Chance

“Okay, so let me get this straight,” Gerard says, “you actually like sports?”

“Not in like a wooooo sports kind of way,” Frank replies, “in like a, I sort of care that my team wins sort of way. Like in a, I’d be bummed if The Devils lost a game but I wouldn’t sit through four hours of it every other day sort of way.”

“Okay, but I can’t even tell you what sport that is,” Gerard says. “My sports vocabulary is limited to like, the Yankees who play one of those sports with the running around in circles a lot, and like the Gryffindor Quidditch team.”

“I’m not super invested. I don’t have a jersey collection or anything,” Frank says.

“Yeah, but you can name a team, I’m not entirely sure what sport LeBron James plays. I can however tell you that Fred and George were the beaters, Harry was the seeker, Oliver Wood was the keeper, and a bunch of badass ladies, Katie, Angelina, and Alicia, were the chasers.”

“Wow so you weren’t kidding,” Frank says.

“I don’t kid when it comes to Harry Potter.”

“That’s so hot.”

“My interests are limited to fictional characters, and punk bands. Occasionally I’ll get obsessed with magic tricks, but that has only happened like seven times.”

“What do you mean by magic tricks?” Frank asks, suddenly very curious as to what’s going on in that beautiful bastard’s head. He’s now wondering how on earth a person who looks like that, a beautiful, gorgeous, statuesque jaw dropper of a man, could possibly be into card tricks. Like, Gerard is the kind of guy who walks into a straight bar and turns all the men in there gay. People with that sort of ability do not pull rabbits out of hats.

“Like, I really love magic tricks,” Gerard says. “In a nonironic way. I’ve seen Penn and Teller five times.”

“I don’t even know what that means,” Frank says. How did he fall for a magician, he’s going to get Gerard’s pants off someday and he’s going to ask Frank if this is his card.

“You don’t know who Penn and Teller are?” Gerard asks, looking like Frank just said something blasphemous.

“You don’t know who LeBron James is,” Frank counter backs.

“Touché,” Gerard nods. “But I love magic, and I don’t know why. It might be because I love Harry Potter, and magic is cool. Watching someone do something impossible is one of the greatest feelings in the world.”

Suddenly, Frank loves magic though, because Gerard loves magic, and if this man can love something as stupid as magic, well then Frank would love to be his slutty assistant.

“I’ve never been into magic,” Frank shrugs, “I don’t like the fact that everything is fake, nothing magical is actually happening, it’s just a trick.”

“Well it depends on your point of view, but I think that it’s cool because it’s real, and not special effects.”

“Yeah, but it’s not real magic. It’s not really happening,” Frank says.

“I disagree. ‘Real magic’ is what we call the magic that can’t be done, the stuff in Harry Potter is ‘real magic’ even though it’s impossible, and yet the magic that can be done, tricks, illusions, and all things involved with trickery, that’s what we call ‘fake magic.’ Why do we call the impossible one real when it’s not, and the possible one fake when the opposite is true?”

“You’re such a fucking dork,” Frank says, “I love that.”

“You’re just pandering,” Gerard says, and scoffs overdramatically until Frank punches him in the arm. A little harder than was maybe necessary, but it’s alright. Gerard would love for Frank to give him a couple more bruises around his neck area. Maybe his thighs too. Gerard really does have a lot of kinks up his sleeve. And flowers, handkerchiefs, and maybe a bunny or two.

“If you like it, maybe magic isn’t the worst thing in the world,” Frank says, and Gerard feels a little miffed at Frank saying that. Not in a bad way, he just didn’t expect it. Does Frank actually like him enough to not make fun of him for something so desperately asking to be made fun of?

“What?” Gerard asks.

“I’ll get in your box any day,” Frank says, and Gerard understands now. He just wanted to make bad magic jokes.

“Well I’ll stab you with my sword any time you want,” Gerard replies.

“I’ll show you a real magic wand,” Frank says.

“You should see my bedroom sometime, that’s where the magic really happens.”

“You’re going to take me to a magic show one of these days,” Frank says, “and I mean a real one, not the magic show you probably call your underwear.”

“I’d say the same about sports but I’d really rather be shot in the foot than watch a football game.”

“You wouldn’t even go to a hockey game for me?” Frank asks, “not even if I bought you mini donuts?”

“Next time, lead with the mini donuts,” Gerard says, “I’ll go anywhere if mini donuts are on the table.”

“Shut the fuck up right now or I’ll be forced to marry you,” Frank says, and Gerard grins with such innocence that it makes his heart claw at him with need. He’s never felt like he needed anyone before as much as he feels with Gerard. He’s pretty sure he’s never felt like he needed anyone before. It’s never a feeling he’s had with such desperation.

“You are so easy,” Gerard says.

“You could literally tell me to a murder a guy right now and I’d beg to bury the body,” Frank says.

“Oh well that really makes it convenient that I’ve got a huge wish list of murders I’ve been wanting committed.”

“I’m on it man, you say the word, I’m there. Call me, beep me, whenever you need me, baby.”

“You’re adorable,” Gerard says, and pauses because Frank’s got a hand on his upper arm, pulling him down, and Gerard can tell he’s begging for Gerard to kiss him, and Gerard just isn’t equipped with the indecency to say no.

They’ve arrived back in a busier part of town, a part that’s got three bars all within relatively close proximity to each other. They’re so far from Gerard’s apartment that he’s not sure where exactly he even is right now. That’s okay though. At least he’s lost with Frank.

The point is that Frank kissing him right now isn’t exactly as private as it had been ten minutes ago. Gerard’s not one for public displays of affection. He doesn’t want to see other people making out while he’s buying Sun Chips so why does everyone feel the need to show off? They’re always dating someone who looks slightly like a member of a boy band but in a bad way, and it’s usually just gross and sloppy.

Until now, he’d never had the urge to actually kiss someone in public though. It’s never been such a full pledged need before, but right now, it’s like he needs Frank’s kiss to breathe, he’ll suffocate without it. It’s just weird, it’s never happened to him before and he feels as though his skin is on fire.

He’s having trouble picturing the idea that this might not be as genuine as his heart is making it out to be. He can’t comprehend the idea that this might not be real. Gerard honestly cannot fathom the idea that this isn’t love. Because it just is. This is love. This is supposed to be some passion filled adrenaline rush that he’ll realize any moment now is an over exaggeration of something more pathetic, but that’s not what it is. He can’t say why he knows it he just knows that he does.

Gerard pulls away from the kiss, not because he doesn’t want it to go on, but because he smiles so widely that it ruins the kiss. It doesn’t feel like he could ever have a smile as honest and unabashedly innocent as this one.

He loves this motherfucker. Like, he actually loves this stupid fucking elf with tattoos and a goddamn teacher voice that makes his skin tingle. He actually feels actual love for this guy who he’s known now for three hours. It’s nearly midnight and he just got fired, he’s got no clue where his life is going at this point and no clue how he came to be standing where he is right now with this fucking perfect human being, and he loves every second of it. And he loves every tiny piece of this tiny man, and he doesn’t know why.

“This is one of the best goddamn nights of my life,” Frank says excitedly.

“How boring is my life that I say it’s one of the best nights of my life too?” Gerard asks.

“No more boring than mine, I guess,” Frank replies.

“I just love…” Gerard considers for a moment, before backing out before it’s too late to take his words back, “this. I love everything about this.”

Frank maybe got his hopes up a little bit. He’d kind of been hoping Gerard was going to say he loved him. Maybe Gerard would have the courage to say the thing Frank’s been thinking for the past hour. He’s not sure he’s going to be able to say it, because Frank doesn’t want to be that guy. Not that he’d consider Gerard to be that guy if he said it, but Frank just doesn’t know for sure if Gerard feels the same for him as he does for Gerard, and he doesn’t want to risk it.

It’s stupid really. He doesn’t even really know this guy. He doesn’t know anything about Gerard when it comes down to it, but he feels as though he knows everything that he needs to in order for him to be sure he’s in love. Because he is. There’s no doubt about it. He is in love. True, painful, gushy, slightly naïve, love.

Frank has been burned by things like this before, though. He told his old roommate he loved him, and the guy moved out three weeks later. Frank told his college fling he loved him and he broke up with him on the spot, then laughed about it behind Frank’s back. Frank told Sally down the street he loved her when they were seven and she threw an ice cream cone at his face. He just doesn’t have a good track record with saying the words ‘I love you.’

Gerard on the other hand is very good at making people fall in love with him, though he’s incapable of realizing it. In all honesty, most people love Gerard, even if it’s just platonically. Usually it ends up being Gerard who ends things because he’s never had a spark with anyone before except for that Greek guy in senior year, and that was probably not because of an emotional connection, the dude just had a voice like caramel, and an enormous… well, he was just really boring when he thinks back on him.

Gerard will figure it out one of these days that he’s irresistible, but until then he will complain to his heart’s content like the middle class kid he was raised.

“You’re going to physically injure yourself if you keep on smiling,” Frank says, but even saying it, he can’t stop his own smile.

“Then stop kissing me,” Gerard says, not as an actual thing he would want Frank to stop doing, that would just be the most efficient way to get him to stop smiling.

“No,” Frank responds, and he kisses Gerard again just to prove it. Gerard makes a crooning sound when Frank’s hand finds its way through his hair, because this is just perfect, and it’s infuriating that it can’t go on forever.

Frank pulls away at least a minute later, probably more than that, though Gerard couldn’t give you an estimate. It doesn’t feel like it went on for long enough, however he does realize that he needs to catch a breath. There are strangers watching him, he can feel their eyes. But he doesn’t give a flying fuck.

“So what do you want to do?” Frank asks. “I mean, it’s only midnight, we’ve got a whole town to paint red, and we’ve only done a fraction of it.”

“That’s a peculiar phrase, isn’t it? ‘Paint the town red.’ Why not blue?”

“We can paint it whatever color you want,” Frank says.

“I’m quite fond of orange at the moment,” Gerard says, because he is quite fond of orange.

“Why orange?” Frank asks.

“I’ve been working on a couple of sketches that just happen to have a lot of orange in them so far,” Gerard shrugs.

“Oh my god, you’re an artist?” Frank asks, looking ecstatic.

“Well yeah, I thought we covered that with the whole animation thing.”

“No, you said you wanted to do animation, you never specified that you wanted to do the art!” Frank says. He’d just assumed that Gerard had an odd fascination with Disney.

“Oh,” Gerard says, “well it’s a little belated, but I want to draw for animation.”

“That’s so hot,” Frank says.

“Being broke and having a ‘tortured soul’ is hot?” Gerard asks, because he’s quite familiar with the publics archetype of artists, and they always have to be those annoying ass artists who are oh so misunderstood by society, and occasionally cut off their ears.

“No, just the… fuck, I don’t know. There’s something sexy about a guy whose got paint all over his clothes, and forgets to shave ‘cause they’re so caught up in a picture, and paints hot naked people in their spare time.”

“Well I’ll paint you naked anytime, you’ve got yourself a promise about that,” Gerard says, and Frank makes a moaning sound, and Gerard realizes that in Frank’s dirty little mind, that was dirty talk.

“You dirty little man!” Gerard says, laughing at him, as Frank timidly eyes the people around him, which are few, but not nonexistent. Gerard doesn’t mind, he embraces his own oddities. Frank on the other hand does not want anyone in the entire world, and that for the time being even includes Gerard, to know about his kinks, thank you very much.

“Oh my god, you can joke. You have like thirty kinks.”

“Yeah, but I’m not embarrassed by them, Mr. Vanilla.”

“Who the fuck are you calling vanilla? You’re literally whiter than your teeth, have you ever actually been in the sun?” Frank says, trying to steer them off subject.

“Why does no one understand the vampire aesthetic I’ve got going on,” Gerard says, shaking his head, but it’s true. He’s never seen the sun; he’s been living in a dungeon his entire life. He’s pretty sure the sun would blind him if he ever saw it.

“I prefer zombies myself,” Frank says, silently cheering that he got them off the subject of kinks.

“Well who doesn’t?” Gerard says, “they haven’t been ruined by pop culture yet. And by pop culture, I mean Stephanie Meyer.”

“I just really love Frankenstein.”

“Is he technically a zombie?” Gerard asks, because he’s honestly never considered what type of lifeform Frankenstein was.

“Technically he was a human,” Frank says, and Gerard punches him.

“You’re that dick,” Gerard says, and then makes a nasally sort of voice, which is saying something considering the fact that Gerard’s voice is fairly nasal to begin with, “’technically Frankenstein is the name of the scientist, the monster is actually just called the monster.’”

Frank nods, and says with mock sincerity, “I set a trap, and you stepped into it, what can I say? You’re an idiot.”

“You’re getting off topic,” Gerard says, “You’re a kinky bastard, you just don’t want to admit it.”

Frank turns red, and curses to himself that they’re back at this. He was quite proud of himself for avoiding the subject. “You have a thing for me being a teacher!”

“And I don’t have a problem with admitting it. I think it’s hot. I think it’s fucking sexy. You want me to paint you naked,” Gerard says.

“You’re the one who brought that up,” Frank groans, while Gerard continues to laugh at him. Frank keeps blushing every time he looks at Gerard, and he can’t stop it.

“Oh my, you can deny it all you want, but you’re vanilla,” Gerard says, “The worst kind of vanilla too. You think you’re a little kinky but you’re actually just a sad little man who’s never seen the world.”

“I feel like you insulting me isn’t the best way for you to get into my pants.”

“We both know you’d take your pants off right now if I asked you to,” Gerard says.

“You probably wouldn’t have to, would you magic man?” Frank asks, “All you’d have to say was abracadabra.”

“Who are you kidding, that’d probably be too kinky for your pale ass. If you were an ice cream flavor,” Gerard says, “you’d be vanilla. Vanilla bean if you were feeling saucy.”

“Oh and what would you be?”

“I’m cookie dough all the way, baby.”

“I don’t know if that’s sexy or if it’s weird. I’m thinking weird. Yeah, no, it’s weird. You’re weird.”

“Yeah, but what’s your favorite ice cream flavor?”

“You son of a bitch,” Frank groans. Wouldn’t you know that Gerard would be able to guess his favorite ice cream flavor? To be fair, cookie dough is the most superior type of ice cream there is, but still.

“Magic,” Gerard says, with jazz hands.