Whatever Gets You Through The Night

I'm the last one you ever saw, but I remember you and you don't.

They say the most important person is the last person you see. They say, the last person you see will be the one soul to lead you on through the dark and into whatever light was at the end, to lead you to the end of things, they said the last person you see will be whatever gets you through the night.

Most people know, this night doesn't necessarily mean the road to whatever heaven, whatever Something was at life's end, but maybe the road through life itself, maybe the road through hardships. Many people long to know who was whatever got them through the night, and the same many people died without ever knowing who this important person was but as they lidded their eyes for the last time at death and smiled, because this person could at least lead them through the road to their great Something, but sadly not through their life.

Not for Gerard.

He knew who was the last person he saw, the problem was the other didn't know him, and it wasn't like he knew the person's name, or anything, he only knew his face.

It had been, what, five years since he had gone blind from diving in front of the boy, shielding him from the falling glass window? Was it that long ago? It always seemed to Gerard it had only been a day since he woke in the hospital and found out that he had gone blind from the window frame dropping onto his brain, damaging whatever part controlled his sight, turning the lights off the world for him forever.

Gerard could only remember the faces of a few people, but like polaroids exposed to sunlight they were fading, slowly, the face of his mother, his father, his grandparents, his best friend Ray. There were only two polaroids kept, unfaded, in a lightless cupboard: his brother Mikey's and of course-

Of course the other unfading polaroid was, as expected, the boy he had closed his eyes forever for.

They always said the last person you saw was the most important in your life. They always told Gerard that, he should at least be grateful there was one person important to him that he could find in his life because that one person he last saw wasn't when he was on his deathbed.

Gerard always told his parents, his family, his friends, that the last person he saw was simply Mikey as he dived to shield that unknown yet all too important boy from the blinding fall of shattering glass. He knew there was no way he could ever find the boy again, for the whole thing happened miles, countries away from his hometown in New Jersey, all the way in Italy, and seriously, Gerard was blinder than a mole in sunlight, there was no way he could find that one boy, special to only him, in the midst of Italy whilst being blind.

But of course, as he wrapped his palm around the cold steel lead that was looped around Lindsey's neck, the boy from Italy was the only thing stuck in his head as he and Lindsey walked slowly to another dreary Monday morning filled with algebra and Shakespeare. Also, a morning filled with mocking insults that weren't shoving into lockers just because of Lindsey's presence, a morning of trying to keep up with the class while running tired and sore fingers on pages of Braille.

And then there was that familiar tug of Lindsey running forward, and then there was him losing balance, and then there was him, face cushioned from the hard cement ground only by his arm, lying on the ground.

Gerard could hear chuckling, then the slight whimper of Lindsey as whoever was chuckling pushed her away, against her will.

"Hey," the chuckler asked him, taking his hand and helping him up. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I think I'm alright," Gerard smiled vaguely in the chuckler's voice's direction. "Is Lindsey alright? Did she scare you or something? If she did, I'm sorry."

"No, she's cool," the chuckler chuckled to themself softly. "I like dogs myself, I've got a rescue dog at home."

Gerard smiled, kneeling down to locate Lindsey's leash. "That's awesome. But I, uh, have to get going." He smiled apologetically to the chuckler's direction and turned to face forward. "Forward, Lindsey!" And with a playful lick to Gerard's hand and a slight swish of her tail, Lindsey led her blind friend towards his walk to school.

"Oh-hey," the chuckler ran as they tried to catch up with Gerard and the fast-paced dog. "I'm going the same way, the same was as you and Lindsey, if I didn't hear you wrong," and Gerard could sense a friendly smile in the chuckler's words, so he smiled back out of politeness. "I'm Frank Iero, I'm 16, and I'm new to this place. Who's you?"

And then Gerard chuckled himself, because that was why he finally met someone who wouldn't just snigger and walk away if he fell flat onto the ground, that he finally met someone decent. "Yes, this is Lindsey, and I'm Gerard, the famous blind kid at school. That's why I bring Lindsey to school, firstly for protection and secondly so she can lead me around."

"That... that's pretty cool!" Frank said hesitantly, and Gerard could hear his smile falter in his words. Was it because Gerard was blind? Did that make him inferior? "I'd kill to be able to bring my dog to school."

Then there was silence between the two on their way to monotonous lessons, but the thoughts rampaging in Frank's head were anything but silent.

Did he actually manage to find the blind guy Lindsey got carted off to when she was one? Did he actually manage to find the dog he fostered once? Was the world really this full of coincidences?

And Frank knew he should be jealous of the person, more like this person, who took Lindsey away from him, or so he always insisted as a boy of twelve, at that time, but he couldn't, not now, especially not now.

Because he knew that face, and he knew that reflex of hand cushioning head. He knew it, because five years ago all the way in Italy, it had been the exact same person with the exact same reflexes who dived in front of him to shield him from the shattered falling glass that inevitably turned his saviour blind.