|
"Something to Believe In" is by Poison. *** *** *** The sunset's delicate rays meandered through the city of Metro. Their rosy-gold fingers caressed a pale face staring hauntingly out a stained window. Tears fell down the smudged face, following a path carved by others of their kind. In the kitchen, on the empty counter, stood a small radio. A burst of static disrupted the silence, then a saccharine voice, joined by a guitar, sang:
Tom Hanson stared at the radio, uncomprehending. Next to the radio lay his service revolver. Tom picked up the gun, feeling the weight in his slight hand.
A shadow flew across his wall, and Tom jumped, aiming the gun at it. The shadow moved again, Hanson following it with the gun. Finally, Tom turned around and saw a squirrel on his window sill. The furry rodent was staring lustfully at the open jar of peanut butter on the table.
The squirrel jumped down from the window, catching the scent of an open jar of the same brown goo in the trash. Tom dug out a clean spoon and picked at the peanut butter. He had no appetite, though. He buried his head in his arms.
Hanson moaned quietly when his mind flashed back to his most recent case. Locking his best friend in the equipment cage at Lincoln High. "Oh, Doug," Tom whimpered. He fingered a bruise on his face, the result of a mob of teens holding down and beating him. Tom shivered, despite the stuffy air in the apartment.
Suddenly, the trash cans below his window clattered to the ground. Tom grabbed his gun and dashed out on to his balcony. He fired his gun, the noise drowned out by a passing car with a dead muffler and in some serious need of engine work. The bullet hit the ground next to the car, scaring the alley cat inside the can.
Tom backed into the living room, shaken. It had been so easy to shoot at that cat. He sat on his couch and put the gun into his mouth. He cocked the trigger. His mind flashed back to seeing Doug after being released from jail, then to that night in the park when the two had talked.
His mind saw Judy and Ioki, recently back on the job after almost dying. Booker, who had quit the force rather than be a clerk. And Fuller, always the father all of them wished they had when they were growing up. Jenko's ghost shimmered into Hanson's muddled thoughts. "Jenk," Tom whispered around the barrel of the gun. Then, another ghost, this one older and far more familiar hovered above Tom's coffee table. Sport... "Dad!" Tom let the gun drop from his hand. It discharged it's loaded bullet, the projectile slamming into a picture taken of the Jump Street Cops last Christmas. The bullet landed right in Tom's heart. Tom ran out of the apartment. His mind was blank as he ran past the park and up a hill guarded by wrought iron gates. White Chapel Cemetery. He slipped through the gates as they were closing. He found the two graves, side by side. Captain Richard Jenko and his father, Officer Thomas Jack Hanson Senior. Next to his father's grave lay two empty plots, one for his mother and one for himself. Tom sat in between the two grave stones and shivered as night finally fell on the city. He finally let his tears flow and a strange resolve built up in his withered spirit.
The End
|