She was very insecure but she ought not to have been. Her lips were as full as the moon. Her hair was deeply tangled yet beautiful, just like the history of humankind. At 22-years-old she was fine as hell. She knew she was fine. All the boys told her so but far too many times there was an asterisk. “You’re fine for a dark skin girl” they would say. She was pretty enough to be a stripper but not pretty enough to be a model. When she got all dressed up she was a bad bitch and not a gorgeous woman. No one saw the pain that was spreading behind her high cheek bones. No one was aware of the self-doubt that had burrowed its way into her body, they were too preoccupied with the way that she walked into a room and stood in the middle of that thang arms akimbo until she found her girls, or a seat, or the bar, or a place to dance. And while she waited she breathed in deeply as if she was inhaling the hatred of the women and the fantasies of the men—then she exhaled slowly, dramatically, seductively. She was the center of all dirty thoughts without ever trying to be. She was viewed as Hottentot Venus but she wanted to be The Birth of Venus. She wasn’t insecure about her culture, no not at all. She was just beginning to be consumed by all of the ways in which her complexion was permeating her dreams. Dreams that used to be sacred and unbound were now tainted by the perceptions of both strangers and loved ones.

She thought of escaping quite often, but to where? She had heard her sorrors tell vacation stories in which natives of Germany, France, and Mexico adored dark skin women. These stories were entertaining but she didn’t want to be anyone’s primitive little fetish. She didn’t want to be chosen in an effort to challenge mommy and daddy’s expectations. She just wanted full credit for her radiance. She had a reoccurring dream of being the queen of the Dahomey Kingdom in the 18^th Century.  She was training to be a female warrior until the king of all of Dahomey took her to be his wife. And since it was her dream the king never took on another wife, and she only bore one child for him because she didn’t want to have too many stretch marks and it was very important that she hold on to the ability to keep her lady parts tight—and the king understood. The king spoiled her with gifts publicly and in private she was the one who made all of the important decisions. Also in the dream were all the people who had abused her in real life. Like Matthew who used to call her blacky in middle school. Taylor who laughed out loud when she decided to go natural in 10^th grade and called her a fake ass Erykuh Badu. “Erykuh Ba-WHO?” he said with both arms in the air resembling a W in a questioning manner. Light skinned Monica who won homecoming queen over her was also there. And with a snap of a finger she had them all captured and sold into slavery, and she never felt bad about it until she woke up. The level of pettiness that she had descended into inside of her subconscious mind concerned her. Since marijuana upset her stomach she decided that she needed therapy. Preferably a dark-skinned black therapist that her sorrors recommended and one who was happily married to a black man. She would send a message of inquiry in the group chat immediately.

YB