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Plenty of people are haunted. By other people, things, sometimes even themselves. There’s always this presence that can’t ever leave them alone and appear in everything, one way or another. The presence followed, both inside and out. Randy couldn’t go anywhere without feeling like he was being ogled by something, and, in a way, he secretly hoped that he was. If it really was around him, then maybe it’d like the sight, the fact that he wrote its old jacket still, or the fact that he picked up on its old bad habit.
Smoking wasn't something Randy thought he’d ever even do. Back in high school, friends would offer—well, they were more Lisa’s friends—but he always noped out because he knew if his mom caught a single whiff of it off his clothes, things would become much worse than they already are now. He would get told that all this anxiety had around his mom would get relieved, c’mon, not even the one puff? No, he couldn’t risk it. Randy had to go do his weekly babysitting with Tessa, but, before he could go anywhere, he needed his fix. He put the cigarette to his mouth and with the words that Benson carved into his head on loop. He wished he could crack his skull open and feel the grooves. He’s a changed man, now, Randy, like how he was told to be.
He struggled with the lighter for a bit, one-armed. That first inhale immediately striking, that woozy feeling flood his mind. When you get up too fast, you get that same head rush, losing your balance. It’s the cigarette that catches you as you fall. The taste and smell lingered in Randy’s mouth as he thought about how close Benson’s own mouth was to his face back in the diner, and how the cigarette breath attacked him. He couldn’t say anything, of course, but he remembered the annoyance that came with having to bear the nauseating smell at all and the fact that that smell belonged to the man who was keeping him hostage.
The smell was in Benson’s car, Benson’s home—Benson. He thought the smell was already bad with just having to get the whiffs from words said to him, grooves, but entering Benson’s house had Randy met with the air pulling him in and chaining him to the ground. It was everywhere, but there were hints of other things clogging up the atmosphere, too, he remembered. Tension, violence, filth. Listening to Benson’s ma asking incessantly for cigarettes quickly pieced things together for Randy, it was a genetic sorrow. His eyes wandered around the living room and he noticed all the miscellaneous bits and bobs that looked like they had no real use other than to make the place cluttered.
When he looked up at the walls, that’s when his heart sank. The tar that leaked through and years and years of stains that no one bothered to do anything about horrified Randy, the thought that Benson had to live in a place like this for his entire life, that little Benny withstood both the second and thirdhand smoke for all of his development. He suddenly felt like his life at home wasn’t so bad after all, and that he should be grateful that his mom was on top of him and never let anything like this happen.
The memory of that house didn't bother him as much anymore. He was outside sitting on the front end of his car, it was chilly today. He wrapped Benson’s jacket around him as he took another puff, trying to really take it all in. If the presence was still around, in the air, does it embed with the smoke entering his lungs? Is it content that it gets to enter him in ways more than one? Randy would question if Benson would like getting to live in his mind, in Randy’s mind, something he sought out for so long.
I’ve been watching you.
He would be lying if he said hearing that didn’t excite him. There was a sort of catharsis that Benson provided him in that moment, after being told that he was being seen for what felt like the very first time in his life. He knew better at the time than to make a fuss about his problems, though. It would be a joke to even say he was suffering in silence. He was just silent. Because he had to be. At the same time, it was almost offensive to hear Benson say that he deserved to put his foot down. Obviously there was a part of him that wanted to lash out. To let everyone know he couldn’t take it anymore—the same part that ended up taking Beard’s eye out. Look what happened when he decided to do anything.
You were seven, Randy.
Okay, but, still.
Listen to me, Randy. He realized Benson liked to say his name a lot. His old manager didn’t even bother to call Randy by his first name when he learned that he’d only been calling him by his last a year, but he noticed Benson making the switch the moment he was told, his inability to put it down. It was notable enough for him that now all his inner dialogue between he and his Brain Benson had him repeating it all the time. Remember what I told you, Randy. What would I do here, Randy? Don’t do that, Randy. Be smart, Randy. Randy. RandyRandyRandy.
Another inhale to bring him back. The smoke surrounded Randy as he put his hand down on the hood of his car, leaving it out enough for something else to reach back. He watched the vapor float into the air around him as he watched its shape change, trying to identify patterns and animals like kids do with clouds. He could kind of see a face, if he squinted, if he actively looked for it. He liked to pretend that the enclosing smoke was the presence finally finding a way to get its hands on him once more, and he thought about how Benson couldn’t stop touching him every opportunity he got.
Ya like that, Randy? You miss me? Is that what this is? The mist whispered to him as he lost his balance—sinking, spinning. He wanted it to catch and touch him again just like how he used to, but Randy knew Benson would just have been jealous of the cigarette that got to kiss him instead.