The blood you
aren't born with

by Jordan Grant

1. Ican still recall the hymns of these words like a late-night infomercial;
people telling me to move on. People telling me to move passed the
fact that | don't have a relationship with my father. That at times, I’ve
got a dysfunctional family. They said, | could find new family members
through co-workers, even. | could find it in lovers, friends, therapists
even, maybe. They said, | could find the love I seek in the brush of a
man just met on the street, thinking up a pitch to sell me some magical
product. They said, | could find it in the affirmation of a one-night stand,
telling me | am beautiful if even just for the night. They said, anyone
can give me fatherly advice, anyone can tell me what | should and

shouldn‘t do. Anyone can tell me I'm doing a great job in life. Thing is,
I think these people, the ones that say this, haven't got a clue what it’s
like to feel- from birth, an underlying and everlasting heartache.

2. The weather was pleasantly cloudless. | was eighteen. The date; approx-
imately January 2014, | had freshly cut hair from an hour before, and my
bangs purposely swept across my forehead like window drapes. Dressed
like a boy, too, | was going through a phase. | was pulling up in a shiny blue
car, to sun-kissed cement steps. | was meeting my new roommates for the first
time, that I'd found the night before on a buy and sell website. | was rushed
to move. Being hastily pushed out by my strict grandmother. | was frightened,
but interested in practicing my independence as a fresh young woman.

Dressed in baggy jeans, and a hint of ego, | pranced up my new steps. Asking

myself whether | could see myself walking these steps every day. And then, quite

suddenly, the sunlight in the sky was corrupted by a big, dark silhouette in the shape

of a man. Asking me if | needed any help with my bags. The trumpet of his voice made

him appear certain; self-assured. In that moment felt inferior to him. | desired to present
myself with such courage, especially to new people.

After unloading, | settled onto a couch, surrounding a drug paraphernalia smeared coffee table, in
the middle of the living room. The doors and windows were wide open, letting the sun leak in like wine.
Music was playing. The atmosphere was peaceful. | was offered beer, and marijuana, which | accepted.
My eyes scattered the room, picking and choosing what they focused in on; stained carpets, cigarette ash
that looked like it had tried to get rubbed away in a hurry. Two women across from me, smiling routinely; teeth
harshly discolored and some completely absent. They were flicking a drug bag, giving me subtle, gentle seconds
of eye contact, as if to reassure me they hadn’‘t felt threatened. | smiled back. | hadn‘t felt threatened either.

3. In the early days of living at the house, | was enrolled in a course to become a Paramedic. My days were mostly full of
school and cash jobs | did on the side, to pay rent. | arrived home one evening, turning the doorknob, letting the sun
spill pink-tinted stripes across our living room wall. It was silent and there was a woman, Tamisha, sitting on our couch.
She didn’t look up, but she managed to say hello. She was my landlord Tabby’s daughter. She was sixteen, and looked
to have a bit of an attitude, just by the way she was perched with her chest puffed.

Tamisha had been through several foster homes and was at the time allowed to move back in with her mother, and
everyone else in our houses gang. In following weeks, | learned a lot about Tamisha; she was a lesbian. Her girlfriend
Cheyanne lived with her in her tiny box of a room. | heard almost everything, being right beside them. They laughed
lots, but perhaps argued more. Cheyanne would leave the house after a big fight, abandoning Tamisha for weeks at a
time. Tamisha would cling to me like overboiled pasta left to dry on top of a stove. Messaging me late at night, asking
to go for walks, and get drunk with me.

ARTIST: CHARLIE JONES

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pS