“He lit another cigarette and inhaled deeply, the tip flaring an angry red. “Isn’t love a beautiful goddamn liar?”

“Not Really," he said then lit a cigarette and handed it to me. I inhaled. Coughed. Wheezed. Gasped for breath. Coughed again. Considered vomiting. Grabbed the swinging bench, head spinning, and threw the cigarette to the ground and stomped on it, convinced my Great Perhaps did not involve cigarettes.”

“I'm trying to quit,” he said. “Just so you know.” He lit the cigarette and inhaled so long and so deep it sounded like air being let out of a tire.”

“I love her handbag. Inside are papers and her wallet and cigarettes and at the bottom, where she never looks, there is loose change, loose mints, specs of tobacco from her cigarettes. Sometimes I bring the bag to my face, open it and inhale as deeply as I can.”

“So what’d you do to the lesser?” a male voice said. “I lit his cigarette with a sawed-off,” another one answered. “He didn’t come down for breakfast, you feel me?”

“Beth,” he whispered. “Come back to me.”He brought more of his blood to her.“Damn it, don’t you die!” Candles flared in the room. “I love you, damn you! Goddamn you, don’t you let go!”