Spectrum (Frerard, Petekey)

6: It's Chapter Six And They Finally Have A Conversation

She's late, and she wasn't entirely sure why she'd even bothered today; it wasn't a good day, by any means, and she looked not far off the definition of shit, because when Gee Way had faced her reflection in the mirror this morning, she couldn't even imagine calling the person that stared back a 'girl', not even 'someone in a skirt', but today, she felt like little more than a fucked up mess of a dude pretending 'he' could be someone 'he' wasn't.

And Gee had wanted to fall right back to sleep the very instant she'd opened her eyes that morning, but she couldn't, because she had to make sure Mikey got to school okay, and make sure her mum didn't want to kill her too much this morning, and make sure she looked at least vaguely acceptable, and still, after what had felt like hours in the bathroom, she still didn't, and now here she was - out of place, of course she always felt out of place, but today she felt like she had a neon flashing sign strapped to her back that displayed all of her insecurities.

And there was little she could do to escape it.

She considered a trip to the nurse's office, because today, just fuck, she couldn't do it; she simply couldn't: every part of her head was screaming at her - a mess, a mix of different words that didn't make sense at all.

Nothing made sense at all, and she knew that, and she hated it, because there was little else to do.

And fuck, she could hardly breathe, as she felt to the floor, pulling her knees up to her chest as she sat with her locker beside her, and in the empty hallways, as everyone had long gone to their classes, Gee Way started to cry.

She hadn't really allowed herself to cry, not really, for a long time now, and perhaps this meant something, but it was likely that it meant little more than what kind of lie she could concoct for herself, and Gee could do little more than accept that.

Because this was how it was, all the time, she felt like she was drowning, she felt like she was about to fall under, but no one ever noticed, no one ever cared, because no one saw it like she did, and perhaps she didn't want them to, because even then, she still doubted that anyone could ever possibly understand.

"Hey..." And she experienced something close to a heart attack as the space beside her filled, and Gee Way came to realise that she wasn't quite as alone as she had hoped.

She blinked her eyes open: red and raw, and stained from the salt water, because still she could hardly breathe, but the face she saw beside her was everything: the hand pulling her up, even if just briefly, because it was him, it was Frank, Frank not Frankie from the nurses office all those weeks ago now, and perhaps the one person who could possibly ever understand.

"What's wrong?" He asked, watching as she shivered a little, her body continuing to tremble in the silence. "I'm going to skip the 'are you okay?' because I'm pretty sure I can work out the answer to that one myself."

And a prolonged silence as Gee felt herself looking from Frank to the floor, and back again, at least seven times, before the word just fell from her tongue, "everything."

Frank nodded, the corners of his lips twisting up into a smile, "I know. But what's made it worse right now?"

"I don't know." She paused, shaking her head a little, "just today... I just woke up and immediately wanted to fall straight back to sleep: today isn't a good day, it feels like it's just meant to be wrong and broken and fucked up and-"

"It doesn't have to be." Frank met her gaze, "as cheesy as it sounds, today is what you make of it, everything is what you make of it, but I understand, or at least I hope I do, but I can relate at least, and I hope you remember us meeting a few weeks ago in the nurse's office, Gee, because I do... in fact, it's all I can think about... somehow, you mean a lot to me, and I've had little more than a vague attempt at conversation with you."