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Lighter (Then Air)

I. My Lover
I happened to acquire a new lighter, as one would a new lover, by legal means. But this lighter would pass me by.
   She was a lovely, little, grey Clipper; full of heat, spark, and I would guess, gas, save for the first flick from the stubby thumb of the Asian shop-keeper; testing her working condition as she was handed over. Then she was mine.
   A virginal, yet fiery little thing which would accompany me to Paris later that month, if only she had not been lost, or stolen away from me, drunkenly at a party later the very same evening. Probably ran off with another man, as they sometimes do.

II. Mingers are Never an Acceptable Replacement
Oh!
My!
Head!
She's up. I can hear her clumping around. Hungover! That party was crap. All us girls came back to the flat and we continued drinking. Me, Heffa, Susie, Jane and Hannah. We even drank something from that bottle of ouzo, the one from the holiday, the one no one had ever touched since last summer. I can hear her and I can't get back to sleep! It's been 20 minutes now! Then I hear the click of the kettle.

“MAKE ME A CUP OF TEA, ROSE!” The shouting stabs my head and eyes. What a mistake. Ouch!

Then Rose is at the end of the bed. Crash! Heffalump. But such a sweet Heffalump with a cup of tea for me.
   “Sweetness. Bless.” I blow her a kiss.
   “Can I have a cigarette, Jess? Got any left? I'm out,” she asks.
   “Yeah in my purse thing.”
   “Your Zippo's not in here. Want one?”
   “Urrrrgh! Can't face one now. Not in this condition.”
   “Cava, beer and then that ouzo ... what-a-mistaker-d-make ... check the denim jacket ... over there on the chair ... my head!”
   “All there is, is this grey clipper. Can't find your Zippo.”
   “I BETTER NOT HAVE LOST IT!” No, my head.

Fat Rose on the end of my bed lighting a cigarette with a grey Clipper. A Clipper! Bad night.

“Open a window!”
   “Do you want some Anadin Extra ... that place was a dump, wasn't it ... the blokes were all complete mingers ... what a shit Saturday night.”
   “Yeah, what a waste of time. What was Hannah thinking. I reckon she's still hung on Jamie. Have we got some?”
   “What?”
   “Headache tablets.”

A headache and a grey clipper in exchange for my engraved Zippo from Steve. And Steve. Steve gone. Lighter gone.
   Oh, that's right.

I didn't take his out. It's there on my dressing-room table. So I now wonder where that Clipper did come from. Cheap quid lighter. Probably from the party. Cheap like the guys at that party. Scruffy, cheap bastards.

“Yeah what a bunch of cheap scruffy bastards,” I say, “total shitty students-ville.”
    Rose guffaws, snorting. I join in.
   We have a good laugh slagging it all off.

“Pass the cigs then.”

III. The Totally Hot are Up in Smoke
Dung-dung-der, dung-dung-der-der. BMX'ing. Smoking spliff. B-M-X'ing. Smoking spliff. Spliff. Spliff. Building at the top of a ramp. Ramp in the park. Der-der-dung! Getting stoned and it's her lighter. Der-der-dung!

Jess equals totally hot. So when I went to see my older-fat-as-fuck-of-a-sis I wanted to nick something of hers, you know like her knickers or something. Something from her room. Jess's room. Not my fucking sister's. Wanted something of hers to carry round when riding. Best would be something that smelt of her. Dirty knickers. Yeah knickers, but I only had like seconds, cos I said that I was going to the toilet. There would have been like too much noise to go through all them draws. So I just grabbed the first thing I saw, innit. I nicked this grey Clipper I am building up with now. Must have had her lovely, little pinkies round this thing hundreds of times. Might have even frigged herself off with it. Not as good as knickers though. But I can imagine it's like her wrapping her hand round it, you know, like my cock. Yeah. Yeah! And least, at least it's useful. Tops for the spliffs. King clipper. Standard!

So I'm building after a mess about on the verts. There's some Slipknot girlies over the other side of the ramp park. Jailbait, innit. The 13s and 14s. Fucking kids. And they're staring over probably wanna come over and have a toke. Chat us up. Nah, I like the ladies ... the wimmin, Milfs, whatever ... the older ... experienced ... you know what I mean ... Jess and that.

Later at home I can't find the Jess lighter. Damn! Fuck! Fuck-double-damn! Left it on that ramp when I got fucked-up after the ride. And my Et's hoody. Bitch. Bitch. The End.

IV. Naughty Inside Track
“Got a fag, Sass?” I ask.
   We are in the park watching the boys. What foxes. Specially the one with his top off on the red bike. They're showing off but I like it. Jumping in the air. Boys are like that. They love to show off. I like them do it. Don’t know why.
   “Yeah skimmed three from my mum’s pack. Let's all go twos.”
   Sass's mum's always pissed.
   “Do you know who the fox on that red bike is? He's hot.” I ask.
   “Daniel. Used to be a skater who hung round with Sally's brother. Got a bike this year though. Good ain't he?”
   “Yeah.” “Total Fox.” “Look at his body.” We all say together. Laughing. I reckon we all fancy him.
   Then Jill says, “yeah, but I like Dave more, he's better.”
   “What do you mean better?” I say.

All the guys have stopped riding now. It looks like they are making a joint. We all watch them but pretend we're not and chat about them.
   Then they leave. Leaving stuff there. So when they were out of sight we go over.
   It was his top and some big blue skins and a lighter. Sonya took his top because she was going to Sally's house that night and could give it to Dave to give back to him. But I took his lighter.
   I said that I was going to try and cadge some money off passers-by cos I almost had enough for 10 Benson's on the way home but I didn't have enough money to buy a lighter and no one had matches to give me.
   But really it was because it was his. And then the next time I saw him I could give it back. We would talk.

I am in the back garden later that night smoking a Bennie and mum comes out. Checking on the plants, she says. because it is hot. But I think it is only because I've been down at the end of the garden a long time and she wants to see what I am doing. I panic and through the box over the fence with eight still left. And worst of all his lighter as well.
   Now my chance has gone. I'll try and look for them tomorrow morning.

V. Manners Built From Luck
Find a lighter and pick it up and all day long, as sure it works, all that day you'll have good luck. Find a cig box and pick it up and as long as there's some in there, and they're not too damp, all that day you'll have good luck.
   Eight left. Jesus wept to Mary. What a find. No mistake there. Eight outta ten Ol' Paddy.
   Would have had to scrape the old copper together and buy Paddy some of the rolling stuff and papers this evening. Now there's no need. He He He. A beautiful can of the White Lightning or two for I, me thinks.

Later on I'm in the park with my goodies. Happy old Patrick singing all the old time songs. Then Tracy, one of the prostitutes who does those drugs, stubbles up to Paddy looking badly and she's trying to be all slobbery.
   I knows she needs her fix. But Paddy don't have any money. Nothing to give. All spent up.

“Paddy,” she says falling onto the bench and puts her arm around me. Oh, that's so nice. Another person touching Ol' Paddy. But I knows what she's after. She's after me loot.

“Giz a swig,” she says.
   I could fight it. But it just feels too nice, I tell ya.
   “Oh, go on then lassie,” I hand her the can, “you gonna give me one for free then?”
   “Not flaming likely! When was the last time you had a bath?”
   “No needs to get all personal there, young lassie. But it's all rights, was only joking anyway, my pretty. Look at me I'm an old man. Not much use to a young, beautiful damsel likes yourself.”
   She smiles.
   And all day long you'll have good luck. What a load of rhubarb!
   “Would you like a tab there darling?”
   “A tab? What tablets?”
   “Nah, hey there, lassie. I means like a tab, a smoke, my dear.”
   “Yeah, if you got one going?”

I slowly open the box find and offer like a gentleman. Cos Paddy knows there's still plenty left.
   “You old charmer,” she says.
   “Just have manners. Don't have anything else in the world, including that bath tub you mentioned, but manners old Paddy has.”
   “I'm sorry.”

But when I go to light the cigarette my hands are all shaky and useless from the first booze of the day.
   She smiles a kindly smile, very warm likes and then takes the lighter and lights the thing herself. Then one for me. Then she's gone. I guess she's got to do the things she has to.
   Wish she'd stayed longer to talk to Ol' Patrick Peter John Grady.

VI. Faggots
At least I have a place to lay my head and that's that. Seen that old Irish, alchy around. Never knew that he was so nice and when I get space at 3 a.m. with my fix after being on my back most of the night I realise that I've taken his lighter. I feel bad. But that is probably cos I've not had a hit for 6 hours. So work. And then the badness is gone with the rock.

A few days later I am by King's Cross looking for punters when these three suited-and-booted, city-type shits come my way.
   One of them comes up to me while the other two waited a bit off. I've seen this before, so I think that he's embarrassed, you know, to ask, looks young, about twenty or twenty-one. Perverts really, the money looking down butit gets them off. Fucking the dirt. They fuck all else. But they’re always a bit shy that age. I hate London. Sick place. First-timer. Probably has lots of money. Really nice suit. So grit.

He tries to talk to me and he's stuttering, “C ... C ... Can ... I ... d ... d ... do ... do you ...”
   “What do you after love?” I asked.
   “Er ... e ... d ... do you ... do ... d ... do you have a light?” All embarrassed.
   I take out that lighter as he takes out a cigarette. Then I light it.
   “No need to be embarrassed,” I say, “I do pretty much anything you want for forty including anal. Blowjob's a tenner. Handjob a fiver. I have a place we can go to just round the corner. Your first time, love?” Trying to be nice because usually they’ll leave more that the deal. Money doesn’t matter to them. It does to me.
   Then he says without the stutter, which I now know he was putting on, “You think that I'd pay money to sleep with you? You'd have to pay me you thick, ugly, crackwhore. You never heard of dentists? Or personal hygiene? Or boutiques for that matter?”
   Then all three of them laugh at their joke. I'm annoyed because I was kind to him, didn't do any of them no harm or hurt. Never done anyone hurt and harm except myself. I know that and they don’t.

I throw the lighter at them as they're walking away, “Shove it up your ass you fucking faggots!”
   One of them walks back and picks up the lighter and shakes it at me, “No lighter for your crack pipe tonight now dumb bitch!”
   They start laughing again.
   I feel bad. Not for not having a lighter, I have more but for I would have given it back if crossed paths with the old drunk again.

VII. The Loneliest Soul
Crack. And a Crack. Filth. The Filth. A Filthy Crack. My crack. Her Crack. The filth will never crack me. Too high. On Crack. Ahhhh ... Ha Ha Ha.
   This, my crack pipe and the crack of that dirty whore this afternoon. The crackwhore. Ha Ha Ha. I can imagine what it looks like. The crack. Look at her mouth. Dirty. Filth. Cracked lips. Crack. Ha Ha Ha. Lips. Hahaha.
   Chomp. Grind. Grind your teeth. What you have left of them. Grind. The grind. Grinding against her crack. Grinding down my crack. Grind. Grand. A grand. Fifty grand. A hundred and ninety grand. Today and a fiver. Fiver for a Handjob. Handy job when you can make a hundred and ninety grand and a fiver. All for crack. BO-nus-ness! Ha Ha Ha. Stupid crackwhore. Here cracked out with her lighter only inches away from my lips. Urgh! Fuck her crack. Don't fuck her crack. Dirty bitch get off my pipe. Urgh ... dirty fucking lighter. Get it away.
   “Oi! Muggsy matey, lend me your facking, gold Clipster. You can have the fanny whore clipper. Smells lovely. I can't guarantee where it's been though.”
   “Bob. You're fucked up.”
   “Oh yeah man. Let me hit it. Hit the crack and the crack is for the rich. The crack of the whiteness and the crack of the fair maiden for the rich. For the rich I say! Let the poor-stines eat cake. Let's make money and make merry with our money, merry men.”
   Everyone's laughing at my pompous japery. I sink into the lush and I can hear a laughing, whiplash sound coming from my own mush. Crack. C-rack! But it might be from her crack.

VIII. Released For Lucy
There it was on unpacking, three days after getting back from uni, the offending article.
   I'd promised Lucy that I'd give up over the summer and there it was on my bed reminding me. How did it get there? Maybe from when I crashed at Jez's brother's those few days in the big smoke. What a plush pad. Jez's bro is loaded.
   I've been back a week now and I haven't started the stopping yet. Plenty of time. I don't see her for another week. Plenty of time.
   The first step on my plan to give up is to stop buying them. Non-smokers don't buy cigarettes.

Last night Nigel finally got pissed off with me poncing off him and I didn't want to commit to a full pack (although you can hardly call 16's, from the machine in the pub, a full pack), so I walked the two hundred yards down the 24 hour petrol station to get ten Marlboro Lights. Plenty of time.
   This found lighter is here on the bed fraternising with the dirty socks. Becoming part of me. Plenty of time.
   Lucy doesn't smoke. Lucy has never smoked. I can understand her point. And the lighter on my bed looks as though it shouldn't be there. She's here next weekend. Mum and dad are cool about her staying. And ashtray breath when kissing must not be nice.
   Plenty of time.
   Where did this lighter come from. Oh well, it doesn't matter because it's going. No smoke without fire. That's the expression isn't it. I'll get rid of it. It's a start. Start somewhere. Get rid of all the smoking apparel. Is that the right word? Well, you know, get rid of the things that go with smoking and act like a non-smoker. I'll give it to dad.
   Maybe his Cooke's matches in the drawer by the kitchen door are just a tradition. Mum doesn't allow him to smoke in the house. But I wonder what he does at work. Probably ponces a light from a colleague. Maybe he has one in a desk draw. He'll probably appreciate it. More than Lucy any how, if I did keep it. Plenty of time.

IX. Undignified Dad
Back in my day it was suave and sophisticated to smoke. These days though, it just seems more and more undignified. Malcom gave up 3 years ago, never looked back, Sandy is dead ... Etc Etc (more info) ... Even Jack is giving up. He said as much when we had our usual post-meal cigarette and chat, in the garden last night. He's so grown up and mature now. University and living away from home is changing him into a man.
   That's when he gave me the lighter. First thing he’s given me. Man-to-man, that is.

I remember when Jack started, or should I say when his mother and I found out. Sandy and I had had to present a united front. He was fourteen and she was furious. He'd come in drunk from a friend's party, smoked a cigarette in the living room, urinated on the kitchen floor and passed out under the dining table. We found him stinking of alcohol, ash all over the floor and very much the worse-for-wear.
   At the time I felt like such a hypocrite because Sandra was more annoyed about the smoking rather than the drinking.
   Now that he's said that he's going to stop for the sake of his relationship, in all honesty, I have rather mixed feeling.
   Part of me is proud, we're brought up our son to be a responsible person and do the right thing for others. But part of me is resentful. It makes me feel weak in the eyes of my own off-spring - this is rather humiliation and undignified. Also I'll miss our after dinner father-son's in the garden especially during the summer. Just as the sun is setting, when everything is so peaceful. It's a time of day that seems most perfect for a father to talk to his son. Especially over a cigarette.

So here I am at work. Undignified Dad. The cigarette break. Under the canopy out front of the office building, with all the other smokers. No hierarchy.
   When one of the foreign temps, a Ukrainian girl, asks for a light I hand her the one that Jack gave me a few days ago. I don't want it. Too much of a painful reminder.
   I tell her I have another, she can keep it. It's my last break of the working day. It doesn't matter.

X. A Recycled Resurrection
The old man, who is one of the bosses, looks sad when he gives me the lighter and annoyed as well. Not as a person should look when they are doing something kind for another person.
   This makes me feel unhappy to take it. The lighter is grey and looks old like it had seen much time; all scratched.

Two days later it ran out of gas. This night I take many books of matches from the bar when I am with my boyfriend. One book every time I go to order drinks. Matches are better than lighters - no plastic. Everything natural.
   But as I fill my bag I see the light is still there. I should have thrown it away. Why did I not?

Two more days later I am glad because I see metal container that looks like it is to refill a lighter. It is on a shelf in Matthew's kitchen. There was a picture of a lighter and fire on the side of the tin.
   “Will that refill this lighter, Matty?” I asked.
   “No that's lighter fluid for a Zippo lighter. A Clipper takes gas.” He doesn’t like Matty but I do.
   “Can you buy refill gas for this lighter? It has a little hole thing on the end to put something in I think.”
   “I guess so but you usually would just buy a new Clipper, they're only one pound so I don't know why they even make them refillable. Doesn't make sense.”
   But it does to me. There seems something romantic and noble about this lighter. I now know why I had kept it.

XI. Big Bag, G'day 'n' G'bye
Jesus, I find stacks of these things on my shift. Shame these lighters ain't five pound tips. Tight fucking forgetful Pomes. Glad to be off back to the Oz tomorrow arvo. But what the hell I'm I gonna do with all these? There must be, I dunno, maybe eighty in this plaggy bag.

Two years behind a bar. I've collected loads of the things stupid things whilst clearing up. No point packing them all. An excess baggage of lighters, there's Buckley's chance, matey. So I'll take a few for me and one each for my mates back home - cheapest souvenirs.
   Let's have a Captain Cooke and see if I can't dig out some Union Jack's, London's, Tube's, Big Ben's. Rest I can leave to the Pome housies.
   Yeah, Bali on the way home for a ten day'er is gonna be ripper. Cheap as shit after the bomb.
   Getting down, sleeping on the beaches with all the traveller, pot heads. Sexy Sheilas in bikinis. Or even better naked and skinny dipping in the moonlight. Fucking Ripper!
   Strewth, I ain't going to miss the weather here on this rainy, little, moaning island. Fucking moaing pomes!
   Top heat on heat here I come!

XII. A Less Than Efficient Front To Back
When I got back to Düsseldorf I knew it was a crime. When I touched down, plane tires screeching and braking, I knew it was over, even though there was still two weeks left. Over before the plane took off.
   It must be told in reverse. But I wish I was still there. Back at a time before it had even happened.
   Naturally.
   The work doesn't matter.

I start work again. The company was good to give me 6 months off. So let us start at the end.

I am stood on my feet outside Herr Möller's office. I have been stood ten minutes. He is the boss and this is the way he likes it. I think I feel like I am at work now.

The weekend before was nothing. Simple preparation. Shirt ready. Making notes from the company intranet so I knew what project we were currently undertaking and whom I had been assigned to and why. Emails all round. No alcohol, no hash and no hard drugs. Clean for the start. Which is a start stood on my feet.
   Standing, a punishment for my crime.
   For that morning I knew it to be a crime. I knew I had been selfish.

The weekend before that to Berlin to see Heino. One last blow-out with my dear, old, university friend?
   Heino is not that style of person - he's quiet, stable and he likes his trips to the 'Dam but his body and soul are not made for the extremities of dancing, jumping fifty feet down into the water, staying awake for four days without sleep. The hard narcotics.
   Out in quiet, drunken acquaintance with the customary merriment and mandatory reminiscence.

In the last bar we go to when I visit the toilets I stealthy slip the stolen items in random people's bags and coat pockets without them seeing. It is late and everyone is rather drunk.
   I feel better. Lighter.
   I was not going to be caught. I was getting rid of the evidence on my soul. The evidence I would have used that morning if it had not all gone wrong. That morning ...

I awake on the beach. I must have had no more than three hours sleep, the sun is up. I can tell without opening my lids. It's red not black. I hear and smell the sea. Sounds and smells of the morning in Bali.
   Why did I do this - these are my friends. Or what I would consider a sense of friendship to be whilst travelling - the drifting in and out like the ocean over the last four months of travelling and travellers.

I had planned it out in advance and when I awake I am too hot, I feel itchy, ragged and the first thing I do is feel in my pockets. The lighters are all there. I had it covered.
   It is good when you have had a good drug-taking evening when you find the other peoples lighters in your pocket. But this was not a normal accident of a common incident shared by friends. This was purposeful.
   Everyone else in the heroin cartel is still asleep. Sanni and Junk are gone but they had a hut to stay in - so this does not surprise me, so I have time, a plan and my two alibis.

The first alibi are the lighters. Where is everyone's lighter? All I have to do is simply produce them and apologise. My mistake.
   The second alibi is the amount of heroin I was taking compared to everyone else. I had been greedy till I was feeling so sick. Then when everyone would ask where the heroin had gone I would say that I had my fill and I didn't care about having more. They would have known it could not have been me by the way I pointed them to me. If I was planning to take it surely I would have been more careful.
   When bags and pockets where checked it would turn up with Andrew, hidden in his water canisters. He would be cast out and Jenny would no longer want him the way she does when I know she is right for me.

The night before I had crept, as slowly and quietly as I could with all the junk in my brain and soul, over to Andrew and carefully open his sack found the canister and silently deposited the large bag of heroin inside. Put everything back the way I found it and headed back to sleep. He had not stirred.

After a undetermined amount of sleep of I hear Jenny shouting, “Andrew! Andrew! How could you!” She is crying. Everyone is awaking. I smile on the inside. He will no longer be part of the group. The person who has betrayed us all.
   I left everyone else to awake and see what there is to see, then pretend to awake myself. To see the guilt, the accusation and a protesting Andrew but I when look in the direction, I realise Andrew will not be able to make any protest over his guilt, today or on any other day as you can when you are still alive. I guess he did take more than me.

They still find the heroin in his water canister and he is shamed in death upon my name.
   It is over.

I wait outside the office, it is my first day.

XIII. Ending A Start With Existentialism
He is there outside the café. A café in Republiqué. Republiqué is where I live. He is smiling to himself like a person with little intelligence. There is no clarity to his face.
   He does not look like a Frenchman. His clothes are bad. Probably English, Finnish or Eastern European. Latvian maybe. Smiling not at me, more to himself but he is looking at me as I arrived at the café lighting my cigarette. Looking just at me. Why?
   I go inside and down to the toilet, make a call that I need to make, urinate, freshen myself up and come back up and take a seat and wait to be served.

As I return his eyes are still locked to the position I had last occupied before I left; as I take my seat they moved round watching me. Staring at me with that same stupid smile, which does not seem for me as a person. But for something else. Or maybe his mind can not help that smile. Something broken.
   This worries me. I do not want to feel bad, so I glare back at him.
   It is then that I realise that he is not looking at me but at something on the table. Probably a thief.
   “You there, what do you look at? What are you doing? Do not think you can steal from me.”
   “Sorry. If you really want to know - it's your lighter.”
   English.
   “You look at my lighter and smile to yourself. Are you an imbecile? You want to steal my lighter. That is it. I see you have one of your own on your own table. Why steal mine. And why are you smiling? Take it if it important to you!”
   “You're ok. Don't worry. It's just I had the same lighter three weeks ago, same model - a Clipper, same colour, grey, you know the same ... for some reason I thought I’d have it with me in Paris now. Stupid, I know. Why think of having a certain lighter with you at any given time in the future. It doesn't make sense. Especially when I lose lighters so stupidly often. This one, the one that looks like the one you have there, I lost it the first day that I bought it. Grey Clipper. Maybe she made it here after all. It's probably just a coincidence. Lighters, I feel, probably do take their own paths. No, thinking about it, it's probably not the same lighter at all. I mean how could it possibly be? A big journey? That's stupid of me. Sorry. Sorry to bother you or look at you. Rude. But who knows? Interesting to think about though, you know, where things come from and where they go to. Where people come from and go. The movement of things.”
   “Yes, interesting,” I say coldly as to stop the conversation. I do not understand what he wants but I also don't want to know.

When I look back what I had said has worked. He has turned away and is now looking into the street. But he still holds that same smile and is now back to his thoughts. They were thoughts after all. He still dresses bad.

After a few minutes this starts to annoy me. I have feel that the conversation does not seem complete. It lacks a conclusion and he seemed happy for it to be this way.
   Before my coffee arrives I say something. He, in his bad clothes and English, and ideas of poor philosophy just because he is in my city Paris. He will not win.

XIV. My Lover (Reprise)
I happened to acquire a new lover, as one would a new lighter. The how, the why, the passing and placement, the chance of coincidence, the befores and afters, well ...

The rest you know.

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