I used to find smoking repulsive. I couldn't fathom why someone would put something so toxic in their bodies, knowing the consequences. Knowing it was slowly killing them. At least, that was until I felt the killer crawl down my throat and make it's home in my lungs.

The burn of that first drag made me feel something other than numb. The faint light headed sensation made my stresses seem to fade to the background. I liked the way it hurt my lungs, and when I adjusted, I loved the sensation of the murderous chemicals swirling around in my once clean lungs. Corrupting them and slowly starting to bring them to the same blackened state my mind seemed to be in.

I finally understood what smokers meant when they said it was addictive as I brought the third cigarette to my lips and lit it, not caring that I'd accidentally burned my thumb. My mind was ignoring everything, just focusing on my slow intake of breath, the pleasant new sensations, and the slow exhale. In and out, that's all my mind could manage right now. Everything else felt irrelevant and pointless.

After leaving school, I'd wandered throughout the streets I'd called home for sometime now. I watched people rake their lawns and jog past me. I watched the crossing guard guiding along elementary students with a pleasant smile on his face as they chattered like birds and flit about animatedly about god knows what.

All the while, no one looked at me, and I didn't do a thing to bring attention to myself. I wondered how I could see into so many lives just by looking around. I wondered first why I could look around and see how happy they all are, but not one could look at me and see the sadness brewing just behind the mask I wore. Then, I wondered why it is everyone but myself was happy at all. What was there to be happy about? Life sucked. People sucked. The god damned economy sucked! Everything couldn't be grand in all their lives. So how did they find it in them to smile and look so put together?

It was wrong, but I despised them suddenly. I hated them for being stronger than me. For having it easier than me. For being the ones who tore down my innocent brother. For smiling when my life felt like it was falling apart. For being happy in general when I couldn't stop questioning why I was even alive. I was merely a show dog, a toy. I had no real purpose other than to be everyone's damned puppet. My brother, dear Skyy, was the only person who treated me like a human being and with him gone, why on earth was I still here?

Not wanting to be around people anymore, I made my way down an old back road and found sanctuary in an old little underpass that Sky and I used to come to; to get away from out life for a little while. I sat where I remember sitting the last time the two of us visited our little spot. Staring blankly at the space that once held his beautiful presence, I had pulled out that first smoke.

By the time the third smoke was down to the filter, I flicked it away from me and found myself growing tired. I close my eyes, wanting to imagine that Skyy was here with me, the two of us just sitting in silence like we often would, just enjoying each other's presence and adoring the lack of noise. An ache began to grow in my heart, because it knew the pathetic truth, but my mind refused to listen. Right now, it wanted to truly believe he could be here with me. Just one last time.

"The hell are you doing in here?" A voice says out of no where, making me jump and shattering the illusion.

Angered, I turned in the direction of the voice and saw a girl standing there with a single pierced brow lifted, "Do you mind? I thought it looked pretty fucking obvious I didn't want to be bothered."

Her downward tilted lips pulled up into a slight smirk, making her dark red lips look almost wicked in nature when combined with her narrowed emerald eyes. "Name's Maya, and you would be?"

"I would be telling you to fuck off, princess," I snapped.

Instead of answering, or looking offended in the slightest, she lazily sauntered over and sat next to me, sitting cross legged and pulling out a pack of smokes before lighting up. I watched in confusion as she just sat there silently smoking as though it was normal to just suddenly find company in a stranger.

She was a strange looking girl. In an obvious manor, she was very attractive, but she had a careless aura about her. She wore a black hoodie and pajama bottoms that had little images of zombified cupcakes. It was when you saw the deviance in her smile and the mischief in her eyes that you knew there was far more to her. This Maya girl had me intrigued and maybe that's why I allowed her to continue sitting with me. If it wasn't the reason, I was beginning to really question my sanity.

"Why are you here?" I ask, lighting yet another smoke.

She turned and lifted an annoyed brow at me as she blew a puff of a smoke at me, "I didn't think it was wrong for a girl to come sit in the dirt in the middle of butt fuck nowhere with a stranger."

"It might be if that stranger blatantly told you to fuck off," I muttered.

She shrugged and took another drag off her cig, "Get over it already. If you were that bothered you'd have got up and left so quit your bitching, or leave."

I rolled my eyes and leaned back against the concrete wall, closing my eyes and ultimately blocking her out. I came to be alone and be a pessimistic piece of shit, not have some unrefined, blunt bitch come and give me a hard time. For as long as I could remember, no one but Skyy and I came here and so why is she here now?

"Look, when you feel like talking, call me," She sighed, shamelessly slipping a piece of paper into my front pocket. "Don't call me if you're in a bitchy mood like today though. Seriously, you're such a buzz kill."

"My brother died you bitch," I growl, standing and throwing a glare in her direction.

She gives me that smirk that throws me off again and makes me wonder just what the hell she knows, "I'm aware. Skyy was a friend of mine."

My eyes widen at her words. Skyy? Friends with her? I could laugh at the mere idea. Skyy was all light and happiness and so full of life. This girl was dark and deviant and reminded me of a viper the way she could get under your skin with that sharp tongue of hers. Made me wonder what he would possibly get out of a friendship with her.

"My brother would never be friends with someone like you. To be quite frank, you're a bitch who has a serious attitude problem and a poor understanding of social conduct," I said bluntly.

Her sly smirk became an actually grin as my words reach her and she gets up herself and steps backwards lazily as she says something that would stay in mind for the rest of the night, "He warned me about you. Who knew that someone who looks so much like him, could be so damn different. Makes you wonder who the real failure twin was, hmm?"

With that, she was gone and I was left standing there, unsure of what I was meant to do next. What did she mean by that? How dare she act like she knew my brother more than me. Stupid, stupid girl.

Angered and exhausted, I dragged my sore and lifeless self out from the underpass and call Matthew to come pick me up. All I wanted to do was forget this day ever happened and disappear into my room and into bed and pretend that for just a while, life wasn't so hard to handle and I wasn't slowly falling apart. Realizing bitterly that I may not have known Skyy as much as I had once thought.

I didn't need to satisfy you with a response Maya, because I was fully aware who the true failure was. Skyy was perfect, and I couldn't comprehend how I deserved to live, and he was cornered into death. He was the light in my life, and the light isn't meant to die.

It should have been anyone but you, Skyy.

 It should have been me.