Another Memory

Alison's P.O.V.:

I couldn't believe him. It was only a week from my prom now, and Gerard hadn't been around at all for me to speak to him. He told me he'd go with me. He told me he'd sort it out. I had a feeling I was heading for disaster.

Mikey told me he'd been hitting the booze with frequency lately, and even he didn't know why. As far as he knew Gerard was still taking his meds and attending his classes, but he'd be out every weekend and wouldn't be back till the early hours of each morning. I wanted to talk to him and to make sure he was okay, but it was hard when he didn't seem to be interested.
I sat on my bed with his gummy bear drawing from way back laying in front of me, his lazy signature on the bottom right corner. I really missed even just seeing him around, and it'd only been a few weeks. I made the decision then to head over and see how Mikey was doing, needing to ask him about the plans to stay at the hotel, anyway. I knocked once and to my surprise, the answer came from behind me.

"Alison, hey." Gerard stood with a garden hose in one hand and a bunch of paper towels in the other.

"...what are you doing?" I asked, trying to peer around the plants he stood behind to see for myself. The door opened and Mikey stood there laughing at Gerard.

"Dude, that'll never come off!"

"Well it fucking better. I love these jeans."

"Mikey, what did he do?"

"Gerard thought squeezing the tube of paint over himself would be a really good idea."

"Off fuck off, I was distracted!"

"Right. Well we'll leave you to it then," Mikey said, turning towards the house and leaving the door open for me.

"Prom this weekend. Don't forget," I told Gerard before I left, almost swearing he'd muttered something from behind me.

"So what's up?" Mikey took a seat and went back to his video game.

"How's he been?" I asked in a low voice. "It feels weird actually seeing him here on a weekend."

"We uhh...had a talk. I think he's gonna be okay." Mikey's smile should have been reassuring enough.

"What did you talk about?" He was silent for a moment, but perhaps the zombie trying to kill him was the reason for that.

"I can't really say. I'm sure he'll tell you soon enough." A hint of a smirk touched his lips, and I wondered if it had anything to do with me. "Just know that he'll be okay. He needed to get a few things out his system, that's all."

"I hope so." I tried to remember why I'd come over in the first place, realising that it was probably just to see if Gerard was okay. "Ohh!"

"Yes?"

"What's hapenning with this hotel business after the prom?" I asked, having heard absolutely nothing about the plans.

"Well I've reserved us 3 rooms. One for myself and Christie, one for Frank and Lisa, and one for you and Gerard. I didn't think you'd mind sharing with him and you can just pay later for it."

"Ohh. Cool."

"Are your parents gonna be okay with it?" I laughed.

"My mum'll be fine with it, I'm sure."

I spent the rest of the afternoon watching Mikey play his games and listening to Gerard cursing from the other side of the room. He was trying to paint something, but I don't think he was in the right state for it. The paint hadn't come out of his jeans, as Mikey had predicted, and you could see it’d got him upset.

“Maybe if you stop just jabbing the brush into the canvas, you’ll get a better look…” I said quietly, and Gerard turned to face me.

“Maybe if you weren’t around, I’d be able to bloody concentrate!” he yelled, and I shrunk back into my seat. Mikey paused his game.

“Not cool, Gerard! She doesn’t deserve that!”

“I’m leaving,” I announced, the tears already stinging my eyes. Being yelled at wasn’t something I could handle, particularly when it was someone I adored doing the yelling.

“Alison, wait!” I heard him yelling from the front door of his house. His heavy footsteps caught up with my pacing ones in no time. “Please, I didn’t mean to yell at you.”

“Go away, Gerard.”

“You’re just so beautiful, sitting there twirling your hair around your finger the way you were…” I blushed. He’d been watching me?

“Why were you watching me?” I thought we’d decided to be friends. His intentions had decided that for us.

“I don’t know,” he mumbled, placing his hands in his jacket pockets. It was freezing out. “Come for a drive with me.”

“To where?”

“I don’t care. My car’s warm.” I smiled. Suddenly, it felt like a good idea.