Welcome to the Pride Parade [Frerard AU]

Part I: Chapter 2

          

CHAPTER 2 – SOMEWHERE IN JERSEY

From Ray Toro: happy first day of summer!!

From Frank Iero: Yay!

From Gerard Way: Only one year left of school... that's terrifying

From Ray Toro: killjoy

From Ray Toro: granted im ready to start living on my own

From Gerard Way: The next year will fly by. I think I'll die as soon as I have to be self-dependent for even a week

From Frank Iero: Anyways, does anyone have exciting plans for the summer?

From Ray Toro: i got a job working in retail at the mall. you guys should visit me sometime

From Gerard Way: Awesome. I've set my own personal goal to go outside at least once

From Mikey Way: Progress is progress

From Ray Toro: my summer goal is to live vicariously through your love lives

From Gerard Way: Something happen with Christa?

From Ray Toro: good question, she stopped texting me and changed her relationship status to single again

From Gerard Way: Shit

From Ray Toro: at least i have you guys

From Gerard Way: At least you have us, lol

From Mikey Way: my love life is off-limits too

From Ray Toro: I kind of figured, given what happened at prom... sorry dude

From Mikey Way: I'm not that upset to be completely honest with you

From Frank Iero: We should all meet up sometime! The pool opens on Monday.

From Gerard Way: Sounds fun

From Ray Toro: i'm not really a swimmer

From Frank Iero: We won't force you to swim, we'll only force you to pretend to be our friend for an hour.

From Gerard Way: I might push you in

From Ray Toro: thanks frank, i'll keep that in mind gerard

I smirked at the screen, out of things to add but having fun teasing Ray. I knew Monday was only two days away, but I was already finding myself missing them and my boyfriend.

My boyfriend. Was I ever going to get used to using that term?

I opened a new conversation just with Frank.

From Gerard Way: Hey

From Frank Iero: What's up?

The sound my phone made every time his words came through never failed to make my stomach jump and ears perk up. I hated loving it.

From Gerard Way: Want to get lunch tomorrow or something?

From Frank Iero: Aren't we going to the pool on Monday with your brother and Ray?

From Gerard Way: Yeah, but I was thinking this would just be the two of us. If you wanted to, or we could just do Monday that's fine

From Frank Iero: Only if you're sure you want to deal with me two days in a row :)

I felt myself relax when he replied with a joke. I was hoping he wouldn't turn me down for a date – what would be our first "real" date – already. Still, I'd never done this before and I wanted it to go the way it was supposed to. I wanted to make sure I was doing this whole boyfriend thing right. I didn't know how many times a week would be too many dates and how fast things could go without him suddenly backing off – or on the other hand, how few would be too scarce and how slowly would be too slow. Maybe I was just nervous after how things had left off at the end of the school year.

From Gerard Way: I'm up for that challenge if you are :)

From Frank Iero: Noon at The Cubicle?

From Gerard Way: See you then!

I switched back to the group chat and carried on a conversation with them for a while, but slowly faded out of it and let the notifications go by without really reading them. I was more distracted by the plans I'd just made with Frank.

Was it because this would be the first date I'd ever gone on? Likely.

Summer had just started and I already had given myself things to do. What was up with that? Disorganization was usually at the center of the summer, but now here I was, scheduling things and making myself busy with socialization – dating, even.

Maybe I should have known then that this summer wouldn't be like all of the ones previous.