"You should stop being in love with me."

And the silence that followed was jaw dropping, but then again so was his statement, and perhaps this was just the kind of silence that it warranted.

"What the fuck are you saying, Gerard?" Came my instant response, words wary and voice shaking just a little more than it should, as I froze, mid putting my school shirt on, my boyfriend watching as I got ready for school from the bed, and sat almost awkwardly upon it as his lips set free the kind of confessions that should never leave the darkest corners of his brain.

"I'm saying what I'm thinking, and you already seem to have my whole mind and mental condition exactly figured out, don't you, Frank?" He rolled his eyes, making a reference to the little box of pills on the bedside table - untouched this morning, yet we'd barely been up fifteen minutes, so I wasn't about to get up his ass about it already, but the time was coming soon.

"Gerard, just fucking drop it. Why on earth would you ever think that I could ever stop loving you, no matter how hard I tried - like even if I wanted to." I sighed, shaking my head as I finished buttoning up my shirt, and neglected tucking it in, mainly because I didn't particularly fancy looking like an asshole today.

"You do though." He sighed, throwing himself back down onto the bed, and his mind whirring in a manner that I didn't even want to think about, because no matter how hard I tried, and no matter how much I hated that fact, I knew that there was always something about Gerard that I'd never come to understand. "You wish things would be simple and that you could just hate me and not want to fuck me after I've slapped you, but you like that. You fucking like this - you like us as we are, and you even get off on it... the whole fucking punching and fucking thing. You're fucking weird, Iero."

"Gerard... I... what? Just what?" I exhaled, turning to meet my boyfriend's gaze as I tightened my tie around my neck, meeting the twenty three year old's gaze almost hopelessly. "Just take your fucking pills, okay? I assume you're happy now that you can paint me as this messed up sociopathic asshole that only manipulates you into taking some fucking pills, but really, Gerard, as hard as it is to believe, I actually care about an asshole like you, and I actually worry about what will happen when you don't take your pills, and then just how messed up things get, huh?"

"I love you." He came to whisper, almost as a last resort, like he'd given up all hope in everything help and that this now was just a broken and pleading beg.

"I know." I sighed, swallowing, and running a hand through my hair. "Look, I've got to get to school soon, but I'm not leaving until you've taken your pills and had something to eat and promised me that we're already and that you won't do anything stupid today."

"You don't trust me on my own, do you?" Gerard rolled his eyes, almost smirking to himself, like this was some sort of accomplishment and really, it sickened me.

"No, not fucking after you killed your ex-boyfriend and nearly got us killed with some stupid fucking plan of yours." I snapped out, not giving myself quite enough time to regret it afterwards, shoving the box of pills in my boyfriend's direction as I surveyed my reflection in the mirror and deemed it adequate, before joining the red-haired asshole on the bed with the two pills in the palm of his hand.

"I'm sorry." He whimpered out, biting down on his bottom lip until it became swollen under the pressure. "I'm really fucking sorry, Frankie, I just... I'm messed up, and my life's messed up, and you're you, and you just don't deserve to have to fight this shit with me."

"Gee, please, I love you. So much, and you know what? You mean so much to me, you mean the most that anyone ever has... look, we'll try - I'll try, and we'll work out, look I want us to work out, and I'm going to try. I promise you that, but you have to try too."

"I do try." He added, eyes widened, almost looking at me weirdly - in a manner that I couldn't quite figure out. "I love you too." And then he swallowed the pills, and from then on, I could just about pretend to myself that everything was okay, or at least for now, and at least I could go to school and face the problems there at face value and without my boyfriend's mental state forever haunting me.

"You okay, yeah?" I asked, just checking, because maybe I did just care too much about this asshole, and maybe I didn't even care anymore.

"Of course, I'm okay... I promise." And that smile was convincing, but not quite, and I just wanted to believe him and go, but I could never quite do that to him or myself, because I was a hypocrite and he was an asshole, and truly we were the worst combination, but surely it felt like the best at times.

"What's wrong?" I broke the silence, cutting to chase in under thirty seconds, and the sigh that I received in response was alluding to the fact that perhaps he'd even considered the fact that I'd believe his lie, and leave him there to wallow in his own messed up head.

"I don't know if I can live with myself anymore, Frank." And those words were crushing and I felt like falling and dying and screaming all at the same time, yet I did none of those things, because I was still stuck in the eternally screwed up mentality where I considered Gerard to be more important than myself.

"Well, I can't live without you, Gerard." I spoke only after a few moments of silence as I began to process his confession. "So, think about that... please."

"This is the kind of co-dependency that makes me want to shove my head through a wall." He sighed out, grabbing my hand and meeting my eyes with a stupidly cute, tired sigh. "But I love you like fuck, and really, I just don't know what to do with myself."

"Me neither, Gee, but we can be hopeless little fuckers together."

"Little?" The redhead scoffed, eyebrows raised. "I'm not the fucking midget here, asshole."

"Oh shut up." And as he parted his lips to continue in argument, I went to stop him with my lips against his, and really that was just enough to keep me going through the day; even if we were just a little messed up and sloppy, having barely just woken up, just knowing that we were both here was enough to keep me going, and I just prayed like hell that it was the same for me.

I guess maybe it was just trusting and believing, and maybe for this to work, just maybe, I'd have to believe that he was okay, and that we were okay.

-

"Mikey still not back then?" Pete asked, the two of us sat outside on the school field, generally just trying our best to avoid Skully and his little 'crew' at all costs, and surprisingly, results were relatively successful so far.

"What does it look like?" I asked, rolling my eyes and perhaps overdoing 'sarcastic asshole' today, but maybe I just didn't care all that much, like perhaps I even had better things to think about, such as my fucking asshole of a stupid boyfriend, and his fucking stupid boyfriend, and their fucking unfortunate mother.

"Seriously, Frank, please stop being so elusive and up your own ass about your boyfriend and whatever shit you've gotten into recently, because it's nothing but pissing me off at this point." Pete sighed out, pulling out his maths homework - due for next lesson, and a calculator that I bet my life that he wasn't supposed to use.

"Well, fucking good for you." I rolled my eyes, leaning back against the school fence, and generally just wishing that it wasn't there and that I could just make a run for it - away from school, and this and everything, but not Gerard, because maybe in different circumstances the two of us would work, and maybe in a different world where were different people with different identities, we would work, and it would be easy, but I just couldn't shake the thought that no matter how hard I tried, and no matter how hard the both of us tried, that with everything and with us like this, we'd never work out, not really.

We should have met differently, because maybe then we'd at least have a chance to make it out of this mess okay and alive, because this was the kind of relationship that was hurting both of us to be in, and this was the kind of love where each kiss was killing us, and yet we could never quite stop.

"Frank...." Pete sighed; meeting my gaze as he pushed away his maths homework, making the easy decision, because even sorting out my fucking life and problems was preferable to maths homework. Getting Ebola was probably preferable to maths homework. "Just tell me, please, like seriously.... tell me what happened with Mikey, as well, because like it or not - I care."

"Mikey got fucking shot in the leg, by the way." My voice was spiteful and the content of my words was perhaps something that I shouldn't have let slip, and Pete's 'what the fuck' tone was perhaps just more than vaguely amusing.

"Frank... please tell me that you're fucking kidding me, because dear fuck, that is the most unfunny joke ever, but please tell me that you are fucking kidding me, because no, fucking no - what the fuck, Frank? What the fuck?"

"Don't act like it was fucking me that shot him." I rolled my eyes, turning away almost too nonchalantly to be deemed anywhere near sanity at this point.

"So who did? Some crazy axe murderer or the police, cause you know they like shooting people, don't they? Or what? Some crazy ex-boyfriend or some gang asshole? What the fuck? I mean, fuck, is he alright?"

"You know he's alright, come on." I met his gaze once more, biting my lip as I let sympathy slip through my asshole facade. "Sorry, I just... I've been trying not to think about it, because everything's just so messed up, like Pete, honestly, this is a messed that you just don't want to get yourself involved in."

"So who the fuck shot him? I want to fucking shoot this motherfucker, I-"

"Pete."

"Sorry, I..." The boy stopped almost instantly, his mind occupied elsewhere for just a second, before turning back to me, eyes almost blank and dear god, I knew something was fucking up, but at this point I just daren't fuck my head up with anything else. "Who shot him?"

"Gerard." I replied after a moment or two of silence, my nonchalant tone making a dreadful return, and then the silence that followed as our gazes didn't quite meet, but didn't need to, as I'd already said it all, and in one word too.

"Fuck." 

And that was all the response I got, even after minutes of silence, and the eventuality of his pen reaching back to the paper of his maths homework, and my eyes still fixated upon the horizon, my mind elsewhere - Gerard, in fact, because only when I said it aloud, did I come to realise just how deep this grave of shit that I'd buried myself in was.

"I love him." I muttered into the silence, almost as if I felt the need to justify everything between Gerard and I, because despite everything it still mattered, and despite everything, we still mattered, and despite the millions of fuck ups on both of our parts, I still loved him, and I could never quite leave him at all, and I was content in believing that it went both ways.

"I know you do." Pete sighed out, catching my gaze for the first time in several minutes now. "I know what loving someone that you shouldn't is like, Frank."

"And what do you mean by that?" I asked, perking up a little at his words.

"Maybe it's my turn to keep something secret and leave you agonised over it, huh?"

"Oh, you asshole."

"Oh indeed." Pete snorted, eyes rolling, biting down on his lip, and looking off again - that same vacant look in his eyes that I would forever question, and perhaps never know the answer to.

-

"Gerard?" I called out into the awkwardly silent house that I went home to, and was still was glad to be able to - nothing felt better than being free of my father and the hell he'd created for me, and really, sleeping in the same bed as my boyfriend every night was just fantastic.

"Mikey?" I went for the younger of the two brothers almost as a second resort and surely that was in some way hurtful, but right now, I was far more occupied with the fact that somehow the house was completely empty, and as I ventured into the kitchen, having dropped my school bag down near the door and already discarded my tie somewhere on the way from the door to the kitchen, I came to notice a scrap of paper upon the kitchen counter.

The scrap of paper - a note, presumably from Mrs Way and vaguely addressed to anyone who might find it, simply said that she and Mikey had gone out, and with no specific detail as to where 'out' was, and really, I couldn't help but let my sympathy slip for the guy, because really, what seventeen year old guy wanted to be dragged out shopping with their mother?

It seemed however that the house was vacant entirely, and that Gerard, too, was nowhere to be found, which was a fact that I really couldn't help but let worry me, because maybe I did just worry too much, I mean, I'd checked his bedroom and he'd taken his pills for definite, and nothing was out of place and everything was absolutely fine - maybe, he'd simply gone out with them, or even just popped out for five minutes to get some cigarettes or something, really, I was over worrying this.

But it was Gerard, and like falling in love with him, I just couldn't help myself.

I threw the note into the trash, sighing as I made myself a coffee and send a casual, totally not giving off 'freaked out over-protective boyfriend' vibes, text to Gerard, and stared at my phone for a good two minutes as I awaited some form of reply, and of course, the asshole probably had his phone off or on silent or even left at home, and he just definitely wasn't ignoring me, because maybe lying to myself for the sake mental stability was far more preferable at this moment.

Something was definitely off with him, especially after what he'd said this morning, and I couldn't help but worry like his fucking mother over this, it was seriously driving me crazy, and even I was beginning to hate how everything around him and between us just seemed to revolve around pills, and fuck ups, and running away, and ruining everything.

It seemed making spectacular fucks up were just what we were good at and just maybe, it seemed that I was far too content with that: love was fucking stupid thing, and oh dear god, how I'd come to rely on it.

I downed the coffee and checked my phone once more, almost glaring at the screen like it was the thing's fault that my idiot of a boyfriend hadn't replied in the last five minutes, and really I knew I'd feel so fucking stupid about this later, but my head was spinning with everything - with Gerard, with Mikey, and with Pete: how I'd messed up, and what he'd said, and how I'd let a secret slip, and how it was always me again, screwing everything up, but at least I was making a show of it, at least, if we went out, we went out with a bang.

And as I checked my phone for the third time that reckless little thought of mine kept my sanity temporarily on board, yet all too soon, it'd all coming crashing down.

I jumped a little as the doorbell rung, and for a moment my mind went into a stage of nothing but panic, but I soon came to the rather obvious realisation that this was in fact nothing more than the doorbell in a suburban neighbourhood at like four in the afternoon on a Wednesday, so really, the worst thing I could be faced with was a couple of particularly determined Jehovah’s Witnesses, or maybe even Gerard - forgetting his keys or something like the idiot he was.

And yet paranoia pulled at the hairs on the back of my neck like it took pleasure in tormenting and slowly killing me, and perhaps, I didn't entirely blame it; I was a clusterfuck of emotions and with one tug of a string, I soon came falling pieces, and bringing everyone with me - surely that was entertaining for even the most skeptical of sadists?

It took a good thirty seconds before I actually moved - previously frozen to the spot, and rolling my eyes at what a pathetic little shit I was, as I made my way over to the front door, unlocking it and ready to open it to either some asshole trying to sell me something or just someone having forgotten their keys - neither of which was particularly traumatising, and yet my stomach still churned and I struggled to breathe, because something was overall off, and I just couldn't shake the feeling that something wasn't quite right.

I opened the door to silence at first, my eyes barely focused, and then, fuck then, just so much noise and thoughts and pleading and screaming, and everything - all at once, and I was staring like an idiot as I struggled to remind myself how to breathe.

"Look, I just... I just... I'm here to say sorry, can I... I-"

The words made no sense at all and my heart pounded in my chest as I rubbed my eyes for the hundredth time and yet what I saw before me didn't seem to vanish at all, and really, the explanation was nothing more than non-existent.

"Bert?"

-

Hey guys:) So how's that for a plot twist, and just a psa he's not just come back from the dead, okay, it's a better plot than that, somewhat logical, please, trust me on this one... as in he didn't really die in the first place okay shush, please don't kill me:') Anyways votes and comments are appreciated as always and I love you all<3