Utter Relief

I shoved my hands into my pockets and headed for the icy walkway, washed over by the breakers off Lake Michigan.

I wasn't going to say anything rash, "Like Hell I'm staying another winter.  I'm out of here or taking a spill to slap my skull on the ice and sink into the thick wetness and void of it all."

Michael was beside me, two inches taller, his pace was an easy lope all his own. "You do what you need to do." His voice was husky and even, but he was asking too. "Where are we headed?"

We had smokes and pints of whisky stuffed into our jackets. But will we ever ride motorcycles through the city ever? I wondered.

At the bottom of it, Michael was looking to see if I was actually out or just complaining. And I was desperately hoping yes and no at the same time. He couldn't fight, or even protest beyond a shrug either way.

"Hey we got a problem" says Michael, and you know? That's the most generous thing a body's ever said to me.

While I'm out here searching desperately for an exit sign, he's talking about us, he and I... are we in this together or not? Guys from Chicago who haven't made out, they don't talk about 'Us'. I didn't even notice, of course. Fucking narcissist I am.

But Michael had the decency to act like he's got a problem if I leave Chicago because he just can't see himself leaving, you know? It's not a socialized thing, but it's classy, him calling it out when I start walking the icy breakwater around the Planetarium in January.

"Hold up. That's my death right there" He's looking at the black water splashing against the dull gray ice. "Not today, you know?"

"But every day we choose to die," I said, staring out at the steel wool sky "every smoke over whisky instead of breakfast. What's this but a faster road to silence?"

He shrugged, eyes down, and stepped back "Like I said, we've got a problem".