Arrangements. Rehearsals. Packing. Fuck, the preparation was exhausting. The only thing that made it worthwhile was singing with Billie again, it was like old times, it was like all this shit hadn't happened. It was like being happy, but I wasn't. Not yet.
Guilt still haunted me every night. The mere sight of my scars still tortured me. My mind was at war with my body, and that was absolutely terrifying.
I think Billie could tell I was stressing. She was constantly worrying about me and asking if I was ok. I hated seeing her like this, and I hated putting my problems on her.
"What is up with you? You've been shutting me out lately" she asked me, after a week of tour preparation. I'd been dodging her questions for quite a while now.
"I'm fine" I replied.
I'm not. Billie sighed and smiled sadly.
"Olivia, this tour can only happen if you're ready" she said, sitting on the bed next to me. "I just-" my voice cracked. "I don't want to pile all of this on you. You have a tour to organise" Billie seemed disappointed that I wasn't telling her. "Can we please just be completely honest with each other?" She pleaded "If something's wrong, I want to be the one to help. That's what I'm here for." She gave me her cute puppy dog face and I couldn't resist it. She was so beautiful. I took a deep breath "It all still haunts me. What happened that night. You had two months to come to terms with all of this shit. I was in a coma, everything has just been going so quick" my eyes watered up. Billie touched my leg. My heart fluttered and I continued "The only time I'm happy anymore is when we sing together, when everything slows down, when it's just us. Alone. In your room." It took a minute to set in. Then a single tear fell down Billie's face. She wiped it away quickly "Have you spoken to your mum?" She asked, which kind of hurt me. She'd got me to talk and didn't even comfort me. "No" I said, my shoulders tensed.
Billie moved closer and put her arm around me. I relaxed instantly "Look. If singing together makes you happy, let's write a song." I looked at her, she seemed upset. "Billie are we good?" I had to ask, she normally knew exactly how to make me happy. But something seemed really wrong. I knew song writing wasn't just my escape; it was hers too.
"It's not you."
"Who is it baby?"
"Finneas" she said. That kind of shocked me. Finneas was the most supportive guy around. I gestured for her to continue. "he's just being really weird. He started avoiding me when I got with you and I don't know why" tears were streaming down her face now.
"Bil I-"
"Let's just write that song" she said, almost too quickly. I looked at her
"if you need to tal-"
"Please can we just sing?" She seemed angry. "Ok" I replied. I think that was what we both needed. Things were getting too much for both of us.
We wrote a song about our feelings for each other, every line explaining how one of us felt. It was so meaningful. We cried a lot. But when the song was done we simply had to record it. I felt free as I was singing, with Billie by my side. She made me stronger. I made her stronger.
We were unstoppable.
After much debate we called the song hostage. And sung it for most of the night.
"I wanna be alone"
"Alone with you, does that make sense?"
"I want to steal your soul"
"And hide you in my treasure chest"
This was where I wanted to be. Singing in Billie Eilish's room, with her. It's all I needed.
When we finished singing, we heard someone clap behind us.
We turned around in alarm - we hadn't intended on anyone hearing the song. It was Maggie. She had a tear in her eye. "That was beautiful" she said.We also hadn't intended on telling our parents that we were together.
The way we sung the song, staring into each other's eyes made it impossible for Maggie not to realise. Seeing our faces, she smiled and said: "Do you really think I didn't know already?" She winked and left us alone.
We laughed for what felt like the first time in forever.