Disclaimer: No matter how many birthday cakes I wish on Dead Poets Society still does not belong to me.

Greetings from Providence

Chapter One

It's Gerard's idea, which should have been a clue from the beginning that maybe it wasn't the best plan in the word. But he was the one who went through with it so Steven really has no one to blame but himself. Even if he only agreed in a moment of weakness and spurred on by both Gerard and his girlfriend. Well actually, of one wanted to be more accurate it was actually Jeffery's fault.

Steven had met Jeffery on his first day of work at Penpals Stationary when he was getting a tour of the distributing centre trotting behind Gerard who had been told to show him around. Jeffery was standing on a set of metal steps looking ridiculously good-looking in his hard helmet, not like Steven who's helmet was too big and kept slipping down his forehead and cracking against the top of his glasses. Jeffery smiled at him and shook his hand and that's when he feel in love.

But he knows now why they call it falling in love, because eventually you hit the bottom and everything shatters around you and Steven hadn't even seen it coming.

"We're just so different, we want completely different things in life," Jeffery had said, holding his hand while he told him, sympathetic to the pain he caused. But that was a lie. They hadn't wanted different things at all, they had wanted exactly the same things because exactly 5 days, 7 hours, and 23 minutes after they broke up Jeffery had gotten the manager position that Steven had been pining over for 2 years. Gerard had promptly kidnapped him and dragged him to a sushi place to help him drown his sorrows in rice wine and raw fish.

"You know what the worst thing is? I'm more upset about the job then the break up. What the hell does that say about me? I don't even like my job that much, why would I want to advance in a company I don't even like working for? I mean it's not as if I'm passionate about stationary. It's a dying industry only supported by grandmothers and girls who think letters are romantic." Steven said, half muffled due to his head resting on the counter of the bar.

"I think letters are romantic."

Steven sighs lifting his forehead off of the cold marble of the bar, "Fine, let the record show that grandmothers, romantic girls, and Gerard Pitts are supporting the stationary market."

Gerard nods approvingly before shoving more crab roll in his mouth, skipping the chopsticks and using his fingers instead. Though about halfway through his fourth one he starts to choke, and not just due to the ridiculous amounts of crab and rice he has in his mouth. "Er, I think we should head out now, come on." He says grabbing his coat and trying to hustle Steven upright.

"I haven't even gotten my spicy tuna roll yet," He protests and then he sees it. And time goes all slow and distorted like he's falling through water and he watches their hands intertwine on the table. Jeffery and this guy who looks much too comfortable with him for this to be a first date. Then he's gone, out into the humid night air.

He makes almost four or five blocks before he realizes he has no idea where's he's going and that he left his blazer with his wallet and keys back at the restaurant. Grudgingly he turns around and heads back towards the way he came and about halfway there Gerard meets him with his stuff and an apologetic look. "Do you wanna come back to my place?" He says instead of something stupid like 'I'm sorry' or 'you're better off without him' and Steven knows that's why they're best friends.

He zones out on the train ride to Gerard's place and thinks about love stories. How he was just the conflict in somebody else's love story, a bystander, the unlucky side effect. He wonders if there's always someone like this. How many untold stories are there about the people who fall in love alone and are left gasping like fish when the well of disillusion finally dries up?

Ironically spending time with Gerard and his girlfriend, who are ridiculously in love, makes him feel somewhat better. They both fuss over him and she makes him crepes Suzette. Which are technically just crepes made by someone named Suzette but he doesn't really care at the moment because they taste good and it's something to do with his hands. "Poor Steven," Suzette says, "I will cut this Jeffery boy for you, hmm?" Which in her French-Canadian accent sounds so hilarious he ends up choking a little bit from laughing.

"I think I'm going to get dumped more often if I get this sort of attention, not to mention crepes." Steven says jabbing at the last stray crumbs on his plate. He exhales sharply jutting out his bottom lip blowing his fringe upwards. "Actually, no statement retracted, being dumped sucks."

"Don't forget losing the job!" Gerard adds cheerfully from the living room where he appears to be watching some documentary about sharks.

"Jee-rard!" Suzette says scandalized, frowning severely at the back of his head before looking over at Steven, "I apologize for my boyfriend who is an incompetent bastard." Which she makes sound ridiculously endearing

"And lazy." Steven suggests. "And badly dressed." Which is pretty much the only one of those four things which is arguably true but of course that leads to a long discussion over Gerard's questionable choices in clothing; including but not limited to puffy vests, bowler hats, and suspenders with jeans. They end up all squished together on a love seat pretending to be a couch and watch the show about sharks until Gerard heads off to bed, insisting Steven should stay the night.

He curls up on the love seat, blankets pulled up to his chin and fisted in his hands and Suzette asks if he needs anything else. "A new life?" He asks pretending to be joking and failing miserably, she makes a tutting noise and gives him a kiss on the forehead before padding softly down the hall. Steven can hear them talking softly in french from their bedroom and falls asleep to the sound of their voices, distant but comfortable.

His wake up the next morning is less so as it involves Gerard jumping into the minuscule amount of space not being taken up by his body and jabs him in the face in the way of a wake-up call. "Steven! Wake-up! Suze and I have had the best idea in the world and you need to be conscious right now to hear it."

Steven grabs his glasses from where he left them on the coffee table. "Okay, what is this fantastic idea? And it better not involve hooking me up with someone from one of those gay dating sites."

"No! It's better. So I found this website where people rent out their houses and instead of staying in a boring hotel you go and stay there. Like a bed and breakfast only better because you can have sex without the owners hearing you."

Steven looked at him blankly, "So what you and Suzette are doing this?"

"No, don't you see you should do it! It's perfect, get away for a few weeks, you know change of scenery." Gerard looks at him expectantly, "So?"

"No." He says simply pulling the blanket back over his head.

"What, why?" He can heard the pout in Gerard's voice.

Steven peeks out from under the blanket and pushes his hair up over his forehead in a way which does not at all help his humongous bed head. "Because I have work and I can't just leave."

"You have more holidays saved up than anyone I know, take them, get away. You're stuck in a rut right now and you're so deep down you can't even see it. So I'm kicking you out. Literally, because we've already set up you up with a house. And we bought you plane tickets. Think of it as a gift."

"You didn't." He gasps standing up angrily, an effect somewhat ruined by getting his legs tangled in the blankets but the emotion is still there.

"Sure did, you leave tonight."

"Even if I wanted to go on this trip-which I don't- I can't accept that."

Gerard sighed, "Look, I had a bunch of points saved up so it was like 10 bucks and we're not actually paying for the house (You'd have to pay for that) so it's really not a big deal."

"Well I don't accept it."

"Just think of it as an early Christmas present!"

"Gerard, its October."

"Steven?" Suzette looks at him from across the island in the kitchen, "Please do it? For me?" And she's got these big pleading eyes and her stupid Quebecois accent and he relents because sometimes Steven is sure that he has absolutely no control over his own life.

"Fine. Where am I going?" He may have to do this but he's not going to be happy about it.

"Providence, Rhode Island!" Suzette trills drumming her hands on the countertop like it's a big reveal

Steven let's himself fall back onto the loveseat, "Oh goody."

"Hey, could be worse. You could be going to Iowa, "

So there it is, the short but sad story of his Steven Meeks currently found himself on the flight from Seattle to Providence with the carry-on bag he was lucky enough to hastily pack on the short trip back to his apartment so he could shower and grab the necessities. "It'll be so fun!" Gerard says repeatedly on the car ride to the airport, "I bet you won't even want to come back! Besides, from what I know about Providence-"

"You mean what you found on google while I was sleeping?"

Gerard conveniently avoided looking at him while he continued"-It's all artsy and shit, you'll love it. That poet guy used to live there, you know the one with the crow. Caw!"

He rolled his eyes and ignored Gerard for the rest of the car ride but did allow him to give him a man hug before he went through security, which despite being awkward because of the height difference, was sort of nice. He also reminded Steven to pack his sleepingmask so he was able to sleep through most of the flight, so maybe he wasn't such a terrible friend after all.

Though Steven retracted that though when -after being shown around the ridiculously large house he was to be staying in by an intensely charming guy named Neil- a drunk guy showed up on his porch at 1 in the morning..

A.N. Despite needing to finish Dead Sexy Society, I am for some illogical reason starting this wherein, as you've likely gathered Steven goes to Rhode Island. I have not been to Rhode Island, so I'm not sure why it's set there. That being said if you have and you notice something that is wrong, please feel free to let me know. Also, be forewarned that future chapters of this fic will include the following; Charlie on a skateboard, vague references to The Great Gatsby, trips to museums I learned about on google, and Back to The Future. Don't say I didn't warn you.

-C