BEING EDITED - Remove the dark - Frerard

Three

A wake up to a soft nudge to my shoulder and I'm greeted with a pair of gorgeous hazel eyes peering down at me as I lazily open mine. 

"Good morning" Gerard says. I look him up and down. He's wearing one of the shirts he'd packed and a pair of boxer briefs. I try to ignore the obvious morning situation he's got going on and try to roll onto my back. "You sure you want to go back to sleep?" He says with a voice that's hinting some teasing.

"You'd better get out of bed, or else you're going to be late." He says, as I push myself up on my elbows. I push off my own covers that were hiding my tattoo-covered body. "Wow" I hear Gerard mumble. "Frank... These are amazing... Oh man, this one is wicked," he says with an admiring grin as he runs his hand over the Hope tattoo above my left nipple. "Don't do that please," I tell him. He shrugs and jumps off the bed, bending over to grab some clothes (probably mine, but I could care less) and walks into the bathroom. Before closing the door he asks me "is it okay for me to shower?"

"Yea, no, go ahead!" I say as I wipe the sleep out of my eyes. I swing my legs over the edge of the bed and stumble into my living room to make myself some coffee. I shout to Gerard if he wants some, too and he replies happily shrieking a "YES". He must love coffee a lot.

When Gerard was done showering, the coffee was ready, too. I spent the waiting time strumming my Pansy. After finishing our coffees, we make our way to work, walking close together - but not holding hands - and separate after a block. I walk the other one alone, thinking about what tomorrow would bring. Gerard and I both have this weekend off, and he promised to introduce me to one of his friends today or tomorrow. I really hope he's a cool guy, I could use a friend myself. 

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I walk home with a slight skip in my steps once my shift is finished. Annie's is an incredibly pleasant place to work and Emma and I have the same taste in music. We talked about it a lot today and we had some small fights about what songs to play next in the shop. I consider her a low-key or a work friend from now on. The sight of my apartment building brings a smile on my face, as does the prospect of getting to spend the next 48 hours with Gerard. 

As I walk in the door, I am welcomed by the smell of lasagne. Gerard just came back up from putting it in the oven.

"Hey, Frank!" He smiles brightly as I walk into the small apartment after kicking off my shoes. "I hope you don't mind I took the liberty of raiding your cupboards and cooking you up some vegetarian lasagne?" I shake my head and tell him it's fine and that I, in fact, am vegetarian. "Oof," his reply is. "It's a good thing I didn't run to the store for some beef like I initially wanted. I promise you now, Frank, I will make you a delicious vegetarian meal each night I spend here." I doubt that he actually will, but I give him a bright smile and tell him I'll hold him onto that.

Once the lasagne is out of the oven, we sit on the couch and flick through the TV channels. I find that Iron Man is on and Gerard gives an indecisive nod of approval, but halfway through, when the meals are long finished, Gerard gets emotional. I ask him what's wrong, but he quickly shrugs it off like nothing and excuses himself to go to the bathroom. 

Once he comes out again, I cautiously ask him for our plans this weekend: to maybe meet his friends. He shrugs and agrees.

"My friends are Mikey and Brad. I can't introduce you to Mikey right now, as he's my brother and I'm not yet allowed back on the premises, but we can go see Brad now?" He asks me. Excitedly, I jump up. 

"Okay, let's go!" and I immediately slip into my shoes and shrug on my jacket, holding his out to him. 

Gerard drags me through all kinds of dark, scary alleys until we reach big, metal gates. I am not liking where we are and I kind of hope we're here to see a grave and not some creepy kid who likes to randomly hang out at cemeteries. Gerard pushes open one of the gates and lets me walk through it. He walks in, too and closes the gate behind him. I follow him until he stops and sits down on the middle of the path, facing a gravestone. He sits in lotus position, props his elbow up on his knee and lays his face in it. He dreamily stares at the inscription.