So Long and Goodnight...

Gerard’s P.O.V.

Physically, I was in the dressing room with the guys and Brooke, Autumn, and Raven, but mentally …I was somewhere else all together. Mikey had gone to get food for us. The girls were sitting in the middle of the floor talking softly amongst themselves. Ray and Frank sat on the worn leather couch, playing their guitars together. They flanked Bob who had his eyes closed, his head leaned back, just listening. Alexa was still nowhere to be found. I tried to care …but I couldn’t think about anything or anyone but Helena. I missed her so much and I just wanted her to be here to see us on that stage. She would have been so proud.

We’d had a really good show tonight. Brilliant. Normally we would be celebrating right now but …celebrating tonight for any reason felt so completely wrong. None of us were happy tonight. None of us could be happy on this night ever again.

After a few minutes, Mikey came back into the room, his pockets full of food and pop for all of us.

Something was wrong.

As he passed out food and drink to everyone, I watched him out of the corner of my eye. He was even more pale than usual and he looked like he had just seen a ghost. No one seemed to notice but me.

“Mikey,” I said gently, taking on the tone of the concerned older brother that I had always been to him. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” he said shakily. All of that energy and the adrenaline rush he’d been high on not ten minutes earlier were gone. Hearing the shock in his voice was enough to pull everyone away from what they were doing.

“Whoa, Mikey,” Frank said upon seeing how shaken his friend was. “Maybe you should sit down, man.”

I got up and guided Mikey over to the chair I had just been occupying. He fell into it limply, staring past the walls of the room we were in at something only he could see.

Ray had propped his guitar up against the couch and came over to see what was up with Mikey. He knelt in front of him and looked up at him. Everyone always seemed to open up to Ray better. Frank and Bob stood close enough to hear the conversation but far enough away to give their friend some breathing room. Autumn and Raven had stayed on the floor but scooted a few inches closer and Brooke, concerned for her fiancé, came and perched on the arm of the chair he was in and took his hand in hers.

“Mikey,” Ray said soothingly. “Tell us what’s wrong. It’s obviously got you pretty shaken up.”

“It’s nothing, okay?” he said more forcefully than he’d meant to. Then he looked sorry and lowered his voice. “You wouldn’t believe me.”

“Tell us anyway, Mikey. We’re your friends, all of us. We’ll believe you.”

Mikey looked around at our faces and he suddenly appeared to me like a trapped animal, turning in his cage, frantically searching for a way out.

Finally, after a few tentative breaths and a little encouragement from Brooke, he began to tell us what he had seen.

“I saw someone.”

“Where,” Frank asked.

“In the concession area when I was getting the food.”

“What was it, a crazy fan or something?”

“No,” Mikey said staring blankly over Ray’s head again. “It was …a girl.”

“A girl?” Ray repeated, not fully understanding at first. But then full realization hit us all at the same time and at last, we knew what had Mikey so worked up.

He looked at me guiltily.

My eyes were wide and I was staring unbelieving at my brother. What kind of sick game was he playing?

“Mikey, that’s not even funny,” I said struggling to keep my voice even.

“I know it’s not but it’s true, Gerard. I know what I saw.”

“NO,” I exploded in Mikey’s face. “What you saw was a figment of your imagination because you’ve never been able to accept the fact that she’s FUCKING dead!”

Mikey jumped and stared back at me with as much shock and pain as if I had just slapped him across the face. From the other side of the chair he was sitting in, I heard Brooke burst into tears.

“Jesus, Gerard,” Frank said.

“Fuck,” I said with a small sob. “I’m sorry.”

I felt Mikey push me out of the way and pull Brooke into his lap so he could hold her and comfort her.

I went to the far corner of the room, sat with my back to the wall, and buried my face in my hands.

“I’m sorry,” I sobbed again. “I’m so fucking sorry!” but I wasn’t talking to Brooke or Mikey anymore.

“Hey,” Frank said sliding down next to me. I knew that he knew who I was really talking to. “Why are you sorry, Gerard?”

I laughed bitterly through the tears in my eyes. Why was I sorry?! How the fuck could I not be sorry? Helena had been there for me through everything in my life, the good and the bad. She was always there for me. She had saved me so many times I’d lost count, she’d talked me down from every single ledge and I still remembered that she had been by my side on the night Alexa cheated on me for the first time even before the paramedics got there and stayed by my side every second until I got out of the hospital. It made me sick to think that she had cared for me so much and so openly and I had gone back to Alexa when the girl of my dreams was always right there. She had done all that for me and all I had done for her was let her down and blow her off for the stupid, sadistic, self-centered, spoiled, rich-girl, bitch that was now my fiancé. Helena had been in love with me and I was too stupid to see it. God, I was such an idiot.

As if reading my thoughts, Frank said: “Gee, it wasn’t your fault, man.”

“She ran away, Frank.”

“From her father, not you.”

“But her note …” I broke off. I could barely talk over the sobs that were wracking my body. “I hurt her, Frank.”

“Not on purpose, Gee. You would never purposely do anything to hurt her and we all know that. She was like a sister to you.”

Though Frank had meant well, that last sentence had stung me to the core. Ever since I’d read that note for the first time, five years ago, I’d known something, something I should’ve known a long time ago.

“No, Frank,” I said, all my energy gone along with what little will I had left to live when Lana left. “That’s where you’re wrong. She was more. She was much more. I just …didn’t realize it until too late. I never had a fucking chance to realize it.”

“Gerard, what are you saying?”

I met Franks eyes and finally said what I should’ve said five years ago.

“I loved Helena just as much as she loved me, Frank.”

The room fell completely silent and I knew that everyone had heard me …apparently one more than I thought.

“Excuse me?” came a voice from the doorway. Every eye in the room snapped up to see a very pissed off Alexa glaring down at me..

“You heard me,” I growled not even caring that she had heard everything.

The air in the room was so thick you could’ve sliced it with a knife.

“Can I talk to you alone,” Alexa demanded more than asked. “NOW!”

“Anything you have to say to me you can say in front of my friends.”

“Who the fuck do you think you are? And how could you say that you love her? How can you talk about her when you’re getting married to me in three months?”

I stood up and walked toward the door, stopping in front of her.

“I’m so fucking sick of you, Alexa. I really am.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“Oh right. You would know because you control every fucking thought I have and everything I do.”

“Gerard, what the hell is wrong with you?”

“YOU are what’s wrong with me Alexa! You’re the reason I’ve hated myself for the past five years, the reason I can’t go one fucking hour with out wishing I had a gun so I could blow my fucking brains out and be rid of all the shit you’ve done to me.”

She looked at me with such obvious fake concern that I wanted to rip my own eyes out just so I wouldn't have to see how blatantly fake she was and how much of am idiot I had been to fall for any of her tricks. It was so see-through now, so obvious and it only made me hate her more.

“Gerard, I don’t know what you’re talking about. I love you.”

She reached out to touch my arm but I jerked it away from her and took a step back.

“Don’t fucking touch me and don’t fucking lie to me. You honestly think I can’t see right through you? I know you’re cheating on me.”

I watched as all the color drained from her face but I didn’t stop yelling. I couldn’t.

“I know there’s more than one. I know you never fucking loved me. Not ever. And you know what? I don’t fucking care. Do what you want. I’m fucking done with your bullshit and I need a fucking cigarette so if you’ll excuse me.”

With that I shoved past her and out of the room. I only took three steps when she re-gained some of her composure and called after me.

“We can talk about this Gerard. I can explain.”

“Explain it to yourself. I don’t give a shit about anything you have to say.” I called over my shoulder and didn’t stop moving until I pushed through the door to the back alley and dug my cigarettes out of my pocket. With a shaking hand, I lit one, Took a long drag and then another, letting the nicotine calm me.

I had just lit my second one when I heard a sound coming from farther back in the alley. It was such a sad and lonely sound that my heart ached for whoever had made it. It sounded like a girl.

She was crying…