Frank did not lie when he said Gerard would have an entire day to think about what he did. After Frank stomped out of the room and slammed the door, Gerard did nothing but lie there for a while. Why? Why couldn't you have just stuck to your own goddamn plan?? You could've been out of here... he reprimanded internally. God you're so stupid, no wonder no one's gonna looking come for you. You'll die in this hell-hole and you fucking know it. Tears began forming in his eyes. Gerard couldn't think of a time when he'd cried as much as he had in the last week. Even when he was depressed, it wasn't so much sadness as it was anger. Pure rage was the only thing he'd felt at the time. Now it was just miserable anguish. He had felt so sorry for himself since day one, and Gerard was getting sick of it. Gerard took a deep breath and straightened his face. With the back of his hand, he hurriedly wiped away the wetness on his cheeks and sat up. He knew mentally beating himself up wasn't a good idea. He'd already done plenty of it, but no more. There is no reasoning with a madman. You can't get angry because that'll make him angrier. You can't ignore him because he'll fight and force your attention. Comply... and you'll be the 'pet' he's always wanted. Hearing himself think that made him cringe, but he knew of no other thing to do. Submission was the only viable option at the moment.

After steadying his mental state, Gerard felt incredibly drained. Emotional spells like that always made him feel exhausted. Now that he was out of that God forsaken chair, he could get a bit of proper sleep. Well, as 'proper' as it gets, he thought to himself. Gerard turned to lie on his side, careful not to apply too much pressure to his aching ribs. He placed his blazer over his arms for a makeshift cover, and folded his arm under his head. Look on the bright side, this isn't as bad as that fucking chair!

*****

It was around 2:40 that afternoon, Frank was in the kitchen making himself lunch. He stood there bitterly, chopping up tomatoes for a chicken salad, rethinking this morning. What was he doing wrong? He was loving Gerard as much as he could while still being strict. Gerard had been doing so good himself, he'd even considered letting him go downstairs for a bit. It had been going well, despite the fact Frank had gotten a little turned out from dressing Gerard's wounds. Bruises and cuts on his milky cream skin that Frank was getting to finally touch, and the occasional whimper that fell from Gerard's lips made his blood rush. Unfortunately that was the only thing had started heading south. Gerard had started to become hostile, confusing Frank. He had tried, desperately so to ignore it, but then he had to start in talking about his family... That was not okay with Frank whatsoever. He did not want to hear about them at that moment, especially from his pet.

Frank still couldn't help but feel a little bad for the way he reacted. Gerard was still being house-trained, after all. He'd have another chance to redeem himself tomorrow. If all went well, then he'd love for Gerard to get to come downstairs, and maybe hang out in his new room. Frank had decorated it nicely, hanging a few of Gerard's posters up and stocked a few bookshelves with his comics and novels. Of course, good behavior would also mean he'd finally be able to show Gerard a few of his special presents. Frank hated to wait, but it all depended on his sweet angel. He'll have to come around eventually, Frank thought, he must know that this is what's good for him. He'll never want to go back after a few good days. Just gotta wait it out, I suppose...

*****

Gerard woke up several times since he first went to sleep. His side would start hurting, and he'd turn over. Eventually his arm would fall asleep and the tingly sensation would annoy him until he fixed it. The temperature was constantly fluctuating. It kept getting colder and colder, except for when the final time he awoke. It was a nice, moderate temperature finally. Gerard sat up, stretching his arms and yawning. His back popped a few times as he stretched but it felt good to release that tension.

Gerard shakily stood, wincing at the pain in his ribs from his earlier fall. He stood in place for a few minutes. He stretched his legs and dusted off his jeans. Partially out of boredom and more so out of curiosity, the man walked towards one of the bins. He had no idea what he'd see when he uncovered it. Kidnapping supplies? All of Frank's rope or drugs or duct tape? Could it be his collection of torture devices that he'd use on Gerard? Any devious or destructive object could lie inside. Jesus Christ, for all Gerard knew, it could be human body parts from past victims. He had no fucking clue. Bracing himself, he slowly opened a corner. So far he could see nothing, and lifted another corner. Slowly but surely, he opened and a little further and-

Christmas lights. In the bin was Christmas lights. What psychopath had fucking Christmas lights in his attic? Gerard uncapped a few more near it, and to his surprise were even more decorations for pretty much every occasion. There was green tinsel, shamrocks and four-leaf clover cut outs for St. Patrick's day in one bin, decal hearts and bears for Valentines in another, and a big, fake pine tree with a sack of ornaments in another. Halloween decorations spanned about three bins. Frank had fake headstones, skeletons, miscellaneous rubber body parts, plastic axes and bloody knives, pumpkin carving kits, you name it! It seemed a little ridiculous. Why would he have all this shit? Gerard thought back to what he had at home. There was a tree, and maybe a few strings of multipurpose lights in one of the closets. That was it. Gerard didn't know much about the daily agenda of a maniac man, but he would've never guessed that something as normal as decorating would be anywhere in it.

Gerard's discovery made him very suspicious. He closed the blue boxes back up, before moving onto a few others. More ornaments and little trinkets were discovered as he made his way around. He noticed one box that had been pushed to the side, and decided to open that one next. Still a little cautious of the container's content, he opened this one a bit slower. To his surprise, this one was quite different. Inside were photo albums. Pictures were stacked along the side, a beaten up Ninja Turtles lunch box laid on top, and a few little action figurines were scattered around the bin. As if the decorations weren't odd enough, this was completely out of place. Gerard stared into the box, contemplating what he should do. For nosy Gerard, there was only thing to do-go through everything.

He pushed the lunch box over and pulled out the first album and took a seat on the ground. The album was forest green with a lovely golden design on the front. He flipped the cover open, where at the top in black sharpie was a large '97. The first few pictures were snapshots of the outdoors. Everything was covered in snow, which was typical for Jersey, but the pictures were still very pretty. Each page held 4 pictures each, so there were a few more of just snow before getting to people. There were tons of pictures of an adorable, dark headed boy, who Gerard assumed was Frank. Endless amounts of them were Frank playing in a yard, or eating, or doing some sort of activity. Some was of Frank's mother holding him at her hip. He resembled her quite a bit, in his opinion. Looking through these felt like an invasion of privacy, and made him feel bad, but so what? Kidnapping Gerard had been an a major invasion of privacy. Gerard continued skimming through the pages before turning to a page from Frank's 6th birthday. In a few, cake covered the boy's cherub face. Relatives were crowding around him, all seeming to enjoy the festivities. He flipped through a few more, before finishing the book and moving on to another. Gerard couldn't help but smile at all these. Frank had been such a happy child. What exactly went wrong? Gerard wondered. He was so caught up in looking at little Frank in a Frankenstein costume that he didn't hear the real Frank coming upstairs until the door was being opened. He slammed the album shut and held it to his chest as Frank caught his eye. The standing man stopped and looked from Gerard's frightful face to the opened bin to the book in Gerard's arms.

"Is.. are those my picture albums?" Frank spoke quietly. Gerard slowly nodded his head. Frank sighed, hanging his head down with a smile before making his way over to Gerard.

"I-I'm so sorry! P-p-please don't hurt me, I didn't know!" Gerard begged. Frank held up a hand to silence him.

"I'm not mad, darling. I came up here to see if you would like to eat. Are you hungry, pet?" This was like a slap in the face to Gerard. Why hadn't Frank gotten angry with him? If he wasn't pissed at him for this, why did he get so upset earlier?

"Um, well a little.. yes," the cowering man squeaked. This was almost as scaring as Frank yelling at him.

"Alright, I'm hungry too. It's almost lunch time. How about I go make us something and we'll go through some pictures together, yeah?" Fucking what?

"T-that sounds nice, thank you." Gerard's 'thank you' got caught in his throat, but he didn't care. He wanted to know what was going on.

"I'll go do that then," Frank said with a smile. He leaned over and lightly kissed the top of Gerard's head before leaving the room, shutting and locking the door behind him. Gerard was absolutely stunned. Two words kept repeating in his mind: Fucking what???

Notes

Oh my god, this update is sooo overdue. I'm sorry, school hit me really hard this week. I've had 3 papers to finish, and a project and I had to study for a test in all of my classes. I literally had no free time whatsoever last week. Fortunately, updates should get back to the regular schedule now! I hope you all enjoyed this chapter. I didn't have time to edit much, so if something doesn't make sense please let me know! Leave me comments below telling me what you think, and thank you ever so much for reading this!!!

-xo OfSaintsandSinners