Confrontation

I huddled in my nook, a solitary smoker seeking cover from the rain -- and some inner solace from my own disgusting wretchedness. I slinked deeper into the corner to avoid the rays of sun slowly creeping from the clouds and threatening to singe my leprous, nicotine-ripened flesh. It was then that I spotted her, all purple socks and Birkenstocks, a semi-transparent bag bearing the logo of the local health food store in one hand and a book on tantric vegan cooking tucked beneath one pasty arm.

Her leaky eyes bulged toad-like behind black-rimmed, cat's-eye glasses, and I could smell the sunscreen bubbling from her pores. A huge, wide-brimmed straw hat bearing a red ribbon sat atop her tiny, 1870s schoolteacher head and lank auburn curls rested on her narrow shoulders. She approached me, unpleasant mid-30s eyes straining to disapprove, even as her 12-year-old broom-shaped body struggled against the breeze.

"That's a disgusting habit," she said, pointing to the butt dangling from my lip.

"And how are you today?" I replied, my intestines rumbling at her unprovoked, though not unexpected, verbal assault.

"You're just a slave of the tobacco companies," she insisted, pointing a bony finger at me, a dozen GREENS+ vitamin bottles rattling in the bag around her wrist.

"Live and let live," I say.

"That's just it," she screeched. "You're preventing me from realizing my right to live a full and healthy life free of the toxic chemicals you so wantonly pump into your body." A hideous triumph sprawled across her face. Her narrow chest rose and with a deductive crescendo she added, "Second hand smoke kills."

I twitched involuntarily then, a full-body flutter not unlike the feeling you get when blasted by a particularly bone-chilling wind. She stared at me, the corners of her mouth curling up into what might be construed as a smile, the look a weasel might give a chicken before snatching it from the henhouse. Crooked, off-white teeth poked from her gums at Picasso-like angles and I caught the glimmer of several mercury-amalgam fillings. No vitamin supplement to boost your likelihood of brushing, I thought.

"You're less likely to suffer the ill-effects of cigarette byproducts if you leave my immediate vicinity," I told her as gently as I could, my voice nearly drowned out by the rumblings of a passing semi.

"You should pay more health tax than me," she stated matter-of-factly, ignoring my thoughts about her departure. "Smokers are a burden on the healthcare system."

I lit another smoke and, though full of guilt and self-loathing, stood up tall with shoulders wide, ready to bare the burden of blame.

"Perhaps the astronomical cigarette taxes I already pay should be pumped directly into the healthcare system?" I countered helpfully. "And placed in a special fund that only assists smokers?"

"Well that's not fair..." she began.

"And for you, well, I suppose we could set up a fund that only treats healthy individuals such as yourself, after years of chewing vitamins, visiting holistic healers and inhaling burning oils fails to prevent you from contracting cervical cancer and you need to rush off to a conventional doctor for treatment that's long overdue."

"You're an idiot," she said succinctly and stomped away, her pipe-cleaner body casting no reflection in the store windows as she passed.