Sing It for the World

“They should be here later on today from what he told me last night,” Frank murmured into Aurelia’s hair two days later, holding her tightly against his chest before he hugged her tightly. She smiled up at him and nodded before standing up, pulling him to his feet as well.

“We should go into town and wait for them, then. I don’t want them getting lost or something,” she murmured to him. He nodded, and then pressed his lips against her forehead as he stood. He called for Biscuit and then grabbed the heavier pack off of the ground before looking at her.

“You’re right. We can get out of this place faster if we’re already there waiting for them,” he told her with a grin. She grabbed his hand and held it in hers before looking at him directly in the eyes, glad that she was with him. She had no idea if their luck was still going to hold out.

“L.A. is calling our name,” she whispered as they started making their way out of the abandoned house. He grinned at her and nodded, and the two of them started making their way into the small town without saying a word to one another. With Frank and Aurelia, no words needed to be spoken. Their love was strong enough so that they could just sit with one another, or walk with one another and feel comfortable not saying anything. When you loved that much, it was evident in just being around the other person, and both of them knew that.

The walk didn’t take long, and they settled down behind a bush so that no one would see them if highway patrol happened to drive through. The town police already knew them and had no suspicions that they were runaways from New Jersey, but there was no doubt that highway patrol would know exactly who they were if they happened to drive through. Neither of them wanted to see what would happen if the police did recognize them, because they knew that Gerard and Mikey were already on their way here to pick them up and take them back to Los Angeles.

“Do you think we’re really going to be free when we get to California, Frank?” Aurelia asked him softly, scratching Biscuit behind his ear as she turned to look at him. He returned her look, and then thought about it before nodding.

“Yeah, we’re going to be okay once we get there, ‘Rel. We’ll make it. Just wait and see,” he smirked at her before reaching down and taking one of her hand in his to squeeze it lightly with his own hand.

“I just want to make sure that we get there alright. I don’t want them to find you,” she whispered, giving him a fearful look. Frank softened his hazel eyes as he looked at her, and then pulled her tightly against his shoulder.

“Baby, they aren’t going to find us,” he shook his head as he pressed his lips against hers carefully. She leaned into his touch and let him hold her and push her hair back off of his face as he looked at her. This was one of those times when words wouldn’t do anything to help either of them. All he wanted was to make her realize how much he loved her, and all she wanted him to see was that she already knew it. The closer they got to reaching Los Angeles, the more frightened she became that the police were going to be able to identify exactly who they were.

They spent the next several hours sitting with one another behind the bush talking quietly under their breath unless people were around, in which they stayed quiet so that no one would see them. Finally, they saw dust start kicking up on the road from a car, and Aurelia looked up, wondering if perhaps it was Mikey and Gerard.

“Do you think that’s them?” She asked Frank softly, grabbing onto his wrists before looking at him. He thought about it for a minute, and then nodded when he saw Gerard’s vibrant red hair in the driver’s seat of the car. It pulled to a stop on the side of the street right by the payphone, and he stood up before grinning over at the brothers as they got out of the car.

“Thought you said you’d be out of town when we got here,” Gerard said, highfiving Frank before he looked over at Aurelia with a grin. “Man, you weren’t kidding when you said it was a dustbowl of a town,” he whistled lowly as he looked around them.

“There’s not even a bar in this place,” Frank kidded lightly as Aurelia walked up to them, grabbing his hand in hers. He let her lean her head onto his shoulder, and smiled when he wrapped his arm around her waist.

“Well, then I think we should get the hell out of here, eh? It’ll only take a few days for us to get back to Los Angeles, and then the real fun can start.”

The two of them nodded, and then watched with amusement as Mikey lowered to the ground and scratched Biscuit behind the ears for a few moments. The three of them moved towards the car and it was decided that Mikey would drive, Frank and Aurelia would sit in the backseat so that they could get some rest, and Gerard would hold Biscuit in the front seat with him until they switched drivers.

-x-

They had only been driving for a few hours when Mikey looked in the rearview mirror to see a car following them. Aurelia and Frank were both sleeping soundly, having not gotten much sleep in the abandoned farmhouse over the past few days, and Gerard too was dozing.

As the car got closer to them, Mikey purposely slowed the car down in case he had been speeding, wondering if the car following them was a cop. When the car passed and he noticed that it wasn’t a cop, but instead was just someone driving the same stretch of highway, he took a breath of relief and then turned his attention back to the road, trying to find the exit he knew would take them to the interstate so they could start going towards California.

“Shit,” he muttered when he heard sirens start sounding from behind him. He knew that it wasn’t a possibility for him to speed and get away from the cop, because he didn’t know the area, and running away wasn’t the smartest idea. “Gerard, wake up,” he hissed at his brother, shaking Gerard’s arm. The red-haired man’s eyes opened wide as he looked over at his brother, and then blinked before sitting up.

“What’s going on? Time to switch already?” He asked.

Mikey shook his head and then looked into the rearview mirror. “There’s a fucking cop!” he said in a frantic tone. “What do we do?”

“Well, we can’t just sit here and not stop. They’ll take the license plate number and then they’ll find us the second we stop. Pull over,” he muttered, looking back at Frank and Aurelia. “I doubt they’ll notice Frank and ‘Rel.”

Mikey nodded, and then put on his blinkers on before pulling over to the side of the road. He had no idea what was going to happen, but he hoped like hell he hadn’t gotten them caught. Because if he had, not only had he signed his and Gerard’s arrest warrants, he’d also done it to Frank and Aurelia. And that wasn’t something he’d wanted to do.