The Black Parade

And there it was. The end. Mikey had been drawing his death out for a while now. It was only obvious that he’d choose the worst damn time to die! I’d never get a chance to tell Gerard how I really felt before he leaves and then I’ll never see him again. I hope he has a lot of damn fun off with his brother wherever the fuck those assholes are going. Okay, I don’t even know Mikey, so Gerard’s the asshole, the asshole comment doesn’t apply to Mikey.

“Now?” Gerard asked eagerly as he rushed back over to Frank and I.

“I’m already here, Gerard.”

We all turned to stare at the source of the noise. Obviously Mikey didn’t want to wait around for Gerard to come to him. He wanted to see his big brother that much. Though I shouldn’t be bitter about that, they had been brothers a lot longer than I had known Gerard. Mikey would always come first in Gerard’s heart, not that I ever deserved to be recognised by Gerard’s heart ever again after what I had just said to him. Ray and Bob had brought Mikey over, it looked like it was going to be a bit of a full house for this reunion. I was feeling more and more out of place by the second.

Mikey was looking a lot better than the last time I had seen him. He looked more solid, healthy. He was tall, taller than Gerard, and had dark brown hair, probably what Gerard’s natural hair colour was. He wasn’t dressed in the parade outfit, nor was he in his hospital gown, he was just standing there in tight black jeans and a black t-shirt. Whoever dressed him had some taste. You know, if you weigh it up against the blonde hair, I think Mikey was probably the better looking Way brother. Though Gerard with black hair definitely did it for me. But I’d never have the chance to try and convince Gerard to re-dye his hair back to black, if that would even work in the afterlife.

“Mikey!” Gerard cried, his previous annoyance with me fading fast as he ran at his little brother, probably to give him a tight squeeze but Mikey just remained still, no excitement coming to his face and no indication that he was going to return the hug. Gerard stopped in his tracks and just stared, his face falling incredibly fast, now looking somewhere between confused, hurt and ashamed. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there to-“

“That doesn’t matter.” Mikey cut Gerard off in a cold voice.

“I’m sorry,” Gerard repeated in a more apologetic tone. “I was just talking with someone.” He turned to me and sent me the evilest of looks I had ever seen from him. At least he had it within him to remember me at that moment in time, not that I deserved that much, though I don’t think I deserved to get such a horrible look from him. “I meant to be there.”

“Why start now?” Mikey asked in an accusing tone.

“Mikey…” You could see how plainly that hurt Gerard. It seemed so wrong, to see Gerard being hurt like that, he always came across as so strong, it was amazing that he could let his little brother get to him like that. I had no idea what was going on but I was guessing this was an age-old argument. “I’m sorry.”

“For what you did to me?” Mikey questioned. I was getting more confused by the second, I thought it was Mikey’s fault Gerard committed suicide?

“Mikey…” Gerard started again almost warningly this time but he trailed off unsure.

“Why?” Mikey questioned in a hurt voice, the first bit of true emotion I had ever heard from him, not just a cold hard front. I guess both brothers did that so well.

“I don’t think this is the right time to discuss that, Mikey,” Gerard started cautiously. “Not in front of everyone.”

“I think they all deserve an answer, Gerard.” Mikey replied. “After all, you did it to all of us.”

“Not now,” Gerard muttered, a strain to his voice as if he was trying to hold back tears. This was terrible.

“I think now is as good a time as any,” Mikey said coldly, as if Gerard’s feelings didn’t seem to matter to him. I knew that it was partly Mikey’s fault that Gerard committed suicide, if he had acted like this all their lives I could see why Gerard would want to kill himself. But shouldn’t Mikey be apologetic instead of Gerard? He did drive his older brother to suicide after all. “You’ve had ten years to word your argument into something justifiable.”

“There’s no way to justify what I did,” Gerard confessed shamefully.

“At least you can see that,” Mikey shot back. “Well, do share, we’ve all waited a long time for this.”

“Please,” Gerard whined.

“I’ve had a lot of time to think about this,” Mikey continued, ignoring Gerard’s pathetic pleading. “At first I missed you so much, I blamed myself, I wanted to kill myself so I could be with you again. But after all this time, after all this waiting and not knowing, I realised something. What you did to me warrants no forgiveness.”

“It wasn’t my fault!” Gerard pleaded.

“You’ve told me that before,” Mikey countered. “I blamed myself so much for what you stupidly went and did.”

“I know it was stupid!”

“But I’ve realised now that it wasn’t my fault, you did it to yourself. You did it to us all. If you hadn’t have been so stupid most of us would still be alive by now.” He had a point, thinking about it now. Frank’s act of stupidity was due to a heavy drinking session caused by depression because of Gerard’s death. Ray’s was because he felt so alone after Gerard died, because he couldn’t cope with trying to look after Mikey alone, so he fell into the arms of the closest person he could find, who just happened to be a manipulative murdering bitch. And Bob’s well… sort of, because if he hadn’t have been going back on that flight to look after Mikey he would still be alive. It all made sense. “I think you all owe us an apology, Gerard.”

“I’m sorry.” There were actually tears slipping from his wondrous hazel eyes now. I was finding it hard to stop myself from crying just at the sight. The others all looked slightly shocked, I guess they weren’t one for seeing Gerard cry that often, but there was confusion too, nobody but Mikey seemed to know what was going on. What had happened between the brothers? What had Mikey done to him?

“I’m sorry, too.” Mikey said, sounding genuine then. “I shouldn’t have got so angry, I should have believed you, I shouldn’t have said those things I said. Do you forgive me?”

“I never blamed you,” Gerard sniffed. This time when he walked towards his brother Mikey wrapped his arms around Gerard and they hugged each other tight, Gerard burying his face into the crook of Mikey’s neck and Mikey resting his head on his brothers. “I was the one at fault, I realise this.” Gerard continued, his voice muffled by his brother’s neck.

“You know how fucking stupid you were?” Mikey asked, though he wasn’t angry, he sounded almost relived even though there was that faint sound of tears in his voice now as well.

“I know.” Gerard agreed, squeezing his brother tight.

“And setting yourself alight!” Mikey exclaimed.

“Hurt like a bitch,” Gerard laughed wetly.

“You were always one for dramatics,” Mikey laughed too.

“I was making a statement,” Gerard said, almost sounding like his usual humorous self.
“About how stupid you are?” Mikey joked.

“I knew there was a reason why I didn’t miss all of you,” Gerard replied sarcastically as he rolled his eyes.

“Hey, my humour is amazing.” Mikey defended.

“He did have a pretty good sense of humour,” Ray added.

“Yeah, the jokes he made about you Gerard were hilarious,” Frank piped up, earning him an evil look from Gerard and a smile from Mikey. “Hey, hate to ruin the moment and everything, but Mikester, give me some love!” Frank declared, opening his arms out wide. Mikey just laughed and opened an arm out to Frank, who squealed and ran towards Mikey, flinging his arms around both Way brothers and giving them a tight hug. “Group hug!” Frank declared and it didn’t take long for Ray and Bob to throw themselves in the mix leaving me alone and feeling very left out at that moment in time, not that I desired to be included, I wonder if Gerard would ever remember me again. Frank pulled back slightly from the group hug to speak. “So, is it just me or did no one understand that argument at all?”

“Nope, I’m pretty lost,” Ray answered, as he untangled himself from the hug.

“Me too,” Bob added.

“Care to explain?” Mikey asked his older brother as the group hug disbanded.

“Must I?” Gerard whined childishly.

“You owe us all an apology,” Mikey said. Gerard grumbled something and looked back over his shoulder at me for a second, which helped successfully draw Mikey’s eye to me, I hope that hadn’t been the plan, I really didn’t feel like intruding on the reunion. “I’m sorry, we haven’t been introduced properly.”

“Gwen,” I answered, “Gwen Jones.”

“Michael Way.”

“I know,” I muttered.

“Oh? I guess my brother has said… something.”

“That’s not important,” Gerard cut in.

“I think it is,” Ray said suddenly in a knowing tone.

“And how’s that?” Mikey asked.

“Gerard and Gwen are-“ Frank started.

“She’ll be replacing me when we leave,” Gerard interjected before Frank could go and say anything embarrassing like how we were dating or fucking probably, considering how crude Frank can be sometimes.

“Leave?” Mikey questioned.

“Moving on,” Gerard answered in a voice full of happiness, it was so weird, it seemed like he was selling the idea with just his voice.

“And what do you mean by ‘we’?”

“You and me, kid,” Gerard laughed, which earned him a soft punch in the shoulder from his younger, but slightly taller, brother. “Off to live the high life.”

“And leaving us behind,” Frank added bitterly. Mikey looked to Gerard questioningly but Gerard ignored the look, he also looked like he was beginning to get annoyed again.

“This isn’t the time, Frank,” Gerard muttered through clenched teeth.

“It’s never the fucking time,” Frank snapped. “You never want to tell us anything! I think you owe us this, Gerard! You fucked us all up by what you did and it’s not just that I’m dead, it’s that I’ll never get to hold my daughter, never get to kiss Jamia again, I’ll never be able to tell them I love them so much!”

“Fine,” Gerard retaliated, “you want you’re damn answers! Well you can have them. You’ll hate me after this anyway, and I’ll be long gone and I won’t have to deal with any of you again, never a-fucking-gain!” He took a deep breath and looked around at his friends and fellow bandmates. Frank’s eyes were full of fire, Bob and Ray were both expectantly waiting for an answer, and I felt like breaking down and crying, but I didn’t fucking know why. “I helped Mikey’s fiancée cheat on him,” he confessed in one quick breath. It was probably the stupidest reason I had ever heard for someone wanting to kill themselves. It just didn’t seem to sit right, there had to be more to it than that.

“You what?” Frank muttered.

“I made Alicia cheat on him.”

“No,” Mikey shook his head. “From what you both tell me I think it was mostly her fault.”

“I think you need to explain yourself,” Ray said.

“She had been trying it on with me for a long time,” Gerard started. “Months, I do believe.

And I… well, I… I went against every instinct I had and just… gave in.” The other three guys were shaking their heads or tuting in disappointment at that. “I slept with her.” So that was why he didn’t want to tell me. He thought I’d hate him for being a fucking sleazy bastard, sleeping with his little brother’s fiancée! How low can you fucking get? “And I felt so damn guilty, even during the damn act.”

“Not guilty enough,” Mikey added bitterly. I guess they weren’t as right as rain as they had made out with that apology.

“But I went straight to you,” Gerard continued, giving Mikey a pleading look. “I didn’t try to hide what I did from you, I knew I had done wrong and I went to seek your forgiveness.” Gerard’s eyes suddenly went very dark indeed. “But things didn’t go to plan.”

“I’m sorry for what I said,” Mikey apologised again. “I was angry, you can’t blame me. My own fucking brother, for god sake.”

“But you still turned your back on me.” Gerard said.

“Well you did do something stupid!” Frank cut in.

“Thanks, that’s just what I want to fucking hear, Frank!”

“Well can you blame me? One act of stupidness and we’re all here! Just because you thought with your damn dick rather than your head our lives were all stolen from us!” He had a point, you know, I never thought I’d think that about Frank.

“Calm down, Frank,” Bob stepped in, placing a reassuring hand on Frank’s shoulder but he brushed it off.

“Are you just going to accept this from him?” Frank yelled, pushing Bob away. “We’re all dead because he just wanted to get laid!”

“It wasn’t fucking like that, Frank!”

“So what was it like then?!”

“It was my fault,” Mikey stepped in, silencing everything immediately. “I disowned my own brother, I turned my back on him in his time of need. He knew he’d made a stupid mistake and I wasn’t there to reassure him that everything was going to be okay, he thought I’d abandoned him forever and he had no one to turn to.”

Frank seemed to accept it to some degree, but he still seemed annoyed about it. Ray and Bob just nodded, their looks full of understanding. They obviously knew how much a thing like that would mean to Gerard.

“Now that you have your answers,” Gerard started, making it something spiteful, “I guess we’ll be taking our leave.”

But it did make sense. If Gerard sought after his little brother’s approval that much a thing like that would kill him. If only he’d talked to someone else, if only he’d waited a while and sorted it out with Mikey. But what would death be without Gerard’s idea? Where would we go? What would be there to greet us and help us move on? I would never have fallen in love. I hate to think of it like that but it’s true, I was in love with Gerard, and now I was just watching him walk away. I couldn’t let this happen, I couldn’t let it end like this.

“Gerard,” I spoke up, pulling them all out of their private thoughts. They all turned to me expectantly and I flinched under their glares. Especially that Frank and Gerard still looked rather angry. “You can’t go.” I sounded pathetic but I felt it then too, it wasn’t right that he was going to leave like that, considering how everyone felt about him right then. “Not yet.” He didn’t seem too keen to buy it. “I’m not ready.”

“You have to be,” he said. It wasn’t reassuring or encouraging it was demanding and it scared me slightly.

“Just stay a little longer, please, I can’t do this without you.” Now I was pleading and I felt worse. Mikey was giving me a sympathetic look, if I could just get Mikey on my side surely Gerard would agree, he seemed to rely so much on Mikey’s approval for things, it did seem.
“I’ve wasted enough time here.” It was obvious, as he looked at Frank, that he was bitter about the Black Parade, that he had hated the waiting and not knowing, but now he knew how Mikey felt surely he’d want to stick around, wouldn’t he? I was hoping that I could be a good factor to make him want to stay.

“I don’t want you to go.” But I couldn’t say why. I just couldn’t bring myself to tell him I loved him in front of his friends, it would just make it something cheesy, something very Hollywood cliché and they’d only think I was saying it to make Gerard stay. But I really meant it. But what if I said it and he said he didn’t feel the same and just left? I deserved as much for doing it to him before, would it not only be fair for him to hurt me like that too? “I can’t do this, I don’t want to be the Leader of the Black Parade, I can’t cope with this.” That statement seemed to shock everyone. “If you won’t stay then I want to move on.” I said in a finalising tone. I’d made my mind up. “I can’t do this on my own, Gerard.”

“I chose you for a reason, Gwen.” Gerard said softly.

“Why?” I asked, feeling my lip trembling on the verge of tears. “Why me?” Ah, the dreaded question.

“Because I saw compassion in you, Gwen.”

Now I really was going to cry.

“You were made for social work,” he laughed softly. I laughed too, but wetly, unable to stop a few tears falling from my eyes. He turned to Mikey. “Ready to go?”

“I don’t know…” He started.

“How about one for the road?” Ray suggested.

“It has been ten years,” Bob added, selling the idea.

“What do you think, Mikey?” Gerard started. “Want to pick up the bass for one last time?”

“I wouldn’t mind at all.”

The Parade Street began to dissolve until we were standing there in some dark desert, instruments set out against the black sky, tongues of bright fire bursting from behind them. Mikey had a Parade uniform now, and in my opinion it was the best one, he had a long drummer boy jacket and I was really quite jealous. But now was not the time to think of something like that. As they picked up their instruments I felt a great sense of loss, this would be the last time My Chemical Romance ever play together, and I’d be the only person there to witness it. I didn’t feel worthy at all. But they all seemed so familiar with their instruments that it felt like a great shame that they were going to give this all up. Just so Gerard could make it up to his brother for eternity.

“Now I know,” Gerard started to a very basic palm muted tune, courtesy of Ray, “that I can’t make you stay.” Now it was starting to sound very personal. I was guessing this was my song then, the one where he convinced me to stay and take his place and to not miss him. But would that even be possible? “But where’s your heart,” he put a lot of passion into his singing, staring at me intently, “but where’s your heart, but where’s your…” He almost growled it. “And I know there’s nothing I can say to change that part, to change that part, to change... “

It kicked in there with a rather meaty guitar riff, courtesy again of Ray. And the rest began to get into the song. Frank was jumping around wildly, putting all his emotion into his playing. Mikey looked rather cool playing bass; he had the whole bass stance down and just spent most of the time leering at his instrument.

“So many,” Gerard started, raw passion in his voice, as he sung the song directly to me and me only, “bright lights that cast a shadow but can I speak?” He looked imploringly at me. “Well is it hard understanding I’m incomplete?” I realised then that this was his song asking forgiveness from us all, and I couldn’t help it, I couldn’t fucking help it, there were actual tears in my eyes. “A life that’s so demanding, I get so weak.” I was finally seeing it from his side. “A love that’s so demanding, I can’t speak.” That couldn’t be me, could it?
As the chorus came along they all seemed to really play their hearts out, it was their last time, and it meant the world to them. Everyone was singing along. Apart from me.

“I am not afraid to keep on living, I am not afraid to walk this world alone, honey if you stay I’ll be forgiven, nothing you could say can stop me going home.”

All he wanted was forgiveness and all I had to do to make him happy was to let him go and accept my duty. Though it was so hard to say goodbye to him after he had made me fall in love with me. Why would he do such a thing to me?

“Can you see my eyes are shining bright?” Gerard sung with more feeling. “’Cause I’m out here on the other side of a jet black hotel mirror.” Okay, I shouldn’t be questioning this sort of thing in the amazing heartfelt finale, but did that imagery actually have any meaning or was he just picking words that looked pretty together? “And I’m so weak.” He confessed it shamefully. “Is it hard understanding I’m incomplete?” But what did he want from us? He had never been straight with any of us. And I got the distinct feeling that he wasn’t moving on for his own happiness sake. “A love that’s so demanding, I get weak.” Mikey?

“I am not afraid to keep on living, I am not afraid to walk this world alone, honey if you stay I’ll be forgiven, nothing you can say could stop me going home. I am not afraid to keep on living, I am not afraid to walk this world alone, honey if you stay I’ll be forgiven, nothing you can say could stop me going home.”

I guess he was right. He’d made up his mind and this really was the end.

An amazing guitar riff was going on now; Ray was really throwing himself into his playing, like it was the only thing that mattered. And perhaps it was. Because what was there to look forward to in Death? You’d seen and done it all. What was the point in sticking around for another show?

“These bright lights have always blinded me.” Gerard sung over the guitar riff. “These bright lights have always blinded me. I say.” Everything stopped apart from the lone sound of Frank’s guitar. “I see you lying next to me,” Gerard started but his voice wasn’t soft, it was still emotion filled and strong, “with words I thought I’d never speak, awake and unafraid, asleep or dead.” It touched my heart. I didn’t want it to but I couldn’t help it.

“I can not see I see you.” Frank and Ray sung in the background.

“Coz I see you lying next to me.”

“I can not see I see you lying next to me.”

“With words I thought I’d never speak.”

“I can not see I see you lying next to me.”

“Awake and unafraid.”

“I can not see I see you lying next to me.”

“Asleep or dead.” Gerard’s voice rouse to its full potential as he poured every ounce of his being into his final performance. “Coz I see you lying next to me with words I thought I’d never speak, awake and unafraid, asleep or dead. Coz I see you lying next to me with words I thought I’d never speak, awake and unafraid, asleep or dead.”

“I am not afraid to keep on living, I am not afraid to walk this world alone,” the others sung as Gerard continued screaming over them.

“Or dead.”

“Honey if you stay I’ll be forgiven, nothing you can say could stop me going home.”

“Or dead.” He fell to his knees in front of me and poured his heart into it.

“I am not afraid to keep on living, I am not afraid to walk this world alone.”

“Or dead.”

“Honey if you stay I’ll be forgiven, nothing you can say could stop me going home.”

“Or dead.”

“I am not afraid to keep on living, I am not afraid to walk this world alone.” The music began to die behind them.

“Or dead.”

“Honey if you stay I’ll be forgiven, nothing you could say can stop me going home.”

Complete and utter silence. And I knew this was the end.