~~Young~~

Chapter Twelve

   Sera gave Mama a look that said she wasn’t buying it but she waved it off, “I found where he had been staying and the manager said he had no idea they left their kid behind but yeah, they had left for good with no forwarding address. After the fact he looked them up and found they had screwed quite a few places with rent, it was a pattern for them.”

   “That’s still no excuse for abandoning your kid,” Sera mumbled with disgust.

   “I stopped trying to figure out how people can do that a long time ago,” Mama patted her shoulder and moved on to an older looking brunette, maybe fifteen, sixteen, this one awake and braiding the laces on her boots, “this is Morgan…or so she tells me,” Mama eyed her playfully, “said she came up from Seattle to see the Olympics and decided she liked it better here.”

   “I did,” she said forcefully, “I swear.”

   “Nevertheless she was a street kid even before then, said she had been in a family down in San Francisco for a while until her “father” got into some heavier drugs and abandoned them and the rest of their family.”

   Father as in the leader of her clan, not anything parental, Sera had heard the term plenty of times and knew it was why Mama preferred Mama and not mother.

   “So what, you walked all the way up here?”

   “No, I hitched to,” Morgan said as if it was something to be proud of.

   “But her hitching and hooking days are over aren’t they Morgan?” Mama said sternly.

   “Yes Mama,” she dropped her head submissively, “I don’t want to end up like Tami back there,” she thumbed behind her.

   “Tami,” Sera raised her eyebrows, “the pregnant one?”

   “Yes the pregnant one,” a voice grumbled from behind her, “and I can’t wait until I’m not pregnant anymore so everyone will stop referring to me as that.”

   Sera spun around to find another, rather pretty, brunette padding barefoot over to the fire. She had one of the blankets Sera had brought with her the last time in anticipation of the cooler weather wrapped around her, but beneath where she crossed her arms over her chest Sera could see her plump belly…and the fading green and yellow blotches on her creamy brown skin.

   “Mama,” Sera looked to her sharply.

   “Yes Dear, her pimp tried to beat the child out of her, force her into an miscarriage once he found out that’s why she hadn’t been showing up for work.”

   “But it didn’t work,” Tami began rubbing her stomach affectionately as she gazed into the fire, “because my baby is strong, stronger than him, stronger than me…” she sniffled and dropped her hand, “but, it’ll have to be strong without me,” she said reluctantly.

   “She wanted to keep the baby,” Mama offered in explanation, “thought it would be a new beginning for her. But I convinced her though the baby could be a new beginning for her, it would have a better middle if she let someone who was already stable have it. Then, when she was stronger, and stable, then she could revisit the subject.”

   “Mama knows a place for girls like me,” Tami looked at Sera for the first time; saw an all too familiar look of defeat in her eyes, “ones who are tired of selling ourselves for money. Said they’ll help me start over when I’m ready.”

   “Why not now?” Sera asked without thinking.

   “Good question,” Mama mumbled to Tami, “they have a birthing center there for just such cases. And a great adoption staff who would help her through the process.”