Cigarette Smoke
I am hazy from how dirty the air is in here. Cigarette smoke hovers still in the air and I feel sick. There is the smell of blood, and it clings onto my skin. I can feel it trying to break in, trying to loosen the gears in my head. I resist, however, because this is just not the time. I can see his eyes through the haze in the room. I can tell he knows he has lost this particular battle, and as he lets out yet another puff of smoke from his mouth, I can tell that I will lose this battle too. It is just a matter of time.
“Remember when you used to insist we paint the walls? Like every two weeks. Over and over, like a child who wants cake. Ha! Cake. I could go for some cake right now. Or just go to Cindy. She used to make the best cakes I have ever heard.”
He is talking to me, but not to me. His eyes wander around the room.
“I’m going to open the window.” I say, trying to sound nonchalant, even though I need him to give me his permission. He goes on though, like I have not said anything.
“There’s this time we were at your birthday. You remember? Like three years ago. And we invited Cindy to come make the cake in our house. You acted as if it was all this big surprise, but I knew you knew. Linnie didn’t know and she knew you so well. But I knew. It was easy to tell. It was surprising no one else could tell. But I did. And Cindy did too! She told me after. And we laughed and laughed. And then two years later, after we’ve built this… this magnificent life… “ His expressions were raw, unfiltered. He does not let himself cry, even though he is this close to crying. He takes a deep puff of his cigarette, and I repeat,”I’m going to open the window.” My voice is more aggressive, but a bit of my fear seeps out, and he throws me a look that shows me he’s picked up on it.
He grunts, and he stomps down with all his might. I can’t feel it on my feet though. Most of the shock is absorbed onto the body his foot was on already. There is a squishy sound instead, and I gag a bit. Now I need the window open. I move suddenly towards the nearest one to the left, and his voice booms through this tiny living room. “I SWEAR TO GOD, I WILL SHOOT YOUR KNEES AND RIP OUT YOUR TONGUE WHEN YOU’RE LOOKING AT ME THIS IS THE LEAST YOU CAN DO!”
I stop, and I look at him, and the gun in his hand is directly pointed to me, and his trigger finger is already well-positioned, and my fear gives way, and I bend over and all the lunch I had before comes gushing out of me. A new smell permeates the room, and through the smoke I can see him smile.
“That’s the way. Hold it in…” He takes another deep puff, and continues,”…and then let it go.” And he lets the smoke in his lungs out through his nose, and he laughs by himself, and I am revolted.
“Do what you want to do,” I say. There is no bravery in my voice, but there is a resolution. I am going to die, and it will be underwhelming, and there was little I can do about-
“Oi, shut up. I can hear you talking.” He says that and stomps on the body again. The hair on the body’s head moves unnaturally as it lightly bounces up then down. It’s as if only her hair had gains its life, then lost it immediately.
I look at him. Damn it, he can tell. We had been friends for a long time. Of course he can tell. He can tell I am talking to all of you right now.
He pushes himself from the wall he was leaning on and he stands, his entire 6’4 frame glaring at my 5’9 frame. I knew he was big, but was he always this big?
“What are you telling them?” He asks. “You’re lying to them, aren’t you?”
“What?” I say out loud, and my heart beats faster than usual, and I can tell the inevitable is closer now. “What are you talking about, man?” I am this close to pleading, and I do not want to go that way.
“Cindy, she always told me not to trust you. She could always tell when something was… off.”
“What is OFF right now is you… waving that thing at me. Dude, chill.” I was getting desperate. “You literally stomped on her right now. With the… way she is right now.” I wonder if he’s ever killed before. I’ve known him my whole life and right now, I was not sure. “Dude, just let me talk for a few seconds, Christ!”
“What is it you’re telling them?” The gun is pointing to me again. I try to move back but my footing is slightly off. I look down on the ground and notice that I had already stepped on the gunk that came out of me a few seconds ago. I have no time to be disgusted.
“They don’t know what’s going on, I swear. They don’t know. They just know you’re… smoking cigarettes and you have a gun.”
“I bet they think I killed Cindy, right?”
Well, I don’t know. Do they?
Do you?
No time to listen. He stomps on the body again, kicks it and he growls. “Fucking bitch. I can’t believe this shit.”
He always never swore. This was bad.
“She left me. Like everyone always does.”
He is now moving towards me with palpable murderous intent. My time is growing shorter. I feel like peeing all of a sudden, and I realize that’s what happens in movies. I’m the guy who pees in the murder scene! Jesus, I want to laugh. I look at his face and his smile is even larger. I cup my mouth with my right hand, and I was laughing already. Loudly. I can feel a bit of wetness underneath, so I figure I have actually peed on myself. I laugh even harder.
He is now right in front of me. His hands are already on my neck. I look at the body in front of me and I remember him kicking it. I want to tell him to not kick me after I die, but no words come out. No air comes in either. The pain registers slowly, and it takes time to notice my palms are on his hands, squeezing and scratching and trying to remove his hands from my throat. I briefly black out, and suddenly I can breath, and the moment I can open my eyes, I see him on the ground, writhing in pain.
I cough, painfully. I can feel some form of imprint of his hands on my neck. What’s going on? I look at his face, and there is a pen lodged in his eye. He is screaming, and both his hands are on his face. He is shouting things I cannot understand, like, “Cindy, I’m sorry. I am so sorry. Oh, God, is this more painful because I am a Christian? If you STABBED me in the back, that would be more ironic, RIGHT?”
I ignore everything he is saying, because if both hands are on his face, then none of them are on the gun. I look around, wiping the tears that are on my face so I can see better. I can see it, to his left. His body takes up most of the space of this apartment, so I have to stand and stumble over him so I can grab the gun. He rolls a bit and the moment I have it, he makes a swipe at me, but misses, and I end up near Cindy’s body.
I don’t know if you can see him as clearly as I can, but I know you would have thought this moment glorious.
He is still on the ground, and I need his attention now, so I fire a shot to the ceiling. The sound is immediately followed by a loud grunt and a thud. Shit, I think. This is an apartment and we are not on the top floors.
Oh well. Problem for another day.
For now, it seems I have his attention. The pen I must have lodged in him is now on the ground, and his left hand cover the left eye that was wounded. He is still. His eyes not on me, but the gun.
I smile. I look at the body next to me, and I feel euphoric. I can finally have my revenge. This body lying here deserves some form of justice.
I point the gun to him, and he looks on, bravely. It ticks me off, so I swing the gun towards the dead body and I fire. The shot is muffled by the dead body, but it is loud enough to muffle his sudden scream.
I point it to him again and he goes still again.
“Shut up.” I says, and he become still. “Jesus, shut up. You and her talk all the time. Blah, blah, blah, blah. God, it’s like you just cannot stop.” I shoot the body again, aiming right for the head. He lets out another shout and lunges at me. I quickly point the gun at him again and he goes still again. He was close, very close to me though. I need to rethink the distance between us.
“The way she liked you, it was so surreal. Like a movie. And it was so touching, how you’re here, going crazy because I didn’t tell them I killed her.”
He looks on, and he looks a lot more calmer than before. He opens his mouth, as if to say something, then closes it. He opens it again, and closes it again. And then he keeps it closed.
I know what he wants to say though. “Why?” And I want to answer him, oh so badly. I look down and I fire another shot into the dead body beside me. My eyes stay locked onto his the entire time, only momentarily looking down to take in the the splendor of Cindy’s very dead head split open.
“Why are you here? Jesus, you never, ever just do what you should… do!” There is an acceleration of commotion on the floor right above us. I have so much to say, but I have no time. “This girl just showed up and threw glitter onto your eyes. You couldn’t see anything else. You couldn’t see anyone else. I’ve been with you for how long now? What, 5 years? You’ve been fucking struggling to be a writer all this time, and this girls shows up and now you’re the fucking welcome committee at a national park and we see you every once a month. You think this is OK?”
He looks at me blankly. I can still tell that he has an answer already perched upon his lips, but he remains mum.
“Fucking speak!” I shout, and another shot rips through the air, and a bullet goes through the floor. I curse again, and I look at him. The madness that had filled his eyes is now completely gone, and a calm has replaced it.
Our apartments are very close together, and whatever commotion that was upstairs is now headed towards this apartment. I need him to understand, and I know he has, but he won’t admit it openly. I start moving towards him but before I do, he has already stretched out his left hand and grabbed the pen next to him and he shoves it into his throat, right into his jugular.
And I drop the gun, and I am shaking, and I run to him. I kneel next to him, and there is so much blood, and I do not know what to do. I cannot remove the pen, I cannot have the wound fully open up, but there is a lot of blood flowing from there. I try use my fingers to cover it up, and there is little I can do.
The noise is now outside the door, and I can hear them shouting at me to open up. I can hear them, but I can’t comprehend anything except for the blood before me.
“I… did it for you!” I say, my hands still aimlessly roaming around his neck, looking for something to do. “She wasn’t good for you. I swear.” His own hands are now on his own neck, and I hover my hand on top of his. “This was for you. You weren’t supposed to be here. You weren’t supposed to know.”
As I talk his left hand moves fast, removing the pen from his throat. And now the drip becomes a river, and I am screaming loudly. The door bursts open as his last breathes escape in a whimper, and I let out a final blood-curling scream, and it is officially the end of the world.
