Story Three: Taller.

Story One. Taller.

I laughed, confused but curious.

            “You boys make no sense to me. What is it?”
            “What?” he replied, eyes squinting through the dimly lit room and the smoke therein. He took another puff of spliff.

            “What are you jealous of? You’re fine!”

            He gave a half-hearted grin, smoke pouring out of his lips. F*****g beautiful thing smoke is. Coming out of a beautiful mouth. There are so many beautiful humans. “Dollface, you don’t know nothin’.”

            He gave a gesture and I took the charred blunt from his fingers. His mouth on mine, indirectly. Half-mouth smile, I coaxed him onward. “Enlighten me.”

            “He’s got things on me, and I’ve got things on him. That’s that. That’s how the world works… But he’s got more things on me.”

            “Like…?” I waited. “Like what, you snitch!” I playfully pushed his shoulder with a stupidly girlish giggle, and blew some smoke right into his face. He laughed back, looking all squinty-eyed in my direction. It was impossible to see the objects that surrounded us. Just us, the couch, and the flaming rolled paper. 

            “Oh come on, he’s taller than me. He’s got the vocabulary and wit. He’s red-headed.” I giggled more and more, while passing on the last hit. I didn’t let him grab it, instead I stuck the un-charred bit into his mouth, and felt him inhale through my tips. He choked for a second, coughing for thirty seconds as I laughed and laughed.

            “You’re absurd! All of you! Men. Even the good ones make no f*****g sense.” Ashtray. Smoke, defused. I felt like a fire-fighter. I save all the lives. For a moment, I imagined there were little bity people in that ashtray, cheering me on as I put out the house fire with my bare hands. What tiny idiots! I giggled so hard my lungs ache.

            He grabbed my hand, getting serious. He can’t stop the giggles, though. The more serious his face looks, the more I laughed and laughed and can’t stop laughing. He knows it, too, and I can tell he’s doing it on purpose. His face is often so serious, so blank, but he’s always laughing inside. Jokes and jokes, I laughed and laughed and laughed.

            “He’s jealous of you too, you know. He tells me. Go on, then, what do you have on him?”

            He leaned in close. Closer and closer, but I don't worry. I knew he wasn't going to kiss me. I'd never allow it. Not even with the intoxicatingly beautiful smoke in the air, in our lungs… not even with the poison running through our blood and our livers and our kidneys. Not even.

            “Well I can dance.”

            And just when I’d straightened my face out --  I giggled harder than before.

            “Girl, you know I can!” I laughed and laughed. “Fine, I got muscles. Or whatever. Look at this six-pack, mmm!” He pulled up his shirt, patting his stomach and producing a delightfully grotesque fap sound. “Not like it means anything, though, does it? Not when you’ve got the smallest penis in the world.” I busted up, gone in a cloud of hazy smoky laughs.

            We had been joking around, earlier, about size. Does size matter? Is bigger better? Who can say. So he decided to give me a scenario. “I’ve got the f*****g smallest penis! In the whole wide world, dollface. Now do you want me?” He broke a smile, and I stuck out my tongue.

            “Smallest in the world,” I agreed, and I leaned back into the couch, letting it envelope me. 

Now, I am in wonderland. I close my eyes and I see purple triangles.

We sit in silence, enjoying our own smiles for a while. Then I look over at him. “You do know it doesn’t matter, right?”

“That it’s the smallest?”

I shake my head. “No, all that stuff you boys do. Comparing, contrasting. It doesn’t matter.”

 He smiles back. "Sure thing, dollface. Sure thing."