The gods were hitting me over the head with the message that this was the dead end of the road, and I didn’t disagree. Without money, there was no way for me to survive. I was too weak to try to pull a job, and after the fever nightmare, I didn’t really want to. I also realized that what happened with Alice was weighing on me much more than I thought. As much as I tried to tell myself I really didn’t love her anymore, without her in my life, my future looked pretty bleak. I tried to imagine myself at forty, like Jean Reno in Léon: The Professional, drinking milk and sleeping in a chair with a gun in my hand, and I knew I would rather die than fulfill that prophecy. So, my plan was to drink as much mescal as possible and chase it with a bullet from the dead bandito’s gun. My last hit. At least it will be an easy gig, I thought as I went to work on the bottle. By sundown, I was stumbling around like a Bowery bum, singing and punching holes in the walls. I reached under the couch and grabbed the gun.
