You're a Mind Fuck, Babe

Chapter 26: Baby

We follow the nurse down the hall. Only Mikey is allowed in the room so Gerard and I have to stay outside. I sit down on a chair outside the room but Gerard continues to pace the hall.
"What could it be? Is his baby okay? Oh God, he has a baby. My little baby brother has a baby of his own. I'm not sure if I should be proud or not. Is he going to keep the child? Is he going to father the child? Does the girl even want him in the kid's life? How old is this girl?" I hear Gerard ask himself.
"Gerard, calm down. You're freaking me out worse than I already am," I shout at him. He stares at me kinda stunned.
"I forgot you were there, sorry," he mumbles. He sits down beside me and holds my hand. His hands are sweaty and he's agitated. His leg starts shaking and he starts squeezing my hand.
"It'll be okay," I whisper to him. Gerard slips his hand away from mine and buries his face in them. He checks his watch and sighs. He's very agitated.
"Do you want something to drink?" I ask.
"I need coffee," he replies. I nod and get up. I head downstairs to the hospital's cafeteria and buy some coffee for Gerard and I. When I get back up to the floor we were on, I see that Mikey is crying on Gerard's shoulder and Gerard is holding him tight. I approach them quietly. I'm tempted to ask what happened but they'd inform me if I was supposed to know. Mikey backs away from Gerard and whips his tears on his sleeve.
"The girl died... She hemorrhaged and they couldn't stop the bleeding. I know her and there's no other option... I am the dad," Mikey cries.
"Oh, Mikey," I say sympathetically. I lean in and hug him and he starts sobbing really hard again.
"Have you seen the baby?" I wonder.
"No.. They're gonna come back when it's okay for me to see him," he replies.
"At least one good thing came from this," I say, not sure if its the right time to say this. Mikey sniffles and sits down. I hand Gerard his coffee and as I go to take a sip from mine, I offer it to Mikey first. He turns it down and I take a sip. The hospital's coffee is horrible but it's still coffee.

A couple hours later, Mikey is allowed to take his son home. I sit in the passenger seat and Mikey sits in the back with the baby in his arms. Contrary to usual, Gerard drives carefully. I hear quiet sobbing and I realize it's Mikey. He's staring at his baby boy's little wrinkly face with tears in his eyes. We go to Walmart and pick up a car seat and a crib for the little guy. People are staring at the baby and giving us all dirty looks as we look around for baby bottles and warm blankets. We only get the bare essentials before we head back to Gerard's apartment. Mikey still hasn't stopped crying.

I spend an hour or so with Mikey, Gerard and the baby. Mikey is really uncomfortable with the baby but seeing Gerard show Mikey how to hold a baby is kinda cute. Mikey smiles through his tears. They seem to be doing well together. I check the time and realize how late it is.

I leave in a hurry because I don't want my mom to get suspicious of anything that could be going on. I don't actually know if I should tell her that Mikey has a son now or if I should keep that to myself. There are a lot of different possible scenarios. When I get home, it's a lot later than I expected it to be and my mom is visibly pissed off.
"Where have you been?" She shouts at me as I close the door.
"Mr. Way was tutoring me at Starbucks and then his brother called and it was an emergency so we went to the hospital," I answer. Most of that is true. I leave out the part where we fucked first and were going back to Gerard's place for who knows what.
"What happened at the hospital?" She asks. Do I come up with a lie or tell the truth? Think fast.
"He got this girl pregnant, but he didn't know until like 10 hours ago, and she died in the hospital giving birth and now he has a baby and everything is really complicated," I mumble. I told the truth for once. She, of course, thinks I'm dating Mikey so this could make everything really hard.
"So you're telling me that your boyfriend has a baby now?" I nod in reply but keep my head down.
"I really don't know what to think right now... Frank, you better be careful.. I don't know how this is going to play out but it seems really risky. Think with your head, not your heart. Your heart will get you into trouble," she instructs. That was easier than I thought. I didn't get a lecture or anything. I head up to my room to sleep.

I arrive at school the next morning, expecting to see an exhausted Gerard but it turns out he never came. I understand with all that's going on. I'll head over to his house after school. Today, I have to face Brendon.

I spot Brendon in the back corner of English class and I sit as far from him as humanly possible. His head remains pressed against the desk for the majority of the class and I feel guilty for getting him in trouble but he blackmailed me first. The teacher goes around passing out the corrected tests and I have a 78, which is decent, seeing as I thought I knew nothing. I got most of the answers right, the only problem with it was my spelling. I have shit spelling. I look over to Brendon who has a giant F written on his test. He buries his face in his arms after rips his test in half.

After class, he pushes me to the side to talk to me.
"Was it you who fucking told on me?" He accuses.
"I was just being honest. It's in my blood," I reply with a smirk.
"Fuck you," he says, slamming me against the wall before turning on his heel and walking away.

The day continues and I find out that I actually retained some information from my tutoring session with Gerard. I actually knew the answers to the questions my biology teacher was asking the class. At lunch, I call Gerard but he doesn't answer. I'll head over after school. I just have to endure his class without him.

Luckily, the supply teacher isn't his mother this time but somebody who knows absolutely nothing about psychology and decides to let us watch a movie about a suicidal teenager who feels stressed about school. Appropriate, I guess. It's called It's Kind Of A Funny Story and I related a lot to Craig, the lead character. We didn't get to finish the movie so hopefully tomorrow, Gerard will let us finish it, unless we have another supply teacher.

I hop on a bus after school and get off near Gerard's apartment. I find his building and head up to his place. I knock on the door and he swings it open. There are tears in his eyes and he looks like shit. I walk in and close the door behind me.
"Gerard? What's wrong?" I ask.
"M-Mikey... He left a note this morning. He left the baby with me. I have to take care of this baby. I'm not losing him in the foster system. I'm going to have to take care of him and I'm not ready but I'm not going to disappear like Mikey did. Mikey chose a name before he left though. The baby's name is Fletcher."

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