Something is ringing somewhere far, far away from Frank. The side of his cheek is wet when he pries his eyes open. He wipes the drool off his face before fumbling for the source of the noise in the darkness of the room, finally managing to press the green button on his phone.
He can’t make out anything at first, just a jumble of noise, and he’s riding the tail end of his cold so he thinks his ear must still be blocked, but then Gee’s voice rings, distant.
“Just give me four more of this,” Gee is saying, and Frank rasps “Four what?” before realizing Gee isn’t actually talking to him.
The shuffling noises and Gee’s muffled conversation go on for a few more seconds, and Frank thinks Gee’s phone probably called on its own from his pocket again, when Gee’s voice comes back, right into Frank’s ear: “Frank? Frankie, are you there?”
“’Course I am, asshole,” Frank mumbles. He squints, rubbing his eyes blearily, trying to make out the numbers on the bedside clock. It's barely 3pm; not even half an hour since Gee left the hotel room. “Didn’t I tell you I was going to take a nap? Where are you? What's going on?”
Gee, unsurprisingly, just keeps asking more questions. “Are you okay? Frankie, are you... are you alone?” he asks, which is kind of weird, Frank thinks.
“Who would even be here while I took a nap?” he says. He hopes Gee either starts making sense soon, or just ends the call so Frank can go back to sleep. He’s determined to make the most of their last afternoon off by sleeping the whole time. The aptly-named tour kicked his ass all through Europe, and Frank needs all the rest he can get before they start contaminating the US. Mostly with his germs.
“Okay, Frank, listen,” Gerard says, and he sounds breathless, probably walking fast as he rambles on. Frank hopes Gee remembered to pay for his coffee with more than an autograph this time. “I need you to stay calm, okay? I didn’t realize it was today, but I’m on my way back, I’ll be there soon, it’ll be alright. You just have to keep calm until I get back.”
“What? Gee, what the fuck are you talking about?” Frank asks, rubbing his hands over his face to try and make sense of it all, because Gerard is starting to freak him out a little. He doesn’t manage to stop the stream of Gerard’s words, though.
“- going to happen,” Gee is saying, “and I just need you not to -“ but Frank never hears what Gee doesn’t want him to do, because his phone is knocked out of his hands and Gerard's suddenly right there, shoving his tongue down Frank’s throat.
*
Frank’s first instinct when it comes to Gerard is always to kiss back, so for the first few seconds, he closes his eyes and enjoys it, shutting out the tinny voice still coming from his phone on the floor. He does love Gerard's taste, and the familiar weight of him on top of Frank.
Something's off, though, Frank knows; he can't tell exactly what just yet, the haze of sleep and cold meds clinging to him stubbornly.
Gerard is not helping. He’s rubbing himself all over Frank in the most distracting way, murmuring “Miss you, miss you, miss you”. It's kind of silly, because Gerard wasn’t really gone that long, and suddenly Frank’s brain gets back online and Frank realizes Gerard didn’t actually come back.
In fact, that’s still him calling Frank’s name through Frank’s phone and if Gerard’s not here, then who the fuck is Frank kissing?
Frank’s eyes jerk open and he starts scrambling backwards on the bed, putting as much distance as he can between himself and the intruder.
He’s breathing hard and his heart is pounding as he gropes around for the switch. When the light comes on he blinks and stares, and stares some more, and tries to make sense of things but his brain keeps coming back with “system error” because the person in front of him? The person in front of him, wringing his hands and biting his lips and giving Frank the pleading look Frank knows so well?
