Sidewalks, Chapter 13, AIDS, Drama, Javey
I decided to break up this chapter, because it’s really long to read in one shot.
I’m also really sorry I’m not beta-ing these chapters. I’m just spell-checking them and proof-reading them. I just don’t remember, and don’t seem to have the time to wait (I’m so sorry, my lovely betas).
Disclaimer: I do not own AFI, or anything affiliated. This is fiction. Davey Havok does not have AIDS nor do I wish it upon him. And the poem is mine, btw.
*****************************************
Sidewalks
Chapter 12: A is for AIDS
Then next day Penny popped in. She had a big, cheesy smile, looking at Jade. “Heeeey ” she greeted.
Jade smiled. “You’re awfully happy.”
Penny looked down saying, “I have to make up for Paul.”
“Why? What happened? ” Jade asked, panicked.
“Have you noticed he never comes over or anything?” she asked.
“Yeah,” Jade replied.
“He’s ashamed. He wishes... to forget Davey.”
Jade was quiet for a few minutes. He then snarled, “Bastard.”
“Jade, please,” Penny tried to reason.
“No ” Jade screamed, “Bastard, bastard, bastard, bastard ”
Now he was pissed. All of this anger he held in from Davey’s stepfather and everyone else was puring out of his mouth and at Penny.
“Hasn’t he learned anything? ” Jade screamed, “Davey’s human He lives and breathes, and now he’s dying, and you mean to tell me Paul’s just chicken shit? ”
“Jade, sweetie...” Penny said quietly as she placed her hand on his cheek.
Jade pushed Penny away. “Penny... Stop... please... Leave me alone... leave me alone... it’s just as well...” he began to mummer, “It’s just as well...”
“Jade, don’t hate Paul,” she pleaded, “He never witnessed a death of someone like that ... he loves Davey... he just can’t think of him as who he is now. He thinks of who he was way back when... he can’t handle the truth.”
Jade shook his head. “...how... how did this happen? ”
“I can see if he knows,” Penny suggested, “I am his mother.”
Jade laughed a little. “...just don’t force him.”
“You should talk,” she said, walking into the hall.
***************************************
Jade sat in the kitchen, alone. Finally, a moment of silence. He didn’t have to listen for anyone calling for him. He didn’t have to be reassuring. The person who should have been taking care of Davey the whole time, his mother, was there. Thinking about this... Jade felt... relieved. Like everything was normal, for a moment. He could certainly pretend it for as long as he liked.
At the same time, he couldn’t. Pretending didn’t cure diseases or touch hearts. He walked across the room to an old picture of the usual “gang.” Everyone looked so alive, so happy... they didn’t have to worry about lifespans or anything... it was ancient times.
As he looked up from the picture he saw his reflection cast by a mirror. He felt as he looked... old... weak. There were dark bags under his eyes. He had wrinkles forming from fake smiles and frowning.
It had finally took its toll. Jade was falling apart. He could actually admit to himself...
...He wanted Davey to die so he could get his life back.
***************************************
“I couldn’t get it out of him,” Penny sighed. “Well, I’m going to Blockbuster.”
“What? ” Jade blurted out.
“Davey told me to rent some movies. You two are having a movie night ”
**************************************
As the introduction to Nightmare Before Christmas started, Jade curled up next to Davey, trying to make up for his negative thoughts. Davey smiled, curling up closer. He was wrapped in his sheets for security, but he tried to fight the cotton barrier he practically made for himself. They didn’t say a word until “Sally’s Song.” At this Davey looked at Jade and whispered, “I love you.”
Jade nodded and said, “I love you too.”
After two more movies, Davey began to waver from sleeping to awake. He spent the time he could focus his sight on Jade. Jade kept saying to himself, “Give him one night... just one more...”
After Pulp Fiction ended, Jade turned off the TV and sat there, listening to Davey’s breathing. Breathing. It was so important to life. You had to live to breath. And yet, you could hold your breath, and you could still be alive, if only a little while. Did you think when you were dying? When your breath stops? It had to a little longer...
Jade just held him close like anyone would. Davey leaned his head on Jade’s chest, almost purposefully. Davey let out a squeaking noise.
“What...?” Jade asked. It was almost like he was in pain. He tried to stroke Davey’s back and whisper his name, but Davey just shook. He didn’t open his eyes. When the shaking subsided...
...so did his heartbeat.
Jade almost threw Davey away like a ragdoll. He then knew for sure Davey was dead. He stared at him for a few moments, barely breathing himself. Davey was really dead. After a year of horror and a constant habit of looking over each other’s shoulders, he was finally gone.
Jade finally began to cry. He grabbed Davey close and cried. Well, it wasn’t Davey anymore... it was just a body. A body that was unidentifiable to the owner of it themself. The holes in their lips and ears were just scars of a past personality. The tattoos were just diary postings in a life barely lived, ultimately...
Jade’s crying began to be full-fledged sobbing. He held the body as close as he could. He just wanted to hear something... a laugh, a joke, a scream, but nothing. He was officially free, and he didn’t like it.
*******************************
As Jade sat, staring at the open casket, people poured in like ink in water. Adam sat next to Jade, looking at that very casket.
“It’s official,” he said, “We’re done. We’re through. We can leave and only have a memory... we can... but I don’t think I can... or will... Davey... is one in a million... and....”
“I’m not leaving you,” Jade said quietly.
Hunter came in, whispering something, and sat down.
All three of them watched people come in, praying, sending condolences.
Penny and Mikey joined them, quiet. Fans came in, sniffling and crying. Some people from Davey’s self-help group stopped by. People told stories, fans said that AFI saved their lives, tattoos and scars were shared. But Jade felt hollow. Like he wasn’t there. Like he never would again. When someone never comes into your life, and they die, you don’t feel anything. Sure, you feel sorry, but you don’t feel the pain, even though everyone was a mother, father, son, daughter, lover, or fighter. The only way to feel it is meeting someone and having them taken away. And Jade finally felt that pain. It was dull and numbing. It left him rubbing his eyes time-to-time. He looked up and saw Penny crying. She deserved to have a good cry. Not once did he see her falling apart. Like the day he died, she was bopping around, smiling. Jade gave up on that months ago. And to think, at one point, Davey was living inside her. Someone put her hand on her shoulder and said:
“Everyone must die. We all know that. You’ll meet him again when you go. Don’t worry.”
“Don’t worry? ” Jade thought, “How can I not worry? Davey kept everyone sane and told everyone it would be okay... what do you do when the sane one goes? Do you officially lose your mind? ”
Jade hugged himself. “I miss him.”
“He’s not coming back,” someone said, “Let go.”
Jade looked up, angry at the comment. “Oh... Mark.”
Mark shook his head. “Don’t tell me my treatment of his death is any better than yours, Jade Puget. You need to get it. Anyone who’s here loved Davey. But crying and touching yourself won’t make him come back.”
“You didn’t have what I had,” Jade defended.
“Keep telling yourself that,” Mark said, “Look at you, a shell of your former self. He ate your heart out. Trust me, he did that to all of us, that bastard.”
“Davey never wanted to hurt anyone,” Jade said, his voice loud, but shaking.
“I never said he did it purposely,” Mark murmured.
Jade turned the other way, frustrated. “Get the fuck away.”
Mark nodded and did just that.
**********************************
On the third and final day of the wake, Jade didn’t go. He couldn’t take anymore crying... at least until the funeral, which was the next day. Poor Rita, whom Jade was sure he forgot to feed more than one or two days, moped around the house with Jade, knowing her master was gone. They went into Davey’s old room and tried to snoop around, even though Jade felt like he was intruding. He then found a pink binder with his name on it... right on it, the first page, was a letter for him:
Dear Jade (and Rita, too),
No word can describe the loneliness you will probably go through. At the same time, no word can probably describe the pain I am going through. At the same time, we’ve become numb. It’s been a monster just waiting to jump out of the closet and at us, shaking in our Pjs.
I don’t know why you allowed yourself to end up like this for me, but appears that it’s just one of those mysteries of life we can only wonder about.
Every night when I sleep I try to think of you, Jade, smiling. As I get closer to what I assume is death, I realize that the picture I have is fading more and more because you simply don’t smile. I guess I saw a glimmer through the darling of a cat, Rita. Cherish her like a queen, Jade.
You’ll realize that a lot is going to you through my will. I know I shouldn’t have overwhelmed you, but I feel like I couldn’t have trusted anyone else. I mean, can I trust my parents or brother? My poor parents... I’d hate to bury my own son. And poor Mikey... I was never there to look out for him, Jade. I know he’s pretty much grownup, but we all need someone to look out for us (I learned that from you). Speaking of which, thank you for not leaving me. I needed you from day one and not once did you waver. I know I got so pissed off at times and you just watched. You led me through everything, and in the end, made me more comfortable with the end, so they say.
I’d rant more, but in the end it will be silly. We all die, right? Just because my death came sooner than yours or anyone else... doesn’t mean I didn’t live. There are so many other people that never had a chance to do what we did, see the world, meet so many people.
Needless to say, I lived a full life, with you at hand.
So now, Jade, here is a binder of things I wrote in my last year or so. Poems, stories, songs, whatever. I hope you enjoy it. You’ll notice I wrote some weird poems (I never did one with the alphabet before...) And I know that whatever you do with it, you’ll do the right thing.
Enjoy.
-DxH
Jade laughed at how Davey just signed it like anything else. He turned to the poems. The first one was titled “Alphabet.”
A is for AIDS, which made and deystroyed us,
B is for Broken, which is both our hearts,
C is for Courage, what you had put in me,
D is for Damned, which we were meant to be,
E is for Elegant, you and me dancing,
F is for Fighting, which we did quite well,
G is for gigantic, the size of your heart,
H is for Hell, what life could have been,
I is for Idiocy, for you being with me,
J is for Jerk, what I was notorious as,
K is for kisses, however few there were,
L is for Lucky, that I met you,
M is for
For some reason, M was blank. Jade stared for a moment, then continued,
N is for Neglect, how my disease for months was,
O is for Outerwear, all that you saw me in,
P is for Puget, which I would have changed it to if you wanted me to,
Q is for Questioning, how long we had,
R is for Regret, what me and
Jade’s eyebrows furrowed. “What the hell...?”
S is for Stupid, because I was.
T is for Terrified, what I would be without you,
U is for Under, where you would be with me
“Yeah right,” Jade laughed weakly.
V is for Velocity, what I longed to escape,
W is for Wonder, what you saw in me,
X is for the X’s we wore for life,
Y is for “you”, like “I love you.”
And Z is for Zoom, like how fast we would go...
But no matter what,
I can’t find a letter,
That would be bitter,
Toward Y-O-U.
(That was so corny. I don’t know where that came from-DxH)
Jade sat there, holding his head. “O-oh my God...”
He looked up, trying to figure out what M could have stood for.
*************************************
Thank you for reading. Please leave a comment or question if you have any. Thank you.
I’m also really sorry I’m not beta-ing these chapters. I’m just spell-checking them and proof-reading them. I just don’t remember, and don’t seem to have the time to wait (I’m so sorry, my lovely betas).
Disclaimer: I do not own AFI, or anything affiliated. This is fiction. Davey Havok does not have AIDS nor do I wish it upon him. And the poem is mine, btw.
*****************************************
Sidewalks
Chapter 12: A is for AIDS
Then next day Penny popped in. She had a big, cheesy smile, looking at Jade. “Heeeey ” she greeted.
Jade smiled. “You’re awfully happy.”
Penny looked down saying, “I have to make up for Paul.”
“Why? What happened? ” Jade asked, panicked.
“Have you noticed he never comes over or anything?” she asked.
“Yeah,” Jade replied.
“He’s ashamed. He wishes... to forget Davey.”
Jade was quiet for a few minutes. He then snarled, “Bastard.”
“Jade, please,” Penny tried to reason.
“No ” Jade screamed, “Bastard, bastard, bastard, bastard ”
Now he was pissed. All of this anger he held in from Davey’s stepfather and everyone else was puring out of his mouth and at Penny.
“Hasn’t he learned anything? ” Jade screamed, “Davey’s human He lives and breathes, and now he’s dying, and you mean to tell me Paul’s just chicken shit? ”
“Jade, sweetie...” Penny said quietly as she placed her hand on his cheek.
Jade pushed Penny away. “Penny... Stop... please... Leave me alone... leave me alone... it’s just as well...” he began to mummer, “It’s just as well...”
“Jade, don’t hate Paul,” she pleaded, “He never witnessed a death of someone like that ... he loves Davey... he just can’t think of him as who he is now. He thinks of who he was way back when... he can’t handle the truth.”
Jade shook his head. “...how... how did this happen? ”
“I can see if he knows,” Penny suggested, “I am his mother.”
Jade laughed a little. “...just don’t force him.”
“You should talk,” she said, walking into the hall.
***************************************
Jade sat in the kitchen, alone. Finally, a moment of silence. He didn’t have to listen for anyone calling for him. He didn’t have to be reassuring. The person who should have been taking care of Davey the whole time, his mother, was there. Thinking about this... Jade felt... relieved. Like everything was normal, for a moment. He could certainly pretend it for as long as he liked.
At the same time, he couldn’t. Pretending didn’t cure diseases or touch hearts. He walked across the room to an old picture of the usual “gang.” Everyone looked so alive, so happy... they didn’t have to worry about lifespans or anything... it was ancient times.
As he looked up from the picture he saw his reflection cast by a mirror. He felt as he looked... old... weak. There were dark bags under his eyes. He had wrinkles forming from fake smiles and frowning.
It had finally took its toll. Jade was falling apart. He could actually admit to himself...
...He wanted Davey to die so he could get his life back.
***************************************
“I couldn’t get it out of him,” Penny sighed. “Well, I’m going to Blockbuster.”
“What? ” Jade blurted out.
“Davey told me to rent some movies. You two are having a movie night ”
**************************************
As the introduction to Nightmare Before Christmas started, Jade curled up next to Davey, trying to make up for his negative thoughts. Davey smiled, curling up closer. He was wrapped in his sheets for security, but he tried to fight the cotton barrier he practically made for himself. They didn’t say a word until “Sally’s Song.” At this Davey looked at Jade and whispered, “I love you.”
Jade nodded and said, “I love you too.”
After two more movies, Davey began to waver from sleeping to awake. He spent the time he could focus his sight on Jade. Jade kept saying to himself, “Give him one night... just one more...”
After Pulp Fiction ended, Jade turned off the TV and sat there, listening to Davey’s breathing. Breathing. It was so important to life. You had to live to breath. And yet, you could hold your breath, and you could still be alive, if only a little while. Did you think when you were dying? When your breath stops? It had to a little longer...
Jade just held him close like anyone would. Davey leaned his head on Jade’s chest, almost purposefully. Davey let out a squeaking noise.
“What...?” Jade asked. It was almost like he was in pain. He tried to stroke Davey’s back and whisper his name, but Davey just shook. He didn’t open his eyes. When the shaking subsided...
...so did his heartbeat.
Jade almost threw Davey away like a ragdoll. He then knew for sure Davey was dead. He stared at him for a few moments, barely breathing himself. Davey was really dead. After a year of horror and a constant habit of looking over each other’s shoulders, he was finally gone.
Jade finally began to cry. He grabbed Davey close and cried. Well, it wasn’t Davey anymore... it was just a body. A body that was unidentifiable to the owner of it themself. The holes in their lips and ears were just scars of a past personality. The tattoos were just diary postings in a life barely lived, ultimately...
Jade’s crying began to be full-fledged sobbing. He held the body as close as he could. He just wanted to hear something... a laugh, a joke, a scream, but nothing. He was officially free, and he didn’t like it.
*******************************
As Jade sat, staring at the open casket, people poured in like ink in water. Adam sat next to Jade, looking at that very casket.
“It’s official,” he said, “We’re done. We’re through. We can leave and only have a memory... we can... but I don’t think I can... or will... Davey... is one in a million... and....”
“I’m not leaving you,” Jade said quietly.
Hunter came in, whispering something, and sat down.
All three of them watched people come in, praying, sending condolences.
Penny and Mikey joined them, quiet. Fans came in, sniffling and crying. Some people from Davey’s self-help group stopped by. People told stories, fans said that AFI saved their lives, tattoos and scars were shared. But Jade felt hollow. Like he wasn’t there. Like he never would again. When someone never comes into your life, and they die, you don’t feel anything. Sure, you feel sorry, but you don’t feel the pain, even though everyone was a mother, father, son, daughter, lover, or fighter. The only way to feel it is meeting someone and having them taken away. And Jade finally felt that pain. It was dull and numbing. It left him rubbing his eyes time-to-time. He looked up and saw Penny crying. She deserved to have a good cry. Not once did he see her falling apart. Like the day he died, she was bopping around, smiling. Jade gave up on that months ago. And to think, at one point, Davey was living inside her. Someone put her hand on her shoulder and said:
“Everyone must die. We all know that. You’ll meet him again when you go. Don’t worry.”
“Don’t worry? ” Jade thought, “How can I not worry? Davey kept everyone sane and told everyone it would be okay... what do you do when the sane one goes? Do you officially lose your mind? ”
Jade hugged himself. “I miss him.”
“He’s not coming back,” someone said, “Let go.”
Jade looked up, angry at the comment. “Oh... Mark.”
Mark shook his head. “Don’t tell me my treatment of his death is any better than yours, Jade Puget. You need to get it. Anyone who’s here loved Davey. But crying and touching yourself won’t make him come back.”
“You didn’t have what I had,” Jade defended.
“Keep telling yourself that,” Mark said, “Look at you, a shell of your former self. He ate your heart out. Trust me, he did that to all of us, that bastard.”
“Davey never wanted to hurt anyone,” Jade said, his voice loud, but shaking.
“I never said he did it purposely,” Mark murmured.
Jade turned the other way, frustrated. “Get the fuck away.”
Mark nodded and did just that.
**********************************
On the third and final day of the wake, Jade didn’t go. He couldn’t take anymore crying... at least until the funeral, which was the next day. Poor Rita, whom Jade was sure he forgot to feed more than one or two days, moped around the house with Jade, knowing her master was gone. They went into Davey’s old room and tried to snoop around, even though Jade felt like he was intruding. He then found a pink binder with his name on it... right on it, the first page, was a letter for him:
Dear Jade (and Rita, too),
No word can describe the loneliness you will probably go through. At the same time, no word can probably describe the pain I am going through. At the same time, we’ve become numb. It’s been a monster just waiting to jump out of the closet and at us, shaking in our Pjs.
I don’t know why you allowed yourself to end up like this for me, but appears that it’s just one of those mysteries of life we can only wonder about.
Every night when I sleep I try to think of you, Jade, smiling. As I get closer to what I assume is death, I realize that the picture I have is fading more and more because you simply don’t smile. I guess I saw a glimmer through the darling of a cat, Rita. Cherish her like a queen, Jade.
You’ll realize that a lot is going to you through my will. I know I shouldn’t have overwhelmed you, but I feel like I couldn’t have trusted anyone else. I mean, can I trust my parents or brother? My poor parents... I’d hate to bury my own son. And poor Mikey... I was never there to look out for him, Jade. I know he’s pretty much grownup, but we all need someone to look out for us (I learned that from you). Speaking of which, thank you for not leaving me. I needed you from day one and not once did you waver. I know I got so pissed off at times and you just watched. You led me through everything, and in the end, made me more comfortable with the end, so they say.
I’d rant more, but in the end it will be silly. We all die, right? Just because my death came sooner than yours or anyone else... doesn’t mean I didn’t live. There are so many other people that never had a chance to do what we did, see the world, meet so many people.
Needless to say, I lived a full life, with you at hand.
So now, Jade, here is a binder of things I wrote in my last year or so. Poems, stories, songs, whatever. I hope you enjoy it. You’ll notice I wrote some weird poems (I never did one with the alphabet before...) And I know that whatever you do with it, you’ll do the right thing.
Enjoy.
-DxH
Jade laughed at how Davey just signed it like anything else. He turned to the poems. The first one was titled “Alphabet.”
A is for AIDS, which made and deystroyed us,
B is for Broken, which is both our hearts,
C is for Courage, what you had put in me,
D is for Damned, which we were meant to be,
E is for Elegant, you and me dancing,
F is for Fighting, which we did quite well,
G is for gigantic, the size of your heart,
H is for Hell, what life could have been,
I is for Idiocy, for you being with me,
J is for Jerk, what I was notorious as,
K is for kisses, however few there were,
L is for Lucky, that I met you,
M is for
For some reason, M was blank. Jade stared for a moment, then continued,
N is for Neglect, how my disease for months was,
O is for Outerwear, all that you saw me in,
P is for Puget, which I would have changed it to if you wanted me to,
Q is for Questioning, how long we had,
R is for Regret, what me and
Jade’s eyebrows furrowed. “What the hell...?”
S is for Stupid, because I was.
T is for Terrified, what I would be without you,
U is for Under, where you would be with me
“Yeah right,” Jade laughed weakly.
V is for Velocity, what I longed to escape,
W is for Wonder, what you saw in me,
X is for the X’s we wore for life,
Y is for “you”, like “I love you.”
And Z is for Zoom, like how fast we would go...
But no matter what,
I can’t find a letter,
That would be bitter,
Toward Y-O-U.
(That was so corny. I don’t know where that came from-DxH)
Jade sat there, holding his head. “O-oh my God...”
He looked up, trying to figure out what M could have stood for.
*************************************
Thank you for reading. Please leave a comment or question if you have any. Thank you.