Fickle Reticence

“You ever get insanely cryptic text messages from Gerard that force you to wonder whether the world is falling out of the sky or the more likely possibility, they ran out of ramen?” Frank asks.

“What kind of text did you get?”

Frank looks down at his phone and reads the message back to Mikey, “’I think I’m dying, Frank, please will you kill my professor for me?’”

“Sounds pretty melodramatic,” Mikey shrugs, “though you’ve threatened the deaths of several of your teachers as well.”

Frank shrugs, “I know. There are some other texts here as well. My personal favorite is ‘gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah’ with 21 a’s.”

“What class is it?”

Frank shrugs, “I have no idea. I just know that it’s ‘gah’ with 21 a’s worthy.”

“Why did you count all the a’s?”

“Because I’m bored,” Frank replies.

“Don’t you have class in like,” Mikey looks at the clock in the right hand corner of his computer, “fifteen minutes?”

“My professor canceled, I got the email this morning,” Frank says, lying upside down on his bed, mostly just to see how long it will take for him to become dizzy. He likes awkward angles that no one else could find comfortable. Frank’s constantly practicing for the monkey bar Olympics.

“Please tell me you did not mortally wound your professor.”

“No, don’t be silly. If I were to mortally wound someone I’d make sure they were incapable of sending an email because they’re in too much pain. No, my professor has a cold. Apparently it’s okay for him to cancel the class because Mr. Ninety year old tweed jacket with the ugly elbow patches got sick, but when I get sick it’s a whole different story.”

“You know they don’t take attendance in college, right? Like, you don’t have to go to class if you’re sick.”

Frank frowns, but he’s literally upside down on his head, hence making it look like a smile somewhat. Mikey looks at him, trying to reason how stupid Frank looks, while also trying to write a fifteen page paper.

“I have no money, Mikey. No money whatsoever. I am going to be paying for this tuition until I have been dead for several hundred years. If I’m paying that much for this, I sure as hell am not going to be skipping anything.”

“Suit yourself,” Mikey shrugs.

“Ugh, Mikey, I want coffee and a diploma,” Frank groans.

“Same.”

“I also want to make out with Gerard,” Frank adds.

“Not same. Gross.”

“Oh, I have a text!” Frank says when the annoying sound of his phone fills the room. He downloaded the loudest message tone he could find so that it would annoy the shit out of Mikey. It also annoys Frank, but at least he never misses a text, because the damn thing is louder than a gunshot.

“Gerard?” Mikey asks.

“Yes. I told them that you were being stupid and looked like you just ate a lemon. Gerard says, ‘Mikey’s such a bitter person, a lemon probably tastes like pure sugar.’”

Mikey nods, “I can confirm that that is one hundred percent factual and accurate.”

“So you must really hate things like Cheesecake and stuff, huh? It’s probably like being injected with molasses.”

“If that’s you trying to find a loophole to steal cheesecake from me than it will not work. Frank, I will murder you if you ever try to steal any kind of cake from me.”

“Urinal cake?”

“You’re welcome to steal as many urinal cakes from me as you wish, but nothing else, okay? Nothing else,” Mikey says with warning in his tone.

“Alright, fine. No cheesecake thefts if I want to keep breathing,” Frank says defensively.

About twenty minutes later, while Frank is attempting to complete all of Bohemian Rhapsody by himself, Mikey is getting ready to murder Frank. Frank’s still upside down on his bed, and his face is turning red because of the blood rushing onto his face, but he doesn’t seem to notice or care.

“Frank,” Mikey says, gritting his teeth, “would you maybe stop?”

Frank doesn’t respond, he just continues to sing, wildly out of key.

“Is Gee’s class over yet? Go bother them, okay? Go bother someone who isn’t trying to write a paper!”

“I'm just a poor boy!”

“Yeah, I get it, and nobody loves you. Including me,” Mikey says with complete deadpan on his face. “Please, would you go?”

Frank just draws his eyebrows together which looks really bizarre when he’s upside down, and he raises his middle finger which also looks really bizarre when he’s upside down.

“Alright, how much do I have to pay you for you to go away?” Mikey asks.

Frank grins and raises his hands showing all ten fingers.

“No, I can’t afford that,” Mikey shakes his head and reaches into his pocket, “how about three bucks and two pieces of gum?”

Frank considers for a moment and finally asks, “What flavor of gum?”

Mikey rolls his eyes, looks at the stick of gum and sniffs it, “I don’t know. Smells like some type of fruit.”

“Deal,” Frank says, rotating on his bed. He shakes his head and stares around the room in a daze for a moment because he’s not used to being right side up. He blinks his eyes, but his vision turns white for a moment and then fades away leaving him with just a weird feeling in his head.

“You are so cheap,” Mikey rolls his eyes.

“Yeah, whatever. Gimme,” Frank says, grabbing the money and gum that Mikey threw onto his bedspread. “I’m going to go make out with Gerard now.”

“Okay, have fun,” Mikey says, obviously not listening to Frank at all.

“And then I’m going to shave your head and buy a pet crocodile to live under your bed. Ha, that rhymed!”

“That’s great.”

Frank giggles, and looks at Mikey from the door, “and I’m also going to impregnate the president. Maybe if I have time, I’ll even sell your kidney on the black market.”

“Good for you, Frank,” Mikey says.

Frank rolls his eyes and opens the door, “love you too, Mikey.”

Frank grins and makes his way out of the dorm again, because Gerard’s class actually did end like five minutes ago, but he was having too much fun annoying Mikey. Though he got three bucks out of the exchange so he’ll take this as a victory.

Frank skips across the campus, his feet carrying to Gerard’s room almost like it’s a second nature. He does spend a lot of time in Gerard’s room though.

When he knocks on the door, Gee opens it almost immediately and rolls their eyes when they see Frank.

“You piss off Mikey?”

“I did!”

“I’m proud of you,” Gerard replies and walks over to sit on their bed to continue looking at pictures of cats on the internet. Sometimes you just have to look at cats when you’ve had a stressful day.

“Aren’t you just?” Frank grins and goes over to sit on the bed right beside Gerard. Mostly he just wants to look over their shoulder at the cats.

“What’d you get from him?” Gerard asks, “He used to pay me in comic books.”

“I got three bucks and two sticks of gum,” Frank says.

“Oh really? Can I have one of the sticks of gum?”

“No!”

“You’re going to have to leave if I can’t have gum,” Gerard says, looking at Frank seriously.

“You fight dirty, just like Mikey. I see how you two are related now,” Frank replies.

“That was uncalled for. I’m way more attractive than Mikey,” Gerard jokes, “and also I have a much better nose.”

“You have the same fucking nose,” Frank says, throwing the gum at Gerard.

“No, mine is better,” Gerard says.

“My nose is better than both of yours,” Frank says rolling his eyes.

“Why are you here if all you want to do is insult my nose and throw gum at me?” Gerard asks, even though they’re smiling at Frank.

“Because, apparently Mikey doesn’t like hearing a repetitive encore of horribly off-key Queen songs.”

“That menace.”

“I know right?” Frank exclaims, and beams at Gerard. He’s really not over the fact that Gerard likes him. He’s not over the fact that anyone likes him. He’s Frank. He likes that someone likes him, but it confuses him greatly.

“What flavor is the gum? Mikey couldn’t tell.”

“You want to find out?”

“That’s disgusting, you’re gross,” Frank says, rolling his eyes, “I hate you, and also, sure, why not?”

A minute later Frank decides that it is some sort of mixed berry gum. It doesn’t really taste like fruit, it tastes like chemicals, but it tastes like chemicals trying to impersonate some variety of mixed fruit. Overall, not bad. It’s the packaging that sells it though.

“You don’t have homework do you?” Frank asks.

“Actually I have a lot of homework,” Gerard replies and makes a face.

“I have a lot too,” Frank says groaning, “I have a proposition for you.”

“And what would that be?”

“I would very much like to procrastinate all of my responsibilities with you,” Frank says, blinking his eyes at Gerard like one of the cats on the laptop.

“That depends on what fashion of procrastination you’re considering,” Gerard replies, looking at Frank, seemingly unaffected by the way he’s batting his eye lashes. Gerard is far from unaffected, the only thing running through their head is ‘damn, he’s cute.’

“Not a lot of talking,” Frank says, looking up at the ceiling like he’s thinking really hard, “and quite a bit of your tongue in my mouth.”

“I think I can be persuaded into procrastinating then,” Gerard says with a nod. Frank grins and then covers Gerard’s mouth with his own again. Because, you know, he can.