Billy BenReilly's Story Arc (Issue #1)

I have no idea how Billy BenReilly and I became friends.

Here's a snapshot of the essentials that formed my concept of his character: Billy BenReilly roaming through the halls of my first duty-station barracks, all 6'4" of him elbows and kneecaps, every part of him including his hands, his feet, his nose, whatever - lanky and jutting and too long for human-proportioned clothing. Billy BenReilly unapologetically wearing flowing silk shirts with comic book characters emblazoned on them, Billy BenReilly donning a fedora every time he strode, like a daddy-longlegs, over the seaside hills of Billyrey Bay to and from the chow halls. Billy BenReilly somehow endearing himself to a crowd of his Army cohorts, who were themselves the more elite picks - the athletes, the charmers, the intellectual outliers that the few resident Susies gravitated toward - Billy BenReilly somehow found a niche under the wings of those sought-afters even despite an inexplicable penchant for making random and startling dinosaur screeches while prowling in stylized velociraptor posture up and down the barracks stairwells, even despite a tendency to go around mock-shooting webs from his wrists à la Spiderman, complete with sound effects and an occasional, spontaneous Spidey crouch-stance. Billy BenReilly getting busted in morning formation for having what turned out (much to everyone's - including our Platoon Sergeant's - relief) to be a Marvel comic book stuffed down his pants. 

Basically, Billy BenReilly just being an utterly, unabashedly absurd presence.

(Just doing whatever a spider can. Nothing to see here.)

Here's the first encounter I really concretely remember: walking into Billy BenReilly's barracks room, a room he shared with one of the hottest topics on the floor, where Billy BenReilly had decorated an entire wall-locker interior - every shelf, every drawer - with Star Wars figurines. And even though we were just barely grown-ups, most of us still highly susceptible to the currents of social approval, Billy BenReilly did not give a shit. He was so fucking proud of that toy collection, of his fedora, of his horiffically-awful billowy silk shirts, that he had stopped me in the hall, just some strange new Susie on-station he'd never spoken to before, to show it to me. It was done with the wonder and panache of a five-year-old showing off a secret fort to a trusted adult confidante.

I was not impressed.

(That is never gonna pass locker inspection.)

But Billy BenReilly's edge was in his incredibly naive and self-confident persistence, and eventually I started to find myself accompanying him through the foggy stretch of cypress standing between our barracks and the dining facility on weekends, or biking down to the wharf with him for clam chowder from the farmer's market, or engaging in silly little projects he would orchestrate, like stealth-planting tree seedlings in the barracks lawn to see how long whoever was being punished with groundskeeping extra-duty would just assume they were there officially and mow around them (as of just a few years ago, one of those fuckers was still standing and taller than me), or volunteering for heavy-lifting in some rescue group's sea-lion release event, or renting out a billeting room with a kitchenette so we could actually cook food, or sneaking into the Billyrey Bay aquarium with homemade people-watching Bingo cards: making a game out of finding the mom-with-a-stroller-blocking-traffic, the way-too-stoned-for-public-kid-lurking-in-the-jellyfish-room-for-hours, the first-date-not-going-well couple. The thing was, every single one of these adventures was good, wholesome fun - Billy BenReilly didn't drink, he didn't smoke, he still had his V-card, for fuck's sake (see what I did there?) - and yet they all went horribly wrong in some hilariously memorable way.

To wit:

One weekend, Billy BenReilly knocked on my door breathless, wide-eyed, champing at the bit for me to get dressed (in a new DareDevil logo T-shirt - he was always buying me T-shirts featuring super-nerdy things he adored) and out the door, because he had stumbled upon a sandwich-board-wearing man advertising the best idea ever: a whale-watching trip. Outside of Minnesota lake canoeing, I had never even been on a boat before, and so I took the bait. Joined by a handful of his benevolent social-buoy older, higher-ranked boys, we biked down to the dock.

I'm not sure what Billy BenReilly expected. I mean, I knew even at that age that he was hopelessly in love with me, and also that No. Not going to happen. But through what plenty of you Billys out there will recognize as tragic attempts at courtship rather than just the ridiculous foibles of an oddball dude, he'd actually achieved a superstar friend-zone slot, one of my most fun partners-in-family-friendly-crime, and - admission - I knew that without a signal from me he was never going to actually make the move for a kiss, so I just wore the shirts and went on the adventures and otherwise let that dog lie. Was it the right thing to do? I don't know. Maybe he boarded the boat with visions of us on the bow like some comic book superhero versions of Kate and Leo in his head, and maybe that day irreversibly changed how he thought of true love, in which case yeah, I'm an asshole. (But also, Titanic sank, the metaphorical romantic implications of which are pretty obvious.)

No, I'm not sure what Billy BenReilly expected. But I can tell you what he got, because it is all captured in an exquisite photo set by one of our aforementioned pals.

(Did not see this one coming.)

Leaving the dock, we are all smiling, waving, looking out at the bright and promising day sure to be full of gleefully-leaping cetaceans ahead of us. It is an uncharacteristically-sunny morning on the Bay. Everything looks to be turning up aces. If we were a Warner Bros. cartoon, Billy BenReilly's googly-eyes for me would be issuing fluttering hearts.

And then, flipping through the action-shots, the casual observer will note that one of us appears to be fading, growing pale. It is me, my face looking more and more desaturated compared to my bright red DD top. I am still resolutely smiling, though there is a trace of tension in my jaw, with Billy BenReilly obliviously joyful at the romance of sailing by my side.

(I *am* smiling.)

Now out at sea, fully committed to several hours afloat, I am a ghost. There is a slight look of dull panic in my eyes and my smile, still among the healthy, happy, rowdy group of strapping young soldiers in their weekend civvies, is more of a grimace. In one of these photos, I am gripping a railing with unduly-whitened knuckles, and Billy BenReilly is looking at me with adoration and a touch of concern.

And now the sun is gone. And now the waves are visible in the background. And now in half of the pictures, the horizon is at a strangely-skewed angle suggesting our boat might be having the balance issues of a staggering hobo. In these photos I am mostly cut off, maybe just the top of my head showing because I'm sitting down. In one of them, Billy BenReilly is kneeling in front of me with an earnest look of loving compassion. The look I am returning can best be described as "hate-lasers."

And then I am gone from the group shots.

(No. OMFG I wish.)

And then, because there is nary a single shit-eating whale apparent within 100 miles of us, because this whole trip is a goddamn motherfucking hellish lie Billy you sonofabitch, possibly because of my bright red shirt popping like a flare in contrast to the now-colorless day, I become the focus of photography, about which I am clearly far from thrilled yet incapable of warding off.

Here I am with my head in my hands, Billy BenReilly stroking my hair.

Here I am with a face indicating I might be pronouncing an "F" sound, flipping two birds at the camera as Billy BenReilly, looking honorably defensive, tries to shield me.

Here I am leaning over the boat's gunwales, clearly hoping for swift drowning death while Billy BenReilly reassuringly pats my back, the very picture of selfless caring.

(Oops! Spoiler.)

And here, a veritable gem of photographic art, is me, losing something like my last eleven days' worth of meals to the water. And no longer beside me but at the precise distance one might immediately acquire between oneself and, say, a just-discovered cow carcass bloating to distention in mid-August heat, stands Billy BenReilly, now sporting a look of complete horror. Billy BenReilly, completely disheartened and betrayed by the world and slightly terrified. Billy BenReilly with the shell-shocked look one might have if one managed to stumble and fall *into* aforementioned carcass. Billy BenReilly backing away, shielding his face from my true colors, the palette of which could be summed up as "every possible shade of puke, Jesus FUCK what did you even eat?"

If you've ever lived on planet Earth you'll a) easily recognize the below meme, and b) it should concisely clarify what sort of human behavior cause-and-effect I'm describing in the above photoset.

(Susie : Whale-watching -- Moshzilla : Dancing)

The final picture is the masterpiece.

On the dock, safely ashore, stands our small group of intrepid seafarers. Captured in a raucous knot are the handful of our Platoon's cool Billys, laughing and pointing and hamming for the camera. And on one far end of this group is me, a disaster-survivor's smile of thin relief on my face and - I shit you not - what upon close scrutiny has been judged by several analyzing parties to be multiple spots of backsplashed vomit marring the DareDevil logo on my chest.

And on the opposite edge of the picture slouches Billy BenReilly, facing the camera but slightly detached from the group, his enthusiastic naiveté of the morning now replaced by the haunted 1,000-yard stare of a grown man who has seen terrible things.

We did not go to the chow hall or, come to think of it, do anything involving food together again for a very long time.