The Light Behind Your Eyes

Chapter 27

Gerard was in a blissful state of unconsciousness when he was rudely awaken by the blaring of his cell phone ringer. Being woken up like this was baseline disrespectful but having a pounding headache accompanied with it thanks to the booze last night made it unbearable. Gerard's instant scowl was soften a little when his brain registered that his arms were wrapped around the small naked body of his favorite guitarist. After making the almost impossible decision to untangle himself from Frank to answer his phone, Gerard felt around blindly for the damned thing.

"Hello?" He grumbled without even bothering to check who was rudely interrupting him spooning with Frank.

"Gerard, are you fucking kidding me?! A divorce?!" His soon to be ex wife screamed from the other end. Gerard sighed heavily before slumping back under the covers. "You want to split up our family?! You are such a selfish prick!"

"Lindsey" Gerard sighed before he was cut off by Lindsey's temper tantrum.

"I left to give us a break, let things cool off and you run off and file for divorce! I leave to take Bandit to school this morning when I'm stopped in the driveway by some curly-headed asshole who hands me an envelope and leaves. Do you know how embarrassing that was?!" Gerard was becoming more and more in tune with reality as Lindsey's tantrum droned on. He was beginning to get angry, though, because her yelling was no doubt starting to rouse Frank up from his angelic slumber.

"Yeah, we'll I don't give a fuck about embarrassing you considering the trauma you just put our daughter through yesterday" Gerard bit back in a gravely voice.

"Trauma?! I didn't do a damn thing, if anyone upset her yesterday it was you! Refusing to let her go! I am her favorite parent, Gerard, not you."

Gerard felt a white-hot rage shoot through his body. He wanted to rip down walls and topple over buildings but he knew he couldn't. He had to behave or risk losing everything.

"Whatever you say" he sighed in defeat.

"And to make things worse was that the china cabinet I ordered over a month ago I can't get now because they said they ran our card and we have insufficient funds?! Are you a fucking psycho? You stole all the money!"

"Don't even go there" Gerard said as he sat up, now aware that Frank was also awake but not moving. "I did what my lawyer instructed, why don't you go out and make your own money instead of spending all of mine."

"Is this really what you want Gerard? Because if you go through with this I will make sure you wish you were never born!"

"Bitch, you already make me wish that!" Gerard yelled, causing Frank to jump slightly. Frank sat up next to Gerard and placed a soothing hand on his knee, sending calming vibes to his new lover.

"Fuck you, Gerard, you will never see Bandit again!" Lindsey screamed before hanging up.

"Gerard..." Frank started before Gerard threw his phone across the room in haste.

"Fucking cunt" he muttered. The two men sat in silence for several long minutes. "Did she wake you? I'm sorry" Gerard started.

"I'm more worried about you. Are you okay?" Frank asked.

"She said it. She finally said it. She is taking my daughter" Gerard hung his head.

"That isn't true, you know that isn't true" Frank countered. "She is just hurt and angry and scared. I'm sure you both are." Gerard turned and gave Frank a sympathetic smile before stroking his cheek gently.

"How do you do that? Make everything seem like it's going to be okay?" Gerard asked dreamily.

"Because it is" Frank said with conviction.

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"Good afternoon, Mr. Way" Ray Toro chirped from the other end of the phone a few hours later. "I just wanted to let you know that Lindsey was served with her divorce papers this morning."

"Yeah, I heard all about it" Gerard sighed as he sat back in his office chair. He decided to come in late to work today because, well, he really needed to get some stuff done and stop being so distracted by Frank.

"Well, she gave me quite the what-for this morning too, so I am not surprised she called you" Ray laughed lightly. "Anyway, we have a court date in a few weeks. Just a preliminary thing, but to speed this along, I suggest you take inventory of things in the house you definitely want to keep. Lindsey has already lawyered up with some new kid on the block who I'm sure won't make this ride easy."

"It's Lindsey, it's never easy" Gerard added.

"Anyway, I have in our court paperwork that we will be asking for 50/50 custody of the minor child, does that still sit well with you?"

"Yes, 50/50 is good, Bandit needs both her parent's, even if her mother is a crazy bitch" Gerard grumbled.

"Perfect, I will finish up the paperwork and we will be ready for court. Oh, and one last thing. To protect you from, well yourself, I strongly advice you speak to Lindsey or her family in either writing or through me. You don't want her recording phone calls to use against you or anything."

"Don't talk to Lindsey, fine, done" Gerard said.

"Sounds good, I will talk to you soon" and with that Gerard hung up. He sat staring off into space as a knot formed in his gut. So many things were happening and he was struggling to digest them all. He was pulled from his near panic attack when his little brother burst into his office with no more then a quick knock.

"Well hey there, newly single guy" Mikey exclaimed in excitement.

"Well hey there, guy who doesn't know how to knock" Gerard mocked back.

"Why the long face, Gee? The wicked witch is leaving. You should be dancing around like all the munchkins in that movie." Gerard sent his brother a pointed look. Mikey decided to take a more solemn tone with his big brother. "Listen, I know this is what you want and I know it will be hard. Just take things day by day and you'll make it through" he said softly. Gerard knew his brother meant well, Mikey always meant well.

"Well I don't suppose I can dance nearly as good as those movie munchkins" Gerard joked while smiling softly.

"Yeah, but I know one that could. As a matter of fact, that little munchkin of ours has a record that is heating up the charts, fast."

"Really? I haven't even noticed" Gerard said, mentally kicking himself. He should have been one of the first to see Frank's hard work begin to pay off.

"I assumed so, considering you can't keep your tongue out of his mouth." Gerard's furious typing ceased at his brothers blunt words. He slowly turned his head with a questioning gaze.

"I'm sorry?"

"Don't play dumb, Gee, I see the way he looks at you and I know you feel something towards him. Which shocked the hell out of me at first but anyone will treat you better then Bitch did." Gerard stared his brother down. Curse Mikey and his ability to read Gerard like a damn pre-school edition book.

"Yeah, well...." Gerard trailed off, not knowing what else to say.

"Dude, I support it, but can you just keep it under wraps for a little bit? Don't want people thinking Frank got to where he is at because he was sucking off the record label owner" Mikey added with an obvious shiver of grossness.

"And what if he did?" Gerard shot back playfully.

"Ew, fucking gross, Gerard!" Mikey scowled before leaving the office entirely. For some reason, as random and weird as the interaction was, Gerard really liked that he had his brother's blessing to be with Frank in whatever capacity the pair decided on.