The Paper Kingdom

Chapter Seven

GERARD

I sat on the sofa, a shivering, crying mess. Mikey and Juliet, were trying to comfort me. Juliet had tried to hug me but I shrugged her off. Well, maybe a bit more violently than that.

Mikey was still there, although he was probably a bit disgusted at me. I knew better than to hit a girl. If a guy ever hit Bandit I’d slit their throats and throw them off a balcony.

I’d never even get to be a real dad probably ever again. If Juliet has half a fucking brain on her head, which I hopes she does, she’ll get away from me. Maybe she’ll go to uni, or get some job at a coffee shop. Marry up, get some money. She’s hot enough to do that.

But it’s been forty minutes since I hit her and she’s still in the kitchen at Mikey’s place, with a pack of frozen peas on her left eye.

“I’m so sorry.” I said gasping out breaths. Who was I talking to? I couldn’t make eye contact with Juliet, and is it worth shit trying to talk to Bandit? Could I get some black magic pro to bring her back to me? That’s my fucking daughter. I could get her back.

“It’s okay.” Mikey told me. “Do you want me to call Frank? He can stay with you or something?” Mikey offered but I shook my head. Frank’s a good guy, but I knew Mikey. Everything he says is subliminal. This wasn’t about Frank. This was him trying to tell me not to torture Juliet with my mid-life crisis.

“I’m fine.” I wasn’t crying anymore. I saw in my peripheral vision that Juliet was still there, having a cigarette. There was a blue bruise on her face but she still looked beautiful. She really was beautiful, and I really needed to stop walking all over her. How has she not walked out yet?

I walked up to Juliet and we couldn’t make eye contact at this point. I looked down at her forehead and she looked down as well. I touched the blue bruise lightly with my fingertips, trying to magically erase it ever being there. She flinched a bit. I must have hurt her again. How could I possibly get everything fucking wrong?

“I’m sorry.” Starting now, I’m getting things right. I’m saying what I need to say to get what I need and what’s best for the people I care about: Juliet and Mikey. I’m not losing them, for any reason. I’m not losing anyone ever again. “I’m sorry I’m a dick, and that you’re way too good for me and should walk out the door right now but you haven’t and I owe you so much for that.” And then I kissed her. Nothing too sexual, a good five second peck on the lips.

“And Mikey, my little brother. Thanks for, not telling me, you know. I wasn’t ready to deal with that shit, after Lindsey, but fuck it we’re all getting through this.” And I kissed Mikey. On the cheek, and much shorter. Affection, not sex.

“You two, go be normal. I have some stuff I have to deal with.” I grabbed my wallet and threw a couple twenties at Mikey. “Get some good food, and make sure Juliet eats, she didn’t eat breakfast.”

I walked out the door and got a cab. I pulled out my white iPhone and searched for a minute.

“Hey man. 349 Front Street.” He nodded, turned on the meter, saying how much I was going to have to pay the man, and then started driving, recklessly, and fast. Good, I liked it. I opened the window, it was one of those twisty things and I leaned my head out, like a dog, and shook it.

“Mister, what did you take?” The cab driver says to me. He’s a tough looking guy with stubble and tattoos and I like him. He’s honest.

“Reality, mister. Fucking reality. Hey, stop here.” I paid him a few dollars and got out. I’d meant to go to a specific location but this is closer.

MARTIN SMITH GUN SHOP
I walk in the door, eyes wide and alert. I don’t know anything about guns. I need to get the people to think I’m not too nuts so they sell me a gun. Am I nuts? I just lost someone important, I should be sad, I should be crying. I should be weak and pathetic and reliant on people.

But I’m not. I feel liberated. My old life was nice but it was full of death and sadness. I have Juliet and Mikey. They are alive, healthy, and beautiful and I love them. If death brought on this new pathway of my life, I’m sure as hell going to follow it.

“Hi. I’m wondering if I can buy a handgun.” I say, to the guy at the counter. He’s got a beard and smells like a sewer.

“Yeah, you can. You know which one you want?” He said, looking at my eye. I was fidgeting, and he could tell.

“No clue.”

“Do you know anything about guns?”

I shrugged my shoulders. “I want to be a good shot. My dad was a good shot. He used handguns.” I said to the guy.

“Fair enough. What’s your name then?”

“I’m Gerard Way.” I said, putting my hand out for him to shake.

“No fucking shit. We went to high school together. I’m Lawrence, Lawrence Shale.” And we shake hands, as I relive a bit of my high school experience to remember this Lawrence Shale.

He was an acid-head, also into rock and roll. We went to see The Doors with a bunch of girls my senior year, he’d just graduated. Everyone was really high, I slept with a bunch of girls. It was a pretty good night.

“Yeah, I remember you.”

“You were fucking weird. You almost killed that guy for calling your brother a faggot.” Lawrence said. I remembered that. This kid went up to grade nine Mikey, started calling him a faggot, pushing him around, and I hit the kid with a baseball bat until he fell to the ground.

“I’m protective about my family.” I say. “Always will be.”

“You got a wife, kids?” Lawrence asks me. “My fiancée’s pregnant. First kid.”

I smiled nervously. “I did.”

“What, did she leave you?”
“She died a long time ago.” I said, choosing my words carefully. Didn’t want the guy selling me weapons to think I was a nutcase, let alone a murderer.

“Condolences.” Lawrence mumbled.

“I have a girlfriend. Her name’s Juliet.” I smiled.

“Younger?” He said. I raised my eyebrows. “What, you’re almost forty and you look twenty five. You’d be an idiot not to go younger.”

I smirked. “Yeah, she’s younger. Anyways, handguns. What’s easy to use?”

Forty minutes later, I have a gun, and I’m in a bar with Lawrence at 5 in the early evening. He got me a glass of Whiskey and we caught up about life. Probably not good to get drunk with a gun. I wasn’t planning on shooting anyone, yet.

“Your girlfriend, what does she look like?” He asks me.

“Kind of short, black hair. We just started dating recently.”

“So you don’t have any pictures of her. Let’s look her up on Facebook. What’s her last name.”

“Finn, Juliet Finn.” I smiled. I wondered how she would feel, me openly calling her my girlfriend. I guess she probably would find it awkward. I should ask her, to be my girlfriend.

Lawrence slid his phone across the bar to me. “This your girl?” I picked it up. That was her, but she looked different. She looked like she was dying. I know she’s a small, skinny girl who needs to eat more but here she looked like she was dying. Her hair was still dark but not black, it was a bit of a dark brown, and she was wearing what looked like a party dress, very tight, very short. She was with a friend too, an overweight blonde girl. I wondered if they were still friends. I noticed she hadn’t changed her status in over a year, so none of this was that current.

“What time is it?” He asks me and I check the time. 5:10. I could have waited longer, but it was time. I knew what was to be done. I was a man with a mission.

“Lawrence, this was awesome, can I ask for a favour?” I said, raising my eyebrows.

“Yeah sure, whatever you want man, you did pay for all these drinks.” I smiled at him. Good guy.

“Punch me in the face. Hard enough for there to be a bruise and some blood, but miss the nose and the teeth.” I said, eyes wide as possible.

“You sure, dude?” He said. He was probably too nice. Fuck.

I slapped his cheek, hard. Enough for him to react. He punched, me under the eye, and much harder than I could have ever possibly slapped him. I was pretty weak.

“Thank you. I’ll call you sometime, tell me if there’s a high school reunion coming up or something.” And with that, I finally left. Big black eye, a little speck of blood, and into the cab.

I gave a driver an address I’d frequented too many times in the past few days. Helene’s.

Walking up the to the doorstep, I prepared the plan. The one I fabricated while pretending to be sad with Mikey and Juliet. The plan was perfect. It was smart. It was important. And it was my freedom from that story that Helene used to get us all into her pity party. She took advantage of us. She came up with the story and we were sad and crazy enough to believe it. And now I was free. Thanks to Mikey and Juliet’s rendez-vous.

I barely pressed the doorbell when Helene opened the door, in a baggy tee shirt, pink sweatpants, and a large glass of soda. Her hair was a bit ratty, and she looked tired.

“Oh my god, your face! Come inside.” I was hustled inside and sat on a high stool in her kitchen.

“Let me just go upstairs to get some ice.” She walked up the stairs, and returned a few seconds later with a ziplock full of ice. “What happened to you, Gerard? Did you get in some sort of fight? Have you been attacked?”

“Fuck you.” And I pulled out the gun, pressed it to her head, and shot her in the side of the head. She dropped to the ground and I fell backwards. Lawrence did say that thing about “recoil” or whatever. There was blood all over Juliet’s shirt, my hair, and my face. I didn’t feel dirty, I felt powerful. Who cares that my evidence was all over this apartment? I was here earlier, with everyone else as alibis.

I walked out the back door and into the ravine behind Helene’s house, somehow finding a street and stumbling my way into wherever I would go.

Just for a moment, the world is my bitch.

Notes

So G killed H.

yeah...did not edit this so let's play a game: find the continuity errors XD