I Didn't Mean to Fall in Love (But I Did)

“You understand how much I’m risking by just speaking to you two?” the woman asks, with her pursed lips in a frown across her heavily botoxed face.

“Evidently a lot because you just said you were risking anything at all,” Frank states.

“I could lose my job for this,” she says.

“Well it’s too late for me to lose my job. You know, because Aaron Crépeau is a piece of shit and got me fired than proceeded to make it impossible for me to ever be hired in a job again.”

“So you say,” the interviewer replies and Frank may not like her as a person, but he’s still really hoping she’s not actually horrible like she’s coming off to be.

“Why would I lie about that?” Frank replies, “Do you realize how little I would gain by tearing down this man? If I hadn’t been in a relationship with the guy, why on earth would I care about him? I was a waiter at the oldest, dingiest diner in town, do you really think I even knew who he was? The only magazines, or news articles I read have pictures of puppies on the covers. I literally would never have crossed paths with him if I hadn’t dated him. So, no, I’m not lying. I may be biased because I have a great desire to tear his lungs out of his body, but I’m not dishonest.”

Gerard smiles at Frank when he goes on his minor rant, because there’s something attractive about the tone of his voice. Now granted, there’s something attractive about the tone of his voice, no matter what tone it is, but Gerard really likes this one especially.

The interviewer clears her throat, “Alright, so aside from the blackballing is there anything else to be noted, before I get more details?”

“Uh yeah, there was the bowl he threw at my face,” Frank says.

“And the part where he tried to isolate Frank from all of his friends, including me, his roommate,” Gerard says.

“And the time where he threatened Gerard,” Frank says.

“And there’s the fact that Aaron got him fired in the first fucking place,” Gerard concludes.

“Yeah, that kind of sums it up,” Frank says, “oh, and I can’t forget about all the times he guilt tripped me. Like there was that time where he tried to get in my pants and, granted, he took no for an answer, but he pouted about it for days. He treated me like shit for rejecting him.”

“You never told me that,” Gerard frowns.

“Well I didn’t want you to do something stupid.”

“I’d have probably done something stupid. Good call.”

“Yeah,” Frank says, “well so Aaron was just always telling me what to do, taking me places I didn’t really want to go, because apparently I would enjoy a five star restaurant more than three dollar tacos. By the way, I don’t know if you’ve ever been to a restaurant where the wine costs more than three years’ salary, but the food is not as fantastic as they’d like to make you think. Literally my food tasted like seawater with a hint of balsamic vinegar, and let’s just put it this way, balsamic vinegar is the work of Satan.”

“Colorful description,” the interviewer responds, jotting something down.

“Yeah, he just didn’t listen to me. God, he always had to be right. I never even noticed it until it was like, behind me, but they say hindsight is 20/20 for a reason. No, but seriously, like whatever the fuck I tried to say, he was right. Always him. God, I couldn’t get a word in edgewise,” Frank continues.

“That just means he’s a lunatic because you’re the most interesting person to listen to that I know,” Gerard says, and Frank blushes than hits him in the arm.

“So what’s the nature of your relationship? You two?” the interviewer asks and Frank raises an eyebrow because, this woman is either a blind idiot, or... no, well a blind idiot. Pete describes Gerard and Frank as ‘so disgustingly coupley that I’m going to have to push you two off a ten story building just to rid myself of all the cooties swarming off of you.’

Frank rolls his eyes and looks at the woman, trying not to sound condescending, because the last thing he wants is to piss her off so that she doesn’t write the article.

“This is Gerard, he was my roommate,” Frank says, “and he is now currently my boyfriend.”

“So it’s a romantic relationship?”

“Yes. He fucks me,” Gerard adds without emotion.

“Graphic,” Frank says.

“Could’ve been worse,” Gerard shrugs.

“So do you think your relationship contributed to the collapse of your relationship with Aaron?” The interviewer asks.

“Well,” Frank fidgets, “yeah. ‘Cause the thing is that I’d been in love with Gerard for what, like five years, coming up on six now, and Gerard is an idiot. A certifiable idiot. His only real loves in this world are superheroes and coffee. That’s the only shit Gerard cared about so he didn’t fucking notice that, hey, I’m in love with him. And then Aaron comes along and he’s dashing and sweet and rich and I didn’t notice any of those problematic things, because when you’re falling for someone, you put on horse blinders. Seriously, the past month I have somehow overlooked the fact that Gerard takes really long showers and uses up all the hot water.”

“Do I do that?” Gerard asks, sounding guilty.

“Yeah, but it’s endearing,” Frank replies, “and also it gives me a reason to join you because I don’t want to take a shower at a polar temperature.”

“Oh so that’s why-”

“Exactly,” Frank interrupts him, “but anyway, back to Aaron’s involvement in my life, he was my way of getting over Gerard, and for a little while I thought it was going to work. It was brand new and exciting and there was that hope that maybe I’d be able to move on. I’d felt like a Soap Opera star for too long, but then this asshole, let’s call him Gerard, decides that he’s been in love with me for a really long time but he’s just so goddamn stupid-”

“So fucking stupid,” Gerard mutters, shaking his head.

“Right. So stupid, he was in love with me and didn’t realize it and he came onto me which was like a little insane, whoa, because I was in a relationship. So I pushed Gerard away, because I am anything but a cheater, but I realized that there was no way I was going to be able to make things work with Aaron when it’s clear that I wasn’t over Gerard. So I just went over to Aaron and told him, he was a great guy, you know, like perfect for someone out there, but that it just wasn’t going to work out, because there’s someone else I think I might be crazy for. Anyway, long story short, that angered Aaron, because I had been dating him for like two and a half months which made me essentially his property in his head, and then he threw a bowl at my face.”

“Yes, don’t forget to acknowledge the bowl throwing,” Gerard says, “Because if it had hit him that would have been a real tragedy. Have you seen how pretty he is?”

Frank giggles, “Oh man, we are so appallingly coupley.”

“I know, isn’t it great?”

“It’s the best thing ever, it’s fantastic!” Frank says. Mostly because he’s never been one half of that really mushy couple that everyone gets annoyed by. He’s been on the outside, looking and somewhat envying the overly affectionate couple, but he’s never been in it, and it feels good. It feels great. It’s the best feeling in the world, so much so that Frank does not even care that he is annoying everyone around him because he gets to be all gross and coupley with Gerard. If it were anyone but Gerard he’d have to take a step back in life and hit himself over the head with a table lamp. Considering it is Gerard though, he has to do no such thing, he’s just going to cling to the guy like he needs hugs to breathe. Which, Frank is sure, he’s developing a rare disorder where that is indeed the case. He needs to be cuddled or else he dies.

“Okay,” the interviewer says, trying to rail the conversation back onto topic, “so don’t you think your involvement with your roommate might have sparked some sort of jealousy in Mr. Crépeau?”

“That’s kind of the point of when he threatened me in the hallway,” Gerard says.

“Okay, and what happened exactly?”

“Well, so Frank invited Aaron over for dinner and things did not go smoothly. I’ll admit my behavior was atrocious, I was not very polite to him at all. I get that, I’m in the future, I see that now. So Frank got mad at me because I was being really cold to his boyfriend. So Frank decided they were going to leave because it was just too much to handle and the situation was going to get way worse if he’d stayed. I kind of get that, sort of, but I haven’t entirely forgiven the part where he left for nine days. But anyway, as Frank was leaving, I followed him out to apologize, but Aaron ambushed me in the hallway and the dude was super mysterious with his threat. It was subtle, but he was definitely threatening me.”

“I never believed him until a few weeks ago when I saw that side of Aaron for myself,” Frank explains.

“But if you cheated on the man, doesn’t that give him some right to get angry?” The interviewer asks.

“I did not cheat on him! I didn’t! I did not cheat! Did not. Cheating was not done by me. Aaron has never been cheated on by me. I did not cheat on Aaron with Gerard, or anyone else for that matter.”

“I think she got the picture, Frankie,” Gerard says.

“I am not a cheater!” Frank says again, “Okay? I didn’t. Gerard just sort of came onto me, and I was like ‘oh so this is a thing that is happening right now, what to do?’ and then I told him that I’m not a cheater.”

The interviewer raises her pen like she’s about to contradict him, and starts “But-”

“No!” Frank yells, “If you order a veggie burger at a restaurant and they intentionally serve you a real burger masquerading as a veggie burger, you’re still a vegetarian! You just had a blip there where someone tried to change you. Gerard came on a little strong, but he backed off, and, once he cooled down, he apologized for it. Aaron never did that, by the way, if we got into an argument, it was always my fault. I didn’t cheat on Aaron though, that’s my point.”

“So you didn’t cheat?”

“Do you really want him to lecture you again?” Gerard asks, “Because I have known Frank for a very long time. I promise you, Frank will keep going. He will hand in a ten page essay on all the reasons why what happened between us does not constitute cheating.”

Frank smiles and adds, “Single spaced.”

“Right. A single spaced essay,” Gerard confirms. “In eleven point font! Ain’t no twelve point shit, no, Frank is going to go big, because he is already home so he would have trouble going big or alternatively going home.”

“That was a long way to go,” Frank says.

“Yeah, and the joke really wasn’t worth it.”

“No, not really,” Frank says, making a face, but he’s smiling anyway.

“Can we get back to the interview?”

“What?” Frank asks, looking around like he’d forgotten the existence of the interviewer completely, “Oh yeah, sorry. It’s just that we get sidetracked easily.”

“Very easily,” Gerard nods. “Sorry, I’m not helping.”

“No, not really,” the interviewer says, looking bored.

“Okay, let’s get to it! How many questions do you have total?”

The interviewer looks down at her notebook and counts for a moment before saying, “thirty.”

Gerard and Frank groan in unison, then laugh because they groaned in unison, and this earns them a scold from the interviewer. They then sit quietly trying not to laugh like they’re schoolchildren who just got put into a timeout and are not sorry in the slightest. They aren’t sorry though, because they’re just really giddy off the fact that they can be all gross and coupley in front of whoever they like now, because they’re actually a couple. And that’s what matters, really.