I inhale, listening with perverse pleasure as the black clove lining and loosely packed tobacco crackles like logs in a hearth. Half the smoke escapes my mouth in a wind tangled mass, dancing malevolently to the side and front and back before disappearing in the night. Half enters my lungs on a fresh wave of oxygen, shredding and biting and tearing who knows what problems into my body. I'd roll my eyes in indifference, but my posture suggests that already. Slouched to the point of pain and in danger of falling off the truck, I spit out the flavor of burn and ash onto the ground. Inhale again, watch the smoke whirl around, and wondering if the tears will fall this time.
They don't. Only instead a small pile of grey burnt matter drifts lazily off of the orange red cherry and lands in the dirt and dust of Iraq. I spit again, tiny clouds puffing back up in exchange. I offer water, the earth offers dust. We're both wrong. Another inhale, another deep breathe of air to rush the smoke into my body. My head doesn't buzz this time like normal. Doesn't make it harder to walk back to my room afterwards. Doesn't let me feel anything, except the sweet shit smell stained on my fingers and lips now. I'm reminded of a time I kissed a girl in a car and she tasted so much like cigarettes I choked. If she could only see me now.
Moon slips behind the clouds and things get slightly darker. I can't see the smoke leaving my lungs anymore, but when I stare at the north star four small lines of yellow street light shine on my retina and skew my vision. A glance down and they vanish. Glance back up, and they're gone. Perhaps I was imagining it all along. Perhaps nothing is ever the same if you look away.
The clove burns down further. A car drives by, lights illuminating nothing I couldn't see already, but my eyes instinctively flash towards the living area across the street. I look away in disgust not at anyone in particular, but with myself. While she was backing off, I was stepping in. It's always this way. Inhale again and a feeling of numbness washes over me. Non-euphoric, just indifference. Stumble through thoughts chaotically arranged and meaning nothing. The clove is so short I can feel the heat through my fingertips. Take one last drag and flick it, edge still red hot, into the distance. Let this world burn and burn down everything with it. I'm not concerned.
Stumble back to my room and realize that nothing, at all, has changed. Time hasn't even accelerated. As if my bad idea simply delayed the world from advancing, just long enough to annoy. Approaching my door and a hesitation to enter manifests. As if...As if I can escape everything if I just. Don't. Return.
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