Ryden Oneshots

86,400 Chances

Brendon watches Ryan. He watches the boy wandering around the apartment, checking over his shoulder every so often to gauge the time. Right now Ryan is kneeling in front of shelf where their movies are housed, making sure they're all in proper order. "Lunch, Ry? It's almost one."

Brendon's voice sounds strange in the room, unusual. It's normally just the ticking and whatever quiet noises are produced from the task Ryan has decided to undertake at that moment. Brendon isn't supposed to talk when Ryan is working, but he's starving. He doesn't get an answer. Ryan makes a noise in the back of his throat, something that's not quite angry, but sounds it. He's just frustrated. Brendon isn't supposed to talk. They both know it, but Ryan can't understand why Brendon would.

When the DVDs are done, Ryan's eyes turn toward Brendon, not quite making eye contact, but looking at him nonetheless, expectantly almost.

"I'm hungry." Brendon says. "It's almost one. Do you want lunch?"

"Okay." Ryan stands up and walks over to his boyfriend, kissing him on the mouth softly, eyes closed. "What do you want to eat?"

"I was going to run out. I'm starving. McDonalds or something. What do you want?"

"What I want." It's Ryan's way of saying 'the usual' and it's endearing in a way. Brendon watches his boyfriend walk back to the living room, check the clocks and the watches lined up on the wall and the shelves. A watch is off by a few seconds and Ryan picks it up, fiddles with the dial to fix it.

---

Ryan's been this way as long as Brendon's known him, which is a rather long time. Brendon's mom helped with a support group for kids with Asperger's and she thought Ryan might benefit from a one-on-one playdate so she'd volunteered her son. Brendon was only eight so he didn't have a problem with it. Ryan was nine and he did, but he came back a second time and a third.

Ryan didn't want to play the games Brendon did a lot of the time, but that was okay with the younger boy. Sometimes Ryan would sit in the corner and read while Brendon played with his action figures, both comfortable with not talking. Sometimes they'd play on the swingset. Ryan didn't like the park because there were too many people, but he was okay with the swingset. Grace Urie would watch them from the kitchen window, always worried the boys would swing too high and tip it over.

The watches and clocks were Brendon's doing, he supposed. Ryan had been obsessed with the concept of time for awhile when his birthday rolled around and so Brendon had bought him a couple pretty clocks and a pocketwatch from a Goodwill as a sort of joke. Then Ryan had started collecting them, like they were religious artifacts to confirm his faith. It was part of the reason Brendon never complained about them; he thought it was his fault.

Brendon asked Ryan out when he was fifteen and Ryan was sixteen at six twenty three p.m. on the 17th of July. Ryan checked his watch before he said yes, then wrote down the time, estimating it took Brendon about seven seconds to ask and so it was technically six twenty three and forty-six seconds. Brendon was too excited to be annoyed and too used to Ryan's behavior to worry.

That had been over six years ago. They'd broken up once when Brendon was seventeen and Ryan didn't want his boyfriend to not go to college at the big university on the East coast he was looking at. The notion of feeling responsible for someone else's actions was new to the boy. That's what he decided love was. But he'd left and Brendon hadn't gotten into his dream school, so a few months later they were back together.

Now they were living in the new apartment outside Sacramento. Brendon was finishing up his bachelor's degree online and working nights at a call center. Ryan designed websites from home and got monthly payments from his father's estate which would last another ten years. Ryan bought approximately one new clock or watch a week. Brendon hadn't bought him any timepieces as gifts since the first time.

---

Ryan lets Brendon kiss him, press him against the wall, hands sliding up under the hem of Ryan's shirt to squeeze the boy's waist. It takes a minute, like it usually does, for Ryan's shoulders to untense, for his mouth to soften and respond, for him to become receptive to the touch, letting a few quiet moans make their way out of his throat. It's not that Ryan doesn't like physical contact, it just takes a moment.

It takes time.

They make their way to the bedroom, Brendon pushing Ryan down onto the mattress and working his own clothes quickly off. There's four clocks on the dresser, two on the nightstand, five on the wall, and one on Ryan's wrist. Brendon puts earphones in at night so he can't hear the constant refrain of ticks and tocks.

Ryan sits up and doesn't really say anything, but his eyes are fixed on Brendon's erection and he reaches a hand out, beckoning his boyfriend forward. His lips part and Brendon's hands tangle in Ryan's hair as his head rolls back toward the ceiling. It takes a moment to realize it, but Ryan's head bobbing, the motion of his hand, it's all in time to the noises of the clocks. Brendon tries to ignore it, but he can't. He gently pushes Ryan back and starts to take his clothes off.

They kiss while Brendon fumbles with the lube and slips his fingers in. Ryan bites his lip, uncomfortable. He's always said how sex is nothing like the movies, how they romanticize for film and the noises and sensations are never as good as they make them out to be, especially the necessities like prep. Ryan won't look at Brendon when they fuck, but it's no different from any other time really. Brendon can count on one hand the number of times Ryan's looked him in the eyes.

Brendon makes sure there's no real rhythm or pattern. If he finds himself fall into something, he changes it. Ryan ends up on his back, his knees, his stomach, and his legs get pushed up onto Brendon's shoulders once. To his credit, Ryan doesn't complain about this, but he does look at the clocks every chance he gets.

"Twenty seven minutes," he tells Brendon after, lips on the boy's shoulder, curled into his side.

"Don't care, Ry." The younger boy reaches for Ryan's wrist, glancing at the face of the ever-present watch. "If I had to get a tattoo for you I think I'd get a clock."

"Don't do that." Ryan says, serious all of a sudden, sitting up, his eyes wide and staring at his wrist, thumb running over the face. "Don't ever do that."

Brendon sits up, slightly considered, wondering what he did wrong. Ryan doesn't tend to get upset about jokes and certainly not sarcasm since he has trouble noticing it. "Why? What's wrong?"

"The time . . . it'll be wrong. It'll only be right twice a day."

"Your clocks are all wrong." Brendon reminds the boy, leaning in to kiss his cheek.

Ryan's close to tears now, voice choked. "I set my clocks early because you know I'm always late. Don't throw that in my face. It's not nice."

The other boy sighs, pulls Ryan in for a tight hug. "I'm sorry, baby. Don't worry. I'm not going to get a tattoo of a clock, I promise. Why don't we watch a movie? You pick."

And just like that, the moment is fixed. Ryan gets the movie and Brendon makes popcorn. They sit in the bed and watch Donnie Darko while Ryan periodically checks the time.

Ryan is different, unusual. And Brendon supposes he is, too, but it doesn't really matter, does it? As long as he has Ryan he can cope with the constant reminder of time, the ticking, the tocking, and the perpetually growing number of clocks on the walls.