Something Like Hope Read Online Free PDF Page A

disrespectful. I appreciate the gesture, however small. After a while in the Center you suspect everyone is trying to fuck with you and cut you down.
    The memory: I am a little girl, swimming off a wooden dock with my father. It’s a reunion of my family on my father’s side, but I hardly know anyone. I don’t think myfather got along with his family, but at this party, everyone seems happy. We are having a picnic next to a lake, and there is so much food: fried chicken, potato salad, greens, hot dogs and hamburgers. There’s a couple of pies, too, and I can’t wait to eat them.
    My father is big and strong, and his body is covered with tattoos and scars. He has just been released from prison, but no one talks to me about this. They do, however, tell me that I resemble my mother, and this makes everyone look sideways at each other, the way people do when there’s stuff going on that you’re too young to understand.
    After eating, I go down to the edge of the lake and dip my feet in. The water is cold enough to leave goose bumps, but it is very hot outside and it feels good. I am too skinny to fill out my bathing suit, and my father says, “Girl, you need to eat more.” I am not used to him, and the attention is almost too much, too good. And being around these kind people, even if I don’t really know them, is so nice. They keep asking me if I want more soda or pie. They call me lovely and beautiful.
    The absolute best part is when my father decides to come swimming with me. He gives me his good leather basketball to use as a float because I can’t swim. “Be careful,” he says.
    I jump in, but the ball pops up without me. And just as I start to go under and swallow the water, my dad’s arm plunges into the dark green water and he pulls me up. Heswims me over to the basketball, makes sure I’m okay, and asks if I want to keep swimming. I nod.
    The next time, he holds my hand and says, “Ready, set, go!” We jump together, knees drawn up in the air, mad grins on our faces, water flying off our nappy heads in silvery beads. The drops of water hang in the air. They catch the sun’s rays and bend them into different colors, and it’s just me and my dad playing together. The sky is extra blue with cottony clouds, and he loves me. I am his little girl.
    Another memory: my dad no longer lives with us. He moved out of state and doesn’t call or send money anymore. I’m alone with my baby brother. My mother is out, but I don’t know where because she doesn’t tell me. My brother clings to me for warmth and comfort. It’s cold and he doesn’t have a sweater or even toys. No stuffed bears or soft blankets. I carry him everywhere and he cries when I put him down—so I don’t put him down.
    I make up a game and pretend that I’m his mother. Kind of like what other little girls do with their favorite dolls.
    “Do you want me to be your mommy? Okay, I’ll be your mommy. Are you a good baby? Marcus, have you been a good baby today? I think you have.”
    Marcus puts his head down on me and falls asleep. He is warm and soft and he loves me. Even though I am only a little girl myself, I can tell that he loves me and trusts me, and this fills my six-year-old soul with happiness. I lie back on the filthy sofa and pull an old blanket over us. I amcold and tired and my belly growls for food, but for the moment I am content, because there is someone in the world who loves me. Someone who needs me.
    Marcus’s little hand wraps around my pointer finger, and I feel the tremendous power of this bond. His tiny fingers wrapped around my own. A hand inside another hand. I watch his eyelids flutter with dreams. I kiss his forehead and say, “I love you, little baby. Momma loves you.”

13
            M s. Choi is pissed today. She will take out her seething hatred on one of us. We all wonder who it will be. Coffee? China? Kiki? Tyreena? Me? No. It will be Samantha, this skinny Hispanic girl with wild frizzed-out hair and