Can smoking kill me?

I took an auto to the station. The bus had not yet arrived so I got a ticket for Dholpurand waited on one of the marble benches, placing my duffle on the ground. The bus stand smelled of diesel and smoke that would often make me barf when I was younger, but today, I inhaled it easily along with the roll of cigarette in my mouth.

There was one benefit of degrading lungs and that was calmness amidst voices in my head and becoming friends with random strangers in need of a lighter, or a cigarette. I took another one out and shoved it into my mouth as I waited for the bus that was running late. A lady with a toddler sat beside me and I had to turn farther away. She didn't seem to mind. The mild scars on her body screamed of other horrors she had faced than the danger of toxic air.

My uncle would be proud to see me like this, or maybe not, since I was a woman. Women are not supposed to smoke. It is against the culture or something that surrounds the pride of family. I guess I left it behind when I took a first sniff at a family function. It was just us kids and one of the guests had left one lit at the coffee table. We all tried a little and only I got the hang of it.

After the initial feeling of choking on thick gas it gave me peace like nothing else had. They said I am a terrible person for smoking but it can’t be too bad to want my head to hurt less, or see the beauty in life after fearing monsters under bed for a long time.

In the near future, I might regret it but so far, I don’t. It makes the day go by fast when I can’t handle it.

Skipping once in a while is good but I am loyal. People in Delhi are inhaling smoke equivalent to ten cigarettes a day without ever touching one.

Some say it can kill you but I was dying way before I bought a pack of smokes from a store that is now closed. The owner, Mr Garg died of a heart attack. He sold tobacco and cigarettes but was a very religious man. He would go on an entire day waterless fast after touching a pack himself. That’s why he had an assistant to hand it over. He only touched the money. He said it was the grace of God but addiction is a sin.

I wonder if God let him know money is an addiction too. I was down two cigarettes when the bus arrived and started to fill up. I pushed my way through and got an empty seat by the window. Moments later an old man came and sat by. I turned my head closer to the window in case the smoke would bother him. He tapped on my shoulder and said, ‘Can I get one?’ I gave him one out of my pocket and lit it up too.

I wondered if that would help me get to heaven or hell. We both enjoyed our cigarettes for a while in silence. A gentleman across from us looked like he could see the spirits leaving our bodies. I would bet that he doesn’t have the voices in his head like me. He went back to his newspaper but his eyes kept coming back to us.

‘Do you want one, sir?’ I asked and he shook his head in disgust.

‘You should be ashamed to smoke as a woman.’

He then turned to the stranger beside me and said, ‘It causes cancer, mister. Don’t you want to live a healthy life?’

Lucky for me I am a woman.