19. Brendon makes a sculpture out of burned marshmallows.
I didn't have any plans for the Fourth of July, or at least I didn't until the phone rang that evening. Fall Out Bros. was closed for the day, and Coach Lisa had cancelled soccer practice, so I hadn't done anything all day. When the phone rang, I picked it up eagerly, hoping that Gabe would give me something to do.
I wasn't disappointed. "Pete, there's a bonfire at Elisa Yao's house!" Gabe exclaimed. "Do you want to come?"
"Why would your ex-girlfriend invite you to her party?" I asked.
"She didn't," Gabe replied. "Elisa invited Tammy, who invited Sloane, who invited Donna, who invited Tracy, who invited Brian, who invited Claire, who invited Erin, who invited me. So do you want to go to the bonfire or not?"
I didn't have anything better to do that evening, and I did want to see my friends, so I said, "I'll come. Are you inviting Brendon and Ryan too?"
"Of course," Gabe said. "This is going to be the best Fourth of July bonfire ever. Apparently you can see fireworks from Elisa's backyard."
I smiled and said, "This sounds like a lot of fun. I'll see you soon, Gabe."
"See you soon, Pete," Gabe said. He hung up, and after begging my dad for the DeLorean, he let me drive it to the bonfire. I wasn't quite sure where Elisa's house was, so I had to call Gabe one more time to get directions, but eventually, I made it to her house.
"Pete, that is the coolest car ever!" a girl that I sort of knew from high school shouted as I got out of the DeLorean.
"Thanks," I said.
I closed the car door and headed into Elisa's backyard, which was packed with hordes of teenagers who could care less as long as someone'll bleed. I couldn't find Gabe, Ryan, or Brendon among the sea of faces, but I did find Elisa, who was complaining to Tammy about the number of people who had come to the bonfire. "I can't believe this!" she whined. "I invited three of my closest friends, and three hundred people showed up!"
"You're exaggerating, Elisa," Tammy said, but Elisa wasn't listening.
"I swear I saw Gabe Saporta stealing some snacks, and I definitely did not invite him," Elisa said. She then gestured toward Ryan, who was leaning against a tree and eating s'mores. "Did he even go to Shermer?"
"I've never seen that kid in my life, but you did invite Patrick Stump, and he doesn't go to Shermer either," Tammy said.
"Patrick's an exception," Elisa said. "He at least lives in town, and we've been friends for forever."
I adjusted my jacket, knowing that Patrick was there somewhere. A part of me didn't want to see him, and with the number of people at the party, there was a good chance that I wouldn't. However, another part of me couldn't live without the beautiful and talented boy that I had met at Tea Monkey. I would wait all night or until my heart exploded to see him, and when I did, I would tell him the truth. I promised myself that I would finally stop making excuses and do it.
I walked up to Ryan, greeted him, and then asked, "Do you know where Gabe and Brendon are?"
"They're both sitting by the fire," Ryan said as he finished off his s'more. "You should try one of these. They're really good."
"I will," I said. I went toward the fire, took a marshmallow, and roasted it over the fire, paying more attention to the other people sitting around the fire than to the state of my marshmallow. Gabe was sitting next to Erin, attempting to flirt with her as she put a piece of chocolate and a toasted marshmallow in between two graham crackers. I recognized a few of the other people sitting around the fire from high school, but I wasn't good friends with any of them. Brendon was nowhere to be found, and neither was Patrick.
Loneliness ate at my heart as I sat there, wishing that I had somebody that I could talk to. I thought about leaving the fire and talking to Ryan again, but I wanted to finish roasting my marshmallow, and that was taking forever. I couldn't leave, despite the fact that I was alone and unloved. You are what you love, not who loves you, I told myself, but does that mean anything if nobody loves you?
Every time I looked at it, the marshmallow was the same snowy white color that it was when I had first started roasting it. It was as if it wasn't roasting at all. I stuck it closer to the fire, but all of a sudden, the marshmallow caught on fire. I yanked it out of the fire, but it was no use. The marshmallow was already burned.
"I'll take that!" Brendon exclaimed as he walked by and stole the burned marshmallow off of my stick.
"Brendon!" I shouted, but he paid no attention to me.
"Hey Pete, it's Positive Hardcore Thursday: America Edition," Brendon said. "TODAY WE CELEBRATE OUR FREEDOM!"
"It's not even Thursday," I said.
"It's not?" Brendon said, confused. He then shrugged and walked off with my burned marshmallow.
I could have taken another marshmallow and tried again, but I wasn't in the mood. I couldn't even roast a marshmallow properly, and all of my friends were ignoring me. I had been excited to come to this party, but the reality of it was just miserable. Where did the party go? I wondered.
I was just sitting there, blankly staring into the fire and doing my best to ignore everything going on around me, when Patrick sat next to me. "Hey Pete," he said as he adjusted his fedora. As usual, he looked adorable in it.
"Hi Patrick," I said. "How are you doing?"
He paused and then said, "I'm okay. Trust me," which told me that he was not okay, and I was probably wearing him out. "How are you?"
"I'm okay too," I lied, but it was nearly impossible to lie to Patrick. It was the torture of small talk with someone I used to love.
Who was I kidding? I still loved him.
"I'm kind of surprised that you're not sitting with your boyfriend," Patrick said.
That caught me off guard. "My boyfriend?" I said.
"Don't play dumb, Pete," Patrick said. "I saw you two making out at the Sunshine Riptide. You even have a picture of him tattooed on your leg."
I looked down and saw that my pant leg had ridden up higher than I would have liked, revealing the tattoo of Gabe's face. I laughed and said, "Gabe's not my boyfriend." Patrick gave me a strange look, and I explained, "We're just good friends."
"Why did he kiss you at the Sunshine Riptide then?" Patrick asked.
"He was trying to prove some theory about women being attracted to gay men," I explained. "Apparently, he was right. I'm not sitting with him right now because he's with his new girlfriend."
"What about the tattoo?" Patrick asked.
"I lost a bet," I said.
"What was the bet?" Patrick asked.
"Have you ever seen Amber Wallace: Consulting Detective?" I asked.
"No, but I've heard of it," Patrick said.
"Gabe thought that Amber Wallace was going to die, and I said that if he was right, he could design my next tattoo," I explained. "He was right, and he made me get a tattoo with his face that said 'Gabey Baby Made Me Go Bad.'"
I left out the part about Gabe's visions - Patrick would never believe me if I told him about that, but he did seem to believe the rest of my story. "That's crazy, Pete," he said.
"I know," I said. "I still can't figure out how he knew that she would die."
"I can't believe that you actually got that tattoo," Patrick said.
"I'm a man of my word, Trick," I said, smiling.
"I love that nickname," Patrick said. He rested his head on my shoulder just as the fireworks started going off. As the two of us watched the brightly colored explosions, Patrick whispered into my ear, "This is going to sound sad and selfish, but I'm kind of glad that you and Gabe aren't together."
"Why is that?" I whispered back.
Patrick blushed and said, "Because I like you, Pete."
"I like you too, Rickster," I said.
"Did you just come up with another nickname for me?" Patrick asked.
"Do you like it?" I asked.
"It makes me feel beautiful," Patrick said.
"Well, do you want to feel a little beautiful, baby?" I said.
"I think you already know the answer to that," Patrick said. He took my hand, and the two of us enjoyed a sweet moment of silence, watching the fireworks go off above us. Words were superfluous - I knew that Patrick cared about me, and that was all that I needed.
We stayed like that, cuddling next to the fire, until the last fireworks went off, and we were left staring into the depths of the night sky. I would have stayed with him longer, but Brendon interrupted me. "Pete!" he shouted. "Come see what I made!"
I pulled myself away from Patrick, and went to see what Brendon had done. He gestured toward what appeared to be a gigantic blob of burned marshmallows. "What the hell is that?" I asked.
"It's a sculpture of my face," Brendon said. "Ryan helped me make it."
"Why is your forehead so big?" I asked.
"It makes me look more like myself," Brendon explained.
That was when Gabe walked over, and I realized what Brendon had done. "Brendon!" I shouted. "Why would you do this?! You knew that Gabe's next vision was you making a sculpture out of burned marshmallows!"
"What's all of the fuss about?" Gabe asked, but then he saw the sculpture, if you could even call it that. "What is wrong with you, Brendon?"
"I'm sorry, Gabe," Brendon said.
"You of all people should know better," Gabe said.
"I got bored," Brendon said.
"That's not an excuse," Gabe said. "I'm not going to die just because you got bored."
"Gabe, relax," Brendon said. "There are still a lot of visions left before you die. We'll stop one of those visions."
"We could have stopped this one!" Gabe complained. "That's it. We're all going home. If I stay at this party any longer, I'm going to strangle someone."
I pouted and said, "I'd like to stay."
"You're just saying that because of Patrick, aren't you?" Gabe said.
"Maybe," I said.
"The sweetness never lasts, you know," Gabe said.
At that moment, I didn't care. I wanted to experience it all - the sweetness and the bitterness - with Patrick by my side. As much as I appreciated having friends like Gabe and Brendon, I had the feeling that Patrick was the only person in the world who really got me. We could be immortals, or at least that was what I told myself.
Eventually, Gabe and Brendon said goodbye to me. As soon as they left, Patrick approached me. "I think I'm going to head home," he said. "I told my mom that I would be home by ten, and it's almost eleven o'clock."
"Okay, Trick," I said. "It was really fun being with you tonight."
Patrick blushed and said, "It was fun being with you too. I'll see you soon, Pete."
"See you soon, Patrick," I said. He walked out to his car, and I headed toward the DeLorean, waving to Patrick as he left. When he smiled at me, my heart pounded, but at least I knew now that he felt the same way as I did.
I drove home and lay in bed for a while, but all I could think of was Patrick, the cute as a button boy that somehow liked me back. I pinched myself, but it wasn't a dream. Everything that had happened that night was real, and I meant everything I said that night. I imagined what might happen next, and I desperately hoped that I would get to see Patrick again sometime soon. He had no idea what he meant to me.
I only hoped that we weren't fireworks that had gone off too soon.