I remember us all being seventeen, eighteen years old and fantasising about how famous and rich and successful we’d be my the time we were all thirty. The success of our first album thrust us all, just kids, into the spotlight, long before we were prepared; we said and did dumb shit as our egos tripled in size and came dangerously close to becoming entitled brats. Now, I’m over thirty, and I look back on that dream of mine and it is nothing like I imagined now I am here. It’s everything I could ask for, it’s a best case scenario that I am able to continue to make music and earn money and have millions hear my songs, but it’s not what I imagined.

Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. I expected to be, like, fed grapes and fanned with huge palm leaves, I looked up to people who were entitled assholes and I just didn’t know it because I only saw their public persona. Privacy isn’t really a thing I have anymore and sometimes I wish that I’d done the same as Ryan and just withdrawn myself into a shell, living off royalties and whatnot, but then I realise that is selfish when I have so much. We started as a foursome and now I am the soul survivor from the original lineup, but I don’t feel any guilt for that.

I used to. But panic is mine, I played a major part in making it as successful as it was and I continue to make it even more popular even when I am on my own and the only official member. I no longer feel like I have at the wheel of a ship that I had nothing to do with building- at the front is where I belong and I don’t regret anything when it comes to the split or how I have handled it. 

Well. There are regrets I have, but they aren’t to do with the band. Rather, the members. Spencer I am still friends with, which is awesome, but Jon and Ryan I haven’t spoken to in years and part of me is always seething that I didn’t make more of an effort to maintain the connection and the close relationships we always had as a band- after all, it was a relatively amicable split, nothing personal, just musical; I have no reason for having let the bonds between us all wear away so fast, but then. That’s life. People grow apart. I try not to let my regrets cling onto me too much because then I would be living in a world of ghosts, constantly yearning for what could have been and not settling for what truly is.

I wish I was as good at moving on as I tried to tell myself. If I had properly moved on, seeing Ryan stood in the hallway wouldn’t hit me like a kick in the gut, wash over me like icy water and leave me in shock for what felt like years but was probably only a half second after I which a response tumbled out of my mouth, trying desperately to pretend that this was completely casual and that encountering Ryan did nothing to me at all. He was just another guest at a party.

Just another goddamn guest out of how many? I thank Gabe for a second, in my head, for having undoubtedly invited more people than I would ever be able to speak to in one night, because it would make it easier to blend in and not see Ryan again for the rest of the night. That said- as my thoughts work a mile a minute and I come out almost immediately with some comment about his car- I find myself wondering if I really wanted to lose him in a crowd again, as I have past lost him in the crowd of life.

He meant so much to me and seeing him now, tall and handsome, so different in his manner and appearance yet much the same skinny introvert I knew as a younger man, is more than I can cope with. But I try, because how mortifying would it be if I turned around and left after speaking to him so casually? I keep eye contact because I simply cannot look away from him, and I register that he is as shocked as I am, and trying to come up with something to say.

And he’s beautiful. Always was, though I never let myself think that too much because I was adamant that I was [i]straight[/i] back then and what we did was just physical and superficial, but since I have not seen him in person in so long it is jarring to see him, long legs and honey eyes and thick dark hair and- he has an earring in one ear, his hands are adorned with rings, I notice this all in the split seconds I have before we undoubtedly make our excuses and try and avoid eachother for the rest of the evening. I shouldn’t have come.

No, no, I can deal with this. It’s been eight years, Brendon, I think, sealing the rawness and reality that comes with seeing Ryan again behind bright eyes and a charming smile, and then I am ready, my mask is on. This is no big deal- and if I pretend it isn’t, as much as I can, eventually, it will become true. He’s just another guy I haven’t seen in years. We were dumb teenagers, nothing we did ever meant anything. We were friends. [i]Were.[/i]

[i]It’s the Trans Am, yeah.[/i] All of my facial muscles strain to keep my smile wide, and it is hard, unless you look close enough, to tell that I am coming loose at the seams (though I have only said a few words to him). Brendon Blake and Ryan Rowe, exchanging the first words in a decade, and we’re talking about his motherfucking car- which, by the way, is exactly the kind of car I always expected him to own. Still. His car. When I know I have so much to say. Funny- now I am here with him my mind cannot dispel the clouds that have formed enough to structure a meaningful sentence. So I say; [b]”It’s fuckin’ awesome.”[/b]

[i]Looks like you took an Uber. Planning on drinking tonight?[/i] No, I want to say scornfully, I’m going to face one of the ghosts of my past completely sober and just hope I don’t have a full-on anxiety attack at Gabe Saporta’s birthday party. Instead, darkly, I laugh, and glance back out of the door, watching the Uber drive away. [b]”Oh, yeah. And, I didn’t feel like flexing on anyone tonight. It’s Gabe’s big night, old fucker that he is.”[/b] This whole scenario is bizarre and I view in from a third person perspective, like I am detached from my own body and I am looking down on this interaction from somewhere else. My voice is clearly distinguishable but I don’t feel it come out of my own mouth. It’s surreal, Is he even real, should I really have taken those meds last minute before I left- I want to reach out and make sure this man in front of me is really [i]in front of me[/i] because it’s beginning to feel like I imagined him all along.

[i]Maybe I should join you. Knowing Gabe, he’s invited, like, 400 people. Not great.[/i] By the time he is finished speaking I have zoned out, and I see his mouth moving but my focus has been lost already. All I heard was [i]maybe I should join you[/i] and my muscles are seized with panic, and I know I started this by acting like there was nothing off between us, like that decade never happened, but now I regret it. Something did happen. I cannot ignore that.

But I try.

[b]”Uh- Where is he?”[/b]