The Artist / Billie Eilish

Chapter 22

Bad Guy blasted through the walls from the other room as I shut the door to lessen the noise slightly.

My hands rested on my hips as I scanned the area I had to work with. Tubes of paint lined one table, coloured pencils scattered along another, and my huge canvas was propped up in the middle. I wasn't entirely sure what I was going to create yet, but I knew I wanted it to be based around the Bad Guy music video.

Probably because someone was absolutely blaring it through the whole entire building.

"You little bitch," I sighed as I pulled my earphones out of my backpack, staring at the bundle of wire I could not be bothered to even start to untangle. Throwing them to the side, I dug deeper into my bag to find my chunky-ass headphones and connected them to my phone - also shuffling the album, but at a volume where I could concentrate.

I started sketching out Billie's face with my oil paints and humming along, creating my own little zone, and soon enough, hours had gone by without me even realising.

Concentrating on the eyes of the painting, I was hunched over my desk making individual eyelashes with my tiny paintbrush when a hand landing on my shoulder almost made me stab a hole through the canvas.

Jumping up, I saw Billie laughing at me and saying something, only being able to hear My Strange Addiction through my headphones.

I scrambled to throw them off me, resting my hands on my head as I paced around the room. "You scared the shit out of me, Billie," I whined as she laughed, looking down at my painting when her face suddenly got serious.

"Shut the fuck up, no way!"

She bent down and looked at the painting up close before standing up quickly and slapping her hand over her mouth, staring at me wide-eyed.

"You can fucking paint like that?"

Giggling, I sat down on the couch and pulled out my phone, noticing 4 missed calls from Claudia and 2 from Ethan... and that it was 5pm now.

Billie collapsed down next to me, still staring at the painting and shaking her head. I shoved her softly, crossing my arms.

"Don't say stuff like that, I get embarrassed. And it's still nowhere near done, I haven't done the background, or the hair, or-"

"Mami, you boutta shut the fuck up right now," Billie interrupted, standing up to have a look at the painting again.

"We're selling prints of your paintings, right? At the shows?"

Nodding, I began to clear up the mess I'd made in this random green room, Billie trying to help but not really knowing where to put anything. "This is the painting for the first city."

Billie whistled lowly, muttering 'damn', as the door swung open, Claudia smiling innocently.

"Didn't mean to interrupt," She wiggled her eyebrows as Finneas appeared behind her, his eyes also widening as he saw the painting.

Billie rolled her eyes at Claudia but invited Finneas inside to gush over the painting, Claudia and I stepping outside of the room.

"So how's it going since last night?"

Scratching the back of my neck uncomfortably, I scanned the halls in case anyone was around. "Alright..." I started, lowering my voice. "She was upset yesterday, but now I think she's ignoring it. She's just being normal around me. I don't want her to be upset, but I also don't want her to get into trouble with management. Not right now, during tour. So many people could be let down if something bad happened."

Claudia nodded her head, her eyes watching me with sympathy as she pulled me in for a quick hug.

"I'm always, always here if you need me. You know that," she mumbled against my shoulder as Billie and Finneas wandered out of the green room, hyping about the art.

•

Billie's POV

"Now, whilst you have no choice over the matter, you do have some choice as to who it's with."

I rolled my eyes. "Wow, what a lucky bitch I am."

Finneas and I were currently sitting at the familiar, long table - the blaring daylight shining through the wall of windows making me squint. I was slumped over in my chair, playing with my rings and barely listening to the team of big, middle-aged guys who thought they had some kind of control over my life.

Side note: they fucking don't.

The main guy, Steve, cleared his throat and leant forward into his chair, looking at me as I refused to look up.

"I know you're not happy about this," he tried to reason with me as I laughed coldly, shaking my head and looking up at him. "But it's honestly for the best."

Before I could say anything, another bald-headed doof sitting at the table piped up. "It's for your own good. It'll clear up those gay rumours going on at the moment with that British girl. Ever since your post on Instagram about flexing or whatever, people have taken a real interest in finding out who that is."

My heart stopped in my chest as I glanced at that guy I didn't know. Steve looked at him too, sighing and scratching his chin. "Billie, he's right. You don't exactly make it easy for yourself. Commenting flirtatious things on all of her posts and posting pictures of her lounging around on your car."

Just as I was about to protest, he interrupted me. "I know, you're just really close friends. But people talk, Billie, and we don't want that kind of talk surrounding you."

Finneas shook his head in disbelief as I laughed again, covering my face with my shaking hands.

I felt Finn's hand on my shoulder as I took some deep breaths, trying to convince myself it wasn't worth it to murder every single old, white guy in this room.

I've never been this fucking angry.

This douche-fuck in front of me thought I was relieved, and carried on spewing shit. "Luckily for you, we have a few different boys who were available and willing."

Steve pulled out three pieces of paper from the envelope in front of him, lining them up to face me.

"So we have Drew, Isaac, and 'Q'. These are their photos, there's information about them on the back."

"Like a fucking dog shelter?"

Steve looked uncomfortable as Finneas and I laughed, making fun of the three random guys.

"Nah, I don't want to adopt any of these random fucks, bro. You can kindly fuck right off with that idea," I grinned at the man in front of me as he smiled, shaking his head.

"I'm afraid that isn't an option, Billie. You signed the contract at the beginning of this. We told you that we were obliged to do anything necessary to keep you away from controversy, and you agreed. Now, here we are, keeping you away from controversy."

My eyebrows raised as I laughed again, Finneas sighing beside me. He knew what was coming.

"Controversy? Over two girls possibly being together? Are we fucking listening to controversies from 100 years ago or what?"

The group of men shook their heads, all speaking at once and justifying their homophobia.

Another guy I didn't know spoke up. "It isn't like that. We don't care who you're with. But, if you were to come out, then you would lose a lot of your following. I know that that isn't an issue, because you and Rose aren't even together, but people suspecting is it just as bad as it actually happening."

I shook my head in disbelief as my mouth hung open.

I didn't know what else to say.

Steve cleared his throat again and gathered up the photos, sliding them back into the envelope.

"We'll pick a guy for you, based off of compatibility with your schedule. Thank you both for you time."