When Loving You Comes So Naturally, What Else Can Be Expected?

I love you.

His words rang in my head like an alarm clock, reminding me that I had to get up and face this soon enough.

I walked slowly into Red Ridge Forest, trying to catch my breath and think logically for a moment after running out of my own room like a madman. But I really couldn't help it, people just don't say that shit to me.

I mean, avoiding him would not work as well as I would want it to because he lived two doors down from me.

But I still can't believe he said it. It was...overwhelming.

Which is probably why I left him on my bed, confused as fuck.

A part of me knew that I couldn't hide out forever. Sooner or later, I would have to answer one of the thousands of calls signaling that I definitely had him worried. Sooner or later, I would have to go home and face this. Face him.

And I so didn't want to.

"You should really pick a better place to hide out if you're trying to avoid me."

I jumped, the voice catching me off guard.

"Frankie." I said without even bothering to turn around. I knew he sensed the difference in the way I said his name. Cold, indifferent. His knowledge of this showed in his silence.

Finally, he spoke. "Look Gerard, I don't know what the fuck that was back there--"

I turned around, my eyes narrowing due to his tone. Irritated, annoyed. Like I was out of line for doing what I did. Maybe I was, but I certainly didn't need him rubbing my face in it.

"To say I was caught off guard would be putting it mildly, Frank."

"Regardless of being caught off guard, you don't run out of the room like the house is on fire when someone admits that they love you, Gerard!"

"Well, excuse me for being the least bit hesitant if--"

"Do you know how hard that was for me to say, Gerard? Do you really?" He got louder. "No, you don't," He answered his own question, "because that would involve you caring about someone other than yourself for once!"

"I do care about people other than myself!"

"Really?" He asked incredulously. "If you weren't so wrapped up in your own self-preservation, you would see that other people have feelings, Gerard! And not only that, but you might learn that you actually have feelings, too!"

"I think you damn well know that I have feelings for you." I said lowly.

"Evidently not enough to even care that I completely and totally put myself out there! I put everything on the line for you! Hell, I put this whole...whatever this is..." He said, motioning between me and him, "on the fucking line by saying that to you! And you know something? I thought it would be worth it. I mean, I knew you were all jaded and messed up before, but I thought maybe you were getting better about it. Maybe you were letting yourself actually feel something for once in your goddamn life and that you wouldn't shy away from this, from us!"

"I do know how to feel, Frank. And just for your information, I have put myself out on the line before, and I got totally screwed because of it!"

"And you won't let anyone ever forget it, Gerard! God, ever since that happened to you you've been walking around with this chip on your shoulder and have closed yourself off to people who really care about you! Look at you and Mikey, that relationship's going down the tube because you care way too much about getting hurt."

"You have no idea--"

"Really? Do you know that for sure? I think I have a pretty good idea of what getting your heart broken feels like."

I stayed silent.

Frank walked over to the edge of the forest that bordered a lake and sat down, facing away from me. I stood several feet away, uncertain of what to do.

"When I was a kid, I spent so much time with my dad. I mean, I loved him more than anything in the whole world. We did everything together, we went to movies, the park, watched television, everything. He even tucked me in bed every single night and told me the same exact story...some stupid ass story he made up forever ago, but it always did the trick and helped me fall asleep." He paused. "He called me il mio bello ragazzo." He smiled and looked back at me with a knowing look. "It means my beautiful boy."

I stood there, stunned. Not only had Frank never talked about his parents or anything to do with his background or life in general before living here, but he never mentioned he was Italian, either.

"Anyways, my mom was this famous writer and she went on book tours a lot. She had this grueling schedule when she went away, going to five different states all in one day and whatnot, and so she didn't take me on most of them. She let me stay at home with my dad which, obviously, I had no problem with...at the time.

But, uh, one night he fed me dinner and we watched tv until I was kind of tired, as usual. He tucked me into my bed and told me that same story and walked to the door. But...instead of walking out of it, he shut it. The lights were already off, so I could barely make out his figure walking back to my bed." My eyes widened, alarmed at the sudden overwhelming pain in his voice.

"He told me I couldn't tell anyone. He said I wouldn't be his beautiful boy anymore if I did. That I was special, different from all the other boys at school and that they'd all be upset if they found out what happened." He was openly crying now, I could tell from the fact that his whole body was shaking and whimpers were coming out of his mouth.

"And I believed him for so long. He did it every single time my mom went on her tours. I hated her leaving then, because I hated what he would do to me every night while she was gone. But I knew I couldn't say anything. I always wanted to be his beautiful boy, I loved him so goddamn much.

My mom even knew. She fucking knew about everything. She had come home late one night, the night before she was due home actually. She caught us. She didn't even say or do anything. Just went into major denial about it all.

But one day at school me and this one kid, James, were fighting. It was something stupid, we were just in middle school. And I wanted to make him really mad, I wanted him to be jealous of me. And I remembered what my dad would say about how upset the other kids at school would be because what we had was different then what they had with their dads. So I told him. He spit right in my fucking face, called me a sicko. The good part was that a teacher had overheard the whole thing, and went straight to the cops. There was no denying it then. The truth was out.

They took my dad away, and I cried so hard that night. I had never wanted it to be this way, I still loved him after everything. He had told me for so long that it was okay, what we did, and I had believed him. I had been so stupid.

The court sentenced my dad with the help of the rape kit that they had done on me for evidence. Then my mom went to court. She was seen as an unfit mother and got some time too, for knowing about it all."

He paused, staring out into the lake. Wearily, I approached him. I sat down on the grass beside him and stared out into the lake, too.

Two broken boys with no idea how to care for one another.

"What happened then?" It was the first time I had spoken, and my voice felt hollow, rough. It hurt to speak because of the new-forming lump crawling it's way through my throat.

"Relocation happened then. They took me out of my home, my town, my friends, everything I had ever known. They dumped me in Belleville's Home of Hope orphanage. A year later when I turned fifteen they sent me off to Belleville High, which is where I met Mikey. You know the rest."

I sighed. Suddenly, I felt like the biggest shit on the whole planet.

"Frankie, I had no idea."

"I know you didn't." He looked at me. "Gerard, I didn't tell you I loved you to push you into anything you weren't ready for. I know you've been hurt before. It's just that...for over a year my guards been completely up. The only person I've let see behind that wall is Mikey, because he was a great friend who genuinely cared and was there for me. But then you came along. And I tried to fight it, I did. I tried to fight being attracted to you at all. I didn't think I'd be able to cope with being gay, not after the shit that happened with my dad. I thought he made me that way, and I felt so dirty for liking you. But I got past it, because I found out what a great guy you were...behind the pretense." I smiled. He looked into my eyes.

"When I'm with you, Gerard, I feel...different. I feel good. Like I can be this person who stands for something, who makes a difference. I felt the best I've felt since everything in my life just blew up. And I let you behind that wall, too, sometimes. And I realized how much you've helped me to move on from what my dad did to me, even without you knowing it. That's when I realized I loved you."

I looked at him pleadingly. He smiled.

"And I understand that you're not ready yet, that you can't say it back. I get it, I do. I just want you to be able to accept that I love you, and to not shy away from it. I want you to stop walking around with the chip on your shoulder because I care about you, I'm worried about all the things you'll miss. You can't let anybody control you, no matter what."

I felt a million emotions swarming around in my head at once. The jaded past that Frankie had revealed to me coupled with the immense confession of love had my head going in a million different directions all at once, and I wanted to cry and scream and kiss him in the same minute. I was confused.

"I'm sorry." I said, and I didn't know what I meant it for. For what had happened to him, and how I couldn't protect him from it. For walking around with a twisted outlook on life when I suddenly realized that I hardly had the right to compared to his past. Or for not being able to say those three words back to him, the three words I knew would be another step in his long road to recovery.

"I know." He said, and somehow I realize that he understood it all. There were suddenly a million things I wanted to apologize for, and he forgave me for every one of them.

I felt my heart swell to an unbelievable size, and in that moment I cared for Frankie so compassionately that I almost said it back.

Almost.

But no one's really perfect.

"I just...don't want to say it hollowly. I want there to be actual meaning behind it when I do."

"I know, Gerard. I know."

And for a while we just sat there, staring out at the lake and our perfect view of the setting sun. Holding hands, wanting to believe that there was nothing to worry about. For a moment, forgetting we had troubles. We sat there, connected by our hands and by our hearts, forgetting any other home, any other past, but this.