Wren shook a Marlboro Light out of the box and lit it. Mournfully he looked inside the cigarette pack and saw there were only half a dozen left. Now, with the combination of being unemployed and cigarette prices rising up to over ten dollars a pack, Wren realized he might finally have the impetus he needed to quit once and for all. But now he craved the solace the nicotine and tobacco would provide. He dragged deeply on the smoke, plopping down on the front stoop of the apartment building where he and his mother, Linda, lived.
He watched his exhaled smoke as the wind carried it upward, listening to the rustling sound that same wind initiated in the leaves of the big maple tree in front of the three-flat redbrick building he called home. This part of the Far North Side neighborhood, Rogers
