My Guardian Vampire

I sat at the kitchen counter, leaning over a cup of coffee. Mike, Tré, and Gerard watched me expectantly.

“I have an announcement to make,” I said, now resting my head on the cold marble. I paused for a moment, making sure they were listening. “I am going to throw up.”

Gerard held my hand, rubbing the top of it with his thumb. I felt so sick; every part of my body wary as I was held down with ties of guilt. I felt as if I was watching the world with a kind of filter over my eyes, making everything unfocused. It was like how I felt when I was extremely depressed the last time I had come here. But this time Gerard was here, and nothing he could do would make this better. I started to cry; not the hormone cry, but a real, deadly cry. I mourned the loss of my soul. I knew it. If there was hell, I was doomed for it. Nothing could excuse what I had done.

More importantly, I mourned the loss of Bert. Even with all he had done, he had no right to be dead. I did not mean to kill him, and he shouldn’t have died. Even if he had done horrible, horrible, things, his music still acted a buffer for the horrible things he had done. He had helped lots of innocent lives; lives like those saved no longer have a chance-

I began to cry deeper. Gerard picked me up and walked me to the couch, where I cried into his chest for some time. Mike and Tré came over and hugged me as I cried, but I pushed them away after a moment or two. I did not deserve their sympathy. I stood up, and Gerard went to help me, but I carefully pushed his hands away. I looked at him for a moment, staring at him with my filter-eyes.

“I think I need to be alone outside for a little while.” Gerard nodded, and hugged me and kissed my cheek. I pulled away from him, and went outside, where I sat on the steps and cried for a while longer. I felt disgusting, only barely resisting the urge to tear at my own skin. It went on like this for forever. An itch at my skin, my skin covered with Bert’s blood…

“The more you tear, the more you see his blood,” someone said, scaring me out of my nightmare. Mike stood against the door under the one little light, lighting a cigarette. Once it was lit, he took a drag and blew it out, and walked over towards where I was. He towered above me as I sat, but then sat down next to me, stretching his legs out on the steps. He then politely put the cigarette on his side farthest away from me so the smoke wouldn’t hit me as it burned.

“It never gets easier, you know?” he asked, taking another quick drag before blowing the smoke out. We both watched it as it curled into the darkness and disappeared.

“Mike,” I said, narrowing my eyes slightly as I gulped, my saliva being especially hard to swallow down for some reason, “I…I never, ever thought I’d ever kill somebody. And now, I’ve killed two people and I haven’t even graduated high school. What does that say about me?”

“That you’ve had to make some very hard decisions and been through some neck-deep shit,” he said, continuing to smoke. He then turned to look at me, and I looked at him.

“You can’t think of yourself as a bad person because you had to do some things in life that anyone else would have done. You just…” he turned his head, looking down as he stretched his arms between his legs, making a tight fist. “You just can’t. I don’t know the right words. But-“ he started, and narrowed his eyes slightly as he continued to struggle for the right words. “Do you think I’m a bad person? Honestly?” He then turned his head to again look at me, looking right into my eyes as if trying to see the answer. “What about Tré, Amber, Tonya, Gerard, Frankie, Bob, Jenn, Ray and Mikey and the rest?”

“Of course I don’t. But…You aren’t given a choice. You do it to survive. And I… I just-”

“You what? You killed Billie out of mercy.”

“But Bert-”

“But Bert nothing. I don’t know what exactly happened, but he was going to hurt your baby. And any mother, or father for that matter, would kill to protect his or her young.”

“I-” I started, but couldn’t think of what to say. I still couldn’t get rid of this guilt, even if it didn’t make sense. “I…”

“You tell me when you have a reply,” Mike said, standing up and rubbing out his cigarette. “In the meantime, come in soon. It’s getting colder,” Mike said. He smiled warmly. “And of course, you are entitled to cry as much as you damn want. I just want you to know that it’s not as bad as you think.” He leaned down and hugged me warmly, then ruffled my hair annoyingly before walking back inside.

I walked back into the building after a little while, and sat myself between Gerard and Mike on the couch. I silently hugged Mike, and he smiled.

“Thank you,” I said. He smiled again.

“No problem kiddo,” he said, putting his hand on my knee. I smiled and leaned into Gerard, looking up at his face.

“Feeling a little better?” he asked, and I nodded. He kissed me on the mouth and smiled. “Good.”

Tré walked in and jumped on the three of us.

“Careful of the baby!” I yelled. Tré laughed.

“What, you gonna kill me too?”

Mike sighed, putting his head in his hands.

“It’s okay,” I said calmly. “No Tré, I’m not going to kill you if you hurt my baby. I will hate you, but I could never kill you.”

“Oh,” Tré said, suddenly realizing his mistake. “Sorry,” he apologized.

“It’s okay,” I said, and hugged him. I then pushed him onto the floor.

“Ow!” he said, and I smiled. Tré then sat up on another chair.

“So, Gerard told me you two needed a hospital. Billie doesn’t own one, unfortunately. But I know that Ali has files in New York…”

I looked at him strangely, as I was very confused what he meant by that.

“You’re an orphan, Lilly Green.”

I laughed, and Gerard looked even more confused.

“Oh yes, I missed being Lilly Green.”

“Technically, Ali Reed isn’t your name either way…”

“What?” I asked, turning my head to give Mike a very confused look.

”Well, that’s what I needed to talk to you about…”