So I'm in the supermarket, and right over near the bottle-return counter are these shelves full of single packs of cigarettes-- not in cartons or anything, just single packs. They're silver and blue and at first I swear they're Marlboros for some reason, but when I look closer I notice they're a brand I've never seen before, a name that starts with an "M".
All of a sudden my mother shows up behind me. My father and sister and baby brother just fall in behind her, and she's making motions at me to block her while she steals these cigarettes. So I turn my back to her and open my jacket wide to hide her-- and all of a sudden she's stuffing pack after pack into MY pants pockets, and then she starts to fill hers.
Right about here there was an announcement over the store PA system that a particular brand of cigarettes--I'm sure now that it must have been Salems (what my mother smokes)-- was on sale for three cents a pack. It was a promo, I guess, for their new "flavored" kind. I wanted to get some, but I'm not old enough to buy them. I saw Kevin there then, who is old enough to buy me cigarettes, and I tried to get him to, but I had no money and he wouldn't buy them if I didn't give him money.
My mother comes running up behind me now and starts to push me out of the store. She's saying something about the girl behind the bottle-return counter giving her funny looks, and my father and sister and brother are just silently following me and my mother as we try and sneak out of the store.
Right at the doorway my mom chickens out and doesn't want to go through with it. I see her through the big glass windows, running back in to stuff the cigarettes back onto the shelf. I've walked out, to try and prove to her that it's okay, that we won't get caught, but she hasn't seen. She comes out then, pockets empty, and our whole family starts to walk back home.
I want to go fast. I want to get out of the parking lot, because my pockets are full of stolen cigarettes, but my parents are talking about something between themselves and don't see me walking faster and faster out of the lot. The packs of cigarettes are falling out of my pockets all over the asphalt, and I don't bother picking them up. I'm trying to get out as fast as I can, but I feel like I'm wading through deep cold rising water.
