Demolition Lovers (Frerard)

22: Quite Possibly The Most Traumatising Chapter Ever

"No- I'm not... I'm not going to shoot him- I'm not going to put him down like some sort of dog- I- you know what? Maybe he will make it through this, he just needs more blood, doesn't he? I can- I'll fucking give him my blood I-"

"Pete-" She let out a sigh, grabbing his hand and shaking her head at him. "No, no he's not going to wake up now and lying to yourself is not going to make anything any easier: I promise you."

"Can't I at least try?" He stressed, sobbing like a fucking maniac, but still with one hand pressed against the bandage, and one pressed against Mikey's.

"The likelihood is that you two aren't even the same blood type, Pete, I don't even know what blood type Mikey is, and if you give him the wrong blood that's only going to make things worse." Alicia paused, giving Pete a moment to let the reality sink in. "They could have done that at the hospital."

"No, I'm not taking him there- no, you just, no."

Because Pete would do everything and anything except the one thing that had the slightest hope of saving Mikey Way.

"It's too late now anyway."

"I know." Because deep down, Pete did know, and he knew it with every fibre of his being, and perhaps, just perhaps, that was exactly why it was so hard to let go.

"Then just take him and take you out of your misery, please, Pete, god- I..." Alicia sighed out, shaking her head as she offered him the pistol once more.

"I'd rather shoot myself than shoot him." The words left Pete's lips before he could think about what they really meant, and afterwards, he kind of just stayed there in an awful kind of silence, unable to gauge just how much he meant them. "I love him."

"So do I." 

And Pete looked at Alicia like she didn't mean it, and just like that, she slapped him straight across the face, because, "fuck you, Pete Wentz," but still, Pete's hands never moved from Mikey.

"Stop." She pleaded, attempting to pull Pete's hand away from Mikey's. "Please, do you not? How do you not see what you're doing to him?"

"What have I done? I'm not the one who wants to shoot him!" Pete exclaimed, turning to Alicia with an unimaginable amount of hated in his eyes, and all for the boy that was just about dead now.

"Fine then, if you really think he'll survive, then let go and let him bleed out, let him die and make him hurt, because you think he deserves that: this wait, this torture-" 

"I'm not letting him go, don't you get that?" 

"No, no I don't, because I can't wrap my head around this kind of insanity, and we both know that it's insanity, don't we, Pete, look, you- you know, you know what you're doing to him, and I reckon that the very moment you drove past that hospital without a second glance was the very moment that you condemned us all to this fate."

"No-"

"You can't turn back time, Pete, you can't take a different turn and you can't take him there, now, not anymore, and still, I reckon, even if we replayed that drive a million times over, you'd still end up here, we'd still end up like this... every time. You dug his grave, Pete, now bury him in it."

"I dug-  I dug? His grave? I- I-" Pete shook his head firmly, watching as Alicia reached out and took Mikey's other hand, placing the shotgun on the sofa beside Mikey.

"You don't have to let go of his hand, just of his head, just do it, Pete, he's hurting, you know, you know he is."

"Why does it have to be me? Why do I have to do- why can't you?"