For MyExcellentStories, for being most excellent and totally loving this fanfic! (And for telling Keanu I exist)

The prospect of losing Bill hit Ted with a wave of nostalgia, where he wanted to do everything that they always did together, all at once. He wanted a year in a single day, a lifetime with his best friend in a month.

Bill didn't feel it the same way Ted did, probably because specific details and emotions were fading.

As much as Ted wanted to trust in Rufus to fix the timeline, there was something digging in the back of his mind, pestering him, a whispering hum on sadness that said he and his Stallyn only had a month left.

He sat in the band van with the wind in his hair, and he let out a long, low sigh as he watched Bill so effortlessly driving, as if time was not ticking down every heinous second.

"Bill?"

Bill looked over at his friend in the passenger seat and smiled warmly.

"Yes, Ted, my friend?"

"Turn left here," he said quickly. Bill obliged without question. Ted continued, "I don't think I'm going to go to school anymore."

Bill's eyebrows furrowed, "Why not? Isn't your dad gonna kill you?"

"It won't matter, dude. School is getting in the way. I've got a month left to see you, and... and... I'm gonna make something of it, dude!"

"Well, then I guess I won't go to school either. It's not like I'll be able to use anything I learned anyway!" Bill shrugged. "Why'd we turn left?"

"We're gonna go to the arcade. I've got 25 days to do all this radical stuff with you, so we should start now!"

***

They pulled in to the arcade and rigged up a few coins to let them play free. If they were caught, so be it. For a couple of clueless dudes, they sure had some bright ideas sometimes.

"Let's play foosball!" Bill yelled, barging in and scoping out the little wooden table.

"You're going down, dude!" Ted shouted, grabbing the little plastic ball and spinning the rods his players were on.

Bill made a triumphant goalie, but in the end, Ted beat him by two measly points, after he almost ripped out a whole rod of players from pulling the handle too hard.

"Rematch?" Bill challenged, out of breath.

"Nah, dude. Pac-Man!"

They ran like kids, ducking in and out of the thirteen year olds to get to the machine first.

Ted slipped his quarter in the slot, then gently drew it out with a string when it registered a new player. He pocketed it keenly and began to rapidly swivel the joystick, a concentrated look on his face.

He cleared three levels before he ran out, and relinquished the game to Bill.

Bill focused with determination, eyes glued to the screen. As someone who was keen to spontaneous actions and outburts, Bill was oddly quiet and precise.

As he finished, much farther than Ted had gotten, a small gathering of awestruck twelve year olds clapped. Bill bowed, taking his tickets and sliding out of the gaggle of onlookers. He and Ted shared an air guitar riff, before Ted pointed across the arcade.

"Tron?"

"You're on!"

The two were raking in tickets like it was payday. They accumulated a total jackpot of 2,147 tickets. To them as kids, that meant saving up for the cool light up disco ball.

To them as adults, it meant getting 428 of the five-ticket candies and sitting on the roof of the band van to eat them all.

As Bill sank into a simultaneous sugar rush and sugar coma, he leaned back to stare at the sky, feeling his heart rate slowly elevating as he fished another tootsie roll out of the bag.

"So, what else shall we do on this most triumphant day?" He asked lazily, grimacing as he ate another candy, but not wanting to stop.

"I was going to suggest Waterloo, but it is getting most cloudy outside!" Ted commented, sitting up suddenly. He looked up at the sky as the sun disappeared.

"Ted," Bill began, looking down at his wrist just in time to remember that he wasn't wearing a watch, "What does the clock say?"

"Tick tock, tick tock," Ted answered immediately.

Then he realized.

"Oh. Uh. 1:27, dude,"

"Wanna get milkshakes from Milo's?"

"Excellent!" Ted hopped down from the roof by walking across the windshield and jumping from the hood of the car and getting into the passenger seat.

They drove. They listened to music. They acted like everything was okay. Ted was going to get a year with his best friend still; he was getting his year in a day. He was going to get his lifetime in a month, and he didn't care what it cost him.

They pulled in to Milo's and ordered the largest chocolate shake they had to offer. It was a cavity waiting to happen in a glass, and they made it even worse by drowning the thing in sprinkles, chocolate sauce, whipped cream, and crushed up Oreos. It would take someone hours to finish.

The boys were done in fifteen minutes.

They were digging at it with spoons, knocking each other's utensils out of the way to get at the sweets. They were laughing and having a grand time, and Bill's sugar high had finally caught up to him. He was squirming in his seat like a child in Christmas, bouncing every so often.

"You okay, dude?" Ted laughed, watching his restless friend.

Bill let out a yelp of pent-up excitement and chugged the remains of the shake, which included nearly an entire Oreo and more marshmallows than a man should consume at one time.

Ted was laughing until Bill started coughing from his impulsive mistake. Ted started thumping him on the back.

"Cool down, dude," he started saying between laughs.

Then Bill's hands clutched at his throat. Choking. His face was all red. Crap.

Bill kicked a little to signal that Ted do something, but now, all rationality was out the window.

He did the first thing he could think of. He thought way back to health class, trying to remember anything he learned in aside from just staring at the naked diagrams of girls.

Come to think of it, he and Bill didn't really do much in that class except look at the naked girls in the textbooks...

Come on, Ted, think! What does a dude do when his best friend is choking?!

Oh yeah. Mouth to mouth.

Ted spring to action, grabbing Bill's face. By now, Bill was purplish, his eyes bugging out painfully as he tried to gag out the cookie lodged in his throat.

Ted tilted Bill's head back and hoped for the best. No way was he losing his friend any earlier than a month, if he could help it!

Here goes nothing. He grimaced a little then plugged Bill's nose, pulled his jaw open wide, and covered his mouth with his own.

It was either Ted succeeding in the process or the pure shock of Ted Logan's mouth on his own that made Bill project the blockage right out of his throat. He was breathing again.

A crowd was panicking around them, shouting their concerns, but Bill was alright now. His face was still red, partly from blushing, partly from strain.

"Thanks dude," he whispered hoarsely, massaging his neck and not looking Ted in the eye.

"No problem, dude. Let's bail," Ted responded quickly, wanting to get away from all the eyes and attention.

They returned to the safety of their band van, tension and awkwardness still very apparent. Bill was shaking, his hands trembling as he reached for the steering wheel.

"Dude, I was blacking out," he said, the color in his face draining rapidly. "I saw my life flash before my eyes. Well, what I could remember, anyway. It is most heinous. But I finally know what I want in life now. I know what I want to do before I die."

Ted fiddled awkwardly with the strings of his hoodie, blush creeping onto his ears.

"And what's that, Bill?"

There was silence for far too long.

"Ted, I want to play in a parade. There's gonna be one later this week. Let's hijack a float!"

"...Okay! Excellent!"

They air guitarred happily.