"You're very pretty, you know. You shouldn't think about killing yourself."

     I gave Nin a boost up the cemetery fence. She balanced herself on the top momentarily before falling to the grass with a thud.
    
     "You alright?" 
     She rose to her feet and brushed the dirt off of herself.
     "I'm fine, thank you-- and even if I was pretty, I don't think that should be reason enough to save anyone's life-- or to live."
     I pulled the bottle of whisky from my inner jacket pocket and passed it to her through the fence then made my attempt at climbing over.
     I rubbed the palms of my hands together the way a gymnast does in preparation.
     I'd almost made it to the ground until the sleeve of my jacket got caught.
     "Could you--"
     But Nin had freed me before I could get the sentence out.
     "Poor rock and roll boy got his leather jacket stuck," She taunted.
     "Are you having me on?"
     "Not at all," She quipped.
     "I happen to think this is a nice jacket."
     "It is. Did it come with the shag haircut?"
     "What's wrong with my hair?" I touched the bottom of it with my fingertips.
     "Nothing. It's just-- I've never actually seen someone who tried so hard to look like the centerfold of a music magazine."
     "I have been the centerfold of a music magazine. Several times. There were other people in the shot, of course but-- oddly enough I was about to tell you that I think you're nice and that's another reason not to kill yourself."
     "Do you take it back now?"
     I reclaimed the whisky and removed the cap, drinking it straight from the bottle.
     "No, now we'll just add blatantly observant."
     "You shouldn't be nice to me just because--."
     I tried to save her before she had to say the words.
     "I like you, Nin."
     "You don't know me."
     "Come away from the fence. We don't want to get caught," I led her into the dark, stumbling over loose ground and ancient tombstones, "I like what I know of you."
     "A suicidal obnoxious American girl--."
     "A terribly sweet, pretty, clever girl who may be slightly self deprecating. I like you enough to take you to a funeral. I've never taken anyone to a funeral-- I've never been to a funeral."
     She plopped down on the ground as though she had suddenly discovered that her legs were tired and she could go no further. In reality, I think it was her heart that grew weak. She started to sob.
     I knelt beside her, placing a cautious hand on her shoulder, fully aware that I was touching this strange girl for the first time.
     "Nothing can be so bad," I soothed, "Nothing can be worth your life unless it's some greater good that you're fighting for and those battles are not fought on whisky and sleep aid."
     She wept harder, covering her face with her hands.
     I had taken an empty seat in a pub and inherited a mess. 
     I wanted to ease her crying and lift her heart back up to its proper place. I had never before viewed myself as a particularly compassionate person but something about seeing her round face sticky with tears and black eye makeup caused my chest to swell in discomfort.
     "I'm not good," Nin croaked, "I'm not pretty or clever or-- because if I was-- oh!-- and I just feel so stupid because it shouldn't hurt this much. It doesn't make sense for it to hurt this much. It doesn't make sense," She gasped, "And I tell myself to let it go but my heart and my brain keep torturing me. It just feels-- I feel ravaged... like some salty dirty finger prodding a fresh wound and everyday it doesn't get better. He doesn't care. I don't know that he ever did. He wouldn't care if I was dead so why shouldn't I be? I just want it to stop hurting."
    "All of this over one person?"
    "I gave my whole heart to someone."
    "But think of all of the people it would kill to have you gone? Your parents, your family, your friends-- all of these people it would gut to have you dead, people who would never get over you and you would put all of them through it for some person who can't get it figured out? You would put all of them through what you feel right now for someone who I guarantee won't be very happy when he finds out the news either... I don't want to belittle what you're feeling but--"
     She squeezed her eyes shut against a swell of pain. Everything that I had said, she had considered before and none of it was strong enough to keep her alive.
    It wasn't that she didn't care about these people in her life, it was that like any sane person, she knew they would keep living even if she didn't. That someday they would find happiness again, even though she had no faith in herself to.
    "Nin," I hesitated, "If you kill yourself-- I'll do it, too."
    Her eyes slowly peeled open and widened to skepticism and incredulous.
    I repeated myself, this time without hesitation.
    "If you commit suicide. I'll commit suicide, too."
    "Why? You don't even know me."
    "And you don't know me. Would you murder a stranger? Just take a random person off the street and kill him? I don't believe you would and if you kill yourself and it causes me to kill myself then essentially you've taken a stranger from a crowd and bludgeoned him to death. It'd be no different."
    "I don't believe you would--"
    "Is that a chance you want to take? You don't know me or what I'm capable of. I always keep my promises and it's not like I really have a lot going for me. A bit of a drug problem, my brother's died and apparently my band is shit. The only thing that I would miss is being on the cover of NME and that'd be because I was dead. With my luck Lou Reed or someone would die a few hours after me and I'd be bumped from the cover, anyway."
     She silently took it in. She wasn't sure that she believed me but it also didn't seem a chance was willing to take. I held her emotionally hostage.
     "So what do you say? Are we going to share the tablets or are you going to forget this nonsense?"
     She pulled her pale pink lips in tight. Her frail body trembled, shaken. I had maybe gone too far.
     I sat down and tucked my knees into my chest.
    "Nin," I spoke softly, somberly, "At least give me until after Ian's funeral. A few days. A week at most. Let me help clean up one mess before I make another."
    She nodded slowly, uneasily, but in total agreement. 
    "Thank you."
     I thanked her in sincerity. Grateful that she had decided to allow us to live if only for a handful of days.
     "Here drink this," I handed her the whisky, "It'll make you feel better."
     She took the bottle then a delicate sip that gave way to a dreadful scowl.
     "Look at that," I teased, "You couldn't even handle one little swig. How did you intend to drink the whole bottle? It would've taken you ages to kill yourself. 'Oh Nin, what happened to her?''She killed herself.''How?''Pills and whisky.''That's terrible. How old was she?''80.'"
     I heard her give a solitary giggle.
     "Go on. Try it again," I instructed. She lifted the bottle to her lips. This time I gently raised the end of the bottle with my fingertips so that more whisky was flowing into her mouth. She gulped once before tugging the bottle away in a fit of coughing and spit. Whisky ran down her chin and the front of her dark blue t-shirt.
     I gave her a pat on the back.
     "Disgraceful--but better."
     She continued to cough to the point that it raised concern. She turned on her side and laid her head down on a grave marker.
     "Nin? Nin? You alright? You cold? Want my jacket? Here take my jacket--," I started to peel the jacket from me in haste when she lifted a hand to wave it away and muttered,
     "I'm fine."
     It pleased me to hear her say something. I'm no good at having conversations on my own if only because I'm unsure of when to stop having them.
     I took up the whisky and drank as though quenching some desert thirst then spread my jacket across the grave.
     "Rest your head here. You don't know where this grave has been."
     "I don't know where your jacket has been," Nin replied, setting her head upon it.
     I knew most of the places the jacket had been (or what I could remember of them). The debaucherous things it had been party to. The girls whose names I had never committed to memory, or bothered learning, that I had taken against the brick walls of urine soaked alleys. The jacket had been to various peep shows, Swiss rehab, the Ko Sanh road. It's pockets had carried everything from royalty checks to heroin wraps to lifted wallets. It had spent more than a couple of nights on the tiles. I could clearly recall at least one occasion in which I had placed the jacket beneath the hips of a slim girl to keep her from sliding across the car as I--and here in the cemetery, it held the troubled weary head of a dark haired American girl.
    Ian had once said that he liked my jacket. Ian had once said.
     I laid my head beside Nin's and took the pack of cigarettes from my pocket. She heard me light up but didn't witness it.
     "Are you smoking again?"
    "What do you mean again? It's been at least twenty minutes since the last one."
     "You smoke a lot."
     "I do many things often. Breathing. What do you think that constellation is up there?"
     "Stars."
     "Yeah, but which grouping of them?"
     She rolled onto her back to look up at the sky.
     "I don't see any stars. It's just clouds."
     "Yes but what would be behind the clouds? My guess is Ursa Major."
     "Why?"
     I shrugged and took a drag. I exhaled and my answer had smoke in it.
     "It's the only one that I know the name of. I don't even know what it looks like. So what is it with Americans and smoking? What about it offends you so much?"
     "Too many PSAs in youth, I guess."
     "Youth--," I mulled the word over, "How old are you?"
     "20."
     "Fuck's sake! Twenty?! And you're ready to check out?"
    For the first time, I noticed the visible softness of her face and body. Though she was absolutely thin, frail with sick, even, her stomach had a slight pudginess to it. A distinct child-like quality.
     "I didn't even move out of my parents until I was twenty-one," I confessed.
     "How old are you now?"She asked.
     "Twenty-eight... but, Nin, twenty? You haven't got a chance, yet, really. You're blinded by pain and you can't see. It'll get better. Life is... well it's terrible most times but sometimes it's less terrible."
     She was quiet for a moment; pensive.
     "You use my name a lot when you speak to me," She said.
     "I like your name quite a lot. I told you it's interesting-- like you are."
    "Why are you so nice to me?"
     I stubbed my cigarette out in the soil.
     "Haven't got anyone else to be nice to."
     "I won't sleep with you."
     "Believe me, it's the furthest thing from my mind as well."
     I gave her a side long glance. It hadn't exactly been the furthest thing from my mind but it hadn't been moved to the forefront until she mentioned it. Now, thanks to her thoughtlessness, my primal instincts viewed her as a sort of challenge.
     I slid my eyes back up towards the sky.
     "Thank you," She whispered. I imagined that her gratitude was for the kindness and not for the lack of sexual advances.
     I turned on my side to face her and gave her cheek a poke with my finger.
     "You should smile. Boys don't like miserable girls."
     "Why?"
     "Because we're afraid that we're what's making you miserable and that lends itself to helplessness. No one likes to feel helpless."
     I pulled up on my finger and it slightly lifted the corner of her mouth. This gave way to a genuine smile. I dropped my hand away.
     "There. Hold it like that."
     "I think your focus is wrong," She said.
     "Is it?"
     "You seem to see my problems but you aren't looking at your own."
     "I haven't got any problems," I contested, flatly.
     "But Ian--."
     I shuddered at his name on the mouth of an American girl.
     "That isn't a problem. It's something that happened and it isn't real, yet-- it doesn't feel real."
     "Have you cried about it?"
     Anger burned through me like offense.
     "You've got a lot of fucking nerve, I'll tell you that much. That's a very personal question."
     She didn't cower or blink.
     "It's difficult for me to imagine us being any more personal, Lee. We've known each other hours and have a suicide pact."
     I imagined that gun powder had a bitter taste and allowed the fantasy to coat my tongue. I washed it away with drink. Nin could sit at the table with her sleep aid but to me it seemed an awful way to go. It required risk and patience, neither of which I had in terms of death. I very much wanted my death to be quick and concrete.
     I wanted my death to be the way Ian's death had been. Without a question that I was dead and that resuscitation was pointless.
     "I haven't cried," I admitted, "So far there isn't anything to cry to about."
     Nin took the whisky from my hand. This time she got two good gulps in before biting the back of her hand to avoid showing me her scowl. 
     "'sides that," I sighed, "Who wants to spend their final days crying?"
     "The same people who spend their final days breaking into cemeteries."
     "It's a kind of luxury. Most of these people can't leave-- I'd just like to be accustomed to what my surroundings will be for eternity. Cold ground, concrete, clouds-- weeping girls."
     I looked at Nin. The black eye makeup had dried and caked in broken trails down her cheeks. It was a horror but a beautiful horror like a real life special effect.
     "What?" She asked.
     "Your face."
     She threw her hands up over it, "What's wrong with it?"
     "Nothing, really. You wear it well and it's be almost flattering for people to think that I beat you."
     "Ohhh...," She moaned.
     I rose to my knees. I tugged and stretched out the bottom of my t-shirt then dampened it with whisky.
     "C'mere."
     She sat up and leaned forward with apprehension. I set a hand beneath her chin and rubbed her face with the shirt. I did it vigorously, maybe even a little more rough than necessary. I wasn't trying to hurt her, I was merely trying to act quickly.
     "The whisky is stinging my eyes," She complained.
     "Close them then. It's better than the alternative."
     She shut her eyes, "Which was?"
     "Spit and my hand."
     "At this point I don't know that I would mind-- have you got a girl?"
     The way Nin had phrased the sentences didn't make them seem as though they fit together. They were disjointed.
     I scrubbed at black gunk trapped between the bridge of her nose and the corner of her eye.
     "Several."
     "Is there one that you have particular feelings for?"
     "There's one that is a girlfriend of sorts, yes."
     I let my shirt hang in a somewhat natural fashion.
     Nin opened her eyes to reveal speculation.
     "How can you have several if you have one?"
     "I don't know."
     "But you do it?"
     "I suppose I do."
     "And you don't understand it?"
     "I don't have to. It's just a body."
     Immediately I knew that there had been a misunderstanding and Nin had thought that I was implying that the other person was just a body when I had actually implied that it was only my own body.
     She appeared repulsed and I didn't bother to correct her.
     "That tablespoon of whisky in your stomach might give you alcohol poisoning," I stuck a cigarette between my lips and lit, "Pick out your plot then we'll get something to eat."