You Told Me This Gets Harder - Well It Did

GERARD’S POV

I woke up the next morning only a little hung over. A couple of coffees later I was fine and I could remember what had happened the day before. The interview (I had clearly pulled that off with all the charm and wit that was expected of me), Frank, Sonny… Geez, what was up with him?

I remembered getting dressed. Being dressed, actually, by darling Frankie. Then I drank a lot of coffee, and I must have been pretty funny in the interview ‘cause we spent the whole time laughing, as far as I could remember. But Sonny, what was he doing there? He looked kind of disturbed, even to me. And Frank had stayed with him.

I couldn’t decide what to do next. It was 11am and Mikey was out, probably with Alicia or the guys. All I could think was to ring Frank and see what he was up to, except I couldn’t find my phone anywhere. In the end I used the house phone and rang his home.

“Hey man, what’s going on?”

“Uhh… I actually have no idea. Sonny’s freaked out and terrified of Matt, Matt-”

“Wait, Sonny’s scared of Matt?! No way! What happened?”

“I have no idea, Sonny won’t say so I rang Matt and he just said a load of weird ambiguous stuff and sounded really upset… Sonny –” He trailed off and sounded almost guilty, even though as far as I could see he was just doing more than he needed to to help out some guys we hardly even knew.

“Sonny what?”

“Ahm… He… Look, I don’t know, just…” he sounded seriously uncomfortable, then changed track, “Well, anyway, he’s living at my place for now –”

“He what?” I asked, incredulous. We had known this kid vaguely a few years ago at school and then just one night when he spent most of the time singing or sitting on people. Why the fuck was he now living with Frank?

“He had nowhere else to go, I –” He sounded like was pleading with me. What the hell was going on?

“Frank… I think it’s great that you’d take him in, there’s no need to sound like you just killed someone. It’s just… A little sudden, that’s all. Don’t worry, you did a good thing.”

“Gerard, I… Um… Sonny…”

“Spit it out, Frankie-boy.”

“Um, hey, Gerard… How come you never had a girlfriend since high-school?”

“Uh… Frank, how is this in the slightest, most infinitesimal tiny bit relevant?”

“Just… Curious…”

“It’s ‘cause I’m madly in love with you, my darling, darling Frankie, please come and marry me and live with me forever?” I said.

Except, of course, I didn’t. Instead I said something a little bit like, “Uhh… Ahmm… I just… Frank, can we keep to the matter at hand? Anyway, why haven’t you had a girlfriend that you ever see since high school? All you seem to do with them is occasionally open doors for them and yell at whoever calls them ugly.”

This was probably the closest we’d ever come to discussing exactly why it was that we both spent most of our time with each other, and why we hugged (and occasionally kissed) an awful lot more than anyone else I know. But I had trained myself to believe all that was just fun in Frank’s eyes. And mine, of course.

“Yeah, you’re right, let’s stick to the subject of Sonny. Okay, well, he’s been in my bed since three in the afternoon yesterday, and he’s showing no signs of getting up. I don’t like to wake him, but…”

“Frank, he’s had twenty hours of sleep. I think he can probably just about manage to stand up and walk around now.”

“You’re probably right, I guess. But I’ll let him sleep just a little while longer.”

“Frankie, I’m gonna come over. You have to find out how long he’s staying, and I have a feeling that you won’t do it yourself.”

“Aw, thanks Gee. You’re right, I need you.” I liked the sound of that.

“Oh, and Frank, do you have any idea where my phone might be? I had it yesterday, I’m sure, but I don’t know what I did with it…”

“Oh… Uh… I think I might just know where it is.”

“Yeah? Great, where is it?”

“Um… In my pocket? I kinda borrowed it yesterday, so I could ring Matt.”

“And you didn’t think of perhaps asking?”

“You didn’t seem like you minded too much at the time…”

“Ohh, whatever. See you in a bit Fwankie.”

“Bye, Gee.”

That was maybe one of the weirdest conversations I’d ever had. Well, time to get over to Frankie’s to try to sort out this mess. Either Sonny was crazy (likely), or Matt actually did try to hurt him, (which, after the night in the diner, struck me as hugely unlikely). Matt was tall, and maybe even pretty strong, so theoretically he could do whatever he wanted to Sonny, but I just couldn’t see it. It was totally unfeasible.

However, a kid who probably still believed in Santa Claus had a more than average likelihood of dreaming something weird up. But if Matt hadn’t denied it – and he could easily have, whether or not it was true – then something must have happened. And if he also sounded upset… Maybe he’d lost his temper? Anyone would need the patience of a saint to be around Sonny for any amount of time and not get annoyed, no matter how much they adored him.

I continued in that kind of vein without getting anywhere the whole way to Frankie’s. When he opened the door there was no sign of Sonny, which most likely meant that he was still asleep.