FicWad

Brittany

“Hey, Mrs. Iero, how are you?”

“Very well, Brittany. Come on in. Frank’s in the shower.”

“Thanks. I’ll wait for him,” I told his mom. She nodded and left me to head up the stairs to Frank’s bedroom. I could hear the shower water running as I walked by the bathroom and smiled to myself. The pleasant memories that shower held.

As always, his room was basically spotless. I’m sure he wouldn’t mind if I made a crease on his bedding, only after I turn on some music of course. He had quite a selection to choose from, but I finally settled on the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

“I thought it would only be you snooping around my room.”

I jumped, nearly dropping the CD in my hand when Frank suddenly spoke up behind me. “Shit, you scared me.”

“Sorry,” he grinned, turning to his dresser in search for something to wear.

I never could get used to how good he looked fresh out of the shower, all wet hair clinging to his face and…

“Hey,” Frank was standing right in front of me and leaned forward, capturing my lips in a sweet kiss. I reached forward and grabbed the pair of jeans from his hand. He started laughing. “For a second there I thought you were going to steal my towel.”

“I didn’t think that far, but now that you mention it…”

“Don’t even think about it!” He grabbed onto the towel around his waist and took a step back from me. “You may be ready for this show, but I’m not and I’m not going to be late because I couldn’t keep my hormones in line.” The last part was mumbled against my lips, because maybe the thought of pushing our luck and seeing how close we could cut it had me wanting him even more.

“No, Brittany.” He pulled away reluctantly, still holding onto his towel for dear life. “The guys will never ever forgive me if I’m late. This is a big deal.”

“I know.” I sit down on his bed and hold his pants back out to him. Tonight would be the first show the band was going to play since the release of their debut album. It really was a big deal for them and I couldn’t be more proud of my brothers or my boyfriend. This was a big achievement for all of them.

I watched as he quickly got dressed and grabbed a hairdryer. It was almost fascinating to watch Frank when he was completely normal, just getting ready for something like a show. He suddenly turned the hairdryer on me blowing my hair all over the place.

“Frank!” I squealed, jumping to my feet and trying to fight him off.

“No no.” He laughed and pointed it right at my face.

“I thought you were in a hurry to get ready.” My face was scrunched up against the hot air as I said this.

“I am,” he assured me, getting back to what he was doing. “Besides, you look beautiful.” He leaned forward and kissed my forehead.

“Give me that.” I took the hairdryer from him and helped him to fix his hair.

Half an hour later he was completely finished getting ready and we got in the car, his mom behind the steering wheel.

“Are you ready for this?” I asked excitedly, giving his shoulder a squeeze from the backseat.

“I was born for this.”

“I’m proud of you, Frank,” his mom commented from beside him. “I was worried about where you were going with your life, but I think you have a good thing going here. And that includes Brittany.” She leaned over to tell him this last part and I didn’t think I was supposed to hear it, but I did and couldn’t help smiling to myself. His mom liked me. It was a strangely satisfying feeling, because I wasn’t even aware that I wanted it. I didn’t catch his response though and huffed.

We reached the venue soon enough and got out. All the other guys, including my parents, were already there and nervously getting ready for the big night ahead. I stayed back with Mrs. Iero and let them do their thing. They didn’t need anyone bothering them right now. I was surprised and relieved to see Melania there, talking to my mom. I guessed that Gee was able to convince her to come after I kind of, and completely unintentionally, screwed things up between them. She catches my eye and winks at me.

“I’m sorry if Gerard gave you any crap about us,” she apologized, approaching me. “It was my fault.”

“That’s okay. I can handle my brother.”

“Yeah, I just completely misunderstood your words during our last conversation. I thought for sure you meant that he was planning on proposing. I couldn’t understand it, because we had talked about it and we both agreed that we weren’t ready yet. I panicked. Don’t worry. He explained the situation and I’m totally cool as a cucumber again. I totally overreacted in any case. He made sure I understood that. It’s not every day he’s so forceful.”

I chuckled at her words, though deep down I was very relieved that they worked things out.
“How so?”

“Gerard was pissed when he came to talk to me. He didn’t even bother playing nice either. He explained the situation and continued to tell me how ridiculous I was.” My eyes grew wide at this. “I needed to hear it though and he was right. I was being ridiculous. That’s over now,” she finished with a smile. “I see things between you and Frank are still going well too.”

“Yeah, by some miracle they are,” I said, rolling my eyes. “We should have killed each other by now.”

“Where’s the fun in that?” We both laughed. “Have you looked around? Let’s look around.”

We head inside the building, which wasn’t that big, and started to look around. I thought it was a good place for the boys to officially start and it was nice to see that there were people inside. They were actually going to have the support of a bunch of fans. All their hard work to get their music out worked. There were actually one or two people from my school and Mel was also talking to someone she knew from somewhere. I continued around to the back of the stage where people were running around to get ready for the show. I checked one of the doors, but it was locked. The next one was open and I stepped inside only to come face to face with my favorite person in the world. Amy.

“Sorry, I didn’t know you were in here.” I hurriedly turn around to leave, but her voice stops it.

“It’s fine.”

I grind my teeth and give into my urge to spit venom at this girl. I have so much anger towards her and it was time to let some of it out.

“No, it’s really not fine.” I turned back to face the now stunned blonde. “It’s definitely not fine.”

“What are you talking about now?” she asked with a sigh. “Brittany, I’m not in the mood for one of your little teenage tantrums, okay? If you want someone to react, go talk to Frank. I’m sure he can’t wait to jump at the snap of your fingers.”

Anger bubbles up inside of me. “You have no reason to be upset. You didn’t get the guy, but at least you didn’t get the guy who was in love with another girl!” I snapped letting it all out. “You’re hurt because Frank is with me? Imagine how I feel knowing that he’s in love with you! And that he had sex with you.” My voice cracked on this last part.

“Brittany,” she said quietly, taken aback by my rant. “I swear Frank and I never did anything while the two of you were together.”

“I know that, but that doesn’t make this easier. He still loves you.”

She sighed deeply. “I’m sorry about that.” She looked up at me. “I’m truly sorry about everything. I didn’t plan any of this. Brittany, I didn’t mean for you to get hurt through all this. You have to believe me.”

I didn’t want to hear this. I wanted to be mad at her. I needed someone to be mad at and if it wasn’t her, it would be Frank and I didn’t want that.

“I just think that you should think about this logically,” she continued and my head snapped up. What the hell was that supposed to mean? “You said it yourself, Frank confessed to loving me, but he’s with you. That can only mean one thing. He loves you more.”

I let out a breath. “He hasn’t said it.”

“Have you? You and Frank are like one person. I think because you guys have hurt each other so much, you’re both afraid to say it. That doesn’t mean that you don’t.”

“I’m out of my depth,” I admitted. I’ve never been in a love triangle or in a situation where I had to tell a guy I loved him.

“It’s very simple. You just say it. I don’t picture you as one of those sentimental girls who want to have too many special moments so just mention it in passing. Frank will hear it and he will reciprocate. I promise you.”

“Do you really think so?”

She nodded. “I know he does. If he didn’t, he wouldn’t have been so broken up every time you guys supposedly broke up. That’s why I couldn’t be with him. He wasn’t over you.”

I didn’t know this. I’ve never thought about it that way. I was filled with a sudden urge to apologize to her, but squashed it.

“You’re not so bad.”

She chuckled lightly. “Thanks, Brittany.”

I nodded and hurriedly left the room, almost slamming the door behind me. I needed to get out of here and left to find Melania again.

Frank

“You’re not so bad.”

“Thanks, Brittany.”

Brittany stormed out of the room and down the hallway. I saunter over to the door that she burst out of and turned the knob.

“Brittany, look, just tell him. It’ll be okay,” the blonde sighed with her back turned to me and I couldn’t help smiling.

“That was really nice of you, you know?”

Amy whipped around, clearly not expecting me. “Frank?”

“The one and only,” I grin, walking deeper into the room.

Her eyes drop to the floor after staring at me for a second too long. “What do you want?”

“I can see that you’re still mad at me. That answers that question,” I muttered, shoving my hands into my pockets.

“No, Frank. I’m not mad at you.”

“Yes, you are.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Yeah, you are,” I giggled.

“What are you doing?” she asked determined to stay mad at me.

“Nothing,” I shrugged, grabbing a pillow off the couch and lightly hitting her with it.

“What the hell, Frank?”

“You know you love me,” I grinned at her.

Her lips quirked up into a small smile. “I don’t even know why.”

“There’s the Amy I know!” I tease, hitting her with the pillow again.

“Frank, I’m going to kill you!” she exclaimed, grabbing the other pillow and running after me. I pretended to run away for a while when all I really wanted to do was turn around and catch her in a hug. I missed her. I didn’t do it though, because I knew it would make things awkward all over again. I stopped and allowed her to hit me a couple of times.

“Are we cool now?” I asked hopefully once the fun stopped. “Because I really am sorry for everything.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong, Frank,” she sighed. “We’re good,” she said with a small smile.

“Yes!” I punched the air. “I missed you.” And then I hugged her tightly.

“Me too, Frank.”

“And I’m so happy that you came to see the show!”

“Of course I did. You didn’t think I’d abandon you now, did you?”

“No, but this is good. Come on, I think we’re about to start.”

Tonight was going to be the best night of my life. We joined up with the guys who were already waiting to go on stage.

“Wish me luck,” I winked at Amy, grabbing my guitar and following Matt on stage ready to change my life.