Young God [GirlxGirl]

8. Dark Side Of The Moon

And if you're still breathing, you're the lucky ones // 'Cause most of us are heaving through corrupted lungs // Setting fire to our insides for fun // Collecting names of the lovers that went wrong // The lovers that went wrong // Youth, Daughter

"I could have just made her forget all about it."

Shortly after Ash was able to calm Violet down, Blake had located her keys from the bottom of her bag and had swung the car door open. And when she saw that Violet was now fine, she'd demanded to get some answers. Such as an explanation for Violet's sudden breakdown. However, Violet wasn't ready to confess everything to Blake, so she spun another web of lies and claimed that being linked to Ash's emotions was just a little overwhelming and would take some getting used to.

Violet couldn't tell if Blake believed her or not, but she eventually convinced her best friend to get to class and trust that she would be fine. So Blake had shot Ash an especially deadly glare and left the pair alone in the parking lot.

"Like I said, I don't want you in her head anymore." Violet said, as she sat down on the knee-high brick wall surrounding the perimeter of the lot and began to rummage around in the pockets of her bomber jacket. The task proved especially difficult since her fingers were still slightly trembling, but soon enough she located what she had been looking for and pulled out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter. Ash watched with some curiosity as Violet proceeded to place a cigarette between her lips, spark an open flame, and shield it from the breeze with a cupped hand as she lit the brown and white paper.

Ash crinkled her nose. "That thing reeks of disease. What is it?"

"This," Violet said as she blew a cloud of pungent smoke from her mouth. "Is a means of making my life shorter."

Once upon a time, Violet would have shared Ash's disgust at such things. Her father used to smoke several times a day, and Violet would always encourage him to try and give it up. She thought it was a nasty habit, and one that would end up killing her father. But then he died, and looking back, Violet saw her constant worrying and nagging as a waste of the words she could have said to her father instead. Like I love you. Violet knew she hadn't said it enough.

And then, just a few days after the funeral and shortly before Violet was due to leave for London, she found a pack of her dad's cigarettes on the mantelpiece along with his lighter. She'd inhaled the bitter smoke and thought of him. Her lungs and throat burned and she thought of him. She blew the smoke out through her open mouth and thought of him. And then, she let the cigarette shrink right down to the stub and burn her fingertips, and the pain made her think of him.

Ever since then she'd buy the same brand of cigarettes each week, and refill her father's engraved lighter whenever the fuel ran low. And each time she invited a breath of poison into her body, she'd run her fingers over the cool metal of the lighter, over the initials of her father's name, and she would think of him.

"Making your life shorter? Why in the world would you want to do that?" Ash asked, bemused by the notion.

"Well I wouldn't want to make it any longer, that's for sure." Violet mumbled, before flicking some ash from the end of her cigarette onto the ground and watching the embers die out.

"Why did you wait until Blake left until you lit it?" Ash asked, picking up on the way Violet had clearly waited until Blake was inside the building. "Doesn't she approve?"

"It's not that she doesn't approve. She just doesn't know about it." Violet replied nonchalantly. And though it was true that Blake didn't know of Violet's dirty habit, she had no doubt that if she found out about it then she most certainly would not approve.