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Where I was in my life
Set the scene. What was your life like then?
Five weeks before I left, a reunion with my old friends from the projects was in order. We had become beautiful young women, twenty-one, twenty-two. I've heard that who we are as adults is the average of the people closest to us. We were all there. Soon after graduation, even though we still lived in the same projects, there had been an unexplained break. I think if we didn't stay close, it's because we never really were. Collectively, our chances of making it were slim; individually, they were at least doubled. Each of us, in her own way, had seen too much, put up with too much, taken too much. How could we support each other when we each had our own demons—our own Damon? A lot had happened in everyone's life. Big celebrations: driver's licenses, moves, diplomas, a birth. And complicated things we didn't have the maturity to handle. How could we be good advisers, or simply honest, with Pam, who wanted to move in with her boyfriend despite all the police reports for violence? What could we say when Aya announced she was pregnant by Aydan, despite all his cheating, and the fact that they both still lived with their parents? Some of the girls found it "so cute," a baby in little tracksuits and brand-name sneakers. Claudia and I were the only ones not thrilled. Claudia had been the first to leave the projects—a group home, then, thanks to a friend who was to her what Stella was to me, nursing school. Pam had moved in with her boyfriend the day she turned eighteen. Aya was still with Aydan, and they'd had a little boy. Bella had started a YouTube channel. The only one missing had left the country without saying goodbye, turning a vacation into a permanent return to the land of her ancestors, to live her religion the way she wanted. The reason for our reunion was Sousou's wedding. She was the second in the group to get married, after Vitali. Sousou was only twenty-one, with just a high school diploma. She stood her ground: her husband would provide, and she dreamed of being a full-time housewife. We didn't really understand her choice. Her fiancé was one of the big shots in the projects, with a bad reputation, on his second traditional marriage before twenty-five. He'd celebrated his divorce in Cancún, like a bachelor party.