SmokeLong Quarterly

Off work first and alone, I smoke cigarettes and read in the neighbor’s yard in the afternoons, sitting on a railroad tie next to the garden. In spring, it was just a rectangle of dry dirt but now it’s August and the whole thing is green and wet, full of fruit and spiders. Nobody knows I’m there and there are no fences keeping me out. I read a few pages and then I stare into the tangles of plants. I ash my cigarette into the grass and wonder if anyone will notice it there, if squirrels taste it and stain their teeth, if ants lift it over their black heads and heave it home to the anthill. It took me weeks to notice the ants but when I look at the railroad tie I see them everywhere, lines spreading around me like a spilled drink. I roll my eyes at them, like Lighten up, you guys, their old-fashioned dedication to labor. I work at a desk in an office where no one speaks because silence is better for concentration. When I go into my house I will turn the bottle of Febreze on myself and pull the blue trigger, feel the cold chemical spray, smell sweet and clean. More and more, I have fantasies of stomping people’s heads beneath my feet. I’ll drink a cold glass of water, wash my mouth out, stand in front of an open window, and halfway through dinner I’ll be listening to a story about my husband’s office where people share lunch together in the break room, realize I’ve lifted my knuckles to my face to smell the tobacco and tar of the skin there. If I get cancer, he will weep and say I told you so and not understand that I had no choice, that there wasn’t even a fence. An ant will cling to me ’til bed, rummage beneath my fingernail for scraps.