August 20th - All for Crack -

Did a puzzle for the bulk of the day today, while trying to hide from the hostilities of the shelter.  As the bulk of the house are crack addicts, or have other ongoing addiction issues, they were definitely people to be avoided at best.   I had been doing it for two days and quite a few girls joined in to get it completed.  I sent Julie out to go and by some tape with the bribe of a few cigarettes and ‘she’ went willingly.  I think that everyone liked the idea that I was about to execute.

The shelter, having only tables, and basic plastic chairs found in a cafeteria at best, resembled a prison.  All the walls are gray brick, and there are rags hanging in the windows, feigning to be curtains.  All the inmates, as I sarcastically define us, thought that it would be nice for said puzzle to be put on the wall.  First it is not steal able, and secondly, there is no glass that someone could smash, and potentially use as a weapon.  I put clear packing tape all on the face of the puzzle to keep it together, and then taped it on the wall.  It was funny how much it seemed to mean to the residents…it was like a little piece of home or the closest that some had been to one in a while, at least.  I was leaving my mark, for better or worse, embodied in said puzzle, and in 36 hours I was leaving, still not knowing where I was going to go.  Children for obvious reasons were not allowed to even be near that building (I wonder why?), and I would not be able to stay the minute that my daughter landed.  I have an ongoing anxiety, eating at the very core of me, and these women who are supposedly social workers are doing sweet f-all to try to help me find the next step!   Useless!!

Later this evening while sitting in the smoking room with said puzzle, a lady of about 50 came up to me.  She looked like she had been dragged through the bush, and was barely coherent. She had a bad dye job, even worse breath, and I was immediately uncomfortable. “Hey, do you do crack?”  she whispered, as she sidled up close to me.

“No,” I replied, trying to keep the shock off my face, and out of my voice.  “I have never done drugs,” I continued, as I took a drag of my cigarette, and looked down at the ashtray on the table.

“You should try it,” she whispered again, with a devious smile on her face.  ‘Sure’, I am thinking,’ so that I can look like you in a few months.  Great idea!’

“No,” I replied again,” It would end my career forever.”  Again, I took another drag of my cigarette, and looked out the bulletproof glass at the other women in the adjacent room, willing one of them to break up this demented conversation.

“Do you have $20.00?” she persisted, clearly getting frustrated with me, and my lack of cooperation.

“No,” I replied again, and then I finally looked at her.  ”If I had money, do you really think that I would be in here?”

She returned my stare, and instantly started to become very hostile.   “Yes, you do”, she growled back at me.

Now I was starting to get riled with her.  “No, I don’t.  I have not had any form of income for two and a half years, and I have nothing left to help you.”  She looked at me, completely unconvinced, and proceeded to try again.

“Do you have $7.00?”  She asked, staring at me, as if looking for some ‘tell’ that would prove that I was lying.  She looked, and unfortunately, she got it.

“No”, I replied again, with less conviction than I had hoped to portray.  Damn, she was good…like a bloody lawyer.  Just keep asking the same questions, and then they wear you down; and she knew that she had me too.

“You do too have $20.00, and you are going to give it to me!!”  She demanded menacingly.  The one thing that I have learned to do, if you have to deal with people like this is to walk away, unless they are gang members or professional assassins.  Short of that, it tends to be the best thing to do…especially if the perpetrator is scared of losing her bed, or being banned from the shelter for a month for bullying and/or blackmail.  I picked up my cigarettes off the table, stared at her, and walked out.

 It was not until I reached the stairwell that I burst into tears, while shaking violently.  She had scared me half to death, and not being a product of the streets, I had dealt with it the best way that I knew how.  Just then I felt two people beside me, Diana, another abused girl just like me, came up behind me and gave me a hug.  She too was not a product of the system, out of her ‘bubble’, and just a victim of other people’s stupidity, and pure bad luck.  There was a witness to what happened, but I did not see her come in at the end of the conversation with my coercer, and it was the most unlikely person imaginable…Julie.  It is funny that one person that should help me, would be the only man in the house…our transvestite…and that it should be “she”, who would one of the only people in the house who really behaved with the attributes of a true woman.