They were both sorry, but still it wasn't enough.

Deep down, it wasn't enough.

But on the surface, it was all they had.

And therefore.

Life went on.

And they shared a bed again.

Shared a house again.

Shared coffee mugs again.

Shared arguments again.

Shared kisses again.

Shared late nights again.

Shared a hatred of the world again.

Shared a hatred of themselves again.

And it was better than feeling alone.

At least most nights.

Today was one of those nights, and the lamp was on in the corner of their bedroom, shared bedroom, shared bed, shared wardrobe, shared carpet, shared walls, shared life, shared love, shared nothing at all.

Shared possessions.

Possessions that held very little value.

Perhaps nothing at all.

But life went on, and Frank had his side of bed, and Max had this - the sides they didn't share, and that liberation was perhaps overwhelming, and for reasons they couldn't quite bring themselves to admit as they talked words that held very little meaning in the twilight, and spoke heavier subjects with alcohol upon their tongues, because like that, they didn't have to try.

And when they didn't try, things started to go wrong.

But the morning served to fix every misunderstanding and every complication: breakfast in bed, a cure to all ails, and enough to make the world worth living in. They knew how the other liked their coffee more than anything else, and they lived in a world where that counted for something, counted for too much, counted for the world.

Counted for late nights. Counted for headaches. Counted for arguments. Counted for a bruise. Counted for nights spent away. Counted for it all.

A non verbal, omnipresent apology in toast perfectly done and words scribbled onto heart shaped post it notes - on places like fridges when one had gone out. Notes - reminders, each other's presence always there, perhaps more in theory than in person, and it worked like that.

They lived like that.

Time passed - almost a week.

And they lived like that.

And it worked, with coffee and toast and sex and kisses and the night light on even when the other wanted it off - compromise.

It worked.

But for how long?

That was a question you couldn't answer on a heart shaped post it note placed on the fridge, or a smiley face written on the milk in sharpie, or presents, or kisses, or hickeys, or late nights awake, and the conversation that followed.

Conversation with meaning but still not enough.

Because there was more they couldn't say than what they could.

And Frank had told himself that it was better off that way, and that this was how it was supposed to be, but he'd been doing a lot of thinking in his time, in the late nights when he couldn't quite sleep because Max had fallen asleep first and started snoring, and he racked his brains, and never once had there been anything to dictate the fact that he had to stay with Max.

It was simply the only thing he knew.

And this was the recovery, this was the hope of it all being okay, and this was smiles, and this was the light at the end of the tunnel, but sometimes, that light just didn't shine bright enough, because sometimes, late at night, Frank got lost in the dark, and he thought about the things Max had said, the things Max had done, and then the things he hadn't.

He thought about the end of the world and where he'd want to be when it came.

It wasn't here.

He thought about Gerard and how they didn't talk anymore.

How Gerard acted weird now.

How Lindsey avoided him also.

How he felt alone at work, how he hated it.

How he didn't know what to do.

But still he thought about where he wanted to be come the end of the world, and he thought about those nights he'd spent at Gerard's, and he thought about wearing his shirts, and that sofa and the way Gerard had looked at his tattoos.

But he thought about how Max might react to him leaving.

He thought about the impact of it all: the fallout, the end of it, so to speak, and what could become of them. He knew it would never go well, and he knew he'd be held responsible for something truly terrible: something he had nothing and yet everything to do with.

And in the late nights, in the darkness, a lamp in the corner of the room on: compromise to sleep with the light on, and Max in the bed beside him - turned over, facing away from him, snoring. Frank came to conclude that this was how it would be.

He got up.

He got out of bed and cursed the creak of the floorboards as he did so.

He shuddered a little with every step and looked himself down in the mirror: circles beneath his eyes, because he wasn't used to sleeping in this bed anymore and he was never any good at sleeping in unfamiliar places, Max's shirt, because it had been the first thing he'd come across, and hair sticking up at all angles.

He didn't know what to make of himself, what to do with himself.

Sleep was of course the obvious option, but Frank decided he wasn't an obvious person.

Because despite this all, he was happy. He was content. He was as content as he might ever be in this life, because he preferred safety over risk, a hometown over Hollywood, and breakfast in bed and a man who'd made a mistake to one that didn't speak to him anymore.

He didn't know why though, because he struggled to make sense out of his own head, out of snoring, out of the light on, out of his own bed.

Out of his cellphone: no new messages, all to Gerard, read but not replied to. Even to Lindsey. And that hurt too.

So in that, he found himself alone and seeking company, late night conversation until morning came from a certain French teacher who'd been nothing but bitter to him: 'are you awake? I need someone to talk to.'

He was.

The reply came within instants.

'You made the wrong decision.'

'What?'

'The thing with your taste in men is that they all seem to be liars. Terrible liars. But you always believe them.'

-

It had easily been the worst few days of Gerard's life, because here he found himself, getting to school early just to avoid three people now, and even finding himself doing his job properly in order to waste time and avoid the aforementioned three people, which was definitely a new low for him. Like seriously, this was this kind of school where he'd probably get fired for actually doing what he was supposed to be doing, or just be fired because everyone hated him and wanted him out, and were prepared to chase him out with pitchforks... okay, that was kind of more like a witch hunt, thinking about it.

Although, if Gerard was a witch he would probably have something better to waste his life away with than actually doing his job, or well, fucking up his friendships and having sex with married men, as that was what had brought on this mess.

Because quite an awful lot had gone on in the past few days: an awfully horrible lot of awfully horrible things, and it was of course, all his fault.

The three people he found himself forced into avoiding were Frank, Brian, and Lindsey - Frank, he hadn't spoken to since the incident with Chantal, and was now pretty sure that Frank was making an extra effort to avoid him, which led him to accept that maybe he had just fucked things up with Frank, and that was that.

And Brian, Brian who he'd gone to when he was upset: Brian, who he'd ended up fucking, and it had fucked him up in the head, but once he'd left he'd had little on his mind besides guilt, of course until he realised he'd left his school I.D. card there, in Brian's bedroom, and of course, he'd only realised he'd left it once Brian had called him up after his wife had found him. Brian was pissed at him, even though it wasn't solely his fault, but still, Brian was married, hopefully still, because Mrs Molko was pissed and very much suspected that something had gone on considering their history, but she couldn't exactly confirm her suspicions, and perhaps that was everything keeping that ring on Brian's finger, although it didn't seem like he valued it all that much anymore.

Gerard had found himself avoiding him ever since he'd cornered him at smoking spot and gotten dangerously close to slapping him for ruining his marriage, which technically, yes, Gerard had done, but it wasn't like Brian hadn't had anything to do with Gerard sleeping with him. Brian didn't seem to see that anymore.

Lindsey, though, he hadn't fucked things up with her directly, it was just the matter of being in a fucked up state of mind and acting 'suspicious', and that there were of course rumours, and then also the fact that he was pretty sure she'd told Chantal not to speak to him anymore, because Chantal really wasn't the kind of person to blank people for no reason, but he was just trying to prevent fucking things up further, and just like that, Gerard found himself having cutting off all the friendships he had at school, and sat alone in his room at break time, actually doing some paperwork as he glared at the smoke alarm every once in a while like it caused him personal offense.

He most certainly couldn't risk going outside to smoke and risk running into Frank and/or Brian, fuck, he wouldn't even be surprised if the two had formed an unlikely friendship based on their shared hatred of him, fuck, they might even have pioneered the Gerard Way hate club, which Lindsey would soon become a member of, as well as those fifteen year olds who'd looked personally offended when he told them they couldn't just walk out of his class because they didn't want to be there (honestly Gerard had wanted nothing more for them to walk out, but he didn't want to create even more shit for himself, honestly he couldn't be bothered with it all anymore).

Life sucked.

Life fucking sucked.

And Gerard wanted, no, fucking needed a cigarette, and he was in fact even getting dangerously close to just getting up and ripping the smoke alarm out of the ceiling and chain-smoking the entire packet of cigarettes at his desk - he might get fired for that- actually, he took a moment to remember that this school was run by Brendon Urie before promptly getting to his feet and just taking the bottom off the smoke alarm and taking out the batteries.

He placed the batteries down on his desk and leaned back in his chair, clicking his lighter somewhat tentatively, almost as if the smoke alarm would somewhat retain its magical fire sensing powers, even after the batteries had been taken out, before putting a cigarette to his lips and lighting it, and seriously, sitting there at his desk, just fucking smoking was the best thing he'd experienced in days, but he had had some pretty fucking shitty days so there wasn't really all that much in the way of competition.

After having finished his first cigarette, he lit another, even going so far as to close his eyes, relaxing a little, but of course, finding himself regretting ever doing so, as when the fire door burst upon with a slam, he had something close to a heart attack: his eyes widening as he pulled the cigarette from his lips, suddenly feeling like he was sixteen, something in his bedroom as his mum walked in.

It was however, not his mum who made their way in through the fire exit, but Lindsey, which was easily worse, like seriously, he'd much rather that his mother magically materalised and came into school and into his classroom to tell him off for smoking, despite him being an adult, and 'responsible', although truth be told, Gerard felt practically anything but responsible.

"What's fucking going on, Gerard?" Lindsey looked at him in disbelief, glancing up at the dismantled smoke alarm and then batteries upon his disk, and really she'd hadn't even thought of Gerard to be that intuitive, and in fact, in a weird way, she was proud of him, but now really wasn't the time, of course.

Gerard blushed, taking another drag of his cigarette as he avoided her gaze at all costs, "uhh... I... uhh... nothing-"

"You locked your classroom door, fucking good thing they design fire doors so they aren't locked, isn't it?" She snapped, making her way over to his desk, and glaring down at him. "Seriously, what's going on? Why aren't you outside, you seriously can't be still avoiding Frank-"

"Not just avoiding Frank now-"

"Yeah, you're fucking avoiding me too by the looks of it." She rolled her eyes in disbelief, one hand on her hip as she looked over Gerard's desk, and then the filled in paperwork, and suddenly felt a wave of serious concern wash over her.

"And Brian." Gerard added, not that it mattered all that much anymore.

"Fuck's sake, Gerard," she grabbed a chair, sitting down across from him, resting her elbows upon the desk and looking the art teacher in the eyes: something he made apparent was uncomfortable for him. "Why are you avoiding Brian?"

Gerard let out a sigh, biting his lip, tired of fucking lying by now, "he fucked me, his wife found out, I practically ruined his marriage, and now he hates me," he found himself saying far too nonchalantly.

Lindsey could only raise her eyebrows in response, because on one hand, she was screaming at him, but on the other hand, this was exactly something Gerard would do to prove a point, and that point was indeed that he didn't like Frank, however, she didn't doubt that regardless of this whole mess, Gerard still had feelings for Frank - heavily suppressed, fucked up feelings, but feelings nonetheless.

"You know what you need to do?" She began, her voice oddly gentle for the situation, which surprised her as much as it did Gerard - perhaps she just didn't have the energy to be angry at him today. "Stop making getting fucked your go to solution when you're upset."

"I didn't even really initiate it, you know?" Gerard protested, his eyes widening a little, "he kissed me...." he trailed off, "not that it matters, really, both our fault, isn't it?"

"Yeah," Lindsey nodded, "you're both fucking idiots."

Gerard sighed a little, "not if you ask Brian, because he's real fucking happy to let me take all the blame, paint me as the fucking scum of the Earth just so he can fix his shitty marriage with his fucking shitty wife. I knew it wasn't going to last. I fucking knew it. From the fucking moment he told me they got engaged, from our last fucking fuck." Gerard leaned back in his chair, "I always knew he liked men more than women, or maybe it's just my ass, fucking better-"

"Gerard." Lindsey narrowed her eyes, "I don't give a fuck about your ass. And clearly, you're overreacting, as you always are, because you made this thing with Frank out to be the clear end of the world, which it wasn't, and now you've done this, which isn't the end of the world, either, as a result of it. I really fucking wish you'd listen to me, only if once in your life."

"I do listen to you." Gerard protested, "you told me not to get a large at Starbucks because I couldn't finish it before class, and you were right, and I knew that, so I got a medium-"

"I'm talking about which guys you fuck and which ones you don't, relationships, important issues, having an affair with Brian Molko, not your Starbucks order." Lindsey sighed out, biting her bottom lip.

"Not really an affair is it? Was only once. How many times do you have to fuck for it to count as an affair, because I mean, if I'm going to do it, I might as well go all out, but Brian hates me now, doesn't he? Only fucking hates me because his wife found out - only hated me after she did, because you know what happened after we fucked and I was out his house and what we'd done really struck me, you know, I was freaking out, and he was just sat there like it was nothing and got me a drink, and that was that, fucking alcohol."

"We all have our ways of dealing with things. Seems his is alcohol, seems yours is fucking people you shouldn't." She sighed, "neither are particularly good things to do."

"And what's Frank's?" Gerard narrowed his eyes, "how is he coping with the life destroying news that Chantal told him that I like him-"

"Getting back into shitty relationships, it seems." Lindsey looked away, sighing, "he moved back in with Max. I never really liked that guy, you know? I can't place what it is, but-"

"He hit him." Gerard said before he could stop himself, "just the once, but he did, and Frank still wants to paint him as Jesus fucking Christ for it, and every time I told him that he should break up with that guy, no, no, of course, I'm overreacting and he's never going to listen, and I... wow, it's such a fucking shame that I give a shit, isn't it?"

"You don't seem like you're giving all that much of a shit, you know, sat here, being fucking bitter about him, when he's back with that guy." Lindsey sighed a little, biting her lip, "he doesn't hate you. He just thinks you hate him."

"You're just saying that." Gerard spoke without thinking.

"Why would I lie to you, Gerard?" Lindsey asked, narrowing her eyes.

"I don't know." He spat, rolling his eyes.

"Talk to him. Apologise. All I'm fucking saying." Lindsey sighed, "you don't have to be the hero here, you just have to be there for him, you just have to fix one thing in your life, before you inevitably fuck something else up."

"Oh, thanks for your fucking optimism, thanks for always believing in me." Gerard spat, but deep down, he knew Lindsey was right. She tended to be.

-

hey pals !!! lmao no milk puns this chapter i have let myself down ik :((( vote and comment for milk puns next chapter ayy ayy lo v u !!!