I Can Transform You

POV: Frank

I had never been more terrified in my entire life. The whole school had seen my suicide tape. They knew all my secrets; they knew about my dad, about Matty and Lydia, about my suicidal nature and deepest insecurities, and about my feelings for Gerard... And the fact that I hadn’t even gone through with killing myself would make them all think I was an attention-seeking coward.

Fuck my fucking life. I should have killed myself while I had the chance. These people knew everything they needed to know about me now to tear me to fucking shreds. I had dug my own grave, and one way or another, I was going to lie in it. I was one doomed motherfucker.

“I gotta get out of here,” I declared frantically, leaping off the bed and practically running for the door. My life was suddenly feeling like a pressure cooker on full-heat, and I needed to escape it right the fuck now. I felt so claustrophobic; utterly consumed in a dark tunnel with no visible light at the end of it.

I got as far as the landing before Gerard was grabbing my arm and pulling me round to face him, holding me steady with firm hands.

“Frank, listen to me - it’s going to be okay,” he tried to tell me, fighting a lost cause.

How could things ever be okay again? There was nothing he could say to fix this.

“No, it’s not! Everyone knows, Gerard!” I cried, verging on hysteria. “Fuck, I – I can’t stay here anymore!”

I shoved him backwards, just hard enough to make him let go, and then I started running again. I ran past him and down the stairs, and rather predictably, he followed hot on my heels.

“Frank, wait! Please,” he called desperately, but his pleas fell on deaf ears. “Where are you gonna go?”

“Anywhere but here!” I yelled over my shoulder, the tears streaming from my eyes.

Okay, so I didn’t exactly know where I was going… Maybe it was hell I was heading for. But nowhere could be worse than here – I just wanted to run and never come back.

I grabbed my car keys from the side with trembling hands, and ran faster towards the exit, my escape.

“Frankie…” Gerard finally caught up with me and tugged on my arm again.

I span around so fast I nearly lost my balance, but he held me steady.

“Don’t try and stop me! I have to do this!” I was full-on crying now, weak and broken on the inside, yet still fighting on the outside.

“I know, just – let me come with you,” he replied, his tone imploring, “I’ll go and get us some money, okay? Wait here…” He reluctantly let go of my arm and started backing away, watching me with pleading eyes and saying, “Wait for me.”

And so I stayed there, rooted to the spot, mostly in pure shock that this was really happening. I wanted to run away and Gerard wanted to come with me… I couldn’t believe he wanted to come with me. I didn't even realise until the offer was in the air how much I really wanted him to come with me. Fuck, I needed him to...

He really was the best friend in the world. And it was a massive weight off my shoulders to know that, together, we were going to get the hell out of this wretched place.

POV: Gerard

I was fresh out of ideas on how to talk Frank out of this rash plan – he was in not fit state to think about anything rationally right now – so I decided all I could do was stand by him. What choice did I have? If he wanted to run away, that’s what we would do. It wasn’t the worst idea ever… I mean, we could find a motel to stay in the city or something, just for a couple of nights, and then hopefully I could find a way of talking him into coming home. Yes, well, that was my plan anyway...

I tried to explain this to Mikey quickly and quietly, as I threw a couple of shirts and stuff into my backpack, grabbing the day-to-day essentials.

“What the fuck am I supposed to tell dad and Linda?” he hissed, looking panicked by the whole frantic situation.

“Anything! Make something up. Cover for us, bro,” I instructed urgently, stuffing my wallet and my phone into my pockets. “I’ll call you later, okay?”

I was running out of the room before he even had a chance to reply, making a quick stop in the bathroom to grab mine and Frank’s toothbrushes, before bolting back downstairs.

I almost expected Frank to be gone, to have left without me, because let’s face it, he probably wanted to be on his own – but he was standing right where I left him, waiting for me just like I asked him to.

“Okay, I’m ready,” I declared, swinging my backpack over my shoulder. He stared at it curiously, as if wondering what was so urgent I had to make him wait, but just nodded wordlessly and turned back to the door.

I noticed him scan the streets first in paranoia, before venturing out into the wide, open world, hurrying over to his car. I felt a little apprehensive climbing into the passenger’s seat, because of the flashbacks I was having to the last time I was in a car with Frank… Good God, he drove like a fucking maniac. I hoped he would be a little less reckless this time, but the fact that he was currently a suicidal wreck right now didn’t really fill me with confidence.

As he fired up the engine, I took a deep breath and hastily put on my seatbelt, preparing myself for what was in store.

And yes, as expected, his driving was just as erratic as it was last time, and yes, I was having heart failure, but I didn’t say a word. I waited for him to speak first. We were driving in silence for at least three minutes before he finally found his voice.

“You didn’t have to come,” he mumbled, without breaking his focus on the road, “I don’t even know where I’m going…”

He swerved suddenly, deciding at the last minute to turn right instead of left at a main junction. For someone who didn’t know where he was going, he seemed to be taking a very specific route…

“Newark, by the looks of things,” I observed, glancing at the nearest road sign which told me we were 5 miles from the city. I figured he was just making this up as he went along, and I would sit tight and let him take me wherever he wanted. “Hey, can I put the radio on?”

The silence was becoming kind of deafening. A little music wouldn’t go amiss right now.

Frank glanced at me, looking rather taken aback by my light-hearted change of subject and nonchalant attitude towards his aimless driving.

“Uh,” he hesitated, as if I had just asked something that required deep thought on his part, before distractedly replying, “Yeah. Actually, I think I have a couple of CDs in the back…”

He suddenly turned around to look on the backseat, whilst still driving at 80mph and swerving all over the road, and I nearly had an aneurism.

“RADIO!” I practically shouted in his ear, pushing him a little forcefully to make him turn his attention back to the road.

“Jesus,” he mumbled, wide eyes darting between me and the road. “What the fuck, Gee?”

“Watch where you’re going, dickface, not everyone in this car wants to die!” I hissed, trying not to hyperventilate. He looked positively alarmed by my strong reaction, with eyebrows raised so high they weren’t even visible behind his fringe.

“Then again...” I continued slowly in a much calmer voice, “If it was a choice between listening to one of your CDs, or being in a car crash… Maybe I would prefer the latter.”

I’m not even joking.

“Oi, fuck off, what’s wrong with my music?” he retorted defensively, snapping his head in my direction.

I stared at him expressionlessly.

“Everything.”

He was into all that rap, hip-hop bullshit that promoted sexism, racism and homophobia. And it was literally all about fucking girls – that was as deep as it got. In my experience, the rappers and their fans were judgemental, shallow assholes.

“You know, music can be a form of therapy, if you listen to something with real meaning, rather than the artificial crap you listen to,” I lectured, trying to be all insightful and stuff, but really just coming across as a giant music snob. He just stared at me incredulously for that comment, a response seeming to fail him. “Like, something that you can actually relate to on a deeper level,” I continued wisely. I was speaking from the heart, having been saved by music myself in the past. I wanted it to heal Frank too.

“Right,” he finally found his voice, and oh man, he sounded pretty irritated. “Take the wheel a second.”

He didn’t wait for me to agree (which I would NOT have) or even give me a chance to get my hands on the wheel before he was turning in his seat again and rummaging around on the backseat.

Cue the seventh heart attack of the journey.

“Wha – FRANK!” I exploded, throwing my hands on the wheel just in time to stop the car swerving into the sidewalk. “Are you insane?”

I’d clearly hit some kind of nerve in him dissing his music, but was it really worth killing me over?

The correct answer that he failed to give me was: “Yes, Gerard, I am totally fucking insane and determined to kill us both.” Instead, he said nothing. He continued silently in his hunt for whatever goddamned CD he was looking to torture me with, and then, the car in front of us suddenly decided to brake and I literally saw my life flash before my eyes.

“FRANK, LOOK OUT!” I yelled hysterically, and he span around and slammed on his brakes so fast I think he gave himself whiplash, but we somehow avoided collision by about an inch.

“Fuck,” he groaned, slightly white in the face from the stroke he was having.

“Pull over,” I hiss-whispered, clutching onto my seatbelt for dear life.

He nodded wordlessly, looking utterly shell-shocked, and indicated to come off the main road, pulling into the nearest layby.

Neither of us said anything for what seemed like minutes on end; we just sat there stunned into silence, waiting for our hearts to return to their regular patterns. Mine was still pounding like a hammer against my ribcage by the time he finally found his voice.

“I don’t want to die,” he whispered fearfully, and well, that was a bit of a twist in the story. It was only two hours ago, I had to pry a gun from the position it was glued to against his head.

“You don't?” I frowned uncertainly, confused about his sudden change of heart.

“Y-yeah, I don’t,” he replied in a small voice, rather lacking in confidence. He seemed just as confused as me by this revelation. I presumed it had something to do with death staring him in the face just now, when it wasn’t invited by him personally.

“That’s the second time my life has flashed before my eyes today… But it’s the first time I’ve been scared about it,” he started to explain slowly, an intense look of concentration on his face, as if he was trying to solve an enigma. “I mean - when I was holding that gun to my head, there was not one single protesting voice in my head… I was at peace with the idea of death, because… well, I thought I had nothing to live for.”

He paused for a moment and just stared out the window at the cars passing us by, like he was seeing the world around him for the first time or something. And then, finally, he turned to look at me, his eyes staring deep into mine.

“And then, you came along…”

The slightest smile pulled at the corner of his lips, as he gazed at me, and in that moment, I saw his sincere gratitude. But then, he averted his gaze bashfully, as if he was trying to resist my searching eyes.

“And when I thought we were gonna crash just now, there was a voice in my head screaming in protest… in fear...”

Well, it was good to know he was reacting properly in the face of death now. Any normal-functioning person would have shat themselves if they were in our shoes just now.

“All I could think was ‘I don’t want to leave things like this.’” He glanced up at me again and bit his lip. “I guess… I wanna stick around and get my shit together, after all.”

Well. Thank Jesus for that.

I let out the breath I didn’t even know I had been holding and gave him a contented smile.

“You don’t know how relieved I am to hear-”

“Oh, fuck,” he suddenly cut me off in panic, crashing back to reality with the harsh vibrations coming from his jeans pocket. I watched with wide eyes as his hand dove into the pocket and pulled out his ringing cell phone. He took one horrified look at the caller ID and groaned, “Forget everything I just said - I want to die.”

Great. Just when he was making a little bit of progress, his troubled past found a way of catching up with him…

I didn’t need to see the caller ID to know it was someone Frank wasn’t ready to talk to yet. I mean, hi, he was an emotional wreck who wasn’t stable enough to talk to anyone except me, at the moment. He didn’t need anyone outside this car trying to force themselves upon him right now; he needed to get away from the world for a couple of days, which was the whole point of this trip.

“Don’t answer it,” I advised in a low, warning voice, but he made no attempt to reject the call. He just let it ring and stared fixated at the screen the whole time, like he was at a total loss for what to do. “Frank?” I whispered uncertainly, and then, to my horror, he just suddenly cracked.

“FUCKING BITCH! GO TO HELL!” he choked out angrily, his eyes tearing up and his face turning red with rage, and I recoiled so fast I hit my back on the car door and winced from the collision.

The phone was still ringing and he continued to stare at it, transfixed, his face twisted with anger and pain, and his whole body trembling. And then, I realised he wasn’t shouting at me, he was shouting at the person calling him… and I had a pretty good idea who that person was.

I could literally see the internal battle he was having with himself over whether to answer the call and give her a piece of his mind, or just ignore her entirely. I, on the other hand, had no doubt about what he should do, and I took it upon myself to boldly reach over and press the ‘reject call’ button.

“Not now,” I told him, my finger ghosting over the ‘power’ button, killing his phone altogether until further notice.

It was for the best that we cut off all contact to the outside world for a while – at least until Frank was prepared to face it all again. He was definitely in no fit state to talk to his backstabbing girlfriend yet. The wounds were still wide-open and bleeding; he needed a little time to recover.

He stared at me for a moment, with watery eyes, before exhaling heavily and turning back to the window, saying nothing. We sat in complete silence for a couple of minutes and I had no idea how to console him this time; I just watched helplessly as he sat there with his head against the glass, the tears streaming silently down his cheeks.

My heart literally ached for him. I knew how much he loved Lydia, and being deceived by her was something he would not get over for a very long time, if ever. I wanted to pull him into a hug, or wipe away the tears, but I didn’t know if he would want my comfort right now. I figured he probably needed to mourn his dead relationship, and he would talk to me about it when he wanted to; I just needed to be patient. I was in NO hurry to have that talk with him anyway… What could I even say to make him feel better about this? I was never very good with the whole relationship advice thing. (Just ask Mikey.)

Finally, after what felt like hours, Frank suddenly sniffed loudly and straightened up in his seat, wiping his eyes and starting up the engine once more.

“Right, let’s find a motel, shall we?” he enquired in a strained voice, without looking at me.

“I thought you were gonna torture me with your music first?” I responded jokingly, trying to lighten the mood a little.

“Oh... oh yeah,” he remembered, turning in his seat completely, getting on his knees and everything, to reach out and search the backseat yet again. I was so very thankful we weren’t doing 80mph this time.

When he turned back around, he had an album clutched in his hand, but I couldn’t quite see what it was. I groaned inwardly, knowing already that I was going to hate it.

“Prepare to fucking eat your words about my music,” he declared boldly, shoving the CD into the player a little vigorously.

I did as I was told and mentally prepared myself for the consumption of my earlier words.

However, it was gonna take a lot more than the crappy intro of some guy saying ‘I can’t sing, but I feel like singing’ over a crappy hip-hop beat for that to happen.

What the fuck WAS this?

Frank seemed instantly consumed by the music, tapping his fingers to the beat against his steering wheel as he pulled out of the layby and onto the road. The guy on the record was still declaring his desire to ‘fucking sing’ and my patience was rapidly wearing thin with him. Like seriously, GET ON WITH IT THEN. But then, he finally did, and every critical voice in my head fell silent, too busy processing the lyrics to focus on anything else about the song.

‘Some days I sit staring out the window, watching this world pass me by.
Sometimes I think there’s nothing to live for; I almost break down and cry.
Sometimes I think I’m crazy, I’m crazy, oh-so-crazy!
Why am I here? Am I just wasting my time?
But then I see my baby, suddenly I’m not crazy.
It all makes sense when I look into her eyes.

Sometimes it feels like the world’s on my shoulders,
Everyone’s leaning on me.
Sometimes it feels like the world’s almost over,
But then she comes back to me.

My baby girl keeps getting older; I watch her grow up with pride.
People make jokes ‘cause they don’t understand me,
They just don’t see my real side.
I act like shit don’t phase me; inside it drives me crazy.
My insecurities could eat me alive.’

I was kind of blown away by the fact that sex or slutty girls hadn’t been mentioned yet, and the song genuinely had a deeper level. Impressed, I glanced at Frank with a look of newfound understanding, but he didn’t even notice me – he was THAT lost in the song. He had that look about him, the one I get when I’m completely entranced in a song I can relate to, just listening intently and feeling the emotions its bringing out in me.

And that was the moment I started eating my words, realising that I was guilty of being a stereotypical asshole, because actually, all music had the power to heal; as long as you could relate to the story in the song, it didn’t matter who it was by – it could be your therapy.

I smiled to myself, feeling like my mind had been opened to a whole different genre of music that wasn’t as bad as I had always told myself. Maybe one day I would share my music with Frank and blow his mind too.

I was so caught up in the whole miracle-conversion experience I hadn’t even noticed Frank pull into a car park, until the song was ending and he was killing the engine once more.

“You owe me an apology,” he stated accusingly, turning to me before I’d even had chance to unbuckle my seatbelt. He didn’t actually look annoyed with me; his expression was more smug because he knew he was in the right here.

“Yeah, alright, I was wrong, you were right, I’m a terrible person, that was a good song,” I sighed, rolling my eyes dramatically.

He snorted and rolled his eyes back at me.

“That was the fucking worst apology ever.”

I grinned cheekily and shrugged, unbuckling my belt and jumping out of the car, leaving behind the passenger seat of death. I was nothing short of amazed that we had actually made it to a city motel alive.

Then again, I knew deep down this whole living thing wouldn’t last very long if my dad ever found out we were here. I’d never really done this running-away-from-home thing before, mainly because I knew my dad would skin me alive if I did. But I had no choice this time; Frank needed me, and quite honestly, I needed him.

I reached out and took hold of his hand as we made our way across the car park, and he grasped my hand tightly. It was a simple gesture, but it meant everything to me. It made me feel safe here in this dingy-looking motel with him. I felt like together, we were truly invincible: we could take on the world.

And right now, it really was us against the world.