Before The Sun Goes Down

Gerard's POV.
When I get back to Frank's, he's still asleep. He looks so peaceful, his hands tucked under his head, his body curled up and still underneath the sheets. His breathing is calm, unlike what it used to be a lot.
I remember countless times I've woke up next to him and he's thrashing around, having a nightmare. I'm not sure how I remember, but I do. I begin to wonder if he still has the nightmares, and if he has any about me.
While I was walking, I thought about a lot of things.
I thought about revealing who I actually am and Frank agreeing to be turned. I thought about just turning him when I got back, but as soon as I saw his sleeping body, I cringed at the thought of it.
I can't remember a lot about being turned, but I remember the pain. It was intense, like my blood was being replaced with fire, and I could feel my lungs constrict and become useless. They were the most painful bits, so I remember the sensations of those more than I do the others.
I can't put him through that, at least not when he isn't expecting it.
I don't want to get into the bed, just in case I wake him up. I stare at him for a few more minutes, smiling faintly. I breathe in the scent of the room, the smell bring more things back from the depths of my mind.
The more time I spend with him, the more I remember about everything. I know my own story through his memories, I know our story, I know what happened to him when he was.. taken.
Sometimes, when I'm looking into his mind, it's like he notices. His nose curls up, his mouth sets into a frown and something in his mind sends a small warning.
He shouldn't be able to do that, at least not while he's still human, anyway.
I know when somebody is in my mind, and I can block them, and attack their mind with my abilities. A mental attack on somebody can be fatal, so I've only used it in dire circumstances. Vampires can't die when you do it, but they can go off their food, become our equivalent of ill, and, eventually, they might start wanting to die.
If a vampire wants to die, he has to go and see the Council. Only they can grant permission for a vampire to die, and if you kill one without their permission, or you commit suicide- which is going and asking somebody to murder you, you will get punished.
Well, if the suicide succeeds, your family or group will get punished.
The Council are some of the most powerful vampires in the world, Ernest and Nikolai both got asked to join, they both said no, which is why the Council aren't on the best of terms with either of them.
Nikolai has actually been framed by them a few times, but there wasn't enough evidence against him, and he's liked around in the undead community, so the Council didn't go through with the sentencing.
Frank moves, his heartbeat increasing. I snap my eyes to his face, which is set in a grimace.
I tune into his thoughts, wincing when I do. I back out of them slowly, not liking the images running through his mind.
To put it lightly, they involve me, his father, his mother, and blood. A lot of blood.
His chest fall and rises faster, his breathing becoming pants.
I'm not sure what to do, so I stand at the foot of the bed for a second, my half outstretched towards him.
I realize I still look like Gerard, so before I do anything I have to shift back to Gerald. I do so, before running to his side, shaking him. All he does is throw his fist in my direction, and mumble 'No'.
I shake him again, harder this time. His eyes flutter, but he doesn't wake up. "Frank!" I shake him, shouting his name. He wakes up, immediately throwing a punch to my jaw.
I doesn't hurt, so I just grab his wrists. His chest is heaving up and down, and his hair is matted to his forehead with sweat.
His eyes swivel to my face, the panic in them dulling a little when he sees it's just me. I let go of his wrists and he buries his face in his hands, starting to cry. He isn't hyperventilating, which is good, so I sit next to him, pulling him to my chest.
I can feel his body shake, and his arms are freezing, even though it's pretty hot in here. I start to wish I have a normal body temperature, instead of a freezing one, just so he'd warm up a little. I rub my hands up and down his arms, hoping the friction will warm them, seeing as I can't by myself.
After a three minutes and twenty three seconds- I can hear the clock ticking, so I could count the seconds, he starts to relax. His breathing is back to normal, his heartbeat is still a little faster than average, but it's fine, and he hugs me back.
"You okay?" I murmur into his hair, getting a slight nod back. We're silent again for a while, Frank hugging me tightly. He finally looks up at me, his complexion paler than mine, his eyes red and wide. "Why don't you have a heartbeat?" The question makes me freeze, and my mind goes blank. How can I give him a believable answer? He isn't stupid, so he'll catch me out if I say I have a weak heart.
I watch his shaky hand reach up to my neck, his index finger and middle finger extending as he places them where I should have a strong pulse. He swallows hard when he feels nothing, but I swear to God that I could feel my heart hammering in my chest.
He gets off me, sitting at the other end of the bed. He places his hands in his lap, looking at me with a pale face and wide eyes. "Why... Why haven't you got a pulse?" He repeats his question, but all I can do is stare dumbly at him. I lift my hand to run it through my hair and he flinches, his eyes closing tight. He thinks I'm going to hurt him, and the revelation makes my stomach sink low into my feet.
"I... I'm not going to hurt you, Frank.." My voice is shaky, and I'm so out of my depth here, I have no idea what to even do. Should I lie, carry on breathing, blinking, lying until he gets his throat ripped out by a fucking werewolf because he 'knows too much'?
His eyes don't open, and I think he's stopped breathing. His lips start moving, saying something silently. "Why haven't you got a.. got a.. heartbeat?" He says it in a rush, the sentence coming out as a shaky sigh.
"Um... I.. I don't know?" My response is so lame, that Frank laughs. Sure, it's bitter and filled with mocking, but he still laughs. "Yeah, I don't know why I haven't got a dick either, isn't that strange... We're both missing huge parts of what makes us human beings!" He laughs again, then his eyes open. They're cold and I wince at them.
His eyes narrow to slits, and he gets off the bed completely. I sit, staring at him with my eyes wide, probably. "Are you... dead? A figure of my lonely imagination? Have I got schizophrenia or something? Maybe last night I didn't just drink, but I took magic mushrooms as well!" He shakes his head, presumably at himself, and looks at me in disbelief.
He starts pacing the floor, his head down. He stops suddenly and reaches out. His hand turns into a fist, and with a ring on his finger, punches me in the eye. To me, it was like being hit with a pillow or something, but to anybody else, it probably would have knocked them out.
I wince, but the reaction is about ten seconds too late. "What the fuck? The last time I punched somebody like that, they fell to the floor...." He turns pale again, and he looks at his hand, which is still in a fist, in disbelief.
"What are you?" I don't answer him, and he must get mad because his cheeks flare. He steps closer to me, his eyes in slits. "What the fuck are you?" His voice is deadly, almost a growl. When he gets no answer, he leaps on me, kicking and punching. I calmly grab his wrists in one hand, and restrain him. I push him off me, Frank making a noise in protest.
"Calm the hell down, Frank. Lashing out isn't going to help you, not when I'm about thirty times stronger than you, is it?" I stand up, looming over him.
I make myself look scary, a skill that was enhanced when I got turned. He looks up at me, his eyes wide and he visibly pales. "I can pick you up like nothing, Frank," I step closer to him. "I can snap your neck like a twig," Another step. "I can drive a blunt bread knife through your heart like it's butter," Another step, so by now my legs have hit the wood of the bed frame. "I can dispose of your body like you can throw a piece of paper in the fire," I'm bent down now, whispering in his ear. "But, I'm not going to. You want to know why?" I pause, but I don't give him enough time to respond. "I won't to that because I'm not like that, I actually like you." I stand up, backing away from Frank's shaking form.
"What are.. y-you?" I smile, showing my partially sharpened teeth. "I'm your worst nightmare, Frankie..." I chuckle, amused by his reactions. He's been biting his lip for a while, clamping down hard and then releasing it, but this time when he bites it, he draws blood.
He feels it and reaches a finger up to wipe it away, but it's too late.
The scent of blood wakes up my feral side and I jump at him, my teeth transforming into a sharp point. He yelps, and I look at him once before snapping at his neck. He moves out of the way just in time, so my teeth close on air.
When my mouth closed, I accidentally bit my own lip, the slight pain bring me back to reality.
I back away from Frank like he's on fire, my hand to my mouth. I feel my legs shake, and they buckle, making me fall to my knees.
Frank has backed away and his back is now pushed up against the headboard. His lips are parted, his eyes wide and full of unshed tears, and his hands are shaking.
I catch my reflection in a metal knob of a drawer, and I see a flash of dull red. I reach a hand up to my hair, finding it cut shorter than it was this morning. I trace the features of my face, realizing that it is actually my face, and not Gerald's. My nose is smaller, rounder, my teeth- now back to normal, are a lot smaller, and my eyebrows are a different shape.
I forgot, that when we hunt, we can't use any shape changing abilities that we have. Seeing as it takes quite a lot of concentration to hold while hunting, our subconscious takes it away so we can solely concentrate on getting nutrition.
So, the person Frank can see right now isn't supposed to be alive, is his husband, and he also hasn't seen them in over a year.
If you haven't guessed, that person is Gerard Iero-Way, recently deceased, but got turned into a living blood sucker, AKA, me.
I look back at Frank, my mouth opened like I'm going to speak. Instead of seeing his eyes staring back at me, I see just the bed. Puzzled, I stand up on my shaky legs. I go around the bed, thinking he could have passed out and fell to the other side. He sin't there, and then I start to hear noises in the kitchen.
I creep out the best I can, my legs ready to give out at any second and look around the ajar door that leads to the kitchen. Frank is in there, holding a knife and fishing garlic out of the refrigerator.
I push open the door, making Frank stop what he was doing and cease breathing. I can hear his heart beating in his chest, it's so hard that I think it might beat it's way out and land on the floor in front of him.
I stand still in the doorway, not knowing what Frank will do. The knife can't harm me badly, it might open a wound or something, but I heal fast. He slowly turns around, a clove of garlic clutched in his hand. He lunges forward, knife in the air, but he hesitates before slashing me with it, and uses the garlic on me instead.
He presses it to the skin on my arm, and to humor him I gasp and then fall to the floor, lying perfectly still. The room goes silent after that, then Frank curses under his breath and nudges me with his foot. "Gerard?" I don't answer him, and he bends down, staring at me.
I lie on the floor for five minutes and seventeen seconds, then jump up, gasping like I've just been revived.
Frank goes flying backwards, dropping the knife and shouting incomprehensible words at me. Despite the situation, I have to laugh at my own prank. I hate my laugh, but I can't stop laughing. Frank just stares at me like I just ripped out his lungs and stood on them.
Then, he laughs. It's just a chuckle at first, then he shakes his head, and starts laughing really hard. "Holy motherfucking shit..." He says in between laughs, and by the time we stop, he's clutching his sides like they're going to split apart.
We stare at each other, the atmosphere becoming tense again. Fear emanates from Frank, Who keeps glancing at the knife that's lying on the floor. With inhumane speed, I pick it up. I hold the point of it, twirling it in my fingers. "If you want to kill me, you're going to have to do better than that, honey..." I smirk, walking to the knife rack and putting it back in.
"Are you really Gerard? Like, my Gerard?" He slowly stands up after he asks, his hands shaking by his sides. I nod, the smirk falling from my face. "It's me, Frankie." He starts crying, his face crumpling up. His cries are silent, though, and I want to touch him, hug him, but I'm not sure if he still want to try and kill me with a butcher's knife and a clove of garlic.
He legs start walking towards me before he even realizes I think, and soon we're hugging and kind of crying. I can't exactly cry, but I make crying noises, whereas Frank is sobbing now. His hands are clutching the back of my shirt, and he's starting to hiccup.
"Oh my God, Gee.. Oh my.. God." I start to kiss the top of his head, then I grab his cheeks and kiss all over his face, wiping a few tears away as I do. I reach his lips and hesitate before I kiss him, but he goes on his tiptoes and presses his lips to mine.
He has to pull away, you know, he needs to breathe. When he pulls away, though, he goes back to trying to rip my shirt off by clutching it so hard. I'm surprised parts of it haven't been ripped off already.
I hug him back just as tightly, forgetting about the strength I have, just wanting to be as close to him as possible. "Gee, I can't breathe... Let.. Go.." I let go of him like I've just been electrocuted, making him smile at me.
"It's actually you..." He breathes out, his eyes flashing with awe. I chuckle at him, kissing his cheek. "What happened? How are you here? How are you alive? Just... How?" I sigh, hugging him once more. "Sit down, I'll make us some coffee, then I'll tell you everything, okay?" I turn away, heading for the kettle and cupboards.

Around an hour later, and around three coffees for Frank and one and a bit for me later, he knows just about everything. And, he only passed out once, which is pretty good for a human.
He started shaking around when I described the turning process, and he's been as white as sheet since I started.
He had a lot of questions to ask, and even though I've answered what seems like fifty, he still has more. "You mentioned 'powers', what do you mean?" I take a sip of coffee before answering. "Well, what if I told you that right now you're thinking about how the fuck can I drink my coffee black answer the question partly?" He smiles slightly, nodding. "I can read minds, I can speak to people telepathically, I can control the elements, I can do a little bit of necromancy, I have powers of clairvoyance, and I can shape-shift." His eyebrows raise, and he breathes out. "Wow... You're.. like a fucking superhero or something, Gee!" He chuckles, and I smirk. Deep down inside me, I'm secretly really fucking happy that he seems impressed. "Okay, so, like, are you a super-fucking-duper vampire hero thing or something? I mean, I don't know a lot about all of this, but surely having as many powers as you, you must be something pretty special.." He sits back in his chair, grinning.
"Yeah, I suppose I am quite.. special. I have more abilities than Ernest, and he's been asked to join the Council about six million hundred times or something." Frank laughs at my exaggerated number, making me smile. I've missed his laugh.
"Who are the 'Council'?" I sigh, talking about the Council makes me mad for a strange reason, it must be second-hand hate from Nikolai and Ernest. "Well, they're like the vampire equivalent of a government or monarchy. They are the ones that make decisions, decide who lives when we've committed crimes, things like that. If you ever come across a Council member, run the other way. Hopefully you'll be with me when that happens, if it ever does, and I'd do my best to protect you." My hatred for the Council bleeds through into my tone, making Frank subconsciously shrink back. He nods, his eyebrows furrowing in thought.
After a while, he yawns. "Gee, I'm tired... Can we go to bed? We can talk about this more tomorrow, but I have a lot going around my head right now, but it's nothing some sleep won't cure." He flashes me a smile, and I nod. We get up, Frank dumping the mugs into the sink, running the hot tap.
He leaves the mugs to soak for awhile while he's asleep. As we walk through to the bedroom, he's silent. He presses himself up to my side when we climb in, our bare legs brushing each other. I wrap my arms around his torso, stroking his hair. He yawns again, and he rubs his eyes. "How can you be tired after three cups of strong coffee?" He smiles, shrugging. "Do you need to sleep?" I shake my head, making him nod and close his eyes, his head leaning on my chest.
I continue to stroke his hair, and soon his breathing is even and deep. I decide to stay in the bed, closing my eye, too. I enter the state between sleeping and being awake, the only way we can 'sleep'. I can feel my mouth curl up as I tune into Frank's dreams, which are peaceful and the emotion I get out of them is love. Love, for me.

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