21st Century Breakdown

Part 1- Christian

I just want to see the light...

Christian woke with a start. The needle rolled off of his chest, and the punctum in his arm throbbed. He realized that he had forgotten to untie the tourniquet. Stupid motherfucker. The high hadn't lasted very long, but Christian had started to feel himself slipping away nonetheless. He hated when that happened. But he couldn't stop. It was the only way to numb the pain.

His last conscious thought before he'd slipped into a fever dream had been will I ever see the light again? I just want to see the light... But did he? Wasn't that the whole reason behind his continued existence? He'd tried to end it all before. But, right as he was prepared to jump, he'd seen her.

She was walking in the Coliseum station, just as he'd looked down off the train tracks in the dead of the night. He didn't know her. But she had said to him, as he stood on the tracks in the rain, shivering,

"You're here for a reason. Don't make it a stupid one. Don't be the reason cops exist. And don't even think about jumping, you dumbass. You don't wanna be the reason coroners exist." And then she'd walked away, going about her way.

"Wait!" he'd called, slurring his words as he stumbled back to the platform.

"Who are you?"

"I'm Gloria. I'm the saint of all the sinners, the one that's fallen through the cracks to end up a dirty rotten bastard like you." She'd laughed, cold, harsh and bitter.

"One difference, though. I actually want to make a difference in the world. Catch you around, Christian." She threw his wallet at him and left down the stairs, hopping the barrier to get back to street level.

All Christian wanted to do was find her again. But no matter where he went, no matter where he looked, all he'd found were rejects like himself. Not that Gloria wasn't a reject; she'd pretty much said it herself, but she was different. Different than the other idiots who sat around and did nothing. Gloria was doing something. He just wasn't sure what that was yet.