Frank’s POV

‘Fucking pills,’ I thought as I threw the bottle against the wall. The little blue capsules scattered all over the floor, rolling around like marbles. I flopped back down onto my bed. I wasn’t going to take them. I don’t like it when things change me. I would rather stay up all night. I gazed up at the chipped paint and cracks covering the ceiling. The posters are barely visible in the darkness of the room.

I rolled over twisting the pile of blankets further in my futile attempts to drift into sleep. The glowing digital numbers stared back at me tauntingly as I closed my eyes to shield them from the light that disrupts the “peaceful darkness”. My legs moved continuously, restlessly. 3:52 am. I stopped using the techniques to fall asleep long ago. It never worked. Memories would come and interrupt my other thoughts and it was the main reason that I would always stay awake.

I hate the dark circles under my eyes that marred my appearance. I’ve always thought that eyes were important. You can tell a lot about a person by their eyes. Like mine- you can tell that I never sleep. Countless sleepless nights… I tossed my pillow away at the same place the pill bottle fell. It doesn’t help anyway. But that doesn’t matter. The doctor has never diagnosed me. I’m just a self-proclaimed insomniac.

I couldn’t get one person in particular out of my mind. Gerard. It was strange. Having something from my past show up in my “new life”. After having to move away from my old home and friends and family to here, seeing him was like seeing a ghost from my past… I fell asleep sometime later still thinking of him. It reminded me of the song “Black Dog”. “…dreams of you all through my head…”


I woke up the next morning feeling worse than hungover and slightly delusional due to the lack of sleep. The constant lack of sleep. I went through the same routine that I normally do, but paying a little more attention to my clothes. Every time that I thought of his face, butterflies would attack my stomach. I felt as though I needed to impress him and I strayed from my normal attire of torn jeans and a black hoodie to my denim vest and black jeans, sort of laughing at myself for being so stupid. I ran my fingers through my tangled hair as I grabbed my old bag and ran out the door.

As I entered the school building like I’ve been doing every morning for the past two years, I made sure to avoid the obnoxious jerks that seemed to love making me their target. Hopefully they wouldn’t come back again. Going to my usual seat in first period class, I didn’t bother offering an explanation to my teacher as to why I wasn’t here yesterday. Most of the students were here already and as the final bell rang, more filed in, including Gerard. When I saw him, my stomach sort of twisted in a weird way. His eyes scanned the classroom, landing on my seat just like they did yesterday, and I fidgeted a little bit, playing with the corner of my tearing notebook.

I don’t think Gerard seemed to notice how people pulled their legs in further under their desk and followed him with their eyes as he walked by; the guys looking at him with revulsion, and the girls with longing. What was up with girls and vampire dudes? I finally averted my eyes unlike the rest of my classmates. The desk next to me shifted as boot clad feet came into view. I looked up and was met with Gerard.

“You seem to keep stealing my seat,” he stated in mock annoyance.

“Boy, this was my seat before you were born,” I said, laughing at the end. Gerard just shook his head and smiled, his fangs showing slightly, under his lip, which to me seemed insanely sexy. As, he turned away, getting his things out for class, I took that as my cue to stop gawking at his mouth like a creep.

The teacher introduced us into a new unit, which I didn’t understand at all. After she let us take notes, me sort of staring at the screen blankly, and Gerard scribbling away on paper, Ms. Jones handed out work for us to complete. I got about as far as putting my name on my page before Gerard started talking to me again.

“Why are you so confused?” He asked me with a confused look himself.

“Why do you think I’m confused?” I asked back at him. He blushed slightly and looked away.

“Uh, you…your face…um, shows it, I guess,” he said, acting awkward for what seemed like no reason.

“Yeah, I’m not really good at math…or any subject, at all,” I added, laughing.

“I can help you if you want,” he said, timidly, a characteristic that didn’t seem to suit him. I quickly agreed and he started to scoot his desk over, but stopped. “I won’t get us detention again, right? For helping you?”

“No. It’s fine. Mr. Shands is just a bitch,” I said as he finished scooting his desk over. “By the way, where were you yesterday during detention?”

He scratched the back of his neck nervously and replied. “Not in detention…” I chuckled at his obvious remark.

“Well, you’re lucky that I made an excuse for you.”

“Wow, thanks,” he replied, laughing again. I finally noticed what we actually looked like right now, desks together, leaning close to each other and giggling. I cleared my throat and scooted back, not even noticing how I had gravitated towards him.

“So, start working on the first problem and then I’ll help you,” Gerard told me. Almost immediately after I started he grabbed my hand, taking my pencil from me. “You aren’t supposed to subtract when you’re multiplying with exponents,” he said like it was the simplest thing in the world. I tried to focus on what he was saying and not and not on how he was leaning over me really close. When teachers help, you want to cringe away from their closeness, but I was having trouble calming my heartbeat, which he could probably hear. Great. I nodded my head and pretended to understand.

Finally, he sat back down in his chair and went back to the worksheet. I stared at him until he was finished, which was not long at all, and put on my best pouty face. He sighed, handing me his paper while I took it, happily copying down the answers.

“Geez, Frank. It’s only my second day and you’re already taking advantage of me,” Gerard said jokingly.

“Yeah, well you can take advantage of me anytime you want,” I said. My words finally caught up to my brain a few seconds later as I realized how that sounded. “Uh, I mean, you know—with math, but probably not, since I’m not good, or—”

“It’s fine, Frank,” He said, smirking. “I’ll keep it in mind,” he finished, winking at me before getting up to leave like the rest of the class. I gathered my stuff, looking forward to getting to talk to Gerard again in my ext class, no matter how nervous he made me. The good thing was that I had a way of keeping my cool even when I was going crazy on the inside. Luckily Mr. Shands wasn’t even in science today, so Gerard and I talked the whole time. I’ve never had a connection like this; not even with Solange. She and I are friends, but I felt like I had known Gerard forever. We talking about anything in that hour of class until I got distracted.

“Why do you have your fangs out?” I asked Gerard. I had noticed while he was laughing at something I said. As soon as I said that, he closed his mouth shut, looking away. “I- I’m sorry,” I started to apologize.

“No, it’s fine. It’s just… I haven’t had blood in a while and uh…well, you, you…”he mumbled. He didn’t have to finish. I had completely forgotten how my racing pulse could affect him. I scooted further back in my seat. “It’s okay,” Gerard said, laughing, “you don’t have to try to stop being human.”

Too soon, the class was over and we said by, me looking forward to our last class together. Now I had to go talk to Solange. I hadn’t seen her yesterday at lunch and she wasn’t in our last class together. I walked down the hallway, not bothering to stop at my locker. I had history with Mr. Cosby, which was the most useless class of the day, and I never needed anything for it. A broad smile slipped onto my face as I saw Solange sitting at our usual place in class, and I started to walk over to her, until someone stopped me.

“Iero!” A person’s voice rang out among the others from the opposite side of the room. I turned around slowly. I was always careful no around people. I barely talked to anybody but Solange (even though that was just a one-sided conversation) and I guess Gerard now. I turned to face whoever called me, expecting to be hit with a paper ball or something.

“What?” I responded, looking at the guy who was staring at me, assuming it was him who called.

“Do you know that guy or something?” He asked me nonthreateningly.

“What guy?” I asked back, trying to play dumb. He was probably going to make fun of me for talking to him.

“The vampire,” He stated, clarifying.

“I don’t really know him that much. We were just talking…” I said, wondering where he was going with this.

“Just try to make sure he doesn’t eat anybody,” he said, smirking. I just rolled my eyes and made a limp, saluting motion with my hand.

“Will do,” I replied sarcastically, walking over to a startled looking Solange. “Where were you yesterday?” I asked her, knowing not to expect a response. “Don’t start skipping, Ange. I don’t want my bad influence to start rubbing off on you…Though it probably already has,” I added. She laughed a little bit. It was the only noise I ever hear from her. Solange visibly relaxed. We got into our usual routine of me just talking to her and making her laugh every once in a while so that she wouldn’t get bored. After a little while, I decided to tell her about Gerard.

“So you know the two new people that came here yesterday?” I asked Solange. She tensed up, but nodded. “Well one of them is named Gerard, and I sort of know him from my old school,” I trailed off from the beginning of my story, when Solange looked away, obviously trying to make a point. “What? What is it? Do you have something against vampires like everybody else?” I asked, sort of disappointed but angry. I thought she was fine with them… but I guess she couldn’t tell me whether she was or not. “Nevermind, it’s fine,” I said, finally noticing the pages assigned on the board. I walked over and pulled a textbook off the shelf, giving Solange the silent treatment. I knew that I wouldn’t stay mad at her for long, but I just thought she wasn’t prejudiced like almost all the other people in this school.
I closed my book at the end of class, calling over my shoulder to Solange as I left.

“I’ll see you at lunch.”

Notes

Sorry that I'm a day late. I had so much homework and I thought I hadn't finished typing it, but I did. It's extra long, and new so I hope that makes up for it. Please tell me what you think about this story. Also, I might post a short story to here, as a chapter, because it's an assignment and I want to know if it's okay or not. But yeah. Please comment, rate, and subscribe.

-I Love All the Poison <3