No significant other who wooed me with a line, no babies of my own, not so far, but I do have a BF, this is my gift. She took me in when I was fifteen and had no place to go but back home to my mother, and for twelve years we lived in tiny apartments we couldn't afford, moving our meager belongings each year when the rent went up:
her water bed, my grandmother's dresser, her tv, our beloved rent-to-own stereo complete with a turn table and glass-door cabinet. She drove a '71 Mavrick and I was her passenger until she taught me how to drive my own VW Baja, my first car and license to drive when I was just old enough to walk into a bar and drink. She got me a job working with her on the south side of town--a pay step up from my 70 hours a week at Dairy Queen and Church's Chicken--at a 7-Eleven. We worked there for more than a couple of years
even when one night some guy threw a rock the size of a softball through the front glass door and knocked all 300 pounds of Brett the night guy out cold and bleeding not two feet from where Glenda stood. Even when another night another guy jumped the counter and dragged me across the deli floor by my hair and kicked me in the ribs a few times for good measure to keep me from reaching the phone before he ran out with the cash drawer. But we both quit when Brett the night guy started bringing a sword to work. The manager and owner told us we'd never work in that town again if they could help it, and it was a long scary time before the Sheraton took us into their housekeeping department a full month and a half later. We were both too slow and inept to avoid getting yelled at by the most formidable woman alive, she who supervised our scrubbing and dusting and bed-making. This is a four star resort,
her sentences began. So we helped each other a lot off the clock and celebrated our first time ever great medical benefits the likes of which I've not seen again, to be honest. And we felt strong working for a strong woman though we were dressed alike in pink maid's dresses and white aprons and name tags. We pooled our money to pay the electric bill, and felt stronger. Our various boyfriends were very confused: if not sisters,
then lovers, secretly, they thought. And sometimes, still--just a few days ago in fact--some old friend confesses uncomfortably: you know what we thought about you two. Yeah, we know. Old news. But you missed the rare beauty of it, in the oldest sense. In the childhood sense of the word forever,
bestfriends:
so if you would, pray for us or light a candle or do whatever you do when you wish hopeful things for others because my bestfriend is not feeling well, and so much is uncertain and terrifying about now, right now, and all this not knowing, and while her husband and children need her most of all, I need her too. Like you can't imagine. And I am far away from home.
