School Was Never This Interesting...

Frank wasn’t nervous. Pfft. What? No way.
His heart was pounding so harshly in his chest that he could hear its agitating thumpthumpthump in his ears and so what if he was this close to breaking a sweat, but he wasn’t nervous…. Okay well maybe just… like pre-show jitters, right? Fuck.
To be perfectly honest with himself, Frank was worried about Pete. The reason? Frank knew for a fact that Pete was coming to the show later. He was also mildly hyper-aware of the fact that extremely sociable. So socially, in fact, that he’d somehow in hell managed to befriend a certain dark-haired introvert who just happened to be going by the name of Gerard.
Which meant (knowing Pete as well as Frank did) that he’d more likely tan not discovered some way to drag the 17 year old out of his house. Which was awesome and all, but Frank hoped he hadn’t used force. He didn’t need anyone breaking his favorite student. That would be incredibly tragic and the thought itself made Frank frown a bit.
Anyway back to point:
This all meant that Pete was coming here.
And dragging Gerard with him… Downtown.
Tonight.
So yeah.
Gerard was going to see him on stage.
He was screwed ten ways from Sunday.
But whatever. He could deal with it. Fuck.
Frank arrived at the bar around 8:30 or so. As he finished off the last of his cigarette, he took in the old bar for what seemed as though it was the millionth time. The rust colored bricks of the front of the building, looking, seemingly ancient and appearing unfinished. He’d seen it a million times but each and every encounter struck something deep within his mind, like the welcoming warm embrace of an old friend who turned into a zombie, but not the fucked up kind that would try to suck your brains from your skull with a bendy straw, the calmer kind…if there was such a thing. Anyway Downtown was the first gig they ever played and it held a special place in his heart.
Wow, that sounded gay.
As he walked back and forth from van stored carrying heavy ass equipment, he caught glimpse of a line already forming outside; twenty or so kids (well not really kids, but ya know what he meant) were loitering around the entrance, waiting till the bands started playing. Frank never understood why, despite the fact that the club had opened almost an hour ago, people would still wait outside and put up with the viscous wind messing up their hair and shit rather than simply going inside and staying warm and waiting there for the bands to play. It baffled him to be completely honest but he just shrugged it off as he made his way inside for the last time that night.
He hauled the last of the equipment in through the back entrance and just stood there for a while. He whipped several beads of sweat that had formed from his forehead that had formed whilst he was lifting. He sat down at the nearest table and made small talk with a few ot the people he knew.
He hadn’t even had a beer (yet) and yet he could still feel it. He didn’t know how to describe it exactly. But it was there; this odd, yet familiar feeling dancing in his veins, washing in his blood, this adrenaline; the feeling of something either incredibly amazing or truly horrific stirring in the works. It was just the way it always was before a show…like spiders playing hopscotch under his skin. The energy got him pumped right before every show, somehow seeming more intense than the time before.
He couldn’t quite describe it… it was like coming down from an orgasm…or being in the middle of an orgasm with the one person you want to spend the rest of your life with… it was that amazing and just perfect and you wanted more. It was like a sex drive that only playing a good show could cure.
So Frank sat there for about ten minutes just staring at his fingers and worrying his bottom lip between his teeth. He was basically a live wire waiting to be provoked. He needed something to do with himself before the started bouncing off the walls. And by the way his adrenaline was challenging him, it was a very high probability.
“Iero! Dude, come on we need you back here!” Shaun hollered from the back stage. Frank got up and made a beeline for the backstage where the rest of the band was lounging and/or getting everything set up.
Finally, he thought, something to do.
Shaun walked up to him, “Hey man, what’s up?”
Frank shrugged and sighed wistfully, an image of Gerard randomly exposing itself like a wound to the surface of his brain. He was tired; honestly he hadn’t been able to think of anything else besides a certain favorite student of his. It was like a mental plague and it was kind of getting annoying. He couldn’t close his eyes for five seconds without thinking of him. He needed to get rid of all these thoughts.
“You seem kinda distant is all, wistful even. Finally got yourself a boyfriend?” Shaun smirked,” found some poor soul and convinced him to date you?”
Frank shook his head, “No one I could ever actually get my hands on.” He sighed sadly.
~
Frank was late. Okay he wasn’t really late but he was gonna be the last one on stage.
Fucking laces, why do you always fuck up?!?!
He thought as he ran his fingers through his black hair. Of all the things that he could be worrying about tonight the two main ones were:
a)His shoelaces
b)Gerard
Okay so you guys already know about Frank being a jittery mess because Gerrard was coming to the show, but shoelaces…. In Pencey Prep’s upper early days, Frank had been playing a show, and while he was focused on Pansy, he tried, as usual, to hop across stage like a fucking bunny and guess hwat? His shoe laces, untied themselves , got all tangled and made him trip across the stage. He’d broken his left hand’s pinky but he was just grateful to whatever gods were up there that Pansy escaped the ordeal with nothing more than a fractured string.
And even with the pain in his finger, and the broken string, Frank somehow managed to pull through for the remaining duration of the song (which thankfully wasn’t that long, since they only had 3 songs left to play before the set was over) and improvise. He played it off but in honesty it hurt more than his fucking tattoos. It was such a tiny little thing, too. It bothered him. But fuck it hurt like a bitch and a half.
Ever since that fateful and catastrophic show Frank took extra special care of his shoelaces. Damn Chuck’s and their damn laces fucking up frank in the middle of his fucking bunny hop across stage. FUCK. Frank also developed an unrelenting hatred for his left pinky, that traitorous little bastard.
So naturally when he finished tying his laces he all but ran up on stage, feeling Pansy’s weight bob up and down on his back as he made a beeline to the front of the stage. He had so much fucking energy he could like… backflip off the empire state building and land in a perfect split. He was buzzing with so much energy frank was sure people could see it radiating off of him.He grabbed the mic forcefully and scanned the crowd as he introduced the band and the song they were playing. Sometime between the first two songs, frank noticed a pale, seemingly entranced face staring up at him with shock or awe…
Gerard…. He thought,
Quick! Do something that won’t make you seem lame. Frank thought to himself and as he w inked at Gerard and patted himself on the back for not being an ass, it dawned on him that Gerard’s brother was in cahoots with Pete.
Scheming fuckers, he thought and continued to play.

Notes