Possibly, I'm Insane

It starts with the orange sneakers that Pete buys, one pair for him and one pair for Tennyson. And then there’s matching fuzzy orange sweaters to go with the orange sneakers. And then Pete manages to locate orange pants, too.

“The exact same shade of orange! And in the right sizes! It’s fate!” Pete explains as he buys them.

“Obviously you need orange socks now, too,” Patrick remarks.

He thinks that Tennyson won’t be into these matching orange outfits, that he’s too old for these shenanigans, but actually it’s Tennyson who suggests, “Maybe we should dye our hair orange, too!”

“I think we can figure it out,” Pete says. “I don’t think it’s that hard.”

These are Famous Pete Wentz Last Words, and everyone in Fall Out Boy knows it.

“Billions of people manage to do it every day!” Pete protests. “You think we can’t figure it out?”

“I think we have other talents,” Joe says. “Good talents. I’m glad we have those talents. This isn’t one of them.”

“You think billions of people do it every day?” Patrick asks.

“Probably! It’s an omelet! It’s pretty basic!”

“I’m vegan, so I want out of this whole thing,” Andy inserts blandly.

Pete always looks devastatingly attractive, with his eyeliner and his swooping hair and his too-small jeans with the belt on the side. Next to him, Patrick always feels…blargh. Deciding what to wear on stage stresses him out, since he has to stand next to the bundle of sex personified that is Fashion Plate Pete.

He grumbles, “I should give up and just wear some sort of uniform.”

Pete says, “Oh, Trickerdoodle, I support you in a uniform, like, a cute little skirt?”

Which makes Patrick turn pink but the leer also makes him feel better about the way he looks.

When Patrick was telling himself stories when he still lived at his parents’ house and thought nothing interesting would ever happen to him, those stories always ended with happily ever after. And Patrick used to imagine to himself what happiness might be. He knows now he imagined poorly. He could never have imagined, for instance, music accurately. He could never imagine warm baths. He could never even imagine what the world looked like, because he didn’t have glasses then. But of all the things he’s learned, mostly what he’s learned is that happiness is a purring cat-person tucked beside you.

“I think we should have a traditional Thanksgiving,” says Patrick.

Pete just looks at him.

“Just because we can’t go home to our families doesn’t mean we should miss it out on Thanksgiving, right?” Patrick continues. “Doesn’t mean Tennyson should miss out, more importantly.”

“Okay,” Pete says slowly.

“What? You don’t agree?”

“Patrick, I think we should all remember that the last time we tried to cook a turkey together, when Tennyson was a baby, we had to call the fire department.”

Patrick considers. “But maybe we’ve gotten better since then?”

“Nope,” says Pete. “Let’s have Thanksgiving tacos.”

Tennyson agrees.