Paper Lanterns

Chapter two

1988

"You miss Miiiiiiiiiiike." I teased Tayla with a large grin, in an attempt to push her buttons as much as I could.

"Shut up." Tayla responded as she went bright red in embarrassment. I was expecting more resistance from her due to her usual sarcastic nature. But I must have been right. That, or she couldn't be bothered arguing with me.

"Come on, Tayla. We just need to finish this afternoon tea and we'll be on our way to Berkeley." I mentioned.

It had been a year or so since Tayla and I snuck into that Operation Ivy gig, the night we met Billie Joe Armstrong and Michael Pritchard. As you would expect in a year of an adolescent's life - a lot had changed since then.

That night was a really fun night. After we had snuck in through the side gate we had all made our way to the main performing area and kept to ourselves. As we didn't bring attention to our presence and as it was really dark, no one noticed that Billie and I were missing stamps, or that all four of us were clearly underage.

We got to stay right up until the end where we actually got to hang out with the guys in the band. They actually recognised Billie Joe and knew his name, which he was over the moon about. All in all it was one of the best nights of my life. Not just because I had such a great time, but because it was the night I met my best friend.

Billie Joe and I kept in contact after that night. Unfortunately we didn't get to chat on the phone as much as we would have liked. My mother only let me call him once a month (due to the fact that Berkeley was a long distance phone call and not local, thus it was fairly expensive). So Billie and I took turns every two weeks to call each other - his mom also couldn't afford the long distance phone calls so she let him sneak the phone at the diner she worked at.

We wrote to each other weekly though with long, lengthy letters. We had a lot in common and we very quickly became close friends. It definitely helped that we lived so far from each other. This meant that we could trust each other with things we couldn't tell our local friends - it built our trust quickly knowing we couldn't blab each other's secrets to other people.

Mike and Tayla had grown even closer. The two began a long distance relationship not too long after the show. It happened out of nowhere. I knew the two were talking the same amount that I spoke with Billie, but one day Tayla announced to our friendship group that she was dating a boy who lived close to Berkeley and I immediately knew it was Mike she was talking about.

Billie and I were strictly platonic towards each other. We were super close, but nothing ever flourished the way it did between Mike and Tayla. Billie would speak to me about all of the girls he had fallen head over heels for - he was the type of boy who would quickly fall for a girl, and he would fall hard.

I on the other hand was more stand-offish towards the opposite sex after all the tormenting I had received throughout the years. I knew it was hard for someone to want to be with me. But I had started dating my very first boyfriend recently and things seemed to be going well. I had a feeling that Billie disapproved of this relationship for one very glaringly obvious reason. But he still listened to me talk about Eugene and seemed to have stopped passing judgement in our phone calls.

"Yeah, tell me about it. This is so boring. Can't wait to go." Tayla whined loudly.

I narrowed my eyes at her, but decided to not say anything. I may have complained about wanting to depart from this afternoon tea as quickly as possible, but it was okay for me to say. Not her.

A couple of weeks ago I had gotten into a huge fight with my mother. We fought almost every day, but this was a big one.

She had started having an affair with a local businessman who had kids and a wife. It was anticipated that she'd have the house to herself, but I had gotten sick and thus couldn't leave. Rather than re-schedule (or just kick me out as per the sleaze's suggestions) they carried on with each other in the kitchen, next to the lounge room where I was watching television. I was sick, but not deaf. I could hear absolutely every revolting detail. So I decided to prank them, as they still had clothes on at that point.