Carmel took a deep breath and sat by her side.
“I stole one of your cigarettes,” Emma said.
Her voice was strange, toneless. She was staring at the television. The television was not on.
“It’s normal,” Carmel said. “A daughter stealing her mother’s cigarettes. I started like that.”
Emma took a deep drag, and pulled her bathrobe closer.
“How was she?” she asked. “My grandmother?”
Carmel shrugged. “A royal bitch. It felt good stealing her cigarettes.”
Emma laughed, a loud, head-thrown-back laugh. She exhaled, and closed her eyes.
Carmel shook a cigarette out of the packet. “What happened, honey?”
“I told Ed it was time he got some balls.”
Her mother froze, the lighter halfway to the tip of her cigarette. “You never.”
“We were at Le Bistrot. Between Jefferson and Main. Very posh place. You need to book with ten days of advance. Forget about it on the weekends. I threw my profitteroles at him. And I told him he needed to get some balls.”
Carmel lit up, slowly, her eyes on her daughter. She took a deep drag, and then took the cigarette between her fingers.
“Now you tell me everything,” she said, her eyes sparkling.
#
“… and I flagged a cab and came home,” Emma finished. She picked up the packet and pulled out two cigarettes. “Last ones,” she said.
Carmel nodded and Emma lit them both, and handed one to her mother. Then she crushed the empty packet.
“You are going to hate me,” Carmel said, “but I told you your beloved Ed was a limp dick.”
Emma scoffed. “Yeah, a limp dick. You don’t know how right you are.”
Carmel nodded, then did a double take. “Oh, shit. You mean—”
She made a pumping motion with her hand.
Emma grinned. “Severely inadequate.”
She tapped some ash off the cig. “And I don’t hate you. You were right. I can see it now. If only—”
She stopped.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
Carmel snorted smoke. “Come on, honey. We are beyond that crap. If only what?”
Emma sucked on her cigarette. “I was thinking—if only you had been here before, you would have set me straight about that limp dick a lot earlier.”
“Would have saved you a lot of faked orgasms, uh?” Carmel said, coldly.
She looked at Carmel, with tears in her eyes. “I’m sorry, I don’t want to make you feel guilty or stuff, but—shit.”
Carmel put her arm around her shoulders and pulled her close. “Don’t, honey,” she said, in a soft voice. “You are right. I was not here when you needed me. And it’s OK to bitch, you have earned the right to. From now on, we will be free to bitch about each other, OK? We are both tough enough to take it, right?”
She took Emma’s hand in hers and kissed her on the wrist.
“So now what’s the plan?”
Emma shrugged. “We go and buy some more cigarettes,” she said.
#
Emma cleared some space in the cupboard for the cigarettes. She had bought two cartons of Camels - Carmel’s brand - and one of Marlboro Midnights, because she thought the black box looked cool. She had smoked two on the way home, and she had liked the menthol taste. On Carmel’s suggestions, she had also bought a box of cigarillos.
“For when you want to feel badass,” Carmel had said.
On their way home they had also stopped at the mall. Carmel had some shopping to do. She bought herself two decks of tarot and a big fat paperback on the subject. They had window-shopped, people staring at the odd couple, the young woman in blouse and slacks, and the big-haired rocker chick.
Emma chuckled and shook her head.
“Listen—”
She turned.
Carmel was standing there, in the tight jeans and Van Halen tee she had been wearing during her shopping tour.
“I’ve got something for you,” Carmel said.
“For me?”
Carmel nodded, and handed her a small box.
“Why—?”
Carmel huffed, irritated. “What the fuck, Em! A mother has a right to give a gift to her daughter, right?”
Emma took the box and undid the bright red ribbon.
“You shouldn’t—” she said.
It was a zippo lighter. Emma took it out of the box, and felt its weight in her hand. It was polished black.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
“Now that you are a serious smoker—” Carmel said, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. “And seein’ you like black—”
Emma frowned. “Black?”
Carmel nodded at the pack of Midnights on the table. “You said the black box was cool.”
Emma looked at the packet of cigarettes, and then at the zippo. Then at her mother. “Yeah,” she said. “I guess I like black.”
She pulled a cigarette from the box and snapped the zippo open. It took her two tries to get it going, and then she inhaled the sweet mentholated smoke.
Holding the smoke down, she leaned closer to Carmel and kissed her on the cheek. “Thank you,” she whispered in her ear.
The doorbell rang.
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