random love.

his story.

he sits quietly still at 3 am in an inconspicuous burger joint that was bathed by the sodium light's yellow. for an observer, he seemed to be deep in his thoughts, pensive even, his stillness disturbed only by his occasional cigarette puffs. he was a marlboro lights guy, and the ashes have accumulated because he was too busy to even dust off the gray remnants of his death stick.

he thinks about what happened earlier that night. the loud music. matronas. parloristas. the suffocating smell of semen, saliva and cigarette smoke. the red light. his naked and oiled body. his gyrating. his skimpy underwear. the glaring light bouncing off of his chest. his glistening moment.

he gives it a thought and he realizes that he's been in the circuit for 3 years already. he takes a long drag from his cigarette one last time before he throws it away. his thoughts drift further into the repository of his memories.

her story.

she arrives at the burger joint for her regular cheeseburger fix. holding a cigarette on one hand while clasping her pointy heels with her other hand, she asks him if the seat beside him was taken. upon his motioning that it was not, she got comfortable in the empty chair. she fished for her philipp morris pack from her bag, and upon tearing the pack open, she lit her 11th cigarette for the night, puffing the smoke away with abandon.

she thinks of the night that she just had. loud music. tacky dj. her red heels. her boots. dirty old men. the stench of puke, beer and pussy filling the dark room that was sparsely illuminated by the red light that permeated through all corners. her performance. her fondling her breast as she looked at herself in the mirror while she gyrates. the captivated stares of the regulars. her staged biting of her lip as she fondles her pussy beneath her silk underwear.

their story.

he asks her for a cigarette, to which she motions for him to wait. he lights the cigarette, slowly inhaling the smoke that would hasten his mortality. he looks up to her as she drifts away in her thoughts, brooding and unperturbed. he dusts the ashes for the first time as he feels her head on his shoulder. he looks at her, deep into her eyes, as he strokes her dark hair that reeked of cigarette and beer.

he puffs his cigarette again, so does she, as they felt, for the first time in a long time, the comfort of how it is to be loved. in a night that was as random as the stars, they both stared into nothingness, puffing their cigarettes incessantly, as the smoke hovered above the heads of two souls who longed for affection all their life.

at 3:14 am in an inconspicuous burger joint that was bathed by the sodium light's illumine.