met at her house, she was having a
much harder time than she let on. “I’m fine now,” she
says. “But that was one of the hardest weeks I’ve ever
had. I’ve never felt more hopeless in my life.”
She says she’s never been one to suffer anxiety or
panic attacks. “But that week, I had a panic attack
every single night. I cried for two hours every night.
It was really, really bad.”
Eilish says it all came back to the tour. “I couldn’t
take the fact that I had to leave again,” she says. “It
felt like an endless limbo. Like there was no end in
sight. And, I mean, it’s true: There really is no end in
sight with touring.” She has shows planned all over
the world, well into next year. “Thinking about that
literally made me throw up,” she says. “And I’m not a
throw-upper, but I threw up twice, from the anxiety.”
Eilish says she often gets this feeling before a tour.
“But it’s never been that bad, ever. There was a mo-
ment when I was sitting on my bathroom floor — this
sounds depressing, because it was — but I was sitting
on my bathroom floor, trying to think of something
I could look forward to. And I could not think of one
thing. I thought for a long time, too. I was like, ‘There
has to be something.’ But there was nothing.”
She was also scared to be by herself. “Every time I
was alone, I would break down and kind of crumble,”
she says. “It got to the point where my friend would
say, ‘I’m going home, see you,’ and I’d get this feeling
in my stomach like a knife being twisted around.” She
mentions her history of self-harm. “I felt unsafe with
myself, even for an hour,” she says. “I don’t trust my-
self when I’m alone.”
Eilish knew she had to get better before she left.
She’d tried seeing a therapist a few times last year
and found it so-so, but she forced herself to go again.
“I don’t ever want advice, because I’m not going to
take it anyway,” she says. “I just want to be heard.”
Slowly, she felt better. Other things helped: She
spent time with friends; she drove the Dragon;
she rode Jackie O. “It’s funny,” she says, not laugh-
ing. “It was literally just a week — but it was so in-
tense that it feels like a whole year of my life I’m
talking about. It was just a completely random week
of bursting misery.”
But to her surprise, she’s been enjoying the tour
so far. “The shows have been amazing,” she says.
“We brought the scooters, so we’ve been scootering
around. We played Ultimate Frisbee and I beat every-
body’s ass. So, yeah. I’ve been pretty happy.”
When it comes down to it, Eilish knows how lucky
she is. “I have an amazing job, dude. I really do. The
things I get to do in my career have just been unbe-
lievable. Like this shit, bro? Can you believe this is
real?” She pulls out her phone and shows me a photo
of the crowd at her Portland show — 20,000 scream-
ing fans. “Are you kidding me? Like, that’s what I get
to do? Come on, bro! So I do love it. And, like, fame is
pretty cool. If I’m putting on my third-person cocky
hat, the shit is fucking amazing. Going anywhere and
being looked at, because everyone knows who you
are? That’s crazy! So I really cannot complain.” She
grins. “But I do anyway.”
After the show that night, Eilish takes a few min-
utes to be alone and drink some water. Then she
spends a while choosing her outfit for the next day.
Eventually she retires to the bus, where she curls up
on the bed with Patrick and debates which pictures
to post to Instagram. Then, sometime around two,
the bus starts rolling, and the family turns in.
But in the middle of the night, Eilish wakes up and
stumbles over to Maggie’s bunk. “Mom?” she whis-
pers in the dark. “I had a bad dream. Can you come
sleep with me?”T
HE NEXT MORNING, everyone wakes up a little
rough. Today’s show is at Red Rocks, the leg-
endary amphitheater outside Denver, and it’s
overcast and chilly. Eilish shuffles into the greenroom
and microwaves herself a burrito, then plops down
into a massage chair, a little queasy with a headache.
Patrick thinks it’s the altitude; Maggie goes off in
search of aspirin.
Someone brings Eilish an oxygen tank, and she
holds the mask to her face. Marquis comes in and
tells her she looks like an old lady, and she laughs.
Then he tells her there might be storms tonight, and
Eilish perks up. “Really?” she says. “I hope it rains.”
One of her closest friends, Zoe, is here. She flew
in from L.A. this morning. Eilish and Zoe have been
inseparable since they met at a home-school park
day as toddlers. Now Zoe is here for the next three
weeks — the rest of the U.S. tour. She says her job is
just to hang out with Eilish and make her feel good.
“I’m like her therapy dog,” she jokes. “Her emotion-
al-support human.”
Eilish and Zoe spend a few hours riding scooters
and playing Uno. Then Eilish gets her wish. The skies
open up; there’s lightning and dangerous winds; they
have to evacuate the venue. By showtime, it’s been
raining on and off for hours.
Eilish takes the stage in a white hoodie, white
gym shorts, and white Air Jordans, her cheeks ap-
ple-red in the wind and cold, looking like a Hype-
beast Snow White. She opens with “Bad Guy,” and
the fans scream every word so loud you can’t even
hear Eilish. It’s one of the loudest crowds I’ve heard
at a concert, ever — until the chorus hits, and it’s
twice as loud.
Eilish bounds around the stage slick with rain, as
Patrick scurries behind her mopping up wet spots.
During one song, she slips and nearly breaks her
neck, then laughs and keeps dancing. As the rain in-
creases, more and more crew guys try to keep things
dry with rags and towels, but it’s a Sisyphean task.
Eventually Eilish abandons the stage entirely and
moves to a railing a few feet from the crowd. The
kids go crazy, and she’s loving it too. “Red Rocks,
watch this!” she says, before moonwalking across
the stage. Then she cackles with delight and quotes
a Vine from a few years ago: “I’m a bad bitch, you
can’t kill me!”
Maybe it’s the weather, or the setting, or the
crowd, but the whole vibe is pretty magical. Eilish
feels it too. Near the end of the show, she gets sin-
cere. “I just want to thank you,” she says. “This has
been one of the most beautiful experiences I’ve ever
experienced. I keep wanting to cry, but that’s dumb.
I’ll cry afterwards.”
After the show, the greenroom is full of industry
hangers-on who flew out from L.A. for the night.
As they schmooze and talk shop, Eilish and Zoe run
around giggling, playing Frisbee with gluten-free tor-
tillas. Eventually they disappear into the bathroom,
singing to themselves as Eilish takes a shower. Gradu-
ally the entourage trickles out, and it’s just Eilish, her
mom, and Zoe left.
The girls gossip and reminisce for a while. Then
they crawl into a recliner together, curled up like kit-
tens, and silently scroll Instagram on their phones,
while Maggie, smiling, sits at their feet, packing Eil-
ish’s suitcase for another day on the road.BILLIE EILISH[Cont. from 55]
tickets at
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new
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halloween
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october 25-27, 2019