Choosing Sides Read Free Page B

But it was that same skill of boosting that Sharina had mastered that kept people from being able to tell just how bad Halleigh’s upbringing really was.
    Halleigh stayed fly in the latest fashions, because her mother’s closet looked like the local Macy’s. Sharina always made sure she boosted some nice pieces for both herself and her daughter. And just like a Mary Kay consultant, she had to be a representative of her product. In fact, Sharina was a walking advertisement for her craft. And for Halleigh, dressing nice was her way of hiding her predicament from the world.
    Nobody knew how tough she had it. Nobody but Malek anyway. Halleigh tried to hide it from him at first, never allowing him to come to her house, making up the excuse that her mother would flip the script if she knew her baby girl had a boyfriend. But after a while, and after Halleigh ran out of excuses, he finally got her to keep it real and to tell him what was really going on at her house that was so bad that she didn’t want him to be witness to it. The last thing Halleigh wanted her new man to know, her new man that lived in a house with both of his parents and dressed nice because both of his parents were employed, was that her mother was a drug addict whose occupation was stuffing pieces of clothing down a girdle.
    But even when Halleigh confessed to Malek one night on the phone when he wanted to stop by and just see her, and her refusal led to a huge argument, his feelings for her didn’t change. As a matter of fact, he was relieved. For some reason, he thought that Halleigh might have been ashamed of him, although he couldn’t imagine why, or even worse, that she had another nigga that she didn’t want to get busted with.
    Malek loved her unconditionally and didn’t look down on her because of how she had come up. He knew that her circumstance wasn’t that uncommon. He truly admired and respected her. Even when his boys told him that he could do better than her, he begged to differ. Far from the prettiest girl in Flint, he thought she was the sweetest and most innocent girl he had ever been with and liked how she carried herself. He also liked a girl with some meat on her bones.
    Malek definitely wasn’t going to hold Halleigh’s being poor against her. Hell, Flint was a dead city. Most of the people who lived there were poor, and not because they wanted to be, but because it was the only way to be. Flint had literally become a war zone.
    With an 18% unemployment rate and the cost of living steadily rising, people from Flint developed a dog-eat-dog mentality. Everybody was out for self. It got so bad that people felt like if you were stupid enough to let somebody get you, then you deserved to get got. Crime swept over the city like a plague, and Flint became notorious as the murder capital.
    Even the hustlers weren’t getting it like they were supposed to, unless they had a good connect. Then it was a completely different story. A city where people were once proud to be called a “Flintstone,” had quickly been transformed into a city where dreams were lost. Everybody who came up in Flint knew the game. Because of its ruthless atmosphere, the city produced some of the grimiest dudes, the sheistiest females, the most strategic hustlers, the baddest bitches, and the most talented authors. Whatever a person’s game was, they were usually the best at it because survival depended on it.
    In a city like that, how could Malek look down on Halleigh for being a part of the majority? Even his own parents struggled every now and then. Most folks were only a paycheck away from being homeless, so when an unexpected financial situation occurred, it hit everybody’s pockets hard.
    Malek’s parents weren’t rich by any means, but they had a roof over their heads, food on the table, and clothes on their backs. His father even ended up working two jobs to make sure that his family didn’t go