Lipstick Kissed Stale Cigarettes, by Mercedes
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Chapter One:
Evanescent Smoke
The cold air shouted against his cheeks as he walked down 6th street, though it was even more frigid as the pelting rain drenched his long sleeved shirt — it had been perfect earlier, where had all the clouds come from? He ducked for cover beneath a covered bus stop, of which were abundant in the Portland bus mall, shivering as the water droplets cascaded off his chin. On instinct, his hands delved through his pockets, searching for a pack of cigarettes and a lighter. In a book he’d read somewhere, the protagonist had mused that smoking was a natural defense against the cold. He didn’t doubt it. But the only problem with the theory , he mused, is that smoking lowers your body temperature . However, addiction caused him to disregard this fact and he slipped a clove between his lips. Cupping his palm around the end as he flipped the lighter, coaxing the flame and shielding it from the wind.
A shadow accompanied by the click of high heels caught his attention as the rest of the figure transfixed his vision: she seemed successful by her poise, possibly one of those West Hillians he kept hearing about, the ones who wake up every morning and look out their window to see the entire city below them, the sun gently peering out beneath orange and pink billows. She reached out to brush back a few strands of caramel-blonde hair, stood a few feet away from him under the bus mall cover. Looked up to read the bus schedule listed on the monitor strategically placed above their heads — he watched her hand absentmindedly fold into her pocket and draw out a pack of American Spirit cigarettes; he cringed. He supposed his addiction to clove cigarettes was parallel to a child’s addiction to candy; it tasted good, and for a habit to begin, that’s a key point.
As she slipped her own cigarette between her lips, she glanced up at him with luminous green eyes that seemed shadowy under the shaded sky of pregnant gray clouds. She watched him watch her, but turned away to glimpse the 17 skid to a halt before them. It was times like this he wished cloves didn’t take so long to burn, he stubbed out the embers and stuck the half-smoked cigarette behind his ear before pulling out his bus transfer and boarding the bus.
