“Don’t know. I done told you there wasn’t no note.”

“The child don’t know its own name?”

“If it don’t know the mama or daddy name, what make you think it know its own?”

“You gone name him?”

“First, let me decide if I’m gone keep him.”

“This a crying shame …”

“You telling me? I’m the one gotta feed him. Showed up on my doorstep, not yours. I mean, if he was just a little older and not growing like a weed, maybe I wouldn’t mind. Now, all he want to do is eat me out of house and home. Grow out of his clothes quicker than he put him on. Wasn’t nothing in them bags but a couple of pants and a few shirts. No socks. No night-clothes. What he had on, I couldn’t remove the stains, so I just washed it best I could and he been sleeping in that. Done come to me already complaining about his shoes was tight, say his feet hurt. I ain’t got no money, so I just said, “So do mine—take ’em off.”

“How you gonna afford all this?”

“Who you asking? I’ve raised my kids. I don’t need no more. Now I gotta deal with a child dumped in my lap and I don’t know when somebody gonna come get it. This don’t make no goddamned sense. The mama’s lucky I’m a Christian.”

“Well, he can’t be too hungry.”

“Better not be. I just fed him.”

“That’s what I’m saying. He outside now and left that whole plate of spaghetti and salad on the table.”

“Where?”

“Right there.”

“See. This what I’m talking about. He ain’t asked me if he could go nowhere! I’m too old for this …”

“And look like he just messed over it.”

“He ain’t ate nothing! Just mixed it up on the plate. And gone be hungry again before the sun set. Well, I ain’t cookin’ no more tonight…”

“Chile, it seem like you done got yo’self into a mess …”

“Who you tellin’? But I ain’t staying in it. I can tell already, he gone wear out his welcome real soon …”

“So what you gonna do?”

“Don’t know, girl. I don’t know …”

•    •    •