Chance

Gerard’s not entirely sure how it is that he was talked into sitting here, and he couldn’t tell you why it is that a nail salon in a Walmart is open past midnight but he knows for sure that Frank’s fucking eyes had something to do with it. Frank just batted those long eyelashes of his and Gerard just magically appeared in a salon getting his nails done, and he really couldn’t say more on the topic than that.

Frank, sitting adjacent to him, looks completely ecstatic.

“I mean, I can’t believe you never even considered it, Gerard,” Frank says, “it’s quite relaxing.”

“I never denied that, I’ve just never had the urge,” Gerard says. He’s never even considered getting his nails done. He crashed a slumber party once when he was about thirteen because he was able to convince his friends mom that he was, in fact, a girl, and he got his nails done there, but that was nearly fifteen years ago. He made a pretty convincing girl. That was not the last time he was able to convince someone he was a girl.

“It’s just fun,” Frank shrugs. Frank had to explain to Gerard what getting your nails done actually means, because Gerard had never even considered the fact that there are people who actually do this. Regularly. Apparently Frank is one of those people.

“Why are you even open this late?” Gerard asks the woman doing his nails, which he’s getting red. Frank said that you don’t actually have to get a color, but Gerard thought that spoiled the fun a little bit. He doesn’t have a job to get to on Monday, so fuck it. He’s going to have bright red nails and everyone’s going to be jealous.

“Drunk women love getting their nails done,” the woman shrugs. Gerard doesn’t know why, but the thought amuses him. He can’t stop picturing a drunk woman sitting in this chair flirting with the manicurist. Drunk woman have the tendency to be really gay, or at least, that is Gerard’s experience with them. He thinks that their drunkenness allows them the comfort of forgetting about heteronormativity. Hayley gets really gay when she’s drunk, she just kind of compliments every single girl she sees and then falls asleep on Gerard’s lap. It’s pretty fucking adorable.

“I love drunk women,” Frank says, “they’re so nice. They always give me relationship advice, and I had one try to braid my hair once.”

“They often try to paint our nails,” Gerard’s manicurist says, and the one doing Frank’s nails nods. Gerard awws a little bit.

“They also love stickers,” the woman doing Frank’s nails says, “that’s why we keep stickers near the front of the store. I’ve had at least five women decorate me with stickers.”

“God,” Gerard groans, “When I was a drunk I used to just puke on shit and insult people. I was never in anyway cute.”

“You used to be a drunk?” Frank asks.

“It’s not something that I like to talk about,” Gerard replies.

“Sorry. It’s just that, you don’t really look like you used to do anything. You look about 12.”

“Yeah, I get that a lot,” Gerard nods, “I’m basically just a taller version of myself with yellow teeth and a bad attitude.”

“Aren’t we all?” Frank says, nodding halfheartedly like he knows it’s true but he doesn’t like admitting it.

Gerard looks over at Frank, and tries to reason with himself why you would want to get a clear manicure, because like, that’s just so boring. He gets that Frank doesn’t want to look gaudy, but it kind of spoils the fun. Gerard has always been very effeminate, and he’s comfortable with that, so he doesn’t know why he’s never gotten his nails done before. Really though, all he needs is some lipstick and he’ll be able to seriously confuse heterosexual men.

“Frank, you strike me as a black nail polish person,” Gerard says.

“I was in high school,” Frank shrugs, “Actually, I was a permanent marker in history class while totally paying attention to the Napoleonic wars lecture kind of person in high school.”

“Weren’t we all,” Gerard nods, because he remembers those days quite clearly. He had to stop because he started to get high off the sharpie fumes and it really interfered with his favorite period of the day, lunch, which he had right after history. Gerard has always found history to be quite tedious because there’s only so many white dictators you can read about before they start blending together.

“That shit smells though,” Frank says, “I’ve tried to repress my high school life as much as I can, but honestly I don’t remember most of it for other reasons.”

“I fucking knew it,” Gerard says, “you have stoner written across your forehead.”

“Hey,” Frank says, but he’s not denying anything. “Okay fine. But I bet you were an art freak in high school who showered once a week.”

“What do you mean ‘in high school’?” Gerard asks, because that pretty much describes him now. Sometimes, if he’s feeling particularly gross, he’ll even shower twice a week. This is very rare though.

“I’m learning a lot about you,” Frank says, “I bet you were also one of the people who ‘forgot’ their gym bag every day.”

“I’m pretty sure I participated in gym three times in four years.”

“Well that’s more than I did,” Frank shrugs.

“Personally, I don’t believe in physical exertion. I believe in donuts and Brooklyn Nine-Nine marathons.”

“You’re my fucking soulmate,” Frank says.

“To be fair, that describes most people,” one of the manicurist’s says.

“Ah yes, but never has anyone said that who was also willing to make out with me, and honestly, the willingness to make out with me is probably the most important characteristic of my soulmate. Otherwise I’m just a guy on an episode of a murder show who kidnaps a bitch due to a fundamentally lacking concept of consent. I don’t really have the overwhelming desire to kidnap Gerard, so his agreement of such a hobby is pretty much a number one on the checklist of my soulmate.”

“You and your sweet talk,” Gerard gushes. “We’ve come a long way since we first met. When we met you were going to stab be in an alley, now you’re going to attempt to not murder me which is honestly just the sweetest thing.”

“Well the key to any relationship is to hold the murderous instinct at bay,” Frank says.

“No offense but you two are really white,” Frank’s manicurist says.

“I never tried to deny that,” Gerard says. “But don’t mistake my acceptance for pride.”

“Fair enough,” she nods, making a face, and finishing up Frank’s nails before Gerard’s even half done with his. To be fair, Gerard’s getting a couple coats of the red nail polish that he spent too long picking out, and all Frank had was the basic treatment. Gerard’s reasoning is that if he’s going to be spending the next three weeks filling out job application forms, with all that typing, his hands might as well look fucking beautiful while he’s doing it.

“You know I had my hair this color once,” Gerard says.

“No way,” Frank says, looking excited. “You had bright red hair? Gosh, you either looked like Ronald McDonald or a sex god, and there is no in between.”

“Yeah, that was during my ‘it’s not just a phase, mom’ phase.”

“But it wasn’t just a phase I see,” Frank says, narrowing his eyes at Gerard. He’s right, it wasn’t.

“It’s not my fault that the Smashing Pumpkins exist.”

“Your cat is called Billie Joe Armstrong, Gerard,” Frank reminds him. Frank remains in his seat, not wanting to disrupt his newly manicured nails, but it’s hard because he really just wants to go over there and kiss that motherfucker until he can’t breathe.

“Ah yes,” Gerard nods, “this is also true. It’s a good thing I didn’t bring up my other cat called Billy Corgan.”

“You’re literal trash. But you never answered my question. Which was it? Ronald McDonald or sex god?”

“It varied day to day, honestly,” Gerard says, “but, overwhelmingly, I looked like Elmo.”

“I still probably would’ve been into you,” Frank says, “I have overwhelmingly poor standards, and bad taste.”

“I’m a magnet for assholes,” Gerard nods.

“Well you’ve reeled one in,” Frank says, pointing at himself. Gerard makes the mistake of mentally imagining an actual magnet that attracts assholes and it really bothers him for a minute before he can shake the mental image away. He feels like that would be one fucked up episode of The Flash.

“So,” Gerard looks at his manicurist, “like, if I were to, hypothetically, claw someone to death à la Wolverine, would they be able to trace these nails back to me? Asking for a friend?”

“Probably,” she says.

“Well there go my weekend plans,” Gerard sighs.

“Who is it you want to claw to death?” Frank asks.

“My upstairs neighbor just bought a DDR mat. I can tell because they’re thumping to the beat of Girlfriend by Avril Lavigne every day at like seven in the morning and there’s only so much Avril you can take.”

“That is a situation that I can honestly say I cannot empathize with,” Frank says, because he really can’t. It’s too specific.

“Avril Lavigne, more like Advil Lavigne, amiright?” Gerard says, turning to Frank and he honestly just looks so proud of himself, Frank wants to hold and protect him. He wants to shelter him from all the evil in this world. Wants to build a barricade of blankets and pillows so that no one can ever hurt him.

“Go die in a well,” is what Frank actually ends up saying to him.

“Someone’s a little persnickety about Avril,” Gerard replies.

“Who the fuck says persnickety?”

“You’re a teacher, you should be proud of my interest in language,” Gerard replies.

“My kids think the word ‘Monday’ is too long, I once spent five minutes trying to teach a kid how to say Chrysanthemum.”

“Tell me, is one of your kids actually Garfield?”

“Actually fuck off,” Frank says.

Gerard snorts out laughter, it’s anything but attractive but it makes Frank fall in love with him a few times over. He desperately wants to make Gerard laugh, a laugh from his fucking belly, wants to make him laugh so hard he has trouble breathing and is physically in pain. He wants to hear Gerard laugh for the rest of forever, and he wants to be the one who makes him laugh the most.

“Alright, you’re done,” the woman says, and Gerard looks at his nails which he’s actually moderately proud of. Not even Hayley gets her nails done professionally, she’s going to be so jealous.

“Well fuck if I’m not just the most attractive unemployed trash can you’ve ever seen,” Gerard says.

“Unemployed trash can is my new nickname for you, it’s too late, no takebacks,” Frank says.

“I’m calling you a vanilla punk ass then.”

“Funnily enough, vanilla punk ass was my senior quote.”

“You two were made for each other,” the woman who did Gerard’s nails says, and Gerard agrees. He knows she’s saying it sarcastically because she thinks they’re slightly idiotic and inferior to herself, and in all honesty, given her fucking amazing contouring, they probably are, but he still enjoys the sentiment. She’s the kind of girl that Gerard would follow around for days just to try to be her.

“It’s not quite a boob job, but it’ll have to do,” Frank says, standing up and walking over to the checkout counter. Gerard does seem to recall Frank offering to pay for his boob job, and Gerard doesn’t know how on earth it’s possible for anyone to share his humor to a T as Frank does but he’s in love with it. He’s kind of in love with Frank. ‘Kind of’ is not a very accurate way of phrasing it. Gerard is in love with Frank.

Gerard stays seated, casually stares at Frank’s ass, and wonders exactly how he came to be here. A lot of different things all had to align at once for him to have found himself right here and right now.

Gerard had to get fired today. He had to get fired, and had to resign to moping at the bar, being apparently irresistible. He had to get hit on by Halitosis incarnate, Frank had to rescue him. Frank had to have been celebrating his coworker’s birthday, they had to have been close enough to have chosen the bar right under where Gerard lives, and he had to be there long enough to see Gerard get hit on. He had to have been able to read Gerard’s thoughts or body language well enough to know that he needed help. The stars had to align in so many different ways for this to be happening right now, and Gerard is eternally thankful.

It’s been a few hours and Gerard can barely remember what his life was like before Frank in it. It’s like, he knows his past is there in his head, and it was great, a lot of his life has been fantastic, but it would have been so much more fantastic if Frank had been there. His life is already getting better and Frank’s only been in it for a handful of hours. What will his life look like if Frank’s still here in a few years?

“You know I can tell you’re looking at my butt, right?” Frank says, breaking Gerard’s reverie.

“I just got lost in thought,” Gerard shrugs, as he pulls himself to his feet. He walks over to Frank, resisting the urge to throw him against the wall and make out with him. Maybe another time. Like, in five minutes.

“You got lost in thought while staring at my ass?” Frank asks.

“That’s the whole basis of this relationship, I don’t know why you sound so surprised?” Gerard replies.

“Touché,” Frank nods.

“I think you mean ‘tooshie.’”

“You son of a-,” Frank starts, and Gerard, instinctively, starts running away from him. This is for many reasons. For one, not a soul in the world other than a middle aged soccer mom should ever, for any reason, use the word tooshie. For another, anyone who does use that word deserves to have their head bashed against a wall. Lastly, Gerard is really fucking excited to find out what happens when Frank catches him.

As they’re in a Walmart, Gerard does not have an ultimate destination. He just runs through the office supplies aisle, and turns to look over his shoulder at Frank. Frank, even though he is far shorter than Gerard, is a faster runner. He’s probably the kid that no one wanted on their kickball team but when it came down to it, he was actually a secret weapon.

Frank catches him in the lightbulb aisle, getting his hands around his waist and nearly pulling him to the ground.

Gerard turns to him, only to be met with Frank’s mouth immediately on his, frantic, and eager. Gerard matches his enthusiasm, grabbing Frank by the sides of his head and deepening the kiss. He hadn’t realized that he closed his eyes, but when he peaks one eye open, he realizes how nice it looks that his bright red nails are on either side of Frank’s face, keeping him there. There’s something insatiably sexy about it.

“God, I fucking love you,” Gerard says, not even aware of his own decision to say it. It just comes out, like word vomit, not even told to say it out loud by his own brain.

Frank laughs, which terrifies Gerard to the bone, until he says, “thank god.”

Gerard, still not entirely sure what Frank means, pulls away from him enough to look him in the eyes. His dark brown eyes meet Gerard’s lighter ones. Their stare is intense and deep, like they’re not looking simply into each other’s eyes, but like they can see right into the others’ soul.

“I love you too, Gerard,” Frank says, without hesitation. Gerard’s heart swells, like the Grinch’s growing three sizes, only Gerard’s heart was overflowing to begin with. He pulls Frank to him again, kissing the shit out of him because there’s no other way to get across just how much he wants this man than to show him. He just can’t put it into words, can’t even reason with it himself. He wants and needs Frank so much that it hurts. It hurts him to his very core, and yet it’s the kind of hurt that he craves.

An employee walks by the aisle, looking completely unfazed by the whole exchange. He looks like it’s a standard thing for two boys to declare their love for each other at one in the morning in the lamp aisle. Just another normal day at work for a Walmart employee.