Chapter Text
The buzz quieted down as Gerard opened his eyes and looked at what he had done.
The long, golden-blonde locks that once adorned his head were gone. It was replaced by a very poorly done blonde buzz cut.
Shaving blind isn’t the greatest idea, but after another night of no sleep, Gerard wasn’t exactly thinking clearly. All he thought of was the itchy hair, itchy hair with sweat in it that was weighing him down, stopping his sleep. The hair that Elody loved so dearly, was a nuisance that must be taken care of immediately.
Now that it was gone, his head was cold. His whole body was cold. His heart was cold.
He took one last look at himself. Even just a few months ago he would scoff at himself. The bloodshot eyes, the shaved head, the tear-stained cheeks, the sickly paleness: he looked like a fucking frog.
He left the bathroom, no longer wishing to see his own reflection, storming through the golden fields of his own hair that was on the ground of the bathroom.
He got back into his brand new king bed, made for two, but only occupied by one.
Gerard wishes he could say he lost track of the time between all of his unrest, but he hasn’t. He counts every second in his head, mourning the events that lead to his situation.
Gerard proposed the idea of downsizing to Elody about 2 years, 7 months, and 18 days ago. He said that as they’re two people with no children, they didn’t need his big family mansion (he didn’t mention his hatred of the mansion he grew up in, or how he felt the paintings on the wall watched him with abhorrence at his own pathetic life).
1 year, 2 months, and 23 days ago, he started to move them in. Elody was busy with her campaign for the Louisiana Senate, so he moved in by himself while she stayed in the big mansion.
6 months and 3 days ago, Elody went radio silent. A few weeks later, divorce papers showed up on his doorstep. He didn’t even get to celebrate her win in the election with her.
For the first time that he can remember, he spent the holidays completely alone. All his friends were Elody’s, and he couldn’t bear his family without her. So he sat at home, watching Christmas movies and eating cookies.
22 days ago, they went to court and settled. She got the big house and the land that went with it, along with 30% of their assets, and Gerard got the rest. Gerard would’ve argued that she should have more, but she insisted on those numbers.
In that stuffy beige courthouse hallway, Gerard holding back tears, he saw Elody for the last time.
There were sounds of other court proceedings, people walking around, their shoes click-clacking against the tile floor. Elody was no longer wearing her wedding band. Gerard embarrassingly was wearing his own.
Gathering up as much of his energy as he could, he told her, “I guess I’ll see you around.”
She only hummed in response, refusing to even look at him. It was cold.
Despite her cold attitude, she looked as beautiful as always. Her hair was in a ponytail, perfectly sculpting her beautiful rosy cheeks, trembling red lips, and stunning green eyes.
Gerard looked away, hoping it would stop him from dropping down to his knees right there and begging her to take him back, saying how he can’t live without her. He knew that wouldn’t help. He knew he couldn’t do that to her.
After a moment of awkward silence, she walked away from him, her heels — velvet green heels, her good luck shoes— joining the chorus of court noises.
There, Gerard quietly wept.
Today was Valentine’s Day. Usually, he would go all out for Elody, with grand gestures and dinner and everything that he thinks girls dream about.
This year, he could barely get out of bed. The only thing that got him out of bed is the itch of the hair that fell inside his shirt while he was shaving his hair, as it was driving him up the wall.
Gerard got up and took a bath, not having the energy to stand and bathe. He always liked baths better, anyway. Holding his head under the water always lets him clear his thoughts, and rid himself of all the world’s little hums for a few minutes.
He tried doing so now, but his thoughts were too much for the quiet, and he held it for too long, causing him to cough up water as he broke the surface.
He got out of the bath, his awkwardly skinny body scooting over to the sink.
The mirror above the sink was covered in condensation from the bath. Gerard quietly thanked whatever being controlled the universe for not making him see the consequences of his own actions. Hopefully, he looked better than he did when he pulled the stunt.
He puts on a crappy shirt from Elody’s political stuff and some boxers and relocates his wallowing headquarters from his bed to his couch, grabbing some coffee and Lucky Charms during his journey between.
About one and a quarter bad romcoms into his wallowing session, a knock came at his door.
He rolls off the couch, wrapping his blanket around him, and grabs his coffee —now on its third refill— readying himself to greet whoever had enough of a lack of dignity to visit him.
He opens the door to see his elderly flamboyant neighbor, Timothy Goose, holding a sparkly decorated fake mailbox.
“Gerard!” Timothy greets him, way too cheery.
“Good morning Timothy,” Gerard replies, lifting his mug to the other man.
Timothy poorly hides his surprise at that greeting, as the late afternoon sun had already started plunging towards the horizon, and Gerard’s whole look was an entirely different problem he didn’t feel like reproaching.
“I just got back from work, and I thought I would give you these, to lift your spirits,” Timothy holds the box out to Gerard.
Gerard stares at it inquisitively, wondering why he would have such a thing.
“It’s from the kids in my class. It was technically for me, but my husband wants us to cut back on sugar, so I thought you might enjoy it.” Timothy explains.
Gerard takes the box under his arm, the contagious sparkles already sticking to his body. “Thanks,” Gerard says with a complete lack of enthusiasm.
“Of course! I love what you did with the hair, by the way. It’s-“
Timothy’s complete lie about Gerard’s horrible shave is interrupted by a frustrated pubescent voice yelling, “Dad! Hurry up!”
Timothy happily sighs. “Kids, you know?”
“I most certainly don’t,” Gerard responds, although it goes completely ignored by Timothy.
“I’ve got to go. Enjoy the rest of your Valentine's Day!”
“You too, Timothy,” Gerard half-heartedly says, quickly closing the door and returning to his station.
He continues watching some crappy romance called The Kissing Booth on his and Elody’s shared Netflix account. It was the only thing they still share, other than a last name, though the sharing of that was only for political reasons.
He slips open the mailbox, which is filled with bright cards, most of which have candy attached. Gerard grabs one with a lollipop attached and sticks it in his mouth, reading out the poor handwriting on the card:
“Dear Mother Goose, thank you for teching me. Happy Valetime! I got you a lollipop, it’s green apple, your favorite. XOXO Liliana.”
He throws the card into the box and takes out another one. At least the cards have better writing than the mind-numbing movie he has on.
He goes through them, grabbing whatever goodies he finds and reading each and every card. He didn’t know why, but the simplicity of these kids’ thoughts and feelings almost made him forget he was sitting in underpants watching The Kissing Booth on Valentine’s Day, or Valentime Day, as the kids tend to misspell it.
Gerard ran out of cards eventually but felt more whole than before. He looks around his big empty house as The Kissing Booth Two starts auto-playing and wonders if a kid would help his life…
But that would be ridiculous! He was single, newly divorced, and way too… Gerard-y to take care of kids.
That doesn’t mean he doesn’t grab his laptop and start looking up ways to obtain children without having a wife.
After hours of reading articles targeted toward women and giving birth to children, Gerard was truly lost. By the time he reached this state, the sun had fallen to the moon, whose crescent shape now shines in the sky.
Gerard’s tummy rumbles and he realizes all he’s had to eat today was coffee, Lucky Charms, and candy. He slowly moves from the couch, stalking over to the dark kitchen.
When he walks into the kitchen, he hears rustling. He fumbles for the light and turns it on to reveal a little black cat in boots and a cape.
He groans when he recognizes the little shit on his counter. It was Timothy’s troublesome cat, Pib, who likes to steal eggs from his fridge.
“Again?” Gerard walks over and grabs the cat before he could escape, grabbing the egg from his mouth.
Gerard closes the fridge and puts the cat under his arm, manhandling Pib.
He goes outside and walks across the sidewalk, toward Timothy’s house.
The bright house, undoubtedly painted by the man himself, could be called an eyesore compared to the other homes surrounding it. Gerard certainly thought so when he first bought the house (though, Elody had thought differently, loving the uniqueness of the house). Upon living next to the house, he had found the inhabitants to match the eccentricity of the exterior.
Timothy’s husband, Henry, answers the door, shocked by Gerard’s appearance but not surprised by him handling Pib. “Good evening, Gerard.”
Gerard switches the cat from being under his arm to in his hands, dangling by his armpits, little boots hanging in the air, putting on a face of frustration.
Henry nods, and steps aside, gesturing for Gerard to enter, which he does.
The inside was much more toned down, although not without its own strange bits. Gerard eyes the goose decor and has to start trying to stop the thoughts of Elody’s own love of frog decor from rising up.
Gerard drops the cat off on the couch and walks to the kitchen, where Henry has joined his husband, who was wearing a ridiculous rubber ducky apron. Timothy smiles, grabbing what he was making so he could face Gerard while continuing to cook.
“Gerard, glad to see you again,” Timothy says with a glee that could only come from a man with a house straight out of a children’s book.
“Timothy, is there any way to prevent your cat from invading my house?” Gerard asks, annoyed.
Timothy lets out a joyous laugh, before bluntly telling Gerard, “No.”
“Pib is a lawless cat, he will not listen to anyone except himself,” Henry elaborates, looking down at the cat, who is currently snuggling against Gerard’s shaved legs.
“Do you not have eggs in your house?” Gerard asks.
“We do, but he likes you so he steals your eggs,” Henry answers.
Gerard groans and looks down at the troublesome animal. Pib looks back at him with his yellow eyes, looking quite cute despite his criminal ways.
“Gerard, since you’re here, would you care to join us for dinner?” Timothy asks with a grin.
Gerard fishes for a good excuse, but he has never been a good liar, so he inevitably hangs his head and says, “Sure,” unable to refuse the elderly couple’s kind offer.
“And Gerard, while we finish up, please put on some pants. I’m sure Jack can find you some to borrow,” Henry adds, hiding a mischievous grin.
Gerard looks down at his boxers and can feel his face turning completely red, so he nods, going up the stairs to find the teen boy, a pitter-patter of little boots behind him indicating that Pib was following.
Gerard assumes the room with clicking and shit-talking would be where he can find the teenager, so he knocks politely.
The knock is ignored, so Gerard pounds on the door.
Jack, a teen boy whose face was covered with acne, rips open the door. “What?!”
Gerard, who is a floormat, backs up and says, quietly, “Oh, um, your fathers asked me to ask you for pants.”
Jack looks down at the boxers and goes in, throwing him an old pair of pajama pants, decorated with little candles.
Gerard starts to thank him but is instead met with the door slamming in his face. Gerard sighs, and looks down at Pib, who is staring at him with a look of amusement, somehow.
Gerard stays and listens to the boy go back on his computer, “Yeah my dads sent our annoying-ass frog-looking neighbor to get some pants. YES, he was wearing his undies-”
Gerard decides instead to put on the PJs and hurry back down.
A couple of moments later, Gerard and the Hubbard-Goose household settled at the dinner table, where a delicious stew was being served with breadsticks.
Gerard feels quite awkward as Henry and Timothy fall into easy talk and Jack ignores the world, playing on his phone. Luckily, Timothy was intuitive and noticed his awkwardness. Unluckily, Timothy doesn’t have social awareness.
“So, I heard you and your wife got divorced,” Timothy says casually, taking a sip of his soup.
Jack chortles a bit while Henry sighs, pinching his temples. Gerard assumes he does this quite a bit.
“Yes, we did, but it was for our own good,” Gerard says, trying to save his own ass in this conversation.
“Divorce is a tough thing, if you need company we’re right here,” Henry comfortably says, giving Gerard a bone.
“Thank you, but I am perfectly fine,” Gerard’s shutdown of the help leads to an awkward silence. He sighs and switches the topic, going back to what he was looking up before coming over there. “Is Jack adopted?” He asks, and quickly adds, “Is that okay to ask?”
“Of course, it’s okay to ask! Yes, he is, we adopted him when he was a baby,” Timothy answers with the cadence of someone who loves stories. “We decided to become foster parents after Katrina hit, as there were so many kids needing a home and we were young and childless and glad to take them in,” He grabs his husband’s hand as he reminisces, Henry looking at him with an awe Gerard knew and missed.
Gerard nods, “That’s very noble of you two.”
“Not exactly noble, we did have to lie to the law a bit,” Henry mentions, laughing a bit.
Timothy laughs along with his husband and continues the story, “Jack was one of the younger fosters we had to take care of. His parents couldn’t afford to take care of him so they surrendered him to the law, and we just fell in love with his little sweet face,” At the mention of his face, Timothy reaches over to squeeze his cheeks, much to Jack’s chagrin. “We — Well I adopted him a few years later, and we’ve been a happy family ever since.”
“That’s wonderful,” Gerard says sincerely. Quietly he was cursing at himself for being emotional about that.
The love in the room was grabbing Gerard by the neck as if he were a frog and shaking him violently. Why did he take their offer?
He clears his throat and continues his path of conversation before he got pulled into the whirlpool of heartfelt storytelling.
“How did you… sign up to foster the kids?” Gerard asks, trying to figure out the correct wording.
“Oh, are you thinking of fostering?” Henry asks. He flicks a look over at his husband who simply smiles back and looks at Gerard.
“It’s probably changed since when we did it, but I’m sure you can look it up. Jack can probably help you with it if you need. He is so good at computers,” Timothy brags, rubbing his son's arm.
“He’s got a great internship at a local tech company-“ Henry adds on to the bragging, until Jack, getting too embarrassed, interrupts.
“Dads!” He says annoyingly, hiding his red face in his hoodie. His fathers laugh and physically reassures him, turning back to Gerard.
“I-I can probably just look it up myself,” Gerard answers, not wanting to further embarrass the teen.
Timothy hums, eating some more bread, “There are a few kids at my school in the system who are absolutely lovely.”
Gerard nods, suddenly feeling a teeny bit excited about this prospect.
Once they had finished dinner and dessert and coffee, the two men wished Gerard a good night and Gerard headed back home in better spirits than he had been in 6 months and 3 days.
He now lay back in his bed. With the knowledge that 4 cups of coffee likely won’t lead to easy sleep, he opened up a tab and looked up “how to become a foster parent”.
He peruses the site and starts gathering what papers he needs, along with signing up for foster parent training at the nearest available date.
This could be the doorway to Gerard getting back to his happiness. He just had to turn the knob.