He always wanted to get to the end of the road. And there he was; at the end. It was dusty, cloaked in black, and made of darkness. Stars up and everywhere and the wind with it's keening way of telling... It was beautiful, for him at least. When you get to end, your end of the road, you might as well respect it. He did.

He admired it, to be exact. There's a difference between admiration and respect, and for him, the difference was massive.

The difference had grown from the steps he'd taken in life, every single one he'd tread in this dusty plane, every single night he'd breathed in and out at the bottom of a ditch, with eyes closed and not looking at anything.

Every single period of replenishment; the sensation of waking up to the tiny green patch of grass on the ground, or the sun striking across the plains ahead of him. It was replenishment, it was the full circle being grown out in front of him. The difference between nothing at all and full presence. Each step, each breath.

And yet, now he was at the end of his circle. Now he was standing at the edge, instead of moving inside the line. He was looking into perfect balance. He couldn't quite understand how he'd finally made his way here, for it had always been a road he'd been following. Since day one, since his first breath.

How does one manage to glide or slip to the end of a circle? It must be an accident. If it just didn't seem so perfect.

It was the sensation of standing at the edge of a cliff. Having the depth yawn out in front of you, the real blackness at the black border of the zero of his life. When one walks for long enough, you realize that the circle you are making is a zero; the shape of your identity scrawled in the dust of the desert.

But it made him think; the darkness. Does not a circle have an inner and and outer side? What if he was at the wrong edge of nothingness? He looked around him. Behind him, life, too enormous to comprehend, just like it had always been. Ahead of him, the sweet glimmer of his destination.

The supposed destination, that is. He felt suddenly hesitant about going on.

Slowly, he picked his feet, and turned around. Life, too enormous to comprehend, ahead of him. And the horizon, the twinkle of blue there, just there, but calling him. If he might reach the other edge, to know the other side of zero, then he might decide which one to take.

And life, containing his sob, allowed him to walk on.