AN: Hi there, thanks for clicking on this story! Be warned, the M warning is mostly for profanity, but eventually I might edit it out. When I wrote this I was feeling pretty angsty ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ . Anyway, I don't own Twilight or any of its characters, and I hope y'all enjoy? Using this story as an emotional outlet, so I'm really sorry if it's bad. Feel free to leave a review.
The truth is, Billy Black was probably my best friend. And I'll tell you why.
It all started my junior year of high school. I was going through a serious rough time as far as grades, the dreaded college search, and the shittiest after-school job known to fucking man. Not to mention, the friends I unfortunately decided to associate myself with were backstabbing idiots who only cared about themselves. My only escape from my godforsaken reality was my eagle scout boyfriend (who later ended up being a cheater; aren't eagle scouts supposed to be honorable or some shit?).
Danny was absolutely the love of my life. He was kind, intelligent, passionate, driven, and just all around the most perfect sixteen-year-old boy a sixteen-year-old girl could ask for. I loved him so much, and I gave him everything, including my body, my free time, and all the love and affection my young heart could give him.
I remember going to the zoo with him, just minutes after one of my trusted spies had sent me pictures of him with some other girl. What sucks was that it wasn't the first time that I had heard rumors about my own boyfriend mooching off with other chicks. I had decided to just treat rumors like rumors and ignore them, but this one in particular was proven to be true.
I broke up with him that day on a bench. In front of a wedding. The kid had the audacity to cry.
I bet you're wondering, well lady, get on with it. What the fuck does this have to do with Billy Black.
I'm getting there.
That night, I was working the evening shift at the bait shop on the reservation. The people from Forks high didn't really go to that part of the res, so I figured it was the perfect place to work. Until I actually started working there.
First, the managerial staff was composed of a bunch of incompetent losers, who didn't know a thing about the life of a high school honor roll student. "Taking off to study for an exam" was something they did not understand. Not only that, I was a sixteen-year-old girl, and they expected me to come in with full knowledge on all the different kinds of bait, reels, rods, wires, whose-its and what's-its. I worked that job every damn day including weeknights and weekends. Homework didn't exist to the heathens that ran this place. The wee hours of the morning and I became well acquainted.
While I was incredibly angry about breaking up with Danny, I was also incredibly hurt and embarrassed. I had been dating the guy for almost two years, and yeah we started young, and some might say that it doesn't count, but to my sixteen-year-old self, it counted, and it was hard. He had me convinced that he was going to marry me after we graduated from hellhole high. He was the guy who told me he loved me every morning and every night. He held my hand in scary movies, he kissed me goodbye, and he even asked my parents to date me. And then he cheated on me. And I broke up with him. Needless to say, I was attached, and I severed that attachment, of course I was really upset.
At the bait shop, even the managers working with me sensed my mood. Normally I tried to be on my best mood so I don't get fired, but today was hard. They all avoided me and didn't ask me to do a single menial task aside from sitting behind the register, which is a miracle in and of itself. I remember holding back tears for my entire shift. I would hold my breath for as long as I could, and then take slow deep breaths, anything to keep the tears at bay. I remember staring blankly out the window at the sunset behind our LED sign that said "come catch some bait" when the Forks chief of police walked in.
I instantly freaked the fuck out. This fucking idiot called the cops on me for breaking up with him.
And then I couldn't keep it in. The tears started rolling and the strangled cries climbed up from my heart and out into the otherwise quiet shop. The sadness poured out of me like sour lemonade, everyone who tasted it wrinkled their face in distaste. I vaguely heard my boss's wife come out from the break room and ask me to go take a break. The pain in my teenage broken heart was too much for her to bear.
"I-I'm sorry" I warbled out to her, "I just have a t-test t-tomorrow a-and—" my tears silence my words and I'm left just waving my arms trying to explain to her what's going on through my emotional turmoil. I remember the chief of police, and I try my best to quiet myself, but I already hear the powerful steps of his combat boots making the floorboards creak as he made his way to the register. I shut my eyes tightly.
"I know it's hard, but you're not alone, and it's going to get better."
I open my eyes and look up at the chief of police.
"Chief, whatever he said, all I did was break up with him." I try and explain.
The chief of police cocked his head and raised a brow, "I didn't get a call about any break up, doll. I'm not here on police business. But I do believe my friend here just had some pretty wise words for you."
Brows furrowed, I looked down to his side, and in a sweet little wheel chair sat an old man. The crinkles near his eyes deepened and his smile became more genuine as he met my eyes. His long dark hair was splayed around his shoulders, speckled with gray. His fingers held the wolf pendent around his neck, and I knew he was Quileute.
His wise voice filled the room like the sun warms the skin, "Dear, you may feel low, but you did the right thing."
My eyes begin to well with water. How could this old man in a wheel chair possibly have known anything at all about what I was going through right at that moment. Not only was the man overstepping by interacting with a stranger in such a deep and intimate way, he was also hitting the nail on the head. Something in me drew me to his words of wisdom, and when the chief of police asked if he could drive me home, I conceded.
It was in that ride home with the chief of police and this strange old man that I knew that I was going to be okay. I knew that I wasn't going to cry about Danny again. I knew that life was going to go on. And it was all oddly thanks to this wise yet eccentric old man.
Sitting in the back of the cruiser was an adventure in and of itself. After I miraculously pulled myself and my things together, my managers let me go home early with the chief of police. At first, I was skeptical of my safety, but then I realized I would be with the chief of police, who much safer could I possibly be? In the car, it started with awkward silence. The chief kept checking on me in the rearview mirror and the old man would just hum some weird tune. I wondered when and which one of us would break the silence.
It was me.
"So, who are you anyway?" I ask the old man, "Why did you say all that stuff?"
The chief and the old man share a sideways look before the old man sighs. "My name," he begins, "is Billy Black."
The silence resumes, and my brain searches for any kind of familiarity from this guy and comes up with nothing. I guess his name was enough of an explanation as to why this guy was so wise and just randomly spewed some pretty heavy advice on me. But then it dawned on me. Old, eccentric man, brown skin with long hair, Quileute, wheel chair… the guy was the Billy Black.
As in the chief of the entire fucking tribe! He's basically fucking royalty in my house! Mom and Dad literally do not shut up about him and his legends, they are always pestering me to go to the bonfires on the reservation and to get involved in our family's culture, but I brushed it off.
Man, am I a fucking idiot.
My eyes widen with my realization and I scramble with how to recover, "I… am so sorry," I say, tears climbing into my voice, "I guess now is as good a time as ever to introduce myself considering I haven't really been around since I was—"
"Enough, child," Billy said with finality, "I know who you are, Miss Call. A chief never forgets his tribe."
Fresh tears begin to spill down my cheeks as Chief Swan hits a pothole. I meet his eye in the rearview mirror and he gives me some sort of fatherly look. That you-should-be-ashamed-of-your-actions-and-you-better-start-explaining-yourself look. I send him a I-know-and-I-am-incredibly-embarrassed-as-it-is look right back, and his gaze returns to the night road in front of us.
"Mr. Chief Black—"
"Billy," he corrects me.
"Sorry," I resume, "I should apologize for, y'know, not being around and stuff…"
"Don't apologize now for something that you never intended to apologize for in the first place."
Well, shit.
He definitely got me there. This guy is good.
He's totally right and has every right to be bitter. I 100% never intended to apologize for missing all the tribe shit. I was hoping I could get away with it for as long as I could until I was old enough to move far away. Thinking about it now, it has to be the most immature idea known to mankind, and yet I allowed myself to stray this far away anyway. There has to be a way that I could clean up this mess that I didn't know I was making. Maybe I could start showing up around the reservation, let people know I exist, and then ghost them again.
"I know I seem ungrateful, but I just made the decision to invest myself somewhere else," I try and reason with him.
Billy sighs deeply, "You have forsaken your heritage, your true family, for the white-man. Do you really expect us to just forgive and forget?"
And that's when the conviction tied a noose around my heart. I didn't realize that everyone was so butthurt about it. I mean I know the Call family has been seriously involved in tribal traditions for generations, and my cousins were part of it enough, I just didn't think it mattered if they had one member of the Call family missing. I said my prayers every night to the spirits of the tribe, why wasn't that enough?
"Alright," I say, "well what would you have me do? How can I make up for all this lost time?"
Billy pauses before sharing a look with Chief Swan. It's almost as if the two of them share some sort of mind link.
"My son has been gone for some time," he begins, "I need some help around the house. Think you can do that for me Miss Call?"
That's it? That can't possibly be all that he wants me to do. The poor guy has a whole tribe of people to keep him company, why hasn't he asked any of them?
As my inner thoughts began to ramble on, I didn't realize we were stopped outside my house. I look out the cruiser window at the lights turning on inside. My parents will not be pleased when they see me getting out of the Chief's police car with my tribal chief in the passenger seat. I'm never going to hear the end of it.
"Alright, Billy," I say, bringing my attention to the old man sitting in front of me, "When should I come over?"
"Tomorrow."
Looking back, Billy totally changed my day—my life—around. He was able to get my mind off of my fresh break up, and he was able to calm me down by only saying a few kind words. The guy radiated some sort of post-breakup magic because after that night, I didn't cry about that stupid eagle scout cheater ever again. Maybe helping him out wouldn't be so bad.
Little did I know, the man would have the greatest impact on me, and I would not see it coming.
AN: hope you enjoyed.
Castle Black is a Game of Thrones reference.
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