Working and enrolling at the local community college in hopes of having a little extra income, in hopes of improving some of my grades already transcripted under my degree, and maybe enrolling in graduate school somewhere? Maybe. I just knew I had to continue. And continue, we did, as a family.
Lyulle and I prepared to move. We’d lived in the bottom-level apartment on the corner of Livingston and Mayfield, but with some ambition and hope and my family, we were able to make some magic happen. I had since quit Kroger and began working at Macy’s at Eastland Mall, still hoping that Lyulle would strike gold as he had once hoped to do. I did minimal and maximum—working, school, family, and anything else in between. I would tell myself to keep a smile on my darling face, never quitting.
We moved to Reynoldsburg. The community was gorgeous. We could breathe out there, and we could think about our chance to make a good life again, our new start, and things were getting better. I mean, for our situation because we made it better. Lyulle looked at the world constantly from the glass-half-full approach. I was a natural at being pessimistic. I knew it, and it had to kill him all the time. I just simply could not believe wholeheartedly in his dreams anymore. He had let me down time after time after time. We were always on the come-up, or he was always on the come-up. I came with him.
We had managed to buy a few cars. A total lemon, the first one. The engine blew up only after a month of us buying the muthafucka. I had applied for a job at Fifth Third Bank and was hired. Okay, okay, things seemed more like home now. I could feel the love. He was a true grinder and got money for us. I will say that no matter how unconventional the task, the bitch was gonna come up.
We were driving an all-white Suburban—it was perfect for us—and we were living decently, really trying to be successful, as far as my measurements of success go. It was the hustler’s life. I was clueless. I was miserable. I had become more accommodating to him though, growing a bit and becoming flexible because I was no longer gasping for air in an attempt to stay above water. We were floating. I still relied on him, making only enough money to sustain us so as to stay under the radar and not shed an overcast on him. I wanted him to be a man. I wanted him to feel like a man.
If I had the grind in me then that I do now, we would have been millionaires. I was unaware of this world. My mind was warped. I was somewhat asleep, and I chose to see none of the truth.