“Come on man,” a large husky boy, Jamie, said, pulling a white cigarette from his mouth and releasing the smoke from his lips. “You don’t really believe that government propaganda do you?”
Frank looked down at his  sneakers, muddy from their time in the woods. “If you honestly don’t believe that there is a link between smoking these garbage cigarettes and lung cancer, than you are truly dumber than you look.  Besides, it's illegal. Don’t want to get caught”
“What pig is going to catch us down here?” Rob said. “We are completely cut off from the laws down here. We are untouchable.”
“I could rat you out, you know.”
They all looked at him wearily, unsure if he was telling the truth or if he even had the nerve behind his words. They all tensed up, Frank had them in his clutches, but hey, he didn’t know. Even if he did he wouldn’t abuse it. They are his friends after all, no matter how bad of decisions they made.
“So… are you really going to rat, or are you just writing checks you can’t cash?” Gary said, his voice was scratchy and riddled with backcountry accents.
“Come on guys, I don’t want to but--you know…”
“No, we don’t,” Gary said, a tall kid with curly blonde hair and almost always had a smoke on him, “You're making a big deal out of nothing, so we catch a break, light up some tobacco, that's worth jail time, huh?”
He was forceful and looked grim, his eyes pierced into Frank, it burnt. Like a hot burning coal being slowly pushed into the back of his neck.
“I don’t know why you guys care whether I smoke or not, what does it matter?”
Rob chipped in, “We are your friends, and we don’t want you to feel left out, we want you to join us and well… Have some fun”
A brief moment of silence overcame them, only to be broken by a large, husky boy stomping out a cigarette.
“One drag,” the Jamie said, “all we want you to do, just one drag and you're done, alright”
“One drag?” Frank said, curious and just wanting to get it over with, “Just one puff and I’m done”
They all nodded, finally deciding that this would be the closest they could get Frank in on their little ‘past time’.
“And we stomp our cancer wraps and go do something else between pouring toxic sludge into our lungs alright,” Frank added.
Gary swiped the Camel out from his lips and stomped it out, looking at the other boys and telling them to follow suit with his sharp piercing eyes. Jamie had already stomped out his smoke, Randy happily took out his cigarette, if it meant getting to see Frank finally smoke.
Gary handed him one, to which he took it. Thinking back to the hell he experienced about two years ago. He was horror stricken when he discovered that his grandmother had contracted lung cancer.
*  *  *
His family rushed to the hospital where she was kept at, she lived for about five months with that awful disease. He was swollen with a deep depression that was unbearable. About twelve days before she died, he was in the hospital tending to her. Sobbing softly and telling her how much he loved her, she was given cancer and all he could do was sit back and watch it consume her.
Fury, rage, anger. Words that described his emotions the day she died. She pulled him up close with her poor innocent eyes, (stricken with age, although taken at the ripe age of 51) and she asked him with pain in her voice for a pack of cigarettes.
“How dare you,” he told her, forcing the words out of his choked throat, “y-you are leaving us on the account of your own decisions and now you only plan on leaving us… with the trail of disgusting smoke and a broken family. Without regrets of purposefully painting your lungs with cancer. How… how dare you”
After this he left the room, weeping. Trying to ignore the soft sobs coming from his grandma’s room.
    *  *  *
He took the cigarette. He immediately felt guilty, as if he had just dropped somebody off a cliff. He felt empty inside, besides the butterflies floating and fluttering. All was quiet, after all, it was the moment of truth. He placed the cigarette in his mouth. He immediately took it out gagging.
“Tastes like something a vulture would vomit out,” he said, holding back the will to throw up.
“Not too polite,” Gary said, “ Cost me eight bucks for this pack”
Frank placed the cigarette back in his mouth and held out his hand in front of him, beckoning for a lighter.
Gary pulled a small red Bic lighter out of his pocket and placed it into Frank’s outstretched hand, “relax man, its just a puff, alright. Chill, just chill”
“Yeah man, its not like you’ll be doing meth tomorrow,” Rob said, grinning.
“If you do, invite us over Mr. White,” Jamie said, laughing.
He pulled the lighter up to the end of the cigarette and struck down on the button. Sparks. Once again, Sparks.
“One more time,” Jamie said.
He was right, about a million things went through his mind at the same time. He still had a way to get out, he still had a way to save himself. He knew it as well, but didn’t know how, he didn’t know whether it would be the right decision, to leave his friends when the most likely needed him most.
Snap, a flash of red fire arose from the lighters end. He stared at it as it danced about at the end of his hand. He slowly pushed it up to the cigarette, he saw smoke arise from the end of it. He held in his breath, eagerly waiting to be able to tear the cancer stick out of his mouth and stomp it deep into the ground. Finally, he let go of his breath, releasing the toxic smoke out of the cigarette and into his lungs. His “friends” began to laugh, and applaude for his most recent accomplishment but was only cut short. Cut short by a quick snap of darkness overwhelming them. Frank couldn’t see the hand in front of his face. He spat out the cigarette that was hanging inside his mouth with great gratitude. The darkness swallowed them for almost fifteen minutes, none of them daring to say a word. Frank found this to be the most unsettling, his friends tend to be extremely excitable and won’t shut up for more than thirty seconds before opening their jaws.
Soon, a dim light came about the area. Like a candle light but enough for Frank to see the horror that lay in front of him. Two figures stood in front of him, eyeing him down like a wounded gazelle on the Serengeti. One larger figure lay slouched on a tree, Jamie. He looked about in his late 20s. His fingers were yellow and gripping his chest. His pale skin was clammy and could barely stay on his skull.  Gripped in his other hand lay a small yellow sign that read
“Heart attack,  age 28”
Frank was disgusted and horrified. He then dared to look at the two figures in front of him. He looked on with crying agony.. Gary and Rob. Gary’s mouth was gaping open in a half smile. Almost all of his teeth were missing but two rotting and decaying teeth lay on his black and webby gums. His eyes were swollen and dark with despair. Bags lay under his old and lifeless eyes. He then dropped to the ground, dead. A small yellow sign, similar to Jamies, fell from his jacket. Reading-
     “Died of Cancer, age 42”
Rob was even worse, his skin was stretched out and looked old and decrepit. He was slouched over and he was thin with the malnourishment and disease. His jaw was separated and torn, his gums was ripped and black. All his teeth were missing, along with all his hair. Veins spurted out of his pale eyes with greying pupils. Along with the rest, he fell to the ground. A sign appeared into his yellowing hand, scratched with his overgrown nails. It read only-
     “Cancer got me, age 38”
Frank could only do one thing, run away. Run for help, try to find help in this horrible darkness. He dashed through the old trees that stared down at him with their cold dead branches. Soon he was in a small field. Filled with dead grass and low hanging hills. In the distance he saw a tall figure, dressed in black with his face covered with the shadow of the night.
“MR! HELP!” Frank yelled as he sprinted towards it, tears streaming down his face.
Almost there he heard a cracking underneath him. Dead branches, leaves, the gaping hole. He fell down almost six feet into a puddle of mud and insects. The dirt walls towered above him, showering him in shadows and mystery. He could only look up in despair as the man in the long dark robe and covered face looked down at him. Tears dripped down Frank’s eyes as he thought of his friends, now dead from his own horrible actions.
“Please Help,” Frank whispered up to the bystander, choking on his sadness that welled up inside him like a large knot in his throat.
Barely moving the figure stretched his long arm down and grabbed Frank by the shirt collar and dragged him out with his long, cold fingers.
“W-Why- Who are you,” Frank whispered, choking on tears and nausea.
The figure then, standing tall, pulled his hood off. Only revealing the grim and ugly truth. He saw himself, staring at him with cold, dead eyes. His pale skin hung loose off of his stretched skull. His fingers were long and skinny with overgrown and yellow fingernails. His mouth was a disaster, his teeth were missing. All of them. His gums were black and butchered by the smokes. His lips were thin and broken, along the end of his mouth was a black and yellow rotting piece. A small hole rested on his throat, stretched, wrinkled, and black with cancer.
The figure dropped to its knees and finally fell. He fell into the pit slowly and without dignity. To Frank’s horror he beheld a headstone on the end of the pit. Cracked and overgrown with weeds. On it was an orange paper glued to it reading,
Suicide, age 45, Don’t do this to yourself
Please
Frank just dropped to his knees in shock. He sat there crying in despair, thinking. He closed his eyes to the black, he wanted to take it all back.
“Please,” Frank gasped, “Why? What have I done”
He felt a presence behind him. A presence filled with comfort and forgiveness. He felt a hand with warmth and love on his shoulder. Time swirled in his mind, twisting and curving. Causing him to fall into his own pit.
    *  *  *
“This is the part where you light the cigarette,” Rob said jokingly, a little amused on how Frank just sat there looking at the cigarette and the lighter.
“Yeah man,” Jamie said, “Like, maybe today”
Frank looked back at them. Unsure of what to say, what to say to his horribly misguided friends who are slowly killing themselves in front of him for sheer amusement.
“Don’t do this to yourself,” Frank said calmly, he smashed the cigarette out beneath his foot and left.
They all looked at him unsure, none of them daring to say a word. They were skeptical of Frank’s intentions but didn’t have the courage to truly stop him. To truly travel on to try to save them, they definitely wanted to but know he was doing what was best for them, whatever it was he was doing. They sat down exhausted and waited.