Jennie Smash

Just outside of Augusta, we stopped for gas and I spied a sign in the window of the mart: MARLBOROS: STATE MINIMUM.

I turned to Isaac, who was filling up the tank. “Um, I’m going in for a minute.” He nodded OK.

I looked around me wildly, as though up to no good, and dashed across the pavement to the mart. I sidled up to the register.

“Do you have cartons of Camel Lights?” I asked the woman.

She looked at me in amusement. “Of course!”

I plunked down my wallet. “Excellent. I’ll take one.”

“OK, honey. $33.12.”

$33.12! I snatched up the carton before she could change her mind and dashed out to the lot, holding it over my head like a prize.

“33.12, bitches!” I announced to Isaac and Cathy. “I’m RICH!”

“Yeah, prison rich,” Isaac said.

“Dude, no kidding. I am holding, in my hand, the equivilant of…” I did the math. “ONE HUNDRED AND SIXTY DOLLARS WORTH OF CIGARETTES.”*

Isaac just shook his head.

“When I get back to New York? I’m trading these for a bitch.”

* The joke here is that I cannot do math. It’s funny, see?