Sweet Children Come Out And Play

As they pulled into the hospital parking lot, all of the chaos began again. Billie Joe found himself left standing in the waiting room as they rushed past with Delphine on the stretcher, breathing what could be her last breaths and he was just standing there. No where to go and no way to follow. Sweat drenched his face and the air was hot in his chest. No one familiar in sight and nothing to do. Billie turned around. A few random people sat in chairs. One was staring at him but quickly looked down as he spotted him. An old woman sat reading a magazine in the corner. Was he just supposed to sit down and wait then? Just like he was waiting for her to get back from a check-up? And maybe she would have a sucker too. ‘You shitheads!’ he wanted to shout. ‘You assholes! How can you just fucking sit! She’s dieing! How can you just go on with your life?’ Billie walked over to a wall in the corner and buried his eyes to hide the tears streaming down his angry face.
~
Mike ran into the hospital and a nurse at the desk pointed to the waiting room. There Billie Joe was.

Billie heard his name called. There it was again. He turned around slowly. Mike was there, running towards him. “Billie! Fuck, I’m so sorry,” he spoke quietly and put his arms around him. Billie stood still for a second and then did the same. He closed his eyes. He might never have done such a thing before, but who cared now? These dieing scumbags in the hospital waiting room?

“Thanks for coming.”

“Of course. I called Tre too. He’ll be here in a few minutes. How’s Delphine?”
“She’s in critical care. I don’t even know what they’re doing to her,” he said miserably. Mike stood back and kept a hand on Billie’s shoulder. Billie wiped his eyes. His eyeliner was smearing. “Billie, you have to take off your make-up.”

“What?”

“Come on, let’s go in the bathroom.” Billie followed him in a daze. Then he was standing in front of the mirror as Mike handed him a wet paper-towel. He took is and sloppily wiped away some of the black and the tears that had muddled it. He couldn’t seem to get it off. He didn’t care. Mike took the towel and wiped off the rest as Billie stood with his head bowed. “It’s going to be ok man.”
~
Now, Billie Joe sat in a chair next to Mike, his head in his hands and Mike with a hand still on his shoulder. Billie seemed to be past any panic attack but just in a stupor. What was there to do? They realized they had not told Brites of Richelle about this. Should they?

Sometime later, seconds or maybe hours, Tre walked in. There was the same reaction he had had to Mike. ‘Someone I know. Someone who cares, but he can’t do anything.’

“Billie,” he paused and then gave Billie Joe a hug too. Tre looked to Mike with the most serious face he had made in a long time, “How is she?”

“We don’t know.”
~
“Mr. Billie Joe Armstrong?”

Billie looked up. “Yes.” There stood a rather tall doctor holding a clip board. He realized no one but himself and Mike and Tre were in the room now. The doctor walked closer.
“We are done with the operation.” He sat down in a chair across from the guys. “She pulled through, and she is now asleep. All we can do is wait. Now, she’s a strong young woman, she has a very good chance, however, she has lost a lot of blood. We must give her time to recover.” He laid down his clipboard in this lap and casually scratched his chin.
Billie breathed a sigh. ‘She’s alive.’

“That took awhile,” Mike said. He was obviously relieved too.

“Yes, I’m afraid it did. I um, I need to tell you that she did give us quite a scare.”

“Like what?” Billie asked urgently.

“Well, half way through the operation, she stopped breathing and for about thirteen seconds we had no pulse, but we brought her back. We would have alerted you sooner, but we finished soon after. You may go see her if you would like, and you may spend tonight in her room.”

Billie felt weak. So, she was dead for thirteen seconds. Why on earth did the doctor need to tell him something like that! The asshole! Well, he supposed it was his job and he would want to know...or did he? “And the baby?”

“Yes, the baby should be fine. We do not think it received any damage and the bullet landed next to Delphine’s left lung so nothing involving the baby was hurt. We will need to do an ultrasound in a week or two to make sure again.”

So they didn’t really know anything at all for fact. Billie was getting very frustrated with this arrogant doctor. ‘He might mean well, but he was arrogant all the same. How dare he call their baby an “it”? And what does he mean that “nothing involving the baby was hurt”? The lungs are a pretty important part don’t you think! For both of them. In fact, don’t you think all of Delphine would be pretty important to the baby?! And to me!’

“Lastly, it is also a possibility that her body could fall into a coma from shock. I’m afraid there is not much we can do to help that except make sure she is healing. The good news is we have room and we can keep her here in the hospital as long as is needed.”

‘That’s the good news? Shit. Why all this now?’ All at once he needed to see her.
~
Delphine lay on the bed like an angel. Her clothing was gone and replaced by a thin light-blue dress. More like an angel after death. She was connected to all sorts of plastic tubes and gadgets. A light sunlight came in through the small window on the opposite side of the room. Billie walked in and almost fell to the floor. He might have had no one been watching. Billie stumbled over to the bed while Mike and Tre stood stunned in the doorway. When Billie reached her, for just a second he thought the doctors could be wrong. What if she really was dead? He touched her hand at first. It was ice cold so he took it in his and began to rub it for warmth. “I’m so sorry, Delphine,” he whispered. Mike cautiously walked over and touched her hair. It was spread out around her face like a frame. Waves of light brown and red fell across the pillow and down over her shoulders. It was as if the doctors had arranged her this way. The thought ran a shiver down Billie Joe’s spine. It was as if they had arranged her body for death and the pale color left in her cheeks was just the effect of make-up. “She looks dead,” Billie blurted out.

Tre touched his shoulder. “She looks beautiful. She’ll wake up.” He paused, “We just have to wait.”
~
Cody sat alone, curled up in a ball. She did all she could to fight back the tears, but they eventually seeped through her lids. She could not take it. How could this happen? How Delphine had been hurt like that. She wanted to be with her, to help her, to hold her, but she couldn’t. Billie Joe was there to do that. It’s not that she did not trust him to do it, but it made her feel so much more alone.

So instead she sat outside in the waiting room; her head in her hands. She was just as upset as Brites and Richelle looked to be, but not because they had been friends all their lives; only a couple of months really. It was because she was a friend as well, but more importantly, to her, Delphine was just…something different. Without love back, she really did not know what to call it.

Richelle sat up after a long while of sitting again. She automatically moved over to the soda machine. She stuck two fingers into the slot for change return. Nothing. No quarters forgotten this time, so she pulled out a heap of change from her pocket and started feeding them into the Coca-Cola themed machine. A classic Coke was all she wanted, but there were none left. She pressed the button for Coke instinctively a couple of times before figuring what the problem was. Ok, fine. It really didn’t matter anyway. Instead she pressed the button that gave her a cherry-vanilla one. As it landed into the slot below, she realized it was the same kind as at home in the refrigerator. They still bought cherry-vanilla for Delphine because she still spent most of her time at the big apartment.

And suddenly she had lost all movement in her arms. Richelle sat there, staring at the can, wondering what they would do with the others at home if there was no one there to drink them, tears rolling down her face.

Cody watched as Tre stood and walked over to the place where Richelle stood. She had to watch him embrace her and kiss the side of her cheek. It sickened her. She wanted to stand up and punch them both in the mouth.

Cody flipped her head away with a flash of anger in her hazel eyes as they settled to where Billie Joe sat on the other side of the room nearest to the door. She had never seen anyone look more miserable than he did right now. His eyeliner was long gone, but black circles still appeared to be painted around his eyes. Mike sat close by, but Mike could not know how Billie was feeling. At very least, Cody could see that Billie understood her. And her stomach felt sicker. She was jealous as fuck of him, but she never wanted to hurt him. He was innocent. He never deserved that. She herself deserved the hurt. Perhaps it served her right even.
~
Billie Joe sat at the foot of the bed. He starred at his wife. Still asleep. She looked no different then yesterday or the day before. Three days really. Billie had not slept for more than a couple of hours. He couldn’t. This was all a living nightmare. Nightmares never give you a good night sleep. It’s not their fault; it’s just their nature.

Before he realized someone had just walked through the door, a voice called his name. It was Mike. “Billie, you should go to sleep.”

“No, I’m not leaving,” Mike stood a second and then walked over. He gave Billie a hug. As he went to pull away, Billie held him back. They sat together for a minute. It seemed so normal with on one else around. Billie needed someone. Anyone right now.

“Seriously, go to sleep here. I’ll watch her. If anything happens, I’m here and I’ll wake you up.”

“Well, ok, but only if I fall asleep.” Billie didn’t think he would, but ten minutes passed and Mike looked over to see him out-cold hunched over in the chair. Finally. He needed that too. Mike turned his clear blue eyes back on Delphine in the dark room. It was so difficult to look at her yet he could not look away. He could not seem to get a grip on the fact that this was one of his closest friends in what seemed like a bad TV daytime drama. What’s worse, for Billie, this was like Brites. Delphine was his Brites. He could not imagine what that felt like; and her being pregnant too.

Mike touched her hand. Someone always seemed to be holding it now. Ironic, everyone reaches out when the person doesn’t need it anymore. She can’t feel it yet they would all like to believe that somehow she could. “Delphine, you have to get better…because I don’t know what to do with Billie.”
~
“I didn’t know you smoked,” Billie said quietly. He sat down beside Cody outside the hospital on the very edge of the sidewalk. His knees propped up together and his toes tapped the cement in the gutter.

“Yeah.” Cody blew the smoke in her mouth out away from him, trying to look clean, but it’s sort of hard when you have a cigarette in your hands. “You want one?”

“No thanks, I don’t smoke.” He said it sort of annoyed. Not at her, just that he wanted one now. He never cared before and he had been offered a million cigarettes. “Actually, can I try one?”

“Sure,” Cody pushed the box away over towards his thigh. Billie popped one out of the carton, lit it and breathed in. After a moment, he began coughing a little. Cody smiled. Soon enough it stopped though. Billie had tried it times before, so he wasn’t that new to cigarettes. Cody could see that.

“You’ve had them before now?”

“Not in a long time. But I have. I don’t know.”

“It’s ok.”

“I was trying to be so health conscious. Now…”

Cody cracked a smile. “It’s all right. Right now, who cares.”

Billie gave her a thankful look and closed his dull green eyes.
~
“It’s only been four days now though,” Mary cried, something she never did. The doctor’s expression never faltered. “How can you tell? This doesn’t mean she’s dead yet!”

“I am afraid that her condition qualifies as a coma. That is just my professional opinion.”

“And are you the only one?” Brites fumed angrily. “Why are you so fucking high and mighty?!” she spat.

“I understand this is hard for all of you. I did seek the opinion of two other doctors in this hospital before consulting you.”

“And who are they! Two more nut jobs!?”

“No miss,” he said irritably, “they are also well qualified doctors. Now please, you will disturb the other patients. Please go back to the waiting room, or preferably, go home and get some rest. There is nothing any of you can do here.”

Mary looked down at her daughter and held her limp hand in hers. Billie stood staring at the doctor, not comprehending a word that he said. Finally, he couldn’t take it and slumped to the floor behind the bed; out of everyone’s view. He didn’t want to look at any of them right now. Fuck them. Fuck the band. Just fuck.

Mike walked quickly over to make sure he was ok. “Look, she could be in this state for another few days, which is unlikely, or another few years,” the doctor started pounding away again. Richelle clung to Tre while Brites paced back and forth in the room around the frustrated doctor. Why was he taking this all so lightly? “We can keep her here for another week, and then you have a choice.” He paused, as if what he would say next might send them all on the attack.

“And what is it!” Brites shouted.

“We will leave her until the term of her pregnancy and attempt to save the baby. Then we can transport her to a long term facility, or we can let her pass. The choice is up to Delphine’s family.”

“You mean pull the plug?” Richelle said unbelievably.

“Well, yes. I am not saying you have to make a decision now. We will wait another week and see what happens. If she makes it through the week, we will talk again.”

Billie stayed huddled on the floor; his head in his hands. This had all happened so fast. What the fuck was he going to do?