You Gotta Smile Sometimes

Your pov

A few days later I was finally allowed back outside by my now seemingly overprotective mother. The first place I visited was Mikey's, this time in the car my mother had gone out and brought me so " I couldn’t get hurt again". What she means is so I couldn't go out and get raped again and force her to take some time off work so that she can pretend to look like a good parent. I parked on the side of the road in front of the Way household, jumped out of the car and made my way to the door. Before I could ring the doorbell, the door was flung open. Before I knew what was going on, a blur of a figure jumped on me, shortly followed by another.

"BERT! GERARD!!" came a strangled, panicked cry from Mikey.

I opened my scrunched up eyes and mouth to speak but managed to get a mouthful of hair instead, Bert being the culprit.

"Bert, Gerard! Don't chew on her head! She's recovering form surgery!" cried Mikey.

"Bleugh!!!" replied Gerard.

The guys were pulled off me and I found myself being pulled up by a girl who I recognised instantly.

"Sambo!!" I screamed and wrapped my arms around her. We were joined by Grace and Vicky and we jumped up and down in a group hug.

"Well, that was strange" commented Bert.

I pulled away from the girls and looked around Mikey and Gerard's living room to see all of my friends and a new guy I didn't recognise. Vicky pulled him over

"this is my cousin, Matt".

"Hi" he said looking at me.

"Hey" I replied.

One by one I was greeted and hugged by all of my friends. However Will hung back, as though he was unsure.

"Aww come here Will" I said, holding my arms open for a hug. He came forward and stopped just in front of me.

"I don't want to hurt you".

"Oh darlin', I've been jumped on by both Gerard and Bert, at the same time. I think I can cope with you hugging me."

He hugged me tentatively, trying not to catch any of the cuts or bruises still residing on me. I hugged him back warmly. Mikey walked over and lead me over to the couch. He sat down and then pulled me into his lap.

He leaned in and whispered in my ear "we're having a movie night for you, love. Everyone wants to stay. I'd rather have you all to myself. But they wanted you to choose. I can kick them out if you want".

Now this might seem really intimate and the sort of behaviour couples have, but this is just how Mikey and I always are. No one ever thinks anything of it, although Vicky has told us before that we should be together, and so has Grace and Sambo. They don't know how I feel about Mikey but they've probably guessed.

"Kitten?".

"Hmm? What?" I replied, still thinking about everything and nothing at the same time.

"You zoned out" Mikey said "so, what's your answer? You want them to stay or not?".

As much as I knew Mikey wanted them to go, I wanted them to stay. Today I wanted to be surrounded by people I knew.

"I'm sorry Mikey, can they stay please?"

he sighed but nodded.

"Okay, what movie do you wanna watch first?" he asked, now speaking in a normal voice so that everyone could hear.

Almost at once they all started arguing about which movie we should watch first. Mikey and I sat back to watch the argument. Eventually 'Donnie Darko' came out on top. Gerard got up off the sofa and found the DVD, putting it into the DVD player. He switched off the lights in the living room and climbed back onto the sofa. I looked around at my friends sitting in Mikey and Gerard's living room. Grace and Frank cuddled up in the arm chair, Bert sprawled out, laying on the floor in front of the sofa with Sambo resting her head on his shoulder and laying next to him, Ray sat in the other arm chair with Will sitting on the arm of the chair and Matt sitting practically underneath Will's feet. Bob was sitting cross-legged on Bert and Sambo's right, Vicky sat next to him holding his hand. I smiled at them, they were the best friends a girl could have, with Mikey being the bestest obviously.

We were half way through watching 'Saw' when the lights were suddenly switched on. Grace jumped and it was Gerard, not one of the girls, who squealed in fright, in turn making Mikey jump and causing me to fall onto the floor.

"Do you guys want me to make popcorn?" we looked over to see Donna in the doorway standing next to the light switch.

"Gerard, you spaz" Mikey said, hitting him in the arm.

"She made me jump!" he pouted at him. Mikey rolled his eyes at him and reached down to help me up. We all signalled to Donna that we would indeed like popcorn. Mikey got up to help his mom get popcorn and so I settled down in the chair where he had been sitting. While everyone else started to watch the film again, Gerard leaned in and whispered in my ear "so, when are you and my brother going to get together? What am I gunna have to do to make you two get together?".

"Gerard, shouldn't you be warning me to not get involved with your brother in case I hurt him?".

"well in most cases yeah, but I know you're not gunna hurt him.".

"And how is that Mr. Way?".

"Because you lurve him!".

I shoved him playfully "I so do not!". He responded to my shove by shoving me back. Our shoving soon developed in a full on shoving war which ended abruptly when we both fell off the sofa and onto Bert and Sambo, me on Sambo, Gerard on Bert. Sambo and I just laughed it off. We looked over at Bert and Gerard to see that Gerard hadn't got off Bert yet.

Bert noticed that we were staring and shoved Gerard off him, mumbling something along the lines of "fucking fag" under his breath but we all heard him. Now mostly none of us care what people say about Gerard, and he just laughs it off but this time his eyes went cold. The turned to Bert and smacked him hard across his left cheek. Gerard got up and walked out of the house, slamming the door behind him. Bert just sat there with a slightly shocked, slightly sneery look on his face.

"What?" Bert said, looking at us incredulously. Sam slapped him across the face. She got up and walked out the door. The happy mood had managed to change into a tense one in a matter of minutes. I sat there uncomfortably, wanting the atmosphere to go back to how it was.

"Bert, go and apologise to Gerard and talk to your girlfriend" Ray finally spoke.

"Do I have to?" Bert replied.

"Yes, now go" Ray said firmly, pointing towards the door. Bert got up reluctantly ad left the same way Gerard and Sambo did. Mikey came back into the room carrying two large glass bowls of popcorn.

"Why is everyone so sad? And why did the front door slam? Wait a minute, where's my brother?".

I sighed and got up, taking one of the bowls from him

"Gerard and I had a shoving fight and we fell off the sofa… ".

" oh my god are you hurt?!" Mikey said with so much concern in his voice it made me feel bad that I had made him worried.

"Nah, I'm fine. I fell on Sam. Gerard fell on Bert and then Bert called him a 'fucking fag'."

"Gerard, smacked him one, stormed off and slammed the front door. Bert couldn't care less what he said and so Sam slapped him too. She walked off also." Ray interjected.

"Ray sent Bert to apologise and talk to them". I finished.

"And so that's where everyone has gonna and why the atmosphere is so sad. Hey I used the word atmosphere" Frank said, making sure he got the last word in. Grace rolled her eyes fondly at him and ruffled his hair. Frank nuzzled Grace's neck. Mikey sighed and sat down on the sofa. I joined him and wrapped my arms around him.

"I'm sure they'll all come back soon" I whispered in Mikey's ear as we settled down to watch 'Nightmare Before Christmas' courtesy of Frank.