033. ficlet: around in the lost and found.

May 08, 2008 13:49

around in the lost and found.
bandom. gee and frankie, with bonus mikey. pg. 600 words.

for kla, because there is not enough kid fic in the world.
and thanks to chloe, who helped immensely.

Gee sits alone in a corner of the cafeteria with his backpack set up on the table as a barrier to the students around him, blocking his face from view. He sniffles quietly to himself, rubbing his eyes with fingers smudged with black pencil lead as he bends over his favorite notebook. The one his grandma bought for him with The Last Unicorn on the cover.

He wishes he was at home in his room with Mikey, teaching him about comic books, and not here at school where there are kids who steal lunch money and make fun of his drawings. (Mikey never does that. He thinks his drawings are cool. And so does his grandma. She thinks he’s creative.)

He’s just finished drawing a zombie holding its own head in its arms to join the other zombies and ghosts that are all chasing after Aaron Matthews and his merry, mean band of fourth-grader friends when another backpack is slammed onto the table in front of him.

Gee automatically pulls his notebook to his chest as he looks up. There’s this tiny kid across the table and opening a Batman lunchbox and smiling at him. “Hi!” he says brightly. “I’m Frank.” Gee glances around surreptitiously to make sure there’s no one else around.

There isn’t.

He murmurs a quiet and quick greeting before looking back down to the notebook in his lap, avoiding Frank and his lunch. (He’s so hungry. He has no lunch money and he’d missed breakfast this morning too.) He turns the page and starts drawing a mummy inside a bat-filled crypt when a pointed cough comes from Frank’s direction.

“Um, what?” he asks, confused.

“Hi, I’m Frank,” he repeats, bobbing his head. He gazes back and forth between the two of them eagerly.

Gee looks down to his hands before hesitantly saying, “I’m Gee.”

Frank’s smile widens. “I like your backpack,” he gestures to Gee’s purple bag with Donatello on the front. “My favorite’s Raphael though. He’s totally kick-ass.” He leans over the table. “So what’re drawing? Is that a mummy? That’s so cool.”

“Thanks,” Gee blushes.

“So what else do you draw? Can you draw zombies?” Frank crawls over the table, ignoring the shout of the cafeteria monitor. (“Tables are for food and not for people, Frank Iero!”) “Where’d you learn to draw? Is that a The Last Unicorn notebook? Awesome!”

“My grandma gave it to me,” Gee says, smiling. “She bought the movie for me and my brother, Mikey, too.”

“That’s so neat,” Frank says as he takes a bite out of his sandwich. Gee’s stomach rumbles. Frank looks up from the notebook and pushes half of his peanut butter and grape jelly sandwich towards Gee.

Gee smiles shyly as he picks up the sandwich. They eat quietly before Frank offers his Juicy Juice juice-box to Gee too. “So,” Frank says as he watches Gee take a sip. “Want some of my Fruit Gushers?”

Epilogue: in which Mikey loves unicorns.

“Mikey, have you seen my Last Unicorn notebook?” Mikey clutches Sunbeam, the stuffed unicorn that his grandma made for him and shakes his head no as he watches his brother run by. “I thought I left it in the kitchen.”

“Gee! Come on,” Frank is standing by the front door, bouncing impatiently. “You can use my Hulk notebook. I want to watch Mr. Lawson feed the snake! We need ringside seats!”

Mikey watches as Gee gives a final desperate look around the room, before Frank grabs his hand and drags him out of the house.

Mikey waits until he’s sure they’re gone before getting Gee’s notebook out from under his mattress.

fic., public.

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