She stood high, watching out over the city. A sugary smoke fell to ash undisturbed, forgotten between her fingers. He blinked long-lashed eyes and breathed in all the scents surrounding her, smoke and rain, city street and burnt gasoline, wet rubber, blood.
Blood.
She turned her head, looked down the alley, and focused her gaze on the form half-curled on the wet cement.
The man lay on his side, staring up at the rain, too-blue eyes going glassy, the last of his breath fogging the air above him. “S’you,” he said from the ground, staring high up at her. “Why’s it always you?”
She flicked her cigarette down toward him in a long, slow arc. It bounced, filter first, near his eyes, the last of it witness to the last of him.
She waited until they both went out, and then answered, “Because it’s always you.”