It’s Friday, and the macaroni’s crusted over like a scab. Jocie picks at hers with a plastic fork, chasing a cold bite around the tray, one shoe half-kicked off under the table. Her braids are tied high today, a puff of defiance on her crown, and the way the sun cuts across her face makes her look carved from something ancient and golden. I walk up to her empty table.

“Can I sit?”

“You looking for trouble, or for company?”

“Both, maybe.”

Jocie side-eyes me, then scoots over just enough to make room on the concrete ledge. “Shit, Ellen, you look like you haven’t slept in days.”

I shrug. “Something like that.”

She doesn’t ask what I mean. That’s the good thing about Jocie. She don’t press. She waits.

I sit down, push around the macaroni on my plate with a plastic fork.

"You gon’ eat that or you just tryna kill it?" She asks, nodding at the mush pile on my plate.

“Not hungry.”

She raises a brow. “That’s new.”

“I need to ask you something.”

She chews a while, then opens her drink. The can hisses for a while. “Shoot.”

“You ever…you ever had to make a hard choice?” I finally asks, voice low.

Jocie doesn’t answer right away. She just leans back a little, her gold cross earring catching the light, like she’s watching for lightning before she speaks.

“Yeah,” she says. “A few.”

I nod. “What kind?”

“You mean like telling my Ma that Sammy must’ve eaten the last slice of cake, or lying to the school nurse ‘cause I didn’t wanna go home?” She dips a fry in ketchup, lets it drip back onto the tray. “You gotta be more specific, Ellen.”

I shift, tucking my skirt beneath me. “I mean,” I start, picking at the edge of her thumbnail until it bleeds, “the kind where nobody’s really right. Where no matter what you do, someone’s gonna look at you like you’re dirt.”

Jocie looks me over real slow. “That about a boy?”

I shake my head. “No.”

“Then it’s about a man,” Jocie looks at me, really looks this time, and whatever she sees must be bad, ‘cause she leans in close and says, “Is it you?”

I shake my head.

She waits.

“It’s my mama.”

Jocie exhales sharp, then nods like something makes sense now. “Shit,” she says under her breath. “You think I’m gonna tell you it’s wrong,” she says. “Or that God’s gonna be mad.”

“Aren’t you? Isn’t He?”

Jocie pulls her hand back, wipes it on her jeans. “Salvation’s got a thousand names, but only one face. And it don’t always look like what Pastor Jim talks about on Sunday. God might be mad, Ellen - the question is if you give a shit.”

“Did you tell your mama?”

“Hell no. She still think I was in Atlanta that weekend visiting cousins.” She looks up at the clouds. “Girl at the gas station saw me bleeding in the bathroom. Called her boyfriend to get me up North.”

I let that settle. It coats my ribs like balm. “Does it get easier?” I ask.

“No. But it gets clearer.”

I swallow the knot in my throat, blinking fast, looking anywhere but at her. “You remember what happened to Camille Garnier?”

Jocie huffs. “Yeah. Everybody acted like she’d got leprosy”

“She was cryin’ in gym for two weeks.”

“And nobody helped her.” Jocie glances around, then lowers her voice. “She’s alive, you know. Moved out to Arizona after she dropped out. Lives with the baby and his father.”

I stare.

“The father’s a bastard,” Jocie finishes, then looks at me like she knows. Like she’s seen through me, through Mama, through everything we’ve spent our lives constructing. Maybe she has. And maybe, just this once, I’m grateful for it.

“I still want to help my Mama,” I say, too quickly. “I think I know how”

Jocie narrows her eyes. “You make something?”

I don’t answer.

Then: “That’s the plan.”

She whistles, low and grim. “That’s dangerous.”

I look up. My eyes sting.

Jocie breaks the silence again, gently this time. “You thinkin’ it’s already too late?”

“No,” I say, barely above a whisper. “Just feels like it should be. Feels like I shouldn’t have waited this long.”

Jocie reaches over and places her hand on mine. Her skin is warm, steady. “You got time. Not much. But enough to figure out what’s real. And whatever you do—don’t do it alone.”

“You think we’re cursed?” I ask.

Jocie snorts. “No. We just got eyes wide open. That’s not a curse.”

I chew my lip. “If she…if we go through with it… Does that make us monsters?”

“No,” she says. “We don’t get to be saints. But we don’t gotta be martyrs either. You’re doing what needs to be done.”

I close my eyes. I want to believe her.

“You think God’s mad?” I ask.

Jocie laughs. “Mad? No. I think God’s tired.”

“Tired?”

“Yeah. Of watchin’ girls like us bleed so other people can feel clean.” She chews for a second longer than she needs. “You’ve got two choices in this town; you’re either a warning or a sermon. If you’re white, like you, they’ll call it tragic. Say your mama made a mistake. Offer to pray with you, bring you shitty casserole. They’ll still hate you. Just quieter.”

“And if you’re you?” I ask.

“If you’re me, they think my mama didn’t raise me right. Ask if I even know who the daddy is.” Her voice is steady, but her eyes are sharp now. “You think the girls at school offered me prayer? They told me to be grateful I had to ride out six hours in a stranger’s truckbed leaking my insides out. Like I was lucky.”

Jocie leans forward, voice quiet now. “You don’t have the privilege of innocence, Ellen. And neither do I. White or Black, we both live in a town that’ll kill us for being women. But you still got choices. You can love your mama through this, not in spite of it.”

“She’s all I got.”

“Then hold her tight. And don’t let anyone—God, church, this place—tell you that mercy can’t look like blood.”

I nod, breath catching. “Did it…did it hurt?”

Jocie’s eyes flick away. “Yeah. Some. But not as much as it would’ve, if I hadn’t.”

I go quiet. The bell rings, shrill and sudden. We both flinch.

As Jocie stands, she says, “You need me, I’m here. No questions.”

“Thank you,” I say.

Jocie shrugs, then smiles just a little, flipping her braids over her shoulder. “I just say what I wish someone told me.” Girls like me don’t get the luxury of waiting on rescue. We gotta be the cavalry. So if you need backup, just holler.”