Part Four – Music

 

I had to leave the house later than usual so my parents didn’t see me try to slip the guitar past their gaze. Ever since I was young, I had no luck in concealing anything in front of people. I was too nervous and I always let it show that I had something I wasn’t supposed to. When Sam and I used to knock off little dollar stores and other places with minimal security when we stole stuff, I always had to be the look out. I could never steal anything, not because I didn’t want to (I didn’t really care for the most part, those stores had enough money and the merchandise was overpriced anyway), but because I was the nervous one of the bunch. My skin was transparent and the clerks could see right through me. Sam did most of the stealing, his tough as nails attitude finally coming into good use.

We actually made a pretty good pair. That was, until our parents caught us and everything went to shit. I was pretty sure I wasn’t allowed out of the house unsupervised for a good year. Luckily, I was only twelve or thirteen so it didn’t affect my nonexistent social status too much. And I couldn’t get a criminal record. My dad had threatened to phone the police, especially when I refused to rat Sam out, but my sudden display of tears had made him put the phone down, un-dialed. It had taken all of that year in solitude, plus some more time to work back all the trust I had lost with those minor crimes, and I wasn’t in the mood to lose it that morning by sneaking out my guitar while my parents drank coffee in the kitchen. Though I wasn’t stealing, it would be obvious I was skipping because I had no use for a guitar in school. Even taking the thing outside to pursue something more than a leisurely pastime activity at home would have made my dad furious.

So, I waited. I waited until my dad left for work in his blue Honda and until my mom went out for groceries. I had pretended to leave for school and just waited at the park until I saw the two family cars drive by, before I booked it back to the house, opened the door and grabbed the instrument and a backpack with cat-like stealth. I was becoming pretty good at this, I thought to myself smugly. I didn’t like lying, but I forgot the horrible sins I was committing as soon as I got to Gerard’s. Probably because I was about to commit more of them.

I let myself in as usual, walking quietly into the silent apartment. The window cast yellow light in bright sun beams, which fell over onto the hardwood floor, making it shine in an almond hue. The dove was out of her cage, sitting on the top of it, still and asleep. Her head was tucked under her wing, small coos of light, sleep-filled breathing sounding around her. I could sense the drowsiness as soon as I stepped into the place. I had never been in Gerard’s apartment this early – conscious at least. We always slept pretty late when I spent the weekends because we were up most of the night, and I always came to visit him after school. It had been after eight when I left my house and probably wasn’t even nine yet now. In essence, it wasn’t even that early. For an artist who thought his best pieces were accomplished in the twilight hours of the night, this was a sacred sleeping time.

The quiet atmosphere made me tip-toe quietly into the living space, discarding my bag and my jacket near the door, but carrying the guitar farther into the abode. I saw Gerard’s door slightly askew, the man asleep in a big lump in the center of the bed. I smiled, knowing I would be the one to wake him up. The precious task had been all his own before, and he committed it delicately each time, either by placing kisses all over my body, or gently calling my name to rouse me. Once, I had even woken up to him sucking me off. I didn’t think I’d go that far today, but I definitely wanted to be the first thing he saw when he unveiled his eyes.

I dropped my guitar down on the ground as quietly as I could by the front of his room. I heard him stir when the echo of the chords hit the air, but he didn’t move. I pushed open the door more and began to walk inside, fiddling with my belt buckle as I did. I slid my pants off my hips and discarded them on the floor with the rest of Gerard’s clothing.

He was covered up a lot with the sheets, but I could still see the pale flesh of his arms, and the flushed cheeks on his cherubic face. I knew he was naked underneath the blankets and the idea thrilled me. I began to take off my shirt, my head popping out in time to see Gerard roll over. I was still wearing my boxers, but I dashed over to him, sitting on the side of the bed, one arm on either side of him as I looked at his sleeping eyes. I could see the pupil begin to dart back and forth under the lid, signs that he was just waking up. One of his hands came up and rubbed his nose, then falling down on his pillow where his hair was messily spread. I smiled down at him, just watching him sleep before I decided to do anything. I loved how he looked right then; so calm and peaceful. Most of the time he was energetic and ready to do anything, to give advice, or spout theories. But now, he was human. He was resting.

“Hey, Gerard,” I whispered, leaning down and bringing my lips close to his sleeping ones, but not touching them just yet. “I’m here.”

I pressed my mouth to his, just pressing, until he finally roused himself from sleep. His lips remained limp for quite some time, before he subconsciously began to kiss back, the urge second nature to him. He opened his mouth slightly and let me taste the bitterness that had accumulated after a night’s sleep.

“Morning,” I whispered after our lips had parted. His eyes weren’t open yet, but he was waking up slowly, one arm extending to touch me and the other rubbing his nose and eyes roughly. He started groaning, the stiffness rendering in his body and I shifted with him so we were both comfortable.

“What time is it?” he said, a strain in his voice. He opened his eyes after I had told him the answer and he brought a hand to my body, pulling me down more.

“It’s too early, Frank,” he whined, moving over and letting me have a spot in the large bed. “Go to sleep again with me.”

I moved off the bed for a moment, taking off my boxers before I slid under the covers he held open for me.

“I thought sleep was a waste of time,” I teased him, pressing myself right next to his body. I began to kiss his neck and down his arm instinctively, not being able to wait any longer without touching him.

“It’s not when you’re in the bed with me,” he smiled, eyes closing again and turning over to meet my kisses with his mouth. He still tasted bitter, but I wasn’t complaining.

“Wait,” he said suddenly, opening his eyes and looking at me widely. “Did you bring your guitar?”

I breathed a sigh, hoping that he had forgotten about that minor detail. This was Gerard I was talking about, though; he never forgot a thing. I nodded and pointed to his door, where the neck of the instrument was just visible outside. He lifted his head up tiredly and after seeing verification, slammed it back down on the pillow, letting out a sigh.

“Good,” he declared, pulling me closer. I accepted his warm hands around my waist and gave into his pull. “Because I would have had to make you leave if you didn’t have it.”

“Yeah right,” I challenged, still in a teasing mode. I was still smiling, but I was sure that I hadn’t stopped since I entered the apartment. “You would not have kicked me out.”

He opened his sleep-filled eyes and cocked an eyebrow, challenging me right back.

“Don’t test me,” he warned, his voice still thick with sleep. “Besides, now that you’re here, I can do this all morning,” he added, burying his face into my neck and kissing the tender skin readily. I laughed and pressed my hips against his under the sheet, running my hands through his hair.

“What happened to sleeping?” I laughed, smiling from the pleasure he inflicted this time.

Challenging my words once again, Gerard stopped kissing and looked at me in the eyes with an animal urge. He flipped me over and straddled my hips, gaining some energy that he had been lacking. I giggled as I looked up at him, his arms propping himself up as he brought his lips to mine.

“Sleep is a waste of time.”

 

***

 

Despite his claims, after we had sex on his bed, going achingly slow because of our stiff bones, we had fallen asleep together, tangled in the stained sheets. I loved sleeping in the same bed with someone, especially Gerard. The few school nights after I had spent the weekend at his place, I had rolled over in my own bed and stretched out an arm, expecting to find someone else there. My heart had sunk a little each time when no one had been filling that void. I missed the company, even though I had never had it before and I had always been fine alone. Sleeping with someone, and strictly sleeping, was just nice. If I got cold, Gerard was there to act as my blanket. He was also my pillow, his skin feeling so much better than any cotton material. It wasn’t so much the falling asleep part I liked a lot, though that was good too. I remembered how I stayed awake that first night at his place, for most of the night, waiting to see when Gerard would fall into slumber. I liked hearing the changing of his breath and the ways his eye movements changed. I liked watching when he was dreaming and wondering just what was captivating his subconscious. I’d sometimes ask him in the morning if he remembered, but he never did. Dreams were fleeting like that. Intense and vivid with closed eyes, and then just a sensation of a better time once it slipped too far away. I forgot a lot of my dreams too, partly because they blended in with reality so readily.

The part I loved about sleeping with someone more was the act of waking up. Bodies moved at night, subconsciously to the proper positions. I loved waking up in the morning to find that the roles had been reversed; that Gerard was sleeping on my chest and his hand was around my waist. I especially loved it when we woke up facing each other, our noses pressed together and the other’s hot breathing tickling our faces. We had made it a game almost, that when we woke up in that way, it was a race to see who could kiss the other first. Gerard always won, rubbing the crusties out of my eyes gently first before placing a kiss on each lid, waking me.

Today, however, I was the first to wake up, and I was able to do the very same to him. He smiled at me as he awoke, knowing and secretly congratulating me for a job well done. He pulled our mouths closer together, deepening the kiss. This time, we both tasted bitter, and it was like I had spent the night all over again.

Sunlight was spilling into the room at that point, mocking us with the fact that half the day was gone already. We still kicked around on the sheets, stretching them above our heads to make a tent and hiding underneath, sneaking kisses from the other side. The dove even came in at one point, perching herself on Gerard’s night stand and cooing rhythmically when Gerard rubbed his thumb over my nipple as we kissed for about the thousandth time that day. I always marveled at how it could never get old.

The cooing seemed to stir an image in Gerard and he moved away from my mouth quickly, changing topics like it was nothing.

“Let me hear you play, Frank,” he whispered, the zest returning to his eyes. He was now fully awake and back to his old, friendly self. I sighed under his grip, knowing he was right; I had a promise to fulfill.

I got up from the bed after kissing him again, grabbing and dragging the instrument and its case over to the bed. Gerard stayed lying down while I sat, one leg folded on the knee to give me a good platform to play on. I could feel Gerard watching me, but his eyes didn’t feel as intense as they had the time before. They felt encouraging and kind. His touches were extra gentle today, I noticed, probably for this key fact. Maybe this time, playing would be easier because I knew he was not trying to hurt me. I wondered if he would still be as harsh as he had been before, or if he would go easier on me. I was sleeping with him now, whereas before, I was just a student.

I started to strum the chords randomly, jumping out of my skin when the noise first hit my ears. It seemed ten times louder in Gerard’s place than it ever had at my house. Maybe because creativity wasn’t always placed on mute here.

“Play me a song,” Gerard demanded sincerely from the bed. I had just been playing random scales to warm myself up, mentally and physically.

“I don’t know many songs,” I told him, and it was true. The ones that were in the guitar magazines for beginners were all stupid nursery rhymes that I was not playing for him. I wanted to impress Gerard; I was pretty sure he was aware that Mary did indeed have a little lamb. He didn’t need to hear it again from me. But he didn’t need to hear scales either.

“Make one up,” Gerard insisted. “On the spot. Anything. Doesn’t have to be good, just as long as it fills the air and has a purpose.”

“Isn’t filling the air the purpose itself?” I asked, looking over at him in the bed. He had told me to bring my guitar for background music. I thought that’s all it was. I didn’t think I’d be called on the spot again. I wanted to impress Gerard, but I had no idea what else was on his agenda.

“You have to give it a purpose,” Gerard smiled at me, nodding his head. “It’s just like with any piece of art or writing. It can either occupy space – in this case sound – or it can mean something. The best pieces of art do both.”

I nodded my head, brushing over the strings lightly, but not playing them.

“Captivate me,” Gerard commanded, his voice taking on a mysticism I hadn’t heard in a while.

His demand was astronomical in my mind. Gerard’s attention span was not an easy thing to captivate or keep. You had to be something special to get a place in there. I knew I was already in there to a certain extent, but it was not for my talent. Again, it was for the fact that I was now sleeping with him. I was special because we were lovers; I doubted my attraction as being special as an individual.

I took a deep breath, forgoing my thoughts, and began to play the first thing that came to my head. Like I had expected, my nerves shattered. I began to play with my eyes closed to not be aware of my destruction, but when I opened them for just a second, I saw Gerard’s eyes dart and watch my furious fingers. Though it was somewhat superfluous, I realized that I was sitting on his bed, in his apartment, naked. I had had sex with him only hours earlier, and I had been in a relationship with him for almost two weeks now. I already captivated him. And it wasn’t just with our physical relationship. I saw the way his eyes lit up as he watched my fingers. He was in awe, or at least happy, that I was making an effort. Really, an effort was all I needed to do. I needed to not give up; not be like Arthur Rimbaud. I was pretty sure I could do that. That thought alone, made everything seem so much easier. I began to spill my soul more freely, knowing that I already had his full attention.

I let myself go completely into the music. My fingers seemed to take on a mind of their own and I felt this thing just grab me, forcing me to sit down and play. I kept going, my hands just knowing where to go and what felt good. I felt like I had zoned out, gone into a catatonic state. I knew I was playing music, I could hear it and feel it, but it didn’t always feel like that at times. It didn’t feel like I was there, like I was the one making the sound that hit both of our eardrums. It was like an out of body experience almost. I had always heard of those before, but I never computed what they really were.

My neck suddenly became weak and began to bob up and down, my chin to my chest and then back up again. My jaw became slacked, doing much the same motions in contrast to the neck. My eyes closed and I just let it take me away. I didn’t know how long I played for, but when I came back down to reality, my fingers felt numb from the rough texture of the guitar strings. I looked down at them and noticed how red they were. One of my already scratched up finger pads had ripped open its scab and small blood droplets were spread down my finger. It was so red; scarlet like the paint we had used for the mural, like the one for anger, forbiddance, and most of all, passion.

I stopped then, my hands resting peacefully over the chords until they ceased vibrating. My neck regained its composure and my mouth closed. I stared down at the floor for awhile, regaining myself and rehashing in my mind what had happened. I played guitar, really played it. I didn’t copy a bar of music down from the paper, I didn’t doubt my hands. I didn’t even memorize something and then regurgitate. I played for playing. I was the guitar and I lost myself completely.

It felt fucking amazing. The only thing left for me to do at that point was to look at Gerard.

He was still sitting on the bed, his head leaning against the wall, chest exposed and covered in a few purple welts I had left on him. His hands were folded in front of him, not moving, much like his face. He seemed to be permanently struck in a look of thought. His eyebrows were furrowed deeply, so deep his wrinkles added thickness to his skin. His mouth was open slightly and he was staring at the blanket in front of him. He was listening, he was paying attention, but I still didn’t know what it all meant.

“So?” I asked, biting my lip and hoping it wouldn’t be too bad.

He raised his head like he had forgotten I was in the room, looked at me, and I saw it in his eyes.

“Frank,” he uttered, his mouth open and as slack as my jaw had been. “You’re an artist.”

 

***

 

The rest of the day we lazed around and didn’t do anything too fantastic, which was perfectly fine by me. Gerard wanted to paint something, saying that he had this mad image that he just had to get down on paper. He went over to his easel and began to pour tubes of paint onto his brush and scatter it all around, smiling over at me every once in awhile. I went off to the side, by the window and sat on the bench, the guitar in my lap. I started to play again, more so for practice. I entered my catatonic state a few more times, to Gerard’s delight, but for the most part, I strummed random medleys while my mind wandered. Gerard said he did that a lot when he painted and especially drew. He said that as mind wandered onto other things, his hand eventually found a rhythm, allowing him to visit other planes of thoughts. He said he got his best thinking done when he was like that, and I had started to agree with him.

As I played the chords, I thought of the dove that flew around the room; how happy she must have been. Though she was only allowed to fly around within the confines of the apartment, it was still better than nothing. I found myself flying with her as my hands fluttered over guitar notes. I would occasionally write something down that I thought was good, repeating it over and over again to get it right, and then broadcasting it briefly to obtain some approval from Gerard. He never lied to me, telling me flat out if the riff was just a small ‘okay’ to ‘really good’ and at one point during that day, ‘astounding’. The way he had said that magical word sent chills down my spine. I had to keep it, and I played it for the rest of the day, when nothing new came to me. I trusted his opinion so much more than anyone else’s around me, because he was so blunt and honest. He wasn’t trying to hurt, always help. He seemed to be much more real when he told the truth, and not just some fantasy in my mind. He told me when I was wrong. And I did the same for him, not as often, because I never really got the chance. When that chance came up, I was for sure going to take it.

“Do you remember when you first played your guitar for me, Frank?” Gerard questioned, waking me up from staring out the window. I had been watching school children pass by and thought I saw someone that looked like Billy, the little boy who appeared so happy at first, but sad on the inside, from the first time I had met Gerard, at that park where he invited me back to his place. If it was Billy, then he looked ten times happier now, and I was glad. Gerard was good at bestowing certain emotions on people.

“Yeah, of course,” I answered his question, the memory still a bit off-putting in my mind, no matter how ‘astounding’ something I produced now was. The guitar was still with me, just in my lap, waiting for when the next piece of inspiration hit.

“I was being hard on you,” he admitted softly, taking his eyes off his work for a second. I met his gaze with a confused look of my own.

“You were? How so?” I questioned, remembering the time not for its insults, but for how I had played. I thought I really had sucked.

“I ripped you apart on purpose,” he said earnestly. “I picked on things that probably didn’t need to be picked on. I was ripping apart your playing style when that has no merit on anything. You could play guitar upside down and backwards, so long as music still comes out. And it did. You played pretty well for me the first time. You’re just exceptional now.”

He tried to smile at me weakly, but I turned my gaze to the floor. I digested this knowledge, replaying the words from that day. He had been so harsh with me. He had never used that tone of voice before in all of the days I had come to see him. Not even when I had stolen his cigarettes, gone through his wallet to find out his age, or walked in on him and Vivian had he ever talked to me that way. I had violated his privacy on several occasions, and he acted as if the way I played guitar had been the bigger travesty, my biggest mistake. Creativity was something Gerard admired, something he kept inside of him and had flow from his fingertips into the paint he used. I thought I had let creativity flow through my own fingers and into the guitar. He had been stifling that urge. It was like I was inhuman, incapable of feeling emotion. That what I had showed him was not a part of myself. Did he not understand that I had been exposing my soul to him? That I had trusted him enough to show him this? He didn’t have to lie to me, but God, he didn’t have to do that either.

“ Why? Why would you do that?”

My face shot up to him, and I just stared. My words came off more high-strung and hysterical than I had wanted to sound, but this was extremely important to me. I had thought I had sucked the entire time, up until now. And even now, I still had some doubts of my ability. Anytime I played, I had his words in the back of my mind, telling me what I was doing wrong. It didn’t matter if I thought the rift I had played was good, the criticism had been imprinted in my mind. Gerard’s opinion seemed to be the only thing of some merit. My own beliefs were discarded, even if it was what made me happy. I was pretty sure if I had been brave enough to play for anyone else, I would have discounted their opinion too. Especially if it had been good. I wouldn’t think they were as intelligent as Gerard or knew what they were talking about. Gerard didn’t know what he was talking about, in the sense of guitar and playing went, but he had been honest.

Or at least, I thought he had been. There was something to be said for honesty, and then completely berating someone. He could have been making suggestions rather than malignant statements, or telling me that I had done something right. That’s all I had ever wanted; some approval for my actions. He hadn’t even given me that. He was trying to now, because apparently, I had been doing it right all along. Suddenly, in a world of constant extremes and opposing forces, being right or wrong didn’t matter anymore. It was the whole principle behind everything.

I stared at Gerard hard. Did he not realize how much I had hurt after he did that to me? Did you really do that sort of thing to someone you cared about?

He sighed, after meeting with my stare for a few long, agonizing seconds. I could tell he was pained in his expression, but I didn’t care. He had hurt me too. He put away his art completely. I thought he was going to come over to me, to comfort me or something, but he stayed stationary in the middle of the room.

“I wanted to teach you about rejection,” he confessed, folding his hands in and out against his body, fidgeting. “You needed to know what it felt like for someone to hate your work for no reason, whether it was good or bad. You also needed to know that just because someone hates it, doesn’t mean you have to stop. I had to learn that lesson the hard way. And I learned from someone I barely knew; an art teacher who didn’t even know who Rembrandt was.”

He threw his hands in the air comically, motioning to the absurdity of it all. I held my tongue and didn’t let him know that I had no idea who Rembrandt was either. I didn’t fucking care.

I didn’t move. I couldn’t move. I still felt the weight of the guitar on my body, and I wanted to throw it off. I was disgusted with myself for believing Gerard, but I was even more disgusted with him for making me doubt that belief. All this time, he had been building up my faith, only to be there to take it down. When I finally turned my gaze to the hardwood floor, he sighed. He knew I was hurt (it was sort of hard not to), and I suddenly felt his presence go back to its relaxed, slightly concerned stature.

“Frank, what’s wrong?”

I snapped my head up, letting my mouth hang open in surprise. He looked back at me plainly.

“Are you kidding me?” I cried out.

“I don’t kid. I’m never one for misplaced humor. I prefer sarcasm and dry wit.” He tried to smile, and touched his chest proudly. I shoved him off.

“Gerard, do you not understand what you did to me?”

“I understand very well, Frank. I did it to you for a reason.”

I heaved an aggravated sigh, rolling my eyes. “Shut up about a lesson, okay? I don’t want them if they hurt me.”

“But you need to hurt. Everyone needs to hurt. It’s your way of making it -”

“Yeah, I know,” I cut him off, hearing this pain philosophy from the first night we were together. My God, he could be so fucking repetitive. I wasn’t a two year old. He didn’t need to explain everything to me. “I need to hurt if I want to remember. Just enough to know it’s real, but not enough to stop. I know, Gerard, trust me, I know. But, I want it to stop. I don’t want this to be real. I don’t want to remember this feeling.”

When finished, I placed the guitar roughly by my side, just so I could fold my arms over my chest. I looked out the window, biting my lip to suppress myself. I could hear Gerard shift his weight and I saw him run his hand through his hair coolly from the corner of my eye.

“That’s with physical sensations, Frank,” he started calmly. “Sensations and emotions are two entirely different things that feel pain two entirely different ways. And therefore, should be treated two different ways.”

I looked at him, not amused, but wanting to hear him out. This better be good, because I needed a reason to why my stomach felt like it was folding in on itself.

“We need physical pain to remember something physical. Like how bodies move together during sex. That is something worth remembering.” He smiled, raising an eyebrow. I was unaffected.

“But emotions, they hurt too. They hurt a lot more, and run a lot deeper than anything physical. Their scars are invisible – we can’t cover them, though we want to. Humans try to hide themselves instead of their emotional wounds, but that only leads to more and more. We have to live with them, wishing and hoping to forget. You can never fully forget, though. Even repression sometimes backfires.” He grew somber for a moment, and I had no idea why. His playing hadn’t been ripped apart.

“Then what am I supposed to do?” I was practically begging now.

“You make it better,” he said, regaining that resilience I still lacked. “You take those hurt feelings, and you say ‘fuck you’. You do what you want. You keep playing, you keep writing, you keep painting. Whatever you want to do with yourself, you do it. Fuck everyone else who may come along.”

“But what if they were right…?”

The way he had said ‘everyone else’ had thrown me for a loop. I could not even imagine playing to other people, especially when playing to him had gone so horribly wrong. I could trust him, or at least, I thought I could. He had still hurt me, even in that position of trust. I couldn’t imagine what anyone else would do who didn’t give a damn what happened to me.

“And what if you’re the one who’s right? There is no such thing as right or wrong, Frank. Especially in art. It’s always the principle,” he smiled, and I hated him reading my fucking thoughts. There was a small lull where he still sensed my despair, so he forced himself to continue.

“Frank, there is always going to be someone who hates you. No matter what. You can bend over backwards to try and please them, but once there, someone else will hate you. Your art form shouldn’t be about popularity, because as soon as you start getting popular, that’s when everything backfires. You get lost in people instead of lost in your work. That’s never how it should become. People are bendable and malleable – they change their opinions with the drop of a hat. You need to stand by your own beliefs and attitudes so you know you won’t be let down. The more people that love you, the more people hate you. It’s far easier to say something bad about someone than to say something good. It’s a lot more fun too, especially if you don’t care how they react.”

I had been listening to him fine for the past little while. What he was saying was even starting to make some sense, and I even found my head nodding at one point. But that last part, that made something inside me sting.

“You didn’t care? You don’t care about me?”

“No, Frank,” he replied quickly, his voice almost painful. “I do care. I care about you a lot, and I did then. That’s why it had been so hard for me to say what I did. I had to be both the good and bad because you weren’t going to show anyone else – just me. I knew that, so I had to give you a taste of what someone else would be like. It was mean, nasty, and unfair, but that’s the human existence, Frank. We’re mean. We don’t care about people other than ourselves.”

“I care about you,” I found myself replying without thinking. “I care about you more than I care about myself because I feel like I’m not good enough. And when you say things like that, it only reinforces that feeling, Gerard.”

He opened his mouth for a second, about to say something, but he gave up on that route. Now, he was coming over to me. He didn’t see the need to comfort me with anything but logic when I had been struggling with my art. Struggle was necessary to prove your vision – or some other foolish thing he had taught me. But suddenly, this wasn’t about art anymore. Or at least tangible art. This was about myself, and he had fucking hurt me. A lot. I didn’t know why he had, especially since he was telling me now that everything was better. My playing had been just okay before, but now I was exceptional. I should have been happy about that, but I wasn’t. I was still dwelling on the past. If my playing had been average, but he still found the need to hurt and criticize me, I took it personally. I took it so much deeper than a lesson in rejection. It was a personal stab I wasn’t ready for. When I let myself really feel it, I was surprised at how much it had hurt. I was really falling for Gerard, and this had been the first time where I didn’t feel his hands catching me.

Soon, he was sitting next to me on the bench. He moved my guitar out of the way gingerly, nestling his body next to mine. He placed the hands that had been lacking before on my back, pulling me forward into a hug. He touched me, kissed my forehead, and though a part of me wanted to throw him out the bay window, I held onto him. He was the person who had hurt me, but he was also the only one who could make it better.

“Oh, Frank,” he whispered, the emotion in his voice startling me. “Please don’t ever say that about yourself. Don’t even think it, because it’s not true. You care about yourself more than me. It’s clear. You’re worried about how you feel, how it’s affecting your playing, and how you’re going to handle things. You care about yourself more, like you should.”

I made a noise in the back of my throat, but I didn’t argue. Even if I had wanted to, I couldn’t form anything logical. I just let him hold me. Both of his hands were pressed tightly to my back for awhile, rocking me. Gradually, when he decided I had enough strength, he let go, and simply placed his arm around me.

“I’m not apologizing for what I did,” he stated, latching onto my side quite distinctly. “It needed to be done. And I needed to tell you now. I could have easily ignored it, and moved on, especially since your guitar playing has gotten so much better. But I don’t like keeping secrets, Frank. Especially from someone like you. You deserve to know everything.”

He looked down at me, a bittersweet quality to his eyes.

“I want to know everything,” I said earnestly, touching his side.

“Then I guess you have to take the good with the bad,” he breathed out, raising his eyebrows.

It was in that moment, in spite of myself, where I realized he was right. He always had been. As much as it hurt him opening me up and tearing me apart like that, it had to be done. He would never purposely hurt me. I could see that in his eyes and feel the way he held me. He was treating me like a fragile object; he could easily throw me down and watch me break, but he wasn’t. He was holding me, making sure I didn’t let myself crumble. He had to crack me, to show me I was breakable, before anyone else had the chance to. Before, I had no idea I would react this way. I needed to do it with him around, so he could be the one to comfort me. He had to play devil’s advocate while still being by my side. He had been my first rejection, but he had also made that experience a lot easier. He had almost turned it into a pleasant experience. Without that self doubt in the back of my mind, I would have never been able to do anything as well as I had. I would not be this ‘astounding’. I would not have spent most of my free time after trying to learn and perfect the way I played. He had been doing a good thing, even I hadn’t seen it right away.

“Thank you, I guess.” I shrugged my shoulders, and the remaining emotion away.

“No,” Gerard cut in strictly. He held the hand up that wasn’t around my shoulder, signaling this halt. “Don’t thank me for this. You really shouldn’t. I didn’t enjoy what I did.”

His voice fell at the end, and I reached over to touch him again. I ran my hand along the arm that wasn’t around my shoulder, stopping before his palm. He gave me a weak smile that I mimicked. We were both a little drained.

“My reasoning behind that gesture was somewhat selfish as well,” he admitted candidly shortly thereafter.

“Really?”

“Yes,” he laughed at himself, looking down at our hands. He rotated his wrist as he talked, making our fingers crash and dance together. “I wanted to see if you would still come back and see me, even if I was mean to you.” He raised his eyes to meet with mine again, his countenance coming off as pure and almost innocent.

“And you got your answer,” I stated, a calm smile spreading across my face.

“Yes, indeed,” he replied cheerfully, fully linking with my hand.

We were quiet for awhile after that, the conversation seeming to lose its spark. He let his grip on my back loosen, until eventually, his arm had slid off of me completely. We were still touching; we just weren’t hanging on for dear life anymore. I felt restless suddenly. Something still wasn’t right. Something was still missing in this whole argument, if I could even call it that. I raised my attention to Gerard, who was staring off into space. He wasn’t satisfied either.

“Things shouldn’t have to be the way they are in this world,” he spouted, rubbing his chin and underside of his neck as he spoke. “I shouldn’t have to be so bitter and harsh with you, but I know other people will be. When you make art, when you create anything that is a part of yourself, it’s strong. It’s so strong, people are going to get mad at it because they don’t understand. They don’t want to understand. But Frank,” he suddenly spoke with more fever, and turned me so I was looking directly into his dancing pupil, “if you’re causing people to form some kind of opinion about you and your work – positive or negative – then at least you’ve done something right.”

I smiled, and I felt his lips come over my own. It was a short kiss, but well needed. His hands relocated around my body, and we stayed that way for awhile. The silence was comfortable again, though my wounds were still a little fresh.

I had a feeling I would never fully heal from this. No matter if I knew that Gerard was still supporting me, and his words had been vicious on purpose, there was still that prospect of people thinking that in the future. I didn’t know if I would ever let my guitar playing get outside this room, but when I did, I knew it would be hard. I tried to picture myself reading my first bad review. I knew my fingers would shake, my heart would race, and I may not even get through the first sentence before I felt like it was too much. I wanted to separate myself from that side of art, but I knew I never could. Gerard would never let me. I had to take the good with the bad, even if the bad seemed to outweigh everything.

I told myself, right then and there, that I could never let the bad outweigh anything. I had to become aware of the hate people may harbor towards me in the future, but I also vowed that I didn’t have to become a part of it. I didn’t have to read every single bad review. I had to be aware of them, maybe read one or two, and then say fuck it. If I dwelled on the past too much, then my future would be gone before I knew it. I couldn’t let bad reviews hold me back. I couldn’t let anything hold me back, whether it was present in that moment, or would be later on. I had no reason to let anything hold me back.

I was already doing something right.

 

Part Five - Dance

 

Eventually, the afternoon sun began to fade and night began to bleed into the sky. Gerard went back to painting and I even joined him. Over the past little while I had been getting back to painting, not needing to have him lean over me every other brush stroke and tell me where I needed to put things. I had begun to paint on my own, testing my abilities farther and farther each time. I was able to paint a sunset one night, having us both sit out on the balcony and watch it go over the Jersey skyline. We had actually been able to keep our hands off each other for that art session, and focused on the art and beauty in front of us. The picture had been decent, actually looking like what it was supposed to. Nature was always the easiest to paint for me because if I screwed it up, it didn’t matter. Nature came in a variety of shapes and sizes and could adjust to any misplaced brush stroke. It was painting other things, like the furniture inside Gerard’s place or the dreamlike images that came to my mind, that were the hard ones to create. Everything I painted that was supposed to look life-like always ended up coming out cartoon-ish. It had begun to frustrate me, and during the week prior, I had tried to smash one of my paintings, pissed off that the table I had painted looked like a run-over horse. Gerard had grabbed me before my hellion hands could do anymore damage.

“I thought I was allowed to destroy my own work?” I asked him, huffing and puffing and struggling against his arms.

“You destroy the things you love,” he said slowly, rubbing my back as he tried to calm me down. “You learn from the things you hate.”

He had made me keep the Goddamn picture and even put it up on his wall. I looked at it as I painted then, hoping that maybe I could learn from the disaster I was creating at that very moment.

I had been trying to paint, draw, or do something with Gerard and his image ever since I had come to this apartment. He had invited me to learn how to do each medium; it was only natural for me to want to encapsulate my teacher inside the strategies. Ever since I found out that he refused to paint himself, or do anything with that image, it had stuck with me. I needed to do something since he refused the task. He was just one of those people you had to paint; he called out for it. The way his body moved, his facial features, his mannerisms. He was an enigma that I had cracked open, if not all the way, then I was slowly getting there. I knew I would never crack him open fully; he was always surprising me each day with a new secret or story to tell. But I loved that essence about him. He never got old, despite his age. I wanted to capture that in a painting. Or anything, for that fact. It would be a travesty if left undone.

I had the hardest time painting noses. They were three-dimensional and I had a hard time portraying them coming off of the page, off of someone’s face. They always turned out to be pig-like in comparison, or too skeletal. It didn’t help that Gerard’s nose was a peculiar shape, the tip very prominent and pointy, and depending on the angle, it could be totally unnoticeable. On some days, it appeared triangular in shape, and with his deep-set eyes, he almost took on the look of a jack-o-lantern. Other days, his nose was normal, but still a challenge to capture.

Eyes were my favorite to draw and paint, and I probably spent a good half of the time, perfecting the olive hue in Gerard’s. I liked doing his hair too, the flows and tendrils of black over a pale white skin. I had drawn his hair and eyes a lot before, and though struggling with everything else a fair amount, I always finished the picture. Every time I did hold the final copy in my hand, it just wasn’t right. It didn’t matter that Gerard’s nose was slightly off center and his lips were too thin, it wasn’t him in other ways. A picture could be anything I wanted it to be, but I knew I wasn’t getting what I wanted. Probably because I didn’t exactly know how I wanted to portray Gerard. He didn’t paint himself for that very reason. And I wasn’t becoming any more successful.

I eventually stopped painting, my hands growing tired and the colors becoming dreary against the textured paper, and I finally just studied Gerard for the sake of studying him. He was still naked, as was I, and we had been that way for the entire day. I was getting used to the feeling of immediately stripping as soon as I got to his place. I had even forgotten about where I was a few times and found my hand at my belt buckle as soon as I got inside my own house. Thankfully, my parents never noticed. Even in my room, where I was alone, I still kept my clothing on. I missed being naked, but it wasn’t the same unless Gerard was around with me. There was something special about being naked around him. He made me want to stay that way; exposed. He appreciated it. He made it okay to just be in my own skin and be comfortable with it. I just loved to watch the way he walked around his apartment, so effortlessly as if he were wearing the barrier.

I watched him at that moment, his confidence oozing from him. Since I had stopped playing my guitar and moved onto a different medium, he had put on some of his French opera that I really didn’t like. It was growing on me little by little, only because I saw how happy it made Gerard. Perhaps it reminded him of France and Paris and all of those wonderful things he was missing. I figured I let the droning of the singer leak into my ears for those very reasons.

As soon as he slipped the CD in the player and the first note was belted out, he proceeded to sing, moving and swaying his body completely into the music. He got so into it in fact, he began to dance with himself, imagining a mysterious partner by his side. It had been hard enough to suppress the laughter beforehand when he merely sang the words out loud, but now that this mystery dancer had been added, I couldn’t contain myself. I smiled brightly, wishing I had a camera or something to capture all of this.

When my giggles didn’t rouse him from his state of a total living daydream, I shouted at him, a sharp edge of a joke in my voice.

“At least you dance better than you sing.”

It was true too; his voice often broke at high notes and he over exaggerated a lot of parts, but the way his bare feet moved and glided against the hardwood floor and the sweepy nature of his hips was just amazing. Astounding, actually.

I thought he hadn’t heard me or was ignoring me until he piped up with a response.

“Dancing is painting a picture no one else can see.” His eyes were closed, but he somehow knew where he was going. He had painted this picture before, I could tell.

“But I can see your picture, Gerard,” I called over to him, only half-joking. The way he moved with his invisible partner, the expressions on his face and his sheer joy of it all made me see something I thought was beautiful. A forty-seven-year-old man recapturing his youth again.

“That’s because you are meant to dance with me,” Gerard stated, suddenly cutting across the hardwood floor over to where I sat down. His eyes were open now as he extended his hand for mine, his brows forming a V formation as he extended the offer. I just stared at his hand, unsure of what to do.

“I don’t dance,” I told him, breathy, nervous laughter coming through.

I had never done anything beyond shuffling at elementary school functions where they made you pair off with someone. I never went to proms, or any social function at my school. They didn’t interest me for the awkward dancing element alone. I had not learned anything fancy, complicated, or beautiful. I was uncoordinated at best.

“You’re an artist now,” he chided with a crafty grin on his face. “You do everything.”

He reached forward and took my hand without asking, pulling me into the middle of the apartment, right up close to his body. He placed the hand he was holding on his waist and the other in his own. He looked deeply at me, his eyes shoulders back professionally and his breathing hard.

“Are you ready?” he asked, though I had a feeling my response didn’t matter.

“I don’t know what I’m doing, Gerard,” I informed him, my voice quiet. I was right up next to his body, my head just under his chin. I didn’t know how we could move this close together, but Gerard insisted upon it, a thin smile spreading over his lips.

“It’s just like having sex, Frank,” he conveyed, starting to move our feet together. “Just like making art. Do what feels right and everything will come.” He smiled at the double meaning in his last words before literally sweeping me off my feet.

Our motions were taut and awkward at first, me almost tripping a few times as he dragged me into his swaying motions, but he held me up. I could see the trust in his eyes, though touched with a tad bit of crazy that night, he was not going to let me fall. He whispered words of encouragement in my ear, in between verses of the opera music, guiding me along with his hands. He kissed my forehead and mouth in small bursts, in time with the music. Any time I tried to step on his feet so he could just lead me, he kicked me off.

“You need to learn some things on your own,” he told me, déjà vu hitting us both over the line. I smiled at him and brought our lips together for longer.

Dancing was just like sex, I told myself. If I kept that in mind, I was going to do okay. And eventually, just like the awkward first time of having sex, the bumps and the kinks were worked out and we were moving together, swaying magically to the rhythm as one person. We danced and danced for what seemed like hours, my feet sometimes growing tired and the act itself looking ridiculous when I saw our reflection in the window against the night sky, but we kept going. It was what Gerard wanted. We were painting a picture only we could see. It was a shame no one else could see what we were making, because it was absolutely gorgeous. Astounding.

We danced until the CD ran out, not even noticing it until Gerard pushed me gently into a wall, placing a chaste kiss on my mouth. When we realized that it was now our turn to make a rhythm for a different kind of dance, I opened my mouth to deepen the embrace. I put a hand on the back of his neck, rustling his hairline. We had both started to become hard during our long dance session and our kiss against the wall was helping in moving matters along. Gerard took my light and limber body from dancing for so long in his hands, lifting me up slightly so he could enter me with ease. Gerard had taken to placing lube in places throughout the apartment, so we had found a small bottle with no problems. I groaned as I felt him push upwards inside me, our mouths crashing together. He started to thrust over and over again while I wrapped my legs around his waist, helping him to keep me supported.

Having sex standing up provided a lot more strain than our normal endeavors, but it seemed to be worth it in the long run. All sex with us was worth it in the long run. We were up against the mural wall and I could feel the distinct, different textures from the paint against my back. It felt cool and interesting, especially since my skin was now becoming flushed with arousal. My hands were around Gerard’s neck, pulling him into kisses whenever I could. He grunted a lot from the effort, but I could see from the way his mouth would suddenly open deeper on occasion that he was doing just as good as I was. My cock was being pressed up against both of our bodies, providing enough friction to keep me hard and get me to come in between both of us. As I clenched around him, reeling from my own orgasm, he came inside me, his legs almost giving out and sending me dropping to the ground. Gerard was strong though, especially in situations where it counted. He managed to hold me up until he finished, then gently let us both tumble onto the hardwood floor. I had brought the bed sheet out from earlier and we wrapped ourselves up it in. I leaned my head against his forehead, breathing hard and catching my breath. He did the same, and reached a hand around the back of my neck, making sure my head stayed where it was. I could tell there were so many things he wanted to say to me then, and I did too. We didn’t know how to form words just yet, so we just spoke with silence, and that was good enough.

I had to leave soon after, the blackened sky from the window threatening me with my father’s possible rage. I gathered up my stuff that I had brought, pulling on my clothing while Gerard continued to nuzzle and kiss my neck, providing a large distraction.

“You should skip more often,” he breathed into my skin, wrapping his hands around my waist. I leaned back and put our hot mouths together, kissing him again.

“Yeah,” I agreed. “Screw education.”

“Exactly.” Gerard nodded, finally letting me go and get my backpack. “I can be your teacher. I already am.”

“And I’ve probably learned more here than anyplace else,” I quipped.

We both laughed, but saw the complete and utter truth behind the matter. When I was in school, I was miserable. In that kind of environment, I didn’t want to work. I didn’t want to learn or do anything. In Gerard’s apartment, everything was available to me. I had learned more in one day here than I would have ever had if I had gone to school all week. And I learned more important things, too. Sure, I learned things in school, but out of all of the lesson plans I had been given, how to actually live this life they were preparing me for was never on the list. That was what I had needed the most, and real school never provided in all of the years I had gone there. I wished that I could just skip everything, drop out of school, and become an artist and just live the rest of my life with Gerard. It sounded corny, but more so than that, it sounded impossible.

With a sigh, I reached over to the other side of the couch, where my guitar was sitting and resting. Before I could even lay a hand on the instrument, Gerard’s voice cut in.

“That stays here,” he informed me, reaching his hands out and snatching the guitar away.

I screwed up my face, looking at him slightly askew. “Why?”

“Because I want to hear you play again.”

He placed the instrument down and moved closer, wrapping me into yet another embrace. I was almost out the door at this point, going home. And though I wanted to stay with him, I knew I was going to be late.

“This is a better place for it,” he breathed shallowly into my neck.

I had to agree with him. There was so much more creativity flowing out of the fucking walls. This was like chemotherapy for my poor guitar that had gotten cancer from years of misuse. All I could do was nod.

“Great. The guitar lives here now,” he said, pulling my face closer to his and leaving me with one final kiss. “Just like you.”

His words threw me for a loop at first. In technical terms, I did not live at Gerard’s. I would never be allowed to, no matter how much I would want to. But as I gazed into his eyes after, I saw the real meaning behind it all. When I was in the apartment, it was the only time I actually lived. I did things. I created things. I lived and fucked and fought. I played my guitar, which was now going to be housed there until I could make arrangements, impossible or not. I had a home where I lived, but I was only rooted there by tradition and family. Where I wanted to be was some place entirely different; a place where I felt alive. After all, how can you live without being alive? I wondered how long I had been dead before I had met Gerard, and how many other walking corpses were around me. I knew the answer would be too many.

I left Gerard’s right after, giving him yet another hug and kiss. The door shut behind me, and I was left staring at the green paint chips for the longest time. As I began to walk away, going down the stairs slowly, the day repeated itself in my mind over and over again. The painting, the dancing lessons, and more importantly, playing music. Gerard now had my guitar; the instrument to my soul. Not only did it live there now, but he was clearing away a spot for me, another artist, still young, still budding, still growing more each day.