“I’m happy to see you having such fun,” he said earnestly.
“Oh,” she stopped here pleasantly as if it were her name, as if introducing herself, then she thanked him. “Do I know you?” she said again, so briefly.
“I’m sure,” he said, with the same artful brevity.
“Well then how do I know you?”
“Oh I’m just the same as everyone else. A little disappointed.”
“Disappointed,” she mouthed. He continued to talk. He talked about morbid things and the disappointment of creatures. He talked as the day chilled and the sky turned turquoise on its way into the dark. Her eyes wandered along the sidewalk by their feet. Warm bulbs lit up the city scene from food carts and balconies above. Hours had passed. A couple stumbled off the curb from down the bright street and walked laughingly across the cobbles, huddling with arms, in front of the two spectators.
The girl smiled optimistically. “But what about them? They look happy.”
“In any case, to look closely at something is a sad thing to do. See their hair and their faces. Everything grays and wanes and leaves you, ultimately. They can’t hold each other forever. One day, they’ll go different paths and trees that fall become dirt again.”
A group of five smiled morbidly as they walked by.
“What should one do? What do you do?” she said.
The man still eying the group and finding them satisfactorily diminished in the grays of distant cross streets lifted his shirt to reveal the pistol on his waist band. She started, then looked closer. An odd machine, singularly useful, was now so close. The gun had been something always to be feared in her life so far, but belonging to the man, she wondered what sort of symbol he intended it to be.
“I keep the gun in case one day I satisfy myself. Then I’ll be done.”
“Today was a good day.”
“It was.”
“Then is tonight the night?”
He thought.
“Isn’t it?” he replied. “That’s funny.”
“Sort of,” she said.
He stood up and brushed the hours from his legs.
“Good night,” he said.
“Are you sure?” She said.
“I am.”
He resumed his walk down the main street. She followed him with sad eyes.