The bowling alley

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Warning! Mentions of abuse, profanity
and harassment read at your own risk!

BILLIE RAN THROUGH the dark streets of her home town like she had so many times before. She'd grabbed a backpack she normally used for school and stuffed some random crap into it to keep her occupied. Two comics, five dollars, a bottle of water and a bag of Oreos filled the bag.  She didn't really know what else to bring. The only thing that was hers were the comics and even then, half of them she'd salvaged from her grandparent's house.

Her head was in the clouds and she couldn't walk straight. Weird looks were thrown at her from different people but she didn't look at them. Was it really running away if there was a possibility she might have to return? That question stuck with her for quite a while before she finally shushed it. This was a big step for her, leaving.

Leaving unannounced gave her the biggest rush of adrenaline she ever had and it made her want to sort of do it again. So what if she was brought back to the house with her mother? She still had two working legs that could bring her right back out if she wished.

The only questions at that moment were; what to do. Where to go and how to go about doing it.

She really needed someplace to go, which was probably the most important thing. Find shelter and food and while you're at it, don't bump into anyone you know under any circumstances, that was her plan. She'd be the laughing stock at school if she didn't follow those simple rules. That and her scar. God, she hated school. She loathed every second of it. Her teachers were nice if you were talking personality-wise but the forceful work they loaded up onto their students was enough to drive anyone mad. But she'd stopped doing her homework a long time ago. Billie had stopped even imagining a future where she wasn't stuck in the rotten hell whole that was her home. Home sweet home.

Billie slowed down to a walking pace and caught her breath. She must have ran at least two blocks which was a record for her. She looked up and the sky was dark. It was around six in the morning so that meant that the street lights were lit up a brilliant golden colour but in a few minutes would begin to fade.

It felt therapeutic to Billie. The scenery.

She could imagine it in a movie.

A girl, running away as the sun rose and some music slowly coming on. Could be sad or happy. The film would flashback to all the shitshows that went down in her life and then to the one at that moment, except she wasn't crying or shouting, or cowering. She was basking in the fact that she was away. Free. somewhat happy.

She thought for a long moment before one of her favourites hit her and she began to hum it softly while trying to avert the cracks on the footpath.

"Weep for yourself, my man,
You'll never be what is in your heart"

She jumped over two squares as she regained her balance.

"Weep little lion man,
You're not as brave as you were at the start"

The cold brushed by and she shivered. She'd forgotten a jacket or even a cardigan. Something to keep her warm and she had forgotten it. How stupid could it get?

Her life might have been different if only she'd went to live with her dad. Maybe they would be together somewhere in west Ireland, beside each other instead of apart.

"Rate yourself and rake yourself,
Take all the courage you have left
Wasted on fixing all the problems that you made in your own head"

He had other things to worry about. Things that weren't Billie.

"But it was not your fault but mine
And it was your heart on the line"

But shouldn't he, as her father, care? Or would her brother have to try and fix every mess their parents left?

Probably.

"I really fucked it up this time
Didn't I, my dear?"

"Didn't I, my dear?"

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

In Rustbelt, there weren't very many places you could go to avoid family members, people you knew or just people in general. There was always going to be someone that greeted you or tried to steal your purse and you couldn't evade them. Just the way it worked. So when Billie began her walk, she knew her lucky streak wouldn't keep up for so long.

After a three hour sit on a bench, where she might have might not have slept for half of that time, the girl decided to walk again. The road began to dip and she started to fumble down a hill.

It was hard to keep herself steady and she kept leaning forward, just about to fall and then gathering her self, standing up straight and doing it again by accident.

There was a large group of young middle school kids who for some reason were out playing a form of basketball with a football net instead of an actual hoop. One of them spotted her, a scrawny beach-blonde-haired eleven-year-old and began to snicker loudly.

She didn't know them and they didn't know her but that didn't make it any less embarrassing. Actually, what were they even laughing about? She was only walking.

Little prepubescent pricks, she thought.

Billie sped up, keeping her head low and her dignity buried deep down. These were middle schoolers and she was in high school, why was she doing this to herself?

The answer to that was; she was scared and alone. Better safe than sorry. There were also more of them, so even if she was older she probably wouldn't stand a chance against what was probably about twenty kids.

Billie walked for ten minutes until the main town's street came into view.

It was dirty and didn't look all that nice but it had all the facilities the people of Rustbelt needed. A convenient store, hardware store, a second-hand toy shop, an arcade, book store and a bowling alley, all on one street plus more.

There were obviously more than these in the town but most opted to go to this street and this street only. Cars whizzed down the road in all directions and she walked tightly to one side of the footpath. She wore a long oversized checkered shirt with some low cut pale blue jeans that were probably both her brother's. Her brother. He hadn't been home when the fight happened.

Shit, Timothy.

Her mother might not have cared about her leaving but her brother would be in his old convertible on his way to find her, no doubt it.

Shit, shit, shit, she cursed in her head, her eyes looking to each building on the street. The bowling alley was the closest and the most familiar.

Timothy used to take her there when no one was home but she was really really young at the time and hadn't gone in around four years. Yet, she still remembered everything about it.

She quickly sped up and walked straight under an overhead bridge, past Fiddles dinner and into the bowling alley, which she assumed wasn't even open. The door still clicked and she walked in.

The same smell wafted in Billie's face. That musty, sort of like an old relative, smell that was horrible but so nostalgic it gave you goosebumps. She smiled wildly displaying all her teeth which were a bit mismatched if you asked anyone but her mother. She hadn't been allowed to get braces, mostly due to money reason and Shelly's excuse. Her mother's excuse was that it didn't matter if she got them or not, her teeth would still look the same. So she never did.

Billie looked around, nobody in her Parsifal-vision and walked into what she hoped was a bathroom.

Luckily it was and she hurried into one of the stalls quietly. She gently put the toilet seat down and cautiously took a seat on it. Well not necessarily a seat, she was hesitant of germs so she, more than anything, crouched on it.

Billie reached into her bag and pulled out a random Runaway comic. She looked at the title and giggled. Ironic, right?

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

The smell of the bathroom was a bit overwhelming and Billie really wanted to leave but was waiting until it closed. She determined her brother might assume her to be inside and wanted nothing less than for him to make a scene out of it.

So she didn't leave.

She heard people going in and out, a few people commenting on how long the person in 'that stall' was taking, teens laughing and plenty of streams.

She'd read both her two comics around seven times and was reading the second one for the eighth, deciding to not read the first again. It had been at least four hours, probably more and during that time she had begun to care less about the germs and more about her comfort. So instead of sitting like a homeless gremlin she slowly slid her legs onto the ground and immediately felt her back ease.

After another twenty minutes, which by then had she started devouring the Oreos, the hustle and bustle began to die down and after another ten the entire building was silent. Billie packed her mess chaotically into her bag, silently zipped it up and put it on her pack.

She unlocked the stall for the first time in five hours and pushed it open, cringing at the loud squeak made as a result. She glanced around the bathroom, making sure no one was in and confirming it, raced to the hall. The hall had four doors, three of which led to random rooms Billie did not need to enter. One of course led to the actually bowling part of the building and that was the one she walked up to.

Billie carefully nudged the bar, allowing for it to fly open without making noise. Nobody was in front of her but she had to check around the other side of the door. She swallowed all her but before she even had to, her heart dropped. Voices, the sound of music and footsteps. There were still people inside.

Breathing heavily and involuntarily, Billie ran back into the rotten bathroom before the others spotted her and sat down again in the same stall. How much longer would she have to wait? She was fed up.

Her breathing sped up again and she had to get out. Even if they saw.

Billie snuck back out the same way she went in, her heart racing a million times a second. It was really quiet. Maybe the people had left in the short amount of time but the sound of more footsteps made her stomach do three flips. Billie crept out of the bathroom and spotted the two people who she would have to face if they turned around even slightly.

She knew them. Sydney Novak and Stanley Barber from her biology and English classes. If they saw her, what would they even do? She looked a state, which was obvious but she didn't think they'd be ones to judge. The door was only a couple meters away. If only they stayed like that for a few more seconds-

Syd was laughing, very awkwardly and the two were quite a distance apart.

"And you wanna know something that's even more embarrassing than being ugly?" Stan asked a smiling Syd.

Billie couldn't understand why she was smiling and didn't know what was happening at all. It was really odd.

Stan leaned forward." Flunking biology. Which you are most definitely gonna do. I mean, Martin Ganda passed biology. And he thinks cyborgs staged the moon landing."

Billie inwardly snickered. Martin Ganda sat next to her in biology for two months and she remembered a particular conversation where he tried to convince her the earth wasn't round, or flat but a square. A fucking square.

Syd lowly chuckled. "Okay, so I'm ugly. I'm dumb. Wait, is that all you got?"

Billie got the memo that Stan was probably just trying to be a dick and kept making her way to the door. But he kept going.

"Do you wanna know the scary thing?"

Billie looked back at the two.

"You're never gonna figure this out."

Syd's face dropped and Billie's turned into one of confusion. Figure what out?

Stan kept starting at Syd. "You'll never know what the hells going on inside you- or what the hella wrong with you and that's gonna eat you up inside," He said.

Billie stood there, taken back. Where was he going with this and what the fuck had she stumbled onto?

"And that's gonna haunt you for as long as you live. And that's gonna suck- yeah it will"

Syd was completely still but looked as if she were about to cry. Or scream. Or beat the shit out of Stan. Anyone of those things would some up her face but Billie wasn't looking at her or Stan and his mean comments. She was looking at the red bowling ball that had begun to rattle aggressively behind the girl.

Stan looked at it and In took a breath. "But nothing will ever suck as much as your shitty family"

Two bowling balls that sat on long metal racks behind Syd began to float into the air to the baffled brain of Billie Wilson. They stayed there and Billies eyes widened. What the hell was going on? Was she on some prank show? Did they have cameras in the bathroom and decided they'd play a joke on the girl who ate an entire bag of biscuits by herself in a cubical?

"For starters, let's talk about your dad." Stan began. He could see the bowling balls too, right? It wasn't just Billie, right? "I hear he didn't even leave a note."

The balls rose higher.

"and do you wanna know something? You'll never know why he killed himself"

Billie's mouth dropped. Boi, Stanley Barber like so many others at school was officially a dickwad.

The bowling balls flew forward, one either side of Stanley. His head turned as they passed and Billie jumped. They hit one side of the alley's wooden interior with a loud 'bang', fell to the ground and rolled off as if they'd only been thrown.

Stan turned back around to look at the startled Syd. "Holy shit! That was awesome!" he smiled.

He walked forward with his hands up, expecting a high five but Syd aggressively pushed him away. "Fuck you," She told him.

"s--What? Syd, I--I didn't mean any of that! I just-" he stuttered in his defence. "I was just trying- " he turned around and looked at the large dint. "I mean, it worked."

"I could have killed you!" Syd argued, rightly so. She began to walk away but not before getting a few wors in. "We're threw I'm done"

Stan walked after her, spluttering all sorts of excuses and apologies.

Syd ran to the door speedily, right in the direction of Billie. Billie made as if she was going to hide but Syd didn't see the girl for some reason and ran straight by her.

Stan stopped, as she was already gone and stood by the reception desk.

Billie looked to the large indents the balls had made, back to Stan and out the door to Syd who was halfway across the street. "What the fuck?!"

That pretty much summed up everything.

Stan looked to her after hitting an entire tower of cans, from somewhere, over to the ground.

His eyes widened, just like Billies and his heart sped up, just like Billies. "You? Oh fuck, you saw all that! You saw all of that! Wait, did you see all of that?

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: AUTHORS NOTE

Sorry if this isn't the best, we got everyone introduced now mostly, yay. That was also a really long chapter, like extra-long lmao. I was watching perks of being a wallflower and it gave me these ~vibes~ that I just need in my life. God, I love watching it. Anyway!

See ya'll next chapter, love ya!