Short Story – Kasarute quits

Short Story – Kasarute quits

Kasarute kicked the tyres and punched the lorry’s windscreen after the owner squeezed a letter into his sweat-dripping hands. 

The smoker was fired for stealing boxes of cigarettes during the night shift. The next day, he hitchhiked to Omakaja and paid the driver two cigarettes at a lay-by tree. 

“This is my last cigar,” he said, sucking whitish smog into his papery lungs. Soon, the stench of cigars every time he coughed dizzied the driver, until the car skidded off the road.  

His name was on everyone’s lips for wearing yellow shorts, a white t-shirt and cigarette-branded socks. The villagers pinched their noses at his cigarette-scented cologne and chuckled at his smoking cartoon hat. 

Later, he planted a tobacco leaf inside a pot as a pet plant. Afterwards, he bought a mug with a picture of a cigarette and applied online for his PhD in smoking, while children drew his brown, stained teeth for their projects. Strangely, the colourful drawing of Kasarute won the Anti-Smoking Campaign.  

His rustling lung sounded like autumn leaves or torn papers. The following month, he spends his pennies on a cigarette-flavoured cake for his birthday. 

Each day that passed, his trash can was full of cigarette buds. Soon, his former boss donated a skip bin for the cigarette buds. However, he continued smoking until the cigarette buds had shaped a mountain.  

The villagers cried that the heap of cigarette buds was blocking the rising sun. 

“The hazy sun is only up at 11am!” yelled a nurse through a handheld speaker. Immediately, people played a coughing prank, and the nurses pinned a poster of the dangers of nicotine on his door.  “Smoking is my hobby,” he said, spitting yellow and slimy mucus. It seems Kasarute was hoping to spot his name in the Genius Book for the most cigarette buds. 

“I was born with a cigar on my lips,” he said, sizzling his blistered lips with ice cubes. 

One day, blue smoke came out of his ears, but there were no pills for this disease. Later, learners glued the cigarette buds into a real-life coffin and wrote Kasarute on the yawning coffin.  

Then they parked the golden coffin in front of his house.  That evening, the white smoke from his cigarettes rolled towards the clouds.  He puffed until balls of smoke blocked the bright moon and the blinking stars. 

The smoker continued puffing night long, and the misty sun protested behind his manmade smog. For three days, it became pitch dark and eye-burning smoke crept into Kasarute’s eyes and blindfolded him. By now, he skipped into the soft-buds coffin thinking it was an ambulance. Finally, he shut his eyes and snoozed forever.

-Mungambue@gmail.com