Gray - By Pete Wentz Page 0,25

out of my mouth, and I’m greeted by my friend the philosopher. He says hello with his fists.

The first punch to my stomach turns my guts inside out. I fall onto the curb and hear my keys clink down the street. I spit up blood, steaming in the winter air, then, in a move of pure showmanship, I lick it off my hand and slap the philosopher in the face, then walk off to find my keys. He spins me around before he hits me again, I laugh ’cause my spit and blood on his face look like war paint. His rockabilly pals are down on the street now, inching closer to the fray but not willing to actually fight. Cowards.

Then the philosopher rears back and blasts me in the face, hits me dead center and tells me it’s for Her, asks how I like being abused. I remember thinking that, for a bookish guy, he punches pretty well, and he’s got a quick wit too. Then it all goes black. Getting punched in the face is like a hiccup in time, it all slows down from there. All of a sudden, every single tear duct in my head starts working overtime to get enough buckets out. The tears are freezing on my cheeks, and the blood starts caking on my face, mixing with the dirt of the Chicago street. I hear Converse pounding the cement in the distance; the sound is absolutely gorgeous. All I can do is crack a smile at this stupid kid—the kind of smile that says too late. Sound the cannons. The cavalry has arrived. This is why it’s a good thing to have a guy like the Animal on your side.

He plows through the philosopher, knocking him to the street with a thud. In an instant, he’s on top of him, pounding his face with his fists, calling him motherfucker and pussy and bitch. The philosopher can’t even cover up, and now he’s making gurgling noises. The Animal relents, mostly because he doesn’t want to kill the kid, and the philosopher staggers off down the street. It only takes us a split second to start chasing after him, the Animal laughing like a maniac, breathing steam into the night air. We fly around a corner and the Animal catches his prey on the front porch of a row house, pulling him off it, the skin on the philosopher’s hand tearing as he is wrenched from the safety of the doorknob he has anchored himself on.

He’s screaming like he’s being murdered. We’re panting in the cold air. The Animal holds his prey as I start laying into him. Again and again. Right hand only. I want him to feel every hit. Blood starts pouring out of his mouth—no more witty words, motherfucker—and the porch light turns on. Out steps the philosopher’s mom, a winter coat pulled over her shoulders. The Animal tells her, “Get back in the fucking house,” and I start punctuating each shot I take with a “This is for your fucking mother.” He’s defiant until the end, I gotta give him that, no white flags, just “Fuck you” between every hit. But I get into a rhythm and eventually his body goes limp. The Animal lays him down in the snow, and then, with his mom looking on from the window, I stand over his body and spit my blood into his mouth.

We book it down the street and don’t stop until we’re practically standing in Lake Michigan. Hands on our hips, lungs aching for air, the Animal and I start laughing. He lived with his fucking mother. We wash the blood off our faces and hands in a pile of dirty snow, and the Animal tells me I should probably go to the emergency room. I want to go back and find my keys, but I defer to his better judgment. He knows a mortal wound when he sees one, after all.

We walk for ages, eventually finding a hospital. We stagger in, me holding a bloody snowball to my mouth, and I tell the girl behind the desk that I’m looking to trade in some broken knuckles for 20 cc of self-esteem. She said my plan probably wouldn’t cover that. She’s funny. Because I am concussed, I decide that I’m gonna try and call Her from the pay phone in the waiting room.

I drop a quarter and a dime into the slot, and start punching in Her number. I get about