Without You is How I Disappear
Title: Without You is How I Disappear
Author: heroes_and_cons
Pairing: Frank/Gerard
Rating: R for language
Word Count: ~1,862
Synopsis: AU Frerard, in which Gerard has the ability to time travel
Disclaimer: do not own, etc etc. thank you ellipsisaddict for the idea :)
1988
As people grow, they inevitably shed their skin like layers, discarding old habits or looks or beliefs for new ones. But there are certain unmistakable things about someone that will always remain with them - the way that they walk, whether their smile meets their lips or their eyes first, how they annunciate specific sounds.
It is to this end, then, that Gerard knows exactly who he is looking for.
He leans against the sidewall of a convenience store and lights a cigarette, trying to look as inconspicuous as possible, which is difficult when he is standing feet away from the gates of St. Mary’s Elementary School. Mothers begin to congregate along the sidewalk, and every time one of them glances over at him, Gerard averts his gaze.
As Gerard pulls up the sleeve of his leather jacket to check the time, the school bell rings; within minutes, the front doors are thrown open, and a stampede of children fly down the steps. Gerard inhales once more before dropping his cigarette on the ground and toeing out the embers.
He is one of the last kids to come through the doors, visibly straining against their weight. His eyes, bright vermilion, squint in the sunlight and he stumbles down the stone steps. Gerard does not move from his spot by the convenience store as the boy makes his way through the school gates.
“Excuse me?”
The boy freezes in mid-step, about ten feet away. His eyes are wide and glossy, his lips turned into a crooked half-smile, half-grimace.
“Hi,” Gerard says, taking a slight step forward. “I was wondering if you could help me out with something.”
The boy shifts his weight from one foot to the other. “My mom says I’m not supposed to talk to strangers.”
“I just need you to tell me where the bus stop is.”
“What’s your name? I think I know you.”
Gerard raises an eyebrow. He kneels down, so that he is at eye-level with the boy. “My name is Gerard. Have we met before?”
“Maybe. I’m Frank.”
Gerard smiles. “Hi, Frank.” He is still a good five feet away, very aware of the mothers that are shooting darting glances in his direction. “Listen, Frank,” Gerard says, lowering his voice a little. “Can I tell you something? Something important?”
Frank nods.
Gerard chews on his lower lip. “Now, this is going to sound strange, okay? But it’s important. And I want you to remember this. When you grow up, you’re going to fall in love with someone very special. And that person that you love…sometimes, you might get really mad at them. And I just want you to remember that that person loves you very much, despite all the things they’ve done. Okay?”
Frank nods again. His eyes meet Gerard’s for a fleeting moment before he takes a step back.
Gerard stands, shoving his hands in his pockets. “I have to go now. It was nice meeting you, Frank.”
“I didn’t tell you where the bus stop is,” Frank says.
“It’s okay,” Gerard shrugs, taking a step in the opposite direction. “I’ll find it eventually.”
2008
Frank leans against the kitchen sink, his shoulders hunched so that his collarbones carve deep dimples into his skin. Gerard can see Frank’s body visibly tense as he walks into the room, even though Frank’s eyes are closed.
“Did you have a nice time?”
“You made dinner,” Gerard comments, noticing the plate of cold chicken and mashed potatoes on the table.
“You can’t fucking run away every goddamn time we have a fight, Gerard,” Frank says, his voice rising. He turns, folding his arms across his chest. “Where’d you go this time? A speakeasy in the 1920s? New York City in the ‘70s? The future?”
“I didn’t-”
“No, no, humor me. Tell me, please, wherever did you go to forget about me?”
Gerard pulls out a chair from underneath the table and collapses on it, exhausted. “When you grow up, you’re going to fall in love with someone very special. And I just want you to remember that that person loves you very much, despite all the things they’ve done.”
For a moment, there is nothing but heavy silence in the space between them. Frank’s eyes darken, and he moves away from the sink.
“It’s not fair. It’s not fucking fair! You can take twenty minutes of my time to go back and fucking…change my life?” He sighs, rests his forehead against the refrigerator. “I knew that was you. Fucking knew it.”
“But I meant it,” Gerard says.
“You only said it because half an hour ago, we were screaming at each other! It takes you seconds to go back and say something like that, but it happened to me twenty years ago. You know what that fucking did to me?”
“It’s true, though.” Gerard stands, taking a step towards Frank. “I still love you. Despite the things I’ve done.”
Frank stares at Gerard, his face softening slightly. “I wish we were normal,” he murmurs.
“We are normal.” Gerard reaches for Frank’s hand, intertwining their fingers. “We fight and we make up.”
Frank pulls his hand back. “No,” he says fiercely. “We fight, you go back in time because you think you can magically make all of this better, and at the end of the day I feel fucking betrayed.”
Frank pushes past Gerard, starting for the door. “Frank-”
“I’m going to bed,” Frank calls, not bothering to stop. “Maybe you should take the couch tonight.”
1994
Gerard finds him in the park. Or, more accurately, he finds Gerard.
“Can I bum one of those?”
Gerard exhales, the cloud of smoke prominent against the chilly fall air. “Nah,” he mutters. “You’re just a kid.” He leans his elbows on his knees, sitting on top of a picnic table.
Frank is slightly chubbier at thirteen than as an adult, but Gerard finds it endearing - it reminds him of his own adolescent years. “Am not,” Frank protests.
Gerard shakes his head. “You’re thirteen.”
Frank frowns, tugging at the hem of his jacket. “How the hell do you know that?”
“I…just guessed. You’re too young to be smoking.”
“Am not,” Frank repeats. He boldly sits down next to Gerard. “I’m in a band.”
“Oh, yeah?” Gerard smiles. “What do you play?”
“Guitar. A lot of great guitar players smoke.”
“That doesn’t mean you have to.” Gerard tosses the cigarette butt on the ground and steps on it. “Smoking can give you cancer and shit.”
“You smoke.”
“I’m old,” Gerard counters. He glances over at Frank, gets a closer look at him. He’s wearing a black jacket and tattered jeans. His hair is a little long in the front, falling over his dark eyes.
“I don’t think being old gives you any more of a right.”
Gerard presses his lips together, fighting a smile. Frank had always been, always would be, a fighter, on all counts.
“Don’t you have somewhere to be? It’s a Saturday.” Gerard rakes a hand through his messy hair.
Frank ducks his chin, his guard falling just enough for Gerard to catch a glimpse of his vulnerability. “No. I don’t have many friends.”
Gerard now wishes, more than anything, that he’d been around when Frank was thirteen and he was seventeen. He’d have been more of a friend than any of the kids Frank went to school with. This, he supposes, is the best he can do.
“I didn’t have many friends when I was in grade school,” Gerard murmurs. “Some days, it really sucked. Actually, almost every day, it really sucked. But I look back on it now, and…” he shrugs. “It gets better.”
Gerard stands and steps off the picnic table, dusting his jeans. “Keep playing guitar, okay? And you’ll be great someday.”
Frank does not say anything, but merely watches with the concave palms of his hands pressed together. He sits and he stares as Gerard saunters out of the park, not bothering to turn back again.
2008
Around two in the morning, when Gerard returns, he slips off his shoes and tiptoes down the hall. For a moment, he presses his ear against their bedroom door before gingerly pushing it open.
Frank is curled into the fetal position, half of the blankets kicked off to the side. His arms are folded so that his hands are clasped underneath his chin, almost as if he is deep in prayer. Gerard noiselessly peels off his jacket and sets it on the chair before crawling into the empty space next to Frank.
“Gerard…” Frank stirs, unfolding himself and blinking. He runs a hand over his face and shifts so that he is closer to Gerard’s body. “Where’d you go?”
“When you were thirteen, in the park. You remember that?” Gerard reaches over, gently stroking Frank’s obsidian-black hair.
Frank smiles slightly, his eyelids still heavy with sleep. “You reminded me of someone I’d seen before, but I couldn’t remember where…and after that, I started looking for you again the park. Looking for the guy with the cigarettes.”
“I’m sorry,” Gerard whispers, kissing the crown of Frank’s head. He smells overwhelmingly familiar, of cinnamon and aftershave.
“How do I die?”
Gerard is caught off guard, and he pulls away for a moment. “What?”
“Tell me,” Frank smiles, curling up against Gerard’s body. “I want to know.”
“No. No, no way! That’s too weird.”
“Right, because everything else about your little time-traveling gift is totally normal. Come on, please?”
Gerard rolls his eyes. “I couldn’t even if I wanted to.”
“I’m immortal?” Frank grins.
“I’ve never been to the future.”
Frank sits up, his green eyes widening. “Really? Never?”
Gerard folds his arms behind his head, smiling. “That’s surprising?”
Frank shrugs, resting his head against Gerard’s shoulder. “Seems like the most obvious place to go, you know?”
“I’d rather go back in time and alter something small, then go into the future and have all of that weighing down on me.”
Frank buries his head against Gerard’s chest, and it’s quiet for a moment. “I think you’re afraid of what you might see,” Frank whispers.
Gerard knows just as well as Frank that this is, to some degree, true. He’s terrified of what the future could hold, yet simultaneously excited by it.
Gerard waits until Frank’s breathing becomes even and slow, then carefully maneuvers himself out from underneath Frank’s weight. He grabs his jacket, slips out of the bedroom, and laces up his boots once again.
For once, he’s not quite sure where he is going to wind up. He’s not quite sure what, or who, it is that he’ll be looking for; he’s not quite sure of how much everything will have changed. Unlike the past, the future is markedly uncertain. He cannot be sure that he’ll be alive in five years, much less that he’ll still be with Frank.
Gerard sighs, closes his eyes, and disappears.
Author: heroes_and_cons
Pairing: Frank/Gerard
Rating: R for language
Word Count: ~1,862
Synopsis: AU Frerard, in which Gerard has the ability to time travel
Disclaimer: do not own, etc etc. thank you ellipsisaddict for the idea :)
1988
As people grow, they inevitably shed their skin like layers, discarding old habits or looks or beliefs for new ones. But there are certain unmistakable things about someone that will always remain with them - the way that they walk, whether their smile meets their lips or their eyes first, how they annunciate specific sounds.
It is to this end, then, that Gerard knows exactly who he is looking for.
He leans against the sidewall of a convenience store and lights a cigarette, trying to look as inconspicuous as possible, which is difficult when he is standing feet away from the gates of St. Mary’s Elementary School. Mothers begin to congregate along the sidewalk, and every time one of them glances over at him, Gerard averts his gaze.
As Gerard pulls up the sleeve of his leather jacket to check the time, the school bell rings; within minutes, the front doors are thrown open, and a stampede of children fly down the steps. Gerard inhales once more before dropping his cigarette on the ground and toeing out the embers.
He is one of the last kids to come through the doors, visibly straining against their weight. His eyes, bright vermilion, squint in the sunlight and he stumbles down the stone steps. Gerard does not move from his spot by the convenience store as the boy makes his way through the school gates.
“Excuse me?”
The boy freezes in mid-step, about ten feet away. His eyes are wide and glossy, his lips turned into a crooked half-smile, half-grimace.
“Hi,” Gerard says, taking a slight step forward. “I was wondering if you could help me out with something.”
The boy shifts his weight from one foot to the other. “My mom says I’m not supposed to talk to strangers.”
“I just need you to tell me where the bus stop is.”
“What’s your name? I think I know you.”
Gerard raises an eyebrow. He kneels down, so that he is at eye-level with the boy. “My name is Gerard. Have we met before?”
“Maybe. I’m Frank.”
Gerard smiles. “Hi, Frank.” He is still a good five feet away, very aware of the mothers that are shooting darting glances in his direction. “Listen, Frank,” Gerard says, lowering his voice a little. “Can I tell you something? Something important?”
Frank nods.
Gerard chews on his lower lip. “Now, this is going to sound strange, okay? But it’s important. And I want you to remember this. When you grow up, you’re going to fall in love with someone very special. And that person that you love…sometimes, you might get really mad at them. And I just want you to remember that that person loves you very much, despite all the things they’ve done. Okay?”
Frank nods again. His eyes meet Gerard’s for a fleeting moment before he takes a step back.
Gerard stands, shoving his hands in his pockets. “I have to go now. It was nice meeting you, Frank.”
“I didn’t tell you where the bus stop is,” Frank says.
“It’s okay,” Gerard shrugs, taking a step in the opposite direction. “I’ll find it eventually.”
2008
Frank leans against the kitchen sink, his shoulders hunched so that his collarbones carve deep dimples into his skin. Gerard can see Frank’s body visibly tense as he walks into the room, even though Frank’s eyes are closed.
“Did you have a nice time?”
“You made dinner,” Gerard comments, noticing the plate of cold chicken and mashed potatoes on the table.
“You can’t fucking run away every goddamn time we have a fight, Gerard,” Frank says, his voice rising. He turns, folding his arms across his chest. “Where’d you go this time? A speakeasy in the 1920s? New York City in the ‘70s? The future?”
“I didn’t-”
“No, no, humor me. Tell me, please, wherever did you go to forget about me?”
Gerard pulls out a chair from underneath the table and collapses on it, exhausted. “When you grow up, you’re going to fall in love with someone very special. And I just want you to remember that that person loves you very much, despite all the things they’ve done.”
For a moment, there is nothing but heavy silence in the space between them. Frank’s eyes darken, and he moves away from the sink.
“It’s not fair. It’s not fucking fair! You can take twenty minutes of my time to go back and fucking…change my life?” He sighs, rests his forehead against the refrigerator. “I knew that was you. Fucking knew it.”
“But I meant it,” Gerard says.
“You only said it because half an hour ago, we were screaming at each other! It takes you seconds to go back and say something like that, but it happened to me twenty years ago. You know what that fucking did to me?”
“It’s true, though.” Gerard stands, taking a step towards Frank. “I still love you. Despite the things I’ve done.”
Frank stares at Gerard, his face softening slightly. “I wish we were normal,” he murmurs.
“We are normal.” Gerard reaches for Frank’s hand, intertwining their fingers. “We fight and we make up.”
Frank pulls his hand back. “No,” he says fiercely. “We fight, you go back in time because you think you can magically make all of this better, and at the end of the day I feel fucking betrayed.”
Frank pushes past Gerard, starting for the door. “Frank-”
“I’m going to bed,” Frank calls, not bothering to stop. “Maybe you should take the couch tonight.”
1994
Gerard finds him in the park. Or, more accurately, he finds Gerard.
“Can I bum one of those?”
Gerard exhales, the cloud of smoke prominent against the chilly fall air. “Nah,” he mutters. “You’re just a kid.” He leans his elbows on his knees, sitting on top of a picnic table.
Frank is slightly chubbier at thirteen than as an adult, but Gerard finds it endearing - it reminds him of his own adolescent years. “Am not,” Frank protests.
Gerard shakes his head. “You’re thirteen.”
Frank frowns, tugging at the hem of his jacket. “How the hell do you know that?”
“I…just guessed. You’re too young to be smoking.”
“Am not,” Frank repeats. He boldly sits down next to Gerard. “I’m in a band.”
“Oh, yeah?” Gerard smiles. “What do you play?”
“Guitar. A lot of great guitar players smoke.”
“That doesn’t mean you have to.” Gerard tosses the cigarette butt on the ground and steps on it. “Smoking can give you cancer and shit.”
“You smoke.”
“I’m old,” Gerard counters. He glances over at Frank, gets a closer look at him. He’s wearing a black jacket and tattered jeans. His hair is a little long in the front, falling over his dark eyes.
“I don’t think being old gives you any more of a right.”
Gerard presses his lips together, fighting a smile. Frank had always been, always would be, a fighter, on all counts.
“Don’t you have somewhere to be? It’s a Saturday.” Gerard rakes a hand through his messy hair.
Frank ducks his chin, his guard falling just enough for Gerard to catch a glimpse of his vulnerability. “No. I don’t have many friends.”
Gerard now wishes, more than anything, that he’d been around when Frank was thirteen and he was seventeen. He’d have been more of a friend than any of the kids Frank went to school with. This, he supposes, is the best he can do.
“I didn’t have many friends when I was in grade school,” Gerard murmurs. “Some days, it really sucked. Actually, almost every day, it really sucked. But I look back on it now, and…” he shrugs. “It gets better.”
Gerard stands and steps off the picnic table, dusting his jeans. “Keep playing guitar, okay? And you’ll be great someday.”
Frank does not say anything, but merely watches with the concave palms of his hands pressed together. He sits and he stares as Gerard saunters out of the park, not bothering to turn back again.
2008
Around two in the morning, when Gerard returns, he slips off his shoes and tiptoes down the hall. For a moment, he presses his ear against their bedroom door before gingerly pushing it open.
Frank is curled into the fetal position, half of the blankets kicked off to the side. His arms are folded so that his hands are clasped underneath his chin, almost as if he is deep in prayer. Gerard noiselessly peels off his jacket and sets it on the chair before crawling into the empty space next to Frank.
“Gerard…” Frank stirs, unfolding himself and blinking. He runs a hand over his face and shifts so that he is closer to Gerard’s body. “Where’d you go?”
“When you were thirteen, in the park. You remember that?” Gerard reaches over, gently stroking Frank’s obsidian-black hair.
Frank smiles slightly, his eyelids still heavy with sleep. “You reminded me of someone I’d seen before, but I couldn’t remember where…and after that, I started looking for you again the park. Looking for the guy with the cigarettes.”
“I’m sorry,” Gerard whispers, kissing the crown of Frank’s head. He smells overwhelmingly familiar, of cinnamon and aftershave.
“How do I die?”
Gerard is caught off guard, and he pulls away for a moment. “What?”
“Tell me,” Frank smiles, curling up against Gerard’s body. “I want to know.”
“No. No, no way! That’s too weird.”
“Right, because everything else about your little time-traveling gift is totally normal. Come on, please?”
Gerard rolls his eyes. “I couldn’t even if I wanted to.”
“I’m immortal?” Frank grins.
“I’ve never been to the future.”
Frank sits up, his green eyes widening. “Really? Never?”
Gerard folds his arms behind his head, smiling. “That’s surprising?”
Frank shrugs, resting his head against Gerard’s shoulder. “Seems like the most obvious place to go, you know?”
“I’d rather go back in time and alter something small, then go into the future and have all of that weighing down on me.”
Frank buries his head against Gerard’s chest, and it’s quiet for a moment. “I think you’re afraid of what you might see,” Frank whispers.
Gerard knows just as well as Frank that this is, to some degree, true. He’s terrified of what the future could hold, yet simultaneously excited by it.
Gerard waits until Frank’s breathing becomes even and slow, then carefully maneuvers himself out from underneath Frank’s weight. He grabs his jacket, slips out of the bedroom, and laces up his boots once again.
For once, he’s not quite sure where he is going to wind up. He’s not quite sure what, or who, it is that he’ll be looking for; he’s not quite sure of how much everything will have changed. Unlike the past, the future is markedly uncertain. He cannot be sure that he’ll be alive in five years, much less that he’ll still be with Frank.
Gerard sighs, closes his eyes, and disappears.