If You're Real

- - -

So I guess my first and second sessions today are group therapy. Well fuck that. I walk away from the Group room and downstairs.

"Gerard! I've been looking for you!" calls Dr Hevan. She's my main doctor and keyworker. "Oh, hi," I reply, irritated. What does this bitch want now? "Gerard," she says sweetly, "you're going to be changing to a new doctor next week! Isn't that exciting! He's a new doctor and we think he might be able to help you."

What? Seriously? Like another annoying new doctor is going to help me at all. Dr Hevan obviously sees my annoyance in my expression and frowns. "Well why aren't you happy!?" she demands. That bitch, I bet she's happy to get rid of me when I get sent to this new doctor. I plaster on a fake grin. "Great," I manage to say in the most cheerful tone possible.

- - -

I totally skive group therapy sessions. Instead I get my guitar and find a quiet corner where nobody can see me; then I start playing. I like playing songs I made up myself. I've never been great at guitar but my strong point is singing - I sing loudly, confidently and with as much emotion as I can.

Soon I'm strumming the strings so hard they might break and I'm lost in the song. the words are my release, my way of telling the world how I feel.

I'm not good with words. I can't write, I'm awkward and I'm shy. But I love to draw and sing so it makes up for it. My voice is rough and deep and layered with notes; it's my thoughts spilled out in the air. As I sing I close my eyes and swish my long tangled hair out of my face when my long bangs fall into my eyes.

But would anyone notice
Would anyone care
Would anything matter
If you're already dead
And should I be shocked now
By the last thing you said
When I pull this trigger,
You eyes vacant and stained...

I carry on strumming my guitar and suddenly I see someone walking round the corner. Who the fuck... oh my god it's that little fuck I keep hallucinating! My hands drop and we are covered in sudden silence. The guy's wearing this jacket that hugs his waist and I glimpse tattoos on his lean arms. I can't deny this guy is drop dead gorgeous.

He walks up to me. Can I control him? Is he a creation of my mind? Is he real this time?

I reach out, wanting to touch him and my hand is drawn to his hair. A curl of chocolate, messy hair has fallen over his eyes again. I take the strand in my fingers and run them along it, breathing in his scent of aftershave and the sea, it fills my mouth. I look into his big hazel eyes and can't help myself, I feel a strike of electricity and there's just this tension in the air.

I looks back at me, speechless as if he's never seen me before and I'm just standing there motionless. He can't be real, he's too perfect, the way he is so mysterious.

"Are you real?" I whisper. I sound weak, broken... not how I wanted to sound. I blink and suddenly realize I'm touching a guy's hair. I step back blushing profusely. A perfect, beautiful guy is standing in front of me and staring, frowning at my face and just grabbed his silky hair and ran my fingers through it. Wait, I actually touched it.

Shit, I think he is real this time.
"I'm real." he says quietly. He is obviously confused. He is furrowing his brow and an emotion I don't know is filling his eyes.
"I'm real, why wouldn't I be real?" he repeats. He says it gently, understandingly. Oh my god, his voice is amazing, it sounds like perfection... it's slightly raspy and makes me dizzy. A small sound escapes my lips; it's not a moan but it's like a mumble or something.

Holy shit, he's real. I step back so quickly I almost fall over.

"I'm so sorry," I say more confidently, but I can still tell I sound flustered. "I know you," I say cheerfully, "I saw you yesterday standing by my room. You were here, remember?" I smile at the floor, trying to break the awkwardness. I refuse to make eye contact with him again. I know my hands are shaking.

He frowns again. "I wasn't here yesterday," he says. "And I've never seen you in my life." He pauses. "What's your name?"

What? "I recognize you," I reply back. "I know you. I said hi to you and you disappeared. Who are you anyway?" I actually start wondering who the fuck he is.

"I'm Dr Iero," he says politely and with a smile. "I'm a new doctor here at the adolescent ward,... and who are you?" he asks softly. This guy is killing me.

"My name is Gerard Way." I reply. I'm so self-conscious, I'm wringing my hands and looking down at them. He notices and smiles reassuringly, and his grin spreads wider as he realizes something else. "Oh, Gerard, you're my new patient! I only have one of the patients here, and it just happens to be you! Uh... Dr Pipe won't be your doctor anymore."

"Are you... happy?" It seems like he genuinely cares about how I feel. I'm fucking panicking. He's acting like nothing happened just now and he seems really awkward and shy but I know he remembers me fucking touching his hair.

Shit. This is my new doctor? Oh Christ.

"Hey," he says quietly. I look up. "It's okay." he says softly. "I'm here to help you as much as I can."

"And you're my only patient at the moment, so... I guess I can do whatever I want with you," he finishes, throwing me a heart-stopping wink. He did. not. just. say. that. I begin imagining him doing 'whatever he wants' to me and I realize I'm blushing. From the corner of my eye I swear I see a small smirk tugging at his mouth, but then it disappears.

I try to smile at him but my heart is racing so loud I think he can hear it; I feel like I'm going to faint. I don't even think he realizes what he just did to me.

"I did see you yesterday, though," I blurt out. "But I said hi to you... and... uh... the nurse who was with me didn't see you -, she said I was hallucinating but I've never hallucinated people before and I don't understand why I would know what you look like before you even came here." I rush this all out without even thinking before I say it.

Why am I saying everything to this new doctor? He already is more intimate with me than my old doctor ever was. Fuck. "Maybe it was meant to be..." he muses out loud. I freeze and close my eyes, I honestly feel unstable on my feet. "Oh, I-I'm s-sorry, I meant, that's so weird. Maybe you saw someone similar to me?"

I open my eyes and look at his murky ones for one last time. I have to get away from here.

"N-nice to meet you. I'll see you around or something. Bye." I stalk off without looking back and pull my hair. My weird, annoying, ugly, disgusting red hair. If he says anything else I don't hear it.

Notes