Chapter Text
Gerard made it a new habit to call Frank before bed. They chat about whatever topic comes to mind and wait to see who dozes off first. Frank learned that Gerard mumbles gibberish as he falls asleep- something he hadn’t noticed since he was always the one to fall asleep first after having sex. It was charming, Gerard barely carrying the conversation as he fell asleep, muttering complete nonsense that was only tangentially related to the topic at hand. On one occasion, Frank wakes up with his Motorola Razer stuck to his forehead, like sit-up-and-it’s-still-stuck, and he decides to take that to his grave.
Gerard was great, like unbelievably great at describing things. He would call the leafy, waterlogged streets of Seattle "rain-battered", and the dining hall food "rations" and he liked saying "broadcast" when he talked about TV or radio. And sometimes he said funny things, like calling Frank a "lad".
And tonight it was no different. Well, hopefully without his phone adhering itself to his body. He’s on his couch eating some leftover chicken and broccoli he dressed up with a hell of a lot of spices when his phone starts ringing.
“Hey.”
There’s the sound of the phone being cradled between Gerard’s head and shoulder, “Frankie! Whatcha doin?”
“Eating. Had some leftovers.” He makes a point of scooping some into his mouth, which muffles his next words, “Wha’about you?”
“Just dyed my hair.” He’s rolling over in bed, the sheets sounding abrasive as sandpaper through the compression of a shitty mic on top of a shitty phone speaker.
“Black?” Frank can’t imagine Gerard with anything but hair as black and sleek as oil.
“Yeah. Next time I want to do blue, though.” A navy blue might be nice. Maybe red? Any color would look good on Gerard, probably.
“I could see it. I like your black hair, though. Looks good on you.” Frank pins his phone between his shoulder and phone, mirroring what he only presumed Gerard was doing.
“Oh. I tried listening to uh- what’s that band you said you liked as a kid?” They had a conversation about music, but Frank was surprised Gerard actually listened to that Black Flag album Frank mentioned lived in his first car.
“Black Flag. Still like ‘em. I finally finished listening to that 'The Cure' CD."
"We didn't get to really finish it last time, huh?" Gerard's moving again, his soft sheets crackling like construction paper through the filter of his cell service.
"It felt fitting. The album's called... what was it? Kiss me, kiss me, kiss me?"
“Mhm. I feel like you would've kissed me even if it wasn't, to be honest." Gerard giggles, making Frank's blood run hot.
Tips of his ears burning, he bites his knuckles. After he's sufficiently gnawed at knuckles in an attempt to push away the tingling burn of embarrassment, he responds, ”You taste good."
"You do too. like uh... a toasted marshmallow? Sweet and smoky." Gerard is still laughing like a blushing teenager, and it makes Frank feel like a fool.
“You’re flattering me.”
“Maybe.” There’s a beat of silence. “I have an exam soon, want to uh… study together? Different things, of course.” Gerard is somehow always suggesting plans as if he’d thought of them just in that moment, and Frank loved it. He’d like to think that it’s because Gerard was nervous, maybe because he had feelings for him, but more likely it was because he was thinking of the plans on the spot.
“Yeah, I’ve got to do some typesetting so I can do that. While you study the Dewey Decimal system or something.” Frank is surprised at the hard, belly-laugh that comes from Gerard. He hears the phone slip from between his head and shoulder, rustling as it lands and once again as Gerard retrieves it.
“Chemistry, but yeah.” Gerard is still giggling, smiling audibly.
“Fuck, chemistry?”
“For preservation chemicals.” Maybe Frank had no idea what library science really meant. It made sense, he supposes. The sterile, chemical smell that lingered through the archives which kept each item of the school’s collection frozen in time.
“Fucking christ. Chemistry.” Frank laughs.
“Let’s meet at the usual cafe. Friday at four?”
“Yeah.”
-
The cafe is normal. Paintings on the wall, sports pennants hung loosely with thumbtacks, the usual. Frank & Gerard’s mismatched ceramic cups kiss rims as they squish between a notebook, textbook, and a large pad of paper.
Frank’s tracing a letter “W” with a mechanical pencil while another pencil taps the table, rolling each time he starts another stroke of his pencil.
Absentmindedly, Gerard sticks his pencil's eraser into the flesh of his bottom lip every time he stops writing to think. He's writing a little "cheat sheet" his professor allows them to use, mainly filled with diagrams of chemical makeup done as compact as he can manage.
"You like chemistry?"
"Well, no. But conservation is interesting. I'm more into hands-on stuff though. Re-gluing binding into its' cover, stuff like that.” Gerard’s eyes are still fixed upon the sprawl of papers before him.
“Same. I like making things, y’know. Creation. All that jazz.” Frank scratches out the last line of the capital "W", moving on to lowercase "w".
"The evolution of restoration as a craft is interesting, though. They used to want to make stuff look brand new by any means, y'know. But now we don't do that, we uh-" Gerard gestures vaguely, "Try to do as little as possible so we don't alter the integrity of the original object, even if it doesn’t look as new.”
“Hm. Is it true most of those marble sculptures from Rome were painted?”
“Not my field, but yes.” There's a beat, and Gerard points at Frank's paper. "What's that for?"
"We've got to make a font, then a logo and some other shit. Full branding kit but it's gotta be from scratch." Frank lifts up the page with the sketches of the letters, holding the tracing paper that he's putting the finals onto.
"You uh- like your major?" Gerard mumbles before flipping a page in his notebook.
"Yeah, but I like doing coursework and research more than I liked using the degree."
"You worked before? What'd you do?" Gerard looks surprised, despite the Frank was a bit older and clearly a continuing education student.
"Design firm. Super dull work, seriously. Fucking soul-crushing.” Frank takes a sip of his coffee, his furrowed brow relaxing. “You like library science?”
“Yeah. I like books, but my real hobby is comics. I draw a bit, but the comic industry? Tough.” Gerard shrugs, eyes still affixed upon his notes.
“I feel you. You fight tooth and nail just to get stuck choosing between two nearly identical blues.” Frank is caught off guard by the gut-laughter that comes out of Gerard, his voice sounding soft and lilted as he laughs.
“Exactly! Should be sky be slightly grey or a clear blue? And I sent a portfolio of fifty drawings to do that.”
“You’ve worked on a comic?” Frank swears Gerard was too young for that, but maybe he started college early. He did look nineteen at the most, though.
“Yeah. I did a short stint at a firm in New York before I started my Master’s. I was a colorist. Fucking drove me insane. Decided I wanted a slow, simple life. Be a librarian.” He shrugs, and the idea of Gerard in an office, poring over uncolored comic pages makes a smile creep onto Frank's face.
“Hm. Different strokes for different folks, I suppose. My life was too slow. I was doing what the world wanted me to. Nice nine-to-five, fiancee, white picket fence. It wasn’t me.” Frank's expression sours a bit at who he was a few years prior, caged into a life he wasn't made for. Kissing up to superiors by the water cooler, and pretending he loved adding that godawful chrome effect to make everything 'futuristic'.
“My cup’s empty.” Gerard comments, holding out his empty mug to Frank.
“Then let’s get out of here.” Frank shoves his work into his messenger bag, tossing it over his shoulder and letting Gerard drag him home.
-
Mikey is on the couch, and acknowledges them with a nod before returning to peering over his glasses to read some book whose back is so cracked from years of reading that it sits in his hand more like a folded pamphlet than a soft-cover book.
Leaning over the counter, Gerard has a ceramic mug held suspended below his palm by his fingertips, offering it to Frank. He's already checking how much coffee is in the carafe- just enough for one cup. “More coffee?”
“If I drink any more caffeine today they’ll load me into an ambulance.” Frank reaches over to place the cup on the countertop.
“More for me, then.” Gerard says cheerfully, scooping up the cup of coffee. The kitchen echoes with the clinking and thudding of Gerard pouring from the almost-empty carafe of coffee, then putting in his cream and sugar. Wordlessly, they head to Gerard’s room to sit on the floor and study more. Alanis Morissette drones on in the background, and Gerard’s eyes can’t seem to stay in one place. Dragging from the edge of his paper up to peer over at Frank’s, then over into Frank’s lap. Gerard finishes copying his notes into a more compressed format, so he takes great pleasure in tossing his notes into a pile onto his desk before splaying flat on the carpet of his room.
“Done already?” Frank is stating more than asking.
“Yeah. Do you want me to wait for you to finish?" Gerard pulls himself up to sit, peering over at the mostly compiled alphabet Frank has on his paper.
"No, I'm in no rush." Frank shuts his sketchbook, tucking it into his messenger bag. He stretches, his shirt raising up to reveal the soft flesh of his stomach, which gently bulged over the top of his jeans, not quite muffin-topping.
In response, Gerard presses his hand into the bare skin, looking down at the skin then up at Frank as if to ask permission.
Frank's heart skips a beat, and his body reacts quickly. Gerard's icy fingers worm their way up to Frank's chest, rubbing against his nipples. Gasping at the chilly sensation, he leans back a against the side of his bed. "Your hands are fucking freezing."
"You love it, though.” Gerard comes up to Frank’s ear, pushing back his hair so he can lap at the side of his neck. He groans at the sensation, hands shaking as he grips Gerard’s waist. Taking it as a suggestion, Gerard throws a leg over Frank’s body, straddling him.
“We shouldn’t-“
“We have music on. He’s probably absorbed in his book.” Gerard presses himself against Frank, rolling his hips. “Take me?”
“Stop.” Frank grabs Gerard’s shoulder, pushing him away. The younger man’s eyes widen, skittering back in bed as if he had stepped on a dog’s tail.
“I-I’m sorry, I thought you-“ His eyes dart from Frank's face down to Frank's body, trying to discern what he had done wrong.
“I just- I don’t want this to be what we are. I sleep with you, wishing there was more. It’s not fair.”
“You- huh?”
“Gerard, I want to be with yo-“
“So you’re asking me out?” Gerard quickly cuts him off. He grabs Frank's shirt from the floor, handing it to him quickly.
“Maybe. We can stay friends and not make things complicated by mixing in sex, or we can be together. Not both.”
“You don't know what you're saying, Frank." Gerard looks away, lowering his head in shame. "We can't be together."
“I know exactly what I'm saying! It hurts so bad, especially because you’re so sweet to me. You stay beside me all night, even if it's just through the phone. My heart aches when you do it because I want you to be mine.”
“I- We-" Gerard stutters, stumbling over his own words, "The thing is you just don’t want to be involved with me that closely. There are things, nasty unpleasant things you’d be better off not knowing.”
“Whatever, Gerard.” Frank pulls himself up sharply, grabbing his discarded shirt and pulling it over his head so hard it almost stretches out the neck. He starts to walk away, but Gerard grabs the edge of his shirt.
“I need time, Frank. Please.” He’s pleading, which is funny for the person who did the turning down, and Frank is tired of this.
“I’m going home.”
Frank knows he slammed the doors on his way out and he'd forgotten his jacket, but he’s too full of emotion to turn back. He’s an embarrassed, heartbroken idiot who should’ve given up at the first round of push and pull. But he didn’t, and he isn’t sure if he regrets sleeping with Gerard. He’s speeding, but slowing down hurts, as if it’s dragging him back into the aching pain of being nothing to Gerard. Parking and running into his apartment is a blur. He goes into the kitchen, takes a shot of his shitty ‘in case of depression’ vodka and heads to bed to sulk.
“I’m a fucking idiot,” He says to himself as if it would illuminate the situation he was in. Could he tell Ray? He should, but he really shouldn’t.