Spectrum (Frerard, Petekey)

22: Alicia The Condom Balloon

Gee felt awkward and oddly out of place at Frank's house, and it most certainly wasn't anything pertaining to a notion suggesting that she didn't want to be here, because she did, more than anything, but she felt like she didn't quite belong in a house where everyone was nice to each other.

And she knew how fucked up it sounded but still she couldn't quite believe how much effort Mrs Iero put in with Frank, how she always tried with his gender, and was perhaps not understanding about everything but ready to listen, and the contrast from her own life almost made her head hurt. Which was bad, and she knew it was bad.

Gee knew a lot of things were bad, and still, she did very little about them.

She was trying with Frank's coke addiction, though, and indeed, so was Frank, so perhaps she was getting somewhere on that front at least, because if she couldn't have a brilliant life she'd do all she could to ensure that Frank had one.

"Are you alright, dear?" Frank's mother sat down beside Gee at the table, Frank having gone out briefly to, in his mother's words, 'make his room look less embarrassingly messy', not that Gee cared, of course, and she was pretty sure that Mrs Iero know that too, but still, there was just something about a perfect excuse to get your son to actually tidy his room that you just couldn't waste.

Gee nodded, biting her lip a little as she felt herself pulled out of her head and back to reality, back to Frank's kitchen, and Frank's mother's face, and the reality of it all and everything happening in her home right now.

"Frank didn't tell me why you're here this weekend." She began, giving Gee a comforting pat on the shoulder, "and I respect your privacy, Gee, of course I do, but I'm not stupid, and I do understand that perhaps that there's something going on, and I want you to know that you can talk to me whenever you need to, and that you're welcome to stay here whenever. You're a lovely girl, I think you're one hell of a good influence on Frank too, I mean I'm pretty sure you're the only friend of his that doesn't look like they'd sell out their entire family for a bag of dope." She laughed a little at that.

Gee nodded, sighing a little, "yeah, I don't smoke or anything." She added, forcing an awkward smile, just to return Mrs Iero's gesture, "thank you for letting me stay. You're really lovely, both to me and to Frank, you're a wonderful mother."

"I'm sure I'm by no means spectacular, but I try." She smiled, leaning back a little and watching the way Gee's expression flickered.

"My mum's not quite that good. She doesn't try." Gee let out a sigh. "My dad doesn't either."

Mrs Iero let out a sigh, "I'm so sorry for you."

"Still insistent upon calling me Gerard. I think they'll be calling me that, calling me their son even when the day comes that I actually get my very own vagina." Gee's eyes widened at that, laughing a little. "I just worry for Mikey, my brother, he doesn't deserve to have to spend so much time in that house and being so young and influential, and he needs his parents at his age, and-"

"You need your parents at any age." Mrs Iero interrupted, "well good parents. Ones that will try with you. I'm very sorry that you don't have that."

"It's okay. I mean, I'm gonna be an adult in two years, then I don't have to see them again."

"Two years is a long time." Mrs Iero noted, her eyebrows raised a little.

"It is." Gee nodded, "but I've lived through two years of them misgendering me and being horrible about my gender. I can live through two more. Well, I mean, what else can I do? I've got to."