ANON (Frerard)

7. The Difference Between Screens and Faces

At some point Frank fell asleep again that night. He doesn't see Gerard anywhere, so he figures that it must be after school has started. He's a bit sad that he's all alone, but hey, it's better than school. And although half of his mind is saying 'no', he gets up anyways, and trudged along to the bathroom.

In the mirror staring back at him is, well of course himself. He vault remembers taking his shirt off to sleep last night, and evidently hasn't put it back on since. Decorating his chest and sides are patches of black, blue, and purple bruises, and dried up blood is smeared in the more violated looking areas. Frank tentatively presses a hand to his ribs, and winces when the reaction is less than enjoyable.

"Fuck," he groans, turning the tap on, taking a hand full of water, and splashing it on his place. Of course there's still blood smeared in his hair, and he eventually gives up trying to use the sink, so he pads over a couple feet to the shower.

The shower fills Frank with a bittersweet feeling. As the scalp-burning water hits his skin, his cuts sting, reminding him of yesterday's events, but the hot liquid helps ease the tension in his sore muscles. He scrubs hard at his hair, not caring about the sores at the top of his head. Running his fingers through the blood stained strands, he watches as the red desolves on his wet fingers.

Frank stays in the shower twenty more minutes than he needs to.

When he finally forces himself out, he picks a towel from the door (the one that was ultimately agreed to belong to Frank really because that was the one he always used) and wraps it around his waist. Walking no less than six steps, Frank finds himself in Gerard's room again. He digs through the bottom drawer of the dresser on the right because the bottom drawer is full of various clothing items that belong to Frank.

It is totally normal to leave clothing at your best friend's house for times that you sleep over.

He pulls out a Misfits shirt but then, unsatisfied, goes into the drawer that's the second from the top and pulls out a pair of black sweatpants.

Gerard won't mind.

Frank changes in the clothing, slowly, and then sits on Gerard's bed. He takes out his phone and lazily texts April.

FI: hi I had fun last night
FI: staying home today bc my injuries :P

He waits a minute before putting his phone down, and sighs.

"I wish Gerard was here," he whispers, barely audible.

And he just sits there for a while, thinking. Just thinking about things.

***

AN: I wanna ditch school
AN: I'm gonna ditch school
AN: tell me if you wanna hang out
AN: so I can make sure

The buzzing wakes Frank up from his short slumber.

It feels like he's done that a lot in the past 24 hours, sleep.

FI: yeah ok
FI: where?
AN: meet me where we met yesterday ok
FI: yeah alright

Frank pockets his phone, a smile on his face, and he groggily hobbles down the stairs.

"Morning Sleeping Beauty," Mrs. Way greets him in the kitchen. "There's bacon on the counter, you can hear it up if it's too cold."