Vegas Boys

Being in Vegas was a lot like not being in Vegas, really. Considering the fact that it was generally known for its tourist attractions and risque night life ("what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas," and all that), it was surprising how little that cliche actually affected daily life here. Brendon had never stepped into a casino; Ryan had never had a drink in his life; none of the boys had gambled beyond a hand of blackjack with their friends at the pool in the summertime. For Vegas boys, they were all startlingly innocent.

All in all, it was a quiet life we led. And it had slowed down a lot since Panic! had been signed: where we had once been five teenagers rushing to cram in as much partying as possible while we had the chance, we were suddenly savoring the little moments we had left together, knowing that once the boys went out and got famous, all of that would be gone. Forget high school--come June, the rest of their lives would be one big party.

And that just left me.

I would be left here, alone, to finish out my senior year of high school in Vegas. I had already decided not to join my mother in New York--for one thing, I would be admitting that she was right and I was wrong, and my dignity could not take that; for another, I had learned to like it here, and I knew I would miss it if I left. And furthermore, why start all over again in a whole new city? I could mope just as well here, where at least everything was familiar.

And I still nurtured the secret hope that Brendon would come back.

I was still telling myself that he would only be gone for a few months, that he would be back home again before I graduated, at least. No matter how many times I reminded myself that I was just setting myself up for disappointment, I still entertained the fantasy of starting college together--of starting the rest of our lives together.

...Even though Brendon had sworn off college and the rest of his life did not, at this point, include me.

-----

"This show is so fucking rad," Brendon declared as, on his shitty discount TV, the laughtrack roared at some overused fart joke.

I pulled the frozen kids' dinners out of the oven as the timer went off and peeled back the plastic coverings, glancing over at Brendon in the living room. He was sitting on the couch, slouched over comfortably with his feet propped up on the coffee table, tapping along with the remote control on his thigh to the beat of the All That theme song.

I grabbed two cans of Dr. Pepper and carried them into the living room with the two steaming kids' TV dinners, handing one of each to Brendon. He grinned as he set his TV dinner on the coffee table and opened his Dr. Pepper. "Thank you, slave girl."

"It was my pleasure, all-powerful master," I grunted sarcastically.

He just smiled wider, putting his drink down again before he even touched it. "Not gonna lie, that's pretty hot," he said, smirking--and then, without even waiting for a response, he got up off the couch and threw me over his shoulder and headed off for his bedroom.

"Brendon!" I protested, beating my fists against his back as I felt the blood rush to my head. "Not now! I'm hungry!"

He stopped in his tracks for a moment, sighing. Then he said resignedly, "Fine," and turned around and put me back down on the couch. "It's nice to know you value eating over...me," he finished lamely, his cheeks reddening slightly.

I laughed as I stirred up the macaroni with a plastic fork (the cheese had congealed a bit). "Well, I have to build up my strength first. You wouldn't want me passing out in the middle from low blood sugar, would you?"

He looked rather uncomfortable--which was pretty hilarious, considering that he was Brendon, and probably the most unembarrassed, painfully outright person I had ever met. He probably still remembered the first time, I realized; I felt a twinge of remorse for that.

Luckily, a black man dressed up as a carton of yogurt had just made some sort of joke on All That, and Brendon laughed along with all the kids in the taping audience, glad for a distraction. A moment later, I glanced over at him, and he was picking at his TV dinner with a rather dark expression.

I scooted closer, so that our hips brushed slightly, and he wasted no time in wrapping his arm around me and pulling me up against him. I smiled up at him and he kissed me on the forehead in response.

But he was holding me with his right arm, so he had to reach around me to get to his food, which was awkward and kind of funny. "Damn," he muttered, as he dropped a macaroni in his lap after struggling with the fork for several minutes.

"Brendon," I giggled as he wiped at the cheese on his jeans, "if this is too awkward--"

"Nope!" he insisted valiantly. "I'll eat left-handed if I have to."

And he did.

He missed his mouth a lot (stabbing himself in the cheek with his fork more than once), and had to do a lot of digging at his food to get to it, but he made it work, and was adorable in the process, of course. He got food on his face a few times, and then I had to wipe it off with a napkin myself, because he just wasn't ambidexterous enough to do it himself...or so I reasoned.

By the time the All That episode was over, we had both finished all of our mac and cheese and chicken fingers, and were down to the brownie with sprinkles. I didn't like the sprinkles, so I gave mine to Brendon (who was a sugar fiend), and he couldn't get them all to fit on his brownie--when he raised it up to his mouth to bite into it, they fell off and scattered all over his lap and onto the floor.

"You're a messy boy," I mock scolded him as I picked a sprinkle off his leg and tasted it; it was pure sugar, for sure.

"I'm sorry," he muttered, distracted, "it's not my fault these damn sprinkles won't stay on the damn...whatever this thing is."

"Uh...brownie?"

He rolled his eyes at me. "I know that, but what's it supposed to be? It's shaped like something," he pointed out.

"Oh." I glanced down at my own as-of-yet-uneaten brownie, and suddenly remembered the box they had come in. "I think it's a penguin."

He cocked his head slightly, studying my brownie as well. "Yeah, I guess it could be," he determined.

Brendon started to say something else, but suddenly fell quiet, an expression I had only seen him wear a couple of times before overtaking his face. He turned away, staring down at the brownie in his lap purposefully as he flicked the sprinkles across the room. Deep in thought, his dark brows were furrowed--but at the same time, a small smile played across his lips.

"Did you know," he said softly, suddenly, glancing up at me as the smile grew just a little, "that penguins mate for life? Like, once they find their mate, they stay together forever. Always. No matter what."

The look in his eyes had nothing to do with penguins, and I found myself blushing. "No," I mumbled, staring down at my lap, smiling so widely that my face kind of hurt, "I didn't know that."

Under normal circumstances, I probably would have made fun of him with some snide remark (e.g., No more Discovery Channel for you, Sir Learns-a-Lot), but these were not normal circumstances. He was sitting very close to me--I could feel his body heat radiating out from his whole body--and smiling in a way that made me pretty sure that he was the most adorable boy to ever walk the face of the planet, and all I wanted to do was throw my arms around him and hug him and kiss him and never ever stop.

Then, before I could process any more of these frantic thoughts, he took my hands in his (his were very warm, and slightly moist, but I didn't mind) and brought his sweetly probing gaze up to meet mine almost shyly, and murmured, "Do you want to be my penguin?"

I emitted a little sob-like noise that was meant to be a laugh, and then we both let out this choked laughter that I guess was the result of all the mixed feelings that kept gettting in the way. And then I smiled back and said sincerely, "Yes, Brendon. I would love to be your penguin."

He twisted his fingers up in my hair as he leaned in to kiss me and I kissed back fervently, glad to have him here with me, for now.

And I wasn't so sure that all penguins stayed together forever--not when the world was such an ugly, inconvenient place--but in that particular moment, I was willing to take his word for it.