Perfect in His Imperfection

“I officially hate you,” Bob proclaimed, throwing up his arms as we stepped out of the hall and into the sunshine.

“Same goes for me, I’m afraid,” Brandon said, agreeing with him.

I rolled my eyes at my two supposed friends. So what if I had dragged them along with me to orientation and made them sit through one completely boring hour filled with speeches, speeches and more speeches. I was starting college this year and so far, based upon today’s session, was not looking forward to it.

“I mean, come on Frank, the worst we have ever done to you is drag you to a party! You drag us to this boring orientation morning filled with all these newbies who all looked shit scared, to re-live something that we already went through when we started college,” Brandon continued, Bob nodding encouragingly throughout his rant.

“Oh, stop being so dramatic,” I told them, following their direction as we walked across the college campus. Bob and Brandon thought they were so amazing because they had already been at college for two years, and were obviously way above hanging out with the lowly freshmen. I was excluded from that of course, having already been friends with the two older men for years.

I looked across the grass that we were currently walking on, admiring the old buildings that had been there for centuries and the people that were walking past it. The boys had been right, college definitely had some eye candy around.

Like that boy, I thought to myself, checking out the man in the distance that looked like he was in a hurry. I squinted my eyes, getting the feeling that I knew that man from somewhere.

“Gerard?” I called out uncertainly, earning strange looks from my friends who were wondering who this person I was calling was.

The man looked up and paused for a second, but quickly looked back down and kept walking. That was all it had taken for me to realize that it was Gerard—he must not have recognized me or something.

“Gerard!? GERARD!” I called again, louder this time and now starting to quicken my pace a little. Gerard simply kept walking, oblivious to my calls.

I got closer to him, certain that the man I was following was the very same man that I had spent that day at the beach with.

“Gerard!” I said and reached out and grabbed his arm. He sighed and turned around, facing me with his arms folded and a blank expression on his face.

Wow, I thought he would have been a little happier to see me, I thought, staring back at Gerard who was looking like he wanted to be anywhere but here.

“Hey, I knew it was you!” I said excitedly, because even if he wasn’t thrilled to see me, I still liked seeing him. “Do you remember me?”

The corner of Gerard’s mouth twitched slightly but he seemed to force it back down. “Yeah,” he finally said.

I grinned. “Well good. How have you been?”

“Fine,” he answered in a bored voice. “Hey what are you doing here?”

“OH, right. I go here and I just had to sit through this shit boring orientation thing,” I explained, “you?”

“Yeah…I’m…I go to school here. Too.”

“Oh wow, that’s really cool,” I said and grinned, “How’s the comic going, by the way?”

Gerard finally let a huge grin escape. “Good! Aw, man, the ending! Fuck, its so crazy!” he said excitedly. “You should…you should read it.”

I smiled at him, happy he had enjoyed my little gift to him. “That’s awesome, I might have to steal it from you one day when you’re not looking!” I said and laughed. “I’m just kidding, I wouldn’t do that.”

Gerard laughed too, just as my friends finally caught up and stood nearby.

“No, don’t worry. You’re free to—” Gerard looked up at my friends awkwardly before continuing, “—steal anything from me.”

I laughed. “Well, I might just hold you to that.”

“Wow Frank, I didn’t know you were into stealing the virginity of random men,” Bob said, finally cutting into our conversation.

“You didn’t?” Brandon said, raising his eyebrows and looking meaningfully at me.
I laughed loudly and said, “Only yours Brandon.” I fluttered my eyelashes girlishly for effect.

“Oh, sorry Gerard. These are my friends, Brandon and Bob, guys this is Gerard,” I said, giving the introductions.

They all nodded at each other in greeting before falling into a silence once more.

“Uh…so Gerard, we were just heading over to some café. Want to join?” I asked him, not wanting to seem rude and just ditch him.

“Yeah!” he said quickly, causing Bob to smirk at his fast answer. I shot Bob and Brandon a glare and started walking, my friends quickly following my lead.

“So, how were the rest of your holidays?” I asked Gerard, as well fell into step following behind Brandon and Bob.

“Um, good. Yeah, good,” he replied hesitantly. “How were yours?”

“Great! I love having all that time off. It was almost as fun as our random day out,” I said with a smile, knowing he would like that answer. His face lit up in a grin, as he laughed.

“Almost, but not quite,” he said to me. “So, where are we going?”

I paused for a moment, trying to think of where my friends were taking us.

“Hey guys?” I called out to them, when nothing came to mind, “where are we going?”

Brandon and Bob turned around, both wearing pretend looks of shock plastered on their faces.

“Look at that Bob, he’s speaking to us!” Brandon exclaimed, holding a hand to his forehead.

“Woah, I thought we must have been invisible to him,” Bob said, blue eyes wide. I rolled my eyes as Gerard grinned.

Brandon sighed. “It’s just over there, Frank. Not too far for your short little legs to go?”

I glared at him. They always made fun of my height—which was silly really, as I was only a little shorter then them.

“Does Fwankie need a piggy back ride? Are your wittle wegs getting sore?” Bob said in what I assumed was his ‘baby’ voice. He actually sounded like a pedophile.

I turned to Gerard. “Excuse me for a minute,” I said to him, then turned back jumped onto Bob’s back.

“Get off me!” he protested as I flung my arms around his neck. Bob tried to buck me off onto the grass we were standing on, but had no luck as I was clinging to him like superglue.

“Never! You offered, now hurry up!” I added a kick in the ribs to give him a little extra motivation, which seemed to work as he stopped trying to fling me off and instead walked forward. I turned around and waved to Gerard, who was trailing behind a bit watching my antics with Bob. He waved back, giving me a smile and shaking his head.

“We’re here!” Brandon announced a few moments later, at which Bob sighed with relief. Hey, I wasn’t that heavy.

Brandon held the door open for all of us as we walked through and examined the menu that was hanging above the blue counter, waiting to tempt us with what it had to offer.

“Brandonnn? Will you just get me an iced tea?” I asked him in my sweetest voice. He nodded and kept looking up at the menu, ignoring the fact he was being checked out by the two middle aged women behind the counter.

“Gerard, what would you like?” I asked him, being the polite individual I am and remembering others.

He looked at me, tearing his eyes away from the menu. “Just a coffee,” he said softly.

“And get Gerard a coffee,” I ordered Brandon, poking him in the side and wandering off to find an empty seat. I soon spied a comfy looking booth and slid in, Gerard sliding in the seat across from mine.

Gerard smiled warmly at me and opened his mouth to speak.

“So Frank, you know where you’re staying yet?”

I smiled back and replied, “Oh no, I’m not living on campus. I live with those dudes,” I pointed at Brandon and Bob, “about ten minutes away.” Brandon, Bob and I lived in an apartment complex my Daddy dearest owned, and was kind enough to let us stay in rent free. When I say rent free, it doesn’t mean that he didn’t get anything in return. Me living with my friends in his apartment meant that he still had some form of control over me, which he reminded me each time I did something he didn’t like. With a simple, ‘Frank, if you ever get another tattoo I will not let you live in my apartment’, he had me right where he wanted me. It was worth it though, our apartment was way sweet.

“Oh…cool. So I guess you are pretty good friends then,” Gerard said to me, clasping his hands together.

“Yes, we are as a matter of fact,” Brandon interrupted, sliding in next to Gerard and placing a coffee in front of him.

“Yeah, we are,” I said as Bob slid in and gave me my iced tea. “We’ve just known each other for ages, plus there’s probably no one else who would put up with me!”

Bob nodded in agreement as Brandon said, “Yeah, he gets pretty annoying sometimes. Some of the things he does…” Brandon trailed off with a shake of his head.

Gerard raised an eyebrow. “Like what?” he asked curiously.

I scoffed. “Yeah, like what?” I folded my arms and glared at my friends, waiting for the truth to come out.

“Like this morning! You fucking came out naked!” Bob exclaimed, his mouth full of hot fries.

“Yeah! Do you really think we want to be exposed to that?” Brandon added, glaring at me.

I scowled, it really wasn’t the end of the world like these two were making it out to be.

“I told you, I forgot my towel,” I said to them, saying it slowly in case they couldn’t understand. Gerard snorted a little with laughter, but quickly stopped once I shot him a glare.

“Okay then,” Brandon continued, going on a roll, “how about the time you let that homeless guy sleep in my bed? I get home, find this dirty old dude in my bed snoring, and then next morning I discover he also wet the bed!”

Bob looked at Gerard and said, “It was winter and Frankie thought it was far too cold for anyone to be outside so he let this dude that was busking come home with us. I’m just glad it wasn’t me out that night because there’s no way I would have had him in my bed.”

I opened my mouth in shock and folded my arms. “Why don’t you just move out if you hate me so much!?” I exclaimed, laughing a little.

Bob leaned over and ruffled my hair. “Nah, we like you too much for that,” he said to me, causing me to grin widely.

“So, Gerard,” I started, smoothing down my now messy hair, “do you live on campus?”

“Uh…no,” he said, giving me a strange look.

I giggled. “Oh yeah, I went there!” This time it was my friends who gave me a strange look.

“So Gerard, did you have to endure orientation?” Bob asked, looking at him.

Gerard glanced up from his coffee. “Yes…about three years ago.”

I snorted. “So did Brandon, but I made him come. What year are you in?”

“Going into my third.”

“Like it?”

Gerard laughed and then said, “Are you serious?”

I laughed too. “I guess not,” I replied and then said, “its good having you here, cause you can, like, have my back and all, tell me which teachers will give me good grades if I give them sexual favors.”

“FRANK!” Brandon exclaimed as I took a sip of my drink.

“See, the sad part is I don’t think he is actually joking,” Bob said, shaking his head as I started giggling manically.

“I totally am! These old men are so boring, aren’t they Gerard?” I said, turning to him and nodding at Bob and Brandon. “As if I would get with my teachers for grades…that’s what my dad’s money is for!”

Gerard started laughing at that, to which I grinned at him. It wasn’t often I had such a responsive audience to my jokes.

“So, Gerard, how do you know Frankie?” Brandon asked him, raising an inquisitive eyebrow.

Gerard stopped laughing and looked at him. “We met over a comic,” he replied.

“Yeah! A comic! It was the last one and he gave it to me, and I said I didn’t want it, but he didn’t take it so I bought it for him,” I jumped in, waving my hands around as I explained, almost knocking over my iced tea.

“And then I couldn’t leave Frank without the comic, so we shared it,” Gerard continued and shrugged. “That’s about it.”

“But I never got to finish the end of it.” I pouted and folded my arms, causing Gerard to smile at my childish attitude. Bob and Brandon exchanged a glance, that didn’t go un-noticed by me.

“Its okay, you can just come over sometime and finish it,” Gerard said to me, smiling warmly. He started stirring his coffee slowly in a clockwise direction. I watched fixated by the motion until Bob’s voice brought me out of my trance.

“Hey Frank, Sarah just walked in,” Bob said to me, causing me to rip my gaze away from Gerard and whip around to face the door. Sure enough, standing there was Sarah, accompanied of course by some bimbo friends. I dived under the table, grimacing as I narrowly missed a wad of gum someone had stuck under the table.

“Ex-girlfriend,” I heard Bob say, most likely to Gerard who had no idea who she was and why she had caused me to dive under the table.

“Psycho ex-girlfriend, actually,” Brandon corrected him.

“Ooh, fun,” Gerard said, ever so slightly tapping his foot under the table.

“Not fun,” I hissed and wrapped my arms around his leg to stop him tapping. It was getting really boring under here, really fast. I started absentmindedly running my fingers up and down Gerard’s leg, while I attempted to poke my head out without being caught by the café staff or Sarah.

I sat down in defeat on the grotty café floor, which was littered with stray fries, and rested my hands on Gerard’s thighs, which were just the perfect height for acting as a temporary table.

“Is she gone yet?” I hissed, clenching Gerard’s thigh in frustration which caused him to elicit a small gasp.

“Not yet,” Brandon replied in a sing-song voice. The fucker was totally enjoying my pain.
I let out and loud groan and banged my head on the seat in the space between Gerard’s legs, before finally resting my head against one of his legs and looking up at him.

“I’m bored and getting sleepy,” I complained, pulling my best puppy dog eyes at him.

“Well, find some way of amusing yourself down there,” Gerard said to me, because of course there was thousands of things you could do sitting under a table hiding from your ex-girlfriend. Thoughts of jerking off under the table suddenly made their way into my head, because what else do boys do when they are completely bored and by themselves?

“Oh, I’m sure there’s a way I could amuse myself down here,” I replied to Gerard, wiggling my eyebrows and laughing my maniacal laugh. Gerard suddenly looked very uncomfortable and looked up at Brandon.

“Is she gone yet?” he asked, with the slightest hint of desperation in his voice as my fingers trailed up and down his thighs. He didn’t know I was playing ‘Incy Wincy Spider’ on his leg.

Brandon suddenly stuck his head under the table. “Frank, stop being such a fucking pansy and get out. She’s not going any where,” he said to me, shaking his head.

“Fine,” I said, pouting, and climbed up Gerard and onto his lap. I could tell my friends thought this was weird by the look they exchanged, but I suddenly felt like being very friendly to Gerard. I think it may have been something to do with Sarah being in the same room. Gerard gingerly wrapped his arms around my waist, clearly quite startled by his sudden lap buddy.

“Maybe we should…go,” Brandon said, exchanging another knowing glance with Bob. I wished they would stop doing that, it was starting to get on my nerves. Bob nodded in agreement as I pouted once more.

“Fine,” I said and turned to Gerard, “we should go, she will have my balls if she see’s me.”

Gerard laughed and said, “Okay.”

I hopped off Gerard and stood, as Brandon and Bob walked out the door.

Gerard stood and stretched slightly. “So I guess your going…home?” he asked slowly, like he was disappointed about that.

I smiled at him. “Why, you want to come over?”

Gerard hesitated. “I don’t…um.”

“Come on, it will be fun. I’ll even cook dinner…well get Bob to cook dinner because I am feeling lazy,” I persuaded him, smiling cheesily and holding out my hand.

Gerard laughed. “Okay, fine,” he said, finally caving.

“WILL YOU TWO LOVE BIRDS HURRY YOUR DAMN ASSES UP?” Bob suddenly screeched through the open café door.

I turned to Gerard and smiled wryly.

“Charming, isn’t he?”