Story Origins
This story is pure fabrication. While I've had my own share of teenage nic-fits (and the misguided belief I could successfully hide my smoking from my parents with either toothpaste or chewing gum), the events occurring in this story do not have a direct parallel to my life.
That being said, when I was writing "And Apparently, Cigarettes," I was heavily influenced by the memories of my early teenage years, and in my mind Katie's house is that of a past girlfriend, one who lived in a not-so-nice part of town, and one who's home life seemed so very much more chaotic than my own.
I'll also admit that Erica (Katie's mom in the story), is a mash-up of two mothers I knew as a teen--my own and my best friend's--both of whom had the ability to scare the living shit out of me. I still remember times when I was lying to my friend's mom (usually trying to save his ass from something stupid we'd both done), all the while knowing she knew I wasn't telling her the truth, but being completely unable to stop as she refused to call me on it. In retrospect, I'm sure those phone calls sucked for both of us.
An early version of this story originally appeared in Chameleon, an in-house anthology for young adults published at the University of British Columbia in 2008.