Chapter Text
Chapter 1
Nobody underrated Joe Trohman like Joe Trohman.
Fall Out Boy's hiatus had been a good thing for all of them. The four of them got their chances to grow up, to spread their individual wings as musicians and as people, and to come back together with a little less drama and a lot less ego between them. But sometimes, Joe still felt left behind. He didn't let it bother him--he was happy with the role he played in the band and the creative working relationship he was developing with Patrick and the creative input he was freely given on the new songs. And Pete was doing his best to rein in his tendency to create dumpster fires of his entire life just to make a smoke screen for the rest of them.
Joe wasn't exactly comfortable with a lot of media scrutiny, but he was doing fine in interviews and liked to see the faces of interviewers when he responded to something instead of Pete or Patrick. But sometimes the media couldn't resist hooking right back into the same old, "PeteAndPatrick Show" and the last thing Joe wanted was a return to the old "put Fall Out Boy's name in the news from drama instead of music." Because these days, it just reeked of desperation and one of the things he loved about his band was their tendency to blaze trails, not walk down the same well-worn ones other people had made.
Joe also liked things to be orderly and neat. It was why he shared a tour bus with Andy and not Pete or Patrick. The "neat bus" had things like folded clothes (clean separated from dirty, thankyouverymuch), organized DVDs and video games, a list of snacks approved for Andy's ethical dietary choices and his own medical ones. All his costume changes, guitars, spare picks and strings, and lists of tunings for each set came via neatly-labeled printouts inside the guitar cases, on top of the stack of "Joe's Equipment" backstage, and in the dressing rooms before and after the shows.
Pete got him a label-maker once as a joke, but the joke was on Pete when Joe went full-Pete with it, labeling everything including the inside of Patrick's hat and all of Pete's underwear. On the inside. In detail. "Penis goes here," on the inside front. "Ass-crack goes here," and a special one right down in the bottom. "Ball-sweat receptacle," which he was pretty proud of. Especially since Pete hadn't noticed the labels until after he'd put on the undies and the sticky edges had time to catch on his short'n'curlies. The howls and the "Trohman, you fucker, I'm gonna get you back for this!" were music to Joe's ears after many years of instances and mishaps involving his own mane and various substances originating with Pete Wentz in one form or another.
But aside from the prankly goodness, Joe liked things to be clearly labeled. So when he walked through the door that was clearly labeled "Dressing Room - FOB" he expected to walk into a goddamn dressing room for Fall Out Boy . Instead, he walked into something that was very much NOT for Fall Out Boy, and not a fucking dressing room.
He stumbled out into the light into one of his recurring nightmares. High School.
**
Chapter 2
Joe felt the familiar weight of a leather jacket over his shoulders and a very unfamiliar helmet-like sensation. Almost like when Pete made them all wear those balaclavas like a bunch of bank robbers. He reached up and felt not hat, but his own hair, only...crunchier. How--
His thought was interrupted by Andy Hurley's voice from somewhere behind him. "Joe?"
Joe turned. "Andy, thank fuck--wait, no, I mean what the fuck?" He stared at Andy. Like him, Andy wore a leather biker jacket, but his hair had been similarly slicked up with the same industrial-strength hair product that Andy probably would raise holy hell about because of animal testing. And his beard--Andy's glorious, hipster beard--was gone. "Your beard," Joe said faintly.
"Our reality," Andy parried. Andy was always better at tucking and rolling when the Fall Out Boy train derailed. Andy pointed at his feet and Joe looked down to see his jeans had been rolled up to show socks.
Joe grimaced. "Who pegs their pants these days?"
"Everyone, apparently." Andy pointed at his own shoes. "Also, 'these days' may need a little redefinition in your headspace. I think we time-traveled."
Joe looked around. They were in a shady corner of a concrete patio with tables and chairs, next to a blocky, institutional building with a bright sign that declared the building to be Rydell High School. Scattered over the molded plastic furniture in small groups were young men wearing khakis and sweater vests, and young women wearing tight capris or wide, fluffy skirts with appliques of dogs and vinyl records and stars. Almost everyone wore saddle shoes, which Joe only knew of from his mother.
But the cars. The fucking cars in the parking lot beyond the low wall surrounding the patio. No wonder Andy’s expression underneath the over-gelled swoop of his hair looked like gathering storm clouds. The fins on the huge land-yachts practically advertised lead poisoning and planet murdering in Andy’s eyes. And a rant already forming on his tongue, which Joe forestalled with a distraction. “Do we know any of these people? Or, like, where we are on a map?” Because sometimes when you were in Fall Out Boy, you sort of found yourself in places you couldn’t find on a map.
He glanced at Andy, who turned and looked out over the tableau. The back of Andy's jacket said "T-Birds" and featured a very bad line drawing of what was supposed to be a hawk or an eagle outlined in white paint.
One of the girls--who was one of the few not wearing a wide skirt--straightened up from a nearby table. Her hair was short and wavy, which made her stand out from the longer, bouffant--another word Joe could thank from his mom--hairstyles of her friends. From behind, Joe could see her pink satin jacket said "Pink Ladies" in neat stitching. The edge of the jacket rested over a nice-looking pair of hips encased in a pencil skirt.
"Oh my," muttered Andy, in one of those "I'm going to never fail to bring this up every chance I get" or "I'm going to never be able to bleach this out of my brain" tones of voice.
The girl turned and Joe could see why, as his stomach dropped out of the bottom of his taint and landed somewhere between his knees. "That's no Pink Lady--"
"Andy? Joe?" Underneath those curls, the sun came out, prompted by the huge, shit-eating grin that was unmistakably Pete Fucking Wentz. "Thank Christ you guys are here!"
Pete was no stranger to oddball fashion choices or women's clothing, so it really shouldn't have surprised Joe to see him rocking a pencil skirt and heels like he owned them. But--"Dude, that porn-scarf is too fucking much."
Pete trotted over to them and patted the fluttery peach scarf knotted at his throat. "Shh. It hides my adam's apple. They...get a little antsy when they remember I'm a dude."
Joe wouldn't say it, but he remembered times where they'd ALL gotten a little antsy when they remembered Pete was a dude. Pete included. " Who the fuck are they , where the fuck are we , and what the fuck did you do , Pete Wentz?"
"Me?" Pete's eyes went wide and Joe had to admit that he made a very pretty girl. "I walked through a fuckin' dressing room door, same as you."
"It's a rip in the space-time continuum," muttered a voice from somewhere off to Joe's left.
"What?" Joe turned, along with Andy and Pete. Two people huddled in the shadows, skulking against the wall like a pair of criminals. Beside him, Pete gasped.
"Mikeyway? Mikey fucking Way?"
"Shh!" The tall, skinny Way hissed. "You'll attract its attention!"
"What's attention?" Andy asked, sidling over to the two of them.
His brother Gerard answered. "The Narrative!"
"I am fully confused right now," Joe muttered.
Gerard pulled him into the corner until they were all the way out of the sunlight. Muttering to himself. "I was fucking happy. I have a fucking deadline. I just went into the closet to find a back issue!" To Joe, he said. "You walked into a closet, right?" At Joe's nod, he continued. "Fucking portals and thresholds. Look. This is how it works. One minute, you're minding your own business, and the next, you walk through a door, into a closet, or from light into darkness and you come out somewhere else because of the fucking Narrative."
"Still not making much sense, dude. Sorry."
Mikey interjected. "This happens to him a lot more than it does to me. You guys ever read Terry Pratchett?" At the round of shaken heads--except for Andy's--Mikey waved a hand. "I'm sort-of cribbing this from him. There's something called Narrative physics, okay? It's like physics--gravity, speed of light, Newton's laws, shit like that--only the way it works isn't physics, it's story. So what my brother is trying to say is that we've stepped into a rip in the great continuum of--" here, Mikey waved his hands with a "fucked if I know" expression-- "whatever, and ended up in a space where Narrative Physics works."
"Gravity does, too," Pete said helpfully, jumping up and looking disappointed when he landed instead of floating.
"That's because the Narrative wants it to," Gerard said from the ground, where he'd slid. "The Narrative has given us all roles in this story, and we have to play the parts."
Pete glanced down at his tight black skirt and pink jacket and heels. "I don't guess it cares whether or not you're...er--"
Mikey grimaced. "The Narrative sticks you where you fit best. Even when your parts might not...fit."
Gerard sighed. "Whatever story we're in--"
"You know what story we're in, motherfucker." Mikey kicked half-heartedly with his boot.
"Whatever story we're in, we've got to roll with it until it plays out."
"What if we don't know the story?" Joe asked. He was beginning to suspect he did know the story, but not his role.
"You have to figure it out."
Pete glanced down at his jacket. "My jacket says I'm Rizzo. Rizzo?”
"And what happens if we don't?" Andy asked carefully. “I’m not sure I want to be this Kenickie guy. Or anybody in a story that’s all about changing yourself to fit other people’s expectations.”
"Sooner or later, you do." Gerard buried his face in his hands. "You either play the role, or you become part of the story. Forever."
**
Chapter 3
Mikey calmed Gerard with a few determined pats and one last kick. "Get up, Gee. It's not so bad."
Gerard glared up at his little brother. "Fucking Frenchie, though?" He scowled.
"Shut up. At least Lynz is here to play Marty to your Frenchie. I have to play Cha-Cha."
"You've got, like, one line." Gerard ran his fingers through his hair. "I have to make eyes at Frankie--"
"How’s that different from Warped Tour?" Pete snickered.
" Avalon , fucker. Iero's around here somewhere strutting in a leather jacket like Joe's and Andy's. I get easter-egg pink hair, a bubble 'do, and a goddamn poodle skirt! " Gerard pushed to his feet. "Do you know how unflattering a poodle skirt is with my build?"
Gerard fished for a cigarette in his pants pocket and came up with one. Joe found a lighter--a nice Zippo with an engraved side that rested against his thumb--in his own pocket and lit it for him, almost wishing for his own, but he'd made a promise to Marie and not even a weird alternate universe would make him go back on it.
"The minute I step out into that light, I go full Pink Lady. This fucker has one line and a cameo appearance."
Mikey rolled his eyes. "I have to dance. Backwards and in heels, asshole. And we already know Ray's not my dance partner, so it's gonna be rough."
"Don't you dance with the lead?" Pete asked. "Who's lead? And where's Patrick?"
They were all shrugging and staring at each other. Joe could tell they were all doing mental tallies in their heads. Joe glanced down at the lighter, still in his hand, and tried to make sense of the force that was pushing down on his brain. Andy's fingers were gentle as he flipped the lighter in Joe's hand over and they gathered around to read the initials.
DZ
"Well, fuck me."
Danny Zuco.
"Joe," Pete said, uncharacteristically quiet. "Look at that, man. You're the lead."