Nicole - A Smoking Fairy Tale

"I haven't honestly Gotha, I wouldn't dream of it!" Nicole begged as she focused on pulling her hair up the side of the tower. "There is never been anyone other than you up here Aunt Gotha! Honestly!"

"You have, you have had man up here. Now I think about it, I can smell the sweat of man, I am surprized I missed it before" she said as she sniffed the air as she marched in to the kitchen area, bent down and rummaged inside in the wicker basket.

"What are you going to do Aunt Gotha?" Nicole said trembling by the window as she continued to pull her hair up the side of the tower.

"You will see." Gotha said as she continued to rummage. "I am going to take away your pride and joy, for being evil and going behind my back!" She steamed and plotted.

"Ahhh. Err, can I help you find what you are looking for?" Nicole asked as she nervously walked in to the middle of the room and picked up another cigarette from the neat pile on the table and tensely lit it and then inhaled fervently on it.

"Ah ha" Gotha said as she stood back up and put scissors behind her back.

Nicole exhaled a cloud up to the ceiling and watched nervously as Gotha walked across the room with her arm behind her back. Nicole bent down and flicked the ash from the rolled up cigarette in to the glass dish. As she looked up Gotha snipped her hair just above the neck taking the whole large pinned bun of hair off in one fell swoop.

"Gotha, what the hell have you just done?" Nicole burst in to tears "You have cut off my hair!" she sobbed and then sucked hard on her cigarette exhaling through her nose.

"You have been a wicked, wicked child; I just don't know what to do with you!" Gotha fumed.

Nicole paused, with her cigarette dangled in the corner of her mouth, looked at the table with the glass ashtray sitting in the middle of it, she picked it up and felt the weight in her hand.

"What are you doing?" Asked Gotha slightly panicked.

"You will see!" Nicole said as she flung it behind her catching Gotha on the side of the head before both falling to the floor the ashtray smashing to smithereens as it landed with the ash and butts from the cigarette creating a cloud of dust and covering Gotha in soot.

Nicole turned and looked behind her, "Oh fuck! What have I done?" Nicole cried out loud as Gotha was lying on the floor covered in glass, Nicole's hair strewn on the floor still in Gotha's hand. 'Fuck I better get out of here before she wakes up!' Nicole said to herself as she looked around the room.

She walked around and grabbed a couple of deep breaths of fresh air, flicked her cigarette out the window and then climbed up on the chair coughed and moved the loft hatch, again getting covered in dust again and coughed. She grabbed her bag full of cigarettes, water and supplies and dropped it on the floor and moved the wooden hatch back. She put the rucksack over her shoulders and then lifted her mattress.

With the twine ladder bundled up, she walked over to the window and rolled the ladder over the edge and tied it on the frame. She went back and felt for Gotha's pulse, she was breathing at least, and then proceeded to climb down the tower on her ladder. For the first time in two or so years she had left the tower.

She looked left and then to the right and then dug in to her bag and lit the match and caught the twine on fire. She watched for second and the twine took light and the fire climbed the rungs of the tower. She turned and ran towards safety. After two minutes she stopped out of breath she leaned forwards with her hands on her knees and breathed hard. 'Fuck I am unfit' she said to herself as she sat down on a nearby log and dug in to her bag and got a cigarette and match box out and lit another of her rolled cigarettes. After a couple of deep inhales, she then slowly walked on through the woodland towards her idea of safety.

Chapter 8

Gotha coughed and rubbed her head and gently opened her eyes to see the glass surrounding her. 'Ugh, what happened she thought as she slowly came around there was a strong smell of smoke in the air.

She slowly got up and brushed the glass, ash and butts off her clothes and looked around. She leaned across and picked up a cigarette and used the last match to light it, she puffed away on the cigarette looking around at the chaos around her. She looked at the smoke coming from beside the window and walked over to see the twine ladder that Nicole had used to escape finally burn to a crisp and then over a few minutes disintegrate in to ash that drifted off in to the woods as calmly as a leaf.

She sat down on the chair inhaled on the cigarette and thought for a moment. A smile creeped across her face, she got up and went to the corner and got the dustpan and brush and tidied up all the glass, and straightened the room out.

'He will turn up eventually' she mused to herself.

***

Nicole walked and walked through the woods searching for safety away from Gotha and the tower. She reached the wall beside the still well-tended to tobacco plants, and she pulled at the gate that she was always forbidden to go through. With a big heave the gate easily opened.

It revealed another well-kept garden, with a gravel garden path leading up to a beautiful old house, the garden was full of old toys, with a large trampoline in the corner. She could remember a few years ago hearing the girl playing next door.

She nervously walked up the garden path and knocked on the old wooden door, hopeful that someone may be in.

"Hello" the voice behind the door said before several deep coughs "I am on my way!" The voice croaked.

Nicole impatiently stood from one foot the other looking behind her the whole-time expecting Gotha to appear behind her at any moment and take her back to the tower.

The door opened to an older lady with greying blonde hair and a pretty but aged face. As she spoke the creases on the skin were deep.

"Hello, I don't want any double glazing and I certainly not interested in religion!" she barked before dragging hard on her cigarette perched between her fingers.

"Hi, I hope you can help me?"

"Why would I help you?" The old lady spoke with her smoke pouring out her mouth, before dragging hard again.

"I have been trapped and I am running away from my Aunt Goth.."

"Sorry did you say Gotha?" Pasha quickly interrupted the looking in disbelief as the smoke again poured out her mouth.

"Yes?" Nicole asked.

"Sorry to be rude, but what is your name?"

"I am, err, hi, I am Nicole!" She politely said a little concerned.

"Nicole?" Pasha said with her eyes wide open and a tear forming in the corner of the eye.

"Yes, I am Nicole?" Nicole asked as she watched a tear roll down the women's cheek.

"Oh. My. God. Why didn't you say earlier?" Pasha beamed, her face lit up as more tears poured down her cheeks. "I don't believe it, I really don't, please come in, welcome home!" she said as she turned "Ludwig, Ludwig, Tabitha, great news Nicole has returned!" she bellowed into the house and then drew hard on her cigarette and coughed the exhale.

***

"Oh, my beautiful darling sexy Nicole, please let down your hair." Paul shouted up to the top of the tower.

"Oh absolutely" Gotha tried to replicate Nicole's voice and the hair was dropped down the side of the tower.

"I have the final bits of twine for you darling!" Paul said between grunts as he climbed up the hair. Gotha quietly chuckled as she heard him climb up the tower.

As he heaved himself over the edge of the window frame he looked up to be faced by Gotha rather than Nicole.

"Oh hell, where has Nicole gone?" He trembled.

"Ah, you were expecting Nicole I assume?" She cackled. "She has gone, and you will never ever see her again!" she cackled again.

"Have you hurt her? She believes she is pregnant with my child, what have you done with her?" he enquired.

"She has gone, you will never find her, and I will make sure of that!" she growled.

With that Paul turned and climbed on top of the window sill, untied the hair and jumped down with the hair unravelling from the top of the tower as he fell to the ground.

He landed in a thud in the soft mud where for years Gotha and Nicole had been emptying the buckets of water and waste from the top of the tower. He landed in beds of roses which were growing at the base of the tower, they were enjoying the human waste thrown from the top, the thorns on the stems ripped his face scratching the skin and cutting his eye lids. He cried out in pain, as Gotha looked down from the top of the tower.

"Find me a ladder!" Gotha screeched from the top of the tower as Paul crawled around blinded in the undergrowth.

Chapter 9

A few months later, a darling little baby boy was born in the same house that Nicole had been born. Pasha and Nicole both looked after the baby; they would sit there once the baby had gone to bed and smoke together and talk there was at least twenty years to catch up on.

Ludwig was now having to spend time looking after the tobacco leaves next door, as Gotha had disappeared and the garden next door was starting to get overrun with weeds.

The family all helped bring up the baby, even Nicole's newly found Sister Tabitha helped. They all looked after the baby together. The family bonded around the baby and their need for cigarettes.

After six months, baby he had been weaned on to cow's milk and had started to eat solids when one evening there was a bang on the door. Ludwig and Pasha stared at each other in fear. Pasha turned to Ludwig and said "Oh, please not again!"

Ludwig puffed out his chest, as the three girls cowered in the corner as went to the door.

"Hello?" He asked before it opened it.

"Hello?" The male voice behind the door croaked.

Ludwig looked back at the three girls cigarettes in their mouths with the fear etched on their faces. He opened the door and there was a skinny looking man.

"Hello, who are you?" Ludwig asked as the man in front of him fumbled against the wall.

"I'm Paul, could a bother you for some food, I have been blinded and I have been walking the woodland for months, and I am starving!"

"Paul you say?" Ludwig asked and the man nodded.

Ludwig turned around "Nicole, I think you might want to come over and help this gentleman."

"Nicole?" The man asked.

"Yes" Ludwig said.

"Am I where she is?" He asked.

"You certainly are!" Nicole said as she ran over and gave Paul a big hug.

Her tears poured down her cheeks all over Paul's scared face.

"Oh my god Paul, you found me!" Nicole sobbed.

"I did, I have been walking the forest for months eating berries and things I could find. Can I ask one thing?"

"You can ask many!" She said as she kissed him on the lips.

"Firstly, do I have a son or Daughter?"

"Oh Darling Paul, you have a wonderful son, I named him your absence. I called him Paul to remember you by! She gave him a hug and burst in to tears again. They rolled down her face and on to Pauls, the tears washed away some of the damage to his eyes.

Pasha and Tabitha stood back exhaled their smoke together and held on to Ludwig's hand as the family enjoyed the moment as Nicole had found her Paul.

***

Paul and Nicole were married a few months later, they moved into a small house not far from the grandparents and close to required source of tobacco leaves, which they all needed. Nine months following the wedding Paul had a baby sister, they were tempted to call her Gotha, but chose Nicole's mum's name of Pasha.

The family often talked of whether Gotha ever escaped but no one ever dared go back to see if she had got out.

So who knows if she ever did...?

The family lived happily ev....as best a married couple with two young kids could!

THE END