Your Heart on the Line

The party went on late into the night, and by the time it got to be two a.m., both myself and a good amount of my friends were ready to call it for the night. It was loud, not everyone could handle themselves drunk off their ass, and it was literally rolling into the morning. Toro got to work on sending everyone home with their designated driver or Uber or whatever plan they had banked on while guzzling copious amounts of alcohol. Meanwhile, Pete, Frank, Bert and I all chose to hole up in his room, desperate to get away from everyone even as they were filtering out clump by clump.
We lay there on his bedroom floor, Frank on one side of me and Pete on the other. Silent for a moment, Frank then spoke, “Wentz, you get laid?”
Pete shook his head in response. “I think the most action I got outside of Spin the Bottle was someone brushing against my crotch as they passed by a tight space.”
“Ooh!” Frank elbowed Pete teasingly as he asked, “Maybe that wasn’t an accident, eh?”
Rolling his eyes, Pete sighed. “Yeah, whatever man.”
Again, silence fell over the group of boys. This time, Bert piped up, “Maybe you just need a good fuckbuddy. Like, a loyal one.”
Considering this, Pete murmured, “I dunno about that. I think it’d be hard not to get emotionally invested in someone after something like that.”
“I would have a fuckbuddy,” Frank spoke. “They better be damn good in bed, though. I’m not boyfriend material, anyways; I’m more blowjob material.”
Pete cringed. “Wow. Vivid.”
Toro appeared in the doorway, sighing as he told, “Everyone is finally gone.”
Bert, cozy with a bottle of Black Velvet in his arms, claimed, “Good fucking riddance.”
Ray settled into his bed, asking, “All of you idiots are really sleeping on the floor?”
Bert was half-asleep by this point, and Pete asked, “Can I hope in bed with you, Toro?”
“You don’t sleep naked, do you?” Ray joked.
Pete crept under the covers, fluffing his pillow before sinking his head into it. “Only if you want me to.”
Frank and I lay on the floor together, Bert starting to snore softly off my other shoulder. I could feel the heat coming off of Frank’s body, that’s how close we were. I glanced over at him, seeing him lounging, one arm behind his head and one relaxed onto his stomach. He was smiling, yes, still smiling with his eyes closed. I couldn’t help but grin looking at him, and my quiet observation was broken as Ray spoke, “Gerard, you and Frank can sleep downstairs on the futon if you want; it’s a pullout.”
Frank cracked open one eye, and I immediately averted my own. He yawned, got up laboriously and prodded my leg with one foot, asking, “You coming Gerard, or what?”
Evaluating my options, I chose the futon over the hard floor in a heartbeat. “Yeah.”
Once we got downstairs, Frank took off his belt, groaning as he realized, “I should’ve brought pajama bottoms.” With that, he set his belt on the ground, kicked off his shoes, and started to work his jeans down his legs. He stopped, looked at me. “You don’t mind, do you?”
“Me? Mind? No! No, not at all,” I stammered, blushing. Turning away, I busied myself by fumbling with some of the blankets and pillows strewn out across the couch, but I had seen Frank’s smirk over my shoulder. I was messing with aligning the blankets to the frame as Frank eased himself underneath one of them, sighing contently. He said, “I cannot wait to fucking sleep.”
I bobbed my head in agreement. “I’m exhausted.” I got in bed next to him, and promptly asked, “Are you drunk, Frank?”
“Yes,” Frank replied. “Honestly, you can’t tell?”
“I dunno, I mean, I’ve never really been around drunk people before. You just seem… happier, I guess,” I noted.
Frank shrugged. “What can I say, alcohol puts me in a good mood.” As I lay there, I tried to focus on anything but the daunting fact that Frank was right there, pants-free, sharing a bed with me, yes, me. Little freshman me… little kid brother me. I started to wonder how I felt about this; I got thrusted into having all of these friends so suddenly that I haven’t really stopped and taken the time to think about how I feel about any of it. Most of all, I had put zero thought into how I thought about Frank. Frank had clearly come to a conclusion about me, and that was that I was a kid brother, always tagging along, always needing to be watched and appeased. That was okay, I decided. I liked Frank; I liked to be around him and I liked myself most when I was with him. It felt like he brought out the best in me; most times, I was reclusive, I was cold, I was nobody. But when I was around Frank, I was almost an entirely different person. I had spunk; I had charm; I had a biting intellect and the ability to effectively handle whatever was thrown at me. I liked this version of myself most.
Suddenly, I felt Frank start to spoon my side; pressing his chest and stomach into me as he lazily slung an arm over my middle. He buried his head into my shoulder and sighed. “I wish I was dating someone.”
I nodded. “Me too, Frank.”
“You don’t get it,” Frank mumbled. “You’ve never been with anyone. Once you’ve been with someone, and that someone goes away…” Frank shook his head. “You miss it, all of it. You miss being touched, you miss the late night conversations and the random dates and the absolute comfort and warmth you get just by thinking about them. You miss it all. It’s really better off to not know what you’re missing.”
My eyes drifted over towards his, his heavy lashes shut and lips pouted. He held me tighter, nuzzled his head further into my shoulder. Laying there, I had to make a choice. I knew what I wanted and I knew how I felt; I was only hoping he’d feel the same way. I held my breath as I shifted onto my side, cuddling myself into Frank as I placed a kiss onto his lips, just one quick peck. Having made my choice, all I could do was pray for things to go least disastrously as possible.

Notes

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Sorry for the late update; I've been busy and I'll try to be better about keeping the story going! I'm really excited about where it's going and I hope all of you are, too!