Chapter Text
Shoving past droves of businessmen and tourists, coffee in hand, Gerard Way decides that the only thing he misses about the suburbs of Belleville, New Jersey is how slow it is. Everyone in Manhattan is always in a rush , Gerard included. There’s always a train to catch, a meeting he’s late for, a project that’s overdue, and laundry he hasn’t picked up in time.
Today is Friday, November 17th, 2000, and like always, there’s a train he needs to catch. He got off work about an hour and a half ago, officially starting his 6 day thanksgiving weekend, and he now finds himself trekking down 23rd street in the biting cold. He pushes his suitcase in front of him since there’s no room to let it drag behind him. If he takes the yellow line to Penn Station, he can hop on a train to Newark, and get to Mikey’s apartment long before midnight. It’s only a 20 minute train ride, and he’s seriously grateful that he can stay with Mikey in Newark instead of trying to get to Belleville. Today it seems like everyone in New York and possibly the world is concentrated in the flatiron district, but it’s Gerard’s fault for trying to catch a train to Penn during rush hour, he thinks while squeezing through the turnstiles. He waits at the subway platform for no more than 4 minutes, where he almost welcomes the stuffy heat as he sips his coffee at 6:45 in the evening.
The train arrives, he and everyone else in the known universe pile on. He’s never lucky enough to snag an empty seat, not this late in the route. He leans against the closed double doors and pins his suitcase between his left leg and the end railing of the row of packed seats next to him. He holds on with one hand, takes another sip of coffee with the other. Gerard rides for two stops, and then it’s back to shoving his way through a crowded station with an air of faux-confidence and lugging his luggage up a flight of stairs.
He can’t properly relax until he’s on that train to Jersey, but the short walk to Penn Station is uneventful enough to the point that he can let out a sigh of relief. Okay, he thinks. Keys, wallet, tickets, enough loose change to call Mikey to pick him up, enough clothes to last the Thanksgiving break. He’s all set.
Gerard also decides that he misses being in college. As a proud employee of Cartoon Network, he gets the day before and day of thanksgiving off, but he decided to use some of his precious vacation time to take the 20th and the 21st off as well. This was not an issue in college, where they got the whole week off with the expectation that you’ll come back with some halfway finished illustrations. He sighs and finishes the last of his coffee.
Gerard finds his way around Penn easily enough, and before he knows it, he’s taking an escalator down to the train platform. Somewhere along the way, he bought another coffee for the road. He’ll eat when he gets to Jersey. When the train arrives, he heads straight for the second level, where there's a variety of seat choices. There are, of course, the highly coveted single window seats with a luggage compartment available. That would make the most sense, he thinks, but he’s always felt weird about taking advantage of those since, really, this shitty carryon sized bag isn’t exactly worthy of its own compartment.
Gerard goes instead for the front facing window seat. He has this rule about only putting his luggage next to him if no one sits there by the time the train starts moving, so since he’s not an asshole he puts his suitcase in the space in front of him. He sits criss-cross-applesauce and balances his coffee on the seat next to him while he reaches down to retrieve a book from the outermost pocket of his suitcase. Gerard sits so that he’s facing the window, looking out at the dark and cavernous platform, and balances his book and coffee on each knee.
As the train starts to pull out of the station, it’s beginning to look like no one’s going to claim the empty seat next to him. He’s never that lucky, and today is no exception, as some fucking guy in dark jeans and baggy layers slides into the seat beside Gerard just as he was seriously contemplating moving his bag over. Great.
This guy can’t be older than 20, that’s for sure. He has a grown out buzzcut, and he sports both a lip and an eyebrow ring. Wherever he works, Gerard thinks, they must be a lot cooler with piercings than Cartoon Network. He’s cute.
The guy leans down to dig an old gray mp3 player out of his bag, and his shirt collar is loose enough for Gerard to notice a huge black and white pumpkin tattooed on his neck. Okay, so that’s two points for cool.
“Tickets?” says a conductor making their way down the aisle.
Both Gerard and the guy next to him dig around in their pockets before handing their wrinkled tickets to the conductor. The guy takes note of the NYP NWK ONE WAY printed on Gerard’s ticket.
“We’re matching,” He says with a nod and a smile.
“Huh?” Gerard says very intelligently.
“You’re going to Newark too, right?” He says.
“Oh, yeah. Thanksgiving with my brother.”
“Cool.” He pauses for a moment. “I’m Frank.”
Gerard really wasn’t expecting an introduction.
“I’m…Gerard.” He says, awkwardly. “What, uh, what’s in Newark?”
“School, home, work, you know the deal.”
“You don’t live in New York.” Gerard notes.
“Nope. New Jersey born and raised.” Frank says proudly. “What about you?”
“Um, same here, actually. I’m from Belleville, I’m just always in New York for work.”
“Oh, no way! I’m from Belleville too! Small world.” Frank smiles. “So what do you do?”
“I’m an illustrator,” Gerard says. “I, uh, graduated from SVA last year and now I’m at Cartoon Network.”
“Oh shit, that’s pretty cool, congrats. I graduated last year too, but from high school, haha. I’m doing psychology at Rutgers now.”
Frank talks really fast and seemingly always has a lot to say, Gerard notices. He’s got none of that shyness Gerard typically has with strangers, and Frank speaks like they’ve known each other for years.
“I’m actually in a band,” He continues. “There’s a studio in the city that we just finished recording some shit at. Eyeball Records. You heard of them?”
Gerard smiles awkwardly and shakes his head.
“In passing. My brother’s probably mentioned it once or twice,” He says. “You’d probably have more in common with him, he’s more into music stuff than I am.”
“I thought you artist types loved music,” Frank laughs. He squirms around in his seat and plants his feet on the back of the seat in front of him. “Or is that just a stereotype?”
“I like music!” Gerard protests. “I just don’t get out much anymore. Or ever.”
“Okay, I’ve decided that you need to come to one of our shows while you’re in town. We’re called Pencey Prep and we’re playing a house show on Wednesday. You should go.” Frank says, matter-of-factly.
Gerard mentally pulls up a calendar. This guy is cute, and well meaning, and he just invited Gerard to come see his band play even though they are essentially total strangers. The 20 minute train ride is rapidly coming to an end. He thinks quietly for a moment.
“Yeah, sure, I’ll be there.” He decides. He definitely does not sound uncertain at all.
“Cool.”
Frank smiles at him and then looks away. He finally puts his headphones on and spends the final few minutes of the trip listening to something fast and harsh. Gerard tries reading his book, but can’t focus anyway.
The automated voice quickly announces their stop, and just like that, they’re hopping off the train. Gerard heads straight for a pay phone, and Frank follows him. He puts a couple quarters in and dials up Mikey.
“Hey, I just made it to the station. Yeah I’ll be waiting out front. Okay. Yeah, see you soon. Love you. Bye.”
Gerard hangs up the phone. Mikey’ll be there in a couple minutes.
“You wouldn’t have some spare change on you, would ya?” Frank says, grinning innocently.
“Oh, yeah, actually.”
Gerard hands him another couple of quarters.
“Thanks man, I owe you one.” Frank says. “Just so you know, my guy already said he’d pick me up, but he’s a dick and I don’t want him to leave me stranded here.”
Frank inserts the quarters and calls up his guy. Gerard waits for him, even though he doesn’t have to, because he feels like they might be friends now. He lights up his first cigarette in 2 hours and looks at the night sky above the tracks. Seeing the stars out here is more or less impossible because of all the light pollution from the city, so the sky never gets truly dark. It’s always this kind of yellowish-gray-black. Behind him, Frank hangs up the pay phone.
“You know, your brother’s never gonna find you if you stay back here staring at the sky.” Frank calls.
“Right,” Gerard says, tearing his eyes away. “Let’s go, then.”
The two stand quietly on the curb out front facing the parking lot. Gerard smokes his cigarette despite the signs telling him not to. Frank bops his head along to whatever’s playing in his ears.
“Hey,” Gerard says suddenly. “How am I gonna know where the show is?”
“Oh, I’ll call you.” Frank says, lifting one of the headphones away from his ear.
“But you don’t have my number.”
“Riiight,” Frank says slyly, shoving his hands in his pockets. “Guess you’ll just have to give me it, huh?”
“Oh.” Gerard says. His face feels warm. “Okay.”
Gerard fishes a loose pen out of his pocket and scribbles Mikey’s home number.
“I don’t, um, have a cellphone, so if my brother picks up just say you’re calling for me.”
“No problem.” Frank says. “I’ll call you soon.”
Just then, a car pulls up and honks twice.
“Speaking of, that’s my brother.” Gerard nods at the car. “Nice talking to you, Frank. See you, um, on Wednesday.”
“It’s a date.” Frank jokes. “See you around, Gerard.”
Gerard waves at him and goes to put his suitcase in the trunk of Mikey’s car before sliding into the passenger seat.
Mikey pulls him into a hug.
“How was the trip?” He asks.
“It was fine.” Gerard shrugs. “Thanks for picking me up.”
“Anytime.” Mikey says while Gerard buckles his seatbelt.
As he pulls out of the parking lot, he offhandedly says:
“Hey, was that Frank Iero you were talking to?”