“People these days, huh?”

A singular grey coil snakes its way from his parted mouth, making its lazy way up to the wooden rafters like a swimming eel.

“Can’t stand ‘em. You?”
The line of smoke breaks. His cigarette is almost ash now. The room is saturated with smoke, almost impossible to breathe with its weight on your chest. There is a slight sizzling. He has put his cigarette out.

“I didn’t used to mind them. It’s just now. I don’t mind you, course, but some others. Lots of others. All they do is cheat you and lie. It’s a wonder anyone trusts anyone, eh?”

He is thoughtful, but not convincing.

“I’m not just saying this because I got fired. I swear. It’s been a long time in the making, I tell you. I’ll be walking down the street can’t even ask for directions because people are all afraid of each other. We’re not all monsters, are we? The world’s scary, but only if you’re scared of it. People aren’t scary. I don’t get why people are scared of me. I’m a friendly guy. I get along well enough. Can’t be blamed if a customer gets angry, can I!”
You say nothing, try not to get in the middle.

“I’m glad you stopped by to check up on me. I needed a friend. I mean, it just wasn’t fair. I know life’s not fair, but I didn’t need to get fired. And I’m pissed! They told me not to get mad, but that doesn’t do s***. They’ve always pissed me off. It’s good that I got fired, except I can’t get another job. They all think I’m a bad guy, bad for business, bad to have around. I’m not a bad person. They’re all bad people. Say something, will you?”
You say something that upsets him even more. You want to leave but can’t.

“Yeah, yeah, of course that’s what you think. Give me an opinion, goddamn it! Say something that means something! You know what else I don’t like about people? How they talk to each other. Saying empty words and things. They don’t mean anything. They don’t say anything with any emotion. Just things. I hate that about people.”

The heat of the room helps the smell fester, and the stench seems to ooze from the walls around you. Your breathing is very rapid, trying to get enough oxygen into yourself and not any more smoke. You cough. You don’t like this.

“What, can’t stand a little smoke? This’ll be good for you. Get you out of your shell. Have a beer.”
You don’t drink. You take the can, open it, and set it next to you.

“Bastards, all of them. They have no consideration from other people. I need a job, and they took that away from me. Only concerned about themselves. So self-centered. Will do anything to get ahead but won’t spare a dime to help out someone who needs it. Don’t want to waste their good, hard earned money on the needy, do they? I didn’t think so. Don’t know why I even tried.”

You wish he would stop so you would not be obligated to sit any longer. The pop, pop, pop, pop of the carbonation in the can is clear and piercing as a whistle. The smoke seems to be circling your head, making every sound echo. Your head is pounding, the smoke being beat out of it like a blanket.

“But now what am I supposed to do! I could barely afford a place to live before, and am I supposed to sleep on the streets? I keep saying, no consideration for anyone but themselves! They’ve ruined me! Kept me long enough for me to get comfortable, then killed me! Pumped me full like a balloon, then popped me. ‘There’s someone better for the job’ they said. ‘You’re just not right’ they said. They could just tell me there was someone cheaper! Or that they didn’t like me! I’m a man. I can take it. I’m more of a man than any of them! They would break down if someone rejected them! I’m standing strong, but think of what they would be like! Hah!”

He’s so pathetic. You need to get away from the smoke. There’s so much of it, there must be something on fire. Black dots swirl in your vision. But you’re too polite to leave.

“Hate them all. Every one of ‘em. Would kill ‘em if I could. Swear it. They’re just skin and bones, but I’m made of muscle, I tell you. I could snap them easy. Pick them up and fold them in half. And I’d have a good time of it, too, for what they did to me! I’d show them. Payback’s a b****, they should know, and they shouldn’t have laid me off. Should’ve known better. Eh? What’s wrong with you?”

The smoke is swirling around you, stinging your skin. It’s pushing in on you. Keeping yourself up straight takes a hundred pounds of force, and breathing takes even more. Smoke from the burnt out cigarette still reaches its tendril towards the ceiling, fluid, weightless, taunting you. Gliding towards the ceiling while you are barely keeping yourself from sinking into the earth. He is talking, but you can’t hear him. The smoke is screaming in your ear, a high pitched noise that cleaves your head in two, too loudly, it blocks out all other noise. He leaves the room; so the conversation was short lived, thankfully. The room starts to shift and swim, you feel like you’re underwater, under a thousand feet of water, pressing down on you, rushing into you, into your head, sloshing and splashing as you look from side to side, nauseated, dizzy, seasick.

All you can see is grey- grey walls, grey smoke, grey sounds, grey windows. It is all-consuming, lapping over and over you, rubbing and soothing you to sleep, like a wave in the ocean, reaching further each time, until there is no retraction, and you cannot tell if your eyes are open or closed. And so you sleep.