Chapter 1
Living in a chaotic world with no light insight proved
unsustainable for Daniel. The .357 Smith & Wesson
Magnum he held in his hand felt more alive than
himself. The idea of suicide attracted him. Daniel stood
looking past the city he’d lived in since birth. At night the
city resembled a grand palace; a gala from a past life
perhaps.
He looked below from the roof of the Hyatt Hotel and
peered at the blend of pedestrians on the sidewalk. They
ranged from peaceful to disturbed. Wealthy to destitute.
Daniel wondered if he should jump or put the gun in his
mouth and end it.
The most that may happen, he figured, a story might
be published online and a cover page in the only local
paper, MySA Express News. It’s not farfetched to think a
cause named after him would be erected in his honor.
Daniel pictured it in the headlines: “Young, Successful, and Depressed.”
A week tops, he figured, of media
coverage. Soon after, he would fade into the past as
another memory and statistic.
“Why do we even have these metrics? Age, race,
gender- like we can crack a code and put everyone in a
box,” Daniel argued. He continued in his news anchor
impression, “As reported by this chart, Asians are smart,
and according to this chart, African-Americans are poor.
This test says your kid will need more attention than other
kids and this test will tell you if the love of your life is a
keeper.”
He looked at a world where, instead of searching for a
reason to help everyone find their own happiness, those
in power scanned to find a reason for going into space,
war, power, and using up natural resources.
“It’s in the name of science. Quality of life. Bullshit! As
far back as we can research on human progression, we
veered from torches and lanterns lighting up our homes
to paying for electricity with light bulbs that harm us. The price for an acre of land is ridiculous.
If you own your
property and live off the grid, you could get hit with so
many ‘violations’ that you have to sell your house to pay
for legal fees. We pushed on from horse-drawn carriages
to cars that can drive themselves, mimicking the complex
human body, which runs on fuel we must buy. In addition,
yearly inspections, registration, maintenance, and car
insurance to keep it moving. We can’t even keep up with
our own bodies and you want us to keep up with
everything on a car?” Daniel stated.
He continued to ramble to himself on how he lived in
an instant gratification society – people could have
whatever they want, and yet, were less happy. In Daniel’s
opinion, the world had become so advanced in the year
2025, it grew dangerous to itself. New discoveries
made at breakneck speed and experts were still behind in
technical advances compared to that of ancient ancestors.
“I mean how in the hell did they make the pyramids?!”
Daniel questioned before taking a break from wrapping his mind around the concept of pyramids.
He took a drag
from his cigarette. Daniel stood on the roof of the hotel
alone and fragile. He didn’t fathom what he hoped to carry
out by going up to the hotel roof and being dramatic, but
he figured a realization may surface to stop his suicide.
Daniel started his business as an act of love for the
right everyone should have – the right to privacy. While in
college, he created a software called Bubble. His program
allowed computer users the ability to browse the internet
and gaze at pictures, with the peace of mind that no one
could view or hack into their computer – not even the
National Security Agency (NSA). That was a big middle
finger to them. Daniel had to brush up on laws,
amendments, and rights, but after two and a half years of
legal battles, he’d won. Bubble was a go and in a flash, his
start-up of four people in a three-bedroom house turned
into seventy-five solid employees. In less than three years,
Bubble had its own building on the outskirts of
downtown.
That win came with consequences. Difficulty arose in
the beginning, multiple relocations, few workers only able
to work part-time, and a severe storm that flooded the
office.
“Will I be happy if I disappear from this place? I have
enough money saved,” he said in a low voice.
Daniel’s company, still considered new in the business
world, at its constant decline, may have to lay off people.
Good people, who because they trusted him by accepting
their position, potentially faced the soul-sucking words, ‘I
have to let you go’. He felt he failed them and they had to
suffer by being unemployed. Everyone in his company
shared a connection to him for their survival. Daniel, like
a parent who could not offer food for the night for their
family, visualized being crushed by glares of shame and
helplessness.
Daniel stood on top of the hotel with a gun. He
weighed in on jumping, or shooting himself, or jumping
and shooting himself while falling off the roof of the hotel.
The latter of the three he imagined being legendary. Folk’s
suspicion on how he could shoot himself off of a roof-top
screamed out conspiracy. He played with the idea of
getting set up by a power-hungry employee who wanted
to own the company.
“Hopefully I don’t have any employees like that.
Hmm… No need to kill me. Without hesitation, I would
give the key to paradise to whoever wanted to step up.
After a year, I guarantee they will be incomplete because
this was my dream and idea. I’m not in it for the money or
power. I am a regular guy with a healthy fortune and a
business,” Daniel assured himself as he finished his
cigarette and lit another.
Daniel didn’t want to kill himself, but he failed to see
why it mattered if he lived or died. “If I walk away from
this, decide not to kill myself, I still might get hit by a car.
At least, in this case, I control how I go,” he explained.
Daniel had been up on the hotel roof for two hours and
was running out of cigarettes.
His parents had been very supportive of Daniel’s
decision to start Bubble, but his mom kept asking when
he wanted to settle down.
“I want more grandkids!” she made crystal clear every
time they spoke. His brother Nathan had a four-year-old
daughter, and another on the way.
Daniel’s mother wanted him to have a bundle of joy of
his own. She didn’t understand that the business and
employees were Daniel’s little bundle of joy.
“I want to leave this world. Why bring a child in it? On
the other hand, a child may help me…” he said, taking
another drag. “…or it might make me more depressed.”
Daniel supposed.
His responses to get her off the subject usually
involved compliments on how his parents met and how
happy they were, even after decades together.
“I’m trying to find a love similar to you and Dad’s,” he
would tell his mom.
She countered with, “Oh baby, if it gets me grandkids
out of you, I’ll settle for a fraction of our love!”
Daniel’s mom always assumed he was kidding, but his
statements were genuine. The way his parents met and
their marriage was straight out of a best-selling romance
novel that turned into a box office hit.
His mother, a California-born, well-known singer back
in the late 80s, had ripped a vocal cord. She had the
number one song ‘You Know’, in the summer of 1988 and
had toured constantly. On the last leg of her tour in New
York that same year, while on stage, her vocal cord ripped
and she had a few surgeries as a result. Unfortunately, she
never sounded the same. Doctors told her to take it easy
for a few months. During that time, she met Daniel’s
father.
His father was a native of the city and a radio DJ in San
Antonio, Texas. He knew when he saw her, he found the
woman God had made for him. She walked past his radio
office on the way to see Daniel’s future grandmother, who
stayed in the nursing home next to his dad’s radio station.
Daniel’s father ran outside and told his mother, “Life
moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once
in a while…you could miss it,” quoting his favorite movie,
Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. It was, by chance, her favorite
movie too. It made Daniel’s stomach turn with how cute
that was. They stayed in San Antonio and married a year
later. Three years after marriage, his brother Nathan was
born and four years after Nathan, Daniel was brought into
this world.
Daniel took a drag of his cigarette. He considered to
himself, “Who would be at my funeral?”
He assumed his parents, by default. Daniel imagined
his mother being crushed by his suicide and blaming
herself because she wanted the best for him. He had never
seen his father cry, but Daniel figured his dad would wait
to break down and cry to himself. He would never let his
wife of over thirty years see him hurting.
His Dad, one-of-a-kind, still held tight to ‘manly man’
traditions. Crying remained a no-no in his book. The sight
alone of his father mourning could stop Daniel from
committing suicide.
His stomach became uneasy
picturing his father in that type of pain. He thought, ‘If
someone as strong and level-headed as my father cries, he
might never recover.’
Daniel feared what was capable of making God cry.
‘Imagine the sight of God crying with knowledge of every
atrocity committed. The weight of the world sustained on
God’s shoulders forever.’
He theorized, ‘Who knows? Are God’s tears the rain?’
At that moment, he remembered a lyric from Lyfe
Jennings: ‘Crying is like taking your soul to the
laundromat.’ Daniel never believed crying made you less
of a man. When done correctly, it’s a release.
Now, with Nathan, it could be a hit or a miss. He may
not come to the funeral. It’s been years since they’ve
spoken. The last thing Daniel told him was, ‘Fuck you!’ He
figured, “I guess if I decide not to kill myself, I should make
things right between us.”
His family threw a going-away party for Daniel
starting college out-of-state in Arizona. That was the day
Nathan decided to announce that he and Daniel’s
girlfriend, Jasmine, were sleeping together.
Jasmine had accompanied Daniel to his party. After a
while, he noticed that Nathan and Jasmine were
missing. Before he went looking for them, Daniel used the
restroom. He walked past his bedroom when he saw both
of them coming out of it, giggling, and Jasmine fixing her
blouse.
Daniel stood baffled, and his voice shook as he uttered,
“What is this?” Both Nathan & Jasmine’s face looked at
him in horror.
“Daniel, I’ve wanted to tell you for a while and-”
Before Nathan could finish, Daniel punched him in the
face. After a few cups of his parent’s wine earlier, Daniel’s
bravery rose a few notches. In his mind, he played the
fight over in slow motion. There was yelling, one thing led
to another, and he shoved Nathan. Nathan shoved back.
When Daniel got in his face, Nathan punched him.
Daniel looked him in the eye before leaving and yelled,
“Fuck you!”
If it wasn’t for that moment, though, Daniel might not
have had his business because after that fight, he
possessed a certitude to succeed. In part, to get Jasmine
back, but the anger fueled him to find motivation within.
Daniel gave up on getting back with Jasmine and focused
on Bubble.
“So, I guess I can at least thank them,” Daniel said,
observing the citizens below and taking another drag. To
make matters worse, his brother and his ex were now
married with their second child on the way. Daniel
realized his brother wasn’t heartless, and they were both
young and stupid, but sometimes, Nathan was a dick.
Daniel reverted his thoughts back to his funeral.
“Maybe he will understand how much of a dick he was and
regret ever treating me like shit! Nathan and Jasmine
might cry together over my open casket,” he continued his
rant.
Daniel knew his best friend Eddie would be there. ‘He
may even give an embarrassing eulogy,’ he grinned. Eddie
was the first person Daniel wanted as a business partner
when his company launched. The two had been friends
since the third grade. Daniel knew friendships and
business didn’t mix, so Eddie ran his own business – as
CEO and mobile application developer under its parent
company, Bubble. Eddie managed his own operation and
acknowledged Daniel as a financial and ethical advisor.
They had been through hell and back together. Eddie even
offered to egg Jasmine’s house and beat up his brother
after his going-away party. Daniel told him to let it go.
Before coming to the hotel, Daniel visited Eddie.
Daniel had him sign paperwork to give Eddie temporary
ownership of Bubble while Daniel tried to get the NSA off
his back.
Ever since they lost that court case to Daniel, the NSA
tried every six months to bribe or trick him into giving up
control of Bubble. Their last try a few months ago,
included trying to get Daniel drunk enough to sign over
the company. Fortunately, Daniel got a call from Eddie to
meet up with him, and never drank the spiked drink.
Any new attempts would be futile. Daniel took another
drag of his cigarette, which burned closer to the filter
during his time of ponder.
A woman Daniel was seeing named Lin, surfaced in his
mind. They were not what some may refer to as official,
but had ‘talked’ for half a year. “To anticipate someone
I’ve been seeing for six months to come to my funeral isn’t
selfish, right?” he’d asked himself. Daniel witnessed her
cry once when her cat died, and it plucked at his
heartstrings. If Daniel committed suicide, and she cared
for him, he would radiate ambient qualities of an asshole
from wherever his spirit traveled.
“With my luck, karma will bring me back as a flower in
an elementary school park. That way, I get trampled every
day by kids during recess as a reminder of the hearts I
trampled by committing suicide. Even if it’s only a
few,” he remarked.
Daniel walked towards the ledge, flicking his cigarette
to the sky. He watched it fall in one of many bushes below,
near the hotel entrance.
He shouted off the ledge, “Why is life hard?!” A few
people looked. At the height he stood, no one could see
him. Daniel opened the cylinder of the gun, removed the
single bullet from the chamber, and took off his biker
gloves.
“I resemble a bootleg hit man,” he mumbled under his
breath as he shook his head. He wrapped the gun and
gloves in a towel he brought and put them in a shoebox.
“I guess I’m not killing myself today!” Daniel
exclaimed. He let out a long sigh, and he proceeded back
into the hotel.
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