It’s warm upon the midnight hour in the city that never sleeps, if it
was colder, it’d probably sleep, but right now it’s too busy sweating...
It’s times like these that I wonder why I don’t invest in a better hat,
this one just channels the warm rain down the back of my collar. If there’s a god out there, he may not be
looking down on me, but that rain feels like I’ve got at least some of his
attention.
Not that God and me are on particularly good terms you understand, been
some time since the sisters in the west side chapel turned me out, and while I
can’t blame them for their actions, I wasn’t the only one committing sins on
that day, and last I checked, Sister Julia got forgiven all her transgressions. One rule for them, one for the other...
So here I am on the mean streets, the steam is coming up out of the
vents as the first metro of the day eases out of the station. The streets aren’t as mean as people would
believe, sure, you’ll never see them put a coin in a jar, but that’s not the
reason they’re mean. They’re mean
because of the people out there on the streets, people who’d kill you for the
change you got from the dollar you bought your morning paper with.
It never gets really dark in the city, like the inhabitants get scared
when they can’t see anything, but they don’t consider that the only reason
there’s shadows is because of the light. If you didn’t have light, you wouldn’t
have shadows, you wouldn’t see the mean streets, you wouldn’t be out in the rain
because you’d be bumping into everything, and the world would be a safer place.
See there? Guy heading down
towards the station, clear that he’s not a native of the city. Just look at him, dressed the way a tourist
might, scurrying around because he doesn’t know that the trains run every five
minutes. See him running there, like
he’s got somewhere important to be, no native runs, it shows a basic lack of
knowledge of the city. Things like that
make you stand out, things like that make you obvious to anyone who lives here.
See there? That red dot on his
chest, that’s because someone noticed that he was running. But he’s too busy running, and he’s too busy
running because he doesn’t know the score, he doesn’t know that the city eats
those who it doesn’t like.
See there? He fell over, that’s
because he doesn’t know the city, doesn’t know that the only person running at
this time is the one that shouldn’t be there.
Or maybe it’s just the bullet I put in his head, that’d do it too...
I look at the coins in my hand and sigh, damn shame that morning papers
cost so much these days...
I need to start charging more...
