcase to find clothes, runs to the bathroom, and I hear the shower turn on. I make eggs and toast and Pete scarfs it down after his shower and runs back to the bathroom to brush his teeth. I get a notification from Twitter.

petewentz: @evelynmarie not that i think you'd do it but i wont risk 3 months w/o sex if im late

evelynmarie: @petewentz stop tweeting and brushing your teeth. you have five minutes.

Pete comes running out of my room dressed to go outside, skidding by my side. "Okay. Ready." He grins, triumphant. Now it's 8:00 and we still have to get gas and go to Starbucks, as per Pete's request. I kiss his jaw before grabbing my laptop, purse, and keys.

"Someone didn't account for traffic," I smirk, and he pouts, pulling me out the door.
Lucky for Pete we make it ten minutes early. My secretary smiles at us and gives me a stack of papers full of emails and forms and memos and she tells me that my boss needs me and Pete in his office at 9:30 and that I have a meeting at 9:50.

"So you're not gonna be with me?" Pete huffs, reading over my shoulder the email I'm looking at about my meeting as we ride the elevator to the seventh floor.

"Yeah, Pete, I'm really sorry but this meeting is really important. I have no clue who's interviewing you." I step off the elevator and hold out my hand for him to take he takes it reluctantly and walks by my side grumpy.

"But Baby Girl," Pete stamps his feet and whines as he waits for me to unlock my office. I hold the door open and let him in first. He sits on my desk and glares at me. I set my things down on the half of the desk that he isn't taking up and plop into my computer chair.

"What do you want me to do, Pete? I used my vacation time on you and your interview was my Get Out Of Hell Free card with my boss. You owe me this one." I can tell he thinks he doesn't owe me anything but he just rolls his eyes and presses his lips t my forehead.

"Fine, just as long as you never jeopardize our sex life again."

"Deal."

Pete sits down on my expensive, white Matteo Thun sofa, against the floor to ceiling window overlooking the street and he props up his dirty boots on my $850 stained Teak wood coffee table. I ignore him and check my email, full of memos, reader comments, editor letters, etc. Nine thirty rolls around and we trudge to my boss's office holding hands.

"Mr. Banks," I nod, walking in, practically pulling Pete behind me. We sit in matching Martha Washington black Leather Side chairs in front of the expansive oak wood desk. Pete's fingers curl around my thing and I rest my hand on top of his. A minute later one of the interns, Nate, comes bustling in with a stack of folders and a cup of coffee, leaving them on Mr. Banks' desk. In another minute one of my co-workers, Olivia, rushes in and stands just behind Pete and me.

"Pete, Olivia's going to be talking with you today. Our topics are fatherhood, Black Cards, and our Top Line Writer, Evelyn Davis." I block out the rest because I've heard this a thousand times. Interview's no longer than an hour, photos forty-five minutes or less. Mr. Banks says I can join at any time even though I have a meeting. Pete gives me a pleading, Please don't leave me alone look, but I say I have other work to catch up on. I stand and Pete does too.

"Please," he whines under his breath, following me.

"No, Peter. I have stuff to do." I don't turn to look at him and open the door.

"Evelyn."

"Okay. Let me go to this meeting and I'll see if the work can wait a little while, all right?"

"Fine." Pete grumbles, his eyes smoldering and dark. I stand on my tiptoes to kiss his nose.

"Have fun everyone!" I call, sauntering out of the tense office. If Pete didn't like what he was forced to do, he made it well known. I felt sorry for the suckers.
........

I never end up getting a chance to see Pete but I catch him walking to the bathroom, rubbing makeup from his face onto the sleeve of his white shirt. "Hey, you." I smile and pull him into a hug. He pulls away from me, grumpy. "You up for lunch?" I look up at him and wipe some eyeshadow from his face.

"Whatever." His voice is quite and sounds like gravel on gravel.

"What're you in the mood for?" I take his hand and lead him to my office where I hand him my makeup remover and some tissues. I try to put his negative mood past me.

"I don't care." He grumbles, wiping off his eyes, throwing the tissues into the trash. The makeup's gone but his eyes and the skin around them holds a red tint. I cup his face in my hand.

"What's bugging you?" I whisper it and his arm wraps around my waist.

"Nothing, why?"

"Are you really going to say that to my face?" I ask skeptically, eyebrow raised.

"You forgot to tell them I don't talk about my personal life."

"Fuck, I'm sorry. They ask about--"

"Yeah, they asked about her." Pete says it like it's something that tastes bad in his mouth, his fingers digging into my hip a little too hard. I twist under his grip and his hand falls.

"Did you answer?"

"Of course I didn't. I said I don't answer those questions. I barely even talked about you besides how wonderful you are and how nice and caring you are. Only the best things," he murmurs. "And you never showed up."

"Look, I'm really, really sorry about that, I was totally distracted by work, Peter." I press my cheek to his shoulder. "I'll talk to them about that stuff later. How about we get sandwiches or something? I only have a few things to do then we can leave by three or so?"

"That's fine." Pete hands me my scarf and jacket.

"Cheer up, Bucko." I sing, pulling him alongside me. Pete cracks a smile and wraps his arms around my shoulders. Somehow just his smile makes me feel a thousand times better.

"I can't really say no to that, huh?"
..........

That night when we're walking inside I slip on ice and twist my ankle in a way it shouldn't be twisted. After Pete panicking and a lot of crying and screaming and "OW FUCK"s on my part, Pete carries me inside and gets me to bed. I tell him that it's not a big deal and that I'm fine, even though in reality it hurts like a bitch and I most definitely can't walk on it at all at the moment. I settle for wrapping it in an ace bandage and icing it.

Pete plays doctor all night, elevating my foot and getting me food, ice, and anything else I want. By 12:17 AM I'm fed up with it and I ask for Advil and a glass of wine. He seems a little reluctant for the later but I tell him if he wants to be a good doctor he'll give it to me.

evelynmarie: @petewentz makin' a fine doctor. Paging Doctor Wentz! I need hugs!

I down my wine and pills and beckon Pete to bed, singing "Doctor Wentz! I need you!" He crawls into bed tiredly and lays down beside me. "You're a fantastic doctor." I laugh, drinking the last drops of my wine.

"I shouldn't have given you that. Whoops."

"It's just what the doctor ordered!" I start giggling and I can't stop. Pete rolls his eyes and kisses my forehead.

"Sleep. For real."

I can't help but continue to giggle uncontrollably, to which Pete glares at me, shutting off the light. Once my eyes adjust to the darkness I can see he's still giving me a hard look. "If you wanted me to sleep you could've asked!"

"Go to sleep?"

"G'night." I throw my head back on the pillows, my arm around Pete's shoulders. The throbbing in my ankle is very much existent, but I sleep soundly with Pete's arms twined around me.

The next day is weird and I'm not awake until 10:06 AM and I freak out until I spot a note taped to my foot. I'm slightly surprised that Pete would do this, even though I know I shouldn't be. I roll my eyes to myself.

"Baby Girl--
It's 7:04 AM and I just called you in sick. I just put new ice on your foot and you didn't notice. It's still swollen. I'm going out for coffee with Gabe so I'll take the ice off before I go. Be careful if you walk on it and don't go far. If you need anything don't hesitate to call. I love you very much. Trying to forget everything that isn't you--Peter."

I fold the note and pick up the phone to call Pete. I have a lot of at-replies on Twitter from people that I don't know so I don't check them. I tweet Gabe and Pete telling them I'm awake and that my foot hurts a lot and that I hope they're having fun and that I love them both. The mention of Gabe's name makes me nostalgic for the "old days" when Pete and I listened to Midtown and Gabe still played bass.

I go to call Pete but I end up calling Patrick instead because I see he called me in the middle of the night. Probably something Bronx-related that Pete took care of. He answers on the fourth ring. "Hi, Evelyn."

"Hi, Patrick." Now I feel stupid for calling because I have nothing to say. He continues the conversation, forever my saving grace.

"What's up?"

"Sprained my ankle and Pete and Gabe are out on the town."

He laughs a little. "Sucks, huh?"

"Yeah. So I thought I'd share my pain with you. What're you doing?"

"I just ate breakfast and I'm waiting for the Bronx to get up."

"Toast a little on the burned side with orange marmalade and a little butter?" I smile into the phone. He used to eat that for breakfast all the time.

"You know me well."

"Always have." There's a brief, awkward silence. "I miss you," I mumble.

"I miss you too, Ev. But I'll be over in--"

"No, Patrick. I miss you."

"I'm still here. Always have been, always will be." The way he says this makes my heart hurt. I begin to think of fuzzy memories that I can't quite remember correctly. Hot lazy days in Chicago in Patrick's basement flood my mind.

"Sometimes I wonder what would've happened if you'd never introduced me to Pete. I wonder if we'd still be together."

All I hear for a few seconds is Patrick's breathing, crackly over wireless telephone lines and it feels like a lifetime until he speaks.

"I don't know, Ev," his tone is dismissive.

"It was just a thought. You were my first love, you know." I feel nervous saying it, but for some reason I feel like it needs to be said; like he needs to be reminded.

There was a time, many years ago. Before I knew Pete, and I fell in love with a shy boy that worked at a Border's Bookstore. He recommended countless books for me and we went out for coffee too many times to count. I used to show up at his house every afternoon once he got home from school his senior year. He took me to prom and I brought him to college parties. He played music for me and sang to me. We used to go to concerts and we went on road trips and we had fun. I was genuinely happy with Patrick. I was in love with Patrick Stumph.

One day he brought me to band practice. There I met Peter Wentz. He was loud, obnoxious, cocky, pretentious, and did anything to win me over, even though I was Patrick's girlfriend. He had something about him that pulled me in and I couldn't stay away. I wanted to hate him because of his personality, but before I knew it I was falling for him. He brought me to local shows, snuck me into his house late at night. He wrote me stories and cried on my shoulder over heartbreak. He made me laugh so hard I peed my pants and he told me every embarrassing thing about Patrick that he could think of.

After being in a relationship with Patrick for just over two years we broke up. I told him exactly why and I didn't think it would be fair to him any other way. I felt like the literal scum of the earth, but somehow Patrick was so understanding of it all. Not that he really had any other choice. We agreed to keep our love platonic, because there was no doubting that I loved, I love, everything about Patrick Stump.

"You were mine too," his voice is quite and it makes me miss Chicago.

"I'm sorry I never called you. I shouldn't have punished you like that." I shake my head to myself, staring up at the ceiling.

"I understand, Evelyn."

"And that's the worst part, Patrick! You should've hated me for falling in love with Pete. You should have been pissed for not talking to you for five years. You should be mad and hate me. But you don't and I don't understand." I'm frustrated and aggravated more than anything else right now. This was something I never understood about Patrick. Why he was so accepting of everything I did? We shouldn't be having this conversation right now, three thousand miles apart where we couldn't even be face to face. My heart hurts, almost as much as my foot.

"Because, Evelyn, I love you too much to hate you. I'm not going to let stupid things get in the way of friendship, got it? I could never hate you."

"But I just don't-"

"There's nothing else to get, Evelyn. I'm just happy I can still talk to you. Those five years were living hell. Living fucking hell. I didn't even know where you were. I count my blessings that I'm talking to you right this second. Okay?"

"All right," I laugh a little bit to lighten the mood and so does Patrick. I can picture him sprawled across Pete's couch on the phone, the newspaper in his lap, still in his pajamas. His voice distracts me from my thoughts.

"Look, I've gotta go. Bronx is waking up," he sounds tired.

"Oh, all right. Tell him we say hi, okay?

"Okay, Evelyn. Rest up your foot, yeah?"

"Okay....I love you, Patrick." The sentence comes out of my vocal chords slightly choked. I want to cry, and I'm sure he knows it.

"I love you too, Evelyn," he pauses a second. "By the way, I wonder what would've happened, too. I wonder a lot. Bye."

Before I can say anything the line goes dead. I've been in love with Pete Wentz for seven and a half years, but I've loved Patrick Stump longer.