[tw: smoking, a minor assists an adult partake in their addiction & vice versa, same minor also partakes]
"interlude - sweet"
.
the taste of summer on a humid day before the rain falls. (or, drought cometh 'fore the flood.)
THE WORLD USED TO be filled with sweetness.
Bianchi feasted on cakes and drank fruit water flavored with lemon wedges or diced strawberries, pretending it was tea, from delicate cups set on gloss-glazed saucers. Cook would cut oranges into perfect slices and carve shapes out of melons and mangos. Uncles, the men in dark suits who were usually around her father, would sit at her round little table in chairs much too small for them and dutifully sip "tea" with their pinkies out.
She laughed a lot and smiled even more.
Even when things weren't so sweet, it was alright because the garden was always there for her. As a safe haven, an exploration zone... home.
...
[sweet]
an INTERLUDE
...
MAMMA AND PAPA CARED FOR HER, but they weren't really around. Not like how the uncles or the maids were. Bianchi was never really alone, but she was mostly left to her own devices. She turned to stories and her imagination during the times she was lonely, which was often.
Uncle Toni indulged her the most out of all of them. He was present in a way few were. He talked with her, played along with her games, and allowed her to braid his bangs, the longest section of his hair, like he was a living doll.
But the highlight of spending time with Uncle Toni was when he would let her amuse herself with his lighter.
It was a beautiful shiny silver thing that made a wonderful "clink" and "clunk" sound. She would stare at the little flame, entranced by the way it danced.
Clink.
Uncle Toni was a smoker. He carried a full pack of cigarettes on him at all times and by the end of the day, it would be empty. Mamma chided him for the habit and wrinkled her nose whenever he lit the tip of a stick up and brought it to his mouth.
Clunk.
He didn't smoke around Bianchi. Not usually. But sometimes, his fingers would twitch and his knees would jump and his shoulders would shake. It wasn't noticeable, not really, but if Bianchi was being held by him she could feel it. The way he would tremble.
It scared her.
"Bring it here, rosa," he'd rasp.
She would blink and obligingly shuffle closer.
He'd fumble around in his pockets for the box with little white sticks lined up neat in a row and flip the lid open with his thumb. Drawing one at random, he'd set it between his teeth, then lean forward. He had playful eyes, rich and dark. His slow (deliberate) movements should have been accompanied with drowsy eyes, but they were alert instead. Feverish in their intensity on the lighter.
That scared her too.
Clink.
She'd flick the gear until a flame flared. Hold it to the end of the rolled cigarette and watch it take. The paper crinkles and burns, blackened to the color of charcoal. Uncle Toni would close his eyes with the first puff, his whole body settling. He'd relax and exhale smoke, like a slumbering dragon.
Clunk.
She asked him once before. If she could try it.
Bianchi didn't like the smell, it made the back of her throat itch something awful. But Uncle Toni acted like it was the easiest breath of air he'd ever taken, even if he coughed, and she was curious.
He refused.
Shook his head and patted the top of hers and told her she could when she was older, but not now.
And that was that.
Except—
On her fourth birthday she goes to sleep and dreams and lives and dies and wakes up. Wakes up and the world was the same, but she was different. No longer sweet.
And she, Bianchi, didn't know what to do. Everything was twisted up and messy. The healer, the traitor, the dreams (memories?), it hurt, it hurt, it all hurt. (She didn't want this.) The world she'd known had changed somehow. She had changed somehow.
She asks him again after.
He must see something familiar in her eyes. Her desperation to breathe.
She was still scared. The fear just felt distant and numbed now.
Clink.
This time, they both tremble.
Clink.
This time, they are both feverish.
Clink.
This time, the cigarette is set between her teeth and she breathes in cloudy smoke.
Clunk.
"Ni-co-tine," Uncle Toni sounds out for her, and, "Just this once, Bianchi."
"Nicotine," she whispers and slumps against his chest. "Okay."
Her head feels foggy. She cries quietly and takes gasping breaths, clutching at the cigarette. Uncle Toni strokes her hair. He doesn't look down, just hums and stares off into the distance, white stick burning at the end in his mouth.
.
Bianchi used to be sweet.
Then, she reached the bottom of her sugared cup and drained its bitter contents dry. Until she too was empty.
notes:
bianchi, my sweet summer child, ily. i'd say it'll get better but- at least there's some crumbs of comfort to go along with the hurt lol?
.
uncle toni came swerving out of nowhere to crash the party. his part in the story up until, yesterday, was a single throwaway line in the next chapter, now he's got a personality and the honor(? role?) of being bianchi's favorite "uncle."
uncle toni's great. even with the whole letting a FOUR YEAR OLD SMOKE thing. i wrote it, but whAT ARE YOU DOING, UNCLE TONI? 👀
EXTRAS
title: "sweet"
readers: oh, fluff
me: ... yeah, sure, let's go with that :)
.
uncle toni: chain-smoking
bianchi: "can i try?"
uncle toni: "HA- no."
-10 seconds later-
trauma: "hey~ bianchi~ remember~ me~?"
bianchi:
bianchi: "uncle toni?"
trauma: "oh, toni's here too? hi toniiiii-"
uncle toni: takes a slow drag of his 5th cigarette and silently passes it to bianchi
bianchi: blows smoke into trauma's face
uncle toni: "atta girl"