It's Just a Cigarette

Trigger Warning : Abuse

A quiet zephyr blew from the West, dismissing the stifling smoke into the air. Once again, the atmosphere smelled like Christmas. Not the gingerbread cookies and crackling fireplace type of Christmas, but ghastly cold and empty plates type of Christmas.

There was no laughter and lively chatter, just an envelope of cold air that pierced through one's lungs and six inches deep of white blanket coating the entire countryside.

It was a particularly dark night, for the gleaming moon wasn't present. It was new moon. A chance for new beginnings, hope and a little bit of miracles, but miracles had never happened for the Aetos siblings.

A girl in an unruly school uniform with twigs in her hair sat in the middle of a barren tree trunk, waving her legs recklessly into the air.

'It's just a cigarette, Thomas, it's not that bad! Besides, you used to smoke all the time!' she snapped. Her warm brown eyes radiated a kind of serenity, but it was concealed by the wrath in her soul. 

'I was different back then,' Thomas said from the bottom of the tree. 'You know grandpa died because of that thing. It's a silent killer, Lilith.' Why couldn't she just climb down already? It was half-past 11 and if they were to be caught outside their dormitory, it would be the end for the two of them. 'Please, Lilith, you must be freezing up there!'

'I'm not scared of the cold, the cold is scared of me,' Lilith said, rolling her eyes. 'Anyways, you speak as if we're going to live a long life,' she snorted. 'Tommy, we'll probably be dead before next year.'

Thomas could see that she didn't mean it- Lilith never thought before she spoke. However, at that moment, a surge of energy entered his body, telling him she was correct. What was a cigarette in comparison to the horrors they had faced throughout his fifteen years of life?

'Fine, do what you want, but I'm going back inside!' Thomas said. He was so tired of her attitude. He was so tired of virtually everything. It didn't help that Lilith had those dark circles around her eyes, and cuts on her arms. He wasn't mad at her, not really. He was mad at the universe.

Stomping on the deep snow, Thomas began to walk back to his dormitory. The stars above him twinkled in glee, but he was furious at them. How could anyone, anything be so happy when he was dying inside?

'Wait, Tommy!'

Thomas did not stop, nor did he turn around. 'Don't bother,' he grumbled.

'Alright fine! I'll throw the whole pack away if that's what you want!' she said, waving her arms madly around, but Thomas knew better.

'What do you want?' he said. Never in his life had his sister give in to something without wanting another in return.

'Let's run away,' she said. Suddenly, the air seemed to drop a further five degrees.

'We can't do that,' he replied. In all honesty, the very thought had been there in the back of his mind since their parents died earlier that year, but he never got about to scratch the itch.

'Of course we can!' she persisted.

Before Thomas could further complain, a deep husky voice called out from behind him, sending a chill down his spine. 

'Thomas? Lilith? What are you doing outside?' the voice snarled.

Lilith looked at her brother, eyes wide in horror and dropped the cigarette she was holding. 'N-nothing father! The headmaster called us and we were just going back to the dormitory!' she lied, stepping frantically on her cigarette.

Every hair on Thomas's skin stood. How was it possible? His father had most certainly died in the crash, but then again, that voice was his.

The two scurried off to their dormitories, determined to run away as quickly as possible from the man. However, Thomas was as awake as an owl that night. Right when the first light of day broke in from the loose curtains, he threw off his blanket and got dressed to meet his sister in the breakfast hall.

'I figured it out, that wasn't father, it was obviously uncle James!' she tugged his blazer, helping herself to some porridge.

'What's he doing here?' Thomas whispered. Uncle James was the opposite of their father. They say identical twins share a mind, but father was a tyrant, and uncle James was the only one who had ever defended them.

Images of his father's tall figure grabbing a belt flashed through Thomas's eyes. His mother crying, his sister begging for the beatings and shoutings to stop and Thomas himself staring blankly at the blood on his back.

The worst thing? Nobody believed them.

When they were sent to St. Joseph's School for Troubled Children, he thought things would get better, but of course, it didn't. Nevertheless, at the very least, the scars on his back were healing. 

'I don't know! Maybe he wants to take us in?' suggested Lilith, her voice croaky. 'Also, about last night-.'

'Attention everyone, I have an announcement,' a voice boomed, interrupting Lilith. 'All students caught out of bed by 10 will serve a month in detention and six months in kitchen and cleaning duty,' the headmistress said, her eyes darting towards them. 'And if anyone is planning to run away, understand that we will inform the authorities to search far and near immediately and bring you back here, where the punishment will be even more severe.'

Thomas heard her sister gasp. He too, felt that way. There was an unnerving menace in the headmistress's words, but Thomas realised something more. 'The punishment will be even more severe'. Those words replayed again and again in his mind ominously, for those were the exact words his father threatened him with when he found brochures on train rides in his room. It was as if the headmistress was being controlled by the ghost of his father. Or could it be something more?

'God bless you all,' she closed the announcement, but God had never been with Thomas. For all he knew, God was dead, and the devils roamed Earth, living inside some people's souls.

'Lilith, I'm with you, let's run away,' Thomas turned to her.

'What?' Lilith asked. 'But uncle James?'

'That's not uncle James, that's father, and we're doomed,' he said in a whisper. His heart started beating faster and adrenaline rushed through every inch of his body. He had never said it before, but he figured it was time he told his sister, even though he knew it would break her. 'Because I was the one who arranged the car crash to kill him,’ he said all in one breath. A weight had been lifted off his chest, and yet, he could still feel the deep abyss of sinister darkness at the bottom of his guts.

The horror in his sister's eyes was crushing. He knew it wasn't because her father was dead, but rather because her brother, the person she had looked up to and depended upon her entire life, was a murderer. Even then, Thomas didn't feel any regret. He didn't feel sad, he didn't even feel scared. Hell, he didn't feel anything, and he hadn't for a very long time.

He wanted to tell her he had to do it for both his and her sake, but he didn't get to, because a hand squeezed his shoulder from behind him.

A very familiar feeling.

A very firm grasp.

A very cold hand.

'What was that, Thomas?' his father asked him.