Anyone who has held someone's hand on their walk through terminal cancer knows this song too well.
I think the storyline here is that we're dealing with longtime friends who, after her diagnosis, realize the big picture in a heaping way.
She knows Andy's past - seems to hint he's had his share of women, and maybe been a guy who moves from bed-notch conquest to the next. Andy acknowledges this in putting her proposal -- that she take him home - into context: Had he taken her home before cancer for sex when she was tipsy and willing, and taken advantage of that mood, he should know her better -- it'd have been a breach of their friendship, and he'd "never have heard the end of it."
They are close friends, he'd be out of line "trophy hunting" her like the others. With cancer, the big picture coming in clearly, she's living more for the moment, drowning her worries in drinks, and knowing her days are numbered, sees him more clearly for being a good guy despite his flaws. Under such circumstances, she indicates a heartfelt willingness to let loose with him. But the reality of cancer, chemo - hair falling out - is nausea, tiredness, and lagging libido... and he knows it, and as the good friend she knows he is, he steps up to do what cancer friends do: clean up hair, tuck 'em in, etc.
As for who they are, "bitching about the weekend crowd", he's a musician as referenced, and a good crowd makes all the difference. Her role is not clear. She sings along, but strikes me as something she's done with him for years, maybe as a fellow musician or as an artist dependent on the bar scenes. He comments that she's dying alone amid family, suggesting that even as they're losing her, her family does not fully understand who she is... perhaps this made her the black sheep of the family? -- the eternal dilemma of so many artists.
Amid it all, they do their best to laugh to stay sane, smoke and drink and sing songs as she deteriorates; they cry looking back on life. They mock cancer back as it mocks her life out of the both of them, doing their best to pretend the elephant in room ain't there.
As we move in, his mind visits / revisits the process of her death 1,000 times (terminal cancer is a long "burial"....), and would gladly have traded his place in the line for death with her place.
In the end, he sums up cancer death that there's nothing pretty about. You struggle through it, and do your best to ignore what it means.
Anyone who has held someone's hand on their walk through terminal cancer knows this song too well.
I think the storyline here is that we're dealing with longtime friends who, after her diagnosis, realize the big picture in a heaping way.
She knows Andy's past - seems to hint he's had his share of women, and maybe been a guy who moves from bed-notch conquest to the next. Andy acknowledges this in putting her proposal -- that she take him home - into context: Had he taken her home before cancer for sex when she was tipsy and willing, and taken advantage of that mood, he should know her better -- it'd have been a breach of their friendship, and he'd "never have heard the end of it."
They are close friends, he'd be out of line "trophy hunting" her like the others. With cancer, the big picture coming in clearly, she's living more for the moment, drowning her worries in drinks, and knowing her days are numbered, sees him more clearly for being a good guy despite his flaws. Under such circumstances, she indicates a heartfelt willingness to let loose with him. But the reality of cancer, chemo - hair falling out - is nausea, tiredness, and lagging libido... and he knows it, and as the good friend she knows he is, he steps up to do what cancer friends do: clean up hair, tuck 'em in, etc.
As for who they are, "bitching about the weekend crowd", he's a musician as referenced, and a good crowd makes all the difference. Her role is not clear. She sings along, but strikes me as something she's done with him for years, maybe as a fellow musician or as an artist dependent on the bar scenes. He comments that she's dying alone amid family, suggesting that even as they're losing her, her family does not fully understand who she is... perhaps this made her the black sheep of the family? -- the eternal dilemma of so many artists.
Amid it all, they do their best to laugh to stay sane, smoke and drink and sing songs as she deteriorates; they cry looking back on life. They mock cancer back as it mocks her life out of the both of them, doing their best to pretend the elephant in room ain't there.
As we move in, his mind visits / revisits the process of her death 1,000 times (terminal cancer is a long "burial"....), and would gladly have traded his place in the line for death with her place.
In the end, he sums up cancer death that there's nothing pretty about. You struggle through it, and do your best to ignore what it means.