Kashmir [1/2]
Title: Kashmir
Author: cassie_roulette
Pairing: Ray/Gerard/Frank OH SHI-
Rating: NC-17 for SEX
POV: Third, changing focus throughout
Summary: This wasn't the first time he'd dreamt of his two guitarists having sex and he feared it wouldn't be the last.
Disclaimer: I'm sorry Mr. Toro, but I will in fact not stop making you have sex with them in my fanfiction. You're just too sexy.
Author Notes: Pseudo sequel to One More Time, though it isn't really necessary to have read it in order to follow. Helps though. Especially if you like bathroom!sex. This one's got a lot more plot to it, as in, at all. Also, it takes place fairly present day, at the start of the PR tour.
Dedications: I'm gonna go ahead and declare this to be Christina's Christmas present that is now almost nine months late. She gave me the idea to start it by asking for Ray/Gerard before I knew one half of a damn about the boyz other than the music. And, of course, for jettabug, for making me want to finish it and being the Gerard to my Ray. I'd also like to thank pandagore, fredlero, damselfly27, emotecontrol, chromasunrise, michiyoemi, and the Academy.
Warnings: Sexy men making sexy sex. Also a surprising dose of pop culture references. And swearing. Lots of fucking swearing.
Additionally: This wasn't originally a two part story but I had to split it up due to the character limit on LJ entries. The link to the second half is at the bottom of the first part so it reads straight through.
Previous
One More Time
"Jesus Christ, right fucking there..."
Rooted to the spot, Gerard is forced to stare, hypnotized by the writhing, sweating bodies in front of him.
The gray, dream-like mist surrounded the scene before his eyes, obscuring the meaningless details of 'where' and 'when'. And least importantly, 'why'.
His angle of vision is tight, perfectly directed like he's watching a glitzy and slick artsy porn. Limbs intertwined, hair hiding the eyes, rough and labored breathing filling his ears like sustenance.
One man is thrusting into the other and they're both moaning, lips just inches apart as if they ache to kiss, straining for it.
In another life, another reality, he might not have been able to identify the two. The tattoos give it away though. The painful truth of who he's watching.
"Shit... I'm fucking close..."
The direct command of 'Keep the Faith' is visible from where he watches, the flesh it's branded into rising and falling above the other man's body, knees straddling narrow hips and riding him hard.
A head of dark, shaggy hair tosses back in a scream of pleasure, glancing over his shoulder for one crucial moment to lock eyes with Gerard, golden and fiery, sparkling with lust as his flushed lips curve into a knowing smirk...
Gerard woke up fast with a strangled gasp. His shirt soaked with sweat, his dick painfully hard. The ceiling of his bunk on the tour bus stared back at him without sympathy for his plight.
Ray's snoring penetrated the air and had him wincing in irritation and shame. This wasn't the first time he'd dreamt of his two guitarists having sex and he feared it wouldn't be the last. Not with the memory of what he'd seen branded into his mind like it was, replaying without warning whenever his thoughts wandered or his eyes closed for too long.
It was only a moment, a fraction of a second, but it had been enough.
A stolen, heated kiss between the two men, off to the side, where others shouldn't have seen.
Where others wouldn't have seen except for the fact that, oh, I don't know, we're in a fucking band and we were fucking due for fucking sound check and no one knew where the hell they were.
Gerard fumed at the thought, furious at his embarrassment, that he felt it at all, the cause of it, everything. Damning both of them for doing this to his sanity and not even having the decency to be aware of it and join in on the shame. It had been almost a month now and the vision still haunted him, stressing him out, and worse, turning him on.
He was very aware that he was being irrational for a thirty-year-old but he couldn't bring himself to care. Not when it was 4am and he hadn't been laid in well over two months in spite of just coming off a break.
Somehow it didn't surprise him that Frank would tackle a man to relieve his tension on tour, but Ray? In all the years that he'd known him, he'd never even guessed that Ray had been anything other than straight and borderline asexual, what with the way he was always either glued to his laptop, his guitar, or both. Not that Gerard was one to talk.
Without even realizing it, his hand had crept to the crotch of his boxers, pawing at himself over top of the fabric, the sudden pressure catching him off guard until he realized the touch was his own.
His teeth grit hard and he could practically feel tears stinging in the corners of his eyes, horny and pissed off and exhausted but knowing he wouldn't get back to sleep until he dealt with it.
With a painful blush of shame, he reached below his waistband and started stroking, closing his eyes and putting more effort into keeping quiet than enjoying the act. The last thing he needed was someone hearing him jerk off in the middle of the night like the saddest mother fucker on the goddamn planet.
And in spite of his best efforts, the only image broadcasting through his mind as his hand tightened and his breath caught in pleasure was that of Frank's hand fisted hard into Ray's hair as their lips met and their tongues danced, carelessly making out in a shadowed backstage hallway somewhere in goddamn Finland.
He remembered that soft intake of breath that had grabbed his attention to the scene in the first place, echoing the memory with one of his own, biting his lip and stifling the little moan of pleasure that threatened to pass his lips as he got closer to the release he desired so badly.
Gerard didn't know what turned him on more: Frank, Ray, or the fact that they didn't know that he knew. The frontman persona under his skin loved that little thrill of power. For all he knew it had been a one time thing, but now his overactive paranoia was seeing the signs everywhere. The little clues that this could very well have been going on for years.
His cock twitched in his hand, hips tensing and back arching as his climax hit him ruthlessly, a soft whimper escaping his abused lip, teeth sinking into it hard enough to draw blood.
Wiping his hand on a napkin from the floor, Gerard let out a grumpy sigh and turned to his side, temper dulled for the time being. Tomorrow was another day on the road with no show, another day of pretending that everything was fine until they reached their next destination.
With an uneasy peace he finally drifted back to sleep, blissfully dreamless and free of familiar faces fucking each other.
~~~~~
"Dude, no way, that's like being asked to chose which of your parents to save from a burning building."
"Come on, just answer the question."
"No! I'm not gonna commit to anything like that, I need time to think, it's a serious question."
The question was which was a better comic-turned-movie: Sin City or 300. Gerard watched the exchange between Ray and Frank with growing interest though he hid it behind his laptop, aimlessly clicking about as he pretended to focus on World of Warcraft.
"Maybe if they weren't both Frank Miller, but picking one over the other just seems fucking blasphemous, dude," Ray sighed, chewing at his lower lip. He was perched on the edge of one of the tour buses' interior couches, looking at Frank with wide, thoughtful eyes. Frank was staring right back with a shit-eating grin plastered to his face, drumming on his knees and waiting gleefully for an answer as if he possessed the means to run off to Frank Miller himself and tattle on Ray's choice.
"Both of you knock it off, the answer's obvious. Sin City's a better comic and 300's a better movie. They balance each other out and are therefore equally awesome in separate categories."
That would be Bob, the resident zen master. Keeper of the peace and all-around badass. At least so far as Gerard was concerned.
Frank just blinked in response to the statement, thrown off center, and Ray was laughing, rising up off the couch to quest for a beer. Crossing the short distance to the tiny refrigerator, he pulled out a green bottle with the Rolling Rock logo facing the other occupants of the bus, wrenching a groan from Bob's throat.
"Dude, don't drink that shit, get a real beer."
"Hey, shut up," Ray mock-pouted, taking a long drink that earned another wince from Bob, chuckling as he padded back to the bunks to grab the latest issue of Nintendo Power or whatever the hell it was Ray amused himself with in his downtime.
Gerard's focus shifted to Frank, carefully not-watching over the cusp of his laptop. He'd grown accustomed to the other guys drinking in front of him, so when Matt rose for the fridge and asked the group if they needed anything, it didn't even phase him.
"Yeah man, toss me a Guinness," Bob answered, craning his neck towards the back of the bus as he added, "Since that's what real men drink!" earning a muffled "Fuck you!" in Ray's soft, high-octave voice.
Frank was giggling, knees brought up to his chest, arms wrapped tight, slightly rocking in place. He was one of those guys who could die of amusement with a brown paper bag over his head. Over the years, Gerard had neatly organized his thoughts and views on the other guys within his mind, needing to categorize; labels and explanations that at least made sense to him.
And Gerard had a deep love for Silly Frank.
For you see, there was Serious Frank; collected, cosmically wise, eyes narrowed enigmatically as he spoke of animal rights and scene politics and his hatred of homophobia, staring into your soul and pinning it to the wall, lifeless, like a scientist's butterfly.
There was Stage Frank; wild and and unchained, fucking his guitar and spitting on the crowd, tossing his sweaty hair out of his eyes as he showed the kids every possible sex face he had in his arsenal.
And then, occasionally, like now, there was Silly Frank. Donning thick framed glasses as he rambled about Harry Potter. Throwing himself into a game of kickball with reckless glee. Sneaking up behind Bob and climbing up onto his shoulders. Holding his new Xbox up high like a seven year old on Christmas morning.
Yes, Gerard had a deep love for Silly Frank.
"Hey, knock it off!" Ray's voice ripped through the air as Bob emerged from the bunks, waving a wireless PS3 controller above his head and out of Ray's reach.
"Dammit Bob, give it!"
"Maybe if you stop being such a pussy!"
Both were laughing, the key sign that neither was actually mad or malicious.
Gerard's eyes drank in the sight of Ray smiling, smiling like he meant it, with his eyes half closed and his cheeks stretched wide, showing off his teeth. It was moments of unplanned for happiness such as this in which Ray was truly beautiful.
The lead guitarist had once ragged on photoshoots, hating the instruction to pretend to be badass. Gerard had spent hours of his awkward adolescence staring at himself in a mirror, getting the look down of artfully disheveling his hair just so. But Ray would just smile with goofy insecurity or level the camera with a heavy gaze that only made him look high - or so Frank had once pointed out before getting clobbered for the comment.
No, Ray's attraction was far more subtle. There was an innocence about him that radiated outward, and in the eight or so odd years that Gerard had known him, the shift from not giving his appearance a second glance to stealing hidden looks on stage and backstage and everything in between had been so gradual that Gerard hadn't even noticed.
He had half a mind to actually get up off his ass and give Ray a hand, but the two men had already made their peace and were settling their differences back in Ray's bunk with a friendly bout of Burnout 3. Before they'd gone, he caught a swift, heated exchange of glances between the two guitarists, though Frank was now chatting up Cortez about some punk band that he apparently "had to fucking hear".
And in the midst of it all, Gerard sat silent, engrossed in his computer for all that the others could tell, slowly curling in on himself socially more and more as the band trekked across the country.
You'd think he saw nothing, his thoughts internal. But he saw everything. His silence and his bored, disinterested look only aiding his ability to eavesdrop, intentionally or otherwise.
And he noticed the underhanded mannerisms that were either forcefully being subdued or so ingrained as to become second nature between Frank and Ray. His spine tingled in guilt mixed with disgust mixed with voyeuristic excitement at the memory of what had opened the window to this hidden underlayer of interaction between the two men. These "normal" times of boredom and laughter were perhaps the most awkward of all for Gerard. He'd smile and laugh and not mention it despite that fact that it was all he could fucking think about these days.
The word obsession floated through his head like a plastic bag in the wind and he snarled at it. He was not obsessed, dammit. It was just disturbing to think of the fact that two of his best friends, two male best friends might be lovers. It was weird. And, though he'd never admit it, he was curious.
"Come on, try and tell me that Kashmir wouldn't be an awesome song to fuck to."
Frank's voice ripped through his train of thought, neck snapping around in time to see Cortez mask a blush and hear Bob chime in with "Totally!" from the back.
"What?" Gerard exclaimed in genuine confusion before he could stop himself, eyes widening a bit as he spoke, surprised at himself. Frank seemed just as shocked, turning to look at Gerard with a curious stare before his eyes narrowed deviously.
"You know, Gee. Kashmir. It's a sexy fucking song."
"Frank, everything's sexy to you," Matt teased, flipping a page in the magazine he wasn't reading.
"That may be true," the rhythm guitarist laughed in response, smacking Cortez playfully on the arm. "But you're the one who brought it up and that's my answer. What the hell were you expecting me to say, some fucking Justin Timberlake song?"
Matt just shrugged with a smirk and took a swig of his beer, content to let the subject drop.
Gerard let out what he hoped sounded like an amused laugh, shaking his head a little and turning his attention back to his computer. Frank was mollified enough with his issue of Fangoria to fall into silence, legs crossed and foot twitching in a rhythm known only to him as he let the magazine absorb him.
~~~~~
"Gerard's acting weird," Ray murmured absently, taking a drag off with his back to the red brick wall of the interstate rest stop.
"Gerard's always weird," Frank replied, reaching for the cigarette without asking. Not needing to. Not after all this time.
"Pfft, so are you then," Ray chuckled, giving Frank's ribs a soft jab with his elbow.
"I never denied that."
Both men were smiling, drifting in and our of comfortable silences as they took advantage of this chance to get off the bus and catch some fresh air.
The irony, Ray mused as he reached for another cigarette, content to let Frank keep his. In theory, they were both trying to quit.
In theory, they were also both heterosexual men with girlfriends.
"I'm being serious," Ray continued after leaning close for the flame of Frank's lighter, letting out a long sigh and dropping his head back against the wall, cushioned by his hair. "He was doing so great in Europe, happier than he'd been in fucking forever. And now it's like he's just paranoid or something. Like one of us is gonna attack him. I dunno, I feel like I should talk to him."
Frank gestured with a 'by all means' wave of his hand in the general direction of the buses. He was a man of no nonsense. The one person in your life that you could always count on never lying to you, on the sole factor of loving to tell the brutal, honest truth too goddamn much.
"Yeah, I know," Ray sighed to the silent response. "I'm just worried that it's gonna start something and we've got a show tomorrow. I don't want to stress him out."
"Toro, you think too much." Frank reached for his cellphone as he felt it buzz in his pocket, checking the brief text message and exclaiming a loud "What the fuck!" with his cigarette still dangling from his bottom lip.
"What is it?" Ray asked with an edge of concern to his voice, brow narrowing in worry at Frank's irritated body language.
"Brian's being a dick," he laughed roughly, jumping to his feet with a groan of effort and tossing the phone in Ray's direction before setting off to the bus without looking back, his laughter still filling the calm air surrounding the area.
Ray caught the phone in one hand, rising slower, not possessing Frank's endless source of energy. As he set about following the other man he glanced down to read the message still blinking on the screen, letting out a laugh of his own as he did so.
Get back on the bus or Toro won't be the only one we leave behind this time.
~~~~~
Gerard narrowed his eyes behind thick sunglasses as he stared out at the empty field. The space that would soon be full of crowd. It was 6am and by all logic it was too early for this shit, the hour positively unholy if you were to ask him. Left to his own devices, Gerard would easily sleep past noon, simply to get a normal amount of rest after staying up until the sun rose.
The vampire jokes were almost too easy.
Bob was around somewhere, perched on an amp surrounded by eager stage techs who were drinking in his little pep talk before the arduous task began of constructing his custom-made drum monstrosity. Ray was geeking out with the sound guys, nothing short of eager and helpful, never once treading into the territory of elitism in spite of his decorated experience.
Frank and Cortez were probably still asleep, like the rest of sane humanity.
Sitting down on the edge of the stage with a sigh, Gerard flipped through the art book the tour was selling that featured a piece of his. He smiled at the sight of his name in print next to the medium he'd once feared would go nowhere for him.
The book also had some of Ray's photography, and he flushed a little with pride for his friend. Ray, when it came to his own skill at anything, was the definition of modest at best, self deprecating at worst. It had taken a good amount of urging and cajoling on the part of the rest of the band to get him to submit his work to the book.
His eyes were drawn to a particular shot, a close up of a Marshall amp. It brought a wide smile to his face, clearly able to imagine Ray sprawled out on the floor to get the perfect angle, biting his lip and ass in the air, oblivious to how silly he looked.
"Good, isn't it?" Frank asked, close enough to speak at the level of Gerard's ear, sending a jolt of surprise up the older man's spine that rocked his core.
Gerard's cheek's flushed hotly, wondering just how long Frank had seen him fawning over Ray's section of the book.
"Yeah, it is," he responded softly after he got his bearings back, turning his head just enough to look Frank in the eyes. "What the hell are you doing up, anyway?"
"Couldn't sleep, I'm pretty jazzed. Coffee?" From behind his back, Frank produced two paper cups full to the brim with Gerard's drug of choice.
"Have I told you lately that I love you?"
"You grab my ass on stage often enough."
That certainly earned a choked laugh, reaching for the offered cup with a grin of thanks, scooting over a bit so that Frank could sit down next to him. They usually didn't talk about their stage antics. Such things were left to spontaneousness and the "heat of the moment" or whatever. Ever since the early days, Gerard fucking with the other guys during shows was just part of the theater of it all. It was good for the occasional punch-line though, and Frank was nothing if not a master of comedic timing.
"About that," Frank murmured idly, kicking his feet back and forth over the edge of the stage, taking on the appearance of a care-free child. "Think we should kick it up a notch for this tour?"
"Meaning?" Gerard asked slowly, thrown off guard by the subject though he had a pretty damn good idea of what Frank was going at.
"The ass grabbing," Frank laughed, arching a mischievous eyebrow in Gerard's direction with a wry smirk. "I mean, after Download we'd better do something." He paused for a moment to take in the frontman's shocked expression, giggling and managing a loud, "What?"
"I... I dunno, we've just never.... you know, talked about it first before."
Plus, wouldn't Ray get mad? The sentence hung heavy at the front of his thoughts, unspoken as he spurted out the lame excuse for his discomfort. He felt like a dick for even thinking it but the notion wouldn't leave him alone.
Frank just stared at him, letting the silence build to the point of no return before he finally blurted out, "Don't tell me you're gonna get all nervous now!"
"I'm not! I just like to go with what feels right, okay? Do you want me to be pulling you aside before every show and going 'Okay, here I'm gonna grab your crotch, and during this song we can like, lick each other or something'?"
Frank's only response was an elegantly raised eyebrow, suddenly making Gerard feel very young and awkward in spite of being five years Frank's senior.
Besides, there was another reason he'd rather not plan it all out ahead of time. And that was so that he wouldn't be anxiously awaiting what Frank would do to him.
Especially since new information pointed towards the fact that Frank kissed boys for other reasons than shock value.
Though he'd rather die than voice those concerns.
"All right," Frank said slowly, still giving him that cheshire smile that warned of horrible, wonderful things to come. "We'll see what happens. Just remember how much these kids shelled out to look at us, okay?"
With that Frank jumped up and strode off to peruse the guitar racks backstage, intercepting one of his techs and falling into immediate conversation, leaving Gerard with a quickly cooling cup of coffee and a greatly shaken peace of mind.
~~~~~
"You're right, he is acting weird," Frank sighed, arms folded on a stack of amps, head tilted to one side as he looked at Ray.
"What happened?"
"Well, I asked him if he thought we should do anything raunchy for the crowd and he curled in on himself like I'd just asked him to Prom."
Ray burst out laughing, unable to help himself with the mental image.
His laughter was contagious and soon Frank was giggling as well, the recent lack of sleep only adding to the humor of the situation. One man would catch his breath, only to look at the other, setting them both off again.
It was Ray who calmed first, twisting around so that his back rested against one of the stage's support poles. "Sorry, it's fucking funny," he smirked, taking a deep breath. "I can totally picture it."
"So what the fuck then?" Frank sighed, tugging off his hat to run his fingers through his dark, shaggy hair. "It's like he's scared of me or something."
"Now whose thinking too much?" Ray grinned, his expression easy and unconcerned. "Dude, it's Gerard. He's not himself on stage. The way you guys slobber all over each other doesn't mean he's gonna want to talk about it afterwards. It's a character."
Frank's hand twitched as he started to reach for a cigarette, stopping though when his eyes locked with Brian's who stood a few dozen feet away, talking with one of the Placebo guys. Brian, who Frank had entrusted to make sure he'd at least try to quit smoking.
He growled low in his throat, knowing he'd need to deal with his nerves in some other way. Or not at all, given his luck lately.
It was only a week or so into the massive tour and Frank was already feeling the consequences of playing outdoor venues alongside an army of other bands and their crews.
No privacy. At all.
"This was a hell of a lot easier when we were playing arenas," he muttered crankily, eyes darting over to lock with Ray's just long enough to get his meaning across.
Ray offered a small, understanding smile.
He knew that Frank wasn't talking about Gerard anymore.
~~~~~
Gerard let out a long sigh, hiding between buses in the locked parking lot with his iPod. He hated warming up in front of other people. Which he knew was hypocritical, given how many he was warming up for.
Mr. Brightside ended and he took a deep breath, clicking through the tracks to find another.
Something with a good range. Nothing too long. And would hopefully ease his jangled nerves.
He smirked as he came across Iron Maiden's Aces High.
Glad that no one else was around he really let himself get into it, closing his eyes and tensing his leg in beat with the song during the genre-typical middle bridge that he could easily imagine Ray picking apart in high school, determined to figure it out. With a grin he cranked the volume, tossing his hair as he wailed along with Bruce Dickinson.
The song left him pumped, giggling even as he struck a dramatic pose on the finishing beat, not even bothering to look for another in his playlist, just laughing breathlessly and doubling over to grip at his knees.
So when the opening chords of Kashmir thundered through his earbuds he couldn't have been less prepared. It was like an icy bucket of water had been dumped over his head and he practically gasped in surprise.
"Come on, try and tell me that Kashmir wouldn't be an awesome song to fuck to."
"You know, Gee. Kashmir. It's a sexy fucking song."
His eyes widened and his breath caught in his throat, tensing as if he'd been caught doing something shameful.
Faded memories of his dreams flitted through his mind, moving in perfect sync to the heavy strings.
Kashmir wasn't something that you sang along to. Kashmir sang to you. Swept you away and fucking took you somewhere.
He'd once, long ago, commented that listening to it was better than drugs. Granted, he'd been stoned out of his mind at the time and Mikey had just looked at him as if he's said the most profound thing either of them had ever heard.
Part of him wanted to switch it immediately, embarrassed by the association with Frank's sex life, the image of him and Ray kissing lighting up every corner of his mind and leaving no room for anything else. But the heavy notes roped him in, sinking claws into his heart, demanding that he let it run it's course.
Gerard slowly sank to his knees and sat back against one of the buses' massive wheels, his eyes falling closed as he let the melody have it's ancient way with him. The progressions were haunting and apparently the force behind the blood that pounded through his veins. His lips moved soundlessly, the memory of the lyrics dredged up from childhood and branded into his synapses, never to be forgotten.
"I am a traveler of both time and space, to be where I have been..."
The world melted away around him, leaving him with only the ground and the song. There was no tour, no pressure, no impending concert that required his voice.
Only this.
And as the song played it's way through, he couldn't help but reach a sort of cosmic realization.
Frank was right. This would be a good song to fuck to.
Gerard smiled slowly, the weight of his years lifting away. He thought of the show that was to come in mere hours. Of his own inhibitions, his own problems, all the fucking hang-ups that had been plaguing his peace of mind since they'd started their headlining tour.
"Just remember how much these kids shelled out to look at us, okay?"
Frank was right about a lot of things.
part 2
Author: cassie_roulette
Pairing: Ray/Gerard/Frank OH SHI-
Rating: NC-17 for SEX
POV: Third, changing focus throughout
Summary: This wasn't the first time he'd dreamt of his two guitarists having sex and he feared it wouldn't be the last.
Disclaimer: I'm sorry Mr. Toro, but I will in fact not stop making you have sex with them in my fanfiction. You're just too sexy.
Author Notes: Pseudo sequel to One More Time, though it isn't really necessary to have read it in order to follow. Helps though. Especially if you like bathroom!sex. This one's got a lot more plot to it, as in, at all. Also, it takes place fairly present day, at the start of the PR tour.
Dedications: I'm gonna go ahead and declare this to be Christina's Christmas present that is now almost nine months late. She gave me the idea to start it by asking for Ray/Gerard before I knew one half of a damn about the boyz other than the music. And, of course, for jettabug, for making me want to finish it and being the Gerard to my Ray. I'd also like to thank pandagore, fredlero, damselfly27, emotecontrol, chromasunrise, michiyoemi, and the Academy.
Warnings: Sexy men making sexy sex. Also a surprising dose of pop culture references. And swearing. Lots of fucking swearing.
Additionally: This wasn't originally a two part story but I had to split it up due to the character limit on LJ entries. The link to the second half is at the bottom of the first part so it reads straight through.
Previous
One More Time
"Jesus Christ, right fucking there..."
Rooted to the spot, Gerard is forced to stare, hypnotized by the writhing, sweating bodies in front of him.
The gray, dream-like mist surrounded the scene before his eyes, obscuring the meaningless details of 'where' and 'when'. And least importantly, 'why'.
His angle of vision is tight, perfectly directed like he's watching a glitzy and slick artsy porn. Limbs intertwined, hair hiding the eyes, rough and labored breathing filling his ears like sustenance.
One man is thrusting into the other and they're both moaning, lips just inches apart as if they ache to kiss, straining for it.
In another life, another reality, he might not have been able to identify the two. The tattoos give it away though. The painful truth of who he's watching.
"Shit... I'm fucking close..."
The direct command of 'Keep the Faith' is visible from where he watches, the flesh it's branded into rising and falling above the other man's body, knees straddling narrow hips and riding him hard.
A head of dark, shaggy hair tosses back in a scream of pleasure, glancing over his shoulder for one crucial moment to lock eyes with Gerard, golden and fiery, sparkling with lust as his flushed lips curve into a knowing smirk...
Gerard woke up fast with a strangled gasp. His shirt soaked with sweat, his dick painfully hard. The ceiling of his bunk on the tour bus stared back at him without sympathy for his plight.
Ray's snoring penetrated the air and had him wincing in irritation and shame. This wasn't the first time he'd dreamt of his two guitarists having sex and he feared it wouldn't be the last. Not with the memory of what he'd seen branded into his mind like it was, replaying without warning whenever his thoughts wandered or his eyes closed for too long.
It was only a moment, a fraction of a second, but it had been enough.
A stolen, heated kiss between the two men, off to the side, where others shouldn't have seen.
Where others wouldn't have seen except for the fact that, oh, I don't know, we're in a fucking band and we were fucking due for fucking sound check and no one knew where the hell they were.
Gerard fumed at the thought, furious at his embarrassment, that he felt it at all, the cause of it, everything. Damning both of them for doing this to his sanity and not even having the decency to be aware of it and join in on the shame. It had been almost a month now and the vision still haunted him, stressing him out, and worse, turning him on.
He was very aware that he was being irrational for a thirty-year-old but he couldn't bring himself to care. Not when it was 4am and he hadn't been laid in well over two months in spite of just coming off a break.
Somehow it didn't surprise him that Frank would tackle a man to relieve his tension on tour, but Ray? In all the years that he'd known him, he'd never even guessed that Ray had been anything other than straight and borderline asexual, what with the way he was always either glued to his laptop, his guitar, or both. Not that Gerard was one to talk.
Without even realizing it, his hand had crept to the crotch of his boxers, pawing at himself over top of the fabric, the sudden pressure catching him off guard until he realized the touch was his own.
His teeth grit hard and he could practically feel tears stinging in the corners of his eyes, horny and pissed off and exhausted but knowing he wouldn't get back to sleep until he dealt with it.
With a painful blush of shame, he reached below his waistband and started stroking, closing his eyes and putting more effort into keeping quiet than enjoying the act. The last thing he needed was someone hearing him jerk off in the middle of the night like the saddest mother fucker on the goddamn planet.
And in spite of his best efforts, the only image broadcasting through his mind as his hand tightened and his breath caught in pleasure was that of Frank's hand fisted hard into Ray's hair as their lips met and their tongues danced, carelessly making out in a shadowed backstage hallway somewhere in goddamn Finland.
He remembered that soft intake of breath that had grabbed his attention to the scene in the first place, echoing the memory with one of his own, biting his lip and stifling the little moan of pleasure that threatened to pass his lips as he got closer to the release he desired so badly.
Gerard didn't know what turned him on more: Frank, Ray, or the fact that they didn't know that he knew. The frontman persona under his skin loved that little thrill of power. For all he knew it had been a one time thing, but now his overactive paranoia was seeing the signs everywhere. The little clues that this could very well have been going on for years.
His cock twitched in his hand, hips tensing and back arching as his climax hit him ruthlessly, a soft whimper escaping his abused lip, teeth sinking into it hard enough to draw blood.
Wiping his hand on a napkin from the floor, Gerard let out a grumpy sigh and turned to his side, temper dulled for the time being. Tomorrow was another day on the road with no show, another day of pretending that everything was fine until they reached their next destination.
With an uneasy peace he finally drifted back to sleep, blissfully dreamless and free of familiar faces fucking each other.
~~~~~
"Dude, no way, that's like being asked to chose which of your parents to save from a burning building."
"Come on, just answer the question."
"No! I'm not gonna commit to anything like that, I need time to think, it's a serious question."
The question was which was a better comic-turned-movie: Sin City or 300. Gerard watched the exchange between Ray and Frank with growing interest though he hid it behind his laptop, aimlessly clicking about as he pretended to focus on World of Warcraft.
"Maybe if they weren't both Frank Miller, but picking one over the other just seems fucking blasphemous, dude," Ray sighed, chewing at his lower lip. He was perched on the edge of one of the tour buses' interior couches, looking at Frank with wide, thoughtful eyes. Frank was staring right back with a shit-eating grin plastered to his face, drumming on his knees and waiting gleefully for an answer as if he possessed the means to run off to Frank Miller himself and tattle on Ray's choice.
"Both of you knock it off, the answer's obvious. Sin City's a better comic and 300's a better movie. They balance each other out and are therefore equally awesome in separate categories."
That would be Bob, the resident zen master. Keeper of the peace and all-around badass. At least so far as Gerard was concerned.
Frank just blinked in response to the statement, thrown off center, and Ray was laughing, rising up off the couch to quest for a beer. Crossing the short distance to the tiny refrigerator, he pulled out a green bottle with the Rolling Rock logo facing the other occupants of the bus, wrenching a groan from Bob's throat.
"Dude, don't drink that shit, get a real beer."
"Hey, shut up," Ray mock-pouted, taking a long drink that earned another wince from Bob, chuckling as he padded back to the bunks to grab the latest issue of Nintendo Power or whatever the hell it was Ray amused himself with in his downtime.
Gerard's focus shifted to Frank, carefully not-watching over the cusp of his laptop. He'd grown accustomed to the other guys drinking in front of him, so when Matt rose for the fridge and asked the group if they needed anything, it didn't even phase him.
"Yeah man, toss me a Guinness," Bob answered, craning his neck towards the back of the bus as he added, "Since that's what real men drink!" earning a muffled "Fuck you!" in Ray's soft, high-octave voice.
Frank was giggling, knees brought up to his chest, arms wrapped tight, slightly rocking in place. He was one of those guys who could die of amusement with a brown paper bag over his head. Over the years, Gerard had neatly organized his thoughts and views on the other guys within his mind, needing to categorize; labels and explanations that at least made sense to him.
And Gerard had a deep love for Silly Frank.
For you see, there was Serious Frank; collected, cosmically wise, eyes narrowed enigmatically as he spoke of animal rights and scene politics and his hatred of homophobia, staring into your soul and pinning it to the wall, lifeless, like a scientist's butterfly.
There was Stage Frank; wild and and unchained, fucking his guitar and spitting on the crowd, tossing his sweaty hair out of his eyes as he showed the kids every possible sex face he had in his arsenal.
And then, occasionally, like now, there was Silly Frank. Donning thick framed glasses as he rambled about Harry Potter. Throwing himself into a game of kickball with reckless glee. Sneaking up behind Bob and climbing up onto his shoulders. Holding his new Xbox up high like a seven year old on Christmas morning.
Yes, Gerard had a deep love for Silly Frank.
"Hey, knock it off!" Ray's voice ripped through the air as Bob emerged from the bunks, waving a wireless PS3 controller above his head and out of Ray's reach.
"Dammit Bob, give it!"
"Maybe if you stop being such a pussy!"
Both were laughing, the key sign that neither was actually mad or malicious.
Gerard's eyes drank in the sight of Ray smiling, smiling like he meant it, with his eyes half closed and his cheeks stretched wide, showing off his teeth. It was moments of unplanned for happiness such as this in which Ray was truly beautiful.
The lead guitarist had once ragged on photoshoots, hating the instruction to pretend to be badass. Gerard had spent hours of his awkward adolescence staring at himself in a mirror, getting the look down of artfully disheveling his hair just so. But Ray would just smile with goofy insecurity or level the camera with a heavy gaze that only made him look high - or so Frank had once pointed out before getting clobbered for the comment.
No, Ray's attraction was far more subtle. There was an innocence about him that radiated outward, and in the eight or so odd years that Gerard had known him, the shift from not giving his appearance a second glance to stealing hidden looks on stage and backstage and everything in between had been so gradual that Gerard hadn't even noticed.
He had half a mind to actually get up off his ass and give Ray a hand, but the two men had already made their peace and were settling their differences back in Ray's bunk with a friendly bout of Burnout 3. Before they'd gone, he caught a swift, heated exchange of glances between the two guitarists, though Frank was now chatting up Cortez about some punk band that he apparently "had to fucking hear".
And in the midst of it all, Gerard sat silent, engrossed in his computer for all that the others could tell, slowly curling in on himself socially more and more as the band trekked across the country.
You'd think he saw nothing, his thoughts internal. But he saw everything. His silence and his bored, disinterested look only aiding his ability to eavesdrop, intentionally or otherwise.
And he noticed the underhanded mannerisms that were either forcefully being subdued or so ingrained as to become second nature between Frank and Ray. His spine tingled in guilt mixed with disgust mixed with voyeuristic excitement at the memory of what had opened the window to this hidden underlayer of interaction between the two men. These "normal" times of boredom and laughter were perhaps the most awkward of all for Gerard. He'd smile and laugh and not mention it despite that fact that it was all he could fucking think about these days.
The word obsession floated through his head like a plastic bag in the wind and he snarled at it. He was not obsessed, dammit. It was just disturbing to think of the fact that two of his best friends, two male best friends might be lovers. It was weird. And, though he'd never admit it, he was curious.
"Come on, try and tell me that Kashmir wouldn't be an awesome song to fuck to."
Frank's voice ripped through his train of thought, neck snapping around in time to see Cortez mask a blush and hear Bob chime in with "Totally!" from the back.
"What?" Gerard exclaimed in genuine confusion before he could stop himself, eyes widening a bit as he spoke, surprised at himself. Frank seemed just as shocked, turning to look at Gerard with a curious stare before his eyes narrowed deviously.
"You know, Gee. Kashmir. It's a sexy fucking song."
"Frank, everything's sexy to you," Matt teased, flipping a page in the magazine he wasn't reading.
"That may be true," the rhythm guitarist laughed in response, smacking Cortez playfully on the arm. "But you're the one who brought it up and that's my answer. What the hell were you expecting me to say, some fucking Justin Timberlake song?"
Matt just shrugged with a smirk and took a swig of his beer, content to let the subject drop.
Gerard let out what he hoped sounded like an amused laugh, shaking his head a little and turning his attention back to his computer. Frank was mollified enough with his issue of Fangoria to fall into silence, legs crossed and foot twitching in a rhythm known only to him as he let the magazine absorb him.
~~~~~
"Gerard's acting weird," Ray murmured absently, taking a drag off with his back to the red brick wall of the interstate rest stop.
"Gerard's always weird," Frank replied, reaching for the cigarette without asking. Not needing to. Not after all this time.
"Pfft, so are you then," Ray chuckled, giving Frank's ribs a soft jab with his elbow.
"I never denied that."
Both men were smiling, drifting in and our of comfortable silences as they took advantage of this chance to get off the bus and catch some fresh air.
The irony, Ray mused as he reached for another cigarette, content to let Frank keep his. In theory, they were both trying to quit.
In theory, they were also both heterosexual men with girlfriends.
"I'm being serious," Ray continued after leaning close for the flame of Frank's lighter, letting out a long sigh and dropping his head back against the wall, cushioned by his hair. "He was doing so great in Europe, happier than he'd been in fucking forever. And now it's like he's just paranoid or something. Like one of us is gonna attack him. I dunno, I feel like I should talk to him."
Frank gestured with a 'by all means' wave of his hand in the general direction of the buses. He was a man of no nonsense. The one person in your life that you could always count on never lying to you, on the sole factor of loving to tell the brutal, honest truth too goddamn much.
"Yeah, I know," Ray sighed to the silent response. "I'm just worried that it's gonna start something and we've got a show tomorrow. I don't want to stress him out."
"Toro, you think too much." Frank reached for his cellphone as he felt it buzz in his pocket, checking the brief text message and exclaiming a loud "What the fuck!" with his cigarette still dangling from his bottom lip.
"What is it?" Ray asked with an edge of concern to his voice, brow narrowing in worry at Frank's irritated body language.
"Brian's being a dick," he laughed roughly, jumping to his feet with a groan of effort and tossing the phone in Ray's direction before setting off to the bus without looking back, his laughter still filling the calm air surrounding the area.
Ray caught the phone in one hand, rising slower, not possessing Frank's endless source of energy. As he set about following the other man he glanced down to read the message still blinking on the screen, letting out a laugh of his own as he did so.
Get back on the bus or Toro won't be the only one we leave behind this time.
~~~~~
Gerard narrowed his eyes behind thick sunglasses as he stared out at the empty field. The space that would soon be full of crowd. It was 6am and by all logic it was too early for this shit, the hour positively unholy if you were to ask him. Left to his own devices, Gerard would easily sleep past noon, simply to get a normal amount of rest after staying up until the sun rose.
The vampire jokes were almost too easy.
Bob was around somewhere, perched on an amp surrounded by eager stage techs who were drinking in his little pep talk before the arduous task began of constructing his custom-made drum monstrosity. Ray was geeking out with the sound guys, nothing short of eager and helpful, never once treading into the territory of elitism in spite of his decorated experience.
Frank and Cortez were probably still asleep, like the rest of sane humanity.
Sitting down on the edge of the stage with a sigh, Gerard flipped through the art book the tour was selling that featured a piece of his. He smiled at the sight of his name in print next to the medium he'd once feared would go nowhere for him.
The book also had some of Ray's photography, and he flushed a little with pride for his friend. Ray, when it came to his own skill at anything, was the definition of modest at best, self deprecating at worst. It had taken a good amount of urging and cajoling on the part of the rest of the band to get him to submit his work to the book.
His eyes were drawn to a particular shot, a close up of a Marshall amp. It brought a wide smile to his face, clearly able to imagine Ray sprawled out on the floor to get the perfect angle, biting his lip and ass in the air, oblivious to how silly he looked.
"Good, isn't it?" Frank asked, close enough to speak at the level of Gerard's ear, sending a jolt of surprise up the older man's spine that rocked his core.
Gerard's cheek's flushed hotly, wondering just how long Frank had seen him fawning over Ray's section of the book.
"Yeah, it is," he responded softly after he got his bearings back, turning his head just enough to look Frank in the eyes. "What the hell are you doing up, anyway?"
"Couldn't sleep, I'm pretty jazzed. Coffee?" From behind his back, Frank produced two paper cups full to the brim with Gerard's drug of choice.
"Have I told you lately that I love you?"
"You grab my ass on stage often enough."
That certainly earned a choked laugh, reaching for the offered cup with a grin of thanks, scooting over a bit so that Frank could sit down next to him. They usually didn't talk about their stage antics. Such things were left to spontaneousness and the "heat of the moment" or whatever. Ever since the early days, Gerard fucking with the other guys during shows was just part of the theater of it all. It was good for the occasional punch-line though, and Frank was nothing if not a master of comedic timing.
"About that," Frank murmured idly, kicking his feet back and forth over the edge of the stage, taking on the appearance of a care-free child. "Think we should kick it up a notch for this tour?"
"Meaning?" Gerard asked slowly, thrown off guard by the subject though he had a pretty damn good idea of what Frank was going at.
"The ass grabbing," Frank laughed, arching a mischievous eyebrow in Gerard's direction with a wry smirk. "I mean, after Download we'd better do something." He paused for a moment to take in the frontman's shocked expression, giggling and managing a loud, "What?"
"I... I dunno, we've just never.... you know, talked about it first before."
Plus, wouldn't Ray get mad? The sentence hung heavy at the front of his thoughts, unspoken as he spurted out the lame excuse for his discomfort. He felt like a dick for even thinking it but the notion wouldn't leave him alone.
Frank just stared at him, letting the silence build to the point of no return before he finally blurted out, "Don't tell me you're gonna get all nervous now!"
"I'm not! I just like to go with what feels right, okay? Do you want me to be pulling you aside before every show and going 'Okay, here I'm gonna grab your crotch, and during this song we can like, lick each other or something'?"
Frank's only response was an elegantly raised eyebrow, suddenly making Gerard feel very young and awkward in spite of being five years Frank's senior.
Besides, there was another reason he'd rather not plan it all out ahead of time. And that was so that he wouldn't be anxiously awaiting what Frank would do to him.
Especially since new information pointed towards the fact that Frank kissed boys for other reasons than shock value.
Though he'd rather die than voice those concerns.
"All right," Frank said slowly, still giving him that cheshire smile that warned of horrible, wonderful things to come. "We'll see what happens. Just remember how much these kids shelled out to look at us, okay?"
With that Frank jumped up and strode off to peruse the guitar racks backstage, intercepting one of his techs and falling into immediate conversation, leaving Gerard with a quickly cooling cup of coffee and a greatly shaken peace of mind.
~~~~~
"You're right, he is acting weird," Frank sighed, arms folded on a stack of amps, head tilted to one side as he looked at Ray.
"What happened?"
"Well, I asked him if he thought we should do anything raunchy for the crowd and he curled in on himself like I'd just asked him to Prom."
Ray burst out laughing, unable to help himself with the mental image.
His laughter was contagious and soon Frank was giggling as well, the recent lack of sleep only adding to the humor of the situation. One man would catch his breath, only to look at the other, setting them both off again.
It was Ray who calmed first, twisting around so that his back rested against one of the stage's support poles. "Sorry, it's fucking funny," he smirked, taking a deep breath. "I can totally picture it."
"So what the fuck then?" Frank sighed, tugging off his hat to run his fingers through his dark, shaggy hair. "It's like he's scared of me or something."
"Now whose thinking too much?" Ray grinned, his expression easy and unconcerned. "Dude, it's Gerard. He's not himself on stage. The way you guys slobber all over each other doesn't mean he's gonna want to talk about it afterwards. It's a character."
Frank's hand twitched as he started to reach for a cigarette, stopping though when his eyes locked with Brian's who stood a few dozen feet away, talking with one of the Placebo guys. Brian, who Frank had entrusted to make sure he'd at least try to quit smoking.
He growled low in his throat, knowing he'd need to deal with his nerves in some other way. Or not at all, given his luck lately.
It was only a week or so into the massive tour and Frank was already feeling the consequences of playing outdoor venues alongside an army of other bands and their crews.
No privacy. At all.
"This was a hell of a lot easier when we were playing arenas," he muttered crankily, eyes darting over to lock with Ray's just long enough to get his meaning across.
Ray offered a small, understanding smile.
He knew that Frank wasn't talking about Gerard anymore.
~~~~~
Gerard let out a long sigh, hiding between buses in the locked parking lot with his iPod. He hated warming up in front of other people. Which he knew was hypocritical, given how many he was warming up for.
Mr. Brightside ended and he took a deep breath, clicking through the tracks to find another.
Something with a good range. Nothing too long. And would hopefully ease his jangled nerves.
He smirked as he came across Iron Maiden's Aces High.
Glad that no one else was around he really let himself get into it, closing his eyes and tensing his leg in beat with the song during the genre-typical middle bridge that he could easily imagine Ray picking apart in high school, determined to figure it out. With a grin he cranked the volume, tossing his hair as he wailed along with Bruce Dickinson.
The song left him pumped, giggling even as he struck a dramatic pose on the finishing beat, not even bothering to look for another in his playlist, just laughing breathlessly and doubling over to grip at his knees.
So when the opening chords of Kashmir thundered through his earbuds he couldn't have been less prepared. It was like an icy bucket of water had been dumped over his head and he practically gasped in surprise.
"Come on, try and tell me that Kashmir wouldn't be an awesome song to fuck to."
"You know, Gee. Kashmir. It's a sexy fucking song."
His eyes widened and his breath caught in his throat, tensing as if he'd been caught doing something shameful.
Faded memories of his dreams flitted through his mind, moving in perfect sync to the heavy strings.
Kashmir wasn't something that you sang along to. Kashmir sang to you. Swept you away and fucking took you somewhere.
He'd once, long ago, commented that listening to it was better than drugs. Granted, he'd been stoned out of his mind at the time and Mikey had just looked at him as if he's said the most profound thing either of them had ever heard.
Part of him wanted to switch it immediately, embarrassed by the association with Frank's sex life, the image of him and Ray kissing lighting up every corner of his mind and leaving no room for anything else. But the heavy notes roped him in, sinking claws into his heart, demanding that he let it run it's course.
Gerard slowly sank to his knees and sat back against one of the buses' massive wheels, his eyes falling closed as he let the melody have it's ancient way with him. The progressions were haunting and apparently the force behind the blood that pounded through his veins. His lips moved soundlessly, the memory of the lyrics dredged up from childhood and branded into his synapses, never to be forgotten.
"I am a traveler of both time and space, to be where I have been..."
The world melted away around him, leaving him with only the ground and the song. There was no tour, no pressure, no impending concert that required his voice.
Only this.
And as the song played it's way through, he couldn't help but reach a sort of cosmic realization.
Frank was right. This would be a good song to fuck to.
Gerard smiled slowly, the weight of his years lifting away. He thought of the show that was to come in mere hours. Of his own inhibitions, his own problems, all the fucking hang-ups that had been plaguing his peace of mind since they'd started their headlining tour.
"Just remember how much these kids shelled out to look at us, okay?"
Frank was right about a lot of things.
part 2