"Jesus Of Suburbia"
-
Part
1
I'm the son of rage and love
The Jesus of
Suburbia
From the bible of none of the above
-
--One
Month Later--
He was the only one who could do it, Dib wandered the streets before coming across the idea, finally realizing it under the glow of the moon surrounded in smog. If he couldn't help these people from themselves, he shouldn't have even tried saving them from an alien. But how could one make these hopeless people believe in something that they lied to themselves about? He had to start somewhere.
"Do you ever wonder why you're here?"
The women sighed, looking over at him. "Not another one..."
Dib blinked. "Another what?"
"Look," she shifted from her spot on the bus bench. "When you kill yourself, don't make a huge production out of it."
"I'm not going to kill myself," Dib laughed. "You just don't understand how life works."
"I understand what I come in contact with," she sneered. "You understand the part in the dirt, cause you haven't tried hard enough."
"I'm trying in my own, which requires this dirt," Dib frowned.
"Right," she started to get on the bus. Then she stopped. "The answer is yes."
"Yes?"
"To your question. I do wonder why I'm here," she turned to look at him from the door. "But that's what my bible is for. Don't try to be Jesus or something." The door slid between them, the bus leaving Dib to think over the words.
-
On
a steady diet of soda pop and Ritalin
No one ever died for my sins
in hell
As far as I can tell
At least the ones I got away
with
-
"Bible," snorted Dib, later. He finished his dinner, a can of cola, and paced in the main square where he had been watching. She was crazy, Dib figured. There could be a god, but he had by now long forgot about them. If he hadn't, the world wouldn't be as fucked up as it was.
"Do you believe in God?" he asked the next person who walked by the fountain.
That person just looked at him strangely as he walked by.
Dib bit his lip in frustration. Didn't these people realize he was trying to save them? If Jesus did exist, did he get irritated when the people didn't believe in him?
"Do you believe in God?"
"What else is there to believe in?" the man that was walking by laughed. "Until there is, most people believe in him without even meaning to."
-
And
there's nothing wrong with me
This is how I'm supposed to be
In
a land of make believe
That don't believe in me
-
"Ever wonder why you're doing this?"
The man set down his heavy load and wiped sweat off of his brow. "Sure. But then I remember I have a wife and kids who need to eat and have a house to live in. Nothing could beat that reason."
"But ever wonder why there has to be money?"
The man stared at him incredulously. "The world would be mad without it."
"Not if it never existed," Dib informed him. "The world survived long before there was money, with a better system of foraging for yourself. Wouldn't that be easier on your family?"
"No," the man said simply, picking up his load again and continuing to work.
Why won't they believe what I'm saying? Dib screamed in his head. It all made perfect sense to him, most things did since that first man in the alleyway spoke with him. Why couldn't they get it too?
-
Get
my television fix sitting on my crucifix
The living room or my
private womb
While the moms and brads are away
-
He turned on the television, flipping past the channel that listed missing persons. His father had finally started looking for him. It would be hard to stay out of sight from his people, but he had to try. He couldn't go back home yet, he still had stuff that he had to do.
He had been watching an awful lot of television lately, he noticed. He didn't even watch Mysterious Mysteries, he just would flip it on to a random channel and watch it. By now it was an excuse to not have to see the other people going by with their own business below.
-
To
fall in love and fall in debt
To alcohol and cigarettes and Mary
Jane
To keep me insane and doing someone else's cocaine
-
At least Dad is rich, Dib thought, and that he never checks his bills himself. It was his way of living at all in the outside without worrying all that much. He pulled out a cigarette and lit it just as the doorbell rang.
Cautiously, he went over and looked through the peep hole.
"It's just me!" Gretchen smiled. After she had gotten her braces removed, she was actually pretty cute. Dib had barely noticed her in class, shyly sitting in the back. She was different now, now that there was no one around, now that no one could laugh at her for helping him. Dib couldn't really blame her for not wanting to be shunned like he was, so he didn't mind that she came to visit him once she found out where he was.
Dib quickly put out the cigarette before she saw it. Gretchen scolded him on it and he didn't want to listen to a lecture today.
"How are you doing?" she asked, putting her hands behind her back. Dib would have had to of been a complete idiot to not know she had a crush on him, but as he felt nothing of the same he didn't pretend to notice. As much as they were only acquaintances, he didn't want to hurt her feelings.
"I have a bit of a headache," he informed her. She would offer to help and then when he said no she would leave. She was a bit predictable in all situations.
"Do you need me to get you anything?" she said, true to his predictions.
"No thanks, Gretchen," he shrugged. "I took something for it, so I was just going to lie down."
"I'll see you later this week then," she suggested.
"Course," he replied. "Thanks Gretchen." For being consistent, I guess.
-
And
there's nothing wrong with me
This is how I'm supposed to be
In
a land of make believe
That don't believe in me
-
He sighed as she left. Sometimes he wanted no one and other times he wished that he hadn't sent her away. It wasn't as he would ever know what friendship or companionship was if he kept up at the rate he was going. Dib pulled out the white bag. He could never really seem to sort things out without it, but why exactly that was he didn't know. He inhaled in straight, finding it easier then the pipe. His problems didn't seem to matter then. The whole experience was better then air. But when he fell asleep the demons would come.
-
Part
2: City Of The Damned
At the center of the Earth
In the
parking lot
Of the 7-11 where I was taught
The motto was just a
lie
-
"You think we just need to understand?" the woman laughed. She was dirty, but it seemed as if that was as clean as she normally got. "You don't seem to understand life very well, kid."
"What do you mean?" Dib asked, shocked. Despite the fact he had no idea of what she was saying, she seemed to make more since then anyone else he had spoken to in the past month.
"Guess where I was raised," she told him, taking his arm and leading him through the alley streets.
"How am I supposed to do that?" he snorted. "You could have been born anywhere and came here illegally for all I know."
"You think too much," she laughed again. "If you didn't think too much you would see life as much easier. That's why they say genius is the closest to insanity. I was born in this same city. I live in the same place I was born." She lead him past a 7-11 and through a hole in the wall. "Down there, go left and take the third hole on the left. That's where I live."
-
It
says home is where your heart is
But what a shame
Cause
everyone's heart
Doesn't beat the same
It's beating out of time
-
Dib blinked and looked at all of the other people sitting and walking by. "But... there isn't anything here!"
"That's it," the woman sighed. "We understand, alright. But we can't do anything about it. I never got to school, my momma couldn't afford it. She taught me what she knew in the parking lot or in our small place in here. How old do you think I am?"
"I... uh..." Dib looked nervously at the seeming to be forty year old.
"Twenty eight," she told him. "My life was ruined because no one would help. I tried, but soon enough I didn't try anymore. My mother died at the age of forty two, looking like a grandmother. And the only children I have are the ones I take care of here if I have extra money or food, which is almost never. I've been raped and the child of that wondrous union died while only a few days old. Take a good look before you try to explain your views to us."
-
City
of the dead
At the end of another lost highway
Signs misleading
to nowhere
City of the damned
Lost children with dirty faces
today
No one really seems to care
-
She left him there, staring at his surroundings. Dib felt guilty for staying in the hotel he was at, as horrible as it was, for these people had less.
"Do you 'ave any food, misser?" asked a small girl, about six years old. Her English was slurred, but clear enough for Dib to understand her.
"I'm sorry," he shook his head. "I don't have anything."
"T'ank you," she bowed her head sadly. Dib could barely stand that this was happening in the same city where his father came up with inventions and cures everyday to make life better for people. It was only the rich people, or the people born with anything. The homeless people were supposed to be miles away, not in the same life as where he could of actually have been doing something about it.
"If you stay here though," he told her, "I'll go and get you something."
The girl smiled, one of her baby teeth rotting. "Really?"
"I'll be right back," he promised her and headed back for the 7-11.
-
I
read the graffiti
In the bathroom stall
Like the holy
scriptures of a shopping mall
And so it seemed to confess
-
I never even thought this was happening here, Dib thought, going into the bathroom in the 7-11. It had been freshly painted, over pen marks and water stains. They only ever did that when the walls got really bad though, not before hand when many things could have been prevented. Just like the children out under the city in the back.
"It's kinda like a blog for people with no computers," Dib murmured.
-
It
didn't say much
But it only confirmed that
The center of the
earth
Is the end of the world
And I could really care less
-
He spent some time reading the things on the wall. None of it made any since, for one rant would skewer into another persons and become lost in the ink or lead. None of the legible stuff actually said anything important, just like the writing on the school bathrooms. Just cussing out the world and life in general. Dib felt a void grow in him. These people were worse off and yet were just saying the same things that someone who had a home did. It was no different.
Dib left the bathroom and finally chose some food that he thought that rotten baby teeth could handle. The clerk there who sold it to him didn't seem to have any idea that there were people living right behind his work.
"How long have you worked here?" Dib asked, casually as the man bagged up the food.
"Ten long years," he sighed. "And nothing ever changes."
-
City
of the dead
At the end of another lost highway
Signs misleading
to nowhere
City of the damned
Lost children with dirty faces
today
No one really seems to careeeeee
-
Dib entered the dirty cement hotel (as it pretty much was, free of charge) and went to where he had left the girl. He didn't feel the horror or sickening feeling like he did the first time he had looked at this place. The fact it shouldn't be here was still eating away at him, but the fact that the people were looking at him only unnerved him, the fact he didn't belong here. Always to be an outsider.
"Here you go," he handed the bag over to her, watching her face light up with happiness. She couldn't even say anything, as she was already opening it to stuff her face. Dib turned and left, not really expecting any words.
As soon as he stepped out of the overhang and into the light he heard a fight go on behind him. Turning quickly, a group of boys ran past, one up ahead with the bag. They were all splattered with blood. It hadn't come from any of them.
-
Part
3: I don't care
I don't care if you don't I don't care if you
don't
I don't care if you don't care
-
Does anyone care? Did it really matter? Was it right to intervene when that was the outcome? How could they do that- when they understood the same position as she? Was death worth some food? Children of six can kill? Why? How?
I caused it.
Dib just lied there on his makeshift bed, on the couch. He had had trouble sleeping before, but it had never come to this. He hadn't bothered to turn on the lights when he got back, so when Gretchen had come to see how he was doing and he hadn't answered, she thought he wasn't there.
-
I
don't careeeeeeeeee
-
"If that's life, why does it matter in the first place?" Dib asked his ceiling. It didn't answer, which normally would be a good thing except Dib knew that the ceiling could answer and he wanted it to. Something had to respond. Was there an answer?
"It would be better not to care in the first place," Dib stated to the ceiling. "Then you couldn't really hurt anyone in the first place. But if I didn't care, why would I be not caring to not hurt anyone?"
Was he any different from the majority? Was he? Was there a point to it?
-
Everyone
is so full of shit----Born and raised by hypocrites
Hearts
recycled but never saved----From the cradle to the grave
We are
the kids of war and peace----From Anaheim to the middle east
We
are the stories and disciples----Of the Jesus of suburbia
Land of
make believe----And it don't believe in me
Land of make
believe----And I don't believe
And I don't care!
-
"It doesn't matter," Dib bellowed at the ceiling, just as the door was knocked on. Dib glared at the door, going to shout at it for daring to make that much noise when his head hurt. Is everyone the same? Am I just like them? I am. If they were there, they would have done the same thing. I am the same as them, the idiots that they are. That means I am an idiot too.
The door was banged on again. Dib went over to shout and tell the door to shut up when it opened by itself. Actually, someone helped it open. The door wasn't making that racket after all, Dib managed through his muddled head. Anyone would be making a loud noise if someone repeatedly hit them with their fist.
"Go away," Dib waved his hand towards the door, turning away from the person who had just entered.
-
Part
4: Dearly beloved
Dearly beloved are you listening?
I can't
remember a word that you were saying
Are we demented or am I
disturbed?
The space that's in between insane and insecure
-
"When did I ever listen to you, Dib-stink?" Zim scoffed at him. Dib blearily looked over the green alien and then just lied back down on the couch.
"Why are you here, Zim?" Dib muttered, his arm covering his eyes. He did not feeling like bringing his voice above much then just a croak. Anyway, he knew Zim had good hearing, it was just what he decided to listen to was the problem.
"Because your father came to me and asked where you were!" exclaimed the alien. "Like I'd know where you were! And you hadn't come to annoy me for a while, so I thought you were up to something!"
Dib stayed quiet, trying to sort out the words that entered his head, only to have them more jumbled the before. "So?"
Zim stopped pacing, obviously confused at Dib's behavior, but as Dib wasn't looking he couldn't tell what the alien was doing at all. "So! What is wrong with you Dib? This just isn't like you at all! And Irkens don't like not understanding something!"
"Nothing's wrong," Dib managed. "I just wanted to get away from home for a bit. Don't tell Dad where I am, okay?"
"You look terrible," Zim frowned. "I think that I should. Something is wrong Dib, and you are not telling Zim! Now, begin your telling!"
-
Oh
therapy, can you please fill the void?
Am I retarded or am I just
overjoyed
Nobody's perfect and I stand accused
For lack of a
better word, and that's my best excuse
-
"Tell you what? The horrible side of life?" Dib laughed, his voice cracking in his throat. It hurt, but he wasn't going to show even pain for the smallest thing in front of Zim. "I think you had that figured out long before I did Zim."
"Heh?" Zim rose an invisible eyebrow, still confused.
"We could have been friends, you know," Dib slurred through his words, "If you weren't trying to take over earth. And if you stupid Irkens accepted such things."
"Dib-stink," Zim sounded nervous, but Dib was getting a major headache and stood up.
"Go away Zim," he pushed the Irken towards the door. "I don't wanna listen right now."
"You're not listening!" hollered Zim. "What is-" Dib shut the door. The door made another groan and Dib knew that it was going to give him another lecture about being careful about shutting doors.
"I don't see you shutting yourself!" he snapped at the dirty white framed wood before heading back and collapsing on the couch.
-
Part
5: Tales of another broken home
To live and not to breathe
Is
to die In tragedy
To run, to run away
To find what you
believe
And I leave behind
This hurricane of fucking lies
I
lost my faith to this
This town that don't exist
-
"Dib?" Gretchen questioned the open door. The room was trashed, the furniture overturned and the bedding strewn all over the floor. She walked throughout the small apartment, searching. His clothes were gone, which meant he wasn't coming back. She had known that he was stretching thin, but she hadn't known how close he was to breaking. She went back out to the couch, picking up the cigarette case from the pillows.
"I could help," she muttered to the pack. "If he'd help me." She was sweet, especially to Dib, but that wasn't going to stop her from putting a stop to where she knew something was wrong. Gretchen pocketed the pack and left out the door, gripping her light green jacket around her. He couldn't do this by himself. And this time, I would do what I can to help him, no matter what.
-
So
I run
I run away
To the light of masochist
And I leave
behind
This hurricane of fucking lies
And I walked this line
A
million and one fucking times
But not this time
-
"He does not tell Zim what to do!" Zim grumbled, looking out from under the bus stop overhang at the dark sky. The rain showed no sign of stopping and Zim knew better then to ask Gir to come and pick him up. He'd probably die faster that way.
There is something definitely wrong with the Dib-worm, Zim attempted to take his mind off of the problem at hand. And not anything like how he acted when he was trying out that "real science"! He seems to actually be snapping, as crazy as our classmates say he always is. That thought disturbed him greatly, his greatest rival being defeated, not by Zim, but by his own mind.
"Nonsense," Zim hissed under his breath. "I will change that, no one but Zim has the right to destroy the Dib, not even himself!" I will save you Dib. You said we needn't be enemies.
-
I
don't feel any shame I won't apologize
When there ain't nowhere
you can go
Running away from pain When you've been
victimized
Tales from another broken home
-
No, none of you deserve this, he thought as he watched over the city. The lights were on, making it as bright as day for the streets, but above it was pitch black as the rain poured down over it. None of you deserve to suffer or gain from this pitiful life. Wouldn't it be much better if you hadn't had to deal with it? Better now, what if you had to deal with it no longer?
He stepped down the street, no longer afraid of his surroundings, the people, the creatures, the machines, the buildings, it all would not exist in a bit. The only thing left to come and leave as it wished would be the rain. The rain would wash away the horror that this city had inflicted on itself.
Dib laughed to the heavens.
Now I have found a way to save you all.
-
You're
leaving...
You're leaving...
You're leaving...
Ah you're
leaving home...