witty-remark's Diaryland Diary

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-

I was very upset when I left that night. On my twentieth birthday, I wiped tears cascading down my cheeks before slipping on my coat and gloves and spilling into the unusually cold air.

I didn't want anyone to know I'd left only because I wanted to come back. And I couldn't think of where to go.
All I knew was that I wanted to smoke. I even rehearsed it in my mind with each step imprinting the freshly snow coated sidewalk.
"I'd like your cheapest pack of smokes...please".

I recalled seeing my reflection, the tip of my nose and eyes glowing like a dulled ruby behind a sheet of paper. How embarrassing it'd be to slide my ID over the counter with puffy red eyes and a request for "your cheapest pack of smokes...please" between sudden gasps of panting breaths on my birthday.

I thought I'd circle the local pub and elementary school before sinking into the convenience store.
As I was busy peering inside the pub window, I nearly missed Brad Allen standing outside of it. He and a friend were smoking cigars and all I could think was to feign unfamiliarity. Could he tell I was crying? A lighting bolt struck my heart and sent it spiraling down to my stomach before bitterness rose from my gut to push it back up into my chest.
Did I fucking care if he could tell I was crying? No. No, I didn't fucking care.
I didn't fucking care a bit. All I wanted were "your cheapest pack of smokes...please" and I didn't owe anybody a goddamn thing.
Especially humility in the face of misery.

I finally got "your cheapest pack of smokes...please". A 20 pack of LEGENDS. Cigarettes that taste like they've been smoked by thirty other people before you. Regardless, I smoked one after another, slowly calming down and admiring my shadow dancing along me in the spotlight of the street lamps.
I thought I looked tr�s Fran�ais in my white petty coat, red scarf, black leather gloves with dainty bows and black beret. I tried to picture myself in a movie but was abruptly interrupted when I saw 8 long legs galloping towards me.
We all stopped when our eyes met, staring back at one another waiting to see who moves first. Two deers peered back anxiously as I gingerly trotted past them; all three of us craning our necks to maintain our gaze before I couldn't anymore and I apathetically returned home.

And so starts twenty.
Oh dear, oh deer, oh dear.

10:09 p.m. - Saturday, Oct. 10, 2009

Then - Now