bookishly_sweety

“Why are you so mad at me?" Norris shouted back. The neighbors could definitely hear them now. His throat dry, but he didn't care. "I'm sorry if I interrupted one of your dates, or whatever, but I DID NOT DO ANYTHING! Ground me for leaving prom, ground me for drinking, but I didn't drive, I didn't have unprotected sex, I didn't even get high! You know that! You're supposed to be on my side here, Mom!"
"NO!" she hurled back. "Not on this, Norris" I can't be!"
"Why the hell not?!"
"You know damn well! Trayvon Martin," she began. "Tamir Rice, Cameron Tillman, so many others that I can't remember all their names anymore!"
Norris knew too well. It was almost a ritual, even back in Canada. They would sit as a family and watch quietly. "Be smart out there," Felix used to say.
"You're not a handsome blue-eyed little Ken doll who's going to get a slap on the wrist every time he messes up. That, tonight?" she said, pointing to the door. "Do you know what that was? Do you?!"
"I-"
"That was a fucking coin flip, Norris. That was the coin landing heads." Her finger dug into his chest, punctuating every other word she was saying, spittle flying at his face. "Heads. A good one. Officer Miller, who has four sons, and luckily, mercifully, thank Jesus saw someone else's kid back-talking him tonight."
She exhaled, her breath Thai-food hot against his face.
"Tails." Her voice broke. "Tails, and I would be at the morgue right now identifying you! With some man lecturing me about our blood alcohol level and belligerent language and how you had it coming.”
― Ben Philippe, The Field Guide to the North American Teenager

“People like me, we’re ants, and rulers are just a big foot looming over us ready to squish us into the dirt. Doesn’t matter whose body the foot is attached to, the purpose is still the same.”
― Maya Motayne, Nocturna

“It’s knowing the world might be a trash fire, but it’s less trash when there are people to help navigate the darkness.
Friendship is messy. Hard. Infuriating. Awesome. Fragile. Durable. Impossible. Worth it.
Always worth it.”
― Marisa Kanter, What I Like About You

“It was crazy. It was the kind of story you told years later while your listeners rolled their eyes, because they had no idea how the terror felt on the back of your neck.”
― Simone St. James