Westbound Sign ➵ Billie Joe Armstrong

Not Yours, Just There

Collin

The ride to El Paso felt different.

Maybe it was the early morning air, heavy with silence and sleep. Or maybe it was the weight of the hours, stacking up behind us like a countdown. Every mile marker felt like a reminder that we were getting closer to the end.

Billie was quiet beside me, one hand on the wheel, the other resting between us. He didn't say much, but I knew he was feeling it too. The not goodbye. The ache of almost.

We took turns picking music - cassette tapes we'd both scavenged from gas stations and truck stops along the way. He played The Replacements, and I countered with Mazzy Star. He put on Hüsker Dü, and I followed with a scratchy recording of Fleetwood Mac my mom used to play in the kitchen on weekends.

"This reminds me of home," I said when "Landslide" came on.

"Mine too," Billie murmured, like he didn't want to say it out loud. "Except my mom played it when she was sad. Which was... most days."

We didn't say anything for a while after that.

The van trailed us in the rearview, just close enough to keep tabs on. Tre had probably forced Erin and Mike into playing some sort of twisted road game, and Liz was somewhere up ahead waiting with a clipboard full of expectations. But in the cab of my truck, it was just us.

"Do you remember," Billie said, "that night in New York? The hallway?"

I nodded, gripping the seatbelt a little tighter. "Yes."

"You looked like a dare," he said softly. "Like if I said one wrong thing, you'd vanish."

I didn't know what to say to that. So I reached for the next tape.

We played The Breeders, Elliott Smith, even a few tracks off Dookie. Billie blushed when I started mouthing the words. He still didn't believe me when I said I liked it for the lyrics. Especially now.

There was something tender about it. The way we didn't fill the silence with jokes or banter. Just music and glances. His fingers brushing mine every so often. A shared granola bar from the glove compartment. My thigh pressed against his when we took a curve a little too sharp.

And for all the softness, there was this low hum of dread in my chest.

He was leaving. Again.

And this time, it wasn't a hallway or a hotel room or a long distance maybe.

It was a border.

A shift in gravity I couldn't follow.

And every time the tires hummed over another crack in the road, it echoed in my bones.

The desert was starting to unfold in soft, dry brushstrokes outside the windows - flat land and sky stretched so wide it almost felt cruel. It looked like the kind of place you could disappear in if you weren't careful. Maybe that's why it felt so right to say everything and nothing at the same time.

Billie leaned his elbow against the window, the wind tossing his hair into soft chaos. "You ever think about running?" he asked.

"From what?"

"From all of it. Texas. Life. Whatever the hell normal is supposed to be."

I chewed on the inside of my cheek. "All the time. Doesn't mean I'd know where to go."

"I'd take you somewhere," he said, without looking at me. "If things were different."

There it was again. The ache. The if.