Wishes In The Dark - A Peterick Fanfiction

Thirty

"It's alright," Pete replies. "My life is much better now."

He takes my hand and for a brief moment it looks like Andrew's been stabbed in the heart.

"Well, that's good, I guess," Andrew mumbles. "If you're doing better without me, then so be it."

"Anyway, how is it in here?" asks Pete.

"It's not bad," Andrew says, perking up. "I get to hang out with other murderers and drug addicts. Some of their sentences are seriously long – one of my friends is in here for ten years!"

He nods to one of the inmates standing at the side of the room with no visitors: a fairly short man with long-ish black hair swept over his forehead. He has a tattoo sleeve on his arm, an interesting black swirly pattern. He looks a little pale. Is he sick?

"He's in here for ten years?" Pete frowns. "Why? What did he do?"

"Cannibalism, or something...I don't know the details, but I think he ate his girlfriend, or split open his girlfriend, or something like that. He did it in a forest, apparently – not very private."

I look over at the man Andrew is talking about. He looks so average, so normal...and yet he was capable of a crime as horrible as that. Funny how that works.

"Sounds gross," Pete says. "Anyway, you're sure they're treating you okay?"

"I'm fine, little bro," insists Andrew, placing a hand on Pete's hand.

Pete looks down at his brother's hand comforting his own and seems to look a little sad...but why?

"No touching!" barks one of the cops at the side of the room.

Andrew takes his hand away, looking a little irritated. Pete doesn't look away from the spot on the table where their hands were. There's sadness in his eyes – why is there sadness in his eyes?

"You okay, little bro?" asks Andrew, squinting.

Pete closes his eyes and exhales slowly.

"All those years," he says quietly. "All those years we spent living together. And all that time I spent feeling like you didn't care about me. All that time I spent wishing you'd hold my hand like you just did, or show some kind of affection for me...but you only decide to do it when it's too late and we can't spend time with each other anymore."

He takes his hand off the table and slowly opens his eyes. They're welling up with tears and it's only then that I realize just how much we can relate to each other. I too spent year after year feeling neglected and unloved, wishing that Mom would pay some attention to me. I felt like a candle that was flickering and slowly dying. But now that we both have each other, I'm not flickering anymore. And neither is he. Sometimes all it takes is two empty hearts to fix two broken souls.

Pete looks down at his watch. "Well, we should be getting back. It's a long journey."

Standing up, he scoops his bag up from the floor and flings it round his shoulder. I stand up too and notice how utterly ashamed of himself Andrew looks. Pete is about to turn away and leave, but he decides to say one last thing to his brother.

"Goodbye, Andrew," he says softly.

And with that, he turns and makes his way out the room. I follow after him.

"Wait...Patrick?"

I turn round and make my way to Andrew's table.

"My brother," he says seriously. "Don't hurt him, okay?"

I shake my head. "I wouldn't dream of it."

And even though he's full of shame and self-loathing, Andrew smiles at me. I can still feel him smiling as I leave the prison with Pete.

------

I've spent my whole life bearing other people's opinions in my mind.

"You're a freak, Patrick!"

"You're a loser, Patrick!"

"You're a dork, Patrick!"

And I suppose, yes, I am all of those things. I'm socially awkward, unbelievably cringe worthy and completely different to what's normal of a sixteen-year-old guy. But I know now that none of that matters, because I have good relationships with the people around me. I am at peace now.

Hayley continues to be my best friend, and we're closer than ever. Sometimes I go to her house after school and we tell each other all about how our relationships are going. Other times she and Chad come back to mine and Pete's apartment and we do homework and just hang out. (That's also because Hayley and I are trying to build Pete and Chad's friendship, but that's confidential). I think we're even going to plan a double date!

Chad doesn't mind me. Although we don't talk that much, I don't bother him, and he doesn't bother me. All that stuff between him and Pete is water under the bridge.

Brendon and Ryan are great friends, and we have a lot of classes together, so we end up spending lots of time together. They're two hilarious guys who never cease to make me laugh – and their relationship is so perfect.

The rest of their group – Taylor, Jeremy, Jon, Spencer and the Farro brothers – have accepted me as one of their own. I'm starting to be less awkward now that I have a friend group. It's a nice feeling.

I'm getting to know Andy and Joe better now, although Joe likes to talk more than Andy. Sometimes they come back to the apartment with us after school. Andy's mom drops off his dismantled acoustic drum kit and Joe's mom drops off his electric guitar and an amplifier, and then the three of them set up and start playing original songs, including that one with the bass riff that Pete played me a while back. Dance, I think it was called? Turns out the three of them make up an unnamed band, and Pete even asked me to sing for them once! I said I'd think about it. I've never given much thought to hidden talents – I don't know if I can sing. I don't even know if I want to be in a band! I'd probably step up to a microphone onstage and vomit at the sight of people watching me. I am not lead singer material.

As for Mom? Well, I suppose I'll never know. I just hope that, even after everything she did to me, she's at peace. I like to think she made the decision to see a doctor. Maybe she's in a mental hospital getting help, I don't know. But I just hope she's found even a little slice of happiness, after she's been searching for it for so long.

And Pete...I think I've expressed enough how much I love him. Honestly I can't see our relationship deteriorating any time soon – and I'm not just saying that because it's new and exciting and I don't know what a relationship is meant to be like. I know that he really loves me, and I really love him. He's still a musical genius and he still writes a lot of songs, of course. He willingly showed me all the songs he's written the other night. Of course, I recognized them all from when I looked in his book before Hayley's party, but now I'm seeing them in a different light. My favorite of his songs is Thnks Fr Th Mmrs. It reminds me of how thankful I am that he's in my life. I'd hate for it to end now, but if it did I'd still be content. I will have been loved for the first time, and I'll take those happy memories of him and I to my grave.

I smile as I think of him.

Thnks fr th mmrs, Pete. Now let's make new ones.

THE END