Life Is but a Dream for the Dead

"Mikey noooo!" I found myself waking up in the middle of the night to the same horrifying nightmares of Mikey's death. I knew that it wasn't true, that he wasn't dead; that he was safe in his bunk below me.

"Gee?" I heard Mikey's unsteady voice from below. I didn't like scaring him with my issues, but I couldn't press pause on my nightmares, instead forcing him to suffer through my restless nights of crying out his name before he shot himself, or downed a bottle of pills.

"It's nothing Mikey, go back to sleep." I soon heard the steadiness of his breathing, signaling that he had been overtaken by sleep again. I needed to get these horrific thoughts from my minds, so that I don't keep waking him at odd hours of the night.

He's a happy teenage boy who doesn't need to deal with his psycho older brothers crazy dreams that obviously aren't going to become reality. He was happy, he wasn't the depressed little boy in my dreams, I would remind myself. In my dreams though, he had taken after his brother, sneaking vodka and pills from my dresser until he hit breaking point, overdosing on my anti-depressant pills. I know that he would never do that, he was a good kid, he even managed to snatch himself some friends. The mains ones sticking in my head being Frank and Ray. I'd met them a couple of time, they seemed nice enough, not the kind to get Mikey into any trouble. Although Ray as in the same grade as me, we never talked much, he usually hung out with this guy named Bob, who scared the shit out of me.

I knew that all hopes of falling asleep now were out of the question. I often couldn't will myself to go back to sleep after waking myself up, I was too worked up about Mikey to care.

*

When the light finally shown through the little window, I arose from my bed, being careful as to not wake Mikey, failing horribly "What are you doing up so early?" He questioned groggily.

"Couldn't go back to sleep," I tried to reassure him, but he wore a worried expression. "I'm fine," I translated, seeing some of the worry leave his eyes. "Now get up, maybe we'll actually have time to eat breakfast without being late," Mikey reluctantly emerged from his bed before walking past me and into the bathroom. I chose then to take the pills from my drawer before taking one from each. I had one for depression, another for anxiety, something for the constant pounding in my head and two others for who-knows-what, just another medication that the doctors though would 'cure' me, when in truth, I used them for the sole purpose of clearing my head and getting a slight high.

"Do you really need all of those?" Mikey asked as he exited the bathroom.

"Yes," I told him for the millionth time. "Now move so that I can get some water." I shooed him from where he had stationed himself by the bathroom door. "And get dressed."

"I should tell you to do the same, some clean clothes would be nice, maybe some deodorant." He was constantly bugging me about my bad hygiene, showers were optional for me, as were clean clothes and he highly disapproved.

"Shut up and hurry, I'd like to actually eat before school," I then proceeded my usual routine of picking clothes off the floor and sniffing them before throwing them across the room with my other 'really dirty clothes.' I finally managed to find an Iron Maiden shirt and a pair of jeans that didn't smell that bad. "You ready?" I asked, heading up the stairs without a responds, my only answer being the footsteps that echoed my own.

"Ooh, I smell coffee!" Mikey rushed into the kitchen with me on his tail. I could also smell my mothers fresh pancakes that she made each morning for her and my father since Mikey and I are always in a rush.

"Well isn't it nice to see both of my sons so early in the morning," my mother teased, setting out two plates for us, and placing the syrup on the table. I had missed my mothers pancakes, I used to eat them everyday as a kid, and occasionally on Sundays, but those were usually our eat out days, and lately I hadn't been that 'hungry' anymore.

"Mmm, just as good as ever," I complimented through a mouthful of food.

"Don't talk with food in your mouth!" My mother argued.

"Yeah Gee, swallow your food first," Mikey joked, earning a kick under the table. "Ow," Mikey complained, almost spilling his coffee.

"Mikey be careful!" Our mother shouted as I laughed at Mikey's predicament. Mikey kicked me back, but I easily hid the non-existing pain, because he doesn't have a very forceful kick. "Oh my, you guys should get going."

"Aye-Aye mother." I said, saluting the 'captain' before grabbing my bag and tossing a 'see yeah' back into the house with Mikey doing the same.

*

I said my goodbyes to Mikey when we pulled up to the school and he went to meet up with his friends and I joined mine who were smoking out front due to the fact that no one was ever supervising outside. I wasn't that close with them, but we kept each other company in between classes and before school, but we never met up outside of school. I met Bert and Brian in Sophomore year when I had taken to indulging myself in a cigarette before school and they joined one day and that was the beginning of our long-lasting alliance.

I could see Mikey laughing with his friends as they entered the school. I have always been jealous of Mikey; mainly his amount of self-confidence that I lacked. He as a good kid, and I was thankful that he hadn't followed in my path. I had tried to hide my failures from him unsuccessfully, not wanting him to have to worry about my problems. I had started drinking as a Freshman, it took a while for him to catch onto my habits, but when he did, I often got lectures for my late nights. I managed to keep him out of trouble as much as possible, hoping that he wouldn't turn out like me, and so far I had succeeded.

I wasn't fond of most of my classes, though luckily I didn't have a lot. I had taken care of most of the required courses earlier on. I only had another math and science class left before I could graduate, although I also took an art course along with something about computers so that I had something worth attending.

Math was the only class I shared with Brian, and sadly we were stuck taking pre-cal. Last year, when I had most of my classes with Bert, we usually skipped and instead chose to smoke in the abandoned third floor bathroom. Ray was in my computer class, but we didn't talk much since he was more Mikey's friend than mine, but we still got along. I often found Ray and Mikey in the band room after school. Ray was teaching Mikey how to play guitar, however Mikey seemed to prefer the bass. Mikey was much better at guitar than I had ever been, after all I was kicked out of a band just because I couldn't play 'Sweet Home Alabama.'

"Hey Gee!" I heard Brian call as I entered the 'torture chamber' and I claimed the desk to his left. I hit him playfully on the arm because the only person allowed to call me 'Gee' was Mikey; his friend occasionally used the nickname too, though I wasn't fond of hearing the words from his mouth, he was Mikey's friend and I didn't want to tell him off. "Are we still gonna grab a smoke after class?"

"Afraid not, I agreed to help some Freshman art class." Although I didn't know why I agreed, besides the extra credit that would look good on my application when I applied for SVA in a few months. I wasn't fond of talking to people, and I sure as hell didn't want to help a lot of Freshman that had no idea how to draw. Mikey was taking art, and lucky for me he was in the class, this way I wouldn't feel completely lost.

I heard the bell that signaled the end of math. I realized that I hadn't listened to anything the teacher had said and that my notebook was open to a blank page. I said my goodbyes to Brian and headed to the art class that I had been fretting over for the last fifty minutes.

When the bell for the beginning of the next period rang, the teacher stood up to announce my presence to the class."Hello class, for the remainder of the semester I have brought in a senior to help you with your drawing. This is Gerard Way, one of the best artists I know." He announced and I admit, I was a little flattered, though the class didn't seem very impressed. I recognized a few faces, the two that stuck out the most being Mikey and Frank who sat towards the back. Frank whispered something to Mikey as Mikey gave me a reassuring glance before laughing at whatever Frank had said.

As soon as the teacher let the students free to work on whatever project they had been assigned the previous day, I headed towards the back, placing myself near Mikey. "Hey Gee," Mikey smiled as he continued his drawing of a flower, and I had to admit that he was pretty good except for the minor errors. "So Gee, how does it look?"

"Awesome," I beamed, not pointing out the little flaws.

"Seriously Gee," he pouted. I didn't like to critique Mikey's work since I always had a habit of leaving out a few things that would make the drawing better, but to my horror might upset him, though he didn't usually mind.

"That line should be a bit more curved," I pointed to one of the petals, "so that it is proportional with the rest. And the shading needs to be darker here." Mikey followed my instructions as usual adding a lot more 'flavor' to his work of art.

"Thanks Gee," he smiled before Frank tapped my shoulder.

"What about this?" He asked, holding up his little kid drawing of a dog.

"Ummm..." I said, scratching the back of my head. "It's very interesting..."

He quickly slammed the paper on the desk before saying, "I know I suck okay!" His outburst attracted the attention from surrounding table, but they quickly went back to work.

"You don't suck." I said, although he kind of did. "You just need a little help." I picked up his pencil, showing him how I had learned to draw a dog as a kid, starting with the miniature stick figure as the nose and adding the circles around it. I made sure to work slowly so that Frank could easily copy my movements. "See, simple as that," I handed him the pencil and he took it, proceeding to copy my strokes onto another paper. "Now you just need to add details, like whiskers and stuff." I smiled proudly as Frank added three lines on each side of the dogs nose. It still looked as though a kid had drawn it, but was definitely better than the other drawing that looked like random circles.

"Thanks Gee," he smiled, admiring his work. I was tempted to tell him not to call me that anymore, but it didn't seem like such a big deal.

"Oh, Gee," Mikey said, bringing my attention back to him. "Frank's coming over after school, I said we could give him a rid, if that's okay with you," Mikey always asked me for permission, since I was the one with a car, and we shared a room, he didn't want me bothered by the intruder. He also didn't want me to get too fucked up, he never said it, but that was implied.

"Course Mikey." Then the bell rang and I realized that I had neglected the rest of the class, and would most likely need to pay more attention to them in the future.

I had lunch next, and neither Bert nor Brian had the same lunch, so I usually sat alone. Mikey always invited me to sit with him, and I always decline, because I felt awkward surrounded by all of his friends, but today I decided to give it a shot.

Frank seemed to pay more attention to me, he even forced me to squeeze in between him and Mikey at the full table. He dragged a chair from another table for me to sit in. A couple of Ray and Frank's friends had also joined us, including Bob and someone named Shaun.

Lunch wasn't that bad; Frank and Mikey were the only ones who payed attention to me. Frank was babbling on about something that I couldn't keep up with. He seemed to be aiming all of his words at me, and seeing as the others ignored him and carried out their conversation, I assumed that this was a conversation just between us. Mikey kept looking over at me, checking to see if I was okay with Frank's rambling.

When Frank finally stopped talking, he proceeded to ask me a bunch of questions. "What's your favorite color?"

"Red."

"How long have you been drawing?"

"As long as I can remember."

"Where are you going to college?"

"SVA," I answered proudly. He acted as though he was about to go on, but the bell rang.