Barbed Wire Love

"I've never been in here before" Frank said with interest as Gerard led him down the hall and into the last room on the right.

"Not many people have" he smiled, flicking the light switch and illuminating the room.

"Oh" Frank choked out as he took in the room. There was a small desk with a reading lamp on it and covered with a range of pencils and paints, and the bottom half of the walls completely cover with painted canvases that had been propped up against it.

"I thought you said you only kept a few" Frank chuckled breathlessly, wandering further into the room to get a closer look.

"Well, I did sell a lot of them too" Gerard smiled, leaning against the doorframe and crossing his arms.

Not really to Franks surprise, there were a lot of comic book inspired pieces. There were many, to his surprise, he didn't recognise.

Nearing the end, there was a slightly larger canvas, a painting of a park with a small boy swinging high on an old set of swings, looking gleeful.

"Er, yeah. I found a photograph a while back of Mikey when he was a kid, so I thought I'd recreate it"

"It's amazing" Frank slowly stood up, gazing around at the pictures. "They all are. You're really good"

Gerard gave a small cough and a shrug, looking away from the painting. "Thank you. C'mon, let's go clean up"

*

The night ended up being just as bad as Frank had suspected.

Ray arrived first, his hand tightly enclosing the thin wrist of who Frank recognised as Katie. She looked awful; she appeared to have lost a shocking amount of weight, there were dark shadows under her tired eyes and she was covered in bruises, seemingly both real and love bites bruises.

When Gerard caught sight of her, his eyes widened in shock and his jaw dropped. He quickly regained composure and looked up at Ray. "Hey man, how are you?"

Ray grinned. "Not too bad, G- I mean Poison. I brought pizza" he added, holding up the hand with the box that wasn't grabbing Katie's arm.

"We're still using code names?" Gerard sighed tiredly.

"Your idea bro"

"F-Frank?" She croaked, pulling weakly away from Ray and running towards him and Gerard. She didn't get far, before being yanked back by her hair. She let out a small scream, her voice hoarse as if she'd been screaming a lot recently.

"Pipe down" Ray murmured. He bent down and whispered something in her ear, making her whimper and flinch away from him.

"So. Pizza?" Ray continued, walking past Frank and Gerard, dragging the poor girl behind him.

"Gee?" Frank whispered. "Gee, what d-"

Gerard shot him a warning look, then brushed past him and into the living room with Ray.

"Floor" Ray growled at Katie, who sank to the ground, fresh tears leaking down her cheeks.

Frank hurried over and sat down beside her, pulling her into a tight hug. "Sh, it's going to be okay"

"Jet, can I get you a beer?" Gerard offered quickly, glancing down at Frank and hoping Ray didn't notice. He did though, of course.

"Hey, twink! Did I say you could touch her?" Ray snapped, sitting up straighter.

Frank looked up despairingly at Gerard, who looked back an unrecognisable expression. Ray also looked over to Gerard.

"Poison, will you please do something about your bitch? He's bang out of order"

Gerard cleared his throat. "Frank- get up"

"What?"

"Get up!" Gerard barked, is tone unlike anything Frank had heard from him before. Shocked, he slowly rose to his feet.

"That's better. Man, you really need to teach that brat some manners. He doesn't actually run amok like that all the time does he?" Ray snorted.

Gerard's jaw flexed. "Of course he doesn't. I don't know what's gotten into him tonight. Although, I'll thank you not to tell me how to manage my prisoners, as if I can't handle them myself"

Ray faltered for a moment, before nodding. "Of course you can manage him, that's not what I meant by it"

"Can I get you that beer then?" Gerard asked in a slightly lighter tone.

"Please" Ray nodded, grateful for the change in subject.

Frank followed behind Gerard, not wanting to be left in the room with Ray.

"Gerard- Gee, why?" Frank voiced, his tone a little wobbly.

Gerard turned around from the fridge sharply, looking disturbingly serious.

"Frank. Just- sit on the floor, okay? Beside the girl. Don't touch her, don't speak to her, don't speak to Ray, don't speak to me or the rest of the boys that are coming. It's best if you don't even look at them too, do you understand?"

"But Gerard..."

"Do you understand me Frank?"

Truthfully, Gerard was scaring him a bit, so he merely nodded.

Gerard's eyes softened. "You probably won't get any pizza when they're here, but if there's any left when they leave you can have it, or I'll make you some food myself, whatever you want"

He bent down to kiss Frank, who only kissed back after a while, remembering that he has a reputation with Gerard to keep up.

*

The second half of the night was worse, if that was even possible. Gerard's friends arrived, along with the remainder of the taken girls from Frank's school. They all looked the same as Katie did- weak, broken, lifeless.

At one point, when Gerard had once again glanced in the direction of the girls, he mumbled; "Guys, you should really take better care of them, we need to have them returned to their families"

The men merely laughed. "Hey, they're still alive, aren't they? They can be returned like this" Bob shrugged.

"So how's your boy, Poison?" One of the men asked, sniggering along with the rest of them.

Gerard glared, then smirked, shaking his head. He was always getting digs from them about being gay. "He's a good boy, aren't you Frankie?"

Frank gave him a mocking smile. "Yes, what is it, 'master' now?"

There was a round of laughter and a "put him straight, Poison," but Gerard just shook his head.

"Behave, or you'll regret it later"

Nearing the end of the night, around 12, Ray stood up and took Katie's hand, taking her out of the room.

Gerard saw the knowing look of horror in Frank's eyes and tried to give him a non-verbal warning to stay put, but Frank had already stood up and began to follow. The men all seemed too drunk to notice.

Frank ran down the hall, suspecting Ray had taken her up to Gerard's room. He heard his name being called, but he didn't look back.

He found the bedroom empty as he threw the door open, so he quickly began back down the hall. Gerard was already walking towards him, looking aggravated.

"Frank-"

He reached out to catch Frank as he passed by, but Frank ducked and started sprinting down to the kitchen.

He pulled the door open, beyond disgusted with what he saw next. Ray had Katie pinned down on the breakfast bar table, her buttoned shirt ripped open and her skirt yanked off. Ray was grinding down on her in a half drunken state. He was biting down on her neck, hard enough that she was starting to bleed. The saddest part Frank saw, was that she was barely struggling, too drained and tired to fight anymore.

Without a thought, Frank yelled and pounced on Ray, somehow managing to pull the man off of Katie and onto the floor. Ray let out a roar of fury and easily changed positions, flipping Frank onto his back and punching him anywhere he could reach.

Frank made attempts to block the punches, even braving a few kicks to Ray's legs before they were pinned down.

"FRANK!" Gerard bellowed, finally catching up. He threw himself at Ray, somehow managing to pull him off Frank.

"Ray, chill man" he said firmly, refraining Ray's arms that were still making valiant attempts to get to Frank, who was lying on the floor, clutching his stomach.

It took a few minutes to calm Ray down, but he was still pretty fired up when he was leaving.

"Gerard that kid is a fucking psychopath! You should just shoot him"

"I'll take care of it" Gerard said for the one hundredth time, but it still made Frank shiver uncomfortably.

Gerard eventually cleared the men out of his house, closing the front door behind them. He slowly turned around to look at Frank, his eyes glowing dangerously.

"Frank" he said quietly. "What the fuck was that?"

Notes

This story is one of my main sources of procrastination.
-killjoybyname