Lyrics

She’s a big girl. She’s a high school dropout.
Kind of mumbles and she’s got a big mouth.
Black lips on her white face.
She jams Pantera but she loves the Ace of Base.
She got knocked up by a married man.
Gonna get her GED on the ten-year plan.
Took a job at the Subway.
She said she’s headed out west. She’s gonna marry Michael Bay.

At seventeen, she’ll be exploding on the scene.
Call the papers, call the magazines.
Everybody said, that’ll be the day.
Every night I heard her say:

I can’t promise you, we’ll be rich and famous someday,
With a house by the water and a room with a view.
But I’ve got hope around the corner, and I’ll break my last dollar,
As long as I know I’ll spend it with you.

Marty’s a rookie. He’s a deputy, man.
Got a Glock and a shaky hand.
Desperado on his headphones.
He wants a God-fearing woman with a smile like Sharon Stone.
Playing D&D against his mom,
He got his ass beat down at the senior prom.
Eighty-sixing his clocked Intel,
For a ‘93 Beretta mint coupe named Mademoiselle.

Hand a lemon to Steve, Frank Bullitt makes a trip for gasoline.
Tear the pavers off of all those streets.
With a lucky d8 tucked into the fold.
Madmartigan’s on patrol.

It’s a graveyard party at 11:03,
Sudafed junkies and double OT.
Eddie Hopper in a cracked frame,
That melancholy ambrosia that nobody would claim.
She’s ringing him up for a few more miles.
Really wringing him out with that next-door smile.
Laboring down on her last day,
When her man walked in half-cocked.

Marty cleared three tables into the mess,
Took one in the chamber to the chest.
But deputies, they don’t get bullet-proof vests.

Rich or poor, turns out we’re just as broke.
Sometimes the reaper makes you dance.
Sometimes she just brushes you with her cloak.
To a hammer click and a puff of smoke,
To a heart attack or an early stroke.
Sooner or later, we all are toast We’re gonna all give up the ghost.
The dented doors, the curdled cream,
And the misfits and all big old dreams we dare to dream.
All the little moments in between.
We take what we get and make the best,
‘Cause when the last story’s told.
Deputies, they don’t get bullet-proof vests.
Just a lucky d8 tucked into the fold.
It’s how a paladin’s got to roll.

A little girl born in a pale green, French fried,
Third-hand Chevy on a hot May night.
A set of pipes and big brown eyes.
And her mama called that girl Hope Adeline.
It’s a graveyard party and it’s coming alive.
In a little town off 175.
Code 24, 10-33,
Brought the EMS, and the cops, and NBC.

Their camera crews, satellite trucks, and cable news.
All the limelight, primetime debuts,
And a Lifetime Network movie of the day.
A real American cabaret.