(Note of explanation: this entire story is based on an REM song, also called "Hope," from the fine fine album Up. Thus it's probably unpublishable, unless I get a kind go-ahead from some folks in Athens, Georgia.)
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You wake up on Friday wanting to leave. You don't know where it is you want to go--doesn't matter, really. The desire is for departure, not destination. It's something to do with the dream you were in just before waking. Maybe it was a nightmare. You frown, disentangling yourself from the bedsheets. It didn't feel like a nightmare at the time, but surely it must have been. You hate snakes. Thinking back on it now drips ice on your back--all those slithering bodies, scales rubbing as pythons and constrictors and vipers met and twined. And you were one of them--you still remember the shuddering, like dry heaves, as you left old skin behind. It was the most realistic dream you have ever had. You can't stop yourself from thinking about it. The fright gives way to fascination. Maybe it wasn't a dream, maybe it was like a spirit vision--but that sounds so New Age-y. You're not into spirit visions.
You go over the day in your head. Exterminators in the morning, doctor's appointment in the afternoon. How could a day off be so busy? You sigh and make yourself presentable to the world just before the exterminators show up. They come in a van with a cutesy cartoon drawing of a roach being banged on the head with a sledgehammer. You wonder why ads for exterminators always feature anthropomorphised cartoon bugs. You decide it's because people can't admit to themselves that they're killing other creatures. In cartoons no one ever dies--you can blast anybody with dynamite and he'll be back in the next scene. So if you think of those pests in your house as cartoon characters, you don't feel so guilty about shooting a poison cloud into their living quarters. No, that's not quite right, you think. Bugs are cartoon characters. You had the exterminator here two months ago and already you need him again. Pests always return in the next scene.
You retreat to your room to listen to some music while the killers stalk your basement. You take out the latest Blue CD just to look at it. You still refuse to play it. The photo of the band on the front cover has Matthew and Anjelle in the middle, with Patrick and Laura flanking them two steps behind. The co-lead singers are cheek to cheek facing the camera. Their right hands are touching like Romeo and Juliet's holy pilgrim's kiss. Their demeanor and their stance are exactly alike, each a mirror to the other, though there is little physical resemblance. Your eyes are drawn only to Matthew's, which are green flecked with gold--at least in this light.
You used to think, if you ever met Matthew Stephens, he would see in you a kindred spirit. You would be recognized. After this CD came out, you didn't want him relating to you. He is on a road you don't want to travel. Is it the money they're starting to make? The magazines that are wanting them on their covers? Matthew's illness? (It's your illness too, but that's a worry for later.) Whatever the cause, Matt's eyes have changed from what they once were. He has surrendered to the world he used to rail against, you think, swallowed whole the contradictions of the rock and roll lifestyle. Maybe he's swimming in drink. How sad would that be?