The mist in Aizawl doesn't just drift; it crawls. It tastes of damp concrete and burnt pine—the heavy, unwashed air of a city built on vertical hills. It clings to your skin like a wet shroud, cold enough to make you wonder if the sun is just a myth the preachers made up to keep us coming to church.
I stood in the kitchen, the linoleum biting into my socks like ice. Behind the mahogany door at the end of the hall, my stepmother was sleeping. She had that heavy, quiet breathing of people who think they've already bought their seat in heaven. Me? I was just a ghost in my own house—a shadow that didn't have the decency to disappear.
I spotted a single, stale biscuit on the counter. I picked it up and gave it a small, mocking salute.
"To survival," I whispered. My voice sounded like a dry rasp. "And to the joke that never ends."
I slipped through the window. The 1:00 AM air hit me like a slap, smelling of wet earth and woodsmoke. Aizawl was a labyrinth of orange ghosts tonight; the streetlights were just dim halos struggling against the fog rolling over the ridges.
Leo was waiting by the stone wall. He's twenty-three, my "big brother," but his hands were shaking so hard he couldn't even light a cigarette. The heroin was winning. I could tell by the way his eyes kept sliding off mine.
"You got the pipe?" he hissed.
"Pipe, can, and enough audacity to fuel a revolution," I said, flashing that 'Clown' grin—the one that makes people think I'm too stupid to be a threat.
We crouched by a heavy bike parked under a dripping tin roof. I knelt in the mud, the smell of oil and rain filling my lungs. I shoved the tube in and sucked. The taste was foul—a chemical fire that burned my throat—but as the amber liquid surged into the jerrycan, I felt that familiar, stubborn spark of spite.
"Zany, someone's coming!" Leo's voice cracked, heavy with withdrawal panic.
A light flickered on upstairs. The floorboards creaked. I waited just long enough to see the whites of the neighbor's eyes through the glass, then I grabbed the can.
"Run, Leo!"
We tore down the steep alleyways, boots echoing like gunshots off the corrugated metal walls. I led the way, laughing—a raw, breathless sound. Two broke outcasts being chased by a man in his underwear with a stick. It was peak comedy. The only kind of joy we could actually afford.
Later, we rode up to the Aizawl Peak ridge. Below us, the city lights were a sea of jewels cradled by the dark mountains. I lit a joint, the smoke mixing with the mountain mist. Leo stared into the abyss.
"Do you think He's actually there?" he asked, his voice small. "The Beginning?"
I blew a smoke ring toward the moon. "He's there. He's just waiting for the punchline."
I didn't know then that the joke was about to get violent. Or that I was the one who was going to pay for the delivery.