Three on a Match
by Freida Theant

SMOKE SIGNALS MAGAZINE - July - August 2013

Lillian, in her blue jean jacket and tight-fitting denim pants, brunette straight-brushed shoulder length hair and knit scarf sidles thru a maze of Student Union cafeteria chairs projecting variously from their central tables, some supporting students slouched over them, others hunched atop the table at odd angles. Penetrating into the smoky, dense interior, she unhooks her shoulder strap from her canvas book bag, lets them crash to the linoleum and settles her coffee onto the sticky, beverage-stained table. Seated a few rows from the floor-to-ceiling windows, she glances despondently thru the windows at the patches of ice on College Avenue that signal that the wintery climate was overstaying its tenure into the spring months.

Her purple-yellow hands, numbed cold from changing classes outdoors, made it difficult to snatch the three quarters full pack of Marlboro Reds, peers up and around to see if her companion had yet entered the cafeteria, while her hands sightlessly pull up a cork tipped nico-promise. Janice slips it between her expectant lips without shifting her focus, and edges a Bic flame expectantly to its tip.

Bathtime

By Smoked

As Mark drove home, his work colleagues' comments were ringing in his ears.
The subject at work had gotten around to second hand smoke and smoking in general, and everyone had voiced their opinions in one way or another. Most were negative as most of the people who worked with Mark didn't smoke at all or had quit a long time back.
But Mark's manager's words were ringing in his ears the most, as he glanced at the road sign saying he was only three miles from home.. He though about the conversation as he stopped at the next light.

Release: Part 2

By Freida Theant

SMOKE SIGNALS MAGAZINE - January - February 2011

"The nametag on your jumper," she replied, paused while she livened her Pall Mall with a short tug and opened her mouth packed with the downy cloud. And then instantly, with her gulp of air, it vanished within, revealing her delectable mouth. For a space of three heartbeats, there was stillness, broken by the muted rush of her opaque breath. "You must have forgotten you're wearing that."

The Stand-Off
by Freida Theant

SMOKE SIGNALS MAGAZINE - May - June 2012

Diane looked forward all week to this girls-night-out, specifically the 'casino' that would assemble after the party swelled and got noisy. She had already made her fashionable entrance to the party, which was rocking, but expecting the players to gather and make up the 'casino' at any moment, she fled outside to wait in a patio lawn chair. She drew thoughtfully, maybe desperately on her Eve 120 and in the twilight of this summer's star-flecked evening, her soothing cigarette glared out for as many seconds as her lips coaxed inward the stream of smoky flavor.