Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Pioneer to the Falls
We are the same blood


The wind whipped dry leaves around Patrick's ankles as he stood on the sidewalk, waiting for Pete to return with his third pumpkin spice latte of the day. Across the street a plastic sheet with painted on eyes and wibbly, screaming mouth flapped in the breeze. He was studying his copy of Billboard magazine, flipping page after page, trying to find a review of the album, or a live show, or anything to say that their hard work and living on PB&J sandwiches had meant something to someone. He was starting to realise that maybe there wasn't anything in there this week, either.

"Dude, maybe it'll be in next week's?" Joe offered, sipping the pop from the rim of his can and prodding him in the calf with his battered blue Puma. He held his bag of Peeps tombstones out for him to take.

Patrick shook his head.

"Don't be bummed out, little dude, we'll make it. It's just that, like, nobody's ready for this level of awesome."

Joe's endless optimism about the band - or, as seemed increasingly likely, delusion - was one of the things that made Patrick fond of him. But it was also often the reason he wanted to smack him in the teeth, and today he wasn't sure which way he was leaning.

"We need a stunt," Pete announced, stepping out of the coffee shop behind them.

Patrick muttered, "But we already have you," slapping his magazine shut and rolling it up to stick it in his back pocket.

"Stunt," Joe clarified, grinning and catching his eye.

He couldn't help smiling back, in spite of his sour mood. That was another thing that made him fond of Joe: his big, stupid grin. And his wit. And his apparent lack of dignity or any desire to display any. Also, despite the madlibs trains of thought that came out of his mouth, sometimes, he was kind of smart. And he had the loveliest, saddest eyes of pretty much anyone he'd ever met. Fundamentally, Patrick really liked Joe, and it was starting to become a Thing.

"Look. We need attention, am I right? So, maybe we need to do something to get that, kind of."

"Isn't that why we're touring?"

"I'm pretty sure that I've like, spent two thirds of my life since we formed this band trying to annoy people into buying our stuff," Joe noted, with a marshmallow tucked into each cheek. "It hasn't worked, so far."

Ahead of them, Andy appeared out of an alleyway, brandishing a Blockbusters bag and looking both ways down the street. He beckoned them over. "Check this out!"

The shop was small and dark, lit by lamps and candles in large glass vessels. It smelled faintly of smoke and strongly of something Patrick recognised but couldn't place. At once citrusy and floral and musky. It was how he imagined the casbah in Raiders of the Lost Ark would have smelled. Old and mysterious. It made him feel pleasantly light headed as he wandered around the store, reading the names of the books on the shelves - some paperback with tatty spines, others leatherbound and thick.

"Check out that dummy," Joe hissed in his ear, nodding over to the counter at a figure in a dark paisley blouse, with a long, thick grey beard that blended into his hair below the shoulder. The dummy responded by turning to look at him and Joe grasped a fistful of Patrick's bodywarmer and gave a small yelp of fright, ducking behind him as he muttered, "Holy fucking shit, dude."

Patrick tried not to laugh. He didn't want to come into the guy's store and seem rude. He shrugged Joe off and smiled at the man, moving along to the next cabinet. It was glass fronted and filled with an assortment of curious objects. Some metal and shaped into stars or crescent moons, carved bells and chalices, a knife curved almost into a circle. Pendants and rings were displayed in dark velvet boxes, none of them with any prices on them, on shelves dotted with what looked like crystals and geodes.

"What is this place, man?" Joe asked, back at his ear again, sounding bewildered.

"I think it's what we call, 'a bookstore'," Patrick whispered.

He was pleased when Joe laughed and gave him a light shove in the back of the shoulder before wandering over to talk to Andy.

On the other side of the store, Pete was looking at a book. The cover was pinkish brown hide of some kind and its pages were yellow and dusty at the edges. He looked deep in thought, his eyebrows furrowed as he scanned the pages.

"What's that?"

The book was slammed shut and stuffed back on a shelf. "Nothing."

Patrick knew better than that. "Uh huh," he nodded slowly, wondering what the hell Pete was up to. "So, can we go home, now? It's Scary Movie Saturday, man, you promised me popcorn and scary monsters."

"Sure," Pete said, turning him by the shoulders and pushing him towards the door. "Let's go."

They'd reached the corner of the street when Pete cursed and said he'd forgotten his coffee. He turned and walked back towards the alley. "I'll catch you up."

---

The futon in the apartment was small, and fucked beyond repair, but they all fitted on it, just. Patrick complained about it constantly until he realised he could use the dip in the base as an excuse to rest his weight on Joe. Joe never complained. In fact, sometimes he'd insist that Pete move over so he could sit in the middle, if Patrick was already sitting on the end. He didn't want to read too much into it, but at least it seemed that Joe didn't mind.

Tonight, he climbed over three pairs of outstretched legs, carrying the bowl of microwave popcorn, to sit on the far end of the couch and squash himself down next to Patrick. He took a handful of kernels and shovelled half of them into his mouth before pushing the bowl on to Patrick's lap.

"Tho waf are we waffing firff?"

Andy grinned and presented a box with four girls in short skirts and what looked like school uniforms on the front.

"Dude, we told you: no dirty films," Patrick sighed, tossing a piece of popcorn at his face.

"It's not a dirty film!" Andy retorted, picking it out of his lap and eating it. "It does have a bunch of pretty girls in it, though…"

"It's also as cool as fuck!" Pete added, pressing the play button on the remote. "It's about a girl that starts a new school and starts hanging out with the outcasts, and they form this coven and all this weird shit starts to happen… Trust me, man, you're gonna like it."

Joe snorted, swallowing his food. "Wasn't this, like, some kind of edgy, girl power movie? My cousins were totally into it a few years ago, or something."

"So?"

"So, nothing - I'm just saying: it made a bunch of nerdy fifteen year olds try to be goths."

Patrick snatched the case out of Andy's hand and read it. The Craft. The girls on the cover were pretty, there was no denying that. In fact, now he looked at it more closely, he seemed to remember it being in the cinema. He'd never actually seen it, so why not?

"Duck Hunt, get the lights," Pete ordered, as the movie opened on a scene of three girls chanting, surrounded by candles. Patrick watched him climb off the futon, using Patrick's knee for leverage, and then stumble across the room in the light of the TV to fall back down at his side, heavily. Patrick looked over at him and they grinned at each other, noses inches apart.

If nothing else, at least he had Joe half-sitting in his lap and that more than made up for any shitty films he was going to endure tonight.

Two hours later, crawling off the futon to press the eject button to change the film, Andy declared, "I told you it was worth it."

"Well, the effects are better on Pong, but it was okay," Joe told him. "Kind of made me think of that weird store you like, dragged us into, earlier."

"Me too," Patrick nodded, feeling the cold of the room settle in where Joe's warmth had disappeared when he got to his feet to walk out to the kitchen and pick up the next round of snacks. He kicked the door back open with a bottle of rootbeer between each finger of one hand and a bowl of Hallowe'en M&Ms in the other, glancing away from Patrick as he put the bowl on the floor between his feet and Pete's to hand out the bottles. "The main girl was kind of cute. I like red heads."

Patrick's heart skipped a little and sank. He'd seen her in other stuff, it wasn't even her natural colour. "I thought the dude she cast the spell on was hot, until he turned out to be a dick."

"But I thought you like dick?" Joe said, feigning confusion and earning himself a kick in the ass as he scrambled back into his seat.

"He doesn't actually know," Pete corrected. "It's still theoretical."

"Fuck you, man." As if he wasn't self-conscious enough about it already…

"Maybe you could do some magic to fix that?" Andy grinned, climbing back on alongside them.

"And you can fuck right off, too."

Pete almost dropped his drink as he sat bolt upright and turned to Patrick with glee in his eyes. "No, wait - Hurley's right!"

"Oh, here we go…"

"I'm serious - we should do it! We should try that shit from the film! Magic, or whatever - see if that helps give us the boost we need to make the album sell."

"You are out of your mind," Patrick informed him, flatly.

"Have you come up with anything better?"

"Better than some kind of hocus pocus?"

"It has to be worth a shot, kind of - I mean, if it doesn't work, it doesn't work. Nobody has to know."

Andy chewed thoughtfully on a couple of Jujubes, the blue light from the TV casting eerie shadows on his face, and said, "Well, there could be something in it. There was a time when a lot of very cool people - writers and artists and stuff - really got into the occult. I mean, I'm talking Victorian London, but there must have been more to it than dressing up in robes and being creepy."

"I'm gonna be a Jedi, if we're like, becoming wizards," Joe announced, trying and failing to catch an M&M in his mouth. "Also totally rocking the robe."

"Well, you guys can do whatever you want, but tomorrow, I'm gonna go back to that store, or whatever, and I'm gonna see what that old dude can sell me."

And that was why, at lunchtime the next day, Patrick found himself pushing aside the wooden beads behind the door of the little bookshop and following Pete inside.

The bearded man didn't look like he'd moved since they walked out the day before. The store still smelled the same, but some kind of chant was playing softly in the background. It reminded him of the Native American performance group he'd seen at the state fair, once. It was beautiful and haunting and ran a tingle up his spine, the drumming slightly hypnotic.

"So… you got anything that helps with success, kind of?"

Pete was leaning both elbows on the counter, talking to the bearded man behind it.

"Probably," the man said. "You'll have to be more specific than that."

"Well, the thing is, we're a band, right? And we could kind of do with a little extra support, or whatever. Something to light a fire under the sales of the album we just put out, you know what I mean?"

The man nodded slowly, a glint in his eye that made Patrick's stomach flip.

"We're not looking for any old hokum, though, man - this is serious."

"Dealing with magic should always be serious. It's not something that should be entered into lightly, or you'll do more harm than good. There's power in this universe that is much, much bigger than you or I could ever comprehend. When you begin to perform magic, you turn on a light. What comes toward that light might be more than you expect. Do you think you're prepared for that, son?"

"Well," Pete began, carefully, "maybe if we had someone like you to guide us, we'd be better informed."

The man smirked. "My name's Frank, not Yoda."

"Okay, Frank, so maybe you could start us off with a book or something, kind of? Tell us what we need, we'll come back if we need any clarification."

Twenty minutes later, Patrick was laden with bags of coloured candles, jars of incense and a small stone dish to burn them in, an antler-handled ceremonial knife that he was pretty sure Andy was going to lose his shit over, two books and a chalice carved from yew.

He wasn't convinced they needed or could afford any of it, but Pete had listened so intently to everything Frank had to say, that he hadn't had the heart or the energy to suggest that maybe they go away and think about it. Pete spent the evening curled into the easy chair with his books and a fancy new journal, making notes in the light of a white church candle on the windowsill. He'd downloaded some kind of sub-Enya ethereal music from Napster and was listening to it to "focus". Patrick and Joe sat in the kitchen, thighs pressed together under the tiny table, watching him through the door as they ate bowls of cereal.

"Is he really fucking serious about this?" Joe whispered, dipping his spoon in Patrick's bowl to steal a marshmallow from his Lucky Charms and earning himself a smack on the hand with Patrick's spoon.

"I think he is. When he took me to that store, earlier, he was asking all kinds of questions about what meant what, y'know? Like, colours and stuff."

Joe pulled a face. "Well. I guess if he wants to light a few candles and burn some shit and chant a bit, it can't totally hurt."

Patrick hmmed, noncommittally. He didn't know the first thing about magic, but he was pretty sure that if he knew anyone who could exploit it, Pete was top of the list. But he had a weird feeling about all of this, something churning in the pit of his stomach, that maybe - just maybe - this time they were dabbling in things that were beyond their ken.

---

When Andy came over for practice on Wednesday night, Pete met him at the door and told him he didn't need to bring his kit up, because they were doing something else. Standing in his doorway, holding his guitar in one hand and his practice amp in the other, Joe looked across at Patrick, who blinked back at him and shrugged. No, man, no idea. Joe sighed exaggeratedly at him and disappeared back into his room to put his things away.

In the middle of the living room floor, Pete had set up a couple of picnic blankets and four cushions, with the wooden chopping board from the kitchen in the middle. At the centre was a large, white candle on a plate. Around it, were the antler knife and scattered piles of sage leaves. The only reason Patrick even recognised them was because his grandma had a plant in the garden and put it in pork stuffing.

"We're doing it tonight?" he asked, feeling Joe step up close behind him to peer into the room over his shoulder.

"Woah."

"We're not doing it tonight. Tonight we're finding our mojo, or whatever."

"A little warning would have been nice," Andy complained, dumping his bass drum behind the door. "I had to dismantle this whole thing!"

"Quit bitching, man, if we figure this out, you'll never have to set up your own kit ever again."

After twenty minutes of gathering drinks and catching up, Pete herded them into the living room and pulled a compass and a piece of paper with a diagram on it out of his pocket. He pushed Patrick with his fingertips until he was standing in front of the grubby green cushion on the floor, then stepped in front of the red one opposite. He grabbed Andy by the wrist and pulled him in front of a blue cushion that Patrick had never seen before, leaving a mustard colour one free for Joe. But Andy pulled his hand away and stepped across to the yellow one.

"Are you serious? Did you even read about this stuff?"

"What?"

"Joe? Air? Are you kidding me?"

"I resent that!" Joe complained, before uncertainly adding, "I… assume."

"Dude, you're so water you're practically dripping."

"What does that even mean?" Patrick asked. "And why the hell am I standing here?"

"You're Earth!" Pete and Andy snapped simultaneously.

"But why? I don't know what the fuck is going on!"

"You're Earth," Andy explained slowly. "Steadfast, consistent - "

"Stubborn as fuck," Pete added.

" - our greatest resource."

"And why's Joe Water, then?"

"Because he's mercurial and constantly in motion and - okay, imagine white water - like a stream or something?"

"Right…?"

"Well, you can't catch it, right? You can get a little in your hands for a minute, but then it's gone."

That definitely sounded like Joe to Patrick, based on his experience. For all the times he thought opportunity was looming on the horizon, never once had it come through for him.

"I kind of don't get it, but I'll just like, go with the flow or whatever," Joe shrugged.

Patrick grinned at him. "Good one."

"Huh?"

"Go with the flow? Water?"

"Oh! Hah. Yeah."

Pete smacked Joe in the shoulder impatiently. "Would you two try to take this seriously? I put a lot of effort into this!"

"What're you hitting me for?! He made the joke!"

"Okay," Patrick nodded, taking a deep breath and trying to sound serious. "So, what are you?"

"Fire."

"Well, that stands to reason."

"It's not about setting fire to things," Andy told them, rolling his eyes. "It's passion, motivation, leadership -"

"I dunno, bro, Patrick's pretty passionate…" Joe shrugged. "Maybe he should be Fire."

"- and as much as it pains me to say this, Pete is our leader."

"Speak for yourself," Patrick muttered. "And what are you?"

"Air. Knowledge. Intuition. Functions of the higher mind."

"So, how come that isn't me?" Joe asked, quirking an eyebrow at him.

"You honestly want me to answer that?"

It was quite plain that Pete was reaching the end of his tether and that he was either about to stomp off and write a cryptic LiveJournal post because no one was taking him seriously, or he was going to start a brawl.

"Alright. So. What now?" Patrick asked.

Without answering, Pete sat down on his cushion and waved at them all to follow suit.

"We're going to cast a circle, right?" Andy asked. "Before we start?"

"Yes. But can I fucking explain, first?"

"Okay, okay - I was just checking…"

From what Patrick could gather, from Pete's description of what was going to happen and the scrap of paper which his instructions on it, they were going to meditate. Which all seemed like a lot of trouble to do something his drama teacher had made them do for five minutes at the start of every lesson.

"So, hold hands," Pete said, when he'd decided that everyone was ready.

Patrick held out his hand for Joe to take, watching him rub his sweaty palm on the thigh of his trackpants before lightly placing it over Patrick's. He didn't bother with the hand he gave to Pete. Patrick smiled at him encouragingly and wrapped his fingers around Joe's, trying not to think about what they were doing or concentrate on the fact that his heart was starting to race a little.

"Okay, Hurley: you're up."

Andy took a deep breath. "I call the guardians of the watchtower of the East - the element of Air. Bring us your powers of intuition, knowledge and insight. Your wisdom and imagination. We bid you hail and welcome."

"Hail and welcome," the three of them echoed.

Pete followed, calling the guardians of the South and the element of fire with its powers of transformation and the guiding beacon of its light.

Joe cast Patrick an uncertain sidelong glance and cleared his throat to read from the scrap of paper balanced on his crossed ankles. "I call the guardians of the watchtower of the West - the element of Water. Bring us your powers of, um… healing and fluidity… the power of intuition and ability change course. We bid you hail and, uh, welcome, dudes."

Pete narrowed his eyes at him, but said nothing other than his echoed 'hail and welcome'.

"So," Patrick began, rattling through his notes as quickly as he could. "I call the guardians of the watchtower of the North - the element of Earth. Bring us your powers of stability and permanence. Your powers of endurance and abundance. We bid you hail and welcome."

Pete got to his feet and walked around them clockwise, dropping a dusting of salt from the shaker on to the floor. Joe watched him, horrified. "You'd better fucking be the one to vacuum that back up after we're done, dude."

"Shh. I cast this circle as a space of peace and protection through which no ill will shall pass."

He sat back down and folded his legs, taking a long, slow breath. "Okay. We're gonna start out with a meditation. I want you to think about your element and what it means, and how you can kind of like, embody it, yeah? Imagine that those things are running in your veins. When we come back down, we're gonna talk about what we learned, or whatever, and we're gonna do a kind of taster spell to see what happens. Something with a quick turn around, okay? We need to be able to measure it."

"That's cool, but like, how do you start a meditation?" Joe asked, looking around at the three of them, as if he thought they all knew.

"If you wait, I'll guide you," Pete replied, shifting his weight on the cushion. "Everyone get as comfortable as you can in this position."

"My back already hurts…"

"In a minute you'll be thinking about other stuff, okay? Just close your eyes and focus."

"Also," Andy added, "you two don't still need to be holding hands."

"Oh." Patrick felt his face warm a little and carefully loosened his fingers from Joe's. "Sorry."

"I don't mind…"

"Everybody close your fucking eyes and stop flirting with each other!"

"I'm not flirting!" Patrick snapped defensively, eyes already shut. He opened his right one just a little and looked around the circle. Andy was sitting up straight, chin perfectly level, breathing even. Pete's head was slightly inclined, his shoulders slowly relaxing. Joe's eyes were closed, but he was frowning, his head dipped and his shoulders dropped. Maybe he really wasn't into doing this at all.

"Listen to my voice. Take a long, slow breath and feel the floor beneath you. Acknowledge it, and let it go. Take a long, deep breath and acknowledge the sounds around you - the traffic in the street outside, the refrigerator in the kitchen - and let it go. Concentrate on breathing deeply and evenly and let every muscle in your body relax - from the top of your head, through your face, and neck, down your arms and back, through your thighs, down to your toes. Let any negativity flow out of you and evaporate into the aether."

This wasn't so hard. This, he could do.

"Now, I want you to imagine that you're outside - you're out in nature, somewhere that reflects your element. I want you to spend some time exploring your surroundings, making a mental note of the smells and the sounds and the things you can see. If you meet someone, remember them and ask them - in your mind - for any messages they have for you. Don't open your eyes or speak, or disturb anyone else."

Patrick took another slow breath and tried to clear his mind. Almost instantly, he found himself standing in a forest, the trees were huge and old, bare - moss growing up their trunks - the air smelled of fallen leaves and soil but the ground was frozen with frost. It was misty and chill and he could hear a waterfall somewhere nearby. Immediately, instinctively, he thought Joe, and set off towards it. The bubbling water sounded like his laughter; the low, delighted chuckle he gave when he was happy. There was a small, babbling brook winding its way through the tree roots, so Patrick followed it, realising his feet were socked and muddy, but not cold. He could feel the moss and the leaves slippery under his toes. As he walked, the brook grew into a stream, and the stream grew into a small river, until the land fell away in front of him, and rocks jutted out from the soil, the water cascading over them. He stepped up to the edge, strangely unafraid of the height that would usually have paralysed him with terror, and looked down.

There, in the pool amongst the froth was Joe, treading water and looking back up at him.

"Dude, I've been waiting for you."

"You have?"

"For ages. Come down!"

"How?"

"You have to jump."

"I can't."

"It's okay, man, I've got you!"

Patrick looked around, at the trees below - some of the leaves were still green, most turning yellow and red and fluttering as they fell. It was still fall, here. He twisted and looked behind him, but the trees that way were just as bare as before.

"If you jump, I'll catch you, I promise!"

He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. He trusted Joe, but swimming was never his thing. He wasn't good at it, he didn't like it and he didn't know if he could do it after jumping off a cliff into a lagoon.

Still, he steadied himself and looked down at the water below him. "Alright." Nervously, he lifted one foot and held it out over thin air, feeling himself tip forward into nothing.

Pete's voice broke his fall. "Okay. When you're ready, say goodbye to anybody you met, and feel yourself coming back to the physical plane."

Patrick's eyes opened instantly, and snapped across to Joe. Joe's eyes were also wide open, his pupils dilated in the dim candle light. He was staring straight at Patrick, his cheeks flushed. Somehow Patrick knew, without either of them saying anything, that whatever had just happened was supremely fucking weird.

Pete was grinning before his eyes opened. His teeth glinting in the flickering orange.

"That was awesome."

Andy was still sitting with his eyes closed, a sedate smile on his lips. He nodded slightly and blinked, returning to the room.

"So, we're gonna go over what just happened," Pete said, "I wanna know what you saw, or if you got any messages or anything, kind of."

"Uh. What if I don't want to share it?" Joe asked, awkwardly.

"You have to, it's the whole point!"

Andy looked at him, curiously. "Joe? You okay?"

"Yeah, but…"

"I think…" Patrick cleared his throat and started again, reaching out to put a hand on Joe's shoulder, feeling it tense under his fingers. "Dude: waterfall?"

He blushed furiously in response and nodded, gazing down at the candle in front of them.

"I think our meditation things might have overlapped a little."

"Holy shit!" Pete gasped. "Are you serious?!"

"Yeah. I was in a forest and I could hear a waterfall, so I walked towards it and at the bottom, Joe was hanging out in the water. It's no big deal." He let his hand drop from Joe's shoulder, back to his own lap, not really sure it was as true for Joe as it was for him.

"Did you say anything to each other, or whatever?"

"He told me to come down to the lake. Nothing interesting."

Joe looked over at him, sidelong, and gave him a small, grateful smile.

"Oh. Well, that's a total waste of time, thanks."

Patrick tried not to catch Andy's eye; he could feel the weight of his gaze and he had an uncomfortable feeling he wasn't convinced by Patrick's version of the truth.

"What about you, Hurley?"

"It was peaceful," Andy said, thoughtfully. "A raven came to me."

"Did it say anything?"

"Well, no, bro - it was a raven. But it stayed with me while I sat in a tall tree, watching over the treetops. I could feel the breeze in my face. It was beautiful."

Pete looked dubious. "I was walking through a wildfire. But it was alright, kind of? I didn't feel afraid or anything. The fire wasn't gonna burn me, like I was part of it, or something. There were animals running past me, though - like they were trying to get away."

"So, wait - are we saying we all wound up in the woods?" Patrick asked.

One by one, the others seemed to think about it, and slowly nodded.

"Well, that's a good sign, right? It must mean we're all on the same page, y'know?"

"Some of us more than others," Pete noted, watching Joe pick at the skin on the side of his nails, nervously. "You two ought to make something of that. See if it happens again."

Joe looked up at him sharply but said nothing.

"What are we doing next?" Patrick asked, trying to change the subject. He had a feeling that Joe was one misstep away from bolting and swearing off anything magical ever again, and now that they'd started, Patrick was kind of getting into it. He was curious as to what exactly Joe had seen, ever so slightly hopeful.

"Okay, so, next we're gonna do a little spell." Pete pulled some small squares of card out of his hoodie pocket and handed them all pens. "I need you to write down something you want on these. Make it simple, right? No 'world peace' bullshit. Stuff that could happen and you'd know, kind of. Something reasonable. This is our fucking litmus test. Oh - and don't go wishing for a bigger dick or anything, because you're gonna have to ask for it out loud in a second."

"Well - like what, though, dude?" Joe asked, hopelessly. "I wasn't exactly, like, prepared for this."

"So, what do you want, that could happen?"

Patrick shrugged and pressed the button on the top of his pen. "I'm gonna ask for a payrise."

"Yeah, that's fine - that could work."

"I think I'm just gonna ask for a sign, you know?" Andy added. "I want to know that whatever's out there is okay with us doing this."

"You want to ask for permission, bro? What kind of fucking anarchist asks for permission to do subversive shit like this, man?"

"An anarchist who thinks fucking with powers greater than he is, is a great time to be polite about it."

"He's got a point," Patrick said, carefully adding 'please' to his note.

"Well, I'm asking to be the name on everybody's lips, this weekend," Pete told them, smugly, writing his request in careless slashes. "Joe. Choose something, bro."

"But…" Joe spread his hands, looking down at the blank square on his knee, the pen wound between his fingers. "I don't… Like, I don't know what to ask for?"

"What about a new computer so you can give me your old one?" Andy grinned optimistically.

"There's gotta be something you want, man, seriously!"

"Not that I want to talk about in front of you assholes."

Pete arched an eyebrow at him, "Oh yeah?"

"What about - " Patrick twirled his pen in his fingers, focusing on it intently, wondering how hard this was going to backfire on him "- if there's maybe someone you're into, or something like that?"

"How much of an idiot do you think I am, dude?" Joe demanded, jerking his thumb at Pete. "I'm not giving him that kind of ammunition!"

"Oh. Sorry."

"Honestly, little bro, I don't even fucking care, right now. I just want you to pick something, so we can get the fuck on with it."

Joe gazed at the ceiling for inspiration, his mouth open a little. "I… fuck. I don't know - maybe… maybe I could just ask to be happy. I mean, that's what everyone wants, fundamentally, right…?"

"Okay, whatever, man - just write it down."

With a heavy sigh, Joe pulled the lid off his pen with his teeth and carefully wrote out, 'Be happy.' Patrick gave him a sympathetic pat on the arm as he folded up his square of paper. It bummed him out a little that Joe felt he needed a spell to be happy, Joe was a strange mix of melancholy and whimsy and unbridled optimism; he never really believed that he was anything other than happy, though.

Joe held up his folded note between his fingers and looked at Pete, determinedly. "And?"

"Now, we ask for it." Pete cleared his throat. "Repeat after me: mark, O spirits, hear my plea, bring that which I desire to me." He nodded to Andy, who stated his request and held his paper into the flame, placing the burning scraps on the piles of leaves on the plate. One by one, they followed suit, the room starting to fill with the smell of scorched sage.

They watched the paper and leaves turn to ash, in silence, the flames melting the edges of the wax on the pillar candle until they burned down to nothing. It had a strangely spiritual feeling, for Patrick. He didn't entirely know what they were really expecting to achieve, or if any of it was going to work, but for the time they weren't bickering, it had been an oddly calming and pleasant experience.

He followed Pete's lead as they thanked the spirits and sent them on their way and then dismantled their invisible circle. It may have been the power of suggestion, but it seemed almost that the room felt different, afterwards. Less full, somehow, even when they all crammed themselves onto the futon with drinks and contemplated their work.

It was later that night, when Andy had left and Pete was in his room, talking to his his girlfriend on the phone, that Joe appeared in Patrick's doorway. His arms were tucked across his stomach, his shoulder propped against the frame. Patrick pulled his headphones off and smiled at him, puzzled.

"Hey. You okay?"

"Yeah."

"D'you need anything?"

"No… I just." He stood up straighter and stepped in a little. "Thanks. For earlier."

"For what?"

Joe looked over his shoulder, out towards Pete's door, and pushed the door almost closed behind himself. "For the meditation thing."

"Oh." Patrick shifted to encourage him to sit down on the bed, next to him. "It's fine, dude, I just told the truth."

"Did you?"

"Well, it was an abridged version, y'know? But it was what happened."

Pausing for a second, Joe hovered by the door, and then moved over to perch on the end, one of his knees pulled up to his chest. "The thing is, dude, you were asking me to come toyou. 'Come out of the water' and stuff."

"You were telling me to jump into the water," Patrick told him. "I didn't know what it meant or anything, I just thought that you wanted to hang out."

Joe nodded, slowly. "I guess that was it."

"Did it freak you out or something, dude? You seemed kind of uncomfortable when we came back out of it."

Joe nodded and looked like he wanted to say something else, but closed his mouth, frowning at nothing.

"Do you think Pete was right? That maybe we should try it again?" Patrick tried, hoping Joe would agree. Aside from being curious about what might happen in their strange little mind meld world, he sort of hoped hanging out and doing intense stuff like this together might help his cause.

"I don't know, dude, maybe."

"Well, I'm down. I'm pretty sure we don't need to go through all the salty crap to meditate, it's just a case of sitting down quietly and getting in the zone, y'know? We used to have to do it in one of my high school classes."

"Okay…."

"Good. Cool. I mean, I think it'll be interesting, if nothing else, y'know? See if it was a coincidence."

Joe nodded again.

"So… what did you make of the whole thing tonight?"

"I dunno, man, it all felt a little dumb until that happened."

"Yeah."

"I kind of wish I'd thought of something else, for my spell thing."

"If it works, maybe you can choose something else next time. 'Cause you know that if this works, he won't want to stop and we're going to end up a frickin' black metal band or something, writing odes to Odin."

Patrick was pleased to see the laugh spread across Joe's face. It changed the atmosphere entirely and Joe shifted to sit beside him, legs spread down the bed, almost ankle to ankle save for the height difference.

"So, what do we do when Pete, like, invokes God and becomes an all-powerful nut?" Joe asked seriously.

"I don't know, dude. Maybe we should ask Frank."

"Frank?"

"Old guy from the bookstore."

"Oh. What else do you think we can use this stuff for?"

"Depends if it works. We might get a fat lot of nothing out of it."

"Except an apartment that smells like weed, now."

"Except that," Patrick grinned.

---

The next morning, when Patrick arrived at work, his manager took him into the office and told him their supervisor had been in a car wreck and was going to be in hospital for months. Patrick stared at the brand new name badge being held out to him, with 'Supervisor' printed under it, and felt a little sick.

Chapter Text

The Air Was Full
Believe that life can change, that you're not stuck in vain


When Patrick got home that night, he wasn't sure if he'd rather be alone to wallow in his guilt at what he felt sure he'd inadvertently caused, or desperate for company, so that he didn't have to dwell on it. He took off his coat and threw it into his room, then wandered into the living room to see if Joe was sitting there, playing on his Playstation, like he usually was. He was disappointed to find that tonight, he wasn't.

Despondently, he opened the fridge, hoping to feel inspired by one of the ready meals. He closed it again, still feeling queasy, and decided to see if Pete was home. It was Pete who'd appreciate this information more than anyone else. He was pretty sure that Pete would consider it evidence of a hard victory.

He was standing at Pete's door, about to knock, when Joe appeared, looking like he'd just woken up. His increasingly wild curls were a mess and he had creases from the pillow all down one cheek.

"He went out," Joe mumbled, rubbing his face. "You okay, dude?"

Patrick exhaled heavily, almost ready to collapse in a deflated heap. "Oh, Joe - I've had the worst day, man."

"How come?" Joe asked, suddenly more alert, his hand finding it's way to Patrick's shoulder comfortingly, rubbing at the seam on his plaid shirt.

"I got promoted."

At first, Joe looked confused, like he wasn't completely sure he was awake, yet. "But…?" Then the realisation seemed to sink in. "Your pay rise?"

"Yeah."

"Dude."

"I fucking know, right?" Patrick said, and the sick feeling was fading away under the rush of disbelief and frustration, like at last he could share this completely insane and unacceptable turn of events with someone who'd understand. "And you know why I got a promotion, man?" He didn't wait for Joe to respond. "Because my actual supervisor, Ian, is in the hospital. He's in the damn hospital because last night, he decided to go to a bar and drive home."

"Dude."

"So, now I'm supervisor and I get an extra two dollars an hour, and that was so not what I meant."

Joe didn't even seem to know what to say. He just patted him on the shoulder, heavily. "Well… I mean, technically, it worked, dude."

"Yeah, but -"

"And it's not like he didn't bring it on himself, if he was drunk, basically."

"But what if he wouldn't have, if -?"

"Honestly, man, we did that whole thing last night - when would these guardian dudes even have time to make that happen? It has to be, like, a really weird coincidence or something."

Patrick sighed, grateful for Joe's uncharacteristically pragmatic perspective. "Maybe you're right."

"Of course, dude, I'm like, Mr Right, or something." It took a second for Joe to realise what he'd said, and by that time Patrick was blushing. He pulled a face. "Or not."

Patrick laughed, nervously, and they stood in awkward silence for a moment until Joe asked:

"Did you eat?"

"Not yet, I kind of couldn't stomach anything I have, to be honest."

"You want to get take out or something? I'll buy you dinner to make you feel better if you want…"

"Thanks, dude, but you don't need to do that - "

"I know I don't, but I still have the money my parents gave me for my birthday, and I kind of need some help spending it or something."

By the time Patrick went to bed, that night, he was feeling a lot better about everything. Maybe it was a coincidence or maybe Ian was a goddamn idiot who was lucky the only person he screwed over was himself. Joe had told him it was probably confirmation bias, anyway: he was looking for it, so he assumed that the two things were connected when it did happen.

When he fell asleep, he dreamed of the forest, making his way straight to Joe's waterfall and laying down on the rocks to watch him floating peacefully in the water, unseen.


---

They had a show that Friday. The Metro was one of their favourite venues, because it felt like a real show, rather than standing in a corner of a room that looked like a run down gym hall. They may only be the second band on the bill, but it made them feel lucky to be playing there at all.

The problem was, four songs into their nine song set, as Pete balanced on the edge of the stage, clasping his mic in both hands and screaming down at the front row, he tipped. Patrick watched it happen in slow motion, the frantic flail for purchase - something, anything to steady himself - but there was nothing. The wide open stage ran straight into the crowd, which parted like the the red sea and swallowed him whole.

Patrick and Joe looked at each other, trying to keep playing, because surely he'd resurface in a second and crowd surf back to the stage - except the kids down the front were all bowing down, scrambling to lift him to his feet. Pete was out cold.

---

"Well, his spell thing worked," Joe told Patrick around a piece of toast, sitting cross-legged in his pyjamas at his computer desk.

"It did?" Patrick asked. He'd fallen asleep face down in Joe's room when they stumbled in from the emergency room after 3am. Andy was presumably in Pete's, monitoring his concussion. After getting him through the door and sending him to bed, Joe had gone on the band's website and posted a message to let people know he was fine. Patrick had collapsed on the bed, exhausted, intending to help him word the message and falling asleep before the desktop had even fully booted up. Now, he was under the covers, fully dressed, and confused.

Joe waved his toast at the screen.

"We got replies, dude."

Squinting and putting on his glasses, he clambered down to the bottom of the bed and looked over Joe's shoulder. The band's email inbox was flooded with notifications.

---

"Well, if we've learned anything," Andy told them, seriously, "it's that we need to be specific. We've been too general. In the module on folklore, in my course, there was a lot of interesting stuff about intent and mischief. If something went wrong, people would blame it on faeries and bad spirits who they thought would fuck with people for fun. I kind of wonder if this is the same principle."

"Well, what happened to yours?" Patrick asked.

"Well, there have been a couple of things which were sort of interesting. You know how I had a raven in my vision? Next morning, I was washing the dishes for my mom, and one landed right at the window. It sat there, kind of looking at me, so I threw a few pieces bread out on the back porch. When I went to take out the trash, later, I found this, right where I put the bread." He pulled a shiny, amber coloured glass bead from his pocket. "Look at the colour."

"Yellow. For air," Pete said, reaching out to touch it.

"Exactly."

"What was the other thing?"

"Less cool: I was driving home at like 2am, and a fox ran out in front of me, and just stopped and looked me in the eye. Just stood there. And then it ran off. Which could mean nothing, because they do that all the time, I guess…"

"I mean, I'd take that as approval, kind of."

"What about you, dude?" Patrick asked, tugging on one of Joe's curls, gently.

"I still think this could all be a coincidence," Joe said, from where he was sitting on the floor, propped against the futon and Patrick's leg.

"Dude, are you actually fucking serious?" Pete demanded, laughing. "Were you even there last night?"

"Sure. I watched your ass nosedive off a stage and fuck up our best show."

"Hey - people are gonna fucking remember my name now, though, right?"

Patrick rolled his eyes, because of course Pete would consider a disaster a total success.

"We should try some of the really cool stuff, next."

"Next time, instead of 'I want a payrise,' it has to be 'I would like to be rewarded for my hard work and commitment with a reasonable increase in pay.' You can't leave room for interpretation," Andy said, seriously. "We can't get anyone caught up in the crossfire."

"I'm talking, like, levitating shit, like they did in the movie."

"Pete, it was a movie. You cannot seriously believe - ?"

"Don't know 'til we've tried it, bro."

And that was how, ten minutes of arguing later, Patrick found himself laying on the living room floor, still complaining that this was a ridiculous idea. As it turned out, he was right. They were no more able to levitate him than they were to juggle water, but as the other three crouched around him, Joe's fingers wedged under his hip and his thigh, Pete's under his shoulders and Andy's at his ankles, whispering "light as a feather, stiff as a board" there was a sudden crash and the sound of ceramic shattering on the kitchen floor.

They all scrambled to their feet, rushing to the doorway to see, Andy ahead of them all, bracing his hands against the doorframe to stop them all shredding their feet to pieces on the dish rack of crockery spread across the linoleum floor. A dish rack of crockery that was six feet across the floor from the draining board it had started out on.

"How the fuck…?" Pete murmured.

"Dude. There's no way."

"Of course there's a way," Andy replied carefully, stepping into the room on tiptoes to avoid the shards and turning around to look for reasons the collection of mugs and dishes may have met their end. "Maybe they were stacked poorly."

"Hey, fuck you - I do an awesome job of stacking that thing!" Joe complained, and they all knew that Joe was the only one who ever bothered to wash up, so there was no one else to blame.

Later, after they'd spent hours debating the potential causes of ar-mug-geddon, and found themselves with no more solid an explanation than when they started, Pete left to be fussed over by his girlfriend and Andy went to hang out with their other friends for a while before heading back to Milwaukee. Neither Patrick nor Joe had felt inclined to join them. It had been a long weekend already, and it was only Saturday evening.

Instead, they sat together on the broken futon, propped shoulder to shoulder with one of Pete's books on their knees, browsing through the lists of correspondences and diagrams of magical symbols. Nowhere did it mention shared meditations, which was a little disappointing. They resorted to the internet for advice, perched together on Joe's desk chair, and found nothing more than theoretical forum posts there, either.

"Maybe we should just, like, try it again?" Joe suggested, when they reached the tenth page of search results.

Patrick's stomach fluttered. "I mean… we could."

"Pete thinks we should."

"Oh, well if Pete thinks so," he grinned, watching a self-conscious smile creep across Joe's face.

Joe got to his feet, the chair almost tipping as it unbalanced, and wiped both of his palms on his jeans. He went to his CD collection and dug out a copy of the Fellowship of the Ring OST. "Will this do for background noise?"

Patrick couldn't quite suppress a snigger. "Yeah, I guess?"

"If we're gonna keep doing this, I could like, invest in something authentic, if you want?"

"We're good, man," Patrick assured him, getting up and waiting for Joe to light the jar candle on his dresser and climb onto the bed before he followed, sitting opposite him, cross legged. They looked at each other nervously, not really sure what to do.

"Do we need to hold hands, or…?"

"We could," Patrick offered. "I don't think it's strictly necessary, y'know, but it might help us stay kind of grounded… or like, connect or something."

Before he'd even finished his sentence, Joe hands were in front of him, palms upturned. Patrick smiled a little, shifting them knee to knee, their toes pressed together awkwardly, just so that he could reach out to hold them. It quickly became clear that this wasn't going to be comfortable, but after much self-conscious fumbling, they settled with legs spread like ragdolls, Patrick's laid over the top of Joe's.

"Pete can never hear of this," Joe informed him seriously, picking up Patrick's hands and holding them in their laps, his eyes already closed.

Patrick nodded, biting his lip so hard it hurt, because it was Joe - just Joe, who he slept next to in the van and practically sat on his lap on the futon and didn't kick him out when he fell asleep in his bed still sweaty and gross after shows - but he didn't think any amount of meditation was going to get his heartrate down after this.

"I'll meet you at the waterfall," Joe said, as if there was any doubt.

When Patrick opened his eyes in the other world, he was sitting on the rocks at the top, his feet dangling over the edge. He looked down into the water for Joe, and was surprised to find he wasn't there. Aside from the bubbling of the water rushing into the pool, there was nothing.

"Joe?" he yelled, looking around at the shore, starting to think that Joe hadn't made it through, yet. Worrying that maybe it was all a coincidence, that there was no weird mind meld going on at all. He climbed to his feet, wondering how best to get down to the lake so he could look for him properly. "JOE?"

The hand on his shoulder was warm in the chilly air. "I'm right here, dude." Joe was standing next to him, ankle-deep in the flowing river, balancing precariously on a submerged rock. "I was waiting."

"You said that last time," Patrick told him, realising that he was soaked through and ice crystals were beginning to form on the threads of torn denim across his knees. "Aren't you cold?"

"Not really," Joe shrugged. "Last time you told me to come out, and the others aren't here, so… I'm out."

Patrick blinked and looked around them. He didn't really know what that meant.

"So… what now?"

The seasons hadn't changed at all, the leaves were still falling from the trees below them, but they didn't seem to be getting any less laden.

"Maybe we should like, explore or something?"

Joe's feet were bare as he used Patrick's shoulders to steady himself and stepped out onto the frozen earth of the riverbank. The water dripped from his clothes and sank into the soil as they made their way through the trees. He didn't know where they were going on how they'd find their way back, but it was okay - he felt safe. The light breeze rustling through the remaining leaves in the treetops was comforting.

As they walked, the ground seemed to slowly defrost, crocuses pushing up through the moss around them. In the trees, birds seemed to be nesting, the hacking squawk of carrion carrying through the forest around them.

Before long, they emerged from the trees on a cliff edge, the land falling away in front of them to charred spears of burnt out tree trunks. The earth was blackened and the air smelled acrid, tasted bitter on Patrick's tongue.

"Pete?" he whispered, scanning the landscape for any trace of flame or smoke, any sign of life under the vivid summer sun.

"Everything's destroyed. What the fuck did he do?"

"It wasn't him, it couldn't have been."

"Dude, he's Fire. If this is the place we all go, then what else was it?"

"Sometimes shit just happens, y'know?"

"I don't know - I have a bad feeling about this."

Patrick's eyes opened wide, staring straight into Joe's glinting with yellow light. For a moment he had no idea where he was or what was happening, but then Pete's voice behind him and the feel of Joe yanking his hands out of his grip brought him abruptly back to reality.

"What the fuck are you two even doing?" he was saying, barely contained laughter in his voice.

Joe was scrambling out from under Patrick's legs, pushing him off to get the lamp in the now darkened room. "Don't you ever fucking knock?"

"I'm sorry, did I interrupt something private?"

"We were just meditating," Patrick told him, annoyed at the intrusion and a little disoriented.

"What time is it?" Joe asked, holding the empty jar the candle had sat in.

"After midnight, why?"

Patrick looked at the watch on his wrist. 00.11. "But we started at like, nine or something?"

Joe looked at him darkly, nodding.

---

"So… you and Duck Hunt…?"

"Were meditating," Patrick insisted, flopping back on the foot of Pete's bed. Joe had kicked them both out and said he was going to sleep, so Patrick had followed Pete into his room.

"Like, I don't know what books you've been reading, or whatever, but you don't need to sit in his lap to do it, kind of."

"It was the only way we could hold hands!"

"Don't need to do that, either."

"We thought it might help."

"Might help you get laid, maybe."

"Pete, would you just stop? It was totally innocent."

"Oh, totally," Pete smirked at him.

Patrick swung out a fist and thumped him in the hip as he passed. "Leave it alone, asshole."

Pete responded by throwing himself down on the bed, half pinning him to the mattress. "So, when you slept in his bed, last night, what happened then, dude?"

"Literally nothing. I just fell asleep."

"Honestly, I'm disappointed. Such a wasted opportunity! I throw myself onto my skull from a height and you can't even get a handjob out of it. You want me to say something?"

"There's nothing to say!" Patrick lied, blushing fiercely, because the last thing he wanted was for Joe to find out, and the fastest way for your secrets to get out was always to confide them in Pete, even if he swore he'd keep them. Mostly because he thought he'd play the white knight and try to resolve the problem. Patrick had literally never seen it work out for him.

"Go for it, dude, he's not getting any better offers."

Patrick glared at him, both offended and hopeful but abjectly refusing to let Pete know he was either. He changed the subject, instead. "So, do you have a plan or anything?"

"To get you in Trohman's pants?"

"To put the magic to some kind of use, if it's actually working."

Pete shrugged and rolled on to his back, propping himself up on his elbows. "I was gonna put something together for Wednesday night. I thought a kind of a mini road trip or something, this time. Get out into the woods, if that's what we've all been seeing, or whatever."

Patrick nodded against the comforter. "Alright. But we take precautions, this time. We plan ahead, we keep it scripted, okay? I want Andy to go over everything and check it, because I don't want to be responsible for anyone dying or anything."

"Whatever my little Lunchbox wants," Pete assured him.

Gratefully, Patrick shifted and propped his head against Pete's side. "Thanks, man."

They lay together in silence for a minute, before Pete said, "I just really want this to work out, dude."

"I know."

"Maybe I don't have talent like you three, but this is something I can do, maybe, you know?"

"Pete, you have talent. You can write and you know what to do with people, y'know? I can't do that kind of crap, it's all on you. That's your talent."

"Thanks, but still…"

"Joe's right, dude - it might not happen now, and it might not happen tomorrow, or next week or anything, but it'll happen. It has to."

"And it will, if we can master this."

Perhaps that was true, and perhaps playing with candles and chanting and thinking that maybe they were dabbling in the dark arts was kind of cool. But deep down, Patrick still hoped that when someone stood up and took them seriously it would be because they were good, not because they'd used sorcery to win them round.

---

They didn't talk much about what had happened on Saturday night, afterwards. Joe seemed utterly freaked out and Patrick wasn't sure if it was what he'd seen in the meditation or the fact that Pete had walked in on them sitting in each other's laps and made fun of them.

Joe spent most of Sunday at his parents' house and by the time he got home it was almost ten and Pete had gone to hide in his room, studying his books and scribbling in his journal. Patrick was eating a family pack of potato chips and watching a cut-for-TV version of The Evil Dead in the dark. He was so engrossed that he didn't even hear Joe come in and nearly flew off the futon when he appeared in the doorway, hood still pulled up, silhouetted against the yellow of the street light through the windows.

"Well, that's flattering," Joe snorted, dumping a plastic bag of stuff his mother always sent him home with to make sure he was eating, and dropping onto the folded foam mattress, next to him.

"Sorry, I didn't hear the door."

Joe just shrugged and took a handful of chips out of the bag.

"How's your mom?"

"Motherly."

"And your dad?"

"Dadderly."

"Of course." He grinned over at him, watching Joe carefully lick the flavoured powder off his fingers.

"Where's our roomie?"

"Writing a black mass or something."

"Cool." Joe leaned over to the floor, half dangling from the furniture to drag his bag closer with his fingertips and pull a folded sheet of printer paper from it. "So, I'm gonna like, show you something and I want you to tell me if it means anything to you, okay?"

"Sure," Patrick nodded, putting down his food and dusting his hands off, then rubbing them on his pants.

At first, Joe seemed to hesitate to steel himself, and then shook the paper out and handed it to him. Across the page, scribbled heavily in black ballpoint, was a landscape of jagged edges and thin spikes across rolling hills. Patrick inhaled abruptly, catching a fragment of chip in his throat and descending into a coughing fit, pointing frantically at the paper and nodding vigorously as Joe rubbed at his back, trying to soothe him.

"You know it?"

"It's our forest! Dude, it's what I saw in our forest!"

Joe nodded slowly. "It's what I saw. Half of it burned out."

"It wasn't half, but… yeah. Right before real-Pete ruined it, that's what I saw."

Joe just kept nodding.

"Do you think it means something," Patrick asked. He hadn't been able to shake that thought all day. What if it was a sign? Did it mean Pete or did it mean the effect Pete would have, or an effect on Pete? Was it Pete at all?

"I don't know, dude, but like… can it be a good thing that we go to this awesome place in our heads and like, Pete's part is all fucked up? 'Cause I don't know, basically."

"I don't know either, but y'know, that book of Pete's said something about fire being cleansing and stuff and meaning renewal or something. Maybe? I don't know. I just don't want to think it means something horrible."

Joe sat absorbed in his sketch for a few moments, before finally saying. "Dude, it's just that, like… we live here with him. You see how intense he gets about girls, man - if things get too weird, we need to kind of like, back each other up, yeah?"

"Yeah, of course," Patrick said, rubbing Joe's arm encouragingly. "We'll be Team Sanity. If Pete goes a little over the edge, we'll be there to pull him back up. It'll be fine."

---

October was in full swing by the fifteenth, leaves scattered the path through Potawatomi Woods, and Patrick kicked through them lightly as they walked away from the parking lot where they'd left Andy's van. Joe was walking just behind his right shoulder, holding a torch in one hand and a metal pail of tinder they'd brought to act as a firepit in the other. Ahead of them Pete was carrying a camping lantern to light the way. Andy seemed half able to see in the dark.

He still couldn't quite believe they were going to do this, even after a rehearsal in the living room the night before, in which Andy had thoughtfully signed off all their work, amending phrasing for clarity as he went. This was either going to be a total failure, a local news item on idiots with out of control campfires in the woods, or the thing that changed the world, for them.

It ran like a military operation: compass out, sigils carefully drawn in the dirt by Andy's artistic hand, tea lights in dollar store packs of earthenware holders demarking the edge of the circle, their bucket-cauldron of fire lit, cast with a handful of incense made of bergamot, sage and patchouli (according to the jar) along with a pinch burning on a charcoal stick in the stone bowl, grape juice in the yew chalice, Joe fully argued through the reasons that yes, they really were going to need to use that knife to cut his finger and yes, it could be his right pinkie if it mattered so damn much and yes they did bring band aids.

With studied care, they cast their circle, inviting the guardians to join them without stutters or 'dudes' or the faintest hint of disrespect. The candles flickered in the breeze whispering around them, casting eerie shadows against the trees surrounding their small clearing. Joe's fingers dug into Patrick's as a particularly sudden gust brought the flames of the fire into a rush of orange, but he didn't break the chant. He closed his eyes tight and kept going. Patrick smiled at him encouragingly, even though he wasn't looking, his mind drifting momentarily to Pete's offer to intervene, wondering if maybe it was the answer, or if there was some other way of testing the water.

He hadn't the time to draw a conclusion, because Pete had produced the antler knife and run it through the flames to sterilise it, and was clutching it carefully, his hand shaking a little as he held Andy's, fingertips exposed. Andy took the knife from his hand and carefully returned the tiny nick, just enough for a droplet to form. Joe didn't let go of Patrick's hand, when he apprehensively offered Pete his right one, and he turned his face away so he didn't have to look. When Patrick’s turn came, he gently untwined his hand from Joe's and offered Pete his own right pinkie. Joe had been right about it being the best choice - he could hold a pick without it. He barely felt it. The blade was sharp and the cut superficial, there'd be no sign of it in a few days.

Pete pulled out a green square of paper, their spell already meticulously inscribed upon it in metallic coppery ink, and held it out for them each to add a droplet to. Then, he folded its corners in, and then again, sealing it up with a few drops of wax from a pumpkin coloured candle.

Patrick pulled the hand trowel from his pocket, knowing it was his big moment, and dug a small hole in the ground. He took the sealed spell from Pete and placed it in the earth, carefully laying a healthy acorn he'd collected on top, before gently filling it in while the others quietly murmured their incantations.

As he stood to rejoin them, arms and eyes cast to the sky, a cluster of four orange shooting stars sliced through the atmosphere. He could hear the hitch of laughter in Pete's voice, knowing the others had seen it, too.

They finished their ritual with sips of the grape juice as a symbol of their shared prosperity and friendship, pouring the rest on to the ground around the disturbed patch and leaving with it offerings of nuts and seeds, things that they thought indicated the potential for growth and might appeal to the animals sharing the woods with them. And then they packed away their candles and equipment, moved the dying fire out of the circle with gloved hands and then kicked leaves back over the bare earth they'd exposed to carry out their work on, hiding the evidence under a blanket of oranges and golds.

For a while, they sat nearby, perched on chunks of felled tree trunk in silence, waiting for the pail to cool enough to be able to carry to the pond and dip in the water so it was safe to take back in the van. Somewhere in the trees, an owl was hooting gently to its mate.

It felt magical. Secret and powerful and almost like a storm was in the air, the atmosphere charged with something. Patrick looked around at the other three - his closest friends and partners in crime. Whatever happened, now, they were bound together in a union of sorcery or stupidity, one or the other, or possibly both. He had a feeling they'd come back here time and again, provided nobody disturbed it.

"So, I just kind of want to say I love you guys, y'know? Even if this goes totally wrong, I still want us to do this band."

They all turned to look at him. Pete grinned with every one of his teeth and barrelled into him from the next log, knocking him to the floor. "Why didn't you say so?! We could be married already!"

Not to be outdone, Joe flopped onto the leaves beside them, kissing Patrick's forehead and tucking his arm around Pete. "I love you assholes, too."

Andy laughed, looking down at them. "You sappy fucks." He dived onto the heap, knocking the air out of all three of them. They let out a collection of squawks and groans through their laughter, and wrapped him up amongst them.

"It's us against the world forever, yeah?" Pete said, bumping his forehead to Andy's ear.

"For fucking ever!" Andy agreed.

Joe cheered, "Until one of us winds up in jail!"

"Always," Patrick added. "Except right now someone's on my bladder and I kind of need for that to stop."

Joe wriggled out from under Andy and stood up, almost overbalancing, before holding out a hand to pull him to his feet. Patrick accepted it and reached for the other one, too. He almost rolled to standing and into Joe's arms with a single heave, steadying himself against his shoulders. Joe caught him at the waist and squeezed him tight, before pushing him gently away. "Go pee up a tree like a dog, then, if you need to."

By the time Patrick got back, Andy and Pete were holding the pail using a long stick under the handle, one at each end. They walked down to the pond and dunked it in the water, watching until the steam stopped, then began the walk back to the van. Sitting in the second row, Joe looped his arm around Patrick's and fell asleep on his shoulder. In the rearview mirror, Pete caught Patrick's eye and mimed a blowjob at him until he flipped him off, embarrassed. He shrugged at Joe until he woke up and re-settled against the window.

---

When he fell into bed, that night, he dreamed of a million paper squares with metallic writing on them, falling like leaves in Joe's corner of the forest. I don't get it, Joe told him, holding soggy fistfuls of paper, frantic and confused. How am I supposed to know which one to follow?

---

It was Friday afternoon, standing in the record store pricing up new stock for the pop section, that Patrick's phone started vibrating in his pocket. He pulled it out to see Pete's name on the screen.

"Dude, I'm at wo -"

"TURN ON THE RADIO!"

"What?"

"DUDE! PUT IT ON WKQX! NOW!"

"NOOOOOOOOW!" Joe's voice yelled in the background. He sounded like he was jumping up and down, his voice wavering excitably.

Patrick walked round the shelves to the radio and turned the dial to 101.1. The handset dropped from his fingers like someone had buttered it. His own voice was playing back at him through the speaker.

---

So, it was working. It was actually fucking working. There was something in this magic thing and he didn't know how it worked, but it made him wonder what else he could do with it. Whether maybe there was something he could do to make sure that his increasingly tender feelings for Joe wouldn't be rebuffed out of hand if he actually made them known. The thing was, none of them even knew what Joe was into. He made ambiguous comments about all kinds of people all the time, and they'd generally assumed he thought he was being funny when talking about anyone other than girls. Patrick had certainly only ever seen him hit on girls, anyway, and his over all success rate was in the low single figures even then.

Perhaps it was the years of living around Pete and his 'helpful' blabbermouth, but Joe always kept personal stuff private. He didn't bring it up to begin with and he'd laugh it off with nonsense and change the subject if they asked, so eventually they just gave up.

There was room to hope that maybe he was actually open to dating other dudes, but even after Patrick had come out to them all in parking lot in Champaign at two in the morning, last year, it didn't seem to have provoked any desire to open up. The risk of him finding out about Patrick's feelings was too great. What if he was horrified? What if things got awkward and he wouldn't share the futon with him, anymore? If Patrick just had a better idea of his chances, maybe he'd be able to make a better, more informed decision on what to do.

Maybe he could try a truth spell or something. Did those even exist? He knew the CIA used some kind of drug on people, but there was no way he was getting any access to that. Besides, he wasn't sure there was something entirely moral about that route. If Joe wanted to tell him, he would.

What if there was something else, though? Something that might make him more open to the prospect? Some sort of love potion or something, that allowed Patrick to position himself as the obvious choice without actually using magic to specifically cast a spell and make Joe fall in love with him. After all, it had gone horribly wrong in the movie, but that was fiction and this was real life.

He got up early on Saturday and left the house before Joe or Pete was even awake. Frank had changed his shirt, but was otherwise unaltered, when Patrick stepped into the shop.

"Um, hi, Frank."

"Good morning."

Awkwardly, Patrick looked around the store at the shelves, trying to work up the nerve to ask for help because he wasn't sure the old guy wasn't going to laugh him out of the place.

"Where's the Sorcerer's Apprentice, this morning?" Frank asked.

"Pete? He's probably still asleep," Patrick told him, smirking.

"So, what brings you in, this fine October morning?"

Patrick swallowed and tugged his woollen hat off, nervously. "I was kind of looking for something."

"Something specific?"

"Uh. Well, information, I guess."

Frank nodded patiently, waiting for him to elaborate.

"Look, the thing is, I was kind of hoping to improve my situation as pertains to… well, to someone I care for a lot, and I don't know how to go about it."

"I find talking is often a good place to start."

Sighing, Patrick confessed, "See, that sounds great and everything, but he - er… they don't tend to talk about this stuff and I can't afford to get it wrong, y'know? I was kind of hoping there was something I could do that might, I don't know… clear the way a little, maybe."

Frank lifted a hand and beckoned to him. "C'mere."

Patrick wound his way around stacks of books and small display tables to the counter, watching Frank pull a velvet bag out from under the register. Silently, he pulled out a deck of oversized cards and spread them on the surface, rubbing his hand over them until they were thoroughly jumbled up.

"Pick one."

"Any one?"

"Sure."

He reached out and tugged a card from the middle of the spread and handed it out to him. Frank flipped it, side to side and laid it down on top of the others.

"Wheel of Fortune. Not the game show." He winked. "A positive sign, so don't panic."

Patrick nodded and pretended to understand what was happening, but being told not to panic didn't make him feel any more at ease.

"There are certain things happening that you don't have control of, and I suspect that's a little scary for you, huh?"

He nodded again, more vigorously this time.

"Well, sometimes you just have to go with what the Universe gives you and find a way to make the best of it. You're not getting a choice in this one, my young friend. The Universe has something - or somebody - in mind for you."

"Oh."

"In short, don't sweat it. When it happens, you'll know."

"Does it say anything about, y'know… who, or anything?"

"Not this card, no."

"But what if I just really want to know where I stand with this one particular person?"

"Won't matter. If he's for you, he's for you. If he's not, he's not."

None of which really made Patrick feel any better. "I see."

Frank watched him knowingly for a few moments, then sighed and walked around the counter to pull a thin, red book from the shelf. It was old and looked like it was missing its dust jacket. He shoved it into Patrick's hand. "Seeing as you're going to try it anyway, take that."

"Oh. How much do I owe - ?"

"Nothing. It has been on that shelf waiting for the right owner for years."

"Are you sure? I mean, I can pay…"

"Take it. But there are two things you should know: it's frowned upon to cast magic to control people and doing so just might bite you in the ass, and there's a total lunar eclipse in three weeks. Do with that information what you will."

"Wow… I… Thanks. Seriously, thanks."

The old man patted him on the arm. "I'd say 'good luck' but it's already working for you."

---

When he got home, book tucked safely in his rucksack, Pete was leaning over Joe's shoulders at his computer desk.

"Hey."

"Little dude!" Joe called. "Take a look at this."

Puzzled, Patrick dropped his rucksack and walked into the room to see what they were looking at. "What's up?"

They were looking at Pete's LiveJournal, the friend count of which had hit four figures.

"How many of those do you usually have?"

"Like three hundred or something."

"Wow. Okay."

"This happened since Wednesday."

"Well, that's neat, but it's not getting us in Billboard."

"Are you insane? Of course it is! Every new follower is another voice to spread the word. This means that 1,297 people have actually heard and liked our music, kind of."

"Fair enough. Meanwhile, I'll be in my room, so call me if an actual journo decides to care." He walked out, flipping Pete off in response to his suggestions that he intended to jerk off.

The book was definitely old. The typeface was strange and all the pictures in it looked like etchings. It talked of tinctures and infusions and the only kind of infusion Patrick was familiar with was his mom's herbal teas. He curled up with it propped on his arm and read every single page, then flicked back through it again to try to find the parts that sounded like they might be helpful.

There was a particular spell that was described as 'opening the heart' which seemed like it sort of fitted the bill. The way Patrick looked at it, he wasn't trying to control anyone, he just wanted there to be a chance, or for some opportunity for to find out what Joe was really thinking.

"A month?!" he muttered at the passage detailing the instructions. Seriously? A whole month? He wasn't sure he had a month before this whole thing got too weird. How was he supposed to brew this potion for a whole month without someone getting suspicious? Where would he keep it where it wouldn't turn nasty?

Sighing at the inconvenience, he made his list of ingredients, grateful that the hardest thing to get hold of was likely to be fresh, food grade lavender, and not eye of newt or something horrible. It might be time consuming, but none of this was beyond the realms of possibility. He had to at least try.

Chapter Text

In Teenage Twilight
I'll face my fear of the sunrise when I wake up with your hand inside mine.

"Um. Dude, you know Hallowe'en is next Friday, right?" Patrick asked, looking up from his third hour of Simpsons reruns that morning.

Pete's face was adorned with thick, black smudges under his eyes.

"Are we doing The Crow, this year?" Joe asked with a small gasp of glee at the prospect.

Patrick responded by slapping the sole of the socked foot in his lap. "No."

Joe pulled his foot away and pressed it to the side of Patrick's face, despite his best efforts to push him off. "Well, fuck you guys, I'm doing the make up even if you won't."

"Looks like Pete's way ahead of you, man."

"I told you that film turns people into goths…"

"It's a look," Pete informed them, archly.

"I know, and I'm pretty sure I've seen it before."

"On like, John Wayne Gacy."

Patrick smothered a laugh and left Joe's hi-five hanging, because he could see Pete's confidence faltering. "So, why the war paint?"

"Girls love dudes in make up!" Pete said, as if everyone knew this. "It's like, sexy and dangerous and shit. Think about it: Bowie, Bolan, Cobain - "

"Marilyn Manson," Joe offered, before absently mouthing a few lines of Simpsons dialogue under his breath.

"Yeah, well, you'll be eating your words when I'm waist-deep in fans, bro."

"I'll be eating take out from some shitty all-night diner while you refuse to let me in the van so you can nail some girl again, probably…"

"Play your cards right and maybe you could be the dude nailing some girl in the van, next time."

Patrick tried not to flinch as Joe gave a dubious laugh and pulled his legs back to sit up and turn to face the TV. "I kind of doubt it, bro. But what are we gonna do for the Hallowe'en show?"

"I was thinking we should go dressed as priests or something. It'd be ironic, kind of."

"I still think The Crow is better, basically, but whatever."

"To be honest, I pretty much don't care," Patrick shrugged. "As long as it doesn't cost me more than, like, fifteen bucks, I'll wear what you want."

"Fine. Get dressed, we're going shopping."

"You're taking that off your face, first, right?"

Pete did not take off his make up, defiantly walking out of the apartment in full panda regalia. Patrick and Joe followed him into town, hanging behind as he strode ahead of them; Patrick wasn't sure if they were hanging back so as not to steal his limelight, to avoid being overtly associated with his ridiculous ass or because they kind of wanted to hang out together. Well, he knew he wanted to hang out with Joe, but not necessarily at Pete's expense.

They made their way down the seemingly endless strait of Lincoln Avenue, past windows decked with lumpy squashes and fake cobwebs, to the costume store to choose something to wear. They picked up the priest costumes Pete seemed to have convinced himself were the best and most subversive joke since The Life of Brian, and a pallette of face paint so that Joe could also be The Crow if he really, really wanted. Then, on the way back through the weak, golden sun and autumnal chill, decided to stop at the bookstore for supplies.

Frank was in his usual spot behind the counter, his cards laid out in a cross before him, this time. He scooped them up with a small smile when he saw them walk in.

"Hi Frank."

"My young friend! You're back so soon," he replied. "And you have company, today."

"Um, yeah. My name's actually Patrick, and this Joe. I think you probably know Pete."

"You playing a game, Frank, my man?" Joe asked, stepping up to the counter and reaching out to tilt the pack in Frank's hand so he could see the picture on the top card.

"Not exactly," Frank said, handing them to him to look at. "They do originate from old world playing cards, but they're really only used for that in the backwoods of Europe, these days."

"Ohh - these are those tarot things, right? I totally saw Lord of the Rings ones in the comic store!"

On the other side of the small store, Patrick tried to pretend he was thoroughly interested in a book by some guy called Culpeper, and not trying to hide the furious burn in his cheeks.

"They are. You want me to tell your fortune?"

"Dude! Yes! But like, if it's bad, I don't want to know it, man. Just make some shit up, okay?"

Frank laughed and Patrick turned to look at them, drawing his hand across his neck frantically, behind Joe's back, trying to silently beg him not to do it, irrationally afraid that he'd announce that Patrick had a ridiculous crush on him, even though he'd never even told him that Joe was in fact the object of his affections.

Frank only smiled benignly in response and placed the cards on the counter, repeating the washing motion he'd used the first time. "Pick one."

Joe picked up a card and flipped it so he could see the image. He instantly turned pink. "Oh. Well, that's subtle."

"See, when you took that, you turned it the other way up."

"Does it make a difference?"

"Yes, very much so. When you invert a card you reverse its meaning. For the purposes of this reading, we had it the right way up."

"Oh." Joe looked at it for a moment more and then handed it back.

Frank studied it for a few seconds and looked over at Patrick knowingly. "This is an interesting card. It says you might be at a crossroads and you're uncertain which path to take. You're not sure whether to take the risk and follow your heart, embarking on a route that may be difficult or require a leap of faith, or whether to take the easier route that may not bring you what you truly want. Maybe you're figuring yourself out a little - which at around your age is perfectly natural, of course."

"Well… I mean, I guess."

"The Lovers is also a card that indicates a strong, deeply-forged bond - usually romantic, but perhaps not always. My instinct is that very soon you'll find yourself completely and consumingly head over heels with some lucky soul and you'll have to make that decision to pursue it or not - choose your path. That's assuming you're not already there." Frank glanced up and caught Patrick's eye across the store from where he had been watching the exchange anxiously. "But I think you'll find that they're amenable to it."

In the back corner, by the carved wooden dresser filled with small, blue jars of incense, Pete was sniggering to himself, staring intently at Patrick's crimson face. In Patrick's mind, Frank may as well have passed Joe a card reading, 'Did you know Patrick has a crush on you?'

Joe remained very quiet at the front of the store, scratching the back of his hair awkwardly and glancing just a little over his shoulder. Patrick quickly turned away to look through Culpeper's recipes for a cure for death by embarrassment.

"I fucking knew it," Pete whispered in his ear, sidling up behind him. "Do something about it, or I'll do it for you."

"I fucking am!" Patrick hissed back. "Leave me alone, asshole."

"Well, thanks, Frank," Joe was saying, breezily. "That was, like… interesting."

"Not a half as interesting as it was for me," Frank laughed.

"So, can I get a reading?" Pete asked, abandoning Patrick to move to the desk.

"Well, you know usually I'd charge, but seeing as both your friends did…" Frank collected all the cards into a stack, shuffled them, and then spread them on the counter once more. "Go ahead."

Pete chose his card and handed it to Frank, without turning it over.

The expression on Frank's face, as he turned the card in his fingers, grew a little concerned. He adjusted his position as he straightened up a little.

"The Six of Wands. When you first came in here, looking for advice, you said you were seeking success for your band. With success, I expect you also anticipate the fame and adulation that we assume comes with it. But it's a double edged sword - it could become a stick to beat you with. The success you're looking for is on its way, but you need to be wary of false friends and supporters, and of believing your own press. An unchecked ego, and not knowing when to stop, could easily be your downfall if you let them."

"Deep," Pete mused. "So, check the haters and don't be an asshole?"

"Easy for you to say, Frank," Joe snorted, looking to Patrick to share the joke. Patrick gave him a half-smile in response and picked up another book. Joe walked over to him, not quite standing as close as usual, picking up a book nearby and running his fingers over its edges. "When did you get a reading, anyway?" he asked, quietly.

"Yesterday. I had some time to kill on my lunch hour."

"Oh. What did you get?"

Patrick hesitated, not sure he wanted to share. It was personal and incriminating and he wasn't entirely sure if Joe had the faintest idea what Frank was telling him, in spite of his paranoia. To be honest, he wasn't sure whether it had all been orchestrated with some sleight of hand to produce that very apt card for Joe. "It was just… um. Like, good luck, basically. The Wheel of Fortune."

"Is that all?"

"Yeah. Just that."

Joe squinted at him for a minute and then turned to scan the shelves. He finally spotted what he was looking for and went over to the shelf to pick it up.

"What're you doing?" Patrick asked, tensely.

Joe just lifted the book briefly, so he could see its cover, and continued to thumb through Tarot for Beginners.

"Why do you need that?"

"Curious."

"Joe. Seriously. I told you what it said."

At the desk, Pete and Frank were watching the exchange awkwardly. In the little shop there was nowhere to hide or anything to distract them.

"Readings can be personal," Frank offered calmly. "It's perfectly reasonable to want to keep them private - for any reason."

Reluctantly, Joe closed the book and slid it back onto the shelf. "Sorry."

"It doesn't matter," Patrick told him. "Just forget about it."

Joe nodded and mumbled, "Maybe I'll just, like, wait outside or something…"

"Joe …"

The wooden beads swung closed without him so much as glancing back.

"Great."

"You okay, Ric?"

"I'm fine!"

Pete winced and turned to Frank. "Let me just pay for the shit I came here for, and then I'll take the kids home. I think they need a nap."

Frank gave a small smile. "Well, I never intended to rile anybody up or anything."

"Don't worry about it, man, Joe gets like this if you leave the seat up. Patrick's just always like this."

Pete clamped a hand around the back of Patrick's neck as Frank bagged up his candles. "C'mon, bud, let's go make up with Trohman."

"Get off."

"Maybe if you asked him real nice."

Irritably, Patrick slapped at his arm until he let go, and skulked out of the shop.

Joe was leaning against the wall at the street end of the alley, his hoodie pulled up and his arms hugged around himself. For a second, Patrick stopped and watched him, wondering what had made him so touchy this time, and flinched when Joe looked up and caught him. He had no real choice but to walk over.

"Hey."

"Hey."

"I don't know why it matters, or anything, but… it was all about just letting stuff happen and not worrying, because it'll happen the way it's supposed to, basically. To just, y'know: trust in fate."

He seemed to muse on this for a minute, pouting and nibbling the inside of his lip, before simply shrugging and nodding.

"I mean, your reading was way better than mine."

"How?" Joe snorted doubtfully.

"At least you get a say in what happens to you. I'm just expected to live with whatever happens to me."

Joe seemed to soften at the thought, his shoulders sagging sympathetically, just in time for Pete to pounce on them both and drag them home, complaining about them being embarrassing.

By the time they got home, Joe had forgotten his sulking enough to curl up on the futon with him, sharing a pizza in front of the TV while Pete returned to his room to pore over his books.

---

The incident in the bookstore made Patrick more determined than ever to figure out his spell and try to take some control back. He was keeping a record of everything in a hardbacked notebook he'd bought at the dollar store, and carefully planning what he needed to do. The main part of the plan had to happen on Saturday night, during the new moon - the last one before Hallowe'en. He'd had to find out when that was from the calendar in his mom's kitchen when he visited her for dinner on Monday night, but it fell at the right time for what he needed. The idea was that he'd start brewing his potion on the full moon and it would grow in strength with the brightness of the moon. There was a lunar eclipse the same weekend that the moon was full, which had some kind of additional power that he didn't think he completely understood, but Frank had highlighted it to him and it worked out fine with his spell, so why not? It also cut down the time he had to wait for his spell to work to two weeks, and that made him feel much better.

He'd planned it carefully: he knew how to cast a circle, now, he could do all the parts himself. They didn't have a show, so he could cry off social events and let them all go, so that he had the apartment to himself. Failing that, he could pack everything he needed into his backpack and go out. Maybe down to the lake. It made sense to be near water, anyway.

He was still thinking about it when there was a soft knock at the door. Hurriedly, he shoved the book under his pillow and tried not to look like he'd been doing anything suspicious while lying in his room in silence. "Yeah?"

Joe opened the door and poked his head around it. "You busy?"

"Uh, no."

He didn't wait to be invited, he just closed the door behind himself and moved over to sit on the bed. "You okay?"

"Yeah, sure - why wouldn't I be?"

Joe shrugged and traced the geometric patterns on the comforter with his fingertip.

Patrick watched him watch his finger move across the fabric. "Are you alright?"

Joe just shrugged again. After a few moments, he said, "I've been having dreams and stuff."

"What kind of dreams?"

"Dreams about our forest, mostly."

"Oh, yeah? Like what?" Patrick asked, feeling his cheeks turn at the notion that it was 'our forest'.

"Like, always being there. You and me."

"Well… that's okay, isn't it?"

Joe nodded. "It is, it's just like, all I dream about. All the time."

"It's probably just because it's on your mind, y'know? You think about it, so you dream about it, so when you next try to sleep, you think about how you'll probably dream about it and stuff, so you do, and then…"

"Maybe. It's just kind of weird, though."

"I mean, it can't be that weird - I dream about it, too."

He became unnaturally still, especially for Joe, and asked in a very measured voice. "What did you dream last night?"

Patrick shrugged and hoped the truth didn't show on his face. "I don't know, dude… it was just… I don't remember much. We were just there."

"Nothing at all?"

He couldn't admit to the truth - the mossy riverbank under his skin - he'd die of embarrassment on the spot. He'd woken before it was even light, his pillow damp with sweat, half convinced it was from the drips of water from Joe's wet curls. He hadn't been able to go back to sleep after that.

"No, dude, nothing. Why? What did you dream?"

"It doesn't matter."

Joe climbed to his feet and stretched, his arms and spine clicking. Patrick knew it was probably unsubtle to stare at the exposed skin under his shirt, but he kept looking, anyway. It wasn't even that Joe's stomach was something he'd never seen before, or even touched - he had mentally archived at least four instances - but it was the memories it invoked from his dreams. Dreams that were vivid and clear and stayed with him after he woke. Maybe their forest was the place to find out the truth.

"Joe, do you want to -"

But Joe cut him off with a shake of the head. "I'm gonna go to bed, dude. All this being a wizard, now, is kind of grinding me down."

Patrick nodded and watched him leave, then flopped down on his pillow and tugged the book back out from under it. It seemed like he didn't have much choice.

---

That Wednesday night was the first time all month that they'd actually had a real band practice. They worked through all the songs they were going to play on Hallowe'en, when they were actually headlining at the Fireside Bowl. Then, at Pete's insistence, they climbed out onto the flat roof outside his window and cast a circle to give thanks for the success they were already starting to see. There was a low rumble of thunder in the distance, as they began, and Patrick felt Joe's hand tighten in his. He squeezed back.

He could see the wind whipping up strands of Andy's hair, and regretted not picking up his bodywarmer to put on before they climbed out.

They were in the middle of a low chant, murmuring their gratitude and asking for continued support, when a great gash of blue and lilac tore across the sky.

All of them flinched and ducked reflexively, except Pete, who burst into a gleeful cackle. "Thank you!" he called into the night. "Thank you for joining us! We're grateful that you offer us your power."

Patrick looked at Andy, worried by the frown on his face. If Andy thought something was off, Andy who was Number One Pete Apologist, then there was definitely something off.

It started to rain just before they came inside. Slow, heavy drops that hit the rim of Patrick's glasses and splashed into his eyes. The candle in the centre of their circle took a direct hit just as they finished, snuffing it out in an instant.

"Well, that's a good omen," Joe muttered to Patrick, scuffing the ring of salt across the roof with his foot.

Patrick could only nod, his arms tucked around himself against the chill.

He and Joe helped Andy carry his kit down to the van, and came back to find Pete still sitting on his window ledge, foot wedged against the frame, staring up at the colourful sky. His room seemed suddenly full of candles that he'd not noticed, earlier, and the journal on Pete's nightstand was open on a page close to the back of the book.

"Dude. You want to come in? It's a little risky, isn't it?"

Pete glanced over to Joe, grinning. "It's awesome, bro - this is the power of the fucking Universe!"

"Yeah, okay, Prince Adam," Patrick huffed, tugging on his arm. "Time to come inside."

Pete reached out and patted him on the shoulder. "I'm good, Ric. I'm just watching the storm, man."

"C'mon," Joe sighed, turning Patrick by the waist and pushing him out the door. "Let Ororo look after himself."

"Night!" Pete called after them. "Don't do anything I wouldn't do!"

Not that that narrowed things down a whole bunch…

Patrick allowed himself to be led as far as the bedrooms, where Joe let him go and stopped outside his door. He scratched a hand through his windswept curls and asked, "Hey, you know what I always wanted to do?"

Make out with me? he thought, hopefully, but not optimistic enough to ask it aloud. "Well… I dunno, get asked to be Anthrax's latest guitarist, or something?"

Joe snorted. "I mean, obviously , but actually, I was thinking about, like, storm chasing."

"Oh. Really?"

Joe had once told him, sitting in the back of the van in Oklahoma on a summer night, with the rain battering the roof, that tornadoes were his biggest fear, so why he thought he'd be up for storm chasing, Patrick didn't really know.

"I just kind of thought it would be cool to go down and park on Lake Shore and watch it without a whole bunch of city in the way, basically."

"Um…" That's not storm chasing, dude, that's lovers' lane st- "I guess that sounds pretty cool."

"So, you'll come?"

Patrick blinked at him. "What? Now ?"

"Dude, it's not like we get thunderstorms like this every day - it's October, this is super weird - and there's no time like the present, right?"

Patrick had kind of been looking forward to putting on his pyjamas and hanging out in one of their nice, cosy bedrooms, possibly engaging in a little bit of ambiguous snuggling, but if Joe wanted to hang out in a Faraday cage on wheels like a courting couple from the '50s, then he'd be an idiot to pass it up.

He took a deep breath. "Alright. Let me just get a dry sweater."

He shut himself in his room and put on the Taking Back Sunday hoodie Joe had lent him when they were last on tour, and he'd never given back. While he was there, he thumbed quickly through his book, wondering if lightning was any use at all, wishing books had a CTRL+F function. The index at the back only went as far as 'J', the final pages lost some time in the past, so he gave up, disappointed.

They parked on the street at Montrose Harbour, looking out over the water towards the lights downtown, listening to the album Spitalfield had just put out that summer, the wipers still running to keep the windshield clear.

Patrick enjoyed watching Joe's glee at the cloudy strobing over the water, the colours catch in his wide eyes. The storm was definitely the most impressive he'd seen in a long time. It had been warm the past few weeks, and it was around the time the cold fronts started to set in, but it was bigger even than the ones he'd seen late in hot summers.

Deep down, part of him wondered if maybe this was something to do with them. What had they conjured up? What if Frank was right in what he'd said to Pete, and they'd called up more than they could handle?

"Hey, Joe?"

"Yeah?" he asked, glancing over at him with a look of awe on his face.

"I was just thinking…"

Joe swallowed, the corner of his mouth twitching,"What about?"

"About Pete."

He seemed to lose interest a little at that. "And?"

"Is it me, or is he getting a little too into this whole thing?"

"Maybe. You saw that whole performance earlier, right? And yesterday he was talking about learning alchemy. I was like, 'Dude, 'cause your family isn't rich enough already?'."

"Hopefully, he'll drop it when there's no more instant gratification."

"Maybe. But what if it keeps rewarding him?"

"I thought you were pretty sure half of this stuff is confirmation bias."

"I mean, I am , dude, but…"

"So, what about when we meditated?" Patrick asked, a little wounded. It felt pretty real for him.

"Because this is different. It's sci-fi quality. This is like, alternate dimension shit and I've got books by, like, actual scientists on that."

Patrick looked at him skeptically. "You sure?"

"Yes," Joe assured him, firmly. "You wanna try now?"

"What, meditating? Here?"

"Sure, why not?"

"Because, y'know…" Patrick quickly realised he didn't have a clear conclusion to his sentence, and if their past efforts were anything to go by, only an idiot would refuse in this scenario.

"...because?"

"You know what? Sure. Let's try it. Maybe we'll get struck by lightning and develop superpowers or something."

Joe grinned widely, his eyes lighting up even though there was no lightning to coincide with it. He gestured to the back seat. "After you."

"Huh?" Patrick started, before shutting himself up hurriedly. "I mean, right. Sure." He climbed over the central console and tumbled into the back, trying not to be embarrassed when Joe laughed and patted his butt as he unwedged himself.

Joe followed him through the gap, using his shoulder for stability and then sat down sideways on the seat, holding out a hand. Patrick grasped it quickly, hoping Joe hadn't noticed how eagerly he'd done so. His heart skipped a little at the soft smile Joe gave him in response.

"So, are we still doing this?" he asked, lifting their joined hands a little. "Pete kind of said it wasn't necessary."

"Totally," Joe replied, slapping at Patrick's shins lightly, to get him to unfold them. "It just feels, like… right, dude."

Patrick did as he prompted, waiting for Joe to shift his leg out along the back edge of the seat, the other hanging into the footwell, so he could shuffle into the space. "Y'know, I know it's probably weird, but I don't feel weird about doing this."

"Me either," Joe grinned, and rubbed his thumbs over Patrick's fingers affectionately. "We're just a couple of weird little dudes, being weird together."

"I'm glad it's us, y'know?" He laughed nervously.

Joe seemed to hesitate at first, his face turning slightly pink in the cheeks. Patrick envied his ability to blush without looking like the cross-section of a watermelon. "I'm glad, too," he said finally. "I mean… I feel like we're a pretty good team."

"Yeah," Patrick nodded.

"Out of like, all our friends, I think… I mean, I know you and Pete are kind of a double act, but…"

"We're not, dude, we're just Patrick and Pete."

"No, but I mean, out of all of the dudes we hang out with, I think you're my closest friend."

Patrick could feel himself turning into the watermelon-faced idiot he'd been afraid of. "Yeah?"

"It's okay if you kind of like... see Pete as your best friend, because you're all soulmate-y or something, but out of all those dudes, I can't think of any of them I could be this cool with."

"Hey, me either. And I feel like we are pretty close, y'know? Sometimes, when things around here get a little too nuts, I just kind of think 'Man, I need to go hang out with Joe,' y'know? It's kind of like when you're on tour, and you're having the most awesome time, but getting home and sleeping in your own bed is a million times better."

"I'm your bed?" Joe laughed, scrunching up his nose.

"Basically," Patrick joked, bumping their joined pairs of hands together absently. "And just so you know, I have room for more than just Pete, dude."

Joe was looking intently at their hands, smiling lopsidedly. "Good. It'd be pretty shitty if you were like, 'Actually, bro, you're super annoying.'"

"Oh, you are," Patrick assured him, enjoying his laugh. "You are like the single worst dad-joker that I have ever met. And I've met your dad , who I swear to God is the source of all dad jokes."

"Technically, dude, he is the source of all my dad jokes."

They sat there together, talking until Joe complained that his legs were getting stiff and his back sore, and they realised it was after midnight and they'd spent hours sitting there, getting no meditation done whatsoever. He'd had to tug his hands free to take off his glasses and wipe tears of laughter from his cheeks, at one stage, and Joe had immediately reclaimed them when he was done, even though they weren't even meditating.

When Joe decided they needed to move, he'd thought it was a hint that their evening was done, but when he shifted and stretched, Joe said, "You didn't want to go home yet, did you?"

"Don't you want to?"

"Well… no, dude, not yet. But if you're tired…"

"I'm not. I mean, I do have work tomorrow, but…." Patrick smiled at him, rolling his head from side to side to get the tension out of his shoulders and neck. "I mean, I'm kind of cramped and a little tired, but I'm having fun… The storm's kind of died down, so why don't we just go back and hang out at home?"

Joe's expression seemed to waver between disappointment and his dopey, self-conscious grin. "I mean, like, if that's what you want, I'm down…"

When they got home Joe headed straight into his room, kicking off his shoes at the door and climbed onto the bed. Patrick followed, without so much as breaking the flow of his sentence, settling down next to him at the head end instead of the bottom, where he'd usually hang out. A tiny part of him hoped that he would be allowed to spend the night again, but a couple more hours would do, too.

So, when Joe complained that it was cold and climbed under the covers, holding the comforter up for him to climb in next to him, he didn't hesitate.

---

He didn't remember falling asleep, or turning the lights out, or even when they decided he should stay in Joe's room over night. Maybe they hadn't. When he woke, he was still propped against the pillows, one arm stretched above his head and heavy with numbness. Joe was lying next to him, face buried between the edge of his pillow and Patrick's ribs. His hair caught the light from the crack in the curtains and Patrick lifted his hand to stroke his curls, but caught himself. What if it woke him up and he had to explain what the hell he was doing?

Reluctantly, he sighed and shuffled down in the bed, knowing he had to be up for work in a couple of hours and disappointed when Joe snuffled sleepily and turned over.

---

Saturday night couldn't come fast enough. He'd woken up first, the next morning, glad to find that Joe had slept through a decidedly awkward situation, and made his escape to work without having to see him in case the watery shenanigans in his subconscious were somehow visible in his eyes. He was so mortified and determined not to mess things up before he could complete his spell, that he avoided Joe for the next two days.

Patrick had carefully packed everything into his backpack to keep it safe and hidden, and laid the groundwork with Pete, telling him when he got up at lunchtime that he thought he was coming down with something, so he wouldn't get harrassed into going out, later. Andy's old band had a show in town, so he was pretty sure they'd all go. He'd decided to climb out Pete's window and cast his spell on the flat roof outside, open to the elements but nowhere anyone could interfere. He was a little guy on his own, he didn't feel like explaining to the cops - or worse, a bunch of college idiots - what he was doing with candles and flowers in the middle of the night.

When the apartment fell quiet, he picked up his bag and snuck into Pete's room, pushing up the sash window and climbing out onto the roof outside. He kicked aside some patches of moss and knelt down, carefully pulling his equipment and ingredients out and setting them down in front of him.

He took a deep breath and lit the tall, green dinner candle in the holder in front of him and set an incense of cedar, rose and copal to smoke, then began casting his circle.

Meticulously, he ground together lavender, mint and basil with a spoon in a small dish and scooped the pulp into a fancy energy drink bottle he'd bought for four dollars and poured straight down the sink. Then he topped it off with rose water and half a bottle of Evian, and held it in the flame of his candle, repeating his carefully scripted incantation.

The theory was that the strength of the potion would grow with the moon as it became full, and by the new moon would be ready to be consumed - only, because of the lunar eclipse, he wouldn't have to wait for the new moon, because, in effect, a new moon would rise from the obscured full, that night.

"Please, please work," he whispered into the bottle, before putting the lid back on tightly and giving it a swirl to make sure all the leaves and pulp were safely beneath the water line.

It wasn't until he stood up to deconstruct his circle that he caught sight of the figure leaning at Pete's window.

"You done?"

Patrick's heart nearly exploded through his chest. "Joe?"

"Do you mind if I close this? It's kind of making the door rattle," Joe said, looking flustered.

"Shit," Patrick cringed, pressing his hands over his eyes. He didn't have time for this, right now. He needed to close the circle. "No, no - sorry, I didn't think anyone was in, dude…"

Joe just nodded and pulled the window down. Patrick did his best to gather himself, with what was left of his heart in his mouth, thanking and dispatching the spirits to do his bidding. Then, self-consciously aware that Joe probably heard half of what he had said, threw his things back into his backpack.

Joe was standing in the kitchen, leaning against the counter in his green plaid pyjama pants, eating a bowl of cereal, when Patrick climbed back in. He looked up at him with an awkward smile and waved with his spoon.

"You're not going out?" Patrick asked, trying not to sound like he was mortified to his very core. "I mean… I figured you'd be going to the show."

"I guess I'm coming down with the same thing as you," Joe replied.

Patrick looked at him, watching him stir the small, colourful hoops in his bowl. "I'm not sick," he admitted. "I just wanted to stay home tonight and I didn't want the arguments, y'know?"

Joe didn't look up. "To be honest, me either, dude. I just kind of hoped that with the guys not here, we could like, hang out, or something."

"Yeah?"

"We kind of haven't hung out at all, the past few days and I thought maybe we could do that... play some Playstation or… like, meditate together, maybe." He shrugged. "But I mean, if you're like… busy...."

"What? No, man, I'm done, I just… had to do a thing, y'know? And I mean, I was at my mom's last night and work in the day, right? I brought you home pumpkin squares - I left them in the kitchen."

"You did?"

"Yeah!"

"I didn't get them… I guess Pete must've got there first. They're probably being used to bribe Satan or something."

Patrick sighed, annoyed. "That little asshole… I'll get you more," he promised, even if that meant asking his mom to make a batch specifically.

Joe smiled a little and nodded without looking up at him. After a few moments, he turned to dump his bowl in the sink. "You gonna come and hang out, or not?"

"Yeah - yeah, dude, of course. I'll be right there." He watched Joe disappear into his room and then shut himself in his bedroom and collapsed on to the mattress, taking a few deep breaths. Whatever Joe thought he knew, he clearly hadn't figured out the truth.

He climbed off the bed when he was sufficiently calmed and pulled the bottle out of his bag. He wasn't sure what to do with it, now. He tilted it back and forth, watching the flowers and leaves floating inside, then stood it on the windowsill, hoping that the light of the moon over the next two weeks would help somehow, more desperate than ever for the spell to work.

Joe had moved to the living room, by the time Patrick returned, so he followed and settled down next to him on the futon, pulling his feet up and letting his knees half fall into Joe's lap. Joe absently switched the remote to the other hand and dropped the free one to Patrick's leg. It wasn't unusual in ordinary circumstances, they'd lost their boundaries some time around Louisville, or the third time Pete insisted one of them peed in a bottle in the back of the van, rather than making a rest stop. But after the awkwardness of the last few days, it was comforting; it meant things were going to be okay.

Carefully, Patrick shifted and rested his head on Joe's shoulder, laughing at Cartman on TV. They hardly talked all evening, just sat together comfortably in the light of the television. By the time Pete stumbled in with his girlfriend, one of Patrick's legs was tucked over Joe's, his other foot on the coffee table, and Joe was dozing with his head propped on Patrick's.

"Aww," she giggled, holding on to Pete. "That's the cutest, gayest thing I've ever seen."

"I'm bisexual," Joe complained into Patrick's hair, and Pete caught Patrick's eye with his mouth a little open in surprise. It was the first time either of them had heard him declare it, even in jest.

"Oh, well, whatever - still looks gay to me," she smirked, sing-songing, "niiiiight!" as she pushed Pete towards his room.

"I didn't know that," Patrick said quietly, once they were both gone.

"Well, that's your own fault," Joe informed him, as tartly as his sleepy voice could muster.

"How?"

He felt Joe shrug against his shoulder and issue what sounded very much like a small snore.

When it got too cold to sit in the living room any longer, Patrick hauled him to his feet by the hands and led him back to his bedroom, gently pushing him at the bed and moving to leave. "Night, dude."

"Night? Where are you going?"

"What do you mean 'where are you going'? I'm going to bed."

"You can sleep here, if you want."

Patrick blinked at him, behind his glasses. "Huh?"

He watched as Joe threw back the covers of his bed and climbed in, leaving one side open. "I miss being on tour," he explained. "It's nice to have company."

"Dude, I…" Patrick took a deep breath and cut himself off. Why the hell was he arguing? He'd slept in Joe's bed already this week, and after Pete faceplanted off stage, it was no big deal. "Fine," he said, pulling off his glasses and hoodie and climbing in beside him, settling on his back and looking over at the grin on the face pressed into the pillow beside him. "Night, my weird little buddy."

"Night, little dude," Joe murmured, tucking his arm around Patrick's and falling asleep almost instantly.

Patrick reached out his free arm to turn off the lamp and laid in the dark, hoping he didn't have any more dreams about the forest and the particular type of magic that happened in it.

Chapter Text

Dear God, Adjust My Dreams For Me
You're a fire burning up in my brain

When Patrick's eyes snapped open, it was dark and there was a hand over his mouth. He wriggled, not sure where he was until Joe's voice whispered, "Shhh! Shhh, listen."

Pulling the hand away from his lips, he frowned into the night and did as he was told.

He could hear Pete's voice - it sounded like he was talking to someone, but it was oddly repetitive, like he was saying the same thing over and over.

"What's going on?" he whispered, turning to squint at Joe over his shoulder.

"There's no one in there with him, dude. She left."

"Then who's he talking to?"

Joe gave a high-pitched mumble to imply he had no idea.

"So, what do we do? D'you wanna go out there?"

"No!"

"Then what?"

"I just…" Joe gave a little huff and shrank back to his side of the bed, awkwardly. "It was freaking me out. I kind of like… wanted someone else to hear it, so I knew I'm not crazy..."

"Well, I'm going out there," Patrick told him, kicking off the covers.

"Dude, don't! What if he's talking to like, Satan or something?"

"That's ridiculous, dude, c'mon. You don't even believe in this stuff. I'm gonna go into my room and see if I can hear from the window - his other one is like, right along the wall…"

For all his fear of finding the Devil himself discussing contracts with their bass player, Joe still scrambled out of bed and across the hall after him when Patrick left. In fact, he crowded into the corner behind him, his fingers tight around Patrick's arm when he tried to push up the window. They listened intently for several minutes, but the sound of the traffic outside and the L clattering in the distance drowned out anything notable. There was a vague murmur from the other room, but he could easily have been talking in his sleep or jerking off to the sound of his own voice, which Patrick wouldn't entirely put past him.

"This is dumb. C'mon, let's go back to bed," Patrick sighed, rubbing his eye and reaching out to pull down the window with his other hand. He didn't really like the idea of spying on Pete, anyway.

"No, wait," Joe started, reaching out to stop him and catching the curtain with his arm. There was a clunk, a slight rolling sound and then a second or two later, the sound of something smashing on the asphalt below. 

Patrick gaped down at the glass glinting on the ground in the restaurant's yard, half wanting to burst into tears of disbelief. "Joe!"

"What? Dude - was that something important?"

"Yes! Yes, that was very fucking important! I can't believe…" he trailed off, pressing his hands to his face. All that effort, all that planning, wasted.

"I'm sorry, dude, I didn't know that there was anything even there… What was it?"

"It was - I can't even explain, but it was so important , I put so much work into it, and now… Dammit, Joe."

"I'm sorry - is it, like, replaceable, or anything? I mean, I can -"

"No! No, it's… I'd have to start over and I don't really have time."

In the golden glow from outside, Patrick could see the information adding up in Joe's head. He panicked, wanting to get in an explanation first, before something terrible happened, like Joe figuring something out by himself for the first time ever.

"It's just… okay, here's the thing: it was a spell, y'know? A potion, I guess. I was trying to figure something out and that was supposed to clear things up a little."

"Like what?" Joe asked, but he sounded far less apologetic and much more like he was carefully reminding himself not to pout.

"Just… stuff. Personal stuff."

"You mean like when you did that whole thing out on the roof?"

"Yes," Patrick admitted, his jaw slightly clenched. "That's what you knocked out of the window you big klutz."

"Oh…" Joe seemed torn between guilt and annoyance. He lifted a hand to his mouth to chew absently on a shred of skin on the side of his finger, frowning. "Well, I mean, like… I don't even get why you think you think you need some dumb love spell. Either he's into you or he's not, it'd be kind of weird to think someone dated you because you kind of like, drugged them into wanting to…"

"That's not even it!" Patrick replied indignantly. "I wasn't trying to make anyone date me, I just wanted to know if I had a chance, okay?"

Joe snorted, cynically. "Oh, well that makes like, way more sense, because you are literally the most oblivious person on Earth. Hope he's worth the effort, dude. Night."

Patrick wanted to say something useful, like 'wait' or 'don't go' as Joe headed for the door, but what actually came out of his mouth was, "Don't wait!"

"Wasn't planning to," Joe replied, as he disappeared into the hall, and the wooden floor was so slippery under Patrick's socks that he almost fell as he tried to run after him.

"What? Joe! No - don't - fuck - STOP!"

Joe turned on the spot just in time for Patrick to slam them both against the bedroom door frame and slump to the floor in a noisy pile.

Patrick barely had time to open his mouth to apologise before he was blinded by the bright light of a door opening in Pete's room. 

"What the fuck are you two even doing?"

"Fuck! Dude!" Joe groaned, shielding his eyes. 

"Oh, want to hold hands in the dark some more?"

"Pete," Patrick snapped, " not now ."

"It's like four in the morning, why are you even up?"

Joe snorted. "Because someone woke us up with their Mongolian throat singing or something, basically."

Pete narrowed his eyes speculatively and looked at them both. "Were you two sleeping together again?"

"No!" 

"Well, apart from the part where we were actively, like, in my bed together, sleeping…" Joe muttered, shrugging deliberately. "But yeah, what does that even mean anymore?"

Pete arched an eyebrow. "Okay… So, I'm getting some water and taking a leak, and then going to bed. You kids… do whatever you were doing in whatever bed you wanna do it in."

"Shut up. And anyway - what were you actually doing? We could hear you talking to someone."

Pete smirked and shrugged. "Learning a mantra."

"But your girlfriend went home - how -?" Joe started, confused, before his eyes lit up curiously. "Wait, like the thing Prince can do with ole'...?" He wiggled his eyebrows pointedly and stuck his tongue in his cheek.

"You're thinking of Tantra, dumbass. If you want something sucked, ask Lunchbox. He'll do it."

Patrick glared at him and flipped off his retreating back. Perhaps the magic really was having an effect, because Pete flipped the bird back at him without even looking over his shoulder.

They both stayed sitting on the floor for a few moments, not really looking at each other, until Joe finally pressed his arm against the door frame and climbed, awkwardly, to his feet.

Patrick hurried to follow, wanting to explain better, somehow - too embarrassed to even really feel hopeful that Joe seemed mad about it - and almost walked into the flat of Joe's bedroom door as it was shut in his face.

Dismally, he turned and walked back into his room, looking down at the glittering fragments below his window as he shut it, and crawled into his cold, empty bed to go to sleep alone.

---

Patrick had to work the next morning, and he clattered around the kitchen making his cereal in the hope that Joe would walk up and come out to bitch at him for being noisy, but he didn't. And when he got home from work, Pete said he'd gone to his folks' place for dinner, so he didn't even get to see him in the evening, either, he just laid on his bed and wondered if he should try again with the spell - even if he had to wait the full month, it was better than not knowing, wasn't it? 

When he got home on Tuesday, though, Joe was sitting on the futon playing the SNES. 

"Oh," Patrick said, immediately disappointed to see that he'd cut his hair - all the loose curls were shorn down to a buzzcut. "Hey."

Joe glanced at him and then looked back to the game. "Hey."

"I like your hair," he lied.

"Mom did it. It was getting unwieldy."

"Right." He tried for humour, wanting to break the ice. "I wish I had that problem…" 

Joe cast him the same dully exasperated, sympathetic look that he'd given him a hundred other times that Patrick had put himself down for his amusement, and sighed. "Dork."

He picked the cushion up from the seat beside him to allow Patrick the space to sit down, and Patrick didn't wait for a second invite. "How are your folks?"

"Same, pretty much. How was work?"

"That guy came in again, but still won't buy anything unless Callie's there."

"Sounds like a creep, man," Joe muttered, directing Chun-Li to kick Ryu's face in, twisting the controller a little as he did.

"Yeah, well… I guess I'm not one to talk, right?"

The little snort that Joe gave said, 'You can say that again', and Patrick felt like a creep. After all, he didn't actually know what he was going to do with his potion, entirely. Obviously, Joe was supposed to drink it or something, but how he'd get him to do that he had no idea - in his eagerness to just kno w, he also hadn't really thought about the morality of sneaking it into a drink. It suddenly felt like maybe it would have been a really shitty thing to do to someone he cared about a lot… Maybe Captain Klutz had actually saved him from a moral quandary of his own making.

He thought about apologising, but he wasn't even sure that Joe realised that it was for him, yet, and it was probably best that he didn't. After all, who'd want to date a creep?

He tried, instead, to find something else to say, but Joe cut him off by throwing the Player 2 remote into his lap and resetting to the start menu so that they could both play.

---

They were rehearsing for a ritual, as well as for a show, on Wednesday night. Hallowe'en, Pete had decided, was The Big One. Right before their show, they were going to carry out an invocation ritual (or something) at sunset. Because apparently that was when the whole shebang started. And then they were going to use whatever energy they mustered from it to perform the most awesome of shows. In Patrick's opinion, they could achieve a better show by actually playing their instruments properly instead of swinging from the ceiling and doing acrobatics, but both Pete and Joe thought otherwise…

At least when they sat on their tatty cushions on blankets on the living room floor, he got a chance to hold Joe's hand, even if it also meant holding Andy's on the other side.

"What are we even invoking, anyway?" Joe asked, reading over the scrawled notes that Pete had handed them all. "Because I wanna invoke Randy Rhoads. If I get a choice, obviously…"

"You don't," Pete snapped, pointing at his page. "We're doing it collectively, or whatever - the power of All. Of the - the Great Spirit."

"We're invoking God ?" Joe's gasp was almost funny, but he was deadly serious as he turned to Patrick. "He's invoking God, dude. I fucking said he'd try to invoke God!"

Andy snorted at him, apparently finding his panic highly amusing. "We're not invoking 'God', we're invoking its power. Like, if you turn on a lightbulb you don't get the power of the whole grid, right? You get enough to do the job."

"Maybe I'm doing a good enough job without God powers…"

Pete looked at him soberly, directly in the eye, and said, "You're not."

Patrick rubbed at the back of Joe's hand as he tried not to giggle, too. It didn't seem like it'd bode well for their chances if they got some alone time, later.

"When we do this for real, I'll use salt," Pete noted in between the ritual words as he walked around the circle, drawing a line in the air.

Andy started with the East as they invoked the elements, and one by one they followed. Patrick was a little proud of the fact that he knew what he was doing, now, and didn't need to recite his quarter from the paper in his hand. Maybe, he thought, he actually had more experience with magic than any of the rest of them, now.

There was a chant, once it was underway, that Patrick thought may just possibly be the same thing that they'd heard emanating from Pete's room in the early hours of Sunday morning. He didn't really know what he was saying - just the syllables Pete had spelled out phonetically on his crib sheet. And yet, as they practised, working on chanting it in the round - first Andy, then Pete, then Joe and then Patrick, each a syllable behind each other until the noise was swirling around the room between them - he began to feel strange; serious. Powerful. On some level, deep down inside him - not in his belly or in his chest, but somewhere unfathomable, intangible - he could feel something expanding. The power of the four of them together, doing this, was mesmerising.

He closed his eyes, trying to hold it all in, remain grounded in the moment, but it just made him feel strange - like he was spinning and spinning, not on the spot but in conjunction with the others. An endless whirligig of momentum, even though he could feel the blanket through his socks and knew he couldn't possibly be moving. 

And there was something else - a change in the pitch and cadence of their voices; they'd deepened, like when his old Walkman ran out of power when he was a kid and the tape couldn't run at the right speed anymore. Only, the words still seemed at the right pace. Just not quite right.

He opened his mouth to draw in some air, and at the exact same moment there was a shrill noise that cut through the atmosphere so sharply it wrenched him out of the spin and his eyes were open and staring across at Pete's. For a split second - like the flicker of an old TV - Pete looked different. His eyes seemed darker, his expression oddly hungry, and in that instant, as Joe pulled his hands free to get the door and pay for the takeout they'd ordered with a wad of collected cash, Patrick was just the tiniest bit afraid.

"You doing alright?" Joe asked quietly, later, when Andy took Pete to his room to go over the finer details of the plan and select the best props. He was still poking at his left over noodles with a chopstick, absently, as they sat propped against the edge of the futon.

"Why?" Patrick asked back, too quickly.

"I dunno," he shrugged. "You just seemed a little weirded out. That's like, usually my job, right?"

Patrick laughed and gave an acquiescent nod. "Kind of, yeah. It's nothing, I just got kind of dizzy doing the whole chanting thing."

"Yeah, that was a little spooky, actually… Did you feel like you were on one of those carousels from a play park?"

"Yes!" Patrick blurted, grasping at Joe's forearm in relief. "Yes, dude, it was so like that!"

"Oh. Neat. I thought maybe I was just sucking at being a wizard again, basically…"

"You don't suck…"

Joe's grin was at least half-forced, but he quirked an eyebrow at him playful and said, "Or do I?"

It caught him in the cheeks first of all but tumbled out of him in a spluttering giggle of embarrassed glee. Joe smiled, watching him laugh, and rubbed at the back of his head where the hair was short and prickly and Patrick couldn't help thinking of all the times he'd ducked his head forward to let Patrick run his fingers over it, because the texture was oddly pleasing. He was about to reach out his hand by way of asking, when Joe blurted, with the air of someone pretending not to have a preference, but absolutely having one, "D'you wanna meditate when these guys leave?"

"Um," Patrick said, purely for the chance to push down his thrill at the prospect and not seem desperate, "we could, yeah… If you wanted?"

They'd barely heard the slam of the door at the bottom of the stairs before they'd both crawled off the couch to settle themselves on the abandoned blankets, Patrick's thighs once again draped over the top of Joe's - just so that they could reach each other's hands and connect better, of course. 

---

The first thing he knew, when he arrived in the other world, was that he was falling. He barely had time to cry out before he hit the water. It was cool, but not cold, yet it still took his breath away. He flailed aimlessly until he broke the surface, splashing, panicked and gasping for air with water still crashing down around him.

"Hey - hey, hey, hey - I've got you, dude, I've got you…"

He scrunched his eyes, blinking the water out of them, reaching out towards the sound of Joe's voice. The feel of hands grasping his shirt and pulling him closer was such a relief that he buried his face into Joe's wet shoulder and almost sobbed. "Fuck… what the fuck was that?"

"You're good dude, don't worry - I've got you. You just… you just fell. From nowhere. But I think you're okay now, right? You can put your feet down..."

Tentatively, Patrick stopped kicking and reached out a foot. Thank God, there it was: solid ground. "Thank you," he said, still clutching on to Joe tightly, as though the pool might suck him back under its waters if he let go.

"It's okay," Joe assured him, reaching up to lift the soaked strands of hair out of Patrick's eyes. "You're safe, little dude."

Patrick closed his eyes at the touch, involuntarily tilting his head towards his fingers. And then it dawned on him: "Wait - my glasses!"

"What glasses? You don't wear them here…"

"I don't?"

"You've never seemed to need them. Which is ironic, because you like, wear them all the time back there and you can still never see what's in front of you."

"I'm not that blind…"

Joe just smiled a little and shook his head. 

They didn't wander this time, not like they had before. The golden leaves, a confetti of yellow and red and copper, fluttered down around them as they rested their weight on the water and floated gently - Patrick's hand firmly in Joe's to stop him panicking that he might drift under the waterfall if he let go; 'Like otters', Joe had explained, and Patrick didn't question it.

Instead, they bobbed gently, enjoying the sound of the bubbling water as they stared up through the canopy above, to perpetually dusky sky - the first white pin pricks of starlight breaking through as the sun faded into never. There was a faint smell of wood smoke in the air, familiar and autumnal, and he thought maybe he'd like an endless fall, if it was always like this.

It was so peaceful, so soothing to be there in the pool, with Joe, that he closed his eyes for a moment and breathed deeply, feeling every little sinew and muscle relaxing to let the surface tension take the weight - and instantly sank.

He could feel hands in the water scrambling for his, hear a rolling, burbling sound that could have been the waterfall, or it could have been Joe's laughter above the water, as he tried to grasp him and finally pulled him up to gasp the air that had been expelled from his lungs in the shock of slipping under.

Frantic, he threw his arms around Joe's neck, spluttering, reassured by the grip tightening around him, and rested his cheek on the bare skin of his shoulder.

"Well, you're really living the Earth experience, huh?" Joe chuckled softly, his face turned towards the sodden strands at the back of Patrick's head. "Goof."

Patrick coughed a little, catching his breath, and tried not to laugh because it wasn't remotely funny that Joe's lake had tried to draw him under twice, like that. He lifted his head a little to turn and tell him so, but as he did, his forehead brushed Joe's nose, lightly, the rivulets of water trickling from the locks on Patrick's forehead down the length of his nose and down into the little groove over his lip. Unthinkingly, he made to run the tip of his tongue to swipe away the tickle and shake the water from his eyes, but in the shift of his head the movement became a nuzzle and the nuzzle, soft and tentative and deliberate, became a kiss.

---

Patrick's heart was racing when he opened his eyes, back on the floor in the living room of their apartment. It was strange, because it hadn't felt at all like the kisses in his dream journeys, and before, he hadn't woken to find Joe staring back at him, face flushed in the flickering blue glow of the TV.

"Well," Joe said firmly, but not really looking at him. "That's enough for tonight."

"Oh…" Patrick nodded, lifting himself back to let Joe scramble to his feet, watching him pick up his cushion as he went, making his way immediately to the door but dropping a hand on Patrick's shoulder to squeeze as he left.

He sat there for a few minutes, alone, gathering his wits and dignity, and then climbed unsteadily to his feet and headed back to his room to throw himself on his bed and relive the whole thing, wondering if those tiny, skewed details they always noticed had misaligned this time.

---

When Patrick walked up to the apartment door the next night, he found Joe sitting on the step to the entrance with his feet on the sidewalk. It was later than usual - they were on festive opening hours - and Joe's knuckles looked white as he grasped the knee of his Dickies, jiggling one leg up and down as he waited.

"Hey. What're you waiting out here for? Not - oh, shoot, we're going to your folks' to get the merch today, aren't we? Sorry - I -" 

Joe didn't seem at all concerned with this, though. He looked pale and dishevelled, now that Patrick really looked at him, and he'd gotten to his feet so fast they'd almost bumped heads.

"I'm so glad you're home."

"Yeah?" Patrick said, trying not to seem too giddy, but his stomach felt like Michael's vampire takeout noodle box - squirmy and tangled. "Me too. How was -?"

"No, no, listen it's like - can we just go?"

"Um. Sure, I guess? Is everything okay?”

”Pete's fucking freaking me out."

"What? How?" Automatically, he started to push past him, worried. Pete had moments when he got kind of unsettling and intense, but Joe had been dealing with them even longer than Patrick had, they didn't usually shake him up.

"No, listen," Joe said, grasping for his arm to stop him going up there, "listen, it was like - his eyes were off."

There was a ringing in his ears, suddenly; an alert of recognition that he almost didn't want to acknowledge. "Off how?"

"They were… kind of black." The wideness of Joe's own eyes was almost alarming in itself. He really wasn't kidding and something really had freaked him out.

"Okay," Patrick said, stepping away from the apartment door and giving him a reassuring squeeze. "So… what happened?" 

"I just… I know what I saw."

"Are you sure he didn't just get some Wes Borland contacts or something, to mess with you? I know he pointed some out at the store when we were picking up our costumes, y'know?"

"No! They were there for like a second and then they were gone! How the hell would he do that?"

It had to be a prank. Patrick had seen the same flicker of something himself, and of course Pete's eyes hadn't turned black, that was ridiculous, Buffy-grade shit. And yet, Joe was completely serious and visibly shaken, and maybe he'd seen the same momentary hunger and his brain had processed it into something from the horror movies they'd binged on at the beginning of October, preparing for the month ahead.

"Okay, man, I believe you… Let's just go, right? Get out of here for a while?"

They didn't talk about it when they got in Joe's car - at least, not until they were out on the expressway. And then Joe said, "I know I sound like an idiot."

"You don't," Patrick told him, quickly. "You sound like something freaked you the hell out, and honestly, with the shit we've done, recently, I get it."

"I feel like an idiot, though..."

Patrick chuckled and rested his head on his hand, propped against the edge of the window. "Okay, sure, you're an idiot. We're both idiots."

"Thanks for being an idiot with me."

"Yeah," Patrick said, trying not to grin too hard as he looked at the side of Joe's face, hoping he wouldn't look over and catch him mooning at him like a little girl, but also kind of hoping for a flash of a smile back, because the truth of it was, he was a complete idiot about Joe.

And when they got home that night, carrying boxes of t-shirts and pins and CDs, the apartment smelled of incense, and from Pete's room at the end of the hall there was a low, rhythmic murmur.

"Hey," Patrick said, to catch Joe's attention, concerned by the anxious look on his face as he dropped their first set of boxes in the living room, "if you want, you can hang out in my room, tonight. For the company, y'know?”

Joe just nodded and ducked back out of the apartment door as quickly as he could.

Which was how, when Patrick rolled over to turn out the light, that night, it was with Joe tucked under the duvet behind him and one arm draped loosely over Patrick's side.

---

Dusk, apparently, was when Hallowe'en - which Pete kept insisting on calling Sah-wen - started, so they were trudging their way into the woods as the sun made its last efforts for October. The fire bucket was discarded, in favour of tealights in jars to mark the circle and a cheap balti dish from a dollar store, that they could leave buried after they'd doused it.

The air felt like the Hallowe'ens of Patrick's childhood. It smelled like the first open fires of the year spilling from chimneys and prickled with the excitement of mischief afoot. He hadn't really believed that devils and witches and ghouls were abroad on the night for many years - since he was in middle school with a skeleton painted on his old, black track pants and a plastic pumpkin bucket for his haul, but tonight, he wasn't sure.

After all, were they not witches, now? Or wizards, maybe? Or were they just a bunch of stupid kids messing with stuff and believing that they were performing dark arts?

He didn't know, but he suspected that Joe was more convinced than he had been a year ago, because he'd looped his arm through Patrick's and clung on tight, glancing around them at the long shadows in the trees where the candle light couldn't quite reach. Patrick had responded right away, squeezing back and resting his shoulder against him, because under the fluttering of the leaves still shedding from the trees in every little, meandering gust of wind, he couldn't help thinking of floating beneath falling leaves and water running in little streams down his face.

Andy had already scooped out a patch of earth to set their little pan - no larger than a side plate - into, and had surrounded it with small rocks he'd gathered on the path up to the spot. It wasn't the same place they'd carried out their last ritual - they didn't have the time to go that far when they had a soundcheck to get to - so they didn't have to worry about digging up the spell that they'd set before. Patrick did cast his mind over to it, though, as they kicked back the leaves on the ground. Was it stirring under the earth, waiting for the sun to start shining down and warming up the ground? He hoped so - if only so that he could say that he had a hand in starting the life of something that could well be there in two-hundred years or more.

"Do you two need to get anything out of your system before we start?" Andy snickered, watching them fuss around together, Joe holding Patrick's candle, so that he could tug off his fingerless gloves.

"Yeah," Joe replied, without a beat, "you're a dick."

Patrick hushed him, grinning, and took his candle back, to stand it at his feet. He didn't let go of Joe's hand as he did so, and the flush in his cheeks was definitely from the way that Joe wriggled his fingers to lace them, and not from the nip of the chill in the air.

Opening the circle was easy for all of them, by now. They knew their elements, Patrick had even studied his, looking online while Joe sprawled across his bed and listened to Patrick read out the table from the webpage he'd found.

And around the tiniest of fires, they began their chant to raise the energy they wanted to use for their show that night. The swirling breeze seemed to follow their voices around the circle, until it almost felt as though they were standing around a small, lazy tornado, drawing their voices up into the night. 

It felt real . It felt like magic - sorcery - like what they were doing with their voices and with their minds was really manifesting before them, like shadowy creatures, lurking amongst the trees, creeping closer to listen. It was exhilarating and frightening and he expelled all the nervous energy that had whipped up inside of him into the deep, simultaneous, HARGH! at the end of their chant. And in that moment he was a warrior - a Viking or a Hun - striking with his voice in the night.

The forest was silent for a long time after their voices faded. It seemed still - everything around them, beasties or monsters or ghosts temporarily banished.

And then, softly, in the trees somewhere to the east, an owl gave a soft " Hoowoo ." And a moment later, another responded. And then another, and another. And somewhere deep in the woods, a critter that Patrick couldn't identify gave an ungodly screech.

The forest around them was answering their call.

Pete started laughing first. Then he tilted back his head and howled along with them, hands cupped around his mouth. Patrick wasn't sure what possessed him, but he took a breath and howled, too, the comical Owh-owh-aroo! of a Hanna Barbera cartoon, half-laughter, half-primal call to the other existences out there in the woods with them. And when Joe and Andy snickered and joined in, it was a different kind of powerful. It was the four of them, their little pack, howling at the moon like the wildmen he was reasonably convinced that they were becoming.

Once the circle had been closed and their equipment packed away, the rest of the candles - those that had survived the wind - flickering in Pete's armful of jars as he and Andy began to pick their way over tree roots and back into the dark, he started to let go of Joe's hand in order to scuff away the salt ring around them. But Joe kept a hold and pulled him back, slipping Patrick's hand from his grip and wrapping an arm around his shoulders, instead.

"You good?" Patrick asked, looking up at him with a grin.

"Yeah," Joe nodded, with a breathy laugh, and just for a moment, he pressed his cheek to Patrick's forehead. It triggered a sense memory at the back of Patrick's mind - water and leaves and Joe's arms around him, keeping him safe. And he didn't really mean to do it, but he nuzzled comfortably under Joe's jaw, wrapping his free arm, still grasping a candle in its jar, across Joe's chest.

It was an awkward position to stand in. He was contorted, stretching to find Joe's arm to hook the side of his wrist around. But it didn't matter. Just like in the water, the soft, tentative nuzzles shifted, and Joe lifted his head enough to whisper, "I was meaning to ask, what does a dude have to do to get you to make him a love spell, anyway?"

"I already made you one,” Patrick mumbled back, the tug of a smile pulling at his cheeks, coyly, as he thunked his forehead to Joe's. "You threw it out a window. I thought maybe that was meant to be my answer..."

"I mean… I did tell you I'm an idiot…" Joe said, and he was still smiling as he bumped their lips together - hardly even a kiss, at first, but for all Patrick's curiosity about kisses and lip rings, he barely gave it a second thought.

"Hey, lovebirds!” Andy's voice called back through the trees, where he and Pete were nothing more than a faint, bobbing glow in the distance. "We're gonna be late for soundcheck!"

"Your mom's late for soundcheck!” Joe yelled back, nonsensically, and Patrick was snickering about it even as he led Joe back towards the van, holding his tiny tea light aloft to help them see. Or maybe that was just the giddy excitement of realising that, on some level, his spell seemed to have worked.

---

The performance itself was one of the best that Patrick could remember playing. He didn't even feel self-conscious - at least not after the first three bars, when the kids started singing along. Joe seemed to have launched himself into some kind of anti-gravity dreidel routine in which, if Patrick didn't have a basic grasp of physics, he might've really thought he was making multiple revolutions with a single jump - and he seemed to be hitting all the right chords. Pete seemed to be bouncing off the ceiling - absorbing the energy from the kids yelling back at them and radiating it back out. Andy was a vicious metronome behind them. It was amazing . He felt like he could see it in waves, like heat off a pavement in summer.

When they got to the merch table, after the show, Chris was practically fighting off kids trying to get a hold of copies of the CDs they had been trying to shift. Two of their shirts had sold out in a medium. Patrick couldn't ever remember it being like this. He tried to help out, at first, but then kids kept interrupting to talk to him and he started to mess up the numbers, so Chris batted him away and he ducked over to stand next to Joe, who was rambling at two fans, slopping his plastic cup of pop as he gesticulated. His Crow make-up had migrated all over his sweaty face and Patrick grinned at it, without even meaning to, just as Joe glanced his way. He reached out amicably and slung his free arm around Patrick's shoulders, introducing him to the kids he was trying to impress (one dressed as a skeleton, the other in a Freddie Krueger sweater), as if they didn't already know he was in the band, too.

"You wanna go?" Patrick said in his ear, as the kids finally wandered off. Most of their gear was already loaded after the set, but they'd had to park a few streets away because there were so many cars outside the hall.

Joe's eyes swivelled around the room, checking that Pete wasn't paying attention, and nodded. "Let's go get our shit."

They already had a plan. Pete's enthusiasm for all his friends joining him on his destructive, firework-launching escapades was only trumped by his tendency to forget you weren't there as soon as you were out of his line of sight. So, if they were sneaky, they could get out before he realised and he'd go about his evening bribing people to pour chilli sauce on their assholes as happy as if they were there the whole time. Although Patrick knew from personal experience that he'd be a whole lot happier if he wasn't.

As they snuck out the venue, in rubber masks Joe had talked out of the hands of some friends, black hoodies over their shirts - zipped up so the priests' dog collar wasn't visible - they even had to squeeze past Pete talking to some girls, and he barely glanced as they nudged past him. Once outside, they burst into nervous laughter and sprinted down the street as if they had actual werewolves chasing them. When they hit the corner, and Patrick almost forgot which direction they'd left the car in, Joe scrambled for his hand and dragged him along the sidewalk, guitar case bouncing against his shoulder with leaves and candy wrappers swirling into drifts as they kicked through them.

On porches across the street, where the residential side of town bordered the small industrial district, Jack'o'lanterns were flickering their last and garden displays had been ravaged by the hordes who'd passed through at dusk. If he'd ever known a night to feel like mischief was afoot, tonight was it. They were laughing so hard by the time they got in Joe's car that it took him three attempts to get the key in the ignition and Patrick couldn't breathe through the smell of rubber from his mask.

It felt like they were on the run - his heart was racing the whole way from Arlington Heights back into the city, where they passed crowds of costumed revellers making for themed nights at clubs that Patrick and Joe were old enough to play at, but not drink in. Not that Patrick would've wanted to be at a club, tonight. He'd gotten into some scrapes with the band before (mainly down to Pete, one way or another), but this time it was exhilarating. He wasn't afraid of his mom finding out that he was there when the police showed up or that he might step in someone's puke, he was just enjoying it - this dumb adventure that literally just meant going home for the night with this kid in his band who he had feelings for that he thought he knew about but had never really experienced before, and maybe indulging in a little bit of softcore meditation if things got really crazy.

They headed into the living room, first, to dump their guitars in the corner behind the door, and Joe slumped down onto the cushions still scattered in the middle of the room because Pete liked to arrange these things but not tidy them back up, afterwards, breathless from the stairs and the giggles that had reappeared when they realised they'd made it home without being caught.

"That was fucking dumb," he announced, grinning up at Patrick with his arm half over his eyes to shield them from the overhead light.

"I swear I thought we'd get pulled over or something," Patrick told him, flipping the switch to turn the light back off and picking up the barbecue lighter to relight the candles they'd set about the room, on Wednesday. He put on his best Pete voice, "'Like, hello? Yeah, I'd like to report my friends for not wanting to shoot roman candles out of their asses with me, kind of?'"

Joe giggled on the floor as Patrick stepped over his legs to perch on the edge of the couch and leaned in to tug the loose tails of Joe's grey button-down, where they'd ridden up over his belly. "But we made it, at least."

"Why are you sitting up there, dude? There's a perfectly good floor, right here…" He reached up and tugged at Patrick's hand, finger tucked into his wristband like a fishhook reeling him in. "Luxuriate in the No Peteness of it all."

Patrick pretended to be a little reluctant as he slipped into the floor and clambered over him to lay down on the other side, where he had room to snow angel at the blankets sarcastically.

"So, I mean," Joe started, after a few moments of Patrick's head resting on his arm, "what's the dealio, now?"

The heat in Patrick's cheeks was immediate. He'd kind of thought they were letting it work out naturally. "I mean, I feel like tonight was kind of self-explanatory? Do you wanna talk about it?"

Joe seemed to weigh this up in his mind; Patrick could see his head loll back and forth a little in his peripheral vision. "I think I pretty much just wanted to, like, know what you were gonna do with that stuff, anyway? Was I supposed to like, drink it , or something? 'Cause that's kinda gross. Did it have eye of newt in it?"

Patrick snorted at Joe's ignorance of what real spells were made of. "It's not fucking Harry Potter, man… It was like, rose water and lavender."

"Huh. That's kind of disappointing, actually… It was kind of a whole bunch of work, though, for like, figuring out if the dude who basically sits in your lap on the couch might wanna hold your hand sometime…"

"It -!" Patrick's smugness disappeared in a puff of righteous indignation, and he sat himself up a little, to argue his case that little bit more authoritatively. "It wasn't - you already hold my hand! I'm not that stupid, Joe.."

Joe quirked his eyebrows proudly as he beamed up at him in the warm glow of the candles. "I'm not sure that that's actually a defence, honestly. I mean, I literally did hold your hand, dude. A bunch of times."

"Well, maybe I thought I was the one doing the hand-holding… Maybe I just thought, I dunno… I don't know. I never knew if you were jerking my chain - 'cause you'd never actually say, like, 'Oh, by the way, I'm into dudes for real.' And that's not just me, by the way, none of us knew!"

There was something reassuringly normal about sinking into petulant irritation while Joe grinned at him, with his big, stupid, doe eyes. Even if Joe had kissed him in the woods earlier and run home holding his hand. Patrick flopped himself back down onto the floor with a huff.

"So, maybe I'm dumb or something. But if I am, I don't know what that makes the dork who did such a shitty job of flirting with me that I didn't even know what he was doing."

The floorboards squeaked a little as Joe shuffled closer to his side, still doing his stupid, adorable grin, like the slight had rolled right off him. Which it definitely had, because they'd known each other long enough for Patrick to know how to be mean without hurting his occasionally hair-trigger feelings.

"I'm basically just hearing that I got you to like me back without you even realising I was doing it, actually. I'll admit it kind of took longer than I wanted," he shrugged, "but I didn't have the advantage of the occult on my side, I guess."

"I'll lend you the book."

"Thanks."

They chuckled and slipped into a weighty silence, until Joe asked, "So, I guess… are we a whole thing, now, or anything? 'Cause nice boys don't put out unless they're going steady or whatever, right?"

Patrick spluttered and almost choked on his own saliva, laughing. "As if you're a 'nice boy'!"

"Who said I meant me? But anyway, I'm super nice. I'm the nicest boy you'll ever do black magic with, anyway."

"I don't think it's technically black magic until you start sacrificing virgins or something, dude," Patrick told him, seriously. "But I don't want Pete getting any funny ideas or anything, y'know? So, I guess, if you wanted to, we could sort of see how dating works out and try to get each other struck off the list of prospects at some point. Like, in the future or whatever, obviously. I'm not exactly afraid I'm gonna wake up on an altar, or anything tomorrow, so..."

"So, like…? Yes?”

"Huh? Oh - yeah. Yes, it'd be pretty cool if we were A Whole Thing. I don't tend to climb out of windows to put flowers in bottles under the new moon unless I actually give a crap, so..." 

He glanced up as Joe shifted and rolled so he was on his side to look at him, head propped on the green pillow, arm still outstretched under Patrick's head. He still had charcoal coloured smudges down his face, but Patrick watched him chew on the ring at the side of his lip, trying not to grin too eagerly, and gazed at the long, delicate lashes resting on his cheeks as he chuckled, wondering how the goofy kid in bottle-bottom glasses in the photos at his mom's house had turned into such a good-looking nineteen year old. Even covered in Hallowe'en make-up.

---

They'd relocated to Joe's room by the time the others got home, so it wasn't until the next day that Pete found out what was going on. It was Patrick's fault. He was excited - he had a boyfriend for the first time ever, and it was Joe - and he wanted to share that news with somebody. It was obviously always going to be Pete, because who didn't share that kind of stuff with their best friend? But if he'd known the angle that Pete would take, he probably wouldn't have been so eager to share his news.

"For fucking real , Cookie?" he said, cross-legged on his bed, still in his boxers and one of Chris's t-shirts, for some reason. "I mean, I knew you kids wanted to bump uglies or whatever, but it finally happened?!"

"Uh. Kind of?" Patrick told him, shifting a little awkwardly and scruffing his fingers through the back of his hair. "There hasn't been any real… direct ... bumping, honestly, but… y'know: eventually. Probably." He didn't mention that a significant portion of the indirect bumping had taken place on the living room floor. He wasn't about to share that with Pete.

"You morons had a whole apartment to yourself and you didn't bone? Are you serious?"

"Have you met me, dude?"

Pete frowned seriously. "Yeah… I get your point, kind of."

"I mean… I guess it turns out you were right. But I'm only admitting to that once, ever."

"Of course I was right, dumbass," Pete snorted. "He follows your ass around like Pepé Le Pew. If it wasn't so lame, it'd be adorable."

He could feel the watermelon effect rolling through his cheeks, but this was Pete and he was honestly past trying to pretend to him about any of it. Well. Most of it. Not the living room floor bit.

"So, wait -" There was something unnerving about the look on Pete's face; a kind of sordid glee with the shadowy reflections of cogs ticking in his head, "if you didn't do anything yet, and I know you're basically pure as driven snow, and everything, then this is a gold mine!"

"Huh?" Patrick's own cogs were following Pete's but he was frantically trying to grind the gears into reverse so the words didn't have a chance to manifest this horror into reality. "Pete, I do not consent to being sacrificed as a virgin offering, okay? Are we clear on that?"

"I'm not gonna sacrifice you, bro - you're my meal ticket! I'm talking about using a pretty inevitable rite of passage to give the whole band a boost."

"No. If you're talking about some kind of Eyes Wide Shut shit, Pete -"

"Not a fucking orgy , you weirdo! Just you and Trohman. Do you have any idea how powerful shit like this is?"

"Pete, no. No, no, no."

"No, for real, listen -"

"I'm not going to just - are you nuts?! We didn't even talk about it for real, yet!"

"Who needs to talk? I mean, to be honest, Ric, I feel like the less you two talk about it, the more chance there is of it happening, kind of…"

"No, Pete! This is a huge deal for me, don't ruin it, man. Please."

"I'm not 'ruining' it, I'm just saying - you're gonna do it, if you can sort of get your shit together - which, on second thoughts… Okay. You're both gonna wanna do it, right? So, why not just use that whole moment and I can, sort of… facilitate, to make sure you do it right.'

"You are not facilitating anything!"

"It's for the band , Ric. You want hot tubs and girls, right?"

Patrick narrowed his eyes at him. 

"Alright, so not 'girls' girls, but metaphorical girls. Dudes."

"Nobody gets dudes from being in a punk band, you whackjob. Anyway, I've got Joe." 

"But don't you get it?" Pete asked, leaning closer with hissed excitement. "You could have whatever you want. That's the magic thing! You wanted Joe, right?"

"I didn't do it to get him, dammit!"

"Do what?"

It occurred to Patrick a little too late that Pete didn't know shit about what he'd been doing, or the fact that it had - by serendipity or design - worked almost instantaneously. "Nothing."

"Don't 'nothing' me, Cookiejar, I can read your face."

"Then why are you asking? I'm guessing you already just know, huh?"

The smile spread across Pete's face with a broad, toothy ominousness. His eyes shone in the reflections of the candles on his dresser, because it seemed like what was left of the daylight had suddenly slunk away. "You got some help, didn't you? From the other side… You asked for something, and they gave it to you."

"It's not like that - it wasn't like that, Pete, I just… I just wanted to know."

"But you got your answer, right? This is for all of us, Ric," Pete was saying, "it's all coming together, kind of. You get what you want, and you give something back, yeah? It's a fair trade. It's something you'll do anyway - you just need to do it right and then the band gets something out of it, too, or whatever…"

"Don't you have a bunch of volunteers for stuff like this, already? You seemed to have a few of them eating out of the palm of your shorts when we left, last night."

The comment seemed to quell Pete's enthusiasm almost instantly, and his eyebrows pinched. "Yeah… I kind of got in trouble about that, last night. With Jeanae."

"Uh-oh," Patrick offered, because he wasn't about to side with Pete without knowing what the fuck he'd done. She seemed to be pretty much on the nail about fifty percent of the times she broke up with him.

"I know… it's not like I even did anything, this time, she just got mad that I was putting the band before her. Like, what the fuck, right? She knows the band comes first."

Patrick shrugged. "I can kind of see her point, dude… it's a long way to come out so you can be ignored by your so-called 'boyfriend' while he flirts with other people so they buy a shirt."

The self-pitying pout on Pete's face deepened at his lack of endorsement. "You're meant to be on my side, Lunchbox…"

"I'm on the side of truth, justice and the American way."

"But not the American three-way with you, Trohman and all the power in the universe?"

"Nah, I'm pretty sure we're exclusive."

He looked around Pete's room, just for something to do that didn't include looking Pete in the eye while he smothered the butterflies the thought stirred up. He noticed, then, for the first time, that there were diagrams stuck to each wall, drawn out on printer paper with Sharpie. They were angular, not recognisable as anything he'd ever seen - almost geometric doodles with little dots and triangles at the ends of lines.

"Been decorating?" he asked, pushing his glasses up his nose.

"Just working, dude."

"Are they sigils?"

Pete nodded. "Yeah. I designed them to represent us all and our elements." He pointed at one which looked mostly like a stream weaving through twin peaks of a mountain with a horizon line connected to a single half-loop of a sun - or maybe a full moon - rising behind it. "That's yours."

Patrick immediately looked anti-clockwise to find Joe's. It was like a table, from the side, or a wake against the horizon, but the left leg looked like a fish hook, almost. It was simpler than Patrick's, though, and it seemed to demystify itself before his eyes - JMT, Joe's initials, only they were connected by a long joined 'tabletop' line and the dip of the 'M' formed the downward pointing triangle that he knew represented water. The others, he assumed, were Pete's and Andy's because something about them evoked a fire basket and a weathervane. "They're cool," he said, absently. "Is there a reason?"

"Just working, dude… Figuring stuff out, so that it works even better next time. Getting a conversation going, kind of?"

"With who?"

The shrug Pete gave was stiff with badly-concealed shiftiness. "Just Them - like, whatever's out there making this shit happen."

"I kind of thought we were making this shit happen, y'know?"

"Well, yeah, but if you're gonna invoke something's power, you gotta get to know it, or whatever."

"Right… I guess. How's that going?”

Pete hesitated and then, slowly, his usual shark-like smile crept across his face and his eyes seemed to grow just a little darker. "Good."

Patrick didn't press him any further. In fact, he made his excuses and went to find Joe, dropping himself onto the futon beside him and huddling up to his shoulder to shrug off the unease. But the strange, cold chill that had run up his spine wouldn't go away.

---

The days slipped by in a whirlwind, after that. The oranges of October gave way to the sombre greys of November, and the cold began to set in, in drizzle and biting wind and somehow a storm was whipping up for the band, too. Their schedule, which had consisted of driving to shows in their clapped out white bus and tagging on to their friends' tours, until now, suddenly involved label meetings and marketing briefings and the suggestion that he was going to need an actual passport, for the first time ever… It was overwhelming. But in between schedules and practises and gathering in the living room to sit on rugs to burn incense and chant and direct their will and their offerings, he and Joe spent the cold nights snuggled up in one or other of their rooms, figuring out a few things of their own.

Pete had tried to bargain with them, for a week or so, pitching his idea of an alternative virgin sacrifice for the greater good until Joe had lost his patience and flat-out lied that it was already too late. Pete lost interest, after that, sulking that they hadn't consulted with him first, as though that was even a thing. But as far as Patrick and Joe were concerned, that just meant they finally had some peace and quiet.

They'd always been close, but with every night curled up under each other's blankets it was growing into something solid. Maybe because of the evolution of their tentative making out on the living room floor, or the intimacy of the meditations they spent wandering their forest together, growing familiar with its landscapes and sounds and smells, or because together they could both feel the muggy acridness beginning to consume the place as Pete - the real Pete who lived in their apartment and spent hours in his bedroom poring over old books, studying tarot cards and retreating into obsession - seemed to envelop himself in a dark cloud of invisible smoke that billowed around him.

The apartment had an atmosphere, too. Restless, somehow. Crowded. It wasn't like he'd started seeing ghosts around the place, or anything, it just felt…off. When he sat in the living room, he'd keep getting up and walking around, in a constant state of feeling like there was something niggling - like he'd made a mental note and then forgotten it. Or stepped into a room and immediately forgotten why he'd entered in the first place. It was unsettling. Ominous. Like he was waiting for the other shoe to drop. Or he'd promised to do something and hadn't kept his end of the bargain, but couldn't figure out why the other person was mad at him.

It wasn't Joe. He and Joe were a giddy mess. And it wasn't Pete, because Pete would've bitched him out by now. He couldn't think of anything he'd have done for Andy, and besides, Andy was hardly ever there.

Pete seemed distant, and maybe Patrick had seen one shitty supernatural horror film too many, but it was almost as though he was a husk - like one of those bugs that has a wasp larvae controlling it like fucking Krang or something - with a tense, distracted version of himself in the driving seat, peering out through his own eyes. Talking to him seemed almost to register a quarter second slower, but that wasn't in itself completely unfamiliar, in the depths of Pete's darkest periods.

"Yeah, it's weird," Joe admitted, hardly taking his eyes off the TV as he tried to destroy the Mana Fortress. "You don't think maybe he's kind of like... possessed by Manon, like the girl in the movie?"

"I'm pretty sure that was a fake Hollywood god," Patrick told him, chewing his lip absently. 

"Maybe that's just what he wants us to think?"

Patrick didn't know, but he did know that the drawings on Pete's wall were accumulating and he really wasn't sure what any of them meant.

---

"Holy. Fucking. Shit."

Patrick stopped at the van door, mainly because Andy was blocking it. "What's up?"

"Are we at the right venue?"

Behind from the driver's seat, Joe snapped, "I can read a fucking map, dude!"

"I'm not talking about your map, idiot - look!"

Across the street, propped against the wall or sitting in small huddles on the floor, was a row of kids. Ripped jeans and black shirts with band logos and Vans motifs on almost all of them.

"Is there a pre-show event or something?" Patrick asked, nudging Andy out of the way, so he could hop out onto the lot.

"Nope," Pete said, pulling up his hood. "Not unless you count soundcheck, kind of."

Together, they stood beside the van, staring at the crowd in confusion, until, out of nowhere, one of the girls sitting on the floor shot to her feet and waved at them with both hands. She was bouncing on her toes in excitement and making a shrill, "Eeee!" noise almost under her breath.

"...the fuck?"

"Dudes, like…" Joe's voice started, slowly, from inside the van. "Do we have, like… fans ?"

The three of them responded in unison. "Only Chris…"

"No, but like… is this part of the thing ? I mean, we know some stuff is working, so what if…?"

Patrick wasn't sure what the words were that came out of Pete's mouth; partly because he muttered them breathily in an undertone, and partly because they didn't sound quite like English. He turned to look, but Pete's face was hidden by the edge of his hood.

They didn't have Chris with them to man the merch, that night; he had work and Jeanae couldn't be there, either. Mixon was playing a show of his own, back home. They'd had no choice but to ask the support band's merch girl to keep an eye on their stuff while they were on, so they thought it must've been a mistake when she said she'd sold all the CDs. They'd brought two whole cartons, this time, assuming that they might get through one, if things went well.

"The other batch was next to the Chicago shirts," Andy was saying, as Patrick crouched to look under the table to see if it was still tucked away.

"I know," she repeated. "I opened it. People bought them. I figured you guys would be peachy…"

"You sold them all ?" Patrick asked, standing up and adjusting his cap. Joe was perched on the edge of the bar beside them, crossed ankles swinging until he untangled them to nudge Patrick's buttcheek, grinning. He gave him an affectionately reprimanding scowl and swatted him away. Now wasn't the time for dicking around. There was a box of CDs missing and he couldn't honestly believe that the whole lot was gone. They were usually lucky if they sold five in a night, not fifty. Sure, Hallowe'en had been a good merch night, but this was nuts.

"Seriously, count the money - it's there ! Are you accusing me of something? 'Cause I did you guys a favor- ?"

"No, it's just we're totally not used to this happening. Like, thanks, y'know - things must've been pretty insane…"

"Pretty. I saw worse when we had this bunch of goths from Jersey come through, one time…"

Joe hopped down from the counter and slid what could just about be excused as a 'friendly' arm around his waist after the girl handed over the cash belt and headed home. Patrick glanced around to make sure no one was paying too much attention and leaned in a little, bumping him with his shoulder in reply.

"We're gonna be mega-rich-rockstar-wizards," Joe whispered.

"We're gonna be able to afford the big cups on the food run on the way home," Patrick corrected, sagely. He didn't want them getting ideas above themselves too early. And he really did need a drink. He'd sweated buckets on stage, again.

"Sweet. Next time, I'm gonna load three boxes…"

Next time, as it would turn out, they didn't need to load any boxes, because they hadn't even gotten on stage and the show was called off when the police showed up, along with twice as many kids as the venue had capacity for. 

"I can't believe we just got paid for doing nothing," Andy was saying in the front, as they drove home, drumming the nervous energy out on the wheel. "Literally nothing!"

"Um, fuck you, dude, I loaded this goddamn van and drove here!" Joe retorted, his head rested on Patrick's shoulder as he slumped across the seats. "That one hundred percent fucking counts."

"And we didn't get to play," Patrick added, because as much as performing made him sick with nerves, the point of being a musician was actually doing it, and he was way more disappointed this time than when they'd had to cancel their set because the bathrooms had backed up at the venue. He was pretty sure no one would have been there to watch that - this time, they'd let down a few hundred kids.

In the front, with his feet on the dash, Pete was contemplatively silent, his hoodie pulled up as it often was, lately, as he chewed the black paint from his nails. It was a heavy kind of quiet that he'd been ruminating in for days, the sort of silence that permeated the atmosphere and set Patrick's teeth just a little on edge.

"It was a warning shot," Pete said, abruptly, in a tone that shut the three of them up in an instant. "We can get what we want, kind of, but they can take it away. We gotta do better."

And that was why, on a bitingly cold November morning, before the sun had even made it over the horizon, they knelt on the damp, fallen leaves in a spot close to where they'd buried an acorn with their spell a few weeks before - and dug another small hole in the soggy earth, with their fingers. They'd put tealights in jars again, for the fire that would burn bright in all of them, without having to carry buckets full of embers home. It cast eerie shadows in the darkness, and he'd held tight to Joe's hand as they picked their way through the forest, only semi-sure of where they were headed. All trees looked just as creepy in the dark.

In the hole they'd dug, they placed an envelope, the small kind that Patrick's wages were paid in at the end of each two weeks, because what they were doing was payment. Inside was a lock of each of their hair, a piece of themselves, in gratitude - and as a deposit for more of the success they'd already seen.

And when Patrick woke from the nap he took when they got home, spooned against Joe, it was to the sound of a strangled squeal from the computer chair. He sat up, scrambling to straighten his glasses and ask what was wrong, but Joe was giggling breathlessly.

"The label emailed! They aren't gonna send any more copies of the album."

"What? But we need more copies to-"

"They can't, because since Dead on Arrival got played on the radio, we sold out the pressing! Two-hundred thousand copies! They wanna re-press it, dude - as a whole new re-release! And they're talking about doing a vinyl!”

Patrick fell back onto the bed to stare at Joe's ceiling. In the pit of his stomach, something had twisted, and he wasn't sure it was excitement.

---

It was that night, restless on the edge of sleep, that something stirred at the back of Patrick's mind - pushing through the beaded curtain of dreams that seemed to skim his eyelids but wouldn't stay. A memory - the chant they'd practised - whirling through his head, round and round, until a shrill ring broke it. And it remained there, resonating in his head, ringing out but getting louder instead of fading away.

Patrick's breath was coming in gasps as he sat up, his heart beat pounding in his ears, as Joe shifted and sat up a little beside him.

"Ric?" he asked, his voice heavy and slurred with sleep. "What's wrong?"

"We didn't close the circle," he said. "At the practise before Hallowe'en - we didn't close it, it's still open."

---

Neither of them slept any more, that night. They crawled out of bed, padding into the hall to stand in the living room doorway, searching the space warily for signs of unleashed magic spilling into the place through some kind of portal. It was ridiculous. They'd been in the apartment every day since, more or less, no demonic chariots had ridden out of it, so far. No parade of ghosts from the Otherside.

But here was something chilling about it, beyond the cold November air on his bare toes. They'd fucked up. They'd gotten distracted and not tidied up after themselves, and ever since, things had been weird.

"Do we ask Pete?" Joe asked eventually.

"We can try, but… I'm not sure he knows enough to know what to do for this, y'know?"

"Andy, then?"

Andy seemed like the better proposition, of the two, but it still didn't feel like it was enough - this needed someone who actually had experience with this kind of thing.

---

Frank, as always, was sitting at the counter when they stepped in, flustered from the chilly, November breeze out in the greying streets and the sleepless night. He was sitting with his eyes closed and a hand on each knee, but even though they didn't speak as they entered, he said, "My young friend and his shadow… I had a feeling you'd be in, today."

"You did?" Joe asked, nervously.

"Well, when you pluck a thread on the web that links us all, the vibrations tend to carry."

"They do?" Patrick said, pulling off his cap and making his way around the displays to the counter. He picked up a small, blue pot of incense and admired it, so that he felt more like a legitimate customer. Flying , it said, and he almost laughed a little at the idea, imagining old crones on broomsticks. Surely people didn't actually believe in that stuff?

Frank nodded, eyeing them both knowingly. "Are you here to browse, at nine-thirty in the morning?"

Patrick's eyes met Frank's, and he shrugged a little. "Uh… kind of not, no."

"Alright," Frank said, exhaling a long breath and sitting back in his chair. "What's eating you?"

The words felt uncomfortably close to the mark, for Patrick. Nothing had tried to chew his legs off, so far, but it seemed to be eating Pete up from the inside. "I guess… I mean, we were wondering what happens if you don't take down a circle when you're finished?"

"Ah. How would you have done that?"

"Take out arrived," Joe said, earnestly, and Patrick could've smothered him with his own scarf.

"It wasn't - that makes it sound like we just got distracted or something…"

"Didn't we?"

"We're not that irresponsible, we just - it was a rehearsal, y'know?" he said, directing his explanation - or maybe excuse - to Frank. "We were doing a rehearsal and we stopped when we were doing the chant and then things just got away from us."

"Chant?" Frank asked, his voice sharp for the first time. "What chant was that?"

"Uh… it was weeks ago, I kind of forgot it. It wasn't written in real words, but kind of sounds, y'know? Something that sounded like it was talking about car doors and furbies…"

There was a tension that set into Frank's shoulders under the paisley shirt he was wearing.

Joe balked at the silence, looking at Patrick and then moving closer to the counter to speak directly to Frank. "Dude, is this bad?"

"It's not bad ," Frank said, with a doubtful twist of his bearded mouth. "It's not gonna summon demons or anything ridiculous, but it's not anything you want to be messing with until you know what you're doing. Or if you're not the full deck... Not a few weeks after you first got it into your heads to meddle in this stuff…"

"Sorry…" Patrick mumbled, guiltily. "We didn't know."

"Ain't no point in apologising, my young friend, you haven't done anything but inconvenience yourself and freak out your good buddy, here. But you've got to quit playing with things you don't understand. What I'd like to know is where he even got a hold of that one - that's old school. Victorians used to play with it. Not the good ones, either."

"It was Pete's idea," Joe said, eager to point the finger at the big boy who made him do it.

"Colour me shocked," Frank said with a chuckle. "The kid needs some help. I'm not sure it's my kind of help, but he's all out of kilter, I could see that a country mile away when he came in here… I've seen it a dozen times with people your age; kids looking for something that they think is missing, trying to find the easy way to get a hold of it… Just not realising how much work really goes into this stuff."

"It kind of feels like it gives with one hand, and takes with the other, basically…" Joe said quietly.

"Well," Frank told them, shifting in his seat with a sigh, "working with magic can be like that, can't it? Fickle. Duplicitous, even. It's all well and good to dabble, but if you wade too far into the water you might find you're out of your depth."

"I mean.. I have tried to tell him that, y'know?" Patrick offered, not wanting Frank to think he was the same kind of reckless fool that Pete had made a career out of being. "He's really kind of invested. Like, I don't think he believes that we can do this without it, anymore. Which is kind of hurtful, actually."

Joe leaned a bit nearer and rubbed at the back of Patrick's arm, soothingly. He knew how much pride Patrick took in their music and what he wrote, and Patrick was grateful for the comfort, even if it made Frank's mouth curl up at one corner.

"Sometimes it kind of feels like he's not really the same dude, anymore," Joe added. "And the apartment feels kind of weird, all the time, like there's just this atmosphere , basically…"

"Well, you could always smudge the place. Got some sage in a basket over there." He nodded in its direction with his chin. "Can you think of any other reason it might feel strange? The tension about this whole situation, maybe? Like when your folks have a fight they don't want you to know they had, but you can feel it in a room after they left?"

"No… We didn't actually fight or anything, it just felt a little strange since…y'know." Patrick picked up one of the thick, tight bundles of silvery leaves and put it on the counter, feeling like he was asking a lot of this kind old dude who'd expressly told them he wasn't going to be their mentor. "What do you think we should do?"

Frank laughed a low, weary chuckle. "I told you before: talk. The best place to start is always the simplest. Did it work before?"

Patrick's face immediately flushed stop sign-red, even though Joe now knew exactly what Frank had been talking about before. "Sort of…"

"It sort of had to after I knocked his little love potion out of a window," Joe told him, smirking and giving Patrick a light poke in the ribs to make him squirm. "Thanks, by the way."

"Think nothing of it."

But Patrick was thinking something of it, because his brain had circled back to Hallowe'en. To sneaking home and laying on the blankets in the middle of the circle they hadn't closed, and how familiarity and eagerness and being alone in the apartment had maybe caused them to get a little carried away. It had taken them a few more weeks to really get the hang of things, but what if they'd done enough, that night, to have accidentally made a reality of Pete's absurd proposal?

---

Pete was sitting cross-legged on the roof outside his window when they got home, stray leaves billowing around him in little, looping dances. They'd stayed out of the apartment for most of the day, kicking around the parks to avoid going back, trying to figure out how they did this at all. They'd settled, eventually, on Patrick raising it. Just because they thought that Pete might take that better than Joe getting pissy. 

He hadn't sprouted bat wings or anything, as far as Patrick could see, so he swung his leg over the sill and only stumbled a little as he dragged his other one out behind himself.

"Hey, man," he said, edging a little closer so as not to spook him but not wanting to give away the heavy weight in his own belly, either. "How's it going?"

Pete shrugged and tilted his head back to look up at him, grinning; his eyes were their usual hazel, if a little tired at the corners, but the awkward angle gave him the uncanny valley look of a possessed child in a horror movie. Patrick folded his arms around himself to hide his shudder and slid around in front of him, so Pete didn't have to twist like that and set his teeth on edge.

"Just checking in," Pete said, like Patrick knew what that meant. "You guys were up early."

"Yeah," Patrick nodded, pensively, trying to figure out how to broach this subject without bursting Pete's bubble. "We went to Frank's actually."

"And you didn't take me?!"

"Well, no - no, honestly, I didn't even know if you came home last night…"

"I did," Pete said, and he was far too old to pout, but it was audible in his voice.

"So, hey - here's the thing, y'know? Joe and I realised something last night."

"Yeah?" he asked, looking Patrick in the eye with intense interest, suddenly.

Jerkily, Patrick nodded, unable to break away from the deep stare of Pete's gaze. And maybe, just maybe, in the odd light of city twilight, his eyes did take on a strange colour. Maybe they did look darker than he was used to… All the activity around them, the cars at the intersection, the L in the distance, the clunks of trash can lids and security shutters on the stores shutting up for the day, seemed to fade out to a silence that ran up his spine with the skitter of spiderlegs. 

"What did you realise?"

"Um. I mean. It could be nothing, but… Do you remember when we did the rehearsal for Hallowe'en? Like, here? Well… we didn't close the circle, did we? I - I don't think we did. And I thought maybe it'd explain a little bit of the strangeness recently, y'know? Maybe?" He felt less and less sure of himself as he talked, even though he knew what he was saying was true.

"Patrick, you're a magician, aren't you? What's there to be afraid of? We've got this."

He wanted to nod in agreement, but his body didn't move. "We're just concerned, Pete - like, maybe we should sm-smudge the place, or something?"

"You don't need to worry about it, Ric," Pete was saying, in the unnatural quiet, "it's all coming together, kind of. It's our space . It doesn't matter if anything's closed, because the energies are welcome, all we need to do is ask."

Somehow, Patrick's neck seemed to loosen and he found himself nodding, slowly, even though some tiny corner in the recesses of his mind was screaming at him. NO.

As quickly as it had faded, sound seemed to roll back over him like a wave hitting a pebbled shore, and he jerked away, blinking clear of the fog.

Pete was still grinning, but it seemed much more benign, now, much more like the sneaky asshole Patrick knew than the insidious and persuasive figure that sat before him.

"I mean, c'mon, Lunchbox, how're you gonna turn your back on something that gave you Joe, huh? You don't want them to take it back, right?"

"I've gotta…" he stood, quickly, his heart thumping painfully at his ribcage and not even uncrossing his legs in the motion, waving his hand back towards the window. He didn't want to think about that. About the prospect of Joe being taken away from him because he'd been dense enough to need magic to see what was right in front of him. He dusted off the back of his jeans as he moved to walk away. "And for what it's worth, I already had Joe, I just kind of didn't know it."

---

So, they didn't smudge the place, and they didn't close the circle, and things didn't get any better.

---

At midwinter, they stood together in the snow, wrapped up in scarves with numb fingers, trying to bind ribbons around small bunches of holly in the dark of a new moon, until Joe pricked his thumb on the sharp tang of a leaf and finally got a little mad. He flung his tiny posy down, where it landed in the fire bucket flickering away at their feet, huddled close to try to borrow some of the warmth, and sucked the bead of blood for the skin.

"This is fucking stupid!" he snapped, as Pete scolded him and tried to fish the leaves back out of the flames. "I'm cold , I'm tired, I'm sick of this always somehow ending up with me bleeding! Can't we just quit, now? Can't we just say, like…'Thanks, guys, we can take it from here,' or something?"

"We could," Andy told him carefully, "but in the middle of a thanksgiving ritual is not the time to make that choice."

"We gotta finish," Pete said, handing him the slightly scorched leaves, and the look he gave was so intent, so imposing, that he almost seemed a hundred feet high. Patrick watched the breath catch in Joe's throat as he recoiled barely perceptibly, and reached out for his hand to squeeze his fingers and ground him a little from the sudden rush of something that had rolled through him.

And after, when they made their way back to the van, he wrapped his arm around Joe's waist and leaned his head on his shoulder as they lagged behind the other two. 

"You okay?" he asked, softly, and Joe shook his head.

"I don't wanna do this anymore, Ric," he whispered, the uncharacteristic tightness in his voice pulling Patrick's arm a little closer around him. "I don't like this. I don't wanna go home and wake up in the apartment, 'cause it doesn't feel like it's just us there, anymore."

---

There had been a blissful couple of days when they all went home to stay with their folks and Joe came over to Patrick's mom's place, where she fed him her traditional Christmas Eve cake, and Patrick got to kiss him in Joe's car on the drive when they grabbed a couple of minutes in private to say goodbye at the end of the night. It was the first time in months that they wouldn't spend the night under the same roof, and Patrick found himself wishing he'd given in and bought a cell phone, just so they could text each other from the comfort of their old childhood bedrooms. On the 26th, they spent the day at Joe's. He'd always felt like a part of Joe's family - ever since he'd first met Cathie and Dick, in their eclectic, artsy house, crammed with books and music and craft projects and no rules except, " Never turn down The Zep!" - but this time, it was kind of official and that felt like a pretty big deal.

Only, it really was just a couple of days, and by the time they picked up Pete at his parents' house to bring him back to the apartment with them, Joe was so nervous he missed the same exit he'd used to get on the expressway for every show for two years. 

---

"They're calling us sell outs."

"What? Who is?" Patrick asked, rolling over to pick his glasses up off Joe's bedside table and jamming them on his face. He looked at his watch. "Dude, it's fucking three in the morning!"

Pete didn't seem to notice. "Everyone, kind of. They saw the post about the album being recut and now we're sellouts."

Joe physically shrugged, even though Pete couldn't see him, burrowed under the duvet. "Like… so what?"

"' So what ?' So, maybe if we did things right, then they wouldn't be!"

"I mean, like… Frank warned you, dude. Don't take shit for granted. Be prepared for douchebags."

"We're gonna have to stop it."

Patrick scoffed and almost started to ask, 'How?' but thought better of it. "We're not gonna stop people, dude, that's… people can have their opinions. Fuck those guys, y'know?"

"Are you for real, Ric?" Pete demanded, and the hurt was audible in his voice. "Do you even care about the band?"

"Right now? I care about sleep and not doing insane shit because you're butthurt that our famously judgy scene is mad that we got a little bit of success. Honestly, dude, I get that you're pissed off but sleep on it, okay? Those assholes don't hand out the Grammys, right?"

Pete stood in the doorway, staring at him for a few moments, and then turned and left without shutting the door.

---

In January the whirlwind continued to swirl, and before Patrick really knew what was happening, they were travelling across the country for the video shoot, after a festive season of walking on eggshells under the snow that had fallen and wouldn't go away. 

Pete had convinced them - and he still wasn't sure how - to engage in some form of fortune-attracting ceremony that he insisted wasn't a ritual and, in fairness, only a few of the hallmarks were there. Joe swore that it wasn't deliberate when he fumbled the ritual 'wine' (grape Kool-aid) and spilled most of it across the floor, but Pete was mad about it anyway.

He swore, after they dragged themselves out of their crumpled van, Joe shaking uncontrollably under Patrick's arm, that it had happened because they messed up their spell, and for Joe that was simply enough.

There was an argument, of course. Pete had literally no concept of how freaked out Joe was, even when he sat in their booth, shivering with his anorak hood pulled up around his ears. It didn't feel funny. It wasn't like driving a micro bike into a trashcan in the alley behind the store, this was serious. And maybe it was confirmation bias, because Joe already thought that Pete's invisible friends were out to get him, but he couldn't help believing that maybe there was something off about their luck, lately. Every good thing that happened seemed to have an equal and opposite reaction. Like getting to do a video in New York meant their only means of transport was trashed and their equipment was in an unknown state, and they'd almost fucking died . He didn't want to be a footnote in some Billboard listicle about Bands That Ended Too Soon (Because They Fucked With Things Beyond Their Ken And Now They're Dead).

Patrick announced that he was quitting the band and refused to talk to Pete for the rest of the day, to make a point, and when he and Joe cuddled up in their room at the Holiday Inn the label had arranged, they finally got to talk alone.

"It's serious though, dude," Joe said, rubbing his palm into his forehead, "when we walked down to the corner store on Tuesday, there was some old jerk who made some comment as he walked by about like, 'fucking punks' or something, and Pete, he just like… He turned around, just really fast, and he said something that I couldn't catch, and this dude turned his ankle as he stepped into the street and almost got taken out by a school bus. It was fucked up. But then right after that happened, Pete caught his hand in the freezer door in the store. Like his fretting hand , dude. It's like every time we do something -"

"It has to balance out?" Patrick finished.

"Yeah. And I mean, maybe this happened because I fucked up and spilled some Kool-aid, but what if we get like really big because we did all this sorcery shit and then we kind of like… have to pay it back. How much does a gold record cost in karma?"

Patrick rolled on to his belly under the covers, so he could prop himself on his elbows. "But we said that if he got out of control, or it went too far, then we'd be the ones to figure it all out, right? So, let's do that. We can talk to Andy and see if we can't get things back to how they were, right?"

Joe nodded stiffly, and even if he didn't seem convinced he didn't admit to it.

---

"Dude, can we talk?"

Andy looked up from where he was sitting on the floor, reading through one of Pete's books after practise, and sighed. "I figured this was coming…"

Patrick nodded slowly, because it stood to reason, in a way. Andy always knew far more about what was going on than presence alone should allow.

Joe closed the door and crawled down to sit beside Patrick; strength in numbers, and all that.

"The thing is, we're kind of freaking out, y'know? Like, you don't live here . You see Pete like once a week and then at shows, so I get that you don't appreciate what's been going on, but…"

"It's the magic or the band, basically," Joe said, his jaw set with determination.

"Pete's… We tried talking to him. I tried telling him that all the weird shit in this place, all the atmosphere, could be because we fucked up the ritual we did, and he said it was fine -"

"Yeah, so fine we almost got fucking killed ."

"- and things don't feel fine. They feel fucking scary , and we don't wanna do this, anymore."

Andy's brow was furrowed thoughtfully, his mouth twisted into a little, pensive curl at one side. His voice was a little low as he spoke. "I thought maybe he was off his meds."

"I dunno," Joe shrugged, "but if this is because he's off his meds, we're all off his meds, because I've seen some shit that made me feel like maybe I was the one who needed some." 

"Like what?"

"Like his fucking eyes going fucking black, like some kind of fucking demon !"

"That's bullshit."

"It's not," Patrick assured him. "I mean I didn't see them go black -black… but. There's something off and sometimes you can see it, and sometimes it's just… the way he says stuff . And I don't even… y'know what, I don't even care if we sound nuts, but I don't wanna do this magic crap anymore. And I'm worried about him. I wanna get my friend back before he's completely out of his mind. I'm kind of afraid of what he's gonna do."

For a long time, Andy sat where he was, and said nothing. He was plotting out a course - aligning his memories of the past few months, perhaps, it was impossible to know for sure - but they were used to his quiet spells and they always turned out sensible solutions.

"You know that first time, when we did the first ritual?" he said, finally, as though his tongue was still feeling its way through the thought.

Together, Patrick and Joe nodded.

"We said, then, that we were all going to the same place, right?"

"It - yeah, it seemed like it, I guess."

"But like, a little different - it's never exactly the same, but like… close enough," Joe added.

"And meditation, basically, that's exploring consciousness, right? So, maybe what we need to do is get him in a meditation and… see if we can't stage an intervention all the way at the bottom of his mind. 'Cause maybe you guys are right. Maybe all of this stuff is more than I wanted to think, or something. Ever since the accident, I can't settle. Shit happens, sure, but it's been happening way too much for my comfort, lately… Let's figure something out."

---

The first thing he noticed was that he couldn't breathe - not because he'd landed in Joe's pool, but because the air around him was thick with smoke. It was dark, this time, and he couldn't see if the sun was down beyond the treetops, or the air was just filled with ash.

He coughed and pulled his shirt up to cover his mouth and nose.

" JOE ?"

Muffled, nearby but not close enough to reach out and touch, he could hear Joe's voice calling back to him. He stumbled forward with socked feet feeling out the ground around him, until suddenly, out of nowhere, he was falling. He seemed to tumble three times before he landed with a cold, shocking splash into water.

"I got you," Joe was saying beside him, breathlessly, spluttering as though he was half submerged on the surface of the water. "It's okay, I got you. You need to try to stop doing that."

The air was clearer, now, tinted orange through the stems of the trees around them - the piles of endlessly falling, golden leaves starting to steam as they dried out from the creeping heat on the banks.

"Are you okay?" Patrick asked, ridiculously, grasping at Joe's face as if he wasn't the one who'd just fallen blindly down a waterfall, but he needed to know - to be sure that he was safe.

"Yeah - yeah, I think so." Joe kissed him quickly and gave a little cough as he pulled at Patrick's elbow and kicked at the water to start across to the mossy bank that had been so familiar. "C'mon…"

They picked their way through the darkness, crouched a little to try to pass under the worst of the smoke.

"What the fuck did he do?" Joe murmured, over and over, with increasing fear the warmer it got.

Patrick clutched tight at his hand with his inner elbow over his mouth and ploughed on until suddenly, like a ghost in front of them, a shape moved in the darkness. He stopped, holding Joe back, unable to see if it was Pete, or something worse. He felt sick. Maybe this was a terrible idea, maybe they couldn't do anything, maybe they were stupid to think they had the power to be of any use at all…

The shape shuddered, suddenly, and they both yelped with fright, but as it wound its way through the trees it gradually became clear that it wasn't Pete, at all. It wasn't even human.

It was a stag, tall and white; his antlers spread like bowled fingers reaching up to the stars above.

It stared at them for a moment, each frozen as they surveyed the other, and then it lifted its head and bellowed, the call resonating across the forest around them. 

Patrick watched it in awe; its great shape and long, powerful neck lifted and exposed. Vulnerable. But not from them. Not from them, and it knew it.

As suddenly as it had appeared, the stag walked on through the trees, passing but giving them a wide berth. A moment later, there was a rumble. A dull clattering of hooves on the earth below the leaf litter. And in the stag's wake, the herd followed, springing between the trees as they fled.

All the two of them could do was forge on, in the direction they were running from.

The heat was beginning to grow unbearable with each step, the angry red billowing around them, climbing trees that had once been rich with leaves and fruit.

"What if we can't get to him?" Joe asked, wheezing. "We can't help him if we can't pass it."

"I don't know," Patrick said, "we don't have a choice."

Above them, through the deafening cracks of wood splintering from the heat and the roar of the flames, they heard a cry. It was raw - the squawk of carrion circling above them. A single bird, swooping and diving in the smoke until it caught their attention, and then squawking once more and darting into the distance, weaving through the charring tree tops.

"That's Andy!" Joe yelled, pointing at it. "That's gotta be Andy!"

When they saw the bird again, it was circling above a clearing, vast and blackened. Great swathes of the land, emptied of nothing but the great spines of ruined trees. Patrick had seen it before, more than once. It was on the wall in Pete's room, and on the paper Joe had brought home the night after they first saw it here, in whatever this place was.

And in the middle of it, curled up, small and vulnerable, was Pete.

"Pete?"

"Is that him?"

" Pete !" Patrick didn't answer Joe's question because he was already running, socked feet pounding through the ashes to reach him. "Hey, Pete - hey, it's me. It's Patrick." He crouched beside him and reached out a hand to clasp his shoulder, but it was too hot to touch.

Pete turned his head slightly, still rested against the arms hugged tight around his knees, and blinked his eyes open; they were ringed in black, like he'd taken fistfuls of the char and smeared it around them. "Patrick?"

"It's us, Pete. It's time to come home."

"Where did you go?"

"'Where did we go' when?" Joe asked, kneeling on the baked earth in front of him, the circling crow fluttering its wings and then settling, too, perching itself on Joe's shoulder.

"I don't… I don't know. I wanted to stay, I wanted to keep feeling like I had all this, kind of… But then I got tired and I tried to find you all and - you were gone and I didn't know how to get home - so I-I started searching, and I searched and searched, but you were never here, and every place I went, I destroyed it. It just burned and it was gone, and I couldn't - even when I came back here, to the places that already burned - it carried on without me. It just kept growing ."

"Well, it's time to go, now," Patrick told him softly, holding out his hand. He stood up, keeping his hand there, to pull Pete to his feet, and Joe reached out for the other hand.

"C'mon drama queen," he said, but he was smiling, just a little.

And as Pete uncurled his arms and placed his hand in Joe's, and the other in Patrick's, there was a soft, damp, splot! against his cheek, leaving a clear, wet stripe through the black rings. And then another, straight on Patrick's nose. And one after the other, huge, ash-grimy raindrops began to fall. They came slowly at first - like the idle tap of fingertips on a tabletop - but it only felt like moments before they were all being pelted with rain, hard and cold, and it was the best feeling Patrick could remember - then, or for years after.

He turned his face up to the sky, to feel it washing his skin clean as it washed through the land, so he didn't notice that under the ash, growing thick and muddy as the water formed little steams, the first tiny heads of shoots were beginning to push through the ground.

---

It seemed appropriate to finish where they'd started, deep in the Potawatomi woods, although they couldn't find the exact spot where they'd carried out their first real ritual.

The ground was hard from the frost, the leaves swept into drifts buried in snow under the trees, so they set their fire on the bare ground, this time, propping small sticks in a cone for air to feed the flames, but only as much as they wanted them to be, this time.

"You ready?" Andy asked, bumping Pete's arm with a gloved hand, when it was well alight.

Opposite him, Patrick reached for Joe's hand, but there was no calling of quarters, this time, no casting of circles.

This was it. They were stepping off this path and if it meant that they didn't ever achieve the things they could have with magic, then fine. It wasn't how they wanted to make it happen, and some things were more important than success. Like Pete; like getting to keep him there with them, not lost in the blackened wasteland he'd imagined for himself.

Pete's shoulders lifted slightly as he took a deep breath and nodded into the thick, black scarf wrapped around his neck. He reached down and pulled the first of his books out of the rucksack they'd carried in with them, rubbing his thumbs across the pinkish, leatherbound cover, and dropped it into the fire. A shower of sparks puffed up into the sky, fizzling out as they dispersed into the air. Knowledge and wisdom returning to its element.

One by one, they followed - dropping candles and notebooks  and drawings and finally the cushions into the flames, where the fire coursed over them, burning away the fabric and racing through the hollow fibres underneath.

And when they were done, and there was no trace of anything but ash, they piled snow on top of it all, extinguishing the last evidence of their mistakes.

"Thanks," Pete said, softly, as they started the long trudge back to Joe's car. 

"No worries, man," Joe replied, taking a half-step in his direction to bump him with his shoulder; and it was organic, after that, the way they clustered into a string of stumbling young men, propping each other up and holding tight.

---

The little shop in the alley was gone, when they went back to say thanks. The door was shuttered and the window dark, and even though they passed a handful of times each month when Pete went to refill his prescription, it never reopened.

Under Patrick's window, in the yard below, the biggest chunks of the glass bottle that smashed there were swept away, tossed into a trash can to lie forever in a landfill. But some nights, when the moon hit it right, it was possible to pick out the tiniest of fragments, embedded into the little grooves in the asphalt, wedged in so tight they'd become part of the fabric.

But it was in the woods that the strangest change took place. 

Because in a clearing, out of a hastily dug impression in the earth, an oak tree grew. It was strong and far bigger than the few months it'd been in the earth would suggest. It seemed, sometimes, if passersby stopped to listen, that it almost creaked as it grew; a quiet, mellifluous sound that made them wonder if they were imagining things. And the strangest part of all, was that the oak seemed always to have a few leaves that were rich and copper, and perfectly ready for fall.