The Weekend (Sleep Spent)
Title: The Weekend (Sleep Spent)
Author: sakurashakedown
Pairing: Frank/Gerard
Rating: R
Warning: Drug Abuse, Self-Harm, Mentions of Child Abuse, Mentions of Sexual Abuse/Domestic Abuse, Language
Disclaimer: Once again, I own nothing.
Summary: Monday morning Frank decides to accept the truth. One day Frank wakes up and realizes his life has spiraled wildly out of control.
I can't expel the truth
It’s much more than I thought I could do
And with time, my worth will stain
And split your heart from my name
So drive away your mouth from my ears
And waste a day so I can think clearly
And what’s left to wait for here
As my hands sleep, spent this last year
Choking the bottle’s neck
That pulled you from my bed
Sleep Spent - Death Cab for Cutie
------<>------
Monday morning Frank decides to accept the truth.
This is the Monday morning after a weekend-long party binge when Frank wakes up in bed - fully clothed - next to Adam Lazzara - also fully clothed - and trips over Gabe Saporta - who’s only half dressed - on his way to the bathroom where he finds Gerard - who’s missing his shoes - passed out on the floor next to the toilet with vomit on his shirt.
It’s not a pretty sight; Gerard’s got a yellow line of puke running down the side of his mouth and little chucks of whatever clinging to the split ends of his matte black hair that’s plastered across his face. It’s enough to shock Frank - as much as he can be shocked with the headache that’s splitting his head open and clouding reality. It makes him wonder how it all got this far, but he doesn’t have time to wonder long before the world spins and his stomach hurls and he’s on his knees trying to get it all in the toilet.
He hears Gerard moan on the floor over the sounds of his heaving and stomach contents splashing in the toilet water. When he’s done - for now at least - he rests his head on the cool porcelain rim and looks at Gerard. He’s missing his jacket and Frank can see the faded crisscross lines on his arms from long ago, before he met Frank, before he started hanging with Gabe, back when he had a boyfriend that used to smack him around and he wanted to die. Frank had learned the story of those scars slowly and over time and in bits and pieces; first over beers, then over shots, then over mirrored table tops, and finally in messy beds, but that’s not what he's paying attention to. What’s holding his attention in iron fists are the little purple-and-red bruises dotting his arm.
These are new. And even though sometimes Frank can’t remember where he is or if he’s eaten, he can always remember every detail of Gerard - the burst blood vessel under his eye, the freckle on his temple, the birthmark on his thigh - and these tracks littering his arm are recent.
Frank can feel a wave of disgust come over him and all the blood drain from his face and it makes him want to vomit again. Instinctually he checks his own arms, because whatever Gerard does Frank does and sometimes Frank can only remember where he's been by looking at Gerard’s shoes; mud means marijuana near the marshes, grass blades and flower petals mean pills in the park, sand means shots on the shore, and clean shoes mean cocaine in a club. With his head splitting open, he looks at his arms and he’s clean, but he still wants to cry because if Gerard’s using needles - Gerard who’s so afraid of needles he gets faint just from looking at them - then it means he’s got to accept the truth - the cold hard truth he’s tried so hard all these months not to realize.
Gerard moans on the floor and rolls over onto his back, his dirty black band shirt rising up, revealing the unblemished skin there and Frank finally fesses up to the severity of his situation. He finally acknowledges his lifestyle for what it is.
It’s Monday morning and Frank Iero accepts the truth.
---<>---
It’s a Wednesday afternoon when Frank tells Gerard what he’s thinking.
It’s sunny and warm and they’re sitting in the park taking in the fresh air and sunshine. The sky is a perfect, cloudless blue. Wednesday afternoons are the perfect time for telling what you’re thinking, Frank decides. They’ve had Monday and Tuesday to recover and they’re not itching for the weekend yet like how they get on Thursdays. Gerard is worse about wanting the weekend than Frank; he gets restless and irritable and sometimes he can’t sleep and so he keeps Frank awake all night, telling him high school horror stories, traumatic teenage tales, and chilling childhood chronicles. Then in the morning it’s Friday and Gabe is pulling up outside their apartment with Adam, and Frank doesn’t know if he dreamed Gerard was telling him these things or not. He never gets the chance to ask though, because Adam always enters their kitchen, brown eyes already dilated, and places a little pink or pale pill on Gerard’s tongue and all Frank can think about it is how sometimes he wants to hit Adam for being so close to his boyfriend.
It’s beautiful outside and they’re sitting in the grass under a tree and Gerard is scratching his arm. Frank hates to see it. It was bad enough seeing the silver scars, but at least those were remnants of a past life and they held within them some kind of hope - Gerard could get through things, get better - but these purple track mark bruises are recent ugly reminders of their present and how revolting it is.
Frank wastes no time; he just comes out and says it, “Gerard. I want to get clean.”
At first he doesn’t think Gerard’s heard him because he’s just staring into space, scratching his arm, but then Gerard laughs a little nervous laugh, not even really a laugh at all, just a sad little Heh and says, “Why?”
That hurts Frank almost as much as seeing the track marks on Gerard’s arms. That means he’s in deep, because he can’t even seem to fathom why Frank would want to be clean.
“Because,” Frank sputters, not really knowing what to say. Gerard just looks at him, waiting for him to go on. His eyes are green in the sunlight and he’s got his messy, shoulder length black hair tucked behind his ears instead of falling in his face, so every time Frank looks at him, he realizes how really beautiful Gerard is. “Because…I…want to.” He thinks. “I’m throwing my life away, Gerard. We are throwing our lives away.”
Gerard tilts his head to one side and starts back scratching his arm again, leaving red scratch marks that only make it look worse and makes Frank’s skin crawl. Gerard’s sitting cross-legged and he’s got a hole in the knee of his jeans, his boney white knee cap exposed.
Gerard says, “But I like Gabe and Adam.”
“You do not like Gabe and Adam,” Frank says, a little too harshly and Gerard flinches a little and Frank has to remind himself to be gentle, because Gerard always gets nervous when Frank gets mad. Force of habit. A Pavlovian response. Frank is certain that, somewhere deep inside, Gerard is still waiting for Frank to hit him one day.
Frank takes a deep breath, goes on. “You do not like Gabe and Adam. You can’t. You only see them on the weekends and most of the time you’re too drugged out to know what’s going on. I know. I’m the same way.”
Gerard is biting his bottom lip, nervous. “Can I think about it, Frankie? Please? I’ve been through withdrawal before; I’m not strong enough to do it again.” The way he says it, all desperate and sad, reminds Frank of a young prostitute that tried to proposition him one night, a long time ago, when Frank had real friends and the worst things he did were drink too much and hit a joint now and then. This prostitute, she couldn't have been more than sixteen, and she followed Frank and Pete for, like, a block, her price dropping lower and lower, her voice getting sadder and sadder.
Frank looks at Gerard and he wants to cry again, because Gerard just keeps breaking his heart. He says, voice clear and steady, “Think about it. It’ll be good for us,” and Gerard says he’s hungry so they get up to go get food.
---<>---
It’s Thursday night and Frank really wants to sleep, but Gerard is up and telling him stories again. It’s dark in their bedroom and you can hear the refrigerator humming in the kitchen and the occasional car zooming past in the night. Frank is on his back, dozing off and Gerard is beside him, lying on his stomach, upper body propped up with his elbows. He’s playing with his hands, twisting the sheets and pulling at his pillow case.
“I can’t get sober, Frankie,” he sobs, his voice pained and pathetic. His jet black hair, made even blacker by the night, is falling in his moon white face that’s so pale Frank can see it in the dark. “I’m sorry, Frank, I can’t.” Gerard covers his face with his hands and Frank can't tell if he’s crying or just trying to block out his anxiety.
Exhausted, Frank rubs Gerard’s shoulder and says drowsily, “Baby, you’ll be fine.”
“I won’t,” Gerard moans through his hands, through his hair. “I’ll fuck up. I fuck up everything.” Gerard’s voice cracks and he says, “I was eight and every time I would fuck up he’d make me - I’d have to -” Gerard is crying now and Frank is scared and exhausted, heart pounding in his ears as Gerard finger paints another nightmare into Frank’s mind. It’s a typical Thursday night. “And if I - if I didn’t swallow - I’d - he’d just k-k-keep h-hitting me.”
As always, Frank sits up just as Gerard collapses, crying into his pillow. When he cries, his sobs shake his whole body and all Frank can do is stroke his hair until he falls asleep and tell him he loves him and feel his own heart break as he wonders, Baby, why didn’t anyone protect you?
And against all better judgment, he whispers, “Don’t worry, hon, it’s the weekend.”
---<>---
It’s Friday morning and when Frank wakes up, Gerard is already out of bed and embracing the day. Gerard’s Thursday night confessional is already erased from his memory - or buried down deep - and it’s such a contrast that, as usual, Frank can’t remember if he dreamed it or not.
This is their lives on Friday.
Adam and Gabe pull up and pop in. As always, Gabe walks in and looks around like he’s never seen the place before, inquires about the chaise lounge sitting in Frank’s living room (because he wants a new one), comments on the A Clockwork Orange movie poster hanging in the kitchen (that is a good movie!) and asks Frank if he likes living near the park (because he’s getting tired of downtown and is thinking of moving). Frank knows enough by now, though to know that Gabe will keep his same chaise lounge and will probably never leave downtown, still, he entertains his ideas anyway, because it’s Friday morning and Frank is itching bad for the weekend.
In the kitchen, Frank can see Gerard laughing at something Adam just said. He tosses his head back and laughs his musical, dorky school girl laugh. Frank watches Gerard lean back against the counter, gripping the counter edge with his hands. He tilts his head back, black hair falling out of his face and opens his mouth while Adam, trying not to giggle, drops a pill down Frank’s boyfriend’s throat.
It’s Friday morning and, as usual, Frank is jealous and restless and is ready to Start the Weekend.
---<>---
Friday afternoon they meet up with Gabe’s dealer outside Gabe’s place. Gabe’s place is this new modern condominium complex downtown. Gabe’s condo is way up on the tenth floor so he can look down at the city and its people through his floor to ceiling windows and it’s completely furnished with that sort of stainless steel, ultra-modern, minimalist bachelor pad furniture that looks cold and uninviting unless there’s a party going on. Gabe can afford to live in his condo on the tenth floor and look down at the world below him because, sort of like Frank, Gabe is a trust fund baby, except Gabe’s money is endless - his dad owns some crazy corporation - and Frank’s isn’t and one day it will run out unless he gets his shit together.
Frank doesn’t know about Adam. All he knows is that Adam is some Southern state refugee and lives downtown and hangs out in art circles when it isn’t the weekend. Frank asked Gerard about him once - it was a Wednesday - and Gerard got embarrassed and mumbled, “I don’t know. He sings or something,” and that pretty much sums up their relationship with these people. I don’t know who you are or what you do, but let’s hang out.
They pass around a joint and Frank watches Gabe cut up some lines and remembers when he first started hanging with Gabe and Adam. Gerard was with them then. Frank was twenty-two and fresh out of college. It was early summer and he was doing the club circuit with Pete Wentz, budding alcoholic and playboy extraordinaire. They’d met sophomore year in college and bonded over shots and music.
Pete was drunk and fawning over this chubby blonde kid with glasses and Frank was just kind of awkwardly standing there watching the scene play out when, all of a sudden, this angel walks in. The first time Frank sees Gerard, Frank’s tipsy and Gerard’s eyes are wide and dilated, but Frank will swear up and down that it was love at first sight.
It was a Saturday.
Since Gabe knew Pete and Pete loved being surrounded by people he knew, they all spent the evening together. That whole night, all Frank could do was stare into Gerard’s kohl-rimmed eyes and watch him blush red and laugh out loud every time Frank called him beautiful.
That was over a year and a half ago. Frank can’t remember the exact moment when he went from sharing beer and joints with Pete to doing cocaine with Gabe and blacking out whole weekends and he doesn’t like it. He doesn’t like any of it. He doesn’t like how he’s spent every weekend for nearing two years with Gabe and Adam and still doesn’t feel like he knows them. He doesn’t like how he feels on Friday mornings and he doesn’t like how Wednesdays are the only days when he feels well enough to get his thoughts together. He hates looking at Gerard’s arms.
Frank thinks about how worthless he’s become and how fucked up Gerard’s getting and all the money he’s wasted when he could’ve been starting a business or something and it makes him angry. Still, he watches Gabe snort up a line off his mirrored coffee table with a sick sort of envy and he knows that if he doesn’t get out now, he’ll get swept away with the tide and washed ashore Monday morning, passed out on someone’s bed or couch or bathroom floor.
So Frank makes his move. He stubs out his cigarette violently in Gabe’s crystal ashtray and stands up. Gerard, sitting beside Frank and leaned over Adam’s shoulder, watching him intently as he does his lines, immediately snatches his attention away from the powder on the table and focuses it all on Frank, standing over him. Gerard’s eyes, gold in Gabe’s living room, are wide and confused and Frank can just see the giant exclamation mark looming over his head, because this is not how this is supposed to go down. Frank is supposed to be sitting on the floor next to Gerard with his hand on his knee, not getting up to walk out.
Frank looks at Gabe leaned back against the couch with his eyes closed, a cigarette dangling from his fingers and Adam sniffing and pinching the bridge of his nose and he knows he won’t be missed, so he doesn’t even bother with goodbyes, just turns around to leave. Gerard is instantly on his heels, following in behind him so close, he’s stumbling and Frank can feel his breath on his neck, because whatever Frank does, Gerard does and Frank is just hoping that Gerard will just follow him out without making a scene.
“Frankie!” Gerard grabs his arm and spins him around just as he’s crossing the threshold. “What are you doing? You can’t leave now - it’s Friday. I don’t want to go home yet.” Gerard is talking fast and desperately, gold eyes dripping with apprehension and Frank thinks Gerard sounds exactly like the lush he is.
He tugs his arm away - a little too fast - and Gerard flinches just a bit before trying to grab his arm back. “I’m leaving,” Frank says, voice solid. He pulls his arm away again and starts walking down the carpeted hall towards the elevators. When he doesn’t feel Gerard behind him, he stops and turns around and looks at Gerard wringing his hands outside Gabe’s doorway. “Come on” Frank says and he doesn’t know if it’s a command or a plea.
Gerard just stands there, shuffling his feet and wringing his hands, his hair falling in his face, and says, “I don’t want too,” and there’s something hard in the way he says it. And Frank just looks at him. And Gerard just looks at the floor. And, for a minute, Frank thinks about grabbing Gerard and dragging him down the hallway, but he doesn’t. Instead, he just turns around and keeps walking. He hasn’t gotten his fix yet and it’s making his blood itch and he can’t think straight with itchy blood.
His first thought is that he’ll just go home, but there’s a bar across the street and if Frank can’t have powder, he thinks he’ll just have a drink instead. He ends up having a bunch of drinks and has to get the bartender to call him a cab and dig through his wallet to find his address, because he suddenly can’t remember exactly where he lives. When he gets home, he passes out on his couch and, in the end, it feels just like a Friday.
PART TWO: To Split A Heart From A Name
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A/N: This was supposed to be a one-shot, but it just kept growing lol So, instead of feeding it to you in big chunks, I've broken it up into easily digestable parts. There will probably be four total (I'm almost done, but I'm still writing so we'll see). I hope you guys like it XD
Comments and critique are warmly welcomed as usual.
Author: sakurashakedown
Pairing: Frank/Gerard
Rating: R
Warning: Drug Abuse, Self-Harm, Mentions of Child Abuse, Mentions of Sexual Abuse/Domestic Abuse, Language
Disclaimer: Once again, I own nothing.
Summary: Monday morning Frank decides to accept the truth. One day Frank wakes up and realizes his life has spiraled wildly out of control.
I can't expel the truth
It’s much more than I thought I could do
And with time, my worth will stain
And split your heart from my name
So drive away your mouth from my ears
And waste a day so I can think clearly
And what’s left to wait for here
As my hands sleep, spent this last year
Choking the bottle’s neck
That pulled you from my bed
Sleep Spent - Death Cab for Cutie
------<>------
Monday morning Frank decides to accept the truth.
This is the Monday morning after a weekend-long party binge when Frank wakes up in bed - fully clothed - next to Adam Lazzara - also fully clothed - and trips over Gabe Saporta - who’s only half dressed - on his way to the bathroom where he finds Gerard - who’s missing his shoes - passed out on the floor next to the toilet with vomit on his shirt.
It’s not a pretty sight; Gerard’s got a yellow line of puke running down the side of his mouth and little chucks of whatever clinging to the split ends of his matte black hair that’s plastered across his face. It’s enough to shock Frank - as much as he can be shocked with the headache that’s splitting his head open and clouding reality. It makes him wonder how it all got this far, but he doesn’t have time to wonder long before the world spins and his stomach hurls and he’s on his knees trying to get it all in the toilet.
He hears Gerard moan on the floor over the sounds of his heaving and stomach contents splashing in the toilet water. When he’s done - for now at least - he rests his head on the cool porcelain rim and looks at Gerard. He’s missing his jacket and Frank can see the faded crisscross lines on his arms from long ago, before he met Frank, before he started hanging with Gabe, back when he had a boyfriend that used to smack him around and he wanted to die. Frank had learned the story of those scars slowly and over time and in bits and pieces; first over beers, then over shots, then over mirrored table tops, and finally in messy beds, but that’s not what he's paying attention to. What’s holding his attention in iron fists are the little purple-and-red bruises dotting his arm.
These are new. And even though sometimes Frank can’t remember where he is or if he’s eaten, he can always remember every detail of Gerard - the burst blood vessel under his eye, the freckle on his temple, the birthmark on his thigh - and these tracks littering his arm are recent.
Frank can feel a wave of disgust come over him and all the blood drain from his face and it makes him want to vomit again. Instinctually he checks his own arms, because whatever Gerard does Frank does and sometimes Frank can only remember where he's been by looking at Gerard’s shoes; mud means marijuana near the marshes, grass blades and flower petals mean pills in the park, sand means shots on the shore, and clean shoes mean cocaine in a club. With his head splitting open, he looks at his arms and he’s clean, but he still wants to cry because if Gerard’s using needles - Gerard who’s so afraid of needles he gets faint just from looking at them - then it means he’s got to accept the truth - the cold hard truth he’s tried so hard all these months not to realize.
Gerard moans on the floor and rolls over onto his back, his dirty black band shirt rising up, revealing the unblemished skin there and Frank finally fesses up to the severity of his situation. He finally acknowledges his lifestyle for what it is.
It’s Monday morning and Frank Iero accepts the truth.
---<>---
It’s a Wednesday afternoon when Frank tells Gerard what he’s thinking.
It’s sunny and warm and they’re sitting in the park taking in the fresh air and sunshine. The sky is a perfect, cloudless blue. Wednesday afternoons are the perfect time for telling what you’re thinking, Frank decides. They’ve had Monday and Tuesday to recover and they’re not itching for the weekend yet like how they get on Thursdays. Gerard is worse about wanting the weekend than Frank; he gets restless and irritable and sometimes he can’t sleep and so he keeps Frank awake all night, telling him high school horror stories, traumatic teenage tales, and chilling childhood chronicles. Then in the morning it’s Friday and Gabe is pulling up outside their apartment with Adam, and Frank doesn’t know if he dreamed Gerard was telling him these things or not. He never gets the chance to ask though, because Adam always enters their kitchen, brown eyes already dilated, and places a little pink or pale pill on Gerard’s tongue and all Frank can think about it is how sometimes he wants to hit Adam for being so close to his boyfriend.
It’s beautiful outside and they’re sitting in the grass under a tree and Gerard is scratching his arm. Frank hates to see it. It was bad enough seeing the silver scars, but at least those were remnants of a past life and they held within them some kind of hope - Gerard could get through things, get better - but these purple track mark bruises are recent ugly reminders of their present and how revolting it is.
Frank wastes no time; he just comes out and says it, “Gerard. I want to get clean.”
At first he doesn’t think Gerard’s heard him because he’s just staring into space, scratching his arm, but then Gerard laughs a little nervous laugh, not even really a laugh at all, just a sad little Heh and says, “Why?”
That hurts Frank almost as much as seeing the track marks on Gerard’s arms. That means he’s in deep, because he can’t even seem to fathom why Frank would want to be clean.
“Because,” Frank sputters, not really knowing what to say. Gerard just looks at him, waiting for him to go on. His eyes are green in the sunlight and he’s got his messy, shoulder length black hair tucked behind his ears instead of falling in his face, so every time Frank looks at him, he realizes how really beautiful Gerard is. “Because…I…want to.” He thinks. “I’m throwing my life away, Gerard. We are throwing our lives away.”
Gerard tilts his head to one side and starts back scratching his arm again, leaving red scratch marks that only make it look worse and makes Frank’s skin crawl. Gerard’s sitting cross-legged and he’s got a hole in the knee of his jeans, his boney white knee cap exposed.
Gerard says, “But I like Gabe and Adam.”
“You do not like Gabe and Adam,” Frank says, a little too harshly and Gerard flinches a little and Frank has to remind himself to be gentle, because Gerard always gets nervous when Frank gets mad. Force of habit. A Pavlovian response. Frank is certain that, somewhere deep inside, Gerard is still waiting for Frank to hit him one day.
Frank takes a deep breath, goes on. “You do not like Gabe and Adam. You can’t. You only see them on the weekends and most of the time you’re too drugged out to know what’s going on. I know. I’m the same way.”
Gerard is biting his bottom lip, nervous. “Can I think about it, Frankie? Please? I’ve been through withdrawal before; I’m not strong enough to do it again.” The way he says it, all desperate and sad, reminds Frank of a young prostitute that tried to proposition him one night, a long time ago, when Frank had real friends and the worst things he did were drink too much and hit a joint now and then. This prostitute, she couldn't have been more than sixteen, and she followed Frank and Pete for, like, a block, her price dropping lower and lower, her voice getting sadder and sadder.
Frank looks at Gerard and he wants to cry again, because Gerard just keeps breaking his heart. He says, voice clear and steady, “Think about it. It’ll be good for us,” and Gerard says he’s hungry so they get up to go get food.
---<>---
It’s Thursday night and Frank really wants to sleep, but Gerard is up and telling him stories again. It’s dark in their bedroom and you can hear the refrigerator humming in the kitchen and the occasional car zooming past in the night. Frank is on his back, dozing off and Gerard is beside him, lying on his stomach, upper body propped up with his elbows. He’s playing with his hands, twisting the sheets and pulling at his pillow case.
“I can’t get sober, Frankie,” he sobs, his voice pained and pathetic. His jet black hair, made even blacker by the night, is falling in his moon white face that’s so pale Frank can see it in the dark. “I’m sorry, Frank, I can’t.” Gerard covers his face with his hands and Frank can't tell if he’s crying or just trying to block out his anxiety.
Exhausted, Frank rubs Gerard’s shoulder and says drowsily, “Baby, you’ll be fine.”
“I won’t,” Gerard moans through his hands, through his hair. “I’ll fuck up. I fuck up everything.” Gerard’s voice cracks and he says, “I was eight and every time I would fuck up he’d make me - I’d have to -” Gerard is crying now and Frank is scared and exhausted, heart pounding in his ears as Gerard finger paints another nightmare into Frank’s mind. It’s a typical Thursday night. “And if I - if I didn’t swallow - I’d - he’d just k-k-keep h-hitting me.”
As always, Frank sits up just as Gerard collapses, crying into his pillow. When he cries, his sobs shake his whole body and all Frank can do is stroke his hair until he falls asleep and tell him he loves him and feel his own heart break as he wonders, Baby, why didn’t anyone protect you?
And against all better judgment, he whispers, “Don’t worry, hon, it’s the weekend.”
---<>---
It’s Friday morning and when Frank wakes up, Gerard is already out of bed and embracing the day. Gerard’s Thursday night confessional is already erased from his memory - or buried down deep - and it’s such a contrast that, as usual, Frank can’t remember if he dreamed it or not.
This is their lives on Friday.
Adam and Gabe pull up and pop in. As always, Gabe walks in and looks around like he’s never seen the place before, inquires about the chaise lounge sitting in Frank’s living room (because he wants a new one), comments on the A Clockwork Orange movie poster hanging in the kitchen (that is a good movie!) and asks Frank if he likes living near the park (because he’s getting tired of downtown and is thinking of moving). Frank knows enough by now, though to know that Gabe will keep his same chaise lounge and will probably never leave downtown, still, he entertains his ideas anyway, because it’s Friday morning and Frank is itching bad for the weekend.
In the kitchen, Frank can see Gerard laughing at something Adam just said. He tosses his head back and laughs his musical, dorky school girl laugh. Frank watches Gerard lean back against the counter, gripping the counter edge with his hands. He tilts his head back, black hair falling out of his face and opens his mouth while Adam, trying not to giggle, drops a pill down Frank’s boyfriend’s throat.
It’s Friday morning and, as usual, Frank is jealous and restless and is ready to Start the Weekend.
---<>---
Friday afternoon they meet up with Gabe’s dealer outside Gabe’s place. Gabe’s place is this new modern condominium complex downtown. Gabe’s condo is way up on the tenth floor so he can look down at the city and its people through his floor to ceiling windows and it’s completely furnished with that sort of stainless steel, ultra-modern, minimalist bachelor pad furniture that looks cold and uninviting unless there’s a party going on. Gabe can afford to live in his condo on the tenth floor and look down at the world below him because, sort of like Frank, Gabe is a trust fund baby, except Gabe’s money is endless - his dad owns some crazy corporation - and Frank’s isn’t and one day it will run out unless he gets his shit together.
Frank doesn’t know about Adam. All he knows is that Adam is some Southern state refugee and lives downtown and hangs out in art circles when it isn’t the weekend. Frank asked Gerard about him once - it was a Wednesday - and Gerard got embarrassed and mumbled, “I don’t know. He sings or something,” and that pretty much sums up their relationship with these people. I don’t know who you are or what you do, but let’s hang out.
They pass around a joint and Frank watches Gabe cut up some lines and remembers when he first started hanging with Gabe and Adam. Gerard was with them then. Frank was twenty-two and fresh out of college. It was early summer and he was doing the club circuit with Pete Wentz, budding alcoholic and playboy extraordinaire. They’d met sophomore year in college and bonded over shots and music.
Pete was drunk and fawning over this chubby blonde kid with glasses and Frank was just kind of awkwardly standing there watching the scene play out when, all of a sudden, this angel walks in. The first time Frank sees Gerard, Frank’s tipsy and Gerard’s eyes are wide and dilated, but Frank will swear up and down that it was love at first sight.
It was a Saturday.
Since Gabe knew Pete and Pete loved being surrounded by people he knew, they all spent the evening together. That whole night, all Frank could do was stare into Gerard’s kohl-rimmed eyes and watch him blush red and laugh out loud every time Frank called him beautiful.
That was over a year and a half ago. Frank can’t remember the exact moment when he went from sharing beer and joints with Pete to doing cocaine with Gabe and blacking out whole weekends and he doesn’t like it. He doesn’t like any of it. He doesn’t like how he’s spent every weekend for nearing two years with Gabe and Adam and still doesn’t feel like he knows them. He doesn’t like how he feels on Friday mornings and he doesn’t like how Wednesdays are the only days when he feels well enough to get his thoughts together. He hates looking at Gerard’s arms.
Frank thinks about how worthless he’s become and how fucked up Gerard’s getting and all the money he’s wasted when he could’ve been starting a business or something and it makes him angry. Still, he watches Gabe snort up a line off his mirrored coffee table with a sick sort of envy and he knows that if he doesn’t get out now, he’ll get swept away with the tide and washed ashore Monday morning, passed out on someone’s bed or couch or bathroom floor.
So Frank makes his move. He stubs out his cigarette violently in Gabe’s crystal ashtray and stands up. Gerard, sitting beside Frank and leaned over Adam’s shoulder, watching him intently as he does his lines, immediately snatches his attention away from the powder on the table and focuses it all on Frank, standing over him. Gerard’s eyes, gold in Gabe’s living room, are wide and confused and Frank can just see the giant exclamation mark looming over his head, because this is not how this is supposed to go down. Frank is supposed to be sitting on the floor next to Gerard with his hand on his knee, not getting up to walk out.
Frank looks at Gabe leaned back against the couch with his eyes closed, a cigarette dangling from his fingers and Adam sniffing and pinching the bridge of his nose and he knows he won’t be missed, so he doesn’t even bother with goodbyes, just turns around to leave. Gerard is instantly on his heels, following in behind him so close, he’s stumbling and Frank can feel his breath on his neck, because whatever Frank does, Gerard does and Frank is just hoping that Gerard will just follow him out without making a scene.
“Frankie!” Gerard grabs his arm and spins him around just as he’s crossing the threshold. “What are you doing? You can’t leave now - it’s Friday. I don’t want to go home yet.” Gerard is talking fast and desperately, gold eyes dripping with apprehension and Frank thinks Gerard sounds exactly like the lush he is.
He tugs his arm away - a little too fast - and Gerard flinches just a bit before trying to grab his arm back. “I’m leaving,” Frank says, voice solid. He pulls his arm away again and starts walking down the carpeted hall towards the elevators. When he doesn’t feel Gerard behind him, he stops and turns around and looks at Gerard wringing his hands outside Gabe’s doorway. “Come on” Frank says and he doesn’t know if it’s a command or a plea.
Gerard just stands there, shuffling his feet and wringing his hands, his hair falling in his face, and says, “I don’t want too,” and there’s something hard in the way he says it. And Frank just looks at him. And Gerard just looks at the floor. And, for a minute, Frank thinks about grabbing Gerard and dragging him down the hallway, but he doesn’t. Instead, he just turns around and keeps walking. He hasn’t gotten his fix yet and it’s making his blood itch and he can’t think straight with itchy blood.
His first thought is that he’ll just go home, but there’s a bar across the street and if Frank can’t have powder, he thinks he’ll just have a drink instead. He ends up having a bunch of drinks and has to get the bartender to call him a cab and dig through his wallet to find his address, because he suddenly can’t remember exactly where he lives. When he gets home, he passes out on his couch and, in the end, it feels just like a Friday.
PART TWO: To Split A Heart From A Name
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A/N: This was supposed to be a one-shot, but it just kept growing lol So, instead of feeding it to you in big chunks, I've broken it up into easily digestable parts. There will probably be four total (I'm almost done, but I'm still writing so we'll see). I hope you guys like it XD
Comments and critique are warmly welcomed as usual.