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21 " Addiction is a hell of a disease. I can’t even feel good that the cops showed up because jail won’t help that guy, either. I regret letting them know he attacked me and sending them after him, though maybe I’ve saved the next person the guy might have encountered. "
― Alyssa Cole , When No One Is Watching
22 " He chuckles. “Depends on who you ask. Get in now if you want that good money, bro. I can hook you up.”He hands me a card, which I take with pinched thumb and forefinger because he’s sitting here in tightie-whities and I don’t know where he pulled it from. "
23 " Well, a big part of it is how people addicted to crack were treated back in the day.” I sniff and start walking. “People acted like those addicts were soulless zombies, or jokes, or problems to lock away and take their babies from. Now white people get hooked on something, and we’re building fancy new facilities to research how to fix things. "
24 " I need you to channel the confidence of a mediocre white man. I’ll give you mine. We’ll figure it out because we don’t have any other choice. "
25 " Theo is on my side. But Drea was on my side, too, wasn’t she? Until money made her betray me. "
26 " It strikes me that it’s pretty typical that I’d discover a goddamn conspiracy theory, infiltrate a secret research center, kill a bunch of bad guys, and still end up not saving the day. "
27 " One is astonished in the study of history at the recurrence of the idea that evil must be forgotten, distorted, skimmed over. . . . The difficulty, of course, with this philosophy is that history loses its value as an incentive and example; it paints perfect men and noble nations, but it does not tell the truth. —W. E. B. DU BOIS, FROM BLACK RECONSTRUCTION (1935) "
28 " The North does not remember; in fact, the North has a super-selective fucking memory. As if slavery was something that happened down there, even though there were enslaved Africans building, planting, and harvesting in colonial Brooklyn alongside the Dutch. "
29 " And what kind of name is Usselincx, the name of the guy who founded the company? It sounds like the super-obvious villain in a movie. ‘Mwahaha, my name is Usselincx and I came here to steal land and get trounced by the British, and I’m all out of— "
30 " hold my cup awkwardly, knowing this is some kind of test but unsure whether it’s to see if I’m dumb enough to believe there’s a poison that works only on white people or dumb enough not to. "
31 " Not old people drinking tea. Not complex self-sustaining financial systems that had to be created because racism means being left out to dry. "
32 " Ruth shrugs. “I play on the game board I’m given, Candace. At least if I sell four of the houses, maybe I’ll be able to pay the property taxes on the fifth. They can pry my house from my cold, dead fingers. "
33 " Not that there’s anything wrong with WIC or forties, but is there any reason you’re making assumptions about my drinking habits or financial status? "
34 " Baby, if you wanna keep what’s yours, you gotta hold on to it better than that. Someone is always waiting to snatch what you got, even these damn birds. "
35 " Wow. And here I was thinking you were just a regular degular dude, but Fyodor was trappin’ at the office.” She snort-laughs a cloud of smoke. "
36 " I did. Kim wanted this house and kept saying it was fine if she had to pay for everything, which made me feel like I had to contribute because, I don’t know, toxic masculinity? In retrospect I should have just let her be my sugar mama instead of committing multiple elaborate and unsustainable crimes to get out of a life of committing small sustainable crimes. Hindsight is twenty-twenty, I guess. "
37 " I’m alone, my new neighbors are assholes, and this con artist is roaming the neighborhood, trying to bring in more of them. "
38 " The hammering that awakened me starts up again—absurdly relentless, as if a Looney Tunes character broke in and is banging a mallet against a wall for the chaotic joy of "
39 " was the “those of the North” part that really annoyed me. The North does not remember; in fact, the North has a super-selective fucking memory. As if slavery was something that happened down there, even though there were enslaved Africans building, planting, and harvesting in colonial Brooklyn alongside the Dutch. "
40 " Me losing my job shortly after the move was the cherry on the shit cake that’s our relationship now. That she doesn’t know the real reason for my unemployment? I guess that’s the decorative icing; it spells out At least you tried. "