Sisterhood Of The Smoker Babes, Part 14

Writers Note---Those that enjoy a good science fiction story know that they
need to suspend their beliefs of the real world and allow for the possibility
of things that are out of the ordinary. You will need to do that when you
read this story. With that being said, while the science fiction stuff is
mostly a product of my imagination, many of the smoking scenes are in fact
based on real encounters and sightings that I've experienced throughout
my life. Some have been modified to fit the context of the story but others
remain mostly intact as they actually occurred. Lastly, when reading this I
suggest that you pay attention to the timeline as it is critical to how
you'll draw your conclusions over the story's ending. My email address is
hotelcalifornia14@hotmail.com if you wish to discuss or comment on the story.
I hope you have as much fun reading this as I did writing it.


          SISTERHOOD OF THE SMOKER BABES-THE SMOKING WAR CHRONICLES

CHAPTER 14 - February 15, 1997 - Melissa comes east
    Twenty four year-old Melissa Turner took one last look around as she
placed the last of her suitcases in the trunk of her 1993 blue Toyota
Corolla. She closed the trunk and peeked in the back seat. Her 4 year old
daughter Kayla was sound asleep in the car seat. She started the car, backed
it out of the driveway and began her long drive. Almost immediately she
reached for a Marlboro Red, lit it and then cracked a window. It was still
unusually cold in Birmingham, Alabama and it was even colder where she was
going, which was Attleboro, Massachusetts. 

    Things hadn't gone according to plan for Melissa over the years. Around
Thanksgiving in her freshman year at UAB she started getting into the party
scene. It wasn't anything serious at first, but like a lot of first year
college students on their own for the first time, she was enjoying her
independence and started enjoying the nightlife perhaps a bit too much. She
was raised by her overly strict and extremely religious father and these
night time sojourns were probably a form of rebellion against her stringent
upbringing. 

    At first it was just a few drinks and nights out dancing with her best
friend Leslie. But Melissa found she liked the attention she got from guys
and would play up to them sometimes with her seductive moves on the dance
floor.  She even discovered at some point that this attention was magnified,
at least for some guys, when she teased them with her smoking. 

    Despite her increasing party girl status, she was able to keep her grades
up and was thriving as the lead sports reporter for the school newspaper.
During a drunken night at the beginning of her junior year, however, things
changed. At a party, she randomly hooked up with a guy named Rob and shortly
after became pregnant with Kayla. Her father was furious with her and
immediately cut off his financial support for her education.  Although she
had a half academic scholarship, she was unable to pay for tuition on her own
and eventually had to drop out of UAB. 

    For three and a half years she worked a series of odd jobs and tried to
raise her daughter as a single mom. Barely able to hold her own she became
depressed and started falling into old habits by going out at nights and
hooking up with random guys, mainly to dull the pain. She was alone with her
daughter in a large city and felt isolated. Her mom, who lived out east,
finally intervened and offered to let her and Kayla stay with her if she got
her act together. She took her mom up on her offer. 

    Things changed for Melissa when she arrived in Massachusetts. After
getting herself oriented, she got herself a job and started taking classes at
night and earned a degree, not in journalism but in the accounting field. In
1999 she took a job as a junior cost accountant at a large jewelry
manufacturer and was able to afford to get a place of her own. She took to
the job almost immediately. It wasn't at all the journalism career that she'd
envisioned for herself when she graduated high school six years earlier, but
she liked the challenges the job gave her. There was something else she liked
about this new job - the smoking area. Although she didn't abuse the
privilege, her boss didn't seem to care how many times a day she went out
there to smoke. It wasn't quite how she expected things to go but life was
good again. 

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