Can't Finish What You Started

It's Hard to Believe, I Cannot Exist Without You

I didn't get everyone in one room until later the next day. Apparently, everyone's coping mechanism of choice lately was to scatter...

And oddly enough, Billie Joe's abandonment and general absence from the tale really didn't stick this time. He arrived as a knock on my door at noon.

"Hey, Marrissa," He greeted me.

"Hey, Billie...Rough night?" I asked.

"Not really...yeah, sorry if I'm hanging around here too much. It just didn't feel-"

"'Just didn't feel right leaving for too long'," I finished, "Yeah, I've been hearing that too often lately...And I'm sorry because, believe me, it's my fault in more ways than you can ever know."

There was a pause. He had a curious glint in his beautiful green eyes. "But don't worry," I clarified, "I'm going to set everything straight soon enough."

That wasn't the unspoken question. Finally, he asked aloud, "Can I come in?"

"Oh, of course," I replied, smiling and blushing at my lack of proper social skills.

Billie entered. Justin was in the kitchen pretending once again to be fascinated by my toaster, looking briefly from me to Billie and back to the toaster as we walked through. Finally, he realized social interaction was unavoidable and decided to forget about the toaster. "Hello Billie," He greeted, and followed us to the couch, where everyone else was congregating.

"Hey," Billie replied. Then he made his greetings to the others and vice-versa. Gerard offered him a seat on the couch. He looked at me, prepared to ask for permission.

"Make yourself at home," I told him, and then more to myself and perhaps to fate itself-or whatever strange power it was that controlled the story, I added,"I only want you to be happy, Billie," I repeated it in my mind with great conviction; I wanted to cement that as his ending for this story or at least its foundation.

I couldn't decide whether I should tell the others the whole truth. I finally opted not to and we all constructed decent conversations instead. It did help me sort things out in my head. I was prepared to close doors and tie up loose ends. There was only one hitch in all my plotting and I was currently staring at him.

I loved Justin Pierre. I didn't want to lose him. Sure I'd miss the others, but I was willing to miss them. I could deal with that, but missing Justin...I just couldn't imagine...I didn't want to imagine.

I just had to come up with something.