Page 36 of We Rip the World Apart

Ella be such a brave girl. She think she the mammy half the time. She think, just ’cause she cook and clean while I at work, it make she the boss of everyone. Of me. This way of seeing the world, it benefit her. It mean she don’t let no one give her grief. She work hard. She be sure she get what she deserve.

Me first baby. The one to make me a mammy.

Her birth derailed me life. Turning me from a good girl to a sullied one. The community’s darling to the community’s shame. Making it so her daddy feel justified in having another woman be he wife, raise he legal family.

But not once did I regret it, regret her. That smiling, chubby, full-o’-life girl. Screaming as she enter the world, transforming me from a child into a woman with she first breath. Then, so soon, running around the house, acting like it hers. Acting like she some big woman before she even know how to wipe she bottom. So sure of sheself, she own way of being, not even the threat of the Duppy coming to steal she voice enough to make her quiet down or listen when she told what to do.

Oh, she make me laugh just as much as she make me proud. She start work too soon, like we all did. But she act like she been in the hustle a decade before. No low wages for she. No bosses saying, Ella, do this , and Ella, do that , when it not her job. No, she decide she going to be the boss one day.

She would have, too. She on her way. Fancy job in Kingston. Working with politicians, though me told her, that no job for no one. Not in those times. With all that strife.

But, Ella, she the boss. Boss of she own life and anyone else’s she can be. So when those hooligans came in, trying to be the boss, touting Manley’s name, Manley’s words, she didn’t walk away. She didn’t surrender. She told them to get out. She stood when she should have cowered.

Me first baby. The one to make me a mammy.

Quick death.

That what I told meself. At least it be a quick death. No suffering, said the others, who be cowering on the floor, listening to everything those men waving their machetes say. Watching it all.

No suffering, the doctor confirmed.

For her, at least.