Archive of Our Own

Patrick Stump is not where he was just a minute ago. 

See, a few minutes ago, he was just about to start eating lunch after taking a break from the day. Pete wasn’t at home - out at some meeting related to some Clandestine stuff, he thinks? - so Patrick was meant to have a mostly chill day to himself. He had been pretty productive! He got some work done, ran some errands, picked up the aforementioned lunch from this place on the way back home that honestly he was excited to try, got back home and then got distracted by working on a piece he had thought about on the drive back, and finally remembered to save the file and get to the lunch he had - when he had a sudden dizzy spell with a pounding headache. For a second he was worried that he had overworked himself (he had gotten better at remembering to take breaks, thank you very much), but he hadn’t had much time to think about that before a flash of light made him reactively squeeze his eyes shut. 

While he regains his senses, he can feel himself laying down, which is weird. He definitely was standing. He doesn’t linger on that very long, because what he sees when he opens his eyes is definitely not his kitchen. Which is more concerning. Did he hit his head? Patrick blinks a few times to make sure he’s not hallucinating.  

His pressing question now is where is here ? He sits up, and it appears to him at first glance that it looked like a tour bus, though it wasn’t like he woke up after a weird dream in his bunk. He actually had a dream like this recently on tour where he was at home writing music, kinda like when he was a kid and dreamt he’d gotten up and gone to school already. Laughably mundane. He finds himself standing up in the middle of the main living space. This tour bus also is a mess and was not the way he had last left a tour bus. (Ok, maybe sometimes he leaves a mess during particularly busy days on tour, but nothing like this.)  He was in the middle of the living space that really, really reminded him of the Fall Out Boy buses from their earlier days. 

What really made the bus remind him of the early buses was the faces of his band members looking right at him, just about 20 years younger than he saw them last. 

Pete, complete with eyeliner and the start of his iconic hairstyle of the era, is staring back at his mouth agape. Andy, labret piercing in his face and hair long, is next to Pete staring at Patrick similarly speechless. Joe is standing behind them, and is looking between Pete, a notebook Pete is holding, Patrick, and -

To the left of Pete is his younger self. That’s… well, it’s really weird. Sideburns and everything. Of all of them, it’s the most bizarre to look at himself. Sure, he’d gone back and looked at pictures of himself from around now to get ideas for his outfits for the “Days of Fall Out Past” shows, but to actually see himself like that again - and not in a mirror!- well. It’s a bit panic inducing, to be completely honest. If the other guys are shocked, which he can tell they very much are, younger Patrick is a step beyond them. He’s not holding back any of his panic, he’s actually gone a bit pale, but despite this he’s the first to break the silence, doing so without looking away from his future self. 

“Pete. What the fuck did you do?” 

“Wha-wh- did I-!” Pete sputtered. “You guys are here too! We all did this stupid quote unquote fortune telling ritual I got off livejournal-“

“Did you read the whole thing??”

“You know, Patrick, I think if the web page mentioned ‘summon a guy from the future’ I would’ve noticed it!”

“ A GUY!!? A guy!? He looks like - You must’ve-  Pete, if you’ve singlehandedly fucked up the space-time continuum I’m going to kick your ass!”

“ Singlehandedly?? -”

Patrick unfolds his arms from across his chest and holds up a hand, the movement from him enough to interrupt the bickering. He exhales deeply. 

“Okay. Alright. Jesus Christ.”

He takes another second. 

“A fortune telling ritual from - livejournal? Really?”

“Listen,” Pete says defensively, “uh, who I can only assume is a hot older version of Patrick,” - young Patrick makes a face at Pete for that comment -  “sorry for disturbing you from whatever it is future old people do-“

“I'm not that old.” 

“How old are you?” Joe speaks up. 

Patrick furrows his brow. “I… don’t know how I feel about revealing information from the future.” 

Pete groans. “I can't believe we don’t even get cool future information from future Patrick. I bet future me would tell us stuff.”

Patrick sighs and smiles fondly. “Yeah, he probably would.” 

“Aha!” Pete exclaims and points - “he still knows me in the future!” 

“Jesus Christ.” 

“Speaking of him, has Jesus come back again yet like all the conspiracy theorists claim?” Andy questions. 

“No.”

Pete speaks away from (older) Patrick and to his bandmates. “If this whole thing actually did something, poof of light and all, how do we know this is actually a future Patrick and not, like, a demon or something?” 

Joe holds up his hands and makes a small cross with his index fingers from where he’s standing behind Andy, who looks at him. 

“Aren’t you Jewish??”

“Yeah, well, maybe the power of Jesus Christ - who was also Jewish, by the way - even if he doesn’t come back, the power can still flow through me and send demon Patrick back to…hell?” 

“Ugh. Fine.” Patrick throws his hands up. “I can prove I’m not a demon or whatever the fuck. What year is it? 2006 or something?” 

“2005.” Andy provided. 

“2005.” Patrick turns around to peek through the blinds on the bus. “Oh, Warped Tour 2005? Jeez.” (“What does that mean?” his younger self says under his breath.)

“So… hm.” he turns back to the guys and takes a bit to think before he speaks. “The ‘Dance, Dance’ single is soonish, yeah? Well, fall this year. The school dance music video. And you guys are about to do the ‘Sixteen Candles’ music video and have that single next year? The vampire hunters one. That was fun.” 

The younger guys look amongst themselves. 

“Well, no one outside of us or anyone involved would know that… besides anyone from the future, I guess?” Andy says.

“And you guys, mostly you two -” Patrick points to Pete and younger Patrick “- have already started thinking about the third album.”

Pete cocks his head a little. “Can you tell me what we decide on for the title? We’re still throwing some names around -”

Past Patrick - or, present day, technically, future Patrick thinks - interrupts Pete, “Hold on, hold on, what if he’s, like, a future demon? Here to, I don’t fucking know, tell us the wrong title for album three so it fails. Or something.”

“You mean to tell me he’s going to tell us that “ Fall Out Boy Album Three: Electric Boogaloo ”  isn’t the final title? I thought it was a good one. Damn.” Pete snaps his fingers. 

“I liked From Under the Cork Tree 2: the Cork Strikes Back, personally.” Andy comments. 

“If it’s the third one wouldn’t it be more like Return of the…Trees? Wait, could it be Revenge of the Cork? Why not circle back around to a Take This To Your Grave bit?” Joe questions.

Pete shrugs. “Album three is actually Evening Out with Your Girlfriend again, subtitle second time’s the charm , parentheses we’ve got andy hurley on it this time. ”

“Ugh, please don’t remind me of that one. Evening Out doesn’t count.” young Patrick groans. “There’s a good reason that as soon as we had more songs we stopped playing those.”

(Mental note to self, Patrick makes, maybe don’t bring up he and the guys played Evening Out songs last tour.)

Andy looks over to his present day Patrick. “Is that even how demons work?”

(Future) Patrick sighs and speaks to his (past) self. “Ok, I’ll make you…me?, believe me. Believe… yourself? Whatever. Come here.”

“What? No.” 

Joe’s eyes flicker between the two Patricks. “Can you even interact with your own past or future selves, or does the universe implode on itself?

“Don’t the cells in your body completely replace themselves every so often? You’re practically different people, physically.” Andy says.

The younger Patrick buries his face in his hands. “Please don’t phrase it like that. I feel like I’m going to throw up. Or that I should go get drunk so I just forget this ever happened.”

Patrick continues despite the lack of actual response. “Alright, so when I was 12-”

“OKAY! Okay, I believe you, no need for that,” younger Patrick quickly interrupts.

“What happened when you were 12?” Joe says, raising an eyebrow and a smile sneaking onto his face.

2005 present day Patrick (okay, he realizes, he’s really got to find a better way to differentiate between the two of them - hims? Who knew the worst part of time travel would be the logistics of grammar and internal narration?) waves his hands and nervously laughs. “Unimportant. Haha. Anyways. There's a version of me from the fucking future in the bus, I think that’s the more pressing issue. Not like that’s giving me a crisis or anything. Haha.” 

Pete, either doesn’t read his Patrick’s crisis or reads him so well that he gives him a distraction from it, interrupts his ramble. “Yeah, gramp’s gotta get back to his oatmeal at the old folks’ home. Don’t wanna miss bingo night, bedtime’s at six thirty p.m sharp, y’know,” tapping his temple.  

Patrick rolls his eyes. “I’m only forty.”

“FORTY??” exclaims all four of the younger band.

Patrick narrows his eyes a bit. “...yes?”

“Hey, at least you know you can grow a beard by then,” Pete says, lightly elbowing the younger Patrick. This earns him a “I can grow a beard now, jackass” and a punch to the gut, in which he responds with an “oof.”

His younger self takes a second. “You’re from…2024?”

“Before my birthday in 2025, actually, but close enough.”

Joe grimaces. “That sounds like a fake year. Like it was made up for a sci-fi movie. Oh fuck, that means I’d be forty too?”

“Nah, you wouldn’t be forty two, you and Patrick are the same age.” 

“Pete, you fucking dumbass, you know what I meant, I should hit you too-”

“So the world doesn’t end in 2012?” Andy interrupts.

Patrick laughs for a second, “It did not.” (Even if it feels like it sometimes. Plus, December 2012 was actually a good time for them, working on their comeback album in secret, and him and Pete - well, yeah. )

He can see the guys thinking of questions to ask him about the future, things he’s really not trying to answer, so he quickly diverts to the important question he needs to ask instead. 

“So as fun as,” he says waving his hand “-this trip down memory lane has been, I guess, I would like to get back to what I was doing. And not ruin the space time continuum, preferably.”

Pete smiles sheepishly. “So, uh, about that-”

Both Patricks give Pete an identical glaring look.

Pete sweats. “Damn, the double Patrick stare down. Uh. So I don’t have any of the extra things I need to do the ritual again?”

“Dude, what the fuck!?” young Patrick exclaims.

Pete holds his hands up. “Don’t ‘dude what the fuck’ me!! This was going to be a one and done kind of thing! For fun! I think you are aware of the concept of fun? I expected, at best, as much of an answer for the future as you’d get asking a magic 8 ball, you know?” He motions a shake with an invisible 8 ball.

Andy glances over to the older Patrick. “I think you accomplished more than just a “reply hazy try again” here, dude,” making air quotes with his fingers.

Patrick almost had to stop himself from laughing at the reference they had no idea they’d be making, but had to come back to earth with the idea that he couldn’t immediately get sent back. 

He still lets out a chuckle, “I think you got more of a “Better not tell you now.” So. when are you going to get the stuff to run the ritual whatever you did again?”

Pete pulls his phone (sheesh, a Sidekick, been a second since Patrick saw one of those-) out of his pocket. “Shit, i don’t know if we’ve got time-”

He’s interrupted by a knock on the bus door before it opens. Someone with a Warped Tour crew shirt and lanyard peeks around the threshold. (Patrick thinks he remembers her face? Someone specifically assigned to get Fall Out Boy, along with some other bands, where they need to be on time. They did not make her job particularly easy, even without time travel. They got into plenty of shenanigans without magic. Sorry. )  “Hello? Fall Out Boy, remember you’re on in 30 on stage - oh, sorry, I thought I heard y’all in here, but I wouldn’t have interrupted if I knew you had a guest-”

Pete laughs. “Haha, it’s fine, he’s definitely not Patrick from the future or anything-”

The younger Patrick backhands Pete’s arm. “Dude!”

Joe, very casually, and not nervous at all, leans with his elbow on Patrick’s shoulder and speaks up. “Oh, yeah! He’s, uh. Andy’s…uncle?”

“His name is also Patrick,” Andy supports. 

“Oh, haha, I see why’d you joke about Patrick from the future then. It's nice your family visits. Anyways, make sure y’all get over soon. Make sure to get your uncle a pass if he needs one,” the crew member says before closing the bus door.

Patrick takes a second to process what has happened. “... Why am I Andy’s uncle?”

Joe answers (as if this was a ridiculous thing to ask) “Well, you can’t be related to yourself, why would Patrick have an uncle with the same name as him? Anyways, no one’s gonna ask Andy about his uncle if that idea gets spread around.”

Andy nods.

Pete has a nervous grin on his face before he speaks. “So. I don’t know if we’ll have time after we go on since it’s already a bit late - plus we’re kind of in the middle of butt fuck nowhere at the moment - but tomorrow we drive into a city, plus we have the day off so we can get that situated!” 

Patrick blinks.  “Tomorrow. This dream is really dragging on, huh?”

“You…think you’re dreaming?” Andy asks.

“I mean. Obviously right? That’s the only reasonable explanation why I'm reliving some summer day in 2005 over since it was on the mind recently -”

Andy raises an eyebrow and reaches out towards Patrick, pinching Patrick's arm.

“Alright, ow,” Patrick says, lightly rubbing the pinched spot, “okay, not dreaming, probably.”

(“Why were you thinking about this year recently anyways?” Pete mumbles. )

Joe brings his hands together with a light clap. “Ok! You’re not a demon, and we're not a dream, and there’s a show we need to get going on. Then we can bug future Patrick for future information. From the future. Do you have lottery numbers?” 

Younger Patrick looks at Joe. “When have you ever played the lottery? Do you even know yesterday’s numbers?”

“I don’t know, isn’t that the kind of shit you’re supposed to ask people from the future? Do I need to buy stocks in something?” 

Patrick prevents any further diversions as a favor to their designated warped tour handler.  “Don’t you guys have a show to play instead of thinking about the lottery and the stock market?” 

“Oh, yeah. Do you…want to come watch?” young Patrick asks. 

Hm. Even if it is a dream, which Patrick is steadily less and less convinced it is, this is an interesting offer. For obvious reasons he’d never actually experienced a show of theirs from the intended average perspective outside of a recording.  

He shrugs. “I guess there’s no harm in that.”  He figures it beats catching a fungus from someone’s dirty socks. “Maybe tomorrow you guys should do some laundry, too.”

Pete playfully scoffs and rolls his eyes. “Sheesh, maybe you really are 40. You sound like my mom.” 

“And whatever else she says she’s probably right.” 

Patrick takes his denim jacket off - thankfully he’s got a plain hat on, and no graphics on his shirt from bands don’t exist yet. He's also thankful he actually went out and picked up lunch rather than getting delivery, so he’s got his prescription sunglasses in his pocket. No need for any, albeit grainy, pictures popping up in the future from 2005 going ‘wow this guy standing over here looks like Patrick Stump now but this is from 2005! Funny, right?’ Let’s just avoid that all together, thank you. He puts the sunglasses on along with a borrowed backstage pass before exiting the bus with the past Fall Out Boy. 

The other guys end up in front of them, the curse of a shorter stride, so Patrick ends up walking almost in sync alongside his younger self. They walk in silence (well, as silent as any part of Warped Tour could get, but they weren’t adding to it) for almost half the walk. He’s not the best mind reader for most people, but this is himself, and Patrick can see that he’s worried.

“Hey, you ok?”

The young Patrick laughs for a second.  “Nervous for the show, and already a bit sweaty, but -  you’ve been here and done this already.” He rubs his arm and avoids eye contact. 

“....Yeah? That’s all?”

A bead of sweat rolls down the younger’s face, but that might just be the summer heat. “Okay, also nervous about - you? Me? Us?? It’s funny to the other guys, sure, but they don’t have another them from the fucking future here! What if I mess something up and-”

Patrick interrupts himself. “Listen, this didn’t happen to me - this time travel thing - back when we played this tour, or ever, so as long as we’re not playing by some type of Back to the Future rules, we’re already different people. Technically. I think that’s how branching alternate timelines should work?”

He shrugs. “Though your life could go the exact same way mine has. Can’t tell yet.” Patrick briefly places his hand on his younger self’s shoulder. “Whichever way it goes - there’s no right answers. Life will just go on.”

They’ve stopped walking as they arrive around the back of their assigned Warped Tour stage. The younger Patrick sighs. “Can you at least tell me when I start to sound like such an old man?”

Patrick laughs. “I think that’s what the old people call ‘wisdom with age.’ It happens over time. ”

Young Patrick thinks for a second. “If we’re bringing up Back to the Future, aren’t you, like, 10 years past when Marty travels in the second movie? Are hoverboards real yet?”

“There was something they called hoverboards, but they were more like… motorized scooter things? The batteries in them kept exploding so they aren’t really a thing anymore. Anyways-” Patrick says, ignoring the younger’s confused expression “-you’ve got a show to do.”

“...Maybe you can take my place and no one would notice?”

Patrick looks at himself, who sighs again after a few seconds of silence. “Yeah, I know.”

—--

Watching their own show in person is an experience, to put it lightly. 

Patrick watches himself go up beside the Warped stage, watches himself high five Joe and Andy and Pete, and sees himself pull his own hat down before walking onto the stage to the cheers of the large crowd. He doesn’t specifically remember this day, maybe, but he remembers doing this on Warped. He’s done that exact routine literally hundreds of times. To see it happen to someone else, technically speaking… weird. Would it make sense to call this an out of body experience?

During the set, he’s quietly nitpicking some things, but that’s just because he’s him and he’s also on stage and Patrick’s his own biggest critic. He does stop himself when he remembers he and his Fall Out Boy have had 20 odd years to get to where they’re at. These guys only have had a few. 

It is fun to see Joe and Pete flinging themselves around the stage again, hurricanes Wentz and Trohman stages left and right. In contrast, his younger self is cemented center stage behind the microphone, his guitar and his hat pulled low as shields against the crowd in front of him. Even though he’s really come into a comfortable level of confidence on stage recently, that level of nervousness feels like a whole lifetime ago. Technically it is. He thinks if he told this Patrick, nervous to sing in front of Warped Tour, that he bantered with the crowd and played songs completely by himself on stage every show the past two tours, well. He might burst into flames at the level of nerves he’d develop. 

“These guys are something, that’s for sure.” 

His thoughts are interrupted by a stage hand also watching the Fall Out Boy set. He’s a bit on the older side for some of the other backstage crew, probably gravitating towards Patrick to make conversation with someone other than a dehydrated 20-something.

Patrick smiles. “They’re something?”

“Oh, yeah, these kids are doing something crazy here, they way they draw these crowds. Them and those guys from Jersey, what’s their name? Chemical Romance? Though maybe the singer here could enunciate his words a bit better, but maybe that’s just the style. I like what I've seen of them, though.”

This makes Patrick laugh. “Oh yeah. I’m, uh, a fan. They’re going to make it big.”

The stagehand raises an eyebrow. “What makes you say that?”

“A gut feeling,” Patrick says with a smile.

The crew member nods and accepts this as a valid answer. He steps away as the set finishes with Saturday, Pete being retrieved from the crowd and the band walking off to a small crowd waiting for them in the wings of the stage. Patrick can see familiar but younger faces - definitely some of Gym Class Heroes and The Academy Is… (not too hard to spot Travie and William in a crowd, especially compared to his band), maybe that’s a few of the My Chem guys too? 

Patrick shrugs a bit to himself. He doesn’t need to wait around, so he heads back to the bus.

—---- 

Patrick ends up back at the bus before the band. He stopped on the way back for a bit to see some other sets from some bands that had since disbanded or he hadn’t seen since this tour, but he expected friends to keep the rest of the guys for a while. He rummages through his jacket to find his phone and sits down on the bus couch - he figures he’s got some time to write a few things down and maybe spare some time to a few games on his phone. 

More than a few games of Tetris later, Joe is the first to walk back on the bus. “Oh, that’s where old Patrick went.”

“...Where else would I have gone? Wait, Old Patrick?”

Pete steps in from behind Joe. “You know, you gotta go and stop some event from happening to stop the end of the world or something, yeah? Or you’ve got some secret assignment we can’t be seen looking at? We considered the demon option earlier but we didn’t even consider the Terminator option-”

“And I would've waited until right now to go off and do that..? And still, why am I old Patrick?”

“Baby Patrick didn’t like it when Pete called him baby Patrick.” Andy says as he steps in.

Baby Patrick all but storms in at the mention of this moniker. “I told him I’m not going to be fucking baby Patrick! He’s-” he says pointing to the older Patrick, “the one out of place here technically!! Someone born in 1984 should be 21 years old in 2005, I am the correct age for this year!”

Pete laughs at '”the correct age for this year” Patrick before looking at the older one, raising his eyebrow. “Uh, whatcha got there?”

Patrick blinks and clicks his phone off. “Um. Nothing important.” Damn muscle memory. It's not like he could lurk on any social media or even check his email, he was just making notes about some music he was writing! And playing Tetris.

Joe sits down to his right and leans over to look at Patrick’s phone. “Ooooh, future thing.”

“No.”

Pete sits down to his left and similarly leans in. “I mean, it’s four versus one, Patrick, we can do this the easy way or the hard way.” His smile is playful but there’s a mischievous look to it that Patrick recognizes. This is not an empty threat.  

Patrick pauses. His younger self got to see his future self (which is him), so it may be only fair if the rest of them got to see their future selves? He’s not trying to fight off four guys in their 20s from his phone, even if they couldn’t unlock it he doesn’t want them to fuck it up. Wait, could his younger self unlock his face ID? He’d probably guess his passcode though, damn. 

“Ok. later. I'm serious. I need to make sure you guys don’t see anything you shouldn’t see, but I'll show you guys later.” 

“Not playing hard to get anymore, huh Trick-meister?” 

Patrick frowns. Not hard to get, sure, Pete, whatever, eyeroll, but - “Where did you pull that nickname out of?”

“Testing things out. But I guess that one doesn’t happen?”

Young Patrick scoffs. “Yeah, because that one fucking sucks.” Andy backs him up with a thumbs down and the graceful “pffbbt” of a raspberry.

Patrick sticks his phone back into an interior pocket in his jacket. He might just try and wear the battery out before he shows them anything.  

He shrugs and holds his hands out. “So, anything else you want to try and bug me about?”

“How many albums do we have?” Joe asks.

“More than two. Less than fifty.”

“Ugh, that’s not a real answer.”

Young Patrick chimes in. “So, do we really take off, or should we just cut our losses and quit after this summer, go back to college like I've told my mom?

“What? Don't you guys play the … I think it’s the Nintendo Fusion tour this fall? Plus the music videos and shit like I said?” Patrick says.

“Yeah, but is it downhill from here? Do we peak in our early twenties?” Joe says.

Patrick narrows his eyes, ignoring Joe and answers his younger self. “I know you’re selling yourself short here. I came to my own conclusion to that question, so you’ll know when you see it.” 

Andy looks to the younger Patrick and motions his hands open to wordlessly say “yeah I figured you wouldn't get an answer,” who responds with an eye roll and scoff.

Pete grabs Patrick’s left hand and holds it up slightly higher than he had held it out. “Check it, future Patrick’s maariiieed,” in a sing-songy tone, like he’s being teased in grade school.

Patrick takes his hand back and he can tell he’s maybe gone a little pink in the face at that (nothing to be embarrassed about, he’s been married for years, but when it’s the past version of your spouse saying that, well.) His younger self is even more red about that. Lots of things to come to terms with for him than he as “future” Patrick has to, he supposes. 

Joe smiles. “Well now I know gay marriage is finally legal, since Pete and Patrick are the only two people that can put up with each other like that.”

Patrick panics for a second. Did Joe see his phone background of him and Pete? Something offhand he said? Shit, he should’ve thought about that earlier- 

Pete interrupts his thoughts. “We already ran away and eloped in Canada, sorry guys. We had a moose and a beaver witness it and everything.”

“Why not Massachusetts? That probably would’ve been easier.” Andy questions.

“I thought about it, but the only available options were a run down dunkin’ donuts and I'm just a bit more romantic than that. Or at a hot dog stand in fenway park but they would’ve made us swear our allegiance to the Red Sox and I wouldn’t make Patrick do that. Nothing but the best for my husband!” Pete beams at the younger Patrick and bats his eyelashes.

Young Patrick is somehow even more red in the face. “Shut the fuck up!!!”

Patrick laughs. Ah, 2005. “If you guys manage to ruin my marriage by bringing me here, I will find a way to come back and kick all of your asses.” 

—-

Patrick had stepped outside of the bus. After refusing to answer most questions the guys had about the future (“I will neither confirm nor deny the Cubs’ curse was broken.”) and when they ignored Patrick’s advice to clean up a bit (“I’ll do it later, Dad ”), they resorted to a bit of a band (plus one, but not really) hangout and watched a movie. He leans against the metal of the bus, cooling under the summer night sky, watching the rest of the tour break down before the bus has to head off to its next destination. 

He’s worried about this whole situation. When he was checking his phone gallery, he didn’t see anything out of place or people fading out of pictures so he’s (hopefully) fairly certain that he really is working with an alternate timeline kind of time travel. He does worry about the butterfly effect - how would him even being there, albeit on accident, even affect the future here? Would their lowest points be lower? Could the peaks be higher? Would they improve? Does their music change in any way? He hopes not. Speaking of the butterfly effect, would this affect anything outside of the band? Like, that stage hand spoke to him backstage, does that lead to a domino effect and next thing he knows he’s reason for something awful - 

His thoughts are interrupted by the bus door opening and closing on the other side of the bus, light crunching of gravel approaching him. 

“Hey.”

Patrick looks over. “Oh, hey Pete.”

Pete rubs the back of his neck. “Yeah, uh. I wanted to say again I'm sorry about this whole thing.” 

“Listen, I'm not mad. It was an accident, there’s no way you would’ve known anything like this could’ve happened. ” Patrick assures him. 

They stand in silence.

Pete moves from picking his nails to looking up at the night sky. “I know I joked about being in the middle of nowhere, but it really makes for some good star gazing.”

“I’m usually in places with way too much light pollution nowadays, sometimes I forget how many stars there should be in the sky.” Patrick says. 

“There’s a Van Gogh quote that reminds me of, ‘Be clearly aware of the stars and infinity on high, then life seems almost enchanted after all.’ It’s something like that, since it’s translated from Dutch. It’s easy to forget how small you really are sometimes, but the night sky helps remind you of it. It’s humbling.” Pete says. 

Patrick smiles. “It is. It’s a nice quote.” 

They stand a minute or so in silence, taking in the night sky and the occasional firefly. Patrick can feel the summer air cooling around them. 

Pete opens his mouth but hesitates and closes it again. His third attempt takes. “...Can I ask you a question?”

“If it’s how many more Star Wars movies they make like you asked earlier, I'm still not telling you,” Patrick teases.

Another beat of silence passes.

“Am I dead? In the future?”

“What?” his smile falls from his face, and he looks over to make eye contact. “Pete.”

Pete diverts his eyes, intensely studying the gravel at their feet. “You - won’t tell us stuff. You’re hiding something. Something other than just, I don’t know, run of the mill future stuff.”

“ Pete .” 

He’s hiding a lot of things. That they’re married for one! He’s hiding the fact they had a hiatus! He can’t say these things, because he’s still worried about messing up his and their timelines. If they didn't have a hiatus, they probably would’ve broken up Fall Out Boy forever at some point after Folie , then there’s no Soul Punk , then there would be no Save Rock and Roll and no reunion and making up of the band, then Patrick and Pete making up, and coming to terms with feelings, then literally everything that follows. Maybe he wishes that part of his life was without such animosity, or personal self esteem issues, or any amount of things he’s since come to terms with. Would he have even realized he was bi without the hiatus? So, yeah, he can’t say this out loud.

“And I know even Patrick - in there -  got on me about the “space time continuum” or whatever, but - I just -.” Pete sighs. “You were telling a few stories from the future about Joe, and Andy, and then you started talking about me and then stopped - so maybe I’m dead or maybe just dead to you and you guys just started doing stuff without me, or -”   

Patrick grabs Pete’s shoulders and looks him in the eyes. “Pete. Listen. I know at this point in your life you - you’ve got all this,” Patrick motions to Pete’s head,  “going on, and it’s so, so hard to see past that. And it’s hard to hear that it gets better when you can’t ever really imagine that - so the space time continuum or whatever be fucking damned, I am telling you are so, so alive in the future. You don’t hate being in your head anymore and you bitched to me the other day about how your knees hurt, and I laughed at you and called you old, and you laughed back at me and you’ve got crows feet and wrinkles that show when you laugh that laugh of yours I love to hear, and -” 

Tears start to well up in Pete’s eyes.

Patrick pulls him close and rubs his back when Pete returns the embrace.  

They stand in silence for - it could’ve been seconds or minutes or hours or the rest of time.

“Do you know I love you?” Pete whispers, so quietly he’s almost inaudible, but just almost. 

Patrick hums. “You’ve got twenty more years until you can say you love this me.” 

Pete gently pulls out of the embrace. “Bullshit, I already know I love you. A-and I love Joe and Andy and us all being Fall Out Boy too, of course, and the kids out there, but. Sometimes it’s hard to imagine-” Pete sighs.  “I don’t know.”

It breaks Patrick’s heart to see a version of Pete in front of him who really does not see any scope of how much he is loved. 

“You know, you guys don’t really say it to each other because you guys are stuck in your… 2000s masculinity thing, but those guys in there love you too. I can say this with one hundred percent certainty. And I know your brain - this isn’t negated because of alternate timelines or time travel, every version of Pete Wentz I know counts for this.” Patrick smiles. “Even past the dirty socks.”

Pete laughs a bit and wipes his eyes. “2000s specific masculinity thing?”

“Listen, wearing women’s jeans doesn’t make you a feminist.” 

Patrick ruffles Pete’s hair a bit. 

“Hey, you of all people should know how long I spend on hair and makeup, now I’ve messed up both!”

They both share a laugh before they walk back around and into the bus.

—-

Patrick slept like shit. Sure, it’s never as good on a bus as it is at home in that really, really nice bed he and Pete share, that bed that makes part of him want to say they spent too much money on but damn it really was worth it, but the bus couch is particularly rough. (He figured making them clean out an unused bunk just for one night wasn’t worth it, but in hindsight he should’ve.) The swaying of the vehicle heading down whichever part of the vast American interstate system they were on did help a little bit. Only marginally. It’s only the fact he got some sleep and woke back up that cemented this wasn’t a dream. 

Andy’s the first one up and about in the morning. He’s also the only one of the rest to actually be up at a time to start making a meal that could be considered breakfast. “Hi Patrick. I see you’re still here.”

He’s still half asleep, voice more groggy than he thought it’d be. “Wh…where would I have gone?”

Andy shrugs. “I guess you could’ve been on some kind of time travel time limit. Or learned some lesson and the universe decided you were done being 20 years in the past. Or on a Terminator mission like Pete guessed yesterday.”

Patrick rubs his face and pats around to find his glasses. “Yeah, well. Still here.” He puts his glasses on and sits up, yawning. “If you microwave me one of whatever you’re making to eat I’ll show you stuff on my phone.”

Andy raises an eyebrow. “Are you vegan now?”

Patrick waves his hand in a so-so motion. “More of a pescatarian.”

“Pescatarians are just the coward’s vegetarian.”

“I like sushi too much, sorry. If it makes you feel better, I personally think vegan food gets way better going forward.” 

Andy grins and sits down next to Patrick with a plate, a variation of some microwaveable vegan scramble, and sets it down before leaning over to look at Patrick’s cell phone.  “I figured you’d keep that away from us for the most part.”

“Eh, I want to pass some of the time without having to hide it from you, at least until the other guys wake up. You’ll see the first of this type of phone in… uh, a few years, anyways. I think.” Was it 2006 or 2007? He’d look it up but his wikipedia app probably wouldn’t work. Note to himself for later.

He’s already got one game pulled up, poking around on it for a bit before he goes to switch to some other app. 

Andy shifts a bit in his seat. “Oh, I think I sat on your wallet?”

“Ah, thanks, I wouldn’t have wanted to leave that here,” Patrick responds without looking up from his phone. Good thing he hadn’t showed Andy anything yet, he forgot to change his wallpaper- 

“I’m going to take a guess and say I wasn't supposed to see this picture?”

Patrick looks up at Andy holding a polaroid in his fingers. It’s - any other scenario it would be a very sweet and romantic image - of him and Pete that he keeps in his wallet. Which fell out when Andy grabbed his wallet. 

Shit.

Andy looks to him expecting a response.

Patrick looks over to the bunk area. No movement, only snores.

He leans in and whispers. “Is it... obvious?” He’s only marginally frantic, he swears.

Andy crosses his arms and matches his volume. “I mean, why’s the picture just you and Pete, like that? Or anything else? Besides diversions from Pete stories yesterday I was suspicious about something, but… “ 

Patrick finally exhales the breath he didn't realize he was holding. 

“Also,” Andy says with Patrick’s wallet now open, to place the picture back in, “is your last name Stump-Wentz now?? That’s obvious if nothing else was.”

Andy hands the wallet over to Patrick. 

“Andy Hurley, I am so serious, I have never been and probably never will be so serious about anything. You need to keep this secret with your life, those guys can not know about this.”

Andy’s eyes go wide.

Patrick continues. “I love him so much. But we only got together later when we were older. 21 year old me in there would probably not even accept that he’s bisexual until later, even if I showed him that I was married to a man. And Pete’s… got his own things to come to terms with.” He waves his hand around in place of explaining what that means. After all, this is the summer of Pete’s Mikey Way Thing TM (trademark pending), so Andy should get it.

“So.. You and Pete?” Andy asks.

Patrick sighs, relieved. “That’s how it ended up for us. Still, you guys’ future could be different from ours. Maybe it’d work out when we were that young but…” he shrugs. 

Andy’s head tilts a bit. “Would that…be soon…or…?

“Uh…?”

“I just need to know if I have to take this secret to my grave or not! That is a lot of pressure!” Andy’s volume grows a bit more into a stage whisper at the end.

Patrick chuckles. “Ok. I'll tell you that basically around the time they legalized it in Illinois we got engaged. If it gets to that point and they haven’t yet then you can probably tell them.” He won’t mention the lighthearted jokes from Andy and Joe about the Save Rock and Roll era basically ended up being like their honeymoon era before the actual honeymoon. They can make those in their own time.

“Legalized it as in, it , legalize it?”

“Same-sex marriage, not weed.”

Andy is silent for a bit, thinking before he asks, “Am I secretly gay too?”

“Not to my knowledge. Or you keep a really good secret from us and your wife.”

“M-my wife??”

“Forget I said anything.”

They finish eating while Patrick shows Andy a few things on his phone. No pictures of himself (Andy didn’t want to see his future tattoos yet, “that’s basically cheating”), then eventually moving onto a game of Mario Kart on the bus’s Gamecube, finally arriving at their next tour date destination.

Hearing the first of the other guys to walk out from the bunk area, Patrick looks up from the show he was watching with Andy on their TV to see Pete, shirtless in a pair of sweatpants. Listen. Patrick saw Pete basically - and literally - naked at this era in their lives, but he wasn’t looking . Patrick’s looking now - it’s fine, it’s his husband even if the husband in question doesn’t know that yet, and he misses his (present to him, future to everyone else) husband, who is firmly in his correct place in their life’s timeline.

Pete laughs. “Take a picture if you want, Stump, it’ll last longer.” 

Ah. He was looking a bit too much. 

Patrick rolls his eyes. “Just surprised you finally emerged from the depths of the bunks sometime before showtime tomorrow, Wentz. ”  

“I was sleeping. But! I also did have to find that ritual thing again for the stuff I need again, so I had to wait until I could get some internet on my laptop - plus figure out where we can go to get that-”

Joe stumbles out his bunk.

“- and now we just have to wait for the sleeping beauty back there!”

Patrick thinks he hears a muffled “Shuddafuckup” from the remaining occupied bunk, but he’s not quite too sure. Sounds like something he would’ve said, though. 

—------

Eventually, everyone is awake and dressed and cleaned up to head out. They exit the bus, finding that it turns out Pete had already turned in a favor to borrow someone’s car for the day. They walk around to it, and Patrick stops to take it in. It’s some early 90s Toyota Camry, and he has to remind himself this car is not that old for the year he’s found himself in. He drove cars like that himself! It just feels… ancient now. 

Patrick has graciously been given the shotgun position besides Andy’s driver seat, and he ignores the “respect your elders” teases he received with the offer. He’s just glad to not be bunched in the back in some combination of the Patrick/Pete/Joe jumble. Plus he can see it’s a car from that era where they went for electric windows in the front, but the back seats still have a manual window crank, so no thank you on that. Patrick could go the rest of his life without using a manual crank window. (Pete did ask him to sit next to him in the middle seat, playfully upset when he denied Pete the “once in a lifetime opportunity to be in a Patrick sandwich!” His younger self took his words out of his mouth with sandwich semantics of “If you’re in the middle, you’re the meat, it’s technically a Pete sandwich.”)  Andy did offer Patrick the driver’s seat, but even though he does have his driver’s license it wasn’t issued until about 14 years in the future, so he passed.

Pete, at one point, starts to read off specific directions out of a pocket notebook. When Patrick turns around and inquires about it, Pete responds that he had to write them down from map quest.

Patrick laughs a bit. “God, I do not miss the days of map quest directions and paper maps.”

“Some of us still live in 2005 and don’t have satellites beaming directions directly into our heads like you do in the future.” Joe taps his own forehead.

“I know for sure that GPS systems for cars exist this year.”

“Yeah, well, they’re not exactly cheap and we’re also in someone else’s car, so us peasants are stuck with map quest.”

Patrick eventually takes to watching the scenery of the city pass. It's interesting how things just gradually got different over time. Advertisements, music, font choices, car styles, fashion - some of it circles around, sure (kids not even born at this point are drawn to the quote unquote emo fashion and music), but the difference in the world is really obvious when someone, say, gets time traveled back about 20 years. He thinks about how long ago 2005 really was. Is? Quite literally half his lifetime ago.

Andy glances over to him. “What’re you thinking about, old and wise Patrick?” The backseat is busy with their own conversation. (something, something, arguments over the game of punch buggy, who’s going to sit bitch on the way back. Etcetera, etcetera.)

Patrick rolls his eyes. “Not helping my ‘not old’ argument, but I’m thinking about how far back I really am. This is literally half my lifetime ago.”

“When you put it like that… but is it really that different?”

“In some ways no, but mostly yes. Imagine you were sent back to, like, 1985. Or - see, you’re 25, someone who’s 25 now to me was born in the year 2000 .”

Andy grimaces. “Eugh. The math checks out, but I’m just going to not think about that.”

“What, the passage of time?” Patrick teases.

“Exactly.”

Eventually they make it within a few blocks of the store they need to go into. It's not too difficult for Andy to find a spot to parallel park a generally small vehicle. Patrick remains thankful for backup cameras and the conveniences of the 2020s. (That’s not even mentioning how, since they were in someone else’s car, they didn’t have any of their own music. Not that the hits of 2005 are particularly terrible, it's more about the option. And the AC barely worked.) 

Patrick gets an even bigger blast from the past on the walk from the car to the store. There’s more record stores he spots, which he mourns the loss of, and advertisements for stores since gone. He does not have any strong feelings about the loss of places like Circuit City, though he does remember Radioshack slightly more fondly. The walk even takes them past a movie theater, advertisements for movies that he’s honestly half tempted to go see again (ah, the summer of Star Wars Episode 3. It would be very easy to convince the rest of them to see it again, even though they’ve probably seen it collectively 50 times already), and some movies he very much forgot about the existence of (see: whatever Sharkboy and Lavagirl in 3-D is about? Though he thinks he recognizes the sharkboy kid as being in those Twilight movies later. The CGI he sees does not age well at all.) The thing that gives him the biggest pause was a Blockbuster right next to their destination, that ’s a blast from the past he kind of misses sometimes. He remembers the late fees and he misses it a little less.

“- Hellooo, Earth to Future Patrick?” Pete’s waving his hand in front of Patrick’s face.

Patrick blinks. “Uh, sorry, what?” 

“What were you thinking about that was so incredibly distracting?”

“Blockbuster.” He points to the storefront. 

Pete makes a face expressing his confusion. “Blockbuster.”

His younger self turns around, entering the conversation he was eavesdropping on. “Blockbuster?”

Patrick nods. “Blockbuster. Just haven’t seen one in a minute, I guess.”

“Nah, now you’re saying wrong shit about the future to fuck with us,” Pete says.

Patrick raises his eyebrows and holds his hands out, letting the younger two decide if he’s lying or not.  

Andy interrupts, holding a door open. “Are you guys just going to stand out here?”

Leaving the sidewalk behind, Patrick walks over to the threshold of the building. The door closes behind him, a small bell ringing as it does, and he sees the younger band has already started perusing the shelves of the store. He thinks he's been into one of these types of stores once? It mostly reeks of a mix of every incense and candle and herb this place has in stock. Which is a lot. Perhaps even too much. It’s small, but it’s less about the size of the space (which is still small), more about how everything is crammed in there, no nook or cranny left empty. Patrick peeks around a bookcase, he can see Joe and Andy looking through the selection of books together.

Joe holds a book open with one hand, waving the other above the open pages. “Haha, abracadabra, I’m casting a magic spell on you,” he says, mockingly.

Andy looks at him. “The fact that he,” he says, pointing to Patrick, “is standing here means that some amount of this,” his hand motioning to the store, “is in fact not complete bullshit.”

Joe’s eyes widen slightly as he slowly closes the book, carefully slotting it back from where he retrieved it. “Sorry if that cursed you.” 

“I think abracadabra would be a ridiculous thing to be a real magic curse, what would that even do?” Andy asks.

Patrick holds his hands up and wiggles his fingers, mimicking casting a spell of his own. “Oooh, abracadabra, curse of, uh…” he stops. “... I couldn’t think of a good curse. Maybe that’s what you cursed me with.” The three of them laugh, and Andy and Joe return to their own browsing as Patrick wanders further in.

He finds his younger self is currently standing at the bins of different rocks, each with supposedly different “spiritual properties”. He’s not sure how-

“I’m not sure what gives each one of these any special magic properties.” Words stolen before he could finish thinking them.

“Like what makes…” the younger Patrick leans in to read a label on the bin, “Rose Quartz good for love and peace? The rose part? Is it because it’s pink? The molecular structure?? ”

Patrick looks at the assortment of rocks. “Not a clue. Maybe time travel magic is real but rock magic is bullshit?”

“Probably.” 

Patrick peeks at a few more of the shelves, not quite sure what to disregard and what is actually real (on a scale of “rock magic” to “livejournal time travel spells,” how real is astrology? Perhaps that will remain a mystery. Or is it just his Taurus tendencies showing?). He eventually makes his way to the rear of the store, where Pete is talking to the lone worker behind the counter, a woman he would guess is in her 50s or 60s. He didn’t think he had an idea of what a “metaphysical supply” store worker would stereotypically look like before this, but she looks like what he would’ve imagined. Like a hippie who didn’t abandon the whole thing for the suburbs and ruining the economy. Patrick wonders how she wears so many necklaces without getting them tangled all together.

“-cool, thanks,” Pete says, as the woman hands him a bag and a handful of change. 

She smiles, and turns and looks at Patrick as Pete starts to speak to him. “Got my stuff again.”

Patrick leans in to attempt to see in the bag. “What kinds of things is it anyways?”

“Uh…,” Pete starts to rummage through the bag, “some incense kind of things, I used some tarot cards last time but I bought more just in case, a few rocks that apparently have specific properties? A few more things, but I’m not sure what’s actually needed and what’s here for show, but,” he says shrugging, “I’m not going to test what we really need or not. I have everything else.”

Pete lowers his voice and leans into Patrick’s space. “I feel like a rich kid trying to buy weed for the first time. Like, maybe this is all oregano?? Do I even need 5 different types of rocks, do you think?”

Patrick looks down at the contents of the bag, leans out of Pete’s personal space, and responds with a “hm.” …Maybe rock magic is real?

The store worker leans on the counter, still looking at Patrick as she starts to speak. “You’re a bit far from home, aren’t you?”

“Oh, yeah, I’m - we’re from Chicago, the accent comes out sometimes still, haha.” 

She laughs and shakes her head. “Not really what I meant, but that too.”

Patrick looks at Pete, hoping he’s hiding the partially confused, but more horrified look on his face. Pete’s definitely not, quickly he says “Well, we’ve got to get going, we've got that thing, have a good day-” before turning around and exiting the conversation. 

Patrick looks back to the woman. She looks him up and down, then gives him a wink and a smile. He really doesn’t know what the proper reaction to this should be, but figures what must look like the world’s most awkward smile and a hesitant thumbs up should work fine. If that was flirting from her it was bad and awkward anyways, if she somehow knew he was from the future - whatever. Whatever, not worth thinking about because it doesn’t matter. 

They all file out of the store, bell ringing behind them once more, and they start to make their way back to the car.  

Joe stops the group about halfway back and points out a diner, something Patrick missed on the way there. “Hey old future Patrick, do you mind staying a bit longer and getting something to eat? I’m starving, dude.”

“That’s fine, I could eat too. But you’ll have to pay for me.” He’s been here for a day and a half already, when in Rome. Or in 2005. 

“What? How does a man in his 40s not have, like, 10 bucks?”

“I have money, asshole. It’s just that my cards won’t work since they are, in fact, from the future, and the one twenty bill I have on me- ” he pulls his wallet and the bill out “-is from… 2017. So not legal tender yet.” He slips the wallet back in his pocket and nudges his younger self. “You owe Joe for me, by the way.”

The younger Patrick slaps his arm in jest and scoffs. “Come on, dude, not cool.”

——

They all make their way into the diner, settle into their booth and order with the waitress. It’s an odd time of day, a bit past lunch and too early for dinner, so they’ve got a section of the diner to themselves.

Patrick ends up sitting next to himself, opposite Pete, Joe, and Andy (in that order). He can see them, almost in sync, looking between him and his younger self.

Pete lets his gaze land on the older Patrick. “We haven’t stood you two next to each other and like… compared you to each other. It’s kind of uncanny.” 

“Is uncanny really the word for it? He’s me. I will be him, probably.” the younger Patrick replies.

Andy is still switching his focus between the two of them, almost like he’s watching a tennis match. “Obviously, but… you’re kind of different…but still the same?”

“Well, seasons, change, people, whatever that lyric is.”

The others at the table look at him in confusion, Pete’s with a slight hint of recognition.

“Uh, oops.” Patrick waves a hand in dismissal. “Ignore that.”

Pete does just that. “Alright, but we’re going to ask you more about the future instead,” he says with a grin.

“You can try.”

Joe interrupts Pete from asking anything first. “Has anyone gone to Mars yet?”

“No.”

Younger Patrick leans forward. “Do we work with any other cool artists?”

“Yeah.” Patrick thinks about their upcoming collab they’ll have with Jay-Z on Thriller. The feature on that Timbaland song, the albums he’ll produce soon. He thinks of Lil Wayne’s part on Folie too, then the numerous ones on Save Rock and Roll - it’s been over 10 years and it’s still fucking crazy to him they’ve got a song with fucking Elton John. 

“Anyone we’d know now?” Joe asks.

Patrick nods. 

“Have we shot our best music video yet?” Andy asks. (“Ooh, that’s a good one,” Pete says.)

“Hmm. No.” Does the Youngblood Chronicles count for just one? That was ambitious, but damn that was cool. And, again, Elton John was god in that one. Even the Less Sixteen Candles one they’re about to do is pretty damn good. Or some of the fun ones - Wilson, Heartbreak, etcetera. 

Andy, Joe, and his younger self pester Patrick with a few more questions while they’re waiting for food to arrive. When no one’s looking, Pete starts to slide down the booth seat and ends up under the table. Patrick notices this after his younger self, because he only noticed after feeling the movement of him kicking Pete. He’s not sure how hard he’s actually kicking him, but he feels like it’s not too hard since Pete’s laughing the whole way. Pete crawls into their side of the booth, squeezing himself in between the two Patricks. 

“Now I can get my Patrick sandwich,” Pete laughs, with a wide toothy smile.

The younger Patrick is less amused as Pete starts to pester him, as he responds to his intrusion with pushing Pete away from him and a “get the fuck off of me.” 

Pete responds with what just may be the world’s fakest pout, and leans his head the other way on Patrick’s shoulder. “See, Future Patrick tolerates me, so you might as well start now since it’ll happen eventually.” Patrick rolls his eyes and shakes his shoulder, enough to pretend like he’s trying to get Pete off of him but not enough to actually make him move. 

Young Patrick sees Pete still on him, and leans on his elbows and puts his face in his hands, groaning. 

“Patrick’s just gotta get all his hater feelings out now, then he’ll mellow out,” Joe teases. Patrick, the younger, doesn’t remove his face from his hands but kicks Joe under the table, who laughs at him.

“...Does Green Bay win the Super Bowl again?”

“Andy, I have no idea.”

Andy shrugs. “I figured.”

—-------

After eating, and Patrick’s slight internal shock at the inflation rate in the past 20 years, they get back to the Warped Tour grounds and their bus with little fanfare. They file into the bus, and Pete starts with the ritual preparation with his laptop open. It doesn’t take long before he tells Patrick he’s ready to get started. Everyone stands in the general position that they were in when the whole time travel thing occurred, in case that was important somehow.

“Alright, Future Patrick,” Pete announces, sitting on the floor, “any last words before you leave us?”

“Please don’t kill me doing this.”

Pete gives a thumbs up. “You didn’t die the first time, you’ll be fine.” 

“Alright. Um.” Patrick looks at Joe. “My present Joe would kill me if I didn’t mention this, so, Joe, watch your back please.”

Joe looks taken aback. “What kind of last minute ominous threat is that??”

“On a summer day, in the year two thousand and eleven, an assassin will approach you and you should be prepared. You need to learn karate.” Andy says.

“No, like,” Patrick laughs, lightly tapping his own back with his thumb, “Your actual back. Maybe throw yourself on the ground a little less or just more carefully. You’ll think of this in 20 years and thank me, so you’re welcome ahead of time.”

Pete lights a candle. “Ok, so this was the last thing we did before the whole… time travel reaction, so I guess we just wait? It wasn’t instant last time.”

There’s a beat of silence. 

“Wait a second - Patrick didn’t show us his future phone shit!” Joe says.

“I showed Andy a few things while you were all sleeping this morning.”

“Yeah. Joe you look the same, except 40. Also tattoos.” Andy says.

“That does not help me imagine it at all. Are the tattoos cool at least?”

“Hm…..”

“Joe, your tattoos are fine.” Patrick says.

“Ok, are they fine , or are they good??”

Pete points a thumb over to the younger Patrick. “Well, Patrick over here shouldn’t have any questions like that.”

He looks over to Pete in disbelief. “Are you kidding?? I have - so many fucking questions my asshole self won’t answer!! Like, he told me nothing about our music!! This jackass didn’t even play a god damn instrument the whole time! He wouldn’t even tell me anything about being fucking married!!”

Patrick laughs, a deep laugh, because god damn what a little shit he was, which makes his younger self flip him off. 

—-------

Patrick is not where he was a minute ago. 20 years ago? Whatever. Wherever he is, he’s on his back. 

“ -trick. Patrick, are you okay?” he can hear Pete say.

He pushes himself up and opens his eyes. 

His kitchen, his laptop and lunch where he left it.  His Pete (god, Patrick missed him) who looks like he’s worried because, oh yeah, Patrick guesses that he found him laying on the floor unconscious. 

“Hi.”

Pete’s expression moves from worried to mostly confused. “H-hi?? Babe, I walk in and find you on the floor and you just say hi? Are you okay, do you need to get to the hospital?? Did you hit your head? What do you ask a concussed person, what’s your birthday, who’s the presid- ok, maybe not that one,” he rambles.

Patrick laughs. “I’m okay! But, uh, weird question to follow that, what day is it?”

“Oh god, maybe we do need to go,” Pete says, helping Patrick to his feet, “It’s Wednesday.”

Patrick turns his head over to look at the clock on their oven - it reads like it’s only been 30 minutes here since he was sent back in time.  

“So,” Patrick starts, “I had some weird shit happen to me today.”

“Uh huh.” Pete’s still skeptical. 

“So, theoretically,”

Pete plays along. “Only speaking in hypotheticals and playing pretend here, sure.”

“Imagine, if you will, that I said that you from the past summoned me back in time to 2005 through a fortune telling ritual you got off of livejournal, what would you say?”

Pete blinks at him a few times before letting out a nervous chuckle. “Are you for sure you’re ok?. Did you have a weird dream?  If you were the drug taking type, I’d try to blame it on that.” He scratches his chin. “Though, to be honest, that does sound like some type of bullshit I would do then. Maybe I did and I don’t remember it.”

“It is a you thing! And you - well, I guess it’s an alternate timeline reality version of you now, I was afraid of what the time travel rules were - hold on, I have some pictures on my phone -”

“You went back in time - still theoretically - and you had your phone?”

“Yeah.” Patrick leans on their kitchen island to start scrolling through his photo gallery.

“That must’ve been, like, sci-fi levels of futuristic compared to what we had back then.”

“You pulled a sidekick out of your pocket and I almost laughed. They had to pull out directions from fucking Map Quest !”

Pete laughs. “Holy shit, I do not miss that or paper maps. I rely on automatic rerouting waay too much for traffic or when I miss an exit.”

“Maybe map quest directions would make you pay more attention, so you wouldn’t miss the exits.” Patrick lightly shoves Pete with his shoulder.

Patrick hands his phone over to Pete. “Here.”

Patrick didn’t take a whole lot of pictures - that phone was strictly staying on that bus and nowhere else. “I wish I could’ve snuck a video of the set I got to see. It was really weird watching us perform in person. And talking to myself.” He pauses. “The whole thing was weird, actually.”

Pete starts swiping through Patrick’s recent pictures. A few pictures of the bus and the guys before a video he took starts.

“-Ok, go.” Patrick (the 40 year old one) says behind the camera.

“Sorry for stealing Patrick from the future.” Past Andy says, waving to the camera. 

“Well, I think we have nothing to apologize for. This was all Pete’s thing,” Past Joe says, lightly kicking past Pete, who is sitting on the floor.

Past Pete points at Patrick behind the camera. “Hey, the universe hasn’t exploded, so obviously this works out fine. It’s not like he’s giving us any information about the future at all!!”

Past Patrick, sitting beside Past Pete, gives the camera a thumbs up before it ends. 

Patrick looks at Pete as the video ends. “See? I wasn’t going crazy -” 

There’s a video that Patrick didn’t take. He only remembers taking a few pictures and that one video.

“-do you even… oh, wait, hold on-” it starts close up to past Pete’s face, but as he realizes the video is recording he holds it further away from himself. He holds it high, giving the camera a peace sign. 

“Damn, when do they invent this shit? This camera rules for pictures. Next time I should send myself to the future - ”

Past Patrick briefly shows in frame, just to push past Pete in the middle of his sentence. “No more fucking with time travel, jackass!!!”

Past Pete turns to have both him and past Patrick in the frame. “Fine, fine,” he turns and looks at past Patrick. “Hey, can I ask you for a favor later?” He only gets a glare in response. 

“Maybe future me and now me can switch places - see, he’ll already know what to do, and then I don’t have to figure that out the hard way and I can hang out with hot old Patrick - ow,” he says, as his Patrick punches his shoulder.

“Sorry hot old Patrick -” he dodges another punch, “for stealing your phone, well, not really, but we couldn’t figure it out besides the camera button when you open it up. To our future selves - hope it’s going well. Anything you want to say, Patrick?”

Past Patrick makes eye contact with the camera. “Sorry if we did mess up your timeline. Tell your wife - my - our?, whatever, this sucks -  tell her I’m sorry. Hm, also, I -”

The sound of the tour bus door opening and the voices of Joe, Andy, and the older Patrick can be heard in the background.

“Shit, ok, it was fun hanging out with you Future Patrick ok love you byeee-” past Pete says before the camera shakes and shows the ceiling of the bus and the tapping of the screen, ending the video.

Patrick takes his phone back from Pete.

“Well, fuck me,” Pete says in disbelief, “I thought I’d have to take you to a neurologist today. Best of luck to those kids.” He mocks a salute with two fingers and laughs. “Did past you say your wife? What did you even tell them?”

“I tried to say very little! Can you guess how much you pestered me? It was a lot! He saw my ring, but I didn’t specify anything so past me assumed I was still straight, I guess. I really tried to say not much because I like how things turned out in the end.”

“In the end? Are you divorcing me?” Pete teases.

“Please, you’re stuck with me.”

“I think you’re stuck with me , but sure.” Pete leans in and presses a kiss to Patrick’s cheek. “Stuck with each other. Is it bad I’m glad it was you and not me? Because I don’t know if I’d be able to hold back on the things I’d want to say to my past self.”

“I had the same thought, but more about how you were busy today. Not sure what Andy and Joe are up to today, but I wasn’t doing much. So, why not get summoned to the past, my calendar was free, might as well fucking happen.” Patrick shrugs.

Pete grimaces. “God, I know he, well, I, joked about coming to the future, but that would’ve been worse, jeez. That’s harder to explain away.”

“Imagine a, what, 26 year old you poking around the house - “oh hey, what’s this picture of you guys with Elton John,” or anyone, or “hey this picture is of you two getting married that’s interesting-” speaking of that, Andy did figure us out.”

“How’d he do that? With his incredible sleuthing skills, or…?

“The picture of us I keep in my wallet fell out. He said he wouldn’t tell.”

Pete nods. “I’d trust Andy Hurley on that. Although, you are cursing past us to headlines taunting that “gay above the waist” thing I said that one time again.”

“There’s probably a few things I could’ve said, but I’m letting the past be the past.”

Pete’s eyes wander in thought. “How do we even bring this up to Joe and Andy without sounding like we’ve gone crazy?”

Patrick laughs. 

—----

Meanwhile, in a now branching timeline 

falloutboyrock.com/journal

September 26th, 2005

while we were on warped tour we accidentally summoned patrick from the future. turns out livejournal witches spells are real, so proceed with caution. he was nice about it. Even in the future Patrick is still made of sunshine and nice things. i’m glad he wasn’t from a future like the terminator bc that would’ve posed some problems 

xo

posted by: pete

comment: do u think patrick will b as hawt as he is now in da future o_O X3

pete: he’ll give off hot dad vibes. all the moms at the pta will be jealous