1.

My day ends with a visit to the last place anyone wants to be at 8:00 at night.The headlights of my car light up the graves of the cemetery in front of me as I pull into the parking lot. I step out into the cold damp night and trudge over to the headstone. The sight of a few empty velvet chairs onlooking a freshly buried plot to my left gives me the chills, but I continue through the fog to sit down in front of a headstone.  Jasmine Reed: Loving friend and mother. I tilt my head up to the sky with my back against the stone; it had been a long flight from Argentina. I touch the locket Jasmine gave me years ago, before I left for college. She had always known I would leave this place. Without her I would have never been able to make it through medical school, but I only wish she could have been there to see me receive my diploma. Before the sadness can wash over me, I collect my things and head to the car. I take a left out of the cemetery and head to Hubert Johnson road.

Time hasn’t done this city any favors. I can see the lights in Dreamwood Terrace flicker on and off and the flow of water from the fountain overshoot the basin and spray into the street. As I head into the outskirts of the city, I can hear the whistle of the train on the tracks and the familiar chords of Guitar Red’s favorite song. Lost in my thoughts, I am jerked back to reality by the lights suddenly going dark in all the shops around me. I drive a little faster, ready to get off the road. As I park and walk up to the New Hope Children’s home, Christina sees me and exuberantly shouts, “Welcome home”, through the upstairs window. I step inside, and memories of my childhood come flooding back. I’ve spent the past seven years trying to get away from Dreamwood, from this place. But here I am, once a child of the system, always a child of the system.