Exodus Tangier stood at the precipice of a freight train as it rushed through the night. The tracks ahead ran straight like a zipper, trees leapt up on either side, trees like blue spruce, dark and embodied with a scent of Christmas. The wind poured across Exodus’ head. He was crying. Something had made him so sad that he was now considering snuffing it. He wanted to snub the stub of himself into the ashtray of the wilderness until his flame of life was extinguished.
Exodus Tangier closed his eyes. Then he wondered if jumping off a speeding train would be enough to kill him or would he just be badly hurt. He didn’t want to end up with some horrible injury and then deal with living life that way at the same time. “Damn it!” he seethed. “I’ve got to get this right!” he screamed into the night.
He stepped back and sat down. Everything felt awkward. At the next stop, named Stubsville, he jumped off the train and sat on a bench there at the platform. He turned around and looked at the small depot. There was the sign dangling like the sun: STUBSVILLE. The only other person there on the platform was a young woman laboriously flipping through a book. She was mumbling to herself as she read.
“Is there anything to Stubsville?” Exodus Tangier called out to her.
She turned her head toward him, annoyed. “I don’t know. I’ve never been here,” she answered. “That’s why I’m reading this guidebook.”
“Oh,” Exodus said in reply. “I’m trying to kill myself,” he told her matter of factly.
The young woman beamed at him with some degree of concern. “By sitting on a bench at a middle of nowhere train stop at this witching hour?”
Exodus sighed. “I guess you could say I’m still formulating a plan.”
“I have a gun with me. I could let you borrow it and you could shoot yourself in the face.”
“I appreciate the offer,” Exodus said. “But too gruesome for me. You don’t happen to have a bottle of sleeping pills with you, do you?”
“No. Sorry. I usually sleep well without them.”
Exodus stood up. He was unusually tall. “That’s okay. I suppose I’ll just go walk around and see if I can find some high place to jump from.”
“Good luck then,” the young woman said. “I hope you find some peace.”
Exodus smiled and nodded his head at her. Then he walked off and followed a small sidewalk to a bus stop shrouded in mist. He waited and a city bus with two other people on it finally stopped to pick him up. Everyone was quiet. He had no idea where he was going. He looked out the window, and it started to rain. He felt alone and sad.
The bus finally arrived at the downtown station and Exodus got off. He ordered coffee from the small coffee shop they had there. He sipped and contemplated life. He thought back to the olden days and when he worked in a grocery store as a stock boy in the produce department. He recalled the asshole customers and how rude and petty most people were. He shook his head in a sense of disbelief and was glad he was free.
“Now, I am a wandering spirit,” he told himself. “I’m no longer a victim of capitalist trappings and wage slavery. He dug into his pants pocket for the lottery ticket and stared at it. $418,000,000. “Then why was I going to kill myself? I can have and do anything I want.”
No one answered. He was alone in the bus depot. It smelled of loneliness and fractured lives. Then a familiar voice called down from the rafters. “Don’t do it. Don’t give up. Live like Snow Fruit.”
He looked up and there he saw the young woman from the train platform. “What’s Snow Fruit?” Exodus asked.
“A religious sect from northern India, up in the mountains, dedicated to hard work and a peaceful mind. It’s not that important. But what is important,” she began, and then she floated down from up high and landed gently before him. “What is important is that you don’t snuff it. You have a purpose, even in old age. Trust me.”
“Who are you?”
“I’m your watcher, your guardian.”
“Are you an angel?”
“They call me Melodia Quasar. I am an extraterrestrial being from another planet. Which all gods and angels really are. We are a higher power in the universe.”
“What should I do? Where should I go?”
“The lottery office.”
“I don’t know what I’ll do with all that money. I want to help people, though. I don’t want to be a greedy, selfish prick like so many others are. I want to lift the downtrodden. Shelter the homeless. Feed the hungry. Comfort the oppressed. And oh, how so many are oppressed right now in this hell hole of a country. I’ll live a reasonable life in a reasonable home. I’ll drive a Nissan Frontier and eat at McDonald’s. I’ll be smart. No more ‘I should have done this; I should have done that’…”
Exodus Tangier waited in a small, quiet room in a big building in the capital city. The door opened and two men in black suits came in. One was carrying a large metallic suitcase. He hoisted it onto the table.
“Here you go… Four-hundred and eighteen million dollars.” He opened the suitcase and Exodus was stunned by the amount of cash.
“Damn,” he muttered.
The other man reached into the suitcase and started removing some of the cash.
“Of course,” he began. “We’ll be taking half of it for taxes. So, in reality, you get two-hundred and nine million dollars.”
“Wait. I get taxed but the other multi-millionaires in this country don’t? That’s bullshit.”
The man sighed. “You still have more money than you’ll ever need.”
“Exactly. So why do I have to live with that fact and others don’t. Why does greed permeate every inch of our society?”
“What others?”
“The privileged. The ones tied into the system that fucks over ordinary people like me on a daily basis. We’re sick of it and ready to fight back. Vive la revolution!”
“Are you a god damn communist?” the first man asked.
“You idiots don’t even know what communism is. What I said refers to the French Revolution. You know, when the ordinary people rose up against the ruling class.”
“Who cares. This isn’t school. If you don’t want the money, just leave it and get out,” the first man angrily said.
Once the second man was done taking out half the money, he quickly closed the suitcase and pushed it closer to Exodus.
“Enjoy your new life,” he said. “Unless you’ve changed your mind.”
Exodus stood up quickly and cried out, “No more kings!” Then he grabbed the suitcase and headed for the door.
After Exodus paid off all his debt, he moved to Reykjavik, Iceland, and spent his last days in comfort and peace.
END
cereal after sex 
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