Chapter Text
"Dammit Frankie, don't talk like that! Please," Gerard begs, standing up stiffly on legs that are half-numb from the floor, "You're NOT garbage and I'm never gonna think less of you just because you've been through some terrible shit. Having bad stuff happen to you, or even doing bad things, doesn't automatically make you a bad person. I should know."
Shaking his head in denial, Frank chokes out a groan of frustration and scrubs his hands through his hair and down his bruised face. "You don't know," he sobs, "You don't fucking get it!"
"How can I if you don't tell me what IT is?!" Gerard cries in exasperation, "If you want me to understand then you have to talk to me, Frank. Please, I just want to help. You can tell me anything, I won't judge. I don't care if you get high, I don't care if you have scars. Whatever you've done, whatever was done to you, it doesn't change who you are inside. I love who you are. I always have!"
His voice echoes loudly off the tiled walls but in the silence that follows Frank doesn't respond, just pants tiredly and rubs his eyes with a clumsy fist, wobbling unsteadily on his feet. "You need to sit down," Gerard frets. "Nuh uh," Frank sniffs stubbornly, "Just need some air." Gerard looks at him doubtfully, "You're too sick to go for a walk."
"I'm FINE, I just need some fucking air!" Frank snaps, his eyes blazing. Gerard folds his arms across his chest, unconvinced, and after a moment Frank's hostile expression crumbles. "I can't talk here," he whispers, "I can't spill my guts if I feel like I can't even breathe." Sighing worriedly, Gerard relents, "Ok. I know a place we can go."
****
FOUR MONTHS EARLIER...
“Want me to stay, Boss?” Babe asked, side-eyeing Frank with a vaguely disgusted expression. “I don't care what you do,” Lou muttered, his greedy eyes devouring Frank's body as he loomed over the teenager like a tombstone over a grave, “You're a pretty little fucker ain't you, even with the bruises. What's your name, pretty thing?”
“Frank Anthony Iero Jr,” Babe reported, and a vile grin nearly split his face in half when Frank gaped at him in horror, “How the fuck do you know my name?!” Babe rolled his coal black eyes, “It doesn't take a genius. You told Sam you were from Belleville so I did a little research while you were chilling in the basement. Your mom's put out a missing persons notice with your name and picture on it. She must be worried sick about her little Frankie. Hey tell me, is she hot for her age? Kind of a MILF? I bet she is. Maybe I should look her up.”
“You stay the fuck away from her!” Frank cried, anger overriding his fear as he jumped up with his fists clenched, wanting nothing more than to beat the smug look off of Babe's face.
“This kid's got spine,” Lou chuckled approvingly, rubbing his massive hands together with glee. Babe cackled a dope-soaked laugh and left, shutting the door behind him with a damning thud. Frank started to follow him, blind with rage, but Lou grabbed his shoulder and roughly spun him around. “Hey, you don't have brawling rights yet, kid,” he warned, metal flashing between his lips, “And if you do what I say then mommy won't have anything to worry about. Take a seat.”
Huffing angrily, Frank sat down on the nearest bar stool with his feet dangling off the floor – why did he have to be so damn short? His heart was beating nails through his sternum as fury and fear fought a war inside him but with Babe out of the room, the fear was starting to win again.
Lou fished a plump brown cigar out of his jacket and sparked it up with a gold lighter, puffing musky smoke into the echoing black space around them. “Doc says you don't got AIDS or nothin,” he stated bluntly, “But Babe wasn't too impressed with your oral exam, if you know what I mean. So what's your type, kid?”
“Type of what?” Frank gulped, his left foot bouncing against the stool's legs in nervous agitation. “Girls? Boys? Somethin else?” Lou pressed, narrowing his eyes. "None of your fucking business!" the teenager blurted, his cheeks flushing with heat. Lou scowled menacingly and moved so close that Frank was forced to lean back over the bar to avoid the larger man's bulk and his stink of tobacco and spicy cologne. Sucking long and hard on the cigar, Lou blew a thick stream of putrid smoke into Frank's face, making him cough and gag, his eyes stinging. “Strip,” the big man ordered in a voice laced with violence.
“What? No!”
“I said strip you little bastard. Clothes off, now!”
“No!”
Without hesitation, Lou smacked Frank across the face so hard he hit the floor with a mouth full of blood. “Do it!” the club boss roared in a tone that threatened serious bodily harm, “I want to see every dirty inch of you and I wanna see it NOW!”
****
PRESENT DAY
“Holy shit," Gerard gulps, his eyes wide with a mixture of sympathy and horror that makes Frank feel loved and ashamed at the same time, "What did you do?”
“I did what he said. It's not like I had a choice," Frank snapped, "And the psycho just stood there staring at me for what felt like hours. I think I shut my eyes, tried to pretend I was someplace else, fucking anywhere else, but I could still hear him breathing. He finally let me put my clothes back on and told me I was too "special" to be sold abroad or pimped out to his club's usual crowd. Apparently I wasn't built to be a whore or a fetish sub-for-hire like Babe. Oh no, I was too pretty for that shit he said, and my skin was too perfect. He wanted me all to himself like I was some kind of luxury fucking champagne, reserved just for him and his sadistic friends."
"Oh my god," Gerard gasps, turning pale. Frank's eyes narrow defiantly at him, full of angry tears. "Hey, you wanted to hear all the gory details, right? You wanted to talk and help me deal so here you are, I'm talking, let's deal!" Chastened into silence, Gerard bites his tongue, and a heavy sense of dread starts nervous perspiration beading on his skin despite the cold. Frank swallows hard and clears his throat before going on, his hoarse voice rough and cracking at the edges, "So then Lou let me go back to Doc for a while and I thought I was off the hook for another day. But I wasn't. Late that night when the Loft was jumping and full of perverts and scumbags, Lou brought me back and got me so drunk I didn't know which way was up. All I remember is noise and shots...and Babe chained to one of the podiums getting flogged by sad old leather daddies. They made him bleed pretty bad and I almost felt sorry for him but he acted like it was nothing, like he enjoyed it even. His eyes were so black...he was always high on fuck knows what and I guess that's when I realized that drugs could get me through the worst of it."
"The worst of what?" Gerard whispers fearfully. Frank winces and heaves a long tired breath that rattles the mucus in his throat. "Once I was wasted Lou dragged me into his private office and locked the door. He had this crappy little camp bed set up in there..." The teenager trails off looking nauseous and his hands start to shake around the mug of water Gerard made him bring along. Sensing the worst, Gerard starts to tell him that he doesn't have to say any more if he doesn't want to, but stops when he realises that that would be for his own benefit, not Frank's. In the end it doesn't matter because Frank groans faintly and continues anyway: "Lou fucked me so hard it felt like daggers up there, even with all the booze. He shoved my face into the mattress so I couldn't scream, and I could hardly breathe. Then...w-when it was over I puked on the sheets and he got so mad about that he burned me with his cigar.”
“Oh fuck," Gerard gasps in horror, his blood running cold.
Frank nods glumly and drains his cup, wincing as it stings his tender throat on the way down. Gerard wracks his brain for something comforting to say but nothing seems right, nothing feels like it could ever be enough, so he stays silent and stares into his own drink of stale coffee. For the first time in weeks he feels a twinge of phantom pain in the wide pink scars on his arm and he shudders and forces himself to take a calming breath that doesn't really work, blowing it out into his cup.
They're sitting out on the flat, walled roof of Ray's building, trying to keep warm with jackets and gloves while the sun sets in the distance. Frank seems a little calmer out here, baring his soul under the wide uncaring sky, but a cold autumn rain is threatening to fall at any minute and the wind is harsh and biting. “After that I think I kinda lost my mind a little," Frank mumbles, staring down at his scarred fingers, "I was so angry and scared and what they did to me made me feel so fucking dirty, like all the way inside, all the way down, and like I was trapped there in the dirt, in that fucking evil place. I had no control, I had no choices, nothing was mine anymore. Not even my own goddamn body was mine! They took all of that away from me, they took EVERYTHING! And it made something snap in my brain I guess because often times the anger drowned out the fear and I started doing everything I could to piss Lou off. I guess I wanted to show the bastard that even though he could fuck me and hurt me, he couldn't break me inside, I wouldn't give him the fucking satisfaction; and every time he gave me a beating or a new burn or scar I would tell myself that I was glad because it meant I wasn't his pretty perfect-looking prize anymore. I wanted the scars to make me ugly so he wouldn't want to fuck me anymore and when he got tired of my bullshit no one else would want to fuck me either. But the joke was on me because he never got tired of it. In fact I'm pretty sure that kicking the shit out of me actually turned him on. After a while I didn't even mind the pain anymore. Some days it was the only thing that made me feel like a real person and not just his pet sex toy locked up in the dark..." Trailing off into a desolate sob, Frank wipes his eyes with his fist and when he speaks again he's so quiet Gerard can barely hear him: "Sometimes he beat me so bad I blacked out and then Babe would have to wake me up, give me some pills and send me right back to him. I hated Lou so much I wanted him dead and one day I stole his lighter and set his suit on fire. I didn't care if that motherfucker burned, but of course he didn't and to punish me he stabbed me, actually fucking stabbed me with a knife! It was kinda worth it though because I got three days recovery time with Doc and a lot of morphine. It was like heaven.”
Gerard shakes his head in horrified disbelief, completely speechless as the howling wind whirls around them, sweeping dead leaves and cigarette butts into the air. He tries to imagine the worst pain he can think of, like the lonely agony he felt after Mikey died or the horrific wounds he gave himself in Florida, but he can't feel the old sharpness of it anymore and it kills him to know that what Frank went through in New York was probably much worse and the poor guy had to face it all alone. Guilt burns in his throat and he finds himself blurting out the first thought that comes into his head: "What the fuck, Frank, he nearly killed you! Why didn't you get out of there sooner?" He regrets the question as soon as it passes his lips but it's too late to take it back. "You think I didn't try?" Frank chokes, his face aghast in the dying light, "That place had security guards and coded locks for days and all the windows were barred or bricked up. If I ever even got close to getting out they threatened to throw me back in that fucking basement and leave me there to die!" Another coughing fit comes over him and he has to stop and catch his breath for a minute, spitting gunky phlegm at the ground. "I know he could've killed me. I thought about that every single fucking day, knowing that my body might be dumped in the river or dissolved in acid and you and mom and Ray would never know what happened to me. You can't imagine what that was like to live with so don't even go there. I tried to escape, of course I did, but it never worked and after the fire incident Lou put a choke-chain on me, one of those awful steel nooses that sociopaths use to punish their dogs. After being strangled half a dozen times a day I didn't have the will to fight anymore."
"The bruises on your neck," Gerard says in sick realization. Frank nods, hunching up his shoulders against the cold and hanging his head. His hands are shaking again, so bad that he drops his cup and it breaks into a puddle of shards on the concrete. “So now you know,” he whimpers, "I was a psychotic pimp's plaything for the worst few months of my life and I just want to forget it ever happened but I can't! I'm not in denial, Gee, I know I'm fucked up, I know I'm damaged and not even close to ok and I-I'm scared I'll never be ok again and it's all my fault for being stupid enough to think a random stranger would ever want to help me! I'm a stupid shitty piece of human garbage, scarred for life and dirty in places I can't ever get clean and n-now do you see? Do you understand why I didn't w-wanna fucking talk about it?!" His quivering voice finally dissolves into broken weeping and he buries his face in his hands.
"I'm so sorry," Gerard gasps, wrapping his arms around Frank shuddering body, "I'm so sorry Frankie, I'm sorry I didn't find you there and save you like you did for me when I was hurting but I'm here for you now and I love you so much! You're not garbage, Frank, and you're not stupid and none of this is your fault! Please don't punish yourself for what other people did to you. It's not your fault! Is there anything I can do to help you now? Anything, just tell me what you need, please, what can I do?" His voice cracks as sorrow and fear force their way in and he presses his lips together and swallows, determined to be the strong supportive one for a change. Shivering in the gathering gale, Frank lifts his tear-stained face and sniffs hard, watery gunk trailing from his eyes and nose. "Well...You can start by taking me back downstairs," he croaks, "I feel like death."
****
“God, I need drugs,” Frank groans as they re-enter the warm cocoon of Ray's apartment and lock the door behind them. Gerard frowns in concern and Frank looks sideways at him before sinking weakly onto the couch, “I meant the legal kind. Can you make me another one of those aspirin drinks?”
“Coming right up.” Gerard assures him, heading to the kitchen. Unwinding his winter scarf from around his neck he tosses it over to Frank who buries his face in the warm woolly fabric and lies down under the couch's ever-present blanket. Along with the lemon aspirin beverage, Gerard gathers a bottle of cough syrup and one of the antibiotic pills that Linda left and brings everything over to the couch.
“Thanks,” Frank mumbles from inside the scarf, sitting up just long enough to swallow the various medicines before retreating to Blanket Land again. Gerard turns on the TV but he's not really watching it. His mind is spinning with all the nightmarish things Frank told him on the roof and nothing in the whole World seems fair or right or bearable right now. Every human being outside of these walls feels like an enemy. With a smothered cough, Frank rests his weary head on Gerard's leg and the older man manages a smile through the weight of empathy and grief in his chest. There is so much he wants to say but he can't find the right words and it takes him most of an hour-long episode of a hoarder reality show to pluck up the courage to ask the question burning brightest in his brain: "How did you finally escape and come home to us?" Frank sighs and tugs the blanket up higher until only his tousled hair is visible. "Not now," he says in a muffled voice, shutting down the conversation, "And don't tell anyone else what I told you on the roof, not even Toro. I mean it. Promise me."
"I promise," Gerard agrees, squeezing Frank's shoulder through the soft layers of fabric. Without another word they rest together in the static glow of the television until Ray comes home with a large bag of Chinese takeout food. “Hey," he says awkwardly, looking sheepish under his shaggy curls as he locks the door behind him, "Are you guys okay? How are you feeling Frankie?”
“Fuckin rad,” Frank mutters sarcastically from under the blanket, nuzzling his sleepy face against Gerard's thigh and making the older man clench his leg to try and stop the sudden rush of blood that Frank's snuggles are sending towards his dick. A boner would really not be appropriate right now. “Where d'you go?” he asks Ray.
"Nowhere. Just drove around and then stopped by Chang's for the food. I figured I should bring back a peace offering after running out on you before. I'm sorry."
"You should be," Frank grunts crankily. Gerard shrugs apologetically at Ray and Ray shoots him a weak smile as he unpacks the cartons of chow mein and dumplings. "So, chopsticks or forks?"
****
Frank manages to get a good helping of veggie noodles down his sore throat and then chases them with one of his grandfather's deathbed painkillers and a Xanax from Gerard. His fever is down but he's so tired he can't keep his eyes open and when he falls asleep in front of a Toy Story movie, his friends retreat into the kitchen nook to decompress.
Gerard settles into his usual spot by the window to smoke while Ray perches on the breakfast bar and tucks into the free bag of prawn crackers that came with their meal. "Frank told you what happened to him didn't he," he guesses in a hushed voice, "You both seem more relaxed now, like the air's been cleared. What did he say?"
"Sorry man, I promised I wouldn't tell," Gerard explains, blowing smoke out of the side of his mouth, "I still don't know the whole story anyway, like where the blood on his clothes came from or how he got back here. I know it's gonna be bad though. Really fucking bad..." Taking another drag of burning chemicals, he tries to focus on the fire in his throat and not the bleak and violent images in his mind. Ray sombrely puts down his food and folds his hands in his lap. "Shit. Isn't there anything at all you can tell me? I mean, how worried should I be here? Was it one person who did this to him or was it like a gang or something?"
"Stop asking me stuff, I mean it. I can't tell you."
"Sorry...But do you at least know if there are any violent maniacs out there who might come looking for him?"
Gerard frowns and taps ash from his cigarette into an empty cup, "I doubt it. He would warn us if we were in danger. All I can say is that I think something big must've gone down the other night because I don't think he could've gotten away from the situation he was in without some kind of intervention."
"That sounds ominous."
"Yeah." Sucking his cigarette down to the filter, Gerard puffs the fumes out into the chilled night air and flicks the glowing remains into the alley outside.
"Those things'll kill you," Ray scolds, munching on another cracker. "Yep," Gerard sighs, shuddering at the thought of Lou's disgusting cigars burning holes in Frank's flesh, "I know."