Out for Blood: A Billie Joe Story

My father continues to twirl the knife around in his hand, always looking from me to the knife and back again. A few minutes later, he stops and smirks.

"Are you scared," he says as he brings the knife's point to the top of my jaw. I swallow.

"Yes," I whisper, my voice shaking. He slowly brought the knife down to my chin and down my neck.

"Will you do what I say?" My heart speeds up. I nod. "Good." He moves to the side of me. "Take everything off." I take a deep breath and start to stand up, but I stop when he turns around. He looks back at me. "I'm not that bad of a man to watch, even if I have seen everything." He turns back around and looks back up at the ceiling.

"Thanks," I mutter. As I pull my shirt off, he sighs.

"I always wanted to paint this room black and red, but Adie wanted it to stay off-white." I take advantage of his distraction.

"Then why don't you paint it now? Like, tomorrow or something?" I push my pants down and kick them off.

"Nah, I'm too lazy," he laughs. I sigh quietly.

"I could help you." He turns a little bit, but he still couldn't see me.

"Really? You would do that?"

"Sure." What was I saying? I don't wanna help him! But maybe he won't do anything anymore, then...

"How much do you have off?"

"Shirt and pants." He turns all the way around. After eying me up, he smiles and looks at my face.

"Come over here." I nervously walk over to him and stand in front of him. He slips his arms around my waist and looks straight in my eyes. He didn't have to look up that much because of how short I was. He gently kisses me on the lips, not like the other times he has. I feel a chill run up my spine, but it wasn't a scared chill. It was like a pleasure type of chill. When he pulls back, he looks like he's thinking hard about something. He leans toward me and puts his mouth right by my ear.

"Get dressed," he whispers. He pulls back and looks at me.

"Are you serious," I ask. He loosens his arms from around me and falls back on the bed.

"Yeah. Get up early tomorrow and we'll go to Home Depot to get paint." I smile.

"A'ight." I walk to the other side of the bed and put all my clothes back on. When I'm at the door, my father clears his voice.

"See you tomorrow morning, hun." I turn a little and look at him. He's just watching me, waiting for my answer.

"Yeah, see you." I walk out and go to my room. I fall asleep in seconds, actually looking foreward to tomorrow for once.

***

I wake up at 7:44 AM and get out of bed immdiately. I take a quick shower and dress, throwing on one of my new shirts. It was green and it said "got green?" Yeah, I'm a bit of a tree hugger, leave me alone. So I put that on with a pair of blue flare jeans. I walk downstairs and my father is sitting at the table drinking coffee writing on a piece of paper. He looks up when one of the stairs creak.

"Hey," he says, looking back down at the paper. "Can you listen to this? I'm not sure if I should go on with it." I sit down at the other end of the table.

"You just released an album and you're already working on a new song," I ask quietly.

"Yeah, so listen, 'kay?"

"Okay." He clears his voice.

"Is it just me or does something seem out of place? Can we just take this back a space? Only to do it again, but this time with more grace. We're at the base of our past, please let this last. We're at the starting line to the rest of our lives. Don't stop me now, I'm finally unbound. I'm free, finally free. I'm finally unbound." I smile.

"I like that. What's it gonna be called," I ask. He shrugs and looks up at me.

"I don't know yet, I'll figure that out when I'm done," he laughs a little. He folds the paper and puts it in his pocket. "Ready to go?" I nod. He stands and walks to the door with me following. We drive to Home Depot and go straight to the paint section.

"Black and red," I say to myself, thinking. My father glances at me and smiles.

"Have any ideas?" I smile, also.

"Every other wall black or red. Write on the black walls in red and write on the red walls in black." He looks at me, shocked.

"You're a fucking genius!"