Patrick reached his sexual peak on a Tuesday afternoon.

What bothered him the most was that it took him completely by surprise. He was a well-read, relatively intelligent guy; he should've known this was coming. But when he'd gotten aroused at age fifteen on a public bus just by the vibrations of the vehicle as it pulled away from a stop, he'd foolishly believed that that was the height of irrational and embarrassing adolescent male sexuality.

Until that Tuesday, in a motel room in Syracuse, as he was watching CNN's coverage of a tornado in a small Midwest town. Julie's grandparents lived in that town, and though he'd already spoken to her and knew everyone in her family was okay, he still felt somehow personally invested. He sat on the bed, watching the camera pans of wreckage and interviews with teary survivors, lazily picking on his guitar, and barely listening to the television, his mind half on the song he'd been working on for the past two days. On the floor in front of the bed, Pete was painting his fingernails black while talking on his cell phone. His half of the conversation consisted entirely of thoughtful, affirmative grunts.

It was a lazy afternoon, the kind that could stretch out for hours without Patrick noticing time had passed at all. They had a show at a college in the evening, but other than that they had nothing to do. Patrick ran through his half-finished song again. As he was playing the second verse he noticed that, in between slow strums on the guitar, his hand was brushing against the inside of his thigh, and it felt really good.

He stopped playing abruptly and took in a sharp breath. He was hard. Sitting with a guitar on a motel bed, for no reason at all, he had gotten hard. And there were sobbing tornado victims on the TV, and this had to be one of the prerequisites for burning in hell for all of eternity.

Pete's head suddenly popped up from where he'd been slouching at the foot of the bed. "What are you doing back there?"

For one horrible moment Patrick was convinced Pete knew, that Pete was some sort of supernatural sex bloodhound, which, come to think of it, would explain so much.

But Pete was just being his usual attention-whore self. His phone call had ended, and he must have gotten bored. He held up his bottle of black nailpolish. "Want me to do yours?"

Patrick knew that, if there was one person on Earth who could not pull of black nailpolish, that person was him. Under normal circumstances, he would've given in to Pete, because giving into Pete felt good as a general rule, and because Pete was all too willing to take the blame later for anything stupid he got them into.

But it would've been beyond embarrassing for Patrick to stand up at that moment, so instead of responding he stood up, said "I have to take a shower now," and rushed into the bathroom, still carrying the guitar clutched to his waist.

They were on tour, or at least that's what Pete kept saying they were doing. To the rest of the band, a real tour would mean shows in clubs and bars, not house parties and colleges. It would mean a tour bus, not Joe's mom's van, which smelled like Joe's feet. It would mean getting paid in money, not pizza and beer. And it would be bankrolled by a sponsor or record label, not by Pete's ex-girlfriend, who he'd somehow gotten almost a thousand dollars from, due to what Joe called "Pete's evil voodoo sex magic".

"I didn't do anything evil," Pete said outside Baltimore as he added up the small stack of post-dated personal checks Amy had written out to him. "We're friends." Pete was friends with everyone.

They stayed in cheap, dirty motels that Andy constantly complained about, but Patrick felt like he was young enough that he should consider squalor a grand adventure, and at least he got to play music. Occasionally they were so pressed for time they slept in shifts in the van, but most of the time they got two motel rooms, so Joe and Andy could hook up their Playstation and play for hours without bothering Patrick, who would rather write music or sleep.

Sleeping was another horrible adventure. More often than not, Patrick would change into sweats, turn off the light, get into the lumpy twin bed, and immediately be joined by Pete, who crawled out of his own bed, collapsed beside Patrick, and then stole the blanket.

"I can't sleep," Pete argued when Patrick tried to kick him out of the bed their first night on tour. "It helps when I can listen to you sleep."

Patrick elbowed him and yanked the blanket back. "Sleep doesn't make any noise," he said.

Pete rolled over the face the wall, pulled his corner of the blanket up over his head, and muttered, "You sleep like music."

The whole time they were on tour, Patrick had vivid dreams. He'd awaken suddenly, in the middle of some fantastic image, and be overcome by what he'd just experienced. But by the time he'd showered, dressed, roused a grumpy Pete, and met the other guys for breakfast, he's completely forgotten what he'd dreamt.

Once he took a sheet of paper out of Pete's writing notebook and left it and a pen on his nightstand. That night he dreamed someone was standing behind him with their arm around his waist, kissing his neck and whispering the meaning of life in his ear. He stumbled out of bed at 4am, hastily scribbled the meaning of life on the page, and went back to sleep.

The next morning when he yawned, rolled over, and saw the paper on the nightstand, he was suddenly wide awake and excited, for once unbothered by Pete's feet tangled up with his. He reached over, put on his glasses, and grabbed the sheet of notebook paper, ready to absorb the meaning of life.

The paper read, "peanut butter monotony".

Patrick crumpled the page into a ball, tossed it across the room, got back into bed, and kicked Pete in the shin, just because.

After deciding to ignore them, the dreams eventually faded, but Patrick was left with his larger problem: irrational and untimely sexual arousal that he, at almost eighteen, though he should be done with.

The next time it happened they were driving to Philadelphia. Joe was at the wheel, Andy sat shotgun, and Patrick and Pete shared the backseat. Pete was listening to his ipod and occasionally singing along, until Joe tossed an empty coffee cup over his shoulder and yelled, "Stop it! You sound like shit!"

Pete took his headphones off. "Is this your subtle way of telling me I can't do backing vocals when we record the EP? Because we already agreed that I could do backing vocals when we record the EP."

Joe opened his mouth to answer, but Andy silenced him with a touch to his arm.

"You can do backing vocals," Andy said gently, "during parts of the songs when Patrick can reasonably drown you out."

"Cool," Pete said, and he put his headphones back on. He stretched his arms out across the length of the seat and started tapping out the rhythm of his music on Patrick shoulder.

Just then the van hit a pothole, and the whole vehicle lurched, jostling them all in their seats. We should hit another pothole, Patrick thought to himself. That would be awesome.

Patrick crossed his legs. "Hey can we stop?" he called out to the front seat.

"Yeah, I gotta piss too," Joe said. "We'll hit the next rest stop."

It was an agonizing twelve miles to the rest area, and Patrick spent the whole time trying to think unsexy thoughts. But it didn't help that, as soon as he'd managed to get into a nice, safe fantasy about his mom's cat vomiting, Pete would resume percussion on his shoulder, pulling him out of his thoughts.

"Could you not touch me?" Patrick snapped.

Pete frowned. "What's wrong with you?"

Patrick shifted as far away as he could on the seat. "Nothing. You're just always space-raping everyone, and it gets annoying after a while."

The van slowed down as they pulled in front of a gas station.

"How about this?" Pete said with a smile. "You go pee, and I'll go buy you a Midol."

The van jolted to a stop in front of a gas pump, and a warm shock went through Patrick's groin as his body rocked forward. He lunged for the door and hurried to the bathroom before anyone could get a good look at the front of his pants.

The bathroom was a single room at the back of the convenience store, and Patrick thanked God and Mobil for this as he locked the door and undid his pants. There was a mirror over the toilet, and his closed his eyes so he wouldn't have to watch himself jerk off into a wad of toilet paper while standing in a public bathroom. He didn't even have any particularly arousing thoughts, just This is so stupid and What's wrong with me? He wondered if a rest area would sell anything that might be the opposite of an aphrodisiac. Was it possible to lower your own testosterone? Would estrogen pills work? Were there female hormones in Midol? Maybe Pete had the right idea, he thought, and then he was coming into the toilet paper in the palm of his hand, struggling not to moan too loudly, squeezing his eyes shut so tightly he saw little lights.

After cleaning up, relieving himself, and washing his hands, Patrick opened the bathroom door and found himself face-to-face with Pete.

Pete squinted at him suspiciously. "What were you doing in there?"

"What?" Patrick said, realizing too late that his voice was much too loud. "What the fuck, Pete? What do you think people do in the bathroom? Jesus!"

Patrick pushed past Pete and headed for the drink cooler.

"You can't do this," Pete said in a loud whisper as he followed behind Patrick. "At least not until we're successful. Then we'll have the money to put you somewhere nice." He grabbed Patrick's arm as he was reaching for a Diet Coke. "Ooo, you can meet Liza."

"What are you talking about?"

"Drugs," Pete said, his voice low. "Drugs are bad, Patrick. Just say no."

"No!" Patrick shook Pete's hand off him.

Pete smiled. "That's it."

"No, I mean –" Patrick sighed. "I'm not on drugs." He took the bottle of soda off the shelf and shut the cooler door. "Look, we had all those cheese fries last night, and they didn't agree with me, and it made me grumpy." He gestured back at the bathroom door. "But I just took a crap, if you really need to know, and I'm fine now."

Pete regarding him for a moment, as if deciding whether or not to believe his story, and then pulled Patrick into a full-body hug.

"I love you, Patrick," Pete said into his shoulder. "I won't ever let you do drugs or cheese fries again."

Patrick patted Pete's back a few times, then gently pushed him away. "You know, Joe's high about 75% of his life, and you're not having an intervention for him in the middle of a Mobil Mart."

Pete waved a hand dismissively. "That's different. Hey, do you have money? Will you buy me candy?"

Patrick bought himself a Diet Coke, and bought Pete a giant bag of M&Ms, though half of them were lost on the floor of the van as Pete tried to throw them in the air and catch them with his mouth.

At their next stop in Cincinnati, Julie drove in to visit them. As they waited for her to arrive, Patrick and Pete sat on one of the hotel beds playing cards. They'd started out playing poker, but Patrick quickly realized that Pete had no idea how to play poker. Patrick suggested an easier game, and they ended up playing War.

"You like Julie, right?" Patrick asked as he put his Queen over Pete's six and took both cards.

"Are you kidding?" Pete said. "I texted her this morning to tell her I'm single once she's done with you."

Patrick reached over and punched him on the shoulder. "Seriously."

"Seriously." Pete picked up his cards and thumbed through them before laying down a nine, which was immediately defeated by Patrick's Jack. "She's cool. I'm glad you're with her and not like, someone psycho."

Patrick relinquished a three to Pete's eight. "You always get the psychos before I have the chance to meet them."

Pete grinned. "Crazy people are good in bed." He looked down at Patrick's seven and started shuffling through his cards. "Hold up; I know I can beat that."

"I don't think this is how you're supposed to play War." Patrick set his cards down in front of him. "How retarded are you that you don't know how to play War?"

Pete tossed his cards down between them. "Don't call me retarded," he snapped. "The doctors said I was 'developmentally delayed'."

Patrick smiled. "Is that because they saw you without your pants on?"

Pete pushed at Patrick's shoulders, easily toppling him onto his back.

"Come on" Patrick said through his laughter. "You totally set that up for me!"

Pete picked up the six of hearts. "This card is symbolic of my heart, which you have broken. I will now make you eat it."

When Julie walked into the room, Patrick was lying of his back, stretching to try and strangle Pete, as Pete straddled him, held his other arm down, and tried to force the playing card into his mouth.

Julie tossed her purse on a nearby chair. "And here I was afraid you'd become such rock stars you'd be doing coke or something."

"We just say no to drugs," Pete said as he rolled off the bed. "And cheese fries."

"Julie!" Patrick got up off the bed and walked over to hug her. "I'm so glad to see you!"

Julie looked down at the front of his pants. "I can tell."

"Um..." Patrick took a step backwards.

"I'll leave you guys alone," Pete said. He kissed Julie on the cheek on his way out the door.

"Um..." Patrick turned away from them and headed for the bathroom. "I have to take a shower now."

Patrick jerked off in the shower, only to come out, find Julie lying on the bed, and then get off again, only minutes later. When they were done, he lay on his stomach, his head turned to the side, and just looked at her.

"You bring your guitar?" he asked.

Julie nodded. "I've been playing some old Springsteen lately."

"I'd like to hear it," Patrick said. He bit down on his lower lip before continuing. "I'd like to see you more."

Julie turned to look at him. "More?"

"Maybe you could come with us for a few shows," he said. "I could clean the van. We'd have fun."

"Um, I'm doing a few things right now. You know, in college."

Patrick rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling. "Then maybe I should go with you."

Julie leaned up on her elbow. "Are you crazy?" she said, not much louder than a whisper. "You love this band. You'd give it up to share a tiny apartment in a boring college town?"

"I guess I'm just lonely," Patrick said.

Julie sat up and reached to the foot of the bed to retrieve her shirt. "I don't think I'm the answer to 'lonely'."

"Let me get this straight," Pete said as they ate breakfast in McDonald's the next morning. "You were dating a smart, pretty girl who played guitar and didn't want to get too serious..." He frowned. "And you broke up with her?"

"She broke up with me," Patrick said.

Andy patted him on the shoulder. "You'll find someone else, man."

Patrick dropped what was left of his greasy hash brown onto the tray and looked at Pete. "Please don't have sex with her."

Pete held up his hands in a gesture of innocence. "We're just friends."

"Like you're friends with Kristine in Philly?" Patrick asked.

"Yeah."

"Didn't you have sex with Kristine in Philly?" Joe said as he sliced one of his small pancakes in half.

Pete paused to chew a bite of his Egg McMuffin. "Define sex."

Patrick threw a plastic fork at him.

Without a girlfriend, the embarrassing incidents only increased in frequency. He got hard unloading equipment from the van and had to jerk off in a dirty bar bathroom where the stalls didn't even lock. He got hard watching a horror movie with Andy and Pete, and had to pretend he'd rather take a shower than see the ending. He even got hard once writing music, having finally figured out the exact chord progression he was looking for, and when he looked up from his guitar Pete was staring at him from the other side of the room, saying, "That was amazing", and Patrick could only reply with, "I have to go take a shower now."

They made their way through the Midwest and the South, playing a state fair in Phoenix before heading to Las Vegas. They were less than an hour outside the city when Pete, who was driving, turned down the radio and announced, "On a scale of one to ten, how much would you hate me if I lied about us having a show in Vegas and we were really there to see a new band I met on the internet?"

In the backseat, Joe was sitting with his head tilted back, and didn't even open his eyes before responding. "Thirty."

"We don't have a show?" Patrick asked. "Pete, we barely have any money. How are we gonna eat?"

"We still have some Amy money," Andy chimed in from the backseat. "And we're getting paid for those shows in California, so we'll make it."

"It's still irresponsible," Patrick said. "I mean, you didn't have to fucking lie about it."

Pete rolled his eyes. "I'm sorry. I did something stupid. Welcome to my life."

Patrick crossed his arms over his chest. "That's really not a legitimate excuse." He felt a warmth spreading through his lower body, and oh God, now he was getting aroused when he was angry, and he wondered if that made him a sociopath. "Can we stop?"

Pete sighed. "We just stopped an hour ago. Are you fucking incontinent?"

"Like you're the one who deserves to be angry right now –"

"Guys!" Joe shouted.

"Fine; we'll stop," Pete muttered, and he signaled for the next exit.

The band in Vegas was surprisingly talented, though unpolished and ridiculously young. After the show they had an impromptu party at the singer's grandparents' vacant vacation house, and though it was crowded and smoky and loud, the guys in the band were all fun, their friends included some interesting and cute girls, and when Patrick yawned, Brendon told him to take his pick of the three bedrooms to crash in.

Patrick got his sweats and toothbrush out of the van and went to the second floor of the house. The party hadn't spread there yet, and the hallway was quiet. He opened the first door on his right, and saw Pete.

Pete, stretched out on the bed, naked. And Ryan, the other band's guitarist, underneath him.

Patrick only saw them for a moment, a snapshot: Ryan with his head tilted back, his face covered with a thin sheen of sweat, his lips parted, his eyes wide open and staring up, like he was seeing God. Pete with his arms on either side of Ryan, his muscles tight, his eyes dark, his mouth twisted into something that was almost a kiss but mostly a growl. There was a sheet over them, covering them to the waist, but Patrick had already seen too much. He took a step back, banged against the doorknob, and fled from the room just as he heard Pete say, "Patrick?"

Patrick rushed into the bathroom and undid his pants. It made no sense, he thought as he leaned one hand against the wall and put his other hand to work between his legs. He'd never been turned on by a guy before, at least, not this much. And he'd barely noticed Ryan before, so why would he get so worked-up seeing him half-naked like that? And what was Pete's problem that he could never lock a fucking door –

And then Patrick was doubled over, panting, and reaching for the box of tissues above the toilet.

He cleaned up, brushed his teeth, changed, and went into the second bedroom, which was thankfully empty. He lay down on the double bed and fell asleep immediately.

Patrick woke up sometime much later when he felt someone pushing him. "Hmm?" he said without opening his eyes.

"Move over a little," he heard Pete say.

Patrick shifted until he was nearly against the wall, and felt the bed dip as Pete climbed in beside him. Patrick rubbed his eyes. In the dim light of pre-dawn he could just make out Pete, wearing boxers and a t-shirt, lying on his side and facing Patrick.

"What happened to Ryan?" Patrick asked.

Pete smiled. "He doesn't sound like you." He reached over and tapped Patrick on the nose. "Also Brendon crawled into bed with us, and when I have my first gay threesome, it has to include Ashton Kutcher."

"How old is he?"

"Ashton Kutcher?"

"Ryan."

Pete looked off to the side. "He's legal," he said. "In some countries."

Patrick chuckled. Pete sighed happily and closed his eyes.

"Hey," Patrick said softly.

Pete opened his eyes.

"I'm sorry I was a dick to you before."

Pete smiled. "Don't worry about it. If we have to apologize every time we act stupid, then I'm gonna have to get 'I'm sorry I was a dick' tattooed on my chest."

"Might save time with your next girlfriend," Patrick said.

Pete stuck his tongue out, the shifted forward so he could put an arm around Patrick's chest. "You never have to apologize to me," Pete whispered.

Patrick tried to say "thanks", but no sound came out when he moved his lips. He cleared his throat. "They were good. Brendon's band."

"Yeah," Pete said with a smile. "I wish I could help them out somehow. Like I wish I could start my own label." He chuckled silently and rolled onto his back, his arm sliding off Patrick's body. "Listen to me. I have three dollars to my name and I want to start a label." He paused. "Two dollars, actually, cause I bought some Cheetos at the last gas station." He closed his eyes. "I am so lame."

Patrick moved forward, until his body was nearly touching Pete's. He put one hand on Pete's shoulder, and draped his other arm across his chest. Pete didn't open his eyes, just smiled slightly at the touch.

"You can," Patrick whispered, his lips right by Pete's ear, his nose filled with the smell of Irish Spring, hair gel, and what he thought might be Pez. "If anyone can start a label with two dollars and some Cheetos, it's you."

"Yeah?" Pete whispered.

"Yeah," Patrick said. "You're a force, Pete."

Pete rolled onto his side, so that his body was flush against Patrick's, and his face against Patrick's neck, his breath warm and wet.

"You can do anything," Patrick said.

"Can I start my own clothing line?"

Patrick looked down at the top of Pete's head. "No one in their right mind would ever dress like you."

Pete laughed.

"All right. Go to sleep." Patrick leaned his head back against his pillow. He still had both arms around Pete, and Pete's knees were pushing against his, but he was ridiculously comfortable.

"Hey Patrick?"

Patrick grunted softly in reply.

"I can't do any of this without you."

Patrick ran his hand down Pete's arm until he found his hand, then intertwined their fingers. "Good thing I'm here then." He gave Pete's hand a gentle squeeze, then fell asleep.

The next morning Patrick had to sneak out of bed without waking Pete so he wouldn't notice the bulge in the front of his pants. On the ride to L.A. he tried to stay as still as possible. He even bought some books at a rest stop that he thought would be especially unsexy, including Rosie O'Donnell's biography and a mystery about a serial killer who dismembered his victims and then processed them into dog food. But when he got to half-mast during a decapitation scene, Patrick gave up and spent the rest of the ride talking to Pete, who'd bought a new Pez dispenser at the last four rest stops, and then used them to write a musical about a bunny who was kidnapped by a duck and forced to make porn with a monkey before being rescued by Hulk Hogan.

"Somehow I don't think this'll be opening on Broadway any time soon." Patrick said after he finished watching the show-stopping number "You're No Bunny Until Some Bunny Fucks You".

"Don't sell us short," Pete said, waving Pez Hulk Hogan at him. "Book by Pete, Music by Patrick. Together we're unstoppable."

"Together you're giving me a headache," Joe said from the driver's seat. "I'm calling for a moratorium on showtunes."

Joe put on a CD of one of their friend's bands from back home, and they were in L.A. before it ended. Patrick waited until Pete was sufficiently distracted by the music, and then stole some of his Pez.

They only had an hour between the time they checked in to the motel and when they had to be at the college where they were playing, so they quickly showered and changed, then drove to the Student Center, where a stoned-looking girl gestured to the stage and said, "There are probably like, outlets."

Despite the rushed set-up, the show went well. The room was crowded, the kids were into the music, and Pete was on, engaging the crowd, roaming the stage, and getting big cheers between songs with his inane banter. Toward the end of the set, Pete moved to Patrick's side and kissed him quickly on the neck. He did this at most shows, and it never failed to make the crowd cheer, no matter where they were playing. Patrick was used to Pete cuddling, nibbling, and groping him in private, so a dry stage kiss was no big deal. But one of the girls in the front row screamed out joyfully, jumping up and bumping into the guy next to her, who spilled his bottle of water all over her tight white shirt.

Patrick stopped signing mid-verse. It was happened again. He was hard again, and now not only was it messing up his relationship, his friendships, and his ability to sit in a car for more than an hour, but it was going to fuck up the band. Patrick got back into the song immediately, but he could feet Pete and Joe staring at him from either side. He finished up the song's guitar part as best he could, but his hands were shaking. It wasn't the hard-on that bothered him so much; it was the idea that he was such a freak that his dick was going to destroy the band, the best thing that had ever happened to him.

The song ended. Patrick unplugged his guitar from his amp and walked off stage.

By the time he reached the single-stall bathroom, his erection was gone, but the dread in the pit of his stomach remained. He closed the lid of the toilet, sad down, and watched as the pattern of the tiles on the floor blurred from the tears in his eyes.

For as long as he could remember, all Patrick wanted to do was make music. He could play piano when he was six, drums at eight, guitar at nine. The first time he played out he was only twelve years old, and he remembered thinking, There has got to be a way I can do this forever. He started writing his own music, and for years he would play with anyone who was interested, anywhere they'd have him, from his aunt's backyard to a dive bar where he wasn't allowed to leave a roped-off area for underage performers. But no other fifteen year-olds were serious, really serious, about their music, and Patrick thought he'd have to fuck around for years playing his family's Thanksgiving dinner and spending Saturday nights trying to prove himself at open mic nights where half the time he was turned away at the door.

Then there was Joe, even younger than he was but quietly focused, just hanging out at a bookstore, not at all bothered when Patrick overheard his conversation and interrupted him. Then there was Andy, all smiles and supportive slaps on the back, saying, "You're good. You're really fucking good."

And then there was Pete, with his tattoos and his stupid growling face, his endless energy and his dumb pranks, his boyfriends and his girlfriends, his pages and pages of lyrics about the same bad relationship. His complete commitment. His determination. His faith. Pete was the only person Patrick ever trusted enough to make music with.

The bathroom door opened, and Pete walked in. "Patrick?"

"I'm sorry." Patrick wiped his eyes and tried to blink away any remaining tears. "I didn't mean to –" He sniffed and grabbed some toilet paper. "I'm sick. I think I have food poisoning." He blew his nose.

Pete twisted his foot so that he was leaning on the side of his sneaker. "The kind of food poisoning that makes you cry?"

Patrick finished wiping his nose and crushed the tissue between his hands. "Were the kids pissed?"

Pete waved his hand dismissively. "The kids were all stoned. And we did enough that they thought the set was done. It's fine."

Patrick nodded, his eyes on the floor. "I'll meet you at the van," he said.

Instead of leaving, Pete took a few strides across the bathroom, fell to his knees in front of Patrick, wrapped his arms around him, and pressed his face into Patrick's neck.

Patrick put his arms loosely around Pete and let his head rest on Pete's shoulder.

"You know," Pete said softly. "If something was wrong, I'm the one guy you can tell anything."

Patrick wanted to say, "I know". He wanted to say, "I think I have a crush on your new boyfriend." "I'm getting turned on by everything and nothing." "I'm afraid something is really wrong with me." He could imagine saying all of these things to Pete, and he could imagine Pete not laughing, just leaning back to sit on his heels and listening until Patrick was done. He could imagine Pete smiling and saying, "Is that all? That's not a big deal. I went through the same thing when I was younger. You can totally ask Chris. There was this one time –" And before long Pete would have him laughing, and Patrick would forget all about everything.

But when Patrick pulled back and saw the completely open expression on Pete's face, all he could say was, "I'll meet you in the van."

The motel was on the dead end of an underdeveloped street, right next to a sad-looking grocery store. Joe and Andy went to their room right away, muttering "goodnight", as if Patrick might explode if they spoke too loudly. Patrick went into the room he was sharing with Pete and lay down on one of the twin beds, pulled the comforter over him, and hoped Pete would read his mood and let him sleep alone.

"I call first shower," he heard Pete say, and then there was the sound of the bathroom door closing.

Patrick woke up confused. He hadn't even realized he'd drifted off, and now he was being roused by Pete, who was standing at his bedside dripping wet, completely naked, and holding a small plastic monkey head in front of Patrick's face.

"What the fuck?" Patrick muttered.

"The next time you steal my Pez," Pete said in a low, threatening voice. "I am going to set myself on fire. Then you will have to tell my mom what happened." He narrowed his eyes. "And she will be so pissed at you."

"What?" Patrick reached down and bunched up the comforter around his waist, hoping Pete hadn't noticed anything. Pete was naked. Not the normal kind of naked that Patrick was used to, where Pete was changing on the other side of the room, or naked under a towel, or hanging out in his underwear, or chasing Dirty around his backyard with his dick out in some sort of bizarre game Patrick didn't understand and didn't want to understand. But this – Pete was completely, shamelessly naked, and Patrick was totally, painfully hard, and suddenly it all made sense.

Patrick wasn't getting random hard-ons. He was getting hard when he was watching TV (with Pete), when he was riding in the van (next to Pete), when he was in a gas station bathroom (thinking about something Pete said), right before he saw Julie (when he was wrestling with Pete), unloading equipment (with Pete), watching a movie (with Pete), writing music (when Pete called his song amazing), while arguing (with Pete), while looking at Ryan (having sex with Pete), and on stage (after being kissed by Pete).

And now, lying on an uncomfortable motel bed, as a wet, naked Pete stood over him and glowered. "Um," Patrick began, feeling like he could barely breathe. "Um, I have to take a shower now."

Pete's face softened into a smile. "Cool," he said. "When you get out we can go to the store and buy cupcakes."

Pete turned and walked over to the other twin bed, where his duffel bag was spilling clothes onto the comforter. Patrick took a moment to look at his ass (oh my God, he thought, his ass), and then bolted into the bathroom, stripped, got in the shower, and came the second he touched himself.

Patrick leaned his forehead against the slick tile and moaned softly. The water spraying over his shoulders was barely even warm, but he was sweating. He thought about Pete. Pete, who always used up the hot water. Pete, who would do anything on a dare. Pete, who would sleep with anything that had a pulse and once (on a dare) a pumpkin. Pete, whose moods ranged from ridiculously cheerful to suicidally depressed, and could make Patrick's head spin with how quickly he moved between the two.

Patrick turned away and let the water hit the top of his head and run down his face. Pete, who stood in his basement on the day they met, his eyes wide, face open, and said, "Holy shit. Your singing is...If I wrote some stuff down, would you sing it?" Pete, who knelt on bathroom floors and hugged Patrick when he was crying, but didn't press him to explain what was wrong. Pete, who put on a big bravado every time they went on tour about how he would protect little Patrick from drugs, cigarettes, aggressive bouncers, and loose women, and then spent most nights sleeping with his face against Patrick's neck, as if he were a child, as if he was best friends with everyone in the world but he still needed someone to love him.

Patrick took a step back, pushed his wet hair off his face, and opened his eyes. He was in love with Pete. He was so in love with Pete. It could fuck up the best band he'd ever been in, and fuck up the best friendship he'd ever had, but he didn't even care anymore, because he was just so fucking in love with Pete.

Patrick changed into jeans and a t-shirt and went back into the bedroom, where Pete was dressed and flipping through the TV channels. Pete looked up and turned off the TV. "So what do you say?" he asked as he stood up. "Cupcakes?"

Patrick nodded and retrieved his green hat from his nightstand.

"Cupcakes and Pez Theater," Pete said, slapping him on the shoulder as he headed for the door. "This is the rock star lifestyle, my friend."

The grocery store was closed. Pete pounded his fists against the dark plate glass window and tilted his head back, staring up at the sky mournfully. "Why? Why?" He lowered his arms and sighed. "Life is hard, yo. I'm writing a song about this. I'll call it 'There Are No Cupcakes and My Soul Weeps'."

Patrick walked around to the side of the building, where there was an old-fashioned park bench, an empty newspaper box, and one of those coin-operated mechanical kid's rides. It was faded pink, and looked like a giraffe, or maybe a dinosaur.

Pete joined him a moment later, sitting down beside Patrick and putting his arm around him. They sat in silence for a moment, watching the dark clouds above them passing over the stars.

"It's okay," Pete said.

Patrick relaxed into Pete's embrace, grateful that he could count on Pete for support even when he wasn't ready to talk about what was bothering him.

"There's a gas station two blocks away," Pete continued. "They might not have cupcakes, but they'll at least have donuts."

"Let me ask you something."

"Sure."

"Are you and Ryan...together?" He looked sideways at Pete. "Like, are you dating?"

"No, no," Pete said. "We're just friends."

Patrick nodded. He opened his mouth to speak again, but it took a few seconds before he could say the words, and when they came out they were too soft, almost timid. "Am I your friend too?"

"Are you kidding?" Pete turned so that he was facing him. "You're my best friend. I love you like burning. If you ate puppies and raped kittens I'd still love you. If you needed a kidney I'd give you both of mine. What's your blood type?"

Patrick just stared at him.

"Nevermind," Pete said. "I'll call your mom tomorrow and ask her."

Patrick leaned forward and kissed him.

It was a short kiss, chaste even, their mouths barely open and lips just pressing together once. Patrick leaned back and looked at Pete, who was staring like he was about to either cry or punch Patrick in the face.

"Could you..." Pete held up one hand, as if he wanted to touch Patrick, as if he had to keep him from moving. "Could you do that again? Because I wasn't ready and usually..." Pete looked down at his hand, which had started trembling, and moved it into his lap. When he raised his eyes again he looked soft, young. "Usually I'm a good kisser." His voice lowered to a whisper. "But I wasn't ready."

Patrick almost started laughing at the concept of Pete being timid. But then, he was a little nervous too. He wanted to tell Pete everything, but he didn't even know where to start, so he just leaned forward.

They started kissing again, longer and deeper this time, and Pete was right; he was a good kisser. Pete rested his hand on the side of Patrick's face and stroked his jaw line with his thumb. Patrick was bolder, putting his hands on Pete's hips and trying to move him closer. And oh God, he knew these hips. This was the body that cuddled with him most nights, the legs that got tangled up in his sheets, the feet that kicked him at night, the hands that played his music, the arms that he'd nearly broken once during a backyard Gladiator match. This was his best friend, his writing partner, and his first love, all under the same skin, and kissing him was the best feeling in the world.

Then Pete climbed into his lap, straddled him, and started licking his neck, and Patrick thought he'd have to reevaluate his internal scale of best feelings in the world.

Pete had his knees braced on the bench, his hands on the back of it, his mouth hot and wet on Pete's neck, and was rubbing the bulge in his pants against the bulge in Patrick's pants hard and fast.

Patrick put his hand on Pete's leg, trying to stop the movement. "Pete –"

"Me too," Pete said, his voice low. "Go for it."

Patrick tightened his hand on Pete's thigh, dizzy just from his words, because it sounded like Pete had just told him to come. Outside a grocery store. In East L.A. In his pants.

Then Pete moved his body up, dragging himself against Patrick's crotch, sucked the entirety of Patrick's ear into his mouth, licked along the curve, and bit down on his earlobe, and Patrick came hard, his vision going black, his thighs trembling, his body pitching forward, moaning shamelessly. Pete rocked himself twice against Patrick's body, then leaned his face against Patrick's shoulder and let out a small, shaky gasp.

This must be the only thing he does quietly, Patrick thought, and he started laughing.

"What?" Pete leaned back. His eyes were wide, and his face was flushed and beautiful as his mouth tugged up at the corners, like just the sound of laughter made him happy. "Shut up," he said through a chuckle. "What's so fucking funny?"

"I love you," Patrick said. He hadn't even meant to say it, but nothing else made sense. He closed his eyes and tilted his head back, still laughing.

"I love you too," Pete said as he succumbed to the laughter as well. He calmed himself quickly though, and ducked his head to be on level with Patrick. "Hey."

Patrick opened his eyes just as Pete leaned in to kiss him softly.

"How long until you can go again?" Pete asked.

"Well, I'm seventeen," Patrick said. "So five or ten..." He started laughing again. "Seconds."

Pete stifled the laugh with another quick kiss.

"Let's go inside," Patrick said.

Pete shook his head. He looked around, taking a deep breath of the night air. "I don't want this to end," he said. "The dark, the crickets, the pink plastic dinosaur watching us, your pants damp against me, and I've loved you since whenever it was you reached the age of consent."

"Writing a song?"

Pete smiled.

"I'm honored that my song will follow 'There Are No Cupcakes and I Am Sad' on our album." Patrick put his hands on Pete's hips and nudged him gently. "Let's go inside."

"No."

"I'll blow you."

Pete stood up. "Let's go inside."

Patrick didn't blow him, at least not right away. When they fell onto Patrick's bed, and Patrick reached for the button on Pete's pants, Pete pushed his hand away, muttering, "I'm embarrassed."

Patrick chuckled. "You do realize that I have pictures on my computer at home of you fucking a pumpkin."

Pete rolled his eyes. "It's different when it's you." He ran his hand down the front of Patrick's shirt and hooked two fingers under the waistband of his jeans. "I don't want to scare you away," he said softly. He looked up, his face serious. "I can't mess this up."

Patrick leaned forward and pressed his forehead against Pete's. "You can't mess this up," he whispered.

*

Five years later Patrick and Pete sat together at a table in a dark corner of the bar hosting the after party for the MTV Movie Awards. They had presented an award, and planned to meet up with William Beckett at the party, but he hadn't shown up.

"Biiiiiiill," Pete whined into his cell phone. "Why aren't you answering? We had a whole threesome plan, and now the only person who wants to touch me is Martha Stewart. She pinched my cheeks." He paused. "On my face. Call me."

Pete hung up his phone and turned to Patrick, who was sipping a Diet Coke and watching people walk past them.

"This sucks," Pete said. "Do you want to make out in the bathroom?"

"I've been to the bathroom here," Patrick said without turning his head. "It's the least sexy place in the world, trust me."

Pete let his phone roll out of his hands and clatter onto the tabletop. "Forget it. I didn't want to sleep with stupid William Beckett anyway."

Patrick rolled his eyes.

"For real," Pete said. "His thighs are like the length of my entire body. It's freaky. And you know what? I'm just bored in general with sex with people who aren't currently Patrick. We should just be exclusive already. Like do you remember that girl in San Diego? She was really cool, but did you see her toes? Her toes were so messed up. It looked like her feet got run over by a car. But of course you can't ask someone –"

"Here." Patrick held out a bag of Reece's pieces that he'd been carrying around all night for the inevitable moment when he wanted Pete to be quiet.

Pete gasped. "You bought me candy?" He took the bag and tore open the top. "That's it. I want to marry you. For real. Marry me."

Patrick took a sip of his soda. "You're proposing to me in a bar?" he asked. "Because of candy?"

"It's what the candy represents, Patrick," Pete said through a mouthful of chocolate.

Patrick turned around in his chair so that he could face Pete. "You're so retarded," he said with a smile.

"I'll take that as a yes," Pete tossed a Reece's into the air and tried to catch it in his mouth, but it fell down the front of his shirt.

"You sure you want to be exclusive?" Patrick asked. "It won't be too monotonous for you?"

"Monotony sounds great right now." Pete threw another piece of candy into the air, and it hit the shoulder of a man at the next table. "As long as it's delicious peanut butter monotony." He threw up another Reece's pieces, caught it in his mouth, and raised his arms triumphantly. "Victory! Let's go home, play some Xbox, call Dirty and see if he can get ordained as a minister in the Church of Satan, and then lie down someplace warm where I can listen to you dream."

"Excuse me?"

Patrick and Pete looked up to see Ashton Kutcher standing next to their table. Pete's mouth fell open.

"Hi," Ashton said with a smile. "I just wanted to, you know, say hi. I'm a big fan."

"Thanks," Patrick said. He extended his hand and Ashton shook it firmly.

Pete just made a soft squeaking noise.

"We're fans as well," Patrick said. "Pete buys all your movies."

Pete put his hand over his mouth and squeaked a little louder.

"I love your new video too," Ashton said. He took a business card out of his pocket and handed it to Patrick. "Drop me an e-mail sometime soon. I'll send you an invite to my movie's premiere next month."

Patrick nodded. "That would be great. Thanks a lot, man."

Ashton held out his hand to Patrick again. "Nice meeting you."

"You too," Patrick said.

Ashton held his hand out to Pete. "Nice meeting you, Pete."

Pete just stared, his hand still over his mouth, his eyes wide. He pulled his jacket off the back of his chair and placed it in his lap. Then he lowered his head, said, "I have to go take a shower now," and ran toward the bathroom.

Ashton just smiled, gave Patrick a little wave, and walked back to his table.

Patrick stood, gathered his things, and started walking to the back of the bar. Pete wouldn't be long, and then they could go home. It would definitely be a good evening in. Patrick knew exactly which sweatpants he wanted to change into, and which video game he wanted to play. He knew exactly what he wanted to dream about.