Surreal Dystopia Pt 4 - Chapters 20-21

Chapter 20 - The Emptiness Machine
Mike was bored beyond belief in the last class of the last day before winter vacation. A two week break from the soul-crushing boredom and turbulent emotional turmoil of high school, and it was just a short, endless hour away. He could almost taste freedom from here.
His math teacher was her usual boring self. Mike would absolutely detest her if she wasn't such a nice woman. Not because there was anything wrong with her or the way she taught her class, because the entire concept of math was totally meaningless to begin with. What the hell is a percentage, and what could it possibly mean to the course of his life?
Well it could mean he doesn't get into college, if he didn't get a high enough 'percentage' in his overall test results; that is, if his knowledge of percentages was insufficient to become a sociologist or whatever meaningless job he could build himself from a college degree that had nothing to do with math whatsoever.
He discretely slipped on a headphone in the ear opposite from the teacher and played the new hit song, The Emptiness Machine by Linkin Park.
He'd mentioned this song to his parents a few days before and they couldn't believe their ears. Linkin Park was back, with a female vocalist? His mother cried. He didn't really care about the history of the band, or whatever it may have meant to his parents when they started yet another, “when I was your age,” speech about the days when Linkin Park expressed their own teenaged angst. He just liked the song.

Your blades are sharpened with precision
Flashing your favorite point of view
I know you’re waiting in the distance
Just like you always do

“And so, when you multiply a negative fraction by another negative fraction, you get...” The teacher, Maddie, looked around the room selecting a victim to mentally shake until the answer fell out. “Mike?"
“I left my phone in my locker!” Mike complained, assuming she was about to give him shit for watching youtube again.
Maddie smiled, trying not to laugh. “I was asking what happens when you multiply these fractions together.”
Mike looked at the board and all he saw was a confused blur of incomprehensible, made up symbols that were trying to convince him they meant something. After a few seconds he shrugged and answered, "they create another fraction.”
A few girls laughed and one of the other boys said, “dude, pay more attention, Mike!” He was trying to distract himself from the fact that, no matter how hard he may have been trying, the symbols would never make any more sense to him than they did to Mike.
Mike rolled his eyes. “Then you answer it, genius!”
The nerdy valedictorian who was head of student council raised his hand from the front row.
Maddie was still staring at Mike. “Let's start with the sign. Is it plus or minus, if both these fractions are a minus?”
Mike had done enough memorization for the last exam to say, “minus, minus, plus” and hope that was a sufficient answer to take the spotlight off him.
It wasn’t.
Maddie knew perfectly well that Mike, along with 90% or nine-tenths of his classmates, would never have any reason to know this stuff. The majority of her adult friends remembered hating their math teachers, and none of them ever used any algebra in their desk jobs.
Some would say this whole thing was just a show so she could say she tried, and the school board could pat itself on the back trying to pretend their students were prepared to make something of themselves out there in the adult world, where none of them ever amounted to anything worthwhile despite their successful academic careers.

Already pulling me in
Already under my skin
And I know exactly how this ends

Mike's best friend was recently sent to juvenile hall for cutting class too many times, and he'd felt so personally attacked by this injustice that he'd lost all willingness to pretend he cared about class whatsoever.
His friend had been on a path straight to juvy ever since he started stealing smokes from his parents, and as soon as he graduated from nicotine to cannabinoids he'd sealed his fate. The THC was incompatible with the programming high school was attempting to coerce him to accepting, and the more he chose a feeling of contentedness and satisfaction, the less interest he had in attending class.
The law mandates that teenagers absolutely must attend school. If the government is willing to pay for these brainwashing facilities, then the students should be willing to attend. Anything less was selfish idiocy and, in the modern idiocracy, that kind of foolishness was frowned upon most severely. Going anywhere other than school 5 days a week was simply not acceptable, and jail was the only reasonable alternative for such miscreants as absentees and delinquent truants.
Mike saw this as an unfair and completely unacceptable limitation on the freedom he felt was his right, the freedom that demanded the world around him offer something more meaningful than fractions and history lessons. Who the hell cares about geography?
The skate park was a mere mile away and he saw no reason to be here when the wheels of his skateboard were brand new and aching to be ground to dust. Except that he could be arrested for leaving.

Let you cut me open
Just to watch me bleed
Gave up who I am for who you wanted me to be
Don’t know why I’m hoping
For what I won't receive
Falling for the promise of
The emptiness machine

Maddie wasn't giving up so easily. She saw in this room the potential for a beautiful future, if only these poor kids would take their heads out of their phones long enough to realize they deserved better than they were giving themselves. “Come on, Mike,” she said, “I know you know how to do this.” That glimmer in her eye betrayed the knowing beyond hope that there was infinite potential in Mike's mind, if only he would harness it for himself.
She’s glad she wore her new sweater today, bearing the phrase, “the limit does not exist.” A hilarious math joke she finds deeply inspiring.
Mike shifted uncomfortably in his chair, unwilling to look back at the board, let alone admit to himself that she was right, he could answer it. But it was completely unfair to expect him to have absorbed all this when all he wanted was to go outside and be active.
Maddie knew perfectly well that these kids would always have trouble dealing with the world if they couldn't hack it. These things simply aren't that hard, and while she understood why they were so resistant, she also knew it's simply a matter of deciding you want to excel, rather than lagging behind out of laziness and latent fears of inadequacy.
High school is such a turbulent time in people's lives. Emotions are all out of control, no one knows what's going on even in their own lives, let alone outside in the real world. And yet every tiny, insignificant trauma is an earth-shattering problem, until next week when it's ancient history and there's a whole new scar to worry about.
Meanwhile the world is passing by right before your eyes, and the decisions you make here will affect your whole life in ways you can't even understand yet. It's simply not fair to these kids for teachers like Maddie to let them slip through the cracks.
She saw it as her duty to ensure these kids make better choices for themselves, and give themselves a bright future, because if she didn't convince them of that then she was robbing this world of the beautiful things they would otherwise create.
90% of nursing students become nurses. 80% of teaching students become teachers. Under 10% of history graduates use their degrees at all.
The majority of college students don't even know what they want to do for a career. When Maddie was in school she found it strange that most of her friends were studying something they found halfway interesting without any real interest in using their degrees. Why even go to school?
Then she discovered that, even among people who do know what they want to do, the majority of college graduates simply aren't presented an opportunity to use their degrees. They enter the work force in a position of pulling themselves through the dehumanizing process of attempting to land a job in a desperate economy, with their CVs being viewed by computers instead of people, and end up getting whatever hand-out jobs they're offered in a moment of need.
Maddie's husband is a contractor with barely a high school education, who makes sound decisions for himself and knows how to live his life in a productive way. Her brother is a genius who took ten years to get a bachelor's degree, hasn't used it, and hates everything about his professional life.
Both of these men would tell her that the education system simply isn't what it promises. She sees things very differently.
She sees people trying to fit into a world that wasn't designed for everyone, and she sees everyone being offered an opportunity to make a great life for themselves. And she sees them squandering that opportunity out of insecurity and stubbornness. She tries one more time, gently prodding Mike's unwilling intellect. “Just give it a try, what's a-over-b times c-over-d?”

Going around like a revolver
It’s been decided how we lose
'Cause there’s a fire under the altar
I keep on lying to

The guy who picked on Mike speaks up. “That's a-times-d over c-times-b!” The tone in his voice is impatient and wants the lesson to keep moving, so he can pretend he understands.
The valedictorian knows that's not the right answer. His hand stays up.
One of the girls who laughed at Mike, and who secretly has a crush on him, says, “That's not the right time to flip the fraction.” She knows the answer but she's hoping Mike will say it, because she wants to think he's smart. Her friend grins and passes a note that says “U + Mike 4EVA” inside a big, pink heart.

Already pulling me in
Already under my skin
And I know exactly how this ends

Mike's dad says math is just a way for smart people to mentally masturbate, and that only engineers ever use it for anything worthwhile. He says math majors just pretend to know things because they're only good at math, and physicists only use it to idealize things that can't possibly work outside a lab setting.
Mike's mom says that high school is a necessary evil. “Just get through it,” she told him. “It's not that bad, and then it's over and you go on with your life.” Exactly what she said about getting shots when he was 6. Maybe she's right.
Mike straightens up and looks one more time, trying to pretend he's thinking. He knows how to do it, he just doesn't want to admit it. With a silent internal groan he sighs, “a-times-c over b-times-d.” After a second he adds, “positive.” His friend would be so ashamed.

Let you cut me open
Just to watch me bleed
Gave up who I am for who you wanted me to be
Don’t know why I’m hoping
For what I won't receive
Falling for the promise of
The emptiness machine

“Very good.” Maddie is grateful Mike has given himself the chance to prove he's capable of this.
Even if he doesn't see it right now, he just opened a new possibility for himself, one that doesn't involve working at a factory for the rest of his life, or going to prison for something dumb.
Maddie wanted to be a teacher because she knows how important it is for these things to be presented by someone who cares and who wants to do it right. Her math teachers were all so rude and arrogant. She never learned a thing from them, because they made it impossible to stay engaged in something so boring.
She wants to help her students make a wonderful life, not just throw it all away before they even have a chance.
And she knows the world outside this school is dark and evil, with very little opportunity available.
But she also knows that, if these kids are ever going to make a life worth living, she has to encourage them to use their minds. She can't stand the idea of all these beautiful brains and their infinite potential, just going to waste because math class is too boring to pay attention.
Mike slumps back in his chair, humiliated to think that he just gave into the soul crushing system of mental slavery that is high school. He has no interest in serving this abusive system, trying to force him to see things the way they want so he can spend his life working and being a servant to some asshole like his dad.
He just wants to be free, to do things that are enjoyable and worthwhile. He wants to be active and thoughtful, to watch the world from a perspective of having the ability to do whatever he wants. He doesn't know if that's what’s actually being offered here, or if the whole thing is just a sham, but he knows he'd rather live according to his own ideals than be forced to think the way they want him to.
And he's beginning to suspect he can do both, he just has to walk the line very cautiously. Either side has its pitfalls and if he's ever going to make something of himself, he has to play the game without giving up that crucial part of him who just wants to be free and have fun, and live his life according to his own rules. Regardless of what anyone else says.
Maddie goes on with her lesson, focusing her attention on the boy who thought he had the right answer but didn't. It's an easy mistake to make, one she can teach him to avoid solely because he's willing to try. And she'll make sure he figures it out. It's her job.
Mike is already spacing out, wondering if life outside these walls will ever make any more sense than it does now. If this is the way they prepare you for adult life, doesn't that mean that adulting is even worse than this? He'll have to make his own version of adulting, before their version kills him from the inside.

I let you cut me open
Just to watch me bleed
Gave up who I am for who you wanted me to be
Don’t know why I’m hoping
So fucking naive
Falling for the promise of
The emptiness machine
I only wanted to be part of something
The emptiness machine
I only wanted to be part of
The emptiness machine


Chapter 21 - Evolution Will Not Be Testified
It was the night before xmas and all through the house, everyone felt the secrets of sewn-over mouths.
Andre’s roommate Shayen turned on the song Revolution Will Not Be Televised, by Gil Scott-Heron: an ode dedicated to the dystopic society Afro-Americans have lived in for far too long.

You will not be able to stay home, brother
You will not be able to plug in, turn on and cop out
You will not be able to lose yourself on skag and skip out for beer during commercials, because
The revolution will not be televised

Paul was approaching Andre’s building, singing along with the song Sewn Mouth Secrets, by Soilent Green: released on an album inspired by a dystopic novel, from a band named after another dystopic novel. “Closet master, reveal yourself! Clenching the truth in your throat! Choking on an abundance of lies!”
Jack opened a beer and leaned into his sofa, savouring the bittersweet taste of fungus-infected wheat juice as he looked longingly forward to the promise of wrapping himself inside Zoe’s limbs again. He wondered what was going on in the world right then but was afraid to turn on the news, lest his addiction to fear porn rear its ugly head once again.
Zoe was listening to the polls and wondering if the world was about to literally tear itself a new asshole, as the old one was elected into the white house once again.
Paul screamed, “I stand and observe, the puppets preach! If I could cut the knotted strings! Instead I have to grit my teeth!”
Shayen was singing,

The revolution will not be brought to you by Xerox in four parts without commercial interruptions
The revolution will not show you pictures of Nixon blowing a bugle
And leading a charge by John Mitchell, General Abrams, and Spiro Agnew
To eat hog maws confiscated from a Harlem sanctuary
The revolution will not be televised

Phil was chuckling about the number of known criminals who succeeded in politics. Nixon was charged for bribery, conspiracy, obstruction of justice and obstruction of a criminal investigation - and pardoned by Gerald Ford. Spiro Agnew claimed the bribes he accepted were debts due to him from years long past. Marion Barry was reelected after his crack-cocaine addiction went public. The Kennedys, who became president and senator, notoriously had mob connections.
When the pope was essentially Emperor of Europe, there was a long string of papal successors who were known to have been involved in murder, rape and extortion - to name just a few in a very long list of common sins committed at the highest clerical levels.
Phil laughed hysterically as he waved twin peace signs in the air, mocking an antipathetic world with the infamous phrase, “I am not a crook!”
According to what a cousin told him from Texas, the new not-a-crook’s opponent promised to allow abortion immediately after giving birth - raising significant concerns about the murder of infants.
Jack looked down at his circumcised penis, wondering why his parents would continue the tradition of child mutilation handed down by a corrupt religion they didn’t even follow. “Why would we follow their example, if their beliefs stem from a culture who’s practised ritualistic sexual mutilation of infants since the beginning of recorded history?”
The answer, ‘why not’ was always good enough for his mother - except when someone said it to her, of course.
He wondered how much that tradition has impacted the amount of war stretched across the planet since that culture’s influence began to spread like a plague across the infected wound of a lost species. He wondered how much of what we now call toxic masculinity is the result of having a mutilated penis.
Jill was wondering how a culture can call themselves civilized while they attempt to normalize the most toxic social trends in all of human history. “Are we all criminals, in the grand scheme of things?” What if conformity is complicity? What if pretending these issues will resolve themselves is the same as giving consent? The same as taking an active role? What if being here is the only role required for these things to continue getting worse?
Outside, someone drove past playing the song The Purge, by In This Moment, at max volume. She half recognized the phrase, “maybe we’re all just parasites.”
The news cut to a commercial break.

The revolution will not give your mouth sex appeal
The revolution will not get rid of the nubs
The revolution will not make you look five pounds thinner, because
The revolution will not be televised, brother

Barbara was looking enviously at a super model’s thin waist and curvy breasts. “I wonder if people’s fear over obesity and their cravings for fame are somehow related to the maxim of the camera making people look thinner?” She’d been giving into all sorts of bizarre, leap-of-logic queries and cynical comments, ever since she stormed out of Chad’s studio.
Chad was looking in the mirror, wondering if his puffy, feminine lips made him look gay, and if that in turn made women less attracted to him.
Paul screamed, “tie me up and tie me down! Tell me a secret, I’ll tell you a lie!”
In Margaret Atwood’s novel, The Handmaid’s Tale, women are forced into sexual subservience to men who are taught to see them as unworthy of marriage while simultaneously being perfect baby makers. These women have had their mouths sewn shut to ensure they can neither speak back nor condemn their men for the crimes they’re subjected to.
America’s fixation on politically correct phrasing and the attempted destruction of offensive language has been a deliberate attack on people’s freedom of speech - on straight, white cis-men’s freedom of speech, mostly.
Men, while having absolutely no control over the government’s regulations or the cultural norms embraced by those around them, are the perfect scapegoat for the current state of society, mostly because they’ve been historically the least victimized by the same social trends - but only if we’re willing to ignore conscription and massacre of soldiers forced into wars they had no control over or interest in.
After all, those who are truly responsible are so far out of reach and yet so very similar in appearance to those who are being blamed.
While men were dying in wars, women were home watching the children and being told they’re unworthy of holding more meaningful jobs - at the expense of a diseased culture who refused to look honestly at their own misguided beliefs about what’s right and wrong.
Paul screamed, “rise to your behalf of the blame, stand up to tell me what is right or wrong.”
Women’s forced role in society traded war for rape, at the unredeemed cost of the illusionary freedom of choice so easily granted to men. Their newfound voices have been used to sound rape whistles across the world, calling out men of all shapes, sizes and ethnicities for their abusive behaviour.
And yet still, no matter how much they may try to silence the ever-triggering opinions of the men they’re surrounded by, they still have no right to commit the same crimes as those same men. At every level of society, women are expected to conduct themselves appropriately, where men will sew closed the mouths of their victims, in order to ensure the continued convenience of their wildly inappropriate conduct.
Women simply aren’t allowed to commit big enough crimes to ever make it in politics. They’ve always been denied the right to be as heartlessly cruel as men and thus will never truly belong in a position of leadership. So speaketh the silent accusations of men whose presumably-well-founded mistrust in women traces all the way back to the allegations levied against the original woman, whose crime was nothing less than to eat an apple in paradise - at least according to that same infant-penis-mutilating religion.
Paul screamed, “Play the deceiver while you preach! Pleasure me, pleasure my head! Wishing you dead!”
Jill turned on the TV, with the distinct impression that she was tolerating something she shouldn’t. But she couldn’t quite place the reason she felt so compelled to search there for resolutions to her confusion. Maybe she was looking for some bad news that would provide consolation regarding her own misery.
She was looking in the wrong place.
She ended up listening to a brief news clip about the mass concentration on social media as an alternative to meaningful interactions. Was it possible that social values were deteriorating as a result of people’s addiction to dehumanizing forms of communication being valued more than real intimacy?
Was she, like so many other people, beginning to see the experience of intimacy as repulsive?
No one trusted each other anymore. Everyone seemed to be conflicting over every single topic of conversation. Polarization of society had reached insane extremes, with everyone arguing about everything with everyone who even slightly disagreed - even if they were technically on the same side. How could people possibly trust each other when they were so accustomed to being at each other’s throats, shoving their misguided beliefs down each other’s throats?
Paul screamed, “A channel of degradation through this misunderstood form of communication, seduction of the mind.”
These days, most people were more comfortable watching porn than even attempting to flirt. It felt so much safer. Woman said they felt safer in the forest with bears than with men. Men said they felt safer talking about emotions with a tree than a woman.
No one was willing to put down their fear of being hurt long enough to stop hurting others.
Jack was thinking about the time he’d played, ‘show me yours I’ll show you mine,’ with a childhood friend. They’d each thought the other’s penis looked strange for reasons they couldn’t place - his friend still had foreskin. The resulting argument destroyed their friendship.
Paul screamed, “climbing walls like hordes of rats! Our plagued feelings of undying lust speak, lips sealed.”

There will be no pictures of you and Willie Mays pushing that shopping cart down the block on the dead run
Or trying to slide that color television into a stolen ambulance
NBC will not be able to predict the winner at 8:32 on report from 29 districts
The revolution will not be televised

The African- and Native- communities, begrudgingly calling themselves -American, have never been truly treated as such. Whether brought by force or removed by force, either way they are required to be silently obedient to a set of laws established to ensure conformity with the beliefs of a church who, in theory, has no right to influence state affairs.
That same church is the reason abortion is illegal in many states. It is also the reason why infants, fetuses and pregnant mothers among the Natives were ruthlessly murdered for not being civilized.
African slaves were forced into circumcision in order to be worthy of holy sacraments under the loving God their merciless captors believed in. Their physically superior, and therefore emotionally threatening, earth-toned penises continue to be blamed for the crimes committed by white men, to this day.
Whether peaceful or otherwise, Dr King and Malcolm X were killed like mockingbirds for daring to return power to their siblings-in-servitude.
Black-on-black crime has been stirred up as casually as international wars by the same groups who openly executed Afro-Americans in the days when the Klan felt no need to hide their activities. The Klan is a satanic group practicing black magic, their leaders dubbed Grand Dragon. They continue to hold as much sway in the allegedly-church-separated-state as the church itself retains.
Phil was listening to a recording of Malcolm X’s last speech and Rage Against the Machine simultaneously. The shout rang out, ‘get your hand out my pocket!’ at the same moment he sang along with the lyrics, “returned the power to the have-nots, then came the shot!”

There will be no pictures of pigs shooting down brothers on the instant replay
There will be no pictures of Whitney Young being run out of Harlem on a rail with a brand new process
There will be no slow motion or still lifes of Roy Wilkins
Strolling through wall street in a red, black, and green liberation jumpsuit that he has been saving for just the proper occasion
Green Acres, Beverly Hillbillies, and Hooterville Junction will no longer be so damn relevant
And women will not care if Dick finally got down with Jane on Search for Tomorrow
Because Black people will be in the street looking for a brighter day
The revolution will not be televised

The nation held its breath in eager anticipation at the prospect of finally finding out who would win during the last episode of Game of Thrones - a timeless epic about political intrigue and exciting character development with characters who died more frequently than in the Walking Dead.
The nation held its breath in equally intense nausea to find out who would win the latest presidential election and, no matter which side won, millions would be either furious or drunk.
Paul screamed, “boiling point of my brain, driving my inner insane. Sink in the quest.”
The real tragedy is, Americans will never truly understand how stupid they look from the outside because they’re so busy arguing over why the inside looks so hopelessly stupid.
No one votes for third parties and the ideas of any governmental structure beyond modern, American-brand democracy are automatically rejected by the public - almost all of whom will insist that those who refuse to vote have declined their right to complain about the state of affairs in the affairs of state.
Paul screamed, “surrounded by betrayal! A plea for forgiveness: ramblings of a mad idea! Intake the abuse!”
Almost no one is willing to admit to themselves that the real problem was never with governments, never with men or women, never about white or black. Never about religion. And no matter how blatantly obvious the real problem blares its horn, the vast majority prefers to remain in acutely uncomfortable and distinctly non-blissful, self-imposed ignorance.
It’s just so much easier than looking in the mirror at the reason you’re making these decisions - the reason you continue to silently consent, every day, to the exploitation of every idea, every resource, every golden intention you will ever hear about.
And the majority will prefer to lock themselves in a closet of out-dated misconceptions, rather than be honest with themselves about who they’ve chosen to become and why.
Soilent Green, recycled humanity fed back to recycled humans, screamed into Paul’s ears. “A broken verse of points: a key to lock the stride; to be deceived again. Apologies unacceptable. Through discourse, taping the mouth shut during intercourse. I lust your sweet distrust.”

The revolution will not be right back after a message about a white tornado, white lightning or white people
You will not have to worry about a dove in your bedroom, the tiger in your tank, or the giant in your toilet bowl
The revolution will not go better with coke
The revolution will not fight germs that may cause bad breath
The revolution will put you in the driver's seat

Zoe texted her friend, “have you ever kissed a man and realized his disgusting breath is the least repulsive thing about him?”
The friend wrote back, “then why are you kissing him?”
Zoe furiously responded, “how dare you victim-blame me!” and blocked her friend forever. Her friend would never notice, because she too clicked ‘block.’ They would never speak again.
Their society had taught them that their triggers were nothing more than an excuse to ghost the offender and move on to a newer, fresher toxic relationship. They’d become so jaded to the idea that everyone around them was an asshole unworthy of their affection, that they stopped bothering to respect each other.
People had no interest in earning the affection that they alone were obligated to receive in whatever ways they alone decided were worthwhile.
Paul was attracting a lot of ludicrous looks in Andre’s neighborhood. He ignored them and screamed, “crawling through the shit, keeping your mouth shut!”
Meanwhile the entire country was arguing about whether kindergarteners should be told to cherish their gender confusion as a sacred gift, while those with more substantial problems were being ignored because no one had time to hear about it.
Everyone was too busy obsessing about the latest crime against humanity.
The longer Jack stared at his permanently mutilated penis, the more difficult it became to ignore the fact that it was considered normal, despite the fact that most people no longer have any real reason to do this to their children.
Jack and Jill were both wondering, what had happened to make things this way? Was it some kind of global disease, too large to be comprehended by any single individual? Or was it a long string of poor decisions, made by confused children?
Was it something everyone chose to be a part of?
Is it something we’re all choosing, right here and now?
Paul screamed, “This! The thread that intertwines... Soul! the mind of selfishness... Lost! all these hungry mouths.”
And for a brief moment, Jack could almost see a long sequence of desperately scared people: lost, afraid, alone. He could see them all doing their best to keep themselves moving in the only way that felt safe. And he could see them all choosing, over and over again, to go the exact wrong direction. Choosing to make things worse, instead of better, telling themselves - and truly believing - that it was what they had to do to keep themselves safe, and that in itself justified their decision.
Paul screamed, “Bite! My! Tongue!”
For some reason, Jill’s TV triggered a memory of the poem Howl. “I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness: starving, hysterical, naked.”
She burst into tears, wondering how many people in history had found themselves hopelessly lost in desperate situations they were never able to find a way out of.
She wondered how many people, right now, were choosing to make things worse for everyone around them, solely because they desperately needed to believe they were making things better for themselves. She wondered how many were actually helping themselves at all, versus how many were fucking up their own lives even more than everyone else’s.
Paul was standing outside Andre’s building. He took one last haul from his cigarette and snuffed it out in a long-dead flower bed. Before he entered, he muttered quietly along with the song. “A promise of lies must be left, to make good for yourself. Boiling point pressures inside, twisting my secrets to lies.”
Jill wiped tears from her eyes as she turned off the news, sank into her couch and wondered how long she could keep the lights on. There was simply no return from here and she could feel the walls closing in around her throat, silently threatening to suffocate her most beautiful goals for the safety of a corrupt system designed to oppress the helpless.

There will be no re-run, brothers
The revolution will be live!