THE ZINE (Newark to Seattle) - Frerard | ✔️

one - exciting news

"We're here for a pickup for Frank."

"Frank..." the lady behind the register repeated. "Twenty dollars even."

Frank pulled out two tens and then put a few dollars in the tip jar while his fiery-haired roommate took their takeout bag from the lady.

"Thank you so much," Frank replied and put his wallet away. "Have a nice day."

"You too!" the lady behind the register sang.

The small Japanese storefront only had one door, so Frank wasn't surprised when his roommate got bumped into at the door, but he didn't expect the stranger to say "fucking faggot" and shove the poor woman out of his way.

"You good, Gee?" Frank asked, putting his hand on her shoulder to steady her and she rolled her eyes.

"Yeah, what a dick."

"You can say that again."

"What a dick," she said again, chuckling, and nudged Frank's shoulder. "It's okay, whatever. He wasn't wrong."

Frank shrugged and laughed along with her. "Still..."

Their flat wasn't anything special. After all, it was Newark, New Jersey, but it wasn't half bad. As soon as they'd moved in, they'd painted over the ugly tan walls, and Gee had insisted that all the walls be painted white. Frank had even started to complain about how boring white was, but as soon as Gee pointed out that he had zero design skills, he shut up and let her do her magic, letting her pick the furniture and the colour scheme.

"I trust you more than I trust myself," he'd said, and he hadn't regretted it. Frank adored the flat, but it seemed like Gee was always changing something about it. She was, in fact, on IKEA's website as they ate their sushi and talked.

"I think I'm going to replace all the plant pots with these grey and black ones," she said, turning her computer towards Frank. He nodded, shrugging.

"I like it, but you should wait, we're gonna be moving as soon as we find a better place," he replied and Gee nodded. He smiled, looking back at the influx of emails that had plagued them that afternoon. "We're getting so many business inquiries. There are a bunch of new bands in town that want exposure, but I don't think we'll get the new zine out in time for their record releases."

"Fucking bummer," Gee whined, tucking hair behind her ear and looking up from her computer. "Is there anything you want me to do for the New Releases, Old Bands page? I'm finishing up on the InDesign document right now. I'll buy plant pots when we move."

Frank chuckled, pushing his glasses up his nose. "I... lemme see if we got any other emails. I think American Gothic is releasing something in two weeks... Uh, hold on."

Frank switched to Instagram and checked American Gothic's page and nodded. "Yeah, they're releasing their new album called 'Farmers' in two weeks. The fifth of the month."

Gee nodded, "Yeah I have that on here, but lemme fix the date, I got it wrong. If there's nothing else, I'm gonna call this page done. Tomorrow we can start printing."

Frank grinned. "Finally, this one has taken forever."

"Yeah, cause someone keeps taking too long to finish his pages."

"I know I'm bad at it..." Frank mumbled, laughing a little bit. "Oh wait, holy fuck."

"What happened?" Gee asked, looking up, concern flashing in her eyes.

"You're not going to believe me, but Meredith Corporation wants to publish our magazine. They emailed us this morning saying that they think we have really good potential."