FicWad

"So have you asked Kaelin to have your musically inclined babies yet?"

Glaring over the illuminated screen of his laptop computer, Patrick shot daggers at Joe, before coughing up a response "Excuse me?"

"Have you told Kaelin that you want to do the dirty with her?" Joe rearranged his question, a smirk growing on his lips; Pete and Cecilia lounging on the couch behind Patrick, attempting to stifle their laughter.

"You guys are funny, really." Patrick mumbled in annoyance, shaking his head at their jokes before reverting his attention back to the screen on the table before him.

"To be honest" Joe spoke up again, "It's probably time, I mean, you've spent basically every waking second of the last three months talking to her with that ridiculous smile glued to your face, why not just grow a pair and tell her already."

Cecilia's chuckled filtered through the cool air of the tour bus where they were all positioned. Hanging out on the bus, with the band, without Kaelin around was an awkward feeling that Cecilia would trade for anything, but they were playing near her school, and Pete insisted that she tag along, skipping her classes to spend the day on the bus and around the venue. Sulking around the bus for the majority of the passing afternoon, Patrick was visibly unhappy and not particularly enthused about seeing Cecilia and knowing how close he and Kaelin had gotten over the passing months, Cecilia felt bad.

"Really, you're hilarious." Patrick whined, fiddling with his keyboard and trying to steer away from the topic at hand, "Why can't I have friends without everyone jumping all over me?"

"Because you want to jump all over her?" Pete inquired nonchalantly, a child-like innocence in his tone.

"Seriously, let's move on." Patrick sighed, his facial expression dropping.

"Sorry Trickster" Pete smile, laughter coating his apology, "we didn't mean to make you sad by talking about your lover."

"Dream-lover, he can't man up to making her his lover for sure." Joe corrected.

"Who's lover?" Charlie inquired as he climbed onto the bus and joined the conversation at hand.

"It really doesn't matter" Patrick sighed in defeat now, "Ohio and Chicago are pretty far apart, and Ohio and LA are even farther. What would it really matter, it wouldn't work."

"So?" Joe shrugged.

"I know a secret you don't know" Cecilia chimed in like a child, her sing-song confession going unnoticed by those around her.

"Can you really develop a functioning relationship based on phone conversations and two physical visits with each other? If it ended in disaster, I wouldn't be able to deal with that again."

"At least say something to her about it" Joe nodded, "you know, drop some hints, see how she reacts."

"Hey, maybe you can at least get some booty out of the deal." Charlie laughed from behind the keys of his vibrating sidekick, Joe and Pete joining in the light-hearted laughter as Patrick's cheeks flushed immediately.

"Excuse me, best friend, sitting right here!" Cecilia called out with her hand raised, trying to stifle her light chuckle. With a defeated sigh, Patrick shut the computer in front of him and ruffled his fingers through his hair before adjusting his hat back on his head.

"Tell her I said hello and I heart her!" Cecilia called out as Patrick made his way down the stairs, adventuring beyond the confines of the bus to make a routine phone call.

"Pete doesn't do casual sex" Patrick commented some where during their absent minded conversation, nervously but attempting to casually pace around the bus and its surrounding area, rousing a laugh from the other end of the conversation before Kaelin informed him matter-of-factly

"Cecilia does casual sex."

"We should probably not talk about Pete and Cecelia having sex, it's awkward." Patrick suggested with a slight laugh, digging his left hand into his pocket, nervously kicking at the ground.

"They're gross" Kaelin interjected absently, leaning her elbows against her kitchen table, biting on the cap of her pen and attempting to balance her concentration between her homework and her conversation with Patrick. It wasn't often he had the free time to devote to talking to her, but her mind was unable to devote all of her attention to the conversation at hand.

"Are you even listening to me?" Patrick inquired minutes later, the sharp amusement in his voice dragging Kaelin back to the conversation she was once a part of as she clutched the phone to her right ear.

"Hmm. Yeah, sorry, I'm listening."

"You don't have to talk to me if you're busy." Patrick assured her, knowing that she hadn't heard one word that he had just said.

"No, no no" Kaelin attempted to perk up, "I want to talk to you, I'm sorry, it's just, it's almost over you know, I'm just a little stressed out." Moments of silence passed again as Kaelin's attention drifted back to the pages of the books spread out before her, her sighs of frustration and Patrick's sighs of anxiety the only sounds filling the void space between them.

"Kae?" He attempted to grab her attention but another frustration sigh was the only response he was met with, "Kae" He began again, sighing heavily himself now, before taking a sharp breath and putting it all on the line, "I want to be together."

"Hmmm" Kaelin responded now, "Oh I know, I wish we were together too. I'm jealous that you're visiting with Cecelia, I feel so let out." Her words began to trial off, along with her attention again, but this time, at least she managed to force out a sentence.

"No Kaelin, not like that." Patrick corrected, sighing heavily his spirits dropped considerably as he absently adjusted the hat adorning his head before silence fell over the line again, the irking of the dead line in her eat pulling Kaelin back to reality.

"What's wrong?"

"I think I fell for you." Complete silence fell through both ends of the conversation now, Kaelin, hundreds of miles away from Patrick, seated at her kitchen table with her mouth agape, her heart beating out of her chest; completely convinced that she was lost in a dream, that she had fallen asleep on her homework again.

"And now you're not saying anything" Patrick began to ramble, "and now I'm freaking out a lot more than I thought I would and I probably shouldn't have said anything but it's been a -"

"Why?" Kaelin broke her silence now, shocked and confused, his confession taking her completely off guard.

"I don't know!" He nearly shouted, leaning against the bus, pulling the bill of his hat down over his eyes, "Maybe because you're amazing and you're beautiful. Because I can't find myself talking to you without smiling just from the sound of your voice; you don't care who I am or what I do, and you don't ever compare me to what I should be. You don't throw yourself at me like most girls would, you're not afraid to make fun of me when I say something stupid in an interview or make a fool of myself on TV and you just-"

"I feel the same way" Kaelin mumbled almost inaudibly under his nervous rant.

"What?" His breath caught in his throat.

"I don't usually believe in anything at first site, it's far too ridiculous to be true" Kaelin sighed, pushing the books on the table off to the side and devoting her complete attention to the current moment, "but I believe I fell for you the day that I met you."

Patrick suddenly released a breath that he hadn't realized that he had been holding, "I don't know what we're going to do, but I know that I want to be more than what we are."

"We'll figure it out" Kaelin assured them both with a smile on her face as an incoming call rang in her ear; instructing Patrick to hold his thought a moment while she hesitantly answered, "Yes?"

"I just want to let you know I just made out with Pete Wentz" Cecelia announced, "I didn't do it for the glory and even if it makes me a slut, it was fantastic."

"I have a reason to be over Jeremy" Kaelin counteracted her announcement.

"Finally, if I had to watch him mope around without you any longer I was going to shoot myself." Cecelia laughed, "But yeah, I can see lover boy standing outside waiting for you to click back so I'll let you go, call me later for juicy details."

Kaelin was still chuckling to herself when she clicked back over to Patrick's call, "Want to make a wager on the Cecelia-Peter sex timeline?"

"Ugh, gross." Patrick twisted his face in disgust, before finding himself smiling at the sound of her laughter, smiling for no solid reason at all, a smile that wouldn't be leaving his facial features any time soon.