Unholyverse

~Part 7~

Gerard left his number for Frank, "Just in case," and Frank spent the rest of the weekend lying in a series of increasingly hot baths, popping painkillers like a junkie and resisting the urge to call Gerard and beg him to come back and let Frank sit next to him for a while.

It was ridiculous. It wasn't until after Gerard left that Frank realized even just having him in the apartment made him feel better; not in the painkilling way that touching him did, but his presence was calming or whatever, fucking therapeutic.

Probably it was all in Frank's mind. Probably this whole fucking thing was in Frank's mind. Probably he had already been locked up in a mental hospital somewhere and this was all a hallucination.

On Sunday he dragged himself out of the apartment for groceries and new shit for his bed - lying on the bare mattress got really old, really fast, and couch pillows were not meant to be slept on for a whole night - and on the way back one of the fliers he'd stuck up about his dog caught his eye.

A bunch of the number strips had been pulled off, which could mean somebody found her, but could also mean someone had been bored waiting for a bus. Frank promised himself he'd remember to check his fucking messages when he got home.

He was so fucking spacey lately, he thought as he waited to cross the street - fuck, he missed his fucking car, and there was another thing he'd forgotten about since he started getting beaten up by the invisible man.

The lights changed and Frank moved with the crowd, shifting his bags in his arms to ease the pressure on his newly-aching wrists. It was so weird how the pain was localized like that. He didn't know what the hell he would do if everything started hurting at once.

He got home and put his groceries away, then managed to get the new sheets on his bed before his wrists gave out completely and he just sat on the floor for a while, holding them close to his chest and trying to breathe through the pain.

Fuck Doctor Durning, he decided suddenly, scrambling up and digging clumsily through his back pack. Two fucking days' worth of Vicodin, that wouldn't even get Frank through a really bad headache. His stupid fingers closed finally on the tub of ointment Luke had given him and he wrenched the lid off with a moan, scooping out way too much and spilling some onto his jeans in his haste to get it on his skin.

"Aaaaah," he hissed, rubbing it in as quickly as he could. It wasn't as good as Gerard, but it was pretty fucking sweet to get any kind of relief, and whether it was the goo or the rubbing, the throb eased off enough he could move his hands properly again without feeling like they were just going to snap right off.

Frank spread the excess ointment over his tattoo. It was healed already, sure, but it couldn't do any harm. She was really beautiful, now she'd settled, she looked like she'd been part of Frank for years, like she was meant to be there all along.

Frank heaved himself up into bed and managed to call his Mom and lie to her for twenty minutes about everything being fine before he passed out into uncomfortable dreams about being followed and watched by someone he couldn't see.

He forgot about checking his messages.