Ethereal In Moonlight

† Chapter 3 †

Gerard groaned at the obnoxious beeping coming out of his iPhone. It was a Sunday after all. Martha had insisted he go to Sunday church with her to meet all the other 'very kind young men and women' who attended. She even brought him out and bought a nice white dress shirt to wear. He didn't have the heart to say no.

So off to church he went.

He didn't particularly hate church, religion was never really his style but he also despised the musty smell. He'd been dragged to church before, but it had just been a while. So he put on a pair of not too tight black skinny jeans and the button up shirt, looking rather stiff, but not bad. Suddenly he was interrupted by two knocks at the door.

"Good morning Gerard, remember we have Sunday church today so make sure you look spiffy!" She called through the door in an almost sing song voice. If it was anyone else Gerard knew he'd get tired, but Ms. Wimble-- Martha, had only been kind and welcoming.

He opened the door and was met with a warm smile and Martha wearing a very old-lady-ish dress.

"Already ready my dear? You're better than they usually are. Come along now, lets tie that hair back." Gerard held in a groan at that, he wanted nothing less than to tie his hair back but at least she wasn't snippy about it so maybe in a few weeks he could leave it down.

If he lasted here that long.

So he sat down at the circular dining room table and grabbed a hair elastic before Ms. Wimble waved his hand away and put a bagel in front of him.

"I'll do it, your hair needs to be cleanly looking." She said in a stern assertive voice, but not sounding mean. She took his firetruck red hair in her hands gently and started brushing it back, working quickly. A few minutes later she had it pulled back into a neat ponytail with two small braids on the left side. It felt abnormal but not bad.

"Alrighty then dear, lets get going, bring your bagel" she grabbed her heavy old lady purse and Gerard grabbed his 3/4th eaten bagel.

Before long they were in an old beige car, trundling down a bumpy road surrounded by dry looking plants. Gerard stared out the window and watched the phone and electricity lines, imagining a colourful superhero running along them. He brought his eyes forward a bit and saw a brown building in the distance.

The church.

And before even needing to open his mouth Ms. Wimble spoke up, breaking the silence.

"That's it there, don't worry you'll do fine." She glanced over to him in the passenger's seat reassuringly. Gerard swallowed a ball of nerves and gripped his knees, he sure hoped so.

So they entered the church, Ms. Wimble chattering to other church-goers and introducing a very awkwardly misplaced Gerard to them. They all seemed to keep the judgement to themselves but he could feel eyes on him and that made him nervous.

Just before the prayer started Gerard got up abruptly, quietly asking Ms. Wimble where the bathroom was.

And so he was off, maybe if he said he wasn't feeling well the whole time she'd let him off the hook. The hallways were lined with photographs of praying women and men, and at the end of the hall was the men's room.

He took a deep breath and walked in wordlessly before making eye contact with a rather attractive young man about his age. But what was most intriguing was the fact that he had a cigarette lit, and went to take a puff before glancing over to see a very misplaced boy standing in the doorway.

"Fuck-- I---" he dropped the cigarette into the moist sink and it died instantly. His eyes faltered back down to the cigarette and he swore again.

"Uh... Hello? I'm Gerard." Gerard felt the need to introduce himself, as a kind of icebreaker? He expected the angry looking boy in front of him to be mean, angry, but instead.

"Frank." He said as more of a statement. Then a warm smile lit his face and Gerard found himself flustered.

"So uhh cigarettes huh?" Gerard was usually confident in his words, but he sounded very un-eloquent right now, but then Frank just started laughing.

And that was the prettiest laugh he could ask for, and he was happy.