Apologies

He told his confessor, “this is my last cigarette, my last woman, and my last drink.” The confessor laughed, and retorted “are you dying then?”. The man smiled, “no, I think I'm getting ready to live.” The old confessor walked over to him, and put his arm around him, “you know as long as you have been alive I don't believe I've ever heard yo talk such rubbish.” The man was hurt. They made their good buys and parted ways. He said to himself, “today it all begins, and today, even if it is just for one moment the world is mine.” His name was Patrick.
She walked down the cold street, her jacket was torn her hair a mess, and the words on her lips read it was all over. Everything, the world, this stupid city, nothing mattered. She walked into the road as if traffic didn't matter, and for her one can really believe it didn't. Into a coffee house she used to frequent she stared at old faces whose names and word no longer even crossed her mind. She sat down, out of breath, weak, stammered, if even for just a moment. Her name was Julie.
They took him down the corridor, and walked him thru the doors. At the final door the guards unlocked his handcuffs, he smiled, the first real smile in five years. The guard asks the man if he regrets what he had done. He smiled, “You are asking me if I regret driving to fast with a particular plant in my pocket?” The guard glared at him. The man continued, “No, I don't regret anything, accept being born in this awful country that has the most insatiable lust for incarceration in the world.” The guard began to raise his hand, and the man said “go ahead and hit me, I'm no longer in chains, I'm not on my knees, I will strike back.” The guard walked away and the man exited the jail a free man, his name was Mark.
Mark walked over to the parked car, Patrick was waiting their with a smile on his face. He couldn't resist, he ran out of the car to throw his arms around his brother. Patrick opened up and said “Mark, you are finally free, five fucking years in that hell. Your out though! Your finally out.” Mark remained silent, he had missed his little brother, but was worried. He looked down at his brother, and said “we probably ought to get going, I don't want to see this place again.”
They drove to the coffee shop where Julie had been waiting, the three of them had grown up together in the same neighborhood. Poor kids, with not much in their lives, but each other. Mark smiled as he remembered how jealous they both were when Julie got her first boy friend, he was some rich boy from the nicer part of town, she was only fourteen and she moved in with him. Eventually she was back. Where the two would look out for her, since the three of them were the only real family they had. Julie's parents had walked out on her when she was only ten, so Pat and Mark let her stay with them, their parents were drunks, and didn't care.
When Mark and Pat's mother died their father couldn't take it. He got into trouble with the wrong kind of people. One night he went out, and never came back. Eventually the news broadcast said he had been shot resisting arrest. The boys knew that the police were on the payroll of the men their father owed money to. At that moment the boys changed. Mark's life became about revenge, and Pat could only dream of escape.
When Mark went away Pat was so out of it that he barely made the trial. After Mark was put away, Julie left. Pat just continued to try to escape, and find some way out of this terrible world. Two years into Mark's sentence Pat had become almost completely lost. He drifted around, drugs, women, life meant nothing, he was just a lost soul.
Julie had a similar time, but that was then, those five years came and went, they were all a little older, but they were together again. Mark would bring them back to reality, he had been the one thing holding everything together until he went away. They went back to the old apartment. It was strange. As if nothing had been touched since Mark went away. They sat at the kitchen table, and Julie prepared the food they had brought home. Finally pat spoke “Mark what are you thinking about, you've hardly said a word.” Mark didn't respond, he looked a Julie and asked her to pour him a drink. He drank it down and looked at both of them. “I can't tell you all the things that are on my mind, some of them are terrible secrets, I may even never be able to convince myself of them. I learned to much in those five years. I was chained, I was beaten. A great man once said, behold the philosopher in chains what the mind loses in lucidity it gains in intensity. The same man went on to say there are only to philosophies that can be developed in bondage, one of subjugation, or one of domination. I've never been much for self induced enslavement.” he stopped talking and looked around. Pat started, “I know you have something planned what is it!” His brother smiled, and patted him on the shoulder saying, “when it all comes to life, you'll understand.” He finished his drink apologized to Julie for not being able to eat, and went to bed.
Pat and Julie ate in silence, and then both went to bed. That night Pat had a dream. He dreamed of a man falling. The whole way down the man would remember a girl he had loved, a food he had enjoyed, as the man ran out of pleasures, he began to think of all the things that hurt him in his life. Finally he tried to think of the most painful thing ever in his life, then the man collided with the ground, and Pat woke up covered in sweat.
Julie woke up that morning, she noticed Mark had already left, she headed out to explore the world as usual.