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In the studio it was normally just the four of them and tech, but now there was a new girl. She’d been coming in with Patrick for about a month now and Pete didn’t like her from the start. She was always on Patrick, always on display. She could be everything Pete couldn’t be during their relationship.
He was riddled with envy. Jealousy.
He never showed it to Patrick though; no, he told him how happy he was for the singer to have someone that was clearly good for him. Pete would say it with his most convincing “I’m your best friend and I really am happy for you smile.” Patrick believed it, he always fell for it. Or, he recently picked up to believe it. He used to notice the second Pete wasn’t being honest, when he was hurt. That was all gone.
They were still best friends, that would never change. No girl, or boy, would ever stop them from being Pete and Patrick. They were one person together, that’s what they said and what everyone else said. It was always them versus the world.
To Pete it stopped feeling like it though. They still spent time together and talked about everything, wrote together, worked quietly in each other's presence; it just stopped being the same. The silence was often filled by Patrick talking about the date he went on with Her and how She made him this amazing meal.
She was truly good to Patrick. Pete felt miserable for hating her but that jealousy was just something that he would never shake. That was meant to be him but when he had his chance no one saw him as special because it was always Pete and Patrick, Patrick and Pete. Patrick didn’t brag about what Pete wrote about him because that was Pete’s job, write for the latter to distinguish. He never wanted it distinguished; he wanted those words just for the two of them. He never minded much though, he loved the way Patrick’s voice would growl back his love confessions.
Pete hated how they sounded now, never because of the singer, but because he could hear his own desperation. He could hear how he pleaded for Patrick, begging for his attention. He had the attention from the crowd, from his friends, from random mothers whose daughters loved him, but he never wanted that. All Pete wanted was Patrick to look at him and understand the overwhelming consumption of love that took him over. All he wanted was Patrick.
Pete wanted his every sense controlled by Patrick, that satisfied his deluded mind. He knew it was over. They grew up, they split and came back. Pete was better now and Patrick didn’t have to babysit him through rough episodes. They were adults and could take care of themselves, not reckless teenagers in a van with hardly anything for them through their expensive tours.
He missed the struggles or maybe he missed the way that when the van got too cold during winter Pete would find himself under the same blanket as Patrick. That was all gone now, for better and for worse.
Patrick’s girlfriend was sweet. When she knew Pete would be screaming that day she brought an extra tea for him as well as her regular tea for Patrick. She helped move equipment. She brought home made food for everyone and it was truly good. He felt miserable for hating her because she was genuinely a good person, in general and for Patrick.
She is what Pete isn’t and wasn’t and that’s why he hated her. Although he really didn’t hate her, he loved her. He saw her as another member of the band. They would talk and joke, play fight, just like he would with Andy, Joe, and Patrick. Pete cherished the way she cared for his friends and was just so sweet to him even when jealousy was very noticeable in his eyes.
He hated it. He hated that Patrick could finally be open with someone that wasn’t him. If they were together now Pete knows it would be acceptable to be all on him; the times were different when they were together. He just wished he even had a standing chance to have that momentary spotlight. That was over though and he knew with everything in him that he had to move on.
Pete Wentz had decided that he was now officially over Patrick stump. That he would have to live okay with just being Pete Wentz who was still Patrick Stump’s other half but as the best friends everyone knew them as. He could accept that, he could pretend as long he knew his other half was happy. That’s all that truly mattered; Patrick Stump was content that Pete Wentz was his best friend.