210

Angel Harrison was my best friend and she was the toughest, most independent girl I knew.  We were four.  During naptime, we'd edge our nap rugs closer and closer to the toys on the floor until we were playing, heads close together, whispering behind the wooden dollhouse.  The nursery school teachers would shush us, and I'd pretend to sleep, but Angel would keep playing.

The next year, in kindergarten, we were in the big school--the elementary school--down in the round rooms at the far end of the building.  Three rooms opened off of a round, central play area that held the big toys: climbing bars and mats and slides and balls.  It was in there that Angel announced to me that she was leaving.  "I'm leaving," she said.  I protested because that was how I was.  "You can't!  It's school."  As if that were explanation enough.  Angel's fat, black braids swung and clicked their beads together as she shook her head.  "Nope.  I'm going, and I'm going right now."  True to her word, she headed for the door and was down the hallway before Mrs. Panagopoulos raced to drag the five year old back.  What I will never forget is Angel's small figure, standing tall in her floral, little girl dress and Mary Jane shoes, walking confidently out that door.  "Wow," I thought.  "I could never do that."

I found out later I could, but it wasn't for another three years, and by then, Angel was long gone.

207

Shirley created a life sized reproduction of Stonehenge in her backyard.  It was by no means approved by the community planning board.  Her neighbors whispered nervously over hedges and fences, wondering what was going to come of it.

87

"What the hell am I suppose to do?"

Mrs. Kirby continued to shuffle paperwork. She sucked on her invisible braces and looked everywhere except at her client.

"I need to see a doctor. I ain't got enough money to see a doctor but you telling me I got too much money, somehow. How? How is that?"

Mrs. Kirby opened her mouth and closed it again.

"I don't even have nothing for them to take when I can't pay. My car? How am I suppose to get to work, then?"

Another service worker peeked over the cubicle divider and looked worried.

"You don't write the rules, is that what you wanna say? You just follow the rules? Is that it?"

Mrs. Kirby tipped her chin up.

"I see. You don't care because you got your nice job with benefits. Or you did care but now you don't because you think I'm mad, that all your "clients" are mad, at you. Is that it? I'm not mad at you excep' for the fact that you don't do nothing to help change the system. You don't ask questions. You don't even answer my questions!"

The security guard wandered in from the hallway and waited at the door.

"Mrs. Kirby, you should quit your job to-day. It has taken your soul. You ain't helping nobody, not even your own self. You are just like all these forms you make all us fill out and send back again and again when there's parts we missed. You a government form. Nothin' but, and just as soulless. Quit, Mrs. Kirby. Maybe I see you around when you found your soul again. Or maybe I'll be dead."