Shortest Days, Revisited

“This will probably be it for me. I can’t imagine I’ll see another Christmas.” Billy holding the steering wheel of the truck.

“How’s that?”

“I just don’t expect to be around much longer. Once the thaw is in I’ll be out of here. The old man doesn’t want me around anyway.”

It isn’t early in the morning but it is dark, mid-December with days barely brushed by sunlight, darkness like a vacuum. Headlights reflect quickly on the road and then vanish. Streetlights pierce the black nights as pinpoint holes in the horizon. A waning moon still high in the morning sky.

“No, I guess he doesn’t.”

“I’d rather be gone anyway.” Billy watches the highway over the hood of the truck and counts the center lines as they pass if they aren’t covered in snow. He counts everything.

“I guess this is it then?”

“Ya, I guess it is.”