Silly Bear

consider yourself disclaimed.


PETE/PATICK or GEN. G.
1479 WORDS.
dedicated to: everyone having a hard time right now. yes, you.




There came a day, pretty early on, when Pete and Ashlee could not for the life of them get Bronx to stop screaming. That's right about when they realised their parents were saints.

They shipped Hemmy and Roxie off to Joe's and prepared themselves for a very, very long night. They'd had a couple of very long nights, especially after Bronx came home from the hospital and had been adjusting to the house and the bassinet and the dogs, but in general, Bronx communicated his needs effectively and it didn't take all that much to shut him up.

Until now. He wasn't hungry - Ashlee could recognise his hungry cry, and so could her boobs, because they weren't lactating at the sound. Plus, she'd offered him her breast and he'd just gummed at it then kept screaming. So, he wasn't hungry.

And he wasn't tired, because he was in his bassinet right now. They kept the bassinet in their bedroom; the nursery was just down the hallway but they were too entranced with Bronx and too worried for him to have him that far away. So, he wasn't tired.

It wasn't that they smelled. Sometimes, when Pete held Bronx, the boy started to cry. That was a good measure of exactly how smelly Pete was, and when it was time for a shower. With so much going on nowadays, with Bronx and their friends and Fall Out Boy and the tour coming up and Clandestine and interviews and and and... with all that, he tended to forget little things like eating and sleeping and showering. So, it wasn't a smell making Bronx scream.

They'd taken turns lapping the house with Bronx tucked in their arms. They'd adjusted the temperature: made it hotter, made it colder. They'd tucked Bronx's favourite toys in the bassinet with him, then taken them out. They'd checked him all over for any signs of pain or discomfort. They'd given him a long, warm bath.

But every night, the screaming began all over again.

Ashlee and Pete called their moms and had a three-way conversation. Dale was mystified. Andrew and Hilary had been mostly well-behaved; Pete, when he didn't get what he wanted, had held his breath until he either came very close to, or actually passed out. None of the Wentzes had been screamers.

"Ashlee was a screamer," Tina said. Pete resisted the urge to say 'I could have told you that.' Bad form, Wentz. "Jess, too. They both had colic."

A quick google search revealed a page of colic symptoms that definitely matched Bronx's behaviour. Lifting his head and scrunching his legs up to his stomach, going red, farting, crying mostly in the late afternoon or evening. "Great," Ashlee said dryly.

The page listed a couple of treatments to try. Ashlee changed her diet - over the next couple of days, she cut out dairy and soya to see if Bronx was lactose or phytoeostrogen intolerant. Nope. Gripe water did quiet him down for a couple of hours, but it passed through him remarkably quickly and neither Mom nor Dad wanted to overdose him, so it was back to the screaming.

Bronx cried. Nothing worked. Both Ashlee and Pete were becoming frantic; did Bronx not like them any more? Was he intolerant to something else in Ashlee's diet? Was he seriously sick, or hurt? Was he going through a stubborn phase? Joe and Andy were now avoiding the house. Hemmy and Roxie, when they were around, didn't go anywhere near Bronx, even during the day when Bronx was more or less angelic.

The frustration and helplessness grew worse. Finally, after two solid weeks of little to no sleep, Pete looked over at Ashlee and saw that she was positively haggard. "Go," he said. "Take a break. Go to Cassadee's thing," he told her. "She invited you, and you should go."

"What about you?" Ashlee said, but she was already leaning towards her keys.

"I'll be fine. When you get back, you can take over for me, and I'll go out, yeah?"

Ashlee kissed him. "This is why I married you," she vowed. "I love you."

"Love you too," he replied. And then she was gone.

Pete looked down at Bronx, lying in his arms like a little red falsetto foghorn. "I am going to try something," he said. "And it's going to work."

Bronx kept crying. Somewhere in the cry, Pete heard him say 'give it your best shot'. Pete's best shot was pretty damn desperate, but it was worth a try. It was not worth a try with Ashlee in the house; he knew she'd laugh at him for even thinking of it. It was pretty ridiculous - pretty far-fetched.

But he'd heard the stories about playing Mozart to babies in the womb produced geniuses, and he'd seen first hand how his own voice had calmed Bronx when he'd been kicking Ashlee's ribs to death. Hopefully, what worked in the womb would work in real life.

He wasn't going to play Mozart, though.

Pete carried Bronx to the computer and settled his baby boy on his lap. Bronx's crying dropped in volume for a moment as he adjusted to the change, but picked right back up again. Hoping against hope and praying against prayer - if that second one was a saying - that this would work, Pete opened up his iTunes.

He flipped through his Guilty Pleasure playlist and found the song he wanted. 'Play'.

Soft guitar spilled from the speakers. Pete turned up the volume so Bronx could hear the sound over his own screams. After couple of bars of the sweet strings, Patrick's voice drifted through the air.

Bronx's screams snapped off like a switch being flipped.

'Lullabye' was just two minutes long. They'd written it and recorded it as a laugh, saying it was for Bronx but never really meaning it. However, the song was just a couple of lines in and already Bronx was staring at the speakers like they were the Holy Grail, his mouth firmly shut and his dark eyes wide.

Pete buried his nose in his son's fine, fine hair. Bronx squirmed, like he always did when Pete nosed his skin, and they both sat there while Patrick's voice wove its soothing spell around them. 'Don't worry your head, just go to sleep,' Patrick crooned - and Bronx did.

The song died away, leaving Pete with eight pounds of conked out baby boy. He gathered Bronx carefully into his arms and stood up. His Sidekick was on the bedside table; he braced Bronx against his chest with one arm, picked it up and dialled the only other number besides his own that he knew by heart.

"Y'ello?" Patrick said. It sounded like his mouth was full of food.

"'Lullabye' just put Bronx to sleep," Pete said simply.

Patrick swallowed whatever it was. "What, like, rock-a-bye baby?"

"No, like honey is for bees silly bear." He sat down on the bed and smiled, listening to Patrick laughing.

"Are you kidding?" he asked. "Why'd you play him that?"

"He's been crying for two weeks straight," Pete explained. "As soon as the sky goes orange, it starts." He glances out the window. It's not even dark yet - the shadows are long but the sun's still up.

"And 'Lullabye' put him to sleep," Patrick said.

"And 'Lullabye' put him to sleep."

Patrick's voice was soft and wondering. "That's amazing."

"That Bronx fell in love with your singing the moment he heard it?" Pete grinned. "Well, like father, like son, right?"

He could practically hear Patrick blushing. "Quit it, Wentz."

Pete gnawed at his lip, looking down at his baby boy. "I love you," he blurted out, clutching the phone a little tighter. "You know that, right? I love you. I'd give you the world if I could. You're like Bronx's other dad. Ash says so, too. You're part of our family. We love you."

Patrick was quiet for a moment. "I love you, too," he finally said. He sounded overwhelmed. It was like for the first time ever, Patrick really believed that Pete thought he was all that. Which wasn't exactly true, because Pete thought Patrick was all that and more besides, but small victories, small victories.

"Come over?" Pete asked. Patrick hasn't since before Bronx was born - or at least, not without a ton of other people with him.

He heard the rattle of keys. "Sure."

Okay. Good. "See you soon," he said.

"Pete?" Patrick said, just as he was about to hang up.

"Yeah?"

"You said... you said, you'd give me the world. And I wanted to tell you for years, but I could never find the words. Pete, you moron," he said softly, and Pete heard the rumble of Patrick's car start up. "A hundred, a thousand, a million times over, you already did."