Chapter Text
He found Frank sitting on the couch in a crowded room that reeked of alcohol and cigarettes.
Gerard stood in the doorway for a moment, watching Frank in his natural habitat. Frank didn’t automatically detect Gerard’s gaze like he sometimes could, probably because everyone’s eyes were on him as he effortlessly charmed the group of people circled around the couch. Whether it was to do with his goofy, crooked smile, endless supply of witty anecdotes, or that damn lip ring, Frank Iero had something about him that just made people listen, and Gerard always thought there was something so beautiful and factual in that. He could have gone hours like this, just standing there and watching Frank exist.
It was only when Gerard’s eyes found the analog clock in the corner of the room that he remembered why he was standing there at all, and took it upon himself to clear his throat as loud as possible. No one reacted but Frank, whose eyes had gravitated to the opposite end of the room within seconds.
Once they were outside, Gerard told him, “I’m going home.”
Frank threw a last glance over his shoulder at the still-bustling party and frowned. “Aw, man, I thought you just wanted to come out for a smoke.”
Gerard stuffed both hands in the pockets of his army-green winter coat and took a moment to appreciate the warmth it brought him amidst the December night’s bitterness. “I’m sorry. You can go back if you want, I don’t want you mad at me.”
“I’d only be mad if I found out you walked home alone,” Frank said with a shrug, reaching into the pocket of the deteriorating blue puffer jacket he thought might have been his father’s once, then pulling out a pack of cigarettes.
He and Gerard’s relationship was a never ending chain of Whats. What am I supposed to do with my hands when we’re next to each other? What is this weird feeling in my stomach when our eyes meet? What even are we?
From Gerard being so fragile and hesitant about everything he did, to Frank being much too proud to allow himself many moments of emotional vulnerability, it was near impossible for either of them to address the special bond they had, what it all meant.
“So, I saw you were talking with Bert at the party,” Gerard told Frank, kicking up the freshly fallen snow with his black Converse as they went along.
Every time they walked down here at night, Frank would look down the road at a row of shitty orange street lamps, then back over at the two, sometimes three-family houses along the street that the lamps were there to illuminate, and just find it so fucking funny that right around the corner from all this, a practical fucking mansion was going to be sitting there. Gerard never found it as funny, perhaps because he lived in it.
His dad had this important, well-paying job Gerard never bothered to understand, and so while the rest of their small town watched all the increasing gang and criminal activity unfold from their front doors, the Ways observed it from a slightly further, slightly safer, slightly more luxurious distance.
The Ways had a status and reputation to uphold, which was Gerard’s sheepish explanation for the hundreds of framed photos around the house of him in football uniforms, even though there were so many high school extracurriculars he would’ve chosen over football. It was the “family sport,” according to his father. It was football or stay home all day and help count the stacks of money stuffed inside the fireplace.
“Yeah. Bert and I? I think we’re cool again,” Frank said after a pause. Frank had been pausing a lot longer than usual between sentences lately, and Gerard felt his heart drop every time he noticed it. He’d done some research the past few days, on head trauma, and found pauses like those to be one of its many symptoms.
“But he robbed you,” Gerard sputtered, bewildered as all hell, kicking up snow more angrily now. “He took all your cash, after you worked so hard.”
“Yeah, I know, but…” Frank scratched his head. “What’s the point in holding grudges, you know? There’s so much shit going on in the world already.”
Gerard once asked Frank if he planned to spend the rest of his life working as a cashier at that drug store in the Town Center, selling weed on the side. Frank shrugged and said, “Maybe?”
It didn’t matter how often Gerard tried to instill in Frank the fact that he had potential. That the song lyrics Gerard had found in a notebook under Frank’s bed once, the banged-up acoustic sitting in the corner of his bedroom, it all meant something. Frank thought it was a waste of time, and continued risking his life out there for as little as an eighth of weed, just so that his family’s bills could be paid a little less tardy than usual that month.
He wouldn’t take Gerard’s money, and stopped him when he caught him trying to sneak it in Frank’s jacket or in his bedroom on multiple occasions. Frank would have rather died than be looked at as a charity case, especially by Gerard. As much as he needed the money.
“I just wish you would stop dealing,” Gerard said quietly. “You can’t keep getting hurt like that. Something bad’s bound to happen. What if one day, you wake up and forget I exist?”
Gerard hated the fact that Frank dealt drugs, especially in an area this dangerous, even if it was the whole reason the two met at all. In their town, after graduating high school, you either fucked off immediately to do something with your life, or stayed here to rot, smoking weed and sleeping all day, then going to the parties at night.
Frank tried—and failed—to bite back a laugh. “That’s a pretty self-indulgent worst case scenario, don’t you think?”
Gerard bent down to gather up some of the snow on the ground, then hurled his poorly-made snowball at Frank’s head. “I’m serious, doofus!”
Frank dodged it with ease, his laughter getting louder. “Come on, now,” he said. “You know I’ve got it all under control. And besides, I can’t stop dealing. You know that, too.”
A frown spread across Gerard’s face. “You could if you accepted a little help.”
It was only when Frank looked down at the cigarette in his hand that he remembered he meant to smoke it. Pulling a lighter from his other jacket pocket, Frank said, “No. I’m not some charity case.”
They turned onto Gerard’s street, and the dark outline of his big, Victorian-style house came into view from a distance.
“You’re not,” Gerard agreed. “No one thinks that. I just get so scared for you.”
Frank got quiet for a moment, then tilted his head up toward the night sky and all the trees that framed it, their bare branches covered in the recent snowfall. “The snow’s pretty.”
“Let’s see how pretty it is when it all becomes black slush that gets in your shoes and gives you frostbite,” Gerard said, kicking up another mound of it with his shoes.
The two of them reached Gerard’s front gate, then stood there for a moment, as if not entirely sure what to do. Frank put the unlit cigarette in his mouth.
“So,” Gerard said. “Wanna come in?”
At the end of the night, when Frank dropped him off, Gerard never failed to offer his hospitality. Frank always declined, not only because he saw it as another act of pity, but also because he was deathly afraid of Gerard’s father, who quite clearly had mob ties or something. Frank just figured a person wouldn’t keep stacks of money hidden in their fireplace or carry a gun in their waistband 24/7 if they worked an honest and clean job, that’s all.
But Frank still wondered what would happen. If one night, he accepted Gerard’s offer, and they walked through the gate into that giant house together. Would they both sleep in Gerard’s bed, or would one of them get the floor? Was this some vague attempt at making a move, and Frank was just unintentionally missing it every time?
“I’ve got work tomorrow morning,” Frank muttered as he lit his cigarette. It wasn’t a lie. “Rain check?”
Gerard gave Frank a playful punch in the shoulder. It always made him smile when Gerard did that, because Frank could tell he was putting at least some effort in those punches, and they still never hurt.
“You’ve probably got, like, a million rain checks by now! Come on, be honest… is it my dad?”
A bigger smile fought its way onto Frank’s face as he took the first drag of his cigarette. “No,” he insisted. “I fucking open tomorrow. I wish I was lying.”
“Alright, well,” Gerard said. He met Frank’s eyes. “Goodnight, then.”
Something about Gerard’s gaze in particular always shook Frank to his core, and part of him was convinced Gerard knew it. It took every ounce of strength in him to part his lips, and weakly mumble, “Goodnight, Gerard.”