Bandom: This Glorified Graffiti
Title: This Glorified Graffiti
Fandom: Fall Out Boy. That's right, bandfic. Oh my.
Rating: PG
Pairing: Pete/Patrick
Word Count: 1503
Summary/Notes: Written for anon_lovefest; prompt was "office/high school AU." Not completely satisfied with the ending, but oh well.
Disclaimer: Complete and total lies. If you see your name in this, stop reading. It'll prevent a lot of awkward moments for everyone involved.
wear me like a locket around your throat, i'll weigh you down, i'll watch you choke
Today, it's written sloppily in black marker above the roll of toilet paper, smudged a bit near the end and almost invisible on the dark brown paint. Apart from the usual shitty (as in, nonexistent) capitalization, it's actually (again, as usual) pretty damn good.
Patrick's been finding these in the stalls for the past few weeks, littered among the obscene graffiti. The first one he'd found ("we're trapped and well concealed in secret places") was, appropriately enough, cramped hastily in a corner in thin lines of red ink, almost invisible. The next week, after ducking into the bathroom to avoid Spencer from marketing, he'd noticed more lines, scribbled between "jordan haz krabs!!!" and "kevin is a cocksuckng asshole". Tuesday he finds "last year's wishes are this year's apology" looping around the handle of the stall door, Wednesday a "me + you" slanting beneath that. After two weeks of silence, it's a "i hope you choke on those words that kissed that bottle" carved in the wood. When Patrick runs his hand over the jagged letters, he can almost feel the anger bleeding from them.
Patrick, he knows he's not good with words, as he stutters through meetings and letters and presentations, but that doesn't mean he doesn't know when stuff is good, and these? These clumsily jotted scribbles, they read like poetry and lyrics, twist across the dirty walls like art.
By the end of the month, Patrick's scouring the walls daily for new words, doesn't care if it's weird or gross--it's a public restroom, for fuck's sake, and here he is with his face a foot away from the toilet--and all the while he vaguely wonders why, with words like these, this guy, whoever he is, is still working at a place like this. Why anyone would want to stay at this hellhole, pushing paper instead of doing something with what they've got to say.
Because whoever this guy is, he's not like Patrick. Patrick, who hates this job and always has and is too damn cowardly to put himself out there, risk the dangers of reality for his dreams. Patrick, whose guitar has been collecting dust in his apartment while his desk is covered in files and folders, sheet music all but forgotten beneath his work.
It's not like kids aspire to have a nine-to-five office job one day. Patrick remembers, it's all "I want to be an astronaut, be a rock star, build planes," not "sit in a cubicle analyzing market statistics." Not guidance counselors staring awkwardly at him as he stuttered--"something, you know, with songs and--composing. Producing. Maybe like that"--before telling him, "Frankly, Patrick, music's not the most stable of careers." Not English teachers handing back creative writing assignments with generically polite comments and a B scrawled at the top, a backhanded way of saying that yeah, not bad, but people sure aren't going to pay to hear it.
Not stony-faced parents who looked Patrick straight in the eye and said, "We won't support you in this career, Patrick." And it was for his own good. And he'd been too fucking timid and easily discouraged and so, so unsure, what do you expect from a teenager like him (wallflower, misfit, never with a huge circle of loud friends), to protest.
Four years later, and he's set himself up for a lifetime of office employment, days spent looking over emails with boring percentages sent by even more boring employees (people just like Patrick, and maybe that's why he hates them). He knows somewhere that these people aren't as bland as they seem, knows he could empathize if he wasn't so busy resenting them, but sometimes (almost always) it's hard to remember, when they only seem to talk to him to pile more assignments on him, or demand work due on impossible deadlines. He's trying, he really fucking trying, but even with three floors full of workers, it's still too tiny of a world to find someone to connect with. Until
(the sounds of this small town make my ears hurt)
(long live the car crash hearts)
(we're the new face of failure, prettier and younger but not any better off)
somewhere around the second month since he's found this writer, and if the words from before were impressive, then this is just utterly amazing.
Because instead of writing a line or two here and there, it's this totally epic poem that starts near the top of the stall door, swirling in circles like a spiral of words until it's spanning halfway to the floor. Patrick's got a crick in his neck from twisting his head around to decipher everything and can only imagine writing all of this in one go, someone carefully laying the words down (who'd be so desperate that they'd pour their heart out to a restroom stall door?), and somewhere around the middle (bullet proof loneliness), his chest constricts, uncomfortable and tight, and he can't stop blinking.
He jumps when the door opens and dress shoes come clacking in; takes one last look at the poem looping in on itself. For the rest of the day, the words swirl in his head instead.
That night, for the first time in so long, there's a song in his mind. He writes it down and starts to set it to words almost before he realizes what he doing.
(And briefly he wonders if the writer would mind him borrowing his words. Then he reminds himself it's not like anyone else is going to hear this anyway.)
------------------
Everything's fucked.
There had been an assembly that morning, everyone packed into the presentation hall for a lecture about respecting company property. Patrick hadn't even seen where it was going, zoning out somewhere around "half of the kitchen appliances have had to be replaced," or maybe "someone has been stealing office supplies." It's only when he hears "defiling public restrooms" does he finally look up to catch "--but stalls have all have been either repainted or replaced--" and then, with a sick lurch in his stomach, he's standing up, rushing out the door to a few others' bemused looks. The speaker drones on, oblivious. Patrick doesn't care.
He bursts into the restroom and it's gone, all of it, they've erased the words and painted the stalls over with a hideous fucking shade of green, and he's pissed right now, for the writer and for anyone who's read the words and savored them and for himself, because this company's fucked over everything he ever gave a damn about.
And maybe he's being irrational, or maybe this is his snapping point, but he comes back with a sharpie in his hand, starts scrawling down words messily before he can stop himself, anything he can dredge from his memory.
It's not the same, but it's better than nothing.
------------------
The next day, Patrick notices a small "thank you" beneath what he'd written. And more poetry, in a familiar handwriting.
He can't stop smiling for the rest of the day.
------------------
"Crap, sorry."
He'd come into the bathroom to wash his hands before lunch and ended up plowing into someone crouched low on the floor instead. He thinks about offering him a hand up, then wonders if it'd just make him look like a tool.
The guy's still on the ground, flat on his ass and staring up at Patrick, who's just confused as to why he's got a deer-in-the-headlights look. Then he notices the marker rolling across the tiled floor, cap still off, and his eyes immediately dart to the stall, and sure enough: i want to be known for my hits, not just my misses, and a thick black line streaking down to the floor when he'd been knocked over.
"Have you been...?" Patrick asks, just as the guy says, "This, uh, isn't what it looks like?" They both stop abruptly, and wow, this is not what Patrick had imagined this meeting to be like, if it ever happened at all.
Just as the silence goes from uncomfortable to full-blown awkward, Patrick blurts out "I like--I like your words. When they covered it up, I was really pissed." He's nervous and jumpy when the other guy's face stays blank, Patrick nods towards the wall, with the old poems he'd copied on there, and stammers, "I, uh. That was me."
And now his face is lighting up, eyes shining as he begins to relax. "That was... oh man, you did that? I couldn't believe someone had--it's fucking great, seriously." He clambers up, and he's in Patrick's face in seconds. "I'm Pete," he tells him excitedly, before falling silent. Patrick nods until he realizes he's waiting for his name.
"Patrick," he says, and Pete beams.
"Patrick," Pete repeats, and again, "Patrick," as if he was testing the name out. And he's still smiling, and Patrick's smiling back; and Patrick, maybe, just a little, doesn't hate this job so much.
Fandom: Fall Out Boy. That's right, bandfic. Oh my.
Rating: PG
Pairing: Pete/Patrick
Word Count: 1503
Summary/Notes: Written for anon_lovefest; prompt was "office/high school AU." Not completely satisfied with the ending, but oh well.
Disclaimer: Complete and total lies. If you see your name in this, stop reading. It'll prevent a lot of awkward moments for everyone involved.
wear me like a locket around your throat, i'll weigh you down, i'll watch you choke
Today, it's written sloppily in black marker above the roll of toilet paper, smudged a bit near the end and almost invisible on the dark brown paint. Apart from the usual shitty (as in, nonexistent) capitalization, it's actually (again, as usual) pretty damn good.
Patrick's been finding these in the stalls for the past few weeks, littered among the obscene graffiti. The first one he'd found ("we're trapped and well concealed in secret places") was, appropriately enough, cramped hastily in a corner in thin lines of red ink, almost invisible. The next week, after ducking into the bathroom to avoid Spencer from marketing, he'd noticed more lines, scribbled between "jordan haz krabs!!!" and "kevin is a cocksuckng asshole". Tuesday he finds "last year's wishes are this year's apology" looping around the handle of the stall door, Wednesday a "me + you" slanting beneath that. After two weeks of silence, it's a "i hope you choke on those words that kissed that bottle" carved in the wood. When Patrick runs his hand over the jagged letters, he can almost feel the anger bleeding from them.
Patrick, he knows he's not good with words, as he stutters through meetings and letters and presentations, but that doesn't mean he doesn't know when stuff is good, and these? These clumsily jotted scribbles, they read like poetry and lyrics, twist across the dirty walls like art.
By the end of the month, Patrick's scouring the walls daily for new words, doesn't care if it's weird or gross--it's a public restroom, for fuck's sake, and here he is with his face a foot away from the toilet--and all the while he vaguely wonders why, with words like these, this guy, whoever he is, is still working at a place like this. Why anyone would want to stay at this hellhole, pushing paper instead of doing something with what they've got to say.
Because whoever this guy is, he's not like Patrick. Patrick, who hates this job and always has and is too damn cowardly to put himself out there, risk the dangers of reality for his dreams. Patrick, whose guitar has been collecting dust in his apartment while his desk is covered in files and folders, sheet music all but forgotten beneath his work.
It's not like kids aspire to have a nine-to-five office job one day. Patrick remembers, it's all "I want to be an astronaut, be a rock star, build planes," not "sit in a cubicle analyzing market statistics." Not guidance counselors staring awkwardly at him as he stuttered--"something, you know, with songs and--composing. Producing. Maybe like that"--before telling him, "Frankly, Patrick, music's not the most stable of careers." Not English teachers handing back creative writing assignments with generically polite comments and a B scrawled at the top, a backhanded way of saying that yeah, not bad, but people sure aren't going to pay to hear it.
Not stony-faced parents who looked Patrick straight in the eye and said, "We won't support you in this career, Patrick." And it was for his own good. And he'd been too fucking timid and easily discouraged and so, so unsure, what do you expect from a teenager like him (wallflower, misfit, never with a huge circle of loud friends), to protest.
Four years later, and he's set himself up for a lifetime of office employment, days spent looking over emails with boring percentages sent by even more boring employees (people just like Patrick, and maybe that's why he hates them). He knows somewhere that these people aren't as bland as they seem, knows he could empathize if he wasn't so busy resenting them, but sometimes (almost always) it's hard to remember, when they only seem to talk to him to pile more assignments on him, or demand work due on impossible deadlines. He's trying, he really fucking trying, but even with three floors full of workers, it's still too tiny of a world to find someone to connect with. Until
(the sounds of this small town make my ears hurt)
(long live the car crash hearts)
(we're the new face of failure, prettier and younger but not any better off)
somewhere around the second month since he's found this writer, and if the words from before were impressive, then this is just utterly amazing.
Because instead of writing a line or two here and there, it's this totally epic poem that starts near the top of the stall door, swirling in circles like a spiral of words until it's spanning halfway to the floor. Patrick's got a crick in his neck from twisting his head around to decipher everything and can only imagine writing all of this in one go, someone carefully laying the words down (who'd be so desperate that they'd pour their heart out to a restroom stall door?), and somewhere around the middle (bullet proof loneliness), his chest constricts, uncomfortable and tight, and he can't stop blinking.
He jumps when the door opens and dress shoes come clacking in; takes one last look at the poem looping in on itself. For the rest of the day, the words swirl in his head instead.
That night, for the first time in so long, there's a song in his mind. He writes it down and starts to set it to words almost before he realizes what he doing.
(And briefly he wonders if the writer would mind him borrowing his words. Then he reminds himself it's not like anyone else is going to hear this anyway.)
------------------
Everything's fucked.
There had been an assembly that morning, everyone packed into the presentation hall for a lecture about respecting company property. Patrick hadn't even seen where it was going, zoning out somewhere around "half of the kitchen appliances have had to be replaced," or maybe "someone has been stealing office supplies." It's only when he hears "defiling public restrooms" does he finally look up to catch "--but stalls have all have been either repainted or replaced--" and then, with a sick lurch in his stomach, he's standing up, rushing out the door to a few others' bemused looks. The speaker drones on, oblivious. Patrick doesn't care.
He bursts into the restroom and it's gone, all of it, they've erased the words and painted the stalls over with a hideous fucking shade of green, and he's pissed right now, for the writer and for anyone who's read the words and savored them and for himself, because this company's fucked over everything he ever gave a damn about.
And maybe he's being irrational, or maybe this is his snapping point, but he comes back with a sharpie in his hand, starts scrawling down words messily before he can stop himself, anything he can dredge from his memory.
It's not the same, but it's better than nothing.
------------------
The next day, Patrick notices a small "thank you" beneath what he'd written. And more poetry, in a familiar handwriting.
He can't stop smiling for the rest of the day.
------------------
"Crap, sorry."
He'd come into the bathroom to wash his hands before lunch and ended up plowing into someone crouched low on the floor instead. He thinks about offering him a hand up, then wonders if it'd just make him look like a tool.
The guy's still on the ground, flat on his ass and staring up at Patrick, who's just confused as to why he's got a deer-in-the-headlights look. Then he notices the marker rolling across the tiled floor, cap still off, and his eyes immediately dart to the stall, and sure enough: i want to be known for my hits, not just my misses, and a thick black line streaking down to the floor when he'd been knocked over.
"Have you been...?" Patrick asks, just as the guy says, "This, uh, isn't what it looks like?" They both stop abruptly, and wow, this is not what Patrick had imagined this meeting to be like, if it ever happened at all.
Just as the silence goes from uncomfortable to full-blown awkward, Patrick blurts out "I like--I like your words. When they covered it up, I was really pissed." He's nervous and jumpy when the other guy's face stays blank, Patrick nods towards the wall, with the old poems he'd copied on there, and stammers, "I, uh. That was me."
And now his face is lighting up, eyes shining as he begins to relax. "That was... oh man, you did that? I couldn't believe someone had--it's fucking great, seriously." He clambers up, and he's in Patrick's face in seconds. "I'm Pete," he tells him excitedly, before falling silent. Patrick nods until he realizes he's waiting for his name.
"Patrick," he says, and Pete beams.
"Patrick," Pete repeats, and again, "Patrick," as if he was testing the name out. And he's still smiling, and Patrick's smiling back; and Patrick, maybe, just a little, doesn't hate this job so much.