God's Broken Lil' Baby. E. Jay Ford
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is the letter from the dope man.
We are back in East St. Louis, Illinois. Something went really wrong in California. We got on a Greyhound bus one day and rode for three of the most horrible days of my young life. I got registered at Lilly Freeman Elementary School. I was in the fifth grade. The teacher I got was pretty nice, but I didn’t want to live here. I want to know what happened. It’s cold as fuck here, and we now lived in a house with about thirteen people. It was so crowded in there, and my mommy was always sleeping. She didn’t do anything but sleep and cry. I’m happy to be around my family. They were freaking hilarious. I just didn’t know why we were here and where was my daddy. Why didn’t my mommy go find him? Why didn’t he come back to us? This shit was crazy. I love my mommy, but this made no sense to me.
There came the day I found out why my life had changed so dramatically. I was the first one home from school from school this day. That was weird because Baby Brother was downstairs by himself. Where was everybody? My granny and granddaddy were at the grocery store. I remembered them talking about it earlier before I left for school. My uncles were always gone, so that was normal for them for them not to be there, but my mommy was always there with Baby Sis and Baby Brother. Sissy wasn’t even there. Mommy picked her up from school every day. I started searching the house when I heard a noise in the basement. I had always been terrified of the basement. My uncles had also banned me from their rooms in the basement, so it was a forbidden spot. I opened up the door to the basement and started to yell for my mommy. She didn’t answer, but I heard laughter. I wanted to see what was so funny.
I got to the bottom stair, and there were a group of people around the pool table. At first, I thought it was my uncles and their friends in a game of pool, but it wasn’t. It was my mommy and three strange people who I had never seen before in my life. They had a spoon, some aluminum foil, cigarette lighters, and some of those metal scrubs that were in the kitchen. There was no pool game going as far I could tell. Everybody looked crazy and was talking really slow. One was slobbering when he talked. It was gross. I got really scared. It smelled terrible down there, and I began to cry. I still didn’t understand what was going on, so I called my mommy’s name. She was startled. I asked her why she didn’t pick up Sissy. She started yelling at me about being in grown folk business and pushing me up the stairs. She told me to get Baby Sis and Baby Brother and take them to the room. I disappeared to my room, but I could hear the commotion downstairs. It must have been later than they thought because they started to scramble. I looked out the bedroom window, and you could see them hittin’ that door and running down Missouri Avenue like they had stolen something. My mommy hit across the field toward Lilly Freeman Elementary School. She was an hour late, but she had finally gone to pick up Sissy.
When you live in the projects, word spread fast, and by the time my granny got home, everybody in the hood knew that my mommy had left Sissy at the school. Granny had been down the street visiting with her best friend trading gossip, and that’s who told her. Granny was shitty! She stormed in the house screaming at my mommy about who the fuck she had in her house. My granny didn’t play that. Nobody was allowed in my granny’s house. There was a time when my parents were married right out of high school, but that didn’t mean shit to my granny. He didn’t have a place for my mommy, so he had to leave me and my mommy every night. Of course, my mommy tried to make the argument about how nosey my granny’s best friend was and about how she always talking. That’s how I found out she was also the one who told my granny my mommy was pregnant with me when she was in high school. My granny and mommy were so mad at each other. Granny released. Told my mommy she brought all that dope smoking shit from California but she wasn’t going to bring it in her house. I finally knew.
I had heard about the parents that had got hooked on crack. I didn’t really know what it meant, but I had seen a number of people real bad off on that shit. My mommy didn’t look like that so that couldn’t be true. Granny had to be mistaken. She wasn’t. You learn real fast that when people are mad, they say everything they have been thinking. In that one night, I learned that my granny had been sending my mommy and daddy money in California to help to take care of us. They must have been smoking the money away because we eventually got evicted. That’s how we ended up living with Grandmother, daddy’s mother, when we were in California. My daddy was high the last time I saw him. That answered the questions I had for that major event. We had become homeless in California and now I know that my mommy was on crack. I can’t believe this. Everything that I thought was the truth was all a lie. My childhood ended that night.
I ended up with two parents who were addicts. I often asked the universe what I had done to deserve this. What was wrong with me? This was no doubt not fair to me or my siblings. It was life, though. On one hand, it made me resentful and angry, and on the other hand, it made me strong and resourceful. I may not have grown up with the best things in life, but I bet you I know how to go out and get it.
Chapter 15
15 Momma’s Baby, Daddy’s Maybe
I Close My Eyes
I close my eyes and make it quiet.
I close my eyes to turn the projects to a field of dreams.
I close my eyes, and my room is luxurious.
I close my eyes, and my cheesy clothes change into the latest fashion.
I close my eyes to wish that wish.
I close my eyes, and my father is here.
I close my eyes to find beauty and joy.
I close my eyes to live the life I’ve worked so hard to live.
I close my eyes to pretend things are better than what they seem.
It’s morning, time to open my eyes, back to reality.
I was living with my granny and granddaddy in Indianapolis. I was a sophomore at Ben Davis High School. I loved living with my grandparents, but I hated living in Indianapolis. It was the worst place in the world as far as I was concerned. This was actually my second time living here. I loved living with them more than I hated Indianapolis, Indiana. The city was depressing. There were all these prejudice white people, and they were mean. It was only four hours from East St. Louis and still the Midwest, but for some reason, it was colder. This particular stay found to be my most painful stay I had experienced this far. Shit happened that made me question my whole existence. Words are so powerful. No matter how strong you think you are, if you allow the words you hear to control you, they can destroy you. These words shut me all the way down.
I was hanging with my one of my uncles this particular night. We were in Coppertree Apartments. That’s where favorite auntie lived. We had some of our people in town for a visit. I don’t remember their names because they were always referred to as the Bush’s and the Berry’s. They were all sitting around in the living room talking, drinking, and smoking when one of them turned to me and told me that he knew my real daddy. Normally, the kids were not allowed to sit around grown folk when they were talking. I wish they had thought of that rule that night. I knew that he knew my daddy, so what was he talking about. They all grew up together in the projects. I’ve heard some of the stories a thousand times. Of course, with a confused look on my face, tell him I already know that. He responded, “Not that daddy, your real daddy.” I’m stunned because I don’t know what the hell he was talking about. What real daddy? My daddy is the only daddy I know. I looked around the room, and everyone was in agreement about this “real daddy.” Conversation immediately switched to how my mommy should be ashamed for not telling me about real daddy. I went deaf. The pounding in my ears of what I just heard blocked all words.
I’m now holding back tears harder than I have ever done in my life. I didn’t know what to think. I had started thinking about everything that I thought I had known about my parents, my siblings, my life. All the times that I have felt I didn’t fit became a conformation to me at that very point. That feeling that my mommy treated me worse than she treated my siblings suddenly became an “I know why now” situation. I wasn’t his child, so she didn’t like me as much became my immediate feeling of resentment. I was angry and hurt all at the same time. I was mad at these assholes for telling me some shit like