Sew Me Up, Buttercup - Fray

Frank played hard on stage.
Every night, he hurt himself;  a new bruise, a cut, and muscle cramp. And it wasn't because he was  masochist or anything.
He was just a klutz. And being a klutz along with holding a guitar and having only a small allotted space to move around did not mix.
He bumped into things, knocked things over, and broke shit.
That was just how it went. It was like he had his own demolition agenda.
Probably one of the funniest parts of it all was that he was so small. Being such a tiny guy, you might assume that he would only reserve a little bit of space. But not Frank.
He made up for his size by taking wider steps, swinging bigger turns, and running around to occupy more space than the four other men on the stage combined.
So, even if you stayed out of his way—thought you were in the clear—you weren't.
You always had to be alert for Frank.
That was probably why Gerard kept such a close eye on him all the time; because if Gerard screwed up, he had a bad show. And if Gerard has a bad show,everyone has a bad show.
And he whines like a diva for hours.

The thing about Ray is that he thinks he's in the clear. Frank is stage right, he is stage left. They never trade sides. Never.
He pities Mikey for having to be so close to Frank while he's wielding a two-and-a-half foot, six-stringed, weapon, but he's also relieved and confident that being on the opposite side of the stage leaves him home free.
This, apparently, is not so, because three quarters of the way through Dead! when Ray has this big epic guitar solo, Frank hits him like a train.

The way it happens is that Ray moves maybe five paces into the danger zone, lingering around by Gerard's mic stand . It was his guitar solo, after all, so he migrated to the center stage for obvious pride reasons. He swears he's grounded, but a guy's gotta show off his skills once in a while.

So, while Ray is killing his solo, Frank is thrashing around stage like it's the last music he'll ever hear. He's already knocked over his own stand and he knows he's headed for Gerard's.
Gerard is smarter and more responsive than he looks, plus he's thin and moves like a cheetah or something when he senses Frank spinning towards him like a helicopter falling out of the sky.

Frank grins when the singer dodges him and doesn't stop until his foot catches the corner of a monitor and he actually loses his balance altogether.
He's figuring on hitting the stage pretty hard, but it's nothing he hasn't done before. He's not playing right now, anyway, Ray is, but wait—

Oh, there's Ray.

He slams into Ray's side like a truck and his guitar slips right out of his sweaty hands and flies around him in almost a full circle before he actually does hit the stage floor.
It takes him a few seconds to get his bearings and realize he's half laying on his instrument before he jumps back up and races back to stage right.

There's never any room for excuse me's or sorry, man when you're in the middle of a song.
So, Frank looks over to see if Ray's mad.

Ray doesn't look mad.

But then again, Frank can't really tell through all the blood that's on his face right now.

His eyes bulge out of his skull and he's noticed how the crowd has gotten noticeably quieter. Then the song ends.

Normally, they play right into Disappear without stopping, but Gerard glances over and sees the mess, saying something charming to the crowd as a distraction as a guy with a headset and a towel runs out on the dark stage to tend to Ray.
Frank strides over and says, "Holy shit, I didn't even see that happen, Ray! I'm so sorry, dude,"

Ray's face is scrunched up and his eyes are squeezed shut, so Frank can see that he's in pain. The guy literally never cries in front of anyone, so Frank is totally surprised and guilty when he sees him wipe his eyes on one corner of the towel.
"Lemme put your tech in for the next song and you can get cleaned up, dude," the stage manager tells Ray quickly, because Gerard can only stall everyone with his weird fuckin' story time for so long.

"No—I'm not missing anything. It's not that bad, I'll survive," Ray replies even quicker. And Frank is totally astonished, though he should have expected this from Ray, who is the most dedicated motherfucker her has ever met.
He puts his hand on the taller guitarist's shoulder.

"Dude, seriously go. It's one song. You're bleeding like, everywhere," Frank says with seriousness.

And it is totally true—Ray's nose is bleeding and his lip is busted open, and there's a big gash from the corner of his mouth to the bottom of his chin.
He takes a deep breath and lets his eyes examine the cut again, enflamed and swollen. It makes all kinds of swooping feelings happen in his belly because he wants to lick it.
It's weird because Frank's not normally hot for the sight of blood or anything. And he's not a vampire—blood does not taste good--it's coppery and metallic and sort of gross.

But somehow this feels different. Like he knows if he reaches out and touches the wound with his fingertips, it's going to be warm and sticky and Ray.
Then he starts feeling guilty again and shakes his head.

Frank shamefacedly thanks God it wasn't any lower because what if he had slashed Ray's jugular vein, then he bled to death on stage—and then there was no more My Chem?!
Ray would fucking hate his guts forever.
Then again, it would be more legendary than Ozzy and his dumb bat, which Ray has always attested to being a pretty epic moment.

"If you don't want blood on you, then, move. I need to tune for Disappear,", Ray quips. The techie recedes and so does Frank as they launch into This Is How I Disappear.

But Frank still feels so bad. He stares at the blood that just keeps coming, even after Ray has wiped his face at least three times. Frank has never even seen someone bleed so much, he thinks.  If he doesn't need stitches, it is gonna be a miracle.

There's one stream that Ray hasn't quite been able to get with his towel without the help of a mirror. It's rolling down the front of his throat and mixing with sweat against his damp, golden skin.
Frank, sobered by the accident, watches it from his reserved side of the stage out of the corner of his eye as it escape under the neck of Ray's drenched-to-the-point-of-transparency white t-shirt. All along his neckline you can see stains of blood which have been washed out a little due to sweat by now, leaving them as mere brown speckles.

Frank gets a weird, twitchy, pully feeling in the deepest orificeof his stomach.

Both of Ray's lips are swollen and they hurt pretty bad, and the side of his face is on fire and throbbing. It's bad, but not enough to make him want to stop playing. His arms are still able to be used, and he figures people are more likely to be looking at Frank and Gerard's faces than his, anyway, so who cares?

He wasn't planning on being mad at Frank for something that happened on accident, even if he was a bit annoyed. He has probably bled Dracula's breakfast, lunch, and dinner by now.
But he didn't skip a chord during his solo, so there was no bad blood.
Well, in a figurative sense, at least.

They weren't even halfway through the set when Frank had crashed into Ray, but the songs seemed to drag on for him now. Since then, he didn't want to get as rowdy because he was still somewhat embarrassed and worked up. Frank just wasn't being Frank, hindered by remorse.
He had been trying to get Ray's attention—making stupid faces, banging his head and shaking his hair, even playing wrong notes—but his attempts seemed futile. Ray was completely absorbed in what he was playing and Frank came to accept that he was probably pissed as hell and wanting to crush Frank's head right about now.


After they came off stage, the manager took Ray to the local hospital because he did actually need a few stitches, after all.

When Mikey informed Frank of this, he flew off the fucking handle.

"Oh my god, are you fucking serious!? He's going to hate me! Forever!And spit on my grave! I'm such a dumb piece of shit," Frank exclaimed, collapsing on the couch in the bus lounge with a beer in his hand.
"Calm the fuck down—you didn't kill his family!" Gerard piped up from the bathroom, where he was leaning over to the sink taking off his melted makeup in the mirror.

"It was awesome, dude—I saw the whole thing! You were, like, spinning in these huge circles going way fast like a twister, and then when Gerard jumped outta your way, Ray was next in line and you smashed the guy! God damn—and then, the best part was how he didn't even fall over but you landed in this heap at his feet! Priceless!" Mikey recounted with enthusiasm, gesturing and laughing.

Frank was horrified, though, staring back at Mikey with wide eyes and an open mouth.
"How'd I bust his face open!?"
Mikey seemed excited to answer his question, bouncing a little on the couch.
"When you ran into him, your guitar flew out and one of the pegs WHAMMED right into his jaw! Oh man—when I saw that it felt like it happened in slow motion!"

Frank's stomach churned as he wondered vacantly if there was any blood on his guitar. He hadn't checked on stage, and he had the intense urge to go and look. Everything was already stowed back in the undercarriage or trailers, though, so he couldn't.

Worried about Ray being too angry when he arrived back from the hospital, Frank decided to lie low and go to bed early.

At least, this way, if Ray killed him, he'd be asleep. Not that Ray was the psychopathic type, he thought.
He laid in his bunk trying to think of ways to make it up to the guitarist. Ray was the kinda guy that would be content if you gave him a pat on the back, but that would not settle Frank's guilt. He felt like he owed the man a debt.
The idea of buying him two classy Asian hookers, getting him the new Halo game, and making him a really good steak seemed to be the very last thing that stuck in his mind. And he was really considering it.

As it turned out, Frank woke up the next day. He was alive, so Ray had not in fact killed him.

Everyone had gotten out their gawking last night, apparently, because Frank was the only one to gasp and start freaking out when he saw Ray sitting on the couch watching television and looking really sleepy.

"Oh. My. God. You're Frankenstein! Holy fuck. Oh my fucking god," Frank said in disbelief, scampering across the bus lounge and jumping on the couch.
He counted seven stitches, starting at the side of Ray's bottom lip, and then leading down his chin like a fucked up, extended frown. The sutures were black and impossible to miss, even from far away, especially because they were swollen and beginning to bruise.

Ray cringed, turning his head slowly to roll his eyes at Frank. The numbing medication and needle he'd gotten last night made the pain disappear, but this morning it was hurting a lot. It was a little better if he stayed still and not speaking.

"Dude, I am so fucking sorry, I can't even tell you how bad I feel about this. I'm a fucking moron," Frank gushed, and he put his hand on Ray's thigh for good measure.

Ray glanced at the hand, then blinked, "Kinda hurts to talk," he said, his sore jaw being maximized.

Frank's eyes got even wider, "Oh my god, I crippled my best friend,"

"M'not crippled, 'Rankie," Ray murmured, keeping his mouth as still as possible. It made some letters get lost and his speech sound stiff.

Frank bent two fingers down and waved them in Ray's face, looking like he wanted to make some kind of gang sign or something.
"Oh god, and I don't even know sign language! This is truly the end,"

Ray started laughing, but when his lips pulled into a smile, he groaned.

Frank fell into his lap and wrapped his arms around him in a defeated hug, mortified. "I have taken your laughter from you, too. Just kill me,"

Ray smacked him, smiling with the unwounded corner of his mouth. " 'ut up, you didn',"

"Ray, you have to play with those on your face, now. There'll be all these would-be awesome pictures of you and you'll have these dumb stitches,"

He sighed and gave Frank a gentle shove. " 'M not 'Erard. Don't care,"

Frank would have laughed, because it was totally true, but instead he relaxed a little and straddled Ray's lap, small enough to fit in it. He made eye contact with him and asked very seriously, "Can I feel 'em?"

Ray nodded, of course, but replied, "Don't 'ull on 'em. Or press,"

The smaller guitarist nodded fervently and reached up with two fingers, leaning forward with intense concentration. Their faces were only inches away.
He gingerly brushed his fingertips over the sutures, following the line down his mouth. They were prickly, stiffer than dental floss but almost as thick.

"How bad do they hurt?" Frank asked him with hope that it wasn't very much. His eyes flickered up to Ray's brown ones for a second.

"Not 'o bad. 'ust really 'ore," Ray breathed casually.

"Can I buy you hookers?" Frank asked, a wave of sympathy crashing over him.

Ray chuckled, "Huh?"

"I feel really guilty. Like, more guilty than when I broke Mikey's toe," he lamented, almost whining, "and I don't know how to make it up to you,"

Ray shrugged, "Don't need to,"

Frank laughed and sat back on his haunches, ass resting on Ray's knees.
"Are you kidding me?! If some fucker slashed my face, I'd make them cook my dinner and kiss my feet and like, be my indentured slave!"

"We 'ave catering, 'eet are gross, an'it's not the 'eventeenth 'entury," Ray replied with his crooked half-smile.

"Wow, I'm trying to offer you my services and you're rejecting me, asshole," Frank joked. Ray just shook his head in amusement, and Frank adjusted himself in Ray's lap again, arranged so that he could still stroke the stitches that he was so mesmerized by.

Frank eventually noticed that Ray was still wearing the same outfit he had on last night, more than likely having missed the chance to change. That meant that the blood splotch stains were still at his collar.
He stared, then traced his finger around one.

"You bled a lot," he muttered, interrupting Ray from his episode of Seinfeld and making him angle his head to meet Frank's gaze.

"Yeah. Some on your shirt. Sorry," he replied nonchalantly.

Frank looked down immediately, remembering that he'd slept in the same shirt as last night, too and he did in fact have a few drops of blood near his shoulder. He looked from his shirt to Ray's stitched-up gash and then sat up, kissing him with a shiver than ran all the way down his spine.

Ray flinched out of surprise, pulling back instantaneously because it hurt a little bit. Frank's thighs tightened around his hips and the sound of their lips disconnecting seemed louder than the TV.

"What're you doing?" he asked with a rise at the end of his sentence.

But Frank blinked and kissed him again with determination. The twisty-tie sutures were prinkly against Frank's lips, and his stomach fluttered when he felt them. Next to Ray's five o'clock shadow, the stitches kind of made him look like a badass. Like, instead of getting smashed by a guitar, he got into a big, aggressive, testosterone-fueled brawl. When Frank imagined Ray purring, You should see the other guy,, he almost moaned.

Frank's kiss had been more planned the second time, so it hadn't really hurt because he knew which side of Ray's lips to focus pressure on and which to stay away from. So that time, Ray had to admit it wasn't bad.

"Sorry. I had to know what that felt like," Frank answered finally, so close that their chests were touching.

"Why'd you 'top?" the bigger guitarist muttered softly.

Frank grinned, accepting that as an invitation and sliding a hand into Ray's spirally hair. This time when he kissed him, he slid his tongue across Ray's lips, tasting the remnant, salty, smoothness of blood. Frank flicked his tongue over the sutures and it was almost too sharp to be pleasant, except it was. He did it again, and then traced his tongue along the tiny holes where the stitches weaved into Ray's skin.

Ray melted into the sofa and slid his hand up the back of Frank's shirt where his skin was hot and fleshy, making a long, "Mmmmmm," sound.

Frank whimpered, sliding his tongue all the way into Ray's mouth and lapping at the roof of it. Unintentional or not, he pressed his ass down against Ray's groin and panted hotly.

" 'Esus, 'Rank," Ray mumbled, his nails scraping slightly down Frank's back.

It gave him the chills and he wanted more, kissing the invisible path of that one drop of blood from last night and putting both hands roughly on Ray's belt.

"Gonna make it up to you," Frank whispered.

Ray gulped when he understood, because oh, okay.

Frank kissed him more heatedly as he undid the guitarist's buckles, pulling the belt slowly from its loops. Ray rolled his hips with want, making Frank's small body rise and fall. He gripped his thick shoulder for balance and keened softly.

He slid down between Ray's knees, almost sorry to leave the infatuating stitches behind.

"You look good with those stitches, Ray. Really, you do. Makes you look extra tough," Frank muttered between heavy breaths, quickly getting Ray's jeans open and whimpering as he slid his palm against his boxers' fabric.

Ray gasped slightly, willing so hard that he be able to keep his mouth shut and quiet, otherwise he could tear the sutures or just make it hurt.

Frank took out Ray's half-hard cock with one impatient hand and yanked his boxers to his knees with the other.

"So much blood last night…I wanted to lick it. Lick it off and taste you. I bet it was warm, just like your body is warm…always so warm," he gushed some more, and just when Ray really couldn't take the dirty talking anymore, Frank closed his mouth around his head.

"Ohh," Ray hummed lowly, keeping his mouth as still and unmoving as he could.

"I know where all the blood went, Ray," Frank panted out hard, licking a stripe up the side of him dick.
Ray moaned, unable to suppress it. The vibration sent a little shock of pain to his mouth where the wound was, but the feeling of Frank's mouth around him again kind of overpowered it almost immediately.
He looked down at him, watching his thin, pink, lips slide up and down, head bobbing. Frank was so turned on, he didn't want to stop. Ray was hot and heavy in his mouth, and he could take all of it until he gagged a little, pulling off to wipe his chin with a sputter.

"I should have hit you in the face years ago," Frank groaned, then sucked a little harder. That made Ray's toes curl in his socks and he whimpered, a tingle spreading out at the base of his spine.

Frank moved faster, eyes flickering up to find the seven stitches and whine at the sight. He lifted his hands, which had been sort of holding down Ray's hips, and met his gaze.

Ray groaned, deep and low in his throat, and bucked his hips up a few times, causing Frank to make a wet, gagging sound. But it wasn't enough for the smaller guitarist to pull his mouth off and catch his breath. In fact, he reached down and shoved a hand into his own pants, letting Ray do some of the work while he jerked himself off.

It was only a matter of time until Frank physically needed air, and it was just in time that he pulled off, too, that Ray came with a comically suppressed moan, getting spurts of spunk on Frank's lips and chin.
He didn't hesitate the lick most of it off, wiping the rest on his shirt, which already had one of Ray's fluids on it, so why not another? Couldn't get much filthier by now.

"If you do 'at til my 'titches come out, you're forgiven," Ray breathed, deflating tiredly against the cushions and smiling lop-sidedly.
Frank grinned.

"You got yourself a deal, Ray,"