The Man Who Would Not Be King

The backdrop yanked Bill’s arm down violently when his pull slackened in surprise. He had heard anger, so raw it sounded like the yowl of an animal wind. But he was in a hurry and so ignored it, or tried to, and reeled the rope back tightly, tossing a nod of apology to the guy on the other end of the massive thing. He guessed the lighting for the show would be done by someone else today. He had only leafed through the article after it had been handed to him by one of the kids he called the errand runners, but that one photo had told him—and likely the rest of the crew—all he needed to know. There was trouble in the air, buzzing between particles and shivering into more.
***

She had actually read it, and first stopped, confused, when it said that Billie Joe had looked at Tré. It seemed irrelevant. Billie Joe looked at Tré all the time. For confirmation, a shared smile indicating an inside joke… What was the reporter getting at? Was he implying that Billie Joe had made it up that she’d played a part in his improved mood? She didn’t like that the queasy feeling spread itself into all corners of her gut.

After that she read it a bit more quickly, laughing despite herself at the paragraph concerning Mike’s Clue prowess. Her vague amusement was snuffed out as she turned the page. Oh God. She read the caption. Her hands shook, and the magazine pages crinkled with the vibration. She checked her surroundings, no one there. Her pace sprinted ahead of her; she barely caught the meaning behind the words, eyes skittering back and forth and losing focus.

She reached the end, and wished that the stupid little RS circle had been placed before the last segment. She would have been happy to start her job thinking about Mike wiping the floor with her and the others at board games. Instead, with this, she knew her relationship was over. There are certain things you don’t recover from. She knew this was one of them.

Suddenly feeling grossly tired, Annabelle made her way over to the dressing room she was sure he was in. It was a slow sort of anger, one that evolved from a fuzz, hit resentment, then finally passed the finish line. She shouldn’t have to be doing this. Hunting him down to say it’s over, extract an apology, pay him back in screaming for what he’d done in silence. Was it a game? Was he waiting for her, laughing with Tré and taking bets as to how high her volume would get?

Annabelle had taken her copy with her, in anticipation of throwing it at him, and that’s exactly what she did. Billie Joe winced as it bounced harmlessly off of him. Shooting each other “oh shit” looks, Ronnie and Jason White left the scene quickly, instruments and bottles of polish in hand.

Inexperienced at being really fucking angry and able to do something about it, Annabelle was at a loss for how to begin. “What is wrong with you!” she yelled, fists clenched and feet planted. When Billie Joe had opened and closed his mouth a few times like a fish, without saying anything, she continued, unable to find a cohesive thread for her diatribe. “How could you do something like this? I trusted you! Why would you turn around and betray me like this?”

She gulped to fight back tears as he just stood there. “Is this funny to you? Am I just a big joke to you? I thought I knew how you felt, but clearly I was really fucking wrong and I don’t know you at all. Let’s catch up, Billie.” Her voice rose hysterically. “How many other roadies have you fucked before me? Do you always go behind our backs? Is it always you and Tré? Have you guys been together this whole fucking time, since Green Day, like, started or something?”

Billie Joe eyed her, watched her eyes redden. He knew he had no reply that could possibly calm her down or make it hurt less. All he could do was offer his version of the truth. “No, we haven’t, it’s not like that. And you’re the first roadie I’ve ever dated. Honestly.” He stopped to breathe; it was like he had a pile of bricks lying over his chest.

“Well why the fuck did you even have a first if this was how you were going to treat her? Or him.” Her lip trembled as a tear ran down to meet it.

They were so separate, he thought. It was amazing what a few feet could do. He struggled to get his words across it. “This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. It’s just…two things were happening at once, two very different things. I wish I could explain, make you understand…” He seemed to almost be pleading with her.

Annabelle’s heart was being pulled in two directions. She didn’t enjoy being angry and wanted to give him a chance to mollify her. But she also didn’t want to go easy on him and let him off the hook, especially since he wasn’t making any goddamned sense. “Explain, then,” she snapped, directing her anger towards the things she still didn’t know.

He would have breathed a sigh of relief had it not been for the daunting task now set before him. He chewed the inside of his cheek and made a mental note never to get into anything this hard to put into words again. “Um, well…I guess I’ll start at the beginning of the tour,” he mumbled, unable to keep eye contact with Annabelle’s piercing, wet stare. “You know all about how my anxiety was acting up. So, uh, anyway, the first person I told about it was Tré. I don’t really know why, maybe it was just ‘cause he was there. Somehow he was the one who started taking care of me, even when I was acting out. You know, just all these sweet things. And, you know, Tré’s been my friend forever, but I think that was the first time that I really noticed him. In the romantic sense.”

“Uh huh.” Annabelle folded her arms. She felt her anger slipping away as she saw the look on his face as he talked about Tré. It was fragile and pained, anguish spilling over from the deep fissures of worry lining his forehead. Instinctively, then, she knew that Tré would win out, meant far more to him than she could possibly in the short time she’d known him.

Billie Joe continued. “Then there was that whole thing with Jason, and he stuck by me then. But Tré was straight. I realized that again after he came back from a one night stand. I also realized I was jealous. I knew it was a problem, so I tried to distance myself from him. I started talking to you a lot and had a couple of my own one night stands at the same time. I was really only looking for a distraction, but I could see that you were different. I liked you a lot. I thought we could have an actual future. I wanted to be together with someone like you, who could make me a better person. I decided to ask you out because I liked you, Annabelle, no other reason.”

Her voice quivered, and tears began to splash more rapidly onto her cheeks. “But you like Tré better,” she stated.

“I kissed him, a couple days before that. I thought it was stupid, and that I’d ruined my friendship with him.” He swallowed. He was getting to the part that mattered, the part that hurt her. “After the radio interview we did, he told me that he wanted to be with me. I am so s-sorry, Annabelle,” he stuttered, “I wasn’t expecting—if I had known…”

She helped him, filling in the missing pieces for him. “So you thought it would be better to hide it from me for a couple of days so I wouldn’t be hurt, then break up with me and make you two seem like a natural occurrence a few days after that?” She sniffed; she didn’t want to be the object of any more pity should the contents of her nose start to trickle from her nostrils.

Billie Joe looked down. “Yeah,” he said.

“Look, you could have just told me. I may be almost ten years younger than you, but I can handle the truth a whole lot better than you think. A whole lot better than a bunch of lies, Billie. You’ve humiliated me! I’m forever going to be that girl that was just used as a front for you and Tré. And even if that’s not really the case, like you said, the public’s never going to know and you and Tré will be fucking married while I’ll be the one to live it down!”

Billie Joe chuckled sadly. “I don’t think that’s ever going to happen, not now.”
***

Tré twirled a drumstick between his fingers as he rounded the corner to the dressing room. He quickly put a stop to the movement when he heard Annabelle’s voice. He wasn’t sure he wanted to run into her today, now that she knew. Maybe tomorrow. But somehow he stayed by the opening, breath held—on the cusp of danger.

“You’re just going to give up? After the hell you’re putting me through? You can’t.” Her voice sounded congested, like she’d been crying. Tré felt a terrible guilt sink its claws into him.

Billie Joe answered. “You read the article. That was what he said, word for word. He said it would be better if it never happened. Why would he try again? So I can ruin things a second time?”

Tré’s heart pounded. It was struggling to get out of his chest and back to Billie Joe. This was not something for his ears. If he paid too much attention he might repeat a cycle of pain, pain for both of them. He backed away from the door and hit something hard, but yielding. “Tré!” Mike nearly shouted, a vindictive smile on his lips.

It took Tré approximately two seconds to realize that Mike had metaphorically sicced a pack of wolves on him. The dressing room revealed itself in a whoosh, laid bare behind Annabelle’s strangely towering figure. Had he gotten smaller in his fright?

“Tré! What a pleasant surprise!” She looked mad, face blotchy and forming a crooked grin. Deranged, Tré thought. He stepped in the room anyway, seemingly escorted by Mike, who simply started walking forward into his back. Tré was trapped. But he saw no evidence of torture. Billie Joe wasn’t cut or bruised, no forming scars. Still, this didn’t calm him.

His fear was amplified when Annabelle told Billie Joe to get out, please. These were specialized fits of anger. Mike stayed. To help? To watch? Spectator’s sport. Tré begged him uselessly with his eyes to get him out of this situation. He shot him silent messages, attempting telepathy. Be the Robin to my Batman, get me out of this mess! Needless to say, it didn’t work.

“Tré.” Tré snapped to attention and stopped thinking at Mike. His muscles tensed, as if he were about to undergo a brutal beating. “Tré, look at me.” He had a flashback of his mother trying to make him confess to eating all the popsicles while she’d been out.

“I didn’t do it!” he yelped.

Annabelle blinked slowly. “What?” She shook her head. “Never mind whatever you have in that guilty conscience of yours, I need to talk to you. I was going to yell at you, but I think dealing with Billie Joe sucked out all my juice. You lied to me.”

Tré’s eyes flicked to the side. “When was that?” He wasn’t sure why he was attempting to play innocence when the prosecutor had all the evidence in the world against him.

Wrinkling her forehead, Annabelle asked, “Are you kidding me? Look, I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt and believe that covering up your affair was mainly Billie Joe’s problem. But that doesn’t mean that you didn’t hurt me by doing it. My issue with you right now is that you had a choice. When I asked you if anything weird was going on with Billie you said no.”

“What was I supposed to say?” he implored her. He scratched the back of his calf with his shoe unsteadily. Distractions helped him not to feel so bad about everything.

“You could have said, ‘yeah, maybe there is something wrong,’ and then I would have talked to Billie about it. And then maybe he would have stepped up and told me straight. I don’t expect you to have the courage to have told me everything then, but you’d think it would be in both of our best interests if I knew. So why did you tell such a bald-faced lie?”

Tré knew she was right. If only he had dropped a hint, they might not be in this mess. He and Billie Joe were over. Annabelle and Billie Joe were over. The magazine dropped in two weeks, and then Green Day would be in for it. He glanced at Mike, who had his arms folded off to the side. He’d be lucky if Mike didn’t punch him in the gut later for fucking with the band’s name.

“I’m sorry…I wish I could tell you that I lied because I was going to break it off with Billie later and it seemed pointless to hurt you with that information, but I didn’t know I was going to until pretty much right before I did it. I’m really sorry. The whole time I was thinking that it would work itself out on its own, that things would go according to plan and you wouldn’t ever have to know that the reason you broke up was me. I didn’t want to be ‘the other woman’.” He made air quotes with his fingers. “Now I fucking am ‘the other woman’ and I didn’t even wind up with the guy in the end. I fucked up everything, and I’m sorry I hurt you, Annabelle.”

She nodded. “Okay. Apology accepted.”

Tré balked, more confused than a lion rescued by a mouse. “Wait, what? That’s it?”

Nodding again, she said, “Yeah, it’s too much fucking work staying angry. I might be frosty though, so stay on my good side.”

“Okay.”

“This is under one condition.” She paused. “You and Billie Joe have to try your best to work things out.”

“But—”

“No buts. I’m not taking no for an answer. If he was willing to completely fuck over our relationship for a shot with you, there’s something there. Don’t waste all this.”

Tré set his jaw, grim. “You know, he hurt me too. I can’t just let that go so easily.”

She wiped her eyes several times to rid them of tears, and sniffled, before adding, “I’m not saying it has to be now. You can take all the time you need, but promise me you won’t rule it out.”

“If you’re so full of forgiveness, why don’t you get back together with him?” Tré asked, suspicious.

Annabelle stepped forward, closing the gap between them enough to lay a hand on his shoulder. They locked eyes. “Tré, we’re not meant to be. You are.” She turned to Mike, who looked to be visibly brooding against the wall. “He’s all yours.” She removed her hand and then removed herself from the room.

Mike slapped him before the door had a chance to close.