I prayed this was one of my smaller mistakes. I knew it wasn’t, but I was working on my pessimism. My wife always talked about my pessimism, as if she was the sun herself, and I the moon counting down the seconds until I could remove her light. I didn’t view it like that, but that didn’t matter. She didn’t know the definition of nihilism. She didn’t read books.

I sat in my car, waiting to feel anything. Nothing came. I waited longer, but nothing came. He said it would be instant, but instant came and went. I wondered if I missed, if I went into muscle instead of vein? Was that pessimistic? Was that possible? I saw the blood come into the syringe, I had to hit. I opened my phone again, and made sure I did enough. I did three times the lethal dose, it should’ve worked. It had to work. I used all I had. I already wrote the note. She might have found it by now. I wondered if she did. I wondered if she called the police and they were looking for me. I wondered if they were approaching. I wondered if she would remarry, if she would be happier. I wondered if she wouldn’t. She might not recover. I might kill two people. I kept waiting.

Ten minutes passed, and I lit another cigarette, waiting. I kept the windows up as if that would speed up anything. Maybe even the cancer, worst case scenario. I started to get impatient. I started to get angry. Then I felt calm. Was this it? Was this the calm that would keep getting calmer and calmer until it stopped everything? Until it stopped the fights and the longing and the pain and the empathy and the apathy and the bills and the retirement and the drinking and the hunger and the lust and the art. The art stopped a long time ago. It stopped when the responsibility started. It stopped when the drinking became the vice. It stopped when she became the sun.

A pack of cigarettes passed and the calm stayed the same. She still hadn’t called me. She must have found the note and didn’t care. She must have called my bluff again. She must have been relieved that there would be no more mistakes, big or small. She must have remarried. I started to cry. I cried for another failure, I cried for my cowardice. I cried for my hypocrisy and my pessimism. I cried for time, I cried for virgins, I cried for losing, I cried for crying. I cried myself to sleep.

I woke forty-one minutes later. My phone was still empty, as empty as the syringe next to me. I felt my arm, where the needle went in hours before. I couldn’t find the mark. I didn’t see it, either. I grabbed the syringe. It looked clean. Unused. The bag of heroin sit next to it, untouched. I lit another cigarette and called my wife. She answered as bright as the sun, saying she was sorry for forgetting to tell me about the plans she had after work. Drinks with friends that were in town. She would be a couple more hours. I told her that was just fine, and asked what she wanted for dinner. She said leftovers were fine. Okay, I said, and hung up. I rolled down my window and threw the heroine and syringe on the ground. The smoke rolled out with them. I put my car in drive and started to head home.