By Mick Havoc
Quick wisps of charismatic grey smoke tangoed opulently above my lips, dropping fiery footsteps against my nostrils. In the mist of the hour before night, the smoke braided itself with the partial darkness and then flew the short distance to enwrap him in its magnificence. It swirled circles around his heart-shaped face, a tornado captivated and centered on him. He swat it away though, untangling its tress, sending it on its unmapped journey.
Looking to me with an upturned lip, he snarled, “I swear to God, those are going to kill you one day and you’re going to wish you listened to me when you had the chance.”
I smiled a smile intended to be sardonically sadistic, but only one corner of my mouth elevated correctly. The other remained limp and uninspired, casually downward and downcast. I made up for its failure with an incensed chuckle and another drag.
“They’re only cloves. My addiction masks my emotions,” I assured, blowing rings of circus smoke, “They have less tobacco, you know?”
“Less tobacco, more tar, same thing. They’re going to kill you, I promise.”
“You’re going to kill me. If I’m meant to die, I will, believe me. Isn’t that the way this thing works anyhow? You live and you die and the wheels on the bus –”
“Go ‘round and ‘round,” he said, looking surprisingly and optimistically forward.
“Exactly,” I agreed, sticking the burnt-out clove into the ground.
The arrogant star in the sky settled itself in the center of us. Its rays shined dimly on my half of the scene, while illuminating every aspect of him he found to be ordinary. His eyes blinked eternally, a brown portal into fantasies. His spikes stood smoothly, not sharp and weighed down by hair-helping chemicals, and glistened gently in the limited light. He held his knees, guarded by ripped denim, to his chest and corded his own fingers.
“Why’d you put it out?” he asked, still staring ahead.
“You asked me to.”
“No I didn’t. I never asked you to do anything to your beloved clove. Maybe you’re just not as addicted as you pretend to be.”
A fortune of vomit traveled my throat carrying an emotion I tried to contain. Growing goaded at the thought, I swallowed it into suppression and said, “Maybe you’re right, but most likely, you’re wrong.” Striking a match in retaliation, I lit another and suctioned it between my chapped lips.
“You’re a douche bag.” That’s the best he had. He couldn’t call me what he really wanted to. He wouldn’t name me something worse.
“We’re both douche bags,” I marked, breathing smoke into his face. I could take him like this. When the color drained from his cheeks and heated his hands, I could handle him. Moreover, I could handle myself and my suppressed sentiments. The smoke grazed him and he attempted to remain resistant. Maybe it wasn’t attempt. Maybe he was actually doing it. Maybe he was actually okay. Maybe he was used to it. He shouldn’t be used to this, I thought, he doesn’t deserve to be used to this.
“Derek,” he spoke. I mulled over the way he said my name, the way it came out so platonically smooth and yet so erotically sensual. I stifled the thought with one more smoke. “When are you going to fall in love?”
“Crispin, when are you going to stop nagging me about it?”
“Either when it happens or when you stop smoking.”
“That means never, you do know that, right?”
Finally ripping his eyes from the sun, he glared at me. I turned my head to avoid him and drew out my drags. The sun flicked harsh oranges and violent pinks at my face as it dipped and dived lower. I squinted and from my peripheral, I could measure the intensity of his stare. I could feel the flex of his fingers, the lift of his legs, the turn of his torso. He croaked internally with a sort of agony and confusion and I restricted my stomach and its flighty revelations. The clove began to shake between my fingers so I threw it in the direction opposite of him and watched as the ember stained orange against the unlit grass. Trembling, I grabbed my matches and set another on fire. As it entered my mouth’s chamber, he pushed his hand against it, knocking it to my knee.
“Jesus Christ, Crispin!” I shouted while standing, stomping on the clove.
He stood and put himself close to me. Jaw set, he cried through gritted teeth, “You could feel, Derek, you could feel so much. But you think your smoking and your sarcasm are much better substitutes for emotions. One of those habits is going to bury you, one or the other, and as much as I hate it, I knew it all along. I’m trying to save you, but you’ve become so…un-savable. You’re so deep in the fire that you don’t realize you’re being burned to pieces. I can only do so much, Derek. Who’s going to save you when the fire’s out? Who’s going to save you when you’re nothing but ashes? Who?”
We stood, toe-to-toe, nose-to-nose. His brown eyes, once as sweet as fallen leaves in Autumn, froze over and bathed in a harvested fire, while mine remained as cold as always. My throat burned with emotion, though, and none of my techniques could assuage the feeling. I liked him like this; I loved him when he was angry.
He blinked and the gust of air from his lashes flooded over my face. With pursed lips, he moaned something pathetic and then stoically walked passed me. I didn’t turn to watch him walk away. I didn’t hear the way his engine rose from its slumber with a groan. I didn’t taste the way his livid breath still lingered across my lips. I moved slowly, intricately with thought, picked my littered cloves from the ground and mounted them together. Stomping on the stack, saltless tears cheered down my face and then plunged into the pile. Only moments later, though, I felt my hand searching my pocket for my black box with my addiction. Readily, I lit the match, but voluntarily, I did not strike the clove. As the arrogant star submerged into the horizon, I poured them into my accumulated mountain and set them on a ginger fire that smoked callous, fetid wisps into the air.
I’m not as addicted as I wish I was.
I’m not as emotionless as I long to be.
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My name's Mick. I'm an eighteen year old trapped in the middle of nowhere. I like good books, good cigarettes, and good company.
