Writing Practice

Jame Part Two

I was smoking a (few) cigarette(s). And I was angry. I'll tell you, but hang on. I need another cigarette. I placed another and also another cigarette between my lips before I started my monologue. Not because I needed them but because the other three were getting lonely up there, and the cigar beside them wasn't much company.

So yeah. I was pissed off at god. And how he hates women. And how women's hygiene products aren't tax-free because the government also hates women. And how women hate women and men hate women and women hate themselves. And also that my partner was just shot and bled himself to death like an idiot.

I'm 6'1" by the way which is the one thing I wasn't pissed about. But my cigar was beginning to piss me off. Bro was complaining that there was only one of him and four of them. I lit another cigar and put it beside him. There. That would shut him up.

I was covered in smoke. The world was going up in smoke. My dead wife was smoke-ing hot. My partner, after he got shot and was dying in my arms, said that this job wasn't nothin' but smoke and mirrors.

He'd said--he grabbed me by the shoulders and nearly broke my arms off he was so close to death and desperate and close to tears (respectfully).

For a second, he even actually thought I was his son like the bozo he was which was kinda ridiculous because his son was long dead and not even slightly as cute as me, honey. I guess maybe he was seeing his ghost or maybe he was already dead despite his nonstop post-mortem yabadabadoodling?

I don't know. What am I? Some kind of detective?

...

That's me staring melancholically into the metaphorical and also literal mirror, as I come to terms with the fact that I am the some kind of detective and I am. Thanks for asking.

Either way it was actually quite dismal to watch, to be real honest with you, he looked up at me and said, he says to me, "This job AINT nothin' but smoke and mirrors. We kill them, they kill us, ain't nothin' being done about nothin' and nobody doing nothin' about nobody and nobody doing nothin' about nothin' and nothin' doing nobody about nothin' and so on and so forth, you get the picture, my boy." Says he, "We're trying to save this corrupt world when we already know deep down, kid, that it was beyond saving long before us." He said, said he, and that was The Situation™️ he said, as he was dying and also speaking. That's what he said anyway.

Bro was monologuing for an embarrassingly long time considering I'd stopped listening after that, so I'll keep his yabadoodles short in my memory. It could cover a couple pages he went on for so long. Not that I would know. As I had stopped listening. He'd been shot in the leg, and it took him forever to finally bleed out.

If I'd had better aim, I would've shot him in the head and gotten it over with. But I had to wait there for hours for the poor bastard to join his ghostly son in the ghostly realm or what-have-you.

That was when I found myself in front of the goon that tried to shoot us out. He was standing there, gun in hand, blood soaking through his shirt, blurry and floating like a ghost in a plume of smoke.

It had to be my partner's dead ghost son. Maybe he came for me too. By golly geez, I was shaking so hard in my boots I had to take another hit off my cigarettes and cigars, of course, but holy gosh golly geez they weren't helping.

He looked like me. Except not 6'1", of course. And not as cute. But he had that lost look in his eyes. The same look in mine.

Like he didn't know what he was shooting for. One man's corruption is another man's salvation, after all. Or something, I don't know. What am I? Some kind of detective?

God fucking damn it.

And I stood there looking at him. And he looked at me. I stepped closer, willing to die for whatever the fuck. He did the same.

It wasn't until he raised his gun, the same as mine and the same time as me, that I realized just that.

Smoke and mirrors? Damn right smoke and mirrors. We were in a mirror shop. And the corrupt, lost boy was me. And we were both smoking eight cigarettes and two cigars at once, hence the smoke.

And he was 6'1" by the way. And he was fucking stunning, alright. Because he was me. And I was him. And neither of us knew what we were shooting for.

I pulled the trigger.

I lived, of course because I'm monologuing to you. I just forgot for a second that I had already realized I was looking in a mirror. I mean, the kid was so convincing. Guess I'm a good liar. Guess I'm the smoke in the mirror.

So yeah. I'm alive but like I'm pretty pissed about it. And my partner is dead but he's not pissed. Because he's dead. I'm pissed on his behalf. Pissed at myself for shooting him and pissed at him for allowing himself to get shot when he could've just like bit the bullet? And swallowed it? And avoided any danger I may or may not have put him in?

I guess he wanted to finally be reunited with his dead ghost son. And maybe there is or there ain't no such a thing as guh-guh-guh-ghosts.

What do I know? What am I? Some kind of detective?