I don't understand birthdays. It's just a day to celebrate one year closer to death with people that will mourn you when that time arrives if they aren't dead themselves.

It's a flurry of comments on my social medias that sparks the realization that I'll most likely have to attend a party later, and that I will definitely need to supply a gift with a heartfelt card. I'm not good at those. Brendon writes those for me. I shoot him a quick text and he agrees to crank one out for me later.

Half the crew is crowded around Taylor's hotel room when I step outside. One of the new cameramen is holding a crumpled pie tin and Taylor is covered in whipped cream and rainbow confetti. She's smiling and trying to find a spot for her little paper Burger King crown while everyone sings the happy birthday song to her.

Josh and Tyler pose for a photo with her, and I briefly hear them tell her they couldn't possibly have picked a better Taylor Winchester.

Then I see her picking her phone from her pocket and zooming in down the hall to me, eating McDonalds in my old gym shirt from high school. She smiles and the notifications start popping up — taylorswift mentioned you in their story, joshuatyler mentioned you in their story, jennasfx started following you, hayleyyy tagged you in their post. It's only eight in the morning.

Taylor pushes her way through the mingling crowd and leans back against the wall with me. The cream has started to drip off her cheeks and to the floor. "I heard you volunteered at thar huge animal adoption thing. Did you have fun?"

It was cold and a nightmare. The paparazzi caught wind of my attendance and I couldn't go two minutes without cameras capturing my every move. It was good attention for the adoption agency. Every animal they had out there had been taken home. Brendon was ecstatic, and I pretended to care. I was good for the most part, but I wanted to run a couple people over with a semi truck.

"It was alright. The cats didn't like me very much." She peels back the rest of the bandages falling off my arm from a restless night. There are deep and shallow cat scratches everywhere. "I'm just glad I'm not allergic."

"Ah, that's good then. You can babysit my cats sometime."

"They'll get along great with our hamster."

Her eyes light up and she accidentally rips the bandaids off my skin in excitement. "You have a hamster?! What's its name? When did you guys get it? You didn't bring it, did you?"

I wouldn't have been caught dead even looking at that hamster a month ago, and she wants to know everything about it. There's a padlock on the cage and Brendon keeps the key hidden so I can't access it easily.

"He's just a little guy," I tell her and she holds her hands over her chest, "and we got him just a bit ago, so he doesn't have a name picked out or anything. Our house-sitter is looking after it, Hayley. You met her."

She nods and finally takes off her crown as the crowd disperses. "I remember her. She's cute. How old is she again?"

I don't know her exact age, but she's in her early twenties. Her birthday was a while ago, and I had Brendon send her a card for me along with a new guitar from the music shop downtown. I didn't pick out the gift nor did I care, and she knew that, but she thanked me either way. "She's finishing up her first semester in college — University of California, Davis I think."

"Cool! Does she live on or off campus? I've heard it's expensive either way."

"She lives in a shared apartment between our place and there. It's always cold and crowded so we let her use our guest room most of the time."

"That's so sweet. What's she studying?"

"Not sure. She switched her major recently. Why're you so interested?"

Taylor frowns and she bites her lip. "I have a boyfriend, you know. I love him a lot."

I didn't know, but I do now, and it's still irrelevant. "Good for you. I have one too."

She crosses her arms and leans back against the wall with me. She's watching me in her peripheral vision. "Do you love him?"

"Of course I do. I've been, uh, searching for a good jeweler around here. I think it'll be special to do it here, but I dunno."

I get a nod of approval and a pat on the shoulder before Taylor walks off and back to her room to scoop the rest of the whipped cream from her hair and face. I just might have to follow through with what I just made up — whatever makes her want me more.

It's all a lie, but I don't care.

🔪

Pete Wentz is an idiot. He rolls into the hotel parking lot while Brendon's sitting beside me in matching Spider-Man lawn chairs from an old toy store down the road.

As soon as he steps out of his matte black corvette, Brendon frowns and pulls down his sunglasses to the tip of his nose. He even goes as far as to set down his hot chocolate with a little paper umbrella sticking out of the lid. He's huddled up in a parka and the bridge of his nose is red from the biting cold, but it still doesn't stop his judgmental side from reading its ugly head.

"He looks like he wears sunglasses inside and refuses to make reservations for fancy booked restaurants b'cause he'll get seats anyways."

"You're wearing sunglasses and pretending to sunbathe on a hotel hall in Michigan." I point it out and he kicks me in the shin with his snow boots.

"What do you know about bein' casual? You had a staring contest with a cat and three different dogs at the adoption event." He's only teasing, but he's right. All four of those animals were on to me too.

"I am a good actor."

He turns to me and smiles warmly. We keep eye contact until he adjusts his sunglasses to their original position. "Could be better. Six outta ten, and that's with an extra point for your nice face."

He's flirting. I'm not good at that. The extent of my knowledge only stretches to Wiki-how and a book I stole from Barnes and Noble a year ago. "If we're still rating each other, I would say you're an eleven out of ten, and you also gained the extra point for attractiveness on top of the ones you already had."

He grabs my wrist and gives me a high five just as Pete clambers up the stairs with his room key and suitcases in hand. He's still wearing his sunglasses, but he looks even more like a jerk. I'd make sure his jacket wouldn't get stained with blood, but that's as far as my artificial kindness would reach.

"Hey," he holds out his hand and Brendon takes it first, and I refuse, "I'm Pete Wentz. You must be Dallon and Brendon."

"You're right. Taylor Swift is down the hall if you want to meet her. We're celebrating her birthday today, but the party is off. It's too cold to do anything." Brendon smiles politely and points to her room.

Pete nods and then he's on his way with a sweet smile.

Immediately I look at Brendon. "He's an idiot."

He's caught off guard, but he keeps a calm composure and picks up his drink again for another few sips. "Do tell."

"His hair is dyed blonde and he hasn't bothered to touch up the roots, which means he is likely untrained in personal cleanliness. He's wearing a leather jacket instead of a heavy coat in the middle of Michigan. He has five large suitcases and he's wearing one pair of sunglasses over his eyes, and another one over the back of his head."

He doesn't believe me, but he glances over to watch Pete unlock his room, in fact wearing two pairs of sunglasses.

"So what? He's a quirky dude—"

"I could kill him."

He pauses and frowns while trying to process it. He grabs my hand and squeezes. "Please don't. Remember that talk we had about not doing or saying anything like that?"

"Yeah, but I could kill him. I want to. Nobody would ever even know. I'd clean it up and I wouldn't leave anything behind. I'd use plastic sheets to make sure the blood doesn't stain anywhere. I'd bury his body underneath the tree out back, and I'd make it look like an accident. I don't leave prints behind."

"Yeah? Well now I know, and I'd turn you in to the police if you gutted him like a fish and hung him out to dry."

I sink back in my chair and smack his hand away. He's such a snitch, but I'll probably do it anyways.