Seeing Someone Fade Away

I watched one of my friends die a slow and painful death of AIDS. No, rather of a common illness that his body couldn't fight because of AIDS, and as he was a junkie, he refused to go get help or go to the hospital. We were his only nurses as he slipped away. As he coughed and shivered and slowly died. He pleaded with us to kill him, but none of us could do it, and so we just watched as he faded away into nothing, knowing that someday, all too soon, this would be us if nothing changed.