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Once upon a time, it was casual. It was stolen looks and lingering glances. It was encounters in cramped bathroom stalls and even more cramped bunks on tour buses that smelled of sweat and cheap weed. It was shared cigarettes, wisps of smoke dancing around them. They’d fumble out of their sweatshirts and skinny jeans and they’d touch one another, explore and learn the shape of the other’s mouths. They’d map out their bodies like skilled adventurers, making discoveries that they’d commit to memory and catalog. They’d become determined to discover more about the other than anyone ever had, than anyone ever would.
That exploration spanned over years. First five, then ten. Now, it’s hovering around the twenty year mark and still, they allow their hands to wander and they share kisses in places no one can see, leaving marks only they can find days after. It was a dedicated study but the two never yielded, never slowed. It was always them. It had always been them.
It was around the seven year mark that Pete had begun to realize that the word casual had lost its meaning to him. Whenever he and Mikey reconnected, be it for three hours or three days, it was harder to let him go at the end of it. Pete clung to him a little tighter when Mikey tried to slip away to shower, claiming his flight back to LA was approaching a little too quickly. Pete tried to encourage Mikey to stay for just a few more hours, offering coffee dates or walks in the park after dark. Something. Anything.
Maybe it was still casual to Mikey. Pete had never asked. Maybe he was too afraid of the answer. Maybe he just didn’t know how to word the question. Maybe it just didn’t fucking matter because Mikey wasn’t his. Mikey belonged to the fans that still screamed his name and he belonged to his brother and his band and he belonged to every single person who wasn’t Pete Wentz.
But, God, what Pete wouldn’t give for the chance to have him for real. What Pete wouldn’t give to simply not have to give Mikey back.
Pete had somehow convinced Mikey to spend the weekend at his place. He’d expected an uphill battle but it was more like a headfirst slide. He’d accepted the invitation to stay with Pete and Hemmy and the pile of sci-fi and horror movies he’d found buried in his basement and every fuzzy blanket he’d piled onto the couch. The invitation also included too much junk food and dim lighting and all the butterflies in Pete’s stomach.
They’d gotten through about two and a half movies by the time Mikey’s head began to lull, leaning against Pete’s shoulder. Pete’s arm moves around Mikey’s shoulder, keeping him close as if Mikey were some sort of flight risk. He wasn’t, warm and content with Hemmy’s head resting in his lap, Mikey’s hand resting against the dog’s back.
Pete drinks him in, the way Mikey's fingers smooth effortlessly through Hemingway's fur as he drifts in and out of awareness. There's a hint of a smile on Mikey’s lips, something softer than Pete deserves to see. This whole moment feels like it wasn't meant for Pete’s eyes; it was too delicate, too warm. He was bound for chaos. It was in his blood, making it erode and decay, turning to sludge as it sluggishly rolled through his veins. He was content to allow himself to decay, let the dirty water inside of him rot his insides.
Until he realized how much Mikey Way made him want to survive, made him want to be better. Mikey made Pete want to purify whatever liquid poison was within him. Whatever doom awaited him in the end, Pete was now determined to hold it off as long as possible if only because of Mikey, because of the way he makes him feel and the way he simply wants to live because of it.
It was odd to Pete at first, how his happiness hinged on a single person, especially when that person wasn’t really his in any capacity. Well, once every couple of months, maybe four times a year. That’s when Mikey was his but he feels like he always belongs to Mikey. He couldn’t explain it and he didn’t bother to try. It just made sense to him.
Would it make sense to Mikey then?
“Mikey?” Pete whispers, fingertips tracing idle lines along the curve of Mikey’s shoulder.
“Mmm?” He’s half-asleep. Maybe completely asleep. Not even Hemingway stirs, pressing his nose into the fabric of Mikey’s pajama pants with a contented sigh.
A smile tugs at the corner of Pete’s mouth. He continues to trace invisible shapes along Mikey’s sharp angles, marveling at how soft he is despite them. “I, uh…shit,” he sighs, the words dying on his tongue. He waits for a reaction, a chuckle or a teasing jab, but he receives nothing. Mikey’s chest rises and falls steadily, rhythmically, and it simply furthers Pete’s belief that Mikey Way is a fucking work of art. Even when he sleeps, he’s a gentle wave lapping at Pete’s shore and all he’s ever wanted is to bottle him up and dangle him around his neck, swaying close to his heart.
Pete decides to try again. “Mikey, what if I told you that I didn’t…I mean, we shouldn’t…fuck.”
Mikey hums softly in his sleep, shifting slightly to nuzzle his head against Pete’s chest. His hand rests in Hemingway’s fur. Still. Silent.
“I don’t wanna be casual,” Pete finally blurts out, unable to hide the little crack in his voice that transforms him back into that prepubescent creature from what feels like a lifetime ago. That same sense of awkwardness bubbles within the pit of him, urging him to withdraw the line of thought and return to the blissful silence.
He continues, “It…it sucks, Mikey. It sucks. I want you so damn much when you’re here but I want you more when you’re gone, ya know? I don’t just wanna be a hookup when we’re bored or when you wander into town. I don’t just wanna be a post-gig hook-up, Mikey. I wanna…”
Why was this so hard to say? He’d said it in the back of his head over and over again, in the quiet of the night with Mikey tangled in his sheets and he’d said it in the mirror in the absence of Mikey when frustration turned him into a monster composed of need and jealousy and seething, white-hot love.
Love.
Fucking love.
Pete’s fingers graze Mikey’s throat, gliding up to his jawline. He hesitates to touch him, afraid to break what oftentimes feels far too fragile to be handled by someone like Pete Wentz. “I love you. I love you. It’s always been you, Mikey. When you leave, every time you leave, it’s torture. So, like…what if you just didn’t leave? What if neither of us left?”
He sounds insane. He sounds like a clingy girlfriend who is latching on too tightly to a figment of his imagination, something that isn’t there. But he’s clutching and tugging at invisible strings that are all connected to the one thing he’s been trying to hold onto for what feels like a lifetime.
“I don’t want you to leave,” Pete admits in a sheepish tone, the tips of his fingers trailing gingerly up the underside of Mikey’s angular chin. “Hemmy hates when you leave. I hate when you leave. I’ve been watching you leave for like…twenty years now, Mikey. It feels like we’re chasing our tails, round and round an–”
Pete looks down and Mikey’s staring up at him, eyes hazy with sleep, a lazy smile smeared across his face. It’s not too often Pete is stunned silent but all he manages to do is blink back at him.
“I–”
“Well?” Mikey’s voice is a low rumble. He licks his lips and Pete helplessly watches. Always watching. Years of wanting and watching.
“...well what?”
Mikey leans into Pete’s hand, encouraging him to continue his leisurely exploration. Not like he hadn’t claimed every solitary inch of Mikey a few times over by now, but it was always nice to retrace one’s steps and take in the familiar all over again. A sigh of contentment leaves his slightly parted lips as Pete continues to trail his string-worn fingertips along the column of his throat. “Finish what you were saying.”
He doesn’t want to. With Mikey’s eyes on him, with an actual audience instead of the always-agreeing silence, Pete’s not sure if he can muster up the words. They’re unwilling to perform for him, to paint a picture, to be even vaguely coherent. As he brushes his thumb across Mikey’s jawline, Pete begins to shake his head.
However, Mikey Way will not be denied. “Pete,” he says, firm but cradled by a warmth that was seemingly reserved for Pete, “tell me.”
He cups Mikey’s chin against his palm and tilts, just so, just enough so their eyes meet. Pete inhales. You’ll lose him if you keep being so damn clingy. Pete exhales. Just fuckin’ tell him.
“You know how I fe–no, maybe you don’t. Maybe that woulda fixed a lot of this before it got complicated.” Pete sighs, leaning down to press a kiss to the center of Mikey’s forehead. “I love you. I think–know, I know I always have and I just need, want, you. You. All of you. I’m just tired of fixating on everything else, ya know? I’m tired of thinking about what ifs and hypotheticals an–”
Hemingway interrupts with a curt bark.
“I think that’s Hemmy’s way of telling you to slow down,” Mikey croons, scratching beneath the dog’s chin as if to reward him for slowing Pete’s rampaging thoughts to a halt.
Pete looks between Mikey and Hemmy, back to Mikey. He feels his face relax into a smile, feels himself become lost in Mikey once again. Defeated, he sighs. “Mikey…”
“You don’t have to use all these pretty words for me to get what you mean, Pete,” Mikey says, expression softening, “and it’s cute that you’re trying this hard to be lyrical and brilliant like you always are, but you know what you wanna say. I know you do. So, just say it.”
He knows? Of course he knows. He’d known since that first day at Warped and every subsequent show after. He’d known during the moments in-between when Pete felt so ridiculously alone and the only one within reach when everything and everyone else felt galaxies away was Mikey. He’d known during Tourdust when Mikey appeared on stage beside them and it had that distinct feeling of home. He’d known. He’d always fucking known.
“I don’t want to be casual anymore,” Pete repeats, finally in a voice loud enough for someone else to hear. “I want…you, Mikey. I want you and whatever else goes with it. Family dinners or vacations or time apart to think or living together or not together o–”
"It sounds like you’re asking me to be your boyfriend.”
Pete startles. Was it really that simple? Would it have always melted down to that juvenile phrase? They weren’t in high school. Fuck, they were in their forties! “I, uh–”
“Yeah,” Mikey says, turning his head to nuzzle his nose back into Pete’s shoulder. “Yeah, Pete…I’ll be your boyfriend.”
And just like that, twenty years of stomachaches and self-doubt, romanticizing and demonizing the feelings he thought only he had, it was settled. For what it was worth, for whatever it meant to both Pete and Mikey, they were no longer casual. They were…exclusive, a bonded pair. At its core, it feels too simple and somehow still overwhelming. Would it have always been that easy? Should Mikey have made it harder for him?
“Y-yeah?”
“Yeah,” replies Mikey, eyes fluttering shut again. One arm snakes around Pete’s middle and the other returns to gently petting Hemingway, who seems oddly pleased by what had just transpired. He wags his stubby little tail and Pete can’t quite decide if he’s angry about it or not.
He’s not. How could he be? Things are fucking great.
Because, well, as you know, once upon a time, things were casual. However, with Mikey comfortably pressed against Pete’s chest, melting against him as though they were simply meant to exist as such, one multi-limbed being with every single complicated emotion shared between them, Pete decides that now they have a chance to maybe, just maybe, live their own sort of happily ever after.