Under the weak yellow glow of a single ceiling bulb, Marlene Foster turned the empty formula container upside down and shook it one last time, even though she already knew nothing would fall out. The plastic rattled hollowly, a sound that felt louder than it should have in her one room apartment tucked above a discount nail salon in the northern Bronx. The bulb flickered again, stuttering like it might finally give up, and Marlene silently begged it to last one more night because light bulbs were a luxury she could not justify this week.
In her arms, her eight month old daughter Juniper let out a thin, exhausted whimper. It was not a full cry anymore. It was the sound of a baby who had already learned that crying did not always bring food, a sound that tightened something painful inside Marlene’s chest.
“I know, sweetheart,” Marlene murmured, rocking gently as her legs ached from another double shift. “Mama is trying. I promise.”
Outside, distant fireworks cracked across the sky, bursts of color she could not see from her narrow window but could hear clearly enough. It was New Year’s Eve. Somewhere not far away, people were raising glasses, kissing at midnight, making plans about diets and vacations and fresh starts. Marlene wondered what it must feel like to make resolutions instead of calculations about diapers and rent and bus fare.
She opened her wallet on the counter. Three dollars and twenty seven cents. She counted it twice anyway. The cheapest formula cost eighteen dollars. The one Juniper needed, the one that did not leave her screaming with stomach pain, cost twenty four. Marlene had memorized those numbers the way other people memorized birthdays.
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