Disenchanted (Frerard + Petekey)

Drowning Lessons

Gerard loved strings. He couldn't take art this year as it conflicted with other things he needed, but luckily someone had convinced the band teacher to open a strings class.
It was a joke really, since you had to have permission to take the course there were only 6 people in the thing, and almost all of them showed up high, sat in their own secluded areas of the room, and just played guitar or bass alone for an hour, teaching themselves new songs or writing their own.

It was bliss.

Even the band teacher didn't pretend he was teaching anything. He shut himself off in his office at the back of the room and had a nap during the hour. Gerard suspected he too was high as a kite and just needed some quiet time.

Gerard had his headphones plugged into the ancient school desktop, playing the same minute-long solo over and over as he tried to pick it out by ear on the equally as ancient acoustic guitar.

With so few students in the class they'd all claimed one of the guitars that lived in the room at the start of the year so nobody had to bring their own.
It worked for him, Gerard didn't own his own guitar. He'd played Ray's a handful of times, and he planned to save up for his own once he was able to get a job. There was no work in this town. There was nothing at all in this town besides old people and junkies. 

Despite the fact he was concentrating intensely on his own work, and the raucous strumming of another student's country ballad, he heard a voice rasp menacingly behind him.

"You're gonna die."

The sound was so loud, so invasive. He swore he could feel breathe on the back of his neck.
He whipped around in fear and confusion, he didn't usually get death threats this directly.

No one was there.

"What" he hissed under his breathe, "-do you want?"

No reply came. The nearest person to him was a good 10 feet away, and paying absolutely no attention to him, shaking their guitar over their head, presumably to dislodge a guitar pick that had fallen down inside it.

There was no one there, and yet...
Gerard shivered, the hair on his arms stood on end, and he couldn't shake the feeling of blind panic creeping at the corners of his vision.

Okay, okay,

he'd stopped the music playing through his headphones, but continued to nod rhythmically as he attempted to slow his breathing.

Okay. We can fix this. You know what to do, let's just go. Make Him go away.

He got up from his stool, setting the guitar back in its case and abandoning his headphones in a pile on the desk.
He snatched his bag from the ground and nodded curtly to the band teacher through his office door as he passed, making a beeline for the bathroom.

It was quieter once he'd left the room, and he could heard the same voice speak again. Whispering condescendingly over his shoulder this time.

"Where you going faggot?" It sneered, "Running away again? You're such a coward, you run away from everything. You can't escape me. You're the scum of the earth why are you even alive?"

Gerard locked himself into the bathroom stall, in the middle of class, in a hall which contained only the music room and drama studio the bathroom was silent, empty.
But it was far from silent to Gerard.

His hands shook as he tore through his bag, dropping his notebooks onto the floor as he struggled to find something, his breathing coming in rapid shallow gasps now.

"You should just fucking kill yourself." The voice laughed psychotically at the thought.
Others joined in.

"Awh look at the fucking baby, what're you gonna do baby?"
"He's such a freak."
"You'll never amount to anything you know. They'd be better off without you."

They'd found their chorus. A cacophony of  voices, men's, women's, most gender less, all of them angry, hateful, petty and filled with rage.

"They'd be better off without you!"
"Just fucking kill yourself so they can get on with their lives!"
"Why are you here? Just die already!"

Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck! Where is it?!

Gerard froze as his hands found the target of the search. His wallet. More accurately, the contents of the tiny pocket therein.
Hyper conscious of his ragged breathing he opened the tiny change pocket with shaking hands, pulling from it two things. One of several pills he'd acquired from his favorite local drug dealer, and his newest blade, freshly extracted from a brand new pencil sharpener.

Just a little,.. just for now...

He yanked up his shirt sleeve and removed his leather wristband.
He tried to steady his hand as he brought the blade to his wrist, already riddled with scars and scabs from years of mastering the craft.

In one smooth motion he brought the metal down and across, gasping slightly as the cold slice ripped open a new trail.
He shuddered and inhaled deeply as he went in for a second strike. A third.
The voices were fading. He slumped back against the tank of the toilet as he felt his breathing slow.

Thank you. He whispered to the blade, pressing it to his lips lightly before returning it to its home in the tiny pocket of his wallet.

He let his injured wrist dangle to the side, he'd be sure to clean up anything suspicious before he left.
He popped the strange pill into his mouth and swallowed it dry. That would keep the voices silent. For a few hours at least.

A little for now, a little for later.

He sat there for a while, just breathing. Enjoying the bliss the bite of the blade had brought. If only he could bottle this feeling.

He thought of nothing. The pain brought him a rare clarity, a sense of calm and an absence of thought. The only time he could truly let his mind go blank without fear of intruders. Without panic setting in.

It was over too soon, and as his new wounds began to clot he sighed and began his cleanup routine.

Wrist wrapped in toilet paper, held on by the leather wrist cuff, make sure it's well hidden, tidy up any stray drops, double check for stains.

Not that it matters, he bemused, my entire wardrobe is black, I doubt anyone would know if I showed up drenched in blood.

Lastly he repacked his bag, silently chiding himself for having strewn its contents so haphazardly across the bathroom floor.

He double checked himself in the mirror and headed back to class, walking with the sensation of piloting someone else's body, of watching a character in a movie walk through his life.
He was safe now, he'd checked himself into autopilot mode, and they couldn't get him here.