Gerard’s POV

To a bystander we probably looked like a group of teens on our way to do no good, but in reality we were on our way to band practice. Actually, I was on my way to band practice, but I had an entire entourage. Mikey, Adam and Ivy were all walking down the street with me on our way to the Iero house. I figured that it would be a good idea to go to every single band practice from now on. Everyone had been really cool about me skipping out on the others, but something told me they wouldn’t be so forgiving if I pulled the same stunt twice. Besides, I couldn’t avoid Frank forever.

We haven’t spoken again since the gig. There had been that heated conversation before the show and everything that followed after that had been nothing important, just simple exchanges of pleasantries. Things have reached a point where we either had to move forward or move in separate directions.

I wasn’t going to make a big deal out of it. If Frank wanted to throw another tantrum, that was his problem. I wouldn’t entertain his fits anymore. Adam was going to be present today anyway which meant that he was going to have my attention instead. Mikey would also be there for backup if necessary.

“I’m glad to see that you listen,” Adam stated, walking next to me with his hand in mine. “When I told you to give it your all and find band mates who are good at playing their instruments.”

I recalled a conversation we had had some time ago in the diner and smiled. “I was lucky enough to have them find me.”

“Either way this is cool,” he said with a grin.

“You guys can totally own skate festivals around the country,” Ivy gave her opinion from Adam’s other side. “Adam can be the skate champ and you can play the show. It’ll be epic. I can be your touring groupie.”

“What about me?” Mikey wanted to know.

“There will be more than enough room for both of you,” Adam assured them as we turned onto the garden path and found everyone else waiting for us in the garage.

It was a full house with everyone’s other halves present. There was barely enough room for everyone, but we somehow made it work.

“I’m glad to see you here,” Frank said, approaching me. “I guess I managed to talk some sense into you the other night.”

I stuck my tongue out at him. “Whatever. I made a commitment to the band and it’s time that I stick to it.”

“Good.” He turned away from me and sat down on the armrest of the couch next to where Lisa was sitting.

Everything was so strangely normal. I guess I expected Frank to still be in a mood, but he was simply the kid who had become my best friend. I didn’t know what they were talking about, but at one point Frank brought his hand up and pinched her cheek in a cute little gesture.

“I suck at instruments too. The only thing I’m actually good at is art.” It was Ivy’s voice and she was talking to my brother and Adam. “Not that I’m complaining. I’m totally going to be a better artist than Gerard one day.”

“You wish,” I playfully responded.

“I can teach you to play the bass if you wanted to. It’s really not that hard,” Mikey offered.

“Then you can be better than him too,” Adam laughed. “I’ll be the only person you can’t beat.”

“Yeah yeah, come on.” I laughed and flung an arm around his neck, pulling him over to where the twins and Bob were talking.

We practiced for nearly three hours before finally deciding that we had done enough for one day. Besides, our audience was becoming restless. None of them had planned to be sitting there that long. They probably ran out of things to talk about anyway.

“You guys work together so well,” Adam commented. “I would have lost it by now with so many different ideas and opinions.”

“This was them playing nice,” Lisa informed him. “I’ve seen them really fight it out. It gets messy sometimes.”

I smiled at her and turned my attention to Adam. “Things ran smoothly today. Tomorrow might well be a completely different story. We’re probably still running on high after the gig.”

“Okay, we have a lot of souls here. You know what that means.” Scary happily clapped her hands together before running off in search of a bottle.

“Do they ever do anything else?” I heard myself asking, because this was ridiculous by any standards. I hated this game, because it never ended well.

Frank dropped the towel he had been using to wipe the sweat from his face and pulled Lisa to her feet just as Scary returned.

“Everyone gather around.”

“We’re heading out,” Frank told her with Lisa by his side. My head swiftly turned in his direction, surprised by his words, because Frank usually lived for this game.

“Uh, no, you’re not.” Scary said definitely.

“This game is kind of getting old,” he replied.

“That’s the point. We have fresh blood tonight,” she argued, pointing at Mikey and Adam.

Frank started in the direction of the door. “I’m not in the mood.” He stopped at the door and turned back to face her again. “Besides I can already tell you what’s going to happen. I’m going to end up shoved into a closet with Lisa and Gerard respectively. I would rather be someplace where I can make out with my girl indefinitely and Gerard and I are friends now. I don’t want it to be awkward.”

That was news to me. He never seemed to care about any of that before.

“Since when do you care about that?” Scary spoke my mind. “You’ve kissed Bob.”

All eyes turned to the parties in question. Bob was as red as a tomato and Frank ducked his head embarrassed. Clearly Bob had done me a favor that time we had been stuck together.

“I guess I’m growing up. See you all later.” With that he and Lisa disappeared out the door, leaving the rest of us with a very annoyed Scary.

“I knew it!” she exclaimed. “It’s that silly little girl’s fault. She’s broken him.”

“Who? Lisa?” her sister questioned.

“Yes Lisa! She’s changed him into this… this new person.”

“I thought you liked her?”

“Are you kidding me? I never really cared much for her, but I wasn’t exactly going to tell him that to his face,” Scary stated vehemently. “She’s stealing him from us and she’s a bad influence. Since when does Frank not want to play Seven Minutes in Heaven? It’s ridiculous.”

“That’s hardly fair,” Bob gave his opinion. “It’s not like she told him not to. In fact, she’s played with us every time she happened to be here.”

“Twice! The first time she met Frank and the second time there had only been a handful of people.” She refused to let up.

“It makes sense now,” Mikey quietly said to me and I leaned closer for him to explain what he was talking about. “It’s not your fault that you’re infatuated with Frank. He’s not even here and everyone’s fighting over him. It’s like natural instinct.” He straightened back up and said loudly, “I’d still like to play.”

“Seriously?” It was my incredulous voice.

“The last time I played this silly game I was thirteen. It can only get better right,” he said. “At least now we all know what we’re doing.”

“And you’re hoping that you’ll be lucky enough to get stuck with Scarlet,” I teased.

“No, I’m not,” he muttered, walking away from me, but his red ears gave him away and I couldn’t help laughing at how adorable my little brother was crushing on someone.

Since Frank wasn’t there, I felt a lot more enthusiastic about the game. I didn’t have to dread every time he reached out for the bottle, because he wasn’t there. Worst case scenario, I ended up in a closet with Scary.

Mikey was so eager that he went first and his first hookup was Caitlyn. Wrong twin, Brother. That didn’t stop the smug look on his face when they returned. It was kind of funny. A hand waved in front of my face and I turned to Adam.

“You’re the chosen one.”

Indeed, I looked down and found the bottle pointing at me. I had forgotten who was next until my eyes landed on Ivy. She shrugged and got to her feet, leading the way. We stood face to face in the small space after Ivy set her timer. We simply watched each other for a long time, because quite frankly, it was awkward. Not completely bad, but awkward nonetheless. Maybe if I had known that she was nothing more than a friend, it would have been different, but I knew she liked me as more and that was what complicated things.

“I’m curious, what did you and Frank do when you were in here?”

My eyebrows shot up in surprise. Did she seriously want to know?

“You’re right,” she waved her hands around. “I don’t want to know. It’s just… how good could it possibly have been?” She laughed.

I smirked and wiggled my eyebrows at her, not saying anything. She covered her face in embarrassment.

“Gross. Now I’m in here with you.”

“It’s not like you haven’t kissed me before,” I said teasingly.

Ivy playfully kicked the side of my leg. “Shut up! That was a moment of weakness, okay? A girl can dream that she would kiss a guy and he would magical turn straight and be with her forever and ever,” she said laughingly.

“Oh, so that’s what it was?”

She stuck her tongue out at me. “They should rather have put Adam in here with you. Give your love life some spark.”

“Excuse me. Adam and I don’t need a closet to ignite a spark.”

Ivy grinned broadly, proudly even I daresay. “It makes sense. He was checking you out from the moment you guys met.”

“He did, didn’t he?”

“Yes, with his Ben 10 band aids. He just had to be the hero.” She laughed again. “It was actually very adorable. You both are.”

The timer went off loudly, cutting our conversation short.

“If I never ever play this game again, it will be too soon,” I stated. “But if this is going to be the last time, I might as well end it on a high note.” I took her face in my hands and pulled her lips to mine, keeping her there for a few seconds before hugging her tightly. “Stay who you are, Ivaine, because who you are is awesome.”

“Thank you.” She sighed deeply against my chest.

*

It was late when I finally got to bed. The night had been fun. Adam and I got our seven minutes in heaven and we made good use of it. I smiled at the memory. I was definitely lucky to have him. My phone notified me that I had a message. It was a voice message.

“Hey, Gerard it’s Frank. We didn’t really talk earlier and I felt like you should know that I’m not mad at you. Tonight was simply…simple. I didn’t want you to think that there was still issues between us, because the isn’t. I’ve thought about it and I think I’ve figured it out.” I fell down on my bed with the phone still pressed to my ear. Frank’s voice continued to speak on the other end.

“For the longest time I thought that all of this was my fault. I’m the younger one and obviously then the one who acts like a child, but that’s not true. I never lied about my intentions. I’ve been clear from the start. Nothing can ever happen between us. You’re the one who always got your hopes up for every little thing. It’s not fair that all of that came down on my shoulders. I know I’m not blameless in all of this, but I’m not the bad guy. You keep putting yourself in a position to get hurt and you avoid things. Instead of talking to me about how you feel or really just talking to anyone, you instead avoid everyone and suffer through it alone which only makes it that much worse. You don’t deal with your problems. That’s your biggest problem. That’s why you skipped out on band practices and why I don’t see you for days on end. You need to grow up and learn to deal with reality. For your sake and Adam’s. I still want to knock him on his ass,” he chuckled. “But like Lisa he deserves better. On that note, I still want us to be friends. It would be best if we left all this awkward nonsense behind though, don’t you agree? I know, it’s easier said than done. I believe we can do it though. So yeah, that was all I had to say. I look forward to seeing you again tomorrow and hopefully it will be great. Anyway, goodnight.” The message ended there and I lay there for a long time processing his words. Something had definitely changed. He was so mature now, aside from the fact that he couldn’t say any of this to me personally. All of that happened in less than twenty four hours. I clearly missed something somewhere. This was a good thing though. Now I could focus on my relationship and forget about everything else.

I put my phone away and turned the light off. It took a long time, but it seemed like Frank and I were finally going to be in a good place.

Notes

Swift updates are usually followed by a long waiting period. I think we've reached that point, because honestly, I don't know where to go from here, haha. Plus, I'm going to be busy as hell. Hopefully this chapter was good enough to hold you out until the next one.
xoxo