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Wounded, living ghosts.
I knew from the moment he walked through the door, it was a ghost coming back in the form of a husband.
Years passed, and he asked me after one particularly bad cut off.
Why do hold onto hurt?
Are you coming to help put the TV stand together and take Baby Boy to the game or not?
Yes.
Okay. Fine.
I’d been asked that all my life.
The hurt keeps me from legally marrying him, my first fiancé, my second fiancé.
The hurt overshadows. It overcomes. And it feeds the beast of my hyper independence.
My foster sister grew up in the projects.
Yet she dubbed me, of all of us, the one with the wildest heart.
Out of control, she said.
I’m not judging you, girl,
she said when I was a dancer.
If DCFS was coming for all the stripper Moms,
Nobody in Chicago or New York would have custody of their kids.
It’s not that. It’s your soul I worry about.
What the fuck was she talking about?
I hung up the phone. Sat in silence, fuming. And went on.
