5 AM and I can't sleep. I'm quitting smoking.
Not the "My lungs are blacker than a coal miners, mouth stinks, teeth are falling out and I can't catch my breath getting out of my chair" sort of quitting smoking, although I'm sure that will come, rather a "I don't have 2 fucking cents to rub together because the damned cheques are fucking freaking late and in part again" sort of quitting smoking. The involuntary quitting smoking.
And I pace and I occasionally cry and there are moments of brief lucidity wherein I sit down to do some work but I can't focus, not even a little bit, and so I stand and pace some more and maybe weep and the cat stares at me, perplexed, l bark in return. . .
There's always the crime spree, but I'm saved from myself by my newfound inability to focus on anything, and no sooner have I Googled "Oceans Eleven" then I have forgotten what I am searching for and why I am even searching. . .
Oh yes, the crime spree . . .
So I dig out the patches, NicoDerm, step 2, a well intended gift for someone with no intentions of quitting smoking, cut them in half because I don't really consider myself to be a heavy smoker and slap one on my arm.
And in an hour I can feel the symptoms palpably, well, alleviated. Slightly. I can sit longer. Only a bit. The urges to cry, throttle, scream, bark, they still come, but they pass quicker. I toy with the idea of making this a permanent state of affairs. But the patches, after a while they burn on the skin, ache, like I've had a flu shot, the whole arm weakens, I can feel it, a peculiar bruising up it's entire length. And I wake in the middle of the night, wide awake, fully awake, my big toe pulsing...