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Chapter Thirteen – The Devil’s Calling

Pete’s POV





My poor, exhausted, hurt little angel. My little Mikey. All scratched up and broken beyond recognition.

Because of that bastard brother of his. He used to hurt my Mikey, used to do things bad enough to make my poor little angel scream and scratch and bleed. God, the scratches. I need to clean those up. I probably should have done that before I let him go back to sleep; what if they get infected and hurt my Mikey even more? No, I couldn’t have made him stay awake, that would have just been plain cruel. He looked so exhausted, like all of the life had been sucked out of his tormented little soul and he really needed to get some proper rest.

Which is why I’m wide awake right now. This way I can stop any sort of malevolence, nightmares or memories, from spiralling out of control like a derailed rollercoaster once more. I should have stayed awake in the first place; I knew that I shouldn’t have gone to sleep with my Mikey in such a vulnerable state. But he wasn’t all that fearful when he went to sleep, I’d actually go as far to say that he looked content. Perhaps he was. But he still had that fucking nightmare, the nightmare that was clearly twice as disturbing as the worse kind of horror movie. Twice as disturbing because it wasn’t a horror movie; it was real life. Things that have actually happened to my poor little angel.

Things that happened because of Gerard. The motherfucker who I’d be busy murdering right now if it wasn’t for the fact that someone far more important, my frightened little Mikey, is already taking up all of my thought process. I’m sat upright in bed, my back slightly slouched against the wall, with my Mikey’s head resting peacefully in my lap. His arms are wrapped around my waist like I’m his own personal teddy bear. Which I would quite gladly be if he so wished for it. Just like I’d quite gladly kill Gerard if he so wished for it. Fuck wishing for it, if he just wasn’t attached enough to that bastard to make him feel dependant on his praise. He looks so innocent, just resting against me with his legs curled around my own like vines wrapped around two firm oak trees, so childlike and frail. I’ve got the bedside light on to help keep me awake and it’s harsh glare is forcing me to see the burning crimson scratch marks that are running on top of my Mikey’s scar and all over his pale, lanky arms. His face is still dripping with the sweat from what happened around an hour ago, still smudged from all of the shit that Gerard dragged him through.

Three fucking years.

Three years of getting beaten by his own big brother, someone who quite clearly means the world to my suffering little angel. And he said that his father blamed him, that the very man who should have prevented his eldest son from getting so pissed in the first place had the nerve to blame some poor, frightened, injured little kid. If his dad wasn’t already dead, I’d kill him. Kill him because my Mikey is one of those people who are too nice to assume that someone would lie to them, always thinks that people are innocent until proven guilty, and that includes all of the bad things that people say to him; so for his own father to blame something like this on him is basically saying the same as he deserved to get beaten for three years.

I think I would have cracked after three years of abuse. Yeah, sure, I don’t know the extent of the abuse nor do I know how frequently it happened, but it must have been horrendous for it to make my Mikey feel the need to openly talk about it with me. My sweet little angel is a lot stronger than I think most people give him credit for. Than I fully gave him credit for before tonight. Obviously I could see that he had been through a hell of a lot, that he was mentally extremely strong to put up with the teasing stares and the bullying that he used to endure at his old high school, but knowing that he went through three years of abuse at the hands of someone he looks up to like a Christian looks up to Jesus? I thought that I was pretty strong, but compared to Mikey I’m really quite weak. It really is no wonder that he gets so jumpy at school whenever anyone comes close to him who isn’t me.

Fuck, it must be twice as terrifying for him when people like Aaron try to beat him up. I can’t even begin to imagine how it frightened, how worthless it must make him feel to have people willing to reinforce what his big brother started. I’m never letting anyone touch him like that again. Especially not now that I know the full extent of his emotional trauma and beyond fucked-up home life.

He really is so very brave, my poor little boyfriend. Braver than anyone I’ve ever met. To go through three years of getting beaten and not even tell his parents must have took so much stamina and loyalty, I just couldn’t be prouder of my little boyfriend. Nor could I be more furious at the bastard who lost all rights to claiming to be my Mikey’s relative the split second he raised his hand to my poor, innocent little boyfriend.

It makes sense now. Why he was so scared when Gerard walked in on us, I mean. He had looked genuinely threatened by the presence of his fuming carer and only now do I fully understand why; in the past an angry Gerard meant him getting hurt. He must have been so terrified when I provoked Gerard into punching me, it must have bought back so many horrendous memories for my poor little angel. Memories that are too evil to belong to the mind of such a benevolent, innocent angel. Even if my Mikey wasn’t the perfectly adorable little angel that he is, I think that I’d still be disgusted with Gerard; just as I am with anyone who thinks it’s alright to raise their hand to a kid. But the fact that my Mikey is the perfectly adorable little angel that he is makes me feel even more furious than a goth being put in a pink dress; more horrified than a cat watching her kitten getting tattered by the tearing teeth of some sort of rabid hound. Because my Mikey has been tattered by some dumb dog; my poor little angel got hurt by the person he looks up to the most.

I honestly couldn’t give a shit if Gerard was drunk when he hurt my Mikey, if anything that just makes it worse; if he thought he was old enough to be getting drunk, then he should have been old enough to know not to get drunk around a kid. A kid. How old was Mikey when the abuse started? When did it stop? If it went on for three years my Mikey must have been pretty young when it started, twelve perhaps? Just a kid. Apart from he had everything that a kid is meant to have torn away from him when his own big brother, someone meant to be his best friend, beat the living shit out of him. He never said how badly Gerard used to hurt him, but if the way his body was reacting to his nightmarish memories is anything to go by it must have been pretty fucking bad.

Why didn’t he tell? If he had, the odds are Gerard would be in prison right now for assault and/or child abuse depending on how old he was when the events took place. If he had told, that bastard would be locked up and unable to hurt my Mikey anymore. But he didn’t tell. Why? Because my boyfriend really is one of the greatest people to dust the Earth with his light footsteps. Knowing my Mikey he probably would have felt like it was his duty to keep it quiet, that his loyalty bound him to silence. I swear to God that that boy would stand there and let Aaron beat the shit out of him if it wasn’t for me; he’s just too introverted and forgiving for his own good.

Kind of like a puppy. A puppy will put up with anything and still come back to his master purely because his master was nice enough to bring him home. Yeah, my Mikey is just like a cute little puppy; innocent and loyal and naïve and completely fucking adorable.

I wonder who my Mikey was before Gerard destroyed him? I bet he was amazing, all bright smiles and pure shining benevolence glowing in his framed masterpieces that we call eyes. No shallow, choppy breaths whenever he’s got more than just me around him; no darting eyes, like fleeing rabbits, sweeping around whenever we walk down the crowded corridors of high school; no stutter or scar because Gerard would have been able to make him feel safe enough to never need to stutter and happy enough to prevent him from feeling desperate enough to play in traffic.

Not that I care about his scar. Obviously I care that he felt bad enough to make it, it obliterates my heart like a hidden mine every time I think that he tried to stop his excellence, but the fact that he has a scar marking his skin doesn’t make me want him any less. If anything I find his scar quite attractive, the way that it makes him look all innocently tough and interesting makes me feel extremely compelled to reach out to touch it; I guess I’m just one of those people who finds scars sexy. Apart from I don’t, I never have done before yet on my Mikey it is. Very much so.

It feels kind of strange to be describing such an innocently callow little angel as sexy. Even more so because it’s his scar that’s making me think it. But the more I ponder it the truer it seems; my Mikey really is sexy. I always thought that he was beautiful in a fragile, bone-china kind of way and I definitely thought of him as desirable when we were kissing, but never really as sexy. Not consciously anyway. Yet he is, extremely so and in his own unique little way; it’s like he’s innocent enough to make me want to make him sinful.

No, I can’t be thinking like that right now. Not whilst he’s so fragile and confused inside. The poor thing must be confused, definitely is if he’s blaming himself for Gerard’s mistakes. When he was asking me why Gerard hates him it was so tempting for me to just shrug and say that Gerard does hate him; that way I could have persuaded my Mikey to never go near that bastard again, to just stay here with me and never get hurt ever again.

No matter how much I may have wanted to turn my little angel against his vampircally demonic brother, I didn’t. Didn’t because I could never do something like that to him, never tear away that tiny little hope he has that Gerard really is an amazing big brother.

Perhaps he is. I don’t know the guy all that well. What I do know is that he’s hurt my Mikey in more ways than one. Abuse is just a word used to cover any action that causes any sort of damage, right? If so then, technically, Gerard is still abusing my hurt little angel. He is, he’s still knocking my poor baby’s already beyond-dead esteem and confidence just by not being the loving big brother that he should be.

That I hope to God, or any other being (malevolent or otherwise), Frankie is.

I really am kicking myself over not getting to properly meet Frankie; maybe if I had then I wouldn’t be feeling so horrified for my Mikey. Because if I at least had the evidence to back up what Mikey, quite sincerely, says about the guitar-playing punk guy then I could at least take some sort of comfort in the fact that at least my Mikey has someone else to be nice to him. Someone to reign Gerard in and make sure that nothing else hurts my boy.

Because Gerard blatantly sure as fuck can’t do either of those things; can’t control his temper and certainly can’t stop my Mikey from getting hurt, not when he’s already hurt my little angel so much himself. The blind hatred that I feel Gerard is more overpowering than anything I’ve ever felt before, aside from my adoration for my Mikey, and I just don’t know what I’ll do if I come into contact with him anytime soon. Wait. I know exactly what I’ll do; tell him exactly what I think of him. No, no I won’t; I’ll wind him up, make him hate himself as much as he’s made my perfect little boyfriend hate himself and then I’ll tell him exactly what I think of him.

Like I’ve said before, I like playing with my food.

I just hope that I don’t see him anytime soon though, or if I do I hope that Mikey isn’t present; it would be hideously unfair on him if I made him watch his almighty big brother fall, if I made him feel like he had to choose between me or his big brother. If that was the case, I can’t help but wonder who he’d pick. I’d like to think that it would be me, the one person who’s never yelled at him in anger and never done a single little thing to intentionally inflict him with pain. Yet I can’t help but think that he would pick Gerard; the person who beat him for three years, still yells at him now and really shouldn’t be let anywhere near my broken little boyfriend. And that’s exactly why I think that he’d pick Gerard, through the abuse he’s always been the one constant thing in my Mikey’s life and so it isn’t all surprising that Mikey believes himself to be dependent on his big brother; because Gerard’s abuse has convinced him that he’s unlovable and less than the perfection that he is, yet Gerard has always been with him and so, by using the logic of an abused child, his big brother must be the only person who’d ever want him.

Apart from my Mikey asked me why that overgrown toddler hates him, the exact opposite of wanting him, asked me with such pained eyes that I wanted to take a photo so that I could show Gerard what he’d done to his brother and kill him with the guilt. My Mikey thinks that the one person who’s always been there, the evil parading around dressed as love, doesn’t want him anymore. Now I’m no genius, as my report card will testify, but the psychological damage of being made to think something like that must be devastating when the fact that Gerard wanted him was all that kept him alive inside in the first place as it seems to have.

He has me now, though. I want him. More than want him; I have him. Just like he has me. Had me from the moment I stopped him from falling to the ground in the school parking lot after running into him on his first day, the second I saw his adorable little face I was smitten. Not that I ever showed it until I was sure that it wasn’t unrequited. Which it most certainly wasn’t; he used to blush like a bed of red roses whenever I so much as flashed him my trademark smirk, the smirk that has gotten me into many a bed. But I don’t care about getting into his bed, not that I would complain about it, just about making him happy and keeping him mine. At first maybe I did think it was just a game, as with all of the other people I’ve flirted my way into, but I soon, literally before the end of his first day, realised that my Mikey is worth more than that; realised that I really so love my Mikey. I don’t care about getting into his pants; I just want to take this slow and not mess up with him, just make him smile again.

Smile like he did when I was on top of him. Smile like he did before that bastard tore it from his face like a gardener slicing off the blooming head of a stunningly beautiful rose. Actually, I think that a Forget-Me-Not is a better flower to fit my little angel; all pale and understated in his awe-inspiring fragility and grace. But it doesn’t matter what analogy I use, the point still stands; Gerard bought him down.

And I fucking loathe him for it with the strength of one of my Mikey’s comic book superheroes.

I absent-mindedly stroke small circles in my Mikey’s sweat-slicked hair, sighing at how soft and silky it is; how perfect it is. Just like I imagine a halo would probably feel like. I look down to see that he’s gripping the fabric of my t-shirt in his sleep-weakened fists, he looks so sweet and defenceless that it’s hard for me to believe that he can kiss like he does. Impossible for me to believe that he scratched himself like he did.

“I really fucking love you, Mikey. My Mikey. My precious little boyfriend. All mine. And I’m all yours. Always.” I know that he’s beyond sound asleep, has been for just under an hour, but just speaking those things to him makes me feel like less of a failure for letting this happen to him. “My perfect little angel. I lo-“

My lovesick, clichéd and yet cripplingly honest words are cut off by the sound of my Mikey’s ringtone, some song by Joy Division, blaring into the almost peaceful silence of the room. Almost peaceful because a room so full of my Mikey’s pain and my hatred for Gerard could never be completely peaceful. Peaceful it may not have been, but it was silent.

Was. I can’t let my Mikey’s well-deserved rest and respite be cut off, the poor kid looked exhausted beyond recognition, so I surprise myself with my care-quickened reflexes by snatching my Mikey’s cell from the bedside table like a frog catching a fly with it’s lightning-fast tongue.

What if it’s Gerard? I hope it is. That way I can lay into him, mess around with him and not have to worry about it upsetting my muddled-up little angel. I hope it isn’t him, I don’t want to permanently turn Gerard against me because that just wouldn’t be fair on my Mikey, yet with the way things are right now in my fuming head I doubt that I’ll be able to hold my uncontainable fury at how he has treated/is treating my Mikey in.

What if it’s Frank? I really do hope that it is. That way I can let him know that my Mikey is safe and sound instead of out on the streets like he was when I found him because, from the photos I saw in Mikey’s bedroom and from what my boyfriend has told me, I think that Frankie is the sort of person to really worry about such a frail little angel being out all on his own. If it is Frank I can get to know him, tell him how much my Mikey means to me and get the blessing of his one true big brother. Not that I care about having their blessings; nothing will stop me from loving my boyfriend, it’s just that I can tell that their approval means a lot to my self-conscious little Mikey.

I click the little green button and hope, for my Mikey’s sake more than my own, that it’s Frankie on the end of the line.

“Mikes! Thank God you’re alright, you are alright, right?”

No such luck. But he really does sound genuinely concerned, really petrified at the prospect of his little brother being hurt. And he is hurt, in every sense of the word. He’s physically hurt because of the exhaustion that Gerard didn’t notice, because of the starvation that Gerard failed to end, because of the scratches that memories of Gerard caused. Emotionally hurt because of the fact that Gerard’s made him feel unwanted, because he’s just had a literally screaming nightmare about what Gerard used to do to him, because his big brother’s cruelty has fucked him up in the head.

So what if Gerard’s worried? He shouldn’t have given himself reasons to worry about in the first place. And the fact that he thinks he even has the right to speak to my boyfriend after all that he has done to the poor little angel, has the right to make out like Mikey’s caused him trouble, really fucking infuriates me.

“Fuck, I’m so sorry for every-“

“Gerard, I’m not Mikey. I’m his boyfriend.” I say the last word forcefully, like I’m proving something to him. I pause a little, taking the time to consider whether I really should say what I know I will anyway just to cause that bastard more grief. “The one with him currently asleep in my bed.” Of course I’d never have my Mikey in my bed in the sense that I intended it to sound like, not whilst he’s so emotionally confused and distraught, but Gerard doesn’t know that. And I only know, through past experience, to get to someone like Gerard like he deserves to be got at you have to use his weak point against him; in this case, the thought of his baby brother not being a baby. “Asleep in my arms. Have you ever just watched him sleep before, Gerard? He really is quite beautiful.”

I hear him sigh down the phone. Good. It’s nothing compared to how he made my Mikey scream, but I can hurt him just as badly if I want to. And, for hurting my boyfriend, I really fucking do.

“So beautiful. And all mine. Just like I’m all his. Every last part of me, Gerard. All his. And he knows it. And vice versa.”

“Pete, look, I don’t want any trouble or anything, I ju-“

“Then you shouldn’t have asked for it, Gerard!” I slice across his almost desperate words like a blade a across his throat, disbelieving that he can make himself sound so innocent and blame-free after all that he’s done.

What has he done exactly? I know precisely what he did when I was present and I have a vague idea, I don’t think I want a clear one, of what he used to do to my poor little angel, but I still don’t know what he did to drive my Mikey out onto the streets. I only know that it convinced him that his brother hates him, that he had nowhere else to go other than the sidewalk outside the ninety-nine cents store when he felt like he was going to pass out. My Mikey could have died if I hadn’t have texted him, could be gone forever, could have died alone on the side of the road from the cold and exhaustion being stirred into his starvation; my boyfriend could have fucking died because of Gerard!

“Do you think I wanted any trouble when I met you, fuck me; do you think that Mikey wanted any trouble when he introduced me?” I hiss venomously down the phone. “Do you, Gerard? Huh, do you?”

“No.” He squeaks back, sounding so much like my Mikey that it feels good to know that I’m making him capable of feeling some sort of empathy with his little brother.

Apart from I don’t think that anyone, myself unfortunately included, can ever truly empathise with Mikey nor understand what he’s gone through and how it is still killing him like a cancer. To be able to understand what my Mikey has gone through, child abuse and seemingly neglectful parents and bullying and being orphaned and attempting suicide, none of those horrible things can ever be understood unless you’ve felt them yourself.

“Of course he fucking didn’t.” I snarl fiercely down the phone with the vehemence of a thousand snakes crawling down the phone line to devour Geetard for what he’s done. “You’re a fucking disgrace. It’s no wonder my Mikey, because he is mine, is so depressed. No wonder he tried to top himself; I would too if I had you for a brother.”

“You don’t even know me! What gives you the right to fucking talk to me like that?”

I can’t help but smirk at his furious tone, at how injured his voice sounds behind the anger that is trying and failing to conceal the hurt.

“How about the fact that your little brother is in my bed? Or the fact that I kissed him goodnight? Or the fact that he’s lying on top of me? Tell me when you hear one that you think gives me the right, Geetard. How about the fact that he cried to me about how much of a fucking dickhead you are? How about the fact that he talks to me without stuttering? Or the fact that he loves me? Or the fact tha-“

“Shut the hell up, Pete!” He roars down the phone, like I’m some cruel circus ringmaster and he’s the lion being forced to dance for my entertainment. But it’s not for my entertainment; it’s for revenge. “Look, I know that we got off on the wrong foot-“

“You punched me in the face!” My indignant remark is full of genuine shock; talk about an understatement.

Getting off on the wrong foot is running into someone in the school parking lot, not smashing their nose in; getting off on the wrong foot is something that can be fixed. I guess that punching me in the face could be fixed, I would have forgiven him if he had apologized, but it’s the fact that he made my Mikey cry that I can’t forgive. Well, maybe I could forgive that too if he just said sorry, but the fact that he used to beat my harmless little angel? I’ll die before I forgive him.

He sighs exasperatedly down the phone.

“Okay, y’know what? I give up. I don’t even know what I did to make you hate me so much.”

“You punched me in the fucking face, you retarded fuck! Or do you want more reasons? I can give them to you if you really want.” My voice is sharp with threat and my tone is practically begging him to ask, for him to enable me to truly let rip on him.

“Whatever.” He snorts arrogantly down the line, clearly thinking me to be a waste of his time. “Look, can you just put Mikes on to me? Please. I know you don’t like me, but please let me talk to my baby brother.”

“No, I won’t hand you over to him. Because he’s exhausted and I’ve just managed to get him back to sleep. You see, Gerard, he had a nightmare. Scratched his arms to shit and his face is almost as bad. Do you know what he told me the nightmare was about, Gerard?” I ask in a sickly-sweet voice, hiding my pain at the mention of my Mikey’s scratching expertly well, before taking a deep breath in to let him know that I have no intention of not telling him; if this doesn’t hurt him then nothing will. “Memories. Or more specifically; memories of you. Because, you see Gerard, I know exactly who you are. And if you weren’t my boyfriend’s big brother you’d be dead right now.”

There’s an agonized silence, a silence that is so pained on Gerard’s part that I almost feel guilty, almost want to tell him that I’m sorry. But I’m not sorry and I don’t feel guilty; he deserves to be in pain. My only regret is that this is a phone call and so I can’t reinforce my words with my fists.

“He is not your boyfriend, Pete.” Oh really? “I don’t know what game you think you’re playing with my brother, but I’m telling you to drop it right fucking now. You break his heart and I’ll break you. So I suggest, for the collective good of all concerned, that you bring him home and let me deal with this. And then leave him the fuck alone. I can make it worth your while.”

I think I’m going to be sick; he’s asking me to dump my Mikey for money. He saw how happy I made his little brother, how can he want to stop that?

“Let me get this straight; you’ll pay me to dump your little brother?”

“I’ll either pay you to leave him alone or punch that pretty little face of yours until you do.”

He sounds so sincere that it sends shivers down my spine; I quite like my face in one piece. But I like being my Mikey’s boyfriend even more. And besides, my Mikey put up with more than a few of Gerard’s punches. That bastard doesn’t half punch hard. Well, he’s had plenty of practice, hasn’t he?

“You’re fucked up in the head, Gerard!” I’m shouting now, letting everything out like it needs to be let out. “You said that my Mikey’s fucked up and maybe he is, but you’re completely fucking sick in the head! It’s a fucking miracle that you haven’t had him taken away from you, if I had my way I’d be phoning social services right fucking now. But I can’t have my way, Gerard, because I actually care about what my Mikey wants, unlike some people I could mention.”

I hear a beep announcing that he’s hung up on me, fucking coward, and I throw Mikey’s phone to the floor like it’s on fire.

And that’s when I feel it; the shaking of a light body that is no longer resting trustingly on my own. Then the sound of soft, frightened little sobs reaches my ears like a sorrowful lament riding the winds of a moonlit night.

I look up from where I had been burning my stare into the cell like it was Gerard himself, to see my Mikey struggling to shuffle to the other end of the bed; eyes wide and terrified, just like Gerard had made them be.

I shouted down the fucking phone. Shouted about him. Shouted like I’ve never been angrier.

“Sugar?”

I reach out a hand to placate him with but he jumps so violently that he falls off of the bed and onto the floor, like an angel falling to hell.

Maybe Gerard and I aren’t as different as I desire to think.







A/N: Thank you very much for reading and sorry that it was kind of crappy. I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again; dialogue really isn’t my strong point so sorry that it sucked. Anyway, thanks for reading and please review! :)