(3. The Cigarette Lover

To be quite honest, I'm really at an edge that I'm shaking to descend from. A plateau of such epic proportions, the briefest mention of anything other than how do I come back down seems irrelevant. Recently, I've taken up smoking, pulling in the thin steady stream of nictoine's paled flesh; it is a nasty habit I thought I'd never pick up. People, in the
most interesting of circumstances, changes.
A woman whose name I recall to be the equivalent of some flower sat me down with her clear gray eyes and gentle smile and asked me to review who I was; so I offered her a
half-lit cigarette, a cup of cold tea, and bread too hard. She kindly accepted it but didn't touch it, which I think it was best because it held some unneeded friendly pretense.
She didn't feel obligated to eat and I didn't feel to obligated to talk.
"Well, did you know yourself when you were a child?"   
Her lips fluttered with some unreadable dialogue, and I say this because were both actors in a poorly constructed play. She wanted more stage and I wanted more gleaming fans
I could flick of and tell to go to hell in a not so subtle way.
Me - "No. Should I have?"

I drove for a few hours after that conversation and decided I had been away from home for too long.
My mother was ill and the room was cold; I for a moment feared she had passed away, and then I realized, I didn't really give a shit either way if she did.
So I sat by her bedside, lit a cigarette, and stared down at her motionless face, her nostrils barely moved like delicate tissue stirring directly beneath wind as it flits through grass. I left with smoke curling round her little malnourished face.
My stepfather, was a bastard anyway, and slept on the couch, clutching the pillow to his chest and maybe he did it for good reason. I could see right through his facade of being a man when in truth, I knew his eyes always watched the sway of my ass and the bounce of my tits on occasion. I knew he was just as good as my fucking father. He's in jail by the by.
And the brother, the most loveliest little boy if I ever knew one. I promised myself when I was old enough I would take him far away and tell him everything about them I learned the hard way. I loathe to leave him in their care but he'd always been their favorite anyway.
I entered my room, and sat for a while, staring at the bread basket serving as a letter holder. It was to the top and I counted 23. That's funny, I think, because I didn't know that many damn people who'd bother to write.

'You were the most amazing girl...'
      'How have things been?'
  'Well, me and her broke up'
        'Really wish you were here'
      'I'm engaged'
            'It isn't that you weren't enough,
  I just didn't feel complete with you'

(Sincerely,      You)
                    Funny thing is I didn't feel complete with me either.

I burn every single letter, the ones I didn't open, which is an estimate of 22. Then I drive to Joe's house, and no, that's not really his name, but what's the point of telling the truth as I haven't up til this point.  I always loved taking the corner of his house fast because at just the right speed, I feel out of control. I parked in my usual spot on the corner, because no wants me to be seen here, and slip in his window, and it's always unlocked because our expectations are the same.
He greets with a frigid half smile. I wave the fag. The sex, it's good. There are moments I like it.
Moments where the pressure of folding under waves of empty pleasure is too typical.

    "I do love you, you know,"
and I give a half mumble and the sad thing is, I think he thinks he means it.

All I wanted was someone to say you're not a smoker but the fire.
You're destructive in your divine right.
But I was the one to stare myself in the face saying it.
I just wanted someone to tell me to come outside and kinda give that awkward laugh.
To just sit with me in the  sleepless nights and talk to me about trivial things.
I have the prescription to do that. I dream in fits of black but I don't see faces anymore.
And then when I actually have to look in the mirror, it's blurry, so it feels great.
Because then, I can't see just really how absolutely mad I've become. 







(In the end, it's all lies and bullshit. If I was fag toting, I would be filling myself with all
kinds of smoke so I don't just fly away.)