Twelve

So that's how we ended up in the first of three sardine can of a two bedroom trailer.

I looked for a cheap place for us to rent and that was all I found. Short & Squatty didn't have a vehicle at the time, but managed to buy a $500 beater of a Pontiac from someone he knew - in payments. I don't remember how we furnished the hell hole, but I know we didn't buy anything new. Somebody was kind enough to give us a bed and we had the black and white TV from my bedroom back home. I vaguely remember going to garage sales to buy dishes and other household things. We didn't have a washer or dryer so we had to use the laundromat up the road, of course. The place was awful, complete with doors that slid into the walls.

As bad off as we were at the time, I felt like a princess. As 20 years old, I still couldn't believe that I was on my own and had realized my dream. That I was living my life and that it was OK with everybody and that, even if it wasn't, I was in a position to not give a shit. I didn't feel grown up and the whole idea of being out of my parents' house made me feel like I was sneaking out of my bedroom window if I happened to go to the store at night.

We lived in the first sardine can for about six months. After the new wore off, I began to complain to the landlord about the squalor we were living in. I demanded that repairs be made and began to withhold the rent. That got us evicted on my daughter's third birthday. That short spanse wasn't a happy one. It could have been so traumatic for me that I blocked most of it out. I don't have many memories of the place and the ones I do recall aren't good. I remember Short & Squatty started going out all night and leaving me and my daughter at home, stranded with no car. We must have had a phone at some point because I remember finding the phone lines had been cut one night after we got in a fight and he went out again. I also remember having to walk to the store to use the phone, too. I'm not sure why. I don't really remember the events that led up to either of those things. I'm not sure if he had hit me the first time already or if that was at the next sardine can that we moved to. It's all a blur now.

Eleven

The courtship started around New Years. We'd been casually seeing each other for about a month. When my birthday came around shortly after, Short & Squatty bought me a gold watch. I was impressed, flattered, and floored at the same time. So he likes my kid, he remembers my birthday, *and* he buys expensive gifts? This was sounding better and better. Then Valentine's Day rolled around and this time he showed up bearing matching gold earrings and a big box of candy. What's this? He remembers holidays, too? *And* buys more expensive gifts? C'mon! How can this guy be bad?

Besides the obvious, I was also smitten with the attention he was affording me. Nobody had ever invested that much thought in me and, honestly, I was scared. Aside from not knowing how to react to it, I was also scared of never experiencing it again. I was scared that nobody else would accept me and my daughter ever again. I didn't want to lose this new and lovely thing I was feeling because it was so different from anything I'd ever known. It wasn't love. I think it was happiness. Or relief. I don't know, but I liked it very much.

Given that people had laid so much shit on me during the previous three years about how my daughter would never have a normal life with a single mother caring for her, I was genuinely convinced that Short & Squatty was my only hope. People had told me so many horiffic things that I believed them. So I couldn't do anything else, but latch on to this guy in an attempt to prove them all wrong. To show them that somebody would have me and, more importantly, somebody would give enough of a damn about my kid to make a life for her. I knew, or I thought, that I had that chance right at my fingertips and there was no way I was going to pass it up - regardless of what it cost me.

I pressed him to get us out of my parents' house. I lied to him and told him that I loved him and that I wanted for us to be a family. I didn't do it out of malice. I did it out of love - for my daughter. I was trying to do the right thing for her instead of doing the best thing for all of us. Complete tunnel vision. All I saw was her future. I didn't have time to realize that I was giving up my own in the process.

Ten

The Meeting:

One afternoon, as I was returning from running an errand, I was suprised to find my friend Chuy sitting on my front porch swing. He had come to visit me and decided to wait for me on the porch since I wasn't home. This wasn't unusual because my mama would tell whomever came calling in my absence that they would wait on the swing if they wanted to. This time I noticed that Chuy wasn't alone.

I didn't recognize the guy who had came with him, but Chuy had many friends I didn't know so it wasn't a big deal. I greeted the guy anyway. He wasn't much to look at and I certainly wasn't impressed by his presence, but I was making an attempt to be friendly since he was a guest. He was short and squatty without a unique trait about him. The three of us spend the next half hour chatting about nothing in particular and swinging on the porch. Finally, Short & Squatty spoke up. He asked me when we were going to go out. I was surprised by his boldness and offended by his assumption that I would even give him the time of day. I figured he was bluffing - trying to be funny in front of Chuy, so I decided to call his bluff. I said we could go out that night to return the favor of putting him on the spot just like he had done to me. Except he wasn't bluffing.

This is the exact moment that my life was ruined. That was exactly the kind of crossroad that makes you feel like you're in the middle of a really bad Afterschool Special with someone harping on you about consequences. That was the exact point where my life might have played out very differently, had I chosen to react differently. That moment in time is the only one I have regretted in my thirty years on this earth. If I had only said, "Never" when he asked me.......

I wasn't too sure of Short & Squatty's intentions so I told him that I would drive. We drove around town in my truck for a while and ended up at a dance that was being held across town. There wasn't anything remarkable or interesting about the date. There was no chemistry that would have called me back for more. He was a gentleman and paid for everything. He was very polite with common courtesies and just exactly what you would expect on a date. It wasn't horrible, but it wasn't mind-blowing either. We wrapped up the non-descript evening about midnight and parted ways. I drove him back to his house and I returned to mine, content with my evening, but not impressed enough by it to spend much time thinking about it.

That didn't stop me from accepting more dates from him. He was a diversion and I needed one. My daughter tagged along on most every date from then on and he didn't seem to mind. I'm pretty sure that's what sealed our fate. I was in this for her, not me. And our lives seemed to be headed in the very direction I hoped, one day, that they would.

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