The Light Behind His Eyes (Frerard)

I reluctantly walked out of the bathroom and followed Mikey to the living room, where we both sat down on one of the sofas across from the coffee table. My whole body seemed to have sank into the cushions of the couch, not daring to shift. Right now I am calmer and more collected than I was just a few minutes ago in the bathroom, where I just about puked my insides out. Despite that, I still feel weary and devastated after what just happened downstairs between me and Gerard. Every single second of it is wired into my memory, painstakingly playing over again inside my head. I've seen my fair share of horror films, but I swear to Christ on his throne-being chased by a complete psychopath with a baseball bat is a hell of a lot different in real life than it is in the movies, and of course, a lot more terrifying.
“You want some water?” Mikey asked, glancing over at me. “You definitely don't look so good,”
Well, no shit. I almost got murdered. I'm not gonna be looking so fantastic, now am I?
“Sure,” I replied.
None of this makes sense. Now that I know exactly what kind of person lives down there, why would the others just let him make it at home there? He doesn't belong here, he belongs in a goddamn loony bin.
Okay...no. I take that back. That's just awful. I've been in a place like that before...and it made being homeless look like living in the Taj Mahal, and that's saying a lot. With that being said, where does Gerard belong? Not here, that's for sure…
“Here,” Mikey handed me a glass of ice water. I grabbed it out of his hand and took a huge gulp of it, feeling the water wash over my dry and sore throat.
“Thank you,” I said. “Really needed that,”
“No problem,” Mikey sat down across from me on another couch, glancing at me as I laid sprawled out on the one in front of him, staring up at the ceiling.
“So, uh...Frank,” Mikey said, clearing his throat. “I think I should begin by asking this…what was Gerard like the first night you met him?”
A hell of a lot different than the way he was just recently, of course. Almost like a completely different person.
“Well…” I glanced over at Mikey, yet again playing the memories of me and Gerard in my head. “I told you that he wanted me to stay down with him for the night, because he felt lonely, right?”
“Yeah, you did,” Mikey nodded. “which is definitely out of the usual. Whenever anyone else here would go down and try to talk to him, he'd tell us to get the hell out,”
“Well, he was like that at first. But when I asked him to come up and join the party with everyone else, he just apologized and told me he couldn’t, because there was apparently too much people up there,”
“Well...that's only half of the truth,” Mikey scratched the back of his head.
“What do you mean?” I asked, taking another sip of my water.
“Well...one of the biggest reasons why he refuses to leave the basement is because…,” Mikey sighed, his eyes forlorn and full of hidden guilt. “he thinks that people are out to get him. That basement is his hiding place from those people,”
“What kind of people?”
“The authorities. The police. The FBI. The CIA. The whole damn government. The list goes on, man,” Mikey rubbed his forehead. “Nothing outta the average for a schizoid, thinking all these big names are out to get him,”
I'm honestly not surprised. It's very sad to know he's really that messed up in the head, but I don't have a hard time believing it's true. After all, this is the same guy that chased me out of his filthy basement with a baseball bat.
“Well, he never told me anything like that when I was around him,” I said, crossing my legs on the couch.
“Well, Frank…can you tell me more about what he did talk to you about?” Mikey leaned in, his legs crossed as well.
Alright. Now I feel like I'm with a shrink, that said shrink being Mikey, and me being the patient lying on the couch, being asked questions. Seriously. All Mikey needs is a notepad and pen to top it all off.
“Well...Gerard kinda became a little more social when I asked him to come and hang out with me for a bit on his couch. We kinda just talked about all kinds of stuff-art, horror movies, personal life- y’know what I'm saying?”
“What do you mean by ‘personal life’, Frank?”
Oh, sweet mother of Christ. Maybe Mikey should have gone for a psychology major rather than play bass and sell comic books for a living.
“Mikey...what I mean by that is I kinda went into detail about how I ended up here. I don't have to go into detail about that, do I?”
“No, you don’t. Ray already told me and Bob,”
Good. One less emotional meltdown for me.
“So, Frank...how did he react to that?” Mikey pushed up his glasses, eyes still focused on me.
“What, like how he reacted to me getting all personal and stuff?”
“Yeah, that,”
“He…well, I guess the best way I can put it is...he was consoling. Y’know, he took it all well, pretty much,”
Mikey nodded, looking down as if taking in all the information I just gave him about his brother. He then glanced up at me again, readjusting his glasses a second time.
“So, what you're saying is that he wasn't aggressive towards you up until...well, that one thing happened, right?”
“Pretty much, I guess. There were a few times he seemed a little...off. Like, sometimes he avoided some questions I asked him. Then there was this one time on the first night where I swear he was talking to himself, but other than that...he was alright. Overall, shy at first, but as we talked more, he opened up a bit,”
Are the questions over yet? Please, tell me it's all over. Right now I'm getting too many vibes from when I was in the psych ward and had to go to weekly appointments with a shrink.
“You know what, Frank?” Mikey crossed his arms.
“What?” I replied, taking another sip of my water.
“I don't think I've ever seen my brother be like that around anyone…”
“What? You don't think I'm lying, do you?”
“No, I don't. I'm just saying that...okay, this may sound strange to you, but there might have been something about you that made him...well, click, I guess,”
“Really? Because what I pretty much did was just encourage him to come outta his room and hang out, and he did. He told me he was lonely, and...when I came back the next night, he told me he appreciated me being there to talk to him and being there for him, when no one else would,”
I think after saying that I instantly perplexed Dr. Mikey, the shrink.
“What?”
“Yeah, man. That's what he said. This is what I've been trying to tell you earlier. All he wanted was someone to be with him. He needed it, and I just so happened to be that someone…”
We both sat in silence, Mikey still holding the same bewildered look on his face. He ran a hand through his hair, looking as frustrated as an honors student in an advanced calculus class.
“So...if Gerard was really like this with you when you were around him...what made him snap?”
I could barely get myself to open up my mouth. So much guilt just flooded over me, making me crash and burn. Gerard may have undoubtedly been responsible for attacking me, but...I'm the one that triggered him. I'm the one that tried weaseling too much information outta him. My own curiosity almost got me killed.
“I...I asked him some questions…”
“What kind of questions?” Mikey asked.
“I...asked him how he knew Ray and Bob. I asked him how he came about to moving in here with the rest of us...I asked him too much, too soon…” I buried my face in my hands, wishing I could hide my own pathetic, ugly face forever.
“Frank…” Mikey sighed. “It's not that you asked him too much too soon. You just asked questions that he really didn't wanna answer. You asked him questions that...reminded him of some of the things that happened to him…”
“But, what exactly did I remind him of? What did happen to your brother, Mikey?” I asked.
Mikey’s whole body seemed to have froze. After what seemed like several minutes, he slowly took off his glasses, wiped the lens off with his shirt, then put them back on. I could easily tell by the discontent in his eyes that he really, really doesn’t wanna talk about it, but has no other choice.
“Alright, Frank...now this is what I’ve been told by Ray to talk to you about, but...I really didn’t want to…”
“Why not?”
“I think after I tell you everything, you’ll understand why,”
“Alright,” I finished my water. “I’m listening,”
Mikey folded his hands, looking down at the ground, then back up at me, the same sullen look on his face.
“When me and my brother were little kids...our mom and dad were murdered...right in front of us,”
I just about dropped my empty glass on the floor after hearing what Mikey just said. The butterflies in my stomach returned, just as strong as last time.
“What?” I gasped. “Oh my god...I’m so sorry,”
“Don’t be,” Mikey shook his head. “It was a long time ago. Besides, you had nothing to do with it,”
“I know, but still...that’s awful,”
It’s starting to make sense now. That was why Gerard avoided talking about his parents earlier. They were fucking murdered. Right in front of him. That’s why he yelled daddy and mama when he had his...well, “episode”. Christ, there are just some days where I despise the hell outta my mom and dad, but God forbid if they ever died in such a gruesome way…
“I had to be like five when it happened. Gerard was eight, I think,” Mikey said, his eyes avoiding contact from mine.
“How were they...you know, killed? I mean, if it’s alright if I ask-”
“Burglars,” Mikey interrupted, his voice shaky. “Two guys broke in our house while we were all asleep. We all went in the living room to see what was going on and...there’s not much I can remember after that, but…I do remember our mom hiding us in the closet and locking the door to keep us safe…and after that...everything else became a blur. I can’t even remember how they were killed…which is a good thing, I guess...”
I take back all the times I’ve been shitty with Mikey lately. I feel like such a dickhead right now. I don’t even know what to say. I just stood there silently, watching Mikey gradually become more and more uncomfortable talking about his and Gerard’s fucked up childhood.
“We never saw each other for a long time after we were found by the police. We got separated by the foster system. We both grew up in different homes. I didn’t get to see my brother until I was eighteen…”
“When was that?” I asked.
It was at that moment where I swear, Mikey looked like he was trying his hardest not to cry.
“When I found out he murdered three kids at his high school…” Mikey choked.
My jaw nearly hit the ground. I just about shat bricks hearing what just came outta Mikey’s mouth.
Oh my god...I haven’t just been hanging around with a guy with mental issues...I’ve been hanging out with a fucking murderer!
“It happened on his eighteenth birthday-April 9th, 1995. Supposedly, the victims were all people that bullied Gerard really bad. The court said that Gerard killed them all in self-defense because they all attacked him, but...they declared him mentally incompetent to stand trial…”
“What? Why?” I asked. “If it was self-defense, then shouldn’t he have been declared as not guilty?”
“Because...” Mikey paused. “It was because of the way he murdered his victims...and the way he was when he was caught. He didn’t try escaping. When the police found him in the local park near the school...he was lying in the ground near the bodies...with the decapitated head of one of the victims wrapped in his arms like a teddy bear...and he was smiling…”
I felt my insides turn to jelly. I’ve never been one to become grossed out or disgusted easily, but I swear I feel like I’m gonna throw up again. I just cannot imagine someone like Gerard-despite being as fucked up in the head as he is-literally decapitating someone and using it as a stuffed animal. Knowing that someone like that lives in your own fucking house is a thousand times scarier than the shit you see in the movies, or wherever else.
“They said that he wouldn’t speak a single word when he was in custody of the police. They just said that he’d either stare off in the distance or just laugh out of nowhere for no reason…so obviously since he was so messed up in the head, he was committed to a state psychiatric hospital, where he’d get treatment so he would eventually be able to stand trial...and that’s where I got to see him…”
A full-out state hospital? Jesus. Just hearing those two words make me wanna cringe, knowing my past experiences with being locked up in a psychiatric center. But the place where I was at was only at a psychiatric unit at a general hospital, not a full-fledged mental institution, where they keep the criminally insane. I don’t think I can even imagine how much worse it is at a place like that, compared to where I was at for a mere two and a half weeks or so. How in the hell was Mikey even allowed to visit Gerard in such a place?
“What was he like when you saw him?” I asked.
“I can't remember much, because it was such a long time ago, but...I do know I was eighteen. Gerard was twenty-one at the time. It was around Christmas time when I went to visit him,”
Mikey closed his eyes and took a deep breath, held it in, then slowly exhaled, as if meditating.
“When I got to the hospital to visit him, they made me wait for him in the day room. I wasn't allowed to visit him in his room...and for good reason,”
“Why’s that?”
“Well, first off, it's part of the rules for visitors. Also...his doctor told me he hadn't been doing too well lately, so I couldn’t see him for very long,”
“Oh...I see,”
“The aides brought him out in a wheelchair. They told me he was so out of it, he was shiftless, almost as if he were catatonic. He obviously looked like he wasn't all there in the head. He barely even made eye contact with me. He looked so...lost…”
“Didn't you try telling him who you were?”
“Of course I did!” Mikey exclaimed. “I was like, ‘hey, Gerard. It’s me, Michael, your little brother. Remember me?’ And he just sat there, totally confused. I told him that I haven't seen him since we were little, but he just kept sitting there, giving me the silent treatment. His mind was clearly off in another world…”
The more Mikey talked about his brother, the harder it became for him to hold back his tears. Part of me feels like a jerk for making Mikey tell me about Gerard, but...I need to know what I'm up against. I need to know more about the man that tried attacking me earlier. I need to know what made Gerard become so damaged. But still...seeing Mikey so torn up about what happened to him and his brother is just so hard to watch, it’s almost soul-wrenching.
“Mikey,” I said. “If you really don't wanna talk about it, that’s fine. I understand,”
“No, Frank,” Mikey sniffled. “I have to tell you. I have to tell you so that you know just what kind of person he is. If only I told you everything earlier, none of this would have happened...But it’s better late than never, I suppose,”
“That's true, but...I feel so bad for making you feel this way. I feel so bad for making you tell me all this about Gerard. I can't imagine how hard it must be to talk about him-”
“Whoever said talking about my brother was gonna be easy, Frank?” Mikey interrupted, accusing me. “I told you, I didn't wanna have to talk about this, but I have to...since you were just so damn curious. But at least now...you know what he's really like. Now I think you see why Ray and I begged you to not go down there, right?”
As much as I cannot stand being given the “told you so” treatment from Mikey, I really hate to say this...but he's right. I was a fool for going against his word. My own curiosity and selfishness not only almost got me killed, but it made Gerard's little brother be forced to look back at painful memories. And because of all that, I feel like a miserable piece of shit.
“Anyway…,” Mikey continued, not letting me answer his question. “When I saw Gerard, he didn't look too well either. In fact, far from it. I could barely even recognize him, since I haven’t seen him since he was a little kid. He looked like something the cat threw up...he was just a complete mess…”
Probably no different than how he was when I first saw him, I thought to myself. I can just envision what he must've looked like when he saw Mikey for the first time in several years; long and messy black hair, sunken eyes, ghostly pale skin, bruised face, and frail body. The only difference there probably was was his age and likely wearing a hospital gown instead of a black T-shirt and pajama pants.
“So, when I tried to get him to recognize me, nothing worked. I was about to give up, until he suddenly looked up at me and stared. He reached across the table and grabbed my glasses, then took them off. Of course, I can barely see without these things on,” Mikey pointed to his glasses, tapping on then lightly. “I told him to please give them back to me, and I tried explaining to him that I need them to see, but he just continued to stare at me...then, he finally spoke…”
“What did he say?”
“He...he said…,” Mikey stuttered. “He said my name...he said Michael...then he said Mikey, like how he always called me when we were kids. He never recognized me with glasses, since I never had to wear them until I was like twelve. It was then in that moment that I think he finally remembered who I was...and that’s when he lost it…,”
By his point, Mikey was literally shaking...and all I could do was sit there and watch in complete shock as I listened to him tell me about his experience visiting brother.
“He started to hit himself in the head and yell at himself...like he was trying to fight one of the voices in his head or something. When I tried to calm him down, he just screamed at me. He tried to grab me and kept telling me ‘don’t look, Mikey…they’re both dead’, over and over again. At first, I didn’t know what he was talking about...but I noticed he also kept yelling “daddy” and “mama” constantly. He was having a traumatic flashback of what happened to our parents so many years ago...He was just so hysterical that the aides ran in and held him down to sedate him. He just wouldn’t stop screaming and crying...and-and thrashing, and rambling, and hitting himself. It was at that moment I knew I had to leave. I just couldn't bear to see him like that…”
“I don't blame you. He was almost the same exact way with me when he…” I stopped myself, knowing the more we talked about Gerard, the more upset Mikey became. “I'm really sorry, man. I truly am,”
“I really don't know what made him that way,” Mikey said through chattering teeth, his face contorted with tearful anguish. “I know it can be very traumatizing when your parents are murdered right in front of you. It messed me up for a while. I still get nightmares about it from time to time, but I got help. I've learned to accept it and move on, but...based off how I saw Gerard was in the hospital, and how he is now especially...I highly doubt he got any kind of help. If anything...I think that the complete opposite happened with him,”
“You mean, like, when you guys were both in foster homes?”
“Yeah, pretty much. Not to say it was a bed of roses for me growing up, but...it wasn't outright terrible. So, what I'm saying is...a lot of really bad things must've happened to Gerard, even though I don't know what exactly...but I think that's why he's the way he is,”
That's undeniably true. There's no way that something that happened to him so many years ago could have messed him up that bad. From what I remember learning in psychology class in high school (when I paid attention, at least), memories of very traumatic events are often repressed deep into the unconscious mind, sometimes to the point where it’s barely remembered, or even not remembered at all (but hey, I could be wrong. After all, I’m a 23 year-old college dropout, not a psychologist). It wasn’t just one thing that made him such a basket case, but a series of awful things...but the question is, what did exactly happen to him?
“How long was he in the state hospital? How did he get out?”
“I'm not entirely sure, to be honest,” Mikey shrugged, seeming a little more calm and collected than before...but only a little bit. “He was eighteen when he did what he did to those kids, and it wasn't until a few years later when I got to see him in the hospital, and...it wasn't until another few or so years later when I got to see him again, this time when Ray brought him here…”
“Really?” My eyes lit up. “So Ray knew him too?”
“Apparently. He told me he knew Gerard when they were both in high school,”
“But I don't think I ever saw Gerard in high school. Come to think of it, I don't think he even went to the same school as us,”
“No, he didn't. Gerard went to a school called Monroeville High, which isn't far from where you and Ray went. I was homeschooled, though,”
“So how did Ray know Gerard then?”
“Ray told me he would occasionally hang out with some friends at a place called Monroeville park, where he would sometimes find Gerard at, and I guess that's how their relationship started,”
“Was he any different in high school than he is now?”
“That, I'm not sure. I would ask Ray myself, but at this rate...that's not a good idea,” Mikey sighed.
Obviously, it isn't a good idea, especially now. I swear, if Mikey tells Ray anything about what the hell just happened...I'm gonna snap.
“From what little that Ray's told me in the past, he recalled Gerard being very shy, of course. And a good artist. He said that Gerard would always be sitting on a bench under a tree, drawing in his sketchbook,”
“Of course. Drawing really seems to be Gerard's thing. He's honestly a really good artist, man. You should see some of his work,”
“Yeah,” Mikey smiled briefly, nodding his head in approval. “He is. So I guess that based off how Ray has always been, he hung around Gerard out of sympathy for him, seeing how he was such an outcast. And because of Ray's sympathy...that was why Ray brought Gerard to live with us,”
“Where did he find Gerard?” I asked.
“Well…he told me he found Gerard out in the streets downtown,”
“Seriously? Like how he found me?”
“Well, Ray told me he found you hanging out in a bar, if I’m not mistaken…” Mikey paused. “But for Gerard...Ray found him in an alley, hiding in a cardboard box…”
“Oh...jesus,” I sighed. I guess that’s another thing me and Gerard have in common; we both know what it’s like to be homeless. “If that's so, how did Gerard get out of the hospital?” I asked.
“Again, I don't know. When I tried asking Gerard about it, he told me he was discharged...which I honestly think is a lie. Gerard still had to stand trial for the murders, so the hospital wouldn't just let him go, obviously. He didn’t even have a home when Ray found him,”
“Huh,” I scratched my head, bewildered by such a statement. “That’s strange. You don’t think he escaped, do you?”
“Oh, heaven forbid if that were the case. The place where Gerard was at was a high-security institution, so I don’t think it would’ve been that easy for him to escape…”
“That’s true,” I nodded. “So, when Gerard relocated here, was he always a hermit? Did he just decide to start living in the basement and never wanted to come out?”
“Oh, yeah. Definitely. We told him he can sleep in the basement since there’s a spare bedroom, and he pretty much made it at home down there. We tried to get him to come out a little more and join the living upstairs, but he flat out refused. We tried convincing him to get a job, but...that didn’t work well. It's not like he would really be able to get one anyway, considering his criminal background and his mental state. Hell, there were times he grew physically violent with us whenever we tried to get him to come out, which was mainly why we kept telling you to not bother him. We all just kinda gave up after a while, because it was clear to us that he was not gonna change,”
“And you guys were all okay with that? You don’t mind him living down there?” I asked, getting more and more skeptical the more Mikey told me about the antisocial, jobless roommate.
“Well, what can we do, Frank? We can’t just kick him out. He’d have no place to go. Besides, I don’t think I can ever do that to my brother. If I could’ve had my way, I would have had him sent back to a mental institution, but doing that is easier said than done…”
“How so?”
I think at this point Mikey gave up on trying to hold back his tears. He took off his glasses and dabbed at his eyes, crying in silence.
“What do you mean ‘how so’?” He pouted. “Can you imagine sending off your one and only brother to a fucking mental institution, where you’ll likely never see or hear from them again? I know it sounds like the right thing to do, considering how sick he is, but...it’s just so hard. I really, really wanna give him another chance to get better, I really do, Frank. But after he’s shown his true colors to us, especially to you...I’ve just about lost all hope. I don’t even know what we’re supposed to do with him anymore. I just really hate having to give up on him, but...it’s become clear to me that he’s a lost cause at this point…”
I really don’t know what to say. After all that Mikey has told me about Gerard, I’m at a loss for words. All this time, Ray and Mikey were hiding Gerard from me like a dirty secret; a dirty secret that they both can barely face themselves; a dirty secret that’s so messed up, but so beautiful at the same time.
A dirty secret that’s not hopeless like Mikey says.
“Mikey...I’m really sorry. I’m so sorry for being so ignorant all this time,” I said.
“It’s alright, Frank,” Mikey replies, the tears in his eyes gone. “At least, now you know…”
I do know. But I don’t know enough. I still need answers. I’m not ready to put this whole thing to rest just yet.
“Now that all that is behind us...I’m gonna go back to bed. I’ve got work in the afternoon,” Mikey stood up from the couch.
“Alright, man. See you later,” I waved as Mikey walked outta the living room and down the hall to his bedroom.
“Night, Frank,” Mikey said before closing his bedroom door.
I laid back down on the couch, not even bothering to change into a pair of pajamas before crashing for the night. I know what I’m gonna do tomorrow morning on my day off from work.
I’m gonna find more answers about Gerard.

Notes