The Photo Album #1 - Before It Happened (My Chemical Romance)

Ray Toro

“Matt, I told you not to bring any beer!” I heard Mikey yelling in the living room. I was in the kitchen, making myself a nice cup of coffee. Ah, Matt’s here, and he brought beer. I poked my head out of the kitchen door. Mikey was there, with glasses on the edge of his nose again, glaring at Matt. “We’re fine today.”

            “This isn’t beer,” Matt snapped, raising the bottle he was holding. It seemed to be filled with orange liquid. “It’s just harmless orange juice that won’t have you fucking up the house.” He stared at Mikey, reached out a finger and pushed his glasses up. Mikes made a weird face. “There! See?” Matt put the bottle close to his face. “Dude, you should really wear your glasses properly.” Mikey mumbled something under his breath and adjusted his glasses, once again, at the very edge of his nose.

            “Hi Matt,” I greeted, sipping my coffee. Mikey came over, I tightened my grip on my coffee and pulled it closer to me. He saw my reaction and lifted an eyebrow. “This is MY coffee.” He chuckled and raised both his hands up in a not-gonna-hurt-you way. There was a knock on the door and Mikes was bolting towards it. Ray stood there and Mikey grinned. I wasn’t sure if this was just my imagination – but his afro seemed…larger and, I don’t know, puffier? It was epic, of course. “Um, Ray,” I said, pointing to Matt. “This is Matt Pelissier. Matt,” I pointed back at Ray. “That’s Ray Toro.” They nodded at each other.

            “And the rock-obsessed Gerard Way has found a new friend,” Matt smiled, stretching his arms. “Let me guess, this guy’s into rock too.”

            “Sharp,” I snorted, rolling my eyes. “He loves Iron Maiden, and comics. Fuck, you know what? This guy’s a second version of my brother.” The four of us sat around in a circle on the ground. “So, tell us more about yourself, Ray.”

            “I’m Mikey Way Junior,” He laughed. “Nah, I’m your typical teenager, I guess. And yes, you got that right, I fucking love Iron Maiden to death, but I also like classical music.” Mikey laughed. Ray looked at him. “It doesn’t put me to sleep, okay? Oh, but I’ve got one really cool story you’d like to hear. Explicit content: ultimate weirdness here, do not try this at home, at school or anywhere. I was in junior high and I wanted to impress a girl, so I stuck a piece of Runts candy in my nose, you know, like a booger.” Matt twitched and stuck out his tongue in disgust. “It ended up getting stuck in my nose, so I had to go see a nurse. That’s probably the summary of my high school years.”

            “Ew, dude, that is gross.” Mikey groaned. “Just…tell us about your family or something.”

            “Oh, um, okay,” Ray shrugged. I had to admit, that was a really, really strange way of trying to impress a girl. I mean, I had a high school crush, but she ended up taking slutty pictures with her boyfriend. I was shattered at that moment, and I couldn’t even be bothered to try impressing her. “Uh, I live in Belleville.” I rolled my eyes. “My neighborhood is scary, there are drug addicts everywhere and it’s dangerous. I couldn’t really leave the house when I was a kid, because there were loads of bodies found in the nearby park and lake. I’ve got two brothers. I listened to their classic rock albums and that’s probably how I got interested in the epic rock rifts and learned how to play the guitar.”

            “You know how to play the guitar, then?” I asked. He nodded. “Nice, you ever thought of starting a band?”

            “Not really,” He answered, giving me a lopsided smile. “But now that you mention it, I suppose I do.” I grinned. I was going to say something, but there was a knock on the door. Mikey glanced at me. I shrugged. Neither of us knew who it could be. I went over to the door, opened it and found a newspaper on the doorstep. Well, it’s pretty late for newspapers right now. I bent down to pick it up and my eyes widened. It wasn’t a newspaper. It was a flyer:

            THE SMASHING PUMPKINS – LIVE IN BELLEVILLE, NEW JERSEY – 10TH SEPTEMBER

            Oh fuck, the date was perfect. It was Mikey’s birthday. I took the flyer, stuffed it in my pocket and returned to the living room. “Who was that?” Matt asked, looking up at me.

            “Nobody,” I lied. “Someone must’ve played a prank; they didn’t even leave anything on the doorstep.” I bit my lower lip and everyone’s eyes turned to me, then they shrugged and went back to chatting. I heaved a sigh of relief. “Do you guys, um, mind if I go to my room for a while?” Mikey lifted an eyebrow, probably in suspicion. But he nodded without saying anything. I smiled and dashed up the stairs and slammed the door a little too loud when I got in. I took the flyer out and stared at it for a good few minutes. I was going to surprise Mikey. This is going to be the best birthday present he’s ever had. He’d been dying to go to a concert. I looked at an address written in small letters at the bottom of the flyer. I suppose that’s where I had to get the tickets from. I wrote the address down and flipped it over and over again in my head.

            Hmmm, I guess I’ve got to readjust my schedule tomorrow. I looked around my room, finding somewhere to hide the flyer. After pacing around, I settled on throwing it under my bed. I pray to dear God that it’s still there tomorrow and not missing beneath the pile of mess. I made my way downstairs again and sat next to Mikey. He looked at me and I stared back. I had to keep calm, like nothing interesting actually happened. “What?” I asked, reaching for my cup of coffee. He shook his head.

            “We’re going to the comic store tomorrow; do you want to come along?” Matt asked. Oh shit.

            “I…can’t, sorry,” I frowned. “I’ve got to go buy my art supplies and um, clean up my room.”

            “But you never clean up your room.” Mikey stated. Oh dear God, why didn’t I think of that?

            “That’s exactly the point, Mikes. I think it’s time I put those comics back in my shelf, instead of stepping on them and falling flat on my face.”

            “Fine,” He huffed. “But I’m not helping you buy the new issue of Batman.”

            My eyes widened with horror and I glared at my younger brother. “You wouldn’t dare,” I snapped. He smirked at me. I looked at Ray. “Ray, I’ll give you an extra ten bucks if you get me the new issue of Batman.”

            “You know what? I’ll get you that fucking issue.” Mikey said, clearing his throat and nodding at the same time. I grinned victoriously. I sipped my coffee and while the others talked, I silently planned when, how and what I have to do tomorrow. 

_______________________________________________________________________________

Hello sunshine. <3

I've been lacking ideas to write so I'm sorry if it's getting shorter and duller. I'll make it up to all you beautifuls, I promise! And some chapters take a longer time to write, because I have to do research on each band member, what happened to them, what they mentioned in interviews etc. and try sorting out the time slots so I can make sure an event happened at the right place, at the right moment. So, I hope you'll understand and forgive me...

Anyway, thank you for reading it so far. Fan, vote, comment...anything! :')

XO

Adrenaline Joker