Last Call
Title: Last Call
Author: crayola123
Rating: PG-13, for language and themes.
POV: Thirrrrd.
Pairing: Brendon Urie/Ryan Ross. Original, huh?
Summary: The train is slow pulling out from the station. Its red doors shining with gloss and sheen.
Disclaimer: I own nothing; this is a work of fiction and NOTHING MORE. Fools :)
Author Notes: This was originally meant to be a standalone, and then I thought - you know what? Sex. It needs sex. Therefore, it can now be considered a two-part standalone. If such a thing even exists :/ However, please feel free to consider them two separate stories if you so wish, as I'm pretty sure that can be done. Criticism/comments greatly appreciated.




Part One: Last Call

It’s been planned for weeks, this. Two friends – more than friends? – making their way across the country. East. The others are waiting for them. Everyone’s waiting for them. Everyone is counting on them and this and maybe it’s too much and it’s too soon and it’s just not right. Maybe it’s not. Maybe it’s everything they’ve ever wanted and all their dreams are coming true, and this is the best fucking thing in the whole fucking world.

The train is slow pulling out from the station. Its red doors shining with gloss and sheen. The heavy clunk and whirr as it picks up speed, the grate of metal on metal. The air screams as it is pushed back from its’ surface, thrown out into the atmosphere as the train bulldozes its way along the tracks. No prisoners.

He stands on the station platform, looking a little lost, expecting. People walking past, not noticing him. He has a bag on his back and a frown on his forehead, and the weight of the world on his shoulders. That train was for him, but he’s not on it because he’s waiting. Waiting.

Ryan Ross is small and thin, and right now, he’s all alone. Brendon isn’t there and he doesn’t know why. This has been planned for weeks; they had even talked about it last night. Brendon had seemed excited, had smiled and smiled like a kid at Christmas, and thrown in that jumper - the one that was about two sizes too small which he’d stolen from Ryan last year – and yelled at him for not packing quicker. Ryan doesn’t understand why Brendon is late – this is something that he’s been looking forward to, and he can’t understand why it’s all falling apart. He’s given up everything for this. Everything. He has no home to go back to if this fucks up; this is his one shot, and he needs Brendon there beside him, or else he doesn’t know what he’s going to do.

He looks around him and all there is is concrete and steel and no sign of Brendon. He shifts the bag on his back, and waits some more.

----------------

Brendon Urie hates himself right now. He is sitting in his hotel suite and staring at his suitcase and thinking about what happens next. He doesn’t know and he can’t tell and maybe, just maybe, this winter isn’t going to be what he expected it to be, after all. Maybe it wasn’t meant to last and maybe this isn’t right for him, and maybe he should just go back to college and start over. Maybe.

The walls are beige and the carpet is patterned. The windows are peeling, and Brendon thinks that maybe this is all he’ll ever be worth. He thinks about getting up and going to the station and trying to explain – to explain that he’s a coward, and he’s not ready, and he just doesn’t know anymore. He’s an ass and a jerk and everything he thought he wasn’t. And Ryan’s just too good for him.

He feels it in the curl of his fingers and the ache in his head; feels the loss and the hope and the confusion. He doesn’t know what to do. He hates it here but he doesn’t want to leave and no-one else understands. It’s too quick. He’s not ready. He’s just a kid. Inside he’s just a boy, and everything’s messed up, like when it’s Christmas and you don’t get what you wanted. Now he knows he just didn’t deserve it.

He bends his back and pushes his hands into his face, scrunches up his eyes and lets out a small noise of frustration. He blocks the world because it’s easier that way, and tries not to think about the damage his actions have caused. He’s just a fuck-up. He’s always been a fuck-up, and that’s not about to change.

--------------

Ryan Ross shivers. He’s been waiting too long now. It’s too long and it’s not fair and why is this happening to him? He feels the burn of rejection in his throat like vodka, and the ache of loss at the back of his eyes. He’s hunched up on a bench, bag on the floor beside him and a mess of tricky questions clogging up his brain. They’re all too difficult to deal with right now, so he buries them and breathes and lets his skin turn to ice.

It’s been hours.

The trains come and go. Loud and screaming one minute, chugging softly the next, disappearing into the ether with a whisper of everything he believed in and everything that was. A nugget of hope is burning in his chest like a candle that refuses to die: he just got held up, he’s coming, he’s coming, he just got held up…

Ryan Ross isn’t stupid. But love is blind and deaf to reason, and mutes all slender strands of rationality. Love is difficult and treacherous, and Ryan has simply fallen into the trap.

He won’t be angry, yet.

He’ll wait a while longer, and he’ll call one last time. He’ll say his goodbyes and he’ll freeze himself to death, and maybe he’ll have been wrong all along.

Maybe.

---------------

Brendon has had enough of waiting. Waiting for his retribution and waiting for the answers which aren’t his – that will never come because his questions were too goddamned self-centred in the first place. The hotel bill can wait. The choice he made can wait. His fucked up head and his fucked up life and all the mistakes he’s made in the last twenty four hours can fucking wait – they can wait and they can burn in hell for all he cares because he has to get the fuck out before his head explodes. He needs to apologise and explain and make it up to his friend before it’s too late.

He’s just a fuck-up. But that’s no excuse.

He’s wallowed too long and now it’s probably too late. He should have got on that train and given the middle finger to the world.

If he had some alcohol, he’d drink it. If he had an ounce of reason in his head, now would be the time to use it. If he had any morals, if he had any feelings for this boy – this boy that has dashed away all the norms and values and preconceptions that he’s built up over time – if he had a care for the bandmates he’s supposed to adore… he would have stopped. He would have stopped and considered days ago. He wouldn’t have gone along with it all against his will, and come to this, now. This car crash of an answer.

Brendon Urie is a selfish fuck-up.

But he gets in his car anyway, and he drives to that goddamned train station, and he hopes that he’s not too late.

-----------------

It is too late. It’s too late for him to just be running a little behind. It’s too late for him to be just around the corner… just around the corner would have worked several hours ago. Not now. Ryan knows now that none of the people just around the corner are coming for him. They are coming to sweep past him, and nothing more. Nothing more.

He can’t feel his fingers from the cold, and his teeth are chattering. If he was a girl, he’d cry. He doesn’t think he’s felt this let down in his life. It’s just not right, and it’s just not fair. Fucking Brendon. Always fucking everything up.

Fuck.

He rocks a little, looks at his shoes. Those fucking shoes he’s been staring at all this time. Because what else could he do? He sighs, curls his finger around the strap of his bag and heaves it onto his back. No point waiting anymore. He’s not coming. He was never coming.

He stands, legs shaking and teeth chattering and wind whipping at his clothes. It’s dark now, the lights of the station glowing like eerie beacons of what it could have been. What this night could have been for him, and them. Could have.

Ryan can barely see; he’s so tired and so cold and so. fucking. angry. But he blinks - through tears and torment he’ll keep on going – looks up, sighs. It’s over before it even began.

And Brendon comes around the corner.

A wild look in his eyes, a desperation in his face, an I’m so sorry already pursed at his lips.

Ryan can’t breathe; he feels like one of those kids in the movies, when something so perfect happens that it can’t be real, it just can’t be.

Brendon hasn’t seen him yet, he’s looking up and down the station for him, but he hasn’t seen him. Ryan wants to cry out I’m right here, right in front of you, but he doesn’t, not yet. He watches the beat of Brendon’s chest and the scuffing of his shoes.

A train is coming. Ryan can hear its whistle, its whirr. By now so familiar to him that it barely even registers. It pulls up with a squeal of brakes and a hiss of the engine. People board, and a handful step off and immediately bustle off into the night.

Last call.

It doesn’t stay long, the driver obviously tired and wanting his bed and home. Ryan thinks Brendon must be blind or stupid if he hasn’t seen him yet. Maybe he’s just avoiding him. Maybe subconsciously, Ryan doesn’t want Brendon to see him.

Brendon does see him.

He sees him as the train pulls away, the screeches and the clunks and the whistles and the whirrs drowning out his exclamation. Ryan stands still, doesn’t move and barely breathes as the other boy approaches, warm and familiar and looking the same as he always has.

“I’m sorry,” he’s saying, but Ryan can barely hear it. He just looks at him. He looks and he tries to see and understand. He doesn’t have words. The time for words is now, and after thinking and worrying and hurting all day, Ryan is bereft of them. “I’m sorry Ryan, Jesus. I didn’t mean to, I didn’t plan on- It was just. Christ, Ryan. You’re shaking. I’m sorry. I would never-I didn’t-“

He’s babbling. Ryan watches him and loves him and tries to understand. He finally finds his voice.

“You’re a dick,” he says, and it’s quiet and simple and the truth, “I can’t believe you did that.”

Brendon’s face crumples and he reaches out and searches for the words. “I know, I know,” is all he manages, and pulls Ryan into him and hugs him so tight he can feel the pounding of his heart. “God, I’m so sorry.”

He probably is, but Ryan is hurting. He feels the warmth of Brendon’s body and feels the strength in his arms, feels him here, there and everywhere, all around him wherever he turns. He unclenches his arm and slowly slides it around Brendon’s waist. His chin fits to his shoulder and he stares unseeingly at the concrete station floor. The emotions of the day fly through his brain like a mini movie. He experiences them again, every one of them, while Brendon mumbles his “I’m sorry’s” and rubs at his back until he’s warm. And then he lets them go.

He lets it go because it is Brendon and in his eyes, Brendon can do no wrong. He fucked up, but Ryan’s fucked up before. He lets it go because love is stronger than hate. And because he has to.

“I’m cold,” he says, pulling back a little, letting Brendon’s arm linger about his shoulder. He rests his hand on the front of Brendon’s jacket, watches his fingers curl in the fabric. He looks up and his eyes shine as they catch with the other boys’. “I didn’t think you were coming.”

Brendon bites at his lip and squeezes Ryan closer to him, sorry all over again. “I know, I know,” he says again, “I was coming, I was always coming, I promise, I promise-“

Ryan doesn’t believe this, but he lets himself be hugged and warmed because… just because. “I want to go home, now,” he admits, voice muffled to nothing as it’s pressed to Brendon’s chest. His heart is beating in his ears, wild and jumping – fuck. “Take me home, Brendon.”

“Yes, yes,” Brendon says, and steers them, keeping Ryan tucked into him like he’s made of china, ready to break and splinter at any moment. Their footsteps slap to the sidewalk and when Brendon breathes he can smell the ash and oil of the station in Ryan’s hair. “Home soon,” he murmurs, and fumbles with his free hand for his car keys. “I’m sorry. I’m a stupid fuck. I don’t deserve you.”

Ryan clings to Brendon and allows himself a smile. He squints in the moonlight and doesn’t move an inch from Brendon’s side whilst he unlocks the car and opens the door. It’s awkward with one hand. Ryan doesn’t care.

He slowly slides away and pushes his body into the gap between the door and the car. His thin hips swing and his eyes don’t leave Brendon’s face as he manoeuvres his way inside. “Thankyou,” he mumbles, simple, and leans out the open window to grab at Brendon’s chin before he has chance to move away, “For coming after all.”

Brendon’s eyes are glued to his face and he doesn’t know what the fuck to do, because it’s this kind of thing that made him so scared in the first place. Brendon doesn’t know, Brendon isn’t sure-

Ryan’s hands are small and firm to his chin and there is no way he’s letting his boy go this time. Fuck the world. Fuck the train station. Fuck everything.

He kisses him, leaning through the window of the beat up car in the train station car-park, the moon setting their skin all a-glow and the wind that’s been bruising Ryan’s body all day whipping at their hair.

Brendon doesn’t pull away.

Ryan smiles, lips still pressed to.

Last call: Brendon made it just in time.

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Part Two: The Fever