I stared in shock at the girl in front of me. It's like she hadn't changed, she was the same sunny sixteen year old I'd been friends with. She wore nicer clothes though, shifting out of her androgynous phase. However, she still had her light blonde hair cut like Peter Pan's. Her muddy eyes were intense as they'd always been, her sideways smirk hauntingly familiar.
"Emily?" I asked in shock.
She smiled wickedly.
"Hey Gee," she said, running a hand through her hair. She pissed me off. Everything about her made me just so intensely mad. From the way she let her ego show to the she didn't seem to care. I wanted to claw her eyes out.
"What are you doing here?" I replied, trying to hide the hatred in my voice. I think I failed.
"I came to see you again," she returned. Her eyes turned to Frank. "And who's this cute little boy you have with you?"
"His name isn't any of your concern," I spat. "Get out, and never come near me or him again."
"Come on baby," she sighed, tugging at the hem of my shirt. "Don't you wanna have some fun?"
She was trying to pull my shirt up, and get me into her pants. Right in front of Frank. My Frankie. That's where I drew the line. I shoved her away from me. I must have done it too forcefully, because she hit the other side of the hallway. Her head banged into wall.
Shit. Shit shit shit.
"Are you okay?" Frank finally said.
She raised a hand to her head, rubbing a sore spot.
"What the hell Gee?" she groaned.
"Stay away," I growled. "I mean it this time."
"You really don't understand anything, do you?" she hissed, brushing herself off. "You can't just throw me away."
"I can't just throw you away?" I said incredulously. My voice was rapidly raising until I was yelling. Almost screaming. My blood was boiling and the fuse was lit. "I CAN'T JUST THROW YOU AWAY?! YOU MEAN I CAN'T DO THE SAME GODDAMN THING YOU'VE BEEN DOING FOR YEARS?! YOU ARE A SELFISH, GREEDY BITCH, AND YOU ARE NO LONGER WELCOME IN MY LIFE!"
She glared at me, raising an eyebrow.
"I always came back for you," she said through pursed lips.
"The only time you came back," I snapped, "Was when you ran away when you were thirteen. And you didn't come back for me. You came back because you were out of money."
She placed her palm on my chest, looking up sweetly.
"I missed you Gee," she pouted.
God this was disgusting. Pathetic. This whole act, this wild game of charades she was always playing. She takes everyone's lives and fucks them all up until they're nothing more than cold, twisted metal blobs on the edge of the earth. She would make mine bigger and bigger and more precariously placed at the edge until it finally tipped over, falling of the face of the planet. I'd seen her games when we were younger. Once she gave a girl pixie stick powder and said it was cocaine. The girl snorted it, thinking she was high. She started getting into real drugs, and last year she died of an overdose. She was in her junior year.
Emily had been my drinking buddy. She introduced me to this whole new world, a big and bright electrica monstrosity of pain relievers and life enhancements. I was having the fucking time of my life.
Until suddenly I wasn't.
And now she's come back, standing innocently on my doorstep as if she'd never done wrong in her life. It was killing me. I was about to explode. If I didn't get away from her, I would combust. The fragments of my skull would fall down, dusting over the room like pixie dust powder. Frank would cry, breaking his silence. Emily would add another notch in her belt, and in her bedpost, and move on to the next poor, unfortunate soul.
I slammed the door shut with all my might, finally cutting the tie and burning the bridge between me and her. My muscles felt achy, like seeing her had physically pained me. Broken piece of glass still remained on the floor. I think I may have stepped in some; there were droplets of blood dotted along the floor. I hadn't noticed really. My anger blurred any physical pain.
I plucked glass remnants out of my foot, wincing in pain.
"Are you okay?" Frank asked, sweeping up the shattered bowl.
"Yeah," I sighed.
"No, are you okay?" He repeated. I didn't reply. We both knew the answer.
"She looked the same as I remembered her," I whispered, shaking. "It was like seeing a ghost."
The anger had faded off. My whole body was shaking as I realized she could go after Frank. The very thought chilled me to the bone, sending waves of panic through my body. It felt like the air had been sucked out of me.
"Gerard!" Frank exclaimed, rushing to my side. The broom clashed to the ground. I am not breathing, I thought. I kept trying to suck in air as fast as I could, only to push it back out of me almost as soon as it touched my lungs. She will ruin him. She will tear us apart.
What if Frank dies, like the junior girl?! Emily could end up killing him off like a character in a play. I couldn't let her do that.
Frank placed a hand on my leg, the other on my back.
"Breathe Gerard," he said calmly. "Come on baby, I know you can do it. Just breathe."
I couldn't stop hyperventilating. It was like trying to breathe underwater, choking on whatever found it's way inside.
"Gerard," he whispered, more urgently this time. "Breathe with me okay. Just in and out. Ready?"
My heart was beating insanely fast.
"In," Frank said quietly, inhaling. He tuned my back carefully. I sucked in as deep as I could. "And out." He slowly exhaled. I tried to repeat his actions. We did this over a few times until I wasn't under attack.
"You had me scared," he sighed, hugging me deeply.
"I was scared for you," I murmured. My thoughts turned back to Emily. I couldn't let her take him alive.
"But you looked like you-- It just-- I don't want to lose my best friend," he trembled.
I smiled a little, placing my hand on his cheek.
"I guess we're scared for the same reasons."
His lips curved slightly upward, his eyes soft and less afraid. his hand found mine, and wrapped around it.
"What a perfectly great waste," he remarked, "to be afraid of pain and death."
"You sound like a poet," I smiled.
"This is a poem," he said, gesturing to the room, the apartment, perhaps the world. "And we are the poets."
"You are an amazingly beautiful philosophical character," I replied.
He chuckled.
"Anything can become a metaphor if you look at it from a certain angle."
A/N
Weekend update holla. Yeah I just wanted to say I love the small following this story has. It's just really awesome and amazing that you guys have stuck through the story through mini-hiatuses and rewrites. You are fab.
So yes I cry tears of joy when you vote and add to your reading lists. I live to read and reply to your comments so comment something.
Thanks for reading my frabjous babes!
-maddie
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