Dave stifled a sob, he could feel the sweat running down his cheek. He heard them on the stairs, they were yelling. It had come to this, finally, and he was ready. He looked down at himself, overweight in his cheap brown suit, and adjusted his glasses. His lower lip trembled as he lifted the gun, turned it to face himself. He stared down the barrel, exactly the way his father had told him not to on that brisk fall day so long ago.

He leaned against the wall, put the gun into his mouth. He laughed a little, Through the lips and past the gums, watch out stomach, here it comes. But today it was not his mother’s despicable cream cheese lasagna passing over his tongue, just a sawed-off shotgun.

He squeezed his eyes shut tight, his mustache bristled against his upper lip, and he felt a bead of sweat roll from his forehead down between his eyes, to rest on the very tip of his protuberous nose. Tears never came, surprisingly, not even when the door burst open and the first cop vomited.

He squeezed.