Insert Romantic Title Here

When I woke up, Melissa and Jackie were playing cards on the floor.

I shot up and looked around. The bus was vacant and we appeared to be stopped. It was light outside so I slept through the night, and maybe all of the morning.

“Morning, Katie,” Melissa said without looking up.

“Or should we say, afternoon,” Jackie added with a playful smile.

“How long was asleep?” I asked rubbing my eyes in a sad attempt to wake myself up.

“Well,” Melissa began putting her cards down. “You disappeared at the concert last night, so we assumed you just came back to the bus. And when we found you it was midnight at you were sleeping.”

“And now it’s three in the afternoon. The guys are at a TV appearance.”

“We still in Germany?”

“Yup.”

I fell back onto my pillow and hit my head on the sketchbook. That’s when the memories of the previous night came flowing back.

“Gerard!” I shot up.

Jackie and Melissa looked at me like I was out of my mind. They both dropped their hands on the floor and got up to sit on my bed.

“What?” Jackie asked very curiously.

I handed them the sketchbook and impatiently paced back and forth as they both read it at the same time.

Each one got teary-eyed reading the letter. This made me a tad uncomfortable so I merely increased my pacing rate and began biting at my nails.

They started flipping through the pages of the book and became wide eyed on almost every page it seemed like they were going to say something to me but second thought it.

Finally when they finished they had nothing to say. After all that and they had nothing at all to say.

“So?” I asked trying desperately to break from this silence. “Any thought?”

“Yeah, I have one,” Melissa said plainly. She stood up from her spot and grabbed my shoulders. “THIS IS SO FUCKING AMAZING YOU HAVE NO IDEA!”

“What?” I asked slightly stunned as she shook me violently.

“It’s about time that this happened! I’ve been waiting so long!”

I turned to Jackie for some help.

“It was a really great letter,” Jackie added, changing the subject.

“Yeah…” Melissa said dropping her hands from my shoulder and tilting her head to one side in a dreamy state.

“When are you gonna tell Gerard that you read it?”

“What are you gonna say?”

The questions really started flying at me then. Questions that I thought were all amazingly obvious.

“I’m telling him today, and I’m gonna say something along the lines of, ‘I love you too’.”

They seemed satisfied with my answers.

“You’re gonna have to wait a bit though,” Melissa said moving to the front of the bus. Jackie and me followed.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Well, this TV thing isn’t done until like five, so we’re meeting them up at this bar at nine, I think it was.”

“Oh yeah,” Jackie said. “We decided to give them a four hour break from us. We can get pretty damn annoying… Especially you,” She teased pointing at Melissa.

“I’m not that bad!” She whined sticking out her tongue.

We laughed together and gathered around the table.

“Hey guys?” I piped up after some more brief moments of silence. They looked up at me with curiosity. “If we’re not moving anymore, why are we still on the bus?”

All at once we shot up from the table and rushed to the fresh air outside the bus. But then we really just stood there as if to say, “What do we do now?”

“Lunch?” I asked just then realizing that my stomach hurt like a bitch.

The other’s shrugged.

“Sure, why not?”
-----
As it turns out, Jackie lied to us when she said that she still remember some German from high school. So here the three of us were, in the middle of some town in Germany that I couldn’t pronounce, and lost. It was getting pretty dark out too. We were probably supposed to be meeting the guys soon.

“Do you know what time it is?” I asked Melissa.

“Lemme check.”

She popped her cell phone out of her pocket and snapped it open.

“Eight-thirty.”

“Dude, Mel, just call them, say we’re lost we’re meeting you there early,” Jackie said as she leaned against a building.

Melissa and I stopped walking and rejoined Jackie on the wall.

“Fine,” She sighed.

Once again she snapped open her phone and dialed Mikey’s number faster than I ever thought possible.

“Mikey. We’re kind of… lost… Yeah. How the hell should I know? We can’t even read the street signs. Okay, well, there’s something that looks like a restaurant… A billboard for something that looks like potato chips… and a bus stop… What about the bus stop? Okay! Hurry up! Thanks!”

She shut the phone and looked over at us.

“Well…?” Jackie asked.

“Mikey and Ray are gonna try and find the bus stop. So we have to go wait there until they come.”

We walked over to the bus stop and took a seat on the bench. Every once in a while we’d say something to each other, or comment on our surroundings, but most of the time we kept our mouths shut.

The bus that stopped here came and went, a few people got on but we stayed where we were.

“Where are they? It’s been like forty minutes…”

We all looked up and down the streets for any sign of the guys. There was nothing. Just a bunch of German people talking in a language we didn’t understand. Melissa sighed loudly and leaned back on the bench.

“I’m calling them again,” Melissa said.

“No wait!” I called, spotting Ray’s big hair out of a crowd of people. “I see them!”

Melissa, Jackie, and I stood up at once. The sight of a familiar face was very comforting.

“Mikey!” Melissa cried as she ran up to him and gave him a giant hug. “Ray!” Then she did the same thing to Ray.

“I hope you know how to get back,” Jackie said as she let go of Ray.

“Yeah, we have a really good idea of the city now,” Ray informed us all. “We kinda got lost… but now we know the city a lot better than we used to.”

The five of us began walking down the street with Ray in the lead. I was standing next to Jackie and Mel and Mikey were holding hands behind us.

Sure enough twenty minutes later we arrived at the club a good forty-five minutes after we were supposed to.

It was loud and crowded inside the bar. Surprisingly they were playing music that we knew.

We swerved around the floor of dancers and made our way to the bar where most of the guys were sitting.

Actually, it was only Frankie and Bob who were sitting at the bar. Gerard was missing.

Everyone sat around at the bar and ordered drinks.

After a few minutes someone else brought up the subject I’d been dying to since we entered this place.

“Where’s Gerard?” Melissa asked scanning the people dancing and sitting at tables.

“He went into the bathroom,” Frank said lowering his head. “It… wasn’t pretty.”

I exchanged glances with Melissa; she looked just as worried as I was.

Speak of the devil; Gerard emerged from the bathroom that minute. His walking was a mess and so were his clothes. He stumbled over to the bar and immediately ordered another beer.

Everyone stared at Gerard, wide eyed. Frank and Bob were the only exceptions, because they already knew what Gee was doing to himself.

We all watched intently as he took a chug of beer.

“What?” Gerard slurred defensively at us.

I tried to look away from the broken down Gerard but I just couldn’t. I don’t know if the others looked away, but I know for a fact that Mikey didn’t.

“Gerard,” He began. “What the hell are you doing?”

“Whaddya mean?” He asked, his eyelids flickering.

“I mean… Jesus Gerard! Look at yourself!”

“I’m fuckin fine, Mike-ay!”

I couldn’t take this shit anymore. I got up from my stool and grabbed Gerard’s arm. He protested, of course, but I didn’t care. This man needed some sense knocked into him.

“What da fuck?” He muttered when I pushed the door open and shoved him outside with me.

“I should be saying that to you!” I poked his shoulder. “Seriously Gerard! Why are you doing this? I thought you were trying to sober up?”

“You shud know!” He yelled poking back. “Datin my best friend, then breakin hes heart! An den when I confess that I lub you, you jus completely egnor id! So now, ere I am, feelin pathedic and wortless all cuz of you!”

Upon finishing his impaired speech, he shoved me back into the wall.

My head banged against the brick and hurt like hell.

“Well, you don’t have to drink your feelings away!” I shoved him back. “There are other solutions!”

“Stop shovin meh!” He shoved me again.

“You stop! Stop all this! Stop drinking! Just stop it!” I shoved him again.

We went into this shoving argument. He would shove me, and then I’d shove him. Until he pushed me too hard and I fell.

“Ow,” I rubbed the back of my head. “Ass hole!” I got up and shoved him just as hard if not harder.

He lost his balance and fell back into the street.

At that moment all of the others came out of the bar curious as to what we were doing out here.

Gerard regained his balance with a little help from the sidewalk.

“You’re such a bitch!” He screamed at me, with surprisingly good pronunciation, well, for being piss drunk. “And I hate you! I HATE YOU!”

What happened next I could barely even put into words.

Some drunk driver forgot to turn his lights on. Speeding in front of us that car went by, and it hit Gerard straight on.

My eyes immediately filled with tears. No second thoughts.

Gerard went flying across the top of the car and rolled onto the street.

“GERARD!” I yelled running to his aid.
-----
I can’t express how sick I was of hospitals by this time. First for Ray, then for Melissa, now for Gerard. For whom I could say I was personally responsible for. Of course everyone else said I had nothing to do with it. Mikey thought I did, but that was only out of anger. He apologized later, but I knew that it was still my fault. And whether they admitted it or not, I knew they probably thought that too.

It was early in the morning. I could see the sun peaking over the horizon as I gazed out the window at the awakening city. Gerard had been in surgery the whole night. I wasn’t exactly sure if I was relived by the coming of the morning, or if it just made me more anxious.

And trust me, I was pretty damn anxious to begin with. From the moment that we entered the waiting room I haven’t stopped moving. And it was only until recently that I stopped crying. I wasn’t sure if it’s because I’m all dried up, or if concern has just over powered it by now.

Everyone else seemed to be calm about the whole situation. Oh, don’t get me wrong, they were all just as worried as me, but they just weren’t showing it. Mikey was hiding his face in Melissa’s hair as she whispered words of comfort to him. Bob and Jackie were holding hands as he held his head in the free one he had. Frankie had his head titled as if he was thinking about something very important. Ray was just kind of silently sitting in his corner thinking about God knows what.

I could tell that everyone was getting annoyed with me. Every three minutes or so I would walk to the door to see if anyone was coming. I just needed to hear that Gerard was going to be okay. Because right now we were all in the dark about his condition. He could be… dead.

That was what made me start crying again. So I instantly shook the thought from my head, but I couldn’t shake that tears.

Ray got up from his spot and didn’t hesitate to give me a hug. I felt better when I was being comforted about him. It might’ve been the illusion of his hair that made him so warm and inviting, or it might’ve just been him.

It was probably just him.

He didn’t even mind when my tears started to soak his shirt. He just squeezed me tighter and whispered comforting thoughts into my head.

“It’s okay in the end, if it’s not okay, it’s not the end. And trust me, this is NOT okay.”

I laughed and he pushed me out to face him.

With a sweet smile he wiped a few stray tears off my cheeks. Then being the great friend he is helped me back to a seat and let me silently cry on his shoulder.
-----
Apparently I fell asleep on Ray’s shoulder. So four hours later we were still waiting and nothing much was changing. The only difference I really saw was the sun’s position in the sky. Now it was right above the trees and shining right in my eye.

“You sleep well?” Ray whispered when he realized I was awake.

I rubbed my eyes with my tired hands and answered ‘yes’ in a yawn.

He smiled sweetly and offered to get me food.

“I honestly don’t think I’d be able to eat anything right now.”

We sat around in the same silence again.

“Any news?” I asked, a little bit of hope hiding behind my noticeable melancholy tone.

Ray solemnly shook his head.

I lowered mine back onto his shoulder and closed my eyes again. I’d lost count of how many hours we were waiting. My worried thoughts were growing larger and larger until I thought my head would explode from all this anxiety.

I was almost about to fall asleep again when a doctor came in. All at once everyone shot up from their seats and surrounded him in a circle.

“That family and friends of Mr. Way, I presume…” She said with a light German accent. With a tiny smile on her face she pushed up her glasses. “I have some good news.”

Everyone seemed to release their breath. Shoulders dropped and we all backed away from the doctor.

“Mr. Way has had successful surgery. But…”

I exchanged a nervous glance with Melissa.

“He has some slight head injuries. So he’s currently unconscious. We’re not exactly sure how long he’s going to be out. But if it gets past three days, we’re going to do more tests, because that’s going into the signs of a coma.”

Right at that moment I felt like falling to my knees. They almost gave in. But luckily I was standing next to Ray; he helped me keep steady.

I wasn’t the only one who almost broke down. Mikey and Melissa were rocking each other back and forth in a hug. As far as I could see both were crying.

Everyone was practically in tears.

The doctor kept on going.

“You can see him in about a half an hour. We’ll come get you when that is.”

She left us.

We all went and sat back down in chairs relatively close to each other, just in case we needed extra support in this nightmare like situation. I could feel it deep inside me that we all would need as much support as possible.
-----
We spent that entire thirty minutes getting out all of our sorrows. Too bad when we saw Gerard lying in that bed, I knew that it would just bring back a whole new flow of uncontrollable emotions.

“You can go in now,” The doctor told us.

We each decided it would be best if we each individually went in to see him, before we did as a group. I volunteered to go last. Naturally Mikey was first. Then Frank, then Ray, then Bob, then Melissa, then Jackie, and finally me.

I don’t know exactly what the others were doing in there. But it took everyone a while to get through their turn. It took Mikey the longest. I didn’t know if they were talking to him, or crying, or what. But I know that everyone came out with red eyes and wet cheeks.

It was finally my turn.

I bravely ventured into room. He was sharing it with another person. A girl who had curly blonde hair. She was sleeping right now so I had to be quiet and try not to wake her.

The curtain between the two was closed. I wasn’t exactly sure if I could handle turning the corner. But I knew I had to at some time, I might as well do it now.

I closed my eyes and took in a deep breath.

Some strange urge inside myself pushed me beyond the curtain. I knew that if that sudden boost didn’t shove me past that curtain, I would have never walked past it. I would’ve just stood there, trying to go, but never be able to.

Beyond the curtain I quickly opened my eyes to get a view of my surroundings. It was terrible. Absolutely terrible. I never thought in my entire life I’d see something as horrific as what my eyes were looking at now.

Gerard, the love of my life, was lying there, lifeless, in front of my eyes. How could I have done something so terrible?

He had scars on his face and needles coming out of his arms. His angelic face was being taken over by bruises, but his unnatural beauty was still shining through.

As he exhaled and inhaled I noticed that he wasn’t doing it by himself. There was a machine that helped him.

Tears welled up in my eyes as I realized that I might never get to tell him that I love him. He might never hear those simple three words pass my lips, and all I wanted to do was to let him hear that.

I kneeled down by his side and took his hand into both of mine. I gently kissed it and began sobbing.

There was nothing I wouldn’t give to go back and change this. I would give my life just so Gerard would be able to go on living.
-----
After what felt like forever of mourning the girl’s family came into the room and I decided it was time to collect myself. I didn’t leave though. There was no way I could leave Gerard alone.

So I found myself talking to him, despite the fact that he was unconscious. I talked about the most private things with him. Things that I never really had the guts to tell him when he could hear me. But now, with the fact that I might never talk to him again dwelling in my head, I wasn’t afraid to touch upon the most sensitive of subjects, even though there were other people in the room. They spoke German though, so I doubt that they speak any English.

“Katie!” Melissa came rushing from behind the curtain.

My head snapped up. I stood but not for a moment did I let go of Gerard’s hand.

“You’ve been in here for hours!” She stated the obvious.

I got up to leave when she held up one finger. “You don’t want to go out there, either.”

I eyed her skeptically.

“Paparazzi.”

My head titled back into a great dramatic slouch.

They really didn’t need any of this. The hype from all the other tabloids about me and Gerard were finally wearing down and now they was going to be all this new stuff about his drinking and now he was in the hospital for it. Yes, that was the wrong story, but knowing them they’re probably going to make it something like that.

“Ugh! We don’t need this right now!” I sighed and sat back down next to Gerard.

I looked at him with severe melancholy and stroked his cold skin. I wanted him to wake up so badly. I needed to hear his voice say that everything’s going to be all right and that we’d be together soon.

But life doesn’t work that way. Gerard might be going into a coma. And there was nothing I could do about it. All anyone could do was wait. If he didn’t wake up in three days we’d have to get more answers.

I just hoped there were some.
-----
“Katie, you need to sleep,” Mikey said with a sleeping Melissa laying over him.

Everyone was in the hospital room, scrunched behind a curtain. Most of them were sleeping. Only Mikey and Jackie were awake.

“Seriously,” Jackie continued, trying to hide a huge yawn. “You’ve been awake for about 36 straight hours.”

“I can handle it…” I muttered, not taking my eyes off of Gerard’s still face.

I hated seeing him so lifeless. It tore at my insides and beat continuously at my distressed mind. His black hair was so contrasted with the white pillow that it looked like he was floating on water.

“Katie,” Mikey gently got up, placing Melissa’s head carefully on a couch pillow. “Honestly, it’s what Gerard would want. He wouldn’t want to you lower your health for this.”

I looked at him. He was leaning by my side and removed my hand from Gerard.

They were right. It was going into the second day of unconsciousness and I needed sleep so I could take on the next two days as awake as possible, because after this, I wasn’t leaving Gerard’s side until he woke up.

After I made that silent promise to him I gently kissed his forehead and went to a spot in the corner and sat down.

Chad was nice enough to go and buy us each a pillow and a three big blankets. Since the blankets were in use I pulled my hoodie that much tighter around my arms. With a yawn I pulled up my hood and leaned my head back on the pillow. And before I knew it I was pulled into the depths of the worst nightmare I could imagine.
-----
I felt cold hands grasping my shoulders tighter than I thought possible. They shook me violently. But nothing could shake the haunting images that would be imprinted in my mind forever.

“Katie! Please!” I heard a distant, yet familiar, cry.

With the voice came more poking and prodding and a few more voices. They were a little more distant, but still quite as urgent.

Finally, I found my inner strength and let go of those dismal images and stopped hearing those dark screeches.

“Katie!” I saw Frank’s relieved face and immediately felt one hundred times better. “You were… having a bad dream.”

I scanned the room and saw everyone but Melissa and Jackie looking at me with great concern.

“Thank, God, you’re awake!” He wrapped his arms around me.

My eyes pleaded with someone behind him to explain to me what was going on. When Frank finally let go he filled me in on what was going on.

I was apparently yelling in my sleep, jolting around like a mad woman, and crying like there was no tomorrow. They’d been trying to wake me up for a while but I was too into it that they were afraid to try anything. Melissa and Jackie had apparently left before anything happened so they had no clue that I was freaking out.

“Where’d they go?” I asked, wiping my almost dry cheeks.

“They went out for breakfast. They’re picking it up and bringing it back.” Bob informed me.

“Oh…”

My eyes wandered around the room, and automatically fell onto Gerard, the source of all my nightmares. He was still eerily still while he was lying on that bed. The only cause of motion coming from his stomach rising and falling from his breathes.

“Don’t worry,” Frank said, reading my mind like a book. “I promise he’ll be better soon.”

I looked up at everyone. Each one of their faces was very unsure about the promise Frank had just made. I was just as skeptical, if not more.

Frank helped me stand up from my little corner and that’s when I realized the sudden openness in the room.

The curtain dividing the blonde haired girl and Gerard had been drawn back. She was awake now and was quietly reading in her bed. It was a German book for sure because I had no idea what it was. It was an all black hardback, and it was a fairly large book.

I did, however, recognize the author; I’d stacked a couple piles of her books back at Barnes and Nobles. Stephanie Meyer. I think she wrote something called Twilight, but I can’t exactly remember.

She looked up at me with her icy blue eyes and stared coldly at me. They moved around from face to face. Slowly a smile spread across her face. The ice was gone from her eyes and was replaced with warmth. I shrugged as she went back to her book.

Must be an MCR fan… I thought. I wonder why she didn’t say anything. Or why she didn’t completely flip out.

“She did earlier,” Mikey whispered, realized my sudden confusion. “When she first woke up about two hours ago. She speaks English quite fluently, so be careful what you say.”

I nodded, knowingly. So that’s why he was whispering.

“Can I go to the bathroom?” I asked touching my finally dry cheeks. “Are the cameras gone?”

“Yeah, they left late last night… They’ll be back soon, though.”

I walked over to the door to the room when I was suddenly stopped.

“Are you alright?” The girl asked. She spoke with a light German accent and a great level of maturity obviously blooming through her tone. “You seemed a little… strange, before.”

“I’m fine, thanks,” I rushed through my words, a little taken aback by her sudden question.

The girl nodded and went straight back to her book.

I quickly glanced over at the guys who seemed just as surprised as I did. But they shrugged if off just the same and I went over to the bathroom.
-----
When I got back so were Melissa and Jackie. There was food containers spread out all over the floor that were nearly all empty.

Had I really been in the bathroom that long? Or are my friends just pigs?

I walked over to them with as much attitude as I could. I was hungry, too. And they didn’t save any for me?

Melissa could read my face perfectly. Right when I walked up to them she held out a raisin bagel and some flaming hot Starbucks.

“Oh, thank, God!” I said gratefully taking the food and started chewing away at it.

They all looked at me in a funny way and started laughing.

It was late in the afternoon and the guys had decided with Chad that it was best for the fans to set things straight and set up an interview with someone. So they were off at that. Jackie went to give moral support, while Melissa offered to stay here with Gerard and me.

She was working in her sketchbook with her headphones tightly hugging her ears. So it was basically as if I were all alone wither Gerard again. Well, unless you count the mysterious curly haired blonde girl.

I paced the area just in front of Gerard’s bed.

“Are you sure you’re all right?” The girl piped up again, noting my anxiousness. “You seem, distressed.”

“That’s an understatement,” I muttered and took an empty seat next to her bed. “I’m Katie,” I held out my hand.

“Emily,” She gladly took it and gave it a firm shake. “So, what’s the issue?”

I explained to Emily the entire story. From beginning to end, I didn’t leave out any details. From the day of the concert to the appalling tabloid to where I was sitting now.

For about an hour I talked. Emily just listened. She was an excellent listener. I even let her read Gerard’s letter, which I was now keeping in my pocket at all times.

“That’s quite a story…” She muttered, her eyes far away. “It’s almost surreal. If you weren’t sitting in front of me I don’t think I’d believe you.”

“I don’t think I believe it, either sometimes.”

We sat in silence for a while.

“So, tell me about you,” I said trying not to let the conversation die.

“I’m Emily, as you know. I’m fifteen years old and I have lung cancer. It’s actually getting really bad… Probably two weeks at the longest…”

“Wow…” I said, not able to think of anything else. “I’m so sorry, Emily…”

“Don’t be, I’m sick of getting people’s apathy. It honestly doesn’t mean a thing to me…”

“But, lung cancer, at such a young age?”

She shrugged it off, obviously not wanting to get into her past.

A woman dressed in all white came rushing through the doors at that moment. She was talking really fast as her flat shoes made strange noises across the tile floor.

The woman walked immediately up to Emily and pecked her forehead. She adjusted some things and sat on the edge of her bed. The speed of her talking didn’t slow down any.
She gestured to me but Emily shook her head and said something in German. The lady looked at me, shrugged, kissed Emily again and then left in the same rush she came in with.

“My mom,” She informed. “She’s a nurse here at the hospital. My dad died a while ago from… well, he died. I have no siblings so it’s just me and her going through this. I fell kind of bad for her… this is the second person she’s about to loose.”

Melissa saved me just in time; she took off her headphones and came over to Emily and me.

“What’s going on, Kate?” She asked, cheerfully. “Who’s this?”

“Emily, Melissa,” I said. “Melissa, Emily.”

“Hey!” Emily smiled. “You’re Mikey’s girlfriend!”

The three of us got into talking. For a long time we talked about some really strange things.

It was strange, for a fifteen-year-old, she was really quite mature for her age. The conversation she gave was really interesting and I knew that no one could get easily bored with anything this girl had to say.

When someone was talking to Emily they were very easy to forget all of your current problems. So as you can imagine, Gerard was wiped from my mind. It was done unconsciously, I felt bad that I forgot about his lifeless body lying three feet away from me. But I think I deserved at least an hour break from my constant state of anxiety.

“As much as I love our fans, I pretty much hate those interviews…” Bob sighed as the doors he came in from made a tiny beeping noise.

Jackie followed with their hands intertwined.

“Especially when they’re so overly personal…”

Everyone trailed close behind Jackie and Bob. They stopped when they saw Melissa and me talking to Emily.

We introduced each other and continued on with the conversation. Emily explained to everyone who joined about her current situation and all about her dad. She also got into explaining how MCR really has saved her life. It was a touching story that brought everyone near to tears.

A couple of times during her story Gerard’s heart monitor did something funny and I either got severely worried or overly hopeful.

It was around eleven o’clock when Emily passed out and soon we all followed.

I felt like I was alone with Gerard again, despite the fact that half of us were still awake.
My hand was still intertwined with his as I drifted off into a deep sleep. We were going into the third day, and I felt more nervous than I ever had in my whole life. Unfortunately I must admit that there was little to no hope left in my heart. It seemed as if he was going to remain lost forever…

----

I just wanted to thank every single one of my readers! You guys are so amazing you don't even know how much it means to me! Every single comment, even if it's two words long it fully apperciated! Thanks for being so awesome, guys! XD

Also, I have a new FanFic. I haven't been working on it as much, but I'd still love for some readers. If you like IRTH (Insert Romantic Title Here... that's what I'm gonna call it from now on... IRTH) then you might like this! Thanks a ton!

For new FanFic... PRESS... Not here... Not here either... but riiiight here!