Archive of Our Own

Frank couldn't sleep.

Not unusual. The bus had been rattling down the highway for hours, the engine humming underneath everything, every pothole turning his bunk into a cheap vibrating massage chair and he was tired of hearing Mikey snore in the bunk directly above him, he also had a habit of tossing around, which made the plywood on top of Frank’s shitty mattress wobble. It was so annoying.

So eventually, he gave up. He crawled out with a hoodie thrown over his pajamas, and found Gerard sitting alone in the lounge, he had his sketchbook balanced against one knee, pen hovering over the page. Frank stayed put for a moment, wondering how many seconds he could stand there like one of those haunted children in horror movies before Gerard noticed him and eventually shit his pants.

Instead, he got to observe Gerard very carefully inking a sketch, pausing every few moments when the bus rattled, he paused like it was a prayer, Frank swore he saw him almost cry at one particularly deep pothole.

The road bumped again, and the pen flew across the page leaving an ugly black streak in the sketchbook.

"Fuck!" Gerard hissed under his breath.

Frank bit the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing. Gerard stared at the page for a few seconds, then slowly lifted his eyes toward the ceiling as if asking God for patience.

"You okay?" He finally said, leaning into the fRame of the bunks, his hoodie was pulled over his head and his hair sticking out in every direction. He looked freshly electrocuted.

Gerard’s shoulders did a little jump upwards, he turned his head to Frank with neck-breaking velocity. "Jesus Christ!"

"What?" Frank couldn’t help but chortle.

"How long have you been standing there!?"

He shrugged. "Long enough to see you cry."

"I didn't cry."

"You made a face."

Gerard did the face again, subconsciously, while looking at the ruined sketch "I was… concentrating."

"You looked like somebody kicked your dog."

"It was important line."

"It's a fucked-up line now." Frank offered, starting to shuffle his feet towards the same couch where Gerard had been fighting with the road for god knows how long.

"Thank you, Frank."

"You're welcome."

There was a heartbeat where neither of them said anything. Frank wondered if this was the kind of silence that meant something, or the kind that showed up because neither of them had the energy to fill it. It was late, beyond late, even for vampires like them, but the road was endless and black and so were the circles under Gerard’s eyes.

The bus swayed again. So Frank started with the stupid shit that existed only in the AM when his brain was beyond fried from sleep deprivation.

"If you had to pick, which Home Alone movie had the best traps?"

Gerard blinked at him, not turning his face but moving just his eyes, like a cartoon character. "You’re being serious right now?"

Frank shrugged, but didn’t break eye contact. "Unless you have something better to talk about."

"It’s three am, Frank"

"Which one?"

Gerard’s eyes flickered back to him, and there was a glimmer there, something like amusement or annoyance or both. "Number two. Pigeon Lady was a way better character than Old Man Marley. Also, the paint cans had better velocity."

Frank grinned. "See, I knew you had opinions."

"I always have opinions." Gerard’s pen did a small, absent rotation between two fingers. "Do you think Pigeon Lady could talk with other animals or just pigeons?"

Frank pointed at him. "It’s in the name, dumbass." He dropped back into the couch cushions. "Okay, since we’re doing opinions. Mikey’s new haircut."

Gerard’s whole face did something complicated. He uncrossed and recrossed his arms. Looked at the ceiling. "I dunno"

"Liar"

Gerard made a sound in the back of his throat that was not quite a word. He looked at the sketchbook. Then at the ceiling. Then at Frank, like he had personally caused this problem. "It looks like someone showed a photo of Pete Wentz to a stylist in a strip mall and then left before it was finished."

"He loves it!"

"I know." Gerard picked his pen back up only to twirl it between his fingers like a tiny baton, grinning at some private joke. "I told him it was sick."

They dissolved into the kind of laughter that only existed at three in the morning, the kind that was mostly just air. Gerard sent the ruined sketch sailing into one of the piles of debris that had taken up permanent residence in the corners of the bus, there was one by the mini fridge that Frank was pretty sure had developed life of its own.

Frank had a thing he did when sleep was completely off the table. He became an interviewer. Not a good one. The questions started somewhere in the neighborhood of normal and then made a hard left to Stupid Town.

Who had the worst haircut. What band on all of Warped Tour made the best hotdogs, and did the hotdog quality correlate to the music quality. Who would survive longest if the bus drove off a bridge. Who had the worst breakup and did they deserve it. Best hidden make out spot on the entire festival grounds, ranked. Who smelled the worst when Sunday came. Which manager would you actually date if you had to, gun to your head.

And then, with the casual energy of someone who had just scraped the bottom of the barrel and found a trapdoor:

"Who on this tour would you kiss?"

Gerard doesn’t even hesitate. "Bert."

Frank stares at him. "Doesn’t count."

"Why?"

"You’ve already kissed Bert."

"Yeah, a lot." Gerard shurgs, tugging the sleeves of his hoodie to cover his hands.

"So it doesn’t count, obviously"

Gerard tilts his head like a confused dog. "That seems like exactly why it should count."

Frank rolls his eyes hard enough to hear it. "That’s cheating."

"Kissing someone is cheating?"

"In this game it is."

Gerard lets out a heavy sigh, like this dumb interview was being conducted by the Interpol. "Fine, then, let me think"

And only then Frank realizes he has walked directly into a trap of his own construction, because Gerard is actually thinking about it. He had asked it the way you knock on a door you’re pretty sure is abandoned. But Gerard has gone quiet in a specific way, the pen doing a slow, unconscious tap against his bottom lip, his eyes fixed on the middle distance like he’s reading something written on the air.

"Okay…"

Frank gets a weird feeling in his stomach, like missing a step on a staircase. "Why are you actually thinking about it?"

"Do you want an answer or not?"

He suddenly becomes very interested in his own hands. They’re sitting in his lap. Had they always been there? Wild. "…Maybe."

They sit in absolute silence for a moment. The bus hit another pothole, jostling them so that Frank’s knee bumped into the coffee table, making an old soda can do a tiny little dance. He heard Gerard make a thoughtful noise, barely audible, like he was chewing on a crossword clue. Sometimes Frank wondered if Gerard had internal monologue subtitles scrolling across his brow, a little digital display that read out whatever wild shit was happening inside his skull. He watched him, waiting for the words to come out.

Gerard finally spoke, at first to himself.

"Hmm, someone funny. I wanna laugh about it." He said it in a way that made it sound like he was already regretting the prospect of kissing anyone who wasn’t at least a little bit hilarious.

Frank barked a laugh. "That’s half the tour gone"

"Good," Gerard replied, without missing a beat, eyes still on the wall across from him. "I guess it would be nice if they were kinda hot, too." He said it like he was ordering a sandwich, and the requirements were both obvious and absolutely non-negotiable.

"You’re really gonna be picky about this?" Frank made a face.

"Why not? I have standards. It’s my imaginary makeout, I get to decide." Gerard countered, still not quite looking at him, but now smiling in earnest, the kind of half-grin that said he was enjoying the argument for its own sake.

"Okay, so you want funny and hot. That narrows it down to like, three people."

"Three is plenty!" Gerard said, holding up three fingers himself, then wiggling them. "Do you want to hear the options or are you gonna keep making fun of me?"

"I’m all ears. Lay it on me." Frank straightened up, turning slightly to Gerard and waiting impatiently for the answers.

Gerard pretended to think very hard. "Well, it’s not Bert, since apparently that’s cheating."

"Correct."

"And not Ray, because I respect his curls too much. Can’t ruin that innocence. Plus, Christa would murder me in my sleep."

Frank nodded, solemn. "She would."

Gerard’s eyes narrowed. "I’m not picking anyone from Dropkick Murphys, because I don’t want to get herpes on principle."

"You’re such a dick." Frank’s laugh was loud enough to make Mikey above them shift and mutter in his dreams.

"I’m a careful dick, there's a difference" Gerard said, now tapping at his chin with the end of his pen, eyes flicking up and down as if reading a menu. "Who does that leave, then? Honestly, it might be… no, wait, let’s set some more criteria first."

Frank wanted to say something, maybe something clever or flirty just for the kick of it, but that could wait until actual names were dropped. He eyed Gerard, who was now staring at the wall like he’d just remembered a ghost story he wanted to keep to himself. Frank felt the caffeine and exhaustion swirl together in his blood like bad chemistry.

He tried to scowl, but he was smiling too hard. "You’re impossible, you know that?"

Gerard finally broke his vow of silence. "What’s the word for, like, someone who’s not going to blab everything to the rest of the tour the second it happens?"

Frank cocked his head. "Trustworthy?"

Gerard snapped his fingers. "That’s the one. Trustworthy."

He kept talking, but now his whole posture was rearranging to accommodate the new dimension this game seemed to have acquired. He rested his chin on his knees, curling tighter into himself, and Frank was suddenly aware of how close their feet were on the ragged carpet.

Gerard’s eyes squinted up, the way they did when he was about to say something that needed a running start. "Okay, so, funny, hot, doesn’t make fun of me, doesn’t narc, and—" Here he paused, the pen wedged in the crook of his finger like a conductor’s baton, as if he could orchestrate the right answer into existence by sheer willpower.

"Jesus Christ" Frank huffed, already tired of how long an answer was taking, he looked directly at Gerard, cheek pressed against the couch. "That narrows it down to, what, the merch guy and one of the twins from Motion City?"

But Gerard didn’t seem to care too much for his suggestion, without a word, he launched the pen across the bus, eyebrow furrowed for a microsecond before he crashed back down into the couch. "Damn!"

"What?" Frank straightened up.

"I already kissed you."

For half a second, Frank’s brain crashed, blue-screened, then rebooted at full volume. "... What?" he echoed, tasting the word on his tongue as if Gerard had planted it there himself.

"You’re out, this is way harder than i though, huh" Gerard said, and there was a finality to it that Frank couldn’t tell was a joke or a dare or just dead fucking serious.

Frank didn’t know what to do with his hands, so he shoved both of them under his thighs, pinning them there with the weight of his own body, they couldn’t betray him that way. They were in jail, officially.

He’d cycled through the usual responses, laugh it off, escalate, throw a pillow, even, but this was definitely a new one. The caffeine in his blood was suddenly more like static electricity, real, jumpy, and absolutely not doing him any favors. He almost let it go, almost let it slide into the past like a million other dumb things Gerard had said during the graveyard shift, but his mouth short-circuited on him.

"I was a candidate?!" Frank blurted, voice bouncing off the low ceiling and right back into his own ears.

"Obviously," Gerard said, like he was confirming a bus schedule.

"You’re funny, you don’t narc, and you’re—" He made a gesture that started as pointing at Frank and ended as something closer to conducting an invisible orchestra. "—the whole thing. The whole Frank thing." He said it like that explained everything, then immediately looked away. "Which is why you’re disqualified."

Frank let that sit for exactly one second, yet his brain snagged on one thing like a hangnail. "Back up. I’m funny?"

"Sometimes"

"Trustworthy?"

"Obviously"

"…Kinda hot?"

Gerard’s mouth did something complicated. "You’re not gonna let that one die, are you?"

Frank spread his hands out like a man presenting evidence to a jury. "You said it first!!"

A low, breathy laugh escaped Gerard as he sank deeper into the worn cushions, making himself small. "Yeah, well. You’re still disqualified."

"Because of the kissing thing?" Frank seemed almost offended, and maybe he was, with himself mostly because he couldn't immediately bring up the memory.

"Because of the kissing thing."

Frank’s frown was immediate, a deep crease forming between his brows.

"You don't even remember it, do you?" Gerard’s eyes tracked the shift in expression like he was reading subtitles.

"Do I look like I remember?" Frank’s voice pitched slightly higher. "This is news to me, dude"

"That’s ‘cause we always do dumb shit at three in the morning." Gerard lifted one shoulder in a lazy half-shrug, slowly but surely shifting his body on the couch to face Frank. He tilted his head again, kind of like a dare.  "Come on. Think about it."

Frank’s gaze went distant, his eyebrows knitting together as he sifted through hazy, sleep-deprived memories. "Genuinely no idea."

"...That time when you asked me if I’d ever kissed a guy?"

Five full seconds ticked by on the dim microwave clock across the lounge. Frank’s eyes went wide, pupils dilating in the low light. "Oh!!"

A slow, crooked grin spread across Gerard’s face. "Got it?"

"Yeah, got it."

Gerard grinned, looking at the window while he shook his head from side to side. "Fucking idiot."

Frank jabbed a finger in his direction. "You could’ve led with that!"

"I thought you remembered!"

"Apparently I was sleepwalking or something!" Frank’s voice came out too loud for the hushed bus.

Gerard’s laugh was soft, almost swallowed by the rumble of tires on asphalt. "You kissed me first." He ducked his head, eyes doing all the heavy lifting to keep his gaze on Frank. "And apparently forgot it, so yeah, you were a candidate"

Frank stared, the line of his shoulders tense. "That’s not what you said."

"I changed the rules."

"Convenient." Frank squinted, playful in the way only his three AM self could be in this situation.

"It’s my hypothetical." Gerard’s limbs dropped, from a tight little ball into a more casual lean that suggested he had given up on the matter entirely.

"You just said I’m disqualified!"

"I know."

Frank’s hands flexed beneath his legs, they were getting numb. "Then why are we still talking about it?"

Gerard went quiet. Frank did too. The bus hit a shallow dip in the road, and the overhead lights flickered a brief, silent gasp of electricity. In the returning dimness, Gerard looked at him.

"Okay."

Frank blinked. "Okay what?"

"...If you weren’t disqualified." Gerard’s voice was low, almost tentative.

Frank’s stomach dropped. He could feel his own pulse in his wrists. "…Yeah?"

Gerard shrugged, letting his head fall back into the backrest of the couch, which made his eyes look glassy under the fluorescents. "Would you?"

"Would I what?"

"Kiss me?"

Frank swallowed. His mouth felt way too dry. "I mean… yeah. I already did, didn't I?"

Gerard nodded once, a short, sharp movement. "Okay."

"Okay."

Neither moved. The space between them felt fragile and charged with some unknown words neither of them was going to blurt out.

"So…" Frank began, voice barely above a whisper.

"So," Gerard echoed.

Frank chuckled, watching Gerard fidget with his own fingers, ever so slightly leaning forward like if he did it slow enough Frank wouldn't notice. "Are we gonna–"

"Apparently."

Frank leaned in, terrified and excited and almost shaking like a goddamned chihuahua, because that wasn't the moment full of ‘what the fuck are we doing?’ he remembered, this was a very deliberate choice, a terrible one, and also the only one he wanted to make, somehow.

But this second kiss (fourth, actually, if you counted the two of that first night of questioning and one quick peck on stage) was nothing like that. It was gentler, intentional in a way that made Frank’s stomach twist. It was the kind of kiss that asked a question and then waited, patient and terrifyingly vulnerable, for an answer. He tasted chapstick and coffee and something else, something he couldn’t pin down, so he just let it be. Gerard didn’t laugh, didn’t pull away or make a joke to deflect the moment. He just remained perfectly still, eyes fluttering closed, like he was cataloging every detail for future reference.

Frank thought about reaching a hand up, just to see if Gerard's cheeks were trembling too, or maybe just to feel his skin, to see if the heat also rose in him. But his hands decided to stay perfectly still.

Frank had never been good at sitting inside his own feelings for more than a second or two, so he broke away first, heart thundering in his chest.

Gerard blinked at him, eyes wide and searching. There was a smear of surprise there, sure, but also something else, softer, almost grateful. Frank had to look away or risk drowning in it.

"Well?" Gerard said, voice steadier than Frank thought possible.

Frank’s mind blanked. He stared at his own hands, which he’d apparently balled into fists during the kiss. Lame. "Well what?"

Gerard rolled his eyes, but the gesture was almost playful, not dismissive. "You gonna write a Yelp review or something?"

Frank’s voice felt lighter now, the weight in his chest replaced by something more familiar. "Eight out of ten, I can tell you didn't brush your teeth"

"Great, now I'm dirty" Gerard said, bringing a fist up to gently bump it against Frank’s shoulder.

"Calm down, I'm trustworthy, remember? I won't narc or anything" He said while suppressing a laugh. He couldn't tell if it was just because the situation was that absurd or just his mouth doing stuff he didn't mean to, mainly: smiling. "So, what’s my status now?"

Gerard hesitated, and in that fraction of a second Frank could see him cycling through every possible answer: make a joke, change the subject, pretend it never happened, or maybe, just maybe, tell the actual truth.

When Gerard finally spoke, it was soft, almost tender: "You’re still disqualified."

Frank snorted, then flipped him off quite gracefully. "Eat shit."

"I’m serious," Gerard said, but he was smiling now, a real, full smile that made the entire bus feel like it was just the two of them, suspended in time somewhere between Cleveland and the edge of the universe.

Frank leaned back into the couch, a slow, ridiculous grin spreading across his face. "Yeah, well. I’ll get you to change your mind."

"Dream on, Iero" Gerard said, but there was no conviction behind it, just a giddy, nervous energy that made Frank want to kiss him again right then and there.

To prove him wrong. Totally.

Frank bumped Gerard’s socked foot with his own. Not as hard as he would like. "So what’s the next hypothetical?"

"Don’t push your luck," Gerard warned, but he said it through laughter. "And by the way, you taste like that awful licorice candy and—"

"You’re the one making it weird! Shut up!" Frank whined, getting back on his feet. "You taste like cigarettes and the eggroll you had for dinner. Goodnight"

Was it a coward's way out? Sure. But he wasn't going to unpack all of that in the AM while this rolling coffin they called home, that was for sure. His feet shuffled back to the bunks even if he knew he wasn't going to even blink that night.

"You asked first" Gerard said from the couch, mirroring him and rising up, stretching his arm overhead.

"And you answered, so that makes two" Frank meant it to sound sarcastic and instead it just landed like a truth bomb.

"...we should probably try and sleep" Gerard said, waiting for Frank to climb up into his bunk, he didn't want any more crossover for tonight, maybe.

Frank nodded, still feeling some tingles on his lower lip, his body started lifting upwards, landing the first leg up the bunk. "Yeah. Sleep tight"

"Same"

"Gee" He said once he settled inside, fingers barely grabbing at the privacy curtain.

"Yeah?" He answered, still at the foot of the bunks.

"Don't you fucking dare narc on me."

Gerard just laughed, way too loud for being so close to two other sleeping people. His hand found Frank's curtain and closed it with a little too much force, leaving the whole conversation to die and hopefully it wouldn't bleed out into tomorrow. "I won't. Goodnight"

From inside, Frank watched the curtain close, leaving him in absolute darkness except for the little cold lines that peaked from the lounge. He listened until he could distinctly hear Gerard's own curtain close.

"Well, fuck."