Between Chemicals And Romance (A Frerard/Gerbert Fan Fiction)ABANDONDED

Chapter Eight: Pizza Pies and Throwbacks

Franks Point of View

I looked at the food on my plate in front of me. The cheesy pizza starring back at me, asking to be eaten. The cheese melted smoothly over the tomato sauce, creating a white, orange and red canvas of food. Pepperoni scattered the slice I looked at as well, the plain slice did looked naked without the pepperoni but just as good. I lifted up my clean hand from my side and gripped each side of the pizza, folding it down in half that way it's easier to get into my mouth. I bit down and immediately tasted the tomatoey goodness presented inside the pizza. I chewed the first bite slowly the swallowed and, under Gerard's concern, ate the rest of the pizza slowly.

As Bert and Gerard excused themselves from the room, I continued eating and drinking this heart attack inducing meal. I'm well aware of the risks of eating this stuff all the time, and that's not pretty. Eating this consecutively can lead to diabetes and possibly heart failure, thank god I only get it once every few months, and even when I do get it, Im usually not able to hold it down, due to the fact, as what I learned now, that when I don't eat for a while and finally eat again, your body rejects it. The last time I ate, a girl offered me her cookies she just bought. She was in tears with an Oreo cookie box in hand. She handed me the box and vented about what happened, understanding she may never see me again-as many people don't come around here. Her friends completely kicked her out of the group for no apparent reason and was so upset, me being to hungry tuned most of her out. Once she left I gave her a quick hug and she gave me the only dollar she had, telling me to get a drink to go with this. I did as she said and drank my combination of freshly bottled water and Oreo cookies. My thoughts were interrupted by both my suddenly full eaten pizza and the return of Gerard.

"You're going to be able to live with us." Both Bert and Gerard exclaimed. I looked at them with wide eyes and then my money. Are they serious? I can just buy a house with one thousand dollars!

"guys, I have enough money to get myself through." I said with my bad grammar.

"Frank," Gerard started and placed a hand on my back, "today, one thousand dollars isn't going to get you far. Just come to the city with us that way Bert can still teach you and you can learn. We can get you a job, Bert knows an employer in Manhattan who can help you."

"Are you sure? I don't want to be problem." I asked, looking over to Bert who would have backed up my plan. To my surprise, he backed up Gerard's idea.

"You won't be troublesome, trust me. With you around, we can learn things as well." Bert said. I looked down at my tattered shoes.

"Okay. Fine. How are we getting there?" I asked, indicating to the van only having two seats.

"Mikey's coming over on the day we move, Bert wanted to ride in his car because Mikey's usually nervous about traveling alone. I would take the ride but Bert doesn't know the way to the apartment like Mike and I do. So you'll take the ride with me." Gerard told and laid out the blue prints.

"Who Mikey?" I questioned

"He's Gerard's brother." Bert said as Gerard bit into the pizza.

I made a noise and picked up my plain slice of pizza that rested neatly on the grease filled plate. My greased up hands picked up the pizza with hunger lurking around. I took a large bite of pizza and a huge gulp of soda to help the pizza go down.

"What part of Monhatton are us going to?" I asked with my understanding of saying everything completely wrong.

"By Maddison Square Garden." Bet said, letting Gerard, who wanted to speak but had a mouth full of pizza, eat.

"Cool." I said, wondering what it would be like. I've seen Madison Square Garden only on televisions on the shelves when I enter stores to get out of either the cold or heat. One f the guys who owns Best Buy lets me stay in the store on Christmas while the place is shut down. He leaves me behind foods that won't ruin the electronics, just in case. He would leave a bottled drink, which would be in a container which never leaks the beverage from inside, along with a salad without the dressing and croissants. At first I didn't like them, which later I found out was because they were made poorly by a store, until Paul brought back croissants from Paris back from his and his wife's trip. His wife came into the store upon opening day, right after Christmas, and gave me the croissant to try. Paul's wife is a thin short woman who seems to always smell like a sort of food, which makes me laugh. Right off the bat I can tell she loves to cook or make people try new foods. I ate the croissant with pleasure. Paul's wife smiled and gave me the rest of the "Made In Paris" croissants. When i looked inside the box, I knew instantly that they literally bought this and left it untouched until they took only one out, and handed it to me.

"What are you thinking about?" Gerard asked me, walking over to me after tossing out his food. I must have been thinking for a while because Bert already left he room and my pizza was cold, not a speak of heat left behind.

"Stuff. I met really nice people and I'm gonna miss them when I move with you guys." I said to him.

"I understand. There was this man at the liquor store who's friends with Mikey. He's really nice and kind, when I was at my lowest point in life, he helped me and even coached me to get away from my habits, the only thing I wish I did was listen to him." Gerard said, getting deep into the thoughts that possibly always plagued him.

"Novembers almost over, and you know what that means, Frank?" Gerard asked after he snapped himself out of his daze.

I raised an eyebrow at him and cocked my head to the side, looking like a puppy dog.

"Decembers almost here, and so is Christmas." Gerard said to me and took a seat next to me. The whole time he was talking before he was standing and finally decided to take a seat. I watched him as he sat down slowly.

"I haven't celebrated Christmas since I was 5." I said, thinking back to the days when I still lived with the abuse.

"Tell me about it." Gerard said, even though it sounded demanding, I knew Gerard was actually interested.

"It was a cloudy day outside, we were in upstate New York. White balls of snow fell from the sky, touching the ground creating a slightly fresh layer of snow on top of the two inches already there. My family and I sat by the tree, just next to the fire place which hung our filled stockings. While all my siblings unwrapped presents, I sat back and watched. I wanted to open my presents later, since I wasn't a huge celebrator of Christmas like the rest of my family. After everyone got what they wanted they moved to the stockings, while I started unwrapping. I picked up the only present for me under the tree saying "From: Santa". I opened it up and it was just a piece of cold, hard, black coal. I just smiled, realizing my parents actually got me something rather than for my birthday. I watched as my brothers and sisters smiled with their presents and filled stocking while I hugged my piece of coal. My stocking was empty, but I wasn't expecting anything. But after that year, after seeing my obsession with the piece of coal, mom sequestered me from the family every year until she kicked me out when I was 10. All I said was I wasn't going to do the dishes and mother kicked me out." I told the deepest part of my history line. My heart ached now with realization about what the coal meant, the way they treated me, I understand now. A tear slid out of my eye and Gerard hugged me.

"But now you're with us, we may not be blood related but we can be family." Gerard said into the hug. I smiled, already feeling at home.

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The day came and I said goodbye, for now. Gerard lent me his jeans and shirt and let me shower. I did, so now the only thing I'm left with is my destroyed and tattered shoes. None of the guys had an extra pair of shoes so i brushed it off. I left the apartment and walked down the road until I found myself right outside of Best Buy. The sign at the top of the store was missing letters, which really spelled "BT BU". I walked through the automatic doors and went up to the cashiers desk.

A woman looked over at me then smiled. She jumped up with glee and her brown hair jumped with her. Her hazel eyes glistened as she exited the cashiers booth.

"Frank! Look at you!" She exclaimed with a huge smile. She wrapped her long arms around me and tugged me close to her chest. "PAUL COME HERE!"

The costumers looked over with a questioning look as the owner/manager came rushing towards the cashier. Paul looked over to his wife and scolded her for screaming like that then looked at me.

"Frank! You look great! How's everything been?" He asked and hugged me as well.

"Good, actually. I found a place to stay." I told them as they smiled.

"That's great! Where you are going to?" Paul's wife asked.

"Manhattan." I said and their eyes grew wide.

"How are you getting there?" Paul asked.

"My friends letting me move in with him and his boyfriend." I told them both. They smiled even more widely.

"That's great, Frank!" Paul said.

"Well, I gotta get to work, I get out in an hour, would you like to get lunch with Paul and I?" Paul's wife offered.

"No, it's fine. I have some things to catch up on. I wanted to come by and say goodbye since we're leaving tomorrow and I gotta say goodbye to some other people." I explained.

"Its cool. I hope everything goes good and here," Paul said, digging into his pocket and taking out a piece of paper. He took a pen from the cash registers desk and scribbled something on it. He extended his hand and placed the paper in front of me, "here's my number, call if you ever need anything. I don't mind drinking over to the city."

"Thank you so much! I'm going to miss you guys. You guys felt like the family I never had." I said to Paul and his wife.

"We're going to miss you too. You were the son I never had. I'm sorry I couldn't look after you when you had no one." Paul said with regret.

"Paul, this isn't your fault. I didn't stick around long enough for you to help me out towards the full 100%, however. You did help me and you did lend me a place to stay with food and television and even drinks. You are so kind. Thank you for everything guys." I said to the couple.

"I'm going to miss you, Frank." Paul said to me.

"I'll miss you too." I said my last goodbyes and walked out of the automatic doors one last time.

~~~~~~~~~

I walked down the street, the sun was almost fully gone from the sky, illuminating dark shades of orange, pink and purple. The slight shine of the sun beat down upon my face as I walked. Today, I said all my goodbyes. I said goodbye to the deli workers who give me free food once in a while, the other homeless guy who watched over me when I was a young lad, the drug dealer who I became best friends with-yeah strangely we never had any problems-and even the old lady who try's to feed the poor with her apples.

It's going to be tough, adjusting to a new lifestyle and actually living in a home again. I miss it yet hate it. I don't want to go. I don't want to live as a grown up. The thing is, I've been milking this whole "I can't speak well English." I bet Gerard caught that when I told him about my back story. I bet even Bert picked it up slightly. I'l wonder what would happen though if Bert found out I picked up English well right after the first lesson. I guess only time will tell.

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"Frankie your back!" Gerard said and tackled me to the ground. My heart beat leaped out of my chest and echoed in my ears.

"God damn it. You scared the hell out of me!" I exclaimed and shoved him off me.

"Hey, Frank. I didn't know you can speak that well." Bert said in the corner of the room. Shit.

"Well you know, you taught me well." I said, which was also pretty accurate. To be honest, the next few lessons taught me proper English rather than slang I hear on the streets.

"Yeah, you're full of shit." He smirked and then laughed at the shock on my face.

"I know you've been tricking me all this time. Don't worry about it." Bert said and ruffled my hair. I sighed.

"So you're not gonna kick me out for lying and pulling this whole charade?" I asked.

"Of course not, there's still some things I can teach you. I'm sure you don't know other words and some advancements to words so I definitely can still teach you. You'll just have to do some extra house chores to make up for the lie." Bert smiled and winked. He got an encouraging nod from Gerard, pretty much saying "go right ahead and do it".

"Well, I guess it's time to hit the hay. Seriously, we have a long day tomorrow, moving around boxes and traveling over bridges just to get to our home will be a struggle so rest up." Gerard said. We all took spots around the house where we can sleep and soon the whole house was filled with the light snores of three men entering their dream land and resting up for a morning and afternoon of labor.