Author's Note:

HUGS!

I wake up the next morning and something is…off… I can’t put my finger on it until I realize that I REALLY want to use that infernal e-cig and get my fix of whatever is in those vials. I try and ignore it, but find I can’t… I finally give in, load the device, and turn it on.

After emptying the vial, I feel much better and get ready for school. As I finish up, I try and decide what to do…there isn’t any way I can take the e-cig with me—they are banned at school (too many kids using them with marijuana extract in the vials). Besides, legally, I am too young to be using it, anyway.

I decide I am just going to have to make it through the day—somehow—and go down for breakfast.

I don’t notice Misty smirking behind my back as she fixes my breakfast. On my way out, she hands me a bag of the mints from yesterday. She says, “Here, Miss. You seemed to really enjoy these yesterday—there were a few left and I thought you may want them?”

I smile and absent-mindedly put them in my purse as I thank her. Then I hurry out to get in the car—Mummy is waiting. Momma is on a short overnight business trip and left really early this morning.

I make it until about mid-morning and feel myself getting fidgety. I reach into my purse between classes and take out one of the mints, thinking it might help. I stick it in my mouth, and to my surprise it does ease the craving I am having. It doesn’t make it go away, but it certainly helps.

At lunch break, I quickly eat a salad and decide to go outside and walk to get my mind off of the increasing cravings. I have a free period after lunch anyway and I think the fresh air will help. As I am walking around the building (something that IS allowed with permission), I run into Grace Harper, a senior. She is stealthily smoking a cigarette and I catch a whiff of the smoke as I am passing by.

I stop in my tracks—just that whiff has me salivating. I go over to her and breathe in deeply—the craving gets stronger. She gives me an odd, then understanding look and hands me a cigarette. I hesitate, but only for an instant. I suddenly know what I am addicted to, now. The good news is it is nothing illegal; the bad news is, it seems I am a smoker, now.

She lights the cigarette with her lighter and I take a deep breath and choke—then I take another…

As I finish the cigarette and thank Grace, I try and figure out why Francie would want me to smoke… She has always said she hates it as much as I do… I shake my head and go in to do some homework.

The rest of the day crawls by. Luckily, I have no cheer practice OR ballet today and as soon as I get home, I grab the e-cig device and go outside and out back to a secluded area not far from the guest house. I have just turned the device on and taken the first deep inhale when Misty scares the daylights out of me.

She comes up behind me and says, “Good day, Miss. May I ask what you are doing?”

I blush and say, “Well, what does it LOOK like, Misty?”

She remains calm and says, “It looks like Miss is smoking… When did Miss start that?”

I shake my head and say, “I just did, I guess…”

Misty asks, “Where is Miss getting her supplies, since she is too young…?”

I shrug. I have no idea how I am supposed to support this… It was the one thing that was in favor of me going to straight to Moms with this problem. I say, “I have no idea, to be honest.”

Misty nods and says, “I can get the supplies for Miss—and keep it quiet—for a price…”

I look at her and she seems serious. I ask, “What price?”

She says, “Well, I would have to charge an overhead—say 50% above the actual cost?”

I take a deep breath of the vapor and say as the craving is both satisfied and intensified at the same time, “Well, that seems OK, I guess. When can you get me some new supplies…?”

She says, “Meet me here at nine tonight—bring cash.” And she turns and leaves as quickly as she came.

I finish the cartridge and shake my head. I have no idea what Francie is up to getting me hooked, but MISTY of all people is the one to help me out in this? The world really IS a strange place.

I go to my room and finish my homework, then slip back out a little before nine with a fairly large sum of cash. Misty meets me at the designated spot at precisely nine o’clock. She hands me a bag and I open it. There are several boxes of the vials and also a carton of regular cigarettes.

She says, “I’m aware that you can’t take the device to school—you will be less likely to get caught with the cigarettes. That will be $325.00”

I barely have enough cash to cover the cost, but this should keep me covered for quite some time. I take the bag and hurry back towards my room to hide my stash…

I am about to go up the stairs when Mummy says, “Paige, can you come talk to me a minute, please?”

I am torn—I start to ask her to let me go up, first; but something in her tone lets me know that may not be a good idea. I go into the family room adjacent the stairs where she is waiting.

I say, “Yes, Mummy? I was just getting ready to go get ready for bed…”

She says, “Well, this is important. I got a call from Ronnie Ferguson a bit ago with some disturbing news. It seems you were captured on a video feed SMOKING? Would you care to explain?”

I feel my face turn white. I don’t want to say it was Francie…but I don’t know what else to do… If I have learned nothing from this WHOLE affair, I have learned it is best to be open about what is going on—at least when asked…

I say, “Well, I can’t really explain it… It seems that Francie somehow got me hooked. She left me an e-cig device and a note not to say anything and that we could talk about it later…”

Mummy shakes her head and says, “You’re going to have to come up with something better than she ‘somehow got me hooked’, Paige. It doesn’t work that way. You have to actually consume the nicotine to get hooked.”

I look at her seriously and say, “Angi, have you EVER known me to KNOWINGLY lie? I’m telling you the truth. I HATE smoking and I don’t WANT this!”

She sighs and says, “Well, let’s call Francie, shall we?”

She doesn’t give me a chance to say anything before she has her phone out and is calling Francie. She puts it on speaker. I hear the voice that I love—but have really conflicted feelings about at the moment, ”Hello, Angi?”

Angi says, “Hi, Francie. We have a problem…”

Over the next ten minutes, we discuss the problem. It seems that Francie had a similar note from ME in her car—along with an e-cig device of her own. She was as unsuccessful as I was at resisting the strong craving.

Angi looks at me with an extremely puzzled look on her face. She says, “OK, go through EXACTLY what you two did that day while Dawn and I were…preoccupied…”

Francie and I take turns telling her about the day—mostly just laying out by the pool and reading.

Francie says, “The only thing I can think of that was different was that herbal sun lotion…”

Angi asks, “Herbal? Where did you get it?”

I shrug my shoulders and say, “It was just out there… I looked today when I got home; I thought about laying out by the pool, but it wasn’t there—just the normal stuff…”

Francie says, “There WERE those strange mints that Misty gave us, too. I felt all tingly when I sucked on them.”

I say, “Me too. And Misty gave me the rest of them to take to school. They actually HELPED with the cravings—a little, anyways.”

Angi looks pensive and says, “I see. Do you have any of those ‘mints’ left?”

I shake my head and say, “No…there weren’t that many. That is how I got into the smoking thing at school—it was purely by chance. But at that moment, I at least knew WHAT I was hooked on. I was planning on a SERIOUS discussion with Francie as soon as I could.”

Angi says, “This is all very interesting. So, you weren’t planning on telling me—or your Momma? How were you planning on supporting this habit? It would be much easier for Francie to get ‘supplies’ in her circumstance—but you, Paige?”

I sigh and say, “Well, I was contemplating what to do when I happened to run into Misty. She was pretty helpful in obtaining supplies.”

Angi looks at me and says, “Interesting. How so?”

I tell her about Misty appearing out back and the ‘deal’; then I show her the supplies. She looks at them and shakes her head. She says, “No wonder you’re having bad cravings—these are all REALLY strong dosages of nicotine.”

She sighs and says, “Francie, there isn’t much I can do until you come home. Can you come this weekend? I suggest getting some nicotine lozenges—that is likely what those ‘mints’ were. That will help—try to resist using the e-cig or real cigarettes and go as long as you absolutely can between lozenges. Paige, you are coming with me to my office immediately…”

She takes me straight to her car and drives to her office building. I talk to Francie a bit longer on the ride and hang up just as we get there.

We go straight to her office and she rummages in a medicine cabinet. She draws up a large dose of a pale green solution in a syringe and says, “OK, Paige, bend over. I’m sorry—this will hurt more than just a little sting…”

She jabs me in the butt and pushes the stuff into the muscle. It DOES hurt a lot, but I don’t say anything. She says, “This will stop the nicotine addiction—it is a new drug. Fortunately, you didn’t have time to really build up a psychological addiction, so this should work well. Just make sure that you don’t smoke or use ANY nicotine products—if you do, your addiction will near immediately return and be much harder to treat next time.”

I nod and say, “Don’t worry about that… Although, I didn’t mean to THIS time…”

We drive home and I get ready to go upstairs. I rub my butt and Mummy says, “It will be sore a couple of days. Let me know if you have any signs of cravings tonight. If you make it through tomorrow morning, you should be in the clear. Now, I have to call your Momma and we have to discuss what to do with Misty…”

I wake up the next morning and, aside from a really sore butt, there seems to be no lingering consequence of my late nicotine addiction. I smile—I REALLY hate the idea of being addicted to something I can’t control.

I go downstairs and notice that Misty is not present. I make my own breakfast, which is no big deal to me—I actually prefer it. Especially now that I don’t trust Misty AT ALL…not that I really ever did after what she had done to me before.

Mummy comes in a few minutes after I am done. She comes from the direction of the guest house and gives no indication of what she was doing. She simply says, “Good morning, Love. How are you feeling?”

I swallow my last bite of English muffin and take a sip of coffee to wash it down. I say, “Fine. My butt is sore but otherwise…nothing! Thank you. I wish I had just talked to you about it to begin with—but I wanted to talk to Francie first.”

She nods and says, “I know, Hon. You know you can ALWAYS come to me, but I get why you approached it the way you did. I’m not sure I would have done it any differently, myself.”

I ask, “What about Misty—I don’t want her around me. PERIOD. I especially don’t want her fixing me meals or buying anything I will be using.”

Mummy nods and says, “Don’t worry, Love. You won’t have to be subjected to her—at least until we can be COMPLETELY sure she has been rehabilitated.”

She drops me off at school and I receive a summons to go to Miss Ferguson’s office. I sigh, wondering what consequences I will face for smoking on school property. I enter the office and immediately notice that Mrs. DICK-enson is not there—there is a young lady in her place.

I smile nervously and say, “Hi. I’m Paige Fitzsimmons. Miss Ferguson requested my presence.”

She smiles at me and says, “Go on in, Hon, she is waiting—I am Ginger Jones, by the way. I’m a temp and will be here a few weeks…”

I nod and go into Ronnie’s office. She smiles and says, “Sit down, Paige.”

I gingerly sit and Ronnie gives me a serious look. She says, “I guess we dodged a serious bullet. I was really disappointed when I was reviewing surveillance camera footage and saw you out there with Grace Harper. I’ve known about her for a while…that’s another subject, though. Anyway, Angi has explained to me that this was another stealth attack on you and that it’s taken care of?”

I nod and say, “Yes, Ma’am. I no longer am addicted to that…crap…”

She smiles and says, “Good! By the way, I’m sure you noticed Miss Jones out front. She is going be there while Mrs. Dickenson takes some needed ‘time off’.” She smiles at the look of understanding on my face—she had been ‘suspended’… She says, “I can’t have my administration not taking student safety seriously. She has some dedicated time to think about her priorities. OK, you better get off to class—Ginger can give you a pass.”

I thank her and take the pass from Ginger. As I walk to class, I sigh. Another disaster averted—I can’t help but wonder when my luck is going to run out, though. So far, there have been serious consequences to all that has happened, but nothing I can’t live with. I shudder and hope that doesn’t change…

When I get home after cheer practice and ballet, a lot of the soreness in my butt has been worked out. I am tired, but happy to see Momma has made it back from her trip.

She hugs me and hands me an envelope. I open it curious as to what it may be. There is a card inside with an ‘apology’ from Misty and $500.00.”

I give Momma a look that conveys my confusion. She smiles and says, “Misty bought back the supplies that she sold you under the same deal conditions that she had with you. It will take quite some time for her to pay ME back for the advance I had to give her to pay you and cover the costs she accrued getting the things for her subterfuge to begin with.”

I sigh and Momma continues, “Her scheme was to have you addicted and to milk you for money getting the ‘supplies’ for you. No doubt, she would have kept increasing the cost as your addiction deepened to include the psychological need for the nicotine fix.”

I feel my face burn red with anger.

Momma says, “Don’t worry, Love. Misty will not be doing anything else in the house. She will continue to do things for me related to work. Of course, that means she is earning even LESS now. Her debt to me continues to grow. And now it is only going to grow faster.”

She doesn’t elaborate and I don’t ask—I want NOTHING to do with that bitch… I don’t care what happens to her anymore, to be honest.

I go upstairs to change and help make dinner. I happen to look out the window and see Misty in front of the guest cottage GREEDILY sucking on an e-cig device. I know that Allen never smoked—he hated it as much as, if not MORE than, I do. Understanding dawns on me as to what Momma meant by her debt growing…if MISTY is now addicted, SHE will have to pay for the supplies—probably under a similar deal to what *I* had agreed to with HER.

I smile—this time I LIKE the punishment!

I grin the whole time we are making supper—and the three of us have a GREAT time doing it. We never needed Misty in the kitchen anyways! I am glad she is banned from the house unless specifically working on work-related projects—and that will be under Momma’s strict supervision.