Wintertime (Frerard, Sequel to Summertime)

32: This Is Where It Starts Getting Traumatic

"A burn." Gerard bit his lip, looking up at Frank, "this is something that's... kind of hard to explain, honestly I have no idea how it works, but do you know how I don't get injuries and well do you remember when I burnt that drawing and stood on it, and well... that's that burn," Gerard let out a sigh as he looked up to gauge Frank's reaction. "I saw it then but I didn't quite get it, and then it's happened a few times since but nothing major, nothing major enough for you to notice. I mean, it was fine, I was just making a specific effort not to get hurt, and now this, and maybe it's the same, but I haven't..." Gerard trailed off, his face growing suddenly very pale, paler, somehow.

"You haven't what?"

"No, that doesn't make sense-"

"What?" Frank exclaimed, "Come on, Gerard, none of this makes any fucking sense to me right now, what's going on?" He grabbed Gerard's hand a little too tightly perhaps.

"I was going to say that I haven't... that I haven't done that, that hasn't happened to me, and I mean, no it hasn't, not now, but I..." He trailed off, "it doesn't make sense, though, Frank, but-"

"But what?" Frank cut him off: a desperate look in his eyes.

"I did this once. When I was alive, though, I got really fucked up, and it was... it wasn't... I did that to myself, I... was pissed and upset and I never told anyone, but it... I don't know, I don't understand how that's here, and why. And where's the logic in this all, seriously?"

"You did..." Frank's eyes widened, glancing down at the scar on his side, "fuck, Gerard, this is- fuck... fuck, fuck. When was this?" He insisted.

Gerard bit his lip, looking away, "about a week before, before I killed myself, I was in a bad place, I... I'm sorry."

"You're sorry? Fuck, Gerard, I'm so-" Frank pulled him closer again, "but how and why is it here, what the fuck? I mean... your injuries from now on me, makes slightly more sense, but..."

"But..." Gerard trailed off. "It was this room, right here, and- maybe it's this house, maybe it's, I don't know- maybe we shouldn't stay here."

"I don't know, Gerard, come on, fuck, what else did you do to yourself?" Frank found himself asking, and it was only then that the realisation really struck Gerard.

"Nothing much... except I... I... killed myself, didn't I?"

"It- though- it... was pills- pills, that wouldn't-"

"I don't know, fuck, Frankie, I don't know." Gerard pulled him into a hug, "maybe we should go. Maybe it's just this house, it'll be fine, I- pr-" Gerard stopped, realising he couldn't promise anything at all

-

The two of them: Gerard and Frank, had walked across town to a local park, in favour of getting away from the house and whatever unexplainable power it could possibly hold inside it, and sat down on a bench between two trees in an awkward silence: their minds consumed more than they'd care to admit with the matters of a certain scar of Frank's side, and a scar that had once been on Gerard's, and how it might all be coincidence and mess, and maybe- maybe it was just genuinely innocent, but how it really might not be.

Frank wondered what could possibly become of them, of him, of this mess, and was too caught up in his own head to notice the way the world around him to fade out or blur at the edges, like as if a painting: smudged slightly as colours bleed into one another due to careless, or perhaps only as you look closely.

And as it really dawned up him, he found himself considering if the whole world around him was indeed an illusion, or if it was just perhaps the tears pooling in the bottom of his eyes, which he was trying his best to ignore, but the world ensured he couldn't.