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One of those guys that a girl would drop everything for. So beautiful that even the prettiest might doubt herself.
I never want to see this place again but our neighborhood has been overrun by new stores new residents new problems and this broken-down laundromat is almost all we have left.
I break contact, stare down at the empty table as my heart starts beating triple time. And a yearning I never asked for alights.
I can tell by the look of him by the way my stomach flutters at his low-pitched voice by the way I am cotton candy dissolving the minute he cracks a joke that I need to safeguard my heart.
His laugh sounds like an engine failing to start.
He opens his arms for a hug and I let him embrace me, stay in his arms like I’ve always known them.
feet on the postered wall of my favorite singers. Beyoncé. SZA. Ari Lennox. Jill Scott. Jazmine Sullivan. The women who ground me when I don’t have my footing.
No matter our age / at WestSide Roll / we come together / share / unleash / be everything we have to apologize for elsewhere
What’s got you in a good mood? I ask. Sometimes you just gotta make it good.
But it’s out of our control. You can either let everything steal your joy or realize the only thing in your control is your joy.
Even when the rink is gone, we have to keep this going, he says. ’Cause I don’t plan on failing you. With his words I’m a candle, burning down to my most vulnerable parts.
No one tells you that losing a place feels like someone plunged their fingers into your chest, snatched your heart out without permission, leaving you hollow and wanting.
I think about calling her name, admitting that it’s not that I can’t let go, it’s that everything I haven’t held on to with a tight grip has gone.
Last summer, we could walk to the beauty supply or the vinyl shop. We’re running out of things to walk to.
When me and my mama moved here, I thought it needed fixing. But I learned it’s valuable because of what it is, not what it can become.
Instead of helping us stay, these developers want to push us out, price everything just outside of our reach, our possibility.
I want to shake off the rules that I will disobey just by being.
Mrs. Joyce says the violence of gentrification is usually silent. It starts with paving the streets and potholes that we’ve complained about for years. Then comes the jogging. The quiet pitter-patter of running shoes. The sneers as runners approach the convenience store or gas station we’ve always relied on. It’s sneaky. It waits, stalks its prey, attacks when our minds are elsewhere.
Will you be my girlfriend? I think if we forgive everybody who made us feel the way we did about love, we’ll be unstoppable.
😍
because we deserve more than being called unlawful in our own neighborhood.
