Common People (frerard)

Chapter 17

I thought I looked extremely fucking stupid. I love Halloween but I could never seem to scramble together a good costume. Frank had made a small suggestion about matching costumes. That had made me so happy, Andy never wanted to do matching costumes with me. There were so many different options for couples costumes that I didn't know what to do. I didn't want to do an overly-cliche one. I also didn't want to do one that would be super romantic because I don't know if I'm at that point with Frank yet.

And that's how we got to be a vampire and a vampire victim.

I looked at Frank as he smoothed out his cloak, smiling in the mirror to show his fake fangs. He even got the nice ones with just the fangs that glue onto your teeth, not the dollar store dencher versions. He used red lipstick on his bottom lip and smeared it to seem like blood. He looked so nice as he ran his hand through his little fauxhawk.

I was wearing a cute grey dress that was ripped a little on the neckline and skirt and had a little bit of fake blood splatters on it. There were two red dots on my neck like a vampire bite. On top of that, I had some makeup on to make my face look paler and some red and purple around my eyes to try and make myself look dead.

I just felt so stupid standing next to Frank. He looked good, so good. He was attractive and confident and perfect. And the whole vampire thing? Everyone's gonna love that, it only makes him hotter. And then there's just me as a little dead person following him around in the shadows.

"You both look so nice," Jamia said when she walked in.

"I know, doesn't he look nice?" Frank asked, gesturing to me.

I blushed as I looked down.

"Okay, but you two are dressed so cool," she said. "I didn't know we were doing the kind of cool, spooky, sexy costumes. I'm dressed as a fucking bee!"

"You look cute," I said quietly.

"Thanks, Gee," she said, sitting next to me on Frank's couch.

"Well, are you all ready to go?" Frank asked.

I nodded nervously and he held out a hand. I looked at it and the way it didn't shake, it was confident and caring. I took it gently and stood up. We got into one of Frank's cars and drove to Lindsey's house. We got early to help set up but as we went in, the anxiety started settling in. It was just us, Lindsey and Bert here but I knew that people were going to be coming soon.

Lindsey handed me a bowl into my shaky hands and gave me instructions but I couldn't hear what she said. Frank gently took the bowl from me, resting a hand on my shoulder. He set the bowl onto the counter and grabbed a water bottle, bringing me out onto the back deck.

"Just take deep breaths, Baby," he said softly.

I took in a shaky breath and nodded.

"Do you want to tell me what's wrong?" He asked.

I sniffled and shrugged my shoulders.

"We don't have to stay, you know," he said. "We can go now. We can leave early. We don't have to stay the whole time, we can leave whenever you want."

"But what if you don't want to leave?" I asked.

"You come first, I'm okay with leaving whenever," he said.

I nodded, feeling a bit more relaxed knowing that this wasn't like one of Andy's parties where I'd be stuck there the whole time in the corner being ignored by everyone.

"It's gonna be okay," he said.

He took off his cloak and wrapped it around me when I shivered, immediately warming me up. It smelled like his cologne and that made me smile.