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If it was possible for a night to go from bad to worse, Matt liked to think that this was the prime example. Frank should have waited for him. He'd told him to wait. He told him what he should have done about five times afterwards too.
When the firefight broke out, Frank should have stayed put and let Matt deal with it. He was perfectly capable, and Frank was in no danger. Yes, he was tied up, but he was a valuable prisoner, one that any of a dozen gangs would have committed murder to get their hands on.
Frank didn't stay put. He got himself out of the ropes, dislocating his shoulder in the process, and now Matt had a pissy, bruised, and bleeding boyfriend to deal with, in addition to treating a bad dislocation that would have to wait until the two of them were somewhere safe, which wasn't here. They had only seconds to make a clean getaway.
The same thought seemed to have struck Frank, who tossed something metallic at him that jangled when it hit Matt's chest: keys. "Here," he said gruffly. "You drive."
"What?" Matt exclaimed, picking up the keys that had fallen to the ground. "I can't!"
"Relax," Frank said dismissively. "I ain't gonna shoot you if you scratch the van. I mean, crash it, and there'll be a discussion, but —"
"I can't drive, Frank! I'm blind!" Matt reminded him.
"Yeah, well, you'll find a workaround. You always do," Frank said, seeming totally unphased.
"That's different," Matt declared, frowning. "This is not happening!"
Frank only scoffed. "Gimme a reason."
"I'll give you two!" Matt retorted immediately. "I don't have a license or any visual acuity! I could kill you! Worse, both of us! Worse than that! Innocent people!"
Frank groaned. "Red, I can hardly move my arm, let alone drive. Fucking drive!" he snapped at him, and then his tone gentled fractionally. "I'll help you. Or we'll sit here arguing and they'll kill us. Pick."
"Fine," Matt reluctantly agreed. "But you'll help."
"Sure," Frank agreed.
It was a lie. Frank didn't help. Not in any measurably positive way. But Matt didn't know that until he was behind the wheel, the van trundling down the street, steadily picking up speed.
"Take a right," Frank instructed him. "Right! Not that far right! Tree! Fucking tree! Oh, Christ. My van!" he groaned, as something screeched, scraping along the side of the van, a tree branch if Matt had to guess… which he didn't want to.
He winced and squeezed his eyes shut (like that would help matters) as he asked tentatively, "Should I stop?"
"Just keep going," Frank said with a sigh, sounding very much like he was second guessing this plan.
It wasn't more than about two minutes before Matt heard a bang and a sickening crunch that made him cringe. The van shuddered, and something in the engine squealed and whined, making Matt duck his head. He almost didn't want to ask, but he needed to know.
"That sounded serious," he remarked in a would-be casual tone. "Was that a street sign or a bus stop?"
"A bus bench, a trash can, and a guy on a bicycle," Frank summarized as Matt gaped at him, horrified.
"WHAT?" he exclaimed in shock.
"Kidding," Frank said quickly as the van bumped and bounced over a pothole. "Jesus, Red, relax."
Matt shook his head and said anxiously, "I don't think I can do this."
"We're twelve minutes out," Frank replied. "You can survive that long without crashing, can't you?"
"My confidence isn't exactly increasing!" Matt declared, resting his head against the steering wheel with a whine to rival that of the complaining van.
"You never drove even once?" Frank asked curiously. "How long have you been — "
"Since I was nine," Matt said with a sigh.
"Huh," was all that Frank had to say to that.
The minutes and the miles passed slowly, agonizingly for Matt, who grew more tense with each additional incident, of which there were four before he judged that he was near the apartment. Frank screaming "BRAKE!" helped clarify matters, and the van screeched to a halt, obstructing the sidewalk, something that Matt didn't have the mental energy to attempt correcting.
"We made it," he said breathlessly, stumbling out of the shuddering van and onto the sidewalk. "How's the van?"
"Eh, I can buff that out," Frank said casually, joining him. "Maybe. Fuck, that's a lot of green paint."
"Never again," Matt declared, as Frank turned the van off and tugged the keys free of the ignition, slamming the door shut.
"Seconded," he said quite agreeably. "No offense, Red."
"None taken," Matt replied, letting Frank lean on him as he made his way inside the building. "Next time we take the subway. I don't care how weird it looks."
"Agreed," Frank said wearily as the two of them made their way up to Matt's apartment.
What was also agreed, at least in Matt's opinion, was the implicit promise to never, ever speak about what happened with the van or who had driven it to anyone.