Actually, No

My first report card of senior year was a disaster. "What's your explanation?" my mom asked. "I'll catch up next semester." "That's your answer? You barely passed English last year. I trusted you to pick a high school across town, and you're late every single day. You lie to me when you come home late and say you were at a friend's or at work. I know you're seeing a boy. I swear on my children's heads, if you get pregnant, I'll deliver that baby myself." She could have. Before she came to this country, my mother had learned from the traditional midwives back home. She would have made a good doula—but with me, she'd have made it last as long as possible. "I don't have a boyfriend." "You're lying. I know you're lying. Nine days for the thief, one day for the owner. You play grown woman, but I gave birth to you yesterday. You can't wash your own underwear. You can't even boil an egg. How do you think you're going to keep a man? You little s—" "Like mother, like daughter." I whispered it. I didn't think she'd heard. Slaps, then the broom. I didn't even feel it anymore. Testing my mother had become a game, my way of making her pay for loving her sons more. I wasn't afraid of her, or of my brother Jude, and even less of my father. The only one who could still reach me was Rina, my half-sister. "Jade, your report card is a disaster," Rina said. "You're failing gym and math, and you want to work in law with a C in human rights ? Dream on. You live at the club or in Damon's projects, you're always late for work, and Lydia says they're about to fire you. I'm telling her to let you go. I won't be part of your failure." Lydia was Rina's friend. She'd gotten me the job at the burger place, even though I was underage. "You can't do that. Not after everything I did for you." "I hope you're not talking about what I think you're talking about." I was. The day, thanks to me, our father stopped raising his hand to her. I threw it in her face like it was nothing. "I wasn't really going to call Lydia. I just wanted to scare you. Now I will. Don't call me. I'll call you when I've forgotten what you just said." I didn't care what she felt. All I could think about was money. My last three weeks of pay came to a little under $800. Without that job, no phone bill, no clothes, no lunch. I'd have to go back to asking my mother, back to living by her conditions. Out of the question.