Look. The Sun is Rising.

William and I left the party. It was late and we took a bottle of gin with us. We walked through town and down the streets and all of the lights in the houses were off but soon they'd be on and soon the streets would hum and the world would exhale all life back onto its belly and people would stress and work and kiss their love goodbye and comb their hair and frown in the mirror and tell themselves whatever they needed to keep going. But for now the sky was dark and streetlamp sentinels stood tired and brave and two idiots with a bottle of gin strolled between them.

The bottle slipped from hand to hand to mouth to hand to hand to mouth and so on. William and I didn't spend much time together but it never seemed to be an issue. We had gin in common then.

“Well, that's the difference between you and I,” William said.

“I guess.”

“I could kill a man. I mean, I want to. It's a step into knowing who you are and knowing what you're capable of.”

“Sure. But, you're fucking killing a guy. You're robbing someone of the opportunity to figure themselves out.”

“Fuck 'em,” he said and laughed. He swigged the gin. “Look, shit happens and they're going to die and they're going to waste their fucking life anyway, you know? Probably, right?”

“Sure.”

“Then who gives a shit?”

“Their families.” I took a drink and passed it back. “Their friends.”

“I mean, isn't there someone who you wish would just fucking die? Just get hit by a bus or something?”

“Sure, but that doesn't mean I want to be responsible for it. That doesn't mean I want to be soaked in blood until I die.”

“So have someone else do it.”

“I don't...”

“I'll do it. Give me a name. I have guns.”

“How do you have guns?” I laughed.

“I don't know. Life I guess. You get guns.”

“I haven't.”

“Eh,” he said. “You probably will. Some people get AIDS and some don't. Maybe you won't get guns but you'll get AIDS. How the fuck should I know?”

“I don't want AIDS,” I said. “Or guns.”

We came up to a park bench and I sat at it. William sat next to me. We each drank a bit more and looked at the library across the street from us.

“My arm is bleeding,” William said. I looked at it and he held it up and there was a deep cut just below his elbow and blood streamed out steadily, though not in pulses, which I took to be a good thing and didn't panic. “Shit arm,” he said.

He swigged the last of the gin and threw the cheap large plastic bottle into the road. “Shit bottle.”

“I feel like I'm suffocating,” I said.

“Me too, man. You know what it means though?”

“No.”

“You have to die a little sometimes."

“I'm tired of it.”

“Look. The sun is rising.” He pointed to the skyline and the sky was a lighter blue there.