The idea of death is very appealing to a person who is suffering. Perhaps not actually taking one's life, but playing with that possibility—just to get close enough to death to get a little feel of his dark cloak. It somehow numbs the pain a little, like how sleeping with your windows open when you go to bed helps you sleep, dreaming of meeting the asphalt twenty feet below.
Or when your lungs are already struggling to take in air, and there's the comfort offered by a cigarette. Or just sitting on a chair, one hand caressing rosary beads and the other stroking the barrel of a gun.
Death is so seductive; and suffering so painful, so exhausting, so tiring. How much should a person take before it is acceptable, redeemable, to give up? To say, "That's it. This is as far as I go. I can't go any further. I've had enough."
