statue of us. a story, incomplete.

We set out to change the world, and change we did. We listened to our peers telling us it couldn’t be done, and we refused to accept it as truth.

It wasn’t easy, nor was it random. It was a plan, a well thought out and conceived plan to change everything around us. Every one wants to survive, even if actually living is a fanciful tale of lore. The world was turning so that even our survival wasn’t guaranteed. The things we wanted so simply, with every passing day, was becoming less of a reality.

We had to become honorable. We had to become virtuous. Two words hard to make into reality because the definitions are so obscure. The dictionary could tell us, but you learn by being shown. And these two words were apparently ex-patriates of our country, ordered to exile. Or maybe they voluntarily left. But current day examples were few and slim, far to none. So, we had to come up with our own. Movies and history could provide the catalyst, but the definition had to come from us.

We boiled it down to two very simple tenants.
Doing whatever is hard is virtuous. The easier it is to do, the less virtuous it was.
We must give back for everything we had received. God had blessed us tremendously, so we could give back until the end of time, and still not be on this side of even. And at the end of it all, we would know because there would be a statue of us.
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“A lot of time has passed since we first started this”

“It has. You never really know how much time has passed while it’s passing. It’s only until…”

“Yes, I know. She’s gotten huge, hasn’t she?

“And grown too. Too damn grown if you ask me. Ha. Just like her momma.”

“I mean, did you honestly expect her to be any other way?”

“No not really. Eh, well…no, not really”

“I wonder what our children would have been like.”

“A little of you, a little of me…”

“Right. All crazy.”

“Hell yes.” His laughter was quick, but trailed off slowly, as if the end was in retrospect about the beginning. “God knows there had to be a reason it never happened.”

She spoke without looking up. She spoke without knowing she was being heard.

“God knows why. I have no idea.”

“Huh?”

She looks up, with no wasted movement. Her eyes meet his, and nothing else. She has to get this right, because moments like this are fleeting.

“Why didn’t we have children?”

She expected a sigh filled with regret. With thoughts of what could have been, what should have been. She expected a comforting, protective tone. Instead, she received none of it.

“We chose not to. We chose not to do a lot of things. Virtue was the choice, remember? We were trying to save…trying to save everything. Everything from itself"
The words came from inside of him, marinated in emotion and wrapped in himself. It would have been easier to hate him if he didn’t believe in them. But he did. Hate was not a luxury to be afforded to her now.

“That didn’t leave any room for anything else.”

Her head moved back down, slightly between her shoulders, eyes looking between her feet. Searching on the floor in that small space on the floor for a feeling. She had the words. For years she had the words. Words stripped of their feeling is a tragic circumstance. She had seen enough tragedy not to want to knowingly add to it.

She found the feeling, and the words left her mouth with a desperate sense of urgency. She didn’t want to lose it. One chance to get it right. A pause. Her eyes closed slowly. A small rise in her chest. Her exhale was audible.

“Did you think it would cost us so much?”

Cost so much? He made no effort to complicate the meaning of her words. She was owed more than that. Those words settled on his chest like somber lead. He knew his answer and did not make her wait long to hear them. A hand on her shoulder, constant and steady. “There, there” is what she felt. She looked up at him.

“No.”
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She got into it because of the children. Because of one child in particular. One child that gave her the motivation to try and change it all, a child that haunted her nights alone, when the only self, was herself.

In her attempt to give back to the world, to at the end, come on this side of even for all she had been given, she worked for a non-profit organization. It was a community center in her neighborhood, which also functioned as an outreach house for the discarded people. It never felt like work or a job when she was there, it felt like living. And this little girl, no older than 10, everyday taught her how to live.

They had conversations, but that isn’t how she learned from her. She learned by watching her be.
She approached everything with the exuberance of a ten year old child. Mainly, because she was a ten year old child. New and fresh every experience was to her. She was never afraid because everything was an adventure to her. After everything she saw, heard, smelled, tasted, accomplished- she realized that she changed. That she was, different. Started out one way, but ended up another. She relished that moment of realization. No sparks or colors, just deep rooted change. At 10, she didn't know this. Didn’t care to know. What she did know or care to know is that after spending time with her nana at Byrd's Sanctuary, helping to serve food to those layered in clothes that no more belonged together than crabs and ice cream, allowed her to view Mr. Buddy, who spent every waking moment on how to get wet and how to stay dry a little differently. She heard his words as kind, even wrapped in the slur of intoxication. These changes softened her, allowing her to bypass judgment based on appearance. The hue of skin, amount estrogen in a voice, or lack there of, meant nothing to her because she never noticed it. She saw, better yet felt, what made them, them. Goodness felt as warm and sweet as the crook of the neck of a woman loved. Sadness was thick and slow; anger, blindingly bright. A living, breathing canvas of emotional color, forever changing and remaining the same was her world, and she never wanted to leave its comforting embrace.

She saw that, and for the first time that she ever noticed, felt a twinge of what it means to be a mother. The desire to protect. Before meeting this little girl, she was content losing her place in this world. She saw it for what it was, and what it could be, but didn't know how to bridge the gap. Was it to get as much education as possible? Or maybe refraining from eating meat. Going to poetry reading was the answer for a while. Books with authors with little letter names, words infused with afrocentricity. All these things left her with temporary satisfaction, and constant confusion. Instead of feeling this way, she was content on giving up her slice of life, free of charge. Death wasn't an option, but detachment was. She was going to withdraw to find a place where she could at least feel like she belonged. But…she couldn’t.

She couldn’t shake the girl.
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”We need to talk, forreal.” She walked into his fenced backyard. The gray drab metal seemed to fit the mood. She felt that behind this 4 foot high fence, their decisions were protected from the ignorant scrutiny of the world. But her words wouldn’t be protected from him.

“About what?”

“About leaving.”

“I knew it.”

“You knew what?”

“That you weren’t serious about it. You just can’t let go, can you?”

“I can’t” For the first time in the conversation, she broke eye contact. She walked passed him with her head down. With their shoulder parallel, she paused mid-stride. I will not feel like this. The feeling trickled down her mind like cold molasses. Slowly.
I will not be ashamed. She turned her head at less than a 45 degree angle, eyes meeting his once again. “But not for the reason you think.”

“What’s the reason?” Concern laced with anger. As if a bright, thin red line was drawn though the median all of his words and thoughts. It demanded attention.

“Does it matter?” A futile shove in the face of relentlessness. He didn’t budge an inch. The protective fence now looked like a cage, and getting smaller by the minute. Her back wasn’t against the wall…yet. She knew he would not back off. She didn’t want him to either. He deserved an explanation and he would be provided with just that.

“I can’t leave, not now. Maybe not never.” She not nevered him when she wanted him to laugh. To break up the monotony of his far-too-stern-to-be-this-young face.

It worked. He smirked. “What made you change your mind?”

She immediately wanted to share the girl with him. How seeing little she made her rub her stomach as if life lived there (inside). How seeing her little hands try to keep steady as she carried unruly soup that probed the edges of the bowl, tongue unknowingly peeking out the side of her mouth, eyes crossed in concentration as she moved this meal across the room, and the smile that accompanied achievement made her realize that she couldn’t give up. To leave was to give up on her, and the hope for her world.
But something would get lost in the translation. He wouldn’t get it. A desperate concern was slowly easing over his face. More desperate the longer she waited. The anguish and guilt were ganging up on her. She had to say something.

“We can’t run.