"Dear Hiatus..." (Sequel to A Living Hell) // Fall Out Boy

Throw The Matches Down Into The Glitter (Joe's POV)

Today is the day. Today we burn our last connections we've ever had to that horrible place, to everything Courtney's done. Today, everything will be lifted off of us, we'll have nothing to look back on and make us relive everything that happened. Today everything will end. I don't think the four of us could be any happier today, and the girls are happier than ever, too. They're happy to see us happy again, and overall, there's just an atmosphere of calmness going through the house. The kids have been behaving; Bronx has been on his best behavior, and the babies haven't cried nearly at all! Ever since we came back from therapy the other day, everything has been better. Literally everything.

Throughout the calmness, Andy and I have been able to rekindle our relationship, and have honestly been nothing less than perfect. Things had been a little rocky ever since we'd been freed from Courtney's rule, but after my attempt last week, I've seen things in a whole new light. I've seen how badly I've hurt Andy - on more than just one occasion - and ever since that, I've been carrying myself differently. He's noticed a change in me, too; everyone has. They're proud of me, but in all honesty, I'm proud of them.

None of us were stronger than the other, but I'm proud of all of them in their own ways. They've all come so far, not only after the first time this happened, but also this last time. How they've managed to still survive, it's beyond me. But, I suppose I shouldn't talk, because somehow, in all of this, I found a small shred of light to hang on to, and I survived, too. We've all come so far, and today I think we'll all realize that - more than we ever have.

"You got the book?" Andy peeked his head into the doorway of our guest room.

"Yeah," I nodded, looking down at the journal in hands. I chuckled, "it's funny that I let this book rule my life while I was in there."

"Babe, we all did," he said, coming in and sitting on the bed beside me. 

"It's funny, because it's just a meaningless journal; it's full of nothing but bad memories and things I never want to relive, but at the same time, I-I don't want to give it up, you know?" I explained.

"Why do you think Pete, Patrick, and I ripped the lyrics out of ours?" Andy said, holding crumpled up pieces of paper.

I laughed, "You're smart. This is why I love you so much."

"We felt the same, like, we didn't want to keep the thing, but there was something telling us to. We finally figured out that we were connected to the lyrics we wrote in it, so we decided to keep those and then burn the rest," Andy explained.

I smiled at him, then opened the journal, paging through it slowly, until I found the pages with lyrics written on them. I ripped them out carefully, then folded them and put them in my pocket. I sighed, then closed the book, looking up at Andy. He smiled at me, then stood up, holding his hand out for me to grab. I took it and stood up, following him out the door and into the living room, where everyone else was. 

"You guys ready?" Patrick asked, standing up. We nodded, he smiled, then we left the house, leaving the girls back with the kids, since they insisted we do this alone.

Although, we didn't want to be alone. We owed some apologies to some very close friends, so we invited them. David, Soren, and Louis, along with Hayley, Taylor, Jeremy, and LOLO were joining us. They hadn't heard from us until about two weeks ago, and we explained the situation as best we could over the phone. They understood, and said that if we needed anything, they'd be there for us. 

We didn't necessarily need them present with us today, but we felt like we owed it to them, since they hadn't seen us since nearly a half-year ago. And, like I said, they'd only ever heard from us about two weeks ago. We intended to explain the situation a little more, then have them present when we burn the journals.

Thankfully, we're on our way to the meeting spot now. We decided to go to one of our favorite concert venues that we've played at countless times; Tinley Park, near the outskirts of Chicago. I've always loved it there, and since it was close, we thought it was only fitting.

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We pulled up the venue nearly forty five minutes later, and everyone else was already there. Before Patrick even parked, the three of us were practically already out of the vehicle, running to everyone that came. We wrapped our arms around them, almost crying from how badly we missed them all. Hayley and LOLO were crying, and I'm pretty sure David was tearing up, too.

"I've missed you guys so much!" Soren said, hugging us all.

"We're so, so sorry," Pete said.

"I'm going to stop you right now," Hayley said, wiping a tear coming down her cheek. "You guys have nothing to apologize for, okay? What happened was not your fault. Now, get back in here, you big weirdos," she said, hugging us again.

We hugged her again, then individually hugged everyone else. We talked for a little while in the parking lot, then walked towards the actual area where they hold the concerts. We walked up onstage, sighing from the guilt plaguing us, because we never came here to play for our last tour. Not like we could, because of what happened, but we still felt terrible. 

After standing up there for a few minutes, we walked offstage, off to our left. We walked behind all the little stands that were there, for selling merch and food, then sat on the grass by the small pond that was back there. I looked off into the distance, sighing at the view. Andy turned and looked at me, smiling as he took my hand.

"Soon," is all he said.

I nodded, then nodded to Patrick. He stood up, Pete following him. They grabbed one of the metal garbage cans stacked up behind one of the buildings, then brought it back. Everyone of us stood up, basically grabbing whatever we could that would hold a flame, which included grass, cattails from the pond, garbage that blew away in the wind from previous concerts. After that, we dumped it all in the can, then Patrick grabbed a piece of newspaper he found. He took a lighter from his pocket and carefully lit the paper on fire, and once it held the flame, he dropped it onto everything else. Soon enough, we had a good-size fire going.

"Guys?" Pete said, looking at us. We nodded again, gripping the journals in our hands.

"One, two ... three!" Andy counted, then we all threw the journals into the fire, making sparks fly upwards.

We all sat back on the grass, watching them burn. We sighed, and suddenly a smile appeared on all of our faces. We looked at one another, and we just knew that this was it. We knew that nothing bad like this would ever happen again, and if it did, we knew we'd have the strength to fight it. 

"It-It's over," I smiled.

"You guys are something else," Jeremy smiled. "I think you're great role models for people around the world who've been in the same situation."

"I'm honestly really proud of you guys," LOLO said, hugging Andy, who was closest to her. 

"I knew you guys could rock the stage, but now I know you can rock anything thrown at you," David chuckled.

"Feels good to be free," I sighed, laying my head on Andy's shoulder. 

"You did it man," Louis smiled, resting his hand on my knee. 

We did do it. We did everything. We survived Courtney's wrath, not only once, but twice. We survived being separated for months on end, not knowing if the others were still alive or not. We survived being trapped in our own heads for what seemed like years. And, we survived the things we did to ourselves. We survived it all, living to tell the tale. 

"I'm proud of us," I said, lifting my head from Andy's shoulder. "Everything we've been through, we didn't let it get us down too much, we didn't let it consume us. We're still here, guys, and we'll continue to do what we know and love, and we'll finally get to hear all the fans sing along to every word of every song we play at shows. We'll be up onstage doing what we do best, and we'll never let these two incidences get us down or hold us back. If anything, we should use them to push us farther and harder! We need to turn all of this is motivation to do more great things in the future, and we need to use it to realize that we shouldn't take anything for granted anymore," I explained. "Look how strong we've become."

We're back, bigger than ever. We're ourselves, and that's what matters. We're motivated to do great things, and I know people are going to remember us for centuries. I can guarantee it.