Folie a Deux
Chapter Twenty - Frank's POV
AUTHOR'S NOTE: So, as always, there's not really a good answer as to why this update has taken so long. I think part of it has been my technology issues; my old laptop stopped working almost complete, so I couldn't do any real writing and/or editing until I got my new one (which works WONDERFULLY! Very glad to have a Gateway back in my life. Our home computer, which was older than me, was a Gateway and worked greatly for a really long time and just recently broke down, but all the Dells, HPs, etc. that I've ever had have pretty much gone to hell within a year or three.)
Also, my cousins who I see maybe once a year were here for about a week or two, so there was that as well.
There's the fact that I start my freshman year (for any of you who don't know, I'm fourteen and just now heading into the terrifying world of high school, haha,) so there's also been that pressure to distract me.
I do have to say, this chapter pulled together better than I thought it would. It's quite a bit awkward in some places I think, but I'm fairly pleased with how it turned out.
I get a lot of questions along the lines of "Is Folie over?" and "Was that the last chapter of Folie?" and to answer those questions, I'll say this: You'll know the last chapter when it comes, I'll be sure to put it in the title of the chapter, it's status will be changed to complete, and I'll announce it in the author's note, but we are FAR from that chapter!
If anyone has any other questions regarding the story, please feel free to ask! I've been bad about responding to comments in the past, but I really do promise to do better from now on.
I'm considering writing a second fic, after Folie. Not related in any way, it won't be a sequel, but I'm thinking about going in another direction entirely, somewhere along the lines of magic and two boys named Frank and Gerard just trying to figure out where the hell they fit in... But more on that later. I probably won't do any posting for that until after Folie is completed, but I may post a small introduction when we near the end of Folie.
Anyway, enough of my talking, I hope everyone enjoys!
Peace, love, and all things unholy,
Eve
---
I don't know how long we sat on the bathroom floor. Maybe ten minutes, maybe just two. It could've been an hour.
It felt like that, like hours.
I sat next to Gerard, and he rested his head on top of mine.
"Why didn't you tell me?" I asked eventually.
"I dunno," he said, quietly, shrugging. He sat up straight and I did, too, turning my head to look at him. "I didn't think it was important."
I sighed. "Of course it's important. Everything about you is important to me."
Gerard didn't say anything for a while, and then; "While I'm telling you things, I own a gun."
"I know. Mikey told me."
He sighed. "I figured he would. You do know, I wouldn't- I won't-"
"I know," I said. "I know how against all types of violence you are, Mr. Make The Kid With Arachnophobia Kill Spiders For You."
He smiled, just barely. "Yeah. It's just... Stress reliever, ya know?"
"Yeah. Why haven't I seen you with it before, though?"
He shrugged. "I just... I dunno. I haven't touched it in a really long time."
I titled my head at him. "How'd you even get started with the whole 'gun,' thing? It doesn't seem like something you'd be interested in."
"My dad," he said quietly. "Mikey doesn't know, I think he was too young to remember, but Dad was really in to that type of stuff. Guns. War. But not in the bad way, he was just patriotic, ya' know? My grandpa, evidently, was in some war; Mikey is named after him. My dad wanted me and Mikey both to go to military school."
"So why didn't you?"
"Because I- well, I never wanted to even think about military school or anything like that. Even when I was younger I think I knew I just wanted to do something creative. Something that was productive, not destructive."
"Why did guns stick, then?"
"Same reason piano stuck when my grandma's health started declining; something to remember someone I care about by."
I nodded. "That makes sense, I guess..."
"I'm glad it does."
We fell into silence again, and I found myself just looking at Gerard.
He was annoyingly attractive, sitting on the bathroom floor with his legs pulled up to his chest, spilling his heart out to me. He looked back at me for a few seconds, and then rested his forehead on his knees, lips parting in a light sigh, strands of black hair framing his face.
"Another thing I guess I should tell you, is that I haven't been taking my pills."
I leaned back, tilting my head, too, staring at the ceiling. "What pills?" I asked, already guessing.
"Depression."
I closed my eyes, and let out a slow breath, swallowing the sadness that was clogging my throat.
"Okay." I looked over at him. "Why'd you stop taking the pills, Gerard? Mikey told me a while ago, but I want to hear it from you. It's been a while and I want to hear your opinion on it."
"Well, at first I thought I just stopped because I thought I didn't need them. Because- because you made me happy," he said quietly.
"You thought?"
"Well, yeah. But then other stuff started happening, that made me realize that the medicine wasn't helping anyway."
"It wasn't?"
"No. It made me too tired. I wanted to sleep all the time. It made me dizzy. Gave me headaches."
"Then maybe you could talk to someone about switching medications?"
Gerard stared at the empty space across from him. "No. Switching medication is admitting that I'm still a failure. Do you know how hard it was to admit I was even depressed in the first place, Frank? I can't- I can't tell people that I'm still too weak to survive on my own. I can't tell them that the chemicals that are supposed to help the ones in my head aren't working and that I need different ones."
"If it helps," I said quietly, scooting closer to him. "I've never told anyone about my depression."
"No one?" he asked, his fingers finding mine.
"No one but you," I confirmed, squeezing his hand. "I'm not even, like, officially diagnosed as being depressed. I guess I should take pills for it or something, get some help or something, but... I dunno. My mom would probably just yell at me if I told her, and if she didn't, she'd probably just worry way too fucking much. And anyway, pills cost money that I really do not have."
Gerard didn't say anything and I guessed he agreed.
"You should probably know that there's something wrong with my eating habits, too," he told me.
I closed my eyes for a second or two, leaning back and resting my head against the wall. "I kind of figured about that. You and your 'just a coffee, please,' thing is starting to worry me even more than it did when we first met."
"I don't know what it is though, that's the problem." He pulled his legs up to his chest even tighter than before, tightening his arms around them and resting his chin on his knees, one hand tangled with mine. "I don't know what's wrong with me."
"Nothing is wrong with you, Gerard." I squeezed his fingers between mine. "You just don't eat enough."
He tilted his head, looking over at me, and I was struck by how attractive he looked, even sitting on the bathroom floor and looking so upset.
"Is that all, Frank? I just don't eat enough? Is that really it?"
I stared at him. "I dunno. I thought it was."
"Then why do I feel fat every time I even look at food?" he asked, voice sighing. "Why don't I like eating in front of people sometimes, why does the idea of gaining weight make my hands shake? I have nightmares about throwing up from eating too much. Just thinking about food makes me want to weigh myself to make sure I haven't gained weight."
I looked away. I'd never felt like that, but I imagined it must be horrible. "I don't know. But I don't want you to feel like that. I think you're perfect just the way you are."
He turned his head, resting his forehead on his knees again. "What's wrong with me, Frank? Why do I have so many things wrong with me?"
"I dunno, Gee," I said, upset. "But I really don't think you have anything wrong with you. Like I said, I think you're perfect."
"I'm not perfect. The definition of perfect is 'without flaw,' and I have more of those than I can count."
"That also depends on what you consider a flaw, Gerard. I don't think you have flaws, I think there's just a few things that you need help with."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah. I just want you to be happy," I told him honestly. "I want you to like yourself as much as I like you."
He looked down. "Can we go home, Frankie?" he asked softly.
I nodded, sighing. "Yeah. I'm sorry that my mom is such a bitch."
He shrugged. "I'm sorry I'm such a freak."
I gave him a stern look. "You're not a freak, Gerard."
He laughed, a dry sort of laugh, not meeting my eyes. "I'm a pansexual teenage boy who draws semi-creepy pictures in my free time and thinks about dying a lot, don't tell me I'm not a freak."
I couldn't bring myself to argue with him.
I stood up instead, pushing hair out of my face. I reached down and took his hand as he stood, too.
"My mom will probably still be out there," I realized.
"Oh. We can- we can stay for a while, I guess. I never finished my coffee, anyway. And I always finish my coffee."
I tilted my head, studying his face. "Yeah, I've noticed that."
He flinched slightly, and then attempted to shrug it off."My doctors say that's a part of, uh- It's my OCD, I mean, that makes me have to do it."
"Finish coffees...?"
"Finish things, in general. I guess you could say I'm not a huge fan of leaving things undone."
"Oh."
Gerard followed me out of the bathroom and I hated having to let go of his hand before my mom saw.
"Mom?" I said walking up to the table. We sat down and Gerard's hands went instantly to his coffee. "I think we're gonna leave. Gee isn't feeling well."
Gerard let one hand drop from his coffee cup, resting softly on my knee, out of view from my mother.
My mom stared at me for a few seconds. "Why don't you come home, if Gerard doesn't feel well? So you don't get sick too."
My lips parted, and I didn't quite know what to say.
"Mrs. Iero," Gerard said quietly, keeping his eyes focused on his coffee. "I don't mean to be rude, but I would really feel more comfortable with Frank there. I- I have trouble sleeping when I don't feel well and it's easier for me if there's someone there when I wake up."
My mom frowned. "Don't you have a younger brother, though?"
"Yes ma'am, but I don't want to put that weight on his shoulders. I don't want to make him worry."
"But you're willing to make my son worry?" my mother scoffed.
"No," I cut in. "I'm willing to let him make me worry. He's my friend, mom. I want to make sure he's okay."
My mother studied my face for a long, excruciating moment. "Fine, fine," she said eventually. "Whatever. Just be sure you go to school tomorrow."
"Of course," I said. And I wasn't lying- I really did need to actually attend school at least for a while.
"And since we're cutting tonight short, why don't you two come by the house tomorrows, after Frank gets out of school, if Gerard is feeling better?"
Gerard's fingers pressed slightly against my knee, and I took it as a warning not to argue. "That sounds great, Mrs. Iero," he said, smiling.
I just nodded in mock-agreement.
"Okay, well, I'll see you boys later... I'll pay for your drinks, don't worry about it."
I blinked rapidly. "Uh, okay, Mom. Thanks."
"Thank you Mrs. Iero," Gerard chimed in, sitting down his finished coffee.
---
We held hands on the way home. It was a mostly silent walk, until I started focusing, picking up on habits that I was guessing were caused by Gerard's OCD. They weren't hard to miss once you started paying attention.
Watching his feet as we walked down the sidewalk, he looked like he was counting his steps.
"Does it bother you?" I asked eventually. "Like, does it cause many problems?"
"What, the depression or the OCD or the insomnia or-"
"OCD."
He shrugged, squeezing my hand. "Yeah. Sometimes. Like, it's not the easiest thing to deal with, but some people have it a lot worse than I do, I guess. There's a few things that I like keeping under control and stuff, but I'm mostly just a counter, I think. Some people have a lot more components to it, it changes who they are."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
I thought about it for a long while. "Is making lists a part of it?"
"Lists? Oh yeah. I make a lot of lists. Like, mostly in my head and stuff, but..."
"I understand," I said, nodding. "I think I know what you mean."
His fingers squished mine and we went about a minute or two in silence.
"They're mostly about you," Gerard said suddenly.
"What are?"
"The lists."
I paused for a second, not knowing how to answer. "Is that a bad thing?"
"I don't think so. I like my lists."
"What types of things about me do you list?"
"Well." He titled his head, eyes focusing on his feet as we walked. "Sometimes I count how many times you laugh, just, like, in general. And then there are subcategories in that. Like, I have lists for smiles that are fake and ones that are real and ones that I caused and ones that I wish I had caused... All sorts of stuff."
I stared at the side of his head. "And you keep track of all of these things? In your head?"
He nodded. "Sometimes I miscount, and that really sucks, but I write them down when I can so I don't forget."
"What... What other types of lists do you have about me?"
He shrugged. "Just... Lists."
"Oh."
We walked in silence after that, and I wondered a lot about his lists.
When we arrived at his front door, Gerard fumbled in his pockets with one hand for his keys, and it started raining, lightly.
"This reminds me of the first time you brought me here," I said, squeezing Gerard's hand. He paused, the key in the door, half turned.
"Yeah," he said, a small half-smile gracing his lips. "I guess it does."
I looked at my feet. "I'm so sorry, Gerard."
He straightened up, turning to look at me, leaving the key in the door.
"What on earth for?"
"I'm sorry that you're so sad sometimes," I sighed, studying his eyes, feeling the way his hand tightened around mine. "I'm sorry for not being able to make you happier."
Gerard's lips parted in surprise. "Wh- what?"
I looked at my feet. "I'm sorry, that sounded stupid. It's just- I- well. You just get so sad, sometimes. And- and I notice, I notice that something is off, but... I never say anything, because I don't know how to help. I don't know how to make you feel better. And I don't want to say something and ask if you're okay, because if you are, then you'll start thinking that I worry too much, or you'll get mad, and you'll start lying when you really aren't okay, and..."
He was staring at me, so I forced myself to look at him. I couldn't bring myself to meet his eyes, though; I focused myself instead on his lips, the slight surprise that he expressed there. I looked at the soft curve of his nose, the gentle slope of his cheeks, the way the rain caught in his hair.
He was beautiful, right then. It was weird thinking of a boy as that, as beautiful, but there really was no other way to put it.
So I told him that, I said, "You're beautiful," and his head tilted, his face pulled into a strange expression that I'd never seen before.
"Thank you," he said quietly. "I can't quite see that, but... Thank you. You're really stunning, too, Frank."
I chuckled, looking at my feet. I was blushing, but hey, so was he.
"You make me happy," I confessed to him.
"You make me happy, too. I- Well. I like you. A lot."
He pulled me into a tight hug before I could ask what he had been about to say before he changed his mind.
I was slightly surprised that he didn't kiss me, but I wasn't going to argue. I appreciated the hug, took it for what it was, said, "I like you a lot, too, Gerard."
He pressed his face into my hair, held me tighter.
"Frank?" Gerard said, soft, pulling away just enough to look at me.
"Yeah, Gee?"
"Tomorrow you have to go to school. You realize that, right?"
"Yeah," I sighed. "I'll miss you."
"I'll miss you, too. My mom left me with a shit-ton of school work that I've been avoiding so I guess I'll have to work on that." His lips brushed my forehead. "I can't wait for summer, when you can just stay here all the time."
I nodded. "Yeah, that's gonna' be nice."
Sitting around with Gerard, every day, all day. It sounded great.
He kissed me, softly.
I was surprising myself with how much I was enjoying his kisses.
"C'mon," he mumbled around my lips, tilting his head away. "Let's go to bed. I'm tired, I wanna' lay down."
---
Sleeping that night was a bit difficult.
At first, it was a good difficult. It was a we-can't-stop-talking-and-making-conversation difficult. We didn't talk about anything too deep, just food and movies and school and music. Eventually, Gerard wrapped one arm around me loosely, and we laid face to face for a while and just looked at each other. He pressed his lips to mine, soft and warm and like he really, really liked me, which I totally appreciated, because I really, really liked him too.
"Goodnight, Frank."
"Goodnight, Gerard," I said, keeping my voice low.
For the first time, Gerard fell asleep before me.
I watched him sleep, hoping I wasn't being creepy but figuring he wouldn't care.
His lips twitched, the muscles in his face tensed up.
I lifted my hand to his face, rubbing the places where small creases of worry formed, hoping he wasn't having nightmares.
I didn't want to sleep, not right now.
I wanted to talk to Gerard about some things. I wanted to discuss his nightmares, his OCD, his intellect. I wanted to sit up with him until we fell asleep from too much deep conversation and too much rough thinking.
He jerked in his sleep, several times, so I reached over and put my hand on the side of his face, brushing my lips against his nose. "Hey," I said, quiet enough that it wouldn't wake him up but loud enough that he could hopefully hear me. "Don't worry yourself."
He mumbled something in his sleep that I couldn't understand.
I shushed him softly.
I wasn't planning on waking him up tomorrow before I went to school, he needed his sleep. I already had a cute little note planned out in my head, already figured that I should leave it on the pillow where he'd see it first thing in the morning instead of the fridge.
I rolled over, closing my eyes.
There was a small ache, deep in my stomach. It was the small ache of knowing that I had left something unfinished, a small ache that I imagine must be similar to the one Gerard gets when he has trouble with his OCD.
I wondered what it was, that had been left unfinished, and as the dreams started messing with my head, making me see things in the dark that weren't really there, I realized what it was.
I hadn't asked if what he had started to say earlier, before he said he liked me, had been "I love you."
---
I woke up the next morning to my cellphone alarm blasting some indie, slightly psychedelic, post-hardcore rock band that Mikey had introduced me too, and managed to find the 'Off' button before it woke Gerard up.
I got up, reluctantly, swinging my legs over the side of the bed and sitting there for a few seconds. I didn't feel good. Not physically, not mentally. Not in my stomach or in my head.
I considered laying back down, curling up, going back to sleep with Gerard's arm around me, hoping that the sick feeling in my stomach would be gone soon.
I closed my eyes, as tight as I could, felt them water.
I didn't need this. Not now.
Not now, please not now.
My head felt like it had been swarmed by bees, or something, like small, deadly bees that carried bad thoughts.
I couldn't help but start to think about a lot of things that had happened last night, a lot of things that Gerard had said, and the things he didn't.
I stood up, trying to defeat the voice inside my head that was telling me to lay down and just waste away in one spot for the rest of my life.
I walked to the bathroom, stared at myself in the mirror until I realized that something was off about my reflection.
Were all those ghosts stories real? I started running through the scenarios in my head, recalling the stories I'd read when I was younger, thinking up a bunch of different situations; mirror steals my soul. Mirror opens portal into another world. My reflection stabs me to death.
My eyes averted faster than my heart sped up, and I started telling myself that it wasn't possible.
Your reflection couldn't kill you, I'd just read way too many fucking books and seen one too many stupid horror movies when I was younger.
After I peed and then stared at myself in the mirror some more, trying to figure out if the kid who stared back at me was capable of stabbing someone to death, I wandered into the Way family kitchen and ate some of Gerard's favorite cereal, even though I didn't really care for it. I convinced myself to drink some water, after pulling out my phone to look up if death by dehydration was painful. (Evidently, it wasn't pleasant.)
I then padded quietly back to Gerard's room, looking briefly over at him to make sure he was still asleep, and then deciding, after staring at him for a while, to put on clean clothes. Ending up in one of Gerard's shirts and a pair of my own jeans, (ripped in the knee from that one time I was pretending to be playing on stage at a concert for some really-fucking-epic band and dropped to my knees with my guitar in hand, skidding across the floor and destroying what was left of the fabric over my left knee,) I decided that it felt at least a little better to be in clean clothes.
I ran my fingers through my hair until I figured it looked okay, not sparing myself a second look in the mirror for fear of being brutally murdered by my own self. I forced myself to stay in the bathroom to brush my teeth and pee again, just because I hated peeing in the bathrooms at school and didn't want to have to go again until I came home.
I wrote the note for Gerard-
"At school, didn't want to wake you up. I'll text you when I can. Don't forget we're going to my house after I get home from school."
I stared at the note for a few minutes, trying to figure out how to end it.
I ended up just scribbling down "xoxoFrank," and left it at that, sitting the paper down where I'd slept last night.
Gerard stirred slightly as I started to leave his room, but didn't say anything.
---
I got a text in the middle of English.
>Why didn't you wake me up? xoG.<
I blinked at my phone.
>You need your sleep, sweetheart. xoF.<
I sat my phone in my lap and went back to doodling, figuring Gerard was done since he didn't like texting that much, and not feeling like doing the classwork.
I was in the exact same mood as I was this morning.
Tired.
Uninterested.
Not wanted to put effort into anything.
Paranoid.
Hollow.
And maybe just a little bit sad.
I was drawing the best I could manage, stupid little stick figures that looked like squiggly circles when compared to Gerard's masterpieces.
My phone buzzed.
>There are some really attractive boys in your class.<
I stared at my phone for a few seconds, reading and re-reading the message.
>What?<
>Home is boring. Window shopping for cute boys at this sweet little place called 'Your School' is much more interesting.<
I rolled my eyes, huffing a bit and then looking up quickly to make sure the teacher didn't notice that I was totally not writing a summary of Shakespeare's sonnet.
I typed the first and only reply I could think of.
>Stop looking through the window you fxcking stalker.<
I could almost imagine Gerard laughing at me, creeping outside the classroom window.
>You spelled 'fucking' wrong.<
I almost snorted out loud.
>I know, you jxckxss. I never curse in text. Force of habit.<
>'Jxckxss?<
>You know what, Gee, just fuck off.<
>I thought you 'never cuss in text?'<
>Only for you, motherfucker. Only for you.<
>It's hot when you use profanity.<
I could feel myself blushing. If he had been here I probably would've freaked out and stuttered out something stupid, but talking behind a screen made me feel a lot more laid back. Fighting through social awkwardness was a lot easier when the other person couldn't see you. (Of course, I knew that Gerard was somewhere outside of the classroom window right now, and could more than likely see me. Luckily my teacher's desk faced away from the window, and there was a huge tree right outside. I glanced at the window, staring intently. I couldn't see him but he was probably sitting on the ground beneath it or something. I knew for a fact that it was actually a really good hiding spot; before the older students found out I was younger than them, they would sit there with me and smoke with me.)
>Maybe I should start using more, in that case.<
There was a short pause before he replied.
>A boy two rows over and three seats back from you is staring at the back of your head and chewing his pencil. I think he likes you.<
I blinked in surprise, glancing over my shoulder. Sure enough, he turned red and looked down at his notebook.
>Pete? Are you serious?<
>Yeah. He's hiding behind his hair now.<
I glanced back- Pete had black hair with a few red streaks in the front, just long enough to hide his eyes behind. I could see his mouth though, and he was chewing his bottom lip so hard I thought it would bleed.
My phone alerted me of another text so I looked down, frowning in confusion.
>You should talk to him.<
I blinked in shock.
>Why? I don't want to lead him on.<
His reply was really fast.
>Invite him over to your house tonight, he looks lonely. I think he needs a friend. Just mention me so he knows you're not interested.<
I reread the text a few times.
>He has more friends than I do.<
>But how many of them are he actually close to?<
That, I didn't know.
I wasn't sure how my mom would react to me having more than one person over, considering I didn't really have friends, not sense middle school, but Gerard was right. Pete never really talked to anyone besides these two kids with curly hair and some other guy who I think plays the drums, or something like that. If I could catch them in a group I might invite all of them, just for the heck of it. I wasn't too big on hanging out with other people or trying to make friends, but I trusted Gerard.
>Okay, sure. I'll invite him.< I paused for a second, and then started another text. >So, Gerard, why are you stalking me?<
>Like I said, I got bored, and Mikey went to the comic book store. So naturally my inner creep got the best of me.<
I was smiling, I couldn't help it.
Big mistake, on my part.
Before I could comprehend what was happening, my phone was being snatched from between my fingers.
I felt my heart drop as I looked up to see someone standing over me, a classmate who I knew well enough to know that if I started fighting back to, would get violent. "Texting your boyfriend?" he sneered, dangling my phone over my head.
I looked around the room, because where the fucking hell was the teacher?
And of course, class had let out without me noticing. And it was lunch time now, so the teachers had all abandoned their classrooms for the cafeteria, and our stupid school doesn't mind if you eat in the classrooms, so if someone passed by, they'd assume we were just two buddies having lunch and messing with each other.
Pete was hanging around the door, his locker was right outside.
I cleared my throat, standing up. The guy was taller than me, I saw no hope in getting my phone back, and I didn't feel like getting my head bashed in today. (As much as I didn't want to be here, I'd at least like to stay conscious if I was going to be forced to.)
I also happened to know, luckily, that if there wasn't a chase involved, this particular person gave up causing trouble easily.
"You can keep the phone, Bert," I said, sighing, gathering up my other things. "Have fun with it. I'm sure you'll find the texts to my mom and my music very entertaining."
He rolled his eyes, dropping my phone on to my pile of books, and I somehow managed to get it to slid to rest against my chest and not clatter onto the floor. "You're no fun, Iero."
"Yeah, well you're an asshole."
"Like I haven't heard that one before." He kicked my desk and then walked away.
I rolled my eyes back at him, even though it was pointless considering he was gone.
"H-hey," I heard a quiet voice speak up from the doorway.
I looked up, blinking at Pete, and joined him in the hall. He shifted nervously, which was amusing, because Pete wasn't the nervous type of person. He was pretty outgoing. He would probably be really popular if people just got past his appearance and music taste, but of course in this shit-hole of a high school that won't happen any time soon.
"Hey," I said back.
He smiled. "So I see Bert didn't punch you."
I smiled back, laughing. "Yeah, no, he didn't. He's the cool type of asshole, the one who doesn't kill you unless you give him a reason. I think we're secretly friends."
Pete laughed too, looking at his shoes, sticking his hands in his back pockets.
I glanced over at his open locker, his schoolwork and binders sitting in the bottom, lunch bag on top.
I blinked a few times, thinking about what Gerard had said.
"Hey, Pete? I was wondering, uh- I normally just sit alone during lunch, could I-?"
His face lit up, but I couldn't tell if it was because of his smile or because of the look in his eyes. "Sure," he said happily. "You can sit with us."
I grinned.
---
Pete's friends were cool.
They were really fucking great, actually.
I found it insane that we hadn't all gotten together before just now, but I guess that was my own fault for assuming that no on in this school could be worth talking to.
I wasn't, like, a social hermit, I don't think. I knew people well enough to have conversations in the hall and stuff; Pete and I had talked about music every once and a while, there was some kid named Brendon with a killer voice that I stopped to talk to sometimes, and there was this guy named James that I sometimes joked about starting a band with, but I could never bring myself to really become friends with anyone.
I just didn't have the trust in me to be friends with people, I guess.
"So," Ray said during a small silence. "You play guitar?"
"Uh, yeah," I said, nodding. "Not the best in the world, but I try."
"Ray and Joe play, too," Pete piped up. "I'm a bass boy myself."
I looked at the other person with us, Andy. "What about you, Andy, guitar or bass? Instrument of the gods or the play-toy of the dorks?"
Pete kicked my shin lightly and sent me a joking glare.
Andy grinned. "Drums, actually. I considered bass for a while, beautiful instrument and all, but drummers set the rhythm when it comes to who's better in bed."
I think I choked on my sandwich. "Are you comparing music to sex?"
"It's a good metaphor, I have to admit," Ray said, nodding. Ray had a lot of hair, but then again so did Joe. I couldn't help but wonder if they synchronized that or if maybe that's why they became friends in the first place.
"Yeah, I guess," I agreed. "But sex is sex and music is music. I like to keep my hobbies separate, thank you very much." There was a light chuckle at that from everyone and I felt proud, I wasn't really good at making people anything but angry or annoyed, so seeing someone besides Gerard finding something I say amusing made me feel happy. "Seriously, though," I continued. "Music is a great way to express emotions and shit, but if sex is like anything it's probably like art."
"You gonna' get all poetic on us, Iero?"
I rolled my eyes at Joe, suddenly feeling embarrassed. I couldn't tell if he meant it jokingly or as a warning not to make metaphors like that.
I wasn't being weird, was I?
Gerard wouldn't think it was weird.
Gerard would just kiss me and agree and then we would have a whole conversation about it.
"Yeah, yeah, whatever," I sighed. "Love and art and all that shit, so cheesy, I know, yeah."
"I actually agree with you," Pete said, leaning back in the grass, looking up at the sky. We'd chosen a spot outside, because it was far easier to have conversations without the stupid background noise of the cafeteria.
"Really?"
"Yeah."
"Thanks, I guess?"
Did you say thank you to someone agreeing to you?
I felt stupid.
"No problem, it's actually a really sweet metaphor. But, like, I have to agree with Andy, it's like music too because music is art."
"Yeah, but, like, well..." I shifted a bit, almost squirming in discomfort and unsureness, tilting my head to the side and considering. "Music is art, but it's different than physical art. Physical art is something you can see, and-"
"You can't see love, though," Pete argued. "You just feel it, like you feel music."
"But music isn't so much like love as it as the art of expressing love," I said, shaking my head. "Music is about love, it's about showing your love. But emotions are just chemicals in your head, y'know? Music triggers emotions, just like love does, but music is just more about telling someone you love them than actually loving."
Ray cleared his throat. "But how do you hold your argument for love being like art, then?"
"Love is like art because love is art, it's a physical form of it and-" My phone rang, and I blinked a few times, shuffling it awkwardly out of my pocket and blinking with a blank gaze at Gerard's name on my screen. "Uh, sorry, one second, I'll- I'll be right back."
I stood up and walked a few feet away, answering the call.
"Gerard, I-"
"Are you guys arguing?"
I rolled my eyes, looking around. "No, we're just having a friendly debate, everything is fine. Can you, like, not spy on me? Where the fuck are you, anyway?"
"It's not like I'm hiding, or something."
I turned around, looking around the schoolyard, rolling my eyes when I saw him sitting at one of the picnic tables that we're supposed to be using to eat lunch at.
"What the fuck, Gerard? How have you not been seen yet?"
"Your school has shitty security. I walked on campus as people were leaving for lunch, no one said a fucking thing about it. I'm just gonna' leave as people start coming back."
"You're an idiot," I said, shaking my head. "If someone realizes that you don't go here-"
"Then I just say I'm here waiting for my beautiful boyfriend to get out of class so we can go hang out at his house."
I paused a moment, looking at him from across the schoolyard. "Yep," I said, nodding in realization, pressing my lips tight together. "You're still an idiot. A sweet idiot, but an idiot all the same."
He smiled, raising one hand in a slight wave and I rolled my eyes and hoped that he could see it from there. "You should come over here. Talk to me."
"I am talking to you," I said, waving back.
"Face to face, it's funner that way."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah. I can't see if you're blushing or not from all the way over here."
I glanced over at Pete and Ray and Joe and Andy, and once I was sure none of them were looking my way, I quickly flashed my middle finger in Gerard's direction.
"Was that a threat or an offer?" he asked suggestively.
I rolled my eyes again. "I'm hanging up now, Gerard."
"Wait, are you gonna invite-"
"Maybe just Pete," I said quietly, looking over at them. They were talking, laughing. They already had a really good group, I didn't really need to be there. "Too many people at once, it's making me feel weird, I kinda feel stupid around them."
There was a short silence, and I looked back at Gerard, who was looking over at me with a soft expression. "You're not stupid, Frank."
"Yeah? Well, I feel like it."
"You're very intelligent, sweetheart."
I looked at my feet, studying my shoelaces. "Thanks. I guess. But, whatever. I don't feel like it."
"Frank, please, don't-"
"Can we, like, not do this right now?"
There was a pause, a slight falter in his voice. "Yeah. Whatever. I don't get why you don't believe me."
"Yeah, whatever."
He paused for a moment. "Are you okay? You seem... Off."
"Yeah, no, I'm fine," I said.
"Yeah?"
"Yeah, I fucking am... I gotta' go, Gerard," I sighed.
I felt like shit.
I felt like I was doing a lot of things wrong at once.
"Okay," he said, voice quiet.
"I'll see you later, okay?" I tried to force as much enthusiasm into my voice as possible. "Just, go home, I guess. I'll come over right after school and then we can go to my place."
"Okay," he agreed, still not sounding sure. "Yeah. See you later."
I didn't want to hang up after that, I wanted to say something more but I didn't know what, but I ended up doing it anyway, taking one last glance at Gerard before walking back to Pete and everyone else.
Pete and Andy were arguing about something with music, something about Motley Crue and whether they actually did suck in recent live performances or not, and Joe seemed to be agreeing with what Pete said. I sat back down on the ground, a little further away than I had been before.
Ray looked over at me, frowning slightly. "Everything okay?"
"Yeah," I said, nodding, lying.
"You sure? I don't mean to pry, but you look don't look the happiest."
I shrugged a bit, noticing Pete turn to us slightly and letting Joe take over his side of whatever the argument was.
"I'm fine," I insisted. "Just annoyed with my- my boyfriend, I guess, but it's whatever. I don't even know what I'm actually annoyed about."
There was a short silence during which I immediately regretted saying 'boyfriend.'
Pete's face fell.
"I'm sure it's fine, whatever it is," Ray said, and I was glad that that was all he had to say. I was glad that there was no surprised gasp of 'you're gay?' or an accusation of 'faggot."
The look on Pete's face hurt equally as much as any of those words could've, though.
I should've led the conversation with something about Gerard. I'd planned on mentioning him, so Pete knew, but-
"Frank's got a boyfriend?" Andy said, studying my face, evidently having joined our conversation.
"Yeah," I said, my cheeks turning pink.
I just wanted to get off of the subject, for Pete's sake and for mine.
"What's his name?"
"Gerard."
"'Gerard,'" Joe echoed. "That's neat. Makes me think of Gerard Hopkins."
Ray wrinkled his nose. "Wasn't Hopkins a writer or something?"
"Yeah," Pete said slowly, quietly. "He's actually one of my favorite poets. Any guy brave enough to write poetry is pretty fucking cool if you ask me."
"Yeah?" I said. "That's funny, I think Gee writes poems."
"'Gee,'" Andy repeated. "That's cute."
I rolled my eyes, knowing I was blushing. "Whatever."
"Does he call you Frankie?" Pete asked quietly. "I would call you Frankie, if- I mean- just-"
He fell silent and his face went three different shades of embarrassed pink.
"He does," I said, blinking at Pete. "Yeah, he does sometimes."
Pete looked away, scratching the back of his head. "Yeah, okay."
There was a silence that made me want to throw up.
Ray glanced at me, and then at Pete, like he knew there was some unspoken issue.
He cleared his throat. "Joe, Andy? You guys want to go ahead and go to English, so we beat the hall crowds?"
"Uh, yeah, sure," one of them, I didn't pay attention to which, said, and they all shuffled to collect their trash and books and things.
Joe glanced at Pete. "Hey, you coming Pete?"
"I'll be there in a minute," he said, looking down. "Don't wait up for me."
The three guys left and I sent Ray a thankful look, and he just returned it with a slight nod.
The second they were out of hearing range, I turned to Pete.
"Look, I'm sorry if-"
"Why didn't you say something?" he said, staring at his shoes. He sat with his legs stretched out in front of him, hands supporting him on the ground behind him. "If you fucking knew I liked you, why'd you get my hopes up like that? You never sit with anyone at lunch, like, ever, I thought maybe-"
"I'm sorry," I said. "I didn't mean to lead you on. I just want to be friends, Pete. I don't have many friends."
He laughed slightly, blinking a few times rapidly. "Yeah, I don't either."
"You have more than me."
He shrugged. "I guess. But the guys are mostly just in-school friends, y'know? We never really see each other beyond school, I spend weekends and summers and shit alone."
I felt bad almost instantly. At least I had people, people in general. Not many close people but at least they were there.
I had Sandra at the diner and Gerard, those were the only two people I really knew that well, and then there were the few people at school like Brendon and James that I saw maybe every once and a while after school, because if we all happened to be going to the record store or a concert or something we would go as a really loose, non-committed group so we at least would feel a little less alone.
"I'm sorry," I told him.
He laughed, short and unamused. "Yeah. Most people are."
I studied the side of his face for a minute. Pete was an attractive person, I had to admit that. I couldn't understand how in the hell he was still single. (But then again, I'd wondered the exact same thing about Gerard the first time we met.)
"Gerard is coming to my house tonight," I said. "To hang out and for dinner and shit. But my mom doesn't exactly know about our relationship or anything, so, it's just a 'as friends' thing. Do you wanna' come, hang out a while? Watch a movie or something?"
Pete was still focused on his shoes. He rolled his bottom lip into his mouth, chewing on it lightly. "So, let me get this straight; you're asking the kid who you know has a crush on you to come over to your house, while your boyfriend is there, to hang out and watch a movie?"
I rolled my eyes. "When you put it like that, I sound like an asshole. I'm just trying to be friends, Pete, and anyway, you'll like Gerard. I can teach you both to play guitar or something, or we can talk about comics or books or music or whatever. Whatever you want to do."
He chewed on his lip some more.
"Yeah. Okay. Sure. I don't know why, but sure."
I smiled. "Don't sound so worried, it'll be fine. I really want to be friends with you."
I stood up and picked up the trash from my lunch, leaning over and patting his shoulder. "Meet me after school, okay? By the tree in front of the building."
"Okay."
I started walking away, pausing and turning when I heard Pete's voice behind me.
"Hey, Frank?"
"Yeah, Pete?"
"For the record, I really like you. Like, really, really like you."
I blinked at him a few times. "For the record," I said. "I think you're a pretty cool kid, Pete, but you could do a hell of a lot better than me."
---
Pete was already by the tree by the time I got there.
Gerard was also there.
I watched from far off, watching them talk. They shook hands, Gerard shifted awkwardly, running his hand through his hair and smiling nervously. Pete was laughing but I couldn't tell much else.
I found it amazing how much easier it was to read Gerard's body than Pete's.
"Gee! Pete!" I called, walking towards them. The both waved, and I smiled. "Hey."
"Hey, Frank," Gerard said at the same time Pete said a quiet, "Hi, Frankie."
Pete flushed slightly and Gerard didn't seem to notice.
"I thought I told you to wait at your house?" I scolded Gerard.
He shrugged. "Figured it would be easier this way. Now we can all just walk to yours."
"Oh," I said. "Okay, uh, whatever. What about Mikey, he know you're gone?"
"Yeah, but he's at the comic store today anyway. They're starting a new Batman series, he pounced on the idea of it and said he'd be sure to tell me all about it."
Pete adjusted his backpack on his shoulders.
I nodded. "That sounds nice." I looked between my best friend, and my almost-friend-but-not-quite-there-yet friend. "Everyone ready to go, then?"
Pete nodded, said "Yeah," and glanced at Gerard, who just nodded.
I pointed down the road. "Well, that way we go, then."
We started walking, and Gerard got really quiet really fast. I didn't know if it was because how rude I'd been earlier, or if it was because Pete was there, but I didn't question it.
"So," Pete said, falling in to step with me as Gerard got a bit ahead of us. "Who's Mikey?"
"Gee's little brother. How old are you, Pete? I don't even know."
"Seventeen."
I nodded. "Mikey's four years younger than us."
"Oh." There was a small pause, and Pete tilted his head. "How old is Gerard?"
"Eighteen," I said.
"So, he's a senior? I haven't seen him around school anywhere."
"He's home schooled," I explained.
"Oh, that's cool. I've always wished I could be home schooled."
"Yeah? Me too. Gerard says he misses public school, though."
"Really?" Pete asked, surprised. "Why?"
"He misses having friends, I think," I said quietly. "His mom, Mikey, a few near-strangers and I are the only people he really has."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
"I can hear you guys talking about me," Gerard informed us.
"I know," I said back.
---
My mom wasn't home so the three of us sat in the living room floor and drank soda for a few hours. We talked about music and life and art, and I was really surprised by how much Gerard and I both had in common with Pete.
"I'm huge on writing, man," Pete confessed, pulling his legs in cross-legged-style, sipping at his Pepsi. "Not much of an artist, but I think I'm an okay writer."
"Gerard's a great artist, and writer," I offered. "And he plays piano."
"Yeah?" Pete asked. "You play piano, I play bass, Frank's got guitar. We could get Andy in on this to play drums and we could start ourselves a band."
"Who'd sing, though?" I asked. "I can't fucking sing worth a shit."
"I've never actually heard you sing," Gerard said. "Maybe, like, wailing along to the Misfits, but you suck on purpose to annoy Mikey. I've never heard you actually sing."
"Well, same could be said for you," I said, tapping him lightly with my foot.
"What about you, Pete?" Gerard asked. "You sing?"
"I try," he confessed.
"I do too," Gerard said, nodding.
They both looked at me, and I admitted with a long sigh that I, too, have tried to sing sometimes, too.
We chatted about just simple shit like that for a while, music and the kinds we liked, the instruments we knew how to play or wished we could play, and the kinds of music we liked to sing and wish we could sing (apparently, Gerard could only sing show tunes and Pete could only scream, but then again I just described myself as sounding like a "whiny little kid who hates his life.")
My mom walked into the house and straight into the living room about thirty minutes later, when we were deep into a conversation about the pros and cons of being in a band or being a solo artist, and she paused with key and purse in hand.
She blinked at me, and then at Gerard and Pete.
"Hi Frank, Hello Gerard," she said, blinking. "And, uh, who's this?"
"This is Pete Wentz," I introduced her.
Pete waved a small hello and my mom just nodded, looking at me.
"Frank, I thought just Gerard was coming today?"
I shrugged. "Well, I-"
"Kitchen. Now."
I glanced at Pete and blinked at him, and he just shrugged a small shrug.
I sighed and followed my mom to the kitchen.
"Who are these people," was the first half of her question, "and why are you suddenly Mr. Popular?"
I stared at my mom, trying to figure out if she was serious or not. "They're my friends," I said slowly, "and it's like two people, mother. I'm literally the least popular person in school."
"Well, why are you suddenly talking to people again, huh? What happened to your whole 'social aniexy' thing?"
I felt like choking, but whether I wanted to choke her or myself, I couldn't figure out.
"Mom," I just said. "Can you please, like, not make me feel like shit?"
She crossed her arms, putting all of her weight on one foot, and started saying something, but I honestly did not want to hear it.
"We'll be back inside for dinner in an hour," I said, leaving the kitchen, sighing.
Gerard and Pete were both standing up when I walked back in the living room.
"Everything okay?" Pete asked, frowning.
I just nodded, but between his gaze and Gerard's, I could tell that they knew I didn't mean it.
"Come on," Gerard said, standing a bit straighter. "Why don't we, like, go outside, or something, get some fresh air?"
I considered for a moment. "Well. That's a good idea. You guys stay in here, I'll be right back, okay? I'm gonna' go grab something from upstairs."
---
By the time I'd managed to teach Gerard how to play a few songs on the guitar, Pete was giggling hysterically at the two of us, laying on in back in the grass nearby.
"You laughing at me, Wentz?" Gerard grinned, strumming a few awkward, completely out of tune chords.
"Maybe," he giggled. "What ya' gonna do about it, Way?"
I laughed at the two of them, shaking my head. "You two are such dorks."
"You know you love it," Pete said with a smile.
I just rolled my eyes, but grinned anyway. "Yeah, I guess you're right, I sorta do."
And then Gerard smiled, too, and everyone was happy.
---
The rest of the night was really nice, until about dinner. Pete went home, his mom called him on his cellphone and informed him that they had some family visiting that night, so he offered us both hugs and then left with a wave, promising me that I could totally sit with him at lunch again tomorrow.
The second Gerard and I walked into the kitchen, though, a small piece of my own personal hell broke loose.
My mom was on the phone, with who I assumed was just her flavor of the week, until I started really listening to the conversation.
"Soon," she insisted, as she was closing the fridge. "Yeah, I know, I know- Okay, sweetheart. Love you too."
I blinked a few times. "Who was that?" I asked, leaning against the kitchen counter. Gerard hovered a bit awkwardly next to me, not really seeming to know what to do with himself.
"A friend of mine," was all my mom said, shrugging. "He's coming over for dinner next Friday."
"Really?"
She glared at me. "Yes, really."
"So, I'm gonna' have to be here for this?"
"Yes, I expect you to be. And if you're not, there will be consequences."
I looked at Gerard, who was giving me a sympathetic glance.
I mouthed "help," at him, but he didn't seem to know how.
There was a short pause, a bit of silence.
"Mrs. Iero," Gerard said, leaning on the counter next to me. "I don't mean to be rude-"
"If you have to say that," she interrupted. "Then whatever you're about to say is probably rude."
The silence that followed that was a stunned one, Gerard blinking in shock and I feeling like punching my own mother in the face.
"So," my mom said, turning suddenly towards the dining room. "Who's ready for dinner?"
Also, my cousins who I see maybe once a year were here for about a week or two, so there was that as well.
There's the fact that I start my freshman year (for any of you who don't know, I'm fourteen and just now heading into the terrifying world of high school, haha,) so there's also been that pressure to distract me.
I do have to say, this chapter pulled together better than I thought it would. It's quite a bit awkward in some places I think, but I'm fairly pleased with how it turned out.
I get a lot of questions along the lines of "Is Folie over?" and "Was that the last chapter of Folie?" and to answer those questions, I'll say this: You'll know the last chapter when it comes, I'll be sure to put it in the title of the chapter, it's status will be changed to complete, and I'll announce it in the author's note, but we are FAR from that chapter!
If anyone has any other questions regarding the story, please feel free to ask! I've been bad about responding to comments in the past, but I really do promise to do better from now on.
I'm considering writing a second fic, after Folie. Not related in any way, it won't be a sequel, but I'm thinking about going in another direction entirely, somewhere along the lines of magic and two boys named Frank and Gerard just trying to figure out where the hell they fit in... But more on that later. I probably won't do any posting for that until after Folie is completed, but I may post a small introduction when we near the end of Folie.
Anyway, enough of my talking, I hope everyone enjoys!
Peace, love, and all things unholy,
Eve
---
I don't know how long we sat on the bathroom floor. Maybe ten minutes, maybe just two. It could've been an hour.
It felt like that, like hours.
I sat next to Gerard, and he rested his head on top of mine.
"Why didn't you tell me?" I asked eventually.
"I dunno," he said, quietly, shrugging. He sat up straight and I did, too, turning my head to look at him. "I didn't think it was important."
I sighed. "Of course it's important. Everything about you is important to me."
Gerard didn't say anything for a while, and then; "While I'm telling you things, I own a gun."
"I know. Mikey told me."
He sighed. "I figured he would. You do know, I wouldn't- I won't-"
"I know," I said. "I know how against all types of violence you are, Mr. Make The Kid With Arachnophobia Kill Spiders For You."
He smiled, just barely. "Yeah. It's just... Stress reliever, ya know?"
"Yeah. Why haven't I seen you with it before, though?"
He shrugged. "I just... I dunno. I haven't touched it in a really long time."
I titled my head at him. "How'd you even get started with the whole 'gun,' thing? It doesn't seem like something you'd be interested in."
"My dad," he said quietly. "Mikey doesn't know, I think he was too young to remember, but Dad was really in to that type of stuff. Guns. War. But not in the bad way, he was just patriotic, ya' know? My grandpa, evidently, was in some war; Mikey is named after him. My dad wanted me and Mikey both to go to military school."
"So why didn't you?"
"Because I- well, I never wanted to even think about military school or anything like that. Even when I was younger I think I knew I just wanted to do something creative. Something that was productive, not destructive."
"Why did guns stick, then?"
"Same reason piano stuck when my grandma's health started declining; something to remember someone I care about by."
I nodded. "That makes sense, I guess..."
"I'm glad it does."
We fell into silence again, and I found myself just looking at Gerard.
He was annoyingly attractive, sitting on the bathroom floor with his legs pulled up to his chest, spilling his heart out to me. He looked back at me for a few seconds, and then rested his forehead on his knees, lips parting in a light sigh, strands of black hair framing his face.
"Another thing I guess I should tell you, is that I haven't been taking my pills."
I leaned back, tilting my head, too, staring at the ceiling. "What pills?" I asked, already guessing.
"Depression."
I closed my eyes, and let out a slow breath, swallowing the sadness that was clogging my throat.
"Okay." I looked over at him. "Why'd you stop taking the pills, Gerard? Mikey told me a while ago, but I want to hear it from you. It's been a while and I want to hear your opinion on it."
"Well, at first I thought I just stopped because I thought I didn't need them. Because- because you made me happy," he said quietly.
"You thought?"
"Well, yeah. But then other stuff started happening, that made me realize that the medicine wasn't helping anyway."
"It wasn't?"
"No. It made me too tired. I wanted to sleep all the time. It made me dizzy. Gave me headaches."
"Then maybe you could talk to someone about switching medications?"
Gerard stared at the empty space across from him. "No. Switching medication is admitting that I'm still a failure. Do you know how hard it was to admit I was even depressed in the first place, Frank? I can't- I can't tell people that I'm still too weak to survive on my own. I can't tell them that the chemicals that are supposed to help the ones in my head aren't working and that I need different ones."
"If it helps," I said quietly, scooting closer to him. "I've never told anyone about my depression."
"No one?" he asked, his fingers finding mine.
"No one but you," I confirmed, squeezing his hand. "I'm not even, like, officially diagnosed as being depressed. I guess I should take pills for it or something, get some help or something, but... I dunno. My mom would probably just yell at me if I told her, and if she didn't, she'd probably just worry way too fucking much. And anyway, pills cost money that I really do not have."
Gerard didn't say anything and I guessed he agreed.
"You should probably know that there's something wrong with my eating habits, too," he told me.
I closed my eyes for a second or two, leaning back and resting my head against the wall. "I kind of figured about that. You and your 'just a coffee, please,' thing is starting to worry me even more than it did when we first met."
"I don't know what it is though, that's the problem." He pulled his legs up to his chest even tighter than before, tightening his arms around them and resting his chin on his knees, one hand tangled with mine. "I don't know what's wrong with me."
"Nothing is wrong with you, Gerard." I squeezed his fingers between mine. "You just don't eat enough."
He tilted his head, looking over at me, and I was struck by how attractive he looked, even sitting on the bathroom floor and looking so upset.
"Is that all, Frank? I just don't eat enough? Is that really it?"
I stared at him. "I dunno. I thought it was."
"Then why do I feel fat every time I even look at food?" he asked, voice sighing. "Why don't I like eating in front of people sometimes, why does the idea of gaining weight make my hands shake? I have nightmares about throwing up from eating too much. Just thinking about food makes me want to weigh myself to make sure I haven't gained weight."
I looked away. I'd never felt like that, but I imagined it must be horrible. "I don't know. But I don't want you to feel like that. I think you're perfect just the way you are."
He turned his head, resting his forehead on his knees again. "What's wrong with me, Frank? Why do I have so many things wrong with me?"
"I dunno, Gee," I said, upset. "But I really don't think you have anything wrong with you. Like I said, I think you're perfect."
"I'm not perfect. The definition of perfect is 'without flaw,' and I have more of those than I can count."
"That also depends on what you consider a flaw, Gerard. I don't think you have flaws, I think there's just a few things that you need help with."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah. I just want you to be happy," I told him honestly. "I want you to like yourself as much as I like you."
He looked down. "Can we go home, Frankie?" he asked softly.
I nodded, sighing. "Yeah. I'm sorry that my mom is such a bitch."
He shrugged. "I'm sorry I'm such a freak."
I gave him a stern look. "You're not a freak, Gerard."
He laughed, a dry sort of laugh, not meeting my eyes. "I'm a pansexual teenage boy who draws semi-creepy pictures in my free time and thinks about dying a lot, don't tell me I'm not a freak."
I couldn't bring myself to argue with him.
I stood up instead, pushing hair out of my face. I reached down and took his hand as he stood, too.
"My mom will probably still be out there," I realized.
"Oh. We can- we can stay for a while, I guess. I never finished my coffee, anyway. And I always finish my coffee."
I tilted my head, studying his face. "Yeah, I've noticed that."
He flinched slightly, and then attempted to shrug it off."My doctors say that's a part of, uh- It's my OCD, I mean, that makes me have to do it."
"Finish coffees...?"
"Finish things, in general. I guess you could say I'm not a huge fan of leaving things undone."
"Oh."
Gerard followed me out of the bathroom and I hated having to let go of his hand before my mom saw.
"Mom?" I said walking up to the table. We sat down and Gerard's hands went instantly to his coffee. "I think we're gonna leave. Gee isn't feeling well."
Gerard let one hand drop from his coffee cup, resting softly on my knee, out of view from my mother.
My mom stared at me for a few seconds. "Why don't you come home, if Gerard doesn't feel well? So you don't get sick too."
My lips parted, and I didn't quite know what to say.
"Mrs. Iero," Gerard said quietly, keeping his eyes focused on his coffee. "I don't mean to be rude, but I would really feel more comfortable with Frank there. I- I have trouble sleeping when I don't feel well and it's easier for me if there's someone there when I wake up."
My mom frowned. "Don't you have a younger brother, though?"
"Yes ma'am, but I don't want to put that weight on his shoulders. I don't want to make him worry."
"But you're willing to make my son worry?" my mother scoffed.
"No," I cut in. "I'm willing to let him make me worry. He's my friend, mom. I want to make sure he's okay."
My mother studied my face for a long, excruciating moment. "Fine, fine," she said eventually. "Whatever. Just be sure you go to school tomorrow."
"Of course," I said. And I wasn't lying- I really did need to actually attend school at least for a while.
"And since we're cutting tonight short, why don't you two come by the house tomorrows, after Frank gets out of school, if Gerard is feeling better?"
Gerard's fingers pressed slightly against my knee, and I took it as a warning not to argue. "That sounds great, Mrs. Iero," he said, smiling.
I just nodded in mock-agreement.
"Okay, well, I'll see you boys later... I'll pay for your drinks, don't worry about it."
I blinked rapidly. "Uh, okay, Mom. Thanks."
"Thank you Mrs. Iero," Gerard chimed in, sitting down his finished coffee.
---
We held hands on the way home. It was a mostly silent walk, until I started focusing, picking up on habits that I was guessing were caused by Gerard's OCD. They weren't hard to miss once you started paying attention.
Watching his feet as we walked down the sidewalk, he looked like he was counting his steps.
"Does it bother you?" I asked eventually. "Like, does it cause many problems?"
"What, the depression or the OCD or the insomnia or-"
"OCD."
He shrugged, squeezing my hand. "Yeah. Sometimes. Like, it's not the easiest thing to deal with, but some people have it a lot worse than I do, I guess. There's a few things that I like keeping under control and stuff, but I'm mostly just a counter, I think. Some people have a lot more components to it, it changes who they are."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
I thought about it for a long while. "Is making lists a part of it?"
"Lists? Oh yeah. I make a lot of lists. Like, mostly in my head and stuff, but..."
"I understand," I said, nodding. "I think I know what you mean."
His fingers squished mine and we went about a minute or two in silence.
"They're mostly about you," Gerard said suddenly.
"What are?"
"The lists."
I paused for a second, not knowing how to answer. "Is that a bad thing?"
"I don't think so. I like my lists."
"What types of things about me do you list?"
"Well." He titled his head, eyes focusing on his feet as we walked. "Sometimes I count how many times you laugh, just, like, in general. And then there are subcategories in that. Like, I have lists for smiles that are fake and ones that are real and ones that I caused and ones that I wish I had caused... All sorts of stuff."
I stared at the side of his head. "And you keep track of all of these things? In your head?"
He nodded. "Sometimes I miscount, and that really sucks, but I write them down when I can so I don't forget."
"What... What other types of lists do you have about me?"
He shrugged. "Just... Lists."
"Oh."
We walked in silence after that, and I wondered a lot about his lists.
When we arrived at his front door, Gerard fumbled in his pockets with one hand for his keys, and it started raining, lightly.
"This reminds me of the first time you brought me here," I said, squeezing Gerard's hand. He paused, the key in the door, half turned.
"Yeah," he said, a small half-smile gracing his lips. "I guess it does."
I looked at my feet. "I'm so sorry, Gerard."
He straightened up, turning to look at me, leaving the key in the door.
"What on earth for?"
"I'm sorry that you're so sad sometimes," I sighed, studying his eyes, feeling the way his hand tightened around mine. "I'm sorry for not being able to make you happier."
Gerard's lips parted in surprise. "Wh- what?"
I looked at my feet. "I'm sorry, that sounded stupid. It's just- I- well. You just get so sad, sometimes. And- and I notice, I notice that something is off, but... I never say anything, because I don't know how to help. I don't know how to make you feel better. And I don't want to say something and ask if you're okay, because if you are, then you'll start thinking that I worry too much, or you'll get mad, and you'll start lying when you really aren't okay, and..."
He was staring at me, so I forced myself to look at him. I couldn't bring myself to meet his eyes, though; I focused myself instead on his lips, the slight surprise that he expressed there. I looked at the soft curve of his nose, the gentle slope of his cheeks, the way the rain caught in his hair.
He was beautiful, right then. It was weird thinking of a boy as that, as beautiful, but there really was no other way to put it.
So I told him that, I said, "You're beautiful," and his head tilted, his face pulled into a strange expression that I'd never seen before.
"Thank you," he said quietly. "I can't quite see that, but... Thank you. You're really stunning, too, Frank."
I chuckled, looking at my feet. I was blushing, but hey, so was he.
"You make me happy," I confessed to him.
"You make me happy, too. I- Well. I like you. A lot."
He pulled me into a tight hug before I could ask what he had been about to say before he changed his mind.
I was slightly surprised that he didn't kiss me, but I wasn't going to argue. I appreciated the hug, took it for what it was, said, "I like you a lot, too, Gerard."
He pressed his face into my hair, held me tighter.
"Frank?" Gerard said, soft, pulling away just enough to look at me.
"Yeah, Gee?"
"Tomorrow you have to go to school. You realize that, right?"
"Yeah," I sighed. "I'll miss you."
"I'll miss you, too. My mom left me with a shit-ton of school work that I've been avoiding so I guess I'll have to work on that." His lips brushed my forehead. "I can't wait for summer, when you can just stay here all the time."
I nodded. "Yeah, that's gonna' be nice."
Sitting around with Gerard, every day, all day. It sounded great.
He kissed me, softly.
I was surprising myself with how much I was enjoying his kisses.
"C'mon," he mumbled around my lips, tilting his head away. "Let's go to bed. I'm tired, I wanna' lay down."
---
Sleeping that night was a bit difficult.
At first, it was a good difficult. It was a we-can't-stop-talking-and-making-conversation difficult. We didn't talk about anything too deep, just food and movies and school and music. Eventually, Gerard wrapped one arm around me loosely, and we laid face to face for a while and just looked at each other. He pressed his lips to mine, soft and warm and like he really, really liked me, which I totally appreciated, because I really, really liked him too.
"Goodnight, Frank."
"Goodnight, Gerard," I said, keeping my voice low.
For the first time, Gerard fell asleep before me.
I watched him sleep, hoping I wasn't being creepy but figuring he wouldn't care.
His lips twitched, the muscles in his face tensed up.
I lifted my hand to his face, rubbing the places where small creases of worry formed, hoping he wasn't having nightmares.
I didn't want to sleep, not right now.
I wanted to talk to Gerard about some things. I wanted to discuss his nightmares, his OCD, his intellect. I wanted to sit up with him until we fell asleep from too much deep conversation and too much rough thinking.
He jerked in his sleep, several times, so I reached over and put my hand on the side of his face, brushing my lips against his nose. "Hey," I said, quiet enough that it wouldn't wake him up but loud enough that he could hopefully hear me. "Don't worry yourself."
He mumbled something in his sleep that I couldn't understand.
I shushed him softly.
I wasn't planning on waking him up tomorrow before I went to school, he needed his sleep. I already had a cute little note planned out in my head, already figured that I should leave it on the pillow where he'd see it first thing in the morning instead of the fridge.
I rolled over, closing my eyes.
There was a small ache, deep in my stomach. It was the small ache of knowing that I had left something unfinished, a small ache that I imagine must be similar to the one Gerard gets when he has trouble with his OCD.
I wondered what it was, that had been left unfinished, and as the dreams started messing with my head, making me see things in the dark that weren't really there, I realized what it was.
I hadn't asked if what he had started to say earlier, before he said he liked me, had been "I love you."
---
I woke up the next morning to my cellphone alarm blasting some indie, slightly psychedelic, post-hardcore rock band that Mikey had introduced me too, and managed to find the 'Off' button before it woke Gerard up.
I got up, reluctantly, swinging my legs over the side of the bed and sitting there for a few seconds. I didn't feel good. Not physically, not mentally. Not in my stomach or in my head.
I considered laying back down, curling up, going back to sleep with Gerard's arm around me, hoping that the sick feeling in my stomach would be gone soon.
I closed my eyes, as tight as I could, felt them water.
I didn't need this. Not now.
Not now, please not now.
My head felt like it had been swarmed by bees, or something, like small, deadly bees that carried bad thoughts.
I couldn't help but start to think about a lot of things that had happened last night, a lot of things that Gerard had said, and the things he didn't.
I stood up, trying to defeat the voice inside my head that was telling me to lay down and just waste away in one spot for the rest of my life.
I walked to the bathroom, stared at myself in the mirror until I realized that something was off about my reflection.
Were all those ghosts stories real? I started running through the scenarios in my head, recalling the stories I'd read when I was younger, thinking up a bunch of different situations; mirror steals my soul. Mirror opens portal into another world. My reflection stabs me to death.
My eyes averted faster than my heart sped up, and I started telling myself that it wasn't possible.
Your reflection couldn't kill you, I'd just read way too many fucking books and seen one too many stupid horror movies when I was younger.
After I peed and then stared at myself in the mirror some more, trying to figure out if the kid who stared back at me was capable of stabbing someone to death, I wandered into the Way family kitchen and ate some of Gerard's favorite cereal, even though I didn't really care for it. I convinced myself to drink some water, after pulling out my phone to look up if death by dehydration was painful. (Evidently, it wasn't pleasant.)
I then padded quietly back to Gerard's room, looking briefly over at him to make sure he was still asleep, and then deciding, after staring at him for a while, to put on clean clothes. Ending up in one of Gerard's shirts and a pair of my own jeans, (ripped in the knee from that one time I was pretending to be playing on stage at a concert for some really-fucking-epic band and dropped to my knees with my guitar in hand, skidding across the floor and destroying what was left of the fabric over my left knee,) I decided that it felt at least a little better to be in clean clothes.
I ran my fingers through my hair until I figured it looked okay, not sparing myself a second look in the mirror for fear of being brutally murdered by my own self. I forced myself to stay in the bathroom to brush my teeth and pee again, just because I hated peeing in the bathrooms at school and didn't want to have to go again until I came home.
I wrote the note for Gerard-
"At school, didn't want to wake you up. I'll text you when I can. Don't forget we're going to my house after I get home from school."
I stared at the note for a few minutes, trying to figure out how to end it.
I ended up just scribbling down "xoxoFrank," and left it at that, sitting the paper down where I'd slept last night.
Gerard stirred slightly as I started to leave his room, but didn't say anything.
---
I got a text in the middle of English.
>Why didn't you wake me up? xoG.<
I blinked at my phone.
>You need your sleep, sweetheart. xoF.<
I sat my phone in my lap and went back to doodling, figuring Gerard was done since he didn't like texting that much, and not feeling like doing the classwork.
I was in the exact same mood as I was this morning.
Tired.
Uninterested.
Not wanted to put effort into anything.
Paranoid.
Hollow.
And maybe just a little bit sad.
I was drawing the best I could manage, stupid little stick figures that looked like squiggly circles when compared to Gerard's masterpieces.
My phone buzzed.
>There are some really attractive boys in your class.<
I stared at my phone for a few seconds, reading and re-reading the message.
>What?<
>Home is boring. Window shopping for cute boys at this sweet little place called 'Your School' is much more interesting.<
I rolled my eyes, huffing a bit and then looking up quickly to make sure the teacher didn't notice that I was totally not writing a summary of Shakespeare's sonnet.
I typed the first and only reply I could think of.
>Stop looking through the window you fxcking stalker.<
I could almost imagine Gerard laughing at me, creeping outside the classroom window.
>You spelled 'fucking' wrong.<
I almost snorted out loud.
>I know, you jxckxss. I never curse in text. Force of habit.<
>'Jxckxss?<
>You know what, Gee, just fuck off.<
>I thought you 'never cuss in text?'<
>Only for you, motherfucker. Only for you.<
>It's hot when you use profanity.<
I could feel myself blushing. If he had been here I probably would've freaked out and stuttered out something stupid, but talking behind a screen made me feel a lot more laid back. Fighting through social awkwardness was a lot easier when the other person couldn't see you. (Of course, I knew that Gerard was somewhere outside of the classroom window right now, and could more than likely see me. Luckily my teacher's desk faced away from the window, and there was a huge tree right outside. I glanced at the window, staring intently. I couldn't see him but he was probably sitting on the ground beneath it or something. I knew for a fact that it was actually a really good hiding spot; before the older students found out I was younger than them, they would sit there with me and smoke with me.)
>Maybe I should start using more, in that case.<
There was a short pause before he replied.
>A boy two rows over and three seats back from you is staring at the back of your head and chewing his pencil. I think he likes you.<
I blinked in surprise, glancing over my shoulder. Sure enough, he turned red and looked down at his notebook.
>Pete? Are you serious?<
>Yeah. He's hiding behind his hair now.<
I glanced back- Pete had black hair with a few red streaks in the front, just long enough to hide his eyes behind. I could see his mouth though, and he was chewing his bottom lip so hard I thought it would bleed.
My phone alerted me of another text so I looked down, frowning in confusion.
>You should talk to him.<
I blinked in shock.
>Why? I don't want to lead him on.<
His reply was really fast.
>Invite him over to your house tonight, he looks lonely. I think he needs a friend. Just mention me so he knows you're not interested.<
I reread the text a few times.
>He has more friends than I do.<
>But how many of them are he actually close to?<
That, I didn't know.
I wasn't sure how my mom would react to me having more than one person over, considering I didn't really have friends, not sense middle school, but Gerard was right. Pete never really talked to anyone besides these two kids with curly hair and some other guy who I think plays the drums, or something like that. If I could catch them in a group I might invite all of them, just for the heck of it. I wasn't too big on hanging out with other people or trying to make friends, but I trusted Gerard.
>Okay, sure. I'll invite him.< I paused for a second, and then started another text. >So, Gerard, why are you stalking me?<
>Like I said, I got bored, and Mikey went to the comic book store. So naturally my inner creep got the best of me.<
I was smiling, I couldn't help it.
Big mistake, on my part.
Before I could comprehend what was happening, my phone was being snatched from between my fingers.
I felt my heart drop as I looked up to see someone standing over me, a classmate who I knew well enough to know that if I started fighting back to, would get violent. "Texting your boyfriend?" he sneered, dangling my phone over my head.
I looked around the room, because where the fucking hell was the teacher?
And of course, class had let out without me noticing. And it was lunch time now, so the teachers had all abandoned their classrooms for the cafeteria, and our stupid school doesn't mind if you eat in the classrooms, so if someone passed by, they'd assume we were just two buddies having lunch and messing with each other.
Pete was hanging around the door, his locker was right outside.
I cleared my throat, standing up. The guy was taller than me, I saw no hope in getting my phone back, and I didn't feel like getting my head bashed in today. (As much as I didn't want to be here, I'd at least like to stay conscious if I was going to be forced to.)
I also happened to know, luckily, that if there wasn't a chase involved, this particular person gave up causing trouble easily.
"You can keep the phone, Bert," I said, sighing, gathering up my other things. "Have fun with it. I'm sure you'll find the texts to my mom and my music very entertaining."
He rolled his eyes, dropping my phone on to my pile of books, and I somehow managed to get it to slid to rest against my chest and not clatter onto the floor. "You're no fun, Iero."
"Yeah, well you're an asshole."
"Like I haven't heard that one before." He kicked my desk and then walked away.
I rolled my eyes back at him, even though it was pointless considering he was gone.
"H-hey," I heard a quiet voice speak up from the doorway.
I looked up, blinking at Pete, and joined him in the hall. He shifted nervously, which was amusing, because Pete wasn't the nervous type of person. He was pretty outgoing. He would probably be really popular if people just got past his appearance and music taste, but of course in this shit-hole of a high school that won't happen any time soon.
"Hey," I said back.
He smiled. "So I see Bert didn't punch you."
I smiled back, laughing. "Yeah, no, he didn't. He's the cool type of asshole, the one who doesn't kill you unless you give him a reason. I think we're secretly friends."
Pete laughed too, looking at his shoes, sticking his hands in his back pockets.
I glanced over at his open locker, his schoolwork and binders sitting in the bottom, lunch bag on top.
I blinked a few times, thinking about what Gerard had said.
"Hey, Pete? I was wondering, uh- I normally just sit alone during lunch, could I-?"
His face lit up, but I couldn't tell if it was because of his smile or because of the look in his eyes. "Sure," he said happily. "You can sit with us."
I grinned.
---
Pete's friends were cool.
They were really fucking great, actually.
I found it insane that we hadn't all gotten together before just now, but I guess that was my own fault for assuming that no on in this school could be worth talking to.
I wasn't, like, a social hermit, I don't think. I knew people well enough to have conversations in the hall and stuff; Pete and I had talked about music every once and a while, there was some kid named Brendon with a killer voice that I stopped to talk to sometimes, and there was this guy named James that I sometimes joked about starting a band with, but I could never bring myself to really become friends with anyone.
I just didn't have the trust in me to be friends with people, I guess.
"So," Ray said during a small silence. "You play guitar?"
"Uh, yeah," I said, nodding. "Not the best in the world, but I try."
"Ray and Joe play, too," Pete piped up. "I'm a bass boy myself."
I looked at the other person with us, Andy. "What about you, Andy, guitar or bass? Instrument of the gods or the play-toy of the dorks?"
Pete kicked my shin lightly and sent me a joking glare.
Andy grinned. "Drums, actually. I considered bass for a while, beautiful instrument and all, but drummers set the rhythm when it comes to who's better in bed."
I think I choked on my sandwich. "Are you comparing music to sex?"
"It's a good metaphor, I have to admit," Ray said, nodding. Ray had a lot of hair, but then again so did Joe. I couldn't help but wonder if they synchronized that or if maybe that's why they became friends in the first place.
"Yeah, I guess," I agreed. "But sex is sex and music is music. I like to keep my hobbies separate, thank you very much." There was a light chuckle at that from everyone and I felt proud, I wasn't really good at making people anything but angry or annoyed, so seeing someone besides Gerard finding something I say amusing made me feel happy. "Seriously, though," I continued. "Music is a great way to express emotions and shit, but if sex is like anything it's probably like art."
"You gonna' get all poetic on us, Iero?"
I rolled my eyes at Joe, suddenly feeling embarrassed. I couldn't tell if he meant it jokingly or as a warning not to make metaphors like that.
I wasn't being weird, was I?
Gerard wouldn't think it was weird.
Gerard would just kiss me and agree and then we would have a whole conversation about it.
"Yeah, yeah, whatever," I sighed. "Love and art and all that shit, so cheesy, I know, yeah."
"I actually agree with you," Pete said, leaning back in the grass, looking up at the sky. We'd chosen a spot outside, because it was far easier to have conversations without the stupid background noise of the cafeteria.
"Really?"
"Yeah."
"Thanks, I guess?"
Did you say thank you to someone agreeing to you?
I felt stupid.
"No problem, it's actually a really sweet metaphor. But, like, I have to agree with Andy, it's like music too because music is art."
"Yeah, but, like, well..." I shifted a bit, almost squirming in discomfort and unsureness, tilting my head to the side and considering. "Music is art, but it's different than physical art. Physical art is something you can see, and-"
"You can't see love, though," Pete argued. "You just feel it, like you feel music."
"But music isn't so much like love as it as the art of expressing love," I said, shaking my head. "Music is about love, it's about showing your love. But emotions are just chemicals in your head, y'know? Music triggers emotions, just like love does, but music is just more about telling someone you love them than actually loving."
Ray cleared his throat. "But how do you hold your argument for love being like art, then?"
"Love is like art because love is art, it's a physical form of it and-" My phone rang, and I blinked a few times, shuffling it awkwardly out of my pocket and blinking with a blank gaze at Gerard's name on my screen. "Uh, sorry, one second, I'll- I'll be right back."
I stood up and walked a few feet away, answering the call.
"Gerard, I-"
"Are you guys arguing?"
I rolled my eyes, looking around. "No, we're just having a friendly debate, everything is fine. Can you, like, not spy on me? Where the fuck are you, anyway?"
"It's not like I'm hiding, or something."
I turned around, looking around the schoolyard, rolling my eyes when I saw him sitting at one of the picnic tables that we're supposed to be using to eat lunch at.
"What the fuck, Gerard? How have you not been seen yet?"
"Your school has shitty security. I walked on campus as people were leaving for lunch, no one said a fucking thing about it. I'm just gonna' leave as people start coming back."
"You're an idiot," I said, shaking my head. "If someone realizes that you don't go here-"
"Then I just say I'm here waiting for my beautiful boyfriend to get out of class so we can go hang out at his house."
I paused a moment, looking at him from across the schoolyard. "Yep," I said, nodding in realization, pressing my lips tight together. "You're still an idiot. A sweet idiot, but an idiot all the same."
He smiled, raising one hand in a slight wave and I rolled my eyes and hoped that he could see it from there. "You should come over here. Talk to me."
"I am talking to you," I said, waving back.
"Face to face, it's funner that way."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah. I can't see if you're blushing or not from all the way over here."
I glanced over at Pete and Ray and Joe and Andy, and once I was sure none of them were looking my way, I quickly flashed my middle finger in Gerard's direction.
"Was that a threat or an offer?" he asked suggestively.
I rolled my eyes again. "I'm hanging up now, Gerard."
"Wait, are you gonna invite-"
"Maybe just Pete," I said quietly, looking over at them. They were talking, laughing. They already had a really good group, I didn't really need to be there. "Too many people at once, it's making me feel weird, I kinda feel stupid around them."
There was a short silence, and I looked back at Gerard, who was looking over at me with a soft expression. "You're not stupid, Frank."
"Yeah? Well, I feel like it."
"You're very intelligent, sweetheart."
I looked at my feet, studying my shoelaces. "Thanks. I guess. But, whatever. I don't feel like it."
"Frank, please, don't-"
"Can we, like, not do this right now?"
There was a pause, a slight falter in his voice. "Yeah. Whatever. I don't get why you don't believe me."
"Yeah, whatever."
He paused for a moment. "Are you okay? You seem... Off."
"Yeah, no, I'm fine," I said.
"Yeah?"
"Yeah, I fucking am... I gotta' go, Gerard," I sighed.
I felt like shit.
I felt like I was doing a lot of things wrong at once.
"Okay," he said, voice quiet.
"I'll see you later, okay?" I tried to force as much enthusiasm into my voice as possible. "Just, go home, I guess. I'll come over right after school and then we can go to my place."
"Okay," he agreed, still not sounding sure. "Yeah. See you later."
I didn't want to hang up after that, I wanted to say something more but I didn't know what, but I ended up doing it anyway, taking one last glance at Gerard before walking back to Pete and everyone else.
Pete and Andy were arguing about something with music, something about Motley Crue and whether they actually did suck in recent live performances or not, and Joe seemed to be agreeing with what Pete said. I sat back down on the ground, a little further away than I had been before.
Ray looked over at me, frowning slightly. "Everything okay?"
"Yeah," I said, nodding, lying.
"You sure? I don't mean to pry, but you look don't look the happiest."
I shrugged a bit, noticing Pete turn to us slightly and letting Joe take over his side of whatever the argument was.
"I'm fine," I insisted. "Just annoyed with my- my boyfriend, I guess, but it's whatever. I don't even know what I'm actually annoyed about."
There was a short silence during which I immediately regretted saying 'boyfriend.'
Pete's face fell.
"I'm sure it's fine, whatever it is," Ray said, and I was glad that that was all he had to say. I was glad that there was no surprised gasp of 'you're gay?' or an accusation of 'faggot."
The look on Pete's face hurt equally as much as any of those words could've, though.
I should've led the conversation with something about Gerard. I'd planned on mentioning him, so Pete knew, but-
"Frank's got a boyfriend?" Andy said, studying my face, evidently having joined our conversation.
"Yeah," I said, my cheeks turning pink.
I just wanted to get off of the subject, for Pete's sake and for mine.
"What's his name?"
"Gerard."
"'Gerard,'" Joe echoed. "That's neat. Makes me think of Gerard Hopkins."
Ray wrinkled his nose. "Wasn't Hopkins a writer or something?"
"Yeah," Pete said slowly, quietly. "He's actually one of my favorite poets. Any guy brave enough to write poetry is pretty fucking cool if you ask me."
"Yeah?" I said. "That's funny, I think Gee writes poems."
"'Gee,'" Andy repeated. "That's cute."
I rolled my eyes, knowing I was blushing. "Whatever."
"Does he call you Frankie?" Pete asked quietly. "I would call you Frankie, if- I mean- just-"
He fell silent and his face went three different shades of embarrassed pink.
"He does," I said, blinking at Pete. "Yeah, he does sometimes."
Pete looked away, scratching the back of his head. "Yeah, okay."
There was a silence that made me want to throw up.
Ray glanced at me, and then at Pete, like he knew there was some unspoken issue.
He cleared his throat. "Joe, Andy? You guys want to go ahead and go to English, so we beat the hall crowds?"
"Uh, yeah, sure," one of them, I didn't pay attention to which, said, and they all shuffled to collect their trash and books and things.
Joe glanced at Pete. "Hey, you coming Pete?"
"I'll be there in a minute," he said, looking down. "Don't wait up for me."
The three guys left and I sent Ray a thankful look, and he just returned it with a slight nod.
The second they were out of hearing range, I turned to Pete.
"Look, I'm sorry if-"
"Why didn't you say something?" he said, staring at his shoes. He sat with his legs stretched out in front of him, hands supporting him on the ground behind him. "If you fucking knew I liked you, why'd you get my hopes up like that? You never sit with anyone at lunch, like, ever, I thought maybe-"
"I'm sorry," I said. "I didn't mean to lead you on. I just want to be friends, Pete. I don't have many friends."
He laughed slightly, blinking a few times rapidly. "Yeah, I don't either."
"You have more than me."
He shrugged. "I guess. But the guys are mostly just in-school friends, y'know? We never really see each other beyond school, I spend weekends and summers and shit alone."
I felt bad almost instantly. At least I had people, people in general. Not many close people but at least they were there.
I had Sandra at the diner and Gerard, those were the only two people I really knew that well, and then there were the few people at school like Brendon and James that I saw maybe every once and a while after school, because if we all happened to be going to the record store or a concert or something we would go as a really loose, non-committed group so we at least would feel a little less alone.
"I'm sorry," I told him.
He laughed, short and unamused. "Yeah. Most people are."
I studied the side of his face for a minute. Pete was an attractive person, I had to admit that. I couldn't understand how in the hell he was still single. (But then again, I'd wondered the exact same thing about Gerard the first time we met.)
"Gerard is coming to my house tonight," I said. "To hang out and for dinner and shit. But my mom doesn't exactly know about our relationship or anything, so, it's just a 'as friends' thing. Do you wanna' come, hang out a while? Watch a movie or something?"
Pete was still focused on his shoes. He rolled his bottom lip into his mouth, chewing on it lightly. "So, let me get this straight; you're asking the kid who you know has a crush on you to come over to your house, while your boyfriend is there, to hang out and watch a movie?"
I rolled my eyes. "When you put it like that, I sound like an asshole. I'm just trying to be friends, Pete, and anyway, you'll like Gerard. I can teach you both to play guitar or something, or we can talk about comics or books or music or whatever. Whatever you want to do."
He chewed on his lip some more.
"Yeah. Okay. Sure. I don't know why, but sure."
I smiled. "Don't sound so worried, it'll be fine. I really want to be friends with you."
I stood up and picked up the trash from my lunch, leaning over and patting his shoulder. "Meet me after school, okay? By the tree in front of the building."
"Okay."
I started walking away, pausing and turning when I heard Pete's voice behind me.
"Hey, Frank?"
"Yeah, Pete?"
"For the record, I really like you. Like, really, really like you."
I blinked at him a few times. "For the record," I said. "I think you're a pretty cool kid, Pete, but you could do a hell of a lot better than me."
---
Pete was already by the tree by the time I got there.
Gerard was also there.
I watched from far off, watching them talk. They shook hands, Gerard shifted awkwardly, running his hand through his hair and smiling nervously. Pete was laughing but I couldn't tell much else.
I found it amazing how much easier it was to read Gerard's body than Pete's.
"Gee! Pete!" I called, walking towards them. The both waved, and I smiled. "Hey."
"Hey, Frank," Gerard said at the same time Pete said a quiet, "Hi, Frankie."
Pete flushed slightly and Gerard didn't seem to notice.
"I thought I told you to wait at your house?" I scolded Gerard.
He shrugged. "Figured it would be easier this way. Now we can all just walk to yours."
"Oh," I said. "Okay, uh, whatever. What about Mikey, he know you're gone?"
"Yeah, but he's at the comic store today anyway. They're starting a new Batman series, he pounced on the idea of it and said he'd be sure to tell me all about it."
Pete adjusted his backpack on his shoulders.
I nodded. "That sounds nice." I looked between my best friend, and my almost-friend-but-not-quite-there-yet friend. "Everyone ready to go, then?"
Pete nodded, said "Yeah," and glanced at Gerard, who just nodded.
I pointed down the road. "Well, that way we go, then."
We started walking, and Gerard got really quiet really fast. I didn't know if it was because how rude I'd been earlier, or if it was because Pete was there, but I didn't question it.
"So," Pete said, falling in to step with me as Gerard got a bit ahead of us. "Who's Mikey?"
"Gee's little brother. How old are you, Pete? I don't even know."
"Seventeen."
I nodded. "Mikey's four years younger than us."
"Oh." There was a small pause, and Pete tilted his head. "How old is Gerard?"
"Eighteen," I said.
"So, he's a senior? I haven't seen him around school anywhere."
"He's home schooled," I explained.
"Oh, that's cool. I've always wished I could be home schooled."
"Yeah? Me too. Gerard says he misses public school, though."
"Really?" Pete asked, surprised. "Why?"
"He misses having friends, I think," I said quietly. "His mom, Mikey, a few near-strangers and I are the only people he really has."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
"I can hear you guys talking about me," Gerard informed us.
"I know," I said back.
---
My mom wasn't home so the three of us sat in the living room floor and drank soda for a few hours. We talked about music and life and art, and I was really surprised by how much Gerard and I both had in common with Pete.
"I'm huge on writing, man," Pete confessed, pulling his legs in cross-legged-style, sipping at his Pepsi. "Not much of an artist, but I think I'm an okay writer."
"Gerard's a great artist, and writer," I offered. "And he plays piano."
"Yeah?" Pete asked. "You play piano, I play bass, Frank's got guitar. We could get Andy in on this to play drums and we could start ourselves a band."
"Who'd sing, though?" I asked. "I can't fucking sing worth a shit."
"I've never actually heard you sing," Gerard said. "Maybe, like, wailing along to the Misfits, but you suck on purpose to annoy Mikey. I've never heard you actually sing."
"Well, same could be said for you," I said, tapping him lightly with my foot.
"What about you, Pete?" Gerard asked. "You sing?"
"I try," he confessed.
"I do too," Gerard said, nodding.
They both looked at me, and I admitted with a long sigh that I, too, have tried to sing sometimes, too.
We chatted about just simple shit like that for a while, music and the kinds we liked, the instruments we knew how to play or wished we could play, and the kinds of music we liked to sing and wish we could sing (apparently, Gerard could only sing show tunes and Pete could only scream, but then again I just described myself as sounding like a "whiny little kid who hates his life.")
My mom walked into the house and straight into the living room about thirty minutes later, when we were deep into a conversation about the pros and cons of being in a band or being a solo artist, and she paused with key and purse in hand.
She blinked at me, and then at Gerard and Pete.
"Hi Frank, Hello Gerard," she said, blinking. "And, uh, who's this?"
"This is Pete Wentz," I introduced her.
Pete waved a small hello and my mom just nodded, looking at me.
"Frank, I thought just Gerard was coming today?"
I shrugged. "Well, I-"
"Kitchen. Now."
I glanced at Pete and blinked at him, and he just shrugged a small shrug.
I sighed and followed my mom to the kitchen.
"Who are these people," was the first half of her question, "and why are you suddenly Mr. Popular?"
I stared at my mom, trying to figure out if she was serious or not. "They're my friends," I said slowly, "and it's like two people, mother. I'm literally the least popular person in school."
"Well, why are you suddenly talking to people again, huh? What happened to your whole 'social aniexy' thing?"
I felt like choking, but whether I wanted to choke her or myself, I couldn't figure out.
"Mom," I just said. "Can you please, like, not make me feel like shit?"
She crossed her arms, putting all of her weight on one foot, and started saying something, but I honestly did not want to hear it.
"We'll be back inside for dinner in an hour," I said, leaving the kitchen, sighing.
Gerard and Pete were both standing up when I walked back in the living room.
"Everything okay?" Pete asked, frowning.
I just nodded, but between his gaze and Gerard's, I could tell that they knew I didn't mean it.
"Come on," Gerard said, standing a bit straighter. "Why don't we, like, go outside, or something, get some fresh air?"
I considered for a moment. "Well. That's a good idea. You guys stay in here, I'll be right back, okay? I'm gonna' go grab something from upstairs."
---
By the time I'd managed to teach Gerard how to play a few songs on the guitar, Pete was giggling hysterically at the two of us, laying on in back in the grass nearby.
"You laughing at me, Wentz?" Gerard grinned, strumming a few awkward, completely out of tune chords.
"Maybe," he giggled. "What ya' gonna do about it, Way?"
I laughed at the two of them, shaking my head. "You two are such dorks."
"You know you love it," Pete said with a smile.
I just rolled my eyes, but grinned anyway. "Yeah, I guess you're right, I sorta do."
And then Gerard smiled, too, and everyone was happy.
---
The rest of the night was really nice, until about dinner. Pete went home, his mom called him on his cellphone and informed him that they had some family visiting that night, so he offered us both hugs and then left with a wave, promising me that I could totally sit with him at lunch again tomorrow.
The second Gerard and I walked into the kitchen, though, a small piece of my own personal hell broke loose.
My mom was on the phone, with who I assumed was just her flavor of the week, until I started really listening to the conversation.
"Soon," she insisted, as she was closing the fridge. "Yeah, I know, I know- Okay, sweetheart. Love you too."
I blinked a few times. "Who was that?" I asked, leaning against the kitchen counter. Gerard hovered a bit awkwardly next to me, not really seeming to know what to do with himself.
"A friend of mine," was all my mom said, shrugging. "He's coming over for dinner next Friday."
"Really?"
She glared at me. "Yes, really."
"So, I'm gonna' have to be here for this?"
"Yes, I expect you to be. And if you're not, there will be consequences."
I looked at Gerard, who was giving me a sympathetic glance.
I mouthed "help," at him, but he didn't seem to know how.
There was a short pause, a bit of silence.
"Mrs. Iero," Gerard said, leaning on the counter next to me. "I don't mean to be rude-"
"If you have to say that," she interrupted. "Then whatever you're about to say is probably rude."
The silence that followed that was a stunned one, Gerard blinking in shock and I feeling like punching my own mother in the face.
"So," my mom said, turning suddenly towards the dining room. "Who's ready for dinner?"