Chapter Seven, Part Two.
Mikey ran back upstairs to Frank's room, but he wasn't there. He remembered that his room had a view overlooking the courtyard, and that was as good a place as any to search. Mikey jumped up onto Frank's bed and looked out. He scanned the area once, twice, three times over... and he almost missed the foot and pant leg sticking out between a bush and a stone wall.
"Gerard!" he blurted out. He jumped off the bed and sprinted out, down the stairs, and into the courtyard. He found the place where Gerard was lying easily; they hung out there occasionally in the warmer months. It was in a pretty quiet corner of the courtyard. He had either been put there by Antoine after the fight, or he had somehow managed to escape and just collapse there.
Either way, he looked an absolute wreck. His shirt was bloodstained, and he was doubled over in the fetal position. His knuckles were swollen and the skin was broken. There was a large rip in the side of his shirt. Through it, Mikey saw a large and very ugly bruise. It looked bad enough that there might even be internal bleeding. He was lying there, breathing heavily, convulsing slightly. Little moans of pain escaped him, whether he was aware of them or not.
Mikey rolled him over onto his back and stared dumbfounded. Everything between Gerard's nose and shoulders was covered in blood. He couldn't tell where the wound began and where it ended. He thought it might be somewhere around his mouth, because he couldn't really talk, and that seemed to be where most of the blood was coming from.
"Gerard! Gerard, can you hear me? Answer me! Answer me, dammit, it's Mikey! Are you all right? Gerard, talk to me!"
But he didn't get a response. All he got was a weird moan, wimpering, cries of pain... and then coughing. It took a second for Mikey to realize that the blood must be going back into his thoat. He quickly hoisted Gerard up into a sitting position and bent him over so that he could spit out the blood, which he did with great gusto.
Keeping a hand on the back of Gerard's neck, Mikey straightened up as best he could and frantically looked around for a friendly face. Not too far away, he spotted Frank, who came running over.
"Frank! What the hell happened?"
Frank just looked down. "Whaddaya think happened?"
They looked at each other for a minute, then Mikey spoke up. "Look, we need to get him out of here."
"Don't worry," said Frank, "I already called an ambulance. Well, ok, I didn't call it, but a couple of the teachers did. They saw it. He's gonna be ok. They're on their way now." It was at this point, as he squatted down next to his friends, that Frank first noticed Gerard's face, the torn lip. "What the hell is that?" His voice shook. "Mikey, I... I'm not that good around... blood."
"You don't have to be." said Mikey. "Because you can go and tell the other people. Get the rest of the gang together, all right? Get Carla, get Helena; make sure they're all right. Go lock up our room, ok? I'm gonna go with him."
"No! I'm not gonna leave you guys alone here. I'm gonna stick around. I'll go with you."
"Are you sure?"
"Yeah. Yeah, I'm sure, Mike. He's my friend. Even though he gave me shit advice about getting Sami, he's still my friend. And I'm gonna help him."
"How'd this all start anyway? Why was Antoine so pissed at him? Pissed enough to do this to him?" asked Mikey.
"Well, he didn't do it alone, trust me. He got four or five of his friends to help him."
"A guy that big? What's he need backup for?!"
"Beats me. But he had four or five guys with him, and they all contributed to this wonderful new look Gerard's sporting. I wouldn't worry too much about Antoine, though. Plenty of people saw it, and it's not like he's ashamed to admit he did it. He'll be on a chain gang or something by the time this all settles down." said Frank.
"Ha ha, yeah, that'd be pretty nice." Mikey laughed wryly. "But, Frank - how this started...?"
"Well, you know how Gerard went out last night?"
"Yeah, kinda think I do. He's only my roomie."
"Right. Anyway. He went out last night, and he went to Helena's. When he was there, he... had a little bit to drink. So did she, mind you. Did you know she lives pretty close to Antoine? Yeah. He's just, like, up the street or something. Anyway... Somehow, they ended up in his backyard. Yeah. And if Antione wasn't such a hardass, there might actually be a pretty decent story to this. A whole lot less bloody, for one thing. As it stands, not only is Antoine a complete and utter egotistical hardass, but he also has an unbelievable crush on Helena."
Mikey snorted. "Humf. Coincidences. Aren't they lovely."
"Yeah," said Frank, laughing a little, "it's almost like it's a soap opera or one of those stupid fan fictions or something. Except we're just, like, nobodys."
"Yeah. But keep going. What happened next?"
"Welllllllllllllll..." Frank bit his lip. "There really isn't much left, that I know of, anyway. And I heard it from Helena. Antoine was more drunk then they were. Apparantly he was having a small party, and it was just breaking up when he found them outside. He got out a croquet set... and interrupted their little... hooplah."
"That's putting it very, very nicely." said Mikey. "I can only imagine what was going on."
"Actually, judging by how they both look, probably not that much. And, I mean, you know Gerard - he was probably leading her around in the woods reciting poetry or something." said Frank.
"While drunk." Mikey offered flatly. "Sorry, devil's advocate."
Frank paused, thinking. "Err, yeah. Well, you know how he is. He can do that. Psht, and then he tells me to go 'make Sami notice me.' Right. Well, on that note, do you think a year is long enough to wait?"
Mikey didn't answer. It was almost a year to the day of the infamous "Locker Incident" and, surprisingly, Frankie hadn't done anything since then to win Sami's heart. She even had begun to talk to him, once in a while. They were extremely, extremely casual friends. Acquaintances, even. Sami and Mikey were casual friends. And they would be closer, were the two of them not painfully quiet. The fact that they interacted at all, really, was mostly because she and Carla were close. Mikey was very happy with how things were going between him and Carla. Though neither of them had officially asked the other to go steady, they went on dates together, and had even kissed a couple of times. Everyone around them in their cluster of friends considered them "official," but Mikey didn't pay much attention to it. "Official," in his book, meant an engagement ring.
As Frank recounted the final details of the manic escape from Antoine's yard to the school, they heard running footsteps. Official-looking people descended upon the boys, and Mikey and Frank backed away to let them take care of Gerard. One of them shouted over his shoulder at them.
"You two. You know this kid?"
"Yeah." said Mikey. "He's my, uh... He's my roommate."
"He's a really good friend of mine." Frank chimed in.
The EMT went back to work, apparantly not listening, but a minute later, he grabbed Mikey by the arm and dragged him along as they brought Gerard on a stretcher out of the courtyard and to the ambulance. Mikey said a hasty goodbye to Frank, and tossed him the key to his room, reminding him to lock it up for him. The EMT started asking him questions as soon as Frank left.
"Do you know if he has any allergies?"
"Uh... no."
"How 'bout to any medications or anything?"
"Not that I know of. Why?"
"Just routine questions, kid. He on any medications?"
"Uh... n- yeah. He's on something. What the hell... what is the name of that? Dammit..." he mumbled under his breath. "I don't remember the name of it, but he's on some antidepressant. I don't know what it is, though. Sorry."
"Antidepressant, ok." said the medic absently, "So. What happened to him?"
"He got in a fight, and he lost."
Mikey fell silent. They had reached the ambulance. The EMTs piled Gerard in, and the driver hopped in, too. The guy who had been talking to him spoke up again as he got in the back.
"You coming, or what?"
"Oh." said Mikey. "Yeah. Yeah, I guess I better do that."
The big guy reached out his hand and pulled Mikey into the back of the ambulance and slammed the door. They were off. Sirens sounded. And then the doctors descended on Gerard's body. Mikey sat in the corner, horrified. He had never really been to a hospital before, and he had never seen anyone so badly beat up. He wondered where Antoine and his gang ended up. Mikey hoped that the teachers or somebody had caught him, because he didn't want to have to go after him on his own. He'd always looked up to Gerard as someone who would keep him safe. He was intelligent, strong... well, strong enough. He wasn't afraid of anything. Maybe that's why he looked up to him so much. In any event, Mikey knew he could never in a million years take on those guys by himself. He could start forming a plan, but Gerard would have a better idea.
So he spent the ride in silence. He spent the time in the emergency room in silence. He spent the time it took for the hospital to assign him a room, and the transfer from the ER to his room, and the time it took to get Gerard settled into the bed, in silence. When the doctors left, Mikey pulled a chair to the side of the bed. He sat there for at least an hour, maybe two. He couldn't tell. He just sat there in silence, watching his friend breathe in and out. Somehow he managed to do this without any considerable effort, considering the amount of sutures and bandaging around his mouth. He'd torn his lip all right, and pretty badly at that. Mikey wondered if that lopsided grin of his would be the same as he leaned back in his chair, waiting for Gerard to wake up.