Lights Up On Trouble

Jimmy and Warren had been best mates since high school.

"I think today is going to be my lucky day," said Jimmy. "The sun is shining, the sky is..."

They were in the athletics team together. They ran track and field.

"Nah. Not likely. Don't get too excited," said Warren. "You'll never have lady luck sitting next to you."

Things hadn't gone so well for Warren since high school - he failed year 12 and had been working in his families Lebanese restaurant since.

"Nah, you are wrong. I can feel it. I'm feelin' lucky. I'm feelin' like I'm gonna win, finally."

Jimmy had applied for psy ed at RMIT uni, he was about to find out if he got in.

"Do your lottery, play the casino, bet on the horses, if ya wanna," said Warren. "You might fluke it some of the time, but you are never going to get higher than you are now. Never meant to be mate. It's predetermined...

"I've got to believe in something," said Jimmy. "Think positively..."

"We're where we are. Always gonna be. No use gettin' any grand ideas..."

"Maybe this once? May be it will be my turn?"

Jimmy felt great, he'd been training hard, jogging every day. He was ready for the next challenge.

"Nah! You're kiddin' ya self."

Warren had always been Jimmy's hero all through school, he still was.

"But I can feel it..."

"I'm sure you can feel your morning hard-on, first thing when you wake up, but that doesn't mean you are goin' to get lucky."

Jimmy had a secret to tell Warren, may be one day. Maybe?

"I've gotta go with my guts, nothing else is going to go my way, if I don't," said Jimmy. "I need something to believe in."

"Believe in you'll never get nothin' for nothin'. Believe in you'll always have to work. Believe in you'll always be treated like shit, if you let people treat you like shit."

"And so that is it, is it?" said Jimmy.

"Yep!"

"It doesn't matter what I do, or say?"

"Nup."

"I'll never surpass my dad or my mum?"

"Chips off the old, crappy blocks," said Warren. "Never believe in any thing greater and then you'll never be disappointed! That's how life works, you dumb cunt. Haven't you worked it out..."

"No, I haven't," protested Jimmy. "I'm not settling for crap! If I did, I might as well just neck myself now."

Warren picked up a length of rope from the ground and gazed up into a near by tree. "Might as well," said Warren. He raised his chin in the direction of the lowest branch. "Get it over and done with, " he said with an out stretched neck and a strained voice.

Jimmy stopped talking and was silent. His eyes welled up, as he gazed up into the tree.

Warren laughed, self-consciously. He stepped towards Jimmy, when he saw the tears in Jimmy's eyes, with his arms out stretched, instinctively, to comfort him, hold him, the idea turned him on, if he was truthful, but he laughed instead and stepped back and stood his ground. You see, Warren had a secret about Jimmy too.

"You gotta believe in something," said Jimmy. "How else do you get through?"