Chapter Text
At first, the mascot scared him. Okay, terrified him; but after getting work at the Cinnabon in the mall, he had to get over that terror. Not only did his kiosk face the Soothing Smoothies which served as the giant mascot’s home base, it was also the only place in the food court where he could get a snack on his lunchbreak that wouldn’t make him sick to his stomach.
If he wanted to get a Green Harvest and soy milk smoothie and save 10% with his mall employee discount, he was going to have to walk past…it. Lola…
They had the nerve to give that unsettling, grinning monster a name—a prissy, friendly, cheery name.
“It’s a little late for your lunch, don’tcha think,” Amy, the Soothing Smoothies clerk, said as Frank approached the counter. It was going on eight-thirty and everything would be closing down in the next thirty minutes. For a Saturday night, the mall was surprisingly slow, but it had rained later in the day—keeping most of the mall goers at home.
“Yeah… I was wondering if I could buy my smoothie now, but—if it’s not any trouble—could you make it a little closer to closing?”
“Sure, sure,” Amy said, waving her hand dismissively.
“I just don’t want it to get all…runny,” Frank said, looking down the corridor out the corner of his eye. Lola was coming, carrying a big circular tray full of unwanted sample smoothies.
“No, it’s fine. We do that all the time back here so we can still have a fresh drink for the drive home,” she said.
“Um… Yeah, can I—can I get the strawberry and passion fruit? And…and can you add a b-banana?” His mouth was running dry as Lola came closer and closer…and closer.
“Sure,” Amy said, looking at Frank with confusion. “Are you okay?”
“Y-yeah,” Frank said, pulling out his wallet with shaking hands. He hoped that if he kept his head down, the monster with the sleepy grin would go away.
“That’ll be four twenty-five,” Amy said.
“What?” Usually his drinks were closer to five or even six dollars with a banana added. He really wished the girl would pay attention, because every second she wasted, the closer and closer Lola came to him—grinning that unsettling grin, perky ears flapping with every calculated step.
“The smoothie mix expires tonight and our bananas do, too. I discounted it for you. Just don’t tell Mrs. Bradley.”
“Oh—okay, thanks,” Frank said, wishing he sounded more gracious. It was hard to think of anything else as Lola came closer and closer.
He paid for the drink, but couldn’t get away from the counter in time.
“Hey, do you want these samples? I think I’m done walking around…” The voice coming from within the suit didn’t fit with the idea Frank had always had about it. The person inside the terrifying costume—a costume, Frank reminded himself, just a costume—sounded tired and disheartened.
“What? But you’ve still got thirty minutes left,” Amy said, not exactly scolding, but not joking either. When Amy spoke to it, Lola was distracted long enough for Frank to be able to hurry back to his own kiosk—able to avoid having to take any samples from the creepy, cat-bear-monster.
Lola didn’t get to quit handing out samples though. Amy sent the monster away with its tray of samples and Frank finished cleaning up his kiosk for closing time.
He spent most of the time planning his course of attack—how he would get his smoothie and avoid getting any closer to the mascot than he had to—but that plan, he realized, was dashed at five-minutes to close when the big, pink monster was handed a large pink smoothie and started his way.
“Fuck,” Frank whispered under his breath. “Fuck, fuck, fuck…”
“What’s your problem?” His coworker asked, scrubbing the last of the sticky glaze off the shelves of the display case.
“It’s coming over here?”
“What’s coming over here? Mrs. Bradley?” his coworker asked.
“No—Lola,” Frank groaned.
“What’s your problem? Lola’s cool.”
“Here’s your drink,” the monster said, setting the pink smoothie on the counter in front of Frank.
“Th-thanks,” Frank stammered.
“Hey, Lola, do you like wearing that thing?” His coworker asked, laughing in jest.
“It’s hot…but it pays my bills.”
“How much do you make walking around in that thing?”
“Minimum wage, same as you,” Lola said, turning and walking back to the Soothing Smoothies.
As soon as the clock struck nine, Frank witnessed what he’d never seen before. Every other night he did his cleaning and kept his head ducked so as to avoid looking at Lola. Tonight, however, he watched as the pink monster reached up and pulled off its own head.
It wasn’t that Frank didn’t realize there was a person in the costume, but it still shocked him to see a mess of black hair spill down against the shoulders of the furry, pink suit. The person shook their head, fluffing the long, black strands. Then they turned around and Frank’s mouth went dry from something other than fear.
It was so unexpected. The person wasn’t a scary, terrifying monster like Lola. The person was…actually very appealing to look at as they shuffled toward the employee break room where he must’ve kept his change of clothes.
Once his kiosk was closed, Frank couldn’t help but stall to leave the building. He took a long time pulling a straw from the plastic box on the counter, took forever to unwrap it, waiting for the person to come back from the breakroom. Sure, he could’ve gone to wait there or hid outside the bathroom doors to catch them leaving, but he didn’t want to stoop that low.
Then, as he sipped his smoothie and cleaned the counter one last time even though he was practically alone and off the clock, the person reemerged, dressed in black skinny jeans and converse, and a baggy sweatshirt that contradicted how tight his pants were.
Frank couldn’t take his eyes off him and followed him toward the doors, hurrying to catch up while trying to look casual by sipping his smoothie.
“It’s a good thing it quit raining, right?” Frank said, trying to make small talk as he hurried to open the door for the man who looked startled by Frank’s decision to jump out in front of him, even if it was to get the door.
“I-I guess…” The man said.
“So you’re…you’re the one in the Lola costume, right?” Frank asked.
“Um… Yeah. Why do you care?”
“No reason I…I just wondered.” Frank tried to think of something else to say, anything to keep the conversation from stalling out, but nothing came to mind.
“Okay,” the guy said, hurrying out the door and disappearing into the dark of the parking lot.
Next time, Frank though. Next time he’d surely get to say more.
( ) ( ) ( )
Lola wasn’t so scary, Frank felt, now that he knew who was inside the mess of pink fur. It had been a week since the awkward door encounter, and Frank thought now might be a good time to greet him again. He hoped the man had forgotten how awkward he’d acted before and this time he’d make a good second first impression.
The night was slow and Frank managed to slip over to the smoothie kiosk to order himself a drink for the ride home. He tried to talk himself out of it, but the words still slipped out as he fished a ten dollar bill out of his wallet.
“So… Who’s the guy in your Lola costume?” Frank asked.
“Gerard. He’s a cool guy,” the clerk said, not looking up from her register.
Gerard, Frank thought. That was a unique name—an attractive sort of name that fit a guy who looked like him.
“Doesn’t get paid enough to walk around in that thing though,” the girl added. “I had to cover his shift once—thought I was going to puke it was so hot in there. And people are rude too. A little kid screamed and ran away from me so her daddy had to come get in my face. It’s awful. I don’t know how he does it.”
Contented to tell her story, she didn’t seem to think anything was off about Frank’s random question.
“Guess he must be desperate for a job,” Frank said.
“He says he just does this job for gas money. He works at the t-shirt design company on Lex Ave.”
“Oh yeah?”
“He says they mostly let him do the club shirts for the local high school, but I don’t know much else. He keeps to himself.”
As she handed him his change she started grinning.
“Why do you ask? Do you like him or something?”
“What?—No. I just wondered. I mean, I wouldn’t be caught dead in that thing. I don’t know how he does it.”
“Right,” the girl said, not believing him for a minute.
Fuck.
“We’ll have it ready around eight-fifty. Okay?”
“Okay,” Frank said. “Thanks.”
Frank tried to mentally recover from the awkward discussion before it was time for him to close up the Cinnabon and pick up his smoothie. It didn’t help that he was reminded of how idiotic he had to look to the smoothie clerk every time Lola would come back to the Soothing Smoothies kiosk to pick up more samples. She would smirk over at him once Lola—once Gerard—was gone with the fresh samples, knowing right away that Frank’s wasn’t simply curious about the other man.
Then just as Frank was about to pick up his smoothie, Lola returned to drop off the last of the samples. Frank hesitated, tempted to hide behind the warming case even though no one was looking at him, and watched as the clerk started talking to Gerard. Frank thought it was absurd that his first fear was the girl telling Gerard about him—of course she was probably telling him about something business related, a discussion of the schedule maybe.
But then why did Lola turn and look at him?—That creepy grin plastered on its white face…those arching eyes scrutinizing him…
Then Lola was gone, hurrying to the break room and employee bathroom to change and Frank was able to come grab his smoothie.
He tried to act like he didn’t notice the stares, but it didn’t work out like he’d planed. He’d already caused irreparable damage it seemed.
“I told Gerard you were askin’ about him,” the girl said, grinning at him like her decision to act like a little matchmaker was something to be proud of.
“Why? I just asked what kind of guy puts himself in a big pink ball of hair and calls it a job,” Frank said, his defenses rising. He didn’t want made a fool of. He didn’t want to be the faggot attracted to the Hairy Pink Giant.
“Oh…” His tone must’ve frightened her but the smile immediately left her face. “Well…here’s your drink. Sorry for…whatever.”
He took his drink from her, regretting immediately how abrasive he’d been. She didn’t do it to make fun of him—he didn’t need to be that defensive.
Frank kept his head down as he returned to his kiosk to clock out, trying not to look over at the smoothie kiosk or the girl behind the counter who was speaking to her coworker. He glanced up in time to see Gerard walking out the building and waited a moment before leaving as well, not wanting to look like he was following him and to keep from crossing paths with him at the door.
If he spoke to Gerard again, Frank decided, it would have to be in a month or more if he wanted to recover from this… He felt embarrassed for what he’d said, knowing she would tell Gerard how little Frank seemed to think of him.
Frank didn’t care that Gerard’s job made him wear a pink, fluffy suit. He still thought Gerard was attractive, and he seemed to be—from the bare minimum that Frank knew about him—a decent guy. He worked, at least, which was better than Frank’s last boyfriend—a useless mooch who drank most of his money and skimped on the rent payment.
Frank kept his head ducked as he hurried to his car, not letting himself look up and scope the parking lot for Gerard to see what sort of car he drove or if he walked.
( ) ( ) ( )
Gerard talked himself out of it three times. He had his Facebook page up and kept peeking at Frank’s mostly private profile. He told himself he was being irrational—for many reasons. One, it wasn’t that big of a deal to add someone from work as a friend. They worked together in adjacent kiosks—they were practically neighbors. However, he was being irrational too for thinking that the small intrigue Amy told him Frank had for him was any more than that—an intrigue.
After all, what sort of loser let himself stoop so low as to walk around in a fluffy pink suit, scaring children all day while handing out samples of overpriced smoothies?
A friend request didn’t mean a friendship. It didn’t mean a date. It didn’t mean a boyfriend.
Frank had tattoos and a punk haircut. He didn’t want to shack up with a loser in a pink mascot costume…
Gerard almost worked up the determination to close his laptop lid for the night and give up on the foolish idea when he heard a ping from phone and a red light lit up on his screen.
He thought at first it was another message from his mom—she probably “liked” another one of his photos from two years ago as she drunkenly perused his timeline—but as he came closer to his laptop, he saw that it was a friend request.
“No way,” Gerard said, eyes lighting up as he hurried to his desk and dropped into his seat. “No way, no way…” He clicked on the notification and couldn’t help the grin that overwhelmed his face.
1 Friend Request.
Frank Iero.
Frank—Frank from work Frank!
He didn’t have to stress about adding Frank anymore because Frank had added him!
If he accepted it right away though, would that make him look desperate?
Gerard leaned back in his seat and stared at the request, considering giving it an hour or two before responding. But then he decided what the hell. What did he have to feel ashamed of? They were both grown-ups who’d gotten off work four hours ago… It was a Wednesday. It wasn’t like anybody had an exciting Wednesday night life Gerard needed to envy or pretend to have. After deleting a couple of embarrassing things off his profile and making his single relationship status public as opposed to private (where he’d kept it out of embarrassment), he accepted the request and immediately started clicking through Frank’s preciously locked profile.
He was single too, and interested in men! and his profile was full of pictures—him with dogs, him at work, him with family, guitars, and on vacation. Gerard was so immersed in his searches he barely noticed the first notification that came through, or the second—but the third definitely caught his eye.
All of them were from Frank.
Frank had liked two of his statuses and his profile photo.
Amy hadn’t been lying.
Frank did like him.
After liking another photo, a message popped up in the bottom of Gerard’s screen.
It was Frank.
Gerard swore he almost swooned because it was a message from Frank. Someone who looked like Frank was talking to him. Someone cool like Frank was talking to him.
“Hey.”
It was brief and simple, but it was still something. Frank said something first that didn’t start with “aren’t you the freak in the pink suit?”
“Hey. How’s it going?” Gerard replied.
Immediately, Frank started answering. Gerard could picture him typing away as he watched the little speech bubble ripple with dots.
“Goood. Bored, tired. Btu good.”
“Same,” Gerard replied, not sure what else to say.
The little dots didn’t start up again and Gerard became nervous that his one-word answer caused Frank to lose interest and go away. But then, just as he was about to really feel his spirits sink, the bubble appeared with the cheery little dots and Gerard was grinning just as much as Lola.
“Before I say anythnig too stupid, you shld know Im a little bit drubk.
*drumk
**damn it, DRUNK”
Gerard laughed as he watched the correction kept popping up. It should probably have been a red flag that Frank was essentially drunk texting him on Wednesday night, but any attention was better than nothing.
“Drunk on a Wednesday?” Gerard asked.
“Honesly… I had to do somethng. I wanted to say hi at wrk but I got nevrous.
You cant’ get nerous if you’re drubk.
*DRUNK OMGF YES I CANT RYPE DRUNK. D-R-U-M-K”
“You mean drunk?” Gerard asked, giggling still.
“DAMN IT.”
“It’s okay. I’d drink too if I had to work with all of those cinnamon rolls and couldn’t eat them all. So depressing,” Gerard said.
“Im alerfic to cinamon. Thats why I wear the long cloves.
*gloves. I dont wear herbs at wrk.
*WORK.
Jesus Christ I look like a dumbass rightnow don’t I?”
“I don’t think so :) ”
“Well youre jsut being nice.”
“Why wouldn’t I want to be nice to you?” Gerard typed. He hesitated a moment before clicking send. Frank was drunk, not the state of mind he needed to be in for Gerard to start expressing his interest.
“Cuase Im drunk as fuck and bugging you.”
“You’re not bugging me :) ”
“Im Drunk.”
“That’s okay. Was work stressful or something?”
“A little. Theres this guy I like but I keep acting weird inseatd of saiyng hi.”
Gerard stared at the words for a moment, not sure whether to trust the excitement he felt. There was guy that Frank liked, at work, and he was drunk because he wanted to talk to this guy but was too nervous sober… But he was online, drunkenly babbling at Gerard. Did that mean he liked him? Or did he like Tom? The mixer for the smoothie bar… Maybe he was just talking to Gerard in hopes of getting to Tom.
Gerard was about to type a vague, supportive answer, but then Frank’s speech bubble appeared again.
“Its u btw haha. I dnot care if you wrar a big costime. Thing is sugly, but yoru==re cute.
Im wasted.
Im sorry.”
“It’s okay. You might need some sleep though,” Gerard replied, starting to think that maybe Frank’s affections were based entirely on the alcohol.
“Probbly, but Im talking to you.”
“Trying to talk to me is more like it lol.”
“Sorry. Im bugging you aren’t I? My bad.”
Gerard tried to type back that it was okay, he didn’t care, but then the little green light by Frank’s name disappeared and he was gone…