Once upon a time in the local cigarette shop
The first time I was left alone in the house was about three months into my stay here. I had all these plans for the time. There was this guy I was talking to that I wanted to invite over, a bottle of gin that I saw as a night time challenge, an entire house empty and waiting for me to do something.
But all it amounted to was nothing. My sleep cycle was suddenly 15 hours long again. The reality of the loneliness hit me weirdly. It felt like I was mourning some sort of abandonment even though I chose not to go with my friends and it wasn’t as if I had no one else to visit or nothing else to do. But the affect it had on me was unsurmountable. I slept in the entire day, I fell asleep to avoid doing anything. I cleaned the house 30 minutes into everyone leaving, I took the garbage out and felt the wind in my hair and a lonely girl in the city I didn’t know what else to do.
The date texted me and asked for my whereabouts and I stared at the notification long enough that it disappeared from my mind. I cooked myself an elaborate meal only to throw it out and I couldn’t eat anything but ice lollies, something I had come to tell myself for YEARS wasn’t good for me.
So night one, sitting in my room looking at the 8 paged paper I haven’t started working on, I decided I will buy myself an abundance of ice lollies- I shouldn’t go hungry after all. That is if hunger ever bothers me. I walked up to the corner shop after an hour of just trying to get out of my bed.
I stood there and bought myself four ice lollies and I stared at the counter long enough to remember that I must buy myself a packet of cigarettes. And for the first time, I asked the shopkeeper a packet of cigarettes for myself. It was always for someone else, I was calling them and checking what they wanted but this time I was sure and I felt her eyes on me, maybe something I was imagining. But there I was, a packet of cigarettes in my pocket walking back home. Insisting to myself that I am not a smoker. And I wasn’t, but I still bought myself an entire packet.
As the night fell, all I could do was stare at the bottle of gin, diluted completely by tonic but still making me nauseous. I was reminded of the month I spent drinking everyday and how could I ever become that person. The empty house reminded me that there was something that I lost in these three months and all I could think about now was for everything to fall apart. I didn’t want things to work out anymore, I just wanted them to stop.
Once upon a time, in the cigarette shop in the corner I was buying myself honey oats bread because I was concerned about gaining weight and now there was no concern, there was nothing at all.