Vampires Will Never Hurt You

"Jaime," I heard a whisper come from behind me.

I recognized this calm and seductive male voice and it sent shivers down my spine. Persuading myself it was all in my head, I walked down a couple of driveways, still watching my friends and their siblings run across the street. They ran up to a row of houses, collecting as much candy as they could. I laughed as I could hear Tina cursing at Gerard for tripping her as they ran to the next house. I tried to push the feeling to the back of my head, but it continued getting stronger. Not succeeding, I began having the feeling that someone was watching me. I casually looked around in every direction, except for behind me, only to realize that I seemed to be invisible to every single person outside. Even my friends weren't looking in my direction. Suddenly, fear flooded my veins as I realised I hadn't yet looked behind me. I took a deep breath and slowly turned around in my spot and my stomach dropped to my feet at the sight I was looking at.

Standing directly across from me, about four houses down was a figure of a person. They were about five feet in height and a small masculine build, dressed in a skeleton costume with the hood up and a white skeleton mask hiding their face. They were holding a blood red pillow case in their left hand at their side and were staring directly at me. Next to them was a long hedge that ran up a driveway, and they stood underneath a bald tree covered in dangling plastic spiders and ghosts with a string of orange plastic pumpkin lights. There were children running back and forth passed the figure, Completely ignoring it. As though they couldn't see it. I'm definitely going crazy. As if the hooded person had read my mind, they lifted both of their arms from their sides and slid their hood down off their head and lifted off the skeleton mask. With the mask and the pillowcase in either hand, they lowered both of their arms back down to their sides, revealing an extremely pale, expressionless, Frank Iero.

"Jaime," he said to me again, right inside my head. His voice was eerie and calm.

He began walking towards me, very slowly, still carrying his mask and pillow case in his hands. If it were possible, my stomach would have sunk even lower but the cement of the side walk was preventing that. Step after step, Frank continued getting closer to me. I had plenty of time to run and get away from this figment of my imagination, but I couldn't. Like there was some type of invisible ties binding me in place. All I could do was watch the body of my dead boyfriend get closer. Part of me wanted to run as fast as I could; it wasn't really him. It was just what my heart wanted to see. Whereas the other part of me was trying to hold me back from running to him and hugging and kissing him. At least, it looked like Frank.

His skin was no longer the warm flesh colour it used to be; it was now a light pale white. As I looked into his eyes trying to read his expression, I noticed the beautiful shade of hazel he once had, was now almost black with a very, very faint tint of yellow. Bruise coloured circles rested beneath his dark eyes, giving him the appearance of missing a couple of days of sleep. His long white fingertips tightened around his mask and pillow case the closer he got. He almost seemed... scared.

"Oi, Jaime, we're heading back to my place," Gerard shouted from behind me. Could he not see his dead best friend standing right in front of me?
"O- oh-kay, I'll be right there," I stuttered, looking over my shoulder. I turned back only to find Frank was gone.

This I could not push to the back of my head, no matter how hard I tried. I blinked and shook my head and hesitantly made my way down the street to the stop sign where everyone was waiting for me. Kira ran towards me and grabbed my hand, walking back to the group with me. I silently walked between Tina and Kira who was still holding my hand all the way back to Gerard's. Kira tugging on my hand made me realise I had completely slowed my pace, entirely lost in my thoughts. I smiled half-heartedly at Kira and picked up my pace, as well as my thoughts and caught up to the rest of the group. Before I knew it, we were already walking up Gerard's driveway. Bob and Ray got into Bob's car to bring Josh and Kira home while Mikey drove the twins back to their aunt's. I followed Gerard and Tina around the house and through the gate into the backyard. I went inside and grabbed my Goldschläger and a can of Ginger Ale, mixing them into my favourite lime green mug Gee kept at his house for me. I also grabbed a beer for Gerard and a can of Tina's Smirnoff Ice and brought them outside.

Gerard and Tina had set up six chairs around the fire pit and I took a seat next to Tina and handed her and Gerard their drinks. One more drink each, Mikey, Ray and Bob had returned, grabbing their drinks from inside and joining us around the fire. Gerard was sitting on the ground in front of me, poking the fire with a long stick, Bob was to the right of Tina, Mikey was to my left and Ray was to the left of Mikey. Before everyone could sit down and get settled, Gerard put the stick on the ground ­­­­next to him and stood up in front of me, holding his beer.

"Guys, I'd like to make a toast," he smiled at the circle of us. The rest of us held out our beers and waited for his toast. "To Frankie's twenty-second birthday" he said, holding his beer out in front of him. We all looked around at each other and stood up.
"To Frank," we all said in unison, our cans and bottles clanking together. We all took a sip and sat back down, leaning back in our chairs, and continued watching the fire.

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