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Frank tries knocking twice before juggling the tray in his hand to pull out his cell phone and press auto-dial. He waits while it rings and makes a face at Worm, who’s waiting down the hall to be sure he makes it inside.
The ringing stops, but all he gets in greeting is a grunted, “huh?”
“Gerard, wake the fuck up and come open the door.”
“The fuck, Frank?” There’s a pause and the sound of shifting and then, “I don’t have to be up for another hour, motherfucker.”
“I come bearing gifts. Get up and let me in.” Frank hangs up his phone and stuffs it back in his pocket, re-shifts the cardboard tray he’s holding and leans up against the wall to wait.
He’s not surprised when it takes a full three minutes for the door to open, and Gerard to glare at him from underneath a truly impressive bedhead. He’s got creases on one cheek and an already lit cigarette hanging from his mouth. “You suck.”
Frank just grins back at him, holds the tray up and says, “coffee,” as cheerfully as he can.
“So you don’t completely suck.”
Gerard takes the large cup closest to him and sniffs at it, then steps back, letting Frank through the door. He closes the door behind Frank and then wanders off to the bathroom, coffee and all. Frank flops down on the couch and pulls his own coffee out of the tray, carefully setting the little pastry box he’s also brought on the table in front of him. The thing about Gerard is, he hates waking up. Really hates it. But all it takes is a cigarette, a piss, and a whiff of coffee to make him human again. Unlike Mikey, who no one talks to until he has two cups of coffee in him.
Gerard shuffles out of the bathroom, cigarette hanging from the hand holding his coffee cup, scratching at his belly with the other one, and Frank can’t help grinning at him.
“Fucker,” he mutters and flops down on the couch next to Frank, propping his bare feet up on the table and leaning against Frank to sip his coffee. They sit in silence for a few minutes as Gerard finishes his cigarette and drinks half his coffee, before snuffling his face into Frank’s neck and asking, “was there some reason you had to get me up an hour before wake-up call?”
Frank nods against Gerard’s hair, then leans forward to pick up the little pastry box. “Bob and I have a radio interview in half an hour and I wanted to give you this.”
Gerard sits up quickly, grinning like a kid. He sets his cup down and takes the box from Frank, pulling the little white ribbon off with a flourish. He stares at the cupcake inside, pulling it out carefully and examining it like a work of art. Frank had gotten up early and made Worm drive him to two different bakeries before he found just the right one, strawberry cake and dark chocolate icing. Frank had put the three little colorfully painted plastic Day of the Dead skulls on the top himself. He’d found them in a little shop in LA a long time ago and had been carrying them around for just the right occasion.
Gerard stuck his finger in the icing and tasted it with a soft smile. “I almost forgot.”
Frank rolls his eyes, because yeah, right. There’s no way any of them could forget the date. Three years ago today. Three years since Japan and rock bottom and the beginning of a new alcohol-free Gerard. The beginning of a new My Chemical Romance, really.
“Thanks, Frankie.” Gerard leans in to kiss him on the temple and then takes a big bite out of his cupcake, grinning at Frank with chocolate all over his lips and teeth.
“Gross, man.” Frank pushes him away, but laughs at him, reaching in to steal a finger-full of icing for himself. He sinks back into the couch and watches Gerard eat his cupcake, hiding his grin in his coffee cup when Gerard hums happily under his breath.
“You got stuff this morning?” Frank asks when Gerard has tossed away the cupcake wrapper and sunk back into the couch against Frank.
“Some phone interviews later before soundcheck.”
Frank nods and closes his eyes, listens to Gerard light another cigarette, feels Gerard’s shoulder rise and fall as he smokes. He thinks about the past three years and wonders if Gerard’s thinking about it too, but he doesn’t ask. He likes this more, just sitting and sharing a little bit of rare stillness with Gerard.
Something’s been changing between Frank and Gerard lately. To say that their relationship is complicated would be an understatement of epic proportions. Frank had been friends with Mikey first, but it was Gerard that Frank couldn’t take his eyes off of during that first show. He’d stood on a chair and fallen a little bit in love with Gerard Way the singer and frontman. It had taken him a little bit longer to warm up to offstage Gerard, but endless conversations about horror movies, comic books, and art and music, while crammed in the back of a van had won him over.
The thing is, their relationship has never been entirely platonic, not since about three months into their first year of touring when a very wasted Gerard had pulled Frank into a bathroom in some crappy band house and given him a sloppy blowjob. Two weeks later, Frank had kissed Gerard and given him a handjob in a deserted parking lot. It hadn’t stopped there. They only ever had sex when they were both drunk or wasted, and it was never particularly good sex, except in that messy, horny, get-me-off-quick way. They never talked about it and when Gerard stopped drinking, that part of their relationship also stopped.
Frank’s just about to fall asleep when his phone beeps at him.
“Time to make the donuts,” Frank groans and reluctantly pulls away from Gerard. He grabs what’s left of Gerard’s cigarette and stands up. He takes the last long pull off the butt and drops it into the dregs of his coffee.
“Hey!” Gerard protests, but grins at Frank and follows him to the door.
At the door, Frank turns and wraps his arms around Gerard, presses his face into Gerard’s neck. He feels like a stupid cupcake is inadequate and he suddenly feels embarrassingly choked up, so he just says, “seriously, Gee, congratulations,” then pushes away and out the door before Gerard can respond.
When Frank gets to the hotel lobby, Bob is already there, standing against a wall with a large coffee cup in one hand and dark sunglasses on his face. He scowls at Frank when he sees him, but Frank just grins, bounces toward him and says, “Oh my god, it’s Bob Bryar! Can I have your autograph? You’re totally my favorite!”
“Fuck off,” Bob grumbles, but Frank’s pretty sure there’s a smile lurking in there somewhere, so leans forward and wraps his arms around Bob.
Some days being in a rock band is a pain in the ass and some days Frank can’t stand the people he works with, but today Frank is kind of in love with his band. It’s stupid and nostalgic, but three years ago they didn’t just get a sober Gerard, they also got a Bob Bryar and Frank is ridiculously thankful for that. Bob is their rock. He’s this quiet solid dude who doesn’t put up with anyone’s shit and mysteriously manages to hold them all together.
“Thank you for being you, Bob Bryar.”
“You’re a freak, Iero,” Bob mutters, but he hugs Frank back briefly before pushing him away and towards the front door.
“That’s why you love me.”
Bob laughs and pushes Frank outside into the painfully bright Tampa sun.
*
Brian shows up to soundcheck with a cake and there’s an impromptu party for Gerard backstage while the early acts go on. Gerard protests a lot that it’s not a big deal, but he doesn’t stop grinning and hugging anyone who gets within two feet of him. Ray toasts Gerard with Red Bull and Gerard disappears at some point when Mikey calls. The show goes fantastically and they hit the bus immediately after, off to the next city.
Frank wakes up somewhere between Florida and North Carolina and stumbles out of his bunk to take a piss. The bus is dark and quiet except for Ray’s snoring and the tinny sound of porn in headphones coming from Matt’s bunk. There’s one light on in the front lounge and Frank’s not at all surprised to find Gerard awake, stretched out on a couch with a sketch book in his lap.
“Hey,” Frank says quietly and Gerard waves at him with a goofy grin. He grabs a bottle of water out of the fridge and then slaps at Gerard’s legs until he bends his knees up, making room for Frank on the couch. Frank doesn’t ask what Gerard’s doing awake. They all have their share of nights that they can’t sleep on the bus, Gerard more so than the rest of them. He drapes an arm over Gerard’s raised knees and offers to share his water.
“Good day, huh?”
“Yeah,” Gerard says, but it doesn’t sound very enthusiastic, so Frank raises his eyebrows at Gerard. “It’s just. Three years seems like some kind of hump, you know? I mean, one day at a time, I’ll never stop being an alcoholic, blah blah blah.” He waves his hand around in the air. “But I think I’ve been waiting for something to happen, expecting to screw it up, you know? Except. Except I haven’t and now I feel like I can really fucking breathe for the first time in a long time, you know?”
Frank nods and leans against Gerard’s legs. His first impulse is to say, don’t be ridiculous, there’s no way you would have screwed it up, but that’s just stupid and untrue and he and Gerard both know that. Honestly, it seems like they all held their breath for a long time, waiting for Gerard to fall off the wagon. But not anymore, not since Gerard made it through recording Black Parade without taking a drink or needing a drug.
“Yeah,” Frank says, instead. “Breathing is good.”
Gerard grins at Frank in the goofy crooked way that always makes Frank want to pinch his cheeks. Or kiss him.
“Besides,” he says, “you fucking know that if it ever did happen, we’d just help you start over, right?” Frank has learned that sometimes you have to say things out loud that should already be understood.
“I know, Frankie.”
“Good.”
Frank spent a significant period of time being really angry at Gerard. Angry that Gerard got so out of control. Angry that Gerard was hurting himself. Angry that it was starting to hurt the band. Angry at himself for not being able to fix any of it. He remembers watching Gerard puke his guts up in Japan and being equal parts scared to death that he was going to die of alcohol poisoning and furious at Gerard for getting to that point. But more than anything, he just wanted Gerard to be okay. So he pushed his anger away and he supported Gerard and did whatever he could to help him get clean.
He thought the anger was gone until one day at the Paramour in the middle of a stupid argument over the bridge in House of Wolves. Mikey had left the house a few days earlier and none of them had been sleeping and suddenly this two year old anger had just slammed Frank from out of nowhere and he’d ended up screaming at Gerard and Gerard had screamed back. They’d said some nasty things to each other and there’d been a couple of really pathetic punches thrown and a broken guitar, but when it was over, it was like a huge weight had been lifted.
They sat up that night for hours by the pool, chain smoking and talking. They talked about Mikey and how scared Gerard was, and about Jamia and the way Frank’s relationship with her was changing, turning into a friendship, and they talked about the album and what they wanted it to be. They made peace with each other, but neither of them had ever made an attempt to re-initiate the sexual part of their relationship, even after they were both officially single for the first time since they’d known each other.
But this tour, they’ve been playing some kind of game of dare on stage, each trying to one-up the other with the kissing and groping. Tonight Frank had rubbed up against Gerard and licked him, but a few nights before Gerard had groped Frank. It’s definitely a mutual game they’ve been playing. Offstage, it feels like they’ve been circling each other, both waiting for the other one to make a move.
Gerard lights a cigarette and Frank lays his chin on the arm that’s still draped over Gerard’s knees. There’s a rustle and a thump back in the bunks, followed by the sound of Bob cussing at the video monitor that he always forgets about and hits his head against. They grin at each other and listen until he’s quiet again. The only sound left is the bus and the faint staticky murmur of the driver’s talk radio station. Gerard traces his thumb absently over the letters on Frank’s fingers and Frank thinks, fucking now or never.
“Gee, what’s going on here?”
Gerard starts to act confused by the question, but then he seems to decide the pretense isn’t worth it and says, “I don’t know. Evolution maybe? Growth?”
Frank snorts and sits up. “Growth? What the fuck does that mean?”
Gerard puts out his cigarette and shrugs. “We used to be one thing and then we changed to something else. Something better, maybe. And now we’re changing into something new. Something that’s both.”
“Don’t…” Frank stops and rubs a hand over his face, annoyed. He thinks this is a lot more complicated that Gerard wants to make it and he’s pretty much done with talking around the subject. “I used to be someone you fucked when you got drunk.”
“That’s not…”
“Gerard.”
“Okay, yes. But you were never only that, asshole, and you know it.”
Frank nods. “And then we were friends. And now?”
“Frank.” Gerard turns and puts his feet on the floor. “You’re one of my close friends, maybe even closest if you don’t count Mikey, and you’re a member of my band. But you’re also more and that’s fucking scary.” He takes a deep breath and looks straight at Frank. “But. I’d maybe like to explore the possibilities.”
“Maybe?”
“Definitely.”
“I can deal with definitely.” Frank grins and Gerard grins back, turns and wraps his hand around Frank’s neck, pulls him in.
“Fucker,” Gerard says against his lips and Frank laughs into the kiss.
And it’s nothing like the kisses they’ve shared on stage. There’s no audience, no point to be made, no adrenaline other than the rush of “oh fuck yes” that goes through Frank’s body at the touch of Gerard’s tongue. There’s also no haze of drugs and alcohol, no chemical insulation to keep things impersonal, unreal. It’s just Frank and Gerard and the taste of nicotine, the smell of dried sweat from their show, and the vibration of the bus under them.
Gerard stretches out on the couch again and Frank stretches out against him, kisses him again before resting his head on Gerard’s shoulder.
“So, we have like a whole 24 hours of hotel time tomorrow. Feel like a little exploration?”
Gerard laughs and it vibrates against Frank’s cheek. He combs a hand through Frank’s hair and says dryly, “Yes, Frank, I’d love to have sex with you.”
Frank laughs and thinks again about how much he loves his fucking crazy band.