Chapter 5CANDI

Chapter 5

CANDI

Mom and Cookie are watching She's Gotta Have It when I let myself into the apartment.

"Isn't that a little old for her?" I ask mom, dropping my backpack on the floor by the door.

Mom shrugs her good should philosophically. "She's eleven going on forty."

"Aren't you a little old to be leaving your stuff lying around?" Cookie snarks.

Knowing that as the older sister, it's my job to set a good example, I stifle a tired sigh. "Yeah, I am."

Grabbing the backpack, I trudge to the bedroom we share to hang it on the hook on my side of the room. And then I just plop down to sit on the edge of my bed, letting my body and mind decompress from what happened tonight.

I've been running on nerve driven autopilot since Angelo dismissed me. When I left, I didn't care if he squared things with Ugo, or not. I couldn't stay after what that lech tried to do.

I know I'm lucky that this kind of thing doesn't happen more often, but every time it does, I question my life choices. I know we need the money I make at Pitiful Princess. There's no other job I can get that will pay me nearly as much.

Despite my hands off rules, I'm one of the top earning dancers. Maybe because of it. Men always want what they can't have.

So do women, I guess. I sure wish I could quit and find a job teaching in a community program, or something. But that's just a pipe dream.

One reality ground into dust a long time ago.

Dancing is pure joy for me. But I cannot make enough working at a dance studio to support my foster mom and sister.

My path is set, whether I like it or not, but Cookie's isn't.

Diamond Miller, aka Cookie, and I don't share a drop of DNA. What we do share is a foster mom who loves us like we are her own. The hub of our three-person family, Mira Czabok, took Cookie in first. My sister's birth mom died just like mine, but unlike me, Cookie was only a year old at the time and was placed immediately with our mom.

Cookie's birth mom and Mira had been friends. They'd prepared for what would happen when Ms. Miller died. Because money has always been tight for mom and it wasn't any better for Cookie's biological mom, the two women worked with social services to get mom approved for fostering.

Mrs. Miller wrote a letter of intent to designate mom as Cookie's guardian after her death, but didn't name her that in a will. With all of Mrs. Miller's family still living in Nigeria and her dead husband having no family at all, Cookie's social worker was more than willing to deal with the red tape to place my sister in mom's home.

She was, and still is, one of the good ones. This allows Cookie to get medical and dental insurance through the state, like I did when I was in the system.

My mom was more of a dreamer than Mrs. Miller. Bonbon was a dancer like me, but unlike me, she offered extracurriculars. I guess she was one of my sperm donor's favorites. She thought when she got pregnant, he would divorce the wife he didn't love and marry her. But that's not how Stefano Bianchi works.

He's a traditional mafioso through-and-through. He doesn't believe in divorce and he already had two sons. He had no interest in claiming me.

Mom loved me. I know that. But unfortunately, she was still fantasizing a version of my sperm donor where he played the hero when she died. She told me he'd come for me. That he'd promised to take care of me.

That didn't happen. Within hours of her death, a full-fledged ward of the state, I was placed in a group home. The sperm donor didn't even come to her funeral, much less make arrangements for the daughter he'd never once acknowledged.

Things got ugly in my last foster home and that's when I ended up with mom as a temporary emergency placement that turned permanent.

Mira Czabok might have debilitating arthritis that stops her from working fulltime, but she's fierce. She made sure I stayed just like she made sure Cookie was never moved to a different placement. Mira studied the ins and out of the social services system so intently, she knew more than the case worker who was supposed to be my advocate.

Which is why I will always take care of her, just like she took care of me. I aged out of care a long time ago, but mom never made me leave. She says I'm her kid.

She would've adopted me but didn't have the money for the paperwork and the lawyer. She's my mom no matter what the documents say. And my sister is more my sister than my brothers by blood.

They'll never acknowledge me any more than our father has. My last name is Brigliano not Bianchi and that's the way it will always be.

Pushing away thoughts of the past both distant and recent, I toe off my shoes and change my clothes. The thin tank top and sleep shorts I put on are more comfortable than the hoodie and baggy jeans I wear as a uniform to ride the subway.

The shorts have been washed so many times they're bordering on threadbare and super soft. Perfect.

When I come back out to the living room, mom and Cookie are once again engrossed in the movie.

Relieved I don't have to talk right now, I settle on the sofa beside my sister and steal the popcorn bowl from her lap.

Instead of complaining, Cookie gives me a guilty look. "Sorry I gave you crap about leaving your backpack on the floor."

Tugging on one of Cookie's many braids, I say, "Don't sweat it kid. You were right. Leaving stuff on the floor only makes it harder for mom to get around when she has to use her chair."

"Yeah, but I could have got it for you."

"Why would you?" I ask and grin. "You looking for nomination for the world's best sister award? Trust me, you already got it in the bag."

"You're such a dork." But Cookie's smiling when she turns back to watch the not so age-appropriate movie for an eleven-year-old.

A few minutes later, mom says, "You're home early." There's concern in her tone that she doesn't put into words.

"Nothing bad," I lie. "They just didn't need me tonight."

"But Saturdays are best for tips. Why did they send you home?" Cookie asks, sounding as worried as mom.

Should my eleven year old sister know tips at the strip club are best on Saturday nights? Probably not. But we don't lie to each other in our family and she's too damn smart not to know what I do for a living.

That doesn't mean she should be worrying about my tips. "Don't twist yourself into a pretzel over money, kid. That's my job."

"Actually, it's my job," mom claims.

"It's both our jobs," I soothe her. "I'm a grown woman and taking care of my family is a privilege."

Mom's smile is gentle, the ever-present pain shadowing her eyes. "The foundation is providing a monthly stipend now. Maybe you can take some more Saturdays off."

Mom knows that Saturdays are the nights I do the routine with the least amount of clothes on at the end of it. The tips are worth it, but she'll probably never be comfortable with me being an exotic dancer.

She never criticizes me though. Mom knows I dance at a strip club for a living because it's one of the few legitimate jobs in New York that doesn't require a college degree and pays enough to cover the bills for my little family.

I'm a good dancer, but I don't do it because I love having men's eyes on me and she knows it. I'm good at projecting sex on six-inch stilettos, but that part of me got destroyed in the foster home before I landed with Mom.

Or at least I thought it did.

Before meeting Angelo.

My ovaries dance with more verve than I do when he's around. Not that either me, or my ovaries would know what to do if he returned our interest.

I don't date. My cherry is still sitting on top of my ladybits sundae.

If the guys at Pitiful Princess knew that personal little secret, they'd never leave me alone. I would be the prize they insist on claiming.

"Did you find out if the stipend is temporary or a long term thing?" Waiting for mom to answer, I munch on a handful of popcorn, reveling in the forbidden buttery goodness.

Not that there's any real butter on the kernels popped in a microwave bag, but it's still a treat I shouldn't indulge in.

I got hired for my generous curves and ability to move them, but management has made it clear that if my waistline expands, I'm out.

Fair? No. Life? Yes.

"Petra said that it will last at least a year and is renewable."

"That's great." It's not guaranteed security, but it gives us a year to build up mom's emergency medical fund.

"It's enough to allow you to cut down to two nights a week and start taking more classes at the community college."

I take one a term when we have the funds to cover my tuition, but I'm not planning to take any more for a while. I haven't told mom that, but we need to save money for Cookie's education. Come hell, or high water, my little sister is going to college and living out her dreams.

We need the foundation money to pay bills, so I can save my income to make that possible. Mom knows it, but she wants things to be different.

"I've got tonight off. That's all I need right now," I finally say when her expectant expression doesn't shift.

"Maybe Petra can find me another foundation grant," Mom says, but her eyes don't reflect the hope of her words.

When mom's disability caseworker came to her a few weeks ago and told her that she was the recipient of a grant that covered specialized treatment not covered by our state insurance including visits twice a week from an in home nurse, we celebrated with ice cream.

When Petra showed up last week with what she said was going to be a monthly stipend check, mom insisted on going out to dinner and inviting Petra to join us. The three of us hadn't eaten in a restaurant in two years.

Mostly because of money, but also because mom hardly leaves the apartment.

The private foundation that doesn't share data on its recipients with the state is a huge blessing. Mom has to be careful applying for aid through the state because it could interfere with her custody of Cookie.

We can't let the caseworkers know just how limited in mobility mom really is, or they'd take Cookie away for sure. They'd do it legally and with all the right words that don't imply ableist thinking, but they'd still do it.

And it would still be ableist as hell.

Not that we'd have any way of proving that, or the money to hire a lawyer to fight a custody battle with the state.

Because mom is a foster parent, not Cookie's legal guardian. She and Ms. Miller set it up that way so that mom could get money to help raise Cookie, neither of them knowing how bad mom's arthritis would get.

Seven more years and it won't matter.

That's what I tell myself on nights like tonight. Seven more years.

Then mom can file for disability income, Cookie can go off to college and I can quit shaking my tits and ass at the Pitiful Princess.