Battling the Loss You Live For.

I literally couldn’t think or speak.
“…What?!” I mumbled, standing up quickly, knocking over books and the table lamp in the process. Gerard didn’t move as he kept his eyes locked on mine. He wasn’t lying.
“What happened?” I said, angry, pissed off. I was so pissed off.
“Sit down, you fool,” he whispered, pushing me on the chest, forcing me back down on the desk, “he was down the street. I got out of my car; he walked up to me, and said ‘do you know a Frank Iero?’ I took one look at him, and kinda knew.”
“And what did you do?” I asked, bringing my cigarette to my lips.
“I just shrugged, and said I heard your name around. I said that I new you were in some pop punk band, and that’s it,” he explained, gesturing for me to pass him my cigarette. I did.
“And…?”
“He said ‘alright, thanks’ and walked off.”
“So that’s it? He went?” I asked, getting hopeful. Maybe that’s it, he’ll leave us alone? Wouldn’t be like him, though…
“Yeah, I guess. But I’m just worried, how the fuck does he know where you live, y’know? You moved out of your Mom’s place…” Gerard said, shaking his head as he passed my fag over, “might wanna finish that up.”
“I know… I know… I don’t get it. I don’t know what to do, either. I mean, I have nothing. What the hell am I meant to do when he – and let’s face it, it’s gonna happen – eventually finds me? I can’t let him even set eyes on Sazzy or the kids, he’s gonna-”
“I know. Don’t say shit like that, man,” Gerard said, shuddering a little.
“Yeah, imagine how I’d feel. It’s like… I can’t even explain. It’s like this dread hanging over my head for all this time, and it’s never gonna go awa-”
“Frank! What the hell is going on over there? Can you come over here!”
“Oh, fuck… Don’t tell her.”
“What?! We can’t not tell her, Frank!” Gerard cried in a low whisper, shocked.
“Listen,” I began, lowering my voice to a mutter, “if we tell her, she’s going to get scared. She’s gonna get paranoid and worry over it. She’s gonna get all emotional and go to drastic measures over it all, and then she’s gonna wanna do something, but there’s nothing we can do.”
“But Frank, she has a right. I mean, what if he comes knocking on the door when you’re not around one day, and-”
“That’s not gonna be a problem. She has a brain. And he’s never seen or heard of her before, he’s not gonna know she’s with me,” I said, nodding to myself.
“But what if he tricks her? You know, comes as like… a business man or something, just to check out the place, the address he might have?”
He did have a point.
“Okay, look. I’ll just warn her… but not now. Just… leave it to me, alright?” I said, sighing as I sat up straight, sliding off the desk. He hesitated, nodding slightly.
“Alright… but just… don’t make the mistake of not telling her, okay?”

“What the hell were you doing? What’s going on?” Sazzy asked, as Marilyn jumped to me, and I wrapped my arms around her waist, allowing her to rest on my hip, her head on my shoulder.
“Don’t worry about it. Just some band stuff,” I explained, giving Marilyn her white pacifier. Sazzy calls it a dummy, so I’ve gotten into the habit of that, too.
Mikey gave me a look, making sure that Sazzy didn’t see, and I responded with one back, and he nodded, looking at Gerard, who gave him a slight shrug, making Mikey’s eyes widen. I guess he knew?