The Innocent Can Never Last

Coming Clean

Billie's POV

Around three-thirty the next day, I was sitting in my room, strumming on my guitar, when there was a light tap on the door, and Roan entered the room. "Hey, buddy," he said. "Your friend Mike is on the phone."

I sat the guitar up against the wall, before getting up and following Roan down the stairs and into the kitchen, where I picked up the phone and said, "Hello?"

"Hey, Bill."

Mike sounded fairly put out. "What's going on?" I asked.

"Not too much."

"Oh...I assume you know about me and Emma, then?" I asked.

"Yeah...she was pretty upset, dude...what's the deal?" Mike said.

"I just...it's hard to explain, Mike. It's just that...for the past several years, I've been leaning all over Emma and looking to her for support, and now that I'm out here, kind of on my own...I actually want to see if I can try to make it by myself. Even if I have to leave her behind," I said.

"Well...you can still keep dating her and make it on your own, too," Mike said.
"Yeah, I guess..." I replied.

"Call her, Billie," Mike said. "And do it quick, because if you don't, I'm afraid she'll move on and leave you behind."

"Huh?" I asked.

"She's Emma, man. She doesn't let things get her down for too long, you know her. She's a rubberband girl...she just bounces back. I'm afraid that if you don't talk to her or something, she'll move on, and then things will never be the same again between you two..." Mike said.

I sighed, suddenly realizing that I would have to tell Mike about Ruby. There was no way around it. "Mike..." I said slowly. "I kind of...have a new girlfriend."

"What?" Mike asked, sounding just a little bit peeved.

"Her name's Ruby, and we're not that serious yet...her job makes it kind of difficult...but I really do like her," I said.

Mike took several deep breaths over the line, before saying, "And what exactly is her job, pray tell?"

"She's a...prostitute," I said slowly. "But she models, too, so she's not all bad."

"You mean to tell me that you left your girlfriend for a prostitute?!" Mike yelled over the phone.

"I didn't leave her for a prostitute...I broke up with Emma because I needed some time to do things on my own, honestly. Things have just...happened since then, that's all," I said.

"That's all?" Mike raged. "That makes me feel so much better! Billie just left his girlfriend for a freaking whore, that's all! It doesn't matter-"

"Mike, calm down," I said.

"No, Bill...this is ridiculous. I can't believe you..." Mike said.

"Mikey, I'm sorry, really...things just happened...I swear," I pleaded.

"I'll talk to you later, Billie," Mike said.

"Please, Mike..."

"Bye."

"Mike!"

I heard a click on Mike's end, and then the line went dead. I hung up the phone, before turning and sliding slowly down onto the floor, where I put my head in my hands and started to cry. I truly hadn't meant for things to end up this way. The whole thing with Ruby hadn't been planned, it had just happened. Honestly. Now Mike just thought that I was a jerk; he would no doubt tell Emma all about Ruby, and then she would hate me. My two best friends in the world, mad at me? This was more than I could take. I had had too much shit flung at me over the past couple of days, and I couldn't take it. With a choked sob, I picked myself up off the floor, and headed upstairs to my room. When I got there, I opened the top drawer of my dresser and pulled out a small tin box. With shaking hands, I carefully pried the lid of off the box, and pulled out a small razor, hardly believing what I was about to do. With another sob, I sat down on the bed, pulled my sleeve up to the elbow, and used the razor to slowly slash open my inner forearm. It wasn't close enough to my wrist that it could have killed me, but it hurt quite a bit. With a shudder, I fell backwards onto my bed and closed my eyes, letting the surging pain from my arm slowly get the better of me.

After my suicide attempt, I had sworn to myself that I would never cut again, but now I saw that sometimes there were no other options. I let out a slow moan, as the pain suddenly became worse, and my vision began to fog up...