I Didn't Mean to Fall in Love (But I Did)

Frank and Gerard Made It to the End

"Aaron, what the fuck are you doing here?" Frank asks, opening the door to him. Aaron walks in, uninvited, forcing Frank to step back.

"What the fuck is this?" Aaron asks, holding up a newspaper and shoving it in Frank's face.

"Oh, you saw that did you?" Frank says, rather calmly as he takes the paper from him. He looks down at the crumpled paper and skims over the story that he's practically memorized at this point.

"Yeah, I fucking saw it!" Aaron yells at him, and Gerard slips around the guy to close the door behind him. It's too early to piss off the other people in the hall. Especially Pete, he needs his beauty sleep.

"What'd you think?" Frank asks dotingly.

"You're slandering my name, Frank!" Aaron scoffs at him, "my phone has been ringing off the hook because of your meddling."

"I only told the truth!"

"You told your side of the truth!" Aaron says.

"No, I told the truth. I'm not even painted perfectly in this article, Aaron. That piece tells the truth in as unbiased away as it can be. It's not untrue."

"But it's not your business to tell!"

"It is when you treated me the way you did."

"I treated you nicely, Frank. Up until you cheated on me," Aaron says, eyes looking evil and scaring Frank just the tiniest bit.

He winces at the word 'cheated' but decides to ignore it for a moment, "you treated me nicely, but not where it counts. You were never genuinely good to me, Aaron. Sure you didn't do your worst, but you were never a good boyfriend."

"How could I be a good boyfriend to someone who wasn't giving me a damn thing in return? All you ever did was sit there and talk about Gerard. You never brought anything to the table. You were just boring."

"Then why does it hurt you so much that I left?" Frank asks bitingly. Aaron fumbles for a moment, looking astounded by the question, but he soon masks it by drawing together his eyebrows.

"You cheated, Frank."

"I made a mistake when I kissed Gerard while I was dating you, but I didn't cheat. I never meant to hurt you. I stopped the relationship because I didn't want to hurt you. That was the last thing I wanted to do, but you wouldn't listen. You wouldn't understand what I meant when I said that I love Gerard, and always have loved Gerard. It was never you, Aaron. It was never you who I was in love with, it's always been him. When I broke up with you, it wasn't to hurt you, it was to save you from wasting your time and being hurt. I knew I wanted to be with Gerard. Not you. I broke up with you when I knew I could have what I wanted. I really did try to spare your feelings, but what did you do? You threw a bowl at me."

"You deserved it."

"No he didn't!" Gerard interrupts for the first time. Frank had all but forgotten about Gerard standing there. He's standing to the right of the front door with his eyebrows screwed up in anger that matches the expression on Aaron's face.

"Shut up," Aaron says, disregarding Gerard's words.

Frank sighs, "The fact of the matter is, Aaron, that article exists now. You have to deal with the consequences that your actions have brought. You got yourself into this by acting like a jerk. You could have left the game with honor, but instead you decided to be a sore loser, and you've gotten yourself into this."

"You're such a bitch, Frank!" Aaron says.

"Oh right," Gerard interrupts again, "it's okay for you to try ruining Frank's life, but when he tries to ruin yours it's all of a sudden not okay?"