The tension between the two Way brothers at breakfast on an unfortunate Wednesday morning was utterly unbearable, and Mrs Way's oblivious outlook upon the whole situation did nothing but add to the silent yet just as deadly conflict between the two teenagers.
And really, Gerard didn't even have a fucking clue as to why Mikey was staring at him like axe-murdering his brother was something he was seriously considering, but of course, just to keep up, well, tradition, he found himself staring at the fifteen year old in exactly the same way.
And still Mrs Way busied herself with making cereal, leaving Gerard to glare at his brother from behind the brim of a piping hot mug of coffee - he downed that shit like a motherfucker in order to assert dominance, and just like that, Mikey grabbed what was clearly some kind of fucked up illegal pill of some sort from his pocket and popped it into his mouth without a second thought, and Gerard was really fucking certain that there was absolutely no hope for bettering his brother if he didn't end up setting himself on fire.
"Mikey, do you want some cereal?" Mrs Way unknowingly broke some sort of silent war between her two sons, whilst almost patronisingly shaking a box of Cheerios at her fifteen year old son, who reckoned he was entirely too cool for breakfast on a whole, which in Gerard's eyes was nothing other than fucking ridiculous. "Gerard?" She finally tried, with entirely less hope, but his answer surprised her entirely.
Gerard met his brother's eyes and answered in the most determinedly bitter tone known to man. "Yes, mother, I will have some cereal." And really, Gerard didn't at all have a clue as to how 'I can eat cereal, fuck you' won him this, but Mikey looked relatively startled.
But then as his mother poured the cereal into the bowl, Gerard came to realise that this was fucking whole grain, more bran than a farmer has ever actually seen in his life, motherfucking healthy cereal. But, of course, Gerard Way was a stubborn motherfucker, and ate the first spoonful as he met his brother's gaze, smirking, and trying his best not to choke like a fucking champion.
And as he finally finished the bowl, which throughout the process of, Mikey's gaze never left his, Gerard knew that he had most certainly won, and that he'd won something that he still had no fucking clue what it actually was, so really, it better be something good because Gerard Way didn't eat whole grain cereal for nothing.
"I need to get to work now, you boys will be fine without me, won't you? Gerard, you've got theatre after school, remember?" Mrs Way smiled, looking between her two children, still totally oblivious regarding the cereal war that had just taken place.
"We'll be fine, mum." Mikey forced a smile, yet still never taking his gaze away from Gerard's, not even for a second. "Have a nice day."
"You too." Mrs Way added, grabbing her bag and making her way out of the back door and round the side gate, and at the exact moment that Mikey heard the start of her car, he almost seemed to jump into life, standing up and full on yelling at his brother.
"Are you a fucking idiot?"
Gerard sat there, continuing to stare at his brother, and just a little overwhelmed as he struggled to understand just quite what Mikey was referring to here; he highly suspected that it wasn't the cereal he'd just eaten, but really, you could never be sure.
"I'm not the one fucking popping pills at the breakfast table with our mother like it's fucking nothing!" Gerard exclaimed, rolling his eyes and watching as Mikey blushed a little, shrugging it off. "I swear to God you're addicted or something."
"It's paracetamol, Gerard." Mikey broke into a grin, pulling the little box out of his pocket and showing his brother.
"Oh..." Gerard didn't quite know how to react to that. "Why the hell do you casually carry paracetamol around with you?" He asked, running a hand back through his severely tangled bedhead, which had really proved harder than he had anticipated.
"It's for Pete - honestly, I don't fucking know. I just owe him a favour and sometimes with Pete it's just easier not to ask." Mikey sighed out shaking his head, before suddenly seeming to snap back onto topic, their paracetamol related tangent almost visibly dissolving around them. "Seriously though, Gerard... what the fuck are you thinking?"
"What?" Gerard continued: still utterly clueless as to exactly what his brother was addressing here - he highly suspected that it, however, was not cereal at this point though.
"Frank told me that he has a girlfriend yesterday." Mikey's tone was nothing but spiteful at this point as he neared the point of fucking punching something: whether that be his brother or another vase of his mother's that there were going to have to bury at the bottom at the garden or something and pray that she forgot about.
"Oh... yeah..." Gerard sighed out, biting his lip and looking down, having really not anticipated that Frank would be entirely shouting about this.
"I don't know who I'm pissed off with more, though. Him or you, because really, you're both being fucking idiots. You don't have to create a whole new identity for Frank to care about you, for fuck's sake, Gerard." Mikey shook his head, resorting to biting his lip before he was screaming all of Frank's secrets at his extremely sexually and perhaps even gender confused brother.
"You know what? I'm happy? And still, you can be nothing more than an asshole about it." Gerard shook his head, getting up and far too forcefully throw his spoon into the sink for someone to wash up at some point in the next three weeks, probably.
"But you're not, though, come on, Gerard. This isn't you - this bitch in a skirt just isn't you, and we all fucking know that, and maybe that's just why Frank has noticed yet because this girl version of you is absolutely nothing like the real you at all, and lying to yourself like that is actually going to kill you someday."
"So basically you're disproving yourself by say that who Frank is in love with is like the polar opposite of me." Gerard smirked, entirely too fucking proud of being able to say that Frank Iero wasn't in love with him, like seriously, the lengths he went to spite and better his brother were actually ridiculous at times.
"But Gerard, he's not fucking in love with this fake you, at all. He just jumped into a relationship because dear god he's fucking stupid and insecure, fuck-" Mikey couldn't finish what he was saying without outing Frank, and although that would seriously just make this whole situation a million times easier, he just couldn't break a promise to a friend, even if that friend was being the world's most stupid motherfucker.
"Mikey, will you stop fucking up my life for just one fucking minute - could you possibly do that?" Gerard asked, turning to make his way upstairs.
"Oh honestly, you seem to be doing a perfectly fine job of ruining your life by yourself, Gerard."
-
"Oh dear God, Gerard, you are an absolute idiot..." Lindsey joined the seventeen year old by his locker in the school hallway and quite honestly, Gerard was absolutely baffled as to how she'd gotten to know.
"Tell my brother to stop fucking telling people, will you?" Gerard sighed out, casually planning his younger brother's murder like there was absolutely no better way to spend a Wednesday morning.
"Gerard..." Lindsey sighed out, almost laughing at him, and with that, the seventeen year old found himself more than a little confused. "I heard this from Frank, not Mikey. Frank's practically told the whole school about this fucking girlfriend called Gee, and it wasn't hard to figure out just who that really was, was it? Seriously, he's going fucking overboard, it's almost like he's trying to make some sort of overly heterosexual statement."
And really, Frank was.
"That's kind of cute, actually." Gerard responded, rolling his eyes at Lindsey and muttering something under his breath about her being a massive fucking cockblock that she just pretended not to hear.
"Yeah, cute that you've destroyed your life with a fake identity that the person you're in love with is going to hate you for, and not to mention, if Frank Iero actually had a heart, this would be exactly how you'd break it." Lindsey snapped, shaking her head, and really, it was a godsend that Alicia turned up before someone's head was shoved into a brick wall or something, because with the equally stubborn nature of the two friends, it wasn't unlikely.
"Hey..." Alicia's tone started off very cheery and almost suspicious considering they had maths in approximately four minutes time, but she soon trailed off as she caught the rather concerning glare between her two best friends, and really, this time, Gerard didn't even have some fucking cereal to settle this with.
"Gerard's actually fucking ruined his life - utterly and completely." Lindsey thought that to be a wonderfully positive way in which to start off Alicia's day, and it did in fact seem that Alicia had absolutely no choice in the matter before her best friend was full on ranting to her.
"Yeah... Frank's going on about some girlfriend in a miniskirt and I'm just a little confused..." Alicia added and with the glare from Gerard, perhaps that was all she needed to say.
"Seriously, stop criticising my life choices, right now, I just want to skip maths and get drunk and it's like nine am but I don't fucking care..." Gerard groaned, closing his locker and looking at Lindsey, and then Alicia, and of course, both of them had even a shred of sense and were immediately opposed to the idea.
"Gerard I am not allowing you to make two ridiculously stupid decisions now, come on. Look, first Fr-" Lindsey stopped mid-sentence, eyes widening a little, causing both Alicia and Gerard to turn their heads in the direction of her gaze, and of course, none other Frank Iero himself was sprinting down the corridor.
And then before Gerard knew what was happening, it was utter deja vu, and Frank Iero was tripping and falling in Gerard's direction, practically pinning the seventeen year old against the lockers, and eyes widening as he realised just what had happened, and really, Gerard was just focusing on trying not to get aroused because there was just fucking something about Frank Iero practically slamming him against a locker, even if accidentally, that was going to fuck him over right now.
"Shit... s-sorry..." Frank sighed out, pulling away, leaving Gerard against the locker like a deer stuck in the headlights and Alicia had to slap Lindsey to stop her from giggling, because the sexual tension was soon going to be more obvious than the blush on Gerard's face.
"I-it's o-kayy..." Gerard drew out, catching his breath and finding that he could hardly breathe at all, and seriously, fuck Frank Iero - that was all he wanted to do.
"Frank, what the hell are you doing? I didn't count you as the type to want to get to maths on time." Lindsey burst into a fit of laugh, raising her eyebrows as she looked Frank up and down with a shake of her head.
"I'm not going to maths, I need to fucking get out of here or I will be exorcised or something-"
"What?" Alicia exclaimed, her eyes widening as she fell into a fit of giggles, and then, Frank pulled down his hoodie for the first time that day, revealing the now shaved and bleached sides of his head. And if Gerard wasn't sexually frustrated already, by now he was just about fucked, and really not in the way he would like.
"I need to just bunk off and get high or something seriously - I can't do detention tonight or my mum will kill me. Hey, Lindsey, you know-" Frank burst into a chorus of bullshit explanations: puppy dog eyes aimed at exactly the wrong person.
"Frank, I'm not fucking up my life to provide you with moral support about your ridiculous hairstyle choices, Gerard, however, already has plans to ditch maths and fuck himself up, so I'm sure the two of you will find this to be a wonderful opportunity to spend time together." Gerard was actually going to kill Lindsey for that, but with the way Frank turned to him, almost as if what Gerard had said to him the other week was entirely forgotten, that didn't seem to matter at all.
Maybe this would even be fun. Maybe they could even just be friends.
"Come on then, asshole, we need to talk as well, you know?"
Okay, with that, Gerard immediately took his previous thoughts back.
-
"I'm sorry." Gerard finally choked out into the silence, catching Frank almost by surprise as the two of them walked down the road: destination unknown - Gerard was just following Frank, and Frank was just following his feet.
"For what?" Frank asked, sighing a little as he did so and Gerard couldn't help but be just a little suspicious as to quite where the sixteen year old was going with that. "You've got nothing to be sorry for: I'm hot as fuck - it was unavoidable."
And even Gerard found himself giggling at that, albeit blushing like he never had before. "Shut up." He groaned, letting his fringe fall over his cheeks in an absolutely terrible attempt to disguise the tomato red tint upon his cheeks.
"I'm not wrong though, am I?" Frank smirked, his voice oozing with excessive quantities of egotistical behaviour and self-confidence. "Come on, Gerard Way - tell me I'm wrong."
Gerard only shook his head in Frank's direction, walking a little faster and leaving Frank to grin like the world's biggest idiot. "Where are we even going?" Gerard asked, changing the subject in nothing but an awkward and painful obvious manner.
"You can't, can you?" Frank ignored Gerard's question entirely and moved in front of the seventeen year old, stopping him in his tracks. "You think I'm hot, don't you? I don't blame, you, I-"
"That sounds an awful lot like a gay thing, Iero." Gerard stopped the sixteen year old with that one as Frank almost froze on the spot at the notion of homosexuality, and quite frankly, Frank was being ridiculous.
"It's not a gay thing; you're being so gay, Gerard, that there's just no room for me to be gay, even if I wanted to." Frank over exaggerated his words with stupid gestures and Gerard only shook his head as they continued to make their way down the road: Frank only stopping him when they reached a side road. "We're going to mind - and again, that's not a gay thing."
Gerard only snorted in response, and despite Frank's grin, he really looked like he could and would slap him. "How am I being so gay that it physically drains you of all possible homosexuality?" Gerard asked, and really, this conversation was far too fucking casual for Frank Iero, and something about this was just fucked up, considering that he was technically, well his alter ego was, dating Frank. Gerard had to blame it on the hair, though - the hair was a different story.
"You're very obviously flirting with me, Gerard." And at that, Gerard was practically choking on his own saliva, and when Frank Iero was involved and it was only that he was choking on, he could really be nothing but disappointed.
"You think this is flirting, huh?" Gerard grinned, playing it cool and just wiping over the fact that he was very definitely kind of turned on right now, and again that they were going over to Frank's house, Frank's bedroom- fuck, that was not helping at all.
Frank nodded, smirking like he knew something that Gerard didn't, and really that should have unnerved the seventeen year old in one way or another, but this was just like breakfast with Mikey and that whole grain cereal he ate - Frank was Mikey and it seemed his common sense was just a bowl of whole grain cereal, and it also seemed that he was a connoisseur of nothing other than absolutely pathetic attempts at metaphorical explanations.
"Gone on, then, Gerard, flirt with me. I fucking dare you." Frank met Gerard’s gaze, and the seventeen year old was nothing but dumbstruck at how Frank wasn't blushing like a motherfucker at this point, because he knew that he certainly was.
"If that wasn't a gay thing, then-"
"Shut up. Come on, flirt with me." Frank stopped Gerard in his tracks, and Gerard's head was running crazy as he couldn't quite decipher what this was - it was most likely some kind of extremely fucked up game that Frank had manipulated Gerard into playing with him, but Gerard just couldn't help but hope for more, and he knew that he was nothing but an idiot for it, but that was just how things had to be: his common sense was, after all, nothing but vacant when Frank Iero was around.
"Why?"
"Because I told you too, and you're so fucking head over heels for me that you'll do whatever I say." Frank catch Gerard's gaze with just an ounce of caution as the seventeen year old weighed up just how badly slapping Frank Iero would go for him. "Or is that not true? Can you beat me, huh? Can you outsmart me? Can you flirt with me so much that you actually make me uncomfortable?"
And Gerard could only laugh when it came to outsmarting Frank Iero, because really, the kid was all punk rock and emotional manipulation, and seemed to utterly useless when it came to seeing the difference between a hot punk girl and some emo faggot with just a bit too much make up and a slutty miniskirt on.
"Okay." Gerard exhaled, biting back a smirk, and wondering just how long it would be before Frank Iero killed him.
-
It was nothing other than Frank Iero's stupid, little, not quite so heterosexual, games that lead the two teenagers to approach Frank's house with the younger leaning into Gerard's side, and Gerard's hand having trailed down to rest on his ass.
"You know that your hair looks fucking hot like that - I want to pull it, I want to tangle my fingers in as I fuck you, and I want to pull you up to look up at me with it, because I want to see you when I make you come harder than you ever have before."
And with that, Frank knew that perhaps he'd gotten himself into more than he'd been expecting, and it seemed that Gerard wasn't quite the same awkward, shy dork when it came to fucking, and just what he wanted to do to the sixteen year old.
And perhaps, Frank just couldn't help but wonder just how much of this Gerard was making up, and in turn, just how much of this was nothing other than the blatant truth, because really, this was absolutely nothing but a gay thing, and it was just Frank's ego that stopped him from admitting that.
"Could you stop getting hard over me just long enough for me to unlock the door, huh?" Frank asked, chuckling a little as he pulled away from Gerard and unlocked the door. "Daisy, my dog, she's at the vets today - nothing serious, don't worry, but you won't get slammed against the floor today."
"Oh I wouldn't mind you slamming me against the floor, or anything really." Gerard continued, grinning, and then stopping within instants as he noticed the offward gaze upon Frank's face and the small blush as he began to bite his lip. "This is making you uncomfortable, isn't it? I'm sorry-"
"N-no, Gerard, I'm not that much of a pussy, come on, look-" Frank only blushed further, continuing to care far too much about his reputation as he continued to do nothing but lie through his teeth.
"Shut up, look I'll stop. This was a stupid idea and it's making you uncomfortable because you're straight and I'm just a faggot and I'm sorry that I find you attractive, but yes, Frank, you're right, you're hot as fuck and that's just something I'm going to have to deal with, okay-"
"Shut up." Frank cut Gerard off, blushing a little as he shook his head at the seventeen year old, and the two almost stood frozen in the hallway as they struggled to make eye contact and Frank's heart began to practically beat right out of his chest at just the thought of what he could say next.
"What?" Gerard finally choked out, his heart unknowingly mirroring Frank's and this was every kind of cliché but neither of them fucking cared, because they both nothing but certain that this was exactly how they'd ruin their lives.
"I'm not straight." And it was like someone had dropped some sort of glass bombshell all over the room, and the two stood frozen as not to cut their feet on the broken glass. "I'm not gay, but I'm not- I don't know, Gerard. I don't know what I am, and all I know is that it's doing nothing but killing me."
Gerard just couldn't help but respond with nothing but silence for far too long as he tried his best to convince himself that Frank was joking or something, but there was nothing but sincerity in that beautiful pair of hazel eyes. "So, you're saying that this is a gay thing?"
"Shut up." Frank burst out into a fit of giggles, and despite the fact that he knew his cheeks were nothing but bright red, he really just didn't fucking care, because this was Gerard, and this was just different, and maybe with 'Gee', maybe with his girlfriend he would have cared, but this felt so simple and yet so dangerous and before Frank knew what was happening, his lips were on Gerard's and everything was on fire.
Not literally - that really would have been quite problematic.
Metaphorically, though, yes, and sexually, quite probably.
"Frank-" Gerard didn't quite know how to react at all, and eventually, at his lack of reciprocation, the younger pulled away, staring at Gerard blankly.
"Do you want to kiss me or not? Come on, Gerard, this is a gay thing, this is so fucking gay that there's no way around it - this is the gayest thing ever, and I want this, so come on, shut up and fucking kiss me." Frank pleaded; grinning up at someone would just couldn't quite return the gesture.
"Your girlfriend, Frank." And if anyone was an idiot, it was Gerard, who suddenly found himself prioritising the needs of female alter ego over himself.
"I don't fucking care - I'll dump her, look, come on... I'm not good with girls, this is complicated and fucked up, just ask Mikey: he can probably explain this better than I can-"
"Mikey?" Gerard exclaimed, making no secret about the fact that he was genuinely personally offended when it came to Frank's decision to tell his brother about this 'gay thing' of his, and not him, and then for Mikey not to tell him.
"Look, oh shut up, Gerard. You're fucking with my head, because you're a guy and I like you, and that's not supposed to happen and we... Gerard, please just fucking kiss me, I'm not good with words-"
And then, Gerard went 'fuck it' and did, and he tried not to regret it, he really fucking did, but he just couldn't help but think about Gee and just how willing Frank was to cheat, and whether it would be like this with the actual him, because there was absolutely no fucking way in hell that Gerard was going to be able to deal with that, but-
Fuck, Gerard's mind went blank instantly as he felt Frank's cold fingertips against his hipbones, trailing up under shirt and pulling it over his head, and as the seventeen year old finally managed to recognise and accept what was happening at reality, he pulled Frank away, crossing his arms over his stomach and blushing a little.
"Frank- I..." Gerard trailed off, meeting the sixteen year old's gaze. "I can't do this if it's not serious, and you're just... you're a just a fuck and run kind of person, and Frank I can't do that, I can't do you."
"I'll change-" Frank protested, but Gerard only grabbed his shirt from the sixteen year old and pulled it back over his head.
"You can make a start with explaining how you tried to fuck a guy to this girlfriend of yours, huh? I bet she'll want an explanation as to why she's not good enough so much that you feel the need to cheat on her with some random fucking faggot."
"Ger-"
"I'm going Frank, I'm fucking going. Love isn't a game, Frank, and seriously, grow the fuck up and start giving a damn about other peoples feelings." And with that, the seventeen year old stormed out, making sure to slam Frank's door behind him.
And then, silence, all too long, and Frank was still, and almost fragile, and almost nothing, and he needed, a smoke, a fuck, and some pills, but had neither of three, and fuck, he felt like crying, but he didn't cry, he fucking never cried.
Frank Iero didn't cry, but it seemed that Gerard Way changed that.
-
Hey guys:') Fun fact: I actually intended for them to actually have some frerard action in this chapter but I got like two thirds through and was like yeah, this isn't traumatising enough, fuck that;) Anyway, votes and comments are appreciated as always:) I love you all<3