To know you is to hate you: Dark side of night.

The next morning I snuck back into my own room to get cleaned up and dressed for the day ahead. I neglected to shave, because Billie had kindly admitted how he likes my stubble, and I pulled on the first thing that came to hand. My neck was covered in little fresh teeth marks from our morning fondle and on my shoulder blade was a dark love bite. I cringed.

The marks were dismissed within moments when I noticed the time. I roughly laced my dress shoes and basically leapt from the room in utter excitement. Billie was waiting in the hallway for me, his hair a mass of black fuzz and clad in his usual attire of black jeans, creepers and a smart shirt. On his nose were aviators, which were actually mine. He smiled at me and wrapped his arms gently around my waste. We kissed gingerly, very aware of our surroundings, and left promptly for the stadium.

As much as I wanted to take Billie to the hospital that day we had a gig later that evening and sound checks needed to be made in the arena. I tried to reassure myself, and Billie, that everything would work out okay but the amount of stress and anxiety that the singer was experiencing could do nothing but harm.
We joined Tre and some of the crew at the arena’s catering hall for something to eat and then we got straight into setting up. Billie Joe was doing a good job of acting normal; he joked around with the techs and made snide remarks to me and Tre. He paraded around wearing silver tinsel and my pink, fluffy, cat ears and although it made every one laugh, it seemed almost too forced to me.

I kept my mouth shut though, exchanging glances with him every so often and fiddling with the wires of my microphone. Tre soon approached me and pulled me gently behind the stage out of view.

“Is your mic off?” he asked.

I made a quick check and nodded.

“What’s up with Billie?” the drummer asked.

“You noticed it too huh?”

“He’s paranoid, man, it’s hard not to notice.” He chewed his lip, “What happened last night?”

I stiffened at his words and I was sure I was blushing.

“Um…what? Er. What do you mean?”

“About the head injury thing! Didn’t you discuss it with him?”

“Yeah, he wasn’t amused. But he knows about it.”

Tre gazed at the tops of his shoes and pursed his lips in thought.

“Christ.” I mumbled.

“Some good he is. Unless we can get him to sing for us tonight.” Tre chuckled.

“Billie can still perform.”

“Are you sure about that? What if he goes all stiff during our set?”

I wanted to make a smart remark about how I really wanted to see Billie ‘stiff’ again but I decided against it. I chewed on my bottom lip and stroked the stubble on my chin as I thought about our options. Really, in all truth, we had none. Except cancel and that was not our style. We haven’t’ canceled a tour since the Dookie era.

“We can’t cancel – “

“Cancel what?”

Tre and I glanced to the edge of the drum riser where Billie Joe stood. He had his blonde guitar hanging down his back and a pair of drumsticks in his hands. Tre’s drumsticks to be exact (I only know because of the cartoon drawings littering their wood.).

“We were just talking about, y’know, your little….um…problem.” I really didn’t know how to address the issue and I stammered on like this for a few moments before Tre decided to rescue me with his inappropriate bluntness.

“We’re worried that you might go ape shit on stage because of your bump to the head.”

Billie moved his mouth in the shape of an unheard ‘oh’ and pursed his lips in thought.

“Yeah.” He mumbled, “I’m kinda worried about that too.”

“We noticed.” Tre sighed.

“But we can’t cancel!” Billie Joe whined, “The fans! What about the fans!”

“We’ll go on. If anything happens we will roll with it, take it as it comes. Y’know?” I said; taking a stand and being the alpha dog as usual.

The two men nodded in silent but reluctant agreement and we dispersed to the catering hall once again. More coffee was desperately needed and a fucking huge box of sprinkle covered doughnuts.

***********

Billie Joe paced the green room. He twirled his fingers around his tie, his whole body was shaking and he chewed on his lip nervously. Never before had I ever seen him so worked up about a show. Back in the day he would have been nervous, sure, but never like this. I was basically watching a deer in headlights. Yet I sat where I was, on the leather couch with my feet resting on the futon and my bass guitar in my arms.

Tre was goofing around in the other room with the Jason’s and some of the stage crew. The support act was due to go on in five minutes and the excitement was building for everyone. Everyone but Billie Joe.

I took my eyes from him for one moment to read a text message from my daughter and when I looked back up he was leaning over the sink. He began to retch. I had my bass from my lap in mere seconds; I shot across the room and laced my arm around his waist. I held his hair back with my hand and occasionally I gently smoothed his back.

“BJ you’re as white as a fucking Irish sheep.” I joked.

He giggled pathetically before immediately emptying more from his guts. I sighed and reached for a towel.

“You can’t go on like this.” I passed him the towel.

“I – I can. I’m just nervous.” He wiped his mouth and dropped the towel into the washing bin.

“Come on. Sit with me and we’ll just chill okay? You’ll make yourself high as a kite walking in circles like that.”

I moved my bass to its stand and positioned myself back in my usual spot. Billie Joe crawled up beside me. He lifted my arm to sling it around his own shoulders, pulled his feet up onto the leather and cradled his head on my chest. I buried my nose in his hair; evidently it smelt of vomit so I withdrew.

“You gotta calm down BJ.” I whispered.

“I know. Fucking promise me it will be okay tonight Mike.”

“I can’t.”

He whined and it broke my heart.

“The first chance we get we’ll go straight to the nearest doctor and get this figured out.” He began to protest but I cut him off with a tap to the skull, “Stop it! You know you have to go if you want this to go away. Take it like a man BJ!”

He chuckled, “Oh I took it like a man last night all right.”

I blushed.

“You loved it slut.”

“Yeah.” He reached up and planted a soft kiss to my lips. Sadly I almost gagged at their taste.

“BJ! You taste like shit!” I joked.

He frowned and lowered his head back to my chest.

“Its vomit actually but thanks all the same.”

We sat in silence for a few moments, 15 to be exact, and just listened to the sound of the distant crowd cheering and to our ever loved support bouncing around the stage. Our own breathing was drowned out by the various noises of the building, by the nose of the sink and the running water in the other rooms. Even our roadies and our beloved band members could be heard from the room down the hall.
I smiled as the small man sighed; it sounded like a child drifting to sleep.

“Billie Joe?” I asked.

“Hmm mm.” he mumbled.

“I’m not gonna let anything happen you. You’re safe with me.”

“I know.” He whispered, “But you can’t save me from myself Mikey. No one can.”

The sad thing is he was right.


***********

I shot after Billie as a wave of applause filled the stadium. Tre bounded up onto the drum riser, Billie Joe brought his guitar to his front and I took up my position at my own mic. We started straight into ‘21st century breakdown’ and mid way through he introduced not only himself but us too.

The atmosphere was amazing, as always. The fans were like a pack of bitches in heat, they screamed and shouted and bounced on the floors. Billie Joe seemed to have completely forgotten his bout of anxiety and dashed around the stage like the god he was. I briefly looked behind me to see Tre grinning widely. He winked at me and mouthed ‘He’s doing well.’ Either that or ‘Go to hell’, but I am almost certain it was the former.

It was extremely well, the adrenaline was building in my veins and I was lost in the noise. We were half way through the set, Billie Joe had his red boa and police hat on, Tre had his bra on and I had my pink cat ears on my head and the glasses placed on my nose. King for a day, of course, was always the highlight for me. Dressing up in those idiotic getups and watching the group sing the lyrics really was the most amazing and childish feeling; like a dream.

It was short lived. There was a sudden screeching as Billie Joe’s mic feel to the ground. He stop still, his legs spread wide, his expression one of utter shock and his hands, I could see, were shaking. I stopped playing, as did Tre. The singers head snapped round to me and I saw a change in his eyes. My heart sank; It wasn’t Twitch. The reverend, as he had called himself, wouldn’t cause any trouble, if anything he would search himself for the lyrics and get on with it; He just seemed like the type. But what about Fink?

‘Billie Joe’ lifted his guitar over his shoulder and let it fall with a twang to the stage floor. He shakily hurried by me into the back stage area. The crowd had began to mutter to each other, from some of the closer fans I could hear them worried rather than angry; which, I guess, was a good thing.

“I’m sorry guys.” Tre was the one to speak first, he held his own mic close to his mouth and gazed from one side of the hall to the other, “BJ hasn’t been feeling too hot all day. We’ll send the support back on and then we’ll arrange for you guys to get your money back or something.”

“We’ll keep you guys informed about the ticket situation.” It was all I could think to say before following after Billie Joe. Tre and the Jasons dashed after me.

We met the support on the way back; they were prepped and ready to go on stage to calm the crowd down. The Jasons took the liberty of speaking to the hall manager, along with some of the roadies, while Tre and I went to our green room.

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