A passage from a book I never wrote:

I smoke Marlboro cigarettes by the Chelsea River and no one knows my name. I see a women through a narrow passageway. She has light brown, wispy hair and a half crooked smile. Her intense brown eyes sparkle under the midsummers moonlight. She reminds me of my mother when I stare at her from afar. I bask in the weather's warm embrace as I smoke my third cigarette in under an hour. I don’t know why I keep smoking so much cause I can’t even handle all the nicotine. I then look at the water as it flows in the riverbed as I contemplate how I got here even in the first place. I contemplate why I smoke cigarettes, how the flavor of Marlboro reds hit the back of my throat like a shotgun, loud and difficult to swallow. It seems in my life I’ve always been the best at gulping down the pain. Like when my mother died or that boy I loved broke my heart. I’ve lived so many lives that I can’t differentiate the different types of pain I have felt, they all feel the same. I think to myself that’s...