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“You’re disgusting,” Del spit at her. “Where’s Shawn and Patty Girl?”

“They’re sleeping. Stop being such a long face. You remind me of your father. Who are you?” she demanded, turning to me.

“None of your business,” Del told her.

“She looks like someone’s business, mon,” LaShay said with a smirk, and Del’s mother and she went into another fit of laughter.

“For your information, Ma, if you remembered half the stupid things you do, you would remember she helped me lift you off the floor and get you into bed the other night,” he told her.

His mother stopped smiling.

“Watch your tongue, boy.”

“Couldn’t you at least close the front door? Does everyone walking by in this neighborhood hafta know what you are doing in here? You know that could bring more trouble down on us,” he chastised.

How strange it was to see the son being more responsible than his mother, I thought.

“Who cares what this neighborhood thinks?”

“You’ll care if they call social services,” he said.

“See,” she said to LaShay. “See what I put up with? Talk about ruining some expensive weed. Just like his father, he can mess up a good time.”

LaShay nodded and glared back at us as if it was true that we were the bad ones.

Del shook his head and said, “You disgust me.”

He went down to Shawn and Patty Girl’s room. I followed, and when we looked in, we saw they were not asleep. They were together, holding each other.

“Hey,” he said, moving in quickly. “What’s the matter with you two?”

“Bad dream,” Patty Girl said. “Screaming for Mommy, but she didn’t come.”

“Oh, the poor thing,” I said.

“You have to go back into your own bed, Patty Girl, or neither of you will get any sleep. C’mon,” he said, and tried to lift her away from Shawn, who just looked up at us wide-eyed and held on to his little sister for dear life.

Del turned to me.

“God knows what went on here before we arrived,” he told me.

I knelt down and started to reassure Patty Girl.

“I’ll stay with you until you fall asleep,” I promised. That brought some hope into her little eyes. She loosened her grip on her brother, and Del got him to loosen his on her. I put her into her bed and sat beside her. “I have an older brother, too,” I told her, “and he told me that when I have a bad dream, I should push it back into the pillow.”

“How?” she asked.

“Just push your head hard into the pillow and then close your eyes and tell your bad dream to get out. Go on,” I urged.

She looked at Del, and he nodded. Then she closed her eyes and pressed her head back.

“Say ‘get out,’ ” I urged.

“Get out,” she repeated.

“Good,” I said. “Just a moment.”

I took the pillow out and pretended to shake the dream onto the floor.