The Friend

by Sigrid Nunez

I once had a rabbit that I let run loose in the house. In the living room was a stereo whose two large speakers sat on the floor. Whenever music was put on, the rabbit would make his way to a speaker and plant himself there. Usually he’d just lie still, listening, or maybe he’d start to groom his ears. But if I played Bach’s “Sheep May Safely Graze,” he would get up and cavort around the room.

Suicides often choose their moment at random, I’m told, in a mood of it’s now or never, when even a pause to scribble farewell could mean time to lose one’s nerve. (He who hesitates is not lost.)