Page 14 of Two Marlboros

Nathan and Ashton seemed to get each other with a glance, but I couldn’t figure out what it was that kept them so close and why they couldn’t communicate in words, like everyone else.

Nathan exhaled more smoke, which, because of the wind, landed right on me, making me cough.

“You know, sometimes it can happen that people get along and make friends,” Nathan replied jerkily.

“Since when do you get so familiar with me?” I retorted testily.

“Since you do.”

“Alright, I’ll take off,” my colleague suddenly said out of nowhere. “I remembered something important to do.”

“Which is?”

Ashton feeling like working was an event to mark on the calendar, but he didn’t even answer me, and just waved goodbye and walked inside. I didn’t have time to think of a response to hold him back, and he was already gone.

Nathan continued to smoke. He did not seem at all embarrassed or even irritated. I thought I was imagining everything and taking the matter too personally, until suddenly he handed me the cigarette.

“Do you want to take a puff?”

I scoffed. “I already told you I don’t smoke.”

He brought it between his lips and squeezed it lightly, which made it barely burn. Soon after, the usual gray smoke came out of his nostrils and mouth, which seemed to caress him before dissipating into the air.

“Ah, I thought it was just an excuse. Never mind.”

The cigarette soon returned to the proximity of his mouth, and just as he wrapped it I felt my pants pull at the front. It didn’t make sense for something like that to happen at a time like that, but I lowered my gaze anyway to check the situation. It was barely noticeable, but it was noticeable. I forced myself to find something to say as soon as possible.

“Didn’t they tell you that smoking is bad for you?”

“Oh God, you really don’t want to lecture me about smoking, I hope.”

I crossed my arms and looked around, unsure of how to answer. I looked at the asphalt, at the wall bordering the area, then for a moment back at him just as his lips pressed on the filter and his mouth sucked in slowly. He let out the smoke andI blinked, only to realize that my eyes were dry. Meanwhile, the pants were still pulling, and that didn’t sit well with me at all.

“Anyway, I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I’ve been smoking for much less time than you think. And more importantly, not for the reason you think.”

“Oh, yeah?”

He brought the cigarette to his mouth again, and once again I was enraptured. The way his lips embraced the filter mesmerized me and triggered an unconscious reaction, almost a kind of excitement. He turned towards me, while I was still staring at him, forcing me to shift my gaze with a jerk so sudden that it could not go unnoticed.

He handed me the cigarette again. “Are you sure?”

I refused, because there was nothing that attracted me in that pile of tobacco. No, it was the way he inhaled that enchanted me for no reason, it was that sequence of gestures that astonished and fascinated me.

I hoped, inwardly, that he was still doing it.

“Anyway, I started just over three years ago, when I was seventeen. It was a bad time.”

His face betrayed a contrite expression without much hesitation. It lasted only a moment, after which the smiling mask suddenly came back up. He came suddenly close enough that I could smell that awful scent coming out of his mouth.

“Are you sure you don’t want any? You seem pretty interested. Or maybe you’re interested in me?”

“In neither.”

“Oh. Too bad.”

Once again, the cigarette burned inside his lungs and I was by now ready for that feeling of unexpected pleasure, but in exhaling he threw the smoke toward me, polluting my throat and causing me to cough suddenly.

He had thrown it at me on purpose!

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