The tears fell slowly on the table as Juka turned his face downward to the floor. His blank expression confused the man sitting across from him, a graying older man with pale eyes and a dull smile, while he toyed with the gun on the table. The room emanated the coldness of the night air and the frequent clicking of the small room's heater encouraged anyone to bundle up. Juka slowly reached for the dirty glass in front of him to pour some scotch from an old green bottle that was simply labeled 'my life'�.
The older man was the first to speak as he drank the glass of warm goldish liquid, 'Seems such a waste for someone as young as you to end it all tonight.'�
'It would seem so'�, said Juka lifting his head from the tabletop, 'but would you really want to live like this?'�
Aside from a small kitchen table and the chairs, which they set in the apartment was pretty much empty. A small refrigerator sat in the corner filled with half emptied take-out containers and bottled water. There was no Television to be seen, but an old record player sat in the corner and the low tones of melodic opera seeped even through the chill of the room. A pile of old newspapers, Some pictures from a family album, a few glasses on the counter, and one clear glass plate was all that the apartment seemed to encompass. The walls were a deep green with discoloration's and chipping paint plaguing them and only one rear-facing window above the sink let in sunlight. The cabinet doors had been taken off by the previous occupant and never fixed and the only working light was above the kitchen table.
'It seems like such a quiet place to have such terrible thoughts doesn't it?'� said Juka, drinking out of the green bottle. His eyes flashed back and forth as if nervously anticipating something tremendous to happen in the room. He set the old revolver on the table long enough to light a cigarette and then picked it back up glancing back and forth again as if something had happened behind him. Then he took his gaze to the table again and continued to smoke.
'You're telling me that you can't find one thing to hope for in the entire world out of all of your life experiences and that nothing is going to make you hope for life again?'� Said the old man, shifting his position in the chair.
'Love.'� uttered Juka in a shaky voice, 'I just want to know what love is and what it means to experience it.'�
'Love is a simple pleasure and you are saying that it's not in your life?'� the man replied, 'but everyone knows what love is and how to find it.'�
Juka's eyes blazed as he extinguished the cigarette in the square ashtray and the last streams of smoke escaped from his nostrils as he replied, 'What would you know of love old man? What makes me this hopeless wanderer that should be drawn to your mass knowledge of the subject and how is it exactly that you know so much more than everyone else I've talked to?'�
'I spent thirty-five years counseling people for a living and then I moved to this apartment complex when I lost my job for talking to some family about a their son without his consent. My life was perfect man. I had a good job, a wife, and a beautiful house. I lost everything when I lost my job including my wife.'� The old man choked out as he took another sip from his glass.
'If you want to talk about love then talk about it, but don't drag real life into it because real life and true love don't mix,'� snapped Juka, 'I've spent 10 years trying to figure it out and I still don't understand how people go through life without it. I remember a time in which I was happy and wanted to live. I remember a time when I was 5 and my dad took me fishing and tried to teach me how to bait the line. Then again when I was 11 my mom took me to a library and told me I could get any book I wanted. I have not spent over 26 years on this earth and only 5 of them did I know and understand untainted love. So don't you dare preach to me about loosing because I've lost more than you could imagine.'�
'I'm sorry son, but you seem to have experienced a lot of pain in your life and I don't want to preach to you it just seems like you don't understand where love can come from. I'm not sorry if I offended you. You just need to grow up.'� he scorned back at the younger man.
The room went silent for the next few minutes as both men cooled off from their systemic rage at the thought of one thinking they knew life better than the other did. The faint sound of scratching could be heard from the record player as the music stopped. Juka stood up and made his way over to the player and turned the record over and restarted it.
'Beautiful isn't it?'� said Juka, moving back to his seat.
The old man turned his face upward from his empty glass and replied with a calm voice, 'I used to be a fan, but now it all seems to mean nothing to me anymore. It seems like music defined my life for a while and turned me into a cold man that didn't pay attention to his wife or friends and only obsessed over his job. I've decided music is a dangerous thing that should not be toyed with or listened to by a weak minded people. For they may fall prey to the enchantment of the melody.'�
'Music is a cleansing of the soul.'� mumbled Juka, 'Only musicians realize that and that's why there are so many bad musicians out there.'�
The old man sat there watching his younger counterpart nervously shifting in his seat again. He had been living in this complex for years now and never really took any time to get to know people, but this younger man had stuck an interest with him. The same clothes everyday and the same drink in his hand at night on the porch smoking a cigarette. The rosary that hung from his neck had always had a meaning, but the old man never actually knew what his purpose at this place was. He sat pondering the boy's eyes. Watching the light flicker and fade across them as he turned them from side to side. The clear blue eyes had red rimmed and tired looking lids with fully dilated pupils. The smell of old cologne and scotch whiskeys emanated from the boy and for only a split second the old man's expression changed to pity instead of despise. After nearly ten minutes of silence the old man spoke again, but this time with a playful loving tone to it, 'Tell me what your family is like.'�
For once Juka did not turn a look of disdain and hatred towards his neighbor and he simply replied with a blank face, 'Dead, they are all dead.'� And then turned his face to the table again.
'I want you to remember what they were like and not how they are now. Tell me how your life treated you and maybe that will help me to understand you more.'� replied the old man patiently.
Juka looked at him again with tears in his eyes. Trying to hide his emotions was not as relevant now as just trying to deal with what had been brought to him this time. This long time neighbor seemed to want to help, but why would he want to help him. The man had walked into his apartment knowing nothing about him and now wanting to know everything. His eyes flittered across the room again at the faces in his head. On his right and left were the people in his nightmares. He had lost his sister, mother, father, wife, and daughter. They all looked to him with tears in their eyes. He finally spoke up, but he still kept his head pointed towards the table, 'The voices come and go, but they are never the same. Some are young and some are old and they all want to be helped. They all want me to join them. I pray every night for them to leave me. I pray every night for them to just leave me be and stop tormenting me, but they are still here.'� He began sliding the rosary through his hand whispering prayers in Latin and Greek that his neighbor did not understand. His speaking became slower and slower until he finally stopped and crushed the rosary in his hand. 'You want to know what happened with my family do you?'� Juka said with a slight hint of sarcasm in his voice, 'I'll tell you what happened to them.'�
The old man perked up and stared directly into his eyes anticipating the story of this young man.
He shifted in his seat and poured another glass of scotch for both of them. "Go ahead" he said, sliding the glass over the table...

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