Mary finished her lunch at went outside. She felt like having her usual after-lunch-cigarette but it was her time to look after the children playing in the school yard, and noone was allowed to smoke out there. She was a bit late too, so there was no time for a quick smoking break anyway. There were children everywhere, playing happily in the sunshine. Mary coughed a few times, quietly and without putting any hand over her mouth. The smoky breathe that her smoker's cough forced out in the air flew away in the light wind.

Some boys that belonged to one of her classes said hello to her as they passed and she replied smiling. She laughed a little when they were gone. "Those little rascals", she thought, "if they only smiled a little like that when I try to teach them mathematics". Mary was 49 years old and had been teaching mathematics in this school for the last nine years. The kids were in their fourth to sixth grades, and this was the age she preferred. They were old enough to start thinking by themselves, she thought, but not old enough to think about too much other stuff. She turned around to walk in another direction when she became aware of the sound of a coughing girl. She had been hearing it for a while but she had been day-dreaming like she always used to so she hadn't really paid any attention to it so far.
Eight girls, all of them belonging to one of "her" sixth-grade-classes were jumping rope, but Helen was coughing heavily. "What a coughing fit", Mary thought to herself as the girl covered her mouth with her both hands cupped up over the nose and bent her body forwards. As soon as the coughing fit had ended, she went into the jumping again with the other girls, but the effort and all the talking and laughing soon triggered a new coughing fit. She had to step aside to concentrate on her coughing fit and when Mary came closer the blonde girl's face was red and she almost whooped.

- Young lady, your Mom should have kept you home, the way you're coughing, Mary smiled. - Come on, you should rest instead of running around like that.
She didn't accept the girl's attempts to protest. - Come with me, we'll fix a cup of hot tea for your throat, she said friendly but very definite.

She brought the girl to the teacher's room where the teachers had a coffee machine which also had a button for hot water.
- Thank you Mrs Ryder, Helen said when they sat down and Mary handed over a cup of tea.
- I had to bring this little lady inside, Mary explained to Mrs Mallone who also was sitting in the room, smoking a cigarette.
- She coughed and coughed so I thought she would explode, but nothing could keep her from running around with the other girls, making it even worse. Mary took a pack of cigarettes from her purse, put a cigarette between her lips and lit it.
- I remember when I was in your age, Mrs Mallone smiled at the girl. - I had had a pneumonia and was almost cougghing my lungs up but still Mom had almost to lock me inside to keep me from going to school to meet my friends. She laughed.

Helen put down the plastic tea mug and watched Mary who was dragging on her cigarette.
- I... I didn't knew that you smoke, Mrs Ryder, she said carefully. Mary smiled back.
- Oh, glad to hear that, she said with smoke flowing from her mouth. She nose exhaled a little before going on talking, still with smoke coming from deep inside her. - Haven't you noticed my smoker's cough, she laughed.
- Oh... well, I know that you cough every now and then but I've never really thought of it.
- And you haven't noticed my breathe even when I stand beside your desk to help you with some exercise? I thought just my breathe would be enough to make my pupils second-hand smokers, Mary laughed and coughed a little. She cleared her throat.
- On the other hand, why should you have noticed, you never ask anything when doing those exercises, she smiled. - She's one of my best pupils in mathematics, Mary explained to her colleague.

Helen finished her tea, thanked Mary and left. Mary looked after her and laughed when she was gone. - If only those parents could keep their kids at home when they sound like that. She doesn't cough very much in the classes, then I would have noticed it earlier, but you know, the way they use to run around in the breaks, jumping, running, shouting , everything. If I hadn't stopped her and brought her in, she would have fainted from those coughing fits, Mary laughed but then sighed.
- I know, these periods when the flus and the colds are here, I often have to call their parents to tell them to keep their kids at home. Yesterday ,for instance, there was one girl whose chest was almost rattling when she breathed. Can you imagine? Letting a 10 year old girl who's coughing like a thunderstorm and can hardly breathe go to school!

Later in the afternoon, it was time for mathematics and Mary entered the class room. As soon as Helen saw her, she came to think about the break. She had been sitting there with her teacher and Mrs Mallone and they had both been smoking their cigarettes in front of her. Helen's mother didn't smoke, actually quite few of the females around Helen did. She couldn't understand this fascination, she had never noticed it before. She glanced at Mary's mouth and remembered how the cigarette smoke coming from her lungs had been pumping from it when she talked. She glanced at her nostrils and recalled the nose exhales. Helen had kept them all in her memory, she noticed to her own surprise. She looked at Mary's fingers that had been holding the cigarette, everything.
- Now, you all go on with the exercises on page 51 to 55 today, Mary said and sat down behind her teacher's desk. Helen started immediately, she really liked mathematics. But today, it was hard to concentrate, especially when she suddenly heard Mary cough. She looked up carefully and saw the teacher's long hand with those golden rings over the mouth. She took the hand away but produced a sequence of deep, chesty hacks with her mouth shut. Helen got an idea and put her hand up.
- Oh, don't tell me YOU need help, Mary smiled and raised. When walking over to Helen's place she inhaled deeply and coughed in her hand. Helen listened to every detail of the sound, each little rattling, even the smallest piece of sound were saved deep inside Helen's memory. Helen explained her problem, at the same time as Mary again produced two hacks with mer mouth shut. The origin of the hacks must be deep inside her smoky chest, Helen thought, now getting really excited. Helen was still explaining when Mary put her hand over her mouth. She didn't cough, yet, but after a few seconds she inhaled with a noticeable sound and coughed in her hand. Her face was so close to Helen's so Helen now for first time really noticed the breathe Mary had been talking about, and the hand was a few inches from the mouth, enough to make the palm she had been coughing in visible to Helen, who now dreamt about putting her nostrils over the palm to really feel the smell of a real smoker's cough.
Mary gave Helen some clues on how to attack the problem, but she felt a bit surprised that Helen hadn't found out herself, should be almost obvious to a girl like her. She left Helen's desk, inhaled deeply and coughed with deep, sharp rattlings for a short while. Helen glanced at Mary, who let the hand remain over the mouth, and soon a new sequence of hacks were heard. She inhaled even deeper this time, and her rattlings sounded harder. Another fast sequence of small but unstoppable hacks with the mouth shut and Helen could hardly control herself; her heart was beating intensively.
- I'll just step outside to cough for a moment, Mary said to the class and shut the door after leaving the room. Helen's desk was so close to the door so she could listen to the coughing fit going on outside. She wanted so much to be out there, watching the teacher. She heard Mary cough harder and harder, deeper and deeper like if she tried to shorten the coughing fit by helping her body to cough harder. Finally, the woman sounded like she coughed up a lung, and the coughing stopped. The door opened after a short while and Mary appeared. She cleared throat three times but looked like she used to. Helen tried to study her face without making it too apparent. Wasn't she a bit red in her face? Wasn't she breathing more heavily, or with at least some rattlings? Didn't she look a bit tired now? No, it was just some sort of wishful thinking.

It was the end of the school day after the mathematics class, and Helen happened to be the last one in the class room with the teacher. She wanted so much to talk to Mary about her cough, but had no idea how to start, or if she dared to at all.
- Excuse me, Mrs Ryder, Helen almost stuttered.
- Yes, Helen?
- I... I was just wondering...
- Yes?, Mary smiled wondering.
- Why did you leave the room to cough, Mrs Ryder?
Mary looked astonished.
- I didn't want to disturb you, simply. I make such a terrible noise sometimes, she smiled. - Why did you ask?
- Oh... Oh, I just felt so curious.
Helen wanted so much to ask more about Mary's cough, and about her smoking but didn't know how to continue. Before she could dream anything up, Mary asked her;
- Don't you live in Theakstone, like I do? Helen nodded.
- Come on, I'll give you a lift then, I'm going home myself.

As soon as they had got outside the school building and were on their way to the car park, Mary lit a cigarette. Helen watched her with admiration and great interest.
- Do you get that cough because of those cigarettes, Mrs Ryder? Helen dared to ask after hesitating.
- Yes, I do, Mary replied and laughed a little. - But you see, I love my cigarettes, and that cough doesn't disturb me that much, you know, she smiled.
- Does all people get a cough from smoking, Helen asked curiously?
- Well, no, not necessarily, no I don't think so. Mary had to think before replying. - Some people would get it, some not, but it also depends on how much they smoke, what sort and so. Suddenly she noticed the girl's interest.
- Don't start, that's an advice. I mean, when you get older. It's of course totally out of question at your age, Mary said shortly. "I love smoking, and I wish I could describe to you how much I love it and even introduce you to my wonderful world", Mary thought to herself. "But, you're just 12, your Mom would kill me, and I would lose my job". She laughed a little and Helen looked at her.
- Nothing, she said to Helen, still smiling.
They had a nice chat when driving to Helen's street, but no coughing fits at all to the girl's disappointment.

In the evening, after the dinner Helen went into the TV room where her mother was sitting in the sofa. The 36 year old brunette, divorced from Helen's father since seven years, was watching TV when Helen sat down close to her. Catherine put an arm around her daughter and Helen glanced at her face. Her nostrils looked so big and fresh, her lips too, Helen thought.
- Mom, why don't you start smoking?
- Hmmmm? Catherine said, - what did you say?
- Smoking, I said. - You would look so great, putting a cigarette between your lips, dragging on it to fill your mouth with smoke, then pulling it deeply down in your lungs before exhaling all the smoke through your nostrils.
- What on earth did you get that from, Catherine said. - Rubbish, she added.
Helen got back to her homework, a bit disappointed. Not that she would have expected her mother to rush out to buy herself a pack of cigarettes, but she felt such an irrestible need for talking about smoking.

The next day, when Helen arrived to school she suddenly got a crazy idea. To get to her class room, she had to pass the entrance to the dining room, and just inside the door, the kitchen staff had a room behind a door to the left. She wasn't sure, but she thought she had seen someone of them smoking in there. This morning, she couldn't resist sneaking in there. Yes, just as she had expected, there were a few cigarette butts in an ash-tray, but they were too small. Well, it was worth a trial, but when she was about to leave, she saw a pack of cigarettes on a small table behind the door. Almost as a reflex, she quickly opened the pack and put a cigarette in her pocket and left quietly.

After school, Helen left the building quicker and more eagerly than usual. Now, she would finally investigate that treasure in her pocket! She had been lucky to find a matchbox during the lunch break, so she had got everything she needed. Her mother would come home a bit later today, but Helen had a key of her own. Immediately after coming home, she sat down and studied the cigarette carefully for a while. She then decided it was time to try it, and put it between her lips. She lit a match, and... dropped the cigarette. She wasn't used to hold it with her lips. She blew the match out before picking up the cigarette for a new trial. She put it a bit longer inside the mouth this time, and managed to lit it, she thought. She took it from her lips and looked at it. The fire was gone, but she didn't understand why it didn't burn by itself. Then she slowly realized she probably had to suck on it at the same time as she lit it, and tested her theory. She saw the orange ember grow a little and felt a strange taste on her tongue. She had, without really noticing, pulled a little amount of cigarette smoke into her smoke and blown it out. She sucked again, a little longer, felt the taste and blew it out. Now, she was smoking, she thought. She took drag after drag, longer and longer until the cigarette was finished. She didn't even think about that she never had inhaled anything of it!