Getting Surreal

When they’d finally made it to the bus after a short detour to tell Brian where they were headed so he wouldn’t have to worry about them and asking him to relay the message to Frank so he wouldn’t wonder where his tech had gone off to, Gerard made himself comfortable in the corner of the wrap-around sofa in the back lounge while Becks rooted in a drunken and haphazard way through the band’s dvd collection, aimlessly tossing aside the ones she wasn’t interested in watching at the moment.

“Anything you really want?” She asked him, flipping through the titles.

“Nah, your call,” he replied, leaning back in his seat, shutting his eyes for a moment.

“Yessss,” he heard her whisper dramatically and looked up to see her shoving a disk in the player. He gave her a questioning look. “You’ll see,” she said with a smile. She took a step towards the couch, then froze, her smile edging away to a frown, drunken thoughts clearly flooding her mind.

“Gerard,” she said, frowning at her feet.

“Becks,” he imitated her serious voice, making her meet his eyes with a smile.

“Is it’kay if I…” she frowned again, thinking, then took a deep breath and followed through with her thought. “I won’ if y’feel uncomfortable…” She paused again, the frown growing ever present.

“Becks,” he caught her attention. “You can drink around me.” He stated it with such sincerity that when she looked at him skeptically, he had to fight the urge to roll his eyes. “Seriously, it’s fine,” he smirked, but his smirk turned into a genuine smile when he saw her face light up. He’d gotten to know Becks fairly well living in close quarters with her over the last couple of weeks, but he was still amazed at her shyness and her overall concern about not crossing other people’s boundaries and respecting their personal decisions.

“You’re sur-“

“Beck’s,” he cut her off, his head bowed in a gesture of openness. “Seriously, go get a drink.”

With that, she smiled widely at him, then ran off to fetch a beer from the bus fridge. Gerard hit the button on the remote to start the movie when she returned, still with that dopey grin on her face as she sat herself on the couch next to him, snuggling into her seat before looking over at him.

“You seen this?” She asked as the menu for Die Hard flashed on the screen.

“Fuck, you kidding me?” He responded incredulously. “Such a good fucking movie!”

She just smiled a nose-scrunching smile and cuddled further into her blanket and muttered “Good.”

---

About twenty minutes later, the rest of the band make their way noisily onto the bus, clearly being herded by Brian, with the way he was yelling directions at them all. Becks looked at Gerard to see if he was hearing all the racket, too, and he just playfully rolled his eyes, drawing a smile from her.

She had just looked back at the screen and focused into the film when the lounge door opened, distracting her once again.

“Hey, Mikes,” she heard Gerard say as he paused the movie. She instantly looked up to see an unsteady on his feet Mikey Way holding himself up on the doorframe, taking in the two people sat on the couch in front of him.

When his eyes met Becks’, he let out a doofy, drunken grin. “Hey,” he said to her.

“Hi!” She smiled back. “Die Hard,” she threw a hand up in the direction of the tv.

“Wanna watch?” Gerard invited.

“Fuck yeah!” Mikey muttered excitedly. “One sec.” And then he was gone back down the hallway, reappearing after a moment with a blanket from his bunk in hand.

When he went to join them on the couch, Becks expected him to take the big, open spot that was on her right. She let out a surprised squeak when he instead squeezed into the small space between her and Gerard, having to shove her over a bit to fit.

“Heyyy,” she whined playfully, not moving from the awkward position he’d pushed her into.

He didn’t say anything, but just leaned over her and plucked the empty beer bottle out of her hands and set it on the floor. Then, he reached over and pulled her into him…no…practically on top of him, throwing the blanket over them both and looking at his brother to un-pause the movie.

Gerard just looked at him with an eyebrow raised, amused at his brother’s behavior. “You all settled?” He asked with a smirk.

Mikey nodded and Becks let out a small “mmhmm,” snuggling into him, laying her head on his chest. If she weren’t so drunk, she would probably be blushing but, at that moment, any sort of embarrassment or whatever was thrown out the window in lieu of complete contentment.

---

“Does it sound like I’m ordering a fucking pizza!” Becks drunkenly shouted out the line along with the movie and felt Mikey chuckle against her. She turned her head slightly to look up at him. He looked down at her and smiled a small smile that she returned, the rest of the room dropping out of focus.

Without breaking their eye contact, one of his hands came up and smoothed back some hair that had fallen in her face. This time, she did blush lightly, and snuggled back into his chest while his hands kept playing with her hair. She was so soothed and warm and comfortable (and not to mention pretty dang drunk), that she just couldn’t keep her eyes from slowly slipping shut, the movie long forgotten.

“What?” Mikey asked his brother, a challenging eyebrow raised, when he noticed his brother staring in his and Becks’ direction.

Gerard didn’t answer, still taking them in, biting his lip thoughtfully. Then, he looked back at the tv and stretched out a little. “Nothing,” he mumbled as he watched John McClane blow up the elevator shaft.

---

When Becks woke up the next morning, she woke up confused.

Not my bunk, she thought as she came to. She didn’t have to open her eyes to know the difference between the cramped, cot style bunk and wherever she was currently laying. This thought was followed immediately by, fuck, it’s bright! when she opened her eyes to try and figure out where she was. She groaned, screwing her eyes shut again, and trying to burrow deeper into what she’d been sleeping on.

She froze.

That didn’t feel like a bed. That felt like a…person?

She opened her eyes again, slowly this time so they could adjust to the brightness in the room, and took in her surroundings. This time, she could clearly see all the defining features of the back lounge on the tour bus-the awkwardly patterned blanket that Gerard for some reason insisted on keeping in the back and the cupboard in the corner with the chip on the side from a few days ago when Frank and Bob had been wrestling for some drunken reason were the things specifically popped out to her. They’d only been sharing the vehicle a few weeks and it had already become a familiar feeling home. She let out a mental sigh of relief. At least I’m on the bus, she thought.

Her slight movements while she looked around must have caused the person she’d fallen asleep with to stir a little, because they threw an arm around her waist and pulled her a little closer, nuzzling their nose into her hair.

Who the hell…. She thought to herself grumpily and was just about to turn in their arms to see who it was, when a voice broke her train of thought.

“Mikes! Becks!” She winced and looked up to see the door to the lounge burst open, one Frank Iero standing with one hand on the doorknob, a smug look on his face as he took in what Becks imagined was quite the scene. “Oh, good,” he said with a smirk when they made eye contact, “you’re awake.”

Whoever was behind her let out an aggravated ‘fuck you for waking me up’ groan and pulled Becks closer to them, seemingly trying to hide themselves from the intrusion.

Wait. Mikes?

Frank could apparently see when the lightbulb went off in Becks’ head, because he just started giggling, shut the door, and left them to their peace.

But Becks didn’t really notice him too much, because she was busy twisting around to get a good look at who and…oh.

Yeah, that was Mikey there, that had his arms wrapped around her, the two of them somehow squeezed on the couch together. His lips were slightly turned down into a small frown from all the disturbance, his usually meticulously styled hair was all mussed up, and his glasses were laying askew on his face.

Becks felt her heart almost stop for a second.

After taking the sight of him in for another few seconds, she internally sighed.

She really, truly, very honestly from some vague, deep down place of her questionable soul did not want to disturb this moment any more than it already had been, but with Frank barging in, shouting their names, she figured that they were needed somewhere and had to get up.

“Mikey,” she whispered. His brow furrowed a little, but he didn’t move other than that. She let out a tiny, near silent giggle and reached up to very, very gently right his glasses on his face then ran her fingers through his hair, smoothing down the crazy bits. “Mikey,” she whispered again, her voice a little stronger.

At this, he groaned again and pulled her even closer, so they were just about flush against each other. She kept playing with his hair as she watched him slowly, slowly come to. Finally, he opened his eyes a little to look at her, sleepy confusion evident on his face.

“Good morning,” she whispered with an amused ghost of a smile.

He groaned out something that sounded like a “mornin’” and buried his face into the crook of her neck. She just kept petting his hair and rubbed his back for the next little bit while he collected himself.

“How did we get here?” He mumbled into her collarbone after a minute, his hoarse morning voice coming out muffled.

She let out a mix between a chuckle and a sigh. “I have no clue.” She shook her head and he lifted his, squinting down at her.

“Was that Frank?” He asked with a frown.

She let out a real chuckle, then. “Sure was.”

“I’m gonna kill him.”

Mikey was so monotone when he said it, that Becks couldn’t contain her laughter. And just one look at his not-at-all amused facial expression, and she was laughing even harder…hard enough to shift a little in her position on the couch, causing her to fall off and hit the floor with a loud thud.

“Oh, shit!” Mikey said, leaning over the edge of the couch to peer down at her, laughing himself now.

“Fuck,” she giggled, rolling over on her back from the awkward position she’d landed in. “I’m so hungover!” She moaned out, covering her face with her hands, trying to contain herself.

“Oh yeah,” Mikey said, “me too,” he agreed, laying his chin on the side of the sofa. “You need help?” He threw out an arm in gesture.

“Nah,” she said, letting out a last chuckle, sighing. “I’m good…just need some Advil or coffee or something.” He hummed in response as she stood up, heading wobbly towards the door. “Better go see what Captain Shorty Pants needs.” And then she left, leaving the door open, and Mikey watched her amble to the front of the bus for a second before getting up and following her lead.