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laniew1I apologize profusely for the delay.
Read Chapter 1 first.
Summary: It was like he was stuck in some awful version of telephone. Except instead of Ryan ending up with something like leprosy or bad hair or something, he was involved in an affair with Mikey Way that he’d managed to keep secret from everyone.
TITLE: Planned Mistakes
RATING: PG (for language)
PAIRING: multiple POV’s: Ryan/Mikey, Ryan/Pete, Pete/Mikey, Ryan/Mikey/Pete
AUTHOR: Melanie
SUMMARY: It was like he was stuck in some awful version of telephone. Except instead of Ryan ending up with something like leprosy or bad hair or something, he was involved in an affair with Mikey Way that he’d managed to keep secret from everyone.
NOTES: So I’m totally mucking with timelines here.
DISCLAIMER: I don’t own any of these boys and I’m pretty sure that this has never happened and will never happen quite like this.
Planned Mistakes 2/?
His house was filled with his brother and his bandmates when he returned. Smile still curving his lips and he felt happy and kind of light, which was something he hadn’t felt for a while without the aid of drugs.
“There are 13 pictures of you and Ryan up on the internet,” Frank announced when he walked through the door. “Only 10 of them are really clear enough where you can make both of you out and the message boards are going nuts.”
“How many of the pictures were taken by you guys?” Mikey asked, he shrugged out of his coat. Put his keys in the little dish on the table in the front entrance, hung his coat on the hook right above it.
“None, you didn’t see all the teenies with their cameras and cellphones at the ready?” Bob said, he was bent over Mikey’s laptop, so didn’t see Mikey shake his head.
He hadn’t even seen his guys, though he’d known that they were going to be spying.
He’d instead been slightly distracted by Ryan, warm and willing at his side, smiling at him and not shying away when Mikey had felt the urge to touch him.
“The first post went up about twenty minutes after you guys left the coffee shop, that picture is one of the clearest, you can see both of you, Zack glaring daggers at you in the background. It’s already got like five pages of responses,” Bob said.
“Bob’s been stationed at the computer the entire night waiting to see if this is going to blow up in your face,” Ray laughed.
“So what’s the response so far?” Mikey asked, not that he was planning on changing his mind, not now that Ryan was willing to try.
And where Ryan went, Pete would follow. Because Pete had never been able to completely cut Ryan out of his life and would never allow Mikey this opportunity to have Ryan to himself if he could help it.
He probably should have talked to Pete first, but Ryan had been the wildcard and if Ryan couldn’t be brought around, having Pete at his side still wouldn’t put Ryan there.
Having Ryan there would put Pete there. Because Pete didn’t share well, not unless it was with Mikey.
And he’d already made the offer once; Mikey thought it might have broken something inside him to turn it down, but he hadn’t been ready. Not then.
Not for them.
They could, possibly, have been everything for him and he couldn’t be anything for them.
He could remember Ryan looking young and beautiful at Pete’s side, so obviously in love with Pete that Mikey had been surprised that everyone couldn’t see it. That Pete had been willing to share that love with him.
That Pete hadn’t taken the chance and kept Ryan for himself, Ryan would never have known what he was missing.
“Favorable with a hint of what the hell,” Ray said from where he was perched in a chair next to Bob.
“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Gerard asked, he’d been asking the same question for almost three months.
“I like him,” Mikey said simply.
“He’s just so young,” Gerard responded, they’d been having this same exact conversation for three months.
“He’s over the age of consent, he’s not experimenting, he’s not trying to hurt me, he’s…” Mikey shook his head, flopped down on the couch next to Frank and laid his head on his shoulder. “I like him Gee.”
******************************************************************************
Ryan woke in the morning to Pete lying next to him in bed, staring at the ceiling.
“What the fuck?” He was pretty sure that he’d been alone when he went to bed last night.
He’d read a few chapters in one of the books he’d picked up, contemplated booting up his laptop and checking to see if pictures of him and Mikey had made their way to the internet yet.
“Well if you hadn’t been out to all hours of the night…” Pete was scowling
“I was back by ten, that in no way resembles ‘all night’,” Ryan rolled over onto his side, pulled the blankets up over his shoulder and attempted to ignore the fact that Pete was rolling over too, plastering himself against Ryan’s back.
“You went out with Mikey last night,” Pete said, his voice was laced with growling disapproval.
“Oh my god,” Ryan closed his eyes. Maybe if he went back to sleep Pete would take a hint and leave him alone, it was improbable but he could have hope.
“You don’t get to date Mikey, Ryan.”
“Why? Because he’s yours?” Ryan couldn’t help being sarcastic, because he’d known that was what this was all about. He wished that he’d put money on Mikey being wrong about this. Pete couldn’t care less about him; this was about Ryan having Mikey, not Mikey having Ryan or the two of them having each other.
He should have listened to his instincts instead of hoping that he might get to have things that he wasn’t good enough for.
“Well yeah,” Pete sounded surprised that Ryan got it and Ryan took a deep breath and pointedly didn’t tell Pete that he’d always gotten it, even when Mikey and Pete didn’t.
He tossed the blankets and Pete’s arms aside. Sat up in the bed and scowled at the clock.
He should get up anyway; they had back to back interviews starting at eleven, if he took his time (and a book) and locked himself in the bathroom he could maybe take two and a half hours to get ready.
“But also because you’re mine,” Pete added, like an afterthought.
Ryan snorted, and stood, stretched and tried to decide what he was going to wear.
“You’re the one that wanted us to go into therapy, Pete.”
“Well yeah, when I thought that it would end in you breaking up. Not when the two of you are going out on dates and eating muffins and he’s kissing you for everyone in the world to see and put up on the internet.”
“You don’t own me Pete, you didn’t want me and I found someone who did. So you don’t get to decide who I can and can’t date. You lost any right in that decision making process when you decided you were straight and wanted Jeanae or Ashlee or whoever the flavor of the year is going to be.”
“Ryan,” Pete sat on the side of the bed. “I just don’t want you to get hurt.”
Ryan rolled his eyes, he had his back to Pete but he thought Pete might know him well enough to know what he was doing.
“I’m a big boy Pete, I’ll survive when Mikey decides that this was all a mistake,” he would, he might not like it, but he would definitely survive it.
He’d survived much worse.
He walked towards the bathroom, shoulders squared and he didn’t look back towards the bed. Pete would be making that face, the one that crumpled whatever common sense Ryan could manage to muster when dealing with him.
It was better if he just locked himself in the bathroom until Pete gave up and went away or Spencer came to find out what was taking him so long.
“You can show yourself out, right?”
******************************************************************************
He’d seen the pictures when he woke up, he liked to read the comments on his journals, some of the fans were insane, some of them could read through the lines better then anyone he’d ever met.
He didn’t know if he could ever decide which ones he liked better.
Some of them posted links to a photo gallery that had ten pictures of Mikey and Ryan having coffee and muffins, smiling and touching, kissing and hugging.
He’d thrown something, he wasn’t sure what, it hadn’t broken and Patrick had managed to calm him down enough before he went and physically reminded Ryan that he was his, his, his.
Possibly Patrick had called him a caveman, possibly Patrick had reminded him that even though Ryan was on his label that didn’t mean that Pete owned him.
Pete disagreed but sometimes it was better to just say, ‘yes, sorry, I understand, I’m okay now’, and keep some of those thoughts to himself.
And possibly handcuff Ryan to his bed.
He’d waited for Patrick to leave, and then he’d snuck his way into Ryan’s room and laid there next to him until Ryan woke up. It was a while, Pete had a whole speech ready reminding Ryan that he was Pete’s, that he wasn’t planning on sharing him with Mikey.
He didn’t get to it, Pete was still angry, Ryan was defensive.
Ryan had reminded him that Pete himself, had made the suggestion of therapy.
Ryan had told him, “you don’t own me Pete, you didn’t want me and I found someone who did.”
Then he might have locked himself in the bathroom and called Spencer on his cellphone to get him to kick Pete out of his room.
Maybe Mikey would be more receptive to the fact that Ryan was his not Mikey’s.
******************************************************************************
He had an empty house and two messages from Pete waiting when he woke up in the morning. He had a cup of coffee, poured a bowl of cereal and ate it dry while he waited for Pete’s third call.
He’d been dodging Pete’s phone calls for months, not ready to talk to Pete if he didn’t have Ryan’s full in yet.
Convincing Ryan had taken a lot longer then he’d thought, and being cut off midstream, having Ryan avoid his phone calls, the way that Mikey was avoiding Pete’s, well that had definitely put a damper on his plans.
It was why he was moving full steam ahead now, no more moving slowly, because he thought if he gave Ryan too much time to think he could manage to think himself right out of what he’d agreed to instead of right into Mikey’s bed with Pete on the other side of him.
“Pete,” he said when the phone rang, he didn’t need to look at the caller ID, he had an almost uncanny ability to tell when it was Pete calling him. He couldn’t prove it but he thought his phone rang differently when Pete was the one on the other end.
“You can’t have him,” Pete said, he sounded angry and frustrated, like he’d already had this conversation and didn’t understand why people insisted on doing things that they weren’t supposed to.
“You never did share your toys well,” Mikey said with amusement.
“You can’t have him, Mikey. He’s mine, not yours, you didn’t want him, so hands off.”
“You don’t get to tell me what I can and can’t have; you don’t get to tell Ryan that either because he’s a big boy, he makes his own decisions and if he chooses to be with me then that’s his prerogative. And oh, that’s right, you don’t own him, you gave him up.”
“Mikey,” Pete sounded exasperated.
“He told you exactly that didn’t he.”
“He’s mine Mikey, just because he’s not with me right this minute, doesn’t make it any less true.”
“And what does Ashlee think of that, huh? Does she know that eventually she’s going to have to allow Ryan Ross open access to her bed and you?”
“Ashlee doesn’t have anything to do with this,” Pete said stiffly, angrily.
“But she does, Pete. If you’re marrying her, if you go through with that, well you don’t get to have the best of both of worlds, that’s not the way it works.”
“He’s mine, Mikey. He’s mine, mine, mine.”
Mikey didn’t tell Pete that he sounded like a spoiled rotten child.
“He thinks you don’t love him, he’s positive of that fact, so positive that I have to wonder why you never told him. You told me often enough, why didn’t you ever tell him?” Mikey asked, because that was the one thing that had confused him since the beginning.
Ryan’s surety that Pete didn’t care about him, didn’t love him, just saw him as a convenient bed to wait in until Mikey came back to him.
Pete was silent for a long while, so long that Mikey would have thought he’d hung up if he couldn’t hear Hemmy sniffing in the background.
“He doesn’t believe the words, and he doesn’t know how to read the actions that say them on anyone besides his guys,” Pete said softly. “He’s always waiting for someone to hurt him and he was always waiting for me to leave him.”
“You told me once that if I came back that we could share him,” it was the last e-mail that Mikey had read from Pete, before he’d deleted all others and resorted to getting all his information from Bob and the internet instead, it hurt less then being offered things that he wasn’t well enough to take.
And besides there had been Alicia back then, he hadn’t wanted to hurt her. Had been so sure that if he just waited a little bit longer that she would make him feel as alive as Pete did.
“Is that what this is? Instead of me wanting to share him, now you want to share him. How is that any fairer coming from you then it was coming from me?”
“Because Ryan knows what he’s getting into this time…”
“You’ve talked to Ryan about this,” Pete sounded incredulous.
“What was your plan back then Pete? To get me back in your bed? I know that. To bring Ryan into bed with us? I figured that one out by myself. But it wouldn’t have worked, not like that, because back then that kid that was so in love with you that he would have done it, would have done anything for you. But he didn’t know me and once it was done, he would have run as fast and as far away from you and me that he could and still be part of your label, he would have left you because he thinks, thought that his whole purpose was to help you get me back.”
“That wasn’t…” if Pete told him that hadn’t been his plan, Mikey might have to reach through the phone and strangle him.
“Do you still love me, Pete? I know you still love him, do you still love me, too?”
“Mikey…”
“That is the plan this time, except this time Ryan knows about it. He’s okay with it and he’s not going to run away when this is all said and done,” Mikey hoped, he prayed that he wasn’t totally misreading Ryan’s actions of the previous night.
“I do love you Mikey Way, sometimes I wish I didn’t, but I still do,” Pete’s voice was soft, a whisper and Mikey grinned.
******************************************************************************
Mikey figured that Pete was going to do something stupid now that he knew.
He’d figured that it was going to be something along the lines of feeling Ryan up in public or making a grand announcement at the concert that ‘yes, he was gay below the waist, and here was one of the guys that he went there for’, and then feeling Ryan up in public.
He hadn’t thought that it would be showing up at Mikey’s house unannounced, because that wasn’t necessarily stupid, just ill-advised.
“What are you doing here?” Mikey grabbed his arm, dragged him inside, quick glance around outside and there was no sign of teenies with cameras or the gossip mongers but they could hide themselves really well when they chose.
He slammed the door shut and turned to see that Pete was grinning at him, that happy, psychotic, real grin that only like seven people ever got to actually see.
Mikey would bet money that Ashlee wasn’t on that list and never had been.
“I wanted to see you,” Pete said, the grin was fading into something less happy.
“Pete,” Mikey sighed, he closed his eyes and scrubbed his hands over his face.
When he opened them the smile was totally gone and Pete looked like he was going to bolt out the door so Mikey pulled him into his arms, hugged him tightly until Pete hugged him back.
“I just wanted to see you,” Pete mumbled into his shoulder.
“I really thought that you would, like, attack Ryan in public with your mouth, I didn’t think that you’d show up on my doorstep,” Mikey said.
“Ryan’s in interviews with his boys all day,” Pete said, Mikey didn’t have to look to know that the grin was back on his face.
“So I’m your second choice then?”
Pete laughed and drew back as far as Mikey’s arms still around him would let him, Mikey was pleased to see the happy, psychotic grin fully back in place.
There would probably be a mutiny when Pete wrote his first happy, feel good song. Mikey imagined that there would be death threats as well.
Mikey couldn’t find it in himself to care. Pete looked good and happy and Ryan had been warm and sweet.
He just didn’t care.
“Hi Pete,” he murmured, he pressed their foreheads together and closed his eyes, felt Pete relax back into his arms.
“Hi.”
******************************************************************************
Pete wasn’t good at waiting. But he could get a lot of stuff done while he was focused on it.
Like pulling Ryan into a dark dressing room and kissing him like his life depended on it. Ryan had kissed him back; Pete could probably have gotten him on the floor and reminded him why there were good together if Brendon hadn’t walked in on them.
Brendon had uttered a harsh, “Ryan,” and Ryan had sprung back and flushed bright red and wouldn’t look at either of them. Brendon had ushered him out, making sure to keep himself between Ryan and Pete like a barricade.
Pete liked that there were people looking out for Ryan, but not if they kept him from getting Ryan back into his bed.
Of course Ashlee still needed to be taken care of, Pete didn’t want to be the one looked at and called a cheater because he jumped the gun with Ryan before getting Ashlee to call off the engagement of her volition.
He might have helped her along, might have mentioned that he’d seen Mikey and she’d just added 1 plus 1 and came up with seven and threw the ring at him, then asked him how Ryan felt about the fact that his boyfriend was apparently cheating on him with Pete.
It hadn’t mattered to her when Pete had murmured the soft, “we’re not like that, we’re just friends,” because Ashlee had a vivid imagination and knew all about Pete’s past relationship with Mikey (though not Ryan, he’d played that one close to the vest, because Ryan was still his) and knew that Pete still loved him.
Although by the time he’d gotten Ashlee off to the airport, Brendon had recruited help to keep other people firmly planted between him and Ryan.
When he went to Panic’s! dressing room to wish them a good show and possibly give Ryan a good luck kiss, Spencer had been standing guard, scowling and radiating disapproval and muttering ‘thanks’ and that he’d pass the sentiment along before slamming the door in his face.
Pete thought about knocking again.
Though about reminding them that he was the owner of their label.
Thought about telling Spencer and Brendon and Jon that yes Ryan was Mikey’s but he was also his, and that they were going to share him and Ryan was okay with it.
Then he thought about the fact that if he actually said any of that to them, they’d lock Ryan away until Pete was old and gray and while Pete loved Mikey and could probably be quite happy with just him, he also loved Ryan.
He wasn’t giving either one of them up. Not when he was so close to getting things that he’d wanted for years. That he thought he would never get to have because Mikey had said no.
“Wouldn’t let you see him?” Patrick asked when he got back to their dressing room; he had his guitar in hand and was playing a song that Pete didn’t recognize.
He looked amused at Pete’s expense.
“Spencer slammed the door in my face,” Pete said.
“You’re not going to try and steal Ryan away from Mikey now that things with Ashlee are done are you?”
“I don’t have to steal Ryan away from Mikey, Ryan’s mine.”
Patrick rolled his eyes. “You do get that Ryan is not one of your guitars right? He’s a person not a belonging and as such you don’t own him.”
Pete smirked at him.
He might not own them, but that didn’t change the fact that Ryan was his, his his. Just like Mikey was his, his, his.
“I don’t like that expression, you’re up to something,” Patrick decided. Pete needed friends that didn’t know him so well.
“I’m not up to anything; I’ve been a good boy all day.”
“Are we starting the day after Brendon caught you kissing Ryan and you broke up with Ashlee?”
“I didn’t break up with Ashlee, she broke up with me,” Pete said.
“Semantics,” Patrick waved.
“Semantics are really important.”
“Promise me that you’re not going to mess up Ryan and Mikey, Pete.”
Pete nodded solemnly. “I promise that I’m not going to break them up.”
If he had his way in three months there was going to be a commitment ceremony and he’d figure out a way to make sure that it tied both of them completely and irrevocably to him.
“Why don’t I believe you?”
******************************************************************************
Mikey had planned on going to the concert.
He had comped tickets, he’d been planning to take Bob, because Bob could distract Spencer and the rest long enough for Mikey to spirit Ryan and Pete away without anyone noticing that instead of one member of Panic! At The Disco he was absconding with one member of Panic! and a member of Fall Out Boy.
He’d planned on going to the concert until Pete had shown up on his doorstep and they’d spent the afternoon making out on his couch and until Ryan had called him a couple of hours before they were due to go onstage.
“He kissed me,” Ryan said, Mikey hoped that eventually he’d be able to read Ryan’s voice.
“Did you enjoy it?” Mikey asked, he had, Pete was a great kisser.
“It was great, right up until the moment when Brendon walked in and now everyone thinks that I’m cheating on you with Pete.”
Mikey laughed.
“It’s not funny,” Ryan said, though Mikey thought he could hear a tiny thread of amusement in his voice.
“What are your plans after the show?” Mikey asked. He knew that the bands were done for the most part, after the concert that night. Fall Out Boy was scheduled to go back to L.A., Panic! had a week off, then three days of interviews and a concert in New York scheduled, then they too, were going to be done.
He planned to make Pete change his travel arrangements and stay in Jersey until Ryan had to go to New York.
Then keep Pete either with him in Jersey until Ryan returned, or go to L.A. with Pete and have Ryan meet them there.
“I’m planning to avoid everyone so as to not have to go through the scheduled band intervention and the ‘Pete is bad for you, don’t jeopardize things with Mikey for someone who’s just going to break your heart, again’ speech.”
“You and Pete are coming here,” Mikey said, he’d already washed the sheets on the bed. There was food in the refrigerator, lots of water, because they’d definitely need their fluids.
“I thought it was going to take longer then this,” Ryan said.
“It probably should have, but I don’t like waiting and Pete doesn’t like sharing his toys or his people unless he knows he’s sharing them.”
“You talked to Pete?”
“He called to tell me that I couldn’t have you.”
“He saw the pictures on the net, I think someone put a comment up on his journal and pointed him towards them and he’s pretty compulsive about checking it at least five times a day so he probably saw them before we even got back to the hotel…” he couldn’t see him, but Mikey knew that Ryan was shrugging. “He told me that I was his and that he wasn’t planning on sharing me with you and, well I had to remind him that he didn’t own me and that it was his idea for us to go into therapy to work through our issues and reminded him that he had Ashlee now and…”
“Ashlee,” Mikey said softly.
“He pulled her into his room a couple of hours ago, right after Brendon caught us and she’s on a plane home, she wasn’t wearing the ring anymore.”
Mikey knew Pete could move fast, he hadn’t thought he could dissolve his relationship with Ashlee that quickly.
“Tonight, after the show?”
“I don’t know where you live,” Ryan said.
“Don’t worry about it, Pete knows. He’ll bring you.”
“Mikey…”
“It’s gonna be okay,” Mikey said in his best soothing voice, he’d learned it from Gerard and wasn’t half as good as his brother was at it, but he was good enough to comfort Ryan who wasn’t used to it.
“Okay… I’ll see you later?”
“Have a good show, Ryan.”
******************************************************************************
When they got off stage, Pete was hot and sweaty and pleased as punch that Ryan was hanging off to the side without his band standing in front of him like human shields.
“Where are the protectors of your virtue young Mr. Ross?” Pete asked, even as he tossed an arm over Ryan’s shoulders and tugged him along with him down the hallway.
He could feel Patrick’s disapproving eyes on his back, which he was ignoring because he wasn’t doing anything wrong.
“Brendon went to get water, Jon went with him to make sure he didn’t end up getting something caffeinated and Spencer got a phone call and took off,” Ryan leaned in close to him.
“Then we can sneak away without anyone interfering,” Pete decided. “Unless they locked you up in a chastity belt while you were getting ready for the show?”
“Spencer got it in on clearance, I don’t think it came with a key,” Ryan said seriously. “Supposedly my one true love can make it open through the power of his love for me or his mind, or possibly by utilizing a lock pick, the instructions were pretty vague.”
Pete laughed
******************************************************************************
Read Chapter 1 first.
Summary: It was like he was stuck in some awful version of telephone. Except instead of Ryan ending up with something like leprosy or bad hair or something, he was involved in an affair with Mikey Way that he’d managed to keep secret from everyone.
TITLE: Planned Mistakes
RATING: PG (for language)
PAIRING: multiple POV’s: Ryan/Mikey, Ryan/Pete, Pete/Mikey, Ryan/Mikey/Pete
AUTHOR: Melanie
SUMMARY: It was like he was stuck in some awful version of telephone. Except instead of Ryan ending up with something like leprosy or bad hair or something, he was involved in an affair with Mikey Way that he’d managed to keep secret from everyone.
NOTES: So I’m totally mucking with timelines here.
DISCLAIMER: I don’t own any of these boys and I’m pretty sure that this has never happened and will never happen quite like this.
Planned Mistakes 2/?
His house was filled with his brother and his bandmates when he returned. Smile still curving his lips and he felt happy and kind of light, which was something he hadn’t felt for a while without the aid of drugs.
“There are 13 pictures of you and Ryan up on the internet,” Frank announced when he walked through the door. “Only 10 of them are really clear enough where you can make both of you out and the message boards are going nuts.”
“How many of the pictures were taken by you guys?” Mikey asked, he shrugged out of his coat. Put his keys in the little dish on the table in the front entrance, hung his coat on the hook right above it.
“None, you didn’t see all the teenies with their cameras and cellphones at the ready?” Bob said, he was bent over Mikey’s laptop, so didn’t see Mikey shake his head.
He hadn’t even seen his guys, though he’d known that they were going to be spying.
He’d instead been slightly distracted by Ryan, warm and willing at his side, smiling at him and not shying away when Mikey had felt the urge to touch him.
“The first post went up about twenty minutes after you guys left the coffee shop, that picture is one of the clearest, you can see both of you, Zack glaring daggers at you in the background. It’s already got like five pages of responses,” Bob said.
“Bob’s been stationed at the computer the entire night waiting to see if this is going to blow up in your face,” Ray laughed.
“So what’s the response so far?” Mikey asked, not that he was planning on changing his mind, not now that Ryan was willing to try.
And where Ryan went, Pete would follow. Because Pete had never been able to completely cut Ryan out of his life and would never allow Mikey this opportunity to have Ryan to himself if he could help it.
He probably should have talked to Pete first, but Ryan had been the wildcard and if Ryan couldn’t be brought around, having Pete at his side still wouldn’t put Ryan there.
Having Ryan there would put Pete there. Because Pete didn’t share well, not unless it was with Mikey.
And he’d already made the offer once; Mikey thought it might have broken something inside him to turn it down, but he hadn’t been ready. Not then.
Not for them.
They could, possibly, have been everything for him and he couldn’t be anything for them.
He could remember Ryan looking young and beautiful at Pete’s side, so obviously in love with Pete that Mikey had been surprised that everyone couldn’t see it. That Pete had been willing to share that love with him.
That Pete hadn’t taken the chance and kept Ryan for himself, Ryan would never have known what he was missing.
“Favorable with a hint of what the hell,” Ray said from where he was perched in a chair next to Bob.
“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Gerard asked, he’d been asking the same question for almost three months.
“I like him,” Mikey said simply.
“He’s just so young,” Gerard responded, they’d been having this same exact conversation for three months.
“He’s over the age of consent, he’s not experimenting, he’s not trying to hurt me, he’s…” Mikey shook his head, flopped down on the couch next to Frank and laid his head on his shoulder. “I like him Gee.”
Ryan woke in the morning to Pete lying next to him in bed, staring at the ceiling.
“What the fuck?” He was pretty sure that he’d been alone when he went to bed last night.
He’d read a few chapters in one of the books he’d picked up, contemplated booting up his laptop and checking to see if pictures of him and Mikey had made their way to the internet yet.
“Well if you hadn’t been out to all hours of the night…” Pete was scowling
“I was back by ten, that in no way resembles ‘all night’,” Ryan rolled over onto his side, pulled the blankets up over his shoulder and attempted to ignore the fact that Pete was rolling over too, plastering himself against Ryan’s back.
“You went out with Mikey last night,” Pete said, his voice was laced with growling disapproval.
“Oh my god,” Ryan closed his eyes. Maybe if he went back to sleep Pete would take a hint and leave him alone, it was improbable but he could have hope.
“You don’t get to date Mikey, Ryan.”
“Why? Because he’s yours?” Ryan couldn’t help being sarcastic, because he’d known that was what this was all about. He wished that he’d put money on Mikey being wrong about this. Pete couldn’t care less about him; this was about Ryan having Mikey, not Mikey having Ryan or the two of them having each other.
He should have listened to his instincts instead of hoping that he might get to have things that he wasn’t good enough for.
“Well yeah,” Pete sounded surprised that Ryan got it and Ryan took a deep breath and pointedly didn’t tell Pete that he’d always gotten it, even when Mikey and Pete didn’t.
He tossed the blankets and Pete’s arms aside. Sat up in the bed and scowled at the clock.
He should get up anyway; they had back to back interviews starting at eleven, if he took his time (and a book) and locked himself in the bathroom he could maybe take two and a half hours to get ready.
“But also because you’re mine,” Pete added, like an afterthought.
Ryan snorted, and stood, stretched and tried to decide what he was going to wear.
“You’re the one that wanted us to go into therapy, Pete.”
“Well yeah, when I thought that it would end in you breaking up. Not when the two of you are going out on dates and eating muffins and he’s kissing you for everyone in the world to see and put up on the internet.”
“You don’t own me Pete, you didn’t want me and I found someone who did. So you don’t get to decide who I can and can’t date. You lost any right in that decision making process when you decided you were straight and wanted Jeanae or Ashlee or whoever the flavor of the year is going to be.”
“Ryan,” Pete sat on the side of the bed. “I just don’t want you to get hurt.”
Ryan rolled his eyes, he had his back to Pete but he thought Pete might know him well enough to know what he was doing.
“I’m a big boy Pete, I’ll survive when Mikey decides that this was all a mistake,” he would, he might not like it, but he would definitely survive it.
He’d survived much worse.
He walked towards the bathroom, shoulders squared and he didn’t look back towards the bed. Pete would be making that face, the one that crumpled whatever common sense Ryan could manage to muster when dealing with him.
It was better if he just locked himself in the bathroom until Pete gave up and went away or Spencer came to find out what was taking him so long.
“You can show yourself out, right?”
He’d seen the pictures when he woke up, he liked to read the comments on his journals, some of the fans were insane, some of them could read through the lines better then anyone he’d ever met.
He didn’t know if he could ever decide which ones he liked better.
Some of them posted links to a photo gallery that had ten pictures of Mikey and Ryan having coffee and muffins, smiling and touching, kissing and hugging.
He’d thrown something, he wasn’t sure what, it hadn’t broken and Patrick had managed to calm him down enough before he went and physically reminded Ryan that he was his, his, his.
Possibly Patrick had called him a caveman, possibly Patrick had reminded him that even though Ryan was on his label that didn’t mean that Pete owned him.
Pete disagreed but sometimes it was better to just say, ‘yes, sorry, I understand, I’m okay now’, and keep some of those thoughts to himself.
And possibly handcuff Ryan to his bed.
He’d waited for Patrick to leave, and then he’d snuck his way into Ryan’s room and laid there next to him until Ryan woke up. It was a while, Pete had a whole speech ready reminding Ryan that he was Pete’s, that he wasn’t planning on sharing him with Mikey.
He didn’t get to it, Pete was still angry, Ryan was defensive.
Ryan had reminded him that Pete himself, had made the suggestion of therapy.
Ryan had told him, “you don’t own me Pete, you didn’t want me and I found someone who did.”
Then he might have locked himself in the bathroom and called Spencer on his cellphone to get him to kick Pete out of his room.
Maybe Mikey would be more receptive to the fact that Ryan was his not Mikey’s.
He had an empty house and two messages from Pete waiting when he woke up in the morning. He had a cup of coffee, poured a bowl of cereal and ate it dry while he waited for Pete’s third call.
He’d been dodging Pete’s phone calls for months, not ready to talk to Pete if he didn’t have Ryan’s full in yet.
Convincing Ryan had taken a lot longer then he’d thought, and being cut off midstream, having Ryan avoid his phone calls, the way that Mikey was avoiding Pete’s, well that had definitely put a damper on his plans.
It was why he was moving full steam ahead now, no more moving slowly, because he thought if he gave Ryan too much time to think he could manage to think himself right out of what he’d agreed to instead of right into Mikey’s bed with Pete on the other side of him.
“Pete,” he said when the phone rang, he didn’t need to look at the caller ID, he had an almost uncanny ability to tell when it was Pete calling him. He couldn’t prove it but he thought his phone rang differently when Pete was the one on the other end.
“You can’t have him,” Pete said, he sounded angry and frustrated, like he’d already had this conversation and didn’t understand why people insisted on doing things that they weren’t supposed to.
“You never did share your toys well,” Mikey said with amusement.
“You can’t have him, Mikey. He’s mine, not yours, you didn’t want him, so hands off.”
“You don’t get to tell me what I can and can’t have; you don’t get to tell Ryan that either because he’s a big boy, he makes his own decisions and if he chooses to be with me then that’s his prerogative. And oh, that’s right, you don’t own him, you gave him up.”
“Mikey,” Pete sounded exasperated.
“He told you exactly that didn’t he.”
“He’s mine Mikey, just because he’s not with me right this minute, doesn’t make it any less true.”
“And what does Ashlee think of that, huh? Does she know that eventually she’s going to have to allow Ryan Ross open access to her bed and you?”
“Ashlee doesn’t have anything to do with this,” Pete said stiffly, angrily.
“But she does, Pete. If you’re marrying her, if you go through with that, well you don’t get to have the best of both of worlds, that’s not the way it works.”
“He’s mine, Mikey. He’s mine, mine, mine.”
Mikey didn’t tell Pete that he sounded like a spoiled rotten child.
“He thinks you don’t love him, he’s positive of that fact, so positive that I have to wonder why you never told him. You told me often enough, why didn’t you ever tell him?” Mikey asked, because that was the one thing that had confused him since the beginning.
Ryan’s surety that Pete didn’t care about him, didn’t love him, just saw him as a convenient bed to wait in until Mikey came back to him.
Pete was silent for a long while, so long that Mikey would have thought he’d hung up if he couldn’t hear Hemmy sniffing in the background.
“He doesn’t believe the words, and he doesn’t know how to read the actions that say them on anyone besides his guys,” Pete said softly. “He’s always waiting for someone to hurt him and he was always waiting for me to leave him.”
“You told me once that if I came back that we could share him,” it was the last e-mail that Mikey had read from Pete, before he’d deleted all others and resorted to getting all his information from Bob and the internet instead, it hurt less then being offered things that he wasn’t well enough to take.
And besides there had been Alicia back then, he hadn’t wanted to hurt her. Had been so sure that if he just waited a little bit longer that she would make him feel as alive as Pete did.
“Is that what this is? Instead of me wanting to share him, now you want to share him. How is that any fairer coming from you then it was coming from me?”
“Because Ryan knows what he’s getting into this time…”
“You’ve talked to Ryan about this,” Pete sounded incredulous.
“What was your plan back then Pete? To get me back in your bed? I know that. To bring Ryan into bed with us? I figured that one out by myself. But it wouldn’t have worked, not like that, because back then that kid that was so in love with you that he would have done it, would have done anything for you. But he didn’t know me and once it was done, he would have run as fast and as far away from you and me that he could and still be part of your label, he would have left you because he thinks, thought that his whole purpose was to help you get me back.”
“That wasn’t…” if Pete told him that hadn’t been his plan, Mikey might have to reach through the phone and strangle him.
“Do you still love me, Pete? I know you still love him, do you still love me, too?”
“Mikey…”
“That is the plan this time, except this time Ryan knows about it. He’s okay with it and he’s not going to run away when this is all said and done,” Mikey hoped, he prayed that he wasn’t totally misreading Ryan’s actions of the previous night.
“I do love you Mikey Way, sometimes I wish I didn’t, but I still do,” Pete’s voice was soft, a whisper and Mikey grinned.
Mikey figured that Pete was going to do something stupid now that he knew.
He’d figured that it was going to be something along the lines of feeling Ryan up in public or making a grand announcement at the concert that ‘yes, he was gay below the waist, and here was one of the guys that he went there for’, and then feeling Ryan up in public.
He hadn’t thought that it would be showing up at Mikey’s house unannounced, because that wasn’t necessarily stupid, just ill-advised.
“What are you doing here?” Mikey grabbed his arm, dragged him inside, quick glance around outside and there was no sign of teenies with cameras or the gossip mongers but they could hide themselves really well when they chose.
He slammed the door shut and turned to see that Pete was grinning at him, that happy, psychotic, real grin that only like seven people ever got to actually see.
Mikey would bet money that Ashlee wasn’t on that list and never had been.
“I wanted to see you,” Pete said, the grin was fading into something less happy.
“Pete,” Mikey sighed, he closed his eyes and scrubbed his hands over his face.
When he opened them the smile was totally gone and Pete looked like he was going to bolt out the door so Mikey pulled him into his arms, hugged him tightly until Pete hugged him back.
“I just wanted to see you,” Pete mumbled into his shoulder.
“I really thought that you would, like, attack Ryan in public with your mouth, I didn’t think that you’d show up on my doorstep,” Mikey said.
“Ryan’s in interviews with his boys all day,” Pete said, Mikey didn’t have to look to know that the grin was back on his face.
“So I’m your second choice then?”
Pete laughed and drew back as far as Mikey’s arms still around him would let him, Mikey was pleased to see the happy, psychotic grin fully back in place.
There would probably be a mutiny when Pete wrote his first happy, feel good song. Mikey imagined that there would be death threats as well.
Mikey couldn’t find it in himself to care. Pete looked good and happy and Ryan had been warm and sweet.
He just didn’t care.
“Hi Pete,” he murmured, he pressed their foreheads together and closed his eyes, felt Pete relax back into his arms.
“Hi.”
Pete wasn’t good at waiting. But he could get a lot of stuff done while he was focused on it.
Like pulling Ryan into a dark dressing room and kissing him like his life depended on it. Ryan had kissed him back; Pete could probably have gotten him on the floor and reminded him why there were good together if Brendon hadn’t walked in on them.
Brendon had uttered a harsh, “Ryan,” and Ryan had sprung back and flushed bright red and wouldn’t look at either of them. Brendon had ushered him out, making sure to keep himself between Ryan and Pete like a barricade.
Pete liked that there were people looking out for Ryan, but not if they kept him from getting Ryan back into his bed.
Of course Ashlee still needed to be taken care of, Pete didn’t want to be the one looked at and called a cheater because he jumped the gun with Ryan before getting Ashlee to call off the engagement of her volition.
He might have helped her along, might have mentioned that he’d seen Mikey and she’d just added 1 plus 1 and came up with seven and threw the ring at him, then asked him how Ryan felt about the fact that his boyfriend was apparently cheating on him with Pete.
It hadn’t mattered to her when Pete had murmured the soft, “we’re not like that, we’re just friends,” because Ashlee had a vivid imagination and knew all about Pete’s past relationship with Mikey (though not Ryan, he’d played that one close to the vest, because Ryan was still his) and knew that Pete still loved him.
Although by the time he’d gotten Ashlee off to the airport, Brendon had recruited help to keep other people firmly planted between him and Ryan.
When he went to Panic’s! dressing room to wish them a good show and possibly give Ryan a good luck kiss, Spencer had been standing guard, scowling and radiating disapproval and muttering ‘thanks’ and that he’d pass the sentiment along before slamming the door in his face.
Pete thought about knocking again.
Though about reminding them that he was the owner of their label.
Thought about telling Spencer and Brendon and Jon that yes Ryan was Mikey’s but he was also his, and that they were going to share him and Ryan was okay with it.
Then he thought about the fact that if he actually said any of that to them, they’d lock Ryan away until Pete was old and gray and while Pete loved Mikey and could probably be quite happy with just him, he also loved Ryan.
He wasn’t giving either one of them up. Not when he was so close to getting things that he’d wanted for years. That he thought he would never get to have because Mikey had said no.
“Wouldn’t let you see him?” Patrick asked when he got back to their dressing room; he had his guitar in hand and was playing a song that Pete didn’t recognize.
He looked amused at Pete’s expense.
“Spencer slammed the door in my face,” Pete said.
“You’re not going to try and steal Ryan away from Mikey now that things with Ashlee are done are you?”
“I don’t have to steal Ryan away from Mikey, Ryan’s mine.”
Patrick rolled his eyes. “You do get that Ryan is not one of your guitars right? He’s a person not a belonging and as such you don’t own him.”
Pete smirked at him.
He might not own them, but that didn’t change the fact that Ryan was his, his his. Just like Mikey was his, his, his.
“I don’t like that expression, you’re up to something,” Patrick decided. Pete needed friends that didn’t know him so well.
“I’m not up to anything; I’ve been a good boy all day.”
“Are we starting the day after Brendon caught you kissing Ryan and you broke up with Ashlee?”
“I didn’t break up with Ashlee, she broke up with me,” Pete said.
“Semantics,” Patrick waved.
“Semantics are really important.”
“Promise me that you’re not going to mess up Ryan and Mikey, Pete.”
Pete nodded solemnly. “I promise that I’m not going to break them up.”
If he had his way in three months there was going to be a commitment ceremony and he’d figure out a way to make sure that it tied both of them completely and irrevocably to him.
“Why don’t I believe you?”
Mikey had planned on going to the concert.
He had comped tickets, he’d been planning to take Bob, because Bob could distract Spencer and the rest long enough for Mikey to spirit Ryan and Pete away without anyone noticing that instead of one member of Panic! At The Disco he was absconding with one member of Panic! and a member of Fall Out Boy.
He’d planned on going to the concert until Pete had shown up on his doorstep and they’d spent the afternoon making out on his couch and until Ryan had called him a couple of hours before they were due to go onstage.
“He kissed me,” Ryan said, Mikey hoped that eventually he’d be able to read Ryan’s voice.
“Did you enjoy it?” Mikey asked, he had, Pete was a great kisser.
“It was great, right up until the moment when Brendon walked in and now everyone thinks that I’m cheating on you with Pete.”
Mikey laughed.
“It’s not funny,” Ryan said, though Mikey thought he could hear a tiny thread of amusement in his voice.
“What are your plans after the show?” Mikey asked. He knew that the bands were done for the most part, after the concert that night. Fall Out Boy was scheduled to go back to L.A., Panic! had a week off, then three days of interviews and a concert in New York scheduled, then they too, were going to be done.
He planned to make Pete change his travel arrangements and stay in Jersey until Ryan had to go to New York.
Then keep Pete either with him in Jersey until Ryan returned, or go to L.A. with Pete and have Ryan meet them there.
“I’m planning to avoid everyone so as to not have to go through the scheduled band intervention and the ‘Pete is bad for you, don’t jeopardize things with Mikey for someone who’s just going to break your heart, again’ speech.”
“You and Pete are coming here,” Mikey said, he’d already washed the sheets on the bed. There was food in the refrigerator, lots of water, because they’d definitely need their fluids.
“I thought it was going to take longer then this,” Ryan said.
“It probably should have, but I don’t like waiting and Pete doesn’t like sharing his toys or his people unless he knows he’s sharing them.”
“You talked to Pete?”
“He called to tell me that I couldn’t have you.”
“He saw the pictures on the net, I think someone put a comment up on his journal and pointed him towards them and he’s pretty compulsive about checking it at least five times a day so he probably saw them before we even got back to the hotel…” he couldn’t see him, but Mikey knew that Ryan was shrugging. “He told me that I was his and that he wasn’t planning on sharing me with you and, well I had to remind him that he didn’t own me and that it was his idea for us to go into therapy to work through our issues and reminded him that he had Ashlee now and…”
“Ashlee,” Mikey said softly.
“He pulled her into his room a couple of hours ago, right after Brendon caught us and she’s on a plane home, she wasn’t wearing the ring anymore.”
Mikey knew Pete could move fast, he hadn’t thought he could dissolve his relationship with Ashlee that quickly.
“Tonight, after the show?”
“I don’t know where you live,” Ryan said.
“Don’t worry about it, Pete knows. He’ll bring you.”
“Mikey…”
“It’s gonna be okay,” Mikey said in his best soothing voice, he’d learned it from Gerard and wasn’t half as good as his brother was at it, but he was good enough to comfort Ryan who wasn’t used to it.
“Okay… I’ll see you later?”
“Have a good show, Ryan.”
When they got off stage, Pete was hot and sweaty and pleased as punch that Ryan was hanging off to the side without his band standing in front of him like human shields.
“Where are the protectors of your virtue young Mr. Ross?” Pete asked, even as he tossed an arm over Ryan’s shoulders and tugged him along with him down the hallway.
He could feel Patrick’s disapproving eyes on his back, which he was ignoring because he wasn’t doing anything wrong.
“Brendon went to get water, Jon went with him to make sure he didn’t end up getting something caffeinated and Spencer got a phone call and took off,” Ryan leaned in close to him.
“Then we can sneak away without anyone interfering,” Pete decided. “Unless they locked you up in a chastity belt while you were getting ready for the show?”
“Spencer got it in on clearance, I don’t think it came with a key,” Ryan said seriously. “Supposedly my one true love can make it open through the power of his love for me or his mind, or possibly by utilizing a lock pick, the instructions were pretty vague.”
Pete laughed
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Date: 2008-01-15 01:34 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-01-16 02:02 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-03 02:07 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-08-04 07:08 am (UTC)More, please?
Date: 2008-09-15 10:12 pm (UTC)