STERLING (almost to himself): Seem like to me if you come to work all the time and can’t talk to nobody, then I don’t know who would want that job. It’s like being in school with somebody always telling you what to do.
(To WOLF:)
How you doing? I seen you down at Irv’s.

WOLF: Yeah, I be down there sometimes.

STERLING: I just got out the penitentiary. I was down at Irv’s yesterday. But I figure I hang out down there I’ll be right back down the penitentiary. I don’t want that. I’m trying to find a job. You know where I can get a job? Anybody know where I can get a job at?

HOLLOWAY: What kind of job you looking for?

STERLING: Any kind. I can do anything.

WOLF: Go up and see Hendricks. He got a construction company.

STERLING: That’s who I was working for. He helped me get out the penitentiary. I work for him one week and he laid me off, say he ain’t had enough business to keep me working. He say he’d call me if he had any work for me.

MEMPHIS: Go on over the steel mill. A big strong boy like you . . .  if you ain’t scared of work . . .  they got work over there.

STERLING: That’s what Hendricks told me. I went over to J&L Steel and they told me I got to join the union before I could work. I went down to the union and they told me I got to be working before I could join the union. They told me to go back to the steel mill and they’d put me on a waiting list. I went and asked my landlady if I could put her on a waiting list. She told me if I didn’t give her twelve dollars by Friday I could wait on the street.

HOLLOWAY: You can go up to Boykins and see if he need anybody. You know Boykins up on Herron what got that junkyard? He always complaining he can’t keep nobody. That’s probably cause he don’t pay nothing. But you can go up there and see him.

STERLING: I ain’t got nothing to lose. I’ll go up there. Thanks. Anybody want to buy a watch?
(He doesn’t get any response.)
I carried it up to the pawnshop . . .  he didn’t want it either. It got seventeen jewels. That’s what it say right here. I don’t know what kind of jewels they are . . .  they don’t tell you that part. It’s liable to be anything. You open it up it’s liable to be diamonds and rubies, I don’t know. I started to do that, but I didn’t know if I could put it back together. You take something apart you should know how to put it back together. Seventeen jewels! And I can’t get five dollars for it.
(To WOLF:)
I’ll let you have it for three dollars.