Confessions in a Parking Lot

The cold air hit hard his face when he got off the bus that night. He wasn’t going to, but he needed desperately to stretch his legs and inhale some fresh air, and his partners were complaining the lack of good coffee - especially the Way brothers, who still, at 11pm, were trying to make their driver to stop at any coffee place he could found on the side of the road.

They’d been traveling around the country for nearly a month and they were heading to a hotel that night, which meant thankfully a comfy bed and a shower. It was nearly pathetic to think how bad he missed that artifact; you could only understand what’s like to be actually clean once you go nearly two weeks without having a proper time under the hot spray with soap and space for yourself, not having to rush because the other’s are bitching that they either need to pee or to shower themselves. Of course you could always go outside and clean yourself at least a bit with a garden hose… in summer, not with 10ºC outside. Unless you wanted to die from pneumonia, that is.

He sat on the curb of the parking lot in the entrance of the small 24 hour café they found on the side of the road after walking for some minutes. The smaller man pulled his hoodie up, covering his head to try to keep himself warm as he dug his hands on his pockets. The night was quiet and peaceful at that hour, surprisingly they were the only ones at the place and the roads were deserted at that time. Most people would be already tucked in bed, having a sweet night of sleep. If you were younger, you would be probably watching a good scary movie or, for those that were into that kind of thing, surfing on the internet, something he never really liked or even felt comfortable doing. He didn’t get the point of it, when life itself seemed to be way more interesting than just a computer screen. Of course the younger Way brother disagreed with him and they were constantly debating that point over and over, but it was useless; Frank didn’t get the fancy of it and he probably never would. He pulled out his pack of smokes from his hoodie pocket and lighted one when the front door of the small coffee shop opened.

“Hey, brought you some sock juice,” Gerard mumbled kind of bitchy with two cups on his hands.

“Sock juice, huh?” he exhaled the cancerous smoke from his lungs, smirking at the older one.

“It fucking sucks, but has some caffeine on it at least. Mind if I join you?” Before even waiting for a reply, he sat next to Frank, giving him the cup and sipping his own, pulling his infamous ‘this-ain’t-fucking-coffee’ yuck face right after. The younger giggled softly as he decided he probably wouldn’t like that shit either and put his cup on the asphalt between his feet. “Something wrong?” The older asked after a few minutes of silence.

“I don’t know.”

“How can you not know?” Gerard arched one eyebrow, staring at him, “you’re quiet. And we don’t see you this quiet often.” Frank laughed to himself; that was the goddamn truth, he was always hectic, either jamming on his guitar or pissing others off invading their bunks or leaving his shit everywhere just for the sake of it.

“I guess I miss Jersey,” he said after a few moments of thinking, leaning his head against Gerard’s shoulder. “Yeah… I mean, I miss home. I miss what’s to have a… normal life. If you know what I mean.”

“Yeah, well… you haven’t really been off the road for long. After all, between your own projects and our hectic touring…”

“Yeah, I think that’s it. I just… I don’t know. Sometimes I think I like to wonder, what would I do if it wasn’t because we’re in a band. What kind of lives would we live?”

“I would probably own the small and shitty comic book store from downtown. With Mikey, of course. We would be running it, and we would be all day long facing comic books and action figures.”

Frank laughed at that picture. He knew how much the Way brothers liked comic books; he liked them himself, but they were real, authentic fans.

“Toro would probably still be a guitar god.” Gerard continued, sipping his coffee. “I think he’s the one that would still be in rock bands, trying to make some sense on his lame band mates about how a real motherfucking rock and roll solo should sound. And then they would be complete assholes and let him walk away, getting a cousin or someone as lame as themselves who knows how to play a few chords and the happy birthday song in replacement.”

“The misunderstood great genius,” Frank agreed with a smirk.

“Indeed. And you…”

“I would probably be dead,” the smaller one said, cutting the older off. Gerard stared at him for a moment, a bit confused.

“I was actually going to say that you’d be working on the small hardcore punk record shop near the comic book store. Either that or working on a tattoo parlor, but certainly not that. Care to elaborate?”

“Well… I think you already know why, mh?” Frank leaned on his shoulder, staring at the front so the vocalist wouldn’t really see his face. He heard him sigh deeply, leaning his head on his.

“Frank we’ve been through this already,” he said in a low tone. Not because anyone was close, and even if they were, it was not a secret. It couldn’t be a secret, not when they were seen making out on stage, groping each other all the time, even looking at each other; both the lustful, dense stares shared on stage or other situations confused with deep thoughts or the small, perky loving smiles, those ‘more-than-just-friends’ gestures they shared. No, the low voice wasn’t because of that. At least Frank knew he didn’t give a shit, as well as their friends didn’t. It was because it was private. To them. Because they were alone, sitting next to each other and there was absolutely no need to speak louder. To make a scene out of it.

“I know,” the smaller man sighs. They both knew. The subject has been discussed over and over, almost endlessly. Still, it didn’t change the course of things. It seemed like it didn’t matter, anything mattered. It just couldn’t happen. It couldn’t, and they both knew. That was precisely what was driving Frank insane lately. Because he knew. “I can’t help it though. Sometimes I wish things were different. The world were different. The people in it. The laws. The nature. The society.”

“But you wanted this as well, Frank. Please. We both agreed it would be the best, didn’t we?” The older asked, and the other nodded. Yes, he did. They both did. They did say it would be the best, that it was going to work out better that way. That they were going to be happy, despite of everything. But… not all ideas transported to reality always work. No matter how beautiful and perfect they seem.

“Yeah, we both did. Still, I wonder… I guess I’m too much of a masochist, mh?” he sighs, crushing his forgotten, now consumed, cigarette on his hand on the asphalt next to his cup of beverage and lighting a new one, all in slow motion. His eyes shone briefly with the fire of the lighter, giving him an eerie look. Gerard shook his head slightly.

“In any case, I think we both are,” he mutters under his breath, taking a sip of his coffee. “I think about it too… always wondering…”

“… if we made the right decision?” Frank completes the sentence, even when there was no need to. They didn’t even need to complete out loud the other’s sentences, like most couples that feel connected do. They don’t need to ask out loud, seeming to know what the other’s going to say, but still asking, wondering if that’s what the other was going to say. They didn’t need that, inside their brains was the rest of the sentence, like imprinted on fire, every time. “I don’t know, Gee…” he concludes, taking a drag of his cigarette, holding the vicious air on his lungs just to release it later, slowly. “I honestly don’t know.”

“But we wanted to. We wanted to do what’s right, Frank… and we did, right?” There was a slight note of doubt on the older’s voice. Doubt that shouldn’t be there. That it wasn’t there one of the last times they had this conversation. “I think we did.”

“You think?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I wanted it, Frank. I wanted to give her that, I… I wanted to make her feel good. I wanted to form a family. I wanted to have kids, to have a conventional life, finally, for once and for all.”

“You could’ve had that, you know… we. Could have had that,” the guitarist mutters the last part. They both know, even if sometimes the singer wanted to pretend he didn’t, it was a lie. He wraps one of his arms around Frank’s shoulders, keeping him close.

“It’s not like that, Frankie… you know that. You did it as well, you… you agreed on all this as well. It wasn’t just me. You did the same.”

“I know. But sometimes… it seems like our happiness is always put on the last place. It’s always for last. And I’m getting kind of tired of that already. Why do we have to put ourselves in the last place? Do we really matter that little?”

Gerard just kept quiet. He wondered many times over the subject the other brought up. Just too many times. And he always concluded on the same.

“It doesn’t matter, Frank. I don’t matter. When I married her I made a promise. I promised I would make her as happy as I could. Even if that cost me my own happiness.”

“And what about mine?” The smaller man suddenly turned to look at him, and to Gerard’s dismay his bright hazels were covered in a thin layer of tears, all glossy and shining with a ting of frustration. It killed him to see Frank like that. “I know you don’t care about yourself. I know you could just kill yourself right here right now for all that mattered, like many times you said. I know. But do you care about my happiness? Just as much as you care hers?”

“No,” he sighs, closing his eyes, pressing Frank closer, his lips landing on the guitarist’s forehead. “I care even much more. That’s why we can’t be together. You don’t deserve something like me, Frank… you deserve so, so much more…” Gerard whispers over his skin, kissing it lightly, his pouty lips quivering. The smaller man closed his eyes as well, breathing heavily through his mouth slightly parted, the tears menacing to slip from his eyes angrily.

“Why do you get to decide what’s better for me? What I deserve?” He asks, shaking, his voice slightly broken.

“Because I love you. And I want the best for you,” Gerard’s lips travel through his face, kissing him lightly over his cheekbones, the tip of his nose, his jaw line, his chin; caressing, brushing slightly, collecting the other’s tears, tasting them on his mouth. “Because I need to know that you’re happy. And I know she can make you happier.”

“Yeah? They why do I feel so miserable? Why am I always wondering if we took the right choice, if… if we did what was best? Why do you always wonder yourself the same, if you’re so fucking sure?”

“Because I’m weak…” Gerard closed shut his eyes with force, going up to the smaller’s head, removing the hood from his hair, smelling it, taking in the scent of the small man. “Because I love you just too much to let it go. Because I’m selfish and I don’t want to see you with someone else.”

“Then what the fuck are we playing?” Frank whined almost desperately, pulling away from the other and wrapping his arms around the older’s neck. “Do you have any idea why I say I would be dead? Do you?”

“No,” the older admitted, trying to fight the urge to kiss Frank, to soothe his pain and to make him feel right, to be selfish and finally do what he wants and fuck the rest.

“Because I would kill myself. Because not even then I would be able to have you. Because you always fucking think that you’re not good enough for me.”

Gerard swallows, feeling tears on his eyes as well. He knew Frank was right. He fucking knew that.

“Why can’t we be happy? Why do we have to make others happy instead of us?”

“Because it doesn’t work that way… and you know it,” the older whispers, getting closer to the smaller man’s lips, brushing them with his own, pecking them barely, ghostly. “We can’t do that. You won’t make Jamia unhappy, Frank. You don’t want that. I don’t want that.”

Now it’s Frank’s time to be quiet. He knows it’s true. They’re trapped in their own mistakes, and there isn’t a way out of them, unless you just let things be like they were.

“But I love you,” he whispers, before kissing him back.

“And I love you too… my Frankie. My love,” Frank’s lips part at those words, allowing him to enter, inviting him delicately; an invitation that was accepted almost immediately. Gerard kissed him softly, his tongue massaging slowly the others, passionately, full of love.

They parted some seconds later, panting softly, looking at each other dead in the eyes, something more than just tears covered eyes supporting on their stare.

“P-please… make love to me tonight,” the smaller man whispered under his breath. Gerard closed his eyes, shaking as a shiver went down his spine. If only Frank knew what those words caused on the other’s body he wouldn’t say them.

“I-It won’t fix anything, Frankie… you know that,” he replied, trying not to look at him as he cupped his face with his bare hands, his thumbs caressing the other’s lips timidly.

“I know it won’t. I know, I just… I need you. I need you to show me this is real, that it’s not just a fucking teenage drama, that… that you really love me. That we can’t be together not because you don’t love me, but because we’re committed with other people… because we’re not as selfish to put our happiness in front of others’ just because… please, I beg you.”

The older man shushed him, posing one of his thumbs over Frank’s lips and not moving it from there, his eyes still closed, too overwhelmed to even move or say anything. The smaller man pulls away after some seconds, just when he thought Gerard wouldn’t reply to his selfish request.

“I’ll make love to you like no one ever has in your whole life, Frank,” he whispered back. “I love you. You know that.”

“I need you to show me, Gee… I need it. I need to know that you love me. Otherwise I can’t… I can’t go on with all this. I just can’t.”

“I will, baby…” the nickname, so long almost forgotten was there again, as cliché as it was. They never used it, although they really meant it. “I will. I love you, and… I’ll never love anyone as much as I love you. We just… can’t go for it.”

“I know. I love you too,” Frank mumbles back before kissing Gerard again on the lips and whipping his tears with the sleeve of his hoodie. He shivered as a cold breeze blew in the parking lot of the place, noticing suddenly how thin the material of his clothes was. The older man hugged him, tightly, noticing immediately.

“Go to the bus, babe... I’m gonna get a smoke and I’ll go inside,” he muttered. Frank looked up at him.

“B-but...”

“Don’t worry, Frankie… I know the way to your bunk,” he smiles at him, one of those small perky smiles as he kissed him once again. The other let out a small whimper on the kiss and smiled back at him, despite of everything. He gets up from his place and pulls the hood up to his head again, sinking his hands inside his pockets after throwing the 2nd filter to the floor, stepping on it to put it out.

“I’ll be waiting,” he says timidly as he walks away, trying not to turn around to see Gerard, more tears spilling from his eyes, this time cleaning them off almost immediately, trying not to show. Because he knew. They both knew. It wasn’t enough.