Never Poor

She had two children. Twins. Key word being ‘had’.

As soon as she hit high school she was asked what she wanted to be. The answers like, “Doctor! Teacher! Business Owner! Author! Psychologist!”, would rumble around in her mind, but never “Poor.”. She hit just at the mark between homeless and middle class, always paid her bills on time, no matter how much her boss cut her check to feed another man’s raise.

She wanted to go to college. She had so many dreams from her youth, but we rushed to tell this adolescent to hurry and choose what you want to do for the rest of your life (even if you’re too young to understand what it entails). We never saw how she slouched. Her smile fading as she realized there was no easy way to get out of being poor. College cost money. Money she didn’t have.

She worked at the diner and his blue eyes caught hers. They shared one night of bliss. One night. He was gone in the morning and in his place was a positive pregnancy test.

“It was a mistake!” She cried as her friends slowly left her.

“Close your legs skank.”

“You chose this when you didn’t get a condom.”

“You should have been more careful.”

But no one said a word about the beautiful blue eyed boy who left her. No one said anything about how he was wrong to use her and leave her like that.

There was no way she could take care of a baby, let alone two. She contemplated abortion, but the yells and protests outside her door called her a murderer. She thought about putting them up for adoption, where someone could take care of them, someone who had money, but once again the people of the world called out to her. They told her she was abandoning them and again she was faced with her mistakes.

Her eyes got dark and sunk into her skull. Depression began and she needed medication. Meds, baby supplies, food, clothes, doctor appointments, all she could never begin to afford with her pay grade.

She asked for loans, she borrowed money, and in the end they all asked, “Why don’t you just get a better job?”

She was a single woman with children who needed care, no degree, but a high school diploma that congratulated her on twelve years of soul sucking, creativity killing, aspiration dying, tests upon tests. Not grading you for what you are worth, but how much you know.

She needed a new job.

Then social services came.

She got a new job.

She danced the night away between sheets of different men every night, sleep would take her away to candy islands, and cocaine whispered lullabies of death in her ear.

There were those frightening moments of awakeness where the voices of the people outside began to speak.

“You slut, how revolting.”

Everyone was quick to judge the prostitute, not those who bought her time.

And no one questioned how she got there.