"Hey, everybody. My name is Jay."

"Hi, Jay," a chorus of voices replied.

I sighed and sat back down on my chair, scratching the back of my head. My hand came back bloody, like last time, but I'd stopped freaking out about that hours ago.

"It's just... weird, you know," I began, unsure of what I should say, of what there even was to say. "It still doesn't feel real. It all happened so fast. I mean, just yesterday, I had the greatest day of my life. I had my first real show at this nice little bar I used to drink at. It was a blast. People clapped, cheered, the barkeeper gave me a drink on the house, the cute server winked at me and slipped me his number. I was on cloud nine."

I chuckled, drinking in the memories of that evening. It all felt like a dream, like a beautiful story told through a soft pink haze.

But then, the pink haze disappeared in a flash of red, and a sharp pain wiped the smile off my face.

"But then... it was over. Just like that."

Sympathetic murmurs reached my ears from all around me.

"How did it happen, dear?" asked an older black woman sitting a few seats to the right. She had a kind smile, her teeth shining just as bright as the pearls in her earrings. The pink silk of her loose-fitting dress was stained by three gaping bullet holes in her chest, which had blood trailing down all the way to her lap, where a trumpet rested.

"Did you get caught on the way home by someone who didn't like 'your kind' playing at their bar?" she asked, a quiet sadness in her smile.

"Or was it a rival, jealous of your immense talent and fame, who had you taken out to keep you from overshadowing them?" an opulently dressed man in a powdered wig interjected. His puffy white cravat bobbed up and down as he spoke and gesticulated wildly, occasionally spitting up a drop of something green. "It was poison, I say! The barkeep poisoned you, I know it!"

"No, no!" I said quickly. "It wasn't anything like that. I just... it was cold out, it was dark, and I was careless on the way home. My guitar was heavy, and I was cold and tired, and my apartment was only a couple of blocks away, so I just wanted to hurry and get home. And then, I slipped on a frozen puddle, hit my head on the curb, and..."

My head started aching again, and I winced.

A somber silence fell over the room. Whispers of sympathy, nothing more. And yet, it was enough.

"It's not fair," I muttered, suddenly feeling tears welling up in my eyes. "Everything was going right. I just..."

A hand came to rest on my right shoulder. I looked up to see a mustachioed man in a fancy tuxedo, his green eyes full of understanding.

"It isn't fair," he agreed. "You are a wonderful young man, and you were taken from the world far too soon. You had so much more to give."

He looked around the room, scanning each person in our circle, and I followed his gaze. There was the woman with the trumpet, the man in the wig, a young lad with a flute and jester's cap, a little girl in an angel costume, a stereotypical rockstar, a tan-skinned man in a white tunic with some kind of harp in his hands, and a few others that I was too tired and confused to properly describe.

Finally, he turned back to me, and his eyes softened.

"But you are not alone. We all here have one thing in common- music. And while our ends may have been too soon, too violent, too cruel for any of us to deserve them, it does not mean that we cannot let our hearts continue to be driven by our one true passion."

Words of agreement came from all over the circle, and as the pain in my skull slowly faded, I smiled.

Maybe my end... wasn't the end of me after all.

Maybe... it was just the beginning.