a sigh

big as our room.

I guess it’s me, too.

I don’t feel like going.

Don’t feel like going?

I said.

That’s weird, girl.

You go on,

Liz said

after a moment.

You go, Hope.

I’ll stay.

So I left.

Went off with Mari.

Left

Liz at home, watching me

leave.

Sometimes

I would go

for a whole weekend.

Liz, she would

stare after me,

follow

out onto the porch,

and

watch me pull

my bike

from the falling-down

garage.

She

would watch me pedal

down the street

away from

her.

Waving good-bye

like she didn’t quite mean it

like she needed Amanda

or Cheri

like I needed Mari.

I’d look back

and there

she’d be

just a dot on the porch,

still standing

there.

Alone.

This memory

is like bricks on me now.

Heavy as a wall.

My sister standing there

alone.

53.

Some days

I miss Liz

so that it feels like

a hand is tight around

my throat.

It feels like

she has been gone years

not just two and a half

weeks.

I remind myself

what Momma has said—

that we can visit Liz

anytime we want

now.

I remind myself

how we could

go every day,

if we wanted.

But.

I have my business,

Momma says,

when I ask for us to go

more often.

54.

At Mari’s house we:

1. Swim in her pool

2. Picnic on the deck

3. Talk about boys from school.

But all the while

I remember my sister,

before,

standing on the porch

watching me

go.

55.

On the way out

of town,

stuck back in the woods

with only a hand-painted

sign to mark it,

is Miss Freeman’s store.

Momma calls Miss Freeman

white trash,

with a capital W

and a capital T. Even

though she made us all

that food

when Daddy left us

for good.

Even though

me and Liz stayed

with Miss Freeman

whilst Momma

had her guests.

Even though

we’ve lived near her

for years now.

Miss Freeman is fat

and old and

missing teeth.

WT,

Momma says.

Three teeth gone,

all right there in the

front, to be exact.

She can’t read or write,

neither.

WT,

Momma says.

I’ve seen Miss Freeman in her store

with
blacks and whites,

men and women,

babies and teenagers.

She treats everyone the same.

Real nice.

She runs this used clothing

place just off the river.

Four old rooms

built from cinder block

with handmade

wooden tables

piled high with clothes

of every kind.

I’ve found me some

pretty stuff in there,

sometimes as cheap as

twenty-five cents an outfit.

On Thursday afternoon,

on the way to see Lizzie,

Momma and me

stop to shop.

Momma doesn’t buy from used

clothing stores,

not for herself.

But she wanted something

for Liz.

And I could do

with a pair of cutoffs

myself.

The store is crowded

because of a

buy-one-get-one-free

sale.

Two for twenty-five cents

today

only,

says a hand-lettered sign

out on the road,

with an arrow pointing this way