The Darkest Child Quotes
"I loved her with all my heart, but if she did not die by Monday morning, I was determined to discover from the pages of my schoolbooks, how to break the chains that bound me to my mother."
"It was uncanny the way Martha Jean understood the crude signs we dangled before her eyes."
"Sometimes I even prayed there had been a mistake, and that somebody would come along, take my hand, and say, 'Rozelle Quinn, I believe this child belongs to me.'"
"Life seemed to have drifted out through the chimney in gray whiffs of smoke."
"You people always wait to the last minute."
"I'm sick and tired of grits. Oughta be something else in the world to eat besides grits all the time."
"Who you think you are? You think 'cause you can read a little bit better than the rest of us that it makes you special or something? You ain't special, Tangy."
"I am going to school. Harvey said we have to go to school."
"Fear was a thing I understood all too well. It was a malignancy that had spread throughout my body until my mother, in her godly wisdom, had diagnosed and cauterized it."
"You a Quinn, baby. We don’t run from nobody. Nobody! Do you understand that?"
"It wouldna burned you so bad if you’da been still."
"Satan’s in here. While I was gone, one of y’all let Satan in my house."
"That’s all she do is read. She oughta get A’s."
"They can appoint me. What’s wrong with a Negro being sheriff around here."
"Education ain’t nothing but words, man. We gotta show ’em that we mean business."
"We gotta sit here real quiet so he’ll think there ain’t no bodies to get into."
"You ain’t friendly enough. Come here, boy."
"I’m gon’ drink ’til I can’t feel shit. Hell, I might even drink myself to death."
"You lucky he didn’t take that finger off."
"It’s a darkie, Mushy, darker than Edna, as dark as Tangy."
"I thought you might wanna come up to the house for a bit."
"It’s a shame. That boy got a wife. Ain’t no telling what people gon’ say."
"It ain’t no time, Tan. It’s just almost time."
"Mama doesn’t care whether I go or not. She thinks I’m too old to go to school."
"I’m not going to school today. I want to be here when you leave."
"You ever notice that—how it’s always just almost time?"
"I think we got enough space out in the yard to plant a garden."
"I was two seconds away from giving you something to cry about if you hadn’t shut up."
"You can’t stand up and be a man until you answer to Me."
"You take the fun outta everything. It’s almost summer. I don’t need no shoes for summer."
"I swung my legs up onto the porch, drew my knees up to my chest, and watched Wallace closely as he spoke."
"Shut up," I said. "How can you worry about modesty? Mama’s gonna kill you when she finds out about the midwife."
"I want you to talk to Miss Zadie," he said. "You’ll see, Tan, she ain’t so bad."
"That’s just a ol’ brassiere. Ain’t nothing but a ol’ brassiere. Don’t cry ’bout it, baby."
"Don’t tell Rozelle, but I thought you was sixteen," he said.
"I gotta plan for it, though. ’Cause if it comes to that, it’ll be up to you to earn a living for us, and I gotta get you started knowing how."
"I swung all my children out from here—from the oldest to the youngest. I ain’t never dropped a one ’til today."
"She ain’t gon’ miss a little flour or meal, or some sugar," she’d say. "You gotta learn to do like I did, Tarabelle."
"I want you to earn a living for us, and I gotta get you started knowing how."
"I’ve seen that bunch of hoodlums you run around with. It’s a wonder I haven’t gotten you for something long before now."
"I always been alone, Pearl. Ain’t nothing new ’bout that."
"It’s a spell, but it don’t work for me."
"She’s probably gon’ eat something else."
"She loves you, Velman. With all her heart, she loves you."
"I’m not afraid of her; I’m afraid of becoming her."
"We a mess, Tan. We need to be all of us together."
"What good is being smart if all you can do is stay here?"
"I can’t understand why anybody would want to destroy something they’ve worked so hard at building."
"I’m going to Hell. I always wondered ’bout that, and now I’m certain."
"I'm going, and don't you put yo' hands on me, Frank."
You right, Mr. Frank," Mushy agreed. "I'm sorry. But I didn't hurt her all by myself, did I?
"Honey, I don't know. I been woke a solid week trying to think."
"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it," she said.
"Late into the night we would finish our game, then sit in the tattered armchairs to talk and laugh."
"You ought to be thrilled that I pay you any attention at all," he went on.
"I swear I could kill a thousand for you. So where does that leave you, sugar?"
"I just want to leave Pakersfield so bad, Lord, that I'm blind to nearly everything else."
"I did it for you and because it needed to be done. Don't make me lie to you, sugar."