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2001

Winter

We were adventurous. We would sneak into different places and have wild sex there....Spirit and Rides. We would go to all the parks and walk the trails talking to the animals. We knew their language and we would then run with them. We even found the areas where no one went unless they were hunting and there we ran dodging the hunter's bullets. One time, we sat and listened to the guns and whispered amongst the limbs of the trees. One friday, we took a trip to Memphis and just drove around aimlessly...we did the same in Oxford. Every week, we spent at least two days together unihibited.

At George's house I would paint in his room and I would sleep there when he was gone. Venum never really questioned me that much at first because he always had his own agenda. I would always leave George's house in time to pick up Damian and go be mother and wife the rest of the day. Once George met Damian but I felt ashamed of that and so I never let him see him again. It kind of made George angry but I did not care because it was just wrong in so many ways. George started to sneak over to my house in the middle of the night when Venum started working third shift on his second job. George would park down the road and travel through the woods to my back door. There I would let him inside and we would make love in my bed while Damian was asleep. We got braver and braver adn I knew we were pushing our luck...but I was stronger and wilder and i just didn't care.
One day while I was watching television at Georges house, he came and sit with me. He held up a little white jewely box just a little bigger than a ring box. I looked over at the box and was surprised and very reluctant to take the little thing from his hand. He insisted and so I opened the box. Inside was a little gold arrowhead on a gold chain. I held it for a moment and marveled at its simplistic beauty.

"Its black hills gold from South Dakota. It's for you. I have had this for a very long time. I bought it but I did not know why and so now I know. It is for Spirit. Put it on."

I pulled the necklace from the box and looked at it as it twirled around on the end of the chain.

"YOU see, look...it is black gold on one side and yellow gold on the other. Two sides, you see."

I looked at both sides of the arrowhead and smiled. "George, I cannot wear this. Venum will wonder where I got this."

George frowned then he quickly smiled. "Just keep it then...safe...just keep it because it is for Spirit"
I agreed to keep the necklace, in fact...I wear it as we speak, in the year of 2013...and I remember him fondly now.


2001

Spring

There was bad news then...the factory was closing down. But in exchange for us losing our job, we were promised a degree from the nearby Community College. We were to pick out a major and the company would pay for everything. I was saddened by the impending loss of my job but excited about going back to school. Maybe this time, I could finish and get my degree. I chose to go to school for Fashion Marketing Tech and so I made plans for this. There would be severance pay and the like. I found myself preparing for a major change and so George and spend that weekend again talking about our future and how we would go to school together. He decided to take the same courses that I took and suddenly I found this to be too much. I started to feel slightly that he was being a little clingy. I asked him why he wanted to take these courses and he said that he was interested...somehow I doubted him...for the first time...i doubted him.

George started to complain that we didn't spend enough time together. He knew how hard it was for me to see him while I was married. I would tell Venum that I was going to the tanning bed or to Wal Mart and he would give me strange looks. I would go anyway and stay gone for 3 hours because George would just not let me leave. He woudl entertain Spirit to no end. Sherrie would panick many times and try desperately to pull away and go back home. One day when I had to go pick up a last check from work, I saw George and he looked horrible. He had been stressing over me horribly.


2001

Summer

I wanted to get Damian away from the neighborhood to get cleaned up. The neighborhood girls had contracted head lice and had given the pests to my son. Me and Damian suffered until we finally got rid of the head lice...just to get them again when the girl would get near my son. Venum would laugh at us and talk about how he couldnt' get head lice because he was black. Apparently, African Americans did not contract head lice and so he had no worries. But he coudl have helped us get rid of them because we were miserable. I grew angrier and angrier as we prepared to take Damian to my aunts. Venum did not drink anything on the way to her house but he kept saying as soon as he dropped Damian off at my aunts, he was getting something to drink.

After we dropped Damian off, Venum stopped and got a 40 oz of beer. I was angry...but at first I did not say anything. Venum lit up a joint and I took a drag from the joint. But this was of no help and I grew angrier. I told Venum that he should stop the car and let me out. He said he had to go to the store and there he tried to call my aunt to come pick me up. He could see that I was extremely mad and that I wanted to get away from him but he did not want me walking down the road. As he was trying to call my aunt, I felt Spirit rise up inside...I snatched Venum's cell phone and threw it and then walked over to the payphone and started jerking the cord trying to break the phone cord. Then I ran....as fast as I could, I ran down the road. Venum got in his car and took off after me. At certain points down the road he would stop and get out  of his car. He would walk behind me trying to get me back into the car. Once when he got too close, I ran up into the woods and grabbed a huge limb that had fallen from a tree. I told him that if he touched me I would fucking kill him. He backed away but continued to follow behind me. Soon a cop pulled over and Venum left. The cop asked me what was wrong and I lied about something. He told me that he would take me home and I told him to drop me off by the factory. I went to George's house and knocked on the door.