Wintertime (Frerard, Sequel to Summertime)

29: Gerard The Ghost Uncle

Gerard grimaced a little.

They could both hear Mikey and Pete downstairs.

Mikey had opted to explain it all to Pete, of course, after he'd seen Gerard, and successfully not fainted, but generally freaked the fuck out, which was, of course, understandable, if not a little amusing, but by the sounds of it, Mikey wasn't having that great of a time explaining it to him.

Frank was attempting to change the sheets from Gerard's bed; the two stood in silence, in the silence of a room untouched for ten years, but now suddenly Gerard's again, suddenly theirs again. Neither objected to the idea, but still, they didn't exactly know what to think of it.

Gerard wasn't helping, as usual, but at least he'd shut the fuck up, making no snide comments this time, just stood back against the wall - his bedroom wall, not even staring at Frank's ass, but stood there, thinking.

"I feel sorry for Mikey," Gerard said out of nowhere, and probably for the first time in his life, shocking Frank a little as he did so.

"Mmm?" Came Frank's response, pulling the sheets off the bed and throwing them on the floor in a heap, before attempting to pull over the clean ones they'd gotten out of the cupboard.

"I should be there to explain it with him, shouldn't I?" Gerard bit his lip, running a hand back through his hair.

"I think Pete seeing you was enough." Frank added, pulling the duvet over the bed, before standing back and admiring his work, well, admiring was perhaps an overstatement, he was just glad he was done.

Gerard shrugged, "I don't know. It's complicated, isn't it?"

"Yeah," Frank nodded, turning around and picking the sheets up, "where do you think I should put these? Like dump them out in the hall, or-"

"Frank." Gerard's eyes widened, looking at him, or looking at anything properly since Pete had gotten home, having found himself in somewhat of a haze of thoughts: a messy mind and a guilty conscience at work.

"Yeah?" Frank asked, a little confused as he met Gerard's eyes.

"You-... y-you..." Gerard stuttered out, unsure what to make of what he saw, whether it could be anything, or in particular if it could be what he thought it to be.

"I? What?" Frank grew impatient and increasingly concerned.

"Your face, you just, you've got-" Gerard pointed loosely towards his face, "a mark-"

Frank rolled his eyes, "not really the end of the world is it?" Making his way across the room and over to the mirror, he looked himself over, and found that Gerard was indeed correct, confirmed by the presence of a seemingly unexplainable red mark upon his cheek.

"How did it get there?" Gerard asked, his tone a little panicked, and perhaps unnecessarily so, as he made his way over to Frank, meeting his reflection in the mirror.

Frank shrugged: unable to place as to why Gerard could possibly be so concerned with one little red mark upon his face. "I don't know. Probably just banged it on something, maybe rubbed it, I rest my hand on my face a lot - could be that. Come on, Gerard, it's not exactly life threatening, is it? You don't need to get all overprotective boyfriend right now."

Gerard forced a smile, biting his lip, as he considered telling Frank, telling him what he thought to be true, but there was a part of him certain that Frank already had a lot on his mind, and that perhaps once they'd been here a few days and things had calmed down would be a better time to approach it, or if it happened again, because then he definitely couldn't avoid the truth.