Categories > Celebrities > My Chemical Romance > Fly Away, Dance on the Milky Way
Chapter 48: My stereo don’t play love songs
“You’re going to WHAT?”
Gerard and Lindsey cringed at the sound of the shocked shout. The girl was staring at them like they had gone mad, but Gerard and Lindsey themselves couldn’t have been more certain about this.
“Gia, you know we’ll wait if it bothers you,” Lindsey tried, but in Gia’s eyes, at this particular moment the woman was just some lady who was trying to steal her dad.
“No you wouldn’t! You’d just do it anyway! Dad, how can you do this to me?!”
Even though he had expected to get this kind of a response, he still felt like running away from the tiny blonde girl who was still staring at him. “Look, I love you, and I understand that you feel like this is a mistake, but trust me when I say that it’s not.”
“Yeah but… This soon?” Gia asked, lowering her voice, looking desperate. “I mean, are you sure you’re ready to get married in a week?”
Gerard and Lindsey glanced at each other. They knew they had to consider Gia in making this decision, but nothing had never made more sense than doing this. She had known they planned on getting married and living together, but Gia wouldn’t have guessed that it wouldn’t happen for months, at least.
“I mean, a week? Don’t people usually take like months, even years to plan a wedding?” Gia asked. “What’s wrong with being normal? Let’s be normal! Doesn’t that sound like fun?!”
“Gia, we’re not normal,” Gerard answered. “We don’t want the big, fancy cake or the white doves flying around and shitting on everyone.”
“That’s a really nice way of putting it,” Lindsey said, rolling her eyes. “But Gia, honestly, tell us how you feel. I swear we’re not going to force you – Where are you going?”
Gia stormed out of the hotel room, too upset to even look at them right now. But what do you know, she can’t even have a few moments of privacy, no. Gerard dashed after her and reached her just as she had gone into the elevator and pushed the lobby button.
“Gia, we need to talk,” he said with a very serious expression.
“Well you have exactly 30 seconds before we are in the lobby and I’m out of here,” Gia frowned, and her frown turned into a face of shock when Gerard pressed the emergency button. The elevator stopped in between floors.
“Why did you do that?!” Gia screeched, certain that he was absolutely bonkers.
“Gia, listen to me,” he said. “I know you’re upset. You have every right to be. And I know I owe you a lot, and I want you to be happy. So if what you really want is for me to cancel this wedding, then I will. But I want you to understand how fucking much I want to do this.”
“But why? I mean, you’ve only been with her for like a year. How much can you really know about someone when you’ve only been with them for a year? Could you maybe have a long engagement? I hear getting married at 70 is really great.”
“You’re still young, you don’t know what it’s like, but when you’re older, you’ll fall in love and you will understand.”
Gia knew that she was fighting a lost battle. But that didn’t keep her from trying. “You love her? You really, really love her? You sure? I mean are you even sure you’re ready to settle down? You’re still relatively young, don’t you want to see the world a bit more? I’m sure there’s some parts of this planet you’d like to go to. A wife is just going to keep you chained to your nice little suburban home until you’re too old to fly on an airplane.”
“Lindsey’s nothing like that. And yes, I really, really do love her. I can’t explain it, I just need to do this. Can you be okay with that?”
Gia thought about it for a long time. She hated it, she absolutely loathed the idea, but still she had to admit that Lindsey made him very happy. Perhaps she’d learn to tolerate the woman, as well. “Eh, whatever. It’s not like you’re getting any younger, so this might be your only chance. You’re like what, 50?”
Gerard smiled widely, and pulled his daughter into a tight hug. Gia was used to these kinds of hugs from Frank, but her father rarely hugged her. She was glad he didn’t rattle her around like Frank did, though.
“Thank you,” he said.
“Yeah yeah. Just make this elevator work again, I need to go to the bathroom really bad.”
She may not have been completely happy with his decision to get married to Lindsey, but she figured that it would save them some resentment, on their part at least. Gia could hide her negative feelings when she wanted to, but her father had such a temperamental personality that he would make his thoughts very clear. And Lindsey… Well, Gia was fairly certain that if Gerard liked her, then she’d learn to like the woman as well. After all, she hadn’t really bothered to get to know Lindsey that well yet.
____________________
A week went by like a cheetah on steroids, and soon it was the day that Gerard and Lindsey planned on getting married.
Yes, they were keeping it very simple.
Why? That Gia didn’t understand. But for some reason it seemed to work for them.
During that short week, Gerard had made sure to spend as much time with his daughter as possible, and in order to make Gia get used to being around Lindsey, include his future wife as well. The plan was somewhat working, but he could still tell that Gia had some problems adapting to this new arrangement. He wondered if he was making the right decision after all, but as soon as he saw Lindsey, the doubts faded.
And all too soon for Gia, that particular evening of doom was knocking on the door.
No, wait, it was just Frank, picking her up for the big concert that took place before the small wedding. Gia didn’t particularly agree that the backstage of a concert hall was the ideal place to marry, but her father seemed to think it was perfect.
“Are you ready?” Frank asked, smiling so widely that Gia wondered if his face was hurting.
“Yeah, just stop grinning like that, it’s creeping me out.”
“Aww, don’t be so sad! It’s a happy day! Weddings are fun!”
Gia glanced at him, and his smile got even wider. “You do realize that he’s getting married. That must put a stop to all that onstage gay stuff you two do.”
The smile dropped like the water down a waterfall. Gia hadn’t meant to make him depressed, but accidentally that’s exactly what she did. The whining and complaining didn’t stop until it was time for them to go on stage.
The band was dressed up these weird marching band type outfits, which Gia found extremely strange. According to Frank, it was only to apply to his already obvious sex appeal, while Gerard gave her an overly long description of the whole Black Parade concept.
While backstage, Gia couldn’t help but take a peek at the crowd. The concert hall was huge, and there must’ve been hundreds of people there in the audience. She couldn’t understand how her dad and uncles could go in front of all those people and actually act normal. In her opinion, it must be impossible. And yet somehow, they did all that and actually enjoyed it.
Gia started to wonder if she was actually adopted.
Just about ten minutes before they had to go on, the backstage was a mess. People running around in a hurry, trying to make sure everything was working and good to go and fussing around the band and making sure they looked presentable.
Gia was standing there awkwardly, watching the people rush by. Her dad was hidden inside a cloud of hair-spray and the other guys were doing pretty much the same. Bob was drumming a table with his drumsticks, which looked like a nervous habit, but other than that they all looked perfectly calm.
Lindsey was of course there, being one of the people who would be getting married later on. Gia saw her standing near Gerard, and they were talking about something while his hair was being covered in that o-zone murdering spray of death.
Soon Gia saw Gerard looking around the room, and when he spotted her, Gerard swatted the hairspray lady away and he and Lindsey walked over to where Gia was standing.
“Hey, you okay?” he asked.
It was weird seeing him with such thick make up. He was really pale to begin with, but with the make up his skin lost all color, except the area around his eyes which were dark with black.
“Yeah I’m fine,” Gia answered. “Are you?”
“Yeah, we do this all the time. Hey, take these,” Gerard said, and gave her a pair of yellow ear plugs. “If it gets too noisy, put those in. Because trust me, this level of noise is nothing yet.”
To Gia, the audience was already being a tad too noisy, so it was hard to understand how it could get even louder.
“And Lindsey will take you up to the balcony, you can watch the concert up there. Stay close to Linds, okay? Don’t disappear.”
“Yeah, okay.”
And all of a sudden, all the lights coming from the dim concert hall disappeared. The crowd got even louder, screaming, no, more like chanting the band’s name.
“Gotta go. Wish me luck,” Gerard said and quickly kissed her forehead before rushing off.
Bob was the first one to run up to the stage. Gia didn’t see what happened there, but the screaming turned to chaos and she guessed that Bob was shooting at them with a bazooka or something. Why else would they scream like they were being killed?
After that, the rest of the guys ran on to the stage, one by one, and Gia was curious to see what happened, but that’s when Lindsey tugged at her arm and told her that they’d go up to the balcony. Gia followed her, and when they got there, Bob had already started drumming and the others had joined in. The lights had gone flashy and the audience started screaming even louder.
At this point Gia understood why her dad had given her the earplugs. Add the screams of the crowd to the music from the speakers, and you’re pretty much deaf. Gia quickly put the earplugs in, but luckily they didn’t tune out all of the noise. She still wanted to be able to hear after the concert, but she wanted to hear them play their music.
Not that she had ever doubted it, but they were great. Earlier she had wondered how they could act normal on stage, in front of all those people. They didn’t act normal. It was completely different. They were completely comfortable on stage, like they belonged there. Whether that was due to them being used to being up there, or because they simply loved it, but it worked.
And the audience loved it like crazy, jumping up and down, screaming and singing along with Gerard. But Gia didn’t pay much attention to the audience. She tuned out everything else but what was happening on the stage, and stayed that way for the rest of the concert. It was as if she was mesmerized, which she kind of was.
Right before the show ended, Lindsey took Gia straight backstage. They hadn’t talked during the show at all, but Gia had been aware of the fact that Lindsey had been checking her reactions every now and then. No doubt she had been asked to do that by Gerard.
When the band came off of the stage, the crowd had quieted down a bit. At least they had stopped screaming for the most part, but they were still noisy. Gia thought it safe to take off the earplugs.
“Gia! Did you see me up there?! I was great, wasn’t I?” Frank shouted, pulling the girl into a tight hug.
“Eww, you’re sweaty,” Gia complained and tried to push him away. She didn’t want to get her clothes dirty. And besides, he stunk.
“Ooh, water!” Frank gasped and let go of her when he spotted the water bottles that were meant for the band.
While Gia was being harassed by Frank, Gerard went to talk to Lindsey.
“Good gig,” Lindsey grinned after he put his arms around her waist and kissed her.
“Really?”
“Meh, I’m still much better.”
“In your dreams,” Gerard laughed. Then he glanced at his daughter who was struggling to get away from the fun-sized guitarist, and asked: “Hey, um… You think she liked it?”
“I’m sure she did. Well, she didn’t really seem too eager but at least she was listening.”
“I guess that’s a start,” he sighed. For sure every parent wanted their kids to be interested in what they do for a living. That was true for Gerard as well. And if Gia showed even remote interest in his profession, or music in general, he was happy. That meant they’d have something to talk about.
“Hey, don’t think about that now. It was an excellent concert, and a great finale for the tour. We have to get married,” Lindsey said, interrupting his train of thought.
“Yeah I guess we should.”
“But you seriously need a shower first.”
Gia had managed to battle off the stinky hug-machine, and was following the conversation between her father and his wife-to-be. They looked so content with each other, it made her sick. Or maybe she was just nervous about the upcoming wedding. She didn’t know, but she wasn’t about to tell about it to anyone. It’s not like anyone (except maybe Frank) paid any attention to her.
“You’re going to WHAT?”
Gerard and Lindsey cringed at the sound of the shocked shout. The girl was staring at them like they had gone mad, but Gerard and Lindsey themselves couldn’t have been more certain about this.
“Gia, you know we’ll wait if it bothers you,” Lindsey tried, but in Gia’s eyes, at this particular moment the woman was just some lady who was trying to steal her dad.
“No you wouldn’t! You’d just do it anyway! Dad, how can you do this to me?!”
Even though he had expected to get this kind of a response, he still felt like running away from the tiny blonde girl who was still staring at him. “Look, I love you, and I understand that you feel like this is a mistake, but trust me when I say that it’s not.”
“Yeah but… This soon?” Gia asked, lowering her voice, looking desperate. “I mean, are you sure you’re ready to get married in a week?”
Gerard and Lindsey glanced at each other. They knew they had to consider Gia in making this decision, but nothing had never made more sense than doing this. She had known they planned on getting married and living together, but Gia wouldn’t have guessed that it wouldn’t happen for months, at least.
“I mean, a week? Don’t people usually take like months, even years to plan a wedding?” Gia asked. “What’s wrong with being normal? Let’s be normal! Doesn’t that sound like fun?!”
“Gia, we’re not normal,” Gerard answered. “We don’t want the big, fancy cake or the white doves flying around and shitting on everyone.”
“That’s a really nice way of putting it,” Lindsey said, rolling her eyes. “But Gia, honestly, tell us how you feel. I swear we’re not going to force you – Where are you going?”
Gia stormed out of the hotel room, too upset to even look at them right now. But what do you know, she can’t even have a few moments of privacy, no. Gerard dashed after her and reached her just as she had gone into the elevator and pushed the lobby button.
“Gia, we need to talk,” he said with a very serious expression.
“Well you have exactly 30 seconds before we are in the lobby and I’m out of here,” Gia frowned, and her frown turned into a face of shock when Gerard pressed the emergency button. The elevator stopped in between floors.
“Why did you do that?!” Gia screeched, certain that he was absolutely bonkers.
“Gia, listen to me,” he said. “I know you’re upset. You have every right to be. And I know I owe you a lot, and I want you to be happy. So if what you really want is for me to cancel this wedding, then I will. But I want you to understand how fucking much I want to do this.”
“But why? I mean, you’ve only been with her for like a year. How much can you really know about someone when you’ve only been with them for a year? Could you maybe have a long engagement? I hear getting married at 70 is really great.”
“You’re still young, you don’t know what it’s like, but when you’re older, you’ll fall in love and you will understand.”
Gia knew that she was fighting a lost battle. But that didn’t keep her from trying. “You love her? You really, really love her? You sure? I mean are you even sure you’re ready to settle down? You’re still relatively young, don’t you want to see the world a bit more? I’m sure there’s some parts of this planet you’d like to go to. A wife is just going to keep you chained to your nice little suburban home until you’re too old to fly on an airplane.”
“Lindsey’s nothing like that. And yes, I really, really do love her. I can’t explain it, I just need to do this. Can you be okay with that?”
Gia thought about it for a long time. She hated it, she absolutely loathed the idea, but still she had to admit that Lindsey made him very happy. Perhaps she’d learn to tolerate the woman, as well. “Eh, whatever. It’s not like you’re getting any younger, so this might be your only chance. You’re like what, 50?”
Gerard smiled widely, and pulled his daughter into a tight hug. Gia was used to these kinds of hugs from Frank, but her father rarely hugged her. She was glad he didn’t rattle her around like Frank did, though.
“Thank you,” he said.
“Yeah yeah. Just make this elevator work again, I need to go to the bathroom really bad.”
She may not have been completely happy with his decision to get married to Lindsey, but she figured that it would save them some resentment, on their part at least. Gia could hide her negative feelings when she wanted to, but her father had such a temperamental personality that he would make his thoughts very clear. And Lindsey… Well, Gia was fairly certain that if Gerard liked her, then she’d learn to like the woman as well. After all, she hadn’t really bothered to get to know Lindsey that well yet.
____________________
A week went by like a cheetah on steroids, and soon it was the day that Gerard and Lindsey planned on getting married.
Yes, they were keeping it very simple.
Why? That Gia didn’t understand. But for some reason it seemed to work for them.
During that short week, Gerard had made sure to spend as much time with his daughter as possible, and in order to make Gia get used to being around Lindsey, include his future wife as well. The plan was somewhat working, but he could still tell that Gia had some problems adapting to this new arrangement. He wondered if he was making the right decision after all, but as soon as he saw Lindsey, the doubts faded.
And all too soon for Gia, that particular evening of doom was knocking on the door.
No, wait, it was just Frank, picking her up for the big concert that took place before the small wedding. Gia didn’t particularly agree that the backstage of a concert hall was the ideal place to marry, but her father seemed to think it was perfect.
“Are you ready?” Frank asked, smiling so widely that Gia wondered if his face was hurting.
“Yeah, just stop grinning like that, it’s creeping me out.”
“Aww, don’t be so sad! It’s a happy day! Weddings are fun!”
Gia glanced at him, and his smile got even wider. “You do realize that he’s getting married. That must put a stop to all that onstage gay stuff you two do.”
The smile dropped like the water down a waterfall. Gia hadn’t meant to make him depressed, but accidentally that’s exactly what she did. The whining and complaining didn’t stop until it was time for them to go on stage.
The band was dressed up these weird marching band type outfits, which Gia found extremely strange. According to Frank, it was only to apply to his already obvious sex appeal, while Gerard gave her an overly long description of the whole Black Parade concept.
While backstage, Gia couldn’t help but take a peek at the crowd. The concert hall was huge, and there must’ve been hundreds of people there in the audience. She couldn’t understand how her dad and uncles could go in front of all those people and actually act normal. In her opinion, it must be impossible. And yet somehow, they did all that and actually enjoyed it.
Gia started to wonder if she was actually adopted.
Just about ten minutes before they had to go on, the backstage was a mess. People running around in a hurry, trying to make sure everything was working and good to go and fussing around the band and making sure they looked presentable.
Gia was standing there awkwardly, watching the people rush by. Her dad was hidden inside a cloud of hair-spray and the other guys were doing pretty much the same. Bob was drumming a table with his drumsticks, which looked like a nervous habit, but other than that they all looked perfectly calm.
Lindsey was of course there, being one of the people who would be getting married later on. Gia saw her standing near Gerard, and they were talking about something while his hair was being covered in that o-zone murdering spray of death.
Soon Gia saw Gerard looking around the room, and when he spotted her, Gerard swatted the hairspray lady away and he and Lindsey walked over to where Gia was standing.
“Hey, you okay?” he asked.
It was weird seeing him with such thick make up. He was really pale to begin with, but with the make up his skin lost all color, except the area around his eyes which were dark with black.
“Yeah I’m fine,” Gia answered. “Are you?”
“Yeah, we do this all the time. Hey, take these,” Gerard said, and gave her a pair of yellow ear plugs. “If it gets too noisy, put those in. Because trust me, this level of noise is nothing yet.”
To Gia, the audience was already being a tad too noisy, so it was hard to understand how it could get even louder.
“And Lindsey will take you up to the balcony, you can watch the concert up there. Stay close to Linds, okay? Don’t disappear.”
“Yeah, okay.”
And all of a sudden, all the lights coming from the dim concert hall disappeared. The crowd got even louder, screaming, no, more like chanting the band’s name.
“Gotta go. Wish me luck,” Gerard said and quickly kissed her forehead before rushing off.
Bob was the first one to run up to the stage. Gia didn’t see what happened there, but the screaming turned to chaos and she guessed that Bob was shooting at them with a bazooka or something. Why else would they scream like they were being killed?
After that, the rest of the guys ran on to the stage, one by one, and Gia was curious to see what happened, but that’s when Lindsey tugged at her arm and told her that they’d go up to the balcony. Gia followed her, and when they got there, Bob had already started drumming and the others had joined in. The lights had gone flashy and the audience started screaming even louder.
At this point Gia understood why her dad had given her the earplugs. Add the screams of the crowd to the music from the speakers, and you’re pretty much deaf. Gia quickly put the earplugs in, but luckily they didn’t tune out all of the noise. She still wanted to be able to hear after the concert, but she wanted to hear them play their music.
Not that she had ever doubted it, but they were great. Earlier she had wondered how they could act normal on stage, in front of all those people. They didn’t act normal. It was completely different. They were completely comfortable on stage, like they belonged there. Whether that was due to them being used to being up there, or because they simply loved it, but it worked.
And the audience loved it like crazy, jumping up and down, screaming and singing along with Gerard. But Gia didn’t pay much attention to the audience. She tuned out everything else but what was happening on the stage, and stayed that way for the rest of the concert. It was as if she was mesmerized, which she kind of was.
Right before the show ended, Lindsey took Gia straight backstage. They hadn’t talked during the show at all, but Gia had been aware of the fact that Lindsey had been checking her reactions every now and then. No doubt she had been asked to do that by Gerard.
When the band came off of the stage, the crowd had quieted down a bit. At least they had stopped screaming for the most part, but they were still noisy. Gia thought it safe to take off the earplugs.
“Gia! Did you see me up there?! I was great, wasn’t I?” Frank shouted, pulling the girl into a tight hug.
“Eww, you’re sweaty,” Gia complained and tried to push him away. She didn’t want to get her clothes dirty. And besides, he stunk.
“Ooh, water!” Frank gasped and let go of her when he spotted the water bottles that were meant for the band.
While Gia was being harassed by Frank, Gerard went to talk to Lindsey.
“Good gig,” Lindsey grinned after he put his arms around her waist and kissed her.
“Really?”
“Meh, I’m still much better.”
“In your dreams,” Gerard laughed. Then he glanced at his daughter who was struggling to get away from the fun-sized guitarist, and asked: “Hey, um… You think she liked it?”
“I’m sure she did. Well, she didn’t really seem too eager but at least she was listening.”
“I guess that’s a start,” he sighed. For sure every parent wanted their kids to be interested in what they do for a living. That was true for Gerard as well. And if Gia showed even remote interest in his profession, or music in general, he was happy. That meant they’d have something to talk about.
“Hey, don’t think about that now. It was an excellent concert, and a great finale for the tour. We have to get married,” Lindsey said, interrupting his train of thought.
“Yeah I guess we should.”
“But you seriously need a shower first.”
Gia had managed to battle off the stinky hug-machine, and was following the conversation between her father and his wife-to-be. They looked so content with each other, it made her sick. Or maybe she was just nervous about the upcoming wedding. She didn’t know, but she wasn’t about to tell about it to anyone. It’s not like anyone (except maybe Frank) paid any attention to her.
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