Fic: "I Only Hide What I Know I Can't Keep" (Bob/Ray, NC-17) (1/2)
I Only Hide What I Know I Can't Keep
Master Post
Art Post
It's seven hours till showtime and Bob's sitting up in the nosebleed section of the arena, giving himself a good view of the hustle and bustle going on below. He's twirling a drumstick absently between the fingers of his right hand, feet planted on the seat in front of him, the floor underneath littered with flattened cigarette butts. The whole arena's a smoke-free zone but he's too lethargic to bother heading out of the building right now, and the steady crowd already gathering outside isn't something he's ready to deal with at the moment. They finished soundcheck about an hour ago and the rest of his band is probably backstage in their spacious dressing room, reserved for headlining acts, Gerard doing last-minute rounds of press that never seemed to require the presence of the others. He can see figures scurrying in and out of the heavy black drapes that hang just behind his drum riser, crew members making adjustments to wiring and amps, security checking the barriers and conversing with arena officials.
"Madison Square Garden..." a voice says, too familiar to be startling. "Who would've thought, huh?"
"Yeah..." Bob sniffs and takes a drag out of his cigarette. "Who would've thought."
Ray's got a towel slung over his neck and a bottle of mineral water in one hand, soundcheck sweat still gleaming on his skin. He moves to sit beside Bob and puts his feet up as well, their sneakers equally dirty and grimy after weeks on the road. Ray offers the bottle to him, and Bob accepts it wordlessly, taking a shallow gulp before handing it back over. He knows he should drink more to replenish what he sweated off during soundcheck but there's a tight knot in his chest that makes swallowing difficult. He knows it well enough to know that it won't recede until the lights go down at showtime, until he's counting off beats in the darkness and willing himself to stay focused in the deafening roar of the crowd.
"How're you doin?" Ray asks, and Bob doesn't need to look to know that he's glancing at Bob's wrists, firmly wrapped in braces that won't come off until they take the stage.
"They've been better..." he says truthfully. "Same goes for the rest of me."
"Yeah, it's been a hell of a tour," Ray agrees. "It'll be nice to go home after this, take a real break for once."
Bob can't agree more. After they came back from Venezuela at the end of the world tour, it was barely a month before they were packed up and on the road again, albeit on a much smaller scale and across smaller venues. Bob's body feels all kinds of fucked up--with parts functioning on different time zones and bits of him still scattered in hotel rooms and airport lounges across three continents, his dirty laundry still bunched up in plastic bags sitting on the floor in a half-furnished apartment in Chicago.
It still doesn't feel like his home, not even after the final installment was paid for in his absence. Just a two-bedroom unit with expensive wooden floors and pale grey walls that Bob's mother finds too dreary. She wants him to paint it something like beige or off-white, just like Bob's childhood bedroom in their house in Darien, while Gerard said something about a mural featuring a drumkit come alive, limbs sprouting out of toms and snares and cymbals flying about like UFOs.
He hasn't taken either approach--both have the potential to be really unsettling. The walls stay grey for now, neutral and inoffensive.
"You made up your mind yet?" Ray asks.
"About surgery?" Bob looks down at his hands, feels the odd twinge of muscles that aren't quite in their right places. "Not really."
"Bob..."
"I know what you're going to say," Bob says. "I know the song and dance, okay? What they need to do, the risks, the procedure, the recovery, I got it all worked out."
"Then there's no reason for you to put it off any longer," Ray says firmly. "It's not just your wrists, Bob...it's your fucking career on the line. We were all there, remember? We heard what the doctors said."
Bob stops twirling his stick, his fingers curled around the glossy black print of the band's logo embedded in the pale wood. "Risk of permanent damage or disability," he mutters.
"And that's not enough?" Ray sounds incredulous. Bob doesn't blame him.
"Sometimes I wonder if it'll be worth it," Bob says. "How far down the road do you think we are?"
Ray sighs, his shoulders sagging. "We've been through this before..."
"It's not going to last forever, you know." Bob says, hiding a grimace as his left wrist flares up, another random spike of pain that's been increasing in frequency for weeks. The braces and medication can only do so much. "Gerard talks about it all the time--how we're just one record closer to the end."
"You think I haven't been listening?" Ray retorts. "It's an old number of his. Of course it's all true, but weighing your surgery against how long this band's gonna last is...well, stupid."
"Ray..."
"Look, you don't want to decide now, that's fine. Just don't expect me to stop bugging you about it." Ray says, reaching over to rest a hand on the back of Bob's neck. It's warm and slightly damp, Ray's thumb rubbing just over Bob's pulse. It's a small comfort, but Bob's entire body feels like it's gone brittle, ready to shatter at the slightest pressure.
"I'm just so fucking tired," Bob huffs out.
"I know..." Ray says. "Let's just blow the roof off this place tonight, and then we can go home."
Bob closes his eyes. Home.
---
Bob's thing with Frank began in the same manner that all things involving Frank seemed to begin--sudden, reckless and disorienting. The culmination happened in the full heat of summer on Warped, when they fucked for the first time. They'd been gravitating towards it for quite some time and the onset of summer and the grueling tour schedule became a sort of catalyst, throwing them together in those small, rare moments when their limited personal space wasn't being overrun by Mikey and Pete and their two-man traveling circus of all-consuming awkward love.
There was nothing romantic about it, Bob and Frank's first time, mainly because they did it in the back lounge of the Rejects' bus with Nick Wheeler and Mike Kennerty listening outside the door, drunk and giggling and obnoxiously calling the play-by-play as they saw fit, announcing it to everyone else who happened to be on board for their free-flowing bus party. It wasn't like anyone else on the bus was sober enough to care, and neither was Bob. The Rejects had been pimping their bus as a “love motel on wheels” for reasons that were probably so assinine that nobody outside the four of them should even bother to contemplate, but Bob and Frank both agreed that it would be a waste of perfectly good horizontal space-a rarity on Warped Tour-not to take them up on it. They did it quick and rough with Frank clawing holes in Bob's back, Bob's fingers smudging Frank's thick stage makeup all over his face. When Frank came, he bit Bob's bottom lip hard enough to draw blood, and Bob's lip stung for days. He didn't complain.
It was the loudest, craziest summer of Bob's life, everything seen through a heat haze. He spent his mornings on his practice pads, honing his precision obsessively, going through the songs in their setlist over and over. They played mostly in the afternoons, Gerard prancing about the small stage with newfound buoyancy, the floor under Bob's kit littered with splinters from his shattered sticks. He played hard on that tour, willing himself to focus on each beat and each roll, as if doing so would make up for the fact that the songs weren't his.
At night Frank would climb into his bunk, no longer in danger of being thrown out, and lick his way into Bob's mouth, tasting like cigarettes and cheap beer that he'd never let Gerard smell on him in the morning. Frank's small hands would try to ease the tension off Bob's shoulders and his mouth would often find its way to Bob's dick, sucking him into oblivion while Bob had to bite on his own hand to stop himself screaming. Frank didn't care, though. He didn't care if anyone saw them like that, didn't bother leaving Bob's bunk to return to his own before the rest of the bus woke up the next day. He was maddeningly careless and self-assured, traits Bob often found himself envying.
Frank was everything Bob wasn't, and Bob held him down and fucked him and clung to him afterwards, knowing that Frank could push him away just as easily as he'd pulled Bob close.
---
All three bands sharing that night's bill have been allocated separate dressing rooms within Madison Square Garden but they all sort of gravitate towards MCR's, where Eddie Reyes is now driving one of his RC trucks across the floor, making it do turns and twists and at one point driving it right between Mikey's legs, who seems oblivious to it as he continued texting on his phone. Gerard and Ray are piled on the couch with Adam Lazzara, catching up on everything that's happened in the year the two bands barely saw each other, while the guys from Drive By hover close to the rider and sneak off with packs of Frank's vegan fruit chips and Gatorade. Bob finds himself in the unofficial smoker's corner of the room with Mark O'Connell, Taking Back Sunday's drummer, sharing a pack of Marlboro Reds as the clock ticks closer and closer towards showtime.
"We'll probably start writing as early as next month," Mark says. "Adam's got some solid ideas and Eddie thinks we're...well, Eddie thinks Fazzi's ready."
Bob looks across the room at Matt Fazzi, Taking Back Sunday's newest member in what seems like an endless cycle of departures and arrivals, who's sitting on the floor watching Eddie drive his RC truck around the room, cradling his guitar. "I'm glad he's getting along well..." Bob says. "I mean, I've never heard him play, but--"
"He's a great guitarist." Mark says as he lifts the cigarette to his lips. "His style's nothing like Fred, though, so we weren't sure how to go about it. Should he just play Fred's parts? Should he do his own thing? It was...a little weird at first."
Bob thinks back to the frantic nights in a sweltering room in New Jersey, with Gerard clinging to sobriety with one hand Mikey with the other, Ray patiently guiding Bob through the songs while Frank chain-smoked furiously to dispel his nerves. He was playing on Otter's old kit, making adjustments after every song, trying to feel less like he's tresspassing on someone else's sacred ground. Brian had promised him a custom kit if everything worked out but at the time it was still a pretty big "if" hanging over their heads, to go with the unspoken but nagging doubt about Gerard's quest to stay clean.
"I played all the Revenge stuff to the letter for the first few months," Bob admits. "I guess I was more concerned with getting it right than with adding my own feel to it."
"You did it in crunch time too," Mark says. "Anyway, it'll be interesting to see what Fazzi comes up for the new record. It'll be his, not Fred's."
Bob nods slowly, struggling to get over the lump in his throat to speak. "How is he...how's he fitting in, you know, personally? Aside from the music?"
"He's a nice kid," Mark says. "Puts up with Adam and all his antics, which is always a good thing."
Bob allows himself a small chuckle. "Always," he repeats.
"I guess if things are falling into place you just know it, somehow..." Mark says. "Can't put your finger on it, can't say what it is exactly...you just kinda feel it, you know?"
"Yeah," Bob says. "I know."
---
People didn't ask Bob too much about the Paramour. They asked Gerard while it was still good article-fodder to do so, back when every magazine wanted to run a story about how My Chemical Romance nearly self-destructed in a haunted mansion up in the hills of Silver Lake, California. The extent of Mikey's troubles were exaggerated in some publications, underplayed in others--Mikey himself offering only vague recollections of the time he spent there, choosing to focus on the things he did once he got out. Frank and Ray often chipped in with bits about the creative process that took place, what little of it they could actually put into words, but for the most part Bob didn't get his share of Paramour-related questions and he preferred it that way. It wasn't a story he paticularly wanted to tell.
The essence of Bob's experience at the Paramour wasn't about haunted paintings or voices that lived in the walls, wasn't about waking nightmares or doors that slammed shut of their own accord. His bathroom might have had a genuine ghost or two in it, but after a while it became less of a scare and more of a nuisance. Bob quickly learned to live with it and--more impotantly--sleep through it. The ghosts didn't bother him so much. The living were another matter entirely.
Losing Mikey--and they really did think they'd lost him for good at that point--wasn't like losing an arm or a leg. It was more like losing a lung, when both had been limping and chugging and smoked to hell and back to begin with. To add to their general misery, Gerard went out of commission almost as soon as the car carrying Mikey out of the property was out of the front gates, which meant that for a few days it was just Bob, Ray and Frank becoming increasingly restless and ready to tear at each other's throats because they knew they couldn't get anything done without Gerard and Mikey, and none of them was willing to accept it. Ray wrote a few angry, disjointed riffs and trashed them just as quickly. Frank broke two strings on his guitar and didn't even bother to change them. Bob was still not getting along with the marching snare they'd gotten for him. He knew that the snare was essential to the sound they were after, but he hated the sound it produced and hated the memories it brought back, how he could almost feel the starched collar of the uniform at his throat and hear the condescending whispers from the bleachers--these were his ghosts, not the Paramour's, and he had no desire to give them any chance to materialize, especially in an environment that seemed all too welcoming to things you'd rather not let out.
----
The show in Madison Square garden ends up being one of the best Bob's played in a long time, the pain flaring up and down his arms momentarily forgotten each time he looks up and sees Gerard's outstretched hand silhouetted against a sea of flickering blue lights from cellphones held aloft. It's a common sight at any of their shows but in a large arena such as this the effect is tenfold, his four closest friends playing their hearts out to a crowd that sang each word back at them. Towards the end, Gerard does one of his little speeches, and he does indeed say something to the tune of the possibility of this being their last show.
The crowd grows wild and anguished at the remark, as expected, because Gerard Way is nothing if not a frontman with a flair for dramatics. He makes it vague enough to open it to interpretation, though Bob dreads asking whether that's for the benefit of the audience or for Gerard himself. He settles for playing the heck out of their set, and for the last song of the encore his eyes are fixed on the four most important people in his life and the sea of people beyond them, the dancing blue lights of cellphones and cameras moving with the music, their music, his music.
Bob ends the encore with his usual flourish, throwing his sticks as far as he can up into the air and not bothering to catch them, already out of his throne by the time the last burst of pyro erupts from the stage and the lights go out immediately afterwards. He climbs down the steps carefully in the dark, his eyes still adjusting to the sudden change of illumination. He's barely at the bottom of the stage when Ray appears from within the folds of the black drapes and grabs him by the waist, pulls him close and kisses him full on the mouth, sweaty and sloppy and harsh. They're relatively hidden from the rest of the backstage here, though it won't be the case for long, so Bob decides that he can do little more than open his mouth and close his eyes, his knees buckling with the force of Ray's sudden ambush. It never fails to take Bob by surprise whenever Ray does it, just comes at him without any preamble and stakes his claim like this.
Bob's definitely not complaining, though.
“We're not done yet...” Ray says against his ear, while Bob gets a mouthful of Ray's sweaty curls. "We're far from done, do you hear me?"
“Yeah...” Bob manages to choke out, not bothering to ask if Ray meant the band, or them, or both.
“Good,” Ray squeezes the back of his neck. “Believe it,”
He lets go of Bob after that and walks off towards the others, Bob following suit with his mouth feeling almost as swollen as his wrists. Mikey and Gerard are several steps ahead, arms around each other and walking uncoordinatedly towards the dressing room while Frank is catching a piggyback ride from a compliant Dewees, his last guitar safely in Cortez's hands. Bob feels a sudden rush of not wanting to be left behind and surges hurriedly after them, falling in step beside Ray. The lights in the corridor leading to the dressing room are harsh against his eyes, sweat fuzzing at the corners of his vision, the sound of their voices and Frank's tired laughter echoing hollow in his head, as if everything he sees is already a memory, already fading into the past.
---
Three days after Mikey left the Paramour, Frank tried to smash the blue light hanging over Mikey's bedroom with a pair of Bob's drumsticks.
He'd marched into the ballroom with the look of murder in his eyes and stole the sticks right out of the case Bob kept them in, ignoring Bob's curses as he and Ray chased after Frank, not realizing at first what the little fucker was about to do. Ray was the one who put two and two together after he saw Frank bounding up the grand staircase in the foyer, and told Bob that they had to stop him before he "did anything stupid". Bob honestly couldn't care less if Frank wanted to smash the whole room into pieces and he'd probably volunteer to break a windowpane or two, but Ray was adamant on stopping Frank.
There was a brief tussle once they reached the blue room--Ray managed to catch Frank by the legs and pull him down onto the bed just as he was about to swing, and when Frank's fingers went slack around the sticks he'd stolen, Bob threw them away, sent them clattering against the wall and onto the floor, and replaced them with his own fingers, lacing their fingers tight and allowing Frank to bruise him as hard as he wanted to. Frank had fought, then crumpled, then finally cried into Ray's shoulder even as he threatened to break Bob's knuckles. He was stronger than he looked, and he was shaking, and Ray was holding both of them close, and Bob's throat and chest felt tight and heavy.
"Why are we still here?" Frank asked after he'd calmed down a bit, his face pale and sickly under the eerie blue light.
"Gerard..." Ray said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "We have to stay for Gerard."
"His own fucking brother didn't stay for him--"
"Frank, stop." Bob cut him off. "You're about to say something that's gonna make me punch your lights out."
"Yeah, heard you were good at that." Frank snapped back, but he squeezed Bob's fingers again.
"Mikey didn't leave because of us," Ray reminded him. "He needs to get better. It's not us he needs to get away from, and not Gerard, either."
Frank shook his head. "I can't believe we're still here. After every fucking thing that's happened--"
"Gerard doesn't want to leave," Ray said. "I know he hasn't been giving us anything new and he's definitely not a happy guy--but he doesn't want to leave."
Bob turned his head to look at Ray. "How would you know?"
"Bob, we came here for something. It's here, and Gerard knows it. He won't leave until he finds it."
Frank snorted into the musty bedcover. "Yeah...but at what cost?"
Ray didn't answer. Frank unfurled his fingers from Bob's and placed his palm on Bob's chest, the heat of his touch bleeding through the material of Bob's shirt and hoodie, warming him somewhat. Cold, it was always cold in the blue room, cold as Mikey's last gaze at them when he told them he was leaving, cold as the water that ran uninvited from the faucets in Bob's bathroom at night.
That night, Frank slept fitfully on the living room couch while Bob watched over him, the TV relaying news about the world that existed outside the Paramour's gates, a world they seemed to be no longer part of. He could hear Ray playing low, mournful tones on his electric guitar in the ballroom, melodies that reached no conclusion. There were noises from the floor above, padded footsteps that could've been Gerard or one of the ghosts--hardly any difference between the two. Frank slept to Ray's disjointed lullabyes and Bob watched from the armchair next to him, wondering if any of them would care or notice if the world outside stopped existing altogether.
---
Bob doesn't go home to Chicago after the show, loading his belongings in the back of Ray's car and sleeping in the passenger seat for most of the drive from New York to Belleville.
He's been staying with Ray since before the beginning of this tour, knocking on Ray's door a few weeks before he was supposed to even show up in New Jersey. Ray seemed disinclined to push for an explanation, even as Bob pushed past him and headed straight to the bathroom to throw up a half-bottle's worth of Jack and his last meal. He was trying to piece the words together in his head when Ray showed up with a towel and a glass of water, telling him that he was welcome to stay for as long as he wanted to and that he didn't have to explain himself if he didn't feel like it.
That was months ago and now the only thing Bob feels like is a freeloading asshole, as he watches Ray shuttling back and forth between the garage and the spare room to bring in all of Bob's stuff. Bob wants to stand up and help but the doctors were adamant that Bob shouldn't be doing any lifting or anything that could strain his wrists other than drumming, and Ray is sticking to their words with military precision. So Bob is left to sit on the couch and text his parents to tell them they'd gotten back from New York safely, hoping against hope that his mom's reply will not include a request for him to come home for some secound cousin's housewarming party or something.
"I just put your suitcase in the bedroom," Ray says as he appeared from the kitchen, carrying two freshly-opened bottles of Heineken. "It's ok if you don't wanna unpack tonight, I still got the spare toothbrush and things."
Bob nods weakly and takes the beer as it's offered to him, sipping at it as Ray sits on the couch beside him and flicks the television on.
"We look like a couple of regular douchebags with nothing to do," he comments dryly as Ray settles on a Discovery channel special on the construction of the Three Gorges Dam in China.
Ray looks over and smiles. "Aren't we?" he raises his bottle towards Bob. "Here's to nothing,"
"Nothing," Bob clinks his bottle with Ray's and drinks, watching the animated computer simulation of ancient villages and hillside temples disappearing under the rising waters of the dam.
Nothing.
"Do you want...do you want to set Daisy up in the practice room?" Ray asks quietly during a commercial break.
Bob's beer is half-empty and fatigue is starting to make his eyelids droop, but he glances over at the doorway to the room Ray's converted into a small practice space, where he's got amps and his guitar rack and a table set up with his computer and recording equipment. Right now the door is closed, and resting on the floor just in front of it is the weathered equipment crate with its stained wooden panels and its rusty latches, one side of it decorated in near-offensive cheeriness with letters spelling out "DAISY" in baby-blue glittery stickers, Frank's personal touch.
"No," Bob says, and it comes out a lot heavier than merely answering Ray's question. "I think she needs a rest, too."
Ray doesn't say anything, just nods and returns his attention back to the television. "Oh cool, they're having a Mythbusters marathon tomorrow night."
Bob smiles. It's nice like this, being with someone he's completely at ease with. He can almost see this as home, which is more than he can say about the half-furnished apartment he's got back in Chicago and the house he grew up in, but he's wary of letting himself get carried away. It's a good thing that Ray's a pretty undemanding guy, that he doesn't question Bob's reasons or motives, that he's content to let Bob use his toothbrush or eat all of his cereal without asking for anything in return, not even an explanation as to why Bob is there in the first place. Bob does his best to repay the hospitality in his own way, whether it's making breakfast or giving morning blowjobs. He's far more skilled in the latter than in the former, though Ray seems equally happy with both.
"You sleeping out here or in my room?" Ray asks softly after their beers are done.
Bob stretches, feeling every aching bone in his body. "Room would be nice."
"Okay," Ray says. "Okay."
---
Bob doesn't remember when the Frank thing ended and the Ray thing began.
It wasn't like he was trading one for the other, or compensating for anything. And it was nothing like what he'd experienced with Frank--this was Ray, after all. Bob only remembers that it happened easy, like a steady progression of closeness, Ray providing the stability that nobody else seemed capable of. When they were tracking The Black Parade, Ray had this habit of going out on late-night drives with no real destination, just mindless pedal-abusing runs through the freeways, and Bob often went with him. Sometimes they'd talk about the song they were recording, or have the rough cut playing on repeat on the stereo, and sometimes there'd be no talking at all. Sometimes they'd stop in deserted parking lots or rest stops and laugh at themselves for being so cliche and high school and whatnot, but Bob was pretty sure nobody in high school had it this easy, this comfortable. Ray would reach over and grab him without so much as announcing his intentions first. Bob didn't need him to. He'd go to Ray willingly, stretching himself over the length of the front seats, feeling Ray unbuckle his seatbelt for him, accepting the wet kisses and the hands in his hair, around his neck, snaking under his shirt.
They didn't make an attempt at full-on sex until Projekt Revolution, well into the lifespan of The Black Parade and already feeling the toll of its weight and ambitious scope. Bob remembers how beautiful Frank looked that summer, how he burned brighter on stage than their pyrotechnics. But Bob had gotten more than his share of fire at that point, and he was content to observe from a distance--he didn't need to get burnt twice. With Mikey missing for most of the tour (though under much happier circumstances) and Cortez keeping to his porn collection whenever he's not on stage with them, Frank gravitated towards Gerard more than ever, and Bob didn't really mind. He'd long since given up on seeking out explanations for Frank's actions, and Ray's reassuring presence was a more appealing prospect. Ray wasn't loud or flamboyant but he was no klutz either, a trait he demonstrated one night on the bus as he maneuvered Bob towards the bunks that night, big hands firmly settled on Bob's hips.
"You know, you really are skinny right now," Ray said as he pulled the waistband of Bob's sweatpants down.
"I'll gain it all back just to piss you off," Bob said, obligingly lifting his hips.
"Don't bother," Ray said as he pressed a kiss to Bob's navel. They weren't exactly at the height of personal hygiene on tour, but it didn't bother Bob as much as he thought it would. "I wouldn't really care."
"Me neither," Bob muttered in agreement as Ray crawled up his body.
Bob had been on the receiving end of anal sex before so the mechanics of it wasn't new to him, but in retrospect it was probably not the smartest thing to do to start off with Ray fucking Toro when you haven't had a dick in your ass for the last three years or so. Frank had been all too happy to let Bob fuck him senseless in all kinds of body-contorting ways when they were still doing it, never once raising the issue of returning the favor--though Bob would've let him, if he'd asked. In the end, Ray had to pull out after a few excruciating minutes when Bob just couldn't take him all in, but he soothed away any embarrassment Bob might have felt by bringing him off spectacularly, mouth wrapped firmly around Bob's dick while two fingers were thrusting viciously against Bob's prostate. Bob had to bite his lower lip until it bled to stop himself screaming when he came, and allowed Ray to fuck his face senseless afterwards. He wasn't a big fan of gagging on someone else's cock but Ray knew how to make it just on the right side of unbearable, just toeing the edge and holding Bob's head in place as he swallowed and shuddered, tears prickling the corners of his eyes.
There were more successful attempts after that, though Bob wasn't necessarily keeping score. The best one he can remember happened not long after Mikey came back, in the short break before they packed off for Asia. They had the luxury of doing it in Ray's newly-purchased house in Belleville, on the edge of autumn as it slid into a long, cold winter, when the heating was still prone to stuttering and snapping out at the most inconvenient moments, because rock-star riches notwithstanding, Ray Toro had decided to buy a mid-century fixer-upper instead of buying a plot and building a house from the ground up.
"It's too much work," Ray said as he a made a slow, lazy thrust into Bob. "All that construction, dealing with builders...I won't be here most of the time."
Bob looked up and smiled. "We won't even be here to see the cherry blossoms."
"That's sad," Ray said in all seriousness. "But they'll still be here the next year."
"Will we?"
Ray stopped moving for a second, lifting a hand to Bob's face to hold him firmly by the chin, his patented gesture of requiring undivided attention. "Of course we will."
---
"Hey...you asleep yet?"
Bob shakes his head. He's been staring at the shadows in Ray's ceiling for the last hour or so, finding sleep more elusive the harder he tried. "Damn tour messed up my body clock again,"
"Yeah, what else is new?" Ray rolls over slightly, the mattress dipping as his weight shifts. He puts an arm around Bob's chest and tugs at his shoulder. "Come here..."
Bob goes, letting Ray pull him close until they're pressed tight against each other under the sheets, and he opens his mouth obligingly when Ray starts nipping at his lower lip, demanding entrance. For all his considerate, good guy nature Ray's actually pretty blunt when it comes to sex itself, far more likely to poke Bob in the toe when they're watching TV to ask him if he wants to fuck than to beat around the bush with weak innuendos for a good thirty minutes. Tonight's no exception, as Bob can already feel Ray's hard-on grinding against his hip when Ray throws one leg across Bob's, his tongue lapping against the roof of Bob's mouth. Bob makes a soft "mmm-hmm" noise in the back of his throat and opens up more, the shift of more of Ray's weight on top of him sending off electric sparks to his groin.
They don't have too many options position-wise, ever since Bob got his first surgery there was no way he was getting on hands on knees for sex, but Ray doesn't seem to mind. He seems to like doing all the work while Bob just lies there and lets him, from pulling Bob's drawstring pants down to fetching the lube and condoms from the bedside table. Bob likes it when Ray uses his fingers to slowly open him up, sometimes threatening to make Bob come just from doing so. Ray knows how to mix it up just right, patiently waiting until Bob's loose enough to take his cock but at the same time nipping and biting his way across Bob's skin, leaving red bruises where he knows only the two of them will see. He latches onto Bob's right nipple just as he's adding a third finger, making Bob buck off the mattress, his fingers tangled in the damp curls of Ray's hair. They're both too drained from the touring and the not-quite breaks in between to do anything too taxing, but Bob likes it when Ray fucks him asleep, releases just enough tension from his muscles to enable him to rest. Ray's good to him, really good, and sometimes Bob wonders if he's doing enough to return the gesture, if Ray even cares.
They switch around so they can fuck on their sides, Ray holding him across the waist with Bob's leg draped over Ray's thigh, and they stay that way until Bob comes in Ray's hands, his moan half-hidden in the pillow he's pushed his head into. The bed smells like Ray and sex and a sweet, a strange comfort he doesn't even know what to do with, and even as he feels Ray coming inside him he begins to wonder how long he can keep this up until he breaks.
---
Mornings at the Paramour were the only times the house seemed quiet in a non-eerie way. The sun was warm enough to chase away some of the house's stubborn chill and Gerard liked to make his presence known during these times, popping in the kitchen to make a huge batch of coffee and leaving it for everyone else, like an offer of silent apology for being non-functional otherwise. This morning, when Bob came down for breakfast Gerard had already gone out into the backyard, sitting at the edge of the swimming pool with his feet dangling in the dirty leaf-strewn water, sketchbook in hand. He wasn't drawing anything, just tapping his pencil idly against paper, but it was something at least. Brian had discreetly assigned one of the techs to keep an eye on Gerard, to make sure he didn't try to jump in the pool and not resurface like he did the day after Mikey left, and since then the entire house had fallen into a muted, stagnant but otherwise uneventful silence.
Frank was the one who came down next, equally disappointed that he'd missed out on a chance to talk to Gerard, who was pretty much a no-go area after he'd made his coffee and retreated back into his own world. But Frank was more than willing to accept Bob's company at the kitchen table while they picked listlessly at slightly burnt toast and Frank's specially-delivered vegan pastries.
"So I managed to get a call through to my Dad yesterday," Frank said.
"Yeah?"
"Yeah, turns out you have to walk up that fucking hill in the back to get reception--you know, past Daisy's grave and along the footpath," Frank gestured in the general direction of the estate's backyard.
"Huh...I should try it next time," Bob said. He didn't need to call anyone and didn't think anyone was desperately waiting to hear from him, but Frank didn't have to know that.
"Anyway, you're still not getting the right sound off that snare, right?" Frank asked.
"Same old, same old..." Bob said. "I don't know, maybe I should switch back to my regular, have it beefed up in mastering."
"Well, my Dad knows someone--well actually my grandpa knows someone from way back, when they were making those things for the military. Like real marching band stuff from the forties, not the high school band type."
Bob looked up from his coffee, his interest piqued. "Oh?"
"Yeah, he said there's probably something in the type of wood they're using these days that doesn't have the same sound quality or something--" Frank shrugged. "I don't know, dude, I'm no drummer."
Bob had to smile at that. "That's good to hear, else I'd be out of a job."
"Oh, fuck you.." Frank said, but he was smiling back. "Anyway, Grandpa's friend knows a collector who can get us a real authentic piece, you know? A real badass military marching snare from the old days. Something that'll make just the right sound."
"Oh hey, he shouldn't go through the trouble--" Bob started.
"Too late," Frank said with a grin. "He's sending it to our production office in Los Angeles this week. By Monday, you'll have your new baby."
Bob blanked for a few seconds, almost burning his hand on his coffee mug. "I...thanks, Frankie. Really, you didn't have to--"
"I wanted to, you idiot." Frank said as he got off his chair and went over to Bob, unceremoniously squishing himself on Bob's lap, flinging his arms around Bob's neck. "It's about time someone did something, right?"
Bob didn't answer, just wrapped his arms around Frank's back--he felt smaller somehow, they'd all been losing weight and not eating right and he could feel the poke of Frank's ribs through his ratty t-shirt, and breathed the scent of Frank's organic shower gel in his neck. "Thanks..." he muttered again. "Make--uh, make sure your dad and grandpa know how much I appreciate it,"
"You'll love it, I know you will." Frank said into Bob's neck. "It'll be perfect,"
Perfect.
"Frankie, I..." Bob caught himself, his throat tightening around the word. He didn't know if this was the time and place to say it, if he was just caught in the moment or not, but he was saved from the dilemma when Ray came into the kitchen, smiling at the sight of Bob and Frank tangled together.
"Well, aren't you two cute?" he said mockingly on the way to the coffee pot. "What's the happy occasion?"
"We're having a baby!" Frank announced loudly, kissing Bob's cheek girlishly for emphasis.
"Congratulations," Ray said, lifting his mug in salute.
Bob laughed, his arm still around Frank's waist. It was probably the first genuine laugh he'd cracked since entering the house. His jaw ached with the strain of it.
---
Ray's got an external hard disk set up next to his computer in the practice room, where he keeps works in progress, snatches of riffs and chord progressions, rough demos with Gerard slurring through half-written lyrics. Bob spends one afternoon sitting beside him as he sifts through it diligently, filing them into appropriate folders for easy access later. They have full songs with no names, half songs with missing bridges or lyrics, things written in hotel rooms and buses in God knows how many different places. There's no way to know how many of them, if any, will see the light of day. What's obvious to everyone is that they were different, no longer being driven by a grand narrative that compels them to live it and breathe it. Gerard's lyrics are just as sharp and brutal but he doesn't paint desolate landscapes with them as he did with Parade, though Bob knows that doesn't mean he's digging any less deep.
"What do you think it's going to sound like?" he asks Ray.
"The new record?"
Bob nods. "I know we're not working on it any time soon, but do you think Gerard's got it all in his head already, like he did last time?"
Ray seems to consider his next words carefully. "I think...maybe it's not like there's a story he's dying to tell anymore, you know?"
Bob snorts. "Dying being the operative word."
"Yeah, pretty much..." Ray agrees. "I mean, you wouldn't want something like Parade living in your head for longer than necessary, would you? Had to share the madness."
Bob remembers how each of them had given it to that madness, ugly truths dragged out in heavy rooms and painstakingly skin-grafted onto the songs, Gerard's sketchpad overflowing with words and images that bled into each other like vines. Gerard had done it for Mikey, that much was obvious to them. Frank had, in turn, done it for Gerard. Ray had done it for the music. Bob had done it for them, once he realized that losing sanity was nothing compared to losing them.
“Were you ever scared?”
Ray turns in his chair. “Of what?”
“That we'd fall in too deep,” Bob says. “All of us, nobody left to pull us out.”
“Of course,” Ray says. “It's not...I mean, nobody wants to go through that ever again, but if I absolutely had to--” he pauses, as if considering the consequences of what he's about to say.
“Yeah,” Bob mutters. “Me too.”
---
True to Frank's word, the snare arrived on Monday afternoon, all the house's occupants gathered near the front door to see its arrival. Frank had insisted on opening the package right there in the foyer, probably more excited than Bob was. The crate the snare was packed in was old, made of dark wood and latches that were beginning to rust. Bob had a feeling it was original, but he wasn't too concerned with the crate, more so with what was in it.
"Open it, come on!" Frank could barely contain his excitement.
Ray and their producer Rob were also looking on, while Bob knelt, unfastened the latches, and gently lifted the crate's lid.
"Oh, wow..." he heard himself say in a hush.
Frank was standing right beside him, his shoes visible in the corner of Bob's eye. "I told you she's beautiful."
Bob's new marching snare was more than sixty years old. She had been produced during World War II, and had probably sent her fair share of soldiers off to war, though nobody could confirm whether or not she had seen any action herself or not. She was, quite frankly, the most beautiful snare Bob had ever seen. The maple finish was rich and still smooth, the drumhead yellowed and weathered with age. Bob hadn't even put a stick to it and he already knew it would sound just right for their record, that she was exactly what they were looking for.
"What will you call her, Bob?" Gerard said from the doorway to the kitchen. His voice was soft, sort of awed, and Bob realized these were the first words he'd heard Gerard say in a long, long time.
Bob gently touched his hand to the snare's hoop, already itching to play it. "Daisy..." he said finally. "I'm gonna call her Daisy."
Above him, Frank was smiling, and Bob felt his chest constrict again. "Thank you, Frankie..."
"Don't mention it," Frank brushed it off. "Come on, let's set her up! I wanna hear how she sounds."
Part Two
Master Post
Art Post
It's seven hours till showtime and Bob's sitting up in the nosebleed section of the arena, giving himself a good view of the hustle and bustle going on below. He's twirling a drumstick absently between the fingers of his right hand, feet planted on the seat in front of him, the floor underneath littered with flattened cigarette butts. The whole arena's a smoke-free zone but he's too lethargic to bother heading out of the building right now, and the steady crowd already gathering outside isn't something he's ready to deal with at the moment. They finished soundcheck about an hour ago and the rest of his band is probably backstage in their spacious dressing room, reserved for headlining acts, Gerard doing last-minute rounds of press that never seemed to require the presence of the others. He can see figures scurrying in and out of the heavy black drapes that hang just behind his drum riser, crew members making adjustments to wiring and amps, security checking the barriers and conversing with arena officials.
"Madison Square Garden..." a voice says, too familiar to be startling. "Who would've thought, huh?"
"Yeah..." Bob sniffs and takes a drag out of his cigarette. "Who would've thought."
Ray's got a towel slung over his neck and a bottle of mineral water in one hand, soundcheck sweat still gleaming on his skin. He moves to sit beside Bob and puts his feet up as well, their sneakers equally dirty and grimy after weeks on the road. Ray offers the bottle to him, and Bob accepts it wordlessly, taking a shallow gulp before handing it back over. He knows he should drink more to replenish what he sweated off during soundcheck but there's a tight knot in his chest that makes swallowing difficult. He knows it well enough to know that it won't recede until the lights go down at showtime, until he's counting off beats in the darkness and willing himself to stay focused in the deafening roar of the crowd.
"How're you doin?" Ray asks, and Bob doesn't need to look to know that he's glancing at Bob's wrists, firmly wrapped in braces that won't come off until they take the stage.
"They've been better..." he says truthfully. "Same goes for the rest of me."
"Yeah, it's been a hell of a tour," Ray agrees. "It'll be nice to go home after this, take a real break for once."
Bob can't agree more. After they came back from Venezuela at the end of the world tour, it was barely a month before they were packed up and on the road again, albeit on a much smaller scale and across smaller venues. Bob's body feels all kinds of fucked up--with parts functioning on different time zones and bits of him still scattered in hotel rooms and airport lounges across three continents, his dirty laundry still bunched up in plastic bags sitting on the floor in a half-furnished apartment in Chicago.
It still doesn't feel like his home, not even after the final installment was paid for in his absence. Just a two-bedroom unit with expensive wooden floors and pale grey walls that Bob's mother finds too dreary. She wants him to paint it something like beige or off-white, just like Bob's childhood bedroom in their house in Darien, while Gerard said something about a mural featuring a drumkit come alive, limbs sprouting out of toms and snares and cymbals flying about like UFOs.
He hasn't taken either approach--both have the potential to be really unsettling. The walls stay grey for now, neutral and inoffensive.
"You made up your mind yet?" Ray asks.
"About surgery?" Bob looks down at his hands, feels the odd twinge of muscles that aren't quite in their right places. "Not really."
"Bob..."
"I know what you're going to say," Bob says. "I know the song and dance, okay? What they need to do, the risks, the procedure, the recovery, I got it all worked out."
"Then there's no reason for you to put it off any longer," Ray says firmly. "It's not just your wrists, Bob...it's your fucking career on the line. We were all there, remember? We heard what the doctors said."
Bob stops twirling his stick, his fingers curled around the glossy black print of the band's logo embedded in the pale wood. "Risk of permanent damage or disability," he mutters.
"And that's not enough?" Ray sounds incredulous. Bob doesn't blame him.
"Sometimes I wonder if it'll be worth it," Bob says. "How far down the road do you think we are?"
Ray sighs, his shoulders sagging. "We've been through this before..."
"It's not going to last forever, you know." Bob says, hiding a grimace as his left wrist flares up, another random spike of pain that's been increasing in frequency for weeks. The braces and medication can only do so much. "Gerard talks about it all the time--how we're just one record closer to the end."
"You think I haven't been listening?" Ray retorts. "It's an old number of his. Of course it's all true, but weighing your surgery against how long this band's gonna last is...well, stupid."
"Ray..."
"Look, you don't want to decide now, that's fine. Just don't expect me to stop bugging you about it." Ray says, reaching over to rest a hand on the back of Bob's neck. It's warm and slightly damp, Ray's thumb rubbing just over Bob's pulse. It's a small comfort, but Bob's entire body feels like it's gone brittle, ready to shatter at the slightest pressure.
"I'm just so fucking tired," Bob huffs out.
"I know..." Ray says. "Let's just blow the roof off this place tonight, and then we can go home."
Bob closes his eyes. Home.
---
Bob's thing with Frank began in the same manner that all things involving Frank seemed to begin--sudden, reckless and disorienting. The culmination happened in the full heat of summer on Warped, when they fucked for the first time. They'd been gravitating towards it for quite some time and the onset of summer and the grueling tour schedule became a sort of catalyst, throwing them together in those small, rare moments when their limited personal space wasn't being overrun by Mikey and Pete and their two-man traveling circus of all-consuming awkward love.
There was nothing romantic about it, Bob and Frank's first time, mainly because they did it in the back lounge of the Rejects' bus with Nick Wheeler and Mike Kennerty listening outside the door, drunk and giggling and obnoxiously calling the play-by-play as they saw fit, announcing it to everyone else who happened to be on board for their free-flowing bus party. It wasn't like anyone else on the bus was sober enough to care, and neither was Bob. The Rejects had been pimping their bus as a “love motel on wheels” for reasons that were probably so assinine that nobody outside the four of them should even bother to contemplate, but Bob and Frank both agreed that it would be a waste of perfectly good horizontal space-a rarity on Warped Tour-not to take them up on it. They did it quick and rough with Frank clawing holes in Bob's back, Bob's fingers smudging Frank's thick stage makeup all over his face. When Frank came, he bit Bob's bottom lip hard enough to draw blood, and Bob's lip stung for days. He didn't complain.
It was the loudest, craziest summer of Bob's life, everything seen through a heat haze. He spent his mornings on his practice pads, honing his precision obsessively, going through the songs in their setlist over and over. They played mostly in the afternoons, Gerard prancing about the small stage with newfound buoyancy, the floor under Bob's kit littered with splinters from his shattered sticks. He played hard on that tour, willing himself to focus on each beat and each roll, as if doing so would make up for the fact that the songs weren't his.
At night Frank would climb into his bunk, no longer in danger of being thrown out, and lick his way into Bob's mouth, tasting like cigarettes and cheap beer that he'd never let Gerard smell on him in the morning. Frank's small hands would try to ease the tension off Bob's shoulders and his mouth would often find its way to Bob's dick, sucking him into oblivion while Bob had to bite on his own hand to stop himself screaming. Frank didn't care, though. He didn't care if anyone saw them like that, didn't bother leaving Bob's bunk to return to his own before the rest of the bus woke up the next day. He was maddeningly careless and self-assured, traits Bob often found himself envying.
Frank was everything Bob wasn't, and Bob held him down and fucked him and clung to him afterwards, knowing that Frank could push him away just as easily as he'd pulled Bob close.
---
All three bands sharing that night's bill have been allocated separate dressing rooms within Madison Square Garden but they all sort of gravitate towards MCR's, where Eddie Reyes is now driving one of his RC trucks across the floor, making it do turns and twists and at one point driving it right between Mikey's legs, who seems oblivious to it as he continued texting on his phone. Gerard and Ray are piled on the couch with Adam Lazzara, catching up on everything that's happened in the year the two bands barely saw each other, while the guys from Drive By hover close to the rider and sneak off with packs of Frank's vegan fruit chips and Gatorade. Bob finds himself in the unofficial smoker's corner of the room with Mark O'Connell, Taking Back Sunday's drummer, sharing a pack of Marlboro Reds as the clock ticks closer and closer towards showtime.
"We'll probably start writing as early as next month," Mark says. "Adam's got some solid ideas and Eddie thinks we're...well, Eddie thinks Fazzi's ready."
Bob looks across the room at Matt Fazzi, Taking Back Sunday's newest member in what seems like an endless cycle of departures and arrivals, who's sitting on the floor watching Eddie drive his RC truck around the room, cradling his guitar. "I'm glad he's getting along well..." Bob says. "I mean, I've never heard him play, but--"
"He's a great guitarist." Mark says as he lifts the cigarette to his lips. "His style's nothing like Fred, though, so we weren't sure how to go about it. Should he just play Fred's parts? Should he do his own thing? It was...a little weird at first."
Bob thinks back to the frantic nights in a sweltering room in New Jersey, with Gerard clinging to sobriety with one hand Mikey with the other, Ray patiently guiding Bob through the songs while Frank chain-smoked furiously to dispel his nerves. He was playing on Otter's old kit, making adjustments after every song, trying to feel less like he's tresspassing on someone else's sacred ground. Brian had promised him a custom kit if everything worked out but at the time it was still a pretty big "if" hanging over their heads, to go with the unspoken but nagging doubt about Gerard's quest to stay clean.
"I played all the Revenge stuff to the letter for the first few months," Bob admits. "I guess I was more concerned with getting it right than with adding my own feel to it."
"You did it in crunch time too," Mark says. "Anyway, it'll be interesting to see what Fazzi comes up for the new record. It'll be his, not Fred's."
Bob nods slowly, struggling to get over the lump in his throat to speak. "How is he...how's he fitting in, you know, personally? Aside from the music?"
"He's a nice kid," Mark says. "Puts up with Adam and all his antics, which is always a good thing."
Bob allows himself a small chuckle. "Always," he repeats.
"I guess if things are falling into place you just know it, somehow..." Mark says. "Can't put your finger on it, can't say what it is exactly...you just kinda feel it, you know?"
"Yeah," Bob says. "I know."
---
People didn't ask Bob too much about the Paramour. They asked Gerard while it was still good article-fodder to do so, back when every magazine wanted to run a story about how My Chemical Romance nearly self-destructed in a haunted mansion up in the hills of Silver Lake, California. The extent of Mikey's troubles were exaggerated in some publications, underplayed in others--Mikey himself offering only vague recollections of the time he spent there, choosing to focus on the things he did once he got out. Frank and Ray often chipped in with bits about the creative process that took place, what little of it they could actually put into words, but for the most part Bob didn't get his share of Paramour-related questions and he preferred it that way. It wasn't a story he paticularly wanted to tell.
The essence of Bob's experience at the Paramour wasn't about haunted paintings or voices that lived in the walls, wasn't about waking nightmares or doors that slammed shut of their own accord. His bathroom might have had a genuine ghost or two in it, but after a while it became less of a scare and more of a nuisance. Bob quickly learned to live with it and--more impotantly--sleep through it. The ghosts didn't bother him so much. The living were another matter entirely.
Losing Mikey--and they really did think they'd lost him for good at that point--wasn't like losing an arm or a leg. It was more like losing a lung, when both had been limping and chugging and smoked to hell and back to begin with. To add to their general misery, Gerard went out of commission almost as soon as the car carrying Mikey out of the property was out of the front gates, which meant that for a few days it was just Bob, Ray and Frank becoming increasingly restless and ready to tear at each other's throats because they knew they couldn't get anything done without Gerard and Mikey, and none of them was willing to accept it. Ray wrote a few angry, disjointed riffs and trashed them just as quickly. Frank broke two strings on his guitar and didn't even bother to change them. Bob was still not getting along with the marching snare they'd gotten for him. He knew that the snare was essential to the sound they were after, but he hated the sound it produced and hated the memories it brought back, how he could almost feel the starched collar of the uniform at his throat and hear the condescending whispers from the bleachers--these were his ghosts, not the Paramour's, and he had no desire to give them any chance to materialize, especially in an environment that seemed all too welcoming to things you'd rather not let out.
----
The show in Madison Square garden ends up being one of the best Bob's played in a long time, the pain flaring up and down his arms momentarily forgotten each time he looks up and sees Gerard's outstretched hand silhouetted against a sea of flickering blue lights from cellphones held aloft. It's a common sight at any of their shows but in a large arena such as this the effect is tenfold, his four closest friends playing their hearts out to a crowd that sang each word back at them. Towards the end, Gerard does one of his little speeches, and he does indeed say something to the tune of the possibility of this being their last show.
The crowd grows wild and anguished at the remark, as expected, because Gerard Way is nothing if not a frontman with a flair for dramatics. He makes it vague enough to open it to interpretation, though Bob dreads asking whether that's for the benefit of the audience or for Gerard himself. He settles for playing the heck out of their set, and for the last song of the encore his eyes are fixed on the four most important people in his life and the sea of people beyond them, the dancing blue lights of cellphones and cameras moving with the music, their music, his music.
Bob ends the encore with his usual flourish, throwing his sticks as far as he can up into the air and not bothering to catch them, already out of his throne by the time the last burst of pyro erupts from the stage and the lights go out immediately afterwards. He climbs down the steps carefully in the dark, his eyes still adjusting to the sudden change of illumination. He's barely at the bottom of the stage when Ray appears from within the folds of the black drapes and grabs him by the waist, pulls him close and kisses him full on the mouth, sweaty and sloppy and harsh. They're relatively hidden from the rest of the backstage here, though it won't be the case for long, so Bob decides that he can do little more than open his mouth and close his eyes, his knees buckling with the force of Ray's sudden ambush. It never fails to take Bob by surprise whenever Ray does it, just comes at him without any preamble and stakes his claim like this.
Bob's definitely not complaining, though.
“We're not done yet...” Ray says against his ear, while Bob gets a mouthful of Ray's sweaty curls. "We're far from done, do you hear me?"
“Yeah...” Bob manages to choke out, not bothering to ask if Ray meant the band, or them, or both.
“Good,” Ray squeezes the back of his neck. “Believe it,”
He lets go of Bob after that and walks off towards the others, Bob following suit with his mouth feeling almost as swollen as his wrists. Mikey and Gerard are several steps ahead, arms around each other and walking uncoordinatedly towards the dressing room while Frank is catching a piggyback ride from a compliant Dewees, his last guitar safely in Cortez's hands. Bob feels a sudden rush of not wanting to be left behind and surges hurriedly after them, falling in step beside Ray. The lights in the corridor leading to the dressing room are harsh against his eyes, sweat fuzzing at the corners of his vision, the sound of their voices and Frank's tired laughter echoing hollow in his head, as if everything he sees is already a memory, already fading into the past.
---
Three days after Mikey left the Paramour, Frank tried to smash the blue light hanging over Mikey's bedroom with a pair of Bob's drumsticks.
He'd marched into the ballroom with the look of murder in his eyes and stole the sticks right out of the case Bob kept them in, ignoring Bob's curses as he and Ray chased after Frank, not realizing at first what the little fucker was about to do. Ray was the one who put two and two together after he saw Frank bounding up the grand staircase in the foyer, and told Bob that they had to stop him before he "did anything stupid". Bob honestly couldn't care less if Frank wanted to smash the whole room into pieces and he'd probably volunteer to break a windowpane or two, but Ray was adamant on stopping Frank.
There was a brief tussle once they reached the blue room--Ray managed to catch Frank by the legs and pull him down onto the bed just as he was about to swing, and when Frank's fingers went slack around the sticks he'd stolen, Bob threw them away, sent them clattering against the wall and onto the floor, and replaced them with his own fingers, lacing their fingers tight and allowing Frank to bruise him as hard as he wanted to. Frank had fought, then crumpled, then finally cried into Ray's shoulder even as he threatened to break Bob's knuckles. He was stronger than he looked, and he was shaking, and Ray was holding both of them close, and Bob's throat and chest felt tight and heavy.
"Why are we still here?" Frank asked after he'd calmed down a bit, his face pale and sickly under the eerie blue light.
"Gerard..." Ray said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "We have to stay for Gerard."
"His own fucking brother didn't stay for him--"
"Frank, stop." Bob cut him off. "You're about to say something that's gonna make me punch your lights out."
"Yeah, heard you were good at that." Frank snapped back, but he squeezed Bob's fingers again.
"Mikey didn't leave because of us," Ray reminded him. "He needs to get better. It's not us he needs to get away from, and not Gerard, either."
Frank shook his head. "I can't believe we're still here. After every fucking thing that's happened--"
"Gerard doesn't want to leave," Ray said. "I know he hasn't been giving us anything new and he's definitely not a happy guy--but he doesn't want to leave."
Bob turned his head to look at Ray. "How would you know?"
"Bob, we came here for something. It's here, and Gerard knows it. He won't leave until he finds it."
Frank snorted into the musty bedcover. "Yeah...but at what cost?"
Ray didn't answer. Frank unfurled his fingers from Bob's and placed his palm on Bob's chest, the heat of his touch bleeding through the material of Bob's shirt and hoodie, warming him somewhat. Cold, it was always cold in the blue room, cold as Mikey's last gaze at them when he told them he was leaving, cold as the water that ran uninvited from the faucets in Bob's bathroom at night.
That night, Frank slept fitfully on the living room couch while Bob watched over him, the TV relaying news about the world that existed outside the Paramour's gates, a world they seemed to be no longer part of. He could hear Ray playing low, mournful tones on his electric guitar in the ballroom, melodies that reached no conclusion. There were noises from the floor above, padded footsteps that could've been Gerard or one of the ghosts--hardly any difference between the two. Frank slept to Ray's disjointed lullabyes and Bob watched from the armchair next to him, wondering if any of them would care or notice if the world outside stopped existing altogether.
---
Bob doesn't go home to Chicago after the show, loading his belongings in the back of Ray's car and sleeping in the passenger seat for most of the drive from New York to Belleville.
He's been staying with Ray since before the beginning of this tour, knocking on Ray's door a few weeks before he was supposed to even show up in New Jersey. Ray seemed disinclined to push for an explanation, even as Bob pushed past him and headed straight to the bathroom to throw up a half-bottle's worth of Jack and his last meal. He was trying to piece the words together in his head when Ray showed up with a towel and a glass of water, telling him that he was welcome to stay for as long as he wanted to and that he didn't have to explain himself if he didn't feel like it.
That was months ago and now the only thing Bob feels like is a freeloading asshole, as he watches Ray shuttling back and forth between the garage and the spare room to bring in all of Bob's stuff. Bob wants to stand up and help but the doctors were adamant that Bob shouldn't be doing any lifting or anything that could strain his wrists other than drumming, and Ray is sticking to their words with military precision. So Bob is left to sit on the couch and text his parents to tell them they'd gotten back from New York safely, hoping against hope that his mom's reply will not include a request for him to come home for some secound cousin's housewarming party or something.
"I just put your suitcase in the bedroom," Ray says as he appeared from the kitchen, carrying two freshly-opened bottles of Heineken. "It's ok if you don't wanna unpack tonight, I still got the spare toothbrush and things."
Bob nods weakly and takes the beer as it's offered to him, sipping at it as Ray sits on the couch beside him and flicks the television on.
"We look like a couple of regular douchebags with nothing to do," he comments dryly as Ray settles on a Discovery channel special on the construction of the Three Gorges Dam in China.
Ray looks over and smiles. "Aren't we?" he raises his bottle towards Bob. "Here's to nothing,"
"Nothing," Bob clinks his bottle with Ray's and drinks, watching the animated computer simulation of ancient villages and hillside temples disappearing under the rising waters of the dam.
Nothing.
"Do you want...do you want to set Daisy up in the practice room?" Ray asks quietly during a commercial break.
Bob's beer is half-empty and fatigue is starting to make his eyelids droop, but he glances over at the doorway to the room Ray's converted into a small practice space, where he's got amps and his guitar rack and a table set up with his computer and recording equipment. Right now the door is closed, and resting on the floor just in front of it is the weathered equipment crate with its stained wooden panels and its rusty latches, one side of it decorated in near-offensive cheeriness with letters spelling out "DAISY" in baby-blue glittery stickers, Frank's personal touch.
"No," Bob says, and it comes out a lot heavier than merely answering Ray's question. "I think she needs a rest, too."
Ray doesn't say anything, just nods and returns his attention back to the television. "Oh cool, they're having a Mythbusters marathon tomorrow night."
Bob smiles. It's nice like this, being with someone he's completely at ease with. He can almost see this as home, which is more than he can say about the half-furnished apartment he's got back in Chicago and the house he grew up in, but he's wary of letting himself get carried away. It's a good thing that Ray's a pretty undemanding guy, that he doesn't question Bob's reasons or motives, that he's content to let Bob use his toothbrush or eat all of his cereal without asking for anything in return, not even an explanation as to why Bob is there in the first place. Bob does his best to repay the hospitality in his own way, whether it's making breakfast or giving morning blowjobs. He's far more skilled in the latter than in the former, though Ray seems equally happy with both.
"You sleeping out here or in my room?" Ray asks softly after their beers are done.
Bob stretches, feeling every aching bone in his body. "Room would be nice."
"Okay," Ray says. "Okay."
---
Bob doesn't remember when the Frank thing ended and the Ray thing began.
It wasn't like he was trading one for the other, or compensating for anything. And it was nothing like what he'd experienced with Frank--this was Ray, after all. Bob only remembers that it happened easy, like a steady progression of closeness, Ray providing the stability that nobody else seemed capable of. When they were tracking The Black Parade, Ray had this habit of going out on late-night drives with no real destination, just mindless pedal-abusing runs through the freeways, and Bob often went with him. Sometimes they'd talk about the song they were recording, or have the rough cut playing on repeat on the stereo, and sometimes there'd be no talking at all. Sometimes they'd stop in deserted parking lots or rest stops and laugh at themselves for being so cliche and high school and whatnot, but Bob was pretty sure nobody in high school had it this easy, this comfortable. Ray would reach over and grab him without so much as announcing his intentions first. Bob didn't need him to. He'd go to Ray willingly, stretching himself over the length of the front seats, feeling Ray unbuckle his seatbelt for him, accepting the wet kisses and the hands in his hair, around his neck, snaking under his shirt.
They didn't make an attempt at full-on sex until Projekt Revolution, well into the lifespan of The Black Parade and already feeling the toll of its weight and ambitious scope. Bob remembers how beautiful Frank looked that summer, how he burned brighter on stage than their pyrotechnics. But Bob had gotten more than his share of fire at that point, and he was content to observe from a distance--he didn't need to get burnt twice. With Mikey missing for most of the tour (though under much happier circumstances) and Cortez keeping to his porn collection whenever he's not on stage with them, Frank gravitated towards Gerard more than ever, and Bob didn't really mind. He'd long since given up on seeking out explanations for Frank's actions, and Ray's reassuring presence was a more appealing prospect. Ray wasn't loud or flamboyant but he was no klutz either, a trait he demonstrated one night on the bus as he maneuvered Bob towards the bunks that night, big hands firmly settled on Bob's hips.
"You know, you really are skinny right now," Ray said as he pulled the waistband of Bob's sweatpants down.
"I'll gain it all back just to piss you off," Bob said, obligingly lifting his hips.
"Don't bother," Ray said as he pressed a kiss to Bob's navel. They weren't exactly at the height of personal hygiene on tour, but it didn't bother Bob as much as he thought it would. "I wouldn't really care."
"Me neither," Bob muttered in agreement as Ray crawled up his body.
Bob had been on the receiving end of anal sex before so the mechanics of it wasn't new to him, but in retrospect it was probably not the smartest thing to do to start off with Ray fucking Toro when you haven't had a dick in your ass for the last three years or so. Frank had been all too happy to let Bob fuck him senseless in all kinds of body-contorting ways when they were still doing it, never once raising the issue of returning the favor--though Bob would've let him, if he'd asked. In the end, Ray had to pull out after a few excruciating minutes when Bob just couldn't take him all in, but he soothed away any embarrassment Bob might have felt by bringing him off spectacularly, mouth wrapped firmly around Bob's dick while two fingers were thrusting viciously against Bob's prostate. Bob had to bite his lower lip until it bled to stop himself screaming when he came, and allowed Ray to fuck his face senseless afterwards. He wasn't a big fan of gagging on someone else's cock but Ray knew how to make it just on the right side of unbearable, just toeing the edge and holding Bob's head in place as he swallowed and shuddered, tears prickling the corners of his eyes.
There were more successful attempts after that, though Bob wasn't necessarily keeping score. The best one he can remember happened not long after Mikey came back, in the short break before they packed off for Asia. They had the luxury of doing it in Ray's newly-purchased house in Belleville, on the edge of autumn as it slid into a long, cold winter, when the heating was still prone to stuttering and snapping out at the most inconvenient moments, because rock-star riches notwithstanding, Ray Toro had decided to buy a mid-century fixer-upper instead of buying a plot and building a house from the ground up.
"It's too much work," Ray said as he a made a slow, lazy thrust into Bob. "All that construction, dealing with builders...I won't be here most of the time."
Bob looked up and smiled. "We won't even be here to see the cherry blossoms."
"That's sad," Ray said in all seriousness. "But they'll still be here the next year."
"Will we?"
Ray stopped moving for a second, lifting a hand to Bob's face to hold him firmly by the chin, his patented gesture of requiring undivided attention. "Of course we will."
---
"Hey...you asleep yet?"
Bob shakes his head. He's been staring at the shadows in Ray's ceiling for the last hour or so, finding sleep more elusive the harder he tried. "Damn tour messed up my body clock again,"
"Yeah, what else is new?" Ray rolls over slightly, the mattress dipping as his weight shifts. He puts an arm around Bob's chest and tugs at his shoulder. "Come here..."
Bob goes, letting Ray pull him close until they're pressed tight against each other under the sheets, and he opens his mouth obligingly when Ray starts nipping at his lower lip, demanding entrance. For all his considerate, good guy nature Ray's actually pretty blunt when it comes to sex itself, far more likely to poke Bob in the toe when they're watching TV to ask him if he wants to fuck than to beat around the bush with weak innuendos for a good thirty minutes. Tonight's no exception, as Bob can already feel Ray's hard-on grinding against his hip when Ray throws one leg across Bob's, his tongue lapping against the roof of Bob's mouth. Bob makes a soft "mmm-hmm" noise in the back of his throat and opens up more, the shift of more of Ray's weight on top of him sending off electric sparks to his groin.
They don't have too many options position-wise, ever since Bob got his first surgery there was no way he was getting on hands on knees for sex, but Ray doesn't seem to mind. He seems to like doing all the work while Bob just lies there and lets him, from pulling Bob's drawstring pants down to fetching the lube and condoms from the bedside table. Bob likes it when Ray uses his fingers to slowly open him up, sometimes threatening to make Bob come just from doing so. Ray knows how to mix it up just right, patiently waiting until Bob's loose enough to take his cock but at the same time nipping and biting his way across Bob's skin, leaving red bruises where he knows only the two of them will see. He latches onto Bob's right nipple just as he's adding a third finger, making Bob buck off the mattress, his fingers tangled in the damp curls of Ray's hair. They're both too drained from the touring and the not-quite breaks in between to do anything too taxing, but Bob likes it when Ray fucks him asleep, releases just enough tension from his muscles to enable him to rest. Ray's good to him, really good, and sometimes Bob wonders if he's doing enough to return the gesture, if Ray even cares.
They switch around so they can fuck on their sides, Ray holding him across the waist with Bob's leg draped over Ray's thigh, and they stay that way until Bob comes in Ray's hands, his moan half-hidden in the pillow he's pushed his head into. The bed smells like Ray and sex and a sweet, a strange comfort he doesn't even know what to do with, and even as he feels Ray coming inside him he begins to wonder how long he can keep this up until he breaks.
---
Mornings at the Paramour were the only times the house seemed quiet in a non-eerie way. The sun was warm enough to chase away some of the house's stubborn chill and Gerard liked to make his presence known during these times, popping in the kitchen to make a huge batch of coffee and leaving it for everyone else, like an offer of silent apology for being non-functional otherwise. This morning, when Bob came down for breakfast Gerard had already gone out into the backyard, sitting at the edge of the swimming pool with his feet dangling in the dirty leaf-strewn water, sketchbook in hand. He wasn't drawing anything, just tapping his pencil idly against paper, but it was something at least. Brian had discreetly assigned one of the techs to keep an eye on Gerard, to make sure he didn't try to jump in the pool and not resurface like he did the day after Mikey left, and since then the entire house had fallen into a muted, stagnant but otherwise uneventful silence.
Frank was the one who came down next, equally disappointed that he'd missed out on a chance to talk to Gerard, who was pretty much a no-go area after he'd made his coffee and retreated back into his own world. But Frank was more than willing to accept Bob's company at the kitchen table while they picked listlessly at slightly burnt toast and Frank's specially-delivered vegan pastries.
"So I managed to get a call through to my Dad yesterday," Frank said.
"Yeah?"
"Yeah, turns out you have to walk up that fucking hill in the back to get reception--you know, past Daisy's grave and along the footpath," Frank gestured in the general direction of the estate's backyard.
"Huh...I should try it next time," Bob said. He didn't need to call anyone and didn't think anyone was desperately waiting to hear from him, but Frank didn't have to know that.
"Anyway, you're still not getting the right sound off that snare, right?" Frank asked.
"Same old, same old..." Bob said. "I don't know, maybe I should switch back to my regular, have it beefed up in mastering."
"Well, my Dad knows someone--well actually my grandpa knows someone from way back, when they were making those things for the military. Like real marching band stuff from the forties, not the high school band type."
Bob looked up from his coffee, his interest piqued. "Oh?"
"Yeah, he said there's probably something in the type of wood they're using these days that doesn't have the same sound quality or something--" Frank shrugged. "I don't know, dude, I'm no drummer."
Bob had to smile at that. "That's good to hear, else I'd be out of a job."
"Oh, fuck you.." Frank said, but he was smiling back. "Anyway, Grandpa's friend knows a collector who can get us a real authentic piece, you know? A real badass military marching snare from the old days. Something that'll make just the right sound."
"Oh hey, he shouldn't go through the trouble--" Bob started.
"Too late," Frank said with a grin. "He's sending it to our production office in Los Angeles this week. By Monday, you'll have your new baby."
Bob blanked for a few seconds, almost burning his hand on his coffee mug. "I...thanks, Frankie. Really, you didn't have to--"
"I wanted to, you idiot." Frank said as he got off his chair and went over to Bob, unceremoniously squishing himself on Bob's lap, flinging his arms around Bob's neck. "It's about time someone did something, right?"
Bob didn't answer, just wrapped his arms around Frank's back--he felt smaller somehow, they'd all been losing weight and not eating right and he could feel the poke of Frank's ribs through his ratty t-shirt, and breathed the scent of Frank's organic shower gel in his neck. "Thanks..." he muttered again. "Make--uh, make sure your dad and grandpa know how much I appreciate it,"
"You'll love it, I know you will." Frank said into Bob's neck. "It'll be perfect,"
Perfect.
"Frankie, I..." Bob caught himself, his throat tightening around the word. He didn't know if this was the time and place to say it, if he was just caught in the moment or not, but he was saved from the dilemma when Ray came into the kitchen, smiling at the sight of Bob and Frank tangled together.
"Well, aren't you two cute?" he said mockingly on the way to the coffee pot. "What's the happy occasion?"
"We're having a baby!" Frank announced loudly, kissing Bob's cheek girlishly for emphasis.
"Congratulations," Ray said, lifting his mug in salute.
Bob laughed, his arm still around Frank's waist. It was probably the first genuine laugh he'd cracked since entering the house. His jaw ached with the strain of it.
---
Ray's got an external hard disk set up next to his computer in the practice room, where he keeps works in progress, snatches of riffs and chord progressions, rough demos with Gerard slurring through half-written lyrics. Bob spends one afternoon sitting beside him as he sifts through it diligently, filing them into appropriate folders for easy access later. They have full songs with no names, half songs with missing bridges or lyrics, things written in hotel rooms and buses in God knows how many different places. There's no way to know how many of them, if any, will see the light of day. What's obvious to everyone is that they were different, no longer being driven by a grand narrative that compels them to live it and breathe it. Gerard's lyrics are just as sharp and brutal but he doesn't paint desolate landscapes with them as he did with Parade, though Bob knows that doesn't mean he's digging any less deep.
"What do you think it's going to sound like?" he asks Ray.
"The new record?"
Bob nods. "I know we're not working on it any time soon, but do you think Gerard's got it all in his head already, like he did last time?"
Ray seems to consider his next words carefully. "I think...maybe it's not like there's a story he's dying to tell anymore, you know?"
Bob snorts. "Dying being the operative word."
"Yeah, pretty much..." Ray agrees. "I mean, you wouldn't want something like Parade living in your head for longer than necessary, would you? Had to share the madness."
Bob remembers how each of them had given it to that madness, ugly truths dragged out in heavy rooms and painstakingly skin-grafted onto the songs, Gerard's sketchpad overflowing with words and images that bled into each other like vines. Gerard had done it for Mikey, that much was obvious to them. Frank had, in turn, done it for Gerard. Ray had done it for the music. Bob had done it for them, once he realized that losing sanity was nothing compared to losing them.
“Were you ever scared?”
Ray turns in his chair. “Of what?”
“That we'd fall in too deep,” Bob says. “All of us, nobody left to pull us out.”
“Of course,” Ray says. “It's not...I mean, nobody wants to go through that ever again, but if I absolutely had to--” he pauses, as if considering the consequences of what he's about to say.
“Yeah,” Bob mutters. “Me too.”
---
True to Frank's word, the snare arrived on Monday afternoon, all the house's occupants gathered near the front door to see its arrival. Frank had insisted on opening the package right there in the foyer, probably more excited than Bob was. The crate the snare was packed in was old, made of dark wood and latches that were beginning to rust. Bob had a feeling it was original, but he wasn't too concerned with the crate, more so with what was in it.
"Open it, come on!" Frank could barely contain his excitement.
Ray and their producer Rob were also looking on, while Bob knelt, unfastened the latches, and gently lifted the crate's lid.
"Oh, wow..." he heard himself say in a hush.
Frank was standing right beside him, his shoes visible in the corner of Bob's eye. "I told you she's beautiful."
Bob's new marching snare was more than sixty years old. She had been produced during World War II, and had probably sent her fair share of soldiers off to war, though nobody could confirm whether or not she had seen any action herself or not. She was, quite frankly, the most beautiful snare Bob had ever seen. The maple finish was rich and still smooth, the drumhead yellowed and weathered with age. Bob hadn't even put a stick to it and he already knew it would sound just right for their record, that she was exactly what they were looking for.
"What will you call her, Bob?" Gerard said from the doorway to the kitchen. His voice was soft, sort of awed, and Bob realized these were the first words he'd heard Gerard say in a long, long time.
Bob gently touched his hand to the snare's hoop, already itching to play it. "Daisy..." he said finally. "I'm gonna call her Daisy."
Above him, Frank was smiling, and Bob felt his chest constrict again. "Thank you, Frankie..."
"Don't mention it," Frank brushed it off. "Come on, let's set her up! I wanna hear how she sounds."
Part Two