The psychiatrist had come to collect his bills and left soon after he realised that Timmy had been shit broke all along and died without a penny. During the five minutes I spent at the wake not a word was uttered and Tim's mum just sat there, gazing out onto the streets. Perhaps she had been expecting something like this to happen for a long time now and its happening did not change a thing.
I was sitting at the corner of my block, passing time. Timmy's death had given me some publicity among the circles and I still took the odd case now and then.
"You know sonny, you look like a guy set on doing nothing in your life." I did not reply to this voice, preferring to concentrate on fiddling with my newly obtained driver's license. That ought to shut Timmy up, if he was still around, though I was nowhere close to getting a car.
"They used to call me the King in those days, I was on the road, did shows and everything. Then one day I realised things weren't going right. I found myself standing on a high place, looking down, wishing, to be down. But I decided not. I just walked out of my own life."
"So what should I do?"
"Ya know kid, now I walk the plane between life and death. The world says I do not exist, that I am dead and yet here, I breathe and speak! Sometimes I wonder if I can ever die. My advice to you? Go an-"
I decided not to take it and left the stranger to continue his rambling to the air and a few moments later, found myself sitting on the ledge of my apartment window, looking down at the streets below. At the corner of the block sat an old Indian man, still speaking about his conflicting state of existence.
I took a deep breathe and let go. I lived on the second floor. I spent the next few months with a cast on my leg and walking on crutches, but I lived.
