Work Text:
June, 2010
Shane Hollander is nineteen years old the first time he smokes.
He is in his apartment next to a propped-open window and coughs so hard that tears well up in his eyes and stream down his face.
He almost quits.
But Shane Hollander is not a quitter, so he feels the burn in his lungs until nothing is left of the cigarette except its butt, which, in a fit of rebellion, has him dropping it from his window and down to the ground below.
As soon as it leaves his fingers, he is standing up and stashing the lighter and cigarette pack into the highest cabinet he has.
He steps into the shower and scrubs his skin red and raw, and he brushes his teeth three times, and why is he crying? He’s not a smoker.
(Why does it feel like the smoke is still clinging to him?)
He smoked one time, he reassures himself.
He’s not a smoker.
(The next time he has dinner with his parents, he is almost certain that they’d smell the smoke on him and know.)
(They don’t.)
October, 2002
Shane Hollander was eleven years old when he first saw a picture of a smoker’s lungs.
All the students in his grade had been called down to an assembly in the auditorium to become properly educated on how exactly smoking impacts the health and well-being of the human body.
The ‘before’ picture slide had shown a perfectly healthy, normal pair of lungs.
The ‘after’ picture slide had the children exclaiming things like, ‘gross!’ and, ‘ew!’ under their breaths.
The essence was obvious. Smoking is bad; don’t do it.
January, 2011
Shane Hollander is nineteen years old the second time he smokes.
He thinks that he coughed a little less than before, since this time he is expecting the kick in his throat. He finishes it off and flicks the butt into the trash can with a warm, fuzzy feeling in his chest, replacing the previous burn.
And of course, someone who has smoked twice in a span of eight months is not a smoker—that’d be ridiculous.
(He adds the remaining nineteen cigarettes in with the first abandoned pack. No one has to know.)
(He does not throw them away.)
October, 2002
Shane had always heard from adults and other, older kids about how smoking blackened the lungs, about all the different diseases you can get from it.
Why would somebody even want to smoke?
Shane would never be a smoker. He would never even touch a cigarette.
May, 2011
Shane Hollander is twenty years old, and he really wants a cigarette right now.
September, 2013
Shane Hollander is twenty-two years old the third time he smokes.
It’s perfect, but he wishes that the aftertaste had lingered a bit longer. He wouldn’t mind.
December, 2008
Smoking is bad. Why does he keep thinking about smoking?
February, 2014
Shane Hollander is twenty-two years old, and even just smelling the smoke would be nice.
May, 2014
Shane Hollander is twenty-three years old the fourth time he smokes.
It burns his throat and lungs, but gives him the rush of nicotine he was after.
It feels so wrong this time, and the smell of smoke is suffocating and he is trying to wash it off, but it won’t go, and it’s just another fucking cigarette, Hollander, suck it up.
Be a man.
(This time, he feels like the butt of a cigarette, used up and tossed carelessly out the window.)
June, 2009
Shane Hollander is eighteen years old when his mother tells him that he will be a role model for children to look up to.
And, obviously, kids don’t idolize smokers.
June, 2014—October, 2016
There are so many cigarettes piling in his cabinet that they’re nearly spilling out.
(Is this an addiction? He’s not a smoker.)
October, 2016
Shane Hollander is twenty-five years old when he smokes his absolute last cigarette.
(He puts it out on his own skin—it hurts, burns, and the smell of singeing flesh is nauseating—but he does it.)
(He has to.)
He was not planning on quitting anytime soon, let alone cold-turkey, but all the smoke seems to have caught up to him, and, oh, god, does he know how fucking bad for him this is? The smoke is rotting his lungs and then he won’t be able to breathe, and he’s throwing all those cigarettes out of the cabinet and into the trash, and he isn’t a smoker, he isn’t a fucking smoker.
Since then, he has started on lollipops and won’t let himself think of cigarettes.
He lets himself believe that the sweet, syrupy flavor is just as good—no, better—than the burn of nicotine in his lungs.
And only after forcing down the candied tang does he allow himself to close his eyes and envision the taste of ash on his tongue.
(He’s not a smoker.)