“Spirits” by Sonia Bhojani
The first Spirit needed to be flipped upside down. My friend told me that, in China, they flip one over and smoke that cigarette last. Then, you make a wish on it. So, my first Spirit was destined to be my last.
The second Spirit fell out of my case. I was wearing gloves a size too big, and in my effort to take one out, it fell from grace rather dramatically. I debated on picking it up and obeying the five-second rule, but by the time I had decided, the five seconds had passed. And there was an ant by it. I reached for the third Spirit and smoked that one, mourning its fallen colleague.
The fourth Spirit I smoked outside Tisch. It’s fun to people-watch outside Tisch. You’ve got a bunch of weird fashionable fabulously pretentious people right in front of you, and as the nicotine buzz hits me, I remember that I, too, have my pretentious moments. It’s oddly sobering. As I came to the end of it, feeling like I was going to faint, I stubbed the cigarette out on the wall, drawing a little smiley face in ash.
The fifth Spirit went with the sixth and the seventh. On my way back from work, an older woman asked me for a cigarette. Her friend came up beside her. Called me adorable. They somehow gleaned three cigarettes from me. I didn’t mind—that was my good deed for the day. God must smile down on me because she pulled out three bucks. I’m going to put that money in my tattoo fund.
The eighth Spirit, I debated on it heavily. If I were to go smoke outside, I’d get frostbite or something. If I smoked inside, everything would smell like smoke. I decided to smoke it right by the window, which didn’t work the way I’d hoped. Everything smelled like smoke, no matter how much Bath and Body Works perfume I sprayed. When I woke up the next morning, it somehow smelled normal. I’d pay that price again.
The ninth Spirit went into my former roommate’s pocket. We did a cigarette trade, which meant I ended up with a Camel Crush. I considered that a minor loss.
The tenth Spirit, I was stoned and outside and figured I’d kill my lungs further. I sat on the stoop outside my old place and puffed away. I felt a burning sensation on my ankle—the ash had straight up burned a hole in my pajama pants. I frantically put it out the best I could. There’s still a medium-sized hole in my purple pants. Sometimes the cauterized edges of the hole brush up against my ankle, and I remember this night fondly.
The eleventh Spirit was smoked in Union while I was with a friend. Two dudes came up and invited us to a Diddy party. They made a baby oil joke. How many times can I say no before they leave us alone? It’s times like this I wish I could push people over.
The twelfth Spirit burned the ends of my hair. I was puffing away outside the AMC by Third North, and the wonderfully deceptive wind did its thing. I was quite panicked at first, but then I just decided to stick my hair in my mouth. Water beats fire. It worked. My hair’s all fucked up anyways, so you wouldn’t be able to notice the burned part.
The thirteenth Spirit, a guy in Wash asked me for. Told me he’d been looking for one of these all day. Here you go, man. I didn’t want to smoke unlucky thirteen anyways.
The fourteenth Spirit was almost a repeat of the eighth. I was this close to smoking it inside and then I remembered the tenet of common decency. I went outside this time and listened to the My Chemical Romance / The Used cover of “Under Pressure.” I think I reached flow state.
The fifteenth Spirit, I was feeling ambitious towards. I decided to smoke a joint and a cigarette at the same time. I fear that I had nothing better to do that day. There was a lot of coughing. I enjoy the feeling of a dying, shriveling lung. I’m definitely quitting this year.
The sixteenth Spirit was smoked with my ex-boyfriend. Bro wanted to meet up and go to 7th St Burger. Now, who am I to disagree if I haven’t eaten all day? He sat there and smoked his Marlboro, which burned out a lot faster than mine. It felt good to win. Even if my opponent was an alcoholic finance bro. Then I realized I was with my ex, and things had gotten shitty enough. I figured I might as well go ahead and smoke the seventeenth as well.
The eighteenth Spirit kept getting rained on. I was more protective of it than I was of myself. In Florida, a pack is like seven dollars. I can’t afford the New York prices, and if no one was asking me for a cig I refused to lose one. I could see the raindrops hitting it, making the white paper a translucent gray. I kept having to re-light it all the way home.
The nineteenth Spirit is the topic of debate. Should I quit vaping and only smoke, or should I quit smoking and only vape? I can’t go cold turkey; I know that much. Other than the one time a guy wanted to pay me a dollar to hit my vape in the West Village, I’ve never had interactions from strangers regarding my vape. And I like being interacted with. I like being charitable. I like giving cigarettes to people who need them, and the few times I’ve needed one and not had one, the universe smiles back at me and places a generous person in my path. Or I could just do both. I like the flavor of tobacco, but it’s winter. And every time I want a hit, I can’t just go outside and freeze to death. The toughest decision in the world, even tougher than choosing a song to go with your Instagram story. What calamity.
The twentieth Spirit was nearly unsmokeable. With only two cigs in the case, and the case in the last pocket of my backpack, my dumb ass has been sitting on it and effectively crushing it. I look at it and sigh. It looks like a limp-dick, its body smushed thin like a soggy grape and the end curving over slightly. I poke and prod it a bit before deciding it’s been fixed enough. I’m just lazy.
The twenty-first Spirit is the first. It’s spent a lot of time upright, so I’ve been seeing its brown tobacco leaves every time I open the case. It feels wrong, like I’m looking at the cigarette’s undergarments. I turn it around in my hand slowly. The last one, kind of. I have a blue pack on my desk—it’s not as yummy as the yellow pack, but it’ll do. I can’t forget to make a wish. I usually just wish for “all good things” and call it a day. God, this is a hard decision.
Let me smoke a cigarette real quick and ruminate on it.
Sonia Bhojani is an NYU film student who enjoys writing in all its forms. She has written one dramatic short and one feature length satirical horror script, as well as many poems and academic papers. She hopes to become a successful author someday and is currently working on her first novel, an LGBTQ horror romance told from an unreliable, obsessive narrator. She has a poem and a paper getting published in the next year and cannot wait for her first small successes!
