...He Said, and Pulled the Trigger
Never.
3…2…1… and his mouth moves, but it’s almost a disappointment, nothing more than an incoherent stream of pleas finally spilling over; hollow words echoing in that indefinite space between our bodies, the syllables torn from the pink lips of… of something broken, a fallen angel, maybe; his perfect hands shaking as though fear and confusion have severed the sole connection to his brain like scissors stabbing cleanly through vertebrae… And “Gerard, don’t!” A ragged gasp for breath; his green eyes are dirty and polluted, irises twisted with terror, and he jerks his body backwards as my outstretched fingers threaten contact, sprawling helplessly across the gritty pavement with a devastating whimper, scattered limbs floppy and fish-like, rippling skin revealing the hard ridges of bone beneath his soft exterior. Picture-perfect as always, he spits blood and saliva, the evidence of his hard fall, then forces his awkwardly splayed body into motion with a cough as I lunge hungrily for his pale throat, the cannibal rhythm of his battered heart thudding wildly against his ribs like a caged hummingbird driving me ever onwards, wanting, needing, dying even, for more. For fulfillment. Hot tears glisten like diamonds in his tortured eyes; disdainful, I snarl like a hungry animal, predatory, and I see fear hit him again with the force of a bullet before he strikes out wildly with arms and legs; a desperate victim, still fighting a war that he has long ago lost. Fighting to get away from me, fighting to escape the waves of darkness which have already come crashing down over us both like death itself.
The discomfort is gone; the awkwardness and gnawing anxiety vanished in a single instant as my intentions finally become clear, laid bare before him in all their sickening honesty. He knows now; he knows beyond any shadow of doubt what he has suspected all along, the agonizing truth only hinted at in all of the covetous glances, every whisper of my lips too close to his ear, or the chilling caress of my touch that all but screamed the warning that he never understood how to heed. Oh Frankie… the voice I have taken to calling mine purrs beneath my skull, complacent with the idea of how he might have achieved some salvation only because it was far too late; there was no escape for him now. Oh Frankie, if you had only known… All those nights I had lain awake, alone in my own private hell, every inch of my body aching for the baptism only he could provide… and yet all he had done was tease me mercilessly, not that he tried, oh no, he never could have known the ways even his most insignificant gesture could affect me; could bring me to my knees with longing, love, or loathing. Frank Iero had never meant to be the hurt so blinding that it was like a razorblade buried deep inside me, sending blood spilling into that hollow cavity I called a chest until I ate, drank, and breathed crimson… He had never visited the two a.m. hell that leached into my brain like a burning venom every time insomnia forced the intolerable moans or whimpers of the unforgivable into my mind, but I was going to make him taste it this time. Frankie was a sinner, and every transgression, every sweat-soaked altercation was another one of his sins carved into me with razor-wire accuracy. And now, finally purging myself of all the devastating lust for blood and sex which had stained me for so long, I was pushing Frankie under, dragging him down to the level where I had been and lower, at last perfecting both my satisfaction and my revenge at the same time.
A bitter laugh escapes my lips; another fleeting whimper passes his, and I’m suddenly back to the reality that I was drifting away from, the sickening Technicolor carousel world of sensory perceptions in a thousand different forms, all of my deprived senses suddenly on overload like a flaming spray of multihued fireworks; Frankie, Frankie, Frankie, and I can hear the rabid screams of all the thousands of little pieces which make up my psyche, all shrieking for satisfaction that has been delayed much too long. How long had I listened to Frankie’s stifled whimpers; submitting his perfect body to everyone and anyone… except to me? Now my knees are digging into his sides as I crawl on top of him, pinning both his hands above his head, the fluid forcing itself through the translucent blue veins branching like spiderwebs beneath the bone-white skin of his wrists pulsing against my palms as he tries uselessly to fight my grip. I watch his eyes, irises glowing an unsettling green and littered with jagged-edged splinters like crushed emeralds, wide with fear such as he’s never felt it; what would Frank Iero know about fear, after all? But he feels it now; choking out hollow threats, profanity, promises, anything, with no hope of deliverance from the angels he once believed in, who are shrieking in the heavens above us, coldly closing their omniscient eyes; turning away from such a sinner as he is, lying on his back with the chill of the concrete crawling into his pores like poison. Lost and forsaken, he suddenly goes still, gasping for breath or for salvation that will never come, body shaking with exertion and anxiety; the awful tension of being caught gripping him like an iron vice; like my knees pressing into his ribcage. I smile; smirk, maybe, because for all of Frankie’s sins, for all the times that he has forsaken me with the force of a stake through my heart, I realize that he looks beautiful lying beneath me, face streaked with tears that must burn like hot acid for how much he deserves them; the tears of Lucifer falling from grace, eyes still radiating the desperation that I have been waiting to see in them forever, lips painted a lurid red with blood where he’s bitten them; the burning and bitter deep red of roses, of murder, of lust. His mouth is open slightly as he draws in a hoarse breath, teasing me. I’m aching, aching from the inside out to feel those lips against mine, taste the crimson liquid as he must taste it, sickly sweet like blood and strawberries, both our bodies moving in unison; everything I’ve waited so long for…
The bitter chill of the wind scouring the cold cement roof of the parking structure is a far away concern to me, even as a shiver runs through his body and up my arms, accompanied by a gasp and a whimper, meaningless to me. “D-don’t do this-” Remorseless after everything he’s put me through, I release one of his wrists and reach for the cold metal button of his jeans, barely able to believe that I will finally be able to get my own, after so much agony. Frankie has always been perfect, so much more than I can ever be, but I will ruin him, break him, leave him for dead. If he escapes in the end, every black-and-indigo-midnight-ink bruise will remind him, not of some drunken encounter staining tour bus sheets, but of me. Me. ”That’s right, Frankie, baby. I win. I win.” The metal teeth of his jeans’ zipper split apart with a harsh grating sound; terror rips through his wild eyes; the bird trapped inside his ribcage is throwing itself against the bars now; still, I barely have time to grin, before- I hear my own voice shriek, a sound so inhuman it must give him chills; white-hot pain flares up along my jawbone; echoes wail fitfully inside my skull, tormenting me, as I realize what has happened… and then his fist slams into the side of my face for the second time, stunning me, physical pain foreign and devastating after a lifetime of emotion torment. Eyes spilling tears and panic, Frankie shoves me off of him with all the strength he has left, and suddenly my head connects with the concrete; a hallucinogenic rainbow of spots dance across the inside of my eyelids; the world spins of course and stars threaten to collide, but the next instant, everything is stable again, and I lurch to my feet, a red-hot anger boiling like poison to the surface of my soul as I watch Frank watch me, his hands still clenched tightly into fists but trembling yet, revealing how weak he is; will always be. One breath; one thudding heartbeat, and his eyes immediately lose all of the hope they regained as I jerk the gun from the pocket of my jacket; the metal cool and seductive under my fingers. Disbelief floods his flawless features; hysteria spurs his cracked lips into motion; “No, Gerard; no, we were friends; we were f-fucking friends, Gee!” I’m too busy watching his lips move to comprehend what he’s saying, disappointed that it had to come to this, when the struggle to force his submission was more than half of the fun. I take a step closer to him; he moved further and further away as I approach, until his back hits the concrete barrier at the edge of the parking structure roof and he stops with a gasp of fear.
My voice is quiet and calm, only the sharp edge to my words betraying the adrenaline pumping through my veins, betraying how long I’ve wanted this. “Be a good boy, Frankie… Be a good boy. Why are you running? Why are you running, angel? I won’t hurt you any more than you deserve…”
“Gerard… Gerard, w-why are you- Why are you doing this?!” His eyes are so scared…
My lips form a smile, and I shake my head slowly, almost pitying him. “Frankie, Frankie, Frankie… You’ve been running from me all your life… But I love you, don’t you see it? There’s no escape. I need perfection; I crave it. And you’re perfection, Frank Iero.
His face has become a battlegrounds for warring emotions; some I can’t even name. Fear, hatred, confusion, shock… but worst is the revulsion I see on his lips. He knows me too well; he knows why I’m doing this, as hard as he has tried to ignore it all these years, building a world of sugar-coated lies and porcelain promises where he could hide from my desires… no longer. “You’re- you’re sick, Gerard!” His eyes are wild; his voice cracks. “Fucking sick! Leave me out of your obsessions, leave me the fuck alone, you filthy m-monster-”
My breath catches in my throat with shock, and my hand shakes even as I grip the gun more tightly; my thoughts racing out of control through the dark tendrils of my mind. How dare he, how fucking dare he let those words pass his poison lips? As translucent as my deepest flaws are to him, you would have to be blind not to know someone you’ve lived so close to both inside and out… and I do; I know him for what he is too, for all the pixie sticks and that stupid fake baby-doll grin, Frankie Iero is nothing more than a whore. And my throat suddenly finds its voice; my tongue is reborn a thousand hissing snakes, spitting “Frank Iero, the easy lay.”
He turns white, ghost-white, bone-white, white as unstained sheets; doesn’t like to be reminded of what he’s become in the years since high school, and real, raw anger shines in his piercing shattered glass eyes for the first time. “Shut up.” His voice trembles only slightly; my fingers, wrapped around the handle of the gun, don’t shake this time. And then “Why me?” he whispers, tearstained pale cheeks making him look so intensely vulnerable as the anger leaves his face, losing the battle to fear and uncertainty.
“Hasn’t anyone ever told you you’re perfect?” I purr, knowing very well that with of all the lovers he’s had, faces that I’m sure blur together in his mind now, he must have heard those words whispered against his skin in the darkness all too many times.
He can’t meet my eyes. “Never.”
The discomfort is gone; the awkwardness and gnawing anxiety vanished in a single instant as my intentions finally become clear, laid bare before him in all their sickening honesty. He knows now; he knows beyond any shadow of doubt what he has suspected all along, the agonizing truth only hinted at in all of the covetous glances, every whisper of my lips too close to his ear, or the chilling caress of my touch that all but screamed the warning that he never understood how to heed. Oh Frankie… the voice I have taken to calling mine purrs beneath my skull, complacent with the idea of how he might have achieved some salvation only because it was far too late; there was no escape for him now. Oh Frankie, if you had only known… All those nights I had lain awake, alone in my own private hell, every inch of my body aching for the baptism only he could provide… and yet all he had done was tease me mercilessly, not that he tried, oh no, he never could have known the ways even his most insignificant gesture could affect me; could bring me to my knees with longing, love, or loathing. Frank Iero had never meant to be the hurt so blinding that it was like a razorblade buried deep inside me, sending blood spilling into that hollow cavity I called a chest until I ate, drank, and breathed crimson… He had never visited the two a.m. hell that leached into my brain like a burning venom every time insomnia forced the intolerable moans or whimpers of the unforgivable into my mind, but I was going to make him taste it this time. Frankie was a sinner, and every transgression, every sweat-soaked altercation was another one of his sins carved into me with razor-wire accuracy. And now, finally purging myself of all the devastating lust for blood and sex which had stained me for so long, I was pushing Frankie under, dragging him down to the level where I had been and lower, at last perfecting both my satisfaction and my revenge at the same time.
A bitter laugh escapes my lips; another fleeting whimper passes his, and I’m suddenly back to the reality that I was drifting away from, the sickening Technicolor carousel world of sensory perceptions in a thousand different forms, all of my deprived senses suddenly on overload like a flaming spray of multihued fireworks; Frankie, Frankie, Frankie, and I can hear the rabid screams of all the thousands of little pieces which make up my psyche, all shrieking for satisfaction that has been delayed much too long. How long had I listened to Frankie’s stifled whimpers; submitting his perfect body to everyone and anyone… except to me? Now my knees are digging into his sides as I crawl on top of him, pinning both his hands above his head, the fluid forcing itself through the translucent blue veins branching like spiderwebs beneath the bone-white skin of his wrists pulsing against my palms as he tries uselessly to fight my grip. I watch his eyes, irises glowing an unsettling green and littered with jagged-edged splinters like crushed emeralds, wide with fear such as he’s never felt it; what would Frank Iero know about fear, after all? But he feels it now; choking out hollow threats, profanity, promises, anything, with no hope of deliverance from the angels he once believed in, who are shrieking in the heavens above us, coldly closing their omniscient eyes; turning away from such a sinner as he is, lying on his back with the chill of the concrete crawling into his pores like poison. Lost and forsaken, he suddenly goes still, gasping for breath or for salvation that will never come, body shaking with exertion and anxiety; the awful tension of being caught gripping him like an iron vice; like my knees pressing into his ribcage. I smile; smirk, maybe, because for all of Frankie’s sins, for all the times that he has forsaken me with the force of a stake through my heart, I realize that he looks beautiful lying beneath me, face streaked with tears that must burn like hot acid for how much he deserves them; the tears of Lucifer falling from grace, eyes still radiating the desperation that I have been waiting to see in them forever, lips painted a lurid red with blood where he’s bitten them; the burning and bitter deep red of roses, of murder, of lust. His mouth is open slightly as he draws in a hoarse breath, teasing me. I’m aching, aching from the inside out to feel those lips against mine, taste the crimson liquid as he must taste it, sickly sweet like blood and strawberries, both our bodies moving in unison; everything I’ve waited so long for…
The bitter chill of the wind scouring the cold cement roof of the parking structure is a far away concern to me, even as a shiver runs through his body and up my arms, accompanied by a gasp and a whimper, meaningless to me. “D-don’t do this-” Remorseless after everything he’s put me through, I release one of his wrists and reach for the cold metal button of his jeans, barely able to believe that I will finally be able to get my own, after so much agony. Frankie has always been perfect, so much more than I can ever be, but I will ruin him, break him, leave him for dead. If he escapes in the end, every black-and-indigo-midnight-ink bruise will remind him, not of some drunken encounter staining tour bus sheets, but of me. Me. ”That’s right, Frankie, baby. I win. I win.” The metal teeth of his jeans’ zipper split apart with a harsh grating sound; terror rips through his wild eyes; the bird trapped inside his ribcage is throwing itself against the bars now; still, I barely have time to grin, before- I hear my own voice shriek, a sound so inhuman it must give him chills; white-hot pain flares up along my jawbone; echoes wail fitfully inside my skull, tormenting me, as I realize what has happened… and then his fist slams into the side of my face for the second time, stunning me, physical pain foreign and devastating after a lifetime of emotion torment. Eyes spilling tears and panic, Frankie shoves me off of him with all the strength he has left, and suddenly my head connects with the concrete; a hallucinogenic rainbow of spots dance across the inside of my eyelids; the world spins of course and stars threaten to collide, but the next instant, everything is stable again, and I lurch to my feet, a red-hot anger boiling like poison to the surface of my soul as I watch Frank watch me, his hands still clenched tightly into fists but trembling yet, revealing how weak he is; will always be. One breath; one thudding heartbeat, and his eyes immediately lose all of the hope they regained as I jerk the gun from the pocket of my jacket; the metal cool and seductive under my fingers. Disbelief floods his flawless features; hysteria spurs his cracked lips into motion; “No, Gerard; no, we were friends; we were f-fucking friends, Gee!” I’m too busy watching his lips move to comprehend what he’s saying, disappointed that it had to come to this, when the struggle to force his submission was more than half of the fun. I take a step closer to him; he moved further and further away as I approach, until his back hits the concrete barrier at the edge of the parking structure roof and he stops with a gasp of fear.
My voice is quiet and calm, only the sharp edge to my words betraying the adrenaline pumping through my veins, betraying how long I’ve wanted this. “Be a good boy, Frankie… Be a good boy. Why are you running? Why are you running, angel? I won’t hurt you any more than you deserve…”
“Gerard… Gerard, w-why are you- Why are you doing this?!” His eyes are so scared…
My lips form a smile, and I shake my head slowly, almost pitying him. “Frankie, Frankie, Frankie… You’ve been running from me all your life… But I love you, don’t you see it? There’s no escape. I need perfection; I crave it. And you’re perfection, Frank Iero.
His face has become a battlegrounds for warring emotions; some I can’t even name. Fear, hatred, confusion, shock… but worst is the revulsion I see on his lips. He knows me too well; he knows why I’m doing this, as hard as he has tried to ignore it all these years, building a world of sugar-coated lies and porcelain promises where he could hide from my desires… no longer. “You’re- you’re sick, Gerard!” His eyes are wild; his voice cracks. “Fucking sick! Leave me out of your obsessions, leave me the fuck alone, you filthy m-monster-”
My breath catches in my throat with shock, and my hand shakes even as I grip the gun more tightly; my thoughts racing out of control through the dark tendrils of my mind. How dare he, how fucking dare he let those words pass his poison lips? As translucent as my deepest flaws are to him, you would have to be blind not to know someone you’ve lived so close to both inside and out… and I do; I know him for what he is too, for all the pixie sticks and that stupid fake baby-doll grin, Frankie Iero is nothing more than a whore. And my throat suddenly finds its voice; my tongue is reborn a thousand hissing snakes, spitting “Frank Iero, the easy lay.”
He turns white, ghost-white, bone-white, white as unstained sheets; doesn’t like to be reminded of what he’s become in the years since high school, and real, raw anger shines in his piercing shattered glass eyes for the first time. “Shut up.” His voice trembles only slightly; my fingers, wrapped around the handle of the gun, don’t shake this time. And then “Why me?” he whispers, tearstained pale cheeks making him look so intensely vulnerable as the anger leaves his face, losing the battle to fear and uncertainty.
“Hasn’t anyone ever told you you’re perfect?” I purr, knowing very well that with of all the lovers he’s had, faces that I’m sure blur together in his mind now, he must have heard those words whispered against his skin in the darkness all too many times.
He can’t meet my eyes. “Never.”