Sweet Children Come Out And Play

“Billie! What on earth are you doing!”

“Nothen…”

“I can see you are doing something… and it doesn’t look good,” Delphine said in lecturing manner.

“Well, I don’t know but it has nothing to do with ear wax.”

Delphine struggled not to burst out laughing as a smile crept into her face. “What the fuck does that have to do with anything? That tells me absolutely nothing and you need to shape up. Now get your hand out my underwear drawer!” she said in a drill sergeant manner.

“I was just looking for something!” he threw his hands up in the air with a whoosh and the most innocent look he could muster. “And also, they’re called panties.”

“What! Why?”

“Because it sounds better.”

“No, why where you looking for something in my panties, huuu?” Delphine folded her arms. Billie walked over to her and wrapped his hands around her waist, pulling her toward him. “That is not going to get you out of this!” she laughed.

“Oh, I think it just might!”

“Stop it you asshole!” she could not keep her herself from laughing and Delphine wrapped her arms around Billie’s neck. He smiled and kissed her lips. “Well, maybe it’ll work.”

“So, what do you want to do today?” he smiled back.

“Oh, I don’t know.”

“Well, we could go to the mall or-”

“Oh yeah! Let’s do that!” He said it. The mall it is. Not to worry. Delphine never liked taking a long time to shop. This was a chance to be with Billie Joe, and that didn’t happen too often so she was not about to spend the day looking at anything else very long except him.
~
Twenty minutes down the road, Billie stepped out of his car at Valley Faire Mall calling “Wait, wait, wait! Don’t open your door! I’ll get it!” And Billie ran to the other side of the car and turned the handle with one hand while taking hers with his other.

“My knight in shinny armor can open a door!” she cooed. His car was what Delphine’s mother would call a shitbox car – from her experience driving many of them in her lifetime. Delphine on the other hand had no car so all that really mattered was Billie’s worked.

“Hey, well then that is all you’re getting,” he said as he threw his arms around her in a hug from behind.

“Billie, I can’t walk like this!” she laughed.

“Oh really,” and Billie let all of his body weight fall on top of her.

“AHH! Get off!”

“Fine, fine. Let’s go!” and they both raced into the mall entrance at one corner of the parking garage. Billie Joe ran ahead.

“Wait!” Delphine cried out and stopped just in front of the Coca-Cola machine. “I want one,” and she started to fumble around in her pockets from some change. Billie dug his hand into one of his back pockets and pulled a front one inside out.

“I got a quarter and a dime.”

“Oh, I’ll take that! Now I have enough.”

Now that they had successfully actually made it inside the mall, there were two questions. Three now to think of it. What are we doing here, where are we going and what the hell is that on the ground?

And so, after passing the mystery spot, they found themselves in front of a Hot Topic. Very true as it is, Hot Topic is a contrived identification with the young subculture to basically market and sell a product; no different from any other store except that it sells logos and other such things that were originally posted as “punk” and manufactured them to the point they are part of the mass media, therefore not punk. But you know, as a good friend of Delphine’s once said, “then where else would I get my clothes.” End result: she still shopped there.

“Hot Topic Is Not Punk Rock!” Billie chanted skipping in through the archway door under sketchy red letters. “Hot Topic Is Not Punk Rock!”

“Billie, cut that out.”

A salesman at the front with orange hair waved. Delphine went over to the wall of shirts. She looked for a while at all of the bands but never found anything new. She looked over to Billie Joe who was staring at the jars of hair dye. He was so cute when he did not know you were looking at him. They had not been together for very long considering, but she was sure about him. She felt like she could love him forever and for the first time in her life, he really and truly loved her back. It was a scary thing to think and she knew she shouldn’t say that just yet. Delphine had known him since he was ten but something had come over her in the high school years that she could not explain. Suddenly, guys became more appealing and she realized this is what other women in the world would call “hot”. Also, now she understood why one would want to be with another person on this level – be it a boy or a girl – and why on earth one would want to touch them, and strangest of all, to do what is needed to make a baby. Why would people have even the slightest urge to do that sort of disgusting thing?

Then that changed pretty damn quickly. Hugs no longer cut it. She had gotten hugs; with another boy from eighth grade, a boy she had known since she was twelve years old. What happened in middle school followed her for the next three years of her life. It drove her mad and angry about everything. She felt guilty as hell and miserable. But then one day, once upon a time, Billie - one of the guys she’d picked out as cute, someone she would look at as he passed in the hall, said “hi” to as a friend, and talked to when she could, but never thought could possibly be interested in her because no one else seemed to be - came up to her and asked her to the Homecoming dance senior year of high school. Something clicked since then. This was her last year of high school. This was supposed to be the fun one. She had counted on that, but could not see that it would be any different. But then something like that happens. Holy fuck. She had never felt so good in her life. She really loved him. And this was a different love than the one she had been brooding over for the past few years. This one made sense. This one was happy.

While Delphine was half thinking to herself in the way she always seemed to be drifting off and half reading all the sarcastic hilarious T-shirts on the other side of the wall, Billie ran back over to her side with a black leather bustiea with red ribbon trimming. He had a twinkle in his eye and raised his eyebrows at her as he pressed it forward. “You like?” he hummed with some sort of accent that had no particular origin.

“NO!”

“Yes, you like!?”

“I love you Billie, but I am not wearing that!”

“Please?” he stopped the accent and tried his best to look serious.

“NO!”

“PLEASE!?” he put on a pouty face.

“Well… I mean no.”

“You know you want to,” he winked.

“Billie, I am not going up to the counter to buy that. If you want to then you can go ahead.”

“Maybe I will…”

“And you can wear it too!” she called after him as he sneaked away.

“I just might do that!”
~
Back in the food court, Billie went to get a stir fry at Great Khan’s while Delphine found a table. Billie knew everything she liked so she trusted him with the food. Delphine sat down near two empty stools. She would wait and save them because the place was packed today. She had not bought anything today. Food was always good though. She found that if she ate somewhere, whatever was going on that day was ok, so long as it was good food. She was rather skinny girl. Billie was too. She was only 5’2” and he was only 5’7”. What luck. She had finally found a guy who was at her level. See, the other boy happened to be 6’4”. They had never kissed, her and the other boy, but Delphine had figured he would have had to bend down. With Billie, she could sneak up, and kiss him anytime she wished. She could reach. You would know the feeling if you are short.

Actually, she had done that just about a month ago today. She hugged him good bye in the hall as she always did after math class let out for her, but this time she leaned over and kissed him first. He had kissed her back. Now it was a regular thing. She loved it. Kisses. Then there was that time two weeks ago in the movie theater when he leaned over and the kissing got a whole lot better.

Back to the point, Billie walked back with their food. They would share a bowl. As he found her from a distance, he smiled. Delphine gave a wave and she could not get out of her head how gorgeous he was. And all he was doing was getting stir fry.
~
“Oh look at that!” Delphine pointed to a large silver heart locket displayed of the store window. “It’s beautiful.”

“It’d look good on you,” Billie said kissing her neck from behind.

Delphine smiled, “Well, that’s very sweet but it's probably not going to happen. It’s thirty bucks. I don't know. Not for one necklace.” Delphine made jewelry with beads at home. She had no idea what she would do for a living, but she was good with arts and craft things. If a necklace didn’t fit, she could reengineer it with some pliers.

“That’s not going to stop us. Come on, let’s go look,” Billie took her hand and led her into the store. He marched up to the front counter, “Can we see that heart necklace in the window?” he asked the salesman. The man moseyed up to the window and came back, handing Billie the locket. Billie placed it around Delphine’s neck as she moved her long brown and red striped hair out of the way. She really liked her died hair. Billie did too. It was the hair he now had permission to run his fingers through. He had had a couple of girlfriends up until now. He had tried. His love life had sucked. It really had. But Delphine was different. Well, they were all different girls, but Delphine made him happy just thinking about her. He really couldn’t remember having loved anyone else once he fell for her. And he fell fast. That’s dangerous. He knew, and she knew. But they didn’t really care right now. For now, it was just her and him.

“It’s gorgeous,” she said, looking longingly down at it. The long silver chain brought the heart down over across her breasts. She really thought so. Billie noticed this was the look that meant she really liked it. “We’ll take it,” Billie said suddenly.

“What?” Delphine looked up confused.

“I want you to have it,” he said nonchalantly. The cashier happily went to ring up the purchase without giving Delphine much time at all to protest.

“Oh, Billie, I love it, but that’s way too much money.”

“Nope. It’s already yours,” he said handing over some crumpled bills – mostly ones.

As the two reached the front of the store, Delphine jumped on Billie from behind in a massive hug. She kissed his cheek. “Thank you honey!” He laughed and turned her around to his front.

“Well, I guess I finally did something right.”

“It’s beautiful. I’ll have to find two pictures to put in it now. Who should I put in it?” she sighed as they began to walk back down the crowded halls inside the mall.

“What ever you want.”

“You know what; let’s go where you want to go now. Your turn.”

“Well… anywhere?”

“Yep.”

“Ok,” Billie said rushing off in another direction of the mall. Their hands interlocked and swinging back and forth. He did not stop until they were inside the Sees Candies store.

“Chocolate, Billie?”

“Yes! Lots of chocolate!” He ran in and bought a dollar candy bar. As they walked out, Billie girlishly swung the little bag he had insisted on having for his one candy bar over his shoulder.

“Ok, Billie, that doesn’t count. Pick another place.”

“It can count.”

“But you know I’m gong to eat half of your chocolate!” she laughed.

“Well, hmm, that’s more difficult now. What else do we need? Oh, music! Let’s go to Rasputin Records!”

“Ok, but that’s not in the mall. Ready to leave?”

“If you are.”

“Yep,” she said and they made it back to the car, hoped that it would start, it did thankfully, and somehow managed to find Rasputin Records again without getting lost too many times.
~
Delphine picked up another CD. Def Leppard, Pyromania; it was their third album I believe. “This?”

“Sure.”

Delphine went over to look at the posters. She pretty much knew what was there but enjoyed looking every time anyway. As she and Billie were laughing and giggling at the retro spoof poster with a bunch of sayings all on the Beer, Sex or Drugs? Billie would not stop laughing about the last saying about ‘Internet Porn’ when a guy standing by them tapped Billie on the shoulder, “Hey, dude, I know you. You played in that band – ah – Sweet Children. I saw you guys last week. You were damn good.”

Billie shrugged and smiled, “Thanks man. I’m glad to hear it.” Delphine knew he was more excited to hear that than he let on.

“Is this your girlfriend?” he said looking to Delphine.

“Yep, this is Delphine.” she said and stepped forward.

“Hi!” she smiled.

“Nice to meet you guys. Keep playing,” he said as he walked away.

Billie Joe waved, “Bye.” Then he turned to Delphine. “Man, that’s awesome. Someone actually remembered me!” Delphine gave him a hug. There was a girl with teal stripped hair hung up in a pony tail sat at the register who stared at them with a look like “what the hell?”

“I know. That was pretty awesome!”

“And I think he was actually serious too.”

“Hey, one day, when you guys are all millionaires, he’ll feel like the luckiest man alive,” Delphine poked.

“Ha! Yeah, like that’ll happen anytime soon,” he said sarcastically.

Finally, Delphine paid the three bucks for her used copy of Pyromania and started humming Photograph to herself. She already knew the album front to back, Billie too, but while she was moving out, she was going to have to re-buy copies of the albums her parent’s owned. Now it was hers.

“What do we do now?”

“Let’s go to my place.”

“Ok.”

When Billie pulled into the garage of his house, after listening and singing along to some old Def Leppard all the way home, Billie opened Delphine’s door again and led her into the house. His home was pretty small and nothing out of the ordinary inside, but it was homey. That’s what Delphine loved about him. That and his beautiful face. No one ever seemed to be at home and again they had the house to themselves, which was suprising because Billie was the youngest of six kids. Delphine was the oldest of four.

Billie pulled Delphine in by the hand into the living room. “Want to watch a movie?”

“Yeah,” she said plopping down on the couch. Billie grabbed the remote and fell down next to her side. He pretended to yawn and reached an arm around her as the TV clicked on. Delphine laughed silently at him but obliged. She circled her arms around his middle.

Billie smiled and began flipping through channels. “What’s on at 12 at night?”

“Oh, how about Inked or Miami Ink? Or something.”

“Here, Inked is on.”

“I love this show. Don’t get to watch it much though.” She didn’t have cable.

A rapper was on first in the show. He had quite a few tattoos already and was getting the name of his band inked across his back. He lived in Oakland too.

“I still wish I had my tattoo.”

“Which one?”

“The one I showed you. I’ll have to wait another year if I want to get it. Mom would never agree.”

“Oh yeah. I like that design.”

“You know you should show the guys that song. She’s a Rebel. I think they would like it.”

“No, I don’t think so. Maybe one day. You still want the tattoo?”

“Oh, I would love it. Can’t wait until I can.”

“Hmmm…” Billie made a sound with his lips. “I think I know how you could.”

“Really?!”

“I can ask one guy who has done a couple things on me. I’m legal now, but he did it before that. He could do it. Doesn’t agree with the underage 18 law. It would just be under the table.”

“That would be great. I get hair cuts from Jeanie that way… and Jennifer who did the strips in my hair.”

“You’re seventeen. Close enough.”

“And you’ll come with me?”

“Of course.”