Habits

by Blair Bishop

They sat together on the roof.

It was a hot August day, and the sun was melting into a lion colored puddle. He watched with wonder as she smoked her cigarette. Her lily-white throat glittered in the sun, catching the light like a thousand tiny diamonds.  

She took a deep drag and exhaled a flawless stream of smoke.

A playful smile crept across her face.

“What?” she asked.

He suddenly remembered where and who he was, and took a drag of his own cigarette. His hands felt heavy and awkward.

“These are really good,” he muttered. “Where are they from again?”

Her smile blossomed.

“Paris”, she murmured, eyes far away and sparkling. “Aren’t they wonderful?”

“Yeah…they are”

She closed her eyes and lifted her head to the sun. She was still smiling, close-lipped and content, golden hair cascading down her back like a waterfall.

He became very aware of his breathing. He felt that his breath was too fast, too slow; too quiet, too loud. Whatever it was, it was disrupting the perfect aura that emanated all around her.

He realized he should say something.

“So what are you going to do when you graduate?”

She peeked open one sapphire eye. “Honestly?

I have no idea.”

She laughed, hair rippling.

“Me either” he said, smiling for the first time in months. It felt unfamiliar – like it didn’t fit anymore.

“I actually don’t even know what I’m good at” he admitted.

She opened both eyes wide, “Me either!”

They both laughed.

“It’s so frustrating– I kind of like writing, and I kind of like drawing. But there’s always so many reasons not to do it. Writing takes forever and drawing’s messy. I guess I’m just lazy”

The honesty of that simple statement struck him. His perfect picture of Melanie was modified; a fresh layer of paint added to the arcs and curves that coalesced into her overall masterpiece. The finished product, though wholly changed, was no less breathtaking.

She looked at him, her big eyes studying his face.

“Do you miss him?”

The bubble of hope that was welling up inside him burst. The notion that she simply wanted to sit on the roof and talk with him—like they did when they were kids—evaporated. He cursed himself for not recognizing her pity earlier.

Yet he heard his voice answering from far away:

“Yes.”

The silence stretched before them, tangible, wrapping its sinuous cords around their limbs and seeping into their skin.

“Tristan, I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have asked.”

He looked at her, and saw the shy girl he had met when he was five. He saw the kiss they had shared, the secrets they had kept, the dizzying and tumultuous whirlwind of pubescence and the awkward hellos and goodbyes of two highschoolers from very different social strata.

He took a drag from his cigarette, needing something to do with his hands.

“It’s ok”, he said, “my psychiatrist says I need to talk about it.”

“Well I don’t think you need to do anything. Deal with it however you want to, it’s not like there’s a handbook on this type of stuff.”

He laughed bitterly.

“You mean you haven’t read ‘Dead Dads for Dummies’?”

“Not funny” she said, smiling anyways.

The sun was setting now, dissolving in a riotous swirl of pinks and blues.

“Why is it we that we’re drawn to things that are bad for us?” Her voice floated into the air, undisruptive of its colorful sonata.

“What do you mean?” he asked.

“I mean why can’t you naturally just want to talk about it?” she held up her cigarette, “and why can’t I just want to quit smoking? Why do we always want to do the things that are bad for us?”

He thought about that for a minute. He realized that this was his opportunity to say something deeply profound to Melanie Skythe, to impress her irrevocably with his wit and charm, and that every boy at St. Francis’ High School would kill to be him right now, and yet…he had nothing.

He chuckled at the fact.

“I have no idea.”

She smiled sadly, “Neither do I.”

She inched closer to him. Her closeness, before a mild buzzing sensation, was now an electrifying current coursing through him, threatening to escape from his every pore.

She looked at him and his breath caught in his throat.

All he had ever been, all he would ever be, was entirely changed by the look she was giving him now; his fate encapsulated in the nebula of her eyes.

She kissed him.

Time and space shattered and he found himself in a fourth dimension, particles of himself floating about, saturated with ecstasy and yet begging for more.

When his brain slowly started piecing itself together, he tasted the trepidation on her lips. He realized that her kiss, rather than being a fully formed thought, ended with a question mark.

He answered by bringing her in closer, soft hair trickling through his fingers like water. She moaned a little, seemingly content with his reply.

All too soon, she drew back, and rested her head on his shoulder. They sat together breathlessly; two broken souls bathing in the starlight.

Thoughts were racing through his head; his lips tingled and he craved to kiss her again, even more fervently this time. But there was one reoccurring thought that taunted him, tantalized him, and gave him pause.

This was the girl that every boy wanted. This was the girl who broke hearts, shattered them, and left them behind for her victims to pick up the pieces.

It seemed that he was, yet again, inextricably drawn to something bad for him.

She lit another cigarette and wordlessly lifted it to his mouth. He took a drag, deeply inhaling the poisonous nicotine.

And yet, he couldn’t care less.