twentysomething

Title: I Want Something That I Want

Fandom: Bandom, P!ATD

Pairing: alwaysagirl!Brendon/alwaysagirl!Spencer, Jon/alwaysagirl!Ryan

Summary: "Formal recruitment is still technically new to Spencer, but she's not a huge fan of it so far. Ryan had told her that getting to hold the basket is probably a compliment from Petey- "It means you're a hotass, Spence," is actually what Ryan said- but her feet sort of hurt and the house has gotten exponentially warmer in the last thirty minutes. Most of it's been a blur of faces and pretty inane conversation, but the next girl in the house smiles shyly at Spencer from behind bright red glasses, tucking her long, dark hair behind her ear, nearly tripping on the door frame.

Length: 9000 wordsish what the fuck

Warnings: FUCKING- THIS IS A COLLEGE AU WHERE THEY ARE LADIES IN A SORORITY, I SHIT YOU NOT, ALSO A WARNING FOR PLEDGE WEEKES

Notes: So to share the blame credit, merelyn is like, my co-pilot and enabler and CO-AUTHOR. This is wholeheartedly her fault, with the aid of amazonziti who terribly encouraged me to keep writing this. But yeah, this is also totally separate from the other two college aus I have written about Brendon and Spencer and even separate from the one where they're both girls and go to a dance. I don't know what to say other than that this was extremely self-indulgent to write and at some point, I'm probably going to write a sequel, because seriously, I didn't include most of the shit Mer and I actually further thought about, especially with Pledge Weekes and Pledgemaster Carden's long-distance girlfriend, Katie Jonas.




Spencer isn't really sure how she ended up in a sorority.

But here she is, in a sundress, holding a basket for girls to drop their card in, like it's 1800 or something with Greta rolling her eyes at Spencer, reminding her to smile. She hadn't really know this was what she was signing up for when she let Ryan trick her into joining- being made to smile at total strangers for hours on end and not rubbing her hand over her face and smudging her stupid eyeliner.

Formal recruitment is still technically new to Spencer, but she's not a huge fan of it so far. Ryan had told her that getting to hold the basket is probably a compliment from Petey- "It means you're a hotass, Spence," is actually what Ryan said- but her feet sort of hurt and the house has gotten exponentially warmer in the last thirty minutes. At least, it's the last round of the night and in about an hour, Spencer can put on some shorts and a tee.

Most of it's been a blur of faces and pretty inane conversation, but the next girl in the house smiles shyly at Spencer from behind bright red glasses, tucking her long, dark hair behind her ear, nearly tripping on the door frame.

Spencer stares after her, watching her get matched up with Trish, the two of them heading into the parlor.

Suddenly, Spencer realizes Billie is talking to her and there aren't any more girls trooping into the house.

"-them off and talk to someone this time, I saw you and Ryan hiding in the hallway and talking to each other last round," Billie tells her, pushing Spencer toward the back hallway. Spencer drops off the basket full of cards, but before she can go stalk into the parlor or be anti-social with Ryan, Gabriella waylays her.

"Yo, check it out, I think Patty's in love," Gabriella strong arms her down the hall, making Spencer's decision for her. "Also, bro, what did Ross dress you in?"

"You cannot talk," Spencer says sullenly, smoothing a hand over the pale blue, polka-dotted fabric of her skirt. "You look like South Beach puked on you." She feels Gabriella laugh, too loud even on top of the overwhelming hum of conversation in the house, as she slips an arm around Spencer. Everyone in this place is way too touchy-feely.

"No, but check this out," Gabriella says, nodding her head at Trish and the girl from earlier on the couch, and the girl is waving her hands around excitedly about something. Trish is smiling indulgently, like she does when Petey decides to have formal on a boat, and Spencer is weirdly irritated by how cute they look together on the couch. The girl is wearing a dress that looks like it's her Sunday best, the pale pink of it oddly at war with the bright red glasses, but Spencer is stupidly enchanted by her silly, probably self-cut bangs and huge grin.

"Petey gonna be pissed," Gabriella croons, elbowing Spencer jovially before slinking off to annoy Billie. Spencer gets distracted from the horrifyingly sweet tableau on the couch when Greta introduces some girl who's "thinking about an Econ major!" and Spencer loses her in the crush.

The round ends before Spencer can find them again and Spencer sort of thinks that's that until the next day when she's holding the basket again, still uncomfortable even if she's wearing her best pair of jeans and the ridiculous hard letters that she swears are the product of Andi getting high and ordering off Something Greek.

"Hi," she hears quietly, and it's her. The girl is dropping off her card in the basket, smiling sweetly at Spencer and no one who wears a lilac button down should look so cute.

"Hi," Spencer says, almost too late as two more girls are dropping off their cards. The girl smiles brighter as she heads into the house, getting handed off to Petey herself and Spencer sort of hopes that Gabriella was just kidding.

Spencer looks down into the basket, and three down, the card says "Brendon Urie, Sophomore".

She's just gotten a biology major with a love of Grey's Anatomy off her hands by dropping her on Billie with a grin when Petey waves her over.

"Spencer, I want you to meet Brendon," Petey is smirking, which usually means nothing good for Spencer. "Spencer is our philanthropy chair." Spencer had gotten tricked into the position after everyone had realized she was the only one who was remotely capable of planning things that weren't formal and mixers.

"I think it's really cool that you guys support Save the Music," Brendon says earnestly, her glasses slipping down her nose. "I went to your Guitar Hero event last year."

"Well, clearly, you two have a lot to talk about. Spencer, you should take Brendon into the dining room for letter writing." Petey looks smug as shit and Spencer can't help but narrow her eyes at Petey as she slips away and slides an arm around Trish.

"So, letter writing?" Brendon asks, strangely shy, because Spencer's seen her gesturing wildly with Petey and Trish, and Spencer feels weirdly compelled to put Brendon at ease.

"Yeah, it's over here," Spencer says, making an effort to smile and finding Brendon a free seat at the table. "We're recopying this sort of form letter and we'll look up your senator on a list and we mail it to them, to ask them to support funding for the arts in schools." Spencer shrugs. "It's kind of lame, but-"

"No," Brendon cuts her off, face open and so excited. "It's great. I'm from Nevada, who's my senator?"

Brendon draws some paint brushes, a palette, the drama masks, a treble and base clef and some music notes around the quickly written blurb.

Spencer hasn't had a crush this terrible since Kelly Jordan in the 4th grade.

That night, in selection committee, there's an anonymous comment from someone that Brendon's "kind of loud and annoying". Spencer spends the rest of the evening glaring at all of her sisters.

"Wow, crazy eyes," Ryan says when they're finally released and no longer in alphabetical order. Spencer's just glad she was between Gabriella and Trish, the first of whom had laughed at her, but the latter had grabbed Spencer's arms and stopped her from saying something stupid.

"Shut up," Spencer says, still obscurely pissed off, which is dumb, because really she's talked to Brendon for about fifteen minutes total, she is a crazy person, but Brendon is a legacy, apparently, and went through to the next round, so what does it matter, anyway.

"Okay, I'm going to take you to Jon Walker's room and get you stoned so you forget we have another weekend of this in five days." Ryan drags her toward the frats.

"If you're not going to put out, you need to stop smoking his weed and drinking his gin bucket," Spencer gripes, but Jon Walker makes everyone feel better, so she goes anyway.

Between class and stupid skit rehearsals, the week is flying by, although on Wednesday, she's eating lunch with Ryan in the university center and Brendon sees her and asks to sit with them, which, of course she can't, and so Spencer spends her lunch break not eating because she's watching Brendon frown by herself. It isn't until her next class Spencer realizes that she didn't explain that they weren't allowed to have her sit with them and there's a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach, thinking about Brendon sitting by herself and Spencer feels like crap the rest of the week.

Brendon doesn't meet her eyes when she walks in the door and if Spencer already felt like an idiot because she's dressed as April O'Neill, she feels ten times worse now.

Spencer can see Brendon talking to Gabriella and Brendon is at least smiling again, but Spencer still feels awful, disproportionately, hugely awful, so, like a fucking crazy person, she crashes their conversation.

"Hey, Brendon," she says, abstractly wondering what the fuck she's doing. "I'm sorry Ryan and I couldn't eat with you the other day, but those are the rules for recruitment," She's willing Brendon to understand, but she still looks wary and quizzical.

"Oh, yeah, we're not allowed to hang out with rushees, it sucks, man," Gabriella adds, looking way too comfortable in her giant pink Raya wig. Comprehension dawns over Brendon's face and she grins.

"No, it was fine," Brendon says and Spencer can't help but break into a grin of her own.

Gabriella puts Brendon down right in front for the skit and squeezes Spencer tightly as they wait in the "wings".

"Oh, querida, you have it so bad," Gabriella crows.

"Shut up," Spencer hisses, wishing for the thousandth time she wasn't wearing a bright yellow jumpsuit. Natalie and Alex, who are definitely enjoying their turtle costumes way too much, drag Spencer on stage.

Spencer nearly flubs all her lines, because Brendon is grinning widely enough to split her face in half right up at her the whole time.

"You know, Ryland is her recruitment counselor," Gabriella whispers as Billie and Ryan sing about being sisters to the tune of a Bruno Mars song. "She loves Brendon, too."

"Oh my god, shut up," Spencer mutters, even though she knows her bright red face is saying it all for her, anyway.

"I'm just saying," Gabriella says, even as she and Travie head out with Vicky-T and Trish, yelling, "Showtime, Synergy!"

After the skit, before she leaves the house, Brendon catches Spencer's elbow.

"Turtle Power, Spencer Smith," Brendon grins and Spencer is so screwed.

Brendon comes back for pref night, wearing a pale green dress and a pale yellow cardigan. She sort of looks like a preacher's daughter.

And now Dusty Springfield is stuck in her head, telling her that maybe in the backyard they'll go walking, lord knows to her surprise.

Spencer wishes she could hide in the kitchen until pref is done. In general, talking about loving each other and crying and saying the word "sister" a lot makes her sort of uncomfortable and itchy feeling, but Brendon earnestly staring at her as Petey talks about being the weird kid who wrote bad poetry in high school and then finding true friendship and hugging Trish- is worse. She also pretends like Ryan isn't holding her hand, for both her sake and Ryan's.

She doesn't manage to talk to Brendon, because she's being monopolized by Andi and Billie, but Brendon smiles brightly at her as she heads back out of the house with a dorky wave and Spencer sort of hopes Brendon wants to be a legacy, after all.

Essentially five minutes after the last round of girls are out of the house, Ryan drags Spencer back to their dorm room to change.

"Come on, find some pants, Jon Walker's weed waits for no man," Ryan says, arms folded over the ridiculous hot pink t-shirt they're all wearing as they roam through the frats as a pack of shiftless, wild sorostitutes tonight.

"Oh my god, you were there like, a week ago," Spencer sighs, but obligingly picks out her tightest pair of jeans. "Are you two still not dating?" Ryan snorts.

"What, no," she says, but she's putting on extra eyeliner, which is a blatant tell.

Tour de Frats, from the point of view of sorority girl is the best thing ever. After two weeks cooped up with your sisters, making shittons of name tags and trying to pretend to go to class, too, you get all the alcohol, frat boys and irresponsibility you could ever want. From the point of view of a frat boy, it's probably 50/50- fifty percent really drunk girls, fifty percent more likely to be busted by the cops.

From Spencer's point of view, it's hours of watching Ryan and Jon continue to fail to hook up.

"Spencer Smith," Carden says, handing her another drink.

"Thank you, Jesus," Spencer says, taking another cup of jungle juice while Jon wiggles his flip-flopped toes at Ryan, who is looking through his vinyl collection, again.

Trish, who is sober sister, just sighs accusingly at Spencer.

Bid Day happens way too early the next day and with way too much sunlight. Spencer whimpers as Gabriella screams her head off next to her. Gabriella either doesn't get hangovers or maybe she gets rid of them by ruining other people's lives with extreme, noisy prejudice. Spencer just adjusts one of the multitudinous ugly pairs of gigantic sunglasses that she stole off Ryan's dresser more firmly on her face.

"You're the devil," Spencer tells Gabriella solemnly.

"Baby, I get Pleasure Ryland back today, I give no fuck!" Gabriella shouts, the pair of electric orange shutter shades nearly flying off the top of her head. Spencer rolls her eyes.

"No one house should have all those pledges!" Natalie shrieks, climbing on Gabriella's back like a monkey.

"There is something seriously wrong with that whole family," Ryan says darkly, although they can't really talk. Petey is their matriarch.

"We lookin' crazy fresh, where's the paparazzi when you need 'em?" Petey hollers, throwing an arm around Ryan's neck.

Spencer's point exactly.

"Whose idea was it, anyway, to have Kayne West tweets as our bid day theme, again?" Spencer asks Ryan, already mostly dead inside about the whole thing, but still abstractly horrified.

"There is no astronaut training for DKD, even though this whole life is so outer space!" Alex screams.

"God," Ryan mutters. Gabriella leans around Spencer and kisses the top of Ryan's head.

"No, it was me, but I understand the mistake," Gabriella croons. Ryan narrows her eyes at Gabriella. "Mmm, so sassy bitch today, Ry, delicious."

They're the only ones with blue t-shirts this bid-day, so it makes it easy to spot their girls in the crowd and it's only a moment until she sees a head of dark hair in a blue shirt, and when the girl turns, it's Brendon, her red glasses glinting in the sunlight.

Spencer's breath catches in her chest and her stomach feels quivery and she wishes she could blame it on her hangover.

Ryland runs back first, barreling into Gabriella's stomach and their whole ridiculous family falls into a giant cuddle puddle, Travie solemnly draping herself on top of all of them. But then there's a crescendo of screaming and there's a crowd of girls in paler blue and there's a lot of indiscriminate yelling and hugging, which, again, not Spencer's favorite.

But suddenly Brendon is flinging herself into Spencer's arms and Spencer has to put her arms around Brendon to steady them both, or they'll fall over.

"Spencer Smith, I'm so happy," Brendon is beaming and Spencer can't help but smile back.

"Me too," Spencer says, blindly honest. The bid day photos are ridiculous- although, if Spencer says so herself, their new pledges are viciously good looking. There's a blond who looks like Twiggy that Ryan has clearly rush crushed on, the tiniest, fiercest girl Spencer has ever seen who is definitely Pete's, and a girl with neon red hair. There's a tall girl with a Zooey Deschanel haircut, talking to a girl with actually pretty sick two-toned hair, and Brendon. Spencer may be biased, but Brendon's huge doe eyes and pink, pink lips put her on another level entirely.

They take a photo in a rockettes kick-line pose and the group of totally obviously fratties scoping out pledges howls appreciatively.

"You're welcome," the tiny fierce one yells back. Spencer thinks she'll like her.

By the end of the afternoon, stuffed full of cake and mass-ordered pizza, Petey and Gabriella have already given them all pledge names. Elizabeth is now "Z-Berg", Bebe is promptly dubbed "Hotkickass", Haley is "Gingerfly" and Tennessee is "Jane Bunny", if nothing else because "if your parents named you Jane Bunny, they meant for it to be heard, Ten." Cassadee is "Happy" because what else can you call a chick with a happy face tattoo on her hand, and Brendon- after about five minutes Petey just laughs her terrible braying laugh and says, "Jesus, Mouth," and that's that.

Spencer still has a touch of hangover, despite all the grease she ingested, and the loud, hot room is a little too much, so she heads out to the porch, only to find someone already sitting in the swing.

"Brendon," Spencer says, too breathy by half. Brendon glances up, startled, but smiles.

"Hey," she says quietly, kicking her foot against the porch to get the swing started again. "I just needed some fresh air."

"Me too," Spencer says and she's a little surprised and a little gratified when Brendon scoots to one side and pats the seat of the swing next to her.

"Wanna sit?" she offers. Spencer sits, gingerly, and the motion of the swing slides her back into the seat.

"Are you having fun?" Spencer asks, inanely, but Brendon smiles up at her.

"Yeah, I- I am." Brendon pauses. "So, I guess I'm like, a legacy, that's what they're called, right? When you're in the same sorority as your mother?" Spencer nods, curious.

"So, rushing was her idea. We haven't, we've-" Brendon stumbles over her words. "We've been disagreeing a lot and she asked if I had thought about joining, and I hadn't, but I wanted to make her happy. I wasn't planning on joining, I was just going to do the rush thing and I figured I wouldn't make it or whatever, or I'd quit and that'd be that, but uh." Brendon's smile is small and private and Spencer's forgetting to breathe.

"Well, I met you guys, and I'm glad I did," Brendon finishes, looking at her fingernails. Spencer swallows around a strange lump in her throat.

"Well." Spencer says, allowing herself to nudge Brendon's shoulder with her own. "I'm glad you did, too."

It's not like anything was going to happen, but when Gabriella sticks her head out and goes, "Oh, don't you start dirty littling, ch, Spencer Smith," Spencer glowers and thinks, "Beaver dam, Saporta."

"I'm taking her inside with me," Gabriella declares like some kind of mother superior, which is ridiculous, because Spencer doesn't even remember parts of her new member retreat or last year's Homecoming, and those are both specially Gabriella's fault. Spencer sits out on the porch until Ryan comes out and nudges Spencer with her bony, sharp elbows.

"Hey," Ryan says insistently. Spencer looks at her suspiciously.

"Yeah?" Spencer asks. Ryan frowns.

"Hey." Ryan repeats and it's a sign of how long they've been friends and how much work Spencer's put into ferreting out the meaning in Ryan's by turns way too short or way too long expressions of feeling that she kind of gets it.

"Yeah, everything's fine." Spencer says, letting Ryan practically sit on her and crowd her with her spiky affections.

The theoretical tenderness of the moment is ruined by a set of freshly minted frat pledges running by in tighty-whities screaming at the top of their drunken lungs.

"Well, what more could I ask for?" Spencer says, as dryly as she can, and Ryan rewards her with a truly embarrassing snort.

Spencer's at lunch by herself the next day, when Brendon shows up.

"So, can I sit with you this time?" Brendon asks, grinning, and it's sort of baffling to see her in a pair of alarmingly tight jeans and a pale green shirt that says "Dance for Heart", but Spencer doesn't really, uh, mind.

"Yeah," Spencer says, kicking out the chair across from her. Brendon grins and puts down a salad and a bowl of Apple Jacks.

"So, I just got about twenty friend requests last night, is that normal?" Brendon looks strangely shy, spearing a mushroom.

"Yeah, totally," Spencer says, wishing she could really say more than "yeah". "Oh, crap, I forgot to friend all the pledges last night." Brendon snorts.

"And here I thought you just didn't like me," Brendon sing songs, but she seems a little relieved and Spencer has a moment of wondering how someone so hot is so insecure. Spencer nudges Brendon's chuck taylor with hers.

"Shut up, I like you fine," Spencer shoots back."You're awesome." Oh god, she needs to stop hanging out in Jon and Tom's room because she's one "bro" away from crushing cans of Natty Ice on her forehead. Brendon's cheeks are a little pinker than Spencer remembers, but she's smiling into her Apple Jacks, which is pretty distracting.

"You're pretty awesome, too, Spencer Smith." Brendon says quietly.

Somehow they start talking about majors, then music, then bands and it's not until Spencer has to go to her next class that she realizes she barely ate any of her lunch- not even really because she said a lot, but because she spent most of the hour smiling like an idiot.

Apparently, their schedules are extremely complimentary, because it becomes some kind of thing- between Econ 303 and Spencer's bullshit English class she hates and Ryan loved, Spencer and Brendon eat lunch together. Spencer learns about Brendon's roommate who plays the guitar and watches Star Wars almost every week and Spencer tells Brendon about the time when she and Ryan made the lawnmower bomb and the stripper yelled at them.

They're a pretty small sorority, so it's pretty clear who wants who as a little a couple of weeks later. By Homecoming, the deal is more or less sealed. She can tell that everyone thinks she wants Brendon for her little and they're waiting for the knock down-drag out fight between her and Trish, but frankly, knowing that Trish wants to take Brendon is sort of a relief.

Considering that it would probably be inappropriate to want to nail your little.

Ryan is mostly distracted in her "furtive" pursuit of Z-Berg- which is to say, Ryan clearly wants to take Z-Berg as her little and equally clearly is worried Spencer won't be cool with it. Spencer is cool with it, but she feels like she's finally getting revenge for how Ryan always lost only one of Spencer's Barbie's shoes. So she's letting Ryan stew.

She feels even better about it when Ryan corners her in the suite bathroom and demands, "So, are you going to date Brendon?"

"What," Spencer says, dripping wet and still mostly naked. "Showering is a private activity, asshole."

"You could have told me," Ryan says flatly, which is code for "someone else brought it up and Ryan feels guilty for being self-centered and is expressing that by trying to pin it on Spencer".

"Yeah, well," Spencer says. "Can we continue this discussion when I have some fucking clothes on?" Ryan lets her put on her robe, at least.

"Brendon's a Mormon anyway," Spencer starts with, playing with the edge of her belt. Ryan just eyeballs Spencer. "Whatever, when are you going to own up to making out with Jon last semester and then pretending like it never happened?"

Ryan goes a record seven hours before she talks to Spencer again.

Spencer's a little touchy about the whole thing, so when Gabriella texts her to ask if she's interested in taking a little that semester, the "FUCK NO" she sends back is probably a little unwarranted, but she doesn't really feel that bad about it.

Their homecoming partner is- like always- Phi Beta Rho, which means that Ryan spitefully avoids Jon to punish Spencer and Spencer spends most of the evening nursing a beer and trying not to listen to their really tall pledge speak in a godawful English accent all night. Brendon is- predictably- delighted by the whole process and is flitting back and forth between banner painting, float building and then curling up next to Spencer on a couch she knows to be unclean.

"Spencer, this is the best, the best," she chirps and she smells like Carden and Sisky's regrettable and mysterious gin bucket.

"Brendon, how many drinks have you had?" Spencer sighs. Brendon squints up at her.

"Your hair is really shiny. I hope people tell you how awesome your pretty shiny hair is. Spencer, do you have a secret boyfriend?" Brendon says in a string of nonsequiters. Spencer frowns, picking out the only concrete question in the group.

"I'm a lesbian, Bren," Spencer says and Brendon blinks up at her and says, "Oh," and promptly falls asleep.

Spencer has no idea what to take from that, so she just stays still and ignores Petey taking a picture of them on her phone.

"This is so cute I want to hurl," Petey coos. Trish rolls her eyes.

"You want to hurl because I saw you doing shots of Jaeger with Travie and Joe," Trish reminds her. Petey smacks a loud, wet-sounding kiss on Trish's mouth.

"Baby, you should be asserting your parental rights right now," Petey insists. "In your stead, Spencer J. Smith, what are your intentions toward our daughter?" Trish drags Petey away and Spencer goes back to ignoring everyone.

She eventually wakes Brendon up and drags/stumbles her back to her dorm, which is at least only about five minutes out of her way. Brendon's roommate looks fairly bemused to receive a sleepy, drunk Brendon, but she takes her, which is good, because they don't have anywhere to put Brendon in their room.

But Ryan doesn't come home and Spencer's getting super fucking anxious- or at least until she gets a text at about 4 in the morning- when she's about twenty seconds away from calling the cops- from Ryan's number.

hey its jwalk ryan's asleep don't freak

"Oh, thank god, finally," Spencer mutters and finally goes to bed.

Ryan and Jon miss the parade entirely, probably doing things Spencer never wants to know about, and Brendon is ten minutes late and wearing sunglasses even though its overcast.

"Spencer, why," Brendon moans, draping herself over Spencer's shoulder, the words vibrating against the skin of Spencer's neck. Spencer shivers, but it's a cold morning in late October, so it doesn't seem too weird.

"Nobody likes Homecoming, don't worry about it," Spencer reassures her. They walk the whole route more or less arm in arm. Spencer's extremely glad Ryan missed it, but Gabriella is waggling her eyebrows at her from on top of the float- which is supposed to be a rocket ship, maybe, but mostly looks like a silver dick. Yeah, this is going to get around.

The biggest downside to Ryan finally getting together with Jon is that Ryan decides she's going to be a good frat girlfriend and go to all the frat parties, which apparently means that Spencer has to go to all of the frat parties, too. Which means a lot of Spencer "letting" Ryan do her makeup and she was really hoping to have gotten that over with until formal, at least. The whole thing is mildly tolerable until the pledge auction, which Ryan decides they should take Brendon to see.

"Why are you doing this to her?" Spencer sighs. Brendon's wiggling her toes from her perch on Spencer's bed.

"I'm excited!" she protests. Spencer sighs again.

"That's terrible." Spencer slaps Ryan's hands away. "Fuck you very much, I can put on my own mascara." Ryan snorts.

"Put on the dress I made you buy." Ryan finally says, although her disbelief is patently obvious.

"I super hate you," Spencer says, but she grabs the dress out of her closet and takes it to the bathroom to change and finish her makeup. By the time Spencer comes out, Ryan has already changed- ugh, paisley- and is retouching her lip gloss.

"Not bad, Smith," Ryan says smugly.

"Shut up," Spencer automatically shoots back and is totally gratified by the way Brendon is looking at her, mouth ever so slightly open.

"Holy crap, Spencer," Brendon breathes out and Spencer fights a blush. Ryan snorts.

"Quit ogling her boobs, it's your turn," she tells Brendon who, other than being bright red, doesn't really protest other than a faint, "what, no, what".

"Ryan," Spencer says, trying to inject as much warning as she can into her voice. Ryan rolls her eyes.

"Whatever, go down the hall to ask Vicky if Brendon can borrow her silver ballet flats. They're the same size." Ryan commands and Spencer a) doesn't know how Ryan knows that and b) is suspicious as hell. After a long, vicious glare, Spencer submits and goes two halls down to knock on Vicky's door.

"Well, Spencer," Vicky says, which, like Ryan's assessment and unlike Brendon's, doesn't make Spencer's stomach feel tight, "What can I do you for?" Spencer fights the urge to roll her eyes.

"Ryan is making me come ask you if Brendon can borrow your silver flats," Spencer explains and then waits the ten minutes for Vicky to find the first shoe and another seven or so to find the other.

"Although, I don't know why she wanted them," Vicky-T looks thoughtful, tapping her finger against her lips. "Ryan has a pair just like these. We're the same size."

Spencer feels like the victim of an extremely stupid and elaborate set up with no purpose.

She walks just short of briskly back down the hall after thanking Vicky, because this cannot be good.

When she opens the door, Brendon is wearing a short, short, fucking short black dress that Ryan banished to the back of the closet years ago for being too boring, and Ryan is painting Brendon's full, pink mouth over with wet, shiny gloss.

"I look ridiculous," Brendon insists, blinking her dark, thick lashes at the mirror, made even heavier looking by the smoky gray eyeliner ringed around her eyes.

"Spencer doesn't think so," Ryan says and it's so devoid of tone that it goes all the way back to giddy smugness. She flicks her eyes up to look at Spencer. "Right?"

Brendon reflexively turns to look at Spencer and she sort of feels like she's been punched in the gut- because it's not like Brendon really looks any different, but Spencer can't take her eyes off they way Brendon's eyes look even bigger and browner, or the way her mouth reflects the ridiculous, unsexy overhead lighting and Spencer would so beyond hit that.

Spencer's thinking about sending the picture she took while Ryan was sleeping in Jon's hoodie that she stole from him on an ill-fated date dash over a year ago to everyone they fucking know, because she's 10000% sure that Ryan turned Brendon into a pornographic fantasy tonight just to piss Spencer off. Ryan's eyes are sparkling, even as her face goes even more blank.

"You know, Brendon, guys love it when two girls dance together. You should totally dance with Spencer tonight. It'd be super hot."

Ryan is going to be murdered so fucking messily.

Brendon's cheeks go bright red under the carefully applied blush and Spencer wants to physically throw Ryan out in the hallway so she can convince Brendon to make out with her.

"Uh, really- I, um, okay," Brendon finally says, looking down. Ryan smiles, just a little nastily.

"You know, though, if dancing is good, makin-" Spencer throws Vicky-T's shoes at Ryan's face.

They make it to the frats and it's only because Brendon's standing between her and Ryan that Spencer doesn't push Ryan into the water drainage bog/pit behind the health center. Pledge auction night is always a shit show, because the brothers are horrifying and sadistic- Spencer remembers Trash Monster from last year- and Spencer's really not looking forward to any of it.

Ryan disappears to make time with Jon pretty much the moment they step into the house and Spencer volunteers to go get her and Brendon drinks, mostly so she can compose herself. Brendon's dress is really short.

"Nice dress, Smith, it makes your rack look great," Carden tells her, passing her two solo cups of some fruity, noxious concoction. There's no real intent behind it, as far as Spencer can figure, since Carden has some kind of "long-distance girlfriend", but who doesn't enjoy being complimented by a guy who goes as "Other Naked Jesus" every Halloween?

"Nice boa," Spencer replies, because Carden actually sort of pulls off the baby blue track pants and hot pink boa wrapped around his neck. Carden snorts.

"Wait 'til you see what Sisky did to Pledge Weekes," Spencer doesn't know who "Pledge Weekes" is, but Carden's grin is not what she would call reassuring.

"This is going to be so fucking traumatizing," Spencer says as she hands Brendon her drink. Brendon grins brightly.

"So when they say Pledge Auction," Brendon sips at her cup and Spencer finds the resulting wrinkled nose way too cute, "What happens if you buy one?" Spencer shakes her head.

"I mean, Billie and Gabriella bought Sisky and Chiz back when they were pledges. I didn't see them for three days and afterward, every statue on campus was defaced and Gabriella had a tattoo. I think it's better not to ask." Spencer offers.

When Pledge Weekes- who is apparently the seven foot tall guy she's seen canoeing across campus streets dressed as a mermaid- comes out, dressed as Britney Spears, circa 1999, she spares a moment to wonder what the fuck is wrong with Sisky and Carden. Beyond the general horror, Spencer's pretty sure that the brothers have given express instructions not to bid on this guy, because under the too-loud blare that someone should hit them, baby, one more time, the room is dead silent.

Until Brendon throws her hand up.

"One dollar!" Brendon yells.

"What are you doing," Spencer hisses at her. Brendon turns up big, sad brown eyes that are not in the least repentant.

"Spencer, it was so sad," she says, even as Sisky is chanting "Going once!" "No one was bidding on him!"

"Going twice!"

"Brendon, I've definitely seen this kid in a pizza costume handing out condoms on the terrace," Spencer tries. Brendon's mouth is quirked in this stubborn moue and Spencer is so fucking tragically in love with her.

"And sold, to the hot pledge from DKD!" Sisky shouts.

"Fuck you, Sisky, all our pledges are hot!" Petey screams from somewhere in the room and Sisky bows in deference before selling the next guy who seems to be dressed as a gay police officer.

"Oh my god, what are you even going to do with him," Spencer groans, even as Pledge Weekes's pigtailed head comes closer above the crowd.

"He's going to be my friend," Brendon chirps and Spencer makes a mental note to never let Brendon near an animal shelter. Brendon and Pledge Weekes- "Dallon"- disappear into the crowd, allegedly to pay for him, but not before Brendon smiles at Spencer, sweet and perfect, promising to "-be back. I still owe you a dance."

Spencer's left, holding a cup of "fruit" juices and alcohol so cheap as to be indistinguishable from lighter fluid, wondering what she did wrong in a previous life to be here, now.

At some point in the evening, probably between cups 2 and 3, Ryan- oddly considerately- lets Spencer know that she's spending the night in Jon's room, but because she's Ryan, she looks at Brendon for a really long time as she does it. Spencer gets about through cup 4 when Brendon attempts to claim her dance- which would be a bad decision in of itself, but particularly dangerous as Spencer's lost a lot of her vertical coordination.

"Oh, wow, you are really drunk, Spence," Brendon says and Spencer hates being the disproportionately drunk friend, and she must have said that out loud because Brendon just snorts.

"C'mon, I'll walk you back to your room," Brendon offers and Spencer wants to say no or maybe something about Pledge Weekes, but instead she selfishly lets Brendon guide them, stumbling, back to her room.

Brendon makes Spencer drink a glass of water and deals with the fussy buckles on her stupidly complicated heels which Spencer is currently incapable of handling at this exact moment.

"You can, uh," Spencer trips over her words. "Ryan won't be back, I can sleep in her bed and you can sleep in mine- you know, if you don't want to walk home right now." Brendon blinks for a long moment, but finally sits down.

"Are you sure?" she asks, looking on the verge of still going and Spencer, possessed by the devil or something tugs her more firmly onto sitting on the bed.

"Yeah, you can borrow some pajamas." Spencer stumbles her way to her dresser and manages to get her hands on two sets of pajamas. She goes to take off her bra, pulling down both the straps and twisting to unhook it before she remembers Brendon's all of four feet away. Brendon's eyes are roughly the size of saucers.

"Um, sorry, I-" Spencer starts, belatedly handing Brendon a set of pajamas.

"No, I- uh," Brendon says before running away to the bathroom. Spencer has the feeling that when she's less drunk, she'll be mortified, but in the meantime, she yanks off her bra and dress- in that order, actually- and gets into her pajamas. She also doesn't realize, until Brendon comes back out of the bathroom, that, being both taller and wider than Brendon, Spencer's pajamas trail helplessly on the floor around Brendon's feet and the neck of her t-shirt reveals a lot of pale collarbone.

"Um," Spencer says again and runs into the bathroom to piss and brush her teeth before she can do something like tackle Brendon into her bed. Somehow, between some valiant lamp turning off and ignoring any odd smells from Ryan's sheets that are definitely not sex smells- even her drunk self refuses to mentally go there- they get to bed.

Separately.

The situation is far from ideal, but still pretty nice when Brendon whispers, "Good night, Spencer," and even though the beds are a couple of feet apart, Spencer likes hearing that as the last thing before she falls asleep.

The first time Spencer opens her eyes, it's like 5 am, and she stumbles to the bathroom long enough to pee again and hate everything, including how fucking precious Brendon is, one knee curled up practically to her chest, the other flung out, arms wrapped around Spencer's pillow.

"Ugh," Spencer says and forces herself to get into the other bed.

The second time Spencer wakes up, judging from the awful amount of ambient light creeping in, it's probably closer to 10 than 9.

"Jesus fucking Christ," she groans, her voice probably an octave lower than normal.

"Oh, you're up," Brendon says, way too cheerful. Spencer eyeballs Brendon from where she's smothering herself in the pillow.

"I'd appreciate it if you didn't look at me right now," Spencer grumbles. She doesn't have to look in a mirror to know her hair and face are super busted and that's really not her best look.

"I mean, I think it's cute," Brendon's smile is tiny and amused and too much. "But if you don't want this orange juice and these donuts, and the entire container of bacon I stole for you from the dining hall, I can always go."

Spencer narrows her eyes.

"Bacon first."

They're both still in Spencer's pajamas, three decimated take out containers spread on their laps from where they're watching an episode of the Nanny on their shitty old tv/vcr combo when Ryan walks in, carrying her shoes.

"Oh my god," Ryan mutters.

In the resulting silence of Spencer and Brendon failing to defend themselves, Fran Drescher laughs loudly.

"Oh, Mistah Sheffield," Nanny Fine crows.

"Donut?" Brendon finally offers.

Brendon heads out for her own room and a shower shortly after, taking the clothes she'd come in the day before with her in one of Ryan's shitty canvas totes. Ryan eyeballs Spencer.

"I have never been so embarrassed for you," Ryan says. "I handed you this on a platter and you two watched Nick at Night?"

Spencer goes back to trying to smother herself.

Fall break comes and goes in a haze of midterms, but which means only one thing- clue week.

It's all pretty predictable- Petey takes Bebe, Greta takes Tennessee- after a lot of Spencer really enjoying Ryan squirm, she puts Ryan out of her misery and tells her to take Z-Berg. Trish actually- in true Trish form- takes Spencer out for coffee to make sure that Spencer's okay with her taking Brendon as her little. Spencer loses track of the number of times she assures Trish it's more than fine.

"Look, I'll even do a clue for you," Spencer tells her. Trish smiles thoughtfully.

"I'll hold you to that." Trish says.

When Spencer gets the email, she stares at her computer for a solid minute.

"You've gotta be fucking kidding me." Spencer breathes out.

Four days later, she's taking a top hat and a picnic basket to the quad.

"Hello, you're late for tea," Spencer calls out when Brendon almost walks right past her.

"Oh my god," Brendon giggles.

"No, the Hatter," Spencer corrects her, tipping her ridiculously embellished hat to Brendon. "Now, if you'll sit down and put on your pinafore, we can have scones." She can't really imagine what they must look like, Spencer in a fucking frock coat and Brendon wearing a ruffly apron over her jeans and tee shirt, but Brendon is still giggling and eating strawberries in an obscene fashion and Spencer really couldn't care less that she thinks Billie and Ryland are taking pictures of them from a bush nearby.

Spencer gets to hear all about how Brendon's big has been having one of the a cappella groups stalk Brendon all over campus and how Gabriella and her made awesome puff paint t-shirts together and she went on a treasure hunt with Petey and Petey was dressed like a pirate and it's been the best week ever. It's a torrent of information and flailing limbs and huge excited smiles and Spencer is momentarily distracted by how much she wishes this wasn't a clue week setup. The realization that she would take Brendon on picnics and listen to the ridiculous mini-adventures of her day isn't really surprising to Spencer, but it's still sort of tragic.

Eventually, they run out tea and tiny sandwiches, though, and Brendon has to go to class and Spencer's folding up the too-big picnic blanket, so it comes as a total shock when she feels Brendon's lips press against her cheek.

"Sorry to drink and dash, but I'm going to be so late!" Brendon cries, already over ten feet away and disappearing rapidly into a crowd of freshmen.

"Um," Spencer says to herself, frozen for a long moment before she realizes she's still in a Mad Hatter costume, holding a picnic blanket and basket in the middle of the quad and she needs to go.

When she gets back to her dorm room, there are already stalkerazzi photos of the clue on Facebook and a text from Billie:

Would you like the photos of your love's first kiss?

Spencer makes a mental note to kill Billie.

Revelation is always more than a little ridiculous- mostly because she's in Petey's family and they apparently require flair.

"You look like an idiot," Spencer tells Ryan, but in a fairly good natured kind of way. Ryan rolls her eyes and adjusts all the fake roses she's wearing.

"You will wear those devil horns and you will like it, Spencer Smith," Petey tells her, waggling a finger in her face. Spencer sighs and puts the novelty headband back on.

Spencer enjoys watching Bebe climb on Petey's shoulders and Z-Berg and Ryan holding hands, but when Brendon flying squirrel tackles Trish, Spencer can't help but smile. They take what feels like hundreds of photos on the house porch, the four of them mugging around Spencer. And because her family is weird, the moment they're done with that, Petey drags them into her weird van and drags them out to the shitty "beach" twenty minutes from campus to drink hot chocolate and eat donuts that they get from the Dunkin Donuts drive through. It's way too cold for it, but they just curl up to each other on the dirty old blanket Petey keeps in her car.

Spencer left her backpack and her cell phone in the car, so it's not until some time past midnight that Spencer thinks to text Brendon.

you happy? Spencer sends as Ryan leans against her sleepily. A couple of minutes later, her phone buzzes in her lap.

oh yes yes spence i am she gets back and Spencer smiles and lets Ryan drool on her shoulder.

Spencer's having lunch with Brendon later in the week when Brendon pokes at her mac n' cheese, after telling Spencer all about her night with Trish, breaking into a practice room and jamming for hours.

"Uh, so," Brendon says, shaping the leftover noodles into a smiley face. "I have like, a dance thing, tomorrow, at the Hall, if you wanted to come." Spencer raises her eyebrows, because she vaguely remembers Brendon saying something about being on a dance team, but Brendon's never really volunteered any other information about it.

"Yeah?" Spencer says, half-rhetorical. "Totally. When?" Brendon's face lights up in huge grin.

"Uh, it's at the basketball game, so, 7?" Brendon offers. Spencer debates making Ryan come with her, because she doesn't really want to sit through most of a basketball game by herself, but in the end decides against it.

Which turns out to be a good thing, because Spencer can't stop staring at Brendon. The dance team is filled with people with not enough dedication and too much respect for themselves to be cheerleaders, but it does mean that they wear tight, tight black pants and weird sparkly shirts that are too short and also too tight. It takes Spencer a moment, because she's used to looking for the bright pop of Brendon's red glasses, but she instead sees Brendon, midway through the line, her hair slicked back into a curly ponytail, glasses-less, and wearing more makeup than even Ryan had put on her.

"Aw, fuck," Spencer mutters under her breath, because Brendon shaking a set of golden pompoms is going to uh, stick with her.

They're not terribly good, but that doesn't really mean anything to Spencer, who can't tear her eyes off of Brendon doing a roll up and- holy shit, a back flip. The whole thing is embarrassingly, embarrassingly attractive to Spencer, even more so after the routine, when Brendon spots Spencer and flails her pompoms enthusiastically at Spencer. And maybe if she hadn't skipped all of her high school pep rallies with Ryan, she would have been prepared for the seemingly obligatory sexy rap dance.

Spencer's not really certain what the song is, other than that she's definitely heard the bass line pumping out of a frat basement before, but it mostly seems to be about wondering where them girls at. The action of the song mostly seems to be a lot of ass shaking- it would take a stronger human than Spencer Smith to have not noticed Brendon's ass before this, but this is more or less torture.

After the show, Brendon darts up into the bleachers to give Spencer a squirmy, sweaty hug.

"You came!" Brendon cheers. It's sort of strange and dangerous to have Brendon's face this close and her eyes seem even impossibly bigger out from behind her glasses.

"Of course I did," Spencer finally says. Brendon beams until one of her teammates yells her name and she scrambles back down.

Spencer is still equal parts turned on and disappointed in herself.

Ryan stares at her when Spencer gets back to the dorm.

"You've been doing something terrible, haven't you?" Ryan accuses Spencer. Spencer frowns.

"You're bedazzling a scarf," Spencer points out, because Ryan lives in a crystal glass palace.

After a long moment, Ryan just goes back to what she was doing, so Spencer thinks they're throwing the whole night out as a wash.

Spencer gets blackmailed into waiting with the pledges in the house while they set up for initiation. It's probably Gabriella's job, but Trish is ritual chair and insists on this kind of shit getting done right, which- Gabriella would probably tell them all that they're going to have to fight something.

They all look weirdly cute in their white dresses and Spencer is trying to ignore the bustier-style bodice of Brendon's dress, because eyelet is not supposed to be sexy. She dutifully leads them over to the campus chapel and also tries to carefully look up as they change into the robes. Just to avoid temptation. Spencer's sort of amazed they make it through the entire ceremony with out anyone giggling or anything catching on fire, which is a pretty big milestone for them. Plus, getting to hear Trish sing is always weirdly soothing and totally awesome.

The post-initiation lull is always weirdly anti-climactic, at least until everyone remembers that formal is coming up. Then it's a nightmare of people bitching that they don't have a date, or, once they get one, that their date wants to go eat on campus before formal, or that they hate their dress and Spencer has a lot of flashbacks to why she didn't go to prom. She's been avoiding thinking about it, and if she's being honest with herself, it's because he doesn't want to think about the extensive amount of pregaming she's going to have to do to ignore Brendon dancing with some guy- probably Dallon, who she's become such good friends with, playing guitar together at all hours- and the whole thing is sort of... lacking in excitement for Spencer.

She's actually thinking about not going at all, but she gets back from class one day, frantically searching for her wallet, only to find Ryan sitting with it and her laptop in a nest of blankets on her bed.

"I already ordered you a dress, you're going," Ryan tells her. "Oh, I used your credit card."

Spencer would strangle Ryan if she thought it would help.

Brendon is weirdly jittery at lunch on Monday, a little more manic than usual, dropping forks and knocking over the salt, and at formal business meeting- which always takes a hell of a lot longer the first time they have new members- she thinks she finally gets why. Spencer looks down at the sign up sheet for formal tickets and she sees Brendon's name- and a check in the box "girl, you bringing a date?"

Awesome, is the first thing to sarcastically run through Spencer's mind and she's trying to figure out what to write, which is difficult, because she's filled with a shit-ton of hate for the universe and her throat feels tight like she wants to cry, which, fuck no, is not happening, so she just blindly passes the sheet on to Gabriella. She doesn't pay attention to much of anything through the rest of the meeting, although she does resolve to not be a dick about the whole thing. Just because Brendon has a date for formal isn't any reason to get weird and miserable, even if she is- completely- weird and miserable about it.

When the meeting is finally over, Spencer's waiting, because they usually walk back to their respective dorms together, but Brendon is like, earnestly engaged in some worried conversation with Trish by the door. Just when Spencer is going to go- because, whatever, Brendon can walk home by herself- Trish finally just pinches the bridge of her nose and points Brendon toward Spencer. Trish says something to Brendon that Spencer doesn't catch but her face is definitely long-suffering.

Spencer has been in an overwhelmingly terrible sort of mood for the past 23 minutes or so, which wasn't helped by her own awkward waiting, but before she can say something brusque like, "Hey, what?" she notices how worried Brendon's eyes look behind her glasses, freaked out and huge. So she says, "Hey, what?" but it comes out soft and concerned instead.

Brendon shakes her head, once, and then again, and then she just blurts out, "So I told myself- Trish is making me- I got an extra formal ticket."

"I know," Spencer says slowly, but she's kind of confused now, and there's something in Brendon's face that's making her stomach twist up horribly, like she's bracing for a blow that will land somewhere, soon. Brendon laughs, but it's a quick staccato burst of semi-hysterical wrongness and she's twisting her fingers in the sleeve of her lavender cardigan.

"So, I don't know if you're going with anyone," Brendon says.

And there it is, there's the suck, because, "Wait, did you want to like...double date?" Spencer finds herself saying, and really? Her head is filled with a jumble of thoughts- what was she thinking, what was she even thinking, joining a sorority in the first place.

"No! That's not what I meant! Why are you so-" Brendon is visibly frustrated and she takes a deep breath, squares her shoulders and looks Spencer dead in the eyes, which is probably why it takes Spencer a few seconds to realize that Brendon has said, "Will you go to formal with me, Spencer Smith?"

It's at that exact moment that Spencer looks around and realizes that no one has actually left formal business meeting because every single girl in the sorority is standing around watching, even Trish though she has the grace to look a little sheepish about it. Ryan is not sheepish, at all, and has actually pulled a chair closer to sit down and watch.

And- ridiculously- Spencer kind of loves them all, even Petey, who's pantomiming eating someone out between her fingers over Trish's shoulder. It's all suddenly really, really funny, and awesome, and Spencer grins helplessly. Brendon is still waiting, but there's already an answering smile starting to curl up in the corners of her mouth, like she knows Spencer's answer- which, it's about damn time. Brendon's apparently the only person in Christendom- no, the planet- who hasn't noticed Spencer's painfully stupid and obvious crush on her.

Spencer grabs a hold of Brendon's sweaty hand and tugs her closer so she can lean down and say, low and intent, into Brendon's ear, "I'd love to go. I'd also love to kiss you right now, but I don't think i could stop." Brendon makes this tiny squeak of a noise and Spencer feels her fingers flex- "And I don't want an audience for the things I want to do to you."

Brendon stares up at Spencer for a long moment and mutters, "Fuck that noise," which is how they end up making out in front of everyone until Spencer pulls away with a gasp because she really does have to drag Brendon- brave, gorgeous, apparently an exhibitionist Brendon- away.

"I guess I'll sleep at Jon's tonight, you're welcome, fuckface," Ryan calls from behind them, to a variety of catcalls. Spencer flips Ryan off over her shoulder and tucks Brendon against her side with her other arm.

"You realize you're totally my girlfriend now, right?" Spencer asks, just to make sure they're clear, and Brendon giggles.

"Toooootallly your girlfriend," Brendon promises in a sing-song voice. Spencer grins, ducking her head a little.

"And we're heading to my room to get it on," she adds. Brendon tugs Spencer down into a quick kiss.

"Totally getting it on," she agrees.