9. New York City and a very long drive!
We arrived in New York after what seemed like forever. It was darkening outside, but I really didn't know – nor care – what the time was. We exited the terminal – after everybody else had – and waiting for us were four, familiar-looking women and an adorable puppy. Well, it wasn't really a puppy, but it was still cute! When Frank, Mikey, Ray and Gerard saw the girls, their faces lit up. They scurried over to them, and kissed them hello. Bob and I just stood there, waiting for recognition.
"Don't worry, it doesn't last long." Bob reassured me, as I started getting bored. The dog managed to get away from Ray and his wife, and ran over to me.
"Hello, Bauer! You are so cute!" I said in a baby voice, while patting him on the head.
"Wow! How'd you do that?" Ray asked, walking over and picking up Bauer's leash.
"Do what?"
"Pat him, without him mauling you. I've never seen him so friendly to anyone outside our little group." Ray told me, indicating the guys and their partners.
"Must be in your blood." The young woman who Ray had greeted, intimately, said to me. She walked over and stopped behind Ray, giving me a brilliant smile, "I'm Ray's wife. You must be, Jadis. You really do look like Gerard. It's scary!"
"Jay, come over here!" Gerard called, signalling, with his hand, for me to come over to him. He was standing with Lyn-Z, his wife. I took a deep breath, and ventured over to my dad and…well…step mum. At first, Lyn-Z seemed apprehensive about me, then she gasped, and kept flashing her glance, between Gerard and I.
"Woah, baby! She's definitely your kid! That's fuckin' weird!" Lyn-Z said to Gerard, as if I couldn't hear.
"She inherited Mikey's short-sightedness." Gerard told her grinning. He slung his arm over my shoulder and pulled me closer. I wrapped my arms around his waist, and breathed in his scent; B.O., smoke and his scent.
"You alright, Jadis?" He whispered in my ear. I tightened my hold on his waist, and buried my face in his side. He put his own arms around me, and it comforted me immensely. "What's the matter, Jay?"
"I'm just scared, I guess." I mumbled into his jacket.
"Don't be. You're with nine adults, and a fucking scary dog, you're safe."
"I feel sick."
"Do you want to go to the bathroom?" I nodded, and he released. "Hon, can you take her to the toilet? I don't want her to go alone, to fucking risky." He said to Lyn-Z. I reluctantly let go of him, and allowed Lyn-Z to guide me to the bathrooms. We entered the toilets, and I walked over to the bench. The bathroom was luckily deserted.
"I guess this is all pretty traumatizing for you." Lyn-Z commented.
"A little," I sighed, "I passed out on the plane before; I don't want to pass out again!" I muttered to myself. I took a deep breath, and then splashed my face with a little water. Lyn-Z walked over to me, and propped herself against the bench.
"I hear you sorta exploded during one of the flights." She said conversationally. I blushed, "I guess that was probably the easiest way to let the press get to know the new, Way. Very dramatic, too! Kudos." The bathroom door creaked open, and a geeky young woman walked in. We both froze. She was mumbling something about being misled by rumours, or what not. My heart almost stopped beating, when I realized she was talking about the band standing outside. She had about twenty My Chemical Romance badges on the bag, slung over her shoulder. She was also wearing glasses, in the same style of Mikey's old ones.
The fan looked up at us, suddenly realizing she wasn't alone. Looking at me, I saw the colour drain from her face. Lyn-Z grabbed my arm, and we bolted for the door. We sped all the way back to the group of celebrities.
"Fuck!" Frank said, noting our expressions, and our hurried movements.
"Time to move!" Mikey commented. We all grabbed our things and hurried out into the parking lot. We found our way to the cars that we would be travelling in. Ray, Bauer and his wife hopped in one car, and sped off. Frank, Jamia, Mikey and Alicia hopped into another car, and waited for us. Lyn-Z, Gerard, Bob and I all hopped into a car similar to Frank's and we drove off in convoy.
After about an hour, I hadn't seen Ray's car anywhere!
"Er…Where'd Ray speed off to?" I asked.
"He's headed off on his sorta honeymoon. He'll be gone for a while." Bob informed me.
"Oh." I replied, lamely. It was mostly quiet after that, and I started to get bored. So I decided to pull out my trusty laptop, and entertained myself. I put my headphones in, so I didn't annoy anyone, and started Photoshopping some random pictures, then putting them into a slideshow. Once I had completed that task, I was still bored, so I started dubbing video clips – it was always amusing to see your favourite singers sound funny. I was in a chipmunk mood, so the voices were very amusing, to me, in chumpmunkian.
"You are such a computer nerd!" Gerard said from the front seat. He was twisted around in his seat, so he could look at me.
"You can talk." Bob said defending me. Lyn-Z smiled to herself, but kept her eyes on the road, and Frank's bumper.
"Uncle Jiggy," I whispered to myself, smiling. Bob started laughing, and I blushed.
"I'm your dad, not your uncle!" Gee joked, "What have made this time?"
"Meh, more random clip things. Nothing very interesting."
"Still think that's fuckin' awesome how you do that!"
"Everyone can do it, it's not hard. Except when you're trying to dub Famous Last Words, then it's hard!"
"Yeah," Bob chuckled, reminiscing, "I got terrible burns from filming that."
"You also nearly died, you fucking idiot!" Gerard told him, disgraced.
"I hate fucking hospitals!"
"Hang on! What the fuck do I sound like once you've fucked up my voice?" Gerard asked me suddenly.
"I'll show you." I said, pulling my headphones out of my computer so the speakers would work. Bob leant over my shoulder and watched as I picked out a song, "Erm…what do you want to hear? I've got Black Parade, Teenagers and I'm Not Okay – that one took a lot of work! What do you wanna hear?"
"Is that it?" Gerard asked surprised.
"The others are on my main computer at home."
"You have too many computers." Bob observed.
"Maybe so, but just pick."
"Er…Teenagers?" Gerard decided
"Ooo, swearing chipmunks!" Bob laughed. I guessed that he had been watching me work. I opened the file, turned my sound up and played the clip.
When it finished, the whole car was filled with laughter. Even I started giggling.
"That was so good!" Bob managed, between bursts of laughter. "You had it lined up and everything! He looked like he was singing like a fucking animal!"
"The new sound of MCR!" Gerard said inspirationally, like it was a title.
"My Chem get 'munked!" Lyn-Z laughed.
"Can I see another one?" Bob pleaded.
"Yea- fucking laptop!"
"What?" Gee asked, gaining control over his laughter.
"Fucking battery died on me. Ah well, I must now hunt down a new means of entertainment."
"Hang on; Frank's pulling over." Lyn-Z informed us. We stopped on the side of the road. Everyone was confused. Gerard opened his door, and I could hear someone yelling.
"Do you guys always fight this much?" I joked, trying to hide my fear.
"Mikey, please!" I heard a female screech.
"What the fuck?" Gerard leapt out of the car, and ran over to the other. I followed him, curiosity taking over.
"Why'd you do this, Ali? You could've ruined everything!" A male roared back – I guessed it was Mikey. Frank jumped out of the car, frustrated.
"I refuse to sit in there, with them yelling at each other!" Frank told us, as he stormed past. I followed after him, as Gerard went to sort his brother out. Frank started kicking around in dirt, away from the cars. We were in a sort of desert area, in almost no-man's-land. It felt good to finally stretch my legs, after hours of sitting, but the dust and dirt and coldness of it all, made it not so pleasant.
"What's happening?" I asked, after he'd had a few strikes at the ground.
"Alicia's the one who tipped the press off about us being in Australia. She also tipped them off about us in LA. Now Mikey's pissed because you nearly had an asthma attack, and the sudden leaving in Australia could've totally depressed you – according to him." He explained.
"Me again?!" I screamed, "Can't you people fucking argue over something other than me? ARGH!"
"Hey, calm down." Frank stopped making dust clouds, and came over to give me a soothing hug. It made me laugh, though, because I was a good three inches taller than him, and I was still growing! "Don't you say a fucking word about my height."
"I'm not saying anything, just thinking it." I giggled, then Frank and I silently walked back to where Mikey was blowing his cap, again. Alicia was crying, and begging him to forgive her. Oh. My. God! I thought This is sooo cheesy! Like a bad soap opera!
"Ugh!" I groaned. "Honestly, you guys should do an Ozzy Osborne, and have your own fucking show. This is seriously like a bad soap opera!"
"Trust is important when you're trying to stay incognito!" Mikey told me angrily.
"What happened has happened. You can't change the past, but the future is coming, and we're spending it on the side of the road fighting!" My speech (or rather rant) was cut short, when I realized someone was playing guitar. I turned and found Frank sitting on the bonnet of the car, which I had been in for the past few hours. He was just leaning back against the windshield, playing something that sounded very familiar to me, but I knew it wasn't a My Chem song. My eyes zeroed in on my notebook in has lap.
"Frank!" I yelled, "That's my fucking notebook!"
"I know," He smiled, "It's fucking interesting." He played a few more chords, then asked, "Will you sing it?"
"Not now!" Jamia groaned.
"Besides, you're not playing it right!" I told him, walking over.
"I'm reading what you wrote!"
"That's not what's in my head, is it?" I held my hand out for the acoustic. He rolled his eyes, and handed it over. I leant back against the side of the car, and started strumming out a hardcore chord progression. I stopped, then the rhythm slowed, and I started singing the melody.
There's an angel floating by
Under the fucking sky-eye
Rumoured as our protector
Then why do we all
Die!
I played another little guitar solo, then stopped. "That's how you do it!"
"Woah! Dude! That'd sound fucking awesome on an electric!"
"Hell yeah, it does! But I've only tried that once. It's fucking hard to get my hands on an electric guitar. I had enough trouble teaching myself how to play-"
"You taught yourself how to play guitar?!" Frank asked, amazed. I nodded, "But that can't be fucking possible! You play almost like a fucking pro!"
"Well, a few years back, I knew this guy. We were really close. He was really good at guitar, and he showed me a few things."
"Do you two jam?" Frank asked. My eyes saddened, and a lump formed in my throat. I swallowed hard.
"It's kind of hard to jam with a ghost." I said quietly. The rock mood disappeared, and transformed into concern, confusion and sorrow. A tear escaped my eye, and ran down my cheek. I handed the guitar back to Frank, and studied the ground instead.
"I'm so sorry I asked." Frank said sympathetically.
"Don't be. It had to come up sooner or later. Besides, it's been two years; I should be over it, right?"
"Wrong!" Gerard said, wrapping me up into a tight, comforting hug.
"We still mourn our grandmother." Mikey told us.
"You liked him, didn't you?" Lyn-Z asked, from behind me.
"I was the nerd, he was the cool guy. He got sucked into drugs, alcohol, and all that shit. He died of an overdose. When he didn't come to school one day, I was confused. Then counsellors came, and all that crap, and I just didn't understand. We had dated for about three months, and, as I said, we were very close. I still miss him!" I sobbed into Gerard's chest.
"It's okay, Jay! It's….it's okay…"My father murmured soothingly, as he rubbed my back.
"Come on, we'd better get back on the road." Mikey told us. We released each other and got back into the car. Gerard was in the back with me this time, with Bob in the front driving, while Lyn-Z sat next to him. After we had been driving for about twenty minutes, my stomach grumbled, loudly.
"I keep forgetting to eat!" I sighed. I had cheered up quite a bit from our stop over, but my mood was still tainted with gloom.
"Do you want a chicken sandwich?" Bob offered.
"Gross!" I screeched. Poor little chicken.
"Turkey? Ham?" Bob tried.
"Do you have cheese or something without an animal on it?" I asked shuddering.
"Don't you eat meat?" Gerard asked me.
"God no! I've been vegetarian since I was two!!"
"Oh God! Another Frank diet!" Bob sighed.
"Let me get this straight: You're short-sighted, vegetarian, asthmatic, your best friend died, you love our band, you play guitar and you can sing. Anything else?" Gerard said, listing out my characteristics.
"You missed the fact that you will never get me, even in the same room as a needle – especially if it's a small room. Plus I'm claustrophobic. Oh, and I'm a nerd, and social reject"
"You're not a-"
"Come to my school, and you wouldn't say that."
"You know, she's like everyone in the band mushed together." Lyn-Z observed from the front seat.
We stopped after another ten minutes and had something to eat. Then continued to drive on into the night. I started feeling sleepy – amazingly all the mentality of events had reset my body clock. Gerard was still in the back with me, and he sung me to sleep again. He must've thought I was sound asleep – which I almost was – because he leant over and kissed my forehead, then whispered quietly, "I love you, Jay. Every part of you." Then I sunk into a deep sleep.
