July 28, 2007: The Kiss

It's obvious, the thought behind it. 'You're not getting away this time'.

Frank gasps despite himself and within a split second, Gerard's mouth is on his, and it is open, and Frank can feel his tongue.

He can't help it. Frank lets out some sort of pathetic mewling sound. He opens his mouth back involuntarily and drops his fucking guitar (thank god it has a strap) which like, since when? It's instinctual to try and wrap his arm around Gerard's waist, and he tilts his head, just a little, going for a better angle, but it's too late.

Life
Is
But
A
Dream

The moment is over and Gerard is forcefully pushing him away. He stands, shocked for half a second before he snatches his guitar back up properly and makes his way back to his place stage right.

Frank reminds himself to focus. He has a part to play. They're on stage. They're in the middle of a song. They're in the middle of a show. He doesn't have the luxury of stopping to process right now. That said, fuck the mic. Fuck his backing vocals, fuck everything that is not the fucking instrument in his hands.

What was that? What the fuck was that? That wasn't like what they've done before. Fuck, Gerard's stuck his tongue down Frank's throat before, but it's never been like that. What the ever living fuck was that?

The force, the grip in Frank's hair, the look of- Fuck, was it determination or was it revenge? Was this for the blood? For the denial of a kiss? Was he making a point? What point was he fucking making?

What the fuck just happened?

Gerard takes the moment after the song's ended to stop and address the crowd, and Frank pants in great, heaving breaths. There's a request for more light in the center of the stage, and Gerard sets off on a spiel about being happy to be back in California. It gives Frank a moment to- well, not calm down, but to sort of calm down.

There's this moment with Cortez near the drum riser. And by moment, that means that Mikey's stand in looks at him, like really looks at him. Frank thinks maybe he sees him mouth something close to 'you good?', but whether or not it's really there is up for debate, because Frank very intentionally does not see it.

He simply gives the barest shake of his head, willing himself to focus on the task at hand which is to check tuning and make sure things are ready for Teenagers. He lingers by the riser for a few moments, wiping at his face with the back of his gloved hand to get the sweat out of his eyes. He even takes a second to look at his finger. Still bloody, and throbbing, honestly, but he's had worse.

The distractions work well enough. Too well, really. When Gerard appears suddenly to tell them all, "Home stretch, boys, let's kill it!" into the dead mic, Frank nearly chokes on air. He hadn't seen him coming, hadn't registered his presence. His fingers were so much more interesting with the whole caked in blood thing going on.

"Frankie? You good?" Gerard asks him, away from the mic and with a look on his face that Frank really isn't entirely sure how to interpret.

Of course, the only answer Frank can manage to give is a labored sort of, "Yeah, man," before he moves back over to his pedal board. When Ray picks up the rhythm for the first verse of Teenagers, Frank is pretty sure he's never loved the man more in his entire life.

Four more songs. He can totally survive four more songs. Three, actually. Cancer really only counts as a song for James and Gerard. Frank will very happily take his cue to walk off stage and get water when that time comes.