Jasmine Harrell
The A/C and I hum, the A/C louder than me, as the children sleep. It gives me time to settle my mind so I can think of another entry to the story.
They’ve been able to stay on their feet thus far.
Officially, the story is that we’re on vacation. Hopping from motel to motel, it’s given me the idea of inventing stories about the little neighborhoods we live near. Instructing them to find “trinkets” centered around the stories I have told before we move on. They were pretty good at finding them, mostly garbage I told them to get rid of once they got “power” from them or unlocked their “mysteries”. Sometimes I tell them real stories when the memory is stirred, but the fake ones are much more thrilling. Ghost stories and made-up murders. I’m every bit like my grandmother.
Parents shouldn’t lie to kids, but doesn’t the moral scale tip in your favor when you know the costs of letting in certain realities? Kids who are acutely aware of poverty’s harsh reality detach from what’s typical in their lives, and go into survival mode.
Like education. Grades plummet where there’s empty fridges and pantries. Kids dream of their own stories outside of hunger in place of what they have to read in class. They sink inside themselves because they’re afraid of the embarrassment that’ll be weaponized against them if anyone finds out they are poor. The fact that there’s elitism in poverty scares me.
Reading takes up my time when the worrying sets in, to keep from sinking into despair. It doesn’t serve me. Eventually we’ll have to leave this motel and move on to the next. I’m not exactly low on funds, not yet, but management’s making jokes about whether I plan on paying rent here. I read well between the lines. We have to go. To where, I haven’t yet decided.
I click my nails against the table, impatience lending power to my fingers that might break a nail or two. I consciously stop myself, ball my hand into a fist, which I proceed to slam against the table. I freeze and look at my kids, who turn and groan irritably without opening an eye. Still again. Asleep again.
I sigh and mutter, the A/C’s rumble consuming my words. It wouldn’t be this hard if I had help. A cooperative mother for one. I paid her bills, her mortgage, sacrificed so much of my life because I didn’t want her staring down the possibility of living on the street. She offered me anything, up to half her tiny kingdom then. When I wanted nothing, she told me I’d always have a place if I needed it.
The things we believe at nineteen. In our early twenties. Like all the I love you’s and I gotchu’s from a man who promises to stop hustling and get a steady job. A job he can do with ease because he’s talented, a job I envied because it meant he could do nothing for hours, hours that I’d like to take and devote to learning something useful. Ten years and back and forth, bouncing between jobs and hustling before the good one comes, then the minute he decides to take it, he gets killed.
I love and I hate Mike. I miss him more than either. We wouldn’t be here if he was still alive. I could be on my ratty brown couch with the jojaba oil stain on the arm, instead of sitting cross legged on this uncomfortable chair with this flat burgundy cushion. It doesn’t look like it’s been cleaned well. At least the beds are.
I scroll through the job listings hoping to find one without a lot of bullshit. When did customer service jobs require four-year degrees? It burns like cigarette into my skin, the limitations of my education, the barriers I faced to expanding it. And I feel sorry for the undergraduates because when I pretend to have a degree just to see what’s offered to them, I bite my lip to keep from screaming. Bachelor’s degree plus ten years of experience. For 40,000.00 a year.
The Red Wall
The next morning is better and worse. It’s worse because we have to leave today. Because when I woke up and stretched, I felt a small cramp. I thought I pulled a muscle too far, but as soon as I piss and wipe, I see dark red all over the tissue. I jump up and it’s all I can do to keep from shouting fuck in frustration. The toilet’s filled with blood. I figured since I was obscenely late, I was always irregular and sometimes my period didn’t come, I wouldn’t have to count this one. I had no money budgeted for it. Just food and shelter. I stuffed wads of tissue in the seat of my underwear and proceeded with my day, bleak before it began.
When I got to the counter, I was relieved to see a woman there. She looked young enough to still be menstruating. While Kayla and Jamal stood idly by, still rubbing sleep from their eyes though it was nine, I leaned forward and asked the woman if she had an extra pad quietly. Shame seemed to make my flow heavier. I looked down at the desk to hide my stinging eyes.
“Oh, yeah,” the woman replied nonchalantly.
She pulled her black bag on the desk, dug through it with tired familiarity before producing the coveted item in pink wrapping. So that brought me eight hours.
It got better because the Red Roof Inn was still taking reservations for the time. For three more weeks. That left me on borrowed time, but enough to figure something else out. I felt like I needed my mom more than ever.
It got better because while on the bus to Naylor Road Station, I scrolled through my emails and saw the subject line INTERVIEW INVITATION in all caps. It was for an administrative assistant job I applied to weeks ago. It was on a whim since there wasn’t a college degree requirement. I opened the email, read the message, then re-read it again just to make sure I had it right despite the words in the subject line.
I got an interview. I could feel my heart swelling as I read through the email before the catch started to deflate it. I needed a laptop. It was a video call. Why, why, why not a damned phone call! My spirit almost sank when I remembered Keisha’s boyfriend brought her one recently. At least my cousin would help me. Living with her wasn’t an option until she got space though. Two of our other cousins were staying with her for the time being. I would have called Mike’s mother for help, but I didn’t want it to turn into an invitation to stay with her. Bless her soul for her kindness, but she couldn’t kick her drug habit completely. Or I could ask Nicey. But that girl was barely home and left no spare keys. Barely available. She was messing with some rich guy up in New York at the moment. Last month they were in Belize. If I had that luck. I hate a money-focused relationship, but I wouldn’t be bleeding into the only solitary pad I had, on a filthy bus, smelling the metallic sweat of the construction worker next to me, and the salted, pungent body odor of the woman in front of me.
I wouldn’t worry for my kids’ education. My family would have a home. Parents sacrificed anyway. What was love to their comfort? Our stop finally came after an arduous hour between taking reluctant breaths and holding them in. That woman rode all the way down here, and I wish she had gotten off and walked. That’s the type of funk that belonged outside.
When I saw a man struggling down the street with piles of bags, I felt a little bad about what I thought about the woman. She could have been homeless. I mean, hell, I was walking that route my damn self. No one belonged outside, not in this heat, the ever-fucking lasting heat wave that was killing people up and down the country. I just wished I didn’t have to smell her all the same. It wasn’t the best thing to inhale when nausea settled in.
Once I checked in and got the kids situated, I left for the CVS nearby. Walking was a sort of divine torture. My grandfather used to say that trials were part of life. God’s tests, but torment seemed more accurate. Pain isn’t the only thing that makes people grow. Nurtured curiosity, stable environments that encourage people to go forward, to do more, challenges that don’t end in decimation, those help people grow too, but what do I know? Parents have seen and done it all, so my point is moot. Even though I’m one. Life is what it is, so what’s the point in complaining? I’m shut out before I even really start to get my words in. Before anyone really hears me.
The CVS has people moving about. An aisle could be empty one moment and packed the next. I had to be quick if I wanted to pull this off right. I made my way to the aisle with the pads and, God help me, there were four women there already. An old black woman who eyed me with smugness immediately, two black women my age, and a youngish white woman in jogging gear. She glanced at me in between searching for her ideal tampons, weighing the choice she had between Tampax and Kotex. The other women left before the older ones did.
I acted like I was a typical frustrated woman, dissatisfied with the pads and tampons, considering new options like the period underwear, but remained unsure. The old woman tapped my shoulder then.
“Don’t worry, eventually you won’t have to worry about it,” she said with mild kindness.
She left with her Depends. I guess she figured I wasn’t trifling and decided to end her citizen’s watch. I used to hate people like her until I saw it from their perspective. Theft drives people crazy. Personally, it steals your peace of mind. Done in stores, it puts boxes around the things you need, and makes you feel like you’re in yet another box like the one you live in. I still don’t like that shit, the suspicious spying. It makes you feel like garbage, especially if you need something for survival. But everyone’s looking for control at the end of it. It makes me sad and sick. These things keep us in circles of destruction. No one stops to ask why people steal, why people spy, why we do anything. They just make more boxes, ones around necessary items or bars around the convicted.
The white woman lingered, stealing peaks at me in between her search. I felt her gaze on me often, looking up in between my fake search as she tore away her gaze. I could keep up the charade longer than she had the patience to wait for me to slip up.
When I picked up a crushed box of tampons, she finally gave up. I looked around once more, ensuring the view was clear, before slipping them into my bag. I wasn’t a fan of tampons, but that thing about beggars came to mind. Since I was here I could pick up the kid’s food this afternoon. I would have never thought of CVS as a blessing, not until today when I saw the sale on snacks and Lunchables. It would give them a break before we had to switch back to Lidl bread and lunch meat. It was the similar rhythm of home, cycles of fun lunches, and staple lunches. No deeper questions into what was really going on.
With that accomplished, I went home, planning my next move. I called Nicey and hoped to God that she picked up. No answer. Mom was my last resort, but I didn’t have the heart to beg her to think about her grandchildren again. All I could do was call Keisha to borrow her laptop for my interview.
“Oh, girl, sure,” she said when I asked. “I hope you get the job.”
“Me too,” I sighed.
“Barely holding up?” she asked sadly.
“Girl, I’m trying,” I said looking at my kids eat now.
“I am looking at one of my room’s opening up,” she told me then. “Kenneth doesn’t like the idea of being assigned chores, so he claims he’s been looking for another place to stay. He’s trying to see if our aunt will take him, but he left her cause of the mice. I don’t know what he’s gonna do afterwards.”
“And if no one takes him?” I asked warily.
“I don’t know, but he can’t stay if he won’t contribute. Laying around my house, eating up my food. Maybe his mama might take him back. If he goes, I’ll let you know.”
I got her position. She didn’t want to throw out family, especially a nineteen-year-old, but life doesn’t come for free.
“Mommy,” Kayla said, tapping me gently. She grew into this gentleness because as an infant she was a boxer. “Can we watch TV?”
“Sure, baby,” I told her. It was at Jamal’s bidding, I’m sure. All kids know how to hustle their parents. Send in the favorite or the cutest kid for a request, do a chore even (once out of all the times they’re told), and they get what they want.
“Mom?” he called out then.
“I’m on the phone, baby?” I said.
“When are we gonna get the next story?” Jamal asked.
“In a bit,” I replied, forgetting that I hadn’t even done that yet. “Hey, let me call you later.”
“Alright. Love you,” Keisha said.
“Love you too.”
I left my phone on the charger and went to my kids. They turned away from the TV, easily ignoring the cartoon playing. I don’t know what it is. My tolerance for cartoons ended five years ago. People aren’t even trying anymore.
“Let me think, what had happened here again?”
I eventually came up with a story about three dead kids. I know, mom of the year, but since we’re under unusual circumstances, I’ll give myself a pass. The story with the kids is that there was a child killer going around in an ice cream truck. He’d park it somewhere near old houses no one lived in, and kids strolling around the block would see it, ask for a treat only to be butchered, and have their brains thrown in the freezer. Each victim had a small trinket found with their bodies. A marble, a barrette, and a HotWheels white and red racing car. I hated myself as the words came out of my mouth, for the morbid story I made today, for all the stories. Why couldn’t I just be honest with my kids?
It was a habit I picked up from my mother that I swore I’d never partake in. A lot of things she did I swore I’d never do and ended up doing. Lying to my kids was the worst.
Into the Great Unknown
My kids were upset they couldn’t find everything on the list. They came back with a dirty, toddler sized basketball, and a red car before I called it quits on their hunt. Work was encroaching. I told them that we’d have time again tomorrow, went over the usual “let no one in speech”, and left for Safeway. I worked at the Waterfront location. The ride was wonderful for the short length. I wish my pay was as nice as it felt.
I thought of the life I used to plan for when I was in school, what I wanted to do with a degree in business, the house I wanted to have. Expenses sidelined all that, so I figured, I do Community College, and then transfer my credits. But I put the rest of my education on hold when mom was about to lose her home. I couldn’t let that happen, so I focused on working to help her. The reward for that was ungratefulness.
I left shortly after.
Then I lost the only good job I ever had two months ago. I never knew why we got laid off for certain, but part of me assumed it was because the owner wanted to open up somewhere cheaper. Isn’t it what they all do? Move businesses out of the state or the country to pay people less? After that, the jobs I got were one disappointment after the other. I wasn’t fired, but it felt like I was branded with those words because no one worth working for would hire me.
I wanted better for me. I spent so much of my time working for someone else’s comfort. It was a horrifying curse. At what point does someone else make me happy? At what point does life pan out better for me?
I put a pin in my depression for after work as my stop came up. I’d have time to add to the question then. The station was packed with people speed walking and cramming themselves on the escalator to exit. I just stood and waited. Since I was close to work, I had time to burn on these assholes. I hoped they would be even later for the people they knocked over as they rushed to the escalator, especially that poor baby, whose mother promptly picked her up, and grabbed the blond extensions of the woman who thought she’d speed by.
I wish I could stay to see the fight. I bent my neck to stare for as long as I could. A crowd morphed into a half circle around the women, each of them distracted from their routes now. A metro worker rushed to break the fight up. From what I could see, the mother was disturbingly amazing, balancing her baby safely against her while whooping that woman’s ass with one free hand. That’s a once in a life time sort of occurrence. I wouldn’t have had my child so close to a fight, but I do hate rude people. It was nice to see the beat-down for as long as I could.
When I got to the top, I made my way to the Safeway only to find another crowd. A smaller one. Outside my store were some of my co-workers, yelling, crying, screaming, threatening to burn down the building. And yelling the words that made knots on top of knots of my intestines. What about our jobs?
Oh, no, nononononononononono…
I felt the blood drain from my body. I was convinced there was a pool of it on the pavement beneath my feet. Maybe if there was, I wouldn’t have to deal with this fucked up reality. But the reality is screaming, threatening violence, crying, gasping for air, wondering how it’ll feed its kids…
And now I am.
I walked on legs that ought to have been limp, but by some miracle I got to the crowd. I could just see our manager, threatening to call the police if no one dispersed.
“Look, it’s from corporate. Too many people got hired here, don’t worry, you’ll get recommended at another store.”
“Nobody’s hiring!” a woman screamed. “I got turned down by Giant, by Subway, by every shit paying job out there!”
“Hey, no one else wants to work, you should be good,” our manager snapped back.
“Bitch, no one’s hiring, did you not hear me?” she shouted, pushing a thick vein against the side of her neck.
“I’m calling the police.”
They didn’t care. It was eight against one, and they rushed past her, shoving her aside, a couple even hitting her. I felt like I could have. I probably should have, but I didn’t need a charge. While she stood there, red faced and breathing heavy, I stared until she locked eyes on me.
“Is my job gone too?” I asked.
She sighed, “Yeah.”
“You know these people won’t hire any time soon, no matter what they say,” I told her.
“I’m sorry, what can I say?” she shrugged futilely. “Get welfare, apply anyway, I’ll give you a glowing review. Hell, I’ll even say you were a fucking manager. Just leave please. That’s all I need.”
“Anna,” a security guard said rushing out now, rattled and wide eyed. Three of my co-workers were leaving with full bags now.
“All I need,” she muttered in defeat.
I think my throat hurt from the amount of pride I swallowed calling my mother. I sounded hoarse as I explained the predicament to her. She sounded quite unmoved.
“Look, I’m not even asking for myself anymore. Just for the sake of your grandkids. Will you let us stay with you, instead of motel after motel? I have an interview, I’ll get unemployment, all the other shit, I just need a hand so we don’t end up on the street, ma.”
My mother sighed, irritable, outraged that I had put so much on her.
“Look, Lonnie hardly likes anybody in his house for too long.”
“Oh, he gets to say it’s his house without helping you pay for it?” I challenged.
“Don’t you get—”
“Stop,” I said immediately, rage bleeding into the pulse of my heart. “I don’t even know why I called you. You didn’t care enough when we was homeless the first time, and you won’t when your babies are on the street, and I’m struggling to keep every creep away from them, food in their mouths, and pennies in our cup from some kind stranger who gave out of their own struggling pockets. You got your man, be happy with him.”
I hung up. I sighed on the ground outside of my job, not caring who heard, not noticing the people who tried to give me money, then left it by my foot when I didn’t take it. I did eventually, I’m not that foolish. Just that angry.
But minutes later my mother did call me back, laying ground rules. How I’m never to disrespect her. How we have to respect Lonnie’s space. The basement is ours for the time.
“As soon as you get a job, you out. Stay with somebody else, get a hotel, since you good for that, I don’t care,” my mother huffed. “You lucky he don’t want no kids on the street. I had to say you was because he’d wonder why you couldn’t just get another hotel anyway. Cuz you don’t know real homelessness anyway.”
“Fine,” I said dryly.
I hope to God I get that job. I hope I don’t have to stay with her but for so long.