giddygeek | Let Me Be Pacific, Pete/Patrick

Title: Let Me Be Pacific
Author:

giddygeek
Pairing: Pete/Patrick, bandslash
Notes: 1500 words for

loveyouallwrong, who wanted Pete/Patrick, seventy degree weather, and got, you know, something else entirely. \o/ Based very loosely on a canon trip to the zoo with the fanclub, and a fan + penguins + Zack related incident in a line in NYC.

Hope it makes you laugh, Lea. ;-)

Patrick is busy making giraffe faces for the camera when he hears Pete's group say, "Awww!" very loudly. Pete is laughing like crazy. When he turns his head to see what's going on, most of Pete's group is looking at him, and so is Pete. More than one person is throwing him hearts.

Patrick bats his lashes at them, still making the giraffe face, then turns back to his own group. Whatever Pete's said--well, he'll get emails about it later, and that's if Pete doesn't tell him himself. Which, ha. Not likely. Pete tends to tell his best jokes until they stop being funny, stop sounding like jokes at all--that's why he has so many problems on the internet.

"Next up, zebras!" their tour guide says cheerfully. Patrick stops mugging for the camera and follows her up the path, chatting with people and 100% aware of Pete brewing all kinds of new gossip in the group behind him.

~

His phone buzzes while they're watching the zebras graze in their enclosure. There's a baby one that Patrick can hardly stand to look at, he wants to take it home so bad, but he doesn't say anything because Pete's right there, and Dirty's with him. If Patrick says two words about how cute it is, he knows he's going to wind up with a zebra in his bathtub, and he's heard they grow up cranky.

He fishes his phone out of his pocket. The text is from Pete--3/4 of them are--and it says, i tld them if we wr girafs r ncks wd mk a hrt

Patrick flushes, ducks his head, tugs at the brim of his hat. Crazy he replies, then goes back to watching the baby zebra spin in clumsy circles. He doesn't put his phone away.

4 u Pete replies almost instantly, and then he's suddenly at Patrick's side, grinning; cameras whir and camera phones click as he throws his arm over Patrick's shoulder, roughly hugging him close.

"If we were zebras, I'd hang out so close to Patrick all the time that the lions would think we were one big, two-headed, eight-legged mutant zebra with a bad attitude and a mean kick," Pete says loudly, and everyone laughs. He laughs too, and knocks Patrick's hat askew when he pulls back; knocks Patrick off balance a little. He glares, and Pete grins at him. "Patrick would be the ferocious half."

Patrick raises an eyebrow at him. "What half does that make you?"

"The shitty one," Pete says, then he punches Patrick on the arm and darts back to his group, to Dirty, cackling as their guides herd them on.

Just crazy Patrick texts him, one eye on his phone, the other on the smooth path; it'd be just his luck to wipe out on the groomed gravel and send his phone into the alligator pond or something.

u luv me it Pete replies, and Patrick smiles, puts his phone away. It's time for the monkey house.

~

Pete's hand carding through the hair at the back of his neck is distracting.

"I already groom him like he's my monkey buddy," Pete says to the fans around them. "That's how he gets all the ladies."

"He could get me!" some dude yells from the back, and everyone laughs; Patrick laughs, his face flushing.

"We'd have to monkey wrestle for that," Pete calls back, grin going a little sharp. "Loser gets the boy!"

Everyone laughs again and Patrick tries to shrug away from Pete's arm, says, "Hey, aren't we supposed to have separate groups, Pete?"

"They all like this better anyway," Pete says as he pretends to pick bugs out of Patrick's hair, his collar; pretends to eat them while the fans titter. Then Pete leans in closer, pulls Patrick's earlobe like he's looking behind it, and while Patrick is batting at him, laughing and trying to push him off, Pete's mouth brushes his ear. He says so only Patrick can hear, "Did you know monkeys fuck for fun, Patrick? Just like us."

"I'm--actually creeped out that you know that without being told," Patrick says, not shivering at the feel of Pete's warm breath on his neck, not at all. "No, you know, I'm really creeped out that you'd say that without like, being hit in the head first."

"Monkeys groom to bond, and then they fuck," Pete says, still against his ear, making Patrick squirm uncomfortably; he can see everyone watching them. "We're done after the penguins, right?"

"We're--yeah," Patrick says. "C'mon, let go. People are looking at us funny."

Pete finally pulls back, raises an eyebrow at him. "That's because they're funny-looking people," he says loudly, so everyone can hear. "Oh yeah, I said it," and everyone's laughing again, but Pete isn't, and his fingers brush across the back of Patrick's neck again before he pulls away.

~

Patrick can't actually prevent himself from saying, "Oh my God, I want one," at the Humboldt penguin habitat. They're small, kind of adorable--he's always liked aquatic creatures anyway, has a totally embarassing seahorse art collection at home. The only things he likes better are sea dragons and, apparently, tiny penguins.

He can feel Pete looking at him. "I don't mean, 'Get me one,'" he says, grinning back at Pete. "I'm actually totally really happy to just want one from here."

Pete is still eyeing him, considering. But as long as he's not looking at Dirty, who happens to be--yeah, Dirty's safely distracted, waddling like a penguin and making a couple girls howl with laughter--it should be all right.

"Did you know that sometimes male penguins carry the eggs around for their buddies?" Pete asks him, finally looking away, leaning on the rail to watch the penguins dart around in the water and waddle on the rocks beneath them.

"I may have heard that, yeah," Patrick says dryly; the guides had mentioned that more than once while they were looking at the big Emporer penguins in the colder building, the Antarctic habitat.

"I'd carry your egg around," Pete says, not looking at him. "You know, if we were penguins, and you wanted me to."

Patrick looks at him, the slightly defensive hunch of his shoulders, his bony hands dangling out over the water, the way he isn't looking at Patrick at all, not even from the corner of his eye.

"Maybe I'd be carrying yours," he says, and bumps his shoulder against Pete's, rests his arm on the railing so he can knock Pete's hand with his.

"Oh, please." Pete smiles a little. "I'm totally the daddy penguin. Who are you kidding, seriously."

"We can take turns," Patrick decides, magnanimous, and he flushes a little when Pete's grin goes sly, dirty. "You're bad," he says, knocking Pete's hand with his again.

"That's what she said," Pete says, leaning into him, and Patrick smiles, leans back. They watch the little penguins play in the sunshine, and Patrick enjoys the feel of Pete warm and happy beside him.

"Hey," Pete says casually, after a while. "And, you know, there's lots of stories about gay penguins raising eggs together. I've read about it on the internet. Happens all the time."

"Oh yeah, I heard about that," Patrick says, just as casual, but now he's flushing red enough that he hopes he can put it off as sunburn; his heart is pounding in his chest a little. They've talked a lot, a lot, about what they're doing; trust Pete to bring up serious stuff at the zoo, at the monkey house and the penguin habitat.

"Plus, penguins are faithful," Pete says, looking at him from the corner of his eye, not smiling, shoulders tight again. "Sometimes they mate for life, I heard."

And Patrick knows that's not exactly true, knows Pete is pulling this shit out of nowhere, but he also knows what Pete means. So he just laughs and leans into Pete as hard as he can, and says, "I know."

~

Back at their hotel, Pete says, "By the way, it's totally my turn to be the mommy penguin," and he laughs like a hyena as he drags Patrick off into his lair.

THE END

...or not...

...in another reality far far away

"Pete's been bringing Patrick rocks for the nest," Gerard says. His shift is over, he smells like the fish he was feeding the seals, and his hair is wet and smells like the pools, slicked back but strands dangling forward, brushing his jaw. He's leaning on the railing above the penguin habitat.

"You think he's confused?" Frank asks, leaning next to him, looking down at the penguin with a spray of black feathers across his belly. Pete drops another pebble in front of Patrick, Frank's favorite, a small male with brighter than average feathering on his head. Pete honks, honks, bows, until Patrick honks back, takes the pebble and adds it to the nest he's digging and building up in the dirt.

"Nah," Gerard says, watching them, amused. "I think he knows exactly what he's doing." He grins, touches Frank's wrist lightly, straightens up and tucks his hair behind his ears. "Hey, you wanna head out for a cigarette or something?"

"Will you let me buy you a coffee?" Frank asks, looking at him sideways through his bangs, and Gerard feels warmed all the way through, not just on the outside, like the sun's in his chest instead of shining overhead.

He smiles and says, "Yes."