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This was supposed to be just a snippet of a random scene from the TBTS 'verse, but somehow it turned into a ficlet, between writing an intro and smoothing it out? Um, yes.
Title: Ballad Of An English Major
While The Best Thing Since has written many songs about Jon Walker and Spencer Smith, causing them to be somewhat infamous among fans of the band, for a long time Ryan Ross remains in happy obscurity. Well. Happy for him at least. He loves Keltie, and he supposes the songs her band plays are alright, though most are very silly in nature. Except for the ones she writes, because Keltie writes these amazing existential things like the peacock song that just blow Ryan away. Then, fall semester of his senior year, he takes Modern Poetry. Ryan figures it's going to be Sylvia Plath, Robert Frost, e.e. cummings, and the like. Apparently the professor really means modern poetry, though, rather than modernist, and on the third day of classes he tells them that he's going to give them a prime example of modern, local poetry. "Now I'm sure many of you have encountered this one before," he says with a smile before hitting a key on his laptop and the next thing Ryan knows, Feathers Like Floating Scarves (The Peacock Song) is playing. Which is, wow. Pretty cool – he can't wait to tell Keltie about how they analyzed one of her band's songs in his class. When the song finishes, the prof cues up a PowerPoint slide with the lyrics on it and begins his lecture. "Though the entire band is credited with the writing of this particular song in the CD's booklet, the majority of the lyrics were clearly written by the band's bassist, Keltie Colleen. Colleen is well known for her existential lyrics which, like those songs written by the rest of her band, frequently incorporate pieces of her own life. This song, for example, is generally held by fans and scholars to be about her boyfriend, Ryan Ross." Ryan can't help but sit up straighter and gape at the professor at this. The peacock song is totally his favorite TBTS song, and he's spent loads of time thinking on and about it, and, just. No. His hand shoots up in the air without a second thought, right in the middle of the professor's analysis of the chorus, and the man blinks slowly. "Yes?" he asks. "Did you have a question?" "I always thought the song was about overly pretentious people who like to pretend they're better than everyone else with a complete disregard of what other people think of them," Ryan snaps, daring the professor to contradict him. It's totally a song about pride and pretentiousness and there's no way this– this academic can possibly be right when he says it's about Ryan. "Not about her boyfriend." The professor looks absolutely delighted by what Ryan's said. "Presumably Colleen's boyfriend possesses the characteristics that you have just described, Mister...?" "...Ross," Ryan chokes out, sinking low in his seat and face absolutely aflame with embarrassment. "Ryan Ross." He can't believe he's made a complete fool out of himself like this. The whole episode leaves Ryan grumpy and angry with Keltie because in his mind, she totally insults and pokes fun at him in the song. She tries to explain to him how she actually meant it in another way entirely and maybe Ryan tends to be a little too cynical in his interpretations of things? Because it's actually a song about how she loves that he doesn't care about what anyone else thinks and he's happy just doing his own thing! But he is angry and doesn't want to hear any of that so he ignores her and sulks a lot. As it turns out, the rest of the band thinks it's a horrible shame that the song has caused such problems for Keltie's lovelife, so they get together and write Ballad Of An English Major: How Ryan Ross Learned To Shut Up And Love His Girlfriend's Band as an apology to Ryan. When they perform it, they don't even let Keltie know about it beforehand – Brendon totally springs it on her when he announces that Jon's taking over bass for the next song, since Keltie doesn't know it yet. Ballad is awesomely amazing and chiding and sweet and funny and even Ryan is smiling by the end of it. Spencer turns to him and tells him that if he doesn't forgive Keltie and the band after that, he's a total ass. Since Spencer is nearly always right about this kind of thing (and also because Ryan has to agree with his assessment), Ryan pretty much has to forgive them, which he does. Ryan still likes the peacock song best.
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