For the Monsters that I've Been.

Mikey ashed his cigarette on his brothers comforter as the latter entered the room, eyes narrowing from the action.

“What the fuck was that?” Gerard asked, locating an ashtray from a dresser and shoving it under the younger boy’s cigarette.

Mikey flicked his cigarette again, this time, over the ashtray. He didn’t answer, but the truth was that he really had just done it because he hadn’t felt like getting up. Because he could, more or less, and because Gerard was there to see him do it. Also, Mikey supposed, he may have just been looking for a rise out of the older brother, just to dig at him, just to show that he could do whatever the hell he felt like now.

He took a hit of his Marlboro, looking up at the figure of Gerard looming over him. An arrogant smile flitted his lips and he looked to the ceiling. “So I’m betting that wasn’t the first blowje you ever gave, but I’m trying to figure out how it isn’t…”

Gerard rolled his eyes. He seemed to disregard the soiled comforter now and sat at Mikey’s feet instead, ploying for attention from his younger brother by tracing a finger up the seam on his jeans. “How do you think I got alcohol when I was underage?”

“Fair point,” Mikey replied, but he snuffed his cigarette in the ashtray. Something in his chest tightened at Gerard’s words, even if he wouldn’t let himself show the emotion. Gerard had more or less started to drink at the age of fifteen because, Mikey had always suspected, ‘it made him look cool.’ And Gerard had just turned fifteen when he’d first taken control of Mikey (who was months away from turning twelve at the time). Clearly, these dates collided and considering that there were six years spanning between the ages of fifteen and twenty one, and how much Gerard usually drank, there had to have been a lot of times that he’d left Mikey to suck some dude off for alcohol.

But he must have been worse at hiding it than he’d thought, because Gerard cleared his throat, and when Mikey looked to him, his brows were raised almost incredulously. “Did I say something wrong?” the older brother asked.

“You never told me that,” Mikey sat, pulling his legs underneath him. He shook his head, his face contorting a bit, “You never told me what you did when you left me at home. When you went out and fucking locked me in my room. I was always alright with it, but you never said you were out getting a piece of dick. You’re disgusting.”

Gerard just laughed, “Out of all the things that coulda pissed you off about that, me fucking other guys was the top? God, you really are a bitch.”

“You basically held me hostage for ten years. I thought it was to keep me to yourself, but-”

“It was,” the older brother ran a hand through his own hair, watching the younger with a bemused expression, “It was to keep you to myself. And I get why you’re pissed. Why else would I hate Frank? But honestly, Mikey, you’re doing the same thing to him so how’m I the bad guy?”

Mikey stayed silent, watching Gerard for once. He was stationary for a few seconds, then he reached for the pack of cigarettes on the bed and lit another one, then brought his hands to his jeans, finally buttoning them up. He exhaled smoke and flicked in the ashtray, eyes scanning Gerard again. “You can’t tell him that we did this,” he said, finally.

“Because you let me near enough to even-”

Mikey dismissed his brother’s statement with by waving his hand through his newly exhaled cigarette smoke, “You can’t tell anyone. At all. If he finds out-”

“Shut up,” said Gerard. His cheeks were red and his fists clenched, his eyes refused to look up to Mikey, “Who do you think I am? Who am I possibly going to tell that I gave my brother head? Seriously, Mikes? I thought you were smarter than that.”

Mikey just shook his head, ashing his cigarette again before standing. “I’m going to go,” he stated. And Gerard just shrugged, lighting up a Marlboro Red for himself.

“Close the door behind you,” he called, then he chuckled as his younger brother pushed the door open further as he exited, ashing onto the bedroom floor.



Mikey pulled his key ring from his pocket, sliding the appropriate key into the lock. He felt a rush in this action. He felt his stomach tighten, hell, his dick throbbed. There was just something so exhilarating at being the only one able to lock or unlock that door. As he entered the room, he felt a sense of satisfaction in having such complete control over the boy who lay, still passed out on the bed.

He took another hit of his cigarette and found a water bottle to ash in before locking the door behind him, then moved to the foot of the bed, just observing Frank’s chest rise and fall. There was a ridiculous amount of tattoos on the boy’s skin. His knuckles spelt out ‘Halloween’ in homage to the holiday that marked his birthday. He had something that looked like a sunrise on his forearm. There was a scorpion on his neck. Mikey knew that if he took Frank’s shirt off, there would be birds on his chest. But none of this stopped the younger boy from looking perfect in Mikey’s eyes. Even with the tattoos, Frank’s skin was so smooth and so soft and so unmarred and so perfect. It was just that moment, taking a hit of his cigarette, that he realized how perfect Frank’s skin really was. And it was the moment that he flicked his cigarette on the rim of the water bottle that he was using to catch ashes that he realized how exhilarating that it would be to leave his own mark on that perfect skin.

Mikey’s eyes scanned the younger boy’s body, settling on his forearm, in a spot between tattoos. It was perfect. Inconspicuous among the tattoos, but still able to be seen if you looked hard enough. It would be the perfect place to mark Frank. Put a stake on the boy’s skin for his own. So Mikey ashed his cigarette again and climbed onto the bed further. He closed a hand around the arm that he would leave unharmed then pinned the opposite hand of down with his knee, more or less straddling the younger boy. He took yet another hit of his Marlboro, then rolled his cigarette between his fingers and pressed the red hot cherry down to Frank’s skin.

Mikey moved his eyes to the younger boy’s face, which contorted uncomfortably in his sleep. Mikey could feel him struggle beneath him and he whined as he came into consciousness. He could see tears forming in Frank’s eyes as they opened. “Mikey,” he moaned, groggily attempting to pull his arm back, “What’re you doing?”

Mikey’s eyes moved to the cigarette, which was now out. He flicked it on the ground, then looked back to Frank’s face after admiring the fresh scalded mark on the boy’s skin. Fresh tears streamed Frank’s face as he looked down to the burn as well, causing Mikey’s stomach to sink. He released Frank’s arm, moving both hands instead to the boy’s face, pressing his lips to Frank’s. The boy kissed back, but Mikey could still feel the moisture on Frank’s cheeks and he could still feel the boy tense under him. “Mm sorry,” mumbled Mikey as he pulled back an inch or so from Frank. He kissed the boy a few more times, as if each time he sucked on Frank’s skin, he could somehow remove some pain. “I didn’t know it would hurt so much.”

Frank simply nodded, eyes downcast (which Mikey interpreted as him saying, ‘it’s okay’), before wrapping his arms around the older boy’s neck, pressing their lips together again, to which Mikey complied. He would allow Frank that tiny bit of what he wanted just to dry the tears. Just to really make it okay.

And then he thought of Gerard and he moved a hand to Frank’s side, slipping his fingers under the boy’s t-shirt, not sexually, just to feel him. And he felt his own eyes start to water and he felt tears slide down his own cheeks, just adding to the moisture between the two.

Then, after a few moments, Mikey pulled back again. He brought his thumb up to Frank’s eyes, wiping the tears from them for what could have been the millionth time (considering how often Mikey found himself doing this). “I can take you to the bathroom,” he offered, “wash your arm…”

Frank nodded, but his fingers wiped Mikey’s eyes as well, “Why’re you crying?”

“I dunno,” the older boy lied, smiling sadly at the younger. His eyes scanned the several lacerations on the boy’s cheeks, the fading purple ring under his red-strung out eyes, “probably cause you are.” He leaned down, really feeling the scabbing of the busted lips below him for the fist time with a fresh kiss. His lips moved to the younger boy’s ear. “I love you,” he whispered.

Frank simply beamed up at him, but that really only lasted a few seconds. They next thing that Mikey knew, he was laying on his back and Frank was on top of him, kissing his lips, down his neck, any bit of skin that he could.

Mikey just chuckled, one hand sifting through Frank’s hair as the younger boy seemed to be sucking a hickey onto his neck, the other hand on the small of Frank’s back. A few moments into this, and Frank pulled off. He settled his head on Mikey’s chest and closed his eyes, one hand under Mikey’s arm, resting on the older boy’s shoulder, the other resting on the older boy’s chest. “Do you want me to be awake right now?” Frank asked.

Mikey raised his eyebrows, almost surprised at the question. He took a sharp, exhilarated breath in. He loved being offered the control to put Frank to sleep more than he loved just taking it. No. He loved the open invitation to just take it the best. But he was not tired (or at least not tired enough to sleep) and he did not like the idea of watching Frank sleep all day, so he nodded, his fingers playing up and down the boy’s side.

“Yeah,” he responded, quite simply, “are you still tired?”

Frank smiled again, as if complimented by the invitation to be in the older boy’s company. Then he nodded against Mikey’s chest, “A little bit.”

“Alright, move for a sec.” Frank didn’t have to adjust himself much, the baggie of pills was sitting on the dresser from last time. Mikey extracted three pills, and lifted Frank’s chin, “Open your mouth,” he instructed. And Frank complied, letting the older boy place two pills on his tongue. With a quizzical look from the younger boy, Mikey popped the last one into his own mouth, dry swallowing it and Frank copied the latter action, looking rather impressed.

“Why’d you take one?” he asked, eyes still on Mikey’s.

“I dunno,” the older boy replied, shrugging, his face scrunched a bit from the oddly familiar bitter taste left behind in his mouth. “I’m kind of tired. And I guess I wanted to see what it was like.”

Frank nodded, laying back on Mikey’s chest, “They’re good,” he said matter-of-factly. “But I sometimes wish they’d kick in faster.” Things were silent for a few moments, then Frank looked up to Mikey briefly, shivering. “Maybe you could give me Ambien when it starts to wear off though.”

“Why’s that?” the bassist asked, still feeling down Frank’s side rather carefree.

The rhythm guitarist was silent for a few seconds. He didn’t look up to Mikey, in fact, he seemed to brace for impact as he said: “A lot of people get angry when they’re coming down from the high.”

It must have been the mood that he was in, because Mikey simply nodded, pressing his lips to Frank’s hair. “Alright.”

And Mikey let Frank close his eyes while he pet the boy’s hair back. He could feel Frank’s breath on his collarbone and the boy’s fingertips contract on his chest, but as close as the boys would try to keep to each other's bodies, Mikey’s mind still flitted across the hallway where his brother most likely still sat. He couldn’t help wondering if what had happened there less than an hour previous really had the potential to stay confined in the sheets soiled from cigarettes. If the boy laying on top of him would ever find out. If he owed it to Frank to let him know what had happened. He couldn’t decide how to go about it, what to say, if or how to rationalize it to Frank.

In fact, it seemed as if the one decision that he could make was that he couldn’t decide any of these things. Not yet at least. Not until he knew if what had happened between he and Gerard was a one time thing or not and not until he decided what Frank’s role in the entire scheme of things would be.