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Brendon wakes up one morning, four shows into their first headlining tour, and Spencer James Smith the Fifth has a heart on his cheekbone.
To be honest, he probably wouldn’t have noticed it for a while, had he not heard Ryan’s maniacal laughter and Jon’s quiet snickers as he poked the damn thing. By the time Brendon stumbles out of the bunks and into the kitchen, Spencer is already maroon and getting angrier by the second.
“That’s a really unfortunate place for a Mark,” Brendon says solemnly in place of a greeting, and Spencer’s face turns a deeper shade of red, which Brendon hadn’t been sure was possible. He tries, he really does, but after a few seconds he starts giggling with Ryan and Jon. To be fair, he’s laughing more at Spencer’s expression than the Mark, but the fact that his Mark is on is face… well. It’s a little funny.
“Thank you, Brendon,” Spencer says through gritted teeth, but Spencer with what equates to a heart tattoo on his cheek is about ten times cuter than Spencer without what equates to a heart tattoo on his cheek, which frankly, Brendon wouldn’t have thought possible.
“You’re adorable,” Brendon tells him gleefully, and Ryan – whom he hadn’t previously been paying attention to – just about dies laughing.
“I hate all of you,” Spencer announces calmly, and then bolts for the back lounge. He slams the door behind him, as much as he can slam a flimsy door on a tour bus.
“He’ll forgive us for that later, right?” Brendon asks, still giggling a little. Ryan laughs louder.
***
Well, Brendon is going to ensure that Spencer forgives him, which is why he brings Spencer a bowl of Brendon’s favorite marshmallow cereal as a peace offering an hour later.
“Spence?” he calls, knocking with his free hand.
“No,” Spencer groans back, sounding muffled, which Brendon takes as his cue to enter.
“I brought you sugary goodness,” he says, almost hesitantly, with too much of a grin to make it sincere. “C’mon.” He closes the door behind him and sits down by Spencer’s head. His face is buried in a pillow, but Brendon just pats his head and balances the bowl of cereal on it until Spencer starts to move. Then, he just holds it out, and tries very hard not to smile even a little bit at the heart on his cheek.
Brendon loves the hearts. He doesn’t have one, which is kind of sad because he’d thought for a while there – but no, he really does love the hearts. It’s a beautiful reminder that love is all around them, and they’re cute, and Brendon is a romantic at heart. He’s not laughing at Spencer for falling in love – not all. He just finds Spencer’s reaction a little adorable.
Spencer sits up with a sigh and pillow creases on his face, but takes the bowl and lets Brendon pat his knee happily.
“You’re not really that upset, right? Like, it could look way stupider,” Brendon tells him earnestly, because he doesn’t have a very good sense of self-preservation. “It could be in the middle of your forehead. Or on your nose.”
“But did it have to be on my face?” Spencer mutters, and Brendon does feel a little bit of sympathy for him and he’s not jealous, not at all. Not of the Mark, or the recipient of it. “Like, anywhere but my face. I can’t hide it if it’s on my face.”
“There’s always makeup,” Brendon says reassuringly, because he does get where Spencer’s coming from. He’s been single since they started getting big and the minute the fans notice the Mark, everyone will be asking who he fell in love with.
“I don’t want to cover it with makeup,” Spencer sighs, and looks down at Brendon’s hand on his leg until he moves it. Which is total bullshit, Brendon thinks, because Spencer is just as cuddly as Brendon is and in about five minutes he’s probably going to give Brendon a hug and let him cling while they watch TV anyway.
“So don’t,” Brendon says promptly. “You don’t even have to say anything. Whatever.” He pauses. “Out of curiosity, though…”
“No, Brendon.”
“But!”
“Nope.”
He huffs, and crosses his arms. “I could totally help you win her over, you know. I’m charming as fuck. No woman could resist me.”
Spencer actually manages a real laugh at that, and he looks so terribly fond that Brendon’s heart skips a beat, just a little bit. He ignores it, and smiles winningly at him. He will help Spencer win his first love, damnit. He will. Brendon’s crush on Spencer is fucking stupid, anyway. “If you charmed this theoretical woman, you’d steal her away and then where would I be?” He sounds a little dubious of this himself, for some reason Brendon can’t figure out, but he just sighs and lets Spencer have his little victory.
“I just want you to be happy,” he pouts, expression as endearing as he possibly knows how to make it, but Spencer’s smile really can’t get any fonder than it already is, and Brendon just gets a pat on his on knee for his efforts. It’s still nice.
***
The thing is, Spencer’s Mark is apparently really distracting. They’re due to go on stage in half an hour, and frankly, Brendon can’t look away from Spencer. They’re playing it off as makeup for tonight, even though they know the truth is going to come out eventually.
It’s slightly smaller than a dime: a stark, black, perfectly symmetrical heart on his cheekbone where a beauty mark might be. It makes Spencer look a little fragile, a little adorable, and it compliments his face well. It makes Brendon wonder what Spencer looks like when he's in love. Is his smile softer, his eyes brighter? Does he blush just out of happiness, like Brendon sometimes does? Love would probably look good on Spencer. Brendon hasn't had the opportunity to see it yet, but he can't wait.
"If you keep staring at me, I'm going to quit the band."
Brendon's attention is drawn from Spencer, to. Well. Spencer. "I'm not staring at you." He's aiming for earnest, but judging by the look on Spencer's face, he'd just managed stubborn.
"Then what have you been staring at?" Spencer asks, skeptical. His bitchface is probably the hottest thing on the planet. "Brendon!"
He snaps back into focus. Spencer's gone from irritated to exasperated.
"You are zoning all over the place, man. Get it together," Spence tells him, but he's up and moving over to sit next to Brendon. "Seriously, what's going on? You're being spazzier than normal."
Brendon thinks about telling him that he thinks his Mark is cute, and that's why he can't stop staring. Then he remembers that he is within punching distance, and he opts not to get taken out by Spencer's right hook. He's a drummer, and Brendon is not stupid.
“I’m just tired,” he says, and then maneuvers so he can put his head on Spencer’s shoulder. Spencer probably moved so Brendon couldn’t stare at him from across the room anymore, but he should have known Brendon was going to get tactile.
Spencer doesn’t complain, though. He just rests his head on Brendon’s and stabilizes them both with a hand on Brendon’s leg, above the knee. He turns into Spencer’s body and relaxes into his side to wait until they have to get onstage.
***
After the show, Brendon begins an investigation into who Spencer’s Mark could possibly be for. It can’t be a random person at a venue – it has to be someone permanently with them on tour. Spencer isn’t fickle with his heart; it has to be. That leaves, unfortunately, about fifty people.
Brendon has to take a minute after the realization that this is Spencer’s first real true love. He can’t imagine how that feels – his crush on Spencer is intense, and true love has got to be even more intense than that. Brendon really can’t imagine.
Naturally, he goes back to Spencer watch. Who does he smile at? Who does he look at for more than three seconds?
Brendon spends the night following him around, but the only person Spencer watches for any length of time is Brendon, and that’s because Brendon is quite literally stalking him around the venue. He’s not sure how Spencer picked up on it within five minutes – he’s nearly twenty feet away! – but Spencer has been sending him confused looks every few minutes since.
Brendon barely notices when Ryan ambled up, but Ryan doesn’t let him stay oblivious for long. “Man, why the fuck are you tailing Spencer?”
Brendon doesn’t really see the point in lying to Ryan, who will see through him in two seconds anyway. “I’m trying to figure out who he’s in love with, so I can set them up?” Brendon probably should have expected that Ryan would start laughing. He glares at him when the laughter lasts longer than he thinks is probably necessary. “It’s not funny!” Ryan wipes a few invisible tears from his eyes and looks far too smug.
“You’re a moron,” he tells Brendon cheerfully, but it’s not malicious. Brendon is Confused, with a capital C, but Ryan just pats him on the shoulder and wanders off. “Good luck hooking Spence up with his true love!”
The asshole, naturally, says this loud enough that everyone stops and Spencer himself spins around, eyes finding him almost immediately. His glare is impressive, and Brendon smiles weakly at him.
He retreats back to the bus in shame and no closer to finding out who Spencer is in love with.
***
There’s a dancer named Kaitlin that Spencer’s friendly with. There’s also a guitar tech named Ally, and Brendon has also seen Spencer talking to Tim from the Plain White T’s a lot. So far, Brendon’s list of potentials is small, and Brendon has to cross Tim off once the Plain White T’s leave the tour and Spencer just cheerfully greets Cobra Starship, who join the tour a couple of days later.
This is agony for Brendon, who has always prided himself on snooping. Spencer is not at all helpful – he just hangs out with Brendon and the guys like he usually does, and more often than not he’ll stay in and watch movies with Brendon than go out. He’s making it very difficult for Brendon to figure this out, which is probably the point. Brendon wants to hate him for it, but then Spencer will turn from whatever he’s doing to give Brendon that carefree grin and Brendon melts like a moron and forgets to hassle him about it.
“Ryan is right. You guys are so stupid,” Jon agrees one day, watching him and Spencer play Mario Kart. Brendon has this thigh pressed up against Spencer’s – not because he’s coming onto him, (he would never come between Spencer and the person he loves enough to get a Mark) but because he just wants to be close to him while he can.
“I hate you Jon Walker,” Brendon says mournfully when he loses, pouting up at him, but then Spencer throws an arm around his shoulder and starts gloating about his win in Brendon’s ear. Brendon can’t help but giggle and twist his neck to try and see Spencer’s face, but Spencer just laughs at his efforts and keeps ribbing him.
“Idiots,” Jon says conversationally, then turns around and walks out.
“What’s up with him?” Spencer asks, but Brendon’s guess is as good as his.
***
The next show, they all put little hearts on their cheeks amidst their makeup. Jon, Ryan, and Brendon’s are all a little less perfect, not quite symmetrical, but they’re still cute, and the fans are insistent about getting group photos afterwards.
Brendon is just as insistent about it. He saves about thirty group photos to his Sidekick, then takes about eight more with just him and Spencer. One, he manages to snap just as he presses his lips to Spencer’s cheek. Spencer suffers through it with a sigh, but when Brendon looks at the photo later, he’s smiling, and it makes Brendon flush, just a little bit happier.
***
The fans finally pick up on Spencer’s Mark after a week, and Panic! isn’t huge, but there’s quite a bit of feedback. Suddenly, every fan they talk to is asking about who he’s in love with, and Brendon hasn’t seen Spencer this consistently red since high school. He’d complain, but now Spencer’s stopped using makeup to distract from the Mark, and Brendon likes to look at it.
It’s just that… Brendon likes to pretend. He daydreams about it sometimes about Spencer’s mark being for him, about being able to lean up and kiss him right over it, about drawing a matching one on his own cheek.
Brendon doesn’t have a Mark himself, so he’s not in love with Spencer. It’s just a crush, and that makes it okay. This isn’t unrequited love and therefore it’s fine.
“I just hate how they all ask about it,” Spencer’s telling them while they’re out at Taco Bell, just the two of them. “I have to look at it every day, and know that I’m in love with somebody that doesn’t love me back. Then they bring it up even when I’m not looking at it.”
Brendon kicks him gently under the table. “Anyone who wouldn’t love you would be stupid, dude. Stupid as fuck.”
Spencer’s smile nearly breaks his heart. It’s self deprecating and sad and Brendon suddenly hates anyone who could put that look on his face. “You’re the best, Bren,” he says instead of telling Brendon anything useful, like who he has to go kill for making Spencer sad.
Spencer hooks Brendon’s ankle with his own, and they eat their tacos with their feet locked together.
***
Brendon has a dream that night. Spencer is happy and married to some faceless woman. She has a heart on her cheek as well, and that’s all Brendon can tell about her. She’s indistinctive and nameless and unimportant, but Spencer glows looking at her, and Brendon spends the dream trying so hard to be happy for him. When he wakes up, he’s not happy at all. He’s actually struggling not to cry, and he really hates that he’s being such a fucking baby about this.
He still climbs out of his bunk and goes to quietly watch TV in the lounge, but a hand shoots out and grabs him instead.
“Spence?” he whispers, ducking his head so he can see into Spencer’s bunk. His friend looks sleepy, but focused on him.
“Where are you going?” he asks Brendon, and Brendon shrugs.
“I had a bad dream,” he says, and he feels bad that it’s true. “I was going to go watch TV. Wanna join me?”
Spencer shakes his head, which is probably for the best, but then he tugs a little on Brendon’s wrist. “Come on, dummy,” he whispers, and Brendon climbs into Spencer’s bunk with a racing heart. It’s a bit of a squeeze, but Spencer hums and arranges them so his chest is pressed to Brendon’s back, his arm wrapped tight around Brendon’s middle. “Go to sleep, Bren.”
It’s suddenly okay, at least for now, and he melts. He presses his body against the line of Spencer’s and wraps his arm around the one Spencer has wrapped around him.
“Love you, Spence,” he mumbles, and Spencer squeezes tighter for a moment in response.
***
Now that the fans know about Spencer’s Mark, there don’t seem to be a lot of boundaries. Naturally, this makes Spencer desperate to avoid talking about it. He hasn’t been this flushed this often since the morning he got the Mark.
“Your Mark is so cute, Spencer!” a fan tells him before a show one night, and he promptly turns the color of a tomato. Brendon watches, hysterical laughter on his lips, as Spencer accidentally misspells his own name on her copy of Fever then mumbles three different goodbyes and books it back to the bus. Brendon turns his huge smile on Ryan, who’s red faced from trying not to laugh.
“Just when I thought I couldn’t love Spencer more, he gets even cuter,” he says, beaming, and he totally means it in a platonic way. Just the thought makes him frown, smile dropping, and he doesn't wait for a response before turning back to the sign he was scrawling his signature on.
***
They finally have a hotel night, and Ryan calls Brendon before Brendon can call Spencer. He feels bad for being disappointed, but it’s probably for the best because being around Spencer is starting to ache in the chest region. A lot. Spencer is still giving Ryan a suspicious look when Brendon’s getting pulled into the elevator, but he says goodnight to Brendon normally, so Brendon assumes everything is fine.
“What’s up with you?” Ryan demands when they get their hotel door shut behind them, proving him wrong.
“What do you mean?” he asks defensively. “Nothing.”
Ryan rolls his eyes. “You’ve been down for like three days. C’mon. What’s up?”
Brendon doesn’t know how to answer this question, so he says “fuck you” with more vitriol than necessary and stomps into the bathroom.
He comes out an hour later, embarrassed and ashamed, and Ryan is calmly waiting on what’s probably his bed, considering that Ryan’s shit is all over the other one. “Are you going to talk now, or are you gonna act like a baby again?”
“I’m sorry,” he sighs, and climbs onto the bed to cuddle into Ryan’s side because he’s grumpy and he knows Ryan will oblige since he wants something out of Brendon. He’s dry enough that Ryan doesn’t even grimace when he puts his head on Ryan’s stomach, arm curled around his hips. “I’m jealous.”
“Of?”
“Spencer.” It’s not exactly the truth, but this cover story is easier than explaining that he has a big painful crush on Ryan’s best friend and it’s making him selfish.
Ryan makes a weird sound. “Why?”
Brendon sighs against his stomach. “I just. Spencer has a Mark, right? And I don’t, and I wish I had someone to love that much. I’m just lonely, I guess.”
Ryan makes another weird sound and shoves Brendon off. He’s hurt for half a second before he sees the incredulous expression on Ryan’s face. “You’re jealous, because you want a Mark?” He nods, confused, and Ryan groans out loud. “You’re a fucking idiot, Brendon. You have one.”
Brendon is a million times more confused than he was a second ago. “No, I don’t. I would know! I went looking after – well, that doesn’t matter. But I’ve looked! I am pristine and unmarked like a baby.”
Ryan smacks himself in the face, looking three thousand percent over Brendon’s drama. “It’s on your fucking ass, moron. You’d think you would have noticed, considering how much you love your own backside.”
Brendon feels like stone. “No, I don’t,” he says dumbly. “I don’t.”
“It showed up sometime during the Ambitious Ones and Smoking Guns tour,” Ryan explains. “You never change behind a partition, so we see your ass all the time and noticed it when you were bending over grabbing a shirt one time. We just never asked because, well. You’re kind of an emotional little dude, so it wasn’t shocking. We thought you were in love with William and didn’t want to bring it up because it was obviously unrequited.” Ryan shrugs, like this is all reasonable.
Brendon feels like he’s taken a fist to the gut. The Ambitious Ones and Smoking Guns tour? Like, when he’d realized how intense his crush on Spencer was for the first time and he’d thought that he’d fallen in love with him but couldn’t find a Mark?
Instead of feeling better, he feels a million times worse. If he was in love with Spencer then, he’s in love with Spencer now, and Spencer is… in love with someone else. Brendon trembles, then pulls Ryan toward the bathroom.
“Show me,” he demands. “Where is it?” He yanks his basketball shorts down and it’s honestly a testament to their friendship that Ryan just rolls his eyes and pushes on Brendon’s back until he bends over, neck craned to see.
There it is, on the curve of his asscheek, where it’d be almost hidden if he was standing. No wonder he hadn’t seen it before. A tiny fucking heart, perfect and symmetrical. There’s his love for Spencer Smith, permanently Marked on his body.
He bursts into tears. Ryan clearly doesn’t know what he’s crying about, but when Brendon collapses to the floor of the bathroom with his ass still exposed and trembles, Ryan wraps his arms around Brendon’s shoulders and holds him, trying to stop the shaking with his own body.
***
He looks like shit the next day, and in spite of himself it’s helpful that Spencer crowds around him like a mother hen from breakfast to dinner. Ryan hasn’t asked about the Mark again, but he keeps giving Brendon worried looks, too. Jon treats him the same, but Brendon catches him talking to Ryan in a hushed voice, and he shuts up the second Brendon looks at them.
Brendon’s answer? Burying his face in Spencer’s shoulder seems to work well enough, and it makes Spencer glare at whoever’s inspired Brendon to do it. “What’s their issue?” Spencer asks after Brendon’s tucked his body against Spencer’s for the third time. They’re standing around at a restaurant, no show that night, which leaves Jon and Ryan lots of time to gossip about Brendon’s Mark. Spencer keeps watching them with dark eyes, a protective hand on the small of Brendon’s back.
“Dunno,” Brendon says, in lieu of saying they’re just worried about me like you are except I’m in love with you so I’m not going to avoid you for it. “Don’t worry about it.” He rubs his nose against Spencer’s shoulder because it makes Spencer wrap an arm around Brendon’s shoulder, and that’s nice.
“I can talk to them,” Spencer says, and he looks determined when Brendon glances up at him. It makes him smile softly, and Spencer pauses when he looks down at him. His expression softens, and Brendon thinks to himself that if that’s Spencer’s fond-friend face, whoever gets his in-love face is going to be so fucking lucky.
God, Brendon is so in love with him.
“Don’t worry your gorgeous head about it,” Brendon tells him, reaching up to pat his cheek lightly. He doesn’t let his fingers touch Spencer’s Mark. “I’m sure they’ll get over it. And I’m fine, too. I’m just not feeling great.”
Spencer looks at him dubiously, but Brendon just smiles again and presses his nose into Spencer’s shoulder again. Perks of being “sick” – Spencer gets ten times more tolerant of Brendon’s cuddling, even in public.
The server comes to lead them to a table, and Spencer pulls Brendon into one side of the booth, letting Brendon slump against his side once seated. He orders for Brendon, too, and it hits him just how lucky he is to have Spencer in his life at all.
***
Brendon is tired all the time. The tour ends, but that just means he’s back to living alone in Las Vegas.
“Living alone” loosely translates to “living with Ryan and Spencer” because they’re literally always around. This is both good and bad. Brendon loves seeing his friends all the time. He loves having someone there when he wakes up, someone to go to when he thinks of something cool for a song even if they’re not actively writing for the next album yet. He loves his friends, and his new not-so-shitty apartment; he does. Even with Jon in Chicago, it's still a marked improvement on his loneliness.
Being around Spencer all the time, however, is both a blessing and a curse. He’s a good friend, great to look at, great to talk to and sit around with. He’s just good. He’s also hot as hell and still in love with someone else, and he still hasn’t told Brendon who it is. So, when William comes to visit from Chicago, still smarting from the aftermath of Conrad splitting, it’s probably for the best that he has someone to hang out with other than Spencer and Ryan.
Brendon is waiting patiently in the living room of his apartment, eyeing the front door as he waits for William to pull up. Ryan is there, giving him these looks, and Spencer is in the kitchen searching for an edible snack. Brendon really needs to go to the store.
There’s a knock, and Brendon jumps up. When he opens the door, Bill is on the other side, looking a little worse for wear but grinning, his long hair tied into a ponytail on the crown of his head.
“Am I standing in the hall all day, or are you gonna let me in?” Bill huffs with a laugh, and when Brendon gets him inside and shuts the door, he drops his bags so he can wrap Brendon in a hug. He towers over him, his arms curled over Brendon’s shoulders. Bill rubs his face lightly over the top of Brendon’s head, making him laugh, and when Brendon pulls back, Bill looks just a little bit happier than he had when Brendon had first opened the door. “I missed you,” Bill says simply, then unwraps just enough to hold an arm out, gesturing for Ryan to join in.
Ryan does, happily – Brendon knew he’d missed Bill a lot. They’d all become fast friends when Panic! had opened for The Academy Is…, and it had kind of sucked when it had ended and they’d started preparing for their own tour.
“Is Spencer here, too?” Bill asks, then calls out, “Spence! You here?”
Spencer pokes his head out from the kitchen, smiling, but then something strange happens. He sees Bill, and the way he’s wrapped around Brendon and Ryan, and his smile kind of freezes before he twitches a bit.
“Hey, man,” he says, instead of an enthusiastic hello, and doesn’t come closer for a hug.
Well, that’s fine, Brendon thinks, because he missed William like fuck and he’ll hug Bill enough for the both of them. Just for that, he squeezes a little, his arms still wrapped around William’s lithe middle, grinning back at Bill’s beaming face.
***
William is literally the best. He’s there for a week, and three days in, he’s made himself totally comfortable. Since Ryan and Spencer always stay over, Bill’s plan for staying out the room and not making things weird for them is staying in Brendon’s room, which means that Brendon always has an incredibly cuddly noodle to sleep with. It’s not that he prefers Bill over Spencer, but it’s nice having someone there, and Bill is as clingy as Brendon is most of the time.
By the morning after Bill got there, Brendon had been entirely filled in on the goings-on since TAI and Panic! had split ways. Brendon felt awful for Bill, who had gotten very quiet when he explained that Tom had left the band. Brendon had known that – hell, all of Fueled by Ramen knew it. The FBR grapevine was impressive at worst and terrifying at best. By the end of October everyone had known exactly what had happened, and about the small heart on Bill’s Achilles’ heel, which made it that much worse.
Brendon couldn’t take the look on Bill’s face when he’d sat cross-legged on Brendon’s bed, fingering his ankle, and had immediately thrown himself forward in a hug. “You’re awesome, William Becket,” Brendon told him sternly. “And everything will be okay.” He doesn’t explain that he’s in the same position, more or less. At least Spencer is still his friend, still in his band. He says a small prayer for that.
“So what about you guys? How have you been?” Bill asked, clearly changing the subject, but he let Brendon lay down with his head in Bill’s lap while answered, so.
Now, it’s like Bill’s been there forever. He’s like Brendon’s answer to what Spencer and Ryan have. Not that he’s complaining, but sometimes their best friend mindmeld is a little daunting, and Bill and Brendon are always on the same page.
Unfortunately, this means that Bill has about as much an idea of why Spencer is so fucking pissed all the time lately as Brendon does.
***
Ryan pulls Brendon aside on the fourth day – four days of meaningful looks and gestures towards Brendon’s ass – to tell him earnestly that if he wants to make a move on Bill, he should wait until Bill’s moved on from Tom a bit more.
“I’m not making a move on Bill,” Brendon tells him, honestly lost. “Why would you think I’m making a move on Bill?” He pauses. “Also, why does Spencer hate Bill?”
Ryan, inexplicably, grimaces and doesn’t answer his last question. “Look, I want to help you out okay? But I’m on Spencer’s side, too. Just. Maybe don’t hit on Bill right now?”
“I’m not hitting on Bill!” Brendon repeats, wildly confused. “And why are you on Spencer’s side? What did Bill do?”
Ryan pats him on the shoulder sympathetically. “I know this is a tough situation. But I don’t think Bill feels the same way you do right now. Give him time.” Then he walks away, and Brendon looks around like his surroundings could explain what Ryan was so very clearly high on.
He doesn’t get what Ryan is talking about until later that night. He has the revelation while sitting on his loveseat with Bill, one of his legs thrown over Bill’s lap. Spencer is sitting on the coach with Ryan, and his arms are folded. He is determinedly not looking at Bill. William had been bothered until day three of his visit, and then accepted that apparently he had offended Spencer somehow and there wasn’t anything to do for it. It still sucked, and Bill still looked hurt when Spencer snubbed him, but he stopped saying anything about it.
Brendon looks over at Bill, then at Ryan who’s watching them with critical eyes. It finally clicks, and he pulls out his Sidekick to furiously text Ryan.
U think im in love with bill!
Ryan’s phone chimes, and he pulls it out, glancing up at Brendon as he does so.
Yeah I told u that? Like we all know ur Mark is for William. It was so obvious during AO&SG.
He gasps at it, offended, but doesn’t reply. He can’t decide if he wants to let them think that, or correct them. It’s a good cover, he has to admit. And he had been all over Bill during that tour – Bill was a real rock star, and they were friends! He represented everything Brendon wanted to be and Brendon had doted on him, but only in a friendly way, almost like a fan sometimes even.
He shifts enough that he can put both legs over Bill’s lap, who is tapping at his own phone with a content smile, one hand over Brendon’s legs. He’s probably texting Gabe again, which lets him watch Bill without getting a questioning look. Bill is gorgeous. His hair is pretty and his smile is adorable, crooked teeth endearing. Bill is the exact kind of person that Brendon adores – he has no limits or boundaries, and he’s so open. He gives smiles easily and he’s so genuine.
“Bill, hey,” Brendon says suddenly, and Bill looks over, charming and lovely as ever. He leans forward, expression very serious, and cups his face in his hands. “I love you a lot, okay?” Then he leans in further so he can plant a kiss on Bill’s pretty lips. It’s nice, but not particularly earth-shattering.
Bill doesn’t seem thrown off much, but he’s also best friends with the aformentioned Gabe Saporta, whom Brendon has personally kissed ten times because Gabe is as free with his kisses as Bill is with his smile. Bill doesn’t even flinch, just says, “I love you too, dude,” completely open.
Brendon hears a splash, and looks over in alarm to see Spencer sitting on the couch, a crushed plastic cup in his hand, and Ryan swearing next to him because Spencer has just spilled Coke all over the couch and Ryan’s notebook and jeans.
“Shit,” Spencer says weakly, “I’m sorry, Ry. Fuck. I’ll go get a towel.” His apology doesn’t sound very sincere, but there’s something about his expression that confuses Brendon, who watches him walk away – without staring at his ass, he should add.
Ryan is glancing between Spencer and Brendon, looking unsure, but after a minute goes after Spencer, mouthing sorry at Brendon, who is very confused.
“I am very confused,” he tells Bill sadly, who just kisses him again, friendly and platonic in nature, and then pats him on the shoulder comfortingly.
***
Bill has a second Mark.
Brendon hadn’t meant to walk in on him changing, he really hadn’t, but now he’s seen it and he can’t look away. Bill looks just as startled, shirt halfway over his head, and he pulls it down with pink cheeks and a dismayed expression.
“You have a second Mark,” he says stupidly, and he knows it’s not his place to say anything. Some people have ten Marks by the time they’re in their twenties. It’s not his place… but suddenly, Bill looks so devastated that Brendon has to come forward and hug him. “Shit dude, what’s wrong? I’m sorry for bringing it up.”
“No,” Bill sighs after a minute, relaxing in Brendon’s arms. “No, it’s fine.” He pulls Brendon onto the bed, settling into a cross-legged position. Bill looks absolutely miserable, and he fingers at his shoulder the same way he’d played with his ankle when he’d told Brendon what went down with Tom.
Apparently, he left out part of the story, which Brendon can’t fault him for. Marks are personal.
“What happened?” he asked softly, mimicking Bill’s position and pressing their knees together.
“This one’s new,” Bill whispers, tapping over the Mark on his shoulder. “The one on my ankle, that’s Tom’s. I’ve had it for a while now. And I loved him so much, but. He didn’t love me back, Bren.” His voice is thin and sad. “He stayed, because of my Mark, because it was easy and we were friends, even if things weren’t really working out with the band.”
Brendon sees his hesitance, and prompts him, “And?”
Bill pulls his hand down into his lap and bows his head so his hair covers his face. Brendon loves Bill’s curls, but right now he wants nothing more to give Bill a haircut so he can’t hide. “And I fell in love again,” he says, so sad. “But I don’t think he loves me either. I don’t know why he would.”
Brendon understands immediately, closing his eyes in sympathy at the pain. “So part of why Tom left…”
“Is because if I was in love with someone else, then he didn’t see any reason why he should stay,” Bill answers. His fingers are restless, fidgeting. He’s pinching his own skin, and Brendon takes his hand to stop him from doing it.
“Gabe.” He should have recognized it immediately when Bill had been texting him yesterday. No one looked that happy about just a text. Bill nods without looking up.
Brendon shifts on the bed, so he can sit next to him and wrap an arm around Bill’s neck. Brendon reels him in, putting his head on Bill’s shoulder. “I’m in love with Spencer,” he confides softly. “So I get it, a little bit.”
“His Mark…” Bill murmurs, and Brendon nods against his shoulder.
“Kind of ruined my life, I think,” he says sadly, and Bill knocks their heads together lightly before he takes Brendon’s hand again, lacing their fingers together in solidarity.
***
When Bill leaves, Brendon drives him to the airport and sees him off, then drives back home with a smile. He feels refreshed in spite of their heavy conversations; a week with Bill and a distraction from Spencer is just what he needed. Apparently, it was not what Spencer had needed – when he gets home, Spencer is the only one at the apartment, and he still looks grumpy.
“So,” he says at length, and when Brendon waits for him, he furrows his brow. “You and William good now?”
“When weren’t we good?” Brendon asks, confused. “And dude, what’s been up with you? Why do you suddenly hate William?”
“I don’t hate William,” he says, hatefully, and Brendon would normally go sit next to him and cuddle him to make him stop frowning, but he’s suddenly feeling sick and tired of being so in love with Spencer he practically sees the sun shining out of his ass, so he stands his ground even if he really doesn’t want to.
“You spent all week being rude to him, man,” he tells him frankly, his hands on his hips. “He’s our friend; what did he do to piss you off?”
“Nothing!” Spencer hisses, and his face is contorted so much that his Mark is creased, and Brendon wants to hate that Mark, but he just loves it and wants Spencer to go back to being sweet and open and content, even if it’s not with him.
“Well, you’re being a fucking dick, man, so why don’t you quit lying and tell me what’s up!” he hisses back, then darts forward to jab Spencer in the chest accusingly. “Bill is such a good guy and he felt so bad all week thinking he pissed you off somehow. What the fuck?”
“Oh, whatever, I doubt he felt that bad when he was fucking you every night,” Spencer snaps, and Brendon’s mouth drops open.
“What even is happening here?” he asks.
Spencer looks a little shocked at himself, too, and before Brendon can say anything else, Spencer grabs his wallet from the coffee table and storms out of the apartment, slamming the door behind him. Brendon looks around at the empty room and tries very hard not to cry.
***
That night, he hears someone come into the apartment. It’s late, almost midnight, and whoever it is has a key, so Brendon isn’t really concerned. He doesn’t get up, either, so when Spencer silently creeps into his room, Brendon just watches him from the bed, still clearly awake.
Spencer strips – socks first, then shirt and jeans, then crawls into bed behind Brendon. He doesn’t cuddle against his back, but he presses his forehead into the knobs of Brendon’s spine, just below his neck, and breathes quietly for a minute.
“I’m sorry about being a dick earlier,” he says softly, and he sounds so hurt that Brendon can’t stay mad. He still doesn’t move. “And…” He takes a deep breath. “I’m sorry about being shitty to Bill, too. I just… I didn’t want him to hurt you, because he’s still in love with Tom probably, and you have that Mark for him, and I didn’t want him to take advantage of it while he’s still rebounding from Tom. And. I don’t know. Fuck, Brendon.”
Finally, he can’t take it anymore. He rolls over to face Spencer, though he can’t really make out his face in the dark. “Why do all of you think I’m in love with Bill?” he asks. “I’m not. I never was. And, Spencer, I didn’t even know about my Mark until Ryan told me when we were on tour.”
“You’re not in love with Bill,” Spencer repeats, sounding confused himself. “Then who are you in love with? Or, were in love with, I guess.”
“Am in love with,” Brendon says quietly, then says, “What about you, then? You never told me yours, either.”
Spencer is very, very quiet for a moment, and then –
There’s a mouth on Brendon’s, and he gasps into the kiss. It’s almost automatic, to kiss back, and he does even though his head is suddenly swimming and he has so many questions it’s ridiculous.
“The day before I woke up with this mark,” Spencer tells him when he pulls back, his voice hoarse. “We’d been out talking to fans, and one of them asked you out for drinks. And you told her.” He gulps. “You told her you were hopelessly devoted to me, and had to decline. We’d just watched Grease, and you were being stupid and joking around, and I knew that. But. It was like a slap in the face.”
Brendon feels like everything is brighter, even in the dark, and he’s trembling slightly. Spencer skims his shoulder, down his arm, until he finds his hand, and then grips it tight in the dark. Brendon grips Spencer’s hand back.
“I’m so in love with you,” Spencer says, and he sounds choked up, like it hurts to say. “I’m so fucking in love with you and watching you with Bill, thinking you loved him and wanted him when you could never, ever want me –“ He cuts himself off.
“I was never in love with Bill,” Brendon whispers, and he sounds scratchy, too. Suddenly, the fact that Brendon had never caught him looking at anyone makes sense. All of Spencer’s fond, gentle smiles went to Brendon, and he loved them so much, of course he did. He’d just never realized that he was the only one getting those smiles. “I haven’t been able to understand how you guys could think that, because… it’s always been you, Spence. I thought, back on that first tour, that I was in love with you, but I never found my Mark, so I tried to push the thoughts out of my head but it just got worse. And then you got your Mark, and I was so jealous of whoever you loved, and then Ryan told me about my Mark, and I thought I was just in love with someone who was in love with someone else.”
Spencer’s close enough that their noses are touching, and Brendon feels him shake his head. “You,” Spencer whispers, and he finally sounds happy again. He lets go of Brendon’s hand to slide up and cup his neck, his thumb brushing over Brendon’s jaw. Brendon grabs at his wrist, but not to pull him away; it’s just to ground him, to ground them both.
“We’re in love,” Brendon says, and he thinks back to his vague daydreams of drawing himself a matching heart on his cheek, about kissing Spencer’s. He thinks about being about to do that. “We’re in love.”
“Yeah,” Spencer agrees, and when his mouth comes back, it’s desperate. He nips at Brendon’s bottom lip, and swipes his tongue over his mouth. Brendon is just as bad, meeting Spencer’s kiss with all the intensity he has. He presses his body forward, fits his other hand in between Spencer’s cheek and the pillows beneath their heads.
“I love you,” Brendon says, and shit, he’s definitely crying a little bit. Spencer laughs against his mouth and rolls on top of him, responding in the affirmative, whispering against his throat vague, formless praises.
“So beautiful, Brendon,” he makes out. “So fucking lovely, and kind, and so talented.” His thigh is slotting in between Brendon’s legs, and he arches up, because he wants this so much and has wanted it for so long that honestly, he’s might as well have been hard since last April. That’s how desperate he feels for this, as desperate as Spencer’s kisses and his frantic declarations against Brendon’s skin. “You’re everything to me,” Spencer says, and he sounds almost wounded in a way that makes Brendon cup his face involuntarily and draw him back up for a kiss.
They don’t fuck, but it’s a near thing. Spencer’s dick is pressed up against his ass, thrusting gently. They’re not even fucking naked, but it’s enough for Brendon, whose own cock is getting brushed against Spencer’s stomach, sensitive skin against cotton against more skin.
“I want to be with you forever,” Spencer murmurs into his mouth, and that’s it, Brendon’s fucking gone. It’s been a long time – he’s had sex twice, and neither time was very good, and neither time was Spencer.
Spencer ruts against him and kisses him and he has his hands running up and down Brendon’s sides. His stomach is still brushing against Brendon’s cock, and he’s sensitive but it’s good. Hell, having Spencer close at all is perfect.
When Spencer comes, it’s with a little cry, and he shudders against Brendon’s still trembling body. Brendon knows that his lips are probably red and raw and when he kisses Spencer again, it tingles.
“I’m going to be crazy about you forever,” Brendon tells him, and he means it. It doesn’t always work like that, but it’s going to work for them, but this feeling in Brendon’s chest? It means they’re going to be able to make it through anything.
Brendon’s phone lights up with a message he’s not going to read until the morning, but he uses the dim light to bring his hand up so he can press his finger into Spencer’s Mark, then press his mouth to that spot in a kiss.
***
As it turns out, Ryan has been laughing at him for two months because lo and behold, he knew all along that Spencer’s Mark was because of Brendon. He also seems a little embarrassed by his behavior concerning Bill, but he gets over it pretty quickly because Ryan doesn’t do embarrassment. He’d come over for their scheduled movie night only to run in on Brendon and Spencer making out on the couch, then had cheered while they made themselves presentable with pink cheeks.
“I hate you,” Brendon tells Ryan mildly once they’re settled and fit for company, but Spencer is sitting with him on his love seat this time, and Spencer kisses his cheek with this sunshine-like smile. Brendon forgets about Ryan being a little shit in favor of kissing Spencer’s face, which he totally gets to do now.
“I hate you both,” Ryan says, making a face at their PDA, but he’s secretly happy for them; Brendon can tell. “Can we watch this movie now, or are you guys going to keep being gross?”
“We’ll be gross,” Brendon says promptly.
“But we’ll do it while watching the movie,” Spencer adds, and Brendon beams at him. As Ryan goes for the remote to turn on whatever they’re watching, grumbling all the way, Brendon leans in and presses another kiss over Spencer’s Mark, then settles in for their movie.