Pinky Promise (Frerard) ✔️

Three

Today was a weird as fuck day.

For some reason, the administrators decided to flip around the schedule so that the second part of the day was before lunch, and the first part of the day was after lunch. So I had gym first.

"I'm going to kill myself," I murmured, walking into the locker room. If I just changed my shirt, my teacher wouldn't care.

"Please don't," someone said.

I looked over to see a guy a little bit shorter than me–though with my posture he was practically towering over me–smiling.

"Why did they do this to us?" I complained.

He laughed. "I really can't help you there, bro. I have no idea. I feel really bad for everyone who does have gym first, though."

I smiled. "I'm Gerard."

"Bert."

"Okay, Bert, important question. How do you feel about men loving men?"

"I'm into girls, but you do you. High key support."

So maybe I had a chance of making a friend.

"Are you into guys?"

I nodded. "Yeah. Um, not that it matters, cause everyone calls me a fag and has spit on me at least once. I'm not gonna get anything here."

Bert shrugged. "I mean, you might? Check the GSA or musical, I guess."

I wrinkled my nose. "Not my type."

He laughed. "Fair enough. Okay, I gotta go so Coach D doesn't whoop my ass. Talk to you later, Gerard!"

I changed my shirt, smiling to myself. He wouldn't want to date me, but maybe that was a good thing. I think I needed to focus on getting friends right now more than getting a boyfriend.

xXx

I was starting to get the hang of the E string, which was good because we were moving on to the B string.

"Okay, B string is the same as the E string, but with different letter names." Mr. Iero paced the aisles, making sure our fingers were positioned correctly. "F is now C, G is now D. There are others, but we're working within the first two frets at the moment."

As much as I tried to arch my fingers, they fell flat over the E string and muffled any noise I tried to make.

"Tall fingers," Mr. Iero said, stopping by me.

I arched my fingers, wincing as pain shot up to my elbow.

"There you go." He smiled at me. "You'll get it soon."

He continued walking around. "I know it hurts, you guys, but if it doesn't hurt, you're doing something wrong. The bell is about to ring, why don't you all put your guitars away? And Gerard, please see me."

I sighed and went to put my guitar away, reentering the classroom as the bell rang and standing in front of Mr. Iero's desk.

"Do you have anyone to eat lunch with today?" he asked.

I shook my head.

"Do you have anything to eat for lunch?"

I avoided his eyes.

He sighed and pulled out his wallet, handing me a five dollar bill. "Go get food and come back. I want to talk to you. You have to eat."

I pouted, but really I was glad he was doing this. It had kind of been a long time since anyone cared about me like this.

I waited in line to food, then went back to Mr. Iero's room. He was staring out the window, quietly munching on a salad, but looked up when I entered.

"Hi," he said, smiling. "Sit."

He pointed his fork at a desk, so I sat and put my tray in front of me.

"You gotta eat," he said. "Um...so, I heard you talking to your brother yesterday."

I lowered my gaze and picked up a soggy French Fry, nibbling on the crispy bit of it.

"Is everything alright with him?"

I shook my head.

"Do you wanna talk about it?"

I shrugged.

"Come on, Gerard, you gotta give me something."

I swallowed the French Fry. "I made a friend today. I think."

"Oh, who?"

"His name's Bert. I don't know his last name, but I have gym with him. He's nice. Straight, but nice."

Was it just my imagination, or did Mr. Iero look a little relieved when I mentioned Bert was straight?

"Well that's good. I'm glad you're making friends." Mr. Iero smiled and pointed at my tray with his fork. "Eat."

I took a bite of the gross, stiff sandwich.

"So, things at home?"

"They're...fine." I shrugged, tearing apart the sandwich and eating the bread. "Mikey's gang of assholes apologized, but only because my mom made them. Nothing's going to change. Maybe I'll just move out once I'm eighteen."

"Do you have a job?"

I shook my head.

"Do you have any way to pay for basic housing necessities?"

"Prostitution."

I said it so bluntly and monotone, I guess it was funny, because he spit his salad all over his desk and snorted. "Oh my god. Don't joke about that, Gerard."

I smiled. "Are you kidding? I'd make a fucking awesome prostitute. Maybe I could be a stripper, too. Rock the pole."

He was gasping, trying to breathe between laughs. I think I might have killed him.

"Aren't you a virgin?" he asked breathlessly.

"Do you know how much virginity goes for? Serious question, I don't know."

He smiled. "We should probably stop discussing prostitution during school."

"How 'bout a stripper? They make like seventy five thousand dollars a year."

"Jesus Christ. That's, like, ten thousand more than I make. Fuck it. Let's be strippers together."

I smiled at my tray.

"So, that got off topic." He put his Tupperware away. "Why don't you think anything is going to change?"

"Because I know how this shit works." I crossed my arms. "Mikey's friends apologize, my mom gives some heartfelt speech to me while I'm trying to do homework, and then next week I'm getting attacked by five dozen rats calling me a faggot with Mikey watching."

"That's not...that's not okay." He frowned. "You really should talk to someone. Your mom can't do anything about it?"

"She's tried. You can't change someone if they don't wanna be changed."

"I think you should talk to your guidance counselor, Gerard."

I shook my head. "I've tried, Mr. Iero."

He smiled. "Just call me Frank. We're obviously going to end up being friends."

I smiled back. "Okay."

"Look, I'm going to set up an appointment for you. Please go. I know guidance counselors rarely do anything useful, but it might help. Okay?"

I huffed. "Do I have to?"

"Yes." He held out his hand and stuck out his pinky finger. "Pinky promise you'll go?"

I sighed and joined my finger with his. "Pinky promise I'll go."