10 More Minutes With You

Chapter 11

Due to obvious reasons, Frank couldn’t stay at his house. The possibility of his dad being there, being drunk, was just to high.

“hey, uhm, Frank…” I began, turning from my position by the stove where I was heating up pasta for dinner. He was sitting at the kitchen table, idly tracing the grain of the wood with his finger. When I called his name, he looked up at me, his eyes curious, encouraging me to go on. I pulled the pot off the stove and sat down next to Frank and grabbed his hand carefully.

“Where are you planning to go after you leave here?” I asked. His face turned bright red. This was obviously a question he was wishing I wouldn’t have thought to ask.

“Um, my house…” he whispered, his voice strained.

“Frank, you can’t I mean, what if your dad…”I trailed off. We both knew what I was referring to.

“I have no other place to go Jess. I don’t have a choice. I’ll be fine, really,” he tried to fake a smile, then quickly let it wash off his face once he saw my fierce expression.

“Stay here Frank,” I said, trying to ignore the heat as blood rushed to my cheeks, turning them bright red. Even though it was for his safety, it still felt weird inviting a guy, besides Gerard and Mikey, to stay with me.

“What?” he asked.

“Stay here, at my house. We have room, it’s just me and my dad. I’m sure he won’t mind; he probably won’t even notice.

“Jess, I can’t. I mean, you don’t have to do this for me. I’m fine, really. I can stay at my own house,” he tried to make his voice sound confident, but I knew he was just as worried about returning to his house as I was.

“Frank, listen to me. You’re not okay. [i/] You’re house isn’t fine. I won’t stand here and watch my friend be in danger when he doesn’t have to be. Stay at my house, please,” I begged him. It hurt him to move and he was ready to go back to the fucker that did this to him?

“Jess,” he paused and looked down at the ground, his face getting beat red. “Thanks. I would hug you but…” he trailed off, gesturing to his body. I grinned at him then went back over to the stove to finish making out dinner.

“Your ceiling looks funny,” Frank giggled. It was midnight and Frank was getting crazy from exhaustion.

“Let’s go to bed Frankie. We can admire my ‘funny looking ceiling’ tomorrow,” I suggested, noticing his drooping eyelids.

“Okay, tomorrow then. Urg,” he groaned. “We have school tomorrow. Is Gerard picking us up?”

“You know, we can just skip school tomorrow. Friday is a teacher work day, so we don’t have school. This way, no one besides Gee and Mikey have to see you like this,” It seemed like a good plan to me. Gotta love no school!

“Okay, sounds good…to me” he said as he yawned. I laughed as he rubbed his eyes, being careful with his battered face.

“Go to bed Frank. I’ll go call Gerard and tell him the plan then I’ll go to bed too, kay?”

“Nighty night Jessy wessy,” he said, not even bothering to open his eyes.

“Night Frankie,” I replied as I got up and left the living room where we were sleeping. “Hey Gee,” I said when he answered my call. “Frank and I are skipping school tomorrow. You and Mikey wanna join us?”

“Hell yeah, I’m always for skipping. Lemme check with Mikey,” I heard him yelling to Mikey and Mikey call back ‘yeah’. “Sounds good. First person to wake up tomorrow calls the other one. Oh, what’s wrong with Frank?”

“You’ll find out tomorrow,” Just then I heard a knock at the front door. “Look Gee, I gotta go, someone’s at the front door. Bye,” I quickly hung up and answered the door.

Standing in the doorway was someone I never wanted to see again, especially with Frank sleeping in the room right behind me.