A Gift or A Curse

Blake went into the dark room. There were unoperated cameras everywhere, the cables on the floor looked like some dead snakes in her path.

“Hello? Anybody in here?”

Nobody answered her. She stepped in even further, wiping tears off her cheeks. Then she saw a figure, sitting down on the floor, face buried in the knees.

“Jimmy!” She ran towards him. After spending somewhat an hour in the dressing room not knowing what to do, Blake decided to go search for him.

“Jimmy, are you okay? Where have you been? Why weren’t you with me?”

She gathered her courage to touch his cold shoulder. Shivers went down her spine, as usual when her palm landed on there.

“Jimmy, answer me!”

Jimmy slowly raised his head. His black eyelinered eyes gazed at her weakly.

“I can’t cry Blake. I want to cry, but I can’t.”
“What?”
“I don’t have any tears anymore.”

Blake frowned at him, but she dropped down to the floor too, sitting beside him.

“Can dead people actually cry?” she wondered to herself, but out loud. Jimmy smiled at her innocence.

“Anyway, why the fuck weren’t you with me? Do you know what they said to me back there? They said I’m a fucking fraud! That big muscled guy scared the hell out of me! Where were you?!”

Jimmy blinked at her. All of his sadness towards his band mates now, gone.

“Wow, you cursed.”

Blake gasped. Hands over her mouth. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to.”

Jimmy laughed. Gradually his laugh became harder that he actually rolled on the floor.

“What’s so funny??”

“You are! Look at you! Only spending a day with them and you’ve changed!”

With her lips pouted, she put her hands across her chest. Luckily Jimmy was already dead. Otherwise she would have killed him right now.

“Hello?” a voice suddenly echoed through the room. Blake stood up abruptly. So did Jimmy. There was a guy, wearing a headphone at the doorway, staring at her.

“We are closed. Who are you and what are you doing in here?”

Blake quickly picked up her backpack, ran out of there, past him and saying sorry, with Jimmy behind her.

“Sorry, we just had sex on your floor. Be sure to clean it up okay?” Jimmy jokingly said to the guy but the guy ignored him.


Outside on the street, Jimmy continued to laugh watching Blake’s panic expression and her alert movements.

“It’s not funny Jimmy. Cut it out!”

“It is funny. You gotta admit. Look at you right now. Sneaking out of a studio when everybody was already gone. Cursing and everything. You’ve really changed, Blake!”

“Shut up!” she turned her back at him. Jimmy settled his laugh finally and teleported in front of her.

“Aww…look at that face. You’re mad at me? I can hang my jacket on your long pouty lips you know.”

Her eyes narrowed as she slapped Jimmy’s shoulder hard. He winced, and felt a sharp pain on it.

“Ouch!”

She rolled her eyes at him. “Can dead people feel pain too?” she mocked.

“I dunno. But you slap like a bitch.”

“Jimmy!”

“Okay, okay I won’t cuss!”

From the point of view of other people in the streets around them, Blake looked like a crazy person with her hands waving in the air, and then she suddenly grunted at the wind, turning her back from the lamp post.

“Blake, they’re staring at us.” Jimmy said, pointing to a few people around them. Blake closed her eyes and bit her lip. She kept forgetting that Jimmy wasn’t visible.

“So what are we going to do now?” with one hand covering her face, she whispered to him.

Jimmy took a deep breath. “We try again.”

“No way. They won’t believe me now.”

“We’re gonna have to make them.”

“But I can’t stay long. I don’t have enough money. And where am I gonna stay?”

Jimmy gazed at the floor for a second. And then he looked up, grinning.

“I know where we can stay.”

******************************************************************************************************

Michelle was staring into space as her fingers constantly scratching behind Pinkly’s ear. She was sitting in their garden, alone. The dog panted in her lap, with her tongue out. She couldn’t stop thinking about that blue eyed girl. Was she really telling the truth? If she was only a fraud, how did she know about Brian’s voicemail?

Hey, you’ve reached Brian Pickled Liver Hane-Dog. I’ll fucking kill you!

She can still hear Jimmy’s voice ringing in her head. After Jimmy died, she kept herself busy by taking care of Brian. Always being by his side, attended to his needs, and never let him be alone. Until she didn’t have time to really think about her own sorrow. She wanted to be strong for Brian. But now that the blue eyed girl showed up and messing with their heads, she couldn’t help but feeling down. She missed Jimmy so much.

Her charmbracelet glistened in reflection of the sun. She took a glance at it. It was a gift from Jimmy. There were pieces of every city that they’ve been to during their Asia tour back then. Michelle loved it so much, she’s been wearing it ever since.

She smiled and touched them lightly, releasing Pinkly from her lap. Pinkly went off running to the backyard.

Suddenly she felt a warm breath on her head and a pair of hands snaked in her shoulders. She took those hands and gripped tight on them as she read the tattoos on the knuckles; MARLBORO. Her smile grew even wider.

Brian kissed the top of her head. She smelled like strawberry and roses.

“What are you thinking about?” he murmured into her hair.

She looked up, her head tilted back with him looking down at her.

“Just some random stuff.”

Brian bent down and kissed her lips softly. His hands fell onto her chest and rested there. She giggled on his lips.

“Naughty husband are you now?”

“I’m just frisky baby.” He smirked, then let go as he walked around the garden bench and took a seat next to her. They were now staring at a far beach view with wind breezing through their faces.

“What do you think about that girl?” she asked suddenly after they drank in the view in silent for a while.

“What girl?”

“That blue-eyed girl. Blake.”

Brian sighed and leaned further. As his elbow rested on his knees, he rubbed his own face.
“I don’t know, Chelle. She’s -” he paused, looking for the right word. “- different. Just really different from us. I don’t think Jimmy knew someone like that in his life before.”

Michelle too, leaned forward, trying to catch his eyes.

“So you think she’s telling the truth?”

Brian gazed at the view long before turning to her.

“She stalked us. Followed us all the way from Canada. Maybe she’s just a fan. Maybe that voicemail leaked on the internet or something.”

Michelle stared down at the ground, thinking hard. It can’t be, because you have to know Brian’s private number to know about that voicemail. Unless you’re one of Avenged Sevenfold members, or you have been contacting Brian all along then you couldn’t have the slightest clue about it.

“Wait a minute…do you have another girl that you’ve been hiding from me?” Michelle narrowed her eyes at him.

Brian blinked at her. “Wha-what?”

“Brian.”

“What?”

“Is she your secret girlfriend?”

Brian raised his eyebrows, his mouth dropped open. He got lost in his speech.

“I won’t get mad. Just tell me the truth. Have you been contacting her behind my back?”

“No! Why would you even think about something like that?”

Her eyes narrowed even more. She knew Brian wouldn’t cheat, she was just teasing him. But still.

“Maybe your previous groupies…or I dunno…whores?”

“Michelle, I fucking swear to you. Even when I was sleeping around I didn’t give them my number. None of them are worthy of getting it.” He stated arrogantly.

“You’re sure…?”

Brian closed his eyes and laughed darkly.

“What do I have to do to make you believe me?” suddenly his face went closer to hers, his eyes piercing sharp.

She jumped and screamed a little at his smooth and fast movement.

“Relax, spiky. I was just kidding!” she pushed his shoulder softly and let out a nervous laugh. Her heart pumped so fast she can’t even breathe.

“Too late.” He grabbed both of her hands on his shoulders and locked them behind her back, making her body arched. Brian buried his face in her neck and bit her there, before sucking it slowly. She moaned and laughed at the same time.

“What are you, ticklish now?” he moved his mouth to her cheeks and took a soft bite there. She giggled even more. This husband of hers sure is frisky, all the time.

“Stop biting! You’re gonna leave a mark.”

“I don’t fucking care. You woke the beast up.”

She struggled to let her hands free from his grip and took his face from biting her chin to in front of her.

“Beast? And what does that make me, your Harlot?”

He grinned. “You’re my Beauty.”

Her insides melted. Brian always knew how to say the right thing at the right moment. He leaned in and kissed the corner of her mouth softly. Michelle thought that she had tamed the beast but then Brian bit her there, before tugging her lower lip with his fangs. She giggled again, praying that her husband didn’t really have anything to do with that blue-eyed girl. And that the blue-eyed girl was actually telling the truth.

*****************************************************************************************************

Blake watched bitterly as the taxi cab went missing into the dark. She opened her purse and sighed heavily. She hadn’t enough money to stay for another day. Her stomach grumbled, quite loudly, but luckily only Jimmy heard it.

“You’re hungry?”

She looked up. “I’ll bear with it.”

Jimmy couldn’t do anything. If he was alive he would’ve stole some money for her. He pitied this girl and felt guilty at the same time. What did she do wrong that she deserved to end up here, with not enough money and labeled as crazy by people around her?

Jimmy took her by the shoulder and led her forward. Blake shuddered at his touch but she just let him be. She didn’t have much energy to fight anyway.

“Blake, welcome to my place.”

Blake ran her eyes through the house generally. The house was quite big, white in color with some stone decoration at the front door. But it also looked a little bit old, plants were crawling up the walls and the windows were dusty.

“Well, better than nothing.” Jimmy commented as he saw the look on Blake’s face. He tried turning on the doorknob but it was locked.

“Of course it was locked. How silly of me.”

He peeked from under his doormat, looking for a spare key. But it wasn’t there.

“Oh shit. My key is gone!”

Truth was, his last spare key was taken by Brian, the morning he found Jimmy’s cold body on the bed. Brian had been holding on to that key ever since.

Blake just watched him panicked around with a weary expression on her face. She sat down on the edge of the small stair in front of the door and buried her face in her knees. She was too tired, she only needed some sleep right now. Or maybe some food.

PRANGGG!

Blake raised her head up abruptly. A sudden noise of something broken made her stood up straight. Jimmy went running towards her, his face gleamed.

“Let’s go through the back door!”

“You broke into your own house?”

“Yeaah. How cool is that?”

Blake can feel it in her guts that she was going to regret this. But nevertheless her tired feet just followed Jimmy to the back as he opened the door from the broken window.

“Apparently when I’m 50 feet from you, I can touch and move things. We’re gonna have so much fun in Halloween!”

Blake glared at him. “What makes you think we’re gonna be together that long?”

Jimmy stunned in his steps. He watched in horror as Blake just walked past him weakly into the kitchen.

The house was dusty. The kitchen looked like it hadn’t been cleaned since WWII. The furniture in the living room was draped over by pieces of large white cloth and the walls were empty except for a framed picture of Jimmy and his four best friends. Blake stared at it without knowing.

Jimmy walked closely towards her. He hadn’t thought about being apart from her, not even for one second. He didn’t even know why. Sure he missed Leana and Zoey, the love of his life but being with Blake made him forgot about them. Was it because that she can see him? Or because of that hauntingly beautiful blue eyes that always look scared and shy?

Blake crashed herself onto the white-cloth-covered couch. As her body slammed onto it, dust were sprinkled everywhere, making her coughed hard. Jimmy chuckled and shook his head. He picked her up by the knee and walked upstairs.

“Jimmy, put me down. I can walk.”

“I know you’re too tired. At least let me do this for you.”

“You’re freezing.”

He smiled at her. “I’m dead, what do you expect?”

Blake groaned but she didn’t have the strength to struggle. So she rested her head on his cold shoulder as he brought her into his bedroom.

His bedroom was surprisingly tidy. A large white cloth covered the bed too but there were no more papers and drumsticks lying around anymore. His upright piano was still there, dusty, untouched and also covered in white cloth. He pushed the cloth aside from the bed and laid her on it. Blake was already asleep.

Jimmy smiled watching her sleep. He tucked away strands of hair from her forehead to the back and kissed the top of it. She frowned a little as his cold lips touched her forehead. After a moment, he snapped and quickly pulled away.

His heart didn’t beat but his stomach was fluttering. Was this a guilty feeling towards Lea? He asked to himself.

Leana. He needed to know how she is doing right now.

Jimmy rubbed his face and went downstairs.

Notes

A/N: i really miss writing scenes of Brian and Michelle...i will try to put them more..but in the meantime you guys are gonna have to deal with jimmy first :P hahhaa