Seven Date Me

Gerard’s personalities were difficult to deal with, but up to this point I had managed, however, this date was the one I had been dreading. Today was Thursday, and that was the day of the week where Gerard became angry and violent. I was nervous – how could I not be? It’s hard enough to deal with people when you’ve known them a long time and have experienced their spectrum of emotions before, but I barely knew Gerard. He had warned me about Thursday; it was why he didn’t want to go out with me in the first place. I was expecting him to be irritable, to yell at me, to want or even attempt to hit me, but his anger and violence could be so much more than that. But I liked him, and every other day had been magic, so I willingly put myself through that day just so we could make it to Friday. I just hoped that what I’d planned would suffice.

I’d considered telling Gerard to meet me at the venue for this date, but I figured the less time we spent in that particular enclosed space the less chance I had of pissing him off. I texted him that morning, around nine, and told him I’d pick him up at his place at one o’clock. “Fine. This had better be good.” was what I received back. My stomach became queasy upon reading it; he had never been short with me before. Even though that text still had me feeling unsettled, I grabbed my keys from the hook by the door and headed downstairs to the garage beneath my apartment block.

It didn’t take me long to get to Gerard’s house; unlike our previous dates, I wasn’t dying in anticipation of seeing him. I eased up alongside the curb when I neared Gerard’s house and pulled up the handbrake. I intended to get out to meet him at the front door like I usually did, but as I was removing my seatbelt the front door was ripped open and Gerard came storming out. He looked tense as he locked the door. As he walked down the path I took in his appearance; his hair was spiked at the front, dark glasses shield his eyes, and he wore dark jeans and a black button-down. Everything about him screamed “go away!” and I was seriously considering doing just that as my foot hovered over the accelerator.

“Let’s get this over with,” he barked as he lowered himself into the car and slammed the door shut. He didn’t put on his seatbelt and I didn’t have the nerve to remind him.

The ride was silent and in the few times I risked a glance in Gerard’s direction, he was avoiding me by looking determinedly out the windscreen, his arms folded across his chest. I had noticed, through day by day comparison, that Gerard’s body language was indicative of his personality each day. Today, his legs were folded, his body rigid; he appeared very much closed. This differed greatly from the way he sat yesterday during our carpet picnic.

We arrived at our destination, and I was thrilled to see that Gerard looked slightly, ever so slightly, impressed by my choice.

“A shooting range?” he asked, intrigued.

I shruged. “I thought you might like a non-responsive target to invest your anger in.”

“You move,” he replied.

His tone sent chills up my spine. There was darkness behind those words, as if he really could have taken a gun and fired a bullet through me. For the first time since I’d met him I was legitimately scared of him and his disorder.

Gerard walked toward the entrance, leaving me to trail after him. He walked fast with his hands wedged firmly in his pockets; his spine was alarmingly straight and his shoulders squared. It occurred to me then that perhaps taking him to there of all places may not have been such a good idea. I was actually terrified of what the result of this date would be, but despite this, I continued on to the shooting range.

A young man, probably about our age, was behind the counter when we entered. He offered us a friendly smile when he looked up from typing on his computer.

“Hey, what can I do for you?” he asked us.

“I–”

“We want to shoot stuff,” Gerard said brusquely.

My mouth gaped open at his forceful, snarky tone. The guy behind the counter seemed to think he was joking and chuckled at what he believed was an anecdote.

“You came to the right place then,” he replied. He bent down behind the counter and popped back up a few seconds later with two forms. “Just fill these standard safety and liability forms out and then we can get started.”

Gerard and I took the pens that were offered to us and started to fill out the various sections. My eyes flicked over to his form every now and then; I noticed that he was pressing very hard on the page and that the ink was far darker than mine. At times it looked as if he was about to shred the page with the ball of the pen.

“Thanks, guys,” the receptionist said when we slid the pens across the counter to him.”Just head through those doors and hand these to Phil; he will talk you through how our guns work and the safety precautions.”

Upon walking through the double doors we were met with a long corridor. On either side of us were doors leading to classrooms, a staff break room, and VIP lounges for regular shooters. At the end of the corridor was a door marked ‘Indoor Range’. We proceeded down to it; Gerard walked on ahead of me with his arms folded across his chest and didn’t even wait for me to walk through the door before he let it go after him. We entered a room that separated us from the actual range itself, with glass panelling all along it so the range master could watch over all the shooters.

“Hey there, fellas!” the man labelled Phil greeted us. “Y’all got your Forms?”

Gerard and I handed the forms we filled out at the front desk to Phil. He scanned them quickly and then led us over to where all the firearms were stored. Along with the handguns we would be using, there were shotguns and rifles, all of which were hung up on a metal framework behind glass sliding doors – kept unloaded for safety sake.

“Either of you fired a gun before?” Phil asked, his back to us, as he selected two standard pistols.

“Nope,” I replied. I looked warily at Gerard, fearful of what his answer would be.

“No,” Gerard answered curtly.

I must admit, I was somewhat relieved to hear that.

“Not a problem,” Phil said to us. He placed one gun on the counter beside him and started checking the second over. “I’ll give you a quick run through and you’ll be pros in no time.”

“No time” was an understatement, as was “quick run through”. Phil, we fast discovered, knew his trade and loved to talk. Together, these were a lethal combination. He began his twenty-five minute talk by naming every single component of our pistols and outlining its role. I felt that describing the trigger was unnecessary, but Phil felt this needed special attention. Then he went on to explain the type of ammunition we would be using, what it was made of, and the importance of the shape of the bullet. I sensed within the first two minutes of Phil’s lecture that Gerard was becoming irritated with the southern, overweight, balding instructor. By minute twelve, before he had even begun to tell us how to hold and fire the pistol, Gerard had snapped.

“Can you get the fuck on with it?” he asked in an irritated voice. He placed a hand on his hip and pointed a straight finger at Phil as his hazel eyes narrowed. “You may get paid to be here but we certainly don’t. So you better leave the 14th Century where the handgun was invented and move into the 21st where we shoot the fucking things!”

Phil, for the first time since we’d met him, was speechless. He stared at Gerard, his moustache twitching with his upper lip. I don’t think he had ever been spoken to like that by anyone before, let alone a patron of the shooting range. The longer he stood there silent and motionless the more I felt the colour drain from my cheeks. Gerard, however, held his ground; he crossed his arms over his chest and glared at Phil.

Finally, after one long minute, Phil composed himself enough to speak again. “Uh... um – s-so to load this type of gun...”

His voice turned into monotone background noise as my eyes went straight to Gerard. A lot of the information he gave us didn't really sink in for me. I was still shocked that Gerard had spoken to our instructor like that. It certainly hurried up the process, but how the hell did he have the nerve to scold someone like that? To this day, I’m is still a little dubious about it.

“And, uh, that’s about it,” Phil concluded as he extracted a bullet from the pistol. “Any questions?”

“Can we shoot now?” Gerard demanded irritably.

Still surprisingly calm with Gerard’s attitude, Phil nodded mutely. He handed us eye and ear protection, our pistols, and two 50-pack boxes of ammunition. Once we had our protection on, we were sent on our way through the door to the actual range just as a trio of girls came in from the corridor.

“If you have a short attention span you might as well fuck off now,” Gerard said to them, pointing at Phil.

The girls looked at Gerard warily, and I quickly clamped a hand on his shoulder and pushed him through the door before he offended anyone else.

“Don’t fucking touch me,” Gerard snapped, shaking my hand from him roughly.

It hurt. It really hurt. Not the action, but the words. Up until that point we had been quite close, physically. This was the first time since I’d met him that he had literally pushed me away. Our other dates popped into my mind – every touch, every hug, every kiss – and they all burned. I know he had MPD, but how could the way he felt about me change so drastically from one day to the next?

“Okay...” I mumbled.

I had hoped that he would turn around and apologise for acting like that, but all he did was walk to the section of the range that Phil had assigned to us. That was perhaps the biggest indicator of what his Thursday personality was like. Usually I felt sparks of electricity between us on dates, but on this one the sparks suggested fire – not passion – the kind of fire that devastates and kills.

That feeling terrified me, so much so that I could not bring myself to follow Gerard into our individual lane.

I stood against the back wall and watched him. He loaded his own pistol and took aim at the mechanical target. I flinched as he, without a moment’s hesitation, fired off three consecutive shots. The target – a cardboard cut-out of a person with various numbered ovals on it – was punctured barely an inch from the centre by all three rounds. His accuracy for a first time shooter was incredibly unnerving.

He placed the pistol down on the bench and turned around, noticing for the first time that I was not in the lane with him.

“Well?” he asked hotly. “It’s your shot.”

I shook my head weakly. “I-I can’t...”

“What are you scared of? The gun, or me?”

My eyes dropped to the rubber floor; I felt guilty for having those feelings toward him. Unfortunately, it was true, though; I was scared of Gerard Way.

“I told you, didn’t I?” The question was rhetorical. I heard him storm toward me. “You were so desperate to date me and you can’t handle it.”

“Please, Gerard...”

Stood right in front of me, he snarled fiercely, “Look at me.” I didn’t. “Look at me!”

I couldn’t. Tears were pricking at my eyes and my heart was pounding in my chest.

“You fucking gutless asshole!” He grabbed me by the shirt and rammed me into the wall roughly. The action shocked me, making my legs tremble beneath the weight of us both. “Yesterday I was special – what the fuck am I today?”

“You’re still–”

“No!” he growled. “Don’t feed me that bullshit!” He pressed me into the wall harder. “’I won’t be changing my mind – trust me’,” he mimicked in my voice. “Bullshit! ‘We’ll part friends’. Try being friends with this!”

He gave me one final, harsh push, then let go of me and marched from the room. The door slammed loudly behind him. Every part of me was trembling. I was sucking in deep breaths as tears leaked from my eyes. In that moment, I never wanted to see him again.