This is the problem.

"Hey guys, how've you been?" Asked the boy with the unkempt hair. There was more to his persona, but that was simply his most outstanding and identifiable feature.

"Good," his companions replied, politely adding "and yourself?"

"Fine, I've just been busy, you know? All the work is getting to me and then there are the expectations that people have." He replied, sighing heavily at the end, signifying his stresses.

"Yeah, I understand," said the quietest of the group, "we're all busy. After all, junior year is already upon us!"

"I can't believe that the DMV wasn't open when I got out. I need to get my permit on the 3rd of next month! And that's the first opening in my schedule." Came the echo of frustration from another, characterized by a very whiny voice.

"Guys, I have a date tonight, and I have no idea what to do for it. I mean, a movie, dinner, a mall? I'm clueless!" Was the final comparison of stresses, coming from the shaking one.

"Junior year? Permit? First date? What the hell are you guys talking about?" Came the shocked inquiry of the boy with the unkempt hair. "You guys, we're going to college, and we all drive, and I know for a fact that you've all had your dating cherry popped. What the hell is going on here?"

"What do you mean, expectations?" The quiet one asked, betraying their usually quiet status. "Please, we're just kids, nobody expects a thing from us."

"No, we're all expected to do basic things, like pass our upcoming drivers tests." The whiny one proclaimed defiantly.

"I wonder if they'll expect, a kiss at the end of the night, or just a nice dinner, or maybe a confirmation of a second date. Oh, decisions, decisions..." The shaking one muttered, seemingly directed at none of the other group members.

"Why are we even doing this? It's a time for change, it's a time for development. How long do you expect to grow within these confines?" The boy with the unkempt hair noted, becoming frustrated at something.

"What, are you afraid of our junior year?"
"Or that you won't do well on your license test?"
"Or about girls, have you considered that you're gay?"

"I'm not afraid, that's what's controlling all of you. I'm not saying that I'm not afraid, but I'm glad to be free of all those problems. Fear is totally normal, but fear doesn't mean paranoia."

"College? Hah! I haven't even started looking at them!"
"You mean you're driving without your license? That's illegal!"
"Hah, I know for a fact that you haven't done a thing! You're so sheltered."

"And here it comes with the insults. What's your problem? My choices are my own? What does it matter to you if I decide to change myself? I'm not changing you, am I? Change is necessary, and you guys are just so... static..." The boy with the unkempt hair stated, turning his back and walking away, obviously angered.

"Why are we doing what, staying in school? Please, we all want to go somewhere!"
"Don't you want to drive around on your own?"
"Please, don't even try to deny that you want to love and be loved in return."

A pause.

"We are changing! We're just coping with these changes in different ways. We're upperclassmen, so why don't we start acting like them?"
"I wouldn't call change necessary, I get nostalgic a lot. I miss the good old days."
"That's a rather polygamous attitude, why don't you just settle down?"

Another pause, and at a closer look nothing was said.

"Confines? We're becoming free! Once you become an adult, parents lose authority! We are discarding our shackles!"
"Yeah, driving will give you so much freedom! You can go wherever you want!"
"Do you really hate love that much that you view it as a cage?"

But there was no argument against them, for the boy had already left.

"Fear? Control me? Please! I don't want the extra work but I could sure go for the benefits. I'd hardly call that fear!"
"Overcompensation is better than undercompensation, that's what my daddy always said!"
"Are you sure you're not afraid of commitment? The way you've been talking is leading me to believe..."

They just went on for hours, down the line.

But he was gone. And they were

Oblivious.

At War with the World.

He walked quickly, but not so quickly as to gain unwanted attention or to make himself look like anything other than a man who needed to be somewhere. This served many purposes, as nobody bothered to stop him, and, if anything, they allowed him to pass with minimal resistance. Of course, the most obvious benefit of walking quickly was that it allowed him to reach his target more hastily.

At a quick glance, which was all that anyone could afford to catch, his sharp features left an onlooker in awe, yet none could accurately picture him or transfer their mental image to another. This was especially useful when it came to police descriptions and sketch artists, as none of them could put him down for a crime that he may or may not have committed.

One could call them crimes, if one were so inclined.

Only the "victims" of these "crimes" knew that they occured, and only they could see what was right and what was wrong. Only they could deliver judgement to this self-appointed arbiter, this vigilante of sorts. But it's very hard to ridicule someone when you're looking down the barrell of a Colt Model 1903, the taste of cold steel infecting your pallet and sending chills down your spine. But the steel didn't stay cold for very long, it actually became quite hot as the mechanism fired. But they couldn't tell, because the gun had no hammer. It was really quite cruel, even the government gives a dead man a last meal.

You have that final meal and then you have to sit there as a legalized murderer straps you in and prepares to strike you with a bolt of compressed lightning. And then there's a clergyman to bless you and protect your soul as you're killed, to read some passage that is supposed to heal the massive wound that you're about to suffer. Then finally you see that executioner put his hand on that switch, or pick up that syringe, or ready that axe, or prepare to pull the board from under you, and you realize that you're dead. And then you die, but you die in peace.

Hell, even a firing squad has to pull a hammer back, and there's always that fraction of a second where that little metallic reaper has to fly through you and deliver you to death. But not an assassin, much less one with no honor.

His favorite way to kill was to wedge the gun into their mouth, hopefully with some desperate struggle, and then to sit on them and to leave them helpless, and then to talk for some indeterminate amount of time. Then, just when you least expect it, he'd pull the trigger mid-sentence, and you'd lie there, dead, thinking you're alive, waiting for those last few words.

He was the single most merciful killer in history.

The Story of...

This is so near the anniversary of Love's demise, that I felt it necessary to write a little piece about it. Not so much prose as a description, I hope you enjoy it.

So there we stood, arm in arm, hand in hand, or hand in wings if you can see the full picture. She had ebony wings, leather to the touch, and a song that was otherwise incredible. Her then-beautiful face smiled to me as I'd smile back, but they weren't one and the same. One was genuine, the other a guise, a tool of manipulation. Who wore which? Well watch them and take a guess as to which was in control, then observe the other. You're wrong in your choice, isn't that a surprise?

So there I was, just flipping dollars out of my wallet into some hole, and she was there batting here eyelashes. I don't know if she was batting them because I dropped a dollar or if I was dropping dollars because she was making those eyes that I just couldn't resist or if I kept doing it because I was already invested, but at that moment she had the upper hand. But that's not what she wanted, silly boy, you've just squandered yourself some grade-D sex.

Tsk tsk tsk.

So now you're back at her place, and the estrogen is so thick in the air that it stings the back of your nostils. One thing leads to another and by the end of the night you've thrown yourself to reality and covered your tracks at least fifty times, and then fifty more. You can take it, that's the long and short of it. But you have to take it, it's not going to come to you.

Then that lack of effort sets in.

And then you think you're crushed, and you think you've hit the bottom of the barrel.

Exerpt from "The Story of How I Saved My Neck and Chopped Off Another".

Any other day.

Any other day and I'd watch the tide,
Any other day I'd sing a dirge,
On any given day I'd choose to hide,
But not today, because I'm in a surge.

Dollars change hands and the wiser walks heavy,
This new life-cycle is not what we're meant for,
There are waters that are building and will break a levee,
And wash away these numbers I can't help but abhor.

Wise men get their point across,
Using a pallet of words, they have choice,
Where happy men's words are at a loss,
They have some magic in their voice.

And any other day I'd drop my bags,
And any other day I'd build a bridge,
On any given day I'd show some compassion,
But not today, because I'm superhuman.