FicWad

A/N: So yeah, this is the chapter where I changed from first person to third (from I to he/she). I’m sorry if someone preferred the first person, but I think it was easier for me to write it in third. I don’t remember. It’s been a long time.

Chapter 16: New neighbors

Gia was seriously considering cloning herself so she could manage to do more things at once. At the moment she was desperately trying to empty the dishwasher, make sure the food didn’t burn, keep the neighbor’s cat away from the stove, talk on the phone and set the table at the same time.

“Yeah Frank, I don’t really know what I think about your new shirt”, she groaned and then gasped when she felt the cat scratch her leg. “Stop that! No Frank, not you, I’m very interested in what you have to say. Oh no, the broccoli is burning!” She almost accidentally dropped the phone into the boiling rice water when she tried to stop the broccoli from flaming. Then Gia almost screamed when the phone was taken away from her. She hadn’t even heard her dad get up.

“She’s kinda busy. Yeah I’ll be there later, Frank. Bye”, Gerard said into the phone and hung up. “Jesus, Gia. You’ll kill yourself if you keep this up”, he then said to her, threw the cat one piece of broccoli and then took over the stove.

“Thanks”, Gia sighed and relaxed a bit.

“What’s up with the blood?” he asked, noticing the cut on her leg.

Gia gave the cat a mean glare, but it was too occupied with the broccoli to notice. “The cat hates me.”

“Well, we don’t have to keep him for long anymore. The neighbors are coming back today”, he assured. “Now go clean up the blood and try to relax. No need to kill yourself over lunch.”

“Well maybe I wouldn’t have to if you didn’t sleep until noon.”

Gerard had been working the previous day, and then went out to a bar with the guys. No, he hadn’t come home drunk and pass out in the shower like he used to do, which Gia was of course happy about. She didn’t worry about it. Gerard was a big boy; he was allowed to have a little fun with his friends every now and then.

Gia went to the bathroom to clean up the cut she had on her leg, and while she was there, the doorbell rang.

“I’ll get it!” Gerard shouted from the kitchen and went to open the door.

For a moment, Gia only heard two voices, one that belonged to her dad and the other one of an unknown woman with a really loud and shrill laugh.

“Gia, would you come here for a second”, Gerard called then and Gia of course did as she was asked to. She was done with the cut anyway.

When she saw who was at the door, she gasped. There was that boy from her history class! He was standing there, looking a little gloomy, with a woman who most likely was his mother. They looked nothing like each other though.

“This is my daughter, Gia”, Gerard introduced when he noticed her walking to them.

“No way”, the history class boy gasped. “It’s you!”

“You two know each other?” Gerard asked.

Gia’s cheeks got a little read from embarrassment. “He’s in my history class.”

“Well, he’s now your neighbor as well.”

If she had been eating or drinking, Gia would’ve been choking on it by now. “Huh?” she asked, and her voice was oddly squeaky.

“Hello, my name is Tina. Welcome to the neighborhood”, the woman with the loud voice greeted. Then she put a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “And this is my stepson, Lucas.”

Gia looked at them curiously. Now at least she knew his name. She wouldn’t have to call him ‘the history class boy’ anymore. That was getting tiresome. But what she was wondering about was that why they hadn’t come greet them earlier? Gia and Gerard moved there almost a week ago. Yeah, that’s right. It’s been a week since the whole accidental drug incident, and now they were completely moved into the new house. Everything was in place, all furniture shopping done, and it was slowly starting to feel like home.

“How come we haven’t seen you around earlier?” Gerard asked, voicing Gia’s thoughts. She started to listen to the conversation again.

“Oh, well me and my husband have been away on our honeymoon. We just married”, Tina announced happily, showing them the ring on her finger. “And we just couldn’t leave Lucas alone for whole three weeks, so he has been staying with his aunt. Did I mention the honeymoon was in Paris?”

Gerard was a little baffled by the strange woman, so it took him a while to answer. “Well... Uh... Congratulations on getting married.”

“Thank you! My new husband, Patrick, really wanted to come here to greet you as well, but he just has so much to catch up on at work. He’s an architect, did you know? Oh, which reminds me, I’d love to see what you’ve done with this house! Will you show me around, Gerard? The people who used to live here had no taste at all, and – Lucas and Gia, why don’t you two go play outside while we adults talk.”

Gia stared after her father and Tina with wide eyes, feeling sorry for him. Gia had no problem with people like Tina, but she knew that Gerard was easily annoyed.

“Well?” Lucas asked from the door. “You wanna go play outside? We have a swing set on the backyard. Tina has it specially put up just for me. I’m fourteen, and she thinks I need a swing set.”

Gia wondered if it was a good idea. And besides, she wasn’t done with doing lunch either. “If you can just wait for a sec, I have to do something in the kitchen.”

“I’ll help you”, Lucas said and invited himself in, just like his stepmom. They went to the kitchen and Gia quickly finished the food and put it in the fridge. “Seems we came in a bad time. I told Tina you would be busy, but she said, and I quote, ‘pishposh, who wouldn’t have time for their neighbors’” he explained, speaking in a high pitched mock voice when he quoted Tina. Gia was starting to get the feeling that he wasn’t so fond of his stepmother.

“It’s fine”, Gia said and when she was done with the food, she and Lucas went outside through the back door. He showed her where there was a hole in the tree fence and they went through it into his yard. There was a sand box in the yard and a swing set, like he said there would be, but also a garden. Since it was winter now there were no flowers in the garden but judging by Tina’s personality, Gia was sure that in summer it was filled with flowers. She liked their back yard. It looked so normal.

“So how long have you lived here?” Lucas asked when they sat down on the swings.

“Only for a week. We lived on the other side of town before moving here”, she explained.

“Why’d you move?”

Gia hesitated for a moment before answering. “It’s... complicated”, she finally said and hoped that he wouldn’t ask any more questions.

“Oh I see. So, is it just you and your dad or is there more of you?”

“Just us two.”

“You’re so lucky. I wish my dad never met Tina. Now all he cares about is making her happy while she’s off spending his money.”

Gia didn’t really feel very lucky. She would’ve done anything if her mom could be here too. If she had never killed herself, then maybe, just maybe, Gerard never would’ve started drinking and doing drugs.

“Uh, what about your family? How many of you are there?” she asked, wanting something else to think about.

“Well, there’s my dad, Tina, and I have an older brother, but he’s off in college in Florida. Doesn’t come home much”, he explained. “So it’s just me trying to cope with Tina now. Oh, and of course there’s my pet snake.”

“An actual snake?” Gia asked surprised. She had never seen a live snake, except on TV but that isn’t really the same.

“Yeah. Wanna see it?”

Gia of course wanted, so they went into his house and up the stairs to his room. The house was pretty normal, and Gia could totally see which parts were á la Tina. But when she saw Lucas’ room, she felt like she had come to a whole new world. She couldn’t tell what color the walls were because everywhere she looked, there was a ton of posters of bands she had never even heard of. And the floor was hard to see too. It was covered with clothes and other stuff that belonged to a closet. Lucas took a few armfuls of stuff from the floor and stuffed it under his bed.

“Sorry it’s so messy”, he apologized. “I haven’t really been cleaning up lately... And by lately, I mean the last decade. Oh and by the way, don’t tell Tina I showed you my room. She’ll freak out if she knew a guest saw this mess.”

“I won’t tell”, Gia assured and kept looking around in the room. It was the complete opposite of hers, since Gia preferred to keep her room plain and clean, but still she found his room kinda nice. Lucas had made his room to look like himself.

“And here’s my snake”, Lucas said, brining Gia out of her thoughts. He was standing by a large terrarium and Gia curiously looked into it. There were a lot of plants and even a piece of wood in the terrarium, so at first she didn’t spot the snake. But then she saw it, and gasped.

It was yellow and its eyes were black. Gia got nervous when the snake looked at her. It was like the devil was looking right into her soul. She wondered how Lucas could sleep with that thing in the room. She sure couldn’t. Plus, she was pretty sure that the snake’s eyes glowed in the dark.

“Wanna hold it?” Lucas suddenly asked with a big grin.

“No way!” she protested. There was no chance of her touching that thing. It could kill her!

“Come on, it won’t bite. It’s not poisonous. But if it makes you feel better, I’ll hold the head so it can’t bite.”

And without even waiting for her to say yes, Lucas removed the top glass from the terrarium and gently picked up the yellow creature. “I’m not sure which gender it is so I just call it Snake”, he explained while trying to get a better hold of the snake. “I used to have two snakes but the other one mysteriously disappeared when dad got engaged to Tina. Since then she hasn’t been allowed to come to my room, hence the mess. Now come on, you can hold it.”

“But what if it bites me?” Gia asked nervously.

Lucas just laughed at her question, but she didn’t even care. She was more concerned about the snake looking at her judgingly. “Alright, well you can just pet it if you’re too scared to hold it.”

Gia hesitantly reached out her hand and touched the yellow skin. It wasn’t slimy as she thought it would be, but it still felt cold and disgusting. She made a face, but after a while she got used to it. It was like petting a dog or a cat, only except that a snake had no fluffy fur.

Then they heard a door open and close downstairs, and a man shout. “Anybody home?” the man asked and Lucas quickly put the snake back into the glass box.

“That’s my dad”, he explained. “Come on.”

As they were exiting the bedroom, Gia happened to notice a magazine on the floor among all the other dirt. Her face flushed crimson when she realized that it was one of those magazines that Frank had at his house, those magazines with half nude women on them. Gia decided that it was best if she forgot about it.

Gia followed Lucas down the stairs and when they came to the kitchen to go back to the yard, Gia saw a man with gray in his otherwise black hair. He was clearly important, or at least that’s the impression she got from the suit he was wearing.

“Who is your friend?” the man asked Lucas and got up from the chair by the table to shake hands with Gia. She took his hand and smiled, even though she had went back into her super-shy mode. The man just had an affect like that, he made her nervous, even if he smiled and didn’t look at all mean.

“This is Gia, the new neighbor”, Lucas explained. “Tina’s at her house now, talking with her dad.”

“Oh, well would you go ask Tina to come here soon? I have a present for her”, his dad said. “The present is on the front lawn, why don’t you go see it on your way there?”

“Sure”, Lucas sighed, and for some reason he didn’t look at all happy. Gia followed him, but she was still confused.

“You don’t seem very happy”, she pointed out when they got outside.

“Dad wastes all his money on Tina. How could I be happy about that? It’s like he’s blind”, Lucas said.

When they were going through the hole in the fence again, they caught a glimpse of the present on the front lawn. It was a new silver colored BMW with a huge red present bow on the front. Gia started to understand why Lucas felt the way he did.

“Your dad seems nice though”, Gia said, after a moment of brainstorming for something nice to say.

“He’s alright”, Lucas shrugged. “Nothing compared to your dad though. I mean, to have Gerard Way as a dad... It’s so cool!”

Gia froze in the middle of the yard of her house. “You know who my dad is?”

“Yeah, of course. How could I not? I’m kind of a fan. I’ve known for a while, actually.”

This got her puzzled. How could he know? Gia didn’t exactly go around telling it to people, so no one at school knew. Or that’s what she thought, at least. And Gerard always respected Gia’s wish to stay out of the public eye, so she never went with him anywhere where she knew there would be press, like award shows or concerts and so on. Of course it was impossible to avoid it altogether, so there were some pictures on the internet for example, and Gerard had sometimes been asked about Gia on interviews.

“How did you know that my dad was –“

“Easy”, Lucas interrupted her. “I once saw Mikey pick you up at school. And I knew that Gerard had a daughter around our age. So I put two and two together and there it was.”

However, his explanation only brought more questions to Gia. Did Lucas figure that out before or after he first started paying attention to her? Was Gerard the real reason Lucas even noticed Gia? She decided that it would be really rude to actually ask Lucas those questions, so she decided to do what she always does. Be quiet and suffer.

Hesitantly, Gia started to walk towards the house again and Lucas followed, oblivious to her bothered thoughts and worrying. Perhaps she was getting a bit too good at pretending everything was okay.
After Lucas and Tina left (she squealed of joy when Lucas told her that there was a present for her outside), Gerard slumped down on the couch and sighed of relief.

“Thank god she’s gone”, he said. “I have never before seen anyone get so happy and excited about wallpaper.”

“I thought she was alright”, Gia shrugged.

Too tired to argue, Gerard laid down on the couch and when the neighbor’s cat jumped on his stomach, he started petting it. “Anyway, what did you and that boy do?”

“We just talked. And he showed me his room.”

“You were alone with a boy in his room?” Gerard asked, furrowing his brows. It’s not that he didn’t trust Gia, but hey, he didn’t have to trust a boy he didn’t even know. Gerard had been a teenage boy once too, so he knew what they thought about.

“Yeah. He showed me his snake. I had to touch it too. It was disgusting.”

Gerard shot up to sit on the couch, making the cat meow annoyed and jump down. “He made you touch what?!”

Gia tilted her head, wondering why he was acting so strange. “A snake.”

“Are we talking about an actual snake or is this metaphorical?”

“It was a real snake. Why? What did you think I meant?”

Gerard lay back down again, grabbed a pillow, put it against his face and let out a groan. Gia shrugged, giving up trying to make sense about him, and went upstairs to her room.