The Jesus of Suburbia

Twenty-First Century Breakdown

I've never been hung up on a girl before. Ever.

In high school I went through them, not after them. Everyone knew it, so no one amazing ever came to me.

Through this thought process, it was easy to explain why I was stuck on Whatsername. First of all, she had stayed the night. Maybe she hadn't meant to, though. When you're drunk you usually don't have the lasting consciousness to leave.

Secondly, she had pink hair. Enough said.

Third, she liked the same bands I did. Obviously she liked Nirvana, and under further inspection I discovered that the grey shirt she left was an inside-out Led Zeppelin shirt.

Back in Brooklyn, my school was going through a rap faze. The coolest of the rap spectrum liked Twenty One Pilots or Dessa, but the rest listened to people like Eminem. It had been a thoroughly disappointing year.

All these thoughts rushed through my head in the back of a limousine on our last day in Ireland. "Are we ever coming back to Ireland?" I ask, opening my eyes.

As I look around I see a sight worth taking a picture of. Tre is asleep on the seat across from me with his head on Billie's lap. Billie has his head leaned back and eyes closed, probably asleep too. Mike is asleep as well, draped across the backseat.

Therefore, I didn't receive an answer.

I lay back on my row of seats and pull a pamphlet from underneath the seats. "Twenty-First Century Breakdown." I mutter to my self as I flip through the tour dates. Damn right.

It turns out that we're going back to New York City for the other half of America after the concert tonight. As far as I can tell, we aren't going back to Ireland on this tour. Even if we were, I probably couldn't find Whatsername anyway.

I close my eyes and let sleep take over the rest of this irritating car ride.

Ten or so minutes later the driver is shaking us awake as politely as possible. He nudges Mike once. No response. Again he nudges Mike.

Tré, who was up first stands up and throws himself on top of Mike in a more effective way. We all laugh as Mike is jolted awake and tries to shove off the unwanted invader. "Holy fuck, I'm up!" He yells, laughing.

Tré is pushed to the floor where he rolls onto his back. "No man, you weren't up. You were snoring like a chainsaw."

Mike rolls his eyes and his cheeks turn slightly red as he steps over Tré and gets out of the limo behind Billie.

Screaming fills the air and I feel extremely jealous.

Tré scrambles up and goes to the door of the limo where he suprise-jumps onto Billie's back. Swearing, Billie holds Tré's legs and attempts to hold him on.

"This isn't working." He dumps Tré off who lands not-so-nimbly on his feet and dusts off his jeans. They all start to walk to the stage door, so I get out of the limo to follow.

Everyone is restrained by ropes, but they're all trying to touch the members of Green Day. Girls are crying, guys are trying to appear manly while internally fangirling and I'm just walking towards the receding band.

I shove my hands in my pockets and slouch my posture a bit as I walk.

A hand grabs my arm and an Irish scream of "Oh my god, Red Dexter!" meets my ear. I turn quickly to see who it is.

It's a girl with brown curly hair and a Green Day shirt. One of the first people to call me by my real name, not Armstrong.

She grins with straight teeth and lets go of my arm, pulling out a small notebook and pen. "Can I get an autograph, please?"

Slightly confused, I nod and sign my name on the paper.

"I love your song! You should really make more music!" She yells over the screaming for Green Day.

"I've got a few things written, I just haven't had time to record them." I explain, adding my phone number to the signature before handing it back.

The girl shrieks when she sees it and I feel myself being pulled into a hug. I hug back for a tiny, uncomfortable second before pulling back and waving.

She waves excitedly and I turn away, continuing to walk to the stage doors. Faintly, I hear another voice behind me screaming "Red!" but I don't acknowledge it.

"Wanted dead or alive, not a soul will dare! Emotion's a joke, don't get too close!" I hear a few people sing behind me. It's also too much to even think about. People are listening to my song and actually liking it?

I turn towards the group of people remaining and particularly the ones singing. I raise a rock on symbol above my head and then turn, walking through the stage doors.