Always There

"How could you keep something like this from me, Maria?" Billie Joe demanded. "Didn't I deserve to know?" He'd never felt so betrayed in all his life. So emotionally beat up in such a short instant. "All these years of wondering how you were, where you were, what you were doing...and you had my daughter? My daughter!"

Maria still sat on Jakob's bed, tears welling in her eyes as she dipped her head down to her chest; her own quivering chin mirroring Billie Joe's. "I'm sorry."

"Sorry doesn't cut it! It doesn't give me any sort of explanation on why you kept this from me. What made you keep this from me, Maria? Didn't you think I could handle it?"

"I didn't even find out I was pregnant until a month after I was in Ecuador. Even then I didn't want to believe it. I didn't tell anyone," Maria began. "When the spring semester ended and I came home, it wasn't until then that I had to tell my parents. Actually, it was more like my mom noticed right away that I'd gained weight. I was four months pregnant when I came home to San Diego. I was scared and confused and wasn't sure what I'd do."

"And calling me was one of those things you were unsure of?" he asked bitterly.

"Yes," she admitted. "I came to the decision that I didn't want to tell you because I didn't want to take away your future. I'd been so ingrained with the mantra that this was a woman's day and age by my parents, that I was confidant I could raise my baby on my own; that I didn't need a man to help me. And I loved you so much, Billie. I felt that if I told you, you're goals would've been put on the backburner and I didn't want that for you."

"Oh, well that's nice," Billie Joe remarked sarcastically, fighting back his own tears. "But how the fuck could you know what I wanted if you didn't bother to fuckin' ask me?"

"I'm sorry," she repeated quietly.

"You're sorry," he repeated. He really fought back the urge to cry. She had been the woman he'd once thought of marrying, before he got back together with Adrienne. Hell, he got back together with Adrienne initially because he was trying to get over Maria. And ever since, he would let his mind wander from time to time, daydreaming about her. "I loved you so much, Maria. I don't care if you didn't think I could handle being a father or not. If you thought I didn't need to be held back or not. That was my decision to make, not yours. You took that away from me. You denied my being a part of the first twelve years of her life. She never got to know me...except from what she may see on TV because to her I'm just some rockstar."

Their mutually watery eyes met and held. Billie Joe hiccuped, not able to suppress the sob that had been creeping up on him. He sank to the floor, his back slinking down the red wall behind him. Bringing his knees up to his chest, he put his head in his hands and ran his fingers through his hair.

"Billie Joe..." Maria slid off the bed and crawled over to him, touching her hand to the top of his knee. "Please...I'm sorry. Please don't hate me."

He shook her hand off of him and looked up at her. "I don't hate you, Maria. I don't think I ever could. But right now I don't like you all that much. You wanna know why?" He paused, but didn't allow time for her to respond. "Because I don't think you would've told me Olivia was mine unless I came right out and asked. Or initiated the inquiry like I did today."

Maria opened her mouth to protest, but he cut her off with a glare.

"Don't. Don't bother. Just...get away from me."

Clearly offended, Maria stood up, looking down on Billie Joe. "Just like that, huh?" she said with her own quivering chin and small sob. "Well, fuck you, Billie. Because I was going to tell you. You have no fucking clue how horrible I feel having kept this from you all this time. There were so many times I wanted to call you or seek you out and tell you, but I didn't know what to say or how to say it."

"Yeah, whatever."

"Exactly. Whatever." She wiped her tears away with the back of her hand and tried to regain her composure. "Well, if you don't want me here any longer, I'll be leaving." Pausing for a moment, Maria blinked back any further tears and walked out of the bedroom leaving Billie Joe to his own defenses.

From within Jakob's bedroom, Billie Joe could hear as Maria rounded up her kids...one of them he knew to now be his. He listened as Olivia's voice rang out above the others, wondering why they were leaving, and why her mom looked so sad.

The next sound he heard was the penthouse door slamming shut, followed by resounding silence.

Crawling to his feet, Billie Joe sauntered from the bedroom and down the hallway to the living room. He stepped past all his new furniture to the sliding glass doors that lead onto his penthouse porch. He stood there, waiting, looking down below several stories until a few moments passed.

He saw four figures leaving the apartment building and hailing a cab, getting in, and driving away from him. Placing the palms of his hand around the railing and gripping it, he pushed back and leaned down, growling out in anger and sadness.

He should be ungodly furious with Maria. He wanted to hate her so much, to want to rip her heart out and throw it to the ground like he felt had happened to his own heart.

But why couldn't he feel that way? Why did he want her to come back so much? It wasn't just because he wanted to face Olivia and tell her, "Hey, I'm your daddy." It wasn't just Olivia.

"Goddamnit, Maria. I--urgh! Fuck you! Fuck...you!" he screamed on the top of his lungs from his porch. He sank down the the floor of the porch and paid no attention to New York City's cold, November air. "I want to hate you...why can't I hate you?" he muttered.