19. Gerard #3
“I didn’t even get a breath,” he said. “We were even more famous after the tour ended than before the tour started. Word of mouth about our shows had been so good that people were already wondering when we might go out on the road again. Not to mention we owed the label another album, which they were ravenous for. I told Toby that I was too busy and that it wasn’t going to work out. I couldn’t handle any more.”
“I know that feeling,” Emory offered. The song changed again. They barely paid attention.
“To me, We the Wells was always a project for now, not for forever. We were going to use it as a launchpad for the careers and lives we really wanted. I told myself I’d reach back out to Toby after All’s Well That Ends Well, but there’s not going to be a hiatus, and there’s not going to be a me and Toby,” Gerard said, up to his eye sockets in feelings.
“Why not?” Emory asked in a strange voice.
“According to social media, he’s getting married next May,” he said. To combat his bitterness, he took another cookie. If only carbs and the taste of cloves could cushion his hurt and not just make his face puffy and his trainer upset.
“I see,” said Emory.
Gerard rolled out his shoulders, letting the music fill the space where their conversation had been for a second.
He stared across the coffee table, at the impression Emory’s sleeve was making in the arm of the couch.
“I wish I could see you,” he said at the end of a mid-tempo anthem he was half-proud of.
“Right now, talking to you reminds me of when I first learned about prayer. My dad—if you can believe this—was a banker during the week and a deacon at our church on the weekends, so I didn’t grow up with imaginary friends, because everybody told me I had God when I was alone or lost. I remember the first time my dad, before tucking me in, told me to kneel beside the bed with him so we could talk to God.
He got a good laugh out of me asking, ‘Is God here right now?’ He said, ‘God is always here.’”
“Now, that doesn’t sound frightening at all,” Emory said, deadpan.
“Right?! He followed that up with ‘He is everywhere. Always.’ I couldn’t have been more than five, and I took him literally.
In the school hallways and at the dinner table, I was always looking over my shoulder thinking God was like Santa—if I stayed up late enough on Christmas Eve, I could catch Him protecting us,” Gerard said, letting out a self-effacing laugh.
“Eventually, my mom noticed how I was behaving and asked what was wrong. When I told her, she didn’t laugh.
She very calmly and seriously said, ‘What your father meant is that God is in the sunshine and the leaves on the trees and in the food we eat. God is love and light, and we talk to Him to express our gratitude for the blessings we have. You won’t see Him, but you can feel Him and honor Him.
’ That only made me more confused. Why did so many people believe in a power they couldn’t see?
It would be years before I accepted that all my extreme questioning and discomfort around religion could be attributed to my neurodivergence. ”
“When were you diagnosed?” Emory asked.
“While we were working on All’s Well,” he said, feeling suddenly like he was doing a tell-all interview with some überserious journalist. “No matter what I tried, I couldn’t catch up on sleep, and I couldn’t stop feeling anxious.
I was constantly forgetting things and zoning out during writing sessions.
Our sound engineer hated me because we’d have to do dozens of takes when that wasn’t the case on previous albums. At photo shoots, I was agitated by the brightness of the lights and the constant shutter of the camera.
I’d demand breaks, and everyone assumed I was just being a diva, a rock star, the fame monster, but as soon as I shut myself in a bathroom or my dressing room, I’d sob.
I felt out of control, so I quickly and covertly found a therapist. It took him less than three sessions to tell me what I clearly already knew—that the world wasn’t built for me. ”
“That is a powerful piece of information,” said Emory.
“Most days it doesn’t make me feel powerful.
It makes me feel like a liability, or worse, like I’m making it all up,” Gerard said.
Finally, he reached forward and shut off the album.
If Emory wanted to listen, he’d let him borrow the headphones.
He couldn’t handle more noise. “After how I acted, I’m afraid if I tell people, they’re not going to believe me.
It’s not the kind of medical diagnosis where blood tests and scans show concrete proof. ”
“If your family can believe in God without concrete proof,” said Emory reassuringly, “I think they can find it in themselves to believe you, too.”
The understanding way Emory said this eased a bit of Gerard’s hesitation. Emory had undergone a miraculous transformation. Not just from visible to invisible. But from scared and biting when Gerard first arrived to caring and kind.
Gerard sank his teeth into a fourth cookie—uncaring of the calories—and smiled through the silence at his invisible confidant.