𝐃𝐎 𝐈𝐓 𝐅𝐎𝐑 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐁𝐀𝐆

3

I was already behind schedule so I couldn't even do my eyebrows the way I wanted to. Thank God for tweezers and this cheap pomade I bought from the beauty supply store that did the job. It was testing day at Francis Curry High and the seniors were allowed to wear whatever they wanted so I thought why not be cute and throw on this PINK sweatsuit I bought from a booster that come around the projects from time to time.

The closest mall is about 30 miles away and for someone who don't have a car you might as well say it's a state away. I hated taking the bus as it was, all the weird shit be poppin' off late in the night or early in the morning and I saw it firsthand every crack of dawn as I waited with my mama at the bus stop.

I sat there, fixing my eyebrows in this little mirror I stole from Forever 21 in silence as my mama sat next to me. She had this half-tired, half-glazed look in her eye but I made sure she looked as good as she could. I fixed up her wig nice and she even let me do baby hairs on her. I tweezed her mustache and I put her on this pretty sundress that made her look like somebody.

It felt like a real-ass mother/daughter moment until she smacked her lips in the middle of me laying her baby hairs and asked me:

"Did Junior call?" She ran out of minutes on her phone so the next line of contact was through me.

He did call her, but since this nigga I was talkin' to, La, was paying my phone bill and everything else for a little bit of pussy and time, I didn't feel obligated.

"No, mama." I lied through the skin of my teeth "Why you still worried about him?" I knew why, she was running low on her secret stash. "I don't know why you don't just leave him and we get our lives together and leave this place."

She sucked her teeth and just scratched her arm, she was getting upset but she was too high to react properly. "When he calls, let me speak to him."

I sucked my teeth softly, added the final touches to her wig as i fish-tailed it down neatly, hopefully she come back and its not hanging off the side of her head again.

I feel like Junior been pimpin' my mama out or she been pimpin' herself out to earn extra money for shit but she don't wanna tell me. She probably too embarrassed, but living in this slave shack already embarrassing enough ain't no use being so formal now.

"Your daddy called me. He want to see you." My mama mumbled, but I heard her. I just didn't respond. For what? He had my number and I'm 18 now, too little too late to play father of the year when he left me and my mama to suffer all these years. He always calling her, sending her money, but he don't never ask about me.

Why I gotta hear it through the grapevine that my daddy wanna talk to me? I get so mad thinking about it sometimes that I just prefer to say I have no daddy.

He done made a whole new life without us so why the fuck should he care now.

My brother want me to move to California with him and his wife he met in the military but then I start asking about Mama and bringing her and he go on his little bitch shit. He know that would be a bad move to leave her behind so he just end the conversation with me with that same old line:

'Just call me when you ready, I'll pay for your ticket and everything.'

If Mama can't come then I'm not leavin', so that nigga Junior can move his drug dealer friends in here and run her into the grave? I don't fuckin' think so.

I snapped out of my daydream and looked over to my mama, her eyes low and her body still. She looked so tired, and she looked like she was on auto-pilot but that was still my mama.

I gave her a kiss at the bus stop and $40 dollars out of my pocket as she got on the bus. Before the door closed I stood between them and stopped her, the bus driver had an attitude because of that but I don't give a fuck - your ass signed up for this early mornin' shift, not me!