The Only Thing I Ask

Michelle can’t believe her eyes. She thought that she was dreaming. A white dream mostly. A week after they landed here in Huntington, Valerie dragged her to wedding dress shops. Shops after shops after shops but Valerie still didn’t find what she was looking for. She got tired of it.

Luckily her work shift didn’t start until 2 in the afternoon so she had her free time that she spent mostly with Pinkly at Brian’s home. But today Valerie dragged her again, and she was standing in front of her, who wore the most beautiful white dress she’d ever seen.

It was a halter V-neck top with flowy white lace gown beneath it. The bottom part dragged along the floor and even had little pieces of flowery fabrics on it. Valerie looked like an angel. A white angel. She couldn’t wait for Matthew to see this.

“Michelle,” Valerie called. Her eyes were starting to get teary.
“I fucking love this dress.” She squealed quietly. Michelle got up and walked towards her.
“You look beautiful Val. Matt’s gonna be so amazed. He wouldn’t want to take it off.”
Valerie laughed. “Knowing him, he would probably want to wear this himself.”

Then they both laughed. It wasn’t that Matt is a cross dresser or anything, it was just some inside jokes that the twins always had about Matt.

“How much does it cost?”
Valerie glanced at the price tag beside it. Her eyes bulged then she quickly turned to Michelle.
“It cost me my whole life.”
“Can’t you use Matt’s credit card or something?”
“I don’t wanna use him for his money.”
“Bullshit! You always use his credit card!”
“But not this much…this is too much. He probably couldn’t afford it too.”
Michelle pursed her lips. Not knowing anything to say.
“I’ll just get out of this dress then. We’ll find a perfect dress soon. A dress I could afford.” Valerie turned away from the mini stage sadly, and into the fitting room again, to take off the dress.

Michelle sat down on the fancy chair, drinking her complimentary champagne. Seconds later, her phone rang. She took a look at the number, it was Leana.

“Hey Lea. What’s up?”
“Where are you?”
“At town with Val. She wants to look at some dress. What is it? Are you okay?”
“It’s Brian. He’s- well it’s all over the internet.”
Michelle’s heart pumped fast, her adrenaline rushed suddenly.
“What? What happened to him?”
“He’s been caught fighting on stage with Gerard.”
“WHAT?!”

Michelle played the video over and over again. Everytime she saw Brian moved ever so quickly to grab Gerard’s collar, she paused it. What was happening exactly? What did Gerard said that provoked him into doing that? The title of the video sounded so wrong that it could start a war between their fans. Never underestimate the power of devoted fans.

Valerie too, watched the video beside her. Well - forced to watch over and over again. She looked at her sister intently. They were now back at their home, with Pinkly sleeping on Michelle’s lap.

Michelle let out a deep sigh. She rubbed the back of Pinkly’s ear, making her stretched out her little feet and yawned.

“Look at your daddy. Stubborn asshole isn’t he?” Michelle muttered to the dog. Valerie shook her head.
“You don’t wanna call him?”

Michelle looked up to Valerie. She hesitated. Brian didn’t make any move to call her and tell her about this news, so she figured there must be a reason. She got up, Put Pinkly down on the chair and went upstairs to her room.

She went through her closet in hope to find the old box that she kept from 6 years ago. It was collecting dust on the top shelf, so she brought it down and blew the dust away. She opened to find her work organizer, some of her work stuff when she was working as a marketing agent, some pictures of her and the guys from MCR, and a lot of pictures of her and Gerard. She closed her eyes and swore to burn it all later.

She opened her organizer and a piece of post it note fell from it. It was exactly what she was looking for. Their manager’s phone number.

She knew the manager - Richard, for years. The problem was she hadn’t been in contact with him for almost 6 years. Hoping that he still used the same number, she dialed.

“Hello?” someone picked up at the end of the line after a long time of ringing.
“Hello, may I speak to Mr Richard De La Font please?”
“Speaking.”
“Hey, Richard! It’s me, Michelle Skylar.”
“Who?”
“Michelle, your ex marketing agent.”
“Ohh Michelle! How are you doing? It’s been a while!”
“I’m fine. Yeah..how are you?”
“I’m good. Stressing over the band though. You know how they like. Especially Gerry. Always with the trouble. And now I have to deal with this petty shit, I never signed for this stuff-”
“Actually Richard, I called you today because of the video on the internet.”
“Oh…really? What do you know about it?”
“Well, here’s the catch though. I really need your help.”
“Anything, dear. What is it?”
Michelle took a deep breath before starting again.
“I need Gerard’s number.”

******************************************************************************************************

At this rate, their fans have started a cyber war with My Chemical Romance’s fans. So many blogs dedicated to the war, mostly were supporting them, but also too many blogs dedicated to hate them. They were relating this incident with the one that happened many years ago. The one where Brian went to prison. They assumed he was on drugs again, attacking people randomly even on stage.

Matthew thought that if Maya had gone from his life, Brian would not jeopardize the band’s reputation again. But here they are, watching him as he reluctantly sat in front of Tona’s video camera, thinking of what to say.

“You’re ready, Syn?” Tona asked, while turning on the camera into record mode.

Brian nodded. His eyes calm, but his jaw clenched. Tona pressed the red button and giving him cue to carry on.

“Hi guys. Synyster Gates here, from Avenged Sevenfold.” He paused and pursed his lips. He took his time to really start. He looked around the bus, fiddled with his hair, his feet nervously moved, anything but talking to the camera.

“Syn, go on.” Tona whispered.

He looked up to the camera again. He inhaled deeply and sighed.

“Well, I’m here to apologize to all the fans. Regardless Avenged’s or MCR’s. What truly happened on the stage was, I-” he paused again, closing his eyes. He recalled what Larry told him to say.

“I know that all this trouble was because of some girl right?”
“Not just some girl, Larry. It’s Michelle. You know her.”
“Whatever, Gates. Don’t tell the fans about her, if you want her to be safe. Those who were fanatics about you or even Gerard will hunt her down like eagles.”

Brian frowned. He hadn’t thought about it that way before. Risking Michelle’s safety because of his stupid and rash action. He should have just grit his teeth and let Gerard torment him a little more.

“Now here’s what I want you to say. Say you’re drunk on the stage and you’re just losing it. Gerard didn’t do anything. Say you’re sorry. You’re a bit of an alcoholic anyway.”

He wanted nothing more than to kick his manager’s face right now. But Larry was that person. He was always straight forward in his words, always insulting, but he helped them through a lot.

“Brian. Are you sure you wanna do this? Tona shut that off for a while, baby.” Zacky approached Brian and made him opened his eyes. Tona obeyed and shut off the recorder.
“What really happened, dude?” Jimmy sat beside him, putting arms around his shoulder.
“Yeah dude. Tell us the story first. Before you announce it to the world.” Johnny came closer after that.

Brian looked at each of them. He glanced at Matthew last, feeling guilty for always letting him down. At that moment, he realized that he wasn’t alone. The band was always there for him through thick and thin. Their friendship means everything to him.

“That fucker provoked me the first time at Reading. He said that he fucked Michelle so many times and he wanted her back. He also said some shit about me not being good enough for her, Michelle will eventually go bored on me. And then last week in Amsterdam, he said that they will end their tour sooner, so he has the chance to take her away while I’m fucking rotten on the road.”

He spilled everything at one go. All five of them looked at each other in disbelief.

“That son of a bitch.” Matthew raged. He was about to get off the bus and punch Gerard’s face when Jimmy stopped him.

“Matt, don’t. You’ll make things messier than it already is.”

Matthew turned back, but then Jimmy suddenly pushed both his sleeve upwards and curled up his fists.

“Let me beat him. NOBODY messes with my friends!”

He marched forward to the front door of the bus. Everyone was yelling his name, telling him not to go. But when Jimmy opened the door, there was Gerard, stood in front of it.