Little Match Boy

Hero Of The Day

  His water was just turned off, along with his heat and pretty soon, his power.

He was going to die alone in the cold. He just knew it...But yet, he couldn't escape it. It was almost -30°F outside, and he couldn't change that. His depression medication had also run out a few days beforehand, so if pneumonia didn't kill him, his thoughts and actions surely would.

Ten years ago, he was kicked out of Metallica. 1986, when Kirk died in the bus crash. He was kicked out barely a week before it happened.

After his leave, they hired a young drummer named Nick Menza. After Kirk died, they added another one to their roster. He had curly black hair and pale skin. His name was Marty Friedman.

Every night of every week afterward, Lars would stay on the phone with Cliff, consoling him and trying to make him understand that Kirk was in a better place now that he was gone. He knew how it really was.

Cliff, despite his constant need for attention and comfort from Lars, never bothered to stop by. Not once was he asked if he could see him. He didn't even get any more calls once January of 1987 rolled around.

There were times where he couldn't help but think about them, and what they look like now that it's been a decade. He liked imagining Cliff's long, frizzy reddish-brown hair cut down to the length of his jaw. James's mane of blond growing longer than Cliff's before he cut it. After all, he can only imagine. He's wanted to keep them out of his mind as of late, not wanting to even hear them mentioned on the TV. Just knowing that Lars could have been better, and thinking about the fact that if he was, he wouldn't be stuck in this awful house in the middle of the Danish wilderness. It made him sick.

Lars Ulrich. Merely a pile of suicidal thoughts, sullen, pale white skin, and visible thin bones. He knew he was going to die. He refused to accept it, but nothing could be done about it.

With a weak mind and weak hands, he turned the TV on. The only light in the house and in the room was coming from it, and its black and white hues made his pale face glow a saddened, depressing tint of deep gray.

Tears fell from his bloodshot pale green eyes. As they rolled down his face, they soaked into his uncut and unwashed dark brown hair and made the tips of each lock wet and soon after, frozen almost completely solid.

He kept the remote in his thin, boney hand so he could flip through the channels to find something at least a slight bit interesting to him so he wouldn't have to be alone with his thoughts and the feeling of the cold air nipping at his skin. All he found was a sad, low-budget game show on some channel he was sure no one knew existed.

In the middle of the show, he could swear that his eyes began deceiving him. He thought he saw Cliff's frizzy hair pulled tightly back in a bun, as the game show host and James, Kirk and himself as the contestants at the pedestals. Was he hallucinating?

He flipped the channel and it was a news channel. He was thankful until the newscaster came into frame. It was Kirk with cropped hair and his glasses on, holding papers describing the current news. In the corner a small screen showed up that had James in it, hair cropped short as well. The caption under his picture read out, in bold letters, "HERO OF THE DAY."

This couldn't possibly be happening, he thought to himself as he flipped the channel again. He could feel himself get weaker and weaker with every press of the remote's button.

He felt almost a sense of relief when an old western show came on the screen, with the title "LOAD" scrolling across the town's backdrop. The camera zoomed in on a saloon, but all he saw was Cliff and James sitting at the bar. They looked back at the camera and it shot to the window, where he saw himself and Kirk ride up on horses in a stereotypical Mexican western get-up.

He felt like he was going mental.

He flipped the channel again and found a boxing match. Lars was now tensed up in fear, the realization of insanity hitting him like a ton of bricks. Cliff was in one corner of the ring while Kirk was in the other. Their appearances looked wildly different, with Kirk having tattoos and the same cropped hair as the News hallucination and Cliff having jaw-length hair and more tattoos than Lars could even imagine being on him.

The coach was James, also with cropped hair, who was hyping up Cliff, while he was in the opposite corner doing the same with Kirk.

He couldn't take it any longer.

One more channel flip and he saw Cliff and James in business suits advertising a type of water, also named Load. Cliff's hair was now just as short as James's and Lars could only stare on in confusion. He's had enough.

He turned his TV off, flipped onto his back, and stared at the ceiling. His frozen lips let out shallow, visible breaths into the coldness of his house. He couldn't feel his body anymore, despite the fact that he was huddled tightly under his blanket.

He heard the door open, and two familiar voices began speaking out.

"Wow...Lars has really let this place go..." A warm voice said softly. He looked around and walked in the house cautiously as he hugged his body tightly in a feeble attempt to keep warm. Cliff.

"I think it's been like this since he was kicked out, Cliff." A colder voice responded. The boredom was evident in his voice when he spoke. It was recognized as being James.

Cliff circled the couch and almost didn't notice Lars's small, fragile body as he sat down. When he did, a strong feeling of dread hit him like a speeding car. He began panicking, taking Lars's shoulders in warm hands and shaking him. The coldness of the man's skin pricked against Cliff's fingers like needles.

Lars only fell limp, still conscious but without motivation or strength to move or speak. The only moment Cliff was able to tell he was still alive was when he saw streams of tears falling down his cheeks. "James, we need to take him home...He's gonna freeze to death if we don't." Cliff said in an almost delirious agitation.

The last moments of Lars's conscious breaths were spent in the warm company of Cliff, being wrapped up in his unused bed's warm comforter and being carried out in loving arms. The last thing he saw, however, was Cliff's short hair in his face and James following behind, eyes grim and face grimmer.