Work Text:
Frank blinks at the sign taped to the door of the Wegmans bathroom. Its typed message reads in all caps:
PLEASE DO NOT DRAW
ON THE WALLS!!
IF YOU WOULD LIKE
TO DRAW, PLEASE ASK
FOR PAPER AT THE CUSTOMER
SERVICE DESK AND WE WILL
HAPPILY SUPPLY SOME :)
He can’t help but snicker and take a photo of it.
First of all, what a weird sign. Secondly, it is clearly part of the genre of weird sign that has been preceded by some sort of incident. Gleeful at the possibility of it all, Frank imagines all of the different strange/ gross/ hilarious/ rude graffiti’d images that scrawled on the bathroom wall that could have necessitated the existence of the sign.
Frank Iero is not the type of person who can resist such a perfect invitation to horse around. He commits to the bit, okay? It makes life so much more interesting. As he exits the bathroom, he resolves to ask the customer service desk for a piece of paper to draw on. And also to hopefully charm the person working at the desk into telling him the story of whatever outlandish thing someone drew on the wall that led to the creation of the sign. Maybe they even took a photo of it.
Frank prides himself on being outgoing. A people person. But he finds himself feeling uncharacteristically shy as he approaches the customer service desk. He has been expecting, like, a sixty year old woman to be there. Or some teenager. He has not been expecting a super cute (hot, really, if he’s being totally honest with himself) guy his own age to be standing there.
The guy has a mop of thick, dark hair that looks like it was probably due for a wash yesterday. Not that a little grease stops Frank from imagining raking his fingers through it, though. His nose is pointy and his face is round. When he sees Frank walking up to the desk, his hazel eyes flicker back to life from their thousand yard “Oh, God, when is this shift over” stare.
Frank feels himself starting to become tongue tied (this guy is cute, okay?), but he pushes through it. He is thirty, for Christ’s sake, not some blushing teenager who can’t figure out how to talk to an attractive person.
“I,” Frank begins, “would like a piece of paper to draw on.”
Hazel Eyes blinks at him. “Uh, what?” The guy looks confused. Frank had not really thought through how his scenario would play out. He just assumed the person at the customer service desk would get the joke. Granted, when Frank thought he’d be talking to some sixty year old mom or an awkward seventeen year old, he hadn’t really cared about the outcome. Now he does. He scrambles.
“Like the sign in the bathroom!” Frank blurts. This statement apparently just digs the hole deeper because Hazel Eyes just cocks his head at Frank and repeats his words back at him.
“The sign in the bathroom?” His voice is a little on the nasal side, especially when it pitches up to call Frank’s sanity into question.
“I’m not crazy,” Frank says, prompting a raised eyebrow from Hazel Eyes. He realizes he has photo evidence of the sign and whips his phone out and navigates to the most recent photo in his gallery. “Here, look.”
Hazel Eyes takes the offered phone and reads the sign. He gives a laugh that Frank would best describe as a giggle.
“Okay, that’s pretty funny. That’s really on the bathroom wall?”
“You work here, dude. Haven’t you seen it?”
Hazel Eyes waves his hand to dismiss the notion. “Staff bathrooms,” he says by way of explanation.
“I was thinking there must be some sort of story to this. You don’t know what someone drew to make them put this sign up?” Frank asks, half because he’s curious and half because what he really wants is an excuse to keep chatting with Hazel Eyes.
“Sorry, no clue. The public bathrooms are outside of my jurisdiction. Thank God,” he adds, and wrinkles up his nose. Frank kind of wants to lean over the counter and kiss him. Then, Hazel Eyes gives Frank an appraising look. “Were you actually serious about wanting paper to draw on?”
“Yes, sure was,” Frank says quickly. He hadn’t planned on taking the paper, actually, when he hatched this plan in the first place. He just wanted to see what would happen if he asked. But now he can’t resist the opportunity to keep the conversation going. Hazel Eyes grins at him and tugs a piece of computer paper free of the printer and passes it across the counter.
“Here you go.”
“Thanks,” Frank starts, and then realizes he could have known Hazel Eye’s real name all along and looks at his name tag. Gerard. The name suits him.
“I’ll throw a pen in for you, too. Make sure that you come back to show me your masterpiece,” Gerard says and hands Frank a pen.
“I’ll be back!” Frank says, holding his newly acquired drawing supplies to his chest.
“Sounds ominous,” Gerard drawls back at him.
Frank hurries through his shopping, turning the idea of what to draw over in his head. Whatever he draws, he’s decided that he’s going to put his number on the paper. Unless he loses his nerve. Which is definitely possible.
As he haphazardly throws unfrosted blueberry Pop Tarts into his shopping cart, he debates the ethics of giving Gerard his number. Is it creepy to give Gerard his number when he’s the customer and Gerard is basically a captive audience since he’s working retail? But he reasons that as long as he doesn’t put him on the spot it should theoretically be okay. Theoretically. He’ll just fold the paper in half, write the number on the inside, give the drawing to Gerard and book it out of there. No pressure. Plus, Gerard had seemed pretty into it. In fact, Frank feels like they were borderline flirting. Maybe actually flirting. Is giving someone a pen flirting? It felt like flirting. Or Frank is already a smitten loser who is reading too deeply into a completely innocuous scenario. Could go either way.
Frank ponders the topic of the drawing further as he scans his purchases through the self check out and wheels his squeaky cart full of now bagged groceries out to the parking lot and unpacks everything into the cluttered trunk of his shit box of a car. Frank contains the cart safely in the corral, and goes back to his car to try and actually produce a drawing.
In the front seat, he sets the paper against a Cormac McCarthy paperback for a drawing surface and balances the book on his steering wheel. At last, he decides on drawing Gerard himself. It is a possibly risky move in case the drawing turns out not to be flattering, or Gerard thinks it’s creepy that Frank paid enough attention to what he looks like to draw him from memory, but Frank is committed to the idea now so he’s gonna go for it. Damn the torpedoes.
Frank is not an amazing artist or anything, but he gets enough practice doodling while he’s bored at work that he can cobble together what he hopes is a recognizable and slightly funny cartoon drawing of Gerard standing behind the customer service desk. He signs it with a flourish. Then, before he can psych himself out, he folds the paper in half like a card so his drawing is on the front. He scrawls his number and “xo Frank” on the inside.
Feeling more than somewhat ridiculous, Frank goes back through the automatic doors once they open for him with a quiet whoosh, and wanders back over to the side of the grocery store where the customer service desk is located. He sees Gerard before Gerard sees him. He’s sitting at the desk, looking intently focused as he assembles an intricate pyramid of individual serving coffee creamers. When he sees Frank, his hand jumps and he sends the entire structure tumbling. Creamers roll all over the desk.
“You came back!” Gerard calls, and Frank would like to think he sounds pleased. The goofy smile on his face doesn’t hurt, either. Frank catches a creamer that is about to roll away and fall on the ground.
“I am nothing if not a man of my word,” Frank replies with mock solemnity, earning a giggle from Gerard. He hands over the drawing. The tips of Gerard’s ears go pink, and Frank (metaphorically) crosses all of his fingers and toes that it is a good blush, not an embarrassed “oh-dear-God-this-guy-is-such-a-creeper-please-make-him-go-away” blush.
“It’s me!” Gerard says, right at the same time Frank says “It’s you!” and then they’re both blushing. Frank runs a hand over the back of his rapidly reddening neck, and wonders if it’s his imagination when he sees Gerard’s eyes flick over the tattoos on his hands.
Suddenly, despite being an outgoing type, this all a little too much for Frank and he waves at Gerard (like an idiot) and makes his retreat from the store before his face can turn even more pink than it already is.
Back in the car, Frank rests his forehead on his steering wheel and hopes that Gerard actually texts him back, because A. He wants a date with Gerard because he is gorgeous (seriously, the man is just his type), and B. He likes this grocery store and doesn’t want to start going to a new one if this becomes so embarrassing that he can never show his face there ever again.
~*~
The afternoon passes by slowly with no text from Gerard. Maybe tomorrow, Frank thinks to himself.
Then, the next day goes by without a text. And the next day. And the day after that. And then, Frank decides that he must admit defeat.
Not to mention find a new goddam grocery store.
Fuck.
~*~
Gerard looks happily at the drawing, now in a cute little frame, perched on the counter of the customer service desk. He bought the frame with his employee discount on his first break after the mystery artist left. Well, now he knows his name is Frank since he scribbled “by FRANK!” in big, messy letters under the Gerard cartoon. He had also helpfully labeled the cartoon “Gerard” with an arrow and wrote off to the side “saw it on ur name tag!! Not a creepy stalker!!” The frame sits right on the counter so he can admire it during his long, boring ass shifts at the customer service desk.
He’s never had a customer do something like this before, let alone a customer as cute as Frank.
He’s texted Mikey about the whole encounter at least five times, and even Mikey’s usually boundless well of patience for Gerard’s stories seems to be running dry now that he’s heard about Frank giving Gerard the drawing over and over and over (and over) again.
Gerard has decided that one good turn deserves another, and now he’s creating his own drawing of Frank. He totally did not ask Ray, who has clearance to access the security footage, to send him screenshots of Frank so that he can use it as a reference picture. Nope. Definitely not. His boss would turbo-fire his ass if he knew, but Ray’s not a snitch. It’s worth it anyway. Gerard now gets to spend his breaks and time waiting for disgruntled customers with expired coupons to come bother him working on his Frank drawing. He’s even been tucking some of his treasured Copic markers into his pockets before he leaves for work each morning so he can add color to the drawing.
There have been several iterations of his Frank drawing (and multiple pages of Frank doodles in his sketchbook), but Gerard thinks he has finally settled on one that he’s happy with. Now, he just has to work up the courage to give it to Frank next time he sees him in the market.
At Mikey’s insistence, even though it is another turbo-fireable offense, Gerard added his cell phone number underneath his signature. He wasn’t sure he could bring himself to do it, but Mikey threatened to disown him if he had to listen to Gerard pining endlessly over some random hot guy if he wasn’t going to even attempt to give him his number.
Gerard has carefully torn the drawing (number and all) free from his sketchbook. Now he just needs to play the waiting game and hope that Frank comes back.
He’s been watching the customers walking around the store much more carefully lately on the off chance that he sees Frank walk by so he can attempt to summon up the courage to call him over and give him the drawing. And the phone number.
As the days stretch into weeks, Gerard starts to lose hope that he’ll ever see Frank again. Maybe he was just passing through town. Maybe he doesn’t usually shop at this grocery store, but just came in because he really needed to pee or something. After all, the whole reason they had met was because Frank saw a weird sign in the public bathroom.
It just seems really unfair that the universe would taunt Gerard with someone so fucking hot (and funny!) only to make him disappear never to be seen again.
At least Gerard has the drawing to remember him by. And the totally-not-creepy-at-all screenshots that he begged from Ray.
He reflects that it’s probably a little over the top that he was so swept off his feet from like, a total of three minutes maybe of interaction. Gerard doesn’t care, though.
If Frank doesn’t turn back up soon, Gerard feels like he’s one step away from launching a Facebook campaign to find him.
And getting turbo-fired when his boss sees it.
But maybe some things are worth getting turbo-fired for.
~*~
Frank cannot believe that he needs to step back into the grocery store. He has switched to the Shop-Rite across town, which is both more inconvenient and also definitely subpar to his usual Wegmans. But he thinks he would shrivel up on the spot and blow away on the wind like a tumbleweed if he ever has to speak to Gerard again.
Either Gerard didn’t think Frank was cute, or he thought Frank was a fucking creepazoid. Perhaps both. Frank goes back and forth on which alternative is worse, but he decides he’d rather have someone think he was ugly and/ or cringey than think he’s a creep. The thought that he may have embarrassed Gerard at work, or made him feel uncomfortable, makes shame curl in his belly. So, for Gerard’s sake as well as his own, Frank has decided he is never ever ever going to his favorite Wegmans ever again. Ever.
But now he needs to pee. Like, really really really needs to pee. Like imminently-in-danger-of-pissing-his-pants-like-he’s-super-drunk-or-six-years-old needs to pee. And, to his horror, the only place nearby that he is confident has a public bathroom is fucking Wegmans. Gerard’s Wegmans. Fuck! He could slap himself silly for going for a second large coffee.
Frank briefly contemplates peeing behind a dumpster or some shit, but with his luck he’d get spotted and be arrested for public indecency and that does not feel like a power move.
He contemplates if it would be that terrible if he tried to make it back to his apartment and risked not making it, but that also does not feel like a power move and he really does not want to clean his car. Or do the walk of shame with wet jeans through his apartment complex.
There’s nothing for it, then. Frank is going to pee at Wegmans, and maybe take a chance on picking up some oat milk while he’s in there since he’s almost out at home. And he’s not going to look anywhere near the customer service desk, which is located unfairly close to the public bathroom, and everything will be totally fine. Totally.
Unless Gerard like, calls security on Frank for being a creepy weirdo or something. If that does happen, Frank just hopes it is after he gets out of the bathroom.
He scoots out of his car and all but jogs into the Wegmans. Inside the store, Frank is a man on a mission and refuses to make eye contact with anyone. Thankfully, there’s no line for the public bathroom, a potential hang up he had not even considered, and he dashes inside. With business taken care of, Frank washes his hands, and sees that the sign that started all of this trouble is still posted to the wall. He resists the urge to rip it down off the wall and crumple it into the trash never to be seen again. Stupid sign.
Frank scuttles out of the bathroom and very carefully does not let his eyes even drift over to the nearby customer service desk. He’s not going to draw one lick of attention to himself. Nope.
Then he hears, “Frank! Frank, over here!”
The reflex to look in the direction of someone calling his name overrides the thought that he should just make a break for it, even though that would make him look like he’s shoplifting or something. There’s Gerard, waving at him with a big smile on his face. The smile does not really look like the expression of someone who is confronting someone who creeped them out. Or the smile you’d give someone you’d rejected for being ugly and/or cringey. Frank, tentatively, walks up to the desk.
“I have something for you!” Gerard beams, and Frank hopes that Gerard isn’t about to serve him with a restraining order or something. Don't the police need to do that? And would Gerard be that smiley over a restraining order? He holds up a drawing of Frank and passes it over to him. Frank looks at it, shocked. Unlike his own ballpoint pen doodle, this drawing is in full color. And it looks downright professional. It’s more cartoony than realistic, but despite the stylized elements, it is unmistakably Frank.
“This is really good. Holy shit,” Frank breathes, staring at the drawing. He takes in all the little details, down to the tattoos visible around his clothes. “You must have, like, a photographic memory or some shit, you even got my tattoos and the patches on my jacket.” Gerard goes a little pink at that and huffs out a nervous laugh. Then, he spots the signature. And right below the signature…
Gerard’s phone number. A thrill goes through him. Gerard just gave him his number! Then his brain catches up.
“Wait!” He squawks. Gerard looks like he’s about to jump out of his skin. “Your number!”
“Nopressureifyoudon’twantmynumber! It’stotallyfine!” Gerard says, all in a rush.
“No, no, no! I totally want your number! You’re gorgeous,” Frank says, and Gerard goes tomato red in about half a second and makes a surprised sound. “But you’ve had my number for weeks!”
“No, I haven’t,” Gerard says. “I’ve been waiting for you to come back all fucking month so I could give you my number! Why would I do that if I already had yours?” He picks up the frame on the counter and turns it so Frank can see the drawing. Frank takes it from him, feeling dazed as Gerard blinks at him. “Look, it’s not on the cartoon.”
“Did you open the card?” Frank asks, hoping that his voice doesn’t sound as strangled as he suspects that it might.
“... the card?” Gerard says, and then snatches the frame back from Frank and (gently) takes the drawing out. It falls open, and sure enough, there’s Frank’s number. Gerard gives a slightly hysterical laugh. “I had it all along! Ohmygod.”
“I thought you were rejecting me! Or that I was a creep!” Frank cackles, feeling extremely relieved. And wishes that he hadn’t spent the better part of the last month avoiding Wegmans and Gerard like the plague.
“No! No! I am so sorry! I just wanted to put it in the frame right away to keep the picture safe! Oh fuck, I can’t believe I did that!” Gerard says, sounding half horrified and half laughing.
“All’s well that ends well,” Frank tells him, grinning over the counter. “What time does your shift end tonight? Since we haven’t exactly succeeded on phone communication, I may as well ask you to dinner in person. If you, uh, wanna go with me.”
“I’d love to get dinner. I’m all yours after six thirty.”
“It’s a date,” Frank says, feeling like he could float up to the ceiling.
“It’s a date,” Gerard confirms, and Frank has never been more glad that people enjoy defacing Wegmans bathrooms with graffiti.