(A/N: Okay, well this chapter is almost exactly the same as my song fic that I posted a long time ago. I guess I could have written something different for this chapter, but that song fic was really the whole bases for this story and I had to use it. Though I have changed it around quite a bit to fit in with the story better, it still seems kind of different from all the other chapters...but it was kind of meant to be like that, in a way. I took out most of the lyrics but left a few, just to separate his dreams from reality a little. Let me know what you think!)

8. Boulevard of Broken Dreams

Jonathan stared down the cracked road, dotted with run down shacks of apartments that, strangely, looked more and more like palaces each time he looked at them. He hugged himself tight while holding the strap of his traveling home, which was nothing more than a ragged bundle of priceless yet worthless items. He would give anything for a night in one of those shacks, just one night, with a roof over his head.

He looked around for any signs of life, only lifeless corpses of drug addicts stirred in their vain shelters of cardboard and blankets. That was one thing that kept him going, knowing that he wasn’t half as bad off as them.

Sometimes he wondered why he even kept on living; his life was going no where, following dead streets and alleys until he’d seen enough rotting rats and shreds of scum like people to make him puke in the nearest dumpster. The nausea was almost as bad as the constant loneliness tearing at his heart...almost.

He turned around to read the street sign on the corner. It was too for away, he could hardly make out the number, or maybe his eyesight was fading. He had never worn glasses, and there was no way he could afford them now.

About to walk towards the sign to read the address, he stopped in mid turn. Why did it matter? He wasn’t going anywhere, so why did he need to know the street? His stomach cringed with the truth as he whispered to himself, “no, I’m not going back there, ever.”

To get his mind thinking of something else, he examined the alley further and scoped out a partially livable spot in the corner. Pulling out a thick wool blanket from his bag of possessions, he snuggled up in the corner and tried to sleep, clutching to his sack like a poor man’s teddy bear.

Sleep was hard to come by, it was his only escape from the horror of a life he was living, and yet every night it seemed like the whole world was sleeping peacefully, and he was the only one awake.

I walk alone, I walk alone...

He drifted off...he was walking, always walking, down an unknown street, surrounded by darkness but for the cloudy memories that filtered through his mind. He had been down this road before, somewhere in reality. Of course he had, he thought with sudden realization, it was all the same. Every road he had ever walked down in his pitiful life was the same, coming from no where and leading to no where, but it didn’t matter to him, that’s where he was heading as well.

I walk alone, I walk alone...

He was walking down the road again, but not in a dream now, the cement beneath his feet and the growing pain in his back proved that. Not that that mattered to him at all, he always had the “walking dream,” or at least ever since he’d been on the street. It hardly fazed him anymore, sometimes he remembered it, and sometimes it felt like he hadn’t dreamt at all. Either way, he had long since given up trying to interpret it.

His stomach gave a low familiar growl, which he ignored. He was now well practiced in not thinking about food, sure he had some spare change in his pocket if necessary to buy a burger or a cheep hot dog at the 7-11, but he needed to stretch his money as far as possible. It was the last of the money he’d stolen from Brad before he’d left.

Begging for money on the street was never fun; he found it degrading and a waste of time. He’d much rather find money another way, if he could just figure out how.

But at the moment he just kept on walking, humming a song he’d forgotten the name of, and letting the rhythm of his feet distract him from his stomach pains. There was no one else on the road, he looked but was only greeted by his shadow, and the sound of his heart, beating out of time with the hum of an unknown song.

Still walking down the road, Jonathan’s thoughts began to wander. He couldn’t help it, it was just too quiet. Thoughts of home couldn’t be kept from breaking through into his mind. He’d been away for so long, but only now was his anger beginning to subside.

When he’d first left things had been fine, he had the time of his life on his own...perhaps even a little too much. It all seemed like a dream know, a blur of alcohol and weed induced imaginings. He may have hated his home in the past, but at least it was warm, and he was never too hungry.

“You’re going crazy,” he murmured quietly. The loneliness was going to his head, there was no turning back now, even if he was starving.

---

“That’ll be a dollar sixty-seven,” the gum popping woman behind the counter said half-heartedly.

He wondered what she thought of him, if she was repulsed by his raggedy appearance or if it was just the fact that she worked at a 7-11 that made her so unhappy.

“Thanks,” he mumbled back, tossing some coins on the counter and collecting his precious meal of coke and a hot dog.

Sitting on the curb, he began to devour his food, hardly taking time to chew. He examined his surroundings, a sign by the road told him that the nearest big city was just a few miles away. Maybe he’d find some luck there, if he moved fast he could probably make it before nightfall with enough time to find a place to sleep. Distracted and foolhardy, he coughed and choked on a piece of bread, beating at his chest to clear his pipes. When it was finally cleared, he gasped for breath desperately.

Through a pitiful fit of coughing, he held a free hand to his head, trying to hold back tears that came out in desperate sobs. What did it matter if he made it to the city or not? There was nothing for him there; there was nothing for him anywhere. He wished he had choked, he wished he had suffocated, he prayed desperately that he could just close his eyes and die.

I walk alone, I walk alone...

He was there again, in his dream, only this time it seemed darker, more depressing. He didn’t have the same sure footed step he usually had either. His feet faltered and stumbled over each other and his back hunched over towards the ground in a drunk like saunter.

Visions of home passed across his half open eyes, both happy and sad, confusing his mind. He couldn’t take the pain any longer, his sack dropped to the ground, his knees buckled beneath him, and he fell to the floor with a thud, feeling nothing more but the cold hard asphalt beneath his beaten body.

I walk alone, I walk alone...