1984, and my life had just gotten interesting. I was in the seventh grade, and I was 13. My birthday was February 18th, a day after the best thing that ever happened to me.



It was the night of our middle school dance, and I sat with my best friend Allison in her mothers car on the way to the dance. It was a warm day in Rodeo, in mid April. Allison was sitting beside me in a dress and leggings, and I was wearing jeans, a t-shirt, and Hi-Tops. I really wasn’t fitting in. I was nervous, mainly because I wasn’t the most popular person in my seventh grade, unlike Allison. I played with my right lip ring, moving it with my tongue. I could see Allison’s mother looking in the back mirror, she disapproved of my lip rings.


We finally got to the school parking lot and I jumped out. I could see everyone waiting for the doors to unlock, and I saw my other friends I fit in with. I walked over to Mike and Billie Joe, who were my guy best friends. They had there equipment, cause they had that crazy dream of being in a band, but they were playing the dance.


When the doors unlocked I grabbed Billie Joe’s amp, since I figured he would ask me anyway. I walked into the gym and walked to the front of it and set the amp down. We all just stood there for five seconds, then Allison came over.


“Hi Michael!” she said to Mike. She had a thing with calling him Michael, since it was more classy. “And William.”


“Allison, his name is Billie Joe, it’s not short for anything. There’s no class to him, incase you haven’t noticed!” I corrected.


Allison shook her head, “it must be short for something! Mike is short for Michael,” she said pointing to him. She then pointed to me, “Shawn is short for Shawna, but I prefer to use Allison instead of that Ally!”


“Yeah,” Billie Joe said. “I’m sorry my mother was high. She didn’t know how to spell it either.”


“I’m sorry Will, I mean Billie… um Joe,” Allison stuttered out. She had a problem with short things, and un classy things. She wanted to be like her mom. A wealthy businesswomen, along with a widow, which makes no sense.


“C’mon two! No stalling,” I lectured the guys.


They grabbed there stuff, and plugged everything into the outlets, Billie Joe played his first chord. Everyone’s eyes bolted right to him.


“What?” he asked the crowd. “I was just warming up!”


Then he started his first song, it was a song I had never heard, but I wondered what it was. “Oh I love her, been dreaming of her, and I understand if she wants to be my friend!”


What was it, and who was it about. Billie Joe always wrote about things he felt. So I wondered who this girl was. He finished that song, and I had to admit I loved it. Billie Joe was extremely talented.


He walked over to me, and I looked at him like ‘what are you doing!?!?’ But he just kept coming over to me. “My throat hurts!” He was lying. He was really bad at it to. “Could you sing the next song? I really need sometime to soak it up with, saliva!”


“Your gross, but yes,” I said. “What song is it though?”


He smiled, “Why do you want him? And Shawn, your awesome!” Billie Joe had some weird thought I could sing, but I always heard him during there practices, but he thought I was.


When the guitar burst out in chords I breathed and sang the words, “I saw you standing alone, with a sad look on your face, you call him on the phone, looks like he left without a trace!” After more of that beautiful song. I finally stepped away from the microphone.


“We are gonna take a break now!” Mike said. They played records and we all danced. I mainly sat against the wall with Mike and Billie Joe throwing stuff at each other. Then a slow song came on. Ramona Wilson came over to us. She asked Mike to dance. He grabbed her hand and held her close. They weren’t going out, but they both like each other. Me and Billie Joe just stood against the wall for five seconds, when he walked in front of me.


“You’re my best friend, you know how to dance, and we have nothing to do,” he explained.


I laughed, “Billie Joe if this is a way to ask me to dance, without meaning it, lets go!”


We walked a little ways to were everyone else was. Billie Joe pulled me closer. He didn’t know this but I had always loved him. He truly was my best friend. No matter how stupid he was I loved him. When another slow song came on. We continued to dance, and my head rested on his shoulder. Him being his stupid self, he blew at my hair. It tickled my ear so I squirmed out of his arms.


“Jeez,” I laughed. “Your such a idiot!”


He smiled, “you have pretty hair.”


I rolled my eyes. Billie Joe was stupid, funny, immature, a kiss up, and a punk. Just like me, take away the stupid part. That song stopped and Billie Joe and Mike went up to play some more. They played some covers so people could know the songs. After 5 songs, it was brake time again. My mom, and absolute druggy was coming to pick me up. Hopefully she wasn’t drunk. We went outside and sat on the lawn.


“Is your mom ever not high?” Mike asked me.


Billie Joe turned to him and hit in the arm. Not only was he my best friend, but he was like my older brother, by only one day, but that’s older. “You can’t just ask someone if there mom’s always high!”


“Well he makes a point! I wonder to!” I yelled.


“Well that’s ok,” Billie Joe explained. “It’s your mom Shawn, not Mike’s.”


It was getting late, and people started walking out of the gym. After everyone had left including Allison, we just sat there. I started to fall asleep and my head lay on Billie Joe’s shoulder. I never did, but I could feel Mike breathing as he tried to bite my head. When his teeth almost touched I threw my arm at his gut.


“Ow!” he yelled.


I laughed, “that’s what you get for trying to bite me Dirt!” Everyone called him Mike Dirnt, even though it was actually Pritchard, but I called him Dirt.


“Oh My God!” Billie Joe gasped. “Our equipment is in the gym!”


He almost got up but I stopped him, “no don’t move! You can get it tomorrow. Besides your shoulders really comfy!”


That was when I crashed. I almost woke up when Billie Joe moved over to the picnic table. I figured I was asleep for like five minutes. Finally I opened my eyes and I saw sun. I must’ve been facing my bedroom window, but when my vision straightened out. I noticed I was wrong. I was lying on the school picnic table with Billie Joe’s coat under my head. I got up and looked around. Finally I found Billie Joe, but he was being weird, and sitting in a mud puddle.


“Dork!” I yelled. “Why did we stay here?”


He got up with mud in his hand. I knew what the plans were for that mud. I started running towards the parking lot and Billie Joe yelled to me. “Your mom never came so I decided we would stay here!”


“What time is it?” I asked.


He hollered back, “it’s like 9:30, and the Saturday detentionee’s are supposed to be here soon!”


I stopped, which was a big mistake. I turned around and Billie Joe couldn’t stop. We fell on the grass and I layed there laughing. Then I felt cold running down my back. Mud.


I pulled it out and Billie Joe was laughing. When his mouth was open I saw the chance. I shoved it in his mouth. He spit it out and looked at me.


“Yummy!” he yelled. “Where’s Mike?”


“I don’t know, I woke up and only saw an idiot sitting in a mud puddle,” I replied.


“Who?” It wasn’t soon before he figured it out and put his head down in shame. Then a car in the parking lot honked and Mike’s Mom was driving her van. I ran to the van, apparently racing Billie Joe, but I knew I won. Mike was already in the back with all the equipment. Mike’s mom dropped me and Billie Joe off at his house, and Mike went home.


Billie Joe’s mom never came home the other night, at least according to his sister. We just sat there, waiting for my mom to wonder where I was. We sat on the couch listening to records. Billie Joe got his guitar out, and played another new song. He started to sing, “Starlit night, the moon is shining bright you are the one that I need. Up at your window I see a shadow silhouette of your grace. Here’s some flowers I picked for all the hours that you spent with me. The one I love, that I’ve been dreaming of sailing across the sea.”


There she was again. The girl, he dreams of, considering she’s in two songs! I couldn’t say anything, except that the song was beautiful.


He smiled. He loved hearing his songs complimented. It made him feel good, since he grew up in a broken home, he never felt that good.


When he walked back into the room and put his stuff away, I hugged him. He said, “I love you.”


“I love you to big brother,” I laughed.


We just stood there, when his brother walked in. “Billie Joe’s got a girlfriend.”


I threw a shoe that was sitting on the floor at him and he walked away. Then I heard a car door slam. It was my mom. She walked in and she looked furious. She was walking over to me. She looked so angry I had never seen her like that. She just stood there, then I finally said, “are you okay?”


That’s when she grabbed me and threw me into Billie Joe’s window. It was large, so I managed to go all the way through. Blood had started gushing out my arm, and my head hurt. Billie Joe had coming running over to me. “Are you OK Shawn?”


“Where’s my mom?” I asked.


“She’s coming around, come on lets go!” he yelled. He picked me up and glass got pierced farther into my skin. I almost screamed but managed not to. Billie Joe ran through the window through the front door. I figured my mom, would be in the back, after we turned the corner off of his house. I was right I heard her scream in anger. I only had one idea where we were going, and that was to Mike’s. Mike lived with foster parents, who were actually qualified parents. Mike’s mom was walking out to get her paper from her mail box, and she saw my arm. She dropped her coffee cup and ran over to me.


“John!” she screamed to her husband. I saw Mr. Pritchard walk out and he ran over and grabbed me from Billie Joe. I was starting to get dizzy and I blanked out. I finally woke up in a hospital bed. Billie Joe was in the room.


“I see the injured one is up,” he joked.


I rolled my sleepy eyes. “I saw my arm was wrapped and my leg in a cast. I figured I broke it, after falling half a story, thanks to the house foundation. “Is my mom here?”


“No,” he said. “Shawn, they took her to the jailhouse. She’s been arrested for child abuse.”


“Then who am I staying with?” I asked.


Then Mike came in, “my parents are gonna take you in, as a foster child. But they’ll probably adopt you like they did me. They love you.”


I smiled, “well thank Jesus I’m away from my mother. Oh, but I’ll have to say with Dirt!”


“I’m not dirt,” Mike frowned.


“Yes you are,” I laughed.


“No.”


“Fine! Dirnt, Dirnt, Dirnt!”


He smiled. Billie Joe finally cut into our small little argument. “Go to sleep, the doc said you need to rest for like a million hours.”


That’s when I had no choice I just fell backwards slowly to sleep. I could still hear. The doctor came in and told Mike and Billie Joe had to leave. Then I could hear footsteps to my bed. Breathing came closer to my face, as lips touched my cheek