When It Rains, It Pours

"What the fuck! What the fuck! What the fuck! Oh my god, what the fuck!"

Emmanuel daftly stammered from end to end of the room, picking up items of clothing and yanking them back on.

"Oh my god! Oh my fucking god! What the fuck, what am I- what the fuck! Oh my god..."

Emmanuel was dumbfounded in a state of traumatic shock. He stood there, motionless and silent for hours it seemed, his clothes sticking uncomfortably to his body and dried blood speckling his face.

He then felt panic creeping through him, and stumbled into the bathroom to shakily rub a wet amorphous blob of toilet paper on his face. After deciding that he looked presentable enough in his trauma-distorted perception, he grabbed his bag and ran toward the door of the loft, unsure whether to tell anyone about what had happened or not. As he stepped up to the door, before he flung it open he noticed a handwritten letter had been pinned up on it.

"Dear unfortunate stranger,

I was dying of leukemia. This is how I instead chose to die. I am aware of the pain I am sure I have caused you, and although I sincerely apologize for it, I cannot deny the ultimate selfishness and disregard I have demonstrated. Help yourself to the contents of my abode. There's money in the dresser.

Todd"

Emmanuel crumpled the letter up and shoved it in his jacket pocket. He had considered taking the money, but feared that it might somehow implicate him in the suicide, and inconspicuously ducked out of the loft. As he turned to walk home through the dimly lit and deserted streets, the rain had grown relentless and hammered him down, but he felt relieved and cleansed by it nonetheless. Emmanuel knew that the waves of involuntary convulsive shuddering were not from the frigid wind billowing down the alleys. Blind to the street signs around him, he meandered toward home, staring flatly ahead and obsessively fixated on imagining what he would do in the morning.