Ashtray

It's 3'o'clock he thinks, then; no it's five.

Or it could be nine.

"They make them look so beautiful."

Vincent flicks a page in a magazine, spider-like fingers quivering over the glossed pages like a haunted bird of prey. There's a boy, and he's smoking, a window open and a tree in sight. His ribs protrude just slightly under the black ink of tattoos.

Sidney wonders how much a tattoo weighs.

"They don't look like that really." Vincent turns the page again; the boy disappearing from sight. His fingers rest now, the magazine shaking with his mind. His pale eyes look mad, a little lost, a little screwed up. They stare earnestly at the plastic girl with the red lipstick. Red, Sidney knows, being the colour of the lipstick the girl Vincent wishes was still there used to wear.

Sidney could bite his lips till they bled red, and then maybe Vincent wouldn't look so lost(a little mad, a little screwed up).

"They're fucking fakes."

His hand clenches and the girl is screwed up under his bones, face contorted and lips ripped through.

"I wonder." says Sidney, looking at the twist of Vincent's lips.

"I wander." Vincent replies, staring at the lips of his past.