The Boy Who Dreams of Babies

There is banda music playing loudly somewhere in the distance, an "Ay! Ay!" heard every few moments when I pull up my car at the group home for boys in Compton.

The house is on a quiet tree-lined street, seemingly far from the liquor stores and women in tight, cheap clothing I passed just minutes before. A Baptist church is perched on the corner of Hobart Boulevard, and a turquoise Neon, dents like pockmarks on its doors, is outside the house.
Once I'm led inside, a flurry of activity greets me. The staff member is annoyed I'm five minutes early, explaining that it's snack time. The boys, six of them, are lined up against a white wall to receive their snacks. A sign on the wall has a picture of a boy with slouched pants and a red line crossed through it. "This Isn't Black culture!" it reads. "This isn't black History!"

These boys are all on Probation, although I don't know the level of their offenses. I'm meeting with two of them today, with orders from their Probation Officer to enroll them in services. The first boy I sit down with still has a child's face. He is soft-spoken, and keeps his eyes downcast. I have to lean in close to hear him speak, which seems to make him uncomfortable. He tells me he's in an Anger Management class, which I find difficult to believe.

The second boy, a 17-year-old named Ernesto, is wearing a light grey sweatshirt like the ones you see at Juvenile Hall. The first question he asks me is if he can drop out of high school if he signs up for our program.

Our services don't replace school, I explain. You would still go to school during the day and come to our classes in the evenings.

Only twice a week, I add.

"Alright," he nods. "But like, I think I'm ready to get a job and be like, an adult. I'm sick of school."

But you're 17, I say. You're so close to finishing. And with your high school diploma, you'll have a lot more opportunities.

He looks skeptical.

Higher paying jobs, I say.

"But I'm not even close to being done," he tells me. "I got 9th grade credits. I'm behind."

That's tough, I say. But if you're serious about it, you can do it.

"You really get more money if you got a diploma?" he asks.

I think it will be much harder to find a job without one, I say. What kind of jobs do you think are available without a high school diploma?

He shrugs. I talk about tutoring my agency provides, job development, the differences between a job and a career. I can hear the group home staff shouting at the other boys about doing their homework.

"You ain't talking about math! You think I'm dumb? I said no talking until you're done!"

I ask Ernesto if he has a goal for himself.

He doesn't pause. "To be a dad."

I look up. To be a good dad? I ask. You have a child?

"Nah, not yet. But me and my girlfriend, we been talking about it. We're gonna have a baby real soon."

I've never had a teenage boy tell me his goal is to have a baby. I ask him if he and his girlfriend have discussed what it takes to be ready for a baby.

"Yeah. Like, you gotta have a job," he says. "That's why I asked you about that."

I ask him how much money he would need to make to support a child.

"Like, eleven dollars a week?" he asks.

A week? I repeat.

"Uh, or like, eleven dollars a month or something?"

More than that, I say. Much more than that.

"Alright, that's cool. I can make more than that."

I run through a list of items: car seats, diapers, strollers, baby food, changing tables. I ask if he knows how much each costs.

"Nah, but I got really good connects, you know? Like, I already know where I can get a free stroller. I got all the connects."

I press him. What if the baby gets sick? Can you afford medical insurance?

"Yeah, but I'm gonna be so protective of my baby. I'll take really good care of it, so it won't never get sick."

I ask him to think about the last time he got sick. Did you choose to be sick? Sometimes it just happens.

"Well, I haven't been sick in like, almost 2 years," he says.

I'm getting nowhere with him, so I decide to continue with the paperwork. I look down at the papers on my lap, and ask him where he sees himself in a year.

"With a baby by then," he says. "A baby is the only thing that's gonna make me happy."

In the Lobby of a Community Center in Watts

"How can art make a difference in the world? Should I give up writing and study something useful like medicine? How can I teach my students to take control of their own destiny? I love these students. What should I be doing to save their lives?....
I write about my students because I don't know what else to do with their stories. Writing them down allows me to sleep," - Sandra Cisneros, on working with disadvantaged teenagers in Chicago's south side before her first book was published.

The cuts on the inside of her left arm are fresh.

They look deep, 20 or 25 precise lines running parallel to her wrist, on the softest of skin, milky and moonlit. My eyes jump back and forth from her dusty eyes to the cuts, which start to look like thin red spider legs the more I look at them.

She is sucking on the ends of her dark hair, her legs folded beneath her on the couch in the lobby of this community center. She is a student in my Life Skills class, 17 years old and beautiful and loud and unsure of herself. My stomach and my heart turn painfully every time I look at her.

"Did you cut yourself at school?" I ask her softly. "Or was it at home?"

She shakes her head. "Nah, it wasn't at school. The teacher, she just saw it when I went to class. I did it Tuesday night."

"After you left here?" I ask. Jasmine comes here to class on Tuesday and Thursday evenings, leaving the community center in Watts at 9 o'clock.

She nods, her eyes on the linoleum floor.

"Did something happen while you were here? Did we discuss something upsetting?"

Our topic on Tuesday was STDs and safe sex, and I skim through the minutes spent in class, trying to remember if she'd seemed unsettled during the lesson.

"No. It was something else. Before."

The man who drives her to and from the community center, a social worker who's older than me but has braces on his teeth, says she lives in a nice house. This makes me think of velvet furniture covered in plastic. Plastic flowers on the table. Framed watercolors of flowers on the walls. That's how most of the nicer house I visit are decorated.

Jasmine is usually like most teenage girls and never stops talking. Like a house on fire, the words leaping from her lips like flames. She comes into class in tight tank tops and brightly-colored bras and she talks about school and boys and teachers and dances. But today it seems hard to get much out of her.

"Before class?" I ask her. "Do you want to tell me what happened?"

She stops sucking on the tips of her hair, shakes her head. "That's why I do it. Cuz I don't know how to like, talk about stuff that happens to me."

I nod. "What did they say at school? What does your social worker want to do?"

"They want to get me in a class. Like, a cutting class. With other people who cut themselves, too."

My mind keeps jumping back and forth between two things: the first, my Supervisor imploring me to separate myself more, to learn how to pull back from these youth I meet in my work. "You have to learn this skill," she'd said, putting her hand on my arm in her office. "Otherwise you won't be able to do this work."

The other thought is of Moss, a teacher working in a township in Cape Town. I was 20 years old when he taught me the Xhosa expression "Ubuntu" - people are people through other people. "This, Jenny, is what we had to remember after Apartheid, after all that pain," he told me then.

I look at Jasmine's arm and I ache.

This Is Why I Go To Work Each Day.

On my desk this morning: a card, made of pink construction paper. A giant heart drawn in black marker on the front, with the words "To: Jenn. From: Zaquisha and Brittany."

Dear Miss. Jenn,

We miss you alot, ILP was a great expirence for the best of us. We learned alot and although we gave you a hard time by being talkative we came to love you as much as you love us. OMG, remember when you "tried to split us up" from Trey and Dominic, those were the days! We miss ILP. Well if you want to call us, here's our numbers.

We loves ya.
Toodles!

You Marry the Girl in the Snakeskin Boots

Kenspeckle.

I only learned the word this morning, but I already love it. It popped up in my email as part of the Oxford English Dictionary's "Word of the Day;" something I began a few months ago to prepare for the GRE. I feel like I have relationships with these words - each morning one arrives, and some are uninteresting, some grow on me, and others I'm drawn to instantly, repeating under my breath, practicing them in sentences, looking up synonyms and antonyms for them.

Kenspeckle. To be easily spotted or noticed. I like how it sounds, the word itself something you can't ignore, a gem of a word in a sentence of stones.

I think of this word as I walk half a block from my office to the liquor store to buy a Diet Coke after lunch. As usual, a handful of men are loitering outside, eyeing the security guard in the doorway. I often ponder the usefulness of the security guard, an Asian man well into his 60s and about the size of a 4th grade girl. Standing seems to be too much for him, and so he's usually hunched over in a chair, clad in his navy uniform and skimming the Penny Saver. Today, he beams at me, slurping Top Ramen from behind Aviator sunglasses. What exactly is secure in his presence? I wonder.

It's sunny again today, and I squint my eyes, forgetting that my sunglasses are on top of my head, keeping my curly hair off my face. Red tornadoes, my students in Korea used to say, pointing to my hair.

A pair of older men, their own white hair like puffs of Cumulus clouds, see me approaching and smile with yellowing teeth.

"My, my. Ain't you a sight?" says one of the men, sliding his sunglasses back and his eyes up and down.

"Yeah, but she Jewish!" the other hollers.

I'm momentarily confused, wondering how he could even tell such a thing. Besides, I think irritably, Natalie Portman is Jewish! And Bar Refaeli. Sure, I realize we've got Tori Spelling too, but there are plenty of pretty Jewish girls out there!

I ignore the strange comment, breezing past the pair and into the convenience store. The shop smells sweetly of barbecue coming from Phil's next door, and of the marijuana smoke from just outside. A handful of guys, the size of NFL linebackers, are buying Lotto tickets and bottles of Olde English near the front of the store.

"Hey sugar," says one, turning as I walk by.

"Oh heeeeey Red," says his friend, dime-sized diamond earrings sparkling in each ear. "You doing okay sweetheart?"

I pretend I don't hear, narrowing my eyes just a bit and scowling slightly. I picture Agent Sydney Bristow in my head, specifically the look on her face just before she performs a snap kick-hand jab-reverse punch on the bad guys. Don't mess with me, my look says.

Apparently these guys missed my look.

"Hey bitch! You hear me? I said Hey."

I deepen my scowl, only vaguely aware that my back is now to them.

"Snotty-ass white girl." They walk out, muttering.

I continue down the aisle, pass the Irish Spring soap and Arbor Mist sparkling wine. Next to the bacon and chocolate milk, I find a can of Diet Coke.

The Korean shopkeeper who usually checks me out is looking slightly terrified, as per usual. When he tells me the amount I owe, his voice is always muffled from behind the thick bullet-proof glass and I have to look at the register, to the numbers in bright green. I smile at him, but he looks back at me like he's just spotted a mouse scurrying near his feet. As I slide two quarters and a dime through the small hole in the glass, one of the older men from outside walks right up to me.

"Honey, what color yo' eyes?" he says loudly.

"Blue," I respond, waiting for my receipt to print out. It takes a few moments; the registers in this place look older than me.

"Look," he says, leaning in to me. "I really need to know. You Jewish?"

This guy could do with a Cotillion lesson or two, I think.

"Sir, that's usually not a question you go around asking strangers."

He pauses for a beat. "Yeah, well, you see. It's like I told ya earlier. My friend thinks you're a real looker, but I keeps telling him you Jewish. Am I right?"

I wonder briefly if I, in actual fact, woke up in Northern Idaho this morning and not in Los Angeles. California. In the year 2010.

"I'm sorry, I have to get going," I say. I can smell liquor on his breath.

I continue briskly to the door, smoothing down the front of my skirt and then raising my hand to wave at the security guard on his stool.

"Bye-bye!" he shouts.

"See you soon," I say, walking back out into the bright day. The Diet Coke can is already sweating in my left hand.

"Oh, honey."

I hear a voice, and look up to see a middle-aged man blocking the sidewalk in front of me. He is dressed in a purple pimp suit, complete with gold chain, a matching hat and a black cane.

Holy Snoop Dogg, I think. Now what?

He looks me up and down, his eyes stopping on my tan cowboy boots.

"Mmmm, mmmm, mmmm. You sure is fine." He shakes his head, and looks back up at me. "If them boots was snakeskin, I think I'd go ahead and marry you."

I smile. "Good thing I left my snakeskin boots at home today, then," I say. And then I nearly jog, cowboy boots be damned, all the way back to my office.

John With the Perfectly Square Teeth

My body is in Inglewood, but my mind is in my kitchen.

I'm walking up to the Happy Home for Boys in South LA, but I'm thinking about the conversation I had with my roommate while sitting at our dining table a few days before. This has been happening a lot lately, my thoughts drifting and skipping in place and time. Kendra was making a polenta dish, her hands deep in a green bowl, her yellow hair twisted atop her head and held in place with a wooden chopstick.

"Do you ever feel guilty?" she asked me then. "About living in Santa Monica when all your kids live in places like Compton?

I only paused for a beat, swallowing milky tea from the mug in my hands.

"No," I said. "I feel like it's good sometimes to have that separation."

I like Santa Monica mostly because it is usually 15 degrees cooler than the rest of the city. I like the curtain of gray cloud that separates me from the sun in the mornings, moving lazily away from the ocean, in no rush to disappear into the day. I like that I shiver as I step out of the car after work in the evenings, that the air smells a little like the sea the closer you walk toward Main Street.

And the colors. Santa Monica is plum and green and azure. South LA, under the Indian Summer's brash sun, is white, beige - the colors of desert bone or disappearing bars of soap. It's hot, uncomfortable. I dive into my car and toward its stream of air conditioning, cold air from thin black vents.

Like now, approaching this house to meet with a new client, a boy named John. It's 9 o'clock in the morning, but the heat hangs waiting in the air. I'm already moving slowly, hoping to find some relief inside. This is a group home, and group homes always make me shudder a little bit - 6, 8, 10 girls or boys in one house, usually there because they're on Probation or have some sort of problem that makes it difficult to place them in a foster home. The kitchen is usually stocked with generic-brand cereal with names like Cruncheos or Corn Bitz. The furniture looks a few decades old, frayed and tattered. And the kids seem the most unhappy and the least trusting.

But John walks into the living room and smiles big at me. His teeth are perfect white squares. I shake his hand and introduce myself, noticing that his left eye is lazy.

"It's really nice to meet you," he says, squeezing my hand. Later, while staring at my computer screen, I will find out that he is bipolar and is reported to have severe anger issues. But I don't know this yet.

He's wearing grey high-top sneakers and a graphic t-shirt, and the staff member who studied my ID badge suspiciously when I walked in orders him to pull up his jeans. He does, rolling his eyes at me.

We sit down across from each other and I begin filling out paperwork, neatly writing his information in blue ink.

"And when's your birthday, John?" I ask.

"10/25/93," he answers quickly. These kids are accustomed to being identified by their date of birth, and I notice they always answer that way. I would have said October twenty fifth, nineteen ninety-three.

"And what's the name of this group home, again?" I ask. I've never been here before.

"Happy Home for Boys," he replies. "Wanna know a secret though?" He lowers his voice and leans in. "Nobody here is that happy." He smiles at me again, and I grin back.

I begin asking him about his goals, his plans for college, where he sees himself in five years. He gives each question a few moments of thought, although he clearly has big dreams for himself.

"What's one goal you've set for yourself for the future?" I ask, without looking up.

He pauses. "To get out of the system. To finish high school. And graduate from college. And to get a job where I can help people like me." I glance up at him, and his face is determined. Something inside me stirs.

"And what are some skills you have? Things you think you're good at?"

He runs a hand over the arm of the couch. "I can rollerblade real good. And I can garden. And I'm really good at skateboarding."

"Who taught you to garden?" I ask him. He shrugs.

"This lady I used to stay with." A second passes. "Hey, you look like you like to party," he says.

I continue scribbling in the thick packet, shake my head no.

"What do you do then? You sit at home and play Scrabble or something?" he asks. "On a Friday night?"

"I do love Scrabble," I say, keeping my voice flat. Talking about my weekend activities seems inappropriate.

"Who do you play with?" he asks. Before I can answer, he is launching into a story about beating his school English teacher at Scrabble, how astounded she was that he won.

"And you still in college? Like, you live in a little apartment with like, 7 other people?" he asks me.

"John, we really need to finish this paperwork." I smile at him.

His eyes crinkle and he flashes his teeth. "You seem like a really nice person," he says.

"Thank you," I say, my voice softening. "You seem pretty nice yourself. Now, let's keep going with these questions."

After we finish the packet of questions, I give him a series of reading and spelling tests, which cause him to jut out his tongue in concentration. He has difficulty pronouncing gigantic and executive, even though he is starting the 12th grade in a few weeks.

"Okay, we're going to start on the math portion of the test," I tell him. "Each problem is adding, subtracting, multiplying or dividing. Please write your answers in simplest form on the line provided. You will have fifteen minutes to complete this portion of the test. I'll let you know when your time is almost up."

I hand him a pencil and pull out my cell phone.

"You starting the timer on your phone?" he asks me.

I look at him. I bought my phone in 2004, in my sophomore year of college.

"Oh, I don't think my phone even has a timer. I'm just looking at the time so I know when you started."

He pulls his black Samsung phone from his pocket and punches in a few buttons. He places it in front of me, the clock counting back from 15:00.

"There you go," he says, the perfectly square teeth visible again.

I smile back. "Thank you."

While he works through the math problems, muttering numbers under his breath, counting on his fingers, I look around the room. There's a shelf of old Encyclopedias from the 80s and black and white photos of Tupac taped to the walls. In the corner, a dry erase board that's a constant in all the group homes I visit - the name of each boy, his Social Worker, his school written in sloppy cursive writing.

When his cell phone beeps and he hands the pencil back to me, I ask to see one of the staff members to sign his medical consent forms. She is sitting at a table in the kitchen, playing Apples to Apples with two other boys. She introduces herself as Miz. Lankershim.

The other two boys, one wearing a Sean John shirt and the other with fat cheeks, are telling John a story about blowing up a condom like a balloon. They say the condom came from a sex-ed class. John glances over at me.

"You guys, do you not notice the two ladies in the room? Have respect for Jennifer and Miz. Lankershim."

Mrs. Lankershim rolls her eyes at me. She's finished signing the forms and I hand John my business card.

"Give me a call if you have any questions," I say. "Otherwise, I'll see you when the program starts in two weeks."

He studies the card in his hand. "And I can call you on this number here? You'll answer?" he asks.

"Yes, of course. Anytime."

He walks me to the door, unlocking the screen and holding it open for me.

"Thanks for coming, Jennifer," he says, with a smile and a wink. "Maybe you'll let me beat you at a game of Scrabble sometime soon."

Urban Dictionary Comes to Life.

It's a Wednesday evening in August and the sun has just disappeared from the sky, taking with it the sticky heat that has clutched Los Angeles all day.

I am driving back to work with dinner I just picked up for the teenagers taking make-up classes at the office, trying to finish the 30 hours required for me to hand them a laminated certificate stating they've completed the Life Skills Training program. The sky is hazy pink and my car smells like fried chicken.

When I walk through the door with plastic bags full of rice and chicken and mac & cheese, the kids start complaining that I didn't get pizza or cheeseburgers or taquitos. I tell them to shush and wash their hands before they eat, which they do.

There's only a handful of them tonight and most of them just finished their last day of summer school, so everyone is in a good mood. The girls are teasing Trey about a crush he has and he's protesting.

"Uh-UH!" he says. "You guys are trippin.' I'm not in love with her!" He pronounces "love" with an "uhhhh" in the middle.

"Oh, Trey!" Janet hollers at him. "Stop gettin' all butt hurt and stuff."

I glance up from my plate of food. "What'd you just say, Janet? 'But her'?" I'm terribly confused.

They all look at me. "Yeah, Miz. Jenn," Janet says. "Y'know. Butt hurt."

I don't know. I look at her quizzically. "No. What does 'but her' mean?"

They start to laugh. "Naw, Miz. Jenn! Not 'butt her!' BUTT. HURT." Trey yells. "Like when your feelings get hurt over somethin' dumb. When it ain't serious."

I've never heard the expression before, but everyone else seems to know it, even the class instructor, who is older than I am.

"Okay, okay," I say. I nod my head. "You guys are teaching me something new. I'm going to use this expression later, though." I pause. "So, I could say something like, 'I got in a fight with my roommate and I'm low-key butt hurt?'"

"Awwww!" John puts one finger to his lips and points the other at me. "Miz. Jenn, did you just say 'low key?'" They're all bent over at the waist, laughing.

"It ain't 'low-key' anymore though, Miz. Jenn!" Trey informs me. "That's like, two, three months ago. Now it's 'low-ball.'"

"Aw, that's some Crenshaw talk," Janet teases Trey.

"What? What? You talkin' bout Crenshaw?" John says. "Don't make me come up to you, girl. You be talkin' bout Crenshaw." Everyone is laughing.

"I'm not even from Crenshaw," Trey says. "I was born in Compton."

I turn around to face him, a stocky 17 year-old with a neck tattoo and a sweet grin. "Alright, what do you guys say in Compton then?"

He pauses for a second. "Aw, we say like, 'You roastin' him.'"

"Roasting?" I ask. I fan myself with my hand. "Like you're hot?"

They all look at each other and explode with laughter again. Trey is gasping.

"Hot? She say hot? Nobody hear that?" John yells.

Janet looks at me and smiles. "Nah, like when you're making fun of someone. Like you're roasting them."

They're all talking over each other now, trying to come up with words and expressions to teach me. They can't believe how little I know.

"Naw, we gotta teach her mickey!" Trey is yelling now. "She gotta know that, she be dealin' with some gang-bangers!"

I try to quiet them down, as the noise level is reaching deafening levels. Latrice is now playing the new Nicki Minaj song on her phone, which is competing with hardcore rap coming from Andrew's iPod.

Shorty I'm only gonna tell you this once, you the illest, sings Nicki. And for your love I'm a die-hard like Bruce Willis. I think briefly about dancing to Annie Lennox in my living room as a little girl.

"Okay, okay. One at a time," I tell them. "And anyway. I think it's time I teach you guys some expressions."

They look doubtful. "What you gonna teach us?" Trey asks.

"Well. How about some British expressions? Like, right now I really need you all to belt up!"

Confusion passes over their faces. "Belt up? What's that mean, Miz. Jenn?" John asks.

"It means to be quiet," I say, smiling.

"For real?" Janet says.

"Your parents are British?" Trey is asking. "They strict and stuff? They always make sure your room ain't dirty?"

John is waving his hands. "Wait, wait, Miz. Jenn! Can you say something to us in British? Like your parents say it?"

I laugh. I tell them that if they promise to clean up the remnants of dinner, to wash the dishes and throw away all their trash, I'll fake a British accent. They eagerly agree.

I put on my most posh accent. "Okay. My mom might say something like, 'Jennifer, darling. Would you fancy some strawberries or a glass of water?'" I don't pronounce the r at the end of my name, and make the t's as crisp as possible.

They are all giggling. Janet tells me I sound like I'm from the film "Titanic." They beg me to say something else.

"Oh my gawd, Miz. Jenn!" Latrice squeals. "What other languages do you speak besides that?"

Shaniece

Today I drive through Inglewood, onto the 105 East, past Watts Towers and through Lynwood. It finally feels like August in Los Angeles, and the sun hangs in the sky like a splattered egg yolk. It's so bright that the city is awash in white and grey, and the stream coming from the air conditioning in my Honda Civic does little to stop the backs of my knees from sweating.

"Welcome to Compton" a blue sign in the center of the road reads as I roll down Long Beach Boulevard. "Birthing a New City" it says below. I can see little of that though - just women pushing grocery carts and carrying babies, men hanging outside Mel's Liquor Store, clusters of teenagers in tight tube tops waiting for the bus. Compton often feels closer to an African township than to Beverly Hills.

I eventually pull up at the address for Shaniece Thompson. She is staying with a friend, she told me, while she waits for her social worker to find her a foster home. If I wanted to meet with her, I'd have to come right away, because she had somewhere else she had to be at two o'clock. It's already 1:20pm according to my cell phone, and I gather my clipboard, my packet, and several pens and swing open the car door. I usually allow at least an hour to meet with youth, ask them questions, test their math and English knowledge, and have their foster parents sign medical consent forms. Today's meeting will have to be quick.

Shaniece is waiting outside for me, dressed in a long summer dress in brilliant pinks, oranges and yellows. She smiles at me and I introduce myself, sticking out my hand to shake hers. I notice that her short nails are painted purple. She is walking, breathing, talking color and she shines against the bright day and the dark circumstances.

"I'm sorry for the mess," she says softly to me as we walk through the living room, stepping over plastic toys, discarded shoes and coloring books. She briefly introduces me to her friend, the girl who took her in, and I wave from across the room. A baby is crying in another room, and two little girls fight over the remote control on the tattered couch.

We step into the room where she is staying, a blow-up mattress next to a washer and dryer. In the corner, a large bookcase is staggering under the weight of dozens and dozens of Spanish textbooks. Shaniece motions to the mattress, and I gingerly lower myself down.

I start by introducing the Independent Living Program, and explaining what she would learn once enrolled. I tell her that my agency works with the Department of Children and Family Services, and that our goal is to help foster youth transition out of the system successfully. She nods, twirling a strand of her braided hair.

"So what I'm going to do with you today is complete an intake packet, and then go through a few tests just to see where you're performing academically. Does that sound okay?" I ask.

She nods again.

"Alright. I'll start with the intake packet then, which should take about 20 minutes." I begin with the questions, standard things like where she attends school, whom to contact in case of an emergency, and whether she has an email address. She sits on the edge of the air mattress, opening and closing her cell phone, and smoothing the front of her dress again and again.

Toward the middle of the packet, I ask her who she admires most in the world. She is quiet.

"I mean, anyone you look up to or respect?" I prompt her. "It can be someone you know, or a sports star or celebrity. Anyone."

She looks at me. "To be honest, I would have to say myself." She nods. "Yeah, definitely myself."

I get this answer a lot. A few kids will name a rapper or basketball player, a few more than that will say a grandmother or older sibling. But more often than not, the teenagers I meet don't look up to anyone.

"Why?" I ask. "Why yourself?"

"Becaaaause. I look at other people, people who are doing real good but have never had struggles. And then look at me, and everything I've been through."

I think about her best friend sitting in the living room, 17 years old and taking care of 3 kids, preparing them lunch on a Tuesday afternoon while they watch cartoons. I can't imagine that none of the people Shaniece knows have struggles, haven't battled hardships. But perhaps they are dim complaints next to Shaniece's problems.

That's the strange part of my job, the few hours I step into these kids' lives with only a fraction of the story. I don't know what happened to Shaniece's biological parents, or why she was removed from their home. I know she was recently forced to leave her grandmother's home, but I'm unsure if the grandma pushed her out, if the living conditions were deemed unfit by DCFS, or if her grandmother passed away.

Shaniece may end up enrolling in our Life Skills class; I may get to know her and find the answers to these questions. I may have the opportunity to help her a little more, connect her with other resources. Or she may not return my calls after this. She could easily go AWOL, her social worker unable to track her down. She may just be a girl I met briefly on a hot day one summer, another name in a folder on my computer that contains hundreds of names.

I always resist the urge to hug these kids goodbye as I gather my things and leave, knowing what I do. I press my card into her hand, and urge her one more time to call me if she needs anything.

"Thanks," she says. "Thanks for coming all the way out here."

And then she waves and closes the gate behind her.