Sick Boy

How do you come out as gay to your family, friends and a million people all at once? How? It was completely fucking insain to do so, and Ryan Ross felt his hands clench into fists as the question began to approach his mind. Dumbshit—how could you? Fucker.

TRL: the root of all evil. Where it all begin. Well, maybe not all the way. Harsh? Whatever. It was a TV show. It didn’t have feelings.

So anyways, how do you do it? How? Ryan wasn’t sure. How do you?

Well, if you’re Ryan Ross, there are two simple words. Two fucking syllables. If you are Ryan Ross, when the happy, pretty, skinny TV host asks you the question, this is what you do:

Blush. Mumble.

“Um…yeah…?” With a question mark. You have no idea what you’re doing. Blush brighter red, bury your head in your hands and retreat to the back of this group. Feel your phone vibrating from the next room, consider running away. Oh, you fucking idiot. You goddamned, fucking idiot. Eloquent vocabulary, Sick Boy, really. Eloquent, impressive. This is the point in your life to run away from everything. Just leave. And not just the building, leave the country, change your name, marry a girl, pretend you’re something else, pretend. Oh, you know…

And so, Ryan took a moment to breathe—sick, Ryan, this is so fucking sick—put his hand on Spencer’s back and took three steps to exist the reign of the camera. Look at Gerard as you pick up that pink phone he bought. Break apart. Kill yourself. Go numb. Feel nothing. Feel everything. Do it all at once. Say goodbye? No. Well, with your eyes. Let them collide onto liquid gold in pure admiration. Goodbye? This is why you will never get anywhere in life. Die. Fuck you, really. Just…go die somewhere, Ryan.

Sick. That’s what you are, sick.

**

As Gerard watched Ryan leave, there was nothing more than “Go to him, just go!” running through his poor, little, insain mind. But Spencer grabbed onto his wrist inconspicuously and Gerard felt an icy cold stab rush through his head, soul, mind. He hates you, Gee. He really does. He fucking hates you. You should have listened to Mikey, listened to yourself—no! No, not yourself. You’re a fuckhead, you’re fucked, you are fuck. So fuck you.

“Yeah, Ryan’s been a bit…” Brendon was stuttering, trying to explain this sudden departure of his right hand man.

“Sick,” Gerard said, in response to a kick in the heel by Jon. Wished he had his own band here. MCR was home, so much warmer than PATD. Oh they were fine, but it was just wrong for him to be here and not to have his brother, his best friends with him.

“Sick,” Spencer nodded, “We’ve been trying not to cancel tour dates, and I don’t think it’s doing good things for him.”

How fucking ironic, Gerard’s mind deadpanned in his ears. You dumbass. Dumbfuck. Motherfucking dumbfuck. Damn—do you have no more insults for yourself? Shit, this is why you’re insain, isn’t it? You’re just not good enough to have something to call yourself, even when the world is falling apart around you and you should have some of the biggest reasons to insult yourself, all you can say are various forms of ‘fuck.’

Talentless pig.

Who would love you? No one! Who would love the real you? Not even you love the real you. You fooled yourself into thinking someone would love you, and—don’t start. Just shut up and kill yourself or something. It would solve everything. Nah, but that’d be too…blah.

“I should go see…” Gerard mumbled, nodding to the VJ who made a stupid remark about “cute couple,” or something.

**

But Gerard, you don’t have the balls to go home. You don’t have the guts, the nerve, the ambition. Yeah. Yeah this is just more evidence for why you suck. This is why you should never have a happy ending. This is why you’re insain.

You deserve nothing of what you’ve been given. Ryan, fortune, everything. Last night was an oasis in the desert and you had the stupidity to leave. If you weren’t in public, you should be slapping yourself, not collecting stares. Duck into a McDonald’s, please? Thank you. Now you can hide.

Gerard nearly ran to the bathroom, locked the door and called Mikey. The world was collapsing, he was panicking, and Mikey was the only person in the world that could help him ever, at all in this situation.

“So how’d it go?” came his brother’s relaxed, quiet voice.

“Did you watch?”

“No. I forgot what channel MTV is.”

Gerard made a face at the phone and continued, “Not well, in the least.”

“How?”

“Ryan left. And I’m too scared to go find him. Because I don’t think he wants me too.”

“Of course he does!” The choice seemed obvious to Mikey. Run after who you love. It was perfect, Gerard was a romantic, Ryan was a romantic. Of course it was what he wanted. Some kind of foreplay, probably…

“Mikey—Mikey,” Gerard whimpered, leaning against the floor now, “Mikey, what should I do?”

“I just told you what to do!”

“I can’t though!”

“Well you’re out of luck. I told you what I think you should do. Go find him. I have to go, sorry.” Click.

Phone was disconnected. Gerard wanted to die. Really. Nothing more than death seemed acceptable right at that moment. Damned rock star, all you want to do is get the attention, get the girl—or the guy, and have a happy ending.

That’s not living.

Gerard picked himself up off the floor, brushed off his pants. His eyes were swollen, but he hadn’t cried. His throat felt hoarse, but there had been no strain on it in the last few hours. Ryan was missing. He didn’t know where he was going from here, but he had to find the boy. He just had to. There was no doubt in his mind, it was the only way.

He stuck his phone in his pocket and peered around the door, to McDonald’s—oblivious to his pain and strife.

And he walked out.