Seven Date Me

When Gerard left me at the shooting range after our argument I was both shocked and relieved. I needed space from him, but at the same time I couldn’t believe that he would just leave me there by myself. The Gerard I had gotten to know leading up to that date was nice, sweet, kind, funny, wise, witty, charming... in a strange way, and I still believe it to this day, he was perfect. I thought that my perfect Gerard wasn’t capable of deserting me like he did. It happened, though, and I should have realised it would.

It took me around fifteen minutes and a brief conversation with Phil to find the strength to push off the wall and leave the range. I paid our bill at the front desk and headed for the door. Despite knowing that it was pointless, I looked about the parking lot for Gerard when I emerged outside. As you would imagine, the place was deserted with no sign of Gerard ever being there. So, feeling like a pathetic failure, I drove home, did a few things, and then by nine o’clock I was in bed where I cried myself to sleep.

At midnight I woke with a start. I thought it was a bad dream that had roused me, but then I saw my phone lit up on the night stand. I reached for it tentatively. There was a message from Gerard displayed on the screen.

Oh Frankie I’m so, so, so sorry for everything. I had no right to ever lay a hand on you. You were so sweet and I ruined everything. Please, please don’t hate me. I don’t ever want to hurt you. I’m sorry. You probably won’t want to speak to me ever again, but please don’t cancel our date. Give me a chance to make it up to you. I’m sorry.
xoxo g

I stared at the text message for a long time. How do you reply to something like that? I had no idea what to write back. The phone buzzed in my hand again; I almost threw it across the room in surprise. It was another text from Gerard.

I’m sorry Frankie. Really sorry. Can you ever forgive me? Can you give me another chance? Please. I didn’t mean to do that to you. I like you a lot, more than you would think, I just couldn’t control myself. I tried though, I really, really tried. Let me show you that I’m more than that guy.
xoxo g

That message tugged at my heartstrings. I could tell he really regretted his actions at the shooting range. The thought had crossed my mind many times to cancel our sixth and seventh dates; I was genuinely scared to face him again. But seeing him pour his heart out to me like that in the middle of the night stirred something inside me. I realise now that it was faith; I had faith in Gerard that he could come back from that low point. His actions on Thursday would have been considered a mistake on six out of seven days in a week – those were the kind of odds I could handle. With that in mind, I texted him back.

I’ll be over at one this afternoon. We can talk then.

Several minutes later my phone buzzed again.

Thank you! I promise you won’t regret it!
xoxo g

It took a while for me to get back to sleep; my mind was filled with thoughts of our last date. New day, new personality and all that, but it sure didn’t feel that way when I was forced to sleep on my stomach because my upper arms hurt from the way he had latched onto me.

Hauling myself out of bed for work was a struggle. Quite frankly, I didn’t give a shit about making coffee for people. I needed more time to assess my relationship with Gerard, and I needed more sleep so I could do that. By time I did drift off to sleep again after being woken by Gerard it was more morning than night. Sleep didn’t stem the flow of thoughts I was having of him; he invaded my dreams and turned them into nightmares.

My shift at Starbucks went by in a bit of a haze. My body operated the machinery on auto pilot while my mind focussed on Gerard. I thought about what I’d say when I saw him next, how he would respond to me, whether the events of that day would allow for our seventh and final date. Sadly, I couldn’t come up with any definitive answers, just a shitload of options all vastly different from each other. I hated myself for not being able to create any solid theories on how date number six would go.

When I did finally arrive at Gerard’s house I was a bundle of nerves. There was no real anticipation like I had been used to. His personality may have changed, but I was still caught up in Thursday Gerard. It took me a minute to gather the necessary strength to swing open my door and get out of the car, and even then I still needed to suck in a few deep breaths to steady myself. As I stepped onto the gutter headed for the house, the front door swung open and Gerard came bolting out. I wasn’t even halfway up the path before he met me and threw his arms around my neck.

“You came! You came!” he cried into my shoulder.

He squeezed me to him tightly, so tight that I thought I would burst. I didn’t quite know what to do in that situation, so I just patted his back awkwardly as he held his tight grasp.

“I wasn’t sure I’d ever get to see you again after yesterday! Oh, Frankie, I am so sorry.”

I wanted to tell him that it was okay, that I forgave him for the way he had behaved, but I couldn’t bring myself to tell him such a lie. What he did to me wasn’t okay. I know, I should have made allowances because of his condition, but I felt like people close to him would have been doing that his whole life; I refused to be one of those people that coddled him like a baby whenever he screwed up.

He pulled back tentatively. “Please say something...”

I took hold of his elbows so I could detach his hands from me. “Let’s go inside.”

The wounded look on his face when I said that made me feel guilty for not saying something more comforting, but I knew he need a bit of tough love.

We walked inside together, I slightly ahead of him. I was unsure where to go, but when he took a step toward the living room I reached for his wrist to stop him. He looked at me, both questioningly and confused.

“Can we go somewhere more...” I paused, trying to word the sentence correctly, “formal?”

He nodded tentatively and led me up the hallway to the dining table. We sat across from each other for a few minutes, completely silent. As the minutes ticked on Gerard became more and more anxious. I should have put him out of his misery immediately, but I was trying to find the appropriate words; we had a sensitive issue to discuss.

“Look, Gerard...” I began awkwardly, “yesterday was really difficult for me.”

His face fell and he mumbled, “I’m sorry... so sorry.”

I sighed. “I know you’re sorry, Gerard; I know you couldn’t control what happened. The thing is, it’s not easy for me to forget.” He reached for my hands, which were resting on the table, but I pulled them away. He was left looking hurt as his hands hovered helplessly over the table. “No one has ever spoken to me, or touched me, the way you did.”

“I didn’t mean it, though!” he said desperately. I noticed tears were forming in his eyes.

As I was about to elaborate more on how I was feeling, the tears that had been teetering on his waterline fell. Gerard dropped his face into his hands and began to shake gently as he cried. A lead weight crashed into my gut. I knew what that felt like, because the day before I was feeling the exact way.

“You’re really feeling guilty... aren’t you?” I asked, almost in disbelief.

He nodded. “Of course. Because I hurt you, and I can’t ever take that back. I want to be able to and I can’t. You hate me for it.”

I touched his upper arm gently. “I don’t hate you, Gerard – I promise. I’m just worried about what triggered it all, and if it could happen again. I’m scared.”

“Can we try again?” he asked between sniffs.

I let go of his arm and took a moment to think about that request. I still liked Gerard very much; the other five personalities I’d dealt with were good, it’s was just Thursday where I didn’t like the person he was. The question I had to ask myself was, ‘Could I go through this week, Thursday included, again?’ The conclusion I came to was ‘yes’. Thursdays would always be difficult, there was no doubt about that, but I didn’t have to see him every Thursday; I could do a Thursday every few weeks or months, to be fair, and stick to spending time with him on the other six days. A relationship with him was doable.

“Gerard, I forgive you, okay?” I said softly. “I want to keep seeing you, we’re just going to have find a way to work around Thursday that we can both handle.”

“Really?” he asked hopefully. I nodded and a grin broke out on his face. “Oh, thank you! Thank you! I’ll make this up to you, I promise!”

I found myself smiling at the way his mood had picked up. But knowing that Friday was the day where he would be remorseful and apologetic, I knew it wouldn’t last long. And I was right. A minute later his smile faltered and he began apologising once more, this time because he’d “pushed too hard to make you forgive me”. I rolled my eyes and told him to relax.

“How about we get out of here?” I suggested when he agreed to calm down.

“Where to?” he asked tentatively.

“Well,” I said, taking his hand in mine, “this is meant to be a date, so the ‘where to’ we’d be going would be somewhere special and date-worthy.”

He smiled shyly. “Sounds good.”

Hugging him first, we headed for my car. I had had a place in mind for a few days about where we could go, and thankfully it still seemed like a viable option after the talk we’d had. I felt confident that he would like the idea, but I was concerned about the execution of my plans once inside. I didn’t have much time to think about how I would get things rolling as it was only a short drive and Gerard was in an oddly talkative mood. It wasn’t an overly exuberant kind, as on some of our previous dates, but rather an ominous one where he explained some of his past Thursdays – and just how sorry he felt about being “an uncontrollable ass” then as he was on our date.

“It’s not something you can control, though, Gerard – people know that,” I told him comfortingly as we turned onto our desired street.

“People know it, but they never understand it,” he replied softly, sadly. “It’s my fault for leaving my house... I know what I’m like every Thursday, yet I still go out as if I’m not going to hurt someone.”

We turned up a narrow alley and parked in the deserted parking lot behind a brick grunge club. Gerard was too busy looking at his lap to notice where we were.

“You can’t lock yourself up every Thursday, though, and if people don’t get that about this whole situation then they don’t deserve to be a part of your life.” I pulled up the handbrake. “We’re here.”

He opened his mouth to respond, but then he saw just where we were; his mouth opened and closed as he tried to form a sentence. His silence made me proud; it meant I’d picked a good place for a date.

“I performed here a few weeks ago...” he finally said.

I nodded. “I know.”

He looked at me curiously, surprised that I knew about that. As far as he knew, I had no idea about his celebrity on the local music scene, let alone the place he performed at. But I did. I knew them well – well because I practically stalked him as a performer. So, I shrugged nonchalantly and hopped out of the car. He followed me to the back entrance of the club, once again looking surprised as I pulled a key out from my pocket and let us in.

“Where did you get a key?”

I ignored his question and led him to through the club to where tables and chairs were set up for the audience. The stage was set with a microphone stand, wooden stool, and a white spotlight that highlighted the dust particles in the air. No one would be joining us on our date, but there was going to be a performance.

“W-what’s going on?” Gerard asked cautiously as he noticed the spotlight on the stage.

“I’ve booked the best musician in all of New Jersey for a private show,” I explained as I guided him closer to the stage.

His eyes lit up. “Who?”

I held him back and stood on my toes to whisper in his ear, “You.”

As I attempted to push him forward again he threw the brakes on and would not budge.

“What?” he asked both fearfully and emphatically.

“You’re the best performer in Jersey, and I want a solo show.”

“I’m sorry, Frankie, I really am... but I can’t do it... not for just one person,” he said in a panicked voice. I saw that guilty look on his face again and it felt like a kick to my stomach. Softly, he said, “I’m so sorry.”

I turned him around, took his cheeks in my hands so he’d look at me, and said, “You know why I brought you here? Why I wanted you to perform for me?” He shook his head. I offered him a small smile. “Because your songs are amazing, and so is your voice, and I thought that if you sung for me you could sing one of your songs, something that fit you today... maybe even something that fit us and our,” I paused, trying to find the right phrase and failed, “thing. You don’t have to do it if you’re not comfortable, but I would be really happy to hear you sing for me.”

He gnawed on his lower lip, an action that was both cute and incredibly sexy, while he thought over what I said. In the end, his guilt about Thursday trumped his fear, and he nodded slightly.

“I’ll do it,” he mumbled, “because I want you to be happy, and I want to show you how sorry I am.”

I smiled warmly at him and squeezed his shoulder. “I believe you know where the stage is.”

Gerard sucked in a breath to steady himself, then made his way to the backstage area. A dozen tables surrounded me; I selected one in the middle of the room, intentionally avoiding the front row. It took a few minutes longer than I had expected for Gerard to step onto the stage. When he did there was an air of self consciousness to him, like he doubted his abilities. I had seen him perform more than once – I knew he could deliver something amazing. Why he would be unsure of that eluded me.

He approached the mic stand with his head down. It was not until he had twisted the microphone several times – not free, just twisted it on the stand – that he finally looked up. I was sat in the shadows with just a small candle on the table to give any indication of where I was to him. He squinted slightly to see me better, then sucked in a deep breath, made audible by his close proximity to the microphone.

“Uh... th-this is a song that I wrote recently – really recently – that, uh, I kind of want you to hear.” He took another breath. “Sorry if it sucks.”

His eyes dropped to the floor as he fumbled in his pocket for his phone. The stool that was behind the microphone was moved to the side. After he slid his thumb across his screen a few times, he placed the phone on the stool and tapped it several times until a tune started playing. He cleared his throat and then placed both hands on the microphone; it remained in the stand.

“Hand in mine, into your icy blues,” he sang softly, matching the tune that was being emitted by his phone.

Gerard’s voice was light and sweet, and I felt my heart inflate with its beauty.

“And then I’d say to you, We could take to the highway, With trunk –this trunk– o-of ammunition – I-I’m sorry...”

When he fluffed his words my heart sank. I witnessed him cringe at his mistake and blink back tears, crushed that he’d messed up his own song.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbled again. “I can’t do solos gigs... I’m sorry. I know how much you wanted it... I’m really sorry.”

I watched him mute his phone then cradled it in his hands as he sat down on the stool glumly. I sighed inwardly; I blamed myself for the way he was feeling. The truth is, which unfortunately I didn’t realise at the time, that I was pushing him out of his comfort zone because on Thursday he had pushed me out of mine. I shouldn’t have asked him to sing for me, but I did. And when he stumbled in his performance, instead of telling him it was okay, I pushed him to sing once more. The thing is, though, to this day I still don’t regret pushing him that second time.

“Do you sing in front of the mirror, or the shower, or anywhere while you’re by yourself?” I ask him as I got to my feet.

He nodded but didn’t meet my eyes or even mumble so much as a “yes”. That answer was all the confirmation I needed, though. While Gerard’s focus was on the stage’s worn floorboards I took a wander over to the backstage area. On the wall by the stairs that led up to stage was what resembled a fuse box with a bunch of levers and switches. All but one switch was off, which meant the one remaining one was for the spotlight; I flicked it into the off position. The club was plunged into darkness. I needed to grope my way back to the table I was sitting at. I could barely see Gerard, but I knew he was still sitting on that stool.

“Sing for me, Gerard,” I said softly, encouragingly.

I blew out the candle and waited.

In the darkness I could see nothing; as there were no windows to the club not even a silhouette was visible. I could hear Gerard, though. His breathing became louder, and I knew he must have been stepping toward the microphone. I waited with bated breath for him to sing again.

“Hand in mine, into your icy blues,” he sung into the darkness, this time without the track from his phone. “And then I’d say to you, We could take to the highway, With this trunk of ammunition too, I’d end my days with you in a hail of bullets.”

I felt my mouth gape open at the beautiful sound of his voice. Nothing proves the talent of a singer more than singing without music. But as that thought crossed my mind his phone lit up on the stool and the music began to play again. The only part of Gerard that was visible was the side of his jean-clad thigh, illuminated by the small light coming from his phone; I used that to established where his face would be and focussed on that spot intently.

“I’m trying, I’m trying, To let you know how much you mean to me, And after all the things we’ve put each other through,” he continued.

As he sung the next line I dug in my pocket for the lighter I’d stuffed in my pocket before I left home this morning. “I would drive onto the end with you, A liquor store or two keeps the gas tank full, And I feel like there’s nothing left to do, But prove myself to you and we’ll keep it running.”
I groped in the dark for the candle, keeping my eyes fixed on that spot in the dark.

“But this time, I mean it, I’ll let you know how much you mean to me, As snow falls on desert sky, Until the end of everything!”

Finally, I managed to find the candle and get it lit, just in time, too. The candle cast enough light in the club for me to make out Gerard’s face. He looked desperate, pleadingly in my direction. He locked his eyes with mine as he sung the chorus with everything he had.

“I’m trying, I’m trying, To let you know how much you mean, As days fade and nights grow, And we grow cold,” he sung. His eyes bored into mine, making my heart pound. I couldn’t look away. “Until the end, until this pool of blood, Until this, I mean this, I mean this, Until the end of-”

This song is about me, I remember thinking.

“I'm trying, I'm trying, To let you know, how much you mean, As days fade, and nights grow, And we go cold.” He flicked his eyes to the ground as he sung the last bit of the song. “But this time, we'll show them, We'll show them all how much we mean, As snow falls on desert sky, Until the end of every-”

My heart was pounding uncontrollably when he finished his song. It had affected me profoundly, and I could see the performance had affected Gerard as well. He stood behind the microphone looking down at his feet for a few moments while the next piece of audio on his phone started to play. My lips were still parted in shock of how good he’d sounded and the fact that he’d wrote that song for me, but somehow my brain sent the message to my hands to start clapping. The sound shook Gerard out of his concentrate trance; he looked in my direction but his expression was unreadable. A matter of five more seconds passed, although it felt like more, before he averted his eyes and walked off the stage.

“I’m sorry I didn’t sing a longer song. You probably feel ripped off,” Gerard said into the darkness about a minute later. I could hear he was walking toward me.

“Are you kidding?” I asked breathily. He came into the candlelight, but didn’t meet my eyes when I fixed mine on his. “I feel luckier than anyone else who as ever heard you sing. Has anyone else heard that song?”

He shook his head. “I started writing it about you after our date Wednesday and finished it before you came over this morning...”

“You wrote it that quickly?” I asked, unable to keep the disbelief from my voice.

“I was inspired,” he shrugged. “It isn’t perfect, though...”

I stepped forward and grabbed Gerard firmly, but not in a rough or domineering way, by the upper arms. “Gerard, that song is perfect to me. You...” I paused, hardly believing the words were in my mind at all, “are my kind of perfect.”

His eyes collided with mine and before I knew what was happening he had stepped forward and planted his thin cherry lips on mine. We stood like that, lips touching but not moving, for a moment, then I loosened my grip on Gerard’s arms and placed my hands on his back so I could pull him closer to me. He parted his lips as I closed the distance between us; seconds later we were kissing like there was no tomorrow.