There was something about waking up in a bed alone, especially when you'd gone to sleep with someone by your side.

There was something else about waking up in a bed alone, with a massive scar down your right side.

Something indeed utterly horrifying, and you couldn't even blame Frank for freaking the absolute fuck out.

He practically leapt to his feet, and indeed regretting doing so, because there was something about a massive scar down your side and suddenly movements that just, you know, hurt like a motherfucker.

He let out an odd kind of muffled groan/yelp, as his fingers made their way down his side, poking tentatively at the crimson mark stark against pale skin, as he struggled to recall, struggle to justify, and piece together just how possibly it could have gotten there.

because the thing was that it wasn't just a little scratch, but a massive scar stretching down from half way down his rib cage to the bottom of hip, and it was fucking ugly in nature: jagged in nature, and goddamn fucking horrifying.

Okay, Frank seemed not to be immediately dying and after the initial shock of it all, he was fine, but more than fucking confused, and more than low-key freaking the fuck out, as he stood there in only his boxer shorts just looking at the scar in the mirror.

He jumped a little as the door opened, leaving Gerard stood in the door way, already a little distraught from a certain conversation he'd had with his brother, only to stand there in shock and disbelief, and more than anything worry and confusion, as his gaze fell upon Frank and the scar.

"What the fuck?" He exclaimed, closing the door behind him and rushing over towards Frank, pulling him into his arms. "What's this? What's happened?"

"I don't know!" Frank exclaimed, clinging desperately to Gerard, tears forming in his eyes as he struggled to explain what the fuck was happening even to himself. "I just, I just woke up, and... I woke up and it was there-"

"Fuck..." Gerard choked out, glancing down at it again, and his head racing as he struggled to piece it all together, because he hadn't injured himself like that, he hadn't hurt himself at all so far that day or even last night, but there was no realistic way that Frank could have acquired such an injury as he slept, but still it lay there, almost mocking, and yet truly horrifying.

"I couldn't have done that in my sleep somehow, and I mean, there's no blood anywhere, it just doesn't make sense." Frank continued, taking Gerard's hand in his for comfort, because honestly, his head felt as if it was about to spin right off his shoulders in that moment, and with the scar on his side, he wouldn't even be all that surprised if it actually did.

"It doesn't." Gerard repeated, "come on, sit down, I think you should sit down," Gerard pressed a kiss to Frank's lips before leading him to the bed and sitting down beside him.

"Doesn't hurt though. It doesn't hurt and it hasn't bled- it's just... there. I mean, it hurts when you touch it like all injuries, but it doesn't hurt of its own accord." Frank glanced across at Gerard, "I mean it's weird, but it's... it's... just a thing, I mean, maybe it's just... I don't know, maybe it's fine, somehow just fine."

Gerard shook his head: not quite so eager to brush it off. "Hey... this is gonna sound weird, but show me your foot," Gerard looked up at Frank, who could only raise his eyebrows back at him in response.

"Do you have a foot fetish or something?" Frank laughed it off a little, before pulling his foot up, and watching with even more confusion as Gerard made a grab for it, before pressing his fingers against a certain spot that Frank hadn't been even aware of. "Fuck." But it hurt, it fucking hurt, and Gerard had barely touched it. "What the fuck was that?" Frank exclaimed, glancing at his foot and looking over a small reddened patch of skin in confusion.

"A burn." Gerard bit his lip, looking up at Frank, "this is something that's... kind of hard to explain, honestly I have no idea how it works, but do you know how I don't get injuries and well do you remember when I burnt that drawing and stood on it, and well... that's that burn," Gerard let out a sigh as he looked up to gauge Frank's reaction. "I saw it then but I didn't quite get it, and then it's happened a few times since but nothing major, nothing major enough for you to notice. I mean, it was fine, I was just making a specific effort not to get hurt, and now this, and maybe it's the same, but I haven't..." Gerard trailed off, his face growing suddenly very pale, paler, somehow.

"You haven't what?"

"No, that doesn't make sense-"

"What?" Frank exclaimed, "Come on, Gerard, none of this makes any fucking sense to me right now, what's going on?" He grabbed Gerard's hand a little too tightly perhaps.

"I was going to say that I haven't... that I haven't done that, that hasn't happened to me, and I mean, no it hasn't, not now, but I..." He trailed off, "it doesn't make sense, though, Frank, but-"

"But what?" Frank cut him off: a desperate look in his eyes.

"I did this once. When I was alive, though, I got really fucked up, and it was... it wasn't... I did that to myself, I... was pissed and upset and I never told anyone, but it... I don't know, I don't understand how that's here, and why. And where's the logic in this all, seriously?"

"You did..." Frank's eyes widened, glancing down at the scar on his side, "fuck, Gerard, this is- fuck... fuck, fuck. When was this?" He insisted.

Gerard bit his lip, looking away, "about a week before, before I killed myself, I was in a bad place, I... I'm sorry."

"You're sorry? Fuck, Gerard, I'm so-" Frank pulled him closer again, "but how and why is it here, what the fuck? I mean... your injuries from now on me, makes slightly more sense, but..."

"But..." Gerard trailed off. "It was this room, right here, and- maybe it's this house, maybe it's, I don't know- maybe we shouldn't stay here."

"I don't know, Gerard, come on, fuck, what else did you do to yourself?" Frank found himself asking, and it was only then that the realisation really struck Gerard.

"Nothing much... except I... I... killed myself, didn't I?"

"It- though- it... was pills- pills, that wouldn't-"

"I don't know, fuck, Frankie, I don't know." Gerard pulled him into a hug, "maybe we should go. Maybe it's just this house, it'll be fine, I- pr-" Gerard stopped, realising he couldn't promise anything at all

-

The two of them: Gerard and Frank, had walked across town to a local park, in favour of getting away from the house and whatever unexplainable power it could possibly hold inside it, and sat down on a bench between two trees in an awkward silence: their minds consumed more than they'd care to admit with the matters of a certain scar of Frank's side, and a scar that had once been on Gerard's, and how it might all be coincidence and mess, and maybe- maybe it was just genuinely innocent, but how it really might not be.

Frank wondered what could possibly become of them, of him, of this mess, and was too caught up in his own head to notice the way the world around him to fade out or blur at the edges, like as if a painting: smudged slightly as colours bleed into one another due to careless, or perhaps only as you look closely.

And as it really dawned up him, he found himself considering if the whole world around him was indeed an illusion, or if it was just perhaps the tears pooling in the bottom of his eyes, which he was trying his best to ignore, but the world ensured he couldn't.

He didn't particularly fancy the idea of crying, in public, in front of Gerard, especially when Gerard knew why, and had gathered to some extent that it was his fault, and even if Frank didn't intend it to be as such, it really didn't matter, because Gerard was going to interpret things as he pleased and nothing was going to stop him.

Frank didn't want Gerard to hurt; he didn't want both of them to cry, but he knew as he ached, Gerard did too - that was just how things worked now, with this connection between them, and for that, Frank found himself forced to smile, but it really hadn't worked that well.

He choked out a sob, biting his lip as he leaned back and into Gerard a little, watching as the world around him bled and faded together: a blur, a mess, a reflection of himself perhaps, crumbling and fading, and here he was, spewing fucking metaphor as he questioned everything.

He just wanted to be alright. He just wanted Gerard to be alright. For them to be alright, and Gerard had insisted that they would be, but Frank had insisted to himself that this only made evident that Gerard had no qualms with lying to save people's feelings.

And Frank didn't care for that.

Not now, not when it mattered.

Not as the world faded around him, and his head ached, and his whole perception spun itself on its head: the world taking him in as prisoner and then spitting him back out again, and as he stumbled to his feet, he found himself unable to make sense of it all, and as this all occurred: the weight of Gerard's hand in his didn't feel quite so heavy, quite so real, quite so present anymore.

And Frank didn't know what to think.

He didn't know what to make of it at all, as he found his eyelids almost forced closed and the world pulling itself out from under his feet, and the scene of a park soon replaced with a similar one, but inherently different.

He found himself somewhere instantly warmer: inside, he soon recognised, and that the similar scene was indeed just a window - grass and daffodils outside, but where he stood was in fact just a white corridor: far too plain in nature, perhaps not even real, and Frank didn't doubt the lack of reality, finding himself comforted in the warmth, whisked away, but on his feet, but this time alone.

And then, his body was moving before he commanded it to, which was really the world's most horrific sensation, but he soon found himself coming to terms with it as he accepted that nothing much could come of it - just a walk down a corridor, just through some double doors and into a larger room, with chairs, a waiting room of sorts, but empty, as if he was the only one waiting.

He didn't sit down, he simply stood there silent: his eyes instantly darting towards the wall, and finding his gaze locking upon a rather peculiar clock in the shape of a cat, which had perhaps been intended to be comical, but it honestly didn't fit the manner of the place at all, which wasn't exactly somber, but by no means comical, just plain, faded, washed out a bit, and unfamiliar, most of all, unfamiliar, despite the fact that Frank's feet knew exactly where they were going.

It was half past four. Thirty two past, to be exact, but Frank didn't find that necessary.

He then found his gaze shifting across the room, to a wooden door, with a sign that had once been taped to it, but had now fallen off for the most part, leaving only a few scraps of ripped paper clinging onto the door by two pieces of tape. He paused for a moment, before his feet were moving again: across the room, past the chairs, still alone, and to the door.

He found his hand hovering over the handle, as if such an action required hesitance: over-thinking, evaluating, and a great deal of his brain, and as if the act of opening a door was an important one. Perhaps it was, Frank didn't know the door, and what lay on the other side, but it seemed, it seemed his body did, and he put trust in that, since he had no other guide.

However, eventually, after a few seconds had come to pass, he pushed down on the handle and pushed the door open, stepping inside and closing it behind him: another empty room, however, this time with fewer chairs and a table in the middle, and a desk in one corner.

The desk appeared abandoned, with work open on it: a folder and several sheets, and Frank found himself curious as to their contents, but he turned away from them, and instead made his way to the window. The window in this room was larger: spanning most of the height of the wall and perhaps a meter lengthways.

He pulled up the blinds and focused upon the scene outside: trees, grass, and what he assumed to be a lake, just a garden of sorts, but in far more colours, far more alive and real than the series of rooms and corridors he'd wandered through.

Frank remained bewildered as he pulled a key from his pocket: not even knowing he'd had pockets, let alone a key, but he didn't have really long enough to question such a simple thing, before he unlocked the window and pushed it open, letting a cool breeze into the room. He then let out a sigh, before proceeding to climb out of it, his body not seeming to care for the floor of the building below him, and the distance to the ground, doing its best to make it to a drainpipe and then down the rest of the wall.

Of course, he stumbled in the process of doing so, but made it to the ground alive, and with no injuries beside a scrape across his forearm: it started to bleed a little, but Frank only wiped at it, before pulling his sleeve down over it,

He stood there for a moment, taking in the world around him, the nature in particular, and the beauty, and odd familiarity of it all, almost losing himself in that moment, until of course, he found his attention drawn away and the little bubble of peacefulness broken with a call of his name.

"Frank?"

He turned: all too fast, the world blurring and fading around him.

"Frank?" And then a grip: tight around his shoulder.

And he turned again, the world blurring out as he did so, before fading to black.

From blackness, he found familiarity, real familiarity in the form of the park, the park he had been sat in: the bench, and the grip on his shoulder Gerard, and he struggled to make sense of what he'd just seen.

He sat there, attempting to catch his breath, before nodding at Gerard, "yeah? I-"

He shook his head, glancing around him and finding comfort in the way the world seemed far more permanent and less flimsy this time, but still, he struggled to account for what he just occurred.

"What just happened?" He directed his worries at Gerard, because he honestly couldn't think of what else to do.

Gerard pulled Frank closer to him and let out a sigh, "you fell asleep, Frankie, that's what happened. I couldn't wake you for a good minute there - I got worried, baby. You seem really tired, did you not sleep well?"

Frank shrugged, "I think maybe I'm just stressed - you know, a lot to think about and all that-"

"Frank, it's going to be fine, I promise you." Gerard held his hand tightly: an odd sense of certainty behind his words, and that left Frank questioning, whether maybe, just maybe, he might be right.

"How do you know?" He asked, raising his eyebrows a little.

"I have a feeling." Gerard smiled: oddly positive, and Frank found a certain hope in that, and more than anything, perhaps he was just happy that Gerard was happy, because Gerard made him feel like everything had a chance of being okay, and when it wasn't like that, he was left with this weight in his chest in the form of helplessness.

"A feeling, huh?" Frank laughed a little at that.

"Yeah, and look, we're going to know, if... if things are going to fuck themselves up, because, I remember later that day... I... I... my arm, too... I... and, look," Gerard held up Frank's arm, almost as if it was a trophy, "you're perfectly fine. I think it's that house - you're going to be perfectly fine. We'll just go back to that place in the woods, is that okay? I'll talk to Mikey, attempt to explain."

Frank nodded, biting his lip. "I had a fucked up kind of dream, though," he let out a sigh, "an odd dream, it felt so real, it didn't feel like a dream at all: I was just here and then I was somewhere else, and there were corridors and empty rooms, and then this window that I climbed out of to see the plants and flowers in a garden outside, and then I woke up, and that doesn't sound like much, but it honestly feels like a lot."

"I'm sorry, Frankie," Gerard pulled him closer, "you'll tell me if it happens again, won't you?"

Frank nodded, "course I will." He let out a sigh, "maybe I do just need sleep: proper sleep in a bed, our bed, not... your old bed, not in that room, not with all those memories, not with Pete and Mikey's screaming kids, maybe?"

Gerard smiled, "yeah, shall we go back?"

"Yeah." Frank nodded, getting to his feet, "could you stay with me in bed as I sleep? I know it sounds pathetic but I really don't like waking up when you're not there - it freaks me out."

"No, it's fine, Frankie, of course it's fine. I love you, you come first - before anything, before myself even-"

"Gerard, that's stupid, don't say that-"

"Come on, Frankie, I'm being realistic here: you're alive, and I'm not - it makes sense."

-

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