It started out fairly innocent, or as innocent as Pete gets. It was a practical solution to a problem with the band, and Pete was just being a good bandmate.

Usually, Patrick's shyness just made him more endearing--it was just one more piece of his puzzle that Pete was putting together, but when they were performing it was kind of a problem. During their first show he looked slightly green the whole time and ran to throw up as soon as they left the stage, but whatever, it was their first show and he still sang great. Better than great, his voice was fucking *fantastic* and sometimes it was difficult for Pete to duck his head down and focus on playing his god damn bass instead of staring at Patrick, just listening, marveling at the way his words sounded coming out of that voice.

But after the first few shows it became apparent that Patrick's natural reticence was becoming a problem. He would sing and play well, but he wouldn't say a word between songs, stepping far away from the mic and ducking his head down. It was always clear to the band and to everyone in the audience that he was terrified. It made for weird shows and, as kick-ass as Patrick's voice was, Pete was sure that he could be even better if he went up to the mic with any confidence in himself at all.

He did it the first time almost without thinking about it. They were playing a show and he fucking *knew* that Patrick could be singing louder and better than he was, not to mention that his body was so damn tense he resembled a robot more than a rock star.

So Pete came up behind him. "You're doing great," he whispered in Patrick's ear, nowhere near the mic. "They all love you, you've *got* this," and maybe it was Pete's imagination but Patrick seemed to relax a fraction, and he belted out the next chorus so well that Pete could feel Patrick's voice like a rope of electricity through his whole body, making Pete shudder and shake and almost forcing him to his knees.

He did it once more that night, whispering encouragement in Patrick's ear, close enough that his lips brushed Patrick's sideburns. Patrick shot him a look of gratitude and stamped his foot on the beat and smiled when he sang, and after that it became somewhat routine. He never said the same thing twice, and sometimes the stuff he whispered wouldn't even be related to their performance--sometimes he'd just say random, off-the-wall shit to try and make Patrick laugh, try and trip him up in the middle of a song. It became kind of a game, just another way for him to fulfill his best friend duty and give Patrick shit.

And that was all well and good--even innocent, mostly. Pete didn't start to really get himself into trouble until they started touring after the first album.

They were playing in Cleveland, and they were fucking *on.* The crowd was in love with them, Patrick's voice was driving people insane, Joe was a blur of constant movement and noise and Pete felt like his heart would stop beating if they ever stepped off the stage. He was playing behind Patrick and he moved to whisper in his ear, the way he always did.

"You're so fucking sexy like this," he said, breathing against Patrick's neck. "I want to get down on my knees for you right now."

The last word Patrick sang as Pete finished his sentence came out as a moan. Girls in the crowd screamed.

After that Pete has to see what he can get away with.

It gets dirtier with every show. Pete doesn't quite intend it to go like that, but his intentions don't always have much to do with his actions. When they play in Denver, Pete tells Patrick that he wants to drag his tongue down his spine. In Phoenix, he asks Patrick if his voice sounds like this when he comes (Patrick doesn't answer, but the chorus of 'Grand Theft Autumn' sounds breathless, overcome, beautiful). In Albuquerque he tells Patrick how he wants to bite his way from his collarbone to his nipples to his hips to his dick. In Austin he doesn't say anything, just presses his face against Patrick's neck and breathes. Patrick jerks slightly like he was expecting something else.

Pete keeps waiting for Patrick to snap at him after some show and say Dude, what the fuck? And then Pete can laugh it off and say he's just fucking with him, and Patrick will roll his eyes and chalk it up to Pete being Pete, and Pete will probably stop, or go back to whispering random shit to try and make Patrick laugh, instead of trying to make Patrick hard.

Except that Patrick never calls him on it. After a while he barely even twitches when Pete whispers how he'd like to fuck him--at most his shoulders will shudder or his voice will get slightly louder or softer, making it so that Pete has to stay completely tuned-in and focused on him to discern any reaction whatsoever--and acts completely normal around Pete offstage, like he's completely oblivious, like he hasn't even heard what Pete's been saying.

Pete hates being ignored, especially by Patrick. When he was little he'd just wail louder than before if his parents tried to ignore one of his temper tantrums, and that strategy hasn't changed all that much.

Eventually it becomes a bizarre routine of one-up-manship. Pete keeps waiting for Patrick to say something and Patrick never does, so Pete gets filthier and filthier, and it's their own weird ritual inside the larger weird ritual of constant touring. It becomes second nature to sidle up behind Patrick and say everything in Pete's mind that's too dirty for his lyrics. "I want to suck a bruise onto your thigh and drag my nails over your back, your ass."

"I want to stretch you out naked and spend hours licking every piece of exposed skin."

"I want you to hold my head down and make you make me suck you off."

"I want you to push my pants down and fuck me against the door of the van."

Pete would give anything to make Patrick look at him when he says it. Sometimes he thinks about grabbing the microphone and yelling his sweet nothings instead of whispering them, talking over Patrick's voice and the instruments and screaming about how much he wants him until Patrick *has* to listen.

It's a weird balance, being best friends with Patrick in the rest of their lives and being the guy who wants to touch, suck, lick, fuck Patrick and tells him so onstage. The dichotomy is driving Pete kind of nuts. It seems completely fucking backwards that he's being honest with Patrick in front of the cameras and the crowds and acting platonic when they're alone.

He finally breaks when they're playing in Milwaukie, in the middle of Chicago Is So Two Years Ago. Pete moves behind Patrick and leans in close, opens his mouth, and what comes out is:

"Do you think I'm kidding about all this? Do you think I just say this shit as a stage gig?"

No reaction. If anything, Patrick's voice gets more jovial.

Pete tastes something bitter at the back of his throat. "I fucking want you and I want you to *know* that and fuck you if you think you can ignore that!" He's practically yelling now, but the band and Patrick's singing drown it all out, not like Pete gives a shit. He wants Patrick to *hear* him. "Tonight I'm going to try and get into your pants and if you don't want me you're gonna have to fucking throw me off--"

Patrick finishes the verse and steps back abruptly, shoving into Pete's chest and making him stumble, interrupting his ranting and making him back off. Patrick ducks his head, his hair falling and obscuring his face, and Pete clenches his jaw and concentrates on playing the god damn bass.

He can feel his face going red. He knows he can be an asshole sometimes, but he usually isn't *that* bad.

As they wrap up the show, Patrick isn't meeting his eyes. That might actually be good, because if he did he'd probably be mad enough to hit Pete, which Pete deserves but doesn't actually want to happen.

Patrick still isn't looking at him in the van on the way back to the hotel, and Pete's beginning to feel slightly ill. It's entirely possible that he just fucked up the best friendship in his life, not to mention the band, and maybe he *does* want Patrick to punch him. Maybe they could yell and fight and then just--put it behind them.

By the time they get back to the hotel, he's practically worked himself into a panic attack. The guys all pile into their room to crash but he stays outside. It's a cold night and he doesn't have a jacket.

He thunks his forehead against the closed door of the van and closes his eyes. Tries to think of some way to apologize to Patrick for going psychotic on him--on *Patrick,* jesus, what was he thinking? This probably counts as sexual harassment. Fuck.

He's so focused on his own private drama that he doesn't even hear anyone come up behind him until he feels a hand on his hip. His adrenaline spikes and he almost jumps, tries to turn around but there's another strong hand on his shoulder, holding him in place and pushing him forward a little--not so much shoving him against the van as just pressing firmly. And then a voice, a voice he's spent most of the night listening to:

"You know, I've had to jerk off after every show we've done for the last year and a half."

Pete's mouth goes dry. "I'm--" he was going to say 'sorry,' but Patrick's hand comes up to--jesus, to cover his mouth, and Pete gets hard so fast he almost feels thirteen again.

"It's my turn to talk." Patrick doesn't sound angry or authoritative or even that intense; his voice is low, soft, casual. Almost sweet. It's doing things to Pete's spine. Or maybe that's the way Patrick is pressed up behind him, nudging a thigh in between Pete's legs.

"I don't know how you came to the conclusion that forcing me to hide an erection while singing was the best way to help me deal with stage fright," Patrick says. "Some of your ideas are really not the best."

Pete wants to say that it stopped being about the stage fright a year ago, that that was the whole *point* of his little tantrum tonight, that he wants it to be more than just what happens on stage. But he can feel the pads of Patrick's fingers dry against his lips, and Patrick sighs against his ear, and Pete decides to listen.

"I don't know what you expected me to *do,* Pete. I can't turn around and stick my tongue down your throat in the middle of a show when you start talking to me, no matter how much I want to. And I never knew--" Patrick sounds less relaxed, more frustrated now, the hand on Pete's hip beginning to squeeze hard. Pete braces his hands against the van and tries not to moan.

"I didn't know what to do about this offstage, either. I didn't know if you would just look at me like I was crazy if I brought it up, if this was just another one of your off-the-wall Pete Wentz things--" and that stings, because yes, he has his Pete Wentz persona around fans and the press but he's never pretending around Patrick "--and also, call me old-fashioned, but I think the guy telling me how much he wants to suck my dick should make the first move."

All valid points. Pete tries not to thrust when Patrick's hand travels over his abs and beneath the seam of his jeans, and fails miserably.

"But I guess it doesn't work that way with you. For the record, you were an asshole tonight, and I'm still pretty pissed at you--" That is definitely Patrick's hand wrapping around his cock, thank *god.* "But I'll, uh. Leave the yelling for later."

This time when Pete moans Patrick pushes a finger against his teeth, and Pete doesn't think anyone could blame him for sucking the finger into his mouth. That makes Patrick's breath hitch, and when he says "I think about your lips on my dick every night " it comes out rushed and almost shy, like he blurted it out accidentally. His hips push against Pete's ass, and apparently these days Pete's temper tantrums result in Patrick Stump humping him and talking dirty in his ear. Which, Pete thinks, is awesome.

Patrick squeezes Pete's dick and strokes and says, "And your hips, god, you keep asking me to fuck you and I want to so bad," and Pete groans around the finger in his mouth. Patrick rocks against him and starts jacking him off in earnest, panting a little in Pete's ear. When Pete bites down lightly on the skin of his forefinger he moans, high and soft, and says, "And your skin, I--I want to trace every tattoo with my tongue--" and Pete feels himself leaking pre-come on Patrick's fingers.

Pete tries to say Patrick's name, but it comes out "Ptrck" and Patrick pushes another finger in his mouth. "You're always talking and I want to hear what you'd say if I had you naked underneath me, how you'd say my name if I were sucking you off--" and jesus, Pete wants to hear that, too-- "or if I had my finger up your ass, or--" and Patrick falters and squeezes his dick and strokes him faster, and Pete is practically drooling around his fingers, and Patrick's hips are thrusting against him hard enough to bang him into the van, and Pete isn't even sure which part finally makes him come, just that it's Patrick, Patrick, Patrick.

Patrick makes a groaning-keening-whimpering sound in Pete's ear and slides his fingers out of Pete's mouth, trailing spit down his chin. Pete yanks his hand away and pushes him back and twists around, ignoring Patrick's vague sounds of protest because he needs to be on his knees right now.

And, ow--that would be asphault grinding against his knees and shins. Pete winces but ignores the scrapes and focuses on getting Patrick's pants down. Patrick is making distressed sounds--no, wait, he's saying Pete's name--and his hands are sort of waving around, finally landing on Pete's hair by the time Pete gets his dick in his mouth.

"*Oh,*" Patrick says with feeling when Pete sucks the head into his mouth, messy and unrhythmic but very, very enthusiastic. He goes down as far as he can and slurps his way back up, groaning around it and wrapping his fingers around the base. Pete knows he can give better head than this, but he's still orgasm-stupid and it's Patrick and Pete's just--not very good at controlling himself when it comes to Patrick.

Besides, Patrick doesn't really seem to mind, if the way he's thrusting is any indication.

Pete has wanted to do this for more than a year--since he's met Patrick, if he's actually being honest with himself. Now he's gotten what he wanted and he just wants to bury himself in it, wants Patrick to twist his fingers in his hair and fuck his mouth until it's raw. Patrick is too nice a guy to do that their first time, so Pete just closes his eyes and goes down until he chokes, and *that* makes Patrick cry out his name almost like he's in pain.

Pete wants Patrick to say his name like that all the time. He wants Patrick to say his name like that onstage, and makes a mental note to figure out how to make that idea a reality.

"Pete, I--" Patrick says when Pete pulls off slightly, sucking hard on the head while he jacks him off. He can feel that Patrick's close and that's so--he's going to make Patrick Stump come. He had no idea his day was going to be this rewarding when he woke up this morning.

Pete pulls off and strokes him once more, and Patrick shudders and jerks and shoots on the side of the van. Pete coughs and licks his lips and rests his head against Patrick's hip. He can't stop himself from reaching up to stroke the exposed skin above Patrick's hipbone, petting his way down Patrick's thigh.

"Pete." He looks up at that, grinning, and the expression on Patrick's face is a jumble of emotions--mostly happy, serious in that Patrick way, turned on, confused. Pete tugs at his wrist and Patrick gets the idea, pulls his pants up and sits down next to him.

Patrick leans his weight on his hands and tips his head back, staring at the sky. Pete resists the urge to climb into his lap, settles for covering Patrick's hand with his, which makes Patrick glance at him and smile slow and warm. He isn't hiding anything, it's all right there on his face, and it kind of makes anything Pete could say die in his throat.

Their pants are still undone, and the night air is beginning to get kind of chilly on Pete's dick. They're definitely going to have to clean the side of the van before Andy and Joe wake up, and really they should be asleep themselves--they have to be on the road to Des Moines in a few hours.

And they have another show tomorrow night--practically tonight. Pete grins, already thinking of whispering to Patrick how much he liked sucking him off in front of a crowd of screaming fans, telling him everything else he can't wait to do, and Patrick can answer him in every word he sings.