New Jersey School of Arts

Chapter Seven

My heart was racing, I couldn't keep still. It was the first gig with the band and I am super excited. I had played concerts before when I was in Pencey Prep, but something about My Chemical Romance is just amazing. The club where our first gig is only lets us play a certain amount of songs, in our case four. There was a band before us and we had to wait until they finished so we can preform, but there is a five minute wait time before the concerts so people can filter through. Ray was tuning his guitar and checking his fro every few minutes, you could see his excitement sweating from him. Gerard had puffy, red eyes like he has been crying for a while and Mikey was straightening his hair and both were drinking alcohol to calm their nerves. Bob was just playing air drums and was pretty calm. I was sitting in a chair talking to Maya, who was giving me some inspiration.

"You'll do great! I'm so happy for you guys!" Maya said ecstatically.

"Yeah I know." I said. Behind her there was a kid who was running to the club's manager. It seemed to be Vic. Also the band before us finished and now we wait five minutes for everything to settle in.

"What are you looking at?" Maya said turning around.

"Look at Vic." I said. He was begging the club manager for something and the manager rolled his eyes and nodded. Vic ran through the curtains and yelled something and someone gave him a guitar. I turned to the club manager and he looked at a body guard and gave a head nod to the body guard. The body guard walked to the stage.

"Well that doesn't matter. Why didn't you put your nose and lip ring in? Don't forget to put on your skeleton gloves! I want them to be special to you as they are to me!" Maya said.

"I didn't put them in yet." I said turning around to the table, which had my bag on top. I put in my nose ring and put on my gloves, when I heard a shreak on stage.

"I JUST WANT TO PLAY ONE SONG MAN!" Vic screamed.

"YOU KNOW THE MANAGER DOESN'T LIKE YOU VIC." The body guard replied and Vic was dragged backstage. The manager said some words to Vic and he started yelling that it was 'unlawful' to take him off stage.

There was a large clock counting down to the performance. Two minutes and forty-five seconds.

"Well I think I'm going to go into the crowd. You'll do great Frankie!" Maya said waving to me and walking away, down the stairs, and into the crowd. I turned my attention to Vic and there was two more body guards on him and one had a pair of handcuffs. I looked into the mirror for the last time before I was called over to the pre-concert inspiration meeting. All five of us huddled together.

"Are you ready Ray?" Gerard asked.

"Yeah." Ray replied.

"How about you Frank." Gerard asked.

"Oh I'm there, baby." Everyone laughed, but that was the point.

"How about you Mikey?" Gerard asked.

"Fucking ready." Mikey replied.

"I think I'm alright." Gerard said high-fiving everyone.

"10 seconds!" The manager said. It was time, we walked out on stage and looked into the crowd. It was mostly our friends from school and a few other guys. Then the All Time Low gang walked in. Oh shit.

"Now welcoming, for their first concert. MY... CHEMICAL... ROMANCE!" The manager announced.

At that moment we started playing our first song, which was Skylines and Turnstiles. We played with our goddamn hearts. To be completely honest, I was probably the most energetic person on the stage. I was jumping, running, and head-banging. This was great.