we pull apart the dark

chapter one

When you're stuck in one place for longer than a few days, it's bound to get real boring real fast. Say you're sick and you're stuck inside for a week or so. You can't leave the house because you're too unwell to interact with anyone or anything outside of the safety of your home, or maybe because you're contagious and don't want to spread any illness to others, but you stay home doing nothing. If you're not too sick, maybe you get out of bed and watch some television or read, finding some way to occupy yourself but it doesn't work for very long. Eventually, you're going to want to get out into the fresh air, feel the sun on your skin. Just do something to get out from that confined area. Try being stuck in the same place for 13 years, unable to move forward no matter what you do. Completely trapped, having to watch life go on around you. Watch the seasons change but not feel it for yourself, watch people live their lives and grow. Well, sort of. There's only so much you can see when people are just walking by, you don't always see them again and you can't follow them. Rooted in one place and matter how hard you try, you were unable to leave. Like an animal of the sea, there's only so far you can swim before you reach the shore. A line you can't cross.

Once something happens that prevents you from properly living, from experiencing life, you begin to appreciate the simpler things a lot more. Like walks in the afternoon, the cool breeze when the weather was changing, snow landing on your cheeks when it got cold enough; the way it melted against the warmth from your skin and dripped down your face. Hunger cravings, late night snacks when you were still wide awake. Making absolutely terrible meals with friends, mixing things you wouldn't normally put together and regretting it once you all had a taste but laughing it off because you were just having fun together. Birthdays, holidays, hanging out with friends.. There were so many simple things people took for granted and would never think twice about.

So many people claim to be alone and to feel invisible, now that feeling isn't a good one. But it's entirely different when you actually are. Frank was alone every single day. Sure, people had stopped by every so often. Spend a little bit of time with someone they once knew, but they wouldn't stay long. And they didn't interact with him because they couldn't see him. Frank wasn't a person anymore. People saw right through him, could walk through him if they wanted to. It was a weird experience, something he tested out a few times just to see what would happen. Remaining motionless when he was in somebody's way, only to feel... Disconnected. It was an odd feeling, uncomfortable and something he didn't want to go through again. But it did happen a couple more times, kids running through the cemetery and Frank not having enough time to move before they ran straight through him. It felt like how static looked on a television, leaving him shuddering and trying to shake the strange feeling from his limbs.

See, Frank wasn't a person. Or, he was. But no longer was considered one. Frank was dead. He had died 13 years ago and since his body was put to rest, he'd been trapped. Unable to pass the cemetery gates, he was only able to roam the grounds of the graveyard inside the fencing. In the past, he had tried numerous times to pass the gates. Sometimes he thought a running head start would make a difference, but it never did. Once he reached them, his body had snapped back to his burial site like he was attached to a spring. Body fading out the closer he got to the entrance, edges a bit blurry before he completely disappeared. Nobody could see him, but he could see himself and how strange it looked and felt when his body wasn't fully there anymore. It took a lot of energy out of him for some reason, he grew more determined and tried to leap the fence across the way at one point, but it was no use. Frank Iero was stuck here and there were no signs of him ever leaving in the near future. So much for being in a better place in the after life.

Not to mention how incredibly lonely he was. He couldn't communicate with anyone. It began to piss him off, all those conspiracy theories he used to obsess over as a child when he was alive. All those horror movies, ghosts were capable of so much! They caused so much fear and destruction but the most Frank could do was cause a little wind storm when he was really angry. Enough to get a few leaves to scatter and debris to move, but not enough to blow anyone away or properly catch anyone's attention.