It’s incredible to me how fast time flies. Today is the day of my graduation, and I’ve never been more nervous or anxious in my entire life. My mom and I have talked about my plans for when I graduate. I told her I’m moving out of the state, but I didn’t tell her that it was going to be with Gerard. I know how she feels about him, and I didn’t want to argue with her on my big day. She was so proud of me, and it made me ecstatic to see her like that. We had spent the last few days getting small furniture for the new apartment I would be getting (with Gee). I had everything packed and ready to go, and I decided that once I was graduated, I would tell my mom about Gerard. It would be easier if I told her about how he had helped me after what Max did to me.
I had finally come to terms with what happened. He did something horrible to me that no one deserves, and it wasn’t my fault. It was his fault, because he decided to take advantage of me. I had trusted him and he ruined it. I still have faint dark marks on my body from where the hickeys had been, but they were going away, and soon, so would my brokenness. I just had to move on and continue with my life, because there is no going back to change anything. It just happened.

My mom and I had just pulled up to the school and we were walking to the back of the building. The graduation was being held outside since it was so nice out today. The sight was truly amazing. My school was absolute shit, but they didn’t fuck around when it came to decorations.
There were white chairs all over the back lawn, a large black stage with white banners all over it, and there were small flowers all over the grass. It was colorful, and promising. We were early, so there wasn’t many people there, so my mom got a seat in the front row, which she was happy about. I sat with her for a while, just talking while more and more people started showing up. After a while, my mom had realized she forgot her camera at home.
“Shit. Frankie, I’m gonna have to run home and get it before this starts. I need pictures.”
I shook my head at her. “No mom, it’s okay I can run home and grab it. If you leave, you’ll lose your seat. Just give me the keys and I’ll be back in ten minutes.”
She reluctantly handed me the keys and gave me a great thank you. I smiled at her before leaving my seat and walking down the long aisle of chairs that were beginning to fill up. I spotted Gerard and smiled at him. He was wearing a dress shirt with a loosely tied tie, and jeans. He looked amazing, as always. He gave me a confused look when he saw that I was leaving.
I made it to the car, and started it up, then began the familiar route to my small house.
I pulled into the driveway and walked to the front door. I unlocked it, then quickly began to look for my mom’s camera. I walked into the living room but didn’t see it, so I decided to check her room.
I got to the top of the stairs and walked past my room. I saw a flash of red and stopped dead in my tracks, then turned to look in my room. Max was sitting on my bed. The flash of red was his shirt.
I felt my heart pick up. I wanted to turn and run, but I couldn’t move. He was staring at me with a blank expression. I was terrified. He got up off of my bed and walked toward me.
He shoved me against the wall and I heard the glass from a picture frame behind me break. I cringed, and moved to run, but he was big and held me in place.
He got up close to my face. “Because of you and your stupid fucking mom, the cops are looking for me. I don’t get to graduate, and I’m going to go to fucking jail if they catch me!” He screamed in my face. I stared right up at him and did the worst thing I could have done. I spat on him. He grabbed me by my jacket and threw me to the floor, and jumped on top of me. He threw punches at me left and right. Then he stood up off of me, and I thought he was going to let me go, but the thought left my head when I heard his pants unzip. Only one thing ran through my head. I’m going to miss my graduation.

Gerard’s POV
“You guys ready to go?” I asked Lindsey and Jimmy as they were sitting down in the living room.
“Yeah, let's go and get this done! I am so fucking ready to be done with school forever.” Lindsey said cheerfully. They had their caps and gowns on, and we all piled into my car. I was incredibly happy for my friends. They had come a long way. and they deserved to graduate.

When we got to the school, we took a few pictures of ourselves flipping it off, then walked to the back where the graduation was being held. “So they gave us four shitty ass years of school, but I guess they make up for it in decor.” Jimmy laughed. The lawn looked really great, and way too formal for a bunch of shitty teens. It was only an hour before it started, so Jimmy and Lindsey had to go sit with the rest of the graduates. As they were walking away, I glanced over at Frank as he was walking toward the parking lot. He smiled at me, but I just wanted to know why he was leaving when he was about to graduate.

I spent the next hour chatting with different people. What really struck me was that not one of them asked why I wasn’t graduating with them. I guess everyone just knew that I was a fucking failure.
The graduation started with a crazy long speech from the principal, and it was so boring that I almost fell asleep. I spent the whole time imagining that a shark would come out of the ground and eat him in one bite. Finally, he started calling out names. When it got to Lindsey, I jumped out of my chair and screamed while blowing an airhorn. I had to be the one cheering for her because her parents didn’t show up. It was fine, though. At least someone let her know that their proud.
I sat back down and tried to tune out the rest until I heard “Frank Iero”. I glanced up to see him, but he wasn’t there. The principal waited for a few seconds before calling his name again. He wasn’t here. I caught his mom looking around for him.
The principal carried on calling out names. I stood up and walked to the parking lot to see if I could spot Frank or his car, maybe he just didn’t know it had started already.
It was nowhere to be found. When I turned around, I was met with a pair of familiar brown eyes. They weren’t Frank’s, but his mother’s.
“Hello, Linda”
“Gerard, Frank left to get my camera from our house over an hour ago.”
“And he still isn’t back?”
“No, and I’m worried about him. I know we don’t get along well, but we both care about him. I’m going to go get the police in a while, but I want you to go to my house, and if Max is there, I want you to fucking kill him.”
I pulled out my keys and began walking toward my car. I got into the driver’s seat and the passenger and the back door both opened. I looked over, shocked. Lindsey and Jimmy both got into the car. “What the hell?” I asked. “You’re fucking crazy if you think we’re letting you do this alone.” Lindsey said.
“But Jimmy hasn’t even gotten his diploma yet.” I glanced at Jimmy and he held up a piece of paper. “I snagged it before we left. We noticed Linda follow you after Frank didn’t show, so we put the pieces together. Now enough chat. Start the car. Let’s go save Frank.”

Notes

Here's a sort of extra long chapter for you guys. Sorry for making you all wait a month for an update so, here's two of them. Thank you all for those amazing comments, by the way. It means a lot to me that you guys like the story and my writing. This story was actually just going to be a one shot, based off of the first two chapters, but I had more ideas that eventually developed into what it is now. There's still a few more chapters left, so thanks again for reading.
comment, rate, subscribe
Stay Rad
-Goth Claudia