Summertime (Frerard)

26: Choose Love Or Sympathy

"C'mon, Frank, how bad can he really be?" Mikey's smile stretched up into a grin as he marched off down the field, leaving me to awkwardly trail behind him like some sort of lost puppy.

I didn't particularly want to follow him, especially amidst his ridiculous, albeit good natured preposition regarding this guy he'd briefly conversed with during the one maths class he hadn't managed to bunk off from this term. Apparently, the teacher even looked surprised to see him walk into the room.

And after the aforementioned ordeal, Mikey had now invited the guy to have lunch with us, which in my mind was nothing short of a fucking ridiculous idea; however Mikey really seemed to think otherwise.

"You were best friends with Skully, for Christ's sake." I groaned, slowly coming to accept that I really had no choice other than to follow Mikey, albeit more than a little reluctantly. Well, more than a just a little actually, as there was an unfortunately high chance that this guy was a major arsehole, seeing as he appeared to get along with Mikey so well for one.

"The key word here being was." He pushed his point forward with a smirk, his eyes meeting mine in an almost hypnotic manner and I began to wonder just how many mind games Mikey reckoned he was capable of using with me, and of course of that number, how many were unbeknownst to me, actually working.

"Still happened, though, didn't it?" I caught up with him, sending a mildly pissed off glare in his direction to aid the sarcastic chirp with which my words left my lips.

"Shut up, you're fucking my brother, in the present tense, and I still put up with you." He raised his eyebrows at me to accentuate his point and I couldn't help as a blush slipped past my barrier of emotion and onto my cheeks, not that the aforementioned barrier of emotion was particularly sturdy in the first place, especially not since Gerard came into my life; since Gerard, everything's been a train wreck, but somehow, it was a good train wreck - the best kind, in fact.

"We don't fuck." I met his gaze to show that I was telling him the fucking truth, and wondering whether it would ever really sink into his head.

"Yeah, you make love, whatever." Mikey pulled the words from his lips as if they were without meaning, whereas from my perspective, it was simply none other than the contrary, because the promises like these that Gerard made to me, they meant everything.

The way Gerard wanted to wait until I was eighteen before we had sex, and the way he put his beer away entirely because it made uncomfortable, it meant so much, because no one else had ever cared quite so much about me, and it's sad to think I was in such a state to fall in love with the first people to give a damn, but maybe that's how it should be, because the person that gives a damn is the most important one of all.

"Mikey, we don't have sex - simple as that." I stopped to meet his gaze, pausing between my harshly spat out words to ensure they successful implanted themselves amongst every fibre of his being; drifting around in his bloodstream as a constant and somewhat irritating reminder as to what was the truth.

"Gerard says he doesn't do a lot of things, you know, Frank." Mikey chose those words carefully, because he knew that out of everything he could have said, it was those few words that would affect him the most, and he loved that. He loved the way the attention was diverted and suddenly I was giving far too much of a fuck about Gerard and those stupid fucking pills.

"I'm not Gerard." I let out a sigh, hating to detach myself from him like this just to detach myself from a tricky situation.

"Just because I'm dating him, doesn't mean I am him." I fought the urge to lash out as Mikey flinched at the word dating, seemingly unable to think for me in his actions as well, or maybe he was just continuing to be an ass about it, because it was Mikey and that was what he did.