Growing Pains

Chapter 3

Years pass by and things were a little better for Silvia as she got older and more aware. Silvia grew stronger mentally and physically as well. She stayed out the house as much as she could. Going out for runs helped ease the stress. She also took it upon herself to help with doing community service to get a good look on her resume because unlike her mother, she wasn't going to be stuck at home waiting for help for the rest of her life. She did small jobs and runs for her neighbors, earning her first pay and saving it up for hard times.

She grew a positive atmospheric relationship with her neighbors. In the hood you would try to stay away from a bad reputation. She had to buy her own food and cater to herself. There came a time when she was the only one at home and Silvia liked it that way.

As an escape from the world Silvia resorted to music. She listened to a vast majority of artist ranging from Nat King Cole in the records her father had left her ages ago to Linkin Park that she picked up from the skaters at school. Even though she loved her music, there was nothing better than a good read.

Either an American comic or Japanese Manga, to a drama novel she would find from English classes to the fantasy world of books she would happen to pass by in the schools library. She loved to read and kept a collection of books in her room lining the walls. She needed this. This was her escape. Her distraction. And everyone needs a distraction. All of this and not one day passes by where she does not think of Nathaniel.

She saw him, though it was nothing like before. No sweet hello's and goodbye hugs. No slow walks in the park after school to buy the time they could spend together.

No.

None of nothing she read in her books she deemed true. She saw the man he grew up to be but only this time he strayed away from her. School was school and that would never change. They grew apart as social class stood between them. He was handsome and tall and had a great build and all the girls were crazy about him but little Silvia was never noticed. Not by him anymore. She was always noticed by the wrong men. The ones who stood on the corner of Amsterdam, drenched in the scent of cheap booze and a sorry ass pack of smokes. The ones who constantly stood in front of the bodega and wouldn't let you pass. Out of all this attention, she just wanted Nathaniel to speak to her. To hear his voice that was for her attention once again.  

They separated when middle school started after he moved away. Things weren't going to be the same and Silvia kept telling herself that everyday. But everyday she felt the sting of the reality of it all. He was cool, she wasn't.

She was indeed beautiful. Her skin a caramel brown, her hair dark as night as it fell to her shoulders in a curly world of wildness. Her body was toned, muscles sculpted all around from all the running and walking and minimal eating.  Her teeth large and beautiful. Her smile would brighten up a whole room if she would let it. But Silvia didn't have much to smile about these days.

She stayed to her books and kept her distance as he grew with popularity and he too soon drifted away from her, not even glancing back when she walked by him and his friends.

At home Gina would come in high and in another world far away from this one and Silvia had no other choice but to help her into her own bedroom, into her own bed. Silvia hated this side of her mother and wished nothing more than for her to get better. But no matter what she would always come up with an excuse. An excuse to leave the house in mid day and only come back 4 am the next morning. An excuse to have track marks on her arm scarring her beautiful skin. There was a time when she felt her mother was an angel because she was so pretty. So flawlessly beautiful. A smile bright as day. A body full and plump and healthy. But now she has to deal with what's left from her fantasy of a beauty queen. Silvia promised herself to never do drugs, never let a man use her for his sex and never drink.

At home was tough but nothing hurt worse than the feeling of neglect from her Nathaniel. The one who would take her out to the roof tops and scream out ice cream flavors after the fights, even made up ones that they promised to go try out together. They'd laugh and make jokes at the squirrels eating away on the side walk, or the shapes the clouds made. And oh how she loved to lay there, blanket spread out across the hard floor of the rooftops, looking at the stars until their names were screamed at the top of the lungs from the two of their mother's to come inside. The Nathaniel who would always slip a cookie on her tray from lunch because he knew that she loved the chocolate chip ones that the school made every Wednesday. But all these kittie dreams, she has to remind herself were in the past. Her Nathaniel is no more than a memory.