Christie Road

"Where the fuck is Billie?" Mike shouted out the driver's window to Tre. The drummer was red-faced, lugging his duffel bag through the hotel doors, and sweat had soaked through his shirt.

"The last time I saw him he was looking for the pay phone in the lobby," Tre panted. "He better be calling 911, 'cause I've carried all his fucking stuff down here from the room while he pisses around!"

"Dammit," Mike spat under his breath. He glanced down at his watch.

Twelve forty-five. PM.

*******************************

Last night in Norfolk, VA, they had played the last gig of the tour, and were chomping at the bit to be on the road back home. The post-show party had been moved away from the venue when Lawrence decided the crowd had grown too big to manage safely. Instead, he had slipped them out through the kitchen and out into a waiting car (the van having been moved hours before by an extremely nervous roadie named Shaun). It would give them time to enjoy themselves at the hotel bar without constant interruptions.

The hotel manager had braced for the worst, the band's reputation for mayhem and destruction preceding them. But when he dropped in to see if they needed anything, he found Tre propped on one elbow in front of a video poker machine, and Mike and Billie sat perched on bar stools, talking with the members of a small ska band from Virginia Beach. Pleased to find no costly damage or complaining customers, he ordered them another case of perfectly chilled longnecks--on the house.

It was Billie who lined up the most bottles on the bar in front of him, by at least five. He didn't seem to be enjoying his beer so much as attacking it, drinking with grim determination until the bottle was empty, then hastily ordering another. His conversation with the other band's singer had become disjointed, his eyes half-open and his speech softly slurred. He wavered dangerously on his feet, but even at his young age, he exuded an air of cockiness that could easily turn to explosive anger, and no one wanted to risk provoking him by suggesting he might need to slow down.

By one AM, Mike was trying to stifle a yawn as he watched two girls, a honey blond and a fiery redhead, flanking Billie, each with an arm slung possessively around his waist. Clearly competing for his attention, they laughed at his every feeble joke, their eyes flashing at each other behind his back. His mumbling had ceased to be coherent, reduced to a litany of proclamations that he had never met two nicer girls before, and that they would always be friends, keep in touch, all the alcoholic rhetoric that sounds great and means nothing.

Billie Joe was staggering, pants-wetting, toilet-hugging, stranger-fucking drunk.

He had spent several nights this way recently, each time stumbling back, either to the van or the dressing room, with whichever appealing young lady had caught his attention for the night. They never stayed long, and always as they stood in the doorway to say goodnight, he would incline his head toward them, smiling and whispering into their ears, his fingers grazing their shoulder or their cheekbone. Always, a piece of paper with a number on it would be slipped into his curled palm, and he would smile his devilish, crooked smile, his green eyes wide and sultry. Mike had seen it a half dozen times in the last two weeks alone.

The lean, lanky boy sighed, rubbing his eyes with the knuckles of his thumbs. He sidled over to the end of the bar, where Tre had fallen asleep on his outstretched arm, a dark circle of wetness on his sleeve where he had drooled.

"Tre," he whispered into the drummer's ear. He shook Tre's shoulder. "Hey, wake up, we need to get up to the room. C'mon, we get to sleep in real beds tonight!" Tre's bleary eyes opened slowly, meandering their way up to Mike's gently smiling face. "Wake up, buddy," he said again, and Tre's hand wobbled to his forehead in a halfhearted salute.

"S'time for bed?" Tre said, sounding closer to ten than his eighteen years. "'Kay, I'm heading up. You going too?"

"Yeah," Mike nodded. "I'm bushed. Besides, I'm looking forward to getting on the road before lunch tomorrow. We're going home, Frank!" he chuckled.

Tre's middle finger curled under his thumb, and he flicked Mike square in the chest. "I told you, don't call me Frank!"

"Yeah, yeah, whatever you say. Just don't sleepwalk tonight, hear me?" Mike warned, wagging his long finger in Tre's sleepy face.

A burst of laughter from behind them made them both turn in annoyance. The two girls with Billie giggled theatrically, hiding their red lips behind manicured fingertips. It made Mike feel a little sorry for them. They all thought they were, somehow, the One, so special and dazzling that they would be able to snatch Billie away from all the others and hold him by the power of their charm.

"Here, take the card key," he said wearily, and Tre tucked it safely into his hip pocket. "I'm going to get Dickhead and I'll be up in just a minute."

"Think he'll leave his entourage behind?" the drummer asked, eyeing the two girls curiously.

"Don't even think about it," Mike said. "You'll be asleep in ten minutes--you'll just embarrass yourself."

Tre nodded morosely, and turned toward the elevators with a gloomy wave. The bassist edged his way toward Billie Joe quietly, trying not to be rude. He smiled at the girls--Tiffany and Amber, they introduced themselves, though he'd forget their names before he got back to the room--and laid a friendly hand on Billie's arm. "You almost ready to head up, buddy?"

Billie looked at him defiantly, a spark in his rheumy eyes. "You trying to take me away from my friends?" he mumbled, head cocked back in drunken arrogance. "I'm not going anywhere without them."

"Bill, we've only got one room, and me and Tre are going to sleep. Sleep. So why don't you tell these lovely ladies goodnight and let's get some rest so we can all take turns driving tomorrow?"

The girls were pouting, lower lips poking out like spoiled children. "Aww, Biwwie, don't leave us," the redhead simpered, trailing one scarlet-lacquered nail from his collarbone slowly down to the waistband of his jeans. "You promised you'd sing me the song you wrote for me!"

Mike shook his head. Billie had sung that same cheesy song to a dozen different girls, changing the name to suit the occasion, and it sounded dumber every time he used it. But they fell for it every time, especially when he finished by leaning close and whispering the final lyrics intimately into their eager ears.

"Listen, man, do whatever you want, but I'm beat. Just don't make a lot of noise when you come in okay?"

Billie's hand flopped up and down in a wave of half-acknowledgment, and he turned back to the redhead, kissing her bare shoulder seductively. The blond's face fell, realizing she had lost the game, and she looked toward Mike with disappointment and humiliation in her eyes.

It just wasn't in him to walk away and leave her standing there, awkward as tits on a bull. "Hey, Tiffany, you look like you could use a cup of coffee," he offered, purposely keeping any hint of flirtatiousness out of his voice. "Let's go over to the cafe--it's right across the lobby." He held out a hand, the kind smile on his face encouraging and comforting.

She looked back over her shoulder at Billie and Amber, who had twined their arms around each other and were now locked in a kiss that should never have been inflicted on the public. Then she reached out for Mike's hand, the brassy confidence fading into a shy vulnerability. He led her, listening to her chat about the fascinating topic of her sister's boob job, down to the 24-hour bistro off the hotel lobby, and they spent the next twenty minutes sipping decaf and pretending they'd struck up a friendship.

"Well, I've enjoyed this, but I really gotta get some shuteye. We're heading out tomorrow morning, and I've got first shift driving," he told her at last, leaving a dollar tip under his cup.

"Where do you play next?" she asked, reluctant to give up his pleasant company.

He grinned. "Nowhere--we're heading home to Oakland. I haven't seen my mom in three months, so I'm really excited."

She smiled, more sincerely than she had all night. "That's really nice. I hope you have a good trip. If you guys ever get back to Virginia, I hope I'll get to see you."

"Wouldn't miss it," Mike said. He lifted his hand to shake hers, and then thought better of it. He folded his long arms around her shoulders in a friendly hug, patting her back. She'd cry as she was falling asleep tonight, remembering Billie's rejection, and he hoped he could at least give her one small, pleasant memory of the evening.

"You're a lot nicer than your friend," she said. "Tell him I said...well, just tell him goodbye for me."

It was hard, cleaning up Billie Joe's messes, but she seemed at least to be on her feet. "I'll do it. And thanks for coming to see us. Till next time?" Mike grinned.

"Yeah, till then. Good night!" She waggled her fingers at him, and headed toward the automatic doors that opened into the parking lot.

He had to knock several times to wake Tre up to let him in, and once inside, he fell onto the bed with his shirt still on, ragged with fatigue. Halfway through the night, he woke up shivering and crawled under the covers, dimly recognizing that Billie still hadn't come back. But by that point, he was so sleepy that his only thought was, 'Great, more room for me.'

They found him at nine the next morning, when Tre wandered into the bathroom to take a shower. Billie was passed out in the bathtub, one leg hanging over the side, and a wax pineapple clutched to his chest. There was lipstick on his cheek and smeared across his mouth, and his shirt was buttoned wrong. Tre stood looking at him curiously for a minute, and then reached over and turned on the water.

Billie spluttered, then started to choke as the freezing water hit his body and ran into his open mouth. Opening his eyes, he saw Tre grinning down at him, and lobbed the pineapple at the drummer's head.

"Fuck you, you motherfucking idiot!" he bellowed, slipping as he tried to scramble out of the bathtub. Tre backed away, laughing hysterically, and Mike's head appeared around the door, wondering what all the noise was about.

"You assholes get out of here before I rip your nuts off!" he shrieked, tumbling over the edge of the tub and into the floor. His eyes were bloodshot, and there was a long rip in the back of his shirt. He looked like he'd been hit by a truck.

The rest of the morning Mike and Tre walked on eggshells, trying not to arouse his temper, but Billie with a hangover was like a badger with menstrual cramps. Just before they were due to pull out, he had disappeared, mumbling something about needing a bottle of Tylenol and wandering down the hall toward the elevator. They waited for nearly an hour, and finally had him paged. When the room phone rang, he explained that he had decided to walk down the street for some breakfast--to settle his stomach, he explained hastily.

"Would have been nice if he'd offered to bring back something for us," Tre said, dropping the receiver back into its cradle.

Mike nodded. "I say if he's not back in fifteen minutes, we leave without him."

Their palms met in an irritated mid-air high five. But they were still waiting forty minutes later, watching cartoons on TV, when Billie finally knocked on the door. He said little, just stuffed his belongings into his bag and brushed his teeth. Just as the other two were shouldering their duffels, he opened the door again and headed out and down the hall without a word of explanation. They looked at each other in disbelief, and shrugged as they rode the elevator down to the lobby.

*******************

Billie had finally emerged, looking perturbed and irritable, and climbed into the back of the van. The decision had already been made to let him take the last turn driving so he could sleep off the remnants of the night. He spread his sleeping bag on the floor and was snoring before they reached the I-40 on ramp.

"Are you as glad as I am that this is finally over?" Mike asked, his hand riding the air currents out the van window.

Tre nodded, finishing the last of the biscuits they'd stopped to get just outside Norfolk. "I mean, it's been fun, and it was awesome meeting all the people, but I'll be so fucking glad to sleep in my own bed, it's just sick!"

"Yeah," Mike agreed. "And as much as I love you guys, I'll be grateful not to be sleeping in the same room with you every night!"

Tre glanced back at Billie's unconscious form. "How do you think he's going to handle being back in Rodeo?" he wondered, lowering his voice. "There sure won't be as much excitement there."

"That's something I've been thinking, too," Mike said. "I think it's going to take him a while to wind down and get used to being back home. I just hope he isn't too much of a dick to live with in the meantime."

"Well, he was a dick before," Tre shrugged.

From the back came the ripping sound of a sleep fart. "True," Mike nodded. "Very true."