He stepped outside and closed the door. It was a cold winter evening and the wind was briskly flowing through Wisconsin to some unknown abyss. The weather kind of matched his soul. After taking a few steps out of the front walkway he pulled out his fine black leather cigarette case. After fiddling with the clasp, he grasped a single Lucky Strike--unfiltered of course.

Seventy-nine dollars for this case, he thought. The value of something was all that mattered to him; keeping up appearances meant a lot. It's funny, it matters and yet there's no one there to appreciate what he owns. He's a loner, but at least it makes him feel important.

Reaching into the pocket of the well-worn black hoodie he once bought--forty dollars--he procured a simple, silver lighter and flipped the lid to spark the flint. Pulling up his shaking hands, he lit the cigarette.

That first drag always shook his body awake before the nicotine calmed it back down. Holding the smoke in his lungs, it started to rise and claw at his throat, so he lets it escape into the night air to roam and be free before it dissipated into the sky. Looking up at the stars, he started to ponder:

Why did I even start smoking in the first place? He chuckled to himself and the trees, that's right, because it brings me some semblance of happiness and calm.

...What is happiness to me?

Happiness, empathy and love were all emotions and feelings he wished to have, it just seemed like the world was cruel enough to leave them out of his make and model. Ever since he learned of emotions and how they played out in the human world, he made the startling discovery that they were void in his being. The problem was that he longed to feel them; he needed to feel them, but alas, they eluded his soul.

He looked down at the cigarette, took a puff and flicked the ashes from its tip.

The trick was faking them, he realized that soon enough in his life. Just act like they're there and maybe they'll come eventually, that's what he always used to tell himself.

Keeping up appearances became a fun little game: smiling when someone made eye contact (maintaining eye contact with other humans was a whole different battle within itself); opening doors for those who needed it; asking how someone's day was; small talk with colleagues to keep the peace; taking general interest in things that he couldn't give two shits about; even trying to form relationships were all part of the facade he so carefully constructed.

Sometimes he got tired of it all and just wanted to drop the curtains to rest his sore arms. This was one of those nights. Unfortunately, in this case he didn't willingly drop the curtains, they were torn from him by someone that he tried his best to love. That was the problem with relationships: both people have to express true emotions, and as good as he was at faking it all, the girls he dated caught on to the game pretty quickly. He could show interest, make connections and hold conversations, but as soon as they went to enter into the world of emotions he had created they found that it was, in fact, a painted backdrop to the play he was creating. No substance... nothing!

It wasn't that he wanted to lead them on, and it wasn't just a game to him at that point. He truly put all he had on the table in the hopes that this time things would be different, but that was just an I.O.U. It was a loan he had hoped would come to fruition so that the ones he wanted to love could be payed back sevenfold.

Alas, this time it didn't work either. She was getting distant, and he knew that was the end of the line. It always was... Maybe he'd find another socket of emotions to power his dead battery, but until then things looked grim.

So he felt content to have a smoke and think things over, maybe find out where his life went wrong in the hopes of fixing his failing body and relationship. It seems that this attempt, like all others, was a fleeting glimmer of hope. His lack of emotions were an enigma to himself.

Looking down once more, this time in a hurry, he realized that the cigarette was now burning the index and middle finger of his right hand. He quickly threw it onto the street, as well as tossing all thoughts held during this period of time along with it. He'd face these problems head on soon enough, and maybe he'd find happiness to rectify them in the process.

Walking up to the door, he opened it and looked back outside once more. As his head turned, a slight grin formed on his face; he could hear the wind whispering to him and it made his life a little less solitary.