The Kiss of Vanity Blessed Me With A Spiritual Murder [Frerard]

Every Breath Is A Bomb

Gerard's face looks kind of paler than usual in the mirror.

It's probably just because of the stupid fluorescent lighting, but it's still making him uneasy as he's sniffing abruptly and trying not to get any dye on his shirt. It always makes his head itch when he first applies it to his roots, and it stings a bit, too, as if his scalp is punishing him for letting them grow out so much. He'll think of it sooner next time, he promises it to himself, and shoves a plastic bag over his head when he's finished.

His room is cold, but he likes the breeze, and he leaves the window open again despite his mother's plea from this morning to keep it shut because of the moist. He can't help himself, he hates feeling like he's suffocating- he gets a weird kind of claustrophobia when there isn't enough oxygen in the room, and everything seems to trap around him.

His breathing is soft but his hands are shaking anyway, they always are, even as he puts some random record on for background noise. It's some old, dark punk rock, raw as hell, but it flows through the air just right, and Gerard can feel it relaxing the muscles of his back as he lights a cigarette. It barely catches, and he reminds himself to buy a new lighter soon, but he puts that thought at the back of his mind as he lets it go blank for a moment or two.

The plastic bag is smushed between his scalp and the hardwood texture of his headboard, he can hear it whenever he tilts his head upwards to take a drag. It's calming; in a sense- Gerard is one of those people who can find a chunk of peace only in the harsher kind of noises. He isn't sure what he means by that, but he still understands- it's mostly just the fact that muffled background noise makes other, unexpected ones quieter than they should be.

It's already close to sundown when he reckons that 30 minutes had passed, and he flicks the butt of his third cigarette out the window.

He's always loved the way all the foam turns lavender blue after it's left his hair black, and he can't help but to appreciate the flow as it's traveling towards the drain. He just watches it disappear for a few moments- he sometimes wishes he could follow the blue, along with the one inside his head.

His hair reminds him of oil tar again, now that the dye is renewed, and he flinches uncomfortably at the thought.

He rinses the remainders out of his hair quickly, cursing at his own clumsiness when the shampoo gets into his eyes. It smells like fresh daisies, green tea and early spring peaches, and it reminds him of his old home so much that he wonders if he'd maybe deliberately brushed it over his eyelids just so that the pictures would come back. They're abstract, some just fractals of forgotten memories while the others are pretty live and vibrant inside his brain- they make him feel like his younger self is dancing over his imagination and pushing all the wrong buttons.

It makes him want to puke, so he turns the faucet to the right and embraces the cold that streams across his scalp in that moment; washing the unwanted thoughts away.

*

Gerard doesn't register that he's put his oldest, most faded band t-shirt on until his mother mentions it later.

"You're going out. Not to bed," she remarks, tilting her head to the side lightly. She looks like she's studying him, but he's so used to it when it comes to her that it doesn't bother him as much as it usually would. Her hair is in her eyes and her shoulders are bare, and he can't help but to wonder if it's a good thing that he's indeed inherited his mother's shoulders.