The Ride

A giggle escaped her lips as she sat staring at the cloud of smoke that filled the tiny room. In the corner was a small television, on which an infomercial mumbled  something about carpet cleaner.  Her grey eyes scanned the familiar faces now veiled by the heavy smoke. She saw the small white object emitting all the smoke being passed, puffed on, and passed again.  When it had made its way around the entire circle of six people and came to her she looked at it for a moment before grasping it between her fingers.  1

She continued to look at it for a short while, until she brought it up to her lips and breathed in. She took the smoke deep into her lungs and held it captive while she passed the treasure in her hand along.  She held the smoke in for as long as she could.  When it finally started to tickle the back of her throat she knew she had to let it go. She held on for only a moment longer, then blew it out her. As it escaped her lips she coughed lightly and felt her head get lighter.  The smoke in the enclosed space of the room didn’t help the situation any.  2

She began staring at the man on the television, who was now showing how the carpet cleaner could also be used as detergent. She somehow found this extremely amusing and burst out in a fit of giggles.  Her laughter caused several of the other people to turn and look at her.  Nobody said anything.  They all just smiled at her and continued to watch the strange man on tv.  Some started laughing quietly too.  3

The next time the small white object made it’s round she passed the opportunity to breathe in it’s rich smoke.  She instead began staring at one of the members of the group who had also sat out.  He was entranced by the infomercial that was now repeating itself for the fourth or fifth time. She was almost entranced by the level of contentment he had from just a tv show, and a bad one at that.  Her thoughts began to speed through her mind, each one lingering for only a moment, but each one pronounced with crystal clarity. She knew that if she were to speak that she would get lost in her own words. But when she was thinking about him, about the television, about the small room and everything outside of it, her thoughts were perfectly in tact.  Although she should have been getting tangled up she wasn’t and it felt great.  4

As she was handed the white object she began thinking about smoke and how heavy yet sweet it felt.  She pondered the meaning of life as she inhaled and passed on the formula for her clear thoughts.  As she breathed out the ever-rich smoke she felt contentment seeping into her every pore. She had traveled along a road from normalcy to true happy pleasure to her current state of contentment.  The ride was a pleasant one, that didn’t go too fast or too slow but instead showed her the twists and turns of her own mind. 5

The smoke in the room became a focal point.  She stared at the cloud that menacingly hung over her and wondered how something so dark could possibly be so sweet.  It provoked a great deal of tangents forming in her mind as she inhaled the smoke yet again.6

She sat like this for a long time and finally with the door having been opened and closed several times the smoke was disintegrating.  She was tired of staring at images on the ceiling and after having gotten up walked out of the room gently closing the door behind her.  She came into a large living room where all the furniture was beige leather.  Here she sat down on one of the couches and began mindlessly staring at the television set, this one showing some movie about love.  She didn’t take in any of what was happening because love was most certainly not on her agenda now. On the table in front of her stood a tray with food, from which she picked up a bag of chips and began to munch contently. As another sex-scene came up she continued to stare blankly only now she her thoughts wandered to the topic of sex. However they fled as quickly as the scene ended.  7

After about and hour of aimless thoughts filling her mind while she only-half watched the movie she began to feel tired.  Her hunger fled and so did the buzz. A calm spread over her and all she wanted was to rest. With this calm her ride ended, and she slowly returned to a state of normalcy and to a world which she had successful escaped for several hours. It was evident that it would catch up to her eventually, but she was glad that it caught up to her along with sleep.8