I ain’t bitter ‘bout much these days. In some ways, I’m damn lucky to be here. My best friend Lennie wasn’t as lucky as me, but hell, he was born with all that misfortune. I can’t keep letting other people’s pain and suffering roll over onto me.

But they’re fighting like dogs in the town across the river, and that don't help a grieving man at all. Seems like everywhere I run the land’s gotta be poisoned with hatred. Lord, sometimes folks just need something to be angry about.

What you angry about?

I ignore the demeaning voice in my head, like cold water. But pain’s like cold water — your brain just gets used to it. But what of the heart? I cut a hole in mine for the liquor to pass through — wise words from my dad, the world-famous alcoholic — but that means it bleeds straight into my liver. ‘Course I go killin’ myself just to not harm anybody else. Why should I be so worried about love?

Love love love. It’s a disease. But if love was contagious, I might be immune to it. I miss being alone when it didn’t mean being alone. Because Lennie still lies in a grave in the land where real men used to sleep; back in the mining days. And I walk by just to weep there, for I am not a real man.

I toss a stone out into the river. Sometimes I come here just to put my feet in the water and feel Lennie’s cold hands against my skin, letting me know I’m still alive. Because when everyone you have ever loved has died, you start to seek out such comforts. That’s what I say about myself, anyway. I could just be killing time, which just about seems to be my motif.

They say killing time ain’t homicide, but a prayer for a leap year.

I hear footsteps in the brush across the riverbank but I couldn’t be bothered to move if the whole forest was on fire.