Wishing You Were a Ghost

Road to Joy

He does, in fact, agonize.

He agonizes every single time he sees Gerard from January to April, which is a pretty large amount of times because they're sort of friends again. Which is great, by all technicalities!

They hang out! Sort of. With Mikey and Ray, naturally. Sometimes James. Even Aspen on occasion. But it's always with other people, and usually people that Frank can make 'for the love of god please kill me' faces at. Not that any of them ever do anything about it. The most he gets is Aspen's 'sorry' face. Mikey just rolls his eyes most of the time. Or laughs.

Mikey also gets into the habit of leaving them alone together over those three months. Hanging out with Gerard in communal spaces is all well and good. Even when Frank gets caught up staring at his lips while he's talking about whatever fancy new comic he's working on, it's still good. Their conversations are enjoyable, and okay, yeah, fine, eventually it maybe feels a little more comfortable. It's just that Mikey probably shouldn't be leaving them alone together.

Frank himself may not have said anything about the kiss on New Year's, but he feels pretty certain that Gerard did, if Mikey's general 'you're stupid' look increasing by like fifteen hundred percent the very next time they saw one another was anything to go by. But it becomes another elephant in the room. Or maybe the new elephant, rather.

The taboo that had once been Frank and Gerard's relationship is mostly gone. A few conversations get a little too close to home, but for the most part, the entire thing gets passed around like a kind of joke between friends. The kiss, though. That is a very large case of sweeping something under the rug. As far as anyone is concerned, Frank and Gerard included, it never happened.

They don't talk about it, they don't exchange glances about it, they don't mention it. They hardly mention the party at all, actually. Another reason that Frank thinks that Mikey knows, and another reason that Frank thinks Mikey is leaving them alone on purpose.

Scratch that. Frank doesn't think he does it on purpose. Frank knows he does it on purpose, but it's not the worst thing in the world. Until it is.

Until it's about an hour off of midnight on the eighth of April, and Frank is showing up to Gerard's apartment where they're supposed to all meet up together so that they can go to a midnight screening of some movie that Frank can't remember the name of. It's meant to be a birthday thing for Gerard, and it's at this really cool movie theater that's also a restaurant and a brewery in one go.

Ray and Mikey go there at least once a month for a date night, and they rave about it. It's their favorite spot in town, and they can't get enough of it, apparently, which is why it comes as a shock when Frank shows up only for Gerard to answer the door and there be no one else inside the apartment. There should be at least two other people in the apartment.

Frank frowns, leaning to try and get a better view of the living room from outside the door, "I'm already late as it is, where is everyone?"

"They bailed," Gerard says mournfully. He lets out a sigh, shifting to allow Frank inside, and Frank is greeted by Gerard's cat, Lotion (awful name), rubbing up against his shins. Lotion meows dismally at him, reflecting the mood of his owner.

"What do you mean 'bailed'?" Frank asks with a frown, leaning down to scratch just behind one of Lotion's ears before picking him up. Lotion bops his head beneath Frank's chin like he's trying to reciprocate the scratches and immediately starts purring, as Lotion is wont to do, according to Mikey. Very affectionate for a cat.

Gerard shuts the door and runs a hand through those wild orange locks. "I mean Mikey texted me literally like ten minutes ago saying they can't make it," he frowns. "Which Isn't the end of the world, I guess, but-"