…This pompous, arid, wannabe intelligentsia fucker came up asking me what do I read, trying to pigeonhole me in the hierarchy he’s lousy with himself due to having lost his mind trying to pander to for polis points.”she fussed.

I told him…It’s just like…Everything. Ya sad fuck…I. Read. Every. Thing.

…she exhaled rings of smoke from a cigarette she didn’t even have in real time that danced over his head, slid down around his shoulders and held him tight, almost against his will. Almost.

& the only way out for you… that is not jumping too… is for you to start reading for real too. Not for me. For you. To comprehend where YOU are.

“…Or were you crowned the poster boy of it because they knew you’d never publicly model doing it?”she asked him plainly.

His words jammed in his throat as he stood there bewildered by water rushing to his normally callously dry eyes. He knew she was tired of his hovering, paid no attention to his gladhanding or succinct subjugation at all anymore. But he knew she knew it was the only time he got to cry.

She sighed, exasperated. “Stop bitching in fear, only to then angrily look over here. “

Her hand raised to gently graze his chin. A lone tear slid down his botox pricked, strangely sallow cheek. She sighed again. eyes black as night devoured him where he stood, the closest to relief he got these days.

“Just…wake Up-” she whispered before hauling off and smacking the fuck outta him for being there. Again.

He woke up with a start.