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A stream of impenetrable dreams still lingered in Thomas’ head as he woke from his sleep one early morning, a rush of fine headache accompanying it as well, as he suddenly became aware of the gravity of his day ahead. The covers flung behind his bed as he sharply leaped off the bed and crawling onto his knees towards his wooden drawer, examined the pack of cigarette inside, which he had kept, in immense satisfaction and fervor, the night before yesterday. “If there can only be another way to move out of this godforsaken town,” he thought to himself as he turned the knob with one hand while the other held the drawer for support, for it was already old and wobbling, while a trace of sweat had already started in his forehead. A sort of a disapproving grin crept his face, though unknowingly, even before he had laid hands on the cigarettes, which, after skimming through its rectangular edges, had smelled of stiff and sensual aroma, impressing upon him a sense of fulfillment and greatness, almost as if in a passionate dream.

He too had noticed abruptly the red broad mark that circled the pack and the foreign letters that surrounded it, as he forced a couple of cigarettes out by pounding the base behind his hand, and bringing it close to his mouth, close enough for him to nip one between his teeth, and simultaneously lighting it with one twist of his wrist-as in a ritual. “It has been two months since I've had a puff, since those stores had given up on trying to sell any form of cigarettes nor liquors, in reverence to one of those absurd ordinances issued, almost in a weekly basis, by those equally absurd town officials”

And so for the last couple of days he had been sneaking, and he felt he had no choice, inside one of his boss' safe cases, for he had recently just decoded one of Aldo's safe pin codes- finally, after all those years of secretly stealing glances over Aldo's fingers as he punched in the numbers once a week to slip in the bulk of his profits inside, and so Thomas had since been carrying out singlehandedly, small scale thieveries of some sort such as this prized pack of cigarettes that he deliberately stole, and neatly he had done so, the day before yesterday.

But then of course the next time would be entirely different, Thomas reminded himself, for that next time he would be stealing real money instead of cigarettes, he thought about this thouroughly but somehow the thought of stealing his boss' money did not seem to bother him even a bit, it even felt the more trivial and natural as he dwelled on it the more, and this feeling, or more appropriately, this bluntness had bothered him. Besides, had he not succeeded in stealing the cigarettes, the idea of stealing his boss' money wouldn't even have been a possibility. So for a while he had contemplated deeply on this plan while sitting on the bed and looking past the bedroom wall infront of him, then he suddenly felt the need to find a more secure place to go about his smoking-for he would be a fool if he'd be caught now by the officers- so he stepped aside towards the darkest edge of his room while warding off the visible smoke with his other arm -as if getting rid of them meant their absolute absence- and sat there for sometime, knees over his chest, anxiously staring out the window from time to time as one pursued convict would, his head bobbing up and down against the bedroom wall, and only the freshly drawn smoke had gripped him firm and somehow had subdued him with an infallible surge of jubilation & freedom, while he continued on with these deliberations.

“I would have to kill him if i have to, if he stands in my way” he re assured himself, as though saying it to himself would make it the less criminal, while the room's shabby reputation seemed to be re-introducing itself slowly to him, seemingly reminding him of all past and present misfortunes, like a biting affirmation of sort that his plan was only all too appropriate and necessary, if not God sent-an absolute no brainer for a person he is- the choice to go about it as swiftly as possible had sounded of perfection; The room was still quite dark that morning except for some chops of sunlight peeking through the window sills, an opened cabinet nailed against the wall, unwashed clothes hanging all around, a faulty study lamp stood helplessly in his table flickering, as if in a bow to him, begging for him to fix it, a heap of plastics, books and garbage cluttered the cratered floor, and the rich dank and heady smell that no other previous occupant have had adapted for all those 5 years of solitary living, made him feel the more futile- the room would have been a bit more pleasant of course if it hadn't been for his own insistence to keep all those windows shut for God knows how long already.

“I've been saving money in the most sacrificing efforts ever since those people up there in the town hall have gone all crazy but to no avail. If I don't do anything about it, the least that could happen to me is that I'll rot down to my own end and die, if I'd stay long enough in this godforsaken town” He almost thought he was talking out loud to himself, “Far away, far away, there's no other way, I do not know of anyone who has that huge amount of money to buy me out of this mess” His head had stopped bobbing up and down and had found refuge against the bedroom wall while he brought up the scorching embers of the cigarette towards his lips and found the heat somewhat condoling.

"Living here is more like living inside a prison cell, and that's to say the least..", He had already taken out a pen and had began scribbling on a piece of paper even before he knew it, it occurred to him that he intend to write her mother, whom he had not seen or spoke to for the last couple of years, and to slip to her information that could surely be welcomed with a strike of awe and disbelief. "With only the west border gates connecting this town to the outside towns and to the rest of the country, and all throughout the outskirts had since been barricaded with exorbitantly tall walls of some sort, adding up only to the multitude of border officials who patrols along the edges of the town premises, in full battle gear and loaded arms I assume, drooling over in anticipation for anyone who had finally found the nerve to make such desperate attempts to escape, and shoots them in the head, and, if there are too many runners and they're in a more playful mood, will shoot them somewhere else less lethal, say in the foot, then let them writhe and beg in pain, and talk to them too and tell them jokes while at it, but more often than not they'd shoot them straight in the head, for the attempts had been more seldom the last couple of months, unlike those first few months when the people up there had begun to go nuts, and besides, it was a form of competition between them officials so they really thought they were true sportsmen. They did so quite casually for the last couple of months, like in a duck hunt, I saw one incident even with my own two eyes, that one man, I do not know his exact name but I've seen him around strolling nearby the marketplace, was limping in the street the other day and a few of his fingers were bleeding and if I had not been too inspecting, I wouldn't have known they were actually missing as well" He felt the heat of the embers and swiftly had thrown the cigarette away and replaced it in his mouth with a new one. The truth, unknown to Thomas, was that the rest of the border, aside from the West gates, was a thick defensive line that is totally impenetrable, too impenetrable that not a single runner had succeeded, and especially impenetrable for an ordinary worker like himself who has totally nothing but his meager salary and an outfitted body to define him, the meager salary that had also been steadily dwindling over the years as much as his ailing body had, due to some unknown economic and social reasons (his boss would often explain), which only seemed to justify his sordid helpless state as one of the many worthless subservient towns people who, for one reason, does not have enough nerve to try an attempt against a bullet, or who simply does not have enough bribe money to get them out the west gates.

For quite some time he sat in his room scribbling over the table, writing almost everything that he could muster to his mother, from the petty corruption of the town officials to the more abhorrent extortions and killings and scams, he even told her mother about the recent ploy of the town officials, he had learned this just recently too, to put the identity of the town mayor under extreme confidentiality and to swore onto its secrecy, as to minimize the probability of assassination- which had been one of the more frequent problems the town officials had faced, it's a problem of course for them only because of the difficulty and tediousness with all those constitutional election procedures and crap that in actuality, were of no value at all, for the delegation of a mayor was all for formalities sake and nothing more- a town official is as powerful as another, the only thing special about a mayor was that he receives a lousy gold plated ID card that is marked in bold letters with the inscription- TOWN MAYOR. Well, 7 mayors had died since the town officials up in the town hall had started to go crazy in the head, and since then, it had been quite reassuring on the part of the town officials, for they now could focus their strengths on the more essential, at least for them, schemes and harassment discourses against the town people. He wrote all of these as he tried to recall, but couldn't quite remember, the last time he had written actual words and letters, or anything for that matter, so he went over the writing more slowly and at times reread the sentences so as not to confuse the words. He intended for his mother to understand the entire situation, of the town and of his situation especially, for there weren't too many souls outside their town who had the faintest of an idea of the real situation of Thomas, and more importantly, of Thomas' town. The letter, after he had finished and had folded it into the size of his palm, could well be a concrete evidence that could immediately incriminate him against the town's laws, he had realized later, and had forced him to sneak the folded letter into his back trousers pocket and contemplated on dropping it off the town's post office on his way to the warehouse.

Deciding to finally prepare for the day's work, Thomas cooked breakfast for Aldo, and after some time had drive him and himself to the warehouse, and go about his own petty work as warehouse supervisor, and personal minion for Aldo of course. Inhaling and exhaling and soothing his mouth, he coughed and laughed a little, as he held his breath in playful intervals for as long as he could remember pft pft pft.... to be continued