"I think," Gerard said, staring at the ceiling, "that I have a problem."

His psychiatrist squinted thoughtfully. "And how do you feel about that?"

"Problematic," Gerard said. "It never used to be this way. I used to be normal."

"Normal?"

"Well-adjusted. Well, sort of. People threw rocks at my head." Gerard hooked his thumbs together. "But I wasn't having such disturbing dreams."

"Tell me about your dreams."

"I just did. Like, two minutes ago."

His psychiatrist blinked. "Oh, right. Totally. Wait, I thought you said you had a problem."

Gerard sighed. "I do. The dreams."

"Do you think your high school bullying caused them?"

"Why would my high school bullying make me dream about -"

"Gerard," his therapist said soothingly, "Life is complicated. The mind is a strange and incomprehensible thing. Behind the hate, there lies a murderous desire for love."

"That's Morrissey," Gerard said, sitting up, "and Morrissey never dreamed about having sex with his old high school mascot, and Pete, why is my brother's head glued onto a surfer's body in the poster on your ceiling?"

"...your brother's got a nice head," Pete said finally, swinging his legs and blinking down at Gerard from his roommate's bunk.

"I think I should go," Gerard said. "And get some real therapy. For -" he resisted glancing up at the ceiling, shuddering - "multiple things."

"Gerard, man, I tried. I just, you know. All I've taken is Psych 100."

"Still!"

"Well, you don't want to have sex with your dad."

"Your degree is going to be worthless," Gerard said, moving towards the door, "and you'll die sad and alone by the side of the road."

The last thing he saw was Pete's grinning face. "Thanks for that, dude."

||

Gerard didn't actually want to have sex with people in fursuits. Not really. He hadn't even watched that much Disney as a kid.

He just wanted to have sex with a person in a fur suit, was all.

"I don't think that makes it much better," Mikey said when Gerard explained it to him.

"You're not being very supportive."

"I don't have a problem with fursuits per se," Ray said when Mikey didn't respond except to glare. "I really only object to that particular fursuit. It's kind of, um..."

"Totally hideous," Mikey said flatly. "Which makes sense. Because it's our high school mascot."

Gerard looked at the floor. "When you say it like that you make it sound perverted."

"It kind of is," Ray said, patting his back. "Sorry, buddy."

"It's not perverted," Mikey said. "Just kind of weird. Um, really weird."

"When considering whose judgment to trust," Ray said, "please remember which one of us is dating Pete Wentz."

"Hey."

"I'm just saying."

"Pete's nice," Gerard said absently.

"Either way," Ray said, "you've gotta get over this crush, man. It's not healthy."

Gerard ducked his head. "I know. I really am going to try."

Ray ruffled his hair. "I believe in you."

||

The problem was, Gerard didn't really believe in himself.

Or – well. He totally believed in himself as a talented individual who could succeed in the world, because he'd had an awesome therapist in high school. But he didn't believe in himself when it came to getting over crushes. He was terrible at it. He'd only kissed K from Canada twice but he'd dreamed about her straight past graduation.

This one was even worse because he was there all the time. On the quad, in the dining hall, in the dorm...Gerard was ready to cry.

"It's just not fair," he told his roommate Frank. "He's, like, haunting me. He totally has no right to do that."

"Yeah, uh-huh, totally," Frank said absently. "Hey, man, how sick would my hair look if I dyed it orange?"

Gerard sighed. "Pretty sick. But you should wait until you're not totally stoned."

"Hah hah hah," Frank said. "Hah hah...oh wait, you're serious? Oh man. Hah."

Gerard lay back and covered his eyes. Someday Frank was going to be so stoned he fell out their window or something, and then what would happen to Gerard? He'd be alone in a room that smelled like B.O. and weed. Or, oh God, what if he got a new roommate? The only reason Frank ignored the smell was because most of the time he was too high to care. Gerard doubted he'd get a second indifferent roommate.

He was, in fact, completely doomed. And somehow - somehow - he knew it was the mascot's fault. A hundred percent.

||

Gerard Way bathed, on average, 1.5 times a week. The .5 was because sometimes he washed his face.

Brian knew the stats because he'd been watching Gerard for the better part of five years. At first it really hadn't been his fault. His parents had moved into the house across from the Ways, and for a dude whose room was actually in the basement, Gerard spent a lot of time eating cereal in the curtainless kitchen right across from Brian's bedroom.

Naked.

And it was pretty easy to just kind of wander after Gerard when he went to class and got stuff from his locker. And to learn the names of his friends. Brian was small and fast, and Gerard always got to class early so he could slump in the back, leaving Brian with plenty of time to sprint to his own classes.

One of the best moments of Brian's lackluster high school life had been sophomore year, when he'd followed Gerard right into their shared class. It felt like destiny – right up until Gerard transferred into gym, anyway.

Brian was still sort of in denial about his obsession. It wasn't a crush! It would end any day! He could quite when he wanted! But he wasn't in denial enough not to recognize that he desperately needed to see Gerard more.

The mascot job was seriously easy to get. Probably because no one really wanted it, but whatever. Through the funny little eye vents, Brian could spend hours watching Gerard try and fail at playing croquet. It was a beautiful existence.

If the best moment of Brian's high school life was during sophomore year, the worst was during junior year. He hadn't meant to leap on top of Gerard. He just hadn't been able to restrain himself. Especially since he knew from keeping close watch on how foggy the Way's bathroom window was in proportion to whether or not he could see Mikey playing Playstation in the living room that Gerard had showered just the night before.

He smelled amazing, but it wasn't worth the look of hatred Gerard sent him. He probably thought the jocks had put Brian up to it. Brian's heart was crushed.

It was mended partially by getting into the same college as Gerard, and helped even more by how easy it was to follow someone in college. His dorm was right next to Gerard's! And, okay, he'd maybe called housing to specifically request it, but that was beside the point. The point was, Brian felt closer and closer to his goal.

Now all he had to do was actually introduce himself to Gerard, and maybe, just maybe, Gerard would think of him as someone other than the mascot who'd jumped on him that one time.

||

"Hi," Gerard said. "I'm Gerard Way."

Brian froze. He felt like his stomach was going to fall out through his ass. Gerard Way was standing in front of him. Gerard Way was talking to him. Something about this was deeply wrong – yet at the same time it was completely, beautifully right.

"Hi," he said finally, when Gerard started to look a little worried.

"Oh, good, you can talk." Gerard slapped his hands over his mouth. "Wait! That's not what I meant. I just – I – oh god."

"You're Gerard Way," Brian said helpfully, because Gerard looked ready to have a heart attack.

"Um," Gerard said in a high voice.

"We went to high school together."

"You were the mascot!" Gerard said, and then went so pale Brian was a little worried he'd faint.

Gerard was weirder than he'd seemed during all those years Brian followed him. Funny how that worked out. "I had a crush on you," he blurted out.

Gerard's eyes looked like they were about to fall out of his head. "Did you really."

Brian nodded. "I know all your favorite things," he said, wondering why he couldn't just shut up, because he was creepy, "which is how I know that when I ask you out for coffee, you'll say yes. Because you're addicted."

Gerard licked his lips. Brian wanted to touch them. "That's kind of weird, you know."

"Go out for coffee with me. Please."

"I could just want the coffee."

"You like creeps," Brian said. It wasn't something he knew for sure, but he was willing to make the gamble for Gerard. For love.

"Will you wear the mascot suit?"

"If you play your cards right," Brian said, and held out his hand.

To his enormous surprise, Gerard took it.

||

Gerard was in his dorm room. Gerard was against his wall.

Brian's life was awesome.

"I'm going to kiss you now."

"I wish you'd just do it." Gerard scrunched his nose up. "You're making me nervous."

"That's just because you're a virgin," Brian said. "Don't worry. I know about the Batman costume masturbation."

"I'm kissing you now, before you can say anything else weird," Gerard said, and did exactly that.

It was kind of wet at first, because Brian was surprised enough that he wasn't doing anything but standing there, and Gerard accidentally licked his chin. But then Brian seemed to figure out what was going on and finally reacted, pushing forward and kissing Gerard back.

And then it was awesome.

Brian knew everything about Gerard, from his eating habits to what kind of toilet paper he used. He didn't know, though, that Gerard got a funny look on his face when Brian tugged his hair, or that he'd squeeze Brian's shoulders hard enough that Brian was sure there would be a bruise.

He had a hard-on almost right away, but he was more than happy to just keep kissing Gerard, leaning against him and biting his lip a little. That got a good reaction, so Brian did it again – and then, because he knew Gerard loved vampire movies so much, he bent down and bit Gerard's neck.

"Ooh," Gerard said, so quietly Brian almost didn't hear it. Except that was the same noise he'd made the first time he got his hands on some gay porn. It had been three days after Brian had bought a longer-range microphone, and oh god, Brian was such a creep but Gerard was completely amazing.

"Come here," Brian said, tugging his hand. They tumbled onto Brian's bed together, and for once Brian didn't have the brain space to resent how fucking uncomfortable his bed really was.

Because Gerard was in his arms, nice and soft and warm, and calling him Brian instead of "that mascot guy". Brian's dreams had pretty much come true.

After they'd gotten each other off, they lay on the bed in a heap. "I wish I'd known you were stalking me," Gerard said finally.

"Why, so you could take out a restraining order?"

Gerard pinched him. "Don't be stupid. So I could get to know you."

"That's weird," Brian said after a minute of his stomach doing nothing but enormous cartwheels.

"It's the truth," Gerard said.

Brian took a minute to think about it. "Okay," he said finally. "So we'll go to sleep right now, and then we'll wake up when my roommate yells at us. And then I'll tell you about my favorite color and shit."

Gerard closed his eyes. "Good plan."

And it was.