The Wall

104

Moses extracted the matchbook and then a cigarette from the packet. One drag. Chesterfield wasn’t his favorite, but that didn’t matter. The one drag would help. He looked down at the white man who hadn’t moved. He felt like kicking him in the face.

Cigarette between his lips. Tear off a match. Slowly scrape it across the stripe. Watch the flame ignite. Hold up to the cigarette. Inhale. Into his lungs.

Whoa!

Hold his breath. Another second, then another. Savor it. He loved the initial feeling of dizziness that descended when you hadn’t lit up in a while.

The flame had reached his fingers. Moses began to cough and dropped the match. One more cough. He had to keep going. He also dropped the cigarette, stepped on it, and set off.

He still had a long way to go.

He started to run. Gained speed and felt a need to take one last look at the crazy white man. Not that there was any way he could be following him. Stopped. Turned back.

The white man actually was struggling to climb over a wall, sluggishly but determinedly.

And where he had dropped the match and the cigarette, the dry lawn had started to smolder. Moses saw the smoke and the disconcerting flicker of a small flame.