I wouldn't even recognize him.

Gerard had been sitting by the fridge for a long time, simply letting the tears stream down his face. He didn't care if other people would call him pathetic for that, nobody could see him here and honestly, there was only so far one could sink and even before today's incident Gerard had been somewhat very close to rock bottom.
He glanced at his blurry reflection on the plain white tiles on the floor and saw the image everyone else got to see of him daily. Ragged, black messy hair, smudged eye-liner, dark circles around the eyes, walking around alone on midday. The prime example of a failure in society. When he couldn't stand seeing his own face anymore, Gerard dragged himself off of the floor and held onto the kitchen counter. For a moment he stared at the now blank spot where the picture of him and Frank used to be before he started to open arbitrary cupboards in search for any kind of alcohol he could find.
Gerard was sure, that he had hid some, when Mikey had come all these years ago to take any intoxicating beverages he could find from his older brother. Somewhere in this apartment there's got to be a bottle of whiskey, Gerard only had to find it.

He knew, that he shouldn't, that Mikey would look at him the same way he did when Gerard had gotten himself into the hospital with alcohol poisoning. He knew, that he had vowed to never have a drink again and that he had promised his brother he would call him if he ever came close to that sort of stuff again and needed help. But in that moment none of that seemed to matter at all. All Gerard needed was to be drunk and forget everything
It took him five minutes to go through everything in the kitchen before he turned around and continued his search in the living room, leaving behind a huge mess in the other room.

Before he made it into the corridor though something on the counter caught Gerard's eye. The reflection of sunlight on the steel blade of a sharp knife he had used to cut something a couple of days ago. Hesitantly he took a step backwards in the direction of the object. He could do it. Just once. Nobody would ever know. Place the blade on his wrist and feel the acute pain, that made him feel free for once, when he pressed it into his skin. He remembered the blood, slowly dripping to the floor, the way he couldn't stop admiring it, flowing down his arms, the romanticism, that came with self-destruction. Gerard had almost grabbed the knife before he could halt his own movements.
It was one thing to get drunk but this wasn't a thing Mikey would forgive him for, Gerard would forgive himself for. He had meant what he had told Ray earlier, he wasn't suicidal. Not anymore.

Quickly he shook his head and left the room, determined to find that bottle, when the doorbell rang.
Who the fuck could that be, Gerard raised one eyebrow in confusion before retreating from the living room to get to the door. It wasn't even thee yet, so even if Mikey had gotten off early from work he couldn't be here and besides, why would he anyways? He pursed his lips, when he couldn't thin of anyone else, that could show up. In a lame attempt to seem better looking than he was, he checked his appearance in the mirror next to the door and saw noting more than what he'd expected. Miserable, probably was the only word capable of describing how he looked. Despicable, might do as well. He huffed silently and then, Gerard opened the door, not very keen to find out who was standing outside. Whoever it was hopefully had a good reason to be here. Or on second thought, Gerard would rather prefer it if they didn't.
It took him a second too long to realize who it was, that was standing in front of him because when he slammed the door in the other persons face Frank already had a foot in the door preventing it to close completely.

“Gerard, please, let me in.”
“I think I've made it extremely clear, that I do not want to talk to you, Frank. Go away!”, Gerard did his best to hide his face behind the door because he didn't want Frank to see, that he had been crying.
“No, Gerard! I will not walk away now. I made some horrible mistakes but now, that I have the chance to make it up to you I won't leave.”
“And how exactly do you plan to do that, huh?”, Gerard was oblivious to Frank pushing the door further open, so he didn't realize that now his face was no longer hidden and Frank could clearly see his puffy, red eyes. The shorter man's expression softened, when he saw this and Gerard was confused with the sudden hurt displayed on his face.
“By telling you the whole story. I do not expect you to forgive me, Gerard but I believe, that you deserve to know all of it and I'm not stopping until I've told you it all.”
The soft tone in Frank's voice reminded Gerard of his childhood, of all the days and night they had spent together and he was to weak to resist the force the other man used to open the door, so he took a step backward letting go of the only thing separating the two of them.

Frank hesitated a moment before he stepped into the apartment, curiously looking around.
“How do you even know where I live?”, Gerard demanded.
“Your friend at the coffee shop gave me your address” Frank explained and Gerard cursed.
“Traitor”

Gerard led the way to is living room, Frank following close behind. As they went by the open kitchen door Frank frowned, “What were you looking for?”
Gerard mentally slapped himself for not closing the door to hide the mess, when he left but only muttered, “Nothing of your concern.”
Thankfully Gerard had his back to Frank so he couldn't see him flinching at his harsh voice.
When they reached the room full of DVDs, posters of comic book heroes and music Gerard turned around to his former classmate but all he could think of were the years he had spent asking himself what he had done wrong, what it had been that had made Frank turn away from him and now he was about the get an explanation for that. “Sit.”, he gestured to the couch in the middle of the room

The heavily tattooed one looked at Gerard for a moment longer than necessary and then did as he was told, carefully removing Gerard's drawings and other things laying on the couch and put them on the small table in front of it so they would join the empty cans of diet soda, that had been standing there for at least a week. Gerard was pleasantly surprised that they hadn't started to develop lives of their own.
“You are very talented.”, Frank remarked, holding a piece of a comic Gerard had been working on.
“As if you know anything about that stuff.” Just because Gerard had let him into his apartment, that didn't mean that he wanted to talk to Frank. He wanted him to talk and say everything he wanted to say and then he wanted him to leave again and never come back.
“I do actually. I'm not an expert but I had a friend who was very into comics, when I was younger and for some reason that second-hand passion followed me through life.” Frank looked up to Gerard, who was still standing a couple of feet away from the couch, with hopeful eyes. Gerard gave is best not to meet his gaze but failed eventually and swallowed hard, when he realized, that it was him, that Frank had been talking about.
Damn it, Way, he thought, don't let those looks distract you from the only thing you really want here. An explanation. That's it.

Gerard sat down on the couch, keeping the longest distance possible to Frank.
“Talk.”, he said, surprisingly calm but demanding.
Frank looked at hm startled, “What?”
“You said, you wanted me to know the whole story, that's what you're here for. Talk.”
The other man looked hurt by Gerard's bluntness but didn't comment. What he didn't know was, that for the artist it was only a defense mechanism, a survival instinct. Be cold or have your feelings backfire at you and stab you in the chest. He pretended to be straightforward, numb to other people, so that he wouldn't ever have to be the victim of grown men, who mentally never put off their high school football uniform again. He had learned to act this way after being struck down too many times and being ridiculed for his sensitive nature since he had been a confused teenage guy, that had no direction in life. This way at least, the other person wouldn't realize it, when inevitably Gerard would get hurt.
“Oh, okay. Yes, alright.”, Frank started, “where should I begin?” He glanced around the room aimlessly as if searching for something to hold on to.
“Possibly at the point, where something went wrong with you and you had a complete change in mind.” Right now, Gerard was surprised by himself, how harsh he sounded, considering, that not ten minutes ago he had been crying on the kitchen floor and then pathetically went looking for alcohol.
At once it struck him, his glance hovering over a greyish box in the bottom shelf of one of the countless messy cupboards. That was where he had put the bottle. All those boxes were full of comic books so he had been sure, that Mikey wouldn't go through them on his alcohol crackdown.

He leaped up off the couch leaving the other present person bewildered of what had gotten into him now. Almost aggressively he tore of the top of the box, the mere thought of the burning substance flowing down his throat now enough to drive him crazy.
“Yes!”, he let out a sigh of achievement as he grabbed the whiskey with his right hand and pulled it out of the dusty carton.
Frank still hadn't said a word and Gerard found a somewhat clean glass in between his stuff laying around.
“Want some too? Could make this easier.”, he suggested, while pouring himself a generous amount.
Frank didn't reply right away, he was still trying to process Gerard's sudden mood swing but then remembered a thing Ray had said back at the coffee shop.
“I'm just imagining her so desperate to find a boyfriend for her thirty three year old, four years sober, unemployed, suicidal son.”
Thirty three year old, four years sober, unemployed.
Four years sober.
Sober.

“Gerard! What the fuck do you think you are doing?”, he jumped to his feet, attempting to take the glass from Gerard's hands but couldn't reach far enough.
“Pouring myself a drink, what does it look like?”
“You're sober, for God's sake, Gee!”
“Who gives a fuck, why would you give a fuck?”
Frank reached forward again but again Gerard was too far away. This time though, the sudden movement was enough to get him off balance and he accidentally knocked over the glass when trying to regain it. They both watched the brown liquid stream over the floor before the alcoholic stared at Frank intensely and in that moment Frank wasn't so sure if it weren't better for him to start running now.
There was a long, heavy silence between them before he comprehended, that Gerard was waiting for an answer.
“Your friend in the coffee shop, he gives a fuck, your mother, who called you to set you up with me because she is worried about you, she gives a fuck, your brother, that texted you, he gives a fuck. I do, I give a fuck. Because I still care about you, Gerard.”
The taller one seemed baffled by that last part of the sentence. “But why would you?”
“I...”, Frank had to think about that himself, he couldn't come up with a coherent reason, that would make any sense, “I don't know. I just do.”

Again, in a matter of seconds Gerard's whole posture changed and with it his attitude. He chuckled at Frank's comment and from his point of view it almost looked like Gerard tried to keep himself from rolling his eyes, before he turned around to grab the bottle of whiskey again.
“Stop!”, Frank shouted but Gerard didn't pay him any attention. Luckily the bottle was standing closer to the tattooed man, so when he lunged forward he could get hold of it before Gerard did.
“Give me that!”, Gerard protested and when he reached out Frank for the first time noticed the bracelet he was wearing. It was a black ribbon with three blue stones on it, the middle on displaying a single red letter G. Frank owned a wristband like that, too, his with an F on it obviously but still, it was the same one, they had made twenty years ago in Gerard's room, promising, that they would stay friends forever.

Gerard evidently hadn't realized, what it was Frank was seeing and kept on pushing him to hand over the bottle.
“Fight me!”, Frank exclaimed and Gerard laughed.
“You're like four feet eight.”
“And you surely haven't exercised since the last gym class you've had.”, Frank shot back.
“God dammit, Frank! Just give me the fucking bottle and leave I'm not up for this right now.”
“Give me your phone.”, the short one demanded.
“What?”, Gerard was legitimately confused at this point.
“Give me your phone and I will leave. I will call Ray and then I'll leave.”
“Fuck, you won't”
“That or I could run over to that window over there,” he pointed to his right, “and throw the bottle out of it.”
For the what seemed thousandth time that day Gerard stared at him before sighing. “Fuck you.” and then handed over his phone.

Frank grabbed it with the hand that wasn't occupied with holding the bottle, making sure Gerard wouldn't make an attempt to get it and scrolled through the contacts. When he found Ray he pressed call and held the phone to his ear.
“You have reached the voice mail of Ray Toro, please leave a message after the signal.”
Frank groaned exasperated before hanging up looking at Gerard. “What's your brother's name?”
“Oh no, you're not calling Mikey!”
“Thank you.”, Frank laughed right before Gerard realized his mistake.
“No, Frank, please. You can't do that!”
“It's that or the bottle hitting the concrete and me staying with you all day until I'm sure you won't go out to get some new stuff.”
For a second it seemed like Gerard was contemplating if he'd not rather prefer the latter option before he reluctantly said, “Go ahead”, and then stared at the ground while Frank called Mikey.

The younger Way picked up at the second ring. “Gee, hey, what's up?”
He sounded happy and Frank felt bad for what he was about to do but it was the only way. “Hello, Mikey. This is Frank. This doesn't have to make sense right now, I just need you to come to Gerard's apartment asap, he's been wanting to...to do something I know he'll regret later and I'm really not the person he should be with right now. Can you come?”
The person at the other end of the line was obviously confused but thankfully chose not to question Frank's words. “Yes, sure. I'll be there as fast as I can.” Then he hung up and Frank handed Gerard his phone back.
“And now,” he said, sitting down on the couch, deliberately choosing the other side from Gerard, who had already taken a seat during the phone call, “we wait”.

Notes

So I decided to make this a chapter fic and I actually for once have a plan of where I want to go with this.