When We're Both Thirty

The Beginning of the Turn: Part Two

Gerard thinks that he's literally never had a worse headache in his entire existence. This isn't just a bad hangover headache or anything, someone is trying to burrow his way out of Gerard's cranium and he's making the biggest possible hole in his head to do so.

He can't even move, he's in so much pain. Gerard groans and feels his hand clasp at his temple, but the panging doesn't stop. Certainly he's dying. That might be preferable to this migraine though.

Gerard wiggles around, trying to find a comfortable angle to rest his head on the pillow underneath him. That's when he notices the unfamiliar surroundings. He's swaddled in a few big blankets, and there's a nice pillow under his head, but this isn't his bed. He's not sure what the hell this is. It's too soft to be the floor. Maybe he's dead or something. That doesn't seem entirely fair though. Gerard would hate for himself to have a headache while he's chilling in hades or wherever the hell he is.

Gerard tries to open his eyes, but that's an enormous mistake. The light in whatever room he's in hits him, and it makes his head screech in pain. He closes his eyes just as quickly as he can, and tries to move around some more to let his hands figure out where he is.

He hears something moving quietly behind him, and he's not sure what it is. There's a faint clattering, it sounds really foreign and far away. Gerard groans, and tries to block out the noise because it makes his head hurt even more. This is entirely unpleasant. Way too unpleasant for him to be dead, so he assumes he must be alive, but that doesn't seem like any sort of relief to him right now.

"Gerard?" A voice asks, "You awake?"

He knows instantly that the voice belongs to Frank, and he wonders why on earth wherever he is has to have Frank there too. He'd probably be better off dead then in the same room as Frank while unconscious. He probably has a mustache drawn onto his face right now. Or maybe he's got something rude written on his forehead. He highly doubts he could possibly be unconscious anywhere near Frank and not have had his face violated by a permanent marker.

"Gerard?" Frank says again, and then Gerard hears soft footsteps walking nearer to him, so he puts his hands over his ears to block the sound from stabbing at his head.

"You are awake," Frank says.

"Quiet," Gerard murmurs in response.

"Headache?" Frank asks him.

"Yes."

"Let me get you some aspirin."

Gerard doesn't respond to that, he just sort of puts his hands over his eyes and pretends to not exist for a minute, hoping that if he falls back to sleep, he won't have to suffer from this aching.

"Gerard!" Frank says way too loudly, interrupting his reverie after a minute. Gerard's almost completely forgotten what was happening a moment ago. He just knows that his head hurts.

"It's not just going to go away, dumbass," Frank says. "You're going to have to sit up if you don't want to get water all over yourself."

"What?" Gerard asks. He feels a hand on his shoulder, trying to pull him up into a sitting position, but he whimpers and grabs the sides of his head to stop making it shake. Moving around has dislodged the peace he'd had for a moment when he kept entirely still.

"Here," Frank says, and he feels a cold glass put into his hand and something small in the other hand.

"Huh?" Gerard asks again, because he's really not understanding much of anything right now while his head is screaming in agony.

"Just take the damn pill, otherwise your head's not going to get any better," Frank says. Its weird hearing him try to be helpful through a voice full of spite. It's like hearing an executioner telling you to smile, or like hearing a politician say something respectful about the female gender. It just doesn't sound right coming from someone who never has a helpful thing to say.