Across Her Universe • Alex Turner Fanfic

(46) Sugar

As the hours consumed themselves, so did Arabella's organic cigarettes. They were disappearing one by one, with the rush and rapidness that her delicate and nervous attitude demonstrated. She had never chain-smoked before like she was doing right now, practically emptying her pack of cigarettes without actually enjoying them. Arabella smoked to kill time, to keep herself busy, out of touch with the reality that she was forced to live in; she smoked with the unavailing desire of disappearing completely, of being consumed within the same air that she breath, and within the smoke that her lungs exhaled, even though she knew that it was all in vain. But mostly, Arabella was smoking incessantly to forget, despite the fact that the chemical dependence of the cigarettes and its nicotine did nothing else but to increase her anxiety, which was at this point, losing itself into madness. She couldn't stop thinking about Alex. Most precisely, she couldn't stop thinking about the fact that she might see him again, and that was driving her inexplicably nervy and mad.

She inhaled once more the killing instrument between her fingers, trying to focus her attention on something else, but the truth was that thoughts don't simply go away just because you choose to forget them. Still, without really looking for it, Arabella found a new painful reminder that made her realize how anxious and frantic she was being with this whole situation, as the burning fire of the cigarette she was holding instantly scorched her skin with the fire of a million suns, warning her that it consumed itself to the point of reaching the cigarette butt, without her really noticing this.

"Fuck!" she exclaimed with genuine pain and anger, as she fluttered her hand in the air, trying to make the pain disappearing, but it was just too unbearable.

Arabella took both of her damaged fingers to her mouth, and covered them with her tongue, trying to alleviate the pain once more, with a little more success than before. This sudden action of a smoking amateur caught Arabella's full attention, bringing her back to reality, and dragging her away from the land of her worried and fearful thoughts. She looked around and suddenly started to realize that it wasn't completely dark now, meaning that the night finally settled itself in the sky, but that there was an actual line of people outside who were waiting to enter The Deep End Club. Arabella looked at her wrist, thinking for the slightest second that she had a watch, only to remember that she never uses one, being that the main reason why she's always late. She looked around with clear incomprehension and with a frowned expression that made her wonder one simple question: how long had she been outside, smoking cigarettes without stopping? She clearly didn't know the answer, and that worried her completely. Was she so deeply out of touch with reality, thinking about a million thoughts, that she never even notice how many hours did she spend alone? Arabella feared that her complete sanity had disappeared.

She shook her head and tried not to worry about it too much. After all, she did said to Richard that she was going to be outside The Deep End Club, having a smoke, and if he haven't called her yet to tell her that the show was about to start, which meant that she still had some free time, right? Arabella searched inside her pack of organic cigarettes, only to find absolutely nothing inside of it but completely emptiness. She looked at the emptiness of the tiny rectangular box as if she was staring right at her soul. Frustration was the first thing that invaded her body, followed by a nervy anxiety. She needed those cigarettes more than anything else in the world, or she couldn't operate correctly. After all, desperate times meant desperate actions, and yes, she wasn't proud of practically smoking an entire pack on a matter of plain hours, but what else could she do than rapidly burn the passing hours?

Arabella touched her pockets, and started to investigate them, looking for some money in them, until she finally found the jackpot and a smile of satisfaction draw itself on her beautiful face; the touch of her skin against the well-known texture of money was exactly like touching smooth and sophisticated velvet in that precise moment. Perfect. All she needed to do now was to find a kiosk or something that would sell cigarettes, but the problem was that she didn't know of any in this side of Los Angeles. During the past few weeks that she had started living in this colorful and exciting city, she always felt entirely out of touch and hopelessly lost within a place that she was forced to call home. She looked around once more, trying to find anything familiar to a kiosk around the perimeter, but her eyes ceased to find anything quite like it. Arabella's gaze suddenly found itself resting unsurprisingly on the line of people who were waiting outside the club. She raised an eyebrow as she considered the idea of going towards them and asking for some directions; and so she did, without thinking it twice.