Hidden Agendas

One Big Story

Citizen soldiers holding the light for the ones that we guide from the dark of despair. Standing on guard for the ones that we sheltered, we'll always be ready because we will always be there.

I hummed as I thought over my life as it was at the moment. Jobless, failing out of college, on the cusp of unpayable debt that would follow me throughout life, ten dollars in the bank and extremely suicidal tendencies even when my depressive episodes die out. In essence, I was me.

Not two weeks prior I had a well-paying job, a good standing in college, and nothing that would indicate that a depressive episode would rip that from me, as it had everything else. No family, no friends, no job, barely a roof over my head. I did have a boyfriend, and I had a drama-buddy in my boyfriend's mom, but other than that I had a feeling I was rather hopeless.

"Speaking of suicidal tendencies..." I muttered to myself as I continued on my walk, legs freezing and nose burning. It was winter, and I was walking around in shorts, too damned pitiful to bother with anything else. I could handle it, and if I couldn't, well. Not like I wasn't ready to die at any given moment.

I thought back on the jobs I had, frowning. I liked those jobs. These depressive episodes were really fucking up my life, and my apathy was making it so that I couldn't push myself out of them until it was too late. I glanced around with a heavy sigh, audible through my blaring music. I open my mouth to apathetically and melodramatically state the words, just for fun, only for the instrumental bit to flare up. I waited, before closing my mouth and pouting.

Fine. Be that way.

I closed my eyes, having to stop as the sudden need to keep them closed forever washed over me. I opened them again. My legs froze, and not because of the weather.

"Oh. Huh. That helped," I sniped at myself. Nice, open your eyes to see an entirely different scene and you make a pun, do you? Bloody fucker. I observe the area, moving to lean against a nearby tree that hadn't been there before. A park? I glanced to the side, leaning to look further back, before nodding. A park behind me, looking mighty parkish. A body of water in front of me, looking mighty familiar. A word popped into my mind. Thames. I blinked. Was it the river Thames? I hummed. Looking around, I gently take out my left earbud, grinning sharply at the next pun, "Traveler's Song? Oh, fuckin brilliant!" I laughed even as I walked up to a random man.

The man turned around, and I didn't blink as I asked the woman a question, "Sorry, was just on a tour, where am I? I thought I was supposed to get off the bus in London?"

The woman snorted, "You made it to London alrigh'," I blinked at her Scottish accent, "The river Thames is righ' there! You're uninformed for a tourist," She critiqued. I hummed, nodding.

"Yeah," I agreed, "Wanted to go to Paris. See the Louvre, Eiffel Tower and the lot. I'm just stayin' here for a fortnight, sorry for the uhhh inconvenience."

"You must be barkin mad to be wearin' shorts in winter! And going to Paris?" The woman shook her head as I walked off, rolling my eyes. Great. I was in London.

Looking around, I wondered how I didn't see how... London it looked. It was like being in Tokyo as a weeb and not recognizing it. Like being next to the Statue of Liberty and not knowing you were in the United States. Like seeing the Eiffel fucking Tower and not knowing you were in Paris. I glared at Big Ben for a moment, before sighing and deciding to just walk.

In my life, there wasn't much I was good at. Walking though? I could out-walk a marathon walker. In distance, anyway. My persistence willed it so, and I understood that it was my only physical talent. Even then I was shit at it. I glanced at the song. Remains. Right. That was, like, twenty songs later. Maybe I should be doing something? Going somewhere? With a sigh, I glanced at the time, glad it was easy to do so in London. I knew my phone wouldn't have any service, so I didn't bother pulling up Google Maps.