Tell Me I'm A Bad Man

Potatoes and Chicken.

Jepha’s point of view.

My mom led me back to our room. I was nervous, not knowing what she was going to tell me. Was she going to quit the Parade? I didn’t think it was possible. Was I going to join? But, then I would have joined last night.

When we got to the suite, she told me to sit down on the couch and she sat on the chair across from me. “Jepha,” she began. “You know that we’re supposed to go home tomorrow, right?”

“Yeah?” I said, waiting for what was about to come.

“Well, there’s been a change in plans,” she said.

“We’re leaving tonight?” I asked, bummed that I wouldn’t get to see Delilah tomorrow.

“Well, no. We’re not. Jepha, you know that our lives back home aren’t exactly comfortable. I’m always working, and now that I lost one of my jobs, I can barely support us.

“But, as you know, we are part of a bigger family. The Black Parade. So I talked to our two Conductors, and asked them for some help with our situation,” mom said.

“What did they say?” I asked.
“The said that they would let us move in here, the Overlook,” Sakura said, grinning.

“FREAKIN SWEET!!!!!” I exploded. I got up and started dancing around. “No more school, no more haters, no more poverty, no more tiny apartments!”

“Wow, you’re taking this well,” she said sarcastically as she got up and started dancing around with me.

“If you don’t get to the kitchen right now you don’t get dinner!!!!!” someone was screaming out in the hallway. I looked out into the hallway and saw Peace holding a giant cow bell and a wooden spoon. Every once in a while she would smack the cow bell with the spoon as she wandered down the hall calling people for dinner.

“Peace!!” I screamed, running towards her. “I’m moving in here!!”

“Sweet!” she said. “It’s fun here. We play games like ‘piss off Gerard.’ It’s awesome!! Plus, prank wars!!”

I was really excited about living in the Overlook. This would be so much fun!!

My mom and I went down to dinner. There was a lot of food. We all sat in the dining room, at a big table. Gerard sat at the head of the table, and next to him was Nicole, Peace, PJ, Ray, Kelly, Mo, Mikey at the other end, Adele, Frank, Bob, Me, and Sakura.

The whole meal was interesting. We had the most random foods to choose from, from turkey, to cheese, to vegetables. And the whole time everyone was included in the conversation about music, current events, random stories, and anything else you could think of except the Parade.

“Sanjaya was good at the Stevie Wonder song he did, but he totally killed the Kinks,” Mikey said.

“Sanjaya, Sanjaya! He sets this place on fiya!” Kelly was singing.

“He has weird hair,” Ray commented.

“Says the one with an afro,” Bob said.

“Hey, you know you’re jealous,” Ray said. “You wish you were cool enough to pull off hair like this.”

“No one wants to look like you, dude,” Kelly said, shaking her head.

“Aw, you know you love me,” Ray replied, grinning.

“You wish,” Kelly shot back, rolling her eyes and then smacking Ray’s afro. “Ooh, it’s soft.”

“Really?” PJ said, reaching up and stroking Ray’s poofy curls. “Yay! It is soft!”

“Paws off, PJ,” Ray said, pushing PJ’s hand away from his hair.

“Hey, you let Kelly touch your hair,” PJ retorted.

“That’s cuz I love her,” Ray said.

“AWWWWWWWW!!!!” Frank screamed. “Kiss her! Kiss her!”

“I set my clocks early cuz you know I’m always late,” I sang, out of reflex.

Everyone turned to look at me. “Fall Out Boy’s ‘A little Less Sixteen Candles, A Little More Touch Me,’” Mo said.

“Off ‘From Under the Cork Tree,’” Adele added.

“2005 from Island Records,” I finished. “What? Fall Out Boy is awesome.”

“That’s kinda weird that you all chimed in on that,” Gerard commented.

“Aw, stop helping divert the subject!” Frank said.

“What subject?” Mikey asked.

“Ray is so totally whipped,” Frank stated, rolling his eyes.

“Frank, what the hell? Apologize,” Adele commanded him.

“Sorry,” Frank mumbled.

“Ha!” Gerard said, pointing at Frank. “Who’s whipped now?”

“You are, retard, I mean honey,” Nicole said, smacking the back of Gerard’s platinum blond head.

“No,” Gerard said quietly. “I’m just a nice guy, that’s all.”

“Code for being totally whipped,” Bob said, shrugging.

“Ya know, maybe you’re just jealous of them cuz you’re lonely, Bob,” I said.

“Oh! Oh snap!! Bob got dissed!! By a 10 year old!! What are you gonna do about that?? Huh, Bryar? Or shall I say Lonely Bob?” Frank taunted, getting way too excited.

Bob just gave Frank a look and then turned to me. “FYI, Jepha,” he said sarcastically. “I’m not lonely. I can have anyone I want.”

“Still not over your last girlfriend yet, huh?” Ray said nodding. “It’s okay if you’re lonely. But admitting is the first step.”

“Toro, I dumped her,” Bob retorted. “And I’m totally over her.”

“But you still can’t have anyone you want,” I told him. “You’d get so beyond rejected.”

Bob just smirked at me. “Really? Hey Sakura,” he said to my mom.

I glared at him and he ignored me. “What?” she said.

“Wanna go out with me?” Bob asked casually.

Everyone turned and looked at Sakura for her response. She smirked at Bob.

“Are you just doing this to prove Jepha wrong?” she asked sweetly.

“Ooh, choose your words carefully,” Mikey warned him.

“Are you?” Sakura asked again.

“Only one way to find out,” Bob said grinning.

“And how is that?” I demanded.

“Shut up,” Bob said.

Out of nowhere, I remembered the episode of the show “The Wonder Years” when the two brothers are fighting at dinner and one flicks potatoes at the other’s face. In a strange defiant moment, I picked up a spoonful of potatoes and catapulted it at Bob’s face.

Everyone froze. I immediately regretted doing that. They were all looking at me in shock. So I did what I always do when teachers get mad at me and blankly stared each of them down until they all turned to Bob.

He reached up one hand and wiped the potatoes off his cheek with a napkin.

No one said anything for a couple minutes. Then finally Frank muttered, “I’ve wanted to do that do Gerard for a long time.”

Adele started laughing, a ridiculous laugh that sounded like an old man who couldn’t breathe, and that set off the rest of us. Once it calmed down, Sakura turned to me. “Jepha, I think maybe you’d better go to your room.”

Oh. The “Mom Card.” Hardly ever used, because my mom and I were friends. But sometimes, I still felt like a little kid who got a time out at recess.

Slowly, I got up and put my dishes in the kitchen. Then I passed through the dining room on my way out. As I passed behind Frank, he held his hand up for a high five. “You’re pretty cool, kid,” he muttered almost inaudibly as I slapped his hand.

I went up to my room to read my book, but on the way I found an open door. I went inside it, and saw that I was in the library. There was a huge wooden desk with a comfy chair that I sat in. The nameplate on the desk said “Gerard Way, The Conductor.”

There were papers with things scrawled on them in his messy handwriting. Random Black Parade business, including a list of things to do. On the list it said as number one, “Find Mikey!! Convince him to join!!”

I started looking through the drawers and found a lot of papers. Then, in the bottom drawer, I found something interesting. It was a sketch book filled with drawings. There were sketches of people who lived in the house, the Overlook itself, and other random things. But my favorite was a hand holding a sword. There was a sword on the wrist, black outlined in red. On its arm there was the silver lined cuff of a black sleeve.

It was a beautiful drawing, lifelike and specific right down to the blood dripping off the sword.

I heard footsteps coming, so I quickly put it away and ran to hide behind a bookshelf.

“Yes, I’m so sorry about her,” Sakura’s voice said. “I don’t really know why she attacked you with a pulverized root vegetable.”

I heard a man laugh. It must be Bob, I thought.

“It’s okay,” Bob said. “It’s happened before.”

“Someone flicked potatoes at you multiple times,” Sakura said sarcastically.

“Well, no, but other things,” he said.

I was listening to them being retarded and wondered why they came to the library to talk.

After a few minutes they left, so I went back to my room. I sat on the couch reading the fourth Harry Potter book for the third time when I heard a knock on the door.

“Jepha?” I heard Mikey say.

I went over to the door and opened it. Sure enough. Mikey was standing there.

“Hey. See, I was thinking, since you’re moving in and stuff, maybe you should have your own room. What do ya think?” he asked.

“Sure, I’ve never had my own room,” I told him. “Does my mom know?”

“Uh, no. But I figured you should make this decision. I’ll help you move in,” he offered.

“Sweet,” I replied. “How about we move me into another room tomorrow?”

“Alright. I’m going to go back downstairs now, then. And the potatoes were brilliant,” Mikey said, grinning.

“Yeah, I rock, don’t I?” I answered.

“Night,” Mikey said smiling. He had a very nice smile, really.

“Night Mikey,” I responded.

About ten minutes later, I was watching “Little Miss Sunshine” on TV. The door opened and my mom stepped into the dark room.

“Jepha? We kinda have to talk,” she said.

“But they’re eating chicken for dinner again,” I told her. I wasn’t in the mood to talk. “And Dwayne hates everyone.”

“I know. Jepha, why did you throw potatoes at Bob?” Sakura asked.

“I didn’t throw anything. I flung potatoes. I had a moment,” I said, my eyes glued to the Hoover family eating their chicken.

“Jepha, I know you’re mad. But is it at me or Bob?” she asked, on the edge of exasperated.

“He was getting cocky. He was all ‘I can have anyone I want.’ I figured he might find that more difficult with root vegetables on his face,” I answered, still watching the movie.

“Jepha-” Sakura started.

“Are you going out with him?” I asked, suddenly turning to face her.]

“What?” she asked confused.

“Bryar asked you to go to dinner with him. Are you going?” I demanded.

“What, yeah, I’m going. Why?” she asked, still confused.

“Figures,” I answered, turning back to the TV and refusing to answer my mother.

Eventually, she went into the bedroom and went to sleep. I don’t know why I was so disturbed by Sakura accepting a date with Bob. I didn’t even hate him. I’ve hated other guys she’s dated, all of them actually. But Bob was a cool guy.

Just not with Sakura.