The Kiss of Vanity Blessed Me With A Spiritual Murder [Frerard]

Sparks

Sunday morning, Gerard decides to take a walk.

The sky isn't blue; it's almost purple with the way dark clouds roll beneath the red of the trees. But it's the last thing on Gerard's mind as he shrugs an old straight-cut, black coat over his shoulders. He can feel the skin of his cheeks drying; it smells like soap, early November and things he wants to forget about. The road outside is dry, but not for long, he can sense the chill down, deep inside his spine. There's a storm coming later, it's already the air- the wind is too warm for it not to rain.

He doesn't plan on going to the cemetery, at first. It's too much, in his head and on his hands, but he can't help it as he skips the few steps it takes to get to the ingrown stone path. It's prettier in daylight, all gravestones a slightly greener hue- the moss sort of makes it look like home; the one of the living, not the one of the dead.

Perhaps it's simple despite Gerard's inability to comprehend: perhaps he just can't resonate with the living. There he has to speak, speaking makes him nervous- fuck, thinking about speaking makes him nervous and he can't do anything about it. Perhaps the dead are easier to talk to. Simply because they don't ask you for words when you can't find them.

Gerard is not good with words.

But what does being good with words even mean?

He walks around the cemetery a bit. He likes the way his shoes feel against the grass, the wind around his arms warm, ruffling his hair. He spreads his fingers apart, lets them dance in the weak sunlight and closes his eyes. His lungs are yelling at him to stop, to think but he doesn't let himself care, he doesn't let himself be afraid now. Now it's just him- him, the wind and a bunch of dead people who are never going to ask questions he doesn't want to answer. And it feels right, for the first time in ages- it feels right.

"Having fun?"

Gerard almost falls to the ground. His heartbeat changes pace abruptly, so abruptly it feels dangerous, but the face he's met with when he turns around doesn't make it any better.

He isn't wearing a jacket, but he doesn't seem to be freezing in just a long-sleeved sweater. He's only in jeans, as well, and his shoulders are loose, like he isn't even pretending to like the temperature- as if it's somehow engraved into his bones. Gerard supposes that someone so cold inside couldn't freeze even if they tried.

His hair is a mess, but a mess that rounds his face like it was made to be; and Gerard can't help but to hate himself because he wants to curl some of it around his fingers.

"How long have you been here?" Gerard breathes, air thick in his mouth, stumbling a bit backwards even though Frank doesn't move from his spot. His face is stern, eyes set, he seems strangely at peace for someone whose general setting is so hostile.

"Long enough," he says casually, hands in his pockets as he's leaning backwards slightly. "Why are you out here, all alone? Haven't you heard about the attacks?"

Gerard breathes through his nose, popping his joints in order to calm himself. "I could ask the same thing."

Frank laughs airily, as if Gerard told a joke only he understands. It makes goose bumps appear all over his arms and the fact that he's alone in a cemetery with Frank suddenly starts flashing all over his head in big, bold letters. He doesn't let himself feel like it's a warning.

"You should relax, you know," Frank adds, moving one of his hands into his back pocket and even before it happens, Gerard knows he'll pull out a pack of Marlboros. "You always seem so jittery."

At first, the remark doesn't do anything to him. Gerard feels nothing at all, he's heard that so many times before that he can't bring himself to react with anything more than a shrug.

But then it suddenly stops, and it feels like something collapsed inside his lungs and it almost starts physically hurting somewhere inside his brain, his bones, limbs- it's a sensation that burns the pit of his stomach and puts a match to all of his organs that have been soaked with gasoline for way too long.

"I can't," it feels poisonous to pronounce it, as if his tongue is made out of cyanide and his teeth coated with sulfuric acid- but he feels angry. It's so strange because Gerard doesn't do angry. He does scared, confused, terrified, anxious and awkward, and now that all of the above are gnawing at his insides, he feels angry, and it feels like hell just as it feels like heaven at the same time.

Frank looks up from his lighter and the fire is still burning inside of Gerard when he tells him, "I know. Want a smoke?" He flicks his wrist sideways, making one of the cigarettes poke out from the pack.

Silence. The anger doesn't stop, it just lowers its volume into something like a dull roar as it tests the limits of all the breaking points in Gerard's head.

"Do you really?" Gerard senses his eyes turning into daggers pointed at Frank, but he seems unfazed with it. It just makes it worse, it just makes it stronger, but it doesn't seem to upset Frank as he looks him in the eyes.

"Yeah, I do," he says nonchalantly, as Gerard looks at him in confusion. "I only said it because I knew it would make you mad."

"You're a giant asshole, you know that?" It takes guts, but considering the mood he's in, Gerard can spare some. He doesn't know when the next time he has a chance like this will be.

"I know," he says, taking another drag. "It feels good, doesn't it?" He's looking at Gerard through his eyelashes, and Gerard can swear nothing in his life has ever felt as strangely familiar as this. "Now, you want this smoke or not?"