Suspicion and a five dollar pack of Camels

We sometimes are intimidated by the sounds we here at night, lying sleepless in our bed wondering if that could be the sound of death rasping over the smoke filled room next door. The subtle coughs in the sleep of our loved one has he takes in the cancer...... He passed out with his Camel full flavored still lit again. You smell the burning of cloth and wonder if you should let him burn now just to save him from the years of cancer treatments you know he is going to have to suffer in only a few short months. Either way he the nicotine addiction is going to be his end. Suspicion crawls in like a worm over a corpse, unnoticed but relevant to the living who have to know that the corpse is deteriorating. You get out of bed and stamp out the death stick and the small hole in the sheet and give the man a kiss on the head, you leaned to deal with this knowing that there is not really anything else you can possibly do. You fought with him for years trying to get him to put it out for good, he even tried once and it about killed you to watch him go into withdraw. The doctors haven't really tagged him with a time just yet but in your head you have accepted the fact that its not long. You blame yourself secretly, maybe you could of fought harder to keep him off when he quite the first time, but when he stopped quitting you felt the relief that you didn't have to deal with the withdraws and jerk like tendencies. Your feel about has flawed has the nicotine itself, harmful yet seemingly helpful. Two years go by and your standing in Church has some priest who barely knew the man says kind words about him and about how he was a loving father, commenting on his good humor. You give a wonderful heart warming speech about how you stuck next to him the whole time fighting with him, but your really relieved the fights over because it was a burden on your life. After the funeral and the hugs and tears your get in your small hybrid car designed to be better for the Ozone and drive to a run down gas station that you know probably waters down their fuel with water, but they are the cheapest gas in town. You walk in and pay for your ten dollars and twenty eight cents in gas and you look behind the shelf and see sitting there, on sale, a five dollar pack of Camel full flavored, you buy the pack and Bic lighter and walk outside. You open the pack and pull out the murder weapon your father used on himself. You want to destroy it like it destroyed your life, tear it up and throw it into the gutter where it belongs. Instead you put the butt of the thing in your mouth with tears running like a leaky faucet and you ignite the other end and inhale deeply...........Does it hurt yet?