The Mayor of Maxwell Street

by Avery Cunningham

“I have no expectations, Ms. Sawyer. I try to see every second of this life exactly as it is.”

His joy left an impression on me. Instead of pretending to make the most out of life, he just did. No matter how inane it all turned out to be.

“Why have all of this wealth and prestige if we can’t even protect ourselves from their hate?”

“I have found in my limited experience that the best defense against hate is complete, unmitigated, iridescent happiness.”

Other women had families and households to manage at her age, but here she sat, watching her parents move her around like a shiny piece on a new game board.

Money is all well and good, but if the name isn’t right, might as well all be leaves fallen from a tree.”

“Shame doesn’t come from how others feel about you, but from how you feel about yourself,”

“There are two candy jars, right?” he said. “One marked for Negroes, and one for white folk. The Negro—under threat of death—can only take from one jar. The white man, though, he can take from one or the other. He can take from both. Never mind that the jars have the exact same candy; the white man still gets to choose. That is all I want, Nelly. The freedom to choose. I don’t want to look like them, or act like them, or be them. But I want their options.”

There were hardly any working streetlamps, but every few yards, a line of paper lanterns dangled between buildings like jewels on a necklace. They flickered with every breeze just as the stars did.

“Who said I wanted to be friends? When you haven’t been born at the top of the hill”—Sequoia motioned with the butt of her cigarette at Nelly—“then everyone you meet is a rung that lifts you up.

I’m a partial connoisseur of diamonds, and everyone always forgets that diamonds are just rocks. Dull, blunt, boring, and fucking priceless. But people don’t want priceless. They want flashy. And the knockoffs are always the flashiest.”

“Coffee is as precious as jewels in our home these days. Lord knows, some mornings I need it. The Bible says man can’t live on bread alone. Not to be blaspheming, but I just might be able to make it through on a cup a day.”

“Just because someone has lived through pain doesn’t mean they can, or will, tolerate it.”