The Man Who Would Not Be King

The nudge woke him first. “Mmm,” he groaned in protest, to both that and a ring tone he assumed Mike had slyly set on his cell phone.

Strings swelled. “And the reason is youuuu.”

“Fuck you, Hoobastank, seriously,” Tré grumbled and rolled away from the offending sound. He shut his eyes and then it stopped. Within the next thirty seconds the song renewed itself. Tré was ready to steadfastly ignore it, but he hadn’t counted on the person with whom he shared the bed encouraging him to answer it with another shake.

“All right…” With one motion he swung out of the sheets and sat on the edge of the mattress, weathering a head rush. He got to his feet slowly, but hunched over, searching for his pants, more specifically his pocket. The music, his clue, had vanished once more. He found his phone at the end of the bed.

He flipped it open. Four missed calls. Voice mail. So he had slept through more. Tapping a key revealed they were all from Billie Joe. Tré didn’t bother listening to the messages, figuring that he could just get the information when he called.

“He—” Tré’s very first syllable dove back into his lungs after tasting the air.

An explosive yell blasted out of the phone speaker; instinctively he moved it away. “Where the fuck are you?”

“Uhhh…,” he replied, unsure how to answer and still unconvinced that he deserved the hostility.

An impatient “Tré?” crackled by his ear.

“I’m at a…friend’s? Why?” Was he missing something?

“Um, hello, we’re leaving! It doesn’t do us any good to get to Oklahoma with only two thirds of our band!” The Billie Joe of Tré’s imagination paced back and forth on a short path, mouth set when not yelling, nostrils flaring.

Tré’s sense of guilt found its gravity. “Oh, shit.” He swallowed.

“No shit,” came Billie Joe’s voice, scathing.

“Just give me a couple minutes, I’ll be right there.” He slammed the cell shut before it released any more harsh words and commenced scrambling to get dressed so he could leave.

The source of his problems yawned, lifting her head off her pillow. “You taking off, then?”
***

Panting outside of the tour bus, Tré wiped the sweat from his hairline. Working up the courage to meet his incensed band mates, he cursed the humidity for taking refuge in the folds of his skin and the contact points with the cotton of his shirt. His stomach felt overly acidic. He took a deep breath and ran his hands down his jeans to relieve some of the clamminess before opening the door and stepping inside.

He was met with a frosty, almost unconcerned glare from Mike, sitting with a magazine. Billie Joe, at the sound of the door’s open and close, appeared from somewhere deeper in the bus. “Nice of you to join us,” he said, only the slightest hint of exasperation leaking through his sarcastically cheerful greeting.

Tré jumped at the slap of Mike’s magazine against the couch cushion. “I guess I’ll go tell Ted we’re ready to leave then,” Mike announced pointedly on his way to the front of the bus.

Billie Joe didn’t move from his spot, so Tré felt compelled to remain standing uneasily where he was, and the former was free to scrutinize him. He squinted. “So where did you end up last night? I didn’t remember you having any friends here…” He scratched behind his left ear.

Tré’s cheeks tinged pink as he anticipated a judgmental reaction to the cause of his being late. A sense of self-embarrassment blossomed up inside of him as well. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d held up the band without a legitimate excuse, never mind for a casual one night stand. He was reluctant to admit it, even though he knew Billie Joe usually had a sense of humor about these things. The bus engine started up, shuddering beneath their feet.

“I, uh, met somebody and we ended up going back to her place. I wasn’t planning on it, sorry.” Tré gave a weak smile. A shadow flickered across Billie Joe’s face, but disappeared so fast Tré could not be positive it had been there at all. He dismissed the thought.

“So you got some, then? Nice…,” Billie Joe said, nodding up and down slowly. He shoved his hands into his pockets and shifted his weight to his right side, crossing his ankles. It was then, as his balance was compromised, that the bus surged forward. His expression became unsettled, eyebrows retreating into the messy fringe of his hair. He reached blindly for the nearest thing to steady himself, but the range of inanimate, stationary objects that were also of useful height was slim; finally his hand found the middle of Tré’s upper left arm.

Tré was pulled roughly forward. Unprepared for the abrupt movement, his leg stuttered across the floor to keep itself under his weight. Finally, Billie Joe’s other hand landed in the middle of Tré’s chest. Tré regarded it curiously as Billie Joe regained his composure. “Ah, sorry,” he cringed, realizing Tré’s focus, and removed his hand like it had been burned, or rather like it had burned Tré where it had touched.

“Don’t sweat it,” Tré replied automatically, waving a hand lazily in the air as if to brush the issue aside. He noticed Billie Joe wearing an expression of apologetic melancholy and smiled reassuringly, feeling like an actor, exaggerating all his responses.

Billie Joe bit his lip before moving. He caught Tré by surprise, drawing him into a hug. It wasn’t the desperate clinging of a few days before, but an entirely different sort of embrace. There was tenderness in the way Billie Joe pressed himself firmly into Tré, gently filling in the spaces instead of smothering them madly.

It was loving; it was nice. It made Tré miss having a girlfriend. And in the next split second Tré balked at this thought. He backed out of the hug.

Billie Joe searched his eyes. “I know I keep having to say this,” he began scratchily, voice growing stronger the more words flowed outward, “but I’m sorry for acting so…whatever and taking it out on you guys. And you’ve really been trying to be there, y’know, I know that you have and in return I’ve just been giving you a bunch of shit.”

“Ah, come on, it hasn’t been that bad,” Tré objected.

Billie Joe shook his head. “No, I know when I’m being impossible. I may not be able to stop myself, but I know. Now take my damn apology!” he scolded lightly.

Tré couldn’t help but grin. “Alright.” He stood there, observing a newfound light dancing in his friend’s eyes.

“So, movie or video games do you think?” Billie Joe asked, cocking his head to the side.
***

“Hey! Jason!” Tré called, eager to let the previous incident slide now that Billie Joe was acting relatively like his former self again. Images of Billie Joe triumphant after kicking his ass in Super Smash Bros. Melee were fresh in his mind as he made his way to a yawning, stretching brown-haired guitarist.

“Oh hey,” or something similar tumbled distorted from Jason’s still-wide mouth.

Tré turned so that he was facing the same way as Jason, towards the gas pumps across the parking lot, back to the rest area building.

“Is Billie Joe doing any better?”

Tré sighed; he’d been hoping for a normal conversation. “Yeah, I guess.” He thought he’d steer away from the current course. “You just wake up from a nap or something?”

“Yeah, maybe,” Jason replied evasively. He yawned again, covering it with a wrist against his mouth. “Billie Joe really seems to get along with Annabelle, doesn’t he?”

Tré choked in the process of swallowing. “What?” He couldn’t make sense of what Jason had just said. “What are you talking about? When have they even been together? He’s been isolating himself.”

Jason pointed. “Over there. Look, they’re like laughing and stuff.” Tré’s eyes followed his outstretched arm to a spot in the distance to their right. By a lone tree and a picnic table, Billie Joe’s head was thrown back in laughter, opposite the apparently amusing lighting tech.

Tré looked away quickly. He cleared his throat. “I, uh, just realized I forgot to do something,” he said, excusing himself lamely. It was a short walk to the bus, but Tré wasn’t aware of anything outside of his body. He felt blurry, if that were a feeling. On the bus, he dropped onto the couch and sat stiff and upright, closing his eyes tightly. His lungs ballooned as he tried to take what was supposed to be a calming breath.

His eyelids fluttered open. The world sharpened into view again. In contrast to its stillness, his insides whirled around. Tré made a heroic effort to identify just one emotion running with the pack, but all of them outpaced him. “What the fuck is my problem?” he whispered, beseeching some invisible force to provide him with an answer.
***

Later, Tré lay awake in his bunk, staring into the pitch darkness, not sure whether his eyes met ceiling or wall, not caring, too preoccupied with the unrest tormenting his chest. His pulse permeated his entire body, thumping through not only his ribs but his hands, neck, and skull. An entire afternoon spent sifting through the short events that had left him feeling like this had yielded nothing upon which to build conclusions. He didn’t know what to do with himself, other than give in to the haze.

Silence pressed in on him. Mike and Billie Joe were surely sound asleep by now. Billie Joe. Billie Joe, Billie Joe, Billie Joe. And Annabelle?

His stomach ached at the notion. But why?

Did she render him obsolete? That couldn’t be it; they’d had a moment that morning. Recalling the circumstances, guilt surfaced as Tré regretted his night with the bartender. It was precisely because of inconsiderate shit like that that Billie Joe would always need other friends. Tré was lucky to still be one of them.

No, it was normal to have other friends. He couldn’t make up his mind.

A thump from across the bus aisle distracted him. He sat up, careful to keep any noise muffled in order to leave his hearing unobstructed. His ears picked up a sound similar to an overworked air pump. Concerned, he pushed aside his curtains. He could now hear precisely that someone was hyperventilating, and he didn’t have to think to guess which one of his band mates it was.

Luckily Mike had the top bunk, so there was no special technique involved in getting to Billie Joe’s bed. Tré stopped outside the curtain. “Billie?” he breathed. There was no change. He peeked into the closed area.

Billie Joe’s curved back faced Tré, shuddering with every abbreviated breath he took. Tré looked on for a moment, at a loss. Then he crawled onto what was left of the mattress space and took up position behind the shivering heap he called his friend. He went unacknowledged, the bouncing motion of the bed under the new weight not significant enough to pull Billie Joe from his trance.

Tré knelt, hesitating before lying down alongside him. He wrapped his arms around Billie Joe’s heaving middle and squeezed tightly. “Hey, it’s okay. I’m here. There’s nothing to worry about.” He rested his head on Billie Joe’s upper arm, where it traveled up in down in time with each inhalation, each exhalation.

It occurred to him that he had no strategy. In the meantime Billie Joe’s scorching skin quaked beneath Tré’s grip. He held on. An idea struck him.

“Billie? How about I count so that you lengthen your breaths? Eventually I’ll get to higher numbers and you’ll be breathing normally. Sound good?” Out of the corner of his eye Tré saw Billie Joe nod. “Okay. One.” He said the number fully, and though a single syllable, Billie Joe’s breath was misaligned, turning into one and a half. They tried again. “One.” Another misfire. “One.” This time Billie Joe held it successfully.

Encouraged, Tré continued the count. “One, two.” With his aid, Billie Joe’s breathing rate gradually normalized. “One, two, three, four.”

“One, two, three, four. Do you think you’re okay now? You don’t have to say it, just nod.”

His head moved slightly. Tré didn’t remove his arms. The wild heat that had been rising off of Billie Joe’s body began to dissipate. Seeking to replenish what it had lost, his muscles started to quiver.

“Are you cold?”

Billie Joe emitted a bright laugh, jarring considering the circumstances. It devolved into rattling teeth. “I can’t…heh…even tell.”

Tré knew he probably wasn’t needed anymore, but his protective instincts refused to subside, on alert against the chill Billie Joe was feeling. He debated drawing the blanket up from the foot of the bed, but the merits of this did not seem to match those of staying with his arms around Billie Joe. It was obvious they could not quiet the shaking, but he wanted to try.

Neither spoke for a minute. First Billie Joe breathed in to say something, out again, and then successfully broke the silence. “You don’t think I bothered Mike, do you?”

Tré scoffed, a pretense of lightheartedness. “No way, guy sleeps like a Disney princess. Besides, he would’ve come running.”

The silence stretched on a bit.

“I’m sorry you always have to see me like this. I know I’m a pain.”

“You’re not a pain.”

Billie Joe turned his neck to look Tré in the eyes. “Liar.”

“Just a small pain, then. One I’m sure I can deal with.”

“Are you sure?” Billie Joe searched Tré earnestly.

Tré gave into whim, kissing Billie Joe’s shoulder lightly. “I’m sure,” he answered. He heard Billie Joe suck in air.

“…Can you stay here tonight?”

“Sure.”