What could it hurt? I asked myself as I returned to contemplating Tommy's suggestion. You haven't tried marriage to help with Tommy's insecurities, though you've tried everything else. It was true. I had tried everything to make Tommy realize that he was the only man for me: not looking out the car window, not looking at other men, not talking to other men. But nothing had worked. In fact, his insecurities got worse.

But you haven't tried marriage, my mind repeated.

"What the hell?" I said now as I took a big swig of Jack Daniel's. "Let's get married."

Tommy jumped up, and picked me up in a big bear hug. He was obviously way more excited about the idea than I was. He immediately started making plans-plans that didn't necessarily match mine. He wanted a big, fancy wedding. I just wanted to go to the justice of the peace. He had at least a hundred friends and family members to invite. The only friends I had were my party friends. I knew none of them would come-unless there was free dope and booze. I didn't have any family except Daddy and Jr.

But Tommy was paying no attention to what I wanted. He wanted a big wedding. He was the only boy in his family-a huge family-and he wanted everyone there.

"Whatever," I flippantly responded. Big, small, I didn't care, so long as it didn't get in the way of my partying.

- I was still looking for a job. But employers didn't seem to be so desperate anymore, so the offers weren't pouring in. I was forced to resort to illegal activities more and more to keep me supplied with the money I needed. But I frantically increased my job search.

One day while perusing the newspaper, I came across an ad for a "legal secretary trainee" position. The ad said "no experience necessary."

I called the number in the ad and scheduled an appointment.

The job was for the two-attorney law firm of Jack Baker. When I entered the office, I was met at the door by Mr. Baker himself. Jack, a thin white man, stood about six foot three and had a full head of wispy gray hair. He had on a very nice suit and his shoes shone so brightly they almost sparkled. His chiseled face and wide, bright smile made him unusually handsome.

He introduced himself and gave me a firm handshake. "Why don't you come into my office?" he said in a manner more like a command than a request.

As we walked along together, I checked out the place. The square footage was sparse. I had entered through the reception area, which was really just a small desk placed directly in front of the door. Directly behind that desk was a small office. Down the hall and to the right of that office was another, slightly larger one, which was Jack's. The large space between the two offices accommodated two computers and several shelves of law books. In the rear corner of the suite was a small kitchen that had a microwave, sink, small refrigerator, and coffeepot.

Jack's office was not very large, but it was very nice. He had a dark brown leather couch that reminded me of the couch the shrink at Hillcrest Receiving Home had had in his office-the shrink bastard that told them to return me to Diane's.

Hillcrest didn't happen! I reminded myself when I realized I was getting angry. Hillcrest didn't happen! Remember, you have a new past. Marcia Brady. A black Marcia Brady!

Jack sat down and gestured for me to sit on the couch. As I did, my butt just seemed to sink down into it.

Damn, I'd love to sleep on this thing! I wonder how it'd feel against my bare skin-like on my ass!

Jack interrupted my fantasy about his couch by asking a few questions: where I was from, where I was raised. I gave him my perfect lil Marcia Brady past. He seemed impressed that I had five brothers, all raised by our father. He was also impressed that I'd graduated from legal secretary school with a "straight-A average."

After asking a stream of questions, he paused for a moment and looked me up and down. Then he asked me if I always wore my skirts so short.

"You betcha!" I proudly replied.

He smiled nervously and continued. After asking a few more questions about my resume, he explained what the job would entail. He was looking to hire someone who would be what they used to call a "Girl Friday"-a receptionist for the office, a file clerk, and a secretary for Todd, the other lawyer in the firm who sat in the small office directly behind the receptionist area. Todd wasn't a partner (which I later learned meant "owner"), but was an associate (which is just another term for an attorney who wasn't a partner). Jack explained that, as a receptionist, I was to answer the three incoming phone lines, input the attorneys' billing time, make sure the coffeepot was always full and the kitchen was always clean. As a file clerk, I was to maintain all of the client and form files. He said that by maintaining the forms, I'd quickly learn about them. As Todd's secretary, I'd file documents with the court, type letters, do general filing, and whatever else he needed done. He was quick to tell me that I was to be only Todd's secretary-he already had one, Gloria, who'd been working for him for fifteen years. Since she was also the office manager, she would be my supervisor as well as the one who would teach me the ropes.

Once he finished the lengthy job description, he looked at me and asked if I had any questions.

"You know I don't have any legal experience, right?" I knew there was no way I could fake having experience with doing all that shit they expected me to do.

"Yes," he replied, "but, you've been to school for it. Besides, between me, Todd, and Gloria, we'll teach you everything you need to know."

He paused for a moment and put his chin in his hands, as if he was trying to remember something. "Oh, one other thing."

What now? I thought, but kept silent and just looked at him.

"DO YOU SMOKE?" He bellowed as his eyes grew large and his eyebrows quickly raised. The volume in his voice startled me.

"Nnnnnnooo," I muttered.

"WHAT?" He bellowed even louder than the first time.

"No!" I replied more loudly.

"Good. Because I HATE smokers."

I'd obviously given the right answer, but, then the realization of what I'd said hit me. I smoked a pack of cigarettes a day. How in the fuck am I gon' hide that?

"I like you," he suddenly announced. He then said that if I wanted the job, I could have it. At first I was thrilled, till he told me how much it paid. Suddenly I realized why he was so quick to want to hire me-the job paid minimum wage. It would be the lowest-paying job I'd ever had! Still, I knew I needed some type of experience if I wanted to break into the legal field. And for some reason, I really wanted to be in the legal field. "Legal secretary" sounded so official, so important, so smart. So I took the job-and the cut in pay.

At first the job was cool. I was supposed to be there at 9:00, although the office didn't open until 9:30. I was supposed to arrive by 9:00 and start the coffee. And in the beginning, I did. But it didn't take long to realize that the phones never rang before 10:30, probably because the others never got in before then. So I started getting in right before they did, usually between 10:15 and 10:20. This plan worked fine, except every now and then before leaving his house Jack would call into the office to see if he had any messages. Of course I was never there to receive his calls. When he would arrive later and ask me why I didn't answer the phones, I'd tell him I was on another line, in the kitchen, or at the copier and couldn't hear it. He always seemed to fall for it.

Once I did get in and get the coffee started, my day consisted of doing whatever it was Jack, Todd, or Gloria told me to do, from typing letters to filing legal documents with various courts to inputting the attorneys' time for billing to clients. Unfortunately, the learning process went extremely slowly. I found the never-ending court rules convoluted and confusing. I couldn't seem to type the letters with sufficient accuracy. Luckily, between the computer's spell-check and Gloria's double-check I'd have to redo each letter only three or four times. I was constantly frustrated and irritated at my lack of understanding and inability to catch on, not to mention the constant stress and fear I had of getting fired for yet another screwup. I swore it was only the drugs that allowed me to keep my sanity!

Somehow, the whole office, especially Gloria, maintained extreme patience with me. I don't know if it was because I was working for pennies or because she really needed the help. Whatever the reason, she was always willing to work with me. Like, when I lied and told her that my bad memory was the result of an old head injury, she believed me and even thought of ideas to help me remember stuff. One of her ideas was for me to write court rules on lil Post-its and stick them all over my desk. Soon, my desk and everything around it was completely covered with hundreds of lil yellow Post-its. You couldn't even see the desk-all you saw was yellow. Although they weren't very attractive, they were extremely effective.

Every once in a while I would hear Jack complaining to Gloria about the sight of so many Post-its haphazardly stuck around my desk, walls, phone, even on my chair and how "unprofessional" they made the receptionist area and entire office look. But Gloria would remind him of the consequences of making me remove them: late court filings, rejected court filings, and numerous other time-consuming, and costly, mistakes. Jack would pause for a moment with his chin in his hands as he thought of my past mistakes and what they had cost him in terms of time and money, and suddenly exclaim: "Let her keep 'em. DEAR GOD, LET HER KEEP THEM!!"

I soon found other uses for the Post-its: though I had learned to speak properly, I hadn't learned to write or spell properly. My grammar was absolutely horrible. Continuing to take me under her wing, Gloria slowly began to teach me grammar, punctuation, and word usage. For some reason, the rules of English came easy to me, so my improvement was quickly noticeable.

The hardest part about working with Jack, though, wasn't the difficulty of learning legal rules and procedures; it was hiding the fact that I smoked cigarettes. Because I was forced to sneak cigarettes throughout the day, my deceit actually caused me to become a chain-smoker. I'd use the fire from the butt of one cigarette to immediately light the next one. In the mornings, before the others arrived, I'd smoke three to four cigarettes. Then, during my ten-minute morning break (which usually lasted twenty minutes), I'd smoke at least four more. Then, during my lunch hour, I'd smoke eight to ten more. Sometimes, I'd be jonesing so bad for a cigarette, I didn't eat during lunch, all I could do was smoke. Then I'd get in another four or five during my afternoon break. Whenever I smoked, I walked around the corner and hid behind a large building pillar or crouched behind a parked car. Then as I made my way back to work, I'd douse myself with perfume and chew three to four sticks of gum. I don't know if they ever caught on to the fact that I smoked. If they did, they never let me know that they knew.

All in all, the learning process at the Baker firm was surprisingly pleasurable. No one in the office ever harassed or hassled me about my continual mistakes, lack of legal experience, or severe forgetfulness. In fact, the whole office learned to work around my shortcomings. For example, Todd would file court documents a day or two before they were actually due-he had to, since he quickly learned that I'd inevitably do something wrong that would force us to have to refile them. And like Gloria, Todd would give me helpful suggestions whenever he saw the need-and he was never rude, condescending, or patronizing.

For example, whenever I would take phone messages or talk to clients calling in, I would say "uh-huh, uh-huh," to signify to the caller that I was taking down their phone number or that I'd understood the message they wanted me to relay. One day, after listening to me take several calls, Todd came out of his office and softly said: "Hey, Cup, instead of saying 'uh-huh' when talking on the phone to clients, why don't you try saying 'okay'?"

The next time I took a phone message I tried Todd's suggestion. Sure enough, "okay" did sound better than "uh-huh." So I immediately squeezed another Post-it onto my already yellow-covered phone that read "OKAY" in big letters.

Nor did they ever sweat me about my attire. I guess it was because clients hardly ever came to the office, so they never had to worry about anyone seeing me. Gloria once told me that, of more importance to them, at least for the moment, was teaching me to be a good legal secretary. She said that they'd come to the conclusion that as I began to feel more and more confident about my job, I'd want to, in turn, dress more professionally-at least that was their plan.

Personally, I liked their plan because it seemed to be working, in spite of the fact that it often took me a long time to get stuff. But, once I did get it, I got it. Luckily, the court rules didn't change often, which made them easier to remember. And all of those legal documents that seemed so strange at first began to make sense as Gloria explained their purpose. Most important, my spelling of the legal terms got better as they began to sink into my memory.

Shortly after starting work, Gloria took me to the thrift shop and showed me how I could get tons of great clothes for next to nothing. Though I refused to give up miniskirts, she was able to convince me to wear more professional (or what I called more "skin-covering") tops.

All in all, their patience and persistence, paired with my hard work and determination to learn to do the job, were actually beginning to pay off.

Again, my party friends couldn't believe it. As we sat around one evening getting high, I was talking about how much I'd learned and how well I was doing at work.

"This bitch is amazing!" one of the cokeheads exclaimed.

"Yeah," Victor, my old faithful get-high buddy, joined in. "First, she says she's gon' change her speech. But none of us believed her."

"But the bitch did it!" the cokehead chimed in.

Victor stood up and began to talk in a southern drawl as if imitating a preacher addressing his congregation. "Yeah," he continued. "THEN she say she gon' get a job! Still, no one believed her."

"Hell, bitch never had no job befo'!" someone else yelled from the back of the room.

"But the bitch did it!" the cokehead chimed in again.

"Shit, she just didn't get ONE, she got SEVERAL fuckin' jobs!" someone else yelled.

"Yeah, and all in a year!" the cokehead chimed in again. Everybody started busting up laughing.

"THEN she say she gon' be a legal secretary!" Victor drawled as he strolled back and forth, continuing his sermon.

"Yeah!" the congregation responded in unison.

"But again, none of us believed her!" He waved his arms across the congregation to explain who he meant by "us."

"But the bitch done did that too!" the cokehead chimed in yet again.

"Just goes to show," Victor continued in his southern-preacher drawl, "you can do anything-on dope!"

"Amen!" everyone yelled as they cracked up laughing. We continued partying.

I sat back and thought about what they'd said, and realized they were right. Slowly, but surely, I was indeed becoming a mothafuckin' legal secretary-on dope.

36.

AROUND THIS TIME, I discovered ready rock. Ready rock is best described as "freebasin' to go." Prior to ready rock, a buyer had to take the powdered coke home and cook it up before it could be smoked. But "ready rock" was just that: cocaine rocks that were ready to smoke. Someone had come up with the ingeniously wonderful idea to do the cooking before selling. So all a buyer now had to do was take it home and smoke it. No more cooking kits, no more waiting. Instant high. It was later called "crack." Why, I don't know; and personally, I didn't care. All I cared about was that it was wonderfully fast-and cheap. I could get a rock for as lil as ten dollars, whereas with powder, the smallest quantity I could get cost twenty-five dollars.

I instantly fell in love with ready rock. Soon, it was all I was doing. I began missing more work because I couldn't pull myself away from it. In one month, I missed fifteen days. Jack sat me down and, for the first time, seriously threatened to fire me if my attendance didn't improve. I was also spending more money on my new dope preference. I stopped buying food, paying rent, or doing anything else. All I was doing was smoking crack.

One day, Tommy was fussing about how we didn't have one dime saved for our upcoming wedding. He was upset that, although we both had jobs, we didn't have anything to show for it. It was during this conversation that I got a moment of clarity. It occurred to me that maybe the crack smoking might be getting a little out of hand.

I couldn't have a drug problem, could I? I asked myself. I decided there was one way to find out. I'd quit-for a while. I figured that if I could stop smoking crack, say, for a year, I couldn't have a problem, because people with a drug problem can't stop.

"Let's not smoke for a year," I said suddenly.

Tommy stopped fussing in midsentence, totally surprised at my outburst. He studied my face to see if I was serious (I'd sworn off dope and booze several times before-usually when I was doubled over with stomach pains caused by lack of food, or while hugging the toilet and praying for the room to stop spinning). I stared back just as hard to show him I was. Realizing I really meant it, he didn't think about it for long. For months he'd been complaining about the way I smoked dope. Still, he wasn't quite convinced. But, after a few more assurances, oaths, and promises that I really did mean it this time, he readily agreed. That day, we stopped smoking crack-just like that. Now mind you, I didn't say anything about powder cocaine, angel dust, acid, pills, weed, booze, meth, and heroin-all of which I regularly used. I really believed that if I could stop and start crack at will, I couldn't have a problem with anything. So I stopped crack, kept up everything else, and continued learning to be a legal secretary.

Meanwhile, Tommy and his family were planning a huge wedding. Still unsure of whether I was doing the right thing, I wanted to wait a couple of years before getting married. But Tommy, afraid I would change my mind, insisted that the wedding take place within six months. When I told him that that wasn't enough time for me to plan a wedding, he said it was more than enough time for his mom to do it.

"Fuck it, then," I snapped at him one day when I had gotten tired of arguing about when we should get married. "Let yo' momma do it."

And she did. Although I had never met Tommy's mom in person, every now and then we would talk to each other whenever Tommy called home to check in. As a result, we got along well over the phone, partly because of my attitude-if you didn't sweat me about my lifestyle, I liked you.

Even though she was in New York, she was more than willing to take over the arrangements. Actually, she was ecstatic about the idea of having control over planning the wedding. I was ecstatic that she didn't fuck with me about wedding stuff and, most important, that she didn't let the stupid wedding get in the way of my partying.

The only thing I insisted on doing myself was picking out the wedding dress. I wanted it to have roses-my mother's favorite flowers. Thinking about my mother and her favorite flowers was one of the few times since her death I'd allowed myself to think about her at all. But even for the special event of a wedding, the thought of her was still too painful to do sober. After having a few drinks and tooting a few lines, I and a couple of my female party friends made the trip to the wedding-dress store.

The store was full of young white women smiling, running around the store oohing and aahing as they looked at the beautiful dresses. When we walked in, a sudden hush descended on the entire place. I and my crew sauntered in, talking shit and cussing loudly. Ignoring angry glares, we began milling around, looking at dresses. It didn't take long before it became apparent that none of the salesclerks wanted to assist us. I don't know if it was because we were loud or black or high or drunk, or because we were dressed in miniskirts and tube tops. Maybe it was all those things. Whatever the reason for the clerks' standoffishness, we didn't care. We were used to being ignored and shunned. But that didn't mean we were going to stand for it.

"Hey, heifer!" one of my girls yelled to the salesclerk standing nearest to us. She was standing so close to a rack of wedding dresses, she looked like she was getting ready to disappear into it. From the look of dread on her face, she was probably wishing she could.

"Get over here and help us!" Lisa, one of my girls, snapped. Though it didn't come out like that. We'd been drinking, and smoking blunts, so Lisa's words were slurred. What actually came out sounded more like, "Shit sover hur and sep us." The rest of us cracked up. The salesclerk, however, was not amused. Nevertheless, she reluctantly walked over and offered her assistance. I think she did it to prevent us from causing a scene or making even more of a ruckus (we were obviously scaring the other shoppers). Realizing that we were drunk and high-but harmless-the white women returned to their shopping, but continued to cautiously watch us out of the corners of their eyes.

The search for my wedding dress did not go well. I was drunk and speeding, which resulted in my constant stumbling as I rushed around trying dresses on. If I did find one I liked, I'd start loudly cussing and complaining that it was too expensive. Tommy's mom had sent me a thousand dollars, with strict instructions to get a "nice" dress. Oh, I intended to buy something "nice," all right; I was going to get the dress for a hundred dollars and use the rest on some "nice" dope.

After an hour or so of trying on dresses (I ruined two by accidentally poking my five-inch stilettos through the trains), I chose an off-the-shoulder white wedding gown.

"Girl, I KNOW you ain't serious 'bout wearing white!" Lisa shrieked when I announced that I'd found my dress.

"Yeah, and why not?" I retorted.

"Girl, only virgins get to wear white!" she snapped back, obviously irritated that I didn't know that.

Sharon, another party friend, spun on Lisa.

"Are YOU a virgin?"

"No," she replied, lowering her head.

"Well, when you get married are YOU going to wear white?" Sharon asked even louder.

"What the fuck does it matter?" I bellowed before Lisa could answer. Every woman in the store instantly stopped whatever she was doing and silently glared at us. I didn't care. I didn't want me and my girls to start fighting among ourselves-at least, not till I'd gotten drunker and higher so I could enjoy the quarreling. But on top of that, I began to think about how I'd lost my virginity. I never gave it to anyone; it was stolen. As I thought back to Pete, Diane, and the system, my anger began to quickly rise. I knew myself well enough to know that if I didn't change my state of mind-and quickly-the booze would intensify my anger and I'd start tearing something up.

"Society makes those stupid rules," I continued, "and society sucks!"

We all seemed to be in agreement about that, so the subject was immediately dropped. Even though it was the cheapest dress in the shop (on sale for a hundred dollars), it was pretty. Standing in front of the store mirror, looking at myself in the long, flowing white dress-just for a moment-I felt like a beautiful princess. But as my mind once again reminded me of my painful past, the beauty soon faded. I began to reflect on how my life had really been. I began to wonder why I had so much anger, hatred, and resentment inside me. Why I couldn't really be someone's princess.

Fuck it! I told myself, fighting back tears as I realized that druggies, gangstas, hos, and high-school dropouts didn't make good princesses so I'd never really get to be one. It's just a fucking dress!

"I'll take it," I nonchalantly informed the salesclerk.

"You do look beautiful in it," she said, obviously happy that she'd made a sale and we'd soon be leaving. She never dared asked me to pay for the two dresses I'd ruined with my high heels. I guess she figured our swift departure would be payment enough.

"Yeah, whatever," I grumbled as I went to take the dress off. But as I came out of the dressing room, I told her that the dress wouldn't do after all, because there were no roses on it. Roses were my momma's favorite flowers, and I wanted roses on my dress. To prevent my having to continue to look at more dresses-which would require us to stay in the store even longer-the salesclerk offered to have roses sewn on for free. Always looking for something for nothing, I took her up on her offer and had three white roses added down the center in back.

"Come on, y'all!" I shouted to my girlfriends as I headed for the door. "I need a drink."

"But we just had some drinks." Lisa slurred as she followed me.

Fuckin' lightweights! I hated 'em.

"Why do you drink so much?" she asked.

They didn't want to know.