the month. That was the month that I started stealin’ milk. I would go to the store, walk the aisles, and take three cans of milk and put them in a big purse. When I needed diapers, I would go into the store, open a package of diapers, and stuff as many as I could into a purse with the milk. Three cans of milk and about ten diapers were all I needed to last me until the next WIC vouchers came. I felt bad stealin’, but my baby had to eat and her daddy was not around and even when he was, he was always asking me for money or just taking what I had. Shanetta and I, and our kids, existed on very little. All we had was each other and the daily conversation of how dirty and doggish our men had been. I would cry on her shoulder and she would cry on mine. I loved my brother, but I could almost understand her rage. It was the rage of all the women in High Point put together who had made families for these young men who so easily walked away.
My lights stayed out for a while. I wasn’t going to ask anyone for the hundred dollars to get them turned back on. Everyone I knew was strugglin’ and waitin’ for their lights to be turned off in the next few days as well. I used to ask God in my prayers, “When is it all going to be over with?” B. was still coming over to see us. Why I let him, I don’t know. I still felt like I needed him. His presence made me feel like I was better than my neighbors, because temporarily, I had my man, even if he wasn’t really loving me. At least my boyfriend was there, and those other lost daddies were not. The fighting continued. B. would come over and fight with me and never pay any attention to Zion. When she would crawl up to her daddy, he would ignore her or act like she was a stray dog that had gotten too close to him, reminding him of obligations that he wanted so desperately to forget.
Our arguments were infecting Shanetta’s fragile household, and one day, out of the blue, she gave me one hundred dollars so I could get my lights back on—and so that Zion and I could leave.
I returned to the First Farmington Apartments, apartment F in building 316, and B. moved in again. I started drinking. I would put Zion to sleep and I would go downstairs and sit on the steps and drink beer. While it was the wrong thing to do, that is what people do in the projects. Project life is like no other life. “Nothin’ to do” is a common reason for the crowded staircases, beer bottles, and cigarette butts strewn throughout the parking lot. Ghetto girls need to look good, so they dress up every single day in heels, makeup, tight shorts, and halter tops. They stroll their babies up and down the walkways of the projects with their cordless phones in their pockets instead of cell phones, going as far up the block as you could go and still get reception. Sitting outside after dark was summer in the projects. The familiar sound of loud voices and deafening car radios was all you could hear inside the project’s gates.
I spent too much time walkin’ the projects with a drink in my hand instead of turning to God and falling on my knees. My heart had been hardened. I needed things, not prayers. I was asking myself, What was praying gonna do?
B. was always out with his friends, so I was out with mine. And when we got home, we would fight about everything and nothin’ at all. We would fight because we were mad that we were sitting in the projects with no money and a child that was not conceived in true love. It continued to get worse every night.
The fights would begin when B. would get off the ugly purple couch with the stuffin’ coming out. He would open the refrigerator door and yell to me that there was nothin’ to eat. That would wake Zion up. I would go into the white kitchen and try to explain: “There was no money this week to get food.” He would say nasty things under his breath. Things like, “How did I end up here with you?”
The morning would continue like this until B. would leave,
My lights stayed out for a while. I wasn’t going to ask anyone for the hundred dollars to get them turned back on. Everyone I knew was strugglin’ and waitin’ for their lights to be turned off in the next few days as well. I used to ask God in my prayers, “When is it all going to be over with?” B. was still coming over to see us. Why I let him, I don’t know. I still felt like I needed him. His presence made me feel like I was better than my neighbors, because temporarily, I had my man, even if he wasn’t really loving me. At least my boyfriend was there, and those other lost daddies were not. The fighting continued. B. would come over and fight with me and never pay any attention to Zion. When she would crawl up to her daddy, he would ignore her or act like she was a stray dog that had gotten too close to him, reminding him of obligations that he wanted so desperately to forget.
Our arguments were infecting Shanetta’s fragile household, and one day, out of the blue, she gave me one hundred dollars so I could get my lights back on—and so that Zion and I could leave.
I returned to the First Farmington Apartments, apartment F in building 316, and B. moved in again. I started drinking. I would put Zion to sleep and I would go downstairs and sit on the steps and drink beer. While it was the wrong thing to do, that is what people do in the projects. Project life is like no other life. “Nothin’ to do” is a common reason for the crowded staircases, beer bottles, and cigarette butts strewn throughout the parking lot. Ghetto girls need to look good, so they dress up every single day in heels, makeup, tight shorts, and halter tops. They stroll their babies up and down the walkways of the projects with their cordless phones in their pockets instead of cell phones, going as far up the block as you could go and still get reception. Sitting outside after dark was summer in the projects. The familiar sound of loud voices and deafening car radios was all you could hear inside the project’s gates.
I spent too much time walkin’ the projects with a drink in my hand instead of turning to God and falling on my knees. My heart had been hardened. I needed things, not prayers. I was asking myself, What was praying gonna do?
B. was always out with his friends, so I was out with mine. And when we got home, we would fight about everything and nothin’ at all. We would fight because we were mad that we were sitting in the projects with no money and a child that was not conceived in true love. It continued to get worse every night.
The fights would begin when B. would get off the ugly purple couch with the stuffin’ coming out. He would open the refrigerator door and yell to me that there was nothin’ to eat. That would wake Zion up. I would go into the white kitchen and try to explain: “There was no money this week to get food.” He would say nasty things under his breath. Things like, “How did I end up here with you?”
The morning would continue like this until B. would leave,
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